The assault squad reluctantly worked its way back to base after failing their mission and taking two casualties. The Council headquarters is an impressive, modern building that spans 18 floors. The structure features a slick design with an all glass exterior – bulletproof, of course. The building is held behind a 18 foot wall, with turrets and guard towers spanning the perimeter. No parking is allowed in the building to maintain security, so all employees must use automated shuttles to travel to and from the building.
The first 6 floors of the building are all boring administrative areas, with cubicles that span the whole of each level. Everyday office workers buzz around these bottom floors as they go about their day-to-day tasks – everything from legal issues to payroll.
The middle floors house the cafeteria, game rooms, lounge, clinic, library and media rooms. There are also suites on the 11th and 12th floors for protective services, where The Council provides safe living quarters for anyone personally threatened by the Martyrs or Blackrogue and is willing to either testify or provide intel to The Council.
The top 6 floors are only accessible by Counsellors, which includes an individual office for each Counsellor. Floor 17 holds The Council’s high-tech mission command and data center. Finally, floor 18 is dedicated to offices for the highest-ranking members of The Council, as well as what is referred to as “The Boardroom”, where all major decisions are weighed out by the top brass. Counselors love to gossip about who attends those meetings and what they discuss up there.
That’s not all though. The facility expands another 6 floors underground. These levels of the complex are dedicated to training facilities, research labs and holding cells for any hostile OPS who The Council brings into the building. “The Pit”, as the Counsellors call it, is located on the 6th and deepest floor of the building. Its rigged with a wide array of suppression methods and holding cells that can counter all types of abilities. Additionally, the bottom floor is supplied with fail-safe devices that can flood the bottom floor with water, release different types of gasses and as a last resort it can even be independently collapsed, crushing everything within while leaving the integrity of the rest of the building unaffected.
Mandrake’s squad arrived back at headquarters just before lunch and felt it was best to wait until after the bosses finished their meals to drop the bad news. General Hastings in particular can get downright nasty on a rumbling tummy. So before heading in for debriefing, Rodeo and Fisher take the prisoners down to The Pit while Mandrake, Sight and Slinger gather in the lounge on the 10th floor.
The lounge is a common area, with plush couches and chairs, TVs and tables where members can gather for socializing or informal meetings. Mandrake, Sight and Slinger each take a seat on different couches.
“Damn it.” said Mandrake. “I don’t know how this happened. I’ve never lost a single squad member before, and today two died on my watch.”
He turns to Sight and accusingly asks “How did you not sense that truck was headed our way?”
“I was focused on keeping track of the Martyrs that were already in the building” Sight responds. “This truck was a variable I hadn’t accounted for and it entered the area so quickly that I wasn’t able to warn the team.”
Slinger chimes in “You have to spread that net wide, dude. If another group of Martrys showed up, we would have been sandwiched between the ones on the inside and the ones who just arrived. And we’d be screwed.”
Sight responds “I was told to focus entirely on the Martyrs.”
Slinger turns and glares at Mandrake.
“Yes. And I don’t like having my authority put into question.” Mandrake fires back. “I am the squad leader and sole authority here.”
“Things change” counters Slinger. She hops to her feet and leaves before Mandrake can get in a response. He slinks down in his seat and grinds his teeth.
Rodeo and Fisher are transporting the captured Martyrs - Luna and a non OPS grunt - to the holding cells at the bottom of the Council headquarters. The two Martyrs are awake but severely groggy and seem to be compliant with their captors. The two are bound by suppression cuffs, a Olympium-powered restraining device that not only binds them at the hands, but blocks the synapses that give OPS their active abilities. In short, any OPS bound by them are stripped of their powers, unless the Olympium has genetically altered their DNA to give them passive abilities.
The two were pretty silent up to the point where they arrived in the elevator to take the prisoners to holding. Once the doors close, a sense of relief washes over them.
“Well, that could have went a lot better” said Fisher.
“Yeah, but you know what?” responds Rodeo. “We did our jobs. None of what happened was our fault. Let Mandrake make excuses up on the 18th floor, but its no skin off my ass.”
“I guess” Fisher responds. “It just felt like we could have done more. Two of our fellow Counselors are dead now.”
“I know. I’ll miss them too.” said Rodeo. “I got along with Harpoon really well. We went through training together. I didn’t know Lightstorm, but I heard lots of good things about her.”
Fisher nods in agreement and pauses for a few moments, thinking of what to say next. ”What do you think they’re gonna do to Mandrake?” she asks.
The elevator arrives at sublevel 6, a chime sounds off and the doors begin to open.
”I don’t know. But I’m glad I’m down here rather than up there right now.” Rodeo says with a smirk.
Fisher flashes a grin and realizes how relieved she is to be as far away from floor 18 as possible. Rodeo always has a way of easing her nerves.
“Let’s get these two lumps of crap processed.” says Rodeo as they start to take the two Martyrs into the detainment center.
// To be continued in episode 6. New episodes released every Friday!
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The SteemHeroes Story
Prologue (complete):
Episode 0-1: The Discovery of Olympium
Episode 0-2: The Olympium War
Episode 0-3: The Splintering
Episode 0-4: The Rebellion
Episode 0-5: The Ravenwood Agency
Episode 0-6: Zenethen
Episode 0-7: The Discovery of Dimensional Fissures
Season 1:
Episode 1-1
Episode 1-2
Episode 1-3
Episode 1-4
Cover Image: Freepik