Across the Rift 7
#4 of Across the Rift
Chapter 7
Arrival
"Name and rank, I can tell that's military gear so don't try and deny it." The large black man in a hodgepodge of military and local clothes holding the gun pointing at Sean's head said. Sean tried to make no threatening moves as he held his hands out far to his sides.
"First lieutenant Sean Turner, US army." Sean said slowly and clearly.
"Well why didn't you say so in the first place." The suddenly cheerful looking man said, as he holstered his gun and extended his hand to shake. Sean was thrown by this sudden change in attitude and nearly missed the handshake.
"Ma name's Gunnery Sergeant Charles Rutherford Jones, but you can call me Jonesy." Jonesy said quite cheerfully.
"We aint gotten any more peoples in about a years now." Jonesy said pulling something that looked suspiciously like tobacco out of a pouch on his belt and sticking it in his mouth and began chewing industriously.
"Wait others, what others?" Sean said slowly still trying to play catch up.
"You wouldn't know the others, there's three of us now, used to be four but martin died of some disease, nice guy for a civvie." Jonesy ended thoughtfully.
"The others are Warrant Officer Kiturney, and Corporal Newtons. Nice gals, even though they are a little green. They both only been here one and two years respectively."
"Pilot and a medic if you would believe it, but here I am rambling, I take it you's looking for Nachhome as the Meechan call it?"
"Ugh yes I mean I guess I am, we are, how do you know about it?" Sean asked feeling totally over his head in a conversation with this man, Jonesy.
"Well we kind of act as an informal guard force for Nachhome, The Meechan send everyone different here for the Elder Nachi to deal with, your about a day's walk away." Jonesy continued.
"You think you could take us there?" Sean asked quickly to try and get a word in edgewise.
"Us? There are more with you." Jonesy asked excitedly.
"Uh yeah, There's me, a Meechan warrior and two Nachi we're escorting."
"Oh, I was hoping there might have been more humans, It's a bit lonely with just the meechan." Jonesy said sadly.
"How did you get here." Sean asked politely and trying to fish for information.
"I came here back in 2011, Course I had three other squad mates with me but they're dead now. Got their Throats slit by these Drakai on the second night in. Fortunately I woke up, shot em dead." Jonesy said, his Cheerfulness suddenly gone.
"I made it here the next day, rested here, then went and got their bodies and gear. Spent seven years here by myself, just sitting here thinking, until Marty showed up, but Marty is dead now." Jonesy continued, looking and sounding a bit forlorn.
"You mentioned two other Military personnel." Sean asked eager to change the subject to something more cheerful.
"Yep, Chief Warrant Officer Kate Kiturney and Corporal Fiona Newtons, you'll meet them soon. I put them on gate guard while I patrolled." Jonesy explained.
"Come on and I'll introduce you to the others in my party." Sean said. Leading the way with Jonesy following behind it took them only a few minutes to reach the camp Sean and the Meechan had created, the dead bodies of what Sean now knew were called Drakai still visible.
By this time Arutha and Syphis had returned from "washing" and Tara had gone down to the river to wash herself.
As Sean and Jonesy entered the clearing Arutha half stood from where he was sitting close to Syphis, her head on his shoulder, and placed a hand on the half sword he carried at his waist.
At this Jonesy immediately reached for his weapon he had holstered on his hip and only a hand on his shoulder by Sean caused him to stop and slowly withdraw his hand.
"Sorry, I'm a little jumpy." Jonesy said quietly to Sean. He then strode forward towards Arutha and went through the same over cheerful with Arutha and Syphis as he had with done with Sean earlier, grinning madly all the while.
While pleasantries were being exchanged Tara wandered back from cleaning herself by the river and was immediately set upon by Jonesy with the same enthusiastic greeting.
With Jonesy preoccupied with Tara, Arutha chose that moment to sidle over to Sean and whisper to him.
"This one seems a bit addled, are you sure we can trust him." Arutha said, so quietly Sean almost didn't hear him.
"I'm sure of it, besides if you had been almost by yourself for ten years you would probably be just as bad." Sean whispered back just as quietly.
"Besides, earlier when he got the jump on me he was all business I'm not so sure this isn't just an act, we will trust him and follow him, but I'll also be watching him." At this Jonesy turned from where he was on the other side of the clearing and winked at Sean, almost as if he had heard there entire conversation, though that was impossible.
Crossing back over to where Arutha and Sean stood, Jonesy glanced around at the Drakai bodies lying around and let out an appreciating whistle.
"You took out almost twenty Drakai single handedly? Damn fine work." Jonesy said.
"Most of them got messed up trying to come through the perimeter, I got the rest with the shotgun and the Flash." Sean explained modestly.
"Shotgun?, Ha!, buckshot just seems to rattle off of em, all it does is piss em off."Jones said suddenly.
"Not buckshot, SCMTR rounds, like flechettes." Sean explained. At this Jonesy nodded with sudden understanding.
"That damn scale has been giving us problems for a while, either you need significant blunt force trauma to penetrate it or you need something armor piercing." Jonesy said, sounding like someone turning onto one of their favorite conversation topics.
"Hollow points are useless, they deform to quickly on the scale, spread the impact just the way the scale wants, almost like body armor. What you need is to him them with a FMJ round at a head on angle, you hit them at the side and they just ricochet off." Jonesy continued, Sean nodding along.
Arutha moved off to take care of a few things he had to do before they set off as Sean and Jonesy settled down, two professionals discussing a problem.
"What about explosives, they seemed to work rather well against these guys here." Sean said.
"Explosives work, but not as well against them as they do against us, the thing to get em with, gets them every time, is a high power round, Anti-material."Jonesy countered.
"Anti material is anti-everything." Sean said with a smile and they both laughed at this.
They both stood and made ready to leave, but first Sean turned to one of his packs and dug through until he found a headset which he handed to Jonesy.
"For communications, I got a few more but they don't fit Meechan heads, My helmet works as mine so you can have this one in case we have to separate." Sean explained to Jonesy.
"When we get back to base you'll have to pass these out to the others." Jonesy said as he fitted it over his head and moved to the head of the column.
After almost an hour of walking through thick forest they eventually broke onto a trail. Jonesy turned onto the path with Sean and the others following them. An hour later Sean was wondering how much longer this was going to take, so he quickened his pace until he drew level with Jonesy.
"We should be there within another hour." Jonesy said, apparently guessing what was on Sean's mind. Sean, for his part, merely nodded and fell back in step.
It was actually an hour and a quarter before they first glimpsed Nachhome. It was situated on a hill in the middle of a valley. The "hill" was actually not true, Sean's first thought was that it was a caldera of a small volcano.
Jonesy confirmed this a few minutes later.
"Half the complex is the structure you see on the volcano, The rest, actually the majority, is underneath. The whole area is honeycombed with tunnels, probably from the magma."
Sean wasn't an expert of geology but that seemed to make sense. So instead he focused on the structure at the top. The first thing he noticed about it was that it was made out of stone, the only building made of such that he had seen so far.
It consisted of a stone outer wall about five meters high, about 100 meters in diameter. In the very center there was a large building, looking like a citadel, that thrust out of the earth and seemed to be nearly 30 meters tall.
Sean and the Meechan stopped and stared in wonder at this place. Jonesy merely grinned as he spoke.
"Welcome to Nachhome."