Chương 94: AT THE LABORATORY OF MADNESS
(UK, 1 week ago)
"Anyone alive?" asked Aya, as they looked through the wreckage of the UK police and SAS convoy.
"Negative Big Sis," said Liu Zhong. "All dead, they left no survivors."
Once making sure that there is nothing else of value. they drove off, trailing the path of the escaping Archangel and Vanguard members.
Albert has his eyes fixed on his individual radar which is linked to the mini-drone following them outside the SUV, keeping an alert on their surroundings.
Driving on the road, they arrived on a hill, overlooking of a small cluster of buildings.
Aya ordered them to stop, and they stepped out of the car.
"I see their cars," said Aya, pointing to the familiar cars parked on one side.
"Do we engage?" asked Vera, aiming her SVD.
Aya shook her head, saying that the 5 of them are outnumbered. Liu Zhong protested, arguing that there may be valuable intelligence down there.
After some back and forth, Liu Zhong relented, but managing to get her permission to place trackers on their vehicles. He then put down his machine gun, sneaking down the hill.
A while later, he came back, crouching down back in the grass. The 5 of them watched the Archangel and Vanguard people leaving.
Aya ordered them to withdraw.
(At their safe house 3 days later)
"So based on the trackers and the surrounding videos they provided by hacking into the cars' cameras," analysed Clara, pointing to the holographic projection, "they left on a private plane after arriving at an airport."
"Where is this plane headed to?" asked Aya.
"Based on images and flight records, they landed in Djibouti. There is an Archangel lab there in the desert," replied Clara.
"This is worth investigating," said Aya.
This prompted Liu Zhong to protest, pointing out that the facility is too big for the 5 of them to investigate.
Aya laughed, assuring them that they are not alone, and they can easily find backup in Djibouti.
(Djibouti desert, near the Archangel factory, September 2134)
Aya, Liu Zhong, Clara, Albert and Vera walked on the sand, looking at their GPS modems to ensure they are at the right rendezvous point. They are dressed in civilian clothes, wearing their Exo-suits over them. Their rifles are hanged over their bodies.
Aya blinked, covering her eyes slightly from the glaring sunlight.
A while later, 4 armoured vehicles pulled up, one of them is of a different model and flying a Chinese flag, the other 3 are flying the American flag.
The vehicles stopped, and their occupants stepped out, forming a defensive sentry as they do so.
"Captain Aya," saluted Sergeant Henry Winters. The rest of the US Marines 15 men squad followed suit. "It's good to see you again."
"Pleasure's mine," said Aya.
Captain Gao and fellow PLAN "Jiaolong" Commando, Lieutenant Liang Chen stepped forward, greeting Aya and their American colleagues.
"Let's move out," said Aya, and they set off, with the Chinese vehicle leading, and the American vehicles following.
"All stations attention, our target this time is the Archangel lab, it is located deep in the desert area to the south of the Chinese military base. This is a recon and intel collection mission. The Jiaolongs will scout the way. Once we arrive, a sniper group and a drone operator from the UN, and one Marine fire team stay with the vehicles and provide overwatch, the rest of us breach and search the compound. If things go south, the Djibouti armed forces are on standby as a QRF" instructed Aya.
"How's Xu Qing?" asked Captain Gao.
Aya sighed, as much as the UN tried to cool down the media backlash following the events in thr UK, it already spread like wildfire, hence Captain Gao would have seen Team Zero's involvement.
"They are...fine..." muttered Aya.
They remained silent throughout the journey, and Aya rested a bit. One thing still pesters her, which is why is her request for the help of American and Chinese troops in Djibouti so easily coordinated and approved. This can only mean one thing, that within the UNSSD system itself, she and her recon team are still registered as alive and active personnel with a mission, instead of MIA.
They arrived at a hill overlooking the lab. It was already dark and the Sun had set, just as they planned.
"This is quite scary," muttered Liang Chen, grabbing his QBZ-192 and disembarking, activating his night vision.
He is right. The reason why they require the assistance of the PLAN is because the lab only appears on Archangel records. To both the Djibouti government and the foreign troops on its land, it is just a barren plot of sand.
They all disembarked, going to their duties as planned.
Clara flew her drone, while the US Marines drone operator went to handle the vehicles' weapon system with the other marines, readying the heavy weapons, while Albert and Vera set up a sniper position.
"I don't see any form of patrol nor guards," said Albert, looking through his sniper scope. "It's completely open, like a village in the countryside."
"There is no other life signals detected, strange," said Clara, flying the drone around. "Be careful."
"Copy that," said Captain Gao, leading the remaining 15 soldiers forward in a front triangle search formation, all with their night vision on, checking their surroundings alertly as they approached the building.
As they advanced, assistant Squad leader Coporal Caleb Dunn led one fire team around the building, acting as surveillance and to lock down the area, since the surrounding sand is not confirmed secure, while Captain Gao, Liang Chen, Aya, Liu Zhong, Henry and the remaining Marine fire team prepared to enter the lab building itself.
Once getting a clear signal from the overwatch team that the coast is clear, they stacked on the front door, readying to enter, before they did, they all frowned and wrinkled their nose at a weird smell, immediately putting on gas masks to be safe.
Captain Gao moved in first, followed by Liu Zhong and the rest. He immediately checked the blind spot, while the rest of them all took a glance at the elevator and staircase entrance as they entered, before clearing the floor.
"All clear," reported Henry.
They checked the front reception desk, finding the security cameras all blurred.
Liu Zhong moved the devices on the counter, finding a blood smear, a fresh one that was made within this week.
"That was bleach and detergent," exclaimed Liang Chen, realising what the smell was. "They disinfected and cleaned the entire place. Most labs don't need to disinfect the reception area, that can only mean one thing, they killed everyone here."
"That means there is valuable intel," said Aya. "They were careless with cleaning, let's hope that it's the same with wiping intel."
They searched the first floor, hoping to find useful things, only to return empty handed.
"We have to go to the other floors then," said Henry.
The building has 4 floors and 3 floors of basement, quite a challenge for the 9 of them to search.
Leaving behind mini-sentry robots in the first floor, they headed to the elevator, locking it at the first floor by pressing the button. Liu Zhong pried open the button panel, finding the data transfer and exchange wire and hardwired it to his modem. Since the elevators used here are smart elevators to manage its usage cycle and conduct predictive maintenance, they can access the server's stored data through the elevator data lines.
"Sending the data over," said Liu Zhong.
"Got it," said Clara, leaving the drone in sentry hover mode, opening her modem, using the AI to decode, sort and extract the useful data.
"The most common floor accessed is basement 2, according to the building plan records, there should be an observation room there," replied Clara.
"Got it," said Aya, and they headed down the stairs. Henry and Corporal Luis Ramirez, the team leader of the fire team, raised their M27 IARs at the entrance of basement 1 alertly. Aya gave the signal to enter.
Checking basement 1 carefully and finding nothing of value, they proceeded to basement 2.
Upon entering the floor, everyone tensed up, for unlike the empty but otherwise neat first floor and basement 1, basement 2 looks like it was swept through by a tsunami and only recently dried. The entire floor has sparks throwing off from broken lights that flickered, leaving the basement in pitch black darkness, prompting the operators to turn on their night vision again. Puddles of water and other liquids are present on the floor.
They checked their Exo-suit filters carefully, ensuring that they are protected from harmful substances.
Liang Chen activated his life form detector, which works by detecting and recognising exhaled carbon dioxide. Unlike the heavy ones mounted on vehicles that have a huge scanning radius, these individual scanners have very limited range and accuracy.
"No signs of none-friendly life so far," reported Liang Chen.
They moved, checking the area carefully.
Aya and Liu Zhong stacked up beside a room, entering alternately, finding it empty, except for a holographic projector located in the middle of the room on a table.
Liu Zhong let his FN P90 submachine gun rest on his body, checking the projector, finding it to be functional.
The login screen turned on, with the username already typed in. Liu Zhong tried to guess the password, and luckily for him:
"Access granted."
"The password is really 1234..." chuckled Aya.
They scrolled through the projected pages, finding some very astounding, and troubling things.
"We have made a perversion..." read Aya, finding a journal of some sort.
"This is not what I want..." read Henry.
They clicked open some videos.
What they saw next horrified them and all of the operators who were unfortunate to see it. Even Aya and Liu Zhong, who are very experienced with the horrors present in the universe are shivering in fear and disgust from what they saw.
Just then, Liang Chen noticed his life form detector beeping. There is a creature approaching them quickly.
He raised his QBZ-192, flanked by the US Marines raising their M27 IARs and M38 SDMR.
Loud clanging sounds came closer and closer. Aya readied her L119A2, breathing to keep herself calm.
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