Battle Group Epsilon

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

March 20 2184, 12:11 hours (Standard Solar Time)
Aboard USNI Carrier "Waterloo" In Martian HPO

Daniel Chang looked out of the porthole of the military transport as it docked with the Waterloo. The magnificence of deep space never ceased to astonish him. There was no comparison between the night time skies on Earth to what he saw now. The absolute black of space faded out as the gunmetal interior of the docking bay surrounded the craft.
Once they had landed, Chang immediately went to the transport's comparatively large cargo hold and personally overlooked the unloading of his Marauder. The crew chief shook his hand and asked how the trip was. After the normal small talk and seeing that Chang was not leaving, the crew chief left to direct the loading vehicles. He glanced back occasionally and gave him a disapproving frown. He was obviously unaccustomed to having pilots around. Chang had been in the Space Force for four years and knew that he had to be responsible for his own fighter. He had started out as a specialist in the pit crew and knew his way around a flight deck.
After that, he grabbed his duffel bag and followed a Petty Officer to his assigned quarters. The Waterloo was brand new and it showed. The halls still smelled of fresh paint, the grated floors unstained with oil, and the walls still dent free. "Here you are sir," the Petty Officer said. "There will be an orientation briefing in the Auditorium zero three at thirteen hundred."
Chang nodded.
The Petty Officer saluted and said, "Good day, Lieutenant."
Chang was taken aback briefly before he returned the salute. He still hadn't grown used to the new insignia he wore or the title it was given. A new rank and a new ship; there were a lot of changes he would have to get used to.
He opened the door and walked into his assigned dormitory. There were a total of eight beds; a pair of bunks against each wall. Eight was the standard size for a Marauder squad. Chang was looking forward to meeting the men and woman that he would be flying with. There was one soldier already in the room. He wore glasses and had a smattering of freckles on his pale face. He was seated on a bed, but stood as soon as Chang entered. Chang smiled at him and extended his hand. "Hello, I'm Chang."
The man looked at Chang's hand uncertainly for a moment before grasping it. "Hi," he said in a nasally voice. "I'm Paul Kowalski."
"Good to meet you Paul," Chang said. He tossed his bag on an empty top bunk bed and taped up a picture on the wall. It showed him in his dress uniform standing with his mother on one side, and his brother Peter on the other. It been taken the day he had graduated from flight school. Beside that he put up a picture of him and his father back in China when he was very little. It was the only picture he had of him.
Chang looked back at Paul and said, "Want to grab some chow before the briefing?"
Paul looked at him and said, "Ugh, yeah. Sure. Do you know the way to the mess hall?"
"Yeah," Chang replied. "This ship's crew quarters has a similar layout to the Alamo."
"The Alamo?" Paul asked.
"It's the UNSF military base around Earth. I was in the Space Force before this," Chang explained. He had received the letter in his mail a week ago. The Navy had come to outer space and because of a lack in experienced pilots they were pulling men from the USNF all over the solar system and transferring them to the USNI. He had been a Captain in the UNSF and overnight he had become a Lieutenant in the Solar Navy. Because of the difference in rank between the Space Force and Navy it was the equivalent rank, but it felt like a demotion.
"Wow," Paul said. "I'm just out of Flight School."
"Mess hall's this way," Daniel said.
He led the two of them to the Officer's cafeteria and grabbed a tray. They loaded up their plates and took a seat at one of the round tables. The food was heavily processed and loaded with laxatives. It tasted just like the food on the Alamo. Military food didn't change between branches.
"So where are you from?" Chang asked.
"Virginia," Paul said. "Just outside DC. How about you?"
"I grew up in Chicago," Daniel said. "Why'd you join the USNI, Paul?"
"Well," he began, "I was never really any good at sports, as a kid I mean. I got picked on a lot. One day a recruiter came to my high school and I thought that I could really do it." Paul said and took a bite of his spaghetti. "How about you?"
"My father was in the war." Chang said. "He was a hero to me and I wanted to be a pilot like he was."
"Your dad was a pilot? Wow," Paul said. "That's something. Was he Navy or Air Force?"
"He was in the PLAAF."
"What's that?" Paul asked.
"The People's Liberation Army Air Force," Chang said. "China."
"Oh," Paul said. Chang could see he had not expected that. Paul looked down at his food and twirled his fork around the strands of spaghetti. He got that reaction a lot when he told people his father had fought with the Chinese.

They finished up their food and headed to the Briefing. Chang soon learned that the Navy's briefings were no less tedious or prolonged than the Space Force's. Fortunately he didn't need to go to the ones orienting him to the ship. He was no stranger to military space vessels. The only briefings he had to attend were ones regarding the USNI.
Chang decided he didn't really mind being transferred to the Navy. He had enjoyed his time in the Space Force but the USNI wasn't so bad. As long as he was flying, he was happy.
He had been stationed all over the solar system; Germania Lunar base, Alamo Earth base, and the Luxemburg Venus base. He had even toured on the moons around Jupiter when a rebel insurrection had begun two years ago. He had never been to Mars though.
The planet had been terraformed. Its canals and channels had been filled with the water from the melted ice caps and vegetation was spreading. Even so, Mars had not lost its reddish color. Chang had considered vacationing there once on leave but had gone to Venus instead. Chang wondered why they had sent him here. The city of Elysium was large and prosperous but besides that, there were no other reasons to station ships here. There were no large military bases or ship yards here, no natural resources that weren't more abundant elsewhere, and it had no real strategic value either as far as Chang knew.

When he got out of the briefing it was nearly 0100. He had the following day off but after that it was back to formation flying and combat simulations. It had been a long day and Chang was eager to go to bed and get back to his regular schedule. He made his way from the auditorium back to his dormitory.
Chang knew something was wrong as soon as he entered the room. His duffel bag was on the floor along with the two photographs. Chang looked up at the bed and saw that someone else was lying there. He was a muscular man with a clean shaved head and a strong jaw. Chang knew right away that the man didn't like him.
"Is there a problem here?" Chang asked him.
"Yeah," he said in a harsh voice. "Your gear was on my bunk."
"I was here first," Chang protested.
"If you had been here first," said a female voice from behind him. He turned and saw a blond haired woman lying in the top bunk behind him. "You would be sitting in that bunk.
The muscular man jumped down from the top bunk. He was a full head taller than Chang but he seemed larger. He stepped close to Chang trying to intimidate him. "Maybe we got off on the wrong foot," he said. "My name is Greenbaum."
The woman with blond hair leaned over and said, "I'm Lieutenant Moore."
Chang nodded. "My name is-"
"I don't care what your name is, chink," Greenbaum said. He turned and climbed back up to the top bunk. "All you have to know is I sleep in the top bunk. You can have the bottom, or the floor for all I care." The woman on the bunk behind him laughed.
Chang stood there for a moment. He didn't move or say anything. He finally pushed his duffel bag beneath the bottom bunk and laid down. Chang suddenly missed his home on the Alamo.