Grimoires & Gunsmoke

Grimoires & Gunsmoke: The Ohio Incident Ch. 2

Hofmann ignored the tense, but still somewhat jovial atmosphere. The sergeant turned his gaze down the line and looked at the rest of the platoon. As the gears in his head turned, Santiago's words seemed to stick with him. As far as he was concerned there wasn't a single country on the planet that had the technology to materialize an invasion force in the middle of a landlocked country.

Were they moving to put down an uprising?

That wasn't right... it would have been lit up all over social media or even the news long before things went hot. Plus this would be firmly in the national guards camp, not a heavily armored unit flying out of Texas...

Seeing that they were the latest iteration of the heavily armored "Penetration" division concept that the brass had slapped together, Hofmann surmised that this was probably a test of some sort. The 1st Cavalry Division had been redesigned to be the Army's spearhead in any major conflict. Composed of advanced and heavily armored vehicles, along with specialized infantry units, Hofmann's division was created with the explicit goal of not only breaching enemy lines, but to keep going.

The Platoon Sergeant gently slammed his head against the plane's hull and closed his eyes to take a little catnap. There was no reason to mull over whatever the hell was going on, they were going to find out whether the Chinese had figured out to materialize out of thin air or if Santiago was right, and it was aliens after all. However, Hofmann was soon interrupted by the sharp crackle of the plane's intercom.

"Brace for approach, we're going into a tactical landing pattern, we're coming in hot." The pilot's voice echoed through the cargo hold and the unexpected announcement sent an electric shock through the cabin.

Tactical landing.

They were going into a hot zone, and they were going in as fast as possible.

DuPont's gaze never wavered from Hofmann, even as the initial surprise began to settle into a grim understanding as they all snapped into work mode. "You heard the man!" Dupont shouted aggressively and called out to the rest of his soldiers, his voice carrying a calm, steady assurance that anchored the growing tension.

"Secure your shit, strap in tight! This is going to be a rough descent," he ordered, moving to tighten his own harness. "We're going in hot, so be ready to move and get the vehicles decoupled as soon as we touch down!"

"Takashi, Cooper, Diego, Thornfield!" DuPont continued, his piercing gaze sweeping each NCO in turn. His voice cut through the noise of the humming engines, a steel blade of authority in the chaos. "Help Hofmann with decoupling his Bradley, we need him out of the way as soon as the bird touches down! Understood?" DuPont said while grabbing his rifle and racking the slide to and chambering a round.

The soldiers snapped to attention, their bodies tense with the adrenaline of the impending drop. "Roger that, sir!" came the unanimous response, each man springing into action to follow their lieutenant's command.

Staff Sergeant Takashi, a quiet Japanese-American man, pointed to a few of his men and started issuing orders to prepare their own Bradley's for decoupling when they landed. Diego, Thornfield, and Cooper followed suit, each issuing orders and deciding which squad was going into whose Bradley.

The roar of the engines and the whistling of the wind outside made it difficult for the soldiers to hear each other as the aircraft descended rapidly. It felt as if their stomachs had been left hanging thousands of feet above them, a sensation only worsened by the anticipation of the unknown.

"The fuck is going on sir...?" Santiago asked again, this time his voice barely audible over the noise. His knuckles were white from gripping the straps of his harness, his eyes wide as he looked to his lieutenant for answers. But DuPont, strapped into his own seat, gave nothing away. His gaze was fixed on the slowly approaching ground below them, a hardened expression set on his stoic face. He'd been in this kind of situation before, and he knew better than to make promises or assumptions.