"Have I made myself clear?" The voice from the radiophone flitted and crackled a bit, but the connection was good enough for Iwaizumi to understand the main point. "You have two missions: to protect the civilians and to eliminate the Dolls." The Dolls, those horrible creatures, were the ones that kept the whole city under a threat. They were like zombies, but way quicker and – luckily – easier to kill. The whole city and supposedly the whole Japan was affected by a strange disease which spread like a wildfire by a Doll's bite. After you got bitten, you had roughly fifteen minutes time to get an antibiotic before you turned into a Doll yourself. Your face would start cracking like a clay mask and your canine teeth would grow comparable to vampires'. The Dolls didn't seem to have awareness or emotions. Their only task was to kill everything that came in their way. The name 'Dolls' suit them perfectly – they were just killing machines guided by something unknown. They were a serious threat to humanity.
"Yes, captain", Iwaizumi answered to the radiophone and turned to look at his team. Kuroo, the one who was speaking, was the leader of all of them, but he was also the captain of this team. There were roughly twenty soldiers in the city, and they were divided into five teams. The sixth team were the medics, who stayed out of contact with the Dolls. Each team had five members, and one of them was in charge of taking care of the antibiotics. Kuroo led team Cat, which consisted of Kuroo himself, Iwaizumi, Oikawa and Kenma. Kenma was mostly a strategist, and Oikawa wasn't officially even a soldier. He was a self-taught sniper, who insisted to help the teams to get rid of the Dolls. He was in charge of team Cat's antibiotics. Iwaizumi was the vice-captain, and mostly oversaw the team when Kuroo had to do something else.
"You heard him. This is no practice anymore. Our lives are in line, but we have a mission to complete. If anyone is scared now, he is free to leave. There are no second chances in the battlefield", Iwaizumi stated and looked every soldier in their turn. Oikawa didn't even blink an eye, he just stared right back to Iwaizumi, eyes calm and serious. Kenma looked like he didn't care, but the bags under his eyes told that he wasn't as calm as he pretended to be. Then Iwaizumi turned his gaze to the other presence team, the Owls. Their captain, Bokuto, seemed rather excited. His vice-captain and the team's sniper, Akaashi, had the same emotion as Kenma did, but behind that could be seen a slight concern about his captain's recklessness. The other two, Semi and Kuguri, were just as calm as Oikawa was. Iwaizumi was sure that they all were excellent soldiers, and that was exactly why he didn't want to send them to the battle against the Dolls. Every one of them would die before giving up. And most of them would, Iwaizumi knew that. He had to send these soldiers to face their fates.
"Crows and Eagles are on the western side of the city", Iwaizumi begun to explain their situations to the teams. "So we go to the eastern side. The Snakes are supposed to be somewhere in the middle, but you never know about them." The Snakes was the team that consisted of the most reckless soldiers of the city. The team got even a nickname 'Suicide squad' because they usually don't even use guns. They prefer knives, grenades and stuff like that, and take straight contact with the Dolls more than the other teams.
"Akaashi, I think this would be a good place for you", Iwaizumi suggested to the sniper and pointed at the map. "It's a high, abandoned building, so you could probably find a good hiding place from there." He looked at the map for a moment. "And Oikawa, you could go here."
"It's pretty near the place where Eagles saw a bunch of Dolls lately", Oikawa noted and pouted. "Are you trying to get me killed right at the start, Iwa-chan?"
"As if", Iwaizumi huffed. "Although you are annoying as hell, we need your skills. This is an old market. It's a perfect place to hide, and you can block the doors and windows with the stuff laying around there."
"As you wish", Oikawa nodded and picked his rifle up from the floor, starting to walk towards the entrance. "Is Kenma going to stay with you?"
"Kuroo should be here shortly", Iwaizumi told. "But yes, he will be staying here with me for a while."
"Akaaaaashi, why you always listen to Iwaizumi easier than me?" The brunet heard a familiar complaint from afar, and he gazed to the other team's captain, who was following his sniper with an upset expression.
"He is careful with his decisions, Bokuto-san", Akaashi sighed. "We would be dead in an instant if I'd always follow you." Semi and Kuguri looked at each other, shrugged and followed their captain and sniper to outside. Iwaizumi couldn't help but chuckle. Akaashi was right. Bokuto was a fearless and skillful fighter, but he wasn't a strategist at all. In short, he was pretty simple-minded.
Iwaizumi's little smile was faded when he heard distant gunfire. He took a deep breath, snatched his gun from the table and hurried outside. Now there was no turning back.