BOOK I - UNION

Chapter 10: Turmoil

NOTE: all vehicles here are left-hand drive

November 15 0630H

The sun rose over Yue Bay as Guderian Base was jammed pack with hundreds of trucks and thousands of men from all over the world. Out of the more than one hundred and seventy countries that exists in our world, some one hundred and fifty of them answered to Raiko's call just over a week ago. They gave tonnes and tonnes of supplies and have established a temporary 'tent city' outside of Guderian Base and it now houses over sixty thousand people.

Operations have now shifted from rescuing survivors to trying to feed and cloth them. All me and my squad did in a week was transferring boxes of food and other goodies from one truck to another and to waiting helicopters flying in and out of the base. So much for discovering an equalist lair... Well, fell into it to be exact. I could still remember my conversation with Korra about it during one of my breaks:

[{"After you got sent to the hospital... literally, I got back into the tunnel and discovered what looked like an underground warehouse of sorts. There were a handful if chi-blockers which I easily took down, what's in the warehouse was a whole different story." She took a drink from her waterskin while sitting down beside me on one of the benches in the base.. "They've got mecha-tanks Geraldt, not just the old ones but they've also got the newer models... the ones Kuvira used a year before."

"So I've heard" I said, eating a sandwich "the mecha-suits, they're still being used by the Earth Republic right?"

"Yeah they are." She bit her lips and looked at me straight in the eye. "Do you thing the Earth Republic is supplying them?"

I winced "I don't know, our governments still haven't released anything about it, but if it was indeed from the Earth Republic... shit's going to go down."

"That's what I was afraid of, not even three years and we might get another war in our hands."

I finished my sandwich and crumpled its plastic cover into a ball before throwing it into a trashcan nearby. "Welp, whatever they discovered its still really bad equalists have mecha-tanks again, in the middle of Republic City no less." I sighed. "If it wasn't fir the earthquake we might not have discovered it in time."

"Yeah." She replied tiredly, leaning forward and placing her elbows close to her knees. "You've still got boxes to move don't you?" She asked cheerfully

"Yep, but I've still got ten more minutes in my break."

"Ah." She leaned back onto the bench. "Soooo... watcha think of Asami?"

Wow that came out of nowhere "Excuse me?"

"You know, how she is and stuff like that."

"Ah.. well.. uh.." I tried but obviously failed at not stuttering.

"Come on Geraldt, no need to be embarrassed its just you and me here " That's the point isn't it

"Well I think she's nice..."

She leaned closer to me, grinning "and?"

"She's uhh, pretty? What the hell do you want Korra?"

"Since she's my girlfriend" she sat upright once more, away from me "its nice to know what other people think of her, be it negative or positive."

"Ah" hastily, I looked at my watch. "Seems like my break's almost up " I stood up and stretched a little. "nice talking to you again after that big-ass chunk if concrete knocked me out cold."

"Yeah." A faint smile appeared on her face. "Good luck sergeant."

I turned around. "You too Avatar Korra."}]

That was more or less how the conversation went, there are definitely discrepancies between this and what actually happened but that's as much as I could remember. Thinking about stuff like this definitely makes the mindless work less boring.

November 18 0900H

General Braun was seated behind his desk, busy as always, as I entered the office in the HQ building. He looked up after hearing me greet him with a salute wearing my fatigues and told me to sit on the chair in front of the desk.

"So sergeant, I heard your unit was used to help transfer the relief goods yes?"

"Yes sir."

"Well I've got new orders for your squad." He gave me the papers, signed by him.

I read it before reacting "So my unit is going to be transferred from Major Krugger to Captain Horton's because he doesn't have enough men?"

"That's right sergeant"

"Isn't Captain Horton's company the ones escorting the trucks going into the city?"

"Yes."

"Hmm... the major isn't going to be happy about this, we already don't have enough men as we were."

General Braun leaned back onto his chair and stroke his stubble. "You're right, but Horton's company needs replacements after, well... that incident and the fact that I'm their commanding officer."

Convoys are being escorted when they're sent to places outside the immediate vicinity of Republic City because there are a number of bandits who would happily attack unprotected trucks with lots and lots if food while the police is busy restoring order in the city itself. But that incident, a few days ago a convoy bound for some small isolated town close to the border with the Earth Republic was ambushed en route just a few kilometers from the town itself killing two soldiers and an aid worker, and wounding ten with six in critical condition forcing the Luftwaffe to divert one of its helicopters for a medevac. It was still unknown who the attackers exactly were, but what is known from the eight bodies recovered by the army that were riddled with bullets is that the attackers were earthbenders, no question about it (it was also based in the fact that they earthbended when they attacked the convoy). What is unknown is where they're from and who's their boss.

"Horton needs more men." The general continued "I can get some of those volunteers to replace you and your men from moving boxes around but I can't send them to be escorts, they're not army remember, just civilian volunteers."

"I understand sir"

"Very well, report to Captain Horton after you give the papers to Major Krugger." He waved me off nonchalantly.

"Yes sir." I stood up and saluted, he replied with his salute sitting down. I then got out of the office, and the HQ building headed to Major Krugger.

On the way to his tent (which was on the other side if the base) I heard helicopters taking off and landing from the airfield which is just behind the HQ building and I could also hear several more flying around. This sure is a busy place. As I walked across the base I could see the big open area where trucks from Germany come to drop their goodies off to be transferred, it was literally a big open grassland with some rudimentary fencing to keep people out. It was 'built' just four days after the quake as an extension of the base and is now occupying an area half as big as the base itself with a capacity of several hundred trucks (the whole base including the airfield was about five square kilometers big by now).

Fifteen minutes later I arrived at the major's tent, and after composing myself and asked for permission, went it.

"Morning sir" I saluted then gave him the paper. "Orders from General Braun." I stood at attention

He stood up and walked around the plastic foldable table and took the paper. Reading it one of his eyebrows shot up before getting back to normal. "Huh, well at least I'll get replacements." He whispered, then got back to his chair behind the table. "Alright, sergeant you should go and round your men up while I do the paperwork."

"Yes sir." I saluted and got out of the tent, breathing in the not so polluted air heavily, I let out a sight. Finally I'm going to be out there again!

Captain Horton was busy assigning squads to escort the convoys when we finally met him at the staging area. Me and my squad of ten are already fully decked out with our gears when we reported to the captain. Our equipment includes the standard H&K 417 carbine version, the H&K USP pistol, body armor (because why not), knee and elbow pads, the standard uniform set (fatigue, helmet, boots) with the Flecktarn camouflage pattern, gloves, and radios.

"Captain Horton?" I said as I approached him.

He looked up from the small clipboard he was holding and started scrutinizing me. "Staff Sergeant Tchaikovsky is it?"

"Yes sir."

"Good good, is that your squad?" He pointed using his ballpen to the small clump of men talking to each other a few meters away.

"Yes sir, all ten of us."

"Okay..." He started through the papers on the clipboard. "You're on convoy C8 bound for the Makapu Evacuation Center, its about a hundred something kilometers to the east on the far side of the volcano which didn't get affected by the pyroclastic flow." he put the clipboard down "the convoy's got ten supply trucks and two HUMVEEs with fifty cals, one up front and one in the back. The route you'll be taking is mountainous so don't be surprised if the road gets blocked by landslides, right now we don't know if they are since we've only flown chopper to the evacuation center and not land convoys... if you were to encounter a blockage of the road then get your ass back here."

"Yes sir, but a hunvee?" I asked puzzled. "Don't we use eagles?"

"Yeah, they're part of the deal with the Americans which included artillery pieces and all the other military goodies... have you been living under a rock sergeant? That got signed months ago."

"Oh, well I heard about it but didn't really read into it."

He shrugged "Now you know" he glanced at his watch. "They convoy will be moving in half an hour, you should get going sergeant."

"Yes sir." I saluted then went to where the rest of my squad is.

After briefing them we went on to where convoy C8 was parked which was thankfully not in the clusterfuck of the extended truck parking area. Instead, C8 was parked somewhere in the same staging area we were in. As we approached C8 I observed that each of the trucks have the red cross painted onto the white canvass coverings. Wow, these are definitely not army trucks. The trucks looked like the ones used for delivery in the cities back in our world. Damn, are we really that overstretched?

"Heyyy!"

I could hear a girl shouting, scanning around trying to locate the source I saw here beside the lead truck waving at us to get closer. She's got black hair with fair skin wearing the red cross t-shirt with jeans and rubber shoes. Beside the trucks I could see several more red cross guys talking.

"Heyyy!" The girl shouted again accompanied by waving.

"Lets go guys." I said to the squad tilting my head towards the girl. "Hallo" The word came out of my mouth instinctively as we approached her.

"Hey! My name's Rachel, good to finally meet you." She walked ahead and shook my hands. Wait did she just spoke to me in english?

I looked down and sure enough the Union Jack was on her left shoulder patch. Well I'll be damned, she's British! Hope my english is still good, quite a while since the last time I conversed in english.

"Hallo! I'm Oberfeldwebel Tchaikovsky of the 3rd Company, United Republic Command."

"Ah, like the famous pianist?" she asked.

"Yeah, but we're not related in any way."

"Mmhmm" She glanced at me through the corner of her eyes before turning around towards the trucks, mumbling something.

A quick glance at the other red cross men confirms they're a British contingent. Well, at least there's international help coming in. I checked my watch : 0945H. Hmm fifteen minutes left before we move out, better get the men ready.

"Hey sarge! The fifties doesn't have the kevlar turret! Not even a cheap-ass gun shield!" Herman was in the front of the convoy pointing at the humvee parked there. "I mean, jesus fuck it still got the desert camo on! Where do they think we are, Afghanistan? It doesn't even have any of the armor add-ons."

"What the hell did you expect?" Ruderford, who was standing beside me, shouted back. "Do you really think they'll give us brand new out-of-the-factory humvees complete with all the weapons and armor? Of course not!"

"Hey hey pipe down, both of you." I interrupted to prevent it boiling into a full blown argument. "Doc, get the men sorted... I'll want three into both of the humvees and the remaining spread out throughout the trucks of the convoy."

"Got it sarge" Ruderford nodded in agreement, then went to start shuffling the troops.

Rachel tapped my shoulder to get my attention, "Hey sergeant, quick question how's the disposition of the troops gonna be?" she said it with somewhat of a twinkle in her eyes.

"Okay, the humvees will have three guys: one driver, one radio operator, and one gunner. The remaining four men would be spread out riding with you guys on every other truck starting from the second one."

"Hmm, so would you be riding with us?"

"Nein... I mean no, I'll be in front with the lead humvee."

"Okay then!" She jolted. "Lets get moving, we don't want to be late now do we?" She said winking.

1210H, 32km East of Makapu Evacuation Center

Two hours in and we're just a little over halfway there. The first fourty kilometers was very nice, we got to see some lovely landscape and since we were travelling on a modern-ish highway, it took us no time to reach the base of the mountainous region. Starting from that point the convoy can't move more than fourty kmph since the quake damaged portions of the underdeveloped road (two way with one lane each, unpaved).

The road wind and zigzagged up and down the mountain as the road was built on the mountain side with a several hundred foot drop right beside us, though the view was spectacular. About an hour more we entered what looked like a valley though the valley slope are just gentle rolling hills and are not very steep.

"That's strange, this doesn't look like the one in the map." Herman commented, he was the driver on the lead humvee, while I sat on the passenger seat. Klaus (some new guy who got assigned to me) is up top on the fifty cal.

I took the map out from the glove compartment as I hummed and started comparing our surroundings to the ones in the map. Hmm the land's greyish here, there are even quite a lot of boulders lying around on the hills. That's to be expected from the ash that came from the volcano, damn and just a few kilometers back most of it still looked green.

"So sarge, we going the right way?" Herman sounded concerned.

"Yeah we are." I replied "There's only one road after we got off the highway, I mean have we even got to any kind of intersection yet?"

"You're right, we haven't. God this is a long-ass road." He said as I fold the map and placed it back into the glove compartment.

"We're still about thirty kilometers away from Makapu and at this rate..." I looked over to the speedometer "Thirty six-thirty five kilometers per hour, yeah an hour more."

He sighed. "Damn, and I though the road trip would be exciting, this is kinda underwhelming."

"Hey you should be happy we're out of the bloody base, when was the last time we got out? Three, four months ago?"

"Yeah I guess, sir."

The car fell into silence , before long my eyes started getting heavy. Ugh not now, should've drank more coffee before we moved out. I closed my eyes for a moment letting it rest and tipped my helmet down to block at least some of the sun, but then I was suddenly jolted by someone shaking me.

"Hey sarge wake up, we got a big problem." It was Herman.

"Ugh, what now?" I rubbed my eyes trying to remove the sleepiness within it.

"Well um sir, the road's blocked up ahead."

"What?" I looked ahead and sure enough, it was blocked by fairly big boulders. Damn I knew they warned me about this but really? Ugh. I reached for the radio between me and Herman. "All units halt, the road's blocked ahead. Stay put and wait for further orders." Herman stopped the humvee a couple of meters from the debris as I announced it in the radio.

"What now sir?" he asked, disappointed.

"Hmm, I wonder..." The boulders only blocked the road but not up the gentle slope of the hills I reached for the radio. "Hey doc, can you ask one of the truck drivers if they'll be able to climb the right side, it looked like it has maybe a twenty degree inclination."

"Yes sir."

I waited for his reply.

"Negative sir, he says its too steep with the amount of load the truck has on right now."

Damn. "Okay, thanks doc. Out."

"What now sir?" Herman asked again.

I put the radio back. "Orders were to turn back if we got blocked, so it looks like..."

Whizz... Crack!

Something warm got splattered all over my face, as I opened my eyes to check what the hell just happened and saw my whole body was covered in red. What the fuck, blood!? I looked towards Herman and saw blood gushing out of his throat that he tried covering it with his hands, at the same time it sounded like he was chocking. What the fuck is happening. My heart started racing, everything felt so slow yet so fast. Training kicked in, I immediately went and covered his throat with my hands and tried to apply pressure to somehow stop the bleeding. "Fuck fuck fuck! Dont' die now!"

"Ambush! Contact right!" Klaus shouted as he swung the fifty cal around and started firing but after just a few bursts it went silent and then I heard a loud thump.

I turned my head to the back of the humvee, still holding onto Herman's neck and saw Karl's lifeless body slumped on the seat with a hole right on his face. Oh god this is not happening now.

Whizz whizz whizz... Crack crack... Ping!

Gunfire, gunfire everywhere. The humvee was unarmoured so the bullets started whizzing inside the humvee.

Pak!

Something hit my helmet knocking me to the side, I tried staying as low as possible within the car. Standard procedure would have us dismount onto the opposite direction from where the fire was coming from and use the vehicles as cover but now...

Splat!

My hands that were still on Herman's throat gave way under his weight as he slumped forward, his head hitting the steering wheel hard. Fuck! I retracted my hands and curled up as best I could and as deep as I could go from my seat, my face looking down to avoid getting injured from shrapnel. At around the same time the unarmoured windshield got shattered as did the windows, sending shards down my way.

Pak!

Another round hit my back which had type four bulletproof ballistic plate inserted in the vest, knocking me around while I was in a fetal position.

It went on for god knows how long and then as quickly as they started, stopped. I gripped my rifle and took it out of safety, I didn't know what to expect. Should I pop up and check? They could be waiting for me to just do that and pick me off... but if I stay like this and they closed in I'm also dead... choose choose choose! Blood was dripping onto me from the dashboard above. Fuck what should I do?

I waited and waited for probably just a few seconds. God... Fuck it! I'm not going down without a fight! In breathed in deeply, then popped up from the seat rifle at the ready looking forward and there it is... A man climbing down the boulders holding several sticks of dynamite bundled together. Wait... green googles, grey clothes... fuck, equalists?! how the hell... He froze as he saw me pointing a gun at him, probably scared shitless too.

Bang!

A single shot right in the center mass was all it took for him to go down, I quickly swung to the right and saw dozens of them coming down from the hills. What the fuck! Some of them froze when they heard the shot and saw the guy with the dynamite hit the dirt, others started running towards me. Wait none of them have guns, just their normal stuff. Fuck, does that mean there's a hell of a lot more of them? Fuck!

As the running equalists got closer, they're the ones I targeted first. One... two... three... fou... Gah miss... four!

Click, click

Shit, out of ammo... I need to reload. Fuck, they're still coming!

Pak!

A round hit Herman's body as I was reloading making me instinctively duck down. God! They're not done yet! I finished reloading and was bout to pop up once more, but then I heard was sounds to be some kind of a bugle. Oh god, are they sounding some sort of attack signal? I'm so fucked. I popped back up but managed to fire only a few rounds before being forced down again by what seems to be a lone sniper somewhere on the left of the convoy. Shit if that guy was on this side he could've killed me long ago!

The fire intensified, though unlike earlier this one was coming just from one source and was more concentrated rather than sporadic and all over the place. Shit he really wants me to keep down huh. I stayed down for a couple of seconds more trying to build up the courage to pop up, but then the fire stopped. He's reloading, now's my chance. I got up and readied my rifle, looking down the sights to shoot at... nothing. They're gone? Was the bugle a retreat?

"Fuck!"

I got back down. No it can't be, they won't just leave without finishing their job. No no no, its a trap. They're going to draw me out of the car and then shoot me when I'm out in the open. I reached for the radio which somehow miraculously escaped any damage, probably because it was shielded by Herman's body.

"All units report!" I shouted at the radio in both English and German but was greeted with silence. Fuck, are they all dead? "All units, report!"

"Its doc! I'm still alive." Phew, at least he's alive.

"Anyone else?"

"Jackson and Mike, sir. (fifth truck)""Ken, still good. (sixth truck)""Its Eckstein and Wagner sir. (rear humvee)".

"Anyone else?" I said. The radio crackled but nothing came out of it. Shit, is this all that's left? I sighed heavily "Everyone stay where you are and get as low as you could, the firing has stopped but they might still come again, copy?"

"Yes sir." came the reply.

"Good, convoy lead out." I returned the radio to the holder and used the lull in the fight to look around the humvee to see what damage has been done. Blood was everywhere, the shattered glass, the dashboard, seats, hell even the roof, a body beside me slumped onto the steering wheel with blood dripping out from both his throat and a hole on his cheek, and another body in the seat in the back contorted in a very uncomfortable position with a gaping hole where his nose used to be... soaking his face and the his upper uniform in blood, his lifeless bloodied eyes staring into my soul.

Now it was my turn to slump down on my seat panting heavily. I tried to relax but failed, with my whole body still dosed with adrenaline my hands started to shake. Oh fuck. My whole body was still tense and soaked in other people's blood, a friend's blood. I sat and waited... waited... but nothing happened. If they really left then I really need to go and check on the men. I was about to get out of the humvee but then I remembered something. You fucking moron! Why the fuck haven't you radioed HQ yet? God!

HQ was shocked to learn about the ambush, they're sending three UH-1 Hueys and a Eurocopter Tiger (for escort) to pick us all up and bring some demo guys to blow the trucks up in order to prevent in from falling into the enemy. We're too far away to drive back to base and all of the six survivors are injured one way or another.

I placed the radio down before sighing again, it seemed like I'm the only one unscratched somehow. Dismounting from the humvee I started walking cautiously towards the truck doc's in, the second one, but out of nowhere extreme pain shot up my right leg the moment I took the first step with that leg. "Ahhh! Fuck!" I collapsed down onto the ground, cursing. "Fuuuuuuckkkkkkk!"

I looked down and saw my right leg drenched in blood but the left only having some splatters here and there. I grabbed my right leg with both my hands, going up and down to find where I've been shot.

"There it is." I murmured, feeling a small hole on the right side of the thigh. Fuck... and I thought I wasn't hit.

"Hey sarge... Sarge!"

I looked to the direction of the convoy and saw Ruderford running towards me, using the trucks as cover.

"Jesus sarge." He exclaimed as he saw the hole and blood on my pants. "Come on get up." He fireman carried me over to the second truck of the convoy before putting me down beside the front left wheel. "So, what did HQ say sarge?"

"They're going to fetch us... nghh" he got his first aid kid out, then proceeded to treat the wound as best he could, he then got a piece of cloth from the truck and wrapped it around the wound. "Where's the rest of the men?"

"Still in their vehicles sir, you did order them not to come out."

"Ahh... nghh. Go get them and form up here." I wearily scanned the hills in front me. "Don't think they're coming back, heh if they did we're still dead anyway."

"Okay sir." He got up and jogged towards the rear of the bullet-ridden convoy while trying to stay low.

Heh... fuck me. Wait, Rachel's on this truck right? I forced myself to get up and opened the door of the truck and tried painfully to climb up and take a peek inside. I was greeted by a girl lying on her side on the seat with a pool of blood surrounding her head, beside her on the driver's seat was a guy laying back onto the seat, a bullet hole on his forehead and the windshield in front of him, blood splattering all over the rear of the cabin. The whole truck was riddled with bullet holes, its a wonder the engine's still running.

Fuck.

I got back down and started hopping with one leg to towards the rear when doc came back with the rest of the survivors. They're badly beaten up.

"Sir..." Eckstein struggled to talk "what... do we do now?"

The gaze of their eyes latched onto me. "We'll..." need to survive "bunker up on the rear humvee since its the least fucked up with the evidence that two guys survived and we'll wait for the evac to come, they told me ETA is about twenty minutes so we'll need to hold out until then. Shit, from the looks of it Eckstein has a bloodied face while Wagner got shot in the shoulder, and those three red cross guys got shot in the legs and in his side, and two in their arms. They seem patched up though, damn doc was fast... or was I staring at the bodies for far too long? "We need to move, now. Follow me." I started hopping towards the rear, but was stopped by Ruderford.

"You're not getting anywhere fast like that, come on I'll help you out." he said, wrapping my right arm over his shoulders.

"Thank I guess."

"Just doing my job sarge, now come on."

We slowly trudged along the convoy before arriving on the humvee.

"Someone get on the fifty cal and take overwatch, the rest try to rest and..." And what? I just let the sentence slide away.

Ruderford took overwatch as he was the least injured among us, just some scratches and bruises here and there. The twenty minutes that he was up there though was tense, we didn't know if the equalists were done or just waiting for the choppers to come and shoot them down. Now now, calm down Geraldt, calm down.

I sat on the ground with my back leaning against one of the wheels and closed my eyes. Fuck, how the hell did this happen... the gunfire, it sounded too familiar... That's right, the G36! I'll never forget that sound, being years in the army with that weapons its bound to get ingrained in your mind. But how? How the fuck did they get them? Fuck, my head hurts already.

"Charlie eight charlie eight, this is Hotline one, how copy over?"

The radio in the humvee crackled as we started hearing the sound of choppers inbound, Ruderford got down from the fifty cal and answered it.

"Hotline one this is charlie eight, read you loud and clear."

"Okay charlie eight, nice to hear your voices, ETA is two minutes."

"Copy that hotline one."

"Affirmitive, hotline one out."

"You hear that sarge? ETA two minutes."

"Yeah doc, loud and clear." It was on speakers.

He got back to the fifty cal as I got up and went around the men to see how they're doing which doesn't look very good. The guy that's fucked up the most, Mike, had already lost quite a lot of blood from the wound in his left torso right below the rib cage... he might not survive. The other two volunteers, Jackson and Ken, is fairing better. Eckstein and Wagner, looks ok so far but might get medically discharged from service later on from the looks of their injuries.

"Sarge, the chopper's here!" Ruderford exclaimed.

I clenched my rifle and became more alert, waiting for anything bad to happen but luckily there weren't. The Hueys landed a little to the back and several men dismounted carrying body bags and walked past us going towards the convoy to retrieve the bodies. Several medics with the red cross on their sleeves Mike and Ken onto stretchers while the rest us walked (in my case hopped) into the third Huey with the help of other medics. The stretchers were placed on the floor while the rest of the guys sat down on the benches and strapped in, the medic gave the signal to the pilot as he closed the door and the chopper started gaining altitude.

When we were about a hundred meters up and started banking to the left I looked out the window and saw the bodies being put into the body bags and getting laid on the road in neat rows while a man was writing something down on a clipboard, with the Eurocopter Tiger circling above looking out for them.

I closed my eyes knowing its finally safe to relax and heaved a sigh of relief as it was over, the five odd minutes of death and hell.

Press Report 20 November, 2015

Convoy C8 was ambushed en-route to Makapu Evacuation Center at approximately 1230H local time, thirty two kilometers east of their destination. Members of the escort group as well as the British Red Cross suffered heavy casualties and were eventually evacuated via helicopter from the area and are now back in Guderian Base receiving medical treatment.

Reports from the escort group indicates that the terrorist organization known as the 'Equalists' were responsible and manage to procure rifles and large quantities of ammunition to stage the ambush.

As of today, two days after the incident, confirmed casualties include twenty three killed and seven wounded during the incident out of thirty personnel in the convoy, the list will be included in the next press report. The bodies retrieved will be sent back to their home nations after the autopsy is completed.

United Republic Command