Alright Jason, it's time to stop feeling guilty about having unprotected sex with a native - after spending the last few days chastising them for doing exactly that - and focus on the task at hand.

And what a situation it was.

There was nothing quite like the smell of smoke combined with the acrid stench of popped roach. When combined with the laser holes and craters strewn across Mining Site Five’s industrial zone, it created the impression that a hell of fight had gone down.

One he was was glad he’d missed.

Part of him had been worried that the final push for the central mining nexus would end in one big ambush. Certainly, that had been the scuttlebutt going around camp prior to his deportation on his mission of diplomacy. Scuttlebutt that he’d known was mostly being perpetuated by the regiment’s aliens, ones who’d dealt with Roaches before and were a little perplexed by the meekness of the resistance they’d faced.

Of course, part of that could have been attributed to the enemy having next to no idea what to do about the regiment’s armored company. Tanks were a weapon system that hadn’t been seen on a modern battlefield in nearly two hundred years. And for all the reputation for ferocity the Roach’s held, they were at the end of the day little more than poorly equipped pirates. Not the sort of people who would be well situated to rapidly adapt to the sort of threat an outside context problem like heavy armor presented.

Still, that didn’t mean they wouldn’t have something prepared. And given that Mining Site Five was the single most important strategic location on the planet, if there was any place they were going to pull off some kind of final trick, it would be here.

Which was why a lot of people were wary of some kind of obscene final trap - like the entire colony being rigged to blow the moment the regiment rolled in.

Clearly that hadn’t happened.

Though apparently the Roaches had pulled something, given how Jason had spotted no less than four burnt out tanks situated outside the colony on his ride in. Clearly the fight for the colony hadn’t been bloodless. Which went someway to explaining the mood of most of the Marines he saw scattered around.

Rather than a feeling of celebration at hard earned victory… there was a certain tension in the air.

He couldn’t help but note the subtle tightening of the postures of the Marines guarding the entrance to the MC-L3 as he approached.

“Champion,” the two women acknowledged before stepping aside to let him into the mobile commands base. “Lieutenant Avilla is expecting you in the briefing room.”

Jason nodded politely as he stepped past.

Avilla was exactly where they said she would be, albeit, looking a little worse for wear. The young plant woman had three different omni-pads open in front of her, and was in the process of tapping away at a fourth when Jason stepped in.

“Champion,” the woman acknowledged quietly. “Please, take a seat.”

He did so, Yaro and Nora taking up positions behind him. As he did, he couldn’t help but notice just how… droopy the Lieutenant's leaves were.

Grey too, he thought.

While she was normally a vibrant green – or any number of other colors depending on her mood – right now the logistics officer's coloration looked more akin to that of a plant that hadn’t seen either sun or water in several days.

“Post-battle operations,” Avilla said, having noticed the direction of his gaze. “You fighting types tend to be busy before a fight and during. Us logistics people, we’re busy before, during, and especially afterward.”

“As you say ma’am,” Jason responded, seeing no need to argue. He was a little surprised to hear such a frank statement from the usually shy and soft spoken Lieutenant though.

Then again, most of the time he saw her was when she was in the presence of the rest of the command staff. And he could personally attest to the fact that people could act significantly differently when under the stern gaze of their superiors. A fact that seemed to go double for Avilla given that, for reasons he’d not yet seen cause to investigate, their moth-like Colonel seemed to have an inherent distaste for the plant woman.

…Or she’s just tired, Jason allowed.

“I do say,” Avilla grunted, placing her pad down. “Aside from those who didn’t die outright, most of our people came through that last fight with minimal injuries. Nothing I can’t have fixed with our onsite equipment. The problem is that I’ve got three people that are critical enough that they need medical facilities that we only have available in one of our ships on orbit.”

Jason frowned, wondering if he was supposed to be hearing this. “Then send them back to the funnel, ma’am.”

“You think I haven’t thought of that? Or mentioned it? I have. Repeatedly. For weeks.” She threw up her hands. “We’re tits deep in enemy territory. Anything I try to send back to the landing site runs the risk of being ambushed by Roach forces we missed on our mad dash up here. Which means they need an escort. A sizable one. But we can’t afford to split our forces to provide one.”

“Are you sure it’s that bad, ma’am?” he asked. “From what I was hearing before I left, the Roaches have pretty much collapsed across the continent. Something that should only be worse now that we’ve crushed them here.” He shrugged. “Hell, I heard on the way that even our ‘allies’ have started making some actual headway on seizing the other two landing sites.”

And with a small skeletal garrison back at their own initial landing site, the Imperium would officially possess the only means of getting on or off Raknos-Three.

Not that we didn’t already have that, given that we still have the ships that brought us here floating around in orbit, he thought.

Still, seizing those landing zones would effectively spell the end of the Roach resistance on the planet. From there, they’d need only tighten the encirclement on the remaining Roach forces. Roach forces whose supplies had likely been dwindling from the moment the Imperial task force had shown up in orbit.

“Yeah, well they could all be dead right now and we wouldn’t have a clue.”

Time seemed to freeze as the alien woman’s muttered words penetrated Jason’s thoughts.

“What do you mean?” he asked carefully.

“You don’t know?” Avilla asked, looking up at him, slightly wide eyed.

Jason felt a sinking feeling. “Know what?”

“Comms went down a few hours ago.”

Jason shot up, alarmed. “What!? Completely?”

The plant woman continued to eye him carefully before nodding slowly. “Not a thing past two hundred meters.”

Jason felt his blood run cold. That was bad.

Very bad.

“Do we have any idea what’s causing it?” he asked. “Or why it’s happening now?”

“Not a clue,” the plant woman shrugged, leaves transitioning to a sickly yellow. “Our comm people seem to think it’s more likely to be worsening weather conditions rather than active enemy interference.”

“And you believe them?”

She glanced at her omni-pad. “I think it’s possible. Maybe even probable. Goddess above, we know our comm trouble has only gotten worse since we left the landing site. Throw in a worsening in the storm and it’s entirely reasonable it would knock out our long range comms completely.”

Jason shuffled in his seat. “Has the storm gotten worse?”

He’d certainly not noticed anything of the sort. Just the same constant wind, rain and lighting that seemed perpetually constant on Raknos-Three.

Relative worseness was a bit hard to judge when the baseline was already pretty torrential.

“According to our people who watch that kind of thing… marginally.”

That wasn’t what Jason wanted to hear. It didn’t prove one way or another what had killed their comms.

“So what are we doing, ma’am?” he asked. “Other than sitting around with our dicks in our hands.”

The Lieutenant raised an eyebrow at that, leaves flushing just a shade towards pink, before she mercifully decided against commenting on either his language or his odd turn of phrase.

“For now? Sitting tight in the hopes that whatever this issue is, it might resolve itself.” Jason opened his mouth to speak, but the plant woman cut him off. “As opposed to blindly abandoning a superior strategic position as a result of our loss of communications. Given that if this is some manner of attack, shifting us away from Mining Site Five might be its intended goal.”

“Like startling a ground Hreff out into the open,” Jason heard Yaro muse quietly to herself.

I can sort of see the logic in holding position then, he thought. Still…

“That doesn’t sound like Cleff.”

He’d sat in on enough strategic meetings to know the woman was a firm believer in the idea of a perfect defense being a good offense.

“No, I suppose it doesn’t,” Avilla allowed. “Fortunately, our Colonel doesn’t have many other options but to sit tight. She’s expanded our sentry perimeter and sent out a few scouts, but beyond that, there’s little we can do but remain on guard.”

“How are the sentries communicating with each other?” he asked.

Avilla frowned. “We’ve broken out a number of… signal flags and flares. We’ve also set up a system of runners.”

Alright, runners and flares were one thing but…

“Would someone waving a flag even be visible in this weather?” Jason asked incredulously.

Avilla just sighed, rubbing her closed eyes. “More than someone without them would be. It doesn’t matter in the end. The sentries and outbound scouts are our most important assets and they’re the ones with the signal flares. If we do come under attack, we won’t be totally blinded to it, nor completely without means to communicate. Even if those means are a little … more medieval than we might like.”

Well, Jason couldn’t argue that.

“Enough about that though. I see you’ve recovered the target designator.” She gestured to where Yaro had the device slung over her shoulder.

Jason nodded absently, mind still on the various bombshells that had just been dropped. “That and a few other things too, but they’re in the truck.”

The plant woman’s leaves brightened a bit at that, even if only a little. “That’s good. Given our current situation, every little bit helps.”

-------

No attack came.

Not even a full twenty six hours after the initial comm trouble began.

It was enough to send a man mad with worry.

Fortunately, the military had long since found many a means of keeping tense Marines occupied while waiting for combat.

Specifically, setting up fortifications in anticipation of said combat. Which they’d have been doing anyway - but the looming possibility of enemy action in the near future added a certain frantic intensity to said activity.

Just outside the window, Jason could see marines digging in. Which was an impressive feat, given the facility sat on hard volcanic rock and asphalt. Hard given solid rock. Fortunately, some bright spark had pointed out that the regiment was currently occupying a mining facility. Which meant that despite the recent Roach occupation, there were still plenty of tools lying around with which to dig foxholes and set up machine gun nests.

…It also helped that some of the previous defensive positions that the Roaches had used were still more or less intact. Though he couldn’t help but wonder about the morale of anyone who occupied those, given that the walls or floor were all too often stained by the remains of the previous occupants.

Fortunately for him, Jason wasn’t one of those people. He was far too important to waste on an activity as menial as digging or occupying a foxhole.

No, he got to risk his life in other, far more creative, ways.

“Motherfucker,” he cursed as one of the loose wires he’d pilfered gave him a small shock.

“What are you doing?”

Jason glanced up over the pile of machine parts he had scattered across the desk in front of him to where Nora stood in the open doorway of the office he’d pilfered.

“Trying to fix our comm trouble,” he muttered.

“With a bunch of stolen Roach rifles?” Nora shook her head skeptically. “Well, whatever it is you were doing, pack it in. Cleff wants you out there inspiring the troops.”

“Yeah, no.” The engineer audibly scoffed, returning his attention to the rifle software display on his omni-pad. “I think that having our compatriots be able to communicate with each other from more than two meters away would beat any speech I might make.”

Nora went deathly still, before she spoke with deliberate carefulness. “You realize that you’ll be disobeying orders? Orders from the Colonel herself.”

Jason resisted the urge to hiss in frustration. “I am utilizing my position as Champion to… defer those orders in favor of my current – far more important - task.”

“Your self-appointed task.” Nora pointed out.

“Yes, well I tried to explain my idea to Lieutenant Harlston, but our storied lead combat engineer just looked at me like I was crazy, before suggesting I leave the engineering work to those more ‘qualified’ before she continued overseeing the digging of yet more incredibly useful holes.”

“You mean defensive emplacements?” Nora deadpanned.

“Holes,” Jason shot back. “Holes.”

Perhaps he was a little bit bitter about the encounter, but that was only to be expected. It wasn’t his fault he wasn’t really qualified for… anything. The responsibility for that lay squarely at the feet of the Shil’vati military and their ridiculous habit of pandering to an outdated aristocracy.

Nora sighed. “She’s not going to like it. She might even have you charged with something.”

“Right before a fight?” Jason shot back. “Because I insisted on doing something useful?”

Of course, it was still entirely possible that there wasn’t really an attack coming. That their comm trouble really was just the result of worsening weather conditions.

He wouldn’t bet on it though. The timing of it was just too coincidental. Just after the Terran 1st seized the central mining nexus, and just before the other two Imperial regiments seized the other two landing sites.

No, something was rotten and everyone knew it, even if no one wanted to outright say it.

“For disobeying orders,” Nora stressed. “Right before a fight.”

“Does she even need me?” he muttered, continuing to work. “She’s already stripped me of my ‘security detail’.”

Which was the reason why he’d been up here alone prior to Nora walking in. Both she and Yaro had been assigned to the role of ‘runners,’ along with a few other non-essentials. People whose job it was to run messages from command to the various security checkpoints scattered around the site.

“Plus,” he continued, “having a pair of MPs come in here and drag me out would probably do more damage to morale than me not showing up for a pep talk.”

Nora continued to stare at him, before sighing. “Just to be absolutely clear, you are refusing to obey a direct order?”

“Yep.” He made sure to pop the ‘p’. “You can take that back to her with my compliments.”

He didn’t see, so much as hear, Nora leave – because she made sure to slam the door loudly as she did.

In the silence that followed, Jason could only come to a realization.

Huh, I guess Tisi was right, he mused.

He really did break protocol the moment a situation actually became dangerous. At that realization he could only shake his head as he continued inputting code into the software program on his omni-pad.

I guess I really am just not suited to the military.

That realization bothered him significantly less than he imagined it should.

----------

Of course, when retribution for his insolence came it came promptly. Or at least, with all the promptness military bureaucracy could muster. Which was to say it took two hours.

Except, it wasn’t a pair of MP’s stomping into his room to drag him bodily out to answer for his act of civil disobedience.

No, something much worse happened.

Cleff came in person.

Which… he should have expected really. She was a hands-on person. And while lots of people were busy, by now every order that could be given from a command level had been. If they so choose, those members of the senior most command staff had little left to but wait.

The figurative calm before the storm and all that.

Of course, given what he knew of the good Colonel, and the fact that it took her two hours to march over to him, he figured she hadn’t been spending her time sitting around on her ass. She’d probably been out there scaring the shit out of some poor band of enlisted by looming over them and barking orders.

“Ma’am,” he said as the moth woman stepped into the room, her porcelain-like face a mask through which he couldn’t get even a hint of her emotions.

Which was fine, because he had a feeling he had enough emotions swirling inside of him for both of them. Mostly pants-shitting terror. Still, he took some small solace in the fact that his initial greeting to the woman had only a hint of a quiver in it.

Well, that and the fact that he’d finished his little project about thirty seconds before the woman had stalked in.

And he used the word stalked in a very literal manner. One needed only a single glance at his commanding officer’s teeth to know that her species were likely obligate carnivores and apex predators too.

“Champion.” Jason couldn’t help but shudder at the woman’s voice. That creepy double toned ‘chittering’ thing she could do was in full effect. “Is there any particular reason you felt the need to disobey my direct orders?”

She sauntered over to him and there was a distinct clicking sound as she drummed her fingers across the desk she was using. “And do feel the need to be frank with me. Very frank. After all, I left my security detail outside so we could have this chat without witnesses.”

Jason couldn’t help himself. He gulped - though little went down, given that his throat had suddenly become very dry.

“Las- Lasers!” he didn’t quite croak, suddenly standing up. He grasped the Roach rifle in front of him and – thrust it into her hands.

--------------

“Lasers?” Cleff asked in befuddlement, her antennae stopping their mad twitching for just a moment as she regarded the weapon she was now holding.

Said confusion only grew as her Regimental Champion stood up and strode across the room to stand on the other side.

This was not the way she’d envisioned this would go down. She’d had a script in her mind as to how this little confrontation would go. It was one she’d been preparing for a long time.

Apparently it happened in nearly every regiment. The Regimental Champion getting just a little too big for their wings because they’d grown a little too accustomed to the extra leeway their position gave them.

Sure, normally they didn’t immediately jump to outright refusing orders, but Cleff considered that to be pretty in-keeping with what she’d seen of Humans thus far.

And especially this Human, she thought.

She looked down at the Roach gun she was now somehow holding. It was of Imperial make. Likely looted somewhere down the line. At some point its new owners had scrawled ‘Eat Slime and Die Imperials’ along the side.

That wasn’t what caught her eye though.

No, that was the omni-pad that had been duct taped to the side. One that was open to a very simple chat function.

“Type a sentence into the chat box,” the Human said from across the room.

...She almost refused to do that on principle.

The sheer nerve of this Human? She’d come down here to chew him out for refusing her orders and here he was telling her what to do!?

Fortunately for both of them, no one else was present. Because if they were, she’d immediately have been obligated to have her Champion dragged outside and brought up on charges for dereliction of duty.

Which was why she’d left her guards outside, because that was exactly what she didn’t want to happen here given how disastrous that would be for morale. Just before what might be a hell of a fight. However, if it were just the two of them she could get away with scaring the shit out of her uppity underling and leaving him the firm understanding of what he could and couldn’t get away with.

Still, she’d admit she was curious. And given that no one else was around to witness this bizarre exchange, she figured she’d give the man the benefit of the doubt. Typing in an old Triki saying, she turned back to her Champion.

“Now what?” she asked, keeping her tone clipped enough to let the Human know he was on brittle branches.

Not that he seemed to notice at all.

Which is sort of to be expected, given just how insane Humans seem to-

“Alright, now I need you to shoot me in the chest.”

Cleff felt her antennae twitch.

"...What?"