After sitting around the tent city of Phoenix for a couple of days I came to an agreement with the people I had run into earlier in the week. The Cyber Knight and Warrior Woman (Atlantean) both had missing kin in the wastes of Vampire infested Mexico. I agreed to help them mount a search in return they would help me get back in contact with my people. The Dragon and Fairy looked like they were going to tag along no matter how hard I ignored them. If they were going to be following us I might as well use their abilities to increase our chances of success. I started planning out a mission against the Coalition States to acquire the supplies that we would need for an extended mission into an extreme hostile area. While planning the raid the Cyber Knight occasionally returned from the settlement to give updates or I think just to make sure we have not run off and abandoned him here. He seems a little more self-conscience every time I see him. He also seems to have a knack for attracting strays. The last couple of times he came back to camp he had some other guy following him like a lost puppy. This new guy was supposed to be some kind of medic but how well do we really know what he is about. Even with all of the distractions including giving some of the Iron wood stakes to the town guards and selling the rest, I have completed a basic plan. I inform the group of the initial plans to get to within striking range of the Coalition. Everyone agreed so I began building a “Basket” from a cut down wagon frame to hold the people that cannot fly or travel fast. Surprisingly the Dragon has agreed to carry the basket that will hold some of the group. The initial journey is tough, we are to leave Phoenix just as it gets light and fly over the remains of New Mexico and just into the north Texas border before night fall of the same day. I hope the presence of the Dragon keeps most nosy creatures away.

Starting out the morning of the mission everything proceeded well. There were no issues with the Dragons capability to carry the wagon and the route was basically clear as I scouted slightly ahead in my Power Armor. Before we reached mid-day an almost crises evolved when a much larger and obvious older Dragon crossed paths with us. Thankfully, after his curiosity was satisfied he flew off leaving us to continue our journey. Personally I believe it was a close thing and he just could not guarantee winning a fight against us. The rest of the journey was uneventful. After making camp that evening I begin the initial recon of the area for isolated Coalition bases to raid in the state of Lone Star. Mid way through the night I located a SAMAS refueling depot and small base. After a through recon of the bases from multiple sides I realized it had only a skeleton garrison that was unwatchful and ill prepared for any sort of attack. Even the buildings looked unfortified and vulnerable, only five main turrets were of any threat and only two had the ability to fire into the compound. If I could take out the two turrets that were able to fire into the compound then we would only need to worry about small arms fire from the waking garrison. After an hour of learning everything I could I returned to the camp and informed the group that it was now or never and unveiled the rest of the plan.

We would assault the compound in a lightening raid and make off with an APC Mark V. Thus we would have a mobile defensive compound to explore the Mexican waste. Everyone was eager and ready for the raid. It took only an hour to return to the enemy compound making it around 3:00 AM. The Dragon would carry the Cyber Knight, Atlantean and medic so they could close the distance at the Dragons flight speed and the fairy would join them. I would lay down suppressive fire from 2000 feet away and destroy the enemy turrets facing into the compound. The attack proceeded even better than I had anticipated. The Dragon was able to get within 500 feet of the perimeter before a turret even began to move and I promptly destroyed that turret and the remaining turrets capable of firing into the compound. The alarm had not even sounded yet and the enemy turrets were destroyed and the initial team was in the compound running to secure the transport. I initiated radio jamming against the compound. Barely 15 seconds had gone by and we were already in the compound facing minimal resistance. The Cyber Knight and Medic began to secure the transport, the Dragon went after anything that was moving, the fairy (god only knows what the fairy was doing), and the Atlantean was casting spells at all of the doors in the barracks, I was informed that the Spells being cast would turned the floor into a super type of fly paper that was impossible to become unstuck from, thus trapping most of the garrison in the barracks. The alarm finally began to wail. Meanwhile I was closing the distance to the compound to help capture the transport. 30 Seconds have gone by and still no significant resistance. I reached the compound after sprinting across the open ground outside the compound and come under rail gun fire. I returned fire eliminating the trooper, using my suits external loud speakers, I command the other gunners to run. Unfortunately it took another Trooper dying before the other two broke and ran. I was here to capture equipment not kill enemy soldiers. We have now secured the interior of the compound and only the occasional shot now comes at us. There is tremendous screaming and cursing coming from the barracks but I have been informed the magic should hold for at least ten minutes so I am unconcerned. It has been 45 seconds and the only opposition comes from the garage but the weapons fire is in the garage and not out into the compound. I take a quick estimate of the interior of the compound and there are three Mark V APCs and eight SAMAS power armor suits waiting for pilots to board. The Atlanteans magic has prevented the pilots from reaching their armor and tied up the garrison forces in the barracks where they are ineffective in fighting us. The Cyber Knight was able to gain access to two of the Mark V APCs when the night was lit up by an explosion from the garage that leveled all three garage hangers and the Admin building throwing debris across the compound. My system began to warn of radiation contamination. Some fool detonated a micro nuke in the garage. The explosion ends up helping us as much as hindering us. The dragon teleports away freaked out by the explosion and the medic panics and jumps into one of the secured APCs and begins to leave as well. The Atlantean, Cyber Knight and I are in Techno Wizard, Environment Armor, or Power Armor and are able to ignore temporarily the radiation. This allows us the time needed to acquire the SAMAS armor. All fighting has stopped allowing us to mount up in all three APCs and capture the available SAMAS suits. The Cyber Knight pilots one APC the Medic pilots another and using my psionic abilities I am able to gain access to the third APC. The SAMAS are quickly loaded into the third APC and we drive off in fits and starts as the Medic and Cyber Knight get used to the controls. It has been just under three minutes from the time the raid began until we were driving out of the compound. I am counting on the micro nuke and confusion to delay any sort of pursuit until we have placed significant distance between ourselves and the Coalition. Within five minutes we return to the linkup point and pick up the Dragon and head south west at best possible speed. Ten minutes have passed since the raid began and we are four miles away and opening distance at an almost reckless pace to out run any pursuit. As first light hits it has been three hours and we are almost 150 miles away and still no sign of pursuit. I can only deduce that the micro nuke truly confused issues at the compound. The response units must have been unable to gather information fast enough to determine what happened and still launch a viable search for us. At this point I believe any viable pursuit is almost impossible. We continued to head back to Phoenix along a route already scouted and away from any settlements or prying eyes.

Even cross country we average 50 miles an hour and it is mid-day when we finally arrive back in Phoenix and create a stir. We have been gone for just over 36 hours on a mission that we planned on taking two weeks to a month to complete. The Cyber Knight keeps everyone calm and no incidents occur. The Cyber Knight and others go off to do whatever they do and I look through the equipment on the APCs. It immediately becomes apparent that they were using the APCs as supply transports, training and storage vehicles. I decide to bank a mega amount of good will with Phoenix and give a Platoons worth of armor and weapons to the settlement along with the ability to recharge the weapons. This is about all of the armor and basic weapons that are on board the vehicles. I also give very basic training to one brilliant individual on how to operate Power Armor along with the manuals that he will need. I leave one SAMAS suit with him but with the jet pack removed. The major and town sheriff are greatly indebted to us for the gifts. I also end up having a long talk with the Techno wizard and I strike a deal that he will improve our vehicle/Armor/Weapons with magic in exchange we will pay him with one fully armed and operational Mark V APC. He agrees but states we need to go to Arzno where he has a garage and contacts to make the improvements. I inform the Techno Wizard we only have a maximum of a month to spare before we must head into the Mexican wastes and he agrees all improvements can be accomplished in that timeframe. As a group we agree and head to Arzno along the great trade route. He also agrees to teach me the basics of Techno wizardry and magic knowledge. I begin to understand the capabilities that magic can give to technology and how to apply magic to a modern battlefield. I make it part of my goals to learn as much about magic spell knowledge and how to apply it as possible. The Atlantean has already described almost a hundred spell varieties and what they do, I can only imagine what other capabilities magic has.