Evolve Fan Fiction: Something Wicked – Part One

While Turtle Rock Studio’s 4 v 1 sci-fi shooter Evolve may not have the strongest story, it does have reams and reams of lore buried in the loading screens, stashed away in various wikis and hidden in the randomised conversations of your hunters. So, being something of a fiction fan – and being absolutely in love with the universe of Evolve – I decided to pull as much of that lore together as I could decipher and fill in the gaps with my own imagination to produce a bit of fan fiction. The story is in three parts, and based around Day 2 of Evacuation Mode with a made-up VIP Escort mission. It’s all a bit of fun, so please be nice in the comments. Oh, and it contains Abe, and that means lots and lots of swears. Enjoy!

ONE | Aftermath

The rumble of the Laurie-Anne’s rear thrusters was like a comforting hand on the shoulder as retired Hub Marshal William Cabot leaned over the blinking CIC console, staring at the spinning holo-cast image of Planet Shear and wondering how in the Hell he was supposed to ensure the smooth evacuation of an entire colony. He’d been doing this a long time, taming planets, but hell, this was a tough one.

A couple of days ago, this was just another job from Colonel Green, the usual NORDITA line: head to some godforsaken little planetoid in the ass-end of the Far Arm, and eradicate an indigenous threat. It happened so often it was practically routine: Colonials went in, dropped a few thousand settlers on a random rock and left them to it. Simple enough, right? Trouble was, they liked their budgets nice and lean, so planet-wide surveys took a backseat or got passed to private contractors. Now and then, something would come out of hibernation or climb out of the ocean and start eating employees and busting up EbonStar’s shit, and that always looked bad on a report.

Regardless, if Colony Command ever found themselves on the bad side of a pissed-off native, their first point of contact was William Cabot. He’d made a name for himself over the last few decades. You wanted a planet tamed? A dangerous local species pacified? A gargantuan alien menace tagged, bagged or fragged? It’s what he did, and he was the best at doing it. But this infestation on Shear – if that was the right word – was what Abe liked to call a meat-grinder. Or a clusterfuck, if he was feeling colourful. They’d gone in on the first day like they had a hundred times before, and got their asses kicked by something they’d never seen. And before that, Cabot would have sworn he’d seen everything. Hell, that’s why he’d retired – but even Sunny had told him that wouldn’t last long.

“You look worried, Marshal. You ok?”

Cabot didn’t turn. It was Caira Diaz, the medical researcher they’d drafted in for her expertise with off-world fauna. She was illuminated on one side by the bank of lights and diodes beside her; almost in shadow on the other. Dark-haired and almost distractingly beautiful, Caira was a little younger than the rest of the team, but she’d seen some bad situations in her time – and she had personally pulled Cabot, Markov and Griffin out of the shit yesterday. She was also the smartest person Cabot had ever met.

He stared at the flickering holo-cast representation of Shear, rotating slowly before him. “What do you think, Diaz? We already lost three hundred of the people we were sent here to save, and two of our men are down. Bad start.”

“With all due respect, sir, I heard you were the best.”

Cabot gritted his teeth. “Am I supposed to appreciate that tone?”

The medic hesitated. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant…”

The rear door opened, and Abe and Parnell ducked into the room, followed by, Lazarus. “She just meant,” Abe answered for her, “that you ain’t usually one for givin’ up.”

Cabot sighed, waving his hand through the projected image and deactivating it. He looked at the trapper sideways. “I never said anything about giving up. And we are the best, Caira. That’s why we’re still here, and that’s why we’re going in again.”

Abe smiled. “Now that’s more like it. My granddaddy used to say: ‘Don’t take no risks, don’t deserve no rewards’.” He grinned at Caira, touching the wide brim of his hat. “You write that down, honey. That’s a little wisdom there. Somethin’ else uncle Abe’s taught you.”

Parnell chuffed, the shoulder pauldrons of his red assault armour grinding as he shrugged. “Those who can’t do – teach, am I right?”

Abe sniffed. “You know what, Jimmy? Fuck you. You can write that down, too. Maybe read it later when I’m not around, so the sentiment lives on.”

Cabot raised a hand. “Alright, can it, you two. How’re our boys?”

“Sleeping,” Abe replied. “Markov is stable, and Griffin has a heartbeat again thanks to Dr. Creepy over here – who still won’t crack a smile even after savin’ his friend’s life.”

Lazarus, currently finger-punching a monitor behind them and correlating data between the Laurie-Anne’s hard drive and his gauntlet, didn’t look up. “Losing a friend puts me in a mournful humour, Abraham. Bringing him back is just doing my job. The grief remains. I would not expect you to understand.”

Abe shrugged. “Whatever. You’re a weird guy, doc.”

“Coming from you, that is a compliment.”

“No. It ain’t.”

Cabot was about to cut in again when the comms array beeped at him. He swung around, palming the dash to bring the holo-cast back up. He answered the hail with a press of a button, and read the message that blinked up on the screen. He swore. “We got a job.”

Parnell and Abe joined him at the console. “Well?” Abe asked after a few moments of silence.

Cabot tapped the screen. “VIP. Now, of all times… Command wants us to secure one Madeleine Harker, a research executive holed up somewhere in the valleys.”

Abe scratched at his moustache. “I thought we were here to help with the evacuation, not babysit some scientist.”

Cabot didn’t answer for a long time, then: “We do what they pay us to do. We’re here to save lives.” He flicked the monitor off. “Get everyone together, Parnell. We got work to do.”

“A research executive. What’s that?”

Cabot, leaning over the safety railing above the common room, let his primary medic, Valerie Wolski, answer Hyde’s question. She thumbed a shell into her sniper rifle’s breach as she spoke. “If you know EbonStar or NORDITA, then you know that a research executive is practically royalty. It means she knows secrets.”

Madeleine Harker’s face was displayed on a 90-inch monitor hung on the wall above the main table, framed by scrolling bars of information. She looked around 40 – 45, severe face, mousy hair, narrow eyes.

“Secrets?” Hyde spat, looking up. “Why do we give a fuck about secrets?”

“We don’t,” Cabot told him. “EbonStar does, and they’re signing our cheques.”

The burly former chem-trooper turned up one side of his fire-scarred mouth. “Well, I don’t wanna take a dump in your bacon sandwich, chief, but you realise we got annihi-fucking-lated yesterday, right?”

“I was there, Hyde. I remember. But we’re not going in blind this time. Our objective is this woman. We are in, and we are out. Clean.”

Hank, perched on an ammo case on the far side of the room, pulled on his cigar. “Ain’t that always the plan?” he said through a haze of smoke. Hank had been a demolitions man and an orbital driller before he started hunting big game, and he appreciated a good plan. Right now, Cabot didn’t really have one. “Why can’t we just whip in and pick her up? Why’re we even gettin’ our boots wet?”

“We don’t know where she is. Colony Command are trying to avoid a wild goose chase here. Green says they’ll feed us her position when we’re on the ground, but she’s likely to be at one of two research stations in the valleys. Bucket’ll drop us near the first and we’ll evac at the power relay.”

“Who’s going down, Marshal?” asked Maggie the trapper. She sat cross-legged in the shadows, the huge, leather-skinned form of Daisy, her pet trapjaw, stretched out in front of her.

Cabot looked at his team for a moment, saw the same thing in their eyes he always saw. These men and women didn’t get scared. They weren’t spooked by a bad day, they weren’t even spooked when Lazarus had to get his magic glove out. It wasn’t that they didn’t care – he knew that some of them had history going back decades – it was that they were professionals, and this was their business.

“Let’s keep it small. Me, Jimmy, Abe; Val, you’re on the med-gun. Caira, Hank, Maggie, Hyde, you’re back-up in case shit gets too real to deal. Meantime, Caira, help Zivkovic take care of the wounded. Bucket?”

The robot’s voice buzzed over the intercom. “Yes, Marshal?”

“Keep the engine running on this one.”

“Affirmative.”

Cabot nodded at the team. “Gear up, people. We drop in five.”

Check out Evolve: Something Wicked – Part Two tomorrow…