Seria stayed quiet. She was frightened but it wasn’t terror that held her tongue in check. Beneath the electric tension that spread from her jaw to the base of her back, a sob grew under her breast, expanding faster than the sounds that echoed from the ruined city. Great plumes of dust and smoke erupted, chased shortly after by a deafening roar and brief flash of blinding light. It should have comfort her to know it would be quick for them, but she thought of her little sister’s face still frozen before the lights blinked those blue grey eyes out of existence. No time to scream. Loving parents, a prolonged birth, tears on her 14th birthday when little Linsl accidentally broke her new holovis in perfect pink. Moments stolen away in less time than it took her to cry out, eyes glued shut in vain hopes that they would open to see the moment redone in kinder circumstance. Her father’s arm smelled like mild berries and soft leather when he dragged her away. The comfort of it now almost tore her sob loose from its festering hole in her chest. It burned to keep it in, but she had to stay calm. Lanac Helsey gripped his daughter tight as the ground kicked up beneath them. It protest the mass that alight just meters away. Bright lights of a different kind shone behind them as the menacing flashes began to blink off chunks of nearby buildings. She heard the mechanical hydraulic whine of the drop ship doors and a USCM soldier all but shoved her out of the way before pointing a death black rifle at a nearby window. A hot blue cast, unreal in its brilliance, lanced down from the window and the man dropped. She was already being pulled toward the humming doors behind them but she could still make out the young boy’s face beneath the visor, red rubies propelled from his contorted mouth. It was apparent now his body held the gift intended for her and awkward indignity at being shoved turned to a hot sour eruption from her eyes that wracked her body. Seria cried for him and her sister, her mother, her friends, her city. As the ship catapult upward with unnatural speed, Seria saw her planet in its last seconds of civilized life. Red flowers were blossoming, cascading over concrete and steel fixtures. A sea of blinking lights left a devastating wake as it consumed her people. The sky was clouded with a swarm of small vessels falling and departing. The Floran kids who broke into Helsey industries laboratories had thankfully not taken anything capable of targeting a ship directly. “It’s near critical! Just pull them all out NOW,” her father’s voice broke her train of thought. He was yelling into his holovis, not in perfect pink. “You don’t understand what it—“ it was his turn to be interrupted as their transport convulsed. Seria grabbed the nearby rail and watched mouth agape as the distant flashes of light coalesced into a single unit. It was hard to believe that only hours ago a gang of Floran criminals had taken her father’s creation and commit such enthusiastic anarchy. The momentum of such careless violence on this scale truly escaped her comprehension. The newly formed globe of lights became an expanding mass that doubled in size. As soon as it had begun it was over, the light unceremoniously dissipate all at once and left nothing but a hole bored straight through the planet. It was her father’s turn to sob and her neck surely smelled like berries and leather. She hoped it brought him comfort. Later that evening she was rummaging in his pocket for his pixdrive, hoping no one would come through the door. He had always been a quiet man and she knew he would prefer his suicide not cause a scene. Seria: 27 Earth years. Red hair, blue/grey eyes. PhD student in advanced theoretical engineering at Crasta Human Colony (CHC). Popular, well liked, grew up in a well to do family that cared for her. Her younger sister by 8 years Linsl was her spitting image. Linsl liked it when their grandparents mistook them for one another. Seria lived to make her proud and hoped it would keep her away from the many bad influences that had begun to infest CHC in the past decade. Her father insisted she do some military training with the USCM since they lived on a colony world, but given this was a scientific outpost with all the comforts of any major city on Earth, she didn’t take it seriously. She spent more time flirting with the soldiers that ran the citizen self-defense program. She wasn’t exactly a sucker for uniforms, but was a sucker for boredom and couldn’t stand another lecture on plasma assembly retaining rods in small arms malfunctions without something to keep her enticed. Then everything went to hell. It only took hours before she wound up on an escape craft battling hobbled together Floran “deathwagons” that literally looked like old skyscrapers strapped together by vines with obscene bristlings of mismatched armaments. It was the signature of Floran mischief makers in CHC’s solar system. She could never understand how Floran’s, regardless of their upbringing, almost always looked like they were pulling the legs off a spider with that scrunched up ecstatic open mouthed smile they got. Most especially when they did something bad. Mischief was the tongue-in-cheek phrase they used to describe the atrocities that began 5 years ago in that awkward sort of war/terrorism/gang violence thing that didn’t ever have a source other than plant v person. It was an odd thing to not quite know if you were at war or not. Reading about people disappearing two cities over while relaxing at a bar listening to the latest tekhop holo. Her escape ship was damaged beyond repair and it was decided they would each break off a segment of the ship to make a separate escape. This particular vessel was capable of dividing itself into multiple smaller craft. The captain was a friend of her father’s and gave her the healthiest segment. Just as they detached, the Florans emerged from the side of a piece of orbital debris and fired. She could almost hear their squeals of glee as she watched every segment but her own collapse in fire and twisted metal. Her ship was hopelessly damaged by the final volley as it catapult toward a random coordinate. She did not have time to be picky. As her jump drive spun down she saw what looked like uninhabited space with a bright greenblue marble before her. Seria prayed it had what she needed to repair her ship as the lights began to flicker and SAIL called out in its soft robotic voice “Pilot, maintenance required. Charon Industries hereby voids your warranty as speeds in excess of this vessels intended purposes have been reached. To dispute this claim please contact…” And for the first time all day she laughed until she realized only echoes followed suit.
Planetfall Day 1. So I’m here and SAIL says I’m supposed to do some orienting. Printed out a packet of basic survival tasks to help me, and I quote, “remain intact physically and emotionally.” What a weird program. I could have sworn it was about to give me a hug or something. So again the emotionally stunted computer program couldn’t tell me much useful. The planet is habitable with near Earth-like atmosphere, but I’ll be cautious anyway. Once I’m done reading this damn packet (who knew a survival program would use so many emoticons?!) I should have a good grip on how to mine, make shelter, and deal with hostile life forms. Though I’m not sure what to make of these “combat” diagrams. In hindsight, SGT Jalen’s one size too tight dress pants hardly seem as useful as his holo on alien anatomical target patterns now. Lesson learned. Let’s see how I do. Day 2. I spent the night on the surface. I managed to get a few trees down and some rocks up. Still no sign of anything that could help repair the ship. I did find a bit of copper and a harmonica… sooo not all bad. Helped stave off the cold until I realized the handbook had a recipe for a firepit. A few hours later.. I was warm in my tent. Oddly enough I woke up and the atmosphere must have rust out of my nearby pile of wood and supplies because it had turned black and crusty and my fire had gone out. Day 2.5 SAIL’s a smartass. I’ve never built a fire before. Judgy robot jerk. Day 3. I was about to sit down after gathering a load of supplies to bring up to the ship when something odd happened. This is all very hard work by the way! My matter manipulator thumb is getting really stiff. And I don’t care that my survival suit compresses mass using dimensional expansion algorithms, 1/1,000 of 100,000 is still 100! I decided to set up my tent in the ship tonight rather than “Soak in the splendors of the surface!” as SAIL had suggested. I saw a strange little snaildog thing sitting outside my camp under the shade of a red tree. It was eating a root so I went over to pet it. When I got closer, I saw the root was actually the leg of a slightly smaller dogbird-ostrichlion thing. I knew this because the rest of it was laying nearby… Its mouth was open and it must have been crying out in an unheard frequency. SAIL crackled to life in my earpiece and offered to translate. Out of curiosity I accepted and SAIL was nice enough to lower the volume on the prolonged british-accented “****!!!!!!!” What little training I gleaned kicked in and I drew the weapon from its holster on my right hip and the snaildog snapped its attention to me snarling. With the confidence of muscle memory, I drew the reticle up to eye level and placed the beast in the center dot. I let out a breath and at the pause gently drew back the trigger. It paused in confusion as its feelers wobbled. I didn’t have a gun… completely forgot. My matter manipulator detected sentient life and only managed to wiggle his long fleshy eyebrow stalk thingies. Day 7. I’ve gathered enough supplies that I can start my deep expedition. My main planetside base camp, a small cottage with a few creature comforts (basically a window a bed and some tools) is well equipped with a few weeks rations and is solid enough to keep the more aggressive creatures at bay. It’s hard to remember which are which. I feel terrible, just the other day I drew my blaster on a sleeping fuzzy fox-like animal with giant ears and no tail. When it saw me it squealed and I accidentally fired taking off one of its ears. It sat there stunned and shivering before looking slowly up at its asymmetrical toppings, turned pale and stumbled off. I’ll have to start a planet catalog of friend and foe. Maybe I can upload it into SAIL to paint them red and green on my HUD. I apparently need to gather some rarer elements that SAIL detected close to the core of the planet. I feel a bit more confident going down there now that I have a few pelts under my belt. Literally. One of the little koala-monkey scavengers dug through my belongings before I got some solid walls up. It ran off with my only pair of underwear into the night. Sometimes I could almost swear I see it in the trees wearing my bra on its head and my lace around its shoulders like a vest… What a weird planet.
