Chapter 9
A Splitting Road

Sophia watched as the final group of soldiers walked into the distance. In a crouch she followed as silently as she could. She couldnt let them out of her sight, but she couldnt get too close yet either. She was counting in her head, two minutes then attack. She crept along the broken road staying close to the sides and the trees so she could hide easily if they turned around. Alone she'd be no match for this many, even a Kira like her couldnt win with these odds.
She watched closely and saw them stop and she darted behind a tree. After a couple seconds she looked around the trunk. They had resumed walking. Sophia exhaled, she had been holding her breath. She relaxed herself a bit then resumed the counting in her head; thirty seconds left.
She turned her head to the other side of the tree hearing a noise, her adrenaline spiked. 'How the hell did they get behind me!?' she thought.
“Well, hello there pretty!” said a male voice. She turned back and saw a small troop of four soldiers. She growled and flexed her fingers, the claws at the ends gleaming and ready to tear into flesh.
A hard metal object connected with her neck and she leaned forward, her vision hazzy. It connected again and this time it caused her to stagger a few steps forward.
“Damn tough BASTARD!” She heard feeling what then she then had figured out was a rifle butt on the back of her neck for a third time. Her vision swam and spun as she dropped to her knees until she finally blacked out.
The man responsible picked up the walkie-talkie hooked on his belt. “Be advised, there are subs in the urban forest directly before the city, they may be up to something. Keep your guard up.”
Static hissed for a second as the response came in “Roger that Spot Guard, reposition to area C-5 and rendezvous with the three infiltration teams, we'll handle them here, you still have your mission, out.”
“You heard the man, lets go.” he said looking at his men.
“Sir, what about this one?” said one of them. He looked at his squad member then pulled out his side arm and shot Sophia twice in each knee cap.
“Put a NAV marker on it, the clean up crew like it when they can recover live samples.”

Twenty-eight, twenty-seven; Dante was counting in his head. He braced himself with each second that passed by. Twenty-five, twenty-four, twenty-three... An explosion rattled the earth beneath his feet followed by the rapid echoing claps of rifle fire.
“Shit, they either found us out or someone jumped the gun! Either way lets move team!” John said already heading toward the fray. Dante gripped the rifle he was holding tightly and followed.
“Sir! We got motion on our sensors about five hundred meters from the city!” Sam said causing everyone to stop.
“How many?” John replied.
“It looks to be about twelve right now.”
Dante saw John bite his lower lip. “Dante, you and Fen with me, Sam you have command of Blue team, the rest of you go with Sam and support the subs ahead. Also Sam, i need you to update our NAV systems when or if the group moves.”
“Sir!” they all said at attention then broke off. Dante followed John and Fen.
“John, or sir, or whatever, whats going on?” Dante asked as he jogged behind them.
“Its quite possible that this force is just a diversion, we're engaging this group because even if Blue team fails their objective can be achieved through an artillery strike, our new objective here however is too close to the city for artillery to be an option. While the city does have some people who can fight its relatively defenseless right now so, we have to go in and stop them before they get to the city.” John explained as he jogged in the direction of the city.
“But theres twelve of them! Shouldnt we get back up or something?” Dante said worried.
“We'll be fine, we have the advantage.” John said calmly.
“What are you talking about? Twelve on three, they clearly have the advantage!” Dante was almost yelling now as he kept up with John.
“They're only human.” John said with a snicker.
“But so are you!” Dante replied. There was a beep as the Nav system updated, five more bodies moved to join the original group of twelve.
“Subs are naturally stronger and faster then humans, you dont think we didnt notice this and compensate?” John said.
Suddenly it hit Dante and he understood, even during the conversation! He had failed to notice that it was HE who was having trouble keeping up with John. Even Fen who looked like an average frail human female was keeping in stride with him. Maybe this was a fair fight after all, especially since they had the element of surprise and knowledge of the terrain. John must have seen this mental line run through Dantes head because he acknowledged it.
“Exactly. Now that we have that figured out, there is an additional five bodies headed towards those other twelve, we're going to set up between the two and take these new guys out first. That should confuse the rest for long enough for us to ambush them as well.”

“Hurry your asses up, the infiltration units are waiting.” Said the leader of the group. His four subordinates were on edge keeping their guard too high since they knocked the crap out of that Kira. The sound of gunfire probably wasnt helping either.
“look, we have confirmed reports that their main force is engaging our diversions we'll be fine lets move!” he yelled. His troops formed up and followed at a quicker pace.
Unknown to the leader and three others, the rear guard of their formation had become deathly silent, now hanging by his neck from a tree branch just a few feet away. His death was not a lonesome one, shortly after another was plucked silently from their formation without a sound.
The leader stopped and ordered his men to halt. The trees rustled in the wind and he turned to command his troops only to find half his unit MIA.
“Guard up! Defensive formation delta!” he shouted, and the remaining troops formed into a defensive triangle. A flash grenade fell from the trees into the middle of their formation. They were all dead by the time their eyes had readjusted to the light of day.

“Hold your ground, defensive formations!” someone yelled. Gunpowder and cordite filled her nostrils. Her eyes were heavy and she felt dirt on her face.
“Hows the major?” another voice yelled. Her head was buzzing, what was going on?
“WIA, dont worry we got her.” This voice had more familiarity. Another blast shook the ground she was laying on.
“FRA!” someone screamed.
“Get back to your position! You, you already got a few wounded, get the major and get out of here!” This voice was also familiar but her head felt so fuzzy she couldnt tell. There was no response to this voice but she felt her body lifted as she was swung over someones shoulder. The buzz inside her head overpowered her and she blacked out again.

A man stood, looking out a window at the vast Atlantic ocean. His hair was long in length, at least for a man. Still the shoulder length hair was neatly kept, straight and clean. His face showed only that of happiness that comes from a feeling of absolute power. His facial features were solid, but showed a soft glow. However this betrayed his actual nature. His ornate military outfit was adorned with campaign ribbons and medals. Everything about it was a trim, neat and proper as the rest of his being.
He stood with his hands behind his back, calm as if he hadnt a worry in the world. “Well Captain, whats the current situation?” he said, his voice low but silky smooth.
“So far we've lost contact with our artillery and our southern decoy force is in full retreat. Our western advance decoy was annihilated but the second wave has engaged ground forces but from the looks of it will need to retreat as well.” Said the other man in the room.
He stood at the doorway holding a clipboard with combat reports listed on it. He looked up for a brief moment before continuing. He marveled at the commander as he stood behind his desk staring out the window, but he wondered what the whole point of this was. This city had been a military strong point of the sub movement for years and despite repeated attacks had never even been penetrated to the city limits.
“What of our northern attack force captain?” he said speaking up at the captains pause.
“They have engaged an unknown amount of subs, they were ambushed sir and projections dont look positive.” the captain said picking up quickly at the commanders words.
The commanders shoulders fell and he sighed. “Well this is an unfortunate turn of events, continue.”
“Yes sir, our infiltration teams are in place and about to move. One squad hasnt checked in yet however.”
“Hmmm, send them in as is. Three squads should be more then enough. What about casualties?” the commander asked.
“Estimations are close to one thousand and fifty troop casualties, unfortunately we expect close to ninety percent to be KIA. We lost contact with all helicopters and tanks. Its suspected that they captured a helicopter and one to three tanks.”
“Is that the entire report captain?”
“Sir, yes it is.”
“Good, update me about the infiltration team in fifteen.”
The captain paused, this whole operation didnt make sense, it was a complete failure and he still wanted his troops fighting? “Sir permission to speak freely?”
“Of course captain.”
“With all due respect, this mission is a failure, we should pull out while we can.” At this the commander turned to face him and a lump developed in his throat.
“This mission, captain, was not to take the city, we could never do that with less then twenty thousand troops. No no, this mission targets one person as he is the reason why this city refuses to come under our control.”
“Sir?” The commander opened a drawer on his desk and pulled out a folder.
“Do you know what this is captain?” the commander asked bluntly. The folder itself wasnt special but it did have some weight to it.
“Yes sir, its the list of military deserters.” the captain responded.
“Good, if you know that then you also know that close to seventy five percent of the people in here are either dead or in our prisons.”
“Yes sir, i do know that.”
“Good,” the commander responded picking the folder up and placing it inside the drawer again only to pull out another smaller folder. “now do you know what this is?”
The captain simply shook his head. “This, captain, is the list of leading officers who have deserted. Unlike the other folder, ninety nine percent of them are dead.”
“Sir, where is this going?” the captain asked.
“Allow me to show you the one percent that is not.” the commander said opening the folder. Unlike the lists that are supplied in the normal soldier desertion reports there was a half page picture of commanding officers along with pages of notes and information attached to each one. The person on the front had short gray hair and a solid face similar to the commanders. There were enough pages attached to his photo to take up half the folder itself. The name printing on top General Patton E. Mandez.

Lynn's head felt like someone was hitting her in the head with a hammer. Her eyes fluttered and she forced them open. Her blurry vision was met with a wonderful view of the sky and a roll bar. 'Wait' she though 'a roll bar, where am i?' Suddenly it all came pouring back and she shot up.
“Hey guys, shes awake!” Lamia's voice spoke out.

Lamia turned back to see how Lynn was doing. “How do you feel? Anything broken?”
“What happen?” Lynn asked forcibly.
“There was another wave of troops, somehow they knew we were there to ambush them and they turned the tables. Your last second orders saved us though, by the time we left it looked like we had the upper hand.”
“where are we?” she asked.
“One of the people in your squad took command and told us to get out of there and make sure you were safe. Right now we're at the vehicle that we had arrived here with.” Lamia saw Lynn take a breath.
“Lamia, could you give me a minute, i want to radio my team, see what happened.” Lynn said after a short pause.
Lamia had been sitting on the back of the car but got off to greet the others.
“Well, how is she?” Glasica asked.
“Shes fine, a little shaken and confused but she'll be fine.”
“Thats good, ill admit i was a little worried when i saw her get thrown by that explosion.” Takun said.
Maric looked past Lamia and walked over to the car, apparently Lynn had put the radio down. “How is everyone?” he asked her. Lynn hung her head a bit.
“We lost Fra and David, only a few injuries and only one of them severe but hes patched up and will make it to the hospital so they're fine.” she said her voice low.
Maico had walked over and jumped into the backseat across from her. “Dont beat yourself up about it, you did what you could. If you hadnt noticed those radio signals we'd all be dead right now.” Her eyes met his for a second and she took a short breath.
“Yea, i guess your right.” Despite her words, her tone and body language showed that it didnt really make her feel better. Her radio clicked and a voice spoke over it.
“Field Major Lynn, your squad has returned and are being treated. What is your current location?” The voice wasnt familiar to anyone but Lynn. Even to her though, it was obscure, but she knew it was one of the commanding officers. She clicked the button and replied.
“Im currently in the company of the subs that visited recently, Ill be fine for the time being.” she clicked off the transmission button.
“I asked your location Major not your company...” there was a pause on the other side of the line. “Never mind that order, Mandez himself said your fine where you are but stay in contact for the time being.”
“Whats Mandez doing there?” Lynn said outloud, she clicked the button to respond. “Mandez, whats the occasion?”
This time it was Mandez's voice that came over the radio “We have our own issues here, they're goal wasnt to take the city at all, it was to take me.”

Dante ran as fast as he could through the urbanized jungle keeping a close eye on his NAV marker which John had told Sam to now update every five to ten seconds so they could keep track of each others movements. The twelve humans hadnt waited for that other squad to arrive and had moved faster then expected. Now they were trying to surround them to ambush again.
Dante was at the top of the formation, keeping pace with the group and just on the other side of the group was John and finally Fen taking up the rear. They were a mere fifty meters from the city now.
“Dante, now!” He heard over his radio. He bolted off his straight path on an intercept course with the advancing group. His Nav system updated and he realized they were just through the bushes ahead. He burst through the foliage and into what should have been the middle of them, but no targets presented themselves. Quickly he clicked the radio. “John somethings up, the Nav says they're here but no ones here but me!”
“Wait for us to join you then we'll move, i don't know whats going on but keep your guard up.”
“Yes sir!” Dante said looking around cautiously. He heard rustling and he turned but it was just John and Fen joining him.
“I just asked Sam if his Nav equipment was damaged but he hasn't even engaged yet so theres no way its damaged. “
“What the hells going on here?” Fen said.
“Computers, is there anything they cant do?” a voice said from the trees.
Dante jumped into action, he had been ambushed before and had experience in how to protect himself from it. He jumped into the center of the three of them and spun himself holding his fingers outspread. He felt the familiar push as he sprayed silk from his fingers. The small strands quickly collected on each other and fell extending in a cylinder shape. Bullets impacted against this newly made shield harmlessly.
Dante landed slightly dizzy. His surroundings looked fuzzy, had he spun that much? Then he quickly realized that Fen had used a smoke grenade and followed her and John as they headed towards the cover of the trees.
“Fen covering fire, Dante keep on my flank we're gona scare those cowards from their hole.” John said turning toward where the gun fire had come from. Fen opened up in the same direction aiming at the tree branches. Leaves tore and disintegrated as bullets tore through them.
Dante and John rain out keeping their heads low. They came about to the area where they thought the others where. Nothing again, Dante looked around and saw something move and opened fire. He heard a grunt and thump as the person he hit fell to the ground. He walked over to confirm the hit.
“Dante stop!” John yelled. It was too late, Dante turned to see why but then he felt his feet catch something, a trip mine. The fragmentation grenade strapped to a tree two meters away detonated . He felt a hundred bee stings all at once and fell to the ground. He felt his body bruising. He stumbled and got up.
“Dante your ok?” John asked, but before more could be discovered Fen radioed in. “Sir to your left ten meters!” John didnt hesitate, turned and fired. A man fell from the tree dead. Dante had let his guard down. The human he had shot had stood back up leaning against a tree for support.
“Why arent you dead yet?” he yelled and open fire with a side arm. Nine of the twelve shots impacted Dante's chest. It felt as though he had been punched nine times and the wind had been knocked out of him. Dante fell to the ground gasping trying to draw in air.
“Why wont you die you worthless sub!” The human screamed reloading. As he hit the clip release and it fell from the gun, John oriented himself in their direction and fire a three shot burst into the mans heart and he folded to the ground.
“Fen, get over here ASAP” John said over the radio as he ran over to Dante. “Come on man, breathe.” he said as Dante gasped again and again. Finally air filled his lungs and he took deep gasping lung-fulls of air.
“How on earth are you still alive?” John asked amazed.
“Its been so long i cant believe i forgot.” Dante responded. “I have a centimeter of compacted silk layered on my body. I do it periodically when humans have been seen around.” he finished still gasping slightly.
Fen came into his peripheral vision. “Whats wrong John?” She asked
“Well, we're not shot but Dante here sure took a beating. You think you can do anything?”
Fen looked confused for a second but set it aside and opened her med kit. There were three quick injection cartridges and an injection gun, each of the cartridges looked to be filled with a mere ten milliliters of blood.
“Alright, this is gona sting at first but you'll feel a lot better afterwards trust me.” Fen said as she slammed a cartridge into the gun. Dante nodded as she lifted his arm looking for an unbruised section. She pressed the gun to his skin and pulled the trigger. There was a loud CLACK as the cartridges contents where forced through his skin and into his blood stream. Dante felt a quick feeling of nausea then a feeling that was hard to describe, something like warm ice flowing through his veins.
“Dont worry, its Elphiseate blood, you'll be fine in just a few minutes.”
No one had noticed that no Nav updates had been sent for the past minute until it updated again. This time the body of twelve now showed only ten but they were already in the city.
“Thats good,” Dante said “because we need to move now!”

Mandez set the radio down. If Lynn was in the company of those kids then she would be fine. That aside he other things to worry about. He knew something was weird, it had all gone too smoothly. His gut instincts payed off when reports came in that a small ten man team had infiltrated the council chamber. Two of the leading members who decided to stay behind showed up dead on the monitor he was looking at.
Mandez had moved to the small shelter under his house, similar to an emergency bunker it would save them some time but if they were found there would be little they could do. Whats worse was that none of the civilians would be able to help. True a lot of them where subs and had powers, but most of them only knew the peace of the city and against a trained military force would just be throwing their lives away. Only a handful of others had followed him back to his house.
Kurt remained in the city trying to organize the civilians to further protect them along with what was left of the military presence in the city. Mandez was left only with a few operators and tactical personnel. Mandez carefully pondered the outcomes that would follow the next few minutes when he was interupted.
“Sir, it looks like we have part of Delta reentering the city.” Said one of the operators.
“Delta, what the hell are they doing here?” Mandez said looking over at the communications equipment over the operators chair.
“I dont know sir, but they have red flags on their coms meaning radio silence.” He responded.
Mandez bit his lower lip. “What of the rest of Delta?”
“hold on sir,” the operator said and his hands flew across the keyboard, the ground radio positioning net popped on screen. “The rest of Delta shows all green.”
“What, am i looking at?” Mandez said slowly. The screen that had just popped up showed hundreds of dots in conflict with each other.
“All the red dots are confirmed HASSK via their own radio frequencies and tags. The white are unknown tags and green shows Delta.”
“Bring up a count form showing all three groups.”
“Sir,” again his hands flew rapidly taping codes. “There”
“Well, ill be damned.” Mandez counted close to seventy unknowns. “Dante must have really pulled through for us!” Mandez turned “Call the artillery teams, i want one down there to help these guys out asap!”
“Sir yes sir!” said the communications officer Mandez was now looking at.

Quafin ran behind his squad leader. They had lost Mitch and Colman but that is a sacrifice that wont go in vein. Their brave sacrifice bought them the extra time it would take to find the traitor.
“Alright,” the leader whispered “This is the main estate, there should be a bunker somewhere, i have no doubt hes hiding in there. Quafin, you lead green team and guard here. Blue teams with me, lets go!”

“Sir we have a weird signal coming from outside, they must be here.” Said one of the operators.
“Damn, already.” Mandez paused. “Whats the situation?”
“They broke into two groups, one guarding the entrance to the estate and the second actively searching the estate.”
“Guarding the gate? I never thought they would make it so easy. Open up on our guests.”
“Yes sir” said another operator as he released the trap. Two blips fell of the radar. “Damn, sir they set off an EMP or something, the traps are deactivated.”
“It doesnt matter as long as we take as many down with us as we can.” Mandez said softly.
“Sir! They've found the entrance!”

Dante turned the corner coming up to the estate. Two of the infiltration team had died for some reason up ahead and John wanted to be sure that they took advantage of any confusion their deaths may have caused. One stood outside the gate and the other two were stationed just inside. A strong defense against a frontal attack but John had a plan.
John gestured for Dante to come over.
“yea?” he said in a low tone.
“I want you to go around this building here to the right and climb the fence, we'll hit them up front in two and you take care of the rest, got it?”
Dante just nodded, checked his gun, and turned back to cut around to the right.

“Damn they had gas masks.” Mandez said. “How does our rescue team look?”
“They've engaged the group remaining at the gate,” The operator paused “Sir, do you think they'll make it in time?”
“We can only hope.” Mandez said quietly. There was a blast and dust shook loose from the ceiling. “What the hell was that?”
“They breached the front wall!”
“Do we have any other defenses other then the gas?” Mandez said still cringing at how easily their defenses were being bypassed.
“We could have pressurized the chamber their in now if they hadnt blown the door behind them, but other then that no.”
“Sir, the gate team is dead, they might get here in time!” said another operator.
One of the particularly quiet operators let out a muffled cry. “Soldier?” Mandez said in a stern voice. It was a small over exaggeration on his part, these people werent trained as soldiers but they had the title of one none the less.
“Sorry sir, its just, i dont want to die down here.” he said calming himself down.
“No one does, so suck it up.” Mandez said firmly, he couldnt show weakness in front of anyone under his command, not in a situation like this. His heart was pounding. His control officers were all human, no chance in hell they could take on trained soldiers like this but he had to keep an illusion of hope.
There was a small electric hiss and the lights flickered and went out followed by all the monitors and screens.
“Sir they cut the power. We have nothing now.”
“Alright, you all have side arms and now is the time to use them. If this is our last stand so be it but I plan on taking one of those bastards with me.” Mandez said firmly pulling his own pistol and loading the chamber. For what seemed like hours even though it was just seconds they waited in pure darkness, watching the blackness of the room in the direction of the door.
Several muffled thuds came through the last steel door separating them from their enemies followed by a mechanic whirl. The lights began to glow dimly and the door hissed open slowly. John came walking through holding his shoulder where a fresh wound bled freely.
“Sorry we’re late sir, we came as fast as we could. Are you and your men alright?” He asked.
Before Mandez could answer Fen stepped over one of the bodies on the floor and began looking at Johns wound. She was quickly followed by Dante who entered the room.
“We’re fine now, thanks for the rescue.” Mandez said. An air of relief filled the room. The weight that had he previously felt inside the small space dissipated and he sighed.

Lynn clicked the radio again “Mandez, command? Anyone? Come in, over.” she waited.
“Any news yet Lynn?” Maico said.
“No response from the line yet, its weird for a line to go out for this long i hope their alright.”
“If its Mandez im sure their fine.” Lamia said with a smile.
Lynn sighed, she was right. If anyone could handle it on their own it was him. She smiled back at Lamia and leaned back on the car they had been waiting near. She took one last glance at the radio in her hand then set it in the back seat.
“We've been waiting for a half hour or so whats going on?” Glasica said slightly irritated.
“Now now be patient.” Lamia said calmly. She walked over and whispered something to Glasica who nodded and sighed. “we're all just going to have to wait until we get information from Lynn's HQ.”
Lynn sighed at this but also found it amusing, without her friend Glasica was getting irritated. Lynn couldn't blame her for her small frustration. For all of the love Sirri gave her she couldn't avoid the fact that she was awfully cat like, and in that sense she was taking a nap in the passenger seat of the car.
Lynn looked over to Takun and Maric, the humans where chatting over a game of cards that Maric had brought with him. She looked the other way and saw Lamia slightly bent over and Maico who was tending gently to the wounds her wings had re-opened. She watched him carefully try and clean and fix the dressings. Watching someone who hadnt been doing the same thing she had for as long as she had was frustrating and she walked over to fix all the things he was doing wrong when static filled the radio.
Lynn stopped dead in her tracks and turned, picking up the radio as fast as she could. “Commander??? Commander come in!” She said desperately.
A faint hiss of static blurred then another “el ------ ome  n ----” more static. “Hello –ome in”
“Commander!” Lynn said relieved.
“Why hello there Lynn, its good to hear you again.” came a response.
“Thats supposed to be my line commander Mandez.” Lynn said with a huge sigh of relief. “Is everything ok there?”
“Everything is fine here, John's team got here in the nick of time.” Mandez responded.
“What about the northern attack force and everyone else?” Lynn asked curiously.
“Minimal losses on our end, we stopped the northern assault but, we don't know the cost that the subs in the area paid for it yet.”
“Sir ill gladly recommend my unit for the job of looking for survivors.” Lynn responded hoping to help those brave outsiders who helped their cause.
“Im sorry Lynn, but we already have a few squads heading out that way.” There was a short pause on Mandez's side. “Also i have to inform you that your unit has been reorganized with your second in command now taking your position.” without letting him finish Lynn spoke out.
“What for?!”
“Actually its because your getting your own assignment.” Mandez said without skipping at her aggressive response.
“What, my own assignment?” Lynn said.
“Yes,” Mandez responded, “I want you to follow that group of subs. Their an interesting bunch and people you can trust. On top of that they will lead you to places far from here and you may meet others who do not know of our cause, and you know as good as anyone else here, that we need every soul we can get. We may have won these small battles but the war is not on our side.”
“Yes sir, but are you sure you will all be ok?” She asked.
“We will miss you and your help in the hospital, but we will manage without. No worries Lynn, take care of your new friends. Mandez out.” Mandez finished.
Lynn set the radio down lightly and looked up, she hadnt noticed that everyone had gathered around her to listen in. She sighed and smiled at everyone. “Well, lets get going!”