>You click away at your keyboard, going over old sensor data. Worthless. Worthless. Orbiting asteroids have decent amounts of nickel, flag for review. Worthless. Literally a spec of dust that triggered the camera.
>"Anon to the conference room, Anon to the conference room."
>Sighing, you get up, cracking your back and stretching. Oh man, what the hell now? You know you just jumped into the system a couple hours ago, but why are they calling you up rather than just sending down whatever data they needed to be sorted through in a message?
>Whatever, you don't work OT and walking up there takes a good few minutes.
>You grab your tablet and set off through the halls, walking through the empty corridors, taking the long route around the hallway that Jeb Blaze still hasn't fixed the powered doors to, lazy prick.
>In retrospect, you probably should have expected a bunch of pricks like him when you found out that the ship's captain was very lenient on the whole "given name" thing.
>At least you don't have to worry about anyone stopping you along the way, with how understaffed the Private Exploration Ship "Watch This" is.
>Soon enough, you are outside the door and, taking a deep breath, you head through to the chime of the automatic door, Captain Jameson wheeling around in his seat with a wide grin on his face.
>Oh, no. 
>No, no, no, no, no.
>You don't know what's coming, but you know that it is zero good.
>"Well, hi, Anon, glad that you could come on such short notice."
>Someone's cheery today.
"Well, Captain, the data sorting can wait, it's not as if we have anything that needs probing right now. 
>"Well, about that... See, well, it isn't a problem precisely, but you should take a look in the shared folder."
>You pull the tablet out of your pocket and pop open the file browser, taking a look and, true to his word, there was a zipped folder containing a few files there, and popping them open.
>Whoa.
"This isn't a prank, right?"
>Honestly, you would be surprised if it wasn't.
>A planet, a life-bearing one with a breathable seeming atmosphere in the system had a big enough discovery reward on it for everyone on the crew to not have to work for a few decades at the very least. Plus, there had to be a reason why he called you up here rather than putting out a crew-wide announcement, after all.
>"Ah, no. Last folder in the zip, please."
>With a nod, you pop it open, taking a glance and...
>Okay, this is definitely a prank now.
>What are those magnetic field readings? Nothing is protecting this planet; the atmosphere should have been stripped long ago.
>Well, might as well play along. Still, that's a lot of data to fake, looking at the size of those files.
"Okay. Let's say we, a small private crew with no significant government backing, just discovered a scientifically significant anomaly. Why call me up?"
>"Well, you see, we wanted both a more solid look and to keep this a bit hushed, so we launched a probe or two. We lost contact with both of them, whatever's keeping the atmo in is doing a number on digital signals heading in. Congratulations, Anonymous, you've been promoted to head drone op. Your duties include going on-site to perform short-range samplings and scans."
>This is how you die. This is legit, and they're using you as a sacrificial lamb to test for murderous monsters.
>You chuckle and shake your head at your Captain.
"Alright, what's the team are you sending down with me?"
>"Daley as security with four combat drones, Viper as Jumper pilot, and, of course, yourself.
>That's actually a fucking A-team right there, other than you, at least. He definitely wouldn't just throw that away on a sacrificial op.
"I'm going to stop you right there, Cap. Why me?"
>There was a palpable silence as, for the first time, Jameson shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
>"Well, you see, nobody else got-"
"Their in atmosphere drone flight ticket."
>He glares at you but doesn't retort.
>"Yes. That."
>That wasn't actually a waste of three hundred, it seems.
"So, when do we start?"
>"Now."
"What? Team or not, I need more time to study the data!"
>"See, here's the thing: we want to get the initial in-atmo done before the rest of the crew finds out about this, we can go to the other planets first and say that you three are taking the Jumper for the day to examine something out for the day..."
"But you can't delay it forever."
>Why can't the rest of the crew be told, though? Something fishy is going on, and you have a feeling you're not being told the full story, but you also feel that you don't have a choice here.
>I mean, it is probably some fucking scheme to screw some of the shittier members of the team out of recognition, but you're on the A-team, so it is probably fine.
>You sigh, rolling your shoulders.
"Everything is in the shuttle already?"
>"Everything is in the shuttle already."
>Of course it is.
"Alright Cap, see you soon."
>You turn to leave, intent on the launch bay.
>"See you soon, Anon!"
>It is, once again, a reasonably short jaunt, and soon enough you're in the launch bay, the hatch to Jumper 03 down, although the lights are off. Subtle.
>You take a glance around for anybody else before heading in, the door immediately slamming shut behind you, lights flicking on a half-second later.
>"Operator."
>The pilot doesn't even bother spinning to face you, merely acknowledging you in a calm, level tone rendered slightly robotic by his helmet's speakers.
"Viper."
>Not a moment later you hear a toilet flush and out comes Daley from the head, rolling his shoulders as he shoots you a smile.
>"Ayyyyy, Nonsez! Head's free for you to get the suit on before we hit atmo! Viper's gauges will probably flip so we might have some turbulence."
>That gets an annoyed grunt from both Viper and yourself, but for massively different reasons.
>"Won't."
>"Oh, come on now. This is a whole new weird thing, Viper. It's only natur-
>"I said won't."
>You tune the two of them out as you grab a proper environmental suit in your size from a drawer, heading into a washroom and changing, trying to ignore the smell from the absolute bellend that knew you had to use this damn room.
>It takes a few minutes to slip into the damn thing and get it properly hugging your body, but at least it came all nice and shrink-wrapped, so you don't have to piss around with it too terribly much.
>You feel the craft shudder to life and take off under you as you finish up, hurriedly jumping out of the washroom and locking yourself into your seat.
>"Chill. Still twenty minutes out of atmo at half-light."
"Yeah, yeah, Viper. Just a bit of a case of the nerves."
>"Hmmph. If you're on the team, you're one of the best of the crew. Do your job, and you'll be fine."
>...Jameson probably didn't tell them why you were chosen.
>"Yeah, listen to the grump. Laser drones are stored in the bay; it'll be fine."
>Viper harumphed in response, and you just zoned out and started going over the environmental files as everyone else went about their jobs.
>Still, even if it doesn't give you the most information about the actual conditions ground side, every little bit helps.
>Entirely too soon, the ship starts shaking and, with a sigh, you put your tablet away and secure it.
>You're just glad you aren't in the savage days before inertial dampeners, at least.
>The descent was relatively smooth beyond the normal re-entry jitters, despite the flight instruments displaying all kinds of wild fluctuations, rocking back and forth between extremes moment to moment, rarely resting.
>The pilot's not even looking at them, though. 
>The rational part of your brain tells you that he's probably just got them projected on his helmet, but you can't shake the disconcerting thought that he might be flying by feel alone.
>Brr, because that's what you need to be thinking about right now.
>Still, despite your poor view, you can't help but sneak the occasional curious glance towards the horizon; it looked oh so familiar, in a way that caused butterflies to well up in your stomach.
>Five minutes later, and you were in the troposphere, flight rapidly levelling out at what looked to be three thousand meters over an alien analogue forest.
>"Hmm. Looks like the gauges fixed themselves."
>Yeah, that is indeed weird, maybe whatever's keeping the star from stripping the atmosphere is just at the upper levels?
>"Well, that's weird, Viper. Good catch. Note it down in the logs."
>"I'm flying. You do it."
>You see Daley huff a bit but pull out his tablet nonetheless.
>"By the way, no turbulence."
>That doesn't get a response from Daley, but you chuckle. Well, that gets you a glare, at least.
>"See a place that might be good to set down to launch the drone from. Forty clicks, north-northwest."
"Anything big moving down there?"
>"Funny. Heat readings show nada big."
>You don't know what's funny about that, really.
>Soon enough, you're descending gently, and you take a look to see a... circle free of tree-analogues, presumably due to the mostly flat stone outcropping below.
>Maybe this is the planet's analogue to the Canadian Shield? What little you've seen of it makes it look like that might be accurate.
>You cease forward movement with a soft whine as the engines change to vertical mode, gently setting you down the last thirty meters with just a slight thunk as metal impacts stone.
>"Alright, time to stop fucking about, Nonsez, you do your job, and I'll do mine, yeah?"
>Good to know that the guy could get serious when the situation called for it.
>You see his helmet's visor darken as he enters VR controls and hear the quiet clunk of several hatches on the bottom of the shuttle open and drop the combat drones, rapidly spreading out, if your tablet is to be trusted.
>Well, time to get to work.
>You take a deep breath to steady your nerves before pressing a button on your tablet to launch drone control before darkening your visor.
>All is black for a few moments until reality slowly fades in around you, not from your own perspective, but from the camera of the DSD-6, inside of its top-mounted launch bay. Without further thought, you press the holographic start key, the drone taking off into the air and hovering. It takes a few moments of adjusting to the altered perspective, but you're soon enough flying at about three hundred meters above ground level, camera pivoting every which way to get a good look at anything that could be considered vaguely interesting.
>You've always liked controlling these things, despite most people's distaste.
>Sure, it was a bit weird to adjust to the odd VR bullshittery with the omnidirectional camera where you had to turn it with your head on a screen-edge pan type deal, and control the drone's direction with your left hand on top on that with your right being for buttons and feet for vertical and horizontal thrusters.
>Eventually, it's is just like riding a bike, really.
>You honestly aren't really looking for anything in particular, you're just panning the camera around, idly flipping through different view modes; catching as many ultra-high-resolution images as you can. It all captures at some fucking stupid resolution anyhow.
>All looking pretty normal, almost as if you were just taking casual pics of an unfamiliar colonized world back in civilized space.
>Say, that's strange. 
>Couple kilometres to the north, more heat than usual. Bit of smoke. Maybe a forest fire?
>Either way, maybe worth a look.
>You cruise gently closer, and the heat readings slowly resolve into more and more detailed profiles, revealing... several different heat shapes?
>Well, that's strange.
>You decide to close in, drone kept level as it slowly shows... what the fuck?
>Huts. Fucking wood and stone huts, like something out of Earth's history or a Renassaince Fair.
>Zooming in, you see various shapes walking around. Human-ish in general form, as far as you can tell from up here. Definitely bipedal at the very least. Dark brownish fur. Wings? Yes, those seem like wings. Big, appear to be merged with their arms, mostly folded rather than splayed, for the most part. Still, it doesn't seem like they should be able to hoist them either way, the wings needed to lift a man-sized creature-
>You immediately cut your train of thought off as you one of them takes to the air without any regard for physics, hopping up to one of the balconies on the second floor of one of the local buildings.
"Hey, uh, guys? You might want to take a look at my feed. I don't want to alarm you... but we have aliens."
>"Aliens? We're in a forest surrounded by aliens, Nonsez, keep your cool."
"No, you fucking dip, I mean alien aliens! Sapients! First contact scenario!"
>"Come on now, this isn't the time for jokes. We're all probably on edge as is."
>"Hmmph. Kid's not lying."
>"You WHAT?"
>"Take a look at this. They look... almost like us, act almost like us, not like the Trappist species.
>"Holy fuck. You know what this means, right?"
"Yeah. This could change everything, even if the natives are primitives."
>The hairs on the back of your neck stand up, an electric pressure building as you stare at the scene, just barely catching the shape of a muzzle.
>At least they seemed to not notice your drone, as far as you can see, no panic or confusion evident amongst their ranks.
"They can't be like the Trappist ayys, right? I mean, if you look on that sign..."
>You turn, zooming in on a sign hanging from one of the more prominent buildings.
"Writing! If they were that different from us, not all of this would seem so... familiar."
>"Yeah. I can see it."
>The tension grows thicker in the air as a shiver creeps down your spine this time, causing you to shift uncomfortably in place.
>"So, how about us lads get back to the ship? Something about this place is giving me weird feelings."
"...You too?"
>"Wasn't going to say anything."
"Man, all of us? Yeah, let's get back home. Probably just the excitement, but we probably have enough info to go over for weeks anyhow."
>"Agreed, Operator."
>"Yeah, I'm not going to argue. Bring the drone back, and I'll pack mine back up when yours gets here.
>You turn around, one last furtive glance showing no winged natives rising up to greet you, your whole visit hopefully incognito. 
>It is a much faster trip back when you're no longer concerned with gathering data.
>It is when you are finally nearing the site when the camera feed starts to break up, crackling of static around the edges of the feed, chunks of chromatic aberration shooting into existence around the screen randomly.
"Viper, get the pre-flight going, please. I'm almost here."
>"Yeah, I see. We better get a bonus for this."
>There's a nervous chuckle at that from Daley as the engines slowly came back to life.
>"Hold on. Something's odd here."
>That is not what you want to hear, especially as the distortion gets worse.
"How about we say fuck the drone and let's just get out of here? We can scoop it in the air if all else fails."
>"What about the combat drones?"
>You turn off your visor's VR function, turning around to look dead at your one-person security detail.
"What the fuck ABOUT the combat drones, Daley? They're a bunch of ye olde surface probes with a laser and shield attached."
>With a colossal crash, it was like lightning struck, power flickering and the engines dying as you are blinded and deafened under a torrent of white.
>You float in whiteness for a few moments, hands probing blindly at the abyss around you, spastic flailing probably not looking so good... well, not as if anybody else could see you anyhow, but you were just looking for anything to stop the headache with!
>Slowly but surely, your vision partially recovers, and by the looks of it, you're the first to do so. Perhaps due to looking away from the window when it hit?
>Regardless of the reason it seems like both Viper and Daley are out of commission if Daley's blind struggle and Viper's just sitting there are any indications.
>With a shudder, you unbuckle yourself and slowly stand up to your feet, legs quivering under you as you stagger off to the side, taking deep, sucking breaths, eyes drifting off towards the front window.
>And they were there.
>You don't know how but they were there!
>With a few awkward, lumbering steps you made your way over to the pilot window, single way tinting hopefully obscuring you as you look upon the aliens.
>If you had to guess based on their outlines, they would tower over you had you a lower vantage, that much was clear, with heights spanning from ten to twelve feet, at your estimation.
>Perhaps alien was the wrong word to describe them with how eerily familiar they were, you could very comfortably describe their silhouette as almost human, more details emerging as more of your vision returned to you.
>Armoured bats.
>Really, that was the easiest way to describe the lot of them, with leather-analogue and occasional bronze plating, one in an almost entirely bronze suit hanging towards the back.
>Their heads were entirely too close to bats back home, but with full, intelligent eyes, albeit with various lengths and shades of hair upon their heads.
>Their ears flicked in every direction as you struggled to track their numbers, a few of them taking to their air, circling your ship.
>Perhaps two dozen? Your count could be easily off, however.
>It was then you noticed their weapons.
>Bows, clubs, spears, and blades were amongst their number.
>Did you just get ambushed? Did you and your crew members blackout for a while and buy them time to investigate the lightning strike?
>...Did they have more advanced technology than what you were aware of and were able to take knock you out of the sky?
>You are barely aware of an audible thunk as one lands on top of your ship, causing you to shiver.
>"Well. That's a problem. We stepped in it, didn't we?"
>Your eyes dart back to the rest of the crew, and praise whatever god is listening, Viper is fine now!
>...Granted, your security expert seems to have fucking passed out, but hey, small victories.
"Viper!"
>"Operator."
>That's all he says before he starts looking at the dash, eyes behind his helmet slowly going over the various gauges.
>"If I were to hazard a guess... it almost looks like the same state our dials were in right after we passed through the thick of the disruption up top."
"So does that mean that you can get us back up?"
>He actually hesitates.
>"Maybe." 
"What, precisely, do you mean by maybe?"
>Try not to panic.
>"Whatever that was, it probably threw a few calibrations off, and I'd rather not die exiting atmo."
>Right, exploding would be bad.
>Panic.
"Can you do your calibrations from inside?"
>"No, half of them require engine access."
>You bite your lip as you go over your options, ideas going through your head one after another, definitely not leading towards 'ritual suicide to avoid being eaten' a few different times.
>Hang on now.
>You pull your tablet out, taking a quick second to check Daley's vitals, which seem fine, afterward tabbing over to the drone controller app and it still lists the four combat drones as online.
>That gives you an idea...