Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Strike Team - 297 Words


Maj. Williams held her breath and froze briefly as the focused beam of light swept across the rough bark of the Oak she leaned into for cover.  She couldn't feel the harsh surface of the tree, nor the chill of the night through the meshes and laminated plates of her hard suit - thankfully the enclosed helmet meant she didn't have to worry about clouds of breath vapor giving away her position.  Echo location algorithms estimated that the approaching sentries were three hundred feet away, judging from the crunch of gravel under their boots.  The light moved on and darkness returned.  Maj. Williams popped out from behind the tree as the sentries were between strides.  Aiming and firing quickly, she placed the kill shots while they were still off balance.  The only sounds were the near silent mechanical pumping of her pistol as it pushed fresh rounds into the chamber, and the soft shifting of gravel under the bodies of the fallen sentries.  The Major waved the rest of her squad forward, wasting no time.

The squad swept forward along the descending path towards their target.  Valdez and Ortega paused along the way only long enough to kill the lamp packs on the fallen sentries.  The exterior of the entire site was unlit, aside from the lamps carried by the few sentries - which had all been quenched.  The briefing had described the location as a dig site, but, it looked more like the entrance to a bunker to Maj. Williams.  The entrance was nothing more than a set of simple steel doors at the end of a narrow descending road that had been dug into a seemingly random patch of forestland.  Whatever this installation actually was TriSigurius Corporation was trying to keep it off the radar.

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

2000 Words a Week - Go

After a year and a half it's time to get back at it. 

The plan is to every week and try to get as close to 2000 Words as possible.  Once I manage to hit that limit on a regular basis, then, it's time to up the quality.  It will be Draft Quality, so, read at your own peril!