by Lucas Marcum
Elise responded, “Roger, Paradise Station. Voodoo Flight—thanks for the escort, fellas. We’re running heavy at the moment. Let us set down, unload, and fuel and we’ll be up and in the game.”
In the rear, Elizabeth pointed off in the distance. The squat, menacing, grey-green shape of the Banshees flying escort were visible, flying slightly behind and on either side of the heavily-loaded Valkyries, as Valkyrie Two, Three, and Four had fallen into formation behind them.
Elizabeth toggled her mic and said, “Elise, we have eyes on the Banshees at seven and five. Is there a threat we weren’t told about?”
Elise answered, sounding casual, “Not sure. The Marines sure seem to think so, don’t they?” In their headsets, they could hear the controller routing them towards their temporary landing zone, a clearing in the jungle about seventy kilometers away. The Valkyrie banked smoothly and headed towards the coordinates.
Suddenly in their headsets they heard an insistent beeping, and Captain Winters speaking, “Anti-air. They’re pinging us.”
Elise responded immediately, “Activate auto missile defense. Thermal masking systems on. Crew, eyes out.” A pause as she shifted frequencies. “Voodoo Flight, we’re being painted. Mind helping a sister out?” The big aircraft rocked as she pulled it into a gentle turn.
The casual drawl of Voodoo One came through their headsets, “Not at all, Valkyrie One. Eyes out to port.” There was a pause. “Voodoo Flight; point six, set anti-rad.”
The squat shapes of the Banshees that had seemed so ponderous suddenly turned on a dime and fell into a wingtip-to-wingtip formation, then shot ahead of the Valkyrie. Another turn, then they roared across the flight path. One of the squat aircrafts’ wing pods suddenly flashed, then streaks of fire shot towards the ground as the pilot fired a volley of anti-radiation missiles into the trees.
They made one more slow pass, this time not firing. Voodoo One’s pilot came back on the circuit, “Valkyrie Flight, I think we chased ‘em off. No returns or energy signatures we can see. You should be good to go.”
There was a pause, then the fighter pilot continued, “By the way, our ground sensors don’t work well at all down here. There’s too much wildlife down there. It’s been like that since we inserted. It’s not as big a deal for us so far, we just have our guys pop their IFF, but you’re gonna have problems doing search and rescue. It’s actually way worse than we thought it was going to be. You might have to do it the old-fashioned way.”
Lieutenant Wilkowsky looked at Brian and Elizabeth, who were looking grim. He covered his mic and asked, “What’s the old-fashioned way?” Brian grimaced and pointed at his eye, then at the ground.
The lieutenant looked at the jungle, then at the two grim-faced soldiers, and swallowed hard. They could hear Elise thanking their escort as the Valkyrie settled into the flight path towards their temporary operating base. Operation Brushfire had begun.
-14-
“Heavy Rain”
FORWARD SUPPORT BASE OLYMPIC
0952 hours, NOVEMBER 5, 2247
Elizabeth stood in her tent, looking at the two inches of water pooling on the floor, and sighed. She’d moved her personal items to her bunk, and to the top of her locker, but there was no getting around the fact that the tent—like all of the UEA-issued tents—leaked, and leaked badly. It had been leaking since it had started raining two weeks ago. Worst of all, the constant drumming of the rain on the canvas made a sound that was so loud that it prevented normal conversation, and between the two, sleep had been intermittent and of poor quality. She’d taken to catnapping in her cubicle of an office in the field hospital, but constantly being in the hospital was taking its toll.
She frowned and turned to look out the tent flaps through the drizzle towards Elise’s quarters, a large non-regulation, yurt-shaped place that stood like a palace amongst the sodden issued tents.
The mystery of why she’d been so insistent about the heat shields had been solved. She and her crew had placed tracers on the disposable heat shields, and after the flight had set up operations and the hospital was set up, they’d gone out on a ‘check ride’ and came back with three of the massive, ten-meter-wide heat shields. They’d set one up as a roof on the steel poles that had been in the back of the Valkyrie on the way down, one as a floor, propped up on blocks, and a third was outside the two, providing a covered area that acted as a porch. The walls were what looked like a composite fabric obtained from somewhere Elise wouldn’t say, and the entire thing had been put together by a unit of UEA Combat Engineers. God only knew how Elise had talked them into building it for her.
Elizabeth considered this, and sighed again. Pulling her jungle hat over her ears, she squished her way through the rain and mud across the pathway and made her way to the entrance. She paused a moment, then called out, “Hello? Anyone home?”
There was a rustling inside, then the flap opened, and Sergeant Ruthers poked her head out.
“Oh, hey ma’am. Come on in.”
Elizabeth gratefully stepped inside. The thick shielding reduced the drumming of the rain to a mere murmur. The composite fabric let in plenty of light without allowing anyone to see in, and there was plenty of room for the four bunks that had been set up behind small screens for privacy. Elizabeth saw a small heater for drying clothing and noted sourly that the entire place was dry.
Elise popped out from behind a screen in her fatigue pants and a tank top. “Hey, Liz! How’s it going?”
Elizabeth responded sourly, “Super. My hooch is flooded, supply says they have no more tents and no more patch kits, and the rain is pounding the canvas so hard I can’t sleep. Other than that, peachy.” She looked around. “I see you’re nice and dry.”
The lean pilot grinned unrepentantly, “You know me, chica. I hate to be uncomfortable if I don’t have to.” She nodded at a bunk. “That’s yours.”
Raising an eyebrow, Elizabeth asked, “What do you mean?”
Elise just grinned. Joanne responded, “Ma’am, that bed’s been designated for you since before we landed. We’re a crew, remember?”
Shaking her head, Elizabeth just laughed. “I guess! Where’s Brian staying?”
Shrugging, the sergeant responded, “I think his tent is ok. If it’s not, he’s not complaining. He’s a real hard-ass old soldier like that. Me, I’m with the colonel on this one. I don’t like to be uncomfortable.”
Elise flopped down on a bunk and stared at Elizabeth for a moment, then grinned. “So, where’s hot stuff?”
Flushing, Elizabeth opened her mouth to answer, “MAJOR Harris is Officer of the Day in the operations center, thank you. And I have a boyfriend, remember?”
The pilot and crew chief looked at each other and smirked, then Joanne responded, “Ok, Ma’am. Whatever you say.”
Elise was studying her fingernails and said casually, “If boy wonder back on Earth doesn’t work out, you can always snag yourself that Marine. He’s good stuff. Little nerdy, but good looking enough, and a nice kid, too.”
She stood up and stretched languidly, then ran her hands through her jet-black hair. “Anyway. We have a non-medical flight later today. Ought to be a pretty standard run down to the main colony and back. Wanna come along and bring the cherry?”
Frowning, Elizabeth asked, “I thought you didn’t like the new nurses on your bird?”
With a shrug, Elise responded, “I don’t, usually, but this is a relatively low-risk, inclement weather flight, plus it’ll log him some more flight time. Let him get accustomed to the bumps and whatnot, maybe have him squeeze some live shots outta the cannons. Teach him to move in the armor on the ground, that sort of stuff. Better now than later.”
Elizabeth paused at this and thought about it. Elise seldom did anything without good reason. She said slowly, “You think we’re going to see action.”
With a grin, Elise motioned at Joanne. Joanne looked at the pilot, then chimed in, “She was talking to her flyboy boyfriend from the 221st Marine Fighter Wing, and H
E said that all the Specters have been rekitted for close air support.”
She gestured around them at the hut. “And the Seabees that built this told us they were moving armored dozers into position up north, building supporting lines of bunkers and forward operating bases.” She then gestured out the tent flap. “Also, my friend Carl in supply said we just got a shitpot of medical supplies, like WAY more than we need for normal operations.”
Elizabeth considered for a moment then sighed. “Offensive.”
Tapping the side of her nose, Elise grinned. “Bingo. Offensive. We’re going to try to flush the little fuckers out of the northern jungles right into the teeth of the waiting and entrenched 5th Marines.” She looked at Joanne and Elizabeth, then smiled a predatory smile, “And we, dear girls, are going to be ready, and so is the cherry.”
****
Two hours later in the Operations Center, Major Anthony ‘Tony’ Harris was looking over the specialist’s shoulder at a three-dimensional map rotating in the air. The specialist was explaining the system.
“So you see, Sir, the images are clear enough for gross terrain features, but the ground is crazy thick with metals, and so are the trees, probably pulled up from the ground through the root systems. That means the ground-penetrating radar doesn’t work for crap, and infrared is near useless in this humidity and temperature. Sat photos are equally crap due to the ground cover and the clouds.” The young man cycled through several other views, but most of them had incomplete data, or were so poorly detailed as to be useless.
The specialist continued, “See, we can sort of see something…here.” He poked at a spot on the map. “That’s something. Building, maybe. Bunker, possibly. Could be a rock, too, or a crashed ship, or an Elai strip club. Could be anything. Who the hell knows? I can send a drone out, but we have so many of these things popping up, it’s not worth checking them all out unless we’re going to be near them or suspect them for some reason.”
Tony nodded. “I see. Do we have drones capable of penetrating to the ground?”
The specialist nodded. “Yes, Sir, but not a ton of them, and the loss rate jumps a LOT when we get below the canopy. Branches, maybe, but there might be things out there that think they’re a snack, too. We have to conserve the recon drones until the next shipment comes in.”
Major Harris considered this, then asked, “When will that be?”
The young man shrugged. “No idea. Three, maybe four months? Hard to say. We didn’t get any in the last shipment, and we’ve asked for them multiple times. We can’t count on it, Sir. Best to conserve what we have.”
The Marine officer straightened up, clapped the young specialist on the shoulder. “Ok. Thanks. Let me know if you manage to clear that up.”
“I’ll keep working on it, Sir, but no promises.” The young man turned back to his display.
Tony turned and made his way back to the duty officer’s station, then sat down. He sighed. He’d applied and been selected for this assignment to a United Earth Alliance Army Medical Unit as part of his professional development pathway. His career counselor had referred to it as a ‘broadening’ assignment, intended to make him a more rounded Marine officer. He wasn’t sure about that, as this was his third choice. The first had been his primary specialty in the Corps- Psychological Operations, with an Army Psyops unit based off of Mars. His second choice had been with a communications unit that managed space/ground communications. He’d selected that because he’d worked with the commo teams frequently in his previous assignments. His third choice, made almost on a whim, was as a Marine liaison officer to an Army Medical Unit. Not surprisingly, the Marine Corps Personnel Branch had selected him for his third choice, and so here he was, assigned to a Field Hospital that he knew nothing about. The hospital commander, Colonel Assad, not knowing what to do with him, had placed him on the duty roster, and was utilizing him as a staff officer, doing odd tasks and acting as an assistant for the hospital executive officer.
Tony sighed again and logged into his station to check the personnel status reports for the day. Idly clicking through the statistics of the unit, he found the status display of the Valkyries. Curious, he clicked on it.
Valkyrie One-One was in flight, and Valkyrie One-Two was in the ‘Ready’ position, fueled and on the pad, with the crew in the ready quarters. One-Three was on backup, with the med crew on shift in the hospital, and the flight crew doing some training, One-Four was on a two-hour launch delay for regular maintenance, and One-Five was in deep cycle maintenance and down for the remainder of the week.
Curious, he clicked on the status bar for Valkyrie One-One. The display switched to a status board. The current position, altitude, and direction were shown on a small map. Fuel remaining, armament, and a dozen other metrics were displayed as well in a real-time feed, as were the crew names.
He scanned the list, reading the names. Lieutenant Colonel Moreno—she’d chewed his ass his second day here over…something. He still wasn’t sure about what. She’d been perfectly friendly if rather informal after that, like the incident had never happened. Her call sign was ‘Fury’, and he could see why, having experienced it up close. He continued reading the list. Captain Mitchell Winters. Good enough guy, and much more even tempered than his pilot in command. They made a good team. Their flight engineer, Staff Sergeant Joanne Ruthers, who always looked at him like he was going to steal something; the new flight nurse, Jonathan Wilkowsky; and Major Elizabeth Suarez.
He smiled a little, seeing her name. She was really pleasant, both professional and not overbearingly military at the same time. Cute, too. He’d always had a thing for brunettes, anyway. Too bad she was off the table; she apparently had a boyfriend back on Earth. Well, no matter. She was still a really fun person to be around, and made the time go a lot faster, since they were inside all the time because of the goddamn rain. Thinking about the rain and the mud, he scowled. This wouldn’t have been a bad assignment, if not for the mud.
“Sir?” The specialist spoke, interrupting his reverie. He looked up. The specialist, having gotten his attention, continued, “I have a call from the Colonial Militia Office. The liaison officer has the Colonial Militia leader on the line. He’s asking for whoever’s on duty.” Tony looked around the near deserted operations center. Seeing no other officers who might know more than he did, he sighed and responded.
“All right. Punch it through.” The screen lit up in front of him, showing static for a moment, then clarified into a man’s face. He was lean, with black skin and piercing, hooded eyes. He nodded without smiling.
Nodding cordially back, Tony answered, “Three Forty Eighth Search and Rescue, Operations Center, Major Harris.”
The man spoke in a low rumble with an accent Tony couldn’t identify, “Good morning, Major Harris. I am Akin Youroba. I am the Chief of the Colonial Militia. Your liaison officer here has advised me to contact you with a request for assistance in a search and rescue operation.”
Tony reached for a notepad. This, at least, he knew how to do. “Ok, I think we can help out. What’s going on?”
The man tapped a few keys, sending a string of coordinates. “Yesterday, we had a scout party encounter an Elai patrol. There was a brief exchange of fire, and the Elai fell back into the jungle with our patrol in pursuit. Shortly after, we lost contact with them. Afterwards, the members of the patrol returned, with three severely wounded. Apparently the Elai had set up an ambush. Three men remain missing. It is unknown if they were killed, wounded, or captured. The Earth Alliance units in the area are responding to perform a ground search, but are requesting a Valkyrie on aerial standby.”
Tony nodded, jotting down the coordinates. “Uh-huh. Ok. I think…” He turned and tapped a few controls. “We have a bird in the air, and they can be on station in about thirty minutes. Got a freq and call sign for the ground units?”
The man nodded. “Yes. The ground unit’s call sign is ‘Trident’. They are…unusual. They would not confirm it, but I suspect they
are specialists who happened to be the closest unit when we asked for help. They are very different than the UEA Marines.”
Tony looked up at this. “What do you mean, different?”
The man shrugged. “They are all very small men with nonregulation rifles, and all carry a very sharp, strangely curved knife. They also don’t wear powered armor, just khaki duty uniforms and a flat-brimmed hat with one side turned up. They look odd, but they seem very ferocious. They are not afraid of the jungle, either. They seem to enjoy it.”
Wracking his brain to think of who it might be, Tony nodded. “Ok. I’ll get the Valkyrie dispatched. Tell Trident Valkyrie One-One will be on station in about thirty minutes.” He paused, then asked, “Why did this come through the Colonial Militia liaison versus military channels?”
The man shrugged. “Faster than routing it through the command center on the warships in orbit, and I was told to ‘call if I needed anything’. I need help for these soldiers looking for my men.”
Tony nodded. “Fair enough, Sir. I’ll get the birds moving. Good to meet you.” The man nodded curtly, then vanished.
Tony tapped his pen on his lip for a minute, thinking. He raised his voice slightly to speak to the specialist, “Specialist Hong, can you ping Major Androvich? Let her know about this and have her call me when she’s free.”
The specialist nodded acknowledgement. “Yes, Sir.”
Tony tapped his panel and activated his comm system.
“Valkyrie One-One, Olympic Station.”
He waited a moment, then heard the calm voice of Captain Winters respond, “Olympic Station, Valkyrie One-One. Go ahead.”
“Valkyrie One-One, we have a change of plans. You are to proceed immediately to the pinged coordinates. You will be providing aerial support to ‘TRIDENT’, which is assisting local militia in looking for some of their guys who were ambushed by the Elai earlier today.”