Busy Work

"This is racist." Xanthiana was hip deep in mud, she hadn't intended on being hip deep in mud, but after slipping off a cliff up above she and the mud had become quite well acquainted.

"I don't see how this task is racist Xan it needs doing." Xanthiana and Max had been assigned to draw off a mutant force so as to allow the Ryan's and Lewis to secure him and another couple ark hunters. What that meant for Xanthiana and Max once they drew the enemy away was anyones guess, certainly not Lewis who told her that was her problem.

"Because you were an AI constructed by humans, to you having Votan's be the only ones split up and set on seperate tasks makes sense."

"It does make sense, both you and Max have optimal skill sets for individual assignments. Operator Lewis and the Ryan's are more team oriented and have a better make up for the extraction team." The mud had already gotten into her boots, she could feel it with each step, she cursed the luck of things. She also found herself hoping it really was mud and not excrement, she had seen a herd of Pows earlier.

"And as I said earlier Elly, that's your human bias talking, Votan's know that human are still trying to kill us. Take christmas music, its so incessant and annoying, and yet humans prefer to keep playing it at high volume during your 'holiday season' in clear hatred of the Votanis people." Xanthiana found a way out of the mud, and made sure it was indeed mud before continuing on to where the map in her head was directing her, a small outpost nearby.

"You don't like Christmas either?" The EGO's voice almost sounded sad.

"The holiday is nice enough, the music is horrifying, all about watchful people and promises of punishment, shouldn't holidays be something nice or festive?" The outpost looked sparsely defended, but it did supposedly have communications which would in theory bring more mutants should it come under attack. Xanthiana tried to make the case they should involve the earth forces stationed nearby, but Lewis overrode her saying that VBI did not need the authorities involved. Xanthiana did not see how a group who had arrived on an air carrier sought to avoid the authorities, but Lewis was insistent and outranked her in the organization so she followed his orders, for now.

"You're just a grinch."

"I don't even know what that is Elly, but I'll take it as a compliment. How is Max doing?"

"Max has already assaulted his outpost, his ego device informs me he's having a good time." Xanthiana smiled, at least someone was having a good time.

"And the extraction team?"

"Already in position, awaiting your distraction."

"Right lets get to it." Xanthiana had aquired a rifle from the Ryan's, it was semi auto, but had a decent magazine and the scope looked to be aligned properly. She took aim at the first mutant, its ugly face looked like an allergic reaction gone bad, and pulled the trigger. The scope was true and the mutants brain splattered against the wall behind him, she fired a couple more times before the alarm went up.

"I believe they are sufficiently agitated Xan."

"Well best to not wait around and find out how agigitated they are." Xanthiana made her way back to the ATV. She couldn't hear the mutants before she took off, but Elly assured her they were following. Xanthiana didn't know all of the ground ahead of her, but she had a route cobbled together from other Ark Hunters Elly was talking to and so she knew the basic areas she should go. Within a few minutes Elly reported the mutants were now off her trail.

"Xan I'm getting a report from the extraction team."

"Go ahead." She sighed she knew what Elly was going to say but didn't want to hear it.

"They are in need of assistance, could we possibly come to their aid?"

Its Good To Have Friends

"I recommend distracting them." The Mutant's numbers weren't insurmountable, no more than thirty of them. Odds Xanthiana herself had fought off in the war, though during those times she had better equipment and ground than she currently occupied.

"With what? A strip show?"

"Mutants are largely male you have a large bust it might actually work." Elly had a computer's mind on things.

"I'm not taking my top off!" Xanthiana was not normally a modest person, but the idea of surviving by showing her breasts seemed insulting in so many ways, she'd rather die. The other operative apparently decided discretion was the better part of valor and laid down his arm. Xanthiana felt a bit of superiority, Votan's generally never surrendered to humans even when it was certain death otherwise, and today would be no different for her, better to die on her feet than to live on her knees. Xanthiana stood on as the mutants aimed their rifles.

"Put weapon down." The one standing out front with a pistol that looked like it had seen better decades ordered one final time.

"Go fuck yourself." She punctuated her statement by spitting and pulling up her pistol. The shot hit the mutant in the chest, the rest of his squad turned to fire and then they were enveloped in fire. Xanthiana had not heard the mortar shot fired by Max until a second later, but she saw its devastating result. The sniper siblings finished off the mutants not killed in the blast. Xanthiana had a smile on her face even though she'd written off the group she had arrived with as dead.

"Nice to see you Roeyka." Max was the first to congratulate her, the sniper's looked after the operative, she wanted to pretend it wasn't racism, but she knew deep down votans will always look after votans and humans after humans.

"Got here a bit late didn't you Max?"

"Actually Xan he arrived precisely when he told me he would." Elly still did not understand the basic nature of ribbing.

"You know what they say about artillery, we aren't the first to arrive but we'll be the first you'll hear."

"I have literally never heard that before." The big sensoth put one of his massive arms over her head and drug her back to the rest of the group. She was happy things had worked out for everyone so far, but she knew the nature of conflict, everyone could be dead tomorrow.

"Glad you can join us Roeyka we have to plan." The operative who's name turned out be Tyrone Lewis, was already arranging the supplies the Ryan's had managed to scrounge up since the last conflict.

"For what?" Xanthiana did not like Lewis, he was too much about the objective and not enough about the people from what little she'd seen of his management style.

"To rescue Mr. Von Bach."

"Oh right that I forgot who is he again?"

Hellbug Matricide

"There are no identifiable weak points or stress fractures in her hide, simply put I don't think we have the fire power to even give her a bad rash let alone kill the creature."

"Elly you are full of delightful helpful information."

"The scent from the hellbug shit is also wearing off Xan, she's about to see us."

"Shit." Xanthiana knew that when it rained it poured, but it seemed like the shower she was in never relented. The operative apparently also recieved the same bad news as he charged forward firing with his rifle. Shocking to Xanthiana none of the other hellbugs seemed to have become aware of their precense immeadiately, she didn't hear a rumble of the adults and other nasties coming to aid their matriarch, it was just the defeaning shriek of the beast as the rifle slugs made an impact but no identifiable mark on its hard hide. Xanthiana not willing to be the only person fighting futilely opened fire herslef, she dropped an entire magazine into what appeared to be the "head" of the creature with no actual effect.

"I told you Xan you can not harm the creature with your weapons." Xanthiana dodged the matriarch as it came charging forward on one of its hundreds of legs, it was like a huge wrecking ball with teeth. She figured as long as the rest of the nest did not come to aid the creature her and the other operative might be able to at least avoid it to escape. That thought died when a blast of electricity emitted from the hide and shocked the crap out of her.

"Did not warn me about static electricity powers." Xanthiana felt all of her muscles spasming and her head hurt, it did not surprise her that Elly seemed also equally taken offline. Xanthiana saw things happening in a slideshow, she almost missed that the operative had managed to avoid getting zapped and exited before the matriarch slammed after him causing the cave above them to shake with her impact.

"Sorry Xan was not aware it had electricity powers, I'll update my files accordingly, the other operative said thank you before he left."

"Yeah I'm so glad I saved his ass for him to leave me behind." The Matriarch appeared stuck in the exit for the time being, which was a blessing and a curse. A blessing because it meant it wasn't trying to actively eat her, a curse because the creature was freaking out causing big arcing currents of electricity to smash around the room and potentially bring down the whole cave structure on top of Xanthiana.

"Xanthiana the structural integrity of this cave has been severely damaged by the matriarch, if she keeps at her current..."

"I got it I got it I'll be crushed." Xanthiana knew she was running out of time, she also didn't have a way of killing the creature with her pistol directly, but she did see some fairly large stalagtites hanging above the beast that would prove lethal if they came down. She fired with her pistol and thankfully between the bullets and the shaking they came crashing down impaling the matriarch and stopping the cave temporarily from collapsing. Unfortunately whatever was preventing the rest of the hive from intervening had come to a halt, Xanthiana could hear behind her a tremendous sound of angry hungry hellbugs looking to kill whatever had just killed their mama. Xanthiana scrambled over the fresh corpse of the matriach, she could see a little bit of daylight between the top of the bug and the cave. The creature smelled horrible, its blood a sticky ooze that clinged to her, as she slipped down to her exit the matriach suddenly sprang to life, its horrific mouth grabbing a hold of her boot. Xanthiana acted fast, firing once again above the creature and bringing a final cavern nail into its body causing the creature to let her go and its screeching death wail to finish the rest of the cave in.

"Yeah fuck you too." She said as she slipped out of the cave and into the daylight beyond. Unfortunately the mutants had also apparently known about this exit as she could see the operative had already been recaptured and their guns turned to her as she emerged.

"Xanthiana I believe they want us to surrender."

"Well ain't that kind of them."

Hellacious Bugs

"Why aren't they attacking?" Xanthiana was covered in Hellbug shit, the smell was so awful she could hardly breathe. The hellbugs which were all over had not attacked her or the other operative yet.

"They are smell hunters Xan, you smell like their excrement they do not see you."

"Well great now I feel better for smelling like shit." The operative got up and started to walk forward very slowly.

"He's not going to talk for fear of alerting the bugs, but he suggest we move forward at a rapid pace." Xanthiana herself got to her feet and followed his lead, though she still wasn't exactly trusting the shit scent mask.

"Well I'm certainly all broken up by the lack of company." The bugs seemed mildly content to just mull about in their caves. In a way it was interesting to just watch the monsters in their native enviroment and not lunging for her neck, Xanthiana could almost forget the creatures sucked the bone marrow from peoples bodies, almost. They continued past the smaller drones and started to be near the larger adults, Xanthiana hoped they wouldn't wake up and notice she was there, because it would be all over, but the sickening sound of her entrails being eaten.

"Keep going this way, the maps say there should be a secondary exit around here." Xanthiana was glad Elly said something she was beginning to wonder if they were just going deeper into hellbug land for nothing. The operative had already skipped ahead of her, she figured he was leaving her behind it seemed to be in his dickish nature.

"I really hope he's not leaving us behind Elly."

"Officially he's scouting ahead for trouble."

"Unofficially?"

"He's totally leaving us behind." Xanthiana picked up her pace even if it meant upsetting the bugs, she didn't know how long the shit mask would work on her and didn't want the operative up ahead to some how piss off the bugs and get her eaten. She was moving so fast she didn't realize he was standing right in front of her until she bumped into him. She was about to curse him out for just standing there like an idiot when she looked up and saw a hellbug matriarch, or what she could assume was a hellbug matriarch since she'd never actually seen one before.

"That's a hellbug matriarch."

"Correct Xan."

"And its standing in the way to the exit of this cave."

"Correct Xan."

"We are completely fucked aren't we?"

"Correct Xan."

"I hate being right."

Out of the Frying Pan

"Get him up." Xanthiana had used the bodies and a stretcher to create a makeshift barricade, there were already two new dead to add to it and she knew there would be more.

"Xan he was just undergoing adrenaline removal, combat efficiency will be well below fifty percent."

"That's fifty more percent than I've got right now." Xanthiana pulled a rifle from one of the dead mutants, she meant to set it next to her but a hand grabbed it. She turned around to see the operative, he was still in a medical night gown, but looked no worse for wear outside of that.

"Operator Roeyka thank you for coming, I hope you have a better exit strategy than you did an entrance one." He was one of Von Bach's personal security, she could tell from the bar code on his arm.

"Figure they can't keep coming, eventually they'll run out of men." She had to admit it was not a very good strategy.

"Fantastic, the kind of plan I expect from someone being paid to shoot not to think, one moment." His voice was pretty gruff, most likely from smoking and not just having been taken off adrenaline stealing machines. Hair was black, going grey, decent shape though she could tell the muscle tone was fading, age was catching up like with his hair.

"I don't think this operative likes us very much Xan."

"Oh what gave you that impression?"

"His ego unit keeps using derogatory terms to refer to us."

"You know in another place that would be hilarious to hear." More mutants were coming, Xanthiana could hear the clank of heavy weaponry coming with them, it was what she feared.

"There is a hallway past this one, listed as closed off due to a Hellbug infestation, we can go that way." The other operative stole some clothes from a corpse, they didn't fit, but Xanthiana couldn't really comment on not looking regulation.

"Sure lets go from guys with guns to creatures that suck the marrow from your broken bones."

"Do you have a better idea?" The clank of a high explosive device ended the conversation, Xanthiana and the operative lept over her makeshift barricade and ran away from the mutants, their gunfire came zipping on by before the explosion let up the world behind them. The mutants seemed genuinely surprised about them running, or at least it seemed that way with how wildly inaccurate their gun fire was. The other operative was leading Xanthiana though Elly had also given her a map to their location in case he tried to leave her behind. They broke through a barrier into an area with quarentine written in an unsteady hand, and then the metal underneath their feet gave way. Xanthian landed right in hellbug shit, the other operative crashed into a cluster of eggs.

"Well I'm so glad we went this way." Xanthiana pulled herself up looked around saw they were in the middle of what appeared to be hundreds of hellbugs.

"Xan I think we were better off with the mutants." Elly piped up her ai voice almost sounding afraid.

"Don't worry Elly, I'm sure they don't eat AI's."

Alone But Not Out

"Put your weapons down." There were four of them, they looked less armed and armored than the mutants outside, but lesser weapons were no less deadly. Xanthiana reached down to where her pistol was on her hip, they had gotten to her so fast she didn't even have time to draw it to the ready position.

"How's my adrenaline Elly?"

"You are in the safe zone as far as usage, if you are wanting to use a burst your health would not be in any danger."

"Excellent."

"WEAPONS DOWN NOW!" The mutant snarled and Xanthiana removed the pistol and in one swift motion tossed it and dove after it just as the adrenaline hit. The mutants were caught off guard from her sudden position change, they didn't even bring their rifles around by the time she put them down. The last one alive managed one errant shot as he died. Xanthiana felt the adrenaline pulsing some more, but it abated as Elly brought her back to normal levels.

"Well I'm so glad I didn't dump that extra pistol ammunition earlier." The bunker was dark, but the EGO overlays made it manageable. Xanthiana was able to see her way forward, and see no one else was coming.

"It would be unwise to leave ammunition lying around Xan." Elly still hadn't gotten a hang of rhetorical statements and that brought a smile to Xanthiana's face. It was like dealing with a really smart child that was somehow stuck in her head and didn't understand people.

"Do we have a map of this bunker available Elly?"

"One second let me try and access the internal servers, yes I do have an overlay, crosschecking with recent power usage finds the most likely room location for our operative here." Xanthiana got a mental image of a room deeper into the bunker.

"Its weird to have an internal gps system Elly."

"I don't find it at all strange, I have several internal diagnostics I'm constantly evaluating." Xanthiana started making her way down the corridor, Elly highlighted areas she considered to be more dangerous than others. Xanthiana went as stealthy as she could, and it appeared successful. Either the mutants were still too engaged with the forces outside the bunker, or this group wasn't as large as their presense outside hinted at.

Xanthiana came upon the room with the operative. It looked like some kind of lab, there were discarded drained bodies near the front of the room and a bunch of tables with drips set up. On one of the tables was the operative. He wasn't Von Bach, but she wasn't going to allow him to die like the rest of the drained corpses like an animal. There was only one other occupant in the room, a huge bioman dressed in a scientists overcoat, the coat was way too small for the Bioman but that apparently didn't bother him. She was however completely confused by what he was doing.

"Producing a drug based on Adrenaline that was developed during the war, in the war they used criminals to produce it, the draining is fatal." Elly answered before Xanthiana could even articulate the question.

"Monstrous."

"It was war is the justification VBI lists in the books, I'll admit it does look fairly horrible when seen like this." Xanthiana didn't know how this wouldn't look horrible when seen some other way, but she didn't want to get into an argument in her own head. On top of that the blueman scientist had spotted her and snatched up the operative.

"Come any closer and this one dies, drop your pistol."

"Yeah that's not fucking happening, put him down and maybe I'll let you live." The creature sneered.

"Your pistol can't even attempt to penetrate my ski..." Xanthiana shot him through the eyes and his big hulk of a body collapsed to the lab floor. The operative was still out, but he was at least safe.

"Xan I hate to be the bearer of bad news."

"But the shots seemingly alerted the base to our presence."

"Correct."

"Swell."

Good Plan, Great Plan

The explosions started rapid fire as Max and Xanthiana charged the bunker. Some of them were from Max's grenade launcher, most of them were the mutants. Xanthiana didn't recall seeing mortars from when they did a quick scouting of the area, but obviously the mutants had some. Elly was tracking trajectory and showing Xanthiana the safe places to run, but she was moving at a high speed and trying to course correct in the midst of gun fire and mortars striking was a little bit harder than just avoiding the very widening circle of doom. Xanthiana slammed into a piece of burned out cover and took a mintue to catch her bearings. Max was well behind her crouched down near a burnt out car, he motioned her forward.

"He has a leg injury his EGO unit informed me he will not be able to make the final push on the bunker."

"Well that's just great, he does realize the point was to at least get two people inside correct?"

"Correct. Xan I'm beginning to suspect the planning for this operation lacked in some aspects."

"You don't say, how are the twins doing?"

"Kill counts are high, ammo counts are running low, their egos are informing me in that we have to 'shit or get off the pot' to borrow a nice earth saying."

"So how much of a chance do we stand, be blunt I can take it."

"We have a 15% chance of making the bunker door, and if I'm being generous a 2% chance of making it out alive."

"I lied I can't take it, tell me we'll make it Elly." Xanthiana shouldered her rifle, she hadn't fired a shot so the magazine was full, but she knew that too would not last.

"We will be 100% successful Xan, so successful the enemies will just give up in the face of our success."

"You are not very good at this lying thing Elly."

"I hope to get better Xan."

"Don't worry you will." And with that Xanthiana pushed herself off the burnt out wall and rushed forward. The first mutant she came across she hit with the butt of her rifle stunning him long enough to spin him around and use him as a human shield from some of the incoming fire. The mutant spun in place as his comrades lit him up, Xanthiana returned fire and kept running. One of the deadly circles came too close to her, the ground erupted to Xanthiana's right and knocked her down.

Her vision was swimming, ears were ringing, and she felt what had to have been a pretty ugly injury to her right leg. She struggled to get back to her feet, in front of her no more than a hundred feet was the bunker, its large blast doors which would be impossible to blow open save some serious ordinance were closing. She gritted her teeth and charged forward, she hadn't come this close to get held back now. She felt the rush of adrenaline, each footfall caused her pain but she grit her teeth past it. The final two mutants between her and the closing doors recieved the rest of her rifles magazine and then the rifle as she threw it aside to not slow her down. Just as the doors were about to close she dove forward and came made it inside, the the loud clang of metal a punctuation mark on her victory.

"What was that Elly?" Despite not having to actually hear the EGO device, the ringing prevented her from focussing on it.

"I said we'll probably need that rifle."

"Right." Xanthiana looked on, the bunker looked pretty deep, there wasn't anyone there to greet her yet, but she knew they would be along shortly.

"Chance for success just went up half a percet Xan!"

"You're such an optimist Elly."

Best Laid Plans of Mice and Bunkers

"Well it's nice of you to join us today Roeyka did you get lost?" The leader of the band of three was a Sensoth, fairly large lumbering one too, Xanthiana could see what looked like a not particularly well dressed wound on his right shoulder. He was also missing most of the hair on his face, it looked like it got scorched off. The other two with him were human, one male, one female, they looked like brother and sister but Xanthiana was always terrible telling humans apart.

"Your directions are shit." It was partly a joke, but the bunker was in a fairly remote area and Xanthiana did have to take some weird paths to get there, Elly was quite proud of her AI self for getting them there without conflict.

"Bitch bitch bitch, its like being back in the Votanis Collective." Xanthiana smiled, most former VC soldiers did not talk very kindly of their former service, that was something the humans definately had going for them, they were at least proud of defending their home. The Votan's felt a bit of shame at destroying earth, and anger at how humans had treated them, but never pride for what they had done. Well outside of Casti's but they were assholes of the highest order.

"What's the situation?" Roeyka wanted to focus on the task at hand, she could tell from the glaze eyed look of the humans they were in conversation with their own EGO units, she hadn't been around many Ark Hunters since land fall, but what she'd seen they all would stand their in a stupor when deep in EGO converstaion, it was almost comical.

"We have a signal, possibly Von Bach, possibly something other VIP, its coming from inside. Mutants are swarming the entire complex, though there appears to possibly be some hellbugs inside, my EGO picked up some of their stink earlier, could have been a former nest of the fuckers or slowly becoming a new one. Can't be too sure until we get inside." Xanthiana could see the entrance, it looked fairly well guarded, the mutants for whatever brain ailment they had that made them still think the war was on, were still well disciplined. The entrance had two guard towers with what appeared to be a sniper and spotter in each one. Sand bagged entrance fortifictions with heavy weapons back up, and at least one blue man stomping around for extra shit and giggles.

"So what's the plan?"

"Kill everyone, collect the vip, get out."

"Sounds great how do you expect to accomplish any of that?"

"I figured with the four of us being ultimate bad asses we could have it done in time for lunch."

"Are all Sensoths entirely insane, or are you just from the same family as every other one of your race I've ever worked with?"

"Nah we're all crazy."

"Well at least that makes me feel better."

"The Ryan's here can provide cover support, she's nasty with a sniper rifle, he's a decent spotter, I figure you and I charge up the middle, I've got a couple rounds in a grenade launcher I borrowed from an Erep soldier here. Figure we can blitz hit them so fast they won't have time to realize our numbers don't resemble our moxxy."

"And what makes you think I like to charge anything?"

"Your charming wit, and your EGO device." Xanthiana wondered what else Elly said to other EGO devices she wasn't aware of.

"Are we going to talk all day or are we going to shoot somebody." The male Ryan was overly eager, but Xanthiana appreciated the sentiment.

"Lets do this before I get a brain and figure out this is a really bad plan." Xanthiana already knew it was a bad plan, but levity always helped in the face of futility. The sensoth who went by Max according to Elly piping up very briefly checked his weapons and motioned Xanthiana forward, and into the breach they went.

Accounting For the Dead

"This one's dead as well." Xanthiana had spent the better part of the day going from drop pod to drop pod finding the results of a mistimed night drop in an unfamiliar battlefield. Over half of the Ark Hunters never survived impact due to either being killed on the way down, or the drop pods failing in one way or another. Xanthiana mentally made note to never again fly.

"This is tragic Xan, there were original casualty estimates, but this far exceeds them."

"I don't really want to know why there were estimate casualties to begin with." The dead ark hunter looked to have made it out of their pod a few feet before something exploded them, possibly a rocket, possibly some other horror lurking in the area.

"Well the operation was listed as high risk, high reward, you should have had the odds explained to you before signing on."

"Was that in the orientation I skipped that would have also explained the AI companion?"

"Yes I do believe it was."

"Well now I feel even more sillier for skipping it." Xanthiana continued on, the search was getting a bit more desperate, other Ark Hunters were reporting the same findings. Lot of bodies, lots of destruction, no Karl Von Bach. Xanthiana started to wonder if Karl even made it off the ship, let alone died on the ground.

"You really should attend all necessary meetings Xan, Von Bach Industries strives to have the one hundred percent employee satisfaction."

"Well next time there is a company wide meeting Ellie I'll make sure to put it on my to do list."

"I'll keep you up to date on future correspondence should we connect with an official representative of Von Bach Industries." Xanthiana smiled, Ellie for all her weirdness still had a boundless optimism that was hard to ignore.

"Looking forward to it Ellie."

"Xan I'm getting a call for assistance from a group of Ark Hunters, they are claiming they have a strong signal on Von Bach coming from a bunker nearby, but mutants are swarming all over it." Xanthiana got back on the atv.

"Tell them we're on our way." Xanthiana was tired of sorting through bodies, it was time to start making new ones, hopefully more mutants than fellow Ark Hunters, but she could never tell which way the day was going to go.

AfterMath

"We thought you were dead." Xanthiana and Cobb were overseeing the wounded with her recovered medical supplies. Xanthiana was never much one for trying to make people feel better, but she had experience sewing and that was coming in handy. The young private she was sewing up had taken a shot just below the knee, without the supplies they most likely would have had to amputate. Instead she was going to most likely make a full recovery, albeit with a very ugly scar due to Xanthiana's not so stellar sewing.

"Oh that's cute you showed concern for me Sergent."

"Yeah if you died who would I have had to do my chores for me?" Xanthiana could tell the concern was real, but men like Cobb struggled with showing sympathy or empthy, they felt it made them look weak and a soldier who was weak would get left behind, especially with the limited resources the Ereps had at their disposal.

"And there it went."

"What went?"

"Any kind of affection I might have had for you Cobb."

 "Good I'm an asshole anyway. Roeyka you deserve a nice cat boy so you can start a litter of your own." Cobb walked off, Xanthiana tried to ignore the dig, but it was difficult. It was always hard being a votan amongst humans, even worse as an Irathient since they were thought of as dirty or whores. It wasn't much better amongst her own people though Xanthiana had to admit. Xanthiana finished sewing and the private thanked her and moved on. The private really should have had at least a few days off her feet, but there was not any time for that, not with the mutants, hellbugs, and whatever else was out there.

"Sergent Cobb is misinformed, Irathients while having minimal cat features are fully humanoid, they do not have litters." Elly had been "away", that's what the AI called it when she was synching up with the other Ark Hunters and exchanging info with Von Bach Industries.  The fatally wounded Ark Hunter was apparently not as wounded as he had appeared and he too would make a full recovery, which was good news for their depleted numbers. Someone would have to save Von Bach, even if none of the Ark Hunters had a good idea how.

"He didn't mean it Elly."

"It's still insulting to your heritage."

"Its sweet of you to stick up for me, but honestly I've grown used to the looks, and jokes, humans are very predictable. Now if you really want insulting, wait till we run across a Castithan, than you'll see real pros at work with insulting Irathients." Xanthiana knew very little of the Castithan language, but what she did know were all the insults they degraded her and her fellow Irathients with.

 "Well in my case I hope we don't run across any Casithans Xan."

"Oh I hope to run across at least one, so what do we know about Von Bach and has the Captain authorized a search yet?"

"Nothing and he said we can leave whenever we felt like."

"That's nice of him considering the state they are in."

"He considers Ark Hunters resource hogs and that we are only going to attract unnecessary attention to his erep personnel, us leaving as soon as possible is a bonus."
 
"And that's more like the Ereps I know and used to shoot."

"Technically you shot Earth Military Coalition forces."

"Right of course my mistake." Xanthiana didn't of course want to admit to Elly she had recently killed erep people, the world was an ugly place post ark fall, and desperate people made for desperate decisions.

"I have coordinates triangulated from the other ark hunters for escape pods, do you wish to get the search underway?"

"Yeah lets get out of here my hands are cramping up from all the sewing." Xanthiana gave one last look around the scattered erep camp and then made for her ATV, she hoped she would be back shortly, but she knew that was not her path, and she was not wrong.

The Fallback Position

"More gunfire Xan, closer than before still less than a mile off." Elly had been rattling off the reports of gunfire since she had woken up Xanthiana early that morning. It started two miles out, Xanthiana was doing the one crazy thing available and actually moving towards the gunfire. She wasn't moving very fast because she was still bringing the supplies from the day before, Xanthiana would be damned if she didn't save that medical convoy for nothing.

"Do we have any idea on numbers?" Xanthiana could easily pick out the different rifle reports now, earlier they had been more of a samey sound from a distance; now she could definately hear the diffference between the two forces fighting.

"I'm processing at least three seperate Ark Hunters involved, their EGO devices are reporting undetermined numbers with air support. The ereps are currently held up in a bunker, they are requesting any assistance possible on emergency channels, the battle does not appear to be going well Xan."

"Thank you Elly, notify the Ark Hunters I'm in route, can you work with their intel to find an optimal attack pattern?"

"Already processing the route, optimal attack appears to be a ridge nearby, several enemies are already up there, and the ATV would not be able to make it on its own."

"I was planning on going on foot anyway, don't want to risk the supplies in the middle of a huge firefight." Xanthiana did hope the supplies would still be there after the firefight, but the Ereps would have to survive for the supplies to be worth a damn to anyone. She parked near some bushes and rubble hoping at least to hide it from potential thieves and then started the slight climb up the ridge. The sounds of battle were all over, Elly was doing her best to try and keep an updated map of friendlies and mutants, but it was a complete disaster from what Xanthiana could see. The ereps were too few, the mutants were too numerous. Xanthiana had hoped the Ark Hunter reports about air support were wrong, but she could see herself there were choppers in the air.

Xanthiana reached the top of the ride, there was a bit of brush between her and the mutants up there so she was at least hidden for the time being. Things were about to get a lot worse for the ereps. The mutants were setting up a minigun on the ridge, with its field of fire the scattered erep forces would be easy pickings. As a plus for Xanthiana though it also meant the mutants would be easy picking for her when she got the mini gun. There were three of them up there, Xanthiana took aim with the rifle and gunned them down before they could turn around. The battle helped keep what she had done off the mutant radar, though she could hear from a nearby radio that the mutants were actually coordinating their strikes, so she knew she had to act fast to turn the tide around.  The minigun looked to be in decent shape, with the ammunition supply connected and a tripod already set up. Xanthiana wondered for a brief second what the mutants were waiting on, or if the gun had been damaged beforehand. She couldn't wait to check it over though, the ereps were losing, Elly had reported an Ark Hunter was fatally wounded and the surviving two were running low on ammunition.

"Elly give me an overlay I need to know generally where the mutant positions are." Xanthiana's vision swam for a moment and then the battlefield was full of red outlines, the EGO device was anything if not efficient in information gathering. The miniguns rotating barrels started to spin up, and the light next to the barrel went from red to green indicating the weapon was properly ready for firing. Xanthiana took aim at the nearest chopper and squeezed the trigger, the minigun went from a whine to a roar and the chopper exploded in shrapnel taking out another chopper that was too close to it. Xanthiana swung the minigun down towards the red, and like a farmer threshing wheat she turned the red outlines in her radar to grey. The mutants suddenly caught in the crossfire between her minigun and the ereps surging out of their bunker scattered in the chaos. Xanthiana did her best to hobble the mutant numbers as they fled, but they fled too eratically and not in enough groups for her to catch a signifigant number after her opening salvo. She did get three of their choppers, which she hoped would at least cripple them in some way. Xanthiana could hear the chatter, the Ereps were ecstatic, she couldn't blame them, since they looked like they were about to be slaughtered.

"Elly open me a channel to the erep command."

"Opened."

"This is Operator Roeyka, checking in sir."

The Long Night

Xanthiana was huddled near a fire. It wasn't the optimal tactical position, it messed with her sight and highlighted her in the night, but she was cold and so by the fire she remained. She hadn't seen any mutants since arriving, EGO had made an attempt to scan the area and didn't come up with any radio signals or Ark hunter communications, she was alone in the night.

"All scans are coming back negative, perhaps the mutants were defeated?" Well alone with a voice in her head. Xanthiana at least welcomed the company, even if it was some weird AI that didn't seem to understand basic social graces.

"Doubtful, not enough bodies and the ereps would still be here, no most likely a tactical retreat they are incommunication because of the bunkers blocking signals, hopefully they did not go to the bunker full of Hellbugs." Xanthiana had cleared some of those things out, but they were persistent bastards, and just when you think you've crushed a nest you wake up to something eating your liver.

"We could go looking for them right now, I can augment your vision Operator Roeyka."

"I'm tired EGO, we've been going a hundred percent since land fall and I just can't keep it up ok, give me till morning we'll find the ereps, and then Von Bach and then I don't know actually do what we were hired to do." It seemed like years since she'd been on the hover carrier, but it had only been a couple days at most.

"Understood Operator Roeyka, I'll keep my scans running while you sleep." The voice almost sounded resigned, Xanthiana pondered the idea that the EGO device could feel emotions.

"EGO is so formal, do you have another name?"

"I have a longer name Operator Roeyka, but no I was not programmed with a first name like a living being, it was deemed a superficial comfort for the Operator."

"Well would you like a new name?"

"I don't honestly know Operator Roeyka, other AI's I've intereacted with since landfall have been granted additional names by their operators, but they do not seem like polite monikers." Xanthiana smirked, she could only guess what the impolite monikers were.

"How about Ellie? You seem like an Ellie to me." Xanthiana knew a little girl named Ellie once, things did not go well for young Ellie.

"Ellie? Ellie, sure Operator Roeyka this will moniker will work."

"Ok and this Operator Roeyka shit has got to go, my friends call me Xan."

"Are we friends Xan?"

"We are a lot closer than any of my other friends Ellie, I mean most of them just think they got into my head, you are actually there." Xanthiana could have sworn she heard Ellie laugh.

"Point taken Xan, I'll update my code files, I do have to say in formal communications you will still be listed as Operator Roeyka."

"That's fine." Xanthiana leaned backward, she hadn't realized how tightly she'd been clutchering her rifle until she released the grip and her hand ached. "Ok Ellie wake me up at daylight if I'm not already up."

"Understood Xan, sleep well." And so Xanthiana slept with her AI companion watching over her. And the long night passed into the morning of battle.

Medical Convoy

"All military personnel have been killed Operator Roeyka I fear we arrived too late." The convoy attack had been a pincer in a small canyon. Mutants were on both sides of the canyon walls, with a small blockade in front of the convoy, it had been a pretty sound massacre. Xanthiana was a bit out of breath from having run to meet up with the convoy, but she did have the advantage of surprise. The mutants had started mop up duty on the downed Erep soldiers and were not looking at outside help coming. There was only one mutant on her side of the canyon and only one on the other side, so if she took out her mutant she could catch the mutants in an ambush attack of her own.

"Well at the very least the supplies are still needed, and the mutants are still assholes, so prepare that adrenaline boost EGO."

"Operator Roeyka I have to remind you per Von Bach industry protocol specifically attempting to kill yourself voids your contractual payment."

"Hilarious amongst all the stupid things we've done so far, this one is the one that you warn me about that particular clause EGO." Xanthiana readied herself, the pistol would alert the mutant across the way too much,  so she'd have to go quiet, hopefully a neck snap.

"Adrenaline Rush activated Operator Roeyka, good luck." The feeling of power was back, the overjuiced muscles singing for action. She was a good hundred feet from the mutant, but she cleared that immediately. She grabbed him around his neck with both arms, the increased power from the adrenaline let her snap his neck with ease. She took the rifle off his shoulder as his body fell and opened fire on the mutant across from her, the burst of fire hit him in the chest area and he went down, the rest of the mutants about four in total turned to face her. She opened fire on them, but the rifle wasn't fully loaded and she only got off two bursts killing one of the mutants and wounding another. Sensing her positions was about to be full of death in a second, Xanthiana rolled forward, sliding down the little canyon wall she pulled her pistol out and dealt with the three remaining survivors, the pistol's slide racked back empty as their bodies hit the smoked road.

"Any survivors?"

"Negative Operator Roeyka, 100% kill rate." She smiled, even though she knew it was probably bad to be proud of your ability to murder others, it was the one thing she was really good at. She took stock of the overall situation, the larger transport truck the Ereps were using was toast, too many direct hits from rifle fire fragged the engine, as had one of the atvs the escort was riding. Which left one atv to try and bring back an entire truckload of supplies. On the plus side there was plenty of different kinds of ammuntion amongst the dead, and a good bit of weaponry to peruse for the most usable amongst the scavenged. She didn't think the Ereps would mind considering she had been their a few minutes and there had not been any more reinforcements, which was a bad thing considering the situation she had left at base camp wasn't very encouraging to begin with.

Xanthiana did the best with what she had to work with, it took a few hours, the afternoon sun was almost gone when she finished. She had a makeshift sled hooked up to the back of her atv with some cable and other assorted bullshit; it would have to hold.  She made the darkened drive back to the camp in fear. She had a good supply of ammunition, and a vehicle, but with the medical supplies hooked up as she did she was a sitting duck, not only that, she was a sitting duck the mutants had already gotten to once that day. Despite all that she managed to make it back to where the camp should have been, but all she found was bodies, most of them mutants, but there were some ereps and what appeared to be fellow Ark Hunters amongst the dead. With the light fading, she would have to hold up amongst the ruined camp, and hope in the morning she could hook up with main erep force, if it indeed still existed. It would be a long night.

Rest and Relaxation

"I don't understand how this is a necessary part of anything." Xanthiana was bathing, the stench of the hellbugs was so strong on her she could still smell it and figured she probably would continue to smell it for a few more days at the very least.

"Because apparently you don't have any programming for smell EGO." She had managed to secure some soap for herself and her clothes, the small river she'd found seemed clean enough that she didn't think she'd get some new disease from bathing in it.

"My files reference hellbugs having a foul order when killed, I did not realize it was enough to have to immediately bathe afterward." Xanthiana had washed her clothes first so they could be drying when she bathed herself, it still meant she'd have to spend time naked, but less time in clothes that reek like Hellbug shit was the price she had to pay for the possibility of people seeing her naked.

"Update your files, the smell is beyond horrible, its matched only by what Sensoth's do in the bathroom."

"Updating my files Operator Roeyka." She kind of meant it as a joke, but it made her chuckle a bit to think of EGO having to arrange a list of smells. Xanthiana finished bathing and found a place to lay down in the grass. She was thankful that it was sunny and hot out, a little bit of sunbathing and she'd be dry and hopefully her clothing would be as well. She was never a modest person especially with the living conditions on the ARK ships, but being naked in the new world was never a good feeling. Between the hellbugs, other creatures, and bandits, you could never truely feel safe.  Xanthiana despite that did fall asleep, she didn't dream and that was a welcome relief from her normal evening of feeling bad for all the things she had done to get where she was. She had slept for a few hours before EGO's voice woke her up.

"Alright alright you're worse than something I can't think of that's really annoying ego, it was only a few hours I'm sure I didn't get too tanned or anything."

"Operator Roeyka I did not awaken you because of your tanning, though your skin does show signs of excessive sun radiation, but no there is a signal coming from a nearby convoy of vehicles attempting to return to base with medical supplies, they are under an ambush." Xanthiana got dressed, her clothing was a little damp, but the stench from the hell bugs had at least been minimized.

"And you think we can provide that assistance?"

"We are within range, I believe they are only a kilometer away from our current position."

"And our current ammunition count is?"

"Currently we have forty nine rounds of .45, zero rounds of .556 which both the light machine gun and assault rifle we have in our inventory utilize."

"And the estimated numbers from the convoy under the ambush?"

"Currently they estimate numbers of up to five to ten attackers hitting them from both sides with rifles."

"And we have no way of getting to their location aside from running."

"Correct Operator Roeyka, should I tell them we are on our way?"

Xanthiana sighed and gathered her supplies, making sure to leave the empty light machine gun behind, it was going to do her no good, "Yeah tell them I'm on my way, god damn it."

Failure

Rushard paced in front of the assembled bandits. His own Arkhunters were off on their own tasks, feeling it important to delegate he felt they could handle things without him while he worked on accessing the ship that was buried deep in the Frisco bay. He did not know how the rest of his unit had faired, but as far as the task of even getting to the ship, he had failed. Not him personally, of course not the Great Rushard, but the bandits with whom he had trusted to accomplish what he had felt was a simple task, had been completely unable.

"Men, wait that's not right, you're not men, no, you're more like schtako, and not even good schtako," The men shifted uneasily, Rushard gripped the rifle he had brought with him tighter he could see their eyes followed him as he paced in front of them, at least they had formed a consistent line, "You have failed me in every aspect of what I had asked you to do.  I had asked you to aquire a boat, no such boat was acquired. I had asked you to get diving gear or at least be able to find out who in this shit sty of an area would be able to come up with some, this too did not come to pass. I HAD ASKED YOU TO KEEP YOUR FUCKING MOUTHS SHUT! And still you could not even accomplish this simple gods for saken fucking task and so every stupid bandit from this shit hole to probably a whole geographic area over thinks they can become a part of my crew. And so it has come to this." One of the bandits raised his hand like Rushard was teaching a school lesson.

"Sir."

"Yes what is it?"

"How do you know it was us who failed you?" Rushard's grip on the rifle tightened. He almost wondered if he could bring the hilt with how angry he was.

"Because I trust my guys and the only other people I told, were you FUCKING IDIOTS!" He gunned them down, turning around and just opening up. Two of the bandits attempted to run away and after he reloaded he walked up to their struggling corpses and emptied the fresh magazine into the two, they couldn't even stand and die for their failure correctly. He was so angry at the bandits he didn't even notice his EGO was trying to get a hold of him.

"What is it Sorn?" The Sensoth had been tasked with disrupting local ranchers near the beach he had hoped to extract the downed warship towards.

"I have a problem with the ranchers." Rushard breathed out, trying to calm himself, another failure.

"What is the problem Sorn?" He hoped that the communication while conveying his anger, didn't fully show how little cool he had left. If only so that his men didn't think he was completely unstable.

"I got the ranchers out, but now damned Hellbugs have moved in, looks like a damned nest of them." Rushard smiled, and then laughed.

"Well then looks like we'll have to find a place for those poor little buggers to go now won't we?"

"You know how to relocate hellbugs boss?"

"Yes, yes I do." Rushard looked over the bodies of the dead bandits and sighed, he had hoped to be getting a warship and its votan tech out of a body of water, but plans change, and now he was going to have to just cause some havoc with hellbugs. At least seeing helpless ranchers eaten by the little buggers would cheer him up a little bit.

Hellbugs

"Hellbugs can come in multiple varieties based on their job within the hive, skitterlings serving as the more drone like servant to the hive are small, where as warriors and archers are defenders of the hive and can be larger up to the size of live stock, where as a monarch..."

"EGO skip the biology lesson and give me a scan for a fall back position. She had been firing the rifle in bursts, killing the smaller skitterlings and keeping the two warriors she'd seen at a distance, but ammo was going to be a concern soon. She also couldn't simply run out of the bunker as her initial entry point was behind the swarm.

"Attempting to connect to a central server, please stand by." The muzzle flashes from the rifle were blinding, Xanthiana cursed that she did not have sunglasses to lessen the impact. She had forgotten the stink of Hellbugs, especially when they died, it was nauseating, especially in the tight quarters she found herself in. She had heard they do not have eyes and find things by smell, which made the stench of the bastards even more confusing, how could they smell anything over themselves?

"Connection established, wow surprising this bunker still has a functioning central computer, that's good news for the Erep personnel, wow all sorts of readings coming in, I don't think anyone has connected to the server in a while."

"EGO door now." One of the bugs had taken a leap at her, she had used the butt of the rifle as a club and crushed it, but she could see the warrior bugs moving forward and by her count she was down to a magazine of ammunition.

"Right Operator Roeyka accessing door commands, look to your left there should be a door opening." One of the heavier bulkhead doors opened and she ducked inside, the bugs smashed against it but for the moment she was safe. The room she had ducked into was darkened, probably from when it had been abandoned in the past, without having to say anything to EGO the room became illuminated. It was the usual abandoned military bunker environment, no carpet on the floors, over turned tables, and no other exit other than the one she just used.

"Brilliant EGO you just trapped me in a room without another exit." Xanthiana looked to the ceiling, but did not see any access ports above, even if there were, it's not like she could reach them.

"You did not specify a room with another exit."

"Point taken thank you."

"Structural integrity on the access door is falling Operator Roeyka, the Hellbug will be in the room shortly."

"Fantastic, and I'm down to my last magazine, this day just keeps getting better."

"Might I offer a suggestion Operator Roeyka?"

"Please EGO, and no I've never been one for suicide."

"Killing yourself would kill me Operator Roeyka I would never suggest that as a solution. No my files indicate this room was a security bulkhead for the outer corridor, per regulations there should be a light machine gun and ammunition supply still here, back wall behind an access panel." Xanthiana rushed over to the panel and dislodged it, behind it was a light machine gun and it looked to be in working order with a good supply of ammunition; things were looking up. She fed the belt of ammunition into the slide and took the light from her rifle and attached it underneath. The LMG was heavy, Xanthiana never quite understood why the damn things were called "Light" machine guns, but that was a discussion for another day, she used the available strap to help steady it and then readied herself near the door.

"Open it."

"Processing command Operator Roeyka, good luck."

Bunker

"Do you prefer human weaponry?" The EGO device had been quiet up to that point. Xanthiana wanted to be annoyed, but as odd as it was to think it, she was hurting for conversation, even if the conversation was in her head.

"Its not so much a preference as it is necessity, in the war Votan weaponry was hard to replace, repair, and reload. We had to make due, which meant using the dropped weapons of the human forces which was plentiful especially ammunition." The Bunker so far had been empty, which was scary, there was no good reason for the mutants to leave an empty bunker unless of course something else had taken residence inside of it. Xanthiana had to rely on the flashlight on the end of her rifle, which cut her visibility to uncomfortably narrow.

"Makes sense, another question?"

"I hope you are actively scanning right now while you are asking me things."

"With what limited equipment I have yes, I'm currently scanning and finding no hostile targets, you have what most likely is a rodent fifteen feet to your right. I am capabable of doing multiple tasks at once Operator Roeyka."

"Noted, what was your question?" The bunker was fairly deep, probably a relic before the war. Xanthiana didn't know a lot about humans, but she had learned that prior to the Votan's arriving they sure did like building bunkers and stockpiling weapons.

"Why don't you associate with your own kind?"

"What?"

"Why didn't you go south after the war, I'm sure with your place in the Votan military you would have been welcomed into Brazil."

"You don't know much about the VC if you think an Irathient soldier would have been welcomed anywhere, let alone down in Brazil." It amazed Xanthiana how naive the EGO device appeared to be, then again from her experience humans in general were completely unaware of social castes within Votan culture, or even within species.

"Care to elaborate?" EGO almost sounded hopeful.

"No, keep scanning." Xanthiana didn't want to go over how she was more or less pressed into service from servitude and that she hated her own kind more than humans, there wasn't any point, it was all just baggage she carried around everywhere she went, and she was getting tired of carrying the problems on her back. It was one reason she signed up for ARK hunting in the first place, a chance to do something new away from her own kind.

"Operator Roeyka there are multiple dog sized creatures on the way, most likely hellbugs"

"Which direction?"

"All directions."

"Shtako."

Supplies

"It's not a size six and the buttons won't close, but I guess I'll have to make do." Roeyka's uniform was more appropriate a stripper than a soldier, but it at least would help keep her warmer than her current outfit.

"I also got you a coat, its not like we are running on a surplus right now, especially not after that Casti blew through and took a bunch of shit, the Captain isn't too happy with Arc Hunters right now." Sgt. Cobb offered her the coat, it was the opposite of the uniform in that it was a bit too big, but it did have some nice pockets she could store things in.

"Casti?"

"Yeah some dick Richard, Rushdie? I can't remember for sure, took a young private with him and disappeared, he was supposed to be helping us establish a perimeter."

"Wouldn't have been Rushard was it?"

"What?"

"The casti's name Rushard?"

"Yeah that sounds about right, you know him?"

"Yeah I do."

"I get the impression its not an association you are fond to rekindle." Sgt. Cobb handed her a semi automatic rifle and some ammunition. Unlike the sniper he tried to give her before, Xanthiana took it and slung it front of herself. The erep camp while more secure thanks to her effort with the snipers, had already been attacked by the mutants twice since she'd been there, they were a long way out of being out of the woods.

"Oh I'd like to connect with Rushard plenty fine, as long as his head is in my cross hairs, what's the rifle for just being polite Cobb?"

"Got you another job from the captain, we have some of you ark hunters chasing down some transmitters up the road trying to establish a connection to the greater Paradise area, he wants you to check on a generator complex nearby and secure our power situation."

"Great some place dark and full of assholes."

"Didn't say it would be easy Roeyka, but it'll go a long way to making the Captain happy, besides rifle has a flashlight underneath the barrel, so you've got that going for you."

"Be still my beating heart Cobb, anything else?"

"Got a hat, might help keep the sun out of your eyes." He handed her over the ball cap. It was all black with the logo of a crudely drawn gold hell bug and Hellbugs written underneath it.

"I hope this isn't some foreshadowing of what I'll find in that bunker." Xanthiana put the hat on, it fit rather comfortably which was a relief, something she was wearing should fit the way it was supposed to. And it did help keep her hair out of her eyes.

"Well if you do find any of those little bastards let us know ok, we've seen signs, but nothing definitive if we're sitting on a whole nest of hellbugs this mission is going to get a whole shit ton worse than it already is."

"Ok sarge point me to where I've got to go." He showed her on a map and EGO noted it and the map itself, so she got a better idea of where she was in the paradise territory as far as the Ereps had maps for. Things were looking up, even if she did have to go off on another solo mission without much intel. In a way it reminded her of how things went during the war, and that thought sent a shiver down her back.

Blue Man Bang Bang

The explosion threw Xanthiana forward. The Bioman's grenade was probably intended on cutting off her escape, even though throwing herself off a cliff fifty plus feet to her doom was a poor escape plan any day of the week. She collided with the ground, knocking the wind out of her and sending her pistol skidding across the ground behind the Bioman. The Bioman stomped over to her, its veiny skin barely containing the mass of muscle underneath, she could feel the vibrations from each step, but was unable to move away before it snatched her up off the ground. It cast the grenade launcher aside prefering instead to hold her with one arm and pummel her with the other.

"Accessing Bioman files, I'll attempt to identify a weakness you can exploit Operator Roeyka." EGO chirped in, Xanthiana could see it manifested behind the blue creature.

"You're a real help." Xanthiana thought as the creature slugged her in the chest and she felt one of her ribs break. Xanthiana, not wanting to be punched into pulp, swung her legs up wrapping them around the flesh giants head. She tried to snap its neck with all the force she could muster, but only seemed to distract it enough for it to let go of her. Which brought her own head swinging down near its crotch in a position that surely would have looked comical to any one who happened to be passing by.

"Operator Roeyka attempting to snap the neck of a Bioman is a physical impossibility, the creatures bones have been reinforced specifically to prevent this." Xanthiana was about to make a sarcastic thought in response when the creature snatched her up and hurled her off its shoulder. Once again she collided with the ground, her ribs ached with pain making her accutely aware one possibly two were broken. On the plus side she found herself near her pistol and away from the cliff, on the negative side the Bioman had regained his grenade launcher and fired another one in her direction.

Xanthiana snatched her pistol up and started to make another run for it, the grenade landed behind her and exploded, she could feel a bit of the shockwave brush her back, but it was far enough away she wasn't hurt. She turned around and opened fire, emptying her entire magazine into the Bioman did nothing, she could see the pock marks from where her bullets had hit his skin, but no actual damage.

"Operator Roeyka your pistol is not of sufficient caliber to penetrate the skin of the Bioman, if you had perhaps brought a sniper rifle you would have much more success."

"Thanks EGO, any other words of wisdom?" Another grenade collided near her, Xanthiana decided fleeing was better than standing and dying and she made her way down the path away from the Bioman.

"If you strike the Bioman over his left buttock you can turn it off."

"Fantastic I'll remember to kick him in the ass next time he shows it to me." Another grenade zinged by Xanthiana's ear and blew up some rocks nearby, and knocked her to the ground.  The Bioman's aim was improving and as much as Xanthiana hoped he'd run out of grenades, she knew that was not an optimal solution to her problem. She got into a shooters crouch, reloaded her pistol and took aim at the Bioman. The Bioman was a good forty feet away, but he was moving up on her and reloading his grenade launcher as he went.

"Operator Roeyka I informed you earlier this is an ill advised line of attack." EGO's voice in her head Roeyka fired, her first shot went wide, but her next hit its target dead on. The Bioman's eye exploded in a blue goo and the creature did a small drifting dance before it collapsed to the ground dead.

"Skin's tough, eyeball much less so, and with the increased skin and bone strength the bullet bounced around in his brain like a pinball EGO, update your records accordingly." Xanthiana smiled as she holstered the pistol and made her way back down the path. She had to see a Sergent about some promised supplies and get some tape for her ribs, but she was alive, and that was more than she could say for the snipers and the Bioman.

Sniper Nest

"This is a sub optimal route." The EGO device chirped in Xanthiana's head. She was climbing up a ridge, each finger strained from the exercise as the rock face she had chosen was extremely steep, and lacked for proper finger holds. Which made it perfect for an ambush position, but terrible for actually scaling. Xanthiana really felt the extra weight from the ammunition magazines she was still carrying, she also regretted not getting something to eat, her stomach growled more than a few times as she went.

"Only other route was up a mountain path with plenty of cover for the snipers to put a bullet in me six times over."

"You could have taken the snipers rifle, I could have helped you aim if you lack for weapon knoweldge."

"And stay out in the open trying to countersnipe people behind rock faces? That's a suboptimal solution." Her hand slipped and for a brief moment Xanthiana wondered if all that religious bullshit about Irzu was true, and then she found a better grip and went back to the argument with the voice in her head.

"They will have guarded this path Operator Roeyka."

"Highly unlikely, these mutants are former humans and if you humans have shown me one thing over the course of repeated conflicts its that they overestimate their cover, and underestimate the ability for the enemy to flank it." The EGO device took a moment to calculate a response, Xanthiana didn't want to call it thinking, because despite the device having a personality and ability to learn, she didn't believe it actually thought in the way a person did, more like came up with a response based on computation.

"Data processed will update records to match Operator Roeyka's experience with human enemies." It was the closest thing to an admission she was right she was going to get from the EGO device and it brought a smile to Xanthiana's face.

She ascended the rest of the cliff face without further input from her EGO. When she got to the top it was as she expected the mutant snipers were unaware of her presence. There were four of them covering different site lines all tightly grouped next to each other. Xanthiana cursed her luck that she didn't have a grenade, but she did notice a nice ammo cache between them that did include grenades. EGO also noticed the grenades and highlighted them in red.

"Why would they have grenades?" EGO asked confirming Xanthiana's suspicion the device was installed without any kind of combat programming.

"They are positioned to cover sight lines in front and a frontal assault up the path you suggested as an optimal route, rifles for distance, grenades for anyone who gets close enough."

"The grenades will not explode by gunshot."

"Obviously." Xanthiana cursed her luck for not having a knife, but she did have the adrenaline rush the EGO could provide her and that would have to do. "EGO iniate Adrenaline Overdrive please." She could feel her heartbeat accelerating and her muscles previously aching from making the climb were super charged. Rushing forward she got the drop on the first sniper and brought her booted heel down roughly on its neck, she heard a snapping noise and her precence hadn't gone completely unnoticed, the other snipers had turned bringing their rifles to bear on her. She could feel the Adrenaline Rush's effects fading when she snagged the pins off a couple of the grenades and sprinted, hoping the fuse's on the grenades would explode before the snipers could line up shots. Xanthiana made it to the cliff face she'd scaled and thought of throwing herself off it hoping only for a broken leg when the series of explosions took out the remaining three snipers.

"Objective completed Operator Roeyka." Xanthiana smiled the smoldering corpses of the snipers was a welcome sight after all the climbing.

"What happened to my friends?" She hadn't noticed the bit of bunker the hulking figure of the Bioman emerged from, but she did immediately notice the grenade launcher he was carrying when he did emerge.

"Objective updated Opeator Roeyka." The EGO device had a unique way of saying they were fucked Roeyka thought to herself.

Earth Republic Camp

It took over a day for Xanthiana to travel to the recovery point the Ereps had set up outside of the crashed carrier. It had been slow going, there was a lot of foot traffic of the mutants and apparently hellbugs were in season, she had seen more than a few of the little bastards, attacking the mutants.  Sometimes the mutants won, sometimes the bugs; all times Xanthiana wanted nothing to do with either of them.

The "camp" the ereps had set up was more a triage tent for a multitude of wounded and dying than any kind of established position. There was hardly a perimeter when Xanthiana approached, just a couple bored looking men in beat up uniforms holding their guns at half mast not even bothering to check people coming or going. She couldn't fault them, from her short time observing; people were running in and running out with varying states of urgency and purpose. The men were not guarding so much as making pretending that there was some order to the chaos. The main hub of the camp was a cobbled together group of com terminals inside a particulary more solid part of the destroyed carrier. Xanthiana could see techs still trying to get com signals or really any kind of signals, while other techs were working hard to set up more terminals and keep the ones they had running. Pacing between them was the former Captain of the ship, a man named Grant, he had a half smoldered cigar clamped between his teeth as he moved from operator to operator hoping one of them had gotten through.

"Reporting for duty Captain Grant." Xanthiana or any of the ark hunters for that matter were never directly underneath erep command, but at this time with Von Bach missing and the operation in shambles reporting to the only command structure she could seemed like the best idea.

"Great another stripper, as if Ducar was not enough, honey if you're looking to turn tricks my men don't have the scrip nor the time to deal with you, if you're one of Von Bach's asshole ark hunters see Sergent Cobb, otherwise I got more important shit to deal with than you." Grant turned back around to yell at a technician and Xanthiana stepped out of the makeshift communications area.

"That was entirely rude." The EGO unit materialized if only to voice her disapproval.

"Grant's a busy guy and Von Bach and by an extension Ark Hunters put him into this position, I'm sure we're not his favorite people." It was still weird think talking to her ego device, but Xanthiana had gotten the hang of it, even if she probably looked strange standing out in the open while other people moved around here talking to themselves

"Still no reason to call you a whore." Xanthiana looked over her just drying tank top and shorts and could see where the confusion came from, she looked like a stripper. It was her own fault really she had dressed in comfort clothes that would be easy to put body armor over, but the ship got hit too fast for her to even get any body armor or even a standard uniform to put on.

"No, but I can't blame him, I really could do with a uniform change." Just then someone snapped in front of her eyes, it appeared Sgt. Cobb had been summoned from whatever duty he had been assigned. Cobb was in the usual blue army camo of the Ereps, but instead of their blue helmet, he had on a cowboy hat. He was also smoking, which was also probably not regulation.

"Do all you Ark Hunters just drift off into space like that?" His voice was a bit of a drawl that denoted he was from the south at some point or liked to pretend he was, there wasn't much of a south anymore in the new world.

"Sorry Sergent I was communicating with my ego device, I was told to see you about finding Mr. Von bach."

"Sure you are, just like all the rest of you, but seeing as the last group of you assholes that blew through here took some atv's, some supplies and we're supposed to help us with a group of snipers and never did, command ain't really looking to help you until you help us." Cobb snatched up a discarded sniper rifle and handed it toward Xanthiana.

"I've got no use for that."

"Well you better learn fast if you want to take out that nest." He pointed to an encampment that overlooked part of the carrier wreckage, "Near as we can tell there are five to six of those mutant assholes up there just picking off our boys."

"And you want me to take care of it?"

"That's correct." He smiled and offered her the rifle again, she shook her head and started to leave camp.

"Have some supplies waiting for me when I get back down, and a damn uniform of some kind I'm a size 6!" Xanthiana started to make her way towards the sniper's nest, it seemed she had to walk before she could drive.

Villains

"I believe your people had a phrase for moments like this, convert or die." Rushard was the only Castithan in the group of men standing around the Erep soldier. There were ten of them now, up from the five he'd set off with post carrier crash. It had been a day since the event the group now numbered two Sensoths and seven humans, all male though that was just coincidence not out of any desire to prevent females from joining. Rushard liked being the only Castithan, it felt right, just like when he lead Votans during the war. He liked being in charge and he liked not having to deal with someone from another caste trying to establish dominance through some bullshit play, they were on Earth now and castes were like everything else from their doomed galaxy, lost to the cosmos.

Rushard was physically not really remarkable at all, his white hair was cut short, his muscle build was lean, and if anything he was under sized for even his own race (he stood just over five feet tall). What he lacked in physical stand outness he made up for with visciousness. In the war he tortured and massacred, his military unit was known for their uncompromising nastyness, even amongst the Votanis Collective. When the ceasefire ended the war, Rushard was disgusted with the VC, he disbanded his unit and refused to report to Brazil as ordered, and so he made his way, first as a bandit, and now an ark hunter.

"I don't know what you people want." The Erep soldier had been granted him by Captain Grant of the crashed carrier, he had also given them a couple of bikes and supplies.  Officially it was to find Von Bach, but to Rushard it was the start of his new empire. Now the Erep soldier had outlived his usefulessness as he didn't have an EGO device and thus was not as genetically superior as the other Ark Hunters. The others also were not aware of it, but Rushard had also hijacked their EGO signals, so any attempt of theirs to overthrow him would be met swiftly and horribly, another thing against the Erep, he could not be controlled.

"Convert or die." It seemed simple to Rushard, though he was toying with the young man, trying to find out what Captain Grant knew about the Ark Hunters Rushard was leading, it appeared nothing from his interrogation of the Erep.

"Co co co convert?" The Erep's voice cracked in such a way that showed more of his weakness. Rushard turned toward one of the Sensoth's a burly eight foot tall  orange haired baboon of a man named Sorn. He drew his thumb across his neck and the Sensoth nodded. The Erep's scream right before his neck was broken was music to Rushard's ears. Rushard turned around to face his group of 9 men, they didn't look put off by the murder, which was why Rushard had chosen them to be with him.

"Boys they call this place Paradise and it will be, starting today we are going to run this town. Drugs, prostitution, even the damned ark hunting will be all ours for the taking." They all cheered at that and Rushard turned around and smiled to himself. It was always easy leading brutes and bullies, and they would serve his purpose just fine for now, but if any of them got out of line Sorn would be snapping more necks. Rushard accessed his EGO device, different from the other ark hunters in that his did not come from Von Bach, but he had been granted his by the VC during the war.

"Now Ego," Rushard thought calling up the Casti construct in front of his eyes, "Where did you say that warship went down again?"

Conflict

"Adrenaline overdrive activated good luck Operator Roeyka." Xanthiana felt a surge of power, her muscles tensed and flexed and she surged forward her eyes singularly focussed on the pistol near the fire. Time seemed to slow down, every minute felt like ten, and still she felt too slow. Nearing the pistol she rolled and snagged it and came up shooting. The mutant EMC personel were caught unaware, between the darkness and the fire it was a basic shooting gallery. EGO made it even easier by outlining the mutants in red, Xanthiana quietly thanked whoever invented the device even if it was more than a little creepy to have some kind of onboard HUD in her brain.

There were four dead and her pistols slide had racked back indicating it was out of bullets. She thought it a bit strange she'd counted five but only saw four dead until the large arm wrapped itself around her throat. The last mutant was shorter than her, but he had lept onto her back and was using his weight and gravity to pull her to the ground. She went with his momentum and slammed him into the ground hoping to dislodge him, it did not.

"Operator Roeyka oxygen deprivation will start in less than a minute you'll lose your ability to function."

"Thanks for that really it's helping." It was weird being smarmy to a robot in your head telling you your dying, but that was Xanthiana's new reality and she just had to roll with it. EGO wasn't wrong though, she could feel light headed just from the short period of time the mutant had started strangling her. She cast the empty pistol aside and stuck her thumb out like she was going to go hitchhiking before shoving it backwards into what she assumed was the mutants eye. Her thumb hit something gooey and the mutant howled in pain and released her. She got to her feet and the creature still rolled in pain on the ground. She brought her soggy boot up and brought the heel of down forcefully on the mutants chest and heard a crack the creature stopped moving, but she could still hear breathing. She retrieved the empty pistol from where she'd cast it aside.

"Subject is critically injured, but not dead Operator."

"I'm aware of that EGO." Xanthiana moved from her position by the fire to the makeshift camp the mutants had been using. Their weapons were older and looked in disrepair, but their bullets were still in working order, she managed to locate some in the pistols caliber and removed the magazine to load some fresh ones in. EGO helped out by highlighting any useful equipment its limited scans could pick up in white. Xanthiana managed to recover a couple more magazines for the pistol, three magazines worth of ammunition for it, and various other bullets for others calibers of weaponry. She made sure to take them as in her experience ammunition was worth more than any paper money in the badlands.  Ammunition was the one universal currency in the new earth economy. She snagged a beat up backpack from one of the dead ark hunters to store her ill gotten gains and made her way over to the dying mutant.

"Operator Roeyka I'd recommend a tactical retreat there may be more of mutants in the area, I'm also getting reports of an erep position not far from here, it would be a safe location to regroup with other ark hunters and start the search for Mr. Von Bach."

"Agreed." She put a bullet between the mutants eyes, there was no reason for the creature to suffer anymore than it already had. She wasn't sold on searching for Von Bach while there seemed to be a new war starting in Paradise, but she had taken his money and signed on to be a bodyguard, and a deal is a deal even if Von Bach was a piece of shtako best left for whatever scavengers could find him.

Arrival

The first thing that was apparent to Xanthiana was that she had not hit the ground but instead had landed in water. The second thing was now the very real threat she'd drown in a metal coffin. She told herself not to panic as she frantically slammed the release button. It wasn't opening of course and despite all of her attempt at remaining calm the prospect of drowning was not one she relished. She didn't even have a weapon commit suicide with to prevent that horrible death from happening, though she theorized if she had a weapon she'd be more likely to just blow the doors open with it than take her own life. The pod hit the bottom of whatever water source it landed in and fell backwards disorienting Xanthiana briefly before the doors triggered open and dark water flooded in.

At least because of the drop pods position she could accurately judge which way was up (and she thanked whatever luck she lived by that it rolled over backwards and not forwards). She emerged from the water into more darkness.  The op as she remembered it was planned to be an evening drop because Paradise was an independent state. Though technically it was VBI industries who arranged the operation, they were on an Erep ship and the few independent areas in North America weren't exactly receptive to the Ereps. None of that helped Xanthiana see any better in the dark. From the shore she could make out a small fire and what appeared to be some men at it, something about the way they were positioned had her cautious though, too relaxed to have just been pod dropped into a hot zone, and the camp looked a little to built in for recent construction.

Xanthiana made her way to the shore quietly. Her initial suspicions seemed to ring true when she could make out EMC uniforms on the men around the campfire and what appeared to be a couple dead ark hunters on the fire. The EMC soldiers didn't look fully human as well, their features were twisted and mutated clearly not friendlies. Xanthiana was wondering what to do about the situation when her vision blurred, her ears popped and her head felt like a radio signal suddenly exploded inside of it. At first she was worried it was some new enemy weapon she'd never heard of, but then she recalled the EGO unit they'd installed in the base of her neck and what Von Bach was talking about prior to the ship exploding and crashing into the wilderness. As if summoned by the thought the EGO appeared in front of her, it looked like a young woman, though its appearance shifted and adjusted while she watched it.

"Hello operator Roeyka I'm your EGO device." Xanthiana was about to tell it to get down before realizing only she could possibly see it since it didn't have a display device on its own, "Scanning equipment," The EGO's body pulsed for a second and then the it returned to how it looked before "I see the personal defense shield, did not make it, you also appear to be completely unarmed and we are not near other ark hunters, one moment." Xanthiana was grateful and entirely weirded out by a robotic voice talking to her in her own head, but if it meant she had a higher chance of survival she'd get over the weirded out feeling. "Hostile subjects near by, they appear to be using EMC communication frequencies, I'm also getting a signal from south of us of an Erep crashed vessel and other live ark hunter EGO devices, no word from Mr. Von Bach or his staff at this time." The Ego clicked off after stating the situation and then stared at Xanthiana, she didn't know if it wanted her to talk back or what. "If you'd like to respond please do so by thinking of the response I can read the brain activity and respond accordingly you do not have to vocalize."

"So I just think and you can read it?" Xanthiana was completely taken back by the idea of having to talk in her own head to something else, if not for technology she'd swear she'd gone crazy.

"Correct Operator Roeyka."

"Ok EGO suggestions?"

"Acquire weaponry, personal defense shielding, and then sync up with Erep personnel south."

"Sure that sounds easy enough considering there are at least five targets in front of us and we currently have no weaponry, no personal defense shielding, and no transportation." The five EMC mutants at least did not appear to have noticed Xanthiana's pod crash landing, nor did they seem to be at any state of alert, which was good, they did appear to be armed though, which was bad.

"Scan's indicate a pistol near the fire that is unattended, unknown amount of ammunition in the magazine."

"So you want me to run toward a pistol near a fire, with an unknown amount of ammunition in it, and hope that it has enough to kill five men before they return fire?" The EGO shimmered twice and then returned, Xanthiana took that to mean it had just thought something.

"The EGO is hooked into your adrenal system, for a short time I can boost your adrenaline response to increase speed and reflexes, it should give you enough time to get to the pistol prior to the EMC mutants becoming aware of you, from there its up to you."

"And then the pistol will be out of bullets, ok I like this plan this is a great plan not at all a complete failure that will immediately cost me my life." Xanthiana readied herself, she thought for a moment that she could have just swam to the opposite side of whatever water source she was in and hope no mutants were over there, but that would take time and she didn't know how long until the sun came up and she became an even easier target.

"Lets do this." Xanthiana said it out loud if only to have said something before the end.

Recruitment

“GET TO YOUR PODS!” The order came loud and screechy some lieutenant on a bridge deck above was worried. The worry extended to the Ark Hunters who had assembled to hear Von Bach give a speech about an ego device and what that meant to them. An Irathient, Xanthiana Roeyka, worried more about the drop pod, she hated enclosed spaces they reminded her too much of the sleep pod she had arrived to earth in. She was so worried about it she had missed most of what Von Bach had set about the ego device, and then everyone was rushing to the pods.  She settled in between a Sensoth and a human amongst the row of pods. The Sensoth she didn’t know, the human male was an engineer named Rico who had taken an unnatural interest in her personally to the point of her having to almost crush his testicles to dissuade him of his affection.

“Don’t worry babe I’ll protect you.” She shot a look his way and snarled he just smiled back, she thought she heard the Sensoth laugh, but couldn’t confirm it because her pod shut suddenly and she was ejected from the ship to the land below.  While she plummeted to what she hoped was the bay area below she recalled how she wound up on an Erep vessel in the first place.

*********

“Roeyka, Xanthiana!” The named was barked out of a small temp tent that had most likely been a field hospital in the war. It was a month prior to her ill-fated trip on the Erep ship, Xanthiana was amongst a lot of assorted humans and Votans waiting to see if they would be picked for a job Von Bach industries had recruited them for.  They were outside of the capital Erep city of New York, in one of the dirty run down suburbs. All Xanthiana could see was poverty, everyone was in tattered dirty clothing, wielding rusting or damaged weaponry and grumbling about having to wait around too long. It was especially sad in comparison to the bright lights of New York. Xanthiana hadn’t been there personally, but she had been told it was quite the city before the war and remained that way despite the Ark fall. She made her way to the front of the dirty throng and was welcomed into the tent. Inside was a Von Bach employee with a name tag that identified him as Rickard, there was a plastic table, two chairs and a filing cabinet. Rickard took his place on the side of the table with cabinet and motioned her to sit down.

“You Roeyka?” He was chewing on a cigar she hoped he wouldn’t light it.

“I came when I was called didn’t I?” He smiled and went to light his cigar.

“I’d prefer if you didn’t.”

“Mess up your sense of smell?” Rickard was some kind of former military, most employees of Von Bach were, his flat top haircut and crisp dress were big signs.

“No contrary to your people’s belief that Irathients are a humanoid version of cats I don’t have increased ability to smell anything; I just don’t like the smell of smoke, cigar smoke especially.” Xanthiana herself was former military though her dress was considerably less crisp, poverty and a stint in the internment camps post armistice had considerably diminished her clothing. She was down to a pair of camo pants that were too baggy, a bra that was too tight, and a shirt that was too small about the only thing she liked amongst her belongings were her shoes and she already had to kill a man to keep those.

“Fair enough I can respect that.” He took the cigar out of his mouth and left it on the table.  He took up a pen and his clip board, “Ok Ms. Roeyka, is that your real name?”

“No I made it up, my actual name is difficult for anyone outside of Irathients to pronounce.” He wrote something on his form and then moved down to the next box.

“Experience?”

“Are you asking me what experience I have for the job you are offering?”

“Yes.”

“War.”

“Is that to say you were a soldier?”

“Yes.”

“Which side?” The room smelled funny, not just cigar smoke, it was the stench of sweat of several different races. Lots of people had been in that tent asked these questions and not all of them responded nicely.

“Seen a lot of Irathients fighting for the ERC? I was in the Votanis Collective, my squad disbanded in Denver.” Denver, lot of unpleasant memories of that place for Roeyka, the memory caused her to shudder.

“You were interred post armistice?”

“Yes.” They all were, some made it, some didn’t, that was the reality of the world post armistice. He marked down some other things wrote something else and then skipped to the bottom of his form.

“You inoculated?”

“Against the plague or whatever they want to call it? Yes got the shot in some town in the Midwest part of a mandatory program.”

“You remember the name of that town?”

“Nope.” There had been some resistance to the inoculation, she wasn’t one of the people who fought back but she left all the same after getting her shot. She’d been interred she knew that forced inoculation was the start of bad times and decided it best to leave before anything worse happened.

“Do you have any kind of implants?”

“These are all real.” Her chest had gotten her unfortunate attention in the internment camp, and had also been a pain in the ass in the war; body armor isn’t kind on breasts no matter the species who made it.

He frowned, “Not what I meant, I mean body augmentation.”

“No.” She did have piercings in her nose lip and ears, but she figured he didn’t mean those either.

“Are you averse to getting augmentations?”

“You mean some kind of cybernetic enhancement? Yeah that’s not going to happen.” She’s seen people with cybernetics it made her skin crawl.

“What about an Ego device?

“A what?”

"Enviromental Guardian Online, its an implant injected into the base of your skull to enhance your combat and communications abilities, basically an onboard computer in your head, I believe it was developed by Indogene doc's during the war surprising you hadn't heard of the tech." Xanthiana had heard of the device but never what it actually did, it was above her pay grade.

"Can't say I was privy to that in my service, I wasn't exactly a high rank when the war ended." That was putting it politely. Xanthiana was more slave than respected soldier, the property of a particularly cruel Casti officer who took sport in demeaning her.

"Well would you be adverse to getting one implanted?"

"Is it a requirement of the job?"

"Yes."

"Then no."

"Ok we're done here, see the Seargent on the way out for your gear and get your implant appointment set up." He stood up and pointed to the exit.

"That's it? Not being very selective are you."

"Frankly we need bodies for this op, besides the EGO implant has a potential failure chance of at least 50/50 don't worry if it doesn't take you'll only be mentally retarded for life."

"At least I'll finally fit in with the rest of the Earth Republic." He smiled at her comeback and then called out to the next applicant. She had heard that they were basically accepting warm bodies into the program and that suited her just fine, it was better than dying in starvation anyway.

 

**********



"Guidance Failure please input new coordinates." The drop pod's onboard computer woke her from her memory and reminded her she was plumeting to earth in an iron coffin that she now apparently could not control.

"Shtako." Was all she got out before impact.