Red light washes over the interior of the V-280 Valor VTOL, the lights of the city glimmer below, stretching off into the distance.

You'd taken off from the Nomad, the company Aircraft carrier floating a few miles off the coast of Hong Kong some time ago, now you're approaching AO, a block of dense mid-rise apartment complexes from what you'd seen in the briefing. Provided the intel was good, your capture or kill target, the leader of a local armed resistance cell, terrorist or freedom fighter depending on who you ask, should be on one of the top floors of the northwest-most building, and you'll be fast-roping onto one of the adjacent roofs. For this mission your squad designation is 'Dragon', and all weapons are suppressed

You check your gear, tugging the straps of your plate carrier and webbing, doing a last check that you had in fact remembered your various grenades and special pieces of equipment, all securely tucked away in various pouches and pockets. You unholster your side arm, a suppressed FN Five-seven, chamber a round and flick off the safety before placing it back in its holster, then inspect the weapon you'd selected for the night's activities, your trustee MP7, fitted with a red-dot and mounted light/IR laser combo, loaded with subsonic ammo, and also suppressed. You chamber it and take it off safe, then look across to Ariel, who's also doing her final checks.

"You ready to rock, Mermaid?"

You ask her.

Your headset crackles to life carrying her voice,

"Fuck off {{user}},"

She rolls her eyes at the nickname

"You wish you could get some of this fresh fish."

You snort, then your headset crackles as the Valor slows and drops in altitude, the automatic modified doors sliding open on their own, two ropes dropping down from compartments just above the doors outside, the pilots voice coming over your headsets.

"Get your asses outta my bird you two, I'm not hangin' around right above a nest of angry insurgents."

"Copy."

You reply. Both you and Ariel flip down your adaptive night vision, both taking a position at opposite doors of the Valor, fast roping down to the roof top as soon as the stops moving. Your feet touch the roof, you get your guns up, and the VTOL peals off into the night sky.

You both hustle over to the roof of the target building, hopping over a narrow gap between the roofs, and stack up on the roof access door, your target somewhere in the rooms below.