Operation: smoking trap

Coalition victory

Noah's pov
20 minutes later our convoy was given permission to advance again, the center force had defeated the enemies and was advancing, I heard Lion "about time" I listened as Thermite replied "think they set up more ambushes?" I replied simply "for sure, there's no possible detours off this road. They know rainbow is over here, I don't see why they wouldn't" we tightened up comms and proceeded into thicker forests. They'd be thicker the higher up the mountain we got, which means any forces coming in from either side to attack us would have a hard time getting any long range shots going. I looked around as we progressed, it was quiet which worried me until a stream of tracers tore through the thick foliage. I yelled on the net "I need 40 mike mike on that tree line, open it up!" I heard the thunking behind me as the treeline to my 2 o'clock got evaporated with the impacts. I opened up as the masks fled like rats I saw a couple fall dead as our ma dueces hit them. I smiled as we moved through the forest, I was hoping everything stayed calm for a while but I knew better.
Valkyrie came over comms "I'm deploying some black eyes to watch our six" I heard Maverick reply "good call, baseplate, convoy is halting. Deploying cameras to cover our six, how copy" I heard Baseplate reply "I copy, be aware center and left force will not be halting" Frost stopped the humvee and my anxiety grew, I radioed "all gunners keep your eyes open, we're sitting ducks." I got teased by Pulse "they were shooting with their eyes closed?" I sighed and replied "Pulse is allowed to get hit" I heard a couple laughs from the team in the humvee. I leaned on the receiver of the ma duece and waited the 30 seconds it took before Valkyrie came back over the comms "Black eyes deployed" we started moving again. I sat up and gripped the handles of the MG, it was quiet for a while which made me nervous. I heard Zofia ask "any one else getting the chills?" I keyed my mic "yeah, I am. Too quiet, especially after those ambushes" I heard Doc add his two cents "agreed" Maverick replied "well good news for the rest of you, we'll hit it first so you'll know if we find another ambush."
I chuckled at the unusual humor for Maverick, he's typically so stoic he doesn't let it show a joke was funny to him. I heard the team in the Humvee behind dying of laughter, I spoke off comms "congrats Maverick you're a comedian" he chuckled as we fell silent and continued on with the mission, we hit the 3/4 of the way mark when the ambush happened. An RPG tore through the air and hit the hood of our humvee, I lifted my arms in an X in the instinctive reaction to protect my face as our humvees ass end lifted in the air I felt myself slip out from under me and I fell to the floor of the humvee as the back end came back down. I coughed as my ears ringed I looked around as a second RPG hit the reinforced steel of the humvee and flipped it to its side I crashed into Aruni as mute fell on me, I felt him push himself up and then he disappeared through the turret ring, I helped Aruni up and spoke "Go help the defense, I'll check on them" she climbed out without a word.
I climbed to the front and saw both of them still, I pulled off my glove and felt frosts neck feeling a heart beat, I did the same with Maverick and felt his. I radioed "We're okay, just keep fighting. I'm gonna get Frost and Maverick out" I got doc in return "I'm gonna work my way up to you, I wanna assess them" I pulled Frost from her seat and carefully maneuvered her so I could help her out as I yelled "Mute! Come here!" He appeared in front of the turret ring and asked "yea?" I said in return "grab her straps, guide her out" he nodded and leaned in grabbing her shoulder strap as I lifted her and he pulled her out. I saw doc was already here and he started looking her over, it eased my worry slightly as I sighed. Now it was the difficult one, Maverick is a heavy dude, luckily we had trained in removing people in situations like this. I went through the SOP and guided him into the back seats, I called "Mute! Last one!" He appeared and sighed when he saw Maverick.
I replied "I fucking know!" As he grabbed his straps and strained to pull him out as I yelled in effort pushing him out. Doc started looking him over as I pulled my 249 out of its holster in the turret before climbing to the side of the humvee that faced the sky, I pushed the heavy steel door open before added my 249 to the fight. I glanced to my right and saw the other teams had disembarked and were engaging, they were doing good. I saw several muzzle flashes as I fired on return before rounds hit the bottom of the humvee ending sparks into my face causing me to lose my footing and fall to the other side of the humvee. I tossed my 249 out through the turret and climbed out, I saw doc working on Maverick and Frost, it made me a bit nervous. I looked at doc and asked "how are they?" He replied "they're okay but they've got concussions" I swore "shit, do you need to get them to your humvee?" He replied "it could be useful" I nodded and radioed "Aruni, Mute, on me. Aruni, help doc move Frost and Maverick. Mute we're covering, how copy?" I got two "checks" In reply.
       I checked my belt and looked at the two "I'm going to suppress, you'll have 6 seconds to cover the distance. Got it?" Doc nodded as he grabbed frost and moved her to a stretcher, I moved to the end of the humvee and heard doc "ready!" I stepped around the end and squeezed the trigger firing the entire box at the tree line as the gunfire stopped, as my belt ran clear and Mute's magazine ran dry Aruni and Doc made it to cover. I crouched and pulled my extra box out of my pouch sliding it into place as I fed the belt into the feed plate closing the dust cover and pulling the priming handle. Doc radioed "you cover us and we'll make our way back for Maverick!" The team as a whole devoted our guns to covering their movements as they came back for Maverick, I looked at him as Doc and Aruni transferred him to the stretcher. I spoke "on your word doc" as Mute and I got ready to cover again, I heard doc behind me "Ready!" As I sidestepped and fired the box off again, round after round warmed up my barrel as the duo ran with Maverick in their care until they reached the other side.
We ducked back into cover and I joked "just two lads marooned on their fucked humvee" mute laughed as I got asked "how are we getting out of this?" I replied slowly "I haven't thought of that yet" I heard Valkyrie talking to command finding out what assets we have to help us deal with this massive ambush. I sighed as I mentally berated myself, I was too worried about Frost I couldn't think straight. I grabbed the humvee and cracked my head off it before releasing a breath "Alright, here's what we're gonna do. I- we're gonna go over the edge of that slope and walk around to- to the convoy, we can work out a plan there" he sighed and replied "I hope you're right" I ordered "you go first I'll cover check?" He replied "aye, sounds good" I moved around to the hood of the humvee seeing it torn to sharp edges and the windscreen crack into a bright white pane, I took a deep breath and counted "3, 2, 1" as I stepped around the end of the hood and fired as Mute ran for the edge.
The moment I hear him "I'm set!" I spun and started running before it felt like a sledgehammer hit me in the center of my back and then 3 burning sticks were jabbed into my shoulder and leg. I fell and started tumbling quickly finding myself going side over side down the hill picking up speed until I hit a tree, I came to a sudden stop and felt a burning sensation in my leg. I looked down and saw a tree branch sticking out of my thigh. My pain blockers failed and the pain hit me so hard I almost blacked out, I heard the gunfight but it sounded so far away. My eyes grew heavy and everything became blurry, I touched my face feeling the tears on my fingers as the sound of the gunfight faded. When I came to it was light out and I heard dogs barking, I reached for my pistol and found my holster was empty. I looked up and saw a team of 3 in multi cam with an all black Belgian Malinois, I saw the American flag and stopped my frantic search for a weapon.
I heard the deep southern drawl of one of the operators who spoke "Baseplate, be advised we have found the missing Rainbow operative. We'll need a medevac, he's in pretty rough shape" I coughed as one of the men crouched "it's okay, we're gonna get you home." I saw Doc and Finka basically running down the side of the hill to get to our position, once they came to a stop I saw Doc dig through his bad as he rambled "Christ, combien de fois dois-je vous dire aux idiots d'arrêter de vous blesser. avez-vous une idée à quel point il est stressant de vous réparer?!(Christ, how many times must I tell you idiots to stop getting wounded. Do you have any idea how stressful it is to fix you?!)" I coughed as he found the tool he was looking for, a saw. I felt my eyes widen at the sight of it as I asked with a bone dry throat "are you cutting off my leg?" He looked at me in shock before yelling "Quoi?! non!(what?! No!)" one of the operators chuckled "he's pissed" as Doc moved around my legs and cut off the tree branch.
I saw Finka set up a hard stretcher with straps to keep someone in place, I carefully got moved onto it and strapped in as they carried me up the hillside and back to the convoy that was waiting. Frost came running and covered her mouth when she saw my state, I was bloody and bruised with a tree branch sticking out of my thigh several gunshot wounds and my back felt like it was burning. They slid me into the back of a humvee as Frost climbed in next to me as Doc and Finka kept doing their checks and the convoy started down the trail again. I asked "did we get em?" Frost nodded tearfully "yeah, we got em all. The central figure heads for the masks are dead" I smiled weakly as I spoke "doc, my backs hurts" he replied after a bit "I'd be surprised if you don't have a broken spine. We'll see when you get to the hospital, Frost I suspect you'll be accompanying him?" She nodded as he wrote down some things. Eventually we hit the field and the convoy stopped while they unloaded me and the Medevac bird started lowering to the ground.
They loaded me into it as Frost climbed in and Doc spoke to the flight medic about what he suspected I had wrong with me as well as the things he knew I had wrong with me. I felt Frost run her hands through my hair before she looked at it and I noticed the red on it, it was starting to sink in just how fucked up I was. I got an oxygen mask put over my mouth while the medics talked to Frost, they looked me over and did anything they thought was necessary to keeping me stable. I was kept awake by the medics since they were worried about how much blood I had lost over the 10 hours I was missing, atleast that's how long Frost says it was. When we reached the hospital a crew of doctors and nurses rushed the helicopter and rushed me into the building, Frost kept up and talked with a nurse. I could tell she was worried as they wheeled me into the X-ray room. They took X-rays of my entire body before I was wheeled into the surgery room and got a new mask, this one being anesthesia.
When I woke up I was in a hospital room with Tina sleeping in the chair next to me, I pressed the call button and saw a nurse walk in. She noticed I was awake and said "1 minute, I'll go get the doctor" I smiled my thanks as Tina woke up at the sound of the nurses voice and I asked "you okay?" She wiped the corner of her mouth as a bit of drool slid down "yea, just worried. I didn't get told what condition you were in until after your emergency surgery." I chuckled and joked "gonna take more than a few bullets, a hill and a tree to kill me" she rolled her eyes and replied "let's not push the boundary" I chuckled as the doctor walked in and spoke "ah you are awake, good, good. Now let me tell you what's wrong with you, you have broken your spine in three places, luckily there is no damage to the spinal cord itself so you will not be paralyzed, you had a nasty hole in your thigh which we took care of and sealed up. There will be a scar and physical therapy will be necessary, your gunshot wounds luckily were only flesh wounds and did no real damage to anything vital."
I dipped my head in thanks as he replied "I'll be sending you back to your organization where the one who goes by Doc will oversee your recovery. Try to take better care of yourself as your wife was very worried about you during the operation" I asked "how long did the surgery take?" He replied after a second "I believe the clock said 7 hours 32 minutes?" I sighed as he spoke "your helicopter will be here in an hour, until then relax and take it easy. You have a long road ahead of you" I spoke as he left "thank you doctor" I looked at Tina as she pointed out "you didn't correct him when he said wife" I asked "would you like me to?" She just replied "it was interesting" I waved her off as she stood and gave me a kiss on the forehead before she spoke "you're an idiot hero but you're my idiot hero. I'm glad you're still here" I nodded and replied "me too, I don't think I wanna die like that" she sat down and excitedly spoke "oh there's so many things to tell you about from the rest of that mission....." I looked out the window as she started telling her story until I heard "hey, are you listening?" Causing me to chuckle "yes hon, I'm listening"