The hunter's bow

The break of dawn

Aksel's pov
The mortars exploded around us as we ran, I heard screams of pain and felt the ground shake beneath my feet as I ran. I had just turned the corner when a large group of masks appeared down the road. I yelled to the team "keep going, I'll cover." Before radioing "Nøkk get the door to the TOC open, we're coming in hot" she replied "opening in 3" as I held the trigger unloading my magazine as my group moved past me, I dropped the double drum mag and slammed in the next the priming my 416 before I fired again, a second later I heard Buck on comms "onyx, get moving well cover" I glanced to my left as I ran for the TOC fully trusting my teammates to deal with the threat I couldn't. I passed them quickly bounding the steps before I turned and sidestepped to the small platform that met the steps and the door to the TOC before yelling "Go! Get inside!" As I fired again. Buck and Nomad moved past me as I turned and followed them in the TOC slamming the door closed and engaging the lock before I slid against the wall gripping my flank as I felt warmth on my hand.
       The joyous mood evaporated as I looked at Freyja and called weakly "hey sis, I'm hit" she looked at me in shock as I lifted my hand showing the red mess covering the palm of my hand. I saw Rich running over with his kit as my eyes traversed the silent room before they landed on Freyja, she had her signature veil lifted over her helmet. She looked horrified at what was happening before I looked to my right and saw Rich, he smiled and said "Christ Onyx, you look like hammered shit" I replied tiredly "I feel like it" he looked worried as he called Nomad and Maverick over he ordered sternly "grab his shoulder we have to get his kit off" the did so causing me to wince at the new burning sensation. I felt my arms get lifted above me and my plate carrier got lifted off my chest before they laid me flat and I felt my shirt get cut as the cold cloth sheers ran across my stomach. I heard Rich order nomad "keep him awake, keep him talking" she appeared in my vision as I looked around.
She made me look at her as she asked random questions "what's your favorite color?" I replied happily as the morphine flooded my system lessening the pain and the blood loss put me in a state of delirium "purple" she replied trying to match my happiness "mines bronze, purples a very pretty color" I smiled tiredly as my eyes dropped before they shot open as I shouted in pain as I felt the cold metal fore-snips digging around my wound looking for the bullet. I saw Nomad look at Rich in horror before she said something causing him to shout back, I couldn't hear them only the my own shouts of pain. I saw Rich hold the bullet infront of my eyes as he pressed a bandage against my flank having Maverick hold it as rich tightly wrapped the bandage I gasped at the constant pressure as Rich looked at me and spoke in his ever present southern drawl "well howdy partner, welcome back to god's world. Thought we was gonna lose ye" I reached for my gun as Nøkk asked "what happened out there?" One of the young soldiers replied "the bastards came back to finish us off."
I tried to move but nomad kept me in place as Nøkk asked "any air support?" The base commander, Thomkins shook his head no "all our air support had to refuel and rearm. Unless I start shelling my base with artillery and Ac-130s we ain't got shit" I heard Glaz "Is this everyone we have?" I looked around and saw an assortment of people from all walks of the military most not soldiers but there was about 49 of us who could keep a sustained gunfight and not panic. I spoke "we've got 42 mikes before the apaches come back, in the mean time we have to keep the masks busy. The other half of the team is coming with tanks" the non-combatants looked relieved as I listened to nomad "in the mean time, we need to try to retake this base" one of the guys called from the back "that's crazy, there can't be more than 50 of you that can fight against hundreds of enemies" I sighed as Nøkk continued "plus we have some wounded" I spoke "so that's it? We just sit here and die? Fuck that, If I'm dying tonight it's balls out in a gunfight." As I pushed myself into a sitting position.
Maverick spoke "if we don't make an attempt to take this base back, the masks are gonna dig in, they're gonna get defenses set up and we're never getting out of this building alive." The people in the building looks unsettled as I stood and looked out the window watching masks run around blowing up equipment and hunting down any isolated survivors. My hand gripped the bandage as the pressure from my weight cause a new wave of pain before I spoke "even as we speak, as we deliberate like politicians, the masks grow stronger. Any survivors die, those brave enough to fight like you will not, are holding out for the relief from us. Every second you wait one more man dies, more masks come into this base and the steeper the hill we have to climb is for us to survive" I gripped my IAR just for Nøkk to say "nej, you're staying here. You're wounded" I looked at her and asked "it's already an uphill battle, we're already out numbered and you want to take even more of ours off the field?" She nodded as I rolled my eyes and disengaged the lock before I turned and spoke "I will retake this base"
      I got stopped by Nomad as she helped get my plate carrier back on before she grabbed her Arx and nodded to me. I smiled my thanks before I started out the door firing into any masks I could see trying to make a beachhead, I looked back as all but 3 combatants came with me to secure the base. I didn't have a problem with the 3 staying since everyone in the TOC needed protecting, I gave the hand signal to move forward as we started down the road that followed the outer edge of the FOB before we took the inner epicenter of the base. We moved quickly checking buildings for survivors and killing any masks we found poking around the base. I sighed as I checked my watch and saw it was going on 1am, now that we had organized a defense the masks were losing members in droves. Their surprise attack had caught everyone entirely off guard and it played to their advantage, even going on 6 hours into the fight we were just now mounting an organized defense.
We found one of the Lieutenants walking around the base with his 1911 casually, I walked up and asked "sir? What are you doing?" He looked at me and replied like it was obvious "well son, I'm taking my base back" I looked at the group of soldiers behind me before returning my eyes to the lieutenant "our guns are yours" he nodded and spoke "form a line shoulder to shoulder 15 meters between each of you, we're gonna form a wall and sweep the entire base." I turned and yelled "you heard the man, let's go. Form a line 15 meter intervals!" The group reacted quickly forming the wall and began sweeping the base. 26 minutes later and 61 dead masks later, the base was officially secure and now we had to keep it that way, we got assigned different points to defend in pairs. I paired with Nomad and we got sent to the southwestern corner, I was now sat on the ground with my back against the wall as Nomad looked out at the terrain before she asked "why are you out here? You could've stayed in the TOC and been safe?"
I replied "we needed to take the base, if they saw a wounded man was willing to fight. They'd come with me" she asked "and if they didn't?" I shrugged and answered "I'd die taking masks with me" she nodded slowly before speaking "you did good leading today, you made the right calls" I looked to my left and spoke "I got lucky, it was a coin flip between the right and wrong decisions" she nodded as the ground started rumbling and the sounds of tanks grew louder. We stood and saw the M1 Abrams column coming towards the base, I sighed in relief as I commented "the nights finally over, I'm so tired" she looked at me and just smiled before I radioed "all surviving coalition forces, the base is secure and reinforcements have arrived." The lieutenant spoke into the comms next "localize all bodies to the helipad, we need to know who we lost." We pulled back from the look out positions we'd been assigned and began putting bodies in the back of any vehicles we could find that could move them. An hour and a half later we had carefully laid out all of our casualties while the masks lay in a pile of contempt from where we had thrown them. During the attack we lost 137 men, all special forces soldiers and aids, the masks paid an even heavier toll losing 471 during the 6 hours of intense combat.