Military SF intro [1000 words]

[Fishbowl Helmet]

Hey, so this is one of the other bits I've been working on. This is the very start of a piece. It is meant to be mildly disorienting with the slight turn at the end, but it's not meant to be confusing to read or hard to follow.

As always, I would appreciate any constructive criticism and pointers/advice on how to improve the piece. Don't be shy if you spot something my idiot-brain missed. This is supposed to be solidly in Roche's POV, so mentioning any bits where I slip out of that would be helpful. Typical questions, such as: is it engaging, interesting, would you keep reading, or is it so cliched it makes you want to pluck out your eyes rather than continuing?

Please. Thank you.

###################

Lieutenant Roche dove for cover among the grassy dunes. Automatic weapons fire pelted the sand and turf around her position.

Mother******* are dug in up there, she thought.

Her earpiece comm crackled to life. “Roche, what the **** are you doing?” Sergeant Petrov demanded. “This ain’t no time for naps. We got a job to do.”

Always the *******. She flicked the comm to send. “Yes, sergeant.” Roche flashed a few standard hand signals to her fire team, ordering them to spread out and dig in. “We’re working on it.”

“Well, work faster numb-nuts.”

“Yes, sir.”

The channel died and she breathed out a heavy sigh.

Sergeants were supposed to push their people. That was their job. But Petrov took it to a whole new level. He was more like a sadistic turd who happened to be a sergeant rather than a sergeant who happened to be a sadistic turd.

A quick check told her the fire team was in a good spot. Nice and spread out, but within sight and earshot. The less they communicated over comm channels the better Roche felt. She couldn’t prove the sergeant was feeding the other team information, but he cheated at cards—badly—so she wouldn’t put it past him.

Tinibu hunkered down a dozen meters to her left, nestled beneath a slight bar in the terrain, his rifle sighted and aimed at the enemy position. Santiago was dug in on the far side of Tinibu. Santiago checked and rechecked his thud gun. He would need to replace it long before it should have worn out because he couldn’t stop ******* with it. Bae sat in the dirt a few meters to Roche’s right, bopping his head to some tune in his head. He sat with his legs crossed and the assault cannon resting in the dirt between his crotch and legs. He smiled down at the meter-and-a-half hunk of metal with a delighted, almost child-like smile.

Compensating much, Roche thought.

The field between their position and the enemy was a few hundred meters of sandy grassland. The broken and uneven expanse slowly rose to form a small hill. The enemy fire team was dug in just on the far side of the crest. They had found what looked like the most defensible spot for a few clicks in the valley and had plenty of time to put up marginal barricades around their position.

The distinctive whizz of a bullet brought Roche out of her thoughts. The round struck the berm just in front of her face, sending sand and dirt into the air. She slammed herself into the ground, trying to push deeper in.

****.

She shook her head. Nope. No way the sergeant was clean.

“All right,” she yelled. “Listen up.”

Bae was still off in his own little world, practically stroking the cannon.

“Oi! Bae! Wake up and stop touching your ****.”

He shook his head and looked over with a clear ‘huh’ look on his face.

“We need to push through to that hill and take their position.”

As she laid out the basics of a plan the team was less than enthusiastic.

“Listen. It’s tough, sure, but not impossible. Just ‘cause they have a few meters height advantage doesn’t mean **** if they’re looking the wrong way. Here’s what we do...”

#

Roche and Santiago crawled low across the broken ground. Moving from berm to berm they slowly crept toward the enemy fire team’s position.

Bae and Tinibu held back but kept exchanging fire with the enemy. Tinibu switched between her rifle and thud gun. If everything went as planned the enemy team would think they were all hunkered down together, trading pot shots till they got bored or were ordered to break cover.

Roche heard the static of her comm channel opening up and cursed under her breath.

“Roche! What are you doing?”

“Hey, sarge.” Roche signaled Santiago to keep crawling. “Just sorting a few things out.”

“This exercise isn’t over. You should be advancing on the enemy position.”

“Roger that, sir.”

“So get your ass in gear.”

“On it, sir.”

“What?”

She could hear the confusion in Petrov’s voice. Roche ran through the scenario in her head. If he wasn’t feeding the other team info, he would most likely ping her location then demand answers. If he is feeding the other side intel, then he would ping her and the enemy would mysteriously ‘spot’ their advance.

Like clockwork the enemy fire team stopped firing on Bae and Tinibu’s location, swiveled their rifles wide, and just happened to open fire on Roche and Santiago. The whine of high-velocity shells and the peppering of dirt and sand into the air confirmed her suspicions.

“*******,” she said.

Santiago looked over at her, confused.

“Sarge sold us out,” Roche said.

“Mother—”

Santiago’s head jerked to the right as a spray of blood shot from his neck. His eyes went wide in surprise. Roche bolted forward; reached out to him…

The world paused.

The gout of blood froze. She was stuck in mid grab.

The delay was barely perceptible, but it was there.

The broken terrain and dirt and sand fractured, split, and shattered into a million glittering pieces. Each one shining bright before falling away and fading into nothing.

#

Roche sat up with a jerk. Shaking hands tearing at the electrodes on her chest and arms.

“What the **** was that?”

Sergeant Petrov stood over her. His severe look told her what was coming.

“You ****** up, Roche. Again.”

“My ass, sarge. We were doing fine till you fed them our location.” Roche stabbed a thumb toward the other soldiers waking up around the room. Eight cots surrounded a central pillar of wires and monitors. The latest and greatest in virtual reality programming—about 30 years ago. Specifically designed to test and train soldiers in a fraction of the time of ages past.

Petrov’s face somehow went even more red than it usually was.

“Did you just accuse me of something, lieutenant?”

Roche’s heart pounded in her ears. She could feel the sweat breaking out across her back. A tight, controlled sigh brought her under control. “No, sir.”

Petrov’s pushed his shoulders back and puffed out his chest. “Good. See that you don’t.”

Roche finished pulling the electrodes from her body and slid off the cot.

Cheating mother******, she thought as the fire teams shuffled out of the room.

 

[HareBrain]

First, I speak as a non-reader of military SF. The prose is very readable and clean (apart from all the asterisks -- if you post up anything like this again, I think you'd be better off changing the words to accepted ones like "what the hell" or "mothers" just for the sake of the crit), and I easily read to the end. Not sure anything in this piece would make me read much further, though, so something else would have to be introduced soon after. You've actually reduced the stakes at the end of this because although the sergeant has sold them out, it's only in VR and so the real-world significance doesn't feel that high as yet. The characters seem differentiated, but there's not much about the protagonist that really grabs me as yet, nor the world -- it feels like standard near-future tech. But as I said, this isn't my genre.

A few nits.

dove

Aargh! I hate "dove". I believe it's a colloquialism even in America. You'll be my hero if you use "dived".

Just ‘cause

My personal one-man crusade is to get people to correct this little thing their word processor always does wrong.

It should be ’cause. The mark before the "c" is an apostrophe, not a quote mark, and apostrophes are always 9's. (In Word, ctrl+', ')

If he is feeding

s/b was feeding.

I said nits, didn't I?

 

[Brian G Turner]

My initial initial criticism would be that your POV character keeps stopping the narrative to complain about things.

Roche complains that the sergeant pushes them too hard. She complains that Santiago ***** with his weapon too much. She complains that Bae thinks his cannon is a big dick.

In short, she has no respect for any of her squad or the chain of command, lacks professionalism, and just complains about her situation. IMO that makes Roche an unsympathetic character, and makes it difficult to engage.

However, you do have elements that if you focused on more you could possibly deliver a stronger intro.

The conflict with Petrov is a great opportunity - nothing rushes a reader to a protags side quicker than a sense of injustice and unfairness. IMO you didn't need the exchange of dialogue right at the start - she only needs to think that he's pushing too hard and is pushing for the other team to beat them. We will believe her word on just that, and it will be proven later on.

Also, give us stakes - at the moment none come through - as this is a simulation, there is no real life or death. So what Petrov does could be entirely reasonable. Give us a reason, and quickly, to see consequences from this - perhaps a consequence of the simulation is that Santiago and Roche will come out with sympathetic pains to reflect their injuries? Either way, for Petrov's "betrayal" to be meaningful, IMO there needs to be a consequence of some kind that works to the detriment of Roche's interests - *if* this is a conflict you want to build on.

Otherwise, Petrov's just a sarge doing his job, on whingey recruits.

Some other points made me stop and pause as well.

The terrain - you mention sand dunes, turf, and grassland. Personally, I did not find these words worked together - my experience of sand dunes is loose sand with grass - "turf" beings up images of garden lawns. And "grassland" doesn't convey images of sand dunes.

I wasn't sure about the officer rankings, either - I think of "sergeant" as a squad NCO, which left me wondering why he'd work against Roche, and vice versa. It can apply in other ways, but the relationship between Roche and Petrov didn't feel clear enough to relate any of this.

Anyway, initial thoughts, and personal opinion, but hope it helps.

 

[Vertigo]

I'm confused by your chain of command. How come a sergeant seems to be in charge of a lieutenant (including addressing him as Sir)? If Roche is as recruit or cadet fine, but then she wouldn't be a lieutenant. Now I understand that in the American military a recruit may be required (or is, I'm not sure) to call a sergeant sir - as in "Sir, yes sir!" - however recruits are not lieutenants. So I'm confused. Also if these recruits are all officer recruits then I'd run down the swearing significantly.

Again I don't know about the American forces but as an officer cadet in the British Army in the '70s Any swearing was almost a hanging offense. (And whilst the sergeants were very much in charge of us they were still obliged to call us 'sir'; it's astonishing just how much contempt they could manage to put into that one world of respect )

Other than that I like the pace and whilst there was maybe a little too much complaining, that is what recruits do.

 

[Nerds_feather]

In the US military, order of rank goes: private, corporal, seargent, warrant officer, lieutenant, etc. You only sir going up, as far as I know. Lieutenants are also usually graduates of the service academies.

 

[Darkchild130]

Hey, so this is one of the other bits I've been working on. This is the very start of a piece. It is meant to be mildly disorienting with the slight turn at the end, but it's not meant to be confusing to read or hard to follow.

As always, I would appreciate any constructive criticism and pointers/advice on how to improve the piece. Don't be shy if you spot something my idiot-brain missed. This is supposed to be solidly in Roche's POV, so mentioning any bits where I slip out of that would be helpful. Typical questions, such as: is it engaging, interesting, would you keep reading, or is it so cliched it makes you want to pluck out your eyes rather than continuing?

Please. Thank you.

###################

Lieutenant Roche dove for cover among the grassy dunes. Automatic weapons fire pelted the sand and turf around her position.

Dived for cover.

Mother******* are dug in up there, she thought.

Her earpiece comm crackled to life. “Roche, what the **** are you doing?” Sergeant Petrov demanded. “This ain’t no time for naps. We got a job to do.”

Dialogue is unrealistic for soldiers. They don't quip when there's stuff to be done.
The second line would be better like
"F*cking hurry up and do your job."

Always the *******. She flicked the comm to send. “Yes, sergeant.” Roche flashed a few standard hand signals to her fire team, ordering them to spread out and dig in. “We’re working on it.”

“Well, work faster numb-nuts.”

“Yes, sir.”

The channel died and she breathed out a heavy sigh.

Sergeants were supposed to push their people. That was their job. But Petrov took it to a whole new level. He was more like a sadistic turd who happened to be a sergeant rather than a sergeant who happened to be a sadistic turd.

Up to this point, Petrov has not been sadistic at all, merely doing his job.

A quick check told her the fire team was in a good spot. Nice and spread out, but within sight and earshot. The less they communicated over comm channels the better Roche felt. She couldn’t prove the sergeant was feeding the other team information, but he cheated at cards—badly—so she wouldn’t put it past him.

Tinibu hunkered down a dozen meters to her left, nestled beneath a slight bar in the terrain, his rifle sighted and aimed at the enemy position. Santiago was dug in on the far side of Tinibu. Santiago checked and rechecked his thud gun. He would need to replace it long before it should have worn out because he couldn’t stop ******* with it. Bae sat in the dirt a few meters to Roche’s right, bopping his head to some tune in his head. He sat with his legs crossed and the assault cannon resting in the dirt between his crotch and legs. He smiled down at the meter-and-a-half hunk of metal with a delighted, almost child-like smile.

Compensating much, Roche thought.

The field between their position and the enemy was a few hundred meters of sandy grassland. The broken and uneven expanse slowly rose to form a small hill. The enemy fire team was dug in just on the far side of the crest. They had found what looked like the most defensible spot for a few clicks in the valley and had plenty of time to put up marginal barricades around their position.

The distinctive whizz of a bullet brought Roche out of her thoughts. The round struck the berm just in front of her face, sending sand and dirt into the air. She slammed herself into the ground, trying to push deeper in.

Bullets don't whizz, they crack and thump.
****.

She shook her head. Nope. No way the sergeant was clean.

Why?

“All right,” she yelled. “Listen up.”

Bae was still off in his own little world, practically stroking the cannon.

“Oi! Bae! Wake up and stop touching your ****.”

He shook his head and looked over with a clear ‘huh’ look on his face.

“We need to push through to that hill and take their position.”

As she laid out the basics of a plan the team was less than enthusiastic.

“Listen. It’s tough, sure, but not impossible. Just ‘cause they have a few meters height advantage doesn’t mean **** if they’re looking the wrong way. Here’s what we do...”

I want to know her plan before she does it, it will help enforce whether she is a good or bad Commander.
#

Roche and Santiago crawled low across the broken ground. Moving from berm to berm they slowly crept toward the enemy fire team’s position.

Bae and Tinibu held back but kept exchanging fire with the enemy. Tinibu switched between her rifle and thud gun. If everything went as planned the enemy team would think they were all hunkered down together, trading pot shots till they got bored or were ordered to break cover.

Roche heard the static of her comm channel opening up and cursed under her breath.

“Roche! What are you doing?”

“Hey, sarge.” Roche signaled Santiago to keep crawling. “Just sorting a few things out.”

“This exercise isn’t over. You should be advancing on the enemy position.”

This line is the best example of the sgt being a douche. She would already know her mission in orders before it starts,this is just pointless micromanagement.

“Roger that, sir.”

“So get your ass in gear.”

“On it, sir.”

“What?”

She could hear the confusion in Petrov’s voice. Roche ran through the scenario in her head. If he wasn’t feeding the other team info, he would most likely ping her location then demand answers. If he is feeding the other side intel, then he would ping her and the enemy would mysteriously ‘spot’ their advance.

Like clockwork the enemy fire team stopped firing on Bae and Tinibu’s location, swiveled their rifles wide, and just happened to open fire on Roche and Santiago. The whine of high-velocity shells and the peppering of dirt and sand into the air confirmed her suspicions.

I don't know why she thinks the Sarge sold her out? She shouldn't be thinking the enemy "just happened" to fire on them, she should be thinking what she has been doing wrong.

“*******,” she said.

Santiago looked over at her, confused.

“Sarge sold us out,” Roche said.

“Mother—”

Santiago’s head jerked to the right as a spray of blood shot from his neck. His eyes went wide in surprise. Roche bolted forward; reached out to him…

The world paused.

The gout of blood froze. She was stuck in mid grab.

The delay was barely perceptible, but it was there.

The broken terrain and dirt and sand fractured, split, and shattered into a million glittering pieces. Each one shining bright before falling away and fading into nothing.

#

Roche sat up with a jerk. Shaking hands tearing at the electrodes on her chest and arms.

“What the **** was that?”

Sergeant Petrov stood over her. His severe look told her what was coming.

“You ****** up, Roche. Again.”

“My ass, sarge. We were doing fine till you fed them our location.” Roche stabbed a thumb toward the other soldiers waking up around the room. Eight cots surrounded a central pillar of wires and monitors. The latest and greatest in virtual reality programming—about 30 years ago. Specifically designed to test and train soldiers in a fraction of the time of ages past.

Petrov’s face somehow went even more red than it usually was.

“Did you just accuse me of something, lieutenant?”

Roche’s heart pounded in her ears. She could feel the sweat breaking out across her back. A tight, controlled sigh brought her under control. “No, sir.”

Now I know she is a lietenant. An officer will NEVER call a seargent "sir" if the sgt is in an instructor role, it will be "seargent" or "staff"

Petrov’s pushed his shoulders back and puffed out his chest. “Good. See that you don’t.”

Roche finished pulling the electrodes from her body and slid off the cot.

Cheating mother******, she thought as the fire teams shuffled out of the room.

It reads fine as a simple explanation of a squad/section attack, but first impressions, your lieutenant strikes me as slightly incompetent and the sergeant is a bit heavy handed with the micromanaging but he's just doing his job.

In that regard, it is an absolutely accurate portrayed of officers and NCOs in my opinion.

 

[tinkerdan]

This reads well at the start and near the end but there are just a few road-bumps along the way.

First this is my most hated of all tropes. Starting with a simulation there is really nothing at stake beyond someones pride and it's close to starting with a dream because it has in every way the same payoff in reality.

I think either of those work fine but they need to be cut short and read with a pace that take the reader out of it quickly and into the real story. This has spots that actually slow the reader down.

The spot starts with::A quick check told her...

And then the reader gets told a bunch of stuff about her teammates in the simulation. The redeeming piece of the simulation is that the bits about the sergeant suggest really early that this is a simulation because I'm immediately impressed with a notion that the sergeant couldn't possibly be betraying her position to a real enemy.

Then we get slowed down and my question is does the reader need to know right now that one soldier is wearing down equipment with to much handling and the other is using his as a limb replacement? Since the conflict seems to be between the sergeant and her and they are just following orders it seems these things mostly slow down and distract. Sure the reader might need to know this later and if thats the case maybe the tell should come interspersed with some action parts within the conflict to show us that she's distracted both by what her team is doing and her battle of the minds with the sergeant.

As it is she whines to much and that's a turn off-it would make more sense that she might confide what she believes to her team and they might do all the second thoughts about would their sergeant do that. And then the splitting up would make more sense as they try to determine what might be the truth and there would be some plan of what to do next. Right now it's a whiner with suspicions and no plan so she's already resigned her fate and allowed the sergeant to win yet much of what we see coming out of her head might suggest that isn't where she's heading. Yet abruptly you are there with no good explanation to why she split her team and what she had planned to do by herself since she really doesn't have a team out there.

So if the purpose of this short piece is to show she's a whiny loser who is not a team player and gives up easy then you succeeded. If we are suppose to see a spark of any kind that proves we should follow this person then that did not come across to me.

One thing as a reader is that we don't know he cheated so again it's just the character who thinks that. If the intent is to wash her out at this point then this works if not then as a reader I need some strength or example of strength to help keep me interested in seeing her succeed eventually.

It's a good scene well written mechanically but it seems to lack the heart or drive that will interest me as a reader in this POV character. Right now I see a lot of failings, which is alright; but there is nothing here to indicate why she might be in charge of her team. There must be something someone saw and perhaps even the sergeant must see but it's hidden from the reader.

She's out of her depth and over her head and should wash out.

So is the rest of the story about her civilian life?

 

[Fishbowl Helmet]

Hey everyone, thanks for taking the time to read and offer feedback.

I will definitely be revising based on the suggestions made here, but a few questions popped up so I thought I'd address those.

1. Chain of Command. Yep. I think that was part of a global find & replace gone awry. By the end of the book she's going to be an Lt. so yeah, my bad there. What's going on is Petrov is the squad leader, rank of Sergeant. He commands two four-man fireteams. Roche is the team leader of one fireteam. The other fireteam was their opponents in the sim, those extra bodies getting up once it was over. The next bit of the scene will address this, with the other fireteam giving Roche and hers crap for screwing up.

2. Verbs. I don't know what it is, but I can't seem to get onboard with a few verb tenses. Maybe it's a regionalism from where I've grown up, but "lighted" instead of "lit" drives me nuts, as does "dived" instead of "dove", and "sneaked" instead of "snuck". I don't know what it is, but they just seem incredibly awkward in the longer 'ed' ending versions.

3. Sergeant Petrov & Roche. Roche's arc will be Roche vs the Sergeant throughout most of the book. She's going to have to take command of the misfit squad--which she thinks she was unfairly dropped into--and drag them all to competency by the end of the squad's arc. I am aiming for Petrov to be an absolute tool here, so a chunk of that is intentional, some of it not so much, which leads me to...

4. Unfair situation, whining. Roche thinks she's better than the rest of her squad at this point so she does see the situation as utterly unfair, but I definitely was not going for whiny. So, the question becomes, how can a character rail against what they think of as an unfair situation without it coming across as whining?

And again, thank you for taking the time to read and offer feedback.

 

[Darkchild130]

It's a commander's job to ensure their troops are competent, that's why they're promoted, because they're better than the men they lead (at least in theory). Roche's feelings of unfairness are the basis of why it seems whiny. She is whining about the specific thing she is supposed to be doing.

In fact, I would go as far as saying any character that uses "unfairness" as an excuse for their feelings or actions is weak and not suitable for military service.
Everything is unfair, a soldier just gets on with it.

If I was Petrov, I would hate to have somebody like her under my command. He doesn't come across as a tool at all, just a sergeant doing what he's paid for.

You can still rail against command without whining about it. Maybe she simply doesn't like Petrov, they may clash over command styles,. If you make him a genuine sadist instead of someone acting like a sergeant, you can make Roche a more dynamic commander who trusts the men under her command to use their initiative instead of micromanaging them.

This will make her a more sympathetic character, demonstrate to the reader that she genuinely is better (hence my previous comment about wanting to know her plan) and she won't have to whine about anything, instead she takes issue with the way he leads his men.

 

[Fishbowl Helmet]

So what I'm going for here is to set up Petrov as the clear ****** antagonist and Roche as the POV protagonist. Clearly it's going the polar opposite way for you. My understanding of a sergeant's role is to train all the soldiers under their command equally. Not play favorites to the point of using one fireteam simply as the target practice of another, or training one group at the expense of the other. Which is what is happening here. Perhaps I need to make that explicitly clear, rather than hinting at it. Sure, no problem.

But there's beat on a soldier to break them down and build them back up again then there's just beating on a soldier to break them down and then beating on them some more because you hate that soldier. The latter is what I need my antagonist to be doing to my protagonist here. What can I have this fictional sergeant do to clearly and unequivocally present himself as just a prick to this group of four soldiers. What action can I have him hit her with that will accomplish that goal in your mind (that isn't a hack cliche like rape)? What level of unfairness can I use that will accomplish my goal, but leave the POV character free to comment on it that you would not perceive as a whine?

 

[tinkerdan]

One thing: what Petrov does is unfair only because Roche is not learning to adapt. But I think her lack of recognition that she needs to adapt is what needs to be showcased rather than all these rants.

If these are misfits she has a right to rant about how she isn't keeping them in line. With less directed at Petrov though there doesn't have to be any love lost between them either so she can be righteously indignant of his taking advantage of her failure to adapt and train her nearly trainable team. But right now it clearly looks to be mostly her fault and then she's railing at the person above her.

Also if anything should come of her tactics she might have to realize before she's pulled out of the sim that she was right that Petrov was giving her position away and she was so wrong that she didn't have much of a plan past discovery.

Also I think she's made a discovery that she shouldn't be giving away and it should be the realization that she didn't have a proper plan to cover what he was doing that should stop her from giving that away.

It should probably be.

"We we're fine until...."

"Until what?"

"Nothing, Sir." As she thought, 'You cheating *******.' "We screwed up. I screwed up."

 

[Fishbowl Helmet]

I'm not meaning to be argumentative here. I'm honestly confused by some of the comments. I have no problem altering the piece to achieve my goals because clearly the piece as written isn't working. But there seems to be a whole lot being read into the piece that I'm simply not seeing.

One thing: what Petrov does is unfair only because Roche is not learning to adapt. But I think her lack of recognition that she needs to adapt is what needs to be showcased rather than all these rants.

I've tried to parse this a few times and I have basically no idea what you're trying to say here. I'm not sure what she could possibly adapt to. The sergeant is giving away her location. She can't plan for that. She can't feed him false data about her location. If you are forced to play a game that your boss is cheating at, there's basically nothing you can do. You cheat back? Welcome to doing KP for the rest of your service, or being busted some other way.

If these are misfits she has a right to rant about how she isn't keeping them in line. With less directed at Petrov though there doesn't have to be any love lost between them either so she can be righteously indignant of his taking advantage of her failure to adapt and train her nearly trainable team. But right now it clearly looks to be mostly her fault and then she's railing at the person above her.

I'm really not sure what in the piece above would give you that impression. What specifically is her fault here? She's trying to do her job, but the sergeant keeps giving clear and unfair advantage to the other team. Sabotaging her fireteam again and again. He can track their positions. She can't stop that from happening. How is that a failure on her part?

Also if anything should come of her tactics she might have to realize before she's pulled out of the sim that she was right that Petrov was giving her position away and she was so wrong that she didn't have much of a plan past discovery.

She knows unequivocally that he's given their position away before the sim ends. The reason I left her plan out of the text proper is that it doesn't matter. We don't see the plan executed so the details are irrelevant to the scene. All that matters is that she did have a plan and was trying to execute it before the sergeant pulled the rug out from under her.

Also I think she's made a discovery that she shouldn't be giving away and it should be the realization that she didn't have a proper plan to cover what he was doing that should stop her from giving that away.

Again, I'm not sure what you're saying here. The discovery is her realization that Petrov gave information to "the enemy"? There was a proper plan, the details of which simply don't matter to the fiction or the scene, so they were left out.

 

[Fishbowl Helmet]

You can still rail against command without whining about it.

Which exact lines in the piece give you the impression that Roche is whining?

Bullets don't whizz, they crack and thump.

When a bullet flies past your head, what sound does it make? Not the crack of a bullet actually being fired, and not the thump of a bullet hitting a bit of dirt nearby. But a bullet in flight going by your head?

 

[Mirannan]

Which exact lines in the piece give you the impression that Roche is whining?



When a bullet flies past your head, what sound does it make? Not the crack of a bullet actually being fired, and not the thump of a bullet hitting a bit of dirt nearby. But a bullet in flight going by your head?

Depends on the round velocity, I'm sure. I'm not military, never have been; but I have been in the target butts (think that's what they are called, a safe zone in which people stand putting up and taking down targets under the protection of a lot of earth) and supersonic rounds going past most definitely make a crack. A very loud one; probably louder than the sound of the rifle firing if you're the one doing the firing. The classic movie ricochet sound does occur, but not very often.

In case it makes any difference, the rounds I heard were from .303 Lee Enfields.

 

[Darkchild130]

When a bullet flies past your head, what sound does it make? Not the crack of a bullet actually being fired, and not the thump of a bullet hitting a bit of dirt nearby. But a bullet in flight going by your head?

I have 14 years military experience in a combat unit,which Is probably why I'm picking up stuff you're not intending. I'm about to go to work so I'll get back to you later on the other points.
Crack and thump: you have it totally wrong. The crack is the super sonic crack of the round as it passes you, the thump is the noise in the distance where the bullet is being fired from.

Soldiers are trained to ignore the deafeningly loud crack, and concentrate on the much quieter thump, as this will help you locate the firing point of your enemy.

If it passes you after the round has dropped below super sonic speeds, it will hiss.

 

[Brian G Turner]

So, the question becomes, how can a character rail against what they think of as an unfair situation without it coming across as whining?

At the moment she complains about her squad members for their personality traits. She is especially condescending about Brae. However, what if the squad members are unsuitable for this exercise in some way? You mention Brae's gun a lot - what if he's never even been trained with that type of weapon? That would make him and his armament potentially unsuitable for the exercise, and gave her a valid reason to feel bitter about that decision.

When I sent my MS to Teresa for editing, she said my characters whined a lot, so don't worry about that, at this stage. What I've done since is give them a more positive attitude, which would only require tweaking in your piece. The simplest way would be for her - despite all perceived problems with this exercise - to try her damnest to make it work. Even if the squad members, their weapons, their guidance, are unsuitable. Trying and failing makes for a more sympathetic reader experience than complaining and failing.

Does that help?

EDIT: Suggestion - foreshadowing! Following normal novel structure, Roche will have to overcome adversary later on, and it will be her doing this that makes the story. However, things are unlikely to run smoothly for her. Perhaps squad buddies become injured but must help despite their injuries. Perhaps weapons break later on and they have to improvise. Whatever setbacks there are, this place - Chapter 1 - is an ideal place to foreshadow at least some of that. Just in case you hadn't considered it in that way, and my apologies if you have and I'm just patronising you!

 

[Vertigo]

I have 14 years military experience in a combat unit,which Is probably why I'm picking up stuff you're not intending. I'm about to go to work so I'll get back to you later on the other points.
Crack and thump: you have it totally wrong. The crack is the super sonic crack of the round as it passes you, the thump is the noise in the distance where the bullet is being fired from.

Soldiers are trained to ignore the deafeningly loud crack, and concentrate on the much quieter thump, as this will help you locate the firing point of your enemy.

If it passes you after the round has dropped below super sonic speeds, it will hiss.

Just so! The supersonic crack is incredibly piercing and louder than the sound of the gun actually firing, which as Darkchild says is the one you must listen for to determine direction. Believe me you want ear defenders in the butts far more than the person actually firing.

 

[Darkchild130]

Let see, how do we make the sgt bad and Roche good.

How about it's the 15th attack that day,they haven't slept in 4 day's, Roche's thumbs are cut up because she has reloaded her mags so many times and she can feel the blood in her boots from the torn blisters.
Petrov is hounding her on the radio constantly, and I mean constantly
"Where the **** are you?"
"What are you doing?"
"Hurry the **** up"
"Take the ****ing objective"
Until it all becomes a blur of background noise, but she knuckles down and does it anyway.

Less snide remarks or thoughts. The guy with the assault cannon has been trained and issued a weapon through no fault of his own. Developing an affection for it is weird but in no way can be interpreted as compensating for something.
It's the kind of banal thought I would expect from some immature sorority girl, not a trained soldier.
Instead,why not make her too tired to make these observation due to all the hard work she has been doing,and let the reader come to their own conclusions after you describe the soldiers doing their respective activities.

Also, going off on a tangent, why is it an Assault cannon? They are two diametrically opposed terms. In the military, an assault is a phase of an attack, in which you close with and engage the enemy at close quarters. A cannon is typically something that lobs high explosive shells at range. I can tell you now,you won't be assaulting anything at close range with a cannon that is a metre and a half long.
But I digress...

When they get shot at, she immediately makes a baseless assumption that Petrov has betrayed them, and tells her subordinate as much.
This is incredibly unprofessional, you never undermine the chain of command in front of your men, Roche can argue with Petrov all day behind closed doors, but the quickest way to destroy unit cohesion is to open a divide among the men, ie those that like Roche against those that like Petrov.

A real soldier,upon being fired at suddenly, should take cover and return appropriate fire, attempting to win the firefight and suppress the enemy. Battles aren't just people taking potshots at each other,they are constantly in motion, no movement without fire,no fire without movement.
Let the accusations come after the battle is won, her priority should've been winning the fight and showing us that she is better than those around her (as you yourself said she thinks this).
A competent soldier should be thinking "what did I do wrong?" Not seeking to pass the blame straight away, as at no point during the piece did Petrov give us any reason to believe he sold them out.

Roche simply got spotted, so she didn't conceal her approach route properly. These are basic skills.

So in summary,you can make Petrov a sadist by having him abuse his power, through sleep deprivation, punishment beatings etc, as it reads now, he is a slightly impatient Sgt doing nothing wrong.

With Roche, show us that she is good at her job, make her react accordingly to her situation, her internal monologue should be focused on the task instead of bitching about everybody around her.

And make the betrayal obvious. Have her do what you already describe, but have her manage to get practically on top of the enemy, maybe she hears the crackle of their comms and picks up Petrov selling her out before she is spotted.
Add some weight to her accusation.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head.

I appreciate that your primary target audience might not be soldiers, but if you label something military scifi, then people like me will read it and rip it apart if you skyline yourself as having no knowledge of the military mindset.

 

[tinkerdan]

First of all in combat the 'plan' can and does reach a point where it is no longer relevant even without having Petrov give away the position so the complaint that he's cheating makes no real sense.

Even so with his prompting for her to do something he could be trying to get her killed but it's more likely he's just trying to get her to do something before the enemy fire finds her where she's standing still.

This is where adaptability comes in; if she's married to the plan to the point that she freezes--she dies.

Knowing what will happen and having everything happen on cue is an efficient way to do things I suppose; but it's not very effective at training people how to act out in the field.

So from this I see that Petrov is acting like I'd expect him to act since I think the sim situ has made it clear this is an exercise; even if he is cheating he's not abandoning her to the enemy; he's trying to see what she'll do. If he stacks it heavy and real people get hurt that's one thing, but in this situ it is clear the only thing hurt might be Roche's pride.

That's what I get from your piece sorry if I went off into some left field from where you were trying to take me; but I can't find my way out.

 

[Bowler1]

"The distinctive whizz of a bullet brought Roche out of her thoughts."

I didn't like the above as you had done a zoom back out to explain the battle field and then pulled back into the character again. I prefer a much stricter character POV and I also feel confusion and command/control problems feel more real when the character knows other characters are out of sight. Hoping her grunts are where they're meant to be while she keeps her head down etc.

However this is a shoot 'em up plot so it's no hanging offence.

I would have liked the scene to moved quicker in the action and from above I felt the action was slowed by the battle field description. You had action, description/setup and action again. I would have set up the scene and rolled through the action at a nice fast pace.

Sand and turf in dunes pulled me out, having lived by the sea I know the two don't go.

I'm also finding the main character hard to relate to. Too whiney and weak willed, while complaining all the time. Not my view of officer material.

Set up issues and how this impacted pace from me. What I think only as ever. Good luck with it.