Free Salvage Marines (Necrospace Book 1) by Sean-Michael Argo Page A

magazine and racked the slide on the combat rifle, chambering the first round as he let his breath out slowly. Tango Platoon was only moments away from boarding their assault craft and despite his months of combat duty this would be his first boarding action. It was the same for the majority of the rest of the salvage marines in the Reaper fleet, since only their squad leaders were veterans.
    There were a handful of exceptions, like Oliver Putin, who were survivors of other Reaper fleets that had been liquidated. Samuel looked out across the hangar bay of the great Reaper tug ship and saw that dozens of platoons also stood in tight rows as they, too, waited to board their respective assault craft.
    Finally, warning klaxons began to sound while yellow and red lights flooded the hangar bay. Mag walked down the line of Squad Taggart, double checking their void gear and giving them last minute pointers on the coming fight.
    “Void battles are fought in a full three hundred and sixty degrees,” barked Mag, raising her voice to carry over the engines of the assault crafts as they revved to life. “No doubt the hulk has artificial gravity in some sections, but you need to be prepared to fight in zero gravity. You’ve all had void combat training during basic, but for most of you that’s nearly a year in the past. If Grotto cared more about making an investment in our continued survival they would have issued this boat with a training deck, but seeing as how they didn’t, we aren’t and this briefing is as good as you’re going to get.”
    Samuel listen with rapt attention. He’d heard many tales and stories about void battles. Tales of the unfathomable emptiness of space, the fragility of the very ships upon which they rode, and the surreal silence that accompanied even the most brilliant of conflicts.
    The marine could feel the additional weight of the void seals that had been screwed into the sockets of his standard issue battle armor. All marine armor came pre-drilled and threaded to support additional void equipment which made Samuel think that it would have indeed been wise to provide them more training for void combat during basic. He’d learned the hard way though, over the last many months of his tour through necrospace, that Grotto Corporation only cared about human life in so much as it affected the Bottom Line.
    He understood that it was a grim view of the world, and one that he’d neither explained to Sura, nor even attempted to make her aware of. In many ways, he felt that being in the Reaper fleet had opened his eyes profoundly to the vast and uncaring world of Grotto Corporation more than any of his time in the factories.
    It was as if by being a Reaper he was able to look down on the rest of the world from a high enough vantage point to see the totality of the organism otherwise known as Grotto. A multi-galactic corporation that spanned through countless systems, ruled over the lives of billions, but most importantly, was only one of a multitude of such companies. Perhaps Grotto was the largest, but it was certainly not the only predator stalking the fields of the endless trade wars.
    The Reaper fleets were accorded equipment that was either well-used, refurbished, decommissioned, or cheaply acquired from Grotto subsidiaries. The marines themselves were recruited from the lowest class citizens in the corporate civilization and offered pay far beyond what they could hope for in the civilian workforce. Their primary mission was to roam the galaxy and pick up the scraps left in the wake of corporate progress.
    This is the job, he told himself as he returned his attention to Mag, who was discussing the vagaries of zero gravity firefights.
    “Though your weapons all have recoil dampeners, firing them in zero gravity is going to push you around just as hard as if you’d kicked off a wall,” said Mag, “So be sparing with your shots and stay aware of who is around you.” The ground guide crewman gave the all