Gorilla reached back into yet another compartment of his seemingly bottomless ruck and pulled out a handful of feathery stuff. He lofted it gently into the air and the bundle of small drones untangled and flapped free to fly above the ort’s likely route, buzzing and circling like dragonflies while feeding imagery back to him. They spread out and fluttered “randomly,” each one a dumb eye sending back a single view that switched between infrared and enhanced low light, the twelve such views sorted by an AI and displayed for Dagger and the captain. They could operate as a collective, like a swarm of bees, but were less detectable singly.
The flock detoured wide around a family herd of something rhinoceros sized, arching shellbacks visible above grass while the snouts stayed near ground.
“Herd beasts,” Gorilla said. “Likely not very intelligent. But dangerous if they have hooves like that beetle thing did.”
While this was going on, Bell Toll decided that scientists would have a field day here. The local life was insectoid on a scale never seen anywhere else, and they grew those armored carapaces that could stop small arms fire. What else was new and arcane?
“Well, that answers that question,” Gorilla said with a tinge of disgust.
“What?” Bell Toll asked.
“The local flyers will attack my drones. I’ve lost two of the dozen,” he explained.
“Might make sense to limit the number you have airborne, then, if you’ve done a scan of the area,” Bell Toll advised.
“Will do.” He brought eight of the remaining ones back, letting them alight on his shoulders like so many pets, though one wouldn’t normally wad pets into a ball, albeit carefully, and stuff them into airtight pouches on one’s harness.
“Okay,” Bell Toll said, “we may as well get going. It’s likely going to take two nights to do this. We’ll need to stop in plenty of time to pitch a camp. And no one trip anything. Ferret, lead on, then Doll. Tirdal, you’ll follow Gorilla. Let me know if you sense anything.”
“Understood, and will do,” Tirdal acknowledged. A human might have felt slighted, being bumped in position as a threat to stealth. No one knew how a Darhel took it, nor did they care. No mistakes that could spook a herd would be allowed.
They made a good three kilometers in a low, slow crawl through and under the grass, getting dusty and sweaty and occasionally smeared by the mountainous piles of bug droppings that smaller scarab-forms were chewing into little piles to rot or wash into the ground. The stuff didn’t smell like anything on a human world, nor likely a Darhel one, but it stank just the same, a rotting odor of fermented plant life and anaerobic bacteria.
About an hour before local dawn, just as Bell Toll and Shiva were getting antsy, Ferret reported, “Got a depression here. Dry. Good spot to dig in.”
“Outstanding. Everyone stay put,” Shiva said. He shimmied through the formation until he could see what Ferret saw. “Yes, that’ll do fine. Let’s get in quick, dawn’s coming.”
That day found them skulking in the hollow for cover, wrapped well in blonde grass, with half-cylindrical camouflage screens overhead. They were close together, and kept two on watch at a time, dug into shallow fighting positions to the north and south. Nothing happened until after noon, and the sleeping went fitfully.
Just after the primary peaked in the blue sky that was brightly decorated with towering, puffy cumulus, local life intruded when a herd of smaller grazers browsed through on Gorilla and Bell Toll’s watch. They approached slowly and started to wander by. Then, as if drawn to the smells from the camp, they turned towards it.
“What do we do, sir?” Gorilla asked.
“We don’t spook them, first of all,” Bell Toll said. “Let’s just hope they drift past. We won’t bother them if they won’t bother us.”
“Yes, sir,” Gorilla agreed, but kept a tight grip on his weapon. He held that pose while a family group of six crawled right over him, feet carefully avoiding the unsteady surface of his back after one step, mandibles clipping grass near him, then brushing against him, nuzzling his right cheek and ear. He was freaked but unhurt, and clamped down on his sphincters and nerves as the pony-sized creatures decided he wasn’t food and moved on. “Glad that’s over,” he muttered.
“It might get worse,” the captain reminded him.
“Thanks, sir. You’re all heart.”
True to form, it did get worse. The local pseudomammalian bat analogs ranged in size up to something like a pterosaur, and five of those rode thermals lazily around the grassland. Then, apparently sharp-eyed, they came over to investigate. Shortly, they were orbiting the bivouac like horrific vultures gone awry. The shadows were big enough to have provided shade for the team, if one were to perch spread-winged.
“What the hell do we do now, sir?” Gorilla asked.
“Well, don’t shoot. That’ll be obvious and might stir them up.”
“Yes, sir. But I would like to do something to get rid of them,” he insisted. “It’s like having a floating billboard announcing our presence. And I think they’re getting lower. I’d rather not be lunch either, seeing as those things can likely carry off one of these grass chewers.”
“Right. Got one of your bots out there?” Bell Toll asked, an idea forming. Heck, it might work.
“About fifty meters in front of me, sir,” Gorilla agreed. “I think I see where you’re going. We have it stagger about and see if one will attack it.”
“Yes,” Bell Toll confirmed. “But be ready to scoot if they freak. We don’t know how similar they are to Earth vultures or Garambi rocs.”
“No problem, sir. Want me to shoot if they freak?”
“Only if you’re being attacked directly. Do it now, they’re definitely lower.”
“Yes, sir.” He called up the bot as he clutched his gauss rifle closely, and sent the lumbering creature out at a trot, circling as if injured on its right side.
One of the long-snouted flyers peeled off, looking amazingly like a fighter aircraft in an historical vid. It dove, wings spread rather than in a stoop, and opened its mouth. The teeth within were obviously meant for cracking shells and rending flesh. And it was huge. It might measure eight meters across the wings.
Then it was on the drone, wings flared to airbrake, neck cracking down like a whip and jaws snapping shut. The mock beetle reacted exactly as programmed, and the molecularly thin spikes drove out, taking it through the jaw and face. It squawked, rather quieter than an earth creature, dropped to the ground and thrashed about, its clawed and fingered wingtips beating at the inedible, hurtful little morsel stuck in its mouth. Confused and wounded, it alternated between trying to flap away and flopping around in agony. The defensive needles withdrew back into the drone, but the damage was done. Staggering and disoriented, the creature fell over and twitched.
Sensing something beyond their ken but clearly uncouth, the other four flapped for altitude and soared away to seek more familiar prey.
“That is done,” Gorilla said, with a sigh of relief. “I think I’m going to crawl back and drain before I wet my pants. That okay, sir?”
“Nerve wracking, yeah,” Bell Toll said. “It’s shift time, so says me. Wake Dagger and do what you gotta do. And don’t waste time. I’m next.”
When they prepped to move out at nightfall, Gorilla discovered the drone had been damaged worse than he’d thought. Reluctantly, he dropped it into the latrine slit, where its enzymes and destruct device would be unnoticed beneath the ground.
Across the mini-veldt, the woods began again. This ridge was the one from which they would hopefully see their target. They slept at the base, dug in well under weeds, and posted sentries in pairs with Gorilla’s small flying bots perched on trees, sensors wide open for any hints. He stayed up most of the day, popping chemicals to keep himself awake. That night would begin the infiltration proper.