Here is Keper's intro.
Chapter Two
Keper carefully shifted his weight to peer around the large circular pylon he was crouching behind to get a better view of the vast hanger. A pair of drone Vipers were sitting in front of the large shielded main door, as if waiting to be let out, and the five main rows of crates and cargo units piled haphazardly in the center served as a poor man’s maze. Everything was quiet and still, even the Movers and Slippers used for transporting all the cargo, but he knew it was a trap. He was less than a third of the way to the office in back that was his objective, but at least he was not where they thought he was, as evident from some of the surface images he was picking up from their thoughts.
The only problem was he did not know exactly where they were either.
Keper leaned back against the hard cement and weighed his options. He could make a run for it after causing a distraction or perhaps he could try to trance-in to pinpoint the others’ locations and take them out one by one, or he could even wait there for them to expose themselves….
“MOVE!” boomed a familiar voice in his head, accompanied by a hazy vision of him staring up at his attackers.
Jolted out of his silent musing, Keper immediately unhooked a flash charge on his belt and placed it at his feet. He then straightened up and locked in on the far left pallet of cargo units about 25 feet away.
It was a long shot.
He took a deep breath and sprinted toward them. As he ran each footfall was a cringing bang of a kettle drum, every exhale a sonic hiss of a plasma engine; how could they not notice? He sensed some of the others were already glancing over and preparing to come over to check it out.
But that was what Keper was hoping for.
As he reached the first row of pallets, he knelt down to one knee and swiveled, turning back to the pylon focusing his breathing and concentrating, painfully aware that all of his psi training had not improved his basic combat prowess. His breathing became steadier as his thoughts focused on the flash charge left there. However, he heard a sound behind him and broke concentration to look around. One shape melted behind one of the cargo units further back and another seemed to dissolve up into the rafters over the middle of the second row of pallets. Keper did not know where the third, fourth or fifth attackers were yet, but he kept his breathing focused and looked back, steadying his gaze.
He knew it was only a few more seconds before they figured out his position. It had to be timed right, though. Half closing his eyes, he tried to expand his consciousness to create a real-time map reading of a few meters out from where he was kneeling. Now he sensed that four of them were moving towards him, and at least three of them would be in the blast radius in three…two….one.
Willing it to move, an ephemeral hand grasped the flash charge and flung it at the entrance between the second and third row of pallets, clinking on the floor twice before exploding in a bright aura of light. Immediately, there was a crash and a curse from the rafters. That one had lost his hold and tumbled down onto the top of the second row of pallets. Keper quickly stood up and with his back against the pallets, made another scan of the area where the blast was just a moment before. He saw that the third attacker was gesturing towards the pylon where the charge came from and the fourth was kneeling behind another pylon in the center of the hanger, adjusting his visor settings. Keper smiled but he was not safe yet. He was standing in plain view of the third attacker, although his ruse had worked for the moment. He slithered between the first and second rows as quietly as possible and this time carefully padded down the aisle, hoping that the first attacker had been instructed to check out where the charge came from as well.
Keper reached the end of the row and peeked out. Here was mostly open space, allowing the Movers easy access, so it would be more difficult to sneak around. He saw three of the Movers and a Slipper, but they were offline against the back wall. The office where the material was located was in clear sight, but it was still more than 50 feet away. He would have to hurry before they figured it out and closed the distance.
Hoping he was being quiet enough, he attempted another quick hustle to the back wall of the hanger to get behind one of the Movers. He would be in the open again, but he would be in a better position than playing hide and seek with them along the rows of cargo units. Keper crouched lower and darted to one of the exo-skeleton machines and quickly hid behind it. Instead of peeking around, he tried to sense where and what they others were doing by controlling his breathing and closing his eyes. He realized that relaxing was much harder under this kind of pressure. He sighed after a few seconds and resigned to using his eyes to peek around knowing that Omprikosh would be shaking his head at him, those sad eyes telling him to keep trying. “Ah well, doesn’t matter,” he thought. He stifled a smile, amazed that he had gotten this far. He was getting better, after all.
But his smile turned to a frown as he saw the first attacker closing in on his position from the right and another attacker moving between the fourth and fifth row of pallets toward the back from the left. “Damnit,” he thought, since he was hoping the first attacker would be going forward toward the flare. However, he had not been spotted yet, since the first attacker was slowly scanning the back area as he crept closer.
Time for another minor distraction. Keper maneuvered his body so that he was facing the office and last row of pallets; his back to the first attacker, and this time did close his eyes and willed himself to relax. He opened his eyes slowly and focused on one of the boxes on top of the fourth row of pallets. Now, to just tip that little one over……
…when immediately he sensed danger in close proximity and felt a burst of energy emanate from him just as he was willing the box to fall. Keper then looked in shock as the entire back half of the fourth row shook and then violently exploded into the fifth row knocking them both down scattering boxes and crates in all directions, engulfing one of the attackers and ruining many under their crushing weights.
Rooted in shock, Keper did not need extra sensory perception to feel the whack of a Nightstick to his kidney. Keper crumpled to the ground holding his side.
“Subject is down and penned in quadrant A4. Repeat: down in A4,” said the attacker into his radio, putting away his Nightstick. Keper tried to stand, but a boot stepped on his chest and kept him prone. “Not so fast, miuty. Stay there and enjoy the view.” Keper took a moment to catch his breath as he heard the others hustling over. Ironically, he looked up and noticed the exact same image he had seen while he was behind the pylon of him staring up at Keiva, Heinrich, Grost, and Vanders. Dieter limped up into view a moment later.
Keper again tried to stand. Heinrich’s boot started to arc in for a kick. “This is for Dieter….”
“Enough! Let him up.” Came an order from behind them. Immediately, all five jumped to attention.
Loud, confident boot steps came up and stopped behind the circle surrounding Keper. As Keper stood up, brushing himself off, two of them parted to show Captain Hahn’s ugly face.
“Pitiful. You only lasted 2 minutes 38 seconds. Richter assured me you would surprise me. Explosions don’t surprise me. Hell, you didn’t even give my boys a workout. That little stunt with the flare wouldn’t fool a securbot, let alone one of my soldiers,” Hahn turned abruptly to Grost probing his finger into Grost’s chest, “which is why you are now demoted to Private, Private Grost. Understood?” Grost looked stunned, but managed to stammer an affirmative answer. Hahn quickly turned back to Keper and said, “And what the hell was that with the pallets? This was an exercise to practice stealth, not muscle or force. I have enough grunts to do that. Any damage comes out of your boss’s pocket.” Hahn now turned on Dieter. “Corporal, are you alright?”
“Yes, sir. Only superficial, sir.” Dieter replied.
“Good. You’ll report to tomorrow at 0600 for endurance and dexterity training. You should have dodged those crates.”
“Yes, sir,” said Dieter, shame apparent in his face.
“Hova! I just don’t understand why they wanna mix unstable miuties with real soldiers. I just don’t like it and neither do the soldiers.” Hahn now pointed at Keper. “You are a risk to my soldiers, to this organization and yourself. Get cleaned up and report to STALQ at 0800. That is your new duty.
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