The Far East War...

Not hearing anything, Newman angrily bashed the phone on the top of radio pack before flipping it onto his knee, completely absorbed in his examination while muttering furiously "...super tough my arse...". Giving up on the shortwave for the moment he reached into his webbing, pulling out a much smaller handheld radio and turning back to the others "Lucky I always keep spa...oh..." he stopped, staring at the device in the Scandinavians hand.

((Sorry, don't check this part of the forums very often.))

"Took you long enough you Scandinavian git!" Ansel said.

The man with the radio had just watched his commanding officer go from distraught to pissed-as-hell in about as much time as it took him to reach the radio. Now the Australian was leaning on the table with the radio's reciever held tightly in his off-hand while he held the handle of his Kalashnikov in the other hand.

"How many JSDF boys are left, and do you need support?" Ansel asked.

He looked around as several of the ground soldiers were already loading up in the helicopters while the crews got ready to start their rotors and take off. Ansel looked to the radio almost as if he could see the Scandinavian on the other end.

"Looks like," Magnusson cut off for a second to do a head-count, "about a dozen of those JSDF are left, not counting my squad."

The "scandinavian git" looked over at Newman, whose bullet wound was bloody and angry looking but otherwise seemed fine. He then looked back out at the woods, and back into the village. About a platoon of Koreans, by Magnusson's thinking, were still in the village, not counting the snipers he had already encountered.

"We're going to need at least two squads to help us sweep out the village and the snipers in the forest, and possibly medical supplies and ammunition."

"And a new radio!" called Newman from atop his mound of straw, his hands going back to trying to fix the large shortwave pack. After a brief struggle and a few curse words the large battery came free from the radio, a nice hole punched into the side of it by the snipers bullet lightly decorated by blood and the occasional piece of Newmans own gore. Raising his eyebrows Newman flipped the battery around in his hands, wondering if he could extract the bullet for later, that'd be a tale to tell the grandkids.

Ansel was already running just as Magnusson finished speaking, his aid hurrying along right behind him.

"I need three squads, on me!" Ansel shouted.

In about the time it took him to reach one of the waiting Blackhawks, the rotors on the necessary helicopters were already starting to spin. Around fourteen men, Ansel and his aid included, crammed themselves in to each of the high-density model Blackhawks with Ansel climbing aboard last and staying by one of the two doors. In moments the helicopters were peeling off and away from the grassy plain where they were currently taking residence and everybody on-board was finding it too hard to talk without shouting until the doors were slid shut.

Moments later Ansel was in the cockpit and soon Magnusson would have a new voice coming over his radio.

"This is Green Fox 1, hang in there boys: we got a little over forty men moving to you!" There was a moment's pause "We're going to try and touch the supply-boys down behind the barn, is that clear?" The pilot asked.

"Affirmative, space behind the barn is clear for landing." Magnusson let off the transmitter beacon for the radio and placed it back into the small pouch on his back. He released the breath he had been holding for the last few minutes, then finally plopped down on one of the assorted hay bales through the room.

"Thank you for the info, stay safe until we're there." Green Fox 1's pilot said.

After fifteen or so minutes had passed since the communication, the sound of the Blackhawks could be heard. It was faint at first and the direction wasn't clear so any hopeful Koreans who happened to be lugging RPGs were stuck to simply scan the horizon with no fruit for the labor during the first few minutes of approach. Then the Blackhawks could be seen, spread out and coming in from the east low and fast. Then they were over the buildings with the smoke streams of RPGs streaking past them and their side-gunners sending out streams of rounds so fast that the tracers seemed to be making a continious green line through the air like a target marker towards those unfortunate enough to find themselves on the other end.

Two of the Blackhawks soon took to circling the barn while the third moved behind said barn. The side doors were open and in a flash Ansel was sprinting across the distance from the helicopter to the barn's back door with a tail of two medics, a radioman, and several men with rifles and grenade launchers that were firing at any stray Koreans that happened across their sights. The back door burst open from the barn and Ansel stopped, along with the men behind him, as the JSDF soldiers greeted them with pointed weapons.

Magnusson immediately stood and heaved his massive Scandinavian bulk over to the JSDF captain, who was dressed identically, looked identical to, and carried the same weapon as everyone else in the squad. Forcing his gun's barrel to point in a general downwardly direction, the sergeant stated (in no uncertain terms, loudly, and English,) that Ansel was a friendly unit and was not to be harmed.

The JSDF got the message when Magnusson's face started twisting from "impassive" to "pissed".

The rest of the squad lowered their weapons as Magnusson made his way across the room and shook Ansel's hand. "Sorry about the delay, sir," the Scandinavian said, "we had to take a few detours on the way here. One of the squadron's Apaches crash-landed in the hamlet and I had to move the pilot to safety, and there's snipers out in the woods that wounded Newman and broke our short-wave."

"Damn." Ansel muttered through gritted teeth "How are your injured?" He asked.

By now the first helicopter had taken off and a second one landed in it's place to drop off it's fourteen soldiers who rushed to not enter the barn but rather take cover in a nearby building to give flanking fire at the Koreans in the front. Once that second helicopter was gone, the third touched down and the soldiers simply moved in to the nearby trees to provide fire from the opposite side. They were probably still relatively outnumbered but now they had firepower. They might actually stand a chance.

"My guy's alright." Magnusson pointed towards Newman, who was going through his radio equipment. "Got hit with a sniper's bullet. It ripped a hole in his torso and busted our radio, but he's still moving and breathing under his own power."

He looked over towards a forsaken corner of the barn, though. "The JSDF guys didn't do so well." Thumbing towards a knot of Japanese soldiers wrapped in varying amounts of Ace bandages and blood, he sighed. "RPG strike blew them off the loft. They're not doing so hot."

"Good to know." Ansel said.

With a nod the two medics moved to the JSDF soldiers and began inspecting them. Of course, they weren't miracle workers and there would be only so much they could do but it was at least dedicated medical attention and not just some soldier with enough knowledge to be dangerous.

"The rest of the unit is on standby and I'm trying to see if we can't get the boys on the guns to give us some support." Ansel said, 'the guns' obviously referring to artillery.

There’s a reason why signalman was a specialist job in the army, it requires a special breed, not the strongest or fastest, but the most down-right determined. As such, no true radio man was going to let something like losing his radio keep him down, inside Newmans webbing where three radios of varying strength and type, two mobile phones, he got free texts on one of them, as well as a satellite phone tucked into his bum pack. Putting the broken battery aside for the moment, Newman pulled out one of the mobile phones and checked if it had a signal. Cell phones in the army have always been frowned upon, and there was an uproar when it was discovered that officers used their mobile phones to call each other instead of their unreliable and bulky radios during simulated battles in the desert.

Raising it up into the air the screen show three bars, just enough for a nice signal, “I’m on it!” he called over the newcomer, scrolling through his contact list for that young bird in the command bunker assisting the bigwigs, the one with a weakness for men in uniform.

((BTW, that phone in the desert thing is a true story as far as I'm aware.))

(Yes, yes it is: my uncle has done it before too. Anyways, would anybody mind if I joined this? It looks pretty interesting.)

((Sorry man, this threads been dead for a while. In fact, I'd almost forgotten about this. Feel free to start your own little thing though. ))

(Well crap, I may start something similar then...or just completely different maybe.)

(You should!)