2851 AD. Planet Earth, Sol System.
Thunder crashed over the dark and desolate wasteland that was once one of Earth's most striking cities. Dark alleyways intersected the abandoned roads as crumbling buildings, haunted by neglect and abandonment rose high in to the eerie night sky. They stood as shadows of their once proud stature, representations that seemed no more than specters of a once sprawling opulence.
The stale night air was filled with the unmistakable stench of human waste, rotting bodies and various other smells that had mixed into a fetid aroma.
Irregularly placed streetlights burned on low, glowing a pale yellow light into the dark streets. Almost all of them were weary from lack of maintenance as they flickered on and off, adding to the already ghostly landscape.
Every once in a while an individual would scurry about, ambling the dark alleyways, careful to avoid the light. There were things and individuals far more fearsome than the dark. But such was life in Sector 9 of The Inferno.
Its dark streets held secrets of unknown depths, but humans being humans had adapted. Its inhabitants came to The Inferno by various means, more often than not; they didn't come of their own free will.
Those who could remember the outside world lived a more oppressive sort of hell, for they had once seen the pleasure to be had outside The Inferno.
But one thing was clear to all, no body escaped The Inferno.
Manmade monsters lingered in dark corners, forever on the watch, looking for prey. Diseased body's lay wherever they had taken their last breath. Even among the living disease ran rampant, food was scarce and in the concrete jungle many called home, only the strong survived.
The dark clouds hovered like a bad omen as six fully armed individuals casually walked across a road towards a crumbling down building. Only three of the four original walls now stood.
The façade of the building was a glass curtain type entrance that extended from the ground floor. It stood twenty or so feet before, breaking off in a haphazard manner that showed the building must have toppled sideways.
The materials of the building showed wear and tear, it was a miracle it still stood after so long. There were many indicators that the construction had most likely been an early twenty first century urban dwelling. The most obvious thing being the steel skeleton frame, which was now an obsolete form of construction.
The fourth floor's three walls didn't even reach their full height and showed the construction had toppled sideways, the other twenty or so stories that would have stood now lay in ruins on top of other neighboring buildings.
Jagged broken glass littered the entrance, but the glass wall was mainly still intact. Its door was nowhere in sight, and beyond the threshold was nothing but an unnatural gloom.
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Maxwell Camden stood to one side of the threshold that led into the antique dwelling; weapon gripped in his Exo clad hands and silently told his Embedded Suit Computer to switch to night vision.
He lifted his head and looked behind him; he could see his team in the cloud covered gloom. Behind him stood two Exo clad agents, he couldn't tell who was who but that didn't bother him.
On his other side stood another three agents.
He lifted his hand and gestured for the agent in front of him to go ahead. The agent held a plasma flash grenade, and with a flick of his wrist the ball flew right into the gloom and disappeared. A beat passed, before an unnatural white light exploded in to the room.
Max wasted no time as he jumped into the light, keeping his finger ready on the trigger as he powered his way into the blinding light.
His visor quickly adjusted to the extreme light as he swiveled his head left, right, keeping his assault rifle trained in front of him he continued into the light, confident his team would follow him in. Seeing no immediate threats, he lowered his plasma rifle and turned around to face his team.
The light of the flash grenade slowly dwindled to a working level. Max looked around his environment, ugly, old, decrepit but antique. They were in some sort of lobby, the area was large-the next level a good fifteen feet above them. The winding stairs standing to each side were a testament to its twenty first century architecture.
Thanks to the flash grenade, the lobby was no longer covered in an impenetrable layer of darkness, and he could see the large slabs of concrete that had fallen from the upper floor and lay in a haphazard manner. The room was covered in wooden tables, chairs and all sorts of furniture.
Although his team was protected in their Powered Exoskeleton Combat Suits, to Max the jumble of stone they had entered felt alive. The environment was harsh and he felt as though he could almost feel the heavy concentrated air bearing down upon him.
Consequently he knew his agents in their Exo's couldn't really complain, because they obviously had advantages over the natives. For one thing he was sure that breathing would be damn near impossible. The dense air in front him danced with large dust particles that most likely would cause long term damage to those who breathed it in.
The heat mixed with the putrid humid air to produce a tense calm, the overhead clouds covered everything like a dense blanket that weighed down on the mood like a ton of moon rocks.
Coming out of his musings he looked back at his team and held his hand up.
"Enter Intuitive Network."
The I.N. in Max's opinion was quite useful, having been developed only five years earlier, it worked quite simply by linking a soldier's system into a network with the other soldiers in his unit; these units were, in turn, networked to each other and up the chain of command.
In his helmet, his HUD brought up a list of some of the features that had previously been off for power preservation as they come online.
Maxwell sometimes wondered why he was given command of the STRK Team Prodigy, he still felt that they needed more training.
Max's STRK Agents were still fairly new to the whole concept of covert and military operations given to a semi-civilian force. But becoming Strikers took hard work, brains, and guts and his Strikers certainly had all those traits in abundance.
All his team members were just what their name stated; prodigy's in their own field, but he still had misgivings about some other factors that his commanders most likely wouldn't have taken into account.
He shook his head and smiled inwardly, they were a great lot and they would do just great on this, their first mission, after 12 training ops on different planets, colonies and satellites.
Due to the I.N. when he looked at one of the agents he 'intuitively' knew that in the Steel Battalion X-09 Mark VII combat armor was the blocky faced pilot Damien Grey, the gentle giant who could fly any space vessel.
Next to him stood the smaller, but just as competent, scout and stealth expert Alvin Zillion, who had on BioCorp Elite Legion III armor.
Close to the stairs stood their three female members, their medic Kelly Jacobson, the electronic engineer Delaney Smith and the rookie Veronica Felton who specialized in everything foreign and was their diplomat.
The three females, along with Max himself, all wore the prototype Vulcan Space Centurion IV combat armor.
Their other skills notwithstanding, they could all handle all sorts of rifles and were all versed in all types of combat skills and were all avid tacticians. And after 12 training ops S.T.R.K Team Prodigy was a go. Except for Veronica all his agents had some sort of experience with combat, all in all the entire outlook for the first mission was good.
Max opened the communications on the I.N. to his team's links. "Listen up."
The agents shifted slightly to acknowledge that they were listening but continued to hold their positions.
"For now we'll stay on Audio-Link via I.N., in a few minutes I will establish contact with Firestorm Control and they will be monitoring the mission as usual." Though they couldn't see his eyes behind his visor he rotated his head to look at each of them.
"This is a relatively routine op. We're not the first team to venture into the Inferno, but remember to expect the unexpected."
"Spread out, identify and neutralize any dangers in the vicinity. Teams of two, Grey and Felton setup Hermes on the fourth floor. Smith and Jacobson with the third, Zillion stand guard on the second, I will be setting up the turrets for our perimeter guard."
"Synch in five minutes." He commanded the system, looking at his wrist a small screen appeared at -4:58.
"Move out!"
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Veronica Felton was an avid fan of Antique Space-Era fiction, but walking a dark ASE corridor was not one of the highest moments of her life.
Maneuvering the empty broken down twenty first century building was a feat akin to watching it on a holo-vid. Except this was more real, had more substance and was absolutely terrifying for the rookie.
She moved in unhurried motions as best as she could, looking around into the gloomy corners where the light couldn't penetrate. Her breathing spiked as she watched the unnatural darkness that looked like thick shifting mist at various points in the room.
She knew once the Captain was in contact with CRV Firestorm, mission control would be able to tell by her vitals that she was anxious, and wouldn't that just make her day. She could bloody well picture Hunter teasing her, he would let it out to everybody they know that 'V the rookie' was terrified of the most pitiful place in Known Space.
And it really was a pitiful place, she thought, as she looked around, no lights, no technology, not even the simplest of worker-drones in sight. Following that logic should mean no assault weaponry, laser mines, or god forbid armored mercs, right? Right.
Still she was uneasy; this place just chilled her to the bone. But her performance was to be monitored, meaning she had to get her overactive imagination under control, calm her racing pulse, and stop her heart's erratic behavior.
Tensely she moved forward, to confront her fears and dispel her worries, she went from corner to corner illuminating them, searching for anything that shouldn't be there. She looked to her left and saw Kelly Jacobson signal her that they were ready.
She sighed, turned around and hurriedly moved to take up position in front of their escort, with her gun at the ready; she began ascending the stairs slowly. Damien was right behind her as Veronica cautiously lead them into the dark using night vision. At the end of the stairs they came upon a large swing door that was operated by hand.
Stopping on the opposite side of the entrance facing Damien, who had taken the door handle in his large fist, they waited for Alvin to proceed. Squatting down lower Alvin lowered his weapon as he removed an ionized plasma flash grenade hanging on his side.
With sure movements and a deft hand he threw it into the dark through the small opening that Damien had opened. As fast as he could he moved into the room, Veronica and Damien followed him in, moving independently to cover the whole room.
"Clear!" came Alvin's disembodied voice over the I.N.
The floor was plain and had some large slabs missing as they now lay on the first floor. Damien moved towards the stairs as they were being followed by Kelly and Delaney.
They cautiously crept up the stairs, expecting anything in the dark. Everything had an eerie green glow to it, to Veronica night vision wasn't a very comfortable visual to use, but until they had lights it was all they had.
This time Kelly knelt in front of the door, ready to throw the plasma flash grenade. Damien put his large metallic palm on the door as they prepared.
"3...2...1..."
