[color=8dc73f][b]March 13th 2014
Late Evening
Malta International Airport
Luqa
Malta[/b][/color]

Hours had passed since the recon flight had returned successful from their part of the mission, a short while after the rest of the squadron had landed. Heartbreak hadn't called a debriefing immediately; he'd been rushed to the local hospital following his crash landing, and Kat along with him. 

Gunther 'Wolf' Wolfman stood at one end of the aircraft apron, away from the area where the built-up, sandbagged revetments for the squadron's active aircraft were. He hadn't ordered the maintenance crew into action yet, so the sleek machines stood silent, gleaming in the reflections of the few lights that were on, what with the blackouts in effect to protect from possible air attack.
Wolf hadn't ordered the crews to work, because there was a suspicion that had been gnawing at him, and it was something he didn't want to acknowledge, despite the evidence. 
He knew how hard he did his job, how well he trained and instructed his people. He made sure - as sure as sure could ever be - to look after the planes under his care, for the sake of the pilots in them. Enabling them to carry out their missions and get back alive was the whole reason he had dedicated himself for the whole of his career to maintenance, and trained generations of maintainers. 
Having as many planes fail as they did on a single occasion, that was something that he couldn't allow to sit as a mark against his career, or his personal reputation and standards.
He'd checked through the electronic 'paperwork' that had been filed, and he'd found something that had pointed to a situation that had raised a suspicion with him, and it was one that worried him. 

Out of the eight planes the squadron had had before the start of the mission, four had been worked on by the team of technicians and maintenance personnel he'd overseen personally - Brightspark's F-16, Peacenik's F/A-18, Chevy's Rafale, and Valkyrie's Gripen. 
The other four, they had been overseen and maintenance checked out and signed off by his second in command. Appointed only a few months earlier, he'd had an average, though not spectacular, career before that. And the second team was comprised mostly of newer personnel taken on only a short time earlier. 
They had been responsible for the rest of the planes; Clown's Typhoon, Stingray's F-117N, Heartbreak and Kitten's ASF-14.
And Rook's Yak-141. 
That last set of signed maintenance documents, affirming that the Yak-141 had been free of all errors, was fit to fly and fight, and was in perfect shape...

Gunther bit down on the stub of the cigar he habitually carried, his teeth biting clear through it and the bitter, acrid taste of the soaked tobacco leaves on his tongue. He spat it out, angrily. 
There was no way this was negligence, or carelessness. The same work had been done by the same people prior to the transatlantic flight, and that had been uneventful, with no problems for any of the pilots or their aircraft. 
This was sabotage, and he had a list of suspects, but pursuing them alone, that would be too dangerous - and the pilots needed to know about the danger they might be facing. 
He was interrupted from his thoughts and contemplation of the sad wreckage of the three planes, as the thundering roar of jet engines intruded, and the runway landing lights came on long enough to guide the planes in, their navigation lights glowing and blinking in the twilight. 
The leading aircraft were a quarter of modern aircraft. The first was a Sukhoi Su-33 in a striking red-white-black camouflage scheme. The next was a swing-winged, stealth jet that was the replacement for the ASF-14, the F-22N Sea Raptor and this one in blue-blue-white Ukrainian camouflage. The third he recognised right away; he had a personal connection to it's pilot, and his anger of the moment was curbed somewhat by her arrival. The delta-winged EF-2000 Typhoon was very similar to Clown's aircraft behind him, but this one carried a lightning-themed paint scheme that he knew personally. 
Bringing up the rear was a plane that was a reminder of recent events, and one that only galvanised his desire to strike back at whatever treachery was afoot within their organization - a Yak-141 Freestyle, the same make and model of plane that Sokolov had piloted.
As the four fighters moved to taxi off of the runway, the final arrival came in behind them; the lumbering shape of a gigantic [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov_An-124_Ruslan]Antonov AN-124[/url] transport that held inside its' cavernous hold replacement aircraft for Heartbreak and Kitten, as well as additional supplies. It would also fly out the remains of the other planes that had been damaged. 
The enormous four-engined cargo plane touched down with a light squeak of wheels, and then the engines kicked into reverse to slow it down with a rushing roar of air, slowing it enough to turn off at the runway end and taxi toward the apron, where it would be unloaded. 
He'd deal with it later; there were things he had to do.

[center]* * *[/center]

A few hours later, and in the dark of the middle of the night, Scott had returned from the hospital in Msida. His injuries weren't too severe; some heavy bruising, minor cuts, and slipped ribs on his left side. Kat had had the worst of it; her spine had suffered some bruising, and her neck heavily jarred and shocked, leaving her with a mild concussion after her head had collided with the instrument panel, along with a dislocated wrist. Her prognosis was good, but the doctors wanted to keep her in for twenty four hours for observation. The fair-haired pilot was exhausted, and wanted nothing more than to shower, and to sleep. He was still wearing the same flight suit he'd had on when they'd taken off that morning, and when the plane had come to rest on the runway. It smelt of burnt insulation, smoke, and fire retardant foam, as well as all the buckets of sweat he'd expelled during the dogfight, and then the crash-landing.
Gunther was waiting for him when he reached the barracks, and the expression on the mechanic's craggy face told him that he wouldn't be sleeping for hours yet.

[center]* * *[/center]

Scott was waiting along with Wolf a half-hour later as he called the squadron's pilots to the office he'd commandeered in the Malta armed forces HQ building. He'd sent the summons as an urgent requirement; something not to be ignored - and it had included the new arrivals.
What had made it seem even more serious was that he'd requested them all to come after drawing their sidearms and longarms from the armoury.

He was sitting on his desk as they entered, having changed out of his flight suit at last and into a simple white T-Shirt and olive BDU pants. His MP5 lay alongside him on the desk as well, and his thigh holster was strapped on. He bid the last one of them in to close the door. 
"Everyone, please welcome our new arrivals - I had hoped to introduce Calico, Sparrow, Ironhand and Jefe in better circumstances with a proper briefing, and a debriefing from our previous mission. But Wolf has important information, and I need to share it with all of you as a priority". 
He looked them all in the eye with a serious expression as he continued. 
"I know we haven't had time to decompress or go over what happened yet. But you're all aware of the problems we had before and during the mission. That many issues with maintenance is incredibly uncommon".
Wolf spoke up, his deep voice hard and his craggy expression matching it as he spoke, arms folded across his barrel chest, the baseball cap he almost always wore bunched and screwed up in one bear-like hand.
"Maintaining those planes, and keeping all of you flying and safe is a matter of pride for me. And so is having the best people doing the best job on my maintenance crews. Which is why this is so... personal to me, and why I looked into all of it. I would never let so much go wrong".
Scott tapped the table laying on the desk in the office he'd commandeered for his own. 
"Wolf has shown me the information, and verified it. The maintenance records for Clown, Stingray and my own aircraft were falsified". His lips formed a hard line, as he continued.
"And so was Rook's. Which means him getting shot down, probably wasn't just a bad deal of the cards. There's a small, tightly-knit group in the maintenance team that actively sabotaged our aircraft".
He pointed to the four whose planes hadn't been affected. 
"You four had your aircraft maintenance personally overseen by Wolf and none of the same personnel worked on them as did on mine and the other three. So that's why you suffered no issues, and why we know who within the maintenance pool can be trusted".
He gestured to the quartet of new arrivals. 
"-And the same with you; your planes were maintained before you left the Forge, by different personnel, so they won't be affected. So as of right now; if anything comes up, the eight of you are the ones we can get in the air to do anything about it. 
"My new jet is here, as is Kitten's. But neither of us are in a shape to fly right now, and the planes need to be checked out after being stowed for transporting here. But we can't do that, [i]and[/i] give the rest of our planes the maintenance they need with only the people we can trust. We don't have the time or manpower to expend drawing them out - so, we're going to confront them. Our security personnel have locked down the perimeter of the airport, as well as securing the ordnance and fuel dumps, the vehicle pool, the flightline and the armoury. That's stretched them and the locals pretty thin, so we're the only people we can spare. 
"We're going to go confront the issue now. I'm expecting things might turn ugly - so be prepared. Let's go"

Scott slid off the desk, picking up his MP5, and lead the way out of the door, and out of the headquarters building, in the direction of the maintenance workshops and stores, the night around them suddenly having taken on a very quiet, and almost eerie air. 
Scott moved with purpose and familiarity, moving into an easy, tactical lope through the airports' shadows, sticking to a route that kept them as much out of sight as possible. 
As they approached the building, he used hand signals to bring everyone to a stop in cover, kneeling in the cover of the service vehicle garage. He spoke in a quiet, hushed tone; one that didn't carry too far. 
"All right, listen up. I know some of you won't have fought a gun battle before. Or maybe not for a long time, if you have. There's not time for a refresher, but all I can say is, remember your training, keep your heads down and stick to cover, and watch each others' backs"
He nodded to Fuka, noting the way she moved with experience and skill with her marksman rifle expertly glued to her shoulder. 
"Peacenik; take half the squadron and move around the rear of the Maintenance building. Tag anyone who tries to run, and get an entry point through the fire exit"
He nodded to Jefe, the sinomexican having lugged her light machine-gun. "Jefe, I want you around the front of the building; suppressive fire with your LMG if they fire on us, so we can breach. I'm gonna assume they're not looking for a peaceful resolution to this, and that they're going to be armed. Stick to cover, keep low while moving. Shoot back first if they're shooting, and then go for surrender and capture". 

He looked to Fuka as the rest of them moved out and shook his head briefly, a tight, tiny smile on his face. 
"You know; this ain't what I expected this mission to go like. I swear, it isn't normally like this".
He nodded to her before he shouldered the MP5 again, moving around the cover and sticking to it as he headed to the front of the maintenance building. 

[url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpwTx4G2EAM&ab_channel=LeCastleVania-Topic]As he approached, he pulled the SMG tighter into his shoulder, his posture moved into a perfect tactical flow of motion.[/url] He stayed below the level of the ground-floor windows as he moved in a crouch. 
As he approached the door, he directed them to stack up on him, and Ximena to cover the front of the building - and then gunfire opened up on them from inside, rattling out from the rooftop and the windows along its' front. Scott wheeled around the door, hugging the wall, and rattling short bursts from the SMG as he moved in.
 
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