In just three weeks, Sweetie Drops has developed an authoritative reputation in Mar Sara’s capitol city, partly because of the number of people she sent to the hospital when they started hitting on her. Apparently, there are a lot of weirdos who would like to get it on with an alien and some who want to make out with a horse or pony. Being a partner with Marshal James Raynor had also helped improve her reputation as a local law enforcement officer. Raynor was glad that he didn’t have to spend any time to train Sweetie. In fact, she has proven that she could kick his ass in a fight.
The only issue that Raynor had noticed was that she had difficulty operating the standard Confederate Marine Corps Powered Combat Suits, or CMC Suit. The issue was that is that they were designed for people with feet and Sweetie had hooves instead of feet. Because of this, she was also unable to handle the C-14 rifles that Marines are standard equipped. It was too big to wield effectively without the suit. Thankfully, the weapons market was selling an old C-10 MK I rifle that fires explosive rounds for her to use. Mar Sara didn’t have the facilities to train Ghosts so Sweetie was lucky that the weapons market was even selling one. Even without armor, Sweetie was more than agile enough to avoid gunfire when fights broke out in the city.
The citizens of Mar Sara have seen Raynor and Sweetie as an effective marshal and deputy duo who kept the streets safe...for the most part. The city was still relatively large and the two of them could not be everywhere.
Today, however, some news had started going around the Confederate worlds about an incident that occured four days ago at the Chau Sara colony. The news had mentioned a large fleet of aliens had annihilated everything on the planet unprovoked. The news stations didn’t give a lot of details about the attack and this made Sweetie suspicious that there was some sort of cover up going on since the media would normally have enough details about a major event less than four days after the incident. Sweetie put her suspicions in the back of her mind as she had no proof to pursue those suspicions.
Raynor was looking up any local news and hummed when he found something interesting.
“Looks like our new Magistrate is gettin’ ready to test some of the colony’s militia equipment. Mighty convenient timin’ for the confederates to be pickin’ a new Magistrate only a few days after Chau Sara went dark.”
“Yeah,” said Sweetie. “The news is not saying much about the incident either. It leads me to think the confederates are up to something and we are going to be the ones paying for what happened over there.
“I’ve also heard rumors of an unidentified species roaming the wasteland. As far as the records show, the unknown creatures are not even shown in the database. Maybe I am just being paranoid, but my past experiences with government tell me that there may be a cover up going on. If the unknown creatures were native to the planet, the Confederates or some past exploratory group should have found them some time ago.”
“You may be right darlin’” Raynor said. “But as far as the matter is concerned, this ain’t none of our business. We’re simply here to make sure the streets are safe. We don’t got time to be roamin’ the wasteland for these critters.”
A series of beeps from their communicator interrupted their conversation. Raynor activated the device to reveal a holographic image of a metallic person’s head, one that looked like a female human with numerous cybernetic enhancements. The figure in particular was the Magistrate’s personal adjutant, a sort of mechanical secretary that organizes the affairs of its owner.
“Greetings Marshal James Raynor and Deputy Sweetie Drops. The Magistrate requests your assistance in an important matter” the adjutant said.
“Well,” Raynor said. “What does our new Magistrate want with me?”
“Due to the recent destruction of the Chau Sara colony by the protoss, Confederate troops are scrambling to protect the colonies nearest Chau Sara. This colony will soon be placed under lockdown by order of General Edmund Duke of the Confederate Security Forces Alpha Squadron. The Magistrate requests your services to escort the core colonists to the outlying wasteland for the duration of the lockdown.”
Something about this seemed off to Sweetie. If the mysterious aliens that the people are calling the Protoss were going around blowing up worlds, then why were they being relocated instead of evacuated until the Protoss threat was dealt with? She could no longer ignore the nagging feeling of a conspiracy going on with the Confederacy.
The transmission ended once Raynor affirmed his acceptance of the Magistrate’s request. “Well Sweetie, looks like we got work.”
Sweetie sighed. She picked up her rifle and slung it over her back and the duo walked out the door of their office.
In an alley around the corner of their office/home, there was an armed hoverbike called a Vulture locked securely in position to make sure any would be thieves didn’t try to steal it. Sweetie waited around while Raynor undid the locks on his bike. Her thoughts began to wonder about how this situation stinks of trouble.
Sweetie was pulled from her thoughts by the sound of a revving engine. She turned to see that Raynor was waiting for her to get on the bike.Sweetie sighed as she got on the seat behind Raynor and held on to him. Once she confirmed that she was secured, Raynor revved the bike once more before suddenly taking off at a breakneck speed. Sweetie tightened her grip on Raynor as they traveled down the roads leading out of the city and into the wasteland.
As the duo was making their way to the escort route where they were expected to rendezvous with the colonists, they encountered a few hostile creatures that had never been seen on this planet before.
The creatures were about the size of humans and walked on four clawed legs. Their bodies appeared to be covered in some form of hard exoskeleton and had a pair of long, thin tendrils that had claws at the ends. Their teeth clearly showed that they were strictly carnivorous and there appeared to be horns on the sides of their heads.
Raynor and Sweetie each fired an explosive round at each of the creatures, frag grenades from Raynor’s vulture and explosive rounds from Sweetie’s rifle.
Times like this were when Sweetie was thankful that she took the proper courses in handling projectile weapons during her agency days.
Their combined firepower was all that was needed to reduce the creatures to bloody stains on the wasteland.
The duo arrived at the rendezvous point and waited for the colonists to arrive. While they were waiting, they saw a few more of the creatures and decided to go after them to relieve the boredom a little.
A few hours later, Sweetie and Raynor heard an open transmission from one of the colonists complaining about being sent to the wasteland and his disdain toward the Confederacy. It didn’t take long for the colonists to meet up with Raynor and Sweetie.
Raynor and Sweetie introduced themselves to the colonists and began making their way toward the wasteland site where they would be setting up a base camp. They encountered more of the creatures along the way, but with the Marines bolstering their numbers, the creatures could not even get within a few feet of anyone.
The group made it to the camp. It was composed of a large, round building that served as a Command Center for the camp. There was also a smaller building that contained a limited amount of supplies for the colonists to use. There was also a moderate outcropping of blue crystals, which the Space Construction Vehicles, or SCVs, began moving toward in order to begin harvesting them. Sweetie had no idea why these minerals were so valuable to the humans, but decided to just leave the matter be.
One of the SCVs began constructing what appeared to be a rectangular building on legs. Setting up additional construction equipment allowed the SCV to quickly finish constructing the building that the other colonists referred to as a barracks where the unarmed people could be fitted into combat suits and equipped with those big C-14 rifles.
Sweetie also watched Raynor release something from a secret compartment in his bike. It looked like a small, bulbous device on small legs. When Sweetie asked, Raynor called them Spider Mines, defensive mechanical drones that carry a powerful, explosive payload. When its built in IFF sensor picks up an enemy, the mine jumps out of its hiding place and rushes towards an enemy and explodes.
A point was made when one of the creatures got too close to the base camp and a mine jumped out of the dirt that it had buried itself into earlier. It rushed up to the creature and detonated its explosive payload.
There was nothing left of the creature to identify.
Sweetie’s eyes widened at the terrifying implications of these mines. Raynor further explained that Vultures can only be equipped with three mines at a time.
Sweetie, still stunned at this seemingly dangerous piece of military hardware, nodded slowly.
Raynor and Sweetie began to make themselves comfortable in the new base since they could not go back to town due to the lockdown.
With the number of unidentified creatures increasing on Mar Sara, Sweetie had a feeling that things were about to get a lot worse and soon.