DISCLAIMER: Battlefield 2142 and all related materials are property of EA. Were they my property, the games would be infinitely more awesome and have a storyline a bit like this one. I do not own anything which is taken from 2142. I do own my characters and the imagined technology which I have incorporated into this fic.

An author's note to readers of The Belgrade Patrol: Sorry...I've stopped writing that. It will probably be deleted, because I hate leaving stories unfinished and not able to be finished. I just have no inspiration for that story, so I'm working on this one now. This story is set before The Belgrade Patrol, and will feature some characters from that story, notably my two favourites: Arkadi Malkov and Zhen Choy. This is set during the First Battle of Belgrade alluded to in the opening chapters of TBP.

Anyway. On with the story.

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Comrades in Arms

Chapter 1: Lonewolf

Sidi Abdel Rahman

May 23rd, 2139

Nobody understood it, but nobody actually cared, so long as it worked.

Which wasn't to say nobody questioned it.

The man was about thirty, perhaps thirty-five, and had a hard, steel glint in his cold grey eyes. Eyes that had witnessed things which would have chilled the blood of other, weaker, lesser men. His hair, black streaked with grey, was ragged and unkempt, the extent of grooming being done by the man himself, with the uneven slices of a combat knife. His face was gaunt, his mouth perpetually locked in a grim scowl that spoke volumes.

The strangest thing of all, though, was the object on which the entirety of the man's attention was focused on.

The item was a rifle of medium length, average height and significantly greater weight than anything in current production, which made sense, because this rifle was no longer in current production. In fact, most people had never seen one outside of a photograph or video.

In a time when the name would have meant something more than a simple designation, the rifle was known as an AK-47.

Its first production was in 1946. Its current usage, 2139.

And nobody understood why.

Which suited its owner fine, really, an air of mystery about him made his job a lot easier.

Although there were the irritating fellows who seemed to have an issue with his choice of weapon. Like the one talking to him right now.

"I never really understand why you use that thing. It's almost two hundred years old," a curious sounding, Russian-accented voice spoke from somewhere to the man's immediate right.

"For the record, the rifle is five years old. The design is precisely one hundred and ninety-three years old, yes," the man half-muttered, half growled. This was the third fellow in that week to ask about the exact same subject. Although this one was slightly different. It took the man some time to realize that the difference lay in the lack of condescending tone.

"I don't understand. After all the advances in modern weaponry, after everything that was a sketch on the drawing board in the 21st century has now come to fruition, after things like the Krylov, you use an AK? Why?"

"Because for a hundred years after this gun was first made, it served in every conflict ever fought. Because it's a proven design that's influenced every firearm ever created up to, including, and going beyond your precious Krylov. And because of a few other, select reasons which I'm not about to disclose. Does that satisfy your thirst for knowledge?"

The younger man had the decency to look ashamed. "I'm not like those other fellows who just want to mock you…I actually think it's interesting. Not to mention effective."

The older man looked up so that his cold grey eyes met the clear blue of his companion. "Sorry," he said, an apology being rare from him, "You're just the third one this week asking me about it, and it's only been two days. It gets irritating."

The younger man, a twenty-four year old Russian Lance Corporal Silver, sat down next to the older man. "Where did you get it?" he questioned.

"Had it custom made. I acquired the schematic drawings for it as part of a job," the man replied.

That explanation was something a bit easier to understand. Everybody knew about the man's background.

He wasn't a soldier. The term would have implied that he was a member of a particular country's armed force.

He was a mercenary. A mercenary who, through a variety of deals and agreements, had earned himself a permanent contract working for the Pan Asian Coalition Army. He was paid the equivalent of what a Captain would have earned, but carried no official rank. He was exempt from all Army regulations, as evident in his clothing, his haircut, and of course his weapon of choice.

And here he was, in the Sidi Abdel Rahman Nuclear Power Plant, fighting against the European Union Army.

The battle for control of the place had been intermittent for the better part of three months. European Union presence here was not strong and neither were the Coalition Army's attempts to remove it. Sometimes the mercenary felt like neither side really gave a shit about who had control of the region.

As it stood, control of the southern half of the complex belonged to the PAC, while the EU maintained a firm grip on the northern areas. It seemed as though the two superpowers were content to share the complex.

Or not.

A man wearing the insignia of a Major General strode up the ramp leading to the area where the mercenary, his companion and about five other soldiers were killing time.

"Orders from High Command. For some unfathomable reason they want us to increase the control we have on this area. The western areas seem to be a good place to establish a forward outpost. Air vehicles are ready to transport you there and support you. Dust-off in five," the Commanding Officer told everyone in the room.

The mercenary shouldered his ancient but deadly weapon and addressed the other six men in the room. "You heard the man, people. Let's move."

The men seemed to either respect, or fear the mercenary enough tomove as soon as the two words had issued from out of his mouth. Before the command had finished echoing around the room, half of them were already suited up, wearing combat armour, NetBat helmets, and wielding slightly more contemporary weaponry.

Soundlessly they made their way towards the hangar bay of their command post, a Type 2, Superior-class PAC Titan. Originally designed for civilian transportation, the revolutionary craft had long since been militarized into a frontline war vehicle impervious to most types of weaponry due to its intelligent energy shielding system.

Arriving at the hangar bay, the group of seven took up places manning the battered BTR-20 Yastreb air transport vehicle. The mercenary himself went to man the left machinegun, while the other six jostled into the pilot, passengers and various other seats.

To add some flair and bravado to the whole affair, the mercenary activated the transport's radio, and muttered "Punch it."

The pilot promptly punched it, and the transport's engines blasted at full power, lifting the vehicle into the air. Tilting the craft forwards slightly, the pilot started it on a westward course.

The occupants not concerned with manning the outer defence machineguns spent the duration of the journey activating and testing their respective equipment and armament. The Support gunner among them, a bulky southeast-Asian of about twenty-eight sitting inside the bay of the transport, meticulously calibrated his Shuko K-80 LMG with the kind of attention one would have expected a sniper to show his rifle. The tall and thin Korean Recon soldier sat in the outer passenger seat, intermittently vanishing and reappearing as he tested his optical camouflage and adjusted the scope on his Lambert Carbine. And the others were no less occupied with their gear, checking sights, ammunition, and working order.

In combat, functional equipment made the difference between success and a military funeral.

The incessant maintenance only stopped five minutes before they were due to reach the drop zone.

The mercenary once again took charge. "Alright, people, prepare to drop!" he roared into the transport radio.

All maintenance and adjustment work ceased as soon as he gave the order. The PAC soldiers made their way to the Assault Pod launch bay located at the back of the transport. Locking themselves into individual pods, they prepared for the order to launch.

Developed in order to solve the problems of easily-spotted parachute jumps, Assault Pods took the concept of airborne vertical entry to a new level. The soldier was encased on all sides by a pod, much like being in the interior of a missile. The pods had hydraulically-assisted launch mechanisms for ground-based launching, or they could simply be propelled by gravity when dropped from the air. The base of the pod had a built-in multilayered shock absorbent design to reduce the potential of causing injury to the soldier. In the case of the PAC Assault Pod design, a hover-drive much like that found on the Nekomata Battle Tank served to slow the pod before impact with the ground. On EU versions, miniature thrusters served the same purpose.

Enclosed in their pods, the soldiers could only see what was directly outside the small viewport, or what lay directly below them on the integrated camera feed. In silence they waited for the order to launch.

The relative silence of their journey was suddenly ended by the rapidWHOOSH of anti-aircraft fire streaking through the skies. The pilot banked hard to avoid contact with the deadly projectiles, some of them superheated flak shells and some of them missiles with an EMP payload which would disable his control systems until he could reboot.

Red-hot lead flew towards him, swift and hellish, while EMP exploded around the craft in brilliant flashes of electric blue.

And then the mercenary and his partner in the gunner seat opposite retaliated.

The Yastreb's twin defence machine-guns opened up, sending more hot lead flying downwards in retaliation. The mercenary himself aimed for the Rorsch Kz-27 anti-air flak turrets, sending anti-infantry shells slamming into their thin front armour plating, either shredding the turrets or mutilating the gunners within.

Two of the four anti-aircraft turrets went inactive before the pilot took a hit from an EMP missile.

"God fucking damn it!" the pilot barked in Russian, as he frantically keyed in the reboot sequence. The craft began to plummet, and remained powerless for three hour-long seconds before the engines reactivated and the transport started to rise again.

The mercenary took the hint and shouted an order into the radio system. "Everybody jump, now!"

And everybody jumped, then.

Four successive shudders resounded through the transport vehicle as the soldiers launched their pods in succession.

The mercenary himself exited the vehicle, albeit with a more retro method. He used a parachute.

Admittedly the parachute was a modern retractable parachute that could be reused indefinitely. It was designed for assaults where the inability to fire while airborne, as was the case with Assault Pods, was a severe limitation, and where the immediate landing impediments of a regular parachute could be dangerous.

The three separate canopies opened up as the mercenary dropped. As soon as the EU soldiers below were within engagement distance, he opened up on them with his AK-47.

The ungodly loud roar of the ancient assault rifle was unlike any small arm that anybody was used to. Its thunderous report spoke of an age where massed infantry fire and intimidation were the driving force behind weapon design. Its recoil was a reminder of an age where soldiers had to contend with their own weapon as well as their enemies.

And the man behind it was a living example that not all soldiers were expendable.

The parachute retracted while the mercenary was about a metre off the ground. Rolling into cover as soon as he touched down, the mercenary pointed his rifle round the corner of a building and sent a ten-round fusillade of bullets in the EU soldiers' general direction.

Satisfied that his teammates were providing enough cover fire after hearing the incessant drone of a Shuko K-80, the mercenary began to climb the stairs on the outer wall of the building. Two flights brought him to the roof.

Hearing his approach, an EU soldier spun around and tried to bring his Baur H-AR to bear-

The mercenary lifted his Kalashnikov to point at the soldier one-handed-

-and the mercenary fired first, spearing the EU soldier with five armour-piercing rounds which ripped through his combat vest and tearing into his flesh. The EU soldier fell off the edge of the building roof, a painful thud announcing his violent collision with the ground below.

Sprinting to the edge of the roof, the mercenary shouldered his AK, this time in a proper firing stance, and proceeded to fire accurate bursts of three shots each at the EU soldiers below. A few fell to his onslaught, but the other Europeans sent such a devastating barrage back at the mercenary that he had to throw himself backwards to avoid being ventilated by the swarm of projectiles zipping past him.

Deciding that the building was no longer a safe vantage point, he retreated back down the stairs. Running over to a low concrete wall, the mercenary found himself sharing cover with another of his teammates.

The man was a stocky-built Russian of thirty, an Assault soldier with a standard issue Krylov FA-37. Despite the bullets chipping away the wall protecting them, they shared a brief exchange.

"How's it going?" from the mercenary, simultaneously reloading his rifle.

"We've got a position and a numerical advantage. They're pinned down over by that AA gun post. Some good suppression fire should be enough to make a good advance on them," the Assault trooper reported.

The mercenary nodded and proceeded to interface with the most advanced technology he used – the NetBat, or Networked Battlefield system. It was a recent development that linked all soldiers of a particular squad by a wireless network. The system could be used to coordinate tactics, give orders, or call for backup, among many other things. The helmets themselves also featured target acquisition and detection systems which worked through walls.

The mercenary triggered the location marker and designated the area surrounding the AA turret, and transmitted the coordinates to the rest of his team. Activating the voice communication channel, he barked "Cover fire, here!"

The acknowledgements came fast, and after waiting for five seconds, the mercenary shouted "NOW!"

The roar of three automatic rifles split the air and a blizzard of bullets pounded the area which the mercenary had designated. Two support gunners, one with the Shuko and another with a more powerful and advanced Ganz HMG alternated firing to keep a constant stream of ammunition in the direction of the EU soldiers, while the Recon soldier added to the storm with his Lambert Carbine.

Under cover of the suppressive fire, the mercenary made his way around the side of the EU, taking advantage of their attention being focused on the barrage of fire that threatened to shred anybody who so much as poked a finger out of cover.

Rounding the corner of the AA bunker, he came across three EU soldiers with their backs turned to him.

Three shots. Three dead men.

Another EU soldier rounded the corner in front of him right in front of his face, and was met with a swift strike from the buttstock of the mercenary's AK to the face. The soldier staggered, and in that moment of defencelessness the mercenary dealt a fatal blow with the other archaic device attached to the muzzle of his rifle.

A bayonet.

Gripping the buttstock at its thinnest point with his right hand, the mercenary thrust the sharp blade of the bayonet into the European's stomach. After twisting the blade and jerking it out of the soldier, the mercenary followed up with an instantly lethal two-handed stab to the throat. Blood spurted out of the EU soldier's punctured jugular vein onto the ground and onto the mercenary's AK, almost like a testament to its wielder's most recent kill.

Three shots whizzed past the mercenary, and he spun around on his heel, dropping to the floor as more bullets streaked towards him. Tracking the fire back to its source, the mercenary primed a fragmentation grenade and tossed it in a high arc towards the direction of his assailant.

A yell in English of "Grenade! Get down!" informed him that his attackers were occupied with saving themselves from the deadly explosives. He used their distraction to pop up out of cover and quickly search for their locations.

He found one of them, a soldier who had dived behind a low concrete roadblock to shield himself from the deadly shrapnel of the grenades. Leaving him in the middle of the road, exposed to every PAC soldier in the immediate area.

All of whom opened fire on him simultaneously and independently. The hapless man was shredded by machinegun fire, punctured by assault rifle bullets, and torn apart by the mercenary's AK at the same time. He must have received well over a hundred gunshot wounds in the final second of his life. A bloody heap that had formerly been human writhed and twisted as bullets raked his flesh, then crumpled to the floor, ripped to pieces.

The two remaining EU were dispatched in equally efficient, though less bloody manners.

The mercenary keyed the command frequency on his communication systems and hailed the General. "Major General, this is the expeditionary force. Area secure, transmitting coordinates."

"Copy that. Additional airborne reinforcements inbound, ETA in five. We're establishing heavy fortifications at your position,"the General's voice replied through the helmet's speakers.

"Understood, General. Expeditionary out," the mercenary finished, and clicked off the comm.

He didn't understand the purpose of the previous half hour. There was nothing remotely strategic about the place they'd just stormed, no viable tactical advantage from holding it other than the simple matter of having more terrain than the EU.

Then again, it wasn't upon him to understand. An old maxim came unbidden into the mercenary's head.

Theirs not to reason why. Theirs but to do and die.

He snorted. Doing, fine. That was what his job was, to do things which normal soldiers or even Special Forces couldn't. He was paid to do, and damn right he would do, to the very best of his ability if not more.

But dying?

The mercenary looked towards the sky, out into the sunset.

No way in hell.