A Grey-Haired Boy

Davai Za

"You're shitting me, right?" Vic asked as he handed Avram a spanner. The pair of young men had gotten to working on the Warhound's engine. As it had turned out, there was such a thing as 'liquid Fire Dust'. Meaning something similar to gasoline, though with a slightly more volatile reaction. What the boys were mostly doing right now was replacing the pistons with stuff that could withstand the explosions.

Victor, meanwhile, had asked his old buddy, whose hand was moving with the crack of the cranking spanner, if he'd seen anything weird in his civilian life. The mountain-born soldier replied, "I'm telling you, man, either a Wendigo probably travelled across the pond to us and I just happened to see it in the middle of the night, or a Habsburg had escaped containment."

Yeah, the man's life had been weird, Vic thought. He told him with a smirk, "Reminds me of some of the dumber stuff I heard from Native Marines when we were training with the US back during DEFENDER '20. Like, they say they saw stuff that near-perfectly matches fuckin' Euro Cryptids, man. We're talking dwarves, Goblins, the whole nine yards. Part of me thinks it was the masks we all had to wear thanks to the Bat Plague."

Avram snorted, then replied calmly, "Man, oh, man, I don't miss those days... At least not the face masks. That stuff was annoying, but, hey, it was breathable."

"We all looked like the Japanese in Tokyo during the bad pollution days," Vic replied as he handed the man a flashlight, "Or Lieutenant Lee on a really bad day," and he let out a short laugh, before sighing and frowning. No words needed to be spoken for Avram to give him a gentle pat on the shoulder and a calm, but approving nod. His friend understood the fact that he missed his other friends dearly.

Avram then told him, "I'm sure if we wound up here, they'll be tagging in, too... Well, no, that'd imply they have to die..." And winced as he saw Vic turn toward him with furrowed brows and sheer confusion. He added a meek, "Yeah, maybe I should shut the hell up from time to time..." as he finished up replacing the last piston with a heavy-duty one they bought on a tab. He hummed, pulled the hood down after installing the top of the engine back and asked, "D'you think this is gon' hurt the engine in the long run?"

"No, this damn thing's a military vehicle engine," Vic snorted as he opened the driver's side door and climbed aboard, "It'll have to get used to the abuse."

"Alright, well, turn it on while I go take cover," Joked his friend. Vic let out a sarcastic laugh, before thumbing the button. The engine sputtered, chunked for a second, then roared to life. Both men laughed and high-fived at that, then Vic shut off the engine and jumped out. Avram said, "That was terrifyingly easy, man. Seriously, just replacing combustion chamber stuff?"

"A little too easy, but let's not look a gift horse in the mouth, aye? If she breaks down on us mid-travel, we can fix her, hopefully," Vic replied, patting him on the shoulder. He turned on his radio and spoke, "Diana, we got the girl modified and tested. Her engine will run on the local gas now," only to listen in after taking his thumb off the 'transmit' button.

"Rog'. Nice work, fellas. Get back here," The woman replied, "We got the map and I've already made the patrol patterns. You'll probably meet Cocean and Alina as you're coming back."

"Copy all, Sarge. We're RTB," The Gunner replied. He motioned to Avram to follow along. The two hefted their gear, slung it onto their backs and started walking over toward their dorm. They indeed saw two of their other comrades, ones armed with AKs, walking over. Standard doctrine for NATO meant that the Romanian Armed Forces had had to upgrade their service rifles before heading into battle. Due to the fact the military was still running trials to select the future main rifle, they went for a stopgap by modifying the existing AKs with stuff like ZENITCO reproduction handguards, dust covers, grips and MAGPUL stocks. The dust covers, latched properly onto place, also had a Trijicon scope on top, while the side rails on the ZENITCO Repro handguards had mounted flashlights and laser sights.