The pod’s initial drop was jarring. Alar could barely keep his teeth from rattling as they plummeted, clearing Mach 20 in less than an instant. He kept his eyes open but tightened his jaw, nervous but not wanting to miss a second of what was happening. Their trainings had stated that descent to the planet would take just under five minutes, and that the first minute or so would be the roughest before their braking mechanisms and boosters slowed their descent effectively. He looked over towards the screens that showed their descent and relayed visuals from their exterior cameras. The portion of the planet he could see was an immense stretch of mountains that curved around the area to the west and north, with lush greenery visible even from this height to the south, and an expanse of plains and desert towards the center, with a large ocean further to the east. Alar tried to focus on the place where they would attempt to land, south of the mountains where he knew was the area’s largest population center, when an alarm began blaring out around him. He immediately knew what it was, and had honestly half expected it to happen, though that didn’t make it any less shocking.

COMM RELAY ERROR. The same female voice that had provided the countdown mere minutes prior while they were still inside the main ship stated. NAVIGATION ERROR. TRAJECTORY UNSTABLE. It spoke again. Alar’s eyes shot towards the man at the front of the pod, closest to the screens, as he quickly tapped and swiped at the screens and systems in front of him. They had expected potential issues upon entry given the problems that the drones experienced, so the man at the controls, their "drop pod operator", was already inputting commands that would presumably allow him to override the automatic guidance system. COMM RELAY ERROR. The voice repeated. Alar looked to the screens around him, noticing that the feeds to outside began looking distorted and blinking in and out.

The pod began to vibrate, but whether it was a natural component of their descent or a result of the errors and human navigator, Alar could not say. Alarms still blaring, the operator began speaking frantically into his visor, clearly attempting to communicate with the other pods around him. All of the pods had multiple different layers and forms of receivers and broadcast signals, even including archaic short range radio communication for emergency messaging between the pods themselves, but even that appeared to be malfunctioning, and the operator seemed to become more and more frustrated as they descended.

NAVIGATION ERROR. TRAJECTORY UNSTABLE. Alar heard the voice say yet again, but as he did he noticed something else. Immediately after the alarms began, it felt like his body was tingling slightly, or that there was almost a slight current running from his chest to his extremities, but he had subconsciously dismissed it as a component of his shock or fear. Now however, he began noticing the sensation in earnest. He panicked slightly as he did, not understanding the cause. Was the ship leaking fumes? Did it release some sort of sedative gas to calm passengers during emergencies? Alar thought these things to himself in an instant, but neither of those options made sense, and didn’t properly describe what he was feeling. It felt like the density of this sensation increased with every breath, with this unknown phenomenon originating in his chest and filtering up to his head, legs and arms simultaneously, it felt almost as though he had a second pulse, or maybe this was his pulse? He didn’t know. But it felt like a foreign energy had entered his system, was circling his chest, and then permeating itself into every fiber of his body. His panic didn’t increase, however, as after his initial shock, he had a near visceral instinct that this sensation wasn’t bad or harmful. It was almost like his body instinctively knew how to respond to it and reacted accordingly, and like his veins were drinking the sensation up like roots drawing from rich soil, welcoming it without hesitation, as if this energy was not foreign at all but something his body had always been meant to receive, something almost essential. Alar breathed out slowly, his panic virtually gone, and his nerves miraculously at almost complete ease. He looked around him, the other members of the crew and his security team clearly not experiencing the same calming effect of whatever was happening, as he noticed most people had their eyes squeezed tightly shut, with many of them trembling from either nerves or the pressure of the G forces of their descent.

The drop pod continued plummeting, the operator apparently no longer attempting to contact anyone else and focusing entirely on the operation of the vehicle. He had engaged their boosters and the atmosphere had slowed their descent significantly, but “slowed” was a relative term given that they were still traveling at around Mach 5. The camera feeds were still pixelated, with the screens blacking out every few seconds, but Alar could see more clearly what they were headed towards.

The “city” that they were aiming to land on the outskirts of was more than a city, it was more like a sprawling metropolis, with structures and buildings fanning out what seemed like indefinitely. There was definitely a central hub of sorts, where the buildings were clearly much larger and more dense, with smaller towns or groupings of buildings spreading out until they reached the edge of the mountains to the west and north. The main capital was flanked by a river on its eastern side, with multiple bridges crossing over it to the smaller cities and plains continuing eastward. The “capital” or what Alar assumed would be considered the capital, was filled with dark angular buildings with sharp black and grey points protruding skyward.

He was attempting to make out additional details when he suddenly felt the pod shake, and a wave of.. something.. washed over him and everyone else. It felt cold and foreign, like the air itself had hostile intentions as whatever it was passed through the pod and out the other side. Then, in less than an instant the wave of energy seemed to tear back and catch the pod, ripping at it like it was a fish on a hook with an intensity that snapped his head back and forth with the sudden movement. People around him began shouting, the sudden change in direction shocking everyone. The pod still descended but it seemed like it was being pulled on a string as it did, falling diagonally, directly towards the center of the city. The drop pod operator started yelling again, attempting to establish contact with someone or report what was happening, his hands flying from screen to screen as he attempted to right course, but their electronics seemed to be going haywire, and the screens around them blinked in and out for a few seconds before going black completely. The alarms ceased, and the female voice over the speakers went completely silent. The only sounds now were the wind and atmosphere as it rushed past the pod, its occupants completely blind to the outside world as they felt themselves continue to fall downwards and to the side. The operator fruitlessly attempted to push at the screens for a few seconds longer, before he sat back for a second, hesitating. Given their trajectory and what he could see of the outside world before their feeds had failed, Alar knew they had only a few dozen seconds before they crashed into the ground below. The operator seemed to be thinking the same thing, and after his brief pause, he turned back towards the group behind him, most still screaming or shouting unintelligibly. Speaking to no one in particular, he shouted over the other voices.

“I am going to engage the emergency thrusters, hang on!”

He had a basic understanding of the drop pods and the technology behind them. With the speeds they were travelling at, parachutes or similar emergency mechanisms were pointless, but all of the pods did have emergency overrides that directly engaged the thrusters, bypassing most of the electronic commands and interfacing directly with the chemical fuel sources of the thrusters themselves. This was extremely dangerous, as there was almost no means to steer or modify their flight path after engaging them, but they had no other options at this point. The operator turned to his right, jamming his hand into a slot in the wall of the pod and gripping a large red handle, he pulled hard, the handle disengaging from the wall. Immediately Alar felt the pod waver as the thrusters whirred to life, the chemicals within activating and the pod beginning to tilt dangerously, now being pushed and pulled in three different directions as it fell. Without any visuals, he did not know if they were upside down, or what direction they were falling, but the operator seemed to have some means of seeing outside, as he had lifted his visor and was peering into a small glass hole near the handle with one eye.

“BRACE FOR IMPACT” he shouted, and Alar tensed his body automatically before he felt the base of pod clip something outside and begin spinning, adding a now fourth direction to their descent. It spun for a second before he felt another impact against the side of the pod, this one harder and shaking the entire structure. At this point he lost any sense of himself or his direction, and a half a dozen impacts occurred in the span of half a second, the collisions rocking the pod and sending the occupants back and forth in their seats, violently tossing and spinning before a loud scraping of metal on earth and rock sounded through the cabin, their spinning finally halted as they slammed into the ground.

He blinked a few times and breathed in and out rapidly, in a shocked daze and partially surprised to still be in one piece. He looked around the pod at the other occupants, most in a similar state as his own, but others appeared to be unconscious from either the shock of the landing or the impact itself. Alar began removing his restraints, careful as he did to position himself to not land on any of the other passengers, as the pod had landed on its side. He unclipped his weapon from the rack above his seat, where it had been secured for the descent, and slung it over his back as he made his way forward. The operator, also apparently unscathed, had already removed his restraints and was climbing towards the exit ramp, finding yet another red handle which he pulled to release the door. Vacuum seals sounded out one by one as the door slowly opened, and Alar quickly reached up to touch and reposition his helmet and visor. The helmets had automatic detection mechanisms that would release a small face mask if the air was unbreathable, but as he did he noticed that no text or information was scrolling across the screen, and all of the electronics within it appeared to be disabled. Apparently whatever had effected the ship had effected their personal electronics as well. Alar knew that the planet was supposed to have a near identical atmosphere to earth, so he pulled off the useless helmet and visor and dropped it to the floor of the pod as he climbed towards the exit.

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Two other people closer to the pod’s exit ramp had already joined the operator by the time he had successfully extricated himself and made his way over, and so it was with this small group that Alar watched as the ramp door slowly lowered, or rather opened sideways, onto the world outside. The view was, honestly, unremarkable, with a mixture of dirt and rock that scattered from the impact being the only thing immediately visible aside from the sky above. The color of the sky was slightly different, but not by much. The blue of the sky had a slight teal hue to it, compared to the lighter blue of earth, apparently from the slight differences in atmospheric gases, but the clouds and other features felt entirely earth-like. The major difference, however, was the giant star, or second sun, that appeared in the distance behind and to the side of the sun he was accustomed to seeing. He had seen it from the ship, but it was a different effect when looking at it from the ground. It was far enough away where it apparently did not significantly impact seasons, but it remained visible throughout the day and night, similar in brightness to a full moon that existed at all times.

He stood staring out for a few seconds before his attention came back to the situation before him. He had been momentarily distracted, but quickly refocused and started stepping out of the entryway and onto the surface, following the three others who had already began making their way outside. As he stepped gingerly through the sidelong pod door and through the large chunks of rock and dirt that had been displaced from their landing, he could not help but notice that his body felt… good. Really good. He had just crashed into the ground and been slammed, spun and twisted as he had dropped in near free fall from orbit, but he didn’t feel like it. He felt like he had just gotten a full night’s sleep, and his muscles felt like they had been recharged rather than strained. Every breath he took felt clean and refreshing, like he had just finished a light workout rather than surviving a catastrophic landing. His muscles felt loose, his mind clear, and even the soreness he had expected in his joints and back was entirely absent. It was bizarre, but he didn’t have time to think about it.

He took another step forward, his boots pressing into the loose dirt and rock of the impact site, and surveyed his surroundings. The rest of the pod’s occupants were slowly making their way out, some groaning from the crash while others were clutching their heads or testing their limbs for injuries. The drop pod itself was tilted on its side, half-buried into the side of a large hill, with deep furrows trailing behind it from where it had skidded and bounced. Steam and smoke curled faintly from the thrusters, and pieces of debris from their descent were scattered across the area behind them. Looking around, it appeared that they were next to what could best be described as a small village, with farmland and fields interspersed between small stone houses, with thatched roofs and chimneys in disuse given the mild spring-like temperatures. The village was in stark contrast to the skyline behind it, however, with large black and grey buildings, towers and walls juxtaposing themselves against the scenery in front of him.

He made his way towards the three men that had exited with him. They all were moving gingerly, clearly still affected by the landing, and all three were focused towards a grouping of a half dozen homes or structures that were to their north-west. Looking in that direction, Alar saw three horses and riders approaching them.

“Do not engage!” one of the men in blue in the group instructed him and the others.

Not like we could anyways. Alar thought to himself. But he did not respond out loud, and let his gun remain hanging at his back. The weapon he had was a coil-gun, meaning it used electro-magnetic coils to push and accelerate the bullet through the chamber. Given that all of their electronics had failed thus far, and that the gun was quite literally powered by electricity, Alar doubted that he could “engage” even if he wanted to. He didn’t say any of this however, and continued to observe the riders approaching them.

The lead rider appeared human, was broad shouldered and was wearing leather clothing and fur that was thicker in the chest and shoulders, clearly a form of armor, and carried a short spear in his hand that was not holding the reigns. The rider immediately behind him, a woman, had similar armor and held no weapon, but he could see the outline of a curved sword bouncing in the hilt at her side. Both rode with a confidence and deliberateness that told Alar that they had approached the unknown many times before, and neither appeared to be particularly shocked by their presence. This surprised Alar, as everything he had seen so far, including their weapons, clothing and appearance, was exactly as they had planned and expected before their descent. Pre-industrial, humanoid, medieval technology. It all lined up. So, to show absolutely no hesitation or outward signs of caution or alarm at the sight of multiple people exiting a spacecraft after falling from the sky made absolutely no sense. The mere existence of human flight should be foreign to them. So why did they seem so unbothered? This coupled with the sensation he had felt as the pod had been pulled sideways during their descent, and the intent he knew he had felt as it was happening, made his hair stand on end. Something was off, and this planet was far more complicated than they had assumed.

This feeling was partially corroborated by the third rider, also male, with a long flowing cloak and hood that was pushed back behind his head as he rode. He was older, with a grey black beard, and seemed, of the three, the most hesitant. He wore no visible weapon, but he had a certain air about him that kept Alar’s focus as they approached. He seemed to radiate something, and Alar felt an innate relationship to whatever this new sensation was that seemed to be affecting his body and this man. Not in a literal sense, Alar could also tell that he was not the source of whatever this was, but more like he naturally knew that whatever was within him was influenced by this man’s presence more substantively than others.

The three arrived in front of them a few moments later. By now, a few others had exited the pod, or were lingering at the ramp, clearly hesitant to move further given their newfound company. The man who had “commanded” Alar and the others a few moments prior, stepped forward and raised his hands in what he clearly intended to be a gesture of surrender. The lead rider stopped a few paces from him and looked down at him, his eyes tracing his blue suit and drifting slowly towards the pod and the other occupants. After a few seconds, he spoke, and the words that came out of his mouth were, unsurprisingly, incomprehensible. His voice was deep, and the language itself was rough mixture of consonants and sharp edges, with a choppy rhythm that blended in his chest. It was unlike any language he had ever heard before. He looked down at the man, their apparent leader, expectantly for a moment, waiting for a reaction.

“I… uh.. apologize but.. I can’t understand you” he said, and Alar wanted to shove his palm into his forehead as he did. Telling him you can’t understand him in a language he doesn’t understand was absolutely pointless, in Alar’s opinion. The large man scowled slightly before turning to the women at his right, speaking a few more of the thick biting syllables before she shook her head in response. Next, he turned to the older cloaked man who had stopped just behind them, and with a nod the older man nudged his horse forward and in between his two companions. The cloaked man looked around at everyone standing below him, his eyes lingering on Alar for half an instant longer than anyone else, before he reached down toward the flank of his horse and pulled out a large wooden staff. He looked side to side before speaking, the staff now raised in front of him just above his shoulder.

The man spoke a single word, and while Alar did not know the meaning of it, he could tell that the man’s intention with it was to soothe or calm those in front of him before he did whatever it was he was about to do.

It kind of looks like something a wizard would carry. He thought to himself, the thought beginning as sarcastic, but shaping into realization in the instant before it finalized. Like he had just awakened from a dream, everything suddenly clicked into place in the split second it took him to complete the thought. The anomalies, the heat signatures, the ship getting pulled and twisted in flight, the man in front of him wearing a cloak and pointing a staff, it all coalesced into a realization so sudden that Alar had trouble keeping up with his own mind.

“No fucking way” he whispered to himself, and at that same moment a pulse of energy emanated from the staff and washed over Alar and everyone else. It felt almost cooling, like the air itself had materialized for the briefest of seconds, and whatever had been sent from the staff entered his body before he had time to react. He felt whatever it was pushing at his mind and senses, like it was trying to permeate his soul. He had the briefest of seconds where he felt like he could push back. Like this new energy that was inside him could be used as a countermeasure against whatever was happening, though he had no idea how. Whatever it was though, didn’t feel hostile, and didn’t have the same terrifying intent as the wave of energy he had felt grab the ship. For this reason, and having no time to even consider alternatives, Alar relaxed and allowed whatever it was to affect him. As he did, he felt like his mind was enveloped in a cloud of mist for a moment, his senses temporarily altered and muted before the sensation passed in the next breath. Having apparently closed his eyes during this process, Alar opened them, blinking a few times, trying to make sense of what just occurred. He looked around for a brief moment, noticing as he did that the other members of the crew had reacted similarly, but no one seemed to be injured, only dazed. He then looked up at the cloaked man, who he was surprised to see was staring directly at him with a quizzical look on his face. Their eyes met, and the man hesitated, but before he could react further, the larger man spoke a word, that might have been a name, that drew the older man’s attention. Shaking his head slightly the man seemed to have recovered from his momentary distraction, and he looked out towards those standing below him.

“Ah, yes, well then, can you all understand me?” he said.