The Owls

Chapter 3

"Can someone please explain to me why the Owls are not responding to our radio calls?" The large stocky male well into his fifties hit the desk in front of him, the small radio mic fell over with the impact.

"Commander we believe the Owls are not responding due to an unauthorised exercise in to the heart of Cardiff Prime." The radio operator ducked to avoid the Commander's hand as he swung it toward his head.

"How did they pull this off? Those good for nothing upstarts have been nothing but trouble. Send Sgt Fields and the Hounds to bring them in, I think its time they had their wings clipped." His snarling smile was frightening and soon the whole of the command room were busy.
It wasn't the first time the Hounds had been called in to find the team of pure bloods, in fact the Commander had started keeping a record. The week before last one of the Hounds had been killed bringing them back from a jolly into the wetlands south east of Cardiff Prime. Days before that three Hounds were injured after an ambush atop of the Cardiff Valley Ridge. Several times the Hounds had spent days in the valley looking for them, and each time the Owls returned back with minimal injuries and since their formation over a year ago they were the only team to have not lost a member. The Commander didn't know if it was just blind luck or if something more sinister was at work, he wasn't a god fearing man so them being blessed or chosen was not realistic.

Sgt Timothy Fields grabbed his radio when it crackled his name, his gut turned and he had a sense he knew what was coming.

"Field's here, where are they?" A faint northen accent could just be heard everytime he spoke, originally from Newcastle Prime he had been sent south with his family after the city fell. The radio cracked again the location of the Owls and with a heavy sigh he responded, "Understood, Hounds are on route." Dropping from his chair he thumped a big red button and the whole building went dark before the red flashing lights came on. Sgt Fields grabbed the internal microphone and his voice echoed out of every speaker. "Listen up, Our little birds have flown the coop again, this time into the city. I want two teams ready to go in five, expect trouble so grab the strike gear and bring the shield braces as well, we have no idea what we will be walking in to." When he was finished he placed the mic down and rubbed his head, "What are my kids up to now."

A few minutes later ten of his men stood to salute as he entered the bunker. "At ease fellas." The men dropped their arms, placed them behind their backs and stood awaiting instruction. "Right here is what we know, some time in the last four hours the Pure Bloods have gone on an unauthorised stroll into Cardiff Prime, we do not know why or what provisions they have taken, all we know is that ten of our youngest pure bloods are missing in enemy territory and it is once again our job to go and find them and bring them home safe. Most of you have been involved in bringing our little birds home before, you know the drill, those of you who are new to this, learn fast, this happens alot and we need everyone at the top of their game. That said we expect to encounter hostiles, of what size we can only guess but keep vigilant and make sure your weapons are armed and ready even before we disembark from the transport. So lets get moving." The Sgt walked off toward the transport shuttle code named the Kat, the twelve man shuttle would propel them at over two hundred miles an hour allowing them to disembark at the fringe of Cardiff Prime within fifteen minutes. The two teams boarded the Kat followed by Sgt Field as he shouldered his rucksack and then pulled the shuttle door closed and locked it in place.

The windowless bullet shaped shuttle came to a thundering hault as the pilot crackled over the radio that they had arrived at the City. In the distance the pilot could see a billowing black smoke plume and he grabbed the radio again to inform Sgt Fields.

"Sgt we have a large smoke plume near the city centre, I would advise caution."

Unshackeling himself the Sgt was first to his feet "Ok Nuke you take Dwane, Rosco, Berry and Raker, the rest of you with me. We have a point of interest so that is where we will converge, stay in cover as much as possible, conserve ammo where possible and do not let your guard down." He dropped the door and signalled for the teams to move out, once both teams were on the ground the radio in the back crackled to life again but the pilots words remained unheard. Just as the teams were about to move out a voice called out to them and they all stopped and stared.