12 – THE WRATH OF THE GHOST OF NOT KEVIN
Patton stood outside the Yellow's base entrance structure in the canyon as warm morning sun washed upon his armor, shotgun cleaned meticulously, out, and at the ready. Ryan stood behind him with his rocket launcher perched on his shoulder, the strap of a grenade launcher slung across his other. They were awaiting the arrival of Lemon Squadron, and Patton had ordered Ryan to look as badass as possible for the occasion, hence the poses and heavy weaponry.
"Any idea when they're going to arrive, boss?" Ryan asked.
Patton shook his head. "Within the next hour, I believe. Lemon isn't known for being supremely punctual; being unpredictable keeps you alive."
"And we have to stay here the whole time?"
"Hobar, do you remember that Blue Hunter holosim I showed you when you first got posted to this base?"
Ryan thought back. "Is that the simulation where you go around killing unsuspecting Blues with a shotgun, and the goal is to kill all of them without anyone noticing you?"
Patton nodded. "Yup, that's the one. My favorite."
"And how does that have anything to do with right now?"
"It teaches you how to be patient. In other words, shut up and don't talk."
"Yessir," Ryan grunted, shifting the rocket launchers center of gravity.
The two of them continued standing there for some more minutes. That was when Patton noticed something moving towards them from the other end of the canyon. No, two somethings: upon closer inspection via his helmet's magnifier, it turned out to be a Warthog and a Mongoose.
For a moment, he thought it might be Lemon, arriving in an unexpected way, which was to be expected of them. But the vehicles were coming from the direction of Green Base.
"It's the Green replacement team, FART, or whatever they call themselves," Patton realized aloud. "They're actually giving it another go. How stupid are these people?"
"Bordering on non-sentient, I'd guess." Ryan added. Patton grunted in agreement.
The Yellows continued watching the Green's Warthog as it neared them. The Mongoose followed behind, which was being driven by the Green Ryan had blown into the air with his rocket launcher on their last encounter. After some moments, the two vehicles finally reached their base. The Greens hopped out and walked up to Patton and Ryan. Ryan readied his grenade launcher, but Patton motioned for him to stand down.
"So then, what the hell are you people doing here again?" Patton asked their leader, who was named Roche or something if he remembered correctly. Chocolates…yes, that's his name. Ferrero Rocher.
After a moment, he thought now I want chocolate. Great.
"You are going to surrender the prisoner to us," Rocher ordered Patton, breaking the Yellow commander from his thoughts of sugary treats.
Ryan interrupted: "We don't have-"
Patton made a slashing motion with his hand, silencing him before he could complete his sentence.
"Let's not tell them that just yet," he whispered over his TEAMCOM. "I want to see exactly what they try on us."
Ryan nodded. "Fair enough." He stepped back slightly, but raised his grenade launcher as he did; the perfect stance to arc a 40mm grenade around Patton and into the Greens.
Patton turned back to face Rocher. "So then, what's to stop us from just killing all of you the instant you try to get past us?"
Rocher crossed his arms. "Ah, but can you kill someone who is already dead?"
Patton snickered. "What the hell are you talking about?"
Rocher pointed at the driver of the Mongoose and laughed: "Behold the spirit of the soldier you killed on our last encounter, bent upon revenge. The Ghost of Not Kevin will go through all of you and destroy your base with his ghost powers if you do not surrender!"
"I still can't believe we're actually going through with this," the soldier, Not Kevin apparently, groaned.
Rezah got on the hood of the Warthog (again, Patton noted) and shouted at the Yellows: "You are completely defenseless against the spirit of this guy. Victory is our guaranteed! It is pointless to resist!"
Patton was on the verge of busting out laughing. "Let me make this simple," he told the Greens. "We're not surrendering, so leave before we do to you what we did last time. Except this time you won't be leaving."
Rocher turned to Not Kevin. "Not Kevin, it is time to show these fools that we cannot be defeated. Invade their base. Take the prisoner!"
"What?" Kevin responded. "How the hell am I supposed to do that?"
Rocher shrugged. "Um, just go through a wall or something. However you ghosts do things. I don't care. Just get in the base somehow!"
Confusedly, Not Kevin approached the door into the Yellow's base, which was closed like last time, Patton having sealed it with a press of his tacpad the instant he recognized his enemy approaching. He put his hands up and touched them to the door's surface and pushed. Then he pushed harder. He grunted with the effort. Finally, he told Rocher: "I don't know what you thought would happen, but this isn't working."
Rocher thought for a moment. "Ah, I see the problem," he finally realized. "His armor is holding him back. Not Kevin, remove your armor."
Kevin stood still for a moment, shocked, then crossed his arms and shook his head. "Okay, I am getting really fed up with this. Look, I am not a ghost, and I'm sure as hell not taking off my armor in front of Yellows!"
"It's an order, soldier," Rocher informed him, jabbing his finger at Kevin. "You may be dead and all, but you're still under my command, at least until you see the light or whatever. Just do as I say."
"An order," Rezah shouted at him. "Ooooooo!" He drew back with a gasp.
Kevin growled: "Fine, I'll take off my armor and then you'll see I'm not a ghost!"
And so, less than five meters from where Patton and Ryan stood, he began removing his armor. It was a very lengthy process that took (on average) about an hour, so the progress was slow.
Patton and Ryan watched in stunned disbelief as Kevin continued to slowly remove sections of his armor.
"These are Greens we're watching, right?" Ryan asked his boss. "Not Blues? Because these guys are on a level of fucking stupid that I don't think I've ever seen before. I mean, shit, those guys who clog the Internet with bad Star Wars fanfictions are probably smarter than these guys!"
"This is truly amazing," Patton agreed. He glanced up at the sky, then noted "I hope Lemon Squadron gets here soon. They really shouldn't miss this."
"I'm getting popcorn," said Ryan. He went through the entrance door. As soon as it opened, the Greens perked up. But Ryan was quick, having been the youngest in a family of six, and he had done this plenty of times; the door closed again before the Greens had a chance to even begin running for it. Ryan came back out with a full batch of popcorn some moments later. Clair and Amber followed behind him, keeping a quick stride, as Ryan had advised them so that the door remained open for as short an instant as possible. Additionally, they hurried so that they could catch the strangeness that Ryan had reported was happening outside their base. By this time, Kevin was nearly done changing out of his armor, with only the waist and thigh plates still on, those being the hardest to remove.
"I'm glad we didn't tell them about the prisoner," Ryan remarked to Patton quietly. "If we had, we would never have gotten the chance to see this."
"Agreed. And no one better say anything about it now either." Patton sent the last comment over TEAMCOM so Amber and Clair could hear it.
"Wilco." Clair replied.
"No problems here," Amber agreed, chuckling. "No way in hell I'm going to mess this up."
"Please tell me you're recording this," Ryan muttered.
"Of course I am. Might as well get some use out of my helmet cam."
By this time, Kevin was completely out of his armor. He was average height, light skinned, with brown hair and eyes of a similar color. His apparel was just a white shirt and red undershorts: his pajamas. His choice of clothing wasn't surprising to any of the Yellows; as most soldiers in all armies spent almost all their time in their armor, no one saw what they were wearing. And, more often than not, the only reason they would remove it would be to sleep on leave. Wearing pajamas underneath meant the time used to change from normal clothing to sleepwear could now be used for more sleep, even if it was only a couple minutes at the most.
Fully unarmored, Kevin briskly strode to the door a second time. Again, he pushed against it, and again he was unable to get through it. He turned back to face the other Greens. "You see!" he shouted, throwing out his arms. "I am NOT a freaking ghost!"
"Your clothes are just holding you back," Rocher said after some more thought. "All outer layers must be removed from the body. Clothes included. That must be why it's still not working."
Clair giggled, Ryan began snickering, and Amber stared in shock and awe. Patton simply shifted his position and subtly wiped away a small smudge that had appeared on his shotgun's barrel.
"No," Kevin responded firmly. "No, I am not getting naked in front of a bunch of Yellows, especially when there's two girls up there! That's not happening."
"I order it!" Rocher shouted at him, putting surprising force behind it.
"You know what, fuck you!" Kevin shouted back, just as forceful. "I'm sick of this. You forget my name, make decisions that put us all in needless danger, fail to listen to common sense and simple facts and now…THIS! I've had enough. I'm not doing this anymore." He took a deep breath and then shouted: "FUCK YOU!" as loud as he could.
With that, he made for the Mongoose, taking the pieces of his of his armor with him.
"I order you to get back there, take your clothes off, and infiltrate the base!" Rocher continued shouting after him.
Kevin got on the Mongoose, gunned the engine, and, flipping his CO the finger, vrommed off towards the shoreline, sending twin plumes of dust into the air. The other Greens stared after him, with Rocher still shouting.
"I think we should tell them now," Ryan suggested to Patton.
Patton nodded. "Yup, it's time for the punch line."
"Tell us what?" Rocher asked, Patton having spoke loud enough for him to hear.
"That we don't actually have the prisoner." The Yellow commander said calmly.
Rocher gave a nervous laugh. "That's…that's not actually very funny."
"No, we really don't," Ryan elaborated. "We transported him to a more secure location last evening. He's not here." He shrugged, shifting his rocket launcher to do so. "Sorry."
"Oh, and why should I believe you?" Rocher asked, voice taking on a desperate edge.
"Why would we lie about it?" Patton said back, still calm as ever. "You obviously don't have the means to get inside our base. If we still did have him, then what would be in it for us to tell you we don't?"
Rocher stood in place for a few seconds while he let the facts sink in. "Shhhhhit," he finally proclaimed, slamming his palm across his visor. "This whole thing was completely pointless, wasn't it?"
"Yup," said Ryan. "Well, for you anyway."
"But worth watching, definitely," commented Clair.
"And posting on YellowTube," Amber noted, referencing the Yellow Army's open-source video posting site.
Rocher angrily growled: "Well, we can still infiltrate your base anyways! Open fire on the Yellows!"
Patton responded to Rocher's spontaneous act of desperation by walking up to the already embarrassed Commander, yanking the assault rifle from his hands, and kneeing him in the gut before he had a chance to retaliate. Patton then pointed Lucy's barrel at the Green's forehead as he attempted to suck air into his lungs.
"Now listen," he ordered Rocher. "Just because what happened this time was funny as hell, I'm going to let you live. But if you ever so much as think about attacking this base or any member of my team again, your brains will be scattered across the backdrop of the canyon wall before you can blink. Is that clear?"
Reluctantly, Rocher nodded. "Yes."
"Yes, sir! Say it!"
"Yes…sir," Rocher growled, voice tainted with hate.
Patton gave him a brutal shove that sent him back a good two meters and removed Lucy's barrel from his forehead. "Now fuck off, before I change my mind."
Rocher made for the Warthog. "Retreat," he ordered Rezah and Mr. Boom. "Our mission has ended in vain." Rezah and Mr. Boom took their places in the vehicle, and the Greens drove off in defeat.
"You haven't seen the last of us!" Rezah howled, despite what Patton had just told his CO. Patton simply chuckled.
"Wow, you really told them, boss," Ryan commented.
"Prick had it coming." Patton said, shrugging. "It's kind of sad that Lemon Squadron missed this, though. Hester would have gotten a kick out of it."
"No worries. I got it." Amber noted, tapping the side of her helmet. "I'll upload it to YellowTube with the rest of this little scene. Featured video here I come!"
"Very good. He checked the time on his HUD. "Speaking of Lemon, they should be here any minute now."
"I think I'll go back inside," Clair said. "It looks like the show's over, and I've got stuff to do."
"Me too," said Amber. "I need to get this footage off my cam and onto the web before I forget. That, and take some time to take my mind off of what I just saw."
She shuddered, hard enough for her armor to clatter against itself.
"I think I'll stay, though," said Ryan. "I've always wanted to meet the legendary Lemon Squadron. By the way, do they autograph?"
"No," said Patton.
"Oh," Ryan muttered, disappointed. "Oh, well. Seeing them in person should be more then awesome enough."
"Don't forget, you're standing next to one already," Patton reminded him.
"Oh, that's right. I keep forgetting. You know, I still can't believe you didn't tell me you used to be a member until just yesterday."
"Well, you were on a need to know basis."
"True."
Patton continued: "If anyone can be relied upon to stop the Reds, it's them. I just hope to God or reality or whatever that they'll be enough…"
Patton paused, then tilted his head sideways, listening to something. After a moment, he looked straight up.
The rest of his team followed his example. Above them, burning brilliantly against the darkening sky, three sparks of light could be seen, growing bigger by the second.
"Stand too, soldiers." Patton barked. "Lemon's here!"
