Aliens: Bug Hunt

by Jonathan Maberry

  —Mordechai Yitzhak, Armat Technician

  Armat was able to utilize more advanced materials for the next prototypes, which drastically lowered the weight, while also increasing the already impressive durability. Their new propellant compounds were able to decisively solve the LaForce prototype’s greatest weakness, heat dissipation. The Armat rifle easily won the rest of the competition, passing all tests with flying colors. The newly designated M41 was put into production, and entered service with the Colonial Marines in 2171.

  However, all was not well. Some of the early batches of 10mm ammunition were subcontracted out to other manufacturers. It is unknown who changed the propellant design, and later congressional inquiries never discovered the culprit, but regardless of who was at fault, this mistake cost Colonial Marines their lives, and gave the early production M41s a bad reputation.

  (Warning, the following footage from LV-832 is intended for mature audiences only. Viewer discretion is advised.)

  It was a nightmare. All of the wildlife on LV-832 is gross, mean, and cranky, but the colonists there were hard as nails. You had to be to survive that shit hole. There is only one thing they ever needed to call in Marine support to deal with, and that was a swarm. There’s this one species, imagine a carnivorous moose-sized critter with tentacles instead of antlers. Individually, not so dangerous. Only it turns out that every seven years they have a population explosion, swarm, and eat everything like locusts.

  My platoon was supposed to protect this one settlement on LV-832 during the swarm. No problem. We’re in a fortified position. We’ve got these fancy new Pulse Rifles. Just stupid alien animals. Nothing we can’t handle. Right?

  Then we heard the thunder. It was like ten million hooves on the rock, and this… wave. That’s the only word. Just a wave of angry green flesh comes rolling down the mountain at us. It was far worse than the projections. Corporal Richards was our forward observer. He died horribly, trampled into bloody chunks in seconds.

  We opened up with everything. Our only hope was to carve a hole in that wave of meat, to pile up enough dead to make a wall.

  But then our Pulse Rifles started to choke. Only the swarm kept coming.

  —1st Lieutenant Hank Reynolds, USCM

  The horrific incident on LV-832 was not isolated. Wherever the improperly formulated ammunition was shipped, problems occurred. As the weapons would begin to heat up, the propellant would expand and stick, causing malfunctions. Or worse, cook off prematurely and detonate inside the conveyor magazines, often with catastrophic results.

  You ever see what a 10mm explosive round does to a man? It penetrates a bit then explodes. The secondary wound channels are nasty. You can stick a softball into the hole. Yeah… Real nasty. Oh, we love them now. But back in ’71, imagine having that same explosive round cook off inside your rifle, right next to your face. Or worse, I heard about one dude where his Pulse Rifle cooked off, and it caused a sympathetic detonation with his grenade launcher. Marines were scared of their own rifles. Some of the guys took to carrying short-barreled shotguns on them for when things got close.

  —Lance Corporal Daniel Walker, USCM

  Rumors began to swirl of Colonial Marines found dead on the battlefield, with their Pulse Rifles disassembled, killed while desperately trying to clear a stoppage.

  To their credit, Armat did not try to pass the buck. Instead, they sprang into action, discovered the cause, alerted Space Command, and tried to track down the bad lots of ammunition. By the time the hearings began, the M41 was working as intended. However, the bad reputation lingered in line units for quite some time, and the topic is still hotly debated among gun enthusiasts today.

  Design changes were immediately instituted to make the M41 less ammunition sensitive and more cooling vents were added to the shell. The integrated digital ammo counter was given a dimmer switch, because Marines had taken to covering the early versions with masking tape to avoid giving away their position during low light maneuvers. This variant was designated the M41A, which remains the standard issue rifle of the US Army and Colonial Marines to this day.

  With the bugs worked out, the M41A began to earn a different kind of reputation.

  Our Cheyenne hit the hot LZ like a meteor. There were so many missiles and so much flak that the night sky was lit up like the Fourth of July. Before the skids had touched ground we already had tracers coming in from three directions. We lost two men before we could even un-ass the transport. Our APC ate a rocket and we lost our Lieutenant. The DeLorme rebels were ready for us, dug in, and itching for a fight.

  My platoon’s orders were to take and hold the main plaza on the coastal platform. We encountered fierce resistance every step of the way. They were well funded. Most of the rebels were wearing top of the line carbon-weave armor, but our Pulse Rifles punched them anyway. Then the DeLorme Corporate Security Teams were wearing these heavy, servo assisted, armor suits. Tank boys we called them. Right hard bastards, every one of them. Except, even when our 10mm bullets failed to penetrate the plates, the impact and micro-explosions were enough to throw them off long enough for my Marines to close and finish them off through the rubberized gaps at their joints. The muzzle doesn’t climb much, and the M41 is so acute, we’d just hammer the tank boys until we pierced something vulnerable and they dropped.

  It was street to street, house to house. We’d catch sniper fire from a window, launch a grenade through it, and keep moving. We reached the plaza, and found out that we were it. Nobody else had made it through the drop. We had to hold that position or the whole mission would fold.

  The battle went on all night, and the rebels kept throwing everything they had at us. We shot our Pulse Rifles until the muzzles were glowing orange, and they never stopped, never jammed, not so much as a hiccup. Cheyennes were doing high-speed fly bys and dropping crates of U Mags and grenades on us so we could stay in the fight.

  That was the first time I used an M41A. It didn’t let me down then, and it has never let me down since. After DeLorme, I’ve taken a Pulse Rifle to every godforsaken planetoid, orbital, moon, backwater colony, and bug hunt you can think of. I’ve used it in zero G. I’ve used it underwater. Polar wastes to burning sands, abuse it, drop it, burn it, and the M41A won’t ever quit on you.

  The Pulse Rifle is the only rifle tough enough for a Colonial Marine.

  —Staff Sergeant Michael Newman, USCM

  The M41A has gone on to earn the respect of every warrior who has used it… or faced it. This mechanical marvel has taken its place in history, as one of the finest combat rifles ever fielded. The Pulse Rifle is known for going anywhere, doing anything, and accomplishing the impossible. Seldom has a weapon so encapsulated the bold, unstoppable nature of the men it is issued to, as the M41A Pulse Rifle.

  This has been Saga of the Weapon.

  DEEP BACKGROUND

  BY KEITH R.A. DECANDIDO

  “Ms. Hasegawa will see you now, Ms. Kejela.”

  Nickole Kejela had been fearing those words since she arrived in the tastefully appointed waiting room outside the office of the CEO of the Hasegawa News Service.

  In the fifteen years she’d been working for HNS, ten of them as a field reporter, Nickole had never been called into a meeting in Hiromi Hasegawa’s office.

  Hell, she’d never even met the imposing head of the corporation in person. They’d been in the same room, of course, but it was always a huge function space at an event of some kind. Nickole had only been within a few meters of her once or twice.

  With a sense of anticipation and dread, Nickole tucked away her NohtPad—she’d been composing some additional thoughts for the sidebar on her profile of Dr. Shalaballaz Rao—and approached the large metal door that slid aside obligingly for her.

  The first thing she noticed was that Hiromi Hasegawa was sitting behind a wooden desk. It had very little clutter on it, which surprised Nickole, as most executives had either a ton of stuff or nothing at all on their desks, but Hasegawa’s was a bit of a middle gro
und.

  Then the woman herself stood up, and Nickole was amazed at how small she was. On her casts and when she stood behind a podium, she looked like the tallest person in the room, but she barely cleared a meter and a half.

  Nickole also noted that the head of HNS had had considerable cosmetic work done, but it was quality stuff. Had she not made an intensive study of the latest bodymod techniques for a story, she probably wouldn’t have even noticed that she wasn’t working with original merchandise, as it were.

  Hasegawa walked to the other side of her wooden desk and put out a hand. “Nickole, it is a pleasure to finally meet you.”

  “Th-thank you, ma’am,” Nickole tentatively returned the handshake.

  “Oh, please, do not call me ‘ma’am.’ If we were out in public, of course, I would insist on it then, but when it is just the two of us, formality is a waste of time, and I do not have any to waste. Refer to me as ‘Hiromi,’ please.”

  Not even remotely comfortable with being so familiar with the most powerful news mogul extant, Nickole simply said, “Okay.”

  “Have a seat in the guest chair, please, Nickole.” Hasegawa sat on the edge of her fancy desk.

  Nickole did as requested. “Thank you.”

  Hasegawa leaned forward with a conspiratorial smile. “Please do not look so apprehensive, Nickole. You have absolutely nothing of which to be afraid.”

  “With respect, that flies in the face of every story I’ve heard about meetings in your office.”

  Waving a hand dismissively, Hasegawa said, “Those are mere rumors and innuendo.” Then her smile became an evil grin. “Mind you, I started those rumors and spread that innuendo myself. I dislike meetings a great deal, so I prefer to limit their use to unpleasant tasks, where at all possible, so they may be ended with dispatch. Worry not, however, this most assuredly is not one of those. I promise, you will depart this office with the same position and occupation and salary you had when you entered—which, to be fair, cannot be said for many of the others who have sat in that chair over the last several years.” She shifted on her butt, and then got up. “This artificial wood is supremely uncomfortable. I do wish I could acquire genuine lumber.”

  Nickole barely managed to contain her reaction, but it was a near thing.

  That earned her a glare from Hasegawa’s hooded eyes as she went to sit behind her desk once again. “Do you have something you wish to say in response to that, Nickole?”

  On the one hand, Hasegawa’s tone indicated that she should answer the question, and smartly. On the other, that same tone indicated that she wouldn’t like Nickole’s answer.

  The first, however, outweighed the second. “A few years back, I did a story on the Forestry Act, and how heavily regulated the use of luxury plant items is now that there are barely enough plants left on Earth to keep oxygen in the air. I got to see some real wood up close and personal and I also talked to people who fake wood. Either what you’re sitting behind is real wood, or it’s a fake that is so detailed that it probably would’ve cost more to get done than the real thing would have.”

  To Nickole’s immense relief, Hasegawa smiled. “You are as talented as I’d heard and hoped. Excellent, that is precisely what is needed. Oh, and it actually is artificial wood, and yes, it would have been considerably cheaper to acquire true lumber, but I also do enjoy the process of breathing, so I simply acquired the finest forgery of wood that I could obtain.”

  Nickole nodded. She didn’t appreciate her boss testing her, but she was the boss…

  “I was speaking with Helena about you. She informed me that you were working on an exposé on Weyland-Yutani.”

  “I was,” Nickole said slowly, “but I couldn’t corroborate enough of my sources.”

  “And you will not be able to.” Hasegawa shook her head. “The company is far too skilled at the fine art of ass-covering for you to be able to obtain anything incriminating in so direct a manner. No, Nickole, the secret to finding out information that the company does not wish you to discover is to eschew directness and instead approach them sideways, so they do not see you coming.”

  Frowning, Nickole asked, “Are you saying I should revive the story?”

  “The purpose of this meeting is to provide you with your next story assignment.”

  Nickole noticed that she didn’t actually answer the question.

  Hasegawa touched a control on her desk, and the wall behind her—which had been showing a view of the Himalayas—changed to a view of the cast on Rao that she’d been doing notes for. “I looked over the draft of your profile on Dr. Rao. It is quite well done.”

  That suffused Nickole with tremendous pride. Hasegawa was not known for uttering praise, certainly not for doing so without meaning it. “Thank you!”

  “I appreciate how you provide a deep examination into who she is, and why she does what it is that she does. She is a person, not merely a subject. In addition, you provide nuance—enough so that intelligent people are able to appreciate it, but presented it in a way that even a complete imbecile can also appreciate it.” She sighed. “Which is to the good, as the galaxy is quite well stocked with complete imbeciles.” She touched another control, and the image went back to the Himalayas. “I have been friends with Emilio Cruz, the chief of staff of the Colonial Marine Corps, for quite a long time, and he has asked me for a favor.”

  “Um, okay.” That was Hasegawa’s second change of the subject in the last minute, and Nickole’s head was swimming.

  “Emilio wants us to embed a reporter with a unit in order to put a good face on them—to humanize them, in essence.”

  “How long?” Nickole asked.

  “For a year.”

  Nickole’s eyes widened and her jaw fell open. “Excuse me?”

  Holding up both hands, Hasegawa started, “I realize that it sounds like a great deal—”

  “More than a great deal! I’ve got vacations planned, there’s my family—”

  “I can promise you that this will not interfere with a bit of it. Understand, most Marine units spend approximately eighty-five percent of their time on standby waiting for a mission, while seventy-five percent of those missions are simple and harmless. We are not at war right at the moment, so the Marines are far more akin to security guards—they are required to be ruthlessly efficient when they are in action, but the majority of the time they are sitting on their posteriors. And worry not, as I said, you will still be allowed to take your vacation and see your family—this will hardly be an immersive assignment.”

  “Okay, I guess, but—what’s the angle here? I mean, I’m sure doing a favor for the Marines will be good for the network in the long term, but—”

  Hasegawa smiled, and this time it was the expression of a predator about to chow down on prey. “This, Nickole, is your sideways route.”

  “I’m sorry?” Nickole remained as confused as she had been throughout too much of this conversation.

  “As I said, I have known Emilio for a very long time. It is not a single thing he has said, specifically, but I am fairly certain that the Marines are in the company’s pocket. I am fairly certain they may have conspired to cover up what really happened on Hadley’s Hope.”

  Nickole blinked. “You think Weyland-Yutani and the Marines are responsible for what happened there?”

  “I think it is possible, yes.” She leaned forward and stared intently at Nickole. “There is, as they say, some shit. I want you to sniff it out, and I believe that spending a year with a Marine unit will enable you to accomplish that.”

  “O-okay.” This was a little better, and it actually brought everything she’d said up until now into focus. “Ostensibly, you want a profile of the Marines?”

  “Not just ostensibly, I also wish that. Provide the same nuance that you brought to the Rao piece to these Marines. I have already uploaded the specifics to your queue. Get yourself a good night’s rest, and then report to Lieutenant Berenato at Camp Obama first thing in the morning.”

&n
bsp; * * *

  ME: Tell me your name, please, Private, and where you were born.

  PVT. D.S. SANDOVAL: I am called Private Dmitri Sandoval. I was born in Estonia, but was raised in Brooklyn.

  ME: And you, Private? Same thing, name and where you were born.

  PVT. D.C. SANDOVAL: I’m Private Dmitri Sandoval, and my mami and papi was born and raised in San Pedro de Macaris, but this pretty face was born in Chicago.

  ME: How the hell did you both get assigned to the same unit?

  PVT. D.C. SANDOVAL: Step thought it was a computer glitch till we both showed up.

  PVT. D.S. SANDOVAL: We are distinguished by nicknames. I am referred to as “Big D,” and he is “Little D.”

  PVT. D.C. SANDOVAL: Which really ain’t fair. I ain’t little, I’m just shorter than this overgrown gorilla.

  —transcript of raw footage of interview of Private Dmitri Shostakovich Sandoval and Private Dmitri Carlos Sandoval, Colonial Marines, J Company, conducted by Nickole Kejela

  * * *

  Nickole’s first month was spent at Camp Obama, a Marine base near the California-Nevada border. The unit she was following was J Company, led by Lieutenant Emily Berenato. J was assigned to the camp for this month to act as camp security, and also to get trained on the latest weapons to come off the line.

  Camp Obama had, as far as Nickole could determine, absolutely no shade. Which was only an issue because everything the Marines did except sleep was outside. After four weeks, her dark skin was practically mahogany.