Emory waved the group forward, "I'll enter first, Wolt second, Zeiss third, Ellen fourth, and Geese last. Keep your guard up, weapons drawn, and lights on. We landed during daytime, so this is the brightest it's going to get. Let's go." The five people loaded into the airlock and then rearranged based on how Emory had directed them. As the ship-side door closed, time seemed to slow, and the silence was deafening. The air hissed as the air lock opened followed by the five people dashing a few feet out the door. While their eyes adjusted to the dim light of the planet mixed with their focused LEDs, a smell entered their nose.
"It smells like grain," Emory commented quietly, "That's incredible. Jask, any life in the immediate area?"
"I am reading life signs for organisms all over; you will need to be more specific," Jask chimed from their suits.
"Do you detect any hostile parties?" Emory grumbled, "Either beast or higher intelligence."
Jask beeped negatively, "No entity is currently targeting you nor are there any aggressive entities in a hundred-foot radius. Now that everyone could just take a moment to breathe, they looked around at the field they had landed in. At least twenty different plants and flowers covered the land as far as the eye could see, yet like the true plains on Earth, they could count the number of trees they could see on two hands. Unlike Earth's yellow and green plants, Yuzuno was covered with black, brown, and red ones. Once they took a few minutes to look around, they took a few steps clockwise around the ship to get a full understanding of their surroundings. Everywhere they looked, though, was more of the same: rolling hills and fields of grass. As Emory had shown them, they could see a river running a quarter mile from their location to the east.
Zeiss was the first to speak, "Commander, what's the plan? The area looks secure."
"I agree," Emory commented, "Just to be sure, let's stay alert and in formation as we move to the river. The first objective needs to be securing fresh water." She led the group slowly through the tall grass towards the creek, making sure to actively check their surroundings as they moved. Though the coloring of organisms was different on Yuzuno, the soil beneath their feet and the texture of the stalks against their suits felt very similar to the Sol System. A slight breeze cascaded across the plains and stirred up the smell of the prairie.
"Have you ever smelt such strong grasses? I wonder if Earth once smelled like this or if this is unique to Yuzuno?" Wolt wondered aloud as he surveyed the field.
"It may be due to the reduced color palette of the wildlife," Ellen speculated, "Smells don't need light to spread, just wind and air, so scent may play a bigger role here." Ten minutes later the group made it to the riverbank. The river itself was only ten or fifteen feet across to the other shore and five feet deep, but the water was so clear that it looked like glass.
Geese asked, "Can I try it, Commander? After we've checked it, I mean." She nodded as a laser array from her arm scanned the water back and forth in a couple different locations.
"This water is eighty-five percent pure," Jask spoke after a few moments, "Though no toxins are present, there are unfamiliar microbes existing in this stream. You may get some light indigestion." The burly man shrugged his shoulders and bent down, using his hands to scoop some up for him to drink. He slurped it down quickly and immediately burped loudly.
"Pardon me. I just haven't drunk fresh water in so long, I had to try," Geese explained, "This is pretty good water, and look, the stream comes straight from those mountains." Gesturing with his hand, he pointed towards upstream and the winding path it took further into the plateau and mountains. Then they spotted their first animal, a neon fish about the size of their hand, swimming slowly near the top of the water. Geese tried unsuccessfully to catch it, only to return to looks of astonishment from the team.
Emory scowled, "Maybe let's not try to collect wildlife just yet. You know, less than an hour after arriving on the new planet. Since the water is clean, let's survey the square mile we're in to make sure this is a safe location." The rest nodded and followed Emory through the plains, making sure to keep an eye on the ship so they didn't travel too far. It was a very temperate climate, with a nice temperature of seventy-eight degrees, so, despite it being a slow walk, the team felt very comfortable walking around outside. During their reconnaissance, they identified several small mammals, birds, reptiles, and insects living in the field they had landed in which were also mostly dark colors like the landscape. However, they didn't see any large predators, a concerning thought given that the land wasn't overrun by small creatures. While it took them over two hours to sweep the square mile they were in, the end was the most frightening as Zeiss pointed out a figure in the tree line.
"Careful," he called quietly, "There's a large creature in the trees in front of us. I'd guess it's fairly intelligent as well by hiding in the shadow of the trees." Emory boldly extended her hand towards the creature and scanned it from a hundred feet away.
"No worries, this bird only attacks small critters. Though if its brain size is any indicator, it could be smart enough to remember us. Don't provoke it," Emory alerted them while she read information for the scan. Meanwhile, the bird extended its wings and looked like it was preparing for an attack. When its wings were out, the black and red plumage expanded to more than ten feet across, a great wingspan for a three-foot-tall bird. Then they noticed that the feathers were different from birds in the Sol System. Not only were they half as thick but also they were razor sharp. Suddenly, it swooped down a few feet before them, and the whole group froze. Gingerly, Emory took a small step forward and bent over to look at the bird on its eye level.
The bird's eyes were dark, mostly pupils, with several indentations around its hooked beak and under its eyes. With the distance between them far less than before, Emory scanned the raptor again to see if it would tell her any better information. "These bumps on its face are for infrared vision," Emory commented, "This looks like a bigger version of the predator birds back home. I wonder why the feathers are like this though." After she finished, the bird tilted its head and looked at the red-headed girl like it knew what she was saying.
Ellen whispered, "How should we proceed?"
"Let's stop here and return to the ship," Emory announced as she stood up, "Even at this great size, the bird poses no threat to us. We've found fresh water and scoured the area for problems. Time to start setting up camp." When she stopped looking at the bird, it flapped its wings and returned to the wooded area it came from. The entire crew was waiting in the cargo hold when Emory's team returned and immediately began asking questions about the place they had landed. Once those were handled, Emory opened the bay doors and let everyone onto the planet's surface. Slowly, the people began exiting the ship and looking around at their new home for the next several months. Most were positive and inquisitive about the new world while a few were anxious about the endeavor. Emory decided to let them look around and experience this little piece of the new world for thirty minutes before addressing them from the bay doors.
"Now that everyone has had the chance to see the area, it's time to start making camp. We'll start by building a small, defensible storage area for our equipment and hooking up our water filtration system to the river. After that, we'll unload the cargo and start building the outpost. I'd like to have it all completed in twelve hours. Finally, I'll lead the group from before to explore out a little further and see what we can find. Any questions?" Emory announced to the squad.
"No, ma'am," the crowd responded, "We will complete the tasks you have given." Emory saluted them then and dipped into the cargo hold.
Tethys tapped her on the shoulder, "Anything specific you want me to make sure is operational by the time you return? I assume you're grabbing some gear to go up the mountains."
"Make sure the RRS is setup," Emory replied as she grabbed a large backpack, "We'll need to let Mission Control know we landed safely." Tethys nodded before heading off, leaving Emory alone to gather more supplies. Unfortunately, the vehicles the squad had brought on the mission were towards the back of the cargo hold, meaning they would be the last to unload. Still, she hadn't planned to go too far since the second pulse was only three miles south of their current location. With the gear in hand, she returned to the shore party group she had created and handed out the hiking attachments for their suits. Once they were ready to go, Emory let Tethys know they were leaving and then left to explore with the others. She took them along the riverbank at first because the ground was the easiest to traverse and they would have a clear path back to camp. The ground began to curve higher and higher as they continued along the way. Once they were around halfway there, Emory stopped them for a moment to rest since they had trekked a mile upwards as they had gone a mile and a half away.