Commando City: A World at War Novel (World at War Online Book 7) by Mitchell T. Jacobs

goggles. She tried to resist the urge to immediately grab her rip chord. She had enough space before she hit the ground, and pulling it too soon might result in her becoming tangled with someone else. They needed space.
    One by one, the parachutes deployed. Nora plummeted by the other three and then finally opened hers, grabbing the risers to give herself some proper steering once it was fully deployed. She looked down to see more parachutes blossoming below, these ones larger and round. If her estimates were correct the Gazelles would land right on target, in the middle of an area of relatively open ground within the city. If they didn't, then someone was going to have a falling armored vehicle crashing through their roof.
    But that was why they had chosen the Eagle Creek District, after all. It had once been their entrance into Indianapolis, bustling with activity in its factory and various headquarters, but the capture of the entire city had turned it into somewhat of a backwater. The railhead was at Zionville, the industry in Central City and Hydra Headquarters had moved to a skyscraper across the river. Right now the district served as little more than a storage area, and that meant they could drop in without fear of damaging anything important.
    Zach's voice started to echo over the radio link. “Alpha Wolf, Bravo Wolf, are you on the ground? Alpha Wolf, Bravo Wolf, this is Wolf Lead. Are you on the ground?”
    “Roger that, Wolf Lead,” Danny replied. “We're on the ground expanding the perimeter as we speak.”
    “We see you, by the way,” Selene added.
    “How's Hephaestus doing?” Nora asked them.
    “Well, they're trying,” Danny said with a chuckle. “But they're builders, not fighters. Remember that time you wanted to train some of them as combat engineers?”
    “Maybe.”
    “Still planning on doing that? Because it's going to take a lot of doing.”
    “Gosh, you're mean,” Anna said.
    “Sorry, but it's true,” Selene added. “They're not cut out for combat. Not against us, at least. If this was a real fight we would have massacred them already.”
    Nora saw the ground and the buildings quickly approaching. Both Gazelles hit the earth with thuds that were audible even from her height, though everything looked to be intact. They'd find out soon enough when they tried to unpack them.
    She pulled down on her risers and made a smooth landing. A few seconds later she unstrapped her harness and had her assault rifle in hand and ready to us. It wasn't loaded, but in a real combat situation she would have been ready to fight within moments.
    Nora headed over to one of the Gazelles, joining up with the rest of the command section and a few others. They quickly unpacked the vehicle and opened up the hatches. Liz climbed into the driver's seat and started it up. The rest of them cracked open the supply pallet and loaded the Gazelle with ammunition. A couple of minutes later, and they were ready to fight.
    “So far so good,” Nora commented as she watched the Gazelle drive off with its crew. The second vehicle was being prepared and would be ready shortly.
    Zach looked down at his wrist menu. “Seven minutes to get it up and running. Not bad.” He looked up at the sky. “But we have to get moving too, otherwise we're going to have people falling on our heads.”
    Barghest would be coming next, followed by Redd Foxx and the second pair of Gazelles. They'd need all the landing space they could get, so it was time for them to clear off and push their way into the rest of the district.
    “What's our objective?” she asked.
    “Funnily enough, it's our old HQ,” Zach told her. “Of course, since we can't shoot enough other I don't know how useful our push is going to be.”
    Nora nodded and got on the radio. “Danny, Selene, how are you doing? Is there any point in pushing further, or do you have the landing zone clear?”
    “We're clear,” Selene replied. “Thought it would be a lot better if we were