writing Rapter: Jump from the Stars --- Original Story

[Mindrop 412]

Okay, well, if you have ever ventured over to the Inheritance Forums, then you may have seen me and Rapter. I have been working on this for a while, its a Sci-fy book.

 

I am looking for any and all feedback (excluding trolling). I could use constructive criticisms.

 

 

 

 

 

Forrest Lybrand was swept off the freighter, as was his pilot, Colin Bryan.

 

“The council wishes to see you immediately,” a young cute brunet said.

 

“No shower, food or changing into a dress uniform?” Forrest Asked.

 

“Nope, they stressed immediately,” she replied.

 

Forrest did not like how fast this was going. It was highly unregulated, something exactly against the council's typical bureaucratic ideology.

 

“Good luck in there Forrest,” Colin said.

 

“Your to come to Mr. Bryan,” The receptionist said.

 

A stream of curses stormed out of Colin's mouth. “No way am I going into the council room, not alive anyway,” Colin said stubbornly.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

The doors opened quickly by two guards as they rushed Forrest and dragged Colin in restraints into the council room.

 

“Representative, Sergeant Forrest Lybrand and Mr. Colin Bryan have arrived.”

 

“Miss Ring, I have no idea why these men are here,” President Joel Christensen said.

 

“Did I forgot to mention I asked these men here? My Apologizes,” Said Commander Jessop.

 

Forrest snapped into attention as he saw his commanding officer and saluted. Commander Jessop rose and saluted back.

 

“This is not about the mishap. I have been on that side before,” Colin whispered to Forrest.

 

“Jessop, why are these men here,” Science Representative Dr. Yeager asked.

 

“Wait, this is not about Elrinel?”

 

“No, of course not. That was an unfortunate mishap, Captain,” Commander Jessop replied kindly.

 

“Captian? That title still holds for me?”

 

“Of course it does...” Commander Jessop was cut off as a soldier in a crisp uniform burst through the double doors, almost tripped and sprinted across the long marble hall to the council desk.

 

“The 62nd Fleet was just destroyed! We received a transmission that an unknown fleet appeared and then the entire network went silent!”

 

“Sound the Red alarm now sergeant!” Captain Lybrand ordered, panic evident in his voice.

“Now just one moment Captain. This is my fleet, I give the orders,” Admiral ------ said standing.

 

“No time, we need to rush the 7th and 8th legions to the San Andrea system and condense all fleets to their legions.” Forrest shot back.

 

“Consolidating our forces would leave major gaps.”

 

“You don't know what we are dealing with,” Forrest cut in.

 

“Nor do you.”

 

“He obviously knows more that you Admiral,” Commander Jessop stated.

 

“QUEIT!” The President shouted. “Admiral, issue the red alert order and then lets listen to what Captain Lybrand has to say.”

 

"Go, issue the red alert. Condense the fleet to their legions," The Admiral grudgingly stated.

 

"Now Captain Lybrand, Elrinel. We have a outpost on there. What happened?" The Science Representative asked.

 

"10 days ago, the 62nd Fleet received a level 10 distress call from the scientific outpost on Elrinel. It took us 18 hours to reach the planet, and we immediately launched the Rapters as standard. The Cavalry was already launching as well.

 

When we hit the upper atmosphere, my pod's glass broke, raising the heat index, but nothing I could not handle, until my helmet fogged up. As soon as I was discharged from the pod, I levelled off and tried to remove my helmet, but the broken glass had slid inside and frozen the release.

 

A Rinon, a veteran Rapter who has is a master of one area and provides support on missions, latched on and forced my helmet to be released. I stayed back with the other Rinon, no need to dive headlong into a situation without a helmet.

 

I felt weird, like we were falling to fast, but nothing was coming up on any helmets. We were well above the others when they pulled their chutes, except it became immediatly apparent that their chutes broke, including their backup. We pulled our chutes, they broke, but out backups caught.

 

Immediately, a warning was sent to the second Rapter Team to pull their chutes immediately. 

 

On the ground, it was carange. My comrades bodies were broken and dislocated, evident even though their suits were intact. My Helment was also intact, one of the Rinon's found it.

 

The Second Team finally landed, and Captain Tomba made me a Captain to take control of the Rinon.

 

It was a twenty minute hike to the outpost and inside it was pure slaughter. No one was alive, thousands of shells littered the floor in the main control room. They fought well, but they still were slaughtered, cut down either by some bladed weapon, or by what appeared to be plasma or laser blasts."

 

Forrest took a deep breath as he finished to keep his composure.

 

"The outpost had discovered a huge amount of Carbon on the planet. I also found a hard carbon based shard, with a silicone slime on the back. I have it on me. It was deemed natural, but I have doubts. Whoever slaughtered them, it was in no way we have seen by pirates, or anyone else."

 

"Spit it out Forrest, what are you suggesting?" Commander Jessop asked.

 

"I believe... I believe, that Man has encountered it's first alien race. The 62nd Fleet should of been destroyed so fast. I spoke with Admiral, the fleet was going on Orange Alert."

 

"Not without getting a more informative message off," Colin said. "This is important and all, but, why exactly am I being forced to be here, in handcuffs?"

 

 

 

 

 

Okay well, I have a new Chapter here. I redid Chapter 1 after I got some feedback on it elsewhere. Here is the new version (if anyone is even reading this here.)

 

 

 

Forrest Lybrand slid his breakfast tray onto the table and plopped down with his fellow sergeants.

 

“Wow, someone woke up on in the crew quarters this morning after a fun night,” Sergeant Jacob Media jived.

 

Forrest smiled as the table chuckled. Rapters stayed in the Rapter quarters, and sleeping with the ships crew was illegal.

 

“Jealous?” Forrest shot back.

 

“Forrest, your shirts on inside out,” Sergeant Chris Matthews pointed out.

 

Forrest looked down at his shirt. “Rough night sleeping,” he said as he pulled it off.

 

“Thinking about mommy and daddy?” Jacob asked.

 

“Yeah, your mommy and daddy,” Forrest said grinning.

 

Chris' laugh died as he spoke. “So, what did keep you up tonight? Certainly not the contest?”

 

“Oh no, not that. I just had a bad dream.”

 

“Details my good commander.” Heads nodded in agreement at Chris' request.

 

“Alright, I dream we did a jump. I was with the Rinon and you all fell to your deaths, never pulled your chutes. And neither did we. I woke up just as I hit the ground.”

 

“You know, we have a ship shrink for a reason,” Jacob said.

 

Forrest shot him a mischievous glance. “Me? My first tour was a 5 year scouting mission, in which we scouted this system and several others. I wont go insane on a 3 year deployment.”

 

“Forgive me commander. I forgot you are all knowing and all powerful.”

 

“I can't help it my dad was cavalry and taught me to think outside the box, and he also taught me to take orders.”

 

“Nice save Commander Lybrand,” came a voice behind Forrest.

 

Forrest whipped around and saw Commander Hallcox, Captains Kiefer and Woods, and Lieutenants Amend, Ra, Schenfeld and Bolshakov. It was Capitan Kiefer who had addressed Forrest.

 

“Always Captain.”

 

“Pay us no heed, just continuing impressing them with your knowledge on the Rapters,” Captain Kiefer said with a wave of his hand.

 

Forrest smiled and continued talking with his friends.

 

“Umm, Forrest, you might want to put your shirt on,” Jacob pointed out a little while later.

 

Forrest laughed. “I forgot about my shirt.”

 

“Yeah, we don't want all the female crew members being distracted from their work by those muscles,”

Chris said.

 

The whole table laughed as Forrest hung his head and smiled. They continued the banter for a while longer.

 

“Well, I have to go warm up for the competition today. I wont beat Dak if I am as rigid as Admiral O'Neill's command,” Forrest said as he stood.

 

Forrest walked away as the chuckles died down. Today he was competing in a test of speed, strength and endurance against the 6^th Legions strongest Rapter, First Sergeant Dak Renalds.

 

An hour later, Forrest ditched his shirt and stood face to face with a shirtless Dak Renalds. The chosen feat was 20 bear complexes at 250 lbs for time. The fastest wins. The Bear Complex was considered the most difficult lifting exercise. A squat clean, to push press, to back squat and then push press again. It is a physically exhausting lift, especially at 250 lbs.

 

With backs to each other, Forrest and Dak bent down and gripped their bars.

 

Beep...Beep...Beep...BEEEEEEEEEP!

 

Forrest exploded into the squat clean and through the rest of the Bear Complex. He finished the 5^th and dropped the bar with a clang. His armed and thighs burned, his clavicles and shoulders were bruised. He swung his arms in an attempt to loosen the tightening muscles. With some more chalk on his hands, Forrest set and began his next set, each move exploding with power.

 

On the 16^th, Bear Complex, Forrest lost his balance on the squat clean. He sat on the ground for a thirty seconds recovering before trying again. It was now 1 bear complex at a time. Muscles burned and ached. His thighs, shoulders and biceps felt useless. The only thing that kept him going was pure adrenalin.

 

Encouragement was raised for him by his friends and comrades who had bet on him. Forrest grunted out numbers 16, 17 and 18. Forrest screamed as he finished the 19^th, just barely finishing it before dropping the bar in exhaustion.

 

“Come on Forrest, finish it out,” Jacob said.

 

“Lybrand, I see a Commander in you, don't give up now! Pick that bar up and do one more!” Shouted Chief Warrant Officer Ryan Olson. “I would follow you to Hell and back, don't disappoint me.”

 

Forrest grabbed the bar and in a smooth explosive movement squat cleaned it. As he came up, he shoved it in the air into a push press and then brought it down on his shoulders. It began to slip off right shoulder, but Forrest held strong as he dropped into the back squat and then muscled through the last last press.

 

Forrest let out a war cry as he continued to hold the final bear complex. He turned to see Dak finish his last bear complex as well.

 

Dak walked over and weakly shook Forrest's hand. “Good job Forrest. You beat me fair and square, and that was a record time for me.”

 

“The credit goes to my support team.”

 

“Yep, because they wanted 4 to 1 odds.”

 

The weight room rolled in laughter.

 

Gunnery Commander pushed his way though the crowd and congratulated Forrest. “Sergeant Lybrand, it was a pleasure to see you win such a difficult contest. You hold the current Rapter record for this event. Assuming your skull is not as thick as your biceps are, you will make a fine commander.”

 

“Thank you sir,” Forrest said saluting.

 

Chief Warrant Officer Ryan Olson came over and clapped Forrest on the shoulder. “Good job, I hope to serve under you someday. Unfortuantly, in an hour, I have to go to the Fort Benning on Cadetia. I am being reassigned.”

 

“In the middle of a tour?” Forrest asked.

 

“Apparently I am not the only one. There have been a bunch of Rapter's reassigned. Most of them are Ronin, and they have been taken from every legion.”

 

“I was looking forward to learning the mastery of the light soldier from you.”

 

“Yes well, your more Commander material anyway. It does not make any sense to take you out of the direct forces into support. Besides, you can't command as a Ronin.”

 

“I guess its for the best. Still, I like to master everything.”

 

Ryan smiled. “Just try to master commanding troops. Your dad gave you good command genes.”

 

“Genes have nothing to do with it.”

 

“So, I still prefer to believe it.”

 

Ryan hugged Forrest and headed off to the hanger to catch his transport.

 

Forrest was swarmed back into the celebration as Scotch was poured and a toast made. Competitions were rare, and the long 3 year tours would get boring. You did what you could to keep your sanity. The rare chance to drink alcohol was not passed up lightly.

 

Three beeps came over the intercom and everyone quieted immediately. “A distress call just came in from the scientific outpost on Elrinel. This is a code red distress call. Rapters deploy in 13 hours and 23 minutes.

“Well, so much for the drinks,” Forrest thought as he began to chug a bottle of water.