Chapter 4

The psychologist asked him slightly cryptic questions that only him alone could understand. Lukas answered them without pausing. He was asked if he felt anything strange about himself lately, and he replied with the horrible nightmares he was having. As usual, the psychologist dismissed it as normal and he was free to go.

Lukas was the last to leave the pscyhologist's room for the post-action psychological evaluation. Just like the medical examination earlier before this, he was cleared for the next operation. He was relieved to know that he could join the next ones because his bestfriend and the superior officer of the assault platoon failed the previous evaluation, prompting the Major to assign him with the 1st Lieutenant's duties and suspending the aforementioned officer for five weeks to rehabilitate.

Another 666IB soldier approached their group, his tone was marred with urgency.

"The Major wanted to see all of you, Lieutenant." He said.

"Briefing?"

"Yeah, something came up."

They followed the soldier back to the briefing room. The sun has already risen behind them, its morning rays flooding through the doors and windows of the outpost, illuminating the sterile corridors in golden glow. From the eyes of an unsuspecting civilian, the establishment would be mistaken easily as a military hospital due to the fact that there were personnel running around in lab coats. They were medical researchers attached by the same shady organization that supplied the 666IB both with knowledge and equipment

No one knew the exact name of the organization but it was just simply called as 'The Agency'.

Major Tomas Veras sat in front of the table, quietly sipping at his mug of coffee. In broad daylight, the battle scars on his face were visible. It was confirmed that the old officer was among the soldiers of the short lived special force unit dedicated in fighting the things they are currently fighting now before the activation of the 666IB in 2001. The activities of the supernatural were rare at that time, but when they began to gradually attack in full force, the AFP responded back in kind.

"Sit down, soldiers." Major Tomas ordered, all of them complied. "Observatory Camp Delta-21 has intercepted numerous calls for help from an isolated village in Pagadian. As expected, the police did not respond due to the location of the caller. It was worth noting that the caller's voice matches the voice signature from a missing person three weeks before."

"What do you mean, sir?" Lukas inquired as respectfully as he could.

"Twenty four hours after the person's time of disappearance, her relatives went to the authorities with a video of the missing person. The MIU boys embedded within the aforementioned authority recorded it for safekeeping. Just so you know, this procedure was already in practice after the activation of the 666IB." Major Tomas replied matter of factly. "In case it turns out to be a case worthy of the Anomalous Warfare Battalion's or our attention, since we are the among few capable of responding to threats like these."

"So the MIU have connections with the Marines." Sergeant Alice replied, but the sentence was more of a statement than a question.

"Yes, they are much closer to them than us, which was understandable. If we are humanity's last line of defense against the supernatural, they are the first. The tip of the spear."

"And we are assigned to this because--?" Lukas asked with a questioning tone.

"The incident took place in our area of jurisdiction. As you can see, the AWB Marines do not have outposts here, if there are, I doubt they would send forces to take care of it given that they are busy in the Sulu and Palawan Front, not to mention, the General also had them help with their regular counterparts."

"I never get why we are supposed to fight in the counter-insurgency conflict when the threat posed by the paranormal was much more dangerous to begin with?" Sergeant Alice added.

"Don't worry about that, Abantay." Major Tomas replied. "We have the numbers and the toys to adequately deal with them. Back to the topic," he cleared his voice, "the missing person--or should I call her, the victim--was abducted from the urbanized area forty five kilometers away. She was taken and in some way, she managed to make contact with the authorities who tried in vain to search for her but realizing that it was in the middle of nowhere--" he shook his head."--anyway, the MIU looked into the matter and detected several kidnappers operating in the urbanized area." He paused.

"Your objective is simple. Capture a member alive and eliminate the rest of the armed lawless elements located in that quiet village. Military intel transmitted to us by the 4th Signal Corps suggested that the village was more of a compound occupied by the ALEs."

"But they are ALEs, sir?" Lukas protested.

"There are evidence that the ALE might be an armed occult element, based on extensive fact findings conducted by the MIU, but this was not confirmed yet. We are sending you because if the ALE turned out to be an AOE, any military unit who will try to engage them will definitely be screwed, big time."

"But what makes them think that they could be an AOE?" Another soldier asked.

"That's a good question, PFC Laurel." Major Tomas replied as he pulled a folder beside him and handed it over to Lukas, who gratefully took it. The Lieutenant flipped through the irrelevant papers and arrived at a document with attached sat-photos of a group of people gathered around a bonfire. "That was a bloodletting ceremony, just to tell you. There were multiple armed lawless elements who were into weird fetishes and traditions but we are not sure if it was one of it. We've never seen like it and for all we know, the people they exsanguinated might have been random people they just want to kill as a form of 'rebellion'." Major Tomas added.

"We have no more questions, Major." Lukas said as he handed him the folder. "Give us time to lock and load."

"Alright then," Major Tomas stood. "Dismissed."