The Plagues Series: Emergency

Chapter 20

I came to, pressed to a shelf in a convenience store by Jay and Michael. The lines and scrapes in their faces were outlined with a layer of dirt. My head sorely ached. I felt the stickiness of blood on my face and lips. Jay and Michael's faces relaxed promptly when I looked at them. They slowly released their grips on me and I stumbled onto my own footing.

I looked around the store, though with still a persistent sting all across my back, to see the windows had been covered up with the sides ripped off of cardboard boxes. I looked to Bravo and saw Absol and the support gunner unaccounted for.

"Where's Absol?" I asked, my voice shaky.

"You just went feral, bro, take it easy," Michael said.

I noticed him holding a dripping blood bottle in one hand.

"Where's Absol?" I asked again of the room.

"You were just hit with a rocket and a blast of sun. Why don't you sit?" Jay said.

"Where's Absol!?" I bellowed.

The store was silent and the faces were grim.

"There's nothing we could do," Michael said.

"He's...?" I murmured, finding myself dumb.

The dimples in the corner ofJay's mouth deepened into a frown. "I'm sorry."

I lost my footing and fell against the front counter, resigning myself into a sitting position. "Did we win?"

Michael knelt down gingerly in front of me. "Our forces are mopping up as we speak."

"You did it, Dave," Jay said.

I nodded reflexively, my brain being compressed with all the information.

We regrouped that night at Incheon where we were collected by AMICA Sparrows to return us to Sunnan. At Sunnan, Bravo and I rendezvoused with Al'fa. Rogers knew about Absol's death, but was adamant to not speak of it until "this is all done".

We ate and drank and replenished our ammo. Jay also caught me up on what happened. Once the snipers were back in the game, we had enough of a line set up to take out the enemy rockets. Once air support came in, Incheon quickly became ours. Our navy had secured the bay and the surrounding harbours.

The room suddenly halted activity as everyone was called to stand at attention. The joint chiefs of AMICA's militaries entered and took their places on a makeshift platform. They all wore decorated suits with the pin of the country they each represented on their lapels.

 "As you know," the chief from Russia said, "this battle was for insurance. Insurance that NATO would stand down. They did. After we responded with the appropriate force for what they did to Warsaw." He paused with a proud, yet dark look on his face, then continued. "Now is the time to take this war one step farther. The final step while the West is weak..."