Chapter LXXV: Super smash brothers.
1300hrs, 26 December 2013, Socotra, Yemen.
"He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat! He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat: Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! Be jubilant, my feet! Our God is marching on." Battle Hymn of the Republic.
"No…" The entire SAILOR team was quiet after that entire incident was played out for them, over Beryl and Kunzite's dead bodies and blood staining the large monitor in front of them. The gravity of the situation was apparent; they had been abandoned. Even their most staunch ally, the President of the United States of America, for whatever reason, had turned her back on them. The Japanese PM was a sleezeball, of course he would sell them out, but POTUS? The person that Amy and Mina had saved from being vaporized, let alone several hundreds of thousands more people in Washington D.C and New York City? This was the thanks that they got? This was the reward they had been given after all this time for a job that they didn't even want in the first place?
"Luna…Artemis…somebody, come in!" Serena said into her radio. There was nothing but static. It would seem that what the President had communicated to the world leaders was true; she wanted to erase them.
"I've got nothing from them," Amy noted, also trying to get in touch with their communications officers. Nothing.
"This…this has to be a trick. Beryl's tricking us somehow," Mina said, still in shock.
"I would like to believe you, Mina," Raye said slowly. "But those guys don't look friendly."
She pointed to a couple of videos from several different security cameras that had just popped up on the screen. Several heavily armed men, with similar looking HUDs to their own, swept through some of the rooms they had passed through earlier, killing any remaining PMC members and capturing the wounded or the non-combatants.
Amy quickly started tapping on her tablet computer, looking for some weakness in their communications. She found one. The SOCOM units were using a frequency, while encrypted, were still using some of the Nakanishi proprietary communications equipment that allowed for her to access it using the information the USAF provided to them earlier.
"Wait…I've got a feed onto their communications. Looks like they didn't remove all of their Nakanishi software." She found it ironic that she was using some of the information that was supposed to help the US military, to hinder their efforts.
"Lucky us," Raye facetiously said. Amy tapped into them and put it out of their HUDs.
"Bravo 3-2, proceed up the corridor and toward Beryl's living quarters. Secure and extract any personnel you find on the way."
"And if they resist, Overlord?" Bravo 3-2 asked.
"Bravo 3-2, lethal force is not authorized against non-military personnel who do not comply with your instructions, break. If you encounter hostile non-military personnel, subdue them using pain compliance, over."
"Understood. Out." There was a second before Overlord started talking again.
"All units, all units, this is Overlord, emergency message from USSOCOM. There is an extremely dangerous PMC unit operating in the Socotra fortress. They are armed and have extensive training and experience in combating special operations units."
"How is this different than the other…" one of the special operations operators started to say, but was cut off by Overlord.
"This comes directly from the President of the United States. You are to terminate this group at all costs. Details are being sent to your HUDs concerning this group. Overlord out."
In a second, their faces popped up on their own HUDs, displaying their ages, what weapons they were using, known associates and aliases, and other vital information that might be helpful in taking them down. Except for their location, of course, and even that could be extrapolated from their communications with the US forces after removing the nuclear threat.
"Jesus…oh fuck." Lita said. "Oh fuck, oh fuck. What the fuck do we do now?"
"I don't fucking know!" Raye burst out, trying not to panic.
"Right now, there's at least five or six special operations people outside these doors, ready to take us down," Serena said somewhat calmly. "We have to take them out and…"
"…and then what?!" Raye retorted. "We get out in the open, and they start shooting at us!"
That caused Serena to hesitate. "I…look, let's take out these guys, okay?"
"What are we going to do then?" Amy asked, bringing the conversation back to ground.
"Um…" Serena still didn't know what to do. The feeling of terror started to build up in her stomach, and all she wanted to do was to curl up into a ball and disappear.
"Let's just shoot them," Raye snarled. "I've had enough of this shit."
"They're still on our side, even though we've…we've…" Mina couldn't bring herself to say it, but the Americans and the allied forces were still with them. They couldn't start to kill American soldiers or any other Allied personnel for that matter. Doing that would start them down a path of darkness that would be much crueler than the one they were already on.
"Mina's right," Amy said coldly, still trying to hide her anger at the President for betraying them. "If we start killing American soldiers, that'll just be one quick way for us to die."
"As opposed to…?" Raye said back to her, skeptical of her reasoning.
"Guys! Okay, we're not going to kill them." Serena brainstormed up an idea...something…anything.
"Strip out of your tactical gear, into just your uniform."
Under normal circumstances, the appropriate response would be "What…?!" But this was life or death time, and there was no time for such responses. They complied immediately, with Serena giving them a plan of action.
"When the special operations people come in, that'll take them for surprise, just for a moment. Lita, hide your Taser over there by Beryl's desk. Pick a target and when…" She looked around for a second to see which person should start the melee. "When Mina decks the first guy that comes up to her, we grab a person and beat them. Do not kill them, but make sure that they don't get up. Understood?" She gestured for Mina to get next to the door.
"Got it."
While Mina was moving over to the door, the rest of the team piled their gear near the desk, and hoped that the incoming spec ops people wouldn't notice it right away.
"I can't believe we're doing this," Raye griped.
"We are doing it, and it might just buy us some time," Lita said back, dropping her M249 next to the chair and placing her tactical vest over it.
Mina heard some voices behind the door, and gingerly walked up next to it in order to open it up and surprise them. She prayed that this ridiculous plan would work out. If not, there would be dead blonde girl on the floor out there and more than likely, a massive shootout involving the deaths of probably all the SAILOR team and some of the special operations operatives would result.
The SEAL team was making extremely good progress, although the amount of dead PMC soldiers and destroyed UGVs was a disconcerting one at best. They had notified Overlord of that development, and they had chalked it up to the rogue special operations team that they kept warning them about. Finally, they got past the last security post, and approached Beryl's living quarters. Alpha 2-5 reached for his radio and contacted Overlord of their progress.
"This is Alpha 2-5, were ready to stack up on…Beryl's living quarters, over." They were inside the foyer to Beryl's office/room, and were admiring the luxury facilities that she enjoyed. Even the personal assistant's desk, located right before the door to the office, was a nice, hardy oak, with a state of the art computer, recording device (just in case), and a gun underneath it. Gallant checked the weapon; it was a P99. He disassembled it and left it on the floor.
"Roger that. Bravo 3-2 is right behind you, wait for them to move up and breach together."
"Affirmative."
"Who the hell has a name like Beryl?" Davies said to no one in particular, wondering his thoughts out loud.
Gallant shrugged. "I dunno."
The patter of heavy boots alerted the SEAL team of Bravo 3-2; A large black man in his late thirties approached them, M4 SOPMOD in hand. They opened up the doors behind the D-Force team and stepped in.
"Hey." Bravo 3-2, said to the SEALs as he approached with three other operators.
"Nice of you to join us, D-Boys," Alpha 2-5 joked with them. "Someone has to be late the party."
Bravo 3-2 rolled his eyes at 2-5. "Hush. You wouldn't be here today if I didn't back you up during that Nigeria mission."
"Alright, alright. Care to go in first then?"
Bravo 3-2 gestured toward the door. "Nah, I'll trust your ever-present intelligence and experience. You first."
"Geez." Alpha 2-5 and his SEAL team stacked up on the door, on the right side, while Bravo 3-2 stacked up on the left.
"Okay, this is how it's going to go; Bravo, open the doors, and my team will go in first. You cover us and come in hard after we go in. Don't know what to expect in there, so we're going to put a camera in there first."
Alpha 2-5 got a small fiber optic camera that could be slipped under doors to see if anyone was inside.
"Did you get anything on thermal?" Davies asked one of the D-Force operatives.
He shook his head. "Nah, everything is hot down here; it all blends together. Couldn't get a good read the second we stepped into this place."
"I'm not seeing anything," Alpha 2-5 said, retracting the camera. "We're set to go in."
Bravo 3-2 nodded, and grabbed the handle for the door. At this point, Beryl had not installed any security locks of that sort on her own personal office and room; if you had gotten past all the security measures at this point, then a dinky lock or keypad wasn't going to stop you.
Alpha 2-5 readied his M4 SOPMOD and prepared to breach. "Ready? One…two…"
The door suddenly opened.
"What the…" There was a very timid, blonde girl, a military style uniform, looking extremely scared and confused at the big, burly special operations people point weapons at her.
"Hands above your head!" Bravo 3-2 yelled at her, but that was made moot by him and his team wrestling her to the ground, while Alpha 2-5 rushed inside the room to find four more girls inside, all in the same shape of the person they captured by the door.
"Jesus. Someone got Beryl here…" Davies looked at the headless body of Beryl and the shredded corpse of Kunzite. "Overlord, we have confirmation that Beryl and Kunzite are dead."
"Roger that, we see the damage here." Overlord also that they had several girls in the picture, but they didn't look anything like the information that had been sent to them via POTUS. They were slightly more muscular, toned, and frazzled than the pictures that had been provided to them, ostensibly by the Japanese government. They forgot to tell them that those pictures were six months old.
The other operatives secured the four other girls in the room, making them put their hands above their head. Bravo 3-2 turned Mina over to Alpha 2-5 who led her toward one of the walls and got out some flexcuffs; it was a precaution, nothing could be left to chance.
"What's your name?" he said, trying to calm her down. She was extremely tense and nervous, as would any untrained civilian would be in this case. Alpha 2-5 figured that they might have been sex slaves or prostitutes trafficked over to the island in order to relieve any "tension" on the island that would have inevitably resulted from having lots of grown men with few women around. The uniforms were probably just part of the job, like most of the other civilian personnel they had found around here. Some bastard really got off to that kind of thing, Alpha 2-5 thought.
"Name…? Um…Mina." Her English was good, in any case.
"Mina, well, we're going to take you out of here and…" Something clicked in Alpha 2-5's head. Mina…Mina…why did that sound familiar? He stopped reaching for the flexcuffs and touched his HUD, going back through the communications with Overlord. He came across a communication with him not more than ten minutes ago that had a description of the girl that sat in front of him looking very scared.
"Considered armed…and extremely dangerous?" Alpha 2-5 turned his attention back to Mina, but it was already too late. A rapidly closing fist impacted with his face, stunning him for a quick second. It was going to take much more than a quick punch to the face to bring down a Navy SEAL, but that's why Mina followed it up with a kick to the groin, then to the ribs. Again, the SEAL could take the punishment, and recovered from staggering about to turn and face his attacker, drawing his sidearm in the process. Mina grabbed his arm and shoved the weapon toward the ceiling, causing it to go off. She hit his arm several times, each time loosening the grip on the P226 that he was carrying. Finally, on the third try, she got Alpha 2-5 to drop the weapon on the floor, only to get her hair yanked back in the process. Mina screamed in pain and delivered a lucky kick to his face, stunning Alpha 2-5. He let go, and Mina moved in for the (metaphorical) kill. She dive tackled him and started punching his face, one right after the other until she had broken his nose, cheekbones, jaw and several teeth. Alpha 2-5 was completely out of it at this point, and couldn't fight back.
Lita had a much easier time. She smashed Gallant's face in with no problem and put him in a chokehold that blacked him out in a couple of seconds. It would buy her some time at least. Lita reached behind Beryl's desk, knocking over a glass of scotch and drawing the much mocked Taser from a chair. She snapped it up and aimed at the three Delta operatives who were trying to take aim at the melee that was going on at the back of the room. They couldn't get a shot off for fear of hitting their own men (even if they were SEALs), and were momentarily distracted by the melee so that they didn't see Lita aiming at them for a second. Their training and perception though, detected movement and the operatives swung their M4 carbines around to try to engage the new threat. Lita however, was just a millisecond faster; in quick succession, she fired the Taser at the first target closest to her. The operatives were standing in a staggered line, with the operative closest to Lita no more than two meters away. The CO2 cartridge sent the prongs flying into the air and hitting him in the exposed arm area. Speed, surprise and overwhelming firepower was the hallmark of SOCOM and normally this would have been no contest. But it wasn't.
He was already recoiling, trying to control the violent shocks that the prongs were sending through his body. It was possible to shrug off the effects of the Taser, but that took a lot of training and effort, and D-Force rightfully assumed that the best way to avoid being paralyzed (or shot for that matter) was not being shot in the first place, unsurprisingly. The effects of the Taser were diminished and not as effective on the operatives as other people, but they still slowed them down for a couple of seconds. That was all that Lita needed.
Quickly, Lita fired off the rest of the cartridges, hitting the remaining two Delta Force operatives in their exposed areas, and rushed forward keeping the triggering mechanism depressed sending out the electrical pulse that kept the operatives immobile. A quick hit to the face by her left arm knocked them out for a second, just enough time to put some flexcuffs on them that she had. In about twenty seconds, three Delta Force operatives had been subdued, a feat unto itself that would have impressed anyone else, especially other special operations operatives. Lita didn't care though. She was just trying to stay alive.
With that threat gone, she turned her attention to the rest of the team. Mina seemed to have her threat under control, and was running to save Amy, who was having a really bad time.
Davies had been repeatedly smacked on the head with his own rifle, and was trying to draw his sidearm in order to kill the dumb blonde in front of him. Serena, on the other hand, was trying to do everything short of killing him, but the amount of CQB training that Serena had was barely doing anything against the big, burly spec ops guy in front of her. She dodged another punch by the machine gunner, and quickly hit him in the ribs before retreating momentarily from his counter-attack.
Mina saw that Amy had picked a fight with a big, burly man (even in comparison with the other operatives, he made them look small), and while she put up a good fight, she was losing rapidly.
Pompey was trying to pin this small girl down, but she would simply not give up. After having his rifle knocked out of his hands, and his pistol literally disassembled in front of him, he had tried to administer a no-holds barred beatdown, like the one he used to give the recruits at OTC, during the CQB section anyway.
Amy refused to go down. She would not give up hope, and despite being tossed about, having a series of nasty punches to the face, kicks to the ribs and pelvic region, she continued to fight on. The only thing that would slow the big guy down was by disrupting his ability to think and to respond to her actions. So, in a final desperate attempt, she managed to pick herself off of the floor and grab onto his tactical vest. She smashed her head repeatedly into Pompey's face, breaking his nose and hers in the process, sending spasms of pain through both their heads. Pompey recoiled, as did Amy, and they both fell back, dazed and confused. Mina finally came to the rescue, delivering a kick to his right leg and then stomping down on it repeatedly until the leg bone broke through the skin. Pompey collapsed onto the ground and screamed out in pain, even more so when Mina grabbed some flexcuffs from his tactical vest and restrained him, zipping them so tight that it drew blood.
"And stay down," she hissed, kicking him one last time.
Serena had finally got a handle on her target, snapping his wrist and pummeling his face with a bust of Beryl that she had on a stand near the TV screen. Davies saw some stars briefly, then staggered about trying to regain his balance. Serena simply stuck out her leg and tripped him, and that was enough to send him falling to the floor.
Raye was the last one to take her target down. The Delta Force squad leader, Bravo 3-2, had been putting up a good fight, but now it was five against one, and he didn't stand much of chance after that.
Raye delivered a couple of quick punches, which were easily deflected by Bravo 3-2, but several kicks to the groin by Serena, and a left hook by Lita to the chest brought him down to his knees. The last thing he remembered was falling to the floor, noticing the grimace on his opponent's face as he blacked out.
"Fuck…" Raye stood gasping in the middle of the room, surrounded by the flexcuffed and unconscious special operations operatives. "Just…fuck."
Serena barely could pick herself off of the ground. "How is everyone?" she asked, wincing in pain.
Amy felt her nose; it was broken. She closed her eyes and breathed in, and after waiting a second, she reset it. The pain snapped through her body, but it was over in a scant couple of seconds.
"I'm fine." Serena winced as Amy did that, but then again, she had more medical training than the rest of them.
"Let me take a look at that," Amy said to Lita, who was holding her prosthetic arm a bit limply.
"I don't know what I did to it," she complained to her.
"Oh…" Amy saw some damage to the mechanics of the arm. There wasn't much she could do about though; without proper specialized facilities, the arm was going to get worse and worse until it just finally snapped. "Lita, this isn't good. Just…" She would have said, "Try not to use it as much," but that was kind of an impossibility due to their circumstances. Lita still got the hint though.
"Got it Amy."
"How are your legs, Serena?" Amy turned her attention to SAILOR Moon.
"I'm fine, I'm fine," she insisted. Amy took a look anyway; despite the fighting, she was in better shape than Lita. "You're good here," Amy said, finishing up her examination. Serena took a few seconds to catch her breath, then started giving out orders again.
"Lita, get these guys into that closet. They're going to be conscious soon, and we can't have them chasing after us."
It wasn't so much that they were "unconscious"; they were more stunned after taking a severe beating. Several of the operatives that Lita had stunned were groaning in pain: Lita depressed her Taser again, making sure that they complied with her.
"Help me get these guys into her closet over there, will you?" Lita said to Raye. "Mina, clean the place out and make sure that there's nothing in there that they could use to escape."
"Got it." Mina went over to the closet and started tossing out the clothes, expensive shoes and anything else that might be useful for a person to escape. It was only a delaying tactic though; it would only be a matter of "when" they would escape and not "if". These were highly trained special operations operatives and a couple of measly flexcuffs were not going to stop them.
"Put all of their equipment there," Serena said, pointing near the desk in the center of the room. "Take some ammo if you need it, but I don't want them to have their equipment when they escape."
Amy searched through their equipment and noticed some special grenades in one of their pockets. "I've got some thermite grenades here," she said.
"Good, we'll need those," Serena said, putting on her flecktarn uniform and tactical vest. "They'll have some ammo as well, grab what you can."
Amy started to take out the STANAG magazines from the operatives' vests, and placed them on the floor, methodically lining them up so that the other team members could get them. None of them had her type of ammunition, but that wasn't a big concern, considering she hadn't fired very much (at least, in comparison to someone like Lita). Still, she should probably pick up something to replace her P90…nope. Amy looked at one of the M4 SOPMODs; it had a biometric sensor on it that would lock the gun up if someone other than the original operator picked it up. Damn. She wondered why they didn't have those types of devices on their own guns, or the other Nakanishi PMC guys, but then figured that those things were extremely expensive. USSOCOM was probably one of the few organizations in the world that would have the means to do so. Even the Nakanishi Group wasn't that advanced (or willing to pay the cost) for those kinds of gadgets.
As Amy was musing over that, a loud noise interrupted her.
"Overlord to Alpha 2-5, come in, over."
One of the HUDs had been dropped on the floor near the piled up equipment, and Amy picked it up to look at it. The HUD was similar to hers', with a more blocky appearance than her streamlined one.
"Overlord, Alpha 2-5, come in, over."
"What should I do?" Amy asked Serena. She held the device in her hands, gingerly, like it was a newly folded origami crane.
Serena came over to her, after stuffing her vest pockets full of ammunition. "Answer it. Make sure they get this; 'We're not their enemy, and we're only just trying to get back home. We can explain everything, and that there must be some misunderstanding between us and President." She paused for a second. "Well, something to that extent."
"Fine." Amy took off her HUD and put Alpha 2-5's on.
"Who is this?" Overlord immediately asked. That wasn't Alpha 2-5, and from what it looked like, it was one of those girls that was on the "shoot on sight" order he had gotten earlier that day.
"My name is Amy Mizuno," was the response.
"Whoever you are, get off of this network. This is a military only channel and any interference…" Overlord started to say, but was cut off by Amy.
"Listen, dumbass," Amy snarled. Everyone in the room looked at her. Now that was a new sight, seeing SAILOR Mercury angry. "Your special operations operatives are disabled, and we're about to burn their equipment. I know you got your orders from the President, so listen to this. Me and one of my friends here..." She looked at Mina, in order to get her point across, "We saved the President's life about two weeks ago when the Nakanishi Group decided to attack the White House."
"Ma'am, I don't care who you are, if you've killed those men…"
"We haven't killed them, like I said before." Amy got up and walked to the closet, where Lita and Raye had just finished up dragging the rest of the groaning spec ops operatives in there. Overlord got a good look at the humbled men in the closet before Amy took off the HUD and pointed it straight at herself, so that Overlord could see her.
Overlord winced a little bit before recovering his stoic face. Years of being in the Army deadened one's ability to feel pain, but even after seeing the prized SEALs and D-Force operatives beat up like that, the damage that they had inflicted on her was just as bad, maybe even worse. Her face was a wreck, blood streamed from a gash on her nose, multiple cuts on the cheeks, a slightly swollen eye…it was bad.
"Listen to me, sir." Amy had also recovered herself from her angry outburst, and tried to make up for it. Pissing off special operations commanders was not a good idea. "Just put us through to your President. We can sort this all out."
"You don't give orders to me, Ma'am," Overlord shot back. "But..."
He could stall for some time at least, just to figure out what in the hell was going on. They had spared the lives of the SEALs and D-Force boys, and were now asking for an audience with the President, claiming that they had actually saved her. This was just too ridiculous.
"Fine. I'll get back to you."
"Thanks. Out." Amy terminated the conversation and pocketed the HUD in her tactical vest. "I'm done here," she said to Serena. Serena nodded her thanks, and turned her attention to the massive pile of equipment from the special operations operatives.
"Okay, is everyone stocked up on ammo?" Serena asked the entire team. "Yes? Good. Raye, torch it."
"With pleasure." Raye pulled the pin on the thermite grenade she was holding in her hand, and tossed it on the pile of discarded equipment. It exploded in a ball of white light and flame, destroying the radios, guns, and ballistic vests on top of the pile before moving down to where the grenades and ammo they couldn't carry had been piled up.
"Let's get out of here before the explosives cooks off," Serena stoically said. The SAILOR team jogged out of Beryl's room as the thermite detonated the explosives and extra ammunition the team couldn't carry; the rounds from the exploding ammunition flew everywhere, pinging off furniture and burrowing inside walls. Inside the closet, the tied up operatives flinched at the explosions, but in a scant couple of seconds, it had stopped. Their equipment was now sufficiently ruined, with their vests burned to a crisp, their weapons turned to slag, and their electronics melted down to goo. At least they escaped with their lives.
"What are we going to do now?" Raye said to the rest of the team, leaving the scene of destruction behind them. "We're going to get slaughtered by those soldiers if we don't figure something out."
"I don't know." Serena didn't have a plan of action. Amy didn't. Mina didn't. Lita didn't. And certainly not Raye.
"We can't stay inside this facility anymore," Lita said, after about a minute of silence.
"Why not?" Raye shot back, but it was more of a half-hearted effort on her part; she really didn't know what to do.
"Well, in here, we're trapped. Sooner or later, those spec ops guys are going to get us. At least out there, we might have a little bit of a chance."
"Anyone disagree with that course of action?" Serna asked the entire group. There really wasn't much they could do about it. Going outside…maybe they could find some help, or surrender to someone that might take them in. Some of the other nations other than the United States were out there; maybe India? Amy and Mina looked at each other, wondering how that work out.
"Where's the entrance that these guys came out of?" Serena asked Amy. They were now walking down the halls they had fought through not a couple of hours ago; scattered youma, destroyed by gunfire and explosives, dead PMC soldiers littering the hallways, their blood making the floor slick. Mina gingerly stepped over one of them, wishing that it really hadn't come to this.
"It's near the tram station, about three hundred meters down the hallway and to the right."
"Thanks." They continued to walk forward, their weapons at the ready, but again, no targets presented themselves. The youma were all destroyed or outside, fighting the landing forces or spec ops, and the PMC soldiers and personnel were surrendering to them outside.
Fifteen minutes later, they came to entrance. It was discreetly located in a janitor's closet, which had already been opened by the other D-Force operatives. Inside, a small hallway lead to an elevator and some stairs that seemed to go on for a little bit, ending in a cave.
"There's an elevator over there, but it's out of order," Raye noted, pressing the call button. The power was out anyway, thanks to Amy.
"Stairs?" Serena asked.
"Right next to them," Amy pointed out.
"Good. Let's take them."
The SAILOR team descended down the flight of stairs to the hidden entrance that would lead them out of this facility. A dry wind howled in the stairwell, ominously cooing at their misfortune. Serena wondered what the hell they were going to do now. They certainly couldn't just walk out there...but to stay here was certain death. But out there was certain death.
"Well, looks like this is it. Now or never. Amy, are you ready with that HUD?"
"Yes Serena."
"Let's do this."
The SAILOR team stepped out into the sunlight.