Difference between revisions of "Reaper's First Drop: Chapter 3"

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The engines roared as Matt pushed the ship to the fullest. The constant whine of the propulsion system was starting to get on my nerves. I heard a clack as Whitney pulled the charging handle on the .50 cal in the back, loading a round into the chamber. We pulled over the lip of a ridge and the stabilizers screamed as Matt battled against the laws of nature. Before us lay rice fields with a small compound at the center, surrounded by a small village.

"Wolf Pack pop smoke." I commanded

Moments later a plume of Neon green smoke puffed up from the compound.

"That makes it easy" Matt said

I noticed it was surrounded by what looked like a hundred troops and some twenty vehicles. I tapped his shoulder and pointed to an Olympian Chinese Missile Tank.

"Think again. Evasive maneuvers". I said

I was thrown against the wall on the right and then slid back into the hold as Matt pulled up to avoid being targeted. I grabbed a bar on the wall and pulled myself onto my feet just in time to see an Olympian missile whip right past the door. I literally could have leaned out and touched it.

"Cutting it close are we?" I asked.

"Just adding to the adrenaline rush." Matt shot back merrily.

He leveled us out just over what looked like the main building, targeted the Missile Tank and launched a few rockets of his own. The Olympian burst open, spreading flaming debris all over the field and burning the surrounding soldiers.

Whitney and Matt opened fire with everything we had. Spurts of water came up as Whitney moved the .50 sending men sprawling in the red-tinged water. Matt blew the front off an APC and Swiss-cheesed a Half-track. I fired a shoulder launched rocket and hit the underside of an SMK. It started spurting flames from the turret and the back but kept moving. It was obviously unmanned as it rolled right into the side of a Scorpion, knocking it over before finally exploding, fully taking the Scorpion and its counterpart with it.

Whitney was dropping men like rocks. The confusion was taking effect. All the enemy knew was they had had the men surrounded when a ship flew in and started taking everyone down, and that they were in an open field with no hope of taking us down. We had surprise on our side and that had cost them dearly. A rocket exploded on the heavily armored front of the ship and flames rolled across the windshield and past the front. Some heat got into the hold scorching my armor.

The ship rolled and shuddered from the explosion, and one wing caught fire. Matt banked sharply to throw off a radar lock or something, and that was when I decided I hated the laws of physics. The centrifugal force sucked me out of the open bay doors as Matt threw the ship into a tight turn to the left.

Hm. Possibly not good... I thought as I plummeted through the air. The rush of adrenaline spread all the way from my toes to the tips of my flailing arms.

Luckily, we had had training for this sort of thing.

Unluckily, the training was meant to include a parachute.

This is gonna hurt slightly. I thought calmly.

I spread my arms and legs out wide, dropping my rifle and the launcher, and making sure my helmet was securely strapped on. The worst part was that I could do absolutely nothing to stop myself from falling. The pure panic that comes with rapidly accelarating through the air with nothing to slow you down was almost overwhelming.

I fell through the ceiling of a building and ended up on the first floor, on what looked like the remains of a table. For a while I had no coherent thoughts, just the pain on my whole rear side of my body. I looked up through the 3 holes I had made. I was going to kill Matt.

The door was kicked in and two Russians ran in, hoping to set up shop. I rolled under a counter to avoid being seen, but the two Russians stopped and stared dumbly at the wreck. Then they craned their heads up at the sky, looking through the three holes in the roof with other startled soldiers looking down at them. That was when I struck; when their rifles were pointing down, their guard lowered.

I bounded over to the first one in one quick leap. From behind, I twisted his neck around, wincing at the sound of grating bones. As he fell I grabbed his assault rifle and peppered the other soldier with bullets even as he turned towards me.

Then I was scavenging ammo quickly, grabbed a spare helmet, as mine had shattered in the fall, and raced out the back door as more Russians poured in.

I spun around the doorway into another room and threw myself to the ground as bullets tore through the thin wall. I got up and rolled into a crouch in the doorway sending a hail of bullets into the young soldier that had been sent first. I grabbed him and used him as a weapon, throwing him into two men behind him. I mowed down 3 more men that came at me next but my weapon ran out of ammo. I threw it into one of the men getting up and grabbed the other and bashed his head into the wall before pulling the pin on a grenade on his vest.

I turned and ran out into the other room, running smack into another man. Where were they all coming from? I snapped his neck and caught a gun butt to the stomach. I keeled over and caught another to the back. I rolled under a third and knocked the man's legs out from under him. I pulled a knife from my boot and jammed it into his right lung, then whipped it across his neck. I cleaned it and put it up. I started to walk off when a man came from the other room. He was the partner of the man who I had blown up with his own grenade. He should have died too, but it seemed the explosion had just taken the mans left eye and part of his side. He leveled a grenade launcher right at my face.

Oh yeah, I was murdering Matt.

I rolled to the left and just missed the shot. I felt the explosion burn my armor and send a jagged piece of shrapnel across my back, leaving a deep trench in the plate. I sprinted across the room and tackled the man, letting my momentum carry us forward and through the wall. I sat atop him and was about to pull out my knife when I heard a creak and looked around. The building was practically destroyed from my violent brawl with the Russians. I saw something give and threw myself to the side through a window. The man was quickly crushed by the three story house.

"Wolf, answer me dammit!" Rogue was yelling over the comm.

"As soon as this is over, I'm gonna kill you." I moaned from my place on the ground. The adrenaline started to dissapate a little and the pain in my back returned.

"Roger that. Wasn't my fault though. Did you see what that first missile did to the ship? If I hadn't spun like that, you would have lived to become a fiery ball of not-fun."

"Just pick me up." I said. All the chit-chat was just a playful distraction to take my mind off of the fact that I had just fallen from 3,000 feet and taken out an entire house.

Rogue, with a little wobbling of the wings, picked me up from the demolished house. As we picked back up into the air, I noticed the distinct lack of enemy AA fire. "What the hell did you do? Drop a nuke on them?" I asked.

"Uh, something like that. You know that extra C4? I'm sorry you missed the fireworks, but we sprinkled some of that along the front line. Nice effects."

We picked up Wolf Pack. They started loading in when I noticed the flaming sword insignia marking them as British SpecOps (Special Operations) unit.

"Bloody hell that was one helluvan' entrance" The leader broadcast over the team comm.

"Jesus, no, its the bloody BRITS." Matt groaned over our private comm. I had to resist the urge to snicker.

"Who are you boys?" The Brit asked in a heavy British accent.

"In the name of the queen." Matt joked. This time I couldn't help but laugh. I tried to play it off as a sneeze, but Matt noticed and went on.

"Tea and biscuits aye old bean." He continued

"Shut it. I'll check his teeth for you." I whispered. That shut him up but I saw him shaking with laughter.

"We are the first Death Angel squad to hit the fields. What happened to you guys?" I asked the Brits.

"We were going to hit a bridge and slow down the mechanized units of the NF. Intel told us that there was virtually no men in the area, but when we got to the bridge a whole mech Battalion was guarding it and another 4 battalions were heading across the bridge. Something's not right over there. Sat. photos showed nothing, then they pop up. Bloody Hell, mate, you ain't much older than 16. What's your rank?"

I drew myself to my full height, more or less 6 feet. "I am Major James Campbell of The United States Reaper Division, Team Echo." I said, activating my FOF transponder so he could confirm it. Checking his FOF, I realized that he was a Master Seargent, pay grade E8 out of 11 ranks, where as I was an officer, pay grade O4. Matt was O2, First Lieutenant, and the rest of the Reapers were O1, Second Lieutenant.

Which meant he was under my command. Sweet.

"As the ranking officer of this battlefield and with communications jammed so that contact with a higher rank is next to impossible, that means I call the shots." Several of the Brits didn't look too happy about taking orders from a kid, but Matt was impossibly smug over the comm.

"Right now our priorities are to regroup with any other squads still alive out there and meet at a fallback point in order to coordinate for your extraction."

The Master Seargent saluted, years of military discipline hiding his true expression, but even he had to ask, " 'Your extraction'? Don't you mean our?"

I grinned. "No, Seargent. Once the Regs are outta the way, the Reapers are gonna party. I'm rerouting you to support division in charge of evac after our op is done."

"Yes sir!"

I pulled my helmet off and scratched my head. The side of my helmet was burned and I had scorch marks on my right side. I looked at the rest of my armor. It was pretty scuffed up. I looked for my knife but couldn't find it. I realized where it was.

"Rouge, you owe me a knife." I said.

"You sound mad." he replied

"Your very perceptive." I said sarcastically.

"How bout I don't tell the girls about that time where-"

"How bout we don't. It might be harmful to your health."

The rest was spent in quiet reflection on the last 5 days. We had crashed. Drove a truck through an enemy base and into a building. Blown up said building. Hijacked an enemy ship. Saved some SpecOps and all without losing but one man. We sure did some damage all by ourselves. I think the Angels had made a good entrance. But that was only the beginning. We were going to have to get better, stronger if we were to survive this war.

Next Chapter: Reaper's First Drop: Chapter 4