Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Everything below is subject to change.

Chapter Text

“Our undercover agents within HRON’s several nations have provided us with vital intelligence. HRON has identified a weak point near the border of No Man’s Land: Previously thought to be an abandoned city, a relatively large city-state that goes by the name ‘Kivotos’ is located just northeast of the Huron sea. HRON plans to occupy Kivotos and use it as a staging ground for their troops. This ordinarily would not be of any issue, if not for the unusual nature of its inhabitants. Kivotos is composed of several different schools, all under the administration of SCHALE; the pseudo-government of the city state. Despite the issues that arise from putting what would be civilians under normal circumstances in danger, the schools of Kivotos have a few aces to stop things like this from happening. The first of which is the unique properties of the students; with the exception of the head of SCHALE, each student has a halo suspended above their head. This ‘device’ allows students to be shot, kicked, stabbed, and take several hits to ordinarily vital areas without suffering substantial damage. The halo’s also have other ‘anomalous’ properties involving amplification of weak chemicals to - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - The objectives of this operation are to establish a FOB within the Abydos desert, insert a representative into SCHALE, all the while preventing HRON from doing the same. A battalion under the command of Lieutenant General Herdsman will be in charge of negotiations with SCHALE, while Tombstone will be responsible for communicating with the school of Abydos and negotiating an alliance with them. The hope of this-”

“Operation is to… blah blah blah, yeah no, I’m not gonna bore you guys with the specifics of that.” Sandra set a file down on a folding table in the front of the room. 

“So, what flavor of sugar-coated bullshit is this one gonna be?” Coral spoke dismissively as he sat up straight. 

“Well, it’s intel from HRON, so don’t bet on it.” Sandra stepped away from the table before continuing. 

“But, in short, they’re bullet proof. We don’t have anything to immediately counter this, although the eggheads are working on some sabot intermediate cartridges, we’ll have to deal with less-than-lethal for now.” 

Lyrian looked around the room, then spoke to Sandra. “First of all, are second and third coming out here, second of all-” 

before she could finish; Skidd, Izzy and another new soldier came bursting through the door. 

“Sorry, sir. ATC wouldn’t let us down.” 

”And we were late for takeoff because of this knucklehead.” 

Izzy added onto skidd’s reasoning as she gestured to the new face. 

“So who is this guy, and why is he in my briefing?” Blackhawk pointed at the new guy, then Izzy responded. 

“Jinx: fresh out of his training. He’s an engineer, and you said if I knew anyone to drag ‘em along.” 

Lyrian motioned for the three to sit down as she turned back to Sandra. “As I was saying, is second squad coming on this, and who else is command sending?” 

Sandra thought for a moment. “Well, second squad would be nice to have, although they probably won’t show unless shit really hits the fan. As for backup…" 

Sandra looked over the file again before continuing. “Says here that a battalion under the command of Lieutenant General Herdsman’ will join us too.”

Blackhawk turned to Skidd as the others discussed the mission. “You finish up Betty yet?” 

Skidd scoffed and gestured to the door. “I flew her out here, so I'd assume she’s working.” 

“Heh, well, you might get the chance to use her. We’ll probably have a need for a smaller, more agile aircraft with that kind of heavy firepower.” 

Skidd smiled at the prospect of using his aircraft, then he turned back to blackhawk. “But I’ll be flying logi for half this op, they probably won’t need me.” 

“You’ll get the chance. Trust me.”

“So we’re diplomats now?” Anthony scoffed as he listened. 

“Well, yes and no. There's a school out in the middle of the desert. That school has next to no students left because severe weather has destroyed just about all the infrastructure out there. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the school is in crippling debt.” Sandra flipped through the operation folder as she spoke. 

“Who are they in debt to? I thought you said it was just a bunch of college kids, actually-.” 

“True, but…” Sandra found an image in the folder and showed it to the squad. 

“There's a corporation that has a monopoly on the entire region. Kaiser. They control the means of production, distribution, construction, they even have their own PMC.” 

“So we've got students with guns, what is basically a dictatorship, what else?” 

“Well there’s some good news.” Everyone turned to Johnson, who was sitting in the back of the room. 

“If we’re just there for HRON, we won’t have to deal with all that.” 

Sandra shrugged, then continued. “Well, that’s what the plan is, but it's wishful thinking. Apart from that, our job is to establish good relations with their PMC, and see if we can get on good terms with Abydos. Good news about that is they’re pretty close to one of the PMC’s outposts.” 

“Other than Kaiser, what kind of heavy weapons do the students have? I refuse to believe they’re sold rifles and machine guns but not any form of explosives.” Blackhawk stood up and walked to the front of the room. 

“There’s a few different ‘factions’ that each have their own doctrine of fighting. The most prominent being artillery, tanks, and even a carrier strike group. It’s actually based on one of ours.” 

“Just great. Well I don’t think that school in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere is gonna have anything like that, so we should be relatively fine. So long as General Herdsman doesn’t do anything stupid.”

Chapter Text

“Lyrian, give ‘em a sitrep.” 

“Roger.”  Lyrian unbuckled her seatbelt and quickly grabbed onto a rail above her. 

Looking out the open doors of the helicopter, she gazed out across the desert wasteland of the Abydos desert. 

“ Well the files weren’t lying. This place really is abandoned. ” 

Lyrian let out a sigh before she turned to her squad. 

“Alright, listen up team. We’re entering the southern border of Kivotos now. There might be some pretty weird stuff out here, so be careful and don’t do anything stupid. Remember: We’re guests, potential military buyers. If residents outside of Kaiser ask about us, make some shit up and don’t look too suspicious.” 

Every member of the team nodded at Lyrian, before Fondale spoke up. 

“Hey, exactly where are we? I thought this was a city not…” 

Fondale gestured out the door of the helicopter to the desert below. 

“Whatever the hell this is.” 

“Yeah, thought you said this place was ‘prosperous’ or some flashy word like that. Why does it look like you just dragged us back into Duban?” Olivia chimed in to add her own comment as she wiped sand out of the sight of her gun. 

“You know how command works. They basically lie to us till we’re knee deep in shit.” Anthony straightened his vest as he spoke.

“He’s right. It is a pretty good city, we just got assigned to a sector that may as well be abandoned. I mean, look around: sand, sand, more sand and then the occasional abandoned apartments and run down railroad.” 

The squad looked out to see the desert of Abydos. 

There were scattered buildings, old and abandoned railways and streets that hadn’t seen use in years. 

“Hold up a second. Is it just me, or does it look like someone has used that one?” 

Coral pointed to a road that had lines of sand moved out, as if someone had rode a motorcycle or something similar down the road consistently. 

“I may not have the best eyes, but I think you’re just crazy.” Savannah teased as she nudged Coral’s arm. 

He shrugged, but looked at the street longer, following the trail to a mass of larger buildings. 

“Hey, didn’t you say there was a school out in this wasteland?” Sandra looked out the window, then back at her brother. 

“Yep. It’s off our 325, 1030. Take a look.” Blackhawk pointed to the laser sight on the console between the two. 

The high power thermal optic was trained on a few white dots a few kilometers out. 

“Hmmm… students? Or are those just some scavs looking for some easy money?” 

“I’ll go with a mix of both, they were shooting earlier, we’re just too far out to hear it.” 

“Didn't realize this place was founded in Detroit.”

Chapter Text

Sandra’s voice came over the radio.

<<“Listen up people, we’re less than half a click out from the PMC. Once we touch down, let Lyrian and I do the talking. Don’t provoke anyone and don’t do anything stupid. I don’t want to have to call Command and tell ‘em that we couldn’t keep our mouths shut, got it?”>>

Before any of the squad could respond, the helicopter lurched back, pulling almost straight vertical before leveling over a relatively small base. 

As the high reinforced walls came into view, everyone started to unbuckle themselves. 

When the tires met the ground, everyone except Blackhawk and Olivia hopped out onto the ground. 

A man, or what was shaped like one, wearing a suit and tie was waiting a few meters away from the helipad. 

“This our guy?” 

“Maybe. Let's see what they have to say.” Lyrian glanced back at her squad as they whispered, then looked back at the man in front of her. 

“I assume you all are part of the United Nations Joint Task Force?” Lyrian nodded, then extended a handshake to the ‘man’. 

“Sergeant First class. Leader of Tombstone. And yes, we’re with the UNJTF.” 

Sandra tapped on Lyrian’s shoulder, then spoke for her. “We’re here to discuss a potential alliance. If we could go to a less open area?” 

The ‘man’ nodded, then waved for the squad to follow him.

“Hey, listen. Use your numbers from now on. We don’t need to give these guys names.” 

Coral glanced back to the closed door of the room their leaders were speaking in. 

“What about me? Can’t you use my tac?” 

Savannah scoffed at Coral, giving him a teasing punch on the shoulder. 

“Sure thing, Phantom .~” She teased her squad mate, who rolled his eyes in response. 

Anthony elbowed Savannah to get her attention.

“C’mon Sis, don’t act like you didn’t try to get one of your own. You’re just jealous.” 

Savannah rolled her eyes, mumbling something about shutting her brother’s mouth. 

“Hey, 1-3. What do you think they’re gonna ask us to do? Better yet, what are we getting outta this shit in the first place?” Fondale turned his head to speak.

Anthony shook his head, then gestured to the door. 

“You know just as well as I, it probably ain’t pretty.” 

<<“Tombstone 1, this is Firebird 1. What the hell is taking so long.” >>

>>“Firebird 1, this is Tombstone 1-2, You know how boss is; She’s probably gambling to get a better deal with them.” <<

<<“Of fucking course. I’ll radio Skidd and see how they're doing with logistics. Probably a nightmare. 1 out.”>>

Chapter Text

“Iz, go check to make sure everything is tied down.” 

Izzy weaved through the tight corridors of the aircraft and into the cargo bay. 

After tugging on the restraints a little, she called back up to Shane. 

“All good! You pack my ammo?”  

“That and more. Let’s get this thing up and rolling.” 

Izzy dashed back to the cockpit and buckled herself in. 

“Why are we taking this instead of a normal aircraft? Don’t we need more than this?.” 

Shane clicked his visor into place, then turned towards Izzy. 

“I think you know why. This is her maiden voyage.” 

“Get a hobby you bum.” 

“Hey, Skidd. Jinx is onboard, right?” 

Izzy slipped out of her harness and stood up. 

“Yeah, just don’t know where he is.” 

Izzy raised an eyebrow, then stepped into the cargo bay. 

“Where oh where would he be… ” 

Izzy took out a flashlight and pointed it over to the seats next to the cargo bay door. 

“Hey, Banshee! Why are you back here?” 

Jinx’s Eyes shot up to her as he stopped picking at the bullet in his hand. 

“It’s nice back here. Not as many bright lights.” 

Izzy shook her head. 

“When you get crushed by a crate and I have to stitch you back together, I’m taking your fingers. Among other things.” 

Jinx chuckled, then went back to disassembling the bullet. 

“You’re an odd one…” 

Izzy said under her breath as she turned and left. 

“So where was he?” 

“Sitting in a corner twiddling his thumbs.” 

“Tell him to get out of there, ‘cause we’re about to drop.”

<<“AWACS Crow to ALCON, we’re approaching the landing zone in the Abydos desert now. General Herdsman will have a landing strip set up. Any pilots under Dagger, Falcon, Angel or Firebird, prepare for an airdrop and RTB.”>>

“That's us Skidd, I'll get the door.” 

Izzy stood up and waved Jinx over, pulling a red lever to open the cargo ramp. 

“Tell him we’re ready!” 

Jinx had to yell to be heard over the sound of the engines of their own aircraft and that of the others. 

<<“AWACS Crow to Drop group, dump your gear and turn ‘round.” >>

“We’re ready Jinx! Send it!”

Chapter Text

"Otogi, hurry up and finish your food, we've gotten orders from top brass to get moving for an upcoming operation." Yukino tapped on her squadmate’s shoulder before speaking.

"Uh huh, got it lead. What they got for us this time?" Otogi nodded as she closed the container to her lunch.

Yukino looked off towards their vehicle, then shrugged

"We don't know. we're just supposed to go out to the south-east of Gehenna."

"Gehenna? Why there? we've got no problems with them." Niko stepped in and cocked her head to the side.

"I know. They mentioned briefly about some new hires being less than optimal, but we’ve got almost no actual intel." Yukino let out a sigh, slightly disappointed as she looked around at her squad.

"I don't like the sound of this." Kurumi said as she fidgeted with the hem of her shirt.

"Keep yourself together, Fox. we're the best of the best. It's not like there's some massive army of highly-trained soldiers just waiting for us." Otogi jokes, attempting to bring a bit of ease to the group.

"That'd be crazy. but come on, pack up and let's go."

"Long car ride over to Gehenna so I've got some time to write. not much has happened recently, so we've been tasked with moving south. I hope Gehenna isn't too mad about us arriving on such short notice, but we've got a job to do."

- Otogi

Chapter Text

“Listen, we both have assets that are valuable to each other, however I’m not willing to sign away my squad as mercenaries.” 

“Then what purpose will you serve for us? In other words: what do we get out of this?” 

“Operators. The best there is. Despite SEMC’s contract with the UN, we can still work for others so long as it doesn’t interfere with anything we are needed for in tombstone.” 

“So will you be willing to sign the contract?”

“Hell no. Just because I can doesn’t mean I will. We can work, but we want the ability to leave when we are needed elsewhere, and this contract denies us that ability.”

“Very well. The contract will be adjusted accordingly.”

“Let me see… Hmmm… I think we have a deal.”

“Welcome to Kaiser, Tombstone.”

Chapter Text

After Battle report.

Silver Eagle Actual touched down in the northern sector of the Abydos desert at 1307, three minutes ahead of schedule. 15 minutes after the air transport was complete and the battalion was able to function at its full capacity, UNJTF forces came under heavy fire from an unknown source. TISUAV footage allowed allied forces to locate and return fire on enemy combatants. Specialists in the Cleveland air base identified OPFOR as a 'gang' or outlaws local to the Abydos desert. Their tactics, gear and overall doctrine resemble that of gangs present within our own countries, however that is not relevant.

Despite the small altercation, OPFOR was repelled with no casualties on either side. Multiple allied riflemen report that the new ammunition is not as effective as expected, however the enemy did present some fear of injury. The halo proved to work exactly as predicted, preventing any long-term damage to OPFOR. Specialists are currently researching a way to mitigate or outright ignore the effects of the halo, and new designs using incendiary, high explosive, and depleted uranium are currently being tested for field viability.

Silver Eagle Actual is currently traveling by convoy north towards sector golf, a school that houses a Tank platoon, three sapper companies, and an infantry regiment totaling around 100,000 combatants. The convoy will enter the southside of sector golf at around 2200.

Despite the danger that is present from the sizable force of the school, Silver Eagle is only passing through in an attempt to make their way to SCHALE.

Further documentation required.

Chapter Text

2-3 - “Jackass, I’m going to kill you.”

2-2 - “What for? I got us a pretty good deal.”

2-3 - “Yeah, with these guys? Look, this is gonna end up worse than the FBTF and you know how that went.”

2-1 - “Cool your jets. It’s a short contract and we can refuse to do some things.”

2-3 - “Do you not remember the last time this happened? The SEMC is gonna be on our ass if this shit doesn’t work out.”

2-4 - “Yeah, but it won’t be that bad. Look at it this way: Tombstone will be there if we really need an out, and if this deal goes south…”

2-2 - “Look, we’re not leaving, but we sure as hell ain’t gonna stay. At least not for long.”

2-1 - “And if they try to make us, we’re out.”

2-3 - “You know how I work. You know what I won’t do.”

2-2 - "Well aware. just bare with it for a while. we've been through worse."

Chapter Text

“So where to, boss?” 

“Middle of fuckin’ nowhere.” Olivia cleared another jam from the helicopter’s window gun, wiping sand from her goggles. 

“Sandra, please tell me why we’re in the fucking desert again?!” Olivia yelled over the sound of the helicopter, slamming the cover to the machine gun down. 

<<“We’ve gotta be ‘useful’ to that company to stay, so recon is our only option that doesn’t involve forcefully evicting someone.” >>

“Then why the hell is Tombstone here? Can’t it just be Firebird?” 

Lyrian stood up and made her way up to Olivia. “We’re not going to stay there by ourselves, and I’m tired of sitting around and doing nothing.”

<<“AWACS Crow to Firebird 2-1, you copy me Sandra?”>>

>>“Loud and clear Crow, you got anything for me?”<<

<<“Yeah, Skidd wants to do a flyover of the Abydos sector. Just the north end though.”>>

>>“Why? We’re the ones who have to do recon.”<<

<<“He said he’s bored of air cargo.”>>

>>“He’s not about to start a fucking war, is he?”<<

<<“I hope not. I told him to keep it cold, but he’s radio silent for a while. How’s that PMC going?”>>

>>“Can’t wait to deal with that… we signed a very loose contract. We can basically say ‘fuck you’ and leave. But we’ve gotta do at least something to stay.”<<

<<“Sounds like shit. Blackhawk was on about how he’s gonna bring a Harrier out here.”>>

<<“Firebird to Tombstone, we’ve got a convoy off to your northwest. Looks to be 3 escorts and 4 trucks.” Sandra’s voice came over the radio as tombstone had finished setting up a small scout post.>>

>>“Where they headed?”<<

<<“Unknown.”>>

Coral lifted the Binoculars to his eyes and looked out to see the tell-tale sign of vehicles on the desert: a plume of sand and dust.

Chapter Text

<<“This is AWACS Crow to Firebird 4, do you copy, over.”>>

>>“Read you loud and clear Crow, what do you need?”<<

<<“Tombstone reports a convoy of vehicles to their direct north.”>>

>>“What do you want me to do?”<<

<<“One moment, putting the contact on the line…”>>

<<“Clean them out. No reports show any allied transports in that area.”>>

<<“Roger that. Skidd, you’re clear to engage. I’m sure tombstone would love to see what that plane can do.”>>

>>“Sandra, we good to engage?” Phantom called over the radio.<<

<<“Negative, Crow says he’s dispatched an allied- OH you motherfucker!”>> Sandra started before spotting an aircraft on her display.

“What’s up? What’s going on?” Olivia looked around, not seeing anything.

>>“Firebird 2-1 to Firebird 4, what is your 10-20?”<<

<<“I think you know where I am, Whitehawk.”>>

Sandra cursed under her breath as she heard Shane's response.

“You ready Izzy?” 

Shane turned to his co-pilot/gunner. 

She nodded, then rotated in her seat to access the console that controlled the weapons.

“First time’s for everything, right?”

Shane chuckled, then banked the aircraft to the right.

“This is gonna be one hell of a first contact.”

Shane went to hail Crow over the radio

>>“Crow, we weapons free yet?”<<

<<“Affirmative, rack 'em up and knock' em down!”>>

Shane smiled ear-to-ear at the confirmation.

He gave a thumbs-up to Izzy, who nodded in return.

“Gonna rain down on them crawlers!”

Jinx, who was in the back of the aircraft, nearly jumped out of his seat as the first rounds went off. 

The howitzer shook the plane a little when it fired. 

Then the machine guns and auto-cannons made a loud droning sound as they unleashed a wall of lead at the forces below. 

Jinx scrambled to his feet and up to the cabin. 

“What the hell is going on!?”

He looked out the side of the aircraft to see the scene below.

The convoy, ill equipped to handle a threat such as this, was almost entirely destroyed.

“This is what we’ve been waiting for!” Shane said as he pulled the aircraft into an orbit over the battlefield.

“Hey Jinx, I’m going to show you how to reload the guns back there, okay?” Izzy said as she nearly jumped out of her seat.

Jinx nodded, then followed Izzy back to the area where the armament was located.

The floor was littered with spent shell casings and the air was thick with the smell of spent cartridges.

“Alright. So these,”

Izzy picked up a clip of 30mm rounds.

“Go to these two guns. These ones will need to be reloaded the most. The machine guns will probably be fine so don’t bother with those. And this…”

Izzy picked up a shell for the 75mm.

“Is the fun one. Pull this lever to eject the spent round, then put a new one in.”

Izzy did as she said, reloading the cannon.

“I need to load that one every time it shoots, right?”

“Yup. Now have fun with that, I've got a job to do.”

Izzy left Jinx to load the weapons himself and quickly sat back in her seat.

“Now where was I…”

With another pull of the trigger, Izzy opened fire on the convoy, tearing apart what little defense they had set up.

“Holy shit! Who the fuck brought that out?” Anthony yelled as he looked up at the gunship raining hell on the vehicles below.

“That’d be Skidd! He said he wanted to bring this thing out, but god damn!” Savannah had to shout over the roar of the gunship's weapons.

>>“Tombstone 1-1 to Tombstone 3-1, cease fire, cease fire, we’ll move in on foot from here.”<<

Lyrian hailed Skidd over the radio, covering an ear to focus.

As all of Tombstone crested the sand dune, they got a good visual of the wreckage.

The entire convoy was decimated.

The hulls of the armored cars were completely hemorrhaged, their armor stood no chance against powerful rounds fired from above.

Then there was the trucks.

Two fuel transports, one APC and one Semi-truck.

The fuel transports were almost entirely gone, their fuel ignited by the incendiary ammunition.

One of them was lucky enough to have been hit by armor piercing first, causing the fuel to blow out the side instead of detonate.

The troop transport had been hit in the engine block by the howitzer and the entire vehicle was strewn across the small clearing.

Lastly, the semi had suffered the least damage, flipping onto one side and having a few bullet holes along the trailer.

“Looks like Skidd cleaned this place up pretty good.”

Anthony said as he poked one of the bodies with the barrel of his rifle.

“Izz probably had some pent up anger about something or other…”

Fondale mused as he tapped the halo of one of the people.

It flickered for a moment, but kept glowing and suspended above the person’s head.

“Well the halos do exist, but it doesn’t look like it works like they said-”

Before he could finish, the person groaned and reached a shaky hand up towards him.

“What the-”

“H e l p.”

“These fuckers are still alive!”

Fondale pointed his gun at the person on the ground in front him.

The rest of the squad immediately sprang into action, readying their weapons.

“Everyone stay down!”

“Don’t you fucking move!”

They shouted as more of the people that should’ve been dead started moving.

“W-who are you people..?” One of them said.

“Doesn’t matter, stay down.”

A few moments of silence dragged on before it was interrupted by a gunshot.

The shot didn’t come from the gunship or any of the squad, but a person that had crawled out of the trailer.

The bullet missed, but the whole squad turned towards the person.

It was another young girl, similar to the people lying half-dead on the ground, but she was different.

Her halo was of a pink crosshair, and she wore a uniform akin to that of a school’s, not the poorly DIY combat gear the people who were in the convoy had.

Anthony shot first, letting a few rounds rip before the person started to run.

Savannah followed suit, firing her weapon in full-auto from the hip.

Bullets whizzed by the student, and she even flinched when a couple landed.

But it wasn’t enough to stop her.

She quickly crested the dune and dove out of sight of the squad.

Chapter Text

“Hey, Kurumi.” 

I tapped on her shoulder.

“Oh, you’re awake.” she smiled at me.

“Yeah, Unfortunately. ”

“How far are we from Gehenna?”

“You were out for a couple hours, we’re about twenty minutes from our stop.”

“Twenty minutes… why do I have a bad feeling about this? ”

I shook my head.

“Just a bit of superstition. Probably nothing. ”

“What is this feeling? Dread? Why, it’s not like we’re any real danger. ”

"Hello!~" Niko said warmly as we all walked into the room.

Yukino put a hand up to Niko.

"Professionals, Niko."

"Right, sorry..."

"Belittlement like that is unnecessary as the problem at hand is far more important than being formal right now."

Their agent interrupted as he set a few papers down on the table.

"That can't be good." Kurumi said as she rested a hand on her handgun’s holster.

"It isn't. An external force has started moving into the cities and they're more heavily armed than any student here."

" So what? if a bunch of hippies come in here we can probably handle them- "

"Sounds like they could be a valuable asset." Yukino interrupted my thoughts as she stepped forward to pick up one of the files.

"They would be. However, despite their 'alliance' with us, they have only mentioned or agreed to cooperate with a small platoon of soldiers. Knowing this, we can't be sure of their intentions."

"So what, you just want us to go in guns blazing because of that? That doesn't seem-" The agent cut Kurumi off.

"You're not. Fox will operate near the force moving into Gehenna and keep tabs on them. if they start to attack students and/or destroy property unprovoked, you may engage. However, there are far more combatants in this force than you are equipped to deal with."

“Recon… Fucking great.” I folded my arms over my chest as I thought out loud.

"Speak for yourself, I'd like a break from the op's we've been doing."

Chapter Text

“Cease fire! Cease fire!”

Lyrian called out to her squad as they stopped shooting.

>>“Tombstone 1-1 to Firebird 2-1, do you have eyes?”<< Lyrian called to Sandra.

<<“Affirmative, eyes on target.”>>

Sandra looked down at the person running on the sand below.

The High Power optic provided a very clear view of her as she ran, kicking up sand behind her.

“Not so fast…” Sandra whispered to herself.

<<“Whitehawk, this is Skidd. I have visual on target.” Shane told Sandra as he watched through Izzy’s sight.>>

“Let me at him. He won’t stand a chance.” Izzy said back to Shane as she trained her sight on the figure.

<<“Negative, hold you fire.”>> Crow said over comms as he uploaded data to the computers in Shane’s aircraft.

<<“They aren’t with that group that you were just engaged with. The data’s… if-ey to say the least, but by the looks of it she’s from that school to the northwest.”>>

>>“Abydos?”<<

<<“Yeah, that one. The images we’ve got are too blurry to know which student, but there's only five of them.”>>

Izzy cocked her head to one side as she straightened her seat.

>>“Five students? Are you sure they didn’t miss a zero? Or two?”<<

<<“Nope. not a mistake. We’ve got records from SCHALE, the school, HRON, and our own spies that all say less than 10.”>>

>>“So… “<< Sandra started as she started to shadow the student. >>“What do you want us to do?”<<

<<“Kaiser said smoke ‘em, but…”>> Shane started as he banked out of his orbit.

<<“Let her go. If she is from Abydos then shooting at her is the last thing we want to do.”>>

Sandra yanked back on the control stick, bringing her aircraft to a hover as she watched the girl run.

“Kaiser is less reliable than HRON. I would say take the chance, but…”

Sandra glanced over at the empty co-pilot seat of her aircraft.

“‘ Let's shadow her. See what she’s up to.’ is what he’d say… goddammit brother. ” Sandra shook her head to dispel the thoughts.

>>“I’ll pull off. Tombstone, standby for pickup.”<<

Chapter Text

Date: 5/13

Location: Eliot lake naval base

Building: central command structure

Room: CAPT. Vladislav’s 2nd floor office

“Sir. We received a shipment.”

“What? Next planes aren’t due till next week.”

“It wasn’t our own logistics. It came from that place.”

“Well what was it?”

“Some sort of… device. It’s nothing like what we’ve seen before.”

“What does it do?”

“We were waiting for your orders, sir. We didn’t want anything to happen if we did something with it.”

“Let me look into this. Command must be notified first.”

“Aye sir. We moved the machine to warehouse C. The entire place is cleared out.”

“When the researchers come out here, they won’t let us into that building. Once I hear back from command, put it in one of the smaller sheds. They can build their own building, I won’t have them take one from my base.”

“Understood.”

Date: 5/23

Location: Eliot lake naval base

Building: Warehouse 2B

Room: Main

“Sergeant, sitrep. How is the operation going so far?”

“Well, your prediction was right. High command sent a whole research team and seized the warehouse closest to the pads.”

“Дерьмо… Well, what are they doing now?”

“You know how they are, sir. They're trying to disassemble the machine and see what it can do.”

“Have they found anything that makes it ‘special’ in any way?”

“It has some kind of strange material. From what I could see before I was told by their security team to leave, there were these strange… shapes? I apologize sir, I wasn’t able to get a good look at it.”

“No worries. I know how private security is.”

“They’re too broke off from those other wars to afford to pay for our own security. Then they signed some piece of shite contract for dirt cheap so they don’t ‘ave to listen.”

“Да. Do your best to keep our men in order until I can get this sorted out.”

“Aye sir. Fair warning though, Ye probably won’t be able to convince them to get their own facility. Command will probably side with ‘em and say they need it.”

Date: 5/27

Location: Eliot lake naval base

Building: N/A

Room: N/A

“Beginning of audio log.”

“Recording?”

“Aye. go ahead.”

“I was working on the trucks outside because they took the shop, when I tried to use my drill, it didn’t work.”

“That’s it? So you’re going to waste my time with some shite like thi-”

“There’s more, sergeant. The drill didn’t stop, it… vibrated. Not like the motor was blocked, but… like it was… I don’t know how to describe it.”

“Then what?”

“The drill bit wouldn’t go through the metal of the truck. It stopped, as if it wasn’t powerful enough, it didn’t even leave a scratch!

“What are you saying, we need new-”

“There’s more. The shop. It started making this low humming. Then a swear, I didn't believe it myself, the place started glowing. Whatever they’ve got in there, it's… It's some real black magic shit.”

“Capin’ want to know about this, ey?”

“If you don’t mind me asking, have you figured out anything about the machine in there? Or at the very least where the thing came from?”

“Nothing I can say on tape. We could talk later if you’d like.”

“No it’s fine.”

“Right on. End of audio recording.”