Excerpt From Chapter Four

Darek paced the room, feeling more, and more nervous. Part of his emotions were a mix of excitement as well, because in just a few short minutes this could all be over. He stopped for a moment and straightened up, taking a deep calming breath. Mr. Boson put a fatherly hand on Darks shoulder, gave it a squeeze, and winked. He felt many of the butterflies in his stomach stop beating their rapid wings, and settle in a peaceful, quiet, sleep. He took another calming breath and closed his eyes as he listened to the scene playing itself out in the room. He heard Mr. Boson’d deep rhythmic voice, Jeffries hurried, excitable, voice, the hushed voices of the other members on the bridge, and most importantly, Kel’s static filled voice as it emanated over the speakers, reporting the progress of his team. He could not bare to watch the monitor in case something horrible was displayed before him, so he just listened.
“ETA three minutes!” came Kel’s voice, “Roads look clear.”
“Have them set their weapons to stun so we can take any of the enemy we can, captive.” That was Mr. Boson’s voice. He then heard Jeffries relay the message.
“Kel, we need to have all weapons set to stun. We want no civilian casualties. Hostages are needed in case of enemy contact.”
“Roger!”
Darek found his lungs weren’t working properly, for he was having some trouble getting fresh oxygen into his system, and only then realized that he had inadvertently been holding his breath. He let it out in a long exhalation of warm, gusting, air. He opened his eyes for a moment and looked over at Kaide, who was standing rigidly still, looking pensively over at Darek.
“It’s going to be ok!” he intoned softly, as if any loud noises would distract the rescue team. Darek issued him a warm smile, and went back to closing his eyes, and listening.
“ETA one minute! No sign of enemy activity. Kel’s voice sounded confident, and sure, and gave Darek a slight surge of hope.
“That’s good to hear, Kel. Stay alert, now.” Ever the studious commander, Jeffries, never could let his defenses down.
“We have the target in sight, ETA ten seconds…”
And that was when Darek heard the first sounds of clamor, confusion, and chaos. The too familiar sound of plasma fire erupted over the speaker system, and Darek almost looked around him to see where it was coming from. Kel’s voice suddenly came over the speakers a split second later, saying, “Attack, attack! We’re under attack!” and then was preceeded by more weapon fire, and then a horrified voice screaming in the background. Darek opened his eyes, feeling his body thumping in time to his hearts rapid beating, sweat pouring down his ribs from under his arms, and his head swimming in shock, terror, and anxious surprise.
He looked towards the monitor above Jeffries station, and saw the camera attached to Kel’s helmet swivel to the side, illuminating a man dressed in the garb of Society field attire lying in the street, both hands clutching his neck, legs kicking wildly as he toppled to the side, screaming in pained agony. The camera wasn’t too clear, with all the motion of the helmet, but Darek thought the mans hands seemed darker than the hue of the skin on the mans agonized face. The man was bleeding to death, darek knew, and was dying quickly. No doubt the artery in the man’s neck was spouting pints of blood with every fading beat of his heart.
Darek watched as the perspective of Kel’s helmet turned around, and bounced off in the opposite direction. Another man dressed in the Societies field attire entered the screen running past Kel and his camera. Abright blue burst of light flashed into view and melted into the man’s back. He was suddenly lifted off his feet and thrown foreward. Darek watched as the man landed on his knees with incredible force, and the momentum thrust the upper part of his body foreward into the pavement. Darek had never seen a man’s neck break before, and was horrified and disturbed when he watched the mans face slam into the iron impregnated pavement, pieces of tooth crack and chip, and the lower part of his body topple foreward over his head, bending the neck at an impossible angle. When the man’s body stopped, it never moved again, and was quickly out of sight as the camera moved rapidly past him, the sounds of plasma bursts, and men screaming, “RETREAT!” and “FALL BACK!” followed him. Then, as if the world were suddenly being lifted into the air, Darek, Kaide, Mr. Boson, Jeffries, and the rest of the men and women in the room watched as the ground was lifted to eyelevel, shivered, and went still. Confused for just a split second, Darek wondered what had just happened, then heard Jeffries whisper in a mortified voice,
“Dead? No! They can‘t be!”
There was no more movement on the screen, just a dull grey wallpaper covering the sounds of the speakers around them. There were just a few more bursts of noise from weapon fire, and then a distant voice yelling.
“Clear! The area is clear!” Then another deeper and calmer voice yelling,
“Hide the bodies in the house. There’s no one left to find them.”
After a few minutes of silence throughout the room, the monitor flickered, and the grey wallpaper of the screen shifted and the camera showed a pair of boots drawing invisible lines on the hard iron pavement then the boots jolted, and the familiar pattern of flooring appeared under the boots, and then grayness filled the screen for it’s final vision into the mission that had become a death trap.