Put forth to watch, unschooled, alone,
'Twixt hostile earth and sky;
The mottled lizard 'neath the stone
Is wiser here than I.
What stir across the haze of heat?
What omen down the wind?
The buck that break before my feet—
They know, but I am blind!
Put forth to watch.
Rudyard Kipling
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The Gunny and I head down the hall to the armory. The Gunny unlocks the door garbing a plas rifle putting in the charger, he hands it to me. "Here you go Sir, wouldn't want you miss anything this time!" saying it with a smirk on his face, I raise an eyebrow.
"Thank you for being considerate to my needs." I say making him laugh, as he grabs his own rifle. We head back up skipping two steps at a time. "Gunny find out what's going on out there!"
"This is Mike two red to Mike three green do copy over." He pauses listening to the response . "Hotel six actual needs a sitrep asap!" He listens intently. "Sir they have some strange creature cornered at the large tower on the east side of the building." We move quickly through the building Getting in the lift to the top of the the east tower, as soon as the door open we hear the shouting to the left and the discharge of a plas rifle and more shouting. We move in AG quick to the sound rounding the corner carefully we see... a spindly looking being almost insect like waving around a pistol like object in one of his claws.
The Marines are hanging back some, but holding their ground. I look at this creature; he's wearing a black robe with his face and head covered. Only his eyes are visible, but they are unreadable because they're insect like, so you can't see emotion play in them. "You are surrounded you don't have a choice here. Just give up and we will not harm you!" I tell him and hopefully he understood me.
He laughs malevolently, almost like a menace he points one of his claws at me, then he runs it across his neck. Well, that didn't need any translation; I know a threat when I see one. "Put the weapon down!" Shouts another marine. This is not going to end well.
"Look!" I shout getting his attention. "It doesn't need to go down like this!" I need this sucker alive, so we can extract information from him. he reaches under his robe pulling out a blade and a second smaller object.
"Knife!" shout one of the Marines. He turns the blade to himself and jams it into his own throat. he staggers for a bit dying; he turns looking skyward opening his arms wide, the other object flies out of his claw straight up and out of sight. Now he's standing at the edge of the parapet, and tumbles over it.
"Damn it!" I shout! I run to the spot looking over I see his body on the ground below. "What the hell was that?" I ask. He preferred to kill himself than to be captured and questioned; this is bad really bad. They whom ever that is are gathering intelligence on us, and I think they got what they were seeking! "Gunny, I want that corps searched carefully for any intelligence and it needs to happen fast!"
"Roger That." he responds. "Well you heard the Captain! Lets clean up what's left of what ever that was and collect what we can!" He looks at his Marines who'r just dumbfounded. "Get moving NOW you Devil Dogs!" Jumping they start to leave to get the remains of the assassin. The Gunny stands next to me looking down. "Well Sir, looks like we're in it deep now." He gazes skyward. "Right up to our necks."
"Gunny, this situation is quickly becoming FUBAR, but we have to get handle on it." I look skyward. "And we need to do it faster than they are."
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Dr. Olsen, the Ships chief medical officer was brought down from the Helios to preform an autopsy on the Bug, as the Marines are calling it. "Well the cause of death is apparent, however the blade is coated with a resin of some type." I look at the blade with Jahní standing next to me.
"Does it have a name?" I ask Jahní; she must know what this thing is.
"The Daralkahn, a race that specializes in espionage and assassinations." She seems disturbed by the Bug more than I thought she would. She folds her arm uncomfortably studying the assassins remains. "The resin is a toxin that kills quickly. I'm sure you will find the same toxin on the dart that killed the mid servant girl." She shivers and I put my arm around her. "They are the legends that have been used to terrorize many a people. The adults would tell stories to frighten disobedient children."
Now that the robe is off this Bug it is not easy to look at, though the fact that it's here is a reason for concern. It got in the Embassy ground without detection, and Lord only knows how long he's been here. "Captain, look here." The Gunny calls to me.
I walk over to where he is taking Jahní with me, since there's no need for her to stare at the Bug any further. Once at the table the Gunny produces a type of pistol. "This is what was used to kill the girl, and this small drum is the magazine that holds the darts." I reach out to grab it he pulls it back. "Careful Sir, a bit of the points protrude from it." I nod and handle it with care.
"I don't see a propulsion system, so how does it fire?" I ask. He turns and Lahí is standing there.
"It uses magnetism to create propulsion." Lahí explains.
I can hardly believe it. "So you're saying that this small pistol is a rail gun?" Its miniature size just baffles me. This quite advanced, so I think we'll keep it.
The Gunny now points out the other item they picked up. "He had an assortment of small, but close range weapons, he had this as well." He produces a small glass tube filled with what look like tiny pebbles.
"Be careful with that!" Jahní nervously says. "Those are the Tarlahmites. They enter your body through the ear or nose, lodging itself in your brain making the victim easy to manipulate." The Gunny carefully puts it down, as to not break the tube.
"Gunny, just dispose of those. Burning should do the trick right?" Jahní nods. Well that's one less headache to worry about.
"Well, this is no small thing having this assassin here, but I'm confused." Lahí says. "Having much more important targets to chose from he kills a mid servant girl."
"Well, that's not hard to figure out." They all look at me. "Think about it. Why not kill one of us?" I ask rhetorically.
"Because that was not his mission." Jahní answers perfectly.
I turn to her. "You move to the head of the class." She smiles. "He was here on a recon mission. Killing one of us would've been counter productive at this time." I relate to them. "Imagine that Jahní or Lahí had been killed. The entire planet would be locked down; no one in no one out."
"And then." Lahí picks up my train of thought. "There would come a thorough investigation on one of our deaths."
"Ruining their plot." Jahní finishes.
"So who do you kill?" I ask. "The lowly mid servant girl who was about to spill the beans." I answer. "That way all of them are safe, and they continue to spy and collect intelligence"
"With the girl dead and the spy taking care of himself there is no one to point fingers to." Lahí says. "Quite clever of that spy to chose so deftly."
I have to agree with her assessment. They've covered their tracks well. I rub my chin wondering about this and the choices that our enemies now have to make, and our response to the next move. "What do think Gunny?" Asking him his opinion of the tactical situation.
"Well Sir, if I were them I would ether pull back and observe waiting for an opening, or speed up operations before we get closer to the brains behind this with counter espionage OPS." He stops for a second. "I'm a Marine Sir, and we're hard chargers. We hit and hit until we knock out our opponents." He puts his hands behind his back analyzing it a bit more. "I would speed things up and start hitting until a breakthrough is achieved."
"I agree." I think his view is correct, they will move up their time table to whatever the objective is.
"Jahní, I think we're going to bring more of our Marines down from the Helios tonight, and fortify our position here." She looks at me with concern, because I know what this is going to seem like.
She glances at Lahí, who seems lost in some thought then she turns to me. "Antonio, if you bring more men to station here at your Embassy it may look like an aggressive action."
"No it won't." We all turn to Lahí. "By now father is aware of what happened here today and is probably making moves of his own, to find and destroy the infiltrators." She goes back to thinking about whatever it is she has in mind.
"Gunny, get lieutenant Monroe on the horn. Tell him to bring down eight more Marines here to the Embassy, to reinforce our position and I want him here as well." I look at Jahní and she looks away putting her hand on her mouth. "I think if and when they move they're going to hit hard, and I think that we are the main target."