by JustinSloan | May 27, 2017 | Snippets
UNEDITED – Follow at www.Facebook.com/SyndicateWars (book now live on Amazon)
A base liaison officer led the Marines from the armory down a short set of stairs and through various anterooms until they hit a catwalk bolted onto the far side of the mountain. The catwalk extended behind an armored bulwark called “Block Thirteen,” which was notched with cubbies where Marines could sleep or shoot through firing holes.
Here and there were missile batteries and robotic chain-gun cannons pointed at the sky that could fire one thousand thirty-millimeter rounds per minute. Next to the weapons were phalanxes of anti-missile devices hooked to their own targeting systems—close-in cannons on swivel bases that fired chaff and tungsten penetrator rounds, designed to destroy any incoming alien missiles and artillery.
The Marines stopped and Hayden went down the line, assigning each a cubby. Quinn humped her gear down toward the end of Block Thirteen and dropped it in a cubby next to Renner’s.
Quinn stashed her rucksack at the back of the cubby and peered through a gun slot. Everything was green, the immense jungle below spreading out in every direction. She made sure the others weren’t looking, then withdrew her cellphone, a battered iPhone that had seen better days. She opened her photo album and started at the beginning, flipping through photos of her daughter from the moment she was born up to the present, her eighth birthday. Sammy aged right before her eyes and Quinn fought to suppress the tightness in her throat, the burning at the edges of her nose. She wanted badly to call her up, to check on her folks, but she knew that was forbidden. Intel had briefed the Marines and warned them that the use of cellular devices might be used by the enemy to track movements and positions. Knowing SouthCom like she did, bastards who cared about nothing more than winning, she figured they probably had cellphone suppression around the base anyway.
Music echoed, and Quinn set down her phone and peered around the side of the cubby. Renner was on his stomach, listening to some classical music while staring at a collection of religious figurines. (more…)
by JustinSloan | May 25, 2017 | Snippets
UNEDITED (Follow us on the Facebook page)
The Marines continued their journey, but it was another eleven hours before they completed their ascent and were driving through the colossal tunnel that had been drilled into the rear of the mountain. The tunnel had been built two years earlier, back when word of the Syndicate first arrived via SETI’s Alien Telescope Array.
The news had been almost impossible to believe and was initially chalked up to yet another “fake news” story. But then the truth was revealed. An armada of alien craft had emerged from a globular star cluster known as M-25, traveling at speeds of what appeared to be a thousand miles per second, heading directly toward Earth.
The first scientist to discover the craft, a man whose name was lost to history, described the spacecraft as moving in formation, as part of a team. He’d used the term “Syndicate” to describe the armada, and the name had stuck. (more…)
by JustinSloan | May 21, 2017 | Snippets
UNEDITED – Launching May 30! In the meantime, follow the series on Facebook!
With every reason to suspect that this might be the last day of her life, Quinn adjusted her well-worn battle armor and shouldered her assault rifle, staring up at the billowing gray clouds of the early afternoon sky.
There were no rays of light, no sign from the heavens, nor any other reason to be optimistic.
Yet, somehow, she still possessed a modicum of hope, because she wasn’t just readying to fight for herself. Hers wasn’t necessarily a personal battle for survival; rather, it was a fight on behalf of humanity against an invading force of aliens that might soon sweep across the Earth, ushering in a new age of extinction. Quinn had always thought that despondency arose out of having choices, and since there was only one option—do battle against the invaders and squeeze every ounce of life from their bodies—there was little reason to lose heart.
A bemused smile danced across her lips, and she wondered how it had come to this. How a young woman from an Ohio backwater could enter the Corps as a means to support herself and her little girl and then, only a few years later, be on the front lines of what might be history’s last great stand. The battle to end all battles, the fight to save Earth from a powerful alien force that the Marines simply knew as the Syndicate.
Soon they would likely see the first sign of what might bring their impending death. Quinn and the others in her squad, the thirty-six men and women of the Global Force Marines, were ready for whatever the day might bring, even if that meant their complete and utter annihilation. (more…)
