There's tension in the ship's hold, as we all listen to the subtle static of the speaker. On the camera, I'm able to identify Grineer ships of various sizes floating around in space, and I find myself needing to continuously readjust the number of them in my head. "Like Jita 4-4," I think, as I watch the various red and yellow icons on the screen drift around. Still, with all the build up of the blockade in my mind, I had been expecting the ships to be packed tight like sardines. Instead, there's huge swaths of space between each individual ship, enough that my gut instinct is telling me we could probably just go for it without there being any actual issue.
"Although, that's probably just what they want us to think," I realize, as I stare at the armada. "They're so far away," Ella notes, as we silently drift towards the red planet behind them. I nod in agreement, but Rease shakes his head before speaking. "They don't need to be that close to us to shoot us down. Any sabot rounds they fire our way will put holes in our hull before we hit full burn. And even then, they have plenty of time lead their shots. It's not easy to change direction in space, unless you're moving real slow."
"Or if you've got maglock with a bigger ship," says the Sarge, his voice clear for once. We all look up to find him standing on the gangway above us, and he casually makes his way over to the ladder, before sliding down it with ease, coming down to eye level to the four off us. "You were a rail jockey, right Thomoni?" asks the FO. Rease nods, but there's an inquisitive look on his face; likely curiosity as to what or why the Sarge is mentioning it. "Then it makes sense you wouldn't really know about a maglock. It's very much faction tech; something you need infrastructure to deploy," he explains, leaning against one of the supply carts.
"As Tenno, we don't often get a chance to deploy stuff like that, but we also don't get in to dogfights like the other two do. We can utilize it around our relay's, but they have mobile platforms for that sort of thing. The bigger carriers can lock on to the smaller ships, and the smaller ship can increase the 'tension' of what's basically a magnetic rope," he says, making air quotes around "tension". "Basically, it lets you take corners in space in a way you wouldn't normally be able to. Of course, the fighter needs to be outfitted with grav systems tuned for that sort of thing, otherwise you just end up getting pancaked against a wall on the first high G turn." Rease nods, a thoughtful look on his face.
"I didn't know about that. We always tried to stay under the radar. We rarely ended up in big scraps, and if we did..." His words trail off, and there's a flash of pain on his face, almost too quick to notice, before his expression shifts back to interested neutrality. The Sarge continues, either having not noticed or just good at pretending he didn't. "You'll learn more about that sort of thing if you end up on the officer tracks, but it's not information that operatives or agents need in their day to day." I'm reminded of the way the player's ships move in game. "What about what the warframes fly? Do those need the same tech?" The Sarge's ever present smile dims slightly, replaced by a complicated expression. "The Liset's? Orokin tech. Sort of a special case." I nod understandingly.
"Tag line for the warframes, honestly," I think to myself. "Man, I'd love to get my hands on-" says Rease, before he's interrupted by a gruff voice emanating from the speakers. "Gransgort forvet chee uk chee, rudor gar kushunhund, gar ran's rav awklogruogashun. Res neer to bregrer for hunspefshun," it says. Sarge groans, muttering a quick "damn it," before throwing himself up the ladder, two rungs at a time. "Remember what we talked about Caz!" he yells, only a moment before he disappears into the cockpit, closing the door behind him. I quickly navigate menus and submenus, pulling up the Grinesh translation feature before any more words come out of the speaker. Caz's unmistakably shaky voice responds, in what is clearly uncertain Grinesh.
"Control, this is TC-313, we should be authorized. Try scanning us again." I catch myself holding my breath, as though just the sound of air leaving my lungs down in the hold would somehow pass through the radio and give us away. "I hope he just sounds like he's regular nervous and not like, 'I'm the enemy faction, don't notice me' nervous," I think, while I wait for the response. There's a painful moment of silence, before the stressed vocal cords of the Grineer emanate once more. "We did scan you, TC-313. Your tags have been flagged. This ship was marked lost, potential Tenno interference," he says, with mechanical efficiency. My mouth is dry, but I'm locked to my chair, unable to pull away even a fraction of my attention to look for the water that I know is on the ship. My eyes are frozen on the screen, on the tiny, outlined ships drifting against the rust red of our destination.
"Will they just fire on us?" I wonder. "Blow us up before we have a chance to retaliate? Or will they board us, and tear us to pieces the moment they realize we're Tenno? Like fish in a barrel. Or... or something else." My mind spins out, coming up with darker and darker options, the tips of my fingers buzzing from the overly deep breaths I'm taking in an attempt to calm my racing heart. Every muscle is primed, every neuron firing at max capacity, but I'm unable to do anything but listen to the back and forth between Caz and Grineer Flight Control. "Then someone logged it incorrectly," responds Caz. His sentence is cut off just a hair earlier than would seem natural, and I can't help but wonder if it's nerves causing his finger to slip off the transmission button, or if the Sarge had waved him off from continuing down that route.
"That's why we're sending over an enforcement crew. Prepare for boarding," says Control. There's a distinctive click that causes me to wince; the sound of the radio connection ending, like a death knell echoing in the belly of the ship. My head feels a touch light, and I find my hands resting on my guns, my lifeline for the coming conflict. "Come on, Caz, you had one job," I mutter darkly in English. Ko-lee shoots me a look, and I'm hit with a flush of embarrassment as I'm reminded I'm no longer the only one who knows the language. "Sorry," I say, chagrined. "Just blowing off steam." Which is entirely the truth. I know it's not really Caz's fault; our tags were out of date, and it's likely there's very little he could've done to actually convince the Grineer to let us pass, but my mind latched on to the simplest answer before anything else.
Ella watches the exchange between me and Ko-lee, before tilting her head. I wave her off, a small shake, indicating that it's nothing. "Just complaining," I tell her. "Don't mind me." Rease grunts, pulling himself to his feet, before grabbing his Furis. He's checking it over, but he looks entirely unbothered; ice cold, in a way I'm envious of. "You're not worried, Rease?" I prod, trying to relax my sweat slicked grip on my Braton. He responds with a casual shrug, and a quick shake of the head. "Not the first time my fuel's been replaced with shit," he says. The phrasing is so matter of fact that I can't stop a bubble of laughter from spilling out of me; something between a snort and a choked gasp.
"What? What does that mean?" I ask, the mix of emotions in me making me feel off kilter. "You know, like, instead of fuel, you've got poop in your engines? So your ship can't move," he explains slowly. It's clearly in jest, and his emotional stability gives me a pillar to lean on, and play against. "It's called a metaphor?" he continues, his expression guileless. "Yes, I know what a metaphor is," I respond, my grin a touch too wide on my face. "Very classy." I can feel the shift in my body from despair to... something else. Maybe a sort of mania sneaking up on me while I wait for the inevitable conflict; that reckless fuck-it-we-ball attitude focused solely on the now, willing to take action regardless of consequence.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
A crackle in the speakers causes me to jump once more, every nerve alight, and my eyes snap towards the screen, trying in desperation to see if perhaps the boarders had already reached us while I wasn't paying attention. Instead of hearing Control's bored mechanical certainty, or Caz's nervous Grinesh, I hear the Sarge echo out into the hold. It's confident, almost overly so; the voice of someone who knows that they're in the right, of someone trying real hard not to enjoy the power they have, and failing. "Control, this TC-313, we have orders from Admiral Boril, authorization code 688. Confirm." The silence stretches on and on, for nearly a full 20 seconds, before the voice of Control responds. "Authorization code 688 confirmed. You're clear for landing. Glory to the Queens."
"Glory to the Queens," says Sarge, and I melt in my chair, boneless, my puppet wires cut. "Fuck me, that sucked," I say, my hands shaking slightly from the adrenaline. "Sorry about that," responds Sarge through the speakers. "Looks like we'll have to decommish this puppy when we get back. We're coming down in a second." I can feel the ship rotating to some new vector, and a gentle force as we start accelerating, but I'm too tired to check the cameras to verify our exact heading. It only takes a minute or two, and once we're on course, the door to the cockpit swings open. "So, Space Trauma, how are we feeling?" asks the Sarge, a teasing lilt to his words. Rease barks out a laugh, and Ella looks pale. "I feel like I'm ready for another nap," I tell the Sarge, as he reaches the bottom of the ladder. He chuckles, but before he can say anything, Ko-lee speaks up.
"What was the code?" she asks, her eyes searching. The Sarge steps a touch closer, giving room for Caz as he makes his way down the ladder with less ease than the FO. When he reaches the bottom, I'm able to see his expression; tense, for obvious reasons. The Sarge gives Ko-lee a lazy shrug. "No idea," he responds, in answer to her question. "Caz couldn't solve this, so he passed it up the chain to me, and I passed it up the chain to my boss. Obviously it meant something to someone over there, but we'll probably never know." He looks unbothered by the knowledge; our lives and his in the hands of a three digit code that meant nothing to any of us. Headquarters Ex Machina.
The whole thing leaves a sour taste in my mouth. In general, the lack of control - of having to act on choices that I have no input on, of decisions being made on high before getting passed down to us without explanation - isn't something I'm a fan of, but it's also something I had already come to terms with months ago, so the feeling doesn't linger. "So now what?" asks Ko-lee, her gaze jumping between Caz and the Sarge. "Now we drift to the planet. At half burn, should take us about 12 hours. My plan is to snag some food, and kick back for some shut eye before the hike. You're free to join me," he says. The hint of focus and seriousness that the Sarge had shown earlier is entirely gone, once more replaced with his more relaxed demeanor. "Hell yeah!" shouts Rease, his voice filling the ship's hold. "Let's eat!"
Once again, my eyes flutter open, this time to the sound of something outside our ship. It takes me a few seconds to realize that it's something, rather than the nothingness of space, and I check the cameras to confirm my suspicion. We're passing through the atmosphere of Mars, and I can see dunes and cliffs stretching out miles, with tiny oasis' dotted here and there. The haze of heat warps the air, and the sand fluctuates between reds, browns, and blacks in large patches, but I'm unable to make out any fine details using the camera from this high up. I settle back in my chair, doing my best to ignore the rattling of the engine as we slowly descend to the ground. A quick glance around at my squadmates shows that the Sarge and Caz are both missing.
"How's our pilot doing?" I ask Ko-lee, over the roar of the wind, the groan of the hull, and the complaints of the engine. "We're not dead yet," she grins. I chuckle, and watch via camera over the next few minutes, as the ship slows and slows, before finally unfolding legs to reach out to touch down on the ground. There's a rough jolt at the final step, and I hear a yelp of pain on my right. I look over to see Ella holding the back of her head, looking frustrated. "Sorry!" I hear the voice of Caz, through the cockpit door. Only a few moments later, it swings open, his expression sheepish. "Sorry, about the rough landing. I cut the engines too early," he explains, his cheeks red under the blocky Corpus tattoo's. "I've had worse," responds Rease, throwing himself to his feet. "I haven't," I hear Ella mutter, and I don't even bother fighting the smile that forms on my face.
A quick space Ro Sham Bo tourney, and the six of us make our way down the ramp, and out into the Martian sunlight. The supplies are being pulled by Caz, a train of hovercarts that follow after us like obedient ducklings. Due to the tech, it's not as heavy as it should be, but with all three linked up, the resistance is like wearing a heavy backpack. I take the time to look around at the planet, this time without a screen in between us. "Very red," is the prevailing thought. Underfoot, the incredibly fine sand crunches like cornstarch, and the breeze is warm and fast, whipping up small little dust devils that last for mere moments before settling down. I take a deep breath and smell dry bitterness in the air, almost like dust, or cardboard. Underneath are notes of oil and rust, which I assume can be attributed to the decaying Grineer structures dotted about the place, and even fainter is the smell of something burning, and ionic charge, like a lightning storm miles and miles away.
"Squad leader," I call out. Caz straightens up, a single eyebrow raised. "Yes?" he asks, confusion clear on his face. "What's with all the Grineer structures dotted about? Why are they rusted if they only just lost control of the planet?" He looks around at the empty containers and broken emplacements, partially melted wires half buried in the sand, and the ajar door at the tunnel entrance into the cliff, before he shifts his gaze over to the Sarge. "Do you really want to pass that up the chain?" asks the Sarge, a bemused look on his face. I take a breath to rescind my question, to tell Caz not to worry, but the Sarge holds a finger out, shutting me down. It's clear Caz is actually taking the time to consider it, in whether there's tactical value in the information, versus casual interest, and we all slowly warm up underneath the sunlight while we wait, until finally he nods his head.
"I need to know. The rust indicates it's old equipment, but the Grineer were just here," he states confidently. "It may be that some quality of the planet or the sand is causing equipment to appear to age quickly. I need to know if it actually is old, and to be expected, or if this equipment is recent, and we should be on guard." The Sarge gives him an approving nod. "I like your reasoning," he says, causing Caz to smile. "And good call; if you don't know something, and it could threaten the squad, then you don't guess, you ask." The Sarge turns to look at the equipment around us, one hand shielding his eyes from the sun. "First of all, you should always be on guard," says Sarge, before continuing. "But in this case, it's old equipment. The Grineer and Corpus have fought back and forth over Mars a lot, possibly more than any other piece of territory. So lot's of places will have a mix of both faction's equipment, new and old. In our case, we'll only really be seeing Grineer equipment. These caves are very intentionally out of the way. They're not strategically useful for the other two factions, but they are for us. easy to hide out in, and close enough for recon purposes."
He gestures to the doorway, the darkness obscuring the entrance to a tunnel in the cliff face. "Normally, we'd have an operative to lead us in, but like I mentioned before, they're having radio issues. It got even worse as we passed the mile mark; atmospheric scattering is wreaking havoc on transmissions." His body language is relaxed, unconcerned. "The scattering is expected, but it means that we can't reach HQ until we get these installed," he says, reaching into the supply cart. He pulls out what appears to be box full of random metal scrap, but the labeling on the side clearly denotes it as Comm Array Replacement Parts. "Alright, Space Trauma!" he says, tossing the box back into the cart with a grin. "Pick up your feet! We've got a long hike ahead of us."
