The Cavern reflected the soldiers glow lights, a foreboding green tint illuminated the way ahead, Theo and Jack had point, their feet soft against the wet ground, the stone ceiling hung low in places, Theo caught his helmet on the edges from time to time, followed by a short curse from Theo and a smirk and snigger from Jack. The path veered left, right, down and down, twisting and turning. About half a mile underground is when they came to their first junction. The stone burrow split into three passages. Theo and Jack dropped a lighting pack at the entrance to all three, lowering themselves to their knees, the contacted Jones on the radio, who was with the rest of the group, somewhere behind them in the darkness. "Lieutenant, we have a junction here, three entries, we have dropped lighting packs and are awaiting for join up." said Theo softly in his radio. An acknowledgement came crackly and off-sounding. Theo was glad his armour was brown in colour, it blended into most things better than most of the other colours of the expedition fleet, their red helmets is what gave them away to spying eyes. Within ten minutes, the platoon had joined up, and decided to split into three teams, Lieutenant Jones was to take three of her own squad and go down the central passage, Sergeant Wilhelm was to take Theo and two others down the right side, Sergeant Serv was to remain at the junction and cover their exit. The cave was hot and the air seemed close, humidity was high, the tunnels gave a whistle with the slight breeze from the entrance high above ground. Theo knew that if he took his helmet off, he would not be able to feel the wind, thankfully, his suit of armour kept him cool enough to work. It was not long before the radio was busy once more with confirming kills, three, five, ten kills now. Theo's group had not found a single enemy in their path, he did not know whether to be thankful or worried. Were the red creatures stalking his team as Wilhelm led them deeper into the cavern? Were they laying in ambush in some narrow passage, ready to tear them limb from limb?
It was when Wilhelm slipped on a slimy rock that they heard the distant roar of falling water, the rocky jagged ceiling was damp and dripping in places, Wilhelm thought they were near an underground waterfall, as they drove deeper and found stalactites and stalagmites rising and dropping from the floors and ceilings. "We must be near the centre." said Wilhelm, "Surely they would have settled near fresh water." he added as they continued deeper. After an hour of heading in the direction of the roaring water, sometimes the echo had thrown them down the wrong path, turned them around and cost them time, they found the end of their passage, cut off by the falling liquid. They had come behind the waterfall. This made it obvious as to why the creatures had not sensed their approach due to the noise and smell brought by the falling water, Theo edged stealthily to the edge, peeking his head out from the falling liquid, quickly pulling back. "about fifteen obvious enemies, looking restless." he whispered to Wilhelm The Mares at the other side of the waterfall had remained behind to look after the nesting ground. The cavern was large and echoed constantly with the flush of water and the grunts and growls off Mares, their nests stood half a meter tall, built from grass, twig and mud, filled with anything soft and heat retaining they could find, mainly the furs of other animals they had savaged on their hunts.
Theo and Jack moved to the left side of the broad waterfall, Wilhelm and Henderson gathered on the right, peering their heads slowly and silently to gain a better view and count of the enemies, they emerged as silently as they could from the water, the mist caused by the waterfall foaming as it hit the pool masked most of their movements, they formed a firing line on the thin ledge that flanked the pool before the beasts caught their scent above the smell of damp and rotting flesh from their meals. With a mighty roar, the beasts advanced relentlessly when they finally saw the invading humans, and with a deadly hiss, the soldiers fired their suppressed weapons, killing all that was not human. Theo bagged himself seven of the twenty beasts, five more had charged from the other side of the tunnel where they had hidden, guarding the other entrance. "Lieutenant, we have found a nesting ground, confirmed eggs on the ground. We will begin dispersing the gas cylinders." said Wilhelm into his radio. Lieutenant Jones' voice came distant and crackly into their ears, "Confirmed. We are near one. We shall release three cylinders each, that should be enough to spread through the entire complex." Wilhelm, Theo and Jack each held a long fat gas cylinder whilst Henderson covered the exits, and set it down near the nests. Each cylinder contained a highly flammable gas, that would be released remotely once they are out of the cavern. Once they had armed them, they began to make their way back to the junction point where Sergeant Serv was waiting. Serv's lights could be seen around the corner of the next bend of the cave when Wilhelm suddenly knelt, holding up his fist causing the squad to halt and kneel. The low growl sent chills down their spines. Henderson was the first to see the sharp teeth, as they snapped at his neck, killing him. Theo sprayed the remainder of his clip into the snapping, blood stained beast, the long hisses emanating from his suppressed rifle alerted Wilhelm and Jack that had been further in front, they turned and also fired their weapons at the hulking mass that had hidden in a blackened passage that joined with theirs.