Kline crept up the stairs. Checked his tactical suit’s radar. No heat signatures. He paused at the top step. The assembly center’s security barracks lay between his position and the Exodus Project’s subassembly plant. The subassembly plant stored the ship’s power core, codenamed C19H—Kline’s primary objective.
Lacking enough time to find a way to bypass the security barracks, Kline had to find some means of getting through them.
With an eye trained on his tactical suit’s readouts, he inched along the left wall of the corridor. The passageway offered little cover, but at the end of the hallway, next to the barracks door, a stack of thick plastic crates offered some concealment. Kline ducked into the shadows cast by the crates and studied the door’s access panel. It required a keycard and retinal scan.
Beep! Beep! Beep! Kline’s HUD flashed red—two incoming Union signatures. Grimacing, Kline shrunk back against the crates. Kept his body out of view. Indicator lights on the HUD glided toward him from the staircase that he’d just ascended moments earlier. Kline overheard the approaching troops before seeing them.
“…then, the guy claims he’s some kind of special agent,” said one of them.
“Somethin’ weird is going on, man,” said the other. “All this increased security, and now some random nut job shows up?”
Kline frowned. None of the XLS infiltrators had been discovered. Or, if they had, these two didn’t know it. He inched to the edge of the crates. One of the soldiers swiped his keycard, removed his helmet’s visor, and scanned his retina.
The door slid open. The lead soldier stepped into the barracks. Kline pounced. The trailing soldier caught a glimpse of Kline out of the corner of his eye, but too late.
Kline fired two silenced shots and the soldier collapsed. He stepped through the barrack’s door as the other soldier spun. The soldier’s eyes ballooned. He reached for his sidearm.
“What the–”
He wasn’t fast enough. Kline shot him in the chest. He sprawled back onto the steel floor. Klike did a quick scan of the room. He was alone.
