Corporate Synergies is a modestly epic 14-part space opera of questionable ethics and dubious morality centred on the ongoing conflict between two mega-corporations and their quest to dominate the retail landscape of Earth’s ever-expanding colonial reach.

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10

HORIZONTAL DEPLOYMENT OF ASSETS II

“Normally, we’d be a lot more detailed here,” said Honzo as he led the group into the Red Roosters’ barracks and on through to their armoury.  “But we don’t have a ton of time right now.”

“Kinda a theme with the Battle Cocks,” said Frog as she pushed past the recruits and began tossing them gear. “Ballistic armour.  Uni-Vest-Whateverthefuck.  Put it on.  It won’t stop a bullet, but it’ll slow it down enough that you’ve got a sixty percent chance of making it off the field.”

“Um, what’s a Battle Cock?,” said Molly as she awkwardly pulled on her vest and tightened the webbing.

“You are, now.”

Molly, Chocolate and Helion turned to face the new voice.  The woman was tall – almost as tall as Helion – and supermodel gorgeous.  She had cheekbones that could cut glass and breast implants that could do the same.

“It’s what we call ourselves when Red Roosters seems too formal.”

“Which is most of the time,” said Frog.

The supermodel nodded with a smile and then handed out helmets.

“Do up the chin strap or they slide back too much on your head,” she said.

“Okay,” said Molly.  “But-.”

“Sidearms,” said Frog, mag-locking a pistol to each vest.  “And that’s Katzena Iy, our resident tactical genius.”

The supermodel – Katzena – bowed dramatically as Frog continued.

“If she gives you directions in the field, do it.  Don’t wait for formal orders from Honzo or me.”

Helion frowned.

“Don’t we have an established chain of command?  Zaggerty Shah seems like-.”

“A giant shit-head?”

“Frog, play nice,” said Honzo, distributing rifles.  “UniMag Lightings for everyone.  Helion, right?  To answer your question, things out in the field are too fluid to have a rigid chain of command.  The Battle Cocks are primarily a recon group, so we’re more adaptable to situations than a standard infantry unit.”

He paused, looking at the three new recruits who were staring back at him.  Each of them had varying degrees of blankness in their eyes.

“Can you tell us the reason for the sudden redeployment, Honzo?”

The voice seemed to be right in her ear and Molly jumped and made a small squeaking noise.  Behind her, the speaker – a man wearing head-to-toe ballistic armour bearing the UniMedia logo – stepped forward a little, getting a clearer view of Honzo.  His oversized, cybernetic eyes whirred as their internal cameras adjusted focus.  Though Molly didn’t know it, since she knew very little about how battlefield broadcasting (or much else, really) worked, the man was himself an entire broadcast team.  His eyes had been upgraded to be cameras, his ears were microphones and a portion of his brain had been replaced with a digital storage device for audio/visual data.

The portion of his brain that had been removed wasn’t one that was particularly important to human functioning, it was just the section that dealt with ethics and common sense.

I can’t remember this guy’s name, so for the sake of simplicity and giggles, let’s call him Cam.

“It seems a very sudden reversal,” said Cam.

“It was,” said Honzo, nodding.  “Negotiations for our withdrawal hit a snag.  You’ve all heard of Star Crystals, right?”

Molly nodded vigorously.  Whether you called them Star Crystals or Star Orbs or UniRe’s unsuccessful attempt to brand them UniGems, the object in question was a rare and very expensive bauble that many on Earth and Earth’s colonies owned as status symbols.  When she was a child, Molly’s grandparents had owned one, displayed prominently in their living room so that any and all visitors could see just how wealthy and important they were.

They varied in size from about the size of a softball to that of a volleyball and all were a deep blue on the outside, lit from within by a shimmering phosphorescence (pretty sure I even spelled that right) in varying shades of green.  And though UniRe and GCon would never admit it publically, the sale and resale of the crystals represented a significant revenue stream for both corporations. There was some worry among the boards of directors – again, not publically – that that particular gravy train had reached its last stop, with the last of known Star Crystal sources having been cleaned out nearly a year prior.

The discovery of a new source on Big Anus changed both the willingness of GCon and UniRe to negotiate, and the economic importance of the foul-smelling planet.

“So the people in charge who don’t have to actually be out here have decided this is pretty important,” said Frog.

She saw Cam’s jaw muscle twitch slightly.

Frog was not one of Cam’s favourites in the squad – indeed she wasn’t one of UniMedia’s favourites either, as she had a tendency to say things on-camera that required her to be edited out of the show prior to broadcast.

It was entirely intentional on her part.

“Exactly,” said Honzo.  “We have to try to secure this area here.”

He unfolded an old-style paper map and used what Molly was pretty sure was a tube of bright red lipstick to circle an area about the size of his fist.  Horrible at reading maps as she was, Molly had no way of knowing whether the circle represented a few metres or a few kilometres or a few hundred kilometres.

“Head office seems to think there’s a cave in the area where they can harvest Star Crystals.”

“Wait,” said Helion, his brow furrowed in what we’ll generously refer to as skepticism.  He glanced around at the Battle Cocks, who were decidedly few in number.  “Do we have enough personnel to secure… anything, really?”

Frog pushed her hair back enough to force it under her helmet and turned to Helion as she locked in the chin strap.

“We’re advance recon.  Go in, figure out the Geek deployment situation for the regular infantry then locate the cave.”

“And if we can’t find it?”

Katzena laughed heartily and put an arm around Helion’s neck.

“They’re so cute when they don’t know what they’re talking about,” she said to Frog, then patted Helion on the chest.  “Frog finds things.  It’s what Frog does.  It’s why we always get these assignments.”

TO BE CONTINUED…

Enjoying CORPORATE SYNERGIES?  Check out my full-length novel that involves fewer douche-bags, Radko’s War!