Ironclad

Subterranean

The elevator came to a stop as it reached the bottom of the wide elevator shaft, shaking the platform subtly as it contacted the ground.
The rattle that came off of it echoed up through the space above them. They were so far down they couldn't even see where they got in from, and the dim lights that lined the walls weren't helping at all.

River and a few other soldiers took the first steps off of the platform and looked around the room they had arrived in, which appeared to be some sort of vehicle depot. Old trucks and transporters were lined up in rows in their own sectioned off areas. A crane system ran above it all, fixed to rails that ran along the high ceiling.
River walked cautiously, looking around the room when she noticed the tools that were laying around.

"I think they must have left in a hurry" she said, lowering her weapon when she was sure the room was safe.
The rest of their remaining forces walked off the platform and collected themselves for a moment.
The room was damp, dark and horribly maintained, with cracks forming in the corners of the walls, mould growing all over and water dripping through the concrete.

Dasyil was confused "I don't understand, how can they make things like the ships that attacked us, but they can't even maintain a small outpost like this"

Briggs walked over, scratching his head "Maybe someone's helping them. I know a lot of companies have made a lot of money over this war. Maybe someone thinks that the investment is worth it to keep the money coming.." he said, slightly hopeful that that wasn't the case.

Looking at him for a moment, Dasyil nodded "That's possible. But I'm not sure who would want to drag the war out"

Briggs nodded "Probably one of the big giant corporations. Triicorp. Proto Industries. Zenith Technologies" he said, exhaling "It could be anyone really."

"But why wait until now to do it?" River asked as she checked the doorway that led out to a wide open tunnel, big enough for the trucks to drive down.

"Who says they only just started? They didn't build those ships in a day, River" Briggs replied, looking over to her.

Dasyil exhaled and nodded "Right, that's food for thought. But we should focus on our targets. Scarlett, Fredrick and..." he paused for a moment, then sighed "And Vladistov." 

"We should move in then, who knows where they are. The longer we take the more likely they're to escape offworld" River suggested as she stood to the side and ordered the Badgers to lead on.

And they did just that. The surviving Badgers rolled on through the tunnel, lighting it up with their powerful spotlights. The lights the tunnel had were dim and broken, not giving much in the way of illumination. 
River followed behind them with the rest of the soldiers they had with them, with the rest of the less combat experienced survivors trailed behind with Dasyil.
Dasyil held his officer's handgun tightly in both hands. It was a beast of a gun. It had a sleek and angular body, with Dasyil's rank attached to the side in the form of a golden pin that was firmly held in place.
The handle was black, with a gritty and firm material that was easy to grip and hold.
It could take many different types of ammunition, as the gun was built with advanced mechanical pieces that could change the internals around dependant on the bullet.
It could take smaller pistol rounds one moment and the next take shotgun shells.
The only downside is that each magazine has to be different, as you couldn't put a shotgun shell in a magazine made for nine millimetre rounds.
Dasyil was currently carrying fifty caliber bullets. He was going to be going into a battlefield against desperate and cornered men, so he wasn't taking any chances.

One of the engineers was holding a normal handgun, he looked at Dasyil and chuckled slightly
"I don't suppose you've got any more of those, do you?" he joked, gesturing to Dasyil's gun.

He chuckled back at him and shook his head "No, but once we're all done, I'll get everyone here a personalised gun of their choice" he said, aiming to keep morale up.

"...Within reason of course. I'm not buying everyone light machine guns" he said and then laughed.

Up ahead however, River was listening to them chatter behind them, and looked forward "They seem surprisingly chipper"

Briggs nodded "It keeps the mood up." he said, then cracked his knuckles as he looked to her and continued "Back when I first joined up, when I was just a Private, I served on a ship called the Gladiator. Must be twenty years since then. She was just a frigate, but she was fiesty"

River was listening to his story as she walked along, keeping an eye out for any sign of trouble.

Briggs continued "Must have been only a year after I joined her crew that I took part in the Second Battle of Mars. The Gladiator had been assigned to the Mars Defense Fleet, so we were there with a lot of the heavy hitters. And we waited there for weeks on end, on constant high alert. Nobody was allowed to leave or land on the planet without going through a military checkpoint."

River nodded "I must have just been a teenager then, or starting to be"

Briggs nodded and smiled gently "But then they came into view after hiding in the planets shadow. Must have been the biggest fleet I had seen. Dreadnoughts, battleships, all sorts of different types and classes. It was like nothing I'd ever seen before"

"You must have fought valiantly if you're still here, Major" River said as she watched him

Briggs chuckled, and nodded "I did, I reached deep inside of myself to muster up every ounce of fight in me" he said, then exhaled "Within the first few hours of the fight, the Gladiator was hit by a round from something big, must have been a battleship. If it were a dreadnought then we wouldn't have survived. But it destroyed the reactor and punched a hole right through the center of her hull"
Briggs took a moment to compose himself, as he seemed to be recalling some bad memories.
"We were adrift. We had no power, no oxygen production, nothing... A lot of people died in that first shot too. But we endured. We worked to try and reroute power from the emergency batteries so we could have a little longer to hold out. And just when it seemed like we weren't going to last until rescue parties arrived, I heard singing"

River was confused, as she looked at him "Singing?"

"Yeah, singing. It was faint at first, but all of us who survived just started singing. Some of them were trapped in compartments that couldn't be accessed anymore, but we could still hear them. Our captain used to always play the same dumb song on the announcer every day, we all hated it. But that was what we were singing. Through the whole ship, the men and women were singing. It echoed through the vents and pipes. We all joined in and sang until we were rescued. But it makes me feel... Proud, to know that my fellow crewmates passed on to the sound of their crew serenading them in their final moments"

Then he laughed, and shook his head "Looking back on it we probably should have kept quiet to preserve oxygen, but we all felt so hopeless we had to do something to bring us all back up."

River seemed to be fascinated by his story, nodding "I see. It's a very touching story, Major. I hope that the survivors of your crew are safe"

Briggs nodded "I do too. Some of them continued fighting, others retired after that. I keep in touch with those still around. The captain was killed when we first got hit, but I'm sure he was listening to us butcher his favourite song" he laughed, and then nodded "Good people, they were"

River nodded, and let the silence speak for a few moments as they walked along the empty tunnel, listening to the rumble of the Badgers in front of them and their footsteps echoing against the tunnel walls.




I'm so sorry for the massive delay in this chapter. I've been busy, being not busy. With everything going on, it's very difficult to find motivation to write. Which sucks, because I never want to leave people hanging. 
Sorry again, and I'll try not to be so long next time