Our truck slid to a stop near the entryway to the mine, still hundreds of feet away from their primary fences, in empty dirt lots full of desert scrub. Bullets rattled against our hood and pinged off from Phyllis’ armor in the back.

I jumped out as soon as the truck stopped and started waving my arms. Bullets whined and snapped past me, and I flinched but held my position, still waving both arms frantically. All of the hobbs jumped out and took cover behind the vehicles, but everyone had their shields on already anyway, and I wasn’t really worried about anyone other than me getting shot.

Phyllis stepped up beside me, shaking the earth with each foot fall. “They seem friendly.” Bullets pinged and sparked off her armor as she spoke, her words mechanically enhanced from inside her helmet.

“Yeah, I figured this might happen,” I said. I stepped away from the vehicles, raised my arms over head, and started walking slowly toward their gates.

Another shooter joined the first, and I took a few rounds. People appeared in windows and doorways all over the compound. I winced and grunted in pain at the first bullet to blast through me, but my suit’s painkiller had kicked in by the time the second round hit, and it just didn’t have the same impact.

My starfish suit started work, deploying tendrils and repairing the damage. As I walked, more rounds sunk into me, sparked off the suit, and sent up clouds of dust from the desert around me. Everything was tinted with rosy light, and the pain barely registered.

“You can stop wasting bullets now!” I shouted as I walked. “We’re not here to fight!”

The shooting stopped, and I could almost feel the confusion on the other side of the fence. After a long moment of watching the huddled figures converse, one of them moved forward.

“Stay where you are, or you will be fired upon!”

I rolled my eyes and muttered, “yeah that’s an effective threat.” With my arms still above my head, I shouted back, “We brought food for trade!”

They froze. One of them broke from the others and ran further into the facility, eventually vanishing into a distant metal-roofed building.

Rayna called me, and I took a moment to open a com channel and place it out of the way inside my helmet.

“Front two trucks took fire, both damaged,” she grunted.

I glanced back to see one of the forward pickup trucks smoking. Steam was rising from the radiator, and I sighed again. The other one had a few bullet holes in the windshield, but seemed otherwise fine, but the first truck was toast. It’d never make it back to camp, and one of the civilians had loaned it to us.

Great, lost a truck on this run. If this didn’t work, and we came away empty handed, I was sure I would have a hobb revolt to deal with. Maybe Rayna would just order them to attack regardless.

“We’ll get the guns, Rayna, don’t worry,” I said.

“One way or the other, right boss?” She asked.

I shut my eyes, grit my teeth, and nodded. “Right. Just let me squeeze them a little first, and only kill anyone who attacks us directly, if we have to kill any of them at all.”

Phyllis thundered up behind me.

“What’s happening?” she asked. The helmet’s faceplate was lifted, and she was smoking a joint, as usual. Her gun arm was rotating gently, heat shimmers wafting out of the barrel in small puffs.

“Nothing, Phill. Just making contact,” I said. Jada stepped up silently behind Phyllis, claws gripping her heavy mace. I nodded at her, and she glared at the militia in the distance.

At the distant building, a small crowd formed outside of the doors and part of it began moving toward us.

They traveled in an inverted wedge formation, with a large, bearded man at the center of it. I sighed and shook my head. The inverted wedge left their VIP open to attack from the front, where we were.

Were they worried about their own civilian population, flexing their perceived combat superiority, or just incompetent idiots who didn’t understand the point of their own formations? I guessed the latter, none of them were walking backwards or even watching behind them. At least they looked cool, I guess.

They approached the gate and broke formation, spreading out and pointing rifles at us.

Phyllis giggled and closed her faceplate.

I stood and gently raised my arms again, watching in silence as they approached. Each of them was heavily armed, with rifles and handguns in abundance. Several of them stared at Jada with obvious hatred. For her part, Jada was in a combat ready position, partially crouched and snarling.

The big man at their lead was wearing a plate carrier over a black ‘tactical’ top and black ‘tactical’ pants. Each of his followers wore an identical outfit. The only thing tactical about their clothing was the uniform nature. It ensured they had a slightly lower chance of shooting one another if a conflict arose.

By contrast, I wore a pair of loose fitting silk pants, a set of leather strapped sandals, and a mirror surfaced helmet. The starfish suit counted too, I guess, but it was so much less obvious since the upgrade that I hardly noticed it when looking at myself.

Phyllis towered at my side in her mech, marijuana smoke leaking from the helmet. Behind us, a small army of alien hobgoblins stood, each staring and waiting for my word to attack.

Rayna and I had discussed the entire situation at length on the way over. Each hobb was wearing a personal shield that would stop or turn aside any physical object traveling at a high enough rate of velocity. Energy weapons or explosives were needed to overwhelm the shields, and none of the militia carried anything but conventional Nu-Earth firearms.

The lead man with the beard stepped forward, one hand on the rifle hung at his midsection. The man was middle aged, with grey streaks running down his cheeks, and some heavy lines on his face. His beard was large, but immaculately trimmed, jutting down to just above his plate carrier.

“What are you doin’ here?” he barked. “This is private property.”

I smiled, but quickly realized he couldn’t see my expression, so I cocked my head to the side instead. “Yours? Or The Dearth Conglomerate’s? I wonder who holds the MortBlock.”

His jaw muscles tightened, and his index finger curled out to extend across the trigger guard of his rifle.

I waved a hand, cutting off any incoming angry responses. “To answer your question directly, we came to trade. Brought plenty of meat, six pallets straight from the butchers table. Tyson Dawes, of Silken Sands,” I said, reaching a hand out for him to shake.

The tall man stepped forward and grabbed my hand, before trying to yank me toward himself. I recognized the move, a classic strongman attempt at domination. I’m sure this guy thought of himself as an alpha male.

When I didn’t stumble forward as he had intended, something popped in his elbow, and a strained look appeared behind his beard. I squeezed his hand lightly and stopped when I felt his bones rubbing together beneath my palm. Strength based intimidation techniques don’t work when you have artificially enhanced strength yourself.

“Cole,” he wheezed, gripping his hand. He stared up at my reflective helmet. “Cole Middler, captain of the Arms Keepers.”

“Who’s the general, then?” I asked.

Cole narrowed his eyes at me, and I heard some grumbles from the men at his back. “Tops out at captain these days,” he said.

“Ah, good. Just making sure I have someone with the authority to trade,” I said.

“I’m as high up as they get here. What is this meat you have for trade?” He gestured behind us, to the trucks.

“Oh you’ll love it. This stuff is yarsp meat, from those crazy swarming land wasp things. Tastes like salt pork, or bacon,” I said. I moved out of the way so they could more easily see the trucks. “Well, you may want to run a metal detector over the pallets in the first couple trucks, but other than the bullets your guys shot into it, it’s a solid food product. Had some for breakfast myself.”

The men behind Cole began grumbling again, but he raised a closed fist at them to silence the dissent. In the distance behind them, a man on crutches furiously moved toward the gate from the bowels of their facility.

Cole pointed. “My men did that to your truck?”

“Yeah,” I sighed and nodded. “Understandable, I guess, given all the recent events on our lovely little planet.”

“Is it your planet?” Cole asked. I turned to face him, expecting a taunt, but the question seemed genuine.

“Yes, Cole. I’m from the same planet as you,” I said, looking his group up and down. “Just adapting better than you guys, I guess.”

He stared at me for a long moment, while Zach approached on his crutches. As soon as the man was in range, he began shouting.

“That’s him!” Zach’s voice faintly called out to us. “That’s the guy! That’s the fucking guy!”

Cole turned and sighed, staring at Zach. “What is he trying to say?”

“He’s trying to tell you that ‘I’m the guy.’ He’s probably trying to bring to your attention the fact that I’m the man you sent him to kill, likely on the orders of Dearth,” I said, casually.

Cole turned and stared at me, eyes wide and jaw clenched.

“How am I doing? Pretty good guesses?” I asked.

Zach made it then, interrupting us. “Cole! Cole, captain! That’s him, that’s the guy! He’s a freak, be careful.”

“Dammit, Zach, I know who he is. Get back inside where you’re covered, you’re a target out here,” Cole barked.

“But captain!” Zach protested. “This man is our enemy! He killed Arms Keepers soldiers!”

“Get him out of here!” Cole roared. One of the men in his escort turned and grabbed Zach by the elbow.

“Yeah, he’s really weakening your bargaining position, huh?” I asked. When Cole turned to glare at me again, I raised my hands. “Hey, I don’t take any of it personally, let’s call it bygones and look to the future, right? Only men I killed were men trying to kill me. Natural right of any man to self-defense, isn’t it?”

Cole’s jaw muscles clenched again. I was glad for the helmet, it offered me a significant advantage in negotiations.

“Look, we have a small shopping list. If you make our list happy, you get all the meat here, plus we can do regular shipments for more trade in the future. We have our food production up and running,” I lied.

“And what’s on your shopping list, exactly?” Cole asked, eyes narrowed.

“Three things. Arms, ammunition, and fuel. Hell, I’ll even throw in the truck your boys here shot up on the way in. You guys can fix it up and it can replace the truck I kept from your assassins earlier this week,” I said.

“Arms and ammunition?” Cole asked. His right eyebrow raised to a peak.

“And fuel, if you can manage it.” I said. “Arms and ammo are the important ones on the list for the moment though. Gotta keeps the yarsps at bay.”

More men began emerging from the various buildings across the compound, each wearing a plate carrier and holding various weaponry. They began walking casually toward the fence line. Zach fought back against his escort, trying to pull the crutches away from the other man.

“This is fucked! Fucked, man! I gotta talk to the captain, he doesn’t know this guy!” Zach shouted. He engaged in a verbal back and forth with his escort, which I watched with interest until Cole shifted his stance to block my view.

“Fuel is no problem, we can trade for that,” he said.

I nodded my helmet and said nothing.

“How much iron are you looking for?” Cole finally asked.

I nodded again, and raised a hand to rub my chin, rubbing the bottom of the helmet instead. “Yeah, about that. Half.”

“Excuse me?” Cole said. It wasn’t a question, not the way he asked it.

“Half of your guns and ammunition, plus two hundred gallons of unleaded, if you can spare that much. Don’t want to put you guys in the dark or anything,” I said.

Cole’s jawline had hardened as soon as I started speaking, and his eyes quickly followed. A handful of the men at Cole’s back had openly scoffed when I asked for half of their weaponry, and a few were smiling, conversing with one another in low voices and looking at my hobbs.

Cole took a breath and opened his mouth to speak, but I raised a hand and cut him off.

“Before you tell me to go fuck myself Cole, I want you to think about your situation good and hard,” I said. I lowered my voice and my volume, so the men at his back would not easily over-hear us.

“I know you need this food, I know your people are fighting each other over candy bars,” I said, watching his reaction closely. His eyes widened slightly, before he got the expression under control and changed it from surprise back to anger.

“And I know you probably have fifteen weapons for every man on that fence behind you, stashed in an armory somewhere on this property. My request is reasonable. I want your guns, I want your bullets. But you need my food,” I growled. “After what happened between our camps, I think I’m being generous with my prices. You can always try your luck selling guns on BuyMort, Dearth is buying 'em all up right now. You like the sounds of your guns going to them?”

Cole scowled further. “No food in the world is worth that much in iron. Even if I could give away that many of our tools, we’d be massively over-paying. I don’t fuck on the first date, son.”

My teeth clenched, and I fingered the bull’s head ring on my finger. “No, Cole. Everything is worth exactly as much as people are willing to pay for it. And you’re going to pay me half of your guns and ammo, plus two hundred gallons of fuel, if you want this food. That’s the price.”

He shook his head and set his jaw. His hands hung casually from his plate carrier. “No.”

“Okay,” I said. I nodded and turned back to Rayna. “Never-mind. Pack everyone up, we’re rolling out!”

Rayna blinked in confusion at me, but angry voices from behind Cole grabbed our attention. The militia members in the compound had spread out, taking up defensive positions and gathering near concrete emplacements.

When the smaller group near us began shouting, all of the group behind us moved quickly into cover and pointed their weapons our way. I faced Cole to see him hunched up behind his rifle, trained at my bare chest. His men formed up behind him and did the same.

“You’re right. We need that food, but I really don’t see any good reason to be paying for it,” he said.

I shook my head and raised a hand to stop violence from my hobbs. “Don’t do this, Cole. You’re about to get your friends killed.”

“Alpha target, strike!” Cole shouted into his shoulder.