The countdown hit zero while Kaden was still tightening his gauntlet.
FINAL INTEGRATED COMBAT ASSESSMENT
STATUS: ACTIVE
The HUD tag that had been ticking down for three days flipped from a timer to a hard blue bar across the top of his vision. No fanfare. Just text and a quiet pressure behind his eyes.
“Cadets, move it,” someone barked down the corridor. “Armor check in the bay. You’re late, you don’t board.”
Kaden sealed the gauntlet, flexed his fingers once, and jogged after the others.
The staging bay felt different when it mattered.
Same rows of rifles. Same overhead strips. Same floor markings. But the air had that tight, metallic taste it got before a storm.
Half a dozen squads had already formed in chalked rectangles. Instructors moved between them, tugging straps, slapping plates, ripping unsecured mags out of pouches with creative profanity.
Kaden dropped by the med crate with his squad tag on it and popped it open.
Foam cans. Dressings. Tourniquets. Injectors.
They lay in molded sockets, neat and color-coded. Thumb-length cylinders with keyed tips meant for armor ports: flaps in the undersuit at the neck, ribs, thighs, arms. Press, twist, and the suit did the rest.
Green rings: basic painkillers.
Yellow: analgesic plus mild stimulant.
Red: last-resort combat cocktail that Corin had described with a warning and a grim look.
His HUD tagged the one he picked up.
COMBAT INJECTOR – MIX A (ANALGESIC / MILD STIM)
DOSE LIMIT: 2 / 24H (RECOMMENDED)
“Mercer,” Corin called. “Left side. You’re with Second Squad, Blue Group.”
Kaden snapped the crate shut, grabbed the handle, and jogged over.
Navarro stood in their chalk box with her helmet under one arm, rifle slung, knee bouncing. Song was next to her, gear tight, fingers tapping against his thigh.
Navarro looked up as Kaden stepped in.
“About time, Mercer,” she said. “Was starting to think you chickened out.”
“In your dreams,” Kaden said, setting the med kit down at his boots.
The rest of the squad filtered in: two riflemen, Li and Hart; Vargas, the heavy, with extra plating and a folded shield on his back; Delgado, tech, cables coiled along her harness.
Corin joined them at the front, helmet clipped to her belt, arms crossed.
A captain strode to the center of the bay. Dress blacks under his armor, Hegemony crest high, voice that cut without needing to shout.
“This is how it’s going to work,” he said. “Listen once. Aurora isn’t pausing for anyone who zones out.”
Silence rolled outward. In the corner of Kaden’s HUD, the external feed showed the training hulk in orbit: a welded abomination of Opp and human hull plates, deliberately ugly.
“You’ve spent four years learning how not to die,” the captain said. “Congratulations. Today we see how much of that stuck.”
He let that breathe a moment.
“You’ll be shuttled to Training Hulk Sigma,” he went on. “Enemy emulation based on recent Opposition tactics along the midline corridors. Live munitions, reduced lethality. Smart armor will dampen impact and trigger auto-med if you go critical. You can still break bones. You can still lose teeth. Friendly fire is logged and weighted heavily. Do not shoot each other.”
No one laughed.
“Your implants will handle your HUD,” he continued. “Ship node is in observation-mode only. No cozy outlines. No projected cover. No triage arrows. You get basic metrics: HP, ammo, AP, squad tags, and a single objective marker. If you can’t work with that, Andromeda will eat you.”
Kaden’s HUD obligingly stripped itself bare. Squad list on the left. His own vitals at the bottom. A faint diamond floating ahead in the ship’s schematic: [PRIMARY OBJECTIVE].
“We are testing three things,” the captain said. “Can you breach. Can you move under fire. Can you keep your people in the fight. You will be graded individually and as units. Performance will inform initial postings.”
Navarro’s boot nudged his. He didn’t look; he didn’t need to.
“Final note,” the captain said. “This scenario is based on a recent engagement in the Erebus Corridor. That offensive has been redeployed for strategic reasons you don’t need to worry your pretty heads about. What you should worry about is that your enemies are not idiots. Expect flanking. Expect rear assaults. Expect to be cut off. They use tactics. You will respond with tactics of your own. Clear?”
“Yes, sir,” the bay answered.
“Good. Group assignments and boarding order are in your HUDs. Instructors, load them.”
Kaden’s slate updated.
BLUE GROUP – STACK 2
SQUAD: 2
LEAD: NAVARRO
HEAVY: VARGAS
TECH: DELGADO
RIFLEMEN: SONG / LI / HART
MEDIC: MERCER
INSTR OBS: CORIN
Navarro’s eyebrows climbed when she saw “LEAD.” Her knuckles whitened on the rifle.
“Congrats,” Song murmured. “You’re in charge of our continued breathing.”
“Shut up and stack up,” Navarro said, but the edge under it was real.
Corin stepped into their box.
“You heard Fleet Daddy,” she said. “Navarro on point. Vargas and I behind her. Mercer, you’re central—close enough to the front to see, far enough back not to catch the first round. Song, Li, Hart, float on call. Delgado, you’re welded to Vargas unless Navarro says otherwise.”
Her eyes hardened.
“You get hit, you call it,” she said. “You get scared, you call it. You think you’re fine, you call it. I do not want to see in the logs that someone tried to walk on a broken leg because they didn’t want to look weak.”
“Yes, ma’am,” they answered.
Her gaze landed on Kaden.
“Remember your pillars,” she said, low enough that it was mostly for him. “Move. Decide. Talk. In that order. You freeze for more than three seconds on a casualty, I bounce a training round off your helmet myself.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Kaden said.
“Helmets on.”
He sealed his helmet. The implant sync tugged at the back of his neck. The bay folded into HUD and audio.
HP: 100/100
AP: 5/5
ARMOR: NOMINAL
TRAUMA RESPONSE – LVL 1 (ACTIVE)
The trait didn’t glow. It just settled into him like an anchor. Less shake. Less tunnel. The procedures he’d drilled felt closer to the surface.
“Blue Group, Stack Two, load up,” the pilot called.
They filed into the shuttle in order. Navarro on the forward bench by the ramp. Vargas beside her. Kaden took the middle bench between Song and Delgado, med kit at his boots, rifle across his thighs. Corin hung onto the rear rail.
The shuttle detached with a jolt. Gravity shifted and then stabilized. No one talked much.
APPROACHING TRAINING HULK SIGMA
IMPACT-PROTECTED LIVE-FIRE EXERCISE
Sigma grew on the feed: a monstrosity of scavenged hull, an Opp ghost wearing human scars.
“Sigma’s a patchwork,” Corin said on squad net. “Opp modules, human modules, some built just to screw with you. Corners lie. Cover lies. Navarro, don’t trust any doorway you didn’t make yourself.”
“Copy,” Navarro said. Her voice was steadier now.
The shuttle thunked into the docking collar. Magnetic clamps bit.
“Blue Group, Stack Two,” the pilot said. “You’re green. Breach in thirty seconds.”
The timer appeared in Kaden’s HUD.
00:27
He let his breathing fall into the rhythm he’d drilled: in for four, hold, out for four. His hands stayed steady on the rifle.
Nine weeks ago, they wouldn’t have.
00:09
“Remember,” Corin said. “No one’s dying today. It just feels like they might.”
00:00
The ramp dropped.
Noise and light hit like a slap.
The docking collar was a tight metal throat with hazard stripes peeling along the walls. At the far end, an Opp hatch hunched in its frame: harsh, ugly angles.
“Stack,” Navarro snapped. “Vargas with me. Song, Hart, left. Li, right. Mercer, center. Delgado and Corin, rear.”
They moved like they’d done this a hundred times in sims because they had. Vargas clanked up to the hatch with his shield half-deployed. Navarro slapped a charge plate on the metal, palmed the detonator, and waved them back.
“Breach in three. Two. One.”
The charge popped. The hatch didn’t explode; it folded, smart material crumpling inward like it had lost an argument with gravity, leaving a jagged hole.
Vargas stepped through first, shield raised. Rounds smacked into the composite with teeth-rattling thuds. His HP dipped.
VARGAS – HP: 88/100
“Contact,” he grunted.
Navarro swung right of the shield. Song swung left. Kaden flowed after them, rifle up.
Two automated turrets perched high in the chamber, spitting reduced-lethality rounds. Red sights swept for targets.
“Kaden, left turret,” Navarro barked. “Song, right. Vargas, hold.”
“Got it,” Kaden said.
He leaned out past Vargas’s shield, shouldered the rifle, sighted high left. The turret slewed toward him, targeting beam sliding over his chest. He squeezed off a tight two-round burst. The first shot punched through the housing. The second shattered whatever passed for a sensor.
Sparks flew. The turret died.
Song took the other a heartbeat later.
Silence crashed down, broken only by Vargas’s breathing.
“Check hits,” Navarro said. “Vargas?”
“Suit says I’m fine,” Vargas said. “Feels like someone hit me with a truck.”
His HP ticked up as the suit’s impact gel redistributed.
VARGAS – HP: 92/100
“Everyone else?” Navarro asked.
“Clean,” Kaden said, sweeping the room, muzzle tracking corners and vents. “No movement.”
“Then we move,” Navarro said. “We’re on the clock.”
If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
The next corridor was a dim, narrow tube. The objective diamond pulsed faintly ahead and below.
“Remember, this is an Erebus pattern,” Song said. “They like hitting from—”
“Song,” Navarro said. “If something awful happens, I’m blaming you personally.”
“That seems statistically dubious,” he said.
They advanced in a staggered column. Vargas at point, shield half-up. Navarro and Song behind, watching opposite sides. Kaden just behind them, watching for movement and listening for pain.
Opp-emulation drones popped out of an alcove without warning.
They were all hard lines and ugly armor—a caricature of an Opp marine. Rounds sparked against bulkheads. One smacked into Kaden’s chest plate hard enough to knock the wind out of him.
KADEN – HP: 92/100
He grunted, dropped his center of gravity, and returned fire, putting three rounds into the drone’s upper chest. It jerked and went down.
Hart wasn’t as lucky. A round slipped in at the seam between his chest plate and upper arm.
HART – HP: 47/100
Hart cursed and dropped to one knee, rifle clattering. Blood bloomed under the edge of his plate.
“Contact left,” Navarro snapped. “Song, Li, clear them. Vargas, hold the lane. Mercer, Hart’s yours.”
“On it,” Kaden said.
He put one more shot into a drone trying to swing its gun his way, then ducked in behind a protruding strut.
“Cover,” he barked.
Song shifted, putting a burst over Kaden’s head that smacked another drone back into the alcove. Opp fire slowed.
Kaden dropped by Hart, rifle sling tight across his chest.
“Hurts like hell,” Hart grunted.
“Good,” Kaden said. “Means it’s working.”
He popped the armor flap at Hart’s upper arm, exposing the undersuit’s injection port: a small, shallow socket glowing faintly to indicate intact seal.
The wound was messy, but not spraying and not bubbling. No red flags for lungs.
Extremity hit. Pain, mobility, morale.
He thumbed a green-ring injector.
COMBAT INJECTOR – ANALGESIC (GREEN)
CONFIRM ADMINISTRATION: HART (Y/N)
Kaden confirmed, pushed it into the port, and twisted. The keyed tip locked; the suit chimed softly.
HART – ANALGESIC DOSE 1/2 (24H)
Hart sucked in a sharp breath as the drug hit, then let it out slowly.
“Wrap,” Kaden said.
He slapped a sealant patch over the entry point, pressed, and held until the foam filled and hardened.
HART – HP: 47 → 54/100
“You can move?” Kaden asked.
“Yeah,” Hart said, flexing his hand. “Still works.”
“Keep it tucked,” Kaden said. “You’re still shooting, just not showing off.”
By the time he picked his rifle back up, the drones were scrap metal. Song nudged one with his boot.
“Cheap, angry toasters,” Song muttered.
“Move,” Navarro said. “We’re not here to clean.”
The junction made Kaden’s stomach flip.
Four corridors met in a cross. Crates and welded plates offered cover. The objective marker pulsed faintly down the far passage.
His brain flashed an overlay from Corin’s lecture: blue dots, red triangles, Koss, Harrow.
The ambush hit from front and rear before the thought finished.
Opp fire chewed the edges of their cover. Rounds hammered Vargas’s shield. Muzzle flashes flared in the corridor behind them, from instructors in Opp-pattern armor.
VARGAS – HP: 71/100
LI – HP: 63/100
Kaden dropped behind a crate, shoulder slamming into cold metal. Bullets chewed chips off the lip as he leaned out and fired a quick burst down the forward corridor, dropping one drone that had tried to rush Vargas’s shield.
“Front and rear,” Navarro shouted. “Vargas, hold front. Song, Li, rear. Hart, float with me. Mercer—”
“I know,” Kaden said. “I’ve got them.”
Li screamed.
“Leg!” he gasped. “Shit—”
LI – HP: 39/100
Blood splashed the deck under Li’s thigh, bright droplets bouncing off the plating in time with his pulse.
“Rear’s hot,” Song snarled. “Tagged, but still up.”
SONG – HP: 58/100
Song’s HP dipped but leveled. By the way he moved, it was upper arm again. Still shooting.
Navarro’s HP dropped in a brutal chunk.
NAVARRO – HP: 70/100
“Helmet scrape. I’m fine,” she snapped. “Keep fire up.”
Three hits. Three voices. Front and back. Leader rocked. Junction trying to turn into Rampart.
Trauma Response keyed in, bringing everything into focus instead of letting it collapse.
He didn’t wait for panic. He spent AP.
[TRAINING LOAN] TRIAGE ASSIST – AVAILABLE
AP: 5/5
AP: 4/5
TRIAGE ASSIST – LVL 1 – ACTIVE (08s)
Li’s HP bar lit, a predictive drop curve flashing over it in angry orange. At this bleed rate, he had seconds. Song’s HP line was jagged but shallowing out. Navarro’s was flat and stable.
Airway, breathing, circulation. Mobility. Firepower.
“Song,” Kaden barked. “Rear suppression. Do not stop shooting.”
“Already on it,” Song said, voice tight.
“Navarro, you still see?” Kaden asked.
“Yeah,” she said. “Just pissed off.”
“Then you’re not mine,” Kaden said. “Li, down now.”
He popped up long enough to put two rounds into a drone that had tried to flank Vargas, then dove into the blood at Li’s side.
“Hold still,” Kaden said. “You’re not dying in a school sim.”
“Feels like it,” Li hissed.
“Then you need practice,” Kaden said.
He pressed his gloved hand over the ragged hole in Li’s thigh, feeling the hot, hammering thumps of an artery going wrong. He popped the armor flap at the thigh port with his wrist, grabbed a yellow-ring injector.
COMBAT INJECTOR – MIX A (ANALGESIC / MILD STIM)
CONFIRM ADMINISTRATION: LI (Y/N)
He confirmed, jammed the injector into the port, twisted.
LI – MIX A DOSE 1/2 (24H)
Li hissed.
“That’s...warm,” he said.
“Good,” Kaden said. “Means it’s in your blood and not the floor.”
He ripped a sealant patch, slammed it over the wound, and leaned into it. Foam surged, then hardened under his palm. The bleed slowed, then stopped.
LI – HP: 39 → 44 → 49/100
“Hands,” Kaden said, grabbing Li’s wrists and planting them on the patch. “Pressure. If you let go, I will tell Corin you volunteered for extra sim time.”
“Copy,” Li groaned.
TRIAGE ASSIST – EXPIRED
The extra clarity dropped away. It didn’t matter. The order was set.
Kaden’s rifle was still slung tight across his chest. He slid along the crate, swung out enough to dump a short burst down the rear corridor, forcing a drone back, then ducked to Hart.
“You good?” Kaden asked.
“Old hole still hurts,” Hart said. “No new ones.”
“Rear cover, then,” Kaden said. “If anything gets clever behind us, kill it.”
“Gladly,” Hart said.
Up front, Vargas pushed two steps forward under Navarro’s orders, shield absorbing rounds. Navarro’s fire was sharp and ugly. Drones fell.
“Junction is ours,” she called a moment later.
The rear corridor still spat occasional rounds. Song and Hart answered with controlled bursts.
“Mercer,” Corin murmured on a private channel. “How long?”
Kaden knew what she meant.
“Half a second,” he said.
“Shave it again next time,” Corin replied. “Someone else’s last breath lives there.”
The rest of the push hurt in a more familiar way.
They moved slower, wounded limping but still shooting. Li’s gait got steadier as the mix A and foam did their work. Hart’s calf complained every time he planted that leg, but his rear-watch aim didn’t waver. Song’s arm moved stiffly; he refused a dose with a grunt and “it’s only a sim, save it for when I’m actually lovable.”
Kaden checked injector counts anyway.
HART – ANALGESIC DOSE 1/2
LI – MIX A DOSE 1/2
SONG – NO DOSE
VARGAS – NO DOSE
Red rings stayed untouched.
The objective-room corridor was a long, straight throat with an Opp slab at the end and cover that looked like a bad joke.
“Feels friendly,” Song muttered. “In the way a loaded trap feels friendly.”
“Delgado,” Navarro said. “Door’s yours.”
Delgado jogged to the access port beside the hatch, already feeding a cable from her wrist rig into it.
“Simmed Opp encryption,” she said. “Fat node. Give me twenty seconds.”
“You get ten,” Navarro said.
“Nine seconds is rude,” Delgado muttered, fingers flying.
Drones poked around corners at the far end, firing off probing shots. Vargas braced the shield and took them. Navarro and Song returned fire in disciplined bursts. Kaden picked off one that tried to crawl up a side wall.
The hatch hissed and slid aside.
“Ten seconds,” Delgado said. “You’re welcome.”
The objective room was wide and busy: consoles, cables, gantries, and a central column pulsing soft Aurora-blue. A mock data core. Drones crouched behind machinery, guns already swinging toward the doorway.
“Go,” Navarro snapped.
Vargas stepped in and took the first storm of rounds on his shield.
VARGAS – HP: 63/100
Navarro cut left. Song cut right. Kaden flowed after Navarro, rifle already tracking.
A drone rose from behind a console, muzzle leveling toward Navarro. Kaden put two rounds through its chest, one through its head. It jerked and dropped.
“Thanks,” Navarro grunted, not looking back.
“Forward left’s clear,” Kaden called.
Drones on the gantry tried for height advantage. Song cut one down. Kaden caught another with a three-round burst when it leaned too far out.
The room went quiet in pulses. Fire, return fire, then the echo of rounds smacking into metal and nothing else.
“Delgado,” Navarro said. “Core.”
Delgado slid to the central pillar and jacked in.
“Ghost data,” she said. “Give me a second.”
Kaden moved to the inner ring, scanning, rifle barrel tracing arcs over doorways and shadowed alcoves.
Vargas shifted his weight—and a drone on its side got off one last spiteful shot.
The round nicked between his plates, into his thigh.
VARGAS – HP: 51/100
“Hit,” Vargas grunted. “Leg.”
“I’ve got you,” Kaden said.
He stayed in motion even as he moved to Vargas, keeping his rifle angled so he could still throw rounds downrange if something moved.
“Mercer, don’t get fancy,” Navarro warned. “We’re not dying for a sim node.”
“Working on prevention, not style,” Kaden said.
He ducked behind the shield, flipped the thigh port flap open, grabbed a green-ring injector.
COMBAT INJECTOR – ANALGESIC (GREEN)
CONFIRM ADMINISTRATION: VARGAS (Y/N)
Confirm. Press. Twist.
VARGAS – ANALGESIC DOSE 1/2
He slapped a sealant patch on the wound, pressing until the foam stopped trying to push his hand away.
VARGAS – HP: 51 → 57/100
“You’re good,” Kaden said. “You’ll hate stairs.”
“Do I look like I like stairs?” Vargas said, lifting the shield again.
“Got it,” Delgado announced. “Node says we’ve stolen whatever we were supposed to steal.”
PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: CORE ROOM SECURED
“Don’t relax,” Corin said. “You know what the scenario wants next.”
The counterattack hit like a script cue.
Drones surged in the corridors outside, turning the doorway into a fire tunnel again.
“Delgado, move,” Navarro snapped. “We’re punching out. Vargas, on me. Song, Hart, Li, suppression in bursts. Mercer, call anyone below forty. I don’t care who.”
“Copy,” Kaden said.
Vargas pushed into the doorway, shield taking the first wave. Navarro fired over the top. Song and Hart alternated, popping out to hose the corridor when Vargas shifted. Li leaned into the other side, propped against the wall, putting nasty, accurate shots into drones that tried to swing wide.
Kaden moved with them in the center, rifle up, triage running in his peripheral vision like a separate process.
Vargas hovered in the fifties. Li stayed in the high forties. Hart’s wrapped leg grumbled in the low forties but held. Song’s HP hung stubbornly in the mid-forties. No one plunged through the floor.
He had yellow and red rings left. He kept them.
They fought their way back through the corridor, into the familiar junction. The sim tried one last half-hearted flanking move with a few drones. Hart nailed one. Song caught another. Navarro drilled the last one as it tried to use a crate as cover.
Then Aurora decided it had seen enough.
SIM TERMINATION CONDITION MET
ALL PRIMARY OBJECTIVES: COMPLETE
TEAM STATUS: ALL PARTICIPANTS ABOVE CRITICAL HP
The world froze.
Rounds hung in midair for a heartbeat, then evaporated. Drones turned to wireframes and then vanished. Pain feeds dropped to warm afterglow. Blood faded from armor and deck in a slow dissolve.
Kaden’s knees wanted to fold now that his body understood it was over. He locked them and stayed upright, one hand on the nearest crate.
Helmet seals hissed in a staggered chorus as cadets lifted them. The air tasted like sweat and metal and recycled oxygen.
Navarro ripped her helmet off, dragged the back of her wrist across her forehead, smearing a faint ghost of cleaned-away blood.
“That sucked,” she said.
“Welcome to work,” Corin said, stepping into the middle of the intersection. Her armor was immaculate. “Form up. No one passes out without my say so.”
They clustered around her, breathing hard. Vargas tested his leg. Li flexed his thigh. Song rolled his shoulder and winced.
Corin flicked her fingers, eyes unfocusing briefly as a holo only she could see came up.
“Good news,” she said. “You didn’t die. No one dropped under thirty. You hit the primary objective inside the window. You extracted under fire without leaving anyone behind. On a real hull, with auto-docs awake, that probably would’ve been enough to get you all back to some kind of bunk.”
She paused.
“Probably,” she said.
“Bad news,” she went on. “Your movement in the first corridors was sloppy. Navarro, your stack was too tight at the second corner. A real grenade would’ve made a trench art project out of half of you. Vargas, you overcommitted your shield twice. Li, you were late calling your first hit. Song, you got greedy in that rear corridor. Hart moved to compensate and your fire almost walked across his spine.”
She shifted her gaze to Kaden.
“And Mercer,” she said. “You still hesitate.”
Kaden felt eyes flick his way, then back to Corin.
“Half a second,” he said.
“Better than the second and a half you started with,” Corin said. “You looked at Navarro when she took that helmet scrape. Then you went to the person who was actually dying first. Li’s leg was the right priority. Hart second. Navarro last. She stayed in the fight the whole time. Aurora agrees. Triage logged as optimal for this scenario. Squad mortality odds shaved by eight percent.”
“Only eight?” Navarro said, bumping her shoulder into Kaden’s. “Slacker.”
“You want higher numbers, go argue with the System,” Corin said. “It loves feedback.”
She flicked the holo away.
“Overall: Blue Group, Stack Two performed above Academy average,” she said. “That is not cause for celebration. That is cause for Fleet to look at your files and say, ‘We can use these idiots somewhere the shooting is real.’ Aurora’s flagged you. Logs are already shipping to the people who care.”
Song lifted a hand halfway.
“Question,” he said. “Do we get points for crying later, or is that pass/fail?”
“Crying is extra credit,” Corin said. “Do it somewhere that isn’t my junction.”
Exhausted laughter rippled through the squad.
“Get out of my sight,” she said. “Turn your gear in. Hydrate. Eat. Try not to concuss yourselves between now and graduation. Fleet hates damaged goods.”
They filed out.
The staging bay felt hollow on the way back.
Kaden stripped his armor, racking plates in order. His undersuit clung damp to his skin. His hands, steady in the fight, had finally started to shake. He let them, now.
Navarro yanked her chest plate off at the next rack over.
“You did good,” she said, not looking at him.
“We all did,” Kaden said.
“Don’t spread it around,” Navarro muttered. “I’ve got a reputation to not have.”
Song dropped his helmet into its cradle, rubbing his arm.
“Next assessment,” Song said, “I want one where no one shoots at us and Aurora just gives us all naps and candy.”
“That’s called propaganda,” Navarro said. “You get to watch that, not live it.”
“Figures,” Song said.
Kaden pulled his HUD up one more time.
FINAL INTEGRATED COMBAT ASSESSMENT: COMPLETE
STATUS: PASSED
PERFORMANCE: ABOVE ACADEMY COHORT AVERAGE
FLAG: FRONTLINE-ELIGIBLE (MEDIC TRACK)
ASSIGNMENT QUEUE: PENDING
Plain. Clean. No fireworks.
He dismissed it and flexed his fingers. The tremor was already bleeding away.
Next time he did this, there wouldn’t be safeties and caps and instructors in Opp helmets watching from the stone-cold zones. There would be corridors that didn’t shut off when someone in a control room decided they’d seen enough.
And somewhere out there, on a ship he hadn’t stepped on yet, there’d be a squad with empty spaces in its fireteam, waiting to see if the Hegemony’s new combat medic could keep them shooting.
