"What!" Ding exclaimed.
"That's right, Ding. We run, on average, ten kilometres a day, then maybe another five or so kilometres on our own. On other days, we extend the distance to twenty, thirty, maybe even fifty km with a full haversack," Chris patiently repeated for the thousandth time.
"Damn."
So that's why the Singaporeans were still fresh at the end of this morning's 5-mile run…and complained that they had expected more from Rainbow. After that, they proceeded to run roughly ten more miles. Rainbow, of course, ran with them in the spirit of competitiveness. The end result: thirty hot, sweaty, tired, but happy men. For the first time in a very long time, Ding remembered what it was like to pant.
"By the way, have you seen the Malays (much to Wong's exasperation, he pronounced it 'MAY-lay' instead of 'MEH-lay')? Ali and Imran?"
"Ding, this is a pub," Chris replied, somewhat exasperated. "They're Muslims. No alcohol. Remember? Besides, they have evening prayers now. They're in their bunks."
"Oh…"
The Singaporeans had arrived in England via civilian aircraft. Their weapons and equipment were flown over by a C-130. Before their visitors had arrived, Rainbow had scrambled to locate extra accommodations after realising that their barracks were too small for the Singaporeans. They managed to 'borrow' a spare barracks from the Special Air Service after a lot of haggling and sweating blood. It wasn't because the SAS guys didn't want to lend it to Rainbow; it was because the bullshit-crats in charge of the SAS (and Rainbow as a result) wanted to know why they (Rainbow) wanted to borrow a barracks from them (SAS) when they (Rainbow) already had enough for everyone. Rainbow Six was eventually forced to step in, and he smote the bureaucrats' whining fairly quickly. The fact that he and his team saved the free world twice helped.
"Hey Chris," Mike Pierce called from behind him, a mug of beer in his hand.
"Yes?"
"How the hell do you guys manage to aim and shoot your MP5A5s with one hand?"
The Singaporeans had put up another performance, again of themselves abseiling down a helicopter and firing their SMGs at dummies. The exercise had to be held in an open field in the English countryside, since the powers that be insisted that no live rounds may be fired in the camp except for live-fire practice at a properly designated spot (read: shooting range). The fact that the SpecOps team were real shooters, that there were areas where such a thing can be conducted, and that the only alternative was too close to civilians homes for comfort didn't mean a whit to the bureaucracy in charge of Rainbow.
"Well…practice."
"And the fancy electronic sights."
"And that."
The ITL MARS sights fitted on all of the black ops team's shoulder arms helped considerably. These reflex sights were used to project a red dot in the middle of a glass block as an aiming aid in CQB. The dot moves around the glass screen as the operator travels, accounting for the effects on bullet trajectory by the shooter's movement.
"Where'd you get the money to buy them?" Pierce asked.
"Hell if I know. Why?"
He knew the real reason. And he couldn't tell anyone.
"Well, I've discovered that aiming the conventional way—getting sight picture and so on—is much slower than with the reflex sights. We'll gain a full half-second or so in target acquisition with them, and every moment counts in CQB."
What he didn't say was that he only found that out when Rainbow and the SpecOps unit went to the live-fire range. As it turned out, while both units had almost the same performance in terms of accuracy, Singapore had an edge in speed. And Wong's men hadn't forgotten how to shoot with conventional sights either; their score using the front sight/rear sight cum muscle memory technique was just as good as Rainbow's.
"True."
"Maybe we should get them, eh Ding?"
"Well…" Chavez started, wondering what his father-in-law would say.
"They're not really expensive, Ding, but they run off AA batteries. Me, I'd pick Aimpoint's Comp M2 or ML2 if not for the fact that the MARS reflex sight comes with a built-in IR (infrared) laser aiming device, and backup sights. And only the SAF version has that…well, maybe without the backup sights," a man replied from behind him, his voice a blend of Scotland and Ireland.
"What the hell?" the SpecOps troops shouted into their beers.
"Am I really that quiet?" Cheah asked from his place, seeing the men whip around.
The writer was standing quietly behind the operatives, dressed in base fatigues. On his sleeves were the stripes of a first sergeant: three bows and two chevrons. His black/brown eyes became a deep black, influenced by the colour of the uniform. A notepad and pen were clutched in his hands.
"And who promoted you to first sergeant?" the Singaporean captain asked, looking at the writer's sleeves.
"I didn't know about that until fairly recently," he admitted, his tone becoming more British.
"Right…Cheah, is it true that SAF commandos run up to fifty kilometres for morning PT?"
"Yeah. At least, that was what my source told me."
"Who's he?" Price asked, walking up to the Rainbow troops.
"A former commando…but he left the army in the late '70s, so…"
Chris rolled his eyes.
"It's not my fault or anything. MINDEF isn't being too cooperative here."
"Yah (pronounced 'y-AH', meaning 'yeah'), sure," Steve Gao replied, appearing behind and between Pierce and Price. Both Rainbow troopers jumped involuntarily. Cheah didn't react, as though he was used to people creeping up on him, Chavez thought. Or…
"Steve…I felt your eyes on me," Cheah told Gao, without turning his head.
"Damn. How can you feel a person's eyes?"
"I don't know…almost every person is born with a natural animal instinct, almost psychic in nature. Most people can literally feel the weight of a person's gaze, even if they don't know they're being watched. In a covert operation, when you need stealth, never look at your target directly, especially if you're close to him. Observe him through your peripheral vision until you strike."
"How do you do that?" Wong asked.
"Practice."
Chavez almost snorted into his drink.
"Just like your fighting technique, Gao. You need work in that. Practice, and it will flow naturally," Cheah continued.
"Don't I know it?" the short trooper replied.
The Rainbow troopers kept their ears open. The only thing they lacked in their training was an effective hand-to-hand combat technique in close quarters. They only trained to kill people with guns, not defeat them with bare hands or when unarmed.
"What's your fighting technique made of?" Price asked.
"Well…it's a combination of the most effective techniques of martial arts and fighting styles around the world. Boxing, judo, tae-kwon do, karate, the Fairbairn-Applegate-Styers school of thought, just to name a few. Add in the Offensive Mindset from a…a certain American fighting technique and you get it. I'm guessing that there are some more moves in there from martial arts that I haven't named yet."
"What the hell are you talking about?" Pierce wondered.
"…Never mind."
"How effective is it?" Chavez asked.
"I'd like to think that it's the most efficient close quarters fighting technique yet developed, incorporating both lethal and non-lethal attacks for various situations. The operator can switch between the two on the fly, in case an escalation or de-escalation of threat response in needed. He does not rely on muscle memory, he does not memorise certain attack combinations; once he knows and can pull off an attack, he does not bother incorporating it into his muscle memory. Any combinations he uses are his personal preferences, but can be interrupted and replaced with another. That way, the attacks can be modified instantly to suit a flowing combat situation. "
"Is it combat-proven?"
"…You know I can't answer that."
"Hey, you!" a SAS trooper called.
Cheah turned to his right, subtly tensing up.
"Yes?" he asked, keeping his tone neutral.
The middle-aged man in front of him was armed with nothing more deadly than an empty mug…not that it wasn't dangerous. Still, he was formidable enough, standing at an even 6" and packed with powerful muscles. He positively reeked of alcohol.
There was nobody else sitting at his table. Two empty bottles of whatever liquid stood atop the table's wooden surface, spewing foam from their mouths. Cheah surmised that the soldier was drunk.
"You! You're the bastard O'Donnell, aren't you?" the soldier demanded, his voice slurred with alcohol.
"No. The name's Cheah," the writer/cadet/fighter coldly replied, stepping forward so that he was now leading with his left leg. He calmly kept his eyes on the trooper's collarbone, watching for sudden movements.
The trooper brought his mug back, and prepared to swing it forward, roaring, "Bullshit! I know that voice anywhere, you IRA mot—"
He had no time to finish his sentence. Cheah sprang into action, lunging forward in a boxing-style falling step, bringing his hands up and rolling them into organic bricks. As the mug came down, the writer swiftly sidestepped to the drunk's left, and snapped out a sweeping left back leg strike that hooked around the soldier's ankle and tripped him backwards, arms flailing.
Reversing his momentum, Cheah spun forward, placing an outstretched palm on the unbalanced soldier's abdomen and turned to his right. The soldier followed the turn, landing on his back at Cheah's boots, perpendicular to him.
The Singaporean sidestepped around him, stopping behind his head. The Briton picked himself up, and Cheah grabbed him in a sleeper hold. Cheah took several steps backwards, ensuring that the SAS trooper's feet were no longer planted firmly on the ground, all the while applying pressure to the soldier's throat.
Half a minute later, he blacked out, and went limp. The fighter laid him gently on the ground. He looked up in time to see a pair of SAS men approaching him.
"Relax mate," the closer one said. "He's just had too much to drink, and his experience in Northern Ireland in the '80s hadn't helped him at all."
"Aye. Stupid git shoulda seen a shrink. You didn't kill him, right?" the other asked.
"No…" was Cheah's reply.
"What the hell was that? Some kind of judo?" Pierce asked.
"No," he answered, his voice and eyes as cold as dry ice, but starting to warm up.
"What is it?"
"That technique we were discussing," Wong replied.
Author's Note: Yes, I know that this chapter's short, but I want to get this out of the way ASAP before touching on the operations side of Special Forces. Most of what I wrote here, including the part about PT, is true. The hand-to-hand combat technique does exist, and yes, I'm the so-called founder of it. The F-A-S school does (at least it did) exist, according to my research. It was originally established to train commandos in hand-to-hand combat. The 'American fighting technique' has been taught to certain US military personnel who have attended the course. It's been declassified officially, but… My technique can't be named due to operational security. Plus, it's not even protected by law, so… Anyway, this year is going to be ultra hectic, so I guess you can't count on a regular update schedule. Oh, and no insult was intended to the SAS.