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Aaand sheet as promised.

Checking in, sheet to follow soon.
*Enthusiastically expresses interest.*
This looks fun.
The drop in volume of fire from the ragheads’ side was noticeable even with the grenade’s explosion briefly drowning it out. Although the rearmost car - likely not a coincidence it was the most expensive-looking one - was hiding something more. Bedouin ‘special forces’, if they even grapsed such a concept? Third party, contractors likely, somehow related to their HVI or his capture? She felt confident ruling out armed forces of any country with an army decent enough to deploy a spec ops team. “Do we want one alive or is it not even worth it?” Sure, how would you even go about that in these conditions, but better ask than be sorry.

The grenade turned out to be everything she hoped for, stopping the russian-built vehicle and the threat of flanking them it presented, all with the added bonus of creating an opening that, although brief, allowed others to clean the rest up with extreme prejudice. After taking a moment to confirm the Lada was well and truly fucked, the ex-spetsnaz stuck her head from behind the Nimr to see what could be done about the rest of the locals, only to be forced to shrink back behind the car by a hail of 12,7s sprayed wildly over the Ares mercenaries. It didn’t look like it was aimed at her - if anything, it looked like the target was anything in a forty-or-so degree cone encompassing the Nimrs. Which was good, because that meant their marksman wasn’t on the receiving end of it. Therefore, in an ideal case, they’d just have to wait a few seconds and boom, problem solved. Right? Ah, who was she kidding? What were these ‘ideal cases’, where could you get some and how much for a lifetime pass? Maybe the company could even get tax returns on them.

Unfortunately, having gone where she was to avoid line of sight from the two American-made cars, she didn’t see much she could do from where she was standing. Yes, she could move, or expose herself, but - bloody fifty cal. If they weren’t going to scuttle their gear at the end of the mission, it might have been worth stealing the thing. “Any bright ideas?” she asked. They had three machine guns over one, so ideally, they shouldn’t have a problem suppressing the fifty. Ideally - that fucking word again.

She decided to leave the flatbed to the others for now and shifted to the corner of the Nimr that was the closest to the dune, her attention going back to the Jeep and the goons around it as she poked her head from around the MRAP, careful not to expose herself to the flatbed. They seemed to be preoccupied with the dune, or rather who was on it. Good for her now, but bad for everyone else. The Russian switched her rifle to her left shoulder to keep as much of her in cover as possible as she sent several short bursts at the Jeep, the first one aimed at the closest person and the rest intended to suppress and give the marksman more breathing room.
Though she felt a bit like a hypocrite for laughing, as had it been her up on that dune and had it been a snake instead of a spider, everyone from Dakar to Cairo would’ve probably known exactly where they were, she couldn’t help but chuckle at Coghlan’s misfortune. The muffled snickering quickly went away when Coghlan’s report came through. Three cars, approaching fast, unknown numbers- mounted MG? Mounted MG. If it was a PKP or something similar, okay, bad enough. If that was an NSV or some other nightmare? Katya gave the Nimr another glance, wondering whether the Saudi-made vehicle would be sufficient cover and whether it would live to tell the tale. In 1914, it would be more comforting to think they outnumbered the enemy three to one in machine guns. “So, the titanium plates in these vests are good for shrapnel and nine mil and sod else...” Katya said idly as the sound of the engines built up in volume.

The Russian shouldered her rifle and followed the repositioning Nimr - careful to keep her feet away from the wheel - and looked to where she thought the engine noise was coming from behind the dune, waiting for the inevitable. Then Immortan Joe’s party flew into view - and of course it was the worst case scenario. “Tvoyu mať, dushka!” she cursed as she repositioned to the back of the Nimr that was parallel to the dune as that gave her cover from two directions, briefly forgetting there was only one other person who’d understand the warning, but the spirit of it probably transcended the language barrier.

The familiar sound of an SVD signalled the start of the bout. Brick managed to stop the Ford before she could get a shot out, saving her a few rounds for later. Instead, Katya shifted her aim intent on addressing the problem that was the flanking Lada, specifically its driver. She turned to face it and dropped down to a crouch, the Nimr fully shielding her from fire coming from the two stopped vehicles. Poking out only as much as she needed to see the Lada, she let loose with semi-auto fire as soon as the front windows came to view, minding that she only had a measly ninety rounds. The Lada swerved to the side and finally stopped four rounds later, letting Katya adjust her position to put more of the Nimr between her and the other bastards in the Lada. Their rounds were getting a bit too close for comfort now. Betting on a combination of training after a year-long hiatus and being a small target in the dark was far from ideal, but that was the general theme of their current predicament. Then a metallic ‘ding’ clearly heard over the gunfire, signalled a close hit on the Nimr. Unfortunately, the vehicle’s occupants were smart enough to keep at least one weapon firing at all times. “Fuck it,” she growled as she fished a grenade out of a pouch, straightened out the pin andn pulled it, “Frag out.” She cautioned the squad over the radio, turned where she remembered the Lada to be and tossed the RGD in a high arc, aiming to land it so the car would be between the grenade and the Nimr’s.
The private flight to Algiers was a welcome thing. Belyayeva planned to take Brick’s advice from the briefing and sleep through most of it - not like there was much else to do anyway unless the squad was feeling chatty, but she wasn’t too keen on taking sleeping pills. That was the main reason she welcomed the absence of howling toddlers and chattering hags that seemed to plague public transport. After hopping from Algiers to Tamanrasset, some local packed them into cars for a drawn-out ride around the town, but at least it afforded them time to get used to the dry air. Dry air and the damn dust.

It was wisely decided to wait until night, when among obvious benefits, the lower temperature made the low air humidity more bearable. As they left the city, the Russian couldn’t pass up the opportunity to remark that the road they were driving along - in the middle of nowhere - was in a much better condition than many in her homeland. Alas, all good things must come to an end. They’d hardly find their guy just sitting on the highway, and as they turned off the paved road and into the desert proper, Katya resigned herself to stare out into the darkness to cover her sector, likely for hours unend. She could only pity the second vehicle for having to drive in their wake. It didn’t take long for a possible contact to show itself, which immediately made a part of her think it was just a wisp of sand caught in the wind or some such false alarm. No matter, the trail vehicle could keep a better eye on it anyway.

When their humble convoy stopped to investigate, she got out of the car and chambered a round, flicking the fire selector to semi and covering the gap between the top cover and main body with her left hand to prevent any stray sand from getting into the rifle for as long as she could avoid it. Someone once joked that the difference between the AK and AR-15 platforms was that Mikhail Kalashnikov wanted to make a rifle that would work when there was junk in it, while Eugene Stoner wanted to make a rifle that would keep the junk out.

“Unless whoever’s following us notices we’re no longer kicking up dust clouds.” she chipped in when Brick mentioned their possible tail driving into their ‘embrace’, sticking by the front end of her Nimr to maximize the protection it offered while looking toward the dune’s edge - for one to see if someone was following them and decided to drive around the dune rather than over it, and also because that was mostly downwind and kept the dust out of her eyes. Nice thing about night time desert was the quiet so one could hear things clearly, but she could do without the cold. That was one part of home she didn’t miss. “Bloody deserts, too hot in the day, too cold in the night. Is there no golden middle path here?” she grumbled off-comms as the familiar calmness was joined by a nervous tingle at the back of her mind. Back in the field after a year.

“May I suggest we start East?” she chose to err on the side of caution when Bakker asked his question “Wherever we find the poor sod, we’ll still have to go West to get out of here, so if he’s there, it’s along the way. I’d rather not waste time and resources backtracking if he’s not. For all we know we might need that extra breathing room to get out of a bad spot later.” She explained her reasoning.
As soon as the mission objective was revealed, the ex-Spetsnaz rubbed her temples wearily. Hostage rescue, crap. Quite possibly her second least favorite thing to do after demolitions. They’d be one twitch of a carpet pilot’s finger away from their paycheck gaining an extra bodily orifice all the time. Sadly, no payment for frozen goods. On the bright side, she wouldn’t have to stick anything in her eyes, there was that. Well, on this run at any rate. She’d heard nightmare stories from some of her former comrades in GRU, about colored contact lenses potentially screwing up the wearer’s eyes if worn for too long. Something about being thicker than normal corrective lenses. Fortunately, she should at least be familiar enough with the team’s transportation. The Nimr was, after all, essentially a GAZ Tigr, scaled down and ruggedized for desert environments.

If she was counting the MREs right, it looked like they were facing up to ten days in the field. Western MREs hopefully, it would be a pleasant change from the oatmeal Russians put in theirs. The personal equipment wasn’t hard to manage, unless you were a leftie, in which case tough shit with the AK-style safety. What worried her a little was the magazine count. What she was assigned was a few mags short of what she’d feel comfortable with, but seemed downright laughable for the support weapons.

“How much shooting do we expect? Because we’re carrying 100 rounds as a spare for our two marksman rifles, but also a mere 100 extra rounds for our two assault rifles and three light machine guns.” she stressed the part that concerned her, “And since I’m being loud and difficult already, the gear list includes fuel, but makes no mention of tools. Are they left out for some reason, or are we simply shit out of luck?” Being left stranded somewhere in the Sahara desert because the trucks broke down sounded like a shit way to go out.
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