Kandahar Providence, Afghanistan
0235 hours
Three years ago...
There was a reason why I hated the dark. Reason number one, you can't see for shit if you don't have NVGs. Reason number two, the biggest reason was because, they...they loved to come out and play when the sun went down.
Our unit was attached to a multinational task force, hell bent on stopping the steady supply of drugs out of the country. The less they got out, the less money they had coming in. Intel told us that a nearby farm was storing more than food for the local villages.
They sent us out at night to raid the compound and secure the drugs, that was all. Up in the front were the Brits, funny bunch once you got to know 'em. Covering us in the rear was a mix of French and German regulars, which were just as fun as the Brits, that was until you started talking soccer, as they liked to call it "football".
The thoughts of our past conversations brought me to almost forget where I was at, where we were at until the transport hit a bump in the, the road? I couldn't call most of what we drove on as roads, more like sand paths with organization. Anyways, all our vehicles stopped when we reached the farm and loaded off. As soon as the ramp went down first sarge led the way, dragging us all behind like the cans they tie behind a recently married couples car. I don't know why people did that and it always made me ask questions because I didn't do that at my wedding. Checked my rifle before I loaded off to make sure it was on safe and followed the rest of my squad.
"This is Spearhead One, we've loaded off and are moving towards the first warehouse, over."
"Copy that Spearhead One, hold position outside the warehouse until the others are ready to go, over."
Lining up outside the side door we stood by as the other group of Americans made their way around. The radio chimed in again and again as the other units stationed themselves all around the compound. Weapons were switched off their safeties when the command was given and charges were put into place on the door. Then in one moment all of our training kicked in.
Doors flew off their handles some completely disintegrated, and through the smoke each team filed in. From our squads we split into teams of twos and threes to cover more ground, flowing around the crates stacked inside. By the time that we all met up at the back of the warehouse, the entire building had been cleared. For us it took only six minutes to search the area, since we got one of the smaller buildings to cover, and sent the other squad to secure the farmhouse.
Dack, our radio operator, walked around with me so we could get a count of all the crates inside while the first sarge went through the office at the back with the others.
"Kinda strange for a farm to have a fully furnished office in a storehouse" Dack said, crooked smile on his face.
"I know. It all seems fishy to me" I replied opening another box to find stacks of opium. "Craziest part is the stash they left behind. Tell me, what did Fallows and his guys find?"
"Oh you mean the Brits? Well uh, same thing. They found a crapton of drugs and a few AKs."
Pausing for a moment I scratched at what I was supposed to shave off this morning and shook my head, "Weapons, drugs...this just doesn't feel right."
Dack scoffed, "Nothing rubs you the right way ever, well except for Samantha."
I could hear the smirk behind me and nearly laughed myself. He wasn't entirely wrong, she knew how to work me up and more...Samantha. We'd only been married for five months when I was sent off to this toilet bowl and away from her. I mean, we'd done it before I left but not without protection.
Part of me wanted to have a baby, but the other half worried that daddy wouldn't be around for very long. I wanted to wait unti I knew that I would be be home for good until we started a family, and every month she would send an incentive. One letter I almost had to shred because the other guys wanted to have a look. They missed their plus ones and wanted to take a look at mine.
"Ha! You just left planet earth didn't you?" Dack laughed.
Wearing a sideways grin I nodded, "yeah, I'm thinking of home."
"Well, you've only got a month left man, one month. So let's get back to counting boxes."
Nodding I turned back to the stacks in front of me and went back to where I left off, counting crates, oh joy. Can't wait to go home and tell my wife, "hey honey guess what I did? Your Marine counted boxes for his whole deployment, oh boy!" It was aggravating, but as long as the enemy wasn't getting any money in then I knew I could feel some sense of accomplishment. Right behind me Dack was counting the crates I passed by, just to be sure I didn't miss anything and stopped for a moment. I thought he just had to sneeze or something but he was actually turning up his radio.
"Uh, guys...I don't know what's going on with the Brits but it sounds like they found something in the farmhouse."
Immediately the rest of my squad ran over to listen in and caught the chatter.
"This is Spearpoint tree, we found something in the basement and are sending the specs for it, but it looks...alien. It's glowing and..wait did you hear that?"
Somewhere outside the warehouse something went off. The lights rocked back and forth and more explosions went off all around us. Leading the squad the first sarge bolted out the door with us in tow. Right outside we could see the convoy that we came in, mostly in flames.
What was left was opening on on the hills around us, unsure of where the attack came from. The other teams scrambled outside to a deadly hail of laser fire coming from the field and the dunes around us. Those bastards set a trap.
Unlike the gunners there wasn't an ounce of panic in anyone's voice, maybe adrenaline but no signs of panic. Everybody hit the dirt as a barrage of laser fire hit the warehouse behind us, my face getting covered with sand. Once the grit was clear I turned my NVGs back on and started loading my M240B. All the others were online and firing at the source of the laser blasts, covering the dunes in lead.
"Painter! The fuck are you doing over there!" First sarge yelled in my direction.
"Got some sand in the chamber first sarge!" I replied.
Chambering in the first round I focused fire on the hills around. Bullets hailed on the hills now, supressing whoever was shooting at us from up above and keeping their fire down to a minimum.
"First Sarge, Spearhead five and four are going to press on the hill, they just said so over the radio!" Dack yelled.
"All right, that sounds, what the...INCOMING, MOVE YOUR ASSES!" First sarge yelled as the sounds of mortars came in.
Explosions went off right behind me, so close I felt the heat. Then the worst feeling I had ever felt hit me in the right side. I fell to the ground with my weapon still in hand. Dack ran on as our rifleman tried to pick me up.
"Dack! I need some help here!" Song yelled.
Before the radioman could respond another round of mortars rained down all around us. Dirt kicked up high into the air and for a few seconds everything went hot. My leg was hard to move but I could still flip myself over, even with the vest. Looking around I saw laser fire pour all around me, silhouettes began to storm down the hill. Checking to see if my weapon was jammed I let the bolt go and fired bursts at the enemy. A slight tug came at the back of my vest as I felt somebody drag me away from the fight.
"Fuck you're heavy painter!" Song yelled.
"No Song, your grip just sucks ass!" I replied.
"Song quit smart talking and get him behind the transport, we've gotta pull away from the compound!" Dack yelled.
"Who are you giving orders? Where's first sarge!" Song retorted.
Looking off to my left I could only catch a glimpse of a burned husk with some familiar looking patches. Song swore under his breath as he dragged me behind the armored transport, close enough to an opening where I could set up my M240 once more. Unleashing another hail of bullets on the surrounding hills. Off to my right medics were doing some grade a field work, tending to the wounded while everybody else was concetrating fire. Dack reached for the radio on his back and started relaying for help.
"Has anybody called in our air support!?" Our grenadier yelled. "They told us we might be facing enemies with AKs, not fucking lasers!"
"I'm already on it!" Dack replied. "Spearhead main, this is Spearhead one lead over!"
"Spearhead one, who is this? I thought that first sergeant..."
"First sergeant Clemons is KIA, I'm the highest ranked member of the squad now, over."
"Well Spearhead one, what's the situation, over?"
"We have multiple hostiles converging within one click of our current position! They seem to have high tech weaponry capable of out matching ours and need immediate air support, over and out!"
The radio went dead for a moment causing Dack to press down on the channel switch again and again. Waiting for a response I looked back at the hill where the enemy was, which was empty. They were pulling back it seemed like which caused for a loud cheer to erupt from our hastily made fighting position. Song even joined in on the celebration, firing a stray shot at the running attackers. I looked back at Dack to see if he got the radio working again when an all too familiar whistling noise filled the air.
"Those motherfuckers weren't retreating because they were scared, INCOMING!" Dack yelled as he and Song grabbed my vest, running for their lives as the fire consumed what was left of our transports.
Pulled over behind a small sand dune we stopped to take cover once more with what was left of our unit. I lay there and watched as those who were still in the burning vehicles made their way out, screaming in pain. Then from behind the smoke, like demons from the bowels of hell came the enemy, except the sight that we saw we weren't prepared for.
We expected rags and bandoliers like we usually faced, not...Thanagarian tech. I recognized from what I saw off TV when they decided to make earth a garrison, never would I have imagined that the enemy would get their hands on something like that. Even so the allied squad leaders told their men to open fire, and then everyone else followed in suit. Bullets poured on to one central location, bouncing off the the alien tech.
"Dack, either we get air support or we die here! Bullets can't penetrate bird armor!" I yelled.
Sliding back into the ditch we were in, Dack picked up the radio, this time receiving a response. Looking down at his watch he started relaying the direction that the enemy was in as well as our coordinates. The only thing that sent a shiver down my spine was the last few words out of his mouth, "danger close."
Right ahead of us the enemy was getting closer, slowly walking towards us with their weapons blasting away at what cover we had left. Round after round left my weapon, and before I knew it I heard the death note for almost everybody in this kind of predicament, a hollow click. I reached around for more ammo and found none. Without anything else left to fire I reached to my side and unholstered my handgun. Each shot fired bounced off their armor, like a tennis ball would against immovable surface.
The handgun also ran out...
Song was hit immediately by laser fire...it...it melted off his face...
The British squad leader was calling for us to all fall back and got a hole blasted through his chest...
Even the shape of attack helicopters flying in overhead didn't bring any hope, especially when the very same lasers being fired at us disintegrated their rotors faster then they could let off a single rocket. Hot metal flew everywhere as both birds went down. Dack tried to pull me away from the destruction and caught a laser blast to his arm, melting down to the bone. I reached back to try and lay a hand on him, maybe help death have a little more meaning having a brother in arms right there with him. Then I felt something tugging at the front of my vest and I looked up into the eyes of the enemy.
I couldn't understand a single world coming out of his mouth except for the last two he uttered, "die American." He cocked his fast back, showing some of his face, when he turned his whole body so he could throw everything into the punch. I closed my eyes expecting a quick jolt of pain and then nothing, but that never came. Eyes open I saw a chrome plated fist stopping my death right in its tracks, I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw him.
"Sorry marine, I came as fast as I could" he said as he decked the guy that was on me.
Flying around he gave the same treatment to the others, occasionally knocking them right out of their armor. At that moment I fell back and cried. Dack slid down the sand towards me and patted me on the helmet with his good hand as we watched the cleanup. In the middle of it all Dack slapped my helmet pointing to one of the fighters picking up a heavy laser, and aiming right at our hero. I quickly reached over to where Song was and found his M16, quietly apologizing as I aimed it right at the enemy and fired a burst. The bullets bounced off of him, just like all the others, and drew his attention elsewhere. With the laser humming in his hand he charged it for a blast in our direction when a silver bullet flew straight into him, sending him flying across the desert plain.
"Nice shooting Painter." Dack said with a wince.
"Don't thank me Dack, thank the punchline that's hovering over to us." I replied.
Captain Atom slowly descended from his flight and offered me a hand. I gladly took it and stood up with a little pain of my own. Never once did I look up to any of those justice league types, then again not too many of them served like Atom did.
"We wouldn't have made it if you hadn't of shown up." I said.
The Captain nodded his head, "and I would've been blasted away if you didn't take that shot."
I just shook my head and grinned. None of that was true, but it felt great to hear him say that and not come off sounding cookie cutter like the rest of the league. Off to my side I saw a VTOL craft touch down with more marines spilling out of the back and all around the fallen, theirs and ours. Looking back at Dack I reached for his good hand and pulled him up.
"Thanks." He said with a grunt as he hobbled to stay on his feet.
Glossing over everything with his NVGs he shook his head at all of the tech the others were picking off of the bodies. "Apokolips, Brainiac, the birds...when's this shit going to end? I mean, every damn time we get invaded by some other crazy alien empire or robots or whatever we end up cleaning house and somehow this shit ends up in the hands of these bastards!"
"You aren't wrong there." Atom replied. "I hate it too."
"And why didn't command tell us about the alien tech!" Dack yelled.
"That's because it's above your pay grade corporal!" A strong female voice yelled from off to our right.
"And who might you be?" I asked.
Taking her NVGs off her head, making things more dramatic then they needed to be she replied, "Name's Waller and that's all you need to know. Other than that, you and your men did an incredible job holding the line against these terrorists. All of this tech is in good hands now. Also your retirement begins now."
Both me and Dack went bug-eyed and looked at each other for a moment. Waller waved off Captain Atom before she went into greater detail on the matter. Turning both of us around, with a painful groan from Dack, Waller, with a cooler tone than before, pulled up a document on her tablet.
"Both of you will sign this document waiving any rights to publicize or record anything that happened here, that and you two are the only ones left out of the recon unit, so this makes it easier."
Looking up and down the line she wasn't wrong. Through the adrenaline rush I didn't see the full carnage that was unleashed on our last stand. Burned bodies, charred remains, some ashes...it would be something that you would want the whole world to know, something I would need to save for later, somehow. Using his finger as a pen, Dack wrote out his signature first. I followed up with my own taking a quick glance over at Dack.
"Good. As soon as you arrive back home you'll be greeted as heroes, and have a nice retirement to collect. Gentlemen, it's been an honor." She said, walking away with the same blank look on her face that she head when she first walked up.
"I hope we made the right decision." I said.
"What do you mean? Joining this task force or signing that paper?"
"Both."