Chương 139: CDM 3, Chapter 15: Field Observation

A new CDM-wide policy on gates with werewolves and vampires landed before the day ended. Enforcer Chapman had gone directly to Director Akinwale, a man I had seen exactly once when crasher and crawler violence was at its height. I don't have any actual insight into how those conversations went, but for those changes to come down as quickly as they did, he must have been overwhelmingly supportive.

For the immediate future, all registered crawlers in the state of Pennsylvania would be notified that lycanthropy and vampirism were now serious concerns. Crawlers were required to proactively report when gates contained any of those elements as well as disclose any injuries or wounds incurred in those dungeons, even if they weren't from one of those monsters directly. On the harvesting side, the bodies of those monsters were to be treated as hazardous materials.

Previously, a harvester dragging a dead werewolf to a more convenient location was a benign process. Now, they had to behave as if the possibility of blood transmission was assumed. Earthborn werewolves–that was the descriptor journalists unofficially adopted to distinguish between werewolves that came out of gates and normal humans who contracted it later–were rare, but the possibility of transmission was confirmed.

The vampirism cases were so rare that none of us in the Divas group chat could find articles about those incidents. Chapman had heard about it somehow, but we knew nothing else at that point in time. Starting a workday with an EPA and FBI meeting set the tone for a challenging shift, but other than the werewolf and vampire news, I was happy to discover that most of the hours were relatively dull.

Enforce de Saint and I spent much of the shift reviewing the footage RAID automatically flagged as potentially including monsters. We were warned that the algorithm was not well tested and that errors were possible. That was very much true. For some reason, RAID flagged every child it saw as a potential goblin. That was problematic for a litany of reasons, one of which was the sheer volume of false positives we had to mark. In 24 hours, RAID produced 121 of those false positives.

Bulk removing all goblin incidents from the logs until that was fixed was tempting, but we had 2 identifications that were accurate. Both appeared to correspond with a known SOC along the Ohio Valley River. We followed the procedure I invented and informed the EPA of our findings, which included the footage RAID captured. The most interesting video was of 3 bugbears moving through a forest northeast of the city. Bugbears were like fit and hairy hobgoblins.

They had gnarled faces, pointy ears, and seven-foot physiques that made steroid-riddled bodybuilders look tiny. Not only was this footage indisputably clear, but Parker Dam State Park was nearby, and one of the tips the Dungeon Divas received was for bugbears in this area. At the time, the EPA didn't have an SOC listed, but their map had one now. Chapman was always CCed on our email chains with the EPA, so when we shared our findings near the end of the day, she received the email as well.

That was usually an unremarkable detail, but Chapman called de Saint and me into her office as we prepared for the end of our shifts.

"I cancelled all of your harvest inspections for tomorrow," she said the moment we stepped through the door. De Saint and I exchanged confused, concerned looks.

"That's not a punishment," Chapman continued.

"I may have ruminated too long on the EPA and the FBI trying to tell us that they are the dungeon experts. They should be taking our direction, not the other way around. Mark my words, our Rapid Dungeon Response team will own all wild monster hunts within the next 12 months." She was always dedicated to her work, but I couldn't recall ever hearing her sound this motivated. Even if the EPA and FBI weren't around to see it, Chapman was throwing down the gauntlet.

"Tomorrow, you two, as well as Enforcer Osheski and Enforcer Black are going to Parker Dam State Park to observe how the EPA exterminates the bugbear infestation. I apologize for the short notice given the drive, but their operation begins at 0600. Will any of this be an issue?"

"No, ma'am," de Saint and I replied in unison.

"I need to emphasize that you are observers, not participants," Chapman added, looking directly at me when she spoke. And that was fair of her to do. I was already thinking about ways to weasel myself into being part of the operation.

"Understood."

"Good. Osheski and Black are already confirmed. It's not required, but riding together so that all of you arrive together would be better optics for RAID."

"I don't mind driving," I said to de Saint. She shook her head emphatically.

"I'll drive."

"Is Enforcer Gray a bad driver?" Chapman asked.

"No…" de Saint began, floundering a bit on how to answer that question. She was new to the Divas and was nervous about revealing the wrong detail. So I jumped in.

"Goblin guts are difficult to get out of upholstery, ma'am." Chapman grimaced.

"That bad, huh?" De Saint nodded.

"It's bad, ma'am." Chapman laughed, which was kind of like seeing a shooting star. I was still pissed about getting arrested, but I dared to believe that Chapman was coming around to liking me. With her being aware of the Divas and having a great deal of power over my working life, that was a heartening development. The EPA commandeered the Parker Dam State Park Office for their mission briefing. Like most State Park offices, the building was small, typically only needing to interface with a few citizens at a time.

The room had old, peeling wood paneling on every surface. A few framed pictures of Parker Lake at various points in history hung on the walls with some old posters about camping trips and fishing events. It smelled like laundry left in the washing machine long enough to go sour, and the space was a dull roar of a dozen personal conversations. This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Today, the office was wall-to-wall with EPA agents, two park rangers, and the four of us from the CDM. I counted 16 EPA agents, all wearing digital winter camouflage. 10 of them carried bows, and the other 6 had shields and swords. All of them wore some kind of armor beneath their fatigues, but the agents without bows wore noticeably bulkier gear. So, the majority of the agents were archers, rangers, or rogues, with a chance for a fighter who took an archery proficiency, but those were rare.

The other 6 were likely fighters, brawlers, or defenders. A mage might have been among them, but I didn't see any obvious signs of one, and also, why would a mage work exterminations for the EPA when they could get a cushy gig with a guild? Enforcer Black was the only one of us who struggled with the early hour. We left Pittsburgh at 3: 00 a. m. to get there by 6: 00 a. m., and he slept most of the way. An Agent Kipinski greeted us. She was closer to Black in stature, and Black used to play D1 football.

To her credit, she didn't seem the slightest bit annoyed that we were tagging along.

"It's good to meet all of you," she said when the rounds of introductions had concluded.

"We haven't had a ride-along in a while. Basically, you'll follow me around, which will be 90% watching monitors, but you know what that's like." She knew we were from RAID. We were professional monitor-watchers.

"I'll do my best to answer questions. All I ask is that you save them for lulls in activity. Any concerns with that?" We shook our heads.

"Great. We're going to start the mission briefing, but I should point out that this is a much bigger operation than usual. If this were goblins, we'd have half as many bodies. Bugbears are a more serious threat, and several organizations, the Governor's office among them, want certainty that the problem has been eliminated." Kipinski threaded through the waiting agents until she was at the front of the room. A map of Parker Lake was on the wall, which Megan pointed out was the shape of a limp penis.

Once that was in my mind, I couldn't get rid of it. This part of the state was mountainous with dense forests and had only one open road passing by the lake. A second road wrapped around the other side, but it had been barricaded off for repairs for 20 years or so.

"Our reconnaissance puts the bugbear camp here," Kipinski said, pointing to the forest east of the lake.

"That's accurate as of sundown last night. We have confirmed at least 23 in this tribe. Team Alpha, you are going to take Mud Run to the powerlines north of the lake." Her finger traced the one open road north and then turned sharply to the east. In this part of the state, cutting a channel in the forest for powerlines was cheaper than trying to manage fallen trees or intrusions, creating a long, distinct reverse mohawk in otherwise untouched nature.

The topography would vary in person, but the line was perfectly straight in satellite images.

"Team Alpha will follow the power lines to here and then approach the camp from the northeast. Team Bravo will approach from the southeast. Team Charlie and our base of operations will be here on the other side of the dam. Alpha and Bravo will converge simultaneously, driving the bugbears toward the river or lake if they run. Team Charlie will eliminate the targets who do.

"We got lucky today. That side of the lake is relatively level, so Team Alpha has about 600 meters of easy ground to cover, and Team Bravo has about 150. As always, exercise comms discipline so we don't spook anything early. Questions?" A man I couldn't really see raised his hand.

"Are we worried they might try to cross the river?"

"Yes," Kipinski answered.

"Team Charlie will be monitoring for that. Any other questions? This is one of the more straightforward missions we've had in a while." When no one else raised a hand, she nodded approvingly.

"Alright, everyone, good hunting." Team Alpha was four people, two with bows and two with swords. Team Bravo was eight people, and all but three of them had bows. The remaining four agents were on Team Charlie, and all of them had bows. The groups broke off right there in front of the park office, and we followed Agent Kipinski up the road to where Team Charlie would be stationed.

During the briefing, I was surprised by how little support the field agents had, but I soon saw why: The support team was already in position. A truck about two-thirds the length of a school bus was parked off to the side of the road, as were two other EPA pickups.

"All of our people are GPS tagged, and we'll have four drones deployed for this op," Kipinski explained as she led us up three stairs and into the comms truck.

"We rarely go above two, but again, bugbears." The comms headquarters lacked the dramatic lighting of a spy or police drama but was otherwise remarkably similar. Each of the drone pilots had two screens–one for flight data and one for the view from the drone. A third monitor mounted above their station duplicated the drone view to make it easier for someone other than the pilot to see what they saw. A fifth person manned a satellite perspective of the area. Clumps of bright pink dots moved across it.

Seeing all of this reminded me of my talk with Enforcer McDouglas. The per hour cost of this operation had to be at least $5, 000, but even that felt low for all the equipment and resources in use. $1, 000 for a troll was cheap as fuck, even if the EPA had half as many people deployed as they did now. Once Kipinksi confirmed each member of her team was on task, she said, "We like to have at least one drone deployed per team, one drone on the target site, and then at least one drone roaming.

Our mandate is total extermination, so if a target slips through, the roamer will follow the loose monster for as long as it takes. Any other questions for me? It'll be quiet for a bit while everyone gets into position."

"How often do you use helicopters for a hunt?" Black asked.

"Rarely. Helicopters are loud, and they spook just about everything. Team Alpha has mana ATVs. They aren't perfectly silent, but they'll make the trip along the powerlines brief. They'll go into the forest on foot."

"How long did you observe the bugbears?" I asked next.

"48 hours," Kipinski answered.

"For large goblin nests, we tend to monitor for at least 72 hours. That gives us a clear picture of how big the nest is, where their trails are, and if they have any sneaky surprises for us, like tunnels or ambush chokepoints. Bugbear tribes are nomadic, however, so we try to hit quickly. They rarely spend more than a week in one place, and they travel mostly at night because they can see in the dark. We actually lost track of this tribe when they were much farther east." Megan raised her hand.

"How much different is fighting wild bugbears from dungeon bugbears?" Kipinski widened her eyes.

"Very. They have all the ruthlessness of goblins but are patient, smart pack hunters. They're good at camouflaging themselves, and they're good with bows. An EPA unit in Colorado lost 3 people because bugbears snuck up behind them. The monsters basically army-crawled for a solid hour before they popped up and loosed a bunch of arrows."

"Damn," Black whispered involuntarily. Kipinski nodded.

"Any wild monster is bad news, but bugbears have skill and discipline. The ones in dungeons are rarely in the kind of terrain where bugbears thrive. Out here? They have the advantage." I risked one more question.

"What levels are your people?"

"Each team is led by a level 15, and the rest are 10s."

"We've got movement in the nest," one of the drone operators reported.

"Five of them moving north with bows and clubs."

"We can talk again after this is done," Kapinski said.

"Enjoy the show."