1970: Anglo-Irish mercenary Carlo Alfred Thomas "Cat" Shannon and his four fellow mercenaries – German ex-smuggler Kurt Semmler, South African mortar expert Janni Dupree, Belgian bazooka specialist "Tiny" Marc Vlaminck, and Corsican knife-fighter Jean-Baptiste Langarotti – leave a West African war they have lost, saying their goodbyes to the General, who employed them for six months.