Chapter 10 – Commissioned officers.

“Stop” a corporal at the door says as they arrive at the operations room “You cannot enter”

Travelling from the Battle grounds to the Operations room took over half an hour, this half hour had allowed Zulu to come down a far bit. Though he was still angry, his eyes were no longer red. He was calm now, but still mad.

“I will enter corporal” Zulu says grabbing the neck of the corporal before he could react “And you will not stop me” throwing him to the ground face first before pressing the button to open the door.

[Door locked]

“You cannot enter” the corporal coughs out getting up with the help of Samuel

“It’s always locked from the inside when a major Op starts” Delia says “Which is why I said you won’t be able to meet with the general”

*Wires*

“How long does an Op usually take?” Zulu asks as the wires from his head gear dig its way into the circuitry of the door button.

“Depends on how big the Operation is.”

“Stop that” the corporal says grabbing Zulus shoulder and in turn being thrown onto his back.

“Stop trying man. Just let the Zulu do what he wants” Samuel tells the corporal helping him up yet again.

[Un-able to access door control]

“But he can’t enter!” the corporal states firmly as he moves forward but is stopped by Matthew “Why aren’t you helping me?”

“He will stop once he realises he can’t do anything” Matthew answers. As in the Half hour he had continuously stated the impossibility of gaining access to that room without the proper authorization to Zulu.

“The general did say he had free rein on base.” Delia states also watching.

[Power to door – Disabled]

[Door Lock still engaged]

[Weakened structure points located]

*Show me*

Images of red dots appear over the glass covering his right eye. Each dot locating a point not on the door but on the walls around it; Making him smile.

“What’s so funny?” Lucy asks as she mistakes the smile for a smirk.

Placing his hand upon one of these points “Just something an old friend once told me” Hitting it hard then moving onto to the others

“Architects will always put immense effort and resources into a structure, most often in a defensive point, such as a wall, door, or window”

Taking a breath and blinking a few times.

“But they tend to always fail to notice a large weakness in the design that makes all of this easy to circumvent.”

A crack appears joining each of these points around the doorway.

“The door itself may be indestructible”

Taking a step back

“But the walls around it.”

And performing a well-placed kick.

“Less so”

The sound of metal, steel and stone breaking rings out, the cracks enlarge and spread, The wall seem to vibrate with the door, but just as it seems to fall it remains standing and still…It does not break.

“…Well that was anti-climactic” Samuel says breaking the awkward silence that had followed.

Taking out his pistol and turning his safety off, Zulu makes to fire but halts as the door slides open, letting red light flash out onto them. A {Damage to outer Wall} warning was being played on the speakers in the room and the man that had given him his living details stands in the doorway, the General.

“Shut down that warning signal already!” he shouts to those in the room before turning to see Zulu and those that followed him.

“Sir!” the corporal that was originally pushed out of the way immediately comes to attention and salutes with Delia and the others.

Returning the salute “What is it” he asks, immediately noting that Zulu didn’t give or return the sign of respect.

Firing his pistol Zulu releases three shots without warning, making everyone jump.

[Pistol ammunition – 8 shots]

The sound of metal, steel and stone breaking is heard yet again, stronger and louder than before. The cracks enlarge and spread out more, and this time the wall around the door crumbles, this time the door falls backwards into the room.

“Much better” Zulu says out loud with a satisfied smile, putting away his pistol.

{DOOR BREACH!} Another siren started bleeping into room and through the speakers onto the base. Alerting everyone in the underground of the destroyed wall, before quickly being shut down as well.

With the door that the general was standing in now gone, he was annoyed and mad. Zulu could see it, where others could not. The burn scars running across the face of the old general was ever more present, with the grey moustache messier then the last time he saw him. It seems to have been busy the last three days Zulu concludes.

“What are you doing!?!” the general yells in frustration, losing all sense of his outwardly calm look.

Taking one step before anyone can react, Zulu closes the distance between himself and the general. Taking hold of the general’s left arm with one hand and holding the neck of said person firmly as to not give him much room to move, but not enough to stop his breathing with his other.

“Why did you authorise the use of Zulu images to the public?” Zulu demands to know, ignoring the general’s questions.

Not faltering under the hands of Zulu the general maintains his line of question, like a true general should “Do you know what you have just done?!” the general tries to push the Zulu back but stops when he feels the hand around his neck tighten “Construction of this place has taken decades to complete!”

“And it has taken me less than a minute to destroy” Zulu responds squeezing the left artificial arm of the general, making him feel discomfit in his shoulder. “Why are the Zulu images being let out to the public!?” he demands again, now projecting a recording of what he saw to those around.

Now realising what was happening the general calms down. “...It has always been that way”

Putting what he hears into context, Zulu concludes that it was not this general that allowed the use of Zulu images but those that came before. Angry and annoyed at his own conclusion he continues his course of action and crushes the left arm, before yanking it out of the generals left shoulder, making the general fall to his knees. No blood flowed to the ground though, only blue liquid from now destroyed artificial arm. In his mind, the general was still responsible for not removing said images from use.

“Give me access to all your terminals! I will erase those myself!” he says making his way into the room.

“I can’t” the general replies firmly clasping his left shoulder and making Zulu stop in his tracks from the answer.

Annoyed at the resistance Zulu comes back and goes down to his knees to be level with the general “I am only asking as a formality General. From all I have seen, the way you and those officers behind you behave, you all know I have more right to what I demand then not. Even though times has moved on and things are different, it seems to me that you all know, even if the common soldier does not, that me being a Zulu, I have special privileges that you all must adhere to…Am I right?”

“…Yes” the General responds now weak.

“Then I am gaining access to your terminals and I will do with it as I will.”

“You will not be able to do what you want to.” An officer in the room steps forward and says.

Looking up at this fellow, he finds that it is a her, with blonde hair, stitches across her cheeks and an artificial right eye. “And why is that.” Zulu asks getting up.

“The private sector has control of those, not us.”

Looking into the room of the officers again he notices that all officers in the room has some limb or part of their body replaced.

“The military no longer controls its own classified files?” Zulu asks.

“No” the general replies “All classified data are filed then handed off to the politicians; to see if the private sectors may use it. We can see them but we no longer control them.”

Taking a long and deep breath before continuing “I am sorry for my behaviour general.” He hands back the arm “I did not think that the military would no longer be controlling the populace.”

Taking the arm back “We will give you access to what we can.” The general states, understanding that he too would be annoyed at seeing the image of someone he fought side by side with being used in the way that was shown. “Colonel” he calls “Get me my tablet from my desk”

“Aye sir” the woman that had stepped up responds moving back into the room to retrieve said object.

“I cannot authorize you into the system. I do not have the capability to do so.” The general says “I will give you my tablet though. It has full access to everything I can access.”

Looking at the crumbled walls “You need to rethink your defensive structures general. It took me three pistol shots to destroy it.”

“Sir!” the colonel comes back “your tablet.”

Taking it and handing it to Zulu “The code is 0931945373473. Long but I did not decide it.”

“Thank you.” Zulu responds “I will run through our current situation and come back later.” He says turning his back and leaving the general to go back to his business.

With Delia and group following in tow. “What are you doing now?” Delia ask.

“Back to the living quarters, you need not follow me, I will be reading.” He answers, not stating that he work on trying to get access to the private sectors as well. “Why did you all not try and stop me when I had the general.”

“You had no intention of killing him.” Lucy states. “You put your pistol away and crushed his left artificial arm as you knew that he wouldn’t receive any permanent damage or die from it.”

“As the medic stated, you had no intention of killing.” Samuel repeats.

Nodding Zulu does not respond, but makes a personal note.

[Possible temporary operation unit members to consider]

[Sargent Delia, Sargent Matthew, Corporal Samuel, Corporal Lucy]

--------------------------------------------

A/N

Hope this chapter lived up to the climax I had been trying to make. I’m not very good and concluding conflicts. Always my down fall ^.^