Lucky 13 (NaNoWriMo 2017)

Chapter 10: Drop...

The ship slams out of warp and into freefall over Dionysus. I can't see this, or even feel it. My only sign that this has happened is my hud. The Magnetic clamps holding us to the side of the ship disengage, but once again the only indication I have this is my hud. The display tells me that the Luck 13 has fired up it's engines, hovering at two-hundred kilometers above the planet's surface.

Sixty seconds later I hit the atmosphere, and that I know without the hud. The air turbulence shakes me like a chew toy in a dog's mouth. I check in on the data from the sensor pod. The specialized pod is just a collection of cameras and radar mounted inside of a transparent bubble and dumping their feed to bluetooth. The drop suits have straightened out as the micro fins studded across their surface catch the air.

Our pods remain black and cold as we drop farther. I begin questioning why we need the dense ceramic drop pod. The first point defence laser awnsers this for me. The first one chips into one of the drop suits, I can't tell which one, it might even have been mine, the important part is that it does more than scratch the material. A few more shot harmlessly hit us befor one finds the sensor pod and its fragile plastic shell.

Now we're dropping blind with nothing telling us when to deploy our wings except a digital red countdown timer. The timer drops down, thirty seconds left, ten seconds, five, two, one, zero. A series of explosive bolts jettison our ceramic panels and shatters them into harmless dust.

My wings swing open, my legs straighten, and my hud starts displaying visual data. Below me, one by one, the rest of my team jettisons their cocoon and spreads their wings. I lock my glide path towards the missile silos and cut off all comm transmissions. The four of us are nothing more than glitches from the falling debri of our destroyed pods.

We come in low and quickly. By the time the AA batteries spring to life we are already at point blank. Our boots hit the ground and any agility we have is lost to the quarter tonne of equipment encasing us. The AA units swivel, trying to get a lock on us, but thankfully they were designed not to be able to shoot their own silo.

"You are in violation of ITA article fourteen," I call out, my voice augmented by my suit. "Surrender now, if you do not comply we can not guarantee your survival." No one responds.

"There's no one up here," Connor informs me. "I don't sense anyone here at all, but I don't do good with concrete."

"I've got into the silo's bluetooth," John tells me.

"Good, what can you find?"

"The login page," he tells me.

I evaluate the landing party. While the armor is all an identical matte black, my hud pins callsign to everyone. "Who's trained in cyber warfare?" I ask. They fidget and glance amongst themselves. "Any one?"

"Gear can do it," John supplies.

"Then get an uplink established," I tell him. "Go, go, go." He starts rushing to set up an uplink and thumps into Mark with his wings. "And ditch the wings, angel."

He detaches the wings and the carbon fiber panels clatter to the ground. I glance around in my control panel and find the wing release, letting my wings hit the ground. "Maelstrom," I bark. "Decommission those turrets."

"How?" he asks.

"You have enough explosives stored on you to level several city blocks..." I remind him.

"Got it, blow them up."

"No, that's way too much shrapnel. Attach remote detonators to them."

"Yes, captain." He ditches his wings and begins to climb up the support structure of the nearest AA turret.

"He forgot the suit has jump jets," Connor comments.