MHG-V3-4 (Initial Draft)

Chapter 21 - Progression

A2.21

**** (route to Teruko)

Ken stepped back out into the hallway and breathed heavily. Now it was just him and the other soldier. Suddenly he felt a great deal of apprehension. At any moment there could be a firefight and it would all be over. However he had to do this for Teruko. He had to get there and save her.

Ken looked at the map again. Teruko's location was quite deep inside the building, while their current location was somewhat near the perimeter.

"Remember you've only got four rounds in a cartridge." Ayaka said, "So you will have to reload frequently. So don't waste your shots. Make sure you're going to hit before you fire."

"O-okay." Ken said.

"And try not to aim for the head.. unless you want to kill them." Ayaka chuckled in his ear.

"You should stay back for the fights." The soldier said. "You only need to use that if something goes wrong. I'll take care of what i can, so just stay back and keep safe."

"Thanks." Ken said, breathing a sigh of relief. After all, he was no solider.

"Huu.." Ayaka said. "And here i wanted to see my knight in action.."

"Your knight?!?" Ken mutteted under his breath.

"Moving out." The soldier suddenly whisphered, and Ken brought his senses to focus on the path ahead of them.

They crept quietly but quickly down the corridor. Suddenly Ken noticed on the map three heatspots up ahead. In otherwords, three enemy soldiers. He held his breath tight, but the man in front of him just calmly raised his gun and proceeded forward.

Suddenly they stopped, and the heatspots rounded a corner. Three short bursts, all silenced, and three men in the distance fell to the ground. Ken bit his lip. It suddenly occured to him that the man in front of him probably did not have paralysis bullets. In other words they were live rounds.

"Should we drag the bodies somewhere?" He heard his companions voice through his earpi.

"No time." Ayaka replied. "I'm already masking the cctv video feed, so unless someone is super aware, we should be fine."

"Understood. Lets proceed."

They kept moving forward with vigilance. Up ahead there were another two heatspots, and they were quickly downed as well. After tip toing over the fallen bodies, Ken followed the soldier down the hallway toward a stairway at the end. They went through and began their descent down three flights of stairs to basement floor 3.

"They're onto us." Ayaka suddenly said. "Someone's noticed that i've hijacked the video feed from the cctv cameras and is trying to regain control. I'm going to sabotage the cameras completely but be the alert. They know we're hear now."

"Affirmative."

Ken watched the map as they came to the door that lead out of the stairwells. Sure enough, the heatspots were changing route and forming into bigger groups. Furthermore, he noticed that at least three groups were making there way toward Teruko's location. Did they know where they were headed?

"Quick." The soldier said urgently. "Lets get them before they can group up."

He suddenly pushed open the door and ran out into the hallway. Ken was caught off guard, but quickly followed after him. They ran down a hallway to the right and then, rounding a corner, four nsa soldiers were downed as they stood in a group. Not waiting, they ran past them, past a corridor crossing and up to another corner. The aoldier breathed heavily as he hid behind the corner and then suddenly jumped out, firing his gun sporadically down the hall. Ken watched amazed as the gun lit up with flashes, but the soldier paused only for a second before rushing down it.