PFC Dillion thought about when he was given the name "Serial Killer" as his UAC ID. Only the first reason he gave the doctor was correct, the second reason was not what was said. It was after basic combat training. His Drill Sergeant gave him the handle because he was the best at everything in training. Expert marksman did the obstacle course in record time.
He was awoken from his memories by one of the marines working the docking bay.
"Marine, go to the reception office to get your assignment it's through those doors that Counselor Swann just went through"
All PFC Dillion did was nod and continued on the walkway, as the ship moved to the second floor of the docking bay. He continued on the walkway up some stairs when he reached the platform where the entry doors were there was a scientist mumbling to his self. The scientist then grabbed him and said.
"It's not safe here, I am leaving this place you should as well."
PFC Dillion walked through the dual doors. Walking into a room with scanners he knew this as the decontamination chamber. The scanners are designed to make sure that your body does not carry any type of pathogen not native to the station. Its' purpose is to keep a sickness from spreading through the station. A voice came from a speaker on the wall.
"Marine, step inside the red square and stand still movement disrupts the scan."
He always hated these decontamination chambers the scanning process, no matter the outcome, always made him feel unclean. The scans showed he was clean of all contaminates.
"Okay Marine, your cleared to enter the station."
The door beeped and the panel turned from red to green. PFC Dillion walked through the door he was then in a hallway, the only door that was accessible was the one right in front of him. He walked through the door and saw a man behind a desk. The man looked at PFC Dillion.
"Welcome to Mars, Marine. Here is your Personal Data Assistant or PDA for short. This is the main way you are to receive information from members of the company, this is all done via e-mail. Just leave your bag they're someone will pick it up and take it to your quarters."
"Yea, sure just let me get something from the pack."
Dillion then went into a side pouch in his pack and extracted a roll of duct tape from it. Then he dug in the same pouch and retrieved a small data disk that was made to download data into his PDA.
"What's that Marine?"
"Rock songs circa late 20th century early 21st century. Old habits."
Dillion then inserted the disk into the PDA. All of the songs downloaded completely into the PDA.
"Marine, I see that you are to report to Sergeant Kelly ASAP, for assignment. Go through the north door, and follow the signs to Marine Command."
Dillion did what he was told. When the command gives orders he follows. Unless it is morally wrong. As he was deep in thought he noticed Counselor Swann, Sgt Campbell, and a Doctor. The conference room they were in was virtually sound proof. He couldn't hear anything but saw that there was an argument. He glared at Sgt. Campbell he was angry. Why did he get to keep his rank? Even get reassigned a better position, one less fitting. But he had orders to follow, and he intended to do so. He continued to follow these orders and followed these up until he reached the kitchen. He was hungry, after a 17-hour space flight with no in flight movie or meal; he decided that spending a few measly credits on a Billy Goat Burger was worth the ass chewing he was about to receive later. He walked to the snack machine paid five credits and had a hot steaming Billy Goat Burger. He ate the burger like he didn't eat in a week. There was a news program on but he didn't pay much attention to it. He had orders to follow, and he did just that.
Sergeant Major Kelly was watching the new transfer through the security camera feed. "Just great, probably some recruit fresh from training. He was supposed to make a bee line straight here." Sergeant Kelly shakes his head in disgust.
"Sergeant Kelly, sir, Dr. Betruger is on the comm. He says he wants to speak with you privately in your office."
Kelly nods to the communication ensign, then he moves to his office to take the call. As he gets in Dr. Betruger's face is on the screen.
"Sergeant Kelly, why did you authorize a new Marine Transfer?" Betruger's voice had an angry tone to it.
"Sir, I didn't authorize this, the Chairman did. I requested records on the Marine but there is some highly classified information in that file. I'm waiting for Earth UAC to analyze the file and send it in its entirety. "
"We made a deal, and the people we made a deal with the kind of people we made these deals with we can't just not hold our end of the bargain. You know the price; do you think this one is the one? The one our employer warned us about. Is this John Grimm?"
"No, nor is he affiliated with RRTS. He will not disrupt our plans."
"Excellent. But just incase, be sure he is far away from Delta Labs next month. Assign him to the security checkpoint at what is called the dungeon. Remember November 15th 2145 is the date we need to pay our debt."
The screen went blank. Sergeant Kelly started to think about the deal Betruger was talking about. But a noise stopped his train of thought. There was a beep and a flashing button. Kelly pushed the button for the internal intercom terminal.
"Sir, the new Marine has entered the first door of Marine Command."
"Very well, Ensign I'll be out in a moment."
Sergeant Kelly walked into the command center. He looked at a screen then a door opened behind him. He turned around and saw the Marine Transfer.
"Marine, you took your sweet time to get here. Your assignment is the security checkpoint in the dungeon. I set up a security drone to lead the way for you. I hope you follow these orders than the last ones."
Dillion did an about face and left the command center. When he exited the command center he saw the security drone. The security drone took him past the infirmary where he stopped and saw a marine on the infirmary table. He was screaming and mumbling indistinguishable words. The doctors took out a syringe and injected him with it. The marine suddenly went limp. If Dillion weren't a corpsman he would have thought he was just unconscious. But because he has seen the throws of death enough times to know this marine died. The security drone beeped bringing the Privates' attention back to the task at hand. Getting to the security checkpoint. The drone took him to the service elevator. He then entered the service elevator and was brought down to the maintence level.
"Welcome to the dungeon Marine, the most unexciting place on Mars. Get your gear from the storage locker from the one that opens."
PFC. Dillion walked over to the storage locker, and grabbed his pistol, with two extra clips, his machine gun, and put on his armor. When he put it on there was a strange hum and he spotted a wireless headset. He put that on and heard the security guard say over in his ear like he was standing right next to him.
"I am sure I do not have to brief you on your tactical armor but I am going to anyway. The hum you are hearing is the suit. It is powered and there are multiple ammo storage compartments. Whatever amount is in the suit it sends to every weapon via wireless link. Except for the pistol but the pistol is low-tech and is a side arm not to be used as a primary weapon. Okay, you've been assigned here at sec ops for Mars City: Underground. I'm just going to clear you and you exit here and go to your right and i'm going to download the authorization to your PDA."
The doors beeped and the panels showed green. He did as the Gunny said. He entered the door and the Gunny was sitting at the desk with his feet up smoking a cigar. He then motioned to the Marine.
"Have a seat, relax like I said welcome to the most unexciting place on Mars."
Just then Dillion's PDA beeped showing he had an e-mail.
"What is he up to John?" Counselor Swann asked his newly appointed bodyguard. Master Sergeant Campbell just shrugged.
"How the fuck am I supposed to know. I am just the muscle of this operation if things get sticky it's my job we make sure it becomes unsticky. This data mining shit is your thing not mine."
Swann sighed Marine's are a hotheaded bunch he thought inwardly as he looked at the screen. It was blinking ACCESS DENIED. He tried to look in at what was going on in the Delta Labs but he couldn't find out anything.
"That John was a rhetorical question. Anyway I'm completely locked out of anything pertaining to Delta Labs. I can't even access the janitorial records to see when they mop the damn bathroom floors."
Swann then pressed a button on a console and the vid screen came alive.
"Ah, Counselor Swann how may I assist your investigation?"
Swann disliked Dr. Betruger for some reason he just always hated the man and he didn't know why. But Swann kept his no nonsense face without betraying his anger.
"Doctor, I cannot access any records pertaining to your work in the Delta Labs. I need to investigate these matters further and make my report to the board so they can determine if you get more funding."
"Well next month we are conducting a big test and you will have the thing that you are waiting for. I will take you on a tour of delta labs myself personally."
"Fine, what do I do until then?"
"I will release all of the incident reports to you, Counselor but you must understand as a former scientist that uncompleted research cannot be released until completed. For security reasons."
Swann hated being called a former scientist. It was through innovations that Betruger and himself created that made this operational base possible. He knew that Betruger was very secretive about his projects. But the only reason Betruger wasn't released from the UAC was because of him. Betruger and Swann where never what you would call friends, they were academic colleges, but since he was voted into the main politics of the Union Aerospace Corporation he was deemed as a former scientist by Betruger. After long deliberations on Betruger's proposal he finally decided.
"Okay Doctor, I will look over these incident reports but do you really think these incidents will take a month for me to look over?"
"I am sure you are going to want to interview the staff involved with these incidents even though there has been a couple of fatal incidents the other incidents were non-fatal. If you have any questions on the reports interview those involved. Besides the next transport does not arrive for another month and a half. Good day to you, Swann."
Before the councilor could retort the vid screen went blank. Swann just snorted with disgust, shaking his head while he pulled up the first of the incident reports.
"John, call in a Mr. Berneche in for questioning. It's going to be a long month."
((UAC ID: SERIALKILLER))
((USER EMAIL: 3 NEW))
((INPUT: OPEN MESSAGE 1))
((MSG 1. From: Samantha DATE: 10-15-2145))
((SUBJ. No Subject ))
(( Hi we do not know each other but ))
((I see that you are a new transfer on mars.))
((I know this is weird but my name is Samantha, my friends call me))
((Sam. I hope we correspond with each other, it gets lonely here on ))
(( Phobos station. There are other people here I know but this is ))
(( primarily a communication relay center. Hopefully we can talk ))
(( some more. I would really like to get to know you. ))
(( Sincerely, ))
(( Sam ))
((INPUT: SAVE MESSAGE 1 ))
((MESSAGE SAVED
((INPUT: READ MESSAGE 2 ))
((MSG 2: FROM: ))
((DATE 10-15-2145 ))
((SUBJ: No Subject ))
((MSG: Tired of your boss, co-workers? Feel way too stressed ))
(( and feel like going postal? Before you do that call us! We can ))
(( send you any weapon you want. Tired of your boss, we have a ))
(( Plasma Rifle that can take care of that? Tired of everyone ))
((giving you shit? Make them eat a BFG round! If you are just ))
(( some nut that wants to kill people, an avid hunter, or just ))
((paranoid. We have the gun for you! ))
(( Who's your buddy? We are! ))
((INPUT: MARK AS SPAM; DELETE MESSAGE ))
((MSG 2 Marked as Spam! Message 2 Deleted! ))
((INPUT: READ MESSAGE 3 ))
((MSG 3: FROM: Dr. Parish DATE: 10-15-2145 ))
(( SUBJECT: Your Request is Pending. ))
((MSG:I Just put in your request to the Chairman at ))
(( Earth-UAC. So hopefully by this time next month I will ))
((get a reply. It looks hopeful. I looked over your Higher ))
((Education transcripts before I filled the e-form and I have to ))
((say Valedictorian!? Your request maybe granted but only time ))
((will tell. Oh and some of the scientist here in Delta has been ))
((telling me stories of weird noises. But I know being at Moon ))
(( Base One that being in an environment will make you hear ))
((some crazy things. I think these scientists are overworked and ))
((need to relax some. Oh Well. I will send you more information))
((as I get it. ))
((Your Friend, ))
(( Dr. Parish ))
((INPUT: SAVE MESSAGE 3 ))
Private First Class Dillion finished reading his new e-mails. Samantha? I wonder what she looks like. Well I should send her a reply even though it is kind of weird how she sent me this e-mail. I hope it's not a welcome bot, I hate those things. Dillion's inner musings was interrupted by the Gunny's voice.
"Hey, I know by looking at you, you're not fresh from boot camp. Why are you PFC still?"
The Gunny said this while smoking a nice smelling Cigar. From the smell it was flavored like a cherry. Dillion sighed even though he was expecting this question. Even though he does not like answering. With a begrudged look he started to tell the Gunny his story.