It was quite warm as they walked toward the cafeteria, but his body had already begun adapting to the sunnier, drier climate in the rain-shadow of the Cascade Mountains.
When they arrived, Bill realized that not only would Meri be absent, but Matt and Nicole were also on the airfield. Bill hadn’t realized until then how close he and Matt had become—the two were practically inseparable—well, whenever Matt wasn’t with Nicole, that is.
Bill’s olfactory senses were assaulted with the smell of spicy food as he walked through the door. Smells like curry today, he thought.
He spotted Jordan and Thep sitting at a table with Brenda Lightfoot, so he and Kim made their way over to them and dropped off his gear.
“Hey, how goes, so far?” he asked.
Everyone nodded to him, as they all had full mouths. Thep even went so far as to give him a grunt. Bill saw that they were eating the red curry noodle soup that was a specialty of one of the cooks. That got Bill’s salivary glands working overtime, so he dumped his backpack and rifle at a spare seat and headed over to the serving line, trailed by Kim.
Soon, Kim and Bill were back at the table digging in. Their soup was spicy enough that it slightly burned Bill’s lips and started clearing out his sinuses.
After a bit, conversation resumed. It turned out that while Bill and Kim were playing with computers, Jordan and Thep were identifying various creatures and plants. They were required to analyze them, describe them, and then try to place them in a taxonomy table.
“It’s actually quite challenging in some aspects,” Thep said between bites. “Not only have I never seen some of these plants, I’ve never even heard of them.”
“Yeah, but at least we’re dealing with real plants and animals, not just pictures,” Jordan said.
“What are you guys up to?” Brenda asked Kim and Bill.
Kim said, “Mainly running through a bunch of GIS problems. This afternoon we’re supposed to report to the rifle range. I guess we’ll be breaking in our new rifles.” She indicated the rifle slung over the back of her chair.
“We’re scheduled for the range tomorrow morning,” Thep said. “I guess they don’t want us getting bored doing the same thing all day.”
Bill looked at his new watch and said to Kim, “Hey, we better get on our way. It’ll take at least fifteen minutes to get there.” He cleared his tray, put his backpack on, picked up his rifle and slung that over his shoulder, and waited while Kim did the same before heading out.
Saying their farewells, the two headed out the door to the rifle range.
11
After a bit over fifteen minutes, Bill and Kim arrived at the rifle range. Along the way they had been joined by a couple of other Probies they recognized from the GIS class.
All of the Probies had been to the rifle range before, during the firearms training portion of the BMT, so they were familiar with the layout. The known distance range was on one side, and the “action” range adjacent to it. The “action” range was where the pop-up targets had been during BMT, and Bill suspected it was also where they would face pop-up targets of potential predator threats that they would face during surveys.
Rather than going directly into the classroom, one of the instructors, an Explorer based on his clothing, waved them over to the shade of some oak trees. The Explorer had longer than regulation hair, a sparse beard, and a trekker medal visible on his chest.
“Gather ‘round,” he hollered to the group, who made their way to him, grateful to get into the shade. “Set your gear down, crack the bolt on your rifle, set it on your pack, and take a seat.”
Bill placed his pack on the ground and unslung his rifle. Working the bolt, he opened it, exposing the chamber. He set his rifle on the pack, ensuring it wasn’t pointed at anyone else and had the barrel tilted slightly toward the ground. He noticed that the others did the same. He sat down behind his pack facing the instructor. Closer to the ground, the smell of dried grasses wafted up to him.
“We’ll give it a couple more minutes until everyone’s here. I don’t want to repeat things,” the instructor said, pulling a tablet from the ubiquitous cargo pocket of his uniform shorts.
Soon, others arrived, until all the Probies who had been in the GIS class were seated around him.
After taking roll, the instructor introduced himself, along with several other Explorers who had joined the group.
“I’m Doug Gerrup, the lead firearms instructor. Today we’re gonna break in your rifles and get you sighted in. Over the next several days we’ll be doing some serious firearms training—the kind needed when exploring new planets.” Gerrup looked around the seated Probies, making sure they were all paying attention. They were.
“Other than your main duties and survival school, this is the one area you want to be the most proficient possible. Sometimes that proficiency can mean the difference between life and death—literally. Just ask any Trekker. This means coming to the range or hitting the simulator on your time off. If all you do is the basic, it might not be enough.
“Now, how many of you have been issued peeders?” Gerrup asked. Everyone raised their hands.
“Okay, then. We’ll work on those after basic and advanced rifle handling. Today is basic rifle handling. You’ll become quite familiar with your rifle, sighting it in, and learning how to use it properly. That means prone, kneeling, sitting, and offhand. Now, I know you’ve done all that in BMT, but you’ll find the ER-1 is a little different.”
Picking up a Probie’s rifle, Gerrup proceeded to go through the differences, pointing to each item with his right hand while holding the rifle with his left. “First, you’ll notice, it’s a bolt action. Not like the automatic action of your R1 or peeder. Second, it’s got an integral bipod in the foregrip. This means you can use the bipod for greater accuracy. Third, it’s scoped. This means, once again, more accuracy, and over a further distance. Fourth, it’s got a space in the buttstock for a spare five-round magazine, and one for a cleaning kit.”
“To insert the magazine, just place it in the magazine well and push up until it clicks. Just like the R1. You all appeared to have figured out how to charge the rifle, but how many of you know how to remove the bolt?” Only a few hands went up. Most of the Probies, especially those not from Hayek or the United States hadn’t handled firearms before BMT.
Gerrup showed them how to extract and replace the bolt. “You’ll want to do that when bore sighting, a technique we’ll show you on the range.”
Handing back the rifle to the Probie, Gerrup told the group to gather their gear and head into the classroom next to the rifle range for rifle familiarization.
As Bill entered the classroom, he was glad to feel the cool air hit his skin. Even though he was getting used to the heat, he always enjoyed it when he could get a break from the heat.
This was only Bill’s second time in the building. During BMT the Probies had only accessed the classroom once, with most of the time on the actual range. Most of their rifle training was done in the training building in the main part of Sacajawea Base. There were tables set up in rows, with only a single seat behind each table.
Gerrup said, “Pick a table, put your gear under it, your rifle on it, and take a seat.”
Bill did so, once again winding up next to Kim.
Once everyone was seated, Gerrup stepped to the front of the class, in front of a table that had two boxes on it. “What’s the first rule of firearms safety?”
“Treat every gun as if it’s loaded,” yelled the Probies.
“What’s the second rule?”
“Never point it at anything unless you intend to shoot it,” they responded.
“Great. Keeping that in mind, go ahead and extract your bolts.”
There was a fair amount of clacking and clicking while the Probies worked on extracting the bolts from the rifles.
“Hold up your bolt when you’ve got it out,” Gerrup told the class.
It only took Bill a couple of seconds to extrac
t his bolt, having done it several times already. Holding it up in his right hand, he waited until Gerrup told them they could put the bolts back into the rifles. That took Bill even less time than removing it had.
“Most of you have trained with iron sights, but shooting with a scope is a whole different animal. In some ways, it’s easier. In other ways, it’s a bit more complicated.
“The scope you’ve got is pretty basic, a 1.5 to 5 power by 20 mm objective. The power refers to how much an object is magnified. In this case, it can range from one and a half times up to five times as big as normal. The objective just means how big the front of the scope is. In this case, it’s 20 millimeters in diameter. The larger the number, usually, the more light it lets in. That’s great for shooting at twilight or long distances, but for the most part, it adds additional bulk and weight you don’t need.”
An image of the view through a scope appeared on the white-screen behind Gerrup. It was circular with the typical cross-hairs, but it also had dots evenly spaced along the cross-hairs extending from the center outward. There was also a red dot in the center and a small circle around the dot.
“These dots are called mil-dots—that’s short for milliradian dot. A milliradian is nothing more than a part of a radian. More specifically, 1/1000ths of a radian. So, what’s a radian? Gerrup asked the class.
Next to Bill, Kim Smith raised her hand, tentatively.
“Yes?” Gerrup asked her.
“Isn’t it just a measurement for a circle, something involved with pi?”
“Exactly—it’s a way to measure a circle. More specifically, there are 6.28 radians in a circle, of which 3.14 is half of. Hence, the pi! So, if there are 6.28 radians in a circle, how many milliradians are there?” he again posed to the class.
Just about every Probie muttered the answer “Six thousand two hundred eighty,” or a variation of that.
“Correct again, but just to make life simple, we go with 6,400 milliradians—much easier to remember, just because!” he finished with a smile.
“So, each one of these dots,” Gerrup gestured to the image of the scope on the white-screen, “represents one milliradian dot, or mil-dot as we’ll call it from now on, from the other mil-dot. That’s center of dot to center of dot. Mil-dots are great for measuring distance, which is why we use them. They also allow you to accurately shoot something without having to make adjustments to your scope or guess. There are ten dots up and down and ten dots across. Note that the center dot, very small and light, is not a true mil-dot, but it can still serve as one. This means you’ve got five mils between the center and the edge of the scope, or ten mils from edge to edge.
“Here’s how it works in a nutshell. One mil on your scope is the equivalent to 10 centimeters at 100 meters. So, if you place your scope on a target that’s 100 meters away, the distance between two mil-dots will cover 10 centimeters. This works proportionally, so at 200 meters the distance between mil-dots will be 20 centimeters, and at a thousand meters it’ll be one meter. Everyone understand this?” he asked, looking around for confirmation.
Bill thought the way Gerrup was explaining it made it very easy to understand. Like the others, he nodded his understanding.
“So, the next thing you need to understand is how to tell how far something is away from you. This is also pretty easy. If you line up a dot at the bottom of the object and get one near the top, and you’ve got a rough idea on how tall it is, you can do the basic math and come up with the distance. The easiest way to figure this out is to take the size of whatever it is you’re looking at, multiply that by a thousand, then divide that by the number of mils covering the target. That’ll give you the range.”
This time an image of a deer appeared on the screen, behind the scope image, looking as if the scope was centered on the deer’s chest.
“Look at the mil-dot near the bottom of the deer, at the feet.”
Bill did so, then looked for the mil-dot near the top of the deer, spotting it just above the back. There were three dots from the bottom to the top.
“Now, most deer stand about one meter tall at the shoulder, so how far away do you think this deer is?”
Bill raised his hand.
“Yes?” Gerrup asked.
“It looks like it’s about 500 meters out,” Bill said.
“Explain how you figured that out.” Gerrup folded his arms over his chest.
“Well, if the deer stands one meter at the shoulder, and there are three dots between the top and the bottom, then that means it’s being covered by two mils: then one thousand divided by two is 500, so it’s around 500 meters away,” Bill explained.
Gerrup nodded his head and unfolded his arms. “That’s correct, and the exact way to figure this out. Knowing this, of course, means you stand a better chance of actually hitting what you’re shooting at, depending on if you know the bullet drop of the round you’re using. By the time we’re done here, this stuff’ll be ingrained in you. You’ll also be well versed in the various critters out there, and how tall they are.
“Right now, though, we want to get you sighted in. Our goal is to have you shooting dead-on at 200 meters. This gives a rise of about 5 centimeters at 100 meters and a drop of 5 centimeters at 300 meters. Most kill zones of larger animals, the part where you want to shoot them to kill them quickly, is about 15 to 20 centimeters. That’s a little bit smaller than a football, or for those of you from America, a soccer ball. This means you’ll be able to rapidly line up and shoot into the kill zone of most animals between 100 and 300 meters without having to do any range calculations.
“So, if everyone’s got it, let’s head out to the range. The first thing we’re gonna do is boresight your rifles and then fine-tune them. You’ll get individual instruction on that as we go, so be patient, others need help, too.” Gerrup chuckled.
“Leave your pack, but keep your belts on. On your way out the door pick up a pair of earplugs and eye protection.” He pointed to earplugs and protective eyewear sitting in the boxes on the table at the front of the room. “Grab a shooting lane when you get out there. Somebody will be by shortly to work with you.”
Bill was soon standing behind the red line on the shooting range, waiting to be told the range was hot. He had put on his eye and ear protection as he walked from the classroom to the shooting lanes. At the shooting position was a bench with a table attached to it, creating a platform he could sit and shoot from. He could see targets set at the 30- and 200-meter range.
A voice came over a speaker system, “The line is hot. I say again, the line is hot. Shooters may approach the shooting position at this time and may handle firearms.”
Bill approached the bench and placed his rifle on it, facing the muzzle downrange. He then opened the bolt to show anyone walking by that the rifle was unloaded. He sat, and then waited for one of the many instructors to approach him. The wait was almost twenty minutes, while the instructors made their way down the line going from Probie to Probie. Those who were the first to get attention were now shooting. Even with his hearing protection on, Bill could hear the shot. He could also feel the concussive force of those closest to him when they shot.
Eventually, one of the instructors appeared at Bill’s side.
“Remove the bolt and let’s get you boresighted in,” he said to Bill by way of greeting. “You’ll want to use your bipod for this.”
Bill removed the bolt and placed it on the shooting table. He then extended the short bipod legs, resting them on the table, so the barrel was facing downrange.
“You ever boresight a rifle?” the instructor asked.
Bill nodded.
“Then this should be easy. Just look through the barrel until you’ve got it lined up with the target at the thirty meter line.” Bill did so.
“Now, look up through your scope. Does it line up pretty close to what you’re seeing through the barrel?”
Bill could see it was slightly off center, a tad to the left, and told the instructor.
“Great, almost there, then. Put the bolt back in the rifle and I’ll want you to fire three rounds.” He placed a box of twenty rounds on the shooting bench and said, “Put these in your five-round magazine. We’ll use just that for now.”
Bill opened the box and extracted one round at a time, feeding them into the magazine, then seating the magazine in the rifle.
“Fire when ready,” the instructor said.
Bill looked through the scope, lining the crosshairs up on the center of the target. Taking the safety off, he gently squeezed the trigger until the rifle fired, surprising him when it did, exactly as he’d been taught. That slow steady squeeze, instead of a yank of the trigger, meant that Bill couldn’t anticipate when the rifle would fire, so when it did, it came as a bit of a surprise. Slowly, he repeated the process twice more.
The instructor used a pair of binoculars to better see the target and told Bill, “Great grouping. All nearly touching, but about two and a half centimeters left, and two centimeters high. Let’s fine-tune this puppy. We’re aiming to zero in at 200 meters, and since the point of impact at 200 meters is the same as it is at 30 meters, we’re gonna want it to be dead on at 30 meters. So, let’s adjust the windage first, then we’ll get your elevation fine-tuned.”
“Now, at 100 meters, one click equals one-half centimeter. Since we want to sight out to 200 meters, how many clicks equals one centimeter?” he asked Bill.
“Two.”
“Exactly, so, since we’re actually at 30 meters, which will give us the same point of impact as two hundred meters, which is where we want to hit, how many clicks will you need to move your windage point of impact to be dead on?”
Bill had to think this one through. Let’s see, one centimeter at 100 meters, which means it’s about a third of a centimeter at 30 meters, and I’m off by two and a half centimeters, so two point five times point three is.. seven and a half.
“Seven and a half?” he answered tentatively.
“Yep, but since you can’t move a half click, what do you think you should do?”
The Corps of Discovery Trilogy Box Set: Books 1-3: A multiverse series of alternate history Page 14
