Snipers and Recon Troops of Terran Infantry
"This is Tania Wolftree, with your evening news.
With a population of over eighty billion, Terra is now covered in hive cities, so there is no where they can perform their craft. Here on Urdesh, a forge world, the light infantrymen and women of the 22nd Infantry Division "TERRA" enjoy unparalleled vistas. Our representative on the ground is there to talk to them today."
"Hi Tania, Sorshal here in the hivemanufactorum city of Urdim, with me are Sniper-Specialist Vicky Tane, Recce Specialist Galliano and Sargeant Jorja Ifrit. Welcome to the program."
"Thank you for having us."
"We don't often have visitors from Terra, so you'll have to forgive us if we sound... provincial, but why do you carry the name of your planet in your unit?"
"Begging your pardon, but the name of our unit is not that. Let me introduce myself, and my colleagues, formally, so we can start on a sound basis." Her accent, which didn't sound very terran, was, indeed a poor manufactory district's accent, on terra, but they all imagined a much loftier terran origin to all these fighters... "I am Recce-Sargeant Jorja Ifrit of the 8745th Montral Fusilliers "Terra". with me are Galliano and Tane, of the same unit. I'm not quoting my origin there, I'm repeating a distinction, spefically, these are called Battle Honours. I'm referring to a battle honour our unit has earned. which refers to the Siege of Terra, at the end of the thirty-second millenium, where our ancestor-unit participated, with distinction."
"So your ancestor-unit participated in the Siege of Terra?"
"Yes, and so has our brother and sister units, in the twenty-second, so all of us, when amalgamated as a division, can continue to claim it. I imagine it must complicate staffing a bit, so I don't know if they do it every time..."
"All right, and you're all 'light' infantry? I always imagined the defense of the palace to be reserved for much more impressive armored troops, etc."
"No, we are light infantry, while the Palace is mind-bogglingly big, and there's a few other structures nearly as big on Terra now, there are hives on terra, where manufactorums, not unlike on Urdesh, pump out military equipment, civilian knick-knacks and food. Everything needed by the immense population, what it can't make, it needs to import, and it imports a lot, but mostly for the palace... Each manufactorum is responsible for corvee and guard levees proportional to its civilian population, and so we were chosen and sent here. We just want to help."
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