Lighting Stuff Up
POV: Cameron Robertson, CODENAME: EMBER
Bir Tawil, Border Between Egypt and Sudan, 8:32 PM
"Why do terrorists do this kind of stuff in the worst of places?" Ela asked as we approached the target, riding multiple Jeeps with mounted guns.
"Neither Sudan nor Egypt claims this land, so it is essentially lawless." Glaz said, making final adjustments on his scope for when we drop him and Outback at the point where they would provide overwatch and sniper support.
I was driving the jeep, following the jeep in front of me continuing Dokkaebi, Blackbeard, Thatcher, and Blitz.
Ela pulled back the bolt on the MG, ensuring that it was loaded as we came within two kilometers of the compound.
"Remember, It's an area of tents. The second Dokkaebi kills the lights, we are speeding in and securing the cargo." Ela reminded us as we went over final review. The cargo, as we had labeled it, was a crate of unknown contents that an arms dealer had sold to a Terrorist group wreaking havoc on North Africa.
We pulled up alongside the other jeep as we reach the final ridge and let Outback and Glaz out. Blitz hopped out of the other jeep and climbed into ours as Dokkaebi began the process of overloading the lights of the compound.
"We have eyes on the cargo." Outback said over the radio. I loaded my Ithaca 37 and left it half pumped, so all I would have to do would be push the slide forward and fire. Then I put in some earbuds attached to my gear and scrolled through my phone before hitting it and strapping it in a pocket.
Insert Song: Beds Are Burning – Midnight Oil
Thatcher gave the thumbs up and Dokkaebi touched her laptop, and over the ridge the lights amplified and then almost simultaneously blew. I floored the gas and the two jeeps climbed over the ridge, with Ela and Blackbeard beginning to unload the MGs into the confused arms dealers and terrorists that were running around wondering what happened to the lights. Thatcher hit a hard left, following his route to the motor pool to either disable or destroy any mode of escape. I however shifted the Jeep into the next gear and plowed through the compound as Ela and Blitz emptied rounds into the tents and terrorists that we passed. A suicide bomber jumped out in front of us, only for her head to disappear thanks to Outback's .50 Cal rifle.
I plow over two terrorists that were two stubborn to move while reloading their weapons and we reached the cargo. I hit the E-Brake and slid the jeep sideways, jumping out and emptying a shell into a terrorist to my left. As he went down, Blitz came around the hood of the Jeep and downed two more terrorists before throwing a grenade towards a makeshift radio hut where a terrorist had just run.
As the grenade detonated I slid around the side of the crate and utilized the Slam-Fire mode of my shotgun and quickly dispatched three more terrorists planting explosives to destroy the cargo.
Taking advantage of my time, I reloaded my shotgun with one hand, while having my Hi-Power at the ready in its holster. After about ten minutes of finding holdouts and taking prisoners, the compound was cleared, and I had joined Dokkaebi, Thatcher and Glaz to inspect the cargo while the others watched the fifteen or so prisoners that hadn't fought to the end.
"I don't want to open it, because I don't know what it is!" Glaz was saying to Thatcher as I approached. Dokkaebi was on her laptop, going through some computers and other electronics that had been collected from the compound.
"Find anything useful yet?" I ask, taking a seat next to her and picking up a laptop that was in her unchecked pile.
"Nothing yet. Just potential targets for whatever this is." She replies gesturing to the giant crate.
"Ooh this looks promising." I say seeing a file on the desktop of the laptop.
"What is it?"
"Looks like instructions for handling the cargo." I reply scanning the page. "By the way. How have you not collapsed from heatstroke?" I ask referring to her combat gear, which consisted of all black, skintight clothing.
"Internal cooling system." She replied with a smug grin.
"Lucky you, I had to change into this Hawaiian shirt and cargo shorts, which I hate!" I say referring to my outfit. "Anyways. It's pretty standard instructions except for one thing."
"What is it?"
I cough and continue using my most mocking voice possible "DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, LET THE CRATE BE LEFT UNATTENDED."
"Seems quite standard." She points out.
"In the middle of the desert, surrounded by about a hundred armed goons?" I question.
"Hey Cameron!" Glaz called out from the crate.
"Yea?"
"You know French, right?"
"It's required to become an Officer in The Army!" I say getting up.
I walk over, Dokkaebi following, and approach Glaz, who points to a label on the crate, written in both French and Arabic.
"It's just standard 'Handle With Care' Instructions. I say, scanning the label.
"Know what? I'm tired of waiting, it's probably just a lot of AK-47's or something." Thatcher says, before grabbing a crowbar and prying off one of the side panels which hits the ground, followed by a noticeable beeping.
We all look in the crate, where a fair sized bomb was sitting, with a timer for 15 minutes beginning to count down.
"Ehh, we got 15 minutes to disarm the bomb." Glaz says annoyed.
"Let me read the label." I say pointing at a fair-sized label next to the display.
My heart stops as I read line by line, before stepping back, a loom of pure horror on my face.
"What is it?" Dokkaebi asks.
"Remember how South Africa had nukes, but dismantled them in pursuit of world peace?" I say.
Everyone nods as the colour from their face drains.
"Found one. I say run."
Everyone nods before grabbing anything of use and legging it towards the others.
"Hey guys. What's the big rush?" Blackbeard asks as we come running up to the group of operators and prisoners seated in the center of the motor pool.
"We know what's in the crate!" Glaz yells as we run for one of the personnel trucks not destroyed.
"What is it?" Blitz yells at him as he begins loading the prisoners into the back of the truck.
"A Nuclear bomb that has 15 minutes till it goes boom!" I Yell as I begin throwing useful data and papers into the back of another truck.
Everyone instantly begins to rush, loading the rest of the prisoners, who are more than happy to get onto the truck, and throwing everything of use into others. After about seven minutes everyone piles into one of three trucks and we floor it upwind of the site.
After six minutes we are only about 4 kilometers away but that would have to do.
"EVERYONE HIT THE DECK." I Yell as I Stop the truck and jump out, digging myself a hole in the ground behind a sand dune, along with everyone else
Funny, here I am sitting in a hole that I just dug, hopefully out of range of any immediate injury, but for all I how, that thing will kill us all instantly, turning us to carbon and scattering us in the sand, won't hear from us again, for all they know, we escaped, and are somewhere in the desert. I think to myself as I sit there, hands covering my eyes, mouth open.
The it went off. Funny thing, everyone thinks that when a nuke goes off, you hear it instantly, but nope. Only thing that told me it went off was that I could see the bones in my fingers like an x-ray. I slowly removed my head from the sand and looked around to see everyone also looking around. I say a few of the prisoners standing up and looking in the direction of the detonation, mouths open. Some fell to their knees thanking whatever god they followed and crying tears of joy. I also stood up. What I saw I will never forget. Illuminating the night, was a rising mushroom cloud, but then I remembered something.
"EVERYONE HIT THE DECK!" I yell as I see the sand moving.
I'm too late as the blast wave hits me and throws me through the air. I'm okay, but I know that sand isn't as soft as people think. Then I hit the ground and am knocked out cold.
The Next Morning, Cairo, Egypt
POV: Grace Nam, CODENAME: DOKKAEBI
Cameron wasn't dead. He was just out cold with a fractured rib. We were lucky that he had remembered about the blast wave, or more people could have been worse. Evac had arrived twenty minutes after the blast, we were immediately given potassium iodide and were flown to Cairo where we were forced to stand in the shower for an hour to make sure that we didn't have any radioactive materials left on us.
All the prisoners were taken to the appropriate government where they would be tortured for information and then imprisoned or shot depending on what government got them.
Cameron was cleared to be released from hospital this morning and we would be flying back to Hereford this afternoon. Currently he was sleeping in his hospital bed, one operator was to be with him always, because Olivia and Logan had told us about the horrific nightmares he had. I had collected his phone and its accessories after they were decontaminated and had chosen a random song off the playlist that was still running and put the headphones in his ears. He has a strange way of listening to music. He would listen to one song over and over and over until he got bored of it and then would go no to the next. I had taken the liberty of choosing his most played song "Twilight Zone" by Golden Earring.
Suddenly, Cameron shot up in bed, eyes wide in terror. He looked around the room and saw me sitting there with my laptop. He recognized me and my emblem on the laptop cover, so he fell backwards onto the bed, quietly singing the lyrics to the song.
"Help I'm steppin' into the twilight zone
The place is a madhouse
Feels like being cloned
My beacon's been moved
Under moon and star
Where am I to go
Now that I've gone too far
Help I'm steppin' into the twilight zone
The place is a madhouse
Feels like being cloned
My beacon's been moved
Under moon and star
Where am I to go
Now that I've gone too far
Soon you will come to know
When the bullet hits the bone
Soon you will come to know
When the bullet hits the bone"
He then turned down the volume of the music before beginning to talk to me.
"How many casualties?" He asks, propping himself up with his elbows.
"Just you surprisingly, everyone else was lower to the ground so they hit it faster." I replied, closing the monitor to the laptop, where I was watching his vital signs.
"Probably didn't help that I was mesmerized by the mushroom cloud. Weird isn't it? I was looking at the immediate aftermath of the most destructive weapon known to mankind, and I was looking at it like it was the Mona Lisa."
"I'll be honest, after the blast passed, I think everyone watched it out of one eye while we looked for you." I say before shifting to a more personal matter. "Do you have the nightmare every night?"
He looks at me for a second, finding the words to explain, before he speaks. "Not every night. Lately I have only been getting it once or twice a week. And it has always ended the same way. It freezes a few milliseconds after impact and I am left sitting there, looking around at the windshield slowly shatter and the metal of the car slowly crumple. I don't dare look at my brother because seeing his death in slow motion is something I do not ever want to see."
"The song, it calmed you down instantly, why is that?" I ask.
He again took a deep breath, pondering his response before speaking. "It was the last song that me and my brother ever listened to together. The crash happened at the beginning of the next one."
He then slightly lifted the covers to the bed before looking around the room. "So." He said in a half question, half statement. "Where's my pants."
"Your case with clothes is over there." I say pointing at the black pelican case on top of a table.
"Yea I'll get changed after you leave." He says leaning back and picking up his phone, scrolling and presumably changing songs.
I grab by laptop and exit the room and walk down the hall to the lounge where the other operators are resting, still under medical observation.
"He's up." I say sitting down between Craig and Mike.
"Nightmare?" Glaz asks.
"Yea, and I figured what calms him down quickest." I reply
"What is it?" Craig questions, opening a can of Coke.
"Twilight Zone by Golden Earring."
"Oh, I remember when that came out. Everyone listened to it because it was the same band that made Radar Love" Mike recalled, looking thoughtfully at the ceiling.
"Whelp. I need something to eat. When's the transport arriving?"
"Half past 3 on the roof Helipad." Mike said, to which everyone stood up and dispersed, some going to see Cameron, others wandering the hospital to find food.