8 Operation Red Herring (2/2)

”Good point Thomas!”

”Get ready to run....now!” They bolted out from the ”trees” together and the other squad caught sight of them.

”Look! Over there! After them guys!” A great chase began, following which Thomas's squad ran in the eleven o'clock direction, hoping to run into some guards. Meanwhile on the other side of the forest.

”Man this plan is all kinds of fucked up,” Smith was complaining to McLaney, ”we should have just gone with my plan, at least we'd have a better chance! How come we've been sitting here for like five minutes and no one shows up huh?” McLaney had enough of Smith's crap, they were both lying next to each other covered in sand so they'd blend together in the ground.

”Shut up Smith! You're gonna give us away, I don't like this plan either, but you heard Drill Instructor Asshole, Conlin is the squad leader!” McLaney reprimanded Smith who then shut his mouth and stared at McLaney like he was hearing things. ”Look there's a guard over there!” He pointed out a guard not even thirty yards away who walked out behind some trees. He already had two blue flags on his belt, in addition to the yellow one on his arm.

”Shit, he caught two of Daniels' men, wait, hopefully he caught Daniels, that would be hilarious!” Smith whispered while trying not to laugh. He lost his laughter after that because soon after two more guards appeared, they had one red flag each. He looked at McLaney and then whispered, ”Shit, they got Conlin and McSnickers?”

”Obviously not you dumb ass,” McLaney retorted, ”the guards are obviously cheating, think about it! Conlin had their whole route memorized, but I don't know how he knew all that. It doesn't matter, what matters is that they appeared on time, who cares if they have fake or real flags, we just need to survive for about five more minutes and we win!”

”Shit, you're right, how could I be so stupid, let's try to sneak past them, there is obviously no one coming this way,” Smith suggested. McLaney agreed and so they slowly backed away through the dirt and sand, crawling the whole time.

Meanwhile two hundred yards to the east, Thomas and Joshua caught sight of Daniels alone, earlier they had run into a group of four guards who then gave chase to not only them but the three stooges behind them. After a few crafty tricks and some false leads, they managed to shake them.

”Look! Daniels is alone, we can take him!” Joshua pointed towards Daniels, ”if we can take his flag that would piss him the hell off!”

”You're right Josh, but we've got to approach this carefully, we don't know if he's alone.” Thomas was trying to figure out a plan of action, but then Daniels turned towards their position. Almost as if he had known they would be there he yelled out, ”Come out Conlin, I know you're there, I can sense it and my gut never lies!”

Shit! Thomas didn't think that he had instincts that sharp, no wonder he was such a bully previously. Well there was only one way to establish superiority in this situation, he's got to outmaneuver Daniels. Hopefully the other two had filled their end of the plan. Otherwise this was going to be the longest five minutes he'd ever had.