The Shape of Surrender

The shuttle swayed as it skimmed the rooftops of the city. They were coming in low, to give the terrorists as little time to react as possible.

Tor’laen was down on one knee, on account of his stature, but he hung on to the grab rail on the ceiling anyway. This was a military shuttle, as opposed to a civilian one, the usual seating that filled the bay gone to make room for more soldiers. Mikka had crammed three full squads into the small craft, eighteen Zakkili commandos, fully armed and armored. And then him.

The Crown Daughter had signed off on his deployment, though Mikka had looked far too pleased when she handed him a weapon.

The Ydani held a burst-fire SMG in his free hand, the weapon small and light enough that he could easily fire it one-handedly. It was a sleeker thing than the weapons he was used to, and closer to a machine pistol in his hand than a true SMG. It would do.

The weapon didn’t have a round chambered, but he was careful to keep his finger resting against the side of the weapon — someone had removed the trigger guard so his finger would fit better on the small firearm. Slightly risky, but better than a gun he couldn’t fire.

He had a Zakkili-issue chest rig and plating strapped to his torso, though he suspected that someone had simply taken two of the things and rigged them together. But it was enough protection, by his guess. No helmet, though. Not a chance one of theirs would fit over his head, even before considering his horns.

“LT, I want to make a formal complaint that I still think giving the Ydani a weapon is fucking stupid,” one of the soldiers behind Tor’laen called out.

“Complaint noted and ignored, Sergeant,” Mikka called back from the front. “I’m not going to pass up the tactical advantage a fucking massive, active-duty warfighter brings to the table. I’m pretty sure he could pick you up and throw you farther than you can throw a grenade, Rila.” The Lieutenant Commander glanced back, her blue eyes visible behind the visor of her helmet. “Besides, I think you’re just still bitter that the big guy and his men packed you and your squad up so neatly when they boarded the Aegis.”

“They had those damn suits, LT.”

“He would have bundled you up even without them, Rila.” Mikka turned back toward the front of the shuttle, the other soldiers chuckling at the exchange.

Tor’laen looked down, catching Saia’s gaze as she stood next to him, now fully kitted out in Zakkili wargear. She grinned and winked at the Ydani.

The mood was upbeat, maybe even positively cheerful among the soldiers. They finally had a chance to strike back at the source of all the mayhem and unrest on Orphila, and they relished it. Tor’laen found he couldn’t disagree with the sentiment.

However, there was still a note of caution humming in the back of his mind. Someone wanted them to do this. Someone who had turned a civilian into an unwilling terrorist and left a note for them to find inside her mind. It didn’t exactly inspire confidence.

Mikka, though, was taking the fact into consideration. She already had a dozen squads of Armswomen moving undercover, surrounding the building, scouting it out. Even the Aegis had done several deep-penetrating scans of the area, revealing no heavy weapons, no obvious explosive stockpiles, and no hidden reinforcement force beyond the life signs already clustered inside the factory. If there was more to the trap, it was impossibly well-hidden.

Tor’laen couldn’t stop his lips from curling into a grin. It had been far too long since he had last been included in something like this. Spotty intel, the possibility of hidden enemies, forces moving outside his control…yes, far too long.

“Eyes up, ladies! We’re less than a mark out!” Mikka’s voice filled the crowded compartment. “You all know the drill. Sweep and clear, just like we’ve gone over! It’s what you’ve all trained to do, you’re damn good at it, and you’re going to give these terrorists a firsthand demonstration of that fact!”

A round of metallic snaps echoed in the troop bay as the Zakkili soldiers chambered rounds into their weapons. Tor’laen chambered his weapon as well, jamming his finger behind the trigger to prevent any accidental misfires. The metal uncomfortably pinched the digit, cold against his bare skin, but he barely even felt it, adrenaline starting to pump through his veins.

“How are we handling this, LT?” Saia called from his side.

“RoE? Weapons free, Corporal. Accept any who surrender and pack them up. But if they resist — put them down with extreme prejudice. Remember, these are fucking terrorists planning to bomb their own damn city. They’re already walking corpses in the eyes of the Monarchy.”

“Yes, LT!” Saia snapped a salute, still holding her rifle.

“Hey big guy,” Mikka’s gaze found his. “You’re rolling with my squad. Try not to stare at any flashbangs, yeah?” She tapped the side of her helmet, her grin plain in her eyes behind her visor.

“Understood.” He returned her grin, not bothering to hide his eagerness.

The shuttle banked, the soldiers inside swaying with the motion, then the craft abruptly dropped. There was a split second of freefall before a loud clanging noise rang out — the landing skids making contact with a metal roof.

“Go go go!”

The doors on both sides opened, and the Armswomen spilled out, the first ones out of the shuttle fanning out and dropping to one knee, sweeping the immediate area as their fellow soldiers exited the craft. Tor’laen ducked out of the exit, careful not to ring his skull or horns on the metal, and raised his weapon, sweeping the area above the heads of the shorter Zakkili.

They were on the flat roof of some kind of factory building, deep within the industrial district. The building was unremarkable compared to the ones surrounding it, little more than a large steel box with some windows and entrances built into it. He glanced around, but there was no sign of any activity on the roof, just some entrances to the factory below, and a few cylinder-shaped cooling systems.

When the last woman was out of the shuttle, its doors resealed, and the craft moved to take off, the backwash from the engines rolling over the soldiers.

“Let’s move! Chapel team, Grace team, get to your entrances! Altar team, on me!” Mikka barked out the orders, her visor open, waving her troops to their positions.

Tor’laen followed the squad of six armored Zakkili, over to one of the corners of the roof where a square entrance structure stood. Out of the corner of his vision, the Ydani noted the other two squads moving to different entrances, on opposite sides of the building.

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“Locked, of course.” Mikka’s voice came only through his earpiece now, the faceplate of her helmet flipped down once more. “Get me a small breaching charge — we’ll blow the lock right off.”

“Lieutenant Commander, if I may?” Tor’laen stepped up.

Mikka glanced up at him for half a second, then stood aside. The Ydani squared himself up. The door was metal, but it looked only to be some kind of aluminum, and made thinly. Not exactly built with security in mind.

Winding up one of his long legs, Tor’laen’s muscles tensed, then his boot shot forward, slamming into the door right next to the latching mechanism. The thing crumpled backwards, a massive dent where his foot had impacted. It swung inwards shakily, the hinges damaged. The latch had been completely sheared off, the newly exposed metal catching the light.

“Oh, damn.” Mikka nodded. “Alright, good shit.”

The Lieutenant Commander took point again, leading her team down into the factory. The upper floors of the building were mostly administrative offices, according to the blueprints they had been shown beforehand. The hallways were sterile-looking, white-paneled walls and tan-carpeted floors under fluorescent lighting. Lights that were conspicuously on, as well. Tor’laen tightened his grip on his weapon.

Just as Mikka had said, her soldiers were experienced, and they moved through the empty hallways, checking corners and clearing rooms. The small offices were basically stripped bare, which meant clearing each one took only a second or two.

The team was passing through a four-way intersection when Tor’laen caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye. Instinctively, he jumped backwards, grabbing the rig of the woman in front of him, hauling her off her feet out of the intersection. A heartbeat later, and the sound of gunfire filled the narrow hallways, bullets whizzing through the air where the Ydani and Zakkili woman had been a moment before.

“Contact!” Mikka roared over the team’s comm channel. “Suppress those bitches!”

Two of her Armswomen moved to the corners of the intersection without hesitation. As soon as there was a small pause in the incoming gunfire, each woman stuck her weapon around the corner, spraying tungsten rounds in suppressing fire. They kept the rest of their bodies in cover, even their heads. Tor’laen guessed that they must be using the cameras embedded in their weapon’s sights — the feeds sent directly to the visors of their helmets.

“Targets suppressed, LT!” one of them called out, no gunfire returning from down the hallway.

The rest of the squad was covering the other three directions, leaving Mikka free to step out from behind her Armswoman, raising her rifle down the corridor. The Lieutenant Commander was steady as a rock, her rifle completely motionless as she waited for a target. Tor’laen also leaned out of cover, raising his SMG in the same direction.

Cease fire.

Mikka’s psychic command reached even Tor’laen, and the two Armswomen immediately pulled their weapons back. A stark stillness and silence filled the narrow corridors for a breath, before one of the shooters, a Zakkili female, burst from cover.

A single crack, and Mikka put a bullet through the woman’s skull.

Almost simultaneously, the other terrorist, a Zakkili male, popped up from behind the crate he had been hiding behind. Tor’laen walked a burst of his SMG up the man’s body — holes suddenly appearing in his stomach, chest, and neck — before the Zakkili could even raise his weapon. He flopped over like a rag doll, all tension instantly leaving his body.

“Clear!” Mikka’s voice came over the comm channel. “Well, they sure as fuck know we’re here now.”

She moved up to the bodies, weapon at the ready. Tor’laen followed, keeping the far end of the hallway covered. The Lieutenant Commander nudged the dead woman’s body with her boot and the Ydani glanced down at the pair of deceased terrorists. They were both dressed in civilian attire, unremarkable in its plainness. A handgun rested by each body, the weapons old and worn.

“These aren’t trained insurgents. They’re fucking citizens of Orphila,” Mikka swore. “These pieces of shit wanted to blow up their fucking neighbors. Murder innocents over some imagined grievance with the Monarchy.”

The Ydani stared down at the limp bodies. The mere idea of it, trying to harm their fellow citizens to strike back at the government, turned his stomach. He followed Mikka as she stormed back to the rest of the squad, still keeping his eye on the end of the hallway.

“It’s about what we expected — near antiquated firearms and barely any equipment. No need to linger here. Let’s keep moving, ladies!”

The squad smoothly moved into formation once again. The Armswoman Tor’laen had yanked out of the intersection bumped her fist into his thigh as she slid past him.

“Thanks for the save, man.”

He nodded at her, and she dragged a thumb in an arc across her helmet’s faceplate, copying the path a smiling mouth might make.

Mikka paused for a moment, raising a hand to halt the squad, then bringing it to the side of her helmet.

“Grace team has made contact with hostiles. Chapel team is still en route,” she said after a moment. “Keep clearing rooms, but at double time, ladies! We’ll meet them in the fabrication facilities!”

The squad started moving again, quicker this time. Each time they came to another doorway or office, one of the Armswomen would break from the formation, rapidly sweep the room clear, then hurry to catch up with the rest of the squad, rotating positions.

They met with no more contacts for nearly five marks. Tor’laen frowned. It was suicidal not to have established defensive positions and pickets throughout a base, what were these people thinking? He subtly shook his head. That was exactly it — they weren’t thinking. These weren’t soldiers. They had little to no training, no instruction. It was probably a small miracle they had even the sense to stage an ambush at all.

The squad stopped once more as Mikka raised a fist. They moved with her, flattening against a wall and stacking up next to a set of double doors.

“Quiet.”

The Lieutenant Commander’s order came in a whisper over the team’s comm channel. With his taller vantage, Tor’laen watched as Mikka pulled a small cable out of one of her rig’s pouches. Under the fluorescent lights, he could see the tip of it catch the light — a camera’s lens. He smiled at the cleverness of the little tool, watching Mikka slowly feed it through one of the corners of the doorway.

The Ydani fished a modest-sized tablet out of his rig, pressing the icon that let him tap into the team’s channel. A moment later, and the camera’s feed popped up on the screen. Not as useful as a helmet, but he would make do.

The room on the other side of the doors was large enough that it easily rivaled the Aegis’s mess hall in size. Most of the space was dominated by numerous rows of fabricators — bulky, box-like devices that were so sizable even Tor’laen would have been able to stand comfortably inside one. They were the primitive cousins of the fabricator he had used back on the Citadel. Civilian-standard, most likely. These were surrounded by various desks and workstations, most switched off, their screens dark and empty.

As Mikka rotated the camera to see more of the room, the Ydani tensed at the sight of movement. There were numerous people milling about, their movements uncertain, almost panicky. A good number of them were Zakkili, of either sex, but other races were mixed in. He noted sturdy Dorrai, a few Kelrana perched on top of the fabricators, and a couple other races he didn’t know the names of. All were dressed in civilian clothes, though some had body armor strapped atop them, the gear looking old and worn. It seemed like every single one of them was armed, mostly sidearms, but a few had SMGs and even a rifle or two.

Tor’laen watched, impressed by the Zakkili software, as the camera automatically tagged each of the terrorists it spotted, tracking them even through the wall.

“When we breach, it’s gonna be a fucking firefight,” came Mikka’s quiet voice over the comms. “Watch each other’s backs out there. And don’t take cover behind any of those desks or workstations — it’s all quick-fab shit, even a handgun will punch right through.”

She waited until each member of the team acknowledged her, with Tor’laen simply clicking his mic to get around his lack of a helmet.

“Chapel team is stacked up on the opposite door of the room. Watch for crossfire.”

The Lieutenant Commander signaled to her squad, and two of the Armswomen moved into position behind her. Tor’laen slipped the tablet back into his rig. Mikka held up her hand, fingers spread, and slowly closed them one by one.

Five. Four. Three. Two. One.

She closed her hand into a fist, and kicked the doors open.

The two Armswomen each tossed a pair of flashbangs into the room, spreading out the four devices, before skittering to the other side of the doorway. There came a series of panicked exclamations from inside the room, then an ear-splitting bang and a blinding flash of light. Mikka’s excitement and eagerness Pressed into the squad as her psychic command sounded in their heads.

Move in!