Chap 4

Siberian Plains

Russia

Republic of East Asia

Lt Simmons mutters a curse under his breath as the storm reduces visibility, forcing him to switch on his headlights to pierce the gloom. All around him his squad does the same. A rag tag bunch of cutthroats out for coordinator blood, they weren't ideal soldiers but they would have to do. Earlier during the day, they had passed by a youthful villager who stared at the giant mobile suits. Simmons had decided against killing him as it was a waste of ammunition and time. What is supposed to be a cakewalk mission turns into a nightmare as his squad is lost. How hard could destroying an isolated and abandoned power plant be? Very hard apparently, when a snowstorm happens to occur on your way.

"Great! We're lost!", mutters Sgt Pavlov on the radio.

"We'all find our way.", Lt Simmons assures him even though he himself doesn't believe it.

A blip appears on his radar for as split second and then disappears.

Lt S:" Did you see anything on radar?"

Sgt P:" Nope. Phantom contact?"

Storms were known to mess with radars especially if enough interference was kicked up.

Lt S:" Maybe. Let's keep moving."

Three steps forward and suddenly the radar was screaming with contacts.

Lt P:" heads up! Multiple contacts closing in fast!"

The squad readies their weapons, headlights trying to pierce the dense storm. Then, Simmons sees them.

Mobile suits on snowboards with thrusters charge straight at them. They have visors that make them seem to be wearing goggles and have long blade-like objects spreading to the left and right of the head like a moustache.

The weird mobile suits open fire, beam machine guns tearing one of Simmon's Dagger's legs and arms with unerring accuracy while the rest take the blows on their shields.

Simmons and his men return fire at the hostile machines, but they dodge their shots easily as though a preternatural sense guides them.

Then they are behind them. As Simmons men turn with shields raised to block the shots as they pass by, one of them draws its beam saber and crouches on its board.

One of Simmons squad, a greenhorn who has never seen action, has his legs sliced off as the hostile mobile suit speeds by.

No on else sees it, but Simmons does. As the beam saber passes a little more than a third through the Dagger's leg, the hostile suit stands up and sweeps the saber upward, amputating the Dagger, twisting its upper torso to face the Dagger as its saber just passes clean through its legs. But the strange suit doesn't just stop there. Right after the hostile brings its saber up and before the speed and momentum of its snowboard takes it right past, it twists its wrist backwards and simultaneously brings its saber down in a backward slash.

The action dismembers the Dagger's gun arm before the handicapped mobile suit has even hit the ground. The entire scene from the time the hostile's saber makes contact with the Dagger's leg to the time it slices of the gun arm has taken place in just over 2 seconds. It wasn't humanly possible, certainly not with human reflexes and even more so while speeding on a snowboard with thrusters.

"Close up! Don't give them space to maneuver past your guard!", yelled Simmons.

Firing at the enemy turning about, the Daggers run towards their commander in as a desperate attempt to defend themselves. One of the suits veers off to a nearby slope of a cliff wall. To Simmons astoundment, the suit launches up into the air and turns the board to face the ground as it descends from the apex of its upward ride.

The enemy suit fires its beam machine gun in the split second after it finishes its turn downwards. Another Dagger is hit. Its head exploding in a fiery ball of flame, followed by its right arm and leg. Simmons sees the pattern, the enemy suits want them alive.

Lt S:" protect your limbs and heads! They want us alive!"

Sgt P:" This is madness!"

Back to back, the last two of the squad defend each other's backs and return fire. Every time they have a lock-on and fire, the enemy mobile suits throw off their locks and their shots go wild.

Then, Pavlov's gun is hit by a hostile coming straight at him from his right. By the time Pavlov registers the lock, the hostile fires and destroys his gun in a fiery explosion. The ball of fire fills his view screen and Sergeant Pavlov turns his head away from the bright explosion out of pure instinct. It is a huge mistake. The hostile continues charging at him, and barrels off its snowboard at him. The impact slams the sergeant's Dagger to the ground. As soon as it lands on top of Pavlov, it punches its arm straight into the cockpit and plucks the screaming Pavlov from his cockpit.

Lt Simmons is next as another mobile suit bats his gun out of his Windam's hand and slams its shoulder into him, sending his Windam flying for tens of meters before it hits the ground. By the time Lt Simmons recovers from the impact, the hostile suit has torn his cockpit hatch open and pulls him out. Unceremoniously dumped into a prison cage of sorts hung on its side, Lt Simmons can only watch helplessly at his men imprisoned in similar cages as the enemy suits grab their incapacitated mobile suits and drag them across the Siberian Plains. Then the mobile suits abruptly stop and look into the distance. Drawing their weapons, 5 of them give their cages to the rest and start running to huge holes in the ground and squat in them. The remaining mobile suits cover back the snow, burying their exposed heads and then continue dragging the wrecked mobile suits along with their prisoners to a huge carrier aircraft, which they board with the hulks and wait. Lt Simmons hears gunfire and then it stops, replaced by the howl of the snowstorm. Fifteen minutes later, the other mobile suits return and the aircraft lifts off for an unknown destination.

Siberian Plains

Russia

Republic of East Asia

Lieutenant Kravchenko leads his squad of 5 Dagger Ls across the plain of Siberia, on what was probably a fools errand. A villager had come running to his base claiming that he had seen mobile suits. If there were any mobile suits in this area, they would be OMNI troops, but cross-checks with the various bases had found no OMNI forces active outside of their bases.

The villager probably just hoped to make a quick buck and came up with a hoax. That was the first thing that had come in his mind and even made it a point to tell his commanding officer so. Still he had been ordered to jump out of a carrier aircraft and check it out and so here they were trudging through the thick snow-covered plain on a wild goose chase in the middle of a storm.

"Hey Lieutenant! You sure we're at the right place? I can't see shit through this storm!" Cried Sergeant Kutusov.

"Yes we're in the right place! Now shut up!" Replied an irritated Kravchenko.

Another pilot snorted over the radio, "Even if we could see, we wouldn't find anything because there isn't anything!"

Kravchenko just kept going, giving up on shutting his comrades up when his mobile suit struck something, sending it flying a tens of metres and almost tripping his mobile suit.

Regaining his balance, he cursed and trudged over to the object and examined it.

"What is it?" asked Kutusov

Lt K:" An arm, a mobile suit arm"

Sgt K:" How.."

Lt k:" I don't know, but I don't like it. Stay alert men"

Acknowledgements came in and the squad warily fanned out slightly, looking for anymore clues.

Lt Kravchenko's squad had advanced 6km when their radars pick up heat signatures ahead.

"Multiple heat sources dead ahead. They're very close.", reported Sgt Kutusov

Lt K:" I don't see..."

He never finishes his sentence as ten Jucargs burst from beneath the ground, showering the air in front of them with a wall of snow and open fire.