247 Recon 2 (1/2)

Having survived her first close encounter with an elder, Terra managed to pull herself somewhat together before she made her way to the designated regrouping point about 10 kilometres inland.

(There we are… Looks like I'm not the first.)

Spotting the tiny mining town that was her current objective Terra checked her scanner to make sure no elders were nearby before she moved closer in. Bringing up her rifle, Terra increased her speed to a light jog, although the rifle couldn't really do anything against the elders, pointing it forward brought a sense of ease as she moved in on the mining town, finding the former cafeteria she knocked 2 times before entering.

”Commander, it's good to see you.”

Being immediately greeted by one of her subordinates Terra removed her helmet as she put down her rifle, allowing herself to rest for the first time since the start of the operation.

”You too Simons, have you heard anything from the others?”

”Nothing so far, I'm afraid.”

”I see…”

With strict radio silence being enforced on all members of the operation it was impossible to know if anyone other than the two of them had even made it past the frontline and broken trough into the elder controlled continent, so all Terra and Simons could do was wait until the planned departure from their current location and hope they would be joined by at least some of their commanders.

In the end, none of the 8 other squad members arrived, leaving Terra no choice but to mark them off as dead, leading to the end of the first day of the operation with a casualty rate of 80%, a figure which unbeknownst to Terra that figure mimicked the rate for the rest of the operation.

-

Having made it past the front line where the most of the elders were believed to operate Simons and Terra continued to travel inland without meeting friend or foe and by the second day they had made it all the way to their second objective, the former domain capital of Turant, a massive fortress city where an estimated 92% of the approximately 3 million inhabitants had refused to evacuate, believing that the stout walls of their city would protect them from any and all invaders.

”This doesn't look good…”

Already form a distance Terra could tell that they would be walking into a hellscape, there was something about the completely silent atmosphere and empty defensive positions on the outer wall which just felt wrong on a fundamental level. There was simply no signs of battle, nor any signs of life, there were no people, no animals and not even any insects around, the only sound was Terra's and her subordinate's own footsteps and the sound of wind passing through the fields of wheat ready for harvest which now surrounded them on all sides.

The reason why was simple, this was her job, the mission she had volunteered for herself, if she backed off now what would her dead subordinates think of her?

”... Oh god.”

”Masks on.”

Having reached the top of the wall Simons found himself as a loss for words, the taste of gastric acid rapidly building up in his mouth as Terra blocked him from puking by engaging his environmental protection system on his armour.

The eerily quiet and deserted cityscape which met their eyes showed absolutely no signs of battle, what's worse, the skyline was now marked with large spires covered in the same kind of fungus that the elders where know to spread wherever they went.

It didn't take an expert to make out that those spires were constructed of biological matter which the fungus fed on, which served as the worst kind of explanation as to why Simons and Terra had yey to encounter even a single fly, or a copse of the almost 3 million people who had lived in the city.

”We have a job to do, now I need to know now if you're with me 100% Simons, if not I need you to head back to the first gathering point and remain there until rescued. This is just the tip of the iceberg, there was an estimated 95 million souls on the imperial continent when the elders closed it off to the rest of the world.”

Being given the option to back out from the operation and retreat Simon initially couldn't believe what Terra was saying, that is until he caught a glimpse of the reflection of his own eyes in the mask he was now wearing.

”No… I'm fine, just give me a second to collect myself.”

Steeling his failing nerves Simons gathered his courage while certain parts of his brain mostly stopped working, it was clear by the look on his face that he was deeply traumatized, but still, he wanted to press on.