C.R.O.W. (The Union Series)

by Richards, Phillip

  ‘Was I talking to you, Sam?’ Woody snapped.

  Sam’s eyes burned with rage but he said nothing, and Woody carried on.

  ‘Think about it,’ Rawson went on, ‘We get the order to take New Earth from Brussels, and they would have thought about this whole idea a lot, not just drawn it up on a fag packet. The big corporations have so much money held up in that place, they’re probably putting a load of pressure on the Union to do something.’

  ‘Well, I think they’ll bin it, we’ll get slaughtered down there. Why don’t the corporations just duke?’

  Rawson shook his head, ‘Isn’t it obvious? The corporations have loads of men and women who could fight - if they were properly trained to - but we have millions, an unending supply. It’s the only thing most nations have that the corporations don’t.’

  Woody bristled, ‘Well why don’t they just build some robots or something?’

  Rawson laughed, ‘Even in this day and age it’s all about money. Why build a load of robots for billions when you can train a hundred troopers for millions? Besides that, humans are more flexible in combat, can’t get hacked into by electronic warfare teams and can win hearts and minds. As long as there’s war there’ll be infantry, mate.’

  ‘The Chinese’ll be dug in deep.’

  ‘Then we’ll have to dig them out, wont we?’

  During our voyage we began to practice fighting as a section within the simulator. Most of the simulator environments we used were set on the surface of Uralis and I recognised them from my voyage to the home of the dropship infantry on board the Fantasque. They had been reddened in colour, as the surface of New Earth was bloody red instead of the dirty browns and greys of Uralis, but essentially they were the same thing; rocky valleys, and expanses of desert, rolling hills and towering mountains.

  We fought pitched battles against computer generated men, sometimes fighting across open ground or amongst jagged rocks. It was the first time I’d had a chance to work with my entire section and see who was in it. As I already knew, Corporal Evans was our section commander, and Lance Corporal McAllister was the section second in command. In addition to Woody and Rawson - Brown and Climo were also part of my section. Then there was also Berezynsky, a lad who had arrived with me as a raw recruit. He had kept himself to himself since arriving, rarely speaking even to acknowledge his old platoon team mates, but then I had remembered him as always being the grey man and Gilbert confirmed this with typically few words, ‘He’s boring,’ he had simply said. Fair one.

  We arrived at our rendezvous some time while I had been sleeping. Our only way of knowing that the jump was complete was a gentle chime on the ship’s announcement system - which was only intended for the crew on duty to hear. Whilst the majority of their crew slumbered, the vast fleet assembled silently in the darkness. It was a fleet bigger than any that the Union had ever assembled, but none of us would ever see it, for Challenger had no portholes for us to see out of, even if there was anything to see in the dark anyway. Before lights out and the bulkheads were locked shut again me, and Climo had contemplated it under Woody’s increasingly hostile gaze.

  ‘Every Union ship is painted black as space,’ Climo pointed out, although I already knew, ‘Camouflage ain’t it.’

  ‘Even with all the sensors ships carry?’ I wondered, ‘Surely painting them black wouldn’t make any difference?’

  Climo shrugged, ‘Every little helps, mate.’

  I would later learn that a ship could reflect the rays off nearby stars, however little it might be. And although on an interstellar scale that light could take years to be noticed - if at all - it could easily give a ship in orbit away and that, after all, was where Challenger was designed to operate in combat.

  And so without a soul to see it, the Union fleet amassed, ready to take war back to New Earth.

  While Challenger and the two fleets hung silent as ghosts in the night, and Generals and Admirals thrashed out their plans, we were taken to practice survival skills in the lock room at the back of the ship. We were all dressed in our freshly issued combat equipment, instead of our drab grey ships fatigues and peaked caps.

  Most of the combat equipment we had been issued on the ship was new, specially designed for the unforgiving environment we were destined to fight in. It felt surreal looking at us all in the tightly packed lock room, our new gel armour and respirators coloured a deep blood red and streaked with sections of brown; the camouflage pattern developed specifically for the surface of New Earth. The last people to wear that uniform had retreated from a victorious Chinese horde two years ago and now here we stood wearing it, contrasted against the grey walls of the ship.

  ‘It’s red so you can’t see the blood so much,’ Stevo said ominously, but Corporal Evans snapped at him.

  ‘Don’t be so stupid.’ The public reproof given by the giant section commander embarrassed the big-eared bully into silence, and although I made no sign of it, inwardly I smiled.

  The respirator filtration canisters which were connected either side of the mouthpiece were slightly larger than those we used on Uralis, supposedly due to an additional element in New Earth’s atmosphere that needed to be removed before it entered our lungs. It wasn’t what was absent from the atmosphere that made it deadly, but rather what was present; noxious gases that could make you giddy after a single breath, knock you out in under a minute and kill you not long after. The respirator’s filters cleaned the air and forced it into the miniature atmosphere it held against the wearer’s face. It could even direct the air flow and change its temperature to keep him comfortable, and more importantly, stop the visor from fogging up. It was equipped with an in built intercom system that allowed troopers to talk to each other over blasting dust storms or over the noise of battle, and sounds were heard through earpieces that hugged the user’s head. They were designed to cut out any noise above eighty decibels - explosions for instance - but magnified quieter sounds such as whispering. As if that wasn’t enough, the respirator visor used what was known as Full Spectrum Imagining, taking all forms of energy from heat to infra-red to create an image that was almost as perfect by night as it was by day. It featured a targeting system that identified friends and foe and could mark key points on the battlefield. All of this was controlled by a wristpad that every trooper wore on his forearm.

  I tried the new respirator on and Corporal Evans checked that I had it fitted correctly by tugging roughly on the straps and shaking my head by the mouthpiece.

  ‘Feel okay?’ he asked. He wasn’t interested in how I was feeling mentally, or I would have said ‘pretty pump’. Corporal Evans wanted to know if the respirator had formed a correct seal and only I would know that. A simple green icon on my visor told me that the seal was fine.

  It often felt weird when I first put a respirator on, they were designed to be as comfortable and unobtrusive as possible, and over time I could forget it was there, but initially I could feel nothing but the seal squeezing my face.

  ‘Feels fine, Corporal,’ I finally said when I realised that Corporal Evans was waiting for an answer.

  ‘You’ve got to put it on, first, Moralee,’ Rawson said, and several lads laughed including me. Rawson was the sort who could somehow get away with bad jokes and still get a good laugh.

  Clearly unimpressed by Rawson’s joke about my looks, Corporal Evans checked quickly beneath my chin and then walked to the next man and repeated the process.

  I removed my respirator, which caused a warning tone to sound in the headset until it finally realised that it was being purposefully removed, and had not accidentally lost its seal. I checked the drinking straw, which could be connected to a water pack we carried inside our daysacks, as well as the feeding straw, which could be connected to ration packs issued on the ground. Mix up the two straws at your peril, the resulting curdled mush was quite sickening!

  The section commanders inspected each and every man in turn, including the Lance Corporals and then they inspected each other. One
man had an incorrect fit and was ordered to run to the ship’s stores to exchange it after a brief telling off for not realizing sooner.

  We checked our wristpads and made sure that they were picking up our vital signs, information that would be freely available to the platoon sergeant on the ground and would tell him automatically if we were injured. We then checked our gel armour, making sure our tourniquets were attached into the legs and arms. We also checked that there was no visible damage to the auto-clotting system that was designed to detect trauma. This was a vital bit of kit that would automatically constrict the padded armour around a wound to compress it, before administering a quick clotting agent into the wound itself. Rather than absorbing blood, it was meant to stop its escape altogether. Originally the armour was meant to administer morphine and other life-saving drugs automatically, but what was found was that sometimes the auto-injectors became damaged or confused and activated for no reason at all!

  Seemingly satisfied that our clothing would do the job, Corporal Evans addressed us all. It was the first time I had heard him speak to the entire platoon, and his booming voice and air of confident capability made every man listen intently, ‘New Earth is a vicious place,’ he began, as if remembering his last few days there, ‘And its atmosphere is as unforgiving as Eden. But if you respect it and look after your kit correctly then it’s as safe as any street in London, Earth.’

  We laughed nervously. The streets of London were murderous.

  ‘It’s important we practice your drills with the kit so that if anything should happen to you or your mates then you can deal with the problem instinctively,’ he stressed the final word, and then held his own respirator high in the air, ‘The less time you spend worrying about this, the more time you have to worry about the enemy.’

  We practiced a series of drills from the simple to the more complex. Changing damaged canisters and patching up cracked visor screens were simple drills which could be carried out rapidly by the individual concerned, as long as he didn’t breathe in or lose his cool. If upon removing the respirator or losing the seal, we were required to hold our breath against the toxic atmosphere, and upon fixing the problem and achieving a seal again we were required to breathe out hard, helping the respirator canister motors to force out the bad air from the mini atmosphere held against our faces.

  This was all stuff I had been taught before. Coming fresh from Uralis I was more used to working in the respirator than anyone else. We spent almost three quarters of the year-long course above ground in the harsh environment. Our instructors taught us to overcome the claustrophobic fear of wearing nothing more than a piece of rubber filled with motors, wires and sensors to protect us from the poisonous air by making us perform tasks with the respirators off, like stacking bricks and negotiating obstacles. There was nothing more amazing and liberating than feeling that alien wind, bitterly cold as it was, brushing against my face.

  ‘Just hold your breath and don’t panic,’ our training instructor had always told us.

  We were practiced on dealing with unconscious casualties with damaged respirators, and then drilled on everything - with the lights off and the lock room plunged into darkness - with and without the aid of our night vision. We felt for cracks on visors with our bare fingers before placing the clear plastic sealing patches over the hole.

  Very rarely was a mistake made, but when they were the section commanders were quick to point it out, often angrily. ‘These drills need to be instinctive!’ Corporal Evans would repeat, ‘You shouldn’t need to think about it. Every second you fumble is a second closer to death!’

  Thankfully that evening Woody spent most of his time in the gym or in the recreation lounge, leaving me and Climo some peace and quiet in our room. He appeared to be ignoring me and Climo, having said nothing since our encounter after the lecture and if he had told anybody else they didn’t show it. Brown stayed in the room with us, but he spoke little if at all and only to Climo. He wasn’t much more senior than Climo. I heard he had served two years, which meant that he had been on exercise on Eden and Uralis and that was it, but he had clearly decided as Stevo had said, ‘Crow should not speak, only be spoken to.’

  We busied ourselves chatting about our lives at home, and Climo excitedly told me of how his home town of Crawley was the roughest town of all of southern England.

  Later that night Greggerson entered the room, with the look of someone with something big to get off his chest.

  ‘Alright mate?’ I said, half as a greeting and half as a question.

  Climo nodded his own less obvious greeting, and then Brown, clearly deciding that the addition of Greggerson into the conversation was too much for him rolled his eyes and walked out. Greggerson jumped out of the way.

  Uninterested in Brown’s silent protest, Climo asked, ‘What’s up?’

  The skinny trooper tried to appear nonchalant when he told his news, but he fooled no one, ‘We’re leaving tomorrow morning.’

  Climo frowned, ‘Who told you that, Stevo?’

  Stevo was in Greggerson’s section, with Westy, and so they were always rife with rumours that spread across the ship like wildfire, stuff about the Chinese having laser banks and giant robot armies - ‘That’s why you can’t see their faces behind their visors!’ - and random changes to our mission. Stevo, a bully who hid behind Woody for protection was also a gossip-monger, filled with pessimistic thoughts that further contradicted his role as a senior bloke, an example setter.

  Greggerson waved off the suggestion, ‘Sam told me.’

  Climo raised his eyebrows, ‘Oh.’

  There were false rumours and there were true ones. Sam always told the true ones, and so wherever he had got the news from it was likely to be reliable. The walls on Challenger had ears, it was said.

  We didn’t say anything for a while, or at least what felt like a while. If we began our voyage tomorrow then there would be no way for the ships of the two fleets to communicate, and so an abortion of the operation would not be possible until we arrived at the Centauri system itself, right on top of the Chinese. As soon as we jumped we would be committed. The final inevitability knotted my stomach, and I instantly thought of home, my mum and dad, and my sister.

  Climo sighed remorsefully, ‘Why didn’t I just stay with the conscripts?’

  ‘What else did he say?’ I asked finally.

  ‘We’re taking a place called Jersey Island,’ Greggerson answered, ‘Us, the Scots and the Danes. It’s supposed to be as big as England. We’re the first down.’

  Nobody said anything for a while as the information sunk in.

  ‘Jesus,’ Climo said under his breath.

  #

  The ship locked down without warning just before we ate breakfast the following day, and we were rudely rushed by the NCOs back into our accommodation without explanation, although none was needed. Everybody on Challenger had probably heard the rumour, spilt out by either the Captain or Major’s parties as they returned by shuttle from their several day-long orders with the Admiral. Surely somebody would end up locked in the brig for such a terrible slip of the tongue, though I often wondered the point in all the secrecy. Spies could not operate in the void of space in an undisclosed location outside of the Hope system. The main reason for secrecy was believed by the vast majority of us to be to avoid a mutiny. Others believed it was the officers enjoying keeping their men in the dark for some kind of sick power trip. Perhaps both of the two theories were true, but ultimately the root cause was most likely due to the chain of command forgetting a critical principle of war; the morale of their own men.

  ‘Thirty-two days it will take,’ Woody said from above me on his bunk, directed to nobody in particular. Brown grunted his agreement, even though he had arrived on Challenger after she had returned from her shame in Alpha Centauri, and so had no idea how long it might take. ‘Thirty-one days until we hit Alpha Centauri Bravo, then another day until we hit New Earth and we drop.’

  Me and Climo said nothing,
for Woody was merely taunting us.

  ‘Of course we might not make it to New Earth,’ Woody warned, ‘We’ve got the whole Chinese navy between us and orbit, thousands of Chinese warships,’ he exaggerated, ‘Loaded with guns and lasers. Then there’s the gun boats, and the surface missile batteries. Not to mention Stevo’s laser battery,’ he laughed at the absurdity of the final claim.

  ‘There’s no laser battery,’ Climo said curtly. He was sat on the edge of his bunk, watching the seconds tick past on his wristpad.

  ‘One in three don’t make it down,’ Woody quoted the statistic that filled every trooper’s soul with fear; ‘We could be shot out of the sky.’

  ‘Well then we all die,’ Climo replied irritably, implying that Woody would be in the same dropship as us. I thought Woody might use Climo’s defiant tone as an excuse to attack him again, but he didn’t.

  ‘I don’t care if I die,’ Woody said after a pause, ‘I ain’t afraid. Are you?’

  Climo looked up at where Woody lay on the top of my bunk, ‘No.’

  The bedsprings squealed under Woody’s weight and his fat head peered down at me, ‘Are you afraid, Moralee?’

  ‘No.’

  Woody smiled, ‘You’re lying. You’re dumping in your little crow pants coz mummy and daddy aren’t around to help you on New Earth.’

  I swallowed, awkward under the bully’s gaze.

  ‘You miss your mummy and daddy, don’t you?’

  ‘Stop it,’ I said, my cheeks burning red.

  Woody made a mockingly high pitched voice, ‘I miss my mummy!’

  ‘Shut up!’ I shouted, and Woody laughed, disappearing back onto his bunk. He began to hum some random melody loudly, whilst I closed my eyes and imagined that none of this was happening.