The Dark Edge Chronicles - Clan War

Little Sisters

As expected from a back door, it opened into a utility hallway of sorts, stacks of materials and cleaning supplies littering the space. Lash hit the wall opposite the door, putting his left shoulder against it and aimed down the dim passageway while the remainder of his team entered, Ballan taking the other side.

A few tense minutes then the door was closing, throwing the corridor into relative darkness. Fishing out an infrared barrel light from the small go kit Synch had furnished him with, he clipped it to the side of his barrel. Then with a look over his shoulder at Ballan, he nodded.

Taking half of the nestari with him, Ballan the other, Lash darted forward, weapon at the ready. Several quick steps and he was at the corner. Truk patted him on his outside shoulder to indicate they were ready in formation behind him.

Nodding tightly, Lash pulled out a flash bang and tossed it around the corner. As soon as it went off, he followed it. And almost ran over a White Flame fire team, staggered from the shock grenade going off in the dark, enclosed space.

The nearest got a double tap right in the visor before a left-handed slash with a combat knife opened up his throat. Lash then ducked an instinctive shot at his face before cutting that trooper's throat as well. A rifle butt shattered another visor he slung his rifle to take hold of the fourth by the head.

A quick, hard twist with vampire strength snapped the human's neck then a quick draw of his sidearm to put a bullet through the shattered visor into the human's face left Lash standing quiet in the midst of four bodies for a moment. There he paused, stretching his senses.

A quick exchange of weapons fire somewhere to his left revealed Ballan's team had run into trouble. Likely another fireteam; the humans must've broken their force up to more thoroughly search the exchange building, which was one of the largest in the Market.

"Clear," he finally reported and the rest of his team slid around the corner, weapons ready. The four bodies they ignored. It no longer surprised them at how quickly and efficiently Lash killed the enemy.

A quick look to determine where the door out of the utility space was, then they were on the move once more.

Once the Ventru were through the door and into the main floor, which was set up with temporary spaces in a warehouse-like layout, supplementary spaces climbing up on the sides to form partial floors, resistance began to climb. The fireteam encountered in the utility corridor was just the leading edge for the fragment trying to take the building.

Almost immediately they took fire on the other side of the door from two separate fireteams, Lash directed his nestari into cover before vigorously challenging the White Flames. Again the humans proved themselves as skilled soldiers, calm under fire and precise with their own aim. But, outgunned by Lash's squad, first one, then the other were neutralized.

Moving deeper, the squad had to cut their way through three more fireteams before there was a lull.

"I'm seeing standard m'tada issued sidearms here, Wolf," Absinthe, a lean vampiress with a tattoed scar stretching across her nose and down her cheek, indicated as she and Morel, another female nestari, ranged to the left.

"Going by the count, ten Blood Guard tried making a stand here."

"Copy " Lash acknowledged as he increased his own scanning. For ten m'tada to hold their ground and fight to the death, they must've been protecting something precious.

A look to his left almost accidentally caught it: a barricaded opening into what appeared to be a large storage room.

"What do you reckon, Cohen?" he asked the warrior just behind his right shoulder. "Breeders are moved in sixes, right?"