First Contact Fallout by Aer-ki Jyr (novels for teenagers .TXT) 📗

8

Mario’topa sat in the damaged gunship, which was barely able to hover due to losing all but one of its gravity drives, but half its weaponry still worked, as did its sensors. He’d sent Yenni off in the transport to pick up Lenna and Ben’ra, so he was hovering down into the canopy slightly and doing his best to blend in with the terrain as he kept watch. Jo’ra was dead, having been killed defending the Era’tran against far too many opponents and being unable to reposition. Defending immobile people was far harder than fighting on the run, and Mario’topa didn’t fault him. He hadn’t really stood a chance.

He’d been 835,022 years old, and the others were no younger. This war was taking away experienced troops more than anything, and doing so in such worthless fashion. Jo’ra didn’t do anything worth his death, for he couldn’t have stopped the attack, and had Mario’topa been in his place he wouldn’t have run and abandoned the Era’tran either. It was such a wasteful situation that it caused him to hate the Zak’de’ron even more, for ultimately they were responsible for all of this.

No, that wasn’t fair. The Elder Council had started this war. Eldorat was Zak’de’ron, but he wasn’t one of them. Over the past 200 years no other Essence users had entered the fighting, making it abundantly clear he had been a rogue allied with an extra-galactic power just as he’d said. Mario’topa wondered if the Zak’de’ron would have struck first once they knew Mak’to’ran was gone. It was possible they would have, and having gotten the first decisive attack in the war would have been to their advantage rather than the V’kit’no’sat’s, but still there was the possibility that there would have been no war and both would be fighting the Hadarak. Now it was a moot point, and there was no way to know what could or would have happened otherwise.

He still blamed the Zak’de’ron. He always would. And the more they killed the more his hate grew, but if Mak’to’ran said to stop fighting he would. The V’kit’no’sat desperately needed his guidance, and from everything he’d seen thus far Mak’to’ran had fully recovered. That was impossible, yet here he was, combat capable and with his memories intact. Sol’an couldn’t explain it either, and right now both were talking and eating up the dead drop foodstuffs to replace the tissue the Kich’a’kat had carved out of their bodies to regrow their wounds.

There hadn’t been enough of Jo’ra left to heal. His chest cavity had been hollowed out by weaponsfire to the point where his armor could not heal him. His heart had not been wounded, but destroyed, so there was nothing left to regrow. Fortunately Sol’an had been salvageable, along with her arm which had been reattached, but right now both Era’tran were famished and telekinetically flying food into their large mouths at a rapid pace.

Mario’topa would continue to guard them until the others came back, and right now there was no one out here in the skies to bother them. The planetary shield overhead was still up, and the nearest enemy installations were more than 1000 miles away. That was too close, but they didn’t appear to be interested in what had happened here. Or maybe they didn’t have any ships left to send. He assumed a signal had been sent out when this group started to fight, or at least when they began to lose, but there were no more transmissions coming from the jungle, so he waited and watched to see if their luck was going to run out again.

“There are still blank spots where we regrew tissue,” Sol’an said, using her halo to lightly scan Mak’to’ran’s brain. Somehow it had survived the fighting without taking any damage. “You must have some memory loss from it, but the rest of your brain is as if it was never damaged. I cannot explain it. I should have shot you long ago.”

Mak’to’ran huffed, but did not stop the flying train of food cubes from arcing up into his mouth. It paused every time he chewed and swallowed, and Sol’an should have been doing the same, but the mystery before her had taken priority after the first few canisters had been emptied.

I do not believe that is what did it, he said telepathically as he continued to eat. The resistance in my brain melted away from the bottom up. The shots merely woke me.

“Replay the memory for me, as much as you can,” she insisted, knowing that such things were highly inaccurate, especially after battle and severe wounds, but she needed something to work with.

Mak’to’ran paused his chewing as he tried to remember back. Most of it was a blur, but he remembered the resistance in his mind like a great wall that would not bend to his push. It annoyed him so much he had flung himself at it, then…

Mak’to’ran’s body twitched as he felt something inside him snap again, then everything went weak as he fell to the ground.

“What did you do?” she demanded, scanning him again but not being able to find anything biologically wrong.

Mak’to’ran pushed himself to his feet with an odd look in his eye, ignoring her question and lifting one of the empty foodstuff canisters telepathically. Sol’an could see it begin to crush slightly in his grip, then a moment later it snapped into a smashed rod with such ferocity that she began to reevaluate his Lachka strength.

The canister/rod dropped to the ground, as did Mak’to’ran, but he stopped at his knees with his tail flexed out straight behind him for counter balance as he breathed heavily, but his oxygen levels were constant. There was no physical strain, yet he was acting as if there was.

“You saw my execution, yes?” he finally asked.

“I saw the recording of it. Everyone in the