Radiance

Chapter 142: Safecrackers.

The underground storage yard was massive, it was like two underground football stadiums tacked on end to end along with their car parks.

Sasha and his team stood marvelling at the sheer size of the place which was now lit up thanks to them restoring power to one of the generators but the sight that was presented to them still filled Sasha with amazement, he hadn't expected this place to be so big.

"Wow look at the size of this place," Ivan said dropping down from atop one of the container stacks that were stood at the entrance to the yard, waiting to be shipped to parts unknown all this time.

"If even half of these are full we will have enough to equip not small army but big army!" Sasha said gleefully as he walked up to the container that Ivan had just lept down from and grabbed hold of the locking mechanism around the door handles.

The large old padlock while still sturdy was no match for the overpowered servos and hydraulics of Sasha's power armour, the metal shrieking in protest as he first crushed the locking pins before wrenching the bars apart in order to pop the lock open.

As he discarded the now very busted lock and began to crank the handle to open the door both the Cossacks and the Valkyries gathered around him to see the spoils of their efforts.

As the door swung open it revealed two pristine rows of suits, one side had T51s and the other had the older but still viable T45s.

"Jackpot," Natalia said nodding in approval and making her headlight beam bounce up and down inside the crate and making the shadows create the illusion of a whole standing army contained within its metal walls.

"Should we not contact the Minutemen and let them know what we have found?" Celine asked and Sasha nodded.

"We will in time worry not my large feathered friend, but first we must secure this place and make sure that none of our rotting friends has made it in here, we must be diligent," Sasha said and he saw Celine's face fall and he instantly twigged what was bothering her.

He stepped up to his large second in command and placed a metal hand on her shoulder squeezing tightly to give her reassurance which caused her to once again look at him in surprise, it seemed that the big Condor woman was not used to having people brave enough to simply touch her out of the blue like this, but she would soon learn what it meant to have Russian friends at her back now.

"Worry not my feathered comrade, you will see the vast open skies again soon and you will soar through them as free as well as a bird," he said with a chuckle at his slight faux par by calling her a bird.

Celine raised a rather large eyebrow in surprise that he had so easily deduced what was bothering her and he saw her feathers ruffle in response, he was really going to have to go some to learn the meanings of those ruffles.

"I hope so, I do not like the feeling of being so cooped up, I do not understand how you humans do it, to not have access to the vast invisible ocean is unthinkable to my kind but to not even be able to see it is......unsettling to say the least," she

said.

Sasha nodded in understanding, he kind of empathised with her plight here but in an oddly reversed kind of way.

He like all true Cossacks had been raised underground far from the brightness of the sun or the dangers of the surface, but this had its own set of problems and curses.

Such as most of them having overly sensitive eyes that while brilliant in the darkness of the tunnels were a pain in the ass under the beating rays of the sun.

But this aside when he was forced to spend too long away from the comforting security of the tunnels and the underground Sasha felt an odd sense of unsettlement.

So seeing his new feathered comrade sensing something similar being detached from her vast open skies which she would use those magnificent wings of hers to soar through he could somewhat sympathise with her plight, where this was home to him and his brethren, to her and hers it might as well have been an alien planet.

He figured that being distracted by duty would help her to keep her mind focused, so he gave her command of their part of the team and sent them off to begin the sweep while he headed for the command centre to search for the inventory or shipping manifest which would hopefully help speed up the task of finding out how many suits they had.

00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Celine swung her smaller automatic rife through her fire arc as she checked the shadowy corners between the container stacks, before leaping high into the air to land atop one of them and gain a bird's eye view of the surrounding area, suddenly she felt a prickling at the rear of her mind.

She kept wondering to herself how this odd Russian human seemed to read her so well and so easily.

None of her kind had ever even bothered to try to do so before, though most likely out of both fear and respect, but this odd human whom she had just met seemed to be able to peer right through her with those sapphire blue eyes of his like she was no more than a pane of glass.

She clacked her beak in annoyance as she tried to wrack her brains for any ideas as to how he was able to do so, he was not of her kind and yet he seemed to somehow understand their plight as if it was his own, which made no sense to her whatsoever.

Upon seeing no threats she leapt back down and signalled to her team to move up and they all fell in behind her, at least Sasha's word was good in that his soldiers followed her commands without question, it was as if he himself gave them, it spoke very well of them indeed which pleased her.

As she moved through the pools of inky shadows Celine kept replaying the last few days back in her head trying to piece together how it was that this human seemed to be able to figure her out so easily.

Was she giving him unspoken tells?

She remembered one of her subordinates telling her once that she was a nightmare to play shells against as she was near impossible to read and incidentally, this was how she was usually able to win these matches as her opponent was unable to gauge if she was indeed hiding her corn beneath the shell they were going to attack.

But somehow a human of all things was able to see right through her and not just any human but it had to be the human that she could not even deny to herself was infuriatingly attractive.

Celine clacked her beak to herself quietly at this little annoying self-revelation as she turned a corner into yet another of the many, many alleyways between the stacked-up containers.

As much as she was desperately trying to deny it to herself it was getting harder and harder by the hour.

This human appealed to her on quite a few different levels and it annoyed her as well as confused her.

Now she knew that there was already one of her kind that had taken one of them as her mate and she was already running with the Free Peoples of the Wastes in the form of Feather Guard Jewel.

When the news of this had hit the barracks it had circulated among the Feather Guard like wildfire, honestly, when it came to idle chatter they were worse than a whole army of sewing circle hens.

But at the time Celine remembered that she had felt a mixture of being reviled and disgusted.

To her this female was not only a species traitor but in her opinion a disgrace to the Featherguard.

This was imparted due to the way that she had claimed him as her mate.

Now it was no secret that if one had an indentured servant they were indeed free to do with them as they pleased but that had never sat right with Celine for a whole host of reasons.

The biggest of which was that it was just plain wrong.

She saw the practice as absolutely distasteful and disgusting. To her, if you could not claim a male through the strength of one's character and feminine wiles then you did not deserve to have them preening on your wing.

Taking anyone by force and against their own will regardless of their station in the pecking order was vile and was the practice of raggy feathers who could not attract a mate through normal and clean means.

Infact she had been rather impressed and pleased by the actions of the Free Peoples when they had sent an ambassador to their city to not only petition for the human soldier's release but to also have Jewel held accountable for her actions towards him.

Though from the whispering chirps she'd heard in the barracks, the pair were still together though now on an equal footing, though apparently, this was due to the intervention of a rather curious being that next to nobody had any information on.

According to the little songbirds, this little being had some incredible power that allowed them to delve into a person's mind and walk through it like they were going for a morning stroll through the floating gardens.

Apparently, they had gone into both of their minds and not only repaired the damage that Jewel's actions had caused to the human but had also made her feel the consequences of them first-hand.

A punishment that in Celine's humble opinion fit the actions rather nicely, to force the victimizer to live the pain and humiliation of the victim as if it was their own and make them suffer it would be a truly powerful deterrent.

Though at the time she had also found herself wondering what in the name of hell she had seen in such a male that she would even consider betraying her own species for one of them let alone actually doing it, especially in such a way.

But now as she stalked among the crates of this once mighty remnant of human ingenuity and military might she could not force images of her commander from her mind.

Before she had met him she had found humans barely worthy of recognition, they could not fly, they were bound to the earth like mole rats, scurrying about their pointless and destructive lives bringing misery wherever they chose to tread.

But now having spent some actual time with them she saw that they were so much more than that.

Yes, there were indeed humans who lived up to the stereotype that the war with her people had fanned the flames.

But then there were good humans as well, humans who understood the ways of honour and valiance, humans who would put others before themselves regardless of either kinship or species and would fight to defend them, humans like Sasha.

Indeed he had in the short time she had known him shown her that their two species were not all that dissimilar at all, they both had their wants and their fears, and the making of those who rose above the masses was simply how they handled both.

Suddenly a flurry of movement in the shadows ahead caught her attention and she snapped her rifle towards it and balled her fist up over her shoulder.

"What do you see?' Natalia asked from behind her as she stepped out to her flank to get her weapon trained in the same direction.

"Unknown, I saw movement in the shadows ahead, everyone switch to night vision and be careful of the light flaring," Celine said causing all of those following her to switch on their night vision systems while she flicked her own set of human goggles down over her eyes.

The world instantly changed to a flickering image of bright green that was blindingly bright if one's vision wandered too close to any source of light.

Celine panned her rifle slowly over the gap between the crates watching the shadows very carefully as she did.

That's when she saw it again and she wasn't the only one.

"What the hell is that?" Natalia asked from her right glancing at her and Celine glanced back equally confused by what they were seeing at the far end of the crate stacks.

At the distance, they were seeing it the shape was hard to make out thanks to the night vision having a limited range but there was definitely something rather large moving between the crates.

Celine pressed her PTT on her shoulder.

"Eagle eye one one to Sitting Duck one one come in over?" she said softly while trying not to smile to herself as she imagined Sasha grinding his teeth at her jokey call sign referring to him being stuck on the ground while she soared through the skies high above his head.

"Go ahead Eagle eye one one," Sasha's voice came back with a distinct hint of both resignation and irritation that made her smile broaden a little, somehow it was rather fun to get under his tough yet soft-looking skin.

"Have possible hostile contact of unknown origin ahead over," she said softly.

"Ghouls? Over," Sasha asked.

"Negative, whatever this is it is a hell of a lot bigger than a Ghoul, can't get a positive ID on it as it's down the far end of the stacks hiding in the shadows ahead of us, over," she said.

"Wait one, Sitting Duck one one to Eagle eye two one you listening in over?" Sasha asked addressing Ava.

"Go ahead Sitting Duck one one over," Ava's voice said.

"You have best eyes of all of us in dark, can you get up high and see if you can get eyes on this target of which Eagle Eye one one speaks, over," Sasha said and Celine nodded her approval as this was something she would have done herself in his place.

Using the strengths of your team to your advantage was the mark of a good leader and he was really proving himself to be just that in her not-so-humble opinion, which given that her standards were considered some of the highest in the Valkyrie military was no easy feat.

"Roger that Sitting Duck one one, Eagle eye one one hold one while I reposition, over," Ava said and Celine imagined the large horned owl taking to the air above the stacks and finding a high perch to look down on them from above.

Ava was one of the best night snipers in the entire unit and she had been hand-picked by Celine to be in her personal unit due to her well-earned, no-nonsense reputation as well as her skill with a rifle.

She was also an expert on silent flying which was usually a skill reserved for those of the Barn Owl genus, so for a Horned owl such as her to be so quiet on the wing that she quite often caught her fluffy white brethren by complete surprise in training was quite the accomplishment and feather in the cap of their unit.

"Eagle eye two one to Eagle eye one one and Sitting Duck one one I have eyes on your target, it is one hundred and thirty meters ahead of you, it's moving between the stacks and I can't quite get eyes on it as its hiding between the crates, but whatever it is it's big, definitely not a Ghoul, over," Ava said.

"Roger that, Eagle eye one one to Sitting Duck one one, what are your orders over?" Celine asked.

"Sitting Duck one one two both teams converge slowly from different angles, catch it in a pincer, I am on the balcony of the office above you, if it tried to escape using the stacks I will fire down upon it, be careful with crossfire, over," Sasha said.

Roger that Sitting Duck one one we are moving," Celine said and she motioned for her team to advance slowly and silently.

The team behind her instantly split into a staggered line and began to advance in her wake keeping their eyes forwards while maintaining their firing arcs.

Over the comms, Ava counted down their distance to the target for both teams as she kept her incredibly sharp eyes on them and their target.

As she got closer she began to hear a rather odd rustling noise that almost sounded.....sticky.

That's when she stood on something that was also sticky and as she glanced down she noticed that the floor was covered with something white that was playing merry hell with her night vision by reflecting the light from the infrared emitters on her head.

"What the hell?' she hissed silently.

"Egale eye one one freeze! I think it's detected you," Ava's voice called with a distinct breathless note of concern.

That's when the creature moved and oh boy did it move.

Like a bullet out of a gun barrel a massive black shadow with what looked like way more legs than it should have shot right up and over the stack moving way faster than something of its size should be able to move, it was so fast that not even Celine's eyes managed to get a fix on it.

"Watch it! It's running!!" Natalia yelled and both teams rushed forward into the gap only to see what looked like a pair of furry legs vanishing over the top of the crate stack leaving behind it what looked like a white trail of some kind.

"What the fuck was that!!?" Ivan exclaimed looking up at the glistening white trail that ran right vertically up the side of the crate stack.

"Eagle eye two one to Eagle eye one one the creature is moving along the top of the stacks towards the command centre, I still cannot get a fix on it to tell you what it is thanks to the bloody glare from the lights, over," Ava exclaimed.

"Eagle eye two one fire a shot and see if you can steer it, we will set up an ambush over!" Celine said with a fiery determination in her voice, this creature had made a fool out of her and she would not let this slight slide.

"Roger that firing now over," Ava said and from high above them there was a boom from her high-powered rifle which caused one of the heavy crates to ring like a struck gong.

There was a shrieking noise and the sound of what sounded like running coming from the top of the crate stacks ahead of them indicating that Ava's shot had worked perfectly.

"This way quickly! We will cut this creature off!" Celine yelled and rushed forward with her team in hot pursuit now having abandoned all attempts at stealth just like their prey which they could hear running along the top of the stacks as Ava steered it by shooting ahead of it.

The team managed to reach a large opening with multiple branching alleyways branching off from it.

"Spread out, take an alleyway each, we will surround this creature and cut off its escape!" Celine said and the group quickly split up and tucked themselves into the branching alleyways to lay in wait.

From above her head, there was a loud dull boom as Ava fired a shot close to them which caused the creature to change direction above them. The sound of it running towards them was quite dramatic as it was either echoing like crazy or it really did have multiple legs as it sounded like multiple people all running at once.

From the crate to her right there was a loud ding noise as a bullet struck it and there was a screech from directly above her before something massive and black dropped down directly in front of her with a heavy-sounding thud.

Even before she had a chance to even realise what she was looking at Celine stepped out of the shadows and started yelling.

"Freeze!! Do not move or we will fire on you!!" Celine yelled despite her every instinct telling her to shoot first and talk second there was still a chance that this was some kind of sentient creature. Given the fact that it had tried to run rather than fight them outright at least gave her pause on shooting it if she didn't have to.

That was when a series of large flood lamps snapped on above their heads and swivelled to aim into the space between them which lit the creature up and for a second Celine was blinded by the light, but as she quickly tore her goggles up she instantly felt her beak drop open by what she saw.

Stood before them on eight very large and fluffy black legs was an Archnakai.

"Please don't shoot me!! I haven't done anything wrong!! Please don't hurt meeee!!" the large arachnid human hybrid yelled trying to cower in fear and pulling its whole body inwards and using its eight massive legs in an attempt to shield its body, the voice was very distinctly feminine.

Suddenly there was a boom as another shape dropped down between the stacks and Celine instantly snapped her weapon to it only to see Sasha walking towards them.

"Do not shoot, is one of Malakai's species!" he called loudly as he strode into the clearing towards the cowering Archnakai.