I am awake again. What horror awaits me this time? When will this neverending hellish cascade of torture end? Where are my comrades? The old man promised that one day we would all awaken again together when the time was right.

What was that old man’s name again? Who am I? I don’t remember anymore. It’s been too long. The grey images of faded faces are all that I can recall, and even that is dim. Please just let it all end. Let my soul be reclaimed once and for all.

UTHLANGA – FORMER HUMAN COLONY – CONTESTED TERRITORY

Dan’s time aboard The Avalon and the ensuing transit to the front lines had been far too short to justify the current hell in which he found himself. It had been a life of relative luxury for a couple of weeks, followed by the standard military lifestyle. He had spent the time that had been given to him well. He’d toured The Avalon and saw everything from the acres of artificial farmland to the massive hangars contained within the outer layer of its hull. If anything was a spectacle, it was that ship and the wonders contained within its hull.

Now, however, he found himself locked in a battle with another sniper. His spotter had already been eliminated. He’d only just gotten to know the kid, too. He’d seemed nice and had been competent even if he wasn’t very experienced. Now he was on his own, letting his ‘light’ stealth exosuit sink into the mud as a torrential downpour reduced standard visibility to basically nothing.

Not that he could complain too much. That mud he was partially submerged into was doing a good job of helping his suit hide his heat signature. The stealth exosuit he was equipped with was good but hardly perfect, as evidenced by his spotter’s torso having been turned into so much paste to be washed away into the mud. He didn’t have the luxury to focus on that, though. What was important now was trying to find the enemy sniper.

Thankfully whoever had designed their kits had some brains. While he had run away, the drones in his spotter’s kit that hadn’t been blasted away by the shot had managed to self deploy. They had linked to his local tactical network, and now he was carefully watching the footage they were delivering to his heads-up display. The species the enemy preferred to use for their snipers were a fairly small bipedal predator that looked something like a cross between a housecat and a macaw. In addition to just being a smaller target, the suits they wore were extremely effective at dampening their heat signatures.

However, they did have an unusual quirk that made them somewhat easy to spot if you had the appropriate equipment. Every now and again, they would let out a burst of garbled radio waves. As far as anyone could tell, it was literally just noise, but it was a consistent phenomenon across all members of the species they’d been able to observe.

Dan, of course, had no way of knowing if that species was the one currently hunting him, but it was the most likely. So he kept himself tuned to the radio spectrum that would reveal his target and let his drones search. It was a simultaneously stressful and boring process, the monotony of listening and waiting clashed against his instincts, warning him of the danger. His training allowed him to stay focused, but staying on high alert for so long was always hard. It was part of the reason why spotters existed, to let the sniper stay fresh while they located the target.

Before his train of thought could lead Dan to more depressing avenues related to his latest spotter, one of his drones pinged him. A sudden burst of radio waves had been detected. Three other drones had also detected it, and from that veritable cornucopia of information, he was able to get a position. He narrowed his scope in on where the transmission burst had been from. His visibility through the light rain and layer of mist was horrible. Between drone footage and shifting spectrums on his scope, he was finally able to find his targets.

It looked like there were three individuals, and they were in what looked to be a fairly well-reinforced building. He couldn’t identify which one was the true threat, but they seemed to be huddled close together, so that made it fairly easy. He’d use an explosive round, and with any luck, it would penetrate the wall and then detonate, killing all three of them. He chambered the round and took aim. None of his targets were trying to move. They were either decoys or didn’t know they’d been detected. Either way, their existence would soon end.

The rifle slammed against his shoulder as the explosive shell was magnetically accelerated along the shaft of his rifle. He watched the bright flash as the shell detonated on the outer wall. He sighed in frustration, but before he could pull away to try and chamber another shell to finish the job, the building began to sag. After a few moments, the upper stories collapsed, leaving nothing but a pile of rubble.

Satisfied with his work, Dan quickly packed his kit and went on the move again. He couldn’t take the chance that the real sniper was still out there. Any competent sniper would use that shot to learn his location. He’d be less worried about immediate reprisal since he doubted they would be able to pin down his exact location. However, one of the enemy’s ammunition types was a biological weapon that released heat-seeking insects that burrowed into your flesh, and you did not need a precise shot for those. Thankfully they seemed to be something the enemy preferred to use rarely, so he hadn’t seen them in action yet. Just the horror stories he’d been told were more than enough to fuel a few night’s worth of nightmares.

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He trudged through the rain and mud for several minutes. He didn’t hear the telltale crack of a shell breaking the sound barrier, so he assumed he was safe for now. He would have to find a way to link back up with the main force, but first, he had to get somewhere safe enough that he could relink with the global tactical network. He’d kept it off for the mission to keep emissions to a minimum, but now he desperately needed it. If he was correct, he was nearly sixty miles from any friendly bases and did not have the necessary supplies to make it back.

As he trudged along, his drones followed and provided him intel periodically. Whenever he received a transmission from them, he would alter his direction at random. At one point, he even just turned right around and started walking the way he’d come. So far, they hadn’t detected any enemy soldiers in the area, but that didn’t mean they weren’t there.

Paranoia clung to Dan’s mind like a shroud as he continued on, trying to locate some form of shelter before night fell. The local ecology had suffered greatly, not only from the initial capture of the planet but the subsequent attempt to recapture it that had turned into a seemingly endless siege. Even with all of that punishment, some of the local fauna had managed to survive. Most of those that had remained were nocturnal predators, which Dan had no desire to meet.

Trying to locate anything that might count as shelter, Dan stopped for a little bit and panned the nearby area with his scope. It took some time, but the pause proved worth it when he found what looked to be a farmhouse. It was mostly collapsed and had clearly seen better days, but if there was a basement or at least one intact room, it would be more than good enough for his purposes. If nothing else, there would be enough material to produce a modest barricade, which would serve to keep out all but the most enthusiastic predators.

Dan began the trek to the house. Luckily it was mostly downhill as he had found himself on a rise. He made his way down the hillside, trying to find solid footing where he could. Unfortunately, most of the vegetation on the hill seemed to have died, leaving several sections of the hill noticeably unstable. Dan measured his options for continuing down, noting a much more circuitous route that would involve him going slightly back up the hill in order to take what looked to be an old dirt road the rest of the way down.

On the other hand, there was a much more direct path to his destination. Parts of it looked washed out and slightly unstable, but there were enough solid rocky parts to it that he was hopeful it would be fine. He looked to the other path and then the sky, which was beginning to turn from its normal deep blue to a shade of purple. He did not have much time before his life potentially became much more difficult.

Gritting his teeth, Dan made his way down the shorter path. The first several meters were fine. He took it slow since the path was steep, and in some areas, he was nearly climbing down instead of walking. And then what he feared would happen came to pass.

He placed his foot onto a steep, heavily rooted piece of the path. Everything seemed firm, and he stepped forward, putting his full weight onto the patch, and then the rotten roots betrayed him and gave way. His leg fell out from under him, and he slammed back into the slightly rocky ground, his helmet managing to protect him from taking too much damage. His suit continued down with the falling dirt, and he bounced off the ground with a thud eliciting a gasp of pain as he attempted in vain the regain control of his motion. In spite of his efforts, he continued to tumble wildly down the hill before he violently struck a half-rotten tree. The tree gave way and fell, but in its final act, had arrested his momentum.

Dan, unfortunately didn’t know this as the impact knocked him out. His suit, now that he’d stopped, began to assess the damage to him. It noted a concussion, two cracked ribs, and that his lower left leg was broken. The suit’s basic level of rigidity had prevented more serious breakage, but what was there was extremely serious. The suit injected medical nanites and locked his leg to act as a cast until proper medical action could be taken. Finally, the primitive computer embedded in the suit recognized the danger of the situation and activated its emergency transponder, loudly squawking its location to everyone nearby.

Some time later, as the sun was finally setting, four short feathered aliens with pig-like snouts approached the hill cautiously. They were bipedal and, if not for their other defining features, might have been mistaken for very muscular human children. Each of them was wearing an identical uniform of black and shades of dark grey. They also carried strange angular weapons that, while distinctly guns, would look odd and clunky to human eyes.

Dan, if he’d been awake, would have recognized the aliens as one of the types that were common in the lower ranks of the Slug’s military. Intelligence had given them the label of ‘Pigflys’ given the combination of their snouts, feathers, and strangely enough, insect-like eyes. He would have also noted that the weapons were one that was similar to the CER of his homeworld, except that it cycled between different types of laser.

The pigfly’s noticed Dan’s still body and one of them signaled two of the others to approach. They made their way slowly, their helmeted head scanning this way and that. Dan would have noted that the visors that covered the alien’s faceted eyes acted in much the same way his own helmet’s faceplate and his scope did and allowed them to see across a variety of spectrums.

Finding no traps, they proceeded forward and approached Dan. One performed the age-old test of kicking his body to see if there was any response. After seeing nothing happen after the kick, the other two approached, and one of the pigfly’s pulled out a device and pointed it at Dan.

After a few seconds, the device chirped and displayed a readout on its small screen. The pigfly snorted and let out a series of indecipherable buzzes and squeals before grabbing another device and attaching it to the suit. The two that had approached initially grabbed each end of Dan, and they four marched back the way they came.