An hour later

Michael and Lani sat in their position, an old sewer that they had found their way into. They waited until nightfall, when they knew they’d have better movement cover. In the meanwhile, the scouts from the recon unit had placed their observation posts and set up their long range surveillance equipment. Some radio chatter in Ukrainian came over their comms.

They slowly climbed their way out of the manhole, handing the rucks up to each other as they got up. They then placed their night vision devices on their helmets and adjusted them so that they could see correctly.

“Michael,” Lani asked quietly through the earpiece, “what do we really expect to find?”

“No fuckin clue,” he replied softly, “but we’re gonna find it and destroy it.”

Lani giggled softly as they moved low behind some bushes. They moved for a while until they found what looked like a school. They stopped moving and watched carefully. After a moment, they saw a head move behind a window. “See that?” Michael said softly into his microphone.

“Yeah,” Lani replied quietly as she very slowly began aiming her weapon and turning the magnification dial.

“I don’t want to,” Michael uttered, “wait for me to position.”

“I have a solution,” Lani whispered as she positioned herself under a bush, which communicated to Michael that she had the target sighted in and was a muscle twitch from that person being gone.

Michael lay himself to the ground and unshouldered his ruck behind a tree. He untied his VAL from the bag and placed his AK in its place. Once he slung the weapon, he set his ruck by the tree which wasn’t far from Lani at all. He began crawling slowly toward the building. Once he was about twenty feet from the building, he began high crawling until he could quickly get to the wall of the building. He froze in place and listened. He could hear the faint movement of a set of footsteps.

“Is that target moving?” Michael asked into his microphone.

“Nope,” Lani replied, “still have solution, he’s stationary”

“I hear a second person,” he replied. “He’s walking slow”

After a moment, the footsteps stopped. He heard an empty tin can bounce off the floor. This motherfucker’s just chillin in here, he realized to himself. He knew there were at least two people in this building, but he wasn’t for certain where the second one was. He started moving slowly around the building until he found a door with a short set of stairs leading up to it. The building was two floors tall, and as he moved around the building he realized that there was quite a bit of real estate that someone could be hiding in.

“We might have more people,” Michael whispered, “take the shot, then we’ll stir them up and take them out.”

Michael heard the glass break, followed by a body falling over and hitting the floor. He heard some muttering in Russian, followed immediately by loud pounding footsteps. He knew he had to kill them quickly and quietly, so he got up and made his way to the door. He turned the doorknob and pushed the door open, aiming his weapon through the gap as it opened. He saw one man hiding from the window that Lani had shot through. He sighted in and put two in the side of his head.

Another man grabbed his weapon and opened fire on the door. Michael ducked back and managed to get out of the way of a couple rounds that grazed his helmet. Lani saw the muzzle flash of the AK that had started firing, placing a shot just far enough behind the flash where a person's head should be. Her shot struck the bridge of his nose, rupturing his eyes and forcing him to throw his weapon down and fall to the ground. He reached into his vest and pulled grenades from their pouches. He managed to get the pins pulled on both of them before Michael had the chance to lean in and fire five times through his body. One of the grenades rolled toward Michael as the other fell to the side of the man.

Two explosions rang out in quick succession, neither of which threw shrapnel at Michael. Having succeeded in staying behind solid cover before the explosions, he was able to spring right back up and enter the school. He moved quickly as he fired a couple shots down the hall at a man who had levelled off his weapon at him. His target got off a couple shots, one that punched Michael in the plate. The plate stopped the shot, and Michael was unphased.

Michael leaned around the corner into the hall, the man who shot him was down and out. He stood back into cover and reloaded his weapon. He didn’t have as many magazines in his vest for the VAL as he did for his AK which he had left on his pack next to Lani. He moved to the door and kept watch on the hallway. “Grab my shit,” he said into his microphone to Lani, “we gotta clear this school out.”

“On my way,” Lani whispered back. She rolled to the side until she was behind the tree and grabbed Michaels bag, reaching into a pouch on the side and grabbing a short lanyard with a ring on it and attaching it to the handle on the top of the bag. She then affixed the other end to her belt and started moving to the door. Once she made it to the door, she peeked in to make sure it was safe to enter.

As she leaned in, a pair of shooters rushed into the hallway and fired wildly. Michael stepped out of the way of incoming fire and got to cover. Lani wasn’t so lucky, as one round struck the side of her head. Gleaning off of the helmet, she stumbled back and aimed her weapon down the hall, letting loose an entire magazine.

With the two shooters down, Lani tossed Michael his ruck and moved to cover. Michael grabbed his AK from the ruck and threw his VAL to his back. Once he was ready, he covered Lani as she grabbed her AK and did the same. Once they had switched weapons out, they began moving room to room.

Michael entered the room, moving his weapon from side to side fast enough that if he had found targets, they’d be dead before they realized that he was the only one entering the room. Lani would pull security in the hallway, eying the end of the hall where the stairs were. As Michael finished clearing the empty rooms on the first floor, they made their way up the stairs to the second floor.

Lani went first up the stairs, keeping her eyes toward the ceiling and her muzzle at the last step of the stairs. As she stepped up the stairs, a man leaned around the corner with a pistol aimed directly for her. Before he could let off his first shot, Lani perceived his movement and placed four shots directly in his chest between the bridge of his collar bone. As the man fell dead, the two men behind him watched in horror as the well grouped burst blew through.

One of the men scampered down the hallway and tried to push his way into a room, the doorknob denying him access as it broke off. He turned to raise his weapon as his friend fell, only to see Lani aiming her weapon straight for his face as she let loose a five shot burst.

Lani furiously smashed doors open, having no concern left for the well being of the building or its historical value. As she did, she swept the rooms and quickly moved to the next. Michael moved behind her and kept watch on the rooms she hadn’t checked yet, expecting for someone to be brave and try to fight. Once the last door had been breached, Lani stepped back into the hall and lowered her weapon. “It’s clear,” she said calmly.

Michael noticed the damage on the side of Lani’s helmet. “Did you feel that when it happened?” he asked with concern in his voice.

“Yeah,” she replied with snark in her voice, “and he’s dead for breaking my shit.” she stepped closer to Michael and carefully placed her hand on the hole that had been made on Michael’s vest. She dug her thumb into it and felt the plate still relatively intact. “You’re not unscratched yourself ya know,” she said looking at him with a scowl that could be seen through her mask.

“I’ll be fine,” Michael said sternly, “an inch to the side and you’d be a lot more fucked up.”

“Ya know,” Lani said with escaping frustration in her voice, “I’m kinda tired of you acting like you don’t matter. You can’t help anybody if you’re bled out from being unable to put a chest seal on yourself!”

“Oh that is so unfair,” he said, feeling the sting of her words.

“Yeah,” she asked, “you were more worried about hiding your injury than fixing it.”

Michael grabbed her shoulder. “You’re right,” he said with noticeable annoyance in his voice, “I should have put more effort into caring for myself than trying to keep a secret from you.” he took a breath, his heavy sigh more audible through his mask, “but the plate did its job and protected me this time.”

“That’s true,” Lani said softly, “and I’m just glad we don't have to keep those secrets anymore.”

The radio keyed and a voice came through the headsets. “Everything alright?” a female voice said, “scouts reported a firefight and everything went quiet.”

Michael grabbed his talk button and pressed it. “The school’s cleared,” he said slowly, “moving further into the city.”