Harry kept his emotions to himself as he marched a step behind Captain Pitt, at the front of their makeshift formation. They were entering a place he had long-since memorized- the briefing room. A large hologram was already set up in the dim room, throwing light across the long table it sat upon, partially revealing the faces of the government officers present.

A man standing nearest to the wall opposite the doors, his back to a large projected screen of a rainforest-like environment, seemed rather annoyed at their entrance.

"Captain Pitt and company, glad you could make it to the party."

Harry saw his Captain's shoulders tighten minutely, but the man did not let the officer know his own emotions, rather choosing to step aside and introduce his 'company'. "These are the pilots that accepted the mission, Mister Zale. From the back to the front, we have Danielle Swarcova, Grant Ergon, Jack Shanely, Meredith Henderson, and my commander, Harrison Elner."

The man- Zale- waved his hand carelessly towards the empty chairs farthest from him, and the squadron sat silently, miffed at being addressed so rudely. "Nice to meet you and all that. The admiral wants to start testing and training for you all as soon as we can, so this briefing has to be quick. There is not a lot of information known about Pandora- I assume you know the planet's name? Anyway, this screen behind me will hold the few pictures we managed to get of the landscape and creatures before it was destroyed." Zale moved off to the side of the projector, letting everyone in the room see the slow slideshow of pictures more clearly. Harry admired the flora and fauna obviously native to Pandora. It was truly beautiful, the plants reaching sizes even he had never seen from his many centuries of life. The Earth no longer held much of nature, so a lot of the people at the table had expressions of amazement. It was understandable though, for even his pilots to break their cold exteriors, as the plants were glowing with brilliant, fluorescent colors.

Harry's eyes widened minutely when he finally got past his awe of the gorgeous plant life and spotted a blue face peering down at the camera from a branch in one of the humungous healthy trees. The picture faded away as he contemplated it, but the small memory was easy to bring back to the forefront of his mind using Occlumency. He had mastered the mind arts some decades ago in order to properly store all of his memories. They had gotten unbearably messy over the many years he was alive.

The creature had small specs of light dotting it's skin while darker strips of blue ran across it's face in no apparent order. Comparing its looks to the men and women around him, Harry decided it had a feline resemblance, with a squished nose, large luminescent eyes, and cat-like ears.

Turning his focus back to the projected screen, Harry's eyebrows rose in surprise at the animals shown on the screen. An odd blue and green monkeyesque creature with four arms and two legs swung from a tree in the still-frame captured by the camera, a huge elephant kind of thing with the head of a hammerhead shark was grazing in another, and odd six-legged horses stampeded in yet another photo. It was the final creature that Harry determined had destroyed the robot, as there were several pictures of it getting closer to the machine and a last one lunging with it's jaws open wide. The animal resembles a tiger in shape, but it had no fur and was completely gray. Large antenna spread from its head in six different directions, and its teeth were uniquely black.

"As you have hopefully deduced, it was the large black cat creature that destroyed our rover, so stay clear of their kind. Unfortunately, we had not been able to get any pictures of the sentient species, but our cameras did spy several crude arrows and nicks in the bark of decaying trees. So it is known that they exist."

Harry felt a little annoyed that the muggles were obviously not interested in knowing more about life on other planets, but this was also an operation focused solely on harvesting as much unobtainium as possible, as quickly as possible. Finding unobtainium when the Earth was quickly being depleted of its own supply was very important to the governments of several large countries in an attempt to forestall public pandemonium.

Harry sat back and crossed his arms as the rude man continued his lecture on the animals of Pandora, of how the air was toxic to humans, that security and safety of the unobtainium would be top priority, and all the other scientist jargon that navy fighter pilots apparently could understand.

"Commander Elner, a word." Turning from the line his fighter pilots were marching in as they made their way to an awaiting jet, Harry nodded to the concerned Captain clutching his duffel bag in a tight grip behind him. "I don't know what will happen once we get to the facility, but I have one last order for you, should I be called elsewhere-"

Harry shook his head with a frown, knowing what was playing in his Captain's mind. "With all due respect, Captain, the likelihood of your post being retracted is minimal."

The burly man pursed his lips as his shoulders sagged. Harry could see the weight of sorrow taking hold in Pitt's eyes. "No one knows what's going to happen, Harry. We're the best fighter pilots this world has ever seen, but I'm not the one who trained you all. Everyone who knows anything about our squadron knows you are the undisputed leader. Keep them safe, will you? If something happened to me, I'd at least know my second family was safe," the Captain sighed.

Shocked, Harry took a step back, his green eyes wide in disbelief. "Sir-"

"No." Pitt clapped Harry on his shoulder with his free hand, giving a tight squeeze before letting go. "You're the best damn pilot I've ever even heard of. You keep your squadron safe- and that's an order, solider."

Standing at attention with the address, Harry saluted with a crisp 'yes, sir'. No matter how mad he was at his Captain for giving up hope, how hard he clenched his jaw, denying a harsh truth that may not even come to pass, nothing would allow Harry to do anything other than accept the order given by his superior with so many officers watching them.

Before Pitt could even utter so much as a 'by-your-leave', the old wizard turned back to his squadron and prepared to board the jet set on taking him and his men to an international training facility where they would reside in the months preceding their trip to Pandora.