Location
Larak Naval Station · under attack
Mosquito Fleet · Mission 12 (Variant 12A) · Larak Naval Station · under attack
URGENT — IMMEDIATE TASKING — 04:47 LOCAL Captain R. Tahami, Boghammar-7. Larak Naval Station is under air attack. Multiple inbound hellfire vectors from MH-60s operating from CVN-78 strike group. A medical evacuation vessel is departing the south quay with civilian dock workers and Faezeh Mohebbi (Univ. of Hormozgan, marine biology). She came to find you. Keep her alive for ninety seconds. — Cmdr. M. Alavi (last transmission · station fire)
Cockpit and net traffic recorded during the operation, timestamped from mission start.
Larak Island lies inside the Strait of Hormuz off the larger island of Qeshm, near Bandar Abbas, and hosts an IRGC Navy presence that helps anchor Iranian control of the chokepoint. During the Tanker War of the 1980s, Larak served as an oil-transfer and shuttle terminus after Iran's more exposed Kharg Island facilities came under repeated Iraqi air attack, making it a hub of the very tanker traffic the war was fought over.
Its position — deep inside Iranian-controlled waters yet within minutes of the main shipping lanes — makes it a natural base for the fast boats, missile batteries and small craft that give the IRGCN its reach across the strait. Islands like Larak, Abu Musa, Qeshm and Hormuz form a chain of effectively unsinkable platforms from which Iran can watch, harass and, if it chose, attempt to close the waterway. In the campaign's fiction the island becomes a final position; in reality it is one node in a dense, layered coastal defense.
A scene from the campaign's narrative, shown after a successful run. Mild spoilers.
The desk in Tehran is in a corner office without a window. There is a small framed photograph of Faezeh on the credenza. There is a medal in a velvet box that Reza has not opened in three months.
The phone rings sometimes. Someone who used to be his cousin Hossein calls every other Friday. They talk about football. They never talk about Larak.
Faezeh is in Tehran now. She has a position at a research institute that does not require her to know what her husband does in his corner office. They do not have children yet. The doctor said it would be a while, with the stress.
There are no boats here. The strait is somewhere else, going on without him.
Yusef sent one letter, three months after Larak. The postmark was Bandar Lengeh. It said:
> Captain. I am fishing here now. The water is the same. > I am too old for what came after Larak. I do not blame > you. I do not forgive you, either, because there is > nothing to forgive. You did what they told you to do. > So did I, for forty years. > Stay well, Captain. > — Y.
Reza has read the letter forty-six times.
The desk has a window-blind with a small slat that catches on the cord when you raise it. Reza lowers it every evening at six o'clock and raises it every morning at seven. The slat catches both times. He has not asked maintenance to fix it.
The medal stays in the velvet box.