“Alright boys, Mengsk sent us here so we could get these disks from the Confederates. They have, information about the Zerg we can use.”

I heard Raynor when I materialized into the Campaign Map. I also listened to a shit ton of movement and what I swore was shouting when I fully emerged with all of my men. I held my hands up, telling my people to keep their weapons lowered while Raynor reigned in his boys. I grinned ruefully at the situation. I had no clue how I was supposed to explain my sudden appearance away, instead of how The System would do it.

“Hey Raynor, Walter.” I nodded to the man in black Marine armor when I noticed him walk up beside Raynor. “What’s shaking?” I couldn’t help throwing in a little bit of a joke here.

“Aside from not knowing where the hell you and your army there came from, we were about to assault this facility. What are you doing here?” Walter was frowning at me though Raynor was grinning a bit. I liked the man a lot more as he was rather than the character I had learned to enjoy the games themselves. Likely because I saw his actions and reactions as opposed to watching them play out on a screen.

“I’m here to help, the men and women with me are my guard detail. I ran into some problems back home and Fernando, you remember him, decided I needed an army to keep me from doing anything too stupid.”

Raynor laughed at my explanation, and I just smiled a little. I wasn’t even lying with that. I knew damn well the army behind me was the best he could provide me within the shape of a fucking wall of shields and Lance Rifles and Greens best Medics. The Condors were overkill, honestly, but who knew what we would face in this place.

Raynor had Walter about twenty other men, six of them were Firebats. I almost wished I had taken some Marauders but the Predators should more than make up for any situation that needed an overwhelming force applied. I knew about their electric shockwave attacks, but I wanted to see how they fought in reality as opposed to the game's mechanics.

“Happy to have you man, happy to have you. We have some objectives here, gathering those disk first and foremost. Anything else we find is icing on the cake.” Raynor said, forcing my attention back on him and not my shiny cat-like metallic beasties.

“Alright, how we doing this then? It’s your operation; I’m just along for the ride.” Walter answered me then, the man still seemed to have his reservations but they weren’t too bad, or he’d likely be more vocal about it.

“We’re breaching the facility quickly. We’ll only have about an hour after I hack these systems to get everything we need and get out before Confederate forces move on our position and trap us in this facility. You and your men are a welcome addition in numbers; it will let us cover more ground quickly. How many have technical experience?”

I had no actual way to answer him, so I did the next best thing. “Raise your hands if you can hack or otherwise extract data.” ten people raised their hands, and I grunted while jerking my head at the people behind me. “There you go.”

“Alright, you ten are team leaders. Pick small mobile teams. Damian, if you would join us back where we were going over the building schematics.” I nodded and made my way toward them and their impromptu table.

The facility layout was reasonably complex, a lot more complicated than I thought it would be in all honesty. Several areas were highlighted or otherwise circled as points of interest. That was likely where we needed to go to obtain the data required. There were roughly twenty such areas, and I was suddenly glad for my colossal detail if he was right and we would only have an hour after making entry then without them we would never have made it on time.

I felt a considerable presence sidle up behind me, slightly to my left and I heard Raynor mutter something about that being a big man. I didn’t even have to look to know it was Trenton in his bear motif armor with his massive shield. I had a feeling the man wasn’t going to allow me to so much as piss without him right up my ass.

“Raynor, Walter, this is Trenton. His life goals seem to revolve around keeping me alive.” Raynor started talking to him animatedly, and Walter regarded me like I was a moron. He wasn’t wrong there; I was a moron in most situations. I shook my head a bit, bringing myself back to the here and now. “What about the scientists and civilians in the facility?”

I asked it more for effect than needing an actual answer. I knew the objectives and that The System would likely enforce them to some degree in that regard. “Avoid killing them if at all possible.” was Raynor's answer, taking him from his subdued conversation with Trenton.

“You and the big guy here are with Walter and me. We’re moving toward the heavier defended areas. Our intel says the Confederates have some experiments going on there and we need to figure out what it is.” I had a feeling I knew what those experiments were, but I wasn’t going to say anything and be proven wrong either.

“Alright, I got a few new toys with me as well. I’m going to bring two of them with us while the other three split up with the teams. The Condors will stay outside and monitor the situation. They’re a bit too big to enter the building anyway.”

Raynor looked at the Condors, smiling. He no doubts enjoyed his gift a great deal from the last mission I did with him. Walter was the one that asked the question about my new ‘toys’ though. I whistled shrilly, and they came bounding from within the huddle that was my people, forcing them out of their way, before skidding to a stop just beside me. The great metal beasts started rubbing their heads against my armor, seeking attention. I tried to ignore the screeching of metal on metal from that action. “Stop that; you’ll get attention later,” I said it more out of habit than actually thinking it would work. I was surprised that it did, considering I believed their A.I was modeled after a felines personality. Raynor and Walter looked at them with wide eyes, and then Raynor just lost his shit, laughing uproariously after seeing them while Walter was a bit lost for words.

“You always surprise, Damian. These things will help us, I have no doubt.” was Raynor's response after he caught his breath. I grinned back and then shrugged. I knew the real surprise would happen when they were sent into an actual combat situation.

We spent the next fifteen minutes getting everyone ready. All the teams were assembled and knew what they had to do. My men also knew to gather any data they could along the way outside of the primary objective. I had a feeling this facility had a lot more going on than anyone could imagine.

Walter was fiddling with a panel of some sort just outside the door on the right, and then the doors opened. No sooner had they started opening than I peeked what lay before us and I felt my eyes widen in shock before lifting my rifle and yelling “Enemy contact!” I killed one Marine with a bullet that pierced straight through his armor while Trenton beside me took another with a well-placed headshot from his own Lance Rifle. I took another down when the Confederate became visible as the doors opened.

Shouting could be heard inside, and I knew the Marines that had been there were scrambling for cover and likely raising an internal alarm of some sort. I growled in frustration at the slowly opening doors. “Can’t you open these things any faster Walter?!” yelled Raynor who was trying to shoot at the Marines as they moved to a better position. “You wanna do this? No? Then shut it and let me work!”

I ground my teeth in frustration again, taking the life of a Marine stupid enough to peek around and try to take a pop-shot at us. The doors were wide enough for us to go through in single file, but that was asking for a bullet between the eyes. I smiled grimly then while looking at the Predators that were growling and pawing at the ground as if they wanted desperately to be sent in that dark entrance. I suppose now was as good a time as any to test them in combat.

I let out a sharp whistle that I had learned was some built-in attack command for these machines when I first obtained them. They each let loose a roar that sounded like unholy offspring of screeching metal and a large cats coughing roar and dove into the opening one at a time. Weapons fired as the first one shoved its large body through the doorway, its wide frame catching momentarily on the edges of the doors and forcing it open a little bit further. Sadly the Marines were firing at human height, and while the Predators were massive, they were just shy of chest level on a Marine in full armor.

The bullets that did hit the first Predator through did nothing but piss it off as well. The thing roared, and then it was through the doors, followed by the second and third shortly after. Screams were heard then with the odd illumination of light that showed glimpses of the slaughter occurring inside that dark entrance.

Illumination from the electrical discharge showed one of the Predators through the gap midair as it smacked a Confederate Marines head, sending the thing flying free from his body as blood shot out before darkness enclosed the area again.

Another that followed showed a Predator having taken two Marines to the ground and the metal beast was savaging them while it cooked them alive within the armor. The final two Predators had forced their way inside at that point, and the screaming only intensified then. The disturbing roars always accompanied a scream before it was cut short in death.

As the doors opened further and the light from outside joined the dark entrance, we saw more of the situation, and I felt like hurling. Armored body parts were thrown all over the floor, blood ran in small rivers along the hard ground, and my Predators were hardly finished with the surprisingly large guard that had been placed here.

Even the men beside me were stunned at the carnage the Predators had unleashed, and I almost wished I hadn’t sent them in. They acted more like Zerglings in the way they shredded people too pieces. No one deserved to die like that, even Confederate soldiers. The problem was that this was war, as the doors opened fully and the last Marine fell beneath the fangs of a Predator I rationalized the carnage I had unleashed on these men. They were the enemy, and war of any kind cared nothing for the means, it only cared about the victor.