A Shadow Company Tale

Re-taking the White House

Almost immediately as the Rangers began to rush out, small arms fire and machine gun emplacements opened fire on the rushing Americans killing many. Arrow stuck with Hunter Two-One as the group rushed to Colonel Marshall to get their orders, who was focused on the situation, "Keep hitting 'em with the Two-Forty Bravos! Get more men moving on the left flank!"

Foley tapped Marshall's shoulder, "Sir, what's the situation here?"

Marshall replied, stretching out his hand in a pointing motion to the left side, "You're lookin' at the 'high ground' Sergeant! There's still power in the White House! That means we still have a way to talk to Central Command if we can retake it! Now get your squad movin' up the left flank! Go!"

Ramirez stood close to Foley as Foley turned and shouted to the squad over the gunfire, "Work your way to the left! Ramirez, let's go!"

The squad pushed with Arrow and Katana staying close together in the rear as the hailstorm of machine gun fire raked every open space possible. A soldier to their left was immediately struck by one of the incoming rounds as were five others around them.

"Medic!"

"I'm hit!"

"We're taking too much fire, keep moving!" More Rangers continued to fall as the machine gun emplacements made extremely quick work of the soldiers in the open. Foley continued to crawl with his squad to the West Wing. He rolled on his shoulder somewhat, "We need to punch through right here! Take out those machine guns!"

Arrow raised his weapon and began to fire upon the crews on the West Wing Roof, "Suppressing! Move move move!"

Katana, Angel, and Ramirez moved up to the crashed MIG on the lawn. 'That's a new edition.' Arrow mused.

He aimed for one of the gun crew's and fired a few rounds in their direction distracting the crews and struck one in the neck. The rest of the Rangers moved up to the MIG, clearing out the Russians at the sandbags.

"Move inside, move inside!" Sandler shouted.

The squad quickly moved inside as Arrow pushed up from his spot into the Oval Office. As the Rangers moved inside, a faint transmission was heard and it drew everyone's attention.

"This is Cujo Five-One to any friendly units in D.C., Hammerdown is in effect. I repeat, Hammerdown is in effect. If you are receiving this transmission, you are in a hardened high-value structure. Deploy green flares on the roof of this structure to indicate that you are still combat effective. We will abort our mission on direct visual contact with this countersign."

Foley immediately stepped back to the door, Arrow and McCord following suit. The trio struggled with opening the door as Foley turned to Dunn, "Dunn, get the door! Dunn!"

Dunn looked to Foley with shock, "Sarge, are you reading this?!"

"That's why we gotta go! Now get the door!"

"Roger that!" He aimed over and shot the trapped hinge and Arrow threw the door to the side.

"Go!" He shouted as he raised his weapon, preparing to clear the Russians who destroyed his unit earlier.

Katana pushed forward, entering one of the Press Brief rooms and engaged several Russian soldiers with Ramirez and Angel supporting her. Arrow moved to support but Snow shouted, "Arrow, left flank with me! I need help!"

Arrow pushed into the room and immediately engaged a small fireteam, downing them in the process. "Bound with me!"

"Bounding!" Snow pushed up to a pillar as Arrow continued to fire on troops that appeared.

The pair met in the middle as Arrow leaned outside a doorway and fired upon a few bounding troops.

Everyone heard the radio transmission echo throughout the building, "Two minutes to weapons release."

Foley shouted as he slapped Arrow's shoulder for him to push up. "We got less than two minutes before they flatten the city! We gotta get to the roof and stop 'em! We got less than two minutes, let's go!"

'Repeating yourself there much buddy?' Arrow rolled his eyes as he led the team forward into the destroyed kitchen.

"Ninety seconds to weapons release."

The importance to continue pushing was silenced as the remaining Rangers threw everything they had at the last remaining Russians. Arrow continued to shoot until he heard the dull click; he ran out of ammo. He leapt out at a Russian that was very close to him and threw him to the ground, choking him out as the other Rangers and Task Force operatives engaged in heavy hand to hand.

"Thirty seconds to weapons release."

"Clear up! Let's go!" McCord shouted as he waved for the survivors forward.

"Thirty seconds, we gotta get to the roof now! Go! Go! Get to the roof! Move!" He slapped Ramirez and Katana who both sprinted up the stairs.

"Standby. Target package Whiskey Hotel Zero-One has been authorized."

"Roger. Standby."

Ramirez and Katana both reached into their packs and pulled out the green flares popping them immediately, the countersign was finally public.

"Countersign detected at Whiskey Hotel! Abort, abort!"

"We got a countersign, abort mission!"

"Aborting weapons release. Rolling out." Two F-15s flew at least a hundred feet over the ruined White House as the rest of the squad made it up the stairs. Ramirez dropped his flares and fell to his knees as Katana dropped her and immediately buried her face in Arrow's vest.

"It's over. It's all fucking over." Ramirez exhaled as the rest of the squad looked out to the destroyed city, seeing many similar sights; green smoke emanating from the roofs of other hardened structures throughout the city.

Dunn took off his helmet and looked at the view as Sandler sat down on a pile of rubble. McCord stretched out as he continued to eye the entire city. Foley looked to the sky and exhaled as Ramirez began to weep. Angel stood behind him and pulled him in against her thigh to say it was alright. Snow just shook her head, "We won. We won DC."

McCord rolled his head to the squad, "So, when are we goin' to Moscow?"

Dunn looked over to McCord with a serious look in his eyes. "Not soon enough man. But I know we're gonna burn it down when we get there."

"Hooah." Sandler looked up to the group and nodded.

Arrow looked up as the rain continued to pour down, he pulled Katana in for a deeper hug. Their hell was over, or so they thought.