[b]Otkroveniye[/b] [spoiler]This story can be read independently, but was originally intended to be a spin-off of LordZoltan's 'Operation Thunder'. I have his permission to write this and use his tags. Enjoy! [/spoiler] [i]This story assumes that the USSR never fell apart in 1991 and that the Cold War is still going on.[/i] [i]Lieutenant Mikhail Vasilijivich, National Institute of Intelligence Analysis, 15th of September 2021[/i] Lieutenant Mikhail Vasilijivich shifted his gaze away from the bright monitor and blinked a couple of times, trying to get his tired eyes used again to the real world, instead of the endless stream of grainy satellite imagery that had been showing on his screen for the past few hours. He took a look around the darkened room, where about twenty men and women were sitting quietly, each of them focused on their own monitors. The noise of the air management system and the low humming of the computers were the only sounds that could be heard. The smell of a cigarette entered his nostrils, and Mikhail sighed. He wasn’t a smoker, on the contrary, he despised everything that had to do with it. Damaging your lungs, while spending an unreal amount of money on low-quality cigarettes or tobacco? No, thank you. He decided to go for a coffee, to keep him at least slightly awake. As he was waiting for the machine to finish, Mikhail looked at his watch, a Sturmanskie which used to be his father’s. Half past four in the afternoon. Another three hours and his shift would be done. Three hours that would take way too long, as he hadn’t closed an eye that night. He returned to his seat, took a deep breath and focused on the monitor again. Dozens of photos, taken from hundreds of kilometers up, required his attention. Most were boring, as always. A fighter plane, the S897, had been shot down above Ukraine. Not that that was the first time that had happened. Planes crash all the time. A small supply depot in Northern Afghanistan had been raided by some brave Mujahideen. Their admittedly large guts had been to no use, as the KGB had captured them already.  The USS Illinois (or SSN-786), an attack submarine of the Virginia-class had recently left Pearl Harbor. Nothing out of the ordinary. These situations happened every day, and were, in Mikhail’s well-considered opinion, completely insignificant. He yawned, and focused again. He sat there for another hour, fighting against sleep and boredom, and was seriously considering, although that would technically be desertion, to shut off his monitor altogether and call it a day. Until his eye fell on a small, low-quality picture of Hunter Airfield, Savannah, in the USA. A Chinook stood still on an abandoned platform. Two Humvees were waiting next to the helicopter. Once again, another run-of-the-mill image, but Mikhail was curious enough to see if there were any more recent pictures, as this one already dated from 7:03AM. He was able to reroute a spy satellite, and exactly seventeen minutes later, the photo, taken in the United States’ morning sun, appeared on his screen. The Chinook still stood there, but there were clearly people boarding the sizeable helicopter, preparing for departure. The time stamp showed 7:45AM local time, while his own watch told him that it was a quarter past five in Moscow, where he was working right now. A quick research informed him that Moscow is seven hours ahead of Savannah, and Mikhail concluded that the pictures were about half an hour delayed. That meant that the Chinook would probably have lifted off already. The question remained: why would a Chinook packed with soldiers leave an airfield early in the morning in the Southern United States? There was only one way to find out: find out where they were going. A quick call to the cyberservice of the KGB would make sure that he got to know exactly who was traveling at this early hour and, more importantly, where they were headed. The KGB called back ten minutes later, with the information Mikhail needed. At least, that’s what he expected. The KGB knew everything, that was a fact known to all of Russia. As soon as the phone rang, Mikhail grabbed it and almost shouted: “Hello, this is Lieutenant Mikhail Vasilijivich speaking, from Room 3 of the National Institute of Intelligence Analysis” A raspy voice answered: “Good afternoon, Comrade Lieutenant. You are talking to Corporal Durow, KGB Cyber Intelligence Wing. You asked for detailed information of a CH-47 type helicopter that departed from Hunter Army Airfield at 8:10AM Eastern Daylight Time?” “That is correct, Comrade Corporal,” Mikhail confirmed. “They are headed North, in the direction of the small town of Springfield. They have been flying for ten minutes on that course now, and we expect them to land there. We were however not able to answer upon your second inquiry. We have no idea who is on board, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that there isn’t a way for us to find out, and we will keep looking. Expect a more in-depth update within a few hours, we’ll need time to hack into their system” Mikhail nodded, although the other person would never be able to see that. “Understood, thank you” Without giving Corporal Durow a chance to answer, he hung up. As soon as he arrived at his office again, he started looking for satellite images of Springfield, Georgia in the United States. He was lucky, as the same satellite from earlier had made a pass over Springfield as well. While outdated (the time stamp showed 7:48AM), this photo would have to do. Mikhail continued to enlarge the picture until it was almost complete grain, but his trained eye could still see what was going on. He could not believe his eyes. He blinked to see if he was dreaming, to no avail. He printed out the photo, shut off his monitor and got up from his chair. He was walking with long strides towards the commander’s office through the long, grey, underground hallways. In his hand was a picture of a small graveyard in Effingham, Springfield. However, the graves were not covered by well-kept grass, the tombstones were not perfectly in line anymore. Instead, the ground was ripped open and human limbs were scattered everywhere. The ground was littered with mutilated corpses. But the most horrifying were the people still standing. People? More like reanimated corpses. TO BE CONTINUED [spoiler]Main page: https://www.bungie.net/nl/Forums/Post/245402812?page=0&sort=0&showBanned=0&path=0[/spoiler]