Rising After the Fall

This is chapter one of a multi-chapter story commissioned by Adam and written by Vanessa Foxe (breedorbebred). This is a bit of a slow burn romance, so there isn't any sex in this first chapter, but it is coming.

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A flashing red circle appeared on the room's main screen, and everybody stared in silence for a moment as the enormity of what it represented sunk in. The screen displayed a map of the country, with shifting borders showing the rapidly-evolving frontline of the war.

"Someone confirm the accuracy of that data," a woman demanded in a voice that clearly announced that she was used to getting her way, and that anyone who dared to question her would be in for a world of hurt. "Right goddamn now."

A man across the room typed quickly, fingers flying across the keys as he pulled up half a dozen separate feeds. They all confirmed what everyone in the room was seeing. "Con-confirmed strike of an IA missile, captain. Medium payload. It's, uh..."

"God have mercy," another man whispered. "The whole metropolitan area? The population was more than ten million. Most of those were civilians..."

"Cut the chatter," a second woman ordered. She was a full foot-and-a-half taller than the captain she stood behind, roughly on-par with the man she'd just verbally slapped down. As a first-generation supersoldier, Lieutenant Cianna sported a batch-designation in place of a surname, to denote when she had been created. Most of the other assembled soldiers had similar designations, although none of the others had one from earlier than Delta, the fourth batch.

Their genetic augmentations came in one of a few packages, predisposing each supersoldier to a specific role: superior eyesight and hearing for scouts, denser bones and muscles for the "heavies", beyond-human levels of speed for the skirmishers. Other traits were universal, like the increased size that let them take advantage of the square cube law for greater armour coverage, the faster reflexes that enabled them to better pilot suits of power-armor and shuttles alike, and their greater reserves of stamina to keep them going during extended encounters.

Cianna had come by her fair skin, blonde hair, and blue eyes naturally however, as the genetic programmers had been too worried about making fitter soldiers to worry about aesthetic considerations. She might have even been considered beautiful, if not for her habitual no-nonsense expressions... and the thick metal-and-glass helmet that concealed all of the soldiers' faces.

The other soldier responded to his lieutenant's words instantly, giving her a crisp salute before falling into a steady parade rest.

As second-in-command of Fireteam Victor-Foxtrot, Cianna had participated in no fewer than a dozen operations, and had helped guide the team until it boasted the highest kill-count and success rate in the country. "What are our orders, Captain Lanney?"

The captain studied the display in silence for another moment, and her face didn't betray a hint of emotions. Whatever anger, fear, or sadness she may have felt was packed up efficiently and tucked away where none of her subordinates could see. She was the only non-augmented individual in the fireteam, and thus never participated directly in operations, but her personal strength was unquestionable. "The same as before, lieutenant. We hold our current position until we receive orders from--"

The team's captain froze mid-speech, displaying more emotion in that reaction than any of them had ever seen from her in all of their combined years of service. All bodies present watched in mute horror as another red circle appeared on the digital map, this one large enough to encompass two cities and a major military base. A third appeared, and then a fourth. On the far side of the map, in the enemy's territory, matching circles appeared as Cianna's side delivered its own payloads from the stations orbiting high above.

Everyone watched as the red circles expanded, representing the total destruction of millions, if not billions, of lives. Not to mention huge swathes of military assets. They witnessed the exact moment that their nation lost the war. The moment that everyone, everywhere, lost the war. Mutually assured destruction.

If the team still intended to wait for orders from their military command, they would be waiting a long, long time.

"Change of plans, team." The captain spoke to the silent room in a somber voice. "Initiate operation Snow White. Operators, begin surface decommissioning and shut-down of this installation. Godspeed to you all."

"Yes, captain," the man at the keyboard whispered. They had all heard what she'd said, and they'd all understood what the captain meant: they were to initiate the closing protocols, then abandon the base. They would have no more support, no more military to back them. They were on their own.

"Soldiers, fall in!" Captain Lanney turned and strode from the room. She didn't need to look back to see if her team of genetically-augmented soldiers were following-- Victor-Foxtrot had followed her to hell and back on more than one occasion, and she knew that she commanded their absolute loyalty even as she led them into the sealed bay in the back chamber of the base.

Fluorescent bulbs lit up the room as the team marched in single-file. These were the only source of light, since this was the deepest room of a base built into a mountainside. Inside, thirteen pods stood in neat rows: one for each of the twelve soldiers assigned to Victor-Foxtrot, and one for Captain Lanney.

The team had been briefed on what to do in the event of a catastrophic military loss. They each moved to stand before their assigned pod, and nobody commented on the ones that would be empty. They had lost two of their comrades mere weeks ago, and the wound was still fresh.

A hiss of hydraulics announced the closing of the main door, sealing the ten remaining soldiers and their captain in this room as the rest of the base evacuated around them. Outside, lights would be turning out for the last time as the operators and regular soldiers shut the outer doors and left behind an empty base. All non-critical systems began shutting down, as the on-site nuclear reactor ceased powering anything outside of this room.

Eleven pods hissed in perfect synchrony, and the eleven remaining members of Fireteam VF stepped into their respective machines. Mechanical arms began attaching tubes to the ports on each soldier's set of power armour, or directly into the veins in Captain Lanney's case.

Knowing the team had mere moments before cryogenic sleep took them, Cianna's captain cleared her throat and delivered what she knew would likely be her final speech to her loyal crew. "Soldiers... friends. We're going under now, and I honestly don't know when we'll wake again. And when we do, I don't know what kind of world we'll find. A barren wasteland, an enemy-occupied industrial zone, an overgrown jungle... we have no way of knowing. But it doesn't matter, because our orders are the same: establish a stronghold, rebuild our military, and wait for the day the republic is ready to wield its armies once more."

Quiet sirens in the room announced the imminent closing and sealing of the pods. Around them, the lights started shutting down, section by section. Now, the only illumination left was the faint glow of the screens on the inside and outside of each pod.

"For the republic," the captain finished, and ten voices echoed the mantra as the doors of their machines closed before them.

A powerful mix of cutting-edge pharmaceuticals flooded the veins of each member of the fireteam as cooled, compressed nitrogen flooded the tanks to almost instantly drop their body temperatures to below zero. None knew how many years, or even decades, it would be before they woke again. They couldn't even say with absolute certainty that they would wake again, but not one member of the team questioned their orders.

"For the republic," Cianna whispered one more time as her heavy eyelids finally shut. The frozen darkness took her, and for a time, she knew nothing but silence.

The next time Cianna opened her eyes, she knew immediately that something was wrong.

For starters, she was horizontal, lying on her back in the pod, despite having fallen unconscious on her feet. And there was the issue of the light: far too much of it was coming in through the transparent panel of the device that was supposed to keep her asleep, or mostly dead, until her captain awoke her.

But the most pressing issue was that damned beeping. It was loud, shrill, and it wouldn't stop.

She groaned and shifted slightly, and found problem number four: she could barely move her limbs. Her arms were leaden and her legs felt like concrete, and it took a massive effort of will just to lift a hand up high enough to tap the darkened screen to her left.

"Battery levels critical," a soft, digital voice chimed in response to her touch. "External power disconnected, power reserves depleted. Reanimation process triggered automatically."

Cianna let her arm fall and closed her eyes for another long moment. That wasn't right, there was no reason for her pod to have been disconnected from external power. Their base's generator should have been able to run autonomously for a few centuries, and it's not like the unit could have just gotten unplugged-- the cryogenic chambers were hardwired directly into the grid. Had the wiring somehow disconnected when her pod fell over?

With another deep, fortifying breath, Cianna forced her eyes open and blinked until she could see through her helmet's visor again. A simple, red lever served as the pod's emergency release, and she pulled it sharply towards her. There was a hiss of displaced air as the seal broke, then nothing. What happened to the hydraulic release?

She pressed both hands against the lid of her metal coffin, pressing up like a backwards push-up. The hinges creaked in protest for a long moment, then another, before whatever was blocking the door's movement finally gave way.

All at once, the door released and flew open, swinging upwards and outwards violently enough that it slammed against something beside it with a resounding boom. Cianna winced at the loud impact, then levered herself up so she could survey her new environment. Even that motion was difficult, and she frowned beneath her helmet at her own weakness. A bit of fatigue might be expected after spending an unknown number of years in a near-death state before being dramatically reawakened, but her armour's powered motion-assistance should have made up the difference...

"Ah, shit," she hissed as she finally caught on to the obvious detail. The huge metal frame around her wasn't assisting her movements the way it should have been. A quick press of a few buttons on her steel-clad wrist confirmed it: the armour was dead. Its battery had been connected to the pod's main power supply, to keep her armour charged during her long sleep, and the pod must have cannibalized the charge to maintain her cryogenic state for a little while longer after its power source was severed.

She had to strain against the armour's massive weight to grab the latch under her chin and disconnect her helmet, but her reward was a lungful of fresh air and an overwhelming amount of... natural light?

A quick check around confirmed that hypothesis: she was outside. Her pod was on its back, half-buried in the dirt and covered most of the way in what looked like moss. She crouched down and examined the greenery on the metal's surface, and found it to be a thick, green blanket of living moss and grass.

All around her was more of the same, the moss and grasses spread out in every direction as far as she could see. It was even clinging to... trees.

Cianna's breath caught in her throat as she stared at the trees around her, her tactical survey forgotten. These were real trees, like the ones she'd seen in the biodomes or in the occasional city park that hadn't been paved over or built on top of. And they weren't scraggly little desiccated things like he was used to, but tall, broad trunks with lush yellow and red leaves. The air around her was purer, fresher, full of the scent of falling leaves decaying. There was no hint of the tang of the chemical decontamination sprays they had all used on almost every surface since the biochemical weapon had been released on their countryside when she was young.

She must have been in some kind of agricultural dome, to have so many living plants in one place. But a quick look upwards was enough to tell that there was no glass ceiling above.

It was all so much, so beautiful, so overwhelming. But Cianna wasn't some civvy to be standing around and gawking all day, and she quickly mastered her emotions and pulled her attention to the present situation.

"Tactical assessment," she whispered to herself, the familiar words working like a mantra to center and ground her. "Armour is unpowered, therefore a liability. The area appears uninhabited, but is likely patrolled by scouts. Heavy armour can only slow me down."

Tactics and planning quickly replaced shock and awe, and she established her next steps. Usually, she would have assistance in donning or removing her armour, but she had learned how to do it herself, of course. You couldn't always guarantee a team of mechanics to help you in and out of your armour when you were moving behind enemy lines.

It was harder in the heavy, unpowered frame, but she managed to strip out of the armour. She undid the wrist latches to free her hands first, then the heavy chest and back pieces. Once those were gone, she removed the layers from her shoulders and upper arms, then started on her legs. All told, it took her the better part of ten minutes to remove the pieces and disentangle herself from the metal framework.

Stepping out of her armour had always left her with mixed feelings. On one hand, she was now six inches shorter and the better part of two hundred pounds lighter, and had no hydraulic assistance fueling her every motion. She'd gone from being able to shoulder-check a car aside and deflect a barrage of gunfire to being a mere mortal. On the other hand, the armour wasn't powered and couldn't lend her its enhanced strength, and at least now she was much more agile and limber.

After another quick survey of her immediate surroundings and a quick series of stretches she had been taught to maximize joint mobility, she was ready to move. The side of the armour had a large pouch that had been designed to be detachable and carried via a single strap, which she now wore over one shoulder. She pulled out the armour's depleted powercore, a tube-shaped battery the size of two fists stacked on top of each other, and tucked it into her makeshift messenger-bag. She also loaded up all the extra ammunition she had been carrying, piling those two boxes beside the other emergency supplies in the bag, then added the communicator from inside her helmet.

She dropped everything else that couldn't be carried, including the armour itself, back into the pod and shut the lid. After a moment's consideration, she grabbed a nearby bush and pulled it over to cover her cache. The bush's roots were deep, but even outside of her armour, Cianna was still a bit over seven feet tall and had the trim strength that came from a lifetime of working out and training. A mere plant didn't stand a chance.

Satisfied that the pod wouldn't be easily spotted unless someone knew what they were looking for, she took a final inventory of her assets and liabilities. She had a pistol on her waist and a small, lightweight submachine gun on a backstrap. She'd had to leave the heavy assault rifle behind-- without the armour's enhanced strength, the rifle was just too heavy to carry conveniently. Not to mention that the kickback would knock her over without the frame's extra weight, or at least a stable tripod. She had some ammo, a basic survival kit, and a long knife. What she didn't have was any way to use her communications device without power, any clue as to where the facility was and why her pod wasn't there anymore, or any idea where she actually was.

Still, it was a start.

Her orders in this case were clear: replenish her armour's battery, repair any damaged equipment, locate the facility, and wake her commander. Then she would contact whatever remained of their military command structure to receive new orders.

The first step was to find a source of power, which meant people, which meant finding a settlement or military structure. Hopefully whoever she found wouldn't be hostile.

A quick circuit of her immediate area revealed a large river cutting a rocky path roughly east to west. She couldn't resist a quick double take at the water... It was so clean. It had been a long time since she'd seen such clean water coming from something other than an industrial purification unit.

She took a moment to wash her hands in the clear water, marvelling at its crystalline beauty. The thick dirt and grime caking her knuckles flaked off and disappeared downstream.

"Where there's water, there's people," Cianna whispered to herself. Clean water was one of the most valuable commodities on the planet, which meant that if there were settlements anywhere nearby, they would be close to this water source. There was no sign of debris in this water, save for some brown leaves floating past where she knelt, so if there was a community by this river, it was probably downstream.

One of the first steps upon becoming lost in unfamiliar terrain was to find memorable landmarks, and this river would be hers. She turned and followed the stream's course.

Hours passed as she followed the water's twists, moving roughly northwest and down a gentle slope. She refilled her water from the stream twice, counting on the chemical filter to purify any potential contaminants. The trek was long, and the rough terrain made it tougher, but her genetically-enhanced stamina held out. As the sun started approaching the high, wall-like mountains that dominated the environment to her left, she was beginning to search for a sheltered area to bed down in when she passed through a thicker copse of trees and finally saw the settlement she had predicted.

There were several rounded, dome-like structures dominating the central area, and a large, multi-story complex built into the side of a cliff. Those would probably be residential in nature. What stood out the most were the smaller, independent housing units, each separated by fields-- not enough to be farmland, but more than the government ever would have allotted for a single-dwelling lot anywhere Cianna had ever been.

But the buildings were green as much as steely-grey, overgrown with mosses and plants, with trees and bushes growing between and around them.

"Abandoned," she sighed to herself as she scanned over the buildings in the last light of early evening. The overabundance of plantlife clearly told her this wasn't a lived-in community: plants were to be cut down and cleared out to make room for buildings, not allowed to grow up and around them.

Still, there were lights clearly visible in some windows, on the sides of buildings, and even mounted on poles along a strip that ran through the center of the settlement. Each of the street lights was shaded on the top, so that their light was directed entirely downwards, instead of up into the night. No doubt to make it harder for enemy aircraft to spot the community.

There was clearly power still running through this abandoned community, probably courtesy of the water turbines she could see spaced along the river in regular intervals, the windmills on top of the western rocky cliff, and the solar panels on almost every roof. These were slow, ineffective sources of power compared to large-scale damming and large geothermal power fields she had been assigned to protect-- or attack-- at various points in her service, of course, but they might still be adequate to her needs.