The Show Begins

"Norton"

The Supreme Commander was behind his glass table and the sliding door to the room opened up. Entering into the office was the Assistant Supreme Commander: Norton.

"Supreme" Norton hailed respectfully. He made his way towards the seat directly opposite the supreme commander's and on reaching it, plopped down on it.

"Same news reached my ears." the Supreme Commander shutting down the holographic interface he was on. Consecutively, the

"Yeah" Norton nodded. "Shields and Lords are present. They arrived yesterday and it seemed they won't be staying long... That was until they made their intentions known for a complete Official Discussion. That'll be in a fortnight."

"In a fortnight huh"

"Exactly" Norton confirmed. "But again, I wouldn't put my hopes on that... that two weeks time. Let's leave it three weeks. If the discussion comes before, that's fine. If it doesn't, let's say we weren't expecting." Norton chuckled.

The Supreme Commander adjusted himself on his seat and made to stand up, but didn't.

"So will I" he said.

"Pardon""Pardon my use of English.." the Supreme Commander apologized. "But, in two weeks time, I'll be going back to the main province." he explained.

"Same two weeks" Norton observed.

"That seems to be the norm around here."

The assistant Supreme Commander; Norton noticed something amiss about the behavior of the Supreme Commander. He made to observe for any detail, but finding nothing, he choose to communicate with words instead.

"Were you doing something before I came in?" he asked.

"I thought you'll never ask." the Supreme Commander sighed.

"As a matter of fact, before you arrived, I was monitoring an attack mission headed by some top grade scouts..."

"Another attack mission?"

"Yes." The Supreme Commander confirmed. "Lately, I've been getting reports, and it was about the rebels operations. I don't need to, but for necessity, it was not some middle tier operation or something of the sort. No. It was top military operations of the rebels forces. We had our investigations, and solidified our approach with the 'aid' of rebel operatives. The operations were traced, and triangulated, giving the military an idea as to their sphere. Upon further investigations, it was revealed that there was a top military base right under our nose." The Supreme Commander massaged his head furiously with his fingers. One one hand, it was a sign of tiredness. And on the other, it was a sign of feigned shock.

"Right under our nose" Norton repeated.

"Figuratively.." the Supreme Commander continued, "It was not 'right under our nose', but very close. Somewhere around minor citadels of Academy A."

"Right here!" The Assistant Supreme Commander was visibly alarmed as he said those words. The reason for that was, Academy A, among all other sectors of the Academy, was almost godlike in respect to them. In terms of population, it was more. In terms of resources and technology, it was well advanced. This also included manpower. And as such, if there was a threat brewing in Academy A , it could be a potential threat to the rest of the Academy. But seeing the almost next to no paranormal expression of the Supreme Commander's face, Norton could only assume it was under control.

"These things should be handled with serious care and not levity." The Assistant Supreme Commander Norton muttered under his breath.

And as for the rebel operatives involved, they were good. The second reason for Norton being alarmed was that: for a potential threat in the form of a top rebel base to thrive in Academy A, that made Norton think he was becoming too lax in his duties. The Supreme Commander may not think the same, but the 'Sir' of the Main province would think that. Also, it crossed Norton's notice that perhaps, he was not the only guilty one. The Supreme Commander, and all other executives were becoming lax. Norton couldn't help but think that maybe serious threats like Unthor and death would wake them up. Or maybe only Unthor.

The Supreme Commander continued his talk distracting Norton from his thoughts. "Since it would house no more than two hundred and fifty to three hundred military personnel besides residing civilians, we've been able to dissect the parameters in segregates making it easy for us to conquer." The Supreme Commander pricked his nose with his index finger and flicked it as if to buttress phis point of conquering.

"And as the saying goes, divide and conquer, I've already commissioned the mission to a hundred scouts. One of the finest. Five teams to each sector, Communications, Power unit, Control Centre, Facilities, and Military camp."

Norton made a gesture to interrupt, but since the Supreme Commander seemed quite engrossed to notice his gesture, he decided to anyway.

"Sorry to interrupt you Supreme, but with all due respect, if the rebel base is truly as 'top' as you proclaim if to be, wouldn't it be foolish of you to send scouts? Agreed. The scouts are good, no dispute. But commissioning this to the SHIELDS would make the work more efficient and quickly perfected. And I mean, a team of ten would be great."

The Supreme Commander looked up with a contorted face and proceeded to explain. "Yes. It would be quite foolish of me to send only scouts." He curved both his thumb and index finger separating them by a small margin to depict the word 'quite'. "But, where's the fun in that, where's the fun? Also, members of SHIELDS tend to be too hot headed at times. They'll probably let the world know their there, drawing all aggression to themselves before they begin any meaningful work. And since we can't tell the type of machinery the enemy wields, it'll be better for us to divide them than for them to conquer."

"Enough chit chat! Let's get to the action. The scouts await my order."

The Supreme Commander turned his head back to the table, and at the swipe of his hand, a holographic plate flat on the table in front of him opened up and a tablet suspended by a metallic arm was constructed. The same was done on the other side of the table. The holographic plate displayed five scenes, all divided across the plate. The scenes on the other hand, were not holographically displayed, but had a standard display resolution.

The Assistant Supreme Commander sat back watching the scenes unfold.

-----

The cool breeze made it's course across the swamp causing mild rustling of leaves and slight ripple effects across the coniferous swamp.

Up, far above the swamp, the flow of the wind was slightly altered and the sound followed a stranger pattern than the are closer to the ground. The cause of this was whirring noise sounding very low caused by the presence of a large air ship looking like a space craft, hovering calmly and silently in the air. The ship was almost disc like in shape, but it had semblance to a curved horse shoe. There was another disc shaped component in the centre which looked more complex than the outermost one. In the ship were Academic scouts running up to thirty in their numbers.

"Can't you go any lower. Two hundred metres isn't really a nice height to play with." A soldier in camouflage mentioned.

He was obviously talking to someone who was not on the same compartment of the ship as he was. After a while, the soldier clapped his hands and began shouting. "Come on people! Time for action. Come on! Come on!"

He clapped his hands repeatedly arousing the attention of the others in the room who began preparing themselves.

"Cap 1 says sensors down there would detect the presence of the ship. I'm guessing he has a way out." Another soldier mentioned to the hearing of others.

The one known as Cap 1 stepped to the front of the group seated and began speaking. "Seems security is a bit tight...a bit tight." he smacked his lips repeatedly. "But, baldy and his team boasts of disabling sensors for a while. It won't be enough for the ship to get through, but....you know the drill. We leave in three."

With that, Cap 1 moved away from the group and continued to make his own preparations. The twenty participating in the event moved around the curved space, entering into cubicles and other rooms, equipping themselves with equipments necessary for the successful accomplishment of the mission.

_THREE MINUTES LATER_

Cap 1 was making his way to the the group of twenty who had gathered in a semicircle. Walking to the middle, he addressed them.

"You're all ready I suppose. You've got a bag pack. I don't need to tell you much, but that's your gliding instrument, jetpack, and the last segmented part is the utility pouch. I believe your Aca suits are fully padded within your camouflage. With that okay, I'll say we're ready to move. Remember, the, mission is supposed to be our priority, but our priority is to get out alive. Hence, know, what is worth shooting is worth shooting well. Never leave your partner and don't abandon the mission. Balance all that."

"These are your finest scouts, whose priority isn't the mission?" Norton addressed the Supreme Commander disdainfully.

"Not really" That was all the Supreme Commander could give as a response.

Soon, the floor of the room opened up in a spiral pattern allowing for a gust of air to sweep across the scouts faces.

"Ready?" Cap asked.

Without waiting for a reply, he jumped down. The others followed suit in same manner as Cap had done.

"Disabling sensors in 3..2..1..

The motion semsors had been disabled for some seconds but restored almost immediately. However, that was enough to get the scouts through. With a serious look on their faces, all twenty scouts disposed off their gliding instruments and jetpacks leaving only deadly ammunition strapped to their body.

It seemed like the group knew their positions before hand and quickly spread out across the swamp.

The Supreme Commander began to coordinate as the group on the mission field.

"Alpha"

"In position"

"Beta"

"Set"

"Gamma"

"Good to go"

"Meta"

"Fire down"

"Cap take over!" The Supreme Commander stated.

Meanwhile, at other sectors were several air ships meters up in the air which appeared inactive. They all had same design: a large bulkhead, with arm like protrusions. The ship itself extended backwards having strange platforms.

"All in place."

"I'm counting on you team 1. The failure of one is the failure of all. And once all fails, the mission fails.

"Got it."

"Sit back, and let the show begin!"

____

Next chapter- Team 1