Chapter Four

The sun rises. Kal'reegar stands at the edge of the cliff, his eyes taking in a landscape of pure white mixed with the violet-magenta tinge of early morning light. A gust of wind blows a flourish of snow up off of a drift, casting a shower of golden sparkles high into the air. The air itself is clear, last night's blizzard no where to be seen. There is nothing before him now but the silent, naked beauty of a seemingly endless plain of snow. Kal scans the vista yet again, searching for any landmark at all that might tell him where the rest of the platoon is. If he squints into the distance he can make out a vague bluish haze that might be a forest, or a city, or nothing at all.

He turns to his left, where the squad's sniper whose name he has forgotten is scanning the horizon through the scope of his rifle. "Anything?" he asks the marine. She shakes her head.

"Nothing, sir. I can barely see with all the glare, and looking into the sun doesn't help either. I'd say there's something out past the plane, but I can't tell what."

Kal nods, stepping back from the cliff's edge. In the blinding storm the previous night the squad had almost literally run into the side of the low cliff. Kal decided to work their way around and try to find a way to the top. It had taken them most of the night to find any sort of path, and by the time they reached the top they were exhausted and cold even in their insulated suits. Half the squad had remained on guard while the other half attempted to pitch their light-weight shelters. That had taken the rest of the night.

The dome-shaped tents are arranged in a close semi-circle, their semi-active camouflage fading into the landscape around them. When the flaps are drawn they are barely visible at all. The fatigued squad sits around a heating element in the center of the half-circle. They had tried to melt the snow, then given up when it revealed nothing but more snow beneath it. One man is running a pen light over his rifle, trying to thaw the thin coat of frost already forming on the metal. The rest sit pensively, their eyes flicking around the empty landscape, to Kal, and back to the snow.

Kal looks around the group, wondering how things could have gone so wrong so fast. There's been no radio contact from Zarra's squads since the previous night. What do I do? he wonders helplessly.

…

"We've got our first target! First mate to the bridge!"

McCormick looks up at the distorted bark of the PA system, then quickens his pace to a jog, pulling himself quickly up the ladder to the upper deck. James follows, uncertain if there's something he should be doing.

When he pokes his head up above the ladder he sees that the observation room has transformed since the last time he saw it. The rows of computers along the sides of the room are alive with readouts and glowing columns of data. The central console has a man sitting behind it, tapping at the holographic screen. He looks up as McCormick strides toward him. "I've got a good one," he says, his fingers continuing their dance over the translucent keyboard. "Scans are showing two main eezo deposits near the surface, one at six hundred meters and another at eight-fifty. Give me a minute, I'll bring 'er up on the big screen."

James climbs onto the deck, tilting his head back as the shutters slide away from the observation screen overhead. The view is black, save for a scattering of silver stars.

"Aaand here we go," says the man at the console, and James jerks back in alarm, stifling a cry as an entire planet seems to fly towards them, stopping only a few feet from the glass. He casts a furtive glance at McCormick, but he and the other man seem unfazed by the seeming near-collision.

McCormick eyes the planet overhead appraisingly. "Looks temperate," he remarks.

The seated man nods. "Yeah, haven't run scans yet but I'd say so too. There's a decent amount of eezo in there, too. It;s not the mother-lode, but it'll make Sawyer happy."

McCormick claps the man on the back. "Well, good then, because a happy captain makes for a happy ship."

The man snorts. "Yeah, whatever. What'd make me happy is to get my cut and get my ass back to Ilium."

"Oh really? What makes ye so hot t' get t' Ilium then?"

"Nothing a perpetual loner like you would understand, McCormick."

"Oh, I think I understand. Th' allure of the blue rose has captured many a lonely sailor's heart."

"Shut up, you dumb monkeyfuck. You been alone so long you don't even remember what a woman looks like."

"I remember well enough. Th' women I remember had hair on their heads though, not tentacles."

"They're not tentacles, asshole!"

James only half-hears the banter, his eyes fixed on the planet hanging suspended above their heads. Green and brown continents poke up out of wide, rust-red seas. Icy white spreads out from the globe's bald poles, swirling clouds wrapping around the whole picture. Light flashes from within them. Lightning. I'm seeing a thunderstorm from above. "What's it called?" he asks. He lowers his gaze, seeing the men's questioning faces. He suddenly wishes he hadn't said anything; his voice sounds awkward and out of place in his ears. "The planet," he says, feeling stupid.

The man at the console shrugs disinterestedly. "I don't know. Probably doesn't have one. Stuff out here is mostly unexplored."

James looks back up at the giant viewport. He's filled with questions, all of them unanswerable and probably wholly uninteresting to his crewmates. Does anything live there? Why is the water red? Why aren't the clouds red, too? Are those green spots trees and grass, or just green rock? If they're plants, does that mean that there have to be animals, too? Why don't they care? How could anybody not care? We could be the first ones to step on this world. The thought makes James want to plant a flag, to make a camp, set out into the alien wilderness and keep a journal of his amazing findings that will someday be published back on earth. He wants to see things that no man has ever seen, and then call Kal and tell him about them. But he's only here to break the planet open and take the money out, and Kal is light-years away in a secure military ship somewhere, unable to receive his calls. The unfairness of it all makes James want to cry a little, so he turns his back on the beautiful planet, trying not to think about what they are about to do to it.

A head appears, followed by a body and legs as a stocky man with short hair and a thick black mustache clambers up the ladder. He steps past James without acknowledging him, giving the planet overhead a cursory glance. "Hm," he grunts. "Briggs! How many deposits are we looking at?"

"Two, sir," answers the man at the console. He keys in a few commands and two flags appear on the planet's surface, a bubble of data attached to each.

"How much?"

"Uh, looks like about ten hundred kilos in site 'A,' maybe around two-thirty in 'B.'"

"We hit 'B' first then. Where's that good-for-nothing Rogers?" The captain marches back to the hatch and stoops over, cupping his hands to his mouth. "Rogers! Where the hell are you?"

After a few moments Rogers's voice comes drifting back up from the deck below, sounding put-upon. "Getting the crew, captain. Just like you said."

"Don't give me that crap, I told you to do that five minutes ago!" Sawyer steps abruptly back from the hatchway as a helmeted head comes up the ladder. The quarian James saw the day before emerges, quickly stepping out of the way of the captain.

"Excuse me, sir," says the quarian, nodding to Sawyer. "Rogers said you wanted us up here."

"Hm," says the captain, turning away and walking stiffly to the slightly elevated platform at the center of the room. He shoots McCormick a stern look over his mustache. McCormick takes the hint, stepping down off the platform to join James and the quarian.

In a few minutes' time the rest of the crew has made their way up from the other decks. They stand before captain Sawyer, who attempts to preside over the gathering but to his obvious chagrin fails to be taller than anyone. "Alright everybody," he says briskly, looking around at nobody in particular. "We've found our first planet. Three hundred thousand kilograms of element zero, right beneath the surface."

"When do we make orbit?"

Sawyer looks down sharply to see who has derailed him. Geoffrey Rogers looks back at him peevishly, his hair mussed and dark circles under his eyes. "We make orbit when we make orbit, Rogers. Ask the navigator if you really want to know. Now,-"

"When do we make orbit, Briggs?"

Briggs looks up distractedly from his computer screen. "Ten hours, I think. Add five minutes or so for an FTL jump into the system. I'm still working out the course."

Captain Sawyer coughs loudly, but Briggs has already gone back to his console. The captain turns back to his crew. "You've got ten hours to get prepped for blasting. I want Elmer's crew decided on. Everyone else is blast-team. Snap-to!"

There are a few half-hearted "aye, captain"s, and the crew begins descending the ladder again. James looks around, wondering what he should do, when he feels McCormick's hand on his shoulder. "Hoy, lad," he says, and James looks up to see that he has Anderson by the shoulder with his other hand. "I'm takin' Anderson down to get fitted up," McCormick continues. "I'll come get ye when we're done. Where'll ye be?"

"I don't know," says James, feeling lost. "What's going on?"

"Nothing yet," explains McCormick. "We've got to get into th' planet's orbit first. Then we run a couple more scans and drop a shaped charge right over the dig site. When th' dust clears, a blast team goes down t' carve out a more specific tunnel. That won't be you; ye need a bit more experience before you can do that. Ye'll be in the team that goes in after with Elmer. Ye'll hack out the actual minerals, pack 'em in crates and send 'em back for us. Boring work, but good exercise." Seeing James's expression McCormick smiles. "Why don't ye come down to engineering with us while you wait? That's where everything's happening right now."

…

It is nearly noon when Retellis squad makes radio contact. The young marine's voice sounds thin over the commlink, distorted by static and barely contained panic. "Feraror, come in! Feraror, do you copy? Elarus, come in. Elarus, do you copy?"

Kal starts when the voice breaks the quiet inside his helmet. He fumbles with his omni-tool, quickly switching himself onto the inter-squad frequency. "This is Elarus one. Identify. Over."

There's a pause, and then the soldiers voice comes back, sounding immensely relieved. "Keelah! This is Retellis squad. They've been jamming us, I've been trying to contact someone since-"

"Identify yourself," demands Kal, cutting the idiot off before he can reveal anything over the radio. Just because they're not jamming us doesn't mean they're not listening. "Where's Feraror one actual? Over." he asks, referring to commander Zarra.

"I don't know. We got separated. Sergeant Denaia is the head of Retellis squad—"

"Well then get off the line, you damned fool, and let me speak to him!"

There's a burst of static, and the a clipped female voice comes on over the commlink. "Elarus one, do you copy? This is Retellis one actual. Over."

"I copy, Retellis one. This is Elarus one actual," answers Kal, thankful to be talking to someone with some discipline. "What's your situation? Over."

"Not good," replies the sergeant. "The platoon fragged at the LZ. We lost our bearing in the storm, and we've got five missing and one confirmed dead. The good news is that we found the machine gun. The bad news is that it's got us pinned down." There's a brief pause, and then the sergeant's voice returns. "I guess it can't hurt to tell you where we are; they know anyway. We're north of the LZ, about two hours march through some really shitty terrain. The gun is on top of a rock formation. If you can get here your sniper should be able to take it out without too much trouble. Over."

"We'll be there. Heading out now. Over." Kal flicks off his commlink and turns to his squad. They're watching him expectantly. "Retellis squad is pinned down north of the LZ," he says. "Pack up and get ready to head out."