Comrades in Arms
Chapter 20: Operation Patriot – Opening Volley
February 30th, 2140
The small Titan slowly cut its forward thrust and began to descend slowly downwards onto the top of the ice wall. Powder snow kicked upwards in clouds which melted and crystallized as the Titan touched down onto the ground and its propulsion drives went dark. Shortly afterward, three assault pods burst from its right flank and vectored over the cliff edge, crashing into the street below. At the same time, another five people – three in EU uniforms, two in snow-white camouflage garb – emerged from the Titan's interior and stood on the aft deck. A ramp extended down to the ground, and they disembarked as a group.
Kosarkov keyed his radio and spoke a brief order. "Snipers, report in."
"Ground team taking positions," replied the voice of one of the snipers, who had rode the assault pod over the cliff edge Kosarkov now stood facing.
Good. They were almost ready, and the convoy was not due to arrive for another twenty minutes. Enough time to fully set up.
The two snipers on the top of the cliff moved to take their designated positions, each of them bearing powerful Zeller-H rifles. Due to their closer proximity and greater need for rapid fire, the ground team were using Park 52s – less powerful, but with more shots in a single magazine.
Kosarkov removed a pair of high-power binoculars from his belt and scanned the street below, where the arms convoy was supposed to pass by. As he watched, the mercenary came up behind him, dressed in European combat gear and carrying – much to his disgust – a Turcotte Rapid SMG.
"Anything?" he asked shortly.
"Not for another twenty minutes, as far as intel goes," Kosarkov replied, not removing his eyes from the lenses of the binoculars.
The mercenary didn't seem to be satisfied with that and keyed his radio. "Vashkin. Call in a local area Sat-Track on this street. Best to know where our convoy is," he ordered.
"Gotcha. Calling now…" Alexei Vashkin replied. Keystrokes and electronic beeps could be heard in the background as he spoke.
The line went silent for a few seconds as Vashkin called in the orbital satellites to scan the area.
"Alright, I see them. They're about fifteen minutes away," he clarified.
Kosarkov had been listening to their chatter, and keyed his radio again. "Snipers, be ready. ETA fifteen minutes. Lock and load."
Rapid, successive acknowledgements came in, and the saboteur felt his determination set in. His hands clenched and unclenched.
"Sarov, bring the guns to the cargo bay. I want the transfer to happen as fast as possible," Kosarkov said.
"Sure thing," Sarov replied, jogging back up the Titan's ramp to drag the crates of EMP-modified weaponry to the front of the cargo bay.
The soldiers waited in their positions for the next ten or so minutes, having no last minute preparations to take care of. The cold wind swirled powder snow across their faces, blowing up a haze that would cover them from view, but would not – thanks to the snipers' scopes – restrict their own vision.
It was eleven minutes before one of the snipers broke radio silence.
"Control, this is sniper element Stinger, we have visual on contacts."
Kosarkov quickly replied. "Copy that. Wait until they are within established parameters. Co-ordinated shots. Hit the front and end of the convoy first."
"Understood."
Switching his channel, Kosarkov now spoke to Takiguchi.
"Command, this is Recon. Commencing Operation Patriot…now," he reported.
Hardly had Takiguchi replied before the snipers reported in.
"Control, immediate. This is Echo, first vehicle in range." The snipers had assigned themselves code names based on their position along the street. Alpha was the one that would be furthest away from the convoy, while Echo was the closest…and the first to spot them.
"Echo, Alpha. No shot, hold fire. I'll hit the first one," Alpha replied.
"Copy, Alpha."
The convoy of trucks slowly approached the strike zone. Four of them – large ones with 14 wheels and wing doors on the left side of their containers. They drove at around the speed of a Groundhog APC, and it was a long, nerve-wracking wait before Alpha broke the silence.
"This is Alpha. I have a shot on the lead."
"Echo, I have a shot on the rear."
Kosarkov had been listening silently, but now he gave the go-ahead.
"All open fire."
Two near-simultaneous BOOMs of Zeller fire tore through the silence of the frozen plain. Through their scopes, the cliff-positioned snipers saw the windows of the trucks crack and their drivers heads' jerk sideways from the force of a heavy, armour-piercing sniper round.
From far below, the quieter cracks of Park rifles resounded – four shots. Then silence for a few seconds before doors were opened and rapid staccato sputtering noises of Takao pistol fire.
"Convoy dead," reported a sniper on the ground.
It was such a clinical, calculated approach to battle. Sniping tended to detach a soldier from the actual emotions of combat – especially for the more accomplished snipers. The chaos of battle did not affect them – they created it. They were the ones who instilled the panic among enemy ranks.
"Everybody back on board. Vashkin, bring the Titan up as soon as we're on," Kosarkov ordered.
"Engines hot. Ready to move," Vashkin replied. The five men on top of the cliff sprinted back up the Titan's ramp, and it immediately rose into the air, slowly moving forwards until it was clear of the ice wall. Allowing some space between the road and his LZ, Vashkin brought the Titan into a descent again, touching down in the shadow of the wall.
The truck drivers were definitely dead, their corpses having been pulled out of the trucks and dumped by the roadside after being dead checked. The trucks themselves had been opened up and their cargo was hastily being offloaded by the snipers who had been on the ground.
Everyone in the Titan began to drag the crates of sabotaged weaponry out of the Titan and loading them into the trucks. The actual EU weaponry was either left by the roadside or loaded into the mercenary's Titan. Rather than loading them individually, two people worked on each vehicle, dumping crate upon crate of SCAR rifles, Bianchi machineguns and Moretti Sniper rifles – all of them with potent EMP charges hidden inside them – into the truck. Their frenetic pace paid off, as it took ten minutes of heavy lifting to load up all the trucks.
"This is my favourite part," Kosarkov muttered to himself once they had finished loading, and as he crossed over to the truck that they had not loaded with any EMP charges and attached a few DemoPaks onto its container, driver seat and underneath one of the rear axles.
"Clear the area!" he shouted, as he himself sprinted away from the vehicle.
He pressed the detonator remote and a deafening thunderclap resounded through the otherwise silent street. Pieces of burning metal flew in every direction and the truck itself seemed to simply vanish in a cloud of flame and smoke.
The three men in EU garb jumped into the trucks and drove away towards the Ninth Armoured Corps' armoury outpost.
Kosarkov took a moment to make a progress report. "Command, this is Recon. Vehicles secured, charges in place."
"Roger that, Kosarkov. Proceed according to mission objectives. Assault teams are on standby," Takiguchi's voice filtered through his helmet speakers.
Kosarkov switched the channel to the one that kept the three drivers linked up. "All right, people. Coalition forces know not to hit this convoy, and EU are expecting us. So keep cool and act like we're meant to be here, got it?"
"This is child's play. I broke into an arms development factory once by hiding underneath a truck…" the mercenary trailed off.
"You know the way, right, Max?" Sarov asked.
"Sure thing. I memorized a map route," Kosarkov replied.
The three vehicles slowly trundled along the street, while behind them, five PAC snipers climbed aboard the mercenary's Titan and took off, their job done.
Operation Patriot was fully underway. The next few hours would be down to Kosarkov and his stealth talents – although stealth was something of a misnomer. The reason Kosarkov had selected Grigori Sarov and the mercenary for the mission was because unlike any of the other personnel he could have chosen, they were the only ones who spoke English, which would be necessary to stand a chance at blending in with the EU.
"So let's go over the plans again, people. I do the talking at the base checkpoint. Once we're in?" Kosarkov prompted. As a way of getting into the habit for the mission's purposes, he asked the question in English, and demanded that all their conversations – even amongst each other – be done as such from now onwards.
"We drive over to the armoury building and offload the guns," the mercenary replied.
"Buildings. There are more than one, and spreading out the blast effects will be the best way to ensure total disabling of the facility," Kosarkov specified.
"Buildings. While you guys load the guns, I'll sneak round the back and disable one of the exit doors. If we don't jam one open, they'll lock down when the place loses power…and then we'd be fucked," the mercenary replied.
"Got it. Then, once we've blown the charges, we break out using the jammed door on foot…why are we not driving the trucks out again?" Sarov asked.
"Because they'll have been fried by the EMP," the mercenary reminded none too patiently.
"Right. So once we're out of there, how do we get back to base?" Kosarkov asked. He knew the answer, but just wanted to be sure everyone else did too.
"There's an airbase about a klick and a half away. EMP won't reach that far. We can commandeer a Shepherd dropship from there," Sarov replied.
"Good. I think we've got it now, people. Just remember, stay cool. We've got ID and a reason to be there," Kosarkov urged.
"No sweat, boss. Come on…let's make some pretty blue lights," the mercenary replied.
Kosarkov could only wish it were to be fireballs instead.