Chapter Forty-Seven: Slice of Life

Chapter Forty-Seven: Slice of Life

Epsilon Eridani, Capellan Confederation July 4th, 3011

Peterson was a professional, he knew what his job was, and he always strived to do better. That's why he was the CO of the second regiment and loved by all of his men. But this time, he was out for blood.

They had three main objectives to accomplish. The first one, was to wipe out the Fusiliers. The second was to secure the Brutus factory and relocate as much of it as possible. The third objective was something that Dunham and his handpicked group would be taking care of.

Kentares IV Draconis March, Federated Suns June 10th, 3011

"Signed and done." I said as I handed the last piece of paper to my new secretary. "Thanks for all of the help Mary."

Ian had really gone to town on getting extra people here to help me set up a bureaucracy in the last couple of weeks. Dunham's XO had submitted the list of people that Dunham had made a short list of to hire as well, and so now I had the beginnings of a larger planetary Government and Sharpshooter Manufacturing now had some talented and ambitious people behind the investments, and helping to get factories up and running.

"Mary." I said before she left my new office. "Can you make a note for us to buy more Sting class dropships for the Militia?" I asked.

"Absolutely." She jotted it down in the little notepad she carried. "Anything else I can assist with?"

"Get me a meeting set for tomorrow with Colonel Sheppard and the Militia Commander." I paused in thought. "I think his name was James Earnest."

"Yes sir, I'll get right now that." Mary responded and left to go man her desk.

"I'm still weirded out by this." I thought out loud. "Well, at least it helps me with the paperwork load for the day." It wasn't even two thirty in the afternoon local time.

"I might as well see how everything else is going." I said, and made to walk out the door to my car when I was ambushed.

"And where do you think you are going?" Natasha Kerensky asked me. "You still owe me for getting you out of the doc's office early."

"I was planning on going to check on the new complexes being built." I said. "You can come with you know."

"Or, you could take a break like you always make the rest of us do." She suggested. "I have some ideas on that."

"Okay?" I questioned. Natasha's idea of rest was much different from mine. "What did you have in mind?"

"I was thinking about a visit to the shooting range." She suggested. "For all of your focus on cross training, I've never seen you do any sort of infantry movements."

"Oh, I haven't been to the range outside of quals in a while." I thought out loud. "That actually sounds great."

With plans having been made, we hopped in my car and made our way to the closest range.

"So, what's the occasion?" I asked Kerensky, she had been strangely clingy since the explosion and surgery.

"Just wanted a break." She replied. "And I asked because apparently everyone else is busy and I kinda wanted to talk." She muttered that last part so I couldn't hear it properly.

"What was that last part?" I asked, as we pulled up to the range.

"Nothing, get us a long range bay" She said. "I want to see if you chose Markman because you are one, or if it was because it sounded like an interesting name."

"Alright." I shrugged. "I hope you're practiced up."

We entered the range shop/check in area, and I grabbed a hunting rifle, one meant for hunting deer or something similar. While the .308 Winchester didn't exist anymore, this was the closest thing I had found in the ballistics profiles. I paid the rental fee and bought some ammunition for both my handgun that was on my right hip and the rifle I had just rented.

When Natasha saw that I had chosen a civilian rifle she just scoffed and paid for the fees and ammo of her weapon of choice.

"Why a civilian rifle?" She asked, still a little cocky that she would beat me in a long distance shootout. "You don't even have the enhanced optics."

"This is the closest to what I grew up with." I shrugged. "And besides, it's the person behind the weapon that matters. Not the weapon."

We walked over to the bay and got the targets set up. We were going to individually sight our rifles in before we tried to out shoot the other person. After we had gotten set up, we started with the closer ranges. Such as 50 to 100 meters, before branching out to reach the far targets.

When we got to the further ranges, Natasha was surprised to see me bring a small notebook out filled with rough calculations. While there wasn't wind in the bay, she did see me check for wind and do quick math to make sure I had everything lined up before I took the shot. Unfortunately for the two of us, the range didn't have any targets that went out past 1200 meters and so we were left with a tie.

"I know something we can do as a tiebreaker." I said with a cocky grin.

"And what might that be?" She cocked an eyebrow at me.

"Tell me?" I asked. "Have you heard of a sport called paintball?"

Epsilon Eridani, Capellan Confederation July 11th, 3011.

The ODST pods for infantry deployment onto the battlefield was a huge success. They had broken the Militia and eradicated the AA with barely a company of Mithril clad infantry.

And then, the Combined Arms forces did the opposite of what the Fusiliers expected them to. At first at least. They sent probing forces similar to the ones the AFFS and most merc units did. Drawing Lances out of cover and seeming to engage before the Sting dropships moved in and provided fire support while widening the gap in the line with more infantry.

The Fusiliers did attempt a fighting retreat back to their dropships. Thinking that they had saved the last battalion they lifted off. But they were met in space by Wardog squadron who had been waiting in space to greet anyone who tried to escape. Given that the Fusiliers no longer had any aerospace cover they attempted to outrun the Aerospace fighters but they were destroyed in a short amount of time.

Once the Marksman's second regiment was finished with the Fusiliers, they went to the Brutus factory and under their engineers directions, loaded up the entire thing into multiple dropships with space to spare. The Colossus, Mule, and the Triumph class dropships were being relegated to cargo carriers for this mission.

While all of this was going on, Captain Dunham had taken a team of engineers, the Buccaneers, and a mule along with some extra Dropship personnel for an important mission that Hull had sent him on.

Bryant, Capellan Confederation July 27th, 3011.

"This isn't a smash mission, boys and girls." Peterson smiled now that he had gotten a little bit of payback against Mad Max. "We are here to take whatever is still intact and can be potentially fixed from both the Grasshopper and Von Luckner factories." He paused. "Do exactly what the Engineers tell you to. If you break something, you will be buying it."

"That said, when we get back home, drinks are on me." Peterson waited out the cheers. "You guys did good. We got some small payback against the leadership of the Capellans by both taking out the Fusiliers, and by denying them an entire factory." He smirked. "And that's a damn good feeling to have."