Adaptation
A space marine from the far future finds a new home, form and love after being stranded on a distant world.
// Transmission Begins //
"Hello? Test. Test, test, test, test, testing... Hmmm. Well, the indicator light is broken... fuckin' grenades, probably... but I'm gonna assume this thing is on. This is Commander James M. Worthington of the fifth Special Operations Company onboard the battlecruiser Wrathbringer. Uh, as per naval protocol I am sending out this transmission to apprise the UENF of my... current predicament but according to some rough calculations you shouldn't be receiving this until about... uh... four million years from now, so... yeah. But what the hell, maybe someone out there will hear this and get a kick out of it.
I guess everything started about two weeks ago, when I was talking with that gal from R&D, Chelsea Hartman. Sweetest goddamn ass I'd seen since... sorry, uh, as I was saying, Dr. Hartman. She was part of that black, black, black-ops science team that came onboard a month ago. I met her in the gym one day; she was a real sweetheart- brilliant, too- and we hit it off pretty nicely, but whenever I asked her what the hell she was working on she got real quiet. She just said, and I quote, that I "wouldn't sleep very well" if I knew. That type of coy shit just made me more curious, of course. So the next time I asked her what it was that was keeping her cooped up in the ship's lab for 14 hours every cycle I did so with the help of my good friend Don Julio.
Now, there ain't nobody tight-lipped after going nine rounds with the Don, and her sulky reticence pretty quickly turned into almost frightening glee as she talked about what she and the other military physicists had been cooking up. She called it a 'graviton cascade weapon', which meant jack-all to me but made her titter like an evil schoolgirl. I asked her if it was capable of cracking the shields on those Haktori dreadnaughts that had been giving the whole UENF a run for its money recently. She laughed and started laying out the physics of it- again, way beyond me. Dr. Hartman was slurring pretty badly- she kept calling electrons 'electricians' and leptons 'lepers', and I'm pretty sure that there was no such person as 'Sir Isaac von Einstein'- but she got her point across: They had built a certified, blue ribbon, grade-A doomsday weapon. This thing wasn't going to take out a Haktori dreadnaught, it was going to take out the Haktori fleet.
Our little battlecruiser was going to sneak into their staging area using its cloak, fire that apocalypse-missile, then get the hell out of Dodge. It was downright devious; I was amazed that for once the brass had even considered a strategy besides 'line up and trade shots until one side is completely destroyed'. It was a damn solid plan, so I guess it was just in the cards that a pissant Haktori frigate running picket duty would somehow spot us though the cloak and land a lucky shot on our torpedo bay before we could even raise the shields. Oops.
So, the captain gets the bright idea of pretending to surrender, then having us Special Operations people transport over, deliver the thing manually, then warp out as fast as physics would allow us to. I don't know who was commanding the Wrathbringer at the time, but that was probably the smartest captain in the whole fuckin' UENF. If he's still alive by the time you get this, you should promote that devious motherfucker right to sector admiral.
Plan B went off almost without a hitch- the Haktori had some really fancy technology, but they were suckers when it came to misdirection and subterfuge. We transported over, created an unholy havoc with fusion grenades and heavy weapons inside their bridge, then set up the bomb... device? Whatever. I gave the order to skedaddle, but unfortunately for yours truly, a particle beam sliced right through my shields as my transporter activated. At least I got to see all the men and women under my command safely escape back to the Wrathbringer as the final seconds on the timer counter down on my HUD. I was desperately trying to activate my broken transporter as I traded railgun fire with a Haktori security team, and I think it finally repaired itself and activated right as the thing went off."
"It was funny how subtle it was. We had just delivered the galaxy's biggest eviction notice to the Haktori, a blast that was eventually going to be visible from Earth itself if I understood Chelsea right, and I didn't even feel a thing. One instant I was fighting for a few more seconds of life with the nastiest looking Haktori platoon I'd ever seen, and the next there I was. Somewhere else.
For a second, I was pretty sure I had died. I mean, you don't survive something described as 'an artificial supernova' by being in the same room as the thing when it detonates. However, if I was dead, heaven and/or hell had dramatically relaxed its guidelines on whom they accepted and their 'you can't take it with you' policy because I still had my armor, my railgun and my grenades. Now, like I said, I'm not exactly a quantum physicist, but it seemed to me that malfunctioning transporter + massive energy surge could = a completely uncontrolled, wild teleportation. I take a few seconds to thank sweet fate that I'm still alive, do a little jig, and then set the task of finding out where the hell I am to my armor's smartcomp. Where in the galaxy had we ended up, I wondered...
Well, at first I thought that the thing had been damaged by the same particle discharge that knocked out my transporter, because it didn't recognize any of the stars in the sky. Then it started searching further out, looking for pulsars and magnetars and all those other bright and flashy things that can be seen from just about anywhere. Ah, says the smartcomp; its synthesized voice astounded. I know where we are.
I didn't even know that the pseudo-AI in my armor *could* be surprised until that day, but if ever there was a reason to be shocked...
We weren't in a different part of the galaxy. We were in a different galaxy."
"Now, I'm not going to lie, I felt my stomach do a barrel roll at that revelation. I'm a tough guy; 22 years of Special Ops duty isn't something the weak-willed survive. I wasn't too concerned with survival either, given all the life support crap they build into our armor. But to suddenly be faced with the certain, absolute notion that you were never, ever going to see another human being again? I pride myself on my ability to adapt to difficult and unexpected situations, but that was a real mindfuck.
I spent about three hours walking about aimlessly and cursing up a storm that would have made my old drill sergeant beam with pride. The planet was sand, sand dunes, sandstorms, and rocks covered in sand, occasionally broken up by small mountains that jutted out of the endless ocean of sand like blisters. Vegetation was scarce and water almost nonexistent. Great.
At least my armor was still at half-power. I had worn a 'Conqueror' class battlesuit for the assault, boarding action configuration- maximum armor, sixteen layers of energy shielding, supercharged field generators, and a point defense system that counted as a weapon in its own right- but not exactly easy on the power reserves. Just standing still was slowly draining the battery because without gravity manipulation the multi-ton armor would have sunk straight through the sand (despite the fact that it was only 43% Earth standard, according to sensors). I wasn't in any danger while the power supply held out, but once it did all my options were going to be reduced to varying degrees of suck. I was probably going to have to Adapt, which was a scary proposition at best.
The smartcomp had picked up something, fortunately. Long range scanners revealed a nice patch of flora and some signs of animal life in a valley to the east, so I figured I'd head that way and see what passed for native fauna on this dusty rock. Contact procedures be damned; I was going to be here for a while, might as well introduce myself. Ambling toward where my HUD directed me, I saw a small rocky mountain in my way, along with a slight, winged, humanoid creature. It looked like a rough cross between a small person and an eagle; its sandy coloration made it blend in pretty well with the desert. One of its wings was hanging down, broken and useless; it was clearly injured.
Thank fucking god! I thought. Sentient Life!
Here was the strange part: the mountain was chasing the bird-thing. That's when I realized that the mountain was alive."
"I've seen a lot of strange creatures in my time, but the mountain-dragon-scarab whatever that was before me took first prize in the 'Holy fuck, what hath evolution wrought?' contest. Seeing its awkward movement was like watching a rockslide in slow motion that never quite ended. A very ugly rockslide, at that. Huge, stony pincers lined a mouth that could have comfortably fit a bus, and its six legs each looked like rock climbing up them would have required a water break. To say that the monster's armored skin was thick would have been a colossal understatement; I sincerely doubt that anything native to the planet save erosion could touch it.
The General Dynamic Systems M- 19 Railgun, on the other hand, was *not* native to this planet. The M-19 sends tiny slivers of metal hurling at relativistic speeds, each one hitting with meteor-like force. It was designed to punch through unshielded starship hulls and vaporize gravtanks. I fired twice.
The mountain-dragon exploded in a spectacular shower of black ichor and stone-like bone fragments, clouds of greasy smoke and gore raining down all around me. It's limbs quavered unsteadily before failing entirely, the sheer force of the impact having dislocated several of them. Blue-green blood as thick as syrup began to bubble out of the innumerable breaks in the creatures skin, sizzling as it was exposed to the scorching heat of direct sunlight for the first (and last) time.
Now, there are many advantages to wearing powered armor in combat. However, one benefit to powered armor than any veteran solider will tell you not to discount is the fact that you don't have to smell shit like flash-fried monster brain in the middle of battle. Just looking at that leaky, gurgling corpse was enough to make me want to dry heave.
The eagle-person was stunned, to say the least. I almost laughed when I saw that a small cloud of his feathers, knocked off by my railgun's wake, were swirling through the air as he approached me. I watched his approach warily, not sure what exactly to expect, when he threw his short, taloned arms around me in a great hug. Uh, well, he tried to, at least. You can't easily return a gesture like that in a battlesuit, and he couldn't even fit his arms halfway around my armored bulk, but what the hell. The eagle-thing awkwardly hugged me. I was then treated to his un-translated voice; a strangely mellifluous speech that was occasionally broken up by a harsher cawing or scratchy tone. Immediately, the translation software went to work on deciphering it, but again, didn't exactly take a xenologist to see that he was extremely grateful.
Noticing that he was only clad in a loincloth and only carried a short spear, I also got the distinct impression that I hadn't exactly landed on a developed planet. Granted, the total lack of subspace and radio communications had been a pretty damn disconcerting, but until then I had held out hope that I was going to find fast food, indoor plumbing and a spare positron battery somewhere on this damn rock.
That particular discovery was depressing as all hell, so I guess I could be forgiven for letting my guard down and missing the second fucking mountain-monster, the one that rose out of where I thought a sand dune was. Teachable Moment™ here, kids: all the sensor data is the universe doesn't mean jack if you don't pay attention to it. It moved appallingly fast for its size, the impact of its starfighter-sized claws making my shielding shudder and HUD scream proximity warnings.
It then tried to eat me. It tried. To fucking. Eat me. Lifted clear off the ground and into the thing's cavernous maw, I unloaded the better part of a magazine through the roof of its mouth and into what I hoped was its brain, immediately ending that little skirmish and sending me plummeting to the ground unceremoniously. A thin coating of the thing's black bile stained the gleaming starsteel of my armor, but the damage had been minimal. Shields were getting a little strained, but...
But that wasn't all. Oh no, no. I looked down into that lush, beautiful valley and saw about sixteen, seventeen of the fucking monsters heading my way. I got the strange feeling that I was suppose to have died back on that goddamn dreadnaught, and Fate was closing her cold hands around my throat for having the temerity to have survived. These things had actually put a big dent in 'Conqueror' class shielding; I briefly considered high-tailing it the fuck out when I remembered that my transporter was kaput and the poor alien on my arm had a busted wing and a spear that looked better suited for fishing than fighting.
The alien was desperately trying to pull me away from the valley, squawking and pleading as he tugged helplessly on my armored shoulder. I mean, call me judgmental, but I took a look at that those fucking mountain-abominations, and another at the bird, and decided where my loyalties on this planet lay. I don't know, chalk it up to having a bad day. Call me a monster. Say I wasn't thinking straight. I was pissed off, I was tired, and I was equipped with weapons that nothing on this planet could match; in a way, my reaction was predictable. If I'm going to get court-martialed for extirpating an indigenous species, it's going to take them a few million years to deliver the paperwork anyway.
Carefully, gently, I grabbed the eagle-person and held him against my armor, extending its protective fields around his wounded body. I activated all four of the remaining fusion grenades on my belt, small warning klaxons ringing pleasantly inside my helmet as I did so. I threw all four grenades at once square into the valley, letting the smartcomp control their flight for optimal detonation height...
The poor eaglelike alien was shaking with fear and crying as I laughed maniacally, holding him fast. The mountain-monsters looked up into the sky, without the slightest understanding of what was about to happen. It was beautiful."
"By the time the artificial sandstorm settled, no trace of the mountain-things remained save a fine coating of ash on my battlesuit. Unfortunately, the lush and beautiful valley they had been occupying was now a smoking, desolate crater and my suit's battery was down to emergency reserves from having to absorb the fusion blasts.
Well, fuck. Like I said, I let my anger get the better of me.
To say the alien was stunned would be an understatement of epic proportions. He was speaking slower now, quieter. The translation software had started picking up bits and pieces of his language, and small probability-clouds of meaning danced across my HUD now as he spoke.
9% 'water', 3% 'life', 85% combined word-(life, water), 3% other. Desert planet, makes sense.
37% 'mountain', 36% 'dragon', 25% 'monster', 2% other. No prizes for second place on what that meant.
58% 'kill', 40% 'death', 1% 'murder', 1% other. I had killed those things good, yep.
81% 'god', 9% 'you', 8% 'avatar', 2% other. Uh...
'Worship'. 'Lead'. 'Promised land'. 'Destiny'. 'Prophecy'. Uh oh.
Well, I was going to have to try and dispel that particular notion before my suit's power ran out, if I was ever going to Adapt to this godforsaken planet. I briefly considered stealing one of the alien's feathers and leaving him in the dust, but I sincerely doubted he was going to let his 'god' slowly shuffle away in transporter-less armor. Not to mention, the idea of not being able to find where these things lived once I Adapted and dying slowly of dehydration was downright chilling. I decided that I was just going to have to try and settle this particular 'outside-context problem' on my own as he led me to the north.
Fuck.
Ever wish you had paid more attention in your xeno-anthropology classes?"
"Well, as we slowly walked toward what I hoped was the alien village, I heard the distinct 'ding!' noise from the translation software completing its work. For the first time, I actually got to understand what the hell the alien was saying. The only problem was I really wish he wasn't sayin' what he was sayin'. Lemme paint a picture for you:
'Anointed savior! I... I cannot believe that you have returned to us once more!' He would say.
'Stop. Calling. Me. That. Please.' I would respond. 'I told you already: my soldiers call me Commander Worthington, my friends call me James and my mom calls me, uh, Jamie. Can you try using one of those names? I'm not your anointed anything, kid.'
'But... but it has to be you! You destroyed the anathema dragons with the spear of light! Everything is as the prophecy foretold!' He would say again, with reverence in his voice.
'Spear of what? Nah, no. Those were fusion grenades. You see, when you combine certain isotopes of hydrogen together, you end up turning some of their mass into energy as per mass-energy equivalence, producing... you don't have the slightest clue what I'm talking about, do you?'
He bowed his head. 'The wisdom of the gods is beyond me, savior.'
'This is basic physics! And I'm not a god, I'm a fucking marine, you stupid alien.' I said back. Uh, like I said, I'm a soldier, not a diplomat. I go in before and after and sometimes during the peace talks, but suffice to say they never call me in to them for consultations.
'What? Anointed savior, I am no alien! I am one of your people, the faithful! Have you not heard my prayers?' He said, taken aback. I guess he had me there; technically I was the alien here. 'Anointed savior, why do you deny your nature? Are... are you testing my faith?'
'No! Listen to me: I ain't a god, and to be quite honest I sincerely doubt yours exists.' In retrospect, not the smartest thing to say.
He gasped. 'Blasphemy!'
'Wait a sec,' I asked, 'if I'm your returned god, how can I blaspheme against myself?'
'I... uh... I need a priest!' He said, looking very confused.
'You need a psychologist, that's what you need...' I muttered
If you want to imagine something like that playing out in about six or seven different ways, you have a good idea of what we talked about as he led me north. He asked so many fucking questions! 'Anointed savior, doesn't your armor cramp your wings?', 'Anointed savior, why did you destroy the promised land when you drove out the anathema? Did we anger you?', 'Anointed savior, will our crops be good this season?', 'Anointed savior, why is your accent so strange?'. Etcetera.
So I said *fuck this*. I wasn't going to get anywhere with finesse and subtlety. I took off my helmet, a small blast of freezing, compressed oxygen temporarily obscuring my face. When it dissipated, the native looked like he'd been sucker-punched right in the beak. He made an immense gasping sound, and then stood there stunned.
Taking my first breath of alien air, I was struck by how hot, dry, and heavy it was. Virtually unbreathable without filtration, very harsh on my lungs. Every breath was like eating a plateful of burning sand... no way was I going to be able to live here for long without my armor. The low gravity of the planet finally hit me, as well. I felt like I could practically fly by flapping my arms about; no wonder these winged creatures had been the first thing on the planet to hit sentience. Idly, I wondered if these things knew about evolution yet. I probably had enough time to ruminate on the nature of life itself because the native didn't look like he was going to come out of his stupor anytime that day.
Well, now that everything was out in the open, I figured he'd be more amenable to listening. I started my explanation anew. 'Uh... like I said, I'm an alien marine.'
He still wasn't moving. His mouth... beak? was agape with shock.
'I think I'm stranded on this place for good, so if you people wouldn't mind letting me stay with you for, uh, however long your species lives...'
Finally, he spoke back up, voice cracking and wavering from surprise. 'I... I see. Forgive me for my... oh, in the Savior's name! You're an alien! You... where... wha... an alien!'
Dear god, these type one civilizations! Think they are the only ones in the friggin' universe, think their planet is the center of the universe, think they have a monopoly on religion, think that everything is magic and omens. It gets tiresome fast, let me tell you. Still, I was relieved I had finally gotten through to him. I put my helmet back on, glad to breathe cool, sweet, processed air once again.
'Listen to me pal. You can't let anyone else know what I am, okay? I'm going to need to try and blend in as best as I can, else it's going to throw your whole civilization out of whack. Can you do that for me?'
'But... what? How can you possibly do that? I do not understand, Commander.' He said, confused
'First of all, Commander is a title, not my name.' I said, annoyed. Proper names were always a bitch to translate. 'Secondly, how much time do we have before we reach your village?'
'A day's travel. I cannot fly with my wing injured, and I do not think you could not match my pace even if it wasn't. You are so slow! We should find shelter for the night.'
I glowered at that comment. If my transporter was working, I could have gone to the next continent over and been back in fifty milliseconds, but right now 'leisurely stroll' was about all I could manage. I guess a day would be enough time to Adapt, and hopefully learn enough about their culture to work on blending in. I don't have much time left before my poor armor is going to run out of juice, and when it does this planet will kill me if I haven't Adapted.
A quick scan shows a nice looking cave formation a klick and a half ahead, so I'm directing us towards there. These damn questions from my new friend are still coming on heavy. Dear god, he is an inquisitive one! I had to turn on my com system's selective mute just so I could file this report; I don't think he even knows I'm not listening to him anymore, heh. Anyway, once we reach the cave I found I'm going to need every last bit of juice to activate the Adaptation system, so it's time for me to sign off. This is Commander Worthington of the fifth SOC, wishing to hell I wasn't stuck here. Recorder off, begin transmission sequence."
// Transmission Ends //
We reached the cave right as I finished sending off my report. While it was almost certainly going to be lost and unheard, it still felt good to say my peace.
We walked into the cave, every one of my footfalls sending ominous rumbles throughout the cavern. Sensors indicated that it was much cooler than the desert outside, but when I took off my helmet again it still felt uncomfortably warm. Every breath I took was agonizing, hot, choked with grit. I could feel a chemical burning in my lungs from something else in the air... ammonia? I wasn't going to be able to survive for ten minutes without my armor.
A UENF solider inside his armor was a killing machine few alien races could match; outside it, we were virtually helpless. Most of the genetic modification we had was to make it easier to operate inside the suit, making us physically weaker but improving our reaction time and mental celerity far past baseline. It all made perfect sense... until you lost your armor.
The native looked pensive; he was staring at my bald, featherless head and beakless face with visible horror. I mean, I'm told that I look pretty good in a rugged, beat-up solider sort of way, but I guess human anatomy wasn't exactly pleasing to his eyes- or was it all my old wounds? Some soldiers opt to have their scars surgically removed after battle, but in the SOC doing that was a good way to get branded a 'gigantic fucking pussy'.
"Hey. What's your name?" I asked, interrupting whatever he was thinking.
"My name is Laias. I am a scout, although sometimes I deliver messages or carry packages between our villages. I can fly faster than anyone else in my tribe!" He said, proudly. Abruptly, his explanation transitioned into a question. "Can you fly? It must be horrible having to walk everywhere! I am going to be stuck on the ground like you until my wing heals and already I feel... constrained. It is torture! How can you stand it?"
"Well, trust me, you get used to it. Man the fuck up." I grumbled.
"I will endure it, anoint... I mean, Commander." His gaze ventured away from mine and started examining the cavern around us, head swiveling about as he danced around the rocks and stalagmites. "You found us a nice place to stay the night; this should protect us from the dust storms and nightwraiths quite nicely."
"Night-whats?" I asked nervously. That didn't sound like the type of animal you could pet and feed bread crumbs to.
"Do not worry Commander; if you can fight Anathema I am sure we would be safe, even if they find us." He said, looking pleased.
"Well, then we might have a problem. My armor is almost out of juice, and without it I can't even survive here. I can't breathe your air and I can't take this heat. What I need to do is Adapt to your world." This statement was punctuated by heavy coughing, as my lungs tried to get rid of all the dust and sand I had been breathing in.
"What sort of juice do you need? Are you thirsty? What is this 'adaption' you speak of?" He asked, confused.
I ignored the less-coherent parts of his questioning and continued. "This armor I'm wearing? It needs a positron power source to work. Seeing as how you can't even pronounce 'positron', I'm going to assume I ain't gonna find one of those in your village, right?"
He hesitated, looking shamed. "No."
I spoke slowly, trying to make myself clear. "That's what I thought. Human beings can't live here without environmental protection and I can't recharge my armor. So, new plan: I'm going to stop being human. I'm going to turn myself into one of you via my technology."
"What!? How is that possible? How does it work?" Laias asked, awed. Awe seemed to be his default disposition... although to be fair he was in the middle of a close encounter with (what was to him) a hyper-advanced alien. There was something winsomely attractive in the native scout; he was damn ignorant about the larger universe, but so eager to learn. At first, I had found the barrage of questions annoying, but I guess now I was just glad to have someone to talk to. Still, there was no way he was going to be able to understand the science behind Adaptation; I only knew a few of the essential details myself.
It was quite ingenious, really. How can you survive when you are stranded on an alien world for a really long time? By borrowing from whatever was already living there successfully.
"How it works isn't important, what's important is that it works." I said after pausing to think. I was trying to remember the details of the training video I'd seen about a decade ago and I wasn't doing very well. I kept my confidence cranked up though; no use worrying my new friend.
Just between us though? I was nervous as all fuckin' hell. I had never used the system outside of the training simulations, and I'd never done recreational biomodding before. I knew some friends who thought it was the greatest thing in the world, and a few of the soldiers under my command seemed to get a kick out of it, but I'd always been a little wary of that sort of stuff. I was beginning to wish I'd been a little more adventurous in my misbegotten youth.
"What do I need to do to help you?" He asked, interrupting my daydreaming. He was really eager to assist.
"I'm going to need a little piece of you, like a feather or a drop of blood. Everything that is a part of you contains this stuff called DNA or RNA, which is like... well, just trust me. It works."
"And then you're... going to become one of my people?"
"Yeah. Whatdya say? Care to help me?"
"I... my people and I owe you a great debt, Commander. I know they would be honored to have you among us!"
"Good! But like I said, we should keep this little secret to ourselves." I said, coughing. This air was killing my lungs.
"Why?" He asked.
"I'll explain why later, it's complicated. Interfering with the natural development of an alien species is against the... blah blah blah. You know what? Fuck it, we'll play that whole thing by ear. However, I really need to..." I wasn't able to finish my thought, because I was too busy coughing up something black and sticky. It looked like a mix between chewing gum and oil.
"How about you give me that feather and we can discuss it all at length once I can breathe?" I managed to say between wheezing coughs.
He hesitated for a second before choosing a small, downy feather from his chest. Plucking it out and grasping it carefully between his claws, he put it inside my open, armor-plated palm. Swiftly, the smartcomp went to work, breaking apart and reassembling the genetic data inside the small piece of organic matter, turning it into a complete picture of the alien life-form. I took the time to look over my companion, see what exactly it was I was going to be for the rest of my life.
His appearance- his body- was an almost perfect fusion of avian and human forms; it was alien yet familiar. At first glance, his feathers seemed to be a uniform, sandy color, but closer examination showed intricate patterns of light-brown spots and wavy, dark lines across his chest, back, wings, and tailfeathers. His legs were digitgrade and stout, terminating in powerful-looking talons while his arms and hands were lithe and delicate. His face was surprisingly expressive, once I learned what meant what on it. His beak was sharp-looking and pointed, but the most angular of his features were his piercing eyes. They were constantly darting about, searching, examining; he drank in every minute detail around him with a level of attention to detail that, as a soldier, made me proud.
By far the most impressive feature of the alien were his wings. Even folded against his back, they were almost as big as the rest of him put together. Unlike the soft-looking feathers that insulated him, his wingfeathers looked strong and rigid, powerful. These mighty wings weren't fragile in the least; whatever broke my new friend's limb must have been a really nasty crash. I stared at those wings with a little bit of envy; flying around in zero-G or with flight-capable armor just didn't seem nearly as liberating as being able to actively defy gravity under one's own power. I guess I'd find out for myself soon enough...
There was a loud, pinging sound from the smartcomp as it finished sequencing the genetic information. I mentally gave the command to initiate the Adaptation process, and manually deactivated the final lockout. There was a sharp feeling across my spine, like an electrical shock, then with a burst of compressed air my battlesuit opened up and I fell to the ground in an unceremonious heap. The massive suit gave a single, forlorn *bloop* as its power reserves gave out for good.
At first, I was afraid that it hadn't worked at all, that the remainder of my life was going to be short and painful. I felt up and down my thin jumpsuit, trying to determine if I had changed at all. I didn't feel that much different... did I? Fuck, it was hard to tell. I had a migraine that could have been measured on the Richter scale from fast-burning the alien's language directly into my brain.
No... it had to have worked. I certainly wasn't feeling normal, at least. Every part of my body, from my head to my heels, felt just plain weird. It was like my skin was too loose, my bones were too heavy, and all my limbs were out of proportion. I mean, on an intellectual level I knew that the way I was now was normal and I was changing into something different... but it was hard to hang on to that notion with these feeling assaulting me. Laias looked upon me with a look of genuine, unabashed concern.
"D-don't worry, I'm sure this is normal. Just takes... a little time...." I managed to choke out. I pulled myself straight up, mostly to preserve my wounded dignity. It's quite a transition to make, from avatar of war to nearly-helpless refugee.
On the other hand, I noticed my lungs had stopped burning up. Whatever adaptation these eagle-aliens had that let them breath the noxious air here I really, really appreciated. A prickling sensation up and down my body heralded the beginning of my physical changes; I felt goosebumps crawl up my arms and down my legs, knowing that pretty soon they were actually going to have feathers to raise. Sure enough, when I pulled off the upper part of my jumpsuit, I saw them slowly growing in all across my body.
"Wow. Look at this!" I said, holding his arm against mine. The sand-colored feathers growing in were patterned the exact same way that his were. He awkwardly pulled his arm away, trying to keep his distance. I tore away the rest of my jumpsuit, which had been getting soaked in perspiration as heat and change made me sweat buckets. Everywhere I looked, I could see tiny feathers growing in or telltale bumps underneath my bare skin.
There was something off about what was going on here... something wasn't quite right. Laias had backed up and was sulking in the back of the cave. Had I offended his delicate cultural sensibilities again? Actually, it was more like he was trying to hide something. Something peeking out of his loincloth...
Hah! Go figure; he was getting turned on by my transformation!
"You're gay, aren't you?" I asked while laughing. "Like what you see?"
A look of utter horror struck the native scout. In the short time I had known him, I had never seen him look so surprised and afraid. Why were his reactions completely out of proportion to everything? Christ, he had been more impressed with my suit's air conditioner than the top of the line weapon systems it powered or its supergenius pseudo-AI! Primitive cultures always blow my mind.
"C-Commander... I am sorry. I did not wish to offend you with my arousal." He said, averting his eyes. He was holding onto his spear like he was trying to hide behind it.
"What are you so worried about? I don't care, Laias." I said, trying to calm him down. God, come to think of it, he did look pretty damn cute. I've gotten more than my share of tail serving in the SOC- when you mention 'special forces commander' to someone in a bar, panties and boxers fall to the ground like someone turned up the artificial gravity- but I wondered what it would be like to get some *actual* tail...
"You... are not repulsed?" He asked, nervously. Clearly he had been expecting something besides acceptance.
"Not at all. More like... intrigued. You know, you and I are going to have a lot of work to do together; you're going to have to teach me how to fly, among other things... maybe we should get closer?" I asked, while my slow transformation continued. I felt like I was getting shorter, losing muscle and bone mass everywhere but my upper back as the feathers growing through my skin got thicker and longer.
I could practically see his heart start to beat faster, as he nervously shifted his weight from talon to talon. "Really? I... you would... you are attracted to me?" He said, words spilling out of his beak seemingly without the intervention of his brain. "I have never before... my tribe is very small... there are no other males in it who share my... tastes. I thought that I was the only one..." His voice trailed off. I could see tears welling up in his eyes; I decided that explaining that I was in fact bisexual wasn't really necessary.
"Well... how does this sound..." I growled, reaching over and tearing off his flimsy loincloth. He gasped in surprise, but stood rigid, "how about I bend you over, pull up those tailfeathers, and slam-fuck you 'till we both cum?"
"And then..." I said, continuing with a naughty smile as I plucked the spear out of his limp hands and tossed it aside, "you could do the same to me?"
He responded not with words, but with a whimper. His cock had grown hard just from hearing my offer.
"Is that a yes?" I asked, trying to break his silence.
"Yes! Yes, yes, yes!" He said, his old enthusiasm returning with a vengeance. I had a feeling this alien virgin was going to be a handful, but I'll be damned if that wasn't a challenge I was willing to accept. He looked so excited, so nervous! Had he even been kissed before?
Come to think of it, looking at that blade-sharp beak, it seemed unlikely these aliens ever kissed, period.
"Well, you are in for a treat..." I said, ruffling his chest-feathers and feeling dumb when I didn't find any nipples to tweak under his coat. "You are going to be the first and only of your kind to have sex with a human."
I firmly pulled him into my arms, finding him willing but awkward and nervous. I wrapped my lips around the tip of his beak, mindful of its sharp edges, and kissed him. Laias was confused as all hell; like I had guessed, his people just weren't equipped for kissing, which was a damn shame. I don't know, call me old fashioned, but I can't get into fucking someone without a nice and slow buildup, especially when it's another guy.
It was the strangest damn kiss I'd ever had; his beak was rigid and hard and his tongue was small and weak; it felt like I was doing all of the work. However, Laias was really getting into it. His breathing became shallow and irregular as he kissed me back, clawed hands fumbling about as he tried to decide what to do with them. His eyes danced back and forth between mine and the entrance to the cave, as if he was afraid someone was going to walk in on us, but he kept up as best as his avian anatomy and inexperience would allow. I pulled him into my arms a little tighter to reassure him, letting our hot erections rub against each other. His downy pubic feathers were so soft; I couldn't stop playing with them, poking them with my cock teasingly as I held his tongue with mine.
For some reason I didn't understand, our intimate contact was accelerating the Adaptation process considerably. One second I was kissing him full on, the next I could feel my face stiffen and my mouth and nose start to meld into one another. I held the kiss for as long as I could, but growing a beak of my own eventually made it impossible. I could feel my heart pounding as the hard, yellow-gray, bony appendage started to grow out, filling up part of my peripheral vision. Sensation from my mouth became dull and unfocused, and my tongue shrank considerably.
This wasn't like growing in feathers; I had Adapted a fur coat before during the training program and that wasn't so different. But this... this was fucking strange. For the first time, the fact that I wasn't going to be anywhere near human baseline for the rest of my life struck me. It was a bone-chilling sensation, but also... liberating? I had been fighting in wars declared and secret for more than three decades now, a soldier. Whatever this planet had in store for me, I sincerely doubted it was going to be anywhere near as stressful or deadly as my old job. Was I finally going to have peace? Did I even want that?
I clamped my jaws together, and both heard and felt the powerful snap. I could tell that it was viciously-curved and strong, but I was half-surprised to feel sensation from it when I touched it with my hands.
"I... have a beak." I said, dumbfounded. Breathing through my nostrils felt strange, but speaking the alien tongue felt a lot more natural now.
"Yes." Laias said, looking unsure what to say. He reached out with one of his clawed hands and touched it lightly. "It looks very nice!"
"It does? Really? Do these feathers look right to you?" I asked, self-consciously. I had gone without body, facial, or head hare for a very long time now; it tended to itch like hell inside a battlesuit. Now I was almost fully covered in feathers of various shapes, sizes, and textures. A few of the biggest ones were still growing in along my back and right above my ass, feeling like goosebumps several orders of magnitude stronger than normal.
"Yes, yes; your feathers are beautiful! Your body was so... fleshy. It was unnatural!" He said with a shudder, before quickly retreating. "Not that you were unattractive! Not at all! But you are so beautiful now... I cannot believe all that has happened today. You saved my life and now you are showing me... love. It is like a wonderful dream!" He said, slowly approaching me and hugging me tight. The feeling of our soft chest feathers rubbing against each other was heavenly. "Please... take me... "
Christ! I could practically have came right then and there, I'm telling you. No one had ever told me that I was their fantasy hero before, or wanted me so badly. I tell you, a compliment like that can go pretty damn far in getting a guy aroused. But I had another idea...
"Hold on a sec cowboy. Since this is your first time, why don't you go first?" I said, gently lowering us both to the ground.
He looked confused, and a little panicked. "But... but I don't know what to do! I've never done anything with anyone!"
"Just relax Laias. I can do most of the work; just do whatever comes natural to you." I said, reaching over and giving his shaft a few long, slow strokes. His maleness was long and ridged if a little small in terms of girth. I licked the inside of my beak; I really wanted to have a taste of him before we went to town, but I didn't trust myself with the damn thing quite yet. I felt like I could carve up a tree with my razor-sharp beaktip. Instead, I settled for giving his glans a few short licks to get it nice and wet. The detail on his cockridges was astounding... wait. When had my eyes changed? I hadn't even noticed.
He was struggling to stay sitting up; every time my small but rough tongue ran over his sensitive cockhead, his splayed talons would clench and unclench and he would shudder with pleasure. My sense of smell was a little dull, but I could taste the salty, sweaty taste of his precum just fine. I let most of it run down his shaft to slicken it, but every once in a while I let myself suck some of the tasty fluid down. When it looked like my licking was driving him too close to the edge, I backed off and ran my beak through his soft pubic feathers, ruffling them up and tasting them as well. I think I may have overdone it a little because by the time I pulled back his entire crotch was soaked through with my saliva and his own precum. His maleness stood straight up, rock-hard while he laid back on the cave floor, panting and breathing hard. He looked at me like he was about to burst into tears of joy, and we hadn't even gotten to the good part yet. God, virgins are fun.
I crawled over on top of him, giving him a short lick as I started to position myself over his rigid cock. A single pearl of his precum dripped off the tip of my beak onto his; he shifted around nervously as I took hold of the bottom of his sopping-wet shaft. I felt the slick tip press against my feathered bottom, leaving small trails of precum along it as I guided it toward my entrance, lowering myself down ontop of it. The well-lubricated penis slid past my outer ring with only a small bit of resistance as I crouched down further onto it. The feeling of his avian member inside me was unbelievable. It took me a few minutes of careful re-positioning and relaxation to get the whole thing in, but when I finally took my weight off my feet and let my ass rest flush against his wet pubic feathers, I can say for fucking sure that it was worth every bit of work. The long penis filled every inch of my tight passage, cockridges massaging my insides with every breath I took or adjustment I made. Laias looked like he was in the throes of ecstasy already, calling out my name softly as he writhed on the cave floor, small clouds of dust suspended in the low gravity from our struggles. Well, technically speaking, he was calling me 'Commander' still, but what the hell. Funny enough, he still didn't know what to do with his hands. I settled that issue for him by taking them into mine, my calloused fingers wrapping around his scaley, talon-like claws.
I started to rock back and forth, up and down, riding the wonderfully-ridged eaglecock inside my ass faster as his precum slickened up my insides. Laias continued his weak struggling, driven not by resistance but overstimulation. My own still-human member was starting to leak copious quantities of preseed as well, pleasure running through it from the fullness in my ass. Shifting position slightly, I started to jam one of those godly ridges on Laias's virgin cock right into my prostate, feeling my own member start to quiver with every soft impact against it. The precum on my manhood dripped off onto the native scout's ruffled chestfeather, wetness darkening their sandy coloration. It was amazing.
The sandy eagle beneath me suddenly gave a sharp cry, as the overwhelming pleasure of his first sexual encounter drove him far past the brink. As the hot raptor essence filled me, I could feel the creeping, strange sensation of transformation overtake me once more...
My ass started its final change first, before Laias was even done pumping his seed into it. Long, rigid tailfeathers grew out from my backside in a sharp, fanlike pattern, and I could feel my muscles shift and change into a configuration suitable for controlling them. I almost fell over when I lost feeling in my hands as they shifted into blunt claws, but Laias was holding them tight enough to keep me up. His cock was still depositing sticky blast after blast of avian seed into me as he continued to gasp, beak open wide and eyes shut tight as I felt my legs go numb. They had been spared a feathery coating up until now, but now feathers advanced down my knees and to the very top of my ankles. I felt another strangely dull pop from them as they shifted into a digitgrade configuration, and I watched with distracted but alarmed focus as my feet shifted into scaled, powerful talons. My new talons were vicious, black, daggerlike claws that were tense with power; it felt like I could hold myself up with a single one of my new feet and a sturdy branch.
The greatest change, of course, was the wings. I felt a sharp pain in my shoulders and heard a loud crack as the powerful appendages emerged from my back, hard and inflexible flight feathers popping out from them before they had even fully gown out. Prickling, electrical sensations assaulted my back and spine as the nerves there grew in; I could feel the powerful new additions to my body and control them. Involuntarily, I twitched them as I tried to understand the new feelings assaulting me, sending a small tornado of dust blowing through the confines of the cave. It was almost too much for me to bear; I could feel myself hit the very limit of my self control as my untouched member came near climax. For a brief second, my newly-grown tailfeathers rubbed against his, and I felt my self control waver... but I managed to just barely hold on. I had to make good on my promise to take his anal virginity, after all.
Laias rubbed the sand from his eyes, gazing at me with grateful wonder. "Oh Commander!" He said, his excitement barely ebbed. He reached over and stroked my new wings with awe. "You... you are one of the people! I can hardly believe it!"
"Me either." I said, still in shock from the final stages of the transformation. I felt like a predator again, except clad in my own feathers instead of starsteel. I hadn't had much of a choice regarding the transformation; I had to do what I did. But still... that didn't mean I couldn't enjoy it, right?
I pulled myself off his barely-softened cock, both of us shuddering with pleasure as the shaft left my tight passage. Standing unsteadily on my talons, I found my tailfeathers and wings seemed to naturally counterbalance the awkward movement of my digitgrade legs. My mind was reeling with new sensory information from my body, and I felt a profound sense of alien loss as the human part of 'me' faded into memory, but somehow the look of love on the other eagle's face set me at ease. I was going to be living here for a very long time, and damnit I was going to make the best of this. I knew exactly what I was going to do with my time here. I was going to teach these aliens everything I knew about science and technology, lead them to the top of the food chain and forge a new civilization.
I looked down at Laias, my first contact with the strange race I was now a part of. I had to admit it, he was beautiful, open-minded and inquisitive, primitive superstitions aside. He was going to make a fine companion... a fine mate. It was time to take those cute tailfeathers of his for a ride.
He got wind of what I was planning and he liked it: a broad smile broke across his beak. I jumped ontop of him, cushioning my landing with a swift beat of my wings.
"Ah!" He cried out as I pinned him to the cave floor. "Watch my injured wing! It is very tender..."
"Sorry!" I said, embarrassed I had forgotten. I shifted it to the side slightly, off the hard ground. That gave me an idea though...
Unfurling my own wings, I carefully slid them underneath him, wrapping us both together tightly. With my hands now free, I was able to reach under his legs and spread apart his knees. Parting his tailfeathers, I moved myself forward until my straining arousal rested just against his entrance. I looked up and saw his eyes shut tight in anticipation, every word spoken by his body language some permutation of 'love'. Holding him tight against my chest, our feathers slick with spent sexual fluid, I penetrated his virgin anal ring and pushed my maleness deep inside him. He squawked in surprise at my intrusion before pleasure took away his breath, turning it into soft and ragged panting intermixed with cries of love. As I drove my lengthened, avian member into him, into his never-before touched prostate, he leaned forward, rubbing his beak up against mine. The contact was playful, sensual... was this their equivalent to kissing? We both continued, repeated the gesture as I continued to drive into him in short, powerful thrusts.
His member had reached its full arousal again as I pounded his sweet ass. We were locked together too tightly for my claws to stroke him off, but the friction from our feathers rubbing against it was more than enough to set him off again. I awkwardly took his beak into mine, giving him the best kiss that our avian anatomy would allow as he cried out into my mouth and came for a second time. Sticky, dirty but wonderful wetness soaked through our feathers as his twitching member erupted, his orgasm causing his virgin passage to clamp around my raptorhood tighter than anything I'd ever felt before. I stood the immense, all-encompassing pleasure for a second or two before involuntarily crying out myself and cumming deep into him. His eyes locked onto mine as I held myself inside him. He was crying again, tears of pure happiness falling from his sharp eyes.
When I started to pull my relaxing shaft out, he stopped me. "Just... leave it in a bit longer, please." He said, plainly. He didn't sound nervous anymore, just content. "I hope that you will like living with us, Commander. I owe you a debt it would take a lifetime to repay."
"Don't worry," I said to him, playing idly with his wingfeathers, "I think I'll get along just fine here after all. Well, as long as your people can make a decent beer."
"What is beer?" He asked, looking confused. The look of pained agony on my face must have surprised him, because immediately his beak broke into a large grin. "Commander! I am joking!"
So these aliens had a sense of humor. Good to know...
I think everything is going to be alright.