The Great Belligerency [Round 4: Static]

Originally posted on MSPA by Pick Yer Poison.

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The backdrop lurched and Phil found himself lying on top of a thatch roof, staring up at a brilliant sun. His visor quickly compensated for the sudden brightness, overlaying a darkened mask over the sun and its rays to prevent it from blinding Phil, and he felt a small vibration as the air conditioner in his suit kicked in to keep the heat at bay. He blinked anyway, instinctively raising his hand to cover his face. The movement caused the roof, already strained from the unexpected weight of the commando, to cave in, dumping Phil unceremoniously onto the dirt floor of the hut below. A skinny, dark-skinned man wearing little more than a loincloth leaped back in surprise, letting out a cry in a language Phil didn't understand. He groaned back in reply. "Suit, translate."

"Unknown language," it reported back crisply. "Recording and analyzing samples." Phil lifted himself off the floor with a grunt, to find the man still staring at him, but with more curiosity than fear. He stepped forward hesitantly, extending a frail hand towards Phil, index finger aimed at the crescent moon on his chest. He spoke again in the strange language, this time almost reverently, and scrabbled out of the hut, pushing aside the scrap of woven grass strands that served as a door. Phil raised an eyebrow and took a few moments to glance around the interior of the hut. The walls were made of hard-packed dirt, and the only furniture in evidence was a woven grass mat on the floor. Well, the Executor did say they were primitive.

Phil walked out of the hut, pushing aside the curtain over the door, and found that he was in a small village consisting of about eight huts similar to the one he had just exited, all centered around a slightly larger one that was really just several merged huts. He glanced around and noticed that there were a number of dark-skinned men and women wearing only the bare essentials of clothing peering at him through cracks in the curtains covering their huts' doors. While they didn't seem overly hostile, Phil was painfully aware that he had no idea what their culture was like, and starting a fight could be throwing away an opportunity. He stood there awkwardly until one of the natives, a short and almost deathly skinny old man, worked up the courage to step up in front of Phil. He grabbed the commando's hand and pulled him towards the large building. While Phil could have easily broken his grip, he allowed himself to be pulled into the large hut.

A crude staircase lined the left wall, leading down to a lower level. Curtains on either side of the room led to the smaller huts Phil had seen merged into the sides. The back wall was flatter than the round walls of the hut Phil had fallen into, and two crude figures were carved into it. The left half was dominated by the figure of a woman with her head covered by a rendition of the sun; on the right stood a man with his head covered by a rendition of a crescent moon. Phil stared at the carvings for a moment, then turned back to see several other villagers had joined the one who had pulled him into the building. More peered in past the curtain Phil had entered through. All of their faces held an expression of awe. Three of them stepped forward, side by side by side. The one on the left held a sunbaked lizard, the one on the right held a clay bowl with a small amount of water in it, and the one in the middle held a chipped piece of stone which vaguely resembled a crescent moon. It took a moment for the realization to hit Phil. Oh shit, do they really think I'm a god?