"I don't want to be a vid star. Why the hell are they doing that?" Stark demanded, outraged. "I don't want the enemy seeing vid of what I'm doing on our civ networks."
"There's supposed to be a long enough lag time to keep us safe. As long as we're on timeline."
"Which we're not. The damn planners are always too optimistic when they lay out those timelines."
"I know, Ethan. It's not my idea." Vic's tone changed, growing crisp and clipped. "Gotta go. We're closing on our objective."
"Roger. We are, too." Stark stared ahead, looking for visual on the objective his Tactical claimed would be nearby now.
Concentrate on the job at hand.
Something suddenly came into view as he crested a small crater rim, a large object set into the lunar surface that glowed like a neon sign on Stark's infrared sight.
Waste heat. A lot of it. Looks like they didn't expect trouble enough to worry about camouflaging their site.
That was good.
"I've got target on visual," Murphy reported.
"Me, too," Stark advised. "That should be the main entry hatch for our objective. Mendoza, check the door for traps or alarms. Gomez, hold back with Billings and Carter to cover the rest of us until we get the hatch open. Everybody else converge on it."
Smooth and easy, going through the motions they'd executed a thousand times before in a hundred different places, though none so different as this. Stark approached the hatch cautiously, crouched, weapon at ready, then covered Mendoza as the Private unlimbered his gear and scanned the access for any defenses or warning devices.
"There is nothing there but a standard arrival enunciator," Mendoza reported. "No sign they are expecting problems, Sergeant."
"Good. Now—"
Another voice cut in on the circuit abruptly. "What is that? What are you looking at, Sergeant?"
Stark checked the ID on the transmission before replying. Brigade Staff had apparently decided to devote their attention to his small part of the operation, at least for the time being. "It's a door, Colonel."
"A door? On the Moon?"
"Hatch, sir. The main airlock into our objective."
"Which is a laboratory, right, Sergeant? A research laboratory investigating, uh, new synthetic material fabrication techniques in low G."
Whatever that means.
"That's what my Tactical says, too, Colonel."
"Good. Good. Well, gather your troops and prepare for entry."
Stark spoke with exaggerated patience. "They're already gathered and prepared, sir."
"Then get in there, man!"
Stark gestured roughly toward the lab airlock. "All right, you apes—"
"Wait a minute!" another voice interrupted. "Has that hatch been checked for booby traps?"
Stark bit his lip before answering this time. "Yes, General."
"It's clear?"
"Yes, General."
"I don't want unnecessary damage to that installation, Sergeant! Tell that Private—no, wait, what's the Private's name?"
"Mendoza, General, he's—"
"Private Mendoza," the General ordered, "run another check on that hatch for booby traps."
"Y-yessir," Mendoza stuttered. Seconds dragged by while he ran another scan. "It looks clean, General."
"It
looks
clean, or it
is
clean?"
"It is clean, sir," Mendoza amended rapidly. "Then get going," the General ordered. "Thank. You. Sir," Stark stated carefully. "And make sure you look good! Remember, we're on top of this!"
I remember when there was a chain of command,
Stark thought darkly. "Yessir."
The hatch cycled open without protest, innocent of defenses, just as Mendoza had predicted. The Squad crowded in, weapons ready, while atmosphere built up. Just before the inner hatch popped, a small vid screen inside the airlock came to life, displaying an owlish visage blinking in surprise. "Who's there? We weren't expecting visitors today, or this early."
"That's the point, Civ," Gomez said with a grin as the inner hatch swung open. "It's called surprise."
"Surprise?" The foreign civilian scientist blinked some more. "I don't understand. Who's the surprise for? Should I come escort you in?"
"You just wait where you are," Stark advised. "We'll come and get you." He faced his Squad, swinging an arm toward the inner hatch. "Move it! Round the civs up before they figure out what's going on."
His soldiers scattered into fire teams, heading down individual routes through the roughly hewn rock corridors of the laboratory in accordance with the plans in their Tacticals. Stark took two privates with him down the longest hall until he reached a ninety-degree bend at the end. He paused, weapon at ready, preparing to leap and then fire immediately if needed.
"Sergeant!" Stark jumped nervously, cursing as another transmission broke his concentration. "Be careful going around that corner!"
"Yes, Colonel," Stark grated out between clenched teeth.
"There may be armed opposition around that corner," the Colonel continued. "Make sure your other soldiers are posted to cover you."
"They are, Colonel," Stark assured his distant commander. "Now just go the hell away and let me do my damn job," he added under his breath.
"What was that, Sergeant? I couldn't understand the last thing you said."
"I didn't say anything, Colonel," Stark hastily assured him.
"I heard something. Major, didn't you hear something?"
"Yes, Colonel," another voice chimed in. "There was something there."
"There may be something wrong with your suit's comm system," the Colonel decided. "Run a diagnostic, Sergeant."
"Colonel, I'm in the middle of an operation—"
"Never mind. I'll order the diagnostic from here. We can't risk you losing comms with headquarters."
Stark opened his mouth to issue another frantic protest, then stopped as a blinking red symbol on his HUD announced that his comm suite had dropped off line to run the diagnostic. He slammed one fist repeatedly into the nearest wall, glaring threateningly at the two Privates, both of whom pretended not to be aware of his situation. Unable to advance while he couldn't talk to anyone else in the Squad, Stark waited and fumed while precious moments crawled by as the suit checked the entire hardware and software of his built-in communications system. "Please, sweet Jesus," he prayed, "when my comms come back on let the worthless Brigade Staff have found another little part of this big battlefield to micromanage to death."
Green lights popped up to announce the completion of the diagnostic. Stark held his breath, waiting for further backseat driving from headquarters, but silence reigned.
Guess they got bored waiting for the diagnostic to run and went off to tell some other poor grunt how to tie his shoes.
Stark eased toward the corner, motioning his two Privates along, then paused. All the training simulators insisted at this point you should stick a finger around the corner to scope out the scenery with the fiber-optic sensors in the suit's fingertip. That helped ensure you wouldn't be surprised, but unfortunately worked both ways in that it also told any enemies lying in wait that there'd be a soldier following that finger around the corner in the immediate future.
"Let's go," Stark grunted, leaping across the gap to plant his back against the wall, rifle aimed down the new corridor. Two civs were walking slowly toward him, apparently deeply engrossed in conversation. First one, then another, became aware of the armored figure menacing them and came to a gap-jawed halt. Stark waved his Privates forward, triggering his external mike. "Attention. This installation has been occupied by armed forces of the United States," he recited. "All personnel will be taken into protective custody. Any resistance will be met with appropriate force."
The Privates reached the two civs, both apparently too stunned by events to resist, and prodded them against the nearest wall with their weapons. "Billings," Stark ordered, "bring them along. Murphy and I will head for the lab." On his Tactical, the laboratory loomed as the largest room in the complex and as his final objective.
Deciding that speed was necessary to exploit the surprise they'd apparently achieved, Stark sprinted forward, following the map on his Tactical display, down another corridor, through a right turn, and then tried to turn right again, only to face a solid wall of stone. "Oh, hell."
"Sarge?" Murphy asked anxiously. "Isn't there supposed to be another passageway here?"
"Yeah, but there ain't. Guess they never finished building according to the plans Intelligence got their hands on."
"What do we do, Sarge?"
Doctrine was explicit on that point. No deviation from actions ordered by Tactical were allowed, which meant Stark was now supposed to call up the chain of command until whichever Colonel was calling the shots for his sector could confirm that Stark indeed faced a wall of rock, then download a new set of actions for Stark to follow.
Can't have grunts thinking for themselves.
On a hunch, he checked his suit's comm system for update delay times, then grinned. As he hoped, the blizzard of communications during the assault had grown so heavy that the Brigade comm system couldn't keep up. Delay times had grown from seconds to minutes, giving him precious moments to do something before anybody in charge realized he had deviated from Tactical.
"Follow me," Stark barked at Murphy, heading at a run for the next closest entry to the lab shown on his map. Stark's HUD revealed that his other fire teams had already covered this ground, so he didn't bother with caution, simply trying to cover ground in the few minutes available before some officer noticed he was off the track dictated by his Tactical.
Sometimes that was a good idea. This time it wasn't. They came around a corner to find a man in what seemed to be a law-enforcement uniform, complete with a holstered sidearm, staring at them. A moment of mutual surprise ended as the man grabbed for his pistol. Stark, off-balance in the middle of a long, low-gravity step, watched as Murphy lined his rifle up, then hesitated. "Shoot him, dammit!"
"But Sarge, that pistol can't—"
Stark, finally stable, brought his own rifle to bear on the foreigner and fired, the round catching him in the midsection with enough force to fling the man backward a meter. "Get his gun," Stark ordered Murphy. "Don't ever do that again."
"But Sarge—"
"But nothing!" Stark's weapon didn't waver from where it focused on the wounded man, but his fury was aimed squarely at Private Murphy. "I don't care if that thing probably can't penetrate our armor. You don't take chances. You don't think. If they have a gun, you shoot them. I don't care if it's a water pistol."
Murphy, scooping up the pistol, avoided looking at Stark. "I'm sorry, Sarge."
"You sure as hell are." Stark fought down his anger, lowering his weapon as the blood from the wounded man's abdomen spread higher in the low gravity than Earth combat experience said it should. "Look, Murph. Take a good look. I don't want that to be you. Now use your med kit on that guy and then bring him to the lab."
"Okay, Sarge. Don't worry, Sarge. I know how I screwed up."
"Good."
Stark headed for his objective once more, sliding into the main lab just as an angry query resounded. "Sergeant, why aren't you following Tactical?"
"I am, sir," Stark responded in tones of injured innocence. "Tactical shows this as my objective, and I'm in place."
"But—" the officer began to object before apparently being distracted by some other display of unauthorized initiative. "Ah, okay. Carry on."
"Yessir." Stark sized up the situation. A large gaggle of civs, most in variations on the universal white lab coat but a few in whatever they'd been sleeping in, stood staring at his Squad members with looks of varying degrees of incomprehension. Stark singled out his acting Corporal. "Any problems, Gomez?"
"No, Sargento," Gomez reported cheerily. "Oh, a few of the civs didn't want to come along at first, but they didn't need much convincing."
Stark took another look at the scientists, at least one of whom seemed to be developing a black eye. "Any of them get hurt?"
"No, Sarge. Well, maybe a little."
"Fine. We'll let central processing deal with them." Stark switched to his outside speaker, broadcasting his voice to both the civilians and his Squad. "This facility is now under U.S. military occupation. You will be held here under guard for your own safety until a vehicle arrives to transport you to a central point from which you will be repatriated to your own countries back on Earth. No one will be harmed as long as—"
A civ stepped forward, interrupting Stark's speech, her dark eyes flashing with anger as she raised two hands in emphasis. "Leave here! You are interrupting our work and trespassing on private property."
"Ma'am, as I just stated, this property now belongs to the U.S. government."
"Pirates! Mercenaries!" Stark sensed his Squad tense at the second term, their pride affronted.
"Ma'am, we're not mercenaries," he corrected harshly. "We don't fight for money."
"I don't care what distinctions you draw about yourselves!" The foreign civ glared at Stark. "This is illegal. You Americans own everything on Earth! Isn't that enough? Do you have to come here and take this, too?"
"Ma'am, my orders are—"
"This is piracy!" she repeated, glancing around at the other civs in the room for support. "You have no right to seize this installation."
"Ma'am," Stark answered slowly, emphasizing each word, "that's not my department. You got a complaint, you bring it up with my Lieutenant. I'm just following orders."
"Then tell your Lieutenant you must all leave at once."
Stark hefted his rifle, its dull metal glinting evilly under the laboratory lights. The simple gesture drew the civs' eyes, which widened in fear and apprehension. "My orders are to take possession of this facility and secure any personnel here."
"I don't care about your orders!"
"That's your right, ma'am. But any resistance will be met with appropriate force." Stark canted his weapon so the barrel leaned in the direction of the civ scientists. "Your choice."