Don't Look at Me, I'm Forging - Squad 7 Assembly
Hydraulic pressure valves groaned somewh10 Squad 7 Assembly
Hydraulic pressure valves groaned somewhere above the catwalks, venting a cloud of hot, mineral-scented steam that turned the dim yellow light of
Bay 7 into a sulfurous haze.Kae clung to her canvas gear bag with both hands, stepping carefully around a coil of thick refueling hose.
Her oversize fleece sweater felt stifling inside the cramped bay, but taking it off meant dealing with the straps of her utility belt in front of nine people she didn’t know.Kaelen
Mercer stood near the shuttle’s lower ramp, holding his tactical slate at eye level.
His thumb flicked across the glass, pulling up the squad’s synchronized biometric feed as the rest of the unit gathered in a loose, restless circle around him.”Alright, listen up,” Kaelen said, his voice easily cutting through the thrum of the shuttle’s idling turbines. “We’ve got six minutes before hatch lock.
Here’s the full manifest so everyone knows who’s doing what when we hit the canopy.”He gestured toward his left. “Vanguards:
That’s four front-line fighters.
Melissa handles
Apothecary support.
I’m running tactical command alongside our secondary observer, and
Cerys is our
Engineer.”Cassia
Vance, who had been lazily spinning one of her curved sabers by its pommel strap, stopped dead.
Her sharp eyes darted from
Kaelen’s slate straight to
Kae.”Hold on,” Cassia grunted, her brow furrowing as she tapped her own wrist-comm to pull up the squad manifest. “Lind?
Lind?”Torin, a wiry guy with a heavy kinetic long-rifle slung over his shoulder, let out a low whistle. “The one who scored ninety-five merits on the practicals?
The ghost from the
Mid-Rim?”Rhys
Sterling didn’t say anything, but his stoic, heavy-jawed face shifted slightly, his dark eyes landing on
Kae with quiet, intense scrutiny.
He looked at her baggy sweater, her frayed cuffs, and the thick black glasses resting crookedly on her nose.Kae felt nine pairs of eyes instantly lock onto her.
Her collar suddenly felt three sizes too small.
She took an instinctual half-step backward, attempting to hide behind
Torin’s broad shoulder, but
Kaelen’s voice brought her right back into the light.”That’s her,” Kaelen confirmed, his expression unreadable. “She’s
Class 1 Mech
Engineering.””You’re kidding me,” Melissa chimed in, her voice dripping with disbelief as she looked
Kae up and down.
She clutched her leather apothecary kit tighter to her waist, taking a delicate step away from the puddle of grease on the floor. “That’s our engineer?
She looks like she’d break if a skitterer blew a breeze at her.
I hope you’re reassigning defense protocols.
I am a licensed apothecary.
My work requires stability.
If our support staff gets killed in the first ten minutes because she can’t run fast enough to keep up with the
Vanguard line, my potion effectiveness drops to zero.”Cassia sneered, her hand resting heavily on her sword hilt. “Oh, shut up,
Nobody asked for your medical commentary.””It isn’t commentary, it’s tactical reality!” Melissa shot back, her chin held high. “I require at least one heavy
Vanguard—preferably
Rhys—to act as my dedicated escort during transit through
An apothecary is an investment.
A frail engineer in oversized clothes is a liability.”Jax
Brody, a lean guy with ink-stained fingers who had been quietly checking a set of heavy bone-saw blades tucked into his belt, chuckled softly to himself. “I don’t know,
The quiet ones are usually the ones who know where to put the knife.””This isn’t a joke,
Jax!” Melissa snapped.Kae sighed softly.
The noise in her ears was rising—the sharp, defensive arguments, the subtle positioning for status, the assumption that because she didn’t walk around flexing her bicep muscles she was made of tissue paper.
It was exhausting.Without saying a word,
Kae reached down, unclipped her biometric
ID card from her belt, and tossed it onto the hood of a nearby cargo container.The card chimed as its holo-chip activated, projecting her basic military physical parameters into the air above the metal.— CADET PHYSICAL EVALUATION —IDENT: 613-1031 (LIND,
MECH ENGINEERING 01PHYSICAL CONDITIONING TIER:
A-RANKSTAMINA RATING: 88/100GRAVITY TOLERANCE: 2.5G BASELINEThe holding bay went dead quiet for three seconds.Torin leaned over the crate, staring at the glowing blue text. “An
A-rank physical tier?
Engineering?”In the
Commonwealth
Institute, an
A-rank physical rating was the standard requirement for infantry
Vanguards who spent six hours a day running in full combat gear.
Most engineers sat comfortably at a
B-rank—just enough to lug a spanner across a launch pad without pulling a muscle.”My dad’s a division commander,” Kae said flatly, her voice dry and completely devoid of flex. “He made me do three-mile ruck marches in five-kilo grav-vests every morning since
I was eleven so
I wouldn’t ‘grow up soft.’ I can carry my own pack,
I can outrun you in deep mud.”Jax burst out laughing, a sharp, delighted bark that echoed off the shuttle’s hull plates. “Oh,
She’s cold.”Cassia’s lips twitched into a wide, fierce grin as she looked at
Kae with renewed respect. “A-rank conditioning under a canvas sack.
Looks like our little dark horse has teeth.”Melissa’s face flushed a deep, angry crimson, her lips pressing into a thin line, but she couldn’t find a single word to counter the official military evaluation floating right in front of her eyes.”Alright, that’s enough,” Kaelen cut in, tapping his slate to dismiss the projection. “We’ve got thirty seconds to load.
You all saw the data.
Cerys doesn’t need a babysitter, which means
Rhys stays on the front line with
Torin where he belongs.” He turned toward the heavy steel ramp of
Shuttle 7 as the red warning lights above the airlock began to rotate, bathing the bay in a pulsing, bloody glow.”Mount up,
Squad 7,” Kaelen ordered, stepping onto the metal grating. “Sector 7 isn’t waiting for us.”Kae snatched her
ID card off the crate, clipped it back to her waist, and fell in line behind
As the heavy pneumatic doors sealed behind them with a deafening
CLANG, cutting off the damp air of the drill grounds, she sank into her jump seat and buckled her five-point harness tightly across her chest.Her hands were still steady.
Her heart wasn’t even racing.Step one complete, she thought, leaning her head back against the vibrating steel bulkhead as the shuttle’s engines roared to life.
I won’t die easily.
Now if they just stop talking to me until we hit the trees, today might actually be tolerable.