Doom Patrol on Pittman

Day 1: Arrival on Pittman

I arrived at Pittman today. The planet is nothing like Earth. It is barren and hostile, with sharp winds that sweep across red deserts and jagged mountain ranges. The outpost where I will be stationed is called Fort Kilo Papa — a small fortified camp housing just over a hundred soldiers. There is a tension in the air, an unease none of us can quite shake. Rumors of strange activity in the outer territories have everyone on edge.

My orders are straightforward: reconnaissance and defense of the resource extraction zones. Pittman holds vast mineral reserves vital to both the United States and the Mutual Defense Force supply chains. We have heard whispers of sabotage in the mines, but what unsettles me most are the unconfirmed reports of something not human moving beyond the mountains.

For now, I will focus on settling in. Tomorrow brings my first briefing — and my first patrol.

Day 2: First Briefing

Today’s briefing made the situation clear. Captain Duvall, the outpost commander, outlined our mission. We are to patrol a perimeter covering nearly fifty square kilometers. The mining sites are scattered and vulnerable. The terrain is treacherous, and Pittman’s weather changes without warning. A calm sky can become a storm of dust and lightning in minutes. We were told to never travel without emergency kits and signal beacons.

What worries me most is the isolation. Reinforcements are days away at best. Out here, you either adapt — or vanish.

Day 4: First Combat Patrol

Our first patrol took us through Razorback Ridge — a jagged stretch of rock that looks like the spine of some ancient beast. I was paired with Sergeant Kiera, a no-nonsense veteran who has been here six months. She briefed me quickly, all business. The sky was a dull orange, the wind thick with sulfur from the mines. As we moved, I felt every muscle tighten. I had trained for this, but no training prepares you for the silence of a dead world.

We returned to Fort Kilo Papa at dusk without incident. Still, I could not shake the feeling that the planet itself was watching us.

Day 7: Dust Storm Delay

A storm rolled in overnight — the worst I have seen. The winds howled so fiercely that they rattled the walls of the outpost. Visibility dropped to zero. We spent the day sealed inside, waiting for it to pass. A few of us gathered in the mess hall, telling stories to pass the time. Corporal Diaz mentioned seeing strange blue lights in the mountains during his last patrol. Most laughed, but his eyes told a different story. He believes what he saw.

I am starting to understand what this planet does to people. The isolation gets into your head.

Day 10: Signs of Sabotage

Patrols had been quiet — until today. We reached one of the smaller mining outposts and found the equipment damaged. The sabotage was crude but deliberate. Whoever did it knew just enough to cause chaos. Sergeant Kiera suspects local dissidents, but I am not convinced. The air around the site felt wrong — heavy, like the calm before a storm. No tracks, no bodies, just silence. We reported it to Captain Duvall, and engineers have been dispatched to make repairs. It may have been minor, but it feels like the start of something larger.

Day 13: Midnight Patrol

I drew midnight patrol duty. The world at night here is suffocatingly dark. The only light comes from the faint glow of our visors and the reflection of stars against the dust. Halfway through the run, our scanners picked up a faint signal — irregular, mechanical, almost rhythmic. We tried to triangulate it, but it slipped away every time we closed in. We marked the coordinates and returned to base. Captain Duvall plans to send a drone, but the signal felt deliberate, as if it was testing us.

Day 16: Ambush at Razorback Ridge

We walked into an ambush today. Razorback Ridge again. The explosion came first, then the gunfire — sharp and precise. We dove for cover as the rocks erupted around us. I was hit in the shoulder, not bad enough to end me, but enough to shake my confidence. Sergeant Kiera dragged me behind a boulder while our squad returned fire. It lasted minutes, maybe hours; time blurred in the chaos. When it ended, there was nothing — no attackers, no bodies, no sign of where they came from.

The medics patched me up, but the wound is more than physical. Whoever they are, they know this terrain. They are watching us.

Day 19: Reconnaissance Drone Report

The drone sent to investigate the strange signal came back with disturbing data. It detected multiple heat signatures moving through the mountains — not human, not animal. They appeared briefly, erratically, before vanishing completely. Captain Duvall dismissed them as geological interference, but I saw the scan myself. The pattern was too structured to be random.

Sergeant Kiera and I have been ordered to lead a small recon team to the coordinates tomorrow. I can feel something building out there. Pittman is holding its breath.

Day 21: The Encounter

We reached the coordinates after hours of climbing through blistering heat and razor-sharp rock. The area was silent — no tracks, no debris, no signs of life. Then the movement caught my eye. A shadow against the ridge, too fast and deliberate to be a trick of light. Through the scope, I saw it clearly. Humanoid, but not human. Taller, leaner, encased in what looked like living armor. It carried an energy weapon unlike anything I have seen. Its movements were graceful, predatory.

And then it was gone.

We reported what we saw. Captain Duvall is skeptical, but Kiera and I know the truth. This is not sabotage. It is contact — and it is hostile.

Day 23: The Calm Before the Storm

Two days since the sighting, and the entire outpost feels different. Conversations stop when someone walks in. Every sound outside makes us flinch. No one wants to admit it, but we all know the truth — we are not alone on Pittman. Whatever is out there is studying us, learning how we operate. We have doubled patrols, fortified defenses, and armed the perimeter drones. I have been given command of a small patrol unit. The responsibility weighs heavily, but there is no room for fear now.

Day 25: The Alien Assault

It happened tonight. The sky came alive with streaks of blue light, cutting through the clouds like blades. At first, we thought it was a meteor storm or a mining explosion, but then the hum began — deep, resonant, vibrating through the ground and our chests.

Then they came.

The alien forces hit us with precision. Their weapons were silent, their attacks coordinated. Beams of energy tore through the barricades, melting steel and armor alike. We returned fire, but it was chaos. Half my squad went down in the first minutes. I caught glimpses of them in the light — their armor pulsing with energy, movements too fast to track. These were not scavengers or colonists. They were soldiers.

We fell back to Fort Kilo Papa under heavy fire. Reinforcements have been called, but I do not know if they will arrive in time. Pittman is no longer a frontier world. It is a battlefield. Whatever these things are, they are not finished with us.

— Corporal Kamau Nyaga, MDF Forward Recon, Fort Kilo Papa, Pittman

Tears from the Starbound Hope

Day 1: Entering the Unknown

Today, we crossed into a region of space marked on our charts as unclaimed. We are deep in the frontier now, pushing beyond known systems into territory few have ever mapped. The six warships assigned to escort us, all crewed by veterans of the Keo Terra Defense Force, were in high spirits, confident that nothing out here could challenge us. The convoy commander, Captain Rho, seemed especially eager to reach our destination.

Then it happened. A transmission came through, brief, direct, and in a language that felt strangely familiar. The translators struggled before the message stabilized: Leave immediately. This system is under the jurisdiction of the Omnium. The name was little more than a rumor within fleet circles, whispered tales of advanced vessels sighted at the edge of human space. But here they were, and they were warning us away.

Captain Rho dismissed the transmission without hesitation, certain that whatever waited beyond could not threaten a Keo Terra convoy. He ignored the second warning as well. I felt the chill of that decision as we pressed deeper into the system, unsure of what awaited us.

Day 2: The Encounter

We saw it, a single Omnium warship, sleek, dark, and silent. It absorbed light rather than reflected it, an absence more than an object. Captain Rho refused to retreat. Instead, he ordered the escorts into formation, determined to show that Keo Terra's strength would not be challenged.

From the bridge, I watched as our warships accelerated toward the unknown vessel, weapons systems fully charged. Then the sensors spiked, an energy surge unlike anything in our databases. In seconds, it was over. Each of our six escorts was destroyed before they could land a single hit. The Omnium vessel moved with impossible precision, striking without visible discharge, its weapons invisible but absolute.

It was like watching a predator at play, swift, effortless, merciless. Six warships, gone in moments. The silence that followed was unbearable.

Day 3: Aftermath and the Message

The bridge of the Starbound Hope was silent as debris drifted past the viewport. I had friends on those ships, people I’d served with for years. Now they were gone, erased by a force we couldn’t comprehend. It hit us all at once: we were completely outmatched.

Another transmission came through. The same calm, detached voice repeated the warning: Leave this system. Do not return. There was no anger, no triumph, just certainty. Our escorts were gone, Captain Rho with them, and no one dared to argue. I gave the order to reverse course. The colony ships turned slowly, engines burning pale blue as we began the long retreat home.

Day 4: Reflections

I can’t shake the image of those ships, the pride of our fleet, falling so easily. The Omnium vessel did not pursue us. It simply watched as we withdrew, a silent sentinel marking the border between what is ours and what will never be. This system belongs to them, and they have no interest in negotiation or conquest. Only in being left alone.

As we move farther from their space, the weight of the encounter grows heavier. The confidence we once carried, the certainty of Keo Terra’s strength, is gone. We now understand what it means to meet the Omnium. It isn’t war. It’s a revelation.

When we finally cleared the system, I contacted Mission Control. The directive came almost immediately: return to base and file no official record. This event never happened. I ordered a full communications blackout for the remainder of the voyage.

Still, I know what we saw. And I know that somewhere out there, in the quiet between the stars, they are watching.

— Journal of Captain Lin Mei Tan (Date Redacted)

Pittman Outpost

Day 17: Pittman Outpost

Pittman isn’t a place for the faint of heart. The landscape stretches out as a barren wasteland — rugged, scarred, and burned by countless battles. I stood watch this morning, staring across the plains littered with craters, some still smoldering from yesterday’s skirmish. The ground is jagged and hostile, peaks jutting upward like broken teeth against a dark, unyielding sky. Everything about this planet feels alive with malice, as if it’s trying to drive us off.

Our outpost is little more than a cluster of armored bunkers and hastily welded barriers — a temporary fortress holding back an enemy that never seems to stop. The Marines here move in cycles: fight, patch, reload, and rest when they can. Exhaustion shows in every face, but there’s no other option. We keep going because stopping isn’t an option.

By midday, the sky was choked with storm clouds, lightning flickering along the horizon. Thunder rolled in the distance, a grim reminder that even the weather here is an enemy. The real danger, though, lies closer — alien scouts that move just beyond our sensors, never attacking, never retreating. Just watching. Waiting.

Day 18: After the Battle

Last night was brutal. They came in waves — fast, silent, their movements like shadows flickering through the storm. We lost three Marines before we could even return proper fire. When the fight was over, the field was a tangle of debris, smoke, and the broken remains of both sides.

The medics worked through the night, patching up burns and trauma wounds while the smell of scorched metal and ozone hung heavy in the air. I didn’t sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw them — their armor glinting in the lightning, their forms disappearing into the storm as if the darkness itself was alive.

By morning, the outpost was quiet. The wounded were sent to the med-bunkers while the rest of us scouted the field. The enemy had vanished, leaving behind nothing — no wreckage, no tracks, no trace of origin. Just silence and ruin.

Day 19: The Calm Before the Storm

Today was quiet — too quiet. The kind of stillness that grinds at your nerves. We spent the day reinforcing the perimeter, laying fresh barricades, and reestablishing firing arcs. Every Marine worked without speaking much. You could feel the tension building with every passing hour.

I walked the perimeter before dusk. The plains stretched endlessly, marked by blackened craters and twisted alien debris half-buried in the ash. Hard to believe this was once a thriving colony world. Now, it’s a graveyard — a monument to endless conflict.

As night fell, the outpost settled into uneasy silence. Everyone knows what’s coming. The quiet never lasts long on Pittman. When the next storm breaks — we’ll be ready, or as ready as anyone can be against an enemy that shouldn’t exist.

Day 20: The Sky Burns

The attack came before dawn. It started as a low hum — then the screech of engines tore through the air as alien fighters streaked across the sky, plasma trails burning against the clouds. The bunkers shook under impact. I grabbed my rifle and sprinted for the line as the alarms screamed.

The Marines poured from their shelters, returning fire with everything we had. The darkness erupted in a storm of light — red tracer fire, slashing through sheets of blue plasma. Then the rain hit, hard and heavy, mixing with smoke and ash until the whole battlefield became a storm of mud and flame. It was chaos. Half the time, we couldn’t see what we were shooting at — only the flashes of light and the screams through the comms.

They were relentless, moving with terrifying precision. But somehow, we held. When the sun finally broke through the clouds, their forces were gone, retreating beyond the ridges. The field was a wasteland of shattered armor and scorched earth. The rain washed away the blood, but the craters remained — deep and silent reminders of what it cost to survive another day.

Day 21: Reflection

I don’t know how much longer we’ll last here. Pittman isn’t a place you survive — it’s a place you endure. The terrain, the storms, the enemy — everything about this planet is designed to break you. And yet, somehow, it doesn’t. Every day we wake, we fight, and we endure. That’s all there is.

Looking out over the battlefield, I wonder how long this war can go on. How many more names will be carved into memorials that no one will ever visit? Still, one thing is certain: Pittman won’t break us. We’re Marines. We fight until there’s nothing left to fight for.

— Journal of Private First Class Jayden, 2299