Bruce wasn’t sure what to expect when he pushed open the door to Stratagem Support. What he certainly wasn’t expecting was a set of spiral stairs leading down into the belly of the ship. The door at the bottom opened to a dark room resembling a call center. Long rows of console desks curved in a semi circle around a holographic planet similar to what was on the command deck. This one, however, was three times the size. Support staff sat in padded chairs before the consoles in their gray Logistics uniforms. Above the hologram of the planet in block letters read the words: “LIBERTY FROM ABOVE”

  A Logistics member stepped up to Bruce as he took it all in, “You’re Bruce?”

  Bruce finished looking around the room then turned toward the person talking to him. “I am. I had no idea this was down here.”

  “Why would you? You’re usually down on the planet instead of up here. We don’t see Helldivers down here very often.” She looked down at her data slate then back up to Bruce. “We’ll have you shadow Milo today. Next time you’ll be on your own.”

  That took Bruce by surprise. “My own? Already?”

  “You’ll see. It’s not that hard. Milo is in row three console ten. It’s on the right side. I’m Varla. Let me know if you have any questions that Milo can’t answer.” Bruce nodded then set off to find Milo.

  A walkway ran down the center of the rows of consoles. At each row, a large number on the floor indicated which row it was. Bruce quickly found his way to console 3-10. A very thin man sat at the edge of his seat before the console, headset over his ears, slouched forward almost as if his upper torso was trying to fold itself in half. As Bruce approached, the man glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. “Give me a minute.” The man said. The long fingers of his left hand danced around several buttons while his right hand rolled over a fist sized red ball halfway exposed on the desk in front of him. Above the desk, two monitors displayed information about the dive he was operating. Eventually, the man pulled one ear of the headset off, but kept his eyes glued to the monitors. “What’s up?”

  “Are you Milo? Varla said I should shadow you today.”

  The man turned to look at Bruce, then sat up straight, the vertebrae in his back popping as he did so. “Oh you... You’re the Helld... Oh Hi!” He pulled the headset off then stood and grabbed Bruce’s hand in both of his, shaking it vigorously. “Hi yes I’m Milo. So nice to meet you. I’ve never met a Helldiver before.”

  This whole fricken ship full of people and no one thought support staff and Helldivers should meet each other?

  “Nice to meet you too Milo. I’m Bruce. You certainly are tall.” Bruce said, looking up at him.

  “Oh yeah yeah. I’m just over two meters tall.”

  Bruce’s eyes widened, “Good lord, I don’t think you’d fit into a Hellpod if you tried.”

  “I most certainly wouldn’t. That’s why they have me here dropping bombs on the traitors instead of down there with you.”

  Something flashed on a monitor and caught Bruce’s eye. He pointed to it, “So what does that mean?”

  Milo turned to look at the screen, “Oh no. Oh No. Oh NO!” He pulled the headset back on then picked up where he left off prior to Bruce’s interruption. Afraid to intrude again, Bruce grabbed a stool from under the console behind him and sat on it, leaning in to watch Milo work. Milo didn’t say much for the next ten minutes other than muttering to himself as his hands danced around the console controls.

  Varla was right, it didn’t seem too hard. The monitor on the left showed telemetry readouts, squad vitals, and several symbols next to each of the Helldivers listed on the monitor. The right monitor showed a top down view of the battlefield the assigned Helldiver squad were operating in. It looked like Milo watched until a symbol appeared on the right monitor, then he’d tap the screen, tap a button on the left side of the console then use the ball to move a cursor over the symbol before pressing the button again.

  Then things would explode.

  Twenty minutes or so later, the squad piled into the Pelican to extract. Milo let out a whoop of victory, took his headset off his head and leaned back in his chair. “Pretty neat huh? Have any questions?”

  Bruce smiled at the absurdity of that question. “Yeah I’ve got a few Milo. Seems you just wait until they call something in then press the button and tell the ship where to fire it?”

  “Uh huh. Sometimes you gotta watch though. They can throw the stratagems in strange places so you have to watch the telemetry to know if it’s going to hit or not. Sometimes it’s easy, but if its windy like on Mastia, the sand makes it hard to see. I don’t like when we dive on Mastia.”

  “The wind plays a lot into it?”

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  “Oh for sure.” Milo nodded, “Yeah sure. And you have to make sure to account for the delay. You don’t want anyone to get hurt.”

  That made Bruce pause for a moment, he hadn’t seen anything about wind or delay. Milo was more than happy to show Bruce where the information was on the screen. Bruce frowned when he saw it. It would take some getting used to, and he agreed with Milo that he wouldn’t want anyone to get hurt.

  “STRATAGEM SUPPORT ONLINE” A voice shouted over the speaker in the same tone and cadence as the Helldiver launch sequence, but instead of a red light, this one was blue.

  “Ok I’m gonna do this one again. You watch me and I’ll help you do the next one ok?”

  Bruce nodded then smiled as Milo resumed his posture for the drop. At first, Milos eccentric nature had bothered Bruce a little bit, but after chatting with him between drops, Bruce decided he liked Milo. He was a little weird but he took his job seriously, and that was important.

  “Oh yaay!” Milo said, putting one fist in the air.

  “What’s up?”

  Milo looked over his shoulder at Bruce while pointing to a symbol of a red half circle with a yellow line coming out of it. “They brought the orbital laser. I love that one. I hope they use it.”

  “Why do you like that one?”

  “I get to play eraser beam hehe!”

  Bruce belly laughed as Milo turned back to the screen. Sure enough, the squad called in the orbital laser on a bug hive. Milo used the ball to drag the laser around the hive collapsing bug holes and melting everything from Hunters and Warriors to Behemoths and Stalkers.

  The dive seemed to go quite well for this squad. They only needed one resupply box and were able to clear several side objectives in addition to burning the hives out. When the squad extracted, Milo pulled his headset off and hung it up on the hook. “Ok I’m all done. I hope you have fun tomorrow.” He stood and started walking away.

  “Wait, you said you were going to help with the next one.” Bruce said.

  “I’m done for today so I’m going to leave. Varla can help you with the next one.”

  Bruce’s face contorted, “Ok but what happens if a Helldiver gets too close to a stratagem? Is there an emergency shutoff? I don’t want to drop something on anyone.”

  “No no that would be bad. That’s why you have to be careful and look at the telemetry.”

  “So if we call in the wrong thing on accident we can’t stop it?”

  “Always use the telemetry. And... and double check the stratagem button. If it matches then use it. Don’t use it unless it's called.”

  “We can use a stratagem if it isn’t called?”

  “No I said DON’T use it unless it’s called. You get in trouble if you use one that they don’t request.”

  “Oh ok.” Bruce wondered about that but kept it to himself. “And there is no emergency shut off switch?”

  “No you don’t need one because you put it where the Helldivers ask for it. Helldivers know where they put their stratagems. They know to stay away from dangerous things.”

  Bruce almost laughed in Milo's face. His blind faith in what Helldivers could see on the ground was staggering. He lost count of how many times he’d thrown a stratagem that bounced the wrong way and landed right next to him.

  Bruce followed Milo back to the door leading up and out of the support room, but found Varla first. “Milo said he’s done. Am I good to go?”

  “Yeah I think so. It’s not so hard is it?”

  “No it isn’t. I think I’ve got it. I’ll just keep an eye out for the next drop to know when to come down here?”

  “We don’t work on drops like Helldivers do. We’re in shift. You’ll be here tomorrow at 0600 SSET and you’ll be on deck until 1400 SSET. Maybe we won’t have any drops, maybe we’ll do ten.”

  “Oh wow ok.” Bruce said. “I guess I’ll see you then.

  Varla nodded then turned to check on something across the room.

  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  “They put you in Stratagem Support?” Kelly asked as the squad came together later that day to eat.

  “Yeah after my little meltdown from the results of the Hanger test, I went up to the Lord Commander and asked him to let me dive again.”

  “How’d that go?” Zack asked.

  “I’m surprised he didn’t push me out of the airlock.”

  The squad laughed.

  “I’m serious. I pushed in there yelling and he brought me up front to watch the drop then gave me a pep talk and told me to do stratagem support until I was fully healed.”

  “Thats cool.” Andrew said.

  Bruce filled them in on how the whole thing worked, or at least how he thought it all worked. They got a kick out of Milo and his eccentricities. Collectively, they agreed that members from the entire shipboard operation should meet each other instead of working independently. When they finished eating, Bruce checked the time and excused himself saying he wanted to get a good sleep in before his first day. Everyone said bye, then Bruce took the Hellchute up to his deck.

  “Hey Bruce, wait up!” Candice called to him as the door to his pod irised open.

  His heart lifted a bit as she walked toward him from the Hellchute. A strange feeling coming over him. “Hey Candice. What’s up?”

  “I just...” She looked out over the barracks deck. “I don’t know. You seemed really upset earlier and I wanted to make sure you’re ok.”

  “Yeah I think I’m ok. I was just feeling the walls closing in you know?”

  “I bet. I think the longest I’ve been on the ship between drops is like two days. It’s been almost a month for you huh?”

  “Yeah.” Bruce said, stepping away from the doorway to lean against the railing overlooking the barracks. “I thought it would be nice to get away from it all for a bit. Turns out, you miss it.”

  “Think so?”

  Bruce just nodded. That flutter in his chest was still there. He feigned looking around the ship so he could steal looks at Candice out of the corner of his eye. There was a sort of pull he felt toward her that started small on the last drop on Lastofe, but had only gotten stronger as time went on. It wasn’t uncommon for squad members to date each other but was that what he wanted? She drove him absolutely nuts when they were on a drop together, but she was sweet between drops. Her laugh made his stomach flutter, and he could stare into her reddish brown eyes for hours.

  She’d caught him doing it several times.

  He took a deep breath, blew it out around puffed out cheeks, then drummed on the railing awkwardly. “Ok well I’m going to head in. Have a good night.”

  Fuck it.

  He took a chance, and put a hand on her shoulder as he left, giving it a little squeeze. She grabbed his hand as it felt from her shoulder and she pulled him back to look at her. They searched each others eyes briefly, each anticipating the other making a move.

  The moment lingered longer than was comfortable.

  “Ok, well have fun tomorrow.” Candice said.

  Bruce nodded then walked into his room, heart pounding.

  He didn’t sleep well.