Freya yawned as she stood in line to get breakfast the following day. They had her stand ‘watch’ all night long until three in the morning, when she was finally allowed to go to bed. Three hours later her alarm had woken her up. She was annoyed that she had only had three hours of sleep right before the first mission in the tournament.

“Stupid tatical mistake, making your pilot sleep deprived right before a mission.” She thought to herself as she fought off another yawn.

Breakfast today was green plant balls that were the size of marbles and grey sludge. She frowned as she looked down the line hoping there was something better but she didn’t see anything else. She was thinking of skipping breakfast and just going with something with caffeine in it when Mon started putting the plant ball things on her plate.

“Excuse me?” She asked the good looking man.

“Do you trust me?” He asked her.

“No.” She replied, annoyed.

He smiled and put two more on her plate. She looked down at the plant things and thought about dumping it back into the metal pot but she was hungry. Giving him an annoyed look she turned to leave but he stopped her.

“Wait, you need gravy on that or it’s too sweet.” He told her as he scooped out the grey liquid and put it on a separate part of her tray.

“There.” He told her with a smile. She didn’t say anything to him and to make her point she turned her back on him before heading to the drink island at the end of the line. She got two mugs from the cupboard and filled them with a tea she had before that she really liked. She smelled the tea and felt a bit her fatigue fade away. Freya sat down next to Patterson and Tike. Mon sat down across from her with Netty.

“So you want to cut the fatilious from tip to tip or you’ll end up covered in the juice.” Mon told her as he picked up tongs that were placed in the middle of the table and gently held the green plant ball. He cut the ball with an odd looking butter knife that was had a curve at the tip. He showed her how to cut the green plant ball end to end. White juice welled up from the cut and spilled over the edges. Taking the tongs again he dipped the plant thing in the grey sauce and ate the whole thing.

“God I love fatilious.” Netty said with a smile as she took carefully cut the plant ball and ate it. “You know, I haven’t had any since I was a little girl.” She said after she swallowed the green ball. She had a big smile on her face.

“Tastes like a dream made out of a cloud but oh my god it’s so bad for you.” Tike said with a smile as she too swallowed one of the plant things.

Carefully cutting the plant thing like Mon showed her, Freya dipped the plant in the grey sauce and popped it into her mouth. Freya closed her eyes as her mind seemed to freeze up as the sweet flavor over rode her mind. For a long second she was oblivious to the world as her body processed the orgasmic flavor of the fatilious. When she opened her mind again she found the entire table staring at her.

“Oh my.” Freya muttered, amazed at the flavor.

“Right?” Mon said with a smile, as he turned back to his tray.

“A thousand calories per pod but oh so worth it.” Tike said as she popped a second pod into her mouth.

“Take a sip of your tea.” Mon recommended. Freya did as he asked and closed her eyes as she tasted the tea. It had the same flavor as before but it was stronger in all the right ways. Whatever fatigue she had was long gone. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes again.

“Ok, I forgive you.” Freya told him. He just smiled and returned to his breakfast.

Even though she only had three pods it still took her nearly fifteen minutes to eat them. She needed time to come down from eating one before she started in on the next one. In between eating the pods she finished her first cup of tea and was starting in on her second one when she finally finished eating her last pod. It was the best breakfast she had ever had in the military.

She made her way to the conference room for the briefing. Sergeant Torres was missing but the rest of the command crew was standing around the holo table talking to each other. Freya walked over to Toast and smiled at him.

“What's up with you?” Toast asked her when she came to a stop.

“Nothing.” Freya told him, smiling.

“They had fatilious in the chow hall today.” Sergeant Leni told him with an odd smile.

“No way! Dammit, do you think they still have some left?” Toast asked, looking around Freya, towards the door to the briefing room.

“Ok people, listen up. We have an hour until the mission kicks off and we don’t have time to waste. Leni you’re in command of third and fourth squads. Wilson, you got first and second squads.” Sergeant Torres said, nearly running into the briefing room.

“This is a break out and survive mission. The mission is to land on the planet and liberate a prison. The prison has just over two thousand prisoners but we are only concerned with these hundred and twenty.” Sergeant Torres said and, with a wave, brought up a list of prisoners and a map of the prison. “The mission objective is to keep those people alive and free for as long as we can. There are two ways to win this mission. First is survive for two weeks with at least seventy prisoners from the prison that are on our list. They must still be live and still kicking when we reach the mission timer. The more prisoners alive, the more points we get. The second way is to make our way over these mountains, four-hundred miles from the prison.

“My plan is that we fake heading to the mountains, take the first and second squad with the hundred and twenty prisioners, and hide out in the forests here.” Torres said, pointing to the south of the prison. “There is roughly a thousand square miles for us to hide in here.”

“This is how we are going to do it. Freya, you’re going to drop here. This is a bus station. I need you to have first and second squads up and ready by the time you touch down. They are to proceed to take over the bus station, steal us four busses and then head to here, halfway to the prison from the city.” Sergeant Torres said, as he adjusted the holo table to show a large city, then zoomed in on a medium-sized building with a bunch of busses around it.

“Third and fourth squads will drop in OTDS here, north of the prison. They will proceed to the prison while first and second squads are en route to the waypoint. The sixth squad will spawn on the dropship and Freya will drop them and the Mechs off here, in front of the prison. This will be a distraction. While the Mechs attack the front of the prison, third and fourth squads will make their way over the wall, here, and proceed to take the prison. While this is going on, fifth squad will drop into the forest in OTDS and find us a good place to hole up.” Sergeant Torres told them.

“From there, third and fourth squads will take the busses and all but the hundred and twenty prisioners and head for the mountains. The Mechs will protect the busses as they retreat to the mountains. We need to keep the prisoners together for as long as possible to give the enemy a big target to focus on. Once it appears that the convoy will fail them we have them scatter and head to the mountains on their own. When they scatter will be up to you, Leni. You’ll be leading them. You have to keep them together as long as possible but you can’t let them be overrun. Once they have scattered, you will be fighting a delaying action to the last man. Don’t be wasteful with your command, but they all need to die.” Sergeant Torres told her, looking her in the eye.

“Freya, once you drop the Mechs off, you need to find a very good place to hide your ship. As the troops die, they will need a place to respawn. That means that your ship needs to be close to where we will be hiding and hidden so well that we can get most of the third and fourth squads back with us.” Sergeant Torres told her. Freya nodded and looked at the map.

“Leni, I booked us a holo room. I loaded it with the prison blueprints. Take third and fourth squads and run them though it as many times as you feel necessary. Be aware that the training room will be run at ship time so you have… fifty-four minutes before we need to leave. Also keep in mind that the prison may have have changed the blueprints, so make sure your squads are flexible.” Torres told his second in command.

“Questions or comments?” Sergeant Torres asked them. Freya ignored the rest of them and focused on the map of the forest looking for a good place to hide her ship. There was a lot of trees that gave partial cover but, other than that, she didn’t see any other places to hide her ship. It wasn’t until she spotted a small pond that she got a crazy idea. She had to do some research and run the math but it looked like it would work. It wouldn’t be comfortable but the odds of someone finding her ship were very low. Freya smiled.

Freya looked up and opened her mouth to tell them her plan but stopped as she found Sergeant Torres talking to Toast. “I don’t know, Toast. Tunnels? Do we have enough time to dig them big enough to fit everyone that needs to be hidden?”

“Tike can build them with a portable dozer. We place sensor sinks around the site to prevent anyone finding us. We hide until the time limit is up and we win.” Toast told Sergeant Torres, sounding excited.

“Tike has a portable dozer?” Sergeant Torres asked, frowning.

“Well, no. She would need the platoon to buy one but it will work. I promise you.” Toast told him.

Freya looked around as the two discussed Toast’s plan. Sergeant Leni had left already with both Tater and Ed, the squad leaders of third and fourth squads. Wilson was also missing and Freya wondered if he was off with first and second squads. One and Done were playing with the other side of the holo table, looking at the city and the surrounding areas.

“Magic, you come up with something?” Sergeant Torres asked her, bringing her attention back to the two of them.

“Yes sir. I want to land here in this pond. According to the map, the pond is covered in requior algae which will hide anything that the cloaking systems misses.” Freya told them, showing them the pond.

“You plan on using the emergency hatch as an airlock?” Toast asked her, frowning.

“Won’t work.” Sergeant Torres replied, also looking at the map. “Oh, don’t get me wrong it will work for the first two times it’s opened, but after that the flooding from opening the hatch will fill up the hold of the ship.”

“We can pump the water back out after each time. It will slow us down a bit but not by much.” Toast told him.

“We can but the water around the ship will be disturbed. I’m worried that if they are looking closely they will see it.” Sergeant Torres said, frowning.

“That's why we don’t use the emergency hatch. We flood the pod bay. Everyone who spawns on the ship will have to hold their breath until they equip their uniforms. Battle uniforms are environmentally sealed.” Freya said, proudly.

“Can you equip uniforms underwater?” Sergeant Torres asked Toast, who shrugged.

“Yup.” Freya said, holding up her tablet showing them the article she had found.

“Risky.” Sergeant Torres said, after a few seconds. “Ok. Go with it. I’ll send out a message to the platoon. Toast, get with Tike and get that dozer. The platoon will loan her the money but she has to repay us.”

Freya smiled as she looked back at the map. Then she sat down and started to do the math for the flight paths she needed to take for the other parts of the mission. She was a little scared that flooding her ship would hurt it in some way even though, from what she read while she was researching, it said the water would not harm it. But the more she looked at what she wanted to do the more she got worried that something would go wrong. She was still going over what could go wrong with her plan to sink her ship when One interrupted her.

“Yo Magic, time to go.” One called to her.

Freya looked up and cursed. One was standing by the door waving for her. Freya put her tablet away and grabbed her helmet off the floor and raced out to meet the other woman. She jogged along with One as they left the barracks to meet up with the rest of the platoon, that was already lined up in front of the lobby door. Sergeant Torres was winding down on his pre-mission speech as Freya found her place in formation.

“Let’s do this!” was all Freya got of Sergeant Torres’ speech as he raised his hand, turned to the lobby door and walked into the light. Freya yelled out her battle cry with the rest of the platoon and marched into the lobby with them.

“...and then he ran naked through Chivia’s.” One was saying when Freya walked into the hanger bay.

“That idiot. He didn’t know it was a joke?” Done replied to One, in between laughs.

“Nope.” One told him as Freya walked up to the pair.

“Magic! What the hell, man. Put that hemet on!” Crew chief Diaz yelled from across the bay as she stormed towards the marine.

Freya looked down at her hand and realized she never put her hemet back on. Feeling embarrassed, she slung it on top of her head and strapped it on. “Sorry, Diaz.” Freya replied.

“Geez. You know better than that. Walking into the bay like some holovid star without a helmet on is just asking to get in trouble. Anyway, how are my favorite bullet catchers? You guys ready to play catch the lethal projectiles with the locals?” Diaz asked, with a smirk.

“I’ve been practicing my pitch for the past few days.” Done said wiggling his hips suggestively.

“By The Founder Jessica, stop!” One said, shaking her head. “Just... no.”

“Ah, but I’ve been practicing.” Done said with a smile.

“Hey guys, can I have a word with my favorite corpse wagon pilot? Why don’t you guys get in your fake-as-hell Gundams and get ready for deployment?” Diaz said, then looked at Done with a frown. “Alone, Mr. Inappropriate. ”

“I feel so unappreciated.” Done whined.

“Come on, you walking sexual harassment charge waiting to happen. Lets get strapped in.” One told him, walking off.

“What’s a Gundams?” Freya heard Done ask One as they walked off. She didn’t hear One’s response. She knew what a Gundam was from watching the shows growing up. She wondered if One got the reference.

“Hey Diaz, I’m so sorry about the helmet thing. I just took it off during the debrief and forgot to put it back on. I promise it won’t happen again.” Freya told the crew chief.

“Just don’t do it again. I can cover for you this time but please just don’t do it again. Anyway, that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about. I have some specs that I want you to look at.” Diaz told her, as she sent a private message to Freya.

Freya looked over at the spec and frowned. It looked like Diaz wanted to add a lot of armor to the front of her ship. It was removable armor but it would cost credits to both put on and take off. She also added an expensive electronic warfare sensor (EWaS, pronounced E-Wa-s) suite. She frowned, not sure why she wanted either one. The armor would be nice except that it was heavy and it would slow her down. Her ship was fast and light. It was never meant to be heavily armored. There was no way that the armor would stand up to what a planetoid could throw at her. The EWaS looked really cool but she would be overwhelmed with information at a time when she needed to concentrate on getting to the ground alive.

She looked at her friend, confused. “Hey, I’m just passing along what some of the pilots in the First Division are getting. It’s not for right now but maybe for your next mission?” Diaz said, then gave Freya a look.

Freya frowned at her then looked over at the specs once more. “Why the hell would anyone do that to a Dropship.” Freya wondered to herself. “It’s like they’re trying to convert their dropship into a poor man’s boarding ship. Wait!”

Freya looked up and opened her mouth but Diaz held up her hand. “It was just a suggestion. I’m not saying that you should, but it’s what I would recommend.” She told Freya, emphasizing the word recommend.

“Well, time's-a-wastin. You need to get to your corpsicle and I need to get into the control room.” Diaz said as she turned around and headed to her little office with the window. She gave Freya a wave over her shoulder as she walked off. Freya watched her leave then started towards her ship.

She sent off the recommendations of what Diaz wanted her to get to Sergeant Torres. She knew that he would not get it until he was on the ground and more than likely would not read it until he got back. She was not sure what to do with the information Diaz just gave her. She knew better than to discuss it anywhere that the Monarch could overhear it without some kind of plausible deniability.

She walked around her ship doing her preflight check-offs thinking on the information. She was not sure if she should report the information leak. Hell, she was not sure if what she thought was true was really what was going on.

“Well, I sent it to Sergeant Torres. I did my job. Let him figure out what to do with the information.” She thought to herself, as she finished her walk around of her ship.

She climbed up the ramp and started going over the checks on the inside of the ship. She was more thorough than normal because she was going to flood her ship with pond water. She checked and double-checked the seals around the pods. The last thing she wanted was to drown her fellow platoon mates. She tried to think about what could go wrong with what she was planning and checked and double-checked and worried. Everything was in working order and as waterproof as intended. With a worried sigh she climbed into the pod and closed the door.

“Monarch, Marine RDS B127. Request permission to disembark.” Freya said, after both the Mechs were loaded up. She looked over at the respawn timer and checked and rechecked that she got the time right so that the first and second squads, minus their Squad Leader, would spawn just as she landed. When the numbers lined up, she took a deep breath and looked out her ‘window’ at Diaz who was in the control room. She didn’t see her but Freya waved at her anyway.

“Marine RDS B127, Monarch. You’re cleared to disembark. Good luck, B127, and kickass.” Came the reply.

“Don’t need luck, Monarch, we’re just that good.” Freya replied with a smile. She got a laugh from the controller before they keyed off the radio.

Freya gunned her engines and dove out of the hanger. The space around the Monarch was clear, but in the distance she could see the close-in support ships fighting near the planet’s surface. She checked her flight path and cursed. They were fighting right in the middle of her flight path. She increased the power from her engines as she looked over at the battle. The space battle was taking place over hundreds of miles and the ships were moving at some insane speeds. Biting her lip, Freya looked for a way around the battle but she couldn’t find any. She was going to have to fly right through the middle of the dog fight.

“Marine RDS B127 to any close support ship fighting in the area of ….” Freya said pausing to give them the coordinates. “My flight path takes me right through your mix-up. Any suggestions?”

“Don’t die?” Came the helpful reply.

“Change your vector to ….” Another pilot replied giving her a new flight path. “... We will clear our way but you need to be fast and we can’t guarantee that you won’t pick up a tail. Just get to the atmosphere as fast as you can. They won’t follow you once you’re in. They know better.”

“They’re Mosquitoes. Great in space but nothing but a target in anything above a level one atmosphere.” Came a woman’s voice over the radio.

“Roger that. Changing my vetor to …” Freya replied. She changed her vector and goosed her engine up slightly to give her more power.

For nearly a minute nothing changed in the battle. The fight was taking place all over the place. The only good thing was that she didn’t think the enemy ships had noticed her yet. A few seconds more than a minute after she changed her vector, that all changed.

The enemy ships suddenly all changed their vectors so that they were massing right into her path. The Marine support ships also changed their tactics as well. They were suddenly in a close flight path with each other, unlike the previous chaotic pattern they had been. As if they had been waiting for it, the Marine close support pilots started mowing down the enemy fighters in a very coordinated way.

In seconds her flight path was mostly cleared. She watched the few ships that had survived as they desperately tried to avoid the Marine close support ships. She boosted her power to eighty-three percent, wanting to get to the atmosphere as fast as possible. She watched her screen as she entered the battlefield. Four of the surviving Mosquitoes moved to engage her. The Marine close support ships moved to prevent them.

For a very long thirty seconds, Freya watched them fight, forcing the Mosquitoes away from her. She also watched the distance to the planet shrink at an agonizingly slow pace. She was eighteen seconds out from the edge of the planet’s Kármán line, the very edge of the atmosphere, when her alarms started screaming at her. One of the Mosquitoes was targeting her.

She jerked her ship to the side as her sensors showed her a missile almost right up on her. The missile passed underneath her going too fast to change directions to hit her. Her guns, which were on auto-fire, took it out. Her eyes looked away as the missile exploded to where the Mosquito was lining right behind her for a follow-up shot.

Freya cursed and spun her ship to decrease the chance of his weapons systems locking onto her. She started chanting the curse over and over as the Mosquito stayed on her. She abused her ship, as she did everything to lose the enemy ship, but he was a much better pilot than her and in a much better ship. It was like he was anticipating her vector changes. He was always moving with her. She was wondering why he hadn’t shot her down when she saw that he fired a missile at her.

She had less than a second to react but somehow she did. She jerked the ship ‘up’ and to the ‘right’, boosting the ship’s engines all the way up to a hundred percent. Her anti-missile gun on the nose of the ship took the missile out, as soon as it passed under her. She was still adjusting to the sudden movement when the Mosquito opened up with it’s blastic guns.

Freya cursed so loud she hurt her throat. She spun the ship around and jerked ‘down’ and to the ‘left’. Her sensor tracked the bullets as they followed her. She watched in panic as the trail of bullets closed in on her. Then her collision avoidance alarmed screamed at her.

She had just enough time to see a Marine close support ship fly over the nose of her ship less than five feet away from hitting her. It unloaded its payload as soon as it cleared the top of her ship. The Mosquito broke apart behind her.

“Holy crap, that was close.” Freya said over the radio. “Thanks.”

“Sorry I was late. I was taking out the one in front of you. He had you lined up. Next time don’t get tunnel vision or you’ll end up frozen chunks.” Came the reply.

Freya checked her sensors and saw a debris field from where the Marine close support ship had come from. It was scary close to her. Her mouth was suddenly dry. She had missed it. The Mosquito behind her had been a distraction for his wing mate. He had led her right towards his wing mate and she never saw it.

“We’re clear. Good luck in the tournament, B127.” The same person who had given her the new flight path less than a minute ago said over the radio. Freya checked her sensors and saw that the Marine close support ships had killed all of the Mosquitos. They were indeed clear.

“Thanks, you guys.” She responded. Four second later she passed the Kármán line and was officially in the planet’s atmosphere. On her screen she saw ten OTDS enter that atmosphere behind her instead of the twelve she was expecting. Freya cursed once more. They had already lost two members of their platoon and the mission had only just started.