Points of Impact by Marko Kloos

Author:Marko Kloos [Kloos, Marko]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
ISBN: 9781542048460
Amazon: 154204846X
Publisher: 47North
Published: 2018-01-09T07:00:00+00:00

“Now hear this: Alcubierre transition in T-minus thirty. I repeat: Alcubierre transition in T-minus thirty.”

The 1MC announcement sounds as casual as if the XO had just announced a foreign-object damage sweep on the flight deck. For the first time in my Fleet career, I’ve heard the Alcubierre transition announcement without a preceding Combat Stations alert. Every time a Fleet ship transitions into a different system, the crew is at combat stations, because you never know for certain what you’ll pop into when the ship comes out of the chute in the target system. This time, however, it’s just an inconsequential heads-up from CIC, which only serves to add to the general feeling of disconnectedness I’ve had ever since I set foot on this ship.

I continue the briefing I was conducting when the 1MC announcement interrupted my train of thought. From the expressions on the faces of my special tactics team, I can tell that some of them share my minor consternation at this change in routine.

“Thirty minutes until go time,” I say. “Well, sort of. We’ll be in transition for twenty-four hours. And the action on the other side of the chute is all in our heads. But other than that, it’s just like going to war.”

The senior NCOs chuckle a little at this and exchange amused glances.

“Anyway,” I continue. “This op is a standard by-the-book orbital drop. We are dumping the whole regiment in and around Arcadia City in a single wave with both drop ship squadrons while Ottawa provides orbital support. The regiment will have overhead cover from the strike squadrons, so there’ll be plenty to do for the combat controllers.”

I bring up the list of unit assignments on the screen behind me.

“Master Sergeant Taggart, you’re dropping with Alpha Company, First Battalion. Master Sergeant Garcia, Alpha Company, Second Battalion. Sergeant Winters, Bravo Company, First Battalion.”

I go down the list by team seniority and distribute my combat controllers so that each of them is assigned to a company command section and each company has one combat controller to drop with it. Last on the list is Delta Company of the Second Battalion, and the last unassigned name on my unit roster is Staff Sergeant Lang, the only female member of the combat controller detachment.

“Sergeant Lang,” I say. “You’ll be going with Second Battalion’s Delta Company. The CO is an old friend of mine, Captain Hansen. She knows her business. Make sure you show her that we know ours as well.”

“Aye-aye, sir,” Staff Sergeant Lang replies. She glances down at her PDP to copy the data, her face serious and earnest. At her rank, she came out of Combat Controller School not too long ago, which means that she’s never done a combat drop because we haven’t dropped anywhere since Mars. The combat controller training track is extremely demanding, both physically and mentally. Eighty percent of trainees wash out for various reasons. The fact that Sergeant Lang has the red beret in her leg pocket proves that she’s tough as a bag of bricks and mentally resilient.

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