Date Point: January 18, 2437

Long Kou Proper

Li Ming Tao

“You are a disgrace to this family!” Li Xiao Hai screamed at her son, “D? You get a D on this test? Stupid child.”

“Wait mother let me explain.”

“Oh? Explain,” his mother spat, “Ok explain to me why you so stupid!”

“I didn’t get a D, the test was split into two parts and he hasn’t graded the other!” Li Ming Tao cried in desperation, “give it a few days and my grades will be back to normal.”

“Excuses, if you worked harder then you would have had a 100 to start! Now go do the laundry in alphabetical order!”

“What does that even mean?” Li Ming asked in exasperation, his mother took off her slipper and slapped him across the head with it.

“Do not ask stupid questions, now go!”

Sighing, Li Ming Tao exited their small high-rise apartment in the capital of Long Kou. His holo dinged and he opened a screen.

It was a message from his best friend and upstairs neighbor Zeng Zi Yen, “That sounded interesting, was it about the test?”

“Yeah, you know how the professor split the test in two?”

“And he’s only graded one of them, my mom gave me the same talk.”

“You want to hang out later?”

“Why not, let's go to the mall. I still need to get the materials for that trip to the station next week.”

“You still haven’t gotten those? Your sister wouldn’t stop bugging me about that for a month. She even made me get her stuff for her.”

“Bro…”

“What?”

“Take a hint for once in your life and ask her out already, I know this sounds weird coming from her brother but I swear to god if I have to listen to her moan your name at three in the morning one more time.”

“WTF?”

“Yeah anyways you down to go right now?”

“Sure… I’ll meet you down in the plaza.”

Li stood in the plaza enjoying the peace and tranquility, in all four directions huge hundred-story high rises gleamed, and in the center of it was the plaza. A garden/playground where a few hundred little kids ran around laughing and screaming. In one of the corners, elderly citizens played mahjong with real pieces. Their ivory tiles clinking and sliding.

“Yo Li!” Zeng shouted, he turned around to find the tall half Chinese half Korean man waving at him. He quickly walked over and gave him a fist bump.

“How’s it going?”

“Pretty well, dad’s on his way back from the Belt for the new years.”

“When’s he get back, you know I love his cooking.”

“Between February 7th and 12th.”

They started down the ramp to the subway station below the complex, thousands of people flowed into the tunnels like ants. Li scanned his holo and entered the station, “at least he made it in time this year.”

“Yeah, the company’s profits doubled so they gave everyone a few weeks off,” Zeng said absentmindedly watching one of the massive holo screens in the middle of the station, a strange-looking white man stood at a podium speaking about history. Li read the subtitles floating beneath the man before nudging Zeng.

“Do you know who that is?”

“He’s the American president, he’s talking about that massacre that happened a few weeks back.”

“I heard about that, it happened a little too close for comfort.”

“Yeah Arcadia’s only a few systems away, we’ll be fine though. The 2nd fleet’s here to keep us safe.”

“You think so?”

“I know so, Terran fleets have never lost a battle against equal numbers and the Mighty Seconds the best of the best.”

“You’re the military geek.”

“Upupupupup hobbiest.”

“Sure, why don’t you sign up to fight then?”

“You know the old saying, nails aren’t made from good iron and good men don’t become soldiers. I don’t see a reason I should risk my life fighting.”

“Nah you’re just too much of a coward to enlist.”

*************************************************************************************************************

“So you’re the new guy?” Graves asked, he was a tall man with a shaved head, nasty-looking scars across his face, and a voice like gravel. “What’s with the dyed hair, you some sort of fag or something?”

Oscar frowned looking up at his hair, a streak of crimson ran just above his temple, “Uhh no, my girlfriend did it.”

“Oh your girlfriend, how fucking sweet,” he said sarcastically.

“Is everyone on this ship a grade A asshole?”

“Yeah is there a problem with that? It won’t get in the way of a helmet so I don’t see why there would be.”

“Sure it’s whatever,” Graves said with a wave, “so McGill tells me you’re our new Combat Controller, you know what that is?”

“McGill’s the quartermaster right?”

“Answer the question.”

“I assume it has something to do with communication.”

“That’s right, you’re the fucker who’s going to be talking to the bridge when we’re boarding or holding a ship and calling in air support when we’re planetside.”

“Man, I have no idea how the hell I’m supposed to do that, is there some sort of manual I gotta read?”

“Yeah, there are sims you can learn from.” he said, “now we’re going to need to get you squared away with new gear. You ever worn a combat suit?”

Oscar shook his head, gang member or not, very few people outside of the military or licensed contractors had access to any real body armor.

Graves rubbed the bridge of his nose, “Jesus, why’d Michael hire you?”

“Hey I can handle myself in a fight, I’ve just never had fancy gadgets to use in the past.”

They entered the armory, rows of GS-3’s and other high-tech firearms lined the wall with suits of armor hanging in ready racks. A couple of marines milled around, stripping rifles and doing maintenance checks on armor. None of them looked up or even seemed to notice Graves' presence.

“Go stand on that,” he said, pointing to a raised box, “it’ll scan your body and fit a suit accordingly.”

Oscar nodded and stepped up to the scanner, it hummed to life and green light encompassed his body.

“Please raise your arms to your side, now please raise your arms above your head,” it kept giving him instructions for the better part of an hour. Finally, the machine dinged and the box lowered itself to the ground.

Graves looked up from his scroll, “God damn son, how the fuck do you way 113 kilos? You can’t be taller than 6’1.”

Oscar scratched his head, “You remember those bone density supplements they sent to the Belt stations some time back?”

“Yeah, they recalled them a month later, something about a formula mix-up?”

“Well, apparently they shipped a few thousand tons of experimental military stims to the wrong stations. That was a weird year at the ward.”

“So you took experimental drugs that made your bones denser?”

“Yep.”

“So that’s it, it wasn’t some kind of supersoldier serum?”

“I wish it was, I mean I’m stronger than I look because my body has to support the extra weight but that’s really it. No superstrength, night vision that sort of thing.”

“Eh, that kind of stuff isn’t really useful when there’s modern powered armor.”

“Speaking of that, when’s my suit ready?”

“Should be done right now, have Price help you put it on. By the time you’re fully qualified you should be able to do it yourself but that’s still at least a month away.”

“Right, is that it,” Oscar asked, “Is there anyone else I need to meet after this?”

Graves paused for a moment, “You’ll need to go up to the bridge and familiarize yourself with networking and communications. And if you were smart, you’d also have a chat with Greyson.”

“Who’s Greyson?”

“He’s the senior combat controller, he’ll be the one showing you the ropes from now on. Try not to piss him off and maybe you won’t end up getting splattered by a deathworlder.”

With that Graves walked off, Oscar sighed looking around. A lean man nodded to him, beckoning him over, “You’re the greenie?”

“I ain’t no greenie.” Oscar scowled.

“Sure you aren’t,” Price said in a condescending tone, “so you ever worn powered armor?”

“Well no, but th-”

He cut him off, “that makes you a greenie so unless you want to end up as a smear on a bulkhead then I suggest you pay attention.”

Oscar gritted his teeth, he wasn’t sure how much more of this shit he could take. Not even the other mob lords on the crime capital of Arcturus blew him off like that. Price walked over to the suit, “this is the Guardian Mk IV all-purpose suit straight from the Japanese factories on Luna. It’s some of the best armor money can buy, while you’re wearing it you should be able to go toe to toe with any sentient being in the galaxy.”

He tapped the breastplate, “I’ll give you the rundown, keep in mind this is all for base equipment. Most guys will add packages and mods to their own suits but you’re going to have to pay for that out of your own pocket. Armor is rated to stop up to a glancing blow from an Akachi anti-mech rifle. Suited up you should be able to lift around a metric ton at one Terra G, TacLink comes preinstalled and since you’re our combat controller you get a communications package. FTL communications up to three light minutes and direct coms to the bridge or any other marine.”

“What’s Taclink?”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah, I already told you I have zero actual military training.”

“Then why the fuck did Michael send you to the marines, in fact why the hell are you even here in the first place? Eighty percent of the people on this ship are veterans of at least one campaign, what the hell did he see in a civvie?”

“Hey look, I’ve been in my fair share of firefights. Just because I’ve never worn power armor doesn’t mean I can’t handle myself.”

“Your fair share?” he scoffed, “Let me guess, you were some street rat as a kid who joined a gang and got in a few scuffles?”

When Oscar didn’t say anything Price continued, “You think you’re hot shit? Sure maybe you’ve seen combat, most humans outside of Terran space have. But I guarantee you that you haven’t seen jack shit. You couldn’t fathom what those Xeno fuckers do to people every goddamn day. I’ve known guys who've served on the border with the empire get tossed around like ragdolls by starved half-dead deathworlders. Do you want to know why the pay is so high? It’s because of how many of us fuckers end up as ground beef trying to keep our end of the contract.”

Oscar blinked, “you want to talk about it?”

“Shut up and pay attention alright,” he sighed rubbing his forehead, “Here step into these boots and wait till you hear them lock.”

Thirty minutes later and several painful mess-ups, Oscar stood proudly in a suit of powered armor with more processing power than all the computers in his old wardroom put together. There were no eyeshields or actual physical viewport, instead, several high-fidelity cameras presented the outside world without the need for any obvious weak spots. A holographic projector was linked to the suit’s tactical computer that analyzed everything he saw. Overlaying his field of view with tactical symbols over every human and labeling any possible threats, then transmitting that data to every other suit. Whatever Oscar could see, everyone else could see as their computers integrated the feeds coming to each other.

“You got the hang of that?” Price asked warily from several paces away, well out of arm's reach. Oscar raised his hands to his face and touched his helmet.

“Yeah, I think the suit’s properly calibrated now.”

“That’s what you said last time,” he said, “if I get injured, it’s coming out of your paycheck.”

“Quit being a little bitch and help me take this off, I still gotta talk to some people.”

Price scoffed, “I’m not a little bitch, I just don’t want to lose an arm because some greenie couldn’t control his suit.”

Taking the suit off was a much faster process and less than five minutes later Oscar was out of the armor. “From now on, whenever it’s your station get in here and kit up, then you can do whatever the hell you want. Just be ready for all-hands call at any time and you’ll do just fine.”

“Alright, thanks,” Oscar said nodding to him and walking out of the armory. Price grunted and went back to weapons maintenance, muttering to himself about green beans. Oscar opened a tab with his list of places to go and people to meet. Next on it was a chat with the people up in navigation.

He exited the lift and was immediately stopped by four Marines in full battle rattle, “Identifications please.”

Oscar showed him his holodeck and the guard paused for a moment, “you’re our new combat controller?”

“Hey come on now, don’t say it like that.”

“Jesus, he looks like he’s fresh out of boot camp.”

“Oh for the love of God, I’m just not going to say anything, it’s not worth it.” he thought. The guards shook their heads and let him in.

“Just don’t touch anything.”

He entered the airlock and was greeted by another group of marines. They gave him one look over before pointing towards a section of the bridge. “That’s the navigation pit, don’t touch anything and we won’t have a problem.”

Oscar walked over and an incredibly buff woman in her forties waved him over, she looked at him then back down to her holo and back up at him. Sighing, she offered a hand and he took it, “Oscar Irons?”

“That’s right.”

“You’ve got STC experience?”

“I do.”

“Good, good, that makes my job a whole lot easier.” she said, “in that case, there’s not much else for you to learn. I’ve sent some stuff to your holo, get that done and you should be good to go.”

“That’s it?”

“Yep, you already have most of the experience necessary. Why else do you think Mickey hired you? Definitely not for your combat experience that’s for damn sure.”

“Yeah, I’ve gotten that a lot today,” he sighed, “Do you know where I could find Andrew Greyson?”

“Drewski?” she tapped her chin in thought, “Pretty sure you’re going to have to wait a couple of hours because right now’s his sleep shift.”

“Ma’am, you’re going to want to take a look at this,” one of the navigation crew said, “Sensors are picking up a massive object.”

“Pull it up on the main screen,” she ordered and a few seconds later the bridge was lit up by the harsh red and purple light of the warp. The screen flickered as something shot past the cameras. No one gave it any mind as their attention was all focused on the three planets directly in front of them. Two were green and blue marbles, of a similar color and size to Terra herself. The third planet was a shattered ball with a long tail of broken pieces trailing behind it.

“Where are we?”

The camera flashed and the entire ship shuddered, every screen in the went blank as all the lights went out simultaneously. Claxons blared as all hands were called, the emergency lights turned on and the secondary generators kicked in.

“Damage control, what the hell is going on?” the ship’s first mate demanded. The bridge crew looked around nervously, “someone get me a sitrep goddamn it!”

“Sir it looks like there’s a hull breach in deck nine, all the cameras are down and no one’s picking up, Graves is sending men to check it out. The reactors are doing a full reboot, engineering says it’ll be less than five minutes before we get power back to the bridge.”

“Pull up Graves’ TacLink, I wanna see what’s causing all the fuss.”

“Aye sir, coming up now.” On one of the main displays, twelve suit cameras flashed to life. They raced up the emergency ladders, doing final systems checks.

“I want Price and Spears in first just in case there's anything in storage. Ty, Noah you two keep going. Don’t stop till you get to the end or see something that shouldn’t be there. The rest of you are with me.” He said placing tactical markers. They reached the emergency entrance and gathered next to the bulkhead.

“Price, do your thing.” from the internal camera feed, Price smiled and pulled out a length of plasma fuse. He applied it like tape, quickly creating a man-sized hole and lighting it up with a press of a button. The camera feed dimmed as the fuse burned a brilliant blue. Several seconds later the camera feed returned but the door was still standing.

“Right plan B,” Graves said motioning another marine forward. This one wore a very modified version of the standard Guardian suit with large bricks of what appeared to be Explosive Reactive Armor and a belt-fed machine gun connected to an ammo pack on his back. He kicked the door with one well-placed foot and it exploded backwards, covering the space in a fine powder. That did not stop the suit’s sensors from picking up the movement however and several red icons blazed to life. One of the icons lunged forward at the marine but was blown away by the anti-personnel mine strapped to his chest. The camera was once again covered, this time in a haze of red mist.

The marine stormed into the entrance, machine gun firing the icons. The rest of the squad followed several beats behind. The two marines named Ty and Noah kept on going and entered the next room. A beast came into view, it was vaguely humanoid, bipedal with three arms and a horrific tail with a stinger at its end. Where the face should have been was a gaping maw filled to the brim with serrated teeth.

“Oh hell nah!” one of the marines shouted and sprayed the monster down. Its chest exploded and it squealed like a stuck pig but the marine didn’t stop firing. Years of fighting deathworlders had drilled that instinct into him. Only when the thing was a smear on the deck did he release the trigger. TacLink showed no further movement and he gave the all-clear signal. The marines went to work finding the hull breach. A hole less than two square feet across gave the men an uncomfortably clear view of the warp and they quickly patched it using composite tiles.

“That’s it then,” Graves said with a sigh, “pack it up and get ready for debriefing.”

The connection winked out and Oscar rubbed his eyes, “I’m going to need to get something to drink.”