Chapter 10
Laura’s head was still spinning. They’d managed to confirm with General Sherman that those energy weapons, both lasers and something called a PPC, were standard for the Hegemony. Indeed, General Sherman had patted the empty holster on his uniform and explained that his personal sidearm was a laser pistol.
A laser pistol. Colonial R&D couldn’t even manage to build a practical weapons-grade laser that would fit on a Battlestar, and here these people had laser pistols.
Admiral Adama had quietly advised her to change into a pantsuit from her dress, since the Marine demonstration would be taking place on one of their ships and they didn’t have gravity. She’d already intended to do that, but that sort of attention to detail and concern for her was something she actually treasured in him.
It was somewhat surreal, floating out of the hatch of the Raptor that brought her, Bill, Dualla, and a few Colonial Marines over to the Potente. She’d actually been in zero-g a time or two, and had never had a problem with it.
She decided not to ask about the lack of gravity, though, it might be a bit impolite. ‘So, why are you so primitive?’ just didn’t sound like something to say.
The Colonials weren’t nearly as proficient in moving in null gravity as the Hegemony personnel, but there were convenient handholds placed in a manner that showed they had carefully thought out all of the permutations of motion that being in zero-g would cause. It was fairly odd realizing that these ships were laid out like skyscrapers, with the ‘decks’ being stacked along the axis of the ship with ‘down’ being towards the drives. It was equally odd how it was apparent that the various compartments had ‘two’ decks, one of which became the ceiling when the ship was under acceleration irregardless of if it were accelerating or decelerating.
So she decided to ask. “How do you know which way to stand when you are about to start thrust?” she asked the young Hegemony officer who was escorting them.
“Ma’am,” the young man said through the interpreter who floated besides them. “When under acceleration, red is down.” he pointed towards the small lights that were inset into the two ‘decks’. “And green is up. If power is out, then if accelerating orient on the hatchway, they are shaped asymmetrically, with a point towards the bow of the ship.”
Once you knew what to look for it was obvious, the hatchways themselves, rather than the hatches within them, were somewhat asymmetric, with the aforementioned point always pointing in the same direction. Clever.
“And I assume that there is a warning system for when acceleration is going to happen?” she asked next, floating up the passageway as she did so.
“Well, for planned maneuvers we use announcements. For an emergency accel we use klaxons. 2 short blasts for accel, 1 long blast for decel, and they are different pitches as well to make it easier.” he explained. “The firing range is up ahead in Marine country.”
Ahead of them she could see that the bulkheads were now painted green. “Marine Country I take it?” she asked, a bit bemused how both the Colonial Marines and evidently the Hegemony Marines had a fondness for the color.
“Yes, Ma’am.” the young man replied. “The firing range is through there.” he paused, then looked over at her. “Before our guys demonstrate, you’ll be brought into the suit morgue to see the process. The higher ups want to ensure against any confusion.”
‘Suit Morgue’? Laura turned the phrase over in her head, not able to really make heads or tails of it. She exchanged a look with Sergeant Hadrian who was leading the detachment and the woman looked just as baffled at the phrase.
The compartment they entered was one of the largest ones she’d seen so far, only the hangar bay itself being larger. It was almost a hundred meters long and wide enough for a half dozen firing lanes, although on second look the lanes were considerably wider than the ones in any range she’d ever seen.
There was a small observation area to one side behind thick transparencies that were obviously meant to be protective. General Sherman was already there, although he didn’t have a translator with him.
Laura and Bill entered the area, while Sergeant Hadrian chivvied up the Marines, making use of the convenient straps that allowed one to secure oneself against recoil in free fall.
A speaker next to the General hummed to life and the woman’s voice she’d heard over the radio came out of it. “Greetings, Madame President.” She noticed that General Sherman had a small radio headset on, with another speaker hanging from his belt. At her look he chuckled and spoke into the radio, the translation now coming from the speaker.
“Our top translator isn’t comfortable around people, Madame President. So we’re using a remote rig. Dr Stevens is working on a portable translator, however, and this is a test rig for the form factor to see if it is as practical as she thinks it would be.” he said.
Laura blinked, a portable electronic translator? That implied a level of computer technology she wasn’t all that comfortable with, and she could sense that Bill was equally uncomfortable at the thought of what the Cylons could do to anybody who relied that much on computers.
“I see.” she was rather proud that she didn’t let any of her concern leak into her voice. “It looks like Sergeant Hadrian is almost ready.” she continued, glancing outside to where the sergeant was looking over at her.
“Very well then.” General Sherman replied, then spoke rapidly to another man who nodded. A few moments later a red light started flashing in the range area and a number of warning lights pulsed on. “The range is now secured.”
Laura nodded, then nodded again to Sergeant Hadrian as Bill made a ‘go ahead’ gesture beside her. The Sergeant nodded, then barked a command to her people.
First they made use of the launchers on their clamshell pistols, the explosive shells ripping downrange to detonate against the extremely heavy backplate.
“That is about the minimum firepower needed to deal with a Centurion.” Bill said to the General as Laura watched the Marines shift to the regular shots from the clamshells. “Ordinary bullets are only effective if they hit something extremely vulnerable, like the scanner on the head.”
Outside the Marines now switched to their standard issue assault rifles and began individual aimed fire at a command from the Sergeant. The heavier rifle rounds were also explosive tipped, giving them some small chance against Centurions.
“The explosive tips can, in sufficient quantity, take down a Centurion” the Admiral continued his explanation. “And will certainly chew up the skinjobs who like to hide behind the tin cans.”
Outside the Marines reloaded, and at another nod from the Admiral Sergeant Hadrian had them firing a full magazine at full automatic, riding the recoil with the ease of long experience.
“Thus it is best to always put as many down range as quickly as possible if you are going to have any hope of stopping them before they get in range.” Bill concluded. They’d decided not to bring any of the heavier weapons in Galacticas armory, since they didn’t have nearly enough ammunition for them to begin with.
Outside the Marines cleared their weapons and secured them once more, rising from the firing positions. The General nodded to the man next to him and the red lights stopped flashing as the range returned to a safe condition.
“Now, if you and your people would follow me?” the General asked pleasantly, the tone still quite unexpected from such an ogre of a man. “After all of your discussions about Centurions and ‘tin cans’ and such I thought it might be wise to allow you to see the morgue first.”
The hatch smoothly cycled open and he led them out and across the range, the general motioning for the marines to accompany them. They went through another hatch, which seemed much thicker and sturdier than any others she’d seen on the interior.
Laura felt her heart attempt to stop at what she saw until her mind caught up. In ranks along the bulkheads were what looked like… disassembled Centurions. Only that wasn’t quite right, because they looked hollow. ‘Suit morgue’... now that made sense, these were armor suits.
There seemed to be large cabinets which contained the suit pieces racked up inside them, each with a small round platform with a pair of empty boots on it.
In front of the closest six cabinets stood four men and two women wearing full body stockings that seemed to cover every single square millimeter of their bodies yet were so form-fitting that they might as well have been nude. Each was standing at Parade Rest, hands clasped behind their backs and their toes hooked into small loops on the deck.
Behind her Laura could feel Bill and the Marines also reacting, although thankfully nobody panicked.
“These are Mark V Marine Space Armor suits, not quite the latest model but still in front line service.” the general explained in that gravelly voice. “One point five metric tons, with full vacuum adaptation.” he looked them over, then nodded once. “MARINES!” he bellowed, and all six of them snapped to attention with the ease of long familiarity in vacuum while the translation into badly accented Caprican came from the belt speaker. “Suit UP.”
Each Marine stepped back, up onto the small platforms. Each stepped into the boots there, stamping down to ensure they were fully on, and held out their arms to the side. Mechanical arms dropped from the ceiling, clamping around each of the six marines’ wrists, while other mechanical arms started, for want of a better term, building the suit around the marine. The lower legs, the ankle joints slotting into the boots seamlessly, high pitched buzzing sounds audible as screws tightened down. Then knee assemblies, then upper legs followed by the hips. A heavy chest and backplate came together and sealed along the sides. Meanwhile, heavy mechanical manipulators attached to the ‘clamps’ around the wrists, which were revealed to actually be part of the armor. The hands were obviously enclosed in the ‘wrist’ of the armor, as the thick mechanical fingers flexed in an obvious test sequence in response to commands from the wearer of the suit Forearm guards were clamped in place, elbow assemblies tightened themselves down, then upper arm guards slotted into position. Heavy pauldrons to protect the shoulders were secured, followed by the helmet which slotted into place.
A moment later there was a ‘thunk’ noise from each of the platforms and the six suits of… power armor of some sort… came free. Tiny cold gas thrusters ‘puffed’ and the suits floated off the platforms, oriented themselves to the deck. A moment later there was a loud ‘clunk’ as evidently the boots were able to be magnetized at will.
General Sherman had been observing their reactions to all of this with a slight smile on his craggy face, then nodded. “If you’d follow me back to the observation room, along with your Marines, I do believe that Sergeant O’Rourke has a little demonstration for you.”
Laura somewhat numbly followed the general back to the observation room, her mind a whirl. She’d seen the thickness of the plates on those suits, and if these peoples armor was only half as good as Colonial armor, those things would be tougher than any Centurion she’d ever heard of.
She watched as the suits filed out, each having evidently picked up a different weapon for use now, both a large one held in the right hand and a much smaller one in the left. Looking now, she could see that the manipulator on the right hand was a full five-finger affair, modeled after a human hand and obviously meant for more delicate operations, while the left was a three-fingered claw that looked quite capable of tearing a Landram apart.
“OK, first up is the most common loadout, a 3cm pulse laser as the primary weapon, and a standard issue pulse laser rifle as the anti-personnel weapon.” the general said.
Laura hadn’t noticed the relatively tiny weapon mounted on the forearm of the left arm, the shocks had been coming too close together she guessed to notice small details like that.
She watched as the closest suit raised the rifle-like weapon that looked heavier than the 30mm cannon on a Viper and aimed it down range one-handed, as if it were a child’s toy. A staccato flashing of cerulean bolts went down range, causing her to blink tears out of her eyes at the brightness.
“Next up is a Heavy Recoilless Rifle, for when you need to punch through armor at a bit greater range than the 3cm pulse laser allows.”
Said rifle was larger than any of the launchers they’d left behind in the Galacticas armory, and with a ‘whoomph’ it sent a heavy shell lazily down range, leaving a massive black smear mark on the armored backstop.
The general gave them a moment or two to get their bearings after that before continuing. “Third is a Colt-Browning GM-2HB Gauss Machine Gun, some wags call it the ultimate Ma Deuce, others without a shred of historical sense simply call it an Anti-Personnel Gauss Rifle.”
The weapon looked old yet new, the basic lines seemed timeless, but the barrel was ‘off’ compared to a regular ballistic weapon, consisting of a series of coils surrounding the bore. And when it fired there was no muzzle flash, but the hypersonic ‘cracks’ were audible even through the heavy armored transparency of the observation chamber.
“Next up is a weapon we can’t actually fire in here, but we included it so you can see it.” the General said with a chuckle. “For when what you want to hit is just too far away, but you aren’t worried, because you have a radio and a spotter, and are carrying your own personal artillery piece on your back.”
This particular piece was just that, an impressive barrel and weapon that seemed to be mounted on an articulated mount on the back of the suit. Hydraulic arms swung it into a firing position and the Marine braced into a slightly peculiar pose, as if expecting incredible recoil, before retracting back into its carry position without firing.
“Fifth we have an advanced SRM launcher, this is a 4 tube model with 4 reloads.” a pause. “Oh, Short Range Missile, the advanced means it has enhanced targeting systems to increase accuracy. They fire 4 round clusters. They’re a bit overkill for ship board Marines, so we’ll be showing you the launcher but not firing it. Our Army suits actually have a launcher of this type integrated into the suit itself.”
The launcher looked like an oversized backpack with four tubes, two over each shoulder. As before the Marine stepped to the firing line, and the armored covers over each of the tubes slid open, along with exhaust ports to the rear, but didn’t fire.
“Finally, for those opponents who like to hide in tight spaces and think they can melee a battle armor suit, well… we have this one.” the General seemed amused.
The sixth and final suit had only the small laser rifle strapped to the left arm as a ranged weapon. Both manipulators had been replaced by incredibly wicked looking claws that looked fit to rend and tear anything in their path.
One of the other Marines brought out a heavy looking steel bar, which they held out, and those claws went through the bar like it was made of butter. Those Marine’s who’d seen just what a Centurions claws could do blanched, because not even a Centurion could do something like that.
