>BLACKBOX
>6SEP2019
>0130...///

Ava was asleep, the dead sleep of exhaustion not just of staying awake but working hard on something meaningful and finally getting results. Laine hung up her hoodie and picked up the discarded clothes, including the denim vest with the stitched flowers. She smiled slightly, the vest along with the coat and hoodie had all come from some little boutique near the campus of the University of Idaho. It had reminded her of the number of independent shops in LA, each struggling and they had both spent generously. 

Laine went into her suitcase and dug out the little pink plastic bag, glancing over her shoulder at Ava who snored lightly, her wild red hair fanned out against the pillow. Laine shoved the vest into the bag and picked up her phone to text Donnelley. 

She felt a giddy smile touch her lips, feeling that same girlish excitement when she texted him. It all needed to be hidden and while it could be annoying to have to be so careful there was a thrill to it. 

[i]I have a secret project. You in?[/i]

[i]Bet your ass, I’m too bored… we could help each other out with both things ;)[/i]

[i]Omg. Just meet me at the cafeteria. We need a workspace that’s private.[/i]

Laine rolled her eyes and smiled, smothering a laugh so not to wake up Ava. Though she could probably beat a drum next to her bed without making her stir. The prospect of both secret plans was interesting but first she wanted to finish the surprise for Ava. Gathering the pink plastic bag, she rolled it up and tucked it under her arm. 

Still dressed in the clothes she wore to the briefing, Laine strolled away from the bunks. Part of her felt slightly uneasy leaving Ava alone but there was security. She could smell the cafeteria before she saw it, even at this late night someone was up making coffee.

That someone was Donnelley, hands stuffed into his pockets as he stood next to the coffee machine. He hadn’t noticed anyone walk up, his attention on something else as he bobbed his head along to a beat Laine couldn’t hear. There were two of the coffee cups next to him and he grabbed them both up, turning around making for one of the tables before looking up to see Laine. A smile quickly grew on his lips and he rushed over to her. As he got closer, it was more apparent that he had earbuds in, no doubt playing something uniquely Donnelley. He offered one of the coffees to Laine.

“Hey, sugar.” Donnelley frowned at that, “Nah, I don’t like that, makes me think of those other two. We need some cute nicknames, yeah?”

Laine smiled at him, her green eyes gleaming when she took the coffee. She looked around, the cafeteria was empty but the cameras scanned. She raised her eyebrow and grimaced at the nickname. “I’m not that sweet,” she said, taking a sip of the black coffee. “Do we need cute nicknames? Is that a country boy thing?”

She smiled slightly then reached up and plucked one of his earbuds out and put it in her own, “Now to judge you by your music choice. You caught me by surprise with the rap last time.” 

“What can I say, I appreciate variety.” He said as Laine listened along to Livin In Exile by Blood for Blood, “Reminds me of home. One of the highest crime rates per capita. Not that there were a lot of, uh, capitas.”

Laine recognized the band and glanced at him, a sly smile on her face. “Ah, my hardcore phase, I remember them, a little misogynistic but good angry music to feel to. I can dig it.” 

She met his eyes when he spoke about home the urge to touch his hand restrained by the eyeless watchers above them. 

“Deputy Donnelley to the rescue,” she said, a little teasing but her smile was warm. Laine looked around the cafeteria again then back at him. She sipped her coffee and leaned forward, “You figure out any better places we can hide and skip class?” 

He snorted at Laine’s comment about his past, endlessly chasing his tail for diminishing returns where even Sheriff Gracy knew there wasn’t much they could do for Dallard County except make sure it didn’t burn itself down too quickly. He shrugged at her question about where they would do this secret project Laine was talking about, “I took a nap in one, yeah. They got a cellar here, storage for old case files they never got around to converting to computer files.” He sipped at his coffee, “You never did tell me what this secret project was.”

Laine laid the bag on the table, pressing her palms on either side of it as she met his gaze. “Remember your battle jacket? I know you must have had one.” 

She grinned, a flash of teeth behind plush lips. “I had one, a cheap leather jacket with Hot Topic spikes and band patches. Well…”

Her face flushed a little and she reached up to tuck her hair behind her ears, “I was shopping with Ava, talking with her. You know she never had many friends, being a kid in college and all. No siblings. When she was trying on coats I was picking out some accessories I thought she might like.” 

Laine opened the bag and took a handful of mostly pastel colored patches, rather than bands they were cute and sassy morale patches. She held up one with flowers embroidered on it along with a pin with the simple message of ‘Don’t be a Dick’ around a heart. There were patches of cheerful cartoon teacups and a Pusheen cat like the plushie Laine had bought her back in West Virginia  among others. Laine chuckled, feeling a little self conscious, “I don’t know, I just felt like doing something for her, she thinks of others quite a bit. Remember the mugs?”

Laine pushed the patches back in, “I stole her vest and I have a sewing kit, I figured you might want to hang out and give me a hand. Maybe some place we can just chill.” 

Donnelley reached over and picked one up, a heart-shaped pouting face with devil horns. He chuckled, “This’ll be the softest battle jacket I’ve made yet, I guess.” Donnelley put it back down and took another sip of his coffee, “Guess we owe it to her for workin’ so hard on that damn thing. If only we’d gotten that a couple months ago, things might be different.”

He sighed, his smile fading a little back as he looked away from Laine. He put the smile back on as he looked back at her, “Come on, follow me.”

He got up and walked out to the halls, pulling out the modified map he’d gotten from Queen. He led them through the echoing passageways, glancing up from his map every so often just to make sure they were going the right way. Once they’d made it to the small door that led down to the storage cellar he took her by the hand and led her carefully down the barely lit stairway. It was a modest place, the cellar. The way it was arranged, dirty and grungy, it reminded him of some places he’d stayed at in his younger days. He plopped down into the ratty couch and patted the space next to him, “If you’re worried about an unattended Avery, he’s sleepin’. Told Queen not to fuck around with him, and told Avery not to hang out with Queen else I’d dress him like a buck.”

Donnelley shook his head and had that little smile, the one he’d get whenever he was talking about how Tilly had gotten into trouble some way or another. She took after her mother in looks, but the rebellious and rambunctious nature was all Donnelley’s blood, “So, hopefully we get some time for ourselves right now… [i]cutie.[/i]” he said, trying another nickname and watching her frown at that one too. He laughed.

Laine nodded, a little impish smile appearing, “Yeah, but I’m no poser, I won’t put a bunch of patches on her vest that wouldn’t suit her.” 

She looked at him, “Maybe it would have, but we got it now. And we’ll figure out what to do with it.”

She followed him through the large facility, the lack of windows and their flipped around schedule made her forget what time of day it was. If time was moving as slow as it felt or was it only a trick of it only being numbers on a clock. Laine held his hand, the cellar had the air of privacy not because it was hidden but that no one would want to come down there. The locked chain link enclosures caught her attention, the metal file totes also padlocked. The possibilities raced through her mind, what dark secrets lay within the stashed boxes. 

He caught her attention as he sat down, she had not thought about Avery and felt a sudden stab of guilt, her focus had been on the work. “I’m sure he’ll be fine, he’s been working hard and maybe that’s enough distraction. At least being worn out enough to just sleep. Queen...ah, he came down to the library earlier, borrowed Ava’s beret. He’s a...quite a character.”

She left it that, whatever made THUNDER successful at their grim task, it was not her place to judge it. Not that it ever stopped her but she kept it to herself when she could. It was an unfortunate necessity in the work the Program did. At least they deemed it to be and she was merely a small cog. 

Laine smiled slightly, gazing at him, his handsome features marred by the burn scar but it was just as dear to her as the rest of him. She perched on the arm of the broken sofa, then scoffed with a raised eyebrow, “Cutie? I’m not cute.” 

She tossed the bag at him then dropped down to the cushion beside him, bouncing slightly on the worn springs. Laine gave him a side eyed glance, trying to keep a straight face, “Cute...you’re [i[cute.[/i]” 

“I’m ruggedly handsome,” he stroked his beard, “Downright [i]beautiful.[/i] So, which one of these we puttin’ on first?”

He rifled through the bag and brought out the vest, and then rooted around in the bag without looking, taking one at random. “Fucking girl power.” He looked at the patch he’d brought out, “I like it. I vote this one.”

She chuckled and grinned at the heart shaped patch, “Fucking right, girl power. We don’t all have big dick guns.” 

Laine took the sewing kit and removed two medium needles, threading one before handing it to him. “You take the right side, mind the embroidery.”

She began threading the other needle, running the thread between her lips to get it to slip through the eye easier. “What was your first patch? Let me guess, it was on a denim battle vest.”

Holding up the left side of Ava’s vest, “Yeah? Minus the flowers and add in scruffy cut off sleeves. I can just see you wearing it, skateboarding around Dalhart breaking hearts and pissing off jocks.”

“Jocks n’ cowboys,” Donnelley made his kissy faces again, holding up the right side and getting to work on the patch, “And yes, it was denim. I actually made my first patch myself. Old t-shirt and some paint, Black Flag bars. Me and my friend had broken into some cars in Dalhart, it was… ‘89, I think? California plates. We jimmied the trunk and there was just record after record after record.”

Donnelley chuckled, “I grabbed up as many as I fuckin’ could and we ran. It was a bunch of punk shit, and I was more of a metalhead until that damn day.” Donnelley smiled, getting the stitching right on the other half of the heart, “If I could go back, I’d ask to hang out with the guy instead of steal his shit, but I thank him anyways. I mean, Stooges, Black Flag, Dead Kennedy’s, Agent Orange.”

“Bloodstains, fast cars, cheap thrills,” he smiled, an edge of spite in the eyes, just like that punk in Dalhart, “Nothin’ was that raw, nothin’ was that in your face to tell you to fuck off or tell the world how shitty they felt or anythin’. And that’s all I needed in a place like Dalhart.”

Laine laughed at the kissy face, shaking her head, her eyes bright with affection and amusement. “DIY, I respect that. Already a street punk before you had a soundtrack.” 

She pressed her teeth against her lower lip, watching his expression as she sewed along the edges of one of the pastel patches. “So many California bands, I swear. I was born at least a decade or two too late.” 

Laine kept stealing glances at him, now sitting with her knees pulled up, her Chuck Taylors braced on the edge of the couch. “I was a child of suburbia, but by fourteen I was all about the dark and doing things that drove my mom crazy. Beach parties, all ages clubs, shit like that.” 

She stayed quiet for a moment, then looked at him, “If the stars had lined up differently, I think we might have still found each other and had some wild times.” 

“We met anyway, fuck the stars.” He smiled, winking at her, “What about you?”

“Nothing as cool as your story,” she laughed, finishing the patch and picking up another one, judging where the circular shape might look best and settled on the back right shoulder. “I used to hang out at the mall a lot.”

She gestured with the needle, “I know, real unusual for a California girl. But that’s where the boys would skate and my girlfriends and I would wander around, buy makeup and clothes our mothers would never approve of. I got my first patch at Hot Topic, ok? It was the Smiths, because I was such a sad girl sometimes.”

Laine huffed a laugh, shaking her head, “Shit, then I learned how to sneak out. How to take the bus, my parents never let me but my brother could go wherever. Typical. So we’d just hang out, trade mix tapes, burned CDs. They had a lot of all ages clubs around in the 80s but they started shutting down in the 90s, a lot of ‘concerned’ parents.”

She made a jerk off motion with her fist then laughed, her green eyes bright. “Jesus, it was dangerous as hell thinking back, knowing all that I know now.”

Her smile faded then, her thoughts turning to the pier at Redondo Beach. “That was another time. I don’t regret any of it. Even the heartbreak.” 

Donnelley nodded at that, a sincere look in his eye before he voiced his agreement, “Not a bit. Wouldn’t be the Donnelley I am now, probably.” He put the last touches on the threading and made sure the patch was snug against the denim, “What else you wanna know ‘bout me?”

Laine tilted her head slightly, giving him a sly smile. “I like the Donnelley you are. And that would take more than a couple stolen hours in a cellar. I’ve wanted to know you since...well since you let me in.” 

She poked the needle through the patch and watched the stitches as she continued, “I guess, you make me curious, intrigued. It’s not all your rugged beauty, buckaroo.” 

Donnelley laughed at that and leaned into her, budging her with his shoulder, “[i]Buckaroo.[/i] I guess I’ll take the chance while we’re here then, Little Miss Scare-All.” He said, “Huh… First kiss. Yeah, I’ll do that, I’ll be cheesy. What was it like?”

“You are like cheddar, baby,” she teased, tossing back her short dark hair. “Oh first kiss...going down that path are we? You’ll owe me an answer, too.” 

Laine finished another patch then picked up the cartoon corgi but paused to rethread her needle, “He was older than me, about fifteen, I was thirteen. My dad hated him because he had a blue mohawk. And probably figured what he was up to.”

She laughed, “We used to go to the boardwalk and hold hands, go to the bonfires and skate at empty swimming pools. He kissed me the first time when he wiped out and cut his knee open, I helped him patch it up and…it was quick and both of us were so nervous. He just ran off after he did it. Later on we made out at a bonfire at the beach.”

Laine ran her hand through her hair, taking a break from sewing. “I thought I was fucking grown after that. How about you?” 

Donnelley snorted at Laine’s story, knowing how much Donnelley thought he was so grown up back then. Not knowing if he’d ever make it to actually being grown up, or if he cared too much. When it was his turn, he looked up and away for a moment, “May Childers. She wasn’t the most popular in school, she was the weird kid, but so was I. I mean, not weird in the ways I was weird at fourteen.” He chuckled, “She was quiet, shy. A lot of the other girls would pick on her and I remember we became friends after the day I saw her in the middle of ‘em all gettin’ pecked at like she was a piece of meat in a swarm of vultures.”

“I went in there hollerin’ and swingin’. Didn’t hurt nobody, didn’t connect with any faces. But they left her alone, not all the time mind you, but enough.” Donnelley had another of the patches in hand, the one that said ‘Be Kind’ and smiled softly, “We stayed friends for two years, but friends don’t kiss each other when they hang out. I was a bad influence on her, though.”

Donnelley’s smile dropped, not exactly proudly boasting it in a joking manner like he usually did, “When we were sixteen, we were drunk. We fooled around a little bit. No condom, because what stupid fuck who’s wasted thinks about a condom?” Donnelley shook his head, “Anyways, she went to live with her family somewhere else wasn’t Texas.”

He cleared his throat, “Sorry, yeah. First kiss, I picked her up after she was gettin’ her ass kicked way back. I say picked her up, but she never went down. On her feet, and hands up the whole time. She kissed me when I drove ‘em off.” He nodded, looking far off to someplace distant and different, “Time was, I thought we were gonna get married. First time in those years I thought about anythin’ past the next day.”

Laine leaned in close to him, the vest spread across both their laps. She put down the needle and reached over, turning to face him. She stroked his temple, there were a few gray hairs among the ginger and she kissed him softly on the cheek. “Always the hero,” she whispered, “It’s a good memory, thank you for sharing it.”

Laine looked at him closely, a question bounced around her mind about no condom and her going off to live somewhere else. And them both being sixteen. “I’m sorry she had to leave, I hope it was on at least good terms.” 

She smiled sadly, leaning her chin on his shoulder then laughed suddenly, “I can’t say much, I didn’t make you wear a condom either. I think we were kinda wasted. It’s a good thing I have back up.” 

“Yeah, I didn’t ask about one either. Like I said, what stupid fuck who’s wasted thinks about a condom?” He chuckled, looking down at the patch and the jacket. He sighed, “You know us doin’ this, together… everythin’ we’ve done together…”

He shrugged, rolling his jaw and shaking his head, “Us doin’ this for Ava. I’m gonna have to talk to the both of them,” he said, “I’m not lookin’ forward to it. Makes me feel like a hypocrite, and I like to think I ain’t one.”

Laine pulled back slightly, then picked up her needle again, working on her last patch. “You’re not being a hypocrite. It’s not wrong they want to be together, God knows, it’s a little bit of happiness in this damn dark world we live in. They just have to realize that they can’t flaunt it, it’s fraternizing. It’s not quite as bad as us.”

She glanced at him with a teasing smile, “You could get in trouble with abusing your authority, [i]sir.[/i]”

“It’s just protocol and I’m not surprised they didn’t think about it. Dave probably never had a job where he had to listen to a sexual harassment conduct briefing and Ava...well I don’t think sex crossed her mind until she caught feelings for Dave. It’s just not something in their experience. That’s all you have to explain, they just can’t be open with the PDA. It sucks but it’s better than working on another team.” 

“You’re right. I’ve been a little pissed between them and Avery, and everythin’ else, I ain’t even thought about that part.” Donnelley shook his head and smiled sheepishly, “Thanks, Laine.”

He leaned over and pecked her cheek, gently turning her head and then kissing her full lips, letting it linger for a moment. He leaned back and continued working, “You’re a lifesaver.”

Laine accepted his kiss and returned it before resuming sewing. “That’s what I’m here for. I think this is the last one for me.”

She held up a patch with a cute puppy running away with a heart which read, “On my way to destroy everything you have ever loved.”

Laine shrugged, “It’s a little dark but let’s face it, she can do some real damage with what she can pull from the internet.”

Once she finished she flexed her fingers and rubbed them against her thighs, finally leaning back and looking around the cellar, “How did you manage to find this?” 

“Queen showed me, gave me a map.” Donnelley said, working on the last bit of stitching on the Be Kind patch. He didn’t tell her what else they did in here, “Give that man a scrap of information to get at and he’ll get it. Gotta give it to him.”

He nodded at the patch that Laine had sown, the seemingly harmless puppy on its way to ruin someone’s life completely, “After that briefing, if that’s not apt for her I don’t know what is.”

“It’s a good thing she’s a white hat. Also, he mapped it, like found all the hiding spots for you?” she quirked an eyebrow and leaned forward, “DId you give him a reason to do that?” 

She made a small questioning gesture with her finger pointing back and forth between him and herself. “What did you tell him?”

“Relax.” Donnelley held a hand up and scooted closer to her, putting a hand on her thigh, “He don’t know anythin’. He found all the spots for himself and took me for a tour. For all he knows, I’m just smokin’ cigarettes and gettin’ a break from y’all drivin’ me mad.” He flashed a grin.

“Everythin’s okay.” Donnelley reassured.

He leaned towards her, closing his eyes to go for a kiss, but felt his phone vibrate. He checked it, seeing a message from Greedy. Sighing, he opened his phone and his eyes scanned it before he locked it again, “Snowstorm, Greedy wants us to report to the meeting room when it clears.” Donnelley was suddenly not so keen to continue with Laine. He swore under his breath and looked at her, “We might have a couple hours.”

Laine laughed, her smile remaining as she teased him back, “I’ve not begun to drive you crazy.” 

When he paused mid kiss, she followed his movement to get his phone. “Has this snowstorm showed any signs of letting up then?”

Laine sat up, her mind already on the weather records and averages of the freak storms lasting. “He expects it might clear then.”

She looked at him for a long moment, reaching over to touch his hand. Laine wanted him, but the vibe that had built up between them sharing memories and joking was thrown back into shadow, like a cloud moving over the sun. 

“I’m game for whatever you want, I had a pretty good nap earlier,” she said, leaning over to drape the newly patched and pinned vest on the arm of the couch. “I feel a little bit bad about leaving you like that earlier. I just...”

Laine shrugged, the gleam in her eyes returning. “I’ll drive you crazy sometimes.” 

She leaned over to kiss his jaw, the beard tickling her nose and murmured, “We don’t know when the storm will let up, it could be sooner than later. What if they come looking for us.” 

She put her hand on his thigh now, the want still rising strong within her and she gave him a squeeze and breathed warmy against his ear, “Or...we could make it quick and dirty.” 

“Now you’re talkin’.” Donnelley said, moving forward again to kiss her. He placed his hand around her neck and leaned forward more, guiding her a little forcefully onto her back as the couch creaked...

[h3]From the Darkness of Futures Past…[/h3
[b]Part I[/b]

>BLACKBOX
>MEN’S BUNKS
>FOUR HOURS LATER
>0530...///

[i]I've been living on the edge so long
Where the winds of limbo roar
And I'm young enough to look at
And far too old to see
All the scars are on the inside...[/i]

Donnelley woke up with his fist cocked back and saw that it was only Maui who’d slapped his boot. He hadn’t gotten undressed, even for sleep, wanting to be ready for whatever Greedy needed them for. Somewhere in his brain, he knew what this meeting was about. “Time to get up, sleepyhead.” Maui smiled down at Donnelley in his bed, all the way up from his great height, “Briefing’s on. I think we’re goin’ out.”

“Fuckin’ finally.” Poker said, hiking his trousers on and slipping his feet into his boots, a wicked and toothy grin set in his face, dagger eyes gleaming. “Oh, fuck, I have to piss like a racehorse.”

“Have some respect for the dead, asshole.” Someone in TRIDENT said.

“Who says they’re dead?”

“It’s SIREN.”

“Oh, yeah.” TRIDENT chuckled, and even Maui cracked a grin. 

Gallows humor, even if the bodies hadn’t even cooled down yet. There was a piece of Donnelley that wished he still could joke like that, but ever since becoming a Team Lead, he could only imagine what it was like for SIREN’s Lead to know he failed them, or die thinking he did. Donnelley stood, lightly slapping Avery awake and the other man looked around. Without a word, he nodded and began suiting up. It was almost like he knew what he was doing now. “Dave, where’s Dave. On me, Lucky!” He clapped his hands loud enough to be heard, “UMBRA, double-time!”

He walked out of the men’s bunks and down the hall, almost barreling into She-Ra on his way to the women’s bunks. He looked her over and asked, “You mind getting my people?”

“Yes.” And she walked on.

“Prick.” Donnelley called back.

She-Ra showed him her middle finger as she walked on. He stood outside the women’s bunks and cupped his hands over his mouth, “UMBRA, on me, double-time!”

Laine woke at the sound of Donnelley's voice, she had slept lightly expecting the call. She rolled out of her bunk, rubbing her eyes. "We'll be there, I'll get Ava up."

She stepped over and shook the little redhead awake, "Ava, we're up. They need us. Come on."

Laine had left the folded denim vest on top of Ava's footlocker and went to lace up her hiking boots, pulling out the heavy coat and scarf, headband and the rest of her outdoor clothing. She kept an eye on Ava so she could watch her discover the vest as she loaded her Glock and slid it into the shoulder holster.

Ghost was returning from the showers when he heard the commotion. He wore nothing but a pair of flip-flops, his hygiene bag in one hand, the other holding up the towel around his waist. He gave She-Ra a nod as he passed, his lips quirking in a rare smile that faded as he locked his cold eyes on Donnelley. One of those eyes was swollen and bruised, his bottom lip puffy and split. Jagged red lines decorated his scarred torso, the spacing suspiciously similar to that of a woman’s fingers. 

“What did I miss?” He grunted. 

“Got a briefing.” Dave appeared in the doorway of the men’s unit, dressed in camouflage and buckling on his gear. “Figure we’re fixin’ ta go out and shoot some badguys.” 

Ghost grunted again, an acknowledgement this time. “Then move,” he growled. Dave stepped aside as he entered the room, tossing his towel in the general direction of his bed before beginning to dig out his ready-gear. 

“Jesus, man,” Dave muttered. “At least put your fuckin’ [i]hog[/i] away first.” 

“You get used to it.” Maui said as he brushed past.

Ava awoke with a snort at Laine’s shaking, gently tugging down her blankets from her head and blearily blinking up at the lights above. “Mmm, five more minutes.” She mumbled and pulled the blankets back over her head as she rolled over and hunkered down underneath the covers.

“What’re we doing?” Avery’s voice came from behind Donnelley and Dave outside the women’s bunks. He yawned and scratched his neck..

Donnelley turned around and clapped his hands on Avery’s shoulders, shaking him a little as he smiled patronizingly, “We’re doin’ CSAR, Avery.”

“See Tzar?” Avery asked, his face scrunched up, before he nodded, “Oh, search and rescue. Oh, fuck, we’re activated? Oh, shit, okay.”

Donnelley turned and cupped his hands around his mouth, projecting his voice, “Whoever is awake in there, drag whoever is asleep out with you. Hurry up!”

Laine finished putting on her boots and pulled on a clean thermal then another charcoal gray shirt on to layer against the cold. 

"Ava!' she snapped, then went over and pulled the blankets back. "We're activated, get up and get dressed."

The sound of Donnelley's bellowing could be heard and Laine grabbed Ava's boots and set them before her. 

“Ah! I’m up! I’m up!” Ava jumped as her warm covers were yanked off of her. “Uuugh.” She picked herself up and scrubbed her hands over her face, the shock of adrenaline from the words ‘we’re activated’ helping to rouse her. 

She was already dressed in a clean set of clothes, after the briefing and some alone time with Dave in an old storage closet she had taken a quick shower and changed out of her previous attire. 

She looked over at what Laine was dressing in and went to her trunk; glad she had taken the time to put together her outdoor attire for such an occasion. She paused and blinked as she saw a denim vest folded up on her foot locker, the wheels visibly turning in her groggy head.

She picked it up and looked it over. “Is this mine?” She asked Laine, looking to the other woman in surprise and a little bemusement.

Laine glanced over at her then grinned, "It's your battle vest."

A moment of concern flashed across Laine's face that maybe Ava wouldn't appreciate her clothing defaced and she said, "I hope you don't mind. It's just like a thing we used to do but with band patches. Donnelley helped."

Ava’s tired eyes started to well up with tears. She smiled and rushed forward to give Laine a hug. “I love it! Thank you!” She said with a sniff, pulling back and wiping at her eyes. “It looks ten times better, thank you so much.” She held up the vest with a bright smile. “I’m absolutely going to wear it right now.”

Laine returned the hug with relief, then gave her wild wake up curls a tousle. "Do that, it's for luck. But hurry, before they send that big bitch She-Ra to drag us out."

Ava nodded with another sniff, still smiling as she returned to her foot locker. “Right, right, I’ll get dressed.” She set the vest aside and went about pulling out her outdoor wear.

As she pulled out the clothes she also lifted up a small but sturdy looking hiking bag. It was filled with an assortment of survival gear Dave had helped her pick out and pack. “Will I need this?” She asked with a slight frown.

"You probably will, considering..." Laine shrugged, not wanting to speculate. "Let's go and see, I'm sure we'll have a bit of time to gear up."

She moved to the door and swung it open, "I'll tell Donnelley you're on your way."

Ava nodded to Laine as she left and then dressed herself as quickly as possible, trying not to let the anxiety of going into the Alaskan wilderness to search for a possibly dead Working Group distract her from the now. She threw on a pair of sturdy jeans over the winter leggings she had slept in, a thermal undershirt with small holes in the sleeves for her thumbs and a muted lilac turtleneck sweater that went over it.

Despite her simmering fears, she smiled as she put her newly altered vest on and sat down to lace up her hiking boots. Without a lot of time to dawdle she had just put on her glasses rather than messing with her contacts. Lastly she strapped her holster to the belt of her pants at her hip and slipped in her handgun.

Fully dressed and as ready as she could be, she grabbed her survival bag and laid it on the bunk as well as a slate grey, fleece lined coat more suited for the outdoors than the one she originally wore to the BLACKBOX; a pair of gloves, scarf and a beanie already tucked away into the zipper pockets. Ready to grab should she need it.

She turned to the door, took in a deep breath to try to ignore the exhaustion settled over her head and the trepidation rising in her chest and started to leave the bunk room.

Then she stopped as a thought occurred to her and she turned around, going to her footlocker to quickly dig out her toiletry bag. She found her bottle of emergency medication she received in Idaho and tucked it into her survival bag, breathing a little easier knowing she had it ready. Just in case.

After putting everything back, making sure her belongings were secured in her foot locker, she stood, tried to steady herself and went to join the others.

>BLACKBOX
>GREEDY’S MEETING ROOM
>0545...///

Once the QRF was assembled in the small room they took their respective places, sticking to their teams. There had been banter, shit talking both playful and not before they got to the meeting room. The fact there was a little more legroom with SIREN and ARTEMIS gone seemed to sober them all somewhat. That, and Greedy’s military officer standing at parade rest with his seemingly persistent anger gleaming in his eyes killed any happy conversation. Even Queen had shut up.

Greedy was the last to arrive, almost looking worse for wear. Whatever arrogant asshole he looked like before, at the start of all this, now he looked like a tired mess. He paced the front of the room for a few moments before he went for his laptop and activated the projector. The same map of the Noatak National Preserve popped up onscreen and Greedy looked at it for a second before pressing another button, a red dot showing up in the mountains. “This is ARTEMIS’ last known location inside the Preserve. The last communication from their channel was a few hours after their last mandatory check-in, zero dark and zero-three-hundred, respectively.” Greedy cleared his throat, “They said they’d found Ipiktok’s compound, eyes on multiple unknowns. Then nothing.”

“SIREN’s last known is similar. They had made it to Noatak, but failed to make their last check-in. I pinged them thirty minutes ago and still radio silent. Both teams are assumed MIA. Now that the snowstorm is cleared I’m activating the QRF to confirm their status.” Greedy nodded at the military officer.

The military officer stepped up at the head of the room, “Wetwork Teams TRIDENT and THUNDER will be subordinate to Working Group UMBRA for this mission. There are no roads that lead to Noatak, locals use the river for transport, or the Noatak airport.”

“Main demographic in the area are indigenous peoples- Inuits. It is remote, it is cold, so pack accordingly. ISR will be overhead. This is a plainclothes operation, Gray Man is the dress order, so leave your Gucci belts here.” Quiet chuckles around the room, “IMINT on the area puts it as fast melting snow, the snowstorm is believed to be unnatural in nature due to the fast disappearing snowfall. The area around Ipiktok’s compound went untouched before ARTEMIS’ arrival. The following and most recent snowstorm left the town of Noatak relatively dry, while Ipiktok’s compound suffered as much as anywhere else.”

“We believe Ipiktok may be in Noatak, hiding. TRIDENT’s first objective is to go to Noatak and sniff Ipiktok out. TRIDENT will embed in Noatak under non-official US Marshal SOG cover in pursuit of Ipiktok and confirm SIREN’s whereabouts. UMBRA and THUNDER will move towards Ipiktok’s compound and confirm ARTEMIS’ status.” The military officer looked towards UMBRA and THUNDER, “Both of your teams will be issued with a strike designator for the Reaper Drone’s hellfire missiles. THUNDER and UMBRA will be issued four Black Hornet Nano UAVs capable of night vision with a range of one mile from its operator.”

“Your objectives are to confirm ARTEMIS’ status and search Ipiktok’s compound for any items that fall under the purview of the Program, as well as search for Ipiktok himself. You have execute authority on Ipiktok and his cult, a reminder not to let them speak. Once these items are identified, they are to be moved from the compound before the compound is scuttled. After these two objectives are complete, you are to make your way to Noatak, rendezvous with TRIDENT and Exfil with any evidence from Ipiktok’s compound by CORAL NOMAD transport from Noatak Airport.” The Officer looked over the faces of the three teams, “Any questions?”

Laine listened intently, her previous attitude towards Greedy melting away as she observed him report on the two missing teams. Her stomach knotted at the thought of finding them, the worst thoughts flickering through her mind but the mission was at hand. There was a chance they were alive, just cut off from radio contact. Once the briefing completed, she glanced at Donnelley for a brief moment and then tentatively raised her hand, “Are we being dropped off at the airport? You said there’s no roads…”

The idea of hiking through the soggy ground beneath the rapidly melting snow was not a pleasant one, almost as bad as taking a raft through waters suddenly inundated with the snow melt. It was going to be uncomfortable and dangerous.

“Your birds are being prepped as we speak.” The Officer nodded, “Your transport today will be two Blackhawk helicopters. TRIDENT will be inserted into Noatak via the airfield, UMBRA and THUNDER will continue into the mountains and infil six miles from ARTEMIS’ last known.”

Ava shifted nervously in her seat, the cobwebs of sleep chased away by the rush of adrenaline and fear brought on by the briefing. They would be going out into the field, into the Alaskan wilderness. She rubbed one hand over her stomach, in the spot where her bullet scar was located while the other reached up to touch the pendant tucked beneath her shirt. Her hands suddenly felt ice cold.

She glanced at her team around her, seeking some kind of solace as she felt the cold sweat start to break out at her hairline and the back of her neck.

Dave caught Ava’s eye and gave her a quick wink. He could tell her nerves were up; the thought of going out into the middle of nowhere was probably stressful for a techy. Dave, though, was excited. This was what he did; a trip into the mountains, pitting himself against nature. The presence of a witch doctor or whatever Ipiktok was might put a small damper on things, but he was reasonably confident that between his own growing skills and THUNDER, they’d come out on top. 

No matter the fact that there were very possible dead people, going out on a mission like this was something that the deep part of Donnelley missed. That Tex missed. The parameters were there, the problem was singled out, isolated. The world now would be simple, right and wrong, good and evil, winning and losing… another sunrise all balanced on the squeeze of a trigger, “You ready for this shit, Lucky?” Donnelley smirked at Dave, looking at him sidelong and offering his fist for a bump.

Dave grinned and thumped his fist against Donnelley’s. He was enjoying his new nickname, which he’d been hearing since he knocked out the bearded TRIDENT operator. Apparently all it took to earn respect among these types was to punch somebody. He partially turned as Ghost’s gravelly rumble sounded from the back of the room. 

“ROE’s?” His massive arms were crossed over his chest, his eyes hidden behind his Oakleys as always. 

“Is that like...Part of his script?” Dave whispered, leaning towards Donnelley. 

“I’ve known him for three years and that’s the only question he asks.” Donnelley murmured back.

The Officer nodded, “If it is not anyone who was present during the first brief, consider them a shooter. Cleared hot.”

Ghost nodded, his satisfaction plain to those who knew him. These were his favorite ROE’s; they created minimal complications. No worrying about witnesses, no wondering if there would be official repercussions. Just playing [i]the Game[/i]. 

“Understood,” he growled, making mental note to grab an extra magazine or two. 

Laine tucked her hands in the puffy vest, the dark green over the heather gray thermal shirt and gray green trousers that had several pockets she picked up at the Moscow Academy store. Forgoing her usual black, she would blend in more with the background of rock, mud, and moss of the tundra. Her black hair had ground out enough to brushed back and she wore a warm headband covering her ears. Gloves and a knit cap were stuffed into her jacket pockets which was draped over one arm, her shoulder holster in place. 

She went over to Dave and Donnelley, smiling a little at the mountain man. “Got any hiking tips for a city girl? The most dangerous place I’ve ever walked was MacArthur Park.” 

“Baby powder,” he whispered. “Chafin’ ain’t made up for TV.” 

Laine bit her lip to keep from laughing out loud and murmured, “Good point, I’ll keep that in mind.” 

>FOUR MILES OUTSIDE NOATAK, ALASKA
>0700...///

The only thing that most could hear was the beating of helicopter blades and the wind rushing past, over THUNDER’s metal playlist screeching and crashing from the helicopter’s speakers since they’d left the BLACKBOX’s small airstrip- Exodus’ Bonded by Blood, one of Donnelley’s picks left over from his Tex days. He almost felt flattered they’d kept it in. Down below was Alaska, looking like a sprawling waste from this great of height, crawling past them on their flight to the Preserve. When the town of Noatak was only a mile away, TRIDENT’s helicopter pitched downwards and away, running toward the Noatak airport- nothing but a small tower and a beat up runway. Not that the town itself looked any better. “UMBRA 1-Actual, TRIDENT diverting to Area Bravo for search, over.”

“Roger, TRIDENT. Good hunting, out.” Donnelley said into his comm headset, watching them drift downwards elegantly towards Noatak.

And just like that, UMBRA and THUNDER were alone in the skies. Curiously, they hadn’t seen one patch of snow, the ground looked completely dry. It was as if the weather patterns were glitches in the system, but they all knew better. It was a strange world where it was safer to say it had something to do with the unnatural nature of the snowstorm than any glitch in the software. His tan 5.11 trousers bloused into his tan boots and OD Green soft shell jacket wouldn’t be out of place at least. He hooked his fingers into his tan plate carrier as he rested and waited, letting his MCX hang on the single-point. The scenery passing by reflected itself in his indiscernible expression under the aviator lenses. It was something of an omen he’d donned his helmet with the rest of THUNDER.

The mountains loomed in the distance, looking sprawling even from such a height as theirs. Somewhere in there was Ipiktok’s compound, and ARTEMIS. Dead or alive, no one could call it yet. “ETA 10 minutes to LZ.”

“Roger, 10 minutes to LZ.” Donnelley spoke again, holding up two fingers for the rest of them in the cabin not linked to the pilot’s comms. He spoke directly to the rest of his team now, which included THUNDER this time around, “Anyone have any last-minute questions? Any grievances we can promptly ignore?” He joked, his smirk showing itself.

Laine sat between two of the hulking THUNDER operators, unable to see much of the aerial view of the tundra.Their buzz of anticipation with the heavy metal competing with the thumping rotors did not infect her with the same excitement. She only felt the thickening dread as they got closer because nothing good ever came of following a siren’s call. She tried to look past Ghost, his bulk almost blocking her off from Donnelley’s view. At least the storm had vanished, that had to be something in their favor.

She tugged at her vest, the plate riding up and her shoulder holster poked into her armpit as she sat, the two minute warning almost a relief. The men on either side of her were bristling with hardware, even Dave and Donnelley were heavily armed and armored. Aside from her FBI issue Glock, she had in her lap the futuristic looking Magpul PDR that packed a harder punch in a small package. When he had handed it to her, she had asked Donnelley if they were invading a cult compound or Klendathu. 

The call that they were ten minutes from the LZ perked Queen up and he resisted the urge to reach into his pharmacy. It could wait until THUNDER was rolling and he flipped the simple old fashioned MP3 player that had weathered so many helicopter rides and ground pounding. The Exodus song was already fading out and he queued their song, the announcement to any of those snow packing assholes down below that they were about to get rocked if they tried any shit. 

The familiar guitar riff started up and Queen nodded his head, making brief eye contact with the boys of THUNDER and when the first line hit, he sang it out, pointing at Donnelley who was nodding his head with a wicked grin. Tex was lurking behind the responsible facade he kept for his UMBRA team and he knew it, he still felt it despite the mantle of leadership he bore. 

[i]THUNDER! THUNDER![/i] 

Queen slapped his thighs, singing along with the gravelly vocals of Brian Johnson at the top of his lungs, “[i]YOU BEEN THUNDERSTRUCK![/i]”

Between the loud blaring music and the motors of the helicopter's propellers, Ava’s groan as Queen added more noise to the cacophony was drowned out. She was seated as comfortably as she could be in the unforgiving seat she was strapped into, with even more military gear strapped onto her person.

To say she was unhappy would be a bit of an understatement. She was terrified for herself, for her companions around her and of what they would discover at the compound. Her mind kept gnawing on the shooting at the cabin like a dog with a bone. Being shot, the pain, the fear, the not knowing how her companions had fared.

All of that tacked on to the fact she was running on at most four and a half hours of sleep in the past 24 hours meant she had spent the bulk of the ride glaring at a particular spot on the floor. She had tried to will herself to sleep early on, but when that failed she settled for trying to bore a hole into the floor with her vision alone.

Though she did briefly shift her ire from the floor, to Donnelley when he made his quip about ignoring grievances. Then she went back to her previous target of ocular assault.

Dave was torn. He was scared, any sane man would be, but he also felt a growing excitement as he hefted the rifle in his hands and tried to keep his right leg from bouncing. It was another AK, not his own but one that had been hanging around the Program armory. His flannel was back, this one a brown-and-green number, insulated for the cold. It topped Coyote cargo pants and the battered hiking boots that had carried him over miles of Arkansas mountain. His plate carrier and helmet were Program issue, but comfortable enough. 

He adjusted the ride of his Sig for the fiftieth time, brushing his hand over his old Buck knife for luck before reaching down to touch the hat Ava had given him, which was tucked into a cargo pocket. He tried to give her a reassuring smile, saw that she wasn't interested, and settled for looking back out the window. 

Across from Dave, and in contrast to his excited nerves, Ghost lounged in his seat with his attention casually out the window. He wore a dark blue hoodie over charcoal ACU trousers, the same outfit he had been in when he first met UMBRA. His gear was pristine, Oakleys in place, his rifle held with the casual ease of a man who had done this more times than he could count.

Inside, Ghost boiled. He was keyed up, wound like a violent spring, ready to get his feet in the dirt and start spilling blood. He trained his eyes on Dave. The hick was doing well. He wasn't to Ghost's standards, but he was at least passable. Avery though…

He kicked a foot out, thumping Avery's boot and the other man jumped.

"You know your sector when we dismount, Pup?" He growled. 

Avery looked at Ghost dumbly, hoping that the huge homunculus of a man would think his comms weren’t switched on or something and leave him alone. Since they’d dusted off the airstrip in their Blackhawks he’d needed to piss, or shit, or both. And now that they were only ten minutes out, he added nausea to his list of symptoms. “My… my sector…” he swallowed the abundance of thick saliva that preceded a hose of vomit, “Um…” 

He looked to Donnelley for reassurance, but the other man only raised his brows at him expectantly. Avery spoke up, raising his voice out of anxiety more than any actual animosity, “Can you guys just fucking remind me, please, I’m trying here!”

"You're across from me," Ghost said. He bit back an internal sigh. "So you're taking the six on our side. Me, then you. The rest will fall out, they know their order." He paused.

"Just don't walk into the fucking tail rotor. You'll fuck up the bird. And die." 

“If you look to your left and don’t see my winnin’ smile, you’re doin’ somethin’ wrong.” Donnelley reached over and softly punched Avery’s arm, which didn’t look like it instilled any sense of surety or camaraderie. There was a lack of chatter as the helicopter flew its course.

“We are approaching LZ, over.”

“Affirmative. Cut the music!” Donnelley spoke, looking to his team, “Remember, on my command, we dismount. Hold position and keep watch over your sectors until the bird’s away. After that, we’ve got a pleasant hike ahead of us, so enjoy it.”

As soon as the bird began its descent, Donnelley’s heart pumped a good rhythm, one part excitement and another part anxiety. That intoxicating mixture he could only get in bar brawls whenever he wasn’t out doing this. And even then, it was like a sorry placebo. They hovered about a foot off the ground and Donnelley called out for his team to dismount, rushing to cover his sector and gave a sigh of relief when he saw Avery executing his movement well enough. They all lay prone among the rocks, grass, and dirt of the valley they’d been dropped into until the beating of the helicopter’s wings faded out more and more only for it to be replaced by the soft whisper of the wind. Donnelley wasn’t sure if he was the first to notice, but he was the first to say anything, “Hear that?” He whispered over his comms, silence, not even chirping birds or any other sign of wildlife. It would take some more time to discern if it was due to the raucous of the helicopter or something more… [i]concerning[/i], “Nothing.”

He got to his knee and brought out his map and compass, glancing between the map and the surrounding terrain for a few moments, he nodded to himself. Satisfied with his calculations, if they kept themselves heading southeast they’d be within a mile of Ipiktok’s compound and ARTEMIS’ last known. From there, they could use the small drones to scout ahead. “UMBRA on me, columns, keep your spacing and watch your sectors.”

A heartbeat before dismount Ghost pulled up the skull-print neck gaiter that he wore into battle, then he charged from the bird. For just a heartbeat, he was somewhere else. Back in some no-name mountain valley, maybe northern Afghanistan, maybe Pakistan. They were all the same. It was always the same. The mountain air, the gun in his hands, the roar of the chopper. By the time his foot hit the ground he was back, moving on automatic to his position, both eyes open. 

Dave hit dirt next to Poker, scanning his sector. His heart was pounding, his hands sweating inside his Mechanix gloves, but it was all he could do to keep the grin off his face, despite his terror. As the helicopter left he heard Donnelley in his ear and paused, straining. He was right; even with the chopper having scared off most of the large game, the birds and bugs at least should have recovered almost immediately. He fought down his unease as Donnelley called them in and fell into his appointed spot, his eyes on the trees around them. 

Laine ducked her head and jumped down, landing with a thump among the lichens and grass. She went to her knees as the men fanned out then lay down on her stomach until the helicopter left. It was quiet but for the distant thump of the fading rotors and she looked around, the ground not the morass of mud she expected from the snow melt. At Donnelley’s order, she pushed herself up and looked around. 

The countryside was rolling and open tundra, rocky outcroppings glaciers had left behind the only thing more vertical than the stunted shrubs. The landscape rolled up into the mountains ahead and behind them in the distance the sun glinted off the Noatak river and its sprawling tributaries. There was nothing else and like Donnelley had observed, it was quiet. 

Laine had seen enough nature documentaries to know that insects swarmed during the summer months, the short lived growing and breeding season before the snow returned. “Maybe it was the storm that drove away the wildlife,” she suggested in a low voice, moving towards her preassigned position among UMBRA. 

Queen scanned his sector, unimpressed by the landscape. It was ugly, drab, and featureless but the maps he had studied showed an undulation of deceptively flat land before they got into the foothills that quickly rose into mountains. A place men could lay low and not be seen, especially if they knew the country since birth. The unnatural silence bothered him as well, like the land around them held its breath for what might happen next. 

He moved to his position, his voice still upbeat over the comms, “Ok boys and girls, time to earn our Arctic cult hunting merit badges.” 

“Radio silence, Queen,” Poker came over the comms, “Head on a swivel, mouth closed and ears open.”

“Let’s move, we got six miles to cover.” Donnelley spoke, letting his SIG rest in the crooks of his elbows as he got up from one knee and addressed his team, pulling out his clicker which was identical to the ones the rest of them had, “If you find anything, give three clicks. Two clicks for yes, one for no. If something got to ARTEMIS it won’t get us, heads on a swivel.”

“Let’s go.” Donnelley began his walk, his column made up of UMBRA parallel to THUNDER’s. His team might not be chock full of killers like his old team, but they could hold their own. A part of him reminded himself that his world wasn’t the same as Tex’s was.

Just as Greedy had said, Noatak was rough country. It sure didn’t look like it, but it surely was. There wasn’t any civilization for miles, and where even Blackriver didn’t feel all that isolated with the presence of Clarksburg and Charleston, Noatak was truly lonely and isolated. Donnelley had set waypoints every half mile or so between the Infil LZ and ARTEMIS’ last known. He pulled his map and compass from one of his pouches and surveyed the land around with a few quick glances. He hadn’t had to refer to a map so much since Bolivia with THUNDER. The closer they got, the more Donnelley himself felt uneasy even though they were still five and a half miles out. He looked around them and saw only short brush, sparse and stubby trees, and flat ground. Not much in the way of cover. Maui would be able to see for miles, tag someone in the gut with his DMR and watch them run away for three days, it was so flat.

After a mile of walking, he decided to stop. With visibility like this, the drones would be less restrained in their speed and he halted his column, Poker doing the same. “Rest up for a minute, hydrate.” He said over their comms, though at a distance like this, it really was just an echo of his own voice in their ears, “UMBRA 1-4(Ava), bring out the UAVs. The rest of you maintain a perimeter.”

Ava nodded, the slightly too big helmet on her head bobbing backing and forth with the motion. She set down her pack, grateful to take a moment to rest as she brought out the Black hornet drones in their protective little cases. Despite her tiredness, she was surprised at how well she was keeping up with the rest of the group, that had been one of the things she had been worrying about since the briefing. 

It looked like all those years of cycling and core strengthening exercises were paying off though, despite the fact all she wanted to do was flop down and go to sleep for eight hours. Maybe the sceneria was helping too, despite the danger she knew was lurking somewhere within these rolling hills; it was still a very beautiful landscape. She wished she was enjoying it under more pleasant circumstances.

“How far out should I send them Do-Tex?” She asked, quickly catching herself before she called him by his actual surname. She grimaced and looked down in embarrassment, fidgeting with getting the drones up and running.

Donnelley checked his compass against the map, “Keep ‘em goin’ out our direction, southeast.” He said, “Mile out, push the limit. I want to see what’s ahead of us before it sees us.”

She nodded again, reaching up this time to keep the helmet from sliding around on her head. She picked up one of the little drones and held it up in her hand and turned on the heavy duty tablet she had been given, activating the cameras and giving them each a quick check to make sure they were working. 

“Okay, Mo off you go.” She whispered, glancing down at the table as with a soft, high pitched whine, the rotors turned on. It gently hovered out of Ava’s hand, rising up a few feet or so before darting up into the sky like a hummingbird on the wing. 

Ava watched its ascent and then looked back down, focusing on the landscape they could now see through the drone on the tablet.

The minutes ticked by as Ava urged the little drone to fly as quickly as it could to its one mile radius. She switched through the three cameras periodically, but saw nothing other than the grasslands and more picturesque views. The nice thing about the terrain was that at least it made it easy to find anything out of the ordinary.

After the monotony of grass, grass and more grass, Ava suddenly perked up. “Something is moving.” She said to the others, narrowing her eyes down at the brown spot moving around down below the drone, almost blending in with the tall, dull grass. “I thiiink it’s a bear.” She shivered as she brought the drone down lower to get a better look. “Yeah, it’s just a bear. Grizzly maybe? Good thing we know he’s there so we can-Body!” She exclaimed, standing up to her feet with wide eyes focused intently on the tablet. “Body, body! The bear is pawing at a human body and-Aaaah!” 

Ava screamed and threw the tablet away from her, backing away from it as though it was burning her hands, stumbling back and away from the device. “Bear gone! Bear gone!” She said, her face growing sickly pale as her body started to shake and tremble. 

Donnelley was facing the direction the UAV was sent until he heard Ava’s scream. He almost jumped when the shrill scream cut through the relative silence, turning and placing a hand on Ava’s shoulder, “What?” He asked, trying to gather more words to say, “What’s wrong? What do you mean it’s [i]gone?[/i]”

Laine watched the little drone drift up into the sky, taking a moment to drink from her water bottle as Ava scanned the area. She was not paying attention to her, scanning the tundra ground until her voice called out. A body. A bear. 

Before she had a chance to ask the scream cut through the silence, raising the hairs on the back of Laine’s neck. “Gone? Did it run off or just...”

“Can you play it back, the recording?” Laine asked, moving to pick up the tablet that had been thrown. 

“Easy sugar.” Dave was suddenly there, resting a calloused hand on the back of Ava’s neck. He looked down at her and gave her his best attempt at a comforting smile, though his own heart was pounding from hearing her sudden scream. “Relax. Easy, now. What’d ya see?”

Ava looked up at Donnelley and Dave, her eyes filled with tears and her body shaking like a leaf. Her almost hyperventilated breathing started to calm slightly, enough for her to get in some deep breaths with their support. “There-there was a bear and-and it was digging at-at something on the ground.” She explained quickly, looking between Donnelley and Dave, with her eyes mostly resting on Dave’s comforting features. “And it was a body, a human body in-in camo, it took-took a bite out of the body,” She paused as her breathing hitched and she wrapped her arms around herself. 

“The bear...It turned into dust.” She said, looking into both of their faces with an expression of fear and earnest conviction. “It-it crumbled in on itself like-like it was hollow and just turned into dust.” She grabbed onto Donnelley’s arm, looking him in the eye with a desperate expression. “No one should touch that body, please don’t make anyone touch it!”

“Nobody’s goin’ to.” Donnelley reassured Ava, placing a hand over hers that was in a death grip around his forearm, but he paid no mind to her surprisingly strong grip. He turned to the others, “We’re movin’ out, check out that body, see if it’s one of ARTEMIS. Keep your spacin’, whatever got him might still be out here.”

Laine checked the tablet, it was still working and she looked to see if the footage had been saved. “We certainly need to get a look at that body,” she said absently, her thoughts turned to bear disintegrating into dust. She rewatched the footage and the continued stream of the body laying in the stunted grass. 

“That’s weird, reminds me a little of the...” she stopped, a strange sense of superstition she had not felt since playing Bloody Mary at a sleepover that to speak it would invoke it. Laine tried to shake the feeling away, to be logical but there was little in the way of logic in what she had witnessed while with the Program. 

She walked slowly, unable to keep her eyes off the screen as she watched the bear vanish again, finally pulling in the image of the body, pushing the drone to hover closer and closer. “Look at this,” she stopped in her tracks. 

Queen noticed Laine stop and stepped a little closer, “Beep, beep, Doc. Don’t get too distracted, we’re gonna get a close look soon enough.” 

Laine pulled her gaze away to look over her shoulder, blinking then shaking her head sharply. “Right.” 

She glanced at it again, the image still shocking. The figure’s exposed hand looked like the elk jerky she had brought along in her pack and it made her stomach turn. Laine zoomed back out, so the drone could be more useful as an overwatch of the area. The crime scene, she thought about it that way, it made it feel familiar and something she could handle. 

Dave gave Ava’s shoulder a final squeeze and then drifted away, back to his spot in the lineup. His palms were sweaty beneath his gloves; he hadn’t watched the footage himself, but he hated seeing Ava so shaken. Laine seemed fine, she had a clinical detachment that probably came with her day job, but Ava wasn’t used to that sort of separation. He gave her a concerned glance and then turned his attention outwards, his eyes combing the surroundings for potential threats. 

Donnelley’s voice came over the comms as they walked, hushed and a little nonchalant despite the ruckus earlier. He’d been doing this a while, and wanted to try to take the edge off, “Hey, Lucky, if we gotta run again make sure you watch your step. Not like last time.” His voice took on a more serious edge the closer they got, though the body was still a mile off, “THUNDER pulls security, I’ll search the body.”

Their walk was uneventful, no monsters, none of them turned to dust, but none of them particularly felt in the right spirit for talking. He didn’t blame them, the spot he put himself in was even giving him some anxiety. If the bear had touched the body before disintegrating, would he? After the amount of brisk walking they stopped, THUNDER facing outwards and taking a knee, rifles at low ready and scanning the area around them. Donnelley stepped around the body while keeping a respectable distance, his SIG pointed at the body. It didn’t move, but after Baughman’s wife and everything else he’d seen, he didn’t trust bodies.

He squeezed off two loud cracks from his SIG into the corpse’s chest, and one more in the head. Instead of blood, it was simply dust that rolled off into the wind. He nodded at Avery, the other man putting his rifle’s sights on the body as Donnelley moved closer. Avery and Donnelley shared a long gaze with each other as Donnelley breathed and readied himself to potentially die. He wondered if it would hurt. His usual arrogant and cocky smirk was weighed down with something, but he forced himself to keep it, “If any of y’all have anythin’ you always wanted to say to me, I’d do it now.”

Laine moved the drone closer to record what might happen and handed the tablet back to Ava. “You just need to keep it steady, you don’t need to watch the screen.” 

She gave her shoulder a pat and moved towards Donnelley, her heart starting to pound and her mouth felt suddenly dry. “I’m here to help,” Laine said, standing less than a foot away from the team leader. Her gaze was on him, the words she would like to say would remain unsaid but she would at least be with him. 

“I suppose latex gloves wouldn’t do much,” she said dryly, “But I’ve got some with the first aid kit.” 

Donnelley shrugged, still looking at the body, “Think I could get some of those?”

Dave frowned, taking a few steps closer and looking from Avery to Donnelley, and then at the body. 

“You ain’t seriously gonna touch that, right?” He said. “That’s...Just poke it with a fuckin’ stick, man. Y’all saw that thing disintegrate a bear, puttin’ your hands on it just seems kinda...Stupid.” 

Ava had a white knuckled grip on the tablet, the heavy duty plastic creaking with the pressure. “Don’t touch it!” She said, taking a few panic steps forward. “You said no one was going to touch it! Don’t fucking touch it!” She pleaded, her voice cracking and breaking as her breath started to quicken with heightened stress.

Dave reached out and took her by the shoulder again. “I’m kinda with Ava, man. Get some dudes out here with spell books an’ space suits. We got enough trouble on our hands with a damn witchdoctor an’ a bunch armed-up Eskimos.” 

Donnelley held up a hand, “I ain’t gonna poke his ID out his ass with a stick, man. Gotta confirm.” Donnelley sighed hard, breath growling in his throat, “Laine, gloves. Please.”

Laine glanced back at Dave and Ava, holding her hand up slightly before letting the strap of her pack shift down her shoulder. It swung forward and she took a knee to open it for the first aid kit, taking out a pair of gloves. She glanced at Donnelley, “Does there seem to be a bite on the body, that you can see? Any tissue damage other than the desiccation?”

She snapped on the gloves, handing over another pair and looked Donnelley in the eyes. He stared back for a moment, then shook his head, “I’m gonna search his pack, I’m not touchin’ this fucker’s skin.”

He took the gloves Laine handed to him and pulled them on, a tight fit around his thicker hands, and he hoped they didn’t split open while he was searching.

Laine watched him struggle to pull them on, frowning slightly, “Why not let me do it? You take some pictures while we’re this close.”

“Laine,” Donnelley had a firmness to his voice, but a softness to his eyes, “I said I’d do it.”

Without waiting for her to protest he reached forward to gingerly take hold of one of the zippers, slightly cringing as he did in preparation for the possibility of not existing anymore.

Ava dropped the tablet, taking a panicked step forward but Dave’s hand on her shoulder kept her back. 

His fingers clamped around the zipper as he sat there, still. The moment seemed to come to a head as everything and everyone seemed to quiet in anticipation. Donnelley’s eyes were screwed shut and a few long moments passed. He opened his eyes, a small chuckle escaping his lips, tentative like it was unsure it was safe to come out. Then he laughed, voice high as he looked around at the rest of them, “Holy shit, could you imagine…?” He chuckled again, shaking his head, “Jesus Christ…”

Laine took a deep breath, the urge to argue with him strong but it was not the time, not in front of two teams. She watched him start to unzip the backpack and breathed out sharply when he remained solid and alive. She pulled her phone out and stood up, “I’ll take some photos of the corpse [i]in situ[/i]. Not that we’ll be moving it anytime soon.” 

Over the comm, she said, “It’s alright, we’re not touching the body.”

Laine took careful steps around, crouching to get whatever images she could of the leathery skin, pulled tight against the skeleton, the flesh seemed to have shriveled to nothing. She tapped the button gingerly with gloves still on and breathed out, she could see the side of the face. “Completely desiccated, like a mummy. Reminds me of that ice man they found in the Alps but the victim has only been here a day or so. Assumed to be part of SIREN or ARTEMIS, no wounds observed but body cannot be touched...”

Laine paused, but then added, “See drone footage of scavenging bear, it...disintegrated after biting into the thigh, there’s no blood because there’s nothing left but dried tissue.” 

She spoke in a calm voice, the recorder app on her phone catching the words and the sound of the wind around them. There were still no sounds of birds or insects, just the wind. Laine went back to her observations, trying to think about what might have done this. “His eyes...still intact from what I can see, completely shriveled attached to the optic nerve.”

Laine tried to get lower, to get a picture of the face that was turned sideways pressed against dry sedge grass. She glanced up over the body at Donnelley, her relief that nothing had happened to him was still in her eyes but kept her conversation light, “Looks like you missed the Thanos snap, any luck with the ID?” 

Donnelley was elbow deep in the pack, rummaging for the last of the things it was stuffed with as he was surrounded by clothes and other such supplies. As expected, his gear was sanitized, nothing to tie the body to a name so far. He opened another pouch and smiled when he grabbed something square and hard like plastic. A cell phone, not unlike the ones they carried. Unfortunately, Donnelley’s face wasn’t programmed into the phone to unlock it, and he doubted whatever the corpse had left for a face would help, “We got somethin’. Ava,” he called out, holding the cellphone out to her, “Think you got somethin’ to unlock this thing?”

Ava let out a deep sigh of relief, the tension she had been holding in seeming to drain from her very bones. Her hands were still shaking and her heart still raced being so close to that cursed corpse, and having her friends even closer to it, but they were alright. They were still there. They didn’t turn into hollow husks and then get swept away by the wind. 

She focused on Donnelley as he held up a cell phone from the body, her throat tightening as she looked to Dave nervously. She didn’t want to get any closer to that body.

Dave winked at her and gave her shoulder a squeeze. As he watched Donnelley and Laine work he felt a tickle, something strange scratching at his woodsman’s instincts. He walked a little closer to the body and squatted near its feet, his eyes on the ground. 

“Got prints,” he murmured. He hesitated. “Looks...Weird. Like they’re frozen or somethin’.” 

He drew his knife and reached out to prod at the iced-over prints with the blade, frowning as the thin crust of ice cracked and the dirt beneath crumbled. His eyes followed the prints back and he stood, grunting as his knees audibly popped. 

As Donnelley gave her no answer, she went back to examining the body. The clothing was intact but the flesh looked ancient, brown and leathery pulled tight against bones. It reminded her of an Incan mummy, frozen in the Andes in perfect but dehydrated condition. Laine squatted down, carefully positioning the phone to try and get pictures where she could not see. Her hand moved closer and she felt it, like reaching into a deep freezer. 

The cold seeped through the latex glove, a biting cold that made her hand ache just within a few moments. She jerked her hand back, careful not to touch the corpse. 

“It’s cold, very cold,” she said, recording it but talking to her teammates. “Dave, what was that?”

Laine turned to see the mountain man crouching over marks in the short clumped grass. She looked back at the sedge and lichen around the body. It was brown and rough, not like the green and golden reds in the rest of the area. Frozen and dead. 

“What did you find?” she asked, following the line from the body to where Dave was.

“Frozen footprints and dead ground,” Dave said. He was following the tracks, his knife still in his hand. “Shit ain’t right. Run back this way, ‘bout twenty feet or so I’d say. Like he started gettin’ cold before he dropped.” He frowned and slipped his knife back into its sheath with the ease of a man who had carried one for most of his life. Then he pulled off a glove, produced a can of Copenhagen from his pocket, and gave it a few snaps. 

“It’s kinda...I dunno. Like the rest of the ground ain’t froze. Like he’s the one who…” Dave trailed off, taking the opportunity to both marshal his thoughts and stuff a fat wad of dip into his lip. “Like it’s him who was cold, ya know?” 

“Maybe it was the snowstorm?” Avery offered as he stepped up, taking a moment to heft the big LMG he was carrying. “I mean, they said it was snowing before we left, we got put on hold before we could even dust off. Had to be pretty cold.”

“Snow melted, or… maybe that ain’t the right word, I don’t know. Ground ain’t muddy, snow’s not anywhere.” Donnelley shook his head, looking out at the tundra like it’d insulted him as he stepped up beside Avery. his hands in his pockets and his SIG dangling on its sling, “If I was stupid I’d sniff the poor bastard back there, see if he smelled like ozone or somethin’ ‘fore I blew away.”

“Magic?” Avery cringed at the word, as if that was the most ridiculous part of this whole world the Program put around them.

Dave glanced at Avery and shook his head, though there was nothing derisive in the gesture, just simple disagreement. 

“I’m from the Ozarks, lived there my whole life,” he said. “I’ve helped with a lotta search an’ rescue, stuff like that. I’ve seen people who’ve died from exposure, from snow storms...This ain’t that. This fella looks like he’s been freeze-dryin’ for decades, not like someone who froze to death in a storm. Them tracks are recent too, or they’da been gone a long time ago.” 

He pointed at the corpse. “Whatever did that, it wasn’t no weather. Shit ain’t right.” 

Laine looked up at the men as she knelt close to the corpse, “It’s not natural at all. He’s radiating cold like a chunk of dry ice. Every bit of moisture is gone, even his eyes look like raisins and they’re usually the first to decompose. Not that he’s had a chance if he’s part of one of the teams. Not enough time, especially considering the temperatures. No insects on him either, from what I can see. I don’t want  to get too close and accidentally brush against it.” 

She stood up carefully and turned her phone on video record, “Let me get those footprints, we should take that soil sample. There’s some ziplocs in my bag, the first aid kit. Now, I’m the last person to instantly think magic but without an expert to examine his body, it’s hard to think of anything natural that could have caused this or that freak storm. Even if the ground is permafrost, you think the snow melt would still be around.” 


Donnelley’s narrowed eyes scanned the far tundra, mountains in the distance, “Wind-Walker.” He said, lip turning up and he snorted something into his face and spat it far, “We should move. I’m not turnin’ out like him if another storm comes around.”

“Wind-Walker?” Laine repeated as she handed Dave a small sandwich ziploc bag, who drew his knife, collected some of the earth from the prints, and then returned it. “It’s the same thing that those journals and RCMP’s reports mentioned. The one that the journal of that gold miner said his workers were worried about. Ish...Ithakwa...something like that. The snow storms that seemed to coincide with those mentions.”

She looked at her phone, the charge had dropped to almost 50% after all the use of the recorder and camera. Laine turned it off after the last overview picture of the scene, tucking it away so she could grab her bag. 

Cautiously Ava approached the group around the body, the drone tablet back in her hands with the small device hovering above and viewing the scene. She still had a nervous eye on the corpse, but everyone being careful and remaining unharmed eased some of her fear.

She walked up to Donnelley, taking the phone from him and giving it a look over. “I can get out the SIM card and pull up whatever was on the phone,” She said, looking up at Donnelley with a faint frown. “But I need to sit down to do it.” She motioned with the tablet slightly. “And I should probably keep sweeping with the drones in case there are anymore bodies. This one’s battery is about to run out.”

Donnelley nodded, checking Ava over with his eyes. She seemed alright, but he knew the truth about judging a book by its cover, “Okay. Put another one in the air and keep it ahead of us.” Donnelley turned from Ava and circled his finger in the air, calling out, “Regroup. Wedge formation, let’s move.”

>2 MILES OUT FROM OBJECTIVE...///

“What the f-“

“Shut up!” Donnelley cut Avery off, his harsh whisper over the comms. He looked over his shoulder at the rest of them and signaled for them to drop to a knee and take up defensive positions. For those of them who weren’t Avery, Donnelley, or Ava the things in the sky were only dots.

Donnelley waved Avery over to him and held his hand out for the binoculars hanging from Avery’s neck. Avery placed them in Donnelley’s waiting palm and he looked through them towards the dots in the sky. Avery watched Donnelley intently as he stared for a few long seconds before handing them back. Avery went to take them and found that Donnelley still held onto them with a strong grip, still staring at the dots in the sky. Avery cleared his throat, looking at the others before saying, “Donnelley, man… my binoculars.”

Donnelley let them go and shook his head, rubbing at his face, “You saw that?” Avery nodded at him, though Donnelley was still staring at the dots and couldn’t see it, until he looked at the other man, “I want us on full alert.”

Donnelley waved his two fingers in the air to regroup his teams, “Let’s move.”

They continued on, wordless. Donnelley was quiet, but so were the rest of them, “Ava, switch the UAV out and get another one with a fresh battery up.”

Ava looked up at the dots in the sky, squinting her eyes and frowning in bewilderment. She glanced down and made the current UAV drone turn around to head back for them. She leaned herself to the side, her head cocked all the way to the side with the slightly too big helmet on her head threatening to fall off. “What are those, they aren’t moving.”

She looked back down at the tablet, noting the battery of the UAV on it’s way back and directed it up toward the dots in the sky. “There’s still some battery left on HAL, I’ll have it move closer to see what those things are.”

“Give the tablet for the second set to Laine. You two stay back with Maui when we get on-target.” Donnelley told Ava.

Laine trudged along, the weight of the pack starting to pull at her shoulders and carrying the Magpul PDR over her shoulder to keep her hands free. Her attention was on the path when she heard Donnelley, his voice tense. She looked around and up in the sky where she could see him looking with binoculars but saw nothing but a couple of dots. 

When Ava handed her the other tablet, she took it and then looked up at again. “Well, that’s weird,” she said dryly, glancing back up at it then got the instruction from Ava to set another fresh drone up to provide scouting and overwatch for the small team. 

As Avery and the THUNDER team members set up their equipment, Laine watched Donnelley and the rest go forward and she forced herself to look away from his back and to the tablet to focus on the task at hand. 

While Laine manned the drone Ava dubbed Baymax, she continued to fly HAL up toward the strange unmoving dots in the sky. At first she thought they might be weather equipment of some kind, but they didn’t move with the wind and she couldn’t see any tethers. 

She continued to frown as she pushed the little drone to fly just a bit further.

Then the dots finally resolved themselves into shapes and she took a sharp inhale of breath, pressing the tablet to her chest with wide eyes. She looked over to Laine next to her and tugged on her sleeve with a shaking hand to get her attention. “Laine, um...I figured out what those dots are.” She turned the tablet around and showed her the screen.

The three dots had finally come into focus enough to reveal three human silhouettes, hanging in mid-air.

Laine was making her drone, Baymax, do methodical circuits in a radius around the men heading toward their objective and their own position. She could see Donnelley on point and Avery beside him and the smallest man, Queen, near the back. The large gun toting ox was likely Ghost and he was on the flank. She heard Ava and the tone of her voice made her look up. 

She saw the image on the tablet and blinked, stepping closer. “How the...fuck? Is that real?”

Laine stopped herself, she had come to accept the weird shit by now though it was still a struggle against her natural tendency towards logic. The human figures just hung there, reminding her at once of the old Superman movies and Zod and his cronies hovering in mid flight.  “Did you see any movement, can you tell how far they are?”


Ava shook her head, making sure the drone was recording before she had it start to fly back to them. “Maybe another mile, I was really pushing the drone to get that much of an image and it needs to come back to charge or we’ll lose it.” She took in a deep breath, trying to steady her shaking hands. “I really don’t like any of this, but there’s nothing I can do…” She trailed off, looking around her at the men setting up and then the ones going forward, her throat clenching and heart dropping. 

“We can warn them,” Laine said, still looking over at Ava’s tablet as she reached up to her comm, “...UMBRA 1-Actual,  do you read?”

As she waited her thoughts raced, nothing in her reading had mentioned flying people or anything even close to it.  Neither had the mention of death by deep freeze or finding a frozen body, the human sized piece of dry ice that turned those that touched it into dust. Maybe that was because the accounts were written by survivors and they had not got so close. Her mouth felt dry and she called again, “UMBRA 1-Actual, come in.” 

“UMBRA 1-Actual, go, UMBRA 1-2.” Donnelley’s voice came over the comms as the rest of his element followed him in after they’d shrugged their packs and left them with Avery, Maui, and Poker. Every so often, his eyes would go to the bodies hanging limp in the sky, an unbearable tingling in the back of his neck with the expectation they’d drop on them at any moment. “Keep a fuckin’ eye on those damned things.” He said to the other men around him.

“UMBRA 1-4 got a visual. It’s three...they look like human figures, just hovering. I saw the footage, it's more weird for you, Actual. The drone could not get close enough the charge was too low but we’ll take another look, 1-2 out,” Laine said into the comm as she guided her own drone overhead of the men making a sweeping circle of the terrain around them while she still had them in range. 

Turning to Ava she asked, “Think we can get Baymax up there?”

Ava looked over to Laine, shutting her pack with the fresh drone, Glados, in her hand. “Um, yeah, I think you can.” She said glancing up at the suspended bodies with a shudder. “You do that and I’ll keep an eye on the area around.” She pointed to the tablet. “Make sure you record it so we can take it back to the base.” She looked back up, unable to help herself. “It’s...like they’re frozen in midair.”

Laine nodded at that, “They do, it’s very strange.”

She gave Ava an ironic glance, how many times would they say those words. Everything since they landed in the freak snowstorm had been strange. What could freeze dry a person or suspend bodies hundreds of feet off the ground. Laine directed the drone upward, the view on the tablet growing more in detail. She frowned, tapping the screen to zoom in, now features coming into view. 

The face of one person coming into focus and she could see the details. Laine tapped the record button and began making a study of the individuals, trying to keep the drone steady in the higher altitude winds. Directing the camera closer, the faces came into focus. They were male and unlike the body on the ground, they did not have the dehydrated appearance. They looked like corpses in a morgue, their camo tactical gear undamaged and she saw no wounds save one.

The man closest to her had a gunshot, a small entrance wound under his eye, a perfect little circle. Laine panned the drone upward and over, searching for the exit wound. Her eyes widened in surprise, she expected to find it but not this fresh. The bullet had entered under his eye and exited from near the base of the skull, a fist sized hole in the base of the cranium. The blood, shards of bone, and chunks of brain had sprayed down his back and it still glistened wetly. It should have been dried to a dull maroon but it looked fresh as if it had just occurred. Frozen in time as there had been hours between ARTEMIS’s arrival and UMBRA making it to the site. 

“Can you believe this shit?” she said, watching the tablet, talking to herself as much as Ava. 

She got as close as she dared with the drone trembling in the wind her own shaky hands. Laine recorded the footage and panned the other two men but they seemed uninjured but clearly dead. She reached up, clutching the tablet one handed and hit the comm button, “UMBRA Actual, this is 1-2. I have an update on the trio, do you read?” 

Donnelley was crawling on his stomach with the others just behind the crest of the hill. They’d stopped just before they could see over it, the compound was just on the other side. When he heard Laine’s voice over the comms, he acknowledged in a whisper, “UMBRA Actual, go, 1-2.”

Hearing his hushed tone, she dropped her voice though the incredulity was still audible. 

"Three men, dressed like the first but they're not jerky.  All dead, only one with a visible wound. Gunshot under the right eye, exit wound from left occipital...base of the skull. High angle entry and exit. So someone had a steep angle, but you. know that. But that's not the weirdest, the blood and brains still look wet, like it happened minutes ago rather than hours. All three figures look like fresh corpses in the morgue. I don't know how these guys are just hanging out but something put them there. Over."

She felt a little breathless, the adrenaline kicking up as she described what the drone showed her. 

“Doesn’t sound like a firefight…” Donnelley said, thinking out loud and his voice trailing off, “Execution?”

But that didn’t even begin to explain why the fuck they were in the sky. Again, he glanced at them, hanging over the scene ominously, “You or 1-4 got eyes on anything moving in the compound, over?”

“I’m coming into view of the compound now.” Ava said over the comms, guiding the drone up as high as she could to hopefully avoid detection as the compound, the only piece of human civilization in this rolling expanse of grasslands, came into view. 

It was nestled at the base of a small mountain, surrounded on all sides by rising hills like the one the forward team was crawling their way up of. A landmark that immediately caught her eye on the compound grounds was a patch of gravel where a small, civilian model helicopter sat; it’s back tail rotor appeared to have been ripped off by some kind of explosion.

As the drone flew down closer she saw something troubling in the middle of the compound. “Um, I see bodies.” She explained into the comms, glancing nervously over to Laine. “10 human bodies, strewn about the ground in the middle of the compound. They’re dressed in civilian clothing, there’s a lot of blood, uh, looks like they all either have AR15s or handguns by their sides.” She swallowed thickly as she piloted the small drone down even lower to get a better look at one of the bodies.

Her stomach flipped as she tried not to dwell too much on the fact she was looking at what was once a living person. “They, they look like members of Ipiktok’s family. Um.” She trailed off and breathed out as she turned the drone away. “I’m not seeing any other movement.”

As if to punctuate Ava’s observation, a lone wind rushed through the tundra, waltzing the grass and making Donnelley shiver as they lay prone just behind the crest of the hill. Maui, Poker, and Avery knew their jobs as Overwatch on the compound. Avery held his FN Mk48 close, Maui had his SIG 716, and Poker was equipped with the strike designator. Somewhere above them a Predator Drone was ready and waiting to send a Hellfire missile nose-first at someone’s forehead.

“Ghost, Queen, you’re with me and Lucky. We’ll search the houses, catalogue anything we need to for CORAL NOMAD, and check the IDs on the bodies in there. Make a few more if we have to.” Donnelley nudged Dave next to him, “You forget all the shit we did in the shoothouses yet, Lucky?”

"Huh? Nah, I'm good man, I'm good." Dave shot Donnelley a confident grin, doing his best to hide the tension in his stomach and the pounding of his heart. His hands were steady as he hefted his rifle. 

Beside him Ghost rolled his head atop his shoulders, loosening the tension in his thick neck. 

"Time to play another round," he grated, flexing his hands. "Let's go. I'm point."

“Rog’, you’re point. I’m second, Queen’s got the rear.”

Queen flashed a smile but let the opportunity for a joke pass, reaching into his pocket eagerly and took out a small vial. Without much care for measuring, he eyeballed a small amount of white powder and rubbed it on his gums, mindful of Dave's presence. He quickly followed it up with a swig from his canteen and grimaced, flexing his numbing face.

"Got it,"  he said with an effort not to slur, running a hand over his beard. 

“UMBRA 1-Actual to all, we are moving on Area Alpha. Starting stopwatch…” Donnelley started the stopwatch on his tactical watch buckled on his wrist, “Now.”

 Poker did the same some distance behind them, “Roger, 1-Actual, stopwatch is rolling, over.”

“Move.” Donnelley said, and they did, falling into place as they made their approach on the compound in a jog. Without a fence it was that much easier to breach, but stepping over the body of a girl who looked only seventeen didn’t help Donnelley’s nerves. Had to be one of Ipiktok’s daughters. They made it to the first building of three, the smallest house on the property, and stacked on the door.

Tex took one side while Ghost, Lucky, and Queen took the other. He reached over and checked the handle, unlocked. No need to kick it open or take the hinges off with his shotgun. Tex nodded to Ghost, twisting the knob and throwing the door open.

Ghost rushed the room, rifle up and moving with his eyes as he scanned his sector. His brain was in combat mode, cataloging dead space and seeking threats, and it wasn't until he had reached his position that he actually began noting the details. 

The one-room cabin was simply furnished, with a minimum of electrical appliances, likely to save the generators. Sturdy furniture, wood stove. He saw a small shelf with what looked like board games. All things you might expect at a summer camp. He grimaced. The residual boredom soaked into the walls made him want to shoot himself just to have something to do. 

Pushing aside his generalized disgust for the 'simple life', he raised a hand and indicated the dead space he had behind the bed on the other side of the room, and the counter across from him. 

Queen stepped quickly through the door, his eyes darting around the room. It was dim but he felt confident as Ghost cleared it but kept his gun in hand. He moved to bed, it was an iron bed frame that looked like it was from the time of dog sleds delivering vaccines. He saw a few personal items and wondered briefly where they plugged in to do the facebook page or watch whale porn. It was snug, small and sturdy against the brutal Arctic winters and had a rustic charm of the sort he would never want to stay too long in. 

He glanced at Dave, “Hey Lucky, remind you of home?”

Flashing a grin, he turned on the flashlight and the gleam illuminating his eyes. The sea-colored irises only a ring around the large dilated pupils,  “We’re looking for monsters, what better than under the bed.”

He put out the light and slung his rifle back to position himself at the side of the bed so he could grab the boxspring and lift it with the mattress, holding it up as Ghost covered the bed. Queen shoved it over and let it hit the far wall, knocking into the nightstand.

Dave, finishing his sweep, opened his mouth to reply but thought better of it when he saw the thunderous glare that Ghost had fixed on Queen. He lowered his rifle as Ghost declared the room [i]'clear'[/i] with his basso growl, then stepped back as the big man stormed over to grab Queen by his vest.

"Fuck are you doing?" Ghost snarled. "You a goddamn amateur like ARTEMIS? Just tell whoever is under the bed to blow your balls off, I guess." He pulled Queen close, their helmets meeting with a clack. "Get your shit together." Then he shoved Queen away, walking to the other side of the cabin. 

Tex sighed under his breath at the small altercation, already feeling like home among the ravenous wolves of the THUNDER pack as he watched Ghost stomp over his way again. Any other arrangement of killers might be at each other’s throats, but THUNDER always seemed to toe the line of consummate professionals enough to bark and snap at each other without blood being shed. “1-Actual to all, first cabin clear,” he said, “Commencing search, over.”

He brought his wrist up and looked at the watch, stopwatch still going, “Time reads zero-eight-thirty, stopwatch at five minutes-thirty-one seconds and counting, how copy?”

“Good copy, 1-Actual, time matches mine. No time anomalies.” Poker said over the comms, “Continue with search, over.”

“Roger, out.” Tex returned his hand to his side, his SIG hanging from its sling while he held the pistol grip and addressed the others, “Tear the place apart, catalogue the weird shit.”

Queen felt the powerful grip as Ghost yanked him closer, knowing he had fucked up even as the words were growled out. The grin vanished from Queen's face as their helmets collided. He looked up at the blank sunglasses but he knew those cold shark eyes were glaring daggers at him behind the reflective lenses. 

A chill ran down his back, a creeping feeling recalling the ease of how Ghost would kill with little emotion. Not hidden or masked, just absent. Queen glanced away, not arguing or getting smart with the big operator this time.

"Yeah, kinda got ahead of myself," he muttered, pulling away as Ghost released him. Queen did not look at Dave or Tex as he stepped over the bed rail to check the nightstand drawers. 

He tossed the drawers, finding nothing of interest, not even a stash of weed. Queen tossed the drawer on the sagging mattress that slumped to the ground and stepped over it to get to the TV console. It was a bulky thing made to hold an old fashioned entertainment system of the wood panel encased television and the brick like VCR. In the cabinets were VHS tapes crammed in, several Disney films and 80s action movies, the plastic on the cases faded yellow and ragged at the ends. 

Queen picked through them one by one, popping the cases open and closing them back up when he saw the black cassettes. The smell of the tape and the plastic, the dust on the convex glass of the tv reminded him suddenly of visiting his Memaw and Granddad in their small home in the panhandle. Bowls of orange sherbet consumed while sitting with his cousins watching animatedTransformers the movie over and over on the worn tape. 

This wasn’t Pace, Florida and this was a long way from Memaw Teagan. This cold place with fucking corpses hovering in the sky. Queen’s rapid thoughts flickered like passing city lights on a dark ride home. He picked up another tape and noticed the weight difference right away. Glancing at the case, it was The Neverending Story cover under the plastic slip but when he popped it open he saw the video cassette. Weighing it again in his hand, he then removed the tape and pulled it open. No reels or black tape, just a leather cord wrapped around something. 

“Found something,” he said, sitting back on his heels as he unwound the cord. It was tied like a necklace and was strung with a pendant. Queen held it up so the light would catch it, studying it briefly. It was made of black painted wood sanded smooth into a circle  and inlaid with a black stone, 

“Looks like... I don’t know, maybe some tribal thing,” he said, turning to show Tex and the others. “Maybe something else. I’ll bag it up.” 

Dave had been half searching, half admiring the home itself. It wasn’t too different from his own place, in truth; he had multiple rooms, and full electrical thanks to his solar set-up, but he often used oil lamps in the colder months when the days were shorter and kept warm with a wood burning stove. If he wanted to run his reloading setup he had to kill everything powered upstairs and then turn on the generator. He honestly found himself feeling a little homesick as he examined the simple but sturdy furnishings. 

When Queen sounded off he crossed to the man, his AK comfortably cradled. 

“Whatcha think it is?” He asked, eyeing the pendant. 

“Witch shit.” Ghost’s voice was dismissive, and earned him a glare from Dave that went entirely unnoticed as he dumped a drawer on the ground and toed through its contents with his boot.

“Why ya say that?” Dave asked.

“Because it isn’t illegal to be Eskimo, or whatever,” Ghost said. “But they hid it anyway. I don’t see any gold or precious stones on that thing, and they’re in the middle of their own compound, but they stashed it. That means there’s a moral or spiritual imperative to hide it.” 

Dave stared at Ghost for a moment. “Oh.” 

“Yeah, [i]oh[/i],” Ghost said. “I’ve been doing this a while. Bag it, don’t fuck with it. If there’s shit written on it, don’t read it.” 

"Already on it," Queen replied, folding it into a small evidence bag. He glanced at Dave, a little crooked smile touching his lips but not his dilated eyes. "Spooky stuff, ain't it?"

“Yeah,” Dave murmured, his gaze on the artifact rather than Queen. “Can’t say I’m a fan, personally.” 

“A lot of people ain’t, if they know what’s good for ‘em.” Tex was kneeling on one knee next to book shelf, taking each one by one and giving them a quick thumb-through, the pages fanning away and not revealing any sort of a secret cut-outs for anything as mundane as guns or drugs, nor anything as horrifying as eyes that dilated and moved on their own, transmitting thoughts into your head… Mexico was a time, alright, “Why do you think we’re even here.” He muttered, voice trailing off.

As he flipped through the last couple books he shook his head, tossing the last one on the pile, “Well, this cabin is borin’ so far. If it weren’t for the bodies floatin’ fifty fuckin’ feet in the air outside I’d say ARTEMIS accidentally Waco’d these poor guys.”

He frowned, “Fact remains, [i]someone[/i] did. ARTEMIS reported some [i]unknowns[/i]. Ipiktok’s family weren’t unknowns, they were the prime suspects. They were ARTEMIS’ targets.” Tex gripped his SIG on its sling, “Whoever they found iced Ipiktok’s family and then blew ARTEMIS away. ARTEMIS was a group of professionals, can’t see ‘em gettin’ slayed by a bunch of half-trained Inuit.”

Tex rolled his jaw and shook his head, leaving the sleuthing to Laine, but something about this didn’t seem right. The sequence of events as it appeared to him when he looked at all the bodies just didn’t make sense. One round fired and ARTEMIS is out of the game, but Ipiktok’s family ventilated…

“Let’s clear the next cabin, Ghost is point.” Tex shouldered his SIG and waited for the rest of them to fall in. “1-Actual to all, evidence secured in first cabin. Four coming out, over.”

“Roger, four coming out, over.” Poker acknowledged.

Donnelley reached up and gave Ghost’s shoulder a soft squeeze, initiating the stack's advance. Ghost was the first out through the open cabin door, and Tex stepped behind him while scanning his sector.


Ghost moved smoothly and deliberately, his finger on the trigger and eyes focused just above his optic. He scoffed at Tex's words.

"ARTEMIS were amateurs like the rest," he muttered. "They should have sent us first. Instead of wasting bodies like this."

He moved on to the next cabin, settling into his position at the head of the stack and sparing a glimpse at Lucky to be sure he was following his role. Despite his stupid fascination with ComBloc weapons, he was doing well enough that Ghost didn't feel like nitpicking his footwork. Not yet, anyway. 

"Set," he grunted, his voice low. .

Tex moved to the other side of the door, replicating the strategy of the first cabin. He ran his hands along the edges of the door in search of abnormalities that could clue them in on traps. Sensing none, he carefully turned the handle of the door to find it was also unlocked. Something splintered the door, sending fine chips of wood into Tex’s eye-pro. A split second after, a crack was heard on the air. Tex ducked and bulled through the door blindly, cursing.

>OVERWATCH, 1 MINUTE PRIOR...///

Ava frowned down at the tablet in her hand, piloting the drone around the perimeter of the compound to provide a lookout for the team on the grounds. All had seemed still and normal until a shifting in the grass unexpectedly caught her attention. The movement was slight, but it seemed like the ground was moving, about 200 meters roughly North of the compound perimeter. 

She drifted the drone down closer, flicking through the seatings of the camera to get a better view of what was moving down there. 

The infrared setting came on and her eyes widened as she had a split moment to perceive the four heat signatures to the North East and two more due North before there was a bright flash of light from the pair from the North and the loud ‘crack’ of a gunshot across the canyon.

“Enemies!” Ava started exclaiming, pressing her hand to the headset comms over her ears to start transmitting, as it felt like her heart was trying to lodge itself in her throat. “Four to the North East, two to the North; 200 meters out!”

Laine had been too focused on the bodies in the air, panning once again to look at the faces when she heard Ava cry out the warning. She shifted her drone away, jerking her hand. The sounds of gunfire could be heard and she moved over to Ava to look at her tablet over her shoulder. “Better get up there to overwatch,” she said, “Go, I’ll be behind you.” 

Ava jerked to Laine, her body freezing up for a moment before she shakily nodded and willed her legs to move. She moved at a crouched run toward Poker, Maui and Avery in case they started taking fire as well. 

Laine followed, glancing up from the tablet and kept her head down to run over to the overwatch team. She moved up to Poker, “I’m moving my drone from the bodies, we’ll have two pairs of eyes over the guys.” 

She shifted the drone, moving over the area Ava had said the contact had come from. 

Dave jumped as the incoming slapped into the wall. He felt his heart kick into high gear, and as Ghost followed Donnelley into the cabin he joined him, making a quick scan of his sector inside. He moved to a window as Ghost took the door, ripping down the curtains and then taking cover. 

"I ain't got shit," Dave said, scanning the treeline. 

Queen lifted his rifle, noticing a bit of movement and fired a quick three shot burst where he had seen it but only bark from the trees sprayed in the air. He grimaced at the miss and crouched down, taking cover away from the window. 

"Target." Ghost's voice was calm, steady. The Consummate Professional. Beneath the skull-print of his mask, however, he was grinning. He steadied himself even as he took aim. 

His finger caressed the trigger and suppressed rifle uttered a harsh bark as he sent a single shot downrange. He was rewarded by the sight of the target's head snapping back, the telltale sign of a hit. 

"Point," he said, his satisfaction audible. "First blood THUNDER." He glanced at Queen. "I really need to unfuck you." 

Queen shot a look back at him, a flirtatious smile flashing, “Don’t threaten me with a good time.” 

“Shut the fuck up and shoot.” Tex piped up, crouching behind the boys at the window, he pinged Poker, “1-Actual to Overwatch, interrogative, where the [i]fuck[/i] is our suppression, over?”

“Standby, asshole.” Poker snorted, “Over.”

Growling behind his bared teeth frown, Tex moved behind Dave, “Behind you, Lucky.”

Spotting another hint of movement, a figure moving in a camouflage uniform, he didn’t waste time sighting up. The red was in his eyes and ask anyone on THUNDER, it made Tex equal parts dangerous and reckless. He squeezed off five rounds to no effect, swearing as he ducked behind cover again. He peeked out to see his target drop like a sack before he heard the shot, “Scratch one.” Maui’s grinning voice over the comms.

Just then, a furious roar of gunfire erupted from somewhere and holes stitched themselves around the door and moved rapidly towards Tex and Lucky. Tex felt a punch hit him in the chest and he stumbled back on his ass, swearing at the top of his lungs as he scrambled away from the wall, “Fuckin’ goddamnit!”

Dave let his rifle hang, ignoring the rounds that punched through the wall. He knelt next to Donnelley instead. 

"Hold still," he said, working to keep his voice relaxed as he grabbed the other man and shoved a hand beneath his vest. He felt the indentation of the round on the back of the plate, but pulled his hand away to find it dry. "You're good man, plate stopped it." 

A wicked grin crossed Tex’s face and a chuckle bubbled up from his throat, saved once again by his plate carrier. He got back up to his knee and held his SIG at low ready, “[i]Nothin’[/i] fuckin’ kills me.”

Queen glanced back at Tex but grinned at his friend's God tempting boast. He swiveled in a crouch back to the window where the muzzle flashes had come from and took aim. 

He sighted in one, center mass but shifted slightly above where the plate carrier might be and drew in a breath before firing a three shot burst. He saw the man stagger back and fall, the red of blood just visible as the bullets traced across his throat.

"How 'bout that for unfucked?" Queen said, dropping down from the window. 

"Adequate. You still suck." Ghost tracked a man as he stood and attempted to move to another position. He let the sight hover, adjusted, and then squeezed off a round. The man staggered, and two more rounds saw him falling into the foliage. "Lucky, you want to fucking shoot somebody today or what?" 

“I’ll try at it.” Tex braced his SIG on the windowsill, sighting up on one of two figures crawling through the tall grass. His wicked grin appeared again, a bearing of wolf’s teeth. He squeezed off one round, catching his target in the neck. He watched him sit up and place a hand on his neck before the second squeeze of the trigger sent lead through his face and dropped him limp, face in the dirt. The other target made a mad dash away, sprinting for all he was worth. “Fuck you.” Tex smiled the wider.

The other target seemed to trip over his own feet, pink mist escaping him as if it were his ghost, blowing away on the wind, “And another.” Maui said.

>OVERWATCH...///

Avery was still gritting his teeth like a madman, the fire from his muzzle reflecting in his eyes as he almost looked the part of a real killer, the FN machinegun in Avery’s hands roaring in their ears. Maui was beside Poker, breathing even, “You want me to try it again?”

Poker shook his head, “Nah, watch this.”

Poker did his best to judge the distance with the help of his leaf sight, sighting up and praying to the gods that his new toy would hit, “Fire for effect, motherfuckers,” he said over the comms, the thump of the grenade leaving his under barrel launcher was like music, “Splash.”

The boom echoed across the wastes, a huge plume of dirt throwing itself as high as it could go before plummeting back down to the ground. Poker looked at the drone feed, a pool of white and white flecks around it. No sign of the sniper team, “Good effect on target, over. Area is clear.”

>SEARCH TEAM...///

“What’s that thing Ghost says?” Poker chuckled over the comms, “I am the artillery.”

“1-Actual to all,” Tex said, “No casualties on our end, we are diverting to check enemy casualties, over.”

“Roger, we have you covered, 1-Actual. Over.”

Tex turned to the others, putting a firm fist to Dave’s front plate and clapping him on the shoulder, “Let us look upon our works, fellers.”

"Some works," Dave muttered. He pulled his dip from his pocket, snapped it, and angrily stuffed his lip. "Didn't even see the bastards."

"Suck less," Ghost grunted. He raised his rifle and stepped from the cabin, missing the extended finger Dave flashed him before falling into formation. "On me."  

Queen grinned at the middle finger, giving Dave's shoulder a pat as he walked past him. "You get used to it," he muttered, then gave the mountain man a sly look. "Best thing it's to make sure you're behind him when the bullets fly, he [I]is[/I] the wall."

“He’s the wall, he’s the sledge,” Tex chuckled as he walked past the two of them to side up with Ghost, “what isn’t our resident CAG Operator? Let’s move, see what manner of fuckin’ idiots decided to try this Snake Eater and his pipe hitters this time.”

Ghost knelt next to the first man he reached, approaching with his weapon raised. The shooter was squirming, panting as blood loss stole the oxygen from his body drop by drop. He quick-checked his hands and, finding them empty, he began checking the man's gear.

"ComBloc shit," he called, tossing the AK out of reach. He pulled a magazine, noted the useless 5.45x39 ammo, and tossed it too. The man reached up and grabbed Ghost's wrist, his eyes pleading.

"Stop," Ghost grunted. He pulled his knife and unceremoniously shoved it into the wounded man's throat, jerking the blade to the side to open veins and windpipe in one pull. There was a gurgle and a rush of blood, and after a few seconds of drumming heels the enemy went still. 

"Nothing useful in his gear," Ghost called, wiping his knife clean and sheathing it. He pulled a smaller knife, this one with a seatbelt cutter, and slit his sleeves to the shoulders. 

Queen glanced away from the dying man Ghost finished and moved onto another that lay half under a low shrub. He poked at him then noticed the skull cap was missing and brains and blood scattered behind him like so much confetti. 

He knelt, searching his gear and pockets, shoving up the sleeves and pulling down undershirts to search for tattoos that might identify a gang or group the dead man might have belonged to. 

"GRU," Ghost said. There was a hint of excitement to his voice as he raised the dead man's arm, using his knife to indicate a stylized bat tattooed just below his elbow. "Explains why they almost knew what they were doing." 

"God damn," Dave said, comprehension in his voice. "Y'all thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?" 

“Professionals.” Tex muttered, not as excited as Ghost about the revelation. His years in the CIA made him grasp and pull at the strings, drawing the implications into the light, “Renko’s guys. He say anythin’ about these guys sneakin’ around on US soil?”

“1-Actual to all, we got Russkies. Foreign Intel guys, over.” Tex said, letting go of the transmitter and speaking to the men around him, “Renko’s got some explainin’.”

He turned to the others, thrusting his thumb over his shoulder at the bodies still hovering in mid-air, “Doesn’t explain that shit.”

"Don't reckon anythin' does,'' Dave said. "More of that...fuckin' Magic, or whatever."

"I hate witches," Ghost growled. 

“Maybe it was Ipiktok done it. Him and his family caught in the middle,” Tex shook his head slow and clucked his tongue, “Decided to use some ancient Inuit spell shit or somethin’, cut and run…”

He put his hands on his hips, letting his SIG hang, saying more quietly to himself, thinking aloud, “But then what happened to our boy we found dried out like jerky, I wonder…” he sniffed, “Alright, keep searchin’, don’t worry about specifics. Take the electronics from these assholes and we’ll dump ‘em at Ava’s feet for her to sift through. We’ll stick around for a bit in case she finds anythin’ useful and burn the rest.”

“We’ll leave a mark for the compound on our maps and hand ‘em over to Coral Nomad so they can search this place deeper. I’m willin’ to bet Irniq ran for Noatak, it’s what I’d do,” Tex pursed his lips, eyes scanning the taiga around, “We’ll just see if he made it. Link up with TRIDENT and get cozy, see if they need our help goin’ door to door for our fugitive Shaman.”

“You think Ipiktok left us some tracks?” He asked Dave.

“Let’s find out,” Dave said. He hit his Comms. “THUNDER 1-3, UMBRA 1-3, I’m gonna take a walk an’ see what I can see. Keep an eye out for me, over.”

He split off from the group, leaving them to strip the dead, and began a circular route, his eyes glued to the ground as he trusted their overwatch to play guardian angel. His blood was cooling after the excitement of the ambush, as was his disappointment in his own performance. His eyes lit up when he spotted an errant bend to a blade of grass and he honed in on it, a hound with a scent. 

“Got somethin’,” he said. His poor combat chops were forgotten as he refocused on his real skill-set. “Prints over here, got a variety of sizes an’ treads. Them Russian boys’ are all wearin’ the same boots, these are different.”

Dave looked around, noting the position of the sun and the direction his team had come from, cross-referencing that with what he’d memorized of the maps they’d been shown. “Looks like whoever these belong to, they’re headed for Noatak, like ya figured. Them Russians left an easy trail to follow, too, but which group we go after’s up to you, boss.” 

Tex chewed his lip for a moment, looking to Ghost and feeling that same feeling he had when he was with THUNDER. The urge to test his balance on the razor’s edge of life and death, his skills up against another’s in a contest whose only prize was breathing for a little while longer. But he looked then at Dave in the distance, and Laine and Ava over the hill. He wasn’t with just THUNDER anymore, “Russians can wait. Ipiktok’s our priority and I don’t wanna get turned into jerky like our friend a mile back.” Donnelley said.

Ghost sniffed, the only sign he’d show of his disappointment. The Mission came first, no matter how much he wanted to tear apart some GRU meat-puppets. 

“The Russians will probably meet us, anyway,” he said, doing his best not to sound too hopeful. 

“Maybe the Kremlin will send some real shooters next time,” Donnelley fished his pack out of a pocket on his jacket, lighting up. That bit of what it was to be with THUNDER still coursing through his veins. He snorted something from his nose and spat it on the bleeding, ruined head of a GRU operator, “1-Actual to all, regroup on my position. We’ll rendezvous with TRIDENT, see if they suck at finding people, out.”

Laine trusted Ava to handle Dave's request for a drone and used hers to make another pass around the compound, the scattered bodies now joined with fresh corpses. After the pass she went to get another look at the floaters, despite her concern for the charge in the drone. 

It was fascinating and unnerving and she wanted as much footage as she could get. Donnelley's call to head up to his location made her reel it back in. 

She checked the charge, still more than half. "We'd better go," she said, slinging her bag back on, the short rifle hanging over her chest. Laine walked with Ava and the two men of THUNDER. And Avery. He was still with them and she had already started to think of the young man as part of UMBRA even if it wasn't so on paper. 

Laine spotted the cluster of men near the scene of the firefight. Her gaze instantly went to Donnelley, lingering for a moment to make sure he was whole then moved away before it became obvious. 

"So these are the Russians," she said, looking at the bodies just beyond where they stood. "Special forces, what are they called again, Spetznatz?"

Laine glanced at Donnelley, "What makes you sure it's Renko's doing?"

“Spetsnaz.” Donnelley corrected, poking one of the bodies staring blankly with the toe of his boot, “Maybe not his doin’. There’s a difference between an agent like Renko slitherin’ around clandestine and…”

He gestured to the bodies, “[i]Soldiers.[/i] The GRU was lookin’ for somethin’. Or somebody.” He took another drag, “Sure, operations are compartmentalized, but who’s to say they don’t have detachments like this in West Virginia, or near Langley, pokin’ around for dirt on the Program.”

Donnelley shook his head, “Or DC. Who’s to say he ain’t compilin’ a fuckin’ file on you, or Dave, or Ava?” Donnelley looked like he’d a bad taste in his mouth, “Water just gets murkier down shit creek. Let’s get a move on.”

“Let me take a look at bodies, the ones you guys didn’t make,” she said, walking away from them towards the stiffened corpses of the residents of the compound. Laine crouched near the bodies, examining the gunshot wounds. Single shots, mostly head or chest. A sniper’s work most likely and very little in the way of brass around them. They were slaughtered out in their own yard by the Russian soldiers. 

She pushed the hair back from the face of a girl that appeared around sixteen, she looked like the girl from the Facebook photo, Ipiktok’s daughter. Laine moved to the male bodies but none of them were the older man, the leader of the cult that had made this compound home. After taking photos of all their faces and wounds, she stood.  

“He’s not here,” Laine announced as she made her way back to the two teams, “Ipiktok, he’s not among the bodies.” 

“So, those tracks are his. Let’s hope he ain’t jerky.” Donnelley said, “Form on me, let’s go.”

As they followed Dave tracking the footsteps that left the compound behind, Laine fell in step by Donnelley. She walked in silence for a while then said, “I was thinking why they let him escape or how he managed it. I thought maybe they’d take him, but maybe they wouldn’t, maybe they wanted to see what he would do.”

She glanced up at the sky, the bodies now no longer just above them but still hovering near the compound. “GRU didn’t put those men up there or turn the other into a premature mummy. Ipiktok...that freak winter storm surrounding his compound ended abruptly before SIREN and ARTEMIS went out. We don’t know how long the Russians have been out here, maybe they…”

Laine hesitated, glancing at Donnelley with a flash of deep green eyes. “Maybe the soldiers interrupted the...whatever was causing that storm when they attacked the compound. That ended it and let our teams in but were met with something like...well, something or someone that has supernatural abilities.”

The words still stuck in her mouth but her stubbornness had lessened the more she witnessed. The supernatural was not supposed to happen, but it did and Laine had started to accept it. 

“You think Ipiktok’s makin’ these storms?” Donnelley cocked a brow. It certainly wouldn’t surprise him, but for whose benefit? In all his years uncovering espionage conspiracies and dismantling the unnatural’s influence on the world bit by bit for one more sunrise, he knew there was always a higher reason. “What’s he gaining? What’s his game?”

Laine shrugged, watching Ghost and Dave ahead of her for a moment, “I don’t know, but if it’s a true cult, their goal is usually the end of times sort of thing. Whatever Ipiktok was doing, what his aims were, it’s usually power. Power over his followers, power connected with God or in this case...”

She hesitated then said, “Remember that name in the gold miner’s report? Ithaqua, I think. He recorded the native workers being very spooked by a freak snowstorm and kept repeating that word. Other storms reported around times of missing people, of deaths.”

“Why would he do it now, if he was doing it, then maybe he knew we were coming or that the Russians were. Maybe it’s for something that has nothing to do with us at all,” Laine said, adjusting the weight of her pack, “Either way, why didn’t the Russians kill him with the others? Did ARTEMIS even get a chance to fight back?” 

She glanced at him again, “So many questions.” 

“And we still ain’t got answers.” Donnelley’s eyes scanned the wastes around, the tall grass, the mountains, a blue sky. If they were here on better terms, it would’ve been a nice hike. He shook his head, “The guy from ARTEMIS we found a few klicks back, he was runnin’. I can’t think he’d be runnin’ from Ipiktok’s family. They reported several unknowns, which I’m bettin’ are our Russians.”

“Nothin’ about this Op seems… right.” He frowned, “If Ipiktok is in Noatak, he’s desperate. Desperate people are dangerous. I know you never let the… [i]wizard…[/i] speak, but I want to know how and why. We might have two Wetwork Teams with us, but we’re a Workin’ Group. We investigate, we don’t just scorch the earth.”

He pointed to Ghost with his chin, “But good luck gettin’ that big sumbitch to listen to that. Me and THUNDER know what happens when Wetwork Groups don’t pull the trigger fast enough.” He also knew what happened when Wetwork Groups were too quick to, Libya flashing through his mind. The two small bodies left on the dirty ground, the room they’d thrown a frag into filled with… and putting a gun to that crooked NSA spook’s head at the end of it all.

“Different jobs.” He muttered, a well-hidden disgust and anger creeping across his face for a moment.

>NOATAK, ALASKA
>1200...///

By the time Noatak was in sight, smoke rising from chimneys, Donnelley felt some sense of relief to be near some semblance of civilization before the sun went down or a freak snowstorm swept through. Donnelley activated his comms and pinged TRIDENT, “UMBRA 1-Actual to TRIDENT 1-Actual. We are approaching from the northeast, over.”

Nothing. Which didn’t exactly make Donnelley feel welcome. He pinged again, “UMBRA 1-Actual, come in, TRIDENT.”

Donnelley looked back at the rest of UMBRA and THUNDER, signaling for them to get down. If there was going to be a firefight with some other Russians, he wanted to be ready. They’d be the ones caught in the open this time. “Keep your combat spacing, watch your sectors.” He pinged one last time, “UMBRA 1-Actual to TRIDENT, come in.”

“TRIDENT 1-Actual, good copy, UMBRA. You are approaching from the northeast. We’ll meet you on the edge of town, over.” Donnelley blew a breath smoking out on the air when he heard TRIDENT’s team lead.

“Roger, out.” Donnelley looked back at UMBRA and THUNDER, signaling to regroup and continue onwards.

Just as they’d said, TRIDENT was standing in the middle of the town’s main avenue as they approached. One of them raised their hand and Donnelley followed suit, raising his own. Once they’d gotten close enough, TRIDENT’s Team Lead said, “How’d it go?”

Donnelley frowned and shook his head, “We got a secure place to talk?”

>...///

“So?” Bear said as he closed the door. He’d led them into a trailer just outside the Noatak school. They’d turned the place into somewhat of a command center and safehouse. THUNDER was outside with Moon and She-Ra, Bear and Rooster were the only ones present for UMBRA’s debriefing, “I’m pretty sure how this debrief is going to go. Doesn’t sound good.”

“It ain’t.” Donnelley admitted, shrugging, “Y’all got a computer or somethin’?”

Rooster nodded and produced his own military laptop, placing it on the long table they were all sitting at, “Videos?”

“Oh, yeah.” Donnelley nodded. “Ava, Laine, you wanna hook up to the computer and play what we got?”

While Ava and Laine were hooking up the drones to the computers to play their feeds, Donnelley was going over everything they’d found. He told Bear about the freeze-dried man, and the rest of ARTEMIS floating in the air. He then pointed to the drone feed of the firefight, “GRU.”

“What?” Bear asked, brows furrowed.

“Russian Spetsnaz. I got pictures of us searchin’ their bodies, man. Tats, guns, gear. I know Russians when I see ‘em.” Donnelley was serious, looking into Bear’s eyes the whole time.

Bear nodded, “Fuck.” Bear leaned back in his chair, “Well, SIREN isn’t here either. No sign of them, no one’s seen them. I mean, fuck, no one’s even talking to us.”

“Think we gotta get Tribal Police into this? Maybe they’ll talk to them.” Donnelley posited.

“Maybe, I don’t know.” Bear shrugged, “We can try hailing them on the radio.”

“Do that.” Donnelley’s stomach growled and he lay a hand on it, “Figure we’ll take some time to eat and talk. Break bread.”