They emerged into a small clearing within the forest, blinking heavily in the sudden bright sunlight. The Pioneers were surrounded by dense jungle vegetation, bushes and ferns littering the ground as vines swayed gently from treetops. These veggies, however, had decided to be a little quirkier than your average plant. It looked as though a paint factory had upended itself on top of the forest floor, dyeing the brush a panoply of oranges, blues, reds, and purples. Even the vines had turned a shade of sickly yellow, with the trees as the only holdouts for a normal, vibrant green. All this life was overseen by a bright violet sky, its uncanny light a shimmering backdrop to the whole scene. The group gaped in awe at the spectacle surrounding them, momentarily stunned from sensory overload and sheer wonder. Of course, they had been briefed on the planet, but nothing could have prepared them to see the real thing in person.
Beyond just the plants, the forest chittered with life and sound. The calls of birds and insects were the most prominent noises echoing all around them, but Daniel could also hear the low, bellowing call of an unknown creature from somewhere deeper into the jungle. It was faint, definitely far away, but that groaning cry sent shivers up his spine. It shocked him out of his stupor and prompted him to grip his spear harder before peering suspiciously at his beautiful surroundings. It might look nice, but this place was as deadly as it was pretty. He was doomed if he fell under its spell.
Just as he thought that, another notification popped up on their HUDs: “Rendezvous with your group. Waypoint designated.”
A circle of blue light popped up in his vision somewhere further into the jungle. He saw the others get startled out of their own trances by this notification, and they all collectively tried to memorize the direction of the waypoint before dismissing the text and the indicator. They couldn’t afford to clutter their field of vision while walking through dangerous territory. In a flash of blue light, they slipped their spears into the dimensional storage spaces created by the Codex. In exchange, they replaced them with machetes.
The Codex’s storage was what they would be relying upon to hold their salvaged valuables. It had a size limit, so they couldn’t just shovel everything they could find into it. Living things were also a no-go. But assuming they limited themselves to what the Imperium considered valuable, they would have plenty of room to store what they needed to meet and even exceed their quotas, alongside any supplies they may need to survive. As it was, all of them had been given water and rations for 3 days, five spare outfits, a machete, a few other basic supplies, and the spear as a part of their standard issue equipment. Daniel also had an old-fashioned, .50 caliber XCL Jackson & Crock gunpowder revolver, eight dozen bullets, and other personal items. The revolver could only do so much against a powerful Xenomorph, but it would kill nearly everything else. His standard issue and personal stuff weren’t included in his Personal Storage value, since they didn’t count against the quota.
Machetes in hand, they began cutting their way through the jungle. The vegetation outside the clearing was so dense that moving around would have been impossible without the long knives. Even with them, it was slow going. The air was so humid they could practically wade through it, and the entire party was covered in sweat after just 30 minutes of walking. Swarms of insects added to their misery, eating away at them as they struggled through the thick brush. If the Imperium didn’t thoroughly inoculate its Pioneers from most diseases, the bugs would have been a fatal threat rather than just an uncomfortable nuisance.
Things got a bit better when it became the Dunid’s turn to take the lead. The big guy was the most vulnerable to the heat of all of them, thanks to his furry body, but he didn’t show it as he trundled to the front of their line and started cutting. He hadn’t bothered taking out a machete and chose to slice through obstacles with his big white claws instead. They flashed in the sunlight as they churned through the undergrowth, and the party’s pace noticeably quickened. A blue-feathered, yellow-bellied bird with a comically large black beak flitted down from the treetops to perch on Daniel’s head. He was shocked, but didn’t immediately reject the bird, wanting to see what it would do. The creature quickly went to work pecking at the insects swarming him, using its beak like a spear to snap them up. It defended him valiantly from the pests, and several of its friends were soon swooping down to perch on the others. Daniel grinned at the sight of four separate birds hanging onto the Dunid and waging a diligent war against insect kind. As he watched, a notification popped up in a blue square next to one of the birds: “Yellow-Bellied Spear Sparrow: A harmless avian common in many humid and insect-laden environments. Their diet consists purely of flies and other small insects, and they are widely considered helpful pest control animals. Adult Spear Sparrow spotted!
Class: N/A: Threat Assessment: N/A”
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“You’re late!”
After just 10 more minutes of walking, they heard a loud and abrasive voice ring out from further in front of them. Immediately, the birds fluttered away from them in fear as they walked into another larger clearing. The fifteen other Pioneers from their group were all milling about within the forest’s opening, but the first person the five in Daniel’s squad saw was Sergeant Gulliman.
He was a large, hairy man with a bushy reddish-brown beard and angry green eyes. He towered over even Daniel, to the point that the only taller person in the 20-man group was their Dunid companion. This seemed to earn the nonhuman Gulliman’s special wrath, and he glared particularly hard at the shaggy man when the five of them lined up in a row to present themselves. The sergeant’s most unique feature was a diagonal scar over his right eye, and it widened a bit when he opened his mouth to yell again: “It’s been over an hour since I set that point! Daylight’s bleeding, and we need to move! Get any slower and we will leave you behind. Do you understand me?”
They had been walking for 45 minutes maximum, but didn’t dare contradict the sergeant, who was also the strongest person on the expedition. After some contrite nodding, Gulliman seemed satisfied: “If you ladies are done standing around, we have work to do. My pod’s survey system picked up a river roughly 40 klicks east of this point. We can set up camp near there.”
As they started mustering to follow orders, Daniel caught sight of Jordan. His friend gave him a lazy wave, which he reciprocated. He also locked eyes with Omar, who gave him a stiff nod that Daniel returned even more stiffly. Daniel had known Jordan since training, but the other 18 guys had been randomly assigned to his group. He had tried to get to know them over the last few days in transit, but most of them had proven reticent and distrustful. He only knew Omar because of the man’s penchant to be irritatingly nosy and straitlaced.
The 40-kilometer walk through the jungle was grueling. Hours flowed like molasses as they trudged through the obstacle-laden terrain, the sun climbing higher in the merciless amethyst sky. The temperature further increased as the party simmered in the moist air, and they needed to take regular water breaks. Some men rolled up their sleeves or even removed their outer shirts in response to the heat, but Daniel resisted the urge to join them. Doing that would increase their chances of getting sunburnt and open them up to more insect attacks. The men should have been trained on this, but they didn’t seem to care.
A hike that might have only taken them 2 hours on open ground turned into a 6-hour slog over rolling hills and through large piles of vegetation. They didn’t even have the luxury of those blue-feathered birds swooping down to protect them from insects. Daniel didn’t know why, but he suspected that their group was large and noisy enough that all the birds were scared away. There was one minor bonus on the trip, however.
Out of the corner of his eye, Daniel spotted a particularly bright gleam of crimson in the dense underbrush. Since he had been relegated to the back of the line, he decided he could chance a few seconds of investigation before anybody noticed. Peeling off from the group, Daniel cut through a few obstructions before he found what he was looking for. Hanging from a tree was a strange blue vine with a broad translucent tip. Nestled within that tip appeared to be a collection of juicy, rubellite berries, and as Daniel grew closer, he got some po-pup text: “Hila Berries: Useful in the creation of stimulants and poisons. Provide an energy boost when consumed raw, but with an added hallucinatory effect. Value per Berry: 20 Credits”
Daniel’s eyes practically popped out of their sockets when he saw their value. At his old job, he was making 18 credits per hour. Each of these berries was worth more than an hour of his work in the past, and there were around 25 of them just in this one vine. He hurriedly cut the tip off the vine and stored it away before hustling back to rejoin the group. This forest didn’t seem quite so bad after that.
Eventually, they could hear the sound of running water, and to the ragged group it was the sound of deliverance itself. They picked up the pace and soon emerged on the lush banks of a burbling, gushing river. The water looked cool and clear, like a stream of pure sapphire cutting through the heart of the jungle, and it took all their discipline to keep from running to bathe in it. There were likely predators in there, after all, and it would have to be carefully investigated before they did anything with the water. Instead, they drank greedily from their canteens and set about following orders.
Having reached their destination, Gulliman ordered them to make camp on the banks of the river, and the whole group spent the next few hours doing just that. By the time they finished setting up, the sun had begun to set, casting the sky in bright blues and yellows. They sat in a circle around a small fire pit in the waning hours of the evening. The day’s mutual hardships had caused them to bond, allowing them to open up to each other. They munched on rations and talked about their histories and motivations. A sallow-faced older man was one of the first to really put himself out there: “Family needs the money. I’ve got five younger kids, and I can’t make ends meet just working normal jobs.”
“Man, I’m sorry to hear that. I just got into this job for the adventure. Money can’t hurt either, I suppose, " quipped a cocky looking red-haired fellow, probably no older than 16. They went around the campfire, some of them talking about providing for loved ones, but most of them talking about the prospect of rising above their station in life and getting rich. Jordan joked about being in too much debt, but Daniel knew there was more to his story than that. All of them, even Gulliman, talked about growing up poor on various planets across the Imperium. The only ones who hadn’t said anything after the first few hours were Daniel and the Dunid, but that soon changed: “What about you, scarface?” called the red-haired kid, looking over at Daniel, “What’re you doing here?”
Daniel watched him for a moment, then he turned away. Gazing into the fire, he opened his mouth and began to speak.
