《Vlaryne》 Chapter 01 - The Bugs. Cold and tired. That¡¯s how he was feeling when he woke up. Brutal waking, the ship¡¯s alarms were screaming, red lights were flashing and the sergeant John was strongly shaking him. The captain Kyle Barnes slowly came out of the stasis numbness. ¡°Shit Paul, what¡¯s happening?¡± ¡°Captain, it¡¯s fucking bad. They¡¯re fucking aliens outside the fucking ship and they¡¯re shooting at us! All the troops are woken up in urgency to take part in the fucking fight!¡± Responded a little muscular man with a really big mustache. Kyle noticed the language of his subordinate, cruder than usual, but passed on it. He was now perfectly awake. Looking around he saw his men getting out of their stasis pods and looking around wondering what was happening. The ship was regularly shaken and some faint explosions could be heard in the distance. At the depth they were, it was quite surprising to feel and hear it. The battle should be very fierce. It was Kyle duty to gather his unit, to announce the news to it and to lead his men to their operating post. ¡®Crap, we don¡¯t really have an operating post attributed to us, we¡¯re not supposed to do a thing before the landing.¡¯ Well shit, Paul could do part of it. Kyle was first gathering more information about the situation. ¡°Sergeant! Gather the men. They are to equip quickly and be ready to move as soon as possible. I¡¯ll contact the Bridge to get more information and our clear order of mission.¡± ¡°Yes, my captain!¡± Walking to the side of the room, Kyle stretched his legged, still a bit numb. He also checked his computer wristband, or comband, and learned they had been woken up 62 years after the start of the travel, they should have stayed asleep for at least 100 years. The icon of an incoming communication was blinking, seeing it was coming from the Bridge, he answered immediately. ¡°Bridge? Here¡¯s ranger captain Barnes. What¡¯s happening?! I heard of aliens, that¡¯s true? What are we supposed to do?¡± ¡°Captain, calm down, here¡¯s Private Jack, on the Bridge¡¯s com. An unknown ship appeared on the radar and started shooting at us without warning. We shot back, but those fuckers sent capsules to board us. We have intruder everywhere, your mission is to find and exterminate them. You are to prioritize the security of the access to the lower decks, the passengers and the Bridge must remain safe. You don¡¯t need to make prisoners, but if you managed to do it the ups and the white coat will be pleased.¡± ¡°What about the automatic defenses and the security robots?¡± ¡°All on the first line, but they¡¯re not as useful as they should be. Nobody knows why. The techs are on it. Don¡¯t expect a mechanical help. Good luck.¡±Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. ¡°Thanks.¡± Kyle turned himself to looked at his men. They were ready and waiting for the orders. ¡°Soldiers! We are under attacks by unknown creatures. They manage to infiltrate the ship and it¡¯s our job to clean it up. You have three minutes to be ready to go. Lieutenant, everyone is awake?¡± ¡°Yes, Captain! They¡¯re all here and out of bed.¡± ¡°Good. Be ready to everything, we have no idea to what they look like.¡± ¡°Alright, everyone! You¡¯ve heard the Cap¡¯?¡± Started to scream the Lieutenant to the men and women of the unit. ¡°Take heavy armament! But not too heavy, we don¡¯t want to destroy the ship! And pronto! Or my right boot will see your asses more close than your little mom!¡± While his team prepared itself, Kyle checked the holographic map of his comband to have a better idea of the local situation. The two other units of the sector were also preparing to move. He could see the position of the other officers and his own men on the holo-map. The map didn¡¯t show the location of the enemy, the sensor of the ship would automatically send the information to the holo-map of the officer''s comband. It would have been surprising to found some there, they were at the 25th deck, meaning they had 24 level between them and the external structure of the ship. If the enemy had managed to go so deep in the ship, the situation would have been desperate. When everyone was ready to go, Kyle led his unit in the corridors and elevators of the Mathilde, the Big Carrot as the men renamed the strangely shaped ship. They were heading to the nearest section of the hull, where they had the most chance to cross pass with the aliens. Coordinating themselves with the other units so that they would not cross pass between them and cover more ground, thanks to their comband. They have all received the same orders and were trained for this kind of situation. The intruders didn¡¯t know what was coming for them. It¡¯s been three hours that Kyle¡¯s unit was at the 4th deck. They had crossed their first aliens five hours earlier, at the 7th deck. Pushing them back to deck 5 had been rather easy, they did it in just an hour. From the 5th to the 4th deck, another hour has been spent. Since that they were blocked. The intruders were looking like big bugs, so, without originality, the men named them ¡®Bugs¡¯. They move fast and are well coordinated. But the worst part is their shell, it¡¯s tough enough to resist most of the weapons the humans used. They had to use semi-heavy weapons to break the shells, anything heavier was forbidden as it could break through the walls of the corridors. The lighter weapons needed to hit the small weak points situated at the articulations of the Bugs or in the wounds to do any small damage, otherwise, they were useless. The aliens completely took the two first deck and they are still some small pocket of resistance on the 3rd deck. But the humans¡¯ reinforcements were unable to put their feet on this deck and they would soon be lost to them. One fourth of the units was scattered in the corridor, their commander officer dead to the bugs. The officer-less soldier were trying to hold their grounds or to rejoin another unit. Thirteen men and women had join Kyle¡¯s unit, taking the place of his seven dead soldiers, he had started the fight with unit of thirty men. All the light security robots were already destroyed by the bugs and the heavier ones were strategically installed on lower decks. Some of the techs had even begun to reprogram the utility robots, they hoped to send them on the front line to support the fighters. The command center was even starting to consider the idea of waking up passengers. Some of them had military training. Chapter 02 - Fighting the Bugs. The Bugs had been pushed back to the 3rd deck. The corridors display a true slaughter, the walls are painted with the dark red of the human blood, the pale blue of the bug blood and the burnt black of the energy weapons. They are limbs and guts everywhere and the humans and bugs fighters are forced to watch their steps or to slip and bath in the dead body. The battle has started three days ago. The fights never stopped, the units were taking turns to allow the men and women to take some rest and receive a bit of medical attention. The situation was desperate. No one could have seen this coming, and the crew was not prepared to face such a mindless enemies. The bugs were fighting without fear and rest, going again and again until they died. All the passengers with military records had been sent has reinforcement to the front line on the second day. Today they had started to wake up all of those with any other kind of training that could be of use, policemen, firemen, hunters, even simple people with a gun license. The reinforcement arrived with less and less formation and they need to learn on the job. Some lose their mind at the moment they see the situation and are sent back to the stasis pods or to be of use as logistical support. Others revealed themselves as natural fighters. But the majority don¡¯t last long and add their blood to the walls in a few hours. The last robot wave passed this morning. It had only some small cleaning robots, the kind that picks the dirt on the ground and takes care of the puddles. The ship still had some robots, but they were too big to be of use in the corridors. The number of bugs doesn¡¯t seem to change when one goes down, another takes his place. But recently the quality of the bugs appears to diminish a bit. At this rate, more than 20% of the passengers will be lost, not taking into account the soldiers. But the command center estimates they will be able to push back the Bugs out of the ship in a few days. Three days later, on the 6th day of battle, the Captain Barnes and his unit reach to the 1st deck. It¡¯s a small victory for them, but the fights aren¡¯t over. The bugs reinforcements are fewer since the 5th day. That¡¯s what allowed the humans to go from deck 3 to 1 in a little more than a day. It also means that fewer passengers have been put out of stasis to join the fight. The hull is pierced everywhere, but the air doesn¡¯t escape thanks to a weak energy shield. From his position, the Captain can see the outer space, the stars, and the enemy ship. A big lump of metal without any aesthetic, there are antennae everywhere on it. Kyle can see the impact marks of Mathilde¡¯s missiles. Sometimes an explosion illuminates the space between the space, and Kyle can see the incoming boarding capsules, with their loads of bugs. Captain Kyle Barnes ¡°unit¡± was actually composed of 24 persons. Himself, of course, the Lieutenant Paul, three other members of the original unit. Of the 19 other, seven were from other units, they had joined his after losing their officers. The last 12 persons were passengers called to arms. During one of their rare moment of rest, Kyle looks by one of the hole in the hull, when he was wandering about the meaning of life, the universe and everything, and what he saw froze his blood in his veins.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. A big whirl of light, with a black hole in the middle of it. An iridescent source of light that grows big every second. It¡¯s right in front of the ships, and their current speed they¡¯ll hit it in less than 10 minutes. Barnes immediately knows it¡¯s not a good sign. At the same moment a message is broadcast through all the ship¡¯s loudspeakers and all the men¡¯s combands: ¡°Attention everyone! A strange phenomenon just appeared in front of the ship. We don¡¯t know what it is. Orders are to evacuate deck 1, 2 and 3 and to take cover on deck 4. We will close the access to deck 4 in 7 minutes. I repeat¡­¡± Kyle doesn¡¯t listen a second time to the message and doesn¡¯t lose time lamenting himself over all the lives lost in vain to retake the decks, the Captain Barnes gathers his unit. ¡°Alright! You all heard this? We have less than 7 minutes to go down to deck 4. I want everybody up and ready to go in 30 seconds! Once there we are to secure the access to everyone behind until they are closed.¡± On his words, the men and women under his command lift themselves and start to carefully advance to the lower decks. Four men are running in the direction of Captain Barnes. They are at the beginning of a corridor and the Captain and his men symbolizing the access to safety, on the 4th deck. When the four men reach the middle of the corridor, five bugs appear at the entrance. They saw the men and make a run for them. ¡°Bugs! Hurry up!¡± Kyle starts shooting at the bugs hoping to give the four men more times to reach the security of the lower deck. He¡¯s quickly imitated by the member of his unit. It¡¯s been three minutes they arrived here and since there they hold the stairs between the 3rd and 4th deck. The bugs aim their weapon at the humans and start shooting in retaliation. ¡°10 seconds before sealing of the decks!¡± The loudspeakers announce. Soon the access to deck 4 will be sealed, and soon after that, the ship will collide with the whirl-light. Everyone still on deck 3 at the sealing time will be considered as lost to humanity. ¡°Everybody get down the stairs!¡± Screams the Captain as himself starts to retreat, not turning his back to the bugs. One of the four men running in the corridor receives a laser beam in the back and fall on the ground, the instant after Barnes shoots the guilty bug. At the same time, the first man crosses him and run down the stairs. The second runner jumps and falls behind Kyle, hurtling down to deck 4. ¡°5 seconds before sealing of the decks!¡± The loudspeakers continue their cold countdown. The last man slips on the ground and a bug catches and guts him, right in front of Kyle. He¡¯s not the first to be eviscerated in front of the Captain, but he was the last one in the corridor. Barnes catches his last grenade from his belt. He throws it at the nearest bug and jumps done the stairs. The bug avoids the grenade, but the explosive detonates behind it, and the bug is propelled in the direction of the stairs. ¡°Sealing of the decks!¡± The bug splatters on the sealing door and just a leg come true, twitching up the stairs. The Captain Barnes looks behind him and sees the door leading to the stairs sealed. He made it to safety. The tension falls down for a second, then the loudspeakers announce something else. ¡°3 seconds before impact!¡± ¡°Everybody on the ground!¡± ¡°2 seconds!¡± ¡°Be ready, it will shake!¡± ¡°1 second!¡± ¡°Hold still!¡± ¡°Impact!¡± Chapter 03 - A little travel. ¡°3 seconds before impact!¡± ¡°Everybody on the ground!¡± ¡°2 seconds!¡± ¡°Be ready, it will shake!¡± ¡°1 second!¡± ¡°Hold still!¡± ¡°Impact!¡± ¡®What happens is not what I was expecting. There is no sensation of violent shock, no projection toward the front of the ship, no clashing sounds, no screams of pain. Instead, there is silence, deadly silence. I can¡¯t even hear my breath, and I¡¯m still panting. I can¡¯t hear the blood that I feel rushing in my ears. I can feel the acceleration, but it is fluid, without pressure or violence. Everything shines around me. It shines so strongly that I need to close my eyes. Then I see a lot of strange, moving and colorful arabesque. There are all the colors of the rainbow, and even more. There are also new colors that I could never have dreamed of, this is so beautiful. I have a feeling that eternity is passing, but everything happens at the time. And suddenly everything stops. The lights and colors are gone, and the sounds are back. It would have been a soft and gentle return to the reality, if not for the screams and moans of pain of the men and women in the corridor with me.¡¯ Looking at his men, Kyle finds them as surprised as him to still be alive. And happy to be of course. The Captain Barnes then process to an evaluation of the local situation. Him, one man and two women from his original unit, and three men woken up for the fight are still in fighting condition. There is also three men and one woman too injured to fight, but not to be of use, counting the Lieutenant Paul. The last three men in the corridor are heavily injured. And there is also two dead body. ¡°Lieutenant, take care of the injured. The others, be ready to move at any moment.¡± The Captain starts to organize the men and then goes to contact the command center to gather more information on the situation. ¡°Bridge? Here¡¯s Captain Barnes. What happened?¡± ¡°Captain Barnes, here¡¯s Private Jack. Nobody knows what happened. But for what we understand of the situation, the Mathilde as travel through space. The stars aren¡¯t aligned with our previous positions, the scientists are on it. We have problems in the motors, due to the bugs and the passage through the thing. We lose the principal propulsion. Bugs¡¯ ship there too, but it seems to have the same problems than us. We aren¡¯t detecting any new boarding capsules. That¡¯s the good news.¡±You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. ¡°Where are we, you said?¡± ¡°I said we don¡¯t know for sure. But I kept the most surprising stuff for the end. The sensors detect that we are at the edge of a solar system. There is a lot of planets in it, and one is more interesting than the others. It seems to be an E7. With our current propulsors, we could be there in four days. The Admiral decided to set course on it for the moment. The bugs are doing the same.¡± ¡°...¡± ¡°Captain Barnes? You¡¯re still there?¡± ¡°Are you kidding me? An E7?¡± ¡°Yep, it looks like it. Will be in orbit there in no more than five days.¡± ¡°Well shit¡­ But whatever, what are we supposed to do now?¡± ¡°Be ready, the doors will be unsealed soon. Your mission is to retake possession of the deck 3 to 1 and exterminate all the bugs you¡¯ll fine. Priority is to rescuing survivors if you find any.¡± ¡°All good, thanks for the information.¡± ¡°Good luck Captain.¡± Kyle hangs up and looks at his men. ¡°Alright, you all. We are to retake the upper deck. Lieutenant, you stay there with the injured, take care of them until reinforcement arrived and hold the position.¡± ¡°Yes, Captain.¡± ¡°Captain? What¡¯s an E7?¡± That¡¯s coming from a young woman, she¡¯s in good enough state to continue the fight with the Captain. She¡¯s also one of the best fighters at his disposal, despite her original formation as a simple secretary. ¡°An E7. That¡¯s a dream.¡± This once, it¡¯s coming from an older man, a professor of mathematics. In a fight is barely able to keep himself alive and to not get in the way of the others. But he had shown himself a pretty good tactician for the unit. ¡°In theory that would be a planet with the same atmosphere composition, temperature, gravity, daily and yearly time than Earth, that¡¯s the E part. But the 7 means it supposed to be 7 times bigger. Except for the size, it¡¯s like being on Earth. Theoretically, it¡¯s impossible, a planet this big must have some different attributes at least the gravity. Originally we were heading to Keird, and it is an E1.5. But the most surprising part is that we are not at the location in space anymore. Instant displacement is a myth, even on paper. It is completely impossible for us to be here. There must be something messing with the sensor. That¡¯s the only expl-¡± ¡°Attention everyone! The doors will now be unsealed.¡± The professor is interrupted by the loudspeaker, reminding them of the situation on the ship. ¡°Thanks, Bernard, but we are not at class. That¡¯s a mystery for another time. Be ready to go and exterminate some bugs!¡± ¡°Yes, Captain!¡± After the unsealing of the doors, Captain Barnes¡¯ small unit went up to the 3rd deck. They only found dead bugs, and dead humans, sometimes a dead robot. Progressing through the corridors up till the first deck, they come to the conclusion that all the bugs died during the phenomenon that transported the spaceship. They only crossed passed with other units, some in a worse state than them. The Bugs had been pushed back out of the Mathilde. Half the units were put to rest while the others had to stay on guard in case the Bugs resumed the assault. Chapter 04 - Crawling in the pipes. The Doctor James Romia was so tired, he had worked almost without breaks. He had been woken at the start of the fight to work in one of the emergency clinics. The ship had a complete and well-equipped hospital in it, but it was too far away from the battle lines, so a lot of closer rooms had been arranged to be used by the medical teams. He had to work on the injured that came back from the front lines and manage to patch them, so they could go back to fight the Bugs. As all the other doctors he had been forced to separate the fighters in three groups. Those he could mend enough so that they could continue the fight, those he could stabilize enough to put in stasis so that they could wait to receive more heavy treatment and the last group, those that nothing could save. He was actually taking a break, he had been forced to by his assistants. And during this break, he could eat and sleep a little, but he also had to check the global situation on the ship. On the 5,000 military men on the ship, only one thousand was still alive, but 700 of them was put back in stasis waiting for the medical teams to be able to take care of them. The ship had had 45,000 non-military passengers on board, half of them had been awake up to fight the Bugs but only 10,000 had survived the fight, with just 500 of them still able to continue. All the survivors would need psychiatric support, and most of them would receive some mechanical prosthetic, going from just some fingers to the four members passing the lungs and the liver Gigantic numbers, too much to really feel something, they were of the range of statistics, but everyone would have lost somebody in the fights. James¡¯ job had been to minimize the casualties, and it wasn¡¯t finished. The fights may have stopped, but the injured continued to come to him. His break was ending, and he had to go back to save lives. Three days after the Jump, like the men were calling the strange phenomenon that had transported the ship from a place in the galaxy to another, nobody was understanding how it could have happened. The scientists were lost in their theories, the calculations and simulations ran on the computers were showing that to make a transfer of this magnitude, the required energy would be incommensurable. The very nature of the Jump was the subject of most of the debates on board. The command center had ordered the mechanics to focus their repair on the most damage systems, the automatic defenses. Understanding what happened and how it happened were secondary to the crew and the passengers¡¯ survival. If the Bugs were to resume the fight, the Mathilde would be ready. Another subject of conversation was the location, where were they? Even if the question was secondary, the people were curious to know. According to the astronomers, they were nowhere on the mapped galaxy. The location of the stars didn¡¯t correspond to any of the sectors of the Milky Way. The third chat¡¯s topic was about the planet. They had been transported to the outskirts of a solar system, and if this one was gathering something like 15 planets, one, in particular, focused the attention of the humans. The one categorized as an E7, meanings comparable in everything to the Earth but seven times bigger.If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. The command center had planned to put the ship in orbit for the time of the repairs. It would allow for small scientific or supply missions. And in case of emergency, they could evacuate or land on the planet and start there their original mission. Millie Evans was a mechanic on board. One of the youngest, and the shortest of those not still in stasis. And as such, she had been designated by her superior to crawl between the pipes. Normally it would be a job for a robot, but none of the specialized were remaining, they had all been destroyed during the fight. The reason for her nomination wasn¡¯t sitting right in her stomach, but it was true, so she had grudgingly accepted to crawl behind the antimatter¡¯s confinement chamber. As long as she wasn¡¯t going too near of it, she was safe, but she didn¡¯t like the situation. And she was there since twenty minutes, crawling between burning and freezing pipes, she was positive she would catch a cold. ¡°They gonna hear me the ¡®big-brothers¡¯, forcing a cute little girl like me to do such a scruffy thing! It¡¯s me who gonna take the full load of it in the face. ¡®Nothing to fear.¡¯ ¡®You¡¯re completely safe.¡¯ I¡¯d like to see them here, crawling in the dust! And the worst! I haven¡¯t found anything!¡± She had crawled there for most time than necessary, checking everything twice. But everything seemed perfectly fine. She was about to check a third time when she heard Her chief, G¨¦r?me, in her comband. ¡°Millie, you hear me? If you haven¡¯t found anything yet, get out, we have some news.¡± ¡°I¡¯m coming. And I hope there is a big glass of fresh water waiting for me.¡± The fact that G¨¦r?me had contacted her while she was so near the antimatter¡¯s confinement chamber and was asking her to exit the place meant that it was serious news. ¡°So? What is it this time?¡± Asked Millie once she had rejoined the other mechanics and grabbed a bottle of ambient temperature water. ¡°This time, that the transitional engines that went down. Barely five minutes ago. With that, we have lost the interstellar and intra-stellar propulsion. We only have the thrust adjusters, the stabilizers, and the retro-rockets. We can land on that fucking planet out there and that¡¯s all!¡± It was a rare sight to see G¨¦r?me swear, Millie immediately knew that he was telling the truth and that he had no idea of why it was happening. ¡°And how does it concern me in particular?¡± Inquired Millie, a bad feeling in her stomach. ¡°You, little mouse, you will go there this time. Take a twenty minutes break and be ready to crawl again.¡± ¡°Yay¡­ When I stop crawling near antimatter it¡¯s for crawling near plutonium¡­ Yippee¡­¡± It was written all over Millie¡¯s face that she wasn¡¯t enjoying the situation. ¡°Stop complaining. Did you find what¡¯s wrong where you were?¡± ¡°I only found things that were where they were supposed to be and in good condition, just not fucking functional. And I don¡¯t know why.¡± ¡°Watch your tongue, Millie. Go take a shower, eat a bit and be ready for your next crawling mission. I¡¯m tired enough like that and I still have to inform the Bridge¡± Mumbling and ignoring the compassionate glare of the other mechanics, Millie went to the women locking room, a big room, almost exclusively for her. Chapter 05 - An important decision. On the Bridge of the starship Mathilde was located the center of commands, it regrouped the commanding officers of the ship, some communication officers and technicians operating from there. One of the communication officers had just received an incoming call in the provenance of the motors area. ¡°Admiral? An important communication, from Chief Technician Gomez, concerning the motors¡¯ state. He¡¯s asking to speak to you directly.¡± ¡°Give me the call, on a secure line.¡± Responded the old man sitting in the comfier chair of the room. The Admiral was probably the oldest man on board, he had been amongst the oldest men at the start of the journey, but being the chief of the expedition until the ship reached his destination, he had been among those who pass the lesser amount of time in stasis. For most of them, the journey was lasting less than a week or a month, for his most trusted men it was the affair of one or two years, but for him, it has been ten years that the ship had left the Earth¡¯s surface. ¡°G¨¦r?me? What¡¯s happening?¡± ¡°Shit hit the fan Patrice, and it hit hard. The intra-stellar propulsion just gave way, we have no idea what¡¯s wrong with the interstellar one and the thrust adjusters start to give signs of weakening.¡± The Admiral Patrice Jackson and the Chief Technician G¨¦r?me Gomez had been friends for a long time, and formality had long ceased to exist between them. But it wasn¡¯t in the habit of the Chief Gomez to swear like that, The Admiral immediately understood that his friend wasn¡¯t joking. ¡°What can we do about it?¡± ¡°We can choose to stay in orbit around the planet or land on it, or on one of those giant moons. You can tell something about the probes?¡± ¡°They are deployed, but the Bugs destroyed almost all of them, the rest are still inside the ship, we won¡¯t use them for now. We also destroyed the Bugs¡¯ ones. But I¡¯m certain you already know that.¡± ¡°Yeah, I know for the remaining, but not for the ones already send out. So the Bugs are still active, that¡¯s some bad news.¡± ¡°They¡¯re still there, but they seemed to have the same kind of problems than us. You think you can do something about the motors?¡± ¡°In theory, they should work perfectly, I can¡¯t do a thing right now, I¡¯ll need at least a week to understand what is going wrong there. And if it continues at the same pace, we will soon lose all the motors. I think they¡¯ll die just after the landing if you decide to do it.¡±This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. ¡°G¨¦r?me, come in the briefing room. I¡¯m calling in all the higher-up for a special meeting.¡± ¡°Ok. I finish a thing or two here and I¡¯ll be there.¡± Claude was listening to the conversation, he had transferred it to the Admiral and had been unable to resist the curiosity to listen to it. He had done it with a lot of discretion and was positive no one had known of it. As such he was greatly surprised when he heard the Admiral voice in his earpiece. ¡°Ensign Jirn. Don¡¯t answer me. I know you¡¯ve been listening on the conversation I just had with the Chief Gomez. I understand curiosity¡¯s killing you. But it can be considered as treason. I won¡¯t punish you know, and you won¡¯t lose your head. Act normally or it will be worse. Now, hang over, that I can see I¡¯ve been understood.¡± His hand shaking the Ensign Claude Jirn push the button to end the call and turned his head to looked at the Admiral. ¡°Shit! I¡¯m dead! I¡¯m swimming in a pool of shit and nothing can save me. What will he do to me? I¡¯ve heard rumors about some unlucky bastards that anger him, they didn¡¯t end well. He said he wouldn¡¯t kill me, but I¡¯m sure he¡¯s planning far worse.¡± ¡°Ensign Jirn! Please call in the General Hanfo and the chief of all the scientistic hub in the briefing room in an hour. They must come with their assistants. You¡¯re to come with me.¡± ¡°Yes, sir!¡± Responded the confused young Ensign. Not understanding what was happening to him, the Ensign Jirn executed the orders and sent the convocation notices to all the required personnel. The General Hanfo would be the commander of the army when the ship would land. He was supposed to take over the commanding role from the Admiral until the colony was stable enough to sustain a democratic government. It was also him who had directed part of the fight against the Bugs. The Doctor Hermand was at the head of all the medical teams of the ship and a renowned surgeon. Currently examining the remained of a Bug and trying to understand their biology. Professor Hotueh, exobiologist, and Doctor Tiy, leader of the biology research were doing the same work that the Doctor Hermand, but in other laboratories. The Chief Gomez of course. He''s supposed to know the ship like no one else, it¡¯s his parents who made the plans and supervised the construction. Professor Detos, head of the social sciences, and numerous others. They all gathered in the briefing room to hear what the Admiral had to say. ¡°Ladies and gentlemen. I have gathered you here to discuss an important matter. Like you already know, we are in a dire situation, the Mathilde is in a really bad shape and the things are not getting better. But there is a solution. There is near us a big planet, looking like the Earth, An E7 to be precise. What you probably don¡¯t know is the fact that the Bugs are in a situation as bad as ours, meaning unable to leave this system. They have already started to take an approach course to the planet. The situation can¡¯t go on like that. Here what I¡¯m proposing, we¡¯re going to change the objectives of our mission, or rather the location of the mission. We¡¯re going to land on this planet and do there what we were supposed to do on Keird. We managed to establish a topographic survey of a part of the planet. Thanks to this map we had been able to determine that the planet is already inhabited, but not the state of the local civilization. We will know more when we¡¯ll arrive in stationary orbit. But before this moment, I would like to hear your professional advice.¡± Chapter 06 - Does the planet have a name? The captain Kyle Barnes was waiting in front of the Admiral briefing room, since one hour. He didn¡¯t know why he was here, he was used to waiting, but he didn¡¯t like it. And what he was waiting for seemed to be of the most important matter. While he was waiting, two other persons had arrived in the small waiting room, they were waiting here with him. One of them was a young and small woman, she looked barely adult. She was looking eager to leave the room and go wash herself of the oil and dust staining her working clothes and her face. She was also trying and failing to hide her apprehensions. The other person was a middle age man that fell asleep on a chair as soon as he sat there. He was looking like he hadn¡¯t slept in days and his white doctor coat was stained by blood. Looking at him, Kyle knew the men in the hospital were still working hard to save lives. Suddenly the door opens, startling the sleeping doctor. Going out of the room are some of the most important people of the ship. They looked worried and concerned by was they were talking about. A young communication officer walks out in last and motions the three waiting people to enter the room. Inside it are the Admiral Jackson, the General Hanfo, the Doctor Hermand and the Chief Technician Gomez. The captain Barnes, the mec¡¯ Evans and the doctor Romia stand uncomfortably in front of the heads of their respective department and the most important man on the ship. They sit in the chairs the Admiral point to them. The heads look at each other, like if they are confirming something. Then the Admiral starts to talk. ¡°Captain, doctor, young girl. You are here for a mission of the utmost importance. The ship is going to crash on the planet, or make a hard landing like said G¨¦r?me. We don¡¯t know exactly what we will encounter on it, and we will probably never be able to leave the planet. It¡¯s like there is an unknown force that wants us to land on the planet. So we are going to continue our primary mission, the establishment of a colony on a new planet, but on this planet and not on Keird, like initially planned. Your part in it will be to leave the perimeter of the ship and gather information about the surrounding area and populations. Yes, you heard me right, there is what seems to be sentient life on the planet. Captain, you will lead the team, the young woman and the doctor here with you have been personally chosen by their respective chief to be assigned to your team. The young Ensign Jirn, over here, has been choosing by me.¡± a small gaping noise can be heard coming from the young man at the mention of his name. ¡°You are authorized to choose whoever you want to form the rest of it. Do you have questions?¡±Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. ¡°Does the planet have a name?¡± Asked the doctor, actually unable to grasp the entirety of the situation. ¡°Not yet, part of your mission is to learn how the local population calls it, for now, it will only be referred as the planet.¡± It¡¯s the General Hanfo who answers the question. ¡°What about the Bugs?¡± Inquired Kyle. ¡°It seems they are in a similar situation, and will probably land on another part of the planet, we hope you won¡¯t cross their path before we are ready to deal with them.¡± The answer of the Admiral doesn¡¯t reassure the captain. ¡°There are people down there? Like humans? Or bugs? Or something else? They have technology? What kind? What is the sophistication of their indus-¡± ¡°Stop Millie! We only know there is ¡®cause some dude monitoring the sensors saw a big town down there. Big like a whole country. But we haven¡¯t yet detected any sign of technology. It¡¯s your personal job on this mission to evaluate this thing.¡± The young woman looked annoyed by the answer her superior gave. __________ Klop was looking at the stars when he saw the signs. Two stars were falling from the night sky, one of them quickly passed behind the horizon and the other seemed to grow bigger with each second. It grows, again and again until it was bigger than Ju, the smallest of the three moon. The falling star passed high above Klop¡¯s head, but it was so big he managed to see it wasn¡¯t a star, but a big ball of metal covered by fire. Just after it passed, a thunderous sound resonated in the air, like if it was tearing at the structure of the night. Klop saw the burning object crash on the mountainside, exposing part of it and making the earth shake under his feet. After a time needed by his mind to registered the information, Klop started running in direction of his village, he had to tell the elders of this. __________ They have landed. What are the damages? Neglectable. How are they feeling about the other ship? One ship immediately attacked, the other only defend. Be careful, they must not lead to mass extinction. Measures had been taken, it will not happen. Good, Vlaryne needed new blood. Chapter 07 - Assembling a team. Far away from the human ¡®landing¡¯ site, another ship had a difficult encounter with the ground, an even harder one. The starship had embedded itself in a mountainside making a deep hole in it. The Bugs almost immediately started blurting out of their ship¡¯s carcass in search for a place to install themselves. Unfortunately for them, they had landed in a revendicated area. The mountain was part of the Reptilian Kingdoms¡¯ Union and even is the Reptilian peoples weren¡¯t expansionists, they were strong warriors and always fought to defend the countries of the Union. Soon a war would start in this part of the world. __________ Three days after the ¡®landing¡¯ the newly promoted major Kyle Barnes had finished assembled his fifteen men team. They were almost ready to leave the immediate vicinity of the ship. The major¡¯s team was constituted of 25 men and women, they could be gathered in three types of people. First, the major and the people specifically appointed to join him. James Romia, a tired doctor that had worked non stop in the last days. Claude Jirn, a young communication officer. And Millie Evans, the youngest mechanic on board.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. The second type of men was composed of those that fought alongside the major during the Bugs¡¯ attack and were still in good enough condition to travel. Among them were the two last survivors of the major¡¯s original team, one of them was the newly promoted captain George Flint and would serve as a second to the major. The lieutenant Paul had been posthumously promoted to the rank of captain. Five other trained soldiers who had joined him from other teams before the Jump and seven civilians who had been woken up for the fight. The young secretary that asked what an E7 planet was and the professor who answered her back then were both parts of the team. The last type was the seven new members of the team. There were two soldiers trained in surgical domains to assist the doctor if need be. Kyles had also requested one of the few historians specialized in languages, the Earth citizens had long unified themselves under a common tongue and very few people still spoke more than one. The last two were simple soldiers that volunteered to the expedition. __________ When Klop had arrived at his village, everybody knew that stranges stars had fallen from the sky, but nobody knew more. So the elders saw Klop and heard his story about the stars being flaming balls of metal, at least one of them, and that one had crashed on the side of the Hi mountain. The elders had consulted the oracles and the signs were disconcerting. It seems like the Spirits could not agree if the falling stars were good or bad news. In any case, they were a sign of great changes to come. Later the elders decided to form a small team that would go and investigates the location where the nearby star had fallen. Klop was chosen to lead the way and he was not entirely pleased by that. He would have preferred to stay in the security of the village¡¯s vicinity.