I don't know about the voices, but they're right that I am curious.

Is this the stress of the situation, or the shock of blood loss? I'm not bleeding though.

Not yet anyway.

"Set up a perimeter around the wreck and don't let the enemy get to it." The Commander yells, and at least I'm not the only one obsessed with that B-52. It's a few more yards, I'm almost there.

"More drones!"

"We need to regroup."

"Men down!"

The firefight isn't going well. But the drones are something I can deal with using the borrowed Masterkey and birdshot.

The Spetznaz brought plenty but only has three dedicated operators. The shotgun has a three-round tube magazine, and I have one in the chamber.

I can deal with their full flight without reloading, while they need minutes to set up another. It will be much faster to reload this Masterkey. Assuming I don't miss, but why would I?

Considering it's my first combat deployment, I'm doing well.

"Min ypotimáte tin katástasi tóra." # Don't underestimate the situation now. # Well, okay, ignore the strange voices and that they shot me twice. Or that I have no idea why this is happening.

"Sniper, six o'clock." Another late warning and a bullet smacks me in the back. Almost nothing remained from the front plates of my bulletproof vest, so the shooter did me a favor.

It still hurts like hell, and I faceplant into the dirt. So they surround us now? Did I piss them off by taking out all the drones? Here they come, their buzzing got louder than the ringing in my ears.

They're too close, and I have my back to them. It is not the best place to be. I roll and the pain jolts me like an electric shock. Yeah. That bullet wedged itself in somewhere.

The world spins around me and my vision is blurry. But the FPV drone flies straight at my face, offering the perfect target. It would be impossible to miss.

It's too close for comfort, but I'd rather take it down at ten yards than kiss it. BAM. The birdshot knocks it back to another yard, and the operator sets off the payload too late.

It takes all my strength to pump the Masterkey and hold the gun steady, but there are two more of these fuckers. And don't forget the sniper.

A bullet cracks an inch away from my face, kicking up more dirt. The shotgun goes off, and I pick the worst time to miss. The voice jinxed it. Come on, pump again, and BAM.

Some shrapnel and mud flies in the air, raining down around me, obscuring the third drone that zooms over my head. It aims for someone else, and those guys will have a bad day.

I failed to take it down, and the screams following the next explosion confirmed the hit.

"Get up, Nerd. Into the wreck, now!" The Commander grabs my collar and tries to yank me up. It hurts. It hurts bad. "Oh, shit, you're hit. Medic!"

A moment later another hand grabs me by the uniform, and the two of them drag me towards the downed plane.

They try to get me to safety, which I appreciate, but they almost tear me apart in the process. At least the pain stops me from passing out.

Once they prop me against the plane, and I get a morphine shot, my consciousness starts to slip.

No. I'm close and still don't know what we're fighting over. I refuse to pass out until I see it.

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"Aftó eínai to pnévma. Xypnó." # That's the spirit. Get up. # The little girl urges me, and whether it's the painkiller, or insanity kicking in, the pain is gone.

"Status report. How many do we have left?" The Commander's voice seems distant. Half a dozen soldiers are inside the Stratofortress with me. The medic treats some other wounded.

The Russians are careful not to damage the plane, so this might be the safest place.

I struggle to get on my feet, but the little voice and my curiosity won't let me rest.

"We lost at least six dead, and six more MIA. The rest is either wounded or low on ammo, Sir."

"Fuck. Roosevelt Actual, SEAL Team Bravo. Come in." By the sounds of it, they're still jamming us. The soldiers are too busy to notice me limping towards the bomb bay.

It's further back from the small storage area we're in, this plane is huge.

"If we can't protect it, we'll have to destroy it." I hear the Commander.

Yeah, there is no way this is a nuclear weapon. You can't destroy that in the middle of Europe.

Think of the destruction, the fallout, the diplomatic consequences. I need to know what we're fighting over before they destroy it. At least it has to be in the bomb bay, and I'm the closest.

"Eseís tha to katastrépsete." # You will be the one to destroy it. # The little girl's voice insists. Fine. I still need to see what it is first. The door is open, and no signs of previous entry.

The Spetznaz guys are so cautious of whatever is in here, that they didn't try to breach the plane's hull. The bay is massive. I've been on CVN-71 for most of my career and have seen many planes.

The Superfortress seems larger than all the rest combined. It could fit an F/A-18 inside without the wings. And the bay is full of a weird contraption. It has pipes and leaking coolants.

It looks like a huge rocket engine, rather than a bomb, and the complexity is insane. There are some levers and screens close to the entrance though, so it's easy to tell, where to start.

This must be some high-tech prototype but what does it do? Why was it near a warzone? From the pieces I puzzled together, the B-52 patrolled the waters over the Black Sea.

A Russian UAV collided with it, but the damage was minimal. Thanks to bad weather in Ukraine and Romania, they sent it the long way around to return to the UK airfield.

It had no issues above the Sea of Marmara, but they reported problems above the Aegean. Then it went down over the Ionian Sea, crashing into Ithaca.

A massive beast like this could take a lot of punishment, so it made no sense. They were in service for decades and will be for another hundred years.

And still, the insides of the bomb bay were rotting and rusting. If they were to haul a top-secret prototype into a warzone, they would have used the plane in the best conditions.

The controls have all kinds of confusing writing on them. Tachyon Lance? Particle Accelerator? A big red warning flashes on the largest LCD screen noting a serious Tachyon Particle leak.

Aren't Tachyon particles often referred to as Time Particles? Did they build a time machine or a weapon that messes with it? And there is a leak. The plane looks older than it should.

Did it age because of this leak?

"The fuck are you doing here, Nerd?!"