She slipped back into the shadows beneath the roots of the tree. Environmentally contained suit of armor or not, she’d been sweating for a while and she needed a moment to rest. She decided to take the opportunity to slip off her pack and start breaking it down into smaller attachable portions. It distributed the one hundred and twenty pound load more evenly across her body and gave her a chance to take a drink from one of the water nodules it contained.
Breaking protocol and better judgment, Elsa also broke the seal on her viewport and pulled the transparent metal out of the way. The humid jungle air assaulted her, causing fresh beads of sweat to spring up on her face. In spite of the wet heat the fresh air smelled good. Not just good, it was incredible. She inhaled deeply and looked around, the helmet no longer amplifying the ambient light. Her own eyes, genetically modified to better than perfect day or night vision, paled in comparison. Even without the enhancements of technology she marveled at the raw power she felt being surrounded by nature.
Ruining an otherwise surreal moment she heard a rumbling noise that rose to a crescendo. It wasn’t nearly as distant as she’d have liked, considering it had come from the direction that her screamer pod was located. She’d never heard anything like it before, but deep in her belly she knew what it was. The sweat on her skin, once sticky and uncomfortable, now felt like ice.
Else snapped her visor down and reactivated her radio transmitter before the echoes of the monstrous roar had faded. “FIST team three, report in!” Her only answer was the rapid breathing in her own helmet.
“ Get it together Gunny,” she whispered to calm herself. Without fear of her words being heard over the radio she loosened up her discipline. With the visor down there was little chance of her being heard outside her helmet. The smart armor encased her completely, providing protection from environmental, biological, and even limited nuclear threats. She wasn’t worried about physical threats either — the armor could handle just about any civilian energy weapon. Anything else, from a ballistic weapon to an ion or plasma burst, would either be too low powered to harm her or big enough to tear her apart.
She was a Marine and that meant either something couldn’t kill her or she’d be dead without a moment to suffer, why stress it? A giant animal hunting her down and tearing her apart one limb at a time, on the other hand, was something she’d never considered before.
Elsa broke from her cover and moved the remaining seven yards to the river’s edge. She tracked a stick floating in it, her suit calculating the current at roughly two feet per second. Elsa broke her rifle down in smooth practiced motions, securing the two pieces to firm points on her armor. She walked into the water, holding her breath subconsciously as the bottom fell away quickly.
Else found herself struggling against the current almost immediately. Beneath the surface it ran swifter, tugging at her and trying to send her downstream. She fought it, putting one foot after another into the rocky river bed. The armor had air enough for half an hour of moderate activity, more had she brought some of the modular oxygen tanks. Vitalis had an atmosphere that was ideal for human consumption — they’d all assumed there’d been no need for spare oxygen. Else bit back the curse muttered by deployed soldiers since the beginning of time — never enough supplies in the field.
She changed her display mode to a mixture of sonar and thermographic, mapping out the river bed and looking for potential hot spots. The water registered at a surprising eighty seven degrees Fahrenheit. Even at night it was warm enough to use as bathwater. She was trying to adjust her display to modify the thermal gradients when something bumped into her from behind.
Else jerked around, catching the blurred image of something swimming around her. She kept twisting, cursing the current for her slowness. On a hunch she counter-spun, rotating back around and catching what seemed to be a large fish coming at her. It struck, teeth scraping against her armored belly and sending her off balance. The current finished the job, knocking her off her feet and sending her rolling and floating over a dozen feet downstream before she was able to stop herself.
She looked up from her supine position and saw the carnivorous fish coming after her again. It was longer than she was tall and for the first time she wished the sensors in her helmet weren’t state of the art. She could make out teeth that would have made a Terran shark envious.
Elsa climbed to her feet, pulling out her V-Bar combat knife as she did so. Distracted by the current, the fish, and the adrenaline bursting through her veins she didn’t notice the faint humming that the powered up knife emitted. The fish came on, sensing an easy target, and tried to tear off her arm. Elsadora jerked her arm back, angling the knife towards it.
Twisting in the water she watched the fish swim downstream away from her rapidly. Had she hurt it? Her suit showed no sign of penetration but she had felt it tug at her arm on the way past. She turned again, staring into the murky depths and wishing she had more than a display based on echolocation.
Chemical sniffers in her display flashed warning lights. She called up the report on it and saw that there was blood in the water. Her knife attack had been successful. She kept the vibrating blade at the ready and continued on, hurrying to get out of the water. Another warning slipped into her display, notifying her of a breach in the arm of her suit.
“ What’s next?” She muttered, lowering her arm to minimize the amount of potential air loss. The thermal imaging showed an increased warmth at the spot of the strike. Fine bubbles emerged from it to be swept downstream by the current. She redoubled her efforts to get across, looking up in time for her sonar to present a cloudy image.
She realized it was localized after a catch in her breath. Refinement a moment later showed it was a school of fish swimming upstream this time, from the direction the wounded fish had gone. Her question had been answered, a school of hungry fish following a blood trail was what was next.
They swam around her and pecked at her armor. In a matter of seconds it turned into a frustrated feeding frenzy. Her armor protected her but the fish didn’t give up. Elsa clutched her arms to her chest, covering the minor breech with her other hand, and pushed hard against the current. Her suit showed no additional breaches but a quick glance at the integrity display showed that they were somehow able to wear away at the armored surface. There were dozens if not hundreds of fish swarming her, visibility was reduced to nothing and each step was that much more difficult as she was being hammered from all sides.
The swarm of fish scattered as quickly as it had appeared. Else stumbled, driving one knee into the creek bed without the sudden persistence of the voracious fish. She looked and saw them disappearing back downstream. “I really need to shoot somebody,” Elsa complained, driving herself back to both feet. She glanced up and grinned, the surface of the river was only a few feet above her. She’d made it!