Chapter 10 - The Order of Battle
Harris turned away from the table, stepping out into the open center aisle of Bay 4. He cleared his throat, the sound sharp enough to bring the remaining eighteen cadets instantly into a rigid line along the perimeter of their assigned tables.
"Listen up!" Harris bellowed, his command voice returning in full force, echoing off the high industrial ceiling like rolling thunder.
The cadets snapped their heads toward him, their eyes wide, their postures strained. The atmosphere in the room had shifted completely. The juvenile competitiveness, the casual bullying, the arrogance of young recruits who thought physical fitness equaled combat capability—all of it had been burned away by the reality of what had just unfolded on workstation three.
"What you witnessed today," Harris paced down the centerline, his combat boots ringing against the concrete, "was a lesson in the difference between an amateur and an operator. Amateurs look at a weapon as an accessory to their ego. They think loud voices, big muscles, and bravado make them dangerous. They play games with machinery that is engineered for one specific purpose: the violent termination of human life."
He stopped, turning his eyes slowly down the line of recruits.
"A professional," Harris continued, his voice dropping into a hard, measured cadence, "treats every millimeter of steel with lethal respect. A professional doesn't guess. A professional feels a two-tenth-millimeter discrepancy in a spring detent before they pull the trigger. A professional disassembles their weapon, clears their malfunction, and secures their sector without uttering a single unnecessary word."
He turned back toward workstation three.
Olivia had finished wiping down the rifle. The carbine was fully reassembled now, resting cleanly on the green neoprene mat, its selector switch set to safe, its magazine seated, its dust cover closed. Her canvas rucksack sat neatly beside the bench, upright and unbothered.
"Cadet Mitchell," Harris said.
"Sir."
"Step out."
Olivia took two paces forward, coming to attention at the edge of the workstation. Her face was completely expressionless, her hands pinned to her seams, her eyes fixed on the horizon line across the shed.
"Fifty-two seconds," Harris announced to the squad. "That is the new base record for the complete field-strip and reassembly diagnostic cycle. It will stand on the training command ledger until someone in this room—or any other room on this installation—has the discipline to beat it."
He looked directly at Elena, then at the rest of the squad.
"For the remainder of this training block, Cadet Mitchell is designated as the squad's primary armorer and tactical skills instructor. If she tells you your bolt carrier is dry, you oil it. If she tells you your stance is wrong, you fix it. If she tells you to hold your breath, you suffocate until she tells you to exhale. Are there any questions?"
"No, sir!" the squad roared back in unison, the volume fueled by genuine, unadulterated awe.
"Elena," Harris said.
"Sir!"
"Reset the digital timers. All stations prep for the second heat. We run the three-minute qualifying cycle from the top. Every cadet will complete three consecutive clean passes, or we stay in this bay until the morning shift relieves us."
"Understood, sir!" Elena moved quickly back to the master control console, her fingers flying over the keypad.
Harris looked at Olivia one last time. He gave her a single, microscopic nod of professional acknowledgment—the quiet salute of one veteran who recognized another across the vast, bureaucratic landscape of conventional military structure.
Olivia returned the nod by an eighth of an inch.
Harris turned on his heel and strode back toward the observation office, his boots crunching lightly over the fine grit on the concrete floor.
At the back of the bay, Lance stood with his nose pressed against the cold red brick of the wall, his hands clenched into useless, trembling fists, listening to the sharp, metallic clatter of the training bay springing back to life.
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Olivia turned back to workstation three. She picked up her canvas rucksack, slung it over her left shoulder with effortless grace, and looked at the next cadet in the queue—a young woman who was staring at her with wide, reverent eyes.
"Set your weapon down," Olivia said softly, her voice calm, steady, and terrifyingly precise. "Let’s look at your extractor."
