Jethro 10 Snippet 5

 

Chapter 5

 

Antigua

 

General Lyon scanned the latest training report and nodded to himself. So far so good. Getting quality material for the Cadre was tough. He had so many commitments going on. It was odd that Tau was the one sector he didn’t have troops in. He had SpecOps, but no Cadre. There hadn’t been a call for them during the Confederation War, though he’d anticipated a call during the occupation phase. Fortunately, that hadn’t occurred, and instead, he’d sent the bulk of the Cadre off to Sigma.

This Confederation civil war was an issue though. As much as the powers that be would love to let the Taurens sort out their own house, they couldn’t. The rebels were holding hostages in the form of their own non-Tauren citizens as well as thousands of Federation personnel.

Given their track record in treating the non-Taurens over the centuries as well as what reportedly happened to the Pele refugees; things didn’t bode well for the hostages.

Well, he had agreed to scrounge up some SpecOps forces for the possible invasion force. Getting Marine and Army Recon squads had been simple. They were on leave but a squad of each would be ready whenever they needed to move out.

He even had a SEAL team ready to go. They had recently graduated from the training course on Agnosta and had been earmarked to go to Sigma sector. He had backstopped them for the moment.

The Cadre would be the icing on the cake. He didn’t have any Cadre officers … Cadre were natural operators not officers. But he did have one squad that had come together. They still had some rough edges, but if the training report was accurate, they might be available to deploy during the window.

He made a soft puttering sound and then blinked when his inbox pinged.

“Is that who I think it is?” he asked Mars, his AI partner.

“Jack is relaying Admiral Thornby’s schedule.”

“Ah.” He nodded. He scanned it briefly. It looks like they were not going to have dinner that evening after all. Pity.

“I guess I’ll take a rain check. Any progress on the investigation on the McClintock assault?” he asked.

“No, sir. The trail has gone cold.”

“Darn,” he said. That was to be expected. The team were professionals. The running hypothesis was that they had come from either ET or Bek. They’d done a very good job playing ghosts. Most likely they had disappeared like smoke into the population.

Well, now that they were forewarned, the Cadre population was forearmed. The AI were on alert and doing check-ins with each family member as well as prospective Cadre members. Hopefully, there would not be a repeat of the assault.

“I wish we had more intel damn it. At least Baggy is okay.”

“Yes, sir. The family is on alert and housed on the base. They are chafing at the restrictions, however.”

“Well, perhaps we can ease up if we know the mercenaries are no longer here or no longer targeting them.”

“Unfortunately, there is no information indicating that, sir,” Mars reminded him.

“Yeah,” the general sighed.

<<(O)>>

Bagheera grimaced as he ran the scenario. He had been gaming and staying awake on adrenaline, youth, excitement, a desire to win, and energy drinks. Probably too much of the last, he was getting button punchy and twitchy. Fatigue was setting in.

He had one last thing to try out though, a trick he’d thought of. He was supposed to deliver his report in the morning.

The scenario was basic, get from point A to B along roads. Obviously, the easiest path was a straight line. He understood why they didn’t want to go by air, that just made you a target for everyone in the surrounding area.

He was finding out that the motorcycle thing was almost as bad.

He rubbed his hands and flexed his fingers as the AI populated the map with opposing forces. Once it was done, the ready button flashed.

He inhaled, held his breath for a second and then exhaled as he centered himself. He then hit the enter key.

The map was randomly generated as was the opposing force. Normally he’d have a unit with him but this was a lone wolf map since it was a basic test.

“Time to mix it up,” he growled as he committed the map to memory. His years of experience gave him ideas on where ambush teams would be set up. Based on what he was seeing, there were too many to avoid.

The straight line course had the most since it was along an elevated highway. But taking a roundabout path meant he would get hit as forces moved to block him. He’d be under siege.

Take the quick path to certain destruction or the death of a thousand cuts?

A timer appeared. He grimaced and he felt his ears go flat. “Frack.”

He triggered the transformation sequence and then got moving. “Let’s dance,” he growled as he felt the base rumble in his chair and then the sounds pick up in intensity.

<<(O)>>