Purgatory, 18: War Drums
30 Jan 2024Meowers
Warning: mind-altering substances, excessive usage of offensive language.
"If you aren't sure about surviving another day, maybe it's the perfect time to live the current one like it's your last."
T + 89h 11min. Yeah, it's almost totally dark now and, seemingly, we're in the thick... Of some fun. By all standards, not just the weird local traditions. I mean, just look at those folks, like, everything tells me that once they finished celebrating the victory, they began celebrating our arrival. Non-stop chaos. Ah, ignorance is truly a form of bliss... Much possibly, they can't even conceptualise that the Azimuth garrison can wipe them out in less than an hour. If only they wanted to... Yet, for a reason, they keep the tribe alive. Why, exactly? No idea. Lucky lil' tribe, I can't even explain that and shatter their little dreamworld.
Anyway... I've even met the local chieftain, presumably. Boss. Commander-in-chief. Warlord. At least he has the most impressive collection of skull parts for a necklace, and the best set of actual armour I've seen around here, and the others stood aside, making a way for him. I can't understand their language even if it sounds like they're already on the verge of inventing their own words... So, I was nodding and sometimes placing my palm on my chest in sign of sincerity as he tried to communicate with me. Also, their funerals. The chieftain offered me an opportunity to bring one of their fallen warriors to the fire, and, before doing so, he gestured to me to take my glove off, made a cut on the dead body and covered my palm in blood, still red and warm. Then... I knew what to do, I reached the ritual rock and left a mark on it, tightly pressing my palm against its surface, already warmed by the fire. Seems like an honourable thing for them...
I think I have to go silent for a little while. Tribals saw my marines opening the MREs and, correctly, guessed we're hungry. So they took quite a few of those fresh caught lizard-dogs and even a... Is that a local hellswine? Damn it's huge... Yeah, something that looks like a wild sow, yet bigger, like, two, maybe even three times, they carried that creature to the fire and now chopping the meat... Yeah, the fire, they have lit up a big one close to the centre of the settlement and brought some logs to sit on. And the pig... Large and bulky, yet without a snout, with a big blunt thick-skulled head, bizarre crested back, adorned with spikes all over it, short legs armed with retractable, long claws attached over the hooves, really long, longer than my hand. They even gave one to me as, like, a gift, phah... Yep, that's some big game hunting there, that previous tribe didn't have the weapons and coordination to bring one of these down, but these folks, it looks like they've caught it not too long ago, maybe even today, and that's a lot of meat to roast... Okay, it's feast time, I guess.
* * *
Ow dammit, they're giving the biggest and most dense chunk to me, phah... Hey! Stop... Ahahaha... Ah holy craps, now there's a girl combing my hair...
Aww... Yeah that's tasty... Really tasty. Just as I like, no fat, no skin, no mess, a big hunk of meat...
What's this... Ah, okay, got it, it's a human skull that's now a bowl. And... what... hey... Am I supposed to drink... That? What's... A fruit... Juice?.. Okay. And, blood? Of a dead merc? Pfft... Fuck, that's nasty, but hey...
Heya, lil' shits, look at me!... Aww... Damn that thing is dense... But, hey, tasty, in a way... Never thought I'd be drinking human blood... Hey, folks, don't shy away, get a sip, this thing isn't as bad as it looks...
Phah, drums... Hey Vince, give that guy a try, they seem to like...
Pffft, they seem to like Foster's thermal visors and optics, they point that stuff at each other, dance and laugh like nuts.
Ah, yeah, another round... Yeah! Fuck Azimuth! Experiment your arse, you fuckholes! Phah damn that thing kicks...
Boom, boom, boom, pffft, that's so fucking unbelievable, they're drumming the heck out of these... Human bones as drum sticks... Phah, lemme blast a few beats...
Fucking holy shits, this is so funny
What's, why are they...
Okaaay... Now they're throwing armfuls of local herbs into the fire. Pfffft, just look at their faces... Others dance around it shaking merc guns above their heads. The same uuuh-uuuh happy dance, phah. And drums in the background. Holy mother of shits, what I've gotten myself into, phah
Okay, lemme do it too... Uuuuuukh-uuuukh-uuuh! Mwahahah...
Phah that stuff smells fucking funny, never thought that this... Hooooly shits, Whitley... Don't fall face down yet, we're just warming up! Get some water if that's too much
Mwahahaha... Hey you, lemme... Dance, dance, get into the circle, phah, shake it, shake it!
Hey you loser! Yeah, you... Marshall, if you want to take a leak already, this place has a toilet! Yeah, with mercs on the bottom, phaaaaah... Yeah, fuck, that's a fucking... Phah... Order! Aaaah dammit...
Argh damm... Pf... Hrmph! Damn that swill kicks... Gimme another one now, phah
Wait, wait for them to start singing... Three, two, one... Yeeeee-aaaaww-yeeee-aaaawww-yeeeee...!
T plus fuck hours of whoop fucking Azimuth arse full of shit dingleberries, everything's so funny you can't imag... Hey, stop it, that's my cup... skull... Whatever
Yeeeee-aaaaww yeeeee-aaaaww yeeee-awwww... Fuck Azimuth, fuck Thargoids, we'll burn them to fucking ashes, we'll mix them with their own shit I tell you
Next time I see those shits I swear I'll rip their fucking throats... The best job I've ever had!
Another round, here, now!.. Yeeeah that's good
Yup... Hmrrrgh... Listen here, chief... Those fuckfaces, those blasted triple-fucked shithead cocksuckers Azimuth, they could wipe you out, yet while I'm here... They're going to fucking die, die like the fucking rats they are
Shit everything's so surreal... I mean, we were on a spaceship... And now we're here, like...ages back
Owwwwowoww... Those drums... Can you feel it?.. They're... They're like a heartbeat, they resonate... Just... Close your eyes, yeah, now, close them... And feel it
thummm-thummm-thudududummm-thummm-thummm... ohhh that feels friggin awesome
hey you dammit, keep yer hands off my arse
Laaaa...Ow. Ooow. Shit shit shit it's so blurry, hold on, hold on... Ffffuck. Hey, could you please...mrgh...gimme a hand?..
You... Pfff... You godsdamned... pfhrr... Godsdamned idiot, don't throw up into the fucking fire, it's bloody saaa-creeeeed!... Pffff...
I remember... pffft!... Phah! I remember getting friggin smashed like that in the high... fucking high school, there was that girl... phah...
...Wwwwooooooo, yeah, you shoot... hmphf... you fuckin shoot them and they like wwwwooooo...
Pffr..I tell you I've seen that...Bloody fuckin Titan shit... bloody mother of blasted bugs it smells like piss
wwwwooooo... pfff that's so fucking funny, everybody repeat... WWWWOOOOOO! That's your new damn battle cry! WWWWOOOOO
WWWWWOOOO pffffft...fffuck that's so funny I can't
argh... never believe... pfff... I'm fucking eighteen again dammit
hey, no, no... phrgh, no touch me, I've a grrlfrnd... yep... go squeeze those... phah, those tribal girls... look at this one she's...ow she's hot phah
awrr...mrow-mrow...mow-mo-mowrrrr... dammit, yeah I'mma kittn
WWWWOOOO dammit!..
...ssshit...Seems like everyone's sleepn. They left us an empty hut to stay... Okay... Okay, one more cig, and I go too... Fuck, I'm so tired. Honestly. I'm so fkin sick and tired... Of evrything. Just... You know, just look at this shit. Why...Me? What's this..all for? Where's my fkin truckload of 'gain' for that pain? Almst... Fkin thirty fkin five years, and I'm...Like that. Argh...I'm so drunk...Okay, gotta go... Can't harm mself furthrmore when asleep, you know...
* * *
Oh, okay. Yep. It's me. I'm still alive. And I'm in a damn hut. And my platoon is in the same hut too. And my head hurts like fuck. Shit, have to tell medics to give everyone painkillers... Shit that's so wild... Anyway, where are we... 102 hours, 13 minutes. Godsdamned 102 hours, our fifth day here. And we'd gotten ourselves totally shitfaced and high on that local stuff yesterday. How amusing. I guess now I have a load of shite caught by the recorder. Mental note to self, cut that entire section once we're done here, I don't want Douglas or Aegis digging that up... Hope no one took any photos.
Going to visit that chieftain guy... I'd like to show him some Thargoid pics I have on my datapad, it seems like they, maybe, know something about them, or whatever... Those modern gut art installations of theirs look oddly familiar. But yeah, painkillers first, and some friggin water, my throat feels like a friggin desert...
What's with the ammo... Phah. At least it seems like we didn't do any ceremonial shooting yesterday. At least I didn't... Kind of, low on it.
* * *
So, okay. T + 102h 49min. It has been... Quite an interesting exchange. Where do I start... Pfff, I'm still a bit woozy, this swill of theirs kicks hard... Sooooo... Apparently, they think that Azimuth equals Thargoids. Or the Thargoids are a higher form of Azimuth troops. Or something along these lines. I'd shown him the pics and he went out of the hut, pointed the finger at a random merc corpse on the tree, then at the pic on the datapad, and then finally at the rifle hanging on the wall. Are they... Do they want to fight bugs? They seem to know what the Thargoids are, and the fact that they are the enemy nowadays. That's... Curious. To say the least.
Also, they have a map of their own. Of their immediate surroundings. In the chieftain's hut. Hunting and trapping grounds, roads, a little lake, and... Azimuth defensive lines. Which are getting thicker in the direction towards that... How was it... C-02 place. So, they send their scouts or skirmishers now and then to annoy the mercs and keep the whole thing updated, but they're like surrounded... Yet aren't overrun. Yet. Does Azimuth keep them under control? Observe them? Contain them, with those defences built around because they're dangerous?
Still no answer to the same question of how do they actually reproduce. No kids, no pregnant women, and even no signs of them keeping them elsewhere, in a kind of a safe place. Their males and females are present in a somewhat equal proportion, from young to old, but nobody young enough to be considered a teenager, not to mention even younger. And, again, piles of bones, no surprise, it seems like clashes with Azimuth are a common thing here, yet they don't have even a single hut empty, their numbers aren't dwindling.
So... I'm starting to think they're a part of that forced development experimental crap and Azimuth just drops new fresh young-adults, late-teenagers, whatever, into those villages to keep the population around a thousand, much like the previous settlement. Like, literally breeding people for... Further experiments? If that's true, then how do they manage to keep a stable, refreshing pool of... Adult people? Those aren't looking like captives brought from our civilised world. Dammit. More mysteries.
And the icing on the cake. I told, gestured, explained, by tracing a line on the map and then drawing a vague circle around myself, showing a photo of the platoon made before the operation, and so on... That we aren't staying, we're going to thrash Azimuth at that C-02 place and raid the shit out of it. The facility was beyond the borders of his map, so I opened mine and comparing the two versions didn't make him happy, with so many Azimuth buildings around he had no idea about. Once we wrapped up that 'conversation', the chieftain got out of the hut, shouting something on a deafening level, grabbed a drum and started bashing it, and I swear the more he did it, the more his eyes looked like they were about to pop out.
T + 103h 47min. What a view. Of course everyone took whatever weapons they had, armour, drums, food supplies, all that, and gathered next to the chieftain's hut. Predictable, kind of. I guess we've got ourselves some quite... irregular reinforcements. Unconventional warfare, they say... Have to give them credit though, less than an hour to mobilise around a thousand people for a long march. Those folks are really living on the edge, of a war axe.
The thing I'm worried about, however. I see no possible way of explaining any strategies, as well as the general theme of they're going to get their arses handed to them in an open fight against a whole garrison of Azimuth guards. And an even lesser, below zero possibility of stopping them once the chief got them so riled up.
So, techs inspected the truck, it seems okay, no damage and it has enough fuel to get us to the C-02. And, well, Smith is at the controls now, I have more interesting stuff to do. First, I stood on the roof, waving the rifle over my head and yelling to get everyone's attention, then sent a couple of soldiers to get me a drum and two large bones. This little march of ours should have a soundtrack.
Yeah, literally. Everyone. The village is empty now and we're on the move... Phah. Fucking Azimuth, should I feel sorry for them? Of course not.
* * *
Next part: #19: I Can Still Hear the Screams
Next part: #19: I Can Still Hear the Screams