Aswan's Fall Chapter 1
Aswan's Fall Chapter 2
C&C AU Fic
A/N: Notice the fact that its an AU fic guys, as in alternate universe. Forgive me for any minor errors, but I don't let that get in the way of a (hopefully) good story. It's alternate universe, as in diverging from the canon storyverse.
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They'd taken shelter in an abandoned hotel that was a shell of its former glory. The past six hours had pushed the pathfinders to the limits, as they hid under rubble and darted from building to building, avoiding the Nod patrols or the ragged convoys of the warlords and crime syndicates who operated in the city with impunity.
From briefings they had received, Hasan knew that the city was divided into several districts, each under the control of any number of warlords or crime kings, parasites surviving on the masses. Cults that worshipped Kane thrived in the city, displacing the Islamic faith that had dominated the city for centuries.
However, the top predators of this food web were unquestionably the Brotherhood of Nod. Many of the warlords had profited from them, often bringing in GDI 'sympathisers' who'd been dragged off the streets. Usually, they were innocent people who'd offended the warlords in some way.
It had taken all their training to navigate the ruins without attracting the attentions of the masses. To keep warm, they'd scavenged clothes from several gangsters they'd happened across in a nearby building. They'd engaged them in a running fire fight, using their superior training, fire discipline, range and skills to circle around the gang and liquidate them, all 30 of them.
Pathfinder sniper teams were feared by Nod forces for good reason. Standing orders as such by the Brotherhood indicated a take-no-prisoners approach to pathfinders. Where with other GDI troopers, they would simply imprison them and use them as hostages, experimental subjects or in prisoner exchanges, with pathfinders it was a shoot-on-sight policy.
Pathfinders were a rare breed. In addition to securing drop zones, gathering intelligence and delivering briefings to follow-on forces, which were their primary duties in serving the airmobile elements of GDI UP - they also conducted operations ranging from ambushes and reconnaissance behind enemy lines to hostage rescue. They were general purpose Special Forces assets, second only to the GDI Commandos Formation and RAID in terms of their ranking and usage, though not their diverse skills.
Extensively trained in stealth tactics; hand-to-hand combat; the use of explosives for demolition; parachuting; amphibious warfare; rock-climbing; mountain warfare; desert warfare; jungle warfare and as ski troops. They differed from other GDI Special Forces assets in their versatility across different operational environments, fulfilling a niche that Nod sorely lacked.
They were also distinguished by their specialisations – they were all superbly trained in unarmed combat, with an almost universal preference for moving light and engaging in hit-and-run attacks against Nod forces, eschewing the heavy armour of the Commandos and RAID.
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Hasan peered through the scope, the nightglow of Tiberium spikes field along the edges of the town visible through the thermal imaging lenses of his rifle. In an eerie way it was beautiful. He'd grown up with that same glow lighting the night sky of Johor. Tiberium spikes, besides refining the Tiberium onsite, served as a way to effectively contain a field from spreading by its constant mining of it.
He checked on Zach and Gerard, whom he'd ordered to take a rest while he stayed on watch. He closed his eyes and leaned against the wall, assessing his own state. Tired, but in hyper-alert mode - which for him wasn't just a state of mind, it was a state of biotech.
Nano-glands had been regulating his adrenaline since they'd crossed the river, keeping watch for any sign of muscle fatigue, and loading his blood with super-coagulants, nutrients, and other goodies he probably didn't even know about or couldn't name.
He wouldn't be feeling the effects of pushing himself past the limits of sleep and endurance for a couple of days yet. They made him a super-soldier in the sense that his stamina was greatly enhanced - as were his reactions, due to the superconductive fibrification of his neural dendrites, which boosted his reaction time to one sixth the human standard norm while under stress.
He'd formerly been a lieutenant in GDi's Special Operations Directorate, Section Zero, which dealt with covert operations that were too distasteful for GDi to ever openly acknowledge and were in fact illegal under GDI and international law, often violating several human rights in the process. Trained as a commando, he'd been responsible for several covert and clandestine ops, many of them involving 'wetwork' or mokroye delo, as the old Soviet KGB had referred to it as.
He'd enlisted right out of junior college in 2050 at the age of 18 after accomplishing his Advanced Level General Certificate of Education or the equivalent of a high school graduation certificate, 2 years after the first Scrin War. Due to the need to support his family, he'd enlisted and been granted his officer's commission with the commandos within two years, based on his service, training and academic records.
After 3 years working with the commandos, he'd been attached out to the black ops units of GD-Special Forces-Section 0. There, he'd eventually volunteered for a program that promised to enhance their physical capabilities to superhuman levels using experimental nanotechnology.
The end result of Project Bahadur as it was known had ended up in nearly a third of their volunteers dead and the rest suffering various form of injury, most of them mental. Many had committed suicide after, suffering from psychosis and other forms of mental injury. In the end, what Hasan had spent years seeking to earn he received as financial compensation which enabled his family to migrate to the blue zone paradise of Japan.
Disgusted with the betrayal of the institution he'd served, he'd chosen to revocate to a pathfinder and adjust his contract, shortening it and serving out his remaining 3 years as a corporal first class in his home states military.
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Gerard woke up when his alarm began to vibrate and beep. He shut it off and would have gone back to sleep if not for the boot that nudged his chest.
"Get up Gerard. It's your shift. Here's some coffee."
Hasan handed him a steaming mug of coffee that Gerard gratefully received. He looked up at Hasan who seemed tired but still alert, eyes darting from shadow to shadow. At the bottom of the stairs they'd rigged a trap with their claymore mines, providing advance warning of any incoming threat.
"I'm going to try and contact HQ while you're on watch, so I'll be up on the roof. While you were sleeping I spotted a convoy of Venoms and artillery being transported via train. I know it's risky but we've got to get the message out. The minute the ion storm lifts they're going to hit the trapped companies with everything they have."
Gerard, still bleary eyed, nodded, taking in the information. He reached out for his HK416 DMR rifle, letting his scoped GD-5 lean against the wall. He cursed internal GDI politics, especially the bickering over budgeting and technologies. The GD-5, while powerful, simply didn't fit the requirements of the Guards or Pathfinders like the HK 416.
Since bulky powered armour would have simply slowed them down and even the lighter encounter suits like other regiments or their compatriot guardsmen, they found it far too heavy to carry without a suit to augment their strength. They preferred lighter weapons, moving light, blending in with any civilian populace and then retreating out of the fight after achieving their objective.
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The GDI was a global confederation of nations, similar to the European Union or the Commonwealth of Independent States that was formed after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and not a federation like the United States of America. It was a hybrid of a federation, confederation and commonwealth that could be considered a single political unit and superstate.
The nature of the relationship between the entities constituting GDI varied considerably. Likewise, the relationship between the member states and the central government, as well as the distribution of powers among them, was highly variable. This could be seen in the relationship between the different countries that made up GDi.
While they were nominally supposed to cooperate and follow a common line on military, foreign policy, economic and ecological affairs, and the majority of nations did, there were bound to be conflicts.
Due to the world-spanning bureaucracy required to run it, GDI was divided into five main military commands with regional sub-commands under them. Overseeing all of them was CENTCOM, Central Command, or as they were popularly referred to by the soldiers on the line and the people in the streets – 'the arseholes up on high'.
In the aftermath of the UN's collapse, as Tiberium spread across the world and GDI's rise to eminence as the most powerful force on the planet, there had been vast political turmoil as nation-states jostled for key positions and tried to maintain their autonomy from GDI. Caught in the crossfire were the defence corporations of the world and the different nation's military organisations who'd been forced to amalgamate their military strength to the GDI.
Against their will, many nations had been forced to surrender their military autonomy to the GDI, which had reorganised it according to its wisdom. Due to GDI being funded by the major world powers of the time, primarily the Western European nations, the United States of America, China, India, Russia, Japan, the Korean Republic and Taiwanese Federation, they had the greatest say in what occurred worldwide.
Predictably, like any major power, they'd protected their interests first and foremost, often at the expense of their allies and greater good.
As a result of this many soldiers had been dismissed from militaries worldwide in an effort to downsize and cut costs. All the while Blue Zone security agencies and private corporations based in the Blue and Yellow Zones proliferated.
From the year 2004 to 2027 GDI had fought and suppressed several rebellions and brushfire wars that had spread around the globe, fuelled by the incredible loss of land, life and wealth, as well as the dilution of national and ethnic identity, spread of the global Internet and ecological destruction wrought by Tiberium. Nod had not done any favours by intermittently performing large scale terrorist attacks on vital infrastructure, many disenfranchised soldiers enlisting with their ranks.
The effects of the internal bickering had only ceased after the Second Tiberium War. The Blue Zones were in the traditionally rich countries with temperate climates, safe behind vast concrete walls and resonator fields that protected their inhabitants from the ravages of Tiberium and the effects of ecological collapse.
They also had large battalions of GDI forces garrisoned nearby to protect them from Nod threats, while corporations in any sector excepting the defence and private military sector were banned from having their own private armies.
GDI Blue Zone troops received the best weapons, the most generous budgets and the top positions in GDI, obvious in the selection of senior staff. The GD-5 with its integral ion cannon and grenade launcher was standard issue among them, especially so in Europe and North America.
In comparison the Asia, Africa and South America Commands received smaller budgets despite often facing larger threats and so had come up with creative solutions to their problems, inventively acquiring materiel through unconventional means to support their military capability.
Many of the countries in these regions stubbornly refused to surrender their military autonomy, often funding GDI at the same time as they maintained their own armed forces. As such, regiments like the Royal Malay Regiment, Indian Gurkhas, Australian SASR, Royal Brunei Land Forces and the Singapore Guards continued to exist.
Refusing to be beholden to senior GDI commanders or defence executives who'd never experienced the hardships of the Yellow or Red Zones and were too arrogant to listen to them, they'd maintained the rugged and reliable weapons technology of the early 21st century over the GD-5. Cheap to produce, easy to maintain, simple to learn and rugged, it was enduring technology that was the legacy of the Israeli and Russian weapon designers.
All of which went a long way to explaining why their unit was currently using such old designs. Of course, the situation had improved in the aftermath of the First Scrin War. As a whole, all GDI members and their supporting militaries had better access to the latest technology in the present, though many units were reluctant to abandon their reliable, battle-tested weapons. Some regiments had different operational needs compared to the rest of the mainline GDI forces.
But some of the old distrust still lingered and older regiments, especially those of South East Asian, East Asian, Israeli, Russian and Australian origins had famously refused to give up their production facilities.
Stubbornly maintaining their hold on their production facilities, most units hung onto their traditional ballistic weapons and utilised new nanofabric uniforms over the heavy armoured suits of the rest of GDI.
With the new experimental nanotechnology that was proliferating, things were about to get a lot more interesting.
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Hasan gasped for breath, feeling the onset of the symptoms that plagued him since Project Bahadur. He took out a nebuliser and put it to his mouth, inhaling deeply as he pressed on it. The nanoparticles would infiltrate his cell membranes, stabilising the nanites that periodically acted up.
His body responded to the situation by producing reactions akin to an asthma attack, which was why he carried a nebuliser with him at all times.
Drawing deep breaths, he hunkered down against the low wall that surrounded the roof. This close to a Nod base he was not keen on making a transmission. In a congested urban environment, even with narrowband, there was a chance that Nod would detect it.
Due to his location, he couldn't very well use the laser as it was LOS (line of sight) dependent and between him and the nearest receiver was several kilometres of hilly terrain and concrete building.
Then his eyes happened across a satellite dish.
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Zach was shaken awake abruptly, interrupting the dream he was having of his girlfriend dressed in nothing but a black lace teddy. The vision of his girlfriend was instead replaced by the image of Hasan shaking his shoulder, face concealed by rags.
"Zach, you think you can jury-rig our radio to use a directional satellite dish to send a transmission to the Gilgamesh?" Hasan asked.
"Um...yeah. Sure. Should be able to do it. Why?"
"We need to urgently get a message out to HQ that they're bringing in extra artillery and air support from across the river. The minute that ion storm lifts they're going to hit the LZ and the nearest air support for us is about 3 hours out from here."
Zach immediately got up. The flanker of the sniper team, he served as the security man who protected the rearguard, as well as being a trained signaller and medic. Popping a caffeine pill, he ran up the stairs following Hasan while Gerard maintained watch.
"Before we go though, get all your stuff ready and prepare to move. We know that Nod's got a listening post somewhere in the region and once we get the message out, they'll know that we're here" Hasan spoke as they raced up the stairs.
Zach nodded.
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"You guys ready?" Zach whispered to Hasan and Gerard. Gerard nodded, body primed for action. Hasan scanned the streets with his rifle, down to his last 30 rounds. He was on overwatch.
"The minute I send the transmission, Nod's going to be on us like a fiend on a visceroid. I'll take a few seconds to disconnect the radio from the dish but once it's up I'll sling it and we'll move across. You go first then I'll come after you. You're sure that power line will hold our weight?"
"Sure thing Zach. Last thing you need to worry your Jewish ass about is us falling down. Worst that can happen is we fall twelve storeys and snap our backs, fracture ours skulls or impale ourselves on Tiberium crystals."
"Cheerful fella aren't you?" Zach replied, a grimace on his face. Gerard simply replied with a grin.
"That's why the ladies love me."
Tapping the message into the set, he watched as the satellite dish activated, drawing energy from the radio's batteries to power itself. He observed as the satellite aligned itself, the tip slowly tilting upwards, away from the horizon. It reached its azimuth and then it began.
Within seconds the transmission had been sent. Pulling the plug, Zach slung it over his shoulder, turning and pounding the concrete as he ran and leapt, grasping onto the leather belt attached to the power line strung between the buildings. Gerard was already flying across, hanging on for dear life.
Closing his eyes, he felt the wind hit his face before he opened and saw he was across, a concrete wall rapidly approaching him. Or was it the other way round?
He let go and rolled, the momentum of his fall carrying him in a roll that ended with him colliding with Gerard. They clumsily picked themselves up as they rushed for the door. Within a minute the building they were in shook as several powerful explosions rocked the building they'd just left. Hasan scrambled up from his position, his expression telling them all they needed to know.
Not pausing for a single moment, they scrambled down the stairs, rushing from building to building as the abandoned neighbourhood they were in erupted around them.
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Panting hard, the trio eyed each other. The bombardment had forced them deeper into the city, which was the last thing they'd wanted. Over the public loudspeaker system a strident voice cut through the chill morning air, the Arabic harsh and guttural.
"Any of you speak Arabic?" asked Gerard, as he sipped water from the water bladder in his backpack.
Zach and Hasan raised their hands before dropping them and eyeing the other. Nodding to Hasan, Zach dropped to the floor.
"You want to hear the good news of bad news Gerard?"
"Just tell it to me plain."
"It seems dangerous rogues of the GDI, terrible unbelievers of Kane, horrific infidels who eat babies and rape women, are in the midst of Aswan. An unknown number but not more than twenty. So they're asking everyone to cooperate and find these men."
"Well...the only way to go is up. We can't get into any deeper shit now. Think of the bright side" Hasan said.
Abruptly, the concrete wall they were leaning against collapsed, dust rising around them. As the dust settled they came face to face with several heavily tattooed gangsters gathered around a deck of cards. Several were caked in concrete dust.
Gerard smile sheepishly, raising his arm in greeting. "Salaam alai'kum..."
They stared at him intensely, all of them reaching for their weapons, whether it was knives, pistols or rifles. Zach and Hasan followed the line of their stares, right to the exposed GDI patch at Gerard's right shoulder.
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Lieutenant Colonel Robert Jambu was 34 years old, an extremely capable leader and competent commander of a young age who'd formerly been the CO (Commanding Officer) of the 2nd Guards Battalion before being promoted to a staff position as a diplomatic defence attaché on board the GDSS Gilgamesh.
So when word reached him of the situation in Aswan, CENTCOM burst into a tornado of activity, the engine of this activity being Jambu himself.
Through a torrent of calls from Guards HQ officers and shouted accusations of negligence on the part of CENTCOM MI (Central Command Military Intelligence), Jambu masterfully negotiated the frazzled nerves of the intelligence officers and calmed the anger of HQ Guards over the incident.
However, things only got worse as the Gilagamesh turned every sensor it possessed on the Nod Aswan base. From orbit, acoustic and seismic sensors were landed, burrowing into the ground, protected by thick heat shielding and thick zirconium casings.
As the sensors burrowed into the ground, they sent out pulses of sonar and radar, giving CENTCOM a map of the base and the surrounding terrain. The findings set alarm bells ringing among MI.
GDI had mobilised the attack in an effort to liberate Aswan from Nod control, as well as to destroy or capture the research material of the Brotherhood. The base was known to house several Scrin artefacts that the Brotherhood was attempting to reverse engineer. It was also known data crystals which contained data from the Tacitus.
It was a strategic asset for sure, but all previous evaluations of the faciity had rated it a credible though insignificant threat to GDI interests in the Egyptian Yellow Zone.
As the sensor data reached the Gilgamesh via an array of communication satellites and powerful infrared laser pulses that punched through the ion storm, Lieutenant Colonel Jambu's face began to crease, before locking into a grimace.
The Aswan base was an enormous complex, with the majority of it underground and hardened against assault. From the seismic readings gained from the sonar of the probes, it stretched beneath Aswan Lake and underneath the city, with well over 500 metres of sand and rock separating it from GDI firepower.
According to interpreted sensor data, not only did it contain crucial research and engineering facilities, it also contained command and control facilities sufficient to act as a backup Temple of Nod. GDI MI had thought it had only hit oil. In reality it had hit oil, gold and crack cocaine.