Freya walked into her room, popped the release on her helmet and tossed it on the couch in her small living room. She sat down on the couch and took her boots off, letting them plop down onto the floor. Spinning around, she crawled up her couch until she could fit as she laid down. Taking a deep breath, she released it slowly and closed her eyes.

Message to all Iron hand: Debriefing in ten minutes.

From: Gunnery Sergeant Maceson

Groaning in irritation, she sat back up. Taking a minute to look around, she grabbed her boots and pulled them closer before she started putting them on. Once both her boots were on, she grabbed her helmet and carried it to her door. Just outside, a very tired looking Mon was waiting on her.

“Hey, hon.” He said, nodding to her.

“Hey, Mon. Carry me?” Freya asked, holding her arms out.

“I’d love to, but…” Mon said, making an overly-exaggerated sad face. It made Freya smile a bit before she let it fall from her face.

“But,” Freya muttered sadly, looking down as they both started walking down the hallway. “You know, I wish training missions had the same good feeling when we get done. You know what I mean?”

“Yeah. It’s like you’re high, right?” Mon asked, looking at her.

“Yeah, it’s like that.” Freya said, nodded her head, still looking at the floor as they got closer to the stairs.

“Hey, you’re smart. How many times did Gunny freeze the mission this time?”

“Twenty-eight, I think.” Freya replied, hesitantly.

“Hey, that’s not bad. Are we getting better you think?” Mon asked.

“No. I think he got frustrated and gave up.” Freya told her boyfriend, as she shook her head.

“I hate training missions. We need a vacation.” Mon muttered, darkly.

“I agree. It’s been three weeks already. Gunny can let up a bit.” Freya muttered, angrily.

“Hey, guys.” Netty said, making Freya look up.

“How can you be so happy? It’s like you have a bigger engine inside you than my dropship.” Freya said, seeing her friend waiting for them at the top of the stairs with Dog and Knowles.

“I got to drive my mech today.” Netty said with a huge smile, but it fell when she looked at Mon. “Sorry Mon.”

“No worries. I screwed up.” Mon said, waving the comment away.

“Magic, how was that last drone? Did it get you guys spotted?” Knowles asked.

“No, that was friggin Tike. She couldn’t wait like I told her too. She walked us right into that ambush. Got us all in trouble. You should have seen Gunny when he froze the mission. This is not going to be good.” Freya warned them.

“Someone is always screwing up. If this keeps up they’ll kick us back to Second Division.” Netty complained, as they walked down the stairs. No one said anything else as they joined the rest of the platoon walking into the debriefing room.

Freya looked up as they entered the room. Gunny was already there, talking to Sergeant Torres. He had his back towards the rest of the platoon. She could see Sergeant Torres’ face as he nodded to what Gunny was saying. He looked stressed, but not unhappy. Sergeant Leni and One were standing off to the side, watching the platoon find their seats.

“Maybe this isn’t going to be as I thought.” Freya thought to herself, as she sat down next to Toast and Patterson. A few seconds later, Tike walked in and stopped in front of her.

“Hey, I should have listened to you when you gave me that warning.” Tike said looking at her feet. “Sorry.”

“No worries.” Freya said, still a little irritated at her fellow squad mate. Tike nodded and moved to sit on the other side of Toast, who ignored the whole thing.

““Platoon atten...chen!” Sergeant Leni called out.

The platoon stood up and waited as Sergeant Leni looked to Sergeant Torres. “At ease.” Sergeant Torres said, waving his hand to motion them to take a seat.

“I know what it seems like. It seems like we're getting worse, but the truth is far from that. We are getting better. Gunny was just telling me that he’s seen some good improvements with everyone here. So much so, that he’s going to clear us in this next training mission if we do as well or better than the last one.” Sergeant Torres told them. Behind him, Gunny nodded his head as he looked around the room at them.

“You’ve got the night off. We are still confined to the camp, but you can do as you please. We go again tomorrow at zero nine-hundred. If we pay attention then, this will be the last one before we go. If we fail, then we have another week of training before we can be tested again. I suggest you people get some sleep and be ready for tomorrow.” Sergeant Torres said as Gunny stepped forward.

“Look people, you are getting there. Yes, there have been some stupid mistakes, but I see definite improvements. At first I questioned why they sent you to me. When we first started the training missions, you guys were like a bag of screw ups. You went your own way and made things up as you went along. That is not how First Division works.” Gunny told them, shaking his head.

“Third Division is for people who are learning their templates. Second Division is where you learn about working together as a team. In First Division, it’s assumed you know everything and are ready to go. You people weren’t.” Gunny said, pausing as he looked at everyone.

“Now I see why they sent you to me. In the three weeks that I’ve seen you work, I watched you guys come together unlike any other platoon that I’ve ever seen. Yes, you still have some rough spots, but so does every other platoon in the First Division. It might take until the end of our deployment, but I see you people becoming my special warfare platoon. It’s what I see in each and every one of you.” Gunny said, his face set like granite.

“What I want to see tomorrow is trust in your fellow squad mates.” Gunny said, looking at Tike.

Looking away from Tike, he continued, “I want to see you people moving as one. You’ve been training now almost constantly for three weeks. You know the missions. I’m gonna skip the first two missions and head straight to the three bridges. You know what to do. Guard the dropship. Patrol the area. Be ready for when another platoon calls for aid. When that happens, you go do your job then get back to the staging area and be ready for the next call. Be aggressive and be fast.”

“Mon, get your head out of your ass. No more excessive barrages. Tike, listen to your scout when she tells you that she thinks that there is an ambush coming. It’s her job. Let her do it. Bob, stop screwing around when the fighting starts. Stay with your squad. You are not a one-man army. Aggression is good, but in moderation. Too much of it will get you killed. Netty, you are back on secondary pilot duty. Everyone else, keep doing what you’ve been doing. Stay aware of your surroundings. Remember the basics, like good fire control, and we can move on. We have a real world mission coming up, and I won’t pass you to go unless you prove to me that you have what it takes.” Gunny told them. “I want to see your best tomorrow. Enjoy your down time. Sergeant.”

Sergeant Torres took a step forward as Gunny turned around and left. He waited until Gunny was out the door before he spoke. “Seriously everyone, he almost passed us on this last mission. We do what we did today, without anyone doing anything stupid, and we got this in the bag. Get out of here and get some rest. Be ready for tomorrow. Dismissed.”

“That went better than I thought it would.” Freya muttered,as she stood up.

“It went as I thought it would.” Toast replied. “He’s puffing smoke up our butts about the special warfare thing, but we have improved. A lot.”

“I think we would have passed, if I didn’t move me and Magic right into an ambush.” Tike said, sounding tired.

“Live and learn.” Toast said, not unkindly.

“I don’t know about you guys, but if we can’t go to Chivia’s then I’m off to bed.” Patterson told them. “You need anything, Toast?”

“Nah buddy, get some rest. See you in the morning.” Toast told him.

“I’m out too.” Freya told them as well. She gave them a wave, turned around and followed behind Patterson, leaving Toast and Tike together.

“Magic!” Mon said, running up to her. “Hey, you wanna watch a stream before we fall asleep.”

“Sure.” Freya said, feeling a bit of energy returning. She followed Mon to his room.

The next day, Freya found herself in the cockpit of her ship, landing in the spot she had picked out three weeks ago when they first started doing the training missions. The missions were based on what Gunny thought they would be doing in the real world mission whenever he passed them. The landing spot was a small parking lot behind a row of stores. The parking lot was for trucks or whatever to bring supplies to the stores. It was narrow, with just enough room for two trucks to pass through.

The seventh company had taken over the row of shops for their staging area. Both mechs were standing in an active camo area. Freya knew that it was Knowles' active camo machines that were keeping the mechs hidden. They were there to both keep guard over the dropship and to supply the rest of the company with artillery support.

Knowles had turned out to be a very good person. Whatever had been going on between her and Mon was gone now. During the vacation they had taken to cloud surf, she had proved she was good people. During the training missions, she kept proving that she was both good at her job and more than willing to help others out. Freya liked the other woman.

Freya set the respawn pods to accept respawns from the entire seventh company and respawned herself. The seventh company was not really here. They were just sim replicas that were based on the real seventh company, but their responses were based on real responses that the Monarch thought they might make.

Tike was waiting on her at the bottom of the ramp. If all was going to plan, Freya knew that Toast should be already out patrolling behind them. It was his job to make sure no one sneaked up on the staging area. Freya’s part was to patrol the area between the three bridges and the staging area with Tike. Their job was to make sure that the area was clear for returning marines to get back to the fight as well as keep the enemy from sneaking up on the other platoons.

Tike waved for Freya to go first. Freya nodded and moved out. They had been doing this same mission dozens of times. It was based off of the tournament missions except that they were the reinforcement platoon instead of holding a bridge. The other missions before and after this mission were not based off of the tournament, or at least they had not done them during the tournament.

The first in the series of training missions was creating a staging area for several companies. Freya’s ship would be one of two respawn ships in the staging area. Their job was to guard the staging area. It wasn’t a glorious job. In fact most of their missions were guarding staging areas. For the most part it was boring. Sixth Squad set up the staging area while the rest did the guarding. Freya’s squad did the most patrolling, which got them out of doing a lot of the heavy work, but walking around got old fast - especially if there was very little action.

This mission turned out to be the same. Freya spent the first two days patrolling the area with Tike and nothing happened. They went out for hours and came back to the staging area to rest before going back out. Knowles had the area under constant surveillance with her drones, but as Freya had learned that didn’t mean that the enemy couldn’t hide from them.

It was how the last mission ended. A group of enemy troops had evaded the drones and Tike had gotten overconfident. She had ignored Freya’s warning that something had felt off. Tike walked them right into an ambush squad that was under active camouflage. If it hadn’t been for Gunny appearing before them, Freya would have never known what had happened.

This time, when Freya held up her hand after her awareness training kicked in, Tike stopped and waited. Freya looked around at the silent forest they were walking in. It was daylight and, from past experience, Freya knew that the weird birds they had on this planet should have been squawking. Instead there was only silence. She looked at her mini map hoping that her sensor drone had picked up something, but it remained blank.

Looking around, she didn’t spot anything else that was out of the normal. Taking a deep breath, she signaled back to Tike that she was moving forward and requested that she stay back and be on guard. Tike nodded in return and took cover behind a tree. Freya looked forward again and moved slowly on her belly. She low-crawled forward, looking for anything that would tell her something was out of place. Maybe a bent or broken limb from a bush, or maybe some kind of tracks. Anything that would tell her why the forest was way too quiet.

She had moved about thirty feet in roughly five minutes and was about to turn back, when she saw a branch from a bush wave up and down. There was no wind, so Freya felt herself tense up. She raised her scope and examined the area. She was hoping it was some creature that lived in the forest, but knew that it was most likely an enemy scout who had messed up.

She saw nothing. No signs of tracks. No signs of anything that might have passed through the area recently. She slowly backed up, keeping an eye on the area. She didn’t see any more movement as she made her way back to Tike. She did mark the spot and launched a surveillance drone, sending the feed to both to command and to Tike. She made a note at the bottom of the feed, telling anyone who would see it that she suspected an ambush squad at that location.

It made sense to her. The bush sat on a small hill that overlooked the most common path that most of the Marines who were returning to the fight had to pass through. The area had good coverage against incoming fire from people coming from the staging area. To her it would be an ideal place to set up an ambush. She stopped about twenty feet away from Tike and awaited orders.

Thiry or so seconds later, a new waypoint appeared on her map with orders to blow up the hill. Freya looked back at Tike who nodded and motioned for them to circle around the hill. Freya nodded, turned to her left and started to circle around. Her eyes flickered at the mini map in the corner of her HUD and saw that Tike was following her. She kept going until they were on the opposite side of the hill. Tike came up beside her and motioned for Freya to guard behind them.

Freya nodded as she watched Tike pull her backpack off from the corner of her eye. Freya scanned the area in front of her. The forest looked empty. There were a bunch of trees and just beyond that she could just make out houses in the distance. The forest was still way too silent.

Freya turned back to see Tike pull out what looked like a flare gun except it had a bigger barrel. Freya looked away to keep any eye on the area behind them then she looked back to see Tike load the flare gun with what looked like a mini missile. Freya once more looked away to scan the area then looked back. Tike had the flare gun thing raised, pointing the thing upwards towards the sky. Then she pulled the trigger.

There was a crack and Tike spun around and jumped on Freya. Less than a second later there were several loud booms coming from the hill that they suspected an enemy squad was on. Freya grunted as she felt the shock wave pass through her. It was like someone had punched her right in the middle of the chest. Her face shield darkened and her armor shut off the outside audio. Even still, she could hear the muffled explosions through her suit. Then she felt a bunch of shrapnel hit her exposed legs. It didn’t feel like it penetrated her armor, but it still hurt.

When her armor turned her audio back on, the first thing she heard was screaming. Fearing that Tike had been injured she pushed herself out from under her and looked up. Tike was fine. She slowly got up and turned towards the hill. Freya followed her gaze and shook her head in amazement. The entire hill was black and several trees were down, facing away from the hill.

She was so focused on the destruction that when her HUD flashed telling her that someone had shot at her from somewhere to the left she was taken completely by surprise. Before her mind could catch up, her body spun around and, with a smooth motion, she raised and fired before she could realize what had happened. She was gently tugging on the trigger again when her mind caught up and registered a fire-blackened light-armored enemy falling back towards a tree. Her round had punched right through the enemy’s face shield.

She looked around, but besides a bunch of unmoving bodies that were somewhat in one piece laying around the side of the hill, nothing was moving. Freya looked down at her armor, thinking that her active camo had been disabled by the explosion, but no it was still working. Hoping that the enemy had just been firing at random and had come close to them by accident, she moved off a bit to the side.

She looked back to see Tike holding her rifle looking behind them. Freya turned around, but there was nothing to see. Freya lightly kicked Tike’s leg to get her attention. When she got Tike’s attention she motioned to the other woman that she wanted to search the area where the dead enemy was. Tike nodded and motioned that she would be staying where she was and would guard Freya’s back. Freya nodded and moved off.

She quickly found the enemy camp. It was not on top of the hill like she expected, but at the base of the hill. It made sense now that she thought of it. Why would you expose your camp when you could just set up a sentry to keep watch while the rest of the squad rested and waited. The good news was Tike’s new weapon had leveled the area around the hill and that included the camp. She spotted a broken active camo generator. It was a small one, but it was mostly intact.

She thought about taking it for loot, but then remembered that this was a training mission and there were no rewards. No E-points, nor loot money. She left the machine and moved around the camp looking for survivors. There was a good chance that someone had not been in the camp when Tike’s missile went off. If so, she had to find them before he or she reported back and compromised the area where her dropship had to be.

Not thirty seconds later, she spotted a branch to a small fern-like bush bend down slowly. It was way too slow to be natural. Taking a deep breath she lined up a shot where she guessed the enemy had to be. She waited until the branch started moving upwards again and gently pulled the trigger of her GMZ. An enemy in medium armor appeared a second later with a dark hole in his back. Freya fired a second round just to make sure, but the enemy never moved as a new dark hole appeared in the back of his head.

Freya sent out another surveillance drone and showed the bodies. Once that was done, she moved on, still searching for any enemies who had escaped the destruction. Fifteen minutes later, Tike stood up and motioned for her to give up and continue on their patrol. Freya nodded and did as she was asked. They spent the next four days wandering around the forest patrolling. During that time, Third and Fourth squads had been called twice to help with the fighting on the bridges, and the mechs had several calls for artillery barrages. Mostly, Freya wandered the forest and the suburbs bored. Gunny ended the mission on the seventh day. He gave them a passing grade and told them they had the next four days off. After that the real world mission would begin.