FIVE
Grant Lohan couldn't believe it. It had been an arduous three and a half hour effort, but the team made the two kilometer trek to Extract Alpha well ahead of schedule. The Toasters had obliged by continuing to track eastward. Whatever it was the Toasters thought they were following, Lohan had no idea. That they were at least two clicks away by now was fine by him. The team was now less than 30 minutes away from a ride home.
Harlow's short rotational cycle was working to the team's advantage again as the shadow's were getting long and it would be dark in minutes. Paula Edwards and Adrian McElroy were both scanning the perimeter. As he had before, McElroy listened closely to the sounds of nature around him. Birds…crickets…even an occasional wild daggit could be heard in the distance.
Sergeant Lohan moved over to Ethan Miller's side. "How ya holding up, Ethan?" The sergeant was leaning across the wounded medic trying to keep his voice low. "Your color is a lot better…"
"I'm as cold as ice, Sarge…All this IV fluid is keeping my body temp down…"
Indeed, when the sergeant laid his hands on the medic's arm he could feel Miller shivering. He turned to find his own ruck sack and pulled his poncho blanket out. Lohan spread it across Miller, making sure it covered his arms and trunk.
"There…that any better?"
"I'll let you know in a few minutes!" Although injured, Miller was alert enough to know that the combination of IV fluids and temperature drop with sunset was going to be a bad combination.
Lohan gave Miller a reassuring pat on his left leg and then turned back to the center of the hide. Reaching into his ruck sack he pulled out a small black box. He then plugged a connecting cable from his wireless into the end of the device. Feeling around the bottom of it, he found the power switch which he clicked on.
A red pilot light came on immediately and an electronic voice came through his headset announcing the initialization of the ground-to-air wireless link. As soon as the Raptor was in direct comm distance, he'd know about it.
The minutes were clicking down. This was the part of the mission Lohan hated most…the waiting. Although they'd been going full throttle since the firefight at the warehouse, all of them, Miller included, were still wound up as tight as they could be. Maybe it was the anticipation of being only minutes away from going home, or maybe it was due to the phenomenal amounts of adrenaline they all had in their systems right now, it didn't matter. They all wanted to get this over with, so fatigue was 'not allowed' right now.
"Psssssst…" Lohan turned to face the sound…It was Edwards.
Lohan saw the PFC proned-out, her left arm pointing slightly to her left which was to the east of the team's position. This was not good. The Cylon patrol had last been seen heading that direction.
When she saw the sergeant in her peripheral vision, Edwards 'walked' her fingers along side her weapon then brought her hand up to show the sergeant the number 'two' without taking her eyes off of the rifle's scope.
Frak. At least two walking targets were coming from the direction the Cylons were last seen in. Lohan got himself into the same prone position as Edwards then worked his way along side her behind the tree that she'd used for cover. He snapped in to her optics to see what she was seeing.
"You got a make on the targets yet, Edwards?"
"No Sir. I can just see the branches parting along the tops of the saplings, like waves breaking. As thick as the brush is over there, though, I don't think they could be human!"
This was twice that Edwards had spotted trouble before it could spot them. And she was right. The Cylons had the advantage of being able to just plow through scrub and not care if they scratched the paint. It wasn't anything a little steel wool wouldn't fix. A human would have to get stitches after an encounter with scrub like that and then worry about the possibility of infection. The thick vegetation would slow the Cylons down a bit, but they'd keep coming.
At just that moment, Sergeant Lohan could hear the squelch on his wireless start to crackle. "Able Actual, Able Actual, this is Bee Sting. We're three minutes inbound, over." He was relieved to hear the voice of Captain Rohs in his headset, but he needed to determine what threat the approaching targets posed before the Raptor landed.
"Bee Sting this is Actual, we are danger close silent, I say again danger close silent. Two targets east of Extract Alpha and closing. Estimate 150 meters from Alpha. Intentions unknown. And be advised, Able Three is walking casualty. How copy, over?" Lohan dared not raise his voice above a whisper but it was easy to tell that he was anxious. Hopefully the wireless' audio circuits would compensate for the hushed tones.
Onboard Raptor Five Sierra Bravo, Jahlee Rohs, along with Brad Westling and Kevin Payge, felt a sudden surge of panic as they heard Sergeant Lohan's report. Although his tone was hushed and whispered, they could hear a sense of urgency. Still two minutes away from the LZ, they already felt like they were being shot at. Knowing that there was at least one casualty on the ground only made it worse.
At the ECO station of the Raptor, Kevin Payge's hand hovered over the mode switch for the DRADIS. "Captain, can I go active on the DRADIS? I can't see squat on the ground in passive mode!"
"Roger active on DRADIS, Payge" she replied. "Let's make sure we know which side of the field the friendlies are on and where the not-so-friendlies are."
Payge's hand was already on the switch, and he flipped it as the Captain said the words. But just as soon as the DRADIS went active, Payge had a spasm of fear go down his spine, causing every muscle in his body to involuntarily tighten.
"MULTIPLE BOGIES WITHIN 200 METERS OF THE LZ! DRADIS IDENTIFIES A MOTORIZED MOBILE GUN BATTERY ONE CLICK SOUTH OF THE LZ AND CLOSING ON THE RECON TEAM!"
Payge's voice was suddenly two octaves higher pitch and many decibels louder than normal. Things were fixing to get real ugly.
Jahlee decided that now was the time to find out where Dewayne Kells was and to be grateful that she had the extra firepower riding shotgun with her. "Quarterback, Bee Sting! We're DRADIS active and paint multiple targets near the LZ! Able Actual reports danger close and he has wounded!"
Dewayne Kells was only seconds behind the Raptor, having undocked from the underside of the Raptor after they cleared translight, but already he was going guns hot. They'd been lucky up till now, and he knew it wasn't going to last. "OK, Jahlee, copy that…Payge, switch your targeting DRADIS telemetry on and let me see what we're up against, over."
Kells no sooner said the words than the targeting telemetry from the Raptor appeared on his own screen. Suddenly Dewayne realized that there were fireworks all around him…Tracer rounds! He was being shot at.
"I'm taking fire, Jahlee! They know we're here! Weapons free!" If they'd hoped for a clean get-away, those hopes were dashed now. "I've got the closest targets to the LZ, Jahlee! You put a candle up the ass of that gun platform!"
Kells switched his DRADIS to "direct" and dropped the datalink. Jahlee would be tracking the mobile gun platform now and if he didn't break the link, his own guns would skew to the same target. That would be a waste time, effort and ammunition.
"Able Actual, this is Quarterback, we'll keep their heads down! Get the package to the check-out lane! Don't get into a firefight unless you're directly engaged!" If the Cylons didn't already know exactly where the recon team was right now, he didn't want to give them any clues.
On the ground, Sergeant Lohan was a step ahead of the Gunner and Captain Rohs. Miller had already pulled the IV tubing from the IV access port in his forearm and discarded the fluids and tubing. Lohan dropped his map case and pulled the self-destruct lanyard. Acid would pour into the case and destroy the contents from the inside-out without sending up any flames. Then he got one arm under Miller's left arm and was helping him to his feet.
"Edwards…McElroy! Gear belts, weapons, ammo and optics only! Drop the bags and let's get the holy frak out of here!"
No one had to tell Paula Edwards twice, although she knew she was about to run towards the two targets she had seen moving only seconds ago. She started moving towards the LZ, keeping low and with her gun sites in the direction of the approaching Cylons.
Suddenly, to the team's right, came a large explosion. In an instant, the previously dark and nearly invisible field was awash in bright yellow and orange flames. There had been no 'fire in the hole' warning, and the bright flash caught all of them by surprise. As they watched the fireball rise from what had been the Cylon mobile gun battery, they could see the underside of a Raptor as it over flew the field, its navigation and running lights turned off. The only other evidence of its presence was the blue glow of its sublight engines as it zoomed by.
Caught in the open when the platform blew up, Paula Edwards threw herself to the ground, face first, hoping that the approaching Cylons were distracted by the explosion. Even though she was flat on the ground, she could feel the force and heat of the blast as debris from the explosion rained down all around her. Some bits of shrapnel fell on her, but her bullet proof vest and helmet spared her injury. "Too bad there's not a bullet proof vest for your wits" she thought to herself.
In the cockpit of the Raptor, Jahlee Rohs and Brad Westling had a front row seat to the carnage that the Firesnake missile they had just launched had wrought on the Cylon gun battery. They could see the LZ below as they flew through the fireball then broke to the left to circle around for the landing approach.
Right behind Rohs, Dewayne Kells was making his own presence known. He targeted the two Cylons that were closest to the LZ with Kinetic Energy Weapon rounds and let a burst fly. As he rolled off the attack to the right he could see small arms rounds start striking the nose of his Viper. The rounds walked their way up from the very tip of the nose of the craft until the last three rounds hit the canopy itself. The armor in the nose held, but the canopy would be another matter. One round ricocheted off of the window frame but the other two hit the right side viewing pane directly. Normally they wouldn't have done anything more than make an ugly "splash" on the clear armored pane, but both rounds hit within a few millimeters of each other. Pressurized from within and weakened in the middle, the pane blew out instantly.
Kells instinctively flinched but kept pulling gees in the turn in order to break right and pitch up. Altitude was his best friend right now, and he planned to put a lot of it between him and the Cylons until he could make sure he was still in one piece.
As the Viper climbed away from the fight, Kells did an integrity check of his environment suit and survival system. As the cockpit depressurized, his suit had instantly compensated. No leaks. Thank the gods for that, he thought. Had he lost that, they would have had to go to another LZ, land, and then transfer Kells to the Raptor. They wouldn't be able to do an on-orbit EVA since the recon team didn't have environmental suits in the back of the Raptor. At least he could make it to orbit. He might get cold, but cold was better than dead.
Satisfied that he was OK, Kells reversed his turn then pulled hard up into an inside-loop maneuver. As he neared the top of the arc, he rolled right-side up to the horizon, then continued to pitch nose over to head back towards the battle below. The Cylons would be expecting him to make a wide turn and roll in from either side, not the direction he just departed from.
As he rolled in, all he could see on his ground attack DRADIS was the form of a single person in the middle of the LZ. Who ever it was, they were moving and had a Colonial personal transponder. Good. The next closest moving Cylons were still a half a click away from the field…No immediate threat if the team hurried and loaded up. Kells keyed his wireless. "Jahlee…No conflicts for a half a click in any direction. Let's get 'em out!"
The call came as the freighter captain was rolling onto her final approach. "Roger that, Quarterback…I'm committed to the full stop…" She pitched the Raptor's nose high and stood the ship nearly on its tail, landing thrusters rapidly decelerating the ship for touchdown. The landing lights came on as the skids unfolded from their spaces and suddenly the grassy field beneath the ship came into view. It wasn't going to be like landing the BeeCee on a commercial aerodrome, but then the whole idea right now was to get-the-frak-in and get-the-frak-out. Anyone who wanted to file a complaint about the jarred teeth could get out and walk.
Sure enough, the Raptor landed hard but evenly on its aft skids, the momentum then forcing the nosegear to the ground. It wasn't pretty, but there was no doubt they were firmly down. As the Raptor came to a halt, Kevin Payge swung around from the ECO seat and flung the hatch open.
Now on the far side of the field, Paula Edwards was in a low crouch, scanning the treeline for any movement of the intruders, watching with satisfaction as Captain Rohs arrived to take them off this forsaken rock. She swept her gaze from left to right, then certain that there was no immediate threat, she slowly turned around to watch Sergeant Lohan and the others moving from out of their cover to meet the landed Raptor.
Suddenly Paula Edwards wasn't wearing her helmet. Her weapon, although supported around her neck by its sling, fell to her side. Her hands were inexplicably limp and lost their grip on the rifle. The headset for her wireless was ripped from her ears. All she could see were blinding bright flashes of light, almost as if she were in the middle of her own personal thunderstorm. There were numbing electrical charges coursing through her arms and legs. She couldn't hear anything around her and her feet were as immobile as if she were standing in concrete. She was, in a word, stunned.
She stood, dazed and unmoving, for many seconds. Slowly her vision started to resolve. At first she could only make out the bright lights of the Raptor's landing gear and the opened hatch. In a matter of seconds she could see shapes. It was as if she were looking through a cardboard tube. As the blurs began to take shape, she could barely make out the form of Sergeant Lohan across the field. He was at once trying to help the wounded medic into the Raptor and then looking towards her. She could see him waving at her as if to warn her about something. Was he signaling her to hit the deck, or was he waving her on? Her mind was swimming. She was confused and she couldn't seem to remember her hand signals! It was as if she were in a video running at half speed. There was no noise from the pandemonium around her…just a high pitched ringing within her own ears that squelched everything else around her.
But dazed or not, she was instantly mortified when she saw Sergeant Lohan disengage himself from Corpsman Ethan Miller and bring his rifle to bear…on her!
In a panic, she started to fall to her knees. An ice-cold wave of fear poured through her as she saw the flashes of rounds leaving the barrel of the sergeant's rifle. She could feel the snap of the air as the bullets passed by her head, missing her by less than a meter. Why did he fire at her? And how could he miss from that range…?!
Then, like a light switch being turned on, Edwards found herself back in "real-time". As she fell to her knees, she turned to look behind her. Only twenty meters behind her and lying right at the edge of the tall grass bordering the field was the upper torso of a Cylon Centurion, now thoroughly decimated by Sergeant Lohan's exacting fire. The automaton had obviously been severed from its lower half, yet appeared to have dragged itself to the edge of the field where it fired on Edwards from behind.
Sneaky bastard, she thought!
She turned back towards the Raptor to see her helmet laying on the ground, cleanly split down the middle and laying in two halves where it fell. Had she been just a couple of centimeters taller, she'd be dead. If she ever lamented being short before, she was grateful for it now!
She tried to shake off the ringing in her ears. As she looked towards the Raptor, she could see Adrian McElroy dashing towards her. Even though he was only a few meters away, she couldn't hear what he was saying, although it was apparent that he was yelling at her.
She reached up to him. McElroy took her arm and then wrapped his right arm around her waist, grabbing her weapon belt and helping her to her feet. She commanded her feet to move, yet they seemingly dragged behind her. She could see Sergeant Lohan on the Raptor helping the wounded Ethan Miller through the door as someone from inside starting pulling him in. Lohan then turned towards the approaching pair and met them half way. He took position on Edwards's right side, wrapping his own arm around Edwards' waist and interlocking his arm with McElroy's.
In a second she was being lifted by her arms and belt, then pushed up the wing of the Raptor by the sergeant and Specialist McElroy. One of them put a firm hand on her back side and shoved, but right now she didn't give a damn! She saw the arm of Specialist Kevin Payge reach for her, and she clasped his right hand with hers, getting a near death-grip in the process. She was then unceremoniously catapulted into the Raptor's cabin by the abrupt shove from behind, falling to the floor just aft of the ECO's position. As she tumbled in, she saw Adrian McElroy clamber into the cabin behind her, followed swiftly by Sergeant Lohan.
Still unable to hear anything except for a horrific ringing, she saw Lohan barking orders towards the cockpit. As the door of the Raptor closed, the ship transitioned to forward flight and Sergeant Lohan fell across the stunned Edwards. He looked at her, somewhat embarrassed to have landed on her like that, but quickly removed himself from the entanglement.
Right now PFC Paula Edwards could care less. Her scalp was in one piece and that was miracle enough.
