"So how far is this stone forest thingy?" Aero asked, aiming his question mainly towards Sienna, who looked up again before promptly responding.
"About a four hour trek, so really not far. But once we reach the borders the new objective as drawn up by our supervisors is to actually go beyond and enter the forest itself."
Sienna's frown, though fleeting, did not go unnoticed by Aero who cocked his head curiously. "What's up Sisi?"
Sienna sighed, pocketing her tablet, "It's just, well there's not much information or data about the interior of the rock formations terrain."
"Hence the purpose of a scouting mission," Zach shrugged as if it was obvious. "We going now?"
The group exited through the main outer doors into an unforgiving howling wind that made Aero incredibly glad that he had already put his thermals on underneath his uniform.
"Shit, shit why couldn't our first mission have been to one of the tropical planets?" Aero grouched as he fell subtly behind the larger forms of Zach and Tyron in order to seek some kind of shelter.
"I suggested that to Professor Turner but turns out they had already been scouted," Cody grinned as Aero jerked his head up at him.
Cody was smiling widely and Aero wondered if the other Doll was excited about finally being allowed out in the field, despite the atrocious climate.
"Everyone keep your scanners out and sweep the sections designated to you on the interactive map that's been downloaded onto your tablets," Sienna announced, without pausing to breathe as she turned round to face them and shouted to be heard over the gale.
They were about fifteen feet away from the shack when Aero finally pulled his own data screen out of his pack and scrolled down to see what he was meant to be doing.
The six mile radius around the shack had already been completely scouted so there was not much to worry about at that moment. Aero scrolled up to see their route to the stone forest.
"Um, guys?" Aero frowned, staring down at the screen and then glancing up at the person closest to him, who happened to be Felicity.
"What does 'SinSan' mean and why is it written in big red warning letter with a skull and crossbones beside it?"
"Oh it means it's a good place to stop for lunch, Aero," Thomas told them, looking up from his own tablet.
"Really?" Felicity and Aero asked at the same time as Cody and Thomas turned back round with double raised eyebrows.
"Sinking sand, Aero," Cody told him. "It's a sinking sand warning. Do you not remember our recent lecture on cartographic warning symbols?"
"Wasn't that the lecture Aero skipped to spend in the bathroom because he'd spent the night before trying to prove that Dolls have a higher immunity to fire chillies harvested from the Roaksha Galaxy lava fields?" Tyron snorted back at them.
Aero opened his mouth indignantly before realising that, yes, okay, that had indeed been the case.
"Sinking sand?" Felicity screwed up her face, "that doesn't sound good."
"Hence the bright red and the skull and crossbones I'm guessing," Aero said, clapping Felicity on the shoulder and winking. "Although it disturbs me how many of those symbols there are on this map."
"Half of them are just approximations," Sienna called back from the front, making Aero narrow his eyes at her.
"What do you mean 'approximations'?" he asked suspiciously.
"Well the surface hasn't yet been explored at ground level so most of the hazardous areas have been pinpointed using scanning drones, but as we know - they're unreliable and can't pick up on oil plugs either," Sienna explained with a shrug, "it says everything in the dossier Aero, right at the end."
"I may not have gotten to the end yet," Aero muttered, flicking his eyes back down to the flashing warning labels scattered across the map of their route. "So these could all be out by what, a few feet?"
"More like miles," Hannah snorted, "drones are useless."
"Drones are Doll technology," Sienna replied to her Feral with a cold expression.
"You literally just admitted they were unreliable!" Hannah exclaimed. "You should be happy Barbie Girl, I think this is the first time we've agreed all week."
Aero tuned out the sounds of bickering emanating from the front of the line as he looked round to see how far they had travelled from the shack already.
His view was blocked, however, by the large hulking form of Jago, following them like a menacing shadow.
"Jesus," Aero hissed as he flinched backwards and nearly tripped over a scattering of loose rocks.
The only reason he didn't end up flat on his face was his innate Doll balance that let him recover at the last moment.
"Graceful," Thomas laughed.
"Even when clumsy," Aero replied with a sheepish grin before turning back to Jago. "So are you really going to be coming up my ass the whole trip?"
Behind Aero, Felicity made a pained choking noise that served as a pretty good soundtrack for the horror movie that was currently projecting itself onto Aero's eyeballs. The title being – ‘Jago's responding expression’.
"I mean, fuck," Aero bit out angrily and flailed his arms aggressively enough to momentarily wind Tyron, who let out a surprised "Oof!"
"What I'm sure Aero meant is are you really going to just lurk behind us like a creeper for the whole journey?" Felicity interjected quickly, cementing herself solidly as Aero's favourite Feral. Aero even felt like rooting around for a Scooby Snack for this girl.
"Jago's trained in being a creeper," Thomas smirked. "That and it's probably a good thing to have a Feral covering your ass."
"I dunno," Aero grouched petulantly, "I'd rather a Doll had my back."
"They have a habit of stabbing you in it," Jago stated grimly.
Aero guessed he was talking about Vera but he noticed that the other man's eyes also flickered briefly to Cody.
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