Weekly 336: What Lurks Below

"2534. Onyx. The training of Alpha Company has been in progress for several years, and their exercises having grown more and more challenging overtime. Capture the Flag, a favorite among both candidates and DIs, is being conducted within the subterranean tunnel systems of Alpine Site Samuel. Team Salamander, consisting of Halle-A025, Ezekiel-A325, and Delvin-A125, is one of several teams competing." It felt like they’d been walking for hours, though their watches told him that it had only been thirty minutes since the exercise started. Delvin shined his light towards the ceiling of the tunnel, revealing a million different colors and reflections off of the mineral deposits embedded within the stone. He felt his chest tighten the longer he looked at it, and took a dry swallow, before being snapped out of the trance by a collision. Though, like it often was, it wasn’t him that was knocked away. 
“Hey! Watch it!” The other boy stumbled forward, nearly managing to drop the datapad in his hand, which would have spelled an instant end to their participation; the device contained the mapped out sections of the cave system through which they were currently in; it also identified where their objective was. Losing it meant they’d have to wait for the DI’s to come and retrieve them and take them back to the surface. Even worse, it meant ridicule and humiliation for who knew how long from the other candidates.
Delvin flicked down from the ceiling and onto the boy’s face, which caused an immediate flinch-and-wince reaction.
“Aaagh! What’s with you? Are you trying to sabotage us on purpose?” He said through from behind the shield of the datapad.
“Wha-no. No!” Delvin almost shouted in reply to the accusation. 
“Then why-”
“Shut up, both of you.” A whisper that barely reached their ears was enough to silence the two boys, its source stemming from the girl who’d been leading them so far. She was small, though to Delvin that applied to most other candidates, pale, and at first glance would have appeared sickly. He’d made that mistake only once, when he first met her during team arrangements, but had long since been set straight. 
“Halle, he’s the one who-” The other boy protested.
“You’re both too loud. The routes for this system intersect at different junctions, and sound travels far down here. It wouldn’t be hard for another team to set a trap at one of those crossroads and pick us off before we saw them.” She looked between the two of them, as if waiting for some kind of protest or objection, and when finding none, sighed.
“Anything ahead to keep an eye out for, Ezekiel?” She asked.
“No…” He answered in a sullen voice, before regaining his composure and energy. “I-I mean, nothing major. Small pits and dig-in, but no worries as long as we’re careful.”
“Alright. Are we good to keep going?” She asked, getting an immediate nod from Ezekial in the form of a nod. Her gaze turned to Delvin.
“I’m fine. Let’s go.”
----
The cracks of rifle bursts echoed through the chambers of the tunnel, underscored by call-outs and shouts of excitement. Delvin and his teammates moved at a near sprint, attempting to put distance between themselves and their pursuers. Ahead of him, Halle carried a baton rolled up within a long piece of fabric; its unsheathed form being a red triangular flag bearing the eagle of the UNSC. And ahead of her, Ezekiel acted both as their pathfinder and navigator, making on the fly decisions for the best route to take in order to escape.
“We’re making a right up ahead!” He said in between breaths, though careful enough for it not to be a shout.
“Delvin, can you see anyone behind us?” Halle asked as she followed Ezekiel.
Their eyes had long since adjusted to the darkness of the caves, as much as they could. He didn’t want to risk shining his own flashlight backwards and giving away their position, so instead he did his best to pick out any movements he saw, any reflections of light against the cave walls, anything that gave a sign of pursuit. He thought he saw something-
His scanning was interrupted by the bodies of both Ezekiel and Halle, who he nearly stampeded through before narrowly sidestepping them.
“What? Why’d we stop!?” His teammates' expressions were a mix of surprise and anger, following their gazes revealing the answers to all his questions at once. Behind three points of light were rifles aimed at their direction
“Hand over the flag, and you can just walk out of here!” One of them shouted. “Don’t, and we’ll just shoot you and take it.” 
He would have laughed, had it not been for the body suits they wore. While the rifles only used paintball rounds, the body panels of their suits contained sensors that, if hit, would paralyze that portioned their body. It was supposed to simulate getting shot in an actual battlefield, but more than once the drill instructors had used it as a punishment to make exercises harder, or to control a more unruly candidate. Delvin had been subjected to both.
“Strobes.” Halle whispered from his side. He could see out of the corner of his eye Ezekiel’s hand drift over his flashlight. He swallowed a dry breath.
“What?” He asked more out of anticipation than expecting an answer.
“STROBES!” She yelled, flicking a switch on her light source, an action mimicked by him and their teammates. Suddenly, the passage was engulfed by rapidly flickering lights, the candidates on the other side of them yelling in surprise and pain at the disorienting display. One of them pulled the trigger, either by reflex or intention, and the others followed suit.
“GO!”
As they made their move, Delvin would catch sight of lights behind them. Before he could get a warning out to his teammates he felt a sting in his leg, the limb tightening up before freezing in place, causing him to stumble and trip to the side. He braced himself for a collision against the walls of the tunnel, but instead found his body crashing through it. Panic seized his voice he tumbled downward, debris from rock and mineral scratching his body, and the shouts and rifle fire growing more distant. And then, darkness.
----
A soft humming, and warmth, were what greeted Delvin when he first woke up. Through his eyelids, he could tell some kind of reddish light was being shone on him, his first thought being some of the drill instructors or other staff within Camp Currahee having come for him. The pain in his head told him of the result of his fall, but how long it’d been, was unknown. 
“Hrrrghhhh….” When he attempted to move, the pain grew in magnitude. Still, he managed to turn himself over, and opened his eyes, the red light blinding him almost immediately, similar to what he and his teammates had done to the others.  Instinctively going to cover them with his hands, a sharp pain made itself known in his left arm. Instead, he went to hold it with his still functioning one.
“My arm…” Looking at it, and not being able to move it, told him of the severity of the injury. It was then that he noticed his actual surroundings. And the lack of anyone else within the space, save for… the red light. It belonged to some kind of drone, or that’s what he guessed it was. It resembled nothing that was used on Camp Currahee, or that they’d been taught about in classes. It was a sleek, metallic sphere surrounded by three ‘limbs’. The red stemmed from what he guessed was its ‘eye’. It sat, doing nothing, except watching him, symbols in its eye flickering periodically. 
“Ca-Candidate Delvin-One-Two-Five.” He identified himself, and received no response. With his free hand, he felt around his torso, and found the strap to his rifle broken, the weapon somewhere else within the room, likely outside of his reach. But something told him that was for the better. His fingers fidgeted nervously as the moments passed. Something wasn’t right. He could feel his breathing become uneven, the fidgets growing into tremors. 
“I-Who-” He tried to begin, but felt the words falling away in the face of the red light. The pain in his head became more intense, and it became harder to think. But he couldn’t pass out. Not while this thing kept watching him. Not while he didn’t know what it was. He couldn’t-
Darkness.
----
“The exercise was ended as soon as Candidate Zero-Two-Five called in the incident.” Chief Petty Officer Mendez stood within Ambrose’s office, as the man himself looked over a datapad containing the report of what had happened beneath Alpine Site Samuel.
“One-Two-Five suffered some bruising from the fall, as well as a concussion and dislocated shoulder. Doctor Healy assures it’s nothing too bad. A few days of bed rest in the infirmary and he’ll be back on his feet.”
“What about what the candidate reported seeing?” Ambrose asked.
“Doctor Schultz is of the opinion that it was some kind of hallucination, triggered by both the concussion, and a slight panic attack. She also noted that One-Two-Five likely suffers from claustrophobia. I’ve noted it for future exercises in Site Samuel.
“What do you think Chief Petty Officer?”
“The maps we provided the teams were up-to-date. None of the geological scans we’ve done indicated any weak points or new channels running through that portion of the tunnel system. We also had drones remotely monitoring each team over the course of the exercise. We lost contact with Team Salamanders, shortly after One-Two-Five fell. It had burn damage on its shell when we recovered it in pieces.”
Ambrose was silent for some time, as he went over the information in his mind.
“Let’s have another survey done of the systems. And have the drone sent to Naval Intelligence to be checked. Meanwhile, let’s make sure One-Two-Five’s experience is kept close to the chest. We don’t need any more-”
A notification appeared on his datapad, and Ambrose silently swore.
“Sir?” Mendez questioned, before he received his own notification.
A brawl had broken out in the Mess Hall.
Category:The Weekly