The Frontier

Chp.2: Unknown Territory

The vast jungle was a lot for Kurtis to take in at once. Such a damp, smuggy atmosphere had Kurtis in deep meditation, focusing on all his senses. He then began scouting his enviroment. The trees were grown in a strange pattern, with a type of bark never seen by his eye. He heard sounds which startled and also intreged him, that brought a smile to his face. He looked up gazing at the sky which had a green color with purple cloud vapors. Kurtis stood there, staring at the sky with a amazed demeaner of a small toddler. "wow" Kurtis stood there whispering and repeating the same word to himself. He soon noticed smoke rising to the very part of the sky he was looking at. Kurtis followed the smoke trail all down to the horizon and remembered about the space station's crash. "The J13.4781! I'd forgotten about the crash for a moment." he crossed his arms and started to think about his situation "okay so let's go over the details, i'm stranded by myself on a planet i've never heard of, and the only way i can get out of here is to head towards the station, and that very same station has crash landed." he then weighs his opitions "i got 2 choices, stay on my own and try to survive in this forsaken jungle for the rest of my life, or head to the station that only has a 50% chance of being operational and if it isn't i'm stranded anyway. I guess the best thing to do right now is head towards the station, but then i'll have to deal with those people..." he thought about his options some more " *sign* guess i'll go just to see the status of the station and hope for the best, *tch* they better not get on my nerves or i swear i'm killing everybody there." He went back to the escape pod to find any thing he needed for the trip. Kurt scanned the pod and found some essentials. "Okay, i got a canteen without any water inside of it, a retractable parachute, a combat knife, a combat pistol with a few bullets, and some rations." with a disappointed look he gathered it all wishing he didn't leave his things on the ship. He walks over to the cliff and prepares himself for what's destined to be a surprising adventure.

Kurt dived off the tall cliff and parachuted straight into the jungle. He began walking, listening for anything strange "this is too nerve racking!" He continued to walk until a silence fell upon the scene. Kurt stopped for a moment and listened carefully "I'm in a jungle, it's way too quiet for a jungle" he thought. He suddenly heard something dashing towards him and he took off. Kurt went sprinting through the jungle for his life. He heard the steps getting closer, so he sped up, he heard them getting even closer, so he sped up more, the steps got so close he could feel it on the back of his neck, he let out one last burst of speed and then he saw it, to his right was a four legged orange monster! It startled him so much he tripped and tumbled to the ground. He sat up and met the monster growling 2 inches from his face. Kurt crawled backwards in fear while the monster just stared at him with a hungry look. Kurt then realized, he was being hunted.

Kurt and the monster was locked into a stare off, both hesitant to make a move. He had an opportunity to examine the monster and learned it wasn't a monster at all. It looked like a tiger from Earth, but was a little different. It was definitely bigger with an exotic orange color to it. The creature had front fangs exposed from it's mouth that's about 8 inches in length. it's eyes were disturbingly small practically making it blind, but was supported by it's enormous wet nose. With a nose like that it could lock onto a prey about 2 miles away, it was probably hunting him for a while now. It's ears were another interesting detail. Big enough to cover it's whole face, it reacted to every movement Kurt had made, helping Kurt understand he had to do something quickly, or it's over. The creature started to approach Kurt while he slowly grabbed his combat knife. He didn't want to use the pistol, because it'll be to loud. Kurt figured the knife would be enough. He decided to wait until the creature came in for the kill, so he can stab it in it's mouth.

Tension rose sharply as Kurt carefully reached his knife. when he was finally in grasp, the knife made a *schite* sound that startled the creature "shit" Kurt whispered angrily . It instantly pounced on Kurt. He tried to stab him at that moment, but the creature placed it's heavy paw on his hand. The creature had him trapped...or so it thought.

The creature roared in Kurt's face to establish it's victory of food, then Kurt roared back at it. He enhanced the roar with a vocal technique taught to him by a Vandoo, a race savaged from an asteroid on the edge of the galaxy back in the Discovery Age. Due to the creatures extensive hearing, the roar disorientated it and it moved off of Kurt, giving him the opening to stab the creature in it's neck. The creature started to throw a tantrum jerking Kurt back and forth.Kurt kept holding on to the knife almost ripping his arm when the creature finally threw Kurt off, it ran into the dense jungle instantly vanishing.

Kurt took a deep breath and was relieved he was able to pull his knife back, but something told him that wasn't the last time he'll see the creature.

Kurt continued to walk until he reached a river. he took this opportunity to cleanse his knife with the water and get a drink, then he noticed the sky. "it's...nighttime, already? when I crashed landed, it was about noon. I walked for about an hour, then that fake tiger attacked, that took about 6-7 minutes, and I walked another 30 minutes until I got to this waterway...how the hell?" He began to feel agitated, until he noticed splashing "splashing...fish...(his mouth starts drooling) food" he dived head first into the water and swam straight for it. It then ran past his mind that this is a jungle, and he's already encountered a alien monster, who's to say the splashing isn't another one. Kurt decided he was too damn hungry just to ignore it so he pulled out his knife and started to investigate. Nothing could have prepared him for what he saw next. Yes it was a fish, 2 in fact, but the fish were...mating. He was disgusted, but knew what he wanted. Taking advantage of them being distracted, he stabbed both of them and then resurfaced. "Oh my god! That was just nasty!" He got out of the water and started to cut up the fish. Kurt didn't want to waste time with a fire, so he mixed the pieces with some rations and took a break to start eating. "I didn't even know fish had sex. I always thought the guys would nut and the chicks just swallowed...honestly, I'm really starting to get tired of this shit."