~Miles-tails-prowler

High above a mesoplanet designated Kepler-62e a huge battle rages. HMCS Halifax a Halifax class destroyer, is the only remaining escort for the SS Kaiserin Auguste Victoria, a Space liner carrying colonists, who was destroyed when her fusion reactor took a direct hit from a stray missile. The Halifax has multiple hull breaches, her captain is dead, her life support is failing, and she has only one remaining turbo cannon (the equivalent to a M2 Browning machine gun from her 21st century namesake). The only reason she is still in one piece is that she wasn't considered much of a threat. The enemy is not doing much better with only one remaining Turzanis class battleship, also heavily damaged. Looking to her crew Halifax's first officer looks each of his remaining officers in the eye. They all know what is coming so they are not surprised when he says "Our turbo cannon is not going to put a dent in that battleship's armour. We cannot let these alien scum reach the other fleets. Our only chance to stop them is to ram them. I can't order you to do this but-"
"Commander," interrupts an officer "I think I speak for the crew when I say let's give these bastards something to remember us by." earning approving nods from the rest of the bridge crew.
"In that case," the Commander says, mouth tightening "helm, plot a collision course with that battleship and apply full power to the engines."
As the helmsmen does this the Commander begins a ship wide broadcast.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, in a few moments we are going to ram the enemy ship. You are the best crew anybody can ask for. It has been a pleasure serving with you."
As the two ships collide Halifax's fusion bottle ruptures and both ships are destroyed in a brilliant flash of light. No escape pods were able to make it out of the blast zone. Miraculously in a debris field not to far away from the explosion, the wreckage of Halifax's CS-294 Space King rescue jumper gets caught in the gravitational pull of Kepler-62e. As it plummets through the atmosphere the tough hull is slowly melted away. Before long all that is left is the pilot's heavily armoured life support pod. This pod slams into the rocky surface below. Thankfully it was designed to do this and survives the impact. Unfortunately it is buried in the ground and the unconscious pilot is unable to escape. However before he dies, the computer puts him into stasis.

Eight thousand years later...

I can't believe mom kicked me out of the house until I take a host! Just because it's socially acceptable to take over a living, thinking creature doesn't make it right! I mean it's a living creature and we're just yanking control of it's body from them. It's not like we need their bodies to survive. I'm perfectly happy being a non-corporeal lifeform! But noooo it has to be "Zrendive, if you want to live in our house you are going to need to get a body, otherwise get out!" he mocks in his mother's voice. Just then he notices something unusual poking out of the ground and senses something strange. There's a lifeform in it and it's alive but... there's no brain activity!
"Whatever is in there must be brain dead... Zrendive, today's your lucky day!"

Meanwhile in the stasis pod the onboard computer detects the creature coming and clicks to life.

Warning: Reserve power depleted, running on solar power...
Warning: Parasitic lifeform detected...
Notice: Containment field raised...
Alert: Parasitic lifeform has breached containment field...
Alert: Parasitic lifeform has merged with user...
Notice: Medical computer enabled, attempting to isolate parasite...
Warning: Unable to isolate parasite, parasite is non corporeal...
Notice: Parasite has been analyzed, revival of user from stasis will inhibit further infection...
Notice: Reviving user...
Notice: Revival successful, parasitic infection has been halted...
Notice: Beginning user health scan...
Notice: User health scan complete...
Warning: Parasitic lifeform thought patterns account for 78.84% of neural activity...
Notice: Analyzing remaining neural activity...
Notice: Analysis complete...
Notice: Autonomic and user thought patterns account for 100% of remaining neural activity...
Notice: System failure imminent, planetary day has 15 minutes remaining. Planetary night will not provide sufficient power to maintain containment field. Infected user release imminent, beginning purge...
Warning: Unexpected power draw detected, containment field has failed...
Notice: Emergency atomization field has been triggered manually, escape hatch is now free of debris...
Notice: Explosive bolts have been triggered, activating distress signal...
Warning: Containment breached, infected user has escaped...

Back with Zrendive

As I merged with what I thought was a brain dead lifeform it came to life! I was almost done the merge and I knew there was nothing the poor creature could do to stop the merge. I felt horrible, but suddenly I felt the presence of the creature's mind and it immediately started fighting me for control! I was acting on instincts at this point or else I would have stopped immediately. As it was the only thing I could do was hope the other presence was stronger than me...

Unfortunately it was not. Were evenly matched! This surprised me to no end because I knew for a fact I had control over most of the creature's brain. If this is just a fraction of the creature's mind power I cannot imagine how powerful the entire thing must have been. As I was musing this fact the presence just suddenly went dormant! Now that I was in control of the body I opened my new eyes and was surprised to discover I was outside of the structure. The phrase "Life support pod" suddenly popped into my head and I realized that it came from the creature I was inhabiting. I thought "what species am I" and I was immediately supplied with "human". My eyes widened when I realized I had inhabited a sentient creature... This was bad... The only sentient creatures on Raznet were us Wilith, everything else was too primitive to have thoughts more complex than "I'm hungry". Looking at the "Life support pod" I realized I had just inhabited an alien!
"Congratulations, you finally figured it out! I was wondering how long it would take..." Suddenly popped into my head and I realized the host's conscience was still present. Immediately I start apologizing to my host and he starts laughing. This completely threw me off. After a few moments of laughing the other presence finally calms down enough to think "You didn't know I wasn't brain dead. You are a kind soul and you have allot to live for. My family is dead, my friends are dead, I've got nothing, if you didn't posses me I would have just rotted away in that pod, and frankly I wouldn't have cared. You on the other hand, I've read your thoughts. You have a family who kicked you out because you wouldn't take over an animal's body while it was still thinking. I admire that, and as such I'm willing to let you have my body. I'd probably just get possessed by others of your kind who don't care about their host anyway."

That made me feel allot better. Now that I knew I had is permission to inhabit his body I decided to ask him some questions. He told me that the clothing I am wearing is his flight suit, and it has everything he'll need to survive for the rest of his life. It is solar powered, has adaptive camouflage (currently off), and has food processing and water purification abilities meaning he does not need to worry about running out of food and water, which came as a relief. Strapped to his leg was a small laser pistol and when I looked at it I got a flash of his memories of training to use and take care of it. I found out that he saved us from the pod, which was going to kill us to contain me, and that his name was Captain Jerald Scott of the Royal Canadian Air Force. He was assigned to the destroyer "HMCS Halifax" as their space king rescue jumper pilot. He went on to tell me that the fleet his ship was part of was attacked by another alien species that his home planet was at war with. The fleet was an international collaboration that was trying to ensure the survival of his species by inhabiting another planet. They had chosen Raznet (which he knew as Kepler-62e) and were about to colonize it when the attack began. He was attached to a rescue party that was sent to look for survivors of another ship (the supercarrier USS Nimitz) which had been targeted by the enemy in their initial volley. Apparently Humans had better pilots then the enemy and therefore almost always won their dogfights, making the USS Nimitz a high priority target for the enemy. Unfortunately the enemy had better shipboard weapons that out ranged the human's so they were able to fire into their fleet from outside weapons range, hence the need for fighters. Apparently the larger the ship the more power it takes to get it to move. A small fighter can move several times the speed of a larger ship, and both sides had been able to make inertial dampeners that could fit in a fighter, making space fighter warfare practical. Thanks to my link with Jerald I was able to understand everything he said and it shocked me to think that there was another species out there that could wipe out my entire planet like it was nothing. He told me not to worry about it because that was a long time ago and we're still here so the enemy obviously doesn't see us as a threat. When I asked him what made him so sure his side hadn't wiped out the enemy he sadly informed me that his species was losing. Although fighters could carry weapons capable of penetrating the armour of the enemy's smaller ships, they were useless against capital ships. So when the enemy brought them out they were getting slaughtered. That was the main reason behind his fleet's mission. They knew they were going to lose so they were going to try and avoid extinction by colonizing other planets. His fleet failed, but he was hopeful that the other fleets fared better.

I felt bad for him. He had no idea if he was the last of his species or not. Sensing my distress he thought
"There's nothing you can do. In fact it's probably all ancient history, seeing as it appears my pod was initially uncovered by erosion. Don't worry about it. Now let's go meet your family, shall we?"
This causes me to realize I can actually go back to my house... Smiling I turn around and head back home. When I get back home my mom congratulates me on finally getting rid of my silly notions and inhabiting an Aranki. I realize then how lucky I am that these "humans" look remarkably similar to the Aranki. I hadn't even thought about what would happen if I came home in a body that was obviously alien. I'm marvelling at this amazing co-incidence when Jerald informs me that it isn't a co-incidence. Humans had apparently sent samples of species common on their planet ahead as part of the terraforming process. One of these species obviously evolved into the Aranki. My mom, misinterpreting my silence tells me I can go upstairs to get some clothing and that I'll feel better after I rest. I thank her and go up to my room. As I'm going through the clothing in storage it clicks that I'm suddenly naked. I was in a flight suit in the forest so what happened to it? Just then Jerald starts chuckling and informs me that he set the adaptive camouflage to make it look like he was naked since it would be suspicious for me to show up fully clothed if I just took over a wild Aranki. I hadn't even thought of that and I ask him if to set it to look like something in the storage closet. He says it's already done and I'm surprised to look down and see I'm clothed in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. He tells me to hide the clothing that looks like what I'm wearing so I hide it in my room. I don't feel like resting (Jerald's been resting for a long time after all) so instead I ask him some more questions. As I had gathered from our discussion earlier humans are much more advanced than Wilith. He politely informs me that the Wilith are at a stage equivalent to his people in the early 21st century. This excites me because it means I have access to knowledge way ahead of my time. I could be a the next Rithinstine! Apparently Jerald had the same thought because he immediately thinks "No, I am not going to make you into the next Einstein!" crushing that dream. I plead with him but he refuses to budge. As a compromise he agrees to help me on my homework if I truly get stuck, and tells me he's going to read my mind and make sure I am really stuck. I ask him how it is that he can read my mind but I can't read his and he tells me that humans have come across many different species and some are like mine and can take over others bodies. In response humans came up with a training program that allows them to resist the invasion. Apparently the only reason I was able to get as far as I did was I was taking over while he was in stasis. He points out to me that the moment he was brought out of stasis he stopped me dead and we were evenly matched even though I had control of most of his brain. That seems reasonable enough, but I can't help but feel embarrassed at the fact that I lost to a creature that can't take over the minds of others and, just adding insult to injury, started with a huge disadvantage. He chuckles and tells me not to worry about it, and I instantly feel better. This makes me realize that he's messing with my emotions and when I call him on it he responds with "you're messing with my body". I ask him to stop and he agrees not to mess with my emotions unless I'm acting irrational. Sighing I realize that's the best I'm going to get out of him and I agree. Realizing I have school tomorrow I settle down to rest so I'm ready for my first day at school with a body.

Waking up the next day is a really weird experience. I find myself eating some of my mother's bran cereal (which I discover I hate) and that snaps me awake. I momentarily forget I have a body now so I'm confused as to how I am eating when Jerald thinks "Nice of you to join the land of the living." causing me to jump, spilling some of the cereal. Yesterday's events come rushing back to me and I realize it was not a dream. Looking down at the mess I realize Jerald must have gotten me up and made me start eating. Glancing over at the clock I notice it's 6:30 in the morning causing me to groan. Jerald seems fascinated with the clock, thinking to me that it's second hand is moving much faster than it would on earth. I ask him why that would be and he says that our day seems to be divided the same as his but our day is a little less than seven of his hours. That's surprising news, no wonder he was up and moving well before my mind was ready to wake up. Hearing somebody coming down stairs I turn and see my sister (She took over a Aranth which is similar to a Aranki but has much more hair. Jerald calls them Ape and Neanderthal respectively.) She's surprised by my appearance and I motion for her to come down. She complies and sits down in front of me, a huge smile on her face.
"I see you finally decided to take a host. You seem to have adapted well. It's not so bad is it?" she asks.
"No, I guess not. I'm still not used to it."
"So I see." she says, indicating the mess in front of me with her chin. "Want help cleaning up?"
"Thanks but I think I can manage." I say, grabbing a sponge and wiping down the table.
"You seem to have full control already." She observes.
"That's because it was mostly brain dead when I found it. I didn't have to go through much a fight before I had control." I respond, only half lying.
"That's not fair! I had to fight for a week before I had control."
"And that, Surena is why I didn't want to take over a body in the first place. I didn't want to wrestle control from a creature that had it's full life ahead of it. I'm just lucky I found this one."
"Well you've got one now."
"Yes I do. Now, are we going to keep talking or are we going to get ready for school? I personally don't want to be late for my first day of school with a body."
"I forgot you've never been to school with a body before! Oh, you're going to love it. You can finally start acting like a normal Wilith and write your own papers! Wait a minute, Zrendive, you don't know how to write do you? That's got to be embarrassing!"
I groan, I forgot about having to actually use a pencil and paper instead of relying on others to write my papers. Great, I'm not looking forward to that.
"But I do." Jerald thinks to me. And I can tell he's thinking of something mischievous.
"Oh, that's going to be so funny, my bigger brother can't write yet, and he's in the eighth grade!"
"Tell her you can, I'll take over from there." Jerald thinks, causing me to grin. I get what he's got in mind now.
"I can so write!"
"Oh yeah? Prove it!" she says. I grin and grab a pencil and notepad off of the counter and let Jerald take over. He writes "See, I told you I could write." and it's surprisingly neat. Surena's eyes widen at how neat it is and I can't help but grin. The look on her face is just perfect. Putting the pencil and paper back where I got it I sit down and finish my breakfast. After breakfast we get on the bus and I take a seat for the first time in my life. I take the opportunity to ask Jerald how he knew he could write in my language, since I find it hard to believe it's anything like his native language. He tells me that it was nothing, everybody on Earth was taught how to write in foreign languages at a young age so that they could pick up new alien languages quickly and easily. Apparently humans were constantly coming into contact with new species and learning how to read and write alien languages comes in handy when dealing with species that only have a written language. Which there are a surprising amount of. As he's thinking of this several images of species I've never seen before pop into my head. Suddenly he stops and my attention is brought back to the present, where I notice my friend Rangula getting on the bus. Suddenly I feel my body tense, everything seems to slow down, and an image of somebody that looks like Rangula killing a bunch of humans pops into my head. I can feel my eyes flick all over Rangula's body as if Jerald's looking for something. I feel the pit of my stomach drop when I realize that Rangula's host looks just like the enemy the humans were fighting. All of a sudden my body relaxes but everything still seems to be happening in slow motion. Now I can feel my body getting up and hear myself say "Hey Rangula, I saved you a seat." as if nothing happened. At the same time this is happening Jerald apologizes to me saying "Sorry about that, you don't know how close I came to killing your friend. Thankfully I recognized him from your memories and stopped myself. If you don't mind I'll keep temporary control of my body until the adrenaline high is over. Don't worry, I won't embarrass you." Too shocked to argue I agree to let Jerald continue, I don't think I'm ready to take control back in my current state of mind. After I calm down I decide to ask Jerald if he'd really have killed my friend. His answer is "Of course!" followed by several graphic images of ways he could have done it. I'm thankful I don't have control of my facial muscles as I'm sure the look I would have been sporting would have drawn quite a bit of attention. Listening in on what I'm saying I am surprised to hear that Jerald is saying things I would normally say.
"You shouldn't be surprised, I've read your mind, remember?"
I don't think I'm ever going to get used to him doing that. I notice that the bus is slowing down and I realize we are finally at school. At this point Jerald releases control back to me and I follow Rangula to history class. Rangula seems really excited and when I ask why he tells me that they've found another artifact and hands me a newspaper clipping. It's Jerald's life support pod. I was not expecting this but apparently Jerald was since he quickly wrenches control from me and says "Cool, what do you think it is?" Causing Rangula to grin and start spouting theories. His favourite one is that it's some sort of Tari escape pod, which is actually surprisingly close to the truth. Then he starts gushing about how cool it would be to actually see a living Tari and how much of a shame it is that it was vandalized, causing Jerald to think "You're not missing much". Something in the clipping's picture catches Jerald's attention and he thinks to me "You're not going to believe this but I think-" but he never finishes the thought because in that moment there is a commotion in the hallway followed by allot of screaming.

Jerald wrenches control from me and rushes me out of the classroom. What I see terrifies me, the hallway is filled with bodies. In the middle of them all is a Rikiki with her back to us. I can feel myself muttering "Damn Ilwrath" before running up behind the Rikiki and hitting her in the vulnerable area where the head meets the body, killing her on the spot. As the body hits the ground I'm stunned at what just happened. Jerald just killed somebody, and now I'm going to get the blame for it. Mind you that somebody just killed a whole bunch of other students, but still... How am I going to explain that?
"When I was looking at that picture I thought I saw an Ilwrath drop pod landing in the distance. You know them as the Rikiki. This makes me I think that that was an Ilwrath soldier. They're merciless and they'll destroy anything and everything in their path. We're lucky it was facing the other direction or else I wouldn't have been able to get to the sweet spot and kill it." I'm stunned but before I can even think a voice gets my attention.
"Z-Zrendive, how did you know to hit her there? I didn't even know to hit a Rikiki host there, and I'm inhabiting one."
"Blame it on me. Just say your host reacted on it's own. It's the best I can offer." Jerald thinks to me. Not knowing what else to do I go along with his plan. Rangula doesn't seem convinced but before he has a chance to respond the police arrive. As I explain what happened to the police they seem to accept it and tell me it was lucky my host reacted the way that it did, but warned me that I can't ever let it happen again. They then go on to declare the school a giant crime scene and kick everybody out. On the bus home it seems people can't decide weather to congratulate me or fear me. Everybody seems nervous around me except for Rangula, who is pressing me for answers. After about the fiftieth time asking I finally break down and promise to tell him the secret when we get home. He seems satisfied with this and since we live on the same street we get off of the bus together. Once we're out of earshot of everybody else Rangula turns to me and demands the truth. At this point I feel Jerald wrench control from me and something about his expression must have tipped Rangula off because the next words out of his mouth were "I'm talking to the host right now aren't I?"
"Yes, you are." Jerald responds, causing Rangula's facial expression to change slightly.
"I thought so. You were in control on the bus too, weren't you?" This catches both of us off guard.
"Yes I was, how did you know?"
"Your facial expressions were too practised. I could tell something was wrong."
"I'll have to remember that."
"You're not a normal Aranki are you?"
"Aranki? No, you know us as the Tari." This caused Rangula's facial expression to change dramatically.
"T-Tari? You're kidding!"
"No, I'm not. Take a good look, do I really look exactly like the Aranki?"
After a few moments of consideration Rangula's eyes widen when he realizes there are differences.
"So, the Tari are related to the Aranki then?"
"Yes, we put them here."
"You what?"
"We put them here, they were part of a terraforming project. I was attached to the ships escorting the colonists."
"Why would the colonists need an escort?"
"We were at war. We called them the Ilwrath, you call them the Rikiki. You don't know how close I came to killing you on that bus."
"B-But how is that possible? The Rikiki are mindless creatures."
"They must have devolved. Believe me, they were way more advanced then us. We were loosing the war."
"But it would take thousands of years for a species to change that much! Besides, where did they even come from? If your people were terraforming this planet wouldn't that mean there were no Rikiki here in the first place?"
"There was a battle above the planet. I wouldn't be surprised if a few Ilwrath escape pods made it down to the surface. From there it was just a matter of time. Just how old are these artifacts you've been finding?"
"They're all around eight thousand years old."
"There's your time for them to devolve. Although it begs the question, why did they devolve in the first place, and why didn't they wipe out the rest of the life on this planet like they normally do?"
"Maybe we possessed them?"
"Maybe, but that doesn't explain why you didn't know about their history."
"Maybe we'll never know."
"Maybe not, but that's ancient history, what concerns us now is why modern ones are showing up now out of the blue. What changed that brought them here?"
"You showed up."
"I was already here, I just finally escaped from my- The distress beacon! That's what attracted them!"
"Wouldn't it have been going this whole time?"
"No, we were engaged in combat so the automated distress beacons were disabled. I must have triggered it when I blew the hatch manually."
"So you're the reason they're showing up now?"
"Sadly, yes. Damn it! We have to disable that distress beacon."
"But it's safely in a government facility by now. There's no way we can get to it."
"Well then, we'll find a way!"