Chapter 6

Subject: Maddy

The IFV ‘Black Mamba’ pulled out of the station with Team 2 nestled into it’s protective shell. The Mamba was a special beast. Heavily armored in the same angled style Maddy had seen on fleet warships, with a low profile turret sporting a mighty auto cannon, a coaxial machine gun, rocket pods that fired guided anti-tank rockets, and a number of small countermeasure pods facing every direction that were originally intended to fire smoke bombs to conceal the Mamba for a hasty retreat. Gremlin and Felix were especially excited to point out that they’d modified the countermeasure ordinance to instead fire bomblets full of tear gas and napalm. “The special sauce,” Gremlin had called it. 

Eight people could fit inside. The driver, gunner, and six passengers. Theoretically, more could ride on top of the turret, but the top edge of the Mamba was covered in spools of razor wire. A hard stop and whatever sorry bastard decided to ride up top would be thrown directly into the wire. Maddy rode in the back, sitting next to Blitz, who’d taken Two-Feet’s spot on Maddy’s inaugural trip beyond the barrier. 

“I’ll show you how we’ve been doing it, but ultimately how you run your team is up to you,” Blitz was saying, his voice being transmitted directly into Maddy’s ears by the comms system built into their medium-weight expedition armor. He was seated next to her in the IFV. “We’ve figured out a pretty good way to do things and haven’t lost anyone yet. There’s some pretty nasty fauna out there, but don’t discount the flora. There’s at least one type of carnivorous plant that where we are going today that you need to be on the lookout for.”

“Aye sergeant, I’ve been reading up on the combat logs but please point things out as we see them,” Maddy replied. Reading about something and actually seeing them were two entirely different things. A thought suddenly occurred to her- “hey Blitz, we have helmet and gun cams, why isn’t the footage attached to the reports?”

Blitz sighed, “we have the footage. It’s linked to the reports, but Chief is using the server where the video is stored for something else. You wont be able to access it or watch the videos until he’s done.” Maddy couldn’t see his face, but his tone implied resignation. Like he’d waged this battle before. 

The IFV hit a bump and shuddered. A skinny, young woman with short red hair shifted uncomfortably, seeming to shy away from looking at any of the security team members directly. She was with the science team, and Maddy hadn’t seen her until today. 

“Hey,” Maddy said while intentionally gazing directly at her. The comms system detected the intended target and funneled the audio to the headset, “what’s your name?”

“Liselle,” she said. She looked at Maddy critically, paused, and then looked down at her feet.

“Liselle? I’m Maddy. I’m the new sergeant for the second security team. I’ll be heading up your security detail for a while.” Saying it out loud made Maddy realize how weird it was that she’d just now met the science team. The whole point of her coming here was to support them, she should have met them on the first day. This whole operation was weird, and the inconsistency and lack of actual real guidance was concerning. Why were there thirteen security staff to support six scientists? Why are the teams so siloed? What the fuck was wrong with Chief?

“It’s good to meet you Maddy,” Liselle said awkwardly, like she had to consciously try to say each specific word in order. 

“So, what kind of science are you doing? I spent a lot of time prepping for this post but no one ever really talked about the actual science of the science mission,” Maddy hoped the small talk would make the science team open up to her a little more. If she was going to be liaison between them and Chief, she should probably get started on making friends. 

“Oh!” Liselle’s eyes lit up, “well, what do you know about the planet’s ecology?” The awkwardness was gone, she seemed genuinely excited now that the topic was hers. 

“Practically nothing, aside from the microbes here make everyone sick and there’s freaky xenofauna outside of the town’s barrier.” The life-altering medical nanite controller implant that she’d so desperately needed, and traded 10 years of her life to get, was a requirement to even step foot on Oasis III because of how virulent the microbes were here. She knew that much, but hadn’t had the mental wherewithal or desire to learn much more. But, it made Liselle happy to talk about it, she could tell. 

“Weellll,” Liselle drug out the word, like she was trying to decide where to start, “the life here is unlike anything we’ve encountered anywhere else. The whole ecology of this place is extremely aggressive and evolves extremely quickly. You can see it first hand when you look at the plants and the animals,” she hesitated and looked at Maddy nervously after saying the word ‘animals’. “Uh, flora and fauna I mean.” 

She continued, “anyway the mechanisms of how they evolve so rapidly are of great interest for research back in the central systems. You can see it most clearly with the micro organisms. Almost every generation has incremental changes, and because they reproduce so rapidly you can watch in almost real time as they adapt to changes in their environment. Even something as small as the weather on a particular day can influence the entire micro ecology. It’s incredible.” Liselle was gushing. Whatever price she’d pay for the medical nanites was probably worth it to her just to be able to do science in this place.

“Is that why medicine does’t work? Because they evolve around it?” Maddy didn’t have to fake interest anymore, Liselle’s enthusiasm was contagious. 

“Yes and no,” Liselle explained, “they don’t actually infect us like bacteria do. Our biology is entirely incompatible. But, they do seem to be able to rapidly adapt to using us as a resource. The initial illness, the one that caused the first quarantine-“ Liselle paused, looking at Maddy in an effort to make sure she was following along with the line of reasoning. Maddy made eye contact, then realized her helmet’s visor partially concealed her face. She nodded and grunted to signal Liselle to continue. “Well, the first wave of illness that we can attribute to native life here was an archae-analogue that adapted to steal iron out of our blood and wound up causing extreme anemia across the colony. Hundreds died and you couldn’t kill it with antibiotics or medicine because it wasn’t even close to similar to Terran life.”

“But nanites work?” Maddy already knew the answer, but wanted to encourage Liselle and didn’t know enough about what she was saying to have any real insight. Liselle’s passion was, well. Extremely attractive, Maddy admitted to herself.

“Yes they do. They’re the only thing that works across the board. The control system that we all have can tell when something is out of line, and the nanites fix it. Nanite injections can work too, but they aren’t nearly as effective as the whole package.” Liselle’s interest was waning, apparently she wasn’t as into the medical side of things. 

Maddy tried politics, “and the cost of the controllers drove ISD to stop the colony efforts?”

Dad chimed in, “that and no one trusts any of the exports from the planet. All of a sudden all the lithium from the mines and all the food grown on the surface were less than worthless. The whole fucking place became a liability for ISD. They were gonna leave everyone to fucking die before the feds stepped in forced ISD to honor their employment contracts.”

“You’ve been listening this whole time?” Maddy asked, and double checked her comms. She was on TAC-1, the unit’s general chatter channel. Whoops.

“Course I have sarge, you’re on TAC1,” Dad’s gruff voice sounded amused, a vein of humor threatening to show itself. “But this is something that I care a lot about and so I want to make sure you see the whole picture. ISD outfitted everyone on the fucking planet with those nanite controllers to make the Colonial Affairs people happy, but ISD don’t give a fuck about this colony or any of the people on it. They’ll provide whatever bare minimum the people need to survive to make it to the end of their contracts, but not a single contract has been allowed to be terminated early. The colony is dead, and there’s no future, and no plan, and everyone here is trapped until their contracts run out.”

Dad paused, giving space for someone to interrupt him. No one did. “Do you know what the average contract length is for an ISD settler? The first wave guys like what live here in NC?” NC was short for New Carthage, Maddy had heard it before but hadn’t quite realized what it meant until she heard Dad say it. 

“I dunno,” Maddy said. She truly didn’t know. 

“Twenty years. Subjective. Half the colonists woke up out of stasis to find the project already shut down and NC abandoned, and their contracts had just started,” Dad’s passion was on display now, but it was far less fun than when Liselle had been explaining microbes or whatever. “Stasis sleep doesn’t count. You aren’t awake, so ISD says you haven’t earned that time.” 

Silence permeated the vehicle. The sustained collective silence prompted the noise isolation on Maddy’s comms system to turn off, and for a breathless minute all she could hear was the whining of the IFV’s turbos. Her mind was spinning; why wasn’t this more common knowledge? The non-stop media circus that she was used to seeing back when she was connected to the rest of the universe would have ran this story around the clock for at least a few cycles. But yet again, Iapetus Systems Development, or ISD, was one of the oldest and richest corporations out there. They’d invented FTL travel as far as humanity was concerned. They could probably silence the media narrative with a stern look.

“Anyway, sorry sarge. I just want to make sure you’re aware of the big picture when it comes time to meet the locals. There’s a lot of desperation out here. This place ain’t normal, and there’s a lot I think you don’t know about it yet.” And that was it, Dad was done talking. He’d said more words in that burst than Maddy had heard in the days she’d known him. The big picture clearly meant something to him, Maddy would remember that. 

They rode in silence for the next ten minutes, with only occasional interruptions for Peanut and Felix to harass each other. The IFV paused at a checkpoint leading out of the city’s barrier; a network of sonic devices that humans couldn’t hear, but kept away the big fauna. 

“Okay Turner this op is gonna be pretty easy,” Blitz said as they neared their first stop. “We’ve got two monitoring stations to hit. Each one takes about five minutes and we’re gonna less than a kilometer from the barrier. I treat this one like all of the others. Keep the Mamba hot, and send out two teams of two, one overwatch and one with the scientists.”

“Copy. Two heavies with the science crew?” Maddy asked. Dad and Peanut were seated closest to the door. They wore powered armor and carried high-caliber weapons.

“That’s usually how I do it, it’s easier for overwatch if you have folks with lighter armor take the job. They can climb over stuff easier. Plus, the scientists like to load their equipment onto the back of the heavies.”

“You know how contract work is,” Peanut sighed. “Client is always trying to get you to do shit outside of your scope.” Maddy knew exactly what he was talking about, but they weren’t a contract team. Opposite actually. Technically, they were all federal law enforcement. Jesus Christ, Maddy realized, Two-feet and Chief are federal police. Despite the Dominion conscripting everyone into federal service at some point in their lives, it seemed odd that they would have such low performing people doing a job like this.

“And when we air drop in?” Maddy said, moving on. She realized this was probably the last time she’d get real OJT from a peer, unless you counted Felix. 

“Same thing, only you have more guys on the ground since you don’t have the Mamba.” Blitz paused for a second, thinking. “Yeah those further away spots where we have to fly in tend to get pretty weird, it’s actually a lot better having the bigger teams. You actually need it once you start pushing out past the barrier.” 

The Mamba came to a stop and Gremlin, started shouting over the internal PA system from her spot at the gunners seat, despite everyone being within earshot and having a military grade communications system that made shouting entirely unnecessary. “First stop! Dick rock! Everyone get out and remember to kill anything that isn’t human! Remember, the more we kill, the better we feel!”

The back door to the IFV burst open and the two heavies, Peanut and Dad, filtered out. The IFV’s auto cannon let out a three round burst, each shot thumping in Maddy’s chest like she’d been punched in the chest by professional boxer. Liselle put her hand over her heart and closed her eyes, and the other science guy, who Maddy had completely forgotten about, winced and shook his head. 

Blitz sighed. “Okay, get out, you’re with me. We’ve done this one hundred times, everyone knows where to go.” Maddy stood and duck walked out of the IFV onto the alien savannah, followed closely by Blitz and the scientists. 

The alien world was breathtaking. The savannah was just that, a hilly area with pockets of dense vegetation shading a deep, lush dark red ground covering. The landscape was a tapestry of reds, purples, and blues. Maddy saw a plant that looked like a fern with spikes that was so dark purple it was almost black. It seemed like everywhere she looked there was a swarm of thousands of bug-like things being chased by a hundred birds. Everything was teeming with life. It was so beautiful, that Maddy was momentarily distracted from the heat, and the smell. 

“Come on,” Blitz said, putting his hand on her shoulder, “it’s only pretty until you get to know it.” 

Maddy hefted her rifle and followed him around the front of the IFV. The science team made their way down a worn footpath while Peanut and Dad scanned the edges of the thick brush for movement. “There’s a good vantage point up on that hill.” 

Maddy rounded the bend, rifle at low ready, scanning the brush. She could hear Gremlin singing softly over the TAC1 channel, “dick rock, phallicite, scrotem totem.” Sure enough, straight ahead was a large, skinny rock that seemed to stick straight up out of ground. Gremlin’s nickname was accurate to say the least. She kept singing, looping back and humming, “dick rock, phallicite… hmm mmhm.”

A scaly, bright pink creature about the size of a dog darted out from behind the rock and scurried towards a pocket of brush about 20 meters away. The coaxial machine gun on the IFV opened up on it, unleashing a hail of fire that tore the poor thing in half and ripped tufts of red grass out of the ground. Before the pieces managed to fall back to the ground Gremlin hit it with a three round burst from the auto cannon, sending a spray of lizard-dog parts, alien plants, and dirt into the air. “COCK ROCK, FUCK-A-CITE,” Gremlin shouted.

“Enough!” Maddy belted into the comms, giving her first real order to the team. “Keep TAC1 clear. Y’all want to sing your weirdass songs and fuck with each other that’s fine, but do it privately.”

Blitz chuckled. 

Together, Maddy and Blitz climbed a nearby short hill and looked down onto the team as they worked. The turret of the IFV whirring back and forth, Dad and Peanut hefting guns so big they needed powered armor to pick them up, and the science team dutifully pulling what looked like air filters out of a red-and-purple-camouflaged patterned box sitting next to a weather station, complete with spinning anemometer.

“Its important to be on the lookout for any fauna that’s bigger than the smallest person on the crew. That red headed science girl you were flirting with is the smallest today since Gremlin is in the Mamba.” Maddy blushed and was about to argue to save face, but noticed the words ‘Private Comms Channel’ on her combat display. Blitz continued, “anything bigger than her is gonna want to try to eat her. That’s just a fact. There’s a big predator out here we call a skullfucker. It’s sort of like a pig, I guess. There’s a science name for it but if you ask the science team to show you pictures of a skullfucker they’ll know what you mean.”

Maddy nodded, “copy, look out for pigs.”

“Yeah, skullfuckers. There’s a flying one too that looks like a big caterpillar with six legs. The legs have hooks on each leg and they are powerful. They CAN and WILL fly off with anything they can carry. We call them flyers. Well, we call everything that flies and might be a threat a flyer.” Blitz turned and looked at her, “honestly Turner there’s no rules out here. We usually shoot the first few things we see in any new area and it scares everything else off. It seems ridiculous but it works. I’d prefer it if Gremlin didn’t waste so much 30mm in the process but this is your team now and it’s your call.”

“Copy Blitz,” Maddy said, trying to sound sincere. “I appreciate you taking the time to walk through everything with me.” Maddy eyed the scene. Aside from the five-thousand not-quite-birds flying around, it was peaceful. Serene even. A sort of pulsing chittering birdsong filled the void in the conversation. Maddy had spent most of her life on space stations. Were all habitat planets this… busy? Alive? She had nothing to compare it to. Dirt-side marine training posts were usually on lifeless frontier worlds. 

“Look I need to talk to you. One on one,” Blitz’s voice cracked with nervous energy. “You’ve probably wondered why there’s twice as many security team members as science staff out here. Well, listen. About a year and a half ago,” he paused, then clarified, “standard, of course. We don’t use local time. Anyway, we had a break in while we were out on a science op. Animals. Back then we only had the seven, Gremlin, Dad, Two-Feet, Chief, Myself, and a few of the guys from Team 1 that I don’t think you’ve met. Anyway, Two-Feet stayed back with with a member of the science team, a doctor, who was doing some science thing that required her to be there non-stop.” 

Blitz took a deep breath, then continued, “When we got back we saw the place was broken into. Window shattered and front door wide open. We stacked up and cleared the building like pros but everyone was gone, until we found Two-Feet crying and trying to work a tourniquet on a very dead doctor. Apparently, Two-Feet was taking a fucking nap when the break in happened and didn’t hear anything until the doc start screaming. He ran in, saw what was happening, started shooting, missed every shot, and let the animals get away. Chief went ballistic. Rumor has it, he’d been sleeping with the doc, so.” 

“Goddamn,” Maddy said. 

“Yeah it was a mess. Nothing’s been the same since. Two-Feet got his new nickname and was completely shunned by Chief and everyone else. Can’t quite kick him out since he’s on contract. We wound up moving to the fire station because it’s more secure than our old building. The science team totally avoids us now. Chief lost his mind. He’s taken on this whole new persona since then. We used to call him ‘Rose’, can you imagine that?”

“Rose? Like short for Roseburg?” Maddy inquired.

“Yeah, like short for Roseburg. But he moved into the fire chief’s office in the fire station and I guess decided that the name on the door was his now. We don’t even have a fucking chief! His job was supposed to be to manage the team’s relationship with the locals and the science folks, but instead he’s been working up this scheme to get back at the animals. I know they were probably after the lab equipment to sell to the zoo chemists, but Chief thinks it’s personal and he’s got most of my guys foaming at the mouth looking for revenge and he’s damn near completely alienated us from the local cops.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Maddy asked, again feeling that the more she got dragged into this nonsense, the more she was somehow personally responsible. 

“Because it’s important context if you’re going to do your job well. You need to be the one to get us back in the good graces of the science team and the locals. Plus Chief’s been neglecting a lot of his job lately and we need to get back on track. Don’t worry about Chief, I’m managing him. I’ve got it handled..” 

Maddy stared at him. Anger boiled in her stomach. Why the fuck does he think it’s my job to show up here and fix everything? What the fuck has he been doing this whole time?

“GET BACK,” an electronically amplified voice commanded. Maddy jumped into high ready, pointing her rifle down at the team and scanning for targets. 

“AHAHAHHAHA!” The voice laughed, before the autocannon on the IFV loosed a barrage of fire into a stand of ropy brush. The shockwave from the rounds sent a cloud of dust into the air. “Okay team, we got em all. Cock rock is drained. Let’s R.T.B!” 

Maddy sighed, she’d been ready to fight off some kind of goddamn forest monster, but instead it was Gremlin doing her best malicious-compliance with the order to stay off the comms channel. Guess the IFV had a PA system and that didn’t technically count. The anger at Blitz was gone for now, he’d just been trying to help in his own way after all. This was too much drama for Maddy’s liking, and she wasn’t excited to lug around a bunch of other people’s personal burdens.