Cyber Wars Ch. 13: "Fallen Knights"

[Wolf99x]

OOC: Here is the new chapter.

BIC: It has been three months since Jade's imprisonment at an
undisclosed reformation prsion and Monk's disappearance into the
unknown. Wolf has now taken command of Cyber Force, and has installed
Wraith as second-in-command. The past 3 months have not been easy. The
General, still confined to his office but acting through his wormy XO
(and co-conspirator) have numerously tried to put the kibosh on Wolf's
plans for military counterstrikes against the latest set of
Mastermind's agressions in both worlds. However, Wolf has managed to
keep the unit intact, and, despite the loss of the team's dedicated
hacking specialist, Cyber Force has managed to force Mastermind into a
stalemate of sorts; neither side wishing to attack the other.
However, one side must inevitably make the first move...

***

Colonel Jason "Wolf" MacKenzie, backed up by 4 members of Cyber Force's
Delta Team, cautiously walked through the darkened hallways of the
weapons facility. They had no NVG, and only their flashlights provided
any illumination.

"Stay sharp, that ninja is still on the loose," Wolf said just before a
throwing star embedded itself into the neck of one of the soldiers,
dropping him to the ground with a gurgling death rattle.

"Take cover!" Wolf shouted as enemy soldiers came out of the darkness,
guns blazing. The remaining Delta troopers returned fire from behind
cover, dropping the enemies with controlled 3-round bursts from their
M16s.

Wolf looked around, and almost got a throwing knife in the head. He
moved away just in time and it embedded into the wall behind him.
Ducking back behind cover, he began issuing orders to what was left of
his team.

"Okay, I'm on point, Martinez and Slater are flanking. King, you bring
up the rear."

The 4 soldiers walked down the hall, weapons at the ready and pointing
forward. Wolf suddenly heard something drop down behind his team, but

by the time he spun around to issue the warning...it was too late.
King's throat was slashed by a survival knife, Slater got that same
knife thrown into his skull, and Martinez was gunned down point blank
with King's M16. Wolf leveld his gun, and saw the assailant, a lithe
black-clad ninja, leap over his head and toss two shuriken in his
direction. Wolf rolled out of danger and tried to track his target, but
the ninja was moving too fast for him to draw a bead.

"Damn it...hold still!" he growled.

The ninja threw three more knives in mid air, then paused for a second
on a rafter before preparting to leap again. Wolf was already tracking.
Firing his M16 on full-auto, he saw some of the bullets deflect the
knives, and walked his gunfire onto the leaping ninja, who fell to the
ground, 5 bullets in its chest.

The lights suddenly came on, and a synthetic computer voice echoed
through the room.

"Objective acheived, simulation ending."

The 'dead' soldiers, still blood splattered, but with their wounds
sealing, stood up. As did the ninja, who removed its hood to reveal the
face of Commander Kaitlin Vong.

"That was a good training simulation. Both sides performed quite well
under the circumstances" Wolf said.

Kaitlin nodded. "I agree...but I would have at least like to have taken you down with me."

Wolf lowered his gun and showed everyone the ersatz knife embedded in
his chest. "But you did..." he grinned. "Only the simulation had ended
so I didn't feel it hit me." He pulled out the knife and tossed it to
the ground, watching it vanish in a flash of pixels. "In real life of
course, I would have been screwed."

He turned to the 20 or so soldiers now gathered in the simulated

hallway. Some of them wore Cyber Force military garb, these were
members of team Delta, while the others wore Mastermind uniforms. The
'enemy' soldiers had been played by Cyber Force's Gamma and Epsillon
teams.

"Now, what went wrong for both sides in this conflict?" Wolf asked

Martinez raised his hand. "the attackers had a lack of proper equipment
and intel."

"Exactly," Wolf responded. "The attackers had no NVG, and no
instruction on how to turn on the power. What about the problems faced
by the defending force?"

Sgt. Laura Coleman of CF-Gamma provided that answer. "We underestimated
you, sir."

Wolf nodded. "Damn right you did. Even though I was outnumbered, I was
able to take down most of the defenders...until their secret weapon
made sushi out of me and my team." He grinned at Kaitlin again, who
grinned back. "Of course, I underestimated too. The real lesson to be
learned from this is that you never want to underestimate your enemy's
capabilities, especially if it's Mastermind."

Suddenly a message window opened up right in front of Wolf. It was a
message from the ops room of Cyber Force's base in the Los Angeles
area.

"Sorry to interrupt, Colonel," the comm officer said, "but we have a
helicopter requesting permission to land. The person I'm communicating
with, a Captain Miles Miller, wants to speak to you personally."

Wolf paused in thought. Miller...what could he want...?

"Tell him I'll be right there. Give him landing clearance to Hangar 2."
he said as he closed the message window with a wave of his hand.
He turned back to the soldiers. "Good job today, you're all dismissed."

Everyone logged out almost simultaneously.

***

Wolf left the training room and headed for Hangar 2, Kaitlin following
him close behind.

"This is the same Captain Miller who saved us on Mt.
McHale, right?" she asked.

"Yes...but I don't know why he'd come here personally...unless FLAG
needs the help of Cyber Force."

"Well, we're certainly qualified to dispense that
help." she said with a smile.

"True...which reminds me. Where did you learn to throw knives like
that?"

"Well, it's part of my heritage...and I learned quite a
bit of knife throwing from some of my father's friends who worked for
him at SysDef. I decided I was going to give you a demonstration
instead of outright telling you. Todays training sim was a perfect opportunity"

"Well, I'm just glad it wasn't real." Wolf laughed slightly as he gave Kaitlin a quick peck on the cheek before opening the doors to Hangar 2.

As they entered the hangar and waited for Miller's copter to land, Wolf
called Wraith on his PDAP.

"Wraith, I want you to have all of CF-Alpha and CF-Beta ready to deploy
at a moment's notice."

OOC: For clarification: CF-Alpha is made up of all the PCs, while
CF-Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsillon are made up of NPCs we can use for
missions if need be.