Chapter 47: Hunter Hunter
Their plane landed on an airport strip in the middle of nowhere. Just a few years ago this had been nothing more than barren soil in the hinterlands of Egypt. Then, a portal opened and a private company paid a lot of money to make it stable and secure. The Egyptian government was only to willing to rent some useless land for a high price to Rozman and Derling and allowed them to build a state of the art base. Everything here had the RD logo on it, Marcus found after a few minutes.
It was modern, efficient and half an hour after landing they already stood in front of the portal in cold weather clothing.
Everything was planned and a company advisors delivered all the information they needed. Once they were through the portal they would use a transporter to make the journey to their target portal. About 500 km through a dessert made out of ice and snow. RD had made that ice world a crossroads to several other planets they exploited for monster parts and other materials. It was a high frequency connection and even now large, special purpose trucks entered and left the portal holding materials worth millions. The large amount of security at the base was not only to avoid invasions but to protect against potential theft.
After another giant truck made its way into the base, the team was given green light to move through. Marcus took the lead and stepped through the portal first, the transition was a shock. Ice cold wind and snow hit Marcus in the face and temperatures under minus ten degree Celsius invaded his clothing and gnawed at his skin. It was dark, some times in the night and large floodlights illuminated the base, “Ugh. Why does it have to be dark and cold again.” Janette was just behind him and looked very unhappy. Achara and Kou followed shortly, but they did not bitch around, “The transport station should be that way.” Kou said and pointed at a large hangar like building.
The base, on this side of the portal, was not any less defended with heavy gun turrets, guards and tall fences. Marcus watched a patrol of three guards walking by, they had company logo armor and at least one of them was a class holder. A private army, Marcus thought with some discomfort and Janette’s face revealed the same emotion. They entered the hangar and quickly discussed the situation with a woman who apparently managed the transporters. “Okay, one trip to the hell hole for four people is coming up. Johns should be on standby, I will call him over.” The woman made a call through the internal com system and Marcus wondered if “hell hole” was the official designation or just her personal idea of being funny. Johns turned out to be a middle aged man with a lot more gray in the hair than you would expect “That is going to be a long drive. If you are ready we can start right now.”
The transporter was a large snowmobile, larger than anything Marcus had ever seen. It had giant treads and you had to go up a ladder to get inside or let down a ramp. It was roomy on the inside, it had enough space for twice as much passengers, and even had a lavatory. “Take a seat, we have hot water and if you need juice for devices just plug them in. This baby has power for days. We will need about 10 hours to the portal so you better get comfy.” Johns showed them around and then took the driver seat. With a roar the machine woke up and a soft humming filled the cabin as the large machine moved down the path, out of the base. They watched through small, round side windows how they left the perimeter of the base behind them and entered a white nothingness.
At the start Marcus spent some time on the co-pilot seat and talked to Johns. He learned a bit about the planet and how it was to work here. “The damn planet turns only once every five Earth days and even at day time it is freezing cold. Only good thing is that there are not many things out here and the pay is good. In contrast to the place you are going. You look a bit soft for the “hell hole”.” Johns said and Achara’s ears in the back of the cabin perked up. “We are tougher than we look.” Marcus said with no real confidence, “But just for the sake of it, why is it called “hell hole”.”
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Johns laughed and shook his head “Because it kills people. Can’t remember the last time I made a trip back from that place without a bunch of coffins in the back. It’s damn creepy I tell you that. Ten hours drive with a bunch of corpses as your only companions.” The team’s faces fell as they heard that and Marcus felt, that this had been a mistake only grew.
They spent most of the drive playing card games, thanks to Achara who was better prepared and brought cards. Eventually Marcus listened to Kou talking about his father’s vintage card collection of some game based around balls and monsters. It sounded hilarious to Marcus until he heard what the collection was worth. People are crazy.
“OHHH SHIT! Hold on!” from Janette at the window, was the only warning he got before something hit the vehicle with tremendous force. The heavy snowmobile was pushed around and everybody inside was thrown down. Marcus came back up to his feet as he heard a terrifying roar and giant claws suddenly cut through the hull of the vehicle. Something gigantic tore and scratched at the machine and was about to turn it into scrap metal.
Marcus stormed to the back ramp and opened the door. Ice cold wind welcomed him and he could see the giant, white furred body of a monster leaning over the snowmobile. Marcus jumped down and Achara and Janette were right behind him, weapons in hand. Right now, Marcus congratulated himself for being adamant on the “always wear armor on other planets” rule. Not that this would help much against a monster of this size. A head, and what a head it was, with long sharp teeth and gleaming black eyes bend down focusing on Marcus. The maw opened and snapped after him with blinding speed, but Kou was faster. Marcus felt a “jank” and did not resist it and was dragged back two meter just outside the reach of the monster. The jaws closed and Marcus could smell the foul breath of the beast which looked like an oversize saber-toothed tiger with long white fur.
Seeing an opportunity Marcus smashed Impulse Hammer into its jaw and send it reeling for a second. Long enough for Janette to sink a shot into its head what made it howl and growl. Thick, red blood dripped into the soft snow and it jumped back ready to pounce again only to fall prey to Achara who turned visible near its hind legs and cut deep with her blade. Immobilized and desperately clawing at the retreating Achara it was a prime target for Marcus, who run up and landed a hook into its flank. Bones broke and organs tore, the beast fell down in pain and a shot into the eye from Janette ended it abruptly.
“Well you just might make it in the hell hole.” Johns stood at the open ramp and looked down to them. A glowing plasma ball floated over his right hand but vanished a moment later. “A Grumbler, have not seen one of those in quite some time. It’s our lucky day I guess.” he said and looked at the damage of the cabin. Marcus and the team looked at each other and gathered themselves after the fight. Johns brought out a small device, activated it and planted it at the corpse. “Nice, you did not damage it too much, the fur, teeth and claws are worth a lot. I think the going rate is 500k for a well preserved corpse. Maybe a bit less, there is a basic 50/50 split for these kind of cases if you are okay with it. Could have done it myself but you looked eager to stretch your legs.” He smiled and rubbed his hands.
After they had patched up the damaged parts of the vehicle they continued the journey and Johns offered hot tea against the cold. Marcus carefully prodded Johns and learned he was a level 55 Elemental Mage. His feeling, that they were out of their league increased even so Johns said they were doing okay, especially the girls had impressed him. “Have not seen an Catsith being aggressive like this. I like it.” he said and Kou looked all but good. For the rest of the cruise Kou did not say anything and looked lost in thoughts, even a small kiss from Achara only cheered him up for a moment.
They reached the smaller base near the target portal and said goodbye to Johns. He promised to take care of the documents for the corpse and vanished into a canteen to get some proper food. For the team the real mission only now started. They walked through the guarded portal and faced another climate shock. Hot burning air drove the cold away, they got out of their winter clothing before they did anything else. Marcus looked around, they had entered the main base on this planet and it looked a lot like the one on the cold planet with some major differences.
There was far more activity around here and an industrial building with a large smoke stack released thick black smoke into the sky. “Great, after ruining our own planet, we move on right to the next.” Achara said with a painful look in her eyes. She was right, there were no environmental laws out here, Marcus thought. The whole planet was fair game and here for us to exploit.
