Syntax Error
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DANGER! Multiple Processors Offline
WARNING! CPU Core Voltage Low
WARNING! Clock Voltage Low
Volatile Memory Damage
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Repair System Diagnostic CRC Error
Repair System Status: Unknown

"I hate this place," someone's voice floated out of the dark hallway outside the room. I picked up the flashlight and clicked it off, turning around and facing the bathroom door in the darkness. I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. Visual purple released into my eyes and when I opened them everything slowly began to brighten up from pitch black to shapes in the darkness. Flashlights were sweeping outside the door, throwing patches of light on the glittering frost and ice that was covering the walls and doors.

"Look, that chick said that her squad leader had the keys to the vehicles. We need those keys," another voice answered.

...two targets...

"I want off this goddamn mountain," the first said. "Goddamn it, I hope that grinning fucker isn't anywhere around. You're sure that guy is dead? He fucked up Kellington and Michaels really bad. I don't want that big fucker coming at me."

...Tandy...

"Calm down. Hastings said he wasted that Stillwater guy, he should still be there. Even if he wasn't dead, he's probably frozen to death by now," The second said. "Stop being such a fucking pussy. There, there's the door that came down in the fight, he should be in there."

The sheathe on my boot was empty, same with the one at the small of my back. Someone had disarmed me, but that was all right. I straightened up, rolling my shoulders. The surgical repair I'd had in the spring had done wonders, there wasn't even tightness any more. I took a deep breath as the flashlights panned over the doorway.

"He's in the room. Hastings said him and Wemmel stomped him to make sure he was dead," The second said.

The darkness was comfortable and almost felt like it was wrapping around me as the two men stepped into the room, carefully stepping over the door. I closed my good eye, shifted to the side, to in front of the toilet, so that the wall was in the way, right before they panned their flashlights over the wall.

"What the hell? Where is he? Why is the window open?" the second guy asked.

"I don't know. We need to get the fuck out of here if that big mother fucker is gone," The first said. Both turned and left the room, stepping over the door.

They moved out of the room and I followed them, moving silently like the Rangers had shown us during Copper Window. Normally I was a stomper, but this time I wanted quiet. I knew they wouldn't look behind them, they never did.

"Christ, goddamn Wemmel and Hastings said that big fucker was dead," The second said. They were hustling it down the hallway.

"He's probably going for his vehicles," the first said.

"Maybe those pregnant bitches?" the second offered.

"Naw, he'd go for that hard core bitch we had to lock up," the first corrected him, "She carved the shit out Blaire and Garvin before we knocked her out."

...Nancy?...

"We gotta tell Hastings. If Lieutenant Carson or Captain Rebel gets a hold of those vehicles they'll be able to get the fuck off this mountain and you just know those assholes will leave whoever isn't one of their ass buddies," the first kept going.

They moved into the middle stairwell and I waited at the third floor landing. I could tell by the stencil on the wall that led "LOBOTOMY WARD NORTH/SOUTH" where I was now. I watched them move down to the bottom floor, near the QASI offices and supply rooms. I counted to three and ghosted out of them, keeping to the wall side of the stairs and landings, keeping silent. I actually caught the door before it closed all the way and saw them go into the supplies used for setting up camps.

I put my boot out and caught the double-door that was slowly closing, preventing it from closing all the way.

"Well, did you get the keys?" Someone asked, then coughed wetly. "Goddamn it. I think that fucker broke something inside of me."

"No, he wasn't there," voice one said.

"He's fucking dead. Did that grinning weirdo get him?" another voice asked, this one angry.

A woman laughed, a familiar voice. "Better men than you two faggots have tried to kill Stillwater. Now he's on the loose and probably coming to kill you."

There was a smack of flesh on flesh. "Shut up, bitch."

"He's gonna kill all you assholes," the same woman laughed.

"Where is he?" The guy with the wet cough asked. Another smack.

No anger. Just focus. I was listening to their voices through the crack in the door. The voice of the woman was familiar, but I couldn't figure out who it was.

"He's going to one of the War Fighter Caches right now, that's what. He won't let Group sensitive information follow into hostile hands," the woman's voice laughed.

"What the fuck is War Fighter?" the angry voice asked.

The woman stopped laughing. "You fucked up and didn't kill Sergeant Stillwater when you had the chance. He's going to kill every member of your shit eating REMF loser unit." Her voice was soft and deadly.

Another smack. "Where is he going? Where is this cache?"

The woman didn't speak until he repeated his demand, then her voice was low and soft. I could hear other people moving around, and the lizard reported that there was at least a dozen people moving around in there. The lack of heat rolling through the crack told me that they didn't have heat, and the flickering soft light told me that they didn't have any power and no good lighting.

"Site Delta, Site Golf, and Site Lima have full caches to arm an infantry company," the woman said. "He's probably after one of the smaller ones, for platoon sized Special Forces elements. Unless you know the landmarks, I can't tell you how to get there."

Silence for a moment as the information sunk in. I didn't think those sites were real. They didn't stir any memories, except for a set of three steel doors with German military markings on them. That was the cache.

"Show us," the angry guy said.

"Let the pregnant women have access to food and..." the woman started, a slap interrupting her.

"Show us, or we'll kill one of those sluts," the angry voice.

"Fine," the woman said softly. "There's one at the bottom of the hill behind the barracks."

"Johns, Delmine, take the bitch out there. Don't let her have any extra gear. If she tried to run, let her, there's nothing out there to save her ass," angry voice.

"Can I at least have my gloves back?"

"No," the cougher said, then groaned. "Jesus, we can't let that bastard get to any weapons. I'm hurt bad."

"Deal with, Wemmel. If you weren't such a pussy, he wouldn't have hurt you so bad," the angry voice snapped.

"Stay in front of us, bitch, no tricks," a new voice said.

"I'll beat you to death if you fuck around," another said, trying to sound tough.

The light in the crack of the door was blocked and I made my decision.

I'd seen it before. I'd been on the other side of it.

The door slammed open when I slapped my hand against it. In front of me was a room with over a dozen wads of blankets and tent liners around the large storage room, with a group of people in the middle, gathered around a stove half that was filled with wan light. A heavy-set woman with a flashlight clipped to her front right pocket was leading two guys, one guy with an obviously broken nose, her hands tied behind her back. Her eyes widened at the sight of me and she screamed when I reached forward, grabbed her by the front of her uniform, and snatched her behind me as the door bounced off the wall.

The flashlight illuminated my chest and face perfectly, and people began screaming as I yanked the woman into the hallway.

One guy, fairly large and bulky, lifted up his hand and I saw fire blossom in his fist three times as the door swung shut.

All three shots missed me completely.

The woman had bounced off the wall and had recovered her balance enough to stumble toward the middle stairwell door, still screaming. I turned from the door and walked toward her as she hit the door and turned around, trying to get a hold on the door handle with her hands bound behind her back.

I coughed right before I reached her, blood filling my mouth, and I let it run out of my mouth, over my lower lip and down my chin. I coughed again as she stopped screaming, cocking her head slightly and frowning.

"Stillwater?" She asked.

I nodded slowly.

"Are you alive?" she asked. I saw the door open slightly.

I nodded again.

"Let's go," she said, pulling the door open. She turned and we moved up the stairs, silent except for her breathing heavily by the middle landing. "We've got a shot at freeing the preggos."

We went through the door, stopping at the first floor laundry room. She stopped and looked over her shoulder.

"Cut me loose, Stillwater," She said.

I just stared.

"Come on, Sergeant, untie me," She said.

I still just stood there.

She turned around and looked at me. She looked me up and down. "Goddamn, I didn't remember you being this big." She tilted her head toward the door. "The pregnant troops and the others are in there. There's like one or two guards. Kill them."

I just nodded slowly.

"Holy shit..." the woman breathed softly. I moved past her. "Holy Mary Mother of God."

I lifted a fist and hammered on the door to the laundry room. Someone yelled something and I repeated the action, hammering harder. They yelled something again, so I repeated it, slamming my fist against it hard enough to shake it in the frame.

"Don't kill the women or anyone tied up, Stillwater," The woman said softly.

I growled in return.

The door pulled open, revealing a man wearing winter BDU's and a field jacket with a liner in it as well as a extreme cold weather cap. His eyes widened as I stepped into him.

"OH SHIT!" He screamed as my hands reached for him. "NO, PLEASE!"

My right hand covered his face.

My left hand wrapped around his neck.

I squeezed my right hand.

His face tore free of his skull, wadding up in my fist.

The scream turned bubbly as I let him go and he fell backwards, his hands going to the raw and bloody skull I'd revealed.

There was another man further in, standing stock still in the middle of the room.

I raised up the flesh in my hand, unwadding it and holding it up.

The empty eye sockets and mouth screamed silently in contrast to the guy gurgling out screams on the ground and the guy in the middle of room who was starting to scream like a gelded horse.

Five steps, dropping the flesh, and I was on him, my hands reaching out.

"I HAVE A FAMILY!" he tried.

My hand wrapped around his neck and I lifted him off the ground.

"LEAVE HIM ALIVE!" the woman behind me's voice was a whipcrack.

I drove my right first into his chest, feeling bones crack and break.

I dropped him.

He had been holding a bayonet. I saw it, but didn't care. I just stood in the middle of the room, silent, swaying slightly, staring at the far end of the room. I didn't bother to stare at the ten pregnant women sitting on the floor with their hands tied. On either side was a man, tied up. They were all gagged.

The woman who had accompanied me bustled into the room, watching me as she kicked the knife to one of the pregnant women.

"Ant, are you in there?" She asked.

The words felt like cold thick molasses as they wound through my brain. The lizard replayed them repeatedly until they suddenly made sense.

I nodded slowly, coughing again, blood running down my chin again.

"Cut me loose, hurry, I don't know how long we have," The woman said, squatting down.
 "You don't want to know what I mean."

I stared at the still alive man at my feet. His arms were wrapped around his chest and he was wheezing, coughing blood in a fan in front of him. I started to lift my boot to stomp his life out.

"NO!" The stocky woman said. "Stand fast," she snapped.

My foot slowly lowered and I swayed slightly, my balance off. The lizard kicked the panel and the gyroscope picked up speed between my ears to keep me upright.

"Good. Let me undo yours. There. Get the rest. Hurry, I need to check Sergeant Stillwater out," the woman said, moving around in front of me. She had a penlight in her hand. She reached up when I looked down at her, pulling my lower eyelid down and shining the light into my left eye.

"Nope, no pupil reaction. Pupil open and fixed, but that's your bad eye," She said, switching to the other. Her breath steamed out in front of her.

"Pupil open and fixed," She said. She shook her head. "Do you understand me, Stillwater?"

The words wound through my brain for a long time before I finally nodded slowly. She exhaled sharply, the steam from her breath blowing into my face.

She shined her light on my face and shook her head. "Mother of God," she said softly.

"What's wrong with him, Cromwell?" A pregnant girl asked. I could see the swell of her belly under her field jacket and it stirred something inside of me.

"Severe traumatic brain injury," The woman, Cromwell said.

"Is he going to be OK?" the pregnant woman asked, looking up. "Wow, he's really big."

Cromwell, I guess that was her name, nodded slowly. "Yeah, he is, isn't he?"

"I thought his brother was the taller one," The preggo said. I kept staring at Cromwell's face.

"Don't worry about it, Private," Cromwell said softly.

"Everyone's untied," Someone said.

"Did he pull that guy's face off?" One of the men asked, a slight Jersey accent blurring his words.

"It must've not been very well attached," Cromwell chuckled. She rolled her shoulders. "It's snowing, we can't get out, there's five groups scattered through the barracks, motorpool, chow hall. We need somewhere safe for them."

It took me a little while to process the words, and she repeated them again, slowly, reaching up and taking my chin so she could tilt my head and stare into my eyes. Her chin only came up to my sternum.

She was a tiny girl.

"Do you know where we can go within five minutes where people won't find us?" Cromwell asked, carefully enunciating each word and speaking slowly.

The lizard threw up the map of the barracks, marking spots off, until we got it. Office behind the Fourth Floor Training Office.

I nodded slowly.

"Lead the way, Ant," Cromwell said.

I moved to the door, stopping and looking down at the guy on the floor who was missing his face. I lifted my boot and brought it down into his screaming face. The skull imploded, brains spraying out of the rents in the flesh and bone.

He stopped screaming.

"Holy..." someone started.

"Don't. Stay silent. We're extremely lucky and in extreme danger right now," Cromwell hissed. "Shut up and follow."

I pulled open the door, the lock/mechanism snapping inside the door. I ducked my head slightly, worried that I wouldn't clear the doorway. I took a right, moving through Queer Country.

"Cromwell, Stillwater's losing a lot of blood. He's leaving a pretty steady trail of pretty big drops," a woman said.

"It doesn't matter," Cromwell snapped. "Shut up."

The stairwell was empty, although it looked as if there had been fire that had blackened the walls, blistered the paint, and melted the plastic on the hand rails. I moved quietly up the side against the wall, taking each step slowly and deliberately.

REBELS DIE was written in OD green camo stick on the wall of the mid-point landing between the second and third floor.

I ignored it.

On the fourth floor I pushed open the door and stepped into the hallway. The hallway was empty, the hallway was dim and ice glittered dimly on the walls.

"Hurry, Ant," Cromwell said softly.

We moved down to the open bay at the end of the hallway. I went left, pushing open the door. It must have been locked, because something went crunch and a chunk of the left hand door fell to the floor. Beyond were the desks and file cabinets and planning boards of the Group Training Office.

I kept moving to the back, where a heavy door sat. Dents and scratches on the door showed that someone had tried to force it.

"Open it, Ant," Cromwell said, her voice holding the whipcrack of command.

"How's he..." someone started to ask.

I grabbed the handle and pulled, something groaning inside the door for a moment before it gave a loud crack and swung open with a scream.

Beyond were training supplies, including stacked boxes of MREs.

"Get in, hurry," Cromwell said. She took my hand and led me inside of room and waved at one of the pregnant women to shut the door. They pulled it shut, but it wouldn't stay.

"Grab a cravat and tie it closed," Cromwell snapped, grabbing a glowstick off of a shelf and cracking it. The green light filled the room. "Everyone grab one."

"How did he?" someone started.

"At ease," Cromwell snapped, grabbing a box of MRE's. She tore it open, grabbing out a brown plastic bag to tear into. After a second she held up a small pack. "See these? Get me as many as you can. Don't say what it is, don't ask why, your lives depend on it."

The people in the dark nodded. I stood there silently and watched uninterestedly.

"Are you still in there, Ant?" Cromwell asked at one point, looking up and taking my chin in her hand to tilt my head down.

The words took a moment before I understood them and nodded.

She smiled, the smile lighting up her face. Her button nose wrinkled slightly as I coughed and blood flowed over my chin again.

"What do we do with them?" Someone asked.

"How many?"

"Thirty."

"Get more. One of you tear them open, pour them in my hand," Cromwell said. She held out her hand while I stood there looking at her. She stared at me.

After a moment she walked around me, still holding my chin. After a full 360 degree turn she stepped back.

There was a liquid snap in my vision, like a wavy plexiglass tube had dropped down around me.

"There, that might hold him," Cromwell said, stepping back.

"Salt? Why would a salt ring hold him?" One of the girls with a rounded belly asked.

"Because I don't think he's all the way alive," Cromwell said softly.