Chapter 149: Advanced Training (1)

"Five o’clock, boys! Drop those shovels!" Arthur’s voice boomed across the snow-covered yard. "Stack ’em by the crates and fall into formation! Double time!"

​The men shoved their iron shovels into the wooden crates and scrambled into four lines, their boots crunching against the hard earth.

​"Right turn! Double time... march!" Arthur barked.

​The sixty men broke into a steady jog, circling the freshly cleared dirt track around the perimeter of the camp. Within two laps, the freezing morning chill vanished. Steam rose off their wool coats in thick clouds, their heavy breathing rhythmic against the quiet rustle of the surrounding pine trees.

​Up on the front porch of the farmhouse, Ricky sat on a wooden bench with a mug of black coffee, flipping through the handwritten draft pages of the Field Operator Training Manual. He watched the lines of men circle the yard below, keeping their pace tight even as snow began to lightly dust their hats again.

​By early afternoon, following a quick lunch of beef stew and hard bread in the warm mess hall, the company gathered outside the new CQC house situated at the edge of the timber line.

​The building was a imposing, eighty-by-eighty-foot timber structure with high flat roofs and no exterior windows. Inside, suspended ten feet above the dirt floor, a wide wooden boardwalk with heavy iron handrails encircled the perimeter, allowing instructors and spectators to look directly down into the interior space.

​What made the building unique was its modular wall system. Hanging from heavy steel overhead girders fitted with dual ball-bearing roller assemblies were dozens of thick wooden wall panels, each backed with thin sheet iron to stop low-caliber ricochets. The bottom of each panel rested inside grooved iron floor tracks fitted with spring-loaded locking pins. By stepping on a foot release and sliding the panel along the steel ceiling rails, two men could reconfigure the entire floor plan—moving doorways, creating narrow hallways, or building multi-room apartments—in less than five minutes.

​Ricky stood near the open double doors of the facility, looking up at the sixty men leaning over the iron handrails of the boardwalk above.

​"Most of you have shot at paper targets standing still on a range," Ricky called up to them, his voice echoing off the high timber roof. "That works for basic marksmanship. But out in the city, an enemy isn’t going to stand in an open field seventy paces away waiting for you to squeeze the trigger. They hide behind doorframes, duck under tables, and wait around blind corners."

​The men peered down at the maze of unpainted wooden walls below, murmuring among themselves.

​"How in the hell do those walls move so smooth?" Floyd muttered to Elmer, leaning over the brass railing. "Look at those iron wheels on the ceiling tracks."

​"It’s a labyrinth," Elmer whispered back. "You wouldn’t know what’s behind a corner until you’re right on top of it."

​"That is the entire point," Ricky said, looking up at the crowd. "I’ll demonstrate how the system works so you understand why we built it."

​Ricky unholstered his handgun, checking the magazine before slapping it back into the frame with a crisp click. He racked the slide, chambering a round, and adjusted his coat.

​Up on the central observation platform, John Caldwell pulled a heavy brass pocket stopwatch from his vest and held a slate board in his other hand. "Ready on your mark, boss!" John called down.

​Ricky stepped up to the missing wall panel that served as the primary entrance point. "Timer starts on the first step," Ricky said.

​"Go!" John shouted, clicking the brass stem on his stopwatch.

​Ricky crossed the threshold, instantly lowering his center of gravity. Instead of holding the pistol out at full arm’s length with one hand—the standard target stance taught in the army—he gripped the butt with both hands, pulling the weapon close to his chest in a tight retention position.

​Rounding the first corner into a narrow corridor, he sliced the pie—peeling back the angle inch by inch from behind the wall before exposing his body.

​BANG!

​A cardboard silhouette target posted at the end of the hall took a center-chest hit before it even fully came into view.

​Without pausing his forward momentum, Ricky glided to the first doorway on his left. He didn’t rush through the opening. He angled himself outside the frame, leaning just enough to clear the far right corner.

​BANG!

​A target tucked deep into the angle crumpled slightly on its wooden base. Ricky stepped through the threshold, snapping his weapon around to check the blind spot directly behind the door panel.

​BANG!

​A second target behind the door took a bullet square between the eyes.

​He cleared the room in three quick strides, stepping into a connecting chamber. Inside, a target was positioned low behind an overturned wooden table, leaving only two inches of its head visible. Ricky didn’t hesitate. He dropped his sight alignment half an inch and squeezed the trigger.

​BANG!

​The wooden head marker split down the center.

​Sprinting into a tight right-hand corridor, his gun ran dry, the slide locking back on an empty chamber with a sharp metallic clatter. In one seamless movement as he rounded the bend, Ricky hit the magazine release, let the empty magazine drop to the dirt floor, slapped a fresh magazine from his vest pocket into the magwell, and released the slide catch—all without taking his eyes off the hallway ahead.

​BANG!

​He shot the hallway target the split second the slide went forward.

​Stepping into the final room, two targets stood side by side. One was a red hostile silhouette; directly in front of it, covering eighty percent of its body, was a green silhouette representing an innocent civilian.

​Ricky halted his forward stride, froze his feet, and let out a long, slow exhale. His front sight post settled into the two-inch margin over the green target’s right shoulder.

​BANG!

​The red target behind it took the bullet right through the forehead, while the green paper target remained completely untouched.

​Ricky lowered his weapon, engaged the safety, and walked out through the rear exit frame onto the open dirt floor.

​Up on the boardwalk, John clicked the stopwatch. "One minute, eighteen seconds!" John shouted, a wide grin spreading across his face.

​John picked up a piece of white chalk and wrote on the slate hanging from the rail: R. Stevenson — 1:18.

​The boardwalk exploded into excited chatter. The recruits slapped their hands against the iron railings, staring down at the maze in genuine disbelief.

​"Did you see that reload?" Floyd shouted, grabbing Rico’s arm. "He didn’t even look at the gun! He dropped the box and slapped a new one in while he was turning the corner!"

​"And that double-handed grip!" Otis noted, rubbing his chin. "Kept the muzzle from rising at all. Barely any recoil."

​Ricky walked back out to the center of the arena, looking up at the men. "That is the standard," Ricky announced. "The room layout changes every single run. Target positions, hostage placements, and door locations will never be the same twice. If you hit a green target, your run is disqualified immediately. Only times under three minutes make it onto the leaderboard."

​He looked over at Arthur and John. "Who wants to take the first run?"

​A dozen hands shot into the air. John scanned the crowd and pointed down at Joey. "Joey! Get down here and step up to the breach!"

​"Yes, sir!" Joey yelled, scrambling down the wooden stairs three at a time.

​While Joey ran to the entrance, Ricky walked into the maze. He grabbed the ceiling levers, rolling three heavy wall panels into new track slots, closing off the previous hallway and opening a brand-new side room. He shifted the target stands, placing a green hostage target directly in front of the first doorframe Joey would hit.

​Satisfied, Ricky climbed the stairs up to the boardwalk alongside John and Arthur, looking down at Joey standing at the entry frame below. Joey held his Colt revolver in his right hand, his face pale, sweat breaking out on his forehead despite the cold draft in the building.

​"Ready on the line, Joey?" John shouted from above, his finger hovering over the stopwatch stem.

​"R-Ready, Sergeant!" Joey squeaked out, shifting his feet nervously.

​"Go!" John called out.

​Joey bolted through the doorframe—and instantly panicked.

​Forgetting every bit of the two-handed retention grip Ricky had just demonstrated, Joey thrust his revolver out with one arm like he was on a target range, his body completely exposed in the middle of the open doorway as he stumbled blindly into the new room.