Desert Treasure

[t0l]

A single white light shone into a dark cavern, revealing nothing but an infestation of stalagmites and stalactites amongst rows of plastic tables. Gradually, the unnaturally bright light became more focused, as our kevlar-clad protagonist slowly began to step out from his unexposed position in a small, rocky corridor. First around the corner came the birdcage-style flash suppressor of his trusty service rifle, suddenly snapping up at a 45 degree angle and then slowly sweeping around in a wide arc so that he could scan the ceiling for any lurking attackers with a rail-mounted flashlight. Upon realization that surely nobody else was in the room, he crept in, rifle raised and ready to fire. Before he knew it, he was standing in the middle of a large, circular room of some strange alien ruin that he'd been dispatched to.

It certainly wouldn't be the strangest situation that he'd been in, remembering when a cheeky experiment-gone-wrong had decided to hijack his ship, but he definitely questioned just exactly why he was doing this as he made his way over to a table and grabbed hold of a nearly-transparent crystal-rock formation of some kind. Alien by design, no doubt, but why would the Core care about a bunch of dumb rocks?

As he proceeded to toss the little rock back onto it's respective table with impunity, his eyes caught wind of small light, shining intensely from a small crack in a rather unnatural-looking rock formation. He cocked an eyebrow, squinting in the darkness through his sunglasses to try and see the source of this light since it obviously wasn't his, until he just gave up and started walking towards it. Upon even closer examination, without taking his sunglasses off, he swore he saw something on the other side, just a little glimpse of what looked like an even deeper extension to the ruins. "Curiosity may have killed the cat," he thought, grabbing his rifle by the long, ribbed, circular handguard and raising it high, "but I'll bet good money that the cat didn't have an M16."

One swift strike with the butt of his rifle knocked a few pebbles loose, the second cracked his polymer stock, and the third made the entire pile of rocks give way to reveal a small opening in the wall, and he guessed it, a large expansion to the cavern. He positioned himself to peer through, rifle ready for any jumpscares that would ensue, although it seemed devoid of any life (he wished a motherf***** would've, though). Lining the cavern walls were manmade light sources, however, and upon closer examination through the scope of his rifle (and at a back-breakingly awkward angle, too), he found them to be torches.

So, there he was, discovering a previously walled-off portion of these ruins. Now, should he report it to the Core, or would he rather come back later and reap the unknown rewards of this cave?

"Hawken to Ravis, come in, have you found anything, over?" came through his vest-mounted short-range radio.

Who was he kidding, he was gonna leave this for his own exploitation.

"Ravis here, I, uh, ain't got nothing, over," he responded whilst staring down "something" in the face.

"Copy that, we're leaving in five. Hawken out."

Tal lowered his rifle and stood back up, trying to think of a way to cover this cavern up so that nobody else would find it. His eyes scanned his surroundings until eventually, he found a particularly alluring plastic table and proceeded to pounce on it. Whatever work that the Zoner archeology team was doing was tossed aside as Tal manhandled the table, flipping it onto it's side and barely giving it a chance to say "no" before slamming it's legs into the closed position. That done, he lightly jogged over to the gaping hole in the wall and planted it directly in front of the opening, making it as tightly sealed as he could.

Once satisfied with the results, he turned tail and proceeded to make his retreat.

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