Olympus Rises (The Code of War)

by Jim Roberts

  "Let's get to it," said Joe. He removed the OpsTab and checked the localised GPS. They were almost exactly where the LZ had been marked. Isabella was a pro alright. Joe checked their current heading and pointed to relative north.

  Krieger removed the nightvision goggles for a moment. He fished around in his backpack for his pair of high intensity binoculars and held them up to his face, scanning the plateau. The binoculars were also in infrared, allowing a perfect view of the area.

  "I think I see fortress my friend."

  Joe followed suit, holding up his own binoculars. The Russian hadn't been wrong. According to the binoculars' range calculator, it was about two and half clicks to the south wall where they would be climbing. They were too far below the fortress to see any life on the base. He shoved the binoculars back into the pack and hoisted the heavy kit onto his back.

  Time to start hoofin it.

  Nearly thirty-three thousand feet in the air above Kazinistan, Whisper stood at the cargo ramp of the C-17, awaiting the green light to make his descent. As he stood, resolute and unmoving like a cold statue of granite, Whisper's mind raged with worry.

  I need someone I can rely on...

  The Colonel's words repeated endlessly in Danny Callbeck's head. What if Joe really does put the safety of his men before the Code? Will I be able to...

  Danny closed his sightless eyes tight inside the suit. It did nothing, as he could still see through the ocular implants beaming the electromagnetic information straight into his brain.

  The Code could lay Olympus's plan bare. It would be a terrific gain.

  But what if Walsh was wrong? What if the disc was just another piece of an endless puzzle? There were so many ifs and buts, Whisper couldn't keep them straight in his head.

  You are still Joint Task Force 2, Danny Callbeck. You are elite; the best Canada has. Deal with this when the time comes. Focus on the mission.

  He repeated the last sentence. His rage began to cool and he focused his thoughts. Almost at the same time, the HUD in the suit's helmet displayed an incoming message. A small image of Yune's face appeared in the lower corner of the helmet's display.

  "We are almost ready for mission start, Whisper. T-minus one minute and counting."

  Whisper nodded, "I read you Doctor."

  Yune sensed Danny's trepidation of the coming jump, "Trust me, it will be easier than any HALO jump you have ever attempted. All I can tell you is to trust the suit."

  Whisper hated hearing Yune say that.

  The overhead lights switched from the Red for STOP to the Green for GO. The ramp began to lower. The temperature dropped several degrees instantly as the cold air in the atmosphere entered the bay. The country of Kazinistan stretched out below him. The Pamir mountains stretched a far as Danny could see.

  Yune's voice blared in Whisper's ear, "Alright Whisper, T-minus 10...9...8...7...6...5...4...3...2...1, jumper away!"

  Danny grit his teeth and took a running jump out the back of the plane, leaping with all his might. A feeling of temporary weightlessness obscured the knowledge that he was accelerating at a rate of fall nearly one-hundred and twenty miles per hour. Than the powerful force of gravity caught up with his stomach as he was hurled down like a meteor. He tilted his body to face directly down; the HUD of the Whisper suit calculated his rate of descent and exact distance from the ground.

  "Alright Doc, when do I release the Patagium?"

  The image of Yune in the heads-up-display crossed his arms, "Activate the wing suit at ten-thousand feet. No higher."

  Whisper held his breath. Skydiving was nothing new to him; he had leapt from planes during LALO and HAHO ops, so the feeling of heading towards the earth at terminal velocity was like riding a bike. But having to put his life in something that Doctor Yune had hardly had a chance to test was disconcerting, to put it mildly.

  The altimeter on his HUD continued to click down furiously. 20,000...19,500...19,000. Christ, he was falling fast!

  "Doctor, you haven't been holding out on me have you? This IS going to work, right?"

  "What is it that we say Danny?" Yune reminded his test dummy.

  Danny snorted, "Trust the suit."

  12,000...11,500...11,000

  Hell with it, I'm hitting it now!

  Whisper activated the patagium.

  Nothing.

  Are you kidding me?

  "Yune, it's not working! What the hell do I do now!"

  Yune's voice came back, quite calm, "It's because you tried to open it above ten-thousand feet, Mister Callbeck. Try it now!"

  Whisper clicked the control again. Immediately the flight suit activated. The fabric membranes of the suit unfurled like a kite. Danny held his arms out and immediately the patagium caught the air and he felt a crushing blow of inertia as the suit slowed its descent drastically.

  Good. He'd avoided being liquefied on the ground for the moment.

  The patagium was difficult at first, but Whisper worked at it a bit and managed to find a decent feel for the controls. The HUD focused on the fortress, coming up quickly ahead of him.

  Yune appeared quite happy in his small HUD window, "Good, the suit is showing a near perfect trajectory. Just stay on your current path and you will reach the top of the fortress in less than ten minutes."

  "What do I do when I reach it?"

  "Firstly, activate the Whisper Shroud. Then, once you are within five-hundred feet, catch as much wind as you can to slow your descent. The suit's compensators will soften the landing to an almost negligible degree."

  Negligible degree. In Yune speak that probably meant bone crushingly hard.

  5,000 feet to destination...

  4,700 feet to destination...

  Joe, Krieger - you two had better be ready!

  The past kilometer and a half had been a fast run in the park for Krieger and Joe. They stopped and crouched behind a rocky outcropping in the craggy plateau they had been travelling on. Joe increased the nightvision's intensity, squinting to get a better view of the area in front of them. Through the goggles, they could finally see Fortress Liberatio. Perched on top of a four hundred-odd foot mountain, it was definitely smaller than Fortress Bellum. However, their only method of entrance was straight up the south cliff-face. As Joe scanned the cliff, he could tell it would be a challenging, though not impossible climb. The Fortress sat atop the mountain like a cold reminder of the place Joe and Krieger had escaped from only a week earlier.

  And now they were trying to get in to a new one.

  Joe moved the night vision down towards the area in the immediate vicinity of the mountain - searching for enemy movement. As he adjusted the goggles, a familiar sound rose from around the mountainside; the high pitched wail of a personal jet engine. Joe pulled Krieger down roughly behind the crags, his eyes searching the sky for the flying bogies.

  He spotted them - three Olympus Hastati Jet Troopers, flying in a perimeter guard around the mountain. Their jet engines hummed angrily as they spun around the mountain, no doubt searching the countryside beyond with the infrared sensors in their helmets.

  As the three troopers disappeared around the opposite side of the mountain, Joe let Krieger up and un-shouldered his backpack.

  "What is plan now my friend?" asked Krieger, following suit.

  "Get your pickaxes out. We're going up that mountain right now."

  Krieger rummaged through his pack and pulled out the experimental pickaxes. He pressed the small ignition button on the handle. Instantly the tip of axe lit up white hot.

  Krieger chuckled, "Nice. Let's go. Living is overrated anyway."

  Slinging their weapons around their backs, Joe and Krieger bolted towards the mountainside, running with all their might. Joe had no idea when the Hastati troopers would return and he wasn't going to sit around waiting for them.

  They reached the mountain and immediately began to climb. Joe held the pickaxe out and, after taking a deep breath and half closing his eyes, clicked the ignite button. Joe slammed th
e axe into the rock face, releasing the button as he did. The axe imbedded itself up to the handle. Joe tried to wriggle the axe free but it held tight.

  Way to go Yune, this thing actually works!

  Joe pulled down on the axe handle and lifted himself up. Igniting the second axe, he drove it higher up on the cliff. He had to press the button on the first axe again to dislodge it from the rock. It came free like a knife slicing butter. He dug his boots into the mountain and began the arduous task of pulling himself up the cliff.

  Krieger had watched Joe from bellow, not wishing to be the first one to have a new invention blow up in his face. Once satisfied that Joe was safely on his way up the mountainside, Krieger took a deep breath and engaged his climbing axes. Making sure the penetrating tools would support his weight, the large Russian pulled himself up; following Joe closely.

  A voice blurted over the comm attached to Joe's ear. It was Whisper's ragged voice, sounding a bit more haggard than usual, "Joe come in, it's Whisper."

  "I'm receiving Whisper, go ahead," said Joe, keeping his voice low. He had no clue how far his voice carried in this mountainous area.

  Whisper's voice spoke quickly, "I'm coming in on the fortress as we speak, ETA five minutes."

  Joe looked up the cliff, holding onto the axes for dear life. He still had about two-hundred feet to go. If they hustled, they might get up in another ten minutes.

  "We're on our way right now. Good luck on your infiltration. Everything will be ready by the time you extract. Trust me."

  "Joe..." Whisper sounded like he was going to ask another question, but his voice faltered.

  "What?"

  "...Nothing. Good luck. See you when it's over, out."

  Joe nodded to himself, "Right." He looked down at Krieger, who was lagging behind by about twenty feet. "Hustle it up man!" Joe called down as softly as he could.

  They continued climbing uninterrupted for another seven minutes when the familiar jet sound echoed from around the mountain.

  Joe looked down at his comrade, "They're coming back!"

  Joe and Krieger killed their movement, leaning against the cliff wall as tightly as possible. It was still quite dark, and the moon had mercifully disappeared behind a thick patch of clouds. Small miracles, thought Joe.

  The Hastati slowed their packs as they hovered; sweeping their gaze around the mountain range.

  Come on, just keep moving...

  Joe grit his teeth; sucked in his breath as he prayed to whatever god or pagan deity that was listening to please let these flying goons pass them by.

  ETA to Destination Rooftop - One Minute

  The message flashed across the HUD of the Whisper suit as Danny closed in on Fortress Liberatio. His descent was going good; if only he could hold it for another sixty seconds. A buffet of wind sheared him off course, pushing him down several hundred feet far sooner than he wanted to. He pulled his body back as hard as he could, trying to grasp as much wind as possible to pull himself up before he ploughed into the cliff-face.

  He was in viewing range of the top of the fortress now. He switched to infrared and scanned the fortress for sentries. The suit registered seven hostiles. He magnified their respective images within the HUD. They were all Centurions; heavily armed with either XM8 Carbines or the new Russian AK-12 Kalashnikov, the most up-to-date revision of the classic AK series.

  Whisper took a deep breath. If these jerks heard his arrival, things would go south from there right quick.

  Yune's face appeared in the HUD, replacing the images of the troopers, "Alright Whisper, you're almost there. Get ready for landing operations. The suit can effectively absorb the shock of a direct fall from fifty feet. Anything more and you risk a suit rupture, or worse, a limb break."

  Lovely.

  "Alright Doctor, activating shroud and folding in patagium....NOW!"

  He deactivated the membranous flight suit as his suit reached a measured distance of sixty-five feet from the first building at the top of the fort. He felt gravity latch onto him and force him straight down. The Heads-up-Display turned completely blue as the suit activated the Shroud. Whisper's body became instantly transparent; blending seamlessly with the starry Afghan night. He fell at a forty-five degree arc to the building's concrete roof, landing on all fours. The suit's leg compensators soaked up the shock of the landing perfectly.

  Nice.

  The patagium webbing retreated back inside the innerspace of the suit. Whisper crouched there for a moment, staring out at the fortress that spread before him like a hawk searching for its next meal. Several Olympus attack helicopters sat in parked locations, as well as two Hyperion VTOL aircrafts. The Centurions moved throughout the base on their pre-arranged patrols, oblivious to Whisper's stealth landing. At the northern side of the fort, just as the Colonel had said, was a small concrete building with a powerful-looking steel door: the prison building. Joe's men would be in there, all right.

  Whisper keyed his comlink, "Joe, do you read?"

  No answer.

  "Joe, come in, over. Krieger report, over."

  Nothing.

  He kept the comm open, just in case, and began his infiltration. According to the blueprint he had studied before the op, the base was laid out fairly similar to Fortress Bellum. He was currently on top of the tallest building in the fortress and had a perfect view of any and all entryways into the fortress substructure. Walsh had been certain that there was an elevator that would lead to a similar interior like the last base's basement; Whisper simply had to find the door.

  First things first.

  A sound directly below him in the yard told Whisper a Centurion was patrolling beneath his crouched position. The shroud was working well and his shimmering form could probably sneak by these fools without being noticed at all. However, if he could make things easier from Joe and Krieger, he would. To the right of the building he was crouching on were a row of trucks and Humvees, sitting forgotten and unused. The Centurion guard was moving slowly towards the vehicles, moving his helmeted head back and forth, on high alert.

  Whisper would need to act fast. The other Centurions were just far enough away to not notice his planned attack. As soon as the Centurion below him had moved amongst the parked trucks, Whisper leapt down from the roof and softly padded towards the backside of the trooper. Leaping up like a lion attacking a wildebeest, he grabbed the trooper across the face with an invisible arm. Whisper then jammed his opposite hand into the small of the Centurion's back and engaged the wrist-gauntlet blade. Shooting out with remarkable force, the spring-mounted weapon sliced neatly through the trooper's armor, skewering him like giblet.

  The trooper shuddered for a brief second, then went limp. Whisper quietly lowered the body to the ground. Gripping the dead Centurion under the arms, he hauled the corpse underneath one of the nearby trucks, shoving it roughly out of sight.

  With one trooper neatly disposed of, Whisper needed to get inside the base ASAP. As he plotted the quickest way towards the central command building, he inwardly hoped Joe and Krieger were okay wherever they were.

  Using the shadows to his full advantage, Whisper crept quietly along the base perimeter towards the mundane, box-like command building in the corner of the base.

  Joe withdrew his 9mm from its holster, slowly. It would take a miracle to hit the bastards at this range, but if this was the end, he would go down fighting.

  Below him, he could see Krieger hugging the cliff; probably waiting to act until Joe did. The Hastati jet troopers were close, probably only a hundred feet away, hovering quickly on their flight packs.

  Stay still...

  The troopers flew closer still. They're gonna spot us any time now. Joe eased back the hammer of the 9mm.

  Come on. Show me what you've got.

  The troopers zoomed by with nary a glance their way.

  Joe closed his eyes, leaning his head against the cliff in relief. Thank Christ! He looked down at Krieger and gestured for him to continue climbing. The Russia
n gave a thumbs up and they continued on.

  Joe keyed his comm, "Whisper this is Joe, we're on our way. ETA approximately five minutes. Can you hold out?"

  Danny's quiet voice, filtered through the helmet's speaking module, came back, "One enemy trooper has been taken down, and six Centurions still remain operational in the main yard. I'm entering the operations building right now, over."

  Joe gouged his pickaxe into the cliff, talking while he climbed, "Copy that. Good luck Danny!"

  Krieger called up to Joe as softly as he dared, "Comrade, are things good with your Inuit friend?"

  Joe rolled his eyes. Good old Russian insensitivity, "He's fine. We're almost at the top. Keep climbing!"

  Krieger nodded, gripping his axes tighter. The two men picked up their pace. The top of the fortress wall was in sight.

  Almost there...not long now.

  Whisper snuck silently through the assorted equipment crates and parked vehicles, as he made his way to the central fortress complex. Inside would have to contain an elevator or stairway or something to reach the basement with. It was an educated guess that the Code was located in a similar mainframe room as in the first fortress. It was a gamble, but so far their luck had held and it was worth the risk. Two Centurions guarded the main entrance, standing to attention at either side of the building's main entryway. They would notice the shimmer the Whisper Shroud created if he tried to sneak between them. He could probably take both men down without too much effort, but hiding the bodies would waste valuable time he didn't have.

  He checked the ground at his feet and saw a small metal washer. Picking it up, he was about to throw it amongst a collection of barrels a few dozen feet away to get the guards attention, when the loud rushing noise of an engine roared in from above. Whisper ducked back among the trucks, keeping low. A Hyperion transport roared in over top; it's dark, dragonfly-like form hovered over the yard, descending to land in the middle of the fortress.

  Whisper hit the comlink, "Joe, be advised we have a Hyperion..."

  What Whisper saw come out of the lowering door of the Hyperion made him forget his friend for the moment. Looking every bit as massive and cruel as the last time he had laid eyes on his gigantic form, Commander Dante walked down the gangway, and towards the main building. A large white bandage covered his right ear where Joe had bitten it off. His eyes and nose were black from the beating he had received.