Chapter 1
The sound of alarms echoed within the now lit up red drop bay of the exploration scout ship, Thunder Child. As soon as the cloak of FTL fully lifted and dissipated, the ship shook as the vibrations of the engines brought the ship into emergency high-g manoeuvres. Anything that wasn’t strapped down suddenly hit the deck. The two rows of drop pods shook “We have been engaged by an unknown force and we don`t…” The voice of the captain cut off but the g force as the ship launched itself along another trajectory.
Tom was already Suited up in his Paladin mark two power armour and safely secured in a pod. It was standard procedure to have one guy ready to drop after coming out of FTL since you never know what was on the other end. but nothing about this was standard. Tom had questions that were only answered when Captain Holden spoke again.
“I’m going to put it simply we don’t have the time. We found fucking aliens and the bastards want to kill us.”
Tom wouldn’t have believed the words of the captain if it wasn’t for the fact that Tom trusted him, the ship was clearly in the middle of a battle, and they were so far from the rest of humanity. The next words came over the drop team’s private comms, the captain’s voice was calm yet full of emotion at the same time. “Guys get your asses to the drop pod! You may be the only ones to survive this, someone must let the guys back home know. It was a pleasure knowing you.”
It was at that point the point defence cannons started firing the sound travelling through the walls of the ship. A sudden shudder as the ship’s coil gun fired after a high g flip. “Tom we are heading to the bay.” His squad lead spoke, “Drop now this is an order don’t wait for us.” Tom’s hand moved to the pod’s control panel to press the buttons and flip the necessary switches looking at the readouts. “Sir we are above a planet. I can’t control where I land too much under these conditions.” Tom spoke his voice straining as the ships dodged one side. He shut his eyes and took a deep breath “I’m dropping.”
The doors behind the pods opened letting the hard vacuum of space into the bay as Tom’s pod was oriented into firing position. The magnetic launcher trusted the pod out of Thunder Child and into the unknown. Tom hoped he was safe now, he hoped as many of his friends and colleagues would be.
His pod made small adjustments he couldn’t see much out of the small window afforded to him. The long pencil-like shape of the ship was barely seen out of the side. The secondary radiators were extended and glowing a bright orange. The PDCs spit out fire and lead into the void. Tom’s eyes widened in surprise as what seemed like a bight laser cut into the side of the ship making parts of the hull glow like someone took a plasma torch before he lost visual.
“Shit! Jenkins got spaced.” Tom’s squad lead spoke. “Rex where are you?” before anyone could answer the sound of an explosion was heard then the defending crackle of static. “Sir?” Tom asked “Sir?” Tom’s voice was filling up with desperation “Hudson talk to me, sir!”
Tom didn’t want to admit he was gone but deep down Tom knew. He was alone the stream of data the ship was transmitting to the pod dried up, the ESV Thunder Child was gone the first human ship to fall to a xeno foe.
Alerts sounded as the pod crashed through a debris field, no doubtable causing damage. The amours self-learning assistant program managed the pod guiding it down to the surface leaving him to wonder if this part was fully automated. He was sure the debris couldn’t have come from the Thunder Child, making Tom wonder if they take down a foe with them?
The cold vacuum of space gave way to the fiery heat of entering an atmosphere of an unfamiliar world. The pod shook, the pod plummeting down to the surface. From how much shaking the pod was doing something was wrong. “Knight Tom, damage to pod detected. Hard landing predicted.” The program spoke in a genderless barely human-like voice, “Going to preserve the pod the best I can, there is no read on any other pods deploying due to excessive wreckage. It’s like a ton of chaff up there.”
“Great, if I pass out don’t use any drugs to wake me up unless something is wrong. They could be more important later” Tom told the program. The small window suddenly had clouds passing by before the pod thrusters fired smoke and vapour covering up the view for Tom. The turbulence bumped around the few loosely attached equipment.
The world went dark from the sudden impact.
Tom woke up with a headache, the world outside was dark, and night had fallen in the time it took for Tom to come to. “How long was I out?” he was asking himself, but the program answered back, “Five hours, sensors say you will make a full recovery without any medical aid.” Tom nodded as he ran through the suit diagnostics on the HUD. “The printers?” Tom asked as he was checking the suit’s reactor status, luckily that was green like the rest of his suit.
“The pod’s 3D printer is non-functioning, your armour’s one is fully functional. It’s recommended to use the suits one to repair the pods.” Tom started to release the seals of the pod’s door before kicking it off. The strong, kick sent the pod’s door a few meters. He climbed out turning on the helmet-mounted spotlights.
The forests were lit up by the high-tech knight. The trees and grass were green like Earth, probably due to the similar star this planet orbited. Tom would have to work out if any of this was safe to eat but on other planets, there were edible plants, if not he could always hunt there wasn’t a planet found yet that the native fauna was inedible but that wasn’t what was important to Tom at the moment.
Tom dropped to his knees a tear leaked from his eye. “It’s not a dream it happened; they are gone.” He took a deep breath then another, “I better make sure they pay for what they did, they can’t get away with this murder, especially if I can’t get home.” His armoured hands clenched into a fist as he tried to process the unreal information.
Tom had no time to cry over the loss of his friends he was a Knight. He had to keep going on he was meant to represent humanity, and he was going to do just that. Tom got his ragged breathing under control as his determination to avenge this act of war and his friends became his mission on this alien world.
He got up the first step was the hardest before turning back to collect everything from the pod, his rifle, his sword, and his side arms. Each had a place on his over two meters tall, armoured body, the suit adding a few inches to his height.
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He made a pin on the suit’s automated mapping software where the pod was and started to walk through the darkness of this alien forest towards the open grassy plane.
He walked for what seemed like hours under the moonless sky showing off the full majesty of the Milky Way. Somewhere up there was Sol and the cradle of humanity. Tom’s thoughts wondered as he mindlessly walked in Northeast by his amours compass. He thought of the guys and his captain, as far as his sensors picked up no other drop pod or escape pod was launched but there was no way to know for sure.
That’s when he noticed it, an amber glow in the distance hidden by a hill. It was fire and a lot of it. his slow walk became a jog the jog became a run as he noticed a dirt road, and his run became a sprint as his suit picked up the sound of screaming.
Running faster than any Olympic athlete a primitive-looking town came into view, the flames engulfed huts and other wooden structures. The cries of the helpless and the shouts of the ones that wanted to do something were clear even if it was in a completely alien language.
Tom ran into the settlement, “Scan for life, and if anyone is in danger let me know.” It was his duty as a knight to protect, these poor things must have been hit by the same ones that took down his ship.
The HUD highlighted a burning hut, “Knight one life from detected within.” The program spoke Tom didn’t have time to question the fact it seemed like concern was in its voice. He ran past aliens without even realizing crashing through the stone brick wall with an almighty punch and stepping inside.
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I’m going to die that’s what Rhea thought, her home was burning the demons that came every few years from the sky attacked her home. She was going to die here, all she could do was curl up and slowly choke to death in the corner of what was meant to be the safest place she knew her home.
The wall in front of her came crashing down, and a towering grey armoured being stood before her as she peaked out under her soot-coved paws. The helmet bathed Rhea in what seemed like a holy light as she stared at the red cross decorating the white front of the helmet. “Are you?” she coughed as the figure walked slowly and towards her and carefully picked her up. “Are you a spirit from the gods?”
Rhea’s vision faded but she had a smile on her face, she was safe and maybe the rest of her village would be saved too.
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“Bloody hell I’m carrying a humanoid space wolf!” Tom didn’t realize what he was doing until he left the burning hut to have many of the same species as the one, she was carrying staring at him in shock. “Yes, Knight that would seem to be an accurate assessment.” The program told him with what was a hint of sarcasm coming through the robotic tone.
Tom didn’t have time to think of that, he carefully put her down laying them against a stone wall. He assumed the one he carried was female it did look that way. He looked about before speaking to his armour “Can we get a translation going?”
“Yes, Knight but it will take time. they will need to talk about stuff so I can build up a library.” Tom nodded his head before getting up again “highlight anything I can do to help on the HUD use red, yellow, and green highlights depending on the importance.”
The fires were marked as the most important highlighted in red, Tom took a bucket lying on the ground before starting to run backwards and forward from a nearby lake. once the fires were under control to the point the natives could handle it. Tom then went about helping those under rubble, and so on.
Tom didn’t remember falling asleep he was running out like a madman trying to help until he fell asleep against a cart. he didn’t really process what he did until waking up to have a bunch of wolf xenos looking at him from a distance.
All that Tom could mutter was “Dam they really do look like wolves.” Their fur was all sorts of mostly greys and brown, but it did drift into light blues and black. They had claws and sharp teeth and dressed mostly like medieval Europeans if they had fluffy tails.
“Knight, I got some basic translation going, I will work on it as I gather more information.” The program spoke. With that, Tom got up and some of the natives took a step back. “Hey there, don’t worry I’m not going to hurt you I guess the guys that destroyed my ship did this to you?” he held his hands up to emphasize the point.
“Ship?” a nervous voice spoke, it was the girl he pulled out of the fire, she was looking a lot better and likely had time to wash off all that soot of her blueish-greyish fur. “Yes, my ship. It sailed between the stars, I was the only survivor.” The girl took a step closer all of them still looked nervous and worried, but they seemed smart enough to understand what he meant since there were a few gasps.
“Who are you? How can you talk to us?”
Tom smiled under his helmet he liked this part of his job he was glad it didn’t lose its appeal even after the tragedy of the Thunder child. With a proud voice, he spoke “My name is Thomas Jones, I’m a knight of the Coalition, trained and sworn to protect its people and its ideals. To be the best the human race has to offer. I’m the shield that protects and the sword that strikes down evil.” He bowed to the aliens; Tom loved doing that to humans, but it got ten times better now he was doing it to something else. “And for your second question, my amour is doing it, if it took my helmet off, I don’t think it would work, wait can I even breathe the air here?”
The Xenos looked at each other, Tom didn’t know how much they understood but they seemed to relax he noted there were a few that looked like guards their weapons were slowly sheaved now they knew he wasn’t a threat. To answer his question his suit's HUD popped up a message saying the air was breathable.
“Welcome sir knight, did the gods send you?” The female asked as an older-looking male came up to join her. Tom assumed he was older his fur was white and grey but in a way that seemed from age. “I don’t know your Gods.” Tom shook his head, but he carried on trying to be respectful “I don’t know if they sent me or allowed me to survive to help, I never believed in any but I’m not going to tell you what to believe, that’s for you to work out. Please just don’t start worshipping me.”
The older one seemed to be happy with that answer “Thank you sir knight for rescuing my daughter Rhea and my citizens, please it’s one of our customs to show your face when you enter a settlement if it's covered, please do so if you can.”
Tom nodded and gestured to the crowd, “I can but you won’t be able to understand me till I put it back on. You all don’t have translation implants.” He took a deep breath before breaking the seal and removing it before looking at the one he must save now knowing she was called Rhea then back to the elder.
They both looked shocked, relieved, and intrigued at the same time. he didn’t mind the strange looks he would be the same. To them, someone with pale skin and ‘brown fur’ only covering the top of the head would look completely alien and Tom was the alien here. “Sir knight,” the elder said, “you look not like us or the sky demons, yet you claim you from the skies.” Tom nodded before putting his helmet back on.
“You may know more about them than me, all I see of them is a laser, a bright light hit my ship on my way down.” The village elder as Tom was referring to him in his head spoke once more seeming to understand his lack of knowledge. “we only know they come to kill and enslave, this time they came to kill, I don’t know why they spared so many of us.”
“I can't say either, anyway, it looks like I’m stuck here with no knowledge of this world. I’m willing to help to do what I can, but I would expect to be looked after. I have no food and the armour can only recycle so much water.”
The elder looked to Tom “You saved my daughter. I would have provided what we could, but I would be a fool to not accept such an offer at a time we need it the most.” Tom liked this guy “Good to hear, so how do your people agree to a deal? Mine hold hands and move them up and down, we call this a handshake.”
The elder held out his hand a bit uncertain “We can shake hands as you call it” and with that they did.