War is Hell... Especially Away From Earth (me and Felixia_Luna)

As the sounds of the cannons rained down on the battlefield past where the sight of the many strange creatures were fighting for their lives. But below all that on one of the artiliary hilltops came a small sound, the sound of a match that would only be barely heard by one as he lifted it to a nice cigar that he had gained from the ambassadors of the other race they fought alongside. Humans had entered a technological golden age... after a near lapse into WWIII a new source of fuel was discovered that was clean burning and ended up helping push many countries out of dark ages and pushed america forward. Thanks to it we managed to get to the moon faster and soon discovered many other things, including another race in a neighboring solar system. They were reptillian, not having had the meteor that ours had so reptiles prospered and became what would be considered an anthromorphic version of a human but then again to them we were just a mammalian version of them.

It had taken a while but the two races had decided for peace and things were working on a shaky surface until the Swarm arrived. This new race was insectoid yet it posessed strange qualities yet to be explained by either side. They were scrawny creatures for the most part but they had many breeds... they posessed strange beak like faces with long antenna atop their head that almost looked like tenticles and the number of them seemed odd as well since there were well over a dozen. Their arms were two sets, the tops would vary from different things like crushing apendages to slicing while the bottoms seemed to be hands that allowed for strange bio weaponry to be held. Their bodies were covered in hard armor that needed special rounds to shoot through.

"Damn buggers" came the voice from behind the cigar as he waved the match out looking out at the battlefield with stern green eyes that were a brilliant forest green yet were hardened by many years in the field. He had the traditional haircut you see on sargents, almost completely gone on the sides and a flat top, though the bottoms were graying a bit from the dark brown that he had. His face was almost like that of a god, strongly built but he always had this unhappy lookon his face as he moved down the line inspecting the troops as they fired the batteries, holding his personalized assault rifle in his right hand which was ungloved unlike his left which had been horribly burned thanks to one of the buggers acidic weapons having burned much of his flesh off.

He had scars, many of them but most were not seen except for a scar on his cheek. Turning his armor made little noise, being close to that which you would see on a modern day soldier instead though he wore no helmet and his body was not carryign bags or anything but was covered with a strange alloy metal that was still in the testing stages. It was a bit bigger, but nothing that seemed to hinder his movement as he walked back and forth "refocus artilitar....." he was cut off as he heard a srange noise "MOVE NOW!" he yelled moving away from the batteries as suddenly a massive lump of movign flesh crashed and the buggers came pouring from the crash "Mortar guns... fuck" he said as he got up blasting at the buggers but it was too late, 2 guns were already gone and the crew for four were dead. "FUCK, MEN FIRE, DON'T BACK DOWN!" he yelled as he opened fire on the buggers, though while most bullets made it through the fuckers were resilliant. He swore as some were going for him and he tried to fight back but found himself backed into a corner, so with his last few bullets he fired and took out the ammo cash blowing up the buggers to hell... and sending him into a world of black as some junk came wizzing at him.

It was many hours when he would awaken, the sound of battle far in the distance as he tried to regain himself, the world blurry and spinning as he groaned. He had dropped his cigar long ago as his gun was in pieces and his right arm was broken as it lay under one of the cannon barrels that had landed on him. He growled a bit "Shit" he said as he reached around to try and pull it free when he heard something coming toward him. Grabbing his pistol he pulled it out to face the incoming noise.

"Easy there, human..." Can a female voice, with a slight lilting quality to it. Tracia emerged from the blasted forest next to him, her pole arm over her shoulder and she walked up to him. Her boots crunched the splattered parts of both human and Swarm origin. "Look's like you boys had some fun." She said, wiping her boot off on some clean crash before crouching down next to him, offering out her hand. She grabbed his wrist and hauled him up, ignoring his cry of pain. She then motioned behind her and the rest of her unit walked up, grimacing at the human who played dead. They snorted and moved out, heading toward the sounds of battle. "That was a good idea to play dead, bet you guys only killed a couple with that technique." She laughed at him and started after her squad, although at a slower pace so the human could keep up. "That's what happens when you softies are thrown into a fight."

"Your luckyu you aren't in my unit... I would sock a man who tried to say that... fuck no" he growled at her "I was knocked out... how else you think I get these scars, by sitting under a bush praying they don't find me?" he was pissed at them yet grateful. He groaned as he tried to collect himself as he was still a bit disporiented from the explosion and his right arm was still broken. He picked up a gun of a comrade as he gave them a small silent farewell. He would remember every man and bring back word to their wives when he could. He walked in pace with her and he said "So what is the situation of the fight?"

She shrugged and gave a feral grin. "No clue, we just arrived on planet. Though the Swarm is supposed to be in retreat. Looks like you guys were the last hit before they started to withdraw. Lucky for you, eh?" She swung her weapon around and chopped through a tree in a single swing. The tree stood upright for a brief second before crashing down behind them, pulping a couple bodies. "Now it's our turn to bash some of those bug to dust." She giggled and walked a little faster. "How are your injuries, human?" Her belt contained a med-kit, but she doubted the treatments would effect him the same way it affected her.

"just an almost dead arm... I have two" he said as he continued to walk, getting out his own small medkit. Now while it would not fix the bone he injected himself with a syringe as he felt the pain dull, he would not be able to move it until he got to a medic but that would not stop him from fighting. "I see... and it is nice that your race chose after the fighting to come... anyway.." he grabbed a radio off a dead body as he began to signal, trying all frequencies as he was trying to reach one of the many bases on the planet before he stopped after the constant static... 'This is not right..." he looked to her "You got in contact with our command before landing correct? because if so we have a problem now..." he looked at her "none of the nearby bases are responding... not even a signal that tells that the base has fallen"

Her face scrunched up in concentration and she shook her head." We landed blind, but from what the reports in our transport said that the bugs were beaten and we are just a mop up force." She called ahead to the others through her com-bead and was rewarded with a burst of static. "What the feth...." She tried more frequencies and ran ahead, her weapon ready. "Come in! What the hell are you guys playing at? Respond!" She growled and smashed a fist into a tree. "Looks like they jammed us. Smart fethers.." She shook her head and went back to the human. "As far as we know now....it's only us." She frowned. "I hope the others are ok....I still am owned some drinks from them."

He however stopped and he said "Their... their brains must have gotten to the bases..." he looked around as she was trying to contact the rest of her squad as he said "They are already dead... we have to assume that" he looked over at her as he held his rifle a bit odd because of him only having one working arm "Because if we assume we are safe right now..." he paused as he said "We need to keep moving, if we can make it to one of the bases and see what the situation is we can call for help from either of our forces.

"We have to head to one of your bases then, we only set up a couple, and those are a hemisphere away." She hissed in frustration and decided she might as well follow the human. If she wanted to get into a fight, you head to where they are clustered. "How could a base fall that quickly? Surely you humans know how to build a base, right?" Her tongue flicked out and tasted the air, not tasting anything but death and nature. With her tail swishing behind her, she followed after the man. "So what do they call you?"

"I am Sargent Lance Stewart..." he told her "and the only way we could be overrun this quickly is if they have hives already set up.... they must have started setting things up before they landed" he said as he walked forward his rifle at the ready "I admit it was a stupid thing to miss but this planet it full of metals which make underground scans very unreliable"

She spit onto the grass and cursed the bugs cowardice. "They used a similar trick on us a few years ago....lost a planet almost over night." She sighed and shook her head softly, her lavender hair brushing over her shoulder guards. " Luckily we already had another armada heading there, and the survivors got off a message." She giggled ominously, "And we flattened all of our bases, built anew." She looked toward the sky and started to jog as she noticed the sun slowly starting to set. "We had better find a place fit for the night...."

"yeah" he said as he looked around "normally I would say find a big enough tree... the buggers don't seem to have a fully mobile neck like us and you don't see them climb too often... mostly dig... However with the infestation this big they surely have their flyers by now so we will need a cave... one with a solid bottom" he said as he pulled something from one of the many pockets on his uniform as he said "there is one justa few miles away if the intel is correct... but there is a chance we will fight a bugger or two to get there... the scanner isn't picking up any nearby lifesigns except us... meaning there is a good chance that there is one of them, only he is too far underground to see..."

She nodded to Lance and motioned for him to lead. "Go ahead and take point...I will watch the rear." She twirled her weapon in her hands and tasted the air again, no longer trusting just her eyes and ears completely. She felt her way forward slowly, searching for tremors under the earth.