"Tell us your oddest story, Captain."

"Weirdest story, huh?" Captain Vir sets his glass down on the bar and tilts his head back thinking as he stares at the ceiling, "Well, you know what, since it's been declassified, I suppose I can go ahead and tell you." He picks up his drink again and takes a draw.

"Have you ever heard of Heaven's Gate Nebula?"..."Of course you have. Well, so it's this really weird cluster of stars just off Andromeda, not technically part of the galaxy but sort of orbiting it. Now you Know Nebulas are actually star nurseries, so generally stars within nebula tend to be really young..... the problem here is that emissions form Heaven's Gate indicated 100-200 main sequence stars. I know, not a whole lot for a cluster. The GA had tried to investigate before, but with no real luck, they thought maybe a human crew would have more luck. And as a newly promoted captain with a newly christened ship, I was ready for any job they wanted to throw at me. So, with my new crew, and my new ship, I headed in, this was all before I met Sunny and Krill, and before I lost my eye."

He finishes the glass and wipes his mouth on his sleeve, "We took it into the dust cloud, and I had to take manual control of the ship. I was nervous, I fly jets, and jets are relatively small, but I had to remember that I was about a thousand feet wider than I am used to. We were navigating mostly by short range radar, so I would only have a few seconds to make it through. Luckily there was no real debris in our way, and when we broke out of the cloud a few hours later, we enter this ..... Open area about solar system wide. Scans showed it had one main sequence star and four planets with a collective 12 moons. There was one planet in the goldilocks zone, so we took her in. I ordered our navigations expert to plot a landing course onto the planet for a shuttle, and then I went down and got together a team of Marines to take our first look. Ok, maybe I was being an idiot, I'm the captain, leading search parties isn't exactly my job, but I would be damned if I was going to miss exploring an entirely undiscovered planet."

***

"Alright, Jar Heads, suit up, we're approaching the LZ." Behind him the sound of helmets clipping into place over suits was comforting. Captain Vir pulled on his own helmet quickly locking it into pace with one hand as he maneuvered the shuttle towards the planet's surface. It was green, Like Earth, very green though it wasn't really due to trees. The ground itself was covered with a very thin layer of moss.... Or so it appeared. The foliage itself was rather sparse, with an odd assortment of trees, and some sort of ferns.

He chose an area next to one of these little clusters, lading their craft with a soft whirr of air. He cut the engines and grabbed his weapon.

The marines were waiting for him ready for exit weapons at the ready, "Alright, Chairfroce, your orders?" The sergeant asked with a good natured nod.

"I defer to you, jarhead. This is simple recon, stay quiet, and keep low. If you see anything, do not engage, we aren't here to start trouble." The men nodded, at the front one held up a hand counting down from five before pressing the button to drop the ramp, and in a coordinated unit, the group rushed from the craft and into a wide circle around the ship leaving the copilot to watch over the ship. Captain Vir stopped behind the point man lowering his weapon and checking the readings from his suit. He had been trained to determine the safety of a particular atmosphere. It was a chill 22 degrees F but the oxygen level was 14.8% oxygen content which would equal out to feel like a relatively high altitude. The rest was nitrogen like you would expect on Earth. With one hand, he slapped the point man on the shoulder who, in turn, gave a hand signal to the rest of the group. One of their designated men reached up, and pressed the release sequence on his helmet. It dropped into his hand with a hiss and he took a deep breath. The group watched as he took a few more deep breaths monitoring his blood oxygen content from the monitor on his suit before giving a nod to the captain, who gave another signal. The rest of the group removed their helmets, though a few kept face masks close at hand, not comfortable completely with the low oxygen content. Helmets were strapped to their waists.

Captain Vir ordered them into a loose arrowhead formation at a good 20 feet apart. He fell in at the very far left of the formation towards the thickest area of foliage weapon pressed into his shoulder lowered into a ready position as they began moving slowly through the foliage. He the advanced eye piece over his left eye to keep track of the crew as their red dots moved through the foliage. He couldn't always see the next man over and up, but he could see the dots.

He was coming up on a very thickly wooded area now, and cut into the trees doing his best to keep up with the marines who moved low and fast through the trees. They were near silent, and he did his best to emulate them as he did so. Yeah, he was trained in combat, but the last war he was in took place strictly on stone, moss and ash, branches hadn't really been a problem.

He took another step forward into the foliage trying to find a grounded place to put his foot... but then.... There was nothing there. He had one moment of horrible realization before his stomach dropped out from underneath him, and he went plunging downwards.

He hit the rock with a hard crack maybe five feet below, and then bounced over to go tumbling like a pinball down the hill. He might have heard the cry of one of the marines over the com before it was dashed to pieces against a rock. In an attempt to keep his head covered, he turtled into the collar of the space suit, allowing it to take most of the impact as he rolled into another rock and was sent flying down a mossy incline. His weapon was ripped from his hands, and the sling snapped catching him on the cheek as it went.

Now loosed from its grip, his arms flailed and clawed at the ground as he fell. Body crying out in anguish against the pain of his fall. The end of the hill came, and he was pitched over another, small, five foot drop. Landing flat on his back... The pain was incredible, not as bad as losing his leg, but still. He looked down through his bleary vision.... Shit.... His leg, the entire F***ing thing was gone.....

A shadow passed over him from above, and in groggy delirium he looked up squinting against the silhouette, massive, hairy, and reaching out towards him.

He blacked out.

***

He woke up to the chatter of unknown creatures, lying on his back on a bed of soft moss staring up at a leafy ceiling above. Squinting past his own delirium and the bright light in his face he tried to make sense of the scene forcing himself to sit up past the pain in his body and the weight of his suit. The striations in the leafy ceiling resolved themselves as he stared on..... realizing in horror that he was looking at bars. He pushed himself upwards the rest of the way limping/hopping over to the bars where he stopped staring out at the world around him. Stacks and stacks of cages, full of strange alien creatures with fur and feathers, and spines chattering and gambling about their cages hissing and yapping at each other.

He rushed around the cage tugging at the bars, trying to find a locking mechanism, but seeing nothing. He tried to force himself through the bars cursing when his chest was too wide to make it through, even sideways. He tugged even harder and came down hard to the ground without the support of his prosthetic. Missing a leg, there was only so much he could do. The boot of his suit and half of the lower leg had been ripped off leaving him with a useless and dangling bit of fabric. He cursed the stupid thing silently. His REAL leg wouldn't have just fallen off like that. Sure his remaining leg hurt like a bitch, but at least it was still working.

Piece of garbage.

He glanced around a little more taking a deep breath. First thing was first, he had to find out where he was. He didn't get much time to figure this out before the air itself was rocked and shattered by an immense vibration. It was a sound like someone had turned the base all the way up on their car speakers. The bars of his cage rattled, his insides rattled, his teeth rattled. Whatever made that sound had to be f***ing massive.

And that's when the absolutely immense creatures stepped into the room. It was at least 40 feet tall and looked like a cross between Sasquatch, a bear, and King Kong. With a gasp he scrambled back in his cage, as two of the other creatures stepped into the room with it. One of them was about as tall if not taller, and the other was maybe 30 feet tall give or take. As their mouths open, the entire room rumbled with the deep base of their voices. He fell to one knee hands to his chest as if he was trying to hold in his bones.

He couldn't have known that the creatures were quite sentient naming themselves the Magnites of the Magnapedibus, and they were here for one very specific reason. The taller, and older of the two guests browed their way around the room glancing in cages and speaking to each other in their impossibly deep voices. A couple of times, they opened one of the cages and took out one of the other creatures. Vir watched from the confines of his cell with a sense of growing horror.

This could not be happening, and to make it all worse, his coms were down, and those things were getting closer to him their feet thudding like thunderclaps on the floor below. Quickly, he burrowed himself under a layer of the moss staring out form a minute hole at the scene unfolding before them. He could see that the cages lifted from the top, but there was no way he was going to manage to make it out if that was the case: no way in hell he was going to be able to lift that thing.

The creatures had moved onto the cage right next to his looking over a creature that had some odd recumbence to a giant rat. The smaller creature didn't seem particularly interested in it. Little did the captain know was that the creature had daned the rat to be not cute enough for its taste. They were arguing among themselves about what the third creature was looking for. What could possibly pique interest when they had gone over the entire place, and yet there was nothing to be seen?

The shop owner gave them one last option, something strange he had picked up out in the woods today, but something he didn't think was likely to survive. It would require special care, and he had yet to look it over for injury. They moved over to the next cage, just to find nothing visible in site. The larger creature gave a look of confusion to the owner who waved him off. The creature was scared, probably hiding. He threw open the cage lid and reached in prodding around in the moss.

Captain Vir lay as still as he possibly could feeling the ground rumble beneath him eyes closed teeth gritted. And then a massive weight pressed down on his back. Like someone was standing on him, making it hard to breathe. The weight lifted off him and light poured into his little hiding spot. The ground trembled with another mass vibrating noise

Shit! He rolled to the side just as a massive hand came down towards him. He barely escaped crawling up to one knee and scuttling to the side as the hand came after him again. A line of expletives ran through his head as he rolled dodged ad ducked out of the way hindered by his missing leg forced to scramble on three limbs as he tried to get away.

He wasn't fast enough, the cage wasn't big enough, and he was caught around the waist by a massive hand. He gasped for air, as the hand grew tight around his middle against his struggling and squirming. He panted pressing his hands against the clenched fist trying to pull himself out, but it was no use.

The massive creatures looked down at him with surprise and confusion. What was this thing? The owner wasn't totally sure, but he had found it lying injured in the forest. He thought it was supposed to have four limbs, and if that was the case than it was missing one of them. The smaller creature thought that it was horribly sad.... The creature in itself looked terrified squirming and wriggling as it was, and with only one leg it must have been in immense pain. It had very large eyes, a brilliant green color and a small tuft of hair atop its head, kind of adorable, otherwise it was furless.... It must have been very cold. It held out its hands begging to hold the creature, and finally they gave in.

Vir was transferred from one hand to the other, a grip that was lighter this time, the smaller creature. He tried to squirm away again, but then became very aware of the twenty to twenty five foot drop..... he didn't think he was likely to make that unscathed. Another massive hand was lifted up, and he cringed away as a single huge finger rubbed against the back of his head and down his upper back. Damn, it was like being stroked by a ten pound dumbbell..... it was rubbery and the palm was cracked like the pad of a dog's foot.

The creature thought it was very cute, whatever it was, and it didn't seem too dangerous, just an adorable, crippled little creature.

He swore that if they did that again he was going to have to beat someone's ass, he didn't care how tall they were.... That was just as soon as he figured out how to get away from this nonsense. That didn't seem likely to happen as the large creature took him back, and began looking him over pinching his limbs between its massive fingers flipping him into his back like you would to examine a lab rat. He kicked out with his remaining foot as the creature tried to get a good look at his severed leg. He'd be damned if he was going to ACTUALLY get probed by aliens. At least the last ones had asked nicely.

There was more roaring, more rumbling as they tried to figure out what exactly the thing was, despite missing a limb, it didn't appear to be in pain, but it was a feisty little creature. If they were to sell it, it would need special care, somewhere warm, a special diet, but perhaps it would make a good pet.

***

Vir was about 0% pleased with the outcome of this. His first mission and things had already gone to hell in a handbasket, or in this case what felt like a massive ass paper bag. He had been dumped into one with a handful of the strange moss, and breathing holes poked in the side. Outside he could hear more grumbling and could feel the ground underneath thudding with the footsteps of the giant creatures. He couldn't stand with only one leg, and lay in the bottom, face pressed against the moss as they moved in short starts and stops. Eventually the rumbling died off a bit, and the movement continued bouncing him up and down inside the bag which swung back and forth.

***

Is this what it was like to be a hamster? Whatever it was like he was done. The creature had barely let him go since it had brought him back to its den. It let him go in its lap, and he'd try to scramble away only to be pulled back. If he was let down on the floor, he would have tried to run, but he was missing something kind of important. There were tons of these things being invited over to hold, pet stoke, and play with him, and he hated every moment of it. He tried to bite at least once, but that turned out to b not worth it at all, the things tasted like ass, and their skin was too thick to bite through. And then it insisted on wrapping him up in randomly soft items like it thought he was cold, like he wasn't wearing a thermal conserving space suit. This was just a load of bullshit.

Giving some time alone, he was sure he could construct a decent pair of crutches, but that wasn't going to happen if the creature kept insisting on holding him.

He had one other option.... He could play dead, at this current moment, which seemed to be his best option, so the moment that someone stopped paying attention, he fell limp eyes half closed just willing them to fall for it. When they came back, he watched their shadows moving around, could hear the thrumming and thudding of their voices. They picked him up, and he let his body flop to the side, he did his best to breathe as little as possible, hoping they wouldn't notice when he did. The roaring grew more urgent, he was moved around constantly laid down prodded, poked, and he refused to move, did his best to keep still as they picked him up. There were many of the creatures there now speaking rapidly, one of them sounded very upset.

He just had to stay still.

And that's when he heard the roar of the shuttle. The creatures apparently did too, and he watched as the ship roared in through an opening over the heads of the creatures before circling down. The creatures made some more roaring sounds. He could hear voices as the carrier landed. Wind whipped at his clothes, there was more roaring.

"CAPTAIN!"

He opened his eyes just in time, as one of the marines grabbed him by the arm and hoisted him over his shoulders racing back towards the carrier as the others covered him from behind. He was thrown to the deck inside the carrier as the ship lurched form the ground and roared forward.

The roaring grew louder, the ship tilted and swung. The marines held on for dear life as one had him pinned to the ground keeping him still as the ship rocked and rolled.

And then they shot forward and the roaring died away. Captain Vir let his head rest back on the floor breathing heavily.

"Are you alright, Captain?" The marine asked looking him over for injuries.

"Relieved to see you Marine..... relieved to see you."