available to help until the cliff opened away near the edge of the waterfall. Spray and mist covered her, blurring her vision. Miraculously, the fish had done little damage to her helmet earlier, but now it became a moot point given the persistence of the spray.
The ledge widened slightly, allowing her lean back and look up, though it did her little good. With a grunt she moved in further then decided enough was enough, it was time to go up. She wiped the mist off her visor, regretting it instantly. Either she could look through a distorted image or one smeared with streaks and splatters. Cursing, she flipped her visor up, rationalizing that her eyelids could blink the mist away as needed. Within seconds her face and hair was soaked and the water began to work its way down her neck and into her suit.
“ This planet is fucking awesome,” Elsa growled. With no display to superimpose over her open viewport she subvocalized the necessary commands to boost power to her suit. The batteries would drain faster, but she had solar rechargers in her gear. One requisition filled, thankfully. Then again without energy a Marine was lost — limited ammo, limited smart armor, worthless gear, and even her vibrating V-Bar combat knife would be little more than a sharp stick.
She drew back her fist and slammed it into the rock, cracking the hard stone and giving her the first of the many handholds and footholds she would need. She held her fist up and flexed it, looking at it carefully. The armored glove was holding up fine, but she had several hundred more left and right jabs into the cliff to go. A kick with one leg and she was off, making her own path up the side of the wet cliff.
The climb was exhausting even with the suit providing extra oomph to her strikes. Micro actuators in her fingers helped her hold on, but there was no power in the suit to keep her shoulders and elbows in place, nor to help her make each grip.
Nearly three hours later, her visor still open and her face now drenched with sweat, Elsa found a crack in the cliff that allowed her to pull herself inside of it. She collapsed, gasping for breath and praying it was too small for one of the predatory birds she’d seen. It was damp in the small crevice, but aside from a couple of tiny hard shelled creatures that slipped into cracks in the rocks, it was uninhabited.
Elsa lay panting for several minutes. The ache in her arms faded and the pinch in her side let loose, making her feel human again. All that remained was the ache to get out of her suit and stretch, but that was a luxury she couldn’t afford. She hoped this trip wasn’t like the one she’d endured on a mission to retake a mining complex in one of the outer systems — her unit had been trapped for nearly three weeks in their suits the entire time.
With a groan she pulled herself up to a sitting position and peered out of the opening. The sun had passed overhead, plunging the cliff into shadows. So close to the water that plunged hundreds of feet below the humidity was almost overpowering. She wiggled her toes in her boots, feeling them squish against the water that had pooled in them. With a reluctant frown she lowered her visor and called up the display of her suits internal sensors. She was carrying extra water, almost all the way up to her knees. That was impressive, considering how the suit had built in water absorption systems that would filter and reclaim it. Her pods were full and the suit couldn’t keep up. That was the same way the suit would process liquid waste, be it sweat or urine. Solid waste was another matter altogether and, ideally, one best avoided. During her three week stint alternative measures had been necessary but they were awkward and considerably unpleasant. She shuddered at the thought, then realized she’d be carrying more weight with every extra ounce of water the suit trapped and failed to process.
Elsa detached her water pods and opened them, dumping the filtered water onto the rocks beneath her. She took a drink from the last one, then secured it back in place. She’d rested longer than she should have. A final check of her clock showed that she was now nearly eighteen hours past due for the landing zone rendezvous. She had thirty hours from a full strike force being launched if no response was given from the First Insertion team.
What did she care? Elsa frowned and flipped up her visor. An orbital strike followed by gunships and a few companies of regular marines would wipe out everything for miles around. Even with that kind of firepower she was far enough away to be safe.
She watched as an insect that reminded her of a butterfly out of a science text fluttered into her hiding spot. It zipped back out just as quickly upon seeing her, reminding her that she was the trespasser, not it. Elsa sighed and looked at her fists again. The material was worn and showed some patchy signs of hairline cracks. She’d made it almost halfway up, another few hours of personal abuse and she should reach the top.
She gazed out over the jungle below, stricken by the beauty of the lush green vegetation and the contrasting flowers from trees and the few birds flying above them. A few creatures even darted in and out below, too swiftly for her to identify them, but she knew they were no more reminiscent of anything from Earth than anything else she’d seen. She remembered a parody of an old military slogan: “Visit new ports and new worlds; explore new cultures and meet diverse people; then shoot them.”
She took another deep breath to set her nerves at ease then drove her fist into the rock wall again.
Chapter 7
The sun was setting as Elsa pulled herself into a sheltered overhang of rock carved out ages past by the river. It thundered past only a few feet from her, promising a swift and unforgiving end to anyone caught within it. She lay on the wet rock shelf shivering. She curled up, her aching body betraying her. Tears ran from her eyes and sobs threatened to burst free of her chest. She gulped at the air, desperate to stay in control. Her body hurt in ways she’d never experienced in all her years with the Corp.
Laying there gasping, Elsa passed out for a while. When she woke she felt exhausted and thoroughly drenched. She groaned and tried to roll over. Her action triggered a reaction, that of a scuttling noise followed by a hiss. She jerked her head, craning to see, and saw a shelled creature that reminded her of a lobster, save for the tentacles that protruded from its mouth.
Elsa screamed, the sudden fright driving her to action that she’d have sworn her body was incapable of. Two of the tentacles lashed out, wrapping around her arm and pulling her off balance. She yanked back, grabbing her knife with her free hand and swinging. It took three hacks to break through the tough flesh, something she’d thought possibly only with metal. Another tentacle reached for her, grazing her cheek as it tried to grab the arm with the knife.
The agony that erupted in her face forced another scream out of her. She felt as though a thousand angry hornets had stung her in the same place. She writhed and pulled away, snapping the wounded tentacle and keeping her free from the reaching one for the moment.
She threw her V-Bar, a skill drilled relentlessly into every Marine FIST. It slammed into the lobsters face, carving a jagged wound in its mouth. Elsa used the distraction to grab the stock of her rifle and jam it between her legs. She reached for the other part and, after fumbling through the awkward position, released it and fitted it onto the other end. A twist and a button touch later and it was in working order.
The lobster had yanked her sideways, closer to the river. Another tentacle wrapped around her leg, dragging her away from the water. Elsa grabbed her rifle in her off hand and aimed it at the hard shelled assailant. “I’m gonna dip your ass in butter!” She spat out, then yanked the trigger over and over until it stopped screeching and exploded.
Elsa fell back onto the rock, gasping for breath. She was covered in hot fluid and chunks of flesh and shell. The fire in her cheek pulled her out of her shock, reminding her that whatever it was, it had poisoned her. She slammed her visor shut and called up the medical panels on the display. It flashed for an alarmingly long time as her wound was analyzed. The final verdict read off a neurotoxin distantly related to that used by invertebrates on Earth’s oceans. The prescribed medicine was lacking from her first aid kit. It could cause sickness and vomiting, local paralysis as well. One means of potentially neutralizing the poison involved… “Oh hell no!”
She read it again to be sure. The pain was spreading, but at the center it left behind a throbbing ache. “I fucking hate this planet!” She pulled herself upright, ignoring the bits of gore that fell off her armor. Her right arm felt like it was dislocated at the shoulder. She grimaced and tried to put it through a normal range of motions. Even the grimacing hurt, but it helped her take her mind off the pain trying to lift her arm over her head caused.
Moving stiffly and cradling her rifle against her side she reconnoitered the rocky shelf. It was a small area with a tunnel led up to the surface. A tunnel she could crawl through even in her armor, but it would be tight and she knew she was in no condition to try it. She slipped back down, pausing to kick a large chunk of the octo-lobster into the river.
