Freya cursed as she ducked back into the room she had just exited. Petey, who had stepped through the doorway first, fell as energy rounds went right through his heavy armor. She pulled out a grenade and tossed it back through the doorway. Dog, who was guarding her rear, pushed her out of the way and took position right beside the door. He waited for the sound of the grenade to go off before he spun through the door and unleashed his heavy machine gun into the hallway.

Freya followed him through the door, stepping over Petey’s body, her rifle at the ready as her armor turned on her dark vision to allow her to see in the darkened hallway. Dog steadily walked down the hallway, gunning down everyone who looked alive. Freya used the doorway for protection as she covered the opposite direction to where Dog was walking. She spotted several dead bodies where her grenade had landed.

Walking backwards, Freya crept behind him until she bumped into his back. She spun around and aimed down the hallway using his body as a meat shield. She peaked around him but Dog was killing the enemy too fast for her to contribute. In less than four seconds, every enemy in sight was down and Dog stopped firing but he kept his weapon up and at the ready.

Freya put her hand on his shoulder to stop him. “Wait, let me take Petey’s backpack.” She told him as she turned around again and retreated back to Petey’s dead body. Dog crouched down, but didn’t take his attention away from the hallway in front of him. Freya pushed Petey’s body over, pulled his backpack off and slung it over her shoulder, then turned around again to rejoin Dog. She patted his shoulder telling him she was back and ready. He stood up and started walking down the hallway.

They left the cargo hold and made their way down the stairs to the main deck. The room that they just left was an airlock that separated the stairs from the main deck. Petey had pulled rank and taken first position. Freya had no idea why he wanted to go first as he should have gone last to direct them. She absently thought he was trying too hard to be a good leader when he should have just followed his training.

Freya took the time to look around. The hallway was about six feet wide and about eight feet tall. The ceiling was made out of rock that had pipes and wires running down the side of it. In the center of the ceiling was a metal pole that could be used to anchor a person if the station ever lost gravity. The walls of the hallway had lights embedded in them illuminating the hallway. The floor was metal and painted with anti-slip black paint. When she glanced back she saw that the hallway was dark for about a hundred feet behind them from the grenade she had tossed.

Freya kept an eye on the enemy on the floor as they passed them. They wore heavy armor and they had decent weapons. She was surprised that she and Dog were still alive. “Must have come up on them and surprised them.” She thought to herself as she stepped over a dead body and glanced behind them to make sure they were still in the clear.

They were heading towards the secondary bridge. While they were walking down the stairs they had gotten notifications on their mini maps informing them that several objectives had been taken. The first to fall was the secondary engine room to Sergeant Leni with first and second squads. The waypoint on the mini map had changed to the next target, which was the secondary bridge. They had to clear that objective as fast as possible before hitting their final objective, which was the enlisted berthing.

“Lead to Magic.” Sergeant Torres’s voice came over the radio.

“Go for Magic.” Freya replied as Dog stopped so that she could talk on the radio.

“I have your location. I need you to turn around and head to the command center.” He ordered her.

“Roger. I have Dog with me. Should he continue or follow me?” She asked.

“Stay together. There are roaming security patrols. Stay alert.” He told her.

Freya tapped Dog’s shoulder and he nodded and spun around leading her back the way they had come. As he did so Freya noticed that he had not come out of the last firefight unscratched. She saw that while he was not limping he had a hole in his right leg and one in his stomach. He didn’t have an exit wound so she was not sure if the round had penetrated all the way through his armor.

“You ok?” She asked him as she glanced behind her to make sure there was no one sneaking up on her.

“Healing. I’m at 87 percent health and rising. I’m a front line fighter and that means that I have to have high health and health regen. If you add that to the couple of wetware medical mods I have, it makes getting shot not as bad.” He told her.

“If that is true then why does Petey keep dying then?” She asked him.

“He went with strength and agility instead of going with health. It’s the speed front line fighter template. It’s a nice template, but Pete’s horrible at it. He should have gone with health like most of us. Coming up to the next junction.” He told her, as they passed the airlock where the stairs were.

They came to the intersection in the hallway and Dog, keeping close to the wall, turned left. Freya stepped into the intersection with her back to Dog and turned right. She spotted two unarmored women in military uniforms running away from them. She pulled the trigger taking them both down.

“Clear.” She called out.

“Clear.” Dog replied.

She walked backwards until she bumped into Dog and waited for him to start moving. This time she didn’t turn around as he started walking. She kept a watch on the hallway behind them. Dog took them down the hallway to another airlock. He knelt down, keeping his weapon trained down the hallway, as Freya used her Personal AI to try and link with the door. She didn’t even look at it as she accessed the locked door. She kept her attention down the hall until she received the notification that her Personal AI had linked to the door. Then she dropped her gaze to her wrist and went through her list of hacking programs before she found the right one and downloaded it. Seconds later the door opened, Freya turned around and tapped Dog on the shoulder, then went through the door first. She turned around as soon as she was inside and waited for Dog to enter, keeping guard as he took his attention off the hallway.

Once the door was closed she activated the second door. The door slid open and Dog went first, his weapon aimed up the stairs because they were on the ground floor for this staircase. Freya followed him and took over his position. As soon as she took his position, he walked up the stairs sideways to get an angle at the next flight of stairs with his weapon. Once he was at the next landing, Freya followed him. Five flights of stairs later they found the correct airlock and Freya unlocked it. Once more she went first into the airlock and Dog took the rear.

The hallway outside the airlock on the fifth deck above the main deck was littered with dead bodies. Most of them were unarmored enemies but she saw a few Federation Marine bodies as well amongst the dead. Freya glanced at the mini map as they made their way down the hallway and noticed that they had to go west to get to the command center. They were currently going south.

“You going the right way?” She asked Dog.

“I thought we could just follow the dead bodies.” Dog said, not turning around.

“There are dead bodies going both directions.” She told him. “We need to head west. I don’t see an intersection coming up. We should turn around and go the other way.”

“You’re the scout.” He told her as he stopped. He spun around smoothly and headed back the way they came. Freya sighed and followed him. They came to another intersection and Dog asked which direction to go. She directed him to the hallway that was heading northwest. Two intersections later Freya smiled as they closed in on the waypoint.

“Magic to Lead. Friendlies incoming.” She called over the radio to Sergeant Torres. Dog stopped at the edge of the last intersection and waited. Freya stopped with her back towards Dog and guarded the rear.

“Magic from One.” Came the reply over the radio. “You’re clear to come in.”

“Roger that.” Freya replied and reached over her shoulder and tapped Dog. He immediately moved around the corner and turned right. Freya followed him.

The hallway ended with an airlock that had been wrecked. She saw two Federation Marines standing just inside the airlock, their weapons pointed right at them. Freya relaxed and ran towards them following Dog. She nodded to Dusty as she ran past him. He was one of the guards in the airlock. The other guard was a guy named Stena. He was a heavy gunner from First Squad.

Done was standing just on the other side of the airlock. “Good to see you, Magic. Sergeant Torres needs you. Dog, glad you could make the party. Take over for Dusty.” He ordered.

The command center was a rectangular room broken up by a bunch of workstations. On the walls were two medium-sized screens with a very large screen in the middle. Sergeant Torres was standing in front of the large screen with One. They were looking at what appeared to be seven objects headed right towards the space station.

Sergeant Torres must have heard her because he turned around and saw her. “Magic, good you’re here.” He said waving her over. “We took too long getting here and they locked us out. I need the station’s defences up. We have seven enemy troop carriers headed our way. They are eight minutes out. Those carriers can offload a hundred troops each in less than a minute.”

Freya nodded and looked around. She found the weapons station towards the far end of the command center. She sat down, pushing a dead body out of the chair, and tried to access the console with her Personal AI, but it was locked up. It wasn’t receiving any outside connections. She cursed and tapped the console. It was DNA locked but that was not a problem. She pulled out her knife and stabbed the dead body then smeared the blood on the DNA scanner. It unlocked the screen so that she could input a code to access the system.

Since the console was still locking out any remote access she had to pull a cable from her backpack and attach it to her armor. She then tried to download one of her password crackers, but the antivirus caught her program and killed it before it could run. She cursed and tried another one with the same results.

“Not to make you worry but those carriers are five minutes out.” Sergeant Torres told her.

“This isn’t going to work.” Freya muttered to herself. She looked around and a crazy idea popped into her head.

“We need it to work or we will fail this mission.” Sergeant Torres told her as Freya stood up. “Where are you going?” He asked her as she headed towards the door.

Freya, remembering her recent sabotage training, looked at the side of the airlock door. She pulled her knife out again and looked for a place to pull off plating on the side of the wall. She found one and wedged her knife in the crack but she was not strong enough to pull it off.

“I need someone to take this panel off.” She said not looking up.

“I got you.” Mon said, kneeling down beside her. He pulled out his trenching tool and lined it up on the crack. He kicked his shovel with the bottom of his foot and the shovel slid into the crack. He leaned on the handle and the panel bent open. Once he got enough room, he pulled his shovel away and pulled the panel off with his bare hands.

“This is what a Strength of nearly five hundred can do.” He told her with a smile.

Freya shook her head absently and looked inside the hole that Mon had created. She had to stick her head into the hole but she found what she was looking for. She saw the control panel for the airlock door. It was a bunch of thin crystals that were lined up next to each other. She pulled off her backpack and took out her sabotage gear.

She opened the small bag and took out a receiving lazer, a modified maintenance scanner and a pair of tongs.

“Three minutes, Magic.” Sergeant Torres said, as Freya started scanning the crystals. She ignored him as she quickly found the right one and pulled it out. She replaced it with the receiving lazer then lined it up. She then tested it and frowned when it didn’t work. She then had to pull two more crystals and put one of them back in. When she tested it once more it didn’t work. She replaced the last crystal with another one and tested it. The modified maintenance scanner pinged. She then moved the lazer and tested it with the scanner. She had to adjust it a couple of times before she got another ping.

“Two minutes.” Sergeant Torres warned her. She didn’t reply as she used her Personal AI to try and link to the receiving lazer. For a second she thought she failed but then she got a blue screen notification saying she was linked. She accessed her programs on her wrists and downloaded her password cracker. This time it worked. Seconds later she was in.

“We’re in. I’m unlocking the weapons station. Someone get the defences up.” She told the room as she downloaded another program to hack the weapons station. She leaned back and another crazy idea popped into her head. She smiled and started another downloading another program.

“I’m in.” One said behind her. “Magic, I can’t target the ships. It won’t let me.”

“Working on it.” Magic said as her first program went to work.

“One minute.” Sergeant Torres informed her.

She looked at the second program and smiled as it finished downloading. She sent it to work. She looked at the first program’s progress and frowned. It was working but it was taking its time. She didn’t know what else to do to hurry it up. She looked back at her second program and smiled. She downloaded a third program and set it to work before she looked back at the progress of her first program. It showed that it was eighty-two percent complete.

“Forty-five seconds, Magic.” Sergeant Torres informed her, sounding a bit angry.

She checked her first program. It showed ninety-two percent done. “Ten seconds.” She told the room with her best guess. “This is a dirty hack. You’re not going to have all that much time once it’s done.” She told One without looking at her. She watched her second and third programs finish. She quickly unlocked the communication center and tasked it to find the Monarch.

“It’s working.” One shouted happily. “Targeting them now.” Freya ignored her and worked on her third program. She got a notification that the comms center had found the Monarch. She tasked it to send it a live message then she linked the third program to the outgoing message.

“Two ships down.” One cried from the weapons station. “Three.”

Freya looked up briefly then looked back at her work. She cursed as the security found her program and quarantined it. She looked at the outgoing message and noted that it had been live for six seconds before it had been cut off. She hoped that the Navy white hats had enough time to use what she sent them.

“That’s it, I’m locked out. There are two left.” One said, leaning back. “Missiles on their way.”

Freya looked up at the main screen from where she was sitting and saw that the two ships were really close to landing. As she watched, one of the ship’s icons winked out as it was destroyed. The last ship was nearly down when the last missile found it. On the screen the last ship blinked out, but not before several icons appeared on the screen. She didn’t need her hacking skills to tell her that some of the troops jumped right before the ship was destroyed.

“We got some company.” Sergeant Torres called over the radio. “Ed, head to the surface. I’ll put up a waypoint. I want those people dead.”

“On it.” Ed replied on the radio.

“Magic, what’s the chances that you can get us back into the command systems?” Sergeant Torres asked her out loud.

Freya shook her head sadly. “Sorry Sergeant, security has us locked out.”

“That’s fine. One, wreck this place. Everyone else, link up with Ed on the surface. We need to take those reinforcements out.

“Leni, status report.” Sergeant Torres said, apparently forgetting to mute his speakers. Freya didn’t hear the reply as Sergeant Torres must have turned off his speakers while he turned away from everyone and started pacing.

Freya stood up and went to join the others as they got ready to head to the surface. “Magic, stay behind. I want you with me. Mon, you too.” One said behind her.

“Yes, Corporal.” Freya replied, moving away from the door to let the others pass her by.

“This Petey’s?” Mon asked pointing at the backpack that Freya had tossed to the ground by the weapons station.

“Yeah.” Freya replied, nodding.

“Awesome. He always has way too many grenades stashed away.” Mon said as he grabbed the backpack.

“Magic, what do we need to make this place inoperable?” One asked her.

Freya looked around and then down. “Mon, can you pull the floor up? We need to find the hardware for all these systems. We don’t need to take them down but we do need to cut off their link to the main system banks.” She told them, as she pulled out her maintenance scanner.

“Sure, use my amazing body for your grunt work.” Mon joked as he picked up his trenching tool.

Freya smiled but didn’t look up from her scanner as she walked around the command center. She stopped when the scanner found what she was looking for. “Here.” She told him, pointing at the spot the scanner had found.

Mon made short work of the floor as Freya continued to scan the area. She found four more areas, one of them in the walls. She had to work around Sergeant Torres, as he had stayed behind. He mostly ignored her as he stared off into the distance doing whatever Sergeants did when they were in command of a platoon.

Feeling like she was missing something she scanned the ceiling and found another spot. She pointed them out to both Mon and One. They both had way more Strength than she did, so she was not able to help them out ripping apart the room. She did pull all of Petey’s grenades out of his backpack and make a pile of them on the floor. She told herself that she needed the non-template demo skill that Toast had. She knew how to use a grenade like normal but she didn’t know how to pull them apart and create a bomb.

Freya was a little relieved though as no one else looked like they knew how to make a bomb out of grenades. Mon came over when he was done and took a couple of grenades with him. One and Freya took two and, to her surprise, Sergeant Torres took the last two. Sergeant Torres counted down and they tossed the grenades into the holes and ran out of the room. Freya waited until the smoke cleared before she went back in with her maintenance scanner and verified that no one was going to be able to use the command center unless someone did some extensive repairs.

“Leni looks like she’s okay for the moment. We need to head topside to help Ed. Magic, send out some drones and let's get going.”

Feeling embarrassed, Freya replied. “Sorry Sergeant, I already tried but my drones are made for outside. There’s not enough room for them to deploy.”

Sergeant Torres looked disappointed. “That’s a pretty big thing to miss. You’re going to have to fix that when we get done with this mission.” He told her.

“Yes, Sergeant.” Freya replied, feeling low.

“Mon, take point. One, you’ve got the rear. Magic, we’ve got enough to form a stack. Set your active camo on and scout ahead.” The Sergeant said, lifting his rifle.

“Yes, Sergeant.” Freya said and did as he asked. She walked around them and turned on her active camo. With her short-barrel rifle held at the ready she moved ahead.

At first she didn’t see anyone as she made her way back to the stairs. About four turns later, she saw a squad of four heavy-armored soldiers turn at the next intersection and head their way. She leaped up, grabbed onto the ceiling and pulled herself up. Then she called Sergeant Torres on the radio.

“Four incoming. Heavy armor.” She told him as they passed under her.

She dropped down and crept behind them. They slowed down when they got to the intersection and one of them peeked around the corner. The enemy soldier was fast enough to pull back when someone from her makeshift squad fired on him. Freya took that as her cue and fired on the four. They were so focused on the intersection in front of them that she took them by surprise.

She knelt down about twenty feet away from the group before she pulled the trigger dropping the one closest to her. He bumped into the man in front of him as he fell. The second soldier didn’t react fast enough and Freya took him out as well. The third soldier fired his rifle on fully automatic blindly, not seeing her under her active camouflage. He over shot and all the ballistic rounds he fired flew over Freya’s head. She dropped him with a single round to his faceplate. The last soldier panicked and stepped into the intersection and away from her. He was torn apart by rifle fire from her squad.

“That looked like an execution.” Freya thought, slightly amused, as the man dropped in the middle of the intersection. She turned around and looked to see if there were any enemies coming her way. She spent a few seconds looking before she called all clear over the radio to her squad. She got an all clear in return. She stayed where she was until she saw her squad come around the corner. As soon as she saw Mon, she started forward again.

She made it to the airlock to the stairs and went slightly further down the hallway to keep guard. It only took a few seconds for her squad to make it to the airlock door. She stayed where she was as her squad cleared the airlock and entered the stairway before she retreated back to the airlock door and followed them. They waited for her to exit the airlock before they started up the stairs. She took the fourth position in the stack and guarded the squad’s rear as they moved up the stairs.

They went up four flights of stairs before they had to exit the staircase, then moved south to the next set that went up. They had to use four more staircases to get to the top floor. Freya waited until the stack left the airlock before she followed. The squad paused just outside the door, leaning against the wall to let Freya move around them. She passed Mon and started running. She slowed down to a jog when she got to the intersection. She paused to peek around the corner and then continued when she didn’t see anyone.

She was halfway down the hallway when she was picked up and thrown forward as the floor she was on lost its atmosphere. The gravity still held up though so, after about ten feet of falling forward, she dropped to the floor. She quickly picked herself up and ran to the next intersection. She peeked around the corner and saw two Federation Marines in front of her taking cover at the next intersection, they were actively shooting at something in a hallway that went south. They were on opposite sides of the intersection but firing down the same hallway.

“Found our people, Sergeant.” She said over the radio and she stopped so that she didn’t accidentally get shot for sneaking up on her people.

“It must be a breach. We are not at the main battle site yet.” He replied.

“Friendlies incoming to your west.” Freya called over the talk-around channel.

One of the marines pulled back away from the hallway to look in her direction. “Fancy seeing you here, Magic. You bring friends?” The marine said. Freya recognized Dusty’s voice.

“What’s the situation?” Sergeant Torres asked over the same radio channel.

“Ed’s outside with most of the squad. He left me and Stena here to guard this airlock. Done and Jacob got the other one. Not sure if they got a breach but we do.” Dusty said, in between shooting blindly down the hallway.

By the time he was done talking Freya caught up to him and, leaning as low as she could, she peeked around the corner and saw two heavily armored enemy soldiers hiding behind their dead. The airlock behind them looked as if it had been blown inwards as the jagged edges of the metal were pointing inwards towards the station. She saw flashes of light from enemy gunfire from outside. She ducked back behind the wall as enemy fire got more accurate.

“Two on the ground hiding among the dead. More outside.” She said over the radio. “Dusty. Stena. On three - suppressing fire. One. Two. Three.” She counted off then waited another second before she popped around the wall and fired off two quick bursts, hitting the two enemy soldiers on the ground. She ducked back behind the wall as soon as she finished pulling the trigger.

“I got the two on the ground.” She said as both Dusty and Stenna pulled back behind their walls and the enemy gunfire intensified.

She looked up as Sergeant Torres and the rest of her makeshift squad came running up. Sergeant Torres tapped Dusty on the shoulder, taking his place. Freya moved back to give him more room. He peeked around the corner for a second then pulled back.

“Magic, can you send out a drone now?” He asked her.

“I got a Sensor drone built. It won’t get anything inside, but if I can get closer to the airlock I might get a picture of what’s outside.” She told him.

“Okay. On three I want suppressing fire from everyone. Magic, stay low and get as close to the door as possible. Stay close to the left-hand wall.” Sergeant Torres told them, as he readied his gun.

Freya laid down, crawled on her belly between him and the wall and waited. She double checked that her active camouflage was active as Sergeant Torres started counting down. As soon as they started shooting she got up on all fours and scrambled towards the dead bodies. She had to stop a few feet short as her allies pulled back. She dropped down and covered her head as the enemy fire flew over her. When the fire slowed down a bit she looked up. She was about ten feet from the airlock and maybe twenty feet from the exit to outer space. All she could see was darkness outside the airlock as her dark vision failed to pick anything up.

“Close enough.” She thought to herself as she sent out her drone. It’s max range was thirty feet and for the first twenty feet she didn’t get anything. But as soon as the drone cleared the hole where the outside airlock door had been, eighteen red, heavy-armored foot soldier icons appeared on her mini-map. The last few soldiers were at the very edge of her range.

Cursing, she carefully crawled forward and her range slowly expanded, showing her five more enemy soldiers. She crawled past the dead soldiers until she was at the edge of the first airlock door. The enemy soldiers were lined up in a V formation and her mini map had a prone soldier icon just below all the heavy-armored icon. She didn’t see any foxhole icons so she was slightly happy about that. She set her cloud forge to make a surveillance drone so she could get a better idea of what was outside. The timer told her she had five minutes until it would be ready.

“Twenty-three heavy armor. Thirteen on the left. Ten on the right. They are in V formation right in front of the door. They appear to be laying down. Making a surveillance drone but it won't be done for another five minutes.” She told them on the radio.

“Hold your position. I’m going to go see what’s happening at the other airlock. Suppressing fire on three.” Sergeant Torres said over the talk-around channel.

Freya moved as close as she could to the side of the wall and hoped she didn’t get hit. She ducked her head as rounds started flying over her, going both ways. The firefight lasted for a couple of long seconds and Freya was slightly surprised to find herself still alive when the exchange ended. She looked at her mini map but there were still twenty-three red icons outside.

“You guys can’t hit the broad side of a barn.” She told them. “Twenty-three still alive.”

“So says the only person in our company that has a Golden E.” Dusty replied.

“Wait. I’m the only person in our company that has one?” Freya said, surprised.

“Like you didn’t know.” Dusty replied.

“Okay, she has enough of an ego. Let’s cut the chit-chat.” One said.

Freya remained where she was, not moving. She looked past the airlock but her dark vision still didn’t show anything but more darkness. On her mini map the enemy soldiers remained where they were. Occasionally they would fire a few rounds then stop. She wondered why they weren’t rushing them. They outnumbered her squad by more than three times. She knew the enemy squad would lose a few people in the attack, but they would still take the airlock and beyond. Sure the airlock was a bottleneck but they had the numbers. She didn’t think her people could hold their position. She thought it was stupid of them to wait.

She was still wondering when the icons started moving. “They’re moving. Looks like they finally got the courage to come at us.” Freya said, as the red icons converged into four groups. Two of the groups separated and took position on either side of the airlock while the other two took position right in front of the airlock, leaving a small hole in the center. Freya relayed the information as they moved into position.

“Come back to us.” One ordered her.

Freya agreed and turned around to crawl back to her people. On her mini map the red icons slowly vanished. She crawled across the hallway to where Stena was holding his position. She made it to his position before the enemy attacked. She spun around and, kneeling below her fellow marine, started shooting at the charging enemy soldiers. The first group got just inside the airlock before they were taken out. The second group made it past the airlock door before they fell. It was the third group that made it to them.

Freya dropped her empty gun, unable to reload it in time, and pulled out her GMZ rifle. She got two more shots in before the enemy got too close. She retreated as an enemy came charging towards the corner. She used the butt of her rifle to hit him as he came around the corner in front of her. She knocked him to the floor, giving her time to spin her rifle around and fire point-blank into his chest.

The next soldier came around the corner shooting blindly. Freya dove forward into his attack and below his gun. She hit him in the knees, knocking him back. She pulled out her knife and stabbed into his armpit where his armor was weak. Her knife penetrated deeply into his lungs. With a savage twist she yanked the knife out of his chest. She picked up his rifle and, with a mental command, accepted paying 100 credits to use it. She stepped around the corner and opened fire. It took all her strength to keep the weapon from kicking up as she unloaded into the on-coming soldiers, taking a few of them out before the gun ran dry.

She dropped the gun and retreated back behind the wall again, avoiding their return fire. She found her rifle on the floor and picked it up just as an enemy soldier came running around the corner. She dove to the ground as he fired at her. She fired back. She lived. He didn’t. She got to her knees before the next soldier came around the corner. Freya pulled the trigger but nothing happened. She had just enough time to realize that she was out of ammo before the enemy soldier pulled his trigger. The first few rounds missed her but the last one didn’t.

You have died. Cost of respawn: 0 credits.