Marcus jerked upright, nearly banging his head on the padded interior of the pod. He tore his headset off and slapped the affectionately named Tap Out button to turn on the interior lights and crack the seal. Light poured in through the crack and the lid was lifted off by the techs. He looked around the room, counting the other pods, checking for activity.

Only two were still closed. Gant and Cockburn’s pods. The others were surrounded by techs pulling the occupants out and stripping off their gear. Gurneys were lined up near the four pods of the members they had rescued.

How are we doing?” He called out.

Sully gave him a weak thumbs up from across the room before Marcus lost sight of him behind the press of bodies.

“Once the docs have done their thing, we’ll have showers and debriefs in the mission prep room in thirty minutes.” He announced.

The expected groans and mutters told him that his crew was okay. He would have worried if he’d been met with silence.

“How about some time for chow boss?” Someone asked.

“Okay, make it an hour, but I expect to see all your smiling faces ready to go back in as soon as we debrief and update the details.”

Nods all around told him his team would be ready to go when he expected them.

“Neville? Can you hang back so can I have a word with you after you get out of your gear?” He spoke softly as he leaned towards the pod next to his.

“Sure thing Sgt. I’ll be done is a sec.”

Marcus waited near the door, checking on each of his people as they filed out of the room. The medics had long since wheeled the four they’d rescued off to the infirmary.

“What did you need Sgt?” Neville asked as she walked up to him.

“Was there anything I should know about before I brief the Colonel? Anything that might impact the next rescue? Are we safe to reinsert and start looking for Gant and Cockburn?”

“As far as I can tell, we’re still go for insertion. There are a few things that aren’t working as planned, but those are beyond what I or we can deal with in the timeframe we have. That’s system level stuff.”

***

The debrief had gone well, and the Colonel was happy with their results so far.

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Neville had talked with the developers and she thought she had a few new tricks to take with them. The rest of the team was ready to go. Marcus scanned the room counting thumbs up and waved to the techs before sitting back in his tank while they closed the lid.

The metal building they started in previously came into focus around them. Everyone had their weapons up in a defensive perimeter. Marcus waved Mackenzie and Abbott to one side and Douglas and Costello to the other to check the entrances. Neville got to work on her tablet. The vehicles they had requested materialized in front of them.

Instead of the pickup trucks Neville had accessed last time these were Oshkosh S – ATVE3s. Not top-of-the-line anymore but rugged, reliable and perfectly suited to snatch and grab reconnaissance. Anderson and Nobel quickly checked the vehicles over and made sure the roof fifty-cals were loaded.

“Okay boss, where to now?” Marcus asked looking at Neville with a cocked eyebrow. She was starting to earn his respect, he admitted to himself.

“Based on the data we got from the last trip, I have a better handle on Gant and Cockburn’s signals.” Neville answered. She pointed to a spot on her tablet display and said, “That’s where they should be.”

“All right people.” Marcus hollered. “Let’s go get our lost puppies and get out of this damned game.”

They loaded up into the trucks in the same teams as last time with Abbott and Nobel waiting to open the doors to the outside. Douglas and Matthews started up the trucks, their hybrid drives eerily silent.

“Let’s go” Marcus said to Mathers. Douglas’ vehicle followed behind them. Once they cleared the doors, Abbott and Nobel pulled them shut and jumped in their trucks.

“Why didn’t you want the newer all electric trucks?” Neville asked Marcus.

“They have a lot of advantages, but I still like the reliability of the diesel as a backup. The electric is great for sneaking up, but sometimes it’s better to have two drives than one.” Marcus answered. “On the other hand everything in here is electrons, but we all have our superstitions to fall back on.”

“Makes sense.”

“So what are the chances that this is actually Gant and Cockburn?”

“The data we got from the last trip showed that Sully’s team had a trackable anomaly in the data. We’re using that information to track these signals. We’re assuming it’s Gant and Cockburn, but we won’t know for sure until we get there. However there’s no other signals with the same anomaly.”

“I guess it’s no worse than intelligence in the real world.”

“Is that the old joke about military intelligence and oxymorons?”

“Yes, yes it is. They do their best but sometimes situations change faster than we can react.”

“Here’s hoping this situation doesn’t and we can get out of here quickly.”

“On that note, do we have any sim-insurgents closing on our position or theirs?”

“There seems to be a concentration circling around their location, but they don’t seem to be interacting.No one seems to have noticed our arrival, yet.”

“Well let’s hope it stays that way until we’re gone.”

***