Freya took a deep breath feeling the cold air brush across her body. It was an oddly pleasant feeling. It was like winter time and she was ice skating. Before she started every game she would warm up by skating in around the rink. It was an old tradition. Once she got up to speed she could stop skating and just glide on her skates. The cold air across her face would wake her up. It would get her excited. It would get her ready to play.

Somewhere in front of her, she heard some muffled shouting. Opening her eyes she found herself looking at her reflection in the glass in front of her. She looked at her reflection for a few seconds feeling something was off. She had the feeling that she had forgotten something important.

Suddenly someone banked on the glass from the other side startling her. “Get your ass out of that pod, Recruit!” A female drill instructor yelled before moving on to bang on the next pod.

Her memory came rushing back to her. She remembered enlisting in the marines on Earth. The memory of the first two weeks in the Marines where she spent most of her time in medical getting her head mapped came rushing back. All her memories came rushing back. She flinched as she remembered the painful last phone called where she finally told her mother that she had enlisted. Her last memory was of her signing the paperwork to have her mind downloaded into Sig149. It was the largest military data warehouse in the galaxy.

Her first body should be gone by now turned back into the basic liquid needed to make clones. Her DNA should be encoded into where ever she was going to be stationed at for next couple decades in the real world. Subjectively she knew she would only experience five years. Time in the digital was a lot faster than the outside real world. Well, sometimes. She had been warned that sometimes that time would be slowed down in the digital. They told her it was mostly for training purposes but not always.

She pressed the release button and the pod door opened. The air outside the pod felt warmer compared with the air inside the pod. “Get your naked asses out of your pod Recruits and get dressed. You now have one minute until uniform inspection.” The drill instructor yelled.

Freya stepped out of her pod and hurried to her locker on the side of the pod where she knew her uniform was stored. She equipped her working ship uniform. She found her boots and equipped them also. Lastly, she found her hat and put it on manually. Making sure it was on correctly she stood up.

She had only been a recruit for two weeks but she knew what to do. She stood in front of her pod at attention waiting on the other to finish equipping their uniforms. She checked her uniform one last time to make sure the gig-line was straight and everything look right before looking up. Rumors of the drill instructors messing with the equipping program had gone through the company since day one. One of the first things that had been drilled into her head was to always check her equipment. Sometimes things would go south fast. When things like that started to happen was not the time to find out the computer messed up equipping her stuff.

The drill instructor walked down the catwalk between the pods and inspected everyone's uniform. She dinged a few people on obvious mistakes in the equipping program. She went on a rant about how a Marine always checks their gear. It was just like the rumors had said. There were equipping mistakes programmed into Basic Training. The drill instructor passed Freya giving her a fast inspection before moving on. Once she completed the inspection she started pacing up and down the catwalk.

”Welcome to the FS Monarch. Basic Training will take less than one second ship time. Ship time is not real-world time. Ship time is the time that runs standard for everyone on the ship. Subjective time for you recruits will last roughly one month for you recruits in Basic while for the rest of the people on this ship will only experience less than one second ship time. Understand this recruits, training time will depend solely on you. Screw up and you could end up spending months longer here in training. Fail basic and you will be put into storage until we can call Sig149 and release you from your service. Once it has been confirmed that you have been released from the service and have a new body we will delete your backup.” She said pacing along the catwalk.

“Your digital body is an exact replica of your real body before you enlisted. This is Basic Training and during Basic, you will not be able to earn any skill or mods. If you work hard you can earn some E-points toward your rank and re-enlistment. If you plan to stay in long enough to earn a citizenship on a paradise planet you will need those points. The only downloaded skills you will receive during Basic will be standard info dumps on the history of the Marines, basic weapons care and tactics. Everything else you will have to learn the old fashion way. You should already have the info dump about common language, ranks in services, and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” The female drill instructor went on to say.

“Everyone open your status page now. Think status page. I do not want to hear anyone speak out loud. You have a brain, use it.” The drill instructor said walking down the catwalk in between the two rows of pods.

“Status Page.” Freya thought to herself and a blue box appeared.

Status Screen

Name: Freya O’Malley

Rank: Recruit Level: 0

Template: None

Enlisted Points: 0

Credits: 0

Skill Points: 0

Mod Points: 0

Wetware Mods

Health:

Level: 0

Health Regen:

Level: 0

Strength:

Level: 0

Perception:

Level: 0

Agility:

Level: 0

Dexterity:

Level: 0

Memory:

Level: 0

Processing speed:

Level: 0

Skills

None

Hardware mods: None

“You should have your status page open now. On top of your status page, you will see your name, your current rank, your level, your template, and your E-Points. Your name is self-explanatory but I will go over it for you meatheads. It’s whatever gave birth to you wrote on your official hospital paperwork. No one here cares what you go by. You will be called by your last name.”

“The next is your rank. Your rank is recruit until you get enough e-points to level up to the next Private. If you got points for enlisting you will receive those points only after basic is complete. The next is your level. There are one hundred levels per rank. You earn your levels by how much e-points you managed to acquire.”

“After that is template. You will only qualified for a template after you pass the final test for Basic training. Every template has pre-qualifications you must meet before you are able to possess your desired template. If you graduate basic you will receive Novice Infantry once you hit up the training facilities and equipment shop. Novice infantry is not a template it is an earned skill that you will receive just from graduating Basic Training. You will be required to get at least a Basic Infantry template before you will able to qualify for a mission in the real world. Failure to get Basic Infantry in one month ship time will result in termination of your contract and you will be released from service with an other than honorable discharge.” The drill instructor said walking past Freya.

“E-points or Enlisted points are the building blocks of earning the right to re-enlist. It is also how you level up your rank. You will need one-million points, which is private first class, to re-enlist in five years ship time. Failure to receive one-million points at the five-year mark and you will not qualify for re-enlistment. You will be given an honorable discharge and sent back to the planet of your origin. You earn e-points by going on either simulated missions or real-world missions. The points you receive depends on the mission and your participation in the mission. Credits are what you used to buy your armor and weapons and it is also how you upgrade them. You will only receive Credits from missions or if you sell something. You can also take enemy weapons and supplies to turn them in for credits or used them to modify your weapon if you have the skill. You do not get paid a regular salary. You get paid by the missions you complete.”

“Below that is your skill and wetware mod points. These allow you to download skills and to modify your body. They are awarded based on your performance during missions that you complete. Wetware mods enhance your body in some way. Skills are downloaded and learned at a training facility.”

“Health increases your bodies ability to survive in a hostile environment. Health regen is how fast you heal and how long you can perform a physical task. Strength is how strong you are. Perception at the enlisted level is an enhancement to your senses and if you get it high enough you will get a low-grade psionic skill. You will need to be careful if you go this route. Most psionic abilities are not combat related. Agility is how fast you can move. Dexterity is how your fast your extremities move. For you meatheads, that’s your arms and legs.” The drill instructor said walking past Freya again.

“Memory is the wetware modification to enhance your ability to remember things. Processing speed is how fast you can think. There are hardware mods you can get as well. Both mods have their pros and cons. Hardware mods are bought from the shop along with weapons and armor. You can find the shop, if you pass Basic, on the Marine concourse. Skills are downloaded in the training facilities. There are twenty of training facilities on the Marine concourse open to the enlisted. After the skills are downloaded you will not be released from the training facilities until show proficiency with the downloaded skill.”

“Questions? No? Good.” The drill instructor said not giving anyone time to ask any questions. “Congratulations you just received one E-point.” She said as the semi-transparent

status page disappeared and a blue box appeared to replace it in front of Freya. That box was replaced with a second box.

Congratulations you have leveled up.

You have earned 0 skill points and 0 mod points. You have received: basic Heads Up Display (HUD).

HUD is locked. You are unable to modify your HUD until you complete the training course Basic training.

Freya looked around as there were a lot of things around the edges of her vision now. They were transparent so she could see through them but it was distracting. She had a health bar at the bottom of her field of vision. To the bottom right there was an outline of a person with a faint green indicator light on. In the middle of the body was the number one-hundred followed by the percent symbol. To her top right was a circle map showing the pod bay along with tiny green dots she assumed were the people in her company. Directly below her nose was the word ammo with two grey lines stacked on top of each other.

“Okay people, if you’re done playing with yourselves we can get started. Right-face.” The drill instructor said. Everyone turned to their right.

“March!” Yelled the drill instructor and in one big line, everyone marched out of the pod bay.

Outside the bay, Freya found herself on a dirt road. The simulation was very lifelike. Freya could hear birds singing in the background. The wind blew the trees and she could hear the leaves rustling. She didn’t know what to expect from this simulation but a simple yet extremely lifelike dirt road was not it.

The drill instructor had them line up in four lines. Once everyone was ready she started the company running at a slow jog. She called out the pace by yelling, “Your left foot, your right.” The drill instructor chanted and had them run down the road for what seemed like forever to Freya. She could feel the sweat build up on her forehead as she ran.

She had been in sims before but never this emersed though. She had a helmet at home that she used to use while she slept to play games but it never felt as real as the one she was in now.

Makes sense since I don’t have a permanent body anymore.” She thought to herself as she ran in formation.

They stopped about a half an hour later by what looked like a weird playground. Freya walked around with her arms behind her head trying to catch her breath. She had never felt so out of shape before.

“You better get used to it ladies. This was just a simple warm-up run compared to what is ahead. Physical Testing is in a week if you don’t pass then you will be processed out of the Marines” The drill instructor said.

She had them fall out and follow her. She walked Freya’s company thought the adult jungle gym. The drill instructor called it an obstacle course. After a few runs through, she had them do exercises for any a very long time. They stopped for lunch and drank their nutrition drinks. After that, it was back to running.

They stopped for dinner as the sun was going down which turned out to be another nutrition drink. They did exercises until it got too dark to see and the drill instructor led the company to a dome building which turned out to be their barracks. Freya and her company spent the next couple of hours: Getting their uniforms. Learning how to fold the uniforms. Learning how to put sheets on the bed the military way and so on. The drill instructor pulled three women out of the company and had them stand watch while the rest of the company went to sleep.

Freya drifted off to sleep exhausted. She woke up feeling her body aching as the drill instructor woke them up by turning the lights on and banging on the racks. The drill instructor gave them fifteen minutes to take a shower and get dressed. Fifteen minutes later the drill instructor chased a few people who took to long getting ready out of the bathroom and had everyone line up in two lines. They marched outside where they ran to another building down the road.

The other building turned out to be the chow hall. They ate real food for breakfast. The drill instructor rushed them to eat though. She only gave the company ten minutes to eat. Once the ten minutes were over she had everyone stand up whether they were done or not and head outside.

The rest of the week was a repeat of the first day except each day was a lot harder than the last. The only real food they got was for breakfast. Lunch and dinner were more nutrition drinks. The drinks weren’t bad but Freya found herself craving real food. The worst day was the fourth day where Freya found herself on a watch. She had what was called the fire watch. They handed her a helmet and had her walk up and down the barracks for most of the night. Luckily the helmet came equipped with night vision so she wasn’t stumbling around in the dark.

The week ended with the physical test. To her surprise, two people failed the physical testing. The drill instructor gave them the option to go to extra military training until they passed or be processed out of the military. They both chose extra training. To Freya, nothing appeared to happen. The recruits stood at attention in front of the company then they turned around and got back to their position in formation.

Freya learned that while it might have been a blink of the eye for her it was an extra week for both girls. The girls told the rest of the company, that night in the barracks, that the training was a coed platoon that took all the people who had failed the physical testing from all the companies going through basic and put them together for the week. They had spent a week working out while the rest of the company only experienced less than a second.

The next week started in the training facilities where they were issued their weapons and learned to shoot and care for them. The gun was a simple M04 rifle with a basic .556 bullet. It was the lowest level gun in the Military. The rifle only had ten rounds. The accuracy and range were horrible, and in certain planetary atmospheres, it was completely useless. It also required a lot of cleaning or it jammed.

They were issued an M09 pistol as well and it was a piece of junk. It had a maximum of six rounds. Only five bullets fit in the magazine and they were taught how to put a bullet in the chamber to increase their firing capabilities. Like the M04 it had iron sights that had to be calibrated by shooting the gun. At night the iron sights were horrible as it was really hard to shoot the gun with only the night vision that they were born with.

Three days later they had a weapons test. It only took half the day. It started off with a surprise weapons inspection. No one failed the inspection but almost everyone got dinged on something. Freya got dinged on a piece of rust on the bottom of the stock of her rifle. It had been there before she got issued it and she never thought to sand it off. The rest of the morning was taken up with target shooting. Everyone passed the second test so no one had to go for extra military training this time.

The rest of the week they learned about hand to hand fighting as well as knife fighting. There learned that there were many enemies of the Federation but the most common was not an outside source but an internal one. Their own people were the biggest threat to the Federation. From pirates to civil wars. Humans were the most violent species towards itself. The Marines were often called in to take care of out of control situations.

The last two week was tactics phase. They learned how to attacked both in an urban environment as well as the many different non-urban environments. The final test in basic was a live-fire Recruit level simulated mission where everyone in the company would have to successfully complete.