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Chapter Text

The Pit briefing room– beneath Fort Wadsworth, New York City

“Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen,” a sharp-jawed man with a head of tightly cut blond hair began as he stood in front of a largish planning table. “I bet you’re wondering what the situation is.”

“…”

The man turned to a lithe figure in a set of dark blue– almost black– BDUs, a commando mask, goggles, and a bandolier standing off to the side. “No, Snake Eyes, it’s not the Red Shadows again,” he said.

“Then who is it, Colonel Abernathy?” a man with auburn hair asked.

The blond man locked eyes with his cohort. “Believe it or not, Grunt, it’s pirates.”

“Somali?”

“Caribbean, believe it or not.”

The briefing room suddenly grew quiet as a holographic projection of a blonde-haired woman on the cusp of middle age materialized above the tabletop.

“Submitted for your approval, one Doctor Adele Burkhart,” Abernathy began. “A top-tier physicist who just so happened to be working for MECH until about two weeks ago.”

“I’m sorry, but did I hear that correctly?” a brunette woman with her hair in a bun asked. “Because it just sounded like you said that she’s defecting.”

“Yes, you did hear correctly, Shooter,” came the reply. “Now, going by the information that General Austin has so graciously provided, the original plan involved her meeting with some CIA contacts working with the local narcos to get her from her assignment in the Colombian interior to the coast, whereupon she’d rendezvous with the crew of the tramp freighter Jackdaw, which in turn would be intercepted by the Coast Guard after entering American waters.”

A hand shot up from near the back of the room.

“Yes, Scarlett?” Abernathy asked.

“You said ‘original plan’, Hawk,” a woman with a red ponytail and a distinct Southern twang replied. “What went wrong?”

“Jackdaw limped into Port of Spain yesterday with an empty hold, a battered hull, and no Doctor Burkhart,” Hawk continued. “Interrogations of the crew revealed that they’d been intercepted by a fast-moving, heavily armed vessel off the coast of Martinique about two days before that.”

“…”

“No solid ID on the attacker, but judging from crew descriptions of the ship, we think it’s the ARBV Luisa Cáceres de Arismendi.”

“The which-what?” a brown-haired man with an impressive beard asked.

“An ex-Venezuelan destroyer that was sold for scrap last year,” Hawk explained. “As for Doctor Burkhart, the subcutaneous RFID tracker our cartel contacts implanted in her when she got to the Jackdaw cut out about twelve hours after the ship was stopped off Martinique. Last known transmission had her going north by northeast towards some overgrown hunk of rock called Isla de Torre– or to use one English translation, 'Rook Island'.”

As if on cue, Burkhart’s image vanished and was a replaced by that of a roughly horseshoe-shaped island with a very prominent mountain on its leeward side.

“What’re you looking at here is the most up-to-date model of Isla de Torre based on recon flights and satellite imagery,” Hawk said. “Assuming Burkhart’s on the island, then she’s probably being kept in the old Spanish fort over here,” he continued, gesturing at a building on a large plateau on the island’s windward side.

“And that thing on the mountain?” the bearded man asked, pointing at some structures on the summit.

“That, Breaker, is a pulse Doppler radar installation,” Hawk replied. “Probably linked to any potential concealed SAM sites peppered across the island, meaning that we can rule out aerial insertion. Further questions?”

“Strength of garrison?” Scarlett asked.

“Judging by the presence of the radar site, an airfield near the fort, a heavy generator, and the presence of the Arismendi in the photos of the island’s harbor, I’d estimate at least a few hundred. Anyone else?”

Silence settled over the briefing room.

“Good.” He turned to Grunt, a black man, and a blond-haired man with a pair of birth control glasses. “Grunt, Stalker, Shooter, and Short-Fuze– you’ll take out the airfield, control tower, and hangar, leaving only one light aircraft intact. Flash, Breaker, and Mainframe will take care of the radar. Mission supply will fix you up with some specialist equipment. Snake Eyes, Scarlett– take out the generator. Your objective is to clear the way for the secondary team that’ll actually storm the fort. Further questions?”

Silence.

“In that case…Yo, Joe!”

“Yo, Joe!” came the unanimous reply.

Primary staging area– several minutes later

“Am I the only one who thinks this op’s kinda hinky?” Shooter asked as she picked up a heavily customized .50 caliber sniper rifle.

Scarlett blinked as she set down her crossbow pistol. “Come again?”

“Pulse Doppler radar, potential SAM sites, a full-on airfield– I mean, doesn’t that seem just the tiniest bit budget-breaking for your average pirate?”

“Could be cartel money.”

Shooter sighed. “Look, I don’t know why, but I just can’t help but feel that there’s…something going on that the Powers That Be either aren’t telling us or didn’t notice.”

“So, you think she’s…” Breaker asked, gesturing at Shooter.

“Wouldn’t be surprised,” Mainframe replied as he picked up a computer about the size of an old CASIO keyboard, its armored waterproof casing covered in bullet marks, stubborn traces of long-dried mud, and various and sundry other dings and scratches. “Especially after that one time in Borovia.”

“Tell me about it,” Flash piped up. “I mean, how could you possibly fail to notice an inbound company of old Soviet tanks when they’re all dolled up with a Red Shadows paintjob?”

“You know what they say about military intelligence,” a nearby Stalker added.

“…”

“Doesn’t make it any less true, Snakes.”

Chapter Text

Spanish fort– Isla del Torre

Adele Burkhart struggled to hold back bile as one of her captors– more specifically, a man with a handlebar mustache and goatee, eye patch, ragged pirate costume, and an odor potent enough to qualify as a chemical weapon– swaggered up to her for what seemed like the umpteenth time.

“Okay, Captain Crook,” she snapped, “mind telling me why you haven’t handed me over to my old bosses yet?”

The man scowled and drew his gun. “First of all,” he began in what could generously be called a horrendous imitation of Long John Silver, “the name’s Zanzibar. Second, you better watch your lip, Doctor, lest the contents of that pretty skull of yours be repainting me walls.” As if to emphasize the point, he aimed his gun at a nearby half-empty bottle of cheap rum and fired, the shot missing by a country mile.

Burkhart rolled her eyes. “You’re a pansy if you do.”

Zanzibar glared at the scientist. “Did you hear what I just said about giving me lip?”

“I did– it’s just that I don’t give a rat’s ass,” came the retort. “I mean, if you’re giving me back to MECH, I’ll be dead anyways, so I might as well go out knowing I robbed you and your buddies of one hell of a payday.”

“Joke’s on you, matey– we got paid upfront. Besides, who said anything about giving you back to MECH?”

Burkhart let out a mirthless laugh. “Did you really think that an organization so devoted to creating their own “newer world order” wouldn’t consider the odds of a bunch of pirates trying to double-cross them? Because if you did, then boy are you in for a rude awakening.”

“So are they,” came the cryptic reply.

Before the captured scientist could get another word in, one of the other pirates darted up to Zanzibar.

“Cap’n, we picked up something on radar!” he said. “Submarine on the surface, twenty miles north– stayed long enough to launch a small boat and a landing party!”

Wait, what? Burkhart thought as she tried to block out Zanzibar’s latest round of gloating. Why aren’t they going for an aerial insertion?

A few miles off the north coast

For the first landing team, the tension in the air was almost palpable as they approached Isla del Torre’s shoreline under cover of darkness, with the only sounds on the air being the soft hum of the boat’s motor, the breaking of waves against its hull, occasionally punctuated by Breaker blowing gum bubbles. Each member’s mind raced a mile a minute as they dreamed up increasingly morbid hypotheticals– vast expanses of picturesque beach converted into minefields, booby traps of all shapes and sizes dominating the island’s jungle (with the added “bonus” of pirates lying in ambush), and even the notion of MECH having caught wind of the operation and waiting to spring a trap of their own.

“…”

“Preach it,” Stalker said as he donned a jetpack. “Grunt, you see anything through the Intel Scope?”

The Joe in question briefly lowered a bulky pair of binoculars from his eyes before turning to face his cohort. “Yeah– another pair staring back at me,” he replied.

Scarlett groaned. “Of course they’d have at least one set of their own.” She then turned to Stalker. “You finished strapping up?”

“Affirmative.”

“Good. See you on terra firma.”

Stalker nodded before taking off and making a beeline towards the beach.

“Godspeed, you mad bastard,” Shooter said under her breath to nobody in particular.

Isla del Torre airspace– just out of radar range along the southern coast

“Wash, Carolina– either of you ever spent any real time in the jungle?” a sharp-faced redhead in a suit of black battle armor asked her two cohorts in a VTOL’s troop bay, idly twirling around a trench knife.

Carolina groaned as she snapped on one of her suit’s cyan pauldrons. “Tex, if this is going to be one of those ‘things from Tropic Lightning’ speeches, then do us all a favor and can it,” she said before idly blowing a lock of her own red hair out of her eyes.

Tex’s nostrils flared out in indignation. “Can’t a girl take pride in her old unit?”

“Depends on whether or not a girl can shut up about it,” a man in a similar gray suit retorted.

“Ha, ha. Very funny, Wash.”

“Seriously, though– if you love that knife so much, why don’t you marry it?” Carolina added as she reached for her suit’s helmet. “Or for that matter, why not go for that Llwelyn guy, assuming you can ever track him down?”

“Sorry, but I quite like not having the clap,” Tex retorted. “Or whatever other samples that blond-haired himbo may have added to that petri dish between his legs, for that matter.”

“…point conceded.” Carolina replied as she finished suiting up. “Though speaking of blondes, am I the only one who feels kinda iffy about this op?”

“You’re not,” Wash said. “But then again, ours is not to reason why, ours is but to do and die.”

Tex snorted. “Look, all we’re supposed to do is go in, pick up Burkhart, put a bullet in the back of her head, and call it a night. No need for this philosophizing or getting cold feet– just get in, get out, and get drinks when we return to base.”

“And the ‘bot that’s currently dangling beneath us?”

“A little something to motivate those pirates into holding up their end of the deal. Now shut up and get ready to hit the silk.”

Both Wash and Carolina quickly nodded as they strapped on their parachutes. Almost as soon as they were done, there was a slight dinging noise from an overhead speaker and a green light turning on.

“And here we go…” Tex said as the back hatch opened before taking a running start and flinging herself out, her cohorts promptly following suit. As the three began their descent, their eyes gravitated towards the increasingly distant stealth tilt-rotor that had brought them there, followed shortly thereafter by a MECHicon (this one resembling a jeep more than the usual green sports car) detaching from the aircraft’s belly and joining them on their way down.