Point of Origin

by Rookie571

They were called many things since the dawn of their unit's inception. Whether they be future soldiers, or advanced warfighters; strangers so far away from home, or survivors that could wage war in the world's most harshest conditions; it did not matter. For what truly did, was that they were everywhere, and then they were nowhere all at once. They are Ghosts—and they do not exist.

Hey, fellas! This is my first time writing a GATE fanfic, so hopefully it won't suck as much as I think it would.

Anyways, this story is about a covert US Army Special Forces unit known only as Ghosts. And them being

sent into the other side of the Gate. To further understand this super secretive unit, I might suggest going over

to YouTube and searching the, "Ghost Recon Future Soldier Live Action Trailer".

Anyways, don't forget to leave a review and tell me what you guys think.

Enjoy! :)

---

Prologue: Skirmish

"Aw, man. I hate to say it, but this place doesn't really look like much at all."

"Uh," a voice in his tactical headset replied, "where you thinking something else?"

"Well, duh. Obviously. I was kinda hoping of something along the lines of awe-inspiring and great, you know?"

"Care to elaborate on that one?"

"Hmmm…well, I wanted to see something that was guaranteed to make me oh-so speechless, and then effortlessly take my breath away."

"…you're kidding, right?" The voice on the other side of the 'net asked in undemonstrative disbelief, after about a few moments' worth of silence. "Because it really does sound like you are."

"No, no, I am dead serious about this."

"Sounds like you wanted to experience a cheesy ass scene from some rom-com chick flick, or some shit."

"Exactly!" He excitedly breathed on his mic. "Definitely one of those. Or at least, feeling something similar."

"Bro…that is, without a doubt, the most dumbest thing I've ever heard come out of your mouth. So far, that is. And I've already heard a lot from both you and Thirty."

"I'm telling you, it makes sense."

"So, you're telling me that us being here in another world, and being thoroughly surrounded by a shit-ton of bad guys with swords and horses—and monsters straight out of Doctor Seuss's worst nightmares, mind you—doesn't even remotely amaze you in the slightest?"

"Nope, not one bit."

"Seriously?"

"Why should it?" He replied nonchalantly. "I don't know if you've noticed this yet, but we're fucking armed to the goddamn teeth here, with these magnificent things called guns. And on the other end of these guns, they spit out these equally wonderful sharp pointy objects called bullets."

"How is that related to—?"

"Not to mention that I have a micro-missile launcher strapped behind my shoulder, for Christ's sakes," he cut him off without preamble, "and just a single one of these little puppies can stop a Russian Armata in its fucking tracks with just one hit. And between our weapons, armor, advanced sensor package and training, we're fucking unstoppable. But wait, there's more! I haven't even gotten to the best part yet…"

"For the love of… —"

"Bro…" He deliberately paused for dramatic effect. "We're fucking invisible right now. Can you even believe that? We are fucking invisible, as in, we are hidden to all ends of the EM spectrum and the naked human fucking eye!"

"What's your fucking point?" The voice finally managed a word in edgewise, though slightly impatient.

"The point is, I might as well be a fucking god to these primitive people. I can, like, smite them with ease if I ever felt like it. And since I am now a powerful god among them, nothing these people do will ever 'wow' me in the least. Ever. Not in the slightest."

"You done?"

"Just about."

"Good. Now shut the fuck up already, and watch your damn sector."

"Jesus, Pepper, that was kinda harsh, don't you think?"

On the other end of their private LOSIR frequency, Master Sergeant Robert "Pepper" Bonifacio laughed quietly on his comm.

"Bones, if you think that was harsh, then me listening to you rant like an annoying little bitch is practically torture in fucking comparison."

That most definitely rubbed him the wrong way, and he quickly huffed in response.

"Quit calling me Bones, you old bastard." He shot back with an annoyed expression. "I know I'm the FNG on this team, but damn it, I'd like to think that I deserve a better nickname than that."

"Hey, it was your own goddamned fault to begin with. I wasn't the one who tripped on a pile of bones just ten minutes after we got past that Gate."

"But it was—"

"Bones, Pepper," another voice from out of nowhere, this one deep and authoritative and definitely not messing around, piped in on their standard comms, "sit-rep, over."

"See?" Pepper remarked smugly on their shared private line. "First impressions are always everything. Although, next time you plan on landing face first on top a pile of random bones, at least try to do it without the Cap looking."

"Fuck you."

The veteran sniper laughed briefly once more before he turned serious and answered the call.

"Ghost Lead, Pepper here. No change in enemy posture. Encampment is still quiet at this time, and besides regular foot patrols going along their perimeter, there's not really much any activity to speak of. Over."

"Copy." The third voice, belonging to that of their team leader Captain Cedric Ferguson, responded gruffly. "Maintain eyes on and continue to report on enemy dispositions and movement. Acknowledge."

"Roger wilco, Ghost Lead."

"Anything else to report?"

"Besides hearing the FNG's talk about how he's an all-powerful god in this AO, there's not really much going on at the moment, sir."

"You know I can hear you, right?" He sent towards Pepper's way via their shared LOSIR freq instead of standard comms.

Which was thoroughly being ignored by the other party.

What a dick.

"Roger. Tell Bones not to desecrate any more poor skeletons from here on out, over."

"I'll be sure to tell him, Cap." Pepper assured him.

"Good, you better. Ghost Lead, out."

"You guys suck." He stated plainly once their team leader winked off from the command net and out of their hair.

"Bones, instead of talking about your apparent ascension into godhood and how shitty your nickname is, how about you actually report on how things are going in your end."

"You and I both know there's nothing really going on here on my end."

"Just do it, anyway."

He sighed tediously and activated his helmet's holographic visor. Within the span of a few milliseconds, his right eye was entirely covered with a small bright rectangle of cyan light, showing him relevant data from his suit's built-in sensor suite, and a real-time vid-feed from the recon drone overhead providing protective overwatch.

Well, well, to no one's immediate surprise—there was still nothing in his immediate sector.

Just like the last nine times he thoroughly scanned this area in the past seven and a half hours ago.

Figures.

Seriously, why bother doing all this if the enemy couldn't even see them? They were mostly fucking invisible anyways, due in part to their suit's adaptive electro-optical camouflage system, so what was the point in doing all of this?

"Well?" Pepper asked.

"Yep, just like I said, there's still nothing out here."

"Just keep an eye out."

"Whatever." He answered automatically while raising his left arm to remotely access the recon drone's controls via his embedded touchpad, setting the automated flier to alert him of even the slightest movements in view of its long-range optics, and relaying the vid-feed of whatever was happening to Pepper in any eventuality.

"Alright, I'm going silent again. Hopefully this time with no other random thoughts from you know who. Think you're going to be alright there all by your lonesome, your Godliness?"

"Bite me."

"I'll take that as a yes then. Later, Bones."

"I hope you go choke on a dick, Pepper."

With that, the other man's line finally went dark as he switched off his comms, leaving Staff Sergeant Derrick "Bones" Matheson alone with his errant thoughts, and also a really large desolate sector of land he was tasked to watch over. With said sector just basically behind Pepper's immediate overwatch position, on a knoll overlooking the enemy's insanely sizeable camp.

It wouldn't be the first time today that he actually wished that Pepper—the team's lone sniper, and possessor of their most longest-ranged optic—wasn't just gathering intel on enemy troop movement and unit dispositions, but was actually legit lazing the enemy camp with a laser designator, so that they could blow these medieval bastards away with a shit-ton of ordinance, and let them burn gruesome and hopefully painful deaths.

Food for thought, he supposed.

Unfortunately, whatever his whims and wishes was regarding the current tempo of his present assignment, the hope for bringing down the fiery and righteous hammer of God wasn't really going to happen anytime soon anyway; as serious and dedicated fire support assets (e.g. fixed- and rotary-winged CAS, MLRS, field guns and heavy howitzers, self-propelled or otherwise) wouldn't arrive until after the first wave of Jap soldiers from the JGSDF had secured a large-scale lodgement (gatehead, maybe?) for additional units to arrive into. Which would immediately help friendly forces establish a long-term and permanent foothold unto this "Special Region", as their Prime Minister had called it during his televised speech a few months back.

Or was it former Prime Minister now? He wasn't really sure. Not that he actually gave a damn about Japanese politics, anyhow.

But still, medieval Roman-looking motherfuckers with actual shields and spears and swords, even accompanied by all kinds of fugly-ass monsters and real-life honest-to-goodness dragons? It's just so hard to fucking stomach. Even—hell, especially—for the likes of him, a hardened mofo that was supposed to specialize in all aspects of unconventional warfare.

Though, he probably forgot to attend the part in his intensive training that focused on the part about outdated warfare in the Middle Ages.

Hell, even now it's still hard for him to stomach all of this. And he was actually really here now to begin with, in the very place in which those feudal-looking bastards had originated from!

The staff sergeant wasn't going to lie. If someone that wasn't his boss (or an officer) had the balls to tell him three months ago that ancient soldiers and weird-ass monsters from another world would really invade Ginza, and wreak all kinds of holy hell in that place—and in such a short-amount of time, mind you—he probably would have punched the guy in the kisser for messing with him. Stop for a moment to question his sanity, then punch him again if the dude's answer was unsatisfactory to him.

To say that all of this was a massive snafu doesn't even begin to cover it. Now, or ever.

He shook his head mentally to clear himself of those inconsequential thoughts.

What he felt about this op, and no matter how fucked up it all seemed it was, didn't really matter anymore. He was here now, doing shit he was—or hoped that he was—rigorously and perfectly trained to do: kicking whatever ass Uncle Sam had deemed unequivocally hostile, and more importantly, look good doing it.

Ghost style.

Yeah, he was a fucking Ghost. At least he thought he was these past four months, ever since Major Mitchell had recruited him straight out of the Rangers.

Which, if he thought real long and hard about it, was almost pretty much the same time as this fustercluck of an unconceivable incident had taken place.

Though, it really would have been unfair otherwise. If he got the posting of his and any hardcore infantryman's dreams, only to have nothing occur during his entire time being in said posting.

Well, that really couldn't be helped anyhow.

But, being in this unit pretty much signified to him that he was in the ranks of something that only a few people have ever grasped. People who have most definitely reached the epitome of American soldiery, exceptionalism, and total badassery.

How else would he have access to such sweet hi-tech equipment, unparalleled training, and advanced state-of-the-art weaponry? They sure as hell wouldn't give him camo-gear and holographic visors when he was still a Ranger in the Regiment, that's for damn sure.

"Team, Ghost Lead here." His team leader's gruff voice rang in his ears once more. "Be advised, time is now eighteen-forty hours. Jap assault will begin in about twenty mikes. Prep for Phase Two."

Shit, it was almost that close already? He really should look at the mission time on his holo-visor more—which he quickly did to confirm—and realized that he was cutting it too damn close for anyone's liking. All these errant thoughts about being in a world, that seemed like it was something out of a surrealistic nightmare, was eating up more of his time than he originally thought it would be.

He really needed to stop doing that.

"Pepper, you've got the high ground. Thirty, Bones—" he slightly cringed at his newfound call sign "—proceed to secondary positions now. Phase Two will start in approximately ten mikes on the dot. We clear?"

"Yes, sir." All of the other Ghosts, him included, succinctly responded.

"Good, we'll RV back at Pepper's mound in twenty-five. Out."

"You going to be alright there, Pepper?" He said via LOSIR towards the sniper currently perched comfortably at his knoll, while he on the other hand started to move. "Not going to be lonely now, are you?"

"Lonely?" The wizened NCO barked a quick laugh on his end of the comms. "Hell, no. If it gets me away from you and you're talking, then I'd sure as hell would gladly take it, brother."

That made him smile as he called up his ride on his arm's embedded touchpad, which hardly took him a few seconds.

"Why you gotta hurt me like that, huh, Pepper? Seriously, I have feelings too, you know."

"Uh huh, sure you do. Just make sure that before you guys play with the natives, you've got our little eye in the sky to watch my back, will ya?"

His sensor suite's long-range scanners were picking up something moving towards him at fast speeds. And he already knew what it was before he even saw the approaching dust clouds billowing in the distance, and his holo-visor identifying the unknown contact and showing it to him.

That was quick. Living in the year 2022 really was a goddamn blessing.

"Already did, bro. Wish us luck, eh?"

"Whatever, Bones."

"You, motherfu—!"

---

It didn't take long for Matheson to finally arrive at his intended destination.

Getting there quick towards his secondary position, at the northernmost portion of the enemy's massive encampment, barely took him all but seven minutes' worth of fast travel—courtesy from his summoned ride, of course—and about another minute and a half of swiftly huffing it on foot to silently get a bit up close and personal with the poor sons-of-bitches ahead, which he already knew in his heart were already dead men walking anyway and just didn't know it yet.

'Ignorance is bliss' at its most finest, if he did say so himself.

He was only about a fifty meters or so from the countless pitched-up tents of varying color that spanned as far as his eyes could see, and his helmet's audio pick-ups easily retrieved somewhat audible voices from the various men and beasts upfront, speaking and conversing in a language he knew he could scarcely comprehend yet didn't bother caring about anyway.

It was kind of…weird, for lack of a better term. Finally seeing them in the flesh and with his own two eyes, nonetheless.

He had seen the photos of them from when these savages had started their bloody and violent incursion into Japan, obviously; and yes, he also saw them when the initial vid-feeds from the first recon drones being sent on the other side of the gate here had started transmitting real-time intel.

He hadn't known what to expect about it, but he was sure that it definitely wasn't like this. This feeling of underwhelming disappointment and indifference. The talk he had with Pepper earlier wasn't just because he was bored, or that he even had the case of jittery nerves, but because that's what he was honestly feeling. They look just like them, only dirtier and more stockier and more primitive, and that they were in the company of beasts and animals that was supposed to only be in fictitious works of supremely imaginative novelists, and residing in a world that—in all respects—wasn't supposed to rightly exist at all in the first place.

The after-action reports he had read, from when the Japanese had engaged them, spoke of warriors that had brazenly charged through armed personnel with such fervor and zeal, that it had basically scared them shitless. And it clearly showed when they wrote and sent those reports to their respective higher-ups.

Jesus.

He wasn't going to lie, he had been scared out of his mind when he first got past through that Gate—and then eventually tripped embarrassingly on a pile of animal bones—expecting to be assailed by whatever creatures that were waiting on the other side, ready to hear him to pieces at a moment's notice.

But that was five days ago.

Now, he just felt…normal.

And he really did not expect to feel that at all, and it was making him feel weird.

Should he feel glad? Be ecstatic about it all, even?

Sheeeit, some fucking Ghost he was.

"Hiya, Bones!" an ecstatic voice reverberated in his headset, followed by his holo-visor popping out of existence to inform him that another friendly was in the vicinity and was now currently in position for their upcoming skirmish.

He instantly recognized that voice. Or, more strictly, it was kind of hard to forget. Even if he wanted to.

"Thirty," he replied whilst checking the mission time, and reigning in his ever growing annoyance to his newfound name, "you're late, dude. Kind of pushing it, aren't you?"

"Hey, hey," First Sergeant James Grant "30K" Ellison, an Arkansas boy through and through, spoke with a huff through standard and public LOSIR comms, "my Cross-Com was acting funny, damned thing almost led me through a ditch. Could've broken both my ankles, you know."

"Did you even bother running a diagnostic before we jumped off from that Gate?"

"Eh, I might have."

"Bullshit, you did." Matheson immediately remarked. "I know you're pretty much a technophobe in all but name, but damn it, why didn't you?"

"I do recall asking you nicely to do it for me back at that Jap CP…"

"And I also recall having said no and to go fuck yourself, if I remember correctly."

"Bones, if you'd fix it for me in the first place, none of this would've happened." Thirty spoke with a slightly indignant tone, which Matheson wasn't sure if he was serious or not. "I could've been here, like, fifty-five seconds earlier at this pos."

"And if you did it yourself in the first place, like you were actually supposed to, I could have avoided hearing your Southern ass bitching about it."

"Hey, I'm just upholding tradition. Everyone knows the FNGs on the teams has to do the useless shit us vets are too busy to deal with. And besides, you know I don't trust these things that run on friggin' batteries, anyway."

He really did hope that Southern hick was kidding. Because if he wasn't, then…

"Tradition? Ha! If that's the case, why don't you kiss the darkest part of my lily-white ass, you lazy—"

"Enough!" Ghost Lead's voice, already imposing and deep in and out itself, impatiently thundered out of nowhere, shutting both of them up in record time. "Bones, Thirty, lock it down, both of you!"

"But—"

"Cap, I—"

"Need I really repeat myself once more, gentlemen?" Captain Ferguson's voice dangerous grew low and threatening, and it was at that moment that he—and probably Thirty—knew that both of them were better off zipping their mouths shut, and not incurring any more of their team leader's obviously scorching wrath.

Also, it probably wouldn't matter now, but he just realized belatedly that Thirty, in his infinite wisdom, was transmitting their comms on the open LOSIR freq, instead of the private ones that people with half-a-brain usually use when they wanted to talk without anyone else hearing besides them.

Goddamn it, Thirty. Stupid technophobic dumbass, Southern hick—

"No, sir." Both of them answered at the same time.

"That's better." Ghost Lead's voice returned to its usual authoritativeness, if there ever was such a thing. "My Cross-Com's says you're already both in position. Ready your weapons, we'll kick things off in one mike."

"Sir." Matheson replied as he brought his primary weapon up and did a last minute check.

His MR-B assault rifle—or Modular Rifle-Bullpup, if he wanted to get even more technical—was, without a doubt, the strangest looking weapon he had ever been issued. The firearm itself was compact and practical, that went without saying, but everything about it screamed that conventional firearm design was thrown right out of the window, when it's designers decided to create this particular weapon. With its overall length not even surpassing, or even actually reaching, that of the standard M4 carbines that was standard-issue nowadays throughout the US military, that wasn't the only reason why it stood out so much.

He didn't know the specifics about it himself, but all he knew was that it worked like a regular bullpup rifle—where the action was located behind the trigger—and that it had a thumbhole grip instead of the standard pistol one, and there was another similar but larger modified hole in front of the trigger to comfortably fit an entire armored hand, allowing him to properly grip the weapon with both hands.

Coupled with a built-in holographic reticle that he could sync in his with the holographic visor in his helmet if he wanted to, and a modular shotgun system lodged in the same housing as it's rifled barrel, the weapon also had a titanium hook launcher below both barrels that served both as a melee tool in the event of CQC situations, and as a breaching tool, where the hook could be pneumatically launched via compressed gas and then be instantly pulled via a small but extremely powerful micro-winch built into the rifle itself. Perfect for bringing down doors and the like. Or even as a grappling hook for ascending into buildings. The possibilities for it were damn-near endless.

The only thing it had similar with the military's prevalent service rifle is that it's also primarily chambered in 5.56x45mm NATO, and that it could fire regular ammunition. And that was pretty much it.

The standard ammo for his MR-B was a new depleted uranium round that, theoretically at least, should have the same penetrating power to that of a main battle tank's kinetic penetrator, which can pierce another enemy armor's well-defended hide with relative ease, but comparatively at a much smaller scale.

He wasn't even going to bother thinking about the built-in shotgun's motley variety of ammunition.

Or the fact that strapped behind his left shoulder blade was a tri-micro-missile launcher that could fire everything, ranging from miniature HE hot loads, to advanced kinetic-kill micro-missiles with secondary cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine RDX burst warheads.

He pointedly tried to ignore the fact that, with the exception of the Cross-Com and his adaptive electro-optical camouflage system, every single piece of gear he was hauling with him right now was mostly experimental in nature; and that prior to all of it being issued to them, they were dusted off an old Army warehouse somewhere in the continental United States.

One can only digress in hoping that he wasn't going to die testing all these really cool and unproven toys.

Anyways, his main weapon was good. A quick brass check to confirm that a round was indeed chambered, and quick magazine pull verified that his rifle was full of DU rounds, and his shotgun was filled to the brim with mostly HE shells.

"Alright, Bones, you do the honors. Laze 'em."

"Roger. Setting targeting solution…"

He brought up his holographic visor, and set it to activate his helmet's multi-mission optical unit, which was basically a high-resolution camera jury-rigged with infrared sensors and a designating laser.

In the rectangular cyan display wholly covering his left eye, numerous small and red diamond reticles were locking on to about three dozen man-sized contacts up front, with his headset letting off a warbling tone to indicate that his optical unit had designated these contacts as potential targets, and were marking them accordingly.

"Targeting solution set."

"Set micro-missile launchers to HE. Air burst, full dispersion."

Matheson didn't say anything, as he complied with his team leader's instructions and spooled up the shoulder-strapped launcher with a quick swipe on his touchpad controls.

He heard a slight whirring noise as the extenders just slightly behind him raised the small launcher from its main housing unit and elevated it a bit further above his head, setting it to its optimal launch position.

"Set."

"Gentlemen, light 'em up."

With another swipe on his arm, two micro-missiles—and another two from Thirty—screamed out of their launchers respectively and arced up high into the sky in a steep angle.

Then came crashing back down hard moments later, towards the tents and the enemy personnel up ahead in particular as it exploded less than two feet above ground level in short, but noticeably powerful detonations; saturating a sizeable area with utter explosive power as its victims only had about a fraction of a second to scream in terror.

Everyone that was in, or was a bit too close to the epicenter of the blasts, were either torn apart completely in more than a dozen places; or at the very least, had one of their appendages severed as the high explosive micro-missiles' absolute shock wave ripped through everything in its wake through sheer force and abandon.

Those that didn't die immediately from having their nervous systems violently shut off from explosive barotrauma, or those that didn't completely bleed out from massive hemorrhaging due to the loss of multiple limbs, started to scream uncontrollably in agony, due in part to the immense wounds they had sustained. Everything ranging from third- and fourth-degree burns, fractured bones, and bodily trauma on a massive scale, so far the list was nigh-endless. One didn't have to be a genius to figure out that most of the screaming casualties here that the bombardment had caused probably won't survive in the next hour or so, let alone survive the night.

And it didn't take long before the smell of burnt flesh started to assail his covered nostrils, with the stench of seared death annoyingly lingering in the general vicinity and letting his stomach know what was occurring outside. Maybe it was just wishful thinking on his part, but it was almost as if the stink was refusing to let the people responsible for this particular carnage forget the consequences of their actions. Reminding them once and for all that all it took for all of this to happen was the push of a single button.

Or, in this case, a quick swipe in their embedded touchscreen interfaces.

But despite all this abject slaughter, or the couple dozen tents further lighting up the night sky with several uncontrollable blazes, or the unaffected personnel hurriedly rushing to the aid of their long-gone comrades, and even his gut deciding overall whether or not it was high time for it to empty its contents into the earth below, one thing was for absolute certain.

The micro-missile launcher worked like a fucking charm.

And if that fucking thing worked so damned beautifully, then one can only imagine what would happen if he fired on the enemy with his prototype MR-B.

"Bones, Thirty, close in and engage enemy forces. Now."

He didn't even need to be told twice.

Standing up from his crouch, Matheson shouldered the compact assault rifle in his hands, aimed the holographic reticle to a Roman legionnaire-looking motherfucker trying to help out a burning man, and pulled the trigger.

The action was smooth and crisp to the slight touch of his fingertip, and the MR-B bucked ever so slightly in his grip as it effortlessly coughed out a three-round burst downrange and on target.

The rounds quickly found their mark. Pseudo-legionnaire took three hits center mass and immediately went down face first next to the burning man. The loud rapport of his bullpup thundering all over as it announced his presence to every single one of the hostile infantry within a thousand-yard range.

It also automatically killed off his adaptive camo, and materialized him in front of everybody for all of the world to see.

But, for the most part, they were too busy with other things to immediately notice. Chief among them a massive fire starting to spread wildly all along the northern portion of their large bivouac, with the blaze already heading further southward due to the wind.

Two others bullpups besides his own started firing more and more rounds, and additional bodies joined the lone primitive soldier and torn corpses from earlier in dropping dead to the ground, with gushing wounds to their chest and head.

Unadulterated panic started to spread out among the ranks of the men guarding the northern flank, and already he could see soldiers outright abandoning their posts as the scene of their brethren just dropping dead after the sound of a brief and fierce thunder, followed by another, and then another, was teetering their already frayed nerves to the breaking point. It was obviously taking its toll on the surviving enemy soldiers' psychological state, by way of them dropping their outdated weapons and just running without ever looking back. Though not a lot of the running soldiers made it out alive, as Matheson and the other Ghosts methodically gunned them down with trained straightforwardness and ruthless precision.

It took them about three minutes and several magazines later to walk out and slowly advance towards fifty meters of open ground, which was separating them and the hostile perimeter, and then finally entering into the encampment proper. The fiery tents burning all around them, illuminating and reflecting the light of the flames off of their mostly grey combat uniforms, making them stand out even more as they gradually made their way even more deeper into the enemy's lines without the aid of their adaptive camo.

As with all good things, the enemy's panicked rout didn't last for long and they eventually noticed them, with the officers finally instilling some discipline and order into what was left of the retreating mob, immediately having them form proper ranks in such short amount of time, with their large rectangular shields raised and their infantry formations locked up secure and tight.

They then started to advance slowly and surely towards him and his spread out three-man element, in step and in tune as the mob that had retreated with their tail between their legs earlier was now looking like the Roman legions of old; moving forward with precision and unfounded direction that was seemingly coming out of nowhere, as they were now being led by a couple of seasoned officers in horseback, who were directing the footmen with commands from behind the assembled formation and urging them ever forward.

In another time, Matheson would've admired such single-mindedness and dedication to infantry formations with rigid discipline in the face of such insurmountable odds.

Today, however, was certainly not going to be that day.

The Ghosts shot the officers out of their horses first, a single burst for each of the four combatants wearing those helms with the ridiculously fluffy hair crest on top, and it didn't take long for them to come crashing back down to reality and unto death as the staff sergeant casually kept his measured pace in his advance towards the enemy formation.

The supposedly reformed pseudo-Roman infantry line, having just saw with their own eyes the deaths of their respective sources of said discipline and order, stopped their meticulous advance and froze. And it gave Matheson and the others just enough time to close the gap with a quick light jog and started blasting them apart with their MR-Bs' built-in shotguns, peppering shields and the men behind them alike with semi-high explosive shells and with near-impunity.

The men at the vanguard of that picturesque formation started to fall face first and collapse into a jumbled heap, promptly followed by the next line of soldiers positioned just behind them. And as expected, the rest of the men behind the forefront of the formation once again ran like their lives depended on it. And once more, him and his fellow Ghosts mercilessly gunned them all down without so much as a second thought.

He automatically ejected his fifth spent magazine and quickly replaced it with a fresh one from his plate carrier.

This was almost too damned easy.

"Whoaaa, heads up Bones." Thirty spoke up on the 'net with equal parts awe and bewilderment. "Got a big ass hostile coming your way. Jesus Christ…"

"Wait, what?" He asked dumbfoundedly.

Before he could ask Thirty what he meant by that contact report and for further verification on the matter, he could feel the ground beneath his boots starting to quiver. It was just a slight vibration at first, and he thought he was just simply imagining it before that little shudder suddenly turned into a supremely noticeable shake.

Which was then followed by another that was even more noticeable than the last.

And then another even more evident than that.

And then another.

He didn't even have the chance to try and ascertain what it was, or whatever the cause was of all these really perceptible tremors in the midst of all this fighting; as one of the burning tents just right in front of him at about fifteen meters away was suddenly swept apart sideways like it was nothing. The pole holding it up and the scorching fabrics that were still obviously ablaze both flutteringly briefly in the wind before crumpling like heap in the dirt, with whoever knocking them down obviously strong enough to just cast them aside like pieces of stick and paper in one fell swoop.

But the smoke from all the fires, coupled with the ever present wind heading southward, was completely obscuring the likeness of whoever the hell it was that floored the flaming tent down just for the hell of it.

Matheson decided to up his Cross-Com's augmented reality functionality to compensate.

Filtering the smoke away to update his optical unit's data feed, then followed by accounting for the night vision already set in place, and the many fires in his surrounding area that would definitely impede with his passive IR imaging, he quickly adjusted his holographic visor's point-of-view to finally allow him to see through all this shit.

Two seconds later, everything was much clearer now.

The smoke was gone, as was the fires that were completely polarizing his field-of-vision, and then there was a giant—

"Giant?"

An ear-splitting roar emanated from in front of him, as a massive humanoid biped creature that was over ten, maybe eleven feet tall, suddenly came into view. It was big, dark blue, wearing the medieval version of jeans, and weirdly enough, was sporting a light brown Mohawk on top of its head, and probably weighed a metric fucking ton; the creature was also wielding an equally larger club in his hand, only God knows what it was made of.

And it was as clear as all day now that the smoke and fires weren't obstructing his view.

Though he irrationally wished for the obstructions to come back for some reason.

Fuck, why the hell was he stupid enough to think that this was all too fucking easy?

"Uh, guys…?" Matheson drawled a bit nervously on the overall team comms. "I need a little help here."

"I'm a bit busy, Bones." Thirty spoke ragged and out of breath. "I got enemy cavalry up on my ass, and they are fast!"

"You got this, son." Ghost Lead awkwardly tried to encourage him in his usual tone of voice, not even the least bit worried.

"Pepper?"

"Hey, I'm taking out hostile archers here so you don't get rained with arrows. I got my own shit to deal with."

As if to emphasize how all alone he was in this situation, the giant screeched again in its unholy kind of roar. It was so fucking loud it was even penetrating the protective noise-isolating muffs on his tactical headset.

It went two steps forwards, and thumped its free hand to its chest as if to challenge him in a one-one-one duel with it.

Naturally, Matheson took two steps back.

"Fuck. Me."

For the first time ever, since he stepped off that Gate in Japan and completely venturing into the unknown world beyond that, and not knowing what was going to happen to him, he was suddenly remembering what fear felt like.

And it completely sucked ass.

He could definitely feel his bowels were starting to clench, his throat was for some reason dry as the fucking Sahara, and his breath was hitched to it.

Thankfully though, his hands were rock steady. But his heart rate was completely jacked.

The creature—which he was going to name Blue, as a way to placate how fucking terrified he absolutely was—roared one last time. And ran straight towards him in a head-on charge.

Matheson's already finely-honed instincts reacted automatically to the situation at hand.

Channeling all that ridiculous amount of adrenaline that was currently in his system—just like what he had learned in training—he quickly used that epinephrine surge to calm his mind and mental state, setting himself up for work.

He felt fully engrossed. Attentive. Ready for himself to engage at this colossal moving target.

And he did just, shouldering his weird-looking but highly-effective rifle as if he was born to do it.

Focusing his MR-B's floating holographic sight picture into the target's massively sized and approaching head, he set the selector switch to full-auto, and then gently squeezed on that ridiculously smooth trigger.

Time seemed to slow to a crawl.

Everything but Blue the big-ass giant was blurred out.

Muzzle flashes lit on the other end of his rifle.

He could clearly see Blue's supremely ugly-ass face contorting into both rage and glee as it jogged to get close to him, it's thoughts agonizingly clear as it hoped to just be near enough for it to maul him repeatedly with that gigantic and unwieldly club.

But Blue's face abruptly changed.

It remained frozen for the briefest of moments, locking that distorted face's display of anger and delight when its facial features started to rapidly deconstruct, as his rifle's constant flow of depleted uranium rounds finally arrived and hit on point.

The giant's pig-looking nose was completely shattered.

It's right eyeball fluttered away off out of its socket, and his left one popped right on the spot.

Teeth were torn apart from all around as it's mouth and pretty much most of the jaw holding everything was smashed to ruin.

Fragments of its cranium explosively flew rearward from the back of its head.

Dark red blood burst outwards from whatever which direction, as it was pouring nonstop out of every unnatural opening or grotesque orifice that were slowly starting to burrow in on its face, clearing making themselves a permanent fixture on the thing's appearance for all of eternity.

In an instant, Blue's legs stopped working. Like a marionette with its strings thoroughly severed, as the limbs below ceased its main function of supporting the rest of the body's weight, due in part to the place where the giant's brain used to be was summarily depopulated.

With extreme prejudice.

Blue's collapse was imminent. It relinquished its grip on the massive war club, ultimately falling down face first in mid-stride as the earth shook prominently beneath Matheson's feet just four meters away.

Had he not braced himself, he probably would have lost his balance and stumbled. On that, he was certain of it.

And with that, everything was finally over.

All of which happened in a span of less than seven seconds.

He hadn't realized that he held his breath the entire time.

Right now, he had never been so glad to be alive and breathing. And no, he was not even going to rightly question how he brought down a fucking giant with just the majority of his forty-five round mag, even though any normal person would want to find out why this epic battle of sorts was so…anti-climactic. To say the least.

He hadn't even expected anything, other than not wanting to die by being squished to death by medieval blunt force trauma.

The staff sergeant was just thankful. And as demanded of a situation like this, he would show proper appreciation to Lady Luck for looking out for him and just contentedly leave it at that. Even in a weird-ass world such as this.

Out of nowhere, numerous large-scale explosions from beyond were picked up by his helmet's audio pick-ups, and his radio came to life afterwards.

"Ghost Lead, Pepper here. I have visual on Jap task force exiting the gate now. I say again, leading elements of the Jap task force are now in the AO at this time. Over."

"That's our cue, boys." Ghost Lead spoke back calmly on comms. "Bones, Thirty, prep smoke dischargers and your adaptive camo. We are outta here."

"Got it, boss man."

"Sir."

"Ghost Lead, be advised, you better get out fast. Their regulars are massing for an attack towards your pos. Estimate seven thousand strong, plus two thousand additional cavalry. You got about five more minutes, give or take, 'til they swarm all over."

"Roger. We'll be long gone by then."

Damn, he honestly forgot how draining combat was. Must be because he hasn't been sent to this shit in so long.

And everything that's happened so far, from start to finish, barely even lasted fifteen minutes.

Whatever, he was just happy that for now everything was going all according to plan and nothing hadn't gone off the rails.

He raised his left arm to access his touchpad.