| "Patience" | ||
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Ersovo 01.00hrs Saf stood outside in the cool night air, just listening to the sounds of the night and the shuffle of the people inside the van. It was good to be here, good to finally use her finely honed killing skills once more; she was impatient for the off, despite being without an essential alpha team member. Baz hadn't been included, though it had never been satisfactorily explained. Instead, they had been assigned Bella and Jaime, both former Section members. She was uneasy about that, though not able to put her finger on why their inclusion made her jumpy. SH1 16.30hrs When she had walked into the briefing room and seen the two familiar faces, she had suddenly felt Section's coldest touch filtering into her bones. She had withdrawn, though remaining polite, she didn't feel the need to make small talk with them instead she had concentrated on the paper forcing a look of boredom on her face to cover up the discomfort at her situation. It had been a relief to be released; she had calmly walked out of the room without a backward glance, leaving the others behind. Only Jordan had caught her eye she was lost in her thoughts, Saf had watched silently and then making her decision strolled casually past her. "Jordan?" "Ya?" "We're ready to go," Saf told her. "You okay?" "Oh ya, fine." Saf wasn't concerned, everyone was a little different, a bit distracted on occasion. Jordy was fine, but she followed her out and into the changing rooms. The changing room was still quiet, she had changed into black clothes, non-reflective and thin, but warm. She buckled on the belt, adjusting it to fit properly, and picking up a protective waistcoat, she walked away to disappear until they were needed upstairs. She stood on a corner of the roof, the wind taking her and pushing her, testing her. She enjoyed this moment alone, not resisting the futile attempts of the wind to force her to move. It was only when the heli approached, did she seek shelter downstairs the ready room was still empty so she reluctantly made her way downstairs. Simon was hovering by the door, a worried expression on his face, "I was just looking for you�" he started to say, but she just smiled, "I just needed some fresh air, but the heli has arrived, so perhaps we should get the others." They strolled into the room side by side and she made a beeline for Paige who was talking to Jordy, Jaime and Bella. She stood silently by, watching the interactions between the players, as Simon mentioned that the Heli was upstairs. It was going to be a relief to get going, after all the delays and the problems of the past couple of days. The heli was big enough for all of them, but she made sure she was last in, saving the corner seat for herself so that she had her own space. The noise of the rotors reduced the need for speaking as nothing could be heard over them and the flying time was only going to be short so they weren't provided with headsets to communicate with each other. She concentrated on the plans as they flew the short trip to the airfield, she could have recited the plans backwards, sideways and forwards if she had needed to; but it gave her something to focus on. The pilots set the heli down near to the next stage of their transport, an army cargo plane. She groaned, no comfortable jet to curl up on, instead basic benches and the sort of noise that regulators complained about unless ear plugs were used. She was the first out, and onto the other plane, walking up the ramp at the rear and stowing her bag onto a spare seat. The others followed behind her, chatting as they stowed bags and took control of their own space. 17.50hrs The flight time was approx 6 hours, landing at Myachkovo cargo airport, which was east of Moscow, at the scheduled time of 12.20hrs zulu with a 40 min drive to the rendezvous at Ersovo some 8 miles from the Dacha. The bench seats down the centre looked hard, but there were some standard aircraft seats at the front which she considered but then shunned, in favour of stretching out on the bench once they were airborne. She sighed heavily as she strapped herself in, watching as the loadmasters loaded a black van with Russian plates onto the cargo space at the rear and shut the ramp behind them. Strange to take their own equipment, unlike Section who could utilize local resources, Gray was keen on using their own. A galley was located nearby as was a toilet, but otherwise it was going to be a basic trip. She noticed that Paige was seated nearby Jaime but not next to him and Jordy and Bella had paired up chattering 10 to the dozen. Simon had bagged the bench behind her, and was already deep in thought, checking and rechecking the updated information. She closed her eyes, sleep was slow in coming, the big engines pulled the bird off the ground like a ponderous elephant launching itself off a steep cliff. She deliberately relaxed no point in getting nervous over flying; either it would happen or not as the case would be, and if it didn't well this much metal had an advantage over the small amount of flesh. If anything remained, it would have to be scraped into a container. She shook her head; the work at the Wolfe facility was beginning to affect her viewpoint on life. Instead she allowed her muscles to relax, the constant level of noise disappearing into the background as she tuned it out and eventually slept. 20.35hrs Simon shook her awake, "Sorry for disturbing you, but I would appreciate your help," he apologized profusely but she waved it away, "No worries and anyway it's better to walk around." She looked at what he had been doing, checking on sat updates and images of the area. Nothing appeared to have changed, but then again Paige was the one with the photographic memory, if there was something there, then she should be the one looking at it. She looked over at where Paige and Jaime were sitting their two heads close as they spoke at length; there was a certain tenderness about the way they interacted, but with a hint of sadness about it. She stepped into Paige's view, "Sorry, but Simon has pulled up new sat images and we need you to give them a once over to ensure that nothing has changed." She smiled regretfully, and left Paige to see Simon while she wandered up the plane to the rest-room and galley. Making herself a coffee, and grazing on the sandwiches provided in the fridge, her appetite had returned with a vengeance and she stuffed herself until she could eat no more, swilling it down with swigs of coffee. When she returned, Paige had returned to her seat and Simon was closing the laptop, stowing it under his seat. She took her own seat, and in a few minutes, the affect of the food, and the tiredness had taken her into a dreamless sleep. It was only when the plane stopped that she woke, refreshed and ready to roll. Simon had loaded everything into the van, stowing the equipment and bags under the lockers. She held out her hand for the keys, which he handed over gracefully, and got into the driver's side. It was not purely a generous thought, the reason for taking the driver's position was to avoid sitting with the rest of the team, and the driver's compartment was separated from the back although there was an intercom so she could hear the others talking about their accommodation as they got in the back of the van. Simon took the seat by her side and as soon as the ramp was down, and the loadmasters gave her a green light, she was off, and into the darkness beyond the plane. Only when she had covered a couple of hundred metres, in pitch black, did she switch the side lights on and then Simon was navigating for her so they covered the egress from the airfield without any problems. It took about 25 mins of driving at speeds inappropriate to the road conditions before their destination was in sight. She slowed down then, while Simon directed her to a disused set of buildings in a two horse town or rather village called Ersovo, she drove in and killed the lights before exiting the van and tapping the side to let the others know it was safe to exit the vehicle. She would have killed for a cigarette, but now was not a good time to show a light. So instead she took out some chewing gum, and started to gently soften it between her teeth all the time watching the horizon for any activity. Return |
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