Junebug felt the crunch of permafrost beneath her feet as she took her place in the line of soldiers as they advance towards the wall of snow draped pine trees. Her terran undersuit turned white but her own ceramic breastplate remained steadfastly tan. The trusty old armor was mottled with ceramic patching from a dozen minor mishaps and it clashed sufficiently to make her stand out among the group. She looked at the unarmored York and grinned. York’s expression was strangely guarded as though he expected some reaction from her, but raised a questioning eyebrow.

“I was just thinking how glad I am to have someone like you along,” she confided with a ghost of a smile.

“Why is that Captain?”

“You are a more obvious target for snipers than me.” York laughed in amusement at the notion, a sound that drew a concerned glance from Woods and several of the nearby soldiers.

“I don’t think that any guardians the Ancient’s left in this place are likely to be using modern scout sniper training,” York said, his tone conceding the point to her even though the words refuted it.

“Hey it is your life,” she said before knuckling her chest plate, “and mine I guess.” York nodded equiabley. Ahead of them one of the soldiers looked up from his scanner and held up a fist in what Sayeeda presumed was the Terran field signal for halt. The line of soldiers stopped within a second or so, crouching down to make themselves as small targets as was possible.

“Why didn’t you take the body armor we provided?” the intelligence officer asked after a moment. Junebug shrugged and was silent for a moment before responding.

“I guess i’ve lived this long with my own equipment, why take the chance right?” York laughed again earning an irritated glance from Woods who would apparently have preferred silence. 

“Superstitious Captain?”

“It has worked so far,” she repeated. The soldier with the scanner reached into an ammunition pouch and withdrew a small object that turned out to be a portable luminator, an electric kind rather than the chemical types Junebug was familiar with. He thumbed the unit live and tossed it like a grenade towards the trees. The glowing ball sailed in an arc towards the pines, and then, suddenly flickered out and fell dead into the snow. Junebug’s helmet, familiar with the effect from previous Terran data drew a holographic redline across the snowy landscape at the projected location of the barrier.

“Mr Edwards,” York said over the commlink, “Its time to see if they will open up when you knock on the door.”