Reality twisted.
Existence bent, warped, and smeared.
Somewhere, Watts heard screaming, a discordant swirl of damned souls that bled slowly into some kind of stuttering, electronic feedback.
A cold wind shrieked through him, flash-freezing his soul.
Red and orange and black swirled before his eyes, slowly coalescing into images...into faces. Faces not of this universe, not human.
Pure evil.
And then everything seemed to snap. Like a soap bubble popping, he found himself standing on a rocky surface.
Watts cried out, stumbling, falling to one knee, as his whole body seemed to twist and writhe in a million different directions. What felt like cold electricity whispered across his skin, sending millions of pinpricks stabbing into his flesh.
"Little warning would have been nice!" he snapped, struggling to keep from vomiting.
"You're fine, Corporal. Suck it up," Kaplan replied from somewhere nearby.
It took him a few seconds, but the man's words helped ground him back to his own body. He couldn't remember all the times he'd been told to suck it up or get the fuck over it by a superior. And usually they were right.
It's not like you had a lot of choice in his line of work. Either you sucked it up or you died. Or, worse, someone else died.
Watts got back to his feet, clenching his fists. He quickly scanned his environment, then wished he hadn't. He spied eight armored figures, men and women transformed into faceless green statues wielding weapons. To his immediate right was a rock wall with an opening near the middle, to his left, however, was something vastly different.
They were standing atop a small plateau that was set several hundred meters up the side of a mountainous cliff sheer. Beyond the plateau was an immense landscape that went on for untold miles. The landscape was…
It was unlike anything he had ever seen before.
Most of it was made of an immense plate of black rock that slowly gave way to what seemed to be a desert wasteland. There were jagged, broken mountain ranges, making up a kind of backdrop to this environment. Dotting the landscape were curious constructions, structures that must be truly huge. One, to the far right, was what looked like an ancient fortress, built like a layered cake, the flat gray exterior dotted with windows. Closer to his position was what seemed like an immense coliseum. Presiding over all of this, to the far left, was a titanic black tower that struck pure fear into the deeper parts of his heart and soul.
But what truly terrified him was both the fact that rivers of what appeared to be blood cut through this landscape and the fact that all of this was beneath a bloodred, constantly shifting sky. It was like he was looking into a nightmare.
"Where are we?" Watts heard himself whisper.
"Less you know, happier we'll all be, now come on!" Kaplan snapped.
He began leading them through the opening in the cliff. Watts made himself follow. He had a job to do, orders to follow, and he intended to do so. But this was so jarring that questions kept popping up at a seemingly exponential rate.
Namely, where the hell were they!?
He didn't like that this place reminded him of...well, of Hell.
And that transition, that portal...he shuddered at the memory. How long had these people been doing it daily? How long was he going to be here? What would he be expected to do here? And where the fuck was here!?
The opening led to a natural alcove about five feet across. It lasted only about a dozen feet before it opened up into a larger area. Cliff sheers shot skywards all around them, creating a boxed in area that held a small human outpost of some kind. All he could see ahead of him was a wall bracketed by watchtowers, manned by other Space Marines.
Watts and the others walked up to the wall, standing before a gate big enough to drive a truck through.
"Hades Squad reporting in!" he called.
"Roger that, Hades Squad."
Watts glanced up. Someone was standing on the wall now, directly above their position. "Letting you in now."
The gate opened up.
The squad walked through it and it slid shut behind them. For some reason, seeing a collection of clearly human structures was deeply reassuring. It was a small outpost, just four structures within the walls, one in each corner. The rocky ground had been covered by an even coating of metal plates. The only problem, really, was that he could look up and still see that seething, crimson sky. He made a note not to look up.
"Stay here," Kaplan said as they reached the middle of the open area. He walked forward into one of the buildings.
Watts studied the others. For the most part, they almost appeared at ease. That seemed insane, but, then again, he'd seen soldiers get used to all kinds of crazy shit. It was kind of in the job description. How long had they been coming here? What was the UAC doing here? Again, he couldn't help but wonder where here was.
A moment later, Kaplan returned. When he did, as if acting on some unseen signal, every soldier who wasn't a part of their squad began to head for the exit. Shift change, he realized. As they made for the exit, Kaplan walked back up to Hades Squad.
"All right boys and girls, listen up. Davis, Bryant, Wong, and Morris, you're with me on cartography duty. Fletcher, Watts, Rogers, and Berry, you've got guard duty back here. Get to it, Marines!"
Watts was directed to one of the four watchtowers that made up the corners of the base. He walked over to it, let his shotgun hang by its sling as he hustled up the ladder. He felt bulky in the envirosuit but knew he'd get used to it eventually. As he got up into the watchtower, he managed to get a better view of the surrounding area. Not that there was much else to see. The gray rock sheers on all sides of them extended well above the base, about a hundred feet straight up, showing only the red sky that was mostly blotted out by the roof of the watchtower. But he could also see beyond the metal walls of the outpost now.
There were three other openings in the cliff sheers with natural alcoves beyond them, snaking away, out of sight. After a few minutes, he watched Kaplan lead the other half of Hades Squad out through one of these openings.
They disappeared from sight.
Several minutes passed in silence until he heard the soft click of someone connecting to his communications suite.
"Hey, Watts, how you holding up?"
It was Fletcher. He glanced around briefly. Rogers and Berry were on the ground, apparently talking with a few men in white envirosuits. Fletcher stood up on another watchtower, on the other side of the base.
"I'm doing okay," he replied. Damn she had a sexy voice.
"I imagine you've got a lot of questions and despite how freaky this place looks, not a lot actually happens here. I'll answer what I can. Though obviously this stays between us, you know, as much as it can stay between us."
"Okay, here's my first question: where the fuck are we?"
"I'm not sure. If the scientists know, they aren't saying, but I get the feeling not even they are sure. Best guess based on rumor and what I've seen so far is another dimension."
"Jeez...all right, what happened to the other guy I'm replacing? Kaplan's answer felt like a dodge."
"Technically, it was true. Cloud did get transferred to Gehenna Squad, the guys we just relieved. What he didn't say was that the guy he replaced killed himself two days ago."
"I see..." He considered his next question, and he also wondered why she was being so forthcoming. No one else really seemed to be. "What do we actually do here?"
"We'll probably stand guard most of the time. The only mix up so far has been mapping assignments. The scientists are having us scout and scan the region. There's a whole network of valleys and alcoves cut into these rocks. I think they've got drones farther on, down towards those buildings," Fletcher explained.
"Any ideas on what they are?"
"Dunno. Creepy though. They almost look human. Almost. Maybe we're in some kind of alternate Earth, the distant future or something?"
"Wonderful thought..." he muttered. "Have you encountered any locals?"
"No. Nada. Nothing. Though I'd be lying if I said I felt alone here. This place doesn't feel so much abandoned as...well, as if everyone's hiding. Watching us from afar."
"Great. How long are we going to be here?"
"They've got four squads, so they rotate us on six hour shifts. They used to have three squads but the stress of being here was getting to be a bit much. I've seen a couple guys lose it here. And that guy Cloud replaced wasn't the first suicide."
"How long have you been coming here? How long has the UAC been coming here?"
"I've been coming here for about three weeks now. Kaplan let slip that he's been coming here for a month and a half, and that he wasn't the first one. I'm not entirely sure how long the UAC has been here, but I wouldn't say too long. I mean, I don't think years. We'd have more built if they were here for years...unless this is just one of many bases. I don't know, it's hard to say."
"Fair enough. I've just got one more question for now."
"What's that?"
"Why are you being so helpful?...not that I'm complaining."
Fletcher offered a short laugh. "You're cute and I was going to ask you if you wanted to have sex tonight," she replied.
"Uh...wow."
"So do you? Cause I could really use some. It's a major stress release."
"Yeah. That sounds great."
"Perfect. Your place or mine?"
"Mine is good."
"I'll see you there after we back and we both grab showers. These suits are supposed to have environmental controls but we always end up sweating bad inside them."
Watts continued looking out over the hellish environment, feeling, if anything, more dislocated than he had before.
Watts stared up at the blank, metal ceiling above him.
Fletcher had been right, sex was a really good way to relieve stress.
After a surprisingly boring six hours, another squad had arrived to relieve them in much the same way they had shown up to relieve the other squad. Kaplan had gathered them up and led them back through the portal, which snapped into existence on the plateau in an entirely disturbing manner. Going back through a second time had been almost as jarring as the first. Once they'd gotten back and returned their armor and gear to the armory, he'd glanced at Fletcher, who'd given him a sly grin, and then they'd split off.
He'd hurried back to his apartment for a shower.
Out of armor, she looked better than he'd imagined. She was a little on the short side, but she had this awesome, toned body, short blonde hair, and bright blue eyes. And she was pretty great at sex. He still wasn't sure why she'd chosen him.
Right now, he was thinking about getting up and getting something to eat. He had the rest of the day free. Fletcher was on her side beside him, studying her PDA. "One other thing I should warn you about," she said suddenly.
"What?" he asked, slightly startled.
He'd been thinking about the other place. The place he'd have to go back to tomorrow.
"You'll have nightmares. You'll probably want to start taking a drug. I can't remember the name of it, something long and unnecessarily complicated, but almost all of us are on it. We call it Insomnium. It helps smooth out your sleep, basically. We can head to the infirmary after we hit the mess. Which, I gotta admit, I want to do soon. I'm starving."
"Same," he replied. "But I need another shower first."
"Me too." She set aside her PDA and got up out of bed suddenly. Standing there naked and awe-inspiring before him, she asked, "Wanna join me?"
Watts got up to join her.