Richard followed the general into a narrow elevator shaft. The two sat in a sort of uncomfortable silence as they made their way down into the deepest depths of the Infinity. When standing in the midst of Marcus "Zero" you were quite literally standing next to a living legend. The man has been actively serving since the age of eighteen, and has fought in some of the most key battles in human history. In his own life time he had seen himself portrayed in hundreds if not thousands of movies, television shows, comics and video games. 

The elevator finally came to a halt, the metallic doors opening to reveal the wide docking station contained within theInfinities hull. A large ship stood before them, a large crowd of military personel bustled around the ship prepping it for take off. The two men approached the lowered landing ramp, though Marcus stopped them before stepping foot on top of the metal ramp.

"You step foot in my ship and there is no turning back. Understood."

"Yes sir."

"You will be giving up your freedom to serve under me. Every move you make is under my direct order. And if not mine, then your squad leaders. Is that understood?"

"Yes sir." Richard said, nearly feeling his very soul melting under the old mans intense stare. He eventually broke it off with a nod, the old man turning towards the ship. 

"You will follow the first hall we come to all the way towards the end. You will find the other men there waiting for their briefing."

"Yes sir." Richard responded again, following the Generals orders just as he had been told. He made his way down the narrow hallway of the battleship until he entered a more wide open room. The room was lined with tall green lockers, each about two feet across in width. He saw some familiar faces from the bar.

"No fuckin' shit." The man he knew has Three laughed.

"Hey." Richard said with a nod, leaning back against one of the walls.

"Richard Bromwell what the hell are you doin' on this ship?" Nathan asked with a grin, approaching Richard and landing a heavy hand down on his shoulder. 

"I'm part of the team now." Richard said, "I had to do a little begging to "Zero" But the man saw the light."

Nathan laughed, "Got down on your knees and sucked the ol' mans dick just to get the chance to die an honorable death. I like it." 

"Yeah, well as long as he don't fuck up and cause me to die my honorable death too early." A rough voice called from the back of the room. A bulky man stood up from the bench he was seated on and walked over. Richard knew him as two from the bar. His green eyes stared down Richard sternly, his wide cheekbones clenched tightly. He had a short mat of red hair that sat atop his bulging head.

"Easy there, Bacon. The grunt may lack the training but he sure as hell has made up for it with experience. Aint that right, Richard?"

Richard nodded, "I hope." He eyed down the large man who had just been referred to as "bacon." "So uh...Bacon, is it?"

"That's right." He said with a wide grin.

"When he's on leave he's Bacon. When he's strapped he's two." Nathan said, "Just like right now you are Richard. When we get into the shit you are Six."

"Whose Five?" Richard asked, only recalling four members to the group.

"Five." The man known only to Richard as Three laughed. He was a rather handsome dark haired man with a sort of purposeful thicket of unshaven scruff on his cheeks and chin. "That dude is a case I tell you what. He is always in his gear. And if not the dude is locked up in his room, probably jerkin' it to videos of himself capping heads."

Nathan shook his head, "Five comes out of Japan. First of his class in sniper training, got one hell of an eye and from what we hear one hell of a set of balls. He keeps to himself, which is fine by me as long as he comes into the fight on our side."

"Don't speak a lick of english neither. Probably why he wears that damn helmet all the time, got some translator shit in it or something." Bacon said as he returned to the bench he was sitting on.

"Well he could be a robot for all I care, as long as he can handle that boom stick as well as his records say he does then I'm damn proud to have 'em." Nathan said with a nod.

"Speakin' of the devil." Three grunted, nodding his head towards the door. 

A rather short figure stood against the doorway, had Richard not known better he could have easily mistaken the dark, and armored soldier to actually be a robot. His suit was intricately designed and yet at the same time seemed as sturdy as a rock. It's heavy black metal hardly held a shine under the white florissant lights. The helmet was perhaps the most intricate of all, it consisted of a few segmented pieces that could be moved up or down. The visor pulled back on the helmet was designed almost like the curved beak of an eagle. Under the visor three circles peered out towards the five men with an almost cold teel glow. These were the snipers false eyes, for the targeting system was too advanced for a simple translucent visor to suffice. 

The mysterious figure, simply known to the men as Five nodded their head back towards the hall and joined them inside the room. Not long afterwards a heavy series of footsteps could be heard, the figure of Marcus appearing in the brightly illuminated room. Immediately the six soldiers stood at attention.

"At ease, men." Marcus grunted as he walked towards the center of the room. His old, yet surprisingly able hand reached up towards the wall and pulled away a wooden panel, revealing a wide computer screen. The U.N logo appeared briefly before giving way to the control panel. "Three hours ago, the New Order struck with full force at one of our Allies stations, here." He said, the star map zooming into the image of a white sphere. Richards brow narrowed as the identification number of the planet seemed to be oddly familiar. 

"Last thing we heard was that their defenses were weak, and the New Order was fixen to make the station their new home. Those were the last transmissions we heard from the ground. I think it is safe to say that our enemies have gotten themselves dug in deep with some fine new firepower to back themselves up with. And it wouldn't exactly take a genius for them to figure out how to revert the stations defense systems to work in their favor." A blue print of the station appeared on screen. "Now, our friends at the station are obviously seeing this as a great and utter defeat. A humiliating one at that. They see this as a god damn military catastrophe!" Marcus chuckled, shaking his head slightly, "But you want to know what I see? I see an opportunity. This is exactly the situation we have been training for, it is time to show this universe of ours exactly how big of a bite us little dogs can dish!" 

There was an excited cry of agreement from the men, including Richard. His heart raced as the great war hero Marcus "Zero" explained to them how these six soldiers were going to take down the New Order. The plan was to exploit their size. They would be dropped down into the combat zone under the radar, and from there they would be able to snake their way into the station. From there they would be able to disable the defense systems to open up the gates for the Knights. 

When Marcus left the room it was Nathan, now known as One, who took over. "Alright boys. Let's gear up." He shouted, his words met with another excited cheer from all but the silent number Five. "Six." He barked, "Your gear is over here."

"Yes sir." Richard said with a nod, falling into the old routine he hard learned in boot camp. He jogged over to the locker that Nathan had pointed towards and opened it. It was hardly the Nova Guard armor that he had grown accustomed to. Though because it was a one of a kind prototype he was not allowed to take it with him. His new armor was much lighter, held together my thick nano-fibre fabrics that had replaced the more standard teflon. The bulkier alloys and plastics of the U.N.S.S armored the key areas of the lower legs, thighs, groin, chest and shoulders and the arms. It was similar in fashion to that of number Five's armor, though just slightly heavier. Their helmets were thick and for the most part solid, the narrow visors would contain a HUD but not one nearly as advanced as that of the Nova Guards. 

Each man carried a similar weapon, a large three foot long canon with two barrels. One barrel was fed high calibre machine gun rounds through a large barrel clip that jutted out from the side of the rifle. The second barrel fired semi-automatic explosive rounds.

Five on the other hand carried a rifle that nearly touched the ground as it hung from his back. The clip was filled with extremely powerful armor piercing explosive rounds that could hit targets from miles away. On earth the weapon was known as a tank killer, but here in this new warzone it had already been dubbed with the name "Titan killer". 

Nathan tossed a pack to Richard, "Take one of these." 

"What is this?" He asked, pulling the pack over his shoulder.

"That would be your parachute my friend."

"Parachute?" Richard asked as they made their way down the hall. He had not even realized that by this point their new, smaller ship had left the Infinity and was about ten minutes away from their drop zone.

"That's right." Nathan called over his shoulder, there was a loud roaring wind blowing through the hallway now, the ship opened up to a larger area filled with large metal crates and some massive structure hidden beneath a heavy green tarp. 

"You mean after all these years we've got nothing better than parachutes to get us down to the ground?" Richard called over the roar of the wind, a white landscape slipping beneath the ship in a blur. 

A wide grin crossed Nathans lips, "What can I say? They wanted to save a little money!" He burst into laugher as he approached the opening with the other men, "Have you ever used one before?"

Richards blood ran cold, "No!" He shouted.

"Oh. Well. We sort of have to go now."

"What?" Richard nearly shrieked, "But how am I supposed to-" He yelled as Nathan grabbed his arm and practically threw him into the wide opening. The other five soliders were quick to follow. Richard screamed as he watched the ground race towards him, it was hard to tell how high they really were against the solid white backdrop. The air was perfectly quiet as they fell, he was completely unaware of the violent battle that took place just over their heads in the outer atmosphere. The white earth was littered with small black dots.

"Hey new guy." A voice called into his ear piece. "When I say go you pull that little orange ring by your right elbow."

Richard tried to nod as he lifted his arm, his eyes falling on the orange ring. He took a deep breath, his mind only just adjusting to the fact that he was free falling towards a hostile frozen tundra. He briefly reflected on what he left behind, a warm bed, a beautiful women. But he reminded himself of what he was after, "I'm comin' for you Kikata." He whispered to himself, unaware of the events that had taken place just a few hours ago...unaware that one of those little black dots in the white landscape was his old ship. 

"Now!"