Freya dumped everything out of her backpack and put it into the locker. Once her backpack was completely empty she took the four coils of rope from Toast and added them to her backpack. She took the anchors and placed them into the backpack as well. She then reattached her backpack to her armor then unequip it and replaced it with her flight version on her armor.

“The blue rope is fifty feet but the others are only twenty-five.” Toast told her as she stood up in the crowded mission lobby.

“Doesn’t matter.” She told Toast. “If I can’t stick the landing by a safety margin of fourteen feet and some change then it means I missed the mark and I hit the cliff at some point. I have to start my landing within twenty to twenty-five feet of the cliff’s edge or I crash. Too early and I over rotate and ram my nose into the side of the cliff. Too late I hit my butt on the ground. Either way, I end up crashing my ship.”

The biggest problem, Freya thought to herself, was what she faced when she slipped into the ravine. The problem she saw was one of time and the fact she couldn’t use her maneuvering engines. To get to the ground in the time she was given she had to boost all the way down to the planet only spinning around at the last possible moment and engaging her engines to slow the ship down. The problem that arises is once inside the small hole in the ravine the maneuvering engines would get a boost from pushing off from the edges of the cliff wall. That boost was too unpredictable to calculate and would almost certainly cause the ship to crash into the opposite side of the cliff.

Freya ignored what the Platoon leader was saying to map out the math for her decent. She finished and swiped away her holographic notepad as the platoon let out a hoorah! Looking around trying to figure out why everyone was cheering she raised her fist and pumped it once just to fit in. Beside her Toast chuckled. She sat back down and opened her notepad again checking the numbers for mistakes. She redid the arithmetic to make sure that she had not made a stupid mistake. Then she checked rechecked them.

Putting her notepad away again she sat back and wiped her hand off on her pants even though she was wearing gloves.

“Hey Magic, I got a really important question to ask.” Toast said breaking her concentration. She had been going over the math in her head one more time when he spoke.

“What’s that?” Freya asked looking up from the floor.

“What did the mushroom say to the bouncer at the club?” Toast asked seriously.

“Hun?” Freya said confused.

“Hey, you can let me in. I’m a fun guy.” Toast said smiling.

Freya looked at him for a few seconds before she started laughing. She had no idea why she was laughing. It was a really stupid joke. It was about that time when the Platoon leader stood up and opened the door. With the customary “Platoon, follow me.” He entered the glowing light.

“Fun guy,” Freya said snickering as the line moved forward. She was the last person to enter the light after Toast.

Her crew chief was waiting for her at the bottom of the ramp of her ship. She was smiling as she petted the ship. “Our girl here is ready to go. You take it easy on her you hear me?” The Petty officer said as Freya passed her doing her preflight check offs. Her crew chief followed her doing the same.

When she was done she stepped into the back of her ship and went through the last bit of checkoffs. When she was done she opened a pod but the crew chief stopped her. “You forget something?” The crew chief asked.

Freya paused and looked back the petty officer. The petty officer pointed to the ship's nameplate and mimed kissing it. “Can’t hurt?” Freya thought to herself as she kissed her first two fingertips and lightly tapped the nameplate. The crew chief smiled and back down the ramp.

“Good luck.” She told Freya. Freya nodded and climbed into a pad and closed the door and opened her eyes to her virtual cockpit. She quickly found her seat and sat down. She started her checkoff. It wasn’t long before she was done and she entered her flight plan into the computer and strapped herself in. She immediately started the pod in the back of her ship to print her a clone. Toast had suggested it. While it was against the rules for a pilot to print their own clone before they landed Toast had told her that as long as she landed her ship no one would care. They would only care if she crashed. Once she started printing her clone she could not stop the process.

“Marine RDS (Respawn drop ship) B127 from Monarch, we’ve gone over your flight plan and a concern has been brought up.” The flight deck, the part of the tower that controlled all traffic coming and going from the Monarch, called her.

“Monarch, B127. I have run the numbers. It should work.” Freya said freezing as she looked out into the hanger deck. Did they notice she was already printing her clone?

B127, Monarch. Your numbers are good. The concern is that you are not leaving a lot of safety margin. You could be fined if this doesn’t work out Private.” The voice from the radio said breaking comms protocol.

“Monarch, B127. Understood. Am I a go?” She asked over the radio relaxing a bit. She wondered what the Platoon leader would do if the Monarch denied her flight plan.

“You’re a go B127.” The Flight deck replied. "Good luck, Private."

“Roger, I am a go,” Freya said smiling as she disengaged her landing gear and hit the button to open the hangar door. She pointed her nose down as the light started flashing red. She waited until the doors were completely open before she powered the engines all the way up to seventy-five percent and roared out of the hanger and down towards the mission planet.

It was a straight drive right to the planet. Freya followed the holographic corridor that she had programmed into the computer as she entered her flight plan earlier. Her screen pinged fifty-nine OTIDS (One-time infantry dropships) all around her launching towards the planet with her. She didn’t have time to look up at them through her window because she was already ten seconds in on the hundred and four seconds flight.

She boosted her speed and the green holographic corridor turned yellow as she increased the speed by a slight margin she had set as her flight plan. It was ok though because she was offsetting the start of the friction at the edge of the Karman line. Her ship slowed down and her corridor turned green again. Smiling she glanced down at the bottom of her instrument and notice that she was thirty seconds in on her flight.

“Time seems to fly by when I fly.” Freya thought as she tilted her ship at a slight angle towards the planet to reduce the friction her ship was experiencing as it hit the thicker upper atmosphere. Looking at the passive scanner she noticed she had pressed ahead of the platoon. Normally that would be a bad thing but since her platoon leader had given her a timeline to follow she had no choice. She frowned as her ship slowed down a bit due to the weather. The flight corridor turned yellow again. She boosted her speed up to seventy-eight percent. Her holographic corridor on her window turned green again. She checked the time and it said that she had twenty seconds left on her flight.

She glanced up past her instruments to take a quick peek outside before her eyes dropped back down to her instrument to keep her ship in the flight corridor. Her eyes were glued to the count down to turnover where she would spin the ship like the hands on a clock. Once her engines were facing the ground she would fire them to slow her descent. At seven second she spun the ship. At six seconds she powered up her engines to one-hundred percent. At four second she flipped the ship so if a person was looking at the same clock, the ship would leave the clock face and come towards the person standing before it. At three seconds she killed the engine and dropped the landing gear. At one second Freya watched the edge of the cliff swing by the window of her cockpit by inches. At zero the ship slammed to a stop and Freya was jerked in her seat and lost consciousness.

Freya opened her eyes and found herself staring at herself in the window of her pod. “Oh my god, I did it!” She screamed in her head. She was leaning on the left side on the pod with her face pressed up next to the window.

"Did I die though?" She asked herself. She didn't remember logging out of the cockpit. She looked for the death in her notifications but didn't find any. She smiled then she started laughing. She pressed the release to the pod doors and carefully climbed out. Using the metal grate she climbed past the pod doors. Once she was out they closed automatically. She climbed to the locker and equipped her battle armor and weapons.

She used the grates to climb upwards and opened the ramp to the back of the ship. It didn’t open all the way but she was fine with that as she climbed up the ramp and grabbed a hold of the cliff in front of her. Looking up she smiled. She was about ten feet or so from the top of the cliff. She had landed on the early side of the spin. Not enough to crash her ship but enough to get her closer to the top than she expected. Shaking her head in amazement at just how close she had been to crashing she looked for a path to climb up the cliff.

It took her about a minute or two to climb up the cliff and another minute to hammer in the anchors for the rope and dropped them into the back of her ship. Once she was done she looked behind her at the large building. It was some kind of bell tower. According to the plan, it would be her squad's position during the first couple of waves of enemies. She made her way around the building to find the door. Once she found it she entered the building and walked up the narrow spiraling staircase.

“Magic in position,” Freya said once she got to the top of the stairs. She unslung her big rifle and scanned the horizon. The rest of the platoon had landed in front of the base and were now making their way towards the base.

“Ship still in one piece?” The platoon leader asked over the radio.

“Yes, sir.” She replied.

“Any sign of the enemy?” He asked.

“Not yet.” She told him.

“Roger.”

The first members of the platoon arrived a few minutes later. Toast and the other three squad members made it to the top of the tower a few minutes later. Toast unslung his rifle and placed it on top of the edge of the wall. He raised his fist and Freya bumped it. He didn’t say a word just got ready.

“The landing was just the start of the mission. We have seven waves to get through.” She chastised herself.

The rest of the platoon got into position. Most of the heavy armored heavy machine gunners found a space on the wall that surrounded the front part of the base. The support squads found a place to set up their heavy cannons just behind the walls. It took nearly five minutes for everyone to get set up and in position. Once they were done it became a waiting game. Freya and the rest of the scout hopefuls scanned the horizon.

Around the ten minute mark, the ground about a half mile away exploded and a mass of insects charge out of the hole in the ground.

“Contact at 82 degrees.” Toast called out almost as soon as the bugs started charging out of their hole. He then gave them grid coordinates. The platoon leader called for a mortar attack on the hole. Less than ten seconds later a hole exploded in a blue fire as a plasma mortar exploded directly inside the bug hole. The mortar was designed to fill the area with liquid fire that stuck on contact and burned hotter than hell for a few minutes. More than enough time to fill the bug hole and burn the bugs death below the surface. The bugs on the surface were taken out by the machine gunners on the wall.

Freya kept one eye glued to her scope and the other wide open looking for another hole to open up. She rewarded for her patience as another hole opened up. Toast called the coordinates out again and one of the support teams dropped a mortar onto the bug hole before any of them could escape. Freya didn’t watch the hole burn. Instead, she kept scanning the area in front of the base for more holes.

The bugs opened four more holes. On the third hole, the support crew that was launching the mortars was a little slow and a single bug escaped. The bug hole was a bit too far for the machine gunner so Freya tracked the bug. It was a fast small bug maybe eight feet long and about four feet tall. Its movements were erratic but Freya thought she had a shot.

“I have a shot.” She told Toast.

As she watched someone fired at the fast-moving bug but missed. She saw the shot hit the sand causing a small burst of sand to fly upwards.

Toast signed and said, “Take the shot.”

Freya tracked the fast erratic moving bug for a few seconds and gently pulled her trigger. The bug dodge right into her shot. Her round hit the bugs head and it exploded in a flash of gore. The explosion left a dark wet looking spot on the sand. The body, however, didn’t stop moving. The back part of the bug's body dropped to the ground but the front four legs kept stabbing the ground violently even though her kill count appeared on her HUD screen. After a few seconds, the bug's body seemed to get the information that it was dead as it gave one more violent stab into the sand and it collapsed.

“Nasty.” A scout beside her said sounding impressed.

“Everyone, be advised, the bugs can still attack for a few seconds after it dies.” Toast called out on the radio.

“Acknowledge.” The platoon leader replied.

Your platoon has completed the First objectives, kill all the Bugs. Wave one complete.

The first bug hole to open up in the second wave was slightly bigger than the bug holes in the first wave. Toast called out the coordinates and one of the support teams dropped a mortar into the hole destroying it. A second hole opened a few seconds after the first and Toast quickly called out the coordinates but it took the next support team off guard and they were a bit late sending the mortar into the bug hole. One large bug and four fast-moving erratic bugs escaped.

“Fire at will.” Toast said a split second after he fired his gun taking out the largest bug. Freya tracked one of the smaller bugs and pulled the trigger. It died in a flash of wet gore. She didn’t wait to watch the show as she moved on to her next target as soon as the red number rose on her HUD. The bug she tracked suddenly died as a scout beside her shot it. Quickly she moved on to the next one. She pulled the trigger and hit her target just as someone else shot and missed sending sand up with the missed shot. Her kill count went up. She looked around for another target but all the bugs were dead.

Freya just had enough time to take a breath and start her scan of the area before another bug hole opened up. The support crew did their job and no bugs escaped. Before the blue fire could go out another bug hole opened. Toast called out the coordinates and the mortar team took care of it. Before he even had time to finish calling out the coordinate however another hole opened up. He immediately gave the next support team the coordinates. The support team was on the ball and launched their mortar as soon as Toast finished calling out the coordinates but a single bug escaped. Someone shot before Freya did but missed. Freya did not.

The holes were opening one after the other. Toast kept calling out the coordinates and Freya and the other scouts trying out for the platoon took care of any escaping bugs. The ones they missed were taken care of by the machine gunners on the wall. This went on for what seemed to Freya a very long time before they got an objective update.

Your platoon has completed the Second objectives, kill all the Bugs. Wave two complete.

Almost immediately bug holes started to open all around the base. Some a lot closer to the base than any of the holes before. Toast sounded like an auctioneer as he called out the coordinates. Freya and the other scout could not keep up with all the escaping bugs. The heavy machine gunners were pressed into a constant state of combat. In between finding new targets, Freya could see streams of light from the gunners as they mowed down the bugs. They were a lot more effective than the scouts were in killing the bugs.

“All Scouts, target take bigger bugs. They can take down the walls if they get close enough.” Toast told over the radio after taking a breath from calling out all the coordinates of the bug holes.

Freya switched targets and fired on one of the biggest bugs she could see. To her, the bug looked like a weird armadillo with the same looking type of armor that the little animals had on Earth. Except the bugs had the armor that went all the way up on its face. It was a lot more predictable than the faster bugs so Freya targeted smaller targets on the bug. Mostly she targeted the dark beady eyes of the bug. A single shot there and the bug dropped dead.

An eternity later the bug holes stopped opening and they got another objective update telling them that wave three was complete. The bugs had got really close to the base this time. Scanned the walls she spotted a bug not twenty feet from the base’s wall.

“I wonder how bad the next wave is going to be?” Freya thought as several bug holes opened up at once.

This time they were nearly double the size of the first bug hole. Toast and another scout started calling out the coordinates for the holes. While Toast was extremely accurate with his coordinates the other scout was not. Worse he was a lot slower. In between shots, Freya saw several mortars miss their targets. The support teams complained over the radio and the Platoon leader told the other scout to either be more accurate or shut up. The scout called out two more coordinates and when they both missed he shut up. Toast on the hand was extremely accurate with calling his targets.

Freya was changing out batteries almost as soon as they finished recharging because there were so many enemies. She almost didn’t have to pick her targets as there were so many. She always targeted the bigger bug first though. The fast-moving and erratic bugs were now hampered by the mass of bugs charging the base. It was almost too easy to hit them now.

A huge bug hole appeared in the distance and the largest bug Freya had seen so far appeared from the hole. It had two weird looking pod-like things on its side. As she watched they opened up and a white ball of light shot out of the pods. They arched in the air and landed just before the wall exploding in the sand. Mounds of sand came crashing down on to the men and women on the wall. It knocked a couple of people off the wall but they were not seriously injured and quickly got back onto the wall.

Freya targeted one of the pods on the big bug as it looked like it was about to open. Timing her shot right she pulled the trigger just before the pod opened. Her shot hit the pod as it was opening causing the slight delay on one of the edges of the pod to pull back. The white light hit the edge and the whole bug exploded. The explosion took out both the bug and the bug hole it came out of.

Freya called out her finding over the radio as she switched her main focus onto the big mortar bugs as they appeared in between taking out the armadillo looking bugs. She was fast and accurate enough that none of the mortar bugs were able to get another shot off. It was a close thing though and several times Freya had to rush her shot to get it off before it fired. Luckily, it seemed like her massive increase of dexterity mods paid off as she moved her rifle from one target to another.

There was fighting on the wall now as the squads fought off some of the bugs that made it up on the wall. The support teams were firing as soon as they got new coordinates. The platoon leader joined Toast in calling in coordinates increase the rate of fire from the support teams. Freya fell into a pattern. Find a big bug aim, fire, and move on to the next target all the while keeping an eye on her ammo count. Once it reached zero she quickly changed out batteries then returned to her pattern. At one point she had to stop and put a new ammo rod into her gun.

The wave ended with someone firing a bazooka at the last big bug. They got a notification that the next wave would be delayed for two minutes to give them time. Freya took a long swig from her nutrition drink and stretched. Toast changed out weapons to a smaller but fatter gun. It had a smaller but wider scope on it. He slid a rod into the gun then slapped the slide closed.

The platoon leader ordered the wall cleared of all the dead bugs. He had some squads go over the wall and pull the dead bodies of the bugs away from the wall and make small piles all around the battlefield creating obstacles for the bugs. He also had the support team move their locations to prevent them from being so close to each other in case a lucky mortar landed in the middle of them. He also pulled two of the six scouts that were in the tower with Freya down to the back walls for the same reason. They didn’t have the best shooting position from where he placed them though. He left Freya, Toast, and the two other scouts on the tower.

Wave five started with four bug holes opening at once and bugs started pouring out far faster than before. The fifth wave was one long blur to Freya. She had no time to go after the armadillo bug as there were just too many mortar bugs popping up. A few them ever got a shot off. One landed inside the base and took out three heavy machine gunners. A notification appeared in Freya HUD telling her that they were respawning in her ship. The mortar from the bug landed right where the Platoon leader had wanted to have her land her ship inside the base. Freya was glad Toast had her land in the ravine. The Platoon really needed the ships ability to respawn friendly soldiers.

A new bug appeared near the end of the wave. At first, Freya ignored it as she was too busy taking out the mortar bugs but when the bug fired a really fast moving artillery shell that took out a sizable chunk of the wall she quickly moved it to the top of her priority list. It took four quick shots to the artillery bug to kill it. In the meantime, it fired once more putting another hole in the wall. She got a notification that there was now a queue for the respawn pods on her ship. It was four people long.

Once the artillery bug was killed Freya went back to taking out the mortar bugs but the little breathing room that artillery bug had given the bugs allowed them to fire a few rounds into the base taking out more Marines. The holes in the walls allowed some of the bugs to penetrate the base and there was a fierce firefight just inside the base. Finally, the wave ended and the blue box told them ten minutes to breathe.

The Platoon leader had squads fixing the hole in the walls while he had other squads moving the bug that were starting to pile up around the edges of the walls moved. He even pulled Freya and her squad off the tower to help. She joined in throwing sandbags into the holes in the wall while another squad filled the sandbags. The platoon leader called them off around thirty seconds to the next wave and told them to get back into positions.

“We got a lot further than I thought we would in this mission. In fact, we are tied with the first divisions highest platoon record. If we can beat this wave I’ll buy each and every one of you a beer even those of you who don’t make the platoon. I really want to be able to say that we have a better record on this mission than the entire first division.” The platoon leader said over the radio as Freya reached the top of the tower.

The sixth wave started off with nearly twenty bug holes opening up at the same time. Freya took a second to look at the ocean of bugs before she started finding her targets in the back of the horde. She mostly aimed at the mortar bugs but every now and then an artillery bug would show up from a bug hole. When that happened she quickly targeted it and ignored the mortar bugs until it was dead. She wasn’t the only to target the artillery bugs. All the scouts and support squads were ordered to quickly changed targets as soon as they showed up. Toast stopped calling out bug hole coordinates and started calling out mortar and artillery bug positions.

Freya was targeting an artillery bug that was just turning around to get into position when Toast grabbed her backpack and pulled her up. “Out! Out! Out!” He shouted as he leaped over the wall of the tower and fell towards the roof fifteen feet below.

Freya didn’t even hesitate and holding her big gun with one hand and using the other to push herself out of the tower. She looked now at the fast approaching roof and got herself into position to roll out of the fall. Unfortunately, the roof was slanted so the moment she landed she started to fall down the roof. She aimed her roll towards a chimney that was sticking up trying to prevent herself from falling off the room. While she was successful with not rolling off the roof she hit the chimney hard enough to knock a few points off her health.

Above her, the tower top exploded showering her with debris. Something hard hit her hard in the back and instantly her body exploded in pins and needles while her black spots appeared in her vision. Blinking furiously until the black dots disappeared she was able to raise her rifle and look through her scope for whatever hit the tower. She found a partially hidden artillery and she pulled the trigger over and over again until the bug dropped sideways dead.

She quickly switched targets to another artillery but it exploded as a light flashed from the base hit it. Changing targets to yet another artillery bug, she fired on it until it died. A light flashed out from the base again and an artillery bug to the far left exploded in gore. Slowly Freya and whoever was firing the bazooka were able to get the artillery bugs under control but the damage had already been done. Bugs were slowly making their way through the holes in the wall where the artillery bugs had punched through. On top of that, mortar bugs were dropping mortars all around the base. Freya’s notifications were going crazy with all the names that were waiting on a respawned in her ship.

Sometime later Freya pulled the trigger on a mortar bug causing it to misfire and blow itself up. She scanned the area looking for another target bug didn’t find one. In fact, most of the bugs outside of the wall were gone. Lowering her big rifle she looked at the fierce firefight happening right below her. She quickly dropped her big rife and unslung her old gun. She targeted the closest bugs that were attacking a lone heavily armored machine gunner.

She fired on it until it died. A few more tried to sneak up on him so she took them out. One bug after another fell to both their guns. Soon the last bug had dropped. The figure turned to look around at the courtyard while Freya did the same. She found a wounded bug and pulled the trigger killing it. She looked around but didn’t see any more targets. Raising her scope upwards she scanned the courtyard first then looked past the wall but she didn’t see any more targets.

Some heavy gunners walked around in the courtyard shooting injured bugs that were playing dead. Freya tracked them with her gun but for the most part, she was not needed. The one time that she was when a bug lunged at a heavy gunner from under a pile of dead bugs. Freya put three round into the bug before it hit the heavy armored gunner knocking him over. She put two more rounds into its body center mass but the bug didn’t even twitch. She was still looking at the bug a few seconds later when the bug started to move again. She put another round into the bug and almost put two more before she stopped pulling the trigger as she spotted an arm waving at her from beneath the bug.

The Marnie pushed the bug off him and waved at Freya. Freya waved back before she returned to protecting the other marines as they searched the dead. They found the last bug playing dead just outside the wall. As soon as they killed it everyone got a notice telling them that they had passed the sixth wave. They had thirty minutes until the next wave was incoming. One of the figures waved at Freya. “Magic…” The platoon leader shouted at her. “...get your butt down here. We need all hands.”

Freya nodded at him and slowly slid down to the edge of the roof. She was about to jump down when she spotted Toast’s corpse. He was half buried under a bug. His face shield was cracked open and she could see his wide staring eyes looked back at her. She froze on the roof for a few seconds before the Platoon leader yelled for her to get on the ground. Numb Freya leaned out and jumped down careful not to land on the corpse of her squad leader.

The platoon leader became an insane taskmaster as he had Freya and the surviving troops dragging all the corpses, both the bugs and the human corpses, outside the base. This time they didn’t have time to put the corpses into piles to be obstacles for the bugs. Besides Freya didn't think it worked in the first place. The platoon leader had them toss the dead bodies out of the wall. Once most of the corpses were gone the platoon leader had them start filling the holes in the wall with sandbags.

Even with her new strength to give her the extra stamina Freya was exhausted by the time the platoon leader called for them to take their positions again. Freya climbed back up the roof and took her position by the chimney again. She was joined a few minutes later by Toast who had just respawned. He went up to the peak of the roof and laid down on the other side using the slanted roof for cover. He waved at her once he saw her. She waved back but in her mind, she saw his corpse again laying staring at her.

Using control demolitions, the support groups created holes in the buildings so that they could find their own targets without someone calling them out. They were careful to only place one team per building so that if a building was destroyed only one team would be wiped out. Freya looked through her scope at one of the teams as they set up their mortars inside a large room that looked like it might have been a barracks at one point. As the counter counted down Freya raised her rifle and scanned the horizon.

The start of the seventh way looked like the entire ground opened up and spewed out bugs. Thousands poured out of the ground in seconds. It was mostly the really small bugs that came pouring out of the bug holes but a few medium sized bugs came out with them. The heavy armored gunners opened up on them and like a wave spreading outward the bugs began to die. The first really big bug was an artillery bug. It popped its head out of the hole and a bazooka strike took it out. Too soon there were too many big bugs for just the single bazooka to take care of and the scouts joined in on the killing.

Time seemed to disappear as Freya went from one target to the next killing as fast as she could. To her left, a mortar landed right in the middle of a building. After the explosion died away there was only a single wall left of the building. A scout and an entire support team were killed. Two targets later Freya was about to pull her trigger on an artillery bug and woke up in the respawn pod. Shaking her head she dismissed the message that she had been killed. She barely noticed that the cost for her to respawn was zero as she quickly opened the pod to rejoin the fight as soon as she could.

She quickly equipped her battle gear and climbed up to the rear ramp. The ropes were being used so she crawled up to the edge of the cliff and started to free climb up to the top. She had done it before and had no problem doing so again. Once at the top, she raced back to the fight. The building where had used as a sniper nest had a huge hole in it. Still, she went back to the same building and climbed up the broken staircase to the second floor. There was just enough room left on the floor for a good shooting position.

She raised her big rifle and looked at what was left of the base. All the buildings were just shells of what they once were. The walls were mostly just huge piles of rubble where the heavy machine gunner stood firing into the horde. The courtyard was wasteland filled with large craters left over from enemy mortars. She took it all in as she raised her rifle and found her first target. She pulled the trigger and rejoined the battle.

Freya had no idea how long she fought perch precariously on what was left of the second floor of the building she was in. She did note every five minutes or so six respawned marines rejoined the fight. She also noticed when the person who had the bazooka died. She missed the spark of white before whatever the person fired at explode. It was a really long time before he made it back to the battle.

At one point Freya spotted an artillery bug aiming at her. She jumped through what used to be a window. The building behind her exploded. She landed wrong and it took her a few minutes to get her bearings back. Since there were no more good places to snipe near her she ran a large the rubble pile and climbed up on top of a big rock so that she could see over the ocean of bugs in front of her. She resumed killing the big bugs behind the enemy lines. It was only after her second change of batteries to her gun that she realized that she was standing on what was left of the wall that used to surround the base.

At one point the rubble pile she was on was overrun and she dropped her big rifle and pulled out her older rifle. Crouching behind the big rock she joined in with the gunner killing the bugs as fast as she could. The fighting got so bad that at one point she had to use several batteries that were only half charged because there were so many bugs. One even climbed up on her rock but died as a heavy gunner jump up beside it and unloaded his gun into the bug nearly point blank range. When the bug dropped off the rock the gunner dropped down beside her and joined her unloading into the ending sea of bugs. Freya crouched beside him and pulled the trigger as fast as she could.

Once the pressure eased up a little bit the gunner left her and rejoined his squad. Freya picked up her big rifle and once more climbed back up on the rock. As soon as she was in position she started sniping the big bugs in the distance. Time seemed to repeat itself as she noticed a group march up the rubble pile several times side by side. She was not sure if it was the same group or not but they looked alike. She never saw them go down the rubble pile though. She was to busy looking off into the distance to see what happened to the group.

“Maybe it's my imagination playing tricks on me.” She thought to herself as the group appeared once again and marched right back up the hill. She was currently firing on an artillery bug. After killing it she looked away from her scope for a split second and looked at the group just as they reached the top of the hill. They blazed away at the bugs that were hidden from Freya’s sight. Soon one of the bugs made it up the hill, and she saw a bug's leg arch upwards and impale a heavy gunner right through his chest. The gunners just closed ranks as the wounded soldier fell and kept firing. Freya took the hint and started sniping again. Sometime later the group marched past her again. She didn’t look to see if any of the gunners on top of the hill were still alive.

The battle slowed down as the sun slowly sank below the horizon. Soon the last of the bug holes was bombed. The Platoon leader organized the survivors into squads and sent them through the battlefield to look for those bugs that were playing dead. Freya remained where she was and protected the marines as they went on their grizzly and very dangerous task. Several times a dead looking bug suddenly jumped up and kill the closest marine before being killed by a sniper round from Freya or multitude of bullets fired by the heavy machine gunners.

Your Platoon successfully cleared the objective: clear the enemy wave. Your platoon leader has declined to continue to the next wave. You have successfully completed Seven waves. Please return to the lobby.

Freya sat down on the rock both mentally and physically exhausted. She cradled her rifle in her hands as she looked out onto the sea of corpses. Here and there she could see a marine armor sticking out of the piles of dead bugs. She jumped up and nearly went running when she saw an armored hand move but it fell bonelessly as the pile of dead shifted slightly before collapsing. She watched it for a few seconds but nothing moved. She sat back down and took a deep breath.

Once she got her breath back she turned around and slid down the rock. She passed a man who was staring at a corpse that looked almost identical to him. Freya paused and looked back. They were the same person. The man looked up and spotted her looking at him.

“Five years and some change in the marines and never saw my dead body before. Can you believe it.” The man asked her.

She shook her head not sure how she was supposed to react. The marine nodded to her then looked back down at his corpse. Freya turned around and started walking back to her ship. When she reached the edge of the cliff she looked down and saw her ship. She smiled at the sight. It was still there. She was not sure how she was going to get it out but it survived the mission. She smiled and leaned over the edge and grabbed the rope. She repelled down to her ship. She used the floor grates to climbed to a pod and hit the button to open the pod door. Grabbing the edge she climbed into the pod. She closed the door then closed her eyes.

When she opened them she was in her virtual cockpit. She stumbled forward into the back of her chair as the floor was now the nose of the ship. She swiveled the chair around so that it was facing her. She spun around and sat down. She clipped her seatbelts on then spun her chair back around again. She sat in her chair and did the math. Reading the results she smiled. Getting out was going to be easier than she thought.

She turned the engines on and slowly increased the power until she could hover. She released the landing gear and spun the ship clockwise slowly. She got really close to the cliff but she didn’t hit it. Once she was facing upwards she slowly increased the power to her engines and raised her ship out of the ravine. Once out of the ravine she gunned it out of the atmosphere. She asked permission to land and got it. Smiling she flew her ship into the hanger.

Once she landed she powered down her ship. As she was unclipping her seat belt she saw her crew chief stomping towards Freya’s ship. She didn’t look happy. Freya left the cockpit and exited out of the pod. She lowered the ramp and stepped out. Her crew chief was looking at the landing gear. Her crew chief absently waved her away as she took out her tablet and hooked it up to her ship. Shrugging Freya turned and left.