Chương 103: 40.Ambush 40-3

We moved out again, and the formation was cleaner than before. Not because the mood had improved—because every one of us had just been educated by a handful of Lurker Razorwasps on what happened when your feet, your overhead awareness, and your mouth all failed at the same time. The spacing held too: Harvey half a step ahead on point; Jess pulled back to left flank, two stripped hard panels hanging off her shoulder; Maki center-front, watching up and forward; me on rear, reading the whole picture.

We covered nearly ten minutes without triggering anything that wanted to come up through the ground. What we got instead was voices. Not loud. First a muffled curse, kept low. Then the light sound of a metal clip tapping a tree root. Then someone deliberately compressing their breathing in a way that only made them sound more tense, not less. Jess raised her hand first, pointing front-left. I pressed a fist down. Everyone stopped.

Maki looked through the gap between two tree trunks ahead, voice barely above a breath.

"Three to four." Harvey added: "Someone's hurt." I didn't ask how he knew, because a second later I heard it myself—someone's footsteps were uneven, dragging half a beat, like something in a knee or shin had gone wrong. I made a quick gesture: don't detour, eyes on first. We pressed forward to a narrow gap where buttress roots and hanging vines tangled together, and the group on the other side clearly spotted us at the same moment. They stopped before we did. Good. At least they weren't completely stupid.

Through two buttress roots thick as walls, the first thing I saw was a face that wasn't having a great day. First-year, female, short hair, half-empty water bladder hanging off her shoulder, identification strip from another team on her sleeve. Of the three people with her, one guy was visibly limping—right leg guard marked by a white corrosion scar—one had a stripped pod support rod in his hands like a club, and the last one was staring at our gear like it owed him money. Nobody drew first. That was good.

Opening fire in a rainforest at an unknown target is basically volunteering yourself as the appetizer course for every needle-barbed steelmidge in the area. The short-haired girl spoke first.

"Which team?" I didn't answer immediately. I read her positioning first. She was up front, the injured one half-sheltered in the middle, the other two flanking left and right. Not sloppy. Brain still online.

"Team 144," I said.

"You?"

"131." She came back just as fast, eyes flicking over my chest ID and gear before settling on my face.

"Just landed?"

"What else—do we look like we've been picnicking here for three days?" I said. Her mouth twitched like she wanted to snap back and chose not to. Good. People who can hold it back are usually more trouble than the ones who just yell. Also marginally more valuable. Jess let out a soft hum just behind my left shoulder, deliberately loud enough for them to catch.

"Oh, good news. They at least ask team numbers first. Not the type who drag you off immediately to use as door decor for the shelter." The tall, skinny guy on their side bristled and lifted his head.

"You know where the shelter is?" Too fast. That question came way too fast—like he'd tucked a blade under the small talk and couldn't wait to flash the tip. I felt a cold laugh inside and kept my face still.

"That's a very optimistic question," I said. Short-hair immediately cut a glare sideways at him—the kind that said idiot—then pulled her focus back to me.

"Ignore him. Something chased us earlier and his brain's still catching its breath," she said.

"We're just trying to confirm whether the route ahead is passable." Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

"Everything on this planet is passable," Harvey said from half a step in front of me, voice flat and dead.

"The only variable is how much of you makes it to the other side." Short-hair looked at Harvey once and clearly filed away that this wasn't the group to expect warmth from. Maki spoke up then, calm as ever.

"Right leg on your guy—Razorwasp?" Not a question. A diagnosis. The limping boy's face tightened. He didn't deny it. Short-hair nodded.

"One nest. Almost hit the joint. He can barely walk now."

"Then you're the ones who cut down from the northwest earlier," I said. She flicked a look at me, expression shifting for a split second. Not fear. Calculating what I already knew.

"You saw the tracks?" she asked.

"And heard you hit something on the way," Jess added.

"Not quietly." The tall boy bristled again.

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning a bit harder and the hive would've thought it was an earthquake," Jess said with a fake-bright smile.

"Relax, we just finished the same lesson." The air didn't exactly relax, but at least it stopped tilting further downhill. Short-hair looked us over, then glanced past us into the deeper forest, and finally put out the first cooperation signal.

"We found a relatively dry root ridge ahead," she said.

"Cuts across a big mud basin. If you're heading southeast, push much further and you'll step into a low-lying zone." Fake cooperation on the table. I didn't say thanks. I asked, "And the price?" She was just as direct.

"If you find drinkable water, you throw back a bearing." Good. Now it sounded like a real negotiation. I hadn't answered yet when Jess clicked her tongue softly in my ear.

"Frost 02 translation: what they're saying is 'we don't want to drink poison first, but we also don't want to walk away empty-handed.'" Harvey followed up, colder.

"They're also probing whether we know where the rainforest resource nodes are." Maki didn't say anything. Her eyes were on the side of Short-hair's pack. A snapped-off length of filter tube was wedged under the strap, still streaked with mud. They were really hunting water. And already desperate. I ran it quick in my head. Front-left, that fake-sweet water patch with the Maw-Fern right next to it. If I said nothing, odds were decent they'd wander that way.

If I laid everything out, I might as well hand over clean, actionable intel. If I lied, it would make my life easier short-term and disgusting long-term—and might get them killed somewhere we'd need to pass later. Annoying. This planet apparently needed a personality quiz from you every ten minutes. I watched Short-hair and finally spoke.

"There is a water point," I said. The tall guy's eyes lit up immediately. I clipped the light out with the next sentence.

"But you leave the sweet pool front-left alone," I said.

"That's not water, that's a mouth. It will close." Team 131 went quiet for half a second. The limping boy muttered a curse under his breath first. They really had been about to head that way. Short-hair stared at me for two seconds, weighing whether I was just talking to spook them. I couldn't be bothered to leave her guessing and added:"We tested it with a rock. It bites fast. If you don't believe me, you can poke it with that sad excuse for a stick."

Jess, charitable soul that she is, added:"Yeah, it's very enthusiastic. If you're even a little slow pulling back, dinner's one plate short." This time Short-hair believed it. Details like that don't usually come out of thin air that smoothly. She drew a long breath and nodded once at me.

"Then that dry root ridge is yours," she said.

"Twenty meters ahead. You'll see a black tree split into three trunks—take the right-side buttress root, stay off the left mud skin. It's hollow underneath." Good. Small enough intel that she wasn't throwing away her future; real enough to be worth logging. I nodded. That was me taking the deal. We could've left it there. But the tall boy couldn't keep his mouth out of it.

"If your HUD really has an official point—" Short-hair snapped, "Shut up!" Too late. The words were already in the air. The atmosphere tightened up again. Harvey shifted half a step forward. The metal panel on Jess's shoulder gave a soft clink. Maki didn't move, but her eyes went clean and cold. I didn't blow up immediately. Going hard right away would only make it sound like he'd actually hit something. I just looked at him and kept my voice flat.

"If your team is already pinning its hopes on someone else's HUD, I suggest you start practicing your make-up exams now." His face jerked. He clearly wanted to bite back. Short-hair got there first, stepping in front of him again and taking the field back.

"He's got a shitty mouth," she said.

"He's not testing you. He's scared."

"If he's scared, he can start with controlling his mouth," I said. That was where I chose my position. Small, but it mattered. I didn't give them anything more. No shelter. No HUD. No hint we were planning to cut southeast next. But I did pin down the fake water that bites. Not because I'd suddenly turned into the Evaporation Forest Benevolent Fund. Because there was no point watching a first-year team die stupidly to a pool pretending to be innocent.

And more than that, I didn't want to walk past a pile of fresh, insect-bait corpses from my own year on a route we might still need. Practical. Enough to keep myself honest. Short-hair probably knew exactly how narrow a slit I'd opened between them and our intel, because she didn't push. She just said, low:"Thanks." I snorted.

"Hold off on that. Live through today first." Jess tilted her head, studying me like a rare animal.

"Wow. That almost sounded like a normal human sentence from Frost 01."

"One more word out of you and I leave you here to fake-cooperate with them until graduation."

"Can't. Our team's conditions may be trash, but at least the jokes are consistent." This time Short-hair really did smile, briefly. She stepped aside and showed the direction of the dry root ridge.

"Black tree, right side. Stay high," she said. I nodded and jerked my chin at her limping teammate.

"If that leg armor starts bubbling white again, you stop. Don't limp through a low-lying zone." She looked at me, like that extra line had caught her off guard.

"Got it." Good. Deal closed. Mutual probing closed. Fake alliance established, maintained for three minutes, then dissolved on the spot. Very healthy. I cut my hand down.

"Frost, move." We threaded past Team 131, taking the dry ridge they'd ceded, and nobody turned their back all the way. That wasn't hostility. Just basic practice. Passing close to the limping boy, I caught a whiff of half-neutralized acid on his guard—identical to what we'd smelled on ourselves earlier. Same lesson. Different tuition. A few steps clear, Jess finally couldn't help herself and dropped her voice over comms.

"Frost 02, genuine question. Was that kindness just now, or business?" I stepped onto the right-hand buttress root of the black three-trunk tree, tested the hardness under my boot, then answered.

"Clearing future road hazards." She laughed.

"Perfect. That's exactly your brand." Maki was half a step ahead, didn't look back, and added quietly:"But still useful." I watched her back for half a second and answered:"Stop polishing my image." She didn't reply. But I could hear it—she was probably smiling. Not big. The kind of short, reluctant one she wouldn't admit to later.