Clara led Loken out of the Col-Ad building, where a group of heavily armed men and women were waiting for them. They sported combat armour and automatic weapons and took orders from Loken as if he was their commanding officer. The soldiers trooped along behind them in three lines of two. 

A queue was forming at the door to the Director’s office, with people requesting to speak to Ogilvie. The agent guarding the door nodded and waved them through one at a time, telling them to keep their business short and quick. When they entered, Director Ogilvie looked up tiredly at them. Having just been confined to  his office he was deep in thought but knew his duty well enough. “New arrivals? Welcome to RX, you have come at a busy time.” He said with a smile. “What can i do for you all?”

[@ihinka] [@themadasshatter]

An uncomfortable silence had developed, so Clara was well aware when some of the soldiers peeled off shortly after to deal with what looked like some new arrivals. Clara thought about saying something but there was definitely an air of urgency about the whole ordeal. Hopefully those new arrivals would take the hint and not piss these people off. 

Clara took them to the vehicle pool, where the colony’s general use buggies were kept. It was essentially a large airless garage with rows and rows of different colony multi-purpose buggies, trucks and mining equipment. The place was always busy with dozens of rigs coming and going at all hours. 

Clara signed out one four seater and a six seater. The four seater was for her, Loken and the two agents accompanying them and the six seater was enthusiastically accepted by the remaining soldiers to follow behind in. She clambered into the driver's seat and powered from the garage with the confidence of someone who drove one every day. After a couple of false starts the marines caught up behind.

“Doctor,” began Loken, looking from one side of the rocking transport to the other. “Can you tell me more precisely what it is you’ve located at this site?”

Clara glanced over at the agent, who luckily wasn’t staring right at her. “Well uh, the site we’ve uncovered appears to be part of an extensive set of structures under the surface of the moon. Maybe an entrance point? The materials used are millions of years old, but we’ve been able to uncover etching and patterns which our linguistics specialist is working on at the moment.

They were winding around large rocks and dips in the landscape, following a beaten track that Clara knew like the back of her hand. She glanced at Loken again. “So why are you guys here? Is it something to do with the quake we just had?”

Loken listened to the civilian while scanning the horizon around them. It was a habit he had developed in the marines, searching for targets; snipers, spotters, anything that could be watching them. “So in other words, no you can’t tell me what it is,” he said. “I can’t tell you specifically, but you’re no doubt aware by now that it is very much to do with the work you people have been doing here this last year or so.”

Great, thought Clara. A lot of talking but not much being said. Her earpiece started vibrating, she looked at her wrist unit. It was Thebes. She accepted the comm line. “Yes Thebes whats up?” She asked, seeing Loken craning to get a listen from the corner of her eye. “Ma’am, i have detected some kind of biological anomaly at the dig site you are heading to. I have dispatched the Sacred Band to your location. 

The Sacred Band were a project that Thebes had been working on since he arrived on RX. With almost none of his impressive processing power occupied with his day job, Clara always marvelled at the interesting advancements the AI made on an almost daily basis. The band consisted of twelve droids, made entirely of components manufactured by Thebes himself via small fabricators in the Security Control room he had made his home. They were stripped back robots which could use colony weapons with a reasonable degree of accuracy. More astonishingly, Thebes could control all 12 of them independently.

“Is that hardly necessary?.” Clara asked.
“Better safe than sorry Ma’am. I would like to take this opportunity to ask you to recall your men and head to the safety of the colony.” Thebes replied.

Loken looked over with curiosity. He wasn’t able to hear the conversation coming through Clara’s commbead over the din of the engine and the crunching of the heavy tires over the rock, but her could hear her replies. “What’s wrong?” he asked, unsure if it was relevant to him or not.

Clara navigated onto the mountainside track that would lead them to the dig site. “I just got a report of a biological anomaly at the dig site. Thebes is sending troops as a precaution.” She tried to get Dr Gao on her PA but his device didn’t respond. Clara sped up the buggy.

[hr]

After half an hour’s drive, they arrived at the Science Station. It consisted of a huddle of habitats and work units on the edge of a precipice. At the bottom of a large roughly circular pit was the excavation, with large metal gantries winding down to it.

‘A biological anomaly,’ wondered Loken. Her reply had been fairly ambiguous, but the mention of troops being sent made him smirk. Local security, or some such. He had half a section of marines with him and his own agents; a small army, by all accounts. 
Loken disembarked from the transport. One of the marines got out of the vehicle behind and walked up to him. “Falcon One can stay here for now. Falcon Two I want you doing a foot recce around the perimeter of the site. No contact to report, but we’ve been caught out before. Make it happen, marine.” he said. He wasn’t expecting contact on a moon like this. The marine nodded and walked back to their transport. His team disembarked and wandered around, scanning the horizon. Some of Falcon One sat down, others slumped against the side of the buggy. It was a case of hurry up and wait for them. Loken turned back to Clara. “Lead on, Doctor Lascelles,” he said. “My team and I will escort you.”

Clara made her way down the winding ramp. It was dotted with grav-lifters fulls of supply crates. She could see no sign of her team. “This doesn’t feel right.” She whispered to Loken. “There’s no activity, we have a team of twenty down here.” She tried calling Dr Gao again, no answer.

“Do not be afraid.” A voice rumbled, seemingly from inside her head. The whole excavation shook violently. Loken tapped his commbead. “Falcon One, come in. Are you feeling tremors up there too?” he asked. 

[@elevation]