Taking a breather between rounds with the reapers, I had just finished adding the girls to the official roster and we were barely five minutes out from home when the call came in.

:>> Go for Tac.1

:<< Draugr Alpha. Acknowledged. Rolling.

As Tac.1 brought each individual ringer online with similar calls the different call signs began reporting in based on current distance from the assigned OP leader, which in this case was me. Now that we were an officially sanctioned tiger cell, our cell identifier was always used first by all operators as it helped prevent confusion during combined ops with other cells.

:>> Draugr One. Strapped. Medtec. Rolling.

Dani sent me a wink in the rearview mirror as the girls and I quickly dressed.

:>> Draugr Two. Reaper. Rolling

Clea responded.

:>> Draugr Three. Reaper. Rolling.

Lilou sounded off flashing me a smirk.

:>> Draugr Four.

Bri answered, the confusion in her voice clear at the two reapers in the cell.

:>> Ceaseless Seven. Strapped. On site. Under fire.

Well that didn't sound good at all.

:>> Tac. 1 confirmed. Locate VIP at target coordinates and confirm status, secure VIP for evac. Good luck. Tac. 2 Go.

Without needing to be told Daniela floored it to get to the compound and pick up Brianna.

:<< This is Draugr Alpha, give me a sitrep when you can Ceaseless Seven.

:>> Acknowledged. Wait out.

There was an explosion in the back ground. Guy clearly had his hands full. Gotta say sucks to be him, but kinda glad we had missed the earlier OP, it's entirely likely this was the tail end of it.

:// Daddy, what the actual fuck?

Brianna's voice came over the cell comms, I could almost hear the pout in her voice.

Tac.2 was an official channel and would be appended to the OP logs, in the Draugr channel however we could talk about whatever the hell we wanted to.

:\\ Hey baby girl, say Hi to Clea and Lilou.

:// Bonjour.

The girls responded in unison with their musical accents.

:// uhhh... hey. Two new french girls daddy? What did I miss?

:// Hot french twin sister reapers!

Dani answered with heat to her voice.

:// Like that is it?

Brianna asked playfully.

:\\ You ready to go baby girl, techs gone?

I asked starting to get the priorities in order.

:// Yep, grabbed a couple of subs, out fro... Oh I see you.

Brianna jumped in the front passenger seat and we were off again before her door had even closed. With a frown she put the sub machine guns (assault rifles that used pistol rounds), into the racks of the center consol and half sat up, pulling up a set of white lacy panties that she had sat on. She looked sideways at Dani who simply ignored her to concentrate on her driving, then leant over to peer into the back seat, holding them up between her fingers with a questioning look at the two new girls.

Clea's face flushed red and she quickly snatched them with an embarrassed smile, explaining herself in french. Brianna just giggled at me and nodded approvingly before turning back around and arming the roof turret. 

* * *

:>> This is ceaseless seven. Have retreated to ingress. Unknown number of hostiles remaining.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Acknowledged. AP active. ETA in 10... 9

AP meaning Anti Personnel for those not in the know. The thirty cal on the roof opened up just as Bri hit the skids and swerved. A wrecked humvee flew past the armored windows. Not a good sign.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Reapers clear the ingress, halt at ceaseless seven. One with me, four clean sweep.

It wasn't strictly sticking to the correct comms syntax, but when your short on time and lives are on the line that sometimes went out the window. So long as people knew what they were meant to be doing and who was giving the orders you could call them bananas in a firefight and they wouldn't give a shit.

:>> Ouais maître.

The reapers again did the creepy twin thing and responded as one.

The .30 opened up again on something over our heads, as we leapt into action. It was long ten second burst, then the .50 took over and quickly fell silent.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Heavies may be on site.

It was the only reason I could think of for the .50 coming into play, and would explain how the seven, likely ten man team before us had all but wiped.

I watched as one of the new girls barely even broke stride slicing a guy from neck to groin as he attempted to draw a bead on her sister as we entered the ingress point. He didn't even get to gurgle as he body fell to the floor in two pieces. The ingress point was a heavy industrial door that had been rammed from its hinges if the hummer imbedded in the opposite wall was anything to go by. Better add some breaching charges to my shopping list. As the reapers moved deeper into the building Dani and I advanced to fully clear the room behind them, Bri huddled in the cover of the ruined doors looking out.

A regular beat of gunfire sounded out from deeper within the building. I had been unable to identify the initial target as we approached and I was beginning to suspect that as seven wasn't here he was either dead because enemy reinforcements had come in from behind, or he was at a secondary ingress that hadn't been marked on the tactical overlay. With that in mind I confirmed the guy in the passenger seat of the Ceaseless teams hummer was indeed dead then pulled him out, letting the body drop to the floor. I checked the turret systems and swore. It was strictly a remote system, rigged to controls in the passenger seat with no automation. Whelp, I guess Bri will just have to earn her money today.

The gun fire died out.

:>> Draugr Two. Seven is secure. Request Medtec maître.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Acknowledged. Four clear and move.

I answered wondering exactly what this 'maître' thing was the reapers kept saying. Probably 'over' in french.

Daniela and I moved to the doorway that would lead deeper into the building, I took point glancing briefly into the three rooms as we passed in a cursory search for hostiles. They were small rooms with little to no obstructions for someone to hide behind, one was a kitchen and eating area, the other two looked like hastily put together barracks with a couple of bunks to each room. Clear enough for now I continued on, Bri would actually enter the rooms for a more thorough search in our wake.

I think... Lilou maybe? Had her thumb and index finger jambed into a hole in sevens chest in an attempt to seal a sucking chest wound. At least I hoped that was why she had her fingers jambed into his chest cavity and I hadn't royally fucked up by signing the sisters on. Despite what my dick might think, crazy is a thing after all. It was hard enough under normal circumstances to tell the difference between the twin girls, now imagine them wearing skin tight black synth skin combat suits and helmets, throw in a liberal splattering of blood and gore around the place and you may get a basic sense of the state of the room Dani and I had just entered.

As Dani got to work on seven I frowned at the stairwell Clea was watching. On the outside it was a single story building, the stairwell leading down told another story, and whatever was below wasn't on the tactical map. Well shit.

:<< Tac.1 this is Draugr Alpha.

:>> This is Tac.1.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Dark Zone. Confirm.

A dark zone was pretty much exactly what I had just described. A section of the building that didn't show on the tactical overview. I focused my view on large pile of shot and hacked apart bodies laying at the bottom of the stairs. An orange indicator lit up in the top right corner of my vision indicating someone, somewhere, was remote viewing my neural feed in real time to see what I was talking about.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

:>> Tac. 1 Confirmed. Advance.

Well fuck. Now I was a guinea pig. It was now my job to show the world what this particular dark zone was hiding and someone was watching real time to let others know in case I or my whole team got fragged doing so. Just like the Ceaseless team.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Wilco. Wait one. Four. Status.

I sure as shit wasn't going down there by myself, and there was no way in hell I was gonna leave Dani up top without someone keeping an eye on her while she worked. I kinda felt like kicking seven in the head, why hadn't his team reported any of this?

:>> Draugr Four. ETA 20... 19

Good, Brianna had just about finished clearing the rooms behind us.

With Lilou now free to get back to work I pointed at her then immediately behind me. Bri entered the room, I pointed to my eyes with both fingers then at Dani. Lastly I nodded at Clea. Drawing a second sword over her shoulder from the sheath at her back she turned and advanced down the stairs silently and without hesitation.

:<< Draugr Alpha. Advancing.

Now just because an area is called a dark zone doesn't mean it can't be well lit. As was the case here. From what I could see at the bottom of the stairwell anyway. The place was deathly quiet, and if you discounted the blood pooling into the hallway from the pile of bodies at the bottom of the stairs you would almost think it was deserted. Almost. There was quiet sobbing coming from further down the corridor.

This hallway was much narrower than the one above, more like you would find in a house than the double width typically found in commercial buildings, much like this one had initially appeared to be. Clea stopped just past the first door on the left and turned back to me for instruction. I indicated she should hold, having decided to clear each room completely as we passed. I walked as quietly as I could to stand by the old fashioned, panelled wooden door. I had always thought of myself as being relatively light on my feet, but the girls moved with barely a whisper, I likely may as well have been an elephant in their eyes. Though that may have just been the stress of the situation telling me that the soles of my combat boots were clomping on the lino floor.

But, now that I was in position I had a choice to make. Hard and loud, or soft and loud? Or actually... with the new reapers I could do soft and soft. Problem being clearing a room with a sword came with a short life expectancy. If there was a guy on the other side of the door at least with a firearm you had a chance of giving as good as you got.

I quickly checked the edges of the door to look for any obvious signs of tampering, deciding on the soft and loud approach. Seeing nothing that immediately stood out I twisted the handle and waited for a five count. Now the problem with old fashioned wood panelled doors is that the lock is separate from the handle. I wouldn't know if the door would open until I pushed it, if was locked I would just be inviting someone to shoot at me through the door.

The door quietly swooshed open when I pushed from the cover of the door frame. I waited for a three count then quickly ducked around and back. Looked like a library or something. I slowly entered the room to clear it, Clea in the hallway in the event of contact from deeper within the building, Lilou following me into the room in case I needed something stabbed. It wasn't a library but more of a printing room.

Three seconds in and I was far from fucking happy. The area was littered with freshly minted copies of the chinese propaganda that was frequently seen during the war. Let's just pause right here and take a little detour shall we?

Way back around the year 2000 the American people started waking the fuck up to the fact they didn't have anything even resembling the democracy they thought they did. It was an oligarchy, the rich ruled the poor. After a bit of momentum building the second civil war happened some time after that. With the rapid decline of that particular world power, China, that had already been stepping up to the plate had quickly taken control of the various world markets. That, combined with the fact that the majority of the planets trade goods were manufactured in China, and being backed by Russia, the world entered a new era.

A surprise to no one at the time was that China invaded their nearby 'ally' North Korea to secure the resources needed for war, and quickly followed through to take the South. They had shown the world that America no longer had the teeth it once did. Emboldened at the lack of resistance, shortly thereafter China figured 'fuck it', we already own most of Australia, and we've already invaded one country (and they were a pushover) so lets just take the rest of the continent down under. So they tried. It was a tough war, but in the end we held the line and pushed them back, now in a loose truce they currently hold the top north western corner of the continent. Things are in motion to fuck them off for good though, at least they were when I was still on active duty.

:>> This is Tac.1 Pan right.

I silently complied, tracking my line of sight back over the stacks of posters. I stopped briefly and focused at the top of each stack before moving onto the next. I neither knew nor cared what the words said, three of the four stacks being written in mandarin. The last stack however was in english. Printed all in red on white stock, the central focus was a closed fist, across the middle of the poster was the slogan. "Communism is a fight for FREEDOM."

:>> This is Tac.1 Proceed.

We had moved forward and were about to enter the second room when the .30 turret opened up again.

:\\ Remind me to put a camera feed on that thing, be nice to know what we're killing.

I said to no one in particular over the private network.

:// Of course maître.

Lilou nodded once. Hmm maybe that word didn't mean over, unless she was just in the zone now as sometimes happened.

The turret picked up and dropped off several times over the next couple of minutes, I was about to ask Bri to take a look when it finally fell mostly silent. Now only firing a couple of short bursts sporadically. Figuring things weren't likely to get any better any time soon we began repeating the process of the previous room to open the next door. Throwing the door open I waited for a three count and ducked my head around the corner and back again quickly.

:<< This is Draugr Alpha. One. Status.

There was someone chained to the rear wall, the stench coming from the room over powering. Before I went into the room and confirmed so that I could called in the evac for the VIP, I needed to know if seven was still kicking and would need to go as well.

:>> This is Draugr One. Stable. Casevac required.

:<< Alpha. Acknowledged. Wait one.

I found myself wondering if I should be envious of the reapers combat helmets. They didn't look like they had built in scrubbers, but it was possible. We were standing in a mostly empty, if rather smelly room around five meters by five. The lights in here were brighter than those in the hallway. I looked down at the naked, bruised, and filthy body of the man sitting against the wall, hands chained in place above his head. Weird thing is, the room didn't match his condition, it was almost spotless. There was a rough hessian sack over his head, but he was alive. Kneeling down to eye level I slowly pulled back the hood. He began sobbing uncontrollably, his eyes had been sewn shut, and from the looks of it his eyes had been removed relatively recently.

:<< Tac.1 this is Draugr Alpha.

:>> This is Tac.1 VIP confirmed.

Oh right, someone was watching and I forgot.

:<< Alpha. Acknowledged. Wait one. Two swap One.

Clea walked past the open doorway throwing Lilou and I a wave as she headed up to help Bri cover our exit so that Dani could get the VIP ready to move. Without waiting to be told Lilou pulled a small vibroblade from somewhere and began working the chains with the blade. They fell to the floor around twenty seconds later as Dani entered the room and quickly assessed the patient.

"He can be moved."

:<< Tac.1 this is Draugr Alpha. Casevac, two passengers. Over.

:>> This is Tac.1 casevac wilco. ETA 60...59

They'd clearly been in a holding pattern nearby as we worked.

Dani and I hauled the VIP to his feet and throwing an arm over each of our shoulders dragged him up to the first patient, seven. We could have taken him out front to the humvee, my primary concern at the moment however was that there was a more critical patient, and when VIP's were involved all other concerns were conveniently ignored, forgotten, or misplaced.

"Three, Four, move forward and let me know when and what is coming to pick up these two." I never used names during an OP, even when talking without comms and regardless of how well I knew them on a personal level. As Alpha I was always distancing myself from their personalities, stripping them of their humanity and reducing them to nothing but their combat abilities and how they could help me complete my mission. It was the only way shit would get done.

Didn't mean I couldn't appreciate the sight of three's ass in the skin hugging synth skin armour as she bolted forward to do my bidding though. I looked over to see Daniela smirking at me. Oops. Busted.

:>> This is Draugr Three. Armored aircar evac and escort maître.

Yep, per his VIP status these guys weren't fucking around.

I caught Dani's eye. "Take two, get seven out first, I'll follow."

She nodded as I took up the VIP's full weight. I waited for the girls to get at least a ten count in front before I followed, plenty of time to ensure the more critical patient would be loaded first.

With seven being loaded into the closest open door I headed over to the opposite side to hand over the VIP. Two assault boats were circling lazily overhead to ward off any would be interlopers as the aircar began lifting off in preparation for full flight. Yeah, obviously not actual boats seeing as they were flying, it's just what their called dude.

With the girls already piling into the humvee around fifty meters away I idly tracked the flight path of the closest assault boat while I headed their direction, and couldn't help but frown a little. It looked like it was doing an attack run. Dipping suddenly as though reacting to my watchful gaze, I watched as it rained hellfire down along what my HUD showed to be a causeway a little over one hundred meters away. Five red blips appeared on my HUD as the engagement started. Two remained after the run. I froze when I read the assigned designation. There were two blips left. Fuck.

:>> WOLF WOLF WOLF

Someone, likely the pilot yelled into the tactical channel.

I had hoped with the wars end I would never hear those words again, but it was the punch in the face I needed to get moving. Whoever was in the hot seat didn't wait and gunned the humvee, spinning around to head directly for me with the front passenger door swinging in the breeze. The engines of the aircar screamed as it clawed for purchase in the sky, nearly throwing me off balance as it suddenly angled steeply for the fastest escape vector. I ran like the devil himself was chasing me, even as the second assault boat laid in a crisscrossing course and fired both missiles and guns and likely everything else it had at its disposal along a course perpendicular to the first approach, the first was lining up for another run. The .50 cal of the hummer opened up, tracer rounds flying at what seemed like mere inches above my head, tracking down my left side as both the rounds and the wolf got closer and closer and... Bri tapped the brakes to force the passenger door fully open with the momentum, immediately slamming the accelerator to the floor again as I dove into the passenger seat. Brianna in wide eyed fear was firing over my back with her .45ACP on full auto as she drove.

The torque and response of the electric motors on the assault trucks was fucking fantastic, unfortunately I think I now have a broken rib or two as the hard door frame slammed into my side with the force of acceleration. Thankfully the majority of my body was in the truck so I didn't simply fly out again. There was a loud 'thunk' as the heavy wolf warbot collided with the side rear door and I nearly slipped back out, the wolf missing me by... well quite frankly I really don't wanna think about it.

I quickly pulled my feet in and slammed the door closed, groaning with the burst of pain in my side as the .50 cal continued firing for a full twenty seconds, we were careening down the evacuated roads of the commercial district at around 160 before the turret fell silent.

:>> This is Tac. 1. End engagement confirmed. Good job Draugrs. Tac. 1 out.

Bri's eyes checked the mirrors before she even thought about slowing down. I turned to make a random smart ass comment to break the tension and let off some steam, but ended up coughing so hard I could taste blood. I looked at Brianna in confusion, mutely holding out my hand and showing her the streaks of blood that I had coughed onto my fist. God dammit my side hurt, and now my leg was all gummy!

There were tears streaming down her face as she screamed something at me, I don't know what it was, her voice was distorted, like listening to a glitching digital radio. Probably because she was practically firing her gun in my face. Then Daniela's face came into view as she crawled into the front seat with me but she was... blurry. She shook me and slapped my face hard, then bent over double fusing with something at my feet. I looked down at what she was doing... oh. Well that would explain it. I was missing my left leg from the knee down.

Blackness took me.