Southern Tajikistan, near the Chinese border.
2230 hours
Operation Blazing Glory
A Black Hawk flies over sandstone hills. It was dead at night, perfect for the operation. Trees sparingly dot the cold desert landscape
"Approaching the LZ."
A team of Delta Force Operatives, Callsign "Metal" were currently flying over Tajikistan on a mission.
"ETA four minutes."
Hours before they were briefed.
The GLA had massive amounts of information on the locations of American bases in the Middle East and Central Asia. The Chinese desperately wanted to get their hands on this information but they didn't want to get their hands dirty. Intel from the CIA suggested that China had paid Chinese mercenaries to raid a small group of GLA held up at a minor outpost near the Xinjiang province in the Chinese-Tajikistani border. And according to information given up by multiple GLA operatives through advanced interrogation methods. This outpost held tons of physical documents of American bases.
The US wasn't going to let the Chinese get that intel.
The plan was to intercept the raid before the mercenaries could get to the intel. Then destroy all of it.
"I have a visual on the target." The pilot stated.
"Lock and load" One of the operatives ordered
"Thirty seconds."
The outline of a faraway cliff grew closer and closer.
"Ten seconds."
"Five Seconds."
A thick rope fell. "Green light. Go." The four operatives descended from it, as soon as they hit the ground they trained their sights to the area around them.
"(COMMS) Metal 0-1, we'll be on standby for extraction." The Black Haw flew away.
"Copy." Metal 0-1 or Sandman said into his comms. "Cliff is a klick north, Truck, you need help with that stinger?"
"Nah, I got it." Truck, was carrying a stinger, with an M4A1 holstered to his front, a pistol on his side. The stinger was brought because the mercenaries would likely land from the helicopter.
"Let's move." They started hastily moving, alert and ready. "Stay frosty, area could be crawling with GLA."
They began moving north as Sandman commanded. While looking and aiming around them. They were making quick progress, moving quickly. Truck was a bit slower though, which made sense considering how heavy the stinger and its ammunition was. The stinger was relatively light on its own. But Truck was carrying the Stinger on top of his usual weapons, ammo, and grenades.
They eventually arrived. They were at a cliff overlooking the outpost. They could see it, it was small, but it made sense as it was just an outpost. There were four rectangular buildings, two watch towers and a paved road connecting all the structures.
"Overlord, we have a visual on the outpost." Sandman said into his radio.
"(COMMS) Affirmative, do you have eyes on the red building, over."
The red building was closest to them, at the southeastern portion of the base, it was also the largest building there.
"Yeah, we see it." Sandman replied
"(COMMS) Keep your eyes on the outpost, the Chinese mercenaries could arrive at any time."
"Copy that" Sandman took out some binoculars and went prone. Grinch loaded his M110 sniper rifle, extended its bipod, he went prone and rested it on the ground, aiming down at the outpost.
"One hostile at the eastern watchtower, another on the other watchtower." Grinch spoke while keeping his aim on the base.
"Multiple GLA on the roads, looks like patrols. A few behind that car." There was an old black car in front of a decrepit green painted building, with two rebels chatting in front of it.
Truck crouched and looked at the outpost. "Could be more inside the buildings."
"Yep."
Truck tapped sandman on the leg "Say, why don't we just attack now, I mean a Black Hawk's on standby, could probably take most of em while we burn the documents."
"We don't know how many there are yet, for all we know, we'll get outnumbered ten to one, and we can't risk the mercs arriving while we're taking care of the documents. When that happens we'll be fighting both sides at once."
"Got it." Truck relaxed a little, but still stayed alert.
Frost crouched down as well, looking at the outpost with interest. Half an hour passed as nothing changed with the outpost.
"(COMMS) Be advised, images from a satellite imaging show two unknown helicopters coming north of your position, ETA ten minutes." Overlord's voice suddenly came into the ears of the four soldiers
Sandman stood up and put away his binoculars. "That's them. Let's go over the plan one more time"
Sandman stood up and walked over to Frost and Truck, Grinch did the same.
"Let the mercs drop in and fight the GLA, while they're distracted, we'll rappel down the cliff and sprint to the wired fence, Truck will then take out the helicopters." Truck nodded as Sandman continued. "I'll cut the wired fence behind the red building, the two of you will take down any hostiles close to the door, Grinch will stay here and provide sniper support. Once the nearby area is clear, I'll go in through the door and start burning the docs and you'll cover me while I'm doing it, clear?"
Frost nodded his head
"Crystal" Truck walked up to the cliff.
They just stayed there for minutes, waiting for the mercenaries to arrive, then Grinch seemed to get alerted to something.
Grinch adjusted something on his scope. "Two tangos exiting the green and grey building to the north."
Truck looked a bit confused "You know this is a lot of GLA just for one small outpost. They said there was going to a dozen at most" It was true, usually outposts like this would only be guarded by around a dozen GLA but there were at least twenty GLA, outside, likely more indoors
"Well, all their main bases were destroyed so most of em are just hanging out wherever they can." Grinch spoke while keeping his aim on the base
"This is also one of the last places that has info on American bases, so the GLA, or at least what's left of them are gonna want to keep it protected."
Over in the distance, two large transport helicopters began flying in, their silhouettes growing closer and closer as time passed.
Truck brought up his binoculars. "Those definitely look like Chinese helicopters."
"Yeah" Sandman had his own pair of binoculars, he brought them down. "Alright, lock and load boys."
Frost adjusted his foregrip and examined the grenade launcher on his M4A1. Grinch readjusted his M110 and truck simply stared at the base.
Sandman pressed his earpiece "Overlord, this Metal 0-1, we have a visual on the helicopters, I repeat, we have a visual on the helicopters."
"(COMMS) Copy that Metal 0-1, you have permission to engage."
The GLA in the outpost suddenly went into a panic, people started running around, loading their AKs, and some of them even were holding RPGs.
Truck laughed "Heh heh, mercs are pretty shit at hiding their presence."
"True that. They're landing way too close to the base." Grinch responded
The helicopters were now less than a hundred meters from the outpost as ropes were then released, the GLA began firing RPGs, the helicopters began veering around and releasing flares.
"Now! While they're distracted.
Sandman, Truck and Frost all embedded metal loops into the sand, the spikes that went in had a fast acting adhesive that would keep it grounded. They attached their ropes with hooks to the loops and began rappelling down the cliff.
Truck stayed above though, waiting for all the mercs to drop, once they did, he aimed his Stinger at one of the helicopters and fired.
The helicopyer was out of flares and was hit by the stinger, it began spinning around uncontrollably and crashed onto the ground, Truck didn't even need to fire another missile, the GLA RPG troopers already took down the other one.
Truck rappelled down.
"(COMMS) Holy fuck, these guys are bad." Grinch said over, Comms.
Truck ran over to Sandman and Frost's position, by a chain link fence behind the red building, Sandman pulled out some wire cutters and began cutting them quickly with ease. After thirty seconds, Sandman lightly pushed the freshly cut part and it fell over.
"Frost, take point."
Frost moved forward and entered through the hole in the chain link fence, taking cover behind the red building, then slowly moving to the corner on the left side. Truck then moved in but did the same to the right side. Sandman stood in the middle.
Gunshots were heard, and a mix of Arabic and Chinese words were flying around.
"(COMMS) The mercs and the GLA fighting right in front of your position."
"Alright let's move in, Grinch will cover us" Sandman moved in front of Frost. A bullet whizzed past them, finding itself in the head of a GLA member, it was Grinch's shot, this caused the one right next to him to panic.
"Weapons free." Sandman whispered. Frost appeared as well and began to shoot at the mercs and GLA alike, the rounds hit and their bodies fell.
There was a small stairway leading to the door of the red building, with guard rails covered with sheet metal, the two ran up the stairs and took cover behind the sheet metal, as bullets began hitting their position.
They could hear bullets whizzing past them again, and suddenly the shooting stopped.
"(COMMS) I got em, the rest are fighting the mercs, you're free to breach."
Sandman nodded to Frost. Frost brought out a frame charge and placed it on the door, it blew up as Sandman and Frost readied their guns, searching for anyone inside who may attack them. It was filled with file cabinets, bookcases filled with stacks of papers rather than books, they searched the room, there was nobody inside, that was until a rebel appeared from the shadows with a pistol and a knife, Sandman was quick enough to react by taking cover behind a filing cabinet.
The rebel ran at the filing cabinet, but as he rounded the corner, Sandman appeared right in front of him, grabbing the arm holding the pistol and lifting it upwards. Sandman unholstered his Five Seven and shot the hand holding the knife, causing the rebel to drop the knife with a grunt of pain, he then brought the pistol up to the rebel's chin, and fired. His jaw now hung lifelessly from his head, Sandman dropped his arm and continued searching the area.
"Rest of the room's empty." Sandman began to open the file cabinets, emptying their contents into the ground, same for the papers. All of it was going to be burned.
"Frost help me out here" Frost brought down his gun and began doing the same as Sandman, tossing papers onto a large pile of papers.
"Truck, where are you?" Sandman spoke as he continued to toss papers onto the pile.
"(COMMS) I'm on the outside, right side of the building, if they move to your position, I'm going to try to flank them."
"Roger."
For a full minute, Frost and Sandman kept on throwing papers as gunshots could be heard outside. Eventually the place was empty.
Sandman looked around for something, then he saw under the desk was a small plastic gas tank.
"Frost, grab that gas tank, pour it all out on the papers."
He walked over to the gas tank, and spun the cap free, and then poured it all out on the papers, soaking them with the liquid. Sandman pulled out a lighter and lit it up, by the time Frost was finished, they both backed away and Sandman tossed the lighter.
The pile lit up in a fiery blaze, the room began to heat up, they backed away and got close to the exit.
Sandman tapped on his earpiece again. "Hawk 3-2 this is Metal 0-1, requesting for extraction over."
"(COMMS)Copy that Metal 0-1, we are en route to your location, ETA five minutes."
"Truck, Grinch what does it look like out there.
"(COMMS) Mercs have taken heavy casualties, but all the visible GLA are dead. Shit, they noticed the bodies near your location, they're walking over."
"Frost, you're with me, Grinch take the shot when you're ready, we'll take that as the signal to attack, Truck you'll flank them from the side. Ready up!"
They both brought up their guns and waited on each side of the door.
"They're two meters from the door, four of them, I'm taking the shot." Soon after the sound of a bullet penetrating a skull came, Sandman was the first to come out, taking out one before taking cover behind the sheet metal.
Frost came out, and just before one of them could shoot him, his head exploded into a bloody cloud, courtesy of Grinch's M110. Frost then aimed at the last one, and gunned him down.
Suddenly shots came from the grey and green building in front of them. The mercs were taking turns shooting from the window.
The concrete walls were thin enough for Grinch to shoot and penetrate through the walls, hitting a target.
More shots then came from behind a car, near the grey and green building. Two mercs were using the car as cover.
"Frost, take out the ones behind the car, Grinch will get the ones at the window, I'll try to get around the building and meet up with Truck, and then we'll take out everyone inside that building."
Frost nodded. He stood up from his position behind the sheet metal and aimed down his sights at the car, a Chinese merc appeared from the windows, ready to fire at Frost, but fell down almost as fast as he came out, they were really lucky that Grinch was a damn good marksman.
The car was familiar, it looked exactly like the kind the GLA would use as car… bombs… He looked closely through the window, and sure enough, one of the seats were filled with blackened C4. Both of the mercs popped their heads up, Frost made quick work of one of them by firing multiple shots, the other merc looked at his downed comrade for just a second before coming back to his senses and taking cover. When he looked to his left, Sandman had already left his side.
He put his hand on the barrel of the grenade launcher on his M4A1 and pulled the trigger, the grenade launched forward and under the bomb car, triggering a massive explosion to engulf the area making the ground shake a little, it completely damaged the green and grey building, causing its occupants to be exposed, there were numerous mercs inside the building, some were on the ground, bleeding having been hit by the car bomb.
He aimed at one of them who was still standing and pulled the trigger, the merc's head brutally blasted backwards as he fell down, as Grinch took out another merc inside.
Suddenly a cooked grenade was thrown inside, it was Sandman and Truck, the Grenade blew up, blasting most of the occupants too. As both Sandman and Truck entered from the right, killing all who were still alive, Frost and Grinch did the same.
Sandman walked to Frost, they had just cleared the entire outpost.
"Check on the papers"
Frost went inside the red building, the pile was still burning, but less bright as most of the papers had already been turned to ashes, and those that weren't already ashes would soon be turned into ashes.
Frost walked back outside and gave his leader a thumbs up.
"(COMMS) Metal 0-1 this is Hawk 3-2 approaching the extraction zone."
As if on cue they all looked above to see a helicopter about to land on the cliff near Grinch
"Change of plans Hawk 3-2, we cleared out the base, requesting direct extraction from within the compound."
"(COMMS) Affirmative Metal 0-1"
The Black Hawk changed course and went closer to the outpost. Grinch began to rappel down the cliff to meet with the rest of Team Metal. The helicopter landed in the middle of the compound, right in front of Frost, Sandman and Truck lightly jogged to it, the doors opened, as Sergeant Bradley helped Truck get on.
Then suddenly from the rubble of the wrecked grey green building emerged one final mercenary charging at the three of them with a knife,
"AHHHHHHH!" He was screaming at the top of his lungs, probably to null the fear of attacking four heavily armed and well trained soldiers, and a helicopter with a knife.
Frost aimed down his sights and pulled the trigger, the bullet hit his head.
Then Bradley helped him up. Grinch soon arrived and got in.
The Black Hawk then took off.
"So we're going back to Afghanistan?" Grinch asked.
Sandman was about to respond but Sergeant Bradley spoke first.
"Negative, the four of you are going to MOB Kostanav, you'll be briefed on your new mission on site."
A confused look spread throughout the men.
Office of the Supreme American Commander of Juno, FOB Juno
1600 Hours
Four days after the discovery of possible intelligent alien life
General Kirkman was angry, no, angry was too soft a term for what he felt, he was furious. Just mere hours earlier, a squad of sixteen marines performing basic reconnaissance outside the perimeter were attacked, not by leviathans no, but by what looked to be humans, twenty of them, all wearing strange white uniforms and white masks.
Three of the marines were killed in action, while five were injured. But the rest were able to hold off and fight back the aggressors, killing all but three.
Kirkman ordered a scout drone to be sent to follow the last men, they found them, but they weren't going to kill them, at least not yet, wherever he was running back to would probably be where the rest of them were.
The marines took a few bodies back to the base, and upon examination, it was found that they all were similar to humans, apart from a few key differences, some of them had furry ears extending from their head, others had horns, whiskers and more.
After this was reported to Kirkman, the scientists went into a mad frenzy simply due to how big of a discovery it was that there was life similar to humans here. But Kirkman couldn't give less of a shit, as far as he was concerned these "Humans" Killed three of his men, and he wouldn't let them get away with it.
"Sir." Colonel Burton entered the room.
"Yes, colonel." His tone was sour, not that he held any hatred for Colonel Burton, no in fact they were good friends. He was simply still in a bad mood from the attack.
"Lieutenant Vasquez is here to see you."
Kirkman nodded as Burton stepped out and a tall mestizo man still in full combat gear entered. Kirkman still hadn't been fully briefed about what happened, all he heard so far was from under detailed reports given to him by different commanding officers, but he wanted to hear it directly from one of the men who were attacked.
Vasquez gave him a salute.
"At ease, soldier. So, I understand you were one of the men present during the attack."
"Yes sir."
"First I would like to commend you for that, not many men could do what you and your squad did, especially while outnumbered and surprised."
Vasquez smiled for half a second. "I appreciate that sir, but it's our job."
"I am fully aware of that, but you still deserve praise." Kirkman smiled at him "Now, I've already been told a few things by a few officers in this base, but I doubt they have everything yet, so I want to hear it straight from your mouth. I'll tell you what I know, and I want you to tell me the things I don't know yet."
"Alright, sir." Vasquez said with a nod.
"At 1431 hours, your squad was attacked by a group of men and women in white uniforms and white masks, all were holding some sort of weapon, mostly rifles and curved swords, due to the element of surprise three of the marines were sadly taken out." That last part was said with a hint of anger, Kirkman looked at Vasquez's face, it wasn't evident, but he could tell Vasquez felt intense anger as well.
"You were eventually able to fight back, and the ensuing firefight led to the deaths of all but three of the attackers who were able to escape despite your efforts, five of your men also suffered medium injuries during the firefight." Kirkman concluded "So, is there anything else you can tell me?"
"I see they haven't told you yet about the forcefield."
"Forcefield?"
"You see, sir. When you fought back, we noticed something… strange."
"Mhm." Kirkman continued to listen.
"Whenever we shot the attackers, they wouldn't take any damage."
Kirkman's eyes widened. "How so?"
"We… Don't know."
"Then how did you kill them?"
"Well they would take damage, but only after a few shots. You see, after about one or two shots, I swear I could see a dim light flicker, we called them forcefields. It was different for everyone, some only took one shot to break it, and others took five, they were all in different colors too, some were just white, some were pink or even black. The officers looked at us like we were crazy when we told them about it."
Kirkman let out a heavy breath as he put his hand on his mouth in a sort of thinking pose. He knew for a fact that since this was a new world, pretty much anything was possible. But this was still a surprising fact nonetheless.
"Well I believe you, but I do have a question."
The lieutenant.
"If these pseudo humans truly did have forcefields that protected from your bullets and indeed outnumbered you, how were so many of you able to survive. I'm sorry for asking such a question, but I would like an answer."
"It's alright sir, but I think it's a mix of being trained for these kinds of situations, and their weapons being weak.
"Weak." Kirkman shifted a little on his chair
"Yes sir. Those who were killed were unfortunately hit in areas that were completely unprotected, more of us were actually hit by them, but their aim wasn't very good, and those of us that were hit, got hit on areas protected by Kevlar and didn't go through, one of injured men were actually hit in the head, but his helmet stopped the round from penetrating his skull and he ended up with only a minor concussion, and some slight bleeding."
"But wait, I heard from one of the researchers that the rounds in the guns you brought back are actually bigger than the standard 5.56x45mm NATO rounds."
"Have they tested how fast the rounds go?"
"No…" That made sense though, if a bullet was slow, the larger size would actually hamper it.
"That will be all for now, lieutenant, thank you.
He gave him a salute and he left.
Kirkman pulled up a drawer on his desk, and picked up an envelope and looked at its contents again, the photos of the cities and settlements discovered by the Blackbird reconnaissance mission.
The first one showed a city, pictures showed buildings that resembled early modern European architecture, but there was one photo that stood out, upon a cliff rested a gargantuan tower that defied all laws of physics, and surrounding it were smaller buildings, situated by a road system. Some of the photos contained little black dots which were likely the people in the city.
It was strange that the architecture was similar to that of human architecture, one would think that a species that weren't humans and didn't live with humans on earth would create visually distinct architecture.
Even stranger was the fact, that though different in certain ways, the specimens they collected looked identical to humans.
Juno was getting stranger and stranger by the day.
Early estimates report the city to be at least a thousand square kilometers. If the population density was like that of London, then that would mean the population would be in the millions.
The fact that there even was a city suggested at least some form of governance, and if the people that attacked his men did indeed come from this city, then that would mean conflict, and his base wasn't ready for conflict of that scale.
It had been four days since the photos arrived, and in those two days he had already made multiple requests for a severe increase in manpower, machine power and more. Kirkman even ordered for an expansion of the defense perimeter. He even requested for materials and manpower to launch a proper satellite network into space.
He then looked to another photo, this one was of a city of similar size, the architecture was different and it was situated in the middle of a desert.
"Sir."
Someone came through the door, he was of average height, had black hair, a mustache and was in a lab coat, he was the lead scientist, Benjamin Steele.
"We did some tests on the weaponry, and we found a few things."
"Oh? What did you find?"
"The most significant thing is that the guns and swords were made of steel."
Kirkman was confused "How is that important?"
"Well it's the same kind of steel we use on earth, same exact composition as the standard type of steel, which means in terms of materials we're very similar."
Kirkman saw it now, there were way too many similarities, you would think that an alien lifeform would have many, many significant differences apart from just a few extra appendages and a forecefield.
"Everything else was analyzed but there is nothing else of importance, clothes were nothing of importance, masks were nothing of importance, but, the bullets." Benjamin paused. "The bullets do not use gunpowder. They use some other form of propellant, it's red in color and is less effective as a propellant but is many times more volatile and slightly more powerful in terms of explosive power."
"What did you do to find these out?"
"An incident occurred wherein a fellow researcher stubbed or toe on the table with small pile of this strange dust like substance, multiple particles spread, causing her to sneeze and well, blow up the ones in the air, don't worry she only suffered minor injuries, since she was some distance away from the pile, but she'll probably have a few permanent scars on the face." Benjamin chuckled casually.
Kirkman shrugged off Benjamin's nonchalant behavior at the injury of his coworker
"What about the part of it being a less effective propellant?" Kirkman asked
"Well, we actually tested the rifles, which by the way were off very different design, we had a ranger fire them at targets, we measured the velocity, and the bullet was slow, going at subsonic speeds, even though the bullet uses more of this substance than we do gunpowder in our own bullets. It travelled at 322 meters per second, putting it a little under certain muskets and modern day large bore pistols."
"That explains why they weren't able to penetrate most of the men who were hit's Kevlar vests."
"With Kevlar, size actually does matter, since size determines the amount of fibers broken on a certain area, speed is more for penetration, but its size combined with its subpar speed will make it so getting hit in the stomach by one of these while wearing a Kevlar vest, will make it feel like you just got punched in the stomach, after interviewing some of the men who fought as you call them "Pseudo Humans" this was indeed the case. Some of the men who were injured in fact even had some major bruising anda few broken bones. Don't worry they're recovering fast"
So the bullets could still be lethal even with proper armor.
Benjamin grabbed a drinking flask and took a quick swig. "Well if you don't mind, I'll be taking my leave now, General. He pulled something from his coat, a brown manila envelope, he tossed it to his desk. "That's my full report on the research done so far."
Benjamin Steele left, Kirkman grabbed the envelope and put it in his drawer, he would read it later, for now he had some business to attend to regarding the drone currently following the men who had escaped. He stepped outside his office and walked through the many hallways and rooms of the command center and left through the door, outside many things were happening, army personnel, rangers, marines, and tanks were doing training drills, drones were being prepared for takeoff at the airfield, soldiers were transporting ammunition and more, he walked silently through all of this and walked up to the large metal doors of the Strategy Center, he entered.
He entered the operations room, and found many military officers on computers and some on papers, one of them approached, Colonel Burton
"General Kirkman, we were just about to come to you, we found it."
"Found what?"
He signaled to one of the men in the operations room to do something, the man types something on his keyboard, which then displayed a black and white video on the screen.
"We followed the men as you ordered, and it led us to this compound." It was small, from what he could see on the video, it was surrounded by some sort of concrete wall, it had multiple buildings, two larger buildings of equal size and three smaller ones, it resembled a small GLA base with its design.
"What are your orders?"
Kirkman took a minute to think, he didn't have the proper equipment to do a proper attack, , and just letting them go would mean that they would go unpunished for attacking and killing some of his men. He merely had a few thousand soldiers and a couple dozen tanks, he could theoretically send in that entire force there and be able to take out the base, but that would end up risking too many lives. The three men who had escaped would likely now be warning the others of them, but attacking now was a last resort.
He would have to wait for extra men, munitions and equipment which would soon arrive in a few hours, he would scramble the jets, and commence airstrikes on the buildings, before having a team of soldiers clear all that was left of the base and hopefully take one of them alive.
He also didn't know how big the numbers in this base were, considering its size there had to be at least a couple hundred of them here.
"I need you to monitor the base for now. Once more Raptors and Lightning IIs arrived I want airstrikes on key points immediately, once the men arrive, I want you to mobilize a strike force capable of searching and killing anyone who may still be alive. If you see any evidence off them starting to evacuate, I want you to mobilize the troops and get ready for an offensive"
"I'll get it done sir." Burton nodded.
Kirkman left the room.
I'm sorry this chapter didn't involve much Kirkman, but I needed to introduce team Metal as I think you've already guessed, they will be the task force infiltrating the base post airstrikes.
And yes you read that right, satellites, will soon come into play.
Now, for reviews:
Bruhmeister935: I hope you like where it's going for now.
yh915: Thanks. For modded units, i'm not sure, the only mods for the game I've played is Rise of the Reds, but I might try some other ones out. But you probably wont see many modded units until way later into the story, and some of the other generals were shown in Chapter 1, but they will be taking on a more major role later down the line
Next chapter will probably be first proper contact with remnant natives that doesn't involve fighting, but yes there will be fighting.