[FIC] From Dusk till Dawn

[Reaper DXR-7]

Full Metal Panic: From Dusk till Dawn

Chapter 1: Training Day, What kind of...??

(Disclaimer: I own nothing involving FMP, except the merchandise that I bought.)

February 3, 1840 Hours
Mithril’s Pacific Base, Melida Island

A dense jungle, tranquil ocean, crashing waves, and a calm breeze is just what a certain overworked Sergeant needed. It had been quite awhile since Sousuke had been able to enjoy a peaceful day such as this one. His life had become quite hectic ever since he had been assigned to Kaname almost a year ago. Today was different though, a nice, relaxing day of fishing.

Sousuke had been called back to the Mithril’s pacific base for a mandatory week of training, by order of Lieutenant Clouzot. The enigmatic Soldier had also received permission to bring Kaname to Melida Island, after the training session had been completed. Today was Sousuke’s third day back, and Clouzot had given them the day off seeing as the team was thoroughly worked just the other day. The look in Urzu 1’s eyes also said that the SRT personnel were in store for hell in the next couple of days.

The seventeen-year-old soldier of Mithril slid his hand through his hair as he gazed at the turquoise water surrounding him. Schools of fish scurried across the clear water as small Cobias circled the bait at the end of Sagara’s fishing line. A light tug had signaled Sousuke that one of the fishes decided to take the bait, which spelled its demise. Quickly flicking his wrist, Sousuke pulled a small Cobia right out of the water and onto the rock he sat on. Looking at his watch the young Sergeant noted that it was time to leave, it was getting late and he needed all the rest he could get before the training exercises tomorrow morning.

After packing up all his gear and placing the fish he had caught back in the water, Sousuke made his way back to the underground base on Melida Island. Once inside he made his way towards his room to drop off his things and then go to the mess hall for dinner and surely a light conversation with Mao and Kurz before turning in for the night.

While on his way towards the mess hall Sousuke began to think of his new enemies, and his last encounter with Gauron. It had been quite awhile since Sousuke had crossed paths with the terrorist organization known as Amalgam. The incident in Hong Kong was long over with and so was Sousuke’s vendetta with Gauron. Sousuke had personally ended that man’s life with his own hands. Mithril had also learned of Amalgam that day and also learned of the machinery that Amalgam possessed. Sousuke had fought with five Venoms, the execution squad sent by Amalgam to silence Gauron and his flunkies. He had fought and won utilizing the Lambda driver. He had also come to the realization that he cared about Kaname, so much that hearing the rumor that she was dead had sent him in to a downward spiral towards nothingness. Only seeing her alive allowed him to continue to fight on, saving countless lives in the process.

That’s all in the past now, thought the young soldier as he walked towards the mess hall. Along the way he stopped by the Arm Slave maintenance hangar, noticing that there was some work being done on the Arbalest. Captain Tesstarosa was overseeing the work being done on the machine, accompanied by two people that Sousuke had never seen before.

Both of Tessa’s acquaintances were men, both wore long black coats. One man was quite tall, with blonde hair, a few scars, and from his outline he was very well built. The other man who was talking with Captain Tesstarosa at the time was of average height and build, didn’t look like an AS pilot, he had black hair and wore sunglasses. Just when Sousuke was about to leave Captain Tesstarosa noticed his presence and called him over. “Sergeant Sagara, I’m glad that you’re here. I would like you to meet some people.”

Sousuke moved towards the Arbalest as Tessa’s two companions observed Sagara’s movements. As he moved closer a young girl popped out from inside the Arbalest, her eyes focusing on Sergeant Sagara. He’s cute, thought the girl. Tessa noticed the engineer, also noticing that the young girl was focusing intensely on Sousuke, and smiled. “Madam Captain,” Tessa quickly snapped back to reality when Sousuke spoke.

She smiled, “Sergeant Sagara.” Turning to her companions Tessa presented them to Sousuke. “Meet Lieutenant Commander Bienson,” Tessa said, pointing to the man with sun glasses, “and the other one is Lieutenant Major Piuz,” she said, point at the larger man. “He will be the SRT Arm Slave instructor by request of Lieutenant Clouzot.”

The large man approached Sagara with a smile. “So, you’re the infamous Sergeant Sagara that has had Mithril all up in arms. In any case, I’ve heard you’re the best Arm Slave pilot this organization has to offer, well, next to Clouzot,” Piuz paused while looking straight up at the ARX. “I’ll be expecting good things from you and Ben, we need to whip you pilot’s into shape if Mithril is going to be dealing with more of those Venoms type units.” Focusing on the young soldier Piuz extended his hand towards Sousuke, grasping his hand in a firm handshake. “Okay then, Miss Tesstarosa still needs to finish the rest of the tour up, so I’ll be seeing you Sergeant.”

“Yes sir,” replied Sousuke. That’s when Sousuke left the room and moved towards the Mess Hall, content with joining Mao at dinner, he needed to discuss something with her that only she or Kalinin would be able to answer.

Recently, a wave of mercenaries and military personnel joined Mithril. The Melida island base was cluttered with new recruits, a handful of them were being trained for piloting the M9s. Most of the others were training for positions aboard the Dadanaan, the high command was even thinking of replacing Tessa with a more experienced submarine Captain. That idea was long since deemed unnecessary seeing as no one could handle the task of commanding the Tuatha Dadanaan quite as well a Tessa could.

The mess hall was filled to the brink with recruits, experienced personnel, military personnel, and others that had just joined Mithril. Over to the northwest corner of the facility was were a few of the SRT soldiers sat, enjoying their dinners and conversing about the latest events and other things. Sousuke brought his food over to his fellow AS pilots’ table and sat down next to Mao. “Hey Sousuke,” Sergeant Major Mao said, greeting Sagara with a beer in one hand and her other clenching onto a fork.

“Welcome Sergeant,” Clouzot greeted Sousuke. The young sergeant nodded towards Clouzot.

“Hey there Sergeant Somber, how long till we get to see little Miss Kaname?” Kurz said, being his usual self, and of course Mao reprimanded him for that.

“Hello Mao, Lieutenant Clouzot, Kurz. To answer you question Kurz, Miss Chidori will be arriving after training is complete.” Sousuke began to slowly eat his food as he and his fellow soldiers had a long conversation. They talked about the newest batch of M9s, the restoration of the Tuatha Dadanaan, politics, and even got a little story from Sagara about Japanese high school life.

About twenty minutes later, as the four soldiers finished their food, Lieutenant Major Piuz sat at the table. “Hello pilots.” Both Sousuke and Clouzot saluted the man, the other two had no clue to who the man Sousuke and Clouzot was saluting, but followed in suit. “At ease,” the soldiers returned to the way it was before Piuz sat at their table. “Sagara, did you tell them about tomorrow?”

“Negative sir,” he said, shaking his head in response to the older man’s question.

Piuz sighed, “how about you Clouzot?” He said turning to the black man sitting at the table he smiled.

Ben Clouzot shook his head. “No.”

“Well then, I guess I’ll have to introduce myself tomorrow.” Piuz smiled, “I’ll see you at hangar E5 after the battle.” With that, the man picked up his tray and moved over to where some of the high-ranking officers were sitting.

February 4, 0400 Hours
Melida Island, Hangar E5

“Welcome troops, today’s training will be intense!” Lieutenant Clouzot stood on his M9 staring at the Urzu pilots and the recruits that the Urzu team would be battling in today’s exercise. “Today‘s training will be performed up top. The forces will be divided in to two teams, the first team to lose all of it‘s Arm Slaves loses the battle. Team one will be composed of Urzu 2, 6, 7, and myself. The opposition will be composed of Trainees 2 through 24, am I clear.”

“Sir, yes sir.” The soldiers shouted in unison.

Clouzot grinned, “all troops, move to your Arm Slaves.” In a frantic rush the eager soldiers hopped in their respective M9s. The first to move out was the Alpha team, composed of Urzu 1, 2, 6, and 7. They moved out into the dense jungle and activated their ECS. The recruits moved out towards the beach, they also activated the ECS.

As the Urzu team reached the surface Kurz began to become a little cocky. “Man, these little kids have no clue what their in for, eh Sousuke?”

Sagara sighed, “I understand that some of these recruits are indeed better than Kurz at piloting, maybe we should replace him with the recruit with the best scores after the battle.” His comment quickly silenced the usually talkative Sergeant, this sent Mao into a hysterical fit of laughter.

The Urzu team split up after they reached the surface, Mao and Sousuke were one team, and the other was Clouzot and Kurz. Up in the hills on Melida Island, Sousuke moved forward along side Mao. “Sousuke, move to waypoint Whiskey.”

“Roger!” The Arbalest silently changed its course and headed West towards a cliff over looking a beach. When Mao and Sousuke reached the cliff they spotted a few M9s dug into a reef a little off shore. “Sergeant Major, I’ve spotted three targets.”

“Roger that, I see them to.” Mao’s M9 pulled out it’s rifle, carefully aiming directly at the three hiding M9s. “This is Urzu 2 to Urzu 1, over.”

“Urzu 1 here, what’s your status?”

“Urzu 7 and I have spotted three trainees, over by Waypoint Whiskey. Permission to begin battle.” Mao grinned when she heard Urzu 1’s response.

“Permission, granted. Open fire!”

Suddenly the Arbalest sprung out from the dense forest with rifle in hand, firing down at the trainees. The heavy fire, even though it was only paint bullets, caused pandemonium on the beach. The trainees didn’t know what the hell was going on and just began to fire in every direction, at anything that moved. One trainee radioed all the troops on the beach to cease fire and to find the enemy target. “Troops, we need to beat these guys and show Mithril what we’re made of!”

Another trainee radioed in, “I’ve spotted an M9, no wait...” After taking a closer look the pilot finally caught a good glimpse of the enemy. “Holy shit!! It’s Sagara, the Arbalest is attacking us.”

The leader radioed out orders to all the M9’s on the beach. “All troops open fire on the Arbalest.” Just then, gunfire erupted as the Arbalest continued to plummet towards the beach below it. “Blow it out off the sky!” The troops continued to fire, then the Arbalest was engulfed in a cloud of blue smoke.

An M9 rushed forward, “we got’um, we shot down Urzu 7!!” The troops began to cheer, but their celebration was cut short as a blue aura dismissed the blue cloud. A hail of bullets engulfed the helpless M9s below. Unit after unit was hit, and one by one they fell victim to Sousuke’s merciless onslaught.

He then used the lambda driver to soften the landing, then to propel himself back to the summit of the cliff. “This is Urzu 7, all M9s at waypoint Whiskey have been terminated. Moving to waypoint Foxtrot.”

“Roger that Urzu 7.” Clouzot grinned, “It’s seems like Weber was right about one thing...” Gunfire could be heard over the com link as Clouzot paused. He continued after dispatching another M9, “these damned recruits never knew what hit them.”

February 4, 1430 hours
Melida Island, Hangar E5

One by one the troops filed into the large hangar. M9s were being cleaned, due to the large amount of paint that covered the surface of all twenty-two trainee M9s. The Urzu team stood at the base of their Arm Slaves feet, observing the briefing the trainees were undergoing. Ben was the first to speak up. “Sagara, you did a good job out there.”

“It wasn’t hard sir. I just did...”

Clouzot quickly cut Sousuke’s response, “no, not eliminating those targets today. The fact that you could use the lambda driver with ease. You’re getting better with that machine, I’m sure that some people are really proud of you.” Sousuke turned towards Clouzot a frowned.

“Maybe, I mean I know you and the rest of the crew of the Dadanaan are but, this organization is probably the only people proud of what I do.”

That’s when Kurz interupted, “I’m sure Kaname is proud of you.” Sousuke sighed.

“Probably not, I mean she does yell at me ever chance she gets for being a militaristic individual.” Kurz just stared at the depressed Sergeant Sagara, then sighed.

Piuz then stepped up on the stage, “I am Lieutenant Major Piuz Castolovia. I will be the new AS coordinator, you will be reporting to me every week for training. That was an impressive battle simulation. I am quite impressed with you soldiers, and the level of expertise you have with piloting Arm Slaves. I have to admit, I didn’t expect much when I heard you recruits would be facing some of the best pilots in Mithril, but you did well.” The trainees just kept staring as the man continued to speak. “That simulation was a mere aptitude test of sorts, we will be training you according to your highest scores and simulation battle’s with the Urzu team with happen often to see how your team is progressing. That is all.”

“So that’s who that guy is huh?” Kurz leaned against the while speaking, “I guess it’s no surprise that we would be getting an AS coordinator, but so soon.”

“Yeah but we were going to need one, I mean with all these recruits coming in so fast.” Mao stepped out from behind her M9, “and this simulation was a good test for our modified M9s. Still can’t believe they managed to get the Urzu team m9s just like Clouzot’s.” They all turned to Clouzot who remained silent. “Wonder what kind of strings Tessa had to pull to get these?”

“She didn’t pull any, I did.” The sudden interruption took Mao and Weber by surprise, they searched for the source of the voice. Their eyes rested upon Piuz. “I had them built after I found out Clouzot was stationed here on Dadanaan. They are all modified to your specialty, for example Kurz’s M9 is modified for rifle and sniping.” Piuz then turned to Sousuke and smiled, “and you performance out there greatly exceeded my expectations. I knew of your exeptional skills, but you managed to take out almost half of the opposing force, and use the lambda driver.” The older man patted Sousuke on the back, his complements caused Sousuke to grow a little uneasy.

Sousuke then saluted Piuz, “thank you sir!”

Just then, Piuz sighed, “your welcome Sergeant, but I have grown very tired. I had to train the load of recruits that didn’t go out on the field. Quite an exhausting activity, so I shall turn in for the night. See you tomorrow pilots.”

The Urzu team responded in unison, “sir, yes sir!” Piuz soon left, then Sousuke saying he needed to rest as well. The truth of the matter is he still needed to prepare for Kaname’s arrival, and to make sure her present made it in on time. Sousuke sighed.

“It’s going to be a long week...”

[Kelek]

Nice. I wonder where this is going.

[Reaper DXR-7]

Down that dark alley...

You know the one...

......................................Don't worry, I'll be there with a gun and some "protection" Just kidding!!