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Revealed: Chapter 8

"You need to stay." I ordered Crane as I raided Francis' gun safe. He had given me the code to it and there was more than enough weapons and ammunition for both Crane and me, but I was planning on going alone. Crane was still injured and I couldn't afford to lose him because I pushed him too hard.

He obviously didn't agree. 'I can fight." He pleaded. "So what if I've got a bullet hole in my arm, it isn't even my good arm." He grabbed an unloaded pistol and a magazine. He tried to get the magazine into the gun and ended up dropping both. "Fuck." He cursed and tried to pick the gun back up.

I grabbed the gun before he could and put it back into the safe. "You're staying here. How are you supposed to fight if you can't load a weapon?" He opened his mouth to say something, but didn't. "Thought so. Just wait here until this mess is cleaned up." I spied the M1 Garand, I already had a shot gun and an assault rifle strapped onto my back, but more couldn't hurt so I took it and a bandolier of ammunition for it. I looked at Crane, he looked utterly miserable.

'Look at what you've done." Dog joked. His intrusion at this time was not welcome.

"What?" I asked him. There wasn't enough time to chat. Francis told me that a frigate sized ship with a J&H transponder code had docked under the guise of bringing supplies and when the airlock had opened, all hell had broken loose. The fighting had just started when Francis called so there was no way of knowing how much of the station was still under friendly control at the moment, I would need to hurry.

'You at least give him something to do, I know you wouldn't like the idea of being left behind.' Damn thing just had to know exactly how I thought.

"Fine, I could bring him onto the station to guard the airlock." That seemed to satisfy Dog.

I grabbed the pistol that Crane had previously tried to load and put the magazine in it and slid the first round into the chamber. I put the gun in Crane's hand. "You can come aboard with me, but I want you to stay by the airlock and guard the ship."

"Like a guard dog." It sounded harsh, but by the way his tail wagged, he was happy with the deal I just gave him.

"Yeah, like a guard dog." I agreed. "Let's go." I led the way to the airlock and opened it. The sound of fighting drifted into the ship and I checked the shotgun that I had out. It was loaded and ready for action. Francis had failed to mention how many hostiles there were, there would be a need for caution.

I stepped onto the station, making sure not to make any noise. The immediate area was clear, not bodies, no signs of fighting. Unlike the Eurasia and other ships, space stations were often filled with large open spaces since it was common for people to spend months aboard one. It was considered better to try and accommodate the people who were going to be living there since a more efficient, but tight design wouldn't do any good if everyone went insane.

There was a small guard station, not much more than a booth for a person to stand in and report. I went over to it and looked inside. There was a pair of radios.

Good. I thought. I would be able to keep in contact with Crane and anyone else I came across. I reached inside and pulled out two and turned them on. I went through various frequencies until I heard Krauss' familiar accent. He was yelling at someone to cover the right flank. That made me smile, it seemed he was taking the sudden action well.

"Krauss? Can you hear me?" I spoke into the radio and waited for a reply.

There was a bit of static for a moment and then Krauss replied. "Anderson? Is that you?"

"Yeah it's me." I replied. The signal was poor, there was too much interference to get a clean signal.

"Good. Get your ass down here. We're in some sort of recreations area, I think it's near the center of the station."

I looked around the booth for a map and found one pinned to a board in the back. I scanned the various decks and found what he was talking about. It was a large area marked "Entertainment" that was near the main reactor. "I gotcha, be there as soon as I can." This time there was no reply, the interference was just too much now. I tried to contact him a few more times to no avail.

'So much for keeping in contact.' Dog chimed in.

"Not the time Dog." I scorned him. Tracing a path like some kid with a maze, I found a path that would take me to where Krauss said he was. It took me through several large open areas, the main mess hall and a sleeping quarters, there was the chance of running into a lot of people along the way.

I turned around and bumped into Crane who had been watching what I was doing from over my shoulder. He stumbled back and caught himself on the door frame. "Whoa there." He said with a crooked smile. "What's the plan?"

Originally I had wanted to just leave Crane here, but now that I had no way to keep in contact with him, I didn't want to leave him behind. He was hurt, but he was a good shot and even with a pistol he would be a great help. I weighed the options in my head, leave him here and hope that everything goes all right or take him with me where his wound could flare up and potentially be a major detriment. He looked okay to me, he had that smile on his face, the same one when he woke me up back on Earth all those weeks ago.

"I can't just leave you here. I want you stay close and keep down if someone takes a shot at us." He immediately lit up and nodded his head. A distant explosion made both of us duck.

Who the hell brings explosives onto a space station? If a fuel tank lit up or a hull breach occurred, the entire station could vent in minutes depending on the severity of it. The only way to stop a leak was to seal an entire section off along with everyone in it.

"We need to hurry." I headed off towards where the map said Krauss would be. I retraced the path in my head over and over to make sure I wouldn't get lost. The station was big and a wrong turn anywhere would lead to hours of mindless wandering.

It seemed that most of the fighting was far away from where Francis' ship was docked. We passed some workers who had locked themselves in various room, but all of the security personnel were gone defending the station. This incident was going to cause a lot of trouble back on Earth. Technically the station belonged to the United States, not J&H. The corporation just used it a lot.

The United States could respond in any number of ways, from sending out an investigative team to an entire fleet. NATO may have used to have been the largest military force in space, but it hardly meant there weren't several close seconds. The United States prided itself on having a strong and mobile fleet, relying on a large number of frigates and destroyers to protect its interests that stretched out from Earth into the Kuiper Belt. China also had a large fleet, since most of the Chinese colonies were centralized to the moon, they used a slow but powerful fleet of cruisers and dreadnaughts. Either way, a reaction from a major space faring power was not to be trifled with.

The sound of gunfire was slowly getting louder as we got closer to the central chambers. I looked back at Crane to see how he was doing. He perked up when he saw me looking back and awkwardly gave a thumbs up with his hand that was in the sling.

I gave a thumbs up in response and then focused on the path ahead. I started to see sings of fighting, mainly bullet holes, but a few bodies. It was very easy to tell the station security apart from the Jostens soldiers. The security guards were in basic uniforms, some had body armor on, but most were just on cloth uniforms. The Jostens soldiers on the other hand were in full heavy blue armor. They had fully enclosed helmets that had x-shaped visors that glowed green, but that wasn't what got my attention, it was their legs. At first I thought their legs were broken until I noticed that every single one's legs weren't broken but slightly digitigrade.

I had investigate. I knelt beside one of the soldiers that was face down and had a bullet hole going through his neck where the armor was lightest. His armor was segmented much like a Roman legionnaire for increased mobility and was extremely heavy. I heaved and rolled him over, the glowing green x glared at me. I studied the legs, they weren't very digitigrade, the boot was small for a man this size, he must have weighed nearly three hundred pounds without armor. The small boot went up several inches from the ground which gave the illusion that he was walking on his toes and then it suddenly bent forward and turned into a normal looking leg.

Crane knelt beside me and looked down at the dead soldier like me. "You don't think?" He didn't finish the sentence, I knew what he was thinking and I was thinking the same thing. I looked at his helmet, there was a switch on the side of the helmet that would open up the face plate. Though the look was different, many helmets used the same basic functionality designs.

I looked at Crane one last time and he nodded. I flipped the switch on the helmet and a small hiss came from it as it decompressed. The x slid back and I was nearly vomited, not from the smell which wasn't pleasant, but from the sight.

The man's face that stared blankly above with dead eyes was something that I had never seen or ever expected to see. It had dog like features, but it also had very human features as well. It was grotesque, the nose came slightly forward where a muzzle had begun to form, but hadn't finished. I couldn't see everything, but I could tell he had pointed ears that sat halfway between the top of his head and the side. I imagined that I probably looked like this at one point when I transformed, but this man's transformation was stopped short. The fur hadn't come in all of the way, it looked as if he had a five o'clock shadow that was covering his entire face and probably his entire body.

"Oh my god." Crane muttered. "What the hell happened to him?" I was wondering the same thing, but then I dawned on me, this is what the Jostens were up to and this is why Francis and the rest of his family wanted to stop them. This was beyond inhumane, it was... I wasn't exactly sure how to describe it.

"I don't know, but we need to stop whatever it is." I closed the mask so I wouldn't have to look at it anymore. "Let's get moving and clear this station, we can discuss this later." A bit of action would help me get my mind off of it. The face was burned into my head to the point that I felt that even Dog was shocked. He was sitting in the back of my head just observing. Normally he would try and say something to feed his ego, but the seriousness of the situation was apparent, he would speak when it was appropriate.

"Yeah, let's." Crane agreed and got up before I did. I looked at the glowing green x a bit longer, contemplating just what exactly I saw. Unsure of what answers I would eventually come across, I pushed the thought away and got up as well.

We got to the entertainment area shortly afterwards. They were still fighting, I looked inside. One side had a group of security personnel along with Crane and his pack. They were taking cover behind anything they could find, overturned tables, some hid in some alcoves that hugged the side of the room and one person was even cowering behind and ancient looking juke box.

On the other side, there were a large number of the Jostens soldiers. Like the security guards and Krauss, they were using anything for cover as well. They sported large semi-automatic rifles and appeared to be extremely well trained. The security personnel were outmatched and wouldn't last much longer without help. It would also be suicide to charge in.

"What can we do?" Just shooting at them from our position wouldn't do much, they were far away and I was crap at aiming and Crane only had one arm.

"I've got an idea." Crane said, he was looking at the M1 in my hand and had a devilish look about him.

"What do you have in mind?" I questioned, entirely at a loss.

"Give me the rifle." I handed it over and he took it. He balanced it and set rested it on my shoulder. "Mobile sniping platform." He laughed.

Despite the silliness of his attitude, the idea had merit. He would easily be able to pick them off until they decided to start shooting in our direction.

"Let's give it a try." I kneeled by the edge of the entrance, just letting my shoulder show. Crane brought the rifle up and rested it next to my face. I brought my ears down so I wouldn't be deafened by the shot. The soldiers were too busy firing at the security and Krauss to notice us. Crane took a breath in and held it. I held mine too, waiting in anticipation. He slowly let it out and fired.

The shot rang in my ears, but I saw one of the soldiers go limp with a spurt of blood from his neck and fall down. The others didn't even notice, with all of the bullets flying in the air, losing one man wouldn't be too much of a surprise.

"One down." Crane whispered. He took in another breath and I held steady.