ArguingPizza's Scrap Files

by ArguingPizza

Entanglement Original Chapter 6

“You know, if I wanted to do all this water shit, I’d have joined the Navy,” came the mouse-whisper quiet complaint of Hot Wheels. The other three soldiers of Camelot team rolled their collective eyes.

“You make that same stupid joke every time we get our feet wet,” Hack replied as he finished painting his face black to better blend in. Despite his years of experience in The Unit and all the time outside that came with it, Hack’s skin was still as pale as the day he popped out of his full-blooded Irish mother. As such, he usually carried nearly twice as much face paint as his teammates.

“It still sucks.” Hack opened his mouth to retort, then thought a moment and nodded in begrudging agreement.

“Alright boys, rack your shit. Ready?” Swiper asked as he seemed to materialize from the shadows behind his men. The two nodded and followed after Swiper. On the other side of a dense patch of bush, the three dropped to the ground beside a fourth soldier. Swiper lightly tapped Duck to alert him, though he didn't strictly need to. Duck's hearing was disturbingly sharp.

A quarter mile outside the town limits of SS1, the small creek that runs through town passes within a dozen steps of the light patch of forest known to the locals as Whitetail Woods. In sync, the four men low crawled from the tree line just outside Ponyville. They slipped into the water without a sound, barely disturbing the water as they entered.

The current was weak and forced the soldiers to swim with it to maintain any sort of speed. Their strokes were smooth and measured to avoid drawing attention. They were specks of barely visible texture on the water. Unless somebody was specifically looking for them, they wouldn't be spotted.

The cold water chilled them as they swam the three quarters of a mile to their stop point; one of the two small bridges that crossed the river near the town hall. The four men stopped themselves and piled closely together under the archway. Swiper pulled himself to the edge of the bridge and peered out towards the guarded building. They were less than fifty feet away.

As quietly as he could, he depressed the button on his throat mike and murmured, “Camelot, in position. Over.”

“Copy, Camelot. Red Herring in sixty seconds. Over.”

Swiper glanced at his watch and waited. Exactly 59.31 seconds later, a powerful beam of light peaked out from behind a dumpster in one of the narrow streets leading towards the town center. The beam cut around erratically for a few moments before cutting off abruptly.

The sentries around the building noticed the unusual activity. One, one of the Pegasi on the second story, barked something incomprehensible, but undeniably a command. The two Pegasi on the third floor jumped from their perches and glided to the ground. The two assumed wary stances as they advanced on the dumpster. When they were within feet of the receptacle, the two horses bolted around the corner.

An empty corner greeted them. The two shared a confused glance until their attention was drawn by a dull thump between them. Both soldiers looked down and for a half second saw a strange metal cylinder rolling between their legs.

A bright flash and an excruciatingly loud bang made them immediately regret turning their heads to look at what the object was. As the two horse-soldiers collapsed to the ground with their hooves covering their eyes and ears, the apparent leader of the sentries flew from his station to his troops. The other Pegasus guard was a half-step behind him, and the four ground floor sentries were all diverting their attention to the commotion.

Camelot team tensed.

As the group leader examined the two stunned Pegasi, a shadow to their left shifted. The second Pegasus noticed the movement and jumped into a battle stance. His wings spread out aggressively and he yelled something that, while not coming with subtitles, was clearly a threat.

The figure in the shadows froze, and then bolted. Almost as fast as his eyes could track, the Pegasus watched dumbfounded as the human sprinted past him and slapped him on the back firmly. Not in a way to cause harm, but more in the fashion of congratulations. The gesture seemed to short-circuit the soldier’s brain for a moment which was all the Operator needed. Before the Pegasus could react or alert his compatriots, the human was gone.

The squad leader turned his head as the information of what had just happened to his subordinate processed. The junior soldier craned his neck to see where he had been touched and the pair of disoriented guards pushed themselves to their feet. Confused, all three looked to their commander.

He did not hesitate before shouting a command. The four snapped into pursuit, leaving the four ground-level guards alone.

“Camelot, Beowulf 1-1. They’ve taken the first bait. Stand by for round two. Over.” Moose’s voice over the radio barely wavered, despite the fact that he was in a full speed foot chase through an alien village with four armored extraterrestrials on his ass.

Two minutes and nineteen seconds after the flashlight beam first appeared in the middle of the night, a second human figure came sprinting full-tilt from one of the streets on the far side of the building from where the chase had begun. The soldier jerked to an abrupt halt, his boot heels digging channels into the earth. The human stared at the dumbfounded front door guards before spinning on his right foot and taking off again into a different alley.

The two unicorns blinked twice before yelling and stampeding after it. The two rear door guards, confused, moved away from their posts towards the commotion on the opposite side of the building in alarm.

Camelot team jumped into action. As one, they all rose from the shallow bank of the creek. They crossed the clearing as quietly as field mice under a full moon. Swiper tested the rear door handle, found it unlocked, and silently pulled it open. The men entered calmly but quickly, sidearms up and at the ready. They hadn’t brought suppressors for their rifles, but they had thought to pack the cans for their pistols. If everything went according to plan they wouldn't be needed, but if things went nasty they didn't want to announce their presence to the whole town. The moment Hot Wheels entered the threshold, Swiper pirouetted inside the doorway and closed it as gently as he had opened it.

In their ears, the team heard Clumsy report that only two of the door guards had followed him and that the other two were splitting themselves between the two entryways. That complicated their plan, but not by much.

Barely breathing so as to not make a sound, Camelot team spread out and searched for the stairs. Most of the first floor was a single large room, though the rear door opened into what appeared to be a personal office that was connected to the main suite. Camelot team was not looking to search the entire floor; they wanted to get to the stairs, find the room that held the captured half of Beowulf, grab them, and leave the same way they came. They did not want to go searching out natives, though their training dictated that was the manner in which they were supposed to operate.

“Found the stairs,” radioed Duck, his deep baritone filling the airwaves. The team had decided to use their radios during the search since it allowed them to communicate quieter than whispers. Their advanced throat microphones could pick up sounds that would be barely audible if one was to put their ear to the speaker’s mouth.

The other three men swiveled and stacked up behind Duck. Swiper motioned for Hot Wheels and Hack to remain on the first floor and provide security. If everything went well they wouldn’t be needed and if everything went sideways they could provide early warning if the guards outside decided to come in.

Duck’s large 6’ 6’’ frame was nearly too tall to fit through the doorway with his helmet on, so he hunched down behind his gun slightly. With far more grace than his appearance would suggest, Duck softly made his way up the stairs.

The flight was short and came to an end with doors on either side of the landing. Without needing to think Duck moved to the door on the right. Swiper stacked up closely behind him and tapped him on the back. Duck twisted the door knob tenderly and pushed the door inwards. The two soldiers froze, waiting to see if the door would squeak on its hinges. When it didn’t, Duck peaked an eye in and nodded to Swiper. There were no guards, which Swiper found strange. Why wouldn’t they be guarding a pair of aliens? Especially aliens that had led them on a several hours-long chase through woods and apparently taken down a monster?

It didn’t make sense.

Duck entered and Swiper followed him into what turned out to be an empty hallway. Three doors opposite a wall covered with dusty paintings and a stack of folded up tables in the corner suggested the second floor was rarely used.

Swiper went over the mental map of the exterior and compared it to what he saw. As far as he could figure it, the two men should have been in the middle door. Duck took up position to enter with Swiper covering his six. If one of the horse soldiers were to walk in at that moment, it would be bad for all involved.

Duck tried twisting the doorknob but found it locked. He signaled the problem to Swiper and the two traded places. Though all Tier One Operators were trained on such a simple thing as how to pick a lock, they hadn’t brought along any lock picking kits and Swiper was the best in the business at using nothing more than his knife to get into anything from padlocks to bank vaults.

You don’t just get a name like Swiper for nothing, after all.

It took less than ten seconds, from drawing his knife to grinning in success, for the door to give way. Swiper drew his Mark 23 and pushed in. Inside, Lowball and Chainsaw looked up towards the door from their positions on the floor. Heavy chains connected the shackles on their wrists and ankles together to impair their movement. A bandage was wrapped around Chainsaw's leg, but the wound didn't appear serious.

“About fucking time you assholes got here,” Chainsaw whispered.

Swiper shrugged wordlessly before getting to work freeing the two. It took longer than the door, 85 seconds, but that was due only to the fact that there were actually eight separate locks that needed to be released. That, and the fact that Chainsaw would not stop squirming.

Swiper stepped close to the newly freed Lowball as he rubbed his wrists happily. "Can you walk?" Swiper asked Chainsaw, who flipped him off as he stood with barely a wince. Taking that as a yes, he turned to the other man. “Where’s your gear?” Lowball glowered.

“No fucking idea. They stripped us.”

Another complication. The men couldn’t just leave without retrieving their equipment. They needed to sanitize the scene.

“This is Camelot 1-1, we have retrieved friendlies. Equipment missing, beginning search. Over.”

Swiper’s earpiece crackled to life with the slightly out-of-breath voice of Moose.

“Roger, Camelot 1-1. Be advised, two natives have disengaged their pursuit of Clumsy and are returning to target building. Over.”

“Copy.” Swiper turned to Duck, since he was the only other man present who could actually see in the pitch darkness. “Look around, hopefully their stuff is still on this floor.

Swiper and Duck began to search the floor as quickly as stealth would allow. They each opened on of the two doors on either side of the room that had been holding Lowball and Chainsaw. When they found nothing, they turned their search to the hallway opposite the first. After searching the first two, Duck and Swiper stacked up on the third door. It looked the same as the others, and Swiper was silently praying the equipment would be inside He dreaded having to search the third floor as every moment they stayed in the building was another moment in which they could be compromised.

Duck opened the door as perfectly as he had the others. His entrance was so quiet it wasn't even heard by the unicorn inside gazing at the layout of gear spread out on a folding table.

Unfortunately, it was seen by the unicorn standing opposite him on the far side of the table. The horse soldier’s eyes grew wide and he shouted a warning as a glow came to life around his horn. In a fraction of a second later a blast of light flew from the appendage and straight into Duck’s chest. He dropped to the floor like a rock.

Swiper, only a single step behind Duck, instinctively put two rounds into both soldiers from his sidearm. He scanned the rest of the room for other hostiles before dropped to the ground beside Duck.

The larger soldier’s eyes were exposed; his NODs had fallen askew when he fell. Through the green-filter of his own goggles, Swiper saw Duck struggle to inhale for several terrifying seconds before he choked in a deep, ragged breath.

A huge weight lifted from Swiper’s shoulders as he helped the massive warrior to his feet. Duck coughed as his diaphragm recovered and his lungs refilled with precious air. Duck pushed Swiper’s hand away and gave a lazy thumbs up. Swiper turned his eyes towards the unmoving alien soldiers.

Pure instinct and training had driven the decision; the second unicorn had appeared to ‘fire’ on Duck. When Duck dropped, he looked dead, and Swiper returned fire just as quickly and precisely as he had been trained. And he had been trained very well. Blood oozed from dime-size holes in both horse’s foreheads where the .45 caliber slugs had torn through their gold armor.

Duck retrieved Lowball and Chainsaw while Swiper reported the shooting.

“This is Camelot 1-1. Equipment retrieved. Two enemy KIA. Egressing in ninety seconds. Over.”