Love Hina Fan Fiction ❯ Love and War ❯ Chapter 5 ( Chapter 5 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
By: Spartan429 
Anime/Manga: Love Hina Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Romance / Comedy / Adventure / Action | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 07.02.2007 | Pages: 4 | Words: 3.7K | Visits: 490 | Status: Work In Progress
Anime/Manga: Love Hina Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Romance / Comedy / Adventure / Action | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 07.02.2007 | Pages: 4 | Words: 3.7K | Visits: 490 | Status: Work In Progress
"abc"-speech
"abc"-speech over radio/TV
abc-thoughts
"abc"-English speech
Location: Bomb shelter under Hinata Sou.
Status: Lockdown
Alert Level: Defcon 1
“Keitaro?”
Indeed, it was Keitaro, in the flesh. He had the same hair, the same face, everything except that he had no glasses on. His eyes were filled with fire, something that the girls had never seen before.
Apparently, he hadn’t heard Naru, and he proceeded to grapple with the Chinese soldier. Keitaro brought his knee into the man’s gut, then twisted him around and put him in a headlock. The guy was struggling like a fish out of water, flailing wildly in all directions. Keitaro pulled his arms in opposite directions, twisting the soldier’s neck with a sickening crack. The man’s body slumped to the floor, never to get up again.
“They always put up a fight,” he said in an annoyed voice. He walked over to his rifle and picked it up. He proceeded to reload it as he bent down and grabbed his helmet. He put it on and spoke into the comm.
“The basement is now completely secure, another squad almost jumped me. I’m heading for the roof.”
He started for the doorway, but turned around. He went to one of the corpses and took its rifle. He looked at the girls.
“Hey Su,” he said, tossing her the rifle. She caught it and looked up at him. “Just in case any more of those bastards show up.” He turned and headed out the door.
The girls were dumbstruck.
“Was that really Keitaro?” Haruka asked.
“For reasons obvious to even the most dense person, I highly doubt it,” Kitsune said.
Motoko was just starting to regain consciousness at this point. She winced as she sat up from laying on the floor, gingerly touching the wound on her head.
“Ugh, what happened?” she asked. “I just had the weirdest dream. Urashima saved us from a handful of Chinese soldiers without so much as a scratch. Like that would ever happen.”
She saw the bodies of the dead soldiers on the floor and her eyes went wide. She looked at everybody, who seemed just as dumbstruck as her.
“It was a dream, right?” she asked.
Everybody shook there heads.
“I don’t know about you guys,” Naru stood up, “but I’m going up to the roof.”
“Are you crazy, you’ll get killed!” Kitsune yelled.
Naru ignored her and continued through the door and up the basement stairs.
Date: May 1, 2007; 0945 hours (Military Time)
Location: Hinata Sou rooftop.
Status: Engaged in combat.
Alert Level: Defcon 1
“Two o’clock! Sniper!”
“I see him.”
Crack! Crack!
“Target eliminated.”
Steven fired a single-round shot, turning a soldiers head into a cloud of blood. They still had roughly five minutes before reinforcements would arrive, and the PLA recon unit was really, really pissed. The automated plasma turrets were a great help, but there were too many targets to keep up with.
“Ten o’clock! Type 98 tank!” Brooks shouted.
“Got it.”
Ppssshheeeww!
The tank became a blazing inferno as the anti-tank rocket connected. Debris flew everywhere, and the soldiers nearby were decimated. Steven turned to see Keitaro, who was holding his spent LAAW launcher.
“Christ, what took you so long?” Steven demanded.
“You let a PLA squad slip in, and I had to deal with them.”
“Well, now you can help us out.”
“Yo! Twelve o’clock high! Chopper inbound!” Harland yelled.
“Oh shit, we didn’t bring any AA ammo!” Steven swore. “Brooks, take the bastard out of the sky!”
“Target confirmed!”
Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam!
Brooks’ M240G’s 7.62mm rounds flew through the air and hit the chopper, leaving barely visible scratches. Brooks yelled in frustration.
“That armor is too thick! I can’t penetrate it!”
“Dammit!” Steven shouldered his rifle, aiming at the chopper. “Frag out!” He depressed the trigger on the M203 and launched a fragmentation grenade. It went soaring and impacted on the chopper’s side with a bang. The chopper lurched to the side as smoke and flames poured from the newly made hole. But the smoke was soon replaced with a white fog, and the flames died.
“That chopper has a fire suppression system!” Keitaro cried.
“Son of a bitch! We need AA support or we’re gonna get killed!” Steven shouted. He targeted a man on the ground and planted three rounds into his gut.
“Look out! He’s strafing the building!” Harland yelled.
“Everybody hit the deck!”
The chopper came down the length of the building, sending a streaming hail of 50mm high explosive rounds down at the exposed Marines. Everyone dived to the side as the spot where they had just been standing was incinerated.
“Control, where are those goddamned reinforcements!?” Steven screamed into his comm.
“Alpha, your fast movers are inbound, along with ground support. ETA is forty-three seconds.”
“We are about to get killed here!” Steven shouted back. “We need those fast movers NOW!”
The chopper fired one of its heat seekers, which sought out one of the plasma turret’s heat vents. The concussion slammed into the Marines. Steven was thrown across the roof and landed next to one of the turrets. Harland and Brooks ran over to the stairway that led to the second floor, trying to draw the chopper’s fire, while Keitaro ran for Steven.
“Gunny! Are you okay?” he yelled out, kneeling next to Steven.
“Yeah…agh, dammit…I’ll live…nooo problem,” he grunted. He turned towards the plasma turret they were near and did some quick thinking. “See if you can find a way to get that turret to fire on the chopper. I’ll help Brooks and Harland draw its fire.”
“Okay. I’m on it.”
Keitaro got up and ran over to the nearby turret. A quick look showed that an infrared sensor was attached to the trigger mechanism (located in the turret), and an emergency power rerouting line directed the power directly to the trigger mechanism if the circuit to the sensor was cut. A small sign on the back of the turret read Emergency Manual Controls.
“Kid, hurry up! I don’t think we can take much more abuse!” Brook’s voice crackled over the comm.
Oookay then, Keitaro thought. Taking out his combat knife, he cut the power cords leading to the infrared sensor. The power, having no other place to go, was rerouted through the emergency line, and into the emergency controls. A small hatch in the back opened and the manual controls slid out.
“Nice,” he muttered, grabbing the trigger and swinging the turret around to point at the chopper. He looked up and aimed.
“The Japanese people send their regards you motherfucker!”
He fired the turret, sending white hot balls of plasma through the air. The chopper tried to swerve to side, but the plasma connected. The armor melted and boiled away as the plasma went through like a blowtorch through butter. The entire chopper was soon engulfed in smoke and flame. It swerved wildly and eventually fell to the ground, exploding with tremendous force, sending shrapnel out in all directions.
“Hell yeah! Kid scores again!” Harland yelled.
“Alpha, this is Talon One. My squadron is coming up behind you and we are about to nape the area. Get clear and keep your heads down.”
“Roger that,” Steven replied, smiling. “Okay boys, sit back and enjoy the show.”
They all walked over to the edge of the roof and looked below. The PLA was bogged down behind the chopper’s wreckage. They had no idea that they were about to be burned. In the distance, the Talon Squadron’s jet engines could be heard growing louder.
“Hey Kid,” Steven said, patting his shoulder. “You do the honors.”
Keitaro grinned and looked down on the PLA’s broken recon unit.
“Five…Four…Three…Two…One 230;Impact.”
As soon as he said impact, the Talon Squadron’s F22As flew overhead and dropped their bombs. The twenty-five hundred pound canisters of napalm transformed the surrounding landscape into a desolate, burning wasteland. Any and all PLA troops, vehicles, supplies, were now smoldering piles of ash.
“Mission accomplished,” Keitaro said proudly.
While the guys congratulated each other with pats on the back, and, in Brook’s case, butting helmets together, they didn’t notice the nine pairs of eyes peeking from the stairway.
“Looks like Keitaro finally got the spine you never managed to beat into him, Motoko,” Kitsune grinned.
“Yes, it appears Urashima has finally changed for the better,” Motoko replied, smiling inwardly.
Naru was filled with a hurricane of emotions. Happiness, relief, love, the list was endless. She couldn’t hold it in.
“Hey Keitarooo!” Naru shouted from the stairway, waving.
Keitaro turned around, as did the others. His face came into view, then his shoulder and upper torso, which had a strange red dot on it…
Crack!
Keitaro’s left shoulder was turned into a fountain of blood. He looked down at the bullet hole wide-eyed, his expression was one of utter surprise.
“Ah, god dammit.”
He fell to the ground, unconscious.
“Sniper!” Steven cried out. “Get to cover!” He looped his arms around Keitaro’s shoulders and dragged him behind an air duct. Harland and Brooks dropped to prone positions and crawled to the roof’s edge.
“Engaging infrared scanner,” Brooks said.
Crack!
Harland’s helmet jerked to the side as a rifle round grazed it. He ducked down and fixed his helmet.
“He’s somewhere in the tree line! Approximately fifty yards out!” Harland shouted.
Brook’s started to scan the trees for any signs of body heat. The entire area seemed to be clear of heat signatures. The bushes and shrubs covering the ground could easily hide a person, but his body heat should be detectable. So where was this guy…
“I see him! He’s camping out in that tree’s branches!” Brooks said.
“Take that fucker out!” Steven shouted.
Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam!
The tree was turned to splinters as the heavy rounds sliced through the tree. Branches started to fall as their limbs were completely severed. After about ten seconds, a mangled, bullet riddled corpse fell out of the tree and hit the ground.
“Target eliminated.”
“Area secure!” Harland called out. He ran over to the girls, all of whom were completely distressed. Harland looked at Naru.
“You know him?” he asked in passable Japanese, pointing to Keitaro’s unconscious form.
“Yes, we all do,” Naru said, tears pouring out. “He used to be the landlord here.”
Harland raised an eyebrow. “He failed to mention that.”
“Can we see him?” she asked, her sad eyes filling with even more tears. All the other girls looked at him imploringly. There was no way he could say no.
“Yeah, you can. But you’ll have to give him some space,” he said. He led them over. Steven was yelling into his comm.
“This is Alpha, calling to any USMC forces in the area! We have a man down! Request immediate medevac support! He is in critical condition!”
“Acknowledged, Alpha. This is medevac helo Foxtrot Seven, requesting your coordinates, over.”
“We are located in the residential district, sector nine, look for the red smoke. Over.”
“Roger, we are on our way. Out”
Steven returned his attention to Keitaro. His face was deathly pale from loss of blood. His breathing was shallow, and his pulse was weak. Steven looked up at the girls, then at Harland.
“Who are they?” he asked, tension in his voice.
“They said that they know Kid. Apparently he used to be their landlord here.”
“No shit? He was a landlord?”
“According to these girls, yeah.”
“Huh, I always thought of him as an aspiring repair man.”
He pulled a smoke grenade out of his belt, pulled the pin, and tossed over to the roof’s open area. After a few seconds, the sky was filled with a pillar of dark red smoke. In the distance, the medevac chopper was approaching.
“Brooks, help me move Kid,” Steven said.
He put his arms under Keitaro’s shoulders while Brooks picked up his legs. Together, they carried Keitaro over to the chopper, which had just landed on the roof. The consistent drone of the rotors drowned out everything.
“Hurry up and get him on board!” the crewman yelled out of the hatch.
“How much room do you have in their?” Steven asked as he and Brooks lifted Keitaro up and onto the stretcher that was in the chopper.
“Enough for all the bullshit my CO (commanding officer) gives me everyday,” the crewman replied. “Why do you ask?”
“We found some civilians that weren’t evacuated. They need to be removed from the combat zone.”
“Sure thing. We’ll bring ‘em back to the base of operations that we set up on the outskirts of town. If you need to talk to the commander there, the call sign is ‘Control Two.’”
“Okay then,” Steven turned to the girls.
“Come on, everybody get on board, we’re pressed for time!” All the girls climbed into the chopper and buckled up.
“Alright! Take her up!” the crewman shouted to the pilot.
“Got it, heading back to base.”
The chopper rose into the air and made its way back toward the temporary base located in the eastern outskirts of Hinata. Armor and infantry units were already being deployed into the streets to mop up any remaining recon patrols. All in all, everything was running smoothly.
“Okay fellas,” Steven turned to Brooks and Harland, “it’s just the three of us. Let’s rendezvous with the nearest infantry squad and establish are next order of business.”
“Yes, sir!” they said enthusiastically.
Date: May 1, 2007; 0954 hours (Military Time)
Location: USMC Medevac Chopper Foxtrot Seven, en route to FOB (forward operating base).
Status: Airborne.
Alert Level: Defcon 1
If it wasn’t for Keitaro’s unconscious form laying in a stretcher with a bleeding wound in his shoulder, the ride might have been pleasant. All the girls were staring at him, hoping that he’d wake up soon. A year and a half of waiting and when they finally see him again, he gets shot. Fate can be so cruel.
Down below, small firefights were taking place between Marine infantry and PLA recon. The Marines, due to their intense training and skill, were easily overcoming the PLA’s makeshift defensive lines.
The medevac chopper was roughly six kilometers from the base when Keitaro started to wake up. He was first aware of a dull ache in his left shoulder, which steadily grew worse. Then his hearing kicked in, which picked up the sound of helicopter rotors. Followed by his eyesight, which slowly started to focus. Straining his muscles, Keitaro turned his head towards the girls, who were taking in the sight of the war torn city below.
“Hey girls. Long time no see.”
It was like flipping a switch. Their eyes went wide and looked down at him, and they all broke into ultra bright smiles.
“Keitaro!” they all shouted with joy.
“I hope you all managed without me,” he said.
“We missed you sooo much!” Su said. “It’s no fun without you.”
“Even Motoko missed you,” Kitsune said, grinning.
“Kitsune! How many times do I have to tell you before it sinks in!?” Motoko yelled in frustration. “I have no feelings for that man whatsoever beyond a simple acknowledgement of his existence!” She immediately realized what she said and looked down at Keitaro. His face showed no emotion at all, but you could tell by his eyes, the pain he felt.
“Well, I guess some things haven’t changed,” Keitaro said coldly. Everybody was glaring at Motoko, who hung her head in shame.
“So,” Haruka broke the silence. “What’s my nephew doing in the Marines?”
“Pretty funny story about that. Me and Seta had just-
“Contacts! Bearing two-one-nine! Three MIGs approaching at fifteen hundred kilometers an hour!” the copilot said.
“Hold on back there! Evasive maneuvers!” the pilot said. He put the chopper into a fast descent, leveling out at about ten feet above the ground. The MIGs had locked on with their radar, and were engaging their missiles.
“They have a lock on us!” the copilot said in a panicked voice. The chopper’s missile alarm was blaring. “The MIGs have launched their missiles! Three R-27RE1s approaching at Mach Two-point-Five!”
“Well girls,” Keitaro said uneasily, “it’s been nice knowing you.”
Impact.
The first missile overshot and hit the cockpit from the left side. The windows shattered and flew inward, cutting the pilot and copilot to shreds. The fiery explosion burned their bodies to ash and turned the nose of the chopper into a cloud of debris. The second missile connected with the main rotor, effectively removing most of the chopper’s roof. Then the third missile hit the rear, and what little that was left of the fuselage after that fell through the air, hit the ground, and due to its uncontrollable speed, started skidding down the road.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!”
The chopper was going at about a hundred or so kilometers an hour. It hit a parked car and went into a barrel roll. The girls were getting thrashed around in their seats, the safety straps just barely holding. Keitaro was strapped down in the stretcher, but it was just as bad. The chopper entered a three-way intersection, where the two streets were lined up perpendicular to the left and right, and up ahead was a building.
“Ah shit. Not again,” Keitaro groaned.
Date: May 1, 2007; 1002 hours (Military Time)
Location: Forward Operating Base, call sign “Control Two.”
Status: Manned and fully operational.
Alert Level: Defcon 1
“General, three MIGs have just shot down one of our medevac choppers. Would you like me to redirect Eagle Squadron?”
“Do it. Send them to hell,” General Dixon replied. The nearby radioman gave the order, and a few seconds later, the three blips on the radar disappeared.
Brigadier General Charles Dixon was the commanding officer of the three battalions of Marine Corp soldiers currently operating in the region. He was an upright and steadfast gentleman, who didn’t take shit from anybody. A brilliant tactician, he always put the lives of the men under his command first.
“Are there any squads in the area?” he asked sternly.
“Yes sir, we have Bravo team two kilometers to the south.”
“Put ‘em on the radio.”
The radio buzzed with static for a few seconds before a connection was established.
“Bravo team, this is Control Two. Please respond for new orders. Over.”
“This is Sergeant Julio Vega of Bravo, I read you loud and clear.”
“Medevac chopper Foxtrot Seven has been grounded by three MIGs. I want you to take your squad and check for survivors. I’m sending you the coordinates now. Over.”
“Understood, we are en route to the crash site. Will update as necessary. Bravo Out.”
"abc"-speech over radio/TV
abc-thoughts
"abc"-English speech
--------------------
Date: May 1, 2007; 0942 hours (Military Time)Location: Bomb shelter under Hinata Sou.
Status: Lockdown
Alert Level: Defcon 1
“Keitaro?”
Indeed, it was Keitaro, in the flesh. He had the same hair, the same face, everything except that he had no glasses on. His eyes were filled with fire, something that the girls had never seen before.
Apparently, he hadn’t heard Naru, and he proceeded to grapple with the Chinese soldier. Keitaro brought his knee into the man’s gut, then twisted him around and put him in a headlock. The guy was struggling like a fish out of water, flailing wildly in all directions. Keitaro pulled his arms in opposite directions, twisting the soldier’s neck with a sickening crack. The man’s body slumped to the floor, never to get up again.
“They always put up a fight,” he said in an annoyed voice. He walked over to his rifle and picked it up. He proceeded to reload it as he bent down and grabbed his helmet. He put it on and spoke into the comm.
“The basement is now completely secure, another squad almost jumped me. I’m heading for the roof.”
He started for the doorway, but turned around. He went to one of the corpses and took its rifle. He looked at the girls.
“Hey Su,” he said, tossing her the rifle. She caught it and looked up at him. “Just in case any more of those bastards show up.” He turned and headed out the door.
The girls were dumbstruck.
“Was that really Keitaro?” Haruka asked.
“For reasons obvious to even the most dense person, I highly doubt it,” Kitsune said.
Motoko was just starting to regain consciousness at this point. She winced as she sat up from laying on the floor, gingerly touching the wound on her head.
“Ugh, what happened?” she asked. “I just had the weirdest dream. Urashima saved us from a handful of Chinese soldiers without so much as a scratch. Like that would ever happen.”
She saw the bodies of the dead soldiers on the floor and her eyes went wide. She looked at everybody, who seemed just as dumbstruck as her.
“It was a dream, right?” she asked.
Everybody shook there heads.
“I don’t know about you guys,” Naru stood up, “but I’m going up to the roof.”
“Are you crazy, you’ll get killed!” Kitsune yelled.
Naru ignored her and continued through the door and up the basement stairs.
Date: May 1, 2007; 0945 hours (Military Time)
Location: Hinata Sou rooftop.
Status: Engaged in combat.
Alert Level: Defcon 1
“Two o’clock! Sniper!”
“I see him.”
Crack! Crack!
“Target eliminated.”
Steven fired a single-round shot, turning a soldiers head into a cloud of blood. They still had roughly five minutes before reinforcements would arrive, and the PLA recon unit was really, really pissed. The automated plasma turrets were a great help, but there were too many targets to keep up with.
“Ten o’clock! Type 98 tank!” Brooks shouted.
“Got it.”
Ppssshheeeww!
The tank became a blazing inferno as the anti-tank rocket connected. Debris flew everywhere, and the soldiers nearby were decimated. Steven turned to see Keitaro, who was holding his spent LAAW launcher.
“Christ, what took you so long?” Steven demanded.
“You let a PLA squad slip in, and I had to deal with them.”
“Well, now you can help us out.”
“Yo! Twelve o’clock high! Chopper inbound!” Harland yelled.
“Oh shit, we didn’t bring any AA ammo!” Steven swore. “Brooks, take the bastard out of the sky!”
“Target confirmed!”
Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam!
Brooks’ M240G’s 7.62mm rounds flew through the air and hit the chopper, leaving barely visible scratches. Brooks yelled in frustration.
“That armor is too thick! I can’t penetrate it!”
“Dammit!” Steven shouldered his rifle, aiming at the chopper. “Frag out!” He depressed the trigger on the M203 and launched a fragmentation grenade. It went soaring and impacted on the chopper’s side with a bang. The chopper lurched to the side as smoke and flames poured from the newly made hole. But the smoke was soon replaced with a white fog, and the flames died.
“That chopper has a fire suppression system!” Keitaro cried.
“Son of a bitch! We need AA support or we’re gonna get killed!” Steven shouted. He targeted a man on the ground and planted three rounds into his gut.
“Look out! He’s strafing the building!” Harland yelled.
“Everybody hit the deck!”
The chopper came down the length of the building, sending a streaming hail of 50mm high explosive rounds down at the exposed Marines. Everyone dived to the side as the spot where they had just been standing was incinerated.
“Control, where are those goddamned reinforcements!?” Steven screamed into his comm.
“Alpha, your fast movers are inbound, along with ground support. ETA is forty-three seconds.”
“We are about to get killed here!” Steven shouted back. “We need those fast movers NOW!”
The chopper fired one of its heat seekers, which sought out one of the plasma turret’s heat vents. The concussion slammed into the Marines. Steven was thrown across the roof and landed next to one of the turrets. Harland and Brooks ran over to the stairway that led to the second floor, trying to draw the chopper’s fire, while Keitaro ran for Steven.
“Gunny! Are you okay?” he yelled out, kneeling next to Steven.
“Yeah…agh, dammit…I’ll live…nooo problem,” he grunted. He turned towards the plasma turret they were near and did some quick thinking. “See if you can find a way to get that turret to fire on the chopper. I’ll help Brooks and Harland draw its fire.”
“Okay. I’m on it.”
Keitaro got up and ran over to the nearby turret. A quick look showed that an infrared sensor was attached to the trigger mechanism (located in the turret), and an emergency power rerouting line directed the power directly to the trigger mechanism if the circuit to the sensor was cut. A small sign on the back of the turret read Emergency Manual Controls.
“Kid, hurry up! I don’t think we can take much more abuse!” Brook’s voice crackled over the comm.
Oookay then, Keitaro thought. Taking out his combat knife, he cut the power cords leading to the infrared sensor. The power, having no other place to go, was rerouted through the emergency line, and into the emergency controls. A small hatch in the back opened and the manual controls slid out.
“Nice,” he muttered, grabbing the trigger and swinging the turret around to point at the chopper. He looked up and aimed.
“The Japanese people send their regards you motherfucker!”
He fired the turret, sending white hot balls of plasma through the air. The chopper tried to swerve to side, but the plasma connected. The armor melted and boiled away as the plasma went through like a blowtorch through butter. The entire chopper was soon engulfed in smoke and flame. It swerved wildly and eventually fell to the ground, exploding with tremendous force, sending shrapnel out in all directions.
“Hell yeah! Kid scores again!” Harland yelled.
“Alpha, this is Talon One. My squadron is coming up behind you and we are about to nape the area. Get clear and keep your heads down.”
“Roger that,” Steven replied, smiling. “Okay boys, sit back and enjoy the show.”
They all walked over to the edge of the roof and looked below. The PLA was bogged down behind the chopper’s wreckage. They had no idea that they were about to be burned. In the distance, the Talon Squadron’s jet engines could be heard growing louder.
“Hey Kid,” Steven said, patting his shoulder. “You do the honors.”
Keitaro grinned and looked down on the PLA’s broken recon unit.
“Five…Four…Three…Two…One 230;Impact.”
As soon as he said impact, the Talon Squadron’s F22As flew overhead and dropped their bombs. The twenty-five hundred pound canisters of napalm transformed the surrounding landscape into a desolate, burning wasteland. Any and all PLA troops, vehicles, supplies, were now smoldering piles of ash.
“Mission accomplished,” Keitaro said proudly.
While the guys congratulated each other with pats on the back, and, in Brook’s case, butting helmets together, they didn’t notice the nine pairs of eyes peeking from the stairway.
“Looks like Keitaro finally got the spine you never managed to beat into him, Motoko,” Kitsune grinned.
“Yes, it appears Urashima has finally changed for the better,” Motoko replied, smiling inwardly.
Naru was filled with a hurricane of emotions. Happiness, relief, love, the list was endless. She couldn’t hold it in.
“Hey Keitarooo!” Naru shouted from the stairway, waving.
Keitaro turned around, as did the others. His face came into view, then his shoulder and upper torso, which had a strange red dot on it…
Crack!
Keitaro’s left shoulder was turned into a fountain of blood. He looked down at the bullet hole wide-eyed, his expression was one of utter surprise.
“Ah, god dammit.”
He fell to the ground, unconscious.
“Sniper!” Steven cried out. “Get to cover!” He looped his arms around Keitaro’s shoulders and dragged him behind an air duct. Harland and Brooks dropped to prone positions and crawled to the roof’s edge.
“Engaging infrared scanner,” Brooks said.
Crack!
Harland’s helmet jerked to the side as a rifle round grazed it. He ducked down and fixed his helmet.
“He’s somewhere in the tree line! Approximately fifty yards out!” Harland shouted.
Brook’s started to scan the trees for any signs of body heat. The entire area seemed to be clear of heat signatures. The bushes and shrubs covering the ground could easily hide a person, but his body heat should be detectable. So where was this guy…
“I see him! He’s camping out in that tree’s branches!” Brooks said.
“Take that fucker out!” Steven shouted.
Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam! Fwam!
The tree was turned to splinters as the heavy rounds sliced through the tree. Branches started to fall as their limbs were completely severed. After about ten seconds, a mangled, bullet riddled corpse fell out of the tree and hit the ground.
“Target eliminated.”
“Area secure!” Harland called out. He ran over to the girls, all of whom were completely distressed. Harland looked at Naru.
“You know him?” he asked in passable Japanese, pointing to Keitaro’s unconscious form.
“Yes, we all do,” Naru said, tears pouring out. “He used to be the landlord here.”
Harland raised an eyebrow. “He failed to mention that.”
“Can we see him?” she asked, her sad eyes filling with even more tears. All the other girls looked at him imploringly. There was no way he could say no.
“Yeah, you can. But you’ll have to give him some space,” he said. He led them over. Steven was yelling into his comm.
“This is Alpha, calling to any USMC forces in the area! We have a man down! Request immediate medevac support! He is in critical condition!”
“Acknowledged, Alpha. This is medevac helo Foxtrot Seven, requesting your coordinates, over.”
“We are located in the residential district, sector nine, look for the red smoke. Over.”
“Roger, we are on our way. Out”
Steven returned his attention to Keitaro. His face was deathly pale from loss of blood. His breathing was shallow, and his pulse was weak. Steven looked up at the girls, then at Harland.
“Who are they?” he asked, tension in his voice.
“They said that they know Kid. Apparently he used to be their landlord here.”
“No shit? He was a landlord?”
“According to these girls, yeah.”
“Huh, I always thought of him as an aspiring repair man.”
He pulled a smoke grenade out of his belt, pulled the pin, and tossed over to the roof’s open area. After a few seconds, the sky was filled with a pillar of dark red smoke. In the distance, the medevac chopper was approaching.
“Brooks, help me move Kid,” Steven said.
He put his arms under Keitaro’s shoulders while Brooks picked up his legs. Together, they carried Keitaro over to the chopper, which had just landed on the roof. The consistent drone of the rotors drowned out everything.
“Hurry up and get him on board!” the crewman yelled out of the hatch.
“How much room do you have in their?” Steven asked as he and Brooks lifted Keitaro up and onto the stretcher that was in the chopper.
“Enough for all the bullshit my CO (commanding officer) gives me everyday,” the crewman replied. “Why do you ask?”
“We found some civilians that weren’t evacuated. They need to be removed from the combat zone.”
“Sure thing. We’ll bring ‘em back to the base of operations that we set up on the outskirts of town. If you need to talk to the commander there, the call sign is ‘Control Two.’”
“Okay then,” Steven turned to the girls.
“Come on, everybody get on board, we’re pressed for time!” All the girls climbed into the chopper and buckled up.
“Alright! Take her up!” the crewman shouted to the pilot.
“Got it, heading back to base.”
The chopper rose into the air and made its way back toward the temporary base located in the eastern outskirts of Hinata. Armor and infantry units were already being deployed into the streets to mop up any remaining recon patrols. All in all, everything was running smoothly.
“Okay fellas,” Steven turned to Brooks and Harland, “it’s just the three of us. Let’s rendezvous with the nearest infantry squad and establish are next order of business.”
“Yes, sir!” they said enthusiastically.
Date: May 1, 2007; 0954 hours (Military Time)
Location: USMC Medevac Chopper Foxtrot Seven, en route to FOB (forward operating base).
Status: Airborne.
Alert Level: Defcon 1
If it wasn’t for Keitaro’s unconscious form laying in a stretcher with a bleeding wound in his shoulder, the ride might have been pleasant. All the girls were staring at him, hoping that he’d wake up soon. A year and a half of waiting and when they finally see him again, he gets shot. Fate can be so cruel.
Down below, small firefights were taking place between Marine infantry and PLA recon. The Marines, due to their intense training and skill, were easily overcoming the PLA’s makeshift defensive lines.
The medevac chopper was roughly six kilometers from the base when Keitaro started to wake up. He was first aware of a dull ache in his left shoulder, which steadily grew worse. Then his hearing kicked in, which picked up the sound of helicopter rotors. Followed by his eyesight, which slowly started to focus. Straining his muscles, Keitaro turned his head towards the girls, who were taking in the sight of the war torn city below.
“Hey girls. Long time no see.”
It was like flipping a switch. Their eyes went wide and looked down at him, and they all broke into ultra bright smiles.
“Keitaro!” they all shouted with joy.
“I hope you all managed without me,” he said.
“We missed you sooo much!” Su said. “It’s no fun without you.”
“Even Motoko missed you,” Kitsune said, grinning.
“Kitsune! How many times do I have to tell you before it sinks in!?” Motoko yelled in frustration. “I have no feelings for that man whatsoever beyond a simple acknowledgement of his existence!” She immediately realized what she said and looked down at Keitaro. His face showed no emotion at all, but you could tell by his eyes, the pain he felt.
“Well, I guess some things haven’t changed,” Keitaro said coldly. Everybody was glaring at Motoko, who hung her head in shame.
“So,” Haruka broke the silence. “What’s my nephew doing in the Marines?”
“Pretty funny story about that. Me and Seta had just-
“Contacts! Bearing two-one-nine! Three MIGs approaching at fifteen hundred kilometers an hour!” the copilot said.
“Hold on back there! Evasive maneuvers!” the pilot said. He put the chopper into a fast descent, leveling out at about ten feet above the ground. The MIGs had locked on with their radar, and were engaging their missiles.
“They have a lock on us!” the copilot said in a panicked voice. The chopper’s missile alarm was blaring. “The MIGs have launched their missiles! Three R-27RE1s approaching at Mach Two-point-Five!”
“Well girls,” Keitaro said uneasily, “it’s been nice knowing you.”
Impact.
The first missile overshot and hit the cockpit from the left side. The windows shattered and flew inward, cutting the pilot and copilot to shreds. The fiery explosion burned their bodies to ash and turned the nose of the chopper into a cloud of debris. The second missile connected with the main rotor, effectively removing most of the chopper’s roof. Then the third missile hit the rear, and what little that was left of the fuselage after that fell through the air, hit the ground, and due to its uncontrollable speed, started skidding down the road.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!”
The chopper was going at about a hundred or so kilometers an hour. It hit a parked car and went into a barrel roll. The girls were getting thrashed around in their seats, the safety straps just barely holding. Keitaro was strapped down in the stretcher, but it was just as bad. The chopper entered a three-way intersection, where the two streets were lined up perpendicular to the left and right, and up ahead was a building.
“Ah shit. Not again,” Keitaro groaned.
Date: May 1, 2007; 1002 hours (Military Time)
Location: Forward Operating Base, call sign “Control Two.”
Status: Manned and fully operational.
Alert Level: Defcon 1
“General, three MIGs have just shot down one of our medevac choppers. Would you like me to redirect Eagle Squadron?”
“Do it. Send them to hell,” General Dixon replied. The nearby radioman gave the order, and a few seconds later, the three blips on the radar disappeared.
Brigadier General Charles Dixon was the commanding officer of the three battalions of Marine Corp soldiers currently operating in the region. He was an upright and steadfast gentleman, who didn’t take shit from anybody. A brilliant tactician, he always put the lives of the men under his command first.
“Are there any squads in the area?” he asked sternly.
“Yes sir, we have Bravo team two kilometers to the south.”
“Put ‘em on the radio.”
The radio buzzed with static for a few seconds before a connection was established.
“Bravo team, this is Control Two. Please respond for new orders. Over.”
“This is Sergeant Julio Vega of Bravo, I read you loud and clear.”
“Medevac chopper Foxtrot Seven has been grounded by three MIGs. I want you to take your squad and check for survivors. I’m sending you the coordinates now. Over.”
“Understood, we are en route to the crash site. Will update as necessary. Bravo Out.”