Chapter 1: So It Begins

The air stank with the smell of smoke. He could also smell something burning, something vaguely familiar…..

He opened his eyes and shot up to a sitting just as he realized what it was he could smell. Flesh, burning flesh.

He stood up, muscles groaning in protest as he did so. As he finally stood up, his eyes widened at what he saw before him.

The Galaxy troop transport they had been riding in was now just a giant wreckage of fire and metal. He gave himself a once-over and was surprised to find that his gray and black form-fitting uniform with red highlights that covered him from head to toe only had a couple of scorch marks.

He was also glad to find that his TX-1 Repeater pistol was still safely holstered at his side. Taking it out of it's holster, he looked it over, admiring the gray outlining in the center of the pistol, separating the black top and brown bottom of the pistol.

Just as he finished looking over it and making sure it still worked, he spied his prized TSAR- 42 sniper rifle lying by a couple of bushes. The moonlight reflected of the gray, metal stock, handle, and barrel, making the black body of the rifle seem darker than ever. After jogging over and picking up his beloved rifle and assuring himself that it was not damaged in any way, he slung it over his back and took a look at his surroundings.

They had apparently crashed in the middle of a clearing in a rather large and green forest. The clearing was heavy with smoke and the sniper could only see a couple yards in front of where he was.

Strange," He thought, I thought Esamir had no forests.

Looking up, his eyes widened at what he saw. The bright, full moon that he had become accustomed to on Auraxis was not there. Instead there was a moon that had a rough crescent, shape. What made his eyes become as big a plates was that the moon seemed to have been broken and next to the crescent shape one could see several chunks of the moon that seem to have been broken off.

Okay then, He said in his mind, drawing out those two words. I think it's safe to say I'm not on Auraxis anymore

While thinking this, he sat down cross legged, and tried to piece together what had happened.

"We were... We were sent to help the Terran Republic 5th Battalion take the Eisa Southern Camp from the Vanu Sovereignty, on the three way border between us, them, and the New Conglomerate. On the way there something.. something happened. I think some NC Light Assault troopers jet packed on top of the Galaxy, they… somehow brought a MAX with them. They came in and started shooting. We shot back. The pilot was yelling "Incoming!" There, there was this… this green glow and then, we crashed, here…. Wherever the hell "here" is.

Just as he came to this conclusion, the now identified Terran Infiltrator heard footsteps off to his right. Acting on the instinct that had saved him from rebirthing too soon so many times, he used his Nanite Stealth technology and cloaked, dived into the nearest bush at the edge of the forest, uncloaked, and peered out of the bush, to see what had made those footsteps.

After a couple seconds of waiting, a man came into his field of vision. He wore simple sand-colored pants with numerous pockets and turtleneck long sleeve shirt with a gray combat vest over the shirt. What set him apart from a regular civilian, however, was his armor.

An open-faced, blue helmet with yellow outlines sat on top of his head, also sporting a night black visor that obscured the top part of his face. What part of the man's face he could, he saw tan skin with a rounded chin, sporting a rather average nose with a small frown.

On each of the man's shoulders sat a hexagonal-shaped blue and yellow shoulder plate. He wore a similarly colored chest plate that sat tightly on his torso, gleaming in the moon light. On his knees the Infiltrator spotted rectangular blue and yellow knee pads that had to be an inch and a half thick. To top it off he had similarly colored greaves that came from his ankles to the top of his calves. What really caught his eye, however, was the jetpack that covered the top part of his back.

An NC Light Assault , He thought grimly as he glared at the man from the bush he was hiding in.

Well, his train of thought taking a slightly more jovial tone, Better make this quick He mused as he finished taking his rifle out and centering the sight on the head NC Light Assault, who was looking at something to his right.

Just as he was about to pull the trigger, The TR Infiltrator heard a low growl behind him. Turning, the Infiltrator laid eyes on a beast that should only have existed in a nightmare.

It was bear, a giant bear, easily a story high, with fur as black as night. There were many of what appeared to be spikes made of bone on it's back, judging by pale white color of them. Still, what really was the part that was terrifying was the similarly bone-like mask on it's face. There were two glowing blood red eyes that peered out of two holes in the mask with the same colored lines that seemed to come from the eye hole.

And this terrifying creature is inches from my face, The Infiltrator thought with fear. Afraid to make too much movement, he slowly stood up and backed out of the bush and into the clearing, the beast growling while following him, showing off sharp white teeth.

His right hand slowly moved to his sidearm as he continued to back into the clearing so. Just as his hand closed around his TX-1, the giant bear-like creature leaped at the infiltrator, roaring as it did so.

The Infiltrator tried to pull his pistol out, falling to the ground, his left arm up in a pathetic attempt to protect himself from the creature. Suddenly, there was a burst of gunfire to his left, and the beast fell to the ground dead, three bullet holes in it's head.

Turning, pistol in hand, the Infiltrator saw the same soldier that he was about kill, standing there, his 3 foot long assault rifle slung casually over his shoulder.

The Light Assault trooper walked over, and after a moment of the staring, hesitantly held out his left hand to help the Infiltrator up while his right clutched the assault rifle, which he knew was a Razor-G5. After eyeing both the gun and the hand warily for the a second, the Infiltrator holstered his pistol, took the proffered hand, and hoisted himself up.

"Thanks," He began uncertainly, "I thought I was dead there"

"No problem," The Light Assault replied, "The name's Eric, by the way, Eric Red"

"Jaxon Long," The now identified Jaxon said. After a moment of awkward silence, Jaxon tried to start a conversation by saying," So Eric, any idea where we are? Or what that thing was?"

Shaking his head, Eric replied,"Nope, not in the slightest. But it's probably safe to say we're not on Auraxis anymore." Sharing that sentiment, Jaxon gave a short nod before jerking his head up and looking to their right, where the crash site was.

"What is it?" Eric asked. Holding a finger to his lips, the universal signal to be quiet, Jaxon halfway crouched and started slowing moving forward, motioning Eric to do the same. Complying, Eric dropped into the same half-crouch and started to move forward as well, couple of feet behind Jaxon with his gun in hand.

After moving closer to the crash site, the smoke from before having long since dissipated, they could see the main body of the Galaxy seemed to be shaking, they heard what sounded like metal tearing and after a couple more shakes, it grew still before a big blue armored being burst out of the wreckage like a chick bursting out of it's shell.

"Kade!" Eric cried out, a smile breaking out on his face as he ran towards the giant figure to help him out. Jaxon remained a couple yards back eyeing the now-named Kade warily. After helping the hulking Kade out of the wreckage, Jaxon finally got to look him over from head to toe, and he remembered exactly why MAXes, for that was the name for figures armored in this way, were so feared on the battlefield.

The figure before him was covered from head to toe in blue armor with yellow outlines. In the few gaps that there were in the armor, one could see what looked like mechanical servos and gears, especially where the joints were. The helmet he wore was just as armored as the rest of him, with an emotionless orange visor for him to see out of. All the armor plates had to be at least 2 inches thick, and the even more armored feet topped it off by giving the figure a imposing 7 foot height.

And if that wasn't scary enough, attached to his right arm, was what appeared to be a giant cannon, at least 4 feet tall. The barrel was gray, and the rest of the body of it was covered by the now commonly seen blue and yellow armor. Attached to was the right arm was an equally large and armored machine gun with three barrels.

After greeting Eric, the hulking blue armored Kade finally saw Jaxon and after staring at him for a second, span up his machine gun and pointed the triple barrels straight at Jaxon.

"Well, well, well, look what we have here," Kade said jeeringly, his voice having a slight echo to it due to the armored mask he wore, "A lost Infiltrator, all on his own. Not so tough when you can't cower in the shadows now are ya?"

"Kade," Eric said loudly, sounding annoyed, "Don't shoot him, I just saved his ass a couple minutes ago and believe me, we're going to need all the help we can get to survive."

"Saved him? Why the hell did you save him? And what did you save him from?" Kade replied, sounding incredulous.

"Show him," Jaxon said, interrupting the conversation. Nodding in agreement, Eric started walking towards the bearlike creature's corpse, gesturing for Kade to follow him as he did so.

"Show me? Show me what?" Kade asked, wondering what it was.

"It's what Eric saved me from." Jaxon replied trailing Eric, a couple feet to his left. Fully curious now, Kade followed them, his machine gun still trained on Jaxon.

Upon arriving at corpse of the creature, Kade took a half step back, his eyes no doubt wide under the orange visor of his helmet. He then voiced the question that each of them had thought when they first laid their eyes upon the beast.

"What the hell is that?"

"No idea," Eric replied to Kade's outburst "But, when I first saw it, it was about to make Jaxon here," Eric continued gesturing to the Infiltrator with his thumb,"A new suit out of his own skin so I shot it right between the eyes and down it went"

"The forest," Jaxon started, bringing the other two's eyes on him,"Is probably crawling with these things and we're probably going to need as much firepower we can get if we want to get out of here."

"Where is here anyway?" Kade asked,"I thought we were on Easmir."

"Kade, we're not on Auraxis anymore." Eric said, pointing to the cracked moon as he spoke. Looking at the moon, Kade took another step back and after a moment of silence he asked, in a quiet voice,"Well then…..where are we? And how'd we get here?"

"I think I can help with that last part." Came a voice behind Kade them. Turning swiftly, Kade looked at the figure that stood before them.

Dun, Dun ,Dunnnnnnn

Sooo, Yeah, That's my first chapter of my first fic. I know we've mainly been doing introductions here, but the action will start in start in Chapter 2!Review! Tell me what I've been doing good with. Tell what I need to work on. All advice is welcome!