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[Mission] Mysterious Cavern: Part 2
Topic Started: Oct 12 2009, 01:23 PM (123 Views)
Dark Harbinger
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Sled Fang
Gun shots, explosions, the clash of metal, and bestial roars filled the air. A pillar of smoke rose into the sky in a remote part of the rolling plains; this was the focal point of all the chaos. The events leading up to the current situation were a bit foggy, but Azreal had a vague idea of what had happened. The helicopter flight had been routine, for the most part at least. When they grew close to the objective, a great horde of monsters came into sight, just as was reported. When they tried to touch down, the beasts attacked the helicopter, sending it spinning out of control. It was the skill of the pilot that had prevented them from crashing into the hills on either side of them. He managed to regain control, but they were too low. A behemoth rammed the side of the chopper and knocked it over. The rotors snapped and the chopper violently swung around until it collided with the beast, killing it. By this time, the five occupants had jumped out of the vehicle and it smashed into the ground not far from them, exploding in a giant fireball. That was roughly a half hour earlier. Since then, the five of them had been fighting for their lives. Approximately twenty of the Wolf-like Bandersnatches had assisted the now deceased behemoth in attacking the group; only two were killed when the chopper crashed. A few more had shown up later.

Azreal swung up his blade to intercept one of the wolves at it leapt at him. His sword met the beast’s underbelly and sliced up into its stomach. He swung sideways and sent it flying to ground just in front of him and to his left, blood trailing out of its new wound. He unconsciously wondered just how many more of the damn things were left. A quick glance around showed at least 7. He quickly changed the number to 8 as he saw the one he had just stricken get back to its feet. Talon and Riot stood to his left and right. Just behind them was the wreckage of the helicopter. Somewhere amongst the twisted heap of metal, the pilot and Rook were positioned, using the debris as cover while they fired off their weapons. Through the corner of his eye, he saw another wolf make an attempt at attack, but Riot had it covered. He seized the creature by the neck before slamming it down on the ground and used his other arm to slice down on its head with his sword. Around them were several bodies of the monsters, some with slashes corpses, but the majority were ridden with bullet wounds; Rook was a superb marksman.

None of the fighters was in perfect condition, even exiting the aircraft had caused minor injuries and the shrapnel from the explosion had led to further damage. Azreal had several lacerations on his arms and a set of parallel gashes among the tattered clothing on his lower chest. Out of all of them, the pilot was the worst off, being the last person to have gotten out of the chopper before it crashed. He had several broken bones, but they didn't have the option of letting him sit out the fight at the moment.

Azreal's eyes carefully scanned back in forth across the wolves as they paced back and forth in front of the group. 1,2,3,4,5,6... Wait... where's the last one? He counted again, but once again came up one less than he should have. "Dark, get down!" Azreal only had enough time to spin around before the seventh wolf came down on him, pinning him to the ground. As its claws dug into his skin on his arms and legs, the monster let out a great screech, nearly suffocating him in its foul breath. Azreal struggled to kick the thing off of him, but it was too heavy for him to move.

Just as it bent its head down to try and bite, a gunshot rang through the air, and its head exploded into a mess of gore over him. 6. The force of the shot knocked it off of him, which was lucky because both Talon and riot were busy keeping the rest of them at bay. Not wasting his time standing up, Azreal rolled onto his side and brought his rifle up to eye level before squeezing off a 4 round burst at a wolf that was coming up behind Talon. Two shots hit the beast in the side, one skimmed the top of its skull, and the last hit it right in the eye. It fell to the ground, dead. 5. He dropped his rifle and kicked himself up into standing position just in time to swing his sword up, blocking a slash by one of the monster that had noticed he was still alive. As he slashed at the wolf, barely missing, he heard a grunt to his right. While she was preoccupied with one of the beasts, another had come up behind Talon and slashed her back, nearly knocking her to the ground. Riot threw his sword at the beast, catching it in the side and sending the blade straight through. The steel pinned it helplessly to the ground while Rook finished it off with a single shot. 4. Azreal turned back to his opponent to block another strike. In response, the wolf charged at him. Azreal jumped over the attack and stabbed his sword down into its hind leg then grabbed his gun off the ground. He stepped on the monster's back and unloaded three shots into the back of its head. 3. He turned towards the nearest source of movement to see Riot snap a wolf's neck before he flung it into the cliff wall. 2. Next he turned to Talon, seeing her stab one wolf's head to the ground with both of her swords. 1. She then tore Riot's sword out of the dead wolf behind her and brought the blade down on the last wolf's back. And... there.... that all of them... for now.

------------------

Azreal let out a sigh of relief before he untied his bandana and used it to wipe the gore from his face. He then brought the cloth back up and tied it around his head again. Talon collapsed backward, falling into a sitting position against a piece of the helicopter. Riot was just as tired as everyone else, but he wouldn't show it. He turned around and crossed his arms, looking at the scene of the crash. The main body of the chopper was still intact, but it was bent up against the side of a cliff. Just between the front of the craft and the wall was the body of a behemoth, the cockpit was running through its chest and one of the rotor blades was lodged in its neck. Azreal was glad that the thing had died before the battle started; chances are that they might have had a casualty or two if they had had to fight the thing.

Azreal fell back against a small boulder, using it as a support while he caught his breath. When his adrenaline finally started to wear off, he noticed the sound of music coming from his left ear. He had never gotten a chance to take his headphones off, and the wire leading up to his left ear had been sliced by a piece of shrapnel or one of the wolf's claws. Sighing, he took both of them out and put them into his pocket with his phone. He closed his eyes, letting himself rest for a few moments. He could hear Rook coming towards them from the wreckage. He sat down on the ground next to Azreal. "Hey Dark, You all right?" He nodded. "Yeah, thanks to your aim." He heard Rook laugh quietly. "No problem.... hey, you're bleeding." Azreal opened his eyes and looked down. Sure enough, he was bleeding where the wolf's claws dug into his skin on his shoulders and below his knees. "So I am..." He ripped off some fabric from each of his pant legs and used it to bandage up the wounds on his legs then used some from his shirt and his bandana to patch up the other two.

After a few more minutes, Azreal could hear someone talking. He looked over his shoulder to see Riot with his cell phone. "...What are your orders? Are we getting extracted? .........Are you kidding me!? Glare, this is ridiculous, we've got wounded and the chopper is- ......Yes sir, I understand... I’ll report back in an hour..." He slammed the phone shut and walked over, taking a seat roughly in the middle of the rest of them. "Bad news, command says that we are to continue on with the mission, the higher ups say that all current losses are acceptable." Talon shook her head and slid riot's sword across the ground to him. "Figures..." Her hair was stained red and her bandage had been torn off in the battle, revealing the large gash that ran over her left eye and covered the majority of her forehead. "So..." Riot continued after putting his sword back in its sheath. "...Rook, I want you to set up those detpacks you brought and stay here with the pilot. Me, Talon, and Dark will continue on with the mission and come back for you when we're done... How many more of the things could there be anyway? We took down about thirty."

After they all caught their breath, Azreal stood up and looked down at Rook. "Have any extra ammo Rook? I only have a few shots left." Nodding, Rook reached into his vest pocket and pulled out an ammo cartridge. "This is all I can spare, don't waste it." Azreal took the ammo and put it on his belt. "Thanks." He had a total of 26 shots now, and he would probably have to use them. Riot stood up, having just finished bandaging up the slashes on Talon's back. He helped her up then turned to Azreal. "Alright, let’s get moving; we’ve got a bit of ground to cover. Good luck Rook"

--------------------

It was about a mile walk back to the intended drop off point. Curiously enough, there was almost no activity on the way there. The only monsters that they saw kept their distance or completely ignored them. Despite the hindrance that constantly moving up and down hills created, they kept at a relatively even pace. When they finally made it to the top of the hill they were supposed to have been dropped off on, Azreal picked up his pace and went a little bit ahead of Talon and Riot. He stopped at the edge of the slope and looked down. From the top of the hill, he could see the opening of the cave that they were sent to explore. There were several shapes moving around just outside. He brought his rifle up and looked through his scope to get a better look. Five more bandersnatches were prowling about, but they didn't seem like they'd be too much of a problem. What really worried him was what was inside the cave; there was the possibility that the only thing in there was a monster nest... which would mean this was a suicide mission.

"Hey Dark, what do you see?" He put his rifle down and looked over his shoulder at the other two. "Five of the things outside, can't tell any more than that." Riot knelt down next to him. "Take as many of 'em out as you can before they notice us." Azreal nodded and brought the gun back up to his eye. "Yes sir." He zeroed in on a wolf that wasn't moving, then positioned his reticule directly over its head. Careful not to move his arm, he lightly squeezed the trigger, firing a single round. It hit its mark exactly, boring into its skull to immediately end its life. "One down..." He didn't waste any time finding his next target, now he only had a matter of time before the rest of the wolves were upon them. He tried to take a pin point shot on the wolf, but its movements were too erratic.
Damn... how does Rook do this?
Giving up, he found himself emptying the rest of his clip into his target, only hitting with three out of the five rounds. Still, he was lucky enough to hit both of its front legs and its chest. Although its wasn't dead, it was at least immobilized.

The last three wolves drew ever closer while Azreal scrambled to get his other clip and put it into his gun. He only had enough time to spray down one more with seven rounds before the other two made it up the hill. "Out of time." He didn't have enough time to draw his sword, but Talon and Riot were already taking care of them. Each blocked an oncoming charge with their blades. Talon was thrown back by the force of the tackle, but her block had given Azreal enough time to get his blade out and slash the beast's legs out from under it. It collapsed on the ground and he finished it off with two slashes to the head. Riot was able to completely stop the Bandersnatch's movement and he dispatched it almost instantly.

After helping Talon back to her feet, Azreal found himself staring at the scar over her eye. "You know, you should probably keep that covered until it’s healed, here." He took his bandana off and gave it to her. She took it from him and tied it on her head so that it covered up her eye. "...Thanks." Riot ripped his blade out of the wolf's back. "Alright, we still have work to do, let’s go." Azreal took his gun back out and looked down the hill at the disabled Bandersnatch. "One second..." He fired off one last shot to end the beast's life. "Alright, now we can go." Shaking his head, Riot started down the hill. Within a few moments, they were at the bottom of the hill, standing at the entrance to the cavern.

"Hear anything?"

"No, there isn't much activity in there at the moment at least."

"Well, maybe we did cut down their numbers quite a bit."

"Don't be too sure Dark; It just might be nap time."

"Very funny."

"Well, let’s not just stand here, better get this over with, Dark, you go first."

"Of course..." Azreal resisted rolling his eyes. He put his gun on his back and took out his sword, holding it out in front of him as he stepped into the darkness of the cave; Talon went in next, and Riot brought up the rear. Azreal moved slowly, trying to keep as quiet as possible with his movements. The cave was narrow and it didn't branch off at all. The only light came from the entrance of the cave, but it reflected off the smooth walls, creating a sort of ambience. After 5 minutes of moving at the slow pace, Azreal stepped out into a wide open room. Light filtered in through a hole in the ceiling, illuminating the room slightly better than the corridor. As soon as he stepped into the light, A shadow leapt at him from somewhere to the side of the door, knocking him to the ground. "What the?" A set of claws came swiping down at him and he turned his head to avoid the brunt of the damage. The razor sharp claws raked against his cheek, drawing blood. Before the beast could do anything else, it was pushed off of him by a hard blow to the back. "Dark!" He could see Riot's silhouette slamming into the beast and shoving it into a wall. Talon's hand grabbed hold of his arm and pulled him to his feet. He quickly shook off the disorientation and charged at the shadow, stabbing his blade through it and into the wall behind while Riot held it in place. Despite its injuries, the wolf continued thrashing about, catching Azreal and Riot occasionally with its claws. "Damn this thing won't quit." Riot yelled over its screeches. "I think we found the alpha wolf." While they struggled to keep the monster in place, Talon rushed over and stabbed one of her own blades into its neck. "Die dammit." Riot follow suit, holding the beast in place with his shoulder while he grabbed his sword. "Hold it still for a second." He took a step back and used all of his strength to carve open the Alpha's side, nearly cutting it in half. After a few more seconds, loss of blood slowed the beast's movements to a halt.

With some effort, Azreal pulled his blade out. The weight of the wolf caused its neck to tear open, freeing Talon's weapon. Azreal looked down at the mutilated corpse, shaking his head. "Well, at least it’s dead now..." Riot sighed. "What a pain in the arse that was... No time to waste, we've got to get done here as fast as we can. The longer we're here, the longer Rook is stuck out there fighting these damn things." Azreal wiped the blood on his cheek on his shirt before turning towards the opening on the room opposite of where they entered. A faint glow radiated out of the door. "Looks like we're just about there..."

---------------

As Azreal stepped through the opening, a deafening roar filled the air of the cavern. Flinching, He looked up to see a large silhouette in front of a bright light. "Aw hell..." His words were drowned out by the sound of the echoes but the same thing was on all three of their minds. Azreal dove to the right, giving Talon and Riot room to get out of the doorway. Talon followed Azreal to the right, but Riot was cut off as the Behemoth swiped at him with its massive claw. He was knocked over to the left by the blow and the beast followed him, turning its back to Talon and Azreal. "Sarah, you know what to do." The behemoth battle was one of the classic training simulations that they had been forced to do over and over again in their training. Fifth squad had the fight down to an art, but then again, they were tired and they were short one person. The most important thing to remember was, of course, the data simulation could never truly replicate a real behemoth's actions.

Azreal knelt down, letting Talon use his back to vault onto the behemoth's back. She landed just below its shoulders, stabbing her blades into its back to use as holds while it began roaring and thrashing about. Obviously, the beast tried to shake her off, but she had enough training to stay on for quite awhile. Azreal ran around to the side of the behemoth, locking his rifle into the slot on his blade as he moved. As soon as he had a clear view of its head, he looked down the blade to line up the target and fired a 4 round burst at it. The bullets did little more than anger it, bouncing off its hard skull because they didn't hit any vital areas. Still, the behemoth stopped its struggling and turned to face the new attacker, freeing Talon to climb a little higher before driving his blades into the back of its neck. Normally in the simulations, the behemoth would have ignored her and continued the attack against the other three, well... two in this case. Instead of going after one or the other, the behemoth spun around, using its tail to lash at Riot as he tried to stand up then at Azreal, sending them both painfully into the walls of the cave.

Able to reach Talon at her new position, the beast reached behind its head and grabbed her in a vice like grip. The pressure on her arms forced her to release her swords, leaving them stuck in the behemoth's back. It held her in front of its massive jaws and let out a mighty roar before it brought its hand up to its mouth. "Dammit! Die you bastard!" Azreal had managed to force himself back up into a sitting position and unloaded his entire clip into the behemoth's face. It screeched and turned towards him, tossing Talon over its shoulder and into the wall behind it. Blood was running down its head and several bullet holes peppered its skin, including its eyes. Filled with rage, it rushed at him while he struggled to stand. When it was a mere three feet away, it stopped, stunned. Riot crouched just in front of it, his blade running up through its chest. The beast realized what had happened and swatted Riot away with one of its claws, once again knocking him into a wall.

Azreal finished pushing himself up to see Riot collapse against the hard rock, no longer moving. Nearly blinded by rage, he charged at the behemoth, sliding under it at the last second, his sword pointed up so that it slashed at the beast's underbelly as he moved. Once on the other side, he grabbed the monster's tail and pulled himself up onto it just before it spun around again. As he held on, he reached up as far as he could and stabbed his blade into the behemoth's back before pulling himself up farther. Another roar of pain filled the cavern, but at this point Azreal couldn't hear anything but his heart pumping adrenaline through him. He pulled himself up as far as he could then briefly stood on the back of his blade while he reached up to grab Talon's short swords. Pulling himself up further, he positioned himself between the blades so that one was against his back and the other was at his feet. He pushed against the one that his feet were on with all of his might, causing it to tear through the behemoth’s skin until it was eventually pushed out of its neck. Blood pour out of the resulting wound, but Azreal couldn’t do any more. Helpless to the beast’s thrashing, he simply held on to the other blade as best as he could. As his grip started to weaken, he figured out some other way he could cause damage. He swung his body around to the other side of the sword so that he was hanging half off the side of the monster’s body. His weight pulled the sword down to side, slicing through flesh as it moved. When the blade stopped moving, Azreal reached out for the handle of Riot’s sword, finding it difficult to reach with the behemoth’s movements hindering him. After several tries, his hand found the hilt of the sword and he grabbed onto it. Once again using his own weight, he tore the large blade from the beast’s chest, opening up yet another large wound.

As he fell to the ground before the beast, Azreal stabbed up into another spot in its chest with the blade. A violent movement ripped it from his hand as the behemoth bent down and roared at him. It charged him, pushing him back using its skull as a battering ram. He felt his ribs crush under the pressure that was created after it slammed him into the wall. He couldn't breath and the edges of his vision started to cloud, but then, it stopped. The behemoth wavered for a moment before it fell on its side, blood leaking out onto the floor under it. Azreal crumbled onto the floor, air flooding into his lungs despite the fact that it hurt when he breathed. Several minutes passed without any movement in the cavern, Azreal struggled to remain conscious, and as far as he could tell, the other two were either out of commision or... he didn't want to think about it. Out of the silence, he could hear Riot's cell phone ring. After several rings, it stopped. A few moments later, Azreal's own phone rang. He forced his arms up to his pocket and grabbed his phone. He opened it and brought it up to his ear.

"...Dark... here... what is it Glare?"

"Riot isn't answering, whats going on?"

"He's... Im not sure... if he's ok... We're... in... the cavern... behemoth was waiting.... back here..."

"Damn... I'll see what i can do about extraction, The higher ups aren't cooperating with me on this one. If it had been up to me, you would have been home the second that chopper crashed."

"Thank you... Sir..."

"Hang in there Dark."

The line went dead, leaving Azreal in the silence of the cave once again. Several more minutes passed before he managed to force himself up. He clumsily limped over to the opposite side of the room before collapsing on that wall, right next to where Talon had landed. A few feet away, Riot was wedged in a small hole that his impact had created in the wall. "That you... Azreal?" He turned his head toward Talon, who was leaning against the wall behind her. "Yeah... You ok?" She made a very slight movement, shakingher head. "Can't move... everything hurts too much... There's a potion... In my pocket... we're going to need you... to get outta here..." Azreal reached into the side pocket on her vest and pulled out the potion before using it. He instantly felt a little better, the pain in his ribs had been numbed and he could feel his energy returning.

He forced himself back up and turned towards the source of the bright light that filled the room. A beautiful display of crystal was at the very back of the room, and a small sphere was perched atop it, bathing the entire room in light. The company's suspitions had been right, it was a mako fountain all right. Drawn to the light, Azreal walked over to the fountain and put his hand on the materia sphere. Naturally occuring materia was indeed a rare sight, but he still had his orders. After a moment, he ripped the sphere from the rest of the crystaline material and slipped it into his vest pocket. Next, he walked over to Riot and pulled another potion out of his pocket before using it on him. He didn't regain consciousness, but his hard breathing died down a bit. "Great... now i get to haul these two out of here..." There was a groan from Talon. "Hey... I heard that." He walked back over to her and knelt down. "Yeah, yeah... let's get you out of here..."

Carefully lifting her up, he had to carry her out of the cavern. It took awhile because of how slow he had to move, but eventually they arrived outside. It took a moment for the effects of the light to wear off, but he couldn't waste any time. He set Talon down against the side of the hill before he went back in to get Riot. When he arrived back in the back chamber, Riot was at least semi-conscious. He pulled his ally out from the hole in the wall and helped support his weight as they stood. "That thing dead?" Azreal nodded. "Yeah... guess it was that other one's mate..." Riot tried to laugh. "Great, son of a bitch had it coming." This trip through the cave was faster, but they still had to move slow to prevent further injury to either of them. By the time all of them were out and sitting against the hill side it was sunset. The amber light filled the sky in front of them, creating a mystifying show of lights amongst the clouds.

The three of them sat in painful silence watching the show for about an hour before the distinct chopping of rotor blades reached them. "'Bout damn time..." The shadow of a helicopter passed over them, heading towards the smoke of the crash site. "Looks like Glare came through for us..." Azreal followed the outline of the chopper until it sank too low for him to see. Several minutes later, it returned, this time touching down a few yards away. Several paramedics climbed out, followed by Rook, who was covered in ash and slashes. He had a huge grin on his face. Each of them was put on a stretcher and loaded into the back of the helicopter. As they started to take off, Rook leaned over Azreal's body, still grinning.

"Man that was a hell of a day, you guys seem to have taken quite a beating, eh?" Azreal noticed that Rook's ammo belt only had 4 round left on it, and all of his grenades were gone. "Jesus Rook... what the hell did you do while we were gone?"

"Me? I had the time of my life! Nothing like the sound of explosives going off, you know?"

"Glad you had fun.... The materia was secured, Its in my vest..."

"Hey man, Don't worry. Get some rest, you deserve it. The medics said that they'd send people back to grab your equipment when they did a further investigation of the cave later this week. Best of all, Glare arranged to get us all time off, so seriously, get some shut eye." Azreal was happy to oblige. He let his eyes droop and his mind rest. Despite the pain in his ribs returning and the noise in the helicopter cabin, He didn't have any trouble at all getting to sleep, today had taken too much out of him for those things to even bother him at all.
Edited by Dark Harbinger, Oct 12 2009, 07:55 PM.
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