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Past the Barrier, within the 'Swamps'.
( ** is first-person reading, ** is third-person reading.)
** I took point in the tunnels, trailing behind the border guard who agreed to let us through the maintenance tunnels of the barrier. As much as he was at ease, I couldn't stop feeling on edge the moment I stepped foot in these tunnels. As we went deeper, it hit me that this really was past the point of no return. I couldn't afford to stop now. Koval followed right behind me, with Sonechko stuck in the middle, then Melnyk, and finally, Boyko. A couple other border guards trailed behind us, so I made sure to give the silent heads up that everyone should stay on guard. As much as we paid these shmucks, I didn't trust 'em to not lead us in to the sewers, shoot us dead, and strip us of our shit and sell it for some more quick cash. That's how quick the world could be cruel to you, if you're not careful.
** Long straights with some turns, before finally the border guard ahead of us stopped. The lead-guard turns to me and points his flashlight deeper in the tunnel straight, that his light shined on a door. He'd say to me in Ukrainian, "That's your entry. Once everyone of you step through, we lock it up behind you. No coming back out this way. We never met, yes?" And to that, I simply nodded. I was trying to keep it all simple and smooth, this was the last thing we shouldn't fuck up.
** Lucky me, all five of us stepped through the opened door into a longer, cylinder tunnel. The guard was quick to shut the door behind us, and lock it up, tight. 'No backing out, now.' I thought, before continuing to take point with the team following behind. We walked for another ten, fifteen minutes of straight and long, winding turns. Before finally, we reached a opening of the tunnel to the surface. Looking around, it was full of brush, and swamp-qualities. This was the infamous 'Swamps' we would encounter, from what our intel said. But beyond that? We were suppose to look around, or even tread deeper into 'The Zone', and report back our findings. But as I was lost in thought, Koval steps up next to me.
** Koval would take a long glance around, before holding the unfolded map in front of him. But he seems genuinely puzzled, taking glances between the map and their surroundings. "This...this can't be right. There's no way, unless...someone fucked up?". He'd ask himself this out loud.
** Weaver simply steps out from the tunnel entrance, as he'd calmly speak over the radio-earpiece. "Everyone, while Koval is catching our bearings, just come out and do a security perimeter. Find solid cover.", he'd say, before glancing back towards the team's navigator.
** The rest of the team's quick to shuffle out from the tunnel, military training kicked in for everyone as they all find proper spots to hide behind. Wrecked vehicles, and even some chunks of the barrier's wall having fallen down as some debris. It was still useable for cover and concealment.
** Weaver finally back-tracks to Koval, quietly asking, "What's wrong, Koval? Talk to me." as the navigator is looking over the map, only to just quite literally turn the map around a few times..
** Koval takes a few moments to analyze the paper, before lowering his arms with little to no care of the map in his hands. He'd look around, before haphazardly folding up the map and replies to Weaver, "...Either command gave us shitty intel', or we're not at the coordinates where we are suppose to be at. Which isn't possible, because we /were/ at the right location before going in the maintenance tunnel."
** Weaver goes quiet, beneath his gasmask was an expression of complete disbelief. At first, he believed that his navigator could be wrong. Yet thinking back at how he got the team to the village from the drop-off point, then from the village to the barrier without much trouble, he didn't want to yet doubt this merc's capability of navigation. He'd look around, before promptly speaking up as to not try and waste anymore time thinking on it, "We've completed our objective of entering. All we have to do is...walk around, look for any landmarks that could guide us to any vital hotspots. Good try, though, Koval. Probably should...expect this from here on."
** Boyko, Melnyk, Sandman, and Sonechko all look back to the navigator and team leader speaking to each other in quiet volumes. Eventually, Weaver walks away from the navigator and speaks up on the radio, "Koval is having trouble with the map he was given, so we're considering it useless. We're gonna be walking blind, from here on out. Keep your eyes peeled for any landmarks, look for anyone suspicious or of interest, and watch for anything you think is unusual. Could be useful for us, here. Let's get moving."
** After informing the team, I could tell from the hesitant glances that they already didn't feel good about this. Losing the capability of our navigator basically meant we were relying on someone's good karma to get somewhere here. But I felt I had to keep calm and keep taking point. Otherwise no one would want to leave the safety of the barrier, but even then, if other border guards caught us, we'd get sent to prison or worse. So I took point, and we had some decent spacing between us. I led us deeper into the Great Swamps, the ambient sounds of wind passing through the tall grass that occupied both sides of the road.
** The idle sounds of the tall grass being blown by the wind made me paranoid. I constantly found myself looking from time to time, sometimes feeling like I can see a few familiar faces, before shaking my head and finding nothing there. My nerves were a wreck, and I eventually manage to calm myself down after a few minutes of walking along the road. Though sometimes this 'road' led us to some manmade bridge, which each one looked fairly sketchy to walk across the very water that was causing our Geiger-counters to spike in levels. I definitely shouldn't try to swim in this.
** After around ten minutes of walking, the clouds overhead had slowly overtaken the bright blue sky, and they block out the sunlight to make the early afternoon somewhat dimly lit. Something about the dark greyish hue told me that this wasn't good, and almost immediately as that thought came to mind, droplets of rain began to start falling. And within minutes, it sped up to a hard rainfall to happen in the swamps. I quietly click my tongue within my mask, and think to myself, 'Just my luck. God pissing on us as we trek into the unknown.'. Yet I continued pressing on.
** After almost a couple miles of walking, we eventually come across a large L-shaped warehouse with a raised overhead out from of it, a few trucks were out there, yet looking unusable. But the building? I was quick to speak into the radio, knowing it'd be picked up over the rain. "Alright- we're staying in the warehouse and waiting for this rain to pass. Melnyk. Be a lad' and start us a fire, won't ya'?" I ask as I step inside first, using my headlamp to scan around the large room. Within the middle of the first room was shelves lining along the brick walls, in the center was a firepit with firewood inside, though the firepit used only a few days ago. But a couple shelves looked to of been modified into bunks. That was a plus.
** After a quick clearing of the warehouse. I made Sandman, Melnyk, and Koval. take guard positions at the three points of the warehouse. But I mostly wanted to keep them close, so they could still get some warmth by the fire, and I was to figure out what we're suppose to do, with Sonechko and Boyko relaxing with me, by the fire. At this point, we're aimlessly wondering through the unknown. A place not meant to be ventured by your average man. Was I really that desperate to come here? Yes. Am I fool for thinking so? Yes, but I'm willing to stick by my choice, no matter if it's smart or foolish. Not every decision has to be perfect, but I felt that I best be damn ready to defend myself for whoever, or whatever, wants to make me regret it.
The Calm Before the Storm.
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