* I apologize for the huge delay I don't have a set writing schedule and my job has been a little crazy. As always, thanks for reading! Let me know what you think of the story so far and if you have any ideas you'd like to have in the next chapter as our operators begin their undercover operation. *

Chapter 4

The operators didn't know what was worse, receiving the news of being deployed, or the month of waiting and preparing till they got deployed. Throughout the weeks, Six, the CIA, and the 5 operators coordinated training every day to refamiliarize the operators with the line of work and the location. Some of the training included lessons in Arabic, geography, undercover strategies and tactics, culture and anything about the enemy they were going to face. The operators lived in a cocoon of stress every second of the day with barely any free time for release. When Mike finally had time to breath he built up the courage to call his wife and tell her the news of his deployment. He already knew she wasn't going to happy about it so he'd been procrastinating talking to her. He sat his desk waiting patiently for his wife to pick up the phone. He tried to put his words together to explain his situation. He wheeled his chair around and stared out the window behind his desk. It was midday and the rain had finally seized. Mike's view of the base from his office wasn't as good as Six's but whenever he started to daydream he found himself looking out the window.

"Hello?" A man answered. Mike immediately recognized the voice.

"Hey son." He said glad to hear his son's voice.

"Hey dad. Got a break from saving the world huh?" He said teasing him. It's been a little while since they last talked.

"Yeah something like that." Mike said chuckling.

"Is everything okay?"

"Everything is fine. I just need to talk to your mum. Is she around?"

"Yeah she's in the kitchen. You want me to get her?"

"Well we can talk for a couple minutes." He said trying to find courage to tell his son the news.

"Uh, alright. Well how's work?"

"Busy son. Very busy. Uhhh…. How's university treating you?"

"Its good. I have all A's and one B. One professor has been giving me a hard time, but I think I'll live."

"Don't let your grades slip now boy. If you ever want to get into the SAS, you have to aim high."

"I know dad I know. You don't have to remind me."

His son wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and become an SAS operator. Mike wanted to push him through college first to get his degree before he signed up for the military.

"I'm your father Sam, its my job to nag you."

His son laughed. He heard a woman's voice in the background ask who his son was talking to.

"Hey mum is here. I'm gonna put her on. I'll see you soon dad."

"Yeah bud I'll see you soon. I love you." His voice said faltering.

"I love you too dad."

He kicked himself for not telling his son the news.

A woman's voice came on.

"Hello?"

"Hey babe its me."

"Hey you."

"Keeping Sam in line over there."

"When he's home yes. I can't control the trouble he gets into at school." She said laughing.

"Hey, I have something to tell you. It's about work."

"What's wrong? Are you okay?"

"Yeah I'm fine… its just…." He paused, took a deep breath, and found his words.

"Lily, I'm being deployed."

There was silence on the other end of the phone.

"Lily?"

Lily rapid fired a million questions at him. She couldn't believe the news.

"What? What do you mean? For how long?" Her voice said shakily.

"What?"

"How long are you going to be over there Mike? How much more time do you want to spend away from us?"

"Honey this isn't my fault. I don't pick and choose where Rai… I mean England sends me."

"HOW FUCKING LONG MIKE?!"

His wife and son had no idea he was apart of Rainbow Six since the unit was classified. They still think he's stationed at an SAS base.

"I don't know."

He could hear her start to cry on the other end of the phone.

"Mike, you've had so many chances to get out, yet you still stay. You're 56 years old! You've missed so much on life because of work. When will this ever end?"

Mike lowered his head in shame. He began to feel a pit in his stomach.

"What am I supposed to tell Sam?" She asked with a twinge of frustration.

"The truth."

"Are you even mentally ready? All the horrible things you've seen? You're just welcoming it back with open arms? Your past fucked you up for a long time. It put a lot of strain on our family. You want to go through that again?"

"Sweetie… let me expl…"

His wife didn't want to hear his bullshit sob story.

"No Mike. Just go. You know I love you. I support you. Never forget that." She said firmly.

The old 56-year-old special forces war veteran closed his eyes fighting tears. He took a breath.

"I know. I love you too." He said shakily.

"You come home to me. Do you understand? Come back to me. Come back to your son. We miss you. Come home Mike. Put an end to this. Be with your family."

"I will honey. I will. I have to go. I don't know when I'll be able to talk again but I'll call you as soon as possible."

"Promise me you'll come back."

"Honey…"

"Promise me."

There was moment of hesitation before he spoke.

"I promise."

"I love you."

"I love you too. Tell Sam I love him too."

"I will."

There was a click on the other end and then the dial tone.

Mike sat in office holding back the wave of emotions. He stared at a photograph of his family that he kept on his desk. He picked it up and stared at his wife and son in the picture. Soldiers have a very basic rule: never make promises in combat. He just broke that basic rule. There was a crackle of thunder in the distance. He turned and looked out his window. It was starting to rain again.

…

Meghan sat on an examination table in a cold and white colored room. There were posters and signs about medical related facts. A counter stood across the room with medical supplies on it. Six had requested all the operators get a pre-deployment physical to make sure the operators were in good health before they were deployed to harsh environment of Iraq. Meghan had just gotten off the phone with her dad telling him she was going to be away for a while. She had to keep the conversation extremely vague because the mission was classified. The conversation left her feeling hallow inside. She was very close with her father and it broke his heart to hear that he wouldn't be able to talk to her daughter for a while, but he understood her situation.

A doctor entered the room wearing teal colored scrubs and a lab coat. She carried a clipboard and a big folder with Meghan's name on it. She had a long and ugly scar going diagonally across the middle of her face. She smiled when she saw Meghan.

"Dr. Mel, how are you?" Meghan said embracing her friend trying to act cheerful. Dr. Lera Melnikova was the new Spetsnaz/CBRN operator and doctor to join Rainbow Six during Operation Chimera. She and her CBRN counterpart Olivier played a major role in their victory at Truth or Consequences. Meghan became friends and workout buddies with her after she had joined the team.

"I'm doing well Meg how about yourself?" She said with a heavy Russian accent.

"You know, same old same old." Meghan shrugged.

"So, Six has me informed that you have been chosen for an undercover op in Iraq." She said reading through her medical record and paperwork.

Meghan frowned at the statement. Lera looked up from her paper work at her troubled friend.

"You don't sound very excited about it."

"Yeah…" Her voice trailed off and she looked down at her feet dangling from the table.

"I understand how you feel Meg. You know I'm here for you. This is your friend Lera talking, not robot Dr. Melnikova."

"I'll be fine. But thank you." She said sounding slightly defensive. She didn't like being opening up her feelings too often. SEAL training had taught well about controlling her emotions.

"Alright well let's not stand on ceremony here Miss. Castello."

Lera made Meghan remove some of her clothes to conduct the physical. Meghan took off her blue t shirt revealing nasty scars all over her muscular figure. Some looked years old while others looked new. There were also other bumps and bruises on her body too. All the marks a testament to the years of abuse Meghan has endured from the SEALs and Rainbow. Each mark and scar had its own story. Lera ran through her physical making sure her body was in good health as well as giving her shots to protect her from any diseases she could be exposed to in Iraq. With the physical she took Meghan's weight. Meghan stepped on the scale and looked down at the number. It blinked '129.9.' She looked at Lera confused.

"Jesus Meghan. You're severely underweight compared to your medical records in the past." Lera said harshly.

Meghan remained silent.

"I know why you're underweight, Meghan. For the past few weeks now since you've been assigned to this mission you've been living in the gym working out till you puke and then some. I've seen you do it and so have the other operators. Are you even feeding yourself? What you're doing is not healthy. How do you expect to be combat ready like this?" Lera said coldly.

"What I do is none of your business Lera. I need to be in top physical condition for this mission. I can't let my team down. There's a lot riding on this." She fired back.

"Hey, I'm not trying to be an asshole. I want to help you. Clearly this mission is bothering you. It's not like you to act this way. You should talk to someone before you end up hurting yourself."

"Lera, every time you work out with Monika and I you finish the day heaving in a trash can too. Don't be a hypocrite. You think I'm becoming a sociopath like Tiana that you think I need a shrink? I'll feel a lot better once this mission is over with." Meghan said with sarcasm.

Lera stared at Meghan with narrow eyes. Meghan was right. She was being a hypocrite, but it was her job to point something like that out to her.

Meghan stepped off the scale.

"Let's just get this done with." She said bumping shoulders with Lera as she walked away.

Lera took an x-ray of Meghan's arm that she broke when she was in high school. Meghan had gotten surgery to have screws inserted to help support the bone break in her arm. She wanted to make sure it was still in good shape. Meghan also had blood work done up. When the x-ray was done they returned to the examination room and looked at the x-ray together.

"Everything is right where it should be." Lera said pointing to the screws in her arm. Meghan looked down at the big scar on her tattooed arm from the surgery she had gotten for the bone break and then back at the x-ray picture.

"Looks good to me. Are we done here?" She asked impatiently.

"Yes."

Meghan put her clothes back on and walked for the door.

"Meghan. Wait." Lera said writing some notes in her file.

Meghan stopped at the door.

"What?"

"If you need anything. Anything at all. Come and find me."

"I'll keep that in mind." She said and walked out the door leaving Lera alone in the room. Lera scribbled down some last-minute notes and left the room.

…

Ela walked through the cold rain back to her apartment. She could feel the temperature drop as the hidden sun hiding behind the cloud barrier began to set. Her baseball hat sat low over eyes. Soldiers waved hello to her as she walked past them. She ignored them kept walking. Ela had been spending her time trying to reacquaint herself with Arabic. She would be the team's translator since she knew the language better than the other operators on the mission. She climbed the stairs to her floor. She was happy to take a break from practicing. As she walked through the door to her hallway she watched Timur Glazkov walk out with an easel. He made his way upstairs to the floors above where the operators lived. Ela went to continue to her room, but her nosiness got the best of her and she turned around and snuck up the stairs following Timur. Timur sat in a chair beneath a tin canopy on the roof of the dorm. The base was lit up in bright lights. The rain continued to fall steadily with the sound of thunder booming in the distance. Parts of the clouds lit up occasionally from lightning strikes over country side surrounding the base. Glaz stared at the grey landscape as if he was in a trance. His pencil began to move swiftly across his easel sketching what he saw before him while his eyes stayed trained on the landscape. He didn't look at the easel once while drawing. Ela sat at the doorway watching silently as a picture began to form on the paper before him. His hand abruptly stopped.

"Elizabetha, can I help you with something?" He said without turning toward her and sounding very annoyed.

Seriously Elizabetha? Of all times of the day, you choose to waste my time when I'm about to draw? His anger spoke in his head.

Timur's nonchalant reaction to her presence took Ela off guard. How did he know she was behind him? She didn't make any noise when she followed him.

"Oh… um… uh… sorry Timur. I saw you walk upstairs and I followed you. Just wanted to see what you were up to." She said timidly.

"Is there any reason why you're snooping on other operators?"

"How did you even know I was sneaking up behind you?"

"I have developed a 6th sense for that kind of thing. Get interrogated from a late flanking Tiana enough times and you'd understand."

Despite the Russian wanting to be left alone, Ela stayed put.

"Elizabetha, if you have nothing else to say, please leave." He said with a dark tone.

Ela continued to stand in silence by the doorway. She studied Timur's drawing. Despite the two being artists, Timur and Elizabetha never got along with each other as operators. Timur thought of her as a reckless and delusional operator who lacked patience. The only times Timur and Ela ever had any interactions with each other was when Timur was squeezing the trigger on his OTS sniper rifle zeroed in on Ela's skull from a distance or when Ela was mowing Timur down with her SMG all in their team's training simulations. Ela went and took a seat next to Timur to get a better look at his drawing. Ela had never talked to Timur about art. All Ela was looking for was a friend; especially during such troubling times in her life with her deployment. She thought maybe art could help improve their relationship with each other.

"That isn't leaving." He said white knuckling his pencil as his frustration with Ela built.

"How do you find inspiration to draw with such a barren and dull landscape?" She asked.

Timur sighed at the fact that Ela wasn't going to leave him alone.

Patience Glazkov. His mind told him.

He placed his pencil down and moved his easel to the side.

"What makes you say that?" He asked watching the landscape in front of him.

"Well the rain, the boring British landscape, and greyness seems lackluster and ugly. I've seen your artwork before. Your paintings are of beautiful, vibrant colored landscapes. This environment lacks beauty and color."

"Quite the contrary." He said leaning back in his chair still admiring the landscape. "Everything has beauty within. Just because there's no vibrant landscape or bright colors doesn't mean it's not beautiful. There is beauty in everything we see. You just have to take the blinders off your eyes and see the big picture."

Ela sat lost in thought as she looked out toward the landscape. Thunder boomed in the distance.

Ela took off her hat and pulled a pin out of her hair letting it fall. She ran her one hand through her hair. The gesture caught Timur's eyes.

Ela's hair wasn't bright green and short anymore. It was long flowing past her shoulders and it was dark brown. Her natural hair color. She must have removed the dye out of her hair and let it grow over the past month. Timur could see the resemblance between Elizabetha and Zofia as sisters. She looked beautiful, but he felt something was off with her mood. He assumed it was the mission she was being forced on. Six had informed the operators with the little information she could tell them of their deployment back to Iraq and she encouraged all the operators to help them any way they could in preparing.

Timur picked up his pencil and handed it to her.

"What's this?" She asked taking the pencil.

"Draw." He said pushing the easel toward her.

"Timur I haven't drawn anything in years…"

"Find the beauty within this landscape that you find boring. You might be surprised by what your mind sees. Maybe drawing will take your mind off things." He said forcing a smile.

Ela positioned the easel in front of her. She held the pencil in her hand and took in the landscape trying to find its inner beauty. A streak of lightning stretched across the sky in the distance over some hills. Ela memorized the second in time of the lightning flash and began to draw. While Timur watched her draw he discreetly pulled a small sketch book from a bag. He flipped to a blank page and pulled out another pencil. He began to sketch a picture of Ela in her natural look drawing her work of art. He wasn't sure when he'd ever see her wear her hair like this again, so he took advantage of the moment.

After about 2 and half hours the two artists had finished their art pieces. Timur turned his little sketch book over hiding his picture and looked at Ela's drawing. He was impressed by her drawing ability despite not drawing for a couple of years. He could see the emotional stress she had been feeling in her pencil strokes. Her picture depicted Hereford Base with a bright bolt of lightning over flashing over the base. The light from the lightning bolt shining brighter than the lights on base. It was very well done.

"Impressive." He said removing her picture from the easel.

He rolled the picture up and handed it to her. She took the picture from the sniper.

"Thank you." She said smiling.

"You really need to work on your stress management Elizabetha. Look at your strokes." He said unrolling her drawing. He pointed to some of the pencil marks. "Marks like these are not relaxed strokes. These are aggressive. Your facial expressions also gave away your sour mood."

Ela broke eye contact with the sniper's icy blue eyes. With eyes like Timur's she felt as if he was looking into her soul.

"Going back to Iraq has really been stressing me out Glazkov. I thought I'd never have to go back to such a horrible place but clearly, I was wrong. The drawing really helped me today. I thank you for that." She said humbly.

"Ela why haven't you talked with anyone about how you feel? Letting your emotions eat away at you is very unhealthy."

"I know. It's just a sore subject for me, that's all."

"You should try talking to your sister or someone in the family. Some good family time never hurt anyone." He said trying to help her.

If looks could kill Timur would be dead right where he stood.

Ela face changed from feeling relaxed to pure hatred.

Timur realized his mistake when he put the name 'Zofia' and 'family time' in the same sentence while talking to Ela.

Nice one Glazkov. Do you realize who you're trying to lecture on family? Way to fuck up. His conscience said mockingly.

"You wanna know what my sister is good for?" Ela asked.

Timur didn't answer.

"Being target practice during simulation training." She said with an evil tone to her voice.

Timur tried to rebound from his idiocrasy. He was never good with talking to females. Especially crazy ones. Especially the ones that took pleasure in shooting their older sister in virtual reality.

"Then talk about how you feel through your art. Lots of great artists used art to explain how they feel. Clearly you still enjoy art and you have talent in it. If talking about things is difficult for you or you find yourself in a bad mood, then maybe try painting it. The easel and paint brush won't judge your thoughts."

She nodded in agreement. Of all people, she never thought she'd receive words of wisdom from Timur Glazkov. The thought returned a smile to her face.

Ela got up, tied her hair into a pony tail and put her hat back on. She took her picture and signed her name on the lower right corner of the drawing. She placed her drawing in Timur's lap and gave him a peck on the cheek.

"Thanks for cheering me up. It was sweet of you." She said and left Timur to his lonesome. Her soft footsteps echoed down the stairwell until they were drowned out by the sound of rain pelting the tin canopy above him and thunder.

Timur opened his pocket sketch book and leafed through the pages. He had captured the operators completing various missions to living their everyday lives in his sketches. Even though he normally kept to himself, he took interest in capturing specific moments of time with his fellow operators. He continued to flip through the book until he made it to his sketch of Ela. Her eyes in the sketch showed hurt and pain as she drew her picture. Strands of her brown hair flowed with the cold breeze. He exhaled and closed the book. He looked at Ela's drawing before rolling it back up again. He began to gather his art supplies. That was enough drawing for tonight.

…

"You going to be okay with the added responsibilities while I'm away?" Jordan Trace asked as he worked on his brimstone charge in the chemistry lab. The timer had been getting finicky in sandy environments causing it to take longer to detonate.

"Yes, Jordan I'll be fine." Yumiko Imagawa said rolling her eyes as she watched him work. Yumiko was Rainbow's secondary hard breaching specialist but instead of creating 'a big fucking hole' with a breaching charge she creates small precise holes in reinforced material from a distance with a special launcher and specials pellets she called X-KARIOS. Without Jordan's expertise, Yumiko's gadget would never have been possible, and she wouldn't know half the tactics of a hard-breaching specialist that she knows now.

"Good." He said stuffing an armful of brimstones into a special case. He removed his lab coat and Yumiko handed him his Carhart jacket.

"Hey Jordan, is there any way we can make my X-KARIOS detonate faster?"

"Why do you want that?"

"Bandit."

"Bandit? You mean Dominic?"

"Yeah, whatever his name is. You've seen that new strategy he's been doing with his batteries where he waits for you to place your charge on a reinforced wall and then as soon as you prime your charge he places his battery down which destroys the charge?"

Jordan chuckled at the thought. Dominic's batteries drove Jordan nuts in training. Jordan was able to outsmart Dominic's cheeky strategy by placing his charge and detonating it in unison with several of Mike's EMP grenades thus negating Dominic's batteries when he placed them. Jordan fondly remembered the first time he tried the counter to Dominic's strat with Mike and how he blew Dominic to smithereens in the training session because he was on the other end of his brimstone panicking as he watched his batteries fail due to the fury of EMP grenades thrown at the opposite side of the wall. Elias had a front row seat to Bandit's catastrophe as the point man and couldn't stop laughing from behind his shield after what he witnessed.

"Yeah I know what you're talking about. Mike and I call it the, 'Bandit Trick.' It's not a solid strategy. If you deploy your breaching device in unison with Mike's EMP grenades you can get around it."

"But that's my problem. My KARIOS aren't exploding quick enough after Mike has exhausted his EMP grenades, so his battery eventually destroys my charges before they explode. Mike and I have been practicing getting the breach correct but we can't seem to figure it out. I figured if we shortened the time to detonation, then I'd have a chance."

"Well unfortunately we can't do that. If we shorten the time to detonation, then your KARIOS won't have enough time to cut the hole in the reinforced metal. If you prematurely detonate your charges before it has cut a hold completely through the reinforced material, you run the risk of injuring your team. Even if we did somehow find a way to make something like that work, the German Looney Toon, the old man, and I won't be around to test it out. We'll have to look into that when I get back."

"How long are you going to be?"

"I have no idea. But I have a bad feeling about this mission for some reason."

Jordan locked the door to the lab and started walking back to the dorms with Yumiko.

"What makes you say that?"

"The details are sketchy as fuck. Its classified though. Sorry."

"I see."

Yumiko walked with Jordan back to their dorms in silence.

Jordan gave her a confident smile despite the depressing details.

"I think we'll be fine though. I got good people going with me."

Yumiko gave him a weak smile. She could see through his bullshit. When Jordan had a bad feeling about something, it was normally best to take it seriously.

Yumiko made it to her dorm with Jordan. Jordan wished her goodnight and made his way back to his dorm. Jordan began to go through his pre-sleep routine. Hey took his dose of Prozac and looked at himself in the mirror. He scratched his fully-grown beard that he let grow out for the mission. He thought he looked like Craig if he were an Irishman. Jordan crawled into his bed and as per usual his mind began to race. He saw his old marine unit. His pals. Most of his unit was dead now. He had no idea where the rest of the group was or what they had done with their lives. All he had left to remember him by was his dog tags and a group picture of them underneath the gates to Baghdad.

"Shit man." He whispered to himself.

He rolled over to his side and stared at the picture on his night stand.

"Looks like I'm coming back to you guys." He spoke to the picture.

He rolled back over to his back and stared at the ceiling fan spinning above him. Hopefully he'd get a few hours of sleep before his nightmares would keep him awake.