“Get down, f’kin’ Chipper!” barks Fitzgerald as I fire the modded P-90 submachinegun blindly at the encroaching foes. He yanks me down as bullets start hitting the half-rotten, orange trunk we’re sheltering behind. Blue puffs of dust rise when the bullets hit the ground around us, making us cough while we hunker down. Alien dirt can’t be good for us, but better than bullets.

“They’re getting too close!” I reply, jerking my free hand in frustration towards the enemy’s summons that have started closing in on us in the last hour of fighting. I’ve never taken part of a skirmish before, and the chaotic fighting is driving me crazy. Especially with unreliable criminals by my side. It’s constant pushing and pulling, trying to draw the enemy in traps while avoiding the same. Encirclement here ends badly, and that’s what I fear.

“Ari is readying a surprise, I’ve told you. Don’t try to be a hero, Quartermaster,” he says, scoffing at me.

“And I’ve fucking told you my Chip is not working! Say it out loud!”

“You better make it worth our while the hassle to keep you from getting yourself killed then.” Fitzgerald is clearly not moved at all by my predicament. Fuck him.

Now, you might ask me what I’m doing fighting at the front with the American Penal Legion of all units, and even better: Why? I think that’s a great question as well. Let’s rewind a bit to try and make sense of this clusterfuck I’ve gotten myself in.

***​

Hours earlier.

“You want us to what, now?” Is my surprised reaction, mirrored by sergeant Cariri.

“We’ve read the Unity’s Rulebook on Warfare on the leaf-tablet, Egg-bearer” explains Maliskar. “The parts useful to us at least.”

“From what we understood, we can be classified as allied combatants and be eligible to receive weapons and supplies out of you as payment for fighting,” says Xenia, scratching the wedge of one upper arm with the other’s.

Damn, aren’t these aliens driven? Can’t say I blame them after the last bombardment. I was extremely preoccupied until they informed us they had sought shelter and hadn’t lost anything but a few supplies they couldn’t move in time.

“So you want us to deliver your proposal to the top commander back on base?” I confirm, sharing a look with the Cabriola by my side as they hand me a letter on parchment - very old school, but it’s written in Unity standard, easily translated with comps. After taking a brief look, I hand it to the dumpst— I mean, drone standing behind me. It turns out the machine’s handy for storing things rather than recycling.

“Exactly, Major Delavega does not have the clearance to accept it,” agrees Xenia.

“Wow, you’ve been thorough,” says Oswaldo, eyes wide at their attitude.

“That sounds… fair. I’ll talk with the Major, and I’ll do it today if we have a convoy heading back, ok?” All of us still feel like idiots for not warning them of the Paladin Swarm’s troopers presence on the planet before, so I’m sure they could guilt trip us to do even more.

“That’s fine, Lieutenant. Thanks for your help.”

We excuse ourselves and started walking back to the base.

“You’ve got this, Barro?” asks me the sergeant, wearing a little decoration on one of his sharp horns. The mythics are starting to loosen up and, as I’ve said, military discipline is nearly non-existent around here. No one to give them a hard time over it.

“No worries, I think I see some of the main base’s truck around,” I point out as we split our ways. “I’m just gonna let the egg on the cradle first, talk to you later.” The sergeant nods to me as I head to the tent where I keep my personal stuff.

Fera has come through with the expert, and he’s sent me a special cradle I can charge with my mana as an apology for an “unavoidable delay”. I can charge it while I sleep and it can take care of the Egg for 24h, though it is still better to charge it directly according to his advice. I’m just finishing placing the now bright purple egg, who nos pulsates from time to time with a faint inner light like a nerd’s LED-equipped computer, when I hear rustling at the entrance.

“Rafael!” Clara calls out, obviously pissed off by her frown and tense soldiers. Did I do something wrong? Or maybe one of the boys? I sure can’t remember.

“Hey, Clara. What has gotten into you?”

“It’s gone!” the werewolf says, clearly agitated. I step forward, raising my hands.

“Easy. What is gone?”

“My main camera! The one with the magical effects! It was a gift just for this gig, what the hell…” I think I know which one she’s talking about - it has incredible rune-features and is still small enough for her to easily carry around. Valuable alien tech.

“I’m assuming you’ve already looked everywhere and asked people about it?” I ask. I’m considerate like that — I hate when people assume you haven’t done basic shit. The classic ‘have you turned off your modem?” kind of question.

“Yes! Did some arrombado steal my camera, Rafael?”

“I can let the Quartermasters know to be on the lookout for it, but I seriously doubt it. The ways out of here are this shithole of a planet are very well watched, it’s stupid to try to sell stolen goods.”

“Porra! What do I do now?”

“This is not the first time magic-infused items have gone missing around here. I hear Lieutenant Bumba was looking into tracking them. I suggest you have a talk with her, but I must go now, sorry.”

“Ok, ok. Thanks, Rafael. The editing… everything was going so smoothly, argh…”

“Don’t fret, I’m sure you’ll find a way.”

After saying my goodbyes, I ask Major Delavega for permission to join the convoy about to return to the main base, which he grants distractedly. The man is busy coordinating the arrival of reinforcements and more anti-air defenses since we’ve become a target because of the Gnodarians. Command hasn’t decided to move them, and the aliens show no sign of agreeing with any such measure anyway. It makes sense after the letter they gave me today.

Guarding the convoy are the Peccari Riders whose mounts have been enhanced in one way or another to keep up with the hover trucks. Some have a sort of mechanical exoskeleton, others have haste effects cast on them by artifacts or their riders. Sergeant Aiowara’s mount is of the former, having also a swiveling gun mount. He hails me amicably.

“Making the trip, Quartermaster? And thanks for the grenade launcher attachment you got me last week - it’s a life taker,” he puns, eliciting a snort out of me.

“Yeah, I have business over on the main base,” I say, shaking the offered hand before I climb on one of the open-ended hover-trucks. I greet some acquaintances as the driver lowers a ramp for my drone to embark, turning back to the rider after a moment. “Aside from the Ambassador’s, have you heard of any problems with other convoys, Aiowara?”

“No, not since those raids behind our lines a few months ago. Do you think they maybe tunneled past us again, lieutenant?” he asks as he rolls a cigar, so beloved by his kind. It was a pain in the ass when they were marauding behind our lines, keeping the Forward Operating Bases’ extremely vulnerable and with little access to resupply. I think that was when we had the worst moral around here.

“Doesn’t sound likely, does it? We’ve sensors set up all around, and they spent a lot of resources on that attack we got their giant mythic. I don’t think they have so many more resources than we do.”

“I don’t know, but that is true. Offensives never seem to break through the stalemate we’ve got over here.”

“I’m not sure they want us to,” I comment.

“Yeah, doesn’t seem like it. It seems just like another way to grind, if I’m being honest. Just with intelligent opponents. We lose more people, but we always end up exchanging prisoners and the figures barely change.”

“That’s a good point.” As we talk, convoy’s vehicles soon spins its engines and soon we’re heading out of the base, the Pecarri-mounted outriders and escorts easily keeping pace. It’s a good point but we do lose good people on these fights. But soldiers with high Chip synchronization and more slots are a must for serious fighting, so I can understand the Unity’s action, if not approve of them. This particular border dispute is pretty irrelevant, but the soldiers who come out of here battle-hardened might change the tide somewhere where millions or billions of lives are at stake.

“We’re gearing up to answer their attack on the Ambassador, aren’t we?” asks the sergeant, keeping up with my vehicle.

“Yes, and their bombing run on the Gnodarians the other day as well. Lots of munitions and mana-crystals are coming on these supplies.”

“Ah, yes, your pet aliens. What a mess, Barro,” the rider says, chuckling at my misadventures.

“Tell me about it. No good deed goes unpunished.”

After a while, Aiowara rotates with his men, and I turn back to doing paperwork on my internal comp. What hounds me now isn’t sheets of processed cellulose, but their digital cousins. After a while, I start getting a headache and start working on the leaf-tablet. The voyage takes a couple of hours, but I make good use of them and eventually someone nudges me to show we’ve arrived at the gate; it’s guards are starting to scan the convoy for anything different.

Prescient Narrator: And that’s when things started going wrong.

I take notice when they start talking with the driver of our truck and Aiowara is called to participate. It’s taking too long. Aiowara argues with the guards about something, but they’re unmoved. Shaking his head at whatever they’re saying, he turns his mount and rides to the back of the vehicle searching for someone: me.

“Hey, Lieutenant. There’s been a little problem - I’m sure it’s only a misunderstanding.”

I frown at what his words imply. “They want me?”

“They do,” he confirms, motioning out of the truck. I’m pissed off, but I don’t want to make a scene, so I get down and have my dumpster drone join me. I’m held to the side as they check the rest of the convoy, clearing them with no one else asked to stay.

“Barro, do you want me to contact someone to sort out this mess?” The Caipora asks me, scowling at the guards coming our way.

“There’s no need to bother LC Polanski about this, I’m sure it will be dealt with in a bit.

Wincing Narrator: Big mistake right there.

“Just pass this letter to Base Command, please. I’ll talk with the commander as soon as this gets dealt with,” I say, handing him the letter the drone passes to me.

The guards aren’t human - or rather, they aren’t Terran at all. The aliens are clad head to toe in black armor, their helm visors reflective - exactly like the ones that first set foot on Earth to guard the meetings between the Unity representatives and local dignitaries. It’s not surprising - they are Regulars after all, a step above rabble like us. They dismiss Sergeant Aiowara with a dismissive gesture that leaves him fuming before taking me to an isolated little room a distance away from their post. My drone is barely acknowledged by the self-assured soldiers, ignorant of Fiddler’s work on it. Babacas.

They take away my submachinegun and order me to sit on an uncomfortable chair in what seems more and more like an interrogation room. There’s a table and two other (better) chairs standing on the other side of it. They leave me to stew for half an hour before they deign to send someone to explain what the hell is going on.

Two armored figures barge in the room, startling me and earning a dark scowl.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” I ask as they take their time sitting and getting comfortable - which I’m not, I must have mentioned.

“Talking to a traitor,” the left one says.

“Or a thief,” offers the right one.

“Maybe both?” they say together. Cute.

“You’re very funny. You’re Debi, you’re Loide.” I say, pointing to each one with disdain. If they won’t give me names or even show their faces, I won’t bother consulting the system, so this is how will it be. My metaphorical wrench brings their (badly) rehearsed act to a halt and they share a confused look. Seems they might have not download everything they should in the Terran culture classes.

“Oh, didn’t get the reference? In English you would be Dumb and Dumber.”

“Shut the fuck up, prim’ scum. We haven’t asked you anything yet,” growls Debi. ‘Prim’ stands for primitive and is the pejorative term of choice for people like humans, recently brought into the galactic society.

“No, you just have accused me of serious crimes I didn’t commit,” I retort, growling back. “I’m ready to see my superior officer and a lawyer now.” For maximum annoyance, I wait just before one of them seems like he’s about to talk to add, “Ah, and a R.E.C. representative as well. I’m afraid you’ve hurt my fragile feelings.” Don’t you roll your eyes at me, these goons’ pettiness brings out mine in force.

They laugh at me. They actually laugh. What the fuck? Those are my rights.

“What are your names and units again? I’m writing a letter right now.” I say, I’ll just open my internal comp. It’s taking a while. It should be opening around now. No? Nothing?

I get a sick feeling in my gut and the duo starts laughing as it dawns on my face they have done something to mess with my comp, maybe even my Chip? You always know when you’re being laughed at, strange though the sound might be you catch on fast to the ridicule.

“Ah, I love to see the Chippers realize it,” says Debi.

“You’re under arrest, Chipper. It’s an open-and-shut case,” adds Loide.

“What the hell? What are you clowns talking about? You haven’t even asked my anything yet!” I nearly shout, getting exasperated besides my attempt to keep calm.

“We know you have been skimming equipment towards the Swarm. This will be easier if you confess.”

“Let me see if I understand it clearly. You say I’ve been giving the people who electrocuted and nearly killed me a few weeks ago our own gear?”

“We’ve read the suspicious reports of the missing items. The scan proves that your Chip’s been illegally altered.”

“Open-and-shut,” repeats Loide. I was more right than I knew when I chose their nicknames.

“I wrote the fucking reports!” I protest the obvious.

“An amateur attempt to cover your tracks,” says Debi, smug as hell. “We’ll convene a Court Martial to deal with you.”

“Why don’t we thrown him in with his kind?” adds Loide, as if just had a brilliant idea. These assholes want to actually arrest me? “Maybe the Swarm will do our job for us until then.”

Oh, hell no.

I stand up, punching the table as anger clouds my vision. “There’s no fucking way you idiots will send me to a Penal Legion!”

They share a look, shrug and draw their side arms. My eyes bulge as they aim their squat, metal-grey guns at me and I flinch as they take their gun’s safeties off with a flick of their thumbs. The green flashes out of the barrels are the last things I see as I feel two excruciating hits on my chest and my eyes roll to the back of my head.

Pissed-off Narrator: Crazy motherfuckers.

***​

“Hey, you alive, fresh meat?” I can barely hear through the pounding headache raging on my skull. I feel a kick and groan in response, noticing I’m laying on the cold, hard ground in God knows where.. I try to say something, but it comes out as a whisper.

“What was it?” my tormentor asks and I feel as she kneels besides me, lowering to hear what I’m murmuring.

“Fuck off…”

“Hah! What a fun guy!” she says, hitting me painfully in the shoulder and cackling. “Hey, hunter, I like this guy!” Her voice rings aggravatingly on my sore ear. I slowly open one of my eyes to see what the fuck is going on, realizing I’m lying in the middle of the ground of a dark, stinking dorm-room. I peek at the woman kneeling by my side, noticing her disheveled black locks and dirty uniform. A thin, fair-skinned woman, she might have even been pretty if it wasn’t the crazy glint in her blue eyes or the crooked, yellow teeth in the too-wide grin that looks like it never disappears. She has a collection of run-downs wands stored at her belt for quick draw.

“This guy? He looks done. Where’s his collar?” I turn my head ponderously to look at the gruff voice, taking note of the indifference at my plight clear on his voice. The man has a sun-beaten, shrimp-red complexion we usually associate with gringos or southerners whose pale skins are not up to warm climates. He’s tall, strong, and holding one modded-shotgun from back home.

“No collar yet! Lucky, lucky guy!”

Of course it didn’t escape me that both of them wear civility-collars. Even through my dazed state, I can only assume Debi and Loide were stupid enough to send me here without the right to a trial. I wasn’t aware there were such cuzões in the Regulars, but here I am.

“Where?” I get out, making them focus back on me.

“Where you are? At Fort Stonewall, the 5-stars accommodation a courtesy of the 3rd American Penal Legion! Don’t mind the psychos, they’re harmless!” she lets out in an advertisement-like pitch, giggling afterwards.

Her companion just snorts and shakes his head. “Don’t mind Ari, she’s insane with. But you’d best get up and get yourself a gun. You’ll need it. I wouldn’t make the tin-man angry if I were you.”

“Tin-man?” I say, making an effort to sit up. Neither offers me a helping hand.

“Judges Harshly. There’s a tip in the name,” the man says, shrugging.

“There often is, AIs don’t usually do mystery very well,” I agree.

“That patch on your shoulder, you a Quartermaster?” asks the man while ‘Ari’ pokes it, fascinated.

“Unfortunately, name is Barro” I reply, getting my bearings back slowly.

“I’m Fitzgerald, Fitz for friends. She’s Ariana.”

“That’s boring, Fitzy. What did you do to get here?” asks Ari.

“It’s Fitzgerald to you,” he mutters, but with little heat.

“Nothing,” I reply, rolling my eyes at their expected chuckling. There’s always this scene, isn’t it? Now I can understand why.

“I do not care,” a metallic voice booms from the entrance of the dorms. “You’re with the 3rd Penal now and your excuses are pointless. Ariana and Fitzgerald, you can get the Chipper up to speed. We depart on one hour, no delays.”

Its message delivered, the AI summarily turns and leaves. I don’t remember ever seeing an android so shot-up to hell, clearly repaired over and over again. It sounds like a bad-ass and I’ve an inkling that’s true.

“There, that was the tin-man!” says Ariana, laughing as I frown. Seems I’m shit out of luck today. I still can’t send any messages through the comp or the Chip, they must have done something while they were transporting me here.

“Fuck, Ari, I said the noob would fall to us, but you had to come poke around,” grumbles Fitz as he finally moves to help me up.

“Thanks,” I say, unsteady on my feet enough that I opt to grip a nearby bunk to avoid accidents. “Why will we need guns?”

“Skirmishing,” says Fitz, sighing.

“It’s so much fun! You’ll love it!”

Unsurprised Narrator: No, I wouldn’t.

I need another ten minutes to shake off the lingering effects of being shot with far more stun guns and power that needed. But the duo walks with me to begin our preparation, consuming most of our alloted time.

“So, we watch your back, and you’ll get us the good stuff?” said Fitzgerald when we’re ready, pausing to stare down a muscled convict with Nazi tattoos all over until he gives up on raising trouble with my black ass.

“It’s a deal.” We shake on it on the tarmac, waiting to board on the trucks that’ll take us to the border. Besides a submachine-gun, now I have my dear dumpster by my side. I’m glad at least one of my mech-slots is being useful so far. It seems the drone was brought with me as Debi and Loide didn’t think to disable it or order otherwise. It should be of some help with how Fiddler modified it.

“You know what to do,” said Judges Harshly before climbing on the first truck. “Don’t get eaten by swamp-eels, I promise you we won’t come searching this time.”

A fucking swamp. The sky darkening. Unreliable allies. Man-eating alien eels. Mana-mosquitoes (manasquitoes?).

Oh man, what a blast.

***​

Back to the present.

Bullets start puncturing our cover as Ari’s surprise never materializes.

“Back, back, back!” says Fitz as he throws a half-defective smoke grenade to cover our retreat, the both of us running for another fallen trunk. We’re damn luck they can take so much punishment, but we’re running through them faster and faster.

“Ariana! Where the fuck are you?” he shouts as we settle into cover, looking back. “Oh, shit!”

When I turn, it’s only to see a single smudged arm sticking out of the maw of a huge, slimy creature. My drone we is face-down, unable to right itself as it’s stuck on a deep flooded hole. It’s clear the creature disabled it with one tail-whip, which it raises threateningly as we lock gazes. It’s the size of a car, its scale-less orange skin blotched and marred with gathered detritus and decomposing material from the swamp.

“Fire all you’ve g—” begins saying Fitzgerald, but the eel suddenly bloats before our eyes and then explodes, a thunderous sound-wave knocking us down. Soon it starts raining alien-eel guts and brains all over us. I hope I never experience something like this ever again. Disgusting.

“Motherfucker!” curses Ari, now freed and drawing heavy breaths — and in need of a bath or two. Fitz and I move towards her, but bullets start peppering the swamp grounds around us. I’m farther from cover, so my only option is to jump on the pond filled with still, stagnant water my dumpster is stuck in. It’s… not pleasant. I keep my head low as I struggle to find the footing underwater to allow me to push it to firmer ground where it can right itself. Though it comes only to my waist, it’s heavy as hell.

I hear Fitz’ rifle begin answering the enemy’s gun and spell-fire, but we’re clearly outmatched. I finally bring the drone back to the fight, instructing it to keep up with me and fire its dual laser beams at targets of opportunity. I rush towards where the duo is taking cover, a depression on the ground half-filled with foul-smelling water. I wince as my Controller module warns me of one, two, three hits on the drone following me. Fiddler is amazing, however, and the thing juts keeps on trucking, if slightly smoldering from a laser hit, corroded by acid spit, and with a seed-bullet crippling one of its lasers. Its tracks are something else not to give up the ghost on this hostile terrain.

“Where to?” I ask as we all gather, firing on the nebulous enemies boxing us in sporadically.

“I need… a breather,” says Ariana, still shaken and lying on the shallow pond, nearly submersed as she swats at mana-mosquitoes. I guess the spell she had been preparing against our foes was what she used to avoid becoming alien-eel chow.

“We might be… a tad surrounded,” Fitz replies after checking our flanks.

“Fuck! I said to shoot at the damn summoned creatures!” I complain, peaking out to fire a few aimless shots and confirm his assessment. How would an American describe this situation on a movie? FUBAR.

“Not my fault an eel ate our spellcaster and her best spell,” he retorts. Seed-bullets, spells and laser start coming too close and our opportunities to shoot back dwindle.

“Have you called for help?” I ask as things turn eerily silent.

“No need,” he replies, oozing sarcasm. “Of course I have.”

Because of the silence, we’re unconsciously whispering to each other.

Our enemy finally makes its move.

“Trespassers of the Unity! Parley!” an annoying, barking alien voice booms through the miserable swamp, the Chip’s translation half a second behind the words.

“And?” I ask, ignoring our enemies for now.

“The only ones who were close have already fled as soon as they had an excuse,” he says, shrugging. “I suggest you talk to the tree.”

“He’s not a druid,” giggles Ariana, despite our situation. She’s taking stock of what she still has to work with. Not much.

“I’m Lieutenant Barro! Okay, let’s parley!” I call out, peeking to see numerous Barkers out of cover and with guns trained on us, foliage cleverly used for camouflage making them seem more like trees than ever. They’re ringed by the incorporeal summons who have given us such a hard time, called forth by a competent spellcaster on their side, no doubt. I’d wager they’re creatures from the Barker’s home-planet, agile and capable of spitting acid.

“I’m Lieutenant Noonbriar. Surrender, Lieutenant! You’re surrounded! We’ll take you alive and the heads of your convicted companions.”

The duo by my side winces, I notice out of the corner of my eyes. They can have their bodies regrown and be brought back to life if their heads put on stasis, but I can understand the lack of enthusiasm. Decapitation doesn’t sound like fun, nor the months of probably painful regrowing of a body.

“Can I have a few minutes to confer with my allies?” It’s never a bad idea to buy time.

“You have three minutes and a half and then we’ll have your surrender or your bodies!”

“Generous fellow,” grumbles Fitz as I crouch to convene with them.

“Any ideas?” I ask. “I hate surrendering, but it’s better than the risk of getting our brains shot.”

“They want head, they’ll have to pay me dinner first,” replies Ariana, surprising a chuckle out of me, crass as the joke might be.

“I’m not sure the Unity would have us regrow our bodies,” says Fitz, somberly.

Aw, shit. Complications.

I’m deeply torn and indecisive, but I see a light at the end of the tunnel. Or rather, I hear a gatling-gun opening up behind us, followed by several kinds of gunfire.

The xenos are caught by surprise. Their encirclement broken suddenly, they scurry back to cover and fire disorderly our way. I think that’s that for our parley, fair enough. We look back to see guns, explosions and spells demolishing any resistance. Our mystery saviors advance is lightning fast and the enemy chooses the best part of valor, retreating in face of such a ferocious attack. Despite the volume of fire, I notice there are a lot less soldiers than I was expecting. In a moment, our saviors have already taken position next to us. One of them waves and rushes to our position while his comrades keep overwatch.

“The Cavalry is here!” announces the caramel werewolf with a laser shotgun, ridiculously painted with a claws-and-fangs motif. I notice there’s even a name on it — Helena. Wait—

“Diego?!”

His eyes bulge at the sight of me, completely ignoring Fitz and Ari. “Barro! What the fuck are you doing here with the convicts?!” He hadn’t even recognize me through the layers of swamp-dirt coating me. Thank God their assault unit was sent to help the convicts.

“That’s a long story. But I can’t tell you how happy I am to see your ugly mug.”

Yes, even if he will never let me forget this ass-saving.

After a moment, a black-furred Mapinguari with a runed gatling-gun joins us, Geni.

“Barro, it’s really you? There’s something really odd going on,” she says, frowning as the rest of her assault troopers advance to make sure the are is clear. “I want some answers from Command. Let’s go.”

Damn right, Geni. So do I, so do I.