Galactic Division - Book Two: Initiation

by J E Loddon

  I wrestled myself free of the restraints, then moved to help Antonia out. She wasn’t showing any signs of movement. I unhooked her, then dragged her body off of the seating frame. I didn’t know if she was alive or dead, but I had to get Casper and Tasia out first. I pulled at the frame, trying to right it back up. It didn’t move much at first, then suddenly gave a bit. I thought something had broken, but then I saw Liberty at the end of the frame scrabbling to her feet, and grabbing hold of the seat. She’s just released herself. Together, we managed to get the seat back over onto its struts. By the time I’d gotten round to the other side, Casper was already out, frantically unhooking Tasia. She didn’t seem to be moving. Seeing that Casper had the situation in hand, I went back over to Antonia, fearing the worst. When I got there, though, she was slowly moving.

  “Are you OK?” I asked her. She looked confused for a moment, and looked around.

  “Uh, yeah,” she said, “Yeah,I’m good. Get the…,” and she pointed over at the equipment. “Get the…,” the words not coming to her. I looked her over, concerned there was a hidden injury I couldn’t see, but there was nothing obviously wrong. Remembering the plan, I went over to the guns, and gave them a quick visual inspection. They looked OK. I popped open the explosives compartment, and it all looked fine there too. I unhooked the guns, and looked back to see how Tasia was. She was on her feet, but had blood all over her nose and mouth.

  “Hey! Is she OK?” I shouted. Casper gave me a worried look.

  “She says she’s good to go,” he called over.

  “Let’s get out of here!” Liberty shouted. “We’ve been here too long already.”

  I handed out the guns, and everyone gathered up the equipment they were responsible for. Tasia’s shades were damaged beyond repair, and Casper had given her his. He asked to go out first with Liberty in Tasia’s place, but Liberty was having none of it. Liberty and Tasia assumed a ready stance, and Casper and myself released the door. Bright light streamed in to the pod and Casper squinted. I unhooked two grenades as Liberty and Tasia cautiously but quickly exited the pod.

  I scanned the outside of the pod. There was no sign of any activity, but my field of view was limited by the relatively small size of the exit hatch. Tasia and Liberty stood at the sides of the exit, scanning the areas we couldn’t see. I tensed myself for a shout of alarm, but none came, and Liberty beckoned for us to exit the pod. She pointed over to an area of shrubbery, and Casper, Antonia, and myself got positioned to provide cover fire. They ran across the open ground to the greenery. It was about 50 meters, and the several seconds it took them felt like minutes. They got into defensive positions once they were there, and called for Casper and myself to make the run. With no signs of any hostile activity at all, Antonia made her way across, and then we started to move North, away from the pod. Aside from a line of shrubbery to the West of us, there wasn’t a great deal of cover. There was a ridge about ninety meters to the East, which looked just a little bit too high to be scalable.

  “I should see what’s on the other side of these shrubs,” Casper suggested.

  “No, we keep moving North, directly away from the pod,” Liberty replied.

  “There’ll be more cover in the bushes,” Casper protested.

  “We don’t know what’s through there”,” Liberty hissed back. “The branches are too thick, you’ll end up getting stuck. Then you’ll be completely exposed.” Casper shook his head, but we continued moving regardless. After about five minutes of rapid travel, the bushes to our left decreased in height, and were only just above our heads. Liberty signalled us to stop. She looked around, taking in our surroundings.

  “OK,” she said at last. “Casper, you give Toni a boost, so she can see what’s past these bushes.” She turned to Antonia. “Be careful, keep your head low.”

  “Why does Toni get to look?” Casper complained.

  “Cos she’s tall, light, and she has pretty good eyes,” Liberty explained. Antonia smirked at Casper.

  “I have pretty eyes,” she taunted, fluttering her eyelashes. Casper grunted, but got into position to lift Antonia. He hoisted her up, and she peered over the bushes. After a moment, she stretched higher up.

  “Keep your head low,” hissed Liberty. After a few more moments, Antonia patted Casper on the head, indicating she wanted to get down.

  “I’m not a load-lifter,” he growled, but complied anyway.

  “Well?” Liberty asked when Antonia was back down.

  “It’s a kind of swamp,” Antonia explained. “It’s lined with brush all the way around, so I can’t see much,” she admitted.

  “How big is it?” Liberty asked.

  “Big,” Antonia said. “It’d take quite a while to walk all the way around it.”

  “Come on, let’s keep going,” Liberty said, eyes darting around nervously. We carried on North, trying to put more distance between us and the pod, whilst searching for an area that would provide enough cover to allow Casper to complete a scan. Pretty soon, I started to lag behind.

  “Milo. Keep up,” Liberty called over at me.

  “I’m trying,” I grunted.

  “What’s the issue?” she asked irritably.

  “My back hurts,” I complained. “It’s making it difficult to move quickly.”

  The truth was, it wasn’t just my back that hurt. It was everything that was connected to it too. The muscles in my legs ached, not having fully recovered from my gym experience. My neck and shoulders had been aching for the past few days, a combination of stress and the way my body had compensated for my aching limbs. All that, it seemed, had just been exacerbated by the crash. I should have been the most well off from it, having just tipped backwards with the chair, and not hit anything. Liberty sighed.

  “Just try and keep it up a bit longer,” she urged. “We’ll find somewhere to stop soon.”

  Eventually, we arrived at the base of a tall, narrow hill. There was a passable area of land between the swamp and the hill that was only about twenty meters wide. There were some rocky outcroppings at the base of it. They weren’t particularly big, but would provide us a bit of cover whilst we went over our options.

  “OK, we have to do a scan soon,” Liberty said. “We’ve already been here a while, and we haven’t done anything yet. We might be walking further and further away from the target, so we have to get our bearings.” She looked at the small expanse between the hill and the swamp. “How are you doing?” she asked me. I wanted to assure her I was fine, that she could count on me, but I knew that I was only slowing them down.

  “I’m not very mobile just at the minute,” I admitted. “I’m OK, I just need to rest a bit.” The combination of being cramped up in the pod for hours and the sudden rapid movement once we’d landed had taken its toll. I was in pain, but I was pretty sure I just needed to rest for a bit. Liberty surveyed our surroundings.

  “Well, this looks like a pretty defensible area,” she concluded. “Milo, you can stay here, and keep watch to see if anyone is following us up from the pod. That’ll give you a chance to rest. The rest of us can move on further and try to find a better scanning position.”

  “He can’t scan here?” I asked.

  “No,” Liberty said, shaking her head. “It’s too tight an area. If someone comes, we won’t have time to pack up the scanning equipment and retreat. If we move further on, you can use your comm to warn us if someone comes. We can come back and support you, buying Casper time to get packed up and ready to move.”

  “Well can’t someone else stay here with me?” I asked nervously.

  “No,” she said firmly. “We don’t know what we’re walking into.”

  The others got moving, whilst I stayed in the rocks, watching the route we’d taken from the South. After what seemed like an age, Casper’s voice came over the comm unit.

  “Milo?”

  “Yeah,” I replied.

  “I’m about to start a scan. Any sign of hostiles?” he asked.

  “Nothin
g,” I said. “How far away are you?” I asked. There was a pause.

  “We’ve gone quite far,” he admitted. “We had to get out of the shadow of the hill. It’s relatively thin. It tapers around at the base just a few meters from where you are, but it’s pretty tall.” I suddenly felt a wave of fear.

  “So I’m on my own?” I asked frantically. Another pause.

  “Get it together, Milo,” Liberty said over the comm. “You’re a trained Scout. You’re perfectly capable of defending our rear.” I heard a snigger in the background, and Liberty scolded Casper. “We’re a ten minute run from your position,” she said back into the comm. “If anyone comes, you hold them off, and drop back towards us. Let us know, and we’ll start making our way to you. You’ve got grenades, and a small opening to cover. You should be able to dig in pretty effectively if necessary.”

  Hold them off? Dig in? Liberty was talking to me as if I was actually a soldier! Whether this was genuine trust on her side, or just an attempt to instill some confidence in me, I wasn’t sure. Most likely, she didn’t think there were any hostiles for me to hold off at that point. There was no sign of any activity in the area whatsoever. So I did as I was told. I stayed put, and kept focused on the path leading up from the crash site, ready for anything. I could do this. I was a Scout. A trained soldier. I could prove to Liberty that they could all count on me.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Once again, I’d spent too long looking in the one direction. I actually realised, this time. I felt a bit of pride when it suddenly occurred to me that I was making the same mistake once again. I’d been so obsessed with focusing on the path up from where the pod was, that I hadn’t remembered to keep an eye on the area to the North-East, around the base of the hill in the other direction. So I was smiling when I turned to adjust my position to face the other way. There was no sign of activity, so I looked down to check my rifle (A habit I was desperately trying to get out of.) I looked up again, and there they were. Three, no four, armoured figures rounding a large rock face only about one hundred meters away. I scrambled up, which in retrospect was probably a mistake, as my movement caught their attention, and they started to approach cautiously, laying down fire at me. At that range, I wasn’t an easy target, but I didn’t wait around to test that opinion. I took off, following the curve of the rock face as I went.

  Every part of every piece of training we’d done pressed an idea into my head. Instead of breaking away from the rock face to head towards the others, I continued to follow the bend around the small mountain. I broke into a sprint, probably the fastest I’d ever moved in my life. The sudden strategic idea popping into my head had given me a pride and vigour I didn’t know existed within me. When I was certain the enemy wasn’t hot on my heels, I flicked on the comm.

  “This is Milo!” I shouted into the comm. “There are at least five enemy soldiers approaching from your East,” I said.

  “Milo?” replied Casper. “I thought you were to our East?”

  “Yeah, I was. They got the jump on me. I’m heading North around the mountain to try to get behind them.” I switched off the comm without waiting for a reply. Talking was just going to slow me down, and if I tried to go back to regroup with the others, I’d just run headlong into the enemy.

  After a good few minutes, I still wasn’t all the way around the mountain. I could vaguely hear gunfire, but with the mountain between myself and the action, it wasn’t very loud. I was panting by that point, and was starting to worry that by the time I got into position, the skirmish would already be over, and I’d be stuck there alone. Well, not really alone…

  Just when I was about to give up, the gunfire suddenly got a lot louder, and I realised I’d made it back to where I’d started. I made my way West a bit more cautiously, then caught a glimpse of enemy soldiers a bit further on. They were crouched behind rock, but on my side of it. They had their backs to me, and were firing further West. I could now pick out the different sounds, and the rest of my squad were firing back on them, as I could clearly pick out the sound of Liberty’s scatter gun. My heart started racing. My plan had worked. Perfectly! The enemy soldiers had no idea I was there. I started to pick a target, but remembered the grenades on my belt. I set one, and launched it at my foe. They were huddled quite close together, and I could potentially damage them all with one explosion.

  In my excitement, though, I whiffed the throw. The grenade bounced along the ground a good 20 meters short. I reached for another one, but realised the explosion from the first grenade would alert them before I could throw it. I lifted my rifle, and got to one knee. I wasn’t going to make the same mistake and let my nervous excitement spoil my aim. I picked my target, aimed for the largest part of his torso, and… The grenade went off. Dust exploded everywhere, completely obscuring my view. I cursed, and considered throwing a second grenade after all. My thought process was too slow, though. Plasma shots started flying past me, as the enemy laid down blind fire to try to pin me down. I began to fall back again, resisting the urge to fire back, lest I somehow hit one of my squad-mates.

  I clicked my comm back on. “This is Milo,” I said sheepishly.

  “Milo? Where the Hell have you been?” Casper demanded.

  “I’ve, er… created a distraction?” I offered.

  “OK. Not bad Milo. We’re taking the opportunity to head South-West, get some distance between us and the Matan,” he replied. “Where are you?”

  I sighed. “I’m East of the Matan,” I replied. “I’m completely cut-off. I’m gonna head South,” I continued. I figured if they were heading South-ish, I could make my way around and rendezvous with them.

  “He’s behind the Matan,” I heard Casper saying. “He’s gonna go South, try to catch up with us.”

  “No way,” I heard in the background, the unmistakably irritated voice of Liberty. “He’ll get lost.” I bristled at her complete lack of faith in my abilities, but only for a moment. She was probably right, and clearly I hadn’t done well so far. I listened to the sounds of a muffled discussion from the other end as I cautiously made my way South, trying to both look behind me to see if the Matan were following me, whilst looking forward in case they had back-up.

  “Liberty says to stay put, we’re gonna come back and try to fight our way through the Matan soldiers,” he said. I rolled my eyes.

  “I’m already a kilometre South,” I lied, “You’ll just get yourselves killed if you try to come back for me that way.”

  “Liberty says we’re not leaving a man behind,” Casper replied, and I could tell from his tone he probably thought my decision was the better one.

  “Well it’s too late,” I told him. “I’ve given up advantageous cover to head South. If I go back now, I’ll be an easy target.” I could hear more muffled discussion, much more heated this time.

  “Milo?” It was Liberty. She did not sound happy. “You are to continue South, and locate the drop pod. Stay there! It’ll provide you some cover, and we’ll know where you are. Do not move from the drop pod.”

  “What if I come under heavy fire?” I protested. “I need to be able to drop back if it becomes necessary?”

  Liberty sighed audibly. “If you have to move,” she said, “Go West, but try to stay as close to the wreckage as possible so we can find you.” She clicked off. I cursed to myself. I’d made the right decision for the circumstances, but unfortunately they were circumstances that I had created. Once again, I told myself off for not paying better attention to my full surroundings whilst on watch. It had happened numerous times, the enemy getting the drop on me, whether it be in training exercise or live situations. I wasn’t learning from my mistakes.

  My outflanking manoeuvre, on the other hand, hadn’t been a bad idea. It had worked, and if I’d managed to get the grenade into the right position, we’d probably have been able to get the better of our enemy. I had been lucky, though, that the others had been able to hold the Matan off long enough that the fight hadn’t ended before I’d gotten
there. In other situations, those six or seven minutes that I was out of action would have been too long. I definitely needed to improve my split-second decision-making. I was, though, still alive, so I’d clearly done the right thing at some point. I was looking back again, and there was no sign of the soldiers behind me, so I figured they had continued on in pursuit of the others. I wasn’t sure if they had even seen me, and they possibly thought the others had lobbed the grenade high over their heads to make them think they were surrounded.

  I saw no sign of the enemy in front of me either, and the terrain had become a lot more open. I recognised my surroundings, and as a result, I was pretty confident that I was heading in the right direction for the crashed drop pod. After about ten minutes, it occurred to me that I hadn’t heard from the others. If they were pinned down by fire, communicating with me wouldn’t have been their priority. On the other hand, if they had been shot down, communication would obviously have been impossible. I didn’t want to distract them and, in all honesty, if they were dead I wasn’t ready for that information, so I put off using the comm. After another five minutes, though, I decided that I needed to know what was going on.