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Minutemen: Cronin Protocol Chap. 15
Posted By: Azrael<sherwood.tondorf@gmail.com>
Date: 21 December 2007, 9:02 am
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Minutemen: Cronin Protocol Chapter 15
Office of Naval Intelligence Outpost
Location Classified
Midway through Covenant invasion of Earth
Late Afternoon
ONI Commander Thomas Young was never satisfied. Part of the reason he had risen so quickly up the ladder at the Office of Naval Intelligence was his voracious appetite for knowing everything. He pursued leads, tracked down sources, and when necessary, executed orders that other naval intelligence officers would deem below them. Thomas always shared a private smile with himself when he considered that last fact. How can someone keep their darkest secret when they won't take care of it themselves? Who better to keep a secret than only one?
Young came out of his brief introspective moment and refocused on the purpose-driven, germanic accented voice speaking to him. The voice commanded attention, even though it came from a source that was barely fourteen inches tall.
"It has been confirmed, Commander, from officers Ricardo and Phillips, and the copy of myself that your ordered to accompany them. You now control the Telemachus. It will only be a short while until I can clear them to initiate Cronin Protocol."
"Excellent work, Bismark." The man in charge of the North American Protectorate branch of ONI stood from his high-backed leather office chair and walked slowly toward his impeccably lit and masterfully maintained wet bar. With a steady hand, he poured a small dose of amber liquid from a crystal carafe into a matching glass. Young brought the drink to his lips and with eyes that conveyed both superior intelligence and murderous tenacity, looked over the glass and asked, "Where do we stand with Boston?"
The AI took an imperceptible instant to shift its focus to the other matter at hand. "I have been researching UNSC databases to pinpoint personnel most likely to be in the city, Commander, but if I may, it seems tacticaly irrelevant. Initiating Cronin Protocol will order a nuclear bombardment on the city of Boston. No one will survive."
"Someone blocked our communication with the ODST team inside Boston. That makes them technically proficient and a danger to what will be the turning point in this war. If someone from our own species wants to ruin our chances at survival, I want to know how to stop them."
Young motioned with his free hand for the AI to continue.
"After looking through all relevant military action into and around the area, I can find no evidence that any active personnel remain or have moved into the hostile zone."
"Meaning anyone who's in there now was either there at the time of the invasion or has no record of military service."
"Correct. Casualty reports and biometric tags have been extremely accurate. I've extrapolated some possible scenarios."
Thomas took a short sip from the glass and laid the vessel down on his polished desk. "Let's see the data."
A long stream of holographic words and pictures now appeared in the holotank in the center of the dimly lit lair. Pictures of UNSC soldiers and officers scrolled by vertically, stopping at several suspects, their images lining up in a straight row, spanning half the width of the room.
"These four officers have not been accounted for, sir. They made up the top tier of UNSC Administration Post Fifty-Three. These two," Bismarck noted in a neutral voice as the images grew in size and resolution, "Master Gunnery Sergeant Angus Reynolds and Captain Jack O'Shea, have the longest service records and are currently listed MIA."
The Commander grunted in what could only be an attempt at a laugh. He motioned for the two holograms to come closer, they flew across the distance and stopped two feet from his face. He scrutinized the pictures like a drill Sergeant looking for wrinkles in a recruit's uniform. The face to Young's right was indicative of a man who had seen action: dark eyes looking straight ahead into space but without the mile-long stare of shell-shocked soldiers. Hair a little longer than regulation length and a shadow of stubble around the jaw suggested an officer who had spent time in the trenches and volunteered to take the late watch. Young's eyes flitted over the name attached to the face. "O'Shea. The name is vaguely familiar. Who was last contact?"
"Ricardo and Phillips last sent an assessment just before the invasion. I can transfer the file--"
Young dismissed the offer with a short wave of his hand. He grabbed the half-empty glass from his desk and took a longer pull of the liquor, letting the heat of the alcohol wash down his throat and add to the fire brewing inside him. "I remember now. The Captain who was using our assets to track the Covenant's advance. He was less than cordial with our agents, as I recall."
Even Bismarck was impressed with the Commander's retention of the report's details. "Yes, sir. We had to blackmail him to allow the agents passage to New York. I need to remind you at this point that the parameters of that mission were redacted immediately after submission."
"I remember what they were," Young said, rising out of his chair and walking towards the visage of Captain Jack O'Shea. He stood in front of the unblinking face and squinted ever so slightly. "O'Shea knew the Covenant were close, and our materials only convinced him further." Thomas shook his head as he tried to get inside the mind of the man in front of him. "He knew the enemy was at our doorstep, yet there's no evidence he left the city. What does that tell us?"
Bismarck knew the Commander never asked a question like that unless he already knew the answer. Despite this knowledge, the AI replied, "The Captain had a compelling reason to remain, or he surrendered himself to the inevitable."
Young scanned O'Shea's dossier as a more concrete scenario began to play itself out in his mind. "A wife and two daughters," he said into the dark space, "yet he doesn't leave. The intel we gave him was purposefully dated, so the invasion probably caught him by surprise anyway. Self-preservation is one of our strongest instincts, and judging from the chip on his shoulder, he probably didn't take kindly to the UNSC withdrawal from Boston."
"In truth, Commander, more than ninety percent of military personnel assigned to Boston were ordered to abandon the city. By raw calculations and assessments, a withdrawal of that scale would seem to be excessive."
"Doesn't matter. He was angry we fucked him with the intel and the retreat. He has dead weight at home, and judging by his service record, probably a dedicated following of local UNSC assets." Young stabbed a finger at O'Shea, pushing through the weightless hologram's forehead. "This man stayed behind. This man rallied together supporters. This man," Thomas turned now, walking with purpose back to his desk, "is the leader of military forces in Boston. He must have detected our ODST team inside his city and ordered the activation of the ULF web that keeps them out of contact with us."
"It seems a bold move, Commander," Bismarck stated, appearing by his master's side on the polished wood desk and crossing his arms behind his back, "He must have known that we would try to establish contact with the operatives."
Young shrugged and tugged on the sleeves of his shirt, allowing the starched, crisp cuffs of the garment to peek out from under his dress jacket. "They've survived by laying low, Bismarck. Captain O'Shea must have seen the writing on the wall when they became aware of a military presence." Thomas leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms, and stared at the stern, unblinking face in front of him. "This man is smart and he knows what's coming. He's probably evacuated himself and all those with him out of Boston."
Evacuated City of Boston
Lansdowne Street
Captain Jack O'Shea was deaf to the cacophony of warfare going on around him. All he could hear in his head was his ragged breathing and the rush of blood pumping through his body, fueled by desperation and the knowledge that men's lives depended on his actions. At this moment, however, as Jack ducked and weaved around plasma blasts and friendly mortar ordnance, he was trying to block out the simple fact that even he might not be able to save the life of the one Minuteman who meant the most to him.
Lansdowne Street was a chaotic mashing of ash grey, obliterated red brick, glass, and steel. The other Minutemen flanking O'Shea took in the scene; their desperate eyes shot back and forth looking for any cover they could find in case the fire from the Covenant blockade down the street unleashed a larger barrage.
To Captain O'Shea, though, all he saw were the tell-tale signs of a completely destroyed Warthog entering a clothing store. Jack was so focused on the site of the crash that he wasn't even aware he was giving orders on the fly. It was only when a Covenant Carbine round whizzed over his helmet, causing him to duck and trip over the crumbling sidewalk that he realized his voice was hoarse from shouting over the din. The squad took cover in an alleyway two blocks from the crash. Jack swore aloud at the delay as the rest of squad gathered in front of him in a small semi-circle.
One Private yelled over the echoing roar, "Sir! What's our next move?"
"We get to Gus Reynolds' Warthog! Everything else is secondary!"
"What about recon, sir?"
"We don't leave this street until recon's found their objective and get underground!" As Jack finished speaking, two more Minutemen slid into the relative safety of the alleyway, their momentum knocking them into the far wall of the alley. They composed themselves as best they could before reporting in. Everyone was straining their voices to be heard over the murderous din.
"Harris and Becker reporting, sir! Mortar team got their rounds, but they can't keep this up much longer!"
The Captain ignored their concern. "You two give us suppressing fire, then follow us to the crash site! Everyone else, you're with me." The militia still remained in front of him, their chests heaving, mouths gasping for breath.
"Let's go!" O'Shea roared angrily, checking his weapon and moving into the street. Jack could barely hear their reluctant answering "Huah," as he got back into the thick of battle, and he really did not care. The grizzled, exhausted leader of the Minutemen ran in a crouch toward the creaking hole in the building ahead; bits of the structure were still dribbling on to the pavement after the 'Hog's ugly incursion from earlier in the struggle.
You can make it, Gus. I can't do this alone.
Captain O'Shea now fought the most dangerous feeling of all: hope. He fully remembered what witnesses had reported to him about his best friend's disaster: that Master Gunnery Sergeant Reynolds' Warthog had hit a mine in the middle of the street and crashed badly into a building on Lansdowne. He had seen Warthog wrecks before. There was a reason the Minutemen rarely ever used the unwieldy vehicles for urban combat. He knew after so much time had elapsed since the crash that there was a very good chance his friend Gus was dead. Despite this, he hoped. He fought the queasy bright spot of feeling under his armor that told him, against all odds, Master Gunnery Sergeant Gus Reynolds had survived.
Please, Gus, not you. Hold on, buddy. You're all I have left. You can make it! Just hold on!
Jack sprinted the last ten feet, boots churning concrete, and swept into the crash site. As he took in the sight, he lost all sense of the world around him. His vision blacked at the edges, the floor dropped out from under him, and the queasy bright spot of hope was instantly replaced with a vacuum of dread. Jack stood, rooted to the spot.
Not you.
The drab gray Warthog was upside down, twisted into a sickening L-shape. The mighty Gauss Cannon mounted on the rear now looked more like a smashed soda can. The entire sad monument groaned and hissed, and a dark red pool of blood spread out from under the mess. Gus Reynolds was one of the biggest contributors to the growing lake of death.
Please. No.
The first sounds Jack heard were his three other Minutemen finally catching up to him and one Private's whispered, "Oh, shit."
Jack lunged toward the wreckage like a starved jungle animal on its prey. He wailed away at the dead metal husk, he kicked mercilessly at the destroyed cannon. If he had thought to sink his teeth into the Warthog, he might have tried that, too. He screamed a blood curdling wail that gave pause to all of the soldiers there. They watched in horror as Jack savagely beat on the wreck as if it were his own despair, sometimes accidentally striking the crushed torso of his slain comrade in the process. Finally, after the Captain slipped and fell in the sticky pool of blood, they ran to him and physically dragged their leader away, leaving a trailing smear of blackish red in his wake.
O'Shea struggled with all of his might, surging toward the one last friend he had in the world. He screamed at his men. He screamed at Gus. He screamed until his saw spots and almost passed out. As two militiamen held him down, one Minuteman walked slowly toward the Warthog as if he was carrying the building on his back. The boy's shoulders sagged as he crouched down next to the body of Gus Reynolds. He then reached under the dead man's collar and tugged the tags off Reynolds' neck; he did it with forlorn reluctance, as if leaving the tags would keep the catastrophe from being real. Every one of the men had never felt so utterly defeated.
Outside the walls of the looted clothing store, the battle continued to rage. Another cannon shot collided with the street; it threw rubble into the store and skittered against the blank dead face of the man who only an hour ago had reluctantly taken O'Shea's place as leader of the Minutemen. No one even flinched. Jack broke free from the men holding him and made one last charge toward the broken body pinned under the vehicle, falling to his knees and collapsing over the corpse of the one man who truly knew the pain that Jack had kept inside. His body heaved with sobs and he stared at the blood on his gloved hands. In one day, everything that Captain Jack O'Shea had left had been taken from him, and he had not been able to do a thing to stop it.
Suddenly, a chirp sounded in every soldier's right ear. Despite the fact a horrific fight was going on outside, everyone, save O'Shea, flinched at the sound. The Minuteman holding Gus' tags looked around; he stared at his CO's sobbing frame and in a moment of panic mixed with despair, opened the COM.
"Go ahead."
"This is Staff Sergeant Ron Parsons, get Captain O'Shea on the line!"
The boy would rather have shot himself in the leg. "His COM's off, Parsons. What's up?"
"Are you fucking kidding? Put the Captain on, dipshit!"
The Minuteman, only a Private First Class, suddenly snapped at Parsons' unknowingly ignorant tone. "I can't fucking get him, dude! Tell me what you want!"
There was a second of stunned silence around the group as a pair of militia eased their leader off the floor. The Captain had never looked worse.
"Tell him we found it. We found the access hatch to Chawla! We've got everything we need and we're going in. Tell the Cap you can get the hell out of there!"
The news that otherwise would have been cause for celebration in the streets was only met with mystified looks as to how to continue. Everyone now looked with immeasurable guilt at O'Shea, who only in that moment recovered the strength to walk on his own. In the time that passed, no one had acknowledged Parsons' call.
"Is everything ok? What's going on?"
The Minutemen exchanged furtive looks back and forth as they frantically tried to decide what to do. Finally, the Private First Class put his hand to his ear and his other hand to his throat mic and blurted out, "Fine. Everything's fine. Good luck, Parsons."
The reply over the COM was hesitant. "OK. Recon out."
The COM closed and the men resumed the guilty practice of staring at their broken leader for instructions. The Captain looked back at them with a look that seemed miles away. Jack refocused and looked at the bodies around the Warthog once more. He swallowed hard and in a croaking voice, rasped, "Call the Lynx...to evac killed and wounded...full...retreat."
Evacuated City of Boston
Fenway Park
Staff Sergeant Ron Parsons looked around the pitch-black room. They had gained entrance to the scoreboard inside Fenway Park's famous left field wall, the Green Monster, only a few minutes ago. In that time, they had easily located their objective: the hidden entrance to a secret facility known only as "Chawla." Three beams of light danced around the space as Parsons' partner, Corporal Tim McManus, and two Orbital Drop Shock Troopers, scanned the room once more. McManus' light flipped over to Parsons.
"What's wrong?" Tim asked in an uncertain voice.
"Dunno, but something's gotta be fucked if I can't speak to Cap."
There was another pregnant pause as the two ODSTs lifted a heavy hatch hidden underneath several floor panels. Parsons growled in consternation for another moment, then checked his Battle Rifle once more. "Can't worry about it now, though. Orders are to get inside this thing and get whatever's inside it. Sooner we finish that, sooner we can help out the rest of the guys."
A very dim light now came up from the dingy floor. All four soldiers walked to the open hatch and looked inside. A ladder led down about twenty feet to a concrete surface, barely illuminated by pale yellow light.
"Lights are on," the taller ODST, a Sergeant, remarked. "That's good news."
"Maybe," Ron muttered. "Let's go. I've set charges in here. We'll seal this entrance after we've found another way out. I don't feel like getting entombed today."
The recon squad now silently descended the metal rungs, each lost in their own thoughts as they proceeded. The two ODSTs refocused their minds to deal with the search that lay ahead. The pair of Minutemen following them were lost in concerned thoughts of the peril that their friends and comrades were in. Despite their separate concerns, they all had an anxious flutter starting in their stomachs; it told them they were going into a place that was undoubtedly dangerous and there was probably no way to call for help if they got in over their heads. Each man spent the last seconds on the ladder doing their best to kill that flutter. Each man failed.
Finally, after what seemed like hours, they all grouped at the bottom of the hatch. Tim McManus took a brief second to stare back up from whence they came, and sighed. "This doesn't feel right at all," he said, then shouldered his weapon and followed the pack.
The dim light at the bottom of the hatch had only been a tease. As soon as they moved away from the ladder, an imposing door stood in their way. A wheel was mounted in the middle of the concrete and steel barrier, which the ODST Sergeant slowly opened with tremendous effort. With a groan that spoke to the abandoned state of the facility, the door swung out, revealing a long dark hallway that seemed to disappear into a haze of black. On each side, long glass windows revealed hastily evacuated cubicles and offices, their holopanels blank, stacks of paper overturned and half-charred. Loose sheets of paper lay discarded in the hallway alongside overturned carts and smashed weapons lockers.
"Looks like they evac'd in a hurry," McManus remarked, still training his sights downrange.
"Or they want it to look like no one's home," the other ODST, a Lance Corporal, replied. "Too many places to hide on either side. We should clear it room-by-room." Ron Parsons huffed at the idea, and the ranking Helljumper put up a hand.
"I'd say take it slow, but we don't have that kind of time, do we?"
Ron shook his head emphatically. "No, we don't," he said as sternly as he could, and broke into a very brisk walk down the left side of the hallway, tactical flashlight on, beam searching for anything that dared get in his way. The rest of the squad immediately followed suit.
The four sniper scout experts advanced down the dimly lit hallway in two tactical columns, their Battle Rifles out and sweeping the pristine quarters for any sign of hostiles. Every twenty feet the rear guard would pivot and jog backwards, eyes straining to catch any glimpse of a threat. Parsons took a glance to his left and scrutinized an obviously empty communications room.
"Hey Tim," he asked over his shoulder, "have you gotten anything from topside yet?
"I've tried a couple times. Nothing but static."
"My COM's FUBAR, too."
"Figure they have security systems to monitor the outside? Get a call out when we're clear?"
"I'd love to be pleasantly surprised."
The squad took a right turn into a section of tunnel completely devoid of light. Even their tactical flashlights were suffering in this space, cones of white tactical light fought to even reach the walls on either side of them. Finally, the foursome reached thick blast doors that took up the entire wall, forming a dead-end. A yellow stripe ran parallel to the floor at chest height, and in glaring red paint, "Penelope" was stenciled on the right door. A large square button stood out next to a keypad and sensor on the right wall. Parsons came up to the button first and pressed it hard, exhaling with relief. Nothing. Perturbed, Ron pushed it again and again until the ODSTs realized something was wrong.
The two special ops soldiers walked toward the Staff Sergeant like scolding parents, moving Parsons' hand with force and moving towards the keypad and sensor. Ron had had enough.
"It's locked! We put all our friends in harm's way to come up on a fucking locked blast door? Of course you gung-ho fucktards thought they'd leave a secret facility chamber unlocked! Are you out of your fucking-"
The Sergeant smacked Ron upside the head, breaking off the Minuteman's rant. "We didn't know where the facility was, we didn't say anything about not being able to get to it."
"Cut the shit."
"Every facility can be overridden by a high-enough UNSC security code. And we just happen to have them all."
As if on cue, the Lance Corporal withdrew a data pad from his chest pocket and placed it on the sensor. The data pad flashed white, then the sensor glowed a comforting ocean blue that bathed the tunnel in temporary light. With the hiss of complicated locks disengaging, the doors began to slide open, overcoming the small blue light in glaring, sterile white. McManus gave a low whistle and strolled by his superior into the chamber.
"Wonder if they have the code to get your foot out of your mouth."
"Not funny."
The chamber was an immense hollow octagonal globe. In the middle of the chamber floated an object surrounded by a purple energy barrier. It was difficult to tell if the object was made of stone or metal, but it was in the shape of a tire, strange alien symbols and letters etched onto it. Around the object were numerous holo panels, keyboards, and monitors. Each of the monitors and holo panels showed a representation of the object inside the energy barrier, with countless numbers and symbols streaming down the right side.
The four men split up and cleared the room. The clear call was sounded four times, and the squad got to work. The Sergeant took the lead.
"Lance, on the door. Seal it shut and lock it down if you can. Parsons, see what the situation up top is like." The large Helljumper nodded at McManus. "You're good with tech?"
McManus shrugged. "Smarter than the average bear."
"Then help me find a way to get this thing out."
The two men walked at a slightly slower pace as they approached the center. It was as if they were hunting a sleeping predator, watching for any sign of danger and knowing that the object in front of you might very well kill you if messed with. Both men took their time looking over the arrays.
"Standard holo panels. Don't look booby-trapped" McManus declared. The ODST agreed. With a simple swipe of his fingerless gloves, Tim activated the panels, causing the tires to fall away and reveal one bright blue holographic man wearing ancient greek armor and flowing robes. Tim's head jerked back a bit as he and the AI took each other in.
"Security protocols acceptable. Welcome to Penelope, my name is Odysseus."
Office of Naval Intelligence Outpost
Location Classified
Commander Thomas Young was hard at work in his office, scrolling between holographic displays and sending off messages in eager anticipation of the strike against Boston. In front of him, Bismarck began yet another strolling patrol along the front edge of the desk, hand clasped behind his back, eyes closed, head down in "thought." The AI was doing its best to stay both in ONI's immense system to full capacity while also hefting the entire UNSC BattleNet. In the flow of the titanic masses of data, Bismarck felt a rare relaxation as he happily completed his deadly tasks. It was a rare kind of peace when he was at this kind of processing power, a very easy, almost euphorically soothing--
Bismark's eyes snapped open wide in astonishment, then squinted slightly in realization and pure, seething, rage. "Odysseus?"
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