\n Ioborne Chapter Six

\n Gunner awoke his white husky ears soaked in water. He felt the ocean roll beneath the ship, slowly rocking the ship.

\n "Good, you're finally awake," Bridge said nonchalantly, "Welcome to Io."

\n As Gunner looked around, he discovered the medic going around and checking on everyone. It was a quick check of their VIs, if they were dead, their VIs would be as well. Some people were awake and slowly coming around.

\n Gunner felt his mouth salivate, indicating he was probably about to throw up again. He went to the door to the engineroom and fortunately it opened under its own power. Bridge remarked that some of the ship still had power. As he stepped into the hallway, it was dark, faint light peeked through the holes in the hull. He made it to the bathroom, finding the body of Private Vicks didn't help the nausea.

\n He went to the observation deck, he found Duke there. The duraglass dome had been shattered. The controls were punctured with holes. They could see Jupiter, the sun was distant but still able to light the sky. Reports came from squad leaders and the medic.

\n Fourteen survivors including himself.

\n "He gave his life so that the rest of us could continue our mission," Gunner spoke as he pulled the newfoundland into an embrace. "So that you could go home and start up that restaurant."

\n Rockstead cried in his arms, making it difficult to contain Gunner's own sense of loss. Bridge remained silent, though in the background he was delegating orders to the rest of the platoon. He even wrote a very thoughtful Chinese poem about the heroes who will never be lost because they won't be forgotten.

\n ***

\n The fourteen gathered in the observation deck for a vigil. Third squad reported that they had put together two satellites and were ready to put them into orbit as soon as their VIs had finished calculating trajectory, orbit information. It would make it easier to track the prefabs from orbit. As per his (Bridge's) instructions, they also installed additional sensors.

\n First squad had already redesign the propulsion to turn their ship into a mobile platform. They had to keep the ship moving along with moon in order to stay in the warm liquid water. Fourth squad was able to turn parts of the ship into living quarters.

\n The days were short and the nights were long, and for a while they worked off of Terra hours, until a better plan came along. Once the satellites were up and fabrication of a third started, they were able to discover the whereabouts of twenty prefabs that were launched ahead of them. Second squad was the perfect recover team once the first squad was able to rebuild a transportation vehicle.

\n Fourth squad was already grafting parts of the first prefab onto their mobile platform when second squad had brought it in. The second squad leader brought the nanites that were stowed aboard the prefab. It was in a raw form, but Gunner was quickly able to acquire a hypospray.

\n Bridge wanted to discuss a few matters with Gunner before all his processes were consumed by having to manage and reprogram all the nanites in their specific duties.

\n "I think the destruction of Europa and the revolt on Luna are linked. The possibilities are limited to several megacorps who have capabilities and lack of moral compass.

\n "They were beat to Europa, and they needed to pre-occupy the military from their colonization efforts. Now that we don't have reinforcements coming, we need to be ready to safeguard our platform."

\n "What can we do?"

\n "Your men are already fabricating weapon posts, the satellites placed in orbit can detect approaching vessels. We stand a pretty good chance if we detect them early enough. They might not expect resistance, so we may have upper hand, but we can't underestimate them though.

\n "Squad leaders know the situation regarding Luna and the odds of seeing the next platoon within the next four or five years. They've relayed the information down. Everyone is taking the news well."

\n Bridge paused.

\n "I just wanted to keep you up to speed."

\n "What about the satellites? Won't they be subjected to the ice shroud?"

\n "They're equipped with stabilizers, but we will be putting up more up within the next few weeks. The moon's ionsphere diverts most of the ice to the poles. We've discovered several other hotspots, where volcanic activity is keeping the water in liquid form, but estimation say it's barely liquid and has a high sulphur content. Sometime after the next prefab we can send a survey squad."

\n "We don't have a survey squad."

\n "But you've already selected them."

\n "Thanks."

\n "No worries, it's all in your report."