Chapter II – Arrival of the elites

Somewhere in Tokyo, 13 February 1993 – 2013 hrs

Dennis J. Thompson was busy eating a bowl of Ramen in his favorite Japanese Restaurant not far from the center of Tokyo, Japan. It was already dark, and he wanted badly to get back to his hotel after the last drop of soup was inside his stomach.

He wasn't just an ordinary American tourist from Washington D.C. He was a Colonel of the United States Army, although Thompson was only 25 years old, quite young or even too young for such a rank. It was his performance and skills that made him to be a full silver eagle. His unit was not an ordinary either. Of course, the Colonel was a Special Force, from the A-216 team. It wasn't a Green Beret unit although had a similar name. The number '216' came from the team's formation day—16 February 1991. The A-216 was famous among the Army personnel and rather famous for the public for their unorthodox methods, which none was in any handbooks, and successful rate. There was no doubt of their performance. All members in this team came from various special force units (Thompson himself was from 101st Airborne division) and had received far more training than any of their counterparts and had almost every skill. They were able to use any weapons or vehicles, operate any type of mission from ordinary recon to infiltration, and multilingual, when combined with their unusual tactics, the team probably one of the best units ever.

However, even the bravest warrior needed a time to rest. After a prolonged mission in the US, the A-216 was completely exhausted and acquired a two-week-long vacation from the HQ. When the HQ asked where the team wanted to go, they chose to come to Japan and had arrived three days ago. They lived in a hotel near the Tokyo tower.

"Is it still good, Dennis-san?" the Japanese Chef asked.

"Still good, as usual." Thompson replied in Japanese. As mentioned before, he was multilingual, able to speak English, German, and Japanese fluently, rather better than the natives. His other skills were disguising and outwitting his enemy. He was a solid tactician and cool-headed, even smiled while in danger, because Thompson usually found the way out.

His suddenly rang mobile phone drew Thompson's attention from the meal. He grabbed the phone beside him and raised it to his ear. The Colonel wondered who would call him. The HQ wasn't in his head. They wouldn't call as he was on vacation.

"Thompson here."

"Dennis, this is General Heinemann, came back to the hotel with your men ASAP. We have an urgent mission."

"Sir, are you kidding me? I'm still on vacation and it will lapse in 19 March."

"Sorry about that, Colonel. The vacation is paused. You'd better come here fast, out."

"What happened, Mr. Colonel?"

"My General called me said my vacation is paused. I can hardly believe this! I've got to go. This is for the Ramen, thanks so much, see you." Thompson said and paid money for the Ramen.

"See you."

Although Thompson was little upset about his untimely-ceased vacation, the duty was more important. He rushed for his rented car that parked near the restaurant and hopped in, his first thought was calling his men. The thumb pressed on the phone's number pad quickly.

"Johnny, it's me Colonel Thompson, get back to the hotel ASAP. Where the hell are the others?"

"They are in Shibuya, sir."

"OK, call them, they may use any type of transportation, except a cab, it's very expensive. We have an urgent mission. I'll be at the hotel in five minutes."

Thompson hung up the phone and drove back to the hotel as fast as he can. If General said there was an urgent mission, he meant that. The only thing he was worrying about was his men. They had gone fairly far from the hotel, which required at least 30 minutes to come back, might longer if there was a traffic jam.

5 minutes later, Thompson could make his way back to the hotel. He drove his car to the empty parking slot. When he was doing so, Thompson saw an unusual car beside him. It was a grey-painted, box-shaped car with a German Army cross insignia on its door. Everybody in that place would wonder who the owner this WWII-era Volkswagen Type 82 was. The colonel jumped out of the car and rushed like hell back to his room. There he found a man he had known for 2 years stood in front of the room. This man wore a well-decorated German Army grey uniform, which could tell that the wearer was high-ranking. It was the Commander of the A-216 team, Major General Karl Heinemann, a-48-year-old Major General of the German Armed Forces. Traditionally, soldiers had to salute the higher ranks before they could begin any conversation.

"Glad you're here, Colonel. Where are your men?" General said.

"They're en route, sir. We can wait for them inside."

30 minutes passed away, but Thompson and General Heinemann felt like they had anxiously waited for days. Several steps and chit-chats could be heard through the door, before it was opened by a group of athletic-shaped men. They formed the line and saluted both high-ranking officers.

They were the rest of the A-216 or called 'A-Team' by Thompson himself, as he was a serious fan of the '80 series 'The A-Team' starred George Peppard, and the way they work was almost exactly the same as the opening title but changed to 'If you have a problem, if no one else can help, maybe you can call 'The A-Team'. They had worked together for 2 years. Members in the team exclude Thompson himself were—

Captain John 'Johnny' Connor, 23, came from New York City. He had been a US Army Ranger before joining the A-Team. He was the most gorgeous member, and had a good leadership. Capt. Connor was the second-in-command of the team.

Lt. Charlie 'The Jackal' Adams, 22, from Wahoo, Nebraska, was a sniper. He used to be a professional racer (He started his racing career when he was 16, cheating his age) before joining the US Army Rangers. His nickname came from his supernatural sniping skill, making a world record by sniping a moving soldier from 3,650 m away with his M82 .50 (12.7x99mm) Sniper Rifle. He was also a vehicle specialist as he could drive or fly anything that had wheels, engines, wings or whatever that made the thing transportable.

No team could survive without an intensive firepower, and Lt. Dwight 'Terminator' Lowe, 22, from Defiance, Ohio, was the solution. He was the biggest member—192 cm and 109 kg, which made him an ideal user for a mighty six-barreled M134 7.62x51mm Minigun. That was why he was called 'Terminator', his personality was an important factor too--Lowe had a German accent as most German-Americans had, he was also able to speak German, Russian, and Japanese.

Lt. Robert 'Doc' Mitchell, 22, an eye-glassed Field Medic from San Francisco, California, he entered the professional doctor career when he was only 18 and became a successful doctor until he quit his job in two years later and joined the Green Beret, then the A-Team. With the extensive experience in the hospital, Mitchell was more proficient than most medics. He was very polite and kind, which made him the most popular man for everybody he had helped in several humanitarian missions.

Lt. Peter J. 'PJ' Defort, a 22-year-old Lieutenant from Wilmington, North Carolina, was a radioman for the team. He was a Green Beret boy like Mitchell, although not in the same team. He was quite intelligent, and a former Air Force Cadet. Defort was proficient in electronics and communication. Defort did had some jokes, but not much as another member.

Lt. Dimitry 'Demo' Vostrikov, 22, ex-Spetsnaz from Moscow, Soviet Union (Before collapsed), was a demolition man of the team. His way of working was 'Blow everything in the way, the havoc will be anywhere I go' Vostrikov was more than excelled in destroying things from a motorcycle to the entire building with C4s and RPGs. He had destroyed 600 tanks, 600 various vehicles, 120 factories and caches, and tons of weapons and other supplies. That undoubtedly made him the most feared member, even his name could make a crying children stop.

Lt. Walter 'West' Westernhagen, 22, a bookworm from Hamburg, Germany, got a duty of pointman. He was good in tracking and Pathfinding. Westernhagen himself was a good marksman too, although still unmatched with Adams. He enjoyed reading so much, when West newly joined the army, he devoured every book about war, war theory and war tactics, he read about various stories as well. His favorite warrior was Gengkhis Khan.

Lt. Daniel 'BBQ' Bacon, 22, from Baltimore, Maryland, had been a flamethrower in the Green Beret and he still was when he joined the A-Team. When energy weapons became available, he became an energy weapon specialist, while the rest of the team refused to give up their conventional weapons. Bacon was a German heritage (His German name was Dieter), and a very good cook. His brother had a very famous restaurant in New York, where Bacon himself proved his skill time to time. When the team was not in action, he would become the team's chef and cook food for his teammates in every meal. Everybody said that Bacon's food was far better than the army's MRE (American soldiers called early MRE as 'Meals Rejected by Everyone', 'Meals, Rarely Edible', or even 'Meals Rejected by Ethiopians' as it wasn't palatable and lack of dietary fiber).

Lt. Philip 'Doraemon' Rogers, 22, from Houston, Texas, but grew up in New York City, was the team's engineer. He came from the 1st Special Forces Operation Detachment (Delta Force). Rogers was a typical redneck/cowboy who always eager to fight, sometimes it was his own eager that kicked him into trouble, but he could make it out. This Ultra-supernatural in survival made Rogers famous—in one assault he was caught up in the open and shot at almost 120 rounds, and hit nothing but air. He preferred his own bulletproof cowboy hat over a military-issued helmet. Due to unknown reason whether had watched too much TV or his own nature, like John McClane in Die Hard, he had a ton of jokes in his head, and able to messing his enemy's head until they went mad. When this ability was discovered, he was always placed as a key player in Psychological Warfare.

Like Q in Ian Fleming's James Bond, he invented and modified several particular equipments for the A-216. Some of them were suitable only for each mission, some of them didn't work at all, and others were very useful until the Federal Army took his invention as its issues. In every mission, the team always asked him for new equipments.

His name 'Doraemon' came from his job as engineer. In US ARMY, engineers had to carry spare ammunitions for their teams. Rogers carried a special backpack that was similar to Doraemon's 4th dimension pocket, it was bottomless.

The last person of this team wasn't a human. Lt. Intel, a special-purpose pale-skinned android who served as an intelligence officer. His directive was to collect as much intelligence as possible. He had not much feeling, and trying hard to have it.

"Sir, what's going on here? I think we have a two-week-long vacation." Rogers asked.

"Sorry Philip, we've a business to do."

"Alright, we're all here, so let's get into our business." General Heinemann said. "Have you heard about Sailor Scouts?"

"Yes, sir." Thompson replied. "I've heard that they protect Tokyo citizens from monsters those have appeared mysteriously since last January."

"Yes, but you'll have no idea where they're from. So are we. Our intel guys told me that they've been looking for the powerful silver crystal, which was inside Tsukino Usagi's body, and their another objective is to defeating the Sailor Soldiers. When the time passes on, they become more and more powerful. We're afraid that eventually they'll unable to deal with them and loses the precious silver crystal to the Dark Kingdom. And don't forget, they have families, and still be students. If those idiots sent their monsters out while they're studying or making some tricks with their families, the city is doomed. Moreover, although they couldn't find the crystal, the Dark Kingdom can gather human energy is an alternative form. Your mission is to assist the scouts and boot those monsters when the soldiers can't do that. If you can find gatherers, blow them back to 15th century."

"RIGHT, it's going to be FUN!" Rogers said.

"Knock it off, Rogers. You can't imagine what it can do to you." Defort said.

"Gah…..OK. But I will boot them anywhere I see them, right?"

"Deal." Defort said. "As long as you don't screw our mission….and yourself either."

"Can it, you can argue later, children. We have all information about the Sailor Soldiers in this file. And you don't have to stay in this hotel. It's pretty far from the Sailors' houses, so all of you will live in a house in Azabu district." General Heinemann said before walked to the door and opened it, letting two people in US ARMY uniform inside.

"This is Maj. Steven Konichek, and Capt. James Crandall from 160th SOAR. They'll be your pilots at your disposal."

"When will we go, sir?" Thompson asked.

"Right now, pack your belongings. Our truck is waiting outside the hotel. Don't worry, we've already checked out of the hotel for you." General Heinemann replied. "I'll go back to the HQ you can make a contact with me anytime, Alles Klar?"

"Sir, yes, sir!" Everybody replied.

This was a nature of Special Forces briefing, superiors just gave the operatives a goal. They told nothing about how to achieve it, so the team was absolutely free to do anything.

After General Heinemann left the room, the team had to attend with packing. There were several things to put in bags as there was a group of football-team-sized men lived there. But soldiers were taught to pack quickly, and they could finish it in 5 minutes.

The team walked with a big, heavy pack on their backs all the way down to the hall. There were some German soldiers in old-fashioned WWII uniforms with rifles. Other tourists inside looked at them curiously and worried. If foreign soldiers came into your house in battle-ready manner, you would be curious and worried too.

"Sir," a German soldier, apparently a sergeant, came and saluted Thompson. "Your car is outside, follow me, sir."

Thompson and his men followed the soldier to the front of the hotel. A grey-painted truck was already waiting for them. In daylight, it could be easily noticed, in the dark, it was another matter, although local citizens would hear a noise from Daimler-Benz engine, which was quite distinctive from local Japanese counterpart.

After everything was ready, the truck began to move. It was 2132 hrs, the time that most citizens stayed at their houses, some even slept. But the team still had a mission to do. This might be the heaviest mission ever, as they had to face evil power. But the A-Team would fight against all the odds to save the world. However, before any mission could begin, the team had to make their way to the house first.

…………