COUNTERPOINT
CHAPTER 1: THE SOLDIER
PART 6
By Mya Thevendra
Over the next three quarters of an hour, Ian sat scrutinizing the tactical readouts on his console, and on the display screens in front of him. Away in the barracks, the marines were preparing themselves for the day's duty, while those who had been on patrol and guard duty through the night were nearing the end of their shift.
At 0750 Ian deactivated his chair console and walked down towards O'Hanlan, who was working through one of the tracking sensor exercises on one of the workstations. O'Hanlan caught sight of him and promptly stood up.
"I'm heading over to the barracks," said Ian, still eyeing the tactical screens in front, "Are you ready?"
"Yes, sir."
There was an unsettled edge about the marine, but that was understandable. Ian gestured towards the primary tracking console on the left forward side of the TacCon.
"Alright, get settled in. I'll contact you before we head out."
O'Hanlan acknowledged and headed over to assume his new post as squad co-ordinator, while Ian exited the T.C.U. and made his way up towards the shuttle terminal.
Marines along the way saluted, but most of the civilians he passed still didn't recognise him. The shuttle over to the barracks was half full, and Ian sat in the midst of a dozen conversations. As he looked through the windows out into the landscape, the sun drove relentlessly down. The burning sands and cracked earth lay still and calm; there was no wind to be seen, not even the slightest breeze. This was a blessing however, as "breezes" on this world tended to heat rather than cool, as well as throw sand through the air at 140 mph.
The shuttle pulled into the barrack terminal and Ian stepped down amongst a handful of others, whilst commuters waiting on the platform boarded. Walking past the guard and through the main entrance, Ian found himself in an entry foyer, with three other exits. Each of the large sets of retracting doors was marked clearly on its front; one lead to the mess hall and recreation-rooms, the second went through into the marines' quarters, which took up more than one third of the entire structure. The last set of doors was labelled 'Secondary Armoury / Exit Bay'. As the doors of this last exit made way in front of him, Ian walked through.
The layout of the typical Confederate barracks was designed to be as efficient as possible, with several access ways linking each of the building's sections, so that in the event of a sudden attack, any marines in their quarters or in the mess hall could get through to the armoury or the exit bay in half a minute or less.
As Ian walked through the corridor, it curved around a left corner and extended on for another thirty feet, widening out at the end into another small foyer, this time with two doors labelled 'Secondary Armoury' and 'Exit Bay'.
The Secondary Armoury in the barracks was where the base's primary complement of infantry weaponry and armour was kept, essentially a large, secured access storage hold, with several distribution points around its edge, connecting to a ring shaped corridor running around the outside. This enabled several groups of marines to pick up their gear at the same time; however, getting hold of their gear directly from the armoury was usually only done in emergency situations. About twenty metres below the armoury, and located on the outer edge of the barracks' structure was the exit bay, from where the marines could access the outside environment. One of the armoury's distribution points extended down into the exit bay, and it was from this point that marines, such as those going onto patrol or scout duty, typically picked up their equipment.
Ian entered through the second door and headed down towards the exit bay. Two sets of escalators took him down almost to ground level, and in front was a large doorway, some ten feet high, and twenty across. The door had already been retracted upwards into the bulkhead, and Ian walked in.
The exit bay was situated almost at ground level, and was a huge, fairly well lit chamber, perhaps fifty feet square and with a high ceiling. A narrow balcony ran around the edge, about halfway up the sides of the bay. The metal floor was scuffed and scorched in places, with yellow and black warning strips lining the edges and reaching up the walls. Over to one side was the distribution point, designed as a large, rounded alcove in the east wall. A system of conveyor belts carried requisitioned firearms and armour from the Main Armoury down to the exit bay. The distribution alcove was colour coded with a dull orange border on the wall running around its edge, and over on the north side of the bay, opposite to where Ian had entered, the region in front of the main bay exit was bathed in an intermittent red glow as signal lights pulsed above the frame of the massive doorway which lead to the outside.
Inside, towards the centre of the bay, waited three squads of Ian's brigade, and three from the Jackknifes. Sgt. Sheppard walked forward to meet him, giving a quick salute; Ian nodded and looked over to the Spider Monkeys who had lined up to attention.
"At ease."
The marines broke up and went back to preparing their gear. Each one would be carrying a light pack with emergency rations, a water flask and field medical kit, as well as some basic tools for field salvage. To stay in touch with one another, and the base, each member of the scouting party would be wearing a communications headset; just a small earpiece with a thin microphone, and a fine transmitter wire which looped around the back of the head. One marine from each company would be carrying a signal booster, to allow the headsets' signals to reach all the way back to the base, as well as cut through any interference from the weather. Each marine had also been issued with a pair of standard protective goggles, which were also tinted to shield their eyes from the sun, and carried a respirator mask; a small device similar in size and shape to an anti-pollution mask, which would enable the marines to breathe in the event of a sandstorm.
In addition to their standard equipment, one marine from each of the six squads present would be carrying a P.F.M. or Portable Fluxgate Magnetometer. The P.F.M. was a smallish piece of equipment, consisting of a rounded box-like unit with a handle on top, and a long silver coloured cylinder protruding from the front. Used for soil and rock analysis, P.F.M.'s could be readjusted to send out a short-range detection pulse, and would be of extreme use in locating the mineral resources, once inside the caverns. The sensors in an S.C.V. would have been capable of the same function, and with greater efficiency, but had to be ruled out, as external ComSat surveys had shown the underground tunnels to be too narrow for anything larger than man-sized to travel through.
Ian drew his attention back to Sgt. Sheppard.
"How are they doing?" he asked.
"They're fine, sir. They're eager to get to work." She replied with a wry smile.
"Yes, I think we all are."
Commander Murello walked over from the other side of the bay where his unit and his XO, Sergeant Noah Davies, were also preparing their gear.
"So, what's the word on those rippers?" asked Murello.
"There should be enough; however many there are should be ready to bring down any time now," said Ian, nodding his head towards the distribution alcove. "Engineering's going to contact us."
"You know," said Murello, "there're still those six CMC suits, as well as a few Impalers. I take it those are staying in the armoury?"
"Yes."
"For consistency's sake, or..."
Ian nodded.
"There's that," He began, "and there's the fact that marines seeing their commanding officers wearing powered armour and carrying Impaler rifles, while they're equipped with spitguns and fatigues, won't exactly be in the most optimistic frame of mind."
Murello nodded in agreement and then looked over towards the closed main exit gate.
"Well, it's a good day for it, anyway. It's a little hotter than yesterday, but we should do okay."
"Let's hope so." Said Ian.
Murello turned and walked back to his unit, while Ian looked over towards the west side of the exit bay. Various lockers and supply cabinet acted as dispensers for the basic field tools and supplies that the marines would be taking with them. Ian turned back to Sgt. Sheppard.
"Have you packed your gear?"
"Yes, sir."
"All right, go and help the men finish up; I'll get my pack together."
Ian moved over to the side, picked up a rucksack, and went about stowing the necessary gear inside. As he took out a prepared flask of water from one of the lockers, he glanced over at the Jackknifes behind him. A few of them laughed boisterously and capered amongst their squad-mates, only to be scolded by Sgt. Davies. To them, this was old hat. They had been out on dozens of patrols, and knew the nearby territory well. The Spider Monkeys on the other hand, though still new to the territory, had more experience as a unit in general, in both combat and non-combat situations; Ian figured that the two units should be able to work well together, although his somewhat conceited attitude towards any unit which he hadn't personally worked with led him to believe that somewhere along the line, the Spider Monkeys would be picking up the slack.
As he slung a light supply belt around his waist, Ian looked over to see Sgt. Sheppard in her element. In some small, hidden way he envied her. The men looked at her with trusting eyes, the same eyes that regarded him with little more than grim, browbeaten obedience. She worked a magic with the men and women of the brigade, a knowing grin here, a supportive nudge in the shoulder there, sharing the odd crude joke with one of the younger members of the unit; things far beyond the realm of Ian's expertise, and yet he was able to find some minor comfort on it, to know that his men were at ease and ready for the coming task. As he watched, he felt a quiet confidence settle into him. He was with his unit, and the feeling of dread from the day before seemed but a distant memory.
Ian finished packing, and swung his rucksack up onto his back, jostling it to test its weight. All in all he was carrying less than twenty pounds of gear; not much but he would probably feel every kilo of it by the end of the day. Suddenly, a voice rang out across the bay.
"Commander Latimer!"
Ian looked over to see one of the on-duty technicians jogging over.
"Commander Latimer, sir, there's a call for you, from engineering."
The technician led Ian over to the east wall of the exit bay, where Engineer Sajan's face flickered on a communications terminal.
"What's your report?" asked Ian.
"That's fifty-two!" announced Sajan triumphantly. "I'm not gonna tell you what I had to pull to get this done, but there it is. They've been shuttled over to the secondary armoury. Should be on their way down to you at any moment."
Ian turned to his right, and stared at the distribution alcove a few feet away. After a few seconds, the conveyor belts whirred into life. Each of the five belts was a thin, vertically looped segmented steel band, which extended up a long diagonal shaft to the armoury. Hooked pegs were fastened at two feet intervals, on which weaponry or armour could be hung.
After half a minute or so, the first ripper appeared, swaying slightly as one of the belts ferried it down. More rippers appeared one by one, until each belt was carrying them. The conveyors froze automatically as the rifles reached the end of the belts; before they were to loop round, back up towards the armoury. Ian walked over to one of them, lifted one of the rifles off its peg, and then walked back to the com terminal.
"Okay," said Sajan "as you can see, we've really had to do some work on them."
Ian looked over towards the marines behind him.
"Everybody gather round."
The marines formed into a bunched semi-circle around Ian, with Murello, Sheppard and Davies at the front, and looked on as Sajan outlined the new modifications.
"Right, the main casing had to be refitted; we used a heated plastic sealant to sand-proof the chamber and the barrel. After the sealant had set, the casing didn't fit anymore, so we had to re-mould 'em; they're a little bulkier now, and we didn't have time to thoroughly test-fire all of 'em, but they should be okay. But there is one thing; the sealant we used is chemically layered, it's heat-proof from the outside only, which means that the sun won't affect it, but if you overheat the chamber from firing, the sealant might crack. If it does, you're guaranteed to lock the weapon up."
Murello glanced around at the Jackknife squads.
"Everybody get that?"
The marines acknowledged and Ian turned back to face Sajan's image.
"All right, good work."
Sajan gave a tired, unassuming smile, the ordeal of working through the night only just starting to catch up with him.
"Hm yeah, glad to help." He said with a sigh.
The terminal blinked off, and Ian motioned towards the conveyor belts.
"Everybody pick up your weapons."
The marines filed into queues in front of the five belts and began picking up their rifles. The belts whined into motion once again as the weapons were taken off, and continued feeding the rippers down towards the marines until all fifty-two present had been armed.
While the marines checked over their weapons and got used to the new weight, Ian walked over to the supply lockers and picked up a communications headset. Fixing it in place, he tugged the microphone, placing it in front of his mouth, and activated the transmitter.
"TacCon from Commander Latimer. O'Hanlan, do you read me?"
O'Hanlan's voice crackled into his right ear.
"Yes sir, reading you loud and clear"
"Report."
"Sir, the TacCon is on ready alert, all tracking systems are active, all channels are open."
"Stand by Corporal, we're getting ready to move out."
Ian inspected his rifle. It had been a long time since he had held a ripper, but even through the modified casing, it still retained its familiar weight and feel. His earpiece crackled once again.
"Commander Latimer from TacCon. Do you copy?"
"Go ahead O'Hanlan,"
"Sir, Sgt. Gleason just contacted the T.C.U. wishing to speak with you."
"Put him through onto this line." Said Ian.
"Yes, sir."
Ian's earpiece fell silent, and he winced as a sudden jarring racket blared through the line.
"Commander Latimer?" shouted a voice over what sounded like the roar of an engine.
"Yes, go ahead."
"Sir, this is Sergeant Gleason. Looks like I'll be your escort for today; we're just circling around from the vehicle plant."
"How many of you are there?" asked Ian.
"Two; me and Corporal Pryce. We decided to double up to match your squads."
"Very well."
"Sir, we'll be at the barracks momentarily, what's your status?"
Ian took a quick look around him.
"We're pretty much all set here," said Ian, "We were going to start at nine, but I can't see any reason to wait. We'll start out now; we'll meet you when we get out there."
"Copy that, Gleason out."
Ian walked over to Sgt. Sheppard, who was adjusting the sight on her ripper.
"How is it?" Asked Ian.
"Think I've got it sir, most of the others were all right."
Ian tightened his pack's straps across his chest, and clasped his rifle with both hands.
"Form the men up. It's time to go."
While Sgt. Sheppard ordered the men into their squads, Ian moved over to the other side of the bay, where Murello was stood watching. He gestured over Ian's shoulder towards Sgt. Sheppard and the Spider Monkeys.
"We heading out now? It's only 0830."
"Yes, no sense in waiting. I thought I'd move the schedule forward again."
"Hunh, that's getting to be a habit with you, isn't it? Said Murello with a grin.
Ian moved to the front of the exit bay and stood beneath the main exit in the blinking red glow of the signal lights. Behind him, the Jackknifes had formed up into squads, and along with the three squads of the Spider Monkeys, stood waiting, fully equipped and armed.
Ian turned and peered to the rear of the bay, to a control booth, where the main exit controls were housed, and a technician stood waiting. Ian gave a signal, and the air rang through with a blaring klaxon as the technician activated the retraction controls. The signal lights changed to flash muted amber, and in front, the bay door's locking bars clanked and hummed, as they were pulled free. The massive gate roared as it was dragged upwards. Extending twenty feet past the door was a dimly lit access tunnel, which sloped gently down to ground level. The tunnel came to an end at a second, final door, which led through to the outside, and opened outwards and downwards like an enormous mailbox. Making sure that everyone else had put theirs on; Ian strapped on his goggles and gave a second signal.
As he moved forward into the tunnel, Sgt. Sheppard led the Spider Monkeys behind, with Murello, Davies and the Jackknifes bringing up the rear. The klaxon screamed out again as they moved in, and the signal lights, both above the fist door, and inside the tunnel changed again, flashing a brilliant green. As the final door drew noisily open, Ian tugged at his microphone.
"TacCon from Commander Latimer"
"Go ahead, sir."
"Start watching Corporal. We're heading out."
Sunlight flooded into the tunnel as the door lowered, and a sudden, sweltering heat passed over them. Without a word, Commander Latimer led the scouting party out of the barracks and onto the scorched earth of the Widow desert.
CHAPTER 1: THE SOLDIER
PART 6
By Mya Thevendra
Over the next three quarters of an hour, Ian sat scrutinizing the tactical readouts on his console, and on the display screens in front of him. Away in the barracks, the marines were preparing themselves for the day's duty, while those who had been on patrol and guard duty through the night were nearing the end of their shift.
At 0750 Ian deactivated his chair console and walked down towards O'Hanlan, who was working through one of the tracking sensor exercises on one of the workstations. O'Hanlan caught sight of him and promptly stood up.
"I'm heading over to the barracks," said Ian, still eyeing the tactical screens in front, "Are you ready?"
"Yes, sir."
There was an unsettled edge about the marine, but that was understandable. Ian gestured towards the primary tracking console on the left forward side of the TacCon.
"Alright, get settled in. I'll contact you before we head out."
O'Hanlan acknowledged and headed over to assume his new post as squad co-ordinator, while Ian exited the T.C.U. and made his way up towards the shuttle terminal.
Marines along the way saluted, but most of the civilians he passed still didn't recognise him. The shuttle over to the barracks was half full, and Ian sat in the midst of a dozen conversations. As he looked through the windows out into the landscape, the sun drove relentlessly down. The burning sands and cracked earth lay still and calm; there was no wind to be seen, not even the slightest breeze. This was a blessing however, as "breezes" on this world tended to heat rather than cool, as well as throw sand through the air at 140 mph.
The shuttle pulled into the barrack terminal and Ian stepped down amongst a handful of others, whilst commuters waiting on the platform boarded. Walking past the guard and through the main entrance, Ian found himself in an entry foyer, with three other exits. Each of the large sets of retracting doors was marked clearly on its front; one lead to the mess hall and recreation-rooms, the second went through into the marines' quarters, which took up more than one third of the entire structure. The last set of doors was labelled 'Secondary Armoury / Exit Bay'. As the doors of this last exit made way in front of him, Ian walked through.
The layout of the typical Confederate barracks was designed to be as efficient as possible, with several access ways linking each of the building's sections, so that in the event of a sudden attack, any marines in their quarters or in the mess hall could get through to the armoury or the exit bay in half a minute or less.
As Ian walked through the corridor, it curved around a left corner and extended on for another thirty feet, widening out at the end into another small foyer, this time with two doors labelled 'Secondary Armoury' and 'Exit Bay'.
The Secondary Armoury in the barracks was where the base's primary complement of infantry weaponry and armour was kept, essentially a large, secured access storage hold, with several distribution points around its edge, connecting to a ring shaped corridor running around the outside. This enabled several groups of marines to pick up their gear at the same time; however, getting hold of their gear directly from the armoury was usually only done in emergency situations. About twenty metres below the armoury, and located on the outer edge of the barracks' structure was the exit bay, from where the marines could access the outside environment. One of the armoury's distribution points extended down into the exit bay, and it was from this point that marines, such as those going onto patrol or scout duty, typically picked up their equipment.
Ian entered through the second door and headed down towards the exit bay. Two sets of escalators took him down almost to ground level, and in front was a large doorway, some ten feet high, and twenty across. The door had already been retracted upwards into the bulkhead, and Ian walked in.
The exit bay was situated almost at ground level, and was a huge, fairly well lit chamber, perhaps fifty feet square and with a high ceiling. A narrow balcony ran around the edge, about halfway up the sides of the bay. The metal floor was scuffed and scorched in places, with yellow and black warning strips lining the edges and reaching up the walls. Over to one side was the distribution point, designed as a large, rounded alcove in the east wall. A system of conveyor belts carried requisitioned firearms and armour from the Main Armoury down to the exit bay. The distribution alcove was colour coded with a dull orange border on the wall running around its edge, and over on the north side of the bay, opposite to where Ian had entered, the region in front of the main bay exit was bathed in an intermittent red glow as signal lights pulsed above the frame of the massive doorway which lead to the outside.
Inside, towards the centre of the bay, waited three squads of Ian's brigade, and three from the Jackknifes. Sgt. Sheppard walked forward to meet him, giving a quick salute; Ian nodded and looked over to the Spider Monkeys who had lined up to attention.
"At ease."
The marines broke up and went back to preparing their gear. Each one would be carrying a light pack with emergency rations, a water flask and field medical kit, as well as some basic tools for field salvage. To stay in touch with one another, and the base, each member of the scouting party would be wearing a communications headset; just a small earpiece with a thin microphone, and a fine transmitter wire which looped around the back of the head. One marine from each company would be carrying a signal booster, to allow the headsets' signals to reach all the way back to the base, as well as cut through any interference from the weather. Each marine had also been issued with a pair of standard protective goggles, which were also tinted to shield their eyes from the sun, and carried a respirator mask; a small device similar in size and shape to an anti-pollution mask, which would enable the marines to breathe in the event of a sandstorm.
In addition to their standard equipment, one marine from each of the six squads present would be carrying a P.F.M. or Portable Fluxgate Magnetometer. The P.F.M. was a smallish piece of equipment, consisting of a rounded box-like unit with a handle on top, and a long silver coloured cylinder protruding from the front. Used for soil and rock analysis, P.F.M.'s could be readjusted to send out a short-range detection pulse, and would be of extreme use in locating the mineral resources, once inside the caverns. The sensors in an S.C.V. would have been capable of the same function, and with greater efficiency, but had to be ruled out, as external ComSat surveys had shown the underground tunnels to be too narrow for anything larger than man-sized to travel through.
Ian drew his attention back to Sgt. Sheppard.
"How are they doing?" he asked.
"They're fine, sir. They're eager to get to work." She replied with a wry smile.
"Yes, I think we all are."
Commander Murello walked over from the other side of the bay where his unit and his XO, Sergeant Noah Davies, were also preparing their gear.
"So, what's the word on those rippers?" asked Murello.
"There should be enough; however many there are should be ready to bring down any time now," said Ian, nodding his head towards the distribution alcove. "Engineering's going to contact us."
"You know," said Murello, "there're still those six CMC suits, as well as a few Impalers. I take it those are staying in the armoury?"
"Yes."
"For consistency's sake, or..."
Ian nodded.
"There's that," He began, "and there's the fact that marines seeing their commanding officers wearing powered armour and carrying Impaler rifles, while they're equipped with spitguns and fatigues, won't exactly be in the most optimistic frame of mind."
Murello nodded in agreement and then looked over towards the closed main exit gate.
"Well, it's a good day for it, anyway. It's a little hotter than yesterday, but we should do okay."
"Let's hope so." Said Ian.
Murello turned and walked back to his unit, while Ian looked over towards the west side of the exit bay. Various lockers and supply cabinet acted as dispensers for the basic field tools and supplies that the marines would be taking with them. Ian turned back to Sgt. Sheppard.
"Have you packed your gear?"
"Yes, sir."
"All right, go and help the men finish up; I'll get my pack together."
Ian moved over to the side, picked up a rucksack, and went about stowing the necessary gear inside. As he took out a prepared flask of water from one of the lockers, he glanced over at the Jackknifes behind him. A few of them laughed boisterously and capered amongst their squad-mates, only to be scolded by Sgt. Davies. To them, this was old hat. They had been out on dozens of patrols, and knew the nearby territory well. The Spider Monkeys on the other hand, though still new to the territory, had more experience as a unit in general, in both combat and non-combat situations; Ian figured that the two units should be able to work well together, although his somewhat conceited attitude towards any unit which he hadn't personally worked with led him to believe that somewhere along the line, the Spider Monkeys would be picking up the slack.
As he slung a light supply belt around his waist, Ian looked over to see Sgt. Sheppard in her element. In some small, hidden way he envied her. The men looked at her with trusting eyes, the same eyes that regarded him with little more than grim, browbeaten obedience. She worked a magic with the men and women of the brigade, a knowing grin here, a supportive nudge in the shoulder there, sharing the odd crude joke with one of the younger members of the unit; things far beyond the realm of Ian's expertise, and yet he was able to find some minor comfort on it, to know that his men were at ease and ready for the coming task. As he watched, he felt a quiet confidence settle into him. He was with his unit, and the feeling of dread from the day before seemed but a distant memory.
Ian finished packing, and swung his rucksack up onto his back, jostling it to test its weight. All in all he was carrying less than twenty pounds of gear; not much but he would probably feel every kilo of it by the end of the day. Suddenly, a voice rang out across the bay.
"Commander Latimer!"
Ian looked over to see one of the on-duty technicians jogging over.
"Commander Latimer, sir, there's a call for you, from engineering."
The technician led Ian over to the east wall of the exit bay, where Engineer Sajan's face flickered on a communications terminal.
"What's your report?" asked Ian.
"That's fifty-two!" announced Sajan triumphantly. "I'm not gonna tell you what I had to pull to get this done, but there it is. They've been shuttled over to the secondary armoury. Should be on their way down to you at any moment."
Ian turned to his right, and stared at the distribution alcove a few feet away. After a few seconds, the conveyor belts whirred into life. Each of the five belts was a thin, vertically looped segmented steel band, which extended up a long diagonal shaft to the armoury. Hooked pegs were fastened at two feet intervals, on which weaponry or armour could be hung.
After half a minute or so, the first ripper appeared, swaying slightly as one of the belts ferried it down. More rippers appeared one by one, until each belt was carrying them. The conveyors froze automatically as the rifles reached the end of the belts; before they were to loop round, back up towards the armoury. Ian walked over to one of them, lifted one of the rifles off its peg, and then walked back to the com terminal.
"Okay," said Sajan "as you can see, we've really had to do some work on them."
Ian looked over towards the marines behind him.
"Everybody gather round."
The marines formed into a bunched semi-circle around Ian, with Murello, Sheppard and Davies at the front, and looked on as Sajan outlined the new modifications.
"Right, the main casing had to be refitted; we used a heated plastic sealant to sand-proof the chamber and the barrel. After the sealant had set, the casing didn't fit anymore, so we had to re-mould 'em; they're a little bulkier now, and we didn't have time to thoroughly test-fire all of 'em, but they should be okay. But there is one thing; the sealant we used is chemically layered, it's heat-proof from the outside only, which means that the sun won't affect it, but if you overheat the chamber from firing, the sealant might crack. If it does, you're guaranteed to lock the weapon up."
Murello glanced around at the Jackknife squads.
"Everybody get that?"
The marines acknowledged and Ian turned back to face Sajan's image.
"All right, good work."
Sajan gave a tired, unassuming smile, the ordeal of working through the night only just starting to catch up with him.
"Hm yeah, glad to help." He said with a sigh.
The terminal blinked off, and Ian motioned towards the conveyor belts.
"Everybody pick up your weapons."
The marines filed into queues in front of the five belts and began picking up their rifles. The belts whined into motion once again as the weapons were taken off, and continued feeding the rippers down towards the marines until all fifty-two present had been armed.
While the marines checked over their weapons and got used to the new weight, Ian walked over to the supply lockers and picked up a communications headset. Fixing it in place, he tugged the microphone, placing it in front of his mouth, and activated the transmitter.
"TacCon from Commander Latimer. O'Hanlan, do you read me?"
O'Hanlan's voice crackled into his right ear.
"Yes sir, reading you loud and clear"
"Report."
"Sir, the TacCon is on ready alert, all tracking systems are active, all channels are open."
"Stand by Corporal, we're getting ready to move out."
Ian inspected his rifle. It had been a long time since he had held a ripper, but even through the modified casing, it still retained its familiar weight and feel. His earpiece crackled once again.
"Commander Latimer from TacCon. Do you copy?"
"Go ahead O'Hanlan,"
"Sir, Sgt. Gleason just contacted the T.C.U. wishing to speak with you."
"Put him through onto this line." Said Ian.
"Yes, sir."
Ian's earpiece fell silent, and he winced as a sudden jarring racket blared through the line.
"Commander Latimer?" shouted a voice over what sounded like the roar of an engine.
"Yes, go ahead."
"Sir, this is Sergeant Gleason. Looks like I'll be your escort for today; we're just circling around from the vehicle plant."
"How many of you are there?" asked Ian.
"Two; me and Corporal Pryce. We decided to double up to match your squads."
"Very well."
"Sir, we'll be at the barracks momentarily, what's your status?"
Ian took a quick look around him.
"We're pretty much all set here," said Ian, "We were going to start at nine, but I can't see any reason to wait. We'll start out now; we'll meet you when we get out there."
"Copy that, Gleason out."
Ian walked over to Sgt. Sheppard, who was adjusting the sight on her ripper.
"How is it?" Asked Ian.
"Think I've got it sir, most of the others were all right."
Ian tightened his pack's straps across his chest, and clasped his rifle with both hands.
"Form the men up. It's time to go."
While Sgt. Sheppard ordered the men into their squads, Ian moved over to the other side of the bay, where Murello was stood watching. He gestured over Ian's shoulder towards Sgt. Sheppard and the Spider Monkeys.
"We heading out now? It's only 0830."
"Yes, no sense in waiting. I thought I'd move the schedule forward again."
"Hunh, that's getting to be a habit with you, isn't it? Said Murello with a grin.
Ian moved to the front of the exit bay and stood beneath the main exit in the blinking red glow of the signal lights. Behind him, the Jackknifes had formed up into squads, and along with the three squads of the Spider Monkeys, stood waiting, fully equipped and armed.
Ian turned and peered to the rear of the bay, to a control booth, where the main exit controls were housed, and a technician stood waiting. Ian gave a signal, and the air rang through with a blaring klaxon as the technician activated the retraction controls. The signal lights changed to flash muted amber, and in front, the bay door's locking bars clanked and hummed, as they were pulled free. The massive gate roared as it was dragged upwards. Extending twenty feet past the door was a dimly lit access tunnel, which sloped gently down to ground level. The tunnel came to an end at a second, final door, which led through to the outside, and opened outwards and downwards like an enormous mailbox. Making sure that everyone else had put theirs on; Ian strapped on his goggles and gave a second signal.
As he moved forward into the tunnel, Sgt. Sheppard led the Spider Monkeys behind, with Murello, Davies and the Jackknifes bringing up the rear. The klaxon screamed out again as they moved in, and the signal lights, both above the fist door, and inside the tunnel changed again, flashing a brilliant green. As the final door drew noisily open, Ian tugged at his microphone.
"TacCon from Commander Latimer"
"Go ahead, sir."
"Start watching Corporal. We're heading out."
Sunlight flooded into the tunnel as the door lowered, and a sudden, sweltering heat passed over them. Without a word, Commander Latimer led the scouting party out of the barracks and onto the scorched earth of the Widow desert.