Why Humans Make Bad Pets!

I am xeno King Arthur IV

The first ric (30 minutes) after landing was uneventful. The dropship had been blown somewhat off course and had landed 2 bortos (4 kilometers) from where the rest of the ships had landed. Manthlel wasn't eager to fight though, and the problem was, everyone knew it. Manthlel was a plital. A coward. He should have been dead. His old squad had been completely annihilated when a Vulza, which no one had known was in the battle, had suddenly descended upon the battle that Manthlel's squad and the Dominion had thought was a victory in their favor. The appearance of the Vulza turned that around. Within a single ric (30 minutes) the Dominions forces had been in full retreat. Manthlel's squad had been gladly following those orders when the Vulza had decided upon his squad as its next target. Their commander, Crimol, had told his squad to fight and hold as long as possible so that others could get away. Manthlel had taken one look at the creature, and then he had run. Run away from the screams of his friends. Run from the Crimol's curses. Run from his duty. He hated himself.

What was worse, he had lived to tell the tale. The Dominion was losing, although it didn't want to admit it, and was desperate for trained soldiers. Manthlel had been reassigned to a new squad to fill up some of the holes in the paperwork, but Manthlel knew it was a good as a death sentence. The men of his new squad hated him, just as he did himself, and he knew that if he ever got in trouble, he wouldn't be able to count on any help from his team.

Fate, it seemed, didn't care about Manthlel's wishes. After a short time jogging, Trxcl's encountered their first enemy squad. It was an ambush. One moment they were jogging towards where they could see pulse-gun fire, the next they were surrounded on all sides, confused and dazed as enemies appeared where only churned dirt had been before. There wasn't a Vulza with them, however, as though Manthlel's squad could have missed one of those and so Manthlel, perhaps not calmly, but steadily, aimed his gun and fired, concentrating his fire on one opponent at a time as he had been trained, trying to wear down his enemies personal shield. Manthlel never got the chance to finish. A blur of brown, whitish-orange, and glowing red flew towards the enemy with which Manthlel had been engaged. The blur shot passed the unfortunate soldier, who immediately stopped firing, which confused Manthlel, until he realized that the soldier had a glowing hole in his gut, left by a Fusion Scythe.

+*Human?*+

It was Human. Manthlel forgot about the enemy. Forgetting to keep his jaw connected for the second time that day as he watched in awe as the short, bipedal creature moved with the speed and deadly grace Manthlel had only ever seen in a Vulza. Human seemed just about as deadly. Jumping from one enemy to the other, he stabbed, sliced, and chopped his way through the ambush which would most likely would have cost Trxcl half his men if it weren't for the intervention. Only after a third of their men were dead did the rest of the members of the ambush even realize that they were quickly taking casualties. All fire turned against Human. Nearly all of them missed, and the few that did hit were absorbed harmlessly by his combat-harness. How would they have hit something like that anyway? He changed directions so suddenly and with such precision that the only way to hit him was to shoot all around him and then some.

The enemy squad was dead in perhaps a ri (1 minute). The surviving squad was silent for about that long as well. Manthlel found himself silently laughing as he remembered his promised to protect Human in this upcoming battle. Human had probably just saved his life, and it was only the first conflict of the battle.

"Well." Trxcl spoke slowly into the silence. "I don't know what your new bunkmate's on, Manthlel, but I'll have some of whatever he's having."

This battle was intense. Not in the same way my previous alien battles had gone. Those had actually contained more action than any of the fights I was finding down here. No, it was intense because they just kept coming. I'd kill off one group - my squad was basically just letting me do my thing at this point - rest for about half a minute, then run into another enemy squad. I was exhausted. My jumps were a mere three meters now, and were significantly slower. During the last few skirmishes my squad had even managed to take care of a few enemies before I had been able to attend to them.

I found myself thinking these thoughts as I was wading my way through another enemy squadron. I was rudely interrupted when my personal shield gave out and I received a shot to my heart. The worst thing was, I had a bruise there, or maybe it was several. If you've ever gotten a bruise after someone punched you, you'll know how much those things smart. If you've ever been punched in that same bruise again, you know that the pain increases exponentially rather than linearly.

The pain focused me like nothing had that day, and I got a whole new burst of adrenaline. I was really starting to rely on that so that I could just feel normal. I hacked the head off of the offending alien, whipping my sword around to s***h the legs off of another xeno behind me. He fell on top of me, which was rude, but at least that gave me something to throw at one of his companions that was a little further than I wanted to run. Really, if it wasn't for the fact that I was in a battle, I probably would have been pretty bored. I took a few more hits, which hurt, but I got through that squad just fine with only a little help from my friends. Hey, at least they were good for something.

Manthlel had been worried Human's personal shield for the past few ris (few minutes). It had taken quite a few hits despite his blinding speed, and it wouldn't hold out forever. Just as he had feared, during the middle of another skirmish, Human's shield took one too many hits too fast. It collapsed, and a final shot found its way through the chaos Human had created in the enemy's midst and hit him in the upper chest.

+f**k, and here I had thought I might get through this battle unscathed. You fought beyond belief, little Human. You won't be forgotten+

Manthlel hiked his gun back into position and continued firing. That's when he noticed that Human wasn't dead. He was in fact, very much alive.

+*But, his shield went down! I saw it fail! Didn't I?*+

As Manthlel watched, Human was hit once again, but aside from momentarily causing him to stumble, it seemed to have no more effect on him than it would have against a Vulza.

+*What is this creatur- f**k! Not again!*+ His jaw was really getting on his nerves today. Trxcl was shaking his head, muttering something about "what he's having". Cresh, one of the three heavies in the squad, hiked his anti-tank gun on his shoulder and blew out a long breath. "I don't know what hellhole he came from, but Human fights like a Vulza, just smaller."

"And fewer teeth." Piped in Yicka, the squad grenadier.

"And fewer scal-" Rekt, another heavy, was cut short as the object of their jests suddenly decided to remind them of the reason it deserved their respect.

I admit it. I had said that the battle was getting bored. Why I ever let such an i***t statement into my head I have no idea, but I paid for it dearly.

Dragons are real. Check that. Space dragons are real, and they're every bit as terrifying as they are in the stories.

I guess I'd better specify which stories. Not the Inheritance Cycle, because dragons aren't magical and don't talk inside your head. Not Game of Thrones, because these dragons actually show up. Not Dragon Tales, because . . . just . . . not Dragon Tales. We're talking the original dragons, like the dragon from King Arthur and the Dragon. The kind of dragon that's basically just a massive killing machine covered in scales stronger than steel. There's none of that wisdom or magic s**t. Just claws, teeth, and a whole lot of speed. And I was staring at one.

First of all I couldn't believe it. Here? In this world of fragile beings who were slow, weak, and couldn't make a serious ray-gun to save their life? Then I hoped it was like the rest of the life I had seen so far, until it jumped the 20 meters between it and our squad with the lithe grace of a pouncing tiger and in about half the time. I barely jumped out of the way, and I mean barely. When I landed I was covered in dirt thrown up by the dragon as its claws gauged massive grooves into the earth where I had been standing before. Another one of it's claws gouged the earth at one of my squad mates feet as well, except he hadn't had the foresight to jump out of the way like I had. s**t.