Sheriff Havelock recognized the look on the Marine Sergeant’s face and moved without question. Knox watched him for half a heartbeat, then turned and called for his medic.
“Krey, on me. We’re going on patrol.”
Krey didn’t bat an eye, falling in beside her squad leader without comment. They left the clearing together, rifles at the ready, moving deeper into the dark wood. What had been a relatively uneventful deployment had just become far more interesting.
Within a minute, they linked up with Richards and Perez, both standing still, eyes fixed on the woods ahead.
“We’ve been tracking something big,” Richards said quietly as Knox stepped up beside him. “Chasin’ a buncha smaller somethings.”
Knox frowned. “We know why the Applebaum kids were out here?”
“Yes, Sergeant,” Krey answered. “Mr. Applebaum said the pigs got out of their pen. Sent his kids to round ‘em up. Never said if they found them.”
Knox studied the ground. A subtle path of destruction led deeper into the woods—broken limbs, trampled brush, the occasional tree pushed over at an odd angle, bark scraped raw.
“Hmph. Let’s go find the herd.”
“Or what’s left of it,” Richards muttered, already moving.
Perez fell in behind him. “Aye aye.”
Krey dropped back behind Knox to cover their rear.
Ten minutes later, Knox was considering calling it. The kids were safe. Whatever had attacked them was dead. The pigs were either long gone or—more likely—no longer alive. A convenient meal for whatever had retreated deeper into the forest.
Then Perez’s voice cut across the internal squad channel.
“Found it.”
Knox grunted and checked his HUD, the overlay shimmering across his augmented vision as he pulled Perez’s position and moved toward it.
He found the Private leaning against a tree about twenty meters short of another clearing. Sweat poured down Perez’s face, his skin pale beneath the grime.
It was warm—but not that warm.
Knox frowned. He remembered the clinic.
“You okay, Private?”
Perez nodded, dragging the back of his glove across his face. “Just a headache, Sergeant.”
“Krey. Check him.” Knox turned back to Perez. “Show me.”
Krey stepped in behind the Private, already pulling out her diagnostic tool. A thin cable extended from its casing, snapping cleanly into the access port behind Perez’s ear before he could protest. Data began to stream across her display directly from his NCP.
Perez flinched but kept his rifle steady, pointing ahead with his free hand.
“Something big and hairy. In those bushes. White fur. Everything else on this planet’s blue-green.”
Knox followed the gesture, letting his optics zoom slowly. At first, all he could make out was bulk—too much of it—matted white fur rising and falling with slow breaths.
He checked his HUD again, Richards’ marker hovering seventy meters off to the flank.
“You got eyes on, Richards?”
“Copy. Eyes on target. Whatever it is, it’s sleeping.”
“More detail.”
“Negative. Curled up tight. And… Sergeant? It’s definitely not in the bestiary.”
The bestiary was the catalogue of known wildlife on Caldera the Colonial Marines considered potentially dangerous. Every colony had one, and Caldera’s was considered virtually benign by all standards. Quill-cats that roamed the woods and predated on smaller mammals, along with the Caldera boar that haunted the high peaks of the planet’s namesake ranges, were the only animals of note that warranted a caution flag. Even the planet’s venomous insects posed a greater statistical threat than its megafauna.
Quill-cats and Caldera boars, despite their size and temperament, avoided humans unless cornered or defending young. Nothing in the database matched what lay sleeping in the clearing ahead.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
Sergeant Knox knew the routine well enough to see how this would play out. If he walked away now, higher command would simply send him back—with orders to track it, document it, and hand the data over to the Colonization Authority’s xenobiology division. The eggheads, as they were affectionately and universally known.
He wasn’t inclined to make two trips.
“Alright, listen up,” Knox snapped over the squad channel, his intent carried as cleanly as spoken words. “Richards, Perez—hold position. Krey, you’re with me. We’re gonna get a better angle on this thing.”
Before moving, he issued a silent command through his Integrated Command Interface.
Record all.
Data collection override enabled per command authority.>
Under Colonial Authority regulations, full sensory recording was not something a Marine activated lightly. By default, the NCP filtered and discarded most experiential data—sights, sounds, biometrics—retaining only what was necessary for mission reports and medical review.
A full capture could only be triggered under three conditions: a verified life-threatening emergency, active combat operations, or a direct command override by an authorized officer. As the highest ranking military authority remaining on the planet, Knox qualified on the last count.
It meant everything the squad saw, heard, felt—even the stress responses of their own bodies—would be archived intact. Reviewed later. Replayed. Second-guessed.
But if this thing turned out to be something new, something dangerous, Knox wanted a record no one could dismiss.
As he and Krey worked their way around the sleeping creature, the remains of the Applebaum pig herd came into view. What was left was little more than a wide smear of blood across the grass, bones picked clean and scattered haphazardly.
“Yeah,” Krey sent across the squad net, her optics streaming live. “Definitely a predator.”
They circled wider.
The animal shifted in its sleep, releasing a low snort that vibrated through its massive frame. As it rolled, its head came into view.
A quill-cat—but nearly twice the size of any they’d encountered during their two-year rotation on Caldera.
That alone would have been enough.
More disturbing were the horns.
A pair of heavy, curled black horns jutted from its skull, the unmistakable hallmark of a Caldera boar—large, mature, and male.
It stretched one massive, feline paw, raking furrows into the dirt as if adjusting its bedding. Then it went still.
Its breathing slowed.
The nostrils twitched once. Then again.
“Shit,” Richards muttered over comms. “I think it’s got our scent.”
Almost on cue, the creature pushed itself up on its forelegs, raising its horned head and drawing in a deep, deliberate breath. A moment later, a pair of yellow eyes slid open—locking directly onto the brush where Richards lay concealed.
“You had to say something,” Krey murmured, already sighting down her rifle.
A long, lizard-like tongue flicked between daggered teeth, tasting the air. The creature’s gaze drifted slowly across the clearing, pausing—lingering—on each of their positions.
The creature rose fully to its feet, unfolding into something far larger than Knox had judged from the ground. Its back arched, muscles rolling beneath its hide as it turned—
—and something massive dragged behind it.
The tail was thick and armored, ending in a knotted, bone-heavy club that scraped a shallow furrow through the dirt as it moved. Plates overlapped its length, dull and scarred, utterly reptilian.
Nothing on Caldera had a tail like that.
“Boss, we should consider backing out,” Richards urged, barely restrained panic leaking across the squad net.
If that thing were staring at him, Knox might have felt the same.
“Do it, Corporal. Perez, cover him.”
“Copy. Moving. Slow.”
The creature stretched lazily, massive limbs unfolding as its oversized yellow eyes remained fixed on Richards’ position.
Knox was about to issue another order when he realized Perez hadn’t acknowledged.
“Perez, copy orders,” he sent, already moving, slinking deeper into the woods as he followed Krey back toward the Private’s last position.
No response.
“Private. Report.”
His mental voice sharpened, command bleeding into concern.
A cold prickle crept up his spine just before Perez finally replied, sounding distant—distracted.
“Level twenty-five? Chimera? What…?”
“Private, what the hell are you—”
Knox froze mid-sentence as the creature’s massive head snapped toward Perez’s position.
Its yellow eyes narrowed.
Then it moved.
The roar that followed was wrong—part dying deer, part enraged bear—and it hit them like a physical force. Knox and Krey stumbled as a pressure wave rolled through the trees. His augmented body compensated instantly; he caught Krey by a rear armor strap and yanked her back, catching her before she face-planted into a rotting tree trunk.
Knox turned just in time to see the Chimera’s armored tail blur through the air toward Perez.
The Private was already off balance. To his credit, he went with it—dropping hard, letting momentum carry him down as the tail screamed past inches above his head.
The bony club at its end struck the tree behind him with the sound of an orbital strike.
The trunk exploded.
Wooden shrapnel tore through the clearing, embedding splinters into surrounding trees by the dozens—maybe hundreds.
Before anyone could react, the Chimera reared, tail rising high overhead.
Then it came down.
Perez was just starting to rise when the club caught him square in the chest.
He let out a single, startled grunt.
Then he vanished below Knox’s line of sight.
Half a second later, Knox’s HUD updated.
Private Perez was dead.