Operation Mourning Tide Debrief (Crows)

[Marcus Prasad]

Sitting in the waiting room of Crow HQ, Marcus, Fox, Bucket and Sleepy sat and waited to see Kiyoshi to give him the Mission Debrief.

"I failed."
"What? It was not a failure sir! We-"
"Needed those supplies."
"Jesus christ Bossman, It's not like we were ordered to Steal that fucking truck."
"Frankly we're still amazed you even survived at all Bruddah. Fox musta done the above and beyond to keep you alive!"
Fox blushed at this.
"Well...Not exact-"

"Alright! Alright guys just....Enough now."
He commanded, the Scowl he had worn since he lost the hunting parties after him and Fox beginning to soften into a thoughtful frown.
"Least you can say you done in a Water voodoo man."
"IN the water no less! That's fucking wild shit bossman!"

"I guess."
Marcus was still worried. That crazy leather wearing freak was a beast of a man. He could feel it down to his bones. He must have been one of Barkers commanders or some equivalent of such. It made him worry. It made him wonder if there was more where that came from.

Quietly the team would wait. They had already exchanged hugs and hearty backslaps before stepping into the base. Now it was time to await judgement.

[Deleted]

Kiyoshi strode down from his room to meet Marcus for his debrief from his mission. The Crows leader took a seat before the team, waiting patiently for Marcus to begin.

[Marcus Prasad]

Marcus fought down an involuntary shiver as Kiyoshi walked in.
Fighting down the urge to fidget, he nodded to Sleepy who promply pulled out a sheet of paper and handed it over.
"Well sir, lemme start with the bad news before I get to the worse news."
Marcus began as he put the sheet of paper on the table.
"The Trading mission was a failure. We found no evidence of Outlying fishing vessels or Independant communities along the shoreline. What we DID find however, was this mess you see here."

On the paper was a Sketch of the seawall drawn on Drafting paper, showing a front view and a top down view to scale.
"As you can see, they have been building this Seawall for some time, using slave labour of course. Probably eating up said communities and forcing them to work. The Wall Stretches almost along the entire coast."

Sitting back down, Marcus took a deep breath before getting to the meat of the story.
"Now, not wanting to return empty handed, I took two members of my team and infiltrated one unfinished section of the wall here during the night and immediatly dispatched the sentries on patrol. One of thier numbers was a Water Qi user I....neutralized permanently. I then sent Bucket...That is Mr. Ramlogan here back to the ship to exfiltrate back to HQ. Ms. Abakan and I then proceeded to gain possesion of a supply truck when we were nearly caught by......."

Marcus paused at the memory and shook his head. Just thinking about that freak spooked him good.
"A Man who I believe is a top ranking member of Barkers command. He insisted on joining us. He also spoke the names Leguna and Darc in a manner which I could deduce put them on the same level as this individual."

Marcus then nodded to Fox, who pulled a map out from her trenchcoat pocket.
"We also Procured this map from the truck before we....errr....Lost it, the truck I mean, Halfway to Darcs base of operations here. In fact this Map gives us the Base of operations of This freak man, Darc and Leguna."
He said as he pointed to the location.
"We were forced to abandon the Truck......He would have killed us otherwise. Ms. Abakan and I then ditched our trackers, hid out for a few days and well......made it back here."

Finished his report, Marcus leaned back in his chair and waited.

[Deleted]

During the entire tale, Kiyoshi was quiet and emotionless. He listened and watched with full attention paid to the man before him. At the conclusion, the silence continued for a few more moments as the Zero digested what had been told to him. Once that was done, designated by the soft sigh that finally escaped him, he spoke to the fact of the report that mattered most.

"I'm glad to see you all return safely from your journey."

Weapons, water, food, shelter, and almost everything could be replaced but not people. The Crows were the most important thing to Kiyoshi and he would rather die than see a single one harmed.

"It seems you've found that my worst fears were well founded. I had hoped Barker's dominion limited but it seems that we may be amongst the few remaining free areas in the world."

To think the man they sought to destroy had the entire world almost at his fingertips. How could they hope to defeat him? Surely Kiyoshi would try to his dying breath but it seemed an insurmountable task especially with enemies at the gates. He exhaled sharply, a great tension buried in his shoulders.

"Take your people to get food, water, and rest. You've earned beyond what I would dare ask of you."

There was a deep gratitude in his voice for their efforts.

[Marcus Prasad]

Marcus would nod in gratitude.
"Thank you sir. Still, I have to wonder, Where is Barker getting the resources to build such a fuck-huge wall? If you don't mind sir, I think I might look into that further, as well as investigate the Outposts and bases outlined on the Map."

Kiyoshi's last words sounded like a dismisal, so Marcus took it as such and rose to his feet, his crew rising with him.
"Just rememeber sir. It's not over until the last crow ceases to breath."
The others might not have noticed it, But Marcus had. He had worn that exact same face Kioyshi was wearing now, many years ago. Looking behind the mans eyes, he could see the turmoil, the tension and the dread.

'All I can do is keep fighting and keep winning then. Shouldn't be too hard right?'

"So....Now what Bossman sir?"
Sleepy would ask as they exited the building. Fox was about to open her mouth and reply when Marcus suddenly whirled around.
"Now. Now we get back to work."