Fox raised a pair of binoculars to his face, across a large open area he could see the building they were supposed to rendezvous with the Cornerian marines at, he reached back and gave the 'all clear' signal. The rest of the team materialized from their hiding places and crept up alongside him. Bill shouldered the sniper rifle he'd taken at the start of the mission and scanned the area.
"There's no movement in or around the building."
Fox lowered his binoculars.
"Maybe they've run into some trouble."
"Could be, we'll find out soon enough."
The commandos sprinted across the open area and into the building, taking up defensive positions inside. Bill swept a pile dusty plastic cups and dishes off a table and spread out a schematic of the city on its cracked and corroding surface.
"Were about right here."
The canine pilot drew a small red circle on the map.
"If all the intel is accurate then the target should be somewhere in this area, just outside the city."
Bill drew in another red circle.
"I'd say that we've got another few blocks to go before reach the edge of the city and from there no more than half a mile."
Fox scratched his chin.
"They'll probably have snipers and patrols all over the area, the patrols we can avoid but does anyone have a plan for dealing with the snipers?"
"I'm thinking there may be a way to hitch a ride underneath a Brotherhood vehicle, maybe a supply truck or APC, once we get out of the city we'll go from there."
A Cornerian commando walked over to the table carrying a datapad.
"Sir, you may want to see this."
Fox accepted the device, on its small screen it showed a diagram of the city, and at a point less than a block away had a flashing red symbol. Krystal walked over from the table.
"What is it?"
"A distress signal."
Fox spoke up.
"How long has this been going?"
"We don't know captain, our comm. specialist just picked it up, since this is all we got then the soldier or soldiers sending this are either too busy to talk or unable to, neither of which is a good thing."
"Do you know for sure if these are the marines were waiting for."
"I'm told that it's within a ninety percent chance of being them."
Wolf put everyone's thoughts into actions as he produced an energy-based submachine gun that he'd liberated from a Brotherhood soldier and jammed a fresh clip into it. Fox picked his own weapon up and checked its charge.
"First squad you'll stay here and keep this area secure, Falco, Bill, Wolf, and Krys, you're with me. Will call in when we reach the beacon's position and then see if we have any survivors that can still fight. Chances are if anyone's still alive they'll be wounded so I want anyone who has medical training ready by the time we get back, whenever that may be."
Falco brandished a pair of blaster pistols.
"Let's go kill some Brothe's."
The whine of incoming dropships filled the Brotherhood base camp. General Osborn stood just outside the cleared area that served as a landing field as four of the compact aircraft touched down. The armored troop doors slid open with a hiss and lowered into ramps, crushing the soft grass as they settled into place. Fresh troops marched out of the dropships, half of them regular foot soldiers, the other half clad in heavy body armor and unusually thick metal helmets. The faces of these soldiers were hidden by a high-tech face mask with three burning red electronic lens giving them the appearance of some kind of metal insect. The soldiers reached the bottom of the troop ramp and came to a halt, upon closer inspection it was easy to see that they were all noticeably beefier than their comrades and moved with agility and ease despite the considerable weight of their gear, they were the EMST, Elite Mechanized Shock Troopers and some of the finest infantrymen the Brotherhood had to offer. Osborn walked out onto the field and the soldiers standing at the ends of the troop ramps, both EMST and regular soldiers alike snapped into a crisp salute. Osborn returned their salutes and gestured for them to be at ease.
"Welcome to the front gentlemen."
Krystal cautiously peered around out from behind a pile of rubble, half of the buildings in the street beyond had collapsed and the street was clogged with rubble which was in turn littered with bodies, some wearing Cornerian green while others wore Brotherhood grey. A dozen living soldiers were wading through the rubble and corpses, checking for life signs from gray clad corpses and prodding the fallen Cornerians with bayonet's to make sure they were dead. The blue furred vixen raised a comlink to her face.
"Fox, I've got a squad of Brotherhood soldiers over there."
"Roger Krys, I see them, what about you Falco."
"I see 'em buddy, can we put 'em down."
"Not yet, Bill, Wolf you got a visual."
"Affirmative."
"Get ready to take them out."
Movement in the corner of her eye caught Krystal's attention, she turned her head to see a red dot climbing up her arm towards her head. The distant sniper realized his target was aware of the danger and pulled the trigger just as the vixen threw herself in the opposite direction. Two 30mm bullets tore through the space the vixen had just vacated and buried themselves in the concrete wall behind her hiding place. The Brotherhood soldiers spun in the direction of the noise and readied their weapons, a dozen safeties clicked off as they moved to take cover or flank the pile the noise had come from. Fox's voice came over the comlink.
"Ahh shit, shoot em, shoot em!"
Four streams of blaster bolts and bullets came raining down on the Brotherhood soldiers tearing through the grey clad figures and sending streams of blood spattering over nearby debris. The remaining soldiers dove for cover and returned fire in the directions that the enemy fire was coming form. A curse came over the comm. as a grenade flew in the direction of Falco's hiding place and the blue and red feathered avian dove to the ground as the small explosive went off behind him. A moment later he reappeared with his feathers badly scorched but otherwise not seriously injured, he gave a war cry and opened fire with both pistols.
Krystal pulled a frag grenade from her belt, armed it, and tossed it at a pair of Brotherhood soldiers hunkering behind a large concrete slab that had fallen into the street when one of the nearby buildings had collapsed. The round explosive flew over the concrete slab and landed at the soldiers' feet. One of the soldiers threw himself away from the grenade and exposed himself to a stream of blaster bolts from Bill while the second soldier desperately tried to kick the grenade out of the shelter. His boot struck the grenade and it just as it sailed away from the soldier it detonated, tearing the hapless soldier into a thousand pieces. The last remaining soldier tried to run; a blaster bolt caught him in the back as he reached the mouth of a nearby alley.
As the last soldier fell Krystal frantically scanned the nearby rooftops for the sniper. Once again she saw movement at the edge of her vision and without moving her head looked down at it. The small red dot moved from her shoulder to her head, a shot rang out and Krystal expected to be dead before she hit the ground. Wolf stood up from his hiding place, a smoking weapon in his hand, about fifty feet behind Krystal a Brotherhood soldier fell from a rooftop with a hole blown threw his chest.
"You missed one."
With that Wolf turned and shot a wounded Brotherhood soldier who had been quietly trying to pull his sidearm from his belt.
Fox silently watched Wolf walk over to another Brotherhood soldier and check for life signs. Was this the same lupine mercenary he'd known over eight years ago? Fox heard a noise behind and spun with his weapon ready to find no one there. No less alert the vulpine mercenary walked in the direction the sound was coming from until it resolved into a muffled voice.
"Over here."
A hand burst from a pile of rubble and Fox trained his weapon on it, through the blood stains he could make out Cornerian green.
"Guys, over here!"
Fox began carefully digging through the rubble as Krystal and Wolf joined him. Together the three mercenaries lifted a heavy support beam that the rubble had covered to reveal a Cornerian marine in a bloody uniform. Fox extended a hand and the soldier accepted, hauling him to his feet. Fox glanced at the name written on the back of the helmet, Stevenson.
"Are you the one who sent the distress signal?"
The soldier managed to nod his head.
"How badly are wounded?"
The marine responded by standing on his own and pointing to a bullet wound on his left arm.
"Not badly?"
The marine nodded.
"Alright lets get him back to the old hotel."