Team Sierra Golf: Anomaly 73

[Noble 6]

  Day 1: Squad Sierra Golf (Sunglass Squad)



Team Members: Capt. Chris Agron

Lt. Charley Scheffler

GSgt. Tyler Winklemann

SSgt. Tiffany Conners

Sgt. Samantha Ploetz

Sgt. Sarah Piette



Team Sunglass... Our team, our family. Our team is a special operations unit, put together to be the ultimate anti-terror and anti-Bio terror response team. Our mission

contain and destroy any and all threats to worldwide stability and security. A week ago, an explosion in the forests

of Western New York drew the attention of High Command in Washington D.C. An

unidentified flying object (code named: Anomaly 73) was picked up on multiple radar systems and reported by residents of the area. Friday at 2300 hours we received our orders to infiltrate a team of Rangers who were being sent in to investigate the Anomaly. Due to the high risk of the operation, our identities will be kept classified from the Rangers. Only the two commanding officers of the platoon, Capt. Wesley Wright and Lt. Daniel Halewski, will know our identities and actual mission.

Our orders:

Mission Objective 1: Find and Identify the crash site.

Mission Objective 2: Determine if the anomaly was a military attack or something else.

Mission Objective 3: If there are hostiles, destroy and contain them in accordance with your normal field operations.

Mission Objective 4: Don't blow your cover.

After receiving our orders, I gathered my team in the Rangers barracks. The Rangers didn't seem to trust us. These men and women had trained for years together, and had become a tight unit. They seemed to see us as intruders. I didn't care too much. After a few days, we'd more than likely never see them again. I looked over at my team, my family as it would seem. These five, my five. I had trained with them for over six years. We'd seen things that would make these Rangers turn tail and run home to their mothers. Tyler and Charley, both exceptional marksmen, were sitting around on their bunks, tossing a knife back and forth between them. Tyler's shotgun was sitting on his bunk right beside him, loaded and ready for whatever problem could arise. I laughed when they added in another knife and Tyler started to strain in keeping up with the blades movements. Sarah and Sam were checking their weapons, making sure they were greased and working properly. Sam was in the middle of breaking down her assault rifle and putting it back together. Her normal silly smile plastered across her face, a sure sign of heavy concentration. Sarah was sitting on the floor at the foot of her bed, her legs crossed under her and her pistol on the floor half put together. I couldn't find Tiffany for a moment, but before long I spotted her on top of her bunk, going through her Med-Pack making sure she had everything she needed. In the six years since she joined the squad, she'd somehow never failed to cure a poison or fix a broken anything. The woman worked magic. She was kinda obsessive with medicine and always tried to be the first on the scene to help a person in need. It was why I liked having her on my team. My team was small, but they were dependable. We'd been through hell and back together a dozen times. We'd stopped terrorist actions before anybody knew about them. We'd fought against Bio-weapons created by mad men and fools. However, what we were getting into, we had no idea how horrible it would be. We had no idea, what horrors we would be experiencing.



End of Log 1

[Noble 6]

Day 1: Squad Sierra Golf (Sunglass Squad)



Team Members: Capt. Chris Agron

Lt. Charley Scheffler

GSgt. Tyler Winklemann

SSgt. Tiffany Conners

Sgt. Samantha Ploetz

Sgt. Sarah Piette





Log 2:

After a few hours of set up and learning about these Rangers we'll be working with, a few of them have begun to warm up to us, namely, a pair of Sergeants, Jason Leal and Taylor Kazlowski. We've all become fast friends and have been trading thoughts on what the upcoming mission was about. Obviously they didn't know about our actual mission, and for some reason I felt bad about not telling them about what was coming up on this mission. Regardless, at about 1800 hours, my team and the platoon of 34 Rangers boarded 5 Black Raven Transport ships. They only seated 8 in the cargo hold and two pilots in front, but they bolstered twin 250mm Gatling guns mounted on the underbelly of the ship. They were my favorite for the singular fact that no matter what was thrown at it. The Ravens had a knack for taking more damage than any other ship in Military use, but with the unique ability to somehow stay in the damn air. Even with holes ripped through its 15 inches of reinforced steel, the Raven somehow manages to fly.

Our take off from D.C. was uneventful, and it wasn't until we were about an hour into the flight that Lt. Halewski clicked a button on his helmet, and static erupted through every radio in the platoon. He flashed a quick smile towards another of the Rangers, a Sgt. Megan Nolan, before turning his gaze back to a data pad he had attached to his forearm armor. After a moment of reading he sighed deeply and frowned. He lifted a hand to his helmet again, and this time he started talking.

"Alright troops,we're coming up on the drop zone. in about 45 minutes, we'll be dropping in via a helios drop." he said checking his data pad again. A Helios drop was a quick entry maneuver that allowed soldiers to be placed in quickly behind enemy lines without being detected by radar or sight. However,because of the speeds achieved while flying head first towards a location, a soldier is only allowed to carry a single weapon.

"Obviously as you know, in a helios drop, you can only carry one weapon on you. So choose you weapon; the rest of our gear will be airdropped in after we secure a location and HQ. So our first priority will be to secure the site of Anomaly 73, and establish an HQ. As per orders from the captain, we'll be splitting up into two teams. One platoon will be sent off to secure the site, while another will set up our field HQ." Lt. Dan shouted through his mic.

I tapped the data pad on my wrist armor and activated a private channel that only my team and the Lt. would hear.

"El Tee, Don't forget my team needs to take samples of the crash site." I said into the mic.

"Yeah I know Agron, when my team is done I'll let you guys do your Spec Ops thing. Don’t worry." The Lieutenant said nodding in my direction. I nodded back and then opened another private channel for my team,

"Squad, I need a weapons check. What are we taking in. I want all our bases covered." I said grabbing my MA18 Lancaster Assault Rifle, and strapping it to my chest. I pocketed an extra 4 magazines for the gun and strapped them to my person.

"I'm bringing my Rampage." Winkleman said strapping his shotgun to his body. The magnetic lock system imbedded in our armor systems made it easy to keep our weapons on us without having to worry about accidentally dropping them in this kind of jump.

"We're both bringing our Pistols!" Sarah and Sam chimed in together. They flipped their M12A Assault Pistols. The 13 .45-caliber heavy tungsten rounds were strong enough to stop a bull elephant in its tracks per clip. Almost in unison, the two girls holstered their pistols and then a soft click issued from their hips as the pistols were magnetically attached to their thigh armor.

Tiffany leaned forward to show us "Harley" sitting on her back. "Harley" was her prized possession, more sacred to her than even her Med-Pack. The weapon in question was a standard issue Vibrating Lancer Sword, Longblade style. A Lancer blade for short. Lancer blades were exactly what they sounded like: swords whose blades vibrated at high frequencies. Due to the blades’ intense vibrating, the weapons could cut through almost any organic matter like a knife through hot butter. Every member of my team was trained in the use and operation of a Lancer.

"I think I'll be just fine with this." she said with a chuckle. I stared at Charley as he pulled out his Assault Pistol as well. He gave a quick nod and then holstered his pistol again and sat back against the hull of the Raven. I always forgot that he hated flying in these things. I laughed and made sure my rifle was secure on me before turning and looking over at Ranger Megan and her dual bladed Lancer Sword. It sat on her lower back in its base half form, allowing for easy carrying. Lt.Dan had a sub machine gun attached at his hip, he was nonchalantly typing away on his data pad. I looked at my data pad as a beep issued from it and then I looked back at the Lt. And then back to his message.

**I'm aware this isn't any ordinary scouting mission. Something's not right, and I won't have my team pay the price for any secrets being kept from me. If you know anything, tell me so I can spare my people.****

I stared at the Lt., for a few seconds, and he stared back at me before I shook my head at him. I was going in just as blind as he and the rest of his Rangers. I sighed and then lifted my helmet to my head. I let it fall over my head, and for a moment I couldn't hear a thing. After a second, my helmets diagnostic systems came to life, and I was able to see my ammo supply and my teammates injury and health conditions. I turned to the Lt and my visor polarized to hide my face. I stood up as the time came to make our jumps. The Lt. issued another order through his radio and the back of the Raven began to open. A rush of wind shot through the cargo hold and I braced myself on the bulkhead.

"Alright Rangers! Begin your jumps now. Our rendezvous point is marked into your data pads. We meet at the highest point of this ravine and then we continue on with our missions." the Lt told his men. He looked at me and nodded.

"Your team goes first, try not to die." he said with a chuckle.

I nodded and my team stood. I walked to the edge of the Ravens now open hatch and stared down at the black sea of trees below us. In the distance, I could see the other Ravens flying behind us, and below them small black shapes were falling one by one out of them. I turned back to my team and gave them the thumbs up symbol, before stepping backwards out of the hatch, and plummeting down to the earth below.

END OF LOG:2

[Noble 6]

Day 1: Squad Sierra Golf (Sunglass Squad)



Team Members: Capt. Chris Agron

Lt. Charley Scheffler

GSgt. Tyler Winklemann

SSgt. Tiffany Conners

Sgt. Samantha Ploetz

Sgt. Sarah Piette


I seemed to hover in place for a moment, before the wind flipped me end over end as I fell. I quickly opened my arms and legs to regain control of my fall and stop my flipping free fall. My helmets heads up display showed me that Tiffany's heartbeat was through the roof. I arched my eyebrow as my radio screamed to life and Tiffany exploded into my head.

"CHARLEY LET ME GO! SERIOUSLY YOU SON OF A BITCH!" Tiffany screamed as I assumed Charley pulled her out. I turned my head and my visor magnified my view, I laughed out loud at what I saw. I could see Charley holding both of Tiffany's arms, and she was struggling against him until eventually they broke apart and Charlie spiraled away from her. His laughter broke through the radio and I joined in unable to help myself.

"Fuck you, fuck you in a host of creative ways!" Tiffany yelled again, although I could tell from her tone, that she was on the verge of laughter. I always wondered why she had joined our team if she was so scared of these entry jumps, and how in six years she hadn't gotten over it.
I continued watching as both Sarah and Sam jumped out of the Raven, before I turned my vision back to the quickly approaching sea of trees. My visor's night vision feature activated and I was able to see where the majority of the Rangers were landing, and I created a navigational marker over where the Rangers were. I made the marker visible on my teammates visors and shouted into my MIC,
"Team, the marker you're seeing is where I want you all to aim for. If we get separated from the group, make your way to this ridge."
I said bringing up another marker, this time a blue one at the top of an outcropping about a half mile from where the Rangers were going to be landing. I straightened myself, and fired down at an even faster rate. I concentrated on slowing my breathing and attempted to calm myself down a bit. The thrill of the drop always made me nervous, because at any point something could go wrong, and with a Helios jump, something going wrong normally resulted in Someone dying.
I shuddered as I remembered a young corporal from my original Helios jump class. He had been a young and headstrong cadet, your normal Mr. I know everything there is to know. He never paid attention to the instructor or any of the tips he'd given us. I knew he wouldn't make it to graduation, but I never thought he would fail out the way he did. During our certification jump, the only jump we needed to complete in order to pass, the Corporal was ahead of me in line to jump. He smiled at me a moment before he jumped, and then he was gone as dove head first out of the Raven. I followed right behind him and jumped as well, my body like a bullet, shot down towards our landing zone. It went normally at first, but as we had been told, our suits had a chance of malfunctioning as they were the older models of our current suits. As we entered our safe zone to launch our reverse thruster packs and then parachutes, I pressed the button on my wrist, and the thrusters went off. A moment later I heard over my radio, and the young corporal was screaming, pleading with somebody to help him. His chute wasn't opening, and he was plummeting down towards the earth. There was nothing anybody could do for him, only he could hit his emergency release attached to his chest. He never did however, and I had to watch in horror as his body eventually slammed into the concrete of the ground below.
I blinked the memory away and focused on my task ahead. I continued on my way down before I noticed it. From the forrest below, about 6 miles from the Rangers landing zone, a dull blue light was growing in intensity. If it hadn't of been for the visors indicator, then I would have missed it. The blue light grew to a insane brightness, and before long Lt. Dans voice came across the radio.
"What the fuck is with this blue light! What's going on?" his voice sounded so panicked, that I couldn't help but feel afraid for his Rangers, their El Tee was falling apart. He needed to get ahold of himself.
As I opened my mouth to tell him to calm down, a blinding white flash erupted through the air, my visor polarized as much as it could to stop the flash from burning my eyes, but even with it set as dark as it could, (nearly black), I had to close my eyes. As I fell, my hair stood on end and I felt odd, almost like static electricity was all around me. After a brief moment,the flash from behind my eyelids was gone, and I opened my eyes. I looked down towards where the light had been, before I noticed something else. My visor was off, the physical visor was still there, but all my diagnostic data from my team, All the data from the surrounding area, all of the data from my suit, all of it was gone. I tried my radio, but without the heads up display on my helmet working, the radio didn't so much as crackle. I was falling head first at over 100 miles an hour towards the forest below. I was falling blind, none of my suits emergency features so much as hummed at me. For the first time in a long long time, I felt fear, real fear. The kind of fear that only came with staring death directly in the face. I was falling through the darkness, and I couldn't think of a way out of it. Terror was gripping me and there was nothing I could do.


End of log 3...

[Deleted]

MEDIC LOG 1

Day 1: Team Sierra Golf

Team:
Capt. Christopher Agron
Lt. Charley Scheffler
GSgt. Tyler Winklemann
SSgt. Tiffany Conners
Sgt. Sam Ploetz
Sgt. Sarah Pipette

Team Sierra Golf, or Team Sunglass as some of my comrades like to joke, has been sent out on a relatively routine mission. Well… routine for us anyway. Investigating the crash site of an unidentified flying object is nothing compared to the dirty bombs we've diffused or the hostage situations we’ve handled in the past.

I won’t remark on the opening day of the mission, when we joined the platoon of local Rangers, except to note that they don’t like my team. At all. You’d think they’d be a little more grateful that highly trained specialists are joining them on a seriously dangerous mission, one of whom is an experienced combat medic, but I digress. A few have warmed up to us, but the mistrust is there. We’ll see how long that lasts once we’re in the thick of things.

We flew out of DC in Ravens on our way to the location. I liked the Ravens. They were warships to boot: sleek, fast, and could take one hell of a beating. I never really minded flying, in fact I even enjoyed it. Lt. Charley, however…. My heads-up display on the inside of my helmet could show me real-time vitals for anyone in the platoon if I so desired. I monitored my squad a little closer than everyone else, and Charley’s heart rate and respirations were starting to edge toward the worrying end of the “okay” range.

Lt. Dan came on the comms to give us our orders about 45 minutes from the drop zone. Agron asked for a weapons check, though I was hardly paying attention. The only thing that I was concerned about was my last minute checks. I ran through everything I had on my person, touching each pocket as I thought of it. My mind ran in the same circle over and over until I couldn’t ignore the tiny pinging in my ear. I looked at my vitals display, expecting to see something wrong. But it was my own heart rate that was climbing alarmingly.

I felt the grinding of the hydraulics before I felt the rushing wind. The cargo door opened, and everyone started lining up to jump. I allowed myself to be shuffled backward until I was nearly last. We were given the signal, and the first couple of Rangers jumped. Agron stepped to the edge and fell backward out of the hatch, and despite the lump in my throat, I couldn’t help rolling my eyes. Tyler jumped, whooping like a Redneck on Fourth of July. Sam and Sarah jumped with a squeal and a laugh.

“Ready to jump, Doc?” I heard over my earpiece.

I looked to my left and Charley was standing there grinning like the cat that got the cream.

“Not particularly.” I was surprised at how little my voice shook, even though my knees felt like Jell-O in an earthquake.

There was something in his eyes that made me nervous, but I didn’t have a chance to think about it further. He grabbed my hand and pulled me to the edge.

“TOO BAD!” he shouted as he stepped off the edge of the cargo ramp, his sudden movement and weight pulling me with him.

The scream came involuntarily. For a terrifying second, I was falling and my stomach was in my mouth. My eyes were squeezed tight, and the world spun like some sasdistic carnival ride. But it only lasted only as long as it took for me to snap my teeth closed, and my training to take over.
I forced my eyes open, and tore my arms and legs away from my body to stabilize my fall. I took a few deep breaths, the air tasting like a bad penny.

“You’re getting better at this.” Charley’s voice was dipped in laughter, and he was doing nothing to hide it.

“Fuck you. Fuck you in a host of creative ways.” I spat, looking around to find him.

Then I heard him laugh harder as his body whizzed past mine in a straight dive. I rolled my eyes and arranged myself for the truly terrifying part.
As soon as I was vertical, I was a rock in the ocean. To momentarily distract myself, I pulled up the vitals display. Immediately, every soldiers’ heart rate, respiratory rate, pulse ox, and skin temp were displayed in neat little columns before my eyes, commanding officers and my squad near the top. I turned down my ear piece to get rid of the chatter while I looked over the data. No one was showing any particular signs that would cause me to worry, but a jump like this could escalate at any given moment. There were a few that were breathing a little too fast, and some that weren’t breathing at all.

“STAFF SERGEANT CONNERS!” a voice screamed in my ear.

I guess I had been concentrating so hard on my data that I hadn't heard someone calling my name.

"I'm here." I grumbled, pushing the data off to the side.

"Did you see the rendezvous points that Agron sent us?" Charley asked.

I cast my eyes around the terrain, and noted the red and blue marks.

"Yeah got 'em."

[Noble 6]

Day 1: Team Sierra Golf

Team:
Capt. Christopher Agron
Lt. Charley Scheffler
GSgt. Tyler Winklemann
SSgt. Tiffany Conners
Sgt. Sam Ploetz
Sgt. Sarah Piette



I tumbled down, flying head first towards the sea of trees that would be my grave. I closed my eyes, and I opened my arms and legs, making myself parallel to the quickly approaching countryside. Instantly I felt pull of the wind against my arms and legs, slowing me down ever so slightly. I knew it didn't mean anything in the long run, but I refused to simply die without at least trying to save myself.
I was panicking, something I was about to berate Lt. Dan for before the damn emp wave hit me and a handful of other Rangers. It was ironic, that I was going through exactly what he had been going through just moments ago. I smiled at the thought, that I would have that to latch onto before I impacted the earth and was turned to mush inside my own armor. That's when it hit me like a bag of bricks. The emergency patch on the side of the thrusters operational pack. The Emergency Patch was the only non electrical piece of equipment that was contained on my armor. I threw my right hand backwards towards the emergency hatch on the thruster and grabbed the lever. In the same motion I pulled as hard as I could, and the satisfying sound of metal exploding out from behind me answered my growl. From behind my shoulder pads, and from right above my hips, four small engines shot out and screamed to life. Bright white flames erupted and instantly I felt the air get knocked out of my lungs as the harness attached to my thruster pack pushed into my chest.

"Holy fucking fuck." I said to myself as my heart rate quickly began slowing down. I was still shaken, but at least I wasn't as scared anymore. I kept my arms out as I fell, my training taking over now that things were going a little more normally. My eyes were shooting back and forth attempting to see anything other than a black sea of trees, but to no avail. The emp wave had shut everything down, and that included all my
helmets normal visual applications and functions. I was shaken, but with the familiar screech of the emergency engines I found myself calming enough to get a bearing on my location, the EMP wave had knocked me several miles off course, and from memory I could see the ridge we were supposed to land on in the distance.
"Guess I'm hiking blind towards the LZ." I whispered to myself.
As the ground approached me, I turned my body slightly, and aimed for a nearby river, as the impact from my fall was still going to be enough to knock me out if I landed wrong on the ground below. When I was what I guessed to be 15 meters from the rivers surface, I hit the second emergency hatch on my Jump pack, and prayed it hadn't been fried by the wave. A familiar hiss answered my prayers, and the second set of rockets ignited causing me to hover in place for a few moments. I hit the emergency release button, and the straps holding me to my savior released and I fell into the river below. The rocket pack flew off the moment I was released and slammed into the side of a tree before quickly burning out and shutting off.
I slowly stood up, and wiped water off my visor. I moved quickly into the shadows of the trees, before I unattached my MA18 Lancaster Assault Rifle from my chest. I kneeled down between three closely growing trees, and attempted to get my helmet working again. I removed my helmet and opened a small hatch on the back of it. the small moonlight trickling in from above allowed me to see the damage. Somehow the EMP wave had knocked a few wires off of their designated compartments. I reattached them to their proper locations before wondering how a wave of electricity could physically move wires in a enclosed space. I put the thought out of my mind, and then let my helmet fall over me once again. There was the familiar silence of my helmet making a airtight seal where my armors neckline touched it, and then my visor lit up and i could hear everything again. My vision was filled with my own diagnostics again, and my ammo supply. My navigational map and Target Finder map came to life on opposite sides of my helmet before the Nav map faded away. I tried my radio, however instead of silence I received a loud screeching noise.
I switched my radio setting to my teams private channel and again was answered with static. I tore the small radio from my shoulder and tossed it to the ground. It was useless to me at this point and these radios were meant to be tossed when they malfunctioned. I switched on my helmets short wave radio system, a special helmet system that was meant for close range operations, (anything within a half mile radius).
I called over the short wave and growled when I was answered with silence at first.
Suddenly the radio burst to life and two different voices answered me.
"Hello...this is Sergeant Taylor Kazlowski, squad leader of Team Rhino." Taylor's familiar voice said over the radio, slightly panicked.
"Hey? Hello? This is Private First Class Josh Downs. Rifleman of Team Sword." the unfamiliar voice said over his Radio.
"I'm hurt, I slammed into a fucking tree and cut my leg open really badly. I can't put any weight onto it.
I've lost alot of blood, I was blown off course by that damn Blue energy wave. I need immediate evac, My location is....is fuck I don't even know. My helmet's display...it says I'm 150 meters from where that blue light originated from. I put a marker on it when I saw it start to glow. Not sure how it stayed activated....please hurry." the PFC spoke as quickly as possible. I could tell by the inflection in his speech, that he was in a tremendous amount of pain, and that was causing him to panic.
"This is Captain Christopher Agron of Team Sierra Golf, Taylor, head towards the river, you're less than a half mile out, you should be able to hear it. Once there, if you're able activate your FOF (Friend or Foe) Tag. I'll come to you. Private Downs, don't worry, We'll find you, and then we'll get you back to base." I said standing up and turning my night vision on.





End Of Log