The recon bay sat at the far edge of Sector Gamma, where the warehouse complex thinned into scrubland and the dead forest began its slow, watchful creep back toward human ground.
The trees out there were dead in the way only war could kill them—not burned, not rotted, just… empty. Trunks stood like skeletal fingers clawing up through the gray fog, their bark stripped smooth by radiation storms and chemical fallout. Nothing grew beneath them anymore. Even moss avoided the place.
It wasn't much to look at, the recon bay itself. A reinforced prefab structure squatting in the mud, its exterior patched with reactive plating and scorched insulation. Repairs layered over older repairs, some done clean and others rushed under fire. The walls bore the scars of near misses and shrapnel spray, metal warped and fused where it had once failed to stop something moving very fast.
Two armed sentries flanked the entrance.
Their armor didn't match—different manufacturers, different generations, paint worn down to bare alloy in places. One had replaced a shattered shoulder plate with something salvaged and bolted on at an angle. The other's helmet carried a long crack sealed with polymer resin.
Veterans.
People who had lasted long enough to stop caring how they looked, because looking good didn't keep you alive.
I paused just outside the doorway.
My HUD flickered as it synced with the platoon's local network, lines of encrypted data scrolling past faster than I could consciously track.
RECON PLATOON – SECTOR GAMMASQUAD DESIGNATION: RAVEN-3ROLE: DEEP RECON / OVERWATCH / TARGET INTERDICTION
A final line resolved beneath it, highlighted in amber.
LOADOUT UPDATE AUTHORIZED
That made my stomach tighten.
A tech inside glanced up from a workbench cluttered with tools and waved me in. "Deadshot?" he asked, already knowing the answer. "Command wants you geared properly."
Properly.
That word carried weight in this war.
Inside, the bay smelled of oil, ozone, and cold metal. The kind of smell that never quite left your clothes once it soaked in. Weapon racks lined the walls—each slot labeled, locked, and obsessively maintained. Every rifle, launcher, and sidearm was cleaned to regulation standards, but none of them looked new. They all bore the subtle signs of use: worn grips, scratched housings, serial numbers polished smooth by too many hands.
A central workbench dominated the room, buried beneath calibration rigs, drone components, spare optics, and half-disassembled sensors. Diagnostic holograms floated above it, flickering as they processed incoming data.
Half a dozen soldiers occupied the space in various states of readiness.
Some were checking gear. Others leaned back against crates or benches, helmets off, weapons resting across their knees. One was asleep sitting upright, chin tucked down, fingers still looped through a rifle sling.
Every one of them looked up when I entered.
For half a second, no one spoke.
Then someone whistled.
"Well, I'll be damned," a woman said. "They really did conscript kids."
A ripple of low amusement followed.
"Shut it, Ash," another voice replied. "He's taller than you."
That earned a sharp elbow and a muttered curse that I didn't quite catch.
Sergeant Miller stepped in behind me, boots heavy on the metal floor. "Eyes front," he said, voice cutting through the room without needing to rise. "This is PFC Carver. Call-sign Deadshot. He's assigned to Raven-3."
That killed the humor.
Not hostility. Not approval either.
Interest.
Eyes lingered longer now. Measuring. Weighing.
Miller jerked his thumb toward the far rack. "Gear him."
The tech moved without argument. He keyed in a long authorization code, pausing once as the system demanded biometric confirmation. A heavy case slid forward on magnetic rails with a low hum, locking into place at waist height.
Matte black. Reinforced corners.
Misriah Armory markings were etched into the side—not stamped or painted, but carved deep enough to survive fire.
My pulse spiked despite myself.
The tech glanced at me. "You ever handled something like this?"
"No," I said honestly.
"Good," he replied. "Means you won't be careless."
The case opened with a soft hiss as the seals disengaged.
The rifle lay inside like a sleeping predator.
SRS-99 Anti-Matériel Rifle.
Even broken down for transport, it was massive—its 1.66-meter frame dominating the foam-lined case. Reinforced alloy and dense polymer formed a body built to absorb stress that would shatter lesser weapons. The barrel alone looked thick enough to punch through concrete, heat shielding layered along its length.
I had seen it before.
Not like this.
In games. In archived footage. In grainy late-night videos my dad and I used to watch with the volume turned low so the neighbors wouldn't complain. Back then, it had been just another iconic weapon—flashy, exaggerated, something designed to look impressive on a screen.
Standing over it now, feeling its presence even before touching it, I understood the truth.
This wasn't a gun.
It was a decision.
"Fourteen-point-five by one-fourteen hyper-velocity," the tech said, his voice almost reverent. "Four-round magazine. Semi-auto. Don't let that fool you—this rifle punishes impatience."
I reached out, hesitated, then lifted the main body from the case.
The weight settled into my arms—heavy, but balanced. Absolute. The mass wasn't awkward or unwieldy; it distributed itself like it wanted to be held correctly, like it expected respect.
"It doesn't suppress," Miller said quietly from behind me. "It erases."
I nodded.
The rifle didn't feel comforting.
It didn't feel dangerous, either.
It felt honest.
The tech finished mounting the optic—a high-magnification smart scope with integrated wind, Coriolis drift, radiation interference, and atmospheric density correction. He locked the magazine into place with a solid, final click that echoed faintly through the bay.
"Four rounds," he repeated. "That's it. Each one costs more than your old apartment."
I didn't smile.
When I shouldered the rifle, my HUD synced instantly. Data flooded in, then stabilized. The world snapped into clarity. Distances resolved into precise measurements. Angles became firing solutions. Environmental noise fell away until all that remained were variables I could control.
The SRS didn't feel like an upgrade.
It felt like an extension.
"DMR stays with you," Miller said. "This is for when command needs a problem to stop existing."
I slung the rifle carefully, feeling its weight settle against my spine, anchoring me.
"Introductions," Miller said. "Raven-3."
He pointed to the woman who'd spoken first. She was tall and lean, armor marked with a jagged white slash across the chest. Her helmet hung from her belt, sharp features set in a perpetual half-smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.
"Corporal Ashley Rook," she said. "Ash. Demolitions and drones. If it explodes or spies, it's mine."
She looked me over slowly. "You don't look like a sniper."
"I wasn't trying to be," I said.
Her grin widened. "Good answer."
Next was a broad-shouldered man seated on a crate, calmly cleaning a light machine gun that looked almost delicate in his massive hands.
"Specialist Ivan Volkov," he said, accent thick but measured. "Support gunner. I make noise so others don't have to."
He gave a brief nod, eyes sharp and assessing, then returned to his work.
A man leaning against the wall raised two fingers in greeting. Dark skin. Steady eyes. Medical insignia worn smooth by years of use.
"Doc Hernandez," he said. "Combat medic. If you get hit, don't die before I get to you."
"I'll try not to," I said.
"Good," he replied, deadly serious.
A woman sat cross-legged near the floor, holographic terrain maps projected from her forearm pad. She didn't look up at first.
"Lieutenant Chen," Miller said. "Navigation and intel. Second-in-command."
Chen finally raised her eyes. Sharp. Assessing.
"You're the Wave One kid," she said.
"Yes, ma'am."
"You disrupted three enemy formations solo," she continued. "From angles our analysts didn't predict."
I shrugged. "They weren't watching their flanks."
A faint smile tugged at her mouth. "They rarely do."
Last was a man seated apart, sharpening a combat knife with slow, deliberate strokes. Older than the rest. Scarred. Every movement economical.
"Sergeant Kade," Miller said. "Scout and point."
Kade looked at me for a long moment. "You hiding anything else I should know about?"
"No," I said. "I'm done hiding."
He nodded once. "Good. Liars get people killed."
Miller looked around the room. "Raven-3, this is your overwatch. He's young—too young for this unit, if we're being honest. But if command's data is right, he's the reason Delta-Three didn't fall."
Ash snorted. "No pressure, kid."
I adjusted the sling of the SRS, feeling its weight anchor me.
"I don't plan to die today," I said.
The room went still.
Then Volkov chuckled. "That is very good plan."
Chen nodded. "We roll in thirty."
Ash snapped a drone battery into place. "Welcome to recon, Deadshot."
As they dispersed to prep gear, I looked down at the rifle once more.
Four rounds.Perfect judgment.One shot. One decision.
The Last War hadn't just given me a new unit.
It had given me a vector.
For the first time since soldiers kicked in my door, I wasn't running anymore.
I was being aimed.