Rainbow Six 3: Athena Sword Diaries Part Two

This is my ongoing exploration of Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six series, played in release order, where I will chronicle my playthrough like a text-based Let’s Play. This time I continue Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six 3: Athena Sword Diaries.

After two missions and one dead RAINBOW, things were off to a bit of a shaky start in Europe…

Remaining in Italy, Operation: Jasper Heart saw us heading to Palermo, Sicily, on 29th June 2007, two weeks after the previous Operation. Terrorists were using a warehouse to store chemical weapons, and the local police & Interpol had already been repulsed. Of course, this included taking some of them hostage. As the previous mission’s terrorists had ties to Nikola Gospic, whom we took out in Operation: Steel Rose, so the assumption was that this was all related. John Sweeney had sent someone to speak to Gospic’s jailed conspirator Alvaro Gutierrez, who had been laughed out of the room. Sweeney also used the saying “by and by” to mean “by the way”, which is not how that idiom works…

The green square is going to be busy

Deploying in three squads, I led Red squad to the left. We met limited resistance, though whether it was due to luck or the barrage of bullet fire I could hear in the distance I couldn’t say. After shooting some guy in the back, I was fired upon - luckily being missed in favour of the metal sheet covering the fence between my would-be murderer and I. After shooting him, I met up with one of the other squads and gave the go-code.

Gold squad confirmed that they had multiple hostages, even before I shot a guy, entered a room and shot another one. Grabbing the hostage, and seeing a nerve gas canister in the adjoining room, we went for the extraction point. As we reached it, I realised that Green squad had - once again - not gone on the go-code. I had given another go-code before grabbing my hostage, which Gold squad had responded to, so I had no idea what their issue was.

They also had this worrying laptop

As a result, Gold squad eventually joined me, and we stood around waiting for Green squad. I can only assume that they finished off the last of the terrorists, because the mission ended successfully before Green squad was anywhere near me. Mission success in 6:30, with 31 dead terrorists and one wounded RAINBOW. Andy Burke, of Gold squad, had killed eight terrorists, and helped rescue three hostages with only one person as backup (who killed five enemies). Definitely MVP.

And so we headed north to Monaco, where the owner of the warehouse was participating in a hostage situation in Montecarlo. Sure, it was now 6th July 2007, so we’d had a couple of weeks off, but man it took ages to find the guy…

Operation: Omega Shadow had us heading into the Hotel D’Erlette. The local gendarmes had attempted to arrest the man, but his bodyguards took umbrage and opened fire. We were to clear rooms, rescue hostages, and capture the man. Sweeney gave me the man’s name, halfway down his briefing: Riccardo Miccini. He also used another idiom, but at least “neither here nor there” was the correct usage.

Obviously I had more work to do on this one...

We deployed in the lobby of the admittedly small hotel, and I led Red squad right whilst Green squad banked left. Before I had reached the first closed door there was a terrorist to shoot, and the darkness of the Summer early evening meant that everything was in shadow. Entering the laundry room, I went to the right and shot another man before grabbing a hostage and leading the way out of the laundry room. We went past an elevator trying to close on a corpse’s leg before heading upstairs. After waiting for Green squad, I called the go-code and we went up to shoot a couple of men, then banked to the right to grab a second hostage.

Doubling back on ourselves, we waited once more for Green squad before heading through a corridor and into the main dining hall. There were a bunch of men there, but I managed to shoot them all without incident. Except for one. He threw a grenade before I got my sights on him, and I ran. My men were further back, but the two hostages were right behind me. The grenade went off, killing one of the hostages. Mission failure in 4:11, 12 “bodyguards” dead, one hostage dead.

We redeployed, and things went the same as before. The first and second hostages were grabbed safely, and we cleared the room without any grenades going off. Heading out of the dining hall, we met one guy laid down with a sniper rifle, before reaching the next go-code. Green squad were waiting, so I called it as I opened the door. There were half a dozen men there, and I managed to shoot them all - including the one who threw a grenade, killing all of my squadmates…

And yet this guy didn't harm anyone

Green squad casually arrived at the second doors into the main stairway, a short distance from me. They had been waiting for a go-code that I had already called. Where they now stood was where they should have been a few deaths ago…

I called the go-code and marched upstairs. Shooting the three or four men who tried to stop me, I was soon face-to-face with Miccini in his ensuite bathroom who promptly surrendered. Mission success in 7:33, with 32 “bodyguards” dead, and three RAINBOWs also dead. Clearly, this wouldn’t stand, so I redeployed.

This time, I paid a bit more attention to Green squad, making sure they moved when they were supposed to. Things went very well this time, though the first two batches of enemies were grouped together, rather than spread apart. We reached the main stairway, which actually turned out to be the main entrance, without any injuries or casualties, and made our way upstairs. We split up, and Green squad shot the one man on my side of the stairs.

Following the hallway around at the top of the stairs, I shot three men and waited. And waited. See, there was a go-code, and no sign of Green squad. I waited so long that it actually turned out that they went and dropped off their bloody hostage! With that, I decided to tell myself to go, and went in guns blazing. We shot a handful of men, then one in Miccini’s bedroom, before capturing him in the bathroom.

I hope he was worth the trouble

Mission success in 7:54, with 32 “bodyguards” dead, and all RAINBOWs completely fine. We had time to relax, as Operation: Proud Flag wouldn’t occur for almost two weeks, so we put our feet up and dreamed of what was to come in Croatia…