The Fall of Man

Chapter 5

"Okay, stop. We'll set up shop here." Our group came to a halt, at a small abandoned building that might've been a office building before The Collapse. We'd been ordered to leave the city and move outside The Wall, were our mission wouldn't recurve as much attention, and to prepare to be out of the city for a while.

We moved inside the building to a in welcoming site. Tables had been flipped over, and papers were strewn about across the floor. Cheryl cleared one of the desks that hadn't been knocked over and placed a small laptop on it along with other technological devices.

I moved across the room to unpack my belongings, I unrolled a sleeping bag that had been gifted to me from Erik. I unrolled it and placed my bag with my clothes that I would have for the next week alongside it. Riley who I had gotten cleared to come with me, padded next to me and curled up comfortably on top of it. Erik walked over to me and patted me on the shoulder, "Hey man you ready, Lance wants us to go over the plan one more time." "Okay, sure man."

We walked over to were Lance and Anthony had gathered around Cheryl and her laptop. On the screen was a map of the city, "Okay, I know we've already been over the plan once, but we need to go over it again." She handed us each a ear piece. "You'll all have these when you go out, it's so we can keep in touch in case anything goes haywire." Cheryl continued explaining, though it was simple, we'd be running a recon mission, sneaking into a Xyclonian territory, and looking to see if Williams information could be trusted.

As Cheryl finished her explanation for the mission, a alarm on Lances watch was set off, he pressed a button, and the beeping stopped, "That's us, let's get suited up." Lance,Erik, and I moved over to a large bag that contained our gear.

We were each given combat boots to exchange with our regular shoes, a Kevlar vest to be placed over our shirts, and a helmet.

Lance also handed out our weapons, both he and Erik were carrying silenced assault rifles, while I was handed a UMP-45 also silenced. Lance gave it to me carefully,"I wasn't sure if you were up to carry a assault rifle so I brought along this, make sure to keep it on semi auto when we get into the field." He smirked at me, jerk.

The three of us walked out of the building, Lance taking point and Erik walking behind me. After a minute or two of walking through the decrypt city a strange voice began speaking to me, "Listen, do not alert your team members anything is wrong." Lance and Erik showed no sign that they were aware of the voice.

"Who are you?" I whispered "It's me, William, I have information that could be vital to your mission." I stayed silent hoping he would continue.

"Our race as you've probably found out isn't organic, but mechanical. We work as a hive mind, all connected to a single source of power, though we have been able to create multiple power sources to keep us alive, as a backup. The base you are about to head into has been installed with one of these power sources, and the surrounding bases also run on this power, so if you were to destroy the power source in the base not only would the Xyclonians inside be killed, but the surrounding bases Xyclonians that are surviving on these power sources, would also be destroyed. I urge you to persuade your team leader to find this power source and destroy them, it would greatly improve your chances of clearing out the Xyclonians on your planet."

Lances voice pulled me out of my conversation with William, "Look sharp Connor, we're heading in."