Chapter XVII: Blue on blue.
0000hrs, 5 September 2013, Shinsegae, Busan, South Korea.
"I'm getting a little fed up with hearing about, oh, civilian casualties. I think we ought to nuke North Korea right now just to give the rest of the world a warning." Ann Coulter.
"God, that mall is huge," Mina said. "Wish I could shop there."
She and Amy were in a very tall skyscraper, overlooking the Shinsegae, or "New World," shopping complex in Busan, in the very south of…well, South Korea. The Shinsegae store here was the biggest in the world since 2009, and even surpassed the Macys in New York City. The normally busy road was dead quiet since it was the dead of night, and the Mall was undergoing some minor renovations.
This was their first operation in the real world, and hence, everyone was extremely nervous. They had done days of VR simulations in the last month, but this was real life now, and if you died here, you died for real. And even if they had killed a real person, that was under a controlled circumstance and was only to toughen them up for the things ahead. After finalizing the mission details, the SAILOR team had been shipped over to Busan just yesterday, and had set up in the hotel nearby. They were checked in under an obscure Japanese (in actuality, a North Korean) trading company, and had unpacked their equipment in there. Amy, along with Luna and Artemis, had taken the liberty of disrupting the CCTV network around the area a couple of hours before the operation so that nothing would record their presence in the area while the attack went down.
"Who's the target again?" Mina asked.
"A Mr. Park," Amy stated. "Didn't you pay attention in the briefing?"
She brought up a profile of the target on the eyepieces they were wearing.
"That's like, half the people in Korea," Mina said. "And not really."
"I know, I know," Amy said. "This is Park Minjun, the CFO for Hyeonjun Heavy Industries. He is suspected of defrauding several Japanese businessmen and companies, but has effectively avoided prosecution in both South Korea and Japan. He travels in a convoy of three SUVs, fifteen bodyguards in total, armed with pistols and SMGs, type, unknown. There is a backup team trailing a half of a kilometer down the road, consisting of three more SUVs and fifteen bodyguards." Luna had gotten that information actually through a news report on Mr. Park only hours before, stating that he needed such a large escort due to threats against him.
"Don't you find it strange that we just killed some Koreans?" Mina asked out of the blue.
"Huh?"
"I mean, your guy and my guy were both Koreans. And here we are, about to assassinate yet another Korean dude. What's up with that?"
"Mina, I don't know," Amy replied. "Focus on the job at hand."
Mina sighed. "Yeah. I know." They stayed quiet for a little bit after that.
"Target located," Amy reported. She saw three vehicles approaching from the across the bridge. "Three SUVs, marking now."
The eyepieces HUDs of the SAILOR team lit up, showing the location and movement of the convoy. Amy hit the transmit button on her eyepiece to send a radio message to a P3 Orion flying over the Korean Strait.
"This is Mercury," Amy said.
"Mercury, send traffic," was the response from Luna.
"Any police presence, Luna,?"
"Negative, SAILOR Mercury," Luna replied. "I haven't detected anything on the police network as of late, just the usual traffic. Over."
"Affirmative, out."
"Get ready everyone," Amy said. "Mina, on that rifle if we need it."
"Right." Mina had already set up a Chogyok-Pochong sniper rifle, a North Korean variant of the M76 Zastava. "Make sure you break that window if we need to." She had also set explosives on the window overlooking the massive eight lane road near the shopping mall.
"Got it." Amy held the detonator in her hand, ready to go.
"I see them," Serena said. She was parked in a Hyundai Carnival, acquired by the finance team, waiting in a small access road by the skyscraper that Mina and Amy were in. Raye was there too.
"Going into battle in a minivan," Raye sarcastically commented. "Wonderful."
"Hey, don't be hating on the minivan," Serena replied. "That's how we got all this stuff in here." She pointed at the backseat. Packed in there were North Korean uniforms, ammunition, and propaganda, everything needed to blame this on the North.
"Whatever. I got the RPG ready."
"Good, Lita, you ready?"
"Affirmative," Lita said. She was waiting in another Carnival down the road, ready to hit the convoy from behind with a Type 62 LMG, a NK variant of the RPD machine gun. Serena's team were all wearing black fatigues and ski-masks, and had all NK or Chinese made weapons imported to NK so that the connection would be clear to the South Korean government; North Korea was most certainly behind this attack. They had blocked off the opposite side of the road with a few bribes to the local public works company ("Not these guys again," Mina complained), who had let them "borrow" portable, plastic jersey wall and some cones on the other side to "symbolize" some sort of construction work, much to the annoyance to the locals.
"On my mark." Serena saw the SUVs slow down to make sure that the road was clear at a stop light, but blazed right through the red. "Standby."
Amy watched the SUVs continue down the road, toward Serena's position. She noticed something on top of the middle SUV in convoy, but she couldn't make out what it was…
"Go." Serena floored it and ran right across into the path of the lead SUV and stopped about fifty meters in front of it. At the same point, Raye ducked out of the side door and fired her RPG. It was a perfect shot…except that the RPG exploded before it hit the lead vehicle.
"What the…"
"Shit!" Serena rolled down her window and started firing her Type 63 Carbine, a SKS knockoff. "Reload!"
"Loading!" Raye rammed a fresh round into the RPG and prepared to fire.
Lita was behind the convoy, engaging the team that had poured out to attack her.
"This is Jupiter! These guys have M16s! Engaging!" Lita fired in short bursts, trying to prevent the convoy from leaving. She managed to puncture some tires in the center vehicle and some rounds in the engine block, stopping it from leaving.
"RPG out!" Raye yelled. She fired the RPG again, but like last time, it detonated before the first vehicle.
"What the fuck!" she exclaimed, reaching for another round.
"Any time now Mars!" Serena shuffled from the driver's seat to Raye's position to get a better firing angle.
"I'm trying Serena!"
Up in the skyscraper room, Mina watched the firefight with growing unease.
"Doesn't look like things are going well down there," she said nervously.
"Goddamnit!" Jupiter yelled over the radio. "Blow the SUV now!"
"I'm trying, I'm trying!" Mars yelled back.
"Wait, wait." Amy looked back at the center SUV. That thing she had seen earlier…she accessed the database of military hardware in her eyepiece.
"Shit," she said.
"What is it?"
"That's a hard kill system on top of the SUV. It takes out stuff like RPGs and missiles."
"Great, what are we going to do about that?" Mina's trigger finger twitched.
"I'm marking it on your HUD." Amy scanned the area and marked the hard kill system on the SUV. She also illuminated more targets. Several of the body guards had gone down, but there was still a lot of fire coming from the area down there. "Backup bodyguard team is five mikes from position," she noted.
"Mercury, SAILOR Moon." Luna's voice was the last thing that they needed to hear right now.
"Send traffic," Mercury replied. "What?!" was the less polite (and incorrect protocol) response from SAILOR Moon.
"The police channels just lit up," Luna reported. "I have five police units en route to your location. In addition, the local SWAT team is being deployed and will on location in fifteen minutes. Over."
"Affirmative," Amy said. "Got it," Serena echoed.
"Okay, Mina, take out that hard kill equipment there. I got the detonator. In three. Two. One. Now."
Amy blew out the window and a second later, Mina fired her sniper rifle at the hard kill system. She then engaged any remaining personnel on the ground.
"It's down!" Amy yelled in the radio. "Mars, take the shot!"
Raye wheeled around and fired the RPG at Kim's SUV. Without the hard kill system, there was nothing to stop it. It detonated on contact, blowing up the SUV and everyone inside it. But just in case, Raye fired another RPG at the vehicle, just to be sure.
"All SAILOR units," Artemis' voice over the radio said. "Get out of there, backup team in one mike from your position and multiple police units closing in."
"Affirmative!" SAILOR Moon and SAILOR Mars piled back into their now bullet ridden minivan and backed up, fleeing from the scene along with SAILOR Jupiter.
"Hurry," Raye said. She could see police cars approaching from the south and west, along the eight lane road. Serena and Jupiter would have to evade the police by driving along the side roads, headlights out and speeding along the quiet residential areas to the ocean.
They would then abandon their vehicles and equipment near a wharf and hastily set them on fire.
"Damn, that was close," Raye said, looking at their minivans on fire. "I kind of miss that car."
"You were bitching about it earlier," Serena said.
"Well, I changed my mind. Where's Jupiter?"
"I'm here." Lita came running up behind them, after setting her car on fire. "Man, this is going to make the North look so bad."
"Tell me about it." Serena looked back at the two plumes of smoke billowing from the docks, and then hurried away into the night, catching a cab back to the hotel.
Up in the skyscraper, Mercury and Venus had a different escape plan. They had planted explosives in the room they had been renting, and left the room in hurry, along with the incriminating evidence that would say that the North Koreans had been here.
Mina and Amy hurried down the stairs. The police were already there, scouring the area and asking questions to the few people there at the time, but this was to be expected. Mina hit the detonator.
The resulting explosion shattered half of all the windows in the building and woke people up for miles around.
They escaped in the confusion, walking for a couple of kilometers before hailing a cab to take them to the RV point, which was at their hotel on the beachfront of Busan, the Westin Chosun hotel.
"Goddamn," Mina said, getting out of the cab and paying the cabbie an extra thousand won or so to make him "forget" that they were ever there. "That was something else."
"Better get out of these clothes," Amy replied. "They don't know that it was us in the attack, but better safe than sorry."
"I'm right with you on that one," Mina said. "Hope the other guys got back okay."
"I'm sure they did."
They walked up to the third floor where they had their rooms, next to Raye and Serena, and Jupiter, who got her own room ("Lucky," Mina bitched.)
After they had gotten changed, Amy knocked on Raye and Serena's room. No response. Mina and Amy looked at each other. She knocked again. Still no response.
"Okay, this is not good," Mina said, nervously. "Got your sidearm?"
"Yeah." Amy checked her Glock 26 and took it out of her purse. "I'm going to bypass the electronic lock." She used some of the on board tools in her eyepiece and unlocked the door. Mina went in, gun up, expecting trouble, but instead…
"Oh for crying out loud," she hissed.
Raye and Serena were fast asleep, with a bottle of champagne from room service by their bed.
"What kind of champagne is it?" Amy scanned it. "Wow, a 1998 vintage Dom Perignon, that's nice."
"I wonder if Iwasaki knows about it?" Mina said.
"He does." Luna's voice came in over the radio.
"I thought you went off duty," Amy replied, somewhat snarkily. They had stopped using proper protocol for now, since they were out of the danger zone. Luna made a note about that and decided to write a memo to Iwasaki about following proper procedure during an operation.
"Hey, we still have to look after you guys," Luna said. "Even though you do outrank us."
"Whatever." Mina stared at the two sleeping girls. "Well, they deserve it…for now I guess. We'll just have to see until later in the day how our attack went."
"They did do most of the heavy lifting," Amy noted. "I tracked about four-hundred rounds fired in their general vicinity during the firefight."
"That's a lot."
"That still doesn't excuse…" Luna began, but Amy cut her off.
"No offense, Lieutenant," and Amy put extra emphasis on Lieutenant. "But you're not the one down here taking the risks. We can handle ourselves just fine, thank you very much."
"I…of course, SAILOR Mercury."
"You're welcome, Luna. Anything else that we need to know about?"
"You're slated to depart in twenty four hours. We expect the police to lock down most of the transportation networks for at least a day and we don't want to raise too much suspicion by leaving too soon."
"Not that they suspect us anyway," Mina replied. "They're looking for NK commandoes, not five women."
"That may be true, but we have to keep this…how do you say…on the DL?"
"Uh-huh."
"Okay, we'd better let them sleep." Amy and Mina backed out of the room and closed the door.
A couple of hours later (and some rest on Amy and Mina's part), they turned on the television to see their handiwork.
"Can you translate this?" Mina asked Amy. "My Korean wasn't so good."
"Sure."
The newscaster was stoic in his voice as he reported the attack.
"At around 12:30am this morning, a convoy carrying the CFO for Hyeonjun Heavy Industries, Park Minjun was attacked by suspected terrorists sponsored by North Korea. Park Minjun was killed in the attack, along with seven bodyguards. Weapons and explosives found on scene were of North Korean origin and a room overlooking the rented a couple of a days ago to a company turned out to be a North Korean shell company incognito. We go to Kim Minseo, on the scene of the ambush."
The camera switched out to the ambush site, with one burned out SUVs and two very shot up ones.
"Thank you Geonu. I'm here on the scene of the crime, where hundreds of bullets were fired last night at this location. Several witnesses heard multiple weapons being fired and loud explosions, presumably from an RPG found in a minivan, abandoned at a commercial wharf several blocks away. There was also another explosion from a rented office on the tenth floor of this building…"
The camera panned up to show a bunch of shattered windows and a big scorch mark where Amy and Mina had done their firing from last night.
"Nice work," Amy complimented.
"Thanks."
"…which contained a sniper's nest and observation post. Police have confirmed that this was rented by a shell company used by the North to conduct overseas business. Live, from Shinsegae, I'm Kim Minseo."
"Thank you Minseo. The North Korean government has strongly denied these accusations, but with the hostile overtures in recent month concerning North Korea's weakened economic state and nuclear weapons program, this attack may be part of a larger conspiracy to undermine South Korea."
Mina muted the television.
"Well…" she said. "We did good."
"I certainly hope so," Amy replied, looking at the TV screen.
Not too far away from the SAILOR team was a man called "Jadeite," head of Nakanishi's operations in Asia proper (covering China, South Korea, Taiwan, Southwest Asia, and India). He was actually staying in the same hotel, for some odd reason.
"Hey, Jadeite." The man called "Jadeite" was on the (secure) phone line with somebody in Japan. She had called a couple of hours after the attack had happened.
"Hmm?" He was bored now.
"Did you hear about the attack on that CFO from Hyeonjun Heavy Industries?"
"Yeah, what about it?"
"Well, we can go ahead with the acquisition. He was probably the only one holding the entire process up." Beryl could almost cackle evilly at that point, but she restrained herself. Barely.
"Really now? That's very convenient of that to happen, at this time." Jadeite was completely playing dumb on that last one.
"Don't be so daft," Beryl chided. "You know why I did that. The PM is completely in my pocket, and SAILOR does whatever I tell it to do."
"Wow, you are one massive bitch," Jadeite complemented.
"Amazing isn't it?"
"What about Yamada?"
"Yamada is too busy getting stoned out of his mind right now. All he cares is if the balance sheets add up and he gets a billion plus yen check in the mail. So I get to run most of the business and he gets to party. Works for all sides involved."
Jadeite lay back in his bed. Things were looking up. Then he remembered something.
"Hey…don't we keep tabs on some of the NK sleeper cells here? There's actually…" Jadeite checked his encrypted computer. "…one nearby."
"Yeah, what about them? After this, they're going to continue to keep quiet."
"Well, picture this. Two incidents in one day. Famed CFO gets knocked off by a North Korean commando squad, right? Then a NK sleeper cell turns up dead, knocked off by a rogue arm of the NK military, trying to assert itself. In the same city, on the same day, within a five kilometer radius. This makes the NK government look weak and forces their hand on some things…"
"Jadeite, you're playing with fire here…" Beryl knew that he could suggest some batshit crazy ideas at times.
"We know who planned their nuclear program. We can shut it down if we want to."
"Even though, there are thousands of artillery pieces pointed at Seoul alone. I don't want a war wiping out all of Korea and a huge chunk of business with it." Beryl was always calculating, looking at the strategic view. Two highly militarized nations with enough firepower to wipe out all of Korea and then some would not be conductive to a business environment. Jadeite was already ahead of her in that regard though.
"All this tension will create demand for some of our products, and with Hyeonjun Heavy Industries in our pocket…"
That set a light on in Beryl's head.
"…we can cater demand to the South Korean government and military, Jadeite, you're a fucking genius."
"That's why you pay me the big bucks." Jadeite smiled. I love my job.
Beryl certainly seemed relieved on the other end, especially since what Jadeite was suggesting could amount to a full scale war between two very heavily armed and dangerous countries. But his rational made sense, for now at least.
"How is the SAILOR team doing at the moment?"
"They're doing good. Two of them are completely hung-over and the other three are awake, and letting the stress from last night bleed off. It was my idea to put them up here. They're just women, they don't know how to live on the fly like us men."
"I'm a woman," Beryl replied, very coldly. Jadeite was not PC at all.
"I know that, but you're special. These girls are pumped full of VR and healing fluid, and now that they've killed some people, it's only going to be 'when' they crack. Men can take that. Women can't. Except you."
"Uh-huh." Beryl made a mental note to admonish Jadeite for his sexist views later on. But she was still in a good mood and she wasn't going to lecture one of her best company officers for his beliefs.
"Keep an eye on them and then return to Japan. I just wanted to see how they did on their first mission. I'll send the orders to the PM and have them attack that NK sleeper cell. Thanks Jadeite."
"Not a problem, Madam Beryl." He hung up the phone and took a sip of the juice he had ordered from room service.
"I love my life," he said to no one in particular.
"Change of orders, SAILOR Team," Luna said.
"What's up?" Mercury asked. Mina and Amy were still in the room, going over the after action report that their eyepieces has collected. Jupiter had finally gotten up and was stumbling around in her room, while Raye and Serena were still in bed.
"We have suspected NK sleeper cell in the city and they have been pushed to action by our recent attack. They are holed up in a residential district and are preparing to move within the hour."
"For what? That makes absolutely no sense," Amy said.
"For whatever reason, we intercepted orders from NK GHQ to activate this cell and to attack police and military installations."
"Couldn't they hold off?" Amy was getting really suspicious now. A North Korean attack, right after our false-flag operation? The idiot ball was rolling on this one now, and where it would stop, nobody knew.
"That's a negative. The orders were to conduct a raid on targets of opportunity in the area and to cause disruption of communications and civil order." Luna was reading off the report that had been handed to her not just ten minutes before. Artemis and Luna, along with Col. Iwasaki were back on the ground now, having landed at Misawa AFB in the north of Japan. "Stand by for location of sleeper cell."
"Who the hell came up with these orders?" Iwasaki said, reading off the paper that had come direct from the JCOS and the PM. "I mean, I'm all for killing more Koreans, but this might make it a little bit more difficult."
Luna ignored her CO's comments and continued relay orders to the SAILOR team.
"The sleeper cell is located in a residential area three kilometers from your position. 41303-422 Millak-dong Suyeong-gu is the address of the building. I'm punching it up on your map right now."
Luna sent the data to Amy's eyepiece, as well as Serena's. But she was asleep, so she didn't hear the beep of an incoming transmission.
"Luna, that's barely a kilometer away from where we conducted our last operation. Advise best course of action."
"Affirmative. Take the alternate route I have placed on your map. That will take you across a bridge that is not guarded by the police and toward the residential district. Suggest that you use suppressed weapons or hand to hand takedowns as not to inform the residents of your presence and attract police attention."
A longer route that would take them across a bridge, then up through a series of small roads would take them to their destination showed up on Mercury's eyepiece.
"Advise, we do not have any means of transportation."
"Mercury, just take a damn car," Luna cursed. For a smart as these girls were, they lacked some street sense. "It'll be fine."
"Uh…you sure about that? I mean, I don't want to attract more attention," Amy protested.
"Dammit," Iwasaki came on the radio. "Steal a fucking car and drive it there with your team. Abandon the car there and walk back. It's only a couple kilometers back."
"Are you trying to get us killed?" Amy was getting more upset by the moment. None of this was well planned through at all.
"For fucks sake!" Iwasaki yelled at SAILOR Mercury. He was getting just as irritated as Amy. "Just do it!"
"Yes, sir," was the ice cold response from Amy. Luna came back on the line.
"Did you get all that?"
"Affirmative. I'll go wake SAILOR Moon and Mars up." Amy walked off in a huff, and didn't even tell Luna that she was ending the transmission.
"Confirmed. Luna out," Lt. Kitsune finally said.
Amy stalked across the hall and unlocked the door again, remotely and woke Serena and Raye up.
"Hey you two," she said, shaking Serena. "Wakey wakey, we have a mission to go on."
"Uhhhhh." Serena was still a deep sleeper.
"Serena, get up," Amy repeated. "We have to go on a mission."
"But we just came back from one," she complained.
"Welcome to our new life. We get to kill more bad guys. Come on, get up."
After five minutes of prodding and pleading from Amy (and later, Lita and Mina who joined her to badger Serena and Raye), they got them up.
"Why are we going out again?" Serena asked, annoyed. "Didn't they say in the briefing that there would be a heavy police presence in the area?"
"I don't know," Amy said. "Besides, aren't you supposed to be the leader of this team?"
"Heh," SAILOR Moon replied. "Like I wanted it."
"Come on every one," Mina interrupted. "We have to get to the location."
"Fine, fine. Let me get my weapons and we'll be on our way." Serena tried to get up from the bed, but plopped back down. Amy rolled her eyes and tried to tug her back up.
"You win," Serena sighed, and got back up. "Did Luna say anything else about this mission?
"We have to use silenced weapons or hand to hand."
"Did we bring any suppressors?" Lita asked. She didn't remember that in the mission plan.
"No." That was something that Serena did remember.
"They why did they tell us to bring suppressed weapons if we don't have any or even use them in the first place!" Lita asked, irritated.
"I don't know."
"Can't anything else go wrong in this mission?" Raye bitched. She had gotten up and was putting some clothes back on.
"Let's just get this over with." Serena grabbed her purse and put her Glock 26 into it. "Lita, looks like you're going in first."
"Great," Lita replied. "Just what I wanted."
After leaving the hotel, Amy remotely unlocked a fancy looking 2011 Infiniti G that was parked right outside. The owner thought that she was going to get a valet, but instead, it got stolen.
"Okay, who's driving?" Serena asked.
"I got it," Mina said. Amy got into the passenger's front seat, and everyone else piled into the back.
"God, you're so fat," Raye snapped at Serena. She had the misfortune of getting the middle seat.
"Oh, you're so original," was the reply.
Mina hopped into the driver's seat. "Uh, Amy?"
It was one of those keyless ignition systems.
"Got it."
The car started up in no time. Mina followed the directions on her sunglasses HUD, across the bridge and toward the residential district.
"Heads up," Luna said. "Police roadblock in 100 meters." Mina saw several police cars and patrol officers milling about, checking cars and in general, being a nuisance. However, they did have submachine guns and assault rifles out, and they would quickly become more than a nuisance if the team did anything wrong.
"Is there any way to avoid it?"
"Negative. Do the best you can. Out."
"Amy, you're going to have to do most of the talking here." Mina was stopped now behind several vehicles going through the checkpoint.
"Can't you just talk to them in Japanese? Tell them that you're Japanese tourists or something." Amy wasn't quite sure if pretending if they were locals was a good thing.
"What about the car? We just stole the damn thing." Dammit, for a want of a nail…
"Make something up." That was the best Amy could come up with. She popped open the glove compartment and got the registration out.
The car had finally advanced to the checkpoint and an officer came up to the driver's side.
"Fine. Here goes nothing."
She rolled down the window.
"Identification please," the officer said.
"Yes sir." Mina handed them her passport, a fake Japanese driver's license and the registration.
"Ms…Tanazaki?" He butchered the pronunciation on that one. "This car does not belong to you." The officer was very suspicious, but he was new at the job, right out of his draft stint in the army.
"We're borrowing it from a friend. We're just visiting from Japan."
"Really now?" Not a chance.
"Yes, really. We can call her and she can vouch for us."
The officer looked up from the car. A long line was starting to back up now, with drivers becoming very impatient.
"Call her," the officer told Mina. He didn't believe their story for one second, but the car was a luxury one, with no signs of forced entry or damage.
"Alright." Mina got a burner phone from her purse and called Luna on a secure line. Luna was monitoring the entire situation and half-expected them to call her to get them out of the mess.
"Luna here," she replied on the secure line.
"Hey, Minseo-san, we got stopped at a checkpoint and they want to talk to the owner."
"Got it." Luna pulled up the registration that Amy had been looking at with her eyepiece sunglasses earlier. "Minseo Kim, address Daeyeon-dong, 10505-05, Busan."
"Hello, Miss. Kim? I have a car that belongs to you and that some Japanese people are driving." The officer looked at the line of cars. It was getting longer.
"Yes, that's them. A Miss Tanazaki should be driving." It was fortunate for the team that Luna spoke fluent Korean and Chinese.
"And what's your address?"
"Daeyeon-dong, 10505-05, Busan. My registration number is…" Luna actually hadn't gotten the registration number, but was going to make something up. But the officer didn't ask for it.
"Okay, okay, I believe you. Thank you Miss Kim."
He gave the phone back to them. "Go on, get out of here."
"Thanks officer."
Mina rolled up the window and drove out of there.
"That was close," Amy said, exhaling finally. "Thanks Luna."
"Not a problem," she replied. Luna pulled up recent police reports in the last hour. The car had not been reported stolen, probably because the owner thought it was in the valet lot.
Several minutes later, the car pulled up a block from the address.
"Okay, the house is on the right side," Luna reported. "It's a grey, two story house."
Amy looked out of the window.
"Advise Luna, they all look like grey, two story houses."
"Copy. I'm going to illuminate the house now."
On the SAILOR team's eyepieces, the house flashed briefly for a second.
"I see it," Serena replied. "We're heading there now."
They started to get out of the car, when Amy decided to do a scan of the area.
"Hold up," she said to the team. "I see something. Across the street." In another house, there appeared to be a lot of heat, with several people inside of it. There shouldn't be that many people in a house except…
"What is it?" Raye asked.
"Problems," Mercury replied. "Luna, we have a situation here."
"Go ahead."
"Are there and NIS teams in the area?" NIS was the National Intelligence Service, South Korea's infamous descendent of the KCIA, a brutal agency that suppressed freedom and democracy during Park Chung-Hee's military dictatorship during the 1960s, and then onward to the 1980s.
"Standby."
Luna checked radio traffic for the area. Sure enough, several frequencies used by the NIS popped up, and they were busy.
"Affirmative. NIS teams are in the area, monitoring your target."
"Shit," Raye said. "This is getting really complex."
"Luna, can you distract them?" Serena asked. "If we can get them away from this building…"
"I'll try sending an alert message to an empty warehouse across town." Luna broke the encryption code and alerted the NIS units to a suspected terrorist meeting point.
Seconds later, the house was buzzing with activity, and almost all the people left the building, jumping into cars and taking off.
"That's more like it," Amy said. She did another scan. Only two people were in the NIS house now. She counted at least four people in their target location as well.
"Venus." Artemis, who had been pretty silent during this entire operation, called Mina on her line.
"Yeah, go ahead Artemis."
"Why don't you and Amy take out the NIS house and Jupiter, Moon and Mars take out the NK hideout?"
"Sounds good. Did you all hear that?"
The other people nodded. It seemed like the two lightweights were paired up and the heavyweights ("Ha, ha," Serena sarcastically said. "Jokes at my expense,") were paired up as well.
"Let's do it," Artemis said. "Luna, take the second team, I'll take the first one."
"Copy. Terminate the NIS agents, over."
Amy and Mina looked at each other.
"Say again?"
"Terminate the NIS agents, we cannot have any witnesses to who you are."
Mina sighed. This job was going to suck, so hard.
"Got you," Venus replied. "What about the NK cell?"
"Terminate with extreme prejudice."
"Received," SAILOR Moon said. "Let's do this."
Amy and Mina jogged over to the other side of the street while Lita, Serena and Raye hurried to the house on their side.
"They're getting a bit antsy in there," Mercury reported. "Watch yourself, there's one looking out of a window on the second floor, toward the road."
"I see him." Serena ducked behind the house before the one they were supposed to attack, along with the others. "Lita, Raye, go around and find a back entrance. I'll go up and distract these guys."
"I'm on it." Jupiter and Mars snapped around a corner while SAILOR Moon snagged some flowers from a potted plant and approached the door of the house.
At the same time, Amy and Mina went to the NIS house, wondering what they could do to get the NIS guys out.
"Hey, block all of the radio traffic coming out of this area," Amy asked Luna.
"Done. Be quick about it though, someone is going to get suspicious if they don't hear back from these guys.""
"Roger. We're going in."
Amy walked up to the door and rang the bell. Normally, the NIS agents would have probably shot at her, thinking that she might be an enemy agent or something to that extent. But today, the most junior of the NIS agents were there, and didn't know any better. All the other agents were out on that false alarm.
"Yeah?" said the agent, coming to the door.
"Um…" Amy said. "We're looking for a cat that we lost, have you seen him?" She ruffled in her purse for a picture, but dropped it on purpose, spilling out lipstick, mascara and other things.
"Oh, shit."
"Here, let me help you," the agent said, kindly. He bent down.
Mina clobbered him on the head, and then pushed him into the house, Amy close behind, closing the door behind her. Amy rushed in and went up the stairs, where the other agent was sitting at a computer, monitoring the other house.
"Hey, Kwon?" the agent upstairs asked. "You okay down there?"
He started to get up from his chair and go toward the door, but Mercury knocked him down and got into a fight with him.
Downstairs, Mina apologized to the agent.
"I'm sorry," she said. Venus snapped his neck and then went upstairs to assist her friend.
Amy was knocked across the room by a flying kick from the agent. She just wasn't strong enough to overcome him. He started to pull out his side arm but Venus rushed into the room and slide-tackled him into the wall. She then stomped on his neck, breaking his spine and killing him.
"You okay Amy?" Mercury looked like she had sustained some punishment.
"I'm fine. Let me over to that computer over there and I'll wipe everything clean."
Amy went over to the computer and started to wipe the hard drive, getting rid of everything that the surveillance team had collected in the last day or so. She also uploaded the rest of the data to Luna.
"How do you think the other guys are doing?" Mina asked, watching the house across the street. "I didn't see anyone go in."
Serena rang the bell on the NK house. No response. She hit the bell again. Again, no response. A third time. This time, a man came to the door, sloppily dressed and in a foul mood.
"What the fuck do you want?!" he asked.
"Uh…I…uh…" she said in broken Korean. The agent immediately noticed this and tried to shut the door, but SAILOR Moon tossed the flowers at him and dive tackled him.
In the back, Raye and Lita had come across a padlocked door to the back of the house.
"Got a lockpick?" Raye asked Lita.
"Right here." Lita reached up and snapped the lock off with her left arm.
"Nice. Let's go."
Up front, SAILOR Moon was still struggling with the NK agent, who almost got her in a chokehold, but a quick kick to the groin solved that problem quick.
The commotion had brought down the three other agents, who were bringing weapons to bear. The door was behind the stairs, so the agents didn't see Mars or Jupiter come in.
"Gotcha," Mars said. "Get em, Jupiter!"
Jupiter had one of those multi-shot Tasers that police departments wanted, because the original one only had one CO2 cartridge and consequently, could only fire one shot. This one could fire three.
She aimed and fired three times. Two of the shots hit the same guy, while the third hit another. That left just one more.
Raye charged in and knocked the handgun out of the agent's hand just as he was about to shoot SAILOR Moon. She quickly delivered a kick to the stomach and a punch to the jaw, stunning him. She got out a knife from one of the incapacitated agents and then slit the one person she was attacking.
Serena was still in trouble. This agent would not go down, no matter how many times she hit him, he popped back up. That was solved by Raye shanking him in the ribs. He fell down, in pain.
"Wait, wait!" he said to Raye, who was about to slit his throat. "I can give you information!"
"Save it for someone who cares." Raye lifted the knife up and killed him with a stab to the throat.
He gurgled, blood spewing everywhere.
"That's gross. Why did you have to use the knife anyway?" SAILOR Moon, Jupiter and Mars were all now covered in blood.
"Sorry, I thought you said no guns," Mars replied, facetiously.
"Okay, fine, but everyone is going to notice us if we're wearing bloody clothing."
"Hey!"
Amy and Mina had come running across the street.
"Wow, what happened here?" Mina asked. It looked like a Shakespearean play had just concluded; blood was everywhere, four dead men on the floor, and three out of breath women standing above them.
"What do you think?" Lita replied.
"Okay, okay, I get it."
"You guys can't back looking like that," Amy stated.
"Thanks Captain Obvious, we were just talking about that," Serena retorted. "Raye, Lita, go upstairs and get some clothes from upstairs. And a bag if they have one. Amy you go too, try to find some intel."
Raye and Lita ran up the stairs and looked in one of the rooms for some clothes, with Amy right behind. They found some T-shirts and ill-fitting jeans, but that would have to do. Lita poked around and found a duffle bag in a packed closet.
"Hey, Raye, get a load of this."
Raye walked over to where Lita was standing.
"Oh, that's just wonderful."
There were some NK copies of the CZ-75, with attached suppressors.
"Grab those, we might need them." Lita took the bag and the clothes downstairs and changed into them, placing the soiled clothes in the bag.
"Found something," Amy said. She had accessed one of the laptops that the North Koreans had, and it showed a treasure trove of information. The rest of the team gathered around her, looking at what the information said. Amy had hit the "translate" function on her eyepiece, and was (for the most part) translating the words on the information document. Translating real time conversations however, was significantly more difficult and more of a hindrance than a help.
"Damn," Raye said. "These are orders, from Kim Jung-un himself!"
"But they don't specify attacking. It especially forbids combat operations unless the time arises."
"Are you getting this Luna?" Serena asked.
"I'm receiving," she replied. "I don't know the answer to that, break. But we received information from a government source that the NK team was going to go into action within the hour."
"Are you sure about that?" Amy asked. "We searched the house, and we found nothing else but pistols and some body armor. No heavy weapons, no explosives, no nothing. Advise, over."
"Again, intel pointed us to the NK team. That's all I have for you, over."
"Why would they plan an attack?" Lita asked.
"They did have silenced weapons, and they were trained operatives," Amy said. "They didn't need a whole lot to cause chaos. It took quite a while for you to take them down…"
"I guess that makes sense," Mina said. "But we got heavy arms into the country, why not them?"
"We have significantly more resources," Serena pointed out.
"And a Nazi Swiss bank account," Raye added.
"Whatever." Serena took a look around the room they were in. They had gone through everything, and there seemed to be nothing left. "Amy, bring the laptop and destroy whatever you can't carry. We're leaving."
It took two minutes for Amy to wipe the other computers and for the rest of the team to destroy whatever evidence that they had been there. Mina had cleared up the crime scene from the other house, and they all left, getting back into the Infiniti G and driving off.
"This is KBS News. In an unusual twist, the shooting death of Park Minjun, the CFO for Hyeonjun Heavy Industries came hours before a North Korean special operations cell was found dead in a neighborhood only a short couple of kilometers from where Park Minjun's convoy was ambushed, also presumably by a North Korean commando force. Analysts suspect that a rogue arm of the North Korean military is trying to assert itself on the international scene, and these latest attacks are a result of that rift between North Korea and that rogue group. South Korea is the latest victim in this conflict, with several NIS agents killed when the special operations cell was attacked by the rogue North Korean military section. North Korea maintains that there is not a rift in the military, and that the military remains united, as do the people of North Korea. However, both nations have placed themselves on high alert, and are conducting exercises with civil authorities and law enforcement to ensure that order and safety of the general public is maintained. This has also prompted a massive defense spending increase, and many companies like Hyeonjun Heavy Industries stand to benefit. However, Hyeonjun was slated to be bought out by a Japanese conglomerate, the Nakanishi Group. What this recent spat with the North will entail for Hyeonjun Heavy Industries, South Korea and Nakanishi Group has yet to be determined."
"Nice parking job," Serena complimented. Mina had parked the Infiniti right where they had found it, in front of the hotel.
"Thanks, I did my best."
The team walked away from the car. Just then, a parking enforcement vehicle came up to it and an officer put a parking ticket on the windshield.
"Well done team." Colonel Iwasaki was addressing the SAILOR group in front of a TV screen, which Amy had hooked up to one of their eyepieces. They were in Jupiter's room, since she was the only one in there.
"The mission was a great success," Luna added. She was standing in the background, along with Artemis.
"I beg to differ," Amy began, but Serena cut her off.
"Thank you very much Colonel, sir. When will we be extracted?"
"Probably in the next twenty four hours or so. We had to push the extraction back due to the recent events, so enjoy yourselves. No Dom Perignon though."
"Understood," Serena said with a smile. "Is there anything else?"
"You have a new mission when you get back."
Everyone groaned, but accepted it. "Thanks Colonel." The line went dead.
"Amy, what are you doing?" Serena snapped.
"That mission was a complete disaster!" she replied. "We had a huge firefight in a crowded, urban area, and then we have to kill off not only a North Korean Special Operations team that had nothing to do with this mission as well as two allies from a nation we're supposed to be at peace with!"
"Amy, why do you have to be a fucking smartass!" Serena spat. "You always have to have an answer for everything, huh? You always gotta be like that mom of yours, right? Right? You blue-haired freak!"
Amy looked like she was about to cry. Serena was looming over her, like a principal admonishing a student.
"Stop it!" Mina shouted. That halted Serena in her tracks.
"Amy has a point. A lot of these things might have been avoided. But you're correct too, we don't need to discuss this right now. So everyone just calm down. When we get back to base, we can discuss things there. Okay?"
Serena stared back at Amy, then to Mina, then back to Amy.
"Fine. When we give back to base, we can discuss it in depth."
Every scurried off back to their rooms; Mina comforting a distraught Amy, Serena and Raye stalking back to theirs. Serena was really pissed off. What was that Amy thinking? Her thinking was completely off the charts and…dammit, there really wasn't much she could do about that. Maybe some more Dom Perigon would make things better.