|RECONNAISSANCE|

UNKNOWN|1ST RECON

Deep in the forest, a squad of fast movers flew through the trees.

"Captain, we've been out here for 8 days and we haven't seen any sign of human activity yet. Do we have a set destination or what?" A young man spoke into the radio.

"Relax kid, the city and village our sky boys found were huge in comparison to the places on earth. Put that into perspective, we can infer the lands around them are also massive in size." In front of him, a mature, petite woman replied to him. "Back at the carrier, I overheard something from the researchers, they are also having trouble launching satellites and spaceborne equipment. Something about how the atmosphere is much bigger than they thought and how much a pain it is to adjust everything to match up."

"She's right Rook, expect everything to be much much larger in terms of size." The old man at the head of the squad remarked. "In fact, we should be about one day out from that village the recon birds found."

Sinking into his own thoughts, 'Rook' returned to his position in the squad, oblivious to the silent laughter from the rest of the squad.

------

"HOLD!!!"

Hitting the air breaks and commanding the other to do the same, Captain Richard 'Caracal' swerved his bike to the right, landing behind a large bush with the rest of the squad behind him.

"Everyone standby for combat." Caracal ordered everyone. "Sensors picked up a large heat signature at least 500m ahead of us."

After hearing that, the rest of the recon squad recalibrated their sensors to long range scanning. Once done, all of them saw a large group of blips ahead of them.

"Stash the bikes and mark this location, from here on out we're walking." Caracal ordered through the radio.

After setting up some proximity mines and covering the hover bikes with large branches and leaves, everyone put their packs on and moved into formation behind the Captain.

"Captain, new signature, same size, bearing 078." A short man spoke up from the middle of the formation. "Rapidly approaching the other signature."

Humming a affirming response, the captain ushered everyone to move into a tighter formation and increase speed.

"Condor, how far are the two signatures from us?" Caracal asked, hopping over a fallen tree.

"100 meters sir, they are also moving towards us. If we keep up this speed, we'll run into them in about 30 seconds." Condor responded.

"Everyone stop and disperse. Prepare for possible combat."

Rushing off into different directions, the recon team suddenly vanished from sight. Hiding in bushes and shrubs, with some of them climbing up trees. Squad became set for a ambush or just staying as observers hidden from their prey.

Everyone was silent except for Condor, who was providing everyone with updates to the location of unknown signatures.

"Both signatures have merged into one massive signature. Still moving to us, but have slowed down considerably."

"80 meters. Its slowly becoming smaller, some faint signatures are being left behind as well."

The captain cocked his weapon. "Everyone arm yourself, looks like we're going to be saving something."

"50 meters, more faint signatures are being left behind. We should be able to hear them now."

As soon as Condor spoke, a large explosion shook the forest.

A massive burning shockwave rushed through the forest, forcing the recon squad deep into their cover.

Everyone on ground level hit the ground and flattened out as much as they could, allowing them to avoid most of the shockwave. The three members that climbed up the trees were not so lucky, though having the huge tree trunk as cover they still sustained injuries.

A suffocating silence that followed the shockwave was soon broken by anguished cries and blazing fire.

"Medic, go tend to the three, the rest of you, on me. Set weapons to incapacitate, Condor let command know we have 'rescued' a few natives from an explosion." Caracal spoke, catching one of the injured members that jumped from the tree.

"Also we have a few casualties, so we'll be cutting the operation short. All in all, we still completed the main objective of the operation." The medic, Osprey yelled over as he treated the other two.

"Roger wilco." Condor replied as he went to set up a mobile communication array.

Caracal took the rest of the squad and charged into the blast zone.

There were few words that could describe the situation. Hell, chaos, despair. The remains of several burning carriages could be seen, with body parts strewn about. Several burning trees that were knocked down were starting to build up into an inferno. And the foul smell of roasted flesh, burning clothes, and blood permeated the area.

'No way anyone survived this.' Was what everyone thought.

The cries of pain echoed further ahead of them, about 20 meters away from the blast zone.

As the recon squad approached, a figure moved towards them. Completely burnt black, with its skin flaking off and trailing blood.

Merlin, a well built dark skin man raised his weapon, only to be stopped by Caracal. Giving him a questioning look, Caracal just shakes his head and indicates that they should move on.

Everyone continued while Merlin stayed back, watching the burnt figure move slower and slower until it finally collapsed, with what looked to be its hand, outstretched towards a burnt body. Its only difference from the other bodies was the jewel that hung on its chest.

Noticing this, Merlin did a series of hand gestures and muttered something under his breath, after holding a pose for a couple seconds. He turned around and left, jogging in order to catch up to the others.

Catching up, the rest of the squad were already dispersed, tending to the wounded, or whats left of them.

"You done?" Caracal asked.

"...Yeah..." Merlin replied.

"Haaa." Letting out a sigh, Caracal patted Merlins shoulder. "Go and scout the area around us, get a breather. Its going to take a while to finish things here. Take Corux and Ibis with you. Start at the carriages down the road."

"...Thanks." Muttering a reply, Merlin moved ahead, tapping the two younger members to let them know that they were scouting ahead.

Caracal watched the three leave and turned his attention back to the scene on hand.

Several children were huddled around a hooded woman in religious clothing. The children had several minor wounds here and there, but none as serious as the woman.

Kestral, the mature petite woman, was applying a tourniquet on her arm just below the shoulder. Another two could be seen on both of what use to be her legs.

Drake was bandaging a man not far away. With a swelling bump on his head, it didn't need a analyzer to tell he had a concussion.

As Caracal was planning on how to approach them, a woman approached him from behind.

"Captain, theres a pair of old people behind that bush and I've patched them up but they've lost too much." She reported to him.

"Hmm? Oh Naga." Snapping him out of his trance, Caracal turned and faced the tall amber woman. "Haaa, bring me to them."

Following Naga to the dying pair, Caracal observed them, especially their eyes. Surprisingly the two pairs of eyes were still strong and carried a glint.

"Its a miracle that they're still alive captain." Naga spoke. "While I was stopping their bleeding, they kept saying something to me but I-"

"/\Children\,where are the \children\? Are they \fine\? Are they hurt?"

The old woman spoke, causing Caracal to react. He was given a couple lessons on the native language before going on this operation courtesy of the quantum computer and the linguistics people back at the carrier.

Since he understood some of the words, he pulled out his tablet and opened a list of words that he could speak, very brokenly.

"/Children. Alive. Fine./"

Stunned at how horribly enunciated his words are, the old woman spoke slower.

"/You do not \speak\ Handlic./"

Caracal noted the string of words and soon made his reply.

"/Language. Name. Handlic?/"

"/That does \not matter\, I know \we\ are \dying\. We have \long\ anticipated our \death\. Can you let us \see \the\ children\ one last time?/"

Piecing together the words, Caracals face darkened. Nodding to the old pair he turned to a bewildered Naga.

"Stay here with them, try to keep them alive. Use half a stim shot on each if you have to."

"Understood." Giving her reply, Naga stared at Caracal. "How can you speak their language? Albeit broken."

"Not the time, place, or occasion. Once we get back I'll tell the whole squad." Caracal barked at her as he left.

Returning to the main road, he saw Kestral bandaging the wounds on the children. As he approached them, the children got frightened and hid behind her.

Nodding to Kestral, he turned his attention to the kids and spoke to them.

"/Come. Old. People. See./"

With that, he turned and started walking back to the dying old folk. Seeing as the children stood still, he spoke one last time.

"/Dying. Save. No./"