Vanguard Word Update

2k words

***

These were nothing much to make note of, but in that month leading up to their rerun of the sim (weeks now, time was flying by), there was one particular exchange that sat above the rest. They had returned to the range along with some of the other squads to brush up on their aim, his ears pricking as the electric snaps of the coilguns filled the air. He had gone off with Kurtis to practice his disassembly first, while Hunte rand the aliens had moved straight for the firing line.

At some point his eyes eventually wandered over to Samiha, as they sometimes did now that she and him had come to some sort of understanding. She was in the booth at the furthest end, and he wasn’t surprised to see her shots landing more on the far wall than the paper target. From the way her snapping beak sent harsh clicks across the rooms, he didn’t think she was giving herself words of encouragement

Cadell felt a sense of déjà vu, remembering their first visit to the range, how Samiha had brushed him off when he’d tried to help. A part of him didn’t want to go through that again, but another part of him, the one that strived to get his unusual squad through the program, insisted that he give her another chance. Shaliyya had done the same once, there was nothing to be lost by following in her image.

He put down his half-assembled weapon and made his way down the booths, stopping behind Samiha’s. She noticed him, cocking her head back to give him a brief glance.

“Cadell,” she said, returning her eye to the rear sight of her submachine gun. “What do you want?”

She wasn’t being rude, but she was clearly frustrated with her lack of progress.

“I want to give you some pointers,” he answered. “cause you need them. The question is whether you’re gonna to shrug me off again.”

“I…” She trailed off, shooting her weapon a hateful look. “It jumps too much in my hands, I can’t control more than a few shots, if that.”

“Don’t blame the equipment, blame the…” He was about to finish the saying with user, but decided now wasn’t the time for insults. “Never mind. Wait here.”

He dipped away for a minute, Samiha tilting her head as he presented an attachment. “You and Kazlu are comfortable with the submachine-gun variant, right? Complement your shields with a fast, light-weight weapon. If I were you, I’d use a foregrip like this one. Know how to put it on?”

She attached it with practiced speed, Cadell giving her a nod.

“Okay, try that out.”

The gripped the vertical hold in her left hand, the trigger with her right. She sent a burst downrange, grumbling under her breath at the results, Cadell watching on in silence.

He watched her empty the whole magazine, then stepped into the booth with her, the alien ejecting the mag well with a annoyed flick.

“So… a couple things,” Cadell said. “You’re holdin’ it like you’re tryin’ to wrangle a crocodile. It’s not gonna blow up in your face, Samiha, don’t have to be afraid of it.”

Samiha rubbed the back of her neck, a very human gesture she must have picked up at some point.

“Hey, I’m not tryin’ to embarrass you or nothin’,” he added, giving her a sympathetic glance. “You’re workin’ with human technology, nobody’s expectin’ you to master it in a couple weeks. Or, uh, months,” he added, correcting himself.

“Thanks for the reminder,” she said, rolling her eyes.

“You just need a couple pointers is all,” he added. “If you want them.”

She grumbled under her breath again, letting it all out in a conceitful sigh.

“Yes…”

“Let’s do it then,” he said, glad they were making some progress together. She held out her coilgun, but Cadell shook his head. “No, you hang onto that for now. Set yourself up to fire.”

Samiha assumed her firing stance, gripping the coilgun like it was a handmade explosive with a short fuse. Cadell moved to her other side, appraising her arms.

“No, no,” he muttered. “bring yourself down here, so I can reach.”

Samiha got to a knee, and even while crouched, she and him were practically eye-level, her size as distracting as ever.

“Loosen up your trigger hand,” he said. “Yeah, like that. Hold the foregrip a little higher towards the barrel. Like this.”

He reached out and took her hand, her warm feathers tickling his skin. He expected her to retaliate, or say some underhand remark, but none of that happened. The feathers along her arms did bristle, but she didn’t try to pull away, her amber eyes dilating as she allowed him to manipulate her arm.

“There,” he said. “Now, pull the stock into the shoulder. Firmly, but not too tight. Yeah, good. Remember, don’t hold the handle too tight, or the stress’ gonna nip you in the bud.”

She adjusted herself according to his directions, Cadell encouraging her to peer down the sights. “Keep both eyes open,” he advised. “but focus your dominant eye on the rear sight. You want to keep your target just over that little pin there, see it?”

He leaned over the top rail and pointed at the front iron sight, his face close enough to her beak that he could feel the breeze of her breaths. He detected some sort of flavour in the air, something like mint or maybe tea leaves, Cadell wondering if the aliens used toothpaste or mouthwash.

“I’ve got it,” Samiha said, Cadell moving out of her personal space.

“We’ll see. Aim in, and remember what I told you.”

She leaned into the sight, her nostrils flaring as she took a shaky breath.

“Fire after breathing out,” he added. “Don’t squeeze the trigger, just pull it using your first two knuckles. Don’t anticipate the recoil, your shoulder will the work for you. Now shoot.”

She fired off a round, the two looking down the range. The paper around the neck of the target had been ripped open.

“That’s the ticket!” Cadell encouraged, Samiha’s feathers roiling in excitement. “Now readjust, and try it while standing.”

Over the next thirty or so minutes, the two of them split their time between fine-tuning her weapon and practicing on the targets. Over three hundred rounds later, Samiha was landing consecutive headshots. Her aim was a little off-kilter at the longer ranges, but she was using the close-quarters variant of the coilgun.

He showed her how to improve her basic resting and aiming stances, showing her how to take advantage of a lightweight gun and make her movements snappy. Not only had her marksmanship improved, but the usually disgruntled avian was enjoying herself, Cadell catching a few grins here and there as she customised and tested her gun. He could hardly believe the sight.

“I’ll admit one thing,” Samiha said after her final test fire, the heat sinks on her gun burning bright. “There is a certain satisfaction to the kick of a coilgun. Laser weaponry does not have that.” She turned to him. “I appreciate you, Cadell, for showing me what you know.”

He blinked at her odd choice of words. Odd, but not unwelcome, Cadell grinning up at her.

“No trouble. It’s what a Kith’sla would do, wouldn’t they? Maybe one day you’ll teach me how to use one of your shields.”

“There isn’t too much to it,” Samiha replied, packing up her gear, the two walking back toward the workshop half of the armoury. “There are buttons on the bottom of the sleeve to control the settings, and the hard light is practically weightless. The real issue is remembering not to touch them directly.”

“How come?”

“Hardlight protection – real ones, not the ones in the simulation - generate a lot of heat overtime, not unlike the heatsinks on your weapons. It won’t singe your feathers – or hair in your case – but after sustained laser fire, the light captures the heat until you may as well be covering yourself with a wall of flame. And knowing the signs of when your barrier is about to break is crucial in a firefight.”

“And what are the signs?” he asked.

“The subtle change in colour, and a slight hissing sound are the most obvious signs of a breakage. You once asked me how much damage a handheld barrier can take, and the answer isn’t simple. Testing is usually done with laser fire, but when the Clan was trapped in the Nebula all those months ago, it was the first time they were tested against supersonic bullets and tungsten shells.”

She placed her coilgun back in an empty rack, pausing for a moment with one hand on the stock.

“Some Sala’ci fighter craft couldn’t take more than a few moments of sustained fire,” she muttered. “Others were more fortunate, the damage spread over multiple sides of the barrier. All I know is, it did not stand up to Confederate firepower, and only a handful of our pilots made it out of that Nebula in the end.”

Her feathers flattened against her figure in worry, or maybe sadness. Cadell moved over to the rack so she could see him.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said. “I heard it was a brutal fight. Did you lose anyone you knew?”

“Everyone in the Clan is a known friend,” Samiha replied dismissively. “We don’t number in the billions like you humans, we are but hundreds of thousands, and every loss is felt by all clansman.”

She was reverting right back to her usual curtness, Cadell trying but failing to fight back a remark. “And how many human pilots died out there?” he countered. “Do you think their families didn’t feel that loss, too?”

Samiha’s amber eyes burned, then were quenched right after, the alien rubbing her hands on her forearms. “I… I did not mean to insinuate humans feel no loss. Talking about the Nebula is… it’s….”

“Not easy,” he suggested. Samiha nodded. He supposed having your entire community stuck in some gas clouds while the UEC hunted you down would be traumatic for anyone, maybe he should change the subject. “You call your shields hardlight,” he suddenly said. “How did Balokarids manage to make it? Even humans have never been able to make light into armour, and we’re supposed to be the advanced ones.”

Samiha noticed his little social manoeuvre, flashing him a grateful smile. “That is the thing, we didn’t make it,” she replied. “The original blueprints were plundered off what you call a Colossus wreckage, on the edge of the Balokar system. Our scientists theorised the entire vessel was surrounded by a barrier the size of a skyscraper, and we’ve taken the concept to heart ever since.”

“Which helped you skip you a few centuries worth of research, like the Mars wreckage did for us,” Cadell mused.

“Since our Clan was the one to discover it, we became the most powerful people on all of Balokar,” Samiha continued. “We could control how much of the material was exported to the rest of the planet, and every new discovered way of applying hardlight to our daily lives, we kept to ourselves. A selfish approach, but the most logical.”

“I doubt being the hoarders of C-loys made you popular,” Cadell said.

“On the contrary, our influence only expanded, with dozens of smaller Clans flocked to our borders with water in droves. It was a time of prosperity for the Kaalesh, but I’m not sure if it has still lasted. We have heard no news from the homeworld in many years.”