Special Needs Forces

In the base everyone was sad because, not only did they lose a good recruit, but they would soon lose their Captain and get a new unknown captain. Captain, while he was still a captain, went to the captain's room, which probably wouldn’t be his much longer, and Melisanda called him.

“Picking up, any new orders?" Captain said sadly

“Actually, no, just checking if you’re alive"

"I'm alive, you can write it down in the report"

"Okay, forgive me for bothering you, I’m sorry you won’t be captain anymore"

"I feel sorry too" answered Captain and then he realized that he was being a bit rude to everyone all this time and he should probably apologize to Melisanda for his behavior "Okay, forgive me for being a nasty bastard live and right now but interacting with other teams isn’t good for me"

"I know, I noticed, the previous meetings were bad, but nothing compared to last time"

"Okay, I don't want to talk about it, I'm leaving the room" Captain started slowly walking away, hoping that Melisanda would hang up

"I'm going out" Captain opened the door "I won’t be back for a long time by the way, long AFK" But Melisanda still didn't hang up. He was standing in the doorway long enough for the situation to become awkward, when suddenly Lukier appeared in the corridor and scared Captain

"Uh, am I interrupting something?" Lukier asked

"No, I'm really leaving the room now" said Captain and closed the door behind him "what did you want?"

"Well, same as Melisanda I guess, check if you’re okay after losing your rank-"

"Who says I lost my rank? Nothing is lost yet"

"But what are you going to do? you won’t fight the new captain."

"I will."

"You will?"

"Yes."

And then they went out to town to buy ice cream or something so that Captain wouldn't think about the approaching new captain.

The next day, Captain Crow and part of her team arrived - Brown with the Medic class, who had brown hair and brown eyes and brown clothes, Lime, a pretty nice person, and Rosalina, that girl with pink hair Rigel tried to flirt with the other day.

“Hello, I am Captain Crow and I will be your new leader. I’ve heard your team sucks so I brought a few of my people to help"

“Captain Crow!" shouted Biel, "I disagree!" and then everyone fell silent

"What do you disagree with?" Crow asked the unfazed

"Well... your leadership. For I am Captain Eliasz Biel and this is my team! And if you want to take command of this unit you will have to defeat me in a duel!" Crow gave him a wry look and then asked his team who also looked a little confused if this was serious. The team didn't answer because they didn't know if it was serious.

"Biel, I was sent on the orders of my boss and I'm supposed to make this team stop being shit so get out of my way or I'll have to use this" Crow said and pulled out a stun gun.

"Pf, this? No, we fight with our bare fists" Captain said

"Don't prolong what is inevitable, just let me follow orders"

"Maybe at least give me a chance to defend my rank, huh?"

"Okay. I suppose it won't take long "Crow replied after a moment and they started to fight for the rank of captain, and Crow was shorter and overall smaller than Captain but she kicked his ass like the final boss in a game and Captain was miserably losing. But he didn’t want to give up and finally Lukier told Crow to stop before she accidentally killed him. Ex-Captain was pissed at Lukier for not letting him fight with dignity, but Lukier was right about Crow being too experienced to fight a noob like Ex-Captain.

After the fight was over, Lukier and Tawny took Ex-Captain to med bay to have Frezja give him some sedatives or something. Meanwhile, Crow went to the captain's room and called Melisanda and said they were waiting for new orders. As for the rest of the team, Rigel was a bit sad that the captain had changed but he was very happy that his crush joined the team, so he thought that on a larger scale it was worth demoting the captain. So he went to talk to Rosalinda

"Hey, so we meet again" said Rigel

"Uh, hey" said Rosalinda

"I hope you were not put off by what I shouted on the ship then-"

"Oh, was that for me?"

"Uhh no, not you, actually the purple one made me shout it because I lost a bet"

"Oh"

And there was an awkward silence

"So, do you want me to show you around the base or something?" Rigel continued

"Well okay, I could use that, I'll just call Brown and Lime since they’re also new" Rosalinda said and Rigel immediately started to lowkey regret his offer because he didn't want to be a guide for everyone, he just wanted to flirt with the pink haired girl, but he agreed not to make the situation more awkward than it already was.

Rigel showed the new teammates around the base and on one hand he was glad he had a chance to talk to two girls instead of one, but on the other hand it meant that it was not appropriate to flirt with Rosalinda, and he didn’t want to waste his second chance at getting to know her, which was a miracle anyway after what he did at the meeting.

In the meantime, Ex-Captain was sitting in his new room, which was not the captain's room. It looked like some kind of broom closet because it was used as a broom closet when the team was smaller and some rooms were unused and all the brooms didn’t fit in the actual broom closet so they used this one. He didn't feel like moving the brooms and household and sanitary items to the real broom closet, or unpacking his things, so he was just sitting there, thinking why the hell they owned so much crap that it filled an entire room. He didn't find an answer to this question because the alarm sounded and although in his current state he would rather think about brooms than go on a mission, he went to the meeting so he wouldn’t be late for his first task as no longer a captain.

“Listen, Thirteen” Crow started “As you can see, the opportunity to prove yourself came quickly, but …” She started to walk back and forth with her arms folded behind her back and everyone felt like they were in the army ”...but the task we were assigned is not an easy one.” 

She continued, and everyone in the original Thirteen would have preferred if she would just get down to business, but no one said anything because she looked scary and spoke loud. Ex-Captain would normally say something anyway, but it was not a normal situation. First, because he had lost all his dignity and his rank in the last few days, and second, because he had been stuffed with sedatives.

“In the town of Hill, pets and children have been dying in recent weeks. Today it has been reported that someone noticed a brownish-white gull-like griffin swallowing a dog whole and flying off towards the quarries. Of course, our task is to kill it, but first we have to find its nest and make sure that there are no chicks, because there are suspicions that is why it started haunting the city in the first place.” Crow finished.

“What? We’re going to the quarries?!” Rigel got scared and realized that it was very visible, so in order not to be recognized as a coward by his team for the third time, and by the new team and crush for the first time, he added quickly “Then we'll have to perform some gryphicide, there are a lot of neutral monsters in the quarries but when we step on their lawn it's like pushing a stick into an anthill and we’ll have to kill them all”

“That's why I said it was a difficult mission. We're going to be stealthy. We will leave a bait and follow the beast until it leads us to the nest.”

They did what Crow said, and she also decided Frezja was a worse team medic than Brown so she left her at the base, which Frezja didn't like. Crow also decided that Tawny could be released from med bay and go on the mission, and so he did, but he was also a bit unhappy that Frezja was treated so rudely. But coming back to griffins, it is known that they have wings and can fly, unlike humans who have to use a large, noisy, and very noticeable flyer that had to be parked quite a long way from the destination, so it wasn’t easy to determine the exact location of the nest, especially since the quarries are known for very big rocks that effectively cover the griffin nests.

"We're splitting up," said Crow.

“let's not do a Scooby Doo strategy please” Protested Lukier, who at first tried to make a good impression on the new captain, but he felt safer in a group on a mission where they had to stealthily enter the territory of a griffin flock, and splitting up didn’t sit right with him. Especially considering the fact that he looked like a custom character in a cutscene of a serious game and against the background of rocks and grass he would look like a dartboard to the griffins. Only worse, because griffins don’t play darts, griffins eat the dartboard.

“Quiet you fool, we don’t stand a chance at being stealthy walking in a group of nine. For now, we split in half and look for the nest. I’m taking Lime, Brown, Rigel and Lukier and we’ll go through the valley on the left, the rest goes right. Do not rush, and above all, be careful and choose the safest paths, even if they are kilometers longer. Only use the radio if absolutely necessary.”

"If I can interrupt…" Rigel began

"You can't" said Crow

"... I'd like to go to the right," Rigel interrupted

“Don't act like a spoiled brat”

“Actually, I’d like to switch sides too” - said Lukier

“That’s enough! Me, Lukier, Brown, Lime, Rigel to the left. Biel, Tawny, Rosalinda, Tanager to the right. That's an order.”

No one questioned Crow's orders anymore, because she clearly hated any objection, even with some trivial decisions she had no logical reason to stick to. Rigel was sad that he wasn't assigned to his crush, and Lukier was sad that he couldn't go with Ex-Captain, leading to Ex-Captain feeling sad as well while could be a little less sad.

With time, however, Lukier realized he preferred the left side. While they were at a disadvantage when it came to looking for a nest, because if the nest wasn’t exactly on their path, they had no chance to see it for the most part because they were surrounded by rocks, they didn't stand out like a spot on a bare ass. The right squad was climbing the hill and had a better view, but it worked both ways and the monsters had a better view of them too. So they tried to go from bush to bush and hide behind everything that was taller than them, until they came across a fairly overgrown place where there were feathers on the ground and some unidentified guts left by griffins, just like cats leave the stomachs of mice when they eat them.

"We are close to some nest, but the probability that it’s the nest we're looking for is slim" Rosalinda said

"Let's walk around, it's still worth checking out" Tawny suggested

“Okay, in 15 minutes we meet under that tree,'' Rosalinda announced, and everyone went their way to look for the nest. After 15 minutes, they gathered under the tree again and each reported what they found.

“There is no nest, but I found a somewhat covered path that leads down” said Tawny

“I got nothing, just some more rotten insides lying everywhere” admitted Ex-Captain.

“I found a pretty feather! Tanager announced, "Oh, and a griffin walked nearby, but in a different color than my feather."

“Holy shit, our target or another griffin?” Rosalinda asked

“I don't know, I'm colorblind, but I know it was definitely not blue like my feather-”

“What the hell? Rosalinda interrupted him. How did you get into the unit without eye tests? This is a joke, we have to report it.”

Tanager was starting to look very sad, but there was a griffin nearby, and it wasn't the time or the place to be reprimanded about falsifying eye test results or whatever got Tanager into this situation, so Ex-Captain intervened

“Guys, we have a griffin around here, so someone who can tell if it's the right color should go and check it out or else it’ll find us first”

"Then go." said Rosalinda who wanted to keep scolding Tanager and since there were more people on the team someone else could do what Ex-Captain asked for.

"Um... I can't" said Ex Captain

“And why is that?” Rosalinda was starting to lose her patience

“Sorry, I'm on sedatives and it's hard for me to concentrate, I prefer not to face the griffin alone”

“Excuse me, what?”

Nobody replied, so she continued.

"Of the four of us, are only me and Tawny actually fit for the task?" Do you take anything seriously? Do you realize the gravity of the situation? Biel, in this state you shouldn't even be holding a gun!”

Ex-Captain wasn’t really mentally present, and Tanager looked like he was about to cry, so Rosalinda decided not to beat a dead horse and just took Tawny with her to identify the griffin.

“Do you think they'll fire us, Captain?” Asked Tanager, who was still sitting with Ex-Captain under the tree

"I'm not the captain, Tanager" drugged Ex-Captain replied, and Tanager thought his tone of voice sounded sad, so he decided to cheer up his friend, even though he wasn't feeling well himself.

“You will always be the captain for me! Besides, now we are only half of the team and the other half has our new captain, so while there are only four of us, you can be the captain of the four of us! Oh, maybe you’ll feel better if I give you my feather?

His inept attempts to comfort him were interrupted by Ex Captain's radio

"Biel, come in," Crow said

“This is Ca- uh I mean Biel, what's going on?”

“We found the nest, mission complete. Is Rosalinda with you? She didn't answer me.”

“Oh no!” Tanager shouted. "The griffin must have attacked them! I'm going to go help them, captain Crow!”

“What? Were you attacked? Biel, what's the situation?”

Ex-Captain Biel began explaining everything that had happened except for details such as his sedatives and Tanager's color blindness, while Tanager ran to where he last saw the griffin. When he got there, the griffin was gone, but there were Rosalinda and Tawny. Half of Rosalinda, to be exact, lying in a pool of blood on the rocks, and Tawny also in blood, but whole.

“What happened here?” Tanager asked

"We were attacked by a griffin," Tawny replied

“Oh Jesus, are you okay? I mean I see Rosalinda isn’t but what about you?”

Tawny looked at himself

"Oh yeah, it's not my blood." That was a very bad answer, and it would have sounded very suspicious to a normal human, but Tanager was dumber than a normal human.

“At least there’s that. Captain Crow called Captain Biel, the job is done, we can go back.”

After returning to the base, no one found out about Ex-Captain's drugs or Tanager's color blindness, because the only person who knew and wanted to report it was dead, so at least that turned out to be good for them. However, things weren't looking bright anyway. Crow gathered the team and gave a speech that, again, sounded more dramatic than necessary. Or maybe this time the level of drama was more optimal, because someone died after all, and in a rather brutal way, but that doesn't change the fact that she just repeated what happened on the mission in a ponderous way and no one wanted to hear it. When she finished, Tanager spoke.

"But you see, Captain, even with you in power, teammates are dying."

“How dare you?” Crow interrupted him

"I just wanted to say that maybe we really are just unlucky..." he finished, but Crow ignored him

“I divided us in half, my squad did the job flawlessly. I let four people go alone, hoping for some competence on their part, but no! We immediately have casualties.”

"I would like to point out that a member of your team was the casualty" said Ex-Captain, who was already starting to recover from the effects of the drugs.

“Oh, you can be sure I have that in mind, Biel. Speaking of… ”Her tone changed to even more sinister, if that was possible. “Tawny, Tanager, and Biel, you're staying. Everyone else, leave.” Crow said and the team left, although it made them want to stay in the room now, even though 5 minutes earlier they only dreamed of leaving.

At this point, even Lukier did not feel like talking to his friends, so he sat down alone at the loser table and ate some twice reheated pizza from two days ago. After a while, Rigel sat down next to him and sighed. Lukier ignored him. Rigel sighed louder.

“If you want to say something just say it” Lukier finally said irritated, because it was starting to get very strange and awkward.

“Uhh, it's just that it’s usually you who starts the conversation so I thought… nevermind. Do you feel like shit too, even though technically we didn't get in trouble? in the sense of me and you?”

“Take a guess”

There was a moment of silence, then Rigel continued.

“I knew her for two days, but it was a knife to the heart anyway.”

“Well, it sucks that the pink-haired girl died, but to be honest, I'm more worried about the future of the living part of the team. Normally, when we fail something, they cut our paycheck, we lose respect from the command and other teams and it’s our loss. But since Crow is here I feel like she blames us, like we’re being bad on purpose, you know? I'm worried about the three that stuck with her.”

"Hey, at least they're still alive, everything can change, and Rosalinda… damn, Lukier, you've been in a situation like me twice, you should understand me."

“Will people ever stop reminding me about this? You can see I’m feeling like a crumpled piece of paper anyway, do you have to pull out some shit that happened to me in the past?” Lukier was pissed off because he didn't like being reminded that his two girlfriends had died on a cave mission and pissed Lukier was a new phenomenon for Rigel, so he decided not to test his patience in this state, he just said "sorry" and went to pour his heart out to someone else.

Meanwhile, Crow was interrogating Tawny, Tanager and Ex-Captain Biel.

"Biel described the situation to me on the radio, but I want to know your versions," Crow said "Tanager, what happened after you decided to search the area?"

“We split up and went in four different directions, because there were four of us. I went to the left of the tree under which we were standing. Left in the sense of how you look at it from the side from which we were walking at the beginning. And that path led to an open space with rocks and trees, but less densely arranged, because as I said it was open, right? And there was a feather, this one…” Tanager showed the feather he had found “and there was a griffin walking on the rocks, so I went back to tell my friends there was a griffin” Tawny and Biel were getting stressed because Tanager was getting to the part where they argued with Rosalinda. A part that Biel comfortably skipped for obvious reasons, but no one expected an interrogation and they had no official version of the story, and Tanager might not have been smart enough to realize the consequences of revealing that piece of the story.

“When I came back everyone said what they found, and it turned out that only I found something worth paying attention to. But Rosalinda said that only she and Tawny were fit for approaching the griffin…”

“Was that our griffin?” Crow interrupted, finally finding some inaccuracy

"No, this one was red." Tawny said quickly, hoping Tanager had enough brains to keep from mentioning his disqualifying ailment.

“I'm not asking you. Tanager, why would you go up to the griffin if it wasn't our griffin?”

"Captain Biel told us to" Tanager said truthfully, condemning Ex-Captain to Crow's wrath

“Biel, is that true?”

"Yes," said Biel without thinking so he wouldn’t look suspicious as he considered a simple answer, then there was a silence more awkward than it would have been if he was wondering before answering "yes"

“Explain yourself then.”

“Rosalinda did not trust Tanager's competence, she wanted to make sure what the griffin was, so I told someone to check it.”

“Tanager, is that true?” Crow asked.

“True”.

“Tawny?”

“Exactly. The two of us went there, because four is too much, and it would be dangerous to go alone too. The griffin was hiding, jumped at Rosalinda from behind a rock like a cat.” Tawny wasn’t looking stressed anymore, now he looked as if he was remembering a traumatic event that had been forced out of his mind. “It broke her neck right away, there was nothingI could do so I hid while the monster was busy. And I waited. Until it finally flew away. It didn't even cross my mind to contact the team, I was shocked. And then Tanager came.”

Crow looked into the eyes of all three of them.

“You're free. I have my suspicions, but for now I will keep them to myself.”

All four of them, including Crow, left the room. She was watching them. Then Ex-Captain went to look for Lukier who was only waiting outside of his room because of him.

“Finally! What did she want from you?” Lukier asked when he saw Ex-Captain

“She wanted Tawny and Tanager to confirm my version of the story. I think he suspects I had something to do with the death of that pink girl.”

“But you didn't, did you?” 

“Lukier, please”

“Okay, okay, sorry. I just want to know where we stand.”

"In deep shit" Ex-Captain replied with a poetic metaphor “but I think I have a plan”

“What's your plan?” Asked Lukier who already thought their team couldn’t be saved

“I just need to defeat Crow in a duel for the rank and we’ll be good”

“But... How do you want to do it Cap- I mean... Biel? After all, she kicked your ass last time you wanted to beat her” Lukier was starting to think Ex-Captain was losing his mind.

“I know. It means I have to ask for help and train hard to finally be able to beat Crow.”

“Who are you going to ask for help?”

“The only person who can beat Crow, that is herself.” Ex-Captain said it with such determination it sounded like the fate of the world depended on it, but Lukier at that moment began to worry more because he could already see how Ex-Captain would embarrass himself in the eyes of the new captain and the whole team would get in trouble again. He was about to stop him, but Captain had already gone to his old room which was now Crow's room.

He entered the room as if nothing had happened and saw that Crow was talking to Melisanda and he interrupted something important, and then he realized that it was not his room anymore and it was inappropriate to barge in like that. So he apologized and closed the door and knocked and waited for the new Captain to let him in. Crow apologized to Melisanda and hung up, then opened the door for Ex-Captain.

“What do you want, Biel” Crow said irritatedly as if it wasn't a question but it was a question

"Uhh I just wanted to say I'm sorry about your teammate being half eaten by a griffin."

“Go bother someone else” Crow said harshly

“No but I really am sorry. I didn't know her but during the several hours she was a member of our team, I managed to become attached to her and so on…”

“Give it up, I can see that you're just trying to kiss my ass. Either get to the point or I'll take Frezja in your place for my next mission and state in the report that you're unable to follow orders”

“Okay, I admit that I was trying to kiss your ass, but I respect that you prefer getting to the point” Ex-Captain thought that in this case he could say what he really thought because if Crow dislikes him for it, he cannot be disliked more than he is disliked, so it doesn’t matter

“It's about my rank that you took from me, can we talk about it?”

“What else is there to say?” she asked irritated

“Well you see, I have a few questions about my team and your team and our future…” Ex-Captain now crammed into his old room passing Crow and sat down on a cool bean bag chair that he used to like to sit on but now he can't because it's not his room. Crow closed the door and stood over him as if his behavior disturbed her, because who wouldn’t be disturbed by that.

“We all know that you were sent here to fix our team and my incompetence and so on, do you know how long you will stay in this position in this region? I mean, not that I do not miss my old captain's room with a nice view of the city from the window and the team's respect…” Ex-Captain was shamelessly lying but surprisingly it wasn’t visible “I just wonder how it looks from your perspective, you know, you've probably been moved from some good squad just to end up at the end of the food chain with us…”

"I'm here to make this team a decent group that qualifies for the job they are supposed to do, and I'll be here for as long as needed. If you think you will get rid of me with some cheap emotional manipulation about statistics in the headquarters, you are very wrong”

“So it means that if this team improves there is a chance that maybe you will give me my captaincy back and go home, right?”

“If the boss decides to move me back to my original base after successfully fixing this team, you most likely won't regain your rank, Biel. You acted like an idiot at the meeting and showed that you were in charge of a bunch of idiots. If anything, he’ll most likely assign you a new captain again”

“What if I prove that I’m a good captain”

“You're not capable of that”

“What if I defeat you in a rematch of our duel?”

“You're even more incapable of that”

“Then teach me”

Crow started to laugh at Ex-Captain and it was probably the only and probably the last time when she laughed because her default emotion is anger. Then she stopped laughing because Ex-Captain wasn’t laughing because he was totally serious.

“Really, seriously?” Crow asked and Ex-Captain said nothing 

“Okay, then if you want a rematch, get up and fight.”

“Oh, but here? Now?” Ex-Captain was a bit surprised because during the whole conversation he didn't know what he was doing and he didn’t think his improvised plan would work, but here we are. After a moment of uncertainty, Captain stood up and swung at Crow, but Crow grabbed his hand and threw him across the room like a sack of potatoes.

“assume that's enough. Don't come here anymore” Crow added, dusting her hands and turning on Melisanda's screen again and Melisanda was a bit confused when she saw Ex-Captain lying on the ground in the background, looking like he didn't have the strength to get up.

“What the hell happened there, Captain?” Melisanda asked, frightened

“Nothing, he was just leaving” Crow said grimly while Ex-Captain barely got up and moaned something like "you didn't have to be so rough, jeez" which without context probably sounded strange for Melisanda.

“All right Captain Crow, if you say so...”

“So, continue with the order from earlier”

“The monster you will be hunting only comes out at night so you have to wait for the night for it to come out of the hideout. And it likes shiny things so, I don’t know, wrap some meat in glittery paper and it will probably come to you.”

“Understood, I know what we're going to do” Crow said and hung up and went to tell the team they were going on a mission at night so if someone wanted to sleep now would be the best time to do it. She also checked the med bay where she thought she would find Ex-Captain and she was right.

“Did he break anything?” Crow asked Frezja

“No, but what exactly happened?”

“I fell down the stairs” Ex-Captain interrupted, rolling his eyes, and Frezja knew he was lying because there were no stairs in the base.

“Due to the fact that you’re beaten up, you may stay at the base tonight.” Crow said

"Shut up, I’m going on the mission tonight," offended Ex-Captain said.

“Then I’ll see you in the flyer tonight, but if you start acting like you did earlier during the mission…”

“I won’t start anything,” Biel replied and Crow left the med bay without a word. Frezja kind of wanted to ask what was up but she could see Biel wasn’t in the mood so she decided to bring it up later.