The warning to brace for multiple impacts caught Pat totally off guard, as the the jolts themselves and the sergeant's sudden reappearance. He picked himself up off the floor and raced to his own bunk, where he began getting his full combat gear on. He was buckling on his webbing when the pressure alarm sounded. He froze and watched the sergeant stroll almost casually down the room, locate the breach and seal it. The fact that she had lunged past him to do so did make him think.<br/><br/>What made him think even more was the way Selwood, who had been sitting in Pat's bunk and chatting to one of the others, suddenly collapsed.<em>Fuck! That could have been me!</em>His thought was followed instantly by,<em>It could have been any of us... or...</em>he swallowed hard at the realisation that the compartment on the other side of that thin metal bulkhead was now open to vacuum,<em>...or all of us!</em><br/><br/>"Sarge? Permission to throw up?"<br/><br/>"Denied, get the fuck on with it, arsehole!" The growl came back.<br/><br/>He shrugged, swallowed and pulled his helmet on, then began clipping the various bits of technology he was supposed to carry onto his webbing. He powered up the satcom and keyed the transmit button, gave the platoon's call sign and added "Radio check, over".<br/><br/>The answer took ten seconds to come back, meaning the command ship was about five light light-seconds away. Not far it space battle terms. The voice, a reassuring female, repeated the call sign. "Reading you five by five. Radio check good, maintain radio silence until further orders, Command out."<br/><br/>Okay, so he had followed procedure, and the thing was good. He switched the set to stand-by. It would pick up any signals preceded by their digital call-sign and store the message then alert him to it's presence.<br/><br/>"Com Tech ready!" He snapped out, clipping his bog standard issue firearm to the front of the webbing.