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comedianmasta
Ace Trainer
Joined: Tue Aug 01, 2006 11:09 am
Posts: 328
Location: Hiding Out Until Things Cool Down...
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 Ok, back in action. Here we go with the next installments.
Chapter 14: Last Supper
The group got back to the back lines, and Marshal Tex gave them a place to rest. It was an old bunker, probably used for defense, but when the battle was turned to offensive, it got no use. They laid their stuff out, and even got out of their suits. Andorian ordered them all to still stand watch, so they had to have their weapons still. Ferdinand was absorbed with how heavy the Gauss Rifle had become. In the end, he found a little place that was elevated and sat to watch the sunset. The sound of the gunfire and motor rounds and artillery never seemed to die off. He was looking around, at the destruction.
He wondered if this same thing was going on at his home, Felone. He thought of Hatrin, being turned into a battle field of artillery craters, burning buildings, and trenches. He thought of the frightening Zerg they had encountered on the Argo, and how they had claimed Jim and Malazar’s life. He wondered if his father would be fighting right along side the Confederation, or would they not reach him in time and he would be forced to fight the Zerg alone. He thought of how he would, one day, return home to help and fight.
With that, his thoughts had turned to the events of the day. What he had seen, what would haunt him, and the most, what it ended up in. He thought about the next day, and how by his actions he would be on the front lines, and would most likely die. His eyes began to water, he thought of what Malazar and him had done. He thought of the group, and how their lives were now, ruined. Andorian, he was keeping them safe. Gambit, a man who actually acted as if he cared about Ferdinand. Lime, the smart, know-it-all of the group, now destined to die. Jim, who had lost his life aboard the Argo. Then, his thoughts turned to Janet. He went from being said, to angry. He thought about how his actions had led to her possible death. He thought about how she could have lived if it weren’t for him.
Than he caught himself, thinking of how he was feeling. He was confused, he had never thought or looked at a person like that before. He found himself thinking about her green eyes, and her long black hair.
Then Lime came and sat next to him.
"Are you alright? Ferdinand? Ferdinand?" he said.
Ferdinand jerked out of his daydream and said, "What? Yeah, yeah I’m fine."
"Good," said Lime.
With that, he took out his laptop again and began typing away.
"What an eventful day, don’t you think?" said Lime.
"Umm.... yes. It was quiet.... eventful." answered Ferdinand back.
"You saw your first mass attack, your first dead human, and your first kill." said Lime, "A bunch of first in that order or in such close occurrence could lead to trauma, are you sure your alright?"
"Yes, I was just thinking of..... tomorrow." said Ferdinand.
"Ah, I see. Tomorrow, yeah. It’s on everyone’s mind. It is quiet a foolish plan. I have no clue about how that guy even became a Marshal. Did you here what he kept calling me? Outrageous." said Lime.
Ferdinand nodded a bit, which was Lime’s cue to continue.
"You see that battle cruiser?" He said, gesturing toward a giant ship in the sky.
Ferdinand looked up, he saw it alright. It was giant compared with most other ships he had seen. So big, it couldn’t probably dock at the Halo Station. It had a H shape mixed with an upside T. It had four main engines in the back, which were not currently on. On the nose of the Battle Cruiser, there were two giant spotlights that were currently on and were moving about the battlefield. It didn’t seem to have weapons, but Lime knew better. Ferdinand nodded to show Lime he knew.
"Well, it’s acting as a command center for all of the enemy units, but the leader of this small army is not on board." Lime continued.
"How can you tell?" asked Ferdinand.
"Because," answered Lime, "If he was on board he would have taken off by now, as soon as more of our reinforcements come they are dead. The air battle is already starting to turn in our favor, and anti air sam sights are being constructed as we speak."
Ferdinand nodded, then Lime took out a small, bowl shaped, silver dish. It had a cord attached to the bottom of the outside, which Lime plugged into the back of his Laptop. Immediately a small stick thing came out of the middle. Lime smiled and typed away still.
"What is that?" asked Ferdinand.
"It’s a satellite dish." answered Lime, "I’m going to use it to help me hack into their Computer systems and data bases."
Ferdinand knew what would happen, so he watched Lime. He did the same, typing frantically. He was at that same blueprint like thing on the screen, and it was slowly turning grey from the left to the right. Lime’s face hardened every now and then or he murmured a curse as the grey bar would every so often go down. Other screens would pop up, and he would read the complex number code and "break it" to help move the grey bar along. Then, he started bringing up some screens himself and typing frantically to keep a red bar from filling a blue screened blueprint.
"Anti hacks," he mumbled.
After a while of doing this, the blueprint was filled, and he sighed a sigh of relief. Ferdinand had no idea of what had happened and he stared at the screen. Lime brought up a page of files and documents. Lime smiled and nodded.
“I don’t care who you are. They just added Lime to their Martini or Information,” Said Lime aloud.
Ferdinand looked at Lime with a confused look on his face and shook his head. Sure he had gotten the pun but it was a bad one. Ferdinand stared at the computer screen, he didn’t understand anything on it. He looked at Lime, he seemed to understand it.
“Um, what did you get?” He asked Lime.
“Everything,” Said Lime, “I got pass codes, patrol routes, guard shifts, a layout of the base, and everything they know about the current situation.”
“Do you have the lists of their soldiers?” asked Ferdinand.
“Uhh….. No. That’s something that they don’t have. I can’t even get the names of the officers there. I can intercept orders but that will take individual hacking in itself. Add in that they are using codenames you might as well go ask one of the guards yourself,” Said Lime.
“Ok,” said Ferdinand, who was getting excited. “All we need to
do now is find useful information.”
“Way ahead of you,” Said Lime.
He had brought up a map of the battle field. It wasn’t complete, but it showed a 3D model of the compound. It showed the Science Facility, the row of bunkers and Siege Tanks. It showed the chain link fences and the barb wire. There was a long, low building like thing that was stretched out to the side until it reached a bow like building out toward the side. It didn’t show very much terrain.
“Is that it? Not much besides the compound,” Said Ferdinand.
“Well, I need to fuse what we know with what they know.” Answered lime and he did more typing on his laptop.
The image of the enemy base expanded to show the entire battle field and the base of their troops. Lime even added the bunker where they were staying at and the spot where Lime and Ferdinand sat at that time. Lime scrolled through the map and studied it. He went through more information and added the placement of the artillery, artillery spotters, and the Battle Cruiser. He saved the map and stared at it a bit. Ferdinand was amazed that they accomplished that much.
“Good work, Lime. Now we can show this to the Marshal and call off the whole mass attack.” He said.
“Not yet,” Said Lime, “We need to have a lot more to call of an official attack, even a lot more because the Marshal is so stubborn.”
Lime made a copy of the map and started making lines of the routes the enemy soldiers took on their patrols. He soon had a lot of Red and Orange lines of the patrol and supply routes around the compound and the trenches they controlled. He also made some lines for the patrol routes for the enemy wraiths, even though they were mostly always fighting the confederation’s wraiths. With that, he nodded.
“Maybe that will be enough information to swing him,” Mumbled Lime.
Ferdinand decided to ask Lime a question that was eating at his mind for a long time.
“Hey Lime,” He started, “What is that box thing connected to the Science Facility?”
“That is a special energy box,” said Lime. “It sends massive amounts of energy to a single spot. The energy is really unstable so it isn’t used much except on special Science Facilities. They must really be using a lot of energy to do…. something if they are in need of all that energy. Hey, you see that long thing connecting it to the Facility? That’s the power cords and stabilizers. They need to armor it up so that nothing can damage it easily.”
“Damage it? What would happen if it got damaged? A power outage?” asked Ferdinand.
”Power outage? That would be the least of their problems,” answered Lime. “If it were to get damaged the odds are that the already unstable power cells would overload and their molecular structure would speed up to a state of hyper speed rusting.”
Ferdinand stared at Lime with a blank look on his face. Lime noticed it and said, “It would explode.” Ferdinand mouthed a ‘Oh’ and nodded.
Ferdinand decided to ask, “How much of an explosion?”
Lime chuckled a bit before answering, “Enough to give anyone a bad day.”
Just than Gambit came and told Lime and Ferdinand that dinner was ready. It was another MRE, Meal Ready to Eat. It was a meal packet that hadn’t change in 300 years. Basically it was a meal in a small bag that when you shook it, it heated up and expanded into a vitamin enriched meal.
While they ate, Ferdinand and Lime showed the others their findings. When they had finished, everyone eventually looked toward Andorian. He put down his bowl and spoon in which he had just finished eating and he looked at the map again.
“So what are you saying we do, guys?” Andorian asked.
Lime and Ferdinand looked at each other and Lime said, “I don’t know. We were just hoping that this would be enough to call of the mass attack tomorrow.”
Andorian nodded than said, “Well I’d feel better if we could use your information to come up with a tactical plan than letting him decide.”
They all nodded a bit before any one said anything. Janet finished her food and left the bunker. No one knew why she left. After a bit Andorian dismissed everyone to think of a plan or just to prepare for the next day.
Ferdinand sighed, he couldn’t think of anything. His earlier happy attitude had left him and he walked off to think.
Chapter 15: The Plan
Ferdinand starred down at the destruction of the battle that had happened so far. Acternius was beginning to seem worse than the Argo. He kept thinking about how scared he was going to be when he went over that trench the next day. He felt a lot of hatred toward Marshal Tex, for being so stubborn. He couldn’t believe someone so stupid got so highly ranked.
His eyes fell toward where the power generator was. He thought of what they would need so much energy for. Could it be for keeping all the lights on? Could it be power of machinery inside? Could they be powering up some sort of secret weapon?
His thoughts turned to how much power it had. Lime said it was unstable, and the armored power lines. He thought of an explosion and how big it would be……. AN EXPLOSION!
He was torn out of his thoughts and sat upright. He smiled at his idea and tore off to the bunker.
“So your saying we blow up the generator, so we can…… knock out their power supply?” said Andorian as he paced the space in front of his small squad.
“Well…… blow it up to make a big enough explosion to hurt a lot of them. It might as well be that so we can destroy their power supply,” Answered Ferdinand.
Andorian nodded and smiled. “Good work, kid. It looks like you just saved the lives of a lot of soldiers,” he said and he ran out of the bunker to tell the Marshal. Gambit took a copy of the “presentation” Lime had quickly put together to show the Marshal and followed Andorian.
Janet clapped Ferdinand on the back and smiled at him while saying, “Good work, Rookie. Looks like you just may have earned yourself a spot here after all.”
With that she walked off into the night. Ferdinand smiled. Yes he thought. Still smiling, he looked over at Lime, who was on his computer with a huge grin on his face.
“Gosh, Ferdinand. I think you’re on to something a lot bigger than a little explosion to knock off their power” He said.
“What do you mean?” Ferdinand asked.
“Well, you see,” started Lime, “I’ve been calculating the size of the explosion if we were to destroy that power box and I’ve…… found something.” He was shaking with excitement when he continued. “You see, if we were to blow up the box, the explosion could set up a chain reaction which could travel down this cord/pipe thing,” on his computer the power box highlighted red than the red traveled down the power cord toward the Science Facility, “and go toward the Science Facility. The Chain Reaction could continue inside, overriding the main power cells inside the Facility. That could actually mean that the entire Facility could explode from the inside!” He looked at Ferdinand than, now breathing hard. “If we destroy that power box, we could blow up the entire inside facility.”
Ferdinand smiled. He had just earned the respect of a lot of people, and he saved his life. All of a sudden, a thought dampened his thoughts.
“Um, how are we going to get in with all the guards?” he asked.
Lime looked up at him, and his smile faded suddenly. He looked down at his laptop and thought a bit. He typed a bit and brought up different pages and read them, than his smile returned and he said, “Easy.”
He gestured Ferdinand over and showed a 3D map of the power box and it’s security. He highlighted the time of day and the soldier units on watch.
“This is the shift on duty now.” He said, “It consists of 20 infantry men, 10 Marines, 1 sniper, 2 Siege Tanks, and every hour a wraith flies over. Now, this particular section has not been under attack since most of the trenches where abandoned by our forces and filled when new trenches were made at our front lines. It is still watched by both sides, but no action has yet been spotted.
“Any way, at twenty-two hundred eighteen hours, approximately three hours from now, the shift will change.” Lime’s smile grew a good amount when he continued, “All of them.
The map showed the highlighted figures slide across the compound and disappear at the border of the section they were watching. Lime continued.
“The infantry men and marines go to rest, the sniper gets his ammo stocked and heads to another position, the tanks go in for refueling and restock their ammo, plus whatever repairs they need, than return with the next shift. With all of this going on, it leaves the box… unprotected.”
Ferdinand got what he meant immediately. They would be unopposed when they blew it up.
“The best thing about it is that there will also be no wraiths flying over during that time because he would have before they switched.” Lime said, but then his voice got serious when he said, “but we only have 15 minutes before the second shift gets in range to see us.”
Ferdinand nodded. He knew that they could still do it. He was still excited that he had thought of it.
Just then Andorian and Gambit returned, with grim looks on their faces. Lime stood up and told them all about what he had discovered and about how important this would be to end this min I war. Andorian’s face just got more grim than before. Ferdinand and Lime then looked confused as they watched him sigh and sit down by his makeshift bed. He opened a can of Coca Cola, a drink that had been around since the late 20th century, and look at them stern.
“Call it off, boys,” he said, “The Marshal isn’t taking the plan.”
He put up his hand to stop the loads of questions and statements from Lime and Ferdinand and continued, when he did Janet entered from outside.
“We told him and he loved the plan, sure enough. He wants to get someone on it immediately. The problem is he says that if we wasted time we’d loose the war, so the planned mass attack is still on for tomorrow.” He listened to the sighs and under-the-breathe remarks from the others before continuing. “I’m sorry, guys, but our orders are not to continue on this plan at all but to prepare for the mass tomorrow.”
Ferdinand’s surprise turned into anger and he said, “He can’t do that. We can’t allow this to happen!”
“Now, Ferdinand, calm down. He can do that and if you try to talk him out of it you will find yourself court marshaled before tomorrow morning, or he’ll shot you himself.” Andorian said.
“You know what, I don’t see why we just don’t go and do it ourselves. It would take a small team to do it any way.” Ferdinand said.
“He’s got a good point, Andy.” Gambit chimed in.
“Now wait just a minute.” Yelled Andorian, stopping all other comments before they left any mouths. He looked around at all of them and said, “Do you know what you’re saying? You’re saying to disobey a direct order from a superior officer. I will not allow it.”
Ferdinand went to oppose him but Andorian held up his hand again to stop him.
“Private Ferdinand Inbags, I order you to stay here and don’t say another word on the subject. That’s a direct order.” Andorian said with now an angry look on his face.
Ferdinand shook his head and stormed out of the bunker. Gambit went to stop him but Andorian said “No”. They knew he would need some time to quiet down. Andorian sighed, than mentioned something about everyone getting some sleep.
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