An HFY Tale: Drop Pod Green

The base had been taken within hand, as well as a wealth of information and technology that the Humans could only dream of.

Thanks to the timely and efficient combat regime of the R.I.S. Companies, the Doch did not have the sufficient time to scuttle their generators used for the instant displacement of troopers from one place to another.

Fighting for the generator bays had been fierce, the Human R.I.S. warriors and special operations recon forces fighting bitterly through enough Doch, that the R.I.S. survivors were fighting on hills of bodies, stumbling and rolling down the fallen Doch and R.I.S. warriors.

Working around these mounds of bodies were the properly armed recon forces, slicing through weak points with keen proficiency, the likes of which were unknown to the Inner Dolcir Coalition. With seconds to spare, these elite Human soldiers had seized control of the bays and stopped the scuttling charges, securing the ominously humming yellow generators that bristled with absolute, unknown power.

Not that Rhidi was aware of this in the first place; As far as the greater United American Authority and European Unified Council Human military knew, there was no fight underground.

Four hundred R.I.S. warriors did not lose their lives beneath the surface of an unknown planet, finding solace and rest under the warm soil and grass of planet XJ-1. Three Platoons of forward recon operations teams did not die around the generators, fighting bitterly with literal tooth and nail to secure this reality, and war winning, technology.

As far as Rhidi and the other Droppers knew, the base had been secured, quickly taken over by extremely elite Human forces, and they were moved back to their FOB after clearing the rest of the outskirts and routing the enemy.

It was here that Rhidi found herself a few days later, tired, soul weary, but smiling as she and the other Droppers sat around in their IB suits, watching as the locals put on a small play for them.

The moth and mantis folk had been formally identified as the Ichiti and the Morloli, the winged moth folk being the Ichiti, and the mantis being the Morloli.

As Rhidi understood, the Morloli were the "warrior" cast, hunting in packs to swarm and rip their targets apart with their razor sharp, bladed hands. The Ichiti were craftsmen, statesmen, religious leaders, and basically everything else the Morloli could not be.

While many had assumed the Morloli would be seen as lesser than the Ichiti, the Ichiti had surprised them with their respect for their smaller cousins, including an entire class of Ichiti that fed and took care of their little mantis protectors.

That still did not explain why the Ichiti were so… odd looking, a question that even the Humans were starting to slowly angle in on.

"They're so cute."

Rhidi snapped out of her thoughts and looked towards Marides, the black haired Pwah leaning forward from her seat on the ground and resting her head on her hands, elbows sitting on her knees.

Rhidi blinked to herself, then looked back at the play, an Ichiti male playing the role of an invading Doch and stomping after fleeing Morloli.

"They have taken everything quite well, all things considered." Rhidi mused, smiling as a Morloli slapped the Ichiti play-actor on the knee with a stick, then scuttled away with a trilling, laughing titter. "Bouncing back from an invasion like this will put quite the toll on their planet."

Marides nodded. "Engineers are staging up to slowly bring them into some form of 'modern' society. The Humans are treading very lightly, starting with construction materials, pipes, things they can easily understand and not be overwhelmed by."

"Not a bad start." Rhidi agreed with a nod. "It is extremely easy to swamp a newly found race and cause them to combust. Reading of the Pwah and Kafya's first attempts was… humbling, to say the least."

Marides let out a wry chuckle. "You mean how our races caused two entire planets to become inflamed in civil wars, and how those races no longer exist?"

"The religious wars of the Rigypt were… especially hair raising." Rhidi murmured, looking towards Marides. "They had believed the Pwah were holy figures from the heavens, and mutilated themselves to match your designs."

"Including cutting away their legs to match our height." Marides said with a grimace.

The two sighed, humming in their throats as they looked on to the play.

"Why are the Humans so good at this?" Marides asked, looking over to a small gaggle of civilian social experts who were happily clapping at the actors, along with most of the crowd.

Rhidi shrugged. "They have a natural charisma that none of us can put a finger on. I think it's their faces… or how they talk."

"Their stupid faces, for sure." Marides said, though she was grinning. "Stupid, tall, handsome faces…"

Rhidi chuckled with honest amusement, though the chuckle died a little sooner than what would have been natural.

Marides looked to the yellow Kafya, eyes hooded. "Still seeing that man in your sleep?"

"... To be honest, I still see him when I'm awake." Rhidi said quietly, the Older Brother's face flashing across her brain like a haunting ghost.

She had researched what he was, what it all meant, and gained a little more intimate knowledge after getting counselled by Sergeant Flores. Once the Humans of her unit had found out that she had come face to face with a R.I.S. veteran, they had sat her down and explained a lot to her, as well as giving her a special meeting with their psychological support unit.

It didn't stop her from remembering the fear she had felt, the smells, the static-like power that had emanated off that man… she had nearly flinched when Morris reached for her hand one day.

Morris knew what was going on, and was being extremely patient with Rhidi. They had managed to touch pinkies yesterday, forward progress no matter how slow it was.

"He can't get you here, you know." Marides said, pointing up at the early evening sky. "They're all back on their ship and heading back to Earth, far away from here. They took too many casualties to stick around, and are going back to fill their ranks."

Rhidi grimaced. "That's not… really what's bothering me. It's more that any Human can have that disease lurking inside of them, resting in their blood like a curse waiting for its activation phrase."

"A curse waiting for its activation phrase?" Marides chuckled. "You make it sound like they're a monster in a video game or something."

Rhidi didn't reply, her nostrils flaring as she remembered the smell of blood, the scent of the wild kill on his skin, the look in his eyes as he loomed out of the darkness…

"Rhidi?" Marides asked, turning fully to the Kafya beside her as the entire crowd whistled and cheered at the actors on the stage.

Rhidi's hair was standing on end, ears back and ivory eyes wide as her teeth slowly bared.

"Rhidi…" Marides whispered, placing a hand on Rhidi's shoulder. "Are you okay?"

Rhidi snapped out of her growing, waking nightmare with Marides's touch, her ears snapping back upright and flesh tingling as if she had just come awake from a deep sleep.

"... Yeah." Rhidi replied breathlessly, not having realized her heart had sped up to a rapid, panicked beat. "Yeah, I'm fine."

Both of them turned to look over their shoulders at a voice they could pick out from a metal concert, along with multiple others.

"1st Pod Section, on your feet!" Sergeant Flores called out, clapping her hands together. "Rifles slung, form up."

Rhidi and the rest of her Pod Section clambered to their feet as the play went on behind them, weaving their way past the crowd as they came to the front of Sergeant Flores, the small, deeply tanned female Human still looking as angry and annoyed as ever.

"Follow me." She commanded, then set off at a brisk walk.

Rhidi shared a confused look with Alias and Shasta, the three having formed up shoulder to shoulder out of habit, but the Pod Section set off after their NCO, winding their way through the dusky street of the local town.

The "capital" of the Ichiti and Morloli was massive, by their standards, but was still in its form of a Bronze Age settlement. The homes were rustic, little more than well constructed hovels and stone buildings, and the streets were less than sanitary.

That did not stop the locals from stepping out of their way and bowing respectively, clearing a path for the Pod Section as they rapidly marched behind their NCO.

Sergeant Flores, despite her height, scared the piss out of anything in front of her, though the Morloli seemed to like her more for it, giving her the warrior's greeting of their bladed hands crossed over each other.

Before too long they came before a massive stone and lumber temple, adorned with tall, carved pillars of alternating stone and wood. It was domed, an impressive feat by any standard, and lined with large bronze dishes that burned with incense.

"What the hell is this place?" Alias asked, turning around on the spot and spying the other smaller, adjacent temples that seemed to be more miniature in scale.

Shasta, hood flared, looked around with Acici. "Temple, of sssome kind."

"Temple." Acici agreed with a nod. "Temple sssquare, where they likely meet to worship en massse."

"That still doesn't explain why we're here." Oin muttered, her black ears pinned. "I've never liked temples, no matter how kind the perceived god may be…"

"Shut your fucking mouths." Sergeant Flores snapped, her head whipping left to stare at them.

Everyone became rather quiet, clearing their throats as they stood there idle.

Nothing of real note happened for ten minutes, then the sound of feet became evident behind them. Rhidi turned her head and saw a large group of Ichiti and Morloli wearing ceremonial garb of one kind or another, brightly colored… but oddly enough, all trimmed in glimmering gold.

"Ah, Sergeant Flores." A Human called out, a small group of them rounding the corner with their ceremonial escort. "Thank you for coming on such short notice!"

Sergeant Flores said nothing, just staring at the blonde haired man with hooded eyes that said "You are cutting into my relaxation time, you fucking nerd".

The man seemed to notice the sentiment, and cleared his throat while gesturing at the other Humans and the locals. "W-Well, anyway, we appreciate you standing in as the honor guard for the Foreign Culture Study and Recording Council."

Again, Sergeant Flores said nothing, just staring down the man who was nearly two feet taller than her.

The robed Ichiti and Morloli looked between the two Humans, the moth folk appearing rather uneasy while the smaller manti glanced at each other, knowing-humor in their eyes.

"So uh… shall, we?" He said, gesturing to the temple and gracefully speaking in the local Ichiti dialect.

Sergeant Flores rolled her eyes, then gestured with a flick of her hand towards the contingent of Humans. "Flank them, parallel eight by eight."

Rhidi and the other Droppers trotted up, eight troopers to a side with rifles still slung, and stepped off in time with the other Humans.

The stench of burning incense was a far cry from the more refined notes of the Human varieties, though to Rhidi they smelled more putrid, a sickly-sweet smell that borderlined on brazenly foul.

"Are they burning a dead animal in here?..." Angel muttered, her gruff voice low and only heard by the Kafya and Lilgara.

Rhidi grinned to herself, as did Oin, Imridit, and Inthur.

Rhidi looked sideways with her eyes at Inthur, and the blue furred Kafya matched the gaze for a moment before looking forward; Rhidi had been meaning to broach the subject at some point, as to why Inthur had leapt to her rescue so readily despite their clear hatred of one another.

The temple was dark, causing Rhidi to become a little more alert and look around her instead of at Inthur; The only light came from the large bronze dishes, out of which poured the foul smelling incense smoke, but there was something rather odd sitting on a large dais.

Sitting upright on a hand-carved display was a single golden record, on which were dozens of bone needles attached to a main horn of copper. While it was crude by modern standards, it held within its own right a kind of beauty long forgotten by all the other races in the room, a craftsmanship so old that any signs of it were likely long forgotten, corroded and eaten by time.

Rhidi had no idea what she was staring at, but the Humans were in a right bout of quiet, stunned shock.

"Are those… no!" One female scientist said, shaking her head from side to side. "There is no way those could have gotten here! How did they even read them?!"

The Humans were stunned, but the blonde haired man began to slowly speak to the main Itchiti, a large female with stunning marigold wings.

They talked back and forth, the Human becoming more and more flabbergasted, then turned to the others.

"They… they read the noise." He said, pointing to his head. "Their antennae could… they could see in their mind."

"That's impossible Richardo!" The woman said, perhaps a little too loudly, pointing to the disk. "Those records were only supposed to be read by a highly advanced civilization! These people are barely out of the Copper Age!"

Richardo shrugged, gesturing to the proudly smiling, golden winged Ichiti. "They read them via the sound they made in the needles, it is as they say. Their antennae fed the noise into their head, and they saw… well… us."

The Ichiti woman spoke at length to Richardo while the other scientists wrangled their emotions, some of them looking as if they were going to pass out. Rhidi and the other troopers stood around, sniffing out of boredom or watching the little scene play out before them.

"I liked the play better." Marides muttered, eliciting a few chuckles from around her.

"They changed themselves." Richardo said after the Ichiti finished. "They saw the images of us on the records, and decided it was the holy way, the correct way, to be. They decided that the stars had delivered upon them their true forms so… so they changed."

"How?" Another female scientist asked, tilting her head so her straight black hair fell over her high cheekbones. "How in the hell could they rewrite their genecode like that?"

Richardo asked the question, and the Ichiti explained herself, ending her long speech with a flourish of her four hands at her body.

"They call it 'The Great Change'." Richardo began, looking up around him with a sudden realisation. "Look, the old sacks are around us."

Rhidi slowly looked up, ready to pull her rifle off her shoulder if something rushed down at her… but all she saw were hundreds of silk cocoons, wrapped in colorful ribbons.

"The entire Ichiti caste bound themselves in great silk cocoons, used mainly to grow themselves over time, and instead shared a great command via… sound." Richardo mused on, resting his hands on his hips with a smile. "They used sound to make them all change their forms, to rewrite themselves in the golden images the stars gave them. The smaller Morloli could not change, so they stayed the same, staying vigilant over decades of watch and care as the Ichiti changed themselves. After…"

He spoke briefly to the lead Ichiti, then nodded.

"After fifty years of change, they were reborn in their current forms. Shaped by the stars." He finished, then shook his head from side to side. "I can't believe it…"

What the Humans learned that day was that, by some miracle of interstellar shenanigans, the ancient Voyager 1 had ended up crash landing on the planet. After the locals had finally gotten into the thing out of curiosity, the golden disk caught their eye. By some miracle, the record was intact and had easily survived the crash, glinting in the light.

Much like Humans, the Ichiti and Morloli loved gold since it was the color of sunshine, and treasured the disk, keeping it in the capital for as long as it has been owned. They didn't realize it played sound until the curious tamperings of a royal scientist, and they figured out how to make the music play.

Detectable by their antennae, they had assumed the images they saw in their heads were holy visions, the stars demanding that they change their forms to better match what the heavens had planned for them.

By pure coincidence, and by bouncing off the solar shield of a passing Kojynn exploration ship, the old probe had landed on their innocent little world.

Due to this fluke of events, Humans had accidentally caused an entire race to change themselves into their resemblance.

Rhidi thought it was absolutely bat-shit insane, but it was the only reason she could think of that would explain the odd body structures of the insectoid race.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

It provided an odd dilemma though, for the Humans; According to the word around the FOB, Human command back on Earth was seeing the world as their "responsibility" due to having a direct, if actually being indirect, hand in the planet's development. The combat actions on the planet were winding down due to the rapid retreat of the Doch, but the Humans believed they could not just pull out and call it a day.

These Ichiti had molded themselves around Humanity, after all.

That problem in particular was not Rhidi's problem, as with the enemy fleet flashing back out into space, and the planet now being Doch free with the stragglers having been hunted rather ruthlessly…

… she had no reason to be there anymore.

—

"Docking complete."

Rhidi looked up, hands on her armored hips as she watched the lock lights. They changed from red, to green, smiling to herself as the door slowly slid open.

Humans loved their green, it was such a happy color afterall.

"1st Wild Hunt, disembark at your leisure."

Rhidi stepped aboard the Wild Hunt with a sigh of relief, treading carefully in her armored boots as she and the rest of her Company came aboard, their helmets under their left arms. They had already been issued their orders to relieve themselves of their armor so the technicians could go over it again in piecemeal, and Rhidi knew her MG111 and SR-113 could use the loving touch of the Drafritti and Skalathir.

Rhidi was pretty sure her own armor was going to have to go over onto the Moose, as it wasn't moving as smoothly as it had before she had fallen down into the base itself.

With creaking joints that were quickly patched planetside, Rhidi stepped into the arming rack that had seen her off all that time before. It felt as if it had been a year since she had snatched up her helmet and ran down to her pod, but it couldn't have been more than a few months at the most.

She raised her arms, then turned her head towards the screen that came out to her, the armory arms going to work on her armor and pulling it off of her IB suit, piece by piece.

Private First Class Rhidi, SOBP-19621983: Confirmed

Helmet destroyed, major damage to plating

Armor pieces showing 35% functionality, refit required immediately

Armor rating: 13%

Ammo load: N/A

Deployments: XJ-1

Confirmed kills of record: 219

Drops: 1

Current assignment ship: The Wild Hunt

SOBP record: In Progress

As Rhidi raised her eyebrows at her confirmed kills, the armory arms held up her armor in a "What the hell happened here?" motion, the arms turning towards each other as they investigated the deep grooves and broken plating.

Standing there in her filthy IB suit, Rhidi found the words as she leaned towards the screen. "Two… two hundred and nineteen?"

The screen displayed "..." for a few moments, then began to list her kills in detail, all which were confirmed by recordings from her helmet, as well as multiple drones.

Rhidi leaned in towards the screen, still too shocked for words; Recording after recording showed her killing every integer on that count, as well as showing her how many people had also viewed those recordings.

"Six thousand people watched me…" Rhidi said under her breath, her fur becoming rather suddenly hot and uncomfortable. "How… what…"

Her inner reflection was interrupted by other Droppers entering the armory rack, one of which was Shorsey who whistled when she saw Rhidi's screen.

"Two hundred and nineteen?" Shorsey said with a grin, leaning down towards the screen while the armory arms waggled at her, annoyed that she wasn't getting fully within the rack. "That's pretty hardcore Rhidi, you trying to speed run your way to a cutter award?"

"I…" Rhidi said breathlessly, but a loud clap of armored gauntlets caught both her and Shorsey's attention.

"Rhidi! Get out of that rack and peel that suit off of you." Sergeant Flores ordered, jabbing an armored thumb over her shoulder. "Go on, all you Kafya need a solid scrub down so the medics won't get on my case."

Rhidi nodded and left the rack as the arms took Shorsey's helmet, the rest of her armor plating coming off with the usual amount of whirring and unlocking actuators.

Getting the suit off turned out to be more difficult than she had imagined, but not for the reason she was expecting. While standing in the locker room and unzipping the center line, she felt an odd… fear, wash over her.

This suit, the very IB suit she was wearing, had kept her alive all through her battles on that planet below, even as she fell into the depths of broken vehicles and shattered pour-rock.

Taking it off for good now, safe and secure on the ship, and knowing it was going to get sucked down into the bowels of the ship for refit, out of reach… Rhidi didn't know why, but it caused her heart to beat quickly for a few breaths.

She managed to muscle through the feelings and place the suit onto its hook; Rhidi knew that even if she didn't press the service button, it was going to get dragged down anyway, so this at least felt like she didn't have a choice.

With her suit whirring off to get serviced, Rhidi grabbed a towel and headed off to the showers. She didn't have to bother with a bra or underwear, as any veteran knew the suits worked best while nude underneath.

Sure, it could be awkward when you had to unzip it a little to get some fresh air, but that was only awkward for civilians.

As Rhidi stepped into a small half-walled shower station, she turned on the water with a smile, remembering back to the first times they had all showered together. Wandering eyes had mostly been an issue from the chest up, but even then, they had all been so tired that they just wanted to get clean and go to sleep.

Privacy in basic was afforded purely out of lack of care, while here on the boats you had a few walls around the ribcage, despite the back being open to the tiled drain aisle.

Some folks ran the risk of passing out in the shower, so doors tended to be a no-no.

A large presence to her right made Rhidi narrow her eyes as she pressed her face into the stream of water, and smell alone told her it was Inthur.

She was still unsure how to handle Inthur, and something told her that the blue furred Kafya had chosen the neighboring shower stall on purpose.

"Inthur." Rhidi said cooly as she pulled her face from the water, letting the steaming stream crash into her collar bones and chest.

Inthur turned her back to her own shower head, her eyes tired as she let the heat cook her shoulder muscles. "Rhidi."

The two stood there in silence, both of their eyes closed as the water cleaned their fur and coursed down their bodies.

Rhidi understood that Inthur was not going to speak, so she opened her eyes first, cupping her hands near the top of her breasts to catch the water. "That was a clean save you did, before I fell into that parking garage."

"Seemed like the pertinent thing to do." Inthur replied quietly, though Rhidi saw that her ears were slowly perking. "Did all that work just so you could fall into a crack in the ground. How the hell did they make an entire parking garage underground that quickly, anyway?"

Rhidi grinned to herself. "They're looking into it, actually. A few of the smarter Humans believe they had transported it underground with the same technology they used to move their troops around."

"What a nightmare." Inthur grumbled, opening her own eyes as she turned around, letting the water crash into her far larger chest. "What kind of culture has the ability to snap an entire building underground?"

Rhidi shrugged. "Dunno, guess we'll find out eventually though."

Inthur shrugged her lips, running her palms down her snout before blowing her nose into the water.

Rhidi broke her palms apart so the water flooded down her stomach, then reached out with a hand, gently touching Inthur's shoulder. "Thank you, for helping me during that day."

Rhidi had to fight to suppress her smirk as Inthur's tail gave a betraying wag, and her ears were fully perked despite the small curls at the end.

"It's nothing." Inthur said quickly, flicking her fingers in the water. "Anyone would have done it."

Rhidi scritched lightly at Inthur's wet shoulder fur, eliciting another wag from the blue furred Kafya. "Yeah, but you came to my aid even after the thrashing I gave you for boinking that Human."

"We didn't… boink." Inthur said ruefully, crossing her arms. "We just relieved some stress, that's all."

"I heard from the Humans around that room that it was a ferocious boinking." Imridit mused as she stepped into the stall on the other side of Rhidi. "You're not beating the boinking allegations."

"It was not a boink!" Inthur cried out, hanging her head back as Imridit giggled evilly from her stall, turning on her shower head as Rhidi grinned at Inthur.

Rhidi turned around so her back was to the water, placing her hands on her hips. "Regardless… I acted a little too firmly with you, so come here."

Imridit slowly turned her head towards Rhidi, her eyes wide and lips splitting into an aghast grin.

"W-… What?" Inthur stammered out, now looking at Rhidi like she was mad.

"I owe you an apology, so come here." Rhidi said, and opened her arms within her stall, the shower water pouring down her shoulders and arms.

Rhidi did, after all, owe Inthur an apology, but that didn't mean she needed to be nice about it. It would be rather foul play of her after all if she, the Kholihl, did not show appreciation for another female stepping up to defend her in battle.

Inthur, ears perked fully out of embarrassment, stepped around the end of her shower stall and stood in front of Rhidi; She was caught in a cultural trap, as she could not technically refuse the apology of her Kholihl, but she could also not be taller than Rhidi as she accepted the apology.

This meant she was going to have to do something rather annoying to appease Rhidi, and she quietly hated that fact.

She sure as hell wasn't getting on her knees in the shower room, so she instead bent forward as far as she needed to, just so her ears were a few inches below Rhidi's.

Rhidi stepped forward with a smile and wrapped Inthur up in a hug, even though her eye twitched when Inthur's breasts touched her before anything else did.

"I'm sorry for fighting with you, Inthur." Rhidi murmured into the blue furred Kafya's ear, patting her on the back. "And I appreciate you making sure I didn't get stabbed with a power-spear thingy."

Inthur, not sure what else to do, hugged Rhidi back, her tail giving a few light wags. "Well… I mean, I couldn't let you get stabbed."

Rhidi leaned back from Inthur, her hands resting on the Kafya's blue shoulders, and she raised her eyebrows.

Inthur rolled her head along her neck, letting out a sigh.

"And… I'm sorry for… boinking that Human without proper paperwork." Inthur muttered, crossing her arms

Imridit raised a finger. "Vicious boinking."

Inthur grumbled in her throat, pulling a giggle from Imridit as Rhidi tilted down a small sitting stool from the shower wall.

"Oh come on!" Inthur growled, forcing her erect ears to pin. "We don't have to do… that! Isn't the hug enough?!"

Rhidi snapped her fingers and pointed down at the stool, her other hand grabbing the scrubbing poof from its hook on the wall. Inthur let out a whine, but sat down on the stool glumly, facing Rhidi.

As per her cultural duties, Rhidi bathed her lesser female in order to "wash away the apologies" they had both given, allowing them to leave clean and fresh to the world. Inthur, naturally, hated every minute of it, staring with furrowed brows into Rhidi's stomach as the yellow fur made a show of scrubbing her erect ears and brushing her back.

As Inthur shook herself and went to wander off towards the blowers, Imridit quickly stepped around her stall into Rhidi's with rapid foot steps.

"You know, I was there too!" Imridit called out. "And I'm really sorry I didn't manage to catch you!"

Rhidi quirked a brow, then snorted when she figured out what the pink furred Kafya was up to. She held open her arms, and Imridit slammed into them, giggling and wagging her tail far harder than Inthur.

By the time she had washed Imridit and sent her off to the blowers, Oin had already been watching them for a few minutes, her black fur dusky in the odd lights of the showers.

Rhidi, rustling Imridit's pink hair as she went running off, turned to see Oin, who smiled evilly at the yellow Kafya while giving her tail a sway.

"I have stuff I'm sorry for too, Rhidi." Oin said, as she would much prefer getting washed by Rhidi than having to do it herself.

Plus, her data-slate was waterproof.

Rhidi let out a long sigh, then kicked the seat back down, grabbing the poof back off its hook as Oin skittered over and pulled out her data-slate.

—

Rhidi finally held up her arms for the blowers, flicking her soaking wet fingers; She had been barraged by nearly every female Kafya in her unit, and ended up scrubbing them all off one by one until her fingers felt like they were going to slough off.

Some of these females she didn't really hang out much with, such as her fellow yellow fur Quinnit, but she supposed it was better off that way. The other female Kafya from basic were pretty much loners, and were now off in the other Platoons… but if Rhidi was the head female of the Droppers, she was going to have to keep an eye on them.

Or at least talk to them one on one, she would make Oin craft a handy list for her.

She had failed to really make some kind of contact with them all, as she had formed her little… "friend group" on a natural basis, but the other female Kafya kept their heads down and out of the lime light.

As the blowers slowly dried her, Rhidi turning in a circle and puffing her hair away from her eyes, she mulled over the casualty reports; She had gotten away rather lucky, as far as the dead went, with only Shaksho losing Kafya. The other dead were Humans, Lilgarans, and Pwah, but they were thankfully none she knew.

Rhidi found that it was a rather macabre thought, as she smoothed down her now dry fur, but that was just the way of it, wasn't it?

Hoping the dead were no one you knew, in the end.

Pulling on a fresh shirt and a pair of pajama pants that Rhidi had stored in her locker, she padded across the ship to her room, opening the door with a sigh of relief. It was one of those rare feelings that not a lot of people got to experience, the welcomed sight of your bed and all your things in one place… as well as not getting shot at.

Rhidi plunked down in front of her data-display and queued up the video feeds for her equipment, then leaned back and fished around for a cold can of soda as the loading bars slowly fed in.

She cracked open the tab as her armor came online first, deep in the workshops of the Moose. The red Skalathir man working on her armor looked rather annoyed at the suit, tapping his massive draconic foot and talking to a nearby red female Skalathir with angry gestures of the hands.

The two were talking quite animatedly, both pointing at the armor with the same kind of disappointment a father would when their son crashes their car for the first time.

Wincing, Rhidi changed the camera feed to the ones for her SR-113 and MG111, the video opening up within the Moose's armory workshops. To her surprise, a bright pink, male Drafritti was working on her MG111, bobbing his head up and down in time with the music playing from his massive earbuds. He seemed a rather cheery sort, doing small little dance moves as he reached for a spring, or fetched a new component to replace a beaten one within the receiver.

Rhidi found him rather funny, actually, sipping her cola with a smile as the Drafritti pointed a fresh barrel and grooved along his worktable. He smiled at something off camera, then jerked over a dark gray Drafritti male who looked far less amused.

Rhidi giggled as the pink Drafriti spun the dark gray one, and she realized that the two Drafritti were sock-hopping. With a shake of the arm, the dark gray male flailed his hands at the pink male, smiling despite stalking back over to his own work bench.

The pink Drafritti danced on, shrugging as he spun around on his heels, slamming the new barrel into place with a flourish.

Rhidi switched to the video feed of her rifle, and let out a small laugh; Leaning over the rifle was a jet black female Drafritti, though she was not working in the slightest.

Instead of replacing the battered weapon's parts, she instead had the SR-113 partially disassembled with its springs and trigger pack laid out, all while staring at the screen of her data-slate.

Rhidi manipulated the camera as best as she could to see what the Drafritti was watching, and saw that she was enraptured by an older Human cartoon. Rhidi found herself watching along with the Drafritti as a rather brawny looking man with red hair, and many arm scars, was fighting with some kind of… animal eared woman with white hair.

"What in the hell is that?" Rhidi murmured aloud as a woman was exposed as the ship's main computer, floating in some kind of liquid filled vessel.

The Drafritti seemed to have the same questions, her eyes transfixed to the screen and ears perked as high as they could be. She wouldn't get her answers, however, as another gold-furred female Drafritti snuck up behind the mesmerised one of jet black fur.

The golden Drafritti goosed her by shoving her thumbs into the black fur's ribs, and Rhidi didn't have to know how loud the Drafritti screamed as she scrambled to turn off her data-slate.

Rhidi chuckled to herself as her rifle parts went flying, and figured the SR-113 was going to be delayed.

She still had a whole day until she went over to the Moose with Morris, as they were going to be in orbit for another four days before skipping back towards Earth, so she pulled up her "mail".

Despite being purely digital messages, Humans still referred to their transmissions as "mail", harkening back to when they would transfer communications via pen and paper and a rudimentary courier system.

Rhidi opened up the little system and was surprised to see that she not only had mail from her little sister… but from her mother, as well.

"How in the fuck does she know how to contact me?" Rhidi whispered to her screen, rapidly opening up the letter and reading down the long script of Kafya-hi, but found that the message became corrupted after the first few passages.

The letters were all jumbled, tilted, or completely unreadable.

"What the hell?" Rhidi muttered, closing and reopening the letter multiple times to see if the new load would fix the issue, but found it only got worse the more she tried. "What is wrong with this fucking thing?!"

There was a knock at her barracks room door, and with a disgusted growl Rhidi turned away from her display. "Come in!"

Saffi leaned into the room after opening the door, her tangle of short green braids wiggling back and forth with the sudden stop. "You gonna eat?"

"Yeah, I'm coming." Rhidi muttered, throwing her hand towards her display screen. "I had a message from my mom, but it's all garbled!"

"Garbled?" Saffi asked, stepping in and leaning down beside Rhidi as her yellow eyes flicked along the message. "Yeah… yeah that's garbled alright. Did it get corrupted on the way over or something? I know skipping can cause issues with messages."

Rhidi glowered at the screen. "Well yeah, but that's if you don't adjust the message to travel over long distances and bounce along the relays. My mom knows how all that stuff works, she's probably been sending mail to my sister every moment she isn't trying to wiggle into new outfits."

"You yellows are so weird." Saffi giggled out, then clapped Rhidi on her shoulders with her pawed hands. "Come on and come eat, they have fried chicken tenders in the shape of dinosaurs!"

Rhidi glumly looked at her screen, then up at Saffi. "Do they have that white sauce with the little green flecks in it?"

"Yup!" Saffi replied gleefully. "Me and the other Droppers are gonna have fun seeing who can make the best dinner diarama!"

"Diorama." Rhidi corrected, standing and slipping on her slippers. "'Diarama' is how the country Humans say it."

Saffi stuck out her tongue, skipping out of Rhidi's barracks room.

There was an apparent collision, Saffi talking quickly to someone in Kafya-hi, and Rhidi stepped out of her room, closing the door behind her.

She found herself looking down at the shortest red Kafya she had ever seen, and the name clicked into her mind like the snap of puzzle blocks.

"Intrikit?" Rhidi asked, remembering the small female being rather scarce during training.

Intrikit was so short, she was one of the few Kafya who wore Pwah armor, hair kept in tight, interlocking braids along the top of her head, and blue eyes sharp as daggers. As far as Rhidi could remember, Intrikit's family hated how short she was and she was a bit of a loner, as very few reds believed she could really "be a proper warrior" when she barely cleared over five feet in height… barely.

Rhidi was pretty sure they had to count a lot of ear, as well.

"Rhidi." Intrikit murmured, avoiding the taller Kafya's gaze. "I was hoping I could… join you, for dinner."

Rhidi blinked down at the short red Kafya, noticing that Intrikit had laced her fingers together in front of her chest. "Uh… I mean, of course you can, we're all Droppers after all."

Intrikit nodded, still avoiding Rhidi's eyes, and stood to the side of the taller yellow fur.

The walk to the galley was quiet, Intrikit fidgeting with her fingers as she walked beside Rhidi, and the quiet was nearly causing Rhidi's neck to cringe.

"So, I hear you did quite well down there." Rhidi said, trying desperately to make some conversation. "You got some confirmed kills down there, right?"

Intrikit nodded. "I uh… I got forty seven."

Forty seven? Damn… Rhidi thought to herself, as Alias had only managed twenty five despite all the chaos. "That's really good!"

"T-Thank you…" Intrikit murmured, her ears stiffening out of embarrassed pride. "That means a lot, coming from you."

Rhidi looked down at the shorter red fur, and the amount of fidgeting and bashful energy was enough to make her wish she was somewhere else entirely.

"So… you like dinosaur nuggets?" Rhidi asked, completely at a loss of what to talk about.

Oddly enough, Intrikit brightened up at this, and even looked up at Rhidi instead of looking at the decking. "Oh! I do, actually. These ones are shaped in the forms of random creatures from both the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods of Earth's history, mostly giant reptiles and the like, though I believe one of the shapes was around during the Tithonian age."

"Oh man…" Rhidi whispered to herself as she looked up at the overhead above them, Intrikit going into great detail of the many dinosaurs that once roamed Earth.