Arcaida

-: Chapter 1 :-

Matthew 6:26-30

"Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them"

Joshua Dryden looked up from his Personal Display Gram (PDG), which mirrored one of the five animals grazing a dozen meters away from him. The alien creature was a herbivore, the same as every other animal on this planet he had observed thus far, excluding the insects. The beast was the largest of a small family group, it was a heavy set six-limbed oddity with four trunk like legs and two spindly arms protruding from its chest, which routinely quested the ground for the spongy moss, this worlds equivalent to grass, before methodically feeding into their horizontal maws to happily grind.

Sighing discontentedly he wondered again if this had indeed been the right choice, life was comfortable back on Spero. The University in United Kingdoms territory of the second colony Humanity had founded had been comfortable if not terribly fulfilling, he was a xenobiologist Ph.D. with something to prove. To get anywhere in academia one had to have experience and something wonderfully new to bring to the table, that was getting harder and harder to do. The first life form had been discovered over a thousand years ago, some bacteria in water plumes of Jupiters smallest moon - Enceladus.

The first multicellular organism to be discovered also coincided with Humanities first contact with intelligent life - The V'vor. The V'vor were creatures who were just beginning to probe their own solar system, their pacifistic approach to Humanities arrival despite their inter warring nature was perhaps not surprising, given Humanity had arrived unannounced with a fleet of warships. Since that point, only one other species of Intelligent life had been found - The Kal, but the Russians had primacy over them, and with Humanity having colonised over one thousand systems while spreading healthily over the Galaxy all life fit a standard shape: Life was Carbon, always. It breathed Hydrogen, Oxygen or some mix of that with one other element. In fact other than a few small details, most life in the Galaxy followed the same standard template of that of earth. Nothing new of significance had actually been found in a long time.

This is what Joshua wanted to find.

Joshua had so far visited over a dozen recently established colonies studying the local fauna, documenting, cataloguing and briefly analysing their behaviours. Routine University work. He had jumped at the chance to study an entire ecosystem that seemed to exist without the presence of carnivores, no natural predators to keep the plant eaters population in check.

His PDG's holographic display chirped and text appeared overlaying the virtual beast.

"Call from - Paul Wake"

With a frown, he motioned to the display to accept the call.

"I know Paul" Josh said preemptively

"My ass you do" came the curt reply "If you knew the bloody rules, you wouldn't have set off-"

"-Without at least two to a party" Joshua quickly interrupted "I know the rules, but for God's sake man, this planet has no carnivores! None of the animals have shown the slightest bit of aggression to us, or anything else for that matter".

Paul Wake was an old policing man, the compulsory representative from the United Interstellar Kingdoms Colonial Policing Force or the CPF. He didn't want to be here and the colonists mirrored that sentiment.

"Just get your self back to camp"

The vindication had drained from his voice and Joshua felt a flicker of guilt, the last thing the old boy needed was more grief, but the rules where ridiculous. It had been a full month since the Colonial class ship - Icarus had landed, so far the worst of the injuries had been a rolled ankle.