Contact [INDEFINITE HOLD]

1. Earthfall

Inyetso went forward to make sure the pilots were talking to ground control well. The computers were fine most of the time, but it never hurt to be sure. The computerized translation software allowed them to speak normally with people who had never learned a word of their language, but only a dedicated translator could handle idioms and unfamiliar words. The bilingual chatter washed over her as the roar of jet engines replaced the roar of reentry. When they were a few kilometers above the ground, the pilots reengaged the external cameras, showing the approaching clouds.

The ground controller interrupted, "Be advised, weather radar shows a few thunderheads on your approach vector. Suggest prep for turbulence."

"Heavy atmospheric storms," Inye said in response to the question the pilot was drawing breath to ask.

Not missing a beat, he replied, "Roger that. We've already got them on visual." On the internal channel, he added, "Hey, check out that view ahead. Never seen anything like that, eh?"

"Just don't make us spacesick, got that? Wouldn't do for our first action on a foreign planet to be losing our last meal! It'd probably cause some horrible diplomatic incident," Sergeant Komoran admonished.

"Roger that, Sarge."

"Hey, we're not in space anymore. Shouldn't it be something like 'atmosphere-sick?'" piped up one of the privates.

"Actually, they do have a word for it that means pretty much the same thing. It's 'airsick'" Inye supplied as the first tremors rattled through the airframe. Most of them had acclimated to nausea by the simple fact of practice, but especially jarring maneuvers could still cause regurgitations.

The silver-grey clouds dappled the external cameras with water, blurring the image, but the wind whipped the droplets away in seconds. The color outside al out matched their skin tones. Below them, fields of green vegetation were visible, their first view of Earth from the surface. A local fighter aircraft pulled up beside them, the waggling of his wings barely visible between its grey coating and the grey outside. The shuttle waggled in response. "X-ray 3 this is Noble Leader. How copy X-ray?" The human pilot queried.

"Solid Copy, Noble Leader," replied Inye, attempting to match the almost ritualistic communication protocols of the local aircraft pilots.

"Roger that X-ray. We have orders to provide escort to the airfield, at which time we'll turn you over to ground assets, over?"

"Understood Noble," Inye said, waiting for her pilot to nod in acknowledgment. "Noble Leader, is contact with hostile elements expected? We were under the impression you were not engaged in combat operations in this region."

"Negative, no hard contact expected, X-ray 3. Just making sure nothing happens to you and nothing happens to us, over?"

"Roger that, Noble Team. X-ray 3 out," Inye closed the channel, muting her headset so she could focus on calming the nerves she didn't realize had been fraying. Then she realized she had just made her own First Contact, and the entire shuttle was dead silent except for the roaring of the jets.

Sergeant Komoran broke the silence with the words, "good work Specialist Inyetso. That sounded impressive, even if I didn't understand a single word." Inye pulled the skin around her mouth back, smiling.

By that time she had calmed herself and put her audio back on, the pilots were lining up to approach the airfield, and she had to handle air traffic control and Noble Team at the same time. This time, she relied on the translation computers to help the pilots with the nonmilitary communications, only jumping in once Noble Team "handed them off" to the human ground control.

When she rejoined her comrades in the main compartment, they were putting on atmosphere diluters. While they would be happy to breathe the oxygen-laden air of this planet, it would be better for their long-term fitness if they only did so under heavy exertion like combat, and they weren't planning on any of that in the immediate future. She slipped the small device over her mouth and nostrils, checking for good seal against her mouth, and tucking in the nose intakes so that they wouldn't ride up and get in her eyes.

Each of them shrugged on their gear. Inye put on a heavy, hardened backpack with multiple antennae sticking out of it, some encased in rigid armor and some not, and checked the NFC link between her communications backpack and her suit, in addition to making sure it reached her platoon. Finally, she took down her weapon, a chemically-powered assault rifle with a single-shot anti-materiel railgun attachment, plus spares, grenades, and ammo. "Com check," she said, as a last point on her checklist.

When everyone had replied, the civil engineers came aft to join in a final group briefing. They were nominally in charge, but Komoran was spearheading ground operations, so they answered to him until hey reached the operations zone. "Alright, this is our first operation with this species, so let's not cause a diplomatic incident. I've said it before and I'll say it again, do not shoot fist, don't even have rifles at the ready or anything gung-ho like that. Inye, I want you on me so you can handle any cultural snafus. Engineers, you're the stars of this show, so you'll come off the shuttle once Inye and I have managed things on the ground." Everyone nodded.

"Sir, don't we want to bring all of us grunts off first to secure the area before we disembark support staff?" asked Revira'so, their sharpshooter.

"Ideally, yes, but this isn't an invasion. We're here to build good faith, and it's not a war zone anyway," Komoran replied. "Okay, let's do this, Umbra platoon." Each if them hissed with bravado, even the engineers.

They lined up to disembark, and when the hatch fell, the pressure gradient made a popping sound. It took every ounce of professionalism not to rush out and see the brave new world herself, but she disembarked behind Sergeant Komoran with as much dignity as she could muster, blinking in the unfamiliar yellow light of the sun, greeted by the utter flatness of the planet's surface and the strange faces of humanity.