So clean, So good

Yunca Village

Westside - Raided

A group of bandits lazes around a campfire. The area is littered with bloodstains, shell casings, and debris when they raided the place. Two bandits near the campfire pulled a sign plate from a dead body, creating a stir as they inspect the sign.

"Ford-- Mo, Tor, Cum, pony. I think that's what it says, Mulby." One of the few bandits that can still read says from behind his friend.

"Really?! REALLY?! Ha! I got it!" Mulby gasped as he jumped around happily while carrying a blue plated sign. "I mean, We got it, Bregk! We got it!"

The two of them celebrated their haul of the day. Making merry, shouting, and dancing around the campfire.

"Well?" Another bandit said. Sitting on a crate, watching them all. "C'mon, Mulby. Put it, put it together. Let's see what it says."

Another bandit crouched down while snorting a grey powder from a rag on a corner not far from the campfire. Near the bandit is a tied up girl, scared of her life. Her tears dried up prior as she saw the others being mutilated and raped. Only leaving her for last.

"AHahhhAHHH! C'mere, Fine skin." A bandit said. "Can't WAIT! YAHAHA! Wanna open them PINK up and have me some TASTE!!" Mucking his lips as he slides his knife around the thighs of a girl

The girl struggles hard as she kicks her feet away from him, a muffled scream as she had a rag on her mouth. Her eyes are begging for him to stay away.

"Ohh~ Ohh~ I LIKE! 'em SOUNDS! That got me so hard~ ohh~ OHHH! SCREAM!! More! MOre!''

Meanwhile, Mulby ran back to his bags of things and pulled out another sign, a Yellow-colored sign. He put the blue colored sign beside the other.

Bregk following behind, "What's it say, Mulby?"

Instead, Mulby looked at him with a tilted face. His smiled arched in a forced and sarcastic way. He felt Bregk was messing with him when he asked that.

In turn, Bregk facepalmed as he forgot that Mulby can't read. Embarrassed, he laughed and asked, "Does it fit?"

Mulby got frustrated. "No! It won't stick!" He tried all sorts of things putting it side by side, hoping it will connect like the game piece that sticks together. Yet, nothing happened.

Bregk had a bright idea, "Why not stick it above it?"

"Then..." Mulby put the one on top and vice versa. Can't decide between the two. He asked Mulby again, "Which one's better?"

Bregk pointed at the blue plate, "Cowlor's nice. Better than this one."

"The yellow?" Mulby raised the yellow-colored plate. "It's shev-- a let?"

Bregk tapped on Mulby's shoulder, "It's Che, Bro, Let."

"Yeah, that one."

The bandit sitting on a crate had enough of the waiting, "Will you too hurry it up?!" He made a loud noise by slamming his hand on the box. "Coldy's gonna use her soon, and you know she's gonna be dead before she gets to us! We took the trouble trying to get you two your first-- ohffmmmmff-"

"What was that?" Mulby tried to look over behind him.

Bregk cut in by tapping Mulby's shoulder, "Don't mind him. Stupid probably tip himself over."

Mulby was not sure about that. He heard a cracking sound like a bone crack. But thought it over and probably that he did fall over and broke something.

Bregk pointed at the Che, Bro, Let sign. "But, the color on this one is pretty nice." He jabs his finger at it, "I think it's better."

Mulby heft the Ford sign up, "Bu- But you said this one is better?"

"Yeah," Bregk replied. "The other's color."

Mulby looked at him in a dazed, his eyebrows scrunched as his eyes close to a slit. "So... is Ford better than the Chev-- Ihh!!!"

!!!!

Suddenly, they heard someone laughed behind them. Bregk felt there's a warm iron on his nape while Mulby just stood there frozen, still worrying about his 2 prized possession. Both of them didn't dare to look behind.

"Shit! That freaking got me, hoo." Pushing in the warm iron further to Bregk's neck. "You're in luck, you two manage to make me laugh. So here's the thing. I'm gonna keep you alive. Now, kneel down. I got a question for you two."

Simultaneously, the bandit, who was molesting the tied up girl, quickly turned his head at the noise. His energized senses flared up as his eyes widened when he saw something he hasn't seen anything before, pointing a gun to one of his bait buddies.

Meanwhile, When the bandit stepped away from the girl, there, an invisible being, crouching down beside the girl. She was about to scream for help but stopped dead right there when she saw the scariest thing in her life.

With its flickering blue light, staring at her and when she stared back. She saw the blurry, shadowy figure placed a finger on where its mouth is, indicating for her to stay silent.

She instinctively nodded. Her body was shaking more to this than when she was about to be raped. She knew the latter what's going to do to her, to the former... It's the first time she saw a ghost.

Soon the figure crouched walk behind the bandit. Before the bandit can even shout his warcry, the ghost quickly locked it's left arm to his neck while its right arm got pulled back. The ghost kicked the bandit's back knees, and as he fell to the ground, using its momentum. The ghost broke the bandit's neck. Instantly killing him.

By the girl's perspective, that took about 3-5 seconds. Then the bandit fell down, not moving at all.

She looked at the shadowy figure and widened her eyes as inch by inch, a small shimmering line of light coming from it went down like a burning rope doused in gasoline. The figure was instead, a man or looked like a man. She ain't ever seen someone like that.

She remembered the stories her folks used to say about the rangers, the ones they defeated years ago... Robots. She was looking at a robot. Again, she shivered in fear.

------------------------------------------

Joe clicked his comm, "Deus, This is Predator. We got additional POIs (Person of Interest). Patch us through Top Hat for confirmation."

"Copy that, Predator."

A cough and a gargle sounded first, "Top Hat to Predator, heard you got some news."

Joe circled around the campfire. He dragged up a bit of dirt to his feet and kicked it to the fire. Putting it out, "A lot of names come up, Sir. I need you to grab a pen and paper for this."

"Send it, Son."

Joe peeked to the sides. He saw Irish was done tying up the two bandits while Castle struggled to calm the girl down.

"Jaberon from Waste Water Gang, Porker from a gang in the South, and Deslin from something called DBM. How Copy?"

"Copy, Predator." Vargas paused. "Hmm, Jaberon has a gang out west close to Nevada, and Deslin was an ex-militia member. He had a gang now somewhere east. Porker? That's the first time I've heard of him."

"The other two... Normally, they'll just kill each other. Something's not right here. They're getting organized... Damn it, Fritzgerald. Alright. Ghost Lead, Bagged them if you can."

"Understood, Top Hat, Predator out."

Bear spoke up as he leans on a barn door. "And what if we don't?"

Joe leans on the other side of the barn door. "Then we'll make sure they stay down. Rout the others, make them panic."

"Form up, leave them to Team Delta--" Joe cut what he said and raised a fist, telling everyone to hold what they're doing.

Bear and Joe heard voices insides the barn. He gestured for Bear to get a drone overhead.

A cloaked drone flew over the barn's exposed ceiling, hovering there. The drone automatically tagged 6 humanoid subjects and instantly relayed the data back to the Ghost's CRISS-COM. Their Active Resonance Software displayed the bandit's outline in yellow color.

Irish dragged the two detainees behind a wall, "You jokers sit still and stay quiet."

Mulby's face frown, and his voice turned groggy, "Bregk, Bregk-- Are we, are we gonna die?"

Bregk's face reduced to tears, "*Sniff* Mulby... I- Ooh-wah. Please," He whimpered. "I got a gun on my neck- Pleashe, shut up-"

Opposite to them, Castle didn't waste time and grabbed the girl, resting her on his shoulder. He turned behind a wall and carefully dropped the girl. The girl squirmed around frantically,

Seeing this, Castle hurriedly shushed her. "Stay quiet, We're the good guys here. The Rangers' gonna come here and save you. Just stay put."

At the same time, Joe and Bear moved backward away from the door. Pointing their gun to the silhouettes. Their Active Resonance showed the weapons and affiliations as [Unknown] regardless, the ones carrying a firearm was labeled as [Balistics] the ones using melee weapons as categorized into two: [Bladed - Weapon] & [Force Trauma - Weapons]

After 30 seconds, the barn door slides open. The bandits walked out, unaware of their the Ghost's I.R. laser pointed at their heads.

"Looks like they got some friends." Bear pointed his suppressed 5.56 Bullpup PDW with an Acog scope with a red dot on top at the group, the front middle one.

"No shit, Sherlock." Irish pointed his suppressed Vector SMG with a hybrid scope at the group, The back right one.

"Even the A.R. doesn't read their weapons right. Damn, you see those things they have? looks like a patched work blunderbuss." Castle pointed his suppressed M110 SASS with a powerful customized sniper scope and a canted red dot at the group, the back left one.

"Careful, no merit in underestimating them. Those things can still shoot... around us." Joe pointed his suppressed 5.56 Tavor with an under-barrel grenade launcher and a hybrid scope at the group, the back middle one.

Joe and Bear shifted their positions closer to the group, Irish and Castle lined their shots to hit the one adjacent to their target. Timing their shots to kill all 6 of them at the same time.

Joe pointed his gun to the chest area of his target, "Wait for them to think something's wrong." on his A.R. view, he can see his team member's I.R. laser on each of their targets. He felt a calm state like everything's coming together. "On my shot,"

The bandits are getting ever-suspicious. Unfortunately for them, they're at the right spot where the Ghosts need them. Circling the once lit campfire, they positioned themselves into a hexagonal formation.

Once the one in the front middle of the group realized that something was wrong, he flinched his head to voice out his suspicion. But, as he looked behind him, he saw the others dropped on the ground. The next thing he knew, he felt a hefty thump to his cheat and fell down.

Not all was clean. Irish's shot didn't make it through the second person because of his weapon's caliber and flailed somewhere. He recovered, and as soon as his crosshair line up with the bandit's head, he took the shot, right between the eyes.

Joe signaled his team to form up, "Deus, we got 1 hare and 2 strays. We'll leave them to Delta. We're proceeding on to the targets."

"Copy that, Predator. We'll let the rangers know."

The Ghosts make their way into the barn. They activated their camo... and began their slaughter of the bandits on this side of the village.

==================

One and a half minute after

==================

Team Delta finally caught up with the area where the Ghosts last reported in. Hunter gestured Dallas and Duke to look for the hostage and the detainees.

Zara, the team's recon and sharpshooter, has noticed the dead bodies in the area, "6 dead each by a single gunshot. And I think that one near the crates and the one to that corner died differently. Their necks broke."

"How'd you think they got close to those two and still killed the 6?" Zara added. She was anxious about what or who are they actually following.

"Worry about that later." Captain Hunter turned the body over close to him. It's the only body that got shot in the head. The rest were over a singe chest shot.

"Clean... Too clean."

"Captain," Dallas called out from the sides, with a girl behind him. "Found her where the General said."

Simultaneously, Duke dragged two captives whos eyes were swollen.

Captain Hunter gave Duke a warning look, "Ease', Cap'n. It wasn't me. They're already huddled up together, crying for who knows what."

The two were bawling out as they try to explain themselves and what happened, and why the people suddenly puffed out of nowhere. To them, that was it. To the Delta, all they heard was the two's unintelligent mumblings and crying. Their snot dripped in and out of themselves.

"We don't have time for this," Captain Hunter grabbed a rifle from one of the dead bodies. He walked in front of the rescued girl.

He offered the gun to her, "You know how to use one of these?" He asked.

She nodded as she wiped the tears in her eyes with her arm, "Brother showed me the ropes on how." She put a hand on the gun, but Captain hunter spoke again before she could grab it away.

"There's a ranger to the South." He pointed behind where there's a side of a hill overlooking the village. "Follow the trail of dead bodies and make your way up. It's where the small passage out of the village."

"I know that place," The girl replied. She says before the Captain could say more. "Could you thank the robots for me? If it weren't for them... I- I- Think... I think-"

The three Delta's looked at each other, an added piece to their suspicion. Captain Hunter didn't break eye contact with the girl.

"Of course," He says. "But we'll have to trouble you of bringing them with you." as he pointed at the 2 detainees.

The girl canted herself as she looked at the direction he pointed at. She reacted quickly by pulling the gun away from him.

Hunter expected this to happen as he tightened the grip on the gun. "I'm gonna ask you again, can I trouble you with making your way to my fellow rangers with them around."

"We need them alive for questioning," He added.

Then Mulby's voice started making sense between the sniffs and snots, "We- tried- to keep them. Away. *sniff* From. You." he snorted his snot.

"We t-t-tried using my signs to keep them distracted and, and, and asked Hut to keep you- alive." Mulby kept getting hiccups in between the words.

Hunter saw the girl's eyes stared at the two. He recognizes the eyes of those who had flashbacks of all the painful memories.

However, he didn't have the time to indulge her in this. "We can make sure you'll thank the "Robots" yourself later on if you just bring them to my fellow rangers."

The girl's gaze turned to him. For a few seconds, she paused but finally agreed.

"Good," He loosened his grip on the gun.

The girl took the gun but struggled at first due to its weight, "No- no- I can- I can do it." she says.

Captain Hunter nodded.

They took their separate ways. Captain Hunter didn't bother to look behind him. He set his eyes straight to the open barn door.

"Let's go." Captain Hunter gestured.

"You think they're actually robots?" Dallas said.

"The way they did things? it makes sense." Zara replied.

"Can it," Hunter cut in. "Ask the questions later. We need to catch up."

They make their way to the barn—two by two on each side. They moved inside, covering each area. Once they made sure everything's clear, they moved on ahead.

Again with the two by two on each side. Nearing the exit of the barn, Team Delta performed a standard sweep and clear maneuver.

Their breath was taken away once they saw what happened. 9 bandits dead. Either by a shot to the head or to the chest. All fresh.

"How many bodies is it now?" Duke asked.

Zara tightened her grip on her weapon, "6 patrols dead, 8 just outside, and now 9 dead."

She exhaled, "23 dead in just a few minutes. And we didn't even hear them do anything."

"Alright, bodies are still fresh." Captain Hunter firmly said, "We can still catch up."

"I'm starting to not like that idea," Duke commented.

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Yunca Village

Eastside - Raided

Earlier

*Thush* *Thush*

A man wearing a FAST helmet with a NOD, and a helmet cam attachment holding a suppressed customized 1911 shot a bandit from the back of its head. On his back was a customized AK-platform holstered in his backpack via partner type magnetic holsters.

While a girl wearing three-lens goggles holding a suppressed customized 5.7 pistol shot a bandit from the side of its head. On her back was a suppressed customized AR-15 platform holstered in the saw way as the other one.

*Ding* *Ding*

As the bullet casings ring out as they dinged down on the floor.

The man vanished in the alleyways getting in close with bandits while the woman floated on the rooftops as the bandits don't expect anyone from there.

♪ In the Shadow of the Valley · Don Burnham ♪