by James Rosone
Pilsner sighed at the request, but he reviewed the casualty numbers again and concurred. McGinnis definitely needed reinforcements; however, Pilsner was more inclined to send double what had been asked for. Intus was nearly two months’ travel by FTL, unless they could get an Altairian cruiser or battleship to open a wormhole portal directly from Earth to Intus.
They were already two years into this global draft, and his ground forces had just reached six million of the twenty million forces they’d been tasked to create by the Altairians. All the new training requirements from the Altairians had added two months to the four months of basic combat training a soldier already received. Add anywhere from two to twelve months of advanced specialty training, and it was apparent why it was a slow-going process to reach their quota.
Pilsner heard a knock on his door. Fleet Admiral Chester Bailey poked his head in. “Afternoon, Admiral Bailey,” said Pilsner. “Come on in.”
Bailey smiled and walked to his desk. The two men shook hands briefly before he took a seat opposite him.
“What can I do for you, sir?” asked General Pilsner.
“General, I reviewed the casualty reports from Intus. It appears the operation is going well,” Admiral Bailey said optimistically. “I received a new request from the Prims and Altairians to assist them in liberating another colony in the same region of space. Before I agree to that request, I need to know if you think we can support another operation that’ll be about the same size as this current one without shortchanging ourselves elsewhere. What are your thoughts?”
Pilsner contemplated for a moment before he responded. “Well, I’m glad the Prims and Altairians believe the operation is going well, and that we’ve acquitted ourselves well enough that they’d now like to include us in another operation. That speaks well of our soldiers and their performance. As to supporting another operation—yes, I believe we can support another operation if it’s the same size and scope as Intus. I’d prefer to complete this one first and use the same force, but, yes, I believe we can support another invasion, or at least the Army could. Can the fleet? I heard your losses were bad.”
Bailey grimaced at the mention of the fleet losses. “I won’t lie and say this operation didn’t hurt us in regard to ships and crews. It did. But ultimately, if the Prims and Altairians are asking us to participate in another operation, I don’t know that we can decline. The Prims are allowing us to cycle our damaged ships through their shipyard at Kita. It’s apparently one of their core worlds. If they hadn’t done that, then I don’t think we’d have a fleet capable of supporting another invasion.
“What I really need to know from you is if we can still move forward with our plan to station one million soldiers in the Rhea system if we get involved in another invasion.”
Pilsner nodded. “We can. It’s taken us some time to get a steady pipeline of soldiers moving through their basic and advanced training, but we’re finally hitting optimal levels. We’ve just crossed our second targeted goal, two hundred thousand soldiers graduating training each month. By this time next year, that number will be doubled.”
Bailey let out a sigh of relief. “This is good, Rob. The Altairians gave us some time and wiggle room to meet our military goals, but we need to make sure we’re showing constant progress. We lost thirty-two thousand soldiers on Intus. It hurt, but not as bad as it could have. I think the C100 program has really saved a lot of lives.”
“It sure has,” Pilsner concurred. “I know there was a lot of consternation about the program at the outset, but it’s clearly been a good move. We lost sixty-eight thousand of them on Intus. I have to think we would have lost at least that many human soldiers had we not had them.”
Admiral Bailey nodded in agreement. “How are Special Forces coming along?”
Pilsner shrugged. “It’s our longest and toughest training program. It still takes us roughly three years to get a soldier through the entire training program. We’ve increased the program by twelve hundred percent, but we’re years away from being able to really double or even triple them in size.”
“OK, just keep at it,” Bailey replied. “They’ve proven to be incredibly effective in this war against the Zodarks. Once we get our new frigates and cruisers, we will implement some new strategies and ways to leverage the Special Forces to carry out some operations behind the enemy lines.”
Pilsner smiled. “I like the sound of that, sir. Just keep in mind, we only have a limited number of them right now. In another year, we’ll be graduating a full three thousand new SF soldiers a month. Until then, I wouldn’t risk losing a lot of them if it can be avoided.”
The two talked for another thirty minutes before the admiral left.
Bailey had given Pilsner a lot to chew on. The more he thought about it, the more one part of their conversation struck Pilsner as a bit odd. Admiral Bailey had mentioned something about not feeling like he could say no to a Prim or Altairian request.
What did he mean by that? Pilsner pondered.
Chapter Eight
Planet Hopping
RNS Comfort
Intus Orbit
Corporal Paul “Pauli” Smith had just finished reading his book when the doctor walked up to him. “You appear to be healing up nicely,” said the doctor, glancing over his electronic chart. “Do you still have any pain, muscle cramps or stiffness?”
Pauli shook his head. “Not really. I think I actually feel better now than before I got hurt, to be honest.”
The doctor snickered at the self-assessment. “Well, we did just pump your body full of medical nanites,” he replied.
“Hey, I have a question for you about that,” said Pauli. “How are the nanites we get here any different than the nanites our medics stick us with when we get hurt?” He didn’t know a lot about this stuff and was genuinely curious.
The doctor nodded and became much more serious as he explained, “The nanites the medics use are meant to stabilize your body and help keep you alive long enough to make it to a higher-level field hospital or a medical ship like the Comfort. The nanite injections infuse your body with roughly ten thousand robotic machines the size of white blood cells. They immediately rush through your body and identify the damage or life-threatening injury.
“First, they go to work on stopping any bleeding. Then they work on trying to repair the body as best they can. Once you make it to a field hospital or a ship like this, we give you a blood transfusion that pumps upwards of one million of these little nanites into your body. Over a few days to a few weeks, they can heal just about anything. In your case, they healed several broken ribs, a fracture in your femur, a concussion and brain lesion, and the second-degree burns on parts of your legs and arms. For good measure, they also repaired some overused calf and lower back muscles, which were probably strained from all the walking you’ve done and the heavy ruck you infantry soldiers carry.”
Pauli shook his head in amazement.
The doctor smiled. “Corporal Smith, we’re going to send you to a couple of days of physical therapy now, to make sure everything is functioning correctly. Once they’ve cleared you, you’ll be sent back to your battalion, good as new. If you don’t have any additional questions for me, then I wish you the best of luck, and I hope we don’t see each other again unless it’s at some dive bar back on Earth.”
The doctor left to speak with the next soldier, presumably to give him or her the same speech.
*******
The next day, Pauli made his way over to the physical therapy group. They ran him through a battery of tests to make sure his injured areas were, in fact, healed and functional. After being signed off as fit for duty, he was directed to a large transient bay of the RNS Comfort to wait for a shuttle.
The waiting room was filled with bunk beds, interspersed with some couches, chairs, and tables. Finding an empty bunk, Pauli dropped his meager set of belongings next to it. The supply section had given him a fresh new uniform now that he no longer needed to wear the hospita
l garb. They had also given him a second set of uniforms along with some underclothes, socks, and a new pair of boots. A rifle and combat gear would be allocated once he was back on the planet. This was, after all, a hospital ship; there wasn’t any need for that here.
There were probably close to three or four hundred soldiers milling about in the transient bay. Most of the soldiers were either reading a book, listening to music or an audiobook, talking with each other, or playing a video game on one of the many entertainment systems. Pauli had to give props to whoever had set this place up. They’d done a good job of making sure the soldiers had a comfortable place to relax and unwind after they got discharged from the hospital and waited to return to their units.
Each day, at around 1000 hours and 1400 hours, a lieutenant would announce over the PA and post on a bulletin board the soldiers scheduled to leave on one of the transport crafts. Roughly fifty soldiers would leave during each announcement. As some soldiers left, more were being discharged from the hospital side of the ship and filtered into the transient hangar.
Pauli became curious. He tapped one of the fleeters on the shoulder and asked him how many wounded the ship could handle at one time.
What the spacer said floored him. Apparently, the RNS Comfort was able to handle up to ten thousand wounded soldiers. The ship had a crew of three hundred and twenty, and a medical staff of four hundred. It didn’t sound like a lot, but apparently, the crew and medical operations were augmented with six hundred Synths.
The more Pauli thought about the medical Synths, the more he wondered why they hadn’t integrated them into the Army units as medics. A nurse practitioner, physician assistant, nurse, or doctor took a long time to train. If that kind of knowledge could be imparted on a massive scale to C100 combat Synths, it could probably save a lot of lives during a battle.
“Stay in your lane, Corporal, stay in your lane,” Pauli said quietly to himself. “Control the things you can control and let go of the things you can’t.” He’d never really been into meditation or spiritual stuff in the past, but during his tour on New Eden, he’d met a Delta soldier during one of their operations. Since Pauli had thought about one day joining the Deltas, he’d asked the Special Forces soldier a lot of questions.
The SF operator had told Pauli something that had really changed his attitude toward both life and the military. “One of the keys to making it through Delta selection and training is to find ways to reshape your worldview,” he’d said. “You need to learn how to make your world small. Instead of saying to yourself, ‘I just need to make it through selection or phase one of the training,’ you need to shrink your view. Tell yourself you just need to make it through the next twenty minutes, or the next hour. If you focus on just trying to make it from one hour to the next, or one meal to the next, your mind and body become a lot less overwhelmed by what’s being thrown at you.”
The Delta had also told Pauli, “If you allow yourself to get angry at situations or people you have no way of influencing, it’s just wasted energy that’s going to put you in a bad headspace.” He had emphasized the need to control what you can control and let go of what you cannot. At first, Pauli had just nodded at the suggestions. But as time had worn on during the New Eden campaign, he had begun following the Delta’s advice more and more. Pauli told himself he just needed to make it to breakfast, then he focused on making it to lunch, then dinner, then sleep.
Within a week of doing this, Pauli noticed two changes happening. First, time was flying by. The days and weeks were no longer moving at a snail’s pace; things seemed to move along at an incredible clip even though nothing had really changed. They still went out on daily patrols or sat on guard duty along the perimeter of a firebase. Still, those routine duties flew by in a blur.
Next, when Pauli had given up being angry and frustrated at things he had no control over, his entire mindset and outlook had changed. He found himself a much happier person. He was less moody and more fun to be around. He realized if he had implemented more of these changes in himself during the big reorg, he probably would have been selected for corporal then instead of having to wait nearly two years longer.
“Are you Corporal Smith?” a sergeant with a clipboard asked.
Pauli placed his book down on the bed, looked up at the sergeant and nodded. “I am. How can I help you, Sergeant?”
“The ship leaving at 1000 hours is apparently a large cargo transport. It’s got room for thirty-eight more people. You’ll be leaving on it,” the sergeant informed him.
Pauli nodded. The sergeant was about to turn to leave, but Pauli stopped him. “Sergeant, once we leave, what base are they sending us to?” he asked. “I’m just trying to figure out how I’ll be getting back to my unit.”
“When we send soldiers back, the transport takes everyone to a large base outside Hatteng City,” the sergeant explained. “It’s the Prim’s capital city on Intus. I don’t know much about the base other than it’s not far from the capital city, and it’s a megabase they’ve been building. I suspect once you get there, they’ll arrange another transport to send you back to wherever your battalion or company is operating.” The sergeant then took off to go inform some of the others they’d be leaving as well.
Pauli had another thirty minutes before he needed to go to the hangar to catch his ride. He’d been on the Comfort for seven days, and two of those days had been spent in the transient bay. Pauli hoped the rest of his platoon and company were still doing all right.
*******
When all the soldiers had piled into the transport, it left the Comfort. The spacecraft had some portholes, so Pauli could see out even while strapped into his jumpseat. He really enjoyed being able to see the planet from orbit. Intus was a beautiful planet, and seeing it in combination with the two suns and the moons in orbit made a spectacular sight.
Thirty minutes later, the transport was already on its final approach to Hatteng City. Pauli heard a few whistles as the soldiers got a good look at the capital city. Clusters of skyscrapers rose high into the sky and appeared to go right into the clouds. Pauli wasn’t sure how high they were, but he imagined they had to be hundreds of stories tall.
The pilot zoomed past the city and kept them moving closer to the coast. For probably a solid two or three kilometers from the shore, the water reflected various shades of green, turquoise, and aquamarine. It was some of the clearest, see-through water Pauli had ever seen.
As they approached the human military base, Pauli was impressed with his surroundings. The Earthers had only been on the planet for coming up on a month and a half, and they’d already built this massive base. It had several runways and numerous parking ramps filled with P-97 Orions, Reaper ground assault ships, Ospreys, and other large and small transport craft.
At three different positions on the base, he spotted artillery positions—and these weren’t small artillery guns either. These were the new, improved M88 Howitzers. These bad boys could hurl a 240mm projectile of one hundred and sixty pounds of high-explosives, smoke, or white phosphorus rounds up to eight hundred kilometers away. They were the ultimate heavy infantry support weapon. They leveraged a special glide technology that allowed them to loiter high above a unit for up to twenty-four hours before they ran out of power. The AI-assisted smart warhead could hit enemy targets with incredible precision once the soldiers below identified an enemy target or geographical location. Because of their incredible range, they minimized the need to have hundreds of fire support bases like they had on New Eden.
Further behind the flight line, parking ramps, and hangars were rows and rows of neatly aligned containerized housing units, which the soldiers called CHUs, pronounced “chews.” Each housing unit had its own bathroom and shower facility and housed sixteen soldiers.
What really drew Pauli’s attention, though, was the beach. The base was situated right on the water with a long sandy shore that extended as far as the eye could see. There were a lot of people making use of the beach and swimmi
ng in the water. Pauli hoped he might have a few days or a week here at this base before they sent him to his unit. Growing up in Texas, he used to swim often in the Gulf of Mexico along the coast.
When their transport landed and the ramp opened, the soldiers inside were greeted with the oppressive heat and humidity of a ninety-three-degree summer day. As they all filed off the transport, a sergeant was waiting for them nearby. “Head to the hangar and wait to be briefed,” he directed.
Once they were all lined up inside, the sergeant called off each of their names and told them to stand in different sections of the hangar. When everyone had been divided up, he announced, “Prepare to board an Osprey in twenty minutes. You’ll be delivered to your division or brigade headquarters units. From there, your parent units will handle getting you back to your individual units.”
The declaration caused more than a few groans from the soldiers. They were all clearly hoping for a few days at the base and maybe an opportunity to swim in the ocean.
Pauli realized his group consisted only of himself and two other soldiers. He wasn’t sure if that was good or not. Twenty minutes later, an Osprey landed not far from the hangar they were waiting in.
The crew chief walked into the hangar and shouted, “First Orbital Assault Battalion!”
Pauli and the other two perked their heads up and waved to the man. He motioned for them to follow him back to the bird.
The three of them grabbed their minimal gear and trotted after the crew chief, who was already loaded up in the craft. When Pauli and the two other soldiers climbed in, he saw that the Osprey was practically full. There were only five open seats. Apparently, they’d already picked up some other replacements, or they were moving another unit around.