text: [Themes: sci-fi, serious]
  
  You aren't going to defeat them head on, this requires a little subtlety. You notice the cave is far enough away from the village that you could probably sneak in without raising an alarm. The plan is to silently kill the few Krik watching over the Lizards and see what's so important in those caves. If it's anything truly worthwhile you can ponder your next move, if it not, you can get the hell out and put a bunch of distance between you and this place.
  
  Salo isn't too enthusiastic with this plan, he wants to attack head on.
  
  "The Emperor will protect us! This creeping and sneaking is for Elojin!"
  "I'm still in charge Salo, and I'll decide what's going to work! We aren't all going anyway, I'll be going, Alyssa, and two other team members. Lieutenant, you hold down the fort here, and dammit I NEED you to fucking muster up ALL your courage for this alright? If something goes wrong you need to get in there and help us."
  "Um, I'll do m...my best sir." LaFleur says unconvincingly.
  
  You shake your head and hope for the best. You aren't worried so much that he'll run, Salo will make sure he doesn't, but you're more worried that Salo will act like the xenophobic hothead he is and start an attack without LaFleur's orders.
  
  You, Alyssa, and your other two team members stealthily sneak into the cave. There's a weird fungus in here that causes a glow allowing you to barely see, but at least its light. The cave seems to descend lower the deeper you go, eventually you reach where the Krik and Lizards are, you keep hidden on an upper level and observe what they're up to.
  
  You see the Lizards being forced to enter some strange doorway; it looks like they really don't want to either. A few go in, and some don't come back out. The ones that do are holding some shining crystals. They're Baz crystals. Figures the Krik would be able to find something of worth on this planet. You wonder how they found it though and what the danger is through the doorway that they're sending Lizards in there, let alone the fact that some of them aren't coming back.
  
  Time to ponder your next move.
  
  > kill the Krik Taskmasters
  The only thing you've found on this planet that's useful and you'll be dammed if you'll let the Krik have it. You don't think you could leave anyway, Alyssa looks pretty focused on killing them.
  
  "Now we have to kill them all at the same time, we don't want one of them alerting the others with those sonic screams they do. Head shots, and aim like a damn sniper."
  
  You all take aim at the Krik taskmasters, there's only two, but their bodies are naturally resilient. Hell, you're hoping the headshots will kill them instantly. And this dim "fungus light" doesn't exactly make it easy.
  
  Squeeze...squeeze...
  
  Alyssa fires twice, hitting both of them in the head! As they fall, she jumps down to the lower level and takes out her knife and stabs them both in the neck! They make twitching movements for a moment and then finally die. The Lizards look at Alyssa in wonder, they are certainly grateful to all of you, but you think she impressed them the most.
  
  They don't understand you, of course, but they do understand that you just saved them. You free the remaining Lizards of their chains, and look willing to follow you.
  
  You could slip out of the cave and escape with the Baz crystals that were already gathered, or you could go through the doorway they were sending the Lizards through.
  
  > Escape
  Sticking around wouldn't be the best idea, for the main reason that the Krik will probably send some more soldiers in here wondering what's going on eventually. You decide to leave and come back in force.
  
  You all escape the cave without being seen, when you make your way back, you're almost surprised to see that Salo, hasn't overrode LaFleur's command and gotten everyone killed. He doesn't look too happy to see more Lizards though.
  
  "Captain what is this? You bring more of these aliens into our midst?"
  "These Lizards were going to be killed by the Krik."
  "And what of it? Let the alien scum kill each other I say!"
  "You would. Look there's a Baz crystal deposit in that cave, (You show everyone some crystals) and we can't possibly take out all those Krik, it might help to have some allies."
  "Bah, your liberal policies concerning aliens will lead to your ruin Captain. You can trust in them, but I'm not. I trust in the Will of the Emperor, and that's all a good Empire soldier needs to believe in."
  
  Alyssa gives Salo a colder stare than usual, while you ignore Salo's tiresome tirades, and decide your next course of action; you could start laying out a plan with who you have, OR you could try an even more radical plan and get the Lizards from the village you just left to help you.
  
  > make a plan now
  The other village is too far away and you have reason to believe they'd follow you, sure they were friendly, but that doesn't mean they're ready to help you fight a battle that doesn't directly concern them.
  
  You need to act now. You plan out an attack, and explain it to everyone. The Lizards fashion some weapons with some nearby trees, and after a few attempts they grasp the plan to retake their village, but mostly they're going to follow Alyssa into battle, seeing as they feel indebted to her for saving their lives. Everyone agrees with the plan and gets into position. Salo grumbles about having to fight along side Lizards, but he's dislikes the Krik more, so he doesn't protest too much more.
  
  You see some of Krik approaching the cave, looks like they got suspicious, you wait for them to enter and then direct some of your team to ambush them. As soon as the sounds of Krik being shot in the back are heard, the Krik encampment is alerted.
  
  The rest of the Krik converge on the caves and you direct another detachment from the other side to start firing. The Krik realizing they're being attacked from two sides split up, and that's when you lead the rest of your team to attack straight down the middle. Alyssa fights like she's possessed with a rage you could never understand.
  
  This simple tactic works surprisingly better than you thought, eventually you kill the last Krik, but the cost was high, many of your team members are dead, as well as all of the Lizards. All the high command survived though, Salo, LaFleur, and Alyssa.
  
  But you've secured the Baz crystal deposit; you don't want to really risk going through the doorway in the cave though. You've already risked enough, if the Krik weren't enthusiastic about going in, and the Lizards weren't either, then you're guessing they had a good reason. Let someone else go in.
  
  Other than keeping Salo and Alyssa from killing each other and reassuring LaFleur that getting wounded by a Krik doesn't mean eggs were laid in him, the rest of your time on Paradise is relatively uneventful.
  
  When the Empire ships arrive you report everything to your superiors who are very pleased. They have plans to start setting up a base immediately. As a reward, you're given a medal, and some accolades, but nothing too special. You were just doing your job as far as the Empire's concerned. However you suggest that Alyssa be able to be promoted, seeing as she displayed exemplarily in the battle with the Krik. Your superiors frown a bit, since you should realize that non-humans can't achieve rank past Sergeant. However they say they'll take it under consideration and maybe some exception can be made.
  
  They dismiss you and you're shipped off to your next mission, where you'll get replacements for your team. As time passes Alyssa becomes the first non-human to be promoted to an officer rank, much to the annoyance of Salo, and to the delight of LaFleur who transfers out of your team for a nice desk command instead. She actually receives another few promotion offer later, but she always remains with your team though; she never forgets how you were the one who spoke out for her.
  Eventually you and she grow even closer.
  
  Another interesting effect that you didn't expect was this one exception eventually becomes a "rule" as the Empire relaxes its policies on its alien citizens a bit.
  
  Perhaps you are just a glorified scout, but you made a major difference in the Empire.