After a lovely 3 weeks of blissful leave in Australia, 6 members of SST 4 received orders to report to an RAAF base in NW Australia near a town called Broome. When they got their, they saw it was a very small, very quiet place with few buildings; some basic landing fields and runways; a squadron or two of mostly patrol planes with some Flying Boats anchored in the ocean just off the base and a surprising number of Anti-Aircraft guns. The members of Special Services Team 4 quickly learned that Broome had been hit by several Japanese Air Raids; including a devastating one back in March.
The 7 members of SST 4 were directed to a small, but story and well protected building off from the rest of the base and they were not surprised to find Commander Marsden waiting for them. Soon, they were gathered in a spacious room around a large table with files packed with papers in front of them along with a newcomer in the uniform of the Australian Army.
Marsden introduced the newcomer as Corporal Harmon Allan; a kindly, nervous looking balding man with glasses who looked to be in his late 30s or early 40s and appeared to be DECIDEDLY non military in his demeanor. Allan rather shyly greeted the team and told them they could call him 'Hal'. Acme and Dutch quickly shot looks to the Commander and he coughed and explained that 'Hal' was indeed a graduate of Hells Motel....though by'by the skin of his teeth', which Hal just ruefully grinned and nodded his head in agreement at the assessment.
Marsden explained that Allan had developed his Talent Powers during the great Air Raid at Port Darwin back in February; he had the ability to move things with his mind (Telekinesis) but more importantly, he could understand any language heard and he could hear from a pretty far distance. It was this latter ability that had brought him to the Team for this mission. However, before the details of that mission was launched into, some news and awards were to be shared....
First, the news from the 'Canal was mostly positive....that massive battle that had been brewing right before SST 4 had been relieved and a massive Japanese effort had been stopped with major battles on the land, air and in the sea; ALL of which had been U.S. victories; though somewhat costly. On the land; the Marines and a newly arrived U.S. Army unit; the 'Americal' Regiment had stopped the IJA assault; with SST 7 defeating an IJA Unit 781 detachment of Talents and a Marine Sergeant named Basilone apparently mowing down dozens of Soldiers with a Machine-gun almost single handedly in vicious close-quarters night fighting; winning the Medal of Honor.
In the skies; the rag tag planes of the Cactus Air Force had done TREMENDOUS service with several notable Aces emerging form the ranks including Marine Pilots Marion Carl and Joe Foss....
At sea, after several Aircraft Carriers on both sides were sunk or badly damaged; and it looked like it would be down to old-school, ship to ship slugfests for awhile....
Next, came the awards and promotions. All members of SST 4 were awarded the Silver Star for valor at the Battle of Edson's Ridge; save Pharmacist's Mate Carl 'Doc' Franklin who was awarded the Navy Cross (second highest honor a sailor can receive) for his actions showing 'utter disregard for his own safety while ensuring his teammates survived the battle at great personal risk'; an award that humbled 'Doc' and left him with some suspicious eye blinking and 'watering'.....
Everyone was also 'awarded' with the Purple Heart; as every member of the Team had been wounded in action. Finally, several members were promoted, including Marvin Acme to 1st Lieutenant; Fred Roker to Radioman 1st Class, Roger Myers to Corporal, Elias Tucker to Radarman 2nd Class and Doc Franklin to Pharmacist's Mate 2nd Class.
After all the hand shaking and back slapping and congratulations and smiles and jokes; Marsden cleared his throat and everyone got quiet as the new mission was outlined....
The Commander spoke about how 'special intelligence' reported that a rare meeting between German Talents (a unit of SS known as the 'Ubermenschen' or 'Super Men') and Japanese Talents of Unit 781 was going to take place in just a couple of days at a report island in the Eastern Indian Ocean known as Allarion Island. The Germans would be arriving on the Auxiliary Raider Cruiser (Merchantmen that had disguised guns, torpedo tubes and other means of attacking liners, freighters and tankers) Tyr; while the Japanese would probably be arriving by Seaplane.
Allarion Island was a small island, just a couple miles by couple miles in size and had nothing and no-one on it that anyone knew of. With this report; it was now believed that the Japanese probably built a small base installation on it; presumably near the deep water cove that would be the most likely place for the German ship to drop anchor at along with the Seaplanes to land on. The island was about 200 miles almost due West of Jakarta and about 1200 miles North West from Broome in the Indian Ocean....making getting there, a bit tricky....
It was just about at the limit of a PBY Catalina Seaplane's radius range (so that it could still come back); so the plan would be for the members of SST 4; along with Hal; to take the long, 12 hour flight from Broome....land off the coast of the island's Eastern side (the cove where the base and German ship will drop anchor are on the Western Side); and use a couple of inflatable rafts to paddle to the island. Once there, they would traverse the island's interior (mostly jungle covered hills), and then stealthily get close enough to the base to hopefully learn what the Axis meeting was all about. Hal's hearing/translating had a range of about 200 yards and even if he couldn't use his Talent Power, he was fluent in Japanese and was decent in German; as was Dutch Van Horn.
At this point, it would be Acme's Tactical command decision if any further action needed to be taken. The primary goal was to learn why the hell the meeting was taking place as the two Axis partners to date had NO known coordination of Talent Groups or Operations and the Allies certainly wanted THAT to continue....
Among the equipment available were the mostly by now standard weapon options of 3 M1 Garand Rifles; 2 M1 Carbines, a BAR, an SMLE, and a 1903 Springfield with Scope along with 5 Colt 1911 .45 pistols and 3 S&W .45 Revolvers. There WAS one new weapon option though; a slight re-worked Thompson SMG; an M1A1 model. The bolt had moved from the top to the side; the compensator had been removed and it no longer had either a 50 round drum or a 20 round stick magazine; but just a 30 round stick magazine. In addition, Roker would be assigned his TBY Mobile Radio, to use to call for extraction by PBY at night......
