Alone with not only his own thoughts, but those of the person he was currently inhabiting, Lukazio tried to get a feel for his hosts' personality. Lukazio was already calling him 'Sentry', as Sentry wasn't an oddball that talked to himself or referred to his own name in the third-person. Therefore, Lukazio just went with Sentry.
His host was a soldier through-and-through. Offended with the aliens, whom Sentry found incredibly disgusting, Lukazio was a bit upset that he couldn't see what Sentry was visualizing mentally, as Sentry was extremely dramatic in remembering the aliens' repulsiveness.
Sentry also complained bitterly about the flat
muddy terrain and the freezing weather despite the planet being close to a large blue star.
Using the mechanisms on his battle suit, Sentry made good time in reaching a ravine naturally carved by glacial ice. Complaining internally that he was an infantryman, Sentry lamented that he wasn't a fancy pilot, or well-connected enough politically to be placed in a cushy intel position .
Lukazio during this time, managed to quiet many of his other perspectives and background conversations as he focused solely on Sentry. For reasons he couldn't
explain, he felt that this perspective was the most important.
Sentry seemed to have locked down a position right inside the ravine that was surrounded by large boulders and other jutting portions of rock.
His briefings told him that the aliens had poor eyesight and lacked mobility attachments on their body suits, so this area would be perfect for maintaining cover, as it was out of the line of sight from the lower parts of the ravine.
Sentry could rout them himself if they were few in number, or make a quick getaway after hopefully developing a report on the enemy strengths, numbers, and other logistical and military details.
Cautiously proceeding inward towards the interior of the ravine, Sentry's spider-leg mobility attachments used the ravine wall itself to access a ledge by digging and gripping the bare rock.
The ledge would provide access deeper into the ravine at a higher elevation, and was angled such that scouts below wouldn't be able to view his approach.
As they traveled, Lukazio studied his surroundings. Lacking the same training that Sentry had, he wasn't able to assess their location and travel in the same distinct way. However, he learned a lot by observing.
Lukazio's sense of time was still heavily distorted from previously managing his attentions between multiple people. He realized he couldn't even be sure how long he had been with Sentry as in his old life, people relied primarily on the location of Earth's
Sun and Moon for their idea of time.
The agile movements of the machine, controlled mentally by Sentry, and lack of obstacles allowed Lukazio to estimate that they were making good time nonetheless.
Once they reached an outcropping of the ledge that Sentry could no longer use, as it scaled upward and out of the ravine, he instead opted to go down.
Reaching the ravine floor, he landed in a slushy pool and began studying something a distance away against the opposite ravine wall. Not noticing it earlier, Lukazio was surprised to see a white dome, just slightly too small for Sentry to enter while wearing the battle suit.
The dome reminded Lukazio of a small igloo nestled amidst pale boulders that worked to camouflage the sculpted structure.
Sentry's next thoughts came quickly. 'A small scouting burrow. These aliens sure like to hide. This blue sun makes them uncomfortable while the gravity is difficult for them to handle. It's small, so likely no more than a six or eight member team. Should be quick and easy with the surprise element.'
Rushing toward the dome, alarms began blaring as he quickly approached. A shoulder mounted weapon shot a red glob that stuck to the dome. Dripping only slightly, it began hissing into a blazing white flame, melting the densely packed igloo.
Covering a wide staircase heading underground, four individuals wearing battle suits emerged carrying glowing rifles.
Standing upright on two legs and aiming with two arms, they looked identical to humans from their overall shape. As a result, Lukazio couldn't tell what was so disgusting about them since they were entirely covered by their own equipment.
Sentry began complaining about the aliens even as he began battling them expertly. First, he fired off several shots of energy from his rifle, then took cover behind a nearby boulder. While in cover, he fired his shoulder-mounted weapon again, lobbing another shot of red goo directly into the air over the area where his enemies were rush to take up positions.
Catching fire in mid-air, the red syrupy goo turned into horrific white flames, which landed amongst the alien troops.
The foremost two aliens, who were moving far too slowly in the heavy gravity, were unable to react in time to avoid a direct hit.
They were both splashed with a large amount of the flaming liquid, which began destroying their gear immediately. They collapsed, trying to extinguish the chemical fire unsuccessfully with several of their suits' mechanisms.
The rearmost two took up positions nearby after using their suits to extinguish a small amount of the flaming substance that hit them. Based on their mitigating actions, their damage was negligible.
The first two didn't fare so well. Their suit's were comprised almost immediately and were malfunctioning heavily under the corrosion and phosphoric flames.
When the suits' power gave out, they were unable to continue their efforts to put out the widespread flaming substance. They were unable to move quickly enough to free themselves, as the white flames' intensity increased drastically.
Hot sparks flying in all directions from the two soldiers on the ground, Sentry peered around the boulder and saw the success of his ploy.
He immediately activated some sort of soundproofing device on his suit in a frenzy seeing his enemies' dire state.
Sentry took cover behind the boulder quickly as the two troops on the ground horrifically burned up. Without waiting for their dramatic demise, he peered around the boulder again and began firing at the remaining two enemies' positions.
Lukazio gathered from Sentry's thoughts that the soundproofing was necessary, as he was worried about the noise made by the aliens upon dying. His training told him the noises that erupted from them were highly pitched and could be severe enough to injure one permanently.
However, Sentry was enough of a badass to fight without sound as he fired several more shots at the remaining two, pinning them into their locations as they made poor attempts to return fire and keep him in cover, despite that
they outnumbered him.
Their return fire was sluggish, which made Lukazio believe that the gravity here was such a significant detriment to the alien race, that he couldn't believe they were being sent here as ground troops at all.
Lukazio had to admit to himself that he had no true understanding of tactics or warfare, at all. There likely was a reason beyond his understanding, but he couldn't fathom what it could be.
Sentry took several deep breaths before activating something on his suit which made a series of beeps before launching him into the air with his leg attachments' full strength. His leap, assisted by the suit, was powerful enough to send him several meters into the air, giving him a birds-eye view of the entire area.
While airborne, Sentry began firing at the enemy that was leftmost to him with his rifle. From his aerial vantage point, the brightly burning energy flew through the air. Catching that soldier unawares, the hits blasted him away from his cover entirely.
Although Sentry caught the enemies by surprise, the one that was more to his right had more time to react after his maneuver.
Attempting to shoot him while airborne, the aim wasn't stable enough to hit Sentry as he landed nearby.
With only a thought, the spider-like leg attachments stabbed and slashed at the remaining alien scout as it fired point-blank at Sentry.
Several green laser rays from close range destroyed the shoulder-mounted incendiary cannon completely. Crying out from the damage, Sentry immediately dislodged the device.
Lukazio, listening to Sentry's thoughts, knew he had been slightly frightened. Sentry's inner monologue rambled while fighting, wondering if he would live to see home again.
One wouldn't have been able to tell by looking at him. He seemed poised and calm while efficiently combating the aliens.
The remaining enemy, its mechanical suit slashed to ribbons by Sentry, struggled to take a knee and level their weapon at him.
With a start, Lukazio was stunned to his core. After all, he couldn't help but notice the heavy flow of blood from the alien scout's wounds as it gripped the laser rifle.
He could easily recognize blood. It was always bright red in the presence of oxygen
.
Human bloodblood was red, which meant. . .
'All of humanity is rotten and needs to die.' Sentry's clear thought rang out as he shot the remaining human before it could shoot him.
Sentry belatedly activated the soundproofing, but Lukazio still heard the human scream, his death throes lasting for only a short moment.
Somewhat at a loss, it made sense now why he had such difficulty maneuvering in Sentry's body. Sentry wasn't a human, so of course it would feel foreign to Lukazio.
In hindsight, many of the odd rituals and statements he heard while perusing the multiple personalities now made sense, as they weren't all human customs.
Interestingly, Lukazio noticed that in every alien perspective, the entire array of individuals were always in the field, fully geared up.
Another indication that these events were highly curated.
Was the deity already watching?
While Lukazio had his musings, Sentry was busy inspecting the remains of the melted dome and its staircase heading deeper into the ground. 'Should be one more. The leader of these scouts.'
Without even having time to fully process what Sentry thought, Lukazio's entire field of vision turned a hazy blue.
Opening his eyes, he realized he no longer had access to multiple perspectives and voices in his mind.
He was alone with his thoughts. From the moment he became lucid, Lukazio was also able to tell immediately that he was in a human body!
Unfortunately, the gravity of the planet was strong and affected him in unexpected ways. His denser tissues, such as muscle and bone, felt heavier and slower to respond to his minds' command for movement. His soft tissues were under a lot of strain, feeling a downward pressure that was unpleasant enough to border on painful.
Standing at a strange console with two different handles jutting out toward him, he realized they were weapons. Grabbing the left handle and pulling it free, he saw it was a single-edged blade, similar to a sword but with notches cut out of the flat backside of the blade. The single-edged sword's blunt side was wide and thick, providing structural stability.
Studying the notches, he noticed they weren't uniform, with slight differences in width. As hard as he thought about it, he couldn't understand why they were there.
The second was some sort of medium size firearm. It had a small textured grip-handle and a wide horizontal grip about halfway up its length, but overall the weapon was unfamiliar, and oddly short.
Studying the barrel obliquely, he saw that the opening for projectiles had a coppery covering with holes of small one centimeter diameter interspersed throughout.
Examining himself and the surroundings, Lukazio saw a screen in the background. It showed the area that Lukazio had just been in while he was inhabiting Sentry.
Sentry was on several screens, fighting the four humans. Studying the surveillance, Lukazio realized that the current situation was just slightly before where his earlier vision with Sentry ended.
Lukazio realized his predicament. He was a human scout and still inside the small base under the igloo-like white dome. Lukazio suspected that his immersion inside this human was the likely culprit for why this guy didn't respond immediately to Sentry's assault.
Watching Sentry vault into the air and come down against the last two, Lukazio realized his turn was next and he shouldered the firearm by a strap it had connected to it.
He approached a set of double doors and hearing the clash end a short distance above, readied himself for battle.