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5.3 - Operation Deadlight Part 3
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Nate continued on to explain about the Submarine 'An-Curadh'.
Submarine itself simple being a catch-all term used to designate any warship that attacked alone or in small groups - Usually lightly armoured, hitting supply lines or even civilian vessels before retreating without a trace.
"But this submarine is no ordinary affair. In the last couple of months this 'Curadh' has destroyed over 18 supply vessels and 3 warship escorts. All while seemingly taking not a single casualty of its own as far as we can tell."
The tone in the room was far more settled now. It was one thing to argue petty politics but Hoki was atleast glad to see ample respect being shown towards the loss of life. Still for her she could only presume it came as more of a shock than it did the others.
As someone with an intimate knowledge of the history of modern warfare, Hoki could safely assert she had never heard of a lone vessels with such a high success rate in that short a period.
'Well except maybe for it....'
The markers on the map made more sense now too. The series of red X's plotting out the path of carnage 'An-Curadh' had marked out for itself.
"The submarine displays some strange tendencies that make it hard to so much as gather data on, in fact until recently it was undecided as to whether it was the culprit behind all these deaths." Even Nate seemed a little less boisterous as he traced a line through the X's with his half-drawn pointer, before turning back to the rest of the room; "It jams all communications before a battle begins and then seemingly appears from nowhere. It does not leave survivors.
We have confirmation of it destroying escape pods and continuing to engage against surrendered ships.
No traces and no survivors. Further unlike most submarines, it is not only carrying a Vijaik team but also what we believe to be a new model of Casnel."
This last point caused a new stirring of voices - "We were not informed of such a machine!" Exclaimed commander Batty half-way standing out of her chair.
"Certainly not, command gave strict orders that you should Only be informed in person by me." Nate replied with just a hint of satisfaction at 'winning' one over Batty.
'Well atleast there's some things that I'm not the only one in the dark about.'
Casnels, the machines made from the exceedingly rare metal Goibniu. Capable of almost supernatural feats, with near infinite energy generation, hyper heat resistant armour and equally devastating weaponry. A single Casnel could easily sink an unsuspecting fleet, even one protected by its own friendly Vijaiks.
"So just to get this right, you expect us with 15 regular Vijaiks and three ships to hunt down an invisible enemy that's guarded by a Casnel and who knows what else?"
Louise stated with raised-brows and a combination of venom and disbelief in her tone.
"I take it Lt.commander Emilia will be joining us then Sir?"
This question came from Louise's second in command, Lt.Tabitha. Her tone was far more respectful and it being the first thing she had said all day, Hoki had almost forget the small woman was over sitting in Louise's shadow.
Nate shuffled on his feet with clear discomfort, "Not exactly..."
An uproar rang through-out the room:
"You can't be serious!"
"Facing a Casnel with just Neos is suicide!!"
"Surely you speak in jest commander Novel?"
"This ain't what I signed up for, I ain't no cannon-fodder!"
That temporary reprieve from earlier now seemed lost - But then Nate did something entirely unexpected (which considering all that had already transpired Hoki was genuinely surprised she even could still be, well, surprised at this point).
He walked silently over to the terminal, all the while questions and curses from almost everyone present (even some of the engineers and pilots) hurled towards him. He reached over, Lt.Sunglasses leaning back in his chair to allow the stocky Captain access to the terminal.
After a few miss-press's, the correct file blipped onto the large screen - Its volume cranked up just enough to be heard over the cacophony of complaints.
----
The recording that came up had a found-footage quality to it, a grainy camera feed and slightly distorted voice over. The image (where not corrupted by a static blur) seemed to be of the large windows of a warship's bridge, with rolling metals columns in-between each sheet of heavily armoured glass.
The view it afforded was bleak.
On that blackest backdrop of space was the site of three or maybe four other civilian transport vessels - All Shrouded in flames.
Shafts of metal protruding in and out of each hull - Bloated to look like butchered metallic animals. The ship's so badly disfigured that one couldn't hope to identify what they had once been as flames and explosions splurged in and out of the carcass remains of the 4 stricken craft.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
Hoki could of sworn she momentarily saw the bodies of people, dressed in plain clothes, floating lifelessly in the vacuum of space to one side of the camera's sight. Their face's drained of all oxygen as they shrivelled and froze, as though they'd never held any life to begin with.
The man's voice that accompanied these images was ragged, on the verge of shouting in rage or perhaps just bursting into tears. Through gritted teeth it commented over the continuing visuals;
"Th-They just appeared the bloody bastards. No sonar, radar, no look-out - Nothing saw them. The Puma just exploded, it was there and then it weren't. We--"
The voice forcefully halted in time with the camera suddenly shaking wildly around, the picture of destruction outside the windows shifting, as the ground beneath the camera man began to warp and buckle.
A new noise of a ship groaning, a crunching screech of metal compressing against metal filling the air. A sound that made nail's on a chalk board seem pleasant by comparison.
"We haven't long now. Escape pods are no good, they shot them all out of the air when the Pirelli tried to run. T-there were kids on that ship, kids for Sun's sake--------- N-no God no----"
The commentary paused again.
This time something new came into the camera's focus - Although partially blurred one could make out the humanoid shape of a mech, jet black in places to the point of almost blending in with its surroundings - And yet a other surfaces a gleaming silver glow.
A faint green shimmer around it, a clunky looking cannon fixed to its arm and an angular head on its shoulders.
'A Casnel...' Hoki and perhaps everyone in that meeting room, thought to themselves.
Said head turned as if to look straight at the camera, before suddenly the whole machine swung rapidly to the right of the shot with blinding speed in an almost elegant, cartwheel motion - Before shooting up and out from the camera's limited field of view.
In its place raced a bolt of orange energy fire cutting a horizontal line across the film for a brief moment, helplessly missing the target and careering off into the distance.
"That's John. Remember him you hear me? Ha, hell if anyone finds this."
The so called 'John' came into focus now, his machine was the green and cyan shades of a Neo-M-type Vijaik, a variant of the very same mechs used by the Fluchtig's.
This lone Neo rose its thin rifle to the sky, feet spread out almost touching the deck of the warship below, with the visor of its face looking towards the anonymous cameraman, as it fired desperately into the space above again and again and again and again.
"He's the only one of his team left, remember John Smith you hear me, rememb--"
Even as the Neo-Vijaik desperately fired at the Casnel somewhere off the screen, a single return shot of bright, shimmering green smashed back down through its oval shaped head in a mere second. Then the mighty blast bore into the mech's main body, sizzling momentarily like sparks off a welder, before appearing straight through the underside of the mech with a violent flourish - Finally piercing straight into the deck of the ship beneath. In a single blast the Neo was defeated.
The camera footage completely cut out for a few moments at this point, but the voice-over persisted, now with interspersed panting and the sound of someone running on metal flooring.
"This is the Cruiser Class 'Red--"
The audio didn't so much cut this time but instead was drowned out by the sounds of screeching alarms and more buckling metal not far in the distance;
"--The enemy has a Casnel, I rep-------- further multiple Vijai-------- tell m-my ------ lov--------"
The voice stopped.
A few moments of silence passed in the briefing room and just as it looked like someone would have to break the moment - The screen suddenly flashed back to life, even more distorted then before as crack lines and static scored the film.
Lying hunched in on himself was the voice's owner, his back pressed against a non-descript grey wall. Aside from the distortion, there also now appeared to be another layer of glass in front of the lens.
The man was smeared in blood, whatever had hit him, had come up through the floor just out of camera shot and in doing so had severed his left leg, which lay a few feet away from the rest of his body, pooling vivid crimson blood across the floor, seeping ever closer to where the camera seemed to lay.
The man was middle aged but past that was so battered as to be near indiscernible.
His face was smattered with harsh burns, his black uniform singed or absent entirely in large patches, where bare blackened skin showed from underneath.
He clutched one arm to his stomach, that same shade of red seeping through the gaps between where he held himself and the flesh beneath.
Where the leg had been served just below the knee seemed at first the most grizzly. The culprit had been brute-force rather then heat, leaving the former limb open to the air, tendons and all.
Finally as his hands fell limply to his side, a massive gushing wound across his sternum was revealed, bleeding profusely into the lapping waves of blood that already covered the floor.
In the final moments of the tape, the man somehow seemed to find strength enough to lift his head up, stare straight at the camera and nod in what might of been a salute of sorts - Before finally going fully lame.
All the while the image seemed to shrink.
The blood still spreading across the floor's surfaces but now further away - Which Hoki soon realised must mean the man had launched the recorder off of the ship in some manner. The camera was literally moving further away from its former owner.
The recording ended for good this time.
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