She stared at him through her curly mane that was hanging down in her face. Her ice blue eyes fixed on Forte. “You know, you don’t outrank me here.”
Forte could see she was still shivering, the platinum streaks in her hair stood out even more in the natural light. He didn’t want to fight over this point right now; he had more important problems to solve. “You are a supply officer; I am a commanding officer. I may not have a ship, but you don’t have a cargo. As this is a tactical situation, I am the ranking officer. That aside, we should work together to get the remaining cargo to the Americans safely.”
Commander Furier nodded her head in agreement.
The seventy survivors of the crash gathered behind the shuttles under the shelter of the overhang. Commander Forte stood on a small rock so he could see the remaining members of his crew.
“Crew of the Impegi, I want you to know that we are going to survive this tragedy. I know many of you are grieving the loss of some of your friends. There will be time to mourn them soon enough. Now, we must focus on survival. Our mission is not complete.” Forte surveyed the group, they were all cold, shivering, and scared.
“I have been in contact with the Americans. They are working on a rescue mission. We have crashed in hostile territory. The enemy has advanced weaponry; so, we need to stay hidden until the Americans come to retrieve us.”
“We are going to break up into small groups to set up camp. Captain Pilosus, take 10 crew and start to devise a camouflage for the front of the cave entrance.”
“Yes Sir.” Pilosus replied.
“Captain Cordatus, start formulating a plan for food, water, and heat.”
“Commander Furier.”
“Yes, Commander Forte.”
“Figure out what we have in the way of armor and weapons. Take a team to the crash site and monitor it. Report back all activity.”
“I thought we were told to stand down?”
“We were, and we are. I just want INTEL. We need to know what we are facing. Just report back activity, do not engage.”
“Yes Sir.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Granite Peak Installation
Present Day
Snap and Neal West sat a table waiting for Chef to bring them their dinner after the FIGAS training exercise. Most of the squad was relaxing in the mess hall or finishing up with their showers. Snap had ordered a bacon cheeseburger, rare with a side of something Chef called wilted lettuce. Neal had ordered a Santa Fe chicken sandwich. Both were wearing civilian gym clothes.
“So, what about Bob?” Neal asked with a snicker.
“He looked human, sort of. Aside from being nine feet tall, not talking, and having an expressionless face that only a mother could love, I suppose he was okay,” Snap replied. “I thought you were going to draw down on him there for a second.”
“He startled me. Good thing I didn’t. Ater said he is competitive against FALOS armor. Can you believe that? How can flesh compete against a titanium exoskeleton?”
“Nothing surprises me anymore,” Snap said, shaking his head. “I guess we will find out soon enough.”
Chef walked up to the table holding two steaming platters. “Evening gentlemen. Here are your entrees. Is there anything else I can get for you?”
“Thank you, Chef,” Snap said. “I think we have everything we need here.” Snap examined his burger, “It looks great.”
The wilted lettuce, as Chef called it, was a leafy, lite, green lettuce, tossed with chopped up radishes and scallions, with hot bacon grease poured over the mixture. “Now, this is my kind of salad,” Snap said.
“Bacon grease poured over lettuce, that’s a salad I can get into. Mine is pretty good, too,” Neal said, as he took a big bite of the sliced chicken breast smothered in cheese, and grilled onions and peppers.
After a few minutes of silent enjoyment of Chef’s culinary masterpieces, Neal asked, “So, what made you want to join the Air Force?”
Snap took a gulp of his unsweet tea, leaned back, and said, “My grandfather. He was in WWII. He really inspired me to join.”
“Were you close to your grandfather?” Neal asked.
“Not really, I wish we were closer. After he retired from the Air Force, he had a second career in the civil service. He was gone a lot. My dad spent some time in Nam, but never talked about it much.”
“My dad was in Vietnam, too. He retired from the Marine Corp,” Neal said.
“That’s the way it works now, with a volunteer military. Many military families serve for generations, while the civilian population has no idea what we do. It was better, back before WWII; when everybody served. It was not military-life versus civilian-life; it was just American-life, everyone had skin in the game.” Snap took another bite of his juicy cheeseburger.
As Snap was chewing a mouthful of well-seasoned hamburger, the lights turned from white to red, and a siren went off.
“What the hell is that?” Williams shouted from a across the small room.
“Everyone report to their assigned positions. This is not a drill,” a hidden loud speaker announced from somewhere in the ceiling.
“What do we do? Where do we report?” Neal asked. The pulsing red light was casting strange shadows across room. The men were starting to stand up, but not sure of where to go.
“I don’t know. We were never told where to report in case of an actual emergency.” Snap rose to his feet, unsure of his next step.
Ater slammed open the door and barraged into the room. The men were shocked to see the menacing figure outside of the training room. “Everyone to the training room. You need to change into your FALOS suits immediately. We have a real-world situation to deal with; and time is of the essence.”
“What’s going on?” Snap asked.
“No time. You will be fully briefed in the air. Get your men suited up. This is not a training exercise.”
Thirty minutes later, the men were standing on what appeared to be a deserted runway just outside Granite Peak Installation. The troop transport that had brought them to the desolate location was heading back to GPI.
“Snap, what the hell are we doing here, standing in the middle of the desert all alone.” Neal said into the head up display of his FALOS suit.
“I don’t know,” Snap replied. “But it doesn’t feel like an exercise.”
“Snap, you don’t think this is just another one of those trick training exercises to evaluate us under pressure?”
Ater’s voice interrupted the conversation, “This is not a training exercise. I assure you of that. Your ride will be there shortly.”
“Ater, I thought only Snap could hear me if I said his name first,” West protested.
“Control can hear everything you say, even directed conversation,” Ater replied.
“Great. I will have to keep that in mind,” Neal muttered.
“Neal, look.” Snap smacked Neal on the arm and pointed at the ground. Ten yards from where they stood, the ground was opening, sliding along a mechanical track.
The false desert floor opened to reveal a deep, dark, perfectly square hole. The squad heard a mechanical humming sound. The bottom of the hole began to ascend, and, as it got closer to the top the team could make out a triangular shaped craft. The platform reached the surface and locked into place; the hole disappeared. The black triangular shaped craft was much larger than a fighter jet, but still smaller than a cargo plane. It had no wings or nose, but the men could tell by its design it was meant to fly.