Out of Space

Chapter 235: Extreme Prejudice

Captain Joseph played with the Orc revolver while the rest of his officers and NCOs gathered at the Great Hall turned Command Center. He dry fired the heavy revolver, requiring him to use both hands to stabilize and squeeze the heavy trigger.

"Damn, this thing is hard to fire!" Joseph said to his men as he dropped the weapon on the table. "Now, anyone has any ideas as to how and where did these come from?"

The room of officers and NCOs looked at each other and shrugged. Joseph sighed before asking, "Any prisoners? Anyone, to interrogate?"

"No, Sir!" The Officer in charge of the Gate replied. "They were Orcs and the men all responded with deadly force when they retaliated."

"So the dudes that were bringing these in to sell or trade were all dead and we have no single clue of who, where, and how all these come from?"

"Eh, yes, sir..." The unfortunate Officer replied.

Joseph rubbed his face tiredly. "Get our Orcs to check the dead of their belongings and see if they can get a clue of which tribe or clan they came from. Then see if we can backtrack from there."

"Yes, Sir!"

-----

UNS Singapore, Captain's Quarters

"- recovered 90 Orc revolvers and over one thousand rounds of ammunition for them," Joseph's image said to the room.

"Any leads on where they came from?" Blake asked as he fiddled with his thumbs.

"Only clue we got is that they are from the Planeswalker clan," Joseph replied. "As to where they are currently, we have no idea as they are nomadic."

Blake nodded, "Got it, send some of the weapons back for Ordinance to take a look, and destroy the rest."

"Yes, Sir," Joseph said. "Sir, if it is possible can we get some UAV support here? It will help greatly to map the area out and also spot threats before they come closer."

Blake glanced at Commander Tommy, who nodded and answered, "We can strip down the Owleye and ship it over part by part and send down a tech crew to reassembly and work maintenance on it."

"Ok, do it," Blake ordered. "Priority now is to try to track where these weapons come from and who is making them."

"Frank, send in the 101st," Blake said. "Get to the bottom of this! This is a major threat should our enemies possess firearms."

Frank nodded, "I will get the team ready for the next flight down."

"Good, okay go do what you all are supposed to do," Blake ended the meeting.

"Captain," Ford's image on the display frowned as he stared at the picture of the Orc revolver. "Could this be made by them?"

"Them?" Blake's eyes narrowed as he thought of the possibility. "The deserters?"

Ford nodded as he explained his theory further. "The Indian Marine is after a weapons designer, and our Single Actions revolver designs are made by him after all. It will not be hard for him to come out with another design."

"Hmmm, so you are saying there is a high chance they have allied with Orcs?" Blake turned to look at the map of the area. "They went east instead of up north? Is that why we couldn't find them all this time?"

Ford nodded again, "Seems so, the terrain has changed since the time this map was made over a hundred years ago. Already teams of surveyors are reporting that the certain terrain features are not as large nor is the map accurate."

"If they are somewhere in the east," Blake's finger landed on a terrain feature on the map. "The Great Ocean Plains?"

"Yes, that is the intel we gotten from the Orcs prisoners where that is where their tribes and clans lived at," Ford said.

Blake tapped on the area where the supposed Great Ocean Plains were supposed to be. "Hmmm, Thorn's map shows that area as a forest."

"Yes, but according to the Orcs, it is actually a vast plain," Ford's image confirmed.

"Tell Lieutenant Tavor to find me at my office now," Blake hit the intercom and spoke to the operator.

"I want his Intel department to work on this!"

-----

Goblin Sea, UNS Matador, Command Bridge

Ford ended the comms and cursed under his breath before turning his attention to the tactical plot. Blimps of surface contacts were showing up on the radar as his tiny fleet prepared to face off the Goblin Fleet.

"Alright, orders to the CAG, go for launch!" Ford ordered the Carrier Air Group, commander to the single squadron of Sea Cobras.

1st Lieutenant Legos, CAG of the Sea Cobra squadron onboard the Matador, grinned as he replaced the phone back onto its mount and yelled at the gathered pilots inside the ready room. "Mount up!"

His pilots quickly grabbed their gear and ran to their individual biplanes. The techs had already warmed up their engines and hooked the biplanes to the towing tractors.

One by one, the biplanes were loaded up on the side elevator and brought to the top decks. The crew quickly hooked up the undercarriage of the biplanes to the steam catapults. There were only two catapults on the decks and the rest of the squadron waited patiently for their turn.

The launch lights turned green and catapult master hit the launch key, and the steam catapult propelled the hooked up biplane out into the air with a massive roar.

Once both catapults were fired off, the locking carriages were winded back to their positions and the next Sea Cobra were locked into place.

Within twenty minutes, all eight of the Sea Cobras were safely launched into the air and they flew off in formation towards the direction of the Goblin Fleet.

An hour later, the comms lit up with calls of enemy contact.

-----

Legos peered over the side of his biplane's lower wing and saw the telltale white lines on the sea's surface which indicated the wakes of ships.

"Flying Fish Lead to all Fishes," Legos called out. "Surface contacts! Two O'clock low!"

"Roger!"

"Flying Fish to Matador, contacts sighted! Engaging!"

The eight biplane squadron split into pairs and dived in towards the unaware goblins. The pilots armed their rockets and gun pods and let loose once they were range.

-----

Camp Alpha, Standard Obstacle Course

"Come on!" Hitsu yelled at their new teammate as they climbed over a low wall in full combat gear. "Bloody FNG!"

The new teammate bit back a curse as he rolled on the sand after jumping off the top of the wall, allowing the roll to disperse away from the weight of his equipment from damaging his knees.

Lance Corporal Wolf Tannor had managed to pass all the strict tests and criteria before he was assigned to take one of the opened slots in the 101st ATI, Claymore One. Now, he just needed to get his new teammates' recognization.

"What's FNG?" Loke asked Tavel as they watched Hitsu leading the replacement for Doth down the obstacle course.

"Farking new guy," Tavel replied absentmindedly as he looked at the stopwatch in his hand. "Well, not bad timing for someone who is not using magic to boost his stats."

"Wooo!" Hitsu dumped his backpack weighing 30 kilos down before removing his vest and weapons. "Hey FNG, run faster!"

Wolf grunted as he ran finished the last 400 meters, several seconds behind Hitsu. He dumped his gear down and started drinking some water from his canteen.

"Not bad, Hitsu at 4 minutes 12 seconds," Tavel said. "Wolf at 4 minutes 18 seconds."

"Damn, I did slower than before!" Hitsu gathered up his gear as he looked at the chart Tavel was holding.

"Alright, boys! Gather up at briefing room four in 15 minutes !" Tyrier suddenly appeared and called out. "We got a new job!"

"Finally!" Hitsu laughed and he quickly jogged off to drop off his gear with Wolf in tow.

Less than 15 minutes, the whole Claymore One team had gathered at the briefing room. All of them except Tyrier and Wolf moaned dramatically when they saw Lieutenant Tavor entered with a thick folder in his arms.

"Quiet!" Tyrier gave a frown as he eyed the Intel Officer. The last time they worked with Tavor, had one of their own dead.

Tavor gave a small smile at the expressions on the men and said, "I am sorry for your loss on the previous mission but now we have a new job for you."

He plugged in a data stick into the display console and an image appeared on the screen. "Okay, shit has just got real now."

"As of 17 hours ago, 2nd Battalion Marines encountered an Orc merchant convoy at Orwell's Point," Tavor started the briefing. "The Orcs instead of surrendering attacked the Marines and were all killed."

He flipped the display showing the aftermath of the skirmish. "Now, the Marines on checking the cargo of the wagons found these."

The images showed dozens and dozens of large revolvers lined up neatly on a table with rows and rows of ammunition laid out on the side. "90 Orc revolvers and over a thousand rounds for the weapons."

"What the?" The team was shocked as they saw the images even Tyrier could not maintain his calmness. "I thought the hoomans were only the ones who knew how to make guns?"

"Apparently not," Tavor replied, "This is where you guys come in."

Tyrier frowned as he said, "So you want us to find out where these weapons come from?"

Tavor nodded, "Find who and where they are making these arms. Once you have positively identified the factories or workshops, you are cleared to call in an airstrike. Your objective is to destroy these weapons and any known methods of production!"

"Oh Shit!" The team groaned as they heard what Tavor needed them to do. "I knew it! He always brings us bad news or some crazy ops!"

"Quiet!" Tyrier growled at his team. "How are we going to find them?"

"So far the only clue we have is that these Orcs come from the Planeswalker clan," Tavor said as he looked at his watch. "You will take the first flight over to Orwell's Point that will leave in... five hours."

"Once there, 2nd Battalion will provide you will all the support you need," Tavor said. "But take note, their support is limited, but you will have priority tasking over the UAV that is going to be station there."

"So where do we go to find this Planeswalker clan?" Altied asked. "And what kind of support exactly?

"At this point of time, we are still determining their locations as the Orcs are nomadic creatures," Tavor answered. "Your area of the search will be within the Great Ocean Plains. Better familiarize yourself with what intel we know of the area."

Tavor started to hand out documents to the team who started to flip through the intelligence documents.

"As for local support, you will have the 2nd Battalion Marines, a company of 120mm mortar support, a squadron of Cobras and two heavy dragons," Tavor said as the team read through the documents. "But expect the Marines to not get to your location quickly. The Marines will also assign some Orc to help liason with you out in the Plains."

"What? The whole Plains is estimated to be over 1.300 km square?!" The team grumbled. "How are we gonna move around that area!"

"On transport, you will have new toys," Tavor smiled. "They will be shipped over together with you and you will start training on their usage once you arrive at Orwell's Point."

"What is this?" Loke asked as he looked at the last part of the documents which was a manual for some kind of vehicle which he found it slightly familiar.

"Are we gonna be rat labs?" Hitsu asked as he looked at the manual. "Motor... cycle operator manual..."

"Last of all, this is highly classified," Tavor suddenly gave them a serious look. "We suspect that these weapons were made by the very same deserters and murderers who ran away."

"If they are found to be the ones making the weapons and selling it, find them and terminate with extreme prejudice!"