"Right, there's nothing to be done about it, I think," Eris replied to Ezequiel. She wasn't truly downcast, but her voice betrayed a little bit of disappointment.
"I forgot that we are on duty, sorry." The reality of war caught up with Eris once again, causing her to feel suddenly sick The weekend misadventures almost made her forget that she had been conscripted; this was something she couldn't afford to ignore.
Later, at the meeting place...
Now there was Eris standing silently as she listened to Dahl's briefing. Most of the questions asked went without saying. The Military Intelligence may have seen some value on their squad but, in the end of the day, all of them were Militia, unlikely to be spies because of the randomness of the draft process, as well as being ultimately disposable. Needless to say, this position didn't fancy Eris, at all. Not so say anything of a frontal assault. It felt way too blunt to solve this case, almost as if...
"Excuse me, Sir," Eris raised a hand, calling for Dahl's attention,
"is there are possibility that this may be a false flag operation, or some other form of deception? I'm not questioning the Gallian Intelligence's skill. However, this much evidence make it seem like that the enemy may be allowing themselves to be intentionally spotted. If that's a possibility, wouldn't a frontal assault be exactly what they are waiting? Their real objective even be feed us with false Intel, as a cover up for some larger scheme.""That said, it's obvious that I do not suggest that we do nothing... But, don't we —I mean, this Squad, specifically— have something that we can use to our advantage?" Eris looked around the small room before continuing,
"You asked us to man this operation because we are Militia —thus, anonymous civilians in the eyes of foreign agencies— but, there's something else we have on our side..." she took a deep breath and laid a hand over her chest, not believing that she was about to say what she had in mind,
"We are a group mostly women, a child, and a couple men. If we play it right, we might be the ones deceiving them. Say... some of us feign doing a picnic around the are of their hideout 'completely oblivious to it', while the others stand ready to storm it, when the chance presents itself. In an ideal scenario, we could even infiltrate their hideout, using a bit of, erm... charisma and use this chance to facilitate the operation or, even extract the intelligence without them ever noticing, basically rendering their whole operation moot. At the very least it'll allow us to observe them from closer and determine which is the best way to tackle this situation.""Of course, it's a risky business —for us— but it also has a high pay-off —for you. I mean, if we storm the place the enemy can always destroy the evidence before we get our hand on it. This way, the chances of this happening are little. It may end up with some of us dead or captured by an enemy spy cell. It certainly win't hurt the Gallian Intelligence since we don't know anything useful to begin with. However it's something that Corporal Hunt as well as the others need to agree with before we depart. Either way, Sir, just think of how your name would gain instant recognition, maybe even a promotion, if we pull this one? It would leave the bitter taste of the Gallian Intelligence's craftiness stinging on our enemies tongues for a long time; I'm sure that Lord Barst would appreciate such an outcome." Eris was practically hyperventilating as well as sweating bullets once she finished her spiel. She never had to propose such a thing to someone with higher authority than her after she graduated. Needless to say, it was exhausting. But, if they could pull it off, there was a slightly bigger chance that the whole Squad would come out of this as a whole, whereas an assault would unavoidably lead to at the very least bullet wounds, if not actual casualties, as long as their Squad was as lacking in manpower as they are.
Hopefully, the others would agree. If not, Eris could only pray for the Valkyrur to smile upon them, pick her guns and fight.
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