"Humanity is an unpredictable species.  They are devious and cunning, not to mention their brute force and insane determination; indeed, when provoked they attack with little to no regard for all and any life other than their own species, though they seem to be especially adept at killing each other.  In battle they do things only the mad and desperate would do, charging blindly into fire, dropping in using what are essentially large metal boxes and sacrificing many of themselves to save one man.  That is one admirable quality about them.  They seem to show loyalty and care for other members of their species somewhat, to an almost fanatical degree (see pg.1254 Syerig Massacre).  The worst position to catch a human in is when they are backed into a corner.  They completely ignore the fact that the only way they will survive is if they surrender and resolve to “Take as many of us with them”.  They take the smallest of chances (see pg. 321 Boarding Tactics) and act as though they have already won, never giving up and never faltering.  All in all, they are a very irrational, destructive species yet some how they continue to exist."     - An extract from the Antalyian species book, The Enemy from the Stars.  

Arrival

Twilight looked down at Spike, the purple dragon curled up in his basket (cot? bed?).  He’d slept in again.  ‘Spike, time to get up,’ she said lightly, shaking him a bit to rouse the baby dragon from his sleep.  ‘Huh, what?’ he said before realising it was morning.  ‘Oh right, yeah, just a sec.’ He jumped up and stretched himself.  ‘I was having the best dream before you woke me you know…’

Twilight rolled her eyes.  ‘I’m sorry if I interrupted you,’ she stated slightly sarcastically, ‘but we’ve got work to do.  Don’t forget we have to write letters, daily, to the princess about friendship.’

‘You mean you’ve got to write a letter, well, come up with one at least,’ he said remembering that he was the one who would physically write it.  Twilight looked at him, ‘Come on Spike, I still need you.  Who else is going to help me carry these books to Rarity’s?’  She said gesturing to a pile of books in the corner of the room.   At the mention of Rarity’s name, Spike stacked all the books (there were a few dozen of them) in his arms and rushed down the stairs, followed by a loud crash and Spike calling out, ‘I’m okay!’  Twilight giggled to herself before following him down the stairs.  Spike had the books already piled in the back of a red cart and stood impatiently by the door.  ‘Come on Twilight, Rarity’s probably waiting for us!’

‘But Spike, neither of us have had breakfast ye-’ she was cut off as Spike pushed her out the door.  ‘No time Twilight!’  Spike slammed the door behind him and with that they left for the Carousel Boutique.

As they neared Rarity’s house, Twilight looked up to see a distant object flying by, leaving a white trail behind it.  It was too far to exact details, and the fact that it left behind a white trail of what looked like clouds was odd, but she remembered that the Wonderbolts left clouds behind (albeit darker versions) so she dismissed it as somepony just going about their daily business.  They knocked on the door which opened almost immediately by a sleep deprived rarity who ushered them in.  ‘Come in, come in!  Would you like anything, tea, biscuits?’ she said, quite quickly with an air of exhaustion about it.  

‘Actually some diamo-,’ Spike was interrupted by Twilight as she kneed him and gave him the ‘don’t-you-realise-she’s-tired-you-shouldn’t-make-requests’ look, then he replied with the ‘but-I’m-hungry-and-I-haven’t-eaten-breakfast’ look followed by Twilight finally ending the ‘look-versation’ with a ‘That’s-your-fault-now-you’ll-just-have-to-wait’ look.

‘No I think we’ll be fine.  We just ate,’ said Twilight.  Rarity had almost drifted off, but she composed herself and moved on to the task at hand.  She went over to the cart and picked up a few of the books, a relieved smile forming on her face, the kind soldiers and Duke of Edinburgh participants usually get at the end of an expedition.  ‘I can’t thank you enough Twilight, I’ve been looking for these books everywhere!  I needed designs from Mare-golia after a customer requested it.'

‘No problem Rarity, you would do the same for me after all.’  Now that Twilight looked about she realised just how messy the room was.  All kinds of fabric were spread out across areas in the room, mannequins turned over, failed designs torn up and thrown in the general direction of the bin leaving litter everywhere.  If the bags under her eyes weren’t testament to her working through the night, this was more than enough proof.  They should probably leave so Rarity could get on with her work, she thought.  ‘Uh, well it was nice visiting Rarity, but, um, we have work to do, you know what with the princess and friendship.’ She pushed Spike out door while at the same time facing Rarity who was too tired to actually realise what was going on.  ‘I’ll see you later rarity!’

‘Huh, wha-? Oh yes, Twilight, of course.  Bye now,’ she replied,  almost nodding off yet again.

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‘23% oxygen, 76% nitrogen and 1% non-specified,’ Second lieutenant Banna read aloud.  He looked up from the data pad he was holding to the room full of soldiers, all sitting in rows.  It wasn’t a very remarkable room, with grey walls, grey ceiling and even grey carpet. ‘It’s full of vegetation, assorted fauna and animals, a planet ripe for colonisation.’  He switched on the projector using a remote he had stashed in his jumpsuit’s pocket.  The screen showed a lush green and blue planet (which was what most colonised worlds looked like) in real time.  The side that was being shown was bathed in the light of the sun, so no indication of intelligent life as of yet.  ‘This, men, is for want of a better word, CL-78/15000.’  The men groaned.  Banna smiled.  ‘Well, until the new governor can come up with another name that’s what we have to call it.’  Normally, the lieutenant would have been giving the speech, but the officer had ‘lost his head’ in one of the previous missions, leaving Banna to do all the work.  He changed slides to another real time video, but this one was of another ship.  It was relatively big, although its apparent lack of weaponry meant that it wasn’t meant for ship-to-ship combat.  It had just enough to deal with most types of pirates and fighters.  Along its side a hollow circle with a thick line penetrating at a 180 degree angle from left to right was visible.  The soldiers’ faces became solemn, and Banna was no exception.  ‘The Anteeists are here as well, as some of you probably guessed, and if we can successfully fight them off the planet, CL-78… ‘He switched back to the view of the planet and stared at it momentarily, ‘…will hopefully become our new home.’  The soldiers were all murmuring in approval, and the new recruits were actually happy that they would be getting to fight but he had no doubts that they would realise the truth very soon…

Most ships would have six to twelve observatory decks, depending on the use.  The GNS. Sanctum had 7, and Banna was currently standing on the seventh deck located on the lower bow overlooking the planet.  Laptops and computers were scattered about being worked by a multitude of technicians, however the edges of the deck were clear to allow observers an unobstructed view.  Night had now fallen, and in a few places, although they were faint artificial lights were clearly visible to the naked eye.

So there are sentient beings on the planet, Banna thought.  He turned to one of the technicians.  ‘Those are settlements, right?’ he said pointing at the planet below.

‘Yeah, they’re settlements alright. We have close-ups if you want to see them.’  Sure, what the hell.

‘Bring ‘em up.’ The technician typed a few commands in and a picture appeared showing a small town from a birds-eye view.  Figures were present in areas of the picture, no doubt the dominant species of the planet.  The resolution of the pictures wasn’t that good (such is the life of a civilisation in a desperate war).  Humans, hopefully, he thought.  Being humans themselves, human behaviour would be easy to predict, and persuading them to join them would be comparatively easy than with aliens.  There weren’t that many sentient alien species in the known galaxy, and a lot of them were quite different to humans, both physically and psychologically.  If they weren’t human he had no clue how they would react.  The one reassuring thought he had was that if they had any problems they could put the locals down so easily it was almost unfair, but with some diplomacy (and some shock and awe) it probably wouldn’t come to that.

‘GMT ANNOUNCEMENT – THE TIME IS 22:00.’  Was it really that late? Space was always confusing.  Time would feel really slow when in all actuality it was going quickly and vice versa.  He’d best get some rest then, after all it was going to be a pretty big day tomorrow.  He’d hate to see the unlucky officer who had to supervise the recon team, because they’d be spending the night on the planet by themselves.  Jeray turned away from the panel, something which the technician didn’t notice, leaving him to prattle on about the planets geography.  

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