Cath

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

This situation just kept weirder and shittier for the Humans.

Ezra confirmed Wodan’s warning to Zey a moment later.

“We have two dozen foot mobiles approaching on the port side. They’re not here for a tea party - I see heavy armour.”

She swore under her breath, then addressed Itxaro, Vigdis and (to a lesser extent) Darnell.

“Guys, stop shaking hands with everyone for a sec. Nellara said whoever blew that horn wasn’t a friend, right? So are they not friends with these aliens, not friends with us, or both? I need to know which faction, if any, we can trust, because we’ve got twenty more soldiers on the way. We’re running out of peaceful options here.”

Zey then hurriedly turned to her XO. She spoke quickly and relatively quietly, poking his arm with each point she made.

“Hold the pens, Mallory. Fuck knows if this new group is friendly or even affiliated with our current guests.”

She pointed to the door with her free hand.

I want everyone awake and ready if they aren’t already. I also want everyone who knows how to handle a weapon tooled up and tactical, outside that airlock door in four minutes. Tell Feng to free up the med bay and get down here, just in case.”

She considered her other options for a moment.

“Is the nose gun operational? Check with Wodan. If it is, I want it pointed at them or over their heads. Got it? Let's go!” She lightly slapped Mallory’s arm as if to spur him on before turning again.

“Eva! What is the status of your mech? Can we have you looking big and mean and mobile in the next ninety seconds? If so, let's do that NOW please. Otherwise go grab a weapon from the armoury.”

Finally, Zey put the communicator back to her lips.

“Ezra, are you able to fall back inside?”

“Not without pushing past all your friends. Droid 2 is stuck close to the new group, hiding.”

Zey swore again.

“Ok, hold tight but be ready to retreat back inside. What are they all doing now?”

“Erm…”

---

All eyes of the Glen immediately fixated on J’eon as he shouted back from the edge of the outcropping on which the Jotunheim rested. Excited mutterings rippled around the group; many of the soldiers looked to Silbermine who had edged forward a bit more but didn’t speak. The Scripts of Venurwreth told of gifts falling from the heavens, not people.

“Who is this Glen?”

“The Sky People?”

“Have they come to help us?”

Sir Sweven turned to Silbermine as well.

“My lord, could these Sky People have the wisdom we seek?”

Silbermine held out a hand for silence as a Tekeri in dark armour with gold gilt emerged from the temple.

For a few moments after Nellara’s address, the only sound that could be heard was the faint rustling of leaves in the wind.

Then Silbermine disgorged a huge, braying laugh from inside his helmet. Laughter spread quickly across his retinue, continuing for ten heartbeats before dying away. The portly noble clopped forward, until he was level with Sir Sweven.

“The Ascendancy claims the mountains.” He boomed, before turning to his retinue with arms outstretched at either side.

“Does this look like a mountain to you?!”

“NO M’LORD!” They all shouted in unison.

Silbermine turned back to the Castigator.

“We have hills like this in Mythadia - intend ye claim those too?!”

The Glen laughed again. Silbermine pointed over Nellara’s head at the Tamerlane logo emblazoned on the Jo’s hull.

“This temple belongs to the Glen of this March, Sudenúr - just look at the painting on its wall.”

He then gestured behind to the trail of destruction leading up the hill, and the outcropping under the Jo.

“It is damaged after its fall from the heavens. The rock it sits on is not stable. I will have the best engineers from Keraknúr secure it for transport to safer ground. I would speak with the Sky People also.”

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

I have updated the story synopsis for 14th March 2023!

On the morning of its maiden voyage in 2296, an exploration vessel called the Jotunheim is attacked at Stavanger spaceport. Its experimental faster-than-light drive is accidentally triggered during the escape, transporting the ship to another dimension. The Jotunheim subsequently crash landed on an uncharted planet called Kanth-Amerek (K-A). Various native citizens of Kanth-Amerek witnessed the crash and came to investigate. After making contact with these locals, the Jotunheim's learned of multiple civilisations on the continent, with technology roughly equivalent to Earth in thr 1500s. However, there was one key difference - some of these natives appeared to have magical abilities, resulting in great societal advancement across some areas.

Understanding the great technological prowess of these 'Sky People', the different parties of natives have begun to splinter.

We are still open to new characters - if you are interested then please feel free to join our discord to discuss ideas:

discord.gg/EbgxhX56

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

The marshes of Sudenúr often made travel off the few main roads slow and tiring for Glen. It was part of the reason this March had been so difficult to control over the years. Several of his knights had urged Silbermine to use caution. It was much safer to take the long way round past Ertiseda; they could not protect their lord if they were shoulder deep in muck. Silbermine took no mind and ordered them through the swamps - he HAD to see this fallen empyrean body for himself. He felt a divine connection had been forged in that fiery moment when it roared over their heads and did not smite them.

So they had hiked in single file through languid pools and over fetid mounds, camping for two nights at some of the run-down family compounds that dotted the March. Sudenúr was relatively flat in the middle, so by the second day even the Glen’s relatively wide-angle eyesight could pick up a smouldering wreck on the foothills in the distance. Silbermine spurred them on, faster and faster until they got stuck in quickmud. Through a titanic team effort they got free, though another load bearer was lost and never found.

There were some accusatory glances around the campfire that night, so Silbermine judged they needed a reminder of the gravity of their quest.

“Brothers, these are hard times. Failed crops, pestilence, teeming hordes of demons in the dark at night. But let us not forget…Venurwreth’s Scripts tell of gifts falling from the heavens unto worthy Glenfolk on the cusp of greatness. The Running is nigh, and the time of House Silbermine has come again!”

Gesith continued on, speaking with the ardent conviction of a true believer. By the end, he was practically shouting into the crisp night air as embers from the fire floated up into the air. His knights and servants rose to their hooves and bayed wildly, eventually galloping in an instinctive circle around the camp with Silbermine, chanting the songs of their forefathers.

Fueled by the herd-fervour that Glen leaders had been putting to good use since the S’tor invaded, Silbermine’s group packed up camp before dawn to cross the final stretch to the crash. The load bearers washed the knights before securing their plate armour. Standards were attached to polearms that most of the knights held upright as they marched. They then fitted Silbermine with ornate barding that sported the red, white and yellow designs of his House. To top it off, they opened up his father’s helmet and carefully secured it around his head.

A dense fog had rolled in off lake Núr overnight, so Silbermine had his force mage lead the way. Using both hands to gesture, they forced the fog back to create a narrow channel. The swirling, roiling fog disturbance was clearly visible from the air, but that mattered not to Silbermine.

He galloped in the middle of his retinue with his eyes fixed forward, searching the soupy mix for any sign of the thing that had fallen from the sky. It seemed that over time, the heavy impact of their hooves on the ground merged into one continuous drum beat. The muscly legs of the Glen clattered in slow motion as the nobleman pondered what they might find.

As the first light of dawn probed through the fog, Silbermine felt the ground firm up. They were exiting the marshes and approaching the foothills on the border with the Ascendancy. He urged them on a final time, and the Glen formed up around him. Three knights and nine Glen-at-arms around their leader, plus ten warrior servants bringing up the rear.

Suddenly, the fog lessened. There it was.

Before them was a long and rocky incline, studded with violent divots where some vast bulk had scraped and rolled up it. Big shards of metal stood like small trees leading up to his prize - the fallen star. An enormous hulk with stubby wings sticking out from three corners. On the side, what looked like a Glen with a bow and arrow was painted in light blue. Some ancient lettering was scrawled written underneath. The Scripts were true!

Smoke still rose into the air around his gift; Silbermine’s keen nose picked up an acrid stench he couldn’t place. Something else too…

“Tekeri, my lord, and Glen.” one of the knights muttered as they approached.

Silbermine ground his tombstone teeth together. Someone had beaten them to it. “Sound the horn.” Silbermine ordered.

The Glen liked horns. Some old houses had created a range of unique sounds for their group that served different purposes. The House horn was meant to serve as an announcement of their presence.

The knight unclipped one of three horns from his harness and blew strenuously into it. Their group cantered forwards, climbing up the hill towards the ship. Silbermine’s eyes weren’t great, but eventually she made out a host of figures on the ridge in front of the star.

They stopped about a hundred metres away and spread out now they were on more solid ground. All of them were tense and ready to bolt if any on the ridge appeared to nock an arrow. The most senior of the knights present, Falgar Sweven, trotted forward a bit further and boomed in a stentorian voice:

“Greetings! We have come to claim this fallen star under the banner of House Silbermine. May we have safe passage?”

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

Ezra carried on waving until Vigdis went inside, then gave her a finger of his own - the middle one. After that, he put his hand back on the gun’s foregrip and watched the aliens closely. He’d had standoffs like this before with all sorts of Humans - Mexican federal police, Kazakh freedom fighters etc, but never bird-soldiers before. It made him smirk under his mask. Were they afraid, or were they just naturally skittish?

---

“Hey, easy on the details! They need to back the fuck up tell us what’s going on here before we just roll out the welcome wagon.” Darnell snapped at Itxaro as Vigdis re-entered.

“Shut up man, I know how a gun works.” Darnell kissed his teeth at Vigdis as she started pushing the end of his shotgun. His South London dialect was more pronounced now he’d had a few drinks. The dawning realisation that they were stuck God-knows-where had really hit home last night. He was just a fixer, not an explorer. He shouldn’t have to deal with all this alien shit.

“The aliens just confirmed what we already know - we’re stuck somewhere off all the charts. Now she’s giving them all invitations to follow us back to Earth, completely disregarding the fact these things have some advanced tech or, or fucking MAGIC. Whatever it is, it's dangerous is all I'm saying.” Darnell pointed to Dr Ibarra while speaking.

“Now it looks like they want us to go somewhere with them to do God knows what.” Darnell continued.

“No one is going anywhere.” Zey said firmly, arms crossed. The aliens had shown a willingness to communicate and be peaceful, but she still wasn’t clear what they were capable of or exactly what they wanted. It seemed this ‘Kerchak’ was instrumental somehow.

“Mr Darnell is right - we can’t risk them finding their way to Earth. Nobody is to give usable reference points for our home until we know more about them, is that clear? Now, how do we ask them about these metal spheres and the fire show?"

She looked around. "Mallory, Eva, how long on those trinkets?”

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

Zey had to check her chem-gland to make sure she wasn’t hallucinating. Vigdis looked unhurt and mobile, praise be. But standing near her in the shuttle bay were five birds, some kind of elk-thing and…well, what the HELL was that thing in the leather robes? A burning tree from the crash? Why was there fire in the air when they were supposed to have fire suppression points in the ceiling? Zey had serious questions, and struggled to take her eyes off their new guests while Vigdis relayed what had happened to her so far.

Tyreese Darnell blurted out the first thing that came into his head.

“They’re aliens…not terrorists but fucking aliens!”

The large suited man shifted his grip on the unfamiliar shotgun as a tidy-looking bird came closer; he shakily half raised it before Zey put a hand on the barrel and pushed it back down.

The bird alien pointed at Vigdis and said the engineer’s name in a voice that struck Zey as similar to that of a parrot’s mimicry. Clearer though. The clothed bird then pointed to itself.

“Kareet.”

Zey was shocked, and hesitated for a moment or two. Then she cleared her throat, gulped and pointed to herself.

“Zeynap.”

She then put a hand on Darnell’s arm.

“Tyreese.”

Finally, she pointed at her XO.

“Mallory.”

In the heat of the moment, it struck Zey that she may have never used Mallory’s first name before. And now she’d just introduced him as Mallory to a new race of beings.

It seemed the engineers were making progress in setting up a basis for communication, so the Captain studied how these aliens were reacting. She noticed that not only was this burning tree apparently making notes with fire in the air, the most imposing bird also appeared to be remotely controlling a bunch of metal spheres with remarkable dexterity.

Mallory asked Vigdis about the roof. As the engineer was making her way over, Zey edged closer to her XO and surreptitiously placed a hand blocking visibility of her mouth while talking to Mallory.

“They have weapons, but where is the tech controlling all this weird shit? In their bodies? We need to get this burning tree out of the shuttle bay too, it's going to set something ablaze.”

Zey was listening in on the damage report with her eyes on their guests, formulating her next move when Eva and her suit woke up. Spider drones dialled in too, towards them from the back of the bay.. The reaction from the locals was understandably concerned, with everybody starting to move and some sort of electrical field appearing.

“Eva get your bots in line, you’re spooking the locals!” Zey raised her voice over her shoulder, palms out in a placating gesture again.

“I have a clean shot, I can blow this one’s head off!” Darnell urged.

“What is your status?” Ezra asked in her ear.

“Do NOT fire! Everybody remain calm - I’d rather not piss these things off.” Zey ordered, making a patting gesture towards the ground with her hands.

Just when Zey thought the tension couldn’t get higher, more bird soldiers appeared and this ‘Nellara’ became visibly more agitated. Zey's right hand crept up to rest on the pistol in her plate carrier’s holster, with her left still held out. The thing pointed its own feathery wing/arm outside, some others formed up while one bird started gesturing something quite different. The large elk creature and a few of the solders exited the shuttle bay. Suddenly Zey realised - Ezra.

Vigdis realised too, and charged towards the aliens.

“Vigdis, wait!” Zey called, but it was too late, she was among them and then outside.

“Oh fuck’s sake.” She groaned, exasperated. The sound of Eva’s suit opening filled the shuttle bay, and then the slap of feet on the deckplate behind her. Zey turned so she could see both her XO and her EVA specialist.

“Mallory, Eva, are there any trinkets in here we could give them as a peace offering? Nothing critical or offensive. Find something, now please.”

Zey looked back at the aliens and pointed to Eva.

“See? Human!”

---

“What is happening? You are in my shot.” Ezra asked calmly, staring at Vigdis through his scope as she gestured out.

“Ezra, i think the locals have spotted you or the droids, they’re getting aggravated. Stand down and show yourself or people are going to die.” Zey talked urgently into her radio.

“We cannot just surrender!”

“We’re not surrendering, we’re communicating! Now stand down and show yourself, that is a direct order.”

There was a pregnant pause over the airwaves.

“Understood.” Ezra crackled, finally.

Outside, the soldier crawled out from under the shrubbery he had set up in and walked a few paces forward, rifle cradled across his chest. He would be up the hill to the left of anyone looking into the shuttle bay entrance. He knew he looked like the bogeyman for humans, in his black armour and tactical mask. But who knows how these aliens would perceive him.

“Droids, step out from cover, holster your weapons and wave.” Ezra ordered, slowly wiggling the fingers on one raised hand. The robots obeyed instantly, both down in the furrow made by the spaceship as it rolled, and up and to the right.

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

A roiling fog had rolled across the marshy plains south of Lake Núr overnight. The first pale rays of dawn crept over the horizon and danced across the Jotunheim’s battered hull. Ezra turned off his night vision and surveyed the crash site again as first contact went ahead.

The Jotunheim was in an awkward, difficult to defend position, perched on the side of this hill. The firestorm immediately following the crash had burned away everything within fifty yards of the ship, leaving a charred circle. Ezra was no expert, but it seemed odd to him that the fires didn’t extend further out considering the oxygen-rich atmosphere. There were still a fair amount of trees and bushes surrounding the crash, even if some were still charred and smoking. This meant line of sight was choppy - no easy way to cover all approaches without more people. Ezra understood the Captain’s resistance to committing either her crew or frightened passengers to an external role right now. In fact this suited him - it meant he was indispensable while he figured out his next move.

The mercenary eventually opted to position himself up the hill from the ship, towards the cockpit end. There was a cluster of bushes that he could lie under which provided him a good vantage point to look out over the crash site and the marshes beyond. The other two androids controlled by Wodan (but accessible by any authorised personnel) completed a triangle around the ship. One was above and towards the engine end, with an OK view of the crest of their hill. The other droid blended in with the tangle of metal and broken trees that littered the Jotunheim’s path.

As the alien creatures arrived and investigated the ship, Ezra and his droids remained hidden. Their rifles were trained on the groups at all times. Once these initial guests filtered through to the shuttle bay on the marsh-side of the ship, they carefully tightened the triangle around them. Ezra changed position slightly to give him LOS on the jagged gash towards the fore corner of the shuttle bay. Peering through his scope, he saw multiple creatures in metal plate armour standing guard at the entrance.

“I have eyes on the shuttle bay opening. Two tangos are external.” Ezra sounded off over comms for the crew to hear. They looked like birds in armour through his scope.

“What is your status?”

Hello everyone!!

@XiaoYuLing welcome to the guild! I'm running a fantasy verse, contaminated with sci fi people. Check it out if you dare

HUFFLEPUFF ATTACK!!!!!!

Welcome! Sweets and hugz please

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Welcome!!

Introduction to me.

@Lionhitch welcome to the Guild! Do you only RP in fandoms or OC too?