Chapter 1

You know it's going to be a bad day when you wake up to the alarms going off and a panic stricken voice overhead says "all pilots to their planes" cause let's face it no way to hit the snooze button on that one.

I rolled out of bed and was in my flight suit and out the door in under a minute. I was running down the halls while shaking the last bit of sleep fuzziness from my mind. A blast rocked the station and I slammed into the metallic wall. One of my squad mates grabbed me before I fell, I looked up into the smiling dark face of Tank.

"Come on Striker you lazy bastard, no time to fall down and go to sleep. We got work to do it looks like." he said in his deep voice

I just laughed and followed behind Tanker, everyone clears a way for him who wouldn't he's 6'8" and pure muscle. I see a cowboy hat and know Outlaw is next to me as we clear the hanger doors, pure chaos is what we see. Pilots running to their respective planes, joining up with their squads and flying out the doors.

"Striker, Outlaw, Tanker get to your planes now." called out Ice over the sirens.

I went to my Raven class fighter she was a thing of beauty to me. She was painted black had a full assortment of missiles and twin rail guns one for each wing. I strapped in and started pre check, I kissed my fingers and put them to the blonde bombshell I had painted on the side.

I was pulling on my helmet while pulling my helmet on when the familiar voice of the admiral came over the com system, "Attention this is Admiral Wicker, we are under attack by hostile unknowns. We lost contact with Saturn Station one, we need to clear out the civilians from the lunar base and take a defensive stance till the rest of the fleet catches up. Spartan Squads 1-4 will run escort, Spartan Squads 5-9 run defense. Good luck and god speed."

"Well at least we won't be bored guys." I heard through my com set, I looked over at Valkyrie. She smiled and waved I just shook my head and laughed.

"Only you would be happy about this Val." Outlaw said in his slow southern drawl.

I saw Ghost and Tanker laughing, "Alright enough chatter, you heard the orders. We try and slow them down, Striker your turn to buy rounds." Ice said.

I nodded and was out of the hanger with the rest of the squad I formed up on Ice with Ghost on my left. Tanker flew on Ice's right with Val on his wing, Outlaw flew behind Ice.

Usually the dark vastness of space has a calming effect on me. What I saw was nothing calm, several unfamiliar planes and a few ships popping out of no where. Coming through small purple doorways, I stopped trying to count them all. It was depressing and wasn't looking good for Earth's forces.

Their planes flew in three plane formations with a point ship having two wing men. I broke off with Ghost and targeted a lead plane and let loose with the rail guns. The shots tore through the enemy's wing before hitting a good spot and sending the rest of the plane to pieces. Ghost let loose with a missile and hit one of the wingmen.

After that it gets hazy, it was nothing but confusion their weapons threw out these balls of green energy. I saw several planes take direct hits and just disappear into a cloud of debris.

Their large ships fired even larger balls of green energy, two of them kept focusing their fire on our missile cruisers. I don't know how many space marines and members of the navy we loss during this battle.

Ghost and I were doing are best we kept forming up with the rest of the squad. I formed up on Ice again and we went straight for a large group of them. I did my job taking out as many as I could, I was targeting a group of planes when they broke off suddenly and scattered. I wondered what got into them when suddenly a purple doorway opened in front of me. and a ship the twice the size of the earth forces flagship pushed it's way through.

The large behemoth dwarfed my plane, I was using every curse word I could think of. I'm pretty sure I made up a few as well, I felt my plane shift as it was pulled towards the door.

"Strike get out of there now." I heard from Ice in my com set.

I couldn't fight it, it felt like I was trying to fight my way out of earth's orbit. I said fuck it and stopped fighting it, I looked for where I thought the bridge would be, and let loose with every missile I had left.

I punched the thrusters and flew the length of the ship, going with the pull of gravity, I was surrounded by nothing but purple. No black emptiness of space, no white dots of stars. Just purple all around as far as I could see, and the ass end of the behemoth.

I'm still not sure what happened next but suddenly I flew through a darker shade of purple and my plane jumped. I felt the my head snap back into the chair as the plane shot forward. I felt dizzy, and the edge of my vision started going black. I fought it as long as I could, and then suddenly nothing. I had passed out.

When I awoke I was hoping it was just a really bad dream, but it wasn't I looked around at nothing but purple. I did a quick systems check, the plane was no worse for wear. And the time said I'd only been out for an hour. I tried my com set but all I got was static. I tried every channel I could, I'm man enough to admit it I was scared. I was on the brink of losing hope when all of a sudden a door opened up and I saw black.

I slammed my thrusters forward and shot through the door. I looked around hoping to see earth. But all I saw was an unrecognizable planet, I did a sensor sweep and a navigation check. Nothing was coming up the computer couldn't figure out where we were. I did a sweep of the planet, it was ranked class H for hospitable. I weighted my options. Basically I could fly around blind and unknowing or land on a planet and see what would happen.

I had the computer figure out the trajectory I would need. At first it wouldn't let me, saying that it wasn't fitted for reentry through atmosphere. It's times like this that made me wish I was Amish, I gave it the override codes and waited.

When the computer figured it out I started to go for a landing. Everything seemed fine, till the structural integrity alarm started blaring. And that's when the shit really hit the fan. It started getting very hot in the cockpit, I felt the heat move through the soles of my boots.

The controls jumped and struggled under my gloved hands. I growled in frustration. Just a little bit more and I could eject, as I was thinking that I saw part of my left wing fly off. Followed by the rest of the wing, the plane started spinning wildly out of control. I knew it was now or never and pulled the ejection lever.

The cockpit blew free of the rest of the plane before deploying it's chute. I watched as the rest of the plane disintegrated. There were several minor explosions as I floated down. As pieces rained down against the foreign planet I took a good look. I was going to land in a clearing with woods several hundred yards away. When I finally hit the ground I un-strapped myself and fell over the edge landing on my back laughing. I could still hear the first flight instructor's voice in my head saying, "Any landing you can walk away from is a good one boy."

I opened the emergency plate behind my seat and found the supplies they give you till your rescued. I pulled out a large pack, I looked inside and found several instameals. I hated those damn things, along with several bottles of water. I grabbed the other pack and found a change of clothes, a field knife, a rifle and a signaling mirror. I just laughed and wondered how long it's been since a pilot needed one of these. I looked in the mirror and saw my green eyes staring back. I looked myself over, I always had a baby face, and ran my hand over my dark brown hair that was in the military style.

I fished out the medical pack and looked at the vile of nano bots. These things freaked me out. But I figured better safe then sorry, I loaded up the injector.

"Now remember lil guys attack foreign germs and cells not mine." I said

On day one of survival training the tell you to stay near your homing beacon but I figured I was the only Terran within the system so them finding me was slim to none. I changed into the camo pants and shirt. I started putting my jumpsuit in the pack and tucked the field knife in the back of my belt. I surveyed the surround area better with my binoculars no hostile life forms detected, I left the rifle holstered against the side of the pack.

I started setting up a camp near my seat and ate a cold ration before it got dark. I closed my eyes and went to sleep.

On my second day on the unknown planet I had found a nice quiet stream, I used one of the scanners to see if it was okay to drink. While contemplating what my next move should be. My train of thought was interrupted by a loud scream.

I ran towards the disturbance the undergrowth rustling against my legs as I followed the sound. I came upon a group of humans and some things human looking there was a lone man dead on the ground with two women and three girls cowering near a large tree.

I counted three of the human looking things, one was eating berries from a basket while the other two were looking at the women one of them looked up and growled at me. Seeing them I knew I had my rifle but it didn't seem fair since it looked like they were from the stone age. I dropped my pack and got in a defensive pose.

The one that growled was large, reminded me of Tanker only with green skin and furs covering his body. He raised a club at me menacingly before charging at me. He took a downward swing I jumped back and just smirked at him, he was strong but slow. He glanced up at me and roared at me again, it was a short roar I drove the tip of my boot into his chin his head snapped back and before he could figure out what happened I drove my knife into his chest. He slumped forward and the blade slipped from my hand as he fell to the side.

The one eating berries looked at me and was reaching for his club I slammed my fist into is face before he could get up. He landed on his back dazed, the one left with the women was busy and oblivious to what had happened to his friends, he had the skirt on one of the women hiked up past her thighs I grabbed him by the back of the neck and threw him off. He rolled over quickly and looked around seeing the others down he looked at me before he pulled a stone knife. He lunged forward I sidestepped and caught his wrist twisting his arm in the process slamming his head into the tree.

I went back to the one I hit and slammed his club into his face. I took the stone knife out of sleeping ugly's hand and slit his throat.

I looked the women over and asked if they were okay. They had no clue what I was saying I should have expected as much. They all looked fearful. I heard a rustling in the bushes one more green skinned bastard came through with a girl over his shoulder.

He looked at me and his fallen friends he dropped the girl and turned to run I tackled him from behind and took him to the ground I quickly got behind him and put my arm around his neck. I put a lot of pressure on his throat it wasn't taking the fight out of him fast enough I turned my arm quickly snapping his neck.

I grimaced as soon as I heard the all knowing sound. That sound always gave me the creeps, I looked at the girl he was carrying and felt around she was knocked out. I looked at her closely she had a lovely face and a beautiful body covered in a leather dress. Her hair was a light soft brown, almost a honey color. I fought the urge to touch it just then I heard voices.

I turned and looked men came running through the forest and found the women. They looked them over speaking in a quick language I had no hope of understanding. Then they noticed me and the knocked out girl. one of them charged at me with a spear but one of the women spoke up, he skidded to a stop. I was ready to grab his spear and disarm him, he looked down at the girl and lifted her up carrying her like he would a child.

I got up and pulled my knife out of the first one and cleaned the blade on his fur vest.

One of the younger girls walked up and grabbed my wrist and pulled me towards the others. The men walked off with the one carrying the girl falling behind, the women just smiled at the little one as she kept pulling at me grunting. I just shook my head and grabbed my pack and followed my new friend. The women bent down to get their baskets and went after the men I followed with the little one chattering away.

I just had to smile who else but a kid is going to try and teach a complete stranger the language of their people, granted she was trying to do it in five minutes. But still it's the thought that counts right.

We walked through the forest in silence except for the little chipmunk chattering away next to me. I watched the men closely they never let their spears lower, they kept their eyes searching for any hint of trouble. Even the one carrying a woman wouldn't let his guard down. The women just followed closely behind with their baskets on their heads or held in front of them. I looked down at the girl, she smiled up at me she had blue eyes and red hair. Her people looked like terrains, they had the same skin colors some were darker granted but all in all the same. They were slender and small I felt like a giant, I'm six foot and the tallest man I had seen yet came up to my chin. Their build was compact they had lean muscles, the best way to describe them is dancer or gymnast.

We came upon a camp of sorts shortly after that, the little girl still chattering away. She yelped when a woman grabbed her and pulled her away by the scruff of her neck. The men started talking to who I guess was the chief. Pointing at me now and again, I just dropped my pack and sat down watching the going ons.

This older man with feathers dotting his shirt came out of a hut and looked down at the girl. He started touching her and looking her over, he started dancing around the girl before an older women brought him a bag. He bit off the end of something and held it under her nose. She shook her head from side to side and came around. She looked around startled, and hugged the man next to her he patted her on the back. He pointed over at me and said something to her, she gave me a curious look.

About this time the chief walked over to me and I stood up he looked me over closely. He walked around a few times, he said something to me and I just shrugged my shoulders. He cocked his head and said something again. I just gave him the confused look, he called out over his shoulder and the medicine man came up. He took his turn to look me over and started chanting and dancing around me. He stopped after awhile and asked me a question I had to shrug again. He pulled the chief and they started talking again away from me.

I just stood around waiting with my arms folded across my chest, finally they decided something and lead me to the center of camp. First the medicine man spoke then the chief, after awhile they both stopped talking. They wandered off and my little friend came back to me and started talking again. I took a seat and tried to pick out words that she repeated but she just went too fast. After awhile her mom came and grabbed her again and pulled her to sit down with her family. It was the hunter that wanted to stab me with a spear.

I watched the going ons it seemed that they had a few of the women cooking a big meal for everyone else. I caught glimpses of the knocked out girl walking around and talking, the man that carried her caught me looking once and gave me a hard look. I stopped after that, and just tried to keep a low profile but that wasn't working.