She didn’t feel herself drifting off to sleep, it just happened, and when Gunnery Sergeant Green came into the barracks blowing his whistle and shouting for everyone to get up, Angel jerked awake. She hadn’t moved for almost five hours, and once her mind cleared a little she was relieved to discover that she felt rested. Not that she wouldn’t have enjoyed more sleep, but through most of her life she had rarely gotten more than a full eight hours, and six was usual when she was training and going to school. Five hours of uninterrupted sleep would have to be enough.
Swinging her legs out of the bed she pulled on the sweatpants hanging from the top bunk and stepped down into her boots, which she laced up quickly. She already had a tee shirt on, and after pulling on a sweatshirt, and running to the bathroom to brush her teeth, she was outside with the rest of her barrack mates in less than two minutes.
“Time for a run, recruits,” Green said. “Then we have marksmanship tests. Move out!”
Hill Colonial Space Fleet Training Base
Ogden, Utah, U.S.A.
The marksmanship test was simple enough. Angel was timed on assembling her rifle, loading two full magazines with 71 rounds each, and then firing at two targets. The first magazine had to be emptied into a human-shaped target at fifty meters with her rifle set to fire three-round bursts. The second magazine was fired at a target at one hundred meters on semi-automatic fire.
She began with three hundred points and was deducted one point for every second the test took to complete. She was deducted three points for any round that failed to hit the body, neck, or head of the targets she was firing at. Any score above one hundred was awarded a marksmanship metal. A score above one fifty resulted in a sharpshooter metal.
Angel took a deep breath, calming her nerves as she waited for Staff Sergeant Gordon to blow the whistle that would begin the drill. The platoon was split into groups of three. Wendy would serve as Angel’s time keeper, and Hillary was the lookout who would watch the targets through a high-powered marksman scope to give direction to the shooter.
The entire platoon was running the test, although no one’s score except for Angel’s would actually count. The rest of the recruits had a full sixteen weeks to complete the tests required to pass basic training. Angel knew that it was her gymnastics experience that allowed her to be ready to qualify with her rifle and on the obstacle course after only four weeks.
The whistle sounded and Angel began snapping the parts of the rifle together. The gas driven piston was the trickiest part, with its small anchor pin. She assembled the rifle in just under twenty seconds, and then began loading the magazines. One hundred and forty two rounds of ammunition was loaded in just over sixty seconds. Dropping to the ground and flicking off the safety switch on her rifle, Angel pulled the trigger. Three rounds flashed out of the barrel. She held the weapon snug against her shoulder, but not too tight. Her finger squeezing the trigger in a rapid, yet controlled fashion. The first magazine was emptied in eighteen seconds.
She hit the release that dropped the magazine from the rifle and rammed the second one into place. The charging lever had to be pulled to chamber the first round. It snapped back into place and she thumbed off the safety again, before flicking the control from burst mode to semi-automatic. The hundred meter target seemed small, but she aimed for the center and began firing one round at a time. The rifle jerked in her hands with each shot, but she had little trouble controlling it. Unlike antique firearms that utilized explosive powder to fire the bullets through rifle barrels, the piston driven weapons didn’t take strength to hold steady. The test was more about staying calm under duress. Angel finished the magazine in forty-four seconds, released the magazine and checked the breech.
“Clear!” she said in a loud voice.
“Damn, you finished in just two minutes, thirty six seconds,” Wendy declared.
“I took too long loading the magazines,” she complained.
“Are you kidding, that’s almost sharp shooter speed,” Wendy said.
“How many misses?” Angel asked Hillary.
“I’m counting,” the girl on watch said.
“That’s not good,” Angel said, her stomach dropping as her mind did the math.
Two minutes and thirty six seconds was a deduction of one hundred and fifty six points. She only had forty-four points to spare.
“Eight missed shots on the first target,” Hillary said.
“Dammit!” Angel said.
“If you don’t qualify this first time you can take the test again,” Wendy said. “Recruits get to retest until they pass. There’s plenty of time today if you don’t make it.”
“How many misses on the second target?” Angel asked, feeling as if she couldn’t breathe.
“Three,” Hillary said. “Three misses on the second target.”
“Holy cow!” Wendy said, slapping Angel on the shoulder. “You did it!”
“I did?” Angel said, not quite believing it.
“A deduction of one hundred fifty six seconds for time,” Wendy said, jotting down the total on the official marksmanship test form. “Eight misses on the first target is a deduction of twenty-four points. And three misses on the second target is a deduction of nine points. That’s a total deduction of one hundred eighty nine points. You scored one eleven, that’s a marksman score.”
Angel felt a surge of excitement and a huge weight lifted from her shoulders. She had passed the first test of her basic training and all that remained was the obstacle course. The platoon stayed at the shooting range for an hour. Wendy scored a one hundred and one on her test. She was slower assembling her weapon and loading the ammunition, but didn’t miss the targets even once. Hillary scored a ninety-two.
From the firing range they marched to the obstacle course. Angel’s nerves were again making her feel like a coiled spring, ready to snap. She took her time stretching as sergeants Green, O’Neal, and Gordon took their places. Half the platoon was sent to the finish line with stopwatches. Wendy would once again be timing Angel. Once the air horn sounded the half of the platoon running the course would start all together.
Angel saw that Hillary and Peter would be running with her. Zach was in the running group, too. She knew the bully would do his best to ruin her time, but she knew the key to her success was staying calm. If she tried too hard she would fail.
“Platoon, ready!” Staff Sergeant Gordon shouted from her place on a high watchtower where she could see the entire course.
Angel shook her arms and legs, then prepared to run. The horn sounded and she took off, sprinting toward the barbed wire and diving under the loose strands, her assault rifle pushed out in front of her. The ground beneath the barbed wire had been sprayed with water, forcing her to crawl through mud. It was an unexpected twist on the course, but Angel stayed focused and kept moving. She was ahead of the pack, most of whom were jogging rather than sprinting. Only Zach was ahead of her, diving through the muck and kicking as much toward Angel as possible.
The mud wasn’t the only unexpected twist. A belt feed machine gun began to fire over the barbed wire obstacle. The bullets sounded like tiny cracks of lightning over her head and made Angel slow down. Her back had brushed against the barbed wire several times before the shooting started, but once it did she sank down and slithered on her stomach. The mud splattered on her face, and some even got in her mouth, but she ignored it. Some of the recruits were screaming in fright at the machine gun, but Angel put everything out of her mind except for completing the course.
The next obstacle was a series of two by fours nailed to supports over another muddy pit. The wooden rails bounced and flexed as Angel dashed across them, but her balance never wavered and she was in the lead as she jumped from the final board. Twenty meters ahead was the wall. Angel hoped she could get up the wall before someone else crashed into it and made the climb even harder. She was sprinting toward the eight foot barrier when an explosion went off beside the wall. Dirt flew in the air and Angel instinctively ducked
, her race toward the wall slowing considerably.
In the back of her mind she could hear her inner voice screaming at her to hurry. She knew the unexpected sounds of combat were slowing her down, but she couldn’t do anything about it. Nothing in her training had prepared her to run toward the sounds of gunfire and explosions. She forced herself to sprint the last eight meters toward the wall and jump. Catching the ledge she began levering herself upward. Zach jumped for the top and let his thick body crash into the wall, shaking it hard. Angel was almost knocked down, but she managed to hang on and a few seconds later she pulled herself over the top and dropped lightly to the ground on the far side.
The next obstacle was a five meter rope climb to ring a brass bell. The sounds of gunfire and bombs whistling through the air was being broadcast over hidden loudspeakers. Angel could even hear screams of terror and wails of agony, but she ignored it all. She was accustomed to meets where different events were taking place simultaneously. She had trained herself not to be affected when the crowd cheered for someone on the parallel bars while she was in the middle of her floor routine.
The rope climb was taxing, but not too difficult. She rang the bell and slipped down the rope, still neck and neck with Zach. The net climb was the next obstacle. Angel’s heart was beating hard and she could feel the muscles in her shoulders and back burning from the previous obstacles. Once more Zach fell behind just so that he could throw his weight onto the net in an attempt to slow her down. Angel waited for the jolt in the net she knew was coming and then scrambled upward. At the top of the obstacle Zach actually shoved her sideways. Angel nearly fell over but she twisted her body around in the nick of time and scaled down the far side of the net.
The final obstacle was a thick log, waist high, that stretched over a mucky pond of brackish water. There were two logs that ran parallel to each other. Zach reached his log just ahead of Angel. Knowing she needed to make up time she jumped forward, tucking her shoulder and rolling over the initial portion of the log before coming up onto her feet. It was an old balance beam trick. It wasn’t commonly used in competition, but Angel and her fellow gymnasts practiced it just for fun. She dashed down the length of the log and saw Zach falling right at the end. He was leaning out, toward her log, waving his arms as if he were trying to regain his balance but Angel knew what he really meant to do. If he could knock her into the water, she would have to slog back through the muck and start the obstacle over again. There was no way she could complete the course in under two minutes if she had to repeat an obstacle.
He dropped just ahead of her, his arms catching on her log. It was too thick to do more than vibrate under his added weight, but his arms were there, waiting to trip her. She saw the look of malice in his eyes and without even thinking she bent her knees, raised her arms and flung them down while driving her body upward with a hard thrust from her legs. She had done somersaults for most of her life and flipping over in the air was second nature. She sailed over Zack and the end of the log, managing a double before her feet hit the ground. Her knees nearly buckled and she felt the shock vibrate up through the balls of her feet. She realized just how much the mats and spring boards absorbed the impact from her jumps for all the years of her training at that second, but she didn’t fall and instead she sprinted toward the finish line.
Wendy was jumping up and down, holding the stopwatch over her head, and Angel knew she had beat the two minute time that was required. Hot tears spilled down her cheeks, happy tears. For the first time in her life she was being scored on her merits alone, without the biases and unrealistic expectations of competition judges. She fell to her knees, catching her breath and feeling as light as a feather. All the worry and anticipation was gone, lifted from her shoulders completely. She had finished her basic training and she was ready for the next adventure.
Communications Center, Hill CSF Base
Ogden, Utah, U.S.A.
“Captain, how was basic training?” Colonel Jakobson asked, via a video link. His craggy face stared at the recipient of the call, who was revealed in vivid detail on the large screen.
“A real pain in the ass,” Captain Wendy McManus said. “I think the entire intelligence division should have to go through basic all over again every five or six years.”
“We couldn’t keep people if we tried that,” Jakobson said. “One time is plenty.”
“I’m in better shape,” Wendy said. “Or I will be once all the blisters heal.”
“What about our new recruit?”
“I have to say I’m impressed,” Wendy answered. “You were right on with the empathy play. Not that I needed to try very hard to appear to struggle. I’m not as young as I look.”
“Your youthful appearance is your greatest asset,” Jakobson said.
“I trust my regular updates were useful?”
“Yes, but I never doubted her physical abilities. What’s her mental state?”
“Cool as any operator I’ve met,” Wendy said. “She thought we were fast tracking her, not testing her, but still, four weeks to pass those tests, which she did all on her own, that should have shaken her. She didn’t waver at all. I could tell she was feeling the pressure, but she didn’t worry over it. She’s got an iron will.”
“Any luck getting her to talk?”
“No sir. It was as if she had no idea what she had been recruited for.”
“Perhaps she was on to you?”
“I don’t think so. We were friends, that’s all. After she finished the obstacle course she cried tears of joy and thanked me for helping her. Which I didn’t do, not really. Then we had a full half hour for lunch and she just seemed happy. When Lieutenant Anderson arrived at our barracks to take her to the officers’ quarters she hugged my neck and made me promise to write to her. She genuinely thought I was a fellow recruit.”
“Excellent. And your recommendation?”
“I can’t say if she has the guile for intelligence work, but she can certainly keep a secret. I don’t think there’s any challenge she wouldn’t rise up to meet. If there are any deficiencies it would have to be on the social spectrum. She made friends easily enough, but she got nervous around the boys.”
“Gymnastics is a demanding sport,” Colonel Jakobson said. “It’s not surprising she didn’t have time for romantic liaisons. We’ll shuttle her through the OTI and get her out to Lieutenant Commander Sozu’s lab. They’ll have the prototypes ready for testing. If she does well there, I’ll approach her. But in the meantime, I want you to make contact. No restrictions. You can tell her I had you keep an eye on her. Take her out for a night on the town once she gets her commission.”
“She isn’t old enough to drink, Colonel. Hell, she isn’t old enough to get into most bars.”
“I know that, but she’s old enough to die in the line of duty. I trust you’ll find a way to show her a good time. Besides, I want to know how flexible she is.”
“You mean how willing she might be to breaking a few rules?” Wendy asked.
“That’s right, Captain. If she’s going to work for us she needs to be able to step across the line from time to time. If we lived in a perfect world breaking the rules wouldn’t be necessary, but there is nothing perfect about this world or any other we’ve found. If she’s going to be an effective agent, she has to be willing to push a little. The fate of too many people is at stake here.”
“I read you loud and clear, Colonel. I don’t have a problem taking her out for a night on the town. Not that Ogden is that rowdy a spot. Maybe we’ll take a drive down to Salt Lake.”
“Just don’t lose track of her. I want her on a shuttle the next day. You’ll escort her and get her settled. Lieutenant Commander Sozu isn’t very warm and fuzzy. We need her to settle in and make herself useful. Hopefully the ARC suit won’t be too dangerous. I’d hate to lose her testing a mech suit.”
“I understand. I’ll do all I can, sir. You’ll have my report following our outing.”
“Excellent. See if you
can get a read on who else she might be talking to. I don’t think there’s much of a connection at home. The mother’s MS is pretty advanced and her father’s an alcoholic. I didn’t have any trouble getting her to commit to the service without going home first.”
“She didn’t talk about her family in basic,” Wendy said. “No friends either. A few stories about gymnastics meets, but nothing that would indicate she had close friends.”
“Excellent work, Captain. Thank you again for volunteering.”
“Glad to be of use, sir,” she replied, before snapping a tight salute.
The colonel returned the salute, then the screen went blank.
Captain Wendy McManus typed in a command and the screen changed to two surveillance feeds of one small room. The lights were out even though the sun hadn’t fully set. The video screen was divided down the middle, with a view from one corner of the room on the right side, and a view from the opposite direction on the left. She could see Angela Murphy asleep on the small bunk. The room was more comfortable than the barracks had been in. The bed, while still small, had a much thicker mattress. A small bathroom with a toilet and shower stall was built into the side of the room. There was a desk with a computer terminal, and a video screen built above the desk surface that doubled as a mirror for the occupant’s use.
In the small closet were clean fatigues, which Angel would wear during her three days of officer training. She had a lot to learn, but she wasn’t being groomed as a combat officer. The need to lead a team would be better learned from experience in the field than in any classroom. And her first assignment was with R&D, which was easily the most lax division of the CSF. Most of the researchers worked business hours with full weekends and regular lives off base.
ARC Angel (ARC Angel Series Book 1) Page 5