Donnie scrambled for the remaining vase on the cab roof, trying to attach it to the trailing copper wire.
“Leave it, son,” Hynd said, clapping him on the shoulder. “We’re free and clear.”
Donnie turned and saw that they were now looking down on the lakebed from a higher position on a rocky track. Behind them, the sand seethed with tiny worms as they fed on the sudden feast of the dead. As they watched, the frenzy subsided. The tiny worms burrowed deeper, the sand shivered, and a wave ran through the lakebed heading away north and west toward the river outlet and the wide desert plains beyond.
Banks drove them into town two hours later. By that time, the sat-phone had got over its huffy spell and was working again. He’d put in a call for support and made a quick report to the colonel with a request to collect Gillings’ remains and the finds from the dig site.
They had time for a long-anticipated beer in a roadside bar. Donnie joined them and got the first round in.
“We did it,” he said. “We won.”
Wiggins smiled thinly.
“Naw, it was a draw at best. We nearly got our arses kicked. Those wee buggers are all still out there in the sand just waiting for it to rain again.”
“Aye? Well, they’re welcome to it.”
“And what’s with all this ‘we’ shite, Donnie. Are you thinking of signing up? Want to join us on our wee adventures?”
He thought of the camaraderie, of how close he’d felt to these men during the action. Then he thought of Gillings, the worms eating through his body, gnawing at his tongue as he screamed. He could only manage a weak smile as he clinked his beer bottle against the one Wiggins held up.
“No fucking way,” he replied.
Read on for a free sample of Recon Elite
1
CAV V-117 landed on planet Mawholla, setting ablaze what looked like a North American pine tree. But Sam Boggs knew better, this was a long, long way from home. The SA-1 intelligence computer on Colonial Assessment Vehicle V-117 had determined Mawholla to be a forest planet, with considerable volcanic activity and cave labyrinths, but also Earth-like elevation changes (rivers and moisture in the canyons, snow and colder as you go up the mountains).
Boggs emerged from his bunk, and slipped off the virtual device connected to his Happy Box. The “Happy Boxes” made advanced space travel tolerable, as Recon Elite disappeared into their fantasies. Most of his squad chose rock star fantasies, selling out large venues while having hundreds of adoring women throw themselves at them.
Boggs chose fishing trips. Specifically the Rocky Mountains, where he’d fish streams not all that different from the ones on Mawholla. Except in the Happy Box, his wife Sarah was still at his side, before she’d died during childbirth, taking his supposed-to-be son Connor with her.
Boggs pressed the red awake button on the Happy Box chain, and soon the rest of Recon Elite Six awoke.
“Get your fat asses up,” Boggs said as he slid into his forest camo uniform. “We have a planet to explore.”
James T Bone rose from his bunker, rubbing his head, and his short crop of hair. He stood at 6’7, an enormous man, with the body of a WWF wrestler. Behind him, along the row of Happy Box beds rose the other four men: Jim Dagger, Raul Portman, Tim Emoth, and Mark “Pearl” Staunch.
The men rubbed their eyes, yawned, and stretched as the CAV-117 winded down its engines and began the transition into support mode.
A bay door opened, and a rush of oxygen flooded the stale cabin air.
While the fresh air flooded the cabin, a security sensor deployed numerous lasers across the opening. Sure, Recon Elite Six had been briefed, and knew much of what they were dealing with on a surface level. But Boggs again knew better, and so did the commanding officers at Colonial Preparation Base, or CPB. No matter how well recon satellites portrayed a planet, there were always surprises. A man or woman had to get onto the surface and sniff around, get his or her fingernails dirty to truly find out what the planet was all about.
There had been countless reports of snafus and surprises… many the deadly kind. And the recon satellites could not, and would never determine every species on the planet, whether said species was poisonous or hostile. Even the drones had a tough time navigating thick forest, with ancient canopies blocking out however many suns on Planet Whatever. Submersibles were launched too, plying the oceans of Mawholla.
Some of the submersibles had disappeared into underwater caves rather quickly.
A little too quickly for Boggs, as if the recon submersibles had been swallowed by something enormous.
The rest of Bogg’s squad dressed, and slipped into their CR-07 replenishing backpacks. These neat backpacks regenerated a hydrating fluid of water, sodium, and carbohydrates, keeping the men consistently nourished in even the most demanding conditions for up to a week straight. The packs connected to a long over-the-shoulder straw from the top of the packs to their mouths. After that, they’d rely on on-board provisions, and whatever they could hunt and drink on Mawholla. The water had already been tested, and was approved by CPB as safe for consumption. The animals?
Not so much.
But Boggs had learned on plenty of these missions that meat was meat. If it looked like a lizard, and ran like a lizard, it probably tasted like one too, depending on what kind of vegetation the damn thing ate that week. If it had lingered in a swamp, he and his men could expect a muddy taste. If the animal had fed on meadow grasses, light and juicy. If it had fed on lichen, somewhere in-between.
“Fuck these packs,” Dagger said as he stood next to Boggs. “Let’s get some meat. I aint no damn vegan.”
“You pussy,” Emoth said to Dagger as he loaded his ZR-15, the standard colonization assault rifle for Recon Elite Six. “How in the hell did you get this job anyway? Maybe you should be a farmer.”
“Hah,” Portman said, also loading his ZR-15 with stun, frag, and decimate bullets. “I’d kill myself,” he said as he pumped in the ammo. “I need the action.”
Dagger shook his head. “Yeah, ‘cause you aint had any in years.”
Portman grinned and shrugged. “It’s true, it’s true. I lost your mother’s phone number.”
Dagger shot Portman a look, then grinned like a maniac. “Well, I hope she was good.”
Boggs sighed. “Alright you nimrods,” he said. “Recon Elite is better than high school locker talk. Respect yourselves, and in return earn respect.”
“Yes sir,” Dagger said, standing at attention and saluting Boggs. The rest of the men fell in line as Boggs paced the room, a waterproof map clenched in his hands.
“You see that door right there, men?” Boggs said as he leaned into his squad. “You see those protective lasers? Why do you think those exist?”
“To protect us, sir,” Dagger said.
Boggs stepped over to Staunch, and made firm eye contact an inch from his face. “What about you, Staunch? Why are there a hundred interlaced lasers protecting our six right now? Do you think it’s because there are rabbits and possum out there?”
“No sir,” Staunch said, his hands shaking at his side.
Hmmm… Boggs thought. He didn’t care for that. And Staunch had been quiet pre-trip as well, as if he’d been shaken by personal issues. Boggs didn’t need that. He couldn’t count how many times formerly confident and centered men had inadvertently screwed with group dynamics on missions. These kinds of psychological issues had a way of creeping up.