They were led into a small reception hall that doubled as a classroom. It was yet another cramped up, multi purpose room. Crazy how a spaceport this size could have such a lack of space. Rust adorned the walls. Hissing pipes covered the ceiling. Folded tables to the side suggested that this room also served as some kind of mess. All in all, this room provided a stark contrast to the luxuriousness and spaciousness of the captain’s office.
Voss made sure to snatch himself a front row seat. Not because he had such a great interest in learning how to shoot, but because he needed all the help he could get to stay awake. He hoped the fear of having the sergeant smack him in the face would do just that.
When every man was seated, an instructor walked into the room. He introduced himself and gave them a small introductory talk. Voss failed to remember his name. It didn’t matter anyhow. Most of these names were irrelevant. You’d see them once or twice and then never again. Besides, you could always get away with calling them by rank. All Voss needed to know was that this instructor held a corporal’s rank.
He started off with yet another health and safety instruction video. At least this one was new to Voss. He drifted in and out of attentiveness as the video played on and only caught shreds of it. ‘Always keep your safety on outside of combat.’. ‘Keep your finger off the trigger until you are ready to fire.’. ‘Never point a loaded gun in anyone’s direction outside of combat, including yourself.’ It was all dumb drivel. Instructions and warnings that anyone with half a brain knew instinctively. Whomever made these videos seemed to assume their target audience consisted of imbeciles and those with a deathwish. He was more than a little surprised there were no warnings not to hug mines or eat grenades.
Voss glanced over to the weapons instructor. He looked bored and zoned out. The poor sob must have heard that same video play a thousand times by now. Voss wondered if the video haunted the instructor in his dreams. He imagined the video playing through each time the instructor closed his eyes. The idea made him chuckle.
The video ended and the instructor took over. ‘Alright, listen up. There are five main types of weapons that you’re likely to come across in void battles. First up you got your ballistics weapons. Bullets, darts, explosives, you know the deal. Been around for thousands of years and if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Then there’s laser weaponry. Way more silent, just as deadly. Laser weaponry has become the standard in combat and is the type of weaponry you’re most likely to encounter. It’s cheap and doesn’t require extensive supply lines like ballistic weapons do. Third group is throwers. Flamethrowers, plasmathrowers, teslaguns and acidthrowers. Nasty business when you’re fighting in close quarters. Most of these are extremely dangerous to use in the void too. In the hands of the wrong person they can easily cause hull breaches or engine explosions. Then there is drone weaponry. Expensive, but highly effective. Allows you to stay safe at a distance. Finally, there are mech suits. Highly expensive and complex equipment that none of you are likely to ever encounter. You better hope you don’t because anyone wearing one of those suits is pretty much unstoppable. A properly trained soldier in a good mech suit can cut through an entire battalion like a knife cuts through butter.
‘Mech suits, huh?’ Voss thought to himself. The way they spoke about such things in the slums had always made it sound like they were a myth, a fairy tale you tell kids to impress them. He had been in training for months now, but he still hadn’t fully come to terms yet with the idea that things like mech suits were now a part of the reality he was living.
‘And that’s how you set an L-rifle to engage and the same button on the other side of the gun switches it back to safety again. Now let’s head out to the range and see what you lot can do with one.’
‘Damn it.’ Voss thought to himself. He had daydreamt through the instructor’s briefing. They were heading towards the range now and he had missed the instructions on how to operate the guns they were going to shoot with. This was going to be a mess…
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Fortunately for him, the door to the shooting range was at the back of the room. This allowed him to make sure he was the last one through. Not that it had been difficult anyhow. He had never seen his fellow recruits so eager to take part in an exercise. He guessed that for most, if not all of these men, this was the first time ever they got to shoot a gun. It was for him.
There were three, twenty five meter lanes at the range. Tables and chairs were stacked on both sides of the room, indicating that even a room like this had multiple functions. Voss scanned the room but saw no more instructors. Jabs’ words echoed through his head again. The spaceport did seem deserted. It seemed crazy to him that for something as dangerous as live fire exercises, there would only be one instructor for nine recruits. Where was everybody?
The recruits lined up. Voss was third to shoot in lane two. He made a mental note of every step the shooting recruits took so that he could copy them later when he was up. He murmured to himself as he watched them. ‘Click in the battery pack. Pull back the slide. Press the red button on the right side. Ready to fire.’. Soft thumps, barely louder than whispers, sounded with each shot. Voss could tell that the L-rifles they were using had been powered down because each shot left nothing more than a small black speck and a miniscule plume of smoke rising up from where the laser had hit. Judging by the poor quality of most shots, it was a good thing they had powered down the rifles. Out of the first three shooters, only Jabs was a good shot. The second round of recruits were better. Dane hit with every shot, and Emil wasn’t too bad either, hitting the target with several of his shots.
Then, the third round of recruits were called forward. Voss repeated the steps he had memorized by watching the others. ‘Attach battery pack, pull slide, press button.’ he again murmured to himself. He took aim and fired his first shot. It was a few centimeters off to the left. He realized he had been too rough on the trigger, pulling the gun out of direction just slightly as he shot. His second shot hit the upper edge of the target. He took a deep breath, aimed again and hit a bullseye. His next shots all hit the mark, with several of them hitting a bullseye.
For the first time since the voidwalking incident, Voss felt confidence in himself. For a few seconds he forgot about the pain and the fatigue and enjoyed himself, taking those shots. A voice celebrated inside his head: ‘Yes! We’re back!’
‘Put down arms.’ The sergeant ordered. In his excitement, Voss almost forgot to switch his gun back to safety and discard the battery pack from its placement. It was only because he saw Hoog struggling with ejecting his battery pack, that he snapped out of his own euphoric state and took all the necessary actions. He turned around and noticed several of the recruits were staring at him.
‘What?’ He asked. Had he done something wrong? Was he in trouble again?
‘I’d never have taken you for being ex-military.’ Emil said.
Voss managed to suppress the urge to correct him just in time. Instead he quipped: ‘Yeah that’s me. Twenty plus years of blasting lowlives such as yourselves in their faces. Ain’t no feeling like it.’
The recruits all laughed and even the instructor and the sergeant couldn’t control themselves. Voss had quoted the most famous line from “Voidkill” one of the most popular immersofilms that had been released in the past twenty years. He made a small sigh of relief. He had successfully dodged a question about his past and at the same time taken another step at getting his fellow recruits to forgive him.
‘Alright recruits.’ the sergeant said with an unusually jovial voice. ‘Let’s move out. We’re going to the VR range next to train armed tactics for an hour and then it’s back to the barrack for an early night. We’ve got some big days coming up ahead.’
The sergeant’s words surprised Voss. He normally never gave them a heads up about what lay ahead. Either Voss’ joke had put him in an exceptionally good mood, or other things were at play here.
The hour of VR tactics were unnoteworthy. It sounded exciting on paper, but it mostly consisted of repeating the same drills over and over with the purpose of teaching each man how to operate in a squad. Voss noticed he had somewhat grown over his fatigue and that the pain was finally starting to reside a little. The rapid recovery was kicking off and healing his back.
When they made it back to their barrack after VR, he even had enough energy left to fulfill a promise he had made. After everyone had had their showers, Dane signaled everyone to come over. Voss stepped on a crate to use it as a makeshift podium. The room fell silent, each man observing him intently.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to read out loud something I wrote for a very special man.
Love of my life, captain of my heart
Voice of a peacock, smell of a fart
Face of a rat, cock of a mouse
My favorite of favorites
Will you be my spouse?
He made a dramatic gesture and got on one knee when he finished his poem. The men were all cheering and egged Jabs on to say yes. It seemed Voss had earned his place back amongst them. Now he’d just have to make it through the final trial and deal with that damned lieutenant.