2518 UNPC universal calendar, December 8, 0611 hours. UNPC vessel Schattenwulf
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Axel "F4" Schultz
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"Happy 200th big boy" I heard from behind me, followed by a clap on the back of my armored right shoulder.
"Thanks," I said, smiling and taking another sip of my coffee as they leaned against the railing to my right.
Lira "E2" Corby looked at me and smiled.
"You know, I remember when you were knee high to me" E2 said, holding her own coffee cup with two hands beneath it. "But that was a very long time ago."
"Maybe we can go see the grand old man sometime, I think even Triple A's there right now" I said, gazing off into the horizon, the morning sky shimmering off of the frigid water pockmarked with glaciers, the stars covering the ocean in glitter.
"Have you ever thought about writing about all you've done?" E2 asked, turning to look off into the starry sky.
"Maybe" I answered honestly. "B1's book did pretty good" I shrugged, "might try my hand at it sometime"
"You should, I think you'd be a good writer" E2 said, taking another drink of her coffee.
"What makes you say that?" I asked.
"Just a feeling I have," she said, smiling as she shrugged.
"It's kind of nice being assigned here,'' I said after a long moment. "Very peaceful"
"I agree," she replied, sighing and leaning a little more against the railing. "Even though it's cold as hell"
"No kidding, the temperatures here are crazy this time of year" I said, chuckling.
I finished my cup of coffee, swilling down the last centimeter or so of black liquid along with a smattering of grounds at the bottom, hanging the cup by its handle on the grip of my Ka-bar, which formerly belonged to my father.
I took out my little notebook with the clip of my Lamy safari holding it to the outer part of the magazine pouch it was stuffed in, and opened it up.
"You really still do those damn things?" E2 asked as I took out the piece of newspaper and unfolded it, revealing the NY times crossword from a few days ago.
"Keeps the mind sharp" I said, tapping my temple with my right pointer finger, pen held in between them.
"I usually just pass the time by reading," E2 said.
"Been a while since I've seen him" she said after another long pause.
"How long?" I asked.
"Twenty years at least," she replied. "Did see D8 a few months ago, that was nice"
"Don't want to know how that went, but how were they?" I asked, not looking away from a question on the crossword that was particularly bugging me.
"Good, we sat and talked for about an hour, just catching up" she replied, a smile on her face as she stared off into the clear starry sky.
"Let's go see him this month, there's a gap in our schedule when we dock at installation two-thirty-four anyways" I said, folding up the newspaper cutout, deciding the question would have to wait.
"Sounds go-" E2 began to say before being cut off by the "contact front" warning from my armor's helmet, and the "wump-wump-wump" of a helicopter.
I craned my neck to see around a phalanx CWIS, and read the tail markings of the aircraft, squinting to zoom in with my contacts.
The aircraft, a Sikorsky HH-60 Pave Hawk, bearing the tail number of "UNPC-LN-26109" (at least according to it's FOF tag) was hauling ass to my eye, going at least 180 mph straight towards the Schattenwulf.
"it's not on any incoming logs" E2 said, straightening up.
The CWIS I was craning to look around came alive, and locked onto the quickly approaching aircraft, aiming its 6 barreled 20mm vulcan cannon at it.
With a "hmm" I put on my helmet, waited half a heartbeat to acclimate myself to the 360 degree field of view, and turned to look at E2, who had also donned her helmet.
She shrugged "well, I guess we ought to go check it out" she said, moving down the walkway past me, headed towards the helipad.
"Now I'm curious" I said, stepping up behind her, the speck on the horizon growing larger as we walked to wait at the helipad.
We stood in the dark, the helicopter was joined by two others, a Sikorsky CH-53E, and a Eurocopter EC725, following behind it in a V formation with the Pave Hawk as its spearhead.
I watched the Pave Hawk come in, and the two others circle the ship while the Pave Hawk initiated a hot landing, which amounted to turning the entire helicopter 90 degrees vertical, with the nose pointed straight into the sky, bleeding off all of its speed, and leveling it out while descending.
I scanned the usually bustling helipad around me, even at this hour, it'd have at least a dozen people either waiting or working, but it was completely barren save the two lone augments standing with their thumbs up their ases and staring at the helicopters.
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The Pave Hawk's landing gear hit the deck, and it idled there for a second before the tone of the engine changed, and the rotors started to slow.
No door gunners, odd.
The right sliding door clattered open on a set of worn rollers and crashed into its "open" position
Inside laid a large black form covered by a OD green canvas tarp, flanked by Andrew "E7" Kinkaid, and Samuel "D1" Lewis. The latter of whom moved to my lfet inside of the cargo bay, and picked up the litter, still covered by the tarp.
E7 nodded to me as he moved past me, and through the open blast door that slowly rolled open, matching their pace.
Inside he LED light spilled out, and several people stood inside wearing blue surgical scrubs and masks, but quickly left, leaving the room empty.
"Follow" scrolled across the top of my HUD in the middle of my field of vision.
I turned to E2, and asked with an emotionless look.
She dipped the chin of her helmet a slight amount, and I turned my head back around while I started walking.
After crossing the threshold of the large blast door, rated to stop a 25kt near hit, or a 100kt airburst at 2 miles, my night vision's flare mitigation adjusted to the lights a moment before everything inside the room came into focus.
The large mass beneath the OD green tarp atop the litter was whisked off, and laid atop one of the large stainless steel tables usually reserved for injured augments, the tarp still covering the figure.
E7 waved me over after looking at me for a second.
I nodded, and walked over.
I was halfway there when "outbreak protocols, codeword: RAZORBACK" scrolled across the top of my HUD, this time in bigger bolder letters.
That codeword caught my attention, RAZORBACK was the highest echelon of secrecy, the codeword had first been devised when the UNPC's ship fleet was small, and we were coming up with new weapons systems.
The HVR (High Velocity Railgun) cannon was designed and the codeword was made to keep it secret until the Schattenwulf and Vorhut were built, employing four of them in the main battery of the two massive ships.
I squashed the thought and walked across the polished tile floor, the same floor my father and I had bled on many times.
The tarp was taken away, and I nearly staggered back at what I saw.
A large rottweiler-like blockhead, the maw of a hyena with a tiger's fangs extending almost an inch and a half from the upper jaw to the tip of the tooth hanging below.
Under thick mats of coarse fur, corded muscle sat twitching, throwing ripples across the creature's chest.
"This is a series G augment, it is a biologically engineered super soldier. This one went rogue" D1 said, tossing the tarp onto the floor, exposing wide rather normal looking human feet.
Well, normal if you ignored their foot and a half length, and the thick fur covering them.
"It is sedated, the damn thing took our entire load of tranq, and still broke out of the restraints twice on the way here" D1 continued to say.
I suddenly didn't want to know what happened to the door gunners.
"Our job" he said, gesturing his hand amongst the four standing around the augment on the table. "Is to make sure it doesn't die from its injuries or what it's infected with" he said.
"That explains the outbreak protocol" I mused.
D1 nodded, and set to work, bandaging it, twice pausing to restrain it as it bucked against us.
"This is what they're going to replace us with?" I asked.
"Not replace, but supplement" D1 said, nodding.
"So this is going to be the new shock trooper?" E2 asked.
"Yes and no, they're supposed to be like massive walking breakthrough tanks, with all of the tactical training we get" D1 said as he worked an israeli bandage onto the lower thigh of the beast.
I turned its head, and checked the back of its neck for injuries.
I stopped to stare at the tattoo behind its left ear.
"UNPC-G1" read, below it, a brand of the same marking.
"Isn't it unethical?" I mused aloud.
"Not paid to ask questions like that, and honestly I'm surprised they didn't do something like this earlier" D1 said, the ever so stoic and of few rods E4 nodding.
"So why'd it break out?" E2 stated more than asked.
"Augmentation onset psychosis" D1 stated, "hell I had it" he said, shrugging.
"What's it infected with?" I asked.
"Smallpox, old, old, old strain" D1 replied. "And a few nerve agents"
"Is it vaxxed against smallpox?" I asked.
"Yes, but it's not showing any of the usual symptoms," he said. "Nor from the nerve agent"
"And that makes him useful"
D1 nodded. "Yes, we need to make sure it doesn't die here and now so they can run more tests and pass on its unique ability to resist chemical and biological weaponry.
The door to my right slid open, and a FOF tagged doctor in an overpressure armored NBC jumpsuit walked in.
They were short, female, their NBC suit too big, probably rushed to put it on.
I didn't care to note their name, they'd probably have a fake one anyways.
No bother to me
"Good work" they said through a speaker, the soft voice surprising me.
"Devil" I thought.
They clomped over and examined the massive figure on the table.
"Triple A will have fun with you once he gets back" I heard her mutter under her breath, as she leaned over the augment, her voice not loud enough to automatically engage the speaker microphone combo on her suit.
Through the large clear visor of her suit, I could see the top half of her bare torso, which wasn't out of the ordinary for unpowered NBC oversuits, hell the early versions the ECA had you naked under a bunch of plates before the LSS was devised.
I couldn't help but note she looked like a small child wearing a baggy pair of overalls.
The woman was about at a height with E2, I guess they don't keep many suits that size.
''You all take a break, I need to run some tests" she said, pushing a large gauge needle under the skin of the augment, and drawing out 10cc's of blood.
"Probably a drop in the damn bucket for that thing" I thought.
"Check" I said out of ingrained habit, and stepped back a pace to plop my rear on one of the large tables that equated to a hospital bed.
I hauled out my notebook and pen, then started making notes, occasionally looking up at the Devil in the NBC suit to see what she was doing.
I studied the G series for a long moment, jotting down notes about its appearance, possible tactical uses, and drawbacks.
I flipped to a blank page, and reeled back my onboard recording till I could see its face clearly in the still image, and let my armor's arm and hand flexors "print" an image onto the paper.
That little invention made life one hell of a lot easier since its inception a few months ago.
I'd caught on quickly that using it to quickly copy + paste text and images onto paper was invaluable.
That done, I spent a moment staring at G1 before I grabbed the folded up crossword and started on trying to solve it again.
While sitting and staring at a question, I let my mind wander.
That led me to thinking of having someone make some UNPC themed crosswords
So, naturally, I opened up the keyboard on my HUD, and typed out a message to a guy I knew at installation 002, asking if he could make some.
I sent it, and the instant I did, the woman turned around and spoke, her ill fitting NBC suit still giving me a full view of her chest.
"Take Golf One to the forth clean room please, this facility is in need of use"
We all shot up, and picked up the massive augment, each of us on a limb, lumbering through the door the woman had come in.
We stepped into a hallway about the width of a GP small tent, but twice as long.
We carried it down the hallway and into one of the clean rooms, setting it onto the identical metal "bed" and headed to decontamination ourselves, hearing the high pressure dilute iodine sprayers kick on right before the door shut.
The Schattenwulf was designed with everything possible in mind.
There were decontamination sprayers and heat lamps in every 'airlock' room, so every room that has immediate access to the outside could be used as a decontamination chamber.
It even had an overpressure system constantly running, with the humidity locked at 0% with dehumidifiers.
Hell it even used IR lamps to kill any bacteria or viruses left over.
The whole damn ship was made this way, a floating bunker.
Triple A hated it.
The HVR cannon boomed me awake that night.
Just another day aboard the Schattenwulf