Nick and Tristan swallowed the pill to turn that night, there was no hesitation from the two of them, unlike what I had done and by the next morning, thanks to an accelerator that green had developed, they were ready to rock the next morning. There wasn't the time for them to pick their colors, but what they did do was make the names Taro and Hunter official. Tristan's full name ended up just like it was in FSRTDW, Taro Ferreth Salanth, while Nick's became Hunter Ajax Bladestorm, names befitting of both of them if you asked me. It was about midnight that we began loading up to go to the Black River base in Iran. Hunter gave us everything, guard shifts, names, armaments and he even gave us the small fact that the general ran this base on an airtight schedule and no one would dare to brake it. They were most vulnerable from 12 PM to 12;25 PM, lunch time. All guards would be pulled in and automated turrets took over, however, there was one entrance to the base, the utility entrance, that was unguarded because it was well hidden, or so they thought.

"I can't wait to test this shit out for real", Hunter growled as he strapped his helmet on and picked up his S-220 and an .50 Caliber variant of the S70 20mm rifle, "how long it take you to get used to the wings snow cone?"

I shrugged as I loaded my vest, "I dunno, bout a week? Just don't try to fly yet, you'll fail."

"You gonna stop me?", Hunter asked.

"No but the fact that Ace broke a tooth trying when he wasn't trained yet might", Riley said.

"You broke a tooth?", Taro asked.

I opened my mouth and showed them a fang in the back of my mouth that was snapped in two, but healing rather quickly, "Doctor Sun said it should grow back soon."

"Speaking of soon", Nina asked, "how long will the trip take?"

"About 14 hours", I said, "since were going on the 260."

That was when Morningstar walked into the armory, "Ace", he said, "leave your equipment here, Hunter, you as well, I have something for you."

Hunter and I looked at each other.

"Now boys", Morningstar said sternly.

'Alright then", I said unstrapping my vest. Hunter followed me to the dome with Morningstar where he lead us down to an area of the Dome I hadn't been in before, where we met Sam and the professor putting what seemed to be the final touches on what appeared to be juggernaut armor, though if it was it was no armor I've ever seen. It looked like the power armor from First Encounter Assault Recon mixed with the Fallout 4 T-60 and the Alpha Series Suit from Bioshock 2. There were two flamethrower's mounted on the arms of each suit and two Gatling guns on the shoulders, .50 caliber from the looks of them. The armor was two tone painted, black for a main and dark, crimson red as a secondary.

"What the hell's going on here?", I asked.

Green pulled his welding mask off, "power armor Ace, the first actual developed suit."

"Cool", I said.

"I figured since your going up against an entire base", Morningstar said, "you kids could use a little extra firepower. The suits come equipped with two, DX-46 Chemical throwers that are loaded with B-19 and two GAU 18 Gatling guns with 250 rounds each."

"B-19?", I asked, 'what the hell is B-19?"

"It's a very, very nasty chemical weapon", Green said, "designed specifically to kill quickly by dissolving the bonds between tissue and bone."

"What?", Hunter asked.

"In short the meat of anyone who get's hit with it will bubble up and slide off their skeleton like water runs of glass. The suits carry enough of the compound to sustain 15 minutes of continuous spray, or you can open the main valves and unleash it all in one burst. What we want you two to do with it, is show Black River that Project Venom means business."

"We'll send them all to hell General", I said.

"Good", Green said handing Nick and I each a mesh suit with a hex pattern that looked like it would stretch to fit our bodies, "put these on, the armor will chafe you like a bitch if you don't."

As Hunter and I were changing, Morningstar spoke up.

"Be careful boys", he said, "the suits are nearly bullet proof, but your not invulnerable, they bring in something heavy, you could go down easily."

"Noted", I said, "now...how do we even enter these things?"

Step by step, Green and Sam helped Hunter and I into the suits. They came in three pieces, the Hydraulic skeleton, which went on first and had to be strapped to us almost blood starvingly tight, then the bottom of the suit, which was heavy as a mother fucker, the torso, which housed the bulk of the onborad computer as well as the ammo and B-19 compound, which was bolted to the pants like a deep sea diving suit then the helmet, which was also bolted. The armor was too heavy to walk in and was almost crushing Hunter and I, until Green started them up, then it was almost like wearing nothing. They walked us through all the controls for the suits and even showed us that the suits had a very high powered grappling hook installed on them that could be used to rip doors off hinges. As and added bonus, they had AC, so we wouldn't suffocate on the way to the BR base. Once they had finished giving us a crash course on the suits, we boarded the 260 and began the flight to Iran. When Taro asked me about the suits, I explained to him that they were set up for Chemical Warfare, which he wasn't that happy about.

"That's fucking cruel", he protested, "are we seriously stopping low enough to use what sounds like Acid on our enemies?"

"Yes", I said flatly.

Taro didn't answer me after that. We sat in silence for hours, but you could cut the tension in that plane with a combat knife. When we were over the base at noon the next day, we made Halo jumps at 40,000 feet. Once we had descended, we made our way to the base's utility Entrance, Hunter and I leading the way. It took me a few minutes to get the door open, but once it was, I found a long tunnel with a door at the end that was full of piping and wires with several more doors on each side.

"Looks like no one's home", Taro said as we entered, "hunter, which way do we go."

"Straight ahead", Hunter said through the suit, "that door at the end will take us into the cafeteria."

'Where the cattle are waiting to be slaughtered", Nina growled charging her M4

"Let's do this", Hunter growled, "it's payback time."

My team and I closed the distance to the cafeteria door. I could hear a decent amount of chatter from the other side of the door. Through my armor's tactical visor, I managed to tag over 200 targets, only about 5 of which, who were wearing heavy armor, were armed.

"I count 195 unarmed targets with only 5 armed", I said, "this is gonna be fun."

With a deep breath, I kicked the cafeteria door off it's hinges, garnering the attention of every single man in the room. The five juggernauts stepped forward and pointed belt fed machine guns into the dark as I fired the hook forward, the sharpened, fish hook style barb easily stuck in the chest of my target as I pulled him into the service tunnel and snapped his neck like it was a twig. I tossed the body of the Juggernaut out into the crowd as another man ran forward and picked up his M240 bravo. With people's hearts beating loud enough for me to hear, I stepped out into the light.

"Open fire!", the unarmored man shouted.

With that simple sentence, all five M240 machine guns dumped over a 1,000 rounds of 7.62 into my chest and head at a range of about 15 feet, which in any video game would be a meat grinder from hell for the heavy solider, but the only effect that the weapons achieved was wasting their ammunition and barely scratching the paint on my suit. I had no idea what this thing was made out of, but it was fucking tough.

"My turn", I said as they ceased fire. I opened the valves of my Chemical throwers and doused the crowd of helpless mercs in B-19, which took effect upon making contact with their skin. White skin turned yellow and red, swelling up with huge puss filled blisters which popped from the pressure as the meat turned to a runny liquid and slid off the bones of my targets, leaving only stained red human frames by the time they hit the ground. As hideously effective as it was, somehow I had a feeling I wouldn't want to touch it after today. The people in the back were running screaming from the room, tripping over each other and trampling their friends to death in an attempt to get away as Nick stepped into the room with the others behind him.

"There is no escape from us", Nick shouted as we sprayed the mercs in the Death Fluid, "your only chance is surrender!"

I knew a few mercs did manage to escape the initial massacre, no doubt they'd run to the armory for Juggernaut armor, or any armor for that matter, possibly even chemical suits and come back with enough firepower to win a small war.

"They'll be bringing X-01 units" Hunter said as we pushed from the cafeteria and were met with gunfire from automated turrets, "we've got about 4 minutes before an entire army arrives to wipe the floor with us."

"We only need two to get our point across", I snarled as I nailed the three hallway turrets with .50 BMG rounds. We pushed through the hallway, meeting what would have any other time been an impossible level of enemy resistance from armored turrets, flamethrowers, Juggernauts and mounted Minigun turrets. As nick had said, in four minutes time, the resistance level went from cattle ready to be killed, to every other man being a flamethrower packing Juggernaut. X-01 and Reborn units had arrived rather quickly as well and my team slaughtered them all. It had only taken 10 minutes combat for the air to go from dry and dusty, to a thick smog of blood, ashes of flesh and bone and the ground to be sticky with liquefied people. We left a trail of meat and bloody bones through the base as everyone who dared to challenge us was quickly shot to pieces or turned into soup by B-19. I could see the looks on my friends faces every time I glanced back, pure horror. Our weapons were so nightmarishly efficient and so lethal that I began to question if they were even moral to use. What was even more terrifying, at least to me, was the fact that that the Mercs kept coming, despite the sheer amount of death and loss we were causing. I couldn't wrap my brain around why the continued to face us even though they knew they were going to die a horrifically painful death.

'They've lost this fight!", I said bashing a merc into the wall next to me, "why do they keep coming!?"

"They must have Armored support on the way!", Hunter said tearing into a group of men with his Gatling Guns, "these guys are just being used as Cannon fodder until the Crack Troops get here! We have to get your friends now!"

"Then let's pick up the pace", I said.

We pushed through a few more guys before arriving at the room where Mercury and Trace were being kept. And let me tell ya something, all the death, all the horror and all the carnage we'd inflicted today, didn't even begin to be justified compared to what they had done to the two of them.

Mercury was on his stomach, his wings had been hacked off and his tail was cut into four different pieces, I could tell just by looking that both his hands and all of his fingers were broken, while his left arm was held on by only a few pieces of meat, while the bone was a bloody powder underneath it and to top it off it seemed to be infected, gang green probably. Both his horns had been ripped off and were deeply embedded in his lower legs and his back and sides were a mess of whiplashes.

Trace, however....she was....Fuck I don't even know where to start. She had been nailed to the wall, crucified if you will. Unlike mercury, her wings were still attached to her back and she didn't appear to have any broken bones, but the membrane of her wings looked like an old dishrag, Like Mercury, her chest, legs, sides and back were a mess of whiplashes and she was covered in dirt and blood and one of her ears had been cut off. They were both, somehow, still alive and even more amazingly, semi conscious."

"Ace", Mercury said weakly, "what.....th...hell kept you?"

"Don't talk buddy", I said, as taro and I started trying to figure out where to start on treating his injuries, "please don't you could kill yourself."

"Ace", Taro said, "his left arm is rotting, it needs to come off right now."

"No", Mercury said, pleading, "they took my wings, please don't cut my arm off."

I inspected the arm closely, Taro was right. It was so far gone it had maggots in it.

I pulled my knife from it's sheath.

"No!", Mercury cried, "please Ace! Don't cut my arm off!"

"I...I don't have a choice", I said, "It's gonna kill you if it doesn't come off."

"Please!", Mercury cried, tears streaming down his cheeks, "Ace I'm begging you!"

"I'm sorry buddy", I said raising my blade and slashing through the dead tissue with every ounce of strength I could muster, cleaving through it cleanly. Mercury screamed from the pain and started sobbing as I bandaged the bloody stump and Taro dug his horns out of his legs and bandaged the holes. Rylar and Leanna helped him up while I turned my attention to Riley and Trace. Nina and Mako had gotten Trace off the wall and Riley was footing her weight rather easily.

"Let's get out of here", I said getting on my radio, "Hawk", I said, "this is Shadow 2-2, is our Evac inbound?"

"Rodger that Ace", Hawk said, "be advised, "I've been advised by the US Army that I got a live Tactical Nuclear warhead on the bottom of my plane and they only way I've got to get rid of it is to carry out a strike against their base. So GTFO!"

"A NUCLEAR STRIKE!?", Jayden yelped, "why the hell do we need a Nuke to get rid of this base!?"

"Who cares!?", I said, "but I don't want to be anywhere near this hole when that bomb goes off! We need to get o...wait, where the fuck is Hunter!"

"He left about a minute ago", Taro said, "didn't tell me where he was going."

"Goddammit Hunter!", I growled into the radio, "where the fuck are you!? We got a nuke coming in and I'm in no mood to get vaporized!"

"I'm just down the hall Josh", Hunter said, "come to me, it won't take long."

I looked at Taro, "dammit. Taro your in charge, get them out of here and don't you dare wait for me."

"Understood", Taro said as I left and sprinted down the hall to an infirmary. When I entered, I saw hunter in the back of the room, his helmet on the bed beside him, his white horns standing out against the black armor. There was another, huge hulk of a man that was tied up in the corner, red in the face and struggling to escape the roll of duck tape that Hunter had wound around his arms and legs.

"Hunter", I growled walking up to him, "we got a fucking nuke coming in and your ass is back here doing I don't fucking know wh....."

I stopped in mid sentence as I saw who was on the bed. It was an older looking Rottweiler that was strapped with mechanical parts, replacing the spine, back of his skull, right eye and legs as well as making a rib pattern on his sides. The dog was in obvious pain. Hunter was stroking the dogs tired looking face gently, looking as though he had stopped crying when I entered the room.

I sighed as Hunter spoke up.

"You see it now Joshua", Hunter said, "Black River science at it's "best".

"Is that", I began, but he stopped me,.

"Rex?", Hunter said, "yes. Josh, I wouldn't wish the Reborn Project on my worst enemy. Those drafted into it face an empty life full of nothing but suffering and war."

Hunter paused as his pup whimpered and tried to lick his hand. There was a few more seconds of pause before Hunter started singing in a low voice.

党Hush little baby, don't say a word, Papa's gonna buy you a mockingbird. And if that mockingbird won't sing, Papa's gonna buy you a diamond ring. And if that diamond ring turns to brass, Papa's gonna buy you a looking glass. And if that looking glass gets broke, Papa's gonna buy you a billy goat. And if that billy goat won't pull,

Papa's gonna buy you a cart and bull. And if that cart and bull turn over, Papa's gonna buy you a dog named Rover. And if that dog named Rover won't bark, Papa's gonna buy you a horse and cart. And if that horse and cart fall down, You'll still be the sweetest little baby in town!"

That was when I noticed that Hunter had taken a 1911 from a holster on his leg and pressed it against Rex's head, "I love you boy, I hope you sleep well."

That was probably the hardest trigger Hunter's ever had to pull. I swear I heard his body shut down when that slide locked back. The shell fell to the ground with a really audible ping, or at least it seemed that way. Hunter closed his pup's eyes and shoved the 1911 back into it's holster, put on his helmet then gently picked up his pup.

"Grab that fat bastard in the back", Hunter said, "I got what I came for, now let's beat it before we all join my pup."

"Got ya", I said walking over to the man, "your coming with me you stupid fuck."

I lifted the man over my shoulder and we made haste to the entrance of the base, where we found not only Project Venom Agents, but US Army Soldiers and Russian troops loading my friends into trucks.

"Sargent Kyloth!", a Russian man shouted, "the nuke is only a few minutes off! We must hurry if we are to make Evac!"

"Where's a bird!?", I asked.

"John can't get near the blast zone", Carlos said from the back of the truck, "his Chinook is Electric."

"Okay", I said climbing into the truck and helping the Russian man in.

"Punch it!", the Russian said, "Everyone is on broad."

"How big is the nuke coming in?", I asked, "more importantly, why is it coming in?"

"It was strapped to the bottom of your friend's Warthog", the Russian said, "she had taken off from the airport when they detected it. There was no time to disarm it, so the only thing we can do is get rid of it."

"Okay", I said, "so why are you here?"

"My name is Sargent Vasil Ikor", the man said, "I am here because my President would like to speak with you about a possible Black River site in our borders, you have experience in dealing with them, where as we do not,. So we require your help."

"Of course", I said as the truck sped away. About a minute later, Hawk's warthog flew by and she came over the radio.

"Are you guys clear Vasil!??", she asked, sounding out of breath, "I gotta get rid of this thing!"

"Yeah!", he shouted, "get rid of it!?"

"Good fucking riddance!", Hawk shouted as she fired a missile inside the Black River base. Through my Tactical visor, I could see the heavy steel door sucked shut behind it as the entire mountain caved in on itself, burying our murder scene with it.

"I'm returning to base for a fuckin decon scrubbing", Hawk said, "I'll meet you guys in Russia later."

"Acknowledged", Vasil said as we pulled to a stop, John's Chinook was already there and spooling up.

"Hunter", I said, "take all of them back to 29, I'll take Carlos and go to Russia by myself."

"Okay", Hunter said, "stay safe Josh."

"I will man", I said.

Hunter nodded to me, Nina gave me a kiss and then they went to John's Chinook while I looked at Vasil.

"Well, looks like my next stop is Russia."