During the Reaver ambush…

In the endless skies above, purple shrouds, grey clouds moved across the large stretching fields of decaying grass. The haze-like mirage that covered the heavenly sky put darkness upon the life below. It was neither hell, heaven, nor a purgatory. Just a place where the world gave its judgment.

An unwavering column of black smoke rose in the distance; the smell of death sprung from the craters where the smoke originated. Silent whispers grew over the destroyed lands, and the distant shouts began to fade as blood was spilt coating the ground in a crimson red that slowly mixed in with the dirt and mud. What remained was no more than an eerie peace. Those brave enough to step into the fire of the beings that scoured the plains had long been forgotten, and the chaos that once inhabited the area began to slowly fade away as those tough enough to survive began to dwindle by the minute.

Sitting on a now-flattened hill craters were spread consuming large expanses of the dead grass that once covered the hill. Sitting in a spot untouched by the destruction and death, a group of four men sat under the sweltering heat that was caused by the explosions released upon their positions not four minutes ago. Beads of sweat dripped down their faces, and all around them, the embers of a large fire were carried in the wind spreading the entirety of the hill.

Wheezing, one of the men slowly gathered himself as he fought every fiber in his body to open his eyes fully. After some time, he had regained some consciousness and out of the corner of his eye he studied the ember-filled grounds beside him. His hand clenched into a small ball as he felt a warm substance falling down the side of his left leg. He smacked his dirty lips and blinked as much as he could as the burning pain of the injury he obtained slowly arrived. He paced himself as he pushed through the distorted mud he saw through his dirtied and scratched goggles sitting atop his face. Not far away he listened to the distant cracks that were released from what he believed were guns being fired, but through the small ringing in his covered ears, he couldn’t make out the sounds clearly as his focus was directed on moving from the muddy location, he awoke in.

Clenching his stomach as he expelled mucus and acid from his mouth, the man sat in his soiled clothes as he slowly breathed trying to gain control of his body. Taking not of the environment he was in; he slowly grasped the brown shemagh around his neck and secured it around his nose and mouth preventing a fair amount of the smog and ash into the air from getting into his lungs. Touching the warm ground next to him, he slowly reached for a pack on his belt as he silently wondered in his mind how he remained unscathed by the flames and debris that were scattered around the battlefield.

Cursing to himself as he took out a squished roll of gauze from his first-aid kit, he slowly revealed the gash he had on his left leg. Triaging the wound, he brought out a small container of rubbing alcohol and uncovered the plastic bottle before biting the cloth covering his mouth. It was a pain induced ten seconds he spent bandaging his wound and securing it with a medical pin. He would have to worry about any other major injuries at a later time, but for now he seemed to be in an operable condition.

Initially it was his mission as a captain to make sure his fireteam prevented Princess Leccamaradel’s team from being compromised and prevent an immediate attack. It more than a simple responsibility to secure the princess’s security, but for all he knew, the mission was a failure.

Removing his torn gloves from his leg, he slowly stood up as he tried to dust off some of the mud that had accumulated on his entire body. Grinding his teeth Thompson managed to stay on his feet as he rose from the ground with some difficulty. Removing his eyes from the darkened blood that had soaked into his olive-drab uniform, he scanned the grounds around him spotting three others wearing the same clothes and similar gear.

Being less than eight meters away from the closest soldier, he placed his foot on the ground and moved forward, his eyes instantly snapping to the unconscious man’s face and slowly moving chest. “Staff Sergeant!” His voice broke under the heavy strain placed upon his throat as he spoke. A searing pain passed over his chest as he heaved dragging his leg on the ground. Furrowing his eyebrows and standing over Baker’s unconscious body, Captain Thompson reached his shaky hand and grasped the radio attached to his plate carrier. He turned the device on, and he reconnected the link to his ear-pro’s before speaking into the microphone just near his mouth, “Lieutenant, radio check.” No voice ever spoke back to him as he awaited a response, “Patterson, radio check.” He said making his throat crack with the sounds he made. His eyes drifted from Baker and towards the fields not far away; he blinked several times clearing dirt from his eyelids and what he saw on the broken lands was something blurry, nothing more.

Shifting in place, Thompson sat silently as he looked around him. A coat of blood was painted in the air, and he could smell the strong stench of the iron. He had already done a once over on Baker. The Staff Sergeant had no external wounds but being knocked unconscious could suggest that he could have internal wounds or worse. Removing his eyes once he completed his second triage, his vision wandered to Sergeant Randall; the young NCO was crawling on the ground towards Simon. “Hey!” Forcing himself to shout towards his trusted Rangers, Thompson suddenly went still as Mike forced himself off the ground and took out the tourniquet attached to the back of his bag.

Out of the corner of his eye, Thompson spotted Staff Sergeant Baker sitting up with a still look on his face; he displayed no emotion as he silently watched Sergeant Randall move the tourniquet around the wound that Simon held. He positioned the black strap above the wound and tightened it with a forceful tug. He speedily tightened the windlass stopping the bleeding and hooked it in place before securing the strap in place.

“Simon!” Mike called out in a broken voice; his hands balled up into a fist as he looked over the boy trying to see any sign that he was alive. Sneaking his hand at the side of the boy’s neck, he let out a sigh of relief as he felt the subtle heartbeat within.

Rising from the ground, Baker seemed lost in a trance as he stepped forward with a limp in his steps. It was almost as if he was possessed as he stood just above Sergeant Randall and the unmoving Simon.

“He’s going to live.” Mike said shaking his head grasping the helmet strap around his chin. “We won’t lose him.” Twisting his arm, he felt a subtle ‘pop’ as he outstretched his arm and placed his dirtied hands-on Simon’s plate carrier grasping the drag handle.

Thompson was also known by the name, “Deliverer”, though this name was only hear around those in his former unit before he joined the 75th Ranger Regiment. The title held nothing, though it did alert those that knew of him that they would make it through whatever deployment they were assigned in one piece. The first time the name had been used was by the mouth of his former commanding officer—for that is what he thought of him— Oliver Thompson was nothing more than a person to deliver those wounded to safety. During Operation Burning Fields, the African tribespeople placed a part of their faith in him; he like the others were the reason why they sided with the United States in the first place, but the courage of such men would eventually get them killed, thus, turning “Deliverers” into “Deliverer”.

Thompson was both a young and old man. He had seen how the sands of the battlefield affected time, and he had been around just long enough to have the insight for making the right decision in the most desperate of times. By now he was almost forty-one-years-old. Originally, he was passed on a promotion to Major due to the higher echelons needing to fill in a gap for their commanding officers, but he was long past his prime to be leading a team in the unforgiving environments that this new world provided. Now here he stood looking over the broken bodies of his men.

Perhaps he was living in a draconian nightmare, but instead of one nation forcing its will upon him, the world moved to the forefront and revealed the reality it wished to display.

“—Captain.” Mike called out from across the muddy fields, “Orders?”

“Yes, give me a sit-rep, gentlemen.”

It was once a piece of advice during his time as a lieutenant to never get to close to the enlisted men that worked the dirty streets. For as long as his seven-year career had beaten in all sorts of rules, regulations, and by-the-books knowledge into his mind, Thompson had always opted to ignore that one piece of advice. It was always easier to get a group of men to work together if you understood their needs and troublesome worries.

A good leader always ate last, but a great one would cook for his men.

“I’m fucked up, but I’m up. I don’t know how long Simon will last without proper treatment.”

Taking the information in silence, Thompson considered his options. His eyes passed over the mutilated arm Simon held that was hanging on by several threads of blood-red matter and his face was stained with long dried tears. The boy wouldn’t last much longer if he stayed in this environment, but the captain knew his options to perform a medical evacuation were limited.

“We don’t have a lot of friends around, but the least we can do is see if we can’t get back to the Major and his jumpers.” Thompson said coolly making up his mind in an instant.

Grasping the carbine sitting across his chest, Thompson looked towards the horizon. The large purple orb that was now synonymous with the appearance of Reavers still stood high in the air, though the strength of the wall had begun to fade away.

“Daylight is burning.” He said with some confidence in his voice as Baker and Mike slowly moved themselves to step out of the hellscape they inhabited, “We need to move.”

Under the soft wind that blew over the decayed field and hills, Thompson alone led the other three. He would be the first to enter the unknown that seemed so familiar, but now he had to do it without the guarantee that his men would follow him into the hollowing darkness that encased the entire area. He knew each of them would take a step into such darkness, but to follow him into the depts was another issue in its entirety.

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It was no walk in the woods.

The searing pain of his leg being forced to move clouded Thompson’s mind; his boot dragged in the mud as he tried to navigate with his dirtied compass, he had withdrawn from his plate carrier. The words throughout his mind overwhelmed him—providing no chance for him to gather his sanity as a voice suddenly emerged in his ear.

“Are you good, sir?”

“Yes. I’m fine; we just need to get the fuck out of here.” Thompson yanked his helmet into place as he fine-tuned the frequency of the communications network that existed between just himself and his men. “You have an idea to get out, Staff Sergeant?”

“Already on a few plans but nothing solid.” The airman said a structured manner, “We need to know what substance that barrier is made out of before we get anywhere.”

Beyond the purpose of investigating what happened during the meet with the kingdom’s representatives and subsequent disappearance of Princess Lecca’s fireteam, the main priority would be a medical evacuation of his men. With the other four gone it was just himself, Mike, Baker, and a wounded Simon who would probably never see the reality of conflict ever again.

Thompson squished his eyes as he removed his left hand from his trusty rifle and thrusted it towards the activation button of the goggles concealing his tired and worn eyes. The world around him flashed and was highlighted in an orange overlay before fading into white. The highlights of the world slowly faded, and the augmented reality held within his goggles popped in and out of existence giving the captain a minor headache. Soon he watched the same world he had looked upon, though at the corner of his google the world was tampered with as the miniscule displays of information provided him the immediate location of his team members; using himself as a beacon, he walked ahead in the mud underneath the broken skies.

An icon of the prowess the ASOC had to offer, the goggles Thompson wore was stout and rugged; its surface was covered in a slim coat of a ranger green paint and sitting atop that was a tight-fitting netting that broke up the silhouette. Through the protected lenses the world around was lightened to a gentle soft brightness that placed little to no strain on his eyes. He drifted past the dead, disintegrating bodies of the Reavers they were able to kill in the sudden rush. As his eyes drifted over a nearby body one thing came to mind: no matter how much they would fight in this new world, some things wouldn’t ever fall to their technology or expertise. It was a troubling thought.

As he pressed his boots into the moist ground—grass below his boots crunched as a vibration shook his nerves, a tremor. Slowly turning his head, Thompson came to a halt as his eyes made their way over to the distant fields where fallen warriors coated the ground. Momentarily drifting to the blank sky, he couldn’t see anything—yet he had his men beside him reminding him of the little fortune he still had left.

“Hey, you still with us?” Speaking in a soft voice, but remaining demanding with his question, Sergeant Randall placed a hand on Thompson’s shoulder shaking him into reality. “Stay with us, sir.”

“Right.” Brushing his covered face, the captain reorganized his thoughts as he turned back to march on through the darkness, unafraid with his new determination.

Watching as his captain walked off with Staff Sergeant Baker driving close behind, Mike breathed silently as he calmed himself. His thoughts drifted to the four that just disappeared. It was something he did not think possible, yet without seeing a body or hearing the call of a radio, he wouldn’t know what would’ve or could’ve happened to the four.

“Got another klick or so till we reach the airborne troopers’ positions.” Mike’s whisper was quick, but it was more than loud enough to be registered by Thompson’s ear-pros that amplified the voice to a comfortable, understandable level. Mike realized this to, but he said nothing more as he opted to adopt silence with his following steps. Frustration ran through his blood, but he wasn’t going to let it control his entire mental state that was slowly being chipped away like the artillery rounds that carved the holes into the dead ground they walked on.

Never letting his hands leave the rifle that just laid on the top of his plate carrier, Thompson tried again-and-again to clear his mind—

It never worked.

Marching forward as small beat of sweat ran down the side of his head. His breaths remained somewhat haggard, but he navigated the environment just fine even in the seemingly unending darkness that stretched ahead due to the large orb encapsulating the entire area. The four sometimes stumbled across a deceased body of a Reaver, but the nature of their deaths could only be seen as basic conjuncture and nothing else.

They wandered for a while. What was placed before them could be perceived as unending, forever lasting.

If only that was the case in the reality, they inhabited.

“Stay alert,” Thompson said over squadron communications. “Mike, check security on Simon, Baker with me.”

Out of the corner of his eye, a green light momentarily flashed on the augmented display showed on his goggles as Thompson moved forward towards the large patches of tall grass that separated the dead areas the Reavers had trampled upon from the golden-green waves beyond. His carbine was held tightly in his hands, Staff Sergeant Baker followed his lead only two steps behind and two steps to his left. The situation was not ideal in any manner; Thompson wanted a squadron with him, a platoon’s worth of soldiers, of Rangers to back him up…

For now, he would make short work with what he had.

Standing on a small mound of dirt encapsulated by the tall gras that bushed against his covered body, he had no bird’s eye view, but the few feet he had provided just enough height to see something he loathed. A white haze rested, surrounded by the golden-green strands of grass. In the distance, behind the large ominous haze, Thompson could spot the snow-capped mountains looming in the distance, yet their colors were not natural and were distorted by the wall of the orb that grew ever so closer. That target was only about two-hundred meters away within the thick, lush plains, and it would only be another few kilometers before he and the others came across a human settlement or one of the many scattered but interconnected towns owned by the Federation. A frown formed on his lips.

He pressed his eyes together and used the pressure to clear his mind.

Focusing and riding himself of such uncalled emotions, Thompson settled himself in the tall grass as he diverted his view away from the haze-like figure floating in the middle of the fields. “Baker.” He said gaining the attention of the Air Force Staff Sergeant. Motioning a hand over his radio, the captain silently told him to contact Sergeant Randall and Simon.

“Mike, standby for situation report.”

“Standing by, over.” The Sergeant said in a quiet and tired voice.

“Confirmed contact with a similar looking portal that took us to this place, break…” Pausing, Baker looked back at Thompson, then shifted his head towards the haze that remained in place. “To our north, we suspect possible outsiders to arrive on site, over.”

“Setting up an interception position.” Mike announced, “Simon has woken up and is somewhat on his feet. We’ll hold on your west.”

“L-shape… Set up a line of fire heading east. We got north, out.” Baker said after receiving a small smile from the drained Thompson who was listening to the conversation and nodding his head occasionally. Looking through his heads-up-display, Thompson awaited the moment when Mike would drop his marker across the sprawling fields; eventually the beacon did drop, and his eyes quickly breezed over the two beaten riflemen that hid amongst the grass with only their off-colored gear sticking out to those with a sharp eye.

Letting out a short-lived sigh, Thompson slunk further into the grass below his boots, “Good old interdiction. If you can even say that.”

Moving to the side the two men waited. Nothing had yet to approach from the haze that had seemingly spawned from the onset and appearance of the Reavers. For what the other-worldly beings came here to eliminate was just up to conjecture, but circumstantial evidence provided hinted that something had triggered their appearance when Lecca and her fireteam contacted the knights and soldiers from the kingdom.

The current situation was far from ideal, and the captain had to think, something that was hard to do within this current reality.

“No movement.” Baker whispered trying to convince himself that nothing would happen. His finger tapped against the side of his carbine. His breaths remained uncertain. His eyes remained drained.

All Thompson could do was breath quietly and respond with a barely audible groan.

A crisp wind blew over the golden-green hills and fields. The orb above lightened. Sunlight flooded through gaps within the surface, yet the entire sphere had yet to fully dissipate. Standing firm, standing fast, the four waited. Rifles at the ready, their minds anxiously waiting…

Rays of sunlight vanished and appeared in succession. Grey clouds distorted the beautiful blue skies that was painted across what was to be a heavenly canvas both at the start and end of a single day on the confines of this planet. Settling across the plains, a calm mist blocked out the distant mountains and forests, beams of light broke through the tree line and revealed the grand lands that was hidden by both the Federation and the Frontier.

Flocks of birds singed in the sky; their paths only interrupted by the fading sphere that covered a large section of the untouched lands which humanity had now reached.

Their war had ended. Though the message had just arrived, yet it was never late. It was just on time.

But now, a hypothesis was placed before the captain.

A haze…

Silhouetting himself against the burning sun and the diminishing orb, Thompson stood tall looking upon the anomaly before him. His mind and heart raced, his body ached, and his lips smacked together dry. He wanted to say something, to call out to someone he had in mind, yet his dry throat prevented him from ever making a sound.

A distant voice, something he smacked himself over-and-over for forgetting echoed in the back of his mind. His hands gripped the rifle sitting neatly in his dirtied hands; now was not the time to recollect distant memories.

“Oliver.”

“Captain.”

He blinked.

“Thompson!”

“God damnit! Simon, stay with me!”

As Mike’s voice cut short over the radio, Thompson immediately turned on his heels towards the sergeant’s position. He and Baker broke out into a mad sprint as they closed the gap at a rapid pace, even while tripping over hidden branches and the bundles of grass, the captain moved swiftly. Reaching the men’s position, the captain and staff sergeant came to a sudden halt, dust kicked up from under their boots and was carried in the wind as his covered eyes scanned over the limp body of the private first class.

“Alive.” Was all that Mike could stutter out in a broken voice. “He’s alive. Just be glad that shock and blood loss hasn’t done him in yet.”

“Ramirez. Fuck.” Baker bit his tongue.

Securing his rifle and detaching a small pouch from the side of his battle belt, Thompson knelt as he blinked through the augmented display he saw through his goggles. He fumbled with the small zipper on the multi-colored pouch, but soon he was able to retrieve the item that suddenly popped into his mind giving him something to do to calm both his nerves and stabilize Simon’s current condition. Grasping the cover to a small needle, Thompson breathed quietly as he inspected the item in his hand.

“Hey.” Baker said in a low growl as he grasped Thompson’s arm as he moved closer to the unconscious Simon. “What are you doing?”

“Morphine.” The captain answered punctually.

“I already administered a dose.” Mike argued trying to find a way to put space between the captain and PFC.

Letting his arms slump to the side, Thompson sat still as he stared at the blood-stained, broken body of Simon. A single tear escaped his left eye and clouded his vision mixing the browns, greens, and blues displayed through his goggles hiding his eyes.

“What the fuck are we doing?”

Publicly Available Information: Situation Report—Geographical Information—The Western Border:

Home to sprawling plains used for agricultural purposes, the people of the southern half enjoy the grand forests, golden fields, and comfortable lakeside properties hidden away from the public eye.

Facing the threat of the monsters and hostile nations beyond the Frontier, the Federation military holds several strongholds along the border allowing OMFS operators and border patrol officers to secure national security. Along with governmental, and local law enforcement personnel securing the border, large groups of civilian-created militias are found not only throughout the southern border, but also the northern and western borders.