It didn't take us too long to get back to the command tent. When my friends and I got there, we were met by Nolan and Hudson. They were both hunched over a map discussing troop placements. It figured. Back at boot camp, Hudson was the one guy even Officers went to when they had problems with deciding where to put their soldiers.
“Is everyone here?”, Nolan asked.
“Everyone's here”, I replied, “expect our light assault expert Vez, she's pregnant at the moment and I don't want her in harms way.”
“Understandable”, Nolan said, “shall we begin?”
We gathered around the table as Nolan drew up a hologram. The halo was of a small village settled in a valley. There were several buildings in the valley that were of a similar construction, while there where four sniper towers located at the highest points and a warehouse in the back of the valley.
“One of our spies, a 6 year old male by the name of Teovanth, was captured by American RDH Forces two days ago and is being held at this out post in Russia”, Nolan said.
“Russia?”, Fireclaw asked, “I was Draco for a long time and saw a few deployments there, American-Russian relations aren't the best, why do they ave an outpost there?”
“Russia gave the land to America as a storage facility”, Nolan said, “on terms of good will and a symbol of trust. Two days ago, our AC-130 in the area registered a much higher than normal activity level and not three hours ago, a whisper drone from that same 130 captured this.”
Nolan showed a video of men unloading crates from more than a few deuces.
“Before he was captured, Teovanth confirmed to me that the crates contain 5000 rounds each of DK ammunition”, Nolan said.
“How many boxes?”, Tess asked.
“Five hundred”, Nolan said.
“Five hundred times five k”, Sozenn said, “that's two and a half million rounds of DK makes my scales crawl.”
Mark shivered, “yeah no shit.”
“It translates to a lot of innocent dragons”, Nolan said, “Draco and Resistance alike that are going to die like animals if you don't ruin the cache”, he produced more pictures, a map and pointed to a spot on the map, “Tyro, you and your team will insert here. Once inside the base, you'll have three objectives. One is to rescue Teovanth as his parents are going crazy with the thought of losing him, two is to destroy the DK ammo cache and three is to retrieve any intel you can, anything you can do to help locate the DK facility. Teovanth is the top priority, as we can always have the 130 ruin the cache if you can't.”
“Yes sir”, I replied.
“When we going?”, Syralth asked.
“Two hours”, Nolan said, “It's the middle of winter, so I recommend heavy vests and clothes.”
We nodded and left the room. I had to hit the armory and get some winter gear, as all I had was light desert stuff. The vest I picked had Siberian camouflage and the 105 that was bolted to it was Ice camouflage. I bolted my Mk-48 to it and it was ready to go. I also got Siberian camouflage fatigues and a black face warp that completely covered my head and had holes in it for my horns.
I went back to the barracks and found Adelind laying in the grass watching the kids play. When I walked up, they dog piled me.
“Wow easy guys”, I laughed, “I'm on your side.”
“What did Nolan want?”, Adelind asked as she walked up to me.
“A mission in Russia”, I said, “were leaving in a couple of hours, I just came by to switch some stuff into this new vest.”
“Are you gonna shoot the bad guys Dad?”, Tyson asked.
I laughed, “Most likely.”
“Cool!”, Tyson shouted.
“If anyone asks”, I said looking at Adelind, “he's not ours.”
She laughed. I walked inside and switched my stuff into the winter vest and then walked out to the helo pad where a V-66 was waiting. My friends were gathered around as well. Everyone was dressed from snout to tail in white gear. One thing I noticed was that Mnerloth had a lot of Vietnam era stuff hanging off her.
“Hey Mnerloth”, I asked, “what's with all the Vietnam gear?”
“I like it for sniping”, Mnerloth said, “they haven't made the HK PSG-1 in forever, at least not anywhere but here and it's a nightmare to find pouches to hold the mags for it, but I find the old US ammo pouches work well and so do a lot of snipers here.”
“Makes sense”, I said stepping into the aircraft.
My friends and I found places to lay as the 66 spooled up and lifted off.
Six Hours Later
Night engulfed the woods around us. The dark, starless sky gave us perfect cover . The wind howling through the trees masked our foot and paw steps perfectly. Taro, Mnerloth and I were approaching a small lit shack that was playing host to three guards.
“Hah”, Taro said, “these assholes are playing chess.”
“This one over here is sleeping”, I said, “take the others out on my kill.”
I lowered myself close to the ground and crept up to the guard. With one swift motion, I pounced. Taking him out of the chair and to the ground. Before he even had the chance to scream, I placed my paw on his mouth and tore his throat out. The was a light scuffle and a faint crack as Taro and Mnerloth finished the remaining guards. Taro came out of the hut with a bit of blood dripping from his mouth and Mnerloth came out from the woods with her rifle in hand.
“Clear inside”, Taro said.
“Then let's get to the rendezvous point”, I said, “keep it tight, no noise.”
My friends and I crept through the woods and we soon came along a cliff face that had at least a 50 foot drop off. Down in the valley below was a cluster of buildings and a large warehouse. I could see lights in many of the windows and I could smell meat drifting on much of the smoke that the chimneys in the village carried. This village was definitely occupied.
“Talk to me Issac”, I said, “were are you guys?”
“Securing evac now”, Issac replied, “just cleaning house.”
“This place will be a lead storm in twenty minutes”, I said.
“Acknowledged”, Issac replied.
“Hudson”, I called, “where are the rest of you?”
“Right here”, a low voice came from behind us. I turned to see Hudson and the others standing behind me.
“Let's move in”, I said, “keep it tight.”
Slowly and quietly, we crept into the town and began observing.
“I count four hostiles with submachine guns and two with M4's”, Fireclaw said, “the rest only got handguns.”
“Chances are good their all packing that DK crap”, Sozenn said.
Ator shivered, “good thing I got plates on my scars.”
“Shadow”, I said, “you, Nina, Syralth and Tess kill power to the village. Mnerloth, you, Taro, Wyatt Rolland and Val displace, I want those sniper towers knocked out and I want sniper support, the rest of you are with me.”
With that, we split off. Mnerloth and her group retreating into the mountain side, Shadow and his team heading for the main generator, while the rest of us went for the big warehouse. When we entered, we were met in a small hallway by two guards. Hunter and Taro took them easy.
“Just like old times huh old man?”, Taro asked.
Hunter laughed, “shut the muzzle Jackie.”
“Quit calling me that you old shit”, Taro snarled.
Ator laughed, “both you two shut up before I blow you up.”
Hunter and Taro quieted as we moved into the main area, what we found, made all of us shiver. I had known there was a large cache of DK ammo, but I hadn't known it was as big as it was. The crates were stacked ceiling high. Each crate contained 5,000 rounds...there had to be at least six times as many crates as the number of rounds they contained. Hunter's black scales went white.
“That”, he said drawing the word out, “is a lot of fucking bullets.”
“At 5000 a pop”, Mark said, “damn.”
“And were gonna blow it sky high”, I said.
I had brought HE rounds for my 105 rather than the kinetic ones I usually carried. I cycled three of them out of the magazine and then Ator went to work, making the biggest bomb ever. He pulled the primer out of the bottom of the shell and replaced it with a blasting cap and C4. The second thing he did was grab several gas barrels and place them in a circle with a space in between them to avoid directing the blast upwards. For him, the final step was always admiring his work.
“My greatest creation”, Ator laughed, “a 105mm C4 laced Gas Bomb. I love being me.”
Hunter laughed, “your talent for blowing' shit up is unmatched by another 12 year old on this Earth.”
Ator laughed as we snuck out of the warehouse. We crept around to an alley way and were stopped by a guard who was patrolling the middle of the street.”
“Mnerloth?”, I asked over the radio.
“I see him”, she called back.
There was a crack so faint that it was hard even for a dragon to hear. The man's head spurted blood and he fell face down in the street, making no noise.
“Damn”, Hunter said, “we did something right.”
“Taro get rid of that body”,I said, “I can smell it from here.”
Taro stashed the body underneath a near by Deuce and we crept down the street, sticking to the blots in between the influence of the building lights. At the end of the village was a house with barred windows and one light on inside. I could see the two men with M4's sitting in chairs looking like they were about to doze off.
“Shadow”, I called, “what's the ETA on that generator?”
“In position”, he called, “waiting on your go.”
“Cut it”, I said, “cut now and then get down here. Issac? Where's that bird?”
“Five minutes out”, Issac called, “don't start without us.”
“Then get here”, I said, “Tyro out. Kill it Shadow.”
The city suddenly went pitch black expect for the dim influence of the moon. The men with M4's stood straight up and pointed their weapons straight ahead. Even in the pitch black, if we moved we could still be seen because of our white clothes.
“Rolland”, I said, “two guys with M4's, switch to thermals.”
Two faint rifle shots echoed in the distance and the men fell, with split heads, into the snow. We closed the distance to the house and slipped inside. Hunter left off a suppressed shotgun blast into a single guy that was groping his way around and blew him apart. We crept back into the cells and found Teovanth, muzzled and chained to the wall, laying in a puddle of his own blood.
“Dammit”, Hunter growled checking his pulse, “he's low, we gotta hurry this up or he'll die.”
“Let's make this a party then”, I said.
We cleared out of the prison and went back to rally point at the entrance to the village.
“Let's make this a party”, I said, “Ator, the fireworks please.”
Ator brought his paw down on the detonator on his vest. The warehouse went up in a ball of smoke as the three 105 rounds, plus the C4, plus the gas and all the ammo, went off at once.
Ator couldn’t keep back his laugh and burst out.
“I love my job”, he laughed, “I love it so much.”
The humans were running allover, trying to put out the inferno raging in the warehouse while dodging the needle tipped ammo as it flew in all directions.
“Everyone clear out”, I replied, “rally on me, Issac, where's that bird?”
“I see the explosion boss”, Issac replied, “but it's so dark night vision can't pick up anything, I can't see where to land.”
“Watch for a flare”, I called, “where in a small clearing.”
I took a flare out of my vest and lit it. The blue, hot glow quickly lit the area around me as Issac's V-TOLL came down as the others arrived.
“Let's go home”, I replied stepping into the dark cabin. As we rose into the air once again, I fell asleep. I was stirred an hour or so later by the V-TOLL touching down at Romeo.
“Come on Tyro”, Ator said, “our females are waiting.”
I smiled and laughed as I stood up. Adelind and the kids,as well as Shadow greeted me as I stepped off the chopper. The warm air of Romeo was a far cry from where we had just come and when it hit my scales, it made me sweat. It was nice to be home.