The Heart of a Pearl

Chapter 5: The Heart of the Enemy

Dawn broke on the horizon, and it was the brightest light I've ever seen. As well as having two moons, this planet also rotated around two suns. One sun was larger than the other. The small sun was bright white, looking like a white dwarf star; while the bigger sun looked like a Red Giant. The two suns lit up the morning sky with radiant hues of dark pink, red, orange, purple, dark blue, light yellow, and white.

The jungle, already a wild and rampant embodiment of life, became even more vibrant and alive when morning came. The colors of the plants popped instantly. The flora were so radiant and pure white, instead of glowing the colors of the rainbow spectrum like they did last night. The scent of the flora consumed the very atmosphere, along with a variety of other scents that I assumed came from the other plants.

What drew me away from the sky was...

Ribbit!

Such a strange sound. It sounded like a deep squeak pressed against a polished floor. I looked over and saw a small, fat creature sitting on a rock. It stared at me. It was hunter green with a yellow underbelly. It squatted on rather fat webbed limbs in the back, and it had skinny front legs. At the bottom of these front legs were sharp little claws. It looked slimy; oozing out some kind of unknown goo. On top its fat head was two large furry and pointed ears. On its bumpy back were a pair of small black wings.

I stared into its eyes for awhile before it squawked its strange sound at me again. I leaned away from it, which made the fat creature hop away into the jungle. It was in that moment that I realized that... I was so unprepared for the unpredictable and dangerous organic life on this planet. The terrain was beautiful, but the creatures seemed to be the complete opposite.

I walked over to the escape pod to see if it had enough energy to give me some information on this unknown planet. I carefully examined the inside chamber of the pod, searching for signs of power. Everything was completely damaged. Both on the outside and the inside. With no tools on hand, I couldn't possibly fix this escape pod by myself. But the good news was...Homeworld couldn't track me. My escape pod couldn't send them a signal. So, I was still free and un-shattered. For the moment at least.

I decided that I had to find intelligent life on this planet, in order to learn about this new world...and how to survive in it.

However, I knew that the journey to find intelligent life would mean confronting the savage life lingering in the vast jungle. Risking the very existence that I had just saved.

I stood in front of the dark and overgrown jungle, and its towering plants. I gulped, clasping my hands together in front of my chest. My body and my mind were not ready for the task ahead, yet...I pushed through anyway.

The jungle kept blinding me with every step I took. The plants kept swatting me in the face, in the gut, and even at my knees. I had to violently push at the plants back, causing some of them to break at my force. During my struggle, I heard the soft buzzing of small organic beings called insects near my ears. Yet they didn't make contact with my skin. I had a feeling that they sensed that I was not an organic life to feast on.

Finally! I made it to an small but opened area. The sunlight shined through and I could finally see. I let out a relieved moan. At that instance, I could feel hard pieces of the plants in my hair and in my uniform. No wonder Blue Diamond took no interest in exploring the potential colony planets.

Straight ahead was a small body of water. I went towards this, and sat down on the soft and soothing ground. When I saw my reflection, I was taken back by how messy I looked. My uniform was torn and filled with holes, my hair was out of control, my skin was covered in spots of organic terrain. I was so use to my appearance being so orderly and refined that...I had to restore myself to my original state.