This is set in a RIFTS style Rping world, and it's about Major Svetlanna Lluchennkov of the 5th Sub- Directorate of the Church of the Nuclear Messiah's Directorate of Intelligence. Essentially, her position is similiar to that of a political officer. This story is heavily based on the movie Apocalypse Now, and contains lots of grusome bloodshed, making it enjoyable for all you ASVSers. Remember, this is based on Role-playing, so sorry if it's a bit odd at times. I think you'll all enjoy it, though. Incidently, Svetlanna is also a clone of the person she thought was her mother, and she just found out recently, which is the cause of alot of her personal problems. 'I've looked into the heart of darkness, where the blood- red journey ends... When you've faced the heart of darkness, even your soul begins to bend. For a week I have been waiting, still I am only in Saigon! The walls move in a little closer, I feel the jungle call me on. Every minute I get weaker, while in the jungle they grow strong. What I wanted was a mission, and for my sins they gave me one.... They brought it up just like room service, 'cause everyone gets what they want, And when that mission was all over, I'd never want another one! "I know captain that you've done this work before. We've got a problem you can help us all I'm sure, The colonel's gone rogue and his methods are unsound, You'll take a PBR up river, track him down." There's a conflict in every human heart, And the temptation is to take it all to far. In this war things get so confused, But there are some things which cannot be excused .... He's acting like a God - an insane lunatic, Your mission - exterminate with extreme prejudice. The route is dangerous and your progress may be slow.. Here is the file and it's all you need to know! Here I am the knife in my hand... And now I understand why the genius must die. Now I stand alone in the darkness with his blood upon my hands, Where sat the warrior the poet, now lie the fragments of a man. I've looked into the heart of darkness, where the blood-red journey ends! When you've faced the heart of darkness, even your soul begins to bend.. I've looked into the heart of darkness.....' - Iron Maiden.. The complete lyrics to "The Edge of Darkness", from the album "The X Factor." One Day Prior: Major Svetlanna Lluchennkov, Fifth Sub-Directorate, Church of the Nuclear Messiah intelligence Directorate, stood before her mother.. If that word could still be applied... After what she'd learned. And she listened.. To the offer for her redemption... As Alexanndrra spoke. "Major... Your mission is simple. You are to track down, undercover if necessary, and terminate with extreme prejudice one Brigadier Maeve Sheridann, formerly the commander of the Army's Fifth Rangers." Svetlanna raised an eyebrow, suddenly curious... "The Butcher of Belmounntt, who was cashiered from service after that incident?" The elder Lluchennkov smirked, and nodded. "That is correct, Major.. Though she weasled her way out of execution the first time.. And her unit was disbanded, her men spread through the Army.. That is precisely the problem. We feel they are beginning to subvert legions.. And she plans to make herself a private kingdom.. To become a warlord. Clearly, we cannot let this happen. Our behavioural sciences unit suggests her former troops will become fully loyal to the Church again.. If she is dead, and it can be proved. We believe she is currently in the New Rydynn area. You will be assigned three troops and an ATV with which to track her down.. She must be terminated at any cost. Good luck..." She paused, her features lightening ever so slightly. "Svetlanna." The younger woman nodded once, and saluted. "Excellent, then.. Here is the file.. It's all you need to know." Svetlanna took the file and headed to the base's airport, to catch the four-engined turboprop transport that was heading to Sabattan. It would be a long ride, but she was used to it. After all.. However dangerous, however.. Dark.. Even as this woman seemed to call to her from the pages of the file.. She had a mission. And that was all that mattered... redemption.. And a chance to escape the heart-wrenching truth of what she was. She drew Svetlanna in. The file, the history.. Brilliance, yes, Brilliance, her tactical and strategic abilities unrivaled, outmatching her own by far.. Hand to hand, firearm combat, the same.. She had led the Rangers personally.. But before then, she had a headquarters job in Strategic planning.. She'd only gone to the front as an observer.. What had she observed.. That changed her so? She had gone back.. Completed the rigorous Ranger training at an age older than normally allowed.. And passed the course on the top. Then she had returned to the field.. Commanding the fifth rangers.. Her success record was.. Stunning. She had nearly wiped out the Freemen Commandos on one cold night in the former Kingdom.. Interesting... Finally, though.. It had let to Belmounntt.. Why? She must kill Maeve, yes, but she must also understand why.. Even if the answer.. and the question.. cost her.. Her life. She looked to the three men with her, in the SV-7, but remained silent. She desired to become a warlord.. an Empress of her own nation, somewhere on this forsaken planet, the report concluded.. But still no why.. Whatever the cost.. She must know. If only.. to make sense out of this mad hell. "Major.. We're approaching the building." A nod to the driver. "Carefully, now.. Carefully.. Let's hope she doesn't have any Anti-tank mines..." At that moment, a .44 magnum sniper rifle bullet blew apart the head of the trooper manning the .68 machine gun on the SV-7.. Svetlanna's heart tensed.. Her body tensed.. Maeve knew.. Maeve was prepared. "Accelerate... Straight through!" The driver grimly brought the vehicle to maximum speed... racing towards the front of the building.. until they hit a mine... anti-personnel, but enough at that speed, as a bullet pinged off the armour.. it detonated.. and they flipped, and rolled, coming to a stop upright, but battered, outside the building, the two left-rear tires shredded.. and another of her men dead, his head crushed by slamming into the side of the vehicle. She herself felt woosy.. but was only bruised. She gripped her sub-machine gun tighter. "Alright.. open the hatch.. we'll dash for it.. only a few yards.." The Driver, the last survivor, eased the hatch open.. and Svetlanna leaped out.. and began running.. when a massive thunderclap of a sonic boom, one after the other, in rapid-fire succession, echoed across the silent streets. Ten stories up, Maeve grinned in delight as the Mass Driver shot out magnetically accelerated slugs at mach speeds, the 1 cm shells shredding the armour of the SV-7 at those speeds, the driver killed instantly, until they tracked and found the gas tank.. the vehicle exploding in a massive fireball, a "silver bullet" shot as it rolled up lazily in the air and came crashing down, triggering a few nearby mines to explode. Below her, Svetlanna felt a whizzing, felt a heat.. now, her left calf was streaked with blood, a small crater in the concrete where the round had impacted.. she didn't really feel any pain.. the wound barely grazing her.. but enough.. Wincing in pain, she flipped the safety off on the Submachine gun and entered the building warily.. Somewhere else in the city.. A CotNM platoon was guarding it's small checkpoint fortification. Eight of the men in that platoon were former members of the 5th Rangers. A call came in to one on a pre-planned radio frequency. Three minutes later, the rest of that platoon was dead, and equipped with the best weaponry they could find among the bodies, the eight went to help their Commander. Inside the building, she paused.. One of the nuclear symbol armbands was removed from her uniform.. and, stretched tightly, after removing a boot, she eased it up her calf and into place over the wound.. then the second. Then, the boot was eased back on.. the pressure annoying, but the bloodflow stopped. Little did she know she'd lost precious time from the arrival of Maeve's reinforcements. Still wincing, she made her way to the elevator shaft.. the doors opened, but it would not activate; locked. A muffled curse in her native Central Perdoxxian, and she headed for the stairs... Then up. The first burst of ammo detonated an explosive device far enough away for her to avoid getting hurt. As the smoke billowed into the stairway from the first booby trap, she put on her gasmask and IR goggles, and began the ascent, checking her clips for the SMG against the number of surveilence cameras in the stairway.. She hoped she had enough ammo.. Above her.. Maeve smirked.. And waited. Below her, a truck came to a stop near the still burning wreck of the SV-7. Eight heavily armed men left it, and headed to the elevator. A radio crackled. "Commander? What's the target's location?" The reply was harsh, yet at the same time.. Kind. "Eleventh floor, heading up. Take the elevator to the Thirteenth floor, and attack her from behind, old friend. Good hunting.. We shall speak again when this is done." "I understand, Commander. It shall be done." The eight men crowded into the elevator, and their leader hit the button for the thirteenth floor out of fifty nine. Svetlanna paused... she wanted to check if Maeve had a position here.. Probably from where the shots had been fired that destroyed the SV-7. She eased open the door to the Thirteenth floor, and stepped out into the abandoned offices, walking silently towards the position she estimated she had hear the shots from. As she turned a corner, and crept towards the outer wall... she heard a "ding" behind her.. and whirled.. to see, through snowed glass.. eight figures.. leaving the main elevator, and heading towards the stairwell she had just left. And grin she did.. The people who Maeve had called to trap her.. Were about to become her targets. She raised the SMG and pressed the trigger.. the glass shattering in two layers, as the bullets ripped out of the barrel on full-auto. One of the figures fell with a cry.. and she immedietly ceased fire and dropped below the partition, as a fullisade of three-round bursts chewed into the wall behind her. As they ceased fire.. she gambled, and dived into the office towards them, through a long-missing door.. just in time.. as a molotov cocktail sailed to an impact behind her, igniting in a shower of flames. She let the SMG drop to it's strap, all instinct now, as her hands found the pump- action 30mm grenade launcher strapped to her back.. her third ranged weapon. Made of synthetics.. it was surprisingly light in her hands.. it felt good. She leaped to her feet and fired. The grenade sailed through the second, now shattered window, and exploded. The team had guessed she was not dead, but loyalty to their fallen comrade got two of them in the explosion of the grenade. She dived and pumped the action to ready the launcher for another shot, as one of the men sprayed the area with dozens of 5.56mm rounds from a SAW. As he fired, she raised the grenade launcher at an angle, and fired a second round. It richoceted off the ceiling and exploded infront of the man.. a fourth casulty... the team had been cut in half.. And Svetlanna turned, and she ran.. Behind her, with his dieing breath, the man primed a grenade and threw it. Behind her running feet, she felt the explosion pick her up and knock her forward, as shrapnel was imbeded in her back. She screamed once with pain, but staggered to her feet... and ran, almost falling over as she did, towards the stairs. Her back was wet with sweat and blood from the wounds.. Her head pounding from the fire alarm blaring, now that the fire from the Molotov Cocktail was spreading, no sprinklers having water to put it out. She could not hold in the soft moan of pain as she eased open the door to the stairs.. Thankfully, the nightvision goggles were still working, and she had far better sight than her persuers.. Made clear by the burst of three rounds imbedded into the wall an instant later, a good foot from her. She had to hurry. And so she ran, up the stairs, persued. The now four man team had reached the stairs, and headed up warily, the barrels of their assault rifles pointed up.. But the darkness, and light drifting smoke hampered their vision. One heard a sound.. he fired, the burst of the rifle echoing with the shrill warning of the fire alarm in a nightmarish hell of black fury. Svetlanna paused as the burst echoed against the wall, and looked down to her weighted ammo belt.. selecting one of two charges of plastic explosives. She took the remote control detonator, as she pressed the explosive into the stair.. and started upwards, as silent as she could.. as the footsteps sounded closer. She paused.. now at the twenty first floor... and waited.. counting the footsteps of the men rushing after her.. The time was right.. she pressed the detonator. There was an explosion behind the men, as concrete chips flew, and a tongue of flame and billowing smoke filled the stairwell... with a gut- wrenching twisting sound, part of the stairwell ripped off and fell, one of the four men falling with it, screaming as he plummeted to his death. Upwards she ran, as fast as her slowly failing strength could carry her.. upwards... upwards. The three survivors pulled themselves out of the smoke- filled stairwell, coughing. They reached the elevator, and they reported in. "Commander.. This is Corporal Williamms.. The Lieutenant is dead, the Sargent is dead.. She's heading up. There's still three of us left.. Where to we stop her?" The response was cool.. but tinged with regret for the lives of her men. "Forty Ninth floor... It's my favourite number.. She may suspect I'm living there... " The survivor nodded grimly. "She won't make it past that floor.. As long as we live." The men entered the elevator, the corporal using his keycard to unlock it, and allowing them to head upwards. Upon arriving at the 49th floor.. they began to set their trap. It had been one cursed climb, indeed, getting more and more exhausted until she finally reached the forty ninth.. but she must be ready... She knew she didn't get all of them.. She'd just felt that she hadn't.. A sense.. one developes.. in combat. Only someone who's lived through combat like this understands that creeping paranoia that someone is near. Or maybe it was just Maeve... Just.. she snorted.. and then calmed herself.. stepping into sight of the missing door on the 49th floor, drawing her plasma pistol.. her vision getting progressively worse as the smoke degraded the effectiveness of the IR goggles. Still.. They saved her life, literally. The first burst was fired with excellent accuracy.. but the first bullet impacted her IR goggles, destroying them, but richoceting clear of what would have been a fatal wound. Muscles being twisted painfully, she through herself UP the stairs, firing two bright red bursts from the plasma pistol, that singed the building, but did not hit a man.. Still.. One private, enraged at the loss of his friends.. snapped. He leaped forward into the well just as Svetlanna ripped off the shattered goggles... two more red bursts flew, and the man's head was a singed piece of wreckage. There was a startled cry from the second Private, as Svetlanna threw herself down the stairs to the landing, wincing as she landed hard and rolled into a half kneel stance... another two red bursts lanced from the plasma pistol, ripping through the chest of the second private and mortally wounding him. She didn't want to wait for the third.. she leaped to her feet.. and ran up again.. the Corporal.. laser sighted .45 taken from his dead lieutenant drawn.. followed. Svetlanna needed to think, as she reached the fifty third floor, and kept on up.. nearly to the top of the building, wheezing from the rising smoke, the filter on her gas mask damaged, her eyes watering. She paused.. and grinned. Yes.. The Corporal's next instinct would be to go straight to Maeve.. to guard her back.. and he'd use the elevator.. Since.. the smoke was even worse for him. She eased the door open, and made her way to the Elevator shaft slowly. The Corporal was headed in the same direction, assuming the enemy was still going up the stairs. He was weary, now holding his pistol to his side as he panted.. Pausing at the elevator, he took his keycard and inserted it in the slot.. And a vicious kick with her right leg sent his gun spinning away from him. As he staggered, a second kick sent him falling.. Svetlanna, like a wild animal, leaped upon him, punching his jaw and nose again and again as she pinned him, struggling, forcing him down, until he was weak enough not to resist... as she reached for the laser- sighted .45, and aimed at his forehead, speaking softly, barely heard through the gas mask. "Treachery is death." She fired once, blowing his head apart like an overripe watermelon.. and finding herself perversely enjoying the shower of internal materials, as she staggered to her feet. Finally, she had navigated the final six floors.. the fire far, far, below getting very serious, the smoke very thick... She stepped over the ancient barrier keeping people from walking onto the roof.. and kicked open the door to the roof.. stepping out onto it. She was now certain of were Maeve was.. Almost. There was a leap, and she was suddenly pinned to the ground.. Maeve had leaped down from her home, built atop the stairway/elevator/ventilation structure atop the roof. Working on instinct now, Svetlanna slammed her elbow back into the older woman's gut and rolled away, leaping to her feet, to find her plasma pistol gone, knocked away. Her other weapons were either out of ammo or useless in this situation.. So she drew her officer's sabre... watching as Maeve slid a wicked looking Bowie knife from it's sheath. "Major Svetlanna Lluchennkov.." She uttered.. Maeve looked on.. "Fifth Directorate, I see... Backstabber. You know who I am." The younger woman nodded once. "I know.. I'm here to kill you.. But first... I must ask... Why?" Maeve smiled softly.. and she spoke. "I was observing, you see... With a team who went into villages.. And reprogrammed the people.. Right there. There were a few Church Sympathizers in this one village.. Not many.. But by the time we were done.. They all supported the Church.. though the ones that hadn't before.. Were only a little bit above zombies, it seemed. We camped just outside the village that night.. And I returned.. to watch.. To see what these people did.. Now that they had been.. Converted. Instead.. I saw an armed Freemen.. He looked like he was returning home.. warily. And I watched him.. as he saw his wife, and eight children.. Converted.. condemning him.. afraid of him, yet still so.. lifeless. He watched them... and he prayed for them.. and he killed them all.. And then he killed himself. At that moment.. I realized.. You have to have the guts.. The love.. The compassion... To kill people. That sometimes.. You needed the strength.. To kill people as an act of mercy, as an act of kindness.. That.. It's real guts.. To kill your friends, and your family, because it's the right thing to do, because it needs to be done. I realized that, and I joined the Rangers.. and at Belmounntt... I got the chance to practice it." Svetlanna nodded silently.. as the first sun split the horizon.. suddenly illuminating the top of the building with the light of the morning. "I understand, Maeve.. Thank you." Then she leaped forward, her sword slashing, but met by the Bowie knife, parried by the far smaller blade.. The Maeve was on the move, dodging as Svetlanna slashed.. catching her twice.. but only minor wounds.. before.. that bowie knife flashed, and she rolled, towards the edge.. regaining her balance just in time.. regarding Maeve warily, as she rushed again.. seeming to go low.. Svetlanna brought the blade down.. in a motion.. to sever her head.. but instant.. found that Bowie knife going upwards, at an abrupt angle that stunned her... She saw it just in time, and threw herself to the right... the knife barely missing her heart as it dug into her body. She screamed in pain.. but came back with her hand.. and flung the sword. Her aim was true, and it imbedded in Maeve's heart. The woman sank to her knees near the edge, as Svetlanna staggered to her.. and heard her last words.. "I.. was not fit..." She pulled the sabre from Maeve's body.. and watched her, dieing, fall backwards off the building.. her final final whispers.. carried by the wind.. to Svetlanna's ears.. "The horror... The horror.." Maeve was dead long before her body hit the ground. Silently, Svetlanna sheathed her blade.. the dagger still imbedded in her.. the pain.. overwhelming.. but she pressed on.. one hand.. grabbing her plasma pistol.. as she staggered back into the stairwell.. and down.. to the top floor. It was an ancient living quarters, there, for the millionaire who had once own the place.. and she found her miracle there.. An emergency elevator shaft. The generator in Maeve's jury- rigged home was still supplying power to the building. Svetlanna sagged into the lift, and hit the only button availible.. down. Her blood flowed, as she went down.. to the bottom.. to a nuclear shelter. The doors opened.. A skeleton reclining in a chair, the millionaire, greeted her. She didn't even react in surprise.. but instead sat down in another chair.. for next to it was the ultimate suprise.. a fully stocked first aid kit. The first thing she gave herself was morphine. Then, she ripped the dagger from her body.. forcing the bandage over it.. wrapping it tightly. She fell uncounscious, then.. and awoke.. some hours later. The pain was still there.. another shot of morphine, she gave herself.. but the bloodflow.. was lessened.. She might make it. Using a metal piece found in the place.. she limped to the doors to what must have been another escape route... the sewer.. but found them jammed with rubble on the other side. So.. she set her last charge of plastic explosive, and staggered back into the elevator... the doors shutting.. she threw the lock to keep it in place.. as she detonated the second charge with a muffled roar. Then.. she opened the doors again.. the Skeleton of the man, trapped with no power on one side, and a block on the other, to eat his food and starve to death.. was gone, destroyed. She staggered through the rubble, and up it... into the sewer, the block destroyed. Her body screaming at her, she pulled herself up an access ladder.. pushing aside the manhole cover.. and climbing up.. onto the street. She lay back, looking up.. at the 59 story building.. utterly ablaze.. Maeve's home at the top just going up now, the fire clearly a massive spectacle all across the city. She looked next to herself.. briefly stunned. Beside her was Maeve's body, broken from where she fell. Gripped in one hand, a last act before death as she fell, was a book. Svetlanna took it out of her hand, and look at the title.. the Tain Bo Cuilage. Svetlanna smiled softly.. and took off her uniform jacket, laying it over Maeve's head.. wearing but a rather tight black blouse under that.. but it didn't matter.. certainly not now. She staggered about a block away from the building before she fell uncounscious. She would have bled to death there if it were not from two of the women from the Grotto, who had come to watch the fire. They found her, recognized her, and carried her back there.. If she got to the hospital in time.. she might yet live. It had been hell.. But the pain had become comfortable, and then left her. The pain was gone now.. Well, not entirely, but stuffed under drugs to the point she felt nothing.... She was tired, and sore.. But herself again. And still, she had seen death.. She had seen darkness. She had succeeded, and she was both proud and regretful. Maeve was brilliant, Maeve was right, and Maeve had to die.. And she did. She would never, never, forget any of what happened. For she had looked into the heart of darkness, and she had survived.. and not become.. what she had fought. She had been close... But she had survived. It was all that mattered, now. The wounds were mostly healed.. In another few days, she'd retake command of Firebase Alpha, and continue the mission.. One filled with even more confused questions than before. But atleast she had a chance to sort through them.. And hope for the future. Whatever happened.. She knew she controlled her own destiny again. The darkness would never come that close again... She was free to choose. The horizon was now clear.. There were questions, surely... But after facing the Heart of Darkness... They would be answered. She had found her path, whatever it was to be.. And she was.. content, now. And greatful for that. She had but two things to do, now.. To read the Tain Bo Cuailage.. And to remember. Slowly, she pushed herself out of her bed, and headed to shower.. then go downstairs. Silently to silence fall in the fields of futile war Toys of death are spitting lead where boys that were our soldiers bled War horse and war machine curse the name of liberty Marching on as if they should mix in the dirt our brothers' blood In the mud and rain, what are we fighting for Is it worth the pain, it is worth dying for Who will take the blame, why did they make a war Questions that come again, should we be fighting at all Once a ploughman hitched his team, here he sowed his little dream Now bodies arms and legs are strewn, where mustard gas and barb wire bloom Each moment's like a year, I've nothing left inside for tears Comrades dead or dying lie, I'm left alone asking why In the mud and rain, what are we fighting for? Is it worth the pain, it is worth dying for? Who will take the blame, why did they make a war? Questions that come again, should we be fighting at all...? After the war, left feeling no one has won.... After the war, what does a soldier become? After the war, left feeling no one has won.... After the war, what does a soldier become? What is at home when the battles are done....? After the war and when no one has won..... I'm just a soldier.... After the war, left feeling no one has won..... After the war, what does a soldier become? After the war, left feeling no one has won.... After the war, what does a soldier become? - The Full Lyrics to the song "The Aftermath" by Iron Maiden.