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A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 02-26-2015
Four months.
James Arland had been on Planet Gaia for four months.
Everything seemed so different back then, when he'd had a different... perspective. He'd quietly meandered into the Edinburgh system from non-occupied space.
Circumvented battleship Castres. Meticulously avoided the sensor sweeps, the picket patrols, all of it. Besides, it wasn't like a single, commercially available snub fighter would attract much attention in what was - for all intents and purposes - a second echelon system.
Removed from the main fighting, but close enough to keep forces stationed in the system. Gallic military strategists would overlook the place, focus on the much more important Leeds theatre - and rightly so.
James Arland actually cared immensely about the fighting in Leeds. But as of the moment, he could do nothing of value there, except throw himself at the teeth of the enemy - die valiantly, like so many other Bretonians had done.
He loathed that mindset. "Dying valiantly" meant you would die in a time and place of the enemy's choosing. Fighting an overwhelming foe where they were strongest - placing yourself in the way of the wrecking ball, with no payoff, no hope of victory in sight. It was madness, delusion. He'd seen quite enough of that sort of thinking from his time in the Armed Forces.
It only got people killed.
It had been the reason he made the painful decision to leave.
But his past had little significance, right now - what mattered was why he was here. The reason sounded more complex than it was: the illustrious Seventh Army of the Gallic Royal Army had finally detached a regimental command - the 32nd "Chasseurs Lyonaisse" - to make landfall on Planet Gaia, maintaining a modest, relatively sleepy supply outpost along with a civilian research station on the lush world.
They were expecting light to no resistance - the entire ordeal was, James surmised, some general's afterthought to draw out more Gaian insurgents.
They were in for more than they'd bargained for.
-
He'd landed his ship - a trusty Eagle he'd owned for some time - in a small jungle clearing somewhere in the wild expanses of the supercontinent that stretched across most of the southern hemisphere. The comm traffic he'd detected on the way in indicated the 32nd had made their base of operations in a set of valleys cozily nested some 200 klicks north of his landing site.
It would be one hell of a trip, but he didn't dare find a closer LZ. Detection would mean certain death, be it within hours or minutes.
Looking at the geolocation scans handily procured by the AI JADE - his sole permanent companion for these past few months - James concluded that the location was roughly as defensible as terrain on this rock really got. The jungle provided problems for both attackers and defenders, and the base was situated in a large valley clearing with perimeter defenses on the ridgelines. The final word of any action held there would depend on who controlled those ridges.
Getting there was a long, long walk through miles and miles of hostile, largely unknown terrain.
A walk that had gotten him where he was now. He was sleeping unsoundly under seven metres of murky brown water that dispersed his thermal signature, teeming with the venomous insectoid aquatic life he'd grown to intensely hate. One might wonder how one sleeps underwater. The answer was simple to James - his state-of-the-art combat suit, constructed meticulously over months and months of careful micromanufacture, born from stolen design plans.
He was already a man well-conditioned for the outdoors - professional soldier by trade, by conviction - but the suit made all the difference. He could move further, faster, carry more, see more - nearly completely sealed away from hazardous environments in a self-contained carbonocuous shell that interfaced with a cybernetic implant in the back of his skull.
Even on this world, few things could touch him. But he always twitched at the thought of waking up to yet another swarm of eyeless creatures probing his suit for weaknesses.
-
Today, this was not the case - rather than hurriedly waking to the harsh beeping of a proximity alert, James blearily opened his eyes to the soft chime of JADE's voice in his ear. A glance at his visor HUD revealed that dawn was about to break.
"Good morning, James. I have compiled a sensor report for you," the digital voice said serenely.
James groggily staggered across the lakebed he'd been sleeping on the past two days. He couldn't quite swim with the suit, but he could sort of hop along where he pleased. It was nicer than some of the darker pits he'd been in, but the time had come to relocate.
He broke the water surface carefully as he worked his way onto dry land - he made a murky outline of a man - the high-tech suit indelibly stained with the colours of this jungle.
Once he'd made it to solid land, the Bretonian mercenary first ascertained that he was not in immediate danger, then started going about retrieving his precious pack and weaponry from the nearby trees - when deactivated they produced no emissions by themselves, so he was comfortable with hiding them using conventional camouflage.
The first thing he reached for was his rifle. A compact thing with a high rate of fire, no muzzle flash. Excellent for these conditions. Second, water - carefully filtered of impurities and microorganisms. He hooked the canteen to a receptor nozzle in his mask - drank deeply.
Only then did he respond to the AI's prompt, his voice still a somewhat raspy, freshly woken murmur.
"...Alright, JADE. What do you have for me?"
The AI responded immediately. James had learned that as efficient as JADE was, she was also patient beyond human measure, which was handy when he took his time to answer anything.
"Motion sensors in sector Echo 2 reported unusual movement exactly two hours forty-three minutes ago. Signature suggest a squad-size infantry unit, standard Gallian Army dispersal and numbers. Sensors in sectors Echo 3 and Delta 9 then subsequently reported the same thing sometime later."
James furrowed his brow.
"That's further out from their base camp than usual," he noted.
"Yes," the AI intoned. "As you also no doubt have surmised, this unit is closing on your position - current estimates 6 klicks out, bearing 187 based on last sensor data."
James smiled tiredly.
"Last week it was a fireteam. Today, a squad. I think they're finally beginning to take me seriously. Maybe they'll send a platoon next, or maybe their Colonel will grow an imagination. Either way..."
James racked the automatic rifle's charging handle with practiced indifference, shouldered his pack.
"...Let's add some more casualties to the list."
RE: A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 03-01-2015
Sunlight started creeping into the Gaian night sky. It was quiet, sudden like a stab wound, bleeding an ethereal, progressively brighter purple hue into the previously black-blue.
James always found these first hours of the day comforting - though this jungle never slept, he noticed the change in the sounds, the impressions. Diurnal life took the field, nocturnals went to find their holes to rest in. None of the wildlife here was like any creatures he was familiar with, from the Bretonian core worlds or otherwise.
Yet he found that the rhythm of life here was much like that of other places, and it made everything seem slightly less alien.
He often thought about things like these as he stalked through the strange vegetation, rifle held in a loose, flexible ready position. He crept through underbrush, took detours around large vegetation masses, measured every step with precision. Disturb nothing. Make no sound. Be just another environment feature. And watch everything.
James understood something essential about jungle fighting - it necessitated a deliberate, extremely cautious movement speed in the pre-contact stages of any fight. The first one to be seen was always the first to die.
And then, once chaos erupted and bullets started flying, immediately gain the upper hand, move quickly, and exploit every weakness. That way, once the guns went quiet, you would be the one walking away... Hopefully.
It went on like this as he navigated towards the squad that had been sent to track him down. Move. Stop. Watch. Listen. Repeat. For a long time, all he heard was the regular chatter of a millions of creatures looking to reproduce. Sometimes he saw a bush rustle, rifle snapping up towards the disturbance and his heart pounding in his ears - only to relax again once he realized that it was just another one of the many-legged creatures lurching away after getting a little too curious.
Last sensor report had put the squad he was hunting out at 500 metres and closing. He was moving around their estimated approach route, trying to catch them blind as they moved past him. Still though, the estimate was just that, an estimate. He had to be prepared for the option that he would run into someone by surprise.
There were no real clearings in this place. Just natural animal pathways amongst dense green matter, sighting ranges no more than a few dozen metres at any one time. Thermals usually weren't very good here, with so many living creatures. Once you discerned a man from the rest of the jungle, he would already have put a bullet or some projected energy between your eyes.
He was moving along the side of a modest incline when he first heard it: the natural sounds had grown... lesser, like someone had suddenly told the vast chorus of life around him to pipe down a bit.
That made him stop immeditely. They had to be close. One squad of ten, two teams. Think. They wouldn't move on the top of the incline with that number. Too visible. Skylighting was still possible, even in this dense vegetation. That meant they were either on the side of it - like him - or further down at the bottom.
He carefully laid down flat, and remained motionless and pretty much invisible to the naked eye in the underbrush. Detached his pack from his rigging, he'd find it later. But for now, he needed mobility - not gear. His chest rig held a full complement of ammunition, as well as enough rations for a full 24 hours.
It should be plenty.
Then he waited. The suit's advanced sensory equipment included a full audio package. If they were as close as he thought...
There was the sound of something going SNAP, followed by a quietly spoken expletive.
In french.
Behin his mask, James' lips stretched backward, revealing teeth. It wasn't a friendly grin, or a particularly amused one.
Hate stirred. And anticipation.
There you are.
-
The patrol was further downhill as he'd assumed. The mercenary took note of equipment - the normally gunmetal gray of their armour here painted with what he recognized as the Gallian Army's tropical standard pattern, and they had the typical complement of a machinegunner and a marksman. The squad NCO was easily identifiable - he had a two gun drones quietly floating next to him.
James watched them carefully. Then followed as they walked past, always remaining just out of sight. They were doing a good enough job of moving around, but it was clear they weren't really used to the terrain - there were gaps in their cover habits, they were looking in the wrong places and the two teams often got separated by foliage.
And for the most part, several of them looked like they were... bored. They wouldn't be for much longer.
All he needed now was a vantage point and ground to retreat to.
Another few hundred metres of stalking, and he had what he needed - a rocky outcropping sticking out of the lip of the incline they'd been following. As the Gauls meandered past, he climbed it.
He didn't even bother taking up a good firing position. He just took aim, held his breath... and squeezed.
A long burst of gunfire ripped into the unwitting sergeant - James felt some satisfaction in walking the shots up the man's torso from behind, into the back of his head. He was dead before he could keel over - as he spun and tumbled to the ground, James could see the lower part of his face had been blown out from the other side of his head.
Confusion quickly gripped the rest of the Gallian squad, frantic contact reports were shouted, gunfire erupted in several directions, and nobody could quite seem to agree on where the enemy was, or from where they'd heard the gunfire. The two gun-drones went on automatic combat mode, their controller dead - they kept their head better than the living, but they were no more used to the terrain.
They simply gained altitude quickly, and scanned for thermal contacts... of which there were hundreds. They fired as randomly as the soldiers below.
James grew impatient, and lined up the machinegunner, who was busily reducing some nearby shrubbery to dust. James aimed high - bouncing one round off the man's shoulder guard - but landing another two in his throat. He staggered two steps, finger still on the trigger, and
fell gurgling to the ground. Calls for a medic ensued, but now the remaining troopers were beginning to get a sense of where they were being shot at from. Gunfire started raking the outcropping as the second fireteam pushed forward to assist, and the first team got a handle on where to shoot.
It was time to bolt. James got his head down, and began to pull backward, expending the rest of his magazine as he sent a third man sprawling. He was probably not dead, but that was fine.
James just needed the distraction - someone had started to try and drag the casualties to safety. They'd be bogged down with their wounded for some time while he made his escape.
The mercenary turned tail and bolted back into the greenery, gunfire still shredding the position he'd just left behind.
Now it was a matter of getting them to follow him to the place he had in mind.
-
Once well out of sight again, James paused, pressed himself against a tree, caught his breath.
He had over several weeks staked out suitable "playgrounds" in the jungle around the Gaul regiment's base.
These were places he had become intimately familiar with - memorizing notable features, hiding spots, solid cover. In addition, he'd placed little surprises in regular intervals in all of these areas.
Whatever he could think of - mines, snares, spikes, all manner of things that could cut, impale, mangle or explode a man, he had scattered haphazardly around anywhere he expected to make a stand.
Naturally, one such place was where he was leading the enemy right now.
He froze when he heard a faint, low-pitched repulsor hum buzz slowly by overhead. The two gun drones, retasked to track him, no doubt.
They hadn't seen him yet, but they would very soon.
JADE calmly proposed a solution to that problem.
"With the remote operator dead, I can subvert those units. One moment..."
A small indicator winked on James' HUD, status blips waiting to connect to a couple of drones.
He saw one of them suddenly halt mid-air - the other drone swung its pulse weapon around and reduced the companion to slag.
"JADE, what just happened?" James asked.
"I have encountered a failsafe. Apparently one drone recognized its compatriot as hostile before I could complete takeover of both units. I suspect it has to do with my lack of proper authorization codes when I slaved the drone to your suit system," she explained.
The survivor drone buzzed down next to the mercenary, idling.
"Well, at least I have one new pet drone. That ought to be useful. Have it transmit location data, one of the Gauls managed to retask it, meaning they probably have some means to keep track of it. It'll lead them right where we want them."
-
The "playground" James had in mind was a tranquil little slice of terrain with a depression that served well enough as cover. The approach to this position was rather unremarkable. Only a few scattered trees provided some small protection to attackers, who otherwise would be largely out in the open.
He hid there, in that small defilade for some time - testing the drone's camera feed, telling JADE the plan and how to use the drone.
The drone was left intentionally out in the open a small distance away from his position - a lure, to draw them in.
He saw them on the feed soon enough - the remaining seven men. They were angry, out for blood - advancing in an aggressive bound-and-cover.
He could hear one of them was trying to reassure the others with a mention of how they'd been in touch with their battalion, they would be getting some kind of support soon.
That didn't bode well.
He could tell they'd spotted the drone - they suddenly stopped talking, the video feed in his visor saw them halt, get down, use hand-signals. Their confusion with the drone was evident, why wasn't it responding to commands?
They had no more time to ponder that question, as two men were engulfed by an incendiary charge they'd gotten too close to, and all hell broke loose.
Fire from the initial explosion spread, and gunfire raked across most of the visible terrain features. The two men caught in the blast were still screaming, cooking alive as the burning adhesive stuck to clothes, flesh, equipment.
The rest had no time to worry about that - all they knew was that whoever was hunting them was here. As such, they kept firing - ammunition was not a concern - to try and flush him out.
They'd neglected the drone, however.
As bullets cracked overhead, James directed it to outflank and engage. It skimmed over and around the troopers, and with a bright flash reduced one of the remaining five men's torso to a steaming mess, before being driven off by the return fire.
Four left.
RE: A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 03-03-2015
Thus reduced, the Gauls were beginning to lose their taste for fighting, beginning a progressive withdrawal. They realized now that they'd already lost, now they were running damage control - trying to get away, get the wounded out. Sensing weakness, James finally committed to the fight properly, raising rifle and head over the defilade and joining another chattering rifle report to the chaos.
Then, something unexpected happened - a bullet struck the mercenary, impacting the side of his head at an angle, knocking him back down to the bottom of the defilade. The round had bounced off the heavy ballistic shielding of his headpiece.
Flat on his back, James' head was spinning. Instinct kicked in - he scrambled to his feet just in time to see an uncommon display of bravery that for a second threw him completely off his game: two of the four remaining troopers storming straight towards his position, about fifteen metres away and closing. The last two were nowhere in sight, probably legged it as they were being hounded by the drone.
One of them got unlucky, stepped on a plasma mine that blew his leg off.
The other screamed inarticulately - rage, terror and sheer panic seemingly fueling him as he kept charged, firing.
James reeled, dropping his weapon as a wild shot grouping struck his arms. Something cracked, he could feel blood dripping down his skin inside the suit.
He responded by hurling himself bodily into the screaming soldier, both of them crashing to the ground as the rifle went click. They wrestled for the rifle. James won.
Blood roared in his head as he slammed the rifle butt into the soldier's faceplate again, again and again until the visor cracked and the soldier yielded - moaning in dazed pain.
James stopped, panting, getting up as he dropped the useless rifle and pulled his old officer's sidearm.
He took aim at the squirming, defeated man - and to his surprise, found that he wasn't so heartless just yet.
Instead of finishing the Gaul, he spoke.
"That... was very... reckless.."
His opponent was beginning to come to. James relieved him of his sidearm, gave him a swift kick to keep him down.
He suspected the rest of his squad weren't coming back for this guy, but he could still hear moaning from nearby. The man who'd stepped on the mine.
"Helmet off," James gestured with the muzzle of the handgun.
Slowly, his captive complied. Under the helmet was a sullen-looking young man, James estimated he could be no older than early twenties. He was bleeding from the nose, and trembling ever so slightly even though he was wearing a brave face.
"Who the hell are you?" He demanded.
"Nobody noteworthy," James replied. "An interested party, I suppose."
"The hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Lad, there's a gun in your face, your squad is dead, wounded or running for their lives. I ask the questions."
The kid seemed to realize how screwed he was. He grit his teeth, got on his knees, hands on his head.
"Jaques Villiers, caporale-chef. Five-three-alpha-dash-three-six-six. That's all you're getting from me."
James started chuckling. With the added voice distortion coming from his mask system, it was an unsettlingly morbid sound.
"You don't appear to be listening, lad. Either this goes my way..."
He lowered his aim.
"...Or I kneecap you, leave another bullet in your gut, then leave you and your friend over there to the jungle. Am I understood?"
The soldier looked doubtful for a minute, but the hard look on his face was slowly slipping into desperation.
He swore under his breath. "I don't have anything useful to tell you."
James snorted. "But you do. One of your people mentioned backup, what is it?"
"A Hellion, a gunship. Which means you'll be dead in minutes." The man spat.
"Close then? Right, tell you what: do as I say, and you'll live through this. You only have my word... but think of your wounded friend over there."
The man glanced over towards his comrade. "Christ... Fine. Fine. I'll play your game."
"Then just stay down, and don't move. Don't even look up."
The corporal laid down prone. The fear, the confusion on his face as he did so - it was all James needed to see to know that the man would comply.
-
Ten minutes later, James was standing with a foot on his captive's back, reacquired rifle now casually pointed at his skull.
He waited like this a little longer, a radio set he'd pilfered off his captive in hand. A voice crackled from it, speaking French.
"<...arlie-six-two, please respond... Any Charlie-six-two elements, this is Griffin-three, inbound on low vector bearing 190, standing by for ECAS, over.>"
James pressed down the talk button.
"Charlie-six-two is currently indisposed, Griffin... They made a new friend, how copy?"
James grinned when he heard the response.
"<What? Who is this? How did you get on this net? Where is six-two?>"
"Oh, they're right here with me. The ones who didn't run, anyway. I assume you've already sent someone to recover those... Why don't you come over here and see for yourself?"
The channel went silent for a while, then James heard the roar of high-powered engines as the sleek, plasma-gun laden shape of a Hellion repulsor-powered gunship swept over the tree canopy once, then came back around to hover nearby.
He knew they'd gotten a visual, a floodlight turned on, nearly blinding James at first before his visor compensated. He waved at the gunship quite blithely.
The radio squawked again.
"<Whoever you are, you're not getting away. Put down your weapon, step away from the hostage, and surrender immediately!>"
"Alright, alright... but before I do... I'd like to speak with the 32nd's commanding officer. Your Colonel. Then I'll release corporal Villiers, and come peacefully."
A new voice crackled on the radio, speaking incensed, slightly accented English.
"This is Colonel Gerard. Release your hostage immediately. I do not recognize you as a lawful combatant, but I promise you will be taken into custody on the condition of your immediate surrender."
James couldn't help himself, he grinned like a madman under his mask.
"Well, Colonel, that's all very nice, and no doubt you will treat me no worse than any other prisoners in your care... But the real reason we're having this little conversation is that I just wanted to say..."
Somewhere in the underbrush nearby, a small repulsor engine strained past its safety parameters, suddenly racing towards its target.
James lowered his voice, barely louder than a whisper.
"You're next."
The drone impacted violently with the Hellion, detonating affixed explosives he'd rapidly salvaged and jury-rigged onto the little frame. The gunship lurched to the side, both port engines dead... then spun towards the ground, out of control.
"<MAYDAY! MAYDAY! GRIFFIN-THREE GOING DOWN, WE'VE LOST BOTH EN->"
The voice was silenced as the craft careened into a nearby hillside.
RE: A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 03-11-2015
James stood there for little while longer, in the light of the slowly dying fire with his boot still planted on his captive's back.
Watching the rising smokestack of the burning wreckage in the hills nearby.
The young corporal got restless, squirmed and sputtered underheel.
"Wh-what was that?! How did yo-"
James forced him back into compliance - a small nudge with the barrel of his gun.
"How indeed? That's something you get to ponder while you fix up your friend. Now, one last thing, Jaques..."
James took the last tube charge he'd salvaged, reached down, stuck it firmly on the rear of the man's chestplate. Then he armed it.
"...Since this is where we part, I'll just need a little insurance. This on your back is something you get to remember me by. I'll just make my exit, you get to live, save your buddy, get back to base for a therapist, hot meal and a shower."
Then he held the detonator in front of Villier's face, so he could see it - out of reach. Wouldn't do if he decided to try kill them both.
"That is, provided you stay still for a few minutes as I leave, and you don't even so much as look at a gun. If you do... Splat. Any lip, I blow you up for fun. Alright?"
The man nodded, sufficiently cowed - as he closed his eyes, James stepped off of him and melted back into the jungle. James knew that man would wait an hour or more before moving, just to be safe.
On the winding trip through the underbrush to get his pack, James spoke to the AI riding shotgun in his helmet.
"What do you think's for dinner, JADE?"
JADE politely played along. "Your pack should still contain some meat from yesterday's hunting trip, may I suggest that-"
James withdrew a pilfered ration packet from his vest, waved it in front of his visor.
"I was thinking Gaul cuisine."
She sounded slightly miffed at the interruption, but this sort of back-and-forth had become commonplace during the long stay in this little hellhole.
"That is hardly the most efficient solution. Logic dictates perishables should be consumed first."
James smirked. "I just blew up a Hellion and caused a Colonel to piss himself, JADE. Just let me have this."
-
James knew well enough to lay low for a few days after the commotion he'd caused. Most of his time he spent near-motionless in some forsaken hole, deep in the jungle. More gunship patrols roared overhead, never far enough away to not be a threat. Entire companies of men stumbled around in the jungle surrounding the 32nd regiment's base, trying to track him down by conventional means.
The sheer tedium of those long hours would have driven him insane if he hadn't kept himself occupied by discerning the motion sensor network data and making small wagers with JADE on where a unit would move, and whether or not they'd stumble into any more of his traps.
Sadly it was more likely that they'd bothered to bring engineers to sweep for mines alongside their infantry, as JADE pointed out.
James in turn grumbled that if it stood between playing make-believe while he waited for activity to die down and literally watching the grass grow outside his hole, he'd choose make-believe.
Other than this, it was almost a highlight whenever a strange insect waddled into his field view. He'd glare at it, it'd wave its antennae at him impertinently.
It wasn't great fun, he'd be the first to admit.
But he would take any opportunity to stop himself from... thinking too much. The stresses of this endeavour were beginning to take their toll. The physical discomfort, the long hours, the loneliness, the violence...
If he began thinking too much about it, sometimes he'd wind up wondering why the hell he'd come to this mudball in the first place.
That maybe he should just... up and leave. Get back somewhere civilized. Maybe get a real job, hah.
But then he'd always think of the massive pain he'd been to the Gauls here, the sweet memory of the Hellion bursting into flame and ploughing into the hillside. It steeled him and made him remember that, yes, there would be a payoff at the end of this mess.
If and only if he persevered and kept his head.
-
The next time James awoke, it was to the sight of dirt. This would have been alarming, had he not known exactly where he was - in the recently conquered lair of some horrible thing covered in spines, with powerful snapping jaws.
He'd been surprised, when he first approached this place. Rushing him out of nowhere, completely unafraid, it had pounced and locked its jaw around his arm with enough force to rip it off. The hardened carbon-based material had shrugged off even that, however.
James had rolled the beast around, pinned it underneath himself, then hacked away madly at it with his old Armed Forces issue combat knife, each vicious stab guided by desperation, instinct, the rush of life - death.
When the beast moved no more, he caught his breath and disposed of the carcass - there was next to no meat on the stringy, deadly animal.
He would yet show this damned world just who was predator, and who was prey.
When the mercenary emerged into the slowly awakening world for the one hundred and thirty-seventh time since his arrival, JADE once more provided her customary SIGINT update.
It had become an unshakable routine at this point.
"Good morning, James," she spoke. Polite and patient as ever.
"Today's sensor report reveals anomalous movement in sector Lima 5. Not consistent with any animal movement or Gaul force movement pattern we've become familiar with from previously recorded data."
James blinked. Considered the options.
"So, what are we looking at, exactly?" He grumbled.
JADE pretended to consider. She'd had her conjecture since she first recieved the data, but she was persnickety about etiquette.
"Considering movement speed and trajectory, I am confident these are not the random stirrings of an animal - but rather someone with a destination in mind. The regimental base camp."
James took some time off to think, removed his mask for a short time to wolf down a home-made ration parcel. It consisted of dried meat supplemented with some of the more edible local plants. It wasn't his preferred form of dining, but it allowed him to subsist.
Every week, he dedicated a day to foraging and treating meat for later consumption. Anything from Gaia he ate, he chased down with immune system-boosting drugs to combat Gaia's relentlessly aggressive micro-organic lifeforms.
He was not going to catch some unholy disease in this dump, if he had a say in the matter. If he suffered mild allergenic reactions when he got back to a more human-normal environment, that was a small price to pay.
He finished his meal, washed his face with some of his purified water, then replaced the mask.
"Well, let's check it out. If they're Gauls, they die. If not... well, some human interaction that doesn't involve killing someone might be sort of nice."
RE: A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 04-22-2015
They followed the anomalous signals, carefully estimating their unknown contact's position as they went around and ahead of it. A river roared nearby, drowning out the sound of movement.
He positioned himself on a little ridge just near this river and waited for... whatever it was.. to come into view, perched just below the skyline to minimize his visibility.
"Hnh... interesting," James remarked quietly when he saw the unmistakeably foreign shade of human skin between some articles of vegetation, movement - too much to be one person.
He held his breath, trained his rifle tentatively on the brush blocking his view. What would come forth?
One by one they emerged into view, an assortment of tired-looking people of varying degrees of roughness, wearing clothes in the colours of the jungle. It wasn't a camo pattern James was familiar with - he assumed it was a makeshift one.
The variety in different articles of clothing was also suspiciously large. Not uniform, even if some pieces looked like they came out of military surplus. An older Bretonian pattern field jacket there, a Rheinlander set of fatigues there.
Paramilitaries, James surmised. Or at least, nothing officially military.
They seemed to relax, taking a break here by the riverbank. Some of them took to refilling canteens, having a little sitdown. They weren't terribly well equipped. Some common black-market guns, some commercial body armour. At most.
They carried a lot of gear, however. "What could they-" James held that thought, as his eye was drawn to one of them. A woman that looked to be somewhere in her thirties took out some sort of long, narrow implement that she used to take what James could only guess was a... soil sample from the riverbed.
"Gaians," he concluded. "Who else would stop for samples down here?"
"I concur," JADE stated. "What do you intend to do?"
James amped up his mask's voice projector, so that they'd be able to clearly hear him over the din of the river.
"You people are out in some very bad country, you know that?" James' distorted voice rang out. It grabbed their attention instantly, men and women scrambled for weapons. James couldn't help but laugh, as he ducked beneath his rock protrusion.
The sound did not seem to make them more amicable.
"Who are you?!" A female voice called back. The same one who took the soil sample? James responded by taking a breath, slowly standing up, raising his weapon over his head so as to not show any hostile intent.
"I'm getting tired of being asked that. Why don't I come down before someone hears us?" Nobody shot at him, so he took that as a yes. He slipped over the ridge, and gently slid down to level ground. The Gaians glanced uncomfortably at one another.
The woman who'd taken the soil sample motioned for everyone else to hold their aim steady as James strolled up. The leader, then, he assumed. He wasn't really in a hurry, and he made sure to use non-threatening body language as he approached.
"Stop! Stay where you are," The woman hissed once they were close enough to talk, but also far enough away for everyone to mow James down like a firing squad. James obliged, though he didn't like his odds much if this went sour. He'd have to depend on this staying peaceful.
"Okay, now, again, who are you?" she insisted. She cut a slightly ridiculous figure, since she was not brandishing a gun at him - but rather the tool she'd used to obtain her soil sample.
"Call me James," he said, trying to make it sound disarming through his voice modulator. He wasn't sure it was working. "And you are Gaians, aren't you?" Another exchange of glances.
The leader seemed none too pleased with his observation, but she didn't deny it.
"...I am Professor Ambrose, and this is my... research team," she offered hesitantly. "We're out here for samples."
James sensed a half-truth.
"It's a strange sort of research team that takes samples so close to a Gaul military base."
The Professor scoffed. "And it is a strange sort of soldier who traipses around on Gaia all by his lonesome. Who are you working for?"
James shrugged. "This is really sort of a personal project of mine. I'm here because I want to be. Believe it or don't, I don't really care. The only reason we're talking is because I think we can help each other out."
The Professor looked doubtful. "What makes you think we'd want anything to do with you?"
"For one, you were walking to your deaths. The Gauls have intensified their patrols these past few days, and greatly increased their response times. One patrol catches you in the open, the gunships would be over you in an instant - and that would be that."
A few of the Gaians looked despondent from these news. Others looked doubtful. Ambrose seemed to consider it, then made up her mind.
"Right, suppose I trust that information. What then? What do we do now?" She asked.
James motioned towards the trees. "I've been out here in this area for weeks. Months. I know the terrain. I can lead you wherever you need to go - faster and safer than you could by yourselves... Or I can help you with your Gaul problem. What kind of equipment have you brought with you?"
Ambrose seemed somewhat mollified, now. She waved for people to point their guns away, and waved James closer so they could take stock. Laid out some of their materiél on a tarp. "Well, besides research equipment, we brought some light mortars. It's pretty old tech, but still useful. We were hoping to get close enough to the Gauls to fire a few shells at them, harass them a little - we don't take kindly to them wresting Gaia away from us."
James examined the pipes of the old devices. They seemed in good enough shape, and the Gaians had brought shells for them too.
"Anything else?" the mercenary inquired.
"Explosives, the remotely detonated kind. Incendiaries, plasma-charges, high-explosives. We were hoping we could use them somehow, but again, we'd have to get close enough to use them."
James nodded, satisfied. "Well, Professor... You're from Cambridge, right? Now, I'm no activist, but I'll cut you a deal. No offense, but I can make this equipment work for the both of us much better than you could by yourself. I can take you wherever you want to go, safe, sound, and undetected, and in exchange... I get some of those charges, and you pop off a few of those mortar shells at the time and place of my choosing. Does that seem fair?"
She seemed unconvinced. "I don't know, this could be a trap on your part. Or you could just be crazy. Tell me your plan, and I might agree."
James undid his mask seal, removed it to look the activist-turned-guerilla in the eye. He could tell she was slightly unsettled by his expression - anticipation.
"Alright. Let's talk plans."
-
After their little talk, James led Professor Ambrose's little expedition around some of the more notable sites of the jungle, around the patrols, the minefields, the trapped "playgrounds". It wasn't particularly eventful. Samples of dirt and plants, mushrooms, water - even some of the wildlife.
All of it for the purposes of insistently moral and non-intrusive study - James frankly stopped paying attention to the details of Ambrose's scholarly ramblings after some time. Damned environmental activists. Though he had to admit, he didn't mind the talking per se, having been away from civilization for such a long time.
They spent a couple of days at this. James insisted on no fires at camp. Some of the Gaians grumbled at this. James in turn told them horror stories of Gallian special forces units, men and women who moved like shadows, killed without hesitation - and could very well be here on Gaia. He told them of the gunships that could see the smoke and the thermal signature from miles and miles away, eyes in the sky that would pulverize the entire squad without the barest amount of effort.
Complaints started dying out after a few such colourful renditions. Some time after James had, for the seventh time in two days, hissed at one of the poor fools to freeze so he wouldn't stumble into one some lethal contraption, Ambrose wanted to talk.
"You told us your plan, but you still haven't said a word about why you're here," she said hesitantly.
James shrugged, non-commital. Evasive.
"Because I want to be."
That made her shake her head. "But that makes no sense! There's nothing of worth here. There's some Gauls, true, but no intel that could make this worthwhile. We're here for research, primarily and that's one thing, but..."
James didn't let her finish. "I'm not here for intel. Not here on orders, and not for some higher purpose, Ambrose. The Gauls are here. Exposed. Vulnerable. They think they're untouchable, because nothing has proven an obstacle in the past."
Ambrose went quiet, perturbed. She didn't expect this answer, James thought.
"I'm here only to show the Gauls that they bleed red like the rest of us."
"You are insane," she hissed. "It's moronic! You'll have no... no impact here. You can't fight a regiment by yourself."
"Of course not," he replied mildly as they walked. "Not the whole regiment. But a few Gauls at a time... then I dictate the terms. They, on the other hand, are stuck fighting shadows. They expend time, manpower and resources, combing all the places I won't be. Fighting largely imaginary insurgents, because I planted the idea there."
He paused, turned to face the Professor.
"I watch, I wait, I force them to make all the wrong moves. And then, when they're spread too thin, I go for the throat."
-
In the wake of this conversation, silence reigned. Nobody was sure if James was brilliant, insane, suicidal, or some combination of all three. He was not forthcoming with his thoughts on that matter, and so they were at a loss for what else to do but to continue gathering scientific samples, until Ambrose was satisfied.
"Remember," he added before they parted ways. "Channel six-one-decimal-four-five. Three more days. Grid zero-three-four-six, niner-niner-five-one. I'll call targets. Be there."
Ambrose rolled her eyes, none too subtly. "Yes, yes. I've written it down. You sure this will actually work?"
Arland nodded. "Provided you know how to operate those mortars."
"Do you take us for idiots? Of course we do. Besides, it's not like these have to be aimed manually these days." James was slightly doubtful, but he had no choice but to trust that his fire support would be there when needed.
"Alright. See you in three days." That, and a nonchalant little hand gesture, was the extent of how much James was willing to draw out his farewell. He rounded two trees, passed some tall, cane-like growths - then he was out of sight.
Now began a game of cat-and-mouse - a diversion, meticulously crafted, meant to draw the bulk of the Gaul contingent out into the jungle.
Three days. Three battalions of Gauls to provoke into action.
No sleep.
And best of all, stimulants in excess of the recommended daily dosage. He'd pay for that one down the line, perhaps not permanently, but definitely painfully.
It was a massive undertaking. Using his stolen comms set, JADE filled the air with with ghost traffic - sending imaginary contact reports and spotreps over the Gaul channels. With the additional effects of mines going off in the jungle, of sentries disappearing at night - James created forces that didn't exist, insurgents that struck, withdrew and dispersed, time and time and time again - sometimes leaving casualties, sometimes not, but always frustrating the opposition.
The Gauls practically HAD to respond with battalion level deployments across multiple vectors to finally stamp out the inexplicable, intangible attacks they'd been facing.
In so doing, they left the regimental base camp undermanned, the surrounding ridgelines left with only token sentry units to serve as the base's outermost defenses.
The southwestern ridge was James' infiltration point - as the sky grew darker and the hour of the strike drew near, he planted incendiary charges along the thickly foliaged ridge - one almost on top of his own position. Almost. Careful consideration was key here.
His position overlooked the base proper, a couple of kilometres off - a haphazardly arranged mass of prefabbed buildings, complex equipment and inert vehicles. People were few and far between, patrols moved around in twos and threes. Little black dots, barely visible in the distance. Ten minutes before the arranged time, he assembled a particular piece of equipment that had until now had until now served only as dead weight in his pack.
The end result was a treasure James had stumbled upon months before he came to Gaia: a Harkonnen Mk. VIII Man-Portable Anti-Materiél Railgun. It was a long device, bristling with technology, aggressively shaped. This weapon was the latest iteration of Westingshire Defense Syndicate's acclaimed - and expensive - line of anti-materiél guns. This model featured an improved cooling system, greatly improved rate of fire, and much reduced weight compared to previous models.
Most important, however, was the Mk. VIII's hallmark feature: a magnetic containment system, that in conjunction with specialized ammunition harnessed a significant percentage of the energy generated by the plasma discharge that follows a railgun slug out of the barrel. This added significantly to the gun's overall destructive potential. The exorbitant price and niche role of the system in a modern combat environment only ensured a limited quantity of buyers, almost exclusively military.
When James gently laid down and shouldered the massive railgun system, it was in a stimulant-induced moment of clarity that he muttered, "Finally."
His hands tightened around the grip - the suit's arm joints stiffened, stabilizing his stance. Finger tapped gently on the trigger guard. Visor lined up with the macro-optic, exchanging data. Constantly calculating firing solutions.
"Finally."
-
The last few minutes of waiting were excruciating. James knew he needed sleep. Everything in his head demanded it, demanded rest, time to process the last few days of frantic activity that had led up to this moment. All of it existed in his mind as a violent blur of mind games, gunfire, floating somewhere between finished memories and dreams.
The drugs did not let him rest - kept his eye staring down the scope with manic focus. Absorbing every detail: every unprotected head, every gun barrel, every countermeasure system, every parked vehicle.
And then it was time. He keyed the radio channel he'd agreed on with the Gaians.
"Sierra for Golf, do you read me?"
"Uh... we read you loud and clear, Sierra. We're in position and ready to fire. You sure this is safe? We heard vehicle noise only a few klicks out."
"Just aim properly. I'll take care of the rest. Transmitting target solutions now. Get your mortars oriented, fire everything you have on these targets on my mark, and not before. Once you're done, run like hell. Understood?"
"If you say so... Alright, we're ready. Waiting on you."
Arland picked out three rapid firing gun systems spread out across the base - usual protocol was to have a number of them hooked up to a fire control and sensor unit, the housing and antennae to which he spotted next to a larger building, presumably barracks. A thought occured to James, then.
"Alright, JADE... How would I hide a candle?"
He could practically hear the smugness of the AI's tone. She was getting better at that.
"Presuming you are referring to the multitude of incendiary charges placed along this ridge in an effort to alight the the surrounding vegetation and thereby mask your thermal signature and that of your weapons discharge, I can only conclude... By setting the metaphorical house on fire."
He chuckled at that.
"Four out of ten. Your one-liner algorithm needs work."
He thumbed the detonator for the charges, and the world erupted into heat and rising smoke and ash around him. His weapon was durable enough to take it, and his suit left him unharmed, even though flames licked dangerously close.
"You see, it's all about the timing. That moment before I blew the charges? That would have been fanta-"
"James, the guns?"
"Oh. Right."
James snapped his sights onto the cuboid frame of the targeting unit, and squeezed. The railgun jerked back against his shoulder, but with his suit's stabilizers it felt little worse than a large-calibre rifle. He'd probably feel bruising later.
The round howled through the air, closing the distance at terrifying speed. It punched an entry hole roughly the size of of a softball in the targeting system's frame, continued all the way through, and made its exit by turning a section of building wall behind the unit into a molten, brutalized mess.
Not taking the time to let the Gauls figure out why the hills were on fire and why their targeting unit had been turned into a smoking mess, James called it in.
"Countermeasures are down, open fire, give me everything you have."
The whistle of shells overhead followed only seconds after, a siren began its wail.
-
RE: A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 07-08-2015
Shellfall was a beautiful thing to watch... from a distance. Dirt and flesh and steel all scattering themselves, the sound of it discordantly booming after the fact.
Up close, it was a nightmare of sensory overload and utter panic, like someone picking up the world around you and then shaking it to bits. James sincerely hoped those confused figures skittering around in his scope were feeling every micro-instant of that terror.
Although just mortars, these packed a punch, James noted. Their targeting was satisfactory, too - bright flashes as vehicles were struck - disabled or rattled by the exploding rain. Gaping wounds appeared in some of the prefabbed structures, men and women dashed to safer positions out of a crumbling barracks, some dragging or carrying wounded.
On the far side of the base, a powerful set of twin engines flared. JADE urged something in his ear, James didn't particularly care right then. The danger was, in his mind, evident.
As the first gunship crested over the top of the base's admin building, James's eyes were locked on it, and soon after, his crosshairs. Adrenaline, artificial and otherwise, made time seem to slow to a crawl as he ever so gently lined up the shot at the cockpit. Two klicks. One point nine-two. One point seven-three. A weapons mounting turned towards him, a savage thrill gripped his chest as he saw the heavy energy weapons light up, felt the ground shake as death fell short less than a dozen metres ahead and below him, chewing apart the stone face with its fury.
But James' aim didn't waver. The railgun bucked against his shoulder - the pilot's head and upper torso turned into a pulpy, reddish mist. The Hellion veered sharply to the side, engines still gunning, then toppled, plowing back into the ground not far from where it lifted off. James could hear himself shouting something indistinct and profanity laden, he missed the specifics through the haze of bloodlust and elation.
A variety of weapons - rifles, machineguns, even heavier vehicle mounted pulse-guns from various recon or transport vehicles had turned against him now. Most of the fire fell well short. The rifles just didn't have the range, the heavier machineguns failed to pinpoint him through the blazing vegetation that higlighted the area he was in, but concealed his exact position.
The vehicular energy-based guns were getting uncomfortably close, however. He sighted a repulsorlift infantry support vehicle, put two railgun slugs into it. One in the turret, one in the leftmost repulsion emitter. It sputtered to a halt, and the crew bailed. He didn't bother going for the random infantrymen milling about, they were the least dangerous at this range - not worth the time, ammo or effort.
Things glazed over for a while, James' world shrinking to a series of violent images as his hands moved seemingly by themselves, destroying all that he left his eyes to rest on.
Was this your endgame all along, James?
A gruesome spectacle punctuated the thought, a machinegunner rent apart from face to spine by one of the hypervelocity slugs.
Just you, some distant Gaians you enlisted, this green hell, and of course, a regiment of Gauls for you to terrorize.
An officer, delirious with pain, sobbing on the ground as a stray armour panel from an alighting vehicle had shorn off his forearms, and half of his rifle.
What do you even accomplish with this? Throwing yourself at forces an order of magnitude greater than what you can actually hope to destroy? How is this any different than Leeds?
A burst, uncannily accurate, ripped up the rockface not a metre to his left, a couple rounds impacted off his armour and knocked him back, off the railgun. Dull pain welled up from the impact. The world around him snapped back into full focus.
Oh, I'll tell you the difference.
He grasped the rifle's pistol grip again, scanned the battlefield. A swarm of combat drones had been launched. This was becoming untenable, and he still hadn't accomplished what he came here to do. Where was he...?
Unlike Leeds, I'm fighting with the express goal of living to tell the tale.
A flash of officer's insignia caught his eye.
...And to make sure someone else does not.
-
Colonel Alphonse Gerard had been standing under a camo netting that denoted a briefing area by the motorpool minutes before the shellfall begun. Sweating in the sweltering heat in his tropical cammies, he'd been complaining to his staff - minus the batallion COs, who were currently in the field - about their recent casualties to an unknown insurgent group.
Things weren't unmanagable by far - their casualties weren't at all anything like they'd face going up against a conventional unit, but it was the absolute lack of visible progress that was really irking him. How the hell had they lost a gunship? There hadn't been enough remains left to identify the damage properly, and troop morale had gone down the toilet when more dead and wounded had piled up, and not once in any of the survivor's reports had there been mentions of even a single confirmed enemy kill.
Only conjecture, uncertainty. Maybes.
Whoever the hell was out there had for all intents and purposes rendered themselves intangible, untouchable, like trying to kill a ghost. Whenever contact was made, the enemy would cause maybe one or two casualties, break contact, and retreat. Every time a unit attempted to pursue and keep a lock, they'd walk straight into another ambush, like clockwork, and casualties would ramp immediately. And every time, they'd report nothing but vague shapes and accurate incoming fire. Their opponents remained a complete mystery.
They were on the verge of changing that, though. In debriefing Caporale-Chef Villiers, the only man to have gotten a clear visual on the enemy so far, had divulged that the guy who'd captured him was unusually well-equipped. Non-standard power armour, nothing in current Bretonian issue, but the layout of his webbing resembled the Bretonian norm. As did the man's sidearm. Speech and mannerisms corroborated the assumption.
The only conclusion Gerard could reasonably draw from this information is that they were dealing with some kind of special forces team, who were possibly also supporting local Gaian units.
It wasn't a pleasant notion - but they were getting closer to making the enemy tangible. And they'd taken less attacks once they'd increased drone and gunship coverage, meaning that now they only had to root the bastards out and put them down.
He'd taken some satisfaction in this, all the way until he saw the flames along the ridgelines, and heard the earsplitting crack of something piercing their point defense system control unit.
He'd been shouting over the radio for all available units to scramble and lay down fire on the ridgeline, whatever they could find in there. Then the shells began falling on the vehicles and buildings, and for a second he wondered if he was back on Leeds again.
And when he'd decided to move his command post to the rear of the action, hurrying along his command staff and urging them towards a nearby transport craft, he wondered where the hell everything below his lower back had gone. Tumbling to the ground, he stared dumbly at the raging fire in the hills, kilometres away. As his staff tried to pick him up - an attempt to keep him alive - darkness closed in, and he vaguely recalled a softly spoken promise.
RE: A Spider Amongst Flies - l3wt - 07-10-2015
"...JADE, I think we got our guy," James said quietly, barely audible even in the helmet over the incoming fire.
"The man in the footage from your optics is a match with the intel profile," the AI agreed. "Now, please disengage, James. Odds of survival decrease by the second." James glanced down at the railgun - it was practically glowing now. "Leave the gun, James. It'll only slow you down." James took the point - he crawled away from it a few metres first, a crackle of autocannon fire shredding a tree just overhead. Then he stood up and ran for his life, the swarm of gun drones would be only a klick or so out, and the fire would only confuse their sensors for so long.
James ran like a man possessed. He had to let the suit work for him as much as possible as he rushed through the brush, probably much to the consternation of the surrounding wildlife. All the way he was convinced he could hear the drones as an infernal buzz in the distance, and though he was heaving for breath, and his chest felt like it was about to burst, he kept running - skirting around trees, sliding feet-first down steeper inclines. After a while he lost all sense of time and distance, all he knew was the pounding of his heart, his head, his feet, and the terror of finally being caught up with.
A river, dead ahead. James came to a stumbling halt at the bank, head spinning, legs becoming weak with fatigue as the adrenaline was beginning to give out. He wrenched off his mask, fingers fiddling with the seal. The spinning in his head was getting worse, like he'd drunk far too much. Every fibre of his body was trembling, limbs heavy, and the darkness of the surrounding jungle was encroaching on the borders of his vision. All the stresses of the past few days were rushing back in on his mind and body with a vengeance, and he found himself overwhelmed.
Before he knew it he was on his knees, puking his guts out. He was about to pass out, he could feel his vision becoming worse. Doing it here would be the end of him, though. The drones were still in pursuit, and he had no protection from the swarm here. He had half a mind to let it happen, every inch of him felt like he'd been put through a steel press, and moving was more than he could manage. But to hold the darkness closing in on his mind at bay, he held on to a thought, one that spurred him to pull that damned mask back over his face anyway.
He'd won.
He anchored himself to that thought, pushed through the pain, and hauled himself, inch by excruciating inch, into the murky water. As the stream took him, his consciousness finally faded.
-
He was surprised to find himself alive, when he opened his eyes. Looking around in confusion, he saw he was caught on the roots of a riverside tree. Carefully dislodging himself, he dragged himself to the surface. Clear blue skies overhead, sun high. Mid-day. He sat on the bank, feeling empty and battered still, but he was alive, even after all was said and done.
He could do something about the emptiness, at least. He pulled a tube of synthpaste from a webbing pouch. Hooked it up to his mask receptor. "JADE."
"Yes, James?" James got the sense the AI was tiptoeing around him, somehow. Not wanting to disturb or push him.
"How far to the ship?"
"The river carried you some way to the south-east, we are currently one hundred and fifty seven kilometres from your Eagle. I'm afraid your pack is caught in enemy territory, and going back there at this point would be inadvisable," she offered.
"Yeah, wasn't planning on it. How the hell did you manage to convince me to leave that railgun behind, though? Do you have any idea how difficult it'll be to find me another one of those?" He joked, somewhat half-heartedly. Trying was important, though.
"I believe Westingshire will be releasing a Harkonnen Mk. IX in Q1 next year. Now, you can upgrade." James smiled faintly at that. He was starting to feel almost human again.
"As long as you're buying," he murmured through a mouthful of synthpaste. He glanced at his webbing. His handgun was still secured to his holster, and he still had food and water to last a few days with proper rationing. Looks like he'd be hunting with just his sidearm on his way back to the ship, an interesting challenge, but he'd pull it off.
"Well, no use sitting around," he said once he'd finished his syntpaste tube. He stood, and crept away, back into the jungle.
"I have one hell of a walk ahead of me."