The sleek insertion craft glided effortlessly across the blackness, and Major Herow began to feel a little anxiety building up as he strained to locate the other craft. It continued to build until his long-range imager, at full magnification, just barely made out the second craft. The whirling, drifting blanket of vapors around the other craft hid it for a few seconds, and then revealed it back to him. The craft danced for him. It was in his vision again, and then it was gone. Finally, he switched to the thermals his helmet offered him. With the other craft’s jump bay door open, he now had visual contact with its team leader, even thought all he could see was a heat blob in a doorway.

His anxiety subsided as he directed his team’s recognition signal to the other craft. Seconds later he received a beep acknowledging their readiness. So far so good, he thought, but the anxiety he felt would not let go completely. The additional insertion craft certainly did not help.

It was a two-team mission and they were forced to use two insertion crafts. The crafts were capable of carrying only ten troopers each in the jump bay. With two crafts, the chances of detection increased. Their short, squat silhouettes made them nearly unrecognizable on most detection screens. Their main defense lay in their being fast, maneuverable, and covered with a special paint that made them almost undetectable. The thermal image that Herow was just barely making out was only possible because the jump bay door of the other insertion craft was open. They had a few guns on them for self-defense and the support of teams during extraction, but nothing big enough to make them a threat. The crafts were well-adapted for this kind of work, but all this activity could only attract attention.

Getting closer to their drop point, Herow stepped back inside the compartment and turned toward his team. He could feel the emotions starting to grow on either side of him. It was more from some sixth sense than anything else, because their battlesuits covered them completely and the helmet filters had darkened automatically when the doors opened.

Nobody could have told you by looking who was who except for Herow and the other members of his team. He could tell by the wear spot on Warrant Misaki Okada’s helmet where she placed her cheek on her sniper rifle that she was in her usual place right behind him. The battlesuit with the two slug rifle impacts in the middle of its chest at the end of the line was Master Chief Shiri Pak overseeing the team like a mother hen. For the last six-plus years the team had trained together, lived together, ate together, and slept together. They knew each other well, and were at the point were they could almost finish each other’s sentences at times, but insertions made everyone uneasy. This was when the team would be most vulnerable.

The dull glow his team gave off in the craft’s glowing red jump lights made them look like ancient knights from medieval times. The dull black battlesuits were lighter than those of the regular line troopers and were designed for speed, stealth, and communications; but they could endure a lot more punishment than the metal suits their medieval brothers had worn. He flinched when the pilot beeped a warning that they were two minutes out from the drop point. It was time to get down to business.

Herow held up two gloved fingers and spoke over the team net. “Two minutes.” Instantly, he heard seven beeps that to anyone else would have sounded like one. He smiled. He tapped the top of his helmet to tell the seven faceless helmets that he was the first jumper and they were to follow him.

Stepping back to the jump door, Herow felt his stomach do a loop. No matter how many times he did it, he hated looking out into nothingness. He didn’t think he would ever get used to throwing his body out of a still functioning, perfectly good insertion craft. Then he shuddered as he remembered that this was a military craft build by the lowest bidder. Thinking about that first step didn’t help matters either; in fact, that was the biggest problem. The sensation of falling always put him on the edge of panic.