Don't stop when you're tired, stop when you're done.
I grumbled in annoyance as I fiddled with my suit, making sure it was in perfect condition. It had been three days since the discovery and the wait for the request to be processed by the relevant staff and when the reply came it wasn't what I had hoped for...
Request Denied.
Apparently I'm way more valuable as a researcher than a soldier... I have to admit they probably weren't wrong. On the other hand, they didn't completely shoot me down. Instead of being inserted in the class I was assigned to the instructor's pool as an observer.
At least I'm not being shipped back off to the lab, that'd have sucked...
Deciding that there was no point in brooding any longer I stood up and looked through my closet and made sure everything I’d gotten was folded and stored to absolute perfection, no point in blowing my cover within the first day by being shoddy. After checking my camo for the thousandth time I finally decided to stop procrastinating and go do something useful. The trainees wouldn’t be waking for a good three hours yet and after waking up any attempt at going to sleep again had failed so far.
I might have read up on how to act the part but I definitely don’t look like it…
I wasn’t going to like it but I needed to start working on my physical condition. The cover story that I was in recuperation from an accident would be good enough to fool them at the start, but if I didn’t put in the effort to lose my noodle arms then people were probably going to question that story. With a sigh, I grabbed the PT-gear and overall that was neatly folded up and quickly slipped into them, picking up a set of earbuds and heading off towards the base’s running track. At this hour most of the base’s facilities were closed so hitting the gym would have to wait until another time.
I guess if they’re not going to allow me to join the training itself I might as well go ahead and just do it by myself.
Entering the running track, I went ahead and did some stretches before heading onto the track to run for a good while. After going for about two hours, running and doing a couple of strength exercises, I headed back to my dorm to get cleaned up before the day’s start. A knock on the door drew my attention as I finished changing back to my cammies, ready for the start of the day.
“Yeah, who’s there?” I called out, grabbing my backpack and heading for the door.
“Corporal Nash, the LT wanted to speak to you.” I opened to find the corporal standing there, fairly relaxed. The human man had short brown hair and was fairly well built, looming over me with his rather impressive height.
“Thanks Corporal, I was about to go see him anyway,” I replied, closing the door behind me, following the soldier to the lieutenant’s office where he left me to see the officer on my own. Knocking on the door I waited to be let in.
“Enter!” a firm voice called out from inside, making me immediately step in and stand at attention.
“Sergeant Shimmer, Lieutenant!” I announced, the old man that sat at the table didn’t even look up from his console as I stood there.
“At ease. Take a seat, Sergeant.” Taking one of the chairs I sat across from the man, the aura radiating from the officer suddenly making me feel very small. “I don’t take kindly to ONI meddling on my base. What is your mission here?”
My heart skipped a beat as he looked up and his eyes felt like they were piercing my very soul. “I’m sorry sir, but-”
“I don’t want to hear the crap cover story,” the Lieutenant said blankly as I was about to give just that to him.
“Observation mission, sir. One of the trainees is the target but I cannot give you either the target or reason for the observation,” I sighed, the man was going to see right through any lie anyway. He huffed and pulled a cigar from his drawer and lit it up, I leaned a bit further back in my chair to get away from the smoke and looked slightly distasteful at the thing.
“What? Not like I will die young anyway,” he grunted. “I don’t like you being here but there are some people very high up that seem to want to keep you here. If you start a witch-hunt among my people for insurrectionists then your stay might turn a little less… hospitable.” When I swallowed and nodded in understanding, his attitude suddenly changed to be much more upbeat. “Good that you understand, you’re dismissed. Have a pleasant stay here.”
Standing up, I saluted the man and quickly made my way out of the office, not wanting to be there any second longer than absolutely necessary. Taking a deep breath that I’d been holding I orientated myself, looking for the way to the assembly area out front. The trainees were already assembled there and the staff was also getting ready for the day as I added myself to their ranks.
“Trainees! Attention!” A sergeant major called out as all of the trainees immediately followed the order, their respective group leaders reporting the state of their groups. “At ease! As of today, we’ll have another instructor added to our pool! Sergeant Shimmer!” I stepped forward and stood at attention. “The sergeant has been out of rotation due to an injury for a while and will be added to the instructor pool for alpha group. The group leaders can report to the appropriate staff to get their instructions for the week. The timetable for today is available on the main board. Dismissed!”
The groups immediately broke apart as their leaders went to get their information.
“Looks like we’ll be seeing more of each other,” I looked over my shoulder to see corporal Nash standing behind me with a grin on his face. “Alpha group are a tough bunch, might even get a couple of ODST’s out of them.”
“Sound like they’re a hell of a group then. Anyone in particular to watch out for?” The corporal nodded and pointed at exactly my target.
“Miska Natália. She’s the quiet person of the group, usually not the person you expect to step up as the leader of a group but she’s… different. Really smart and has a gut so well attuned that it’s scary, the others trust her because she always knows when shit is about to hit the fan.” Nash explained as I looked and grinned as a devious plan formed in my mind.
“Well, I guess that we’ll just have to fool that sense somehow then.”
I loaded blanks into my MA5 as I finished preparation. I’d learned quickly over the previous weeks, teaching myself the entire content of the handbook in record time and drilling myself to make sure my cover would hold. That left me here in the field with the alpha group, along with bravo and charlie, keeping watch of a certain objective and camouflaged in the treeline.
Let’s see if their watch isn’t asleep.
I grinned deviously as I looked at my fellow instructors, all of us wearing ghillie suits. We’d have three hours to slowly sneak across the open field and scare the living crap out of our trainees. The staff of the other groups would be doing the exact same thing to their groups as well.
“See you at the treeline, Shimmer,” Nash grinned, his white teeth glistening in the moonlight while his face was obfuscated by the camo covering it in the darkness.
“Not if you get yourself caught before that,” I shot back, the corporal putting a hand on his chest as if hurt.
“Ouch, tough talk coming from you redhead. Careful that that bacon hair doesn’t give you away… or that blush.” He said with a savage grin on his face while my face went red. Nash waved his hand in a suggestive manner and winked before he disappeared into the darkness. The blush on my face only spread further as I closed the lid on the small tritium light used in our preparation.
Jerk… Stop blushing god damnit!
After wiping the blush from my face I followed the others into the field and started crawling. The journey to the other side of the field was quite the undertaking as we did everything to avoid making noise or moving too fast, not wanting to get noticed. The others were just a mass of black slightly more elevated than the tall grass we were laying in, totally silent as after little over an hour of sneaking forward we found ourselves at the edge of the other forest.
This is where I come in...
I held my hand under my gilly suit to avoid lighting our position up as a beacon or to show the others my unique ability. It lit up as magic flowed into it, the matrix formed making sure that any other magic in the area would be neutralized.
There, that should keep our surprise intact.
“Up!” Sergeant Wilson, the leader of alpha group’s staff ordered. The three of us rose from the grass and moved forward in a spread formation, weapons high on the observation post manned by our group. I brought up the left flank, Sarge Wilson in the middle and the corporal on the right. Everyone was sound asleep as we found the small pit they’d chosen as sleeping spots. The corporal had broken off at the observation post and was waiting for the signal from the other instructors who were still getting in position.
“Execute.” The order came over the net, pins from the flashbangs on my belt were pulled and tossed into the pit and looked away.
BANG!
BANG!
BANG!
All throughout the forest strip explosions went off followed by gunfire as all the instructors emptied their magazines into the unsuspecting trainees who were scrambling in panic. The excitement was double for us as our group had avoided ambushes on multiple occasions due to Miska’s ability, it was starting to give me, the sarge, and the corporal a bad rep with the other instructors. Speaking of Miska, she had jumped up from her sleeping bag relatively close to me and in a panic she’d run over towards me, taking a swing. Time slowed as I saw her hand glow in a dim green hue as it approached me.
Ah, crap…
Countering her move I raised my left arm and lighting my hand up with red magic, quickly forming a small shield around it to catch the incoming fist. Had I not been a mage of Equestria, that fist would have probably shattered a good number of ribs but in this case the fist just bounced off. The amount of magic put into the punch was pathetic compared to the ocean of arcane energy poured into the small shield which dissipated immediately after knocking the Reach local flat on her ass. Everyone froze as they looked over at me, some of them in confusion because they hadn’t seen and others because they had.
“Your watch fell asleep,” I sternly stated, acting as if nothing was wrong while every eye was focussed on me. I’d quickly gotten used to the attention over the last couple of weeks, so my cocky side was showing itself again every now and then. “Everyone here’s dead now, thank the people in the observation post later.” I turned and headed off to see how the corporal was doing.
“Wait!” I glanced over my shoulder to see Miska with an astonished expression plastered on her face, not that it stopped me from making my way over to the corporal. “How did you do that?! I’ve never met anyone who could do stuff like that as well!”
A grimace found itself onto my face, I wasn’t sure how much I could tell her. “It’s rare,” I admitted, after getting out of earshot from the others.
“How rare? Are there more like us? And how is it that I can’t sense what’s going to happen?!” Miska asked with excitement.
“Don’t know, one in a couple million? Yes, there are. I made sure you can’t sense anything,” I answered in order, stopping to face the trainee. “Do you even know what you have access to?”
She shrugged. “I just call it magic.”
“Pretty much,” I answered, Miska taking a step back in shock. “Though I must now inform you as well that from this point on you can’t talk about your ability to anyone on section three’s authority.” Pulling an ID from a pocket in my jacket below the gilly suit I showed the ONI credentials, making Miska set another step back. Not in shock this time, but fear.
“...Section three? You’re a spook?!”
I jumped around to see Nash standing behind me, an incredulous expression on his face. Sighing as it was clear the jig was up I gave him a nod, showing the ONI credentials to him as well.
“The fuck Shimmer, what the hell is a spook doing at a training facility?” the corporal asked, his tone of voice slightly offended.
I turned back to Miska who still looked very scared at me. “Observing her. She’s… interesting. I’m sure you’re going to find out about that very soon.”
“What’s going to happen now?” Miska asked, interrupting me and the corporal.
“To be honest, I don’t know. I’m going to have to report this to the higher-ups but if their position on this is anything like it has been until now I’ll get the final call on whatever it is.” This did not relieve Miska of any of her doubts in the slightest. I sighed as I approached the woman. “I’m not going to ship you off, that serves me no purpose at all, but our relationship will change significantly… because that punch was absolutely pathetic.”
“Excuse me!” she exclaimed, severely offended. I only reacted by letting a significant amount of magic flow out of my wellspring into my body, to Miska and Nash feeling as if gravity had turned towards me. My irises were glowing with magic as I looked into the fellow mage’s eyes.
“There’s so much you don’t know… But I can teach you.” Holding out a hand to her I waited for Miska to shake. She slowly stepped towards me and brought her hand forward, grasping my hand as if doing so would crush her own. A small smile forming on her face as none of that happened.
“I won’t disappoint, sarge.”