“Oh…that’s cold! Hah!” Alighten laughed, then waved to the rest of the platoon. He made sure to wave at all the new members too, mostly because he knew how big of a drag it was being the FNG or fucking new guy. He didn’t want to see them go through that. “Hey guys, good to see you all!”
The group quickly exchanged pleasantries; Cholius nodded respectfully toward him. “It’s good to see you, Alighten. What have you been doing the past years?”
“Just going to school, trying to finish my bachelors. I’m majoring in Political Science and it’s not as much fun as I thought it would be.”
Sarah sighed in agreement. “Tell me about it… That’s cool though, how many credits do you have left?”
Alighten tilted his head and thought for a moment. “I have about…twenty credits until I’m done. I’m going to Hudson State.”
“Gross…Hudson State. You’re one of THOSE people.” Sarah smirked at him.
Alighten retorted firmly with a laugh. “Best college baseball team on the planet, the statistics don’t lie.”
Valor shrugged helplessly and nudged Alighten on the shoulder. “Yo, not to break this up or anything, but this fool owes me a pool rematch! Its games time, son!”
Alighten shrugged in return. “Hah! I guess I’m not getting out of this. Valor was pretty upset when I beat him last time.”
Valor stopped walking over to the pool table and turned dramatically slow. “Ok, whatever pool shark! Hah, come on let’s get this thing started!”
Major Johan “Dade” Broz, the platoon Flight Officer, yelled out in frustration from the bar stool closest to the large holographic monitor, which was currently playing the Olympus Mons Versus San Rafael State soccer game. “That was just horrible… Come on!”
Major Phil Lawrence, the platoon Medical Officer, sighed loudly and moved to a bar stool next to Dade. “The goalie isn’t doing his job. There is no way that last kick should have made it past him, considering how slow it rolled in and how far it was from the goal to begin with.”
Dade leaned back heavily onto the bar counter, surprised by Phil’s sudden interest in soccer. He didn’t remember him for that, but not too many of the platoon had ever been big soccer fans. “Yeah, the goalie is a freshman that just made the team. He has a lot of potential but doesn’t have a whole lot of experience and that clearly shows. I don’t know why they even fielded him, this game is way too important!”
Baranov walked over holding three unopened beers, and spoke in his signature heavy Russian accent. “Sirs, are you watching football game? May I watch with you?”
Phil sat up and nodded with a smile. “Yeah of course, but what team are you going for? Just out of curiosity.”
Baranov glanced over to the monitor and then back. “Gagarin School team not playing, so I go for team in yellow and blue.”
Phil chuckled. “San Rafael of course! Olympus Mons is for students that couldn’t make it in a real college.”
Baranov laughed and nodded in total agreement. “Olympus Mons beat my team first game, so I want them to lose very quickly. I hold grudges.”
Dade sat up, took another French fry off his plate, and laughed. “Hah! Good, to hear it man. Have a seat! What would sports be without grudges and competition?” Dade smiled to himself and turned back to the television. Of all the things to survive the fall of Earth, sports was such Godsend. It almost made the whole world feel normal again. Almost was good enough.
Baranov set the beers in front of Dade and Phil, who took them thankfully. Another goal was made by Olympus Mons a moment later, prompting the three to yell out in unison. “Ah come on!”
Dade shook his head at the television and grabbed another fry off the tray. “Well, I suppose a 10 game winning streak was a little much to ask for.” Dade snorted and then tossed the fry onto the bar near Cholius, who had immediately turn to see who threw it. “Hey Josh! Remind me again later I’m starting up a new fantasy football league.”
Cholius smiled and nodded. “That will be fun, are you going to make it an ongoing thing again?”
“Yeah, and I want to get at least a dozen people going on it this time. Maybe even the entire platoon if we could!”
Baranov grunted and took a swig off his beer. “I would like to play this game. Father used to play it often. Just not your American football…”
Willits leaned over the top of their booth, directly next to bar. “Can join in on that, Sir?”
Dade shrugged toward her. “Yeah, have you ever played before?”
“No, but I would like to try it.”
Kazowski turned around from the same booth as Willits. “Yeah, me neither, Sir.” Hawkins stood and nudged Kazowski on the shoulder. “Hah! If Skeet’s doing it, then count me in too! Can we bet money on it?”
Dade shrugged at the last question. Maybe? “We’ll do it Friday nights at the Officers club or something, and probably no money involved but we’ll see.”
Cholius nodded supportively toward non-monetary involvement. “That will be better in the long run. Phil, are you going to get in on it?”
Phil shrugged unsure. “I’ve never been any good…but heck, why not?”
The sound of pool balls hitting each other loudly, and Valor screaming out in excitement, drew everyone’s focus away. Alighten was standing silently off to one side of the pool table, just holding his pool stick and staring seemingly bored at the table. Valor was strutting around the table and congratulating himself. “That’s right, son! Corner pocket, all day!”
Alighten shrugged and then moved in and casually hit the cue ball into two stripes near the center, sending both stripes into two separate pockets. Valor froze in shock. Alighten just shrugged innocently. “I don’t know how I did that…”
Valor just stared at him, jaw agape. “How? For real…”
Dade and the group turned back to each other slightly laughing. “Valor’s his usual self.”
Cholius grunted a quiet laugh. “Yes, some things never change.”
Unexpectedly, two people in winter civilian clothing moved in and sat at two empty bar stools close to the center of the bar, James moved over to greet them almost immediately. “Jon! Bag! Good you guys could make it!”
Jon grunted as if to say to hello. “How much is beer around here?”
James hesitantly laughed and handed both Bag and Jon a beer. “Don’t worry, I have the whole tab covered…for the entire platoon…”
Bag laughed and popped the cap off both his and Jon’s beer. “Lost a bet?”
Matt paused from his argument and grinned over widely. “Hah! You know he did!”
Sarah smiled and leaned into the conversation. “Yep, James is finally good for something!”
James crossed his arms and smirked at Sarah. “Bet or not, YOU are cut off. I’m putting my foot down.”
Sarah stared back, half smiling. “Is it down right now? It doesn’t look very down.”
Bag laughed and turned back to the bar. “Oh God, I may need this beer more than I thought…”
Jon held his beer up to Bag. “About damn time you realized that. Cheers you bastard.”
The two clanged beers together and drank; James waited for them to finish. “Hey, just curious. What did you guys find out about everything that went down? You talked to Patriot, right?”
Jon let out a loud and frustrated sigh. “James, I really don’t want to talk about this right now…”
James lowered his gaze and took in a deep breath. “Damn…was it that bad?”
Bag nodded solemnly. “I’ll explain that all tomorrow... For now let’s just chill. Please.”
James made two fists and shook them in the air in excitement. “Oh, yeah we will!” James grabbed Matt by the shoulder and shook him wildly. “It’s time for shots!”
Cholius looked up from his drink slightly concerned by the words, but then just grinned and went back to his drink. Matt shoved James right back and laughed. “Hah! Alright! There goes my plan to stay coherent tonight.”
Jon shook his head and sighed with clear irritation. “Bag, seriously you need to learn to turn the military shit off and just relax.”
“Yeah, but I just have a few things to say first.” Bag laughed then stood up and positioned himself in about the center of the game room floor, and began to yell as loudly as he could over the music and mass conversation. “Hey everyone! Hey!”
The platoon slowly stopped conversing and stared up toward the source of the voice; Bag began to speak once he felt had everyone’s attention. “Alright, sorry to interrupt your guys’ morale night, but I just had a few quick things to say. Ok, first I want to once again welcome all our latest additions into the platoon. I know we kind of dropped you all head first into a fight, but you did a hell of a job today and I know I speak for everyone when I say glad to have you on the team!”
James began hooting and cheering, which drew the rest of the platoon into a moment of enthusiastic applause and cheers. Bag smiled brightly and clapped as well. “Alright…now Specialist Briar…” Sarah shot a look over at him, suddenly wary. Bag continued. “I spoke to Sergeant Reagan earlier today at great length and he brought it to my attention that your abilities once again far exceed your pay grade, so that’s why I am glad to FINALLY promote you to Sergeant, effective immediately.”
Sarah looked stunned and stared back at Bag sourly, but her expression turned to a reluctant smile as the platoon began to applaud and cheer for her. Bag grinned and shrugged back at her. “Alright and lastly…make sure you all get good sleep tonight, because by tomorrow evening we WILL be deploying again. I know its short notice and I’ll make it up to you as soon as I can, but I need everyone battle ready by noon tomorrow…with that said, I have the next round of drinks.”
The platoon all began to cheer and laugh wildly as Bag retook his seat. Jon popped the top on another beer and passed it to Bag. “Nice speech. I especially like the part where you bought me beer.”
Sarah moved over closer to Bag, cleared her throat, and whispered harshly. “Bag…are you serious? I thought we talked about this?”
Bag should have let her know about it first, he knew her stance on the idea. It wasn’t up for debate this time though, even if he had wanted it to be. “Look, I know you wanted to stay a Specialist, but I couldn’t justify you being an E4 for seven years to the rest of the command. You already do the job of a Sergeant, so now you’re being paid for it. That’s really the only thing that’s changed.”
Sarah sighed and made an annoyed expression. “Fine…I guess…”
Bag smiled at her and changed the subject. “You’ll thank me later. How’s little Kelley doing?”
Sarah half-smiled. “She’s at the hospital. Phil setup a room for her so she’ll be ok…she misses her family a lot. I’m going to try and visit her again in the morning.”
Bag’s expression turned to genuine respect. “That’s really great you’re looking out for her like that, thank you… and I hate to ask this but could you try to talk to her about what happened before the attack? I’m still trying to fill in a lot of missing details in my rep-”
Sarah shot him a dirty scowl and cut him off before he could finish his sentence. “She just lost her family and went through God only knows what before we got there! So no, Bag, I will NOT ask her about it! She’s scared enough as it is!”
Bag put his hands up defensively. The question did sound callous now that he thought about it. “I wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t important… Hey, forget I said anything.”
Sarah sighed and turned back to her beer, just as James came back to the bar smiling brightly and carrying an entire new round of drinks.
Chapter 16 – Fact from Fiction
The sun was just reaching its zenith as the armored units rolled down the freeway and toward the heavily guarded city access tunnel, which appeared to have been blown open by some great explosive force. Probably a missile, but that raised the question of whose? The high city white carbon city walls, were now blemished and pitted with blackened scars and impact points from a variety weapons and explosive devices. The pinnacles of dozens of skyscrapers soared up over the walls top, and were surrounded by the all too tell-tale clouds of darkened smoke and fire all throughout the city. Even now the concussive booms of explosives sounded loudly in the distance, accompanied by the staccato of gun fire and red trailing waves of tracers. It was a warzone beyond anything the team would have expected from such a normally secure city…
Outside the walls was a swarm of utter chaos. With only a small handful of vehicles and personnel, the dwindling number of Police and National Guard units remaining in the area were hard pressed to keep any order to the desperate evacuation. All around the tank the sound of thousands of frightened voices all seemed to be yelling out at once. Suitcases with strung about clothing, abandoned and often overturned vehicles, and ransacked and unmanned barricades were spread about the road hectically. The inhabitants escaping the raging combat were literally running over each other in a terrified frenzy to board the transports first, and the soldiers and police could do little except try not to fall victim to the same. It was absolute panic, and there was no sign of coordination or support. It was pretty clear this is all that there was left of the city defenders.
One and Two Alpha, along with Two Bravo, had been airdropped a full thirty miles from the original drop zone after militia had reportedly shot down a number of escaping civilian aircraft. The threat was obviously there, but that didn’t keep Pierce from throwing a temper tantrum over the radio for the issue of ‘wasting time’. They were an hour off the time line, but what the hell did he expect them to do? Fly right into hostile airspace and die? He was being more irrational now than he had been at the brief earlier in the morning. James thought to himself.
If you could call it a brief…he didn’t say a damn word that made any sense. No clear objectives, no indication of resistance, and pretty much nothing of use other than a location to go to. Secure the building…that’s all they had to go off of. James rolled his eyes just thinking of the name Central Intelligence Agency… Nothing ‘Intelligent’ about it apparently. He couldn’t wait to be done with this BS.
Armor-Two bounced about wildly for a moment as they recovered from hitting a fairly large piece of debris. Lance Corporal Wolfe called back on the intercom, obviously exhausted from the late night he and the rest of the platoon had. “Sorry about that guys…didn’t see that tire in the road…it’s kind of dark in here...” The armored column exited the long, rounded entrance tunnel and entered into the vacant and war-torn streets of Crystal City past a string of flashing hazard signs. Wolfe came back on the intercom a moment later, in awe. “Uh damn, you guys may want to take a look outside!”
James and several of his team member moved to open the small, rectangular window slats along the side of the troop bay. James struggled to get a good picture of what was in front of the tank…but what he saw off to the side was enough. The once beautiful and clean streets of Crystal City were now littered with junk, burned out vehicles, and the broken glass of hundreds of vandalized store fronts and buildings. Abandoned military barricades blocked some of the smaller side streets, and smoked billowed up from all around the towering city skyscrapers.
This was just getting worse and worse. If the other cities were having problems like this, then the US was hurting way more than it wanted to admit. James closed the window and sat back down in his seat quietly.
Senior Airman Kabir continued to stare out the window however, and began to shake his head irritably. “What the hell happened here? The News did this no justice at all! They made it seem like there was SOME fighting, but we had this under control… That was a complete lie!”
Joe shrugged and crossed his arms. He agreed with Kabir, but right now wasn’t the time to find the faults in the nation’s media coverage. It was hidden for a reason. “The country’s already fall
ing apart, what do you think showing all the nitty gritty on television would do?”
Kabir shook his head again and sat down, very conflicted. “What happened to freedom of speech and of the press and all that? That doesn’t seem very constitutional.”
James sighed loudly. “Martial Law happened. You saw all those people back there; no one wants to admit it, but things are getting worse by the day…for everyone. The government’s desperate to stay in control, and censorship of the media is part of that.”
Kabir gave James a troubled frown. “You sound like you’re ok with that. That’s all wrong… That’s like taking away what makes us American in the first place.”
James sighed again and nodded in agreement. “Yeah, tell me about it. Once things calm down, it should go back to normal.” Hopefully it does…
Joe took another glance out the window. “Yeah you’d hope, right? Damn man…look at this place… I can’t imagine how Dade must have felt…watching this go down in his home town. He’s lucky his family left when they did.”
Wolfe came back over the intercom, with a tone that clearly said hangover. “Hey, we’ll be approaching the building in like 5 minutes. CO says get ready... Oh and hang on, we’re gonna hit some broken road....”
The sounds of gun fire and fighting became much more apparent as the vehicles moved farther and deeper into the city. The absence of any police, soldiers, or anyone really was especially more evident. The place was deserted and looked like it hadn’t been touched in days, which probably wasn’t far from the truth. The damage to the surrounding area also became much more extensive, and showed signs of military type weapon and explosive damage. The radio would also on occasion jump from an overwhelming number of soldiers trying to give reports or requesting assistance, to dead static; the platoon switched to an encrypted channel just for the added silence. They couldn’t help those soldiers anyways…
A few blocks later the engines wound down on the ARV’s, followed immediately by the back ramps dropping to the cracked pavement with a thud. The platoon rushed out of their vehicles and onto a large 4-lane street surrounded by skyscrapers on all sides. Though this street was mostly untouched by the fighting, except for the occasional abandoned car and bits of trash blowing about in the wind. The smells of chemical fire wafted down the road along with a small bit of falling ash from a distant inferno. The situation was unnervingly similar to New Prim to the veterans… No time for that thought now.
Krieger Platoon Page 20