"I must say I have to thank you Phoenix, for showing me that I must be more selective in handpicking men for my unit, and for demonstrating what the gunship could do in the hands of a human." Vulture chuckled as he was holding his right forehead again and covering his destroyed right eye.
"They are collateral damages. Is that what you want to say, Vulture?" I scoffed and squinted my right eye.
"Oh, please. I know that you are NOT naive, Phoenix." He swung his left arm with the scythe spear in his hand once.
"Unlike that Italian American Navy Lieutenant buddy of yours."
"Then, I suppose the general officers of your force also look at you in a similar way; a guaranteed tool to deliver them what they wanted." I lifted my head a bit, trying to challenge his own meaning behind his words.
He suddenly fell silent, with his left eye immediately stared right to my right eye with such anger I had never seen previously.
I must have just said the very sentence that triggered him the most.
Almost immediately after that though, he switched to another topic.
"Do you know that technically this whole operation consisted of more people who wanted the aliens' technology far more than those who actually just wanted to eliminate the terror?"
That time, I was the one who fell silent, as I had already predicted from the start that so many things seemed so odd, but I just decided to keep quite about it and let things played out.
"Ha, I knew it. So, you are basically the only non-naive person stuck amongst the naive ones." He laughed while pointing the scythe spear to my direction.
"Fine, let me fill you in, Phoenix."
Vulture began by revealing that out of five units sent to investigate the current abnormal phenomenon, three units had been wanting to take the extraterrestrial technology for their own military powers; Crimson Vulture, Dark Bison, and Polar Bear units.
The only two units that did not participate and had not known about the plan were Gray Phoenix and Bronze Falcon units.
So, that made it twenty-four against ten; almost two and a half times larger in terms of number. However, aside from Bronze Falcon unit, the rest of the other units including mine had at least one personnel on the opposite side from their leaders.
That would mean if the leader had planned on taking away the extraterrestrial technology for their military power instead of just destroying it, then that one person either did not know about it or did not agree with their leader.
Either way, they would be killed once the leader knew the exact personnel and/or once they found out about the plan. In my case, it was Park Bum Dong, my own vice commander who had died because he had been impaled by a temporarily mind-controlled narwhal.
The Crimson Vulture unit had the task to eliminate my unit; the Gray Phoenix, while the Dark Bison unit was tasked to eliminate Bronze Falcon unit. The Polar Bear unit, led by Colonel Dmitriy Pavlov had been tasked to give total communication disruption to the whole archipelago since his unit had the most personnel and that there was more than one communication tower around the air base that needed to be disturbed.
"And where are those two units?" I tried to not get triggered if Vulture's answer would put me in a disadvantage.
"Dark Bison and Polar Bear? Heh, who cares?" He chuckled and widened his left arm.
"Chances are, once one of us got the technology the other two would most likely come and try to peck the alien tech away from us anyway. So, it is actually a good thing if somehow they got lost and died and buried by the snow of this ground blizzard."
"Will not that be kind of sad, though? Even though you three were allies to begin with, and once one of you are one step ahead, the other two would kill just to drag you away from the tech?" I scoffed and shook my head.
"Just, you said?" He turned his head a little and leaned forward a little, gesturing that he mocked me back by pretending he could not believe his ears, before he continued with another revelation.
"I suppose someone from a country who has experienced extraterrestrial terror before would never understand what it felt like to not have one, yet nevertheless must keep up with the race of the outer space defence."
By mid of March 2033, the whole world had been officially declared free of extraterrestrial invasion completely. For the first time ever, the whole world joint hands in order to create a solution to combat another possible invasion in years to come.
But a couple countries had been kicked out due to their controversial agenda to exploit the alien technology which had been revealed unintentionally during the classified last meeting. Those countries were North Korean, and Poland.
It resulted in those two countries left all by themselves to figure out how to battle any extraterrestrial invasion should it happen some time in the future. That, and they could not expect any assistance from any other country.
With the two of them left alone by the rest of the other countries, and that nuclear weaponries and their controls proved to be powerless against the aliens since they could simply cut the electricity power and made it completely useless, they had to resort to one last option; to steal a similar technology from another country.
That technology was a Direct Energy Weapon….
The obvious countries would obviously the ones who had experienced the invasion in the first place, but naturally those countries would also be the ones with the best defence and therefore made it impossible to steal from. So, they had to wait for the perfect moment for their plans.
The formation of E.X.T.I.R.T was unlike what it had been during the important and classified meeting for a united outer space defence, the organization encouraged all countries to participate in countering any extraterrestrial terrors happening in various places around the globe.
It was during that time, that Vulture and Park Bum Dong had been successfully selected as the representatives from North Korea.
Although, they also keep within themselves the true agenda of North Korea military force in taking the alien technology for themselves, exploiting it for their own outer space defence, and if possible, to penetrate through their neighboring countries' air defence.
He had not known the true agenda of the Poland military force yet on why they would ally themselves with North Korea, but it might had something to do with conquering the entire Baltic Sea, especially since they suddenly agreed to accept the North Korea's offer in joining hands once they heard the news of the E.X.T.I.R.T's success in capturing several extraterrestrial hover boats.
"You people will never change, do you…." I sighed hard as I shook my head again, despising what could be described as the representation of the minds of power-hungry military officers from multiple countries.
"Why should we, Phoenix? It is our nature to eventually outdone the less cunning ones." He said while giving me a proud half smile.
"I know that you are not naive, Phoenix. But despite getting the hints of our hidden agendas and activities, although very subtle ones, you DECIDED to stick with the plain and dumb people. That is why, I CHOSE to not call you by your name anymore, because you rejected your true nature as a human!"
Right… he must have eavesdropped to the conversation between me and the alien voyager commander.
He must have known by now that I am a descendant of a human born from an enhanced genetic black science project.
"What? The thing about your grandfather? Yes, I heard it clearly from the start." He nodded, as if he could guess accurately on what I had been thinking.
"But, you should also know this; my grandfather fought in the Korean War when he was only fifteen back in 1953."
"What?!" I could not believe my ears.
"Him, then my uncle in Angolan Civil War in 1990, and finally me. It is thanks to him that I became so proficient in using the Type 63 assault rifle."
So, I am not the only one here whose descendant have tasted the battlefield….
Even worse; he is the third generation without any gaps in battlefield experiences!
"Descendants guarantee nothing to one's capability in combat, Vulture." I gritted my teeth and squinted my eyes again.
"True. And that is why I am being fair." He smiled widely, must be thinking that he thought I had come inside right into his invitation for a bloody skirmish.
He told me that it was exactly the right moment to test which one of us deserved to carry on our missions; me or him, by first duelling to the death with our obtained extraterrestrial weapons.
If it turned out that I was the victor, then that would mean the end of the plan of both the North Korean and Polish military force. Although he mentioned that I must expect total retaliation from both Dark Bison and Polar Bear units if they were still alive.
If he was the victor however, then that would mean the change for the whole world, as they would first try to invade their neighboring countries.
So, it was either leaving behind two countries in order to advance the rest of the others, or to have two countries dominate the others that had left them behind….
And it was entirely up to me and Vulture… alone….
I guess I have no other choice!
Tightening my grip once again on my beam trident halberd, I held the upper part of the handle with my right hand and lower part with my left hand, taking my defending stand against any possible attack that he might deliver in a blink of an eye.
Taking a deep breath twice before releasing it slowly and I was ready….
"You ready, Phoenix?!" Vulture also tightened his grip, litting the scythe spear even aggressively than before and bending his body a little
"Bring it on, Vulture!" I stood firm, very steadily.
"Good, now HERE I GO!!!"