The desert planet was warm, as most desert planets are, but despite the dry heat, it was hardly comparable to an earth desert which could quickly take your life in under a day if you weren't careful. Honestly, he would have compared the weather to that of the Rockies in early August. Maybe 81 degrees tops.

The ground below their feet was covered by a strange purple sand, and the sky above was a dusky orange to match the orange rocks that lifted themselves high into the sky. There was no wind, which would have been a good thing, he imagined that the sandstorms here could be quite devastating. Despite the heat, or rather, lack of it in his opinion, the others weren't doing so great.

When he said others he meant their non-human counterparts, the humans were fine. This temperature was at the higher end of Krill's comfort scale despite him being a creature that photosynthesized light. Sunny looked downright uncomfortable, which made sense her planet was comfortably tropical when it came to climate, and sky ash kept the sun from hitting the ground on most days out of the year.

The three of them and a group of marines were led across a thin dessert and up towards a small outcropping of orange cliffs. Commander Vir kept his eyes wide scanning the surroundings. One might have assumed he was looking for threats, and to the watching aliens, that's exactly what it looked like. However, he was honestly just wishing he had thought to bring a camera. In that case he was going to have to attempt and draw this landscape later, not that he was all that great as an artist, but he was at least possible enough to make his ideas known.

Internally he was kicking himself.

By the time they reached the foot of the hills, Krill was lagging behind, and one of the marines had dropped back with an umbrella helpfully casting a shadow over the small figure. Sunny stood at his back like she always did. He doubted there was anything that could make her leave his side even if it meant hurting herself to do it, so he slowed his pace.

"Commander Vir, thank Sanctum's rings you're here."

He stopped atop a bare patch of orange rock and bowed, "Councilor."

The rundi woman adjusted her black robes and turned to look back towards the outcropping of rocks. Commander Vir could hear it now, a small voice shrill and defiant throwing curses at the gathered assembly members and their accompanying guard.

"What's going on." He wondered. Upon hearing his question, the assemblywoman motioned over one of the other delegates, the Gibb representative, who was looking both embarrassed and exasperated. Commander Vir could understand why, the Gibb must have had a hard few months with his countryman (the scientist) going off his rocker and capturing an entire prison only to experiment brutally on it's inmates. Tensions were a bight tight between his species, and those from Earth and Mars. Commander Vir knew enough not to totally blame them. Their species were known for the commonality of mental instability, delusions, and psychotic breaks.

Statistically it wasn't that common, but it was more common than it was even with humans, who were known to be highly mentally unstable.

"I am afraid, the second Gibb representative, other than I, has experienced the reduction." The Gibb's five spidery eyes stared on glassily at the commander as he continued, "Usually we would just let him go quietly to return home in peace, but those circumstances remain difficult when his delusions have convinced him that he is a mighty warlord and we are his enemy. Even that would not be so much of an issue, but he has found himself an impenetrable fortress.

Commander Vir was almost 100% sure that was exaggerated, but decided to keep his mouth shut first asking to SEE what the situation was before proceeding.

They walked up on the scene to the equivalent of maniacal laughter. He craned his neck upwards at the rock face.

"Look at you, you WORMS! You cannot DEFEAT ME!"

He could finally see what the issue was now. The Gibb's little fortress didn't appear to have any doors that he could see. The only opening was at least fifty feet up the rock and about two feet by three feet. A hover craft wouldn't be able to come near the hole as it wouldn't be able to squeeze into the space between the rocks. Going in from above was also not an option since the cliff face rose to at least 100 feet in the air above that and was too rounded at the top to land a craft.

"See my impenetrable walls!" The gibb yelled, "Even against you humans I-"

"Are you kidding me!"

The gibb looked down in annoyance to being cut off. The entire delegation turned to look at the human standing with his arms crossed one eyebrow raised clearly unimpressed.

"You think you can challenge me human!"

Behind him a few of the marines stood smiling clearly on the same wavelength as their captain, "I... well it's not a challenge, but I'm seriously asking.... Are you serious?"

The gibb looked quite confused now, "I AM the end!"

"Well ok, sure you are." The human said voice slightly exasperated as if he was talking to a small child, "In that case does The End or the lord of the rock face have any idea what a primate is?"

Seeing the confusion, the captain continued taking a seat on a rock as he began to unlace his boot, "Humans are primates, and so are monkeys. We share a common ancestor that lived in trees." He flexed his fingers at the Gibb, "See these, hands used for gripping onto branches.... For climbing specifically." He set his boot to the side, and the other marines began following his lead rolling up their pant legs and lining up their combat boots in a neat row on the ground.

The commander lifted his foot, "See these, they are the exact same thing as hands, accept evolved for running. We used to use them to swing through trees." He flexed his foot and wiggled his toes causing a murmur to rise up from the crowd, "I can pick up things with my feet." He rolled up his pant leg, "So Here is what I am going to do. I am going to use my magic powers of hands and feet and drag your idiot ass back down here faster than you can say, oh yeah I probably should have known that humans were originally evolved to live in trees."

Without prompting, the other humans came to join him at the base of the wall. Above them, the Gibb was spluttering angrily while the rest of the delegation looked on in mild interest.

"But you CAN:T humans can already swim and run, you cant ALSO climb."

The human didn't bother to look up, instead reaching down to rub some of the purple dirt into his palms, "Don't suppose you've heard the song. I can do what you can do but I can do it better? No, well same premise, I can run, I can swim, I can jump, with a little help I can fly, but since I forgot my jetpack at home, I may as well as show off some natural selection."

The alien delegation watched in interest as the human gripped onto his first rok, and by an excellent show of strength, hauled himself up the wall. His other hand followed, as did his other two feet. The toes of his right foot probed the rock face gripping onto minute ledges in the stone just as his fingers did. The prosthetic, Drev-designed, foot struggled, but he made good time up the first few yards.

A team of the marines went with him. A few of them scuttling up the wall like spiders.

At about 20 feet the assent grew more difficult, and it seemed as if there was no way to go, but the humans didn't seem bothered. Gripping onto ledges and protrusions, despite taking longer to think their path through. Commander Vir had fallen behind struggling with his non-human leg.

Eventually he simply gave a curse, and a small blade snapped from the toe of the prosthetic.

He drew his leg back and slammed it into the stone soon overtaking the other maines as he was able to place a foothold wherever he pleased.

"That's hardly fair." Ramirez muttered.

"Oh yes Ramirez, I am so sorry you have all of your legs. Let me cry for you." The Commander muttered sarcastically as he clambered up the wall.

"That's cheating." Another human called

"No, I'm just evening the playing field for a cripple."

The council members below looked on in wonder and amazement as the humans, somehow, clambered their way up a vertical face speaking normally with each other as they did. As always, the leader of the humans seemed to have no concept that he was crippled.

Above the Gibb had gone quiet sinking further back into his hole.

The humans all made it to the top safely, and rather smugly, and with their superior strength, what little fight the Gibb could put up was lacing and rather pathetic. Two of the humans rigged up a rope to a steel hook driven into the stone, and the commander himself picked up the gibb under one arm like a troublesome child. From there, each of the humans clambered easily down the rope as if they were simply walking. Some of them chose to slide straight down, while others simply walked backwards down the face of the wall using the rope to support themselves at a horizontal.

Commander Vir only required the use of a single arm as he made his descent. And dumped the Gibb on the ground at the feet of the council rubbing purple dirt from his hands. He nodded to the council, and then just simply walked away nonchalantly to recover his shoes.

The council thought it might be a good idea not to tell the humans how long they had been there trying to come up with an idea.

It would probably be prudent to keep this little fiasco unknown to the public. If people knew that it had taken a one legged human, and his strange hand feet thirty minutes to do what the council had failed to do in days, than there might be some questions raised about their own effectiveness.