Hazmat: The Delta Contagion, Role Play

"Roger" Alea said in a monotone voice. Her right hand rose to hold up her sidearm and her left hand revealed a knife clenched tightly and held horizontally beneath her right arm. The suit made her feel a bit off balance but it wasn't like she never wore heavier gear before. Her eyes scanned the area in front of them then to her right. She glanced back to look for Chris. Finally, she was given an order that exploited one of the few reasons she was here. She hated sitting still and doing nothing.

Alea stepped off toward the left side to ensure that nobody, including the team leader, was in her way should she be required to fire. She cleared the way behind her to ensure they're not ambushed either. Her eyes never even paid the smallest hint of attention to the figures on the ground. Her orders were to cover Chris. The bodies had nothing to do with that order as far as she was concerned.

"Guys, I think we've got casualties in there. Irish, thats you. Soon as we get in and it's clear, you'll check 'em out. Alea, you get his back."

Chris only nodded at his new callsign, noticing the HUD reflecting the designation on his biometrics.

"Lets move."

Chris waited in turn, watching Alea take position and waiting for her signal. Once clear, he steps in quickly to examine the bodies, and has to bite his tongue to keep from shouting out. The rhythmic red flashing didn't do much to illuminate the bodies, so he'd flipped on the flashlight attached to his gun. It revealed the first body he'd set it on was mutilated almost beyond recognition, facedown on the floor. Large chunks of flesh and muscle had been ripped away, spilling blood on the floor, which had become congealed pools across the walkway.

Hoping to fight down the bile surging at the back of his throat, he quickly swung the flashlight over to the next body, laid out on its back. This one was largely intact, except for missing a hand and having a twisted shin, but its throat had been torn open and skull cracked. An eyeball was pulled partially out of its socket, still attached by the optic nerve and dangling across what used to be the man's face.

Chris took a deep breath before moving the flashlight over the final body, and almost wished he hadn't. The body was female, and looked almost pristine with her arm covering her face, as if she were only sleeping where she laid on her side. As the medic circled around it, however, he saw that back was nothing but ground meat. He was handling it pretty well, when she suddenly slunk back and her arm flopped aside to reveal her face...or half of it, at least.

"Ho shite," Chris muttered after the initial scan, taking a stumbling step back and bringing his hand to his face, despite the helmet already there, "Gimme a sec, LT...sweet Jesus, Mary and Joseph..."

Alea took a few glances off the bodies while the light jumped between them. Nice, she thought. A curious sight to behold, mangled bodies. Alea approached with her arms still raised. She turned to aim her weapon, looking around to secure the area, making sure nothing got the jump on them. Better safe then sorry.

Chris was near the end of his inspection by the time that Alea had advanced on their location.

Though she wouldn't admit it, not that she could, she wanted to get a closer look at the bodies. Things like this were like art to her. When she got a closer look; she turned her head and looked away from them. They were indeed like art... sadly, they were done by a sloppy artist.

"Ho shite,"

"Are you okay, doc?" Alea checked Chris to ensure he was fine, confirming only with a glance off her right shoulder at him.

Loran had the team assemble along the wall, in a defensive line, and watched as the medic and Alea moved from the group to check out the forms on the floor, their forms barely silhouetted by the beam of Chris's flash-light, and the pulsing red light further onwards to the right of the door they'd came through. He turned and leaned against the wall, looking away from the medic and his protection towards the left into darkness.

As they'd came through, he'd noticed on the wall they'd formed up on, directional arrows pointing to locations of the facility and he double checked their objectives on his HUD. "David," he motioned the Sargent over, quietly, "looks like we have to find a secure then coms room on this floor, and then descend one three levels, and secure two objectives. Looks like once we leave this level we'll have to split into two Squads, seems the main-"

Rek heard Chris exclaim as the Irish-mans voice echoed from his suits filter, and the lieutenant swung around, going down to one knee, to cover the hallway where Alea and Chris were, pistol ready. "What is it, Irish?"

David checked over his gun, nodding in acknowledgement. When they were interrupted by the loud curse he leaned over, peeking over Rek's shoulder into the lobby. His HUD flashed and green hue flowed over everything in view, leaving faint outlines of every object in the room, and brighter, green outlines around his teammates. The corpses on the floor had dull yellow outline. "Woah... Low light mode has built in IFF... But if green is friendly, and red is hostile, what is yellow?"

Carlos grunted beside him, "Biohazard, maybe? They are hazmat suits, after all..."

"Are you okay, doc?"

"What is it, Irish?"

Chris took a deep breath, turning his head and nodding at Alea before speaking up, "Seen my share of carnage, but this...this is something else." He stepped back up to the bodies, his medical instincts taking over now that the shock had worn off. He carefully examined the bodies, speaking aloud to inform the others. "Severe head trauma on this lady," he spoke the obvious as he indicated to the woman missing a lower jaw. "Her back, what's left of it anyway, looks like it suffered heavy contusions. Whatever tore into 'er, it didn't have any sort o' claws...they just ripped th' flesh right off."

He moved on to the next body, reaching down and plucking the eyeball off the floor. "This fella made a run fer it, but somethin' nabbed him. S'why his leg's all twisted up, and he didn't land lightly at all. His skull cracked on the walkway, knockin' him out. Whatever it was jumped up on him once he fell...th' throat's looking like something bit down, but the angle of th' teeth..." He reaches down, dropping the eyeball and running a finger along the edge of the throat damage. "Central...lateral...canine...this bite came from a human mouth. Never known a human t'have jaws enough for this, tho."

The medic swallowed hard before moving onto the last body, which incidentally was the first he'd looked at. "Got 'nother runner, but this'n looks like he got taken down when something landed on him. Contusions again, an'...yeah...clear indications of mastication here." He reaches down and grabs a chunk of tissue, rising up and holding it in front of the light of his gun. "These folks didn't just get killed, LT. They been eaten, by other folk." He turns his hand over, letting the chunk of meat hit the floor with a wet slap, then looked over at Rek.

Alea follows up with Chris, keeping on watch. "Isn't sending people like us in to deal with a few cannibals a bit overkill.." Alea lowered her gun so she could look at the bodies again, wanting to examine them a bit more. They were torn up, bitten, just ravaged. Realistically, this would call for a group of cannibals. Excitable, more dangerous, cannibals. While such a thing was easy to make some lick of sense from, Alea had to ponder on the idea of why they were sent in to deal with such a matter. Cannibals were usually left to people hired to kill. The group they have here have too much variety to them. They also weren't there to deal with cannibalism. Nothing was adding up. The whole situation seemed beyond sense.

"How would a couple of crazies get into this place? Gotta be easier ways to eat people than to break into secure underground labs..." Carlos grunted. "Someone definitely left something out of the briefing. I don't like it."

"Suck it up, Marines. We're here to do a job, and thats all we're concerned with." The lieutenant glanced at Carlos, and then walked over to where the bodies were, his steps echoing down the corridor.

He crouched beside one of the quietus forms, studying the wounds, and watching the blood trail across the ceramic floor. "Damn, what ever command hasn't told us, they may not even know." He placed his hands under him, and lifted himself up. "We'll need to come back and burn them. Until then, lets move. The armoury and personnel areas are this way," he pointed off towards the flashing red end of the corridor, "we need to secure our gear, and then get to the communications centre, and get it operational."

Loran made a hand motion to signal David to get the group moving again. "David, with me. Chrs, Alea you follow ten paces behind us. Carlos, watch the rear and make sure no-one gets lost."

With that said, he hopped over the bodies and pointed his flashlight towards the far end of the corridor- and froze. Something reflected the light of his torch, three small pinprick dots in the diffused light, that blurred up towards the right wall, about twenty-five meters ahead, and disappeared with a metal clang as something hit the floor. "Jesus... did anyone else see that?" He asked, his voice filled with a little disbelief, and a slight shake to it.

Carlos nodded, stepping into the lobby and taking a quick look around before turning and watching the doorway that led back out into the tunnels.

David stepped over the bodies, stepping to the opposite end of the hall from Rek and raising his weapon at the loud noise. "Didn't see anything. What was it?"

Alea helped Chris get up and moving with her left arm. She had him lead in front of her so she could continue to cover the flank. Alea's right hand held her sidearm still and she walked in almost a sideways angle, keeping her pistol aimed at their six o'clock while her eyes shifted from two o'clock, five o'clock, seven o'clock, then back again. Her shifts were different on each change. She jumped from two o'clock to five o'clock after a five second watch, then from five o'clock to seven o'clock slowly after three seconds. She shifted from seven o'clock back to two o'clock after a time period of about ten seconds. The difference came when attention was brought to something out in front of them.

At the sound of what may possibly be danger, Alea quickly stepped forward and placed a hand onto Chris' shoulder. She held it there to alert him that she was there and with her right hand took aim down the hall past Loran, Carlos, and David. Her eyes caught the attention of Carlos. She spoke angrily; "Keep your eyes on yourself, dog". Alea patted Chris' shoulder and turned back to their six o'clock. She raised her gun to aim at four o'clock high, lowering her aim as it slowly scrolls right.

"I've got nothing in my sights, Lieutenant." Alea spoke with a sturdy tone. Despite the strange going on, Alea didn't seem phased about the situation and instead continued watching her direction carefully. Her back was almost to Chris' back, but gave space between the two. She didn't like being near him, it was out of orders from her commanding officer that she stood where she did.

Carlos huffed, shaking his head and checking his weapon before looking back out into the tunnel, his flashlight burning through the darkness and emphasizing the scale of the underground structure they had just left. David, meanwhile, stepped forward, his gun raised as he turned his own tactical light on. "I'll take point..." He slowly crept up the corridor, carefully scanning left to right and looking briefly over the doors as he moved on. Under normal circumstances he would be keen on checking each and every room, but they had a very clear objective, and something didn't feel right about the situation. The torn up bodies by the door. The sketchy intel.

Frankly, he didn't want to stay here any longer than he had to.

He stopped at the corner near the end of the corridor, where it split off both to the right and left. He peeked first around the right, then turned and scanned the left, grunting and pulling back around the corner. "Looks clear."

Chris was still nauseated from the state of the bodies, but the lieutenant pushed everyone into formation helped him settle his nerves. At least, until Rek himself seemed to spotted something. What it was the medic couldn't tell, but he had caught the briefest flashes of movement. Alea's contact reminded him that he had comrades near him, which helped even if he was still unsure of the woman's mental stability.

"Saw movement, LT, but nothin' else," he spoke up in affirmation.

The Lieutenant was slightly behind David, his flashlight poised on the metal grating from a vent that had been ripped from the wall, and torn apart. the Lieutenant shone the torch up to where the vent was, noticing two sets of three jagged deep scratch marks etched into the wall where the vent had been ripped off and then some. "What ever it was, it tore through the vent like it was nothing. Lets keep moving."

David nodded, checking his map and then turning right, starting down the hall. He scanned the wide corridor, keeping his flashlight frontward at all times. As they moved further, they began to spot similar claw marks to those by the grate, as well as occasional splashes of blood along the hall. There was a soft splash as he stepped in a large puddle and he stopped, looking down. There were several sets of bloody tracks leading away from it, but the most disconcerting thing was the lack of bodies.

Rek placed a hand on David's shoulder, pulling the man back. "Thats a hell of a lot of blood for no bodies." He said, mostly to himself, as he shone the flashlight around the room they had entered. It was an apex. A room with three other exits that acted as a quasi-junction for the adjoining divisions on that level of the facility.

Rek didn't see anything in the room and blood trails lead off in each direction, he pointed to the left corridor. "Straight down that corridor twenty meters, we take a right passed the lounge area, take the service lift at the back of the kitchen and down one level to the cold storage.

"When we exit that, communications should be thirty meters from there. If we take that sides route," the Lieutenant pointed to the other corridor, "we will have to go down a two hundred meter corridor, and then doubles back into a ramp down to the what seems to be a sports hall and gym, and recreational facilities. Once through them, the communications room will be fifty meters up on the left." Rek crouched down and held his left arm in front of him, and activated a projector that displayed a basic map of this level onto the blood stained floor.

The route directly ahead lead to guest suites. "Looks like ever ever caused these blood trails when both ways. And it looks like the power is down, but I am only guessing, we'll know more when we get down there." The sounds of the teams footsteps still perturbed the room, but other than that it was too quiet.

"Suggestions?" He asked at last, waiting for everyone to enter the room, and the footsteps to finally stop.

Directly ahead of the assembled team was an accessable drop, with an abdomen high railing around it to prevent accidental falls, except for the side facing them, where there was a simple rolling gate, with a hand-print panel to call for what he assumed was an all-purpose elevator to other levels.

He deactivated the light projection from his wrist, and suddenly the map which had been lighting the room with a soft white glow, suddently plunged the room back into semi-darkness. His footsteps echoed as he walked over the dark, dried, bloodied floor to the shaft, and gazing over the edge, and pointing his hand-light down to what looked like a two level drop. Some of the blood seemed to give the impression of dragging, and ended at the drop edge.

"Great." He muttered. "Okay we've got objectives to complete on this level, we can come back here." He turned around, and let his weapon fall to the sling, facing the rest of the group now.

Alea approached Mirez with her weapon still unholstered, though she held it low and steady so as to keep it from being aimed at him. "What now Lieutenant?" She speaks with a stead fast tone, prepared to take whatever course of action her commanding officer gives. Her eyes began to wander while she waited for his response.

She viewed the light projection, investigating it in depth to gain a full understanding of its layout before it had disappeared. After it had, she reached down to take hold of a flashlight in her left hand, holding her left arm beneath her right. She raised both up, aiming the gun around the room while she utilized the light source to brighten up the directions that she looks.