The base started to take shape.
Not pretty, but solid.
The prefab walls were up. The tarmac was dry. The power was flowing. And for the first time in weeks, nobody was actively bleeding or wary. The higher-ups were in their command prefabs arguing over projections, while the rest had time to breathe.
That's when the messing around started.
The new recruits, fresh meat from Libertalia, had been rotated in with the latest supply drop. You could spot them from a mile away. Clean armor. Shiny weapons. Eyes wide like they were still waiting for a heroic speech to kick off Act One. They moved in squads, always a little too tight, a little too stiff. Like they were trying to remember training footage instead of just walking like human beings.
Bertha spotted them before anyone else.
"Kids," she muttered, popping a ration bar into her mouth and chewing with exaggerated boredom. "They even smell fresh."
"What, like gun oil and hope?" Rus said.
"No," she replied, "like inexperience."
She flicked the rest of her snack into the fire barrel and stretched like a cat—arms overhead, back arched, hips tilted just enough to send two passing Privates into a full-body stutter. She gave them a wink. One nearly dropped his rifle. The other tripped over a crate.
Laughter exploded from the rest of the squad.
Dan clapped once, barking a single "got 'em" between gasps. Gino was doubled over, practically wheezing. Stacy muttered something about secondhand embarrassment, while Kate just took a bite of her protein stick and nodded solemnly like this was a necessary ritual for their squad.
Cym stood nearby, unmoved by human rituals of flirtation or chaos. Just silently tracking thermal signatures and occasional signal interference.
Amiel, seated on a supply crate, didn't even look up from her cleaning cloth. "This is degenerate," she said flatly, wiping down her scope. "As always."
Bertha spun dramatically, arms out like she was welcoming applause. "I'm just giving the next generation valuable field experience."
"Of what? Trauma?" Rus asked.
"Exactly."
Another group of newbies passed by, clearly trying not to look. One caught Bertha's eye for half a second too long and got a blown kiss for his trouble. He walked face-first into a stack of rations and fell over sideways.
Bertha gave a mock salute. "Stay frosty, soldier."
The company around us was dying.
With laughter, mostly.
It was harmless, just the kind of screw-around you got after clearing a kill zone and getting stuck in downtime. Nobody was drunk. Nobody was stupid. Just burnt-out veterans watching rookies trip over their own boots and pretending for a few hours that war was something you could laugh through.
Rus didn't join the teasing. Mostly
He just watched.
Not annoyed. Not amused. Just present.
There was something in the air. Something that made him glance back at the newly made airfield more than once.
Another drop was coming. More VTOLs. More bodies. Maybe even another Counter team. With the way Libertalia was pumping assets into this bay, Rys wouldn't be surprised if this turned into a full fortress before month's end.
And for what?
A strategic port? A foothold?
Or something else they weren't telling them.
Either way, he lit a cigarette, leaned against a stack of crates, and let the laughter roll around him.
Sometimes it was okay to let the world laugh before it caught fire again.
Then–
"Lieutenant."
The voice came sharp and low, just as he was lighting another cigarette.
He turned. Kilgore stood at the edge of the makeshift mess area, hands behind his back, face set in that grim look that only meant one thing – orders. His uniform was streaked with dust, his gloves still dirty from walking the field instead of just commanding from a chair.
Rus snuffed the cigarette before the first drag.
"Sir," he replied, stepping off the crate he'd been leaning on.
"Debrief. Now."
No need for theatrics. When Kilgore says now, you move.
They crossed the base in silence. The sky had begun to burn orange with the sun dropping low, shadows stretching long across crates, floodlights flickering on along the landing strip. Mechs stomped through the mud, escorting more prefab structures toward the forward command ridge. VTOLs still buzzed overhead, cutting through wind that smelled of sweat, oil, and the faint memory of burnt Gobber flesh.
Kilgore didn't waste time once they were inside his tent. The place was bare-bones with two desks, a holo-map table, and a wall lined with gear racks. No chairs. This wasn't a meeting. It was a war room.
He flicked the map console. The layout of the bay lit up between them sectioned off into grid zones they'd swept over the last few days. Roads marked. Relay points tagged. Everything glowing in red, green, and yellow overlays.
He pointed to a small peninsula on the western edge of the bay. "This is where we're vulnerable."
He studied the shape—long, narrow, with a gradual incline and overgrown ridgelines leading directly into Sector Four's western border.
"Cover's thick," Rus noted. "Hard to keep drones active there. Any heat signature gets swallowed in the canopy."
"Exactly," Kilgore said. "And based on the tunnel complex you found beneath the old port, it's highly likely those same networks stretch further. That peninsula could hold more Gobber spawn tunnels, or worse deep chambers."
Rus nodded. "Not just nests. Potential rally points."
"Which makes it a weak point."
Rus folded his arms. "We can torch it, but that'll drive anything deeper into hiding. We need a seal-and-watch strategy. Fast concrete pour. Bunker-grade."
Kilgore's lip twitched, his version of a smirk.
"Already requested a mobile pourer from Libertalia Command," he said. "ETA: three days. Until then, we reinforce with what we have."
He tapped the center of the bay on the map.
"This is now the FOB's hard core. All incoming supplies land here, all command and communication hubs route through this point. It's elevated, it's central, and it's dry. That gives us two advantages: quick movement to any front, and a fallback position with solid footing."
Rus nodded. "But it also paints a target. They take the core, they paralyze us."
Kilgore glanced at him. "Which is why I'm not letting them take anything."
He shifted the map view, cycling in drone footage and recent thermal scans. A web of movement patterns glowed red across the outer rim, mostly wildlife, but with a few too-perfect lines of motion along the forest floor.
"Gobber scouts?"
"Could be. Or something worse. Look here." He zoomed in. "Same movement pattern every night, same time, same direction. They're watching."
Rus studied the pattern. It skirted just outside their sensor perimeter. Intelligent. Avoidant. Not feral.
Riftborne? Maybe. But more likely Gobber leadership adapting.
"They're testing response times," Rus muttered. "Maybe?
Kilgore nodded. "That's why we build depth, not just perimeter. You're in charge of that."
Rus blinked. "Sir?"
"You've led your unit without screwing it up, and Cyma's synced to you tighter than any officer we've got. You've got three days to make this place a wall, not a camp. Plan overlapping zones of fire. Defense in layers. Think like they do."
Rus didn't argue.
He'd seen what happened to bases that relied too much on outer fences and clean drone coverage. The enemy didn't always come from the front. Sometimes they came from under, or behind, or from the trees when you blinked too long.
"Understood," Rus said.
Kilgore brought up another overlay, this time a logistics map.
"We're expecting another thirty soldiers in the next batch," he said. "Ten from Libertalia proper, ten UH specialists, and ten Knights. They'll need integration, quarters, loadout updates, and patrol schedules."
"Three squads with mixed protocols and incompatible chain-of-command," Rus muttered.
"Correct. Handle it."
He wasn't asking.
"And one more thing," he added, stepping back from the map. "You and Sgt. Bertha have eyes on everything. If Riftborne signs show up, you call it in immediately. No solo heroics."
"Copy."
Kilgore nodded once, then turned back to the wall rack and started suiting up again. Debrief over. That was his way.
Rus left the tent with my brain already dividing the base into fire sectors, drone blind spots, fallback trenches, sniper towers, and emergency ordnance placements. He needed to meet with the mechs. Pull a schematic on the tunnel underlays. Coordinate with Cyma for thermal tracing through the soil. Start laying foundation requests before the rain came back.
But as he walked past the squads milling around the now-busy plaza, something caught his eye.
More greenhorns. Another batch was already unloading. Their armor looked barely broken in. Some were taking pictures of the bay. Others tried not to stare at Bertha, who was back to lounging on a crate like a mercenary on a magazine cover, taunting the recruits with that same crooked smirk she used in battle.
It was almost funny.
They were turning this place into a fortress and half of them still thought it was summer camp with rifles.
***
The logistics tent smelled like hot plastic, synthetic coffee, and too many compressed lives in one place.
He'd been in firefights that were more pleasant.
"Lieutenant," barked a corporal, barely glancing up from his slate. "You're early. We're still logging the drop from Alpha convoy."
"Good. That means I'm not late."
He didn't laugh. None of them did.
Logistics people rarely had a sense of humor. They lived in spreadsheets, fuel ledgers, crate manifests, and chain-of-custody arguments. To them, a rifle wasn't a weapon, it was a barcode with a destination. And if you asked for anything without a requisition number, you might as well be asking for a unicorn.
Rus handed over the new patrol rotations and construction requests, already tagged and cross-coded.
"Need three modular towers moved to sectors seven, eight, and eleven," Rus said. "Fuel barrels repositioned along the west trench. And forward mech storage is getting backed up with unspent cartridges, they need a sweep or someone's gonna trip and eat a 20mm."
The corporal took it, scanned it, and tapped his slate twice.
"You'll get half," he said. "We're short three operators. One's on medical leave, one's processing incoming materials, and one just walked off because someone in Counter Command screamed at him."
Rus stared at him.
"I don't need excuses. I need movement."
He stared back.
"You'll get half, Lieutenant."
Fine. It was always these people and the gunny that couldn't be easily persuaded.
Rus left the tent before he said something career-shortening.
Outside, the base was in full churn. Cargo lifters grumbled across the main strip. The smell of welders, wet earth, and boiled protein pouches filled the air. Another mech stomped past dragging a crate the size of a gunship cockpit. A few techs rode on top, legs dangling, too tired to care about safety regs. Not the MPs cared until bones are broken.
The bay had stopped being quiet.
It was a living, pulsing thing now.
But not all of it was working right.
As he crossed toward the residential zone, he heard shouting—near the east tent row. That was where the newest batch of Libertalia troops were being quartered.
Sure enough, he saw two groups of soldiers, mid-argument, chests puffed, voices raised. One had already planted a flag of ownership with a makeshift tarp, a few crates, a gear net. The other group clearly didn't care. They were standing their ground, insisting they were assigned the space.
Rus didn't intervene.
Not yet.
It was the usual post-deployment ritual. You bring a hundred soldiers into a new zone, jam them into a corner of canvas and aluminum, and they start acting like birds in a cage. Peacocking. Drawing lines in the dirt. Establishing who eats first, who sleeps closest to the gear, and who gets to say "this is mine."
One of the veterans nearby, a UH comms guy leaned over to Rus, chewing on something unidentifiable.
"This is what they always looks like after the shooting stops," he muttered.
Rus nodded. "Like school lunch hour but with weapons."
Eventually, a sergeant broke it up. Someone got reassigned. Someone else got quiet. Nobody got shot. Success.
Further down the tent line, another group was playing cards on a steel supply crate, using spare mags as betting chips. The game was being played in at least three languages. One of the Knight pilots walked past and flicked one of their helmets with a gauntleted finger with no words, just a smirk. The player didn't even flinch. He just raised his cards higher and kept playing.
It was stupid, chaotic, and somehow… functional.
This was military life.
Not the fights. Not the heroics. This. The bullshit in-between. The moments where everything was too calm and too loud. Where you weren't sure if you were recovering or just killing time before it all fell apart again.
Rus walked past the mechanics' station, where someone was trying to fix a busted exo-loader that had collapsed under its own cargo weight. Cyma stood nearby, watching, likely recording diagnostics for later review. It didn't need rest. It didn't complain. It just stood there like an immortal war statue, always ready.
He envied it, a little.
The rest had cracks.
Rus stopped near the ridge above the bay and looked out across the water. The sun was lower now, casting orange-gold reflections across the surface. The airships were gone for the day. Supply lanes would slow down until morning. The horizon looked peaceful.
It never stayed that way.
Behind him, he heard Bertha's voice bark something at the new recruits again, probably teasing, probably lewd. More laughter. Someone tripped again.
Same script.
Different cast.
It was her fun these days. At least she toned it down on being a sex pest lately.
Rus pulled a ration bar from his pocket and bit into it. Stale. Dry. Didn't matter. He got used to it
And for just a minute, he let himself wonder—
How much longer?
How many more bay clearings? How many more debriefs? How many more nights listening to the same jokes, staring down the same monsters, walking the same mud-choked trenches pretending the next wave isn't already on its way?
Service was always this way.
No one tells you when your service ends. It's not like the movies. You don't get a medal, a handshake, and a flight home. Sometimes you just get rotated somewhere else. Sometimes you don't get rotated at all.
Sometimes you just stop waking up in the same place, and nobody asks why.
Rus flicked the last bite of the ration into the dirt and turned back to the lights of the bay.
Another night.
Another breath.
Still standing.
All he could ask for really.