The MH-53 Pave Low could seat the whole team comfortably. Seated sporadically, everyone was minding their own business. All the men had their ritual on the way to the mission. Meat moved his head to the rhythm in his ears, Roach chewed gum, Hernandez read a book, and the rest simply stared around observing their environment.
Reynolds shifted uncomfortably in her seat. MacTavish was constantly staring her down and he did not make any effort to hide it. She was unsure what was going through his mind but there may have been a hint of distrust in his eyes. It did not matter. Her objective was to complete the mission. Anything beyond that was irrelevant.
The pilot, who was called Nikolai, landed in a nearby field. Team Alpha was to descend here while Team Bravo would get off on the other side. They were to eliminate anything in their path and meet at the LZ.
Reynolds fist-bumped Hernandez and got off the Pave Low. Taking a knee, she aimed her HK416 equipped with a suppressor in front of her, protecting her 10 to 2 arc. The forest was not as dense as she would have liked but it gave them enough cover.
Ghost motioned them to proceed. They stood in a single file, each of the covering an alternate cover for their left or right flank.
Arriving at a chain link fence, Ghost took a pain of bolt cutters and cut through a passageway. Sneaking through, they kept as covert as possible. They slinked through the buildings and placing C4 on trucks and gas tanks where they would do most damage. Skilfully, the men neutralised the targets with silent efficiency moving their bodies out of sight. They made their way inside an office and kept low waiting for their next cue.
"Bravo One, this is Alpha One. How copy?" Ghost mumbled in his comms.
"Solid copy Alpha," replied MacTavish.
"We're in position Romeo. Making our way towards the HQ."
"Roger. Keep it as silent as you can."
"We may blow our cover when we reach HQ."
"Understood. Bravo out."
They kept low, slipping between buildings, but the deeper they pushed, the denser the patrols became. Then gunfire ripped through the night on the far side of the base, MacTavish's team has been compromised.
"They do not know that we are here," said Ghost. "Lay low."
With the enemy concentrating their focus on the others, they could advance freely to the HQ. Without warning, a bullet sliced past Reynolds's ear and slammed into a tree, exploding it into a spray of splinters. She flinched back her arm raised to shield her face and shouted over the sudden chaos.
"Contact front!"
"Go loud!" roared Ghost.
In just a moment, they were overwhelmed by opposing forces. Armed to their teeth, the Russians were not going down without a fight. The last time Reynolds was in this kind of firefight was when she was still in Afghanistan, and it did not end well.
Taking cover below a low cement block, bullets were beating the concrete with a striking force. Meat was lying near her when he reloaded his weapon as Reynolds laid down suppressing fire. He gestures to her if she was alright in which she replied in the affirmative.
"Push on!" yelled Ghost.
They kept on firing as they managed to enter the HQ building. CQB assault was much more manageable as they started clearing out room by room. Arriving in what was assumed the main operations centre, Reynolds stuck in a pen drive similar to one used in Amsterdam given by Billy, in the mainframe.
"Hammer, this is Alpha Four, how copy?" panted Reynolds.
"Loud and clear Alpha," responded Billy through comms.
"I have connected to the mainframe. Are you receiving the signal?"
"Affirmative. I need five minutes to sift through the noise."
"Roger that, Hammer."
"Can't he be quicker?" asked Royce.
"These things take time, especially if it's downloading the whole damn system," she replied.
They kept getting swarmed by the enemy. They held down the operations centre as best as they could as Billy worked from thousands of miles away.
"Hammer, SITREP!" yelled Ghost in his comms.
"Don't rush me," replied Billy, annoyed.
Bullets were whizzing past them dangerously close to their skin. Reynolds could feel her heart pumping hard, sweat dripping from under her helmet despite the temperature being 5C. The vest felt strangely uncomfortable against her chest. Changing magazines from her rifle, she felt for her refills and realised that she was starting to run low. Panic struck her as they still needed firepower to extract.
"Where the hell are they coming from?!" roared Meat.
Intel had to be off, thought Ghost as he sprayed the targets with bullets. They knew they were going to encounter heavy resistance, but this was too much. He glanced over to his squad; they were all holding up like champs. Even Reynolds took him by surprise. The Marine in her was coming out during the mission. She moved with finesse and attacked with savagery, leaving no man standing. His opinion of her might have changed slightly.
Might.
"Done," they heard Billy in their ears.
Reynolds snatched the pen drive and secured it in her pouch.
"Alpha, do you copy?" asked MacTavish.
"Affirmative."
"Eastern side of the base is filled with C4. We're falling back to our LZ."
"Roger that. Objective completed from our side as well," replied Ghost. "Let's proceed to the LZ. Move!"
Retracing their steps through the trail of corpses left by them, they made their way back to the LZ. It was only wishful thinking that they may have thinned out their forces. Out of nowhere, bullets rained on them with such a force that they were forced in cover.
"Spread out and fall back!" ordered Ghost.
They followed their lieutenant's order and divided themselves against a larger area. They managed to keep it under control while slowly shifted back to make way to their extraction. The Pave Low hovered above them, and she expressed a sigh of relief. Extraction was closer than ever. One last push and they were homebound.
Suddenly, a cry echoed in Reynold's vicinity. What she saw next, made her body instantly chill. Meat collapsed to the ground clutching at his thigh, screaming in pain.
"Meat is hit; I repeat Meat is hit!" she roared.
As she was planning the safest route to him, MacTavish's voice boomed in her ear.
"Alpha Four, leave him, proceed to the LZ. We'll get him together."
She froze. Glancing over at Meat, she noticed that blood was spurting uncontrollably from his right thigh. It seemed that an artery was severed, and if that was the case, he did not have another couple of minutes to spare.
Without any hesitation, she bolted near Meat's side, keeping her head low. MacTavish roared in her ear once more.
"Alpha Four, fall back; I repeat, fall back. That's an order!"
She stopped with huge force near Meat and observed his wound. As she had suspected, an artery was severed. She searched for her windlass tourniquet in her med kit. She strapped it around his thigh and turned it with all the force she had, praying that a second one would not be needed as she was only equipped with one. She locked the mechanism and wrote the date and time it was applied.
"Fuck! It hurts!" he cried.
She rummaged through Meat's med kit and took out alcohol, gauzes, and what is referred to as an emergency bandage. This was ideal as it provided pressure to the wound to control bleeding with the capacity of around a pint of blood.
She cleaned the entry and the exit wounds, packed them with the gauzes and bandaged them. The result looked rough, but it did the job.
A loud swish was heard a couple of hundred metres away from them. They both cursed as they recognised the sound of the RPG travelling towards them. Without a second thought, Reynolds jumped on top of Meat and shielded him as best as she could. The RPG hit near them a couple of metres away, destroying the trunk of a tree nearby. Splinters flew into her face, neck, and forearm, embedding themselves into her skin. Groaning, she reached for her face and noticed blood staining her tactical gloves.
The sound of the Pave Low's minigun boomed through the woodland, decimating anything in its path. Wincing, she got off Meat and checked if he was ok.
"You're bleeding!" he uttered.
"We need to leave!" she yelled as she grabbed him by the arm and helped him up. "I gotchu, brother."
He leaned on her as he limped trying his best to move as fast as possible. With a pistol in his hand, Meat did his best to provide cover as they shuffled through the rough terrain.
The Pave Low's gun thinned the majority of the enemy yet there were still some stragglers left. They would not relent but they noticed that they were dropping one by one. Raising her gaze, she noticed that Ghost and Royce came back to cover them. Royce took Meat from her and dragged him towards the LZ.
"You came back," she told Ghost.
"No man left behind. Move!"
Sprinting towards the Pave Low, Bravo team were providing cover till they were all on board.
In the air, Reynolds expressed an extremely heavy sigh of relief. Ozone was working on Meat inserting a needle in his forearm to start an IV. Hernandez grabbed a first aid kit and made her way to Reynolds. She put on a pair of gloves and disinfected a pair of tweezers. She observed her face; foreign objects were embedded on any skin that was exposed on her right side. Some of the wounds wept trickles of blood as she started extracting them.
"Ouch! Genesis! What the fuck?!" recoiled Reynolds.
Hernandez giggled internally. She knew she was not the most delicate when it came to the situations, but Ozone was busy with Meat, and she was not risking Reynolds getting an infection regardless of how superficial the wounds may seem to appear.
"I prefer waiting for Ozone."
"I prefer to be at the Bahamas right now, but I'm stuck with someone constantly bitchin' instead."
Reynolds rolled her eyes and realised that everyone was observing them. She toned it down and bit her tongue especially with MacTavish glaring at her. She knew she had to face the music once they landed.
Hernandez felt a hand on her shoulder and turned round to see Ozone smiling at her. She removed the gloves and got up.
"She's your problem now," she muttered.
Ozone chuckled and put on a new pair of gloves and observed Reynold's injuries. He grabbed the tweezers and gently removed the wooden splinters from her skin, rubbing alcohol after each extraction. She winced slightly but it was much better than Hernandez's heavy hands.
"How is he?" she asked.
"He lost a lot of blood, but he'll make it. Thanks to you," he added. "Nice application of the tourniquet, Sergeant."
She simply grimaced in response.
Finally, they arrived at the base. Meat was put on a gurney and steered towards to the medical centre. Covered in sweat and dirt, everyone made their way towards their barracks. Reynolds was looking forward to a hot shower and a long sleep.
"Are we meeting for a debrief?" she inquired.
MacTavish turned hard on the spot, boots thudding as he closed the distance, a low snarl rumbling out as his eyes bored into her.
"I'll give you a debrief right now, Sergeant," he spat. "When I give you an order, you bloody follow it!"
"Sir, I understand. But Meat did not have a couple of minutes. He would have –"
"Regardless of the reason, you fuckin' obey!"
"We would have carried a corpse if I obeyed your order!" her voice sharpened, rising with anger.
"We would have carried two corpses!" he retaliated, his voice booming as he stepped closer to her. "We saw a bloody shitstorm from the sky, and they were all swarming to your position! You only got lucky."
Reynolds fell silent. The others did not dare to breathe. Hernandez remained by her side through the whole shouting match but dared not to comment.
MacTavish took a step back and drew a steadying breath. He made his way towards the barracks. Ghost locked eyes with them, and they could see his eyes filled with apprehension underneath the mask.
Back in their room, they started removing their kit and undressing. Hernandez jumped in the shower while Reynolds got a head start removing the camo paint from her face and neck wincing, as she tried to go over her wounds as gently as possible.
"Chris, one of these days, you're gonna give me a heart attack," laughed Hernandez, from inside the shower.
"Was I in the wrong?" she asked genuinely as she scrubbed the paint away.
"It is a very tricky situation," she replied, half-yelling over the drumming of the water. "But the Captain was right, you got lucky. The number of enemy forces that were closing in on you..."
She shuddered just at the idea.
"You gotta see it from his perspective," she carried on, "whole Alpha team had to return to you to save your ass. If you've done what he asked, he would have organised rescue efforts more efficiently."
"I guess..."
She got out of the shower and wrapped a towel around her.
"Honestly, if it was me bleeding out, I would have preferred you disobeying and coming to my aid. Meat must have been scared shitless."
Reynolds observed herself in the mirror. Camo paint streaked with sweat and flecks of dirt clung to her skin. She pushed the day's thoughts aside and stepped into the shower, letting the water wash away the grime, and the tension, with it.