Chapter Text
“Man down!“
Juliet looked down at the supposedly grown men in front of her, covered in paintball color, scattered on the floor and giggling uncontrollably. “Please gentlemen, could we quit the shenanigans and take this all a bit more seriously.”
Another round of giggling erupted.
The trip to the paintball place had been intended as fun activity to blow off a bit of steam. She had to admit, the situation had gotten slightly out of hand with Thomas, Rick and TC goofing around like a bunch of teenagers.
She exchanged a long look with Lia and Gordon, who were both on her team and once again raised her voice. “I suggest we start with a simple attack battle to familiarize ourselves with the guns and go on from there to more complex scenarios.” With a calculating look towards Thomas, she added: “And to make things interesting: Losers buy lunch.”
Magnum gracefully leapt to his feet. “Did you hear this, boys?”
Sobering up quickly, Rick summarized: “Yep. Jules buys lunch.”
“Don’t be too sure, Orville.”, she countered.
They took their sides and everyone scattered behind some of the ridiculous props.
All of a sudden, Team Magnum meant business. After a hand sign from Thomas, they confidently started to approach Juliets team, systematically clearing the area.
The hole encounter didn’t last long. They took out Lia and Gordon first. Only a few seconds later, Juliet saw herself surrounded by shorts-clad grim looking men, who meant business.
She cursed inwardly. One tended to underestimate those chaps, but there was danger lurking right under their easygoing and sometimes childish attitude. If push came to shove, they could turn into highly trained and combat proven fighters in the blink of an eye. For a second, she thought that her boys could look really menacing, closing in on her with deadly precision.
She took the hits gracefully and just wanted to announce the defeat, as Magnum suddenly fired from his hip. Rick yelped, as he was hit in the butt, just to reciprocate by coloring Magnum’s crotch and all three broke down in laughter once again.
“Hey! Careful!“, Magnum admonished, as the small rockslide Rick had caused started to settle again. “We don’t want any broken ankles right now!”
The terrain in the valleys of the Hindu Kush was unforgiving and brutal. Humping up and down the mountainsides over lose shales and rubble, always on the lookout for hostiles, had taken a toll on all of them. Hell, after two days and a miserable night in this goddamn valley he was SO looking forward to a hot shower and some downtime at the FOB.
On the upside, they completed their mission and located the target. And boy, Greene would be pleased to hear, they’d not only found the source of all the weapons turning up in various Taliban groups, but also the main supply routes through Shuryak Valley. They’d done similar missions countless times before, but this time they’d truly struck gold.
His Team might not always look the part, but they were quite successful at what they did. They might seem easygoing, maybe even a little too cocky, childish, and in Rick’s case, he thought with a smile, squeamish.
But they’d fought more than their fair share of battles and conducted countless recon missions to gather intel or identify and eliminate targets in some of the most dangerous parts of the country. Their skills and experience combined with Hannah’s secret squirrel stuff had made quite the impact, so he guessed they could afford a few quirks and liberties.
Sneaking through the side valleys of the Pech river, back to their RV, they’d tried to keep a low profile. It was hard to tell if they’d succeeded so far. The Taliban haunted the Valleys like ghosts. Sometimes you had no idea they were right behind you, until they attacked. Thomas and his team were quite adept at stealth if they had to be, but the Taliban knew the terrain like the back of their hands.
As a consequence, Thomas never seemed to be able to shake off this slight feeling of unease, when they were deep in enemy territory, without any means of backup.
They tried to avoid villages and main paths. Without their translator Arash, Magnum was the only one who had a basic knowledge of Pashto and he wasn’t really keen on having to negotiate their way out of an encounter.
Again, he checked their exfil coordinates. So far, they’d made good time, so the rendezvous with their exfil chopper shouldn’t be a problem. Then why did he have such a bad feeling all of a sudden? They were vigilant and alert, but the lush wooded mountains, terraces and lots of caves had them at a disadvantage. In all the deserted villages they had come through with random goats and not much else, they felt watched.
All of a sudden it felt like there were a thousand eyes on them, waiting in hiding for the right moment. They were securing in all directions, always on the lookout for little things that seemed off, signs that could give away an ambush. There were none.
Suddenly he heard a crack and screamed “Contact! Get cover!”, while diving behind some large-ish boulder, returning fire with his M4.
As he was checking on the others, all had found some kind of cover, shooting at a growing number of enemies who seemed to just materialize out of the trees and were firing at them from above. Cursing their bad luck, he pondered their options.
Chances of backup where slim. Their exfil was still two hours out. Nevertheless, he reported “troops in contact” and their approximate coordinates. Maybe they’d get lucky. Deep down he knew they were on their own, there simply wasn’t a QRF on this side of the mountains, and drones weren’t as readily available as one might think.
The answer was simple and devastating: No aircraft was available in the vicinity, no backup was coming. Cursing, he concentrated on returning fire and holding off the Taliban. More and more of them turned up. Suddenly, he was wishing himself back to Kandahar, when backup always was just a radio call away.
Rounds were hitting all around them and they were going through their ammunition fast. “Status?” he shouted over the battle noise. The answers confirmed his fears, they were already running low on ammo. It was a small miracle, no one had been hit by now.
Their only chance was to make a break for it. So he yelled to the others: “We need to break east! Nuzo, take point, Rick take rear.”
They concentrated their firepower on the path to their right, where they hopefully could get lost behind a ridge. Running with burning lungs and firing steady bursts, miraculously they all made it to the ridge and hunkered down.
A loud bang was all the warning they got and Magnum heard Nuzo yell “Incoming!”, right before the RPG hit the ridge only a few feet away.
For a moment all he felt was searing heat and then the massive pressure wave knocked him straight to the ground in a hail of rocks. Looking around in a daze, he saw the others on the ground. All a little worse for wear, but alive. For now.
Then the precariousness of their situation hit him and he tried to get up on hands and knees, only to face the muzzles of two rifles. Shouting in Pashto made its way through his foggy mind, but honestly, he could get by in a chat with some villagers, but frantic shouting in a mean dialect - no way he could make sense of that!
On the other hand, the meaning was pretty clear and he lowered his M4 to the ground. He saw Rick gingerly putting down his M16. When he locked eyes with Nuzo, he saw his feelings mirrored. “They got us. They finally got us.” They were SO screwed!
Secretly, Captain Greene was pretty fond of his boys. (Not that he would admit that to anyone, ever!) He valued them on a professional level, too, even though they weren’t exactly good for his blood pressure. Despite all their antics, they were honorable men as well as valuable assets.
As soon as he heard that they were in trouble, he started rounding up resources to get a rescue mission on its way. This was easier said than done, since the Pech River area still was considered a hot zone.
As word got round, a lot of people had gathered and offered their help, as the guys had a lot of friends on base.
Suddenly he thought it odd that Hannah wasn’t already pestering him about the rescue, but he discarded that thought until later. He had more important matters to attend to right now.
In the end, a SEAL team was sent out on a search and rescue mission. They searched the area for hours, but found nothing, no trace of Magnum and his team, no gear, no bodies. Without any solid leads, they had to return to the FOB empty handed.