Sithandra led the way through the mechanical door that the AD Droids had come in from and into a weird hallway that annoyed me more than I could appreciate its simple architecture, given the circumstances. A second door at the end of the hall hissed open and, running rear guard, I instinctively glanced back to see if anyone, perhaps a lone AD Droid that survived in adaptive camouflage, was following us. But there seemed to be no need for the module I was loosely gripping instead of my Model 5 or the Panther I had on backup. In short, I wasn't facing forward.
My ears picked up some sort of commotion suddenly going on in front of me, and as I was turning back around, Alvin's voice cried out, "Sven, lock!"
I didn't object. I dropped like a stone onto the module with the full weight of my EOD suit and crunched it beneath my fist. Boom! Boom! Boom! One unknown projectile after another slammed hard against my metal exoskeleton and flew askew, each ultimately detonating against some other obstruction that resulted in the soft quakes I felt rumble beneath me shortly after. I stayed locked down for as long as the module allowed. All I could hear was my team in the background, shouting in deep, morphed voices, and the ever present gunfire. Sithandra's Model 5 sounded like a jackhammer and Alvin's Model 4 was like a hammer and chisel. The module shorted out a moment later, and the transition back into the war zone was akin to the sensation of lifting my head out from under water.
"Awwwlkleeer. All clear, move up!" Alvin barked.
A freight train of nausea and disorientation crashed into my brain and nearly took me off my feet. Imagine what it's like to randomly stand up way too fast, then quintuple that and you'll start to get an idea of the module's kickback. Everything was a blur as I start to fall flat to the mat, but I jabbed an arm out and caught the wall just in time. I waited there a moment to regain my senses.
When I felt like I could stand on my own two, I hurried to catch up with my teammates. The shootout had devolved into a chase, I'd noted with a hint of dismay. I hated running. Hated it when the target in question made me chase them down. It's not exactly easy lugging around all this extra armor. But I could see both of the HVTs running, and Alvin and Sithandra were in hot pursuit.
Our first high value target, a Terran crime lord clad in glinting bronze armor with a red shoulder cape, was waiting at the end of the catwalk above us and to our right, parallel with the path we were running. Borris Kalvinov. He was reloading an enormous yellow plasma ray, and it was then that the color that normally denoted fear and spinelessness suddenly had the opposite effect. Running down the catwalk towards him were two Reptilians. One was our second high value target, a mad scientist we were after; I could tell by the stained white lab coat, the robotic face mask, and the long, thin repulsion pugil strapped to his back. The other was just a henchman but he was wielding an M814 grenade launcher. This one was struggling to keep up as his employer bounded along.
Even as we ran, Alvin raised his Model 4 and took shots at the HVTs. Kalvinov's massive helmet and armor absorbed most of the impact, but the Model 4's stopping power repeatedly jerked the crime lord's head back. It probably would have been funny had I not just witnessed the death of a creature who was like a brother to me less than ten minutes earlier. Kalvinov eventually decided it wasn't worth it, turned, and disappeared from sight towards the escape pods with the two Reptilians lumbering in tow. Finish the mission. Iktac had given us his dying request. I was not about to let them get away. Despite what Alvin had said after we destroyed the AD Droids, we still had a score to settle.