Chương 11: Xenobiology

Academy Hill, Vidako Imperium Stellarum August 29, 2847 Every morning when Arc woke, he couldn't keep his eyes from drifting to the stripped bunk where Delvan Beck had slept. He kept expecting that one evening he would walk in after eating in the dining hall to find that there'd been some sort of mistake, and that, having talked things over with the commandant, Beck was back, and ready to join them in the morning.

At other times, though he knew it was uncharitable, Arc silently wondered why it couldn't have been Cal Madine who threw a fit and quit the academy. He hadn't known Beck long, but given the choice, Arc would have roomed with him over Madine in a heartbeat. Cal hadn't yelled at him since the day he'd arrived, but he also hadn't exactly been friendly. The absence was even more obvious during meals, when Arc and his friends all deliberately avoided looking at the empty place where Delvan Beck used to sit.

The conversation would lag, suddenly and at unpredictable times, like some engine or machine trying to turn despite the absence of a missing part.

"I have a cousin," Pika said, into one such silence, on the second day after Beck had left.

"Graduated the academy five imperial years ago. He said they lost twelve cadets during Hard Burn."

"Is that normal?" Vee asked, around a mouthful of some kind of fried insect which reminded Arc of a cricket or grasshopper.

"Between fifteen and twenty percent during Hard Burn is the average," Cassie said. Her certainty spoke of just how much time she'd spent learning about the academy before ever stepping foot on Vidako.

"Classes would have been a maximum of sixty-one five years ago, so twelve is on the high end, but yes. Within the bounds of normal." Vee's crest drooped for a minute, and then she perked up.

"Well, there's six of us. Or there were. So, we've already lost sixteen percent. We paid our toll! No more wash outs, right?" Arc wasn't so certain, though he kept his thoughts to himself. He tried to keep what Cadet Iyer had said to him in mind—to just keep going, do the next thing, and not think about what would come after. But he didn't think that he'd ever been so tired in his life, and he knew for certain that he couldn't go on for four years like this.

It was better to be learning, rather than simply pushed until they collapsed, and he comforted himself with that. The morning after that conversation, they were brought to an outdoor range, where Arc learned how to strip, clean, re-assemble and fire the Broadleaf Arms. 50 flechette rifle which was standard issue to all imperial marines.

"Before any of you mole rats gets the bright idea of asking why a mech pilot needs to know how to fire a rifle," Lieutenant Kekoa said, while they all sat around him on the black grass, unloaded weapons on their laps, "I will tell you. First, you will almost certainly spend time attached to a fleet carrier. In the unlikely event that your ship is boarded, you may be required to take a weapon from the armory and help repel said boarding party.

Now, if everything goes correctly, you will never be in that situation—but the first lesson you need to learn about plans is that they all go to shit the moment a soldier makes contact with the enemy."

"Secondly," Kekoa said, "Once you get into a cockpit, you will find that there is an emergency kit stored in each and every imperial mech. It has plenty of goodies that might keep you alive, and one of the things packed away is—you guessed it—a standard issue rifle like this. In the event that you are forced to eject, perhaps behind enemy lines or on some unexplored death-world, this piece of weaponry in your lap may save your life."

Kekoa reached into his pocket, retrieved a bullet that looked to be at least ten centimeters long, and held it up.

"I'm going to pass this around so everyone can get a good look," he said.

"But for the moment just keep your eyes up here. In the nose of this bullet is an optical sensor. This sensor sends information to the guidance and control electronics, and those use actuators to move the fins along the sides. I've removed the sabots on this bullet so that you can see those; normally, they're concealed until after you've fired, when the bullet is in flight."

"At close ranges, you won't notice much of a difference, because the bullet doesn't have time to make course corrections," the lieutenant explained.

"So, you still need to develop actual skill with your weapon. But once you pass a thousand meters, this bullet will get within two tenths of a meter of your target area, so long as you aim in the general direction of what you're trying to hit." One of the cadets, a human girl with pale blonde hair, hard gray eyes, and the unfortunate name of Cieszyński, raised her hand. Once she'd been called on, she asked, "how does the bullet know what to target, sir?"

"It hooks into the neural lace you don't have yet, and reads targeting information from your ocular nerve," Kekoa explained.

"Good question cadet. Take a look at this and then pass it along." He handed the bullet to Cieszyński. When it came to Arc's turn—the bullet went to Cassie first, and she passed it to him after a very brief glance—he turned it over in his fingers. He could make the fins wiggle, he found, with a bit of effort. He tried to imagine what those fins would do to a human body when they entered flesh and couldn't suppress a shudder of revulsion.

No longer interested in holding the bullet, he passed it off to Vee, then turned his attention to the lieutenant again. Arc knew that on some worlds hunting was a sport—but on Zurah, there weren't any native animals which drew people to the hobby.

In fact, there weren't many native life forms more advanced than primitive flora at all, and the bombyx zurahis, genetically engineered silk moths which made their home in the mulberry trees introduced to the planet to provide a suitable habitat, were too important to the world's economy to let people tramp around with firearms, anyway. As a result, this was the first time he'd ever handled a rifle, and his performance was predictably abysmal.

He wasn't at all surprised to find that Cadet Cieszyński was the top shot of their class. Perhaps the best thing which could be said about weapons training—or the survival training which was introduced around the same time—was that it provided less opportunity for Blake Van Camp to take notice of Arc and his friends.

Even that was a double-edged sword, because when Van Camp was present, such as during the morning runs, the older cadet seemed even more irritable than usual—perhaps because Lieutenant Kekoa having less need for him meant that he'd be earning less merits, Arc speculated. Arc had certainly never had the sort of instruction in the dangers of Vidako's native ecosystem that the cadets were given as Hard Burn continued.

For that, they were finally permitted into a classroom in the science building, where a severe-looking woman, with her blonde hair pulled back in such a tight bun that it seemed to be painted to her skull, presided over two long tables worth of crates, pelts, water-filled tanks, strange insects suspended in jars of fluid, and what Arc suspected were carcasses only barely covered by white sheets.

"Be seated, cadets," Lieutenant Kekoa shouted, his deep voice filling the lecture hall easily.

"I am going to leave you in the care of Doctor Vogel, head of the academy's xenobiology department. If your behavior is anything less than the standard I have set for you, be assured that I will hear about it, and that there will be consequences. This is a change in setting, only—you are still my responsibility until Hard Burn is complete." Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Arc, Cassie, Vee, Rain and Pika managed to find themselves a cluster of seats in the front row of the lecture hall, though Pika had to sit behind the rest of them and on the outer aisle, so that those in the next row back could still see their instructor. To Arc's surprise, no more than five minutes after the piloting program cadets had arrived, a crowd of technical students poured into the hall and began filling in the upper rows.

It took a moment more for everyone to get settled, but when the woman at the front of the room tapped her earpiece, the ruckus reduced to only an occasional cough or muted shuffling of feet.

"Lieutenant Kekoa and Chief Jastrow instructed you all to bring your tablets, I hope?" Doctor Vogel said, looking over the filled seats. Arc already had his unfolded and set on the half-desk which swung up from between the lecture seats, and had opened a note file, ready to type. There was a bit more shuffling as those cadets who hadn't thought that far ahead fetched their own tablets from pockets.

"Good," Vogel declared, once she'd scanned the audience and, based on the nod of her head that Arc noticed, decided that they were all sufficiently prepared.

"I have you for a very limited time, and there's quite a bit of information to impart. You will begin each of our training sessions ready to take notes." A hand raised, and though the xenobiologist pursued her lips, she nodded.

"Doctor Vogel, wouldn't it be more efficient to simply post a notes file on the academy servers?" a cadet with frizzy hair and a spray of acne across his cheeks asked.

"No," Vogel answered, sharply.

"Taking your own notes forces you to engage with the material as it is presented. You must make decisions on what is most important, how to summarize, and in what manner to organize the information. Wanting someone else to do that work for you is not only lazy, it is a less effective way to learn. I expect the next person who asks a question to think before opening their mouth." That remark was followed by silence.

"Now, there is some debate as to whether Vidako qualifies as a death world or not, among the academics of the empire," Vogel went on.

"This is foolish, and largely politically motivated. The local dukes have insisted for several generations that the mere fact they have been able to, at great cost, clear enough of the jungle to plant crops around their cities invalidates the label. They do this because they wish to attract tourists and investors, not because they have a real argument.

Make no mistake, when you leave the academy for the last two weeks of Hard Burn, you will be entering a hostile alien environment—one which has every intention of killing you." Arc frowned and leaned over so that he could whisper to Cassie.

"We're going into the jungle?"

"It's how they end every Hard Burn," she said, leaning so close that their faces nearly touched.

"They don't usually have any actual deaths."

"—witness the zombie fly," Vogel said, pointing to a fluid-filled jar. She pulled a remote control from her pocket and flicked on a projection that filled the enormous screen at her back with a magnified image of the thing. It had four legs, horrific mandibles, dragonfly-like wings, and a tail reminiscent of a Terran scorpion.

"Roughly the size of the genetically adapted Terran birds many of you may be used to on the core worlds," Vogel continued, "the zombie fly is so named because of its strikingly grotesque means of reproduction. The tail, or ovipositor, here –" and she tapped a hand against the projection "—is used to pierce the epidermis of the victim, and to implant already fertilized eggs.

When the eggs hatch, rather than bursting out of the still-living victim which would be, let us be honest, dangerous enough, the larvae begin to crawl their way to the host's brain. There, they find the frontal lobe and begin to eat. Through a fascinating process that I don't think is relevant to you at the moment, the larvae can even inject a series of toxins and hormones into the host brain which permits them to modify the creature's behavior.

Only at the end of this stage of their life cycle, during which the fly is a quite effective parasite, do the larvae leave the body and grow their wings."

"I hate it," Vee grumbled. At the center of the front row, Cal Madine raised his hand.

"What level of protection is sufficient to prevent the implantation of the eggs?" he asked.

"Ceramic armor plates will do it," Doctor Vogel said.

"Anyone who stays sealed in a mech cockpit is completely safe. The moment you leave that cockpit, however, you're vulnerable." Next to Madine, one of the other cadets with close-clipped hair and a military bearing—one of those from a second or third generation fleet family, Arc guessed—put his hand up.

"Can the eggs be surgically removed? Can we cut them out with a knife?"

"If you can get them," Vogel said, and gave a nod.

"Which requires a deft hand. They're small, slippery little buggers, and tend to slide further into the body every time you miss a good grip. That means you have to open your incision further the longer you work, and unless you're here at the infirmary, you can easily end up with a patient who's in shock, bleeding out, or even in the best-case scenario with an infected wound. And all of that assumes you don't miss one of the sneaky little things."

Something, however, was bothering Arc, and before he could think better of it, he lifted his own arm. Doctor Vogel met his eyes, and nodded permission to speak.

"The indigenous fauna must have evolved some sort of defense," he said, "or the ecosystem wouldn't function. We're outside elements, so we're vulnerable—but what do they do?"

"Well put, cadet," Vogel said, and raised her control, flicking to the next image: that of an amber eyed feline creature with thick fur, a long, curling tail, powerful jaws, and, to Arc's discomfort, elongated, clawed fingers rather than paws—including a primitive thumb.

"The Vidakan tree cat—which is not truly a cat but is certainly a mammal. It has characteristics of both a primate and a feline. Strictly nocturnal, semi-arboreal, and an ambush predator with a penchant for dropping onto unsuspecting targets from above. The males can get up to four hundred kilograms, which is more than enough to break your back. Their fur, save for around the fingers or the mouth, is so thick that the zombie fly's ovipositor can't get to their skin. Of course, that isn't always enough."

Vogel flicked to a third slide, which depicted, rather than an animal, a mass of roots. They draped down over the bank of a waterway, coiled up, cracked nearby rocks open, and eventually bloomed into spikey-looking, scarlet leaves or flowers so bright that Arc could hardly believe they weren't artificial.

"Death root," the doctor declared.

"A predatory, carnivorous network of surface roots connected by subterranean mycelium which permits entire colonies to work together across vast swaths of the jungle. The roots trap and kill their prey in a manner similar to Terran constrictor snakes, such as boa constrictors. The flowers, on the other hand, are thoroughly toxic—and adapted specifically to kill the zombie flies."

"In fact, tree cats are known to gnaw on the leaves if they've been stung," Vogel continued.

"A sufficient concentration of the death root poison in their bloodstream appears to kill the eggs of the fly. It's really quite fascinating and may someday lead to a pharmaceutical treatment." A cadet in the third row, who wore a black scarf to cover her hair, raised a hand.

"All of this sounds incredibly dangerous, ma'am. Which would you consider to be the apex predator of the local biome?"

"None of them," Vogel said. She raised her remote, clicked it with one finger, and moved the projection to a new picture. When Arc and Cassie had looked down at the jungles of Vidako during their descent on the orbital elevator, he had seen trees moving, though not the source of the disturbance. There's supposed to be indigenous predators that can rip a Tyro in half, Cassie had told him, at the time. He'd had a hard time imagining what such a monster would look like—but now, he didn't have to imagine.

If there hadn't been trees in the picture to give a sense of scale, Arc would have tried to find some way to deny the sheer size of the predator that Doctor Vogel was showing them. It stood—barely—on two rear digitigrade legs, with muscular thighs and enormous, clawed feet that dug into the soil of the jungle floor. The forelegs were almost as large but equipped with grasping claws.

The enormous jaw looked powerful enough to crush ceramic armor, and the back, shoulders, upper skull, and tail were covered in wicked-looking spiked growths. Just looking at it made Arc shiver. The monster had to be twenty meters at the shoulder, based on the height of the trees. It might well weigh nearly as much as a Tyro.

"The Vidakan spiked terror," Doctor Vogel declared, with evident satisfaction. Arc thought it rather unfair that she took such pleasure in the existence of something which looked expressly designed to kill them all.

"This, cadets, is the apex predator of the jungles which surround us—and the reason this planet deserves the distinction of being classified as a death world."