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Mailing List Logs for ShadowRN

Message no. 1
From: "Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: A Night to Remember
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 00:51:43 +0000
>>>>>[++++relay via tacstation "Wolf Den"

Guess what? I got a portable uplink and two hundred rounds of 7.62mm and
some company in my stocking.

Merry fucking Christmas, Akbar.

+++++begin video
The by-now-familiar symbology of Lynch's headware camera, as he crawls
across the rocky ground from boulder to bush to ditch. Twenty yards to
his left, two men sitting next to a tripod-mounted machine gun are
smoking and arguing about whether it would be more satisfying to ravish
the female soldiers, who'd fight and struggle and resist, or the female
miners, who would sob and beg and plead. One claims to have done both at
Camp Three, and the other is hanging on his descriptions of rape and
pillage as Lynch low-crawls past them.

It takes him nearly an hour to cover three hundred yards, moving
noiselessly on his belly, before he rises and walks with a casual
assurance towards a parked BMP-4. Quietly opening the rear hatch, he
sees two sleeping forms inside: stepping into the cramped interior of
the armoured personnel carrier, he clamps a hand over one's mouth before
driving a knife through the side of the sleeping man's skull. A fast
wrench from side to side, and only a faint shudder marks the sleeper's
death.

Lynch takes the man's rifle and web gear, and retreats, leaving the
other sleeper to discover his comrade's fate when he wakes. As he closes
the hatch, four walking figures pass nearby.

"Hey, is the HQ near here?" he calls in fair Arabic.

"Battalion HQ? You must be joking." One man replies. "You're right on
First's perimeter!"

"Damn!" Lynch says, apologetic. The four men are bright and clear to him
in the starlight, but to them Lynch can only be a shadow. "Got lost
_again_. My sergeant's going to throttle me!"

"Hey, no problem. This night stuff is hard, isn't it? Turn around and
listen for the generator. HQ is the BTR with the tent on the back, next
to the generator. Don't blunder into Second or they'll have you
flogged."

"Yeah, I know what to look for, I just missed the damn thing." Lynch
replies. "Thanks."

He walks past the four men - close enough to touch them - and walks
towards the smear of warmth that marks the centre of the battalion's
position.

A _snap_ - the sound of a grenade fuse firing, or a tripflare arming -
has him falling into a fold in the ground, the rifle seeking a target.

Another _snap_ as a voice protests "Damned cheap Indonesian synthfruit
soda again! Two in a row. Curse Akbar!"

"Blame Supply." a second voice suggests. "Don't blame The Glorious One.
Not if you value your life."

"Supply all work for Akbar. If he cared he'd sort them out and get us
something you could enjoy drinking. Instead we get piss-warm swamp water
with chemical flavourings added." Lynch rises silently, keeps walking
past the two squabbling men in their foxhole, towards the steady thrum
of a diesel generator.

Pausing by it - a big trailer-mounted unit - he pulls a roll of
electrical tape from a pocket, uses a few inches to hold down the safety
arm of a phosphorous grenade. Pulling the pin, he drops it into the fuel
tank of the generator, where in half an hour or so the diesel will
dissolve the adhesive and let the grenade explode.


Lynch moves around with the same patient, agonisingly slow pace, finding
a good position where he can see the headquarters tent stretched out
from the back of a BMP-4 personnel carrier. Vague warm manshapes move
inside it, and a faint buzz of conversation reaches him: Lynch's ears
filtering out the generator and the wind to break out the words. As he
listens to the conversation in the HQ tent, the display in his vision
shows his headware radio gear searching for the local channels and
battling their encryption.

"...the prisoners back to Kermanshah. Hardly any time for fun at all."

"None at all?" A younger voice.

"Officers had them first, rank has its privileges." A chuckle. "No, I
didn't indulge. I'm too old for that now."

"When I'm too old for that they can bury me. Dead or not."

Amused laughter. "There's more to life than sex, Najib. And the young
men wanted their reward, and I knew that The Glorious One would want the
prisoners collected soon, and I take so long these days with even a
willing woman... there was no need. When this camp falls, there'll be
enough for all. The Glorious One has promised."

"As he did at Camp Three? When only the officers had their turn, where
there were less than a dozen women captured?" The younger voice is
almost hostile. "After his promises, I almost had a mutiny."

"The northern camp had escaped and was heading here, there was no time.
If Yashed - Allah rot his dead soul in Hell! - hadn't attacked early,
and if Mazdak hadn't let a broken bridge delay him for half an hour,
we'd have had all three camps surrounded and overrun days ago. Instead
we're bouncing off a prepared defence and taking heavy losses. But when
they fall... trust me. The Glorious One will grant us leisure to amuse
ourselves, as warriors should."

"Midnight. Shadowfox. Stand by." Lynch subvocalises, bringing the AK-97
into his shoulder.

Two microphone clicks, then another pair.

The officers are still discussing the opportunities for amusement with
their soon-to-be POWs, the younger speaking. "Perhaps. I still have my
doubts, there are over two thousand of us and there can't be more than
sixty or seventy-"

The generator explodes in a searingly bright pulse of flame that flings
gouts of blazing fuel for dozens of yards.

Lynch fires a whole magazine from his stolen AK into the headquarters
tent, the tracers ripping through the thin nylon and smashing both men
inside to the ground, bouncing and skipping along the stony ground,
ricocheting off rocks or vehicles. He screams "OPEN FIRE!!!" at the top
of his voice in Arabic into the moment of silence as he changes
magazines.

The entire perimeter of the battalion harbour seems to start shooting in
unison, greenish tracers arcing out randomly into the night as they fire
at shadows and blurs that a tired, frightened man sees as charging enemy
troops.

Lynch drops the AK on its sling and brings up the G3K, sweeps his
augmented vision along the ground. A man with a pistol - an officer? -
is screaming orders at a group of men around a machinegun as they hose
long bursts into the night, and a single shot knocks him flat. Another
throws the machine-gunner sprawling, jerking and screaming in agony, and
the half-dozen soldiers there turn and begin firing into the camp back
towards the shots: only occasional rounds coming near Lynch, but the
return fire already growing.

"Aggression will save you when caution doesn't." Lynch says to himself,
picking out a man standing by a 30mm anti-aircraft gun mount. One shot
splatters his brains across the gun crew, who begin firing their weapon
in widening arcs that sweep across their own troops. "But you have to
know what you're fighting. Sorry, guys." An APC explodes into sullen
flame, the heat overloading Lynch's thermal imagers: but the light lets
the image-intensifiers find targets, and with six shots he kills four
men.

Elsewhere, the firing ebbs and flows: someone (Midnight?) is shouting
orders in perfect Arabic and that company is suddenly firing across at
its neighbour, the two positions trading a heavy fire as ill-trained men
panic in a night suddenly full of death and fire and terror.

"Glory, Glory, this is Scimitar! We are under heavy attack! We have at
least a company of troops attacking us!" comes over his headware radio
as Lynch throws a grenade into a group of terrified soldiers huddling in
a mortar pit.

"Scimitar, this is Glory. How can a company be hitting you? There are no
enemies in your area!"

The grenade explodes amidst screams of agony, and Lynch breaks cover,
zigzagging to a new position.

"Glory, we are under heavy attack! We are- <choke> <gag> <strangling
noise>"

Someone has killed the signaller, the open channel transmitting every
awful moment of the young man drowning in his own blood, blocking any
other communications on that line. Another speaks, further away, calmer.
"Thunder, this is Siege. Fire mission, grid four three nine eight,
seven two one zero, over."

"Shot, out." Lynch crawls under a BTR, as a smoke round lands outside
the perimeter with a gritty thud.

"Splash. Long and left, Thunder. Drop two hundred, right one hundred,
fire for effect. Ladder pattern descending right. Out." Shadowfox, it
seems, has not been idle: he's acquired codewords and callsigns and
frequencies, and has called for fire support.

Seconds later, the first mortar rounds land, inside the camp perimeter:
one every two seconds, walking rapidly across the battalion's most
crowded area.
+++++link coherency lost
+++++retry link? (Y/N) N
+++++signal lost]<<<<<
-- Lynch <00:50:36/11-13-58>

*****INTERNAL: SIGANet
>>>>>[TO: 1Lt L R W Lynch
Uh... losing signal doesn't mean anything. Maybe he needed the channel
for something else.

I mean, okay, that desert's a mean place to be. But he's probably okay.
Isn't he?]<<<<<
-- SSgt J S Karlsbruhn <Sergeant:Peppers:Lonely/Heart-Club-Band>
Strategic Intelligence Gathering Agency

*****INTERNAL: SIGANet
>>>>>[TO: SSgt J S Karlsbruhn
Jason's fine. I'd know if he was hurt.

Pity anyone who gets in his way. Especially with the help he's acquired.

Shadowfox and Midnight and Lynch, oh my.]<<<<<
-- 1Lt L R W Lynch <00:51:46/11-13-58>
I Know She's Worried But She Won't Show It
Strategic Intelligence Gathering Agency
Message no. 2
From: Michael Broadwater <mbroadwa@*******.GLENAYRE.COM>
Subject: Re: A Night to Remember
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 13:33:13 -0600
*****PRIVATE: Lilith
>>>>>[Hmmm...how do I say this without sounding offensive...?

Do you need any help?

I'm already in Europe, and been talking to some people I know over here. I
can do some plane hopping and do a 'chute drop (thank the SAS Para
trainning) to just about any point you want. If you can give me a rough
position on Jason, I can try there too. Of course, if you don't know where
he is, that makes things a little more difficult. Depends on what intel
you have.

Well, the offer's open. I liked Sasha's people, and I'd like to help them
if I could. Jason's like a brother, and you guys are the closest I have to
family. If you want me, I'm here.

Oh, I don't have any special info that you either are or aren't going.
It's just that I'm not stupid. I know that if Jason might be in trouble,
you'll be close behind to help him out.

Contact me.]<<<<<
-- Blade <11:32:56/11-14-58>
Message no. 3
From: "Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Re: A Night to Remember
Date: Sat, 15 Nov 1997 00:44:31 +0000
*****PRIVATE: Blade
+++++relay via tacstation "Eagle's Nest"
>>>>>[How do I put this clearly? Hell, yes, you and Quinn both.

This phase is pure grunt work, battalion-level stuff, and it's all
running to plan. Meaning you'd be sort of wasted and pretty bored.

The next step, we could use you big time. The step after that, we
downright _need_ you, but that's still speculative.

Can you keep a secret, Matt? We may have a lead to the Farmer.

Get to Seattle iin the next few days. We'll need to talk.]<<<<<
-- Lilith <00:43:36/

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about A Night to Remember, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.