Star Force: Nemesis (SF3) Read online

  But better to bite the bullet now rather than have it hanging over his head for latter.

  He watched Larry on his run with interest, trying to learn what he could from it and the others that he observed before it came around to his turn again. Jack succeeded in trimming four seconds off his previous best and left satisfied. The others each took two tries and called it quits for the day, leaving Paul alone on the course and able to make multiple back to back runs, only stopping to swap out equipment for fully charged units.

  After five attempts he succeeded in making par, but only barely. Still, it was a pass, and opened up another level 2 underwater challenge, one that he would not be tackling for some time. He needed points, and while passing additional challenges did give him and others a points surge, it didn’t last when the rest of them went through the same challenges later.

  Those trainees who at first sought out only to pass just above par on as many challenges as they could found themselves with an early points lead that eventually faded when the rest of the group got deeper into the challenges and the fast starters found they couldn’t easily pass the level 2 challenges…not without first sharpening their skills on the level 1 scenarios.

  All in all, Paul was pleased with his progress and his current ranking, but not satisfied. He knew he’d have to do better just to graduate from the program, let alone maintain his rank. There wasn’t a single slacker out of the 100 of them, and if he or any of the others started to take it easy they’d be passed up in good order. All of them were making steady progress up the charts, and if he was to keep pace with the others he had to continue improving on a daily basis.

  Today had been a success, and with the par time achieved he vaulted 302 points higher, but that was still 135 behind Kerrie, and based on her progress…which Paul watched intently…she was nearing the completion of another challenge of her own, which would boost her lead over him yet again.

  After finishing up his swimming challenge, Paul caught a quick shower then met up with the rest of the 2s as they ran through a cross country obstacle course in one of the 37 training ‘parks’ located inside Atlantis, each mimicking a different style of Earth terrain.

  Paul and the others ran through one of several forest environments that dominated the parks, this one consisting mostly of tightly packed evergreen trees and no open grassy areas…on top of which it was snowing lightly, thanks to the climate controlled indoor environment. The size and scope of the training parks were jaw-dropping, and fit in with the overly ambitious design of the city who, on the surface, was sitting in 102 degree weather…while here inside, Paul and the others were running through two inches of snow!

  The point of the drill was two-fold. First was the basic problem of navigating through dense forest. There were markers spaced out designating the route they had to travel, but in between each of the two-pole ‘gates’ were long stretches of forest without any premade paths to follow, so the trainees had to gage the quickest routes, as well as avoid getting lost.

  The second point of the drill, as always, was time. Navigating your way through a forest environment was one thing…doing it quickly was something else entirely, especially given the irregularly spaced snow packs falling down through the trees in almost random locations, meaning they didn’t have an even amount of snow on the ground to adapt to. Some areas were bare dirt while others had a half foot of snow to deal with.

  The trick of the team run was to get everyone through the course as quickly as possible, but to do so in a way that was advantageous to the slower runners, else it would just be a challenge for the slowest person on each team. Paul was the second best runner in the 2s, after Jason, and both of them had been assigned to pace the slower runners. Jason had Ivan trailing him, while Paul led Megan, picking the route they would run while she only had to focus on keeping up with him.

  By the time they’d finished their run…of which they only attempted once today, due to the high energy expenditure involved…they’d gotten their team time a good twelve seconds faster than Megan’s best individual time, putting them 7th out of the 10 teams at present.

  That wasn’t going to be good enough for the 2s or Paul, who knew that the better his team did, the more points he’d score in his individual ranking. Star Force philosophy valued teamwork as an important individual skill to possess, thus 10% of the points available in the individual trails came from a trainee’s team score…meaning someone couldn’t ignore their teammates and hope to climb up the individual ranks on their own.

  Paul didn’t think any of them would have done that anyway, but the points spillover, which worked both ways, served as an ever-present reminder that they were a part of a larger endeavor, and the stronger they became as individuals the stronger the team would be and vice versa as they learned from each other and explored how they could surpass themselves by teaming up, such as on this cross country run.

  Thoroughly exhausted after trouncing through the snow in skimpy bodysuits, Paul and the others retreated to the communal shower rooms back in their residential quarters, finding that the 4s had beat them there and were already occupying 10 of the 40 stations. The 2s took up ten more of the enclosed mini-bathrooms that had everything from a shower, toilet, mirror, sink, bench, and drying unit to a hamper chute that led down to an automated collection shaft that took their snow- and sweat-soaked clothing over to the laundry, which was also automated, save for folding the clean and dried clothes and returning them to the trainee inventory, which had to be done by hand by the quartermasters.

  At the far end of the long ‘shower hall’ was a wide wall with numerous closets and drawers filled with fresh clothes and racks of sandal-like casual shoes, which they all shared. Paul grabbed a set of clothes and shoes in his size and retreated into one of the open shower stations as the 5s came in and began claiming their own stations.

  15 minutes later Paul walked out in a fresh set of clothes and headed over to the cafeteria while Frank from the 6s took his shower as he and most of the other teams were waiting their turn at the end of the training day. He was a bit sore from slipping on the snow, but he was originally from Indiana, so running on the white stuff wasn’t exactly new to him.

  The rest of the 2s met up and occupied two of the 5 seat tables in the cafeteria and were halfway through their overly stuffed food trays when the 7s came in with obvious looks of frustration on their faces. They weren’t talking to anyone else when they came in, which was normal for the teams since downtime was their only chance to mingle…which suggested to Paul that their ill mood was probably a result of their recent team challenge, of which the 7s were the first scheduled to tackle.

  As per mutually agreed protocol, teams wouldn’t discuss new challenges with other teams that had yet to pass them, so as to not give them an advantage in the points war, but while that was true the trainees always had individual challenges or past team challenges to discuss, or even their unofficial video game tournaments to talk about…so it was immediately obvious to Paul and everyone else in the cafeteria that something was wrong with the 7s.

  As they walked by the 2s enroute to the food stations, the 7s said nothing at all, but Greg looked over at Paul and gestured with two fingers pointed up at his eyes as he walked by.

  Paul frowned, now sure that something was up. In their hand signal code, created entirely by the trainees to give themselves the ability to communicate during challenges without the trainers being aware, the ‘two fingers over eyes’ gesture meant ‘keep your eyes open,’ suggesting there was danger or mischief at hand.

  “Wonder what that’s all about?” Emily whispered after they were out of earshot.

  “What challenge did they just run?” Dan asked the others.

  “G-2C,” Jason answered. “The same we go through in two days.”

  “Bunker defense?” Brian asked, based on the identification code. “I wonder what the trainers have up their sleeve this time.”

  “If it’s got the top dogs spooked, it must be somet
hing big,” Megan pointed out.

  “Guess we’ll find out in two days,” Paul said, biting a chunk out of his extra-large, blue iced sugar cookie…one of three on his plate, along with a stack of other sugar and carb-heavy foods. The amount of calories they burned through in a day was more than 3 times the norm and Paul and the others found themselves eating as often as they could, with sugary snacks being the lifeblood of their daily diet.

  “Yeah,” Jason said distractedly, still looking at the 7s as they filled their trays. Something was definitely up.

  3

  Two days later…

  Kip knelt down and pressed his back up against the low upper bunker wall and held the single-shot paintball ‘shotgun’ up at an angle aiming back over his head. The butt of the thick weapon was set on the floor and with an iron grip Kip adjusted the angle as Randy gave him instructions.

  “Five meters port,” Randy said from his spotter position up in the corner of the squarish cupola that topped the bunker the 2s were tasked to defend for half an hour against continual trainer onslaughts. “Ten shallow.”

  Kip used his two arms as levers and marginally adjusted the angle of the weapon then nodded at Brian, who was squatted down on the opposite side of the paintball gun. With Kip holding the barrel in place, Brian pulled the trigger and the oversized paintball flew up into the air and out of sight.

  Randy watched it land a meter short of one of the trainers on high ground who was sniping the hell out of the trainees. “Trajectory on…one shallow.”

  Brian recycled the weapon and Kip made the barest of adjustments to their improvised mortar, then gave him teammate the go ahead to fire, launching another green ball up into the air.

  “Splash damage!” Randy reported.

  “Has he moved?” Kip asked.

  “Yep.”

  Kip released his hold and shook out his arms as Brian picked up the shotgun in a more traditional pose and walked up to the wall and took position in the nook between two castle-like wall protrusions, exposing only a piece of his head and the barrel of his weapon. Down below him Megan fired off a similar oversized round at one of the trainers trying to advance toward the bunker through a cluster of boulders set on the grass just outside the bunker.

  It caught the man in the right calf and forced him to crawl back behind cover while three other trainers took the opportunity and opened up on the first level wall, causing Megan to duck down as they plastered the bunker with a volley of the fast firing, normal-sized paintballs.

  Kip and Randy ran back down the inside ramp in the cupola and emerged in the northwest corner of the small bunker just in front of the mission end pedestal that the trainers were trying to get at. The 2s had to defend it for 30 minutes against 30 trainers equipped with the standard issue semi-automatic weapons that the trainees usually used…however, the ten trainees were only given two of the slow firing, over-sized shotguns to use in defense, leaving them seriously outgunned.

  Their only other means of disabling the attackers was the stun sticks they were all equipped with. Barely an arm’s length long, the silver rods looked like short lightsabers without the glow, ending with a rubberized hilt. The ‘blade’ was metallic and ended in a curved cap, but otherwise was just a long silver cylindrical tube that charged with stun energy then released on physical contact.

  It gave the trainees a means of hand to hand combat, but that meant they had to wait for the attackers to get inside the base, which was problematic because all they would have to do to beat the trainees was rush forward and tap the button on the pedestal once.

  It was a tough challenge, but not something overly complex. The trainees were meant to be huddled up inside the bunker as the trainers made their way across the boulder-strewn park that greatly resembled ‘blood gulch’ from Halo, where upon a hand to hand fight would ensue for possession of the bunker…at least that’s what it had been intended to be, but the 2s weren’t going to play that game.

  Using the shotguns as mortars had been a trick the 4s had perfected on an earlier challenge, then shared with the other teams after the final scores had been tallied. It gave the trainees a way to break up any sniper positions as well as being able to fire back without exposing themselves directly to the attackers’ mass fire. The larger size of the shotgun balls also meant additional stun potential, meaning a direct hit on a cluster of targets could disable them all with a lucky splash.

  That said, the shotguns had to be recycled after each shot, making them poor choices for hand to hand fighting against multiple opponents. You could take down one target with even a glancing shot, but you’d be exposed to the others too long with the slower rate of fire, meaning their best use would come in fire support.

  Knowing that the challenge would inevitably end in a fight inside the bunker, the 2s had decided to change the ground rules. While Kip, Brian, and Randy kept the attackers distracted with the mortar fire and Megan made sure they couldn’t just run across the open areas with impunity, Paul, Jason, Dan, and Emily quietly snuck out the back entrance of the bunker and split up in pairs, one going north, the other south.

  Paul and Emily headed north and kept behind the rocks and trees as much as they could as they flanked the trainers who were approaching from the west end of the park. This was the first time the 2s had run this scenario, but not the first time they’d been on this training site. Paul knew there was a series of small paths through the bits of forest that bordered the north and south edges of a wide open grassy area that encompassed most of the park and made for an intense free for all engagement zone.

  The 2s had beaten the 8s three weeks earlier in one such throw down…with the temporary bunker having been removed. Paul had gone down in that engagement, but thanks to Jason’s skills the 2s had come out victorious and earned a few bonus points, even though he’d been the only man left standing.

  How familiar the trainers were with this park, Paul didn’t know, but the three that he and Emily were coming up behind either didn’t know of the paths or they just didn’t expect the trainees to leave the bunker…at least maybe not on the first go around.

  Big mistake. The trainers should have learned by now to expect the unexpected.

  Emily exchanged glances with him and gave Paul a ‘shove of her fist with thumb and pinky extended’ hand signal towards the three trainers who were starting to inch their way forward, looking like they were going to make a break towards the next available cover, which was probably the clump of trees cattycorner right.

  Paul nodded his agreement. They would rush the group together.

  Emily slid to the side and up behind a tree, waiting for Paul to get in position. When he did, he pulled his stun stick out of his belt holster and thumbed on the power button. A slight crackle/pop sounded as the weapon charged, but the trainers didn’t notice. Paul counted down on his fingers so Emily could see, starting at four and dropping his hand on two. They both continued the mental countdown in sync, then jumped out of cover and ran towards the backs of the trainers some 15 meters away.

  One of them heard them coming and turned around just in time for Paul to kick his weapon out of his hands, followed by a quick jab of his stun stick into the man’s chest, dropping him to the ground unconscious. Meanwhile Emily took her target down with a slap across the back of his shoulders, never having seen who hit him.

  The third man turned and took a pair of shots at Paul, but he ducked behind cover as Emily came up on the man from behind. A quick whack on his butt and he was down as well, with the trainees graciously appropriating their paintball rifles.

  Paul took the extra weapons and headed back through the trees as Emily crept her way along the flank to harass more of the trainers. When he got back to the bunker he gave the extra rifle to Jack and they took up firing positions in the bunkers, spraying the trainers with suppressive fire while the rest of their teammates slowly picked apart the trainers.

  There were nine opponents still active on the battlefield when the thirty minutes expired
and the challenge end tone sounded, with only Ivan going down among the 2s. Paul and the others were proud of passing the scenario on the first try, which would bump them ahead of the others in the training rotation and temporarily put them ahead of the 7s in points.

  Unlike most other challenges, this one had simply been pass/fail, with 1000 points awarded for completion, so there was really nothing to gain or lose to the other teams here, just the prestige of beating it before anyone else had.

  Still, a lead was a lead, and it was the first time the 2s had risen to the #1 ranking, and even though they knew it statistically wouldn’t last, Paul and the others took it as a sign of things to come. They had gradually whittled down the 7s’ lead to the point where this leapfrogging of the score could start to take place, and they were chomping at the bit to close the gap even further.

  Later in the day, after all their training and challenges were finished, Paul was in the main lounge working on a snack and some navigational calculus drills on a datapad when Greg and Scott walked over to him with grim expressions on their faces.

  “Well?” Greg asked.

  Paul put the pad down and glanced up at him from his comfy, overly plush chair. “Well what?”

  “You went through G-2C today, right?” Scott said pointedly.

  “Yes,” Paul answered, a bit confused by the breach in protocol. Neither the 5s nor 7s had beaten the challenge yet, as far as he knew. “We got it on the first try.”