Sergeant (The United Federation Marine Corps Book 2) by Jonathan P. Brazee Page B

ramp lowered, the Stork’s stealth capabilities would be far less effective, and if spotted, their shielding wouldn’t be as strong, either.
    As if to emphasize that vulnerability , a flash of light from the outside illuminated the cabin of the Stork. Ryck felt his heart drop as he tried to see out the back.
    The re was a surge of chatter on the comms. Ryck didn’t have ears on higher headquarters circuits, but he could hear the platoon circuit. A missile, probably part of an automated defense system, had been launched at the other Stork carrying the lieutenant and Sams’ squad just as they lowered their ramp. Luckily, it never hit the Stork. One of the Toowoomba’s monitors, parked at the edge of space over the target, and taken the missile out with its ARG, the Atmospheric Rail Gun. A split second later, the jacketed round delivered its kilojoule pulse to the missile’s launch site.
    Atmosphere dissipation was the bane of space-based energy weapons, requiring huge amounts of power to get that energy focuse d on the target on the ground. The ARG got around that by using railgun technology to send shells at amazingly high speeds through the atmosphere, each shell, a self-contained pulse generator. The jacket of the round would slough off at the target, and the pulse would initiate, focused at the target, and taking it out. A kilojoule was not as effective against hardened targets, but it should have been enough to put the launcher out of action.
    Ryck hoped, at least.
    Lieutenant Nidishchii’ passed that one of the Wasps was coming in for a strike at the launch site, but Ryck knew the monitor’s crew back on the Toowoomba would be watching the site closely, and at the first sign of electronic stirring from enemy weapons systems, would hit them with something a little more effective.
    Worse than the scare of the missile attack was the fact that if they ever did have the element of surprise, it was gone now. Whoever was in the hidden complex had to know that they’d been discovered.
    The Storks had continued their approach while the incoming missile had been destroyed. The first Stork, carrying Second Squad and the Weapons team, had already reached the LZ and was lifting back out of the LZ. Ryck’s Stork flew in fast, flaring at the last moment, its ramp slamming a little harder than normal.
    Cpl Mendoza’s team started the deliberate shuffle to get out of the bird . Ryck wanted to scream out to hurry, but that was just his nerves wanting to get out of the bird and to where he had more control of his situation. Peretti led, then Khouri, Mendoza, and Stillwell. Ryck was next, and he followed Stillwell out, ducking down as well as he could to make sure the helmet of his PICS didn’t hit the top of the Stork’s cabin at the lead edge of the ramp. He hoped his pet legionnaire wouldn’t have an issue with The R-3’s added height.
    As soon as Ryck’s feet hit the ground, he pushed forward, running a good 15 quick meters before turning to make sure everyone else debarked OK. Major Laurent was only a step or two behind him, and Ryck’s abrupt stop and turn obviously took him by surprise. He nimbly dodged to his left and scooted past Ryck.
    “Scooted” seemed like an odd term to Ryck to describe someone in a combat suit, but that is what it seemed to him. The legionnaire was remarkably nimble in his R-3. While the armor on an R-3 was termed “flexible” by many, it wasn’t as if it was just a shirt and trou. However, there was som e give to it, and the globe joints, which were small hardened spheres actually imbedded into the armor skin, offered a far more realistic range of motion than the PICS GT joints. If Ryck ignored the size and shape of the R-3, just from the movement, Ryck could almost imagine that the legionnaire was not in a combat suit at all as naturally as he was moving.
    Ryck had to get his attention off the legionnaire. It was crunch time, and he had to focus on the mission. He waited until his squad