Lecith was an orbital technician whose duty was to repair space construction equipment during the work of the main assembly team. According to him, a construction ship with a modest crew of one hundred people fell on the planet right in the mountains, where in the end only five people survived, including him.
These five people soon headed north in search of shelter from the weather, but ended up on the lands of the green people of Gobe, where, not having any weapons with them, they could only run away from them, but they soon fell into a swamp and drowned one after another.
Lecith was lucky, he was the last to drown and was able to live until that moment to meet us. And what surprised me most in this story was that they had been here for more than a year and were trying to somehow establish contact with the local civilization, but in vain. They were pursued by the so-called Gobe and driven here, and some were even caught, and their fate remained unknown and hardly enviable.
"You know,"
The man spoke with tears in his eyes, cleansed of dirt and covered with a cloth.
“I'm so glad I met you. I thought I was going to die here... *sob*... I'm finally coming home."
“Don’t rush to conclusions.”
I answered him, causing Lecith to look up at me with a surprised look in his brown eyes.
"We're stuck here ourselves."
“W-what?”
He said not believing his ears.
“H-how? Why?"
“Our cruiser crashed on the other side of the planet. We expected drastic climate change, but it doesn’t seem to have happened.”
“Surely there’s nothing else on the other side of the planet.”
Fred said, examining Lecith with a medical scanner and feeling his skin.
“Fortunately, the 127th Army evacuated and landed in the east and is most likely working to return to space. We must hurry to her before they consider us dead and fly away without us.”
“We have to meet Leo first.
I voiced the current plan out loud, crossing my arms over my chest.
“And only then will we head to the landing site, no matter how long it takes. It’s unlikely that without a ship they will be able to fly somewhere even within a year.”
"It's clear."
Lecith said sadly, lowering his head.
“So you are also lost.”
"Well, not quite."
I answered him.
"We know where to go."
"It's still not reassuring."
He was clearly very upset after what he heard and thought that he would soon return home to Ecostate. Unfortunately for him, we also found ourselves in this asshole of the galaxy and could not quickly get out of here, and we also lost a lot of people, including mid-level officers. If we weren’t soldiers, we would have killed each other or done something else rash and dubious.
At that moment, one of the fighters, who was Forn, tapped me on the shoulder.
“Can we talk in private?”
He asked me in a whisper.
While Fred was examining Lecith, I decided to move a little further and talk to Forn. Other fighters and native fugitives decided to make a halt for now, despite the fact that the forest was not a safe place for this, but for the sake of the civilians we had to do it. I went with Forn a little further into the forest and asked him:
“So what did you want to talk to me about?”
“You heard what he said, right?”
"What exactly?"
“That he’s from Ecostate.”
I nodded, answering the Martian:
“Yes, I heard. Is there something wrong with this?
“Don’t you remember the story?”
He asked me in surprise, and I rubbed my temple with my right palm, answering him.
“Sorry, Forn, but I still have memory loss after the crash.”
I confessed to him.
“I still vaguely remember everything. I didn’t even remember all of your names right away.”
"Oh... that's how it is."
Forn said and decided to explain himself.
“Well, since you don’t remember, I’ll remind you: during the Pantora War, Ecostate was occupied by the Pantorians and was occupied for six whole years.”
“What do you mean by this?”
I interrupted him, not understanding what he was driving at.
“The fact is that six years later Ecostate was completely sanctioned and populated by Pantorians.”
«WHAT?»
I widened my eyes after hearing this.
"Wait."
I raised my hand, realizing something.
"You want to say…"
"Yes."
Forn said sternly.
“Lecith is most likely Pantorian.”
"It is unlikely."
Fred said, appearing behind me, looking at the medical device he was holding in his hands.
“He is a man, and an earthling at that. I checked it with a scanner at the molecular level and made sure of it.”
“Earthling? Isn’t he from Ecostate?”
Forn objected.
“Yes, he’s from Ecostate, but don’t forget that this planet was cleared of Pantorians for a thousand years by settling with terrestrial colonists, and the Pantorians were sent to a star collective or sold to the black fleet. It’s unlikely that there are many Pantorians on Ecostate now, and even if Lecith were one, he would immediately admit that he is a Pantorian.”
«Would he have confessed right away? Why?»
I didn’t understand, and Forn answered my mental question.
"Pantorians never lie."
Forn understood and sighed and gave in, realizing that he was wrong,
“Okay. Let's get some sleep and move on.”
"Let's go."
Having sorted out the situation, we went to our mini-camp and went to bed, changing night duty from time to time. Although before that I should have thanked Forn for refreshing my memory, even if only for a short time.
«Pantorians.»
I spoke in my head, shaking only about thoughts about them.
From childhood, all people throughout the Republic were frightened by the story of the bloodiest war a thousand years ago. The first full-scale interstellar war on a galactic scale in the history of not only humanity, but the entire galaxy, and I hope the last one, and it was the Pantorians who unleashed it.
A war where entire races, entire planets and even stars perished. Humanity alone has lost over five hundred billion people, which is half of the entire population of the Republic at the end of the third millennium and on the threshold of the fourth.
The entire galaxy is dotted with supernova nebulae, black holes and white dwarfs. It was a long time ago, but the consequences of that monstrous war were still visible and will be visible for tens of thousands of years, if not hundreds.
I didn’t go into this topic and I’m unlikely to feel the fear in which the entire sector 1318 was shrouded when the Pantorians attacked humanity and this despite the fact that the Pantorians were part of this humanity only better, better in terms of everything, but not from the point of view of morality and ethics, but only the effectiveness of themselves.
Forever young, smart, beautiful, brilliant, tenacious, reasonable, calm and practically emotionless - that’s who the Pantorians are. This is how they were shown to us as almost ideal people, who were genetically improved and set free to do real evil in the name of the vague idea of the so-called “great order”.
From century to century we were constantly reminded of one thing: if you see a Pantorian and realize that it is him, then just run and don’t look back. They never lie, they don’t eat food familiar to people, they are very strong and powerful, but what’s even worse is that you will always feel humiliated in front of them, as if you are a disgrace of the human race, not daring to stand next to them, as if they are always right in everything, but you are just a pathetic worm, part of some mindless herd, and they are part of something great and whole.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
They reason logically, coldly, extremely calculatingly and there are thousands of times more of them than us ordinary people, and they can be grown anywhere in incubators, cloned on the ships of the black fleet or born naturally. They are the truest evil that the universe could produce.
«If Lecith were a Pantorian, we would kill him immediately, but since Fred tested him at the molecular level, then we have nothing to worry about. For us, he is just a civilian whom we will return to the Republic.»
"What is your name?"
Lecith suddenly turned to me as I lay down on the ground, wrapped in a sleeping bag.
"Boris."
I answered briefly.
"One of us thought you were a Pantorian."
"Huh?"
Lecith was surprised.
“But I'm human. I can’t... I can’t after all...”
“Calm down, boy, our senior medic checked you, you are not a Pantorian. It’s just that one Martian’s imagination took flight.”
It seems that the word "Martian" made Lecith's curiosity spike.
"Martian? I mean... Wow! So are you from the solar system?
"Yes. Does this surprise you so much?”
“Yeah. I always wanted to go there, to see the planet where people came from and that very Moon.”
“I would like your dreams.”
I said sadly with a laugh.
“Although I’m already starting to dream about the same thing.”
“How long have you been here?”
"Three weeks.""
I answered.
“We spent one week in the shuttle, we were going to establish communications, we sent a platoon to the east to get the STCNC machine, but then ... we made first contact.”
I turned my gaze towards the natives. It was funny to see how the four of them slept in an embrace with Itami. When he wakes up, he will clearly be surprised by this.
"Many people died."
I said sadly, continuing my story.
“Some kind of devilry is happening on this planet.”
"Exactly exactly."
Lecith nodded.
“I remember then that my friend came across a strange lake with red water. We were very thirsty then; at first we didn’t want to drink from the lake, but in the end we tried it anyway. And you know what?
"What?"
I became curious.
“It... was real blood. A whole lake of liquid blood. Phew... I can still feel that metallic taste. Then, it’s true, we no longer drank from that lake, but looked for fresh streams. We started having strange dreams... terrible dreams. It seemed that I could not understand where reality was and where the dream was. One sip was enough to make us almost go crazy.”
«Lake of blood? Strange dreams? Interesting.»
I thought, deciding to ask him something:
“How did you make first contact?”
“Oh~... this is a sad story.”
Lecith said sadly.
“We came across a village where we thought people lived, but when they saw us they made a noise and ran at us with pitchforks. We got scared and ran away, although now I think they were more afraid of us than we were of them.”
«Perhaps this is true.»
I noticed something in my mind and decided to clarify something.
“So these Gobe... that is, green creatures are not the first ones you came into contact with on this planet?”
"Yes. But the people in that village have some... strange kind of mutation."
“And which one?”
"They had tails."
"Tails?"
"Yes. Fluffy, like these... Shleakas, well, in your opinion, these are cats. Am I saying this correctly? It’s just that there are no cats on Ecostate, they didn’t adapt and died out.”
My curiosity suddenly increased when I heard about tails. I suddenly became curious to clarify something else, and I asked:
“Did they really look like people?”
"Yes. Well, it was winter then, I definitely saw their tails. Some of them hid them, and even when some woman was chasing us, she could see sharp tubercles on the top of her head. I thought it might even be Shleak ears, but I thought it might be something else…. Well... the headdress, for example, but I think they looked so appropriate.”
«This is all strange...»
I thought as I listened to Lecith’s words.
«The conditions on this planet are not too harsh for people to develop mutations over two thousand years. Shit! There are more and more questions about this planet, and it will take me a while to dig up the answers to them.»
“Of course, this is all interesting, but let’s leave the rest for tomorrow.”
I said, turning on my side.
"Praise the night."
"What?"
I asked.
“That’s how we wish you a good night’s sleep in Ecostate.”
“Ah... well then, praise the night.”
I said and closed my eyes. I lay there for a while and listened to the sound of the rustling treetops. I couldn't sleep well thinking about something:
«Tailed people... why does a person need a tail? And also the ears on the top of the head... some kind of nonsense. If Fred had heard our conversation, he would have refuted everything he heard. Perhaps that's enough for today.»
I closed my eyes and began to fall asleep while insects and crickets buzzed around me in the pitch darkness. Probably, by this moment about an hour had passed and now I was already falling asleep when suddenly...
"ALARM!"
Suddenly someone shouted. I jumped to my feet and immediately grabbed my assault rifle.
"What's the matter?"
I asked, activating the earphone.
“The wolves are coming this way! Giant wolves!
"Understood."
I answered and started broadcasting to the entire channel.
“The whole platoon get ready. All-round defense."
The fighters suddenly jumped up from their seats and prepared their weapons, turning on the flashlights attached to the barrels of their weapons. They took up a circular position around our small camp. We didn’t know exactly where the wolves were coming from here, so we prepared to meet them from any direction. Although I should have clarified this, what if they surrounded us?
"North!"
I heard the direction in the earphone.
"Accepted."
I answered, activating the bioscanner on my left hand and noticing the rapid approach of more than two dozen dots on the screen.
«Two hundred kilometers per hour?!»
I was surprised to see how quickly they were approaching us.
I directed my gaze north into the forest darkness, most of which was illuminated by our flashlights. We heard no sounds of approaching and yet the wolves were heading this way. And we thought that we would meet wolves, scare them away or shoot them, when an arrow whistled past my ear and stuck into a tree trunk.
"What the?!"
I shouted out, realizing that it had almost hit me. My heart froze for a moment. I turned my head to the left and saw the tip of the arrow. Rough, wooden with a stone tip. It bent after hitting the tree trunk and yet the way it pierced told me that the force of the shot was enormous and that our exposed parts of our bodies were vulnerable.
“For the trees!”
I quickly ordered. The soldiers carried out my order and quickly hid behind the trees while continuing to target a potential enemy in the north. Meanwhile, more arrows were whistling and falling to the ground, and then we heard wild wolf roars that seemed to shake the entire forest.
Several fighters opened suppressive fire to scare off the enemy, but judging by the bioscan, they were not afraid of the frightening sounds of shots and continued to rapidly approach us.
"Holy shit..."
I spoke for a brief moment, looking out from behind a tree trunk and saw a pack of three-meter gray wolves, which were saddled by Gobe.
The green humanoids shot from bows and threw stones in our direction, while screaming disgustingly and drooling, and then, stopping the movement of the giant wolves, they began to jump to the ground, lighting torches in their hands.
The bioscan did not show this, but on each of these giant wolves there were ten Gobes, who jumped off them and rushed towards us, hiding behind the trees, that is, at the moment we are dealing with about two hundred Gobes, who were not afraid of us at all.
What is interesting is that the giant wolves, freed from Gobe on their backs, ran back into the darkness and all in different directions. Roughly speaking, these giant wolves played the role of infantry fighting vehicles and landed troops in the form of green-skinned small humanoids.
It was amazing to see how primitive creatures even thought of this. I expected these wolves to take part in the battle, but it looks like... it looks like they will still play a role in flanking attacks.
That’s right, they attacked us head-on, trying to divert our attention from other directions. And these Gobes turn out to be quite smart for thinking of this. They need to be treated as equals, but that’s just for today. If these little assholes kill even one of our soldiers, I swear I will chase them throughout this forest all the way to Sirius until they are burned and shot!
Meanwhile, the rain of arrows prevented us from conducting aimed fire, forcing us to hide behind the trees. The grenades that worked best in this situation were those that we had not yet used, but which we had already prepared for throwing. While the forest was filled with the noise of gunfire, I quickly explained my plan to the entire platoon through the communication channel.
“Let’s let them get closer and throw grenades at them!”
"They're surrounding us!"
And indeed, the bioscan showed how more packs of wolves were approaching from the west and east and landing Gobe. As I thought, Gobe will now carry out a flank attack. The situation became increasingly tense and extremely dangerous.
It seemed impossible to maintain the position now, and at the same time, if we begin to retreat, there will be a risk of being hit by arrows and stones, but if we take our time.... And to hell with it! If we are surrounded, we will be shot with arrows in any case! There's nothing to think about here! We need to act!
"New order!"
I shouted into the earphone.
“Mshkhan, mine the camp. Everyone else, pack all your things and head south! Esko, cover Mshkhan! Is the order clear?
"Yes sir!"
Everyone answered in unison.
"Fulfill!"
As soon as I was the first to emerge from behind the cover, I felt severe pain in my right leg. The arrow went right through, causing me to fall face down. Groaning in pain, I abruptly rolled over onto my back. At that moment I simply could not believe that I had been wounded by some primitive arrow.
«Shit! Shit! Shit! SHIT!»
I panicked inside myself, groaning in pain.
One Gobe quickly rushed towards me with a club in his hands. He was drooling and shaking his head aggressively, either screaming or laughing. He looked quite creepy. At that moment, seeing all this, I was both scared and hurt. Adrenaline filled my body, causing my brain to tense up, my heart to pound wildly, and my hands to reach for weapons.
"BITCH! DIE!”
I took a pistol out of my holster and with the first shot I shot right through Gobe’s head, and he, in turn, took two post-mortem steps and collapsed like a rag doll.
“A BITCHES!”
I fired a couple more shots at the other Gobes that were approaching me after the first one I killed. Two hits to the head, and they fell to the ground dead, they barely had enough of a meter to get to me and beat me to death with sticks. My leg was trembling convulsively, the pain was so strong that I could not stand it and screamed:
“A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A~!!!”
No matter how painful and scared I was now, Fred ran up to me and quickly stuck me with a dust remover, and it seemed to me that my leg instantly went numb, and all the pain turned to cold. Fred began tying my leg under fire while the rest of the fighters standing around me shot at every Gobe that they saw, and after Fred finished his job, Stern lifted me onto his back, fastening me to his exoskeleton.
“Bag of bones, please don’t twitch!”
The droid operator shouted angrily.
"Okay."
I answered, feeling extremely weak from the waist down.
I held the pistol in my trembling hand and fired back. I had to hold the pistol with both hands and fire to kill from the Gobe clouds that were making their way towards us from cover to cover. Stern rose to his feet and ran south. The entire platoon, firing back along the way, began to move and soon Mshkhan completed the mining.
"I did everything!"
I heard it in my earphone.
"So that's great! Let's leave!"
I ordered and we began a general retreat to the south. Meanwhile, what I had already seen was a forest space strewn with the corpses of small green-skinned creatures. They attacked us fearlessly and madly. Did they even have an instinct for self-preservation? If not, then now I begin to understand why the fugitive natives were so afraid of them.
At this time we moved quite far away, but continued to fire back. Judging by the bioscan, most of them entered our mini-camp, after which I gave one clear order to our sapper:
"Explode!"
And what I saw before my eyes was a bright flash. A deafeningly powerful explosion almost knocked our group off our feet, and in the distance we could hear the crash of falling trees. The dust obscured our view, but from the bioscan I saw that most of Gobe was killed, while the rest, after recovering, fled in different directions.
And it seemed like the battle was over, but the platoon continued to move south, and at that moment I could no longer be in my right mind and lost consciousness.