We've Been Surrounded

"Captain! We... we're surrounded!!"

The room, which had just regained a little warmth and life from a bowl of hot soup after surviving disaster, instantly froze over again.

The Howling Commandos veterans, who had been bragging and joking about how black bread could be used as bricks just moments ago, all froze as though someone had hit pause.

Dugan stood there holding his canteen, mouth open, forgetting to drink.

Denier had his cheeks puffed out as he chewed jerky, forgetting to swallow.

Surrounded.

On the battlefield, those three words were practically a death warrant from the King of Hell.

Especially in this godforsaken snowy mountain range, with supplies cut off, ammunition running low, enemies several times their number outside, and those unreasonable metal monsters called tanks...

This was no longer one foot in the coffin.

Their whole bodies were already lying inside, just waiting for those Hydra bastards to come nail the lid shut.

"What are you panicking for?! Stand up straight, all of you!"

A steady, low shout rang out like thunder, forcibly tearing through the suffocating silence.

It was Steve Rogers.

Captain America!

At some point, he had already moved to the center of the room.

His blue combat uniform seemed to carry its own holy glow beneath the dim firelight, instantly becoming everyone's anchor.

Damn it, the captain really knows how to make an entrance... Chu Hang silently complained from the corner, where he was pretending to be half-dead against the wall.

To be fair, he had that American spiritual leader aura down perfectly. If this were the future, he would have been a top idol. One wave of his arm, and fans would line up from New York to Los Angeles.

Steve strode over to Jones, who was nearly collapsing to the floor. His broad hand firmly gripped Jones's shoulder, and those eyes bluer than the sky stared straight into his as he asked, clearly and forcefully, word by word:

"Jones, look at me. Take a deep breath. Now tell me: how many enemies are there? What equipment do they have? Where exactly are they?"

His voice was not loud, yet it carried an undeniable power. Jones's body, trembling violently with fear, miraculously began to calm.

"Reporting, Captain!" He suddenly straightened up, as though courage had been pumped back into him. "I... I saw them! At least two fully staffed battalions! There are Tiger Tank tracks in the snow, more than one! And... and those blue energy weapons of theirs! Their encirclement stretches from the eastern valley to the western cliff, blocking every route down the mountain!"

Two battalions!

Tiger Tanks!

Hydra Energy Weapons!

Every word was like an icy hammer smashing into everyone's hearts.

"Fuck!" Dugan, with his distinctive little mustache, had lost the roguish grin that usually hung on his face. It was now utterly grim.

With a crunch, he crushed the empty can in his hand into a twisted lump and cursed under his breath, "Have those Hydra scumbags gone insane? They pulled over all the mobile forces in the entire mountain region? Just for a dozen of us? That's hilarious. Since when were we worth this much?"

"Heh, not us."

A lazy voice tinged with mockery came from the shadowed corner.

Everyone looked over and saw that Logan, the man who radiated a beastly presence, had somehow risen to his feet. He pressed the half-smoked cigar against the rough wall to put it out, then carefully slipped it back into his jacket pocket as though it were treasure.

Then he strolled to the window, lifted one corner of the ragged curtain with his fingertips, and narrowed his sharp eyes as he glanced outside.

"They're after those two treasures."

Logan jerked his chin toward Steve in the center of the room and the "sickly" Chu Hang in the corner.

"One living Captain America, the nation's spiritual icon, the sole finished product of the Super-Soldier Program." A cruel curve formed at the corner of his mouth. "And another freakish monster who can conjure energy cannons out of thin air and blow their entire base to the sky."

He glanced at Chu Hang, his eyes carrying a hint of scrutiny. "Kid, your head is worth far more than the captain's. Do you think they'll let us leave?"

His words were blunt and unpleasant, but they were the bloody truth.

The air in the room froze again.

That was right.

What did their squad have?

They had Captain America, a living legend.

And Chu Hang... that mysterious existence who, in everyone's eyes, was so weak he looked as though he might drop dead at any moment.

As long as Hydra had not been kicked in the head by a mule, they would spare no effort to keep them all in this snowfield forever.

"Falsworth, count every remaining bullet and explosive we have. Down to the last round."

"Dugan, bring me the map. Now!"

Steve's voice rang out for the third time.

It was still so calm, so steady. As though it was not them surrounded by several battalions of Hydra elites, but the poor bastards down the mountain.

He completely ignored the despair that would have crushed an ordinary person's mind and began issuing orders in an orderly fashion, organizing this nearly impossible breakout.

Before long, the inventory results came in, cold and cruel.

"Captain..." Falsworth's voice was thick with bitterness. "The situation is bad. On average, each man has fewer than three magazines left. We have eight grenades total. As for C4, all of us combined have... less than one kilogram remaining."

With that little equipment, forget facing two Hydra battalions head-on.

One probing charge from them would probably wipe out their pitiful firepower completely.

Yet after hearing the report, Steve merely nodded calmly. There was not even a hint of disappointment on his face. He took the messy military map from Dugan and spread it across the only relatively intact wooden table in the room.

It was a simple contour map, marked with red and blue pencil notes containing the reconnaissance information they had gathered along the way.

Steve's finger moved slowly across the map like a calm hawk, examining every ridge and ravine.

At last, his fingertip landed heavily on a spot in the northwest corner of the map.

There was a symbol there marking an extremely dangerous, steep cliff.

"Here." He pointed at the spot, his voice resolute. "This is the only gap in their encirclement."

"My God, Captain, that's a cliff!" Dugan immediately leaned in, his face plainly saying, You can't be serious. "I scouted it during the day. It's at least three hundred meters high, and the bottom is covered in sharp rocks! If you fall, there won't even be a whole body left. We can't get down there!"

"I know." Steve's gaze remained fixed on that point. "But precisely because we can't get down there, it must also be the weakest point in their entire encirclement!"

"We have no choice." He suddenly raised his head and swept his gaze across every member of the room.

In those azure eyes, it was as though two eternal flames burned fiercely.

"There are only two paths before us. Either we crouch here like lambs waiting for slaughter and let Hydra's tanks grind us into pulp! Or we act like real soldiers, charge out ourselves, and carve a bloody path through the place they least expect!"

"I choose the latter."

"What about you?"

After a brief silence...

"Fuck them!" Logan was the first to grin, his smile full of wild, bloodthirsty delight.

With a swish, he drew a sharp hunting knife from his military boot and spun it deftly between his fingers. "My hands have been itching for a long time. Perfect chance to sharpen my claws on those bastards' bones!"

"We're with you, Captain!"

"Let's fight them! Even if we die, we'll take a few of them with us!"

Steve and Logan's reckless ferocity completely ignited the Howling Commandos. Fighting spirit flared back to life in their eyes.

They were all veterans who had crawled out of piles of corpses. They feared death, but they feared dying like cowards even more.

Since death was waiting either way, they might as well go out in a blaze of glory!

"Good." Steve nodded in satisfaction.

Then he turned and walked over to Chu Hang, who had remained silent from beginning to end, merely leaning against the wall and breathing heavily.

"Chu." Steve stopped before him and slowly crouched down. His voice became low and gentle, as though afraid of disturbing this fragile "delicate object." "I know you're very weak right now. You've exhausted too much energy. You don't need to take part in the breakout. I just need you... to do us one last favor."

Chu Hang slowly lifted his eyelids and looked into Steve's eyes, filled with trust and expectation.

Damn...

For some reason, Chu Hang felt a little uncomfortable inside.

This old popsicle is too good at this, isn't he? That look, that tone... It's making me feel a little embarrassed to keep acting.

But the first rule of being a transmigrator was this: never break character.

If he was acting, he had to see it through!

"Help me listen."

"I need you to be this squad's eyes and ears. I can tell that, like me, you possess extraordinary abilities. Your senses are far sharper than those of ordinary people."

Chu Hang looked at Steve's sincere face, nodded weakly, and said in a voice so hoarse it seemed ready to give out, "I... I'll do my best."

After saying that, he slowly closed his eyes and let his head fall limply against the wall.

This time, he was not pretending.

He truly poured every last trace of his mental power into his ears.

He glanced at the sky outside the window, which had already gone completely dark. His voice was as cold as ancient ice.

"We move after nightfall."

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