The battlefields are genderless. Two beauties in disguise are currently deployed near Sempadan, within the bounds of The Republic. They are overlooking a weapon facility that was built by Milium in the Grey Zone.
Grey Zone supposed to be a no man's land created by both side of the conflict as a buffer between countries. Nothing should own or built anything on it, as per agreement. Lately Milium started to not care about the terms. A message was sent and it's clear one must suffocate the hornets' nest to tame it.
These beauties has lied here since a week ago. Rationing their food and water, waiting for commands from remote.
"Parma, when was the last time remote gave us an ETA?" Aya asked her friend who is in the watching duty.
"Twelve hours ago. Before you asked, no we can't contact them. We are going dry, that's the requirement."
"This is boring as hell Parma, I've spent all of my life's question on you. At least talk back to me, give me a topic Parma!"
The one on the binos is Parma. She is practicing what's called concealment. Dark green clothes, pattern that breaks straight lines, extra features like common vegetation that she sticks to her own clothes, and staying still for days on end. Just peering into the lives of other people, stalking, thinking, and waiting.
Aya on the other hand is doing what's called taking cover. She is not concealing herself at all, because she can't be seen by anyone. The dense formation of vegetation made it easy to search for fallen trees that can be used as cover. Meanwhile the facility are located on an open plain, which have lower elevation than their position.
Aya washes her eyes with clean water she distilled from yesterday's rain. Her clothes are muddy, pants forming cracks from the dried clay of the forest floor. Everything feels damp and uncomfortable. She had slept the night over, soon it's her turn to watch. This is far from her most ideal place to be in.
"God I am not paid enough for this shit."
"Stop being selfish, Aya. No one is ever paid enough for anything." Parma saw nothing interesting in her binos, she must admit that it has been a slow few days.
"What about actors? Engineers? Those guys on Trade Street?"
"They are exceptions, not the rule."
Aya rested her back on a dead log behind her. She doesn't need to worry about small animals and insect, the animal repellant she brought with her helped tremendously.
"I'd rather be in Roze than here."
"Upcoming next, water is wet." Replied Parma in a condescending tone.
"But you wouldn't be there for pleasure though, I bet. It's all work for you, anywhere and anytime. They can give you a freebie with one of the hot guys and you'd rather be a chauffeur instead."
"That's not true."
"Yeah, you'll still work. As an entertainer that is. Hehehe." Aya lightly slap Parma's butt in jest, which are located near her left hand.
"Stop touching the merchandise ma'am. I want it clean and perfect, after he found me that is."
"Oh you and your billion Koens assets. The last time someone exist, you don't have it in you to give him a slack. You should never expect anyone to find you."
It's true, love can bloom even on the battlefield. As these living machines of destruction goes back to their respective homes and hometowns, a desire to leave a legacy starts to grow. Mortality highlights the importance of not being forgotten, hence it blooms. Gardens of pink flowers starts to grow, parallel to the arrival of these peons of war.
Contrary to popular belief, women are no less desperate than any unwedded men. Parma is no different. Following her instinct, she went to blind dates. Aided by the help of randomly selected partners through a black-box algorithm that's spread around the uninet, she found several matches there. She only went to a single date.
His name was Dan. He was a semi-retired mana engineer, specializing in micro-technology and fuel efficiency. It happened on a saturday night, at the balcony of a luxurious restaurant, Alexandria. They sat right on the edge of the balcony, the sky was clear, and romances were so thick you can scoop it from the air. It was a perfect.
But Parma fumbled and spilled too much spaghetti unto the floor, figuratively speaking. None of their conversation ended well. Both acted nervous around each other and things turn to worse. By the time the main course came, Parma was disgusted by how weird he looked when eating. She noticed that he can't even hold the fork right, it was a dealbreaker for her. What a horrible and socially awkward night, she thought.
"These are not free, and he is below standards." Parma replied her jab with another of her own. Everything comes with a price, especially thing that no one else own but you.
"Oh bull-"
"Shut up."
"Fuck do you mean shut up, I was jus-"
"Target is out of the building. Check the radio, Aya."
Aya scrambles to find the radio, she found it in the left breast of her pocket. She turn the knob slowly until a certain static sound is produced. Parma is doing her best to follow the target. He is far away, a dot in a middle of an otherwise boring pavement. According to the brief they got at the start of the mission, they are searching for a certain man. Middle aged, grey hair, scar on his left cheek, often with bodyguards, and are always wearing luxurious gadgets.
"Parma, is he wearing a lux item right now?" Aya ask in curiosity.
Parma pauses and read back what she sees as accurately as she can. "Aquamarine X-500, the half centuries anniversary one. How much is that again?"
"Aquamarine? Shit, he is a big guy. You gotta account imports from our side to theirs. After that, you need to add the high valued item border inspection. Don't forget the bribes and a contact from our side. Probably around five mill Koens, give or take."
Someone so important should not be here, never near the border. Inspections are rarely done physically, often disposable workers are used instead. Parma is following his steps up to a tactical loon. It's small, nimble, and can accelerate up to mach 1 in less than ten seconds. Perfect for carrying a VIP in any situation.
The radio jumps up in amplitude, a clear voice replaces the boring static. It's a guy, raspy and tired. His breath sounds uncontrollable, messy, and uncomfortable. There's a lot of pain in his voice as he speak.
"All hands, this is ring speaking. Twenty on my position, stat."
Someone on the other end of the frequency replied quickly. They are expecting for his calls. "Ring acknowledge, CP confirmed. We have your position. Twenty need code, reply?"
"Code black, ASAP."
"Say again?"
"Code black, ASAP. Repeat until activation. Code black, ASAP. Repeat until activation." He said it thrice, just to make sure Command Post received his message correctly.
Aya's heart sank as soon as "Code Black" is being uttered. It means utter desperation and lost hope. No one in this world can say it twice within their career, because death must be imminent for him. Although, she does not yet know what code twenty means.
"Code black? Do you have his point Aya?"
"Yeah, he is located in the basement of the facility. But he's code black Parma, nothing we can do about it."
"Our mission is to make sure this factory blows up right?" Parma is churning her brain for ideas. A plan to rescue "Ring" from the depth of Milium's facility. He must have been successful in planting the bomb, but don't have time or energy to escape.
"Don't do it Parma, please. It's impossible to get out of the facility, not without backups. The place will blow up soon, we won't have time to enter or escape..."
"Yet we can't stand still. There must be a clear way out. Kill the alarms, make sure he has a getaway vic. I won't watch him die without doing anything."
Despite her own sets of morals, Aya do not see a way to save Ring. Her reply is soft, resigned. "All we can do is pray, Parma."
Parma got up from her prone position. She walks through paces of mud and bushes, then proceeded to sit on the motorbike they used to get here. An old beast, non-hybrid, fully mana powered. She keys-in the ignition and starts the bike. It speaks a gentle roar from her engine, it had gone through a lot of beating.
"Get on the bike, and let's do something."
"This is stupid Parma, we could die in the process." There are no instructions yet coming from remote. What they are about to do can be considered as mutiny, if not done right. Lives will be lost if they go in without planning or reason.
Parma scoffs at Aya's apparent cowardice and turn the throttle, breaking the silence they have guarded for days. "Occupational hazard. I will leave with or without you."
Aya stands and brushes her body off muds. She took a deep breath and smells the damp hell of a situation that they are in. It will take them at least one minute to reach the gates, more after the guards start sounding the alarm. They need to be fast, agile, and aggressive.
First they must kill both guards that are taking patrol nearby. Next, any active duty had to be eliminated or passed through by moving as fast as possible.
Once inside, they must gain a security code to access the lower level. Naturally, there will be resistance from the guards and defense systems. If they survived all of this and get to the deepest part of the facility, only then they will get access to whatever left of "Ring".
Those are what real "tall orders" look like. They have a motorbike, two standard issue rifles, ten magazines of ammo between both of them, near to no protective gears, and a lot of courage. A legend was in the making, but the process is arduous, to say the least.
Aya is dead. Her bits of flesh and bones were scattered far from the blast zone. The operation was marked as a success, albeit with casualties from both Milium and The Republic. Journalists flock the area soon after, calling it an aggression against the status quo or a necessary campaign against evil. Both things were true, but it only made the headline for a week, replaced by a celebrity getting caught cheating on his vacation in Roze.
The term "code twenty" was released to the public, coined by a government spoke person in an open interview. It means "to activate a remote explosion device", commonly used when the operator doesn't have access to it. The situation was cleared and cleaned before it reaches the public, with Ring being renamed to Alpha, a way to immortalized the deceased. His sacrifice had affected morale positively across all strata of society. George Roffamaltine, a writer well known for his work on fictional war between "houses" of kings and queens, decided to work closely with the government. He wanted to create a novel adaptation from this anonymous heroic story. His fans doesn't take it kindly, wishing him to finish his abandoned series of books instead. He moved on from the uninet debacle, and made an adaptation anyway.
There was no mention of Aya's death anywhere. Privately, it's clear that there are neglects from the agent which have caused this death. It's only mentioned at a debriefing, a day after the explosion.
After losing her only friend, Parma decided to distract herself. Getting drunk, punching random passersby, and often face planting the sidewalk. This went for days without rest or sleep.
Her workplace have been trying to contact her after the incident, but her phone is inactive since her arrival from the mission. She is taking a rest occasionally, in-between her public shenanigans, at a speakeasy. Untitled, but served by the one and only, Jackson The Bartender.
He watches over her, making sure she is not hurting herself, nor his other patrons. Although Jackson did serve her several alcoholic drinks, he often water down her drinks, grinds up some vitamins and supplements and spike them with it. She is getting weaker and more skinny as time went on. Without proper care, her time might be numbered not in years, but days.
As it turns out, today might be it. She is being bothered right now by another friend of Jackson. He touched her shoulder, a bottle broke, shards of sharp glass misses Jackson's friend face by a hair. Her hand extends forward, swinging it in frenzy, yet in strange accuracy. She's closing in, her eyes are blood-red, wearing an unkempt hair, revealed after her motion moves the hood out to her back. You know the rest.
Strangely the bell rang twice as she runs out of the bar. A strange fellow starts to follow her. A man with a distinctive mullet, broad shoulder, and mean looking face. Jackson noticed an aura of authority around this fellow, but paid it no mind. He just hoped this strange lady is safe, where ever she went to.
There is a dimly lit park, ten minute walk away from Jackson's Speakeasy. After miraculously avoiding ten cars which nearly crashes into Parma, she finally ran out of juice, slumped on a bench, hitting her head against the edge, and fall down to the wet grassy-muddy-floor. Even after having her face scored with dirt, it is clear as day that she's crying and having a mental breakdown.
"I kyyleed... her..."
She's blaming herself, that's clear. But whether or not it's her fault, is none but she can confirm. A large figure slowly appears from the shadows. He is wearing a dark overcoat, made out of synthetic leather that's resistant to the elements, and threaded by a felt like material. Everything else is made from the same material, except his square glasses, contained in a silver colored plastic frame.
"You need to get a vacation, Parma."
"Nooouhhh... Aiiii... I can NOT!"
"I knew this would happened. I'm sorry to do this child, but you need to bathe and be healthy before you're ready to talk. We haven't gotten any details from you about Aya. Beside her death, that is."
"I... I KYYYYLLLED HEEEEER! Look, my hands! Dirty and bloody!"
From her prone position, she raises both of her hands. It's dirty from the floor, but there's no blood on it. Her imagination have consumed the mind of once great agent. Seeing Parma on the floor, crying like a lost child, damages the image she had before. That's as long as this strange fellow can shut up about it.
"They are dirty, just like you are. So you're gonna bath."
"NO!"
"Please, Parma. Let me help you."
"Fuck you!"
"Alright, I gave you a chance. Pick her up boys."