Felicity: The Flesh and Blood Mining Planet
Felicity was the Ciejek family's jungle mining planet in Michael Jan Friedman and Robert Greenberger's Predator: Flesh and Blood. The name was a joke, because nothing about the planet was fortunate. The family had cut it for precious metals, left one forest standing, and brought Andar Ciejek back there after patriarch Karl Ciejek died. Cousin Derek then faked a scout signal so a Hish hunt under Bet-Karh would wipe Andar out of an unread will.
Name And Setting
Travelers reached Felicity by way of Polyphemus. It was a hot, smelly jungle planet the Ciejeks had riddled with precious-metal mines, named the opposite of what it was, and it took migrants from a dying Earth. EarthGov had hidden hunter attacks for centuries so colonies like Felicity would keep taking people. Cousin Derek's technician hacked UNISC databanks and aimed the fake beam with a survey of colony remains on Harmony.
Surface And Colony
The planet had breathable air for humans. The Hish remixed a breathing charge before they left their landing vehicle, because the mix was not what they wanted, and Bet-Karh later said the atmosphere tasted wrong with his helmet off. Gravity on Felicity sat close enough to Earth that both sides could hunt and walk without special gear. Wildlife filled Karl's forest with insect noise, sap, and local flowers.
From orbit the mountain ranges of Felicity showed deep gray scars. Dark conduits crossed the valleys and carried ore to Ciejek processing plants that sat on the land like metal coins. The air over the colony smelled of that processing. Minerals in the water made coffee and everything else taste tart, and filters did not fix it.
The settlement was a cluster of cream geodesic domes of mixed sizes, offices, stores, bars, labs, and living quarters, plus a macadam landing field about a hundred meters on a side. Derek kept his men in a rectangular guest block near that field because none of the domes could hold them all. Felicity had an early-warning grid. Derek spoofed it as eight hours of solar-flare static so a Hish ship could slip into orbit without a challenge. The colony cell net failed once the hunt started. South-side shelters locked thirty minutes after the siren.
Karl's Forest And The Mines
Some forests on Felicity remained lush after the mining cuts. Karl had ordered one stand left untouched, and he wanted a jungle tour there before the will reading at 4:00 p.m. Guide Pablo Ortega took a party of twenty-one into that wood. That is where the first hunters set down, out of earshot, and where seven people died before the rest reached a mine tunnel across an open field.
The mines on Felicity were old enough to hold cars, pickaxes, and a bucket-wheel digging machine with a long drill. Andar used that machine to break out of a far-side plateau and drive through a mountain, killing the hunter Kaj-Nal with the drill. The will Karl had fixed for the planet was never opened.
The Hunt
Two remnant Hish clans came in because Derek replayed scout-style traffic and jammed the warning grid on Felicity. Close scans found only one knot of humans near the false signal, so they sent four hunters down in a landing vehicle. Plasma and a cloaked hunter with a telescoping staff and wristblades opened the forest. Ordinary energy pistols and bullets stopped on the armor. A portable flamethrower did not.
Bet-Karh later destroyed Derek's shuttle on the landing field, killing Celina Laban inside, and melted the tarmac. More hunters came down, then turned on each other in a Hish-on-Hish fight on the way to the mountains. A call to the mother ship returned only static.
Aftermath
Colonists on Felicity packed into the locked south-side shelters during the hunt. Andar meant to get wounded Emphalelo to a colony doctor, collect the Ciejek dead for their families, and turn the old syndicate machine toward repairing Earth. He was Karl's last descendant on the planet after Derek died, and the will had never been read. Bet-Karh walked back to his landing shuttle without learning that the scout signal had been fake.
Conclusion
Felicity was a breathable jungle mining planet the Ciejeks had cut for metals, with one forest patriarch Karl Ciejek left standing and a dome colony beside a macadam landing field. His grandson Derek Ciejek's fake scout signal brought hunt leader Bet-Karh's merged clans down on that rock, the landing field was wrecked, and Karl Ciejek's will stayed unread.
Appearances
- Predator: Flesh and Blood (2007)
Tag Categories: Predator Universe Planets | Predator Hunt | Predator Lore
