For Tomorrow

Whump, whump, whump, went the rotary blades of the King Raven as it moved towards the small town of Mercy. Marcus closed his eyes as flashbacks played in front of his eyes.

"Dom, what the fuck are you doing?"

"Pulling the plug on 'em Marcus! Jump, will you? Do it!"

"Dom! No!"

"Marcus! He's gone! There's nothing you can do!"

"Get off me! God damn it, let me get him out of there!"

"It's okay Marcus… it's okay. Come on we gotta go now."

"Marcus?" Carmine asked, pulling him out of his trance. Marcus' face had slipped from his usual stone gaze into an expression of sorrow, like a switch he pulled himself from sadness and let his iron side show.

"Yeah?" his baritone voice that could rumble glass asked in a tone that suggested irritation.

"We're here." Baird said simply. Even his smartass comments stopped for a moment sensing Marcus' distress.

"Let's get this over with." Marcus ordered as he pulled his Lancer off of the magnetic plate on his back.

The remaining members of the Coalition of Ordered Governments, or COG for short, had expressed interest in expanding the remaining low tens of thousands of humans under their protection to the town of Mercy. The island of Azura could only hold so many for so long with their current food stores. Colonel Hoffman, the highest-ranking member of the COG, had ordered Delta to explore Mercy to see if there was a chance the COG could expand to Mercy and let the civilians inhabit the buildings that remained and if the nearby fields could be suitable for farming and raising livestock.

Delta-One was composed of Corporal Damon Baird, Private Samantha Byrne, known by everyone as just Sam, Private Clayton Carmine, and Marcus. Marcus turned and peered at the town, trying to see if it had been lived in recently.

"Carmine, you and I will take right. Baird, Sam, take left." Marcus ordered as he slowly began to walk off.

"Really? I can't take the helmeted pig lover?" Baird argued as Sam nudged him in the rib cage.

"You know you would jizz your pants if you saw a plate of freshly cut and cooked bacon Baird." Carmine retorted, something about his voice sounded extremely familiar to his brothers Anthony and Benjamin Carmine, both had died in the line of duty. Sometimes Marcus could swear they were talking through Clay.

"Right, right. Just like you when that sapper last night tried to unbuckle your pants? What was her name? Joe?" Baird fired back, his sarcasm back full swing.

"Remind me to skin you when we get back to base Baird."

"Enough." Marcus cut in and killed the mood with one word. "Next person who talks gets to train the new recruits through today's lecture. Chainsaw bayonet day."

That shut the two up quickly allowing Carmine and Marcus to proceed without interruption. They walked silently for about fifteen minutes before Carmine broke the silence.

"You doing alright Marcus?" he asked in his normal slightly upbeat and slightly grim tone.

"Great." Marcus replied.

"If you need a minute while we're here, just tell me. When I found out Tony and Ben had died I spent hours rereading their letters and looking at old pictures of the four of us."

"Drop it."

"Okay. Remind me to check on Duke when we get back. I haven't talked to him in a week."

The two were silent again, continuing along the stone paved path with random grass spurts popping through the pavement. Something was eerie about the small town. It was the clichéd too quite, not an insect buzzing or a bird chirping in the distance to off put the Gears need for high alert.

"Is it just me or does it seem a little quiet out here?" asked Carmine.

"Yeah, keep your eyes out. I don't think we're alone."

"Stranded?"

"Gotta be. Unless some new monster came out of the depths of the earth."

"Shit. You think we could handle another version of the Locust or the Lambent?"

"I don't know, if we all became bullet proof then yeah. Since we haven't, we'd probably go extinct if we had to pull some of the shit we did back during the war."

The two came up to a rubble filled road, the only way though was through a building that had a heavy chest of drawers propped against the entrance. Despite the two being bigger than most body builders both of them would have to pick it. Carmine and Marcus slung their Lancers onto the plate on their back and walked over to grip the chest of drawers.

Carmine bent down, his huge arms flexing and showing the two tattoos of his younger brothers immortalized forever on his biceps, and gripped the bottom of the piece of furniture. Marcus bent down with him and they counted out loud to three before grunting and picking the heavy wooden object up.

The two moved it forward four or five feet before putting it down. Carmine pretended to wipe sweat off of his helmeted forehead from the lifting.

"Shall we continue sir?" Carmine asked as he gestured towards the opening.

Cut the sir shit, we ain't that polite out here. Came the sound of young Benjamin Carmine's voice ringing through his head. "Let's go." he quickly said as he walked into the house, squeezing behind the chest of drawers, Carmine in tote behind him.

Marcus' stopped for a moment to observe the inside of the building. Making sure there were no traps waiting to be sprung. His gaze moved over to see Carmine pressing forward on a tripwire he had missed seeing.

"Carmine look out!" Marcus yelled as he ran towards him.

******
Marcus had been gone for five minutes and that was about how long it had taken for Baird to narrowly avoid being punched in the face by Sam.

"Fucking ingrate." Sam spat at Baird as she placed her Lancer on her back and took out her Longshot sniper rifle. Peering through the scope to recon the plaza square before moving up into an area that could serve as a viable place for an ambush for whatever waited for them.

"Hey, I wasn't talking about your mother." Baird scowled, as he stood flush against the wall of the house they were occupying.

"You don't say that. Asswipe."

"Whatever, I'll just take a nap now and let you look." Baird told her as he pulled a chair up and put his feet up on an old table that looked like it was about to fall apart at any moment.

"No you won't. You're going out for a little lookie loo."

"Bitch please."

"Out, or I'll have Bernie punch you out when we get back."

"Fuck, she just punched me once. Never once did she actually punch me out."

Sam was quite as she turned and looked at him. Baird felt an urge to get out and look around like she had asked.

"Whatever, getting boring in here anyway." Baird told her as he pulled his Lancer off his back and left the room.

Walking down the stairs, which creaked underneath his twelve-pound boots, he muttered obscenities to himself that would have made Marcus pause for a moment. Opening the door, which ended up ripping it off the hinges from rot, he walked back out onto the street.

He stopped murmuring to himself and walked forward towards the dry as a bone fountain that made up the centerpiece of the plaza's once grand majesty. Towards his left he could have sworn he heard someone moving and talking in hushed whispers. Baird raised his Lancer and peered down the iron sight at where he thought the sound was coming from.

"Hey!" he yelled, about to say something that would register about a six on an asshole scale of one to ten. Pausing long enough to realize that he wasn't looking to get shot right now he reined it in. "Uh, if you guys come out then we'll accept your cooperation, or something like that. Fuck what should I say?" he said though he started to mumble at the last bit.

Baird heard the sound of a safety being flicked off. That meant it was time to hide.

"Shit!" he yelled as a hail of bullets came out and skittered all over the ground around him.

"And that's how I scored the last touchdown against the Sharks during the All Father's Bowl." Cole finished as he and Jace walked through the town.

"Yo, I remember watching that game. That was some cool shit." Jace responded as he ran a hand across his dreadlocked hair.

"Yeah, it was."

"Hey Cole?"

"Yeah big man?"

"How come we always seem to split up into pairs? Wouldn't it make more sense to stay together?"

"Big town and there's eight of us. Besides, not like we got grubs popping up at our feet no more."

"I guess, but still it would be nice to stick together."

"You talkin' about stickin' together for safety reasons or so that you can eye Anya?"

"Cole! Not cool man."

"It's alright, she's an attractive lady."

"She's Marcus' lady, if I hit on that Marcus would hang me with my small intestines."

"Damn right he would."

"Besides that's not who I even have my eye on."

"You want a little of that Alex Brand action? Shoot, you one brave kid."

"Yeah since the last time Baird pissed her off she nearly gave him a prostate exam with her Lancer, and not with the bullets."

There was a sound of clicking, like someone snapping a briefcase shut. A briefcase, no one had used a briefcase in years. That got Jace's attention. He put his hand out to stop Cole and shushed him.

"You hear that man?" he asked quietly.

"What?"

"Sounded like someone shutting something, quiet."

The two stood still for a moment before they heard what sounded like a latex glove slapping against skin, in that way doctors in horror movies did to freak everyone out.

There was no visible door to the building, an oddity of the highest degree. So Cole had to boost Jace onto a ledge that connected to a balcony. Jace gripped the ledge and managed to swing himself over to the balcony. Gripping the edge and pulling himself up in full gear was hard but Jace managed to do it. There was nothing he could do for Cole until he found a rope or a ladder of some sorts. The balcony was too far up for Jace to reach down and extend his hand out for Cole to reach up, maybe something was inside that he could use.

"I'll be right back, stay here." Jace whispered as he pulled his Gnasher shotgun off of his back and cocked it. Anything that came at him would leave a bloody mess after facing the wrong end of the barrel.

"Jace, be careful. If something goes fucked then you're on your own." Cole whispered to him.

Jace nodded before he slowly pushed the door open, voting for stealth instead of Delta's normal method of entry, kicking the door down and alerting everything within a fifty-foot radius to their location. Raising the shotgun to hip level he slowly made his way further into the house.

The house was abandoned, as so many others were, and had a rather haunted house vibe to it. Creaking floor panels, random whispers in the wall, the one painting whose eyes seem to follow you as you walked by it. Yet despite all of this, that wasn't what was scaring Jace. The air was cold, colder than it should have been for the pleasant seventy-degree weather outside. A sense of dread crept through him like an icy scalpel slowly cutting open each individual vein and filling them with ice.

Jace swallowed, his throat was dry. He kept his eyes forward knowing that he couldn't stop and take a quick swig from his canteen. If whatever was in here was as bad as he felt it was then it would strike when his guard was down. He approached a long hallway, one of those ones that you question why anyone needed a hallway as long as it was. Doors on each side, some in perfect condition, some broken off the hinges, some that had rotted away as if it was infested with some festering plague.

Jace's palms began to sweat; thankfully he had gloves on to help keep a grip on his shotgun. His heart felt like it was ripping through bone and skin to be loose from his chest. Reaching nearer to the end of the hallway he could have sworn that he heard screaming coming from behind the door. Jace was sweating bullets now, his heart seconds away from bursting through his chest like an alien. He reached the end of the hallway and slowly moved towards the door handle. Grabbing onto the door handle was like trying to grab a piece of dry ice, a burning cold that made him let go and jump back a few feet.

"Shit." was all Jace said as he contemplated pissing his pants and curling up in the fetal position.

Within him a spark of courage started to build. Jace focused on it, trying to build the courage into a fire, enough that he could get through this. Regripping his shotgun he ran up and kicked the door down to reveal what was on the other side.

The door fell back and landed on the ground a few feet from the doorframe. Jace looked in to see what had been giving him frights. In a normal wooden chair sat a person, not just any person but a Gear! He was decked out in the normal summer Gear armor, chest plating but no sleeves, with a helmet covering his face. He was bleeding from several places and was tied to the chair he had obviously been tortured. The Gear moaned to signify he was alive.

"Shit, I hope you're not a booby trap." Jace whispered as he walked over and untied him. Making sure he wouldn't trip any hidden traps that could kill him and the newfound Gear.

After untying the Gear Jace's curiosity was killing him. He had to know who this Gear was. Jace placed his hands on either side of the helmet and slowly pulled it off, revealing whom it was underneath.

"Shit! Ayers? Is that you man?" Jace said in utter shock. Ayers looked like shit, there was cuts and bruises all over his face. The most notable was a jagged cut in the shape of a lightning bolt that stretched from his left earlobe to the middle of his left cheek.

"Look out…" Ayers rasped out.