Eureka!
It had seemed all too easy. Even factoring in the travel time and fuel costs due to the vast distance from the homeworld, their profit would have been substantial.
Sheer desperation had driven them out this far. Nothing was known about this unexplored frontier other than there were a few systems that could potentially contain planets with treasures to be found. They had hoped to find just enough of something to mine and process that would give them a marginal profit. Their most outlandish expectation was to make enough to get their small floundering operation back on its feet, allowing them to compete for mining rights within the more civilized regions of space.
Scans of an outlying system containing an insignificant backwater planet populated by a race of non-space faring, bipedal primitives, showed potential. In short, a planet filled with a defenseless population whose resources could be easily seized by their small crew. A quick drop to the surface, they had reasoned, would allow them time to gather enough ore of one of the many known minerals the planet had in abundance to get their operation back on its feet.
They had found that, and much more…
For what the alien they encountered upon their initial survey landing had called “gold” was not a known mineral where they were from. It was beautiful to behold and, according to the analysis of the samples they had taken from the wandering native before killing him, useful in ways that would profit them beyond their wildest imaginations. A quick scan of the crude holes these savages called mines revealed the mineral to be in abundance. They had returned to their orbiting mining barge to scan the surrounding area to formulate a plan. A scant few hours afterward found them back in the jump ship heading towards the surface.
That seemed like an eternity ago.
5 Hours Earlier
They had donned their lightly armoured mining suits and switched on their shields as they stepped out of the jump craft into the cool night.
Scans had revealed a small settlement to the east of where the mines were located…this was a problem. It had been unanimously agreed that the solution was to eliminate the town and its inhabitants entirely, then return with the mining barge. Unbothered by the natives they estimated that with their full crew of ten working in shifts, plus their several dilapidated, but functioning androids, they could mine enough of the ore to fill their processing holds in no more than 2 of this planet's days.
Hopefully this won’t take long. Taeshean, vessel captain and crew foreman, perturbedly thought as he checked his beam rifle settings while making his way through the trees. He considered the natives nothing more than an annoyance and was eager to get this over with. He and his crew had been struggling for far too long to have some primitives stand in the way of a much deserved fortune. Spread out and with their weapons set on a wide beam with a distance from the small town of no more than 30 meters, they estimated they could eliminate the entire populace (no more than roughly 200 according to scans) and turn the town into a smoldering heap of ruin shortly after sunrise.
They exited the small grove in the pre-dawn darkness and began crossing the vast plain surrounding the rag-tag collection of ramshackle wood structures and smattering of tents. They were almost in range as the sun started to slowly peek over the craggy mountains behind the town when things started to turn.
From out of the town came two natives, each mounted on the back of some sort of large, short haired, four legged beast. Their pace was nonchalant until the one in the lead caught sight of Teashean. They brought their mounts to an abrupt halt and just sat there, excitedly muttering to each other, seemingly in some sort of dumbfounded trance. Taeshean, annoyed at this potential wrinkle in their plans, casually raised his rifle and shot the one on the right. The blue beam streaked straight through him, sheering him in half. The remaining one shouted what sounded like a stunned curse and quickly spun his mount around, running it back toward town. A few of the others raised their rifles but Taeshaean signaled to let it go, they would all be dead soon enough. Unphased, they continued spreading out to their positions.
The native had vanished between the buildings of the town’s perimeter and, shortly after, a harsh chiming began ringing out. There was a great commotion, accompanied by a cacophony of angry noise. In the burgeoning gold light they could see more of the creatures pouring out of the tents and structures scattered about the town. They appeared to be gathering in the center of the town in small groups that then began splitting off and heading in their direction.
The small band had to suppress a laugh at this sight. Heading towards them?! Were these aliens predisposed to suicide? So much the better, Taeshaean thought, this would make their task far easier.
The dry wood sprung ablaze almost instantly as they started to beam the outlying structures. They continued to weave the deadly streams through the town, collaterally setting alight some of the scampering natives. He was slightly unnerved by how fast they were moving, like hyperactive Megzant bugs coming out of a hive! The ones that they hadn’t killed (and there were many, FAR too many…) began taking shelter outside the town behind boulders or any other cover they could find. Teashean was about to tell his crew to switch their focus to the approaching villagers when a cacophony of sharp popping noises started ringing out. It was difficult to tell where the sounds were coming from with his helmet on, he thought it was nothing more than the crackling of the burning town.
Then, to his left, Gradanuk's head violently exploded in his helmet. He was dead before his body hit the ground. What hit him? Taeshaean was dumbfounded, the shields! What happened to his shields? Had they been off? Before he had any more time to ponder, he felt an impact then a sharp pain in his lower left limb. He looked down to see blood flowing through a ragged tear in his suit. Within seconds, two more of his crew to his right had fallen, their suits riddled with smouldering holes. No sooner had he turned to fire towards a group sheltered behind some trees than he heard a sharp explosion instantly followed by excruciating pain in his mid section. The impact had knocked him on his back. He slowly raised his head to look down and gasped as he beheld a bloody, alarmingly large, smouldering hole in his lower right torso.
In the dawning gold light of the alien sun, he turned his head to see the silhouettes of what remained of his crew frantically turning back and running towards the forest. None of them made it very far. As they retreated they were riddled with holes seemingly springing from nowhere, and fell face down into the dusty earth. Shaking himself from his bewilderment, Teashaean willed himself to sit up only to see one of the aliens almost on top of him. He instinctively fired. The alien burst into flames with a high pitched shriek. What looked like a small black club fell from his hand as his convulsing and burning body slammed into the ground. Several more of the villagers were fast approaching, there were more popping sounds followed by impacts to the ground around him. He fired, torching the approaching cluster. The rest of their number had thought better of advancing and retreated back behind what little cover the plain afforded.
Taeshean, bleeding and in agony, rolled over to push himself up to stand and came face to face with the dead aliens “club”. Suddenly, their predicament crystalized in his mind as he shook his head in horrified disbelief. Painfully, he pushed himself upright and beamed the terrain between himself and the remaining villagers. The dry prairie brush ignited, creating a wall of fire that would burn itself out all too soon. He turned and straggled back towards the ship.
Regrets
Taeshean just needed to make it 20 more meters to the medical bay. His legs had gone numb during the flight up, loss of feeling in two of his four arms followed shortly thereafter. He was slowly dragging himself down the corridor, leaving a trail of smeared gore behind him. Hopefully he would have just enough strength to hoist himself up on the med bed where the robotic doctors could do their healing work.
How arrogant they had all been! How presumptuous! They had assumed that none of the natives would be able to get anywhere near them during their attack. The thinking had been that they would either be on fire or too terrified to approach. On the outside chance that a scant few did get past their beams, they had reasoned, their suits and shields would protect them from any hand held weapons like a club, knife, or a spear…possibly even something akin to an arrow as well.
Mining suits were designed primarily to dissipate the energy from beam tools. Secondarily, they could also deflect blows from falling rock, and errant hand held digging tools. Mining was a dangerous occupation, and accidents frequently happened. Beams went astray, rocks came loose and fell, hand tools missed their mark and hit their users. But deflecting a high velocity metallic round driven by a propellant? That was never a consideration taken into account by the suits manufacturers.
Consumed by their insatiable greed and in a rush to claim the primitives' buried wealth, they had never stopped to consider this planet's stage of advancement in weaponry. They had assumed that this species hadn’t yet developed projectile weapons. To his horror, and now regret, he had recognized the weapon that had fallen from the burning alien's hand immediately. Even on this far away world, ancient projectile weapons looked roughly identical to what he had seen in the historical records of his own world and that of countless others in the inner systems.
They had been defeated by a band of savages armed with weapons that hadn’t been used in any capacity for over 400 years! He bitterly laughed, spraying the deck with a mist of blood as the world closed to black around him.