This is a work of fiction set in the future of an alternate but similar universe. No kooks were harmed in the making of this story. BE WARNED: this story does NOT include sex. It does include the use of fictional weapons, fictional imagination, the conjuration of alcohol and the mixing thereof, the possible knowing elimination of useless superior officers, sniper foo, rum foo, seeker missile foo, hitting the dirt foo. There is no use of Kung Foo. No persons mentioned in this fictional story are meant to resemble any living, dead, or future humans or aliens. No officers or NCOs in this fictional story resemble in any way actual officers or NCOs that the writer may or may not have had contact with.
The author used a popular on-line translation feature to come up with three names used in this story.
Copyright Gary Royce 2020.
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I hated being stuck on this rock, I was an Imperial Marine Commando and should have been on board an assault carrier or on a contested planet fighting 'The Collective'. Instead I was on this poorly terraformed rock, assigned to a C-A (Colonial Army) firebase in a disputed sector of some local rebellion.
The damn Combined Fundamental Movement didn't want Imperials on what they claimed as their planet. They ignored that it was the Imperial Engineers who Terraformed it, and the Imperial Navy who brought their ancestors out here free of charge, and the Imperials who supplied the damned rock for the three centuries it took for them to be self sufficient. And the Imperial Armed Forces that kept them safe from all alien and human raiders.
Our firebase, 'Rosebud', called informally 'The R-butt', housed a battalion of three infantry companies, plus an artillery battery, a medical post, three combat Lifters, and me. I was supposed to impart to these so-called infantry soldiers, fresh from their training, some real world combat experience. It should have been some C-A puke doing this, not me.
Maybe they wanted some Marine style cross training? Hah.
Why me? Before they sent me here I was told by my old CO that I was a discipline problem. All I did was give a dressing down to a new Lieutenant for giving away our position and ruining an ambush and incidentally getting three marines killed. I guess that L-T I dressed down had some connections.
Up till then I had been part of the cutting edge in the war with the Collective - an alien and human alliance set on destroying the Empire. And now I was a baby sitter in a police action against some misguided kooks in an out of the way sector on a forgettable planet.
With a Battalion CO that didn't know his anal cavity from a hole in the ground.
So, there I was, on the way back from the latrine/shower room after an all night recon patrol. I was tired, my brain fuzzy, when I saw the glint from the side of a mountain several klicks away. It took a while to register. I was getting soft.
I was carrying my weapon in my right hand, at the balance point at the base of the handguard, a round in the chamber and a full forty round triple stacked magazine of caseless six point five millimeter ammo. The under barrel launcher was also loaded. I pays to be ready, although I did have the weapon on 'safe'. After my shower I had put my helmet and body armor back on. I was tired and already the sweat had started. I was way overdue for some rack time.
And then the idiot appeared. A Colonial Army Major here get some combat time into his 'record'. He had it in for me for some reason. On top of that he wanted everyone to display the same spit and polish that he spent perfecting at their academy, and for many subsequent years in some Very Rear Area where he manned a desk. Where he no doubt leered at the female soldiers, and impersonated a soldier for the daughters of rich merchants.
Putting him out here was good way to get men killed. On top of that he thought knew everything and wouldn't listen to experience. Politics and status seemed to be all important to his kind.
I nodded in greeting as was the norm in a combat area. He had, after all, been in the briefing about this, had been warned that the enemy had several smuggled long range fourteen point five millimeter sniping rifles. We were in a mountainous region with uncountable hiding places.
"You! Marine!" he called out.
The proper salutation should have been 'Color Sergeant' or even 'Sergeant'. But he was C-A so what did he know.
"Sir," I said, straightening.
"Aren't you going to salute a superior officer! Don't the Marines subscribe to military courtesy?" he called out.
That's when the evil in me came awake. I put it all together, the glint, the asshole, the soldiers that had been killed by his stupidity the ones in the future that same stupidity would kill, the low moral because of him, everything.
"Sir! YES SIR!" I called out.
I stamped to attention, smartly slung my weapon on my right shoulder, smartly grasped the sling near my right shoulder with my left hand, keeping my forearm exactly level with the ground, smartly brought my right hand up in smart Imperial Marine salute, my hand quivering at the apex waiting for his return salute, then smartly brought my hand down.
Inwardly I was cringing and ready to hit the dirt, but no worries. As the Major's hand made it down from his sloppy return salute, his head exploded as the fourteen point five millimeter round tore through it at supersonic speed.
I heard the report as I slid into a trench, my weapon up and pointing at the area I had seen the glint coming from. I saw movement through my optic sight, pushed the red 'track' button, saw a green 'confirm' signal in my sight, and fired a twenty-one millimeter seeker mini-missile from the secondary barrel of my weapon.
