I haven't added a chapter in a while, but hopefully I will start doing it more often now that I have extra time. If you like it or have a suggestion, leave a comment please.
The human encampment grew quickly. Just after a few months, they had established a few mining camps. Their initial landing site had stayed and been quickly fortified. We think they had seen some of the Omaticaya because they had constant surveillance on their perimeter. Once the second ship landed, the camp changed dramatically. Scientists arrived on that ship, and quickly set up labs and ventured into the forest on several occasions. Soon after the ship landed, a new leader on the ship took troops into the forest, as well as a few scientists. Mostly infantry, but a few armored suits, about the size of a small platoon.
"Sir, live feed from Hope indicates that soldiers are entering the forest and are on a course for our shuttle crash. Numbers are about ten suits, fifty soldiers, and ten unarmed civilians, probably scientists, " ARC said. It was the day the second ship landed and early in the morning, about 0730.
"Alert the others. Get them to the shuttle crash, " I said.
"Yes sir. "
I was at hometree, and I needed some help. "Ole'eyktan, humans are headed to our shuttle crash. If they find it, their weapons will become more powerful and we will no longer be a secret weapon. I would like to request thirty or forty of your warriors to protect the shuttle and drive away the humans. "
He thought about it and answered. "How long until they reach the shuttle?"
"Three or four hours. "
"Send whoever you need. "
"Thank you sir. " I rounded up three dozen warriors, including Tsu'tey. I needed him as another leader and to help organize the others. We ran to the shuttle crash, meeting up with the other six Atlantians there.
"Sir, ARC has tapped their suits. Their GPS says two hours until they arrive. " Paul said. The cloaking shield on the shuttle was still on, but if they crossed through the barrier they would see the crash immediately. We couldn't let the do that.
"Alright, we need to stop them before they reach the shuttle. We'll intercept them a few miles away from here. Bows and knives only, we can't give away that we're here. We'll all start from above them, and when they pass below we'll shoot them and then the Omaticaya will descend and attack them. Try to hit the suits in the first volley. Aim for the human inside of the cockpit. We don't have to kill them all, just chase them away. " Everyone agreed and we traveled to meet them.
We set up in four trees besides a path we predicted they would travel through, and waited. When they arrived, they found a footprint we had left behind on purpose. It was Omaticaya, and we knew the scientists would stop to examine it. I signalled to the others and began to count down. On zero, we all fired in unison. After the first volley, there was chaos amongst the soldiers below.
Only one of the suits were left, and about fifteen soldiers were lying dead. I signalled for a second final volley. The second volley killed four of the scientists and another twenty of the soldiers. The Omaticaya leaped down from the trees and attacked with their knives. It was a short fight, resulting in a full retreat from the humans. They had lost nine suits, four scientists, and about 40 soldiers. The remaining were running to their base. We had lost nobody, and our only injuries were a few glancing bullets, which we were able to quickly heal with some medipads from the shuttle.
"Thank you for helping us, Tsu'tey, " I said.
"Your welcome John, I just hope you weren't sighted. Right now, you are our best defense against the humans. " He replied.
"We'll be able to clean up here. You can go back to hometree now while we take care of everything here. " He nodded and left with the Omaticaya towards hometree.
After they left, I turned to the Atlantians. "Alright, let's get the human's weapons and bury them. After that we'll track them to make sure they don't try to loop around us. " They all agreed and we began to get everything useful we could from the humans. We got lots of weapons and several rations, but the most interesting thing was the masks all of the humans were wearing. They were breathing apparatuses, which meant that humans couldn't breathe this air. I looked in the bags of the scientists and found lots of samples. I knew that most of them had no special use, but a few of them were food or medicine. I left the bags and continued to scavenge. We put all of the supplies in the shuttle and dug a mass grave for the dead.
After all of that was done, we tracked the remaining humans and found that they had made it back to base. There were lots of people on the perimeter and a lot of commotion inside. We left confident our existence was still a secret, and arrived at hometree about 1830. After a quick chat with Ole'eyktan, we went upstairs to our area and watched the human encampment from Hope satellite feed.