\\___Scav; Episode Six___/

Taking off his pack, Bokep sat down on the skybridge alongside his detached squad. Rummaging through its pouches, Bokep took out a small packet of crackers and began to eat them. He had been fighting for the last six hours on and off. The initial assault into the chemical plant had been successful due to the rapid breakthrough Europan lines, but as more and more quick reaction forces responded, and as more and more Euruskan men began their own assaults, what had begun as an armored spearhead had turned into a war of rats. Individual squads engaged one another in building to building street fights as armored vehicles, ever wary off the urban environment, played a life or death game of cat and mouse.

There was intermittent fire all around their squad’s position. Bokep’s platoon had taken only light casualties in the initial firefights, and had thus been sent forward with limited resupply to act as a first line of defense against any Europan counter attack. Their position gave them a head on view of a roadway, to their right, two blocks down, was another platoon which was currently engaging a fireteam of Europan Exosuits. They had heavy armor support and could likely take care of the threat, or at the very least force a stalemate. Taking out his canteen, Bokep washed down his crackers and looked around him to see the ever-vigilant Voru glued to his rifle scope.

“Sir, I have eyes on a Europan convoy, four vehicles, three-hundred meters.”, Came Voru.

“I see ‘em, I’ll radio it in.”, Bokep began.

“Everyone, get ready to move, we may need to engage them to keep fourth platoon from being encircled.”, He continued. After radioing the sighting in, Bokep heard a sound come from his visor as he received new orders to engage the convoy’s dismounted infantry.

“Alright, I’m sure you all saw that. Voru and Syvent, I want you two in fire over-watch positions, the rest of us are going to get between them and fourth platoon.”, Bokep said, picking up his backpack and moving towards a doorway which would lead them down.

They quickly moved down a series of stairwells until they were on the second floor of their building. They made use of catwalks and skybridges to cross roads and double time across industrial blocks. As they reached their target point, Bokep looked out, over the skybridge and saw the Europan platoon crossing the street about fifty meters ahead of them.

“Sakorsky, Nevar?”, Bokep said looking around him.

“Yes Sir?”, came the reply.

“Take your squads and try to cut them off from fourth platoon, the rest of you are with me, we’re going to say hi from behind.”, He continued, starting forward once again.

As they reached the bottom floor, the two remaining squads set up for fire and maneuver. Bokep led the first squad across and set them up into covering positions to cover the others in turn. As the two squads began moving into the block they had seen the Europans enter, they heard gunfire initiate from the other end. They moved together in a two man column. Bokep and their platoon’s Bruiser heavy infantryman armed with a Saiga-12 in front as point men.

They heard the sound of engines moving outside of the block as the firefight continued in front of them. The Europan armored vehicles were moving in to provide support to their infantry. Reaching near the source of the Europan gunfire, Bokep slowed their advance in order to allow for an ambush. There were two Europans pulling security to the rear of their position in the next room. From what he could see from sneaking glances, the room was a connected by a single doorway to another set of rooms which laid at the end of the block and where the Europans had their MG3 machine-gun. Bokep raised his right hand above his shoulder at a right angle and lifted two fingers, then pointed them forward. After communicating the positions of the Europan soldiers, Bokep slung his rifle over his shoulder and pulled a Vog-29 fragmentation grenade and his sidearm, a suppressed SHR1MP.

Nodding to the other point man, Cherni, the dreadnought of a man lowered the visor of his altin helmet and led the stack up into the room. As Cherni rushed in, Bokep pulled the pin on his grenade and followed him. Cherni caught the first man off guard and threw three flechette rounds into his plate carrier, dropping him dead on the spot. Bokep had to deal with the second, a more well equipped man with a full torso and shoulder protected plate carrier. He put five rounds into the man, center mass which knocked him off balance. Bokep tackled him to the ground, being careful not to release the grenade in his left hand which would kill them all.

The man tried to go for Bokep’s face with his hands, but his visor saved him from the worst of it. After wrestling the business end of his pistol under the Europan’s neck, he pulled the trigger thrice for good measure, splattering the man’s brains on the inside of his helmet. Standing quickly, Bokep threw his Vog-29, calling out the deployed ordinance as he did so.

The Europans responded in their own language shortly before its detonation. The explosion sounded and Cherni led the charge into the room, confirming kills as he went as Bokep gathered himself off the ground once again. As he entered the now cleared room, Bokep saw that they had infact neutralized the MG3. Peeking his head out the window, he saw several Europan corpses of different weight classes on the street, he didn’t see much else before being pulled away by Cherni as more automatic fire rang out into their position from across the street. Evidently the other half of his platoon hadn’t realized that they were now in control of this particular Europan position. Holstering his sidearm, Bokep got on the radio.

“Sakorsky you drunkard, you’re shooting at us you dumb fuck!”, Bokep called over the radio. Nothing.

“Well shit… uhh Reshuko, help me grab this corpse..”, Bokep said, picking up the legs of the lighter looking Europans. Reshuko obliged and lifted the deceased man’s arms.

“We’re going to throw it out the window, if Sakorsky and his men don’t get that, then I think we’ll have a bigger issue.”, Bokep continued, starting to sway the corpse in preparation throw it.

“On three. One, two, three!”, Bokep grunted as the two men hurled the body the window. It make plopping sound, like that of a heavy book on a table as it hit the ground. Testing his luck, Bokep then stuck his hand out in front of the window and waved accross the street. When he didn’t hear gunfire, he presumed that the message was understood.

“Sorry sir, didn’t realize it was you!”, came Nevar over the radio with a chuckle.

“…Son of a bitch…”, said Bokep to himself.

\\___Scav; Episode Seven___/

“Nevar, how many casualties?”, Bokep asked over the radio.

“Three sir, but we have them pinned on the first two floors. Their vehicles did a pass through with their autocanons, but we don’t know where they are now. I have men ready with AT in case they try anything again.”, Nevar responded.

“Affirm, try to get them engaged, and we’ll try to clean them up.”, Bokep responded.

Taking his side arm out of its holster, Bokep changed its magazine before reholstering it and heading for the door way towards their original entry point.

As the two squads moved down the building, their orders were updated.

*Fall back to line two defensive positions, await reinforcement.*

“Sir?”, a rifleman came from behind him.

“I know, I saw it too.”, Bokep responded.

“Nevar, Sakorsky, deploy smoke in the road on my signal, we’re coming to you, then we need to move back.”

“We’re out sir, we used it all at the crossroads.”, came the reply.

“Well, then I guess we’re still coming, just make sure you can give us covering fire when we do. And Voru, take your detachment and meet us back at the fall back position.”

Descending a flight of stairs, Bokep and his unit found themselves in the midst of was once a small warehouse. Moving through it, rifles raised, they found long since rotted corpses of their fallen comrades. Paying the piles of bones little mind, they made their way onto a manufacturing floor where they hit contact with Europan ground forces. Plunging fire from catwalks and ground level fighters alike. Returning fire, Bokep tried to get his men out of the line of fire, and into some degree of usable cover.

Making a mad dash out of the maneuver, the Euruskans manages to take out several Europan assailants, though at the cost of several of their own. As they ran, the soldier infront of Bokep took several rounds and fell to the floor. Slinging his rifle over his shoulder, Bokep threw the soldier, a female private in his own squad, over his shoulders and continued forward into cover.

Once their were a few walls in between them and the Europans, Bokep did a head count. There were three unaccounted for, but they were confirmed KIA by other members of the platoon. The one wounded that Bokep had secured had been hit twice in her plate carrier, and once in her left forearm. The hits to the plate hadn’t penetrated, and the arm wound had been treated to the best of their ability with what minuscule medical supplies they had.

“We’re in position Nevar.”, Bokep said panting.

“Just in time sir, a few of my guys who I have as look outs are telling me that the Europans are moving in armor. Looks like we are sat in front of their counter-attack.”, he replied.

“Can you run?”, Bokep said to the injured private.

“Y-yes.”, she said struggling to her feet.

“Don’t lie to me, I’m going to carry you, lose your pack.”, Bokep said removing his own backpack as well to lighten the load. Once again carrying her on his shoulders, Bokep gave the signal.

“Okay, let’s move, get across and hunker down for the rest of us!”, Bokep said starting towards the wide open street, sidearm drawn. Moving across the first lane, there was nothing, as he reached the second, the Europans which had engaged them before on the factory floor had reached their previous positions and had begun opening fire.

Bokep looked to his behind and saw the two men in the back get cut down, Cherni among them. Soon Nevar and Sakorsky’s men began returning fire, taking the attention away from Bokep and his fleeing men. A burst of machine-gun fire tore through the air as Bokep felt several impacts to his back and fell forward.

\\___Scav; Episode Eight___/

When Bokep awoke, it was cold. More than that, it was wet. His neck felt as it had been broke, but he knew it wasn’t. There was a large weight on top of him; something large was laying across his back. At first he thought he was in a corpse pile, but as he moved the weight off of his back, he found himself standing on a road… he remembered.

Wiping his face from the wetness, the back of his hand was a crimson red. Looking around, Bokep saw several bodies in the street, pools of blood gathered around each as rainfall made small puddles on the heavily damaged arterial roadway. Looking down, Bokep found that the weight he felt on his back was in fact another soldier, the same private he had tried to carry across that road. His visor was shattered, its display either functional, nor protection worthwhile for the limitation in visibility it imposed. Raising the piece of reinforced material, Bokep felt a pain as he pinched his hand around it. Examining the source of it, Bokep found a hole in his jacket sleeve, he followed it to the other side and through his forearm. Moving back across the street to where his platoon had initially tried to cross, bokep found both his pack, and that of the woman he had carried.

Reaching for his radio, he tried to contact his unit. “This is Lieutenant Bokep, I am alive and behind Europan lines, all uplinks failed. I repeat, I am alive and behind hostile lines with no tactical uplink, please respond, over.”, Bokep said in a worried tone. No response, not even a click from the radio to signify that his message was transmitted.

Sitting down next to the two packs, Bokep tied a tourniquet around his left arm and used his IFAK to treat the wound itself. After jabbing himself will a dose of morphine, Bokep consolidated what useful supplies from both packs into his own, and grabbed his rifle off the ground and headed for higher ground, intending to use verticality and the assorted sky-bridges and cat walks to remain over and away from Europan lines of sight as much as possible.

Before leaving his fallen comrades, Bokep collected their dog tags, and one of their short-range radios. It didn’t have close to the same range his own did, but if he got close enough to friendly lines, it would be better than nothing. As Bokep started out, he heard the distant boom of tank shells and a rockets. The hab-plex made artillery strikes from outside the hab impossible due to their reinforced shell, the same prevented artillery being being shot inside. The only options for ordinance were grenade-lauchers -man portable and mounted- and heavy bunker busting munitions which were costly in both creation, and utilization due to the high demand of SU-25s.

Looking up, Bokep saw glimmers of moon light through the numerous holes in the hab-plex’s exterior roof. Rain water fell through them and onto the streets in a light rain, enough to be noticed, but not enough to have an effect on Bokep’s movement and equipment.

Moving from building to building, floor by floor, Bokep soon found himself atop a building near the second line that his platoon was originally orders to fall back to. Taking our his infared binoculars, he peered into the dark, lamp-lit night of the hab-plex, and saw it aflame. Entire blocks were ablaze with Europans pressing the attack against what Bokep thought to be his unit. The few armored assets that their initial vanguard had been allocated were outnumbered by the Europans by a tleast two-to-one, with heavy infantry simply out-gunning the 409th. As he looked towards the initial breach point, Bokep heard a voice over his short range radio.

“This is Captain Rusputov of the 409th Mechanized Vanguard Brigade, we are being engaged by heavy Europan ground and air assets, we are out numbered, and low on vehicles and munitions, please respond!”, The voice came. As Bokep began to prepare to descend, he heard another transmission.

“Europan Exosuits have cut us off at the access tunnel, I repeat, we are cut off, glory to Euruska, duty until death!”, came the Captain once again. Miscellaneous combat chatter continued as the clamor of combat and death replaced orders and statuses. Knowing that at best, he would likely end up dead if he got anywhere near the access tunnel and tried to return to friendly lines, Bokep sat. He watched the exos fired their forearm-mounted canons, and heavy breacher teams burn the last few hold outs, unable to do anything to affect the result, and unable to peel himself away from the massacre of everyone he knew, Bokep sat, and watched.

As the flames died down and the rain picked up, Bokep descended from the top of the building and into the undercity. Europan UAVs and ground forces would be searching for survivors and he didn’t want to be one of the ones they caught. Reaching the bottom floor of the building he was in, Bokep found a steel double door blocking his path into the undercity. He tried to push it open, but found that a chain was bound between the handles on the otherside, practically locking it shut. Debating his options, heard the hum of a vehicle’s engine approach and stop outside. Raising his rifle towards the entrance to the hallway he was in, Bokep made sure that he was in automatic.

Pausing for a moment to listen, Bokep turned and fired two rounds into the chain, breaking it and allowing the door to be opened. He heard a voice from outside call out, the Europans had to have heard the shots and would be pursuing him. Moving through the doors, Bokep closed them and used his rifle to replace the chain, preventing the door from being usable once again.

Drawing his SHR1MP once again, Bokep turned on his helmet mounted flashlight and saw that he saw now in a utility tunnel. It was narrow, dry, but musty and smelled of stale air. Advancing forward into the darkness, Bokep tried to create distance between himself and the Europans, taking turns and changing levels as much as possible in order to avoid capture. As he continued on, Bokep found more descending stairs than ascending. The dry, but smooth concrete turned damp and damages, as more and more rusted catwalks run across sewers and long dormant factories, likely converted at some point in the war, but ultimately deemed nonviable by some industrial algorithm.

What might have been a few hours later, or perhaps only a half of one, Bokep sat down in one of the drier portions of the underground network and changed his bandages and ate. It was at this point that he finally felt safe enough to think. Presently he was by all means the lone survivor of a brigade sized unit located who knows how far under ground in enemy territory. He was a dead man by all means, but he was doomed the moment he was conscripted anyway. Flicking off his light, Bokep decided that if he was going to get out of here, it would be better to do so with a fresh mind.

As he slept, Bokep dreamed of a time before the war. His parents had told his stories about how beautiful the world once was. Their homeland was called the steppe, fields of grass and grain which fed the world thrice over. Crystal blue oceans where children played, and men fished… whatever that was… For Bokep, he saw an old man sitting outside his house in a chair. There was a dog by his feel sleeping, and the man had a glass of vodka in his hand. He sat there and watched the sun set over clear skies, and down below the Ural Mountains, only to rise once again in beautiful splendor.

*Click*

Bokep opened his eyes to see several flashlights trained on him, each had a corresponding muzzle adding to the threat. Bokep looked down at his opened holster. He could probably take one out before they managed to riddle him with enough bullets… However, as he looked up at the first face -the only one he could see from the reflection of the flashlights- they didn’t have the expression of someone who wanted to kill him, rather they seemed to be someone who just didn’t want to waste their ammo, or another life.

Unbuckling his war belt which had the holster on it, Bokep handed it over to his captors.

“This should be interesting…”, He said awaiting whatever fate might be his.

“Who are you, from where do you come, and why are you here?”, came the reply from one of the strangers, a woman, the sole face he could see. She spoke in perfect Russian, but clearly was Euruskan herself.

“Bokep, I am a Euruskan, 409th Mechanized Vanguard Brigade and uhh… everyone is dead and they thought I was too…”, He replied, taking off his helmet and showing the small collection of round impacts on the backside it, and his own gunshot wound.

“

You need medical attention…”, She said looking Bokep’s arm over.

“

You didn’t have a medstick?”, She continued.

“No, guess they didn’t think we were worth the investment…”, Bokep said, wincing as she touched his arm.

“You have infection, so I will offer you a choice. You can either die out here from abhors, your own wound, and hunters, or you can come with us, live, and maybe do some good with your life instead of taking it.”, she said holding out a medstick. {Medsticks are valuable medications which act as an all-in-one treatment for gunshots, stab wound, sickness, and other ailments.}

Bokep took the stick, popped the cap and injected his arm with it. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath as the world turned black.

\\__Scav; Episode Nine___/

Bokep awoke, finding himself in another concrete room, this time in a bed instead of on the ground. Sitting up, Bokep examined his surroundings and felt his wrist pulling against something, unable to move. He looked down at it and found himself restrained with hand cuffs from his left wrist to the pseudo medical bed he was on. He figured he was in an infirmary when he saw the clear bag of fluids which was connected to a syringe in the top of his right hand, no doubt done on that hand in order to prevent the cuffs from moving it.

The room he was in was made of concrete. It was well kept unlike the tunnels he had found himself in before. The ground was made up of square metal mesh grates. Small enough for liquids to pass through, but not much else. Looking up his left arm to the gunshot wound he had received during the firefight, Bokep saw that there were fresh medical bandages on it instead of the field wrappings he had used.

Coming to the realization that there wasn’t much he could do in his current predicament, Bokep laid back down and tried to fall back asleep. His mind raced with the reasonings for why the soldier… whoever had spared him, opting to capture rather than kill him. He figured they either wanted him for Euruskan intelligence, enslavement, or they were Euruskans themselves. These would be answers gotten at a later time. For now, Bokep needed sleep if he was going to recover in a timely manner, so sleep he would.

A while later, Bokep was awoken by the wound of the double doors to the infirmary being opened. Opening his eyes, Bokep recognized the face approaching him as the woman he had met at the business end of a rifle in the tunnels.

“I see you're recovering.”, She began in a semi-friendly tone.

“Last we saw, you were as pale as abhor… Bokep…”, She continued. Bokep’s face got serious as she said his name… he had told her his name hadn’t he… {Abhors are genetically modified humans and animals which roam the battlefields as crazed murder machines, killing anything and anyone they see.}

“As you can see, you’re alive. I am sure this gives you questions, all of which will be answered in due time. For now, you should know that we are not Europans, Eurasians, or Euruskans like yourself. We are what you call Scavs. We are survivors, the forgotten rounding errors in your war.”, She started once again.

“What this does not mean is that we are going to kill you. There’s been enough death already. What we do want to do is recruit you. We are few in number and always seem to lose more people than we gain. So, in exchange for your life, you can join us and have three hots and a cot, with an added bonus of being able to help the few non-combatants that remain. To be the lone light in the darkness. Or, you can take the other options which we offered you before. We wil give you back your kit in its entirety, you can leave and fend for yourself out there.”, She continued, coming to an end of there monologue and pointing towards the outside of the infirmary..

Bokep was somewhat taken aback by her idealism. He had known about the Scavs from his time back at the steepe. They were small groups of individuals who roamed the battlefields taking what they can, killing what they needed to, and generally trying to eek out a survival in the midst of an active war zone. They had always been described as bandits and terrorists to Bokep, but he knew that this was likely propaganda, but a half-truth none the less. Weighing his options, Bokep decided that there was safety in numbers and that at worst, he could leave later on with extra rations for his efforts if he was careful.

“Well first off, I need to use a bathroom, but soon as that is done, I’ll accept your offer.”, Bokep said taking out the IV and raising his left arm, bringing attention to the handcuffs.

Taking out a key, the woman unlocked the hand cuffs and walked towards the double doors, gesturing for Bokep to follow her.