"What about my dogs?" Selene asked as she stood at attention next to sergeant Luan.
Her babysitter essentially. They were standing inside a shuttle that was carrying them to a planets surface.
"They'll send someone. We have protocols like that ready for service members. Just stick close to me and let me do all the talking if we come across any colonists."
"'Kay. How do I look?" Selene asked, putting a hand on the kukri machete on her hip and striking a pose.
"Like a badass." Luan scoffed.
Damn right. Selene thought. She wore black enforcer armor similar to what she did on Endelon. But this time it was slimmed down and fitted to her. And specialized for telepaths.
Unlike most DF soldiers she had extra bells and whistles too.
Energy shield, her fancy kukri, a more angular set of armor, and a carbine rifle that wasn't a spray and prey machine gun like the other soldiers.
Major Masukas' voice came over the intercom.
"Zeta unit: your objective is to watch out for the researchers and follow their orders as well as the orders of your superior officers. ..I hear the civilian population may be particularly anti-puck on this world so... Do what you need to do."
There was some turbulence as the shuttle entered the atmosphere. The shuttle rocked, causing the rows of soldiers within to sway slightly. Clutching the triangle handles above them.
They touched down and the ramped door opened forming a staircase to the planets surface.
Desert sands blew into the confined space instantly. Flecking against their visors.
There was a sandstorm outside.
"Fall in, secure the perimeter, I don't want anyone closer than four meters to each other!" Sergeant Luan orders and stepped down the ramp.
Selene followed closely. Holding her carbine to her chest.
Their were Zykra here. On the loose. She could feel it on the air. Forget rebels or unruly civilians. The Zykra were the true threat.
They fanned out and surrounded the landing craft. Two more shuttles like theirs landed in a triangle formation on the ridge. And a somewhat larger research command center vessel landed in the center of that triangle. It was white and sleeker in design.
She cycled through the vision types on her visor.
Ultra violet. Thermal.
Whatever she could use to see through all this dust and sand. She switched to her geo-scanner.
A blue wireframe swept over the ground outlining a bumpy arid landscape in a 3D projection ahead of her.
There were many crevices that disappeared beneath the ground.
One wrong step and who knew where you would go...
'This place sucks. Who would live here? And why?' she thought.
In the distance there was a small colony. It was like a trailer park of tiny metallic modules. A shanty town rusted by years of weathering these sands. A field of spiraling wind catchers were turning fast in the storm.
Luans voice came over the radio; "Selene, Cass, Brett, Cob, Darude, on me. We're going down to the colony. The rest of you maintain the perimeter. Lieutenant Ford: contact the head researcher and organize the sweep."
Selene's visor created a round mini-map in the bottom left of her vision. It showed numerous dots on it around her.
A circle of light-blue dots representing soldiers surrounded four shuttle icons. Green dots began to be highlighted with a gold dot that represented Luan's position.
'Just like in the simulations... No big deal..' Selene told herself as she met up with Luan and the others.
"What your step." she said as they made their way down the rocky canyon. The constant sound of sand bouncing off their armor became white noise at this point.
"How you feeling Selene?" she asked as they formed a single file line and began navigating the narrow path down the ridge.
Selene was eyeing the tops of the ridge tops. Her scans weren't picking up anything, but the Zykra were good at burrowing into any hole or crevice they could find. Even in controlled environments.
"There's some around but they're not agitated. Or big."
"Don't try to downplay it private, no matter the scope of the threat it would still be us here. Prepare for the worst."
Selene nodded but remembered that the sergeant couldn't see her. "Yes sir."
There was a larger force landing in other positions to deal with the Zykra. They were more of a special force meant to extract high value targets. Namely, whoever lived in these trailers.
The ground flattened out as they approached the colony. Transitioning to dunes of sand which felt soft beneath their boots.
Her geo-scan was overlayed ontop of her thermal scan now.
Which caused most of the sand in the air around them to appear grey, against the blue wireframe surface of the dunes. Anything alive would appear a vibrant orange color.
Speaking of which; she saw a little orange blip appear above a dune for a split second.
"Hold." Luan ordered.
Selene's breath hitched.
Falling back on their training—they all began to cover each others blind spots. Fanning out slightly. This was a perfect ambush location.
Selene narrowed on where she saw the orange slip appear above the sands.
'Up.' she sent the vibe across the dunes. And the orange blip appeared again. She saw the outline of mandibles and felt the familiar Zykra vibes. A Munloc.
'Fuck'. One munloc meant at least twenty scantids.
She fired a shot.
Orange shards and drips went flying off into the air before coating the ground. Instant kill.
The best way to deal with Munlocs. Tough bastards. She'd only shot them in a controlled environment before, but they died the same out here.
The ground began to vibrate around them.
Scantids shook off the sand as they appeared from beneath the dunes.
The dog-sized flea monsters surrounded them.
"Light them up!" Luan ordered.
This was what the typical soldiers automatic weapons were for. Gun shots rang out in rapid succession in a circle around them.
Some soldiers were even providing cover-fire from the top of the ridge behind them. Though their accuracy was questionable.
Her visual overlays were becoming just as bad as the sand storm. Orange mist mixed with the grey sands whirling around in the air.
She relied partly on her telepath senses. She had to find the high priority targets. She wasn't here to kill the scantids.
Another Munloc peaked above a dune and shot one of their spurs at them. It pounded into the sand near their feet sending a plum of sand up.
If one of the soldiers died it would be her fault for not reacting quickly enough.
She shot. And the Munlocs shoulder was shredded, but it wasn't out of the fight. Another spur landed near them. Only slightly directed off course from the impact of her shot.
'Pud,pud,pud!' the impacts began to happen one after the other. It was just spraying them at this point. Closer and closer in an arcing motion.
She shot again and half of it's head blew off in chunks. Which hung from strings of viscera to the rest of its' head. The munloc swayed a bit before falling over dead.
'Control your breathing...' she reminded herself and continued to scan the horizon. Feeling for the more potent vibes that Munlocs had.
Just then a few pinchers clamped on her leg. The electronic sheen of her shield flickered for a moment before shattering. She whipped her leg back as the scantids mandibles closed on the now-empty space with a clanking sound.
She kicked as she deactivated her overlays.
The sands became orange, and the scantid became brown. The dog sized creature did a backflip from the impact and rolled a dozen feet from her. A little pool of purplish blood spilled onto the sand from it.
Combined with her nanofiber muscles, the enforcer armors enhancements made her entire body a weapon.
"Cover me!" she shouted. Darude ran up beside her and began to spray the oncoming scantid swarm.
She reactivated her overlay and began to fire at the munlocs that were appearing in force now. Several of them were around now. The sandstorm was throwing their aim off, but who knows how long that would last.
'Bang, bang' Selene took controlled breaths with each shot. Swiveling to one munloc after the next. Detonating their heads.
Every now and then she would check her immediate surroundings- she couldn't rely on these chucklefucks to protect her. To their credit they were doing fantastic... But this was just a fucked situation in general.
The group of six were holding their own against the swarm.
—How were there so many? Selene didn't sense it, were they hibernating or something? Was the ambush tactic they did shield them from her abilities somehow?
Luan was blasting away cones of scantids around them with her shotgun. A resounding 'boom' would come from her direction like clockwork.
'Click' Selene's weapon sounded. She ejected the magazine and produced another from her belt. Just then a scantid leapt on her before she could finish reloading.
She fell to her back and held it at bay with her rifle. It snapped at her face again and again. It's mandibles sounded like steel hammers bashing against each other.
She heard the cry of a soldier near her. Cass by the sounds of it.
"We're getting overrun, get your asses down here!" Luan ordered. A voice sounded on the radio—the Lieutenants; "They're here too! You'll have to hold your position until we can reach you!"
The rest of the zeta unit was firing down from the ridge. They might as well already be here, it just wasn't enough.
This wasn't like the other infestations. More than larvae and a few scantids.
Selene pulled the kukri blade from her hip and impaled the scantid through the face with it. She rolled it off her and stood up, producing her sidearm and casting her rifle to the side.
The bulky gun fired large rounds with lots of recoil—but the effects were undeniable. It blew head-sized holes in whatever it hit.
She shot the scantid that was whipping around Cass by his ankle. Bits of chitin bounced across the sand leaving purple trails.
"Uahh!" Cass cried out producing a stimpack from his belt and injecting it into his leg.
It wouldn't miraculously heal it but it would slow down the bleeding and help with the pain.
"Reloading, cover!" some one shouted. Brett.
Selene reloaded her pistol and went next to him as he knelt down to change out his drum mag. She shot about five scantids, but there were six more behind them.
It was all... Going out of control.
She started to hyperventilate as she emptied her mag, reloaded, and repeated. A dense circle of Zykra were closing in on them, and she sensed more munloc on the horizon..
"Stop..." she breathed. She channeled her ability desperately. Feeling it coiling within her like a typhoon. She blasted it outwards like a hurricane.
"STOOOP!" she shouted.
A gust of sand kicked up around her in a spiral. The sandstorm was pushed outwards clearing the air around them for over a dozen meters. And all the Zykra froze in place.
"Grenades!" Luan ordered and each of them tossed grenades into the crowd of scantids.
"Down!" They all dropped to the floor. Selene covered the injured Cass, who'd been firing from the ground with his rifle.
'BOOOM!' the explosion caused an earth quake.
She heard nothing but a loud ringing in her ears after that... She stood up. Blearily blinking her eyes. Cycling through her vision overlays. None of them revealed the area around her.
She wiped the purple and brown gore from her visor.
"Are we alright?" she asked. Her voice was muffled beneath the ringing.
"I'm... I'm alive I think." Cass said below her.
"We need to push to the colony in case there's a second wave. The explosion scared them, but who knows for how long! Move out!" Luan ordered.
"Pick him up!" Selene said and took her carbine off the ground. She slotted in a new mag and racked it.
Brett and Cob picked up Cass by his arms and they all ran towards the colony, or limped more rather. Darude and Selene covered their backs as Luan led them onwards.
...That was only her first battle with the Zykra and she almost died. She felt bad for comparing them to animal control now. To say the least.
"Open the fuck up or we're setting up charges!" Luan shouted at the front door of the colonies largest trailer. Their tablets led them here, most of their VIPs were inside this one.
The door hissed open and they dragged the bleeding Cass inside. A crowd of people parted ahead of them. Hushed whispers were all around them now.
They cleared a table sending bottles and plates shattering to the ground.
They laid Cass down. Selene was pushing people back and patrolling around their group protectively.
"Get back! Give us some space!", she took a guy up by the lapels and tossed him into the crowd. "Fucking idiots..." she grumbled.
"We need a medkit, is anyone here a doctor?" Luan asked, her head scanning the crowd. "I am!", "Get over here, his ankles been torn off! And we need guns on the doors—get the emergency shutters down! Whoever can fight find something to defend yourselves with!"
The lobby of the.. bar? Inn? Something like that—became a sea of activity then. People were running back and forth. Grabbing weapons, supplies. Some were even stacking tables by the doors and windows as if that would help.
Meanwhile she just stood there, checking her weapons and cataloguing her remaining ammunition. The fatigue from using her abilities was hitting her a bit.
"Selene?" someone asked.
She looked over to see Raymond standing there. Shoulder length brown hair and green eyes that seemed to of seen better days.
"You? Why the fuck are you here?" she asked in disbelief. Was she hallucinating some random asshole from Endelon? If so she'd way rather see her brother.
He rubbed the back of his neck. "I uh... This planet was closest, and... It's a long story."
"I don't care. Just leave me alone. Go stand over there." she said as she continued to scan the room. Thinking about what she'd do if another wave of Zykra attacked. But he stood in front of her.
"I have a lot of questions! My grandma died, I lost my job, and now I'm barely scraping by—I-I helped you on Endelon! You owe me!"
Luan glanced over at them, hearing the commotion.
'Tssk', Selene clicked her tongue.
She thought for a moment then, and rolled her eyes as she came to a decision.
She grabbed Raymond by the collar and dragged him into a backroom and tossed him inside. Closing the door behind them. She really didn't have time for this.