Vanguard

Chapter 10

"Sharpshooting 101"

[Saleucami, UNSC Vanguard]

Aboard the Halberd-class Heavy Destroyer Vanguard, deck seventeen, Tano was following the SPARTAN through the empty corridors as they make their way to one of the ship's armory where they'll take the equipment they need and make their way outside the destroyer and find something to shoot.

They were in the middle of talking about ship classes when she asks "So this isn't the largest class the UNSC has?"

Percival answers "No but it is very effective for its size, the largest ship the UNSC currently possesses would be the UNSC Cradle, a mobile repair/refit station that measured at little over thirteen kilometers."

"Thirteen kilometers!? That's a huge ship" she said with newfound respect for the UNSC's engineering capabilities to create such a large ship.

Longarm comments "My personal favorite is the Halcyon-class Light Cruiser, they may not have much bite but they can sure as hell take a beating."

They reached a large reinforced bulkhead door with a keypad next to it, Ahsoka watched him input the security code and the door hissed releasing pressurized air and opening revealing an entire stockpile of rifles, pistols, machine guns of varying calibers, and explosive ordnance.

She complements the SPARTAN "Nice set of weapons you have here, enough to arm a large militia."

Longarm nods "Yep, we got MA37s, M395 DMRs, the infamous M247 machine guns, and even the deadly M41 rocket launcher."

"Cool so what're we using?" she asks as she takes a closer look at a set of BR55 battle rifles.

The SPARTAN made his way to a rack set up against the back wall containing a line of silver long barreled rifles saying "This."

Ahsoka turned her attention to Longarm and found him holding the same kind of rifle she saw in the picture she found, she had to ask "A sniper rifle?"

Longarm chuckled "Hmph this isn't no ordinary rifle, this is the SRS99D Anti-Materiel rifle system. It weighs fourteen kilograms and chambers the 14.5 x 114mm armor piercing, fin-stabilized, discarding sabot round that can pierce the frontal armor of a tank and other vehicles. Some say it can take the hat off a target at two thousand yards which is true depending on who's behind the rifle. It is designed in the conventional layout, so the magazine and operating system are located in front of the trigger. Fitted with a 5x and 10x optical scope it can show real time images in infrared vision when not looking through it. When looking through it, the scope shows a target's distance and elevation from the shooter's position. The weapon also utilizes a frame that serves as a carrying handle as well as a scope protector and a folding bipod located in front of the magazine on the underside of the rifle."

"So this is your weapon of choice . . . no doubt you're undisputed when it comes to long range combat."

"I may not be good in close quarters as I am at long range, but god help you if you stay in my line of sight for more than three seconds."

The young togruta looked at the SPARTAN for a second in disbelief and took his word for it, if he was able to hold his own against Grievous in hand to hand combat and take on a small army of droids then there was no doubt that he would dominate a battlefield singlehandedly with his rifle, she asks "So we're sharing?"

Longarm shook his head "No" he turns around and picks up another rifle holding it out to her "You get your own."

She held out her hands and took the rifle, the weight caught her off balance but she was able to hold it in her hands and feel the engineering put into it, she then looked up to the SPARTAN to see him grabbing a small box containing ammunition and shoulder the rifle with its sling before he said "Let's get going."

She shoulders the rifle just like he did and follow him out the armory, as they make their way to one of the exits she asks "So how old are you?"

Longarm glanced down at her before answering "I'm forty two."

"Oh . . ." Tano replies with an unenthusiastic tone.

But Longarm states "But if we were to exclude my time in cryogenic stasis, I'm twenty one."

"Wow really? You're twenty one? Your voice makes it sound like you're older than that."

"That's what augmentations will do to you."

"Well you're not that older than I am."

The SPARTAN could only guess how old her species could get, because in Sangheili terms forty two is still considered young, he had to ask out of curiosity "Really? How old are you?"

"I'm nineteen."

"Huh . . ." he says with intrigue at first not believing her age.

Ahsoka looks up at him as they continue walking and ask "You thought I was younger didn't you?"

"What? No I didn't . . ."

She steps up in front of the SPARTAN and stops him before pointing her finger up at him "You were thinking it weren't you?"

"Honestly it never came up in my mind, I was too busy not trying to get killed during the last few days."

She steps out of the way and they resume walking down the corridor nearing an airlock when she says "Alright . . . so why are you placed in cryogenic stasis for so long?"

"Like I said our FTL isn't the greatest, we can only cover about three light years a day. So I spend most of my time in stasis as it takes weeks and even months to reach another planet."

"Wow that's extremely slow, we can be on the other side of the galaxy in days. You know if you want we can have Obi-wan give us some credits to have someone switch out your FTL drives."

At that very moment both Percival and Longarm stopped what they were doing and yelled out in objection "NO!"

Tano jumped in fright "What!? What did I say!?"

Longarm explains "You can't just switch out FTL drives, especially a slipspace drive, that's suicide on a massive scale!"

"Why not?" she asks not understanding the matter with FTL drives.

Percival explains with more clarity "A Shaw-Fukijawa Slipspace drive is an extremely fragile piece of equipment, if we allowed your people to even try and remove the drive it'll send everything within a two and a half mile radius into oblivion, literally."

"So not only is your drive slow as a rancor it's a doomsday weapon as well if not handled correctly."

Longarm gave a silent repetitive nod, she realizes that if these two were afraid of something like this then it was probably best to just leave it be, she said "Alright . . . no switching out FTL drives . . ."

Both the SPARTAN and AI sighed in relief saying "Thank you . . ." and Longarm states afterwards "Airlock is just up ahead."

The two resumed walking up to the airlock where Percival kindly opens the door for them and let them into the depressurization room, the door closed behind them and the room hissed as the air pressure changes from inside the ship to the outside atmosphere, the second door then opened and the two walked out into the evening daylight on the grasslands that surrounded the downed destroyer.

Ahsoka breathed in the fresh air and said "Well if there's one thing our two galaxies both share, is that our ships still have that stale recycled air."

Longarm chuckled "I agree . . . there's a ridge about two kilometers east of here. Hope you don't mind hoofing it a little."

"Alright let's get going" the togruta said with a grin and began walking first with the SPARTAN catching up.

The two walked across the open plains putting distance between themselves and the Vanguard as they looked around the landscape and took in the sights as they progressed to the ridge Longarm mentioned. The two unlikely friends were silent letting the sounds of Saleucami take over, nearby animals called to one another as they traveled in herds grazing along the hillsides, Ahsoka seemed to enjoy the silence and peace but it seemed to her that the SPARTAN-ll super soldier that had seen twenty five long years of war and could probably think of more ways to kill a person than anyone could imagine, was actually enjoying it more. She watched him as he couldn't take his eyes off the herd until they retreated behind a hill to graze elsewhere and he looked elsewhere, and for once she actually sensed the pent up anger and frustration slowly dissipate from inside him as if the scenery is somewhat putting him at rest.

"It's beautiful isn't it?" she asks him as they continue walking.

"Yeah it is . . . the ridge is just up ahead" he responded calmly.

The two continued walking onwards until they reached their destination, a small ridge overlooking a vast grassland that could be seen for tens of miles, and started unloading their equipment. Ahsoka found a small rock to sit on while Longarm took his spot on the dirt setting the box of ammunition down next to himself.

He then holds out his rifle as a demonstration "Alright first thing we're going to do is familiarize ourselves with the SRS99 rifle system, though you're already familiar with some of the components, we're going over the five major parts of a rifle" he then moves his hands to the corresponding part stating "Trigger. Scope. Box magazine. Safety switch. Charging handle."

Tano takes her rifle into her hands and examined the parts the SPARTAN stated, she was familiar with trigger, safety, and scope but the other two were new to her which was expected of UNSC weaponry. Nonetheless she understood what they were called and waited for his next set of instructions.

"Ok with that out of the way we're going to go ahead and load the rifle, pull your charging handle back into locked position and pull the magazine from underneath" he says as he does so pulling the bolt back and taking the magazine out.

She follows suit and pulls the bolt back until it made a loud click, which was harder than she initially thought at first, and slid the magazine out of the rifle, Longarm then sets his rifle aside on the ground with the magazine still in his hand as he brings out the ammunition box and opens it revealing twenty four 14.5mm anti-materiel rounds, he then instructs "Set the rifle aside and take your magazine, take four rounds from the box and slide them into the magazine one after another like so" as he inserts each individual bullet into the four round box magazine.

Ahsoka does as told and begins loading the rounds into her magazine with each round making a light click as each round is pushed downwards to make room for the next one, once all four rounds were inside she looks up to see the SPARTAN picking up his rifle and insert the magazine back into the underside. Realizing he wasn't giving instructions anymore she follows his example and inserts the box magazine back into her rifle which then the bolt swung forward making a loud click signaling that the clip was locked in place and the first round was loaded into the chamber.

"Good" Longarm states with appreciation "Now the fun part, go ahead and lay on the ground in firing position."

Tano does so laying on her stomach while firmly resting the stock of the rifle against her right shoulder as she holds onto the trigger grip with her right hand and her left hand up at the foregrip, she watches the SPARTAN enter the same position and look through his scope commenting "Alright let's if we can find you a target, go ahead and look through your scope and see if you can find something. There's a notch on top of the scope that'll adjust the zoom on the optics."

"Alright . . ." Ahsoka replies before looking through the scope and scan the distant plains, she decides to fiddle with the notch he mentioned and watched the screen in front of her zoom in further where she then notices a small boulder sticking out of the tall grass, "Hey there's a rock out there, think that's good enough for target practice?" she asks.

Longarm asks "How far out?" as he searches for the rock through his scope.

She looked at the bottom of her screen but she couldn't understand the numerical symbols Longarm's kind used, she said "I don't know . . . I still don't understand some of your kind's writing."

The SPARTAN took a moment then said "Oh wait I think I see it, that's about fifteen hundred meters away. Alright we can start with that, is your reticle on target?"

"Yeah . . ."

"Alright . . . take a few deep breaths and when you're ready . . . gently squeeze the trigger."

Ahsoka asks "What? No tips or anything from the professional SPARTAN sniper?"

"I believe in hands on experience, just do what I say and I'll make sure you'll be fine. You're doing well so far. But if want a sniper's saying then hear this, sniper's take their time to make sure they won't miss on the first shot but they don't waste their time either because they'll never when the situation will change."

Ahsoka understood what he meant, snipers take their time to ascertain the situation and acquire the right target but they don't want to waste any time in case something unexpected comes up in which it normally does.

"Alright . . ." the young togruta finally says before falling silent and focusing on the rock through the scope.

Her light blue reticle was centered on the boulder and she took several deep breaths before relaxing and gently apply pressure on the trigger, the next moment the rifle violently jerks backwards against her shoulder as it is accompanied by a loud deafening roar of a rifle shot echoing out into the distance. She felt the raw power of the UNSC's might first hand as the dirt around her kicked up and formed a brief haze before settling again, once everything cleared and the ringing in her ears ceased, she found a large empty metal casing lying next to her with smoke slowly trailing out of it.

"Whoa . . ." Tano said with awe.

Longarm chuckled "Like that huh? Check out the rock."

Ahsoka looked back into the scope and took herself another moment to find the rock again until she found it, or what's left of it. The top half of the rock was utterly shattered to pieces from the devastating impact of the anti-materiel round there was nothing left but a faint vapor trail that originated from the end of the barrel and ended where the rock used to be.

"I did that?" she asks in disbelief.

"Yeah, no matter who you are, this rifle will definitely ruin your day."

She settles the rifle down flipping the safety on and looks over to the SPARTAN who was searching another target through his scope when she asks "How good of a sniper are you?"

The SPARTAN takes his eyes away from the scope and looked into her eyes asking "What kind of question is that?"

"An honest one . . ."

"Alright . . ." Longarm says as he gets up from prone position and states "How about I show you, it's no fun just to explain things."

"Ok how do you want to do this? I point something out and you shoot?"

The SPARTAN-ll chuckled saying "Haha I hope that was an insult, no see that rock behind you?"

Tano turns around to see a small rock roughly the size of a training droid used to help young Jedi hone their skills with a lightsaber, there were three other rocks of similar size, she walks over and picks one up and says "You want me to throw them and you shoot them out of the air."

Longarm nods saying "Make it a good one."

"Alright big guy, let's make this more interesting with a bet. If you manage to shoot all four rocks out of the air then you'll get a hundred credits easy. But if you miss one shot then you earn nothing and I get the pleasure to know that I have seen one of the UNSC's greatest snipers fail to hit their target."

The SPARTAN said with a smirk "Alright you're on" and assumes position with his rifle at the ready.

Ahsoka gave one quick casual toss throwing the rock up and down back into her hand before she readies herself and hurls the rock out into the distance, it took a split moment for the SPARTAN to take aim and fire a shot sending the round straight into the tumbling rock and utterly obliterated it before it even reached ten meters.

He turns back around saying with a laugh "I said make it a good one!"

The young former Jedi picks up another rock and hurls it into the air before he even got into firing position, nonetheless he was quick to react and shot the rock down with ease before it could've hit the ground. She had to admit that his shooting skills were undeniably deadly beyond any measure and she was sure glad that she wasn't his enemy but the bet wasn't quite over yet since he still had to make two more shots. She readies the third rock and decides to change it up a bit, instead of throwing it out towards the open plains, she hurls the rock upwards high above the two thinking he wouldn't have enough time to react but he quickly proved her wrong as he twists himself around and aim directly up firing his third shot, it was merely seconds later when a small shower of tiny rock fragments came down on them.

"Alright hotshot, last rock" Ahsoka said as she picks up the fourth rock.

She heard the SPARTAN chuckle which prompted her to change her strategy entirely, she watches Longarm assume position before she hurls the rock. As the rock hurtle through the air she watched him take aim but before he could've pulled the trigger she used the Force and quickly changed the rock's trajectory just as the fourth round was fired. As expected the round missed and zipped passed harmlessly, Longarm watched in disbelief at how the rock could've changed course until it landed on the ground and he figured it out.

"You did that on purpose didn't you?" he asks as he looks back at Tano.

"Maybe" she replied with a face with an innocent grin.

The two chuckled for the moment before Longarm sat down against a rock and started loading more rounds into his box magazine while Ahsoka got behind her rifle again and begun searching for another target to shoot and help her get better. She eventually found another boulder, though smaller and much farther out than the first, and lined up her shot before pulling the trigger sending another high velocity round downrange. The ground beneath her body shook under the immense power of an anti-materiel rifle and the dirt kicked up once more around her, through her scope she could see the boulder blow apart as the round impacts the surface with sheer force. Despite the sheer ferocity of the rifle and its purposes, she began to actually relax ever since she left the Jedi temple, she looked over her shoulder and found the SPARTAN loading another magazine with rounds and thought that moments like these are a must because during a time of war things aren't as calm as they were before. She turns her head back into the scope and begun searching for another target when she found something unusual.

She asks out loud "Hey Longarm, I see a ship out there, you think there's someone coming by to check out the Vanguard?"

The SPARTAN-ll looked up and brought up his rifle scope, it took him a moment before he found the same ship Tano was asking about and got onto his comms contacting Percival aboard the Vanguard "Sierra-121 to Vanguard over?"

"Yes SPARTAN go ahead" Percival responds.

"We got visual on a corvette class vessel about two kilometers north northeast of our AO, are you picking up anything in that sector?"

The AI took a moment to scan the area with the destroyer's sensors and reports "Negative, they must have jammers active."

Ahsoka comments after further examination "It looks like a Republic ship . . . Consular-class."

"Republic?" Longarm asks before turning his attention back to Percival "Standby Vanguard, we're moving in to investigate, have missile pods three and seven ready for fire support in case we need it."

"Acknowledged Sierra-121."

The transmission ended as the SPARTAN loads up his rifle and packed everything up before saying "C'mon, let's see what's going on."

"Right behind ya'" Ahsoka states as she stands up with her rifle slinging it over her shoulder before she followed the SPARTAN off the ridge to investigate the unusual Republic ship.

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