**Author:** SLDH8MM3R **You Can Find Me At:** SLDH8MM3R #6935 MIAMI, FLORIDA. 28TH MAY 2043. The once bustling ocean-side city had once been a bustling area where community and nationality would merge into one and embrace a multitude of cultures. After hurricanes and rising water levels left the area inhospitable for average citizens, the area would become a smuggling hub connecting North America and South America used by narcos, terrorist organisations and the Dark Market. Intelligence via a reliable yet shady source revealed to the US government that a known No-Pat Terrorist Cell consisting of Ex-US operatives have been spotted in the ruins of the flooded baseball park now turned into a port for their operations, This cell needed eradication before they could become a larger threat so they sent in the Marines to get the job done. The USS Graveyard was a mighty vessel that sat idle off the shore of the once glorious city, it housed the Tombstone Unit; a few battalions worth of the best marines who were trained in efficiency and brutality. The figurehead of the unit was none other than Captain Daniel Recker, the esteemed legend who prevented the coup in Hong Kong and delayed the war enough so America could prepare to take victory from the Chinese army. Age hasn't slowed him down one bit, the other sign of his progress was the grey lock of hair in his brown widow's peak. Recker was on the top deck of the ship as he stood beside his second in command Jackson Hernandez, his team called him Gravedigger due to his affinity for using a shovel as a melee weapon. As Gravedigger unlatched the chin-strap of his helmet, he would look out onto the shore. “Shipping out in ten minutes, I wanted to give you time to enjoy the view.” “You said you were from around here, where did you grow up Jack?” “Me? I grew up in Tampa but that’s DM territory now, shame we can’t do anything about those bastards.” It was a shame that the Dark Market had invaded their nation but they were only undisputed because of their pin-point intelligence on No-Pat forces and high value shipments, as long as they had what the CIA needed then the Dark Market had immunity. Recker sighed softly as he held onto the railing of the ship, his tan-coloured RM68 resting on his chest sling as the suppressor tapped against the metal barrier. Recker took a minute to breathe the sea air before moving his hand over the textured grip of his rifle. “Intel looks solid, the team is fueling up a drone for aerial reconnaissance just so we don’t get any nasty surprises. You’ll be in charge of Upright and have an MAV to lay down covering fire on the main gate, a Nightbird will come in later once my Slant team has finished extracting intel from inside. Remember we eliminate all threats before exfil.” The briefing was simple and rudimentary but it described the basic dynamics of the situation, Recker will infiltrate via the makeshift port while Gravedigger began an assault on the militia from the flooded car park and divert attention from Recker’s squad. Gravedigger nodded in confirmation of the plan of action, they had gone over specifics earlier but Recker reminded Jackson of the fundamentals. The intercom called their call-signs to the well deck to prepare for launch, Recker tucked the rifle into his armpit as he led the walk down to their squads. The Nightbird on the main deck was going over last second preparations whilst the Drone was ready to be launched for overwatch, as they walked past the airstrip they were stopped by the drone pilot to give them a warning. “Recker, I can provide a quick fly over the makeshift port and car park but the tower is saying there’s a heavy storm coming; hence why most of the birds are in storage.” “What about our Nightbird?” “Got the twins operating it, got the balls to fly out in high winds and won’t be told otherwise.” The twins were the best pilots Recker had ever seen, a brother and sister who took to flying like fish to water. If anyone was providing covering fire for Upright squads, they would be the top pick. As the pair walked past, the twins would nod in unison as the brother loaded the missiles and the sister checked the controls. Down into the lower decks and past the marines in the cafeteria and the marines doing checks of the equipment, they finally made their way to the well deck and watched as the separate units prepared for the operation. Gravedigger’s team was loading into the MAV with ammunition boxes of 6.8x51mm rounds being lowered into the vehicles through the hatch, their attacking force was bolstered with a 50mm cannon and a 60mm Mortar pod for entrenched infantry dug-in at the of the stadium. Recker’s team however was loading repel kits and C3 charges for clearing the inner compounds and getting up to the supposed base of operations. On the catwalk between the two transports, Recker stopped Gravedigger so they could say their goodbyes and reiterate the plan. “You’ll take Northwest seventh street and set up 50. calibre sniper support in the apartments opposite the entrance, once I give the order you’re clear to make it rain.” “Got it, Got it. See you on the other side brother.” The two shook hands before they made their way to their respective vehicles, Gravedigger climbing into the hatch of the leading convoy whilst Recker boarded the RHIB and manned the wheel. The floodgate began to open slowly with the loud flashing alarm warning those nearby to keep clear, once the gate was open, the two squads split off to get into position. They would wait until nightfall to start the offensive. OPERATION PITCHERS TIDE 19:48pm // 28TH MAY 2043 Using the second to highest story of the flooded car park, Upright team had set up a temporary base of operations and a small depot for weapons and ordnance storage. The sniper team has found themselves in an old apartment with a view into the stadium and on the street below, easily more than twenty in sight. The overhead drone had confirmed at least five on the loading dock with automated security such as sensors and turrets, all controlled by a commander in the commentator’s box for a good view of the port. Intel did confirm that they were at least a hundred and at most one hundred and fifty including the commander. Recker’s team prepared for insertion, they had been waiting by the torn open wall of the outfield which worked as a port entrance for the militant group. Gravedigger would break radio silence and confirm that they were ready to strike. “Tombstone actual, this is Upright, ready to mobilise.” “Slant is ready for infiltration, send them to the graveyard.” Recker would turn to his squad and move over towards Grace, the recon expert and marksman, who gave Recker the repel kit and hooked herself to her own kit. Anders and Philip, the medic and machine gunner respectively, attached themselves to their own kit before giving it a tug. Anders would curse underneath his breath at the repelling cable, this was caught on my Philip who would begin to comfort him with his soft southern accent. “Andy, I checked the cable, your ass isn’t going to break it” “Try double checking? Because if this snaps then you’ll be without a medic-“ Grace stared down the pair into silence before nodding towards Recker and pulling her mask over her nose, she would attach the tool to the cable before ascending up the wall. Recker and the other members of the squad would join shortly after and climb over the wall into the stands, the heavy storm battering the stands and causing the floor to creak with every step. As they quietly moved towards the commentator’s box, the sound of the incursion outside began to draw more enemies from the port towards the entrance of the main building. From what he could hear on the coms, Gravedigger’s forces had been laying into the militants force’s fortifications and the mortar had effectively eliminated all combatants on the first floor. Slant team began to slowly stack up on the door leading into the commander’s overwatch position, Recker removed a concussion grenade from his plate carrier and passed it to Philip. After a quiet countdown, Philip would throw the grenade into the room and wait for the bang before kicking the door open with his backfoot. Recker led the infiltration and pulled his gun up to fire at the commander, lining up his shot on the target’s head; he would fire twice as the body slumped against the wall. Anders would mop up the other two occupying hostiles with two short bursts from his suppressed PBX-45, once he had cleared the other entrances for hostiles, he would push the dead commander from his chair and get to work on shutting down the rear defences. “Clear, let me give us some breathing room.” After searching the linked devices tab, he would disable the security systems which would allow them to sneak into the exterior. Anders would get up and pick up the commander’s black NVK-S22 and pull the sling over his shoulder, reserving the gun for close encounters. The team reprepped to enter the main interior and hopefully take out command, Philip kept his LCMG’s laser on the door as Recker opened it; once clear they began to search for the command room. Recker would take point as he would reach the sports bar that had been turned into a heavy machine gun nest, the MAVs had pulled back from their offensive positions and Marines had disembarked to suppress the position. Through Recker’s earpiece, Gravedigger demanded that the Slant squad do something about the problem. “Upright to Slant, they’ve got 50.s pummelling our MAVs. Nightbird can’t get close and our snipers can’t get a good shot, it’s up to you guys.” Recker would respond to the request as the squad got itself into position, Grace removed the silencer from her G57 and switched the fire mode to burst while Philip and Anders set up the machine gun behind the unattended bar. “Copy Upright, we have a visual. Engaging now.” Recker joined the team and aimed his assault rifle at the heavy machine gun operator and took the shot. Before the enemy combatants could react, Philip would shred through them all with his machine gun; the bullets penetrating the wood that blinded the snipers from firing on the placement. Once the room was clear, Philip pivoted the machine gun to cover the entrance towards the staff areas where the rest would probably be. Recker leaded into the radio on his plate carrier to request some back up. “Upright, link up in the sports bar. What’s the ETA on the Nightbird?” “Twins are nearby and awaiting orders, patching them through to the frequency.” The sound was gargled, especially since they were flying in high winds and the chaff from the storm was making longer range communications less coherent. Shortly after a few seconds of static, the twins would respond with the older brother checking in. “This is Wing, Thanks for taking out the 50. We can get close and deliver the pain, awaiting orders.” The blades could be heard overhead and almost drowned out the Upright Squad’s footsteps as they joined Recker at the bar, Gravedigger and a couple of other Marines had joined them to assault the staff areas. Recker, Anders and Grace would change their magazines beforehand so they wouldn’t run dry unexpectedly during the fight, Grace keeping the pistol up since using her DXR-1 indoors wasn’t the right fit for CQB. Once everyone prepared, the marines took one of the C3 charges off Anders and breached the door after a short delay. Recker’s squad were to clean house and eliminate all hostilities while Gravedigger would secure any weapons or intelligence found in their wake alongside burying the bodies at sea. Slant squad stacked up on the door before entering into the breach, a long corridor of caffettiera storage rooms that led towards the server rooms; where no doubt some of the militants will be dug in. Beforehand they split into two groups with Recker and Anders pairing off while Grace and Philip were grouped together, the pairing worked well as they silently cleared the rooms and marked any notes with a red sticky note. Soon they came together by the door as they planned to break into the server room, Grace placing down a T-UGS so they could get better eyes on the room. Seven hostiles were present behind the door and in a defensive position with no-doubt that a machine gunner was waiting on the other side, if they couldn’t go through the main door then they’d just had to make a new one. Using a pack of C5 and a rough layout on the wall of the building, Recker would place the explosive on the left of the gunner encampment and give the team the advantage by flanking them. With the double-click of the C5, the explosive blew a crater into the soft wall of the server room, sending the wood splinters and insulation towards the enemy as Grace and Anders would spray into the militants and killing five whilst destroying a couple servers with the spray. They would pull back as Recker used the information on his PAC to find the last two targets, unholstering his Rex as he rounded the corner. Seeing that the final two were hiding behind a thin wall, Recker would shoot through it to nail the pair in the head with two separate bullets. With one last sigh of relief, the rest of the team regrouped with Recker before he could give any more orders. “Grab whatever you can download, keywords for Oz, Leviathan or the Dark Market.” Command had been demanding that all information on those organisations needed to be found, the paranoia from Oz was justified by his power. Recker had wanted a shot at Oz after he got Pac killed trying to protect Irish and his ship, deep in the back of his mind, Recker couldn’t help but miss Kimble and prayed that his hunt for Oz hadn’t gotten him killed. Anders began to download as Recker received a message from the sniper team. “This is Slant-2, we have confirmed visuals of the militia’s leader being guarded in the executive office with the rest of the armed guards in the upstairs offices.” Anders allowed the search algorithm to comb over any necessary data about those people of interest, he left the laptop there for the Marines to pick up during exfil. If they had a shot of getting good intel from the milita then the leader must be captured alive, with a quick checking of equipment and magazine counter; they were ready to extract the target. “Going upstairs, Stack on me.” Recker commanded his unit to stack up on the stairs leading up to the offices and make their way upstairs, Anders elected to take point with his submachine gun and scan the stairwell before giving the go-ahead to follow him up the stairs. The office floor was covered in sandbags and empty crates where weaponry once was, no doubt that the militants had set up their last stand in the manager’s office and where all communications within the stadium had been moved to. Slant squad quietly pushed up the stairs, eyeing the upper and lower stairways in case they were being flanked by the enemy forces. Eventually after a suspenseful trek up the stairs, they had finally made it outside the office. Sniper team made contact to confirm visuals on the enemy’s inside, easily more than ten hostiles visible with more out of sight. From their Bipoded position, the spotter would lead into his radio. “Slant-2 to Slant Squad, permission to fire on the targets?” “Make it rain.” Recker quietly whispered into the radio as to not give away their presence, after a short delay the distant ringing of the shot and the panicked shouting of the combatants as they rushed the window to get a shot at the snipers. Philip and Grace moved to prep the door with a frag grenade in his hand to clear out the office, with Grace’s backfoot kick on the door, the door flew open to which Philip would throw in the grenade. Whilst the milita was too focused on the door, the hand grenade would go off and cut down a majority of the combatants. Disorientated by the two directions of combatants, the milita began to switch between firing out of the window and at the door. Recker’s squad pushed into the cubicles and took cover behind the various printers and countertops, trading shots with the milita as they were picked off by the internal fire or the sniper support outside. Recker’s shot was the one to land the final kill on the leader’s guard with a penetrating shot from his rifle, going through a stall wall and through the headset of the guard. He would huff out the adrenaline of the battle and lean into his radio to confirm that they were at the leader’s operating room. “All call-signs, Slant squad is outside the target room. Anyone got a visual?” “Slant-2, Boarded up and curtains. You’re going in blind.” Recker cursed underneath his breath as he picked out another concussion grenade, they didn’t know what heat the leader was packing. Before they could finish prepping the door, a rattle of gunfire that penetrated the walls and door caught the team by surprise. Most of them would duck for cover except Anders, who had been tagged by the shot. Recker would pull Anders into cover as he groaned in pain at the shot, the plate had caught a bullet but another ricocheted off the door frame and shot him on the far left side of his pelvis. Philip returned fire through the wall before being cautioned by Grace about their mission. “We need him alive, he knows more about Oz. Recker! Toss me a concussion grenade!” Between applying pressure on the wound, Recker unclipped a grenade from his carrier and passed it to Grace. Philip took out a SPH launcher and shot a charge at the door while Grace prepared to throw the grenade, between the eardrum shattering gunfire the beeping of the charge would count down to the explosion. The charge exploded in a cloud of smoke and the concussion charge that was thrown in afterwards disoriented the occupants of the room, before entering Philip grabbed Ander’s stolen shotgun. Philip would rush the enemy while they were nursing their sudden splitting headaches, kicking what remained of the door off its hinges before firing on the occupants and killing the remaining guards. He turned his barrel towards the leader, Philip would demand he stood down. “Heard me boy!? You reach for that piece and I’ll spill your last lunch on the floor of this here office!” Grace came from behind and kicked the leader’s side arm away from him whilst she took out some zip ties to secure the hostile, although struggling against the cuffs, Grace had him restrained and ready for extraction. Before Recker had joined the two squadmates in the room, the leader began to spew insults at the pair. “YOU FAKE FUCKING PATRIOTS, DOING WHATEVER WASHINGTON TELLS YOU TO DO! ONE DAY YOU’LL SEE HOW PLAYING ALONG WILL GET YOU ABAND-“ Philip had enough of his shit and took the stock of the NVK-S22 and hit the leader on the head with it, knocking him out and keeping him quiet. Recker and Anders shortly joined them by the door, Anders pressing on his wound to force a clot so he wouldn’t have to worry about bleeding out. Recker lifted the ‘patriot’ onto his shoulders and took out his Rex in case that there were any hiding hostiles. Unfortunately they weren’t in the clear, the loud boom from a tank cannon ripped through the air and shattered the windows. Anders shielded himself from the spray of glass, after which he saw the source of the powerful shot. Recker’s radio beeped and on the other end of the line was Gravedigger speaking under heavy gunfire. “This is Gravedigger! We have an unidentified armoured vehicle that just ripped through our MAV, we need you to soften the target for the twins. They should have some launchers in there.” With Recker’s hands full and Grace tending to Anders, it was up to Philip to find a launcher that could be used to distract the tank. Philip would drop his machine gun to scavenge the crates and boxes for any sort of launcher, at most he could find was twenty year old weapons and ordnance from the last war. In frustration Philip would push over a table which revealed a case that was marked as ‘Javelin,’ seeing the case and hearing the tank cannon rip through the air once more, Philip opened the case and activated the Javelin lock-on whilst rushing towards the window. The lock ticked slowly as Philip got visual on the tank, it appeared to be floating on the water with no visible tracks or known method of movement; no doubt experimental from Nordvik or someone else. As the tank lined up on the MAV to destroy the final ground support vehicle available, the Javelin had a complete lock on the tank and with a click of the trigger the rocket began to fly; sending the papers and stalls shooting backwards with the back blast. The hit was effective, for a short while it even looked like it had been disabled completely until the turret began to spin towards the direction of the offices; no matter if they ducked for cover the shot would pulverise the squad inside. As a last resort, Philip clutched his radio and yelled into the radio for the air support from the Nightbird. “SLANT TO WING! WE NEED FIRE ASAP! I REPEAT WE NEED FIRE ASAP-“ Boom. The explosion rocked the street and sent waves crashing against the walls of the buildings, Gravedigger wouldn’t list himself from cover until he heard the cheer of his squad. Once he himself peaked over the wall, he witnessed as the turret had been blown clean off by the Nightbird’s ATG missile. The Nightbird hovered overhead as it fired a couple bursts from its 20mm cannons into the burning chassis of the experimental tank before moving towards the car park for the Slant team’s extraction with the target. The sister would come on the radio to direct the team. “This is Wing, Phil, you can tell me how much you owe me at the new LZ. Lighting a flare for you to follow.” “I’d tell you but your brother would kill me.” “Affirmative, just give me a reason, Philip.” The older brother butted in as the flare grew as the fanning winds of the helicopter and the approaching hurricane approached the area. Philip dropped the spent javelin and jogged over to Anders to help get him towards the landing zone, Recker had the target over his shoulders as they exfiltrated down the stairs and through the server room to retrieve their data drives and down towards the entrance. The water was littered with bodies and bloody water which were scattered by the movement of the remaining MAV transporting troops and prisoners on top of the vehicle, they would link up with the Slant team on the USS Graveyard once they had retrieved the MAV and the bodies inside it. After a short trek through the old streets of downtown Miami, Slant team found themselves at the landing zone to get a trip back to the ship. Loading the VIP into the back of the helicopter and the squad climbing onto the seats, they could finally extract from the zone; it was time to ask some questions about the operation the militia had set up. USS GRAVEYARD 23:12pm // 9th December 2043 Back on the USS Graveyard, the rumours of a new deployment had been talked about within the cabins and halls of the ship as the request of using an occupied port off the coast of Cuba had been requested to be used as a fuelling station for the next voyage. Recker had been invited into the war room by the admiral as he was requested by General Greenland, from the tone of her voice it wasn’t usual squid work but something a little dirtier. As Recker stood beside the General with his combat equipment still adorning him, he would watch as the screen presented the FALT team logo; it reeked of a CIA special task force job. Wolff’s sly voice played through the ear pieces of the two officers as he made his request. “Greenland, Recker, we have confirmed the whereabouts of the known Non-Patriated terrorist and insurgent Loyiso Okusanya, a.k.a ‘Oz’. I already have a team implanted within their little commune to execute Oz and Camila Blasco when I-“ Recker was confused by Blasco’s name drop as an enemy combatant, she had proven herself an ally to Recker for when he was tasked under some deniable operations clearing coasts of smugglers coming to the US. Why she would be considered a target would be concerning to say the least. “Blasco’s’ good people, I’ve worked with Leviathan and they never betrayed me for a lick of cash. Are you sure they’re enemy combatants?” “Positively, they were the ones that transported known fugitives of the United States. You wouldn’t like who’s also on the hit list.” Wolff would reveal the full list of those on his kill list, Oz being a priority until he made his way down to a string of familiar names; task force Exodus and by extension, Irish was on the list. Recker would lean on the table as he looked up at the footage of the Black Ridge raid and saw his old friend as clear as day; why the hell was he helping Oz? Greenland would take over as the level headed of the pair and asked for specifics. “Agent Wolff, what would you need? Any ports nearby we can use to unload the cargo for your incursion.” “I can get you non-patriated identities for the Graveyard to slip past Levithan without panic. You just send whatever you have left to spare, make camp on the other side of the mountain and wait for our signal. Any questions?” Recker gripped the table with silence as his answer, Greenland more politely nodded towards the screen and leaned over to close the call. “We’re good here, we’ll contact you once we’re in position. Let’s bag this bastard.” Recker sighed softly as he looked at the kill list for the mission, there’s no way Irish would work with the people who killed Pac and hijacked an experimental US satellite. The last communication before he went dark was Recker and Kimble shooting the shit about the war and talking about Omar, it reminded him of old times. Greenland placed her hand on his shoulder as Recker dropped his head in defeat. “Recker, you knew Irish cared more about Civvies than Soldiers; remember Shanghai-“ Recker took a step back and tucked the straps on his plate carrier back over his shoulder before turning around to go towards the armoury where his team was waiting for him. “I’ll deal with this. Just get everyone prepped for Richtersveld.” Recker stormed out of the room and down towards the lower deck, where people would normally stop for conversation; they would instead get out of Recker’s way to not disrupt a man on a warpath. After a brief moment of traversing the ship down towards the armoury, he was greeted by his squad which had been given some new weapons to battle with. Their excitement turned to worry as they saw Recker enter with a scowl, they knew he had just been given an order he didn’t agree with. “Reck, heard we’re setting sail? You don’t seem too happy about the destination.” Anders was the first to talk out of the squad, the wound from Pitchers Tide had healed completely and he was ready to fight in the frontlines once again. He pulled off his Tactical vest and set it down on the bench as he listened to Recker’s troubles. “It’s not where we’re going, it’s who’s our target. Exodus has been put on the combatants list and Irish is included.” The squad froze when they heard Irish was now a part of the enemy, Philip had the pleasure of fighting alongside Irish until he left the Marines whilst the other two had only heard good things about Kimble. They stayed silent for a short while as they thought about how to deal with this situation. Grace would tap her knife against the metal cage like a metronome for her thoughts, trying to make sense of the announcement. “If he’s collaborating with Oz then it has to be for a reason? If we could just find it out maybe we could coax the exodus back to the winning side-“ “Recker, if the CIA has declared Irish enemy of the state then it’ll be a kill order anyway we swing it. I’m sorry.” Grace butted into Recker’s hepithony yet it didn’t stop the gears from turning in his head, he needed to know why he was doing this and if Oz’s cause really was in the best interest for everyone; or if it was dooming all those not underneath his flag. Recker didn’t want to leave Omar without a father once again, so he had a plan to go against Greenland and Wolff’s orders. “While Gravedigger and FALT search for Oz and Silver Spear, we’ll conduct our own mission to contact the exodus and find out what this is all about. I have a feeling we’re not being told everything we should know.” “And if Exodus isn’t in the country?” “Then we stick to the plan of action, this doesn’t leave this room.” The three Marines nodded towards their captain as they made a pact to find the truth about Black Ridge, Oz, Exodus, and how they fit into the narrative of the war that was raging on. Recker trusted his brother to help him understand, and if he didn’t, then he should be the one to finish the job.