by J E Loddon
“Don’t worry?!” I said to Liberty. “Don’t worry?! Of course he’s gonna worry. We’re gonna be dropped into the middle of who knows what tomorrow, and we’re gonna get torn to pieces!”
“Get it together Milo,” she replied to me sternly. “We’re Scouts. Let’s stop worrying about things we can’t control, and concentrate on the things we can.” She turned to Tasia. “We don’t know what we’re gonna find down there, but we need to have a plan in place for landing.” Tasia’s eyes went wide for a minute, and she looked at Casper as if searching for help.
“Well,” she began. “I guess we need to make sure we have all the equipment, and that we leave the pod as soon as we land. If there are hostiles there, the pod crashing will certainly get their attention.” She thought for a moment. “So, Casper and Milo will be responsible for making sure we have all the equipment. We don’t need breathers, but Liberty, you need to make sure you have your extraction rocket. Casper, give it to her before you do anything else, and Milo, hand out the guns straight away. Liberty and I will exit the pod first. Milo, you need to be ready with some grenades in case we’re running into an enemy force, to buy us some space. Toni, you leave the ship last, so you can cover the rest of us as we leave.”
“Good, Tasia,” Liberty nodded.
“We need to worry about survival before we start trying to scan anything,” Tasia continued. “We head for whatever we can see that offers us the best cover. If there turns out to be hostiles in that direction, we go to the second best option.” Liberty nodded again.
“Last time, when we left the ship, it was too bright to be able to see anything properly,” Casper said. “The system’s sun doesn’t look to be particularly close to the planet, but I think we should have shades for the pod exit,” he said.
“Sounds like a good idea,” Liberty agreed. “Everyone is to be in charge of their own shades, and have them on their belts when we board the pod. We can’t afford to be fiddling around with them once we land. When the proximity alarm goes off, I’ll call for everyone to put them on. Anything else?” she asked. We all looked at each other, and shook our heads. “OK, so we head for cover, scan once we think we’re in a relatively safe position, then approach the target cautiously. If there are hostiles, they’ll most likely be based around the target, and will travel from there to the pod. I suggest we move in a triangle of sorts, head away from the pod, then back towards the target from a different direction. What do you think, Tasia?”
“Sounds good,” Tasia agreed.
“OK,” Liberty said. “We can do this. We’re going to do this. Get fed. Get rested. We meet at breakfast, but this time, we’re not gonna sit in silence. We’re gonna go through the plan again, and we’re all gonna remind each other what we need to do in preparation. OK?”
“Yes sir,” we all responded in unison.
“Go Ultra Mega Power Warriors!” Casper called out.
“Casper, No!” Liberty replied sternly.
CHAPTER TWELVE
After the meeting, I went and booked in some time on the firing range. Firing practice was an assigned activity, and I had done some at the beginning of the week. We were allowed to book in for extra practice, though, if there was an open window. Luckily, no sessions were scheduled into the practice room for our zone, and only a couple of people were there putting in extra work. As far as aiming went, I wasn’t terrible. Of all the things we did in training, this was the one aspect I thought I could probably improve on the most. It wasn’t really a physical skill, in that it didn’t require great cardiovascular conditioning or athleticism. Because all my sessions revolved around guns, as the ‘Weapons Expert’, I was starting to develop a good understanding of them which I thought might assist me.
Despite all the distractions going around in my head, I worked hard, and focused intently. My arms were still sore, which caused me problems at first, and concerned me greatly about the next day. I wasn’t hitting well at all, and I had to really try hard not to lose heart. Once I’d gotten past the first few rounds of poor shooting, though, I started to improve. The more I relaxed, the better I seemed to get. My arms were still aching, but I was able to take my focus off of that, and once I’d found a comfortable firing stance and grip, I seemed to move on in leaps and bounds. Don’t get me wrong, I still wasn’t very good. I just didn’t seem to be terrible anymore, which was a massive improvement, and definitely gave me a confidence boost.
I sat at dinner on my own, lost in quiet reflection. I wasn’t sure what to make of what Hung had told us. It had sounded pretty frightening at the time, but there had been no factual information that should cause us to panic. Our home planets were relatively undefended. I think we had all pretty much been aware of that. We were in an area that wasn’t under direct attack, and so defence had never been an issue. The enemy was now thought to be moving around to our area. This was to be expected. They hadn’t been able to crash through the front line of conflict, so were trying to outflank our forces. Even with my limited knowledge of military strategy, I knew this was a common concept. The fact that outflanking in this respect meant moving around who knew how many millions of miles didn’t really make any difference. It was still, conceptually, the same.
The fact remained that we weren’t under attack yet. The enemy forces presumably wouldn’t be able to commit a huge force to this region of space whilst still holding their own at the front. We had a ship filled with thousands of soldiers. OK sure, we weren’t experienced, or particularly competent yet, but we’d get there, given enough time. My biggest worry was that as far as I knew, we didn’t have any attack ships to call on. Pilots were not a conscripted area. There were flight academies on planets that had the facilities, so no-one on board the Anastasia was likely to be trained for space combat. Our entire force in our sector was being held on one big ship. The strategy for the enemy should be obvious. Blow up the Anastasia, and all resistance would be gone. Hung had said we could rely on support from nearby forces, but I didn’t know if it was true, or if he was just trying to make us feel better. As far as I knew, it wasn’t in Hung's nature to lie, though he did hold a lot of truths close to his chest.
Before going to bed, I went and found Chris, who was at lunch. He’d been unhappy that I hadn’t said goodbye to him before the first mission, and I wasn’t going to make the same mistake this time. He excused himself from his squad, who were only a little bit more talkative than the last time, and we sat at a table away from them. I told him all about the mission, though didn’t fully explain the importance of it, and didn’t tell him what Hung had said about this sector of space.
“You’re actually going to be in combat!” he said. “Oh my stars, that is crazy. How are you holding up?”
“As well as can be expected, I guess,” I told him. “It’s not definite that there’s an enemy presence, and I’m still hoping that it’ll turn out to be another massive mineral deposit or something. But who knows.”
“We’ve got a meeting with our Instructor tomorrow,” Chris said. “Brett has been acting a bit funny about it. I think we might be getting a mission too.”
“Wow,” I replied. “How do you feel about that?”
“Well, it has to happen, right?” he said. “I’m less concerned about getting killed by the enemy and more concerned about our squad killing each other, at the moment.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “You should tell your Instructor about that. There’s no way you can go into a dangerous situation with your squad in that state.”
“Well… I’m probably exaggerating a bit,” he admitted. “They’re not talking to Brett, and he’s only talking to them to give them instructions, which they are on the verge of ignoring. I’m talking to everyone, but Denn is starting to put pressure on me to be on their ‘side’,” he told me.
We talked over what he’d done that day, and then I told him about my squad’s tactics for the landing. He thought that it sounded pretty good, and said he’d much rather be with my team-mates
than his own. Although we weren’t exactly the shining example of a communicative, adhesive unit, I could see that things were far more fractured on his side, and I started feeling guilty again. Guilty for being the reason he was even there, and guilty for complaining about the squad-mates I had. They weren’t bad people. Actually, they were really pretty good people, and we were all trying to make it work. That was far better than Denn and his boys, who seemingly had no intention of trying to fix anything.
I slept well that night, considering. Even better, the next day, my body wasn’t aching anywhere near as much as it had been. This was a good and bad thing. If I hadn’t been able to physically go through with the mission, maybe they would have delayed it, chosen a new squad, or replaced me. I knew, though, that none of these would be ideal as far as the good of the mission. If there really was an enemy presence out there, we needed to find out about it immediately. If Hung’s words about our having already made our mistakes were true, we probably were the best squad for the job at that point. If we could keep it together, we had a chance. I wasn’t intending on taking any chances. As soon as we saw what there was to see, from as far away as possible, I was going to insist we called for extraction. Maybe even call for it before we arrived at the target. That way, the transport would have time to get there whilst we checked the target out, and then would hopefully be there as soon as we needed it.
We went over the plan at breakfast together, which really helped. There were a couple of things that I had forgotten about, despite the fact that I had listened intently, and I felt much happier for it. We all reminded each other what our tasks were. We repeated them to each other several times. We were on our way to becoming a well-drilled unit, which seemed to give everyone a bit of a boost.
After breakfast, I got cleaned up, then went for a walk around the ship. I hadn’t done this for a while, and I was a bit wary about putting too much strain on my legs before the mission, but it definitely helped clear my head. This was it. I’d said that to myself before the first mission, but this really was it this time. We’d gone into the last mission being fairly sure that we weren’t going to be running into trouble. We were going into this mission fairly sure that we probably would. I consoled myself with the thought that even if there was a hostile force there, it was definitely possible that we could get in and out without any sort of engagement. That, I thought, probably depended a lot on two things. Whether the enemy spotted the pod when we crashed in, and how long it would take the transport to come and extract us when it came to it. Those would be our two most vulnerable times on the mission. Once on the planet, we could run and hide if necessary. It was a big planet, and if there had been a particularly significant presence there, then the probe would have probably picked up more activity.
Once I’d had a walk around, I booked into one of the gyms just to loosen up. The intensity of the build up to the mission, coupled with my overwork on the equipment a couple of days before, had caused a lot of my neck and shoulder muscles to tense up. I very slowly and carefully did stretching exercises, working my mind into a state of calm in the process. I thought of all my team mates. I thought of Chris. I thought about my training. It might be all right, I told myself. It might be all right.
I began the long walk to the departure area. Firing pins. Firing pins. I didn’t think I really needed to be worrying about the pins. I knew why I had left mine out last time, and it wasn’t a lack of competence. It was a lack of focus. I was going to concentrate much harder this time, on the right things. Don’t worry about what anyone else is doing, I told myself. Just worry about doing your job. Put your armour on first. Then, get the guns ready. Double check them, slowly. Move on once you are sure. Then, check the explosives. Check them very, very carefully! Pack them in their case, make sure it is well sealed. Place them in their correct compartment on the pod, against the exhaust port. The case they were transported in was designed to ensure they didn’t explode in transit. If they did explode, the blast would be funnelled out of the exhaust section in their compartment. Attach my shades to my belt. Check nothing has been left behind in the departure area. Enter the pod. Check the shades are on your belt, and that the guns, ammo and explosives are all secure. Sit on your chair. Strap yourself in. Cower in fear of your life. Don’t throw up.
By the time I arrived at the departure area, I felt as ready as I possibly could. I knew exactly what I needed to do, and I felt pretty ready to do it. It might be all right, I told myself. It might be all right.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I entered the departure area. As with the last time, I was a few minutes early, though the other squad members all arrived at pretty much the same time. As they started to get their equipment prepared, I went to put my armour on first. It might have been a little more restrictive than my ship outfit, but I didn’t want to walk away from the weapons after I had checked them. I’d not been certain that no-one could have removed my firing pin at first when Hung had held it up for us all to see, and I didn’t want to be in that position again. I went to the armour rack, and went to take my Derm suit. I saw the composite and the heavy armour on the rack, and it caused me to pause momentarily. We were much more likely to face fire this time than last time. The heavy armour would offer me much more protection in combat. Even the composite armour would give me more chance of survival. No, I thought. The mission is one of speed and efficiency. Get in, get out. The Derm suit was much better suited for a scout mission. Besides that, I knew my muscles wouldn’t be up to carrying the hull of the heavy armour around.
I was stopped in my tracks when I first entered the hangar. We had a full-sized shuttle this time, and there were other squads loading pods from other departure areas. It was a real buzz of activity, and it almost threw me off of my focus. I’d never been next to a ship that was that big. Even though I knew the ship we were living on was hundreds of times bigger, it still blew my mind.
I didn’t let the size of the ship, or the buzz of activity around me distract me though. I did everything I was supposed to do, in exactly the order I was supposed to do it in. I didn’t pay any attention to what anyone else was doing. I didn’t even notice Liberty’s shapely butt this time as I moved weapons onto the pod, fastening them in with care and attention. I went back to check nothing had been left behind in the departure area, then made my way back to the pod, tightly clutching my shades.
“Everything good, bud?” Liberty asked me.
“All checked and loaded aboard the pod, sir,” I replied.
“Including firing pins?” she asked me, though there was no menace in her voice.
“Including firing pins,” I confirmed.
“Good work, bud,” she replied, then moved on.
I entered the pod. Tasia and Casper were already sat down, beside each other on one side of the pod. I sat on the seat backing onto Casper’s, and Antonia came and joined me. We all got fastened in, and went through the lift-off routine. This time, we had to wait much longer before take-off, though. With eight pods all being loaded up by different squads, with different equipment, it was a difficult process to co-ordinate. By the time we took off, my weaker feeling muscles were starting to ache in the basic chair. I tried to do some stretching exercises, and clear my mind. The mind-clearing routine worked, and I barely felt the now-familiar sensation of leaving the ship and entering the zero gravity. The ship powered up, and accelerated into space.
Despite our new focus on communication and preparedness, we remained in silence for a lot of the journey. I was just happy to be resting my muscles in advance of our crash landing, though I was a little bit concerned that my muscles might cramp due to the uncomfortable position. My comfort wasn’t helped by the stop-offs along the way. I’d focused so much on the mission itself, that I hadn’t really thought about the fact that we’d be dropping other squads off at other planets beforehand. We were the fifth of seven turns, it turned out, to be dropped, so our waiting time was extended quite a bit. It was a bumpy ride, too, entering the uppe
r atmosphere of planets, then breaking off out again. I had started to get used to ship travel by that point, but the lurching in and out definitely tested my stomach, which was already fluttering at the thought of what lay ahead.
Eventually, it was our turn. I was apprehensive, but at the same time, looking forward to getting the chance to stretch my legs. The proximity alarm went off in our pod, and Liberty called for shades to be put on. She called out the plan one more time as we entered the upper atmosphere, then everyone went quiet and held on tight for the descent. It seemed to be much steeper this time. As gravity kicked in, and then the pressure in the pod started changing, I started to get pain in my ears again, but much more intense this time. My stomach lurched, and I gripped tight for all I was worth. Then, suddenly, the whole world turned upside down.
Pain rang through my body. All I could see was white light. After a few moments, though it could have been hours, the light faded, and I was in gloomy darkness again. For a frightening few seconds, I thought that I had broken my neck. My head was upside down, and there was searing pain all through my neck and shoulders. What I quickly realised, though, was that my whole body was upside down. I started trying to free myself of the restraints, and that’s when I heard the shouting. It was Casper. His voice was very muffled, and I struggled to make sense of what he was saying. Then I realised. I was on my back, my legs up in the air. The whole seating unit had tipped back, meaning Casper and Tasia were pinned underneath me.
