The scorching heat brought memories flooding back into Darien's mind, memories better left in the darkness. Ravine's capital city, Karpa Luna, sprawled out for miles in every direction from the cylindrical pillar of the main space port, a quagmire of dark, armoured buildings with thin windows that belched out sickly off-white light. The noise of heavy industry made the air ring as though he were stuck inside a bell full of nails, mixed with the thunder of engines and ever-present background fuzz of the human population.

He looked out at it, a whole world crashing back down on him. Even inside the space port the ever present heat was suffocating, and the air had a burnt taste, like ash. The natives of the planet were distinct by their dry, cracked skin, coarse from the heat even with the medical supplies ferried in on a monthly basis by colonial flotillas. He thought back to Vass's grim threat – withhold the medicine until the uprising stopped. Part of him recoiled from the very thought, but a small voice in the back of his mind knew that, if all else failed, that plan would beat the colonists into submission.

Suppressing the heavy sigh that was rising in his throat, Darien turned from the window, looking back into the space port. The military debarkation of colonial ground forces was well under way, with phalanxes of armoured crawlers and jeeps roaring out of enormous ground transports. Armoured men and women marched in crisp columns, directed by roaring officers who fought to make themselves heard over the thunder of engines and moving equipment.

The Blink operatives, however, were at the back of the queue. Their redeployment orders had come through just minutes before touchdown on Ravine, and it was clear that the colonial forces were concentrating on their conventional forces first.

They waited patiently in their assigned loading sector, a hot, dank bay that stank of petrol and scorched metal. While they probably could have just Blinked across the city to the main military installation just beyond the city limits, he didn't want to unduly disrupt the military deployment plans. If Colonel Merlynn wanted them to arrive in a truck, then that's what they would do.

In the interim, however, he saw an opportunity to dispense one pearl of wisdom.

"Alright, everybody circle up," Darien called above the hubbub, beckoning the operatives over. Once they'd assembled he reached into one of the small pockets of his combat vest and freed a flat, circular container. "We've all been issued with Cleanser Packs for the duration of our stay here. You all know I grew up on this furnace – I know how important these are. One pill will rinse your lungs out of the crap in the air around here for twenty-four hours only. If you miss a dose, the side-effects are unpleasant."

He waited, gauging the faces of his operatives. They'd all received a briefing pack outlining the use of the medicines that made life on Ravine liveable. How deeply they'd read that particular part of the mission file, however, was another matter. Most of them nodded, faces impassive; a handful exchanged worried looks as the full gravity of their situation was driven home.

"If you lose your pack or miss a dose for any reason let your squad leader know," he continued. "We can get replacement packs if need be, but these things are shipped in from off planet so the supply is finite. Don't get into any bad habits." He let the words hang in the air for a moment, just long enough to let it sink in, then popped his container open and swallowed one of the tiny spherical pills nestled within.

In a quick flurry the other operatives followed his example, hastily knocking back their medication under his watchful eye. Satisfied, Darien felt his nerves settle. And for the next forty-three agonizing minutes they stood there, watching and waiting as truck after gas-spewing truck rumbled away, out into the searing heat of the city towards the military base.

At long last the queue of military forces in front of them dribbled away and another truck pulled up, all black metal and gigantic, bulbous wheels, heavily reinforced against jagged rock and even the heat of a lava flow. Its heavy rear door swung open on massive hinges revealing a grizzled colonial marine with the bars of a Lance Corporal etched across one shoulder guard.

"Blink teams?" he grunted.

"That's us."

The man motioned them forward. "Then pack 'em in kid."

Darien smiled and bounded up through the doorway, the clatter of booted feet echoing behind him as the rest of the Blink contingent followed. He swept past the corporal and took his seat at the far left side of the truck's cramped troop compartment. It could seat forty marines, so it would handle the Blink operatives with some room to spare. The other slotted in around him; Niamh sitting opposite and Idas alongside, and zig-zagging down the line until all thirty of them were buckled in.

And then they were off, trundling out into the volcanic murk of Ravine; a small cog in the colonial war machine that had descended on this planet.

Twenty minutes later their crawler came to a halt, and its rear door flung open again. The Blink operatives piled out and entered. maelstrom of the Karpa Luna military base. The whole place seethed like a nest of vipers as the colonial new arrivals jockeyed for space with the local forces already inhabiting the barracks and vehicle hangars. The huge, rectangular and half-barrel buildings formed a grid that sprawled out to fill the space of half a dozen city blocks, and the thunder of engines shook the air, mingling with the continuous bawl of voices from commanding officers.

"Main command," the lance corporal informed them as they exited the truck, pointing at the immense cube of a building that they had parked beside. It rose up six levels, thickly armoured and with turret emplacements studded on its reinforced balconies. "Colonel Merlynn's inside."

"On me," Darien barked, raising a fist high for all the operatives to see, before turning and heading towards the sandbagged entrance of the building. A sergeant wielding a bulky, square-barrelled shotgun waved them through the security checkpoints and then they were inside, caught in the whirl of the administrative centre of the colonial forces.

Adaya Merlynn was waiting for them on the third floor, in the centre of a vast room surrounded by banks of screens that loomed in on a holographic display table five meters square. Officers and aides flowed around her like a river. The Lieutenant Colonel was a picture of military efficiency as she dished out orders to her subordinates with startling rapidity. Her eyes never left the enormous data pad that lay on the operations table in front of her; she scrolled through directories with the speed of an expert, allocating resources and confirming assignments to units of every denomination.

As a result, Darien didn't have long to wait. When he approached her she finally glanced up, giving him a stiff nod of approval.

"Operative Flint," she said. "Good to see you found your way through this mess. I'm going to have the regimental quartermaster through the ringer for this. Half a dozen wongly-assigned supply columns and the whole thing starts to topple like a house of cards." She sighed in exasperation. "Fortunately you and your operatives are relatively simple to sort out."

"Just tell us where to go, ma'am," Darien told her.

"Sub-Structure Alpha-143. You'll get your first operational briefing there. Think you can find it?"

"I'm sure we'll muddle along somehow."

"Good, then report in. I'll find you there when I'm finished dealing with this mess."

Darien threw her a quick salute and turned, jogging away from her intimidating presence. Normally the rigid rank and structure of the military organisations would have filled him with a mischievous desire to be flippant, but something about Merlynn told him that would be a big mistake.

She had the aura of someone who could move mountains if they had the will.

*

In the Sub-Structure they were met by Lieutenant Breznik, a young man with a shaved head and a thick auburn beard, who shepherded them into a small briefing room. Breznik loomed over the operatives, standing well over six feet tall and sporting a thickly muscled frame that was visible even through his baggy fatigues.

"You're slated for a recon op," Breznik began without preamble, his voice deep and coarse. "We've got intel on a resistance cell moving weapons through the southern factory district of a quarrying town called Shukker's Deep."

"I know the place," Darien said nodding. Shukker's was an A-grade hell hole, a dangerous place for outsiders. If the anti-colonial forces wanted to find some allies, it was a safe bet they'd find some there.

Breznik zoomed the map to show a satellite view of Shukker's Deep. The place had been bedded into an old meteor crater, off the beaten track of main transit arteries. It would make for a good covert stop off point.

"There are normally only a handful of regular trucking runs in and out of Shukker's, running from Karpa Luna and out to and from the northern settlements, but recently we have seen a small but definite increase in that traffic." Breznik thumbed the holo of the controls, bringing up a graph on the right hand side of the screen to emphasise the point.

"Are there actually any resistance troops there?" Vanna Proctor piped up, sitting with her arms folded and boots slung op on another chair in front of her. "Are we expecting live fire opposition?"

"Not according to long range spotters," Breznik replied. "To move weapons and supplies through here unobserved they couldn't have a combat presence. That would send up red-flags to every colonial unit on the planet and we could just roll over the place. They're playing smarter than that. Now, that does not mean that the shipments are unguarded. These guys play the guerrilla game – there may well be plain-clothes resistance fighters armed with concealed weapons keeping watch, so keep your eyes open."

"So what are we looking for exactly?" Darien interjected.

"There's no way to externally identify which of the trucks are carrying weapons or supplies for resistance groups. That's where your unique skills come into play." The lieutenant smiled thinly. "I need two things. First, close surveillance of the main vehicle depots and quarry loading bays to keep track of any unusual activity. Second, I need sweeps of all stationery vehicles scheduled for runs out to the north, and to Karpa Luna. You can Blink inside the trucks and back out again without leaving any broken locks – no trace that anyone was ever inside the vehicle."

There was a murmur of agreement from the operatives and Darien commended the logic of the plan. A normal special ops team would still have to break into suspected vehicles to confirm their findings. If they were wrong, they'd have a bunch of angry locals, and if they were right, the resistance groups would know they'd been caught and immediately abandon the Shukker's Deep route for their supplies.

"So when we find people who are doing the smuggling," Vass said. "What then?"

"You place a tracker on the interior, somewhere they won't find it." Breznik picked up a tiny black sphere from the table in front of him and held it up for them to see. "These little jewels will bounce a signal to our satellite trackers in orbit. We're not trying to catch the people driving these trucks. We're using them to trace the shipments back to their source. That way we can catch the bigger fish.

You'll all be uploaded with full schematics of possible target vehicles, the layout of the town and deployment schedules. You ship out at 0500 Ravine time tomorrow morning. Until then you're off the clock. You've been assigned billets in the barrack block. I'd suggest you find them, do your homework and get yourself some sleep. Understood?"

He saw Vass's face twist with disdain, but he spoke up before Tundra's volatile leader could shoot his mouth off at the colonial officer.

"Understood," he said sharply, standing up and shooting Vass a warning look. The others rose with him and he nodded to Breznik. "We'll be ready to go."

"I look forward to seeing what you can do," the man said. "I've heard a lot about Blink. I'm hoping you'll live up to the hype."

"Well, I guess we'll find out." Darien turned away, and pointed to the exit. "Everybody, fall out."

He sighed heavily as he led the operatives back out into clamour of the military base and the scorched Ravine air. Everything about this assignment had become very real, very fast, and he wasn't sure it had really hit him yet. The travel had been such a blur he hadn't really had a chance to stop and take stock of actually being back here, where it had all begun.

Niamh stepped up alongside him. She didn't say anything, but he could see from her face that she could sense his discomfort. She flashed a brief glance back at the others, then nodded to him. Ready to follow him again, as though he'd never left.

Darien shouldered his kit bag and set off towards the barracks. The fight for Ravine's future was about to start, and Blink's operatives would be right in the middle of it.