The plan was simple. Send two platoons of infantry through the expansive cave network that sat just beneath the planet’s surface and then pop up behind one of the Alliance Regiments that had recently set up outside the Nexus.

At the same time, the Terran First’s tank and Exo companies would sortie out to take the fight to them. Caught out, in the open ground outside the mining nexus where the tanks held the advantage, the Edixi regiment would be pincered between the two forces and destroyed - or otherwise rendered combat inoperable. At which point, both attacking forces would retreat before the other two Alliance Regiment’s that maintained the current cordon around the Nexus were able to arrive to intervene.

A simple plan that had so many points of failure that Jason genuinely wondered how it hadn’t been shot down in the briefing room.

Oh yeah, our colonel’s determined to go out in a blaze of glory, he thought as he languidly looked over the small flotilla of boats that made up the infantry component of ‘Underground Attack Group One’.

Which seemed a fairly ridiculous title to him, given that Underground Attack Group One was the only Underground Attack Group.

Expansive or not, their came a point with tunnels where more bodies would simply get in the way. And according to Puta, that point was exactly two platoons worth of men and women.

Personally, he thought the number to be a tad small given what they were intended for, but he hadn’t been asked his opinion. The only thing he’d been asked was if he thought it might be possible to get the Ufrian’s onboard to help navigate the underground world.

And being the naïve idiot he was, he’d said yes.

To be fair, he’d thought they’d been spitballing ideas for a possible avenue of retreat – not attack – but that scrap of knowledge proved precious little comfort to him now. Not now that he was sat in a boat, who knew how far underground, and set to attack a much larger and better equipped force.

Oh yeah, and I’ll probably be responsible for getting those Ufrian guides we brought with us killed. He thought grimly. Because some higher power thought it would be deliciously ironic for me to be responsible for getting them killed in a war that has nothing to do with them while I in turn am about to be killed in an alien war that I have nothing to do with.

To be fair, he’d had the feeling that the Ufrian Chiefess had been less than enthused about risking her people herself. Unfortunately for her, and his conscience, Puta and two platoons of Imperial Marines showing up on her doorstep had been a hell of an incentive toward cooperation.

Which was just Imperial negotiation tactics to a tee, really.

“Look, I’m just saying, why don’t we save ourselves some trouble, and rather than going up there to get shot up, just drop the tunnels beneath them?”

Jason slumped in his seat as he heard the whispered conversation between the two marines behind him. Both women. Human too.

“Look, have you ever seen an Alliance APC?” The second one responded. “They float. So do the Exos. The only thing that doesn’t float is the infantry. And to be frank, they aren’t worth the effort for us to even attempt to drop them in a hole. If they aren’t in the APCs, chances are they’ll be too spread out for us to get enough of them.”

“So we’re stuck doing this the old fashioned way,” the first muttered.

The second just laughed. “Fuck me girl, I thought you were Vietnamese, you guys are supposed to live for this tunnel fighting shit.”

“First of all, that’s racist. Second of all-”

Jason mentally tuned the rest of that conversation out. It was nothing he hadn’t heard before. Hell, it was nothing he hadn’t argued before. Unfortunately, Cleff had made the same arguments the Vietnamese woman’s friend did.

And as much as Puta had seemed… ill at ease with the order she’d been given, he knew the Rakiri woman well enough to know that she’d follow them without deviation. Which meant, that by extension, he’d be following them without deviation.

Even if he put pretty even odds on this getting them all killed. Which meant Dobry’s words were on his mind. About how Cleff was being callous with all of their lives. How she didn’t have any real expectation of them surviving what was to come and only desired to go down swinging.

Despite himself, he had to wonder if the old man would be fairing any better than he would in an hour. The old Russian’s tenure as a ‘valued advisor’ had come to an end with his decision to argue against Cleff. Which meant he was likely stuck in a tank with the rest of the tank company, waiting for orders to move, even while Jason floated lazily down a river.

Or paddled. Technically. Though he wasn’t the one doing the paddling. That was a task relegated to the hapless Ufrian guide they’d brought with them and two of his fellow marines.

Speaking of which, he thought, turning around.

“So… you’ve been avoiding me ever since we had sex.”

He couldn’t actually see Nora’s features through her helmet, but it was easy to read the incredulity in her body language as she stopped paddling for a moment to stare at him.

“I haven’t,” she said after a moment, before she resumed paddling.

“You definitely have.”

“I spoke to you about Cleff ordering you to help with morale.”

“You were ordered to do that,” he pointed out. “And while that wasn’t all that long ago, according to Yaro you practically begged to switch with her for guard detail when the Color Guard was reinstated.”

Which had come as a surprise to him, when Yaro had silently shown back up at his side. Though it shouldn’t have been. He was now, once more, considered a valuable asset for his contributions to the unit’s comm trouble.

It also helped that the regiment no longer really needed soldiers to act as runners with the laser-comm system disseminated throughout. For the most part, at least. Certain things couldn’t be conveyed through text, and as such, a much smaller pool of runners still existed.

Which was why Jason had only had a single member of his protective detail returned to him.

Though apparently it was Nora who had originally been slated for that role, with Yaro remaining a member of the runner team.

Which just stinks of mismanagement and prejudice, given that humans would obviously make for better runners with our improved stamina, he thought.

Clearly command disagreed, as those who’d been picked for the role seemed to predominantly come from the ranks of the Rakiri. Apparently only they were trusted enough for those more valuable messages. And even then, he had a feeling the wolf women had only been chosen for the role because even a bigot on the level of Gremp would be able to see that they’d outperform a Shil’vati by magnitudes when it came to running.

Nora sighed. “See, this is why fraternizing is a bad idea. It turns a military unit from a smoothly operating machine into the set of some godforsaken soap opera.”

As much as Jason wanted to argue with that assertion, he really couldn’t. After all, he was the one bugging one of his subordinates about why they were ‘giving him the silent treatment’ right before what would probably be the most desperate fight of his life.

And he included boarding the Maw on that list.

“But, if you’re going to corner me over it, I might as well be honest.” She nodded to him. “I figure I owe you that much.”

“I appreciate that.” He smiled.

“We’ll see.” She said dubiously, before continuing. “Because I’m going to say right now that what we did shouldn’t have happened. It was grossly unprofessional and damn near a dereliction of duty.”

Jason went to speak, only for Nora to cut him off as she raised her hand. “Look, I know the purps do things differently. But I’m not a purp. What I am – or was, was horny, drunk and frustrated with… lots of things.”

Well, he’d gotten some hints of that. The phrase, ‘human pussy’ certainly leapt to mind.

"I also discovered I might have a bit of a… voyeurism fetish,” She mumbled.

And he’d certainly gotten more than a hint of that.

Still, he could read the writing on the wall. “So it was a…”

“One off thing.” She nodded. “One that’s never going to happen again.” She paused. “I like you Jason… mostly. You seem like a good guy from what I can see, but you’ve got a few flaws that makes me think things would never work out between us. A mile wide issue with authority being the biggest and most pertinent one."

Well… he liked to think he had a pretty good reason for that. He also didn’t have an issue with authorities when they weren’t being stupid.

Which is pretty rare so… huh, he thought. Perhaps I do have an issue with authority.

“You also have a bad habit of disappearing into your own head for hours or days at a time when you’re working on something.” Nora continued. “Your morals seem to be pretty fairweather. I also don’t think I’ve ever even heard you reference any kind of life back on Earth, which certainly raises a few red flags for me.”

The woman shook her head, as if realizing that she’d gotten sidetracked. Apparently she’d given this whole ‘thing’ a fair bit of thought.

“My point is, as I said, I like you.” He couldn’t see it, but he had a feeling she was smiling at him. “But you definitely aren’t relationship material.”

To be honest, Jason didn’t know why that last bit stung. Not that he’d been exactly happy to hear the other parts, but the last bit definitely had the most impact. Which was odd, because it wasn’t like he’d been looking for a relationship with Nora either. His dance card was already all kinds of full.

Perhaps because it was almost word for word what he’d heard from girls in the past?

"Now don’t go thinking this is all about you. I’ve got my own issues here too.” Nora said, as if attempting some commiseration. “While purp girls might be willing to look past a lot of guy’s issues, because they’re thirsty as hell, I’m not quite there yet. Just because it’s suddenly got a bit tougher to find a decent relationship, doesn’t mean I’ve got to latch onto the first dick that sticks around me for more than five minutes.”

Well, he supposed that made sense…

“So… colleagues?” he asked, finally.

“And friends, I’d like to think.” She extended a hand.

Which he shook.

For whatever reason – despite the harsh truths he’d just imbibed – he felt a little lighter after that conversation. It was nice to have cleared the air. And while he might have lost a potential lover… he’d gained a friend.

And he had precious few of those.

“Now, rather than gossiping like a pair of high school teens, how about we focus on acting like marines.” He returned his attention to the front of the boat.

“You won’t get any argument from-”

Her words were cut off as a sudden shriek came from up ahead.

“Roaches!” Someone shouted just as another echoed, “Alliance!”

Jason watched in muted horror as a marine in the boat ahead suddenly keeled over, dropping lifelessly in the water beneath.

Adrenaline coursing through his blood, he glanced around and swore. The little flotilla had entered a semi-open area of the cave. It was the perfect ambush spot.

Careless, he thought, even as he knew it was a lie. They hadn’t been careless. The troops at the front would have been watching for anything.

The Edixi were apparently just that much better at hiding.

The Imperials were in chaos as shots seemingly came from all around and people were thrown into the water. Alive and dead. It was difficult to return fire because Jason could scarcely see where the shots were even coming from. Not that said fact stopped some, who seemed to be firing blindly into the murk.

Jason ignored them, trying to sight in on the enemy. Unsuccessfully. Thermal was no use. Nor was night vision. He was picking up nothing.

How though? He thought frantically. Even if the Edixi had some way to hide their body heat, their guns should have started running hot the moment they opened fire.

Eventually though, his mark-one eyeballs eyes noticed a sort of ‘blur’ near a distant stalagmite. He fired on it and was rewarded with an explosion of sparks. A black patch seemed to form out of thin air before it and the blur it was attached to dipped beneath the water.

Active camouflage, he thought incredulously. We’re fighting the fucking predator!

Though that little trick still failed to explain why their fucking guns weren’t showing up on thermal.

Though he quickly got an answer to that.

“Fuck!” Nora shouted, gripping her arm. From which jutted a thin metal bolt.

The Edixi were using bolt throwers. Likely some kind of gas mechanism. And the projectiles were clearly traveling slow enough to penetrate clean through the Imperial’s flimsy synth-fabric armor.

Jason swore, even as he reached out an arm to keep his friend from toppling out of the boat.

“Use the boats as cover,” he shouted! “The shots can’t penetrate.”

As if to give credence to his theory, he felt more than heard something thunk against the side of the boat, a small barbed tip sprouting out of the inside of the wood.

He glanced up, noticing just how reduced the flotillas numbers were from less than minute ago.

Plenty of corpses floated in the water. Human, Shil and Rakiri alike. It seemed that they’d tried to make a break for the nearest stalagmites, seeing the boats as little more than tempting targets. Which would have been true, for regular weaponry.

Fortunately for him and the other ‘indecisives’, that wasn’t the case this time.

“Puta?” he shouted, trying to get a read on the flotilla’s commander, even as he set more shots into the murky distance.

Even if he was missing more often than not, he figured the steam kicked up from stray shots hitting the water could only aid them.

“She’s dead!” a surprisingly young voice called back, panic clear in their Italian accented Shil.

“Luitenant Kresh?” he shouted back.

“Dead!”

“Maccavoy?”

This time another voice called out. “She’s dead too.”

Jason swore, because of course the enemy had started with the leadership. Or perhaps, just the aliens. Given it was more often than not the same thing, and they’d probably known that.

It was a little surreal to realize that he was only likely still alive because as a human he was low priority.

Also… Puta was dead? Just like that…

“Champion!”

“What!?” he shouted back, though he needn’t, given that Nora was the one who’d spoken and she was right next to him.

“You’re in charge now,” the woman said through what sounded like gritted teeth, gripping her bleeding limb.

…Fuck.

“Fall back! Fall back!” He was shouting the words before the full import of what Nora had just said even registered. “Use the boats as cover!”

Not that it mattered. The mission was a wash. Retreat was the only viable option.

It was an order the survivors were more than happy to obey. Paddling with their gun stocks or pushing the boats if they were out of them. In short order, the flotilla started moving back to the entrance of the cavern.

Unfortunately for the Imperial’s, the Edixi weren’t content to just let them leave.

While Jason struggled to make out the outline of their enemy in the dark, he could see the water they displaced as they started swimming after them. At least, at first.

Then they submerged… and he could see nothing. He just knew they were coming towards him.

And given the sudden wave of pain filled cries by unfortunate water-based marines, they were still perfectly capable of firing their harpoons underwater, where a laser weapon would be near useless.

“Get into the boats!” he shouted. “Focus on paddling.”

He reached out to help a nearby figure into his boat, only to rapidly retract the offered hand as - what he now realized was a corpse – was pulled under by an eerily familiar shape.

“Please tell me that wasn’t a gator-shark!” Nora hissed, from where she was perched, attempting to paddle one handed.

“It wasn’t a gator-shark,” Jason lied as he pulled another marine into the boat.

Though… that did give him an idea.

Glancing around, he could see that already most of what few soldiers remained had put his words to action, and were ‘safely’ aboard their boats.

Which was good, because while the arriving aquatic predators seemed more interested in corpses than live prey, he didn’t doubt that one might take an opportunistic bite if a wounded marine brushed against them.

…It was enough to make him wonder if the creatures were more like vultures than true predators. He also had to wonder if how the Edixi were avoiding them, underwater as they were.

They might just be swimming under them, given the creatures seem to float close to the surface, he thought.

“Well, let’s see if we can put a stop to that,” he murmured, drawing a bead on a nearby figure as it snacked on a Rakiri corpse.

“Nora, you better tell people to row like hell when I give the signal,” he shouted.

“I’m already rowing like hell!” The Norwegian woman shot back. “And what signal!?”

“You’ll see it,” he murmured as he slowly pulled the trigger.

The side of the creature exploded, along with a good chunk of the water around it as all the molecules in the affected area were instantly turned to steam.

It barely made a sound, before simply going limp in the water.

Jason held his breath, listening over the sound of frantic paddling and the occasional wet crunch of feasting animals.

Nothing happened though.

“Was that it?” Nora asked.

Then everything seemed to explode at once as the fairly sedate feeding frenzy turned into an orgy of violence as the creatures turned on the closest object and savaged it fiercely.

Be that a corpse, a fellow gator-shark… or an Edixi.

As evidenced by the way he watched one of the shark-women appear from the frothy turf like something out of jaws. Her active camo had clearly shorted out and she was flailing madly, at the subterranean animals that had its jaws locked around her midsection. Then she was pulled under again. Down into the chaotic thrashing water.

He didn’t want to imagine what madness was going on beneath the surface. Nor did he much care. All that mattered was that he’d bought some time.

“Keep rowing,” he instructed to his fellow Imperials – some of whom had stopped rowing in favor of staring at the carnage behind them… or him.

Still, his instruction seemed to zap them from their inaction, as they started rowing again with renewed enthusiasm.

Jason finally let out a small sigh of relief as he slumped down into the boat from his half-standing position. Of course, he didn’t let his moment of rest last too long. He wanted out of here just as much, if not more, than anyone else. Which was why he started to reach for a nearby oar.

Only to stop as he felt an odd twinge in his arm.

Glancing down, he was more than a little surprised to see not one, but two barbs sticking out of his arm. One near the shoulder, the other right through his forearm.

“Oh…” he murmured, feeling a little faint. “I think I’ll be rowing one handed then.”

Naturally, he didn’t bleed too much on the way back. While the synth-suits were next to useless in defending against the new weapons the Edixi were using, they were quite effective at dealing with the results. Specifically, tightening around the punctures in the suit to keep airborne bacteria out, and perhaps more importantly, keep blood in.

Of course, that didn’t keep him from being rather preoccupied by the presence of his new piercings. Which was perhaps why he didn’t notice the awed looks he was receiving from his fellow survivors – or the whispered conversations that accompanied them.