This Forsaken World

This Forsaken World Chapter 2

This Forsaken World Chapter 2

Commander Devin Crowe

As my flight team filed into the debriefing room I sighed inwardly and took my place at the podium. The room was set up in a rectangle with two rows of seats extending six by four. I leaned forward against the podium and smiled at the group of pilots assembled before me.

There were five people in the squadron, each a talented and skilled pilot, however no member of the New Alliance Military had space combat experience.

There had been no in-fighting for several years as the only threat was the infected humans on the planet surface. In space, there was peace and stability as everyone focused there efforts on the construction of the fleet. It was a critical weakness I saw and the only solution was to put my pilots through extensive maneuvers, attempting to imitate actual combat as realistically as possible. Unfortunately, my flight team was short. The average squadron had up to twelve ships and pilots, the 22nd reapers however were six pilots short. We still had the fighters on standby, but due to logistics issues and lack of recruits, we were the most understaffed unit in the fleet. I had countered this by selecting the most promising cadets out of the academy and I held each of them to a high standard. We had proven to be the most combat effective unit in bomber escort and training drills.

"Alright, lets get this started." I turned my attention to my second in command, Lieutenant Commander Jewel Anders, known as Angel to her fellow reapers. The woman was well muscled with bright red hair and piercing green eyes. "Angel, what did you do wrong during the escort mission?" I asked, leaning back against the white board behind me.

The redhead sighed, audibly growling in response. "I failed to follow military protocol and misused pilot identification. Other than that, I think we did pretty good....sir." It was obvious by her tone of voice the 'sir' was tacked on to make a point.

I couldn't help but chuckle. "Yeah, we did, didn't we? Still, as flight leader I have to bring things like this up, you know that." Jewel rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her ample chest. "Roger that boss." She stated, looking away and staring at the wall.

"Right, Everyone else did well aside from Lieutenant Graves, you were a bit rough out there. I need you to polish your formation positioning a bit and try to distance a little more. You almost clipped Smith's wing." Sid Graves, or 'Tombstone' as we called him, scratched the back of his shaved head. "Sorry about that Commander, I'll try to work on that, sir." The man was very large and barely fit into a cockpit, standing easily six foot seven with rippling muscles. He was the most junior officer to join and as such had the least experience flying.

I glanced about the room, taking in the rest of the reapers. There was Lieutenant Commander John Romeo, known simply as 'Romeo' since his last name was the perfect call-sign to begin with. Standing at mid-height, roughly five nine, he was athletic but lean. His hair was brown in a short crew cut and he had a carefree attitude that made being around him enjoyable.

Sitting beside him was Lieutenant Mitch Wilson, or Raptor. Mitch was the shortest person in the room and he was very aware of it. While he seemed friendly on the surface, the man was actually quite rough and aggressive. I pegged it as a reflex from people giving him a hard time about his height, but when it came to flying, he was one of the best I had ever seen.

The last reaper was Lieutenant Gary Smith, or Doom as he was affectionately known. The pilot had dyed his hair white with a middle part, he was on the taller side without being too tall and he was well muscled. Gary had more simulation kills than anyone else in the fleet, other than myself, and he was the resident comedian among the group.