Shortly after the mysterious Papillon had been wheeled away from the now smoldering Nosferatu, the pilots, tired from the exhausting day brought themselves to the new base's briefing room for what was hopefully the final debriefing of the day. Along the way, Charles found himself greeted by a great many base personnel, most of them familiar faces from when he had been stationed at the base and those who hadn't known him saluted him nonetheless for the logo on his uniform. Erika, however, earned a few strange looks for her own insignias. While there was little more than a friendly rivalry between the two private air forces of Neucom and General Resource Limited at the time, and while both forces were little more than tools for test flights of each company's products and showing each company's products at airshows, it was still a strange occurrence to see a Neucom Emergency Unit pilot on a General Resource Defense Force base. 

Solo Island, once an OADF and OMDF base, had by the 1990's fallen into disrepair and had practically wiped off the map, due in large part to the technological difficulties of operating on a volcanic island with natural radar jamming properties. Thus, it was a huge surprise on the international level when in 2017, the newly created conglomerate, which infamously contained the Belkan Gründer Industries within it, bought the island and the base on it as a main base for their private military. They began with a huge modernization of the base; repairing and building new wind turbines on the southern area of the island, building a second runway on the base, clearing three quarters of the planes in the boneyard to make a residential area for personnel, harnessing the geothermal properties of the island for energy, renovating the tunnels on the north part of the island originally meant as a subterranean base for the OMDF and last but not least building state of the art communications towers on the perimeter of the island, circumventing the problems originally posed by the island's volcanic nature and establishing stable platforms for radar and sonar.

Charles had arrived on the island in 2018 and had been based there for two years before heading south to Leasath as a spokesman for General Group's products, after rumors were heard of Neucom providing experimental aircraft to Aurelia. This would be met with little success when Leasath was put on the defense after a powerful offensive by Aurelia following the failure of the attack on Aubrey Air Force Base and the following counterattack. The following months were some of the most memorable in Charles life, for various reasons...

"Captain Kreulich. Great to see you again." Charles was cut out of his thoughts by a man tapping him on the shoulder. He realized he was now standing in the briefing room. Erika, who looked more than a little ticked off by the looks she was getting from the General personnel, had remained silent but her attention was caught by the man. Charles recognized the voice.

"Franz. It's been a long time." He turned around and shook the hand of the man; a Colonel Franz Grisham, who looked about Charles' age but was much higher rank as he had one of the first men in the General Resource Defense Force when it was formed. As the commander of GRDF Air and Naval Base at Solo Island, he had known Charles ever since he had transferred to the base three years ago. They had become quick friends when they found out about their common Belkan origins.

"Too long, my friend. Who might this cutie be?" Erika was distracted from her investigation of one of the briefing room's chairs by this question. "Neucom, huh? Rare breed around here. She with you?" He asked Charles as more of the other pilots began to come in. The Belkans came in one group and many of the chairs were quickly occupied by the twelve pilots. 

"Unfortunately." He chuckled and introduced his WSO. "Lieutenant Erika Ansel, Colonel Franz Grisham. She's my WSO for the games. Well, 'was'." The Colonel grinned, took off his cap and eagerly shook Erika's hand.

"A pleasure. You may be Neucom, but welcome to our base." Erika smiled somewhat, exhausted from the events of the day. 

"Thanks. Glad to be here." Grisham put his cap back on and turned back to Charles.

"Well, we can talk more later. I need to get this briefing going. Have a seat." Charles nodded and gestured to Erika to take a seat and the lights were dimmed as the last few pilots entered. Amazingly, Papillon came in, bandaged from head to toe, but obviously standing. Unfortunately, Charles couldn't make out her features in the dim light and she took a place behind him, so he couldn't really look at her without being noticed.

Before the briefing started, however, the obligatory pitch for General Resource was put on screen. Charles cringed at it, but Franz chuckled from the back. [i]Idiot[/i], Charles thought to himself as he shook his head.
[i]Those who will prop up everyone's lives:
General Group.
Those who want to progress the flow of ages along with everyone:
General Group.
Those who invent ideas for the environment of the future with everyone:
General Group.
And today, with someone...
Tomorrow, surely, with you. [/i]

A chime indicated the advertisement was over and Erika muttered. "Sounds like some sort of occult chant."

"Alright, that's enough of that." Franz walked to the front of the room and spoke in front of the screen, which had the General Resource Defense Logo on it. "As a few of you know, I'm Colonel Franz Grisham, with the GRDF. I know you're all tired and I don't like talking in front a group, so I'll keep this really short. Miss NUN butterfly, would you like a summary of what happened this afternoon or should I just tell these guys about your adventures this morning?" The bandaged NUN pilot shook her head and answered in a quiet voice.

"No thank you. I read the report on the way back to base." Her voice was weak, probably from the injuries and without the extra volume that she was given by the plane's radio earlier, the two Phantom pilots had to make something of an effort to hear her.

"Gotcha. That'll save us a lot of time. So, from what I read, Miss Papillon here was scrambled from an OADF base early this morning after hostilities began and it was thanks to her that you guys had an easier time in Oured. Fifty-five planes was it?" Franz leaned against the wall casually and Papillon nodded. "Damn, that is impressive. Mind teaching some of the guys around here how it's done when you're all better?" He chuckled and continued on with the briefing. "Unfortunately, her plane was damaged on the way back, but it should be repaired in a day or two once those NUN planes get here with the parts needed for repairs of her Nosferatu. Anyway, you Peace Sparrow guys were scrambled to Oured this afternoon and defeated the Yuktobanian and Estovakian aircraft. And then those bombers came in. But, [i]this[/i] is where it gets interesting. Our friends in NUN just got off the phone with the Stovies and the Yukes and they both said that they deployed no bombers at all. Not even that Valkyrie. Apparently, the only ground attack aircraft they sortied were those Harriers. Thankfully, the Belkans, under direct orders from NUN arrived in time to save your asses and shoot down the Valkyrie so everything is good. Mission was a success." Not a single image appeared on the screen, though there didn't really need to be, Charles remarked. They all knew what had happened out there.

"NUN's trying really hard to find the origins of the MiG-29K's, Mask Squadron and the bombers, but they haven't gotten anything yet. So for the time being, they say you'll be on peacekeeping duty. You'll get more in a day or two once all the NUN personnel are on base." He was about to dismiss the pilots when Erika asked a question.

"What about Romeo? The ISAF pilot? Is he alright?" she said with a worried tone. Franz bit his lip.

"He's.. um... fine. Came out with some injuries, but he'll hopefully be back in the air in no time. Is that all...?" He trailed off, thinking he was forgetting something when he noticed the figure standing a little away from the group in the room. "Ah, that's right. I need to introduce you all to the newest member of Peace Sparrow." He gestured to the figure and he introduced her. "This is Second Lieutenant Vigdis "Mareritt" Lorenson, with the Royal Nordennavic Air Force. She'll be replacing Romeo definitively. Have anything to say, Vig?" He stepped aside to allow the pilot to introduce herself...