Some people walk in the rain, others just get wet.

Sam was on 'duty' at the command post. At least as far as duty went. She was guarding a room full of nerd-types. 'Every Marine a rifleman', didn't seem to apply here. She wanted to cut them a break, being Navy and all, they were basically glorified civilians, here to do their hitch to pay for school or whatever. Captain Naptime, her name for the Valero ever since he'd slept through her simulation run, was sleepwalking through this too. Sam stifled a yawn herself. Maybe he had the right idea. NO! She wasn't going to end up like these sad sacks. Maybe she was stuck here, but she was going to do her duty. She was a Marine, damn it. She just needed something to divert her attention.

When Sam was a girl, growing up on Sirius Prime, she always loved watching the ship come in by the spaceport. Especially military craft. She'd learned the names of every class operated by the Alliance before she could count to twenty using her toes. She'd begged her mother to take her to the starport, begged for days, then weeks. A dozen 'no, its not a place for a child', hadn't put her off, the next dozen, set her desire AFLAME. She had been a willful child. Francis had been the one to take her in the end. Not to the dangerous grind of rough men and uncaring robots that was the loading deck though. He called in a favor and she ending up in the Traffic Control Tower, reading the monitors and squealing with delight as ships jumped off the screen to the massive windows overlooking the pad, as if by magic. Francis was a good dad, even if he wasn't her dad. Mom was furious when she found out for some reason, though.

Sam ended up by ECD, Earth Collision and Detection (why did they still use Earth? Sam had never even been to Earth), mostly for old times sake. The Specialist was manning his station with bored disinterest, he barely even noticed when she stood behind his station.

"Can I help you?" He didn't look up.

Sam swallowed her contempt. "It's 'Can I help you, Sergeant?', specialist."

"Yeah, yeah. Ra ra, for the Corps and all that, Sarge." He finally looked up at her with bloodshot eyes. Teller, his uniform said. "I'm at this station for the next two years of my life. Can we just get on with it?"

Sam counted to five in her head. She was still furious, of course, counting didn't do much. She was more of a puncher. "Give me a rundown on your station. Now."

Teller rolled his eyes and spun back around. "The ECD is linked with the three satelites in the system, two in counter orbits around Thiidian, one deep space at the L3 Lagrange, other systems have more, but its more than enough for us, because no one ever comes here." He met her eye, hoping she'd laugh, when Sam didn't he shrugged and kept going. "I monitor the data they produce to detect asteroids and-"

"What about enemy ships."

He stopped. Stared at her in genuine confusion and repeated it as if she were slow. "No one ever comes here. Just the Alliance transport, with cargo and new prisoners."

Prisoners. Cute.

"Show me the logs for the past ten days."

"No."

"What was that?"

"No, Sergeant. This has gone beyond your purview. I get your bored, but you'll have to get your Jarhead, hardass rocks off somewhere else. Leave it or I'll go to Valero."

She didn't drop her stare. "You're here for two years? I'm here for ten. My MOM's in the next building over. This planet is my home now. I want to know its safe. You're one of the few people who actually has an important job here. And we have no where else to be."

Teller shrugged and brought up the feeds on a smaller screen, they had barely even started when something caught her eye, a small contact six days ago, it had been on course for Thiidian, then it disappeared. No further contact.

"What was that?"

"Hmm, probably just a sensor ghost, we actually get them all the time, especially out in the asteroid field. Just asteroids. There's a unstable Jupiterian belt ringing the inner system. We get invaders." Teller chuckled. "Scares the crap out of new ECD techs."

"It was on course for Thiidian. Direct course."

"Asteroids hit us all the time, they burn up. It looks pretty. You can make a wish if you want. I do."

Was Sam stretching here? She wanted off this rock, badly. But not enough to start imagining phantom problems to solve, right? Only she'd had a feeling since she'd got here; that things weren't quite what they seemed. Why even put a base out here if there was nothing to guard? She pointed to another screen, the Lidar analysis from the ping.

"It was metal."

"What do you want me to say, Sergeant, asteroids have metal. Please don't do this. Don't work yourself up and make a bunch of extra effort, it all just ends back up here again. Just serve your rack and get out like the rest of us." His face turned sympathetic for the first time since she'd walked over. "Nothing ever happens on Thiidian."

But Sam didn't even listen to him, she keyed her Pad into the system and downloaded the data packet. She'd pour over it later on her own time. She was a good Marine, and she was doing this for the right reasons, she was almost certain of it.

---

"This planet sucks!" Cindi screamed in frustration. Her further shrieks were swallowed by the rain and the mudhole she was trapped in. Not the first one either.

Adam let out an exasperated sigh as he pulled her free from the knee high muck they had spent the last few hours trudging through. "I told you to stay on the ship." He tried a bridal carry, but her glare stopped him dead and he put her back on her feet.

"I don't NEED to stay on the ship. I NEED thermo-nuclear warhead!" She hissed. Adam laughed, until he realized she wasn't joking. Temper sister, temper.

They'd had a rough go off it for a while now. The respite of drifting through space, watching holos and exploring each other's bodies had seemed like a brief dream, ending with a rather rough, thrusters only landing in the middle of the night with no lights to guide them.

Cindi was a natural pilot, she put them down safely the lip of an ancient caldera. The rain and mud had quickly camouflaged the ship and no one fired a ping or wave-comm their way. The two of them had figured they'd wait out the rain and then trek to the nearby military base, where Sam and Kat were. That was when they realized their dream had shifted to a nightmare.

After nearly six days Cindi figured out the rain never stopped. She couldn't understand how or why. Only that somehow it kept falling all day and night. And the heat. The fucking heat. They had landed in hell. The base had seemed so close from orbit. A half days trek over open ground. In these conditions….Adam would have preferred to go alone.

Hours later, her breathing shallow and fast, Cindi dropped into the mud again. This time she didn't scream. She hadn't spoken in a while, Adam realized. He threw himself at her **** form, dragging her head out of the mud. She kept shivering and clutching her stomach, mumbling about lighting a fire. "I'm so cold, Adam!"

Adam put a hand on her head. She was burning up, maybe even heat stroke. Covered in water even hotter than her flesh, her body had given up on sweating, trying to preserve its moisture for her dying kidneys. They were hours from the ship now- too far to make it back before her kidneys failed and her heart exploded, if her brain didn't cook like scrambled eggs first.

Adam wiped furiously at the pad on her wrist. They'd come further than he thought. They were close to the base now. But not close enough. Cindi would be dead long before he saw the first lights. There just wasn't any way to cool her. Their bodies were the coolest things around for kilometers in every direction. There was nowhere for the heat to go! He felt the panic rise up in him. She was so small in his arms. Her hand came up and touched his face. He saw years of love and trust in her eyes, she still thought her big brother was going to save them. He'd just swoop in and make everything all right, just like when they were kids. Only Adam had seen a lot more of the galaxy since he was ten. Cindi wouldn't be the first little sister to die in her brother's arms. The world was cruel and hard. He'd gotten by for years by not caring. Only now, he did care and that fear was paralyzing him.

No. They weren't going to die here. Adam wouldn't let them.

Adam cradled his sister as he slogged through the mud. Cindi's head was sunk into his shoulder, one hand clutched to the safety of his neckline. She was counting on him. Adam's ground his panic into the dirt, crushed by that unstoppable Carter will to survive. He had Cindi's Pad set to alarm as soon as it pinged off any electronic signal. Bases had scouts, geographic surveys, recon patrols. He'd find one and figure out a way to get them shelter. To save Cindi... He'd burn this fucking world down.

---

"What'chu workin' on hun?" Kat looked up from her notes, rubbing the bridge of her nose, years of studying had given her astigmatism, hence the glasses. Thy also gave her a sexy scientist look, which wasn't going to hurt her plan later. No reply from her daughter. Still the dinner she'd made Sam was untouched. "Your foods getting cold, baby."

"Sorry mom." Sam shoveled in a few bites and went back to starring at the screen.

Kat sighed, pushed her glasses up with one finger and and read over Sam's shoulder. "You always did like to watch the ships come in."

Sam grunted noncommittally. Why was it always so much harder with with her own daughter? Men, women, children, they all seemed to just adore her. But Sam had always felt distant. Kat wondered for the millionth time if it was her fault. She'd kept her secrets, hid her mistakes, her secret shame. Was that why they'd never been able to make it work? Did her daughter sense on some level, that Kat wasn't honest with her? Nothing to do about that now.

"Maybe I could help? If you let me." And to Kat's great surprise, Sam showed her mom what she'd been going over, a deep space sensor logs and charts showing so called 'sensor ghosts'. "So these readings are all system?"

"Yeah?" Sam sounded wary.

"Near asteroid belt?"

"Would it kill you to just believe in me, for once? Instead of assuming I'm wrong?"

"I don't think you're wrong. I think you're ****. Why not let your Aunt Charlotte and Keith help? You know they have connections, they could get you out of this planet and somewhere better in a jiff."

"Thanks, mom." Sam had gone cold. "I can earn my own way out. That's what marines do."

From what Katerina had seen, Marines also pounded against brick walls instead of walking around them like a normal person, and her daughter was worse than most. She'd probably use her head instead of her fists. No. This was Kat's fault. She'd been a child herself when she'd had Sam, just eighteen years old and alone. She hadn't been ready to be a mom. She'd treated her daughter like a little sister at best, when she didn't push her off for Charlotte and Francis to take care of. Why couldn't she just have her daughter's back? What was she afraid of? Sam might pound her head against that wall, but she'd do it with company.

Kat dragged a chair over to her daughter's work desk. Sam studiously ignored her. "You think they're ships, right?" Silence. "This one you showed me from ten days ago? It was headed for Thiidian?" A small nod. "So its here then. That's where you have to look."

"It didn't land at the spaceport. Thiidian is a big planet."

"A big empty planet, hun. The base is all there is. There's nothing else. Everything important is ... here. Kat paused. It was a question she really hadn't considered at all. Why was the base in THIS spot, she wondered. A whole empty planet, there were other areas, some of which even more suitable locations, so why build here?

Sam meanwhile was furiously sifting through new data on her screen. Drone footage, patrol logs, she stopped dead. Kat saw the words 'septic crawler'. Ugh.

Sam hurriedly explained, there was so much water, dumping waste would just flood them all with, well, shit, unless it was far enough out to disperse safely. A handful of giant, beetle shaped machines with wide tracks to roll over the mud, were automated to dump and return day and night. Only one of them didn't return. One of them was hours overdue. Sitting out in the middle of nowhere. No one checked on it, because no one on Thiidian cared. But it mattered. Because someone was out there.

---

Crisis-2 was hungry. The serum always made him hungry. And angry. That too. They'd just gotten back from a harvest operation at Vanguard and he couldn't stop checking the clock on his pad, waiting for his next dose. Blackout, their handler, always let them have more juice on mission. 'A reward', he always said. 'Don't worry, I'll make sure no one asks questions'. Only they weren't on mission anymore. They at the base waiting for redeployment. Crisis-2 hated being off mission. The last two years had been glorious. Report after report, all of them colossal fuck ups. Stations to clears, rogue personnel to silence and all the serum he could want. For a moment, his mind drifted to the farther past before he joined Crisis Team. It seemed like a lifetime ago, blurry and distant.

Crisis-4 slammed down his equipment in the space just next to his. No, not just next to his, it was his. It belonged to him. He rose, eyes burning. Crisis-4 didn't back down. "What?"

"You're in my space." The air was crackling with imminent ****. Crisis-3 and Crisis-5 stopped their wildly mismatched sparring session to observe. Their smiles wide at the prospect of real blood being spilled.

"What are you gonna do about it?" Sneered Crisis-4.

Good question. There weren't any weapons around. Blackout had learned the hard way that if they were within reach, they'd be used. They'd had to replace Crisis-3 two times before the change in policy. He smiled, remembering how his teammates blood felt on his hands. Now all the wonderful guns and knives and bombs they used to terrorize and **** were locked away behind six inches of steel in the armory that not even Crisis-Leader could access. Or maybe he could. Cold prick never let them do anything fun.

His tightened his fists, knuckles popping, it was better to do it by hand anyway. Crisis-4 seemed to agree, **** shining in his eyes, but before the first fist could fly, Crisis-1 walked in.

His eyes raked over the team. "Stand down." Not a yell, not a shout. Crisis-Leader was some big, bad Confederate Ghost Operative. Or he had been. He spoke and he expected them to listen. Crisis-2 knew first hand what happened if he didn't listen. The man hadn't been shy about beating him into compliance, but he always used words first. It was weak. Crisis-2 hated weak.

Crisis-4 eyed their commander warily. His body already assuming a submissive pose. "You got it boss-man." Pathetic.

Crisis-2 kept his chin high. Stretched to his limit, trying to match Crisis-1 for height, it was no matter, they were equally tall, just over 1.9 meters. That seemed as much as most of them were gonna grow, even with the boost from serum. Well, except for Crisis-5. That guy was a monster.

Crisis-1 didn't flinch, didn't look away. He barely even looked awake. Instead he turned away and put his back to him. That. Little. Bastard.

Crisis-2 threw a hook at the side of his head, only it didn't connect. Somehow, faster than the eye could move, Crisis-1 had shifted, just enough that he swung and hit empty air. He turned, eyes still infuriatingly calm. Eyes that judged. Eyes that looked too human. Crisis-2 tried to claw them out, but his arm was contemptuously pushed to the side. A leg sweep was similarly dodged with minimal effort. Crisis-2 felt his rage building. He needed the juice! He needed-

Crisis-1's haymaker drove him to his knees. Then a sharp low kick put him on the cold metal. He expected more blows to rain down. Expected Crisis-1 to finish him, but he just waited. Weak. Crisis-2 got to his feet. He met his team leaders eyes for a moment, then looked down, shoulders hunched. You win old man. For now.

Crisis-Leader was cold as ever, not even a hint of satisfaction when he turned to the rest of the squad and spoke, he put his back to Crisis-2 again and it took every ounce of control not to take the bait. "We have a new Op. Location unknown, but we have at least one positive ID. 'Adam Carter'. Blackout's got a mission brief for us."

The words had barely left his mouth when the south wall of their rec room dissolved into a massive wave-comm screen, complete with the caramel skin and wide unfaltering smile of Blackout himself. The five commandos snapped into attention, Crisis-Leader like a ramrod, Crisis-2 just a less than casual slouch.

"Congratulations Crisis-Team. Headquarters was extremely pleased by your performance the last few missions."

"Vanguard was a tough get, sir." Crisis-4 wouldn't know tough if he slapped him in the pussy.

"Crazy bitch was strong. Tag, not harvest, you said." Crisis-3 added.

"Well that's why I'm calling boys. We've reviewed your data logs. Crisis-Leader, excellent work securing the girl, by the way." Crisis-Leader didn't move a muscle, he was cool, even for Blackout. Too cool. Cool was weak. "With that and some preliminary tests we've run, we now believe that Carter may have not just breached security at Gorgo, he may have actually been contaminated."

There was a moment of confused silence before Crisis-1 spoke up. "Contaminated in what way, sir? These things don't keep men alive, and the bite doesn't turn you into one of them." They all had enough teeth shaped scars to prove that.

"That's where you come in. Headquarters is very interested to examine Mr. Carter. He is now the highest priority target. We have every available agent looking for him, but he MUST be taken alive, for testing." There were unhappy rumbles, with the juice in them, taking people alive wasn't their forte. Crisis-5 had a habit of 'accidentally' squeezing too tight. Blackout seemed to read the room, his smiled deepened, like an understanding parent giving his kids a treat before a difficult chore. Or a snake, playing with its prey. Hard to tell sometimes. "I'm sneaking you boys a dose now. I wouldn't want you to go hungry."

The Serum rose out of a solid steel basin covered in scratch marks and dents. They'd all tried to break in at least once before. If anything, the metal was thicker even than the armory door. Made sense, the weapons were dangerous. But the serum was on a whole other level. Crisis-2 was the first to the drum, like always, though the others weren't far behind. He snatched one of five heavy injectors from inside- he'd tried taking two before, it went badly -and trotted back to his space. His space. HIS. They all liked a little room when they shot up if possible. Nobody trusted anyone in this outfit. Crisis-2 pressed the cool rubber seal against his bulging deltoid and squeezed. The wide bore needle punched into him and soon he felt the rich numbing fire pumping through his veins again. He felt fast, strong. Invincible, even. He heard his teammates howling like wolves in the corner, but before he could join them, something caught his eye.

Crisis-Leader hadn't injected, instead he'd unscrewed the vial and slipped it into his secure storage. His hands had been shaking the entire time. Interesting. Just how long had their fearless leader refused to indulge? Was he going on missions without dosing? Maybe it was time for a rematch. The voice that always rose up inside Crisis-2 after he injected, spoke up. Don't. Not yet. He paused, the voice always gave good advice. It saved his life countless times. He could wait. For now.

Crisis Leader corralled them into the ring for sparring practice to bleed off some 'energy'. As he directed their form in between each bout, Crisis-2 was the only one who noticed their leader's hands were still shaking.

Soon, the voice promised. Soon.

---

Sam was plunging through the darkness on her hoverbike. Running lights off. A hardsuit shielding her from the worst of the rain and the heat. She had two hours. That was what the guard at the vehicle locker she had bribed for a 'joyride' agreed to. Two hours on the bike for half a month's pay. The sentries hadn't even looked up when she'd snuck by.

Sam hated this. Hated breaking military regs. Going AWOL, stealing the Corps hoverbike- god this thing was fast, good thing this planet was barren or she'd have crashed by now. But what choice did she have? She fired the front airbrake and fishtailed around to a stop beneath the canopy of a mushroom forest. She checked the location of the missing septic hauler.

(*Credit to Joon Ahn for the amazing picture.)

No.

That was what Colonel Agnetti had told her when she showed the discrepancies in their ECD logs, the missing hauler, even some seismic activity that showed possible landing sites stretching back for years. She'd asked him for a recon patrol to find the hauler first.

"Colonel. We have intruders in system, spying on an Alliance base, or at least violating our territory. These aren't smugglers touching down. This is a sophisticated operation. There's been three landings in the last years. The most recent, in the Veros Caldera-"

Agnetti held up a hand to stop her. His eyes flat and hard. Colonel 'Hardass' indeed. Why was it the ONE good officer on planet, had such a stick up his ass? Couldn't he just be reasonable? Instead it was, "Leave the reports. Dismissed."

Sam had left in a cold fury. What would Adam do? He'd been on her mind more and more lately. Probably wouldn't let the 'rules' stop him, especially if he thought it was the right thing to do. The man had a wild side, but it was his noble ideas that got him into trouble. Still...

And that's how Sam found herself 'renting' the bike. She was close now. She tore through the forest. It was worse here than in the open. Sure the giant fungi blocked the rain, but they trapped even more of the humidity, and the heat she could practically feel it radiating up from the the mud her bike glided over so effortlessly. She caught site of the hauler up ahead and took a wide looping circle, the optics in her helmet zoomed to max. Some enterprising person had cannibalized it. Huge sheets of the storage tank were striped and pushed back together, from the beads of condensation dripping down the sides, they had rigged the coolant systems to create a shelter. Clever. Maybe they really were smugglers. This didn't look like the high-fly operation she'd pitched to Agnetti hours ago. Time to get some answers.

Her bike idling safely behind her, Sam dropped into the muck, wishing once again for a full rig of power armor. At least the suit kept her legs dry. She pulled her sidearm free, just a laspistol, but weapons were harder to 'rent' than transport. She would be eating noodles for a long time paying it off as is. "This is the Alliance Marines. Come out slowly, or we'll fill you full of holes." The mics in her suit boomed, gave her voice a bit of reverb too, it sounded cool as hell. No response. This was taking too long. She aimed for high spot, chances are no one was that tall. A scream, silence, then frantic arguing as the cool air streamed out.

A girl, maybe a few years younger than Sam pushed out with her hands high. Her blonde hair was plastered to her skull, but she met Sam's eyes steadily despite the lasgun leveled at her head. Not the first time she'd seen the wrong end of a gun, Sam figured.

"Tell your friend to come out too."

The girl shook her head. "Its just me."

Sam gave her a flat look. "I was born at night, but not last night. Last chance before I turn your little house into swiss cheese."

The girl took a step forward, head cocked in familiar way. Actually, now that Sam thought about it, a lot about this girl seemed familiar.

"Sam?" Her little cousin called out.

"Cindi!" She couldn't believe it. Shock, then indignation filled her. Just like the princess to make more work for everyone else. "Why couldn't you just land at the spaceport like a normal person?"

"We-" But whatever she'd been about to say rolled over Sam's ears, cause there he was. Taller, broader, blue eyes glowing like a wolf, his hair was smoking from her laspistol graze. Adam. Fucking. Carter.

Sam ripped her helmet off. She wanted him to see her face. She splashed her way over. "You've got some nerve coming here. All this time. You didn't even think to call me and now you're sneaking around my backyard?

"Good to see you too, Sam." He snorted.

"Fuck you, Adam."

"How is you get to be mad at me right now?"

Only she wasn't mad. How did only the sight of him turn her back into that nervous, knobby kneed teen? Barely more than a girl, when she'd shyly asked if they could be each other's first kiss. Just to get it out of the way. Really. No other reason. She'd fallen hard after that. Secrets compounding feelings, taboo driving emotion. No, Sam wasn't mad, she was fucking terrified. And when she got scared, she struck first, just like always. He armored fist connecting with her cousins fat head.

"Sam!" Came Cindi's shrill little yap. Whatever. It was just a cross. Sure enough, Adam had barely flinched. More surprised than hurt.

"I'm sorry, ok. I didn't even plan to see you. We just need to talk to your mom. And they we'll leave." Adam seemed to realize what stupid thing that was to say, riiiiiiiiight after the words left his mouth.

Sam put her whole weight into the left hook and it showed. Adam went down like a sack of hammers. This time he stayed down.

Ok. Now she was mad.