NOVA
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08/02/2003 - 5:45pm
Panay, The Philippines
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"Are you ready for this?" Tara asks, checking over her rounds for a final time.

I take a deep breath before answering. I don't know if we are ready for this, but we need to act. There's absolutely no more time to waste now we've got the location, especially when another life is scheduled to end tomorrow.

The plan has been thrown together in a complete hurry. There's probably loopholes swirled all the way through, but North says we don't have the chance to perfect it.

This is the most disorganised, yet most determined I've ever felt in my whole life.

"I think so. We have to be, right?" I reply with a small sigh, ensuring that all of my gear fits perfectly so I'm ready to up and leave tomorrow.

Tara nods slightly. Her eyes hold a nervous gaze, most of ours do. Some aren't even completely recovered from the events of last week, yet they're insisting to come along and assist.

The sounds of clanking artillery riddles the tense atmosphere around base, everybody fluttering about in their own preparations.

Our plan is to push in, pretty much what I had suggested that day I argued with Leo. Push in with no hesitation, hopefully take out a fair few adversaries instantly, and storm every damn room until we find what we're looking for.

The hostages, and hopefully him.

North paces over to us and halts, analysing our movements in complete silence.

"Sir?" I tilt my head, standing upright.

"'Just seeing how everybody is getting along with the preparations. This is our most intense operation in years, I'd say. So many lives are on the line. We can not afford to fuck this up in any way." He speaks in a warning tone, pacing around on his spot.

"None of us plan on letting this fail, North. It's just going to be different, we've always had a completely strategised method in the past, also a whole lot more time to prepare." I say calmly.

He mumbles something under his breath, causing Tara to glance at me and shrug.

"I'm counting on you two. You're two of my best, I know you're both crucial in this plan." He speaks over his shoulder, already starting to stride away from us.

"I barely even know an outline of the plan, how are we getting out there again?" She asks once North is out of earshot, resuming the check over her rifle.

"The choppers, we fly in on two of them. Third one will get flown in once we've secured the hostages, all three pilots are needed. I guess that's the good thing about their hideout being in a farmland, there's plenty of space around the fields for us to land on." I inform, squinting as I attempt to remember all of the details.

I've been fucking bombarded with information in these past 24 hours.

"And are we going in for the kill? Or do we plan on capturing them for interrogation?"

"It depends. If there's an immediate threat, North said kill without hesitation. If we can disarm them, I guess we could bring one or two in for questioning. We can't afford to have them take up too much space on the choppers, though. They aren't worthy of that." I shrug, stretching my arms over my head.

"And Jed?" She asks quietly as she looks up at me, "would you rather have him dead?"

"Yes." I answer without a moments hesitation. Tara nods slowly, looking back down at her gun.

There's no question about that, I'll only be satisfied if I'm the one to kill him.

"I wonder if we'll meet 'Las', the executor." She says after a few seconds, packing her rifle into its case.

"Probably," I shrug, "I can imagine he'll be in that farmhouse. He's somebody I'd like for us to capture, I think it'd be interesting to hear his explanations; not that it would excuse what he's done."

Tara nods in agreement, "yeah, I was thinking the same thing. He's from the South by the sounds of his accent, the same as you."

"Hit close to home, hearing the only other Southern accent in forever and it's the fucking executor." I chuckle, shaking my head in disbelief.

It's true, every other officer seems to be from the more Northern states. It should've been comforting to hear a voice like my own after all these months.

It's not very comforting when they're brandishing a machete in one hand and a head in the other.

"It's so unusual, don't you think? We thought this was Anti-Americanism, yet an American seems to be a ringleader. I wonder what his story is, how he turned to that type of life." She ponders, leaning back against a wall.

"Well, he's a goddamn coward for one. He's had a mask over his head in every video we've seen of him. He's hiding behind the camera," I mumble, clicking some ammo into my S&W.

"I guess you're-"

We're interrupted as a whistle blows. Vincent is waving his hands in the centre of base, gesturing for us to gather. Me and Tara trudge over, I find myself stood next to Banksy.

"Hey, you all recovered?" I ask, patting his back.

"Pretty damn much, I wouldn't miss out on this operation even if I'd just had an amputation!" He says enthusiastically.

I don't know how he does it, it's as though he considers all of this a big challenge within some sort of game rather than real life. It's almost as though he thinks once he dies, he'll just spawn again.

There's one thing that's been nagging at me all week, something I've been desperate to roll off of my tongue and ask him about.

"That night, what happened from your perspective? You said you were with Leo and you saw him get taken." I speak quietly, eager for his response.

He looks up at the sky for a few seconds before gazing back down at me.

"We were both in hand to hand combat with two of the bastards. That's when I ended up getting hit. For some reason he didn't have a vest, so another prick took the opportunity to whack him from behind. He got dazed and then they both went for him, knocked him out cold. I tried to help out, but I was pretty damn restricted." He sighs.

"He gave me his vest, that's why he didn't have it." I mumble after a moment, glancing at my feet.

Banksy raises his eyebrows but doesn't look shocked.

"He thought a lot of you," he says softly.

What?

I know he thought something of me, but hearing somebody else say it seems to hold a completely different meaning. 'Seems to hold much more value.

"What makes you say that?"

He chuckles slightly, "you had that fallout with him, right? When you refused to plan the strategy with him a few days before the raid. I was set to organise it with him instead, but he didn't speak about the damn plan for half of the time."

He hesitates for a second, "honestly? The main thing he spoke about was how worried he was that he'd ruined your civility."

I narrow my eyes slightly, "what did he say?"

"He was saying how he'd messed up, how he'd made an awful comment. He was almost panicking that you'd never talk to him again. He-"

We're annoyingly interrupted as Vincent has finally gathered the group he wants, staring at us intensely with his uncovered eye.

"We have nine hours. Nine hours until we're transported to Passi city, hoping to arrive at the destination at 3am. Yes, this plan is rushed; it's not what we're used to, but it's essential. It's for the sake of rescuing nineteen potential lives. You're all aware of our plan, to just push in. Push in from the front, back and side entrances. We have faith that we'll be able to execute this, hopefully with minimal losses."

He says the last part almost incoherently, as though it's in small print. Chances are, we will lose more members of the group. There's no sugarcoating it.

I just need to make sure that I'm not one of them.

But, nine fucking hours?

Nine hours until we undergo the most intense operation we've been on in years, with nothing more than a mere outline of a strategy.

Even North is coming on the mission, usually he just arranges them. I've never worked alongside him in direct conflict.

Tara shuffles nervously beside me and I notice lots of worried glances getting exchanged throughout the crowd.

Vincent is still talking, but his voice is just droning around the back of my concentration.

I'm stuck in my imagination, hoping and picturing that there will be a moment in which I break into one of those rooms in the farmhouse and see the face of Leo Hendrix once again.

—
09/02/2003 - 2am

My nerves are churning so much it feels as though my body is about to break up into little pieces.

I've never felt anxiety like this in my whole career, whole life.

I click the vest around my waist, securing it over my shoulders and sliding a helmet right over my head. Tara does the same alongside me, yet we haven't spoken a word to each other as of yet.

The tension is so thick that words can't even penetrate.

We sit against the edge of the barracks, right on the dirt ridden ground. I quit smoking when I was twenty-two but for some reason, a cigarette seems like a damn good idea right now. Luckily for me right now, Tara has a nicotine addiction.

"Mind sparing a smoke?" I ask.

She narrows her eyes, pulling her own cigarette from between her lips, "I thought you said you quit years ago?"

"I did. I just could really do with one right now," I admit with a sigh.

She hesitates for a second before handing me the pack, as well as a lighter.

The skin of her lighter is a badly printed picture of Fleetwood Mac. I chuckle slightly, pursing my lips around the butt of the cig' and sparking it up.

"Fleetwood Mac, eh?" I grin, she snickers and takes a drag of her own smoke.

"My Mom was obsessed with them. She practically thought she was Stevie Nicks." Tara laughs, shaking her head.

"My Dad drilled AC/DC into my ears from the second I was born, practically." I grin, taking a puff. 

It's nice to speak about these things, to escape from the fact we could be very well dead in a few hours time.

Plus, I've always loved music. Dad decided a good way to help me relax after a day of forcing his veteran skills onto me, was to make me learn the guitar and practice until my fingers bled.

It was worth it I suppose, I'm sure I could still play a few of those old tunes if I ever had a guitar in my hands again.

Tara coughs and flicks the remnants of her smoke to the floor, stomping it out as she pushes herself up. She offers me a hand, to which I accept and follow suit with my own cigarette.

"That could be our last one," she murmurs.

"Maybe, maybe not. We've gotten through a lot, Tarantino, let's not sell ourselves too short." I give her a playful nudge on the shoulder, although it's a completely futile attempt to lighten the situation.

She nods, but doesn't crack an inch of a grin. If Tara of all people isn't smiling, it's a good way to measure how bad a situation really is.

And this situation is fucking terrible.

"Shields, Mulvey! Come and load yourselves onto the first chopper."

Norths authoritative voice ricochets around the glum courtyard. I share a glance with Tara as we slowly stride towards the aircraft. Marcus is perched in the cockpit, running over some final tests with the blades. 

We clamber inside, sliding the headsets as best as they will sit over our helmets and organising our guns. We don't say a damn word to each other.

Looks like North has an idea of some sort of seating arrangement, since he's calling off names one by one as they squash into the chopper beside us. Once we're rammed like fucking sardines, he climbs in and pulls the steel door shut behind him.

"Cozy," I mumble, earning a chuckle from Banksy who is practically wedged up my ass.

"Marcus, we're ready when you are." North says breathily, purple jagged vein bulging above his eyebrow as per usual. He's never been an expert at disguising his stress, I realised that the minute I first stepped foot in the Hawk base last year.

Marcus gives a thumbs up as the familiar thump of the wing-slap intensifies, the force causing the whole chopper to vibrate as we gradually lift off of the ground.

I brush my hand across my S&W for some sort of comfort, strapped right over my cargos and around my thigh as per usual.

How I said I swear I'll kill Jed Nolan with this gun?

I'm a woman of my damn word.