[Two years later]
"Man down!"
It was Eve's first deployment after training in TRACE, the Halcyon foundation's special operations unit, and it was already going downhill. Under a hailstorm of gunfire, the point operator[1] in her squad crumpled under a hailstorm of gunfire as they emerged at a T-section in the hallway.
Fuck. Eve acted quickly. "Second and third, return fire- the rest of the column, hold." The operators slowed to follow her orders. The second and third operators arranged themselves behind the partial cover of the wall and returned fire with their rifles, sending rounds towards the enemy that flashed through the air like little stars of death. The one high, one low configuration - with one operator standing, the other crouching - gave them two gun muzzles instead of one pointed at the enemy.
This new concentration of precise fire landing next to them caused the enemy force to stall, and the gunfire whizzing towards them thinned out. Reacting to this break in fire quickly, Eve dropped her rifle on its sling and snatched a smoke grenade from her belt. She shaked it from side to side as the smoke piped[2] from it, then tossed it down the hallway, obscuring her team, but more importantly, the injured operator on the ground.
"Cease fire!" The two operators holding the hall ceased fire and pointed their rifles directly up to avoid flagging[3] Eve, who ran forward, her five seven in hand. The visor of her helmet whirred to life as she tapped it to transition to infrared. Dragging the downed operator with one hand and firing through the smoke at her enemies with the other, Eve managed to bring the downed operator to the other side of the T-Section. She lost no time and pulled out a medical kit while giving orders through the comm channel microphone installed in her helmet.
"Free to engage. Third[4], come to this side while suppressing through the smoke." Her team, who were already well trained in almost every scenario, was already in motion.
Eve continued. "Give suppressive aimed fire[5] for the rest of the column to move past, then switch with the two last." Her team followed her orders with practiced discipline, and they managed to move past the T-section without having another casualty.
Eve quickly checked over the operator who'd been shot. Thankfully, their combat suit and ballistic plates had taken the worst out of the hits. A glancing ricochet off their head had dented the helmet, but the visor and mask were still online, and no exterior bleeding was visible. They were still breathing heavily, as the wind had been knocked out of them.
"Sergeant, I'm fine." They stood, steadying themselves against the wall for a moment before checking over their rifle.
Eve glanced over them once more and patted them on the back. "Alright. Go to the middle of the stack for now. I'll take point." This meant that she would now take place as the first operator in the column. Holstering her sidearm and medical kit, Eve shouldered her rifle and went up to the first operator in the column, tapping their shoulder to trade spots. "2IC[6], take my spot." Eve's second in command shuffled backwards to replace her original position within the squad.
Shaking off the encounter, Eve's squad of eight quickened their pace towards the location of their objective now that they had been located by the Asphodelian forces. The mission had been to extract a team of specialists that had been investigating secret information the Asphodelian military had hidden in a research facility. After being dropped behind enemy lines in the Asphodelian federation a couple kilometers out by helicopter, they had silently eliminated the remaining security around the site and entered the building. Now, having been spotted inside the facility, they had to reach the team and extract against the clock.
- - -
[15 minutes later]
"Thank you so much for doing this, sergeant. I don't know where we'd be without you." A standard force soldier, a marine sergeant, thanked Eve as Eve's team took up defensive positions in the massive archival room. As Eve eyed the bloodied soldiers barely hanging on who had formed the security for the specialist team they had come to extract, a thought couldn't help but pop up her head.
I can imagine, though. You'd all be dead. She thought dryly. She kept her thoughts to herself. "Don't thank me just yet, sergeant. We still need to get out of here. How much longer will this take? We encountered a squad in the halls, and given the profile of the site, I'm sure they've called it in."
The marine shook their head. "We're in no shape to move. My squad has been hurt pretty badly, as you can see. Luckily, none of the data analysts have been injured, but so far we still haven't found what we're looking for. They say that it's all just data for previous operations. As much as those might be helpful, we haven't been able to find anything related to the intel we received just yet."
As if being spotted wasn't enough, this all added onto the pressure building on Eve. "We need to leave now. They know that we're here, and given how hard they've tried to keep this secret, they're soon going to have every possible nearby squad on this compound."
The marine sergeant shook his head. "Orders from above say no. We are to stay until the analysts are able to find anything related to the intel the Asphodelians were trying to keep secret. A QRF will be on their way here as soon as we've found it."
Hearing this, Eve sighed. "We'll do medical and security for now. Please let us know when they've found anything."
The marine sergeant nodded and watched as Eve stepped away, her TRACE tab prominently displayed on her shoulder.
- - -
[30 minutes later]
"Sergeant, we've found it." The data analyst team leader waved a thick binder filled to the brim with pages. The marine sergeant nodded to Eve, who was nearby. Eve signaled for her team to take their places and waited as the marine sergeant called in the QRF over comms. The sergeant suddenly became stiff, as if with fear. Soon, Eve heard a call over TRACE's communications channels as well. The voice was undisguised, as the channel was made through to TRACE's command center, and was picked up by someone well behind the lines.
"Owl, Insert team. QRF [7]is no longer possible. The airfield has been destroyed by an Asphodelian airstrike. The Helis[8] on call have been destroyed. Fixed-wing aircraft takeoff impossible, taxi and runways have been destroyed."
Eve's heart sank. Fuck.
The marine sergeant glanced at Eve for instructions. Even though they were of the same rank, Eve and her team's TRACE tabs commanded more respect.
Thinking quickly, Eve spoke on TRACE's channel. She first identified herself, then called out to the mission controller. "Insert team, Owl. Check, over."
She quickly heard a reply. "Owl, Insert team, good check, over." Now Eve knew she had contact.
"Insert team, Owl. Is the insert Heli available? We can set an exfil point away from the facility. Condition is dire, majority of the escort team requires proper medical attention. Over."
"Owl, Insert team. Stand by." The marine stared at Eve as she made the call. Eve signalled for the marines to get ready. They shouldered their rifles. The two Halcyon squads waited for what seemed like eternity before Eve received an answer from TRACE's command center.
"Owl, Insert team. Insert Heli marked for exfil[9] location. Marking LZ [10]on your HUD[11]s now." A small cyan dot appeared in Eve's vision on the heads-up display built into her mask's visor. Eve assumed that the marine sergeant either heard the comms or received the location, judging by his informing of his squad. He nodded to Eve. Eve heard the TRACE command officer's voice once more:
"Heli has taken off. No personnel onboard. Carrying capacity, 11 personnel. Second Heli has taken off from a nearby airfield. Carrying capacity, 11 personnel. ETA[12] is an hour and 30 minutes. Get to the LZ and hold security for the analyst team to extract. Out."
Eve sighed and nodded. She turned to the marine sergeant. "Sergeant, you heard all of that?" They nodded. Eve shouldered her rifle and stepped forward to the door, getting ready to unlock the door. "Then we'd better get moving."
- - -
[ETA: One hour remaining.]
The team was eventually able to make it to the side exit that Eve had noticed while studying the blueprints in the mission briefing, running into Asphodelian soldiers only once. The result was a brief firefight in which the TRACE squad handled easily without any losses.
The exit was a small maintenance tunnel that led underground and out to an exit a little distance away from the compound. Eve aimed for them to quietly move through the tunnel, emerge, eliminate any threats, then exit the compound and move to the forest, which then they would be able to use to conceal their movement until they reached the clearing that had been designated as the helicopter landing zone.
They stopped at the double-doored entrance to the tunnel, and Eve signalled for the column to stack up behind her. "We're going quiet from here on out. Keep your voices down." Eve, rightfully not wanting to cause a commotion and alert the enemy to their presence, signalled 'quiet' with a hand signal to her TRACE squad's breacher, a young corporal. They nodded and stepped forwards with a lockpick. As they got to work on the lock, Eve signalled for everyone to take a collective step back.
As soon as the breacher had successfully picked the lock with a soft 'click', they gave Eve a thumbs up. She nodded, and the breacher silently swung the door open. Eve was the first one into the tunnel, taking the position of point. Eve noticed that the tunnel remained dark, and any lights that had been there in the past were either now broken or so dim that they almost provided no light at all. She quickly tapped her helmet, and the tunnel's features quickly came into view as the night vision built into her visor flicked on. [13]
The rest of the team followed suit, turning on night vision. They moved into position, protecting the data analysts on all sides, who had no visors and had to rely on the dim vision of the flickering lights of the tunnel. It gave the tunnel almost an eerie appearance as shadows danced around the Halcyon squads, who had to skirt carefully around the occasional pile of construction material or long abandoned forklifts who casted shadows that loomed like monsters.
Eve carefully scanned the tunnel and kept her rifle up as they trod silently down the long corridor without a word, their footsteps echoing mutely around them.
[ETA: 55 minutes remaining.]
A pinprick of light could be seen in the distance, a ways away from the team. As it grew closer, Eve signalled for everyone to take cover behind the abandoned construction materials dotting the tunnel. It quickly became clear that the light wasn't the exit door as a second light joined the first, and the two lights began to sweep the tunnel from side to side. Footsteps - not the team's, who had stopped in their tracks completely - could soon be heard.
Flashlights.
[ETA: 50 minutes remaining.]
[1] Soldier
[2] Most smoke grenades don't emit smoke immediately, and will take some time before there's enough smoke to provide any cover.
[3] Pointing a gun (muzzle) at a friendly.
In this case, Eve's squadmates point their rifles at the cieling to avoid flagging Eve as she runs forwads. Even though trigger control is a HUGE thing, accidents still happen, so this is a sure-fire way to avoid flagging a friendly and to avoid accidents.
[4] Refers to the operator's position within the squad or column. Generally the person first in line in the squad will be called a point, then second man, third man, etc.
Since the focus of this webnovel isn't men, I'll try to avoid using 'man' whenever possible in this context, but depending on the use case, I'll still use it.
[5] Suppressive fire refers to shooting, not always directly aimed at the enemy, but in their direction to slow their advance, or stop them from moving.
Overall, the idea is to keep the enemy's heads down from the rounds whizzing past and stop them from moving. In this case, Eve is calling for her squadmates to aim precisely at the enemy and give more precise suppressive fire instead of just spraying bullets randomly down the hall.
[6] Second in command.
2 = second
IC = in command
[7] Quick reaction force.
Quick reaction force. Refers to a unit that is readily deployable to respond to ongoing situations. In this case, that would be attacking the facility and getting them out.
[8] Helicopter
[9] Exfil, exfiltration - To withdraw from a specified location, often this will be stealthily and in an area under enemy control.
[10] Landing zone
[11] Heads up display
[12] Estimated Time (of) Arrival
[13] If you take a look on my X, I've posted a concept of the helmet, and it has a mask and visor that covers the face. The idea is that they can switch the mode the visor displays in, such as in normal mode, night vision, infrared, etc. The visor can also display images and mark locations / targets.