The 13 cadets picked up their pace, rushing forward.
They are finally close to their destination — a training camp. The flag pole flying both the UNSSD flag and South African flag can be seen with binoculars.
Sean looked at the time.
"5am, perfect, now we just need to—
A mortar landed around the cadets, exploding.
"GET DOWN!" Clara yelled.
The cadets immediately took cover as mortars exploded around them.
"Don't cluster, spread out and move forward!" Ariel yelled.
A cadet dashed ahead of the rest. Suddenly, he felt a bullet scraping past him, he tried to run in zig-zags, though to a sniper that is useless and he is quickly taken out, yellow smoke rising from his JPC 2.0 plate carrier.
"Sniper," exclaimed Sean as they hid after moving out of the mortar kill zone.
"Engagement distance in jungles usually will not exceed 100m due to the thick vegetation blocking vision," analysed Albert. "Hence the sniper used a suppressor and subsonic ammunition, as well as firing when mortars landed to cover up his gunshots. We can only determine he is in front of us."
True enough, Santos and James had hidden themselves with ghillie suits. Santos is looking into the optic on his Barret MRAD sniper rifle, looking through the both the Leupold Mark 5HD 5-25x scope and the front mounted thermal sight. James is looking into his monocular, his URGI placed next to him.
"Good shot," said James as Santos cycled another round.
Carl then grabbed his dagger and started drawing out the environment around them on the soil in front of him, mumbling things as he did so.
"You're trying to guess where the sniper is at?" asked Albert and Sean, who recognised what he is doing.
"A sniper's biggest enemy other than heavy weapons is another sniper, hence when choosing their sniper position, they will definitely look out for other areas which can pose a threat to them and memorise their features, so that they can spot the first new thing to appear, no matter how small and far it is," said Carl.
Albert commended Carl for his familiarity, Sean is impressed too, recounting how tough it was for him to study all these things when he was Frederica's observer.
"Hence, all we need to do now is to focus on where the sniper may hide, and the moment we notice something off, we use suppressive fire," said Sean.
"I'd say that these areas," pointed Sean at Carl's drawings then at the area in front of them. "Right side of the rocks, the area of shrubs there, and the left side of the swamp are the most-likely areas, as the moonlight does not cover them."
"Agreed," said Albert. "My idea is that we split up, lock our sights down on the 3 suspicious areas, and then move up and burst fire on these areas the moment you all see something amiss, I will stay here and provide precision shooting. Remember, our main goal here is not to eliminate the sniper, but rather to create an opening which we can all escape from."
"Good plan, one more thing," added Clara. "Don't cluster nor stay in one place for too long, remember, they have mortars too."
With that, the other cadets slowly crawled back and moved off, while Albert loaded his gun, alert.
Sean rushed forward, fixing his aim on the swamps. Santos noticed him and moved his finger to the trigger, but not aiming for Sean, but rather Eddie behind him.
Just as he was going to make the shot, a few shots rang around him, puzzled, he turned to see Louis and Carl shooting at the shrubs. 30 bullets then whizzed past him as Ariel and Vera fired on his area, causing him to miss, which landed right next to Sean.
"FOUND HIM! SWAMPS!" he yelled, returning fire.
The other cadets also concentrated their firepower on him as they ran forward. In the frenzy, a lucky rifle grenade shot from Erika his James, yellow smoke rising from his AVS plate carrier.
Santos is pinned down as his position is shot on from 12 different directions. Due to how the cadets are essentially blind-shooting as they did not hit him.
In his panic, he moved too much, exposing him in Albert's reticle.
"Got you now," grinned Albert, moving his finger to the trigger.
A shot later a yellow smoke rose from Reza, and Albert immediately moved off, just in time, as a few seconds later a mortar landed where he previously was.
Seizing the opening, the cadets dashed forward, miraculously not getting hit by mortars, and the 12 of them reached the gates of the base just in time, at 6am in the morning.
"We, made, it…" panted Eddie, collapsing onto the ground after dashing the final 2.4km in full gear.
The rest of the cadets are worn out too.
But the cruel instructors are not going to let them have it easy after a tiring day of being through a tropical jungle and mountain. One blow of a whistle later they are drilled on in PT…
(1 week later, in space)
"This is so much better then trekking through a jungle!" exclaimed Carl in the cockpit of his MA-1810 standard issue Mecha, soaring in space around the Moon, opening fire with the plasma beam cannon on the moving targets carried by drones that are randomly deployed, hitting them with ease.
While Carl is having a lot of fun, his performance is not the best, as soon Clara swooped by his side and took out the targets effortlessly.
"As expected of Number 101," commended Singh in the control room. Franz sneered, ordering Nanami to increase their difficulty.
Nanami complied, releasing another wave of target drones from the leg mounted missile pods of her MA-1870AC, the AC-3. But this time she also deployed the attack drones that carried one plasma blaster and 2 air to air missiles each, sending them mixing together with the target drones, harassing the cadets' MA-1810 Mechas.
"Bloody hell," cursed Louis as a missile hit his unit, causing his structural integrity to fall. He tried to lock onto them with missile, but they have stealth countermeasures deployed, making him unable to lock on. The sheer speed of the drones also rendered his fire control AI unable to trace them with the plasma cannons, leaving Louis in a state that is best described as a handicapped man trying to swat off mosquitos.
Left with no choice, he accelerated forward sharply, quickly closing his distance with the drones, the 6 point-defence 30mm autocannon batteries on his Mecha unit blasted their arsenal at the drones, wiping them off at last.
Sean on the other hand managed to cooperate together with Ariel, deploying his shield and covering her while she took out the drones with contact space mines she launched from one of her missile pods.
"What the?" muttered Singh, picking up a strange reading on the sensors of the Lunar Alpha space station.
His eyes widened in horror and disbelief the moment he realised what it is.
"A DEEP DWELLER IS APPROACHING!" he warned, raising the alarm.
Franz immediately ordered Nanami and Herbert to pause the exercise and get the cadets back into the space station at once, while ordering the Mecha pilots in the station to gear up and prepare for battle.
"Negative sir, they are too far away to return on time, based on the trajectory of the Deep Dweller!" said Singh.
"F***, scramble all Diamond Detachment units at once!" yelled Franz, referring to Singh's Mecha unit stationed at the Moon sector.
"Wait," said Xiao Tian, "don't send everyone out, something is not quite right," he analysed. He then told Singh to order the cadets to defend on the spot, while he readied his own Drive-suit, ready to go fly into battle in the Crimson Dragon.
"ARE YOU INSANE?" Franz roared. "A Deep Dweller is no joke! And they behave in a hivemind from what we can gather, if there's one there's definitely more!"
Xiao Tian nodded "Need not be so nervous. Deep Dwellers have never encroached so far into Earth Space before, and the other Sector armies did not warn us nor try to intercept it. Now, communication channels with our space assets are still active, meaning that the others simply did not contact with this one."
"Which can only mean one thing, it FTL travelled straight into this area," he analysed. "This is insanely stupid, even for Deep Dwellers, hence I deduce that it is a case of a rogue, rare scenarios in which a Deep Dweller broke from control. It will be a turkey shoot for the cadets."
"Now," emphasised Xiao Tian. "In the past, rogues are only theorised; this is the first time we have a possible concrete example. We need to have back-up forces to prepare for any surprises. Since the cadets can't retreat back in time, and the Deep Dweller would arrive too fast for us to reach them in time, the only scenario is for them to hold the line there, while Nanami and myself reinforce. Diamond Detachment needs to be held as a flexible spare card."
Relenting, Franz agreed to his suggestion, and Xiao Tian left, rushing out to wear his Drive-suit and to the electromagnetic catapult to launch Crimson Dragon out.
Seeing Xiao Tian's vanishing back, Franz sighed.
The truth is while he respects and trusts Xiao Tian deeply, he always had issues with this Lieutenant Colonel who commands a way greater influence in UNSSD then what his rank suggested, especially his close rapport with Director Kovac and Secretary Li. He cannot describe how he feels, for while he appreciates Xiao Tian's personality and abilities, he could not help but to feel that Xiao Tian is a riddler, always seeming to know more than what he appears to know, yet not sharing it.
And now is one of those moments.