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Minutemen: Cronin Protocol Chap. 18
Posted By: Azrael<sherwood.tondorf@gmail.com>
Date: 17 October 2008, 2:45 am
Read/Post Comments
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Minutemen: Cronin Protocol Chapter 18
Boston Police underground garage/Minutemen staging area
Midway through Covenant invasion of Earth
Evening
Kale Coldman opened his eyes to a flash of stars followed by darkness. He tried to lift his head to take in his surroundings, but cold fire rushed through the base of his skull and embraced his forehead in anguish. Exhausted, defeated, and in a terrible amount of pain, Kale laid his weary head back on the rumpled pile of clothing that served as a pillow and groaned.
"I thought getting rescued would be a shit load more comfortable."
A few tired chuckles replied through the dim light as the other nine refugees reflected on their situation. Kale got up gingerly, trying to massage his unbearably stiff neck. The exhausted refugee got on his knees and once again examined the holding cell his so-called rescuers had placed him in. It was a large room with no windows and a decently high ceiling. The walls were all rusting metal; two hanging lights gave their best effort to illuminate the space, but they required another floodlight in the corner to keep the place from feeling claustrophobic. That light had gone out over an hour ago.
Along the walls, five military style cots supported the weakest of Boston's newest refugees, their chests rose and fell with rhythmic breathing. They had been marching for days with only snatches of rest, and had they not been found by the protectors of the city, they would probably be dead, or worse, stranded and found by the Covenant. Kale finally got to his feet and took a couple shuffling steps toward large double doors, the only entrance and exit in the room.
Another refugee lay on his side by the doors, back to the wall. The left side of his face had been hastily bandaged, but even in the miserable light Kale could see dark stains from the bleeding. Coldman sat down by the injured man and nudged his shoulder.
"Mike. Mike, you up?"
Mike Pace looked up at his friend with bleary, bloodshot eyes. "Not anymore I ain't," he whispered, wincing. "Whaddaya want?"
"I gotta get outta here. man," Kale replied, keeping his voice low. "I didn't walk across Massachusetts to get put in a prison."
"It's not a--" Pace paused as pain stole his breath, "--it's not a prison. You heard the guy; they gotta process us and find us room, then they're puttin' us up."
"What if that's bullshit? You remember the stories those two kids told us back in Framinham, about the camp in New Hampshire that takes refugees and tortures 'em? What if this is one o' those?"
"Those two kids died a day after we met 'em. They were hallucinating and delirious."
"What if they're with those ODSTs that hit us? Those two were fucking monsters. C'mon, man, they fucked you up."
Mike put a hand up to his face and closed his eyes. "The Minutemen almost killed those guys. Didn't you hear? They were pointing guns and yelling and everything."
Kale shook his head and put his back to the wall, feeling hopeless, but anxious.
"I'm just saying they said they'd tell us something by now. I'm gonna try to talk to 'em."
Coldman got up and tried to stretch. He could feel the cobwebs clear in his mind, and decided he would do something about the situation. He mentally pushed back his shoulders and began walking to the door. Mike shuffled in protest but was powerless to stop his friend.
The shabbily clothed refugee approached the doors with seeming confidence. He placed a gloved hand on the handle and pulled lightly, but the doors remained solidly locked. Kale glanced over to Mike with a look that said, "I told you so," and stared at the metal entrance for a moment. He then balled his right hand into a fist and began banging on the door, shattering the silence. The rusty echoes of each blow began to draw the ire of the huddled masses inside the room.
"Hey!" Kale shouted. "Anyone out there? Come on!"
The assault on the entrance/exit continued for a full minute. As one of the healthier wanderers approached Coldman to physically stop him, the shriek of metal on metal weakly ground through the steel. The door opened slowly to reveal one of the Minutemen, his face dirty with grime and the occasional streak of dried blood.
"What?" The Minuteman asked with weary irritation. Kale was less than sympathetic.
"Whaddaya mean, 'What?'" Coldman cried. "You threw us all in here a couple hours ago and haven't said squat to us since. We're tired, man. We need food and aid. We have sick and injured people here."
The young militia member stared back at the refugee as if he had just grown several new appendages. "Take a number."
The Minuteman then tried to close the door, but found Kale's hand blocking the way. "What's happening out there? What happened to you? At least tell us something."
"I'm not at liberty to say anything. All of you are safe, ok? Just give us a little more time and we'll move you all into the camp, I promise."
"No. Let us talk to your Captain."
The mere mention of the Minuteman's commanding officer turned the young man's face from an initial look of sadness and weariness into what best could be described as eyes of homicide. The tired tone of voice vanished, replaced by cold anger. "Don't push your friggin' luck."
Kale recoiled just enough for the door to get closed in his face, plunging the large holding room into near darkness again. The ragged refugee could feel nine pairs of eyes staring at him through the space, and he leaned heavily against the door, sliding down until he was sitting facing his peers.
"Well that accomplished a whole bunch of nothing," Mike sighed as he shifted position. "All we know now is that they're tired and getting pissed off at us."
"Yeah," Kale responded, an unseen smile creeping across his face. "Tired enough to forget to lock the door."
Chawla Underground ONI Facility
Evacuated City of Boston
"So how exactly do we plan to move this?" Corporal Tim McManus asked with an exasperated look. "Should I try to find a cart?"
"That won't be necessary," the short artificial intelligence answered curtly.
Tim glanced around the large white laboratory one last time. The space had once served as a critical objective, now it seemed a prison. Tim and his partner, Staff Sergeant Ron Parsons, traded looks with the two Orbital Drop Shock Troopers beside them and realized they were all equally mystified with exactly how they were getting out of Chawla. Before the Minuteman sniper could ask another question, he heard the hissing of locks being disengaged for the first time in years.
The group took a collective step toward the large, tire shaped object as the holographic displays around it winked out, taking the blue and purple light off the artifact and restoring it to a dull gray stone color. It rose a full foot in the air, hovering with no apparent mechanism to be seen.
"What in the--?" McManus managed to whisper.
"The artifact has many unique properties that I've had the privilege to research," Odysseus explained, popping up on the closest holo tank. "With some very minor cosmetic adaptations, I've harnessed the artifact's power to create some electromagnetic propulsion."
The object floated noiselessly toward the four men. The ODST Lance Corporal shot a look toward his data pad as it beeped urgently. "Radiation spike," he said, alarm creeping into his voice, "is that thing safe?"
"It's not radiation, per se." Odysseus explained, now appearing above the middle of the tire. "It's just what your instruments designate as radiation."
"Then what the hell is it?" Tim demanded.
"I'm sorry, Minuteman. It's--"
"Classified." The two Minutemen sighed simultaneously, shaking their heads in frustration. McManus pointed at the artifact with a fingerless glove. "How fast can that thing move?"
"To be quite honest, I've never tested that," the AI shrugged, spinning its spear. "Shall we?"
The laboratory blast doors opened slowly, revealing a long, intermittently lit hallway. The four men split into two pairs, one militia, one UNSC, and escorted the floating objective to an uncertain destination.
"So I'm right, right?" Parsons sighed to McManus as he pointed his weapon down the hallway. "This is our dumbest plan yet?"
"I dunno, " McManus replied, straightening his gray jeep cap and slinking along. "I wasn't aware we had a plan yet."
Boston Police Underground Garage
"What do you mean, 'one's gone?'"
The young Minuteman, a Private, was stammering and stuttering, trying to find the right answer to Lance Corporal Ankit Jeevaji's question.
"The 'fugees were banging on the door a half hour ago. I brought them some food and water ten minutes ago and they were all looking at me strange, so I did a count."
The Indian superior glared at the Private, angered by the pause. "And?"
The Private gulped. "And they were minus one. I checked and rechecked."
"Private, how would you imagine a tired and unequipped refugee would escape the confines of the holding room?"
The young man, barely nineteen, lowered his eyes to the ground. "There's a possibility I accidentally left the door unlocked."
Jeevaji felt the temptation to strike the Minuteman, but quickly suppressed it. "Kid, you're in a whole mess o' trouble. Those refugees heard and saw things that the Captain put the camp on lockdown for so they wouldn't learn them. Our main refugee camp, our home, is a ten minute tunnel walk from here. Where do you think that 'fugee's gonna head? What do you think that one guy's gonna do to get some attention?" The Lance Corporal stared, eyes widening, at the lowered head of the boy in front of him. "Don't start acting sorry for yourself. You find me that refugee immediately or you'll be responsible for a camp-wide riot."
The look of fear on the Private's face told Jeevaji everything. "I'm on it."
Jeevaji sighed angrily as the overwhelmed Private turned on his heel and began jogging for the tunnel leading to the camp. As another Minutemen passed, Ankit grabbed him by the shoulder and turned the militia member toward him. "Find me a First Sergeant or anyone above me still alive," he said. "Tell them there's a situation in South Station."
South Station Refugee Camp
Rachel Lynch had no idea how to feel at this moment. Almost an hour ago, a hasty announcement had sounded over the camp, telling all civilians to get inside their tents for an artillery shelter drill. Rachel did not believe any of it, and when she snuck out after hearing Minutemen passing her tent, Rachel witnessed something she wished she had never seen.
Six Minutemen, including the leader of the camp, Captain Jack O'Shea, were carrying a body bag into the commuter train that served as the base of militia operations. In a tearful and gut-wrenchingly brief conversation, Lynch received good and terrible news. The body in the bag was not her boyfriend, Tim McManus, but instead Master Gunnery Sergeant Gus Reynolds, the man who only hours ago had taken command of Boston's Minutemen. The Jack O'Shea she had spoken with was a shadow of his former self, and now Rachel found herself sitting alone in her tent, wondering what the hell she was going to do now.
The camp's going to find out, she told herself, and when they do, they'll panic. They'll tear each other apart in fear. Lynch found herself standing on wobbly knees and pacing uneasily around the dimly lit interior. No matter how she played out the rest of the day in her mind, it always ended the same: widespread panic and the dissolution of order in the camp. The Minutemen were trained as best they could to deal with the Covenant; she doubted they had ever considered seriously enforcing hard discipline on their fellow Bostonians. If the camp fell into anarchy, there would be no hope for Tim and Ron to get back to the camp, and as good as those two were at being invisible, they could only stay out of sight for so long. Rachel began to see that the camp's fate and Tim's were one and the same, but how am I supposed to keep order when the Captain doesn't have a reason to live?
The red headed civilian pressed both hands to her forehead and massaged her temples in angry thought. What am I supposed to do? What can I possibly do from here? Lynch walked over to a shoddily constructed desk and picked up her spare data pad, the display winking open and showing her the layout of the South Station refugee camp. As assistant to the late Laura O'Shea, Jack's wife and head coordinator of the camp, Rachel had access to all of South Station's schematics, including the tent layout and the refugee rosters! Of COURSE!
Like a sink filling up with water, Rachel's mind recalled a time talking with Laura O'Shea when the Covenant occupation had first become a hard reality. They were taking inventory of ammunition when Rachel voiced a moment of despair.
"There's no way we can stay hidden, care for these people, and fight meaningfully against the Covenant," Lynch had said, sitting down heavily on a rough wooden crate. "I can't be the only person to realize this."
"Of course people think about this," Laura replied, sitting down next to her and offering her canteen, "but as long as people don't panic at the same time, we'll be fine."
"How?" she had asked.
"Everyone here looks up to someone," O'Shea said in a soothing tone, like she would use with a child having a nightmare, "as long as someone you trust is telling you it will be ok, you'd be surprised how much better you'll feel."
Rachel remembered how she had looked up at her boss' face, how Laura smiled so reassuringly, so naturally, so easily that Lynch knew O'Shea believed it in her own heart.
"Do you think we'll be ok?" Rachel had asked.
"Jack says we will," Laura O'Shea smiled, "I don't have a reason to doubt him yet."
Every tent on Rachel's data pad displayed a list of names, their occupants well known to her after months of constant communication and shared duty. Her agile mind already put together a long list of people who would listen to her, who would take this news with the gravity it demanded, but with the strength it required. If she had to face them as a group, the young college student knew she would not stand a chance, but if she could reach them now individually, the camp's will would hold. Her fingers flew with purpose and Rachel collected herself for a brief second, inspecting her image in a small, dirty mirror over a makeshift sink. No sooner did she leave her tent then she collided with a short, scared, and dirty refugee she had never seen before.
"You gotta help us!" Kale Coldman cried loudly. "These militia guys locked my friends up and there's Helljumpers out there killing them!"
Chawla
The four men and secret artifact turned yet another dark corner and faced three giant titanium doors.
"What are we doing here, Odysseus?" McManus asked.
"We have to make a choice," Odysseus said. "These three elevators will take us to different exit points throughout the city."
The ODST Sergeant took a few steps toward the massive doors and stared ahead in silence for a moment. "Do you have cameras or any way of telling what's on the other side?"
"No."
"This is a joke, right? This is a joke." Parsons spat on the floor and shook his head. "We're going to put this mission on 'let's see what's behind door number 1?'"
"Give me a moment," Odysseus said, and immediately disappeared. The other ODST, a Lance Corporal, shot another look at his data pad.
"Another radiation spike. What the hell is this thing?"
Parsons couldn't help but chuckle nervously and take a step closer to McManus.
"Not to be unprofessional," he whispered, "but I am starting to freak out a bit."
McManus glanced back down the hallway, then toward the doors. He shrugged, "Odysseus is the only thing that can get us out. I sure as hell can't think of a better way to get out of this mess. He wants this thing out of here as much as we do."
Tim then crossed his arms and put a hand to his mouth as through he were deep in thought. He locked eyes with Parsons and continued speaking in a much lower voice. Ron realized what his Minuteman partner was trying to do and tried his best to naturally block the ODSTs view of Tim. McManus continued. "I'm more worried about the ODSTs once we get topside. We're going to need Minutemen waiting for us there or this whole situation could get out of hand real fast. It's just a matter of time until they decide to jump us for once, and we're not as good as these guys."
"It would be interesting to see, though."
"Don't start."
A soft whooshing sound announced the return of Chawla's AI. Instead of his normal blue color, Odysseus was now rapidly changing colors, a detail that was not lost on the soldiers around him.
"Lift one is obstructed and the opening would crush you. Lift three would bring us straight into a Covenant patrol and you'd be killed. Lift two is our safest exit."
"Where does it end?" McManus asked.
"A large boat house on Storrow Drive. If you have water transportation, I'd recommend that."
Parsons laughed out loud.
"Is the road around the exit point intact?"
"Yes, but it would have to be quick. There is Covenant armor on regular patrol in that sector." Odysseus turned to the Helljumpers. "You're going to need to call your Blackspear as soon as possible."
Both Minutemen looked at the AI with surprise and confusion. Judging by the ODSTs body language, McManus assumed that behind their faceshields their expressions were the same.
"The hell is a Blackspear?" Parsons asked.
"How do you know about that?" The Helljumper Sergeant demanded.
Odysseus changed to a dark gray color. "It doesn't matter. We need to go right now."
Ron marched toward the middle door and stabbed a finger into the elevator call button. "I'm real sick of not knowing anything." He said over his shoulder. The large titanium doors began to slide open and the group moved forward. Tim glanced over to make sure the artifact was keeping up and found himself locking eyes with a staring Odysseus.
"What?" The Minuteman sniper asked, consternation written across his face.
"People you know are going to die, Corporal McManus."
"What? What's wrong with you?"
"Some will die no matter what you do; others are in your hands. You need to prepare yourself for what you have to do."
"Don't talk to me anymore unless it's absolutely necessary."
Tim found himself entering the elevator last, entirely confused and frustrated. Odysseus had disappeared again. The four men looked up into the pitch black shaft and noticed the lift didn't have a roof.
"What's with the topless elevator?" Ron asked.
"Easier to conceal an elevator in the floor," the ODST Sergeant replied, his helmet-filtered voice echoing in the space. "Also might mean we're going sideways."
Parsons sighed as the lift engaged, a low rumbling of long ignored machinery. Ron ejected the rifle's magazine, checked it visually, and slipped it in again. He then sighed and muttered, "This day just won't end."
South Station
Rachel Lynch had wasted the last seven seconds fantasizing about knocking the unknown refugee out and dragging the body back to her tent to contain him, but she was several seconds too late. The commotion caused by the short young man in tattered and raggedy clothes had coaxed over a dozen Bostonians out of their tents already, and curious heads were poking out up and down the streets of the tent city.
"Calm down!" Rachel whispered harshly, trying to get a hand on the kid's shoulder. "Who the hell are you?"
"I'm Kale Coldman!" He shouted back, far too loudly. "And if they kill me you'll know I'm telling the truth!"
"What in blue fuck are you talking about?" A large man with big, meaty fists demanded as he approached the scene. "Which tent are you?"
"I'm not in a tent, I came from Lexington with nine other refugees! Minutemen promised us food and shelter if we made it here but they boxed us in a room and I ain't seen no one since the Helljumpers started shooting people!" Rachel cursed aloud as others tried to press the boy for information, but their numbers and their urgency only made the weary traveler panic more. He began shuffling rapidly back and forth as if trying to evade them, a look of fear crawling across his face.
"Kid, UNSC ain't touched this place in ovah a yeah," a doubting Bostonian in a heavy accent called out. Rachel felt the situation slip completely from her grasp and felt utterly out of control.
"They fought the Minutemen! They're still out there!" Coldman cried out, rapidly becoming exhausted with stress and fatigue. "Tied us up...said sumpthin' 'bout...blowing up the city."
Everyone around Kale now took a big step back as if he was a bomb himself. As they did so, Ankit Jeevaji, a First Sergeant, and two other Minutemen arrived on the scene and began to detain Coldman. The increasingly large crowd came back to life.
"What the hell is this, Jeevaji?" The large, meaty fisted Bostonian asked.
"It's nothing," Ankit replied gruffly, trying to muscle the outsider away.
"He said Minutemen told them to come here!" A voice called out from the crowd.
"More 'fugees!"
"We don't got room for more!"
"Hey," Ankit said, separating himself from his three teammates to confront the crowd, "we're not gonna turn away civilians who need help."
"It's our food! Our space!"
"And we'll make it last!" Jeevaji shouted back. Rachel could now sense the crowd shifting from growing crowd to angry mob, and it was only seconds away.
"He said there were Helljumpers in Boston!"
Ankit put his palms up as if to ask what the crowd wanted from him. "We're dealing with everything up top."
"The fuck you are! Where's Captain O'Shea?"
"He's not available right now--"
The crowd/mob took an angry step toward the Minutemen. Rachel found herself in the space between, glancing anxiously back and forth.
"You go get him right now, or we'll--"
One militia member, a Private, foolishly advanced toward the mob with his MA5C Assault Rifle up as he tried to assist Jeevaji. "Hey!" He shouted, unaware of the heat of the moment. "Back up or--"
"--on't you point that thing at me!" The large Bostonian at the head of group bellowed as he swung one of his rough, large, hard fists into the side of the Private's head. The Minuteman dropped like a sack of hammers to the floor, prompting the rest of the militia in sight to draw their weapons and level them at the people they had sworn to protect. Rachel could see in her mind's eye the powder keg that was about to explode right that very instant, and she threw herself into the middle of it.
"Stop!" She yelled, so loud it hurt her throat. She stepped in front of the refugee crowd and beat a much smaller hand against the aggressive Bostonian's chest. "Think about what you're doing!" The moment Lynch bought the Minutemen was enough to collect the woozy Private and Jeevaji and take several precious steps back and create space. Lynch stepped into the bare concrete between both sides and extended her arms as if she could physically separate the soldiers and crowd. "You've got to calm down, please. We can figure this out. I can talk to Captain O'Shea. We'll get our answers."
The crowd seemed to absorb the words as if in collective thought. The Minutemen were not about to let it speak collectively, however.
"Give us fifteen minutes," Jeevaji said as loudly as possible, "we'll hold a camp meeting by the command train. You'll get the whole story. Until then, chill out."
"I don't trust you," the pugnacious Bostonian replied. "I won't listen to you." The crowd began to grumble in agreement and that grumble began to grow into a shout. Rachel felt her own words bubbling out of her lungs before she had the time to think about what they really meant.
"I'll speak," she whispered, then shouted loudly, "I'll speak!"
The answer silenced both sides. The crowd looked at her with approval, the Minutemen looked at her with fear. Rachel did not look at anyone, she simply walked with her head down with the militia toward the command train that bisected the camp.
The First Sergeant opened a channel on the COM quickly. "I need all available personnel for crowd control at South Station," he ordered, "and I need them right the hell now."
Ankit Jeevaji put a hand on Rachel's shoulder and she realized she was trembling. Ahead of her, a long commuter train with blacked out windows held a battered Captain, a dead comrade, and fifteen minutes to keep her friends from ripping each other to shreds. Her eyes misted as the trembling became shaking.
"What am I gonna do?" She whispered.
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