The Silver Giant

Chapter 1

Freefall

Well…this was quite strange.

Hoplon Captain Ulrich Valschika was not unused to the unforeseen. He had been a soldier for thirty five years in life, and more than six hundred in death. Together, all of his experience had taught him an important lesson – you cannot always anticipate the enemy, no matter how much you knew about them.

But this was not a mere battlefield surprise; it was a surprise…period. One minute he’d been assisting the 151st Phalanx division in battle against the Babylonian onslaught, the next…he was falling through the atmosphere of a terran planet, when he had just been on a volcanic one.

Not that he was particularly worried. A Hoplon’s multi-ton Chorite armor was built to withstand atmospheric entry speeds after being dropped from orbit and hitting the ground without slowing down, and he was falling from a significantly lower height than this world’s stratosphere, let alone the exosphere. The most he would get from the impact would be a dent or two in his armor, which would quickly be repaired by the nanites in his blood.

So no, he was not particularly worried about his own situation. He was, however, worried about two things. First and foremost was the fate of Melchior’s garrison and what would become of them without his assistance. When he had suddenly appeared here, the Babylonians were very close to breaking through, and reinforcements were still quite a ways out. He was not sure how long they would be able to last without him.

Second, he was worried that someone might be living in that house he was rocketing towards…

Two thousand feet…

Ulrich calmly flipped himself upright so that he was falling boots-first and not headfirst.

Twelve hundred feet…

The house was much easier to see now, and he could see it in perfect detail without having to zoom in as much. There were scores of animals of all types surrounding it, all of them completely oblivious to the several ton hulk of armor hurtling towards them. Odd, why were so many of them clustered around that little hut? There didn’t seem to be any form of fence to keep them in.

Five hundred feet…

In unison, the animals all looked up at the silver meteor about to land amongst them. Ulrich blinked in surprise as horror clearly registered on their faces. Maybe they weren’t animals. Could they be the sentient species of this planet?

Two hundred feet…

The creatures (Ulrich couldn’t safely call them animals now) frantically scattered from the clearing, heading into the forest. But no one seemed to stir from the house.

Impact…

The Hoplon felt layer after layer of wood shatter under his immense weight with as much resistance as jell-o would give against a freight train. Several parts of the house hit his helmet, only to splinter in spectacular fashion from the sheer speed at which he was going.

Good thing the house only had one floor…

The stone floor cracked and shattered within the space of a second as several tons of weight were added to the large, metal, legged object atop it. The iron stove, however, was no match for tons of Chorite, the same metal used for the hulls of Destroyers – eighty kilometer long warships. The dark, primitive metal immediately caved and flattened like a pancake under the combined weight of wood and Hoplon alike, slamming into the stone floor and worsening the already grave damage done to the foundations of the house.

When it was all said and done, the wall and most of the roof were gone. All that remained of the room was a floor forcibly turned into cobblestone, a mass of iron, Chorite, and wood, and an absolutely flabbergasted rabbit standing in front of where the stove (and the meal he had been cooking) stood only a second earlier. He still held the spatula in one paw, though the end of it had completely snapped off.

Where the wall to the kitchen had once been, there was now empty space, showing a once-calm living room and a yellow creature with a pink-ish mane standing (and quivering with fear) as she looked at the thing that had just crashed into her house.

The pile of rubble began to move.

Fluttershy saw only a silver, metallic, faceless monster with glowing blue eyes. She saw a creature larger and more powerful than any she had seen before. She saw a monster that looked to her with blind fury, ready to crush her in those giant, metal paws it had.

Captain Ulrich saw an almost comically afraid, obviously at least somewhat sentient, horse with a color scheme the likes of which he had never seen on an equinoid creature. He saw a creature that, if his scans were accurate, was seconds away from fainting outright.

Angel…well, he was in too much shock to see anything. He was still staring blankly at where his meal-in-progress had been a moment ago, ignoring the now useless spatula in his paw, the fact that his chef’s hat had completely deflated, or that his apron had torn in two from the shockwave.

Then, exactly as Ulrich predicted, Fluttershy gave a gasp and collapsed…

After making sure his external speakers were offline, Ulrich gave a sigh. This was not the first time an alien had such a reaction to him. Hell, some humans reacted the same way, particularly the ones from the Frontier Edge. He doubted that very many of them had seen more concentrated firepower than a few dozen Regiments of Corpsmen. It did get tiring after a while, though. It was hard to get anything done when the person you wanted to talk to was out cold.

In a situation like this, where he needed to know what was going on, where he was, how he had gotten here, etc, unconscious locals made it all the more difficult.

As he got up, he had the omni-sensor in his helmet scan both aliens. They seemed just fine, though in shock. He guessed that the small, white one would come too in a few moments. Still, it was a good thing he had only damaged the structure and not its occupants.

The Hoplon stood and took a step forward, seeking to get out of the pile of metal and wood he had created. The moment his boot struck the ground, there was a sound akin to shattering glass.

Ulrich looked down, lifting up his foot. The stone floor where he had stepped was completely pulverized. The tons of force put on it caused it to sink into the general shape of a giant boot. The mass of iron he had his other foot on began to groan and warp, causing him to slowly become lopsided.

Right. Primitive planet means primitive building materials.

The Graviton Generator in the chest of his armor began to hum quietly as it lessened the force of gravity around him. The mass of metal on the floor ceased to warp, and while the stone seemed to grumble as Ulrich stepped on it once again, it did not break.

Confident that he could walk around without causing greater damage than he already had (though that would be a feat to accomplish, now that he took a good look at his surroundings), the cyborg began walking past the small, white alien and towards the one that had passed out. As he did, his omni-sensor gave a pulse, a much stronger one than what was used to scan the two aliens. In only point-zero-seven seconds, he had a complete map of nearly every object –living or otherwise- for almost a mile in every direction.

The cyborg’s mind churned in the time it took for him to reach the alien. To a normal person, the short walk would have taken only a few seconds, not enough to really think of anything. But Ulrich’s cybernetic mind worked at the pace of a supercomputer.

Thus far, the planet itself showed no particularly unusual characteristics…but the creatures here, in addition to his method of arrival, made no sense at all. Instant, controlled travel on an interstellar scale (which he had, without a doubt, accomplished) was only possible via Jumpgate. Yet Jumpgates were massive contraptions, each nearly the size of Akeridai’s moon, so it was not likely that one had been hiding on Melchior’s surface.

Excluding Jumpgates left only one option: a Null Gate – naturally occurring, wormhole-like phenomena. But they could not form on a planet’s surface, and lasted no shorter than a day when they happened to appear, taking nearly as long just to show up. Ulrich’s sub-sensor, however, could sense no disturbances that suggested the presence of a Null Gate. Even if one ignored that, however, what were the chances that only Ulrich would be pulled through? Null Gates were typically even larger than Jumpgates! A good portion of the entire planet would have been yanked here, not just one individual.

The indigenous creatures were only a minor point of thought. Equinoids were rare, but not unheard of. Ulrich could name a couple off the top of his head, without even delving into his memory files. Even if the coloring was a bit off, this one could be a mutant, or perhaps the colors symbolized something. Since it was apparently sentient, they could even be artificial. As for the wings…though, to date, no equinoid species had been discovered that possessed wings, it was not as though it was an impossibility, though Ulrich found them rather pointless. The alien was far too heavy for wings of its size to provide enough lift for flight. They were most likely vestigial.

Of course, that did not explain how an equinoid of similar height, weight, and wingspan was capable flying towards the half-demolished house in a clearly controlled fashion…

Well, perhaps the indigenous creatures were a bit more than a minor point…

Deciding that he might look just a bit unfriendly if the soon-to-be new arrival walked in and saw him tending to the unconscious one, Ulrich just stood off to the side of the living room, the only room not damaged by his rather destructive landing, purposely keeping himself in clear view of anyone that happened to casually look in.

No sense startling the locals more than need be, right?

The second equinoid was getting closer. The display inset on the cyborg’s retinas helpfully calculated its range and speed, as well as marking it and calculating the ideal fire control settings for the reflex rifle at his hip. With an annoyed grunt, Ulrich dismissed the last part from the display.

Suddenly, an irregularity pinged on Ulrich’s proximity sensors. Even with his extremely quick thinking, all he noticed before it clicked was three things: that the irregularity was missing from the room where he had landed, that it was now attached to his right gauntlet, and that he was raising his gauntlet to look at it.

The small, white, furry alien was hanging from his index finger by the teeth, glaring and growling warningly at him, though it looked and sounded completely unthreatening.

At this, the old cyborg gave an amused smile, though it went unseen. He did wish that the locals weren’t so utterly afraid of him, didn’t he?

Of course, the angry reaction wasn’t even slightly more help. He needed to hear them talking. That’s the only way he could even hope to start analyzing and translating whatever language the dominant species spoke on this planet. As the incoming sensor ping approached, the Hoplon increased the power to his omni-sensor. Ulrich took note of the unusually artificial-looking topography nearby, likely a small settlement. He stored that information away for later.

If he couldn’t make progress with the new alien, the settlement would be plan B.

At that moment, a shouting voice floated in through the hole in the ceiling.

“Fluttershy? Hello? You alright in there?”

In the second it took for the equinoid to speak those words, Ulrich had rebooted his audio pickups three times, run five diagnostics on them, and had his nanites check and re-check his flesh-ears. How on Akeridai…? This was impossible!

An alien…not just any alien, but an alien from a previously unknown race, had just spoken in perfectly clear Corinthian Standard! How was that possible? Ulrich took another scan of all three aliens and ran it through his database.

Nothing. There was no record of any equinoid like them. They had not been encountered before.

This made absolutely no sense. The odds of even a single aspect of any language matching another were low, let alone sounding exactly alike! How could an alien speak the language of a race that-

Ulrich set the thought aside. As groundbreaking as the revelation was, he could look into it at a later time. For now, he focused on the equinoid as it touched down just outside the room and began looking in.

Just as his omni-sensor had shown, the alien was of similar mass and size as the unconscious one. She also possessed wings that were apparently capable of fully-fledged flight, an impossibility. Nor was this the only aspect of her that did not add up.

The cyborg reset his retinas and helmet eyepieces twice to make sure he was seeing this right. The equinoid had cyan fur – odd, but not utterly shocking – and…a rainbow mane?

A rainbow…why on Akeridai would an equine have a rainbow-colored mane? If his scans were correct, there were no artificial dyes or chemicals present, either. That was its natural color.

Ulrich chalked it up to the steadily growing list of ‘items that do not add up’. He would take care of that list in time, but for now there was the alien to deal with. She was walking into the living room. How she could do so without noticing the massive cyborg in front of her was beyond Ulrich. He would think that the growling alien on his hand (the thing was persistent, he’d give it that much) would be enough to clue her in.

“Geez,” she intoned softly – again in perfect Corinthian Standard – as she looked around the devastated house and gingerly stepped over various pieces of rubble. “Whatever hit this place must’ve been a real-”

The equinoid froze. Ulrich wasn’t sure if it was the persistent little alien, the groan that the floor underneath him decided to make at that moment, or something else that grabbed her attention. Whatever it was, though, it certainly had it – complete and undivided.

The alien’s eyes were wide, and she had stopped moving so suddenly that her multicolored hair drifted over her face. She moved very, very slowly, her gaze turning first to Ulrich’s massive, silver boots, then slowly going up…and up…and up…

“…doozy,” she finished weakly.

The equinoid opened her mouth again. From the biometrics that his omni-sensor was feeding to him, the Captain was certain it wasn’t to say “hi”. Whatever she was going to say, she never said it. The alien started, wings flaring out slightly, as though she had just realized something.

Swiveling wildly, the equine’s head turned to her fellow, still lying on the floor, then to the alien still hanging from Ulrich’s finger, then to his helmet. She then repeated the process before turning slowly to face him again. Her eyes narrowed fiercely as she did so, and she lowered herself to the ground, like she was about to pounce.

Which was, of course, exactly what she was going to do…

The equine alien flew off the ground with surprising speed, hooves outstretched.

His surprise changed to mild shock when she struck his chest. He reset the surface sensors of his armor several times, convinced they were malfunctioning.

They were not malfunctioning. That little alien had just hit him with enough force to knock out any unarmored human. Had it not been for his armor, inertial dampener, and stabilizer nodes, Ulrich was certain he would be unconscious at the moment, likely with a concussion and whiplash damage as well.

He would need to keep an eye on this one…

As she fell from his chestplate and back to the ground, sitting on her haunches and wringing her front hooves and repeating “ow” over and over again, he realized it would be more for her good than his. However much oomph this little alien could put out, she was more likely to seriously injure herself than even put a scratch on his armor.

Well, that should be enough to put out her brave-but-stupid act. Now he could-

Before the Hoplon could even open his mouth, the alien flew back up with surprising speed, fluttering around him and striking different sides of his armor. She wasn’t testing him either. That would have been the smart thing to do – trying to find a weak point or seam in his armor, though it would not have worked. No, she was just striking and pushing him as hard as possible. It was obvious that she viewed him as a dire threat to the unconscious equine.

He wasn’t sure whether to say she was valiantly brave, incredibly loyal, or hopelessly stupid. Perhaps it was a combination of the three.

This was getting nowhere.

Ulrich decided it would be best to immobilize the alien. Then he could talk to her and actually be listened to. Incapacitating her would not be difficult; doing so non-permanently would be the hard part. Hoplons were designed for lethality, for being one-man-armies, for being living tanks.

They were neither built for diplomacy or any type of operation that did not involve the copious use of guns…very, very big guns.

This was going to be extremely difficult.

Grabbing her out of the air was too dangerous. At the speed she was zipping around him, a sudden stop from something as large as a Hoplon’s gauntlet was quite possibly lethal. He could wait for her to tire, but (if her current adrenaline levels alone were anything to go by) that was not likely to happen soon. He didn’t have time for this!

It needed to be quick, but as non-lethal as possible. That left just one option…

The cyborg mentally triggered a subroutine, activating his energy shield in a point-two-six second pulse.

Before she even had a chance to yelp, the equinoid was launched away from Ulrich head over hooves, hitting the wall in front of him with a loud smack. Even before she sloughed off the wall and onto the floor, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that she was completely unconscious.

Ulrich very nearly gave in to the temptation to clap a gauntlet to his faceplate.

Well, at least he hadn’t killed her…