20/Kryo/2467 R.S. 12:21:30

Michael stands alone in the Engineering Room surrounded by four Millitant Soldier corpses, as he stares into the blue monitors that fill the room with a deep blue hue, 51 looks away from the monitors and begins to Scan the room in search of anything that looked remotely like an explosive device. While he waits instead of keeping thoughts to himself he saves them by opening the TDA or Tactical Data Assistant, a technology integrated within the Trooper's helmet and could be opened at any time by the user if they require assistance on the field, storing useful information about places, hostile presence per area, this technology is highly customizable and adapts to its owner so to each Trooper their own TDA. Besides important digital notes regarding enemies and their weaknesses, Michael also has a separate folder with the sole purpose of him emptying his thoughts into it.

"Wisdom, something that takes years, even decades to have but I often sense that it is earned by the problems you are confronted with, and most importantly your solution to said problem, not by time... Hmm, Time..."

49: "Mike, we are approaching the Dam, how is the situation down there?"Michael is interrupted by Jack SatComming in to inform him of their arrival. The bright orange HUD of Michael's visor shines on his brown eyes as they dart across what he had just said, making sure it is all good. "Save file." He commanded the helmet's systems. Within the visor, the verse slides into a folder on the top right of the User Interface and he replies to 49.

51: " Taken care of, Vera, I've been told this place is rigged to blow, we need to find out whether this is true or not."

20: " Understood, got any other useful information?"

51:" I've got pointers on where to start."

Michael walks out of the Engineering Room and into the hub of the Dam, where a semicircular white desk spans across the whole right side of the hub, behind it, there were more monitors, some of these turned out to be camera screens, "What do we have here?" Michael thinks to himself as he pries open a metal floor panel behind the desk with his hands. Using his strength he achieves to rip off the panel and reveal what is under the desk, an array of cables varying in colors and sizes are laid-out across the foundation of the Hub. The Squadron's Tactician Jade (0012) begins to descend the crooked stairs making loud metal creaking sounds with every step she takes, behind her, the Squadron's Demolitions Expert Vera (0020) follows.Vera shows off her bulky yet sluggish dark maroon armor with a shiny black glass visor, the armor makes her withstand higher capacity explosions by having a larger capacitor slot on the back of her neck.

While Jade, on the other hand, sports a lightweight dark blue armor with an exception on her left shoulder plate which is white and a sky blue glass visor

Jade reaches the Hub and sees Michael trying to access the camera systems via the wiring, she approaches him and interacts.

12: "Do you know what you're doing?"

51: "I do."

He replies to Jade as he finally taps into the old Dam's camera feed with his helmet, 51 can now cycle through the many recordings that the security cameras had stored within their data banks, he can also patch this feed through to his fellow Squadmates.

12: "What do you see?"

51: "I'm still scrolling through all the files to find the right moment when these Millitants arrived, it seems they've been here for a day or two."

Jade hangs over Michael closely supervising what he is doing, as the Squad's Tactician Jade had to superficially train her squadmates the basics to Tactical Engineering. Michael was the only one that caught on to her difficult teachings, and most importantly, actually practicing what he learned in the field.

51: "There, they are unloading the rip-lines from the trucks, but this was in the nineteenth of Kryo."

20: "Which means they have had a whole day to set this up, Mike I don't think we should waste any time here."

Vera strictly implies to Michael as she hastily walks past them both in direction of the Engineering Room, he rapidly fast forwards the feed and patches it to Vera's helmet, now receiving the camera's feed she can dial-in on the location of the rip-lines.The term Rip-Line comes from the sound these mechanisms create when they are deployed, a loud velcro separation enables the explosives as they are shaken and made unstable, the black line has six open slots where the user could fit in Thermite Infusers that eventually detonate on command.

51 disconnects from the Dam's systems and attempts to put the metal panel back on the ground, while doing this he asks Jade: "Did Ankiros come too?"

She pans her head towards him as he asks and replies by nodding, confirming his question, 51 notices her affirmation and drops the metal panel locking it into place. *CLANK* The sound of the panel hitting the ground resonates within the Dam, he stands up and asks: "Good, why didn't he come down?"

12: " That's something you should ask him. Go topside, I'll help Vera."

Michael nods in affirmation before making his way to the stairs and ascending towards the surface. Once there he sees both, Squadron Operator Jacklyn (0049) and Squadron Medic and SL (Squad Leader) Ankiros (0009), Jack is leaning his back against the Sanity while to his left Ankiros has his arms crossed and seems to have been waiting for Michael to surface, he calmly walks his way to them and gestures a greeting with his right hand, Ankiros lifts his left hand with his index and middle finger extended from his fist, they both walk closely and smack their hands together. Ankiros' black glass visor fades and becomes clear except for the green trim around the glass, his armor is almost identical to Michael's in exception of the previously mentioned green trim, Ankiros' gray eyes are revealed and so is his roman nose.

09: "Missing for two days and now this."

Ankiros lets go of Michael's hand and returns to his crossed-arm pose. In an attempt to provide answers for his harsh statement, 51 responds with his reasons.

51: "Well, I wasn't missing, I was running ops for Dovyo."

09: "You and that General. No contact with any of us and not even Central could tell us anything, you sure had us worried, do not do that again."

51: "I did what I had to do Ank, oh and it's good seeing you too."

09: "Regardless, tell us why we're here."

51 : "Dovyo has a datapad he wants me to recover from Epsilon Squad."

09: "Ugh those criminals, what's so special about this Data Pad anyway?"

51: "Ankiros, I don't know, but it would be great to get some assistance finding that out."

09: "So it's just another op... I understand, what do you need?"

The conversation tones down, and the tensions between the two come to an end, now with a higher emphasis on solving the problem at hand.

51: "For now it's up to Vera and Jade to locate the rip-lines the Soldiers deployed somewhere in this Dam, if it all checks out we head to Epsilon's barracks in Caloris."

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

09: "And if it doesn't?"

51: "Then we ask for a Marine EOD unit to handle the situation, we don't have enough time to search the entire Dam."

"Hmm..." Ankiros quietly hums to himself as he thinks about the situation, turning around towards Jack in search of a third opinion on the Dam matter, but instead Jack shrugs his arms at them both as he has nothing to say. Ankiros looks back at Michael and asks: "How long do we have until our window to Epsilon closes?".

51: "About an hour, anything beyond that and they could be running another op."

We transition away from the surface of the Dam and crawl back into the dimly lit Hub where we see Jade leaning against the corridor wall interacting with her Data Pad, swiping across the touch screen in search of the precise moment when the Millitants brought in the Rip-Lines, when suddenly... "Jade!!" A scream echoed throughout the corridor and eventually the Hub itself, it was Vera. Jade quickly holsters her Data Pad on a hardened polymer case situated on her waist and runs toward the Engineering Room, upon reaching the door she turns facing the room, where she sees that the walls were dismantled and taken down by Vera in search of the explosives, she also sees her standing in the middle of the room holding her hands towards the door with open palms indicating Jade to stay outside.

20: "Come in, slowly, I found the rip-lines..."

12: "Where? All I see are wall panels scattered all over the floor."

20: "It's not in the structure, it's on the outside..."

12: "Shit..."

20: "That's why they were just about to leave, the job is done, it's only a matter of time until they detonate, run a scan on the walls facing the lake, I'll let the guys know."Vera activates SatCom and contacts the rest of the squadron: "Guys I've got some bad news." She starts off with urgency and worry. But she continues: "The Dam has the explosives already attached to it, however, they are placed on the outside of the Engineering Room, facing the lake, there's really no way for us to get to them unless we have two extra hours." ...The rest of the squad on the surface receives Vera's SatCom. Ankiros looks at Michael and activates SatCom to reply.

09: "That's time we don't have.Unfortunately."

Michael enters the conversation and adds to Ankiros' opposition.

51: "How long would it take if we had a Marine EOD Platoon?"

20: "A lot less time than before but how long would it take them to get here?"

51: "Half an hour, tops."

Jade and Vera walk out of the Dam's interior and reunite with their Squadmates, Jack walks into the Dropship from the open hatch in the back of the Sanity and commandeers the Dropship, switching its systems online it begins to vibrate, eventually hovering around seven feet off the ground.The squadron gathers around in the exception of 49 which is in the cockpit of the Sanity, preparing to take off.

09: "12 call in the EOD from Ellis Complex and inform them of the situation, 20 give them everything you've got on the explosives' location. 51 we gotta get to Epsilon, give 49 their coordinates, let's try not to get too involved with this damn matter."

"Understood" they all say in unison in exception of 51, before turning to their Data Pads to undergo their specific orders. Ankiros instantly notices the discrepancy and looks at Michael. "Is there a problem?" He asks Michael with a strong voice.

51: "Well yes, when did we decide to abandon the Dam?"

09: "The moment we realized a Marine EOD unit could handle this faster than us, let's go."

51: "Whoa whoa, wait!"

Michael grabs Ankiros' left arm as he was turning around towards the Sanity, "What the hell, Xentenas? This is not your choice to make!" He yells as he makes a movement with his left arm to release it from Michael's grip.

The Sanity's loud turbines roar above the two Troopers while they stand facing each other, 49 activates SatCom and warns them: "I've got eyes on three Millitant Trucks headed our way from the north, I-I think one has an AA Gun, I'm evading NOW.".

49 pulls back on the pilot control stick and the dropship flies away from Ankiros and Michael and into the dense jungle's overhanging trees to the west of the Dam, also known as the Caloris Jungle.

The Troopers look as the Dropship flies away from them and towards the dense jungle then they look at each other, Ankiros is the first to talk.

09: "Now look what you've got us into, Xentenas." He scolds Michael, Ankiros also reactivates the visor's black tint covering his face, and reaches for his Side Loading Marksman Rifle or SLMR-11 indicating that he is about to fight.

51: "I hope you're ready to do your job." Michael throws in a comeback before he pulls his MTR from his back and reloads it, keeping the previous magazine in one of the many waist straps he has. The first truck barely arrives near the service door that leads to the Dam's infrastructure and it is instantly riddled by bullet holes as both Troopers unload their magazines into it, Ankiros continuously shoots eleven rounds at the windshield eventually breaking it in revealing the crew, more bullets fly in and puncture into the Soldier riding passenger, also killing the driver of the first truck and stopping the small convoy. The back doors open and Millitant soldiers come out into the blinding sun, reloading his MTR, 51 advances to 09's location behind the first stationary truck. One Soldier mans the Anti Air Gun installed on the top of one of the black trucks as another, more specialized Millitant, known as a Shock Millitant, a much faster and agile version of the regular Soldiers but in the expense of their armor, therefore these Shock Millitants are better for hit and run operations, but now they are faced up against two Mikundrian Troopers, the Shock Millitant takes a shotgun from the back seat and slams the door, she advances followed by two more Soldiers.

09: "I'll take left."

51: "Keep your eyes on that AA Gun, one burst of that and you're screwed."

09: "Noted."

The Troopers part ways between the truck, Ankiros encounters a Soldier and shoots three rounds at him, missing two and landing the last shot on the waist of the Soldier, he grunts but remains focused, enduring the gunshot wound he shoots at 09, most rounds hit near him and direct hits were covered by the Barrier System, Ankiros growls with anger. Meanwhile on the opposite side of the truck 51 encounters the Shock Millitant accompanied by two Soldiers, 51 instantly shoots a three-round burst at the Soldiers behind the Shock, killing one of them on the spot.The Shock Millitant unleashes a deadly buckshot from her SEE-R shotgun directly onto 51 that his Barrier systems could not withstand the instant pressure and broke but vaporized most pellets along with it. He staggers back and grabs on to her shotgun, with an extreme force he pulls it from her as she rang out a second shot that ricochets off the surface of the truck and fragmentation scatter across 51's body armor, he smashes the shotgun against the truck and the shotgun breaks in half and Michael regains stability, he throws the other half at her and she grabs it in mid-air, she smiles as if to taunt him but was hit by a front kick that caught her off guard, a very effective hit that left her unconscious, consequently the remaining Soldier went for her safety. "You will pay!" The Soldier cries out as he aims down his U-2 Pistol at Michael but he responded fast enough to burst him down before he could shoot. Coming back to consciousness the gaggling Shock Millitant is fighting for her life as her organs were kicked upwards and moved out of place, but manages to send a message to her Commanding Officer to abort the operation: "Abort the Dam raid. We've been, *cough* compromised..." while crawling away from 51 but he steps on her left leg both of which were mechanical to assist mobility, he applies more force on it crushing it, she screams in pain and consequently, the AA Gunner spots the gruesome scene and opens fire towards 51. Ankiros aims down his rifle at the Soldier behind the Truck, he peeks to take a look, and in a blink of an eye his head is blown off, dead on the spot. Ankiros carefully moves forward and notices the AA Gun hindering 51's movement, as the gun chews its way across the Millitant truck cutting it in half horizontally 51 starts to dodge as much as he can but right when his Capacitor reboots the Barrier Systems, he crosses his arms and gets hit by two heavy AA rounds, pushing him down against the pavement. The gun suddenly overheats, as the bald Soldier leans over to the coolants on both sides of the gun Ankiros has a clear shot and shoots two consecutive shots, both of which crash into the man's head, crushing it into a mixture of flesh and bone.

51: "AA Gun's temporarily disabled, Jack?"

Ankiros hastily runs to Michael, upon reaching him he helps him up, 49 SatComs in: "Get away from their last truck, I'm going in.". Ankiros' eyes widen as they are at a close proximity of the last truck. Both Michael and Ankiros begin to sprint towards the abandoned convoy as 09 yells into SatCom: "Danger Close! Danger Clos-" The Sanity flies close by and opens heavy fire at the trucks using the frontal autocannons, the anti-Air truck blows up and engulfs the surrounding area with flames followed by dark smoke, seeing this, the remaining pick-up Truck begins to reverse away from the area in an attempt to escape the scene and report back to their leader. 49 flies through the smoke and pans the Dropship slightly to the left to allow 51 and 09 access to the Sanity.

49: "They're gonna get away, get on board!"

51: "How long for that EOD Unit to get here?"

49: "Around twenty minutes."

09: "Xentenas let's leave this Dam to the EOD Unit, I'm certain they'll handle it."

Michael remains still thinking whether or not he should leave the Dam, he looks at Ankiros as the Sanity hovers above them surrounded in smoke with the back hatch open ready for them to embark.