Chapter 2 - A Whole New World

Mk23 -IRJ Droplet - Class 7 - Carpe Victoria

Sector - Unknown

Planet - Unknown

1st May 2341 (BSST)

I was lying there when a bright beam of light split the darkness of my dream addled eyes and forced me to wakefulness. I opened my eyes in time to fully regret my decision as the fading light of the beam that had awoken me burnt my retinas and sent me tumbling headfirst into the darkness once again.

I clenched my jaw tight and my hands clenched involuntarily as well as I tried to endure through the pain without crying out. I still had enough cognisance about me to recognise I was in a foreign element and unaware of any potential danger surrounding me. As the healing Nano bots in my bloodstream went about repairing my sight, I let out a few shaky breaths before I managed to get a smooth rhythm going.

I always hated the feeling of healing. Not more than I hated being injured and weakened but it was not pleasant nonetheless. A serious itching and it just felt wrong as flesh grew and knitted itself together. When it was my arms or legs I could at least watch the process, and take my mind off of it. But with my eyes being damaged I had to persist through the darkness focused only on the pain and maintaining a steady breathing pattern. It was a simple mental technique I had learnt one summer when I had a seriously bad sunburn.

I hadn't yet received my nanobots at that point. Well not the upgraded ones anyway. You see once you join the military they need to upgrade the body ware from the civilian package to the military one and that meant a detox to allow the new ones to be injected.

It was during the detox month that I had begun to use such a technique to deal with the feeling of sunburn. If you've ever had bad sunburn before you know the feeling. Constantly hot with periods of extreme itching. The only cure is time or an expensive procedure that I sure as hell did not have the money for.

Besides no hospital would deal with sunburn as it was a problem solved some time ago by the introduction of basic body ware. So, a backstreet doctor would be my only choice and I wasn't about to let some unqualified stranger have at me that was for damned sure.

I think the reason my mind brought up that memory is because of the startling similarity in the feeling of sunburn and the enhanced healing. The healing being several orders of magnitude worse but still comparable in feeling type.

After I had finished my introspection I noticed the feeling in my hands. I had clenched my hands and gathered up what felt like dirt. Sandy, stony with what felt like small skinny twigs and blades of some form of grass.

Odd, I thought to myself. Last, I remembered I was sitting in my shuttle awaiting the end, and now here I am. Alive and on a planet. A life filled planet if I was correct about grasping some twigs. Odd.

I rubbed the contents of my fists around and felt more sure that I was indeed correct and sharp twigs were digging into my palms. I rolled onto my front gingerly as I wasn't sure what was to my left and burying my face in my neck before slowly blinking my eyes a few times and opening them. The world appeared in shades of white.

"Computer, Tone down brightness by fifty percent." I vocalised to my flight suit. There was no change. Okay so it's not a visible spectrum light that was blotting out my vision then.

"Computer, scratch last and tone down UV by fifty percent." I asked it, cycling through the options. Now that achieved something. Whatever planet I was on its sun was one that had a high output of UV rays. Leaving me blinded by my suit's capabilities.

"Computer, status?"

"Ronja, our status is as follows. Suit operating at one hundred percent efficacy. Bodysuit same, Body ware same." Thank god for small favours ay.

"Your fighter; Mk23 IRJ-Droplet Fighter Class 7 is no longer functional as it is in multiple pieces. I estimate a rebuild to be impossible considering our current resources. Concerning the supplies aboard, the food rations and water purifier are located four hundred metres to your south west and are in retrievable and reparable conditions. Your weapons crate similarly is intact enough for retrieval and located in a similar area. I shall now mark them on your HUD." Computer responded in a robotic emotionless tone.

"Our location?" I asked him hoping he knew where we were. I'm not sure why I ascribed him to being of the male gender, but I felt it suited him. Note to self; give computer a name and tone. If I'm to be stuck here, then I at least want a semi human companion to keep me company.

"Ronja, I have been unable to locate our position in space. I will need approximately nine hundred thousand more data points to begin to estimate our current location. Furthermore, I have not been able to scan any such biological matter as to narrow down a region of space, except to say we are not in recognised explored space" Great, just fucking great. Why couldn't luck have been on my side in this instead of my rations. I sighed again. After all the law of serendipity states: Lady luck favours those who try. So, I might as well get up and try. No use lying around waiting for rescue. One certainly wasn't going to come if we weren't in recognised space. The ship had been in space with no planets nearby so...

"Computer, any idea what happened to us and how we got here?"

"Ronja, from my calculations I posit that there is an 89% chance that there was a spacial warping event that afflicted our shuttle and ended up changing its cartesian position in space. When we came into existence somewhere and I reactivated on this planet."

It sounded like reports of the spacial punch weapon was right then. We were somewhere completely different from where we had battled the Odrath and rescue was certainly not likely.

Perhaps if this planet has a sentient race I could get home but considering we had only found the Odrath and the Coalition so far, it seemed sentience was not exactly common in the universe. Though creatures far and wide existed as panspermia had been proven to be correct a while ago so it was not a foregone conclusion that I was alone here.

I stared daggers at the sand taking a few moments to bemoan my situation like some weak heroine waiting for a male to come save the day. Pfft, pathetic. You're absolutely pathetic Ronja I thought to myself. You're a strong independent woman who don't need no man to come save thyself. I thought laughing quietly to myself.

You might have thought mankind could have overcome prejudice in several hundred years but no it was still prevalent. Blinking twice I took a deep breath before rocking back over my knees and sitting up into a kneel. More awake now I observed my surroundings.

I was kneeling on a soft sand beach. The sand, like on earth was a yellow, perhaps a richer, deeper yellow than on earth. But a familiar warm yellow nonetheless. I was kneeling at the boundary of the beach to the forest, well it looked like one from here. I couldn't tell the size, so it could just be a small copse of trees. Though something was telling me it wasn't so.

Behind me I could hear water lapping softly at the sand. A soft pitter patter relentless in its monotony yet somehow peaceful and not irritating. Here and there a crashing sound as a particularly strong wave mustered up the energy to crash down over a raised dune in the sea bed echoed around me. A gentle breeze rocked the trees and a consistent endless rustle of leaves from the gently bowing trees provided a background track.

The salty smell of the sea mixed with the heady wooded aroma of the woodland and a smoky hint wafted across me. Bringing with it a sense of foreboding that fell across me I shivered unexpectedly despite the ungodly heat.

"Computer, boost AC please."

"Understood, Ronja. Boosting air conditioning to 180% of standard value."

One hundred and eighty percent! Wow it really is damn hot here, wherever here is.

"Computer, current temp? Oh, and switch to shorthand please"

"335K" computer replied.

Nearly four hundred kelvins. Whew, that was far far too hot to survive without the flight suit. It put into perspective how lucky I was for the suit to have survived virtually intact from my crash landing.

"Computer, switch from flight to fight mode please"

"Initialising... ... ... Confirm?"

"Charlie, Foxtrot, Sierra, Nine, Eight, Zero, Romeo, Lima."

"Confirmed, switching suit, please stand and hold still for two minutes."

I stood. The flight suit, much like an iron man suit began changing around me. The rigid supports around my middle loosened and popped out relocking in a new, less confining arrangement. The pack at my back slid out and over me covering me in a layer of tougher metal.

Knut's and bolts unscrewed and repositioned as metal plates moved around me. My knees, elbows and fists become more heavily armed and the suit bulked up around my extremities and chest whilst reducing the bulk around my back and hips. The flight suit was meant to aide in flying. It locked you into the seat and to the controls.

A fight suit on the other hand was meant for a fighting, recon and planetary movement. Most pilots only had a suit configured for flying. I however had come from the tough army world and had gotten my fight suit converted. As such it was the most valuable thing I owned by far and was primarily still a fight suit not a flight suit.

Once the process was finished I walked over to the sea and had a look at myself. Standing seven feet tall in my suit I had bulky arms and legs and a series of flares and curves that were tough and brutal. I smiled. Changing to the different modes.

"Covert" I called out to computer. The suit faded from view and my screen tinged green at the sides. The running lights sent me into darkness. The reserve oxygen tanks engaged, and the hydraulics shut off. The arms and legs locked into position.

"War." The suit lit up with a red tinged screen. The hydraulics charged, and the power core started ramping up. The cables tensed. The oxygen tanks fed into my regular breathing to give me the maximum performance. Sensors went berserk scanning and sending out noises. When I peered over the water the red running lights looked very mean. In the gaps between plates red light blossomed and my face plate was lit up in a vibrant crimson. My weapons would automatically switch to lethal if I had any on me. My HUD popped up and analysis software linked to my brain and set of giving me tactical on my screen.

"Display" I called out to computer. The suit cycled down, and the running lights brightened. The suit locked into parade stance allowing me to rest in the suit. On the screen a prompt offered me a choice of entertainment to watch. A standard suit had very few options but as part of a diplomatic mission a few years ago to the withdrawn Aelica. They had upgraded it for me free of charge.

"Standard" I called out finally as the suit set for standard use. The sensors went to passive. The hydraulics and cables slackened, and power consumption dropped. My screen had no tint and showed only the basic HUD.

The water lapped at my metal covered toes and I looked down wondering at the beauty of the nature surrounding me. In the reflection the water the sky appeared faintly pink and perhaps more startlingly the sky was lit by two stars. One was very large and very bright, almost too bright. Even with the adaptive brightening my screen gave me it was tough to stare at. The other was much more toned down and I could only faintly see it. It was almost swallowed up by the larger of the two. Perhaps more startling though was the colour. The large star was a bluish white colouration that only the hottest of stars would accomplish. Short in life the supermassive blue stars burnt themselves out quickly. The live fast and die young type of stars.

I stood watching the sea for a few moments more wondering where the heck I was. I sighed deeply before turning and walking back over to the forest.

Climbing up past the boundaries of the gently sloping beach I entered the tree line. The trees were varied, very varied for a small section of the forest. Not dominated by any one type except for the general green and brown feeling pretty much all trees gave off. There were tall ones, short ones, fat ones and thin ones.

There were trees with smooth bark stretching round them like skin or ones with cracked gnarled bark that felt rough to the hands with interlaced cracks ascending up the tree weaving in and out of one another. They disappeared up the trunk into the emerging branches where the textures merged into one seamless colour. Of course, I could have focused up there with the augments to my eyes but that was beside the point after all.

On the forest floor I could see a mess of broken down decaying plant matter. From bark, discarded like an unwanted skin rotten and falling down to small twigs and the many leaves all in different states exhibiting a range of colours from the reds through the browns into the freshly fallen leaves blossoming with green colour as if they were still alive. But alas they are not.

It was whilst staring at the floor that I noticed my first sign of alien life. When I say alien, I mean it in the strictest sense of the word meaning extra-terrestrial. Or not from earth. When you say 'alien' most people think of the Odrath or the other sentients. Not of a beetle. And a beetle was what I was looking at.

Small, well of course its small it's a beetle. They didn't have the capacity to be large otherwise they would be crushed under the weight of their own exoskeleton. I paused as a thought occurred to me. If the gravity was significantly less, then the weight of an exoskeleton could possibly be supported.

"Computer, what's the gravity?" I asked pondering my new question.

"1.5 standard earth gravities." Computer replied in a dry tone.

Okay, so it's not sufficiently less to support large armoured bugs. Whew. That's one worry calmed.

The beetle ignored me, resolute in its pursuit of some incomprehensible task. It scurried around on the ground floor climbing mountains that were sticks, sheer drops and other unthinkable obstacles on its way.

The beetle was dark in colouration. Black or perhaps a dark iridescent red. I couldn't tell in the falling light. A blocky angular head with antennae that were endlessly searching. For what? I did not know. A short fat thorax separated the pairs of legs. Behind the legs its armoured abdominal sections interlock to form a solid carapace. Well, solid to any foe it would likely come across. A human was no more a foe than a god was to a human. So incomprehensibly powerful that there was no threat.

From what I could see there were no wings. Sharp looking mandibles clamped down on a leaf in a series of abrupt motions. It reminded me of a sewing machine or a band saw. But soon a section of leaf was cut out and being dragged of.

I let the beetle wander off on its own way and took a few more steps into the forest. Here I took a closer look at the trees. They had green leaves reminiscent of those on earth. However, when I touched them they were far more rigid than those earthly leaves. I flinched slightly at a sharp shock of pain. You see fight suits have very sensitive feeling software that simulates feelings. It can of course be turned down but in general it is advised to maintain full feeling. It not only makes you a better soldier, but you don't become disconnected from the ground you walk on knowing that the small things still cause you pain. Less careless, more dextrous was what they told us. I wasn't sure I believed them, but I had steadfastly followed the recommendation.

A small fleck of paint was left behind on the leaves. I turned my hand over to stare at my palm. A thin silver streak ran its way across it like a flash of lightening on a dark and stormy night it split the dark metal with a surprising contrast. Underneath the paint the bare metal glinted at me.

My eyebrows rose in surprise. Leaves sharp enough to chip the paint on my suit. This was certainly no safe place. If the leaves were this well defended against what had they had to evolve defences to. I was now sure danger was present.