Earthdragon

chapter 2

The ship rocked back and forth, thermal currents wreaking havoc with the guidance system and air resistance. Like a giant was shaking a box with them inside it and suddenly...the box was put down… gently.  

(James)

'Landfall, we made it, thank the Maker' raced through my mind, as I rushed to the exit hatch. There were guards at the departure bay, clad in light blue armour, holding back the crowd of colonists to be, with electromagnetic energy riot shields. I showed them my ID and got waved through into the departure and unloading bay. All the cadets were lined up, in rank order in rows as well as classes. I went to the back left to be on my own at the back of the A class cadets, seeing as I was the only AC in A class. "Now, cadets, since we're all here now, I think I'll introduce myself to you, I, am General Mardun, but you will refer to me as General Mar, or more preferably, Sir.", General Mars voice echoed through the hangar bay, his voice hard edged and authorative, at this prompt, I then shouted "Sir, yes, sir!" Coming to attention as I said so. I was the only person to say this, but to my surprise, the General just looked amused staring at all present in the room, bar me. "Am I speaking in a foreign language that only one cadet understands?. I said that from now on I am to be referred to as sir!". "Sir, yes, sir" I said once more, with everyone else joining in this time.

"ALL G class cadets and T class cadets, you will take the beetle down to the prefab barracks you will all live in.", "P class cadets, follow your CO to the beetle transport to take a look at your quarters, A class cadet Darkline, make your way to your AC accomodation behind the P class cadets. Everyone else go to the A class Barracks!" Mar barked. "Sir, yes, sir!". 

Now, if I can remember correctly then G class means grunts, the foot soldiers. T class would be tanks, people dedicated to lifting so many weights that they're a walking tank in combat with the amount of armour and heat they pack, then there's the P class, the pilots, the ones that scored with 80% or more on their target flying practice, and then there's A class, the aces.

MY class, the cadets who got into the top 10% in the entire academy. Following the Pilots, I stood near the door of the beetle as they boarded and entered behind them, the black door sliding shut with a hiss of hydraulics. 'They're all silent' I thought, 'disciplined soldiers, training and living in simulations projected into their minds whilst in cryostasis'. Personally, the only thing I trained for was endurance and strength, seeing as I already had the discipline, and the sleep running machines and the resistance bands were great seeing as I excercised in sleep and in real time. The door opened and the other cadets started filing out, leaving me alone as I dawdeled out behind them, reactivating my eye visor to see where my prefab would be placed, and after confirming it's predetermined position and overlaying the colony blueprints I confirmed that no other prefabs overlapped mine, meaning I wouldn't come back to a demolished abode, which sometimes happened with the builder robots and their slightly buggy software with large scale builds, I decided to explore the new world. Tapping a command into my gauntlet, a small side compartment on my thigh popped out, revealing a small rudimentary 3D printer that gathers air and rearranges the atoms into whatever you want, within reason, a pistol grip started to materialise and after three separate printings of the grip the chamber and the muzzle, and then two magnetic ammo clips holding fourteen .45 cal hollow tip titanium bullets respectively. I had a weapon for self defense. The magazine's twisted and locked into magnetic holster slots on my upper thigh with the gun slightly further back, and I was ready. Starting at a light jog, I decided to explore the immediate forest mountain in front of me.

Upon arriving, I noticed that I felt more awake now that I was among the nature of the new world, 'hmm, should probably name it sooner or later, calling it the new world is a drag'. I started to jog and soon the scene of luscious green trees changed, but not in a bad way, as shrubbery and plant life started to emerge instead, and it was almost like thee was a path, unused in a long time, but a path. 'Animals maybe?, An old path to water maybe?'. After deciding to follow the path, I heard someone humming, and ducked down behind a bush and creeped closer to the source. Upon doing so I saw a girl, 'Wait, a girl?', ' I'm the only colonist out here!', 'So who is she?'. I creeped closer, and I was able to make out that she was singing a chirpy sounding tune, but in a different language than any of the ones in my lingual translator, and that's saying something, since there are about 11,000 in the database. "Linguistic translator, start scanning for any discernible language structure similar to the ones in the database, and then cross reference them with all other languages to make a logically acceptable algorithm for the language she is speaking." I whispered, and in my ear, the implanted microphone beeped, indicating that it had begun that process. In order to get closer, I activated my helmet and turned on active camouflage, to ensure it was working, I looked towards my hand, and saw only grass. 'Now, time to make a one way first contact', carefully, stepping to avoid twigs and leaves, I tip-toed behind her and turned on my vidfeed as I sidestepped slowly around her and to my surprise, she looked very human, and around my age too. Her eyes narrowed and her face lost the childlike happiness that was on it moments before, "sljga tedek?" "I cachg gerclnse yonaf aura!" She exclaimed. 'Aura?',  'The translator is starting to work, it's working!' I thought. 'Wait, she knows I'm here?' 'How?' "I know ygh in the area!" "Shneow yesdelf!". It was then that I realized that I'd lost connection to the ship. The green light brought my attention back to her, as she was holding a large orb of the light "I will use this sewker sobbll to fiad you the hardvn way if you doght show yoursead!".

Suddenly my HUD notification screen started going mental as one after the other, status reports on my armour popped up; Physical damage resistance (Damage nullify) Fire resistance +100,000,000 , Water resistance +100,000,000 , Earth resistance +100,000,000 Magic resistance + 100,000,000 , Fire magic cheat=true , Water magic cheat=true , Earth magic cheat=true , Stamina cheat=true , Strength cheat=true , Speed = 10,000 , Mana cheat=true , Intelligence cheat=true…