CHAPTER 8:

13:00 HOURS (MILITARY CALENDAR), TRAINING WILDERNESS RESERVE, EPSILON ERIDANI SYSTEM, PLANET REACH, JANUARY 31st 2525

"Another day, another excerise"

Otto quietly whispered to Margaret.

It was another versus fireteam excerise on another day. Another day where the sky was a chilled stream of white and the sun shone silver, Margaret tightened her knuckles to resist the bitter cold in her simulated training armor. She rested her arms on her paint pellet gun and looked over at the other side of the training ground, where the horizon shone over the head of Menachite Mountain.

"It's...quiet." Roma Whispered

"I know" Victor whispered back, "that's when they shoot you first"

"yeah, right!" Roma Sassed

"Shut up! Or I'll take you both out myself!" Margaret joked, easing the tension. They all kept a level head over all possible means of approach. They had placed their new proximity based "paint bombs" in the bushes.

They strode silently through the branches and bushes of the vast wilderness, placing each foot carefully, smooth as silk, checking each footstep for a branch that could give away their position. they moved slowly through the woods.

Margaret curved her hand into a fist, and then indicated to make eye contact. Placing her two finger proportinally to her eyes. She held up three fingers and indicated Otto to hold the right flank she made a number two and made a rear cover motion, and then four, and had him with a left cover motion.

They fell into place like pieces of a jigsaw, clockwork, with uncanny syncronisation to each other.

Margaret carried forward, she raised her Paint Pellet Rifle to shoulder level, she slowly inched forward.

After a rustle of bushes, in which all four pellet rifles came levelled towards, then only for a Rabbit to pop out, then suddenly what sounded like a hooting Owl.

"Sam!" Victor yelled out, "Covering fire!"

Victor had fired in which the hoot came from, out flopped Sam onto the round, locked inside his paint pellet armor, he had watching them in the bushes. Victor was an excellent sniper, hunter and scout. He knew every detail about the other trainees.

A streak came from a bush behind, pink paint stained against Roma as she dropped, she was always "first".

"Damn!" She groaned

Margaret spun and knelt over Roma, grabbing her and moving her against one of the many oak trees

"You ever get tired of being the first to go down, Two?"

"You've got no idea, Boss"

She smirked, "I think I do."

Margaret certainly knew, Roma was good on her feet, and good with her fists, the perfect assault expert. Sassy and deadly. She would have been a vital member to withstand a rapid ambush.

an ambush they were now in.

Margaret stood back up from setting Roma down and retrieved her paint pellet rifle and took position with Otto and Victor, who were laying suppressing fire against the blue-tinted armor of their competitors.

For a moment, they managed to catch their breath, they gave up and slogged back down, only to begin picking them down to the cover of the trees as they were peppered with a barrage of pellet fire, as Kelly rushed up the side of the hill in a flank.

Kelly caught Otto in the leg, leaving him a limp when she began to fire. She was virtually untraceable to her, to Margaret, she was a blur, her feet barely touched the ground and glided across the air in careful arcs, arcs which facinsated, admired and troubled Margaret to Kelly's sheer speed. She was the fastest of them all.

Kelly charged Margaret as she dumped what was left of her pellet rifle in th vain hope of catching her. Until a streak of pink rang out and caught her in the forehead.

Kelly was fast, and Victor, was a dead aim.

Kelly crumpled to the earth, "dead"

"You good, One?" he called out, his hands steady and remarkably calm. While her own breaths were shallow.

"I'll live and breathe at some point, Vic" she humoured

Otto was on the ground, next to another blue team member, whom Margaret recognised as Fred 104, Roma's shooter. Otto had caught him dead on. They had "taken each other out."

"He played dead, barely had a chance to stop him" he grunted in regret

"least we're even"

The only two left were John and Linda. John was someone whom Margaret had mutual respect for as a leader, someone who she looked up to. John 117, he had made sure herself and all the other trainees weren't subjugated to being left behind in the cold on "patrol excerises". He never left anyone behind, even it was himself in trade for them.

What Margaret failed to recognise was that Linda was a much deadlier sniper than she was, a shot caught her in the chest. She felt numb, as her legs gave.

"Victor!" she screamed

Victor had been too focused on stopping John, who attacked them both with assault speed, he had caught the rifle of Linda, but not her. After kicking John down a branch and fetching his rifle over his head, a familar snap of the paintball gun echoed through the valley, and a bright spray of pink painted Victor's midsection and right arm, a second shot found his head. He fell to the floor.

It was over, and they had lost.

After the game over was called out, the four trainees began to stop at the barracks and began to release themselves from the shell of the training armor, it was remarkably uncomfortable.

Margaret felt weak, she pondered the question of what she could have done to save her teammates and herself, she wondered what she could have done differently. No one said a word to each other. She imagined Chief Mendez yelling at them, saying that they would have been meat.

Chief Mendez had no paitence for whiners, and Margaret had become good at not whining.

It was nearing the end of their training, and at times like these, Margaret really wondered if she had done enough.

That was all she wanted to think about now.

Victor shoveled the locker with his fist, "I had him!"

"It's okay, Vic" Margaret soothed him, "He's the lucky one"

"I need to be better than luck, Mag"

She held him tight, "It's on me, I should've kept us together, he knew we would box them, he found a way to get past it. I should have changed things up, I'm too reliant on my typical tactics.

Victor's eyes welled. He was cold and calculated but he was a "softie" behind it all.

"We're not out of it yet" she nudged him. "Keep on the target".

Victor Smiled "Yes, Ma'am"