Star Force: Phase 2 64-73
Author: Aer-Ki Jyr
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Age Range 2 Older Audience
Description: Anthology containing: Star Force: LITrpg Star Force: First Contact Fallout Star Force: The Forbidden Space Fleet Star Force: Death Mark Star Force: Atonement Star Force: The Forever Empire Star Force: Captains Mint Star Force: The Powers That Be Star Force: Symbiosis Star Force: Capitulation
Rights: Copyrights as per source stories

LITrpg

1

March 23, 128690

Stugarrata Nebula (Tovok Kingdom)

Kappa Temple

131 years had passed since Mak’to’ran’s death and the beginning of the 2nd Zak’de’ron/V’kit’no’sat war, but Puar knew nothing of it. What happened beyond the Temple was not publically known, and the information Star Force offered was spurred by most of the Vargemma, but fortunately not all. A few brave, curious, or foolhardy individuals had sought out Cal-com’s call for warriors and had been rewarded with actual combat against the Hadarak. They had returned, spurned by their own races, but their stories spread like wildfire along with the data they had brought back.

Puar had not believe it when he had first seen the helmet-cam footage of ground combat against Hadarak minions. He thought it was yet one more piece of Hadarak fiction created for the amusement of the masses, as such things in the Temple were far older than him, but this one had not been fake, and a piece of him had known it instinctively.

But like the others he had spurned it…until his curiosity got the better of him and he began to loosely look for more bootleg information on those called the ‘Varkemma.’ Apparently it was the name for those that chose to join Star Force and travel beyond the Temple into the wilds of the galaxy to fight the impossible war against the Hadarak. It was a war that had been said to be unwinnable without the assistance of the Founders, and any loyal Vargemma were patiently waiting until their return while keeping those less loyal in check…but Star Force’s possession of naval superiority in this Temple had changed everything.

Now those without the constitution to follow instructions were seeking out the combat in droves, with nearly all being rejected. Fortunately Puar had come to his revelation before the masses and sought out the competitive matches where he had to prove his worth to even begin training to join the Varkemma. There were so many superior warriors ahead of him he had to suffer through loss after loss until they were ascended out of the competition, leaving those next strongest in line with an opportunity to be the future chosen.

Puar had won the most recent tournament after 78 years of trying, and it had not been a sure thing. He felt that he was luckier than strong, given his victory in the battle royal that saw him the last standing in the ring. The moment was still emblazoned in his recent memory and, more than that, now etched into his Core. He had stood there, with billions watching the live feeds from the arena, as the other warriors were recovering outside the massive ring with a halo of Caretaker drones hovering above ready to kill anyone that went too far in the combat.

That wasn’t on Cal-com’s order, but a testament to how close to breaking the rules the tournaments were coming. Puar was still injured with a number of cuts on his forelegs, but nothing that would inhibit him from joining the others in Redemption, which he now stood before. It was the city that was the gateway to the galaxy beyond, and it stood so tall it reached beyond the atmosphere of the Temple with several Star Force vessels visibly docked with the uppermost part of the tower that doubled as a space terminal.

Puar was on the exterior border wall looking in, as were many others, but the difference was that he had a pass key now to go inside and the others did not. He had once stood here like the others, hoping to be let inside without passing through the tournaments or just wanting to be as close to Redemption as possible, to see it for themselves.

Puar didn’t want to go inside yet, for he was still trying to get a handle on his recent achievement, so he simply stood in the crowd outside one of the many landside gates in the short barrier wall that had an invisible shield beyond that allowed full view of the city without permitting access. The gate was guarded by machines, who would only allow those with a pass key through, and whenever someone came or went through the gate those around felt privileged to be this close to them…even if they were just a worker and not one of the warriors. Even the workers in Redemption were near legendary status amongst the ‘illicit’ Vargemma seeking to join Star Force and abandon the orders of the Founders.

Some had been imprisoned for their desire to disobey, but Cal-com had found out about it and sent special teams down to extract them…as well as teach the races in the Temple the lesson of who was truly in charge. Now Puar and the others were shunned and decried, but not punished for their hopes and dreams of one day entering this city. They were the optimistic cast-offs, but today Puar was no longer a dreamer. He was now entering the city and did not care what the rest of the Temple thought of him. His future lay in Redemption, and if he could prove himself worthy he would one day join the Varkemma and venture beyond the inside of the giant sphere that had been his universe from the day he was born.

Others had ventured beyond before Star Force had invaded, and they were heroes to the Vargemma rather than outcasts, but now their status was greatly diminished, because they had not even seen a Hadarak, let alone fought them. But the few Varkemma that had gone forth and returned had, making them the legends that the masses were forbidden from acknowledging.

Puar picked up his right paw and licked one of the scabs from the claw marks that had been dug into him as he rolled through an Essence-enhanced grapple hold that had nearly pulled him outside the ring boundaries by a Vadnai attempting to help another advance. The one who had clawed him was trying to pull them both out, which wasn’t against the rules, but it was against the nature of the battle royal. It was meant to leave the best warrior standing, and an intentional ring-out was seen as dishonorable…yet the competition to get to Redemption was so fierce many were teaming up in an attempt to get one through, and it had nearly worked on Puar, had he not been able to slightly overpower the winged Vadnai and break his four armed grip before he flew both of them out of bounds.

In doing so the other’s claws had tore deep and bloody slashes into his pinned forearms, probably by accident, but it hadn’t been enough to cause the Caretakers to intervene. And if they had, the shield protecting the combatants would stop them from killing the individuals involved long enough for them to escape through tunnel entrances all around the ring. Once out of sight the Caretakers would lose interest so long as they were not engaged themselves. Of the many times they had intervened in the tournaments, Star Force’s measures had insured no one had ever been killed, but it was made clear that if you went beyond the tournament rules and tried to seriously injure or kill another and drew the wrath of the Caretakers, then it was your own responsibility to get clear. Star Force had created the escape routes for them, but that was the limit of their involvement with the Caretakers.

Puar understood the delicate balance that Kappa existed under. Most of the other Temples, he’d been told, had seen the Caretakers engaged in a never-ending war with Star Force because they had been triggered into full scale combat. The Caretakers were not forgiving of such things, and no one in Kappa wanted that to occur here, so the Vargemma resistance to the Star Force occupation operated on certain rules, and while Star Force left them alone in their own cities the two empires reluctantly agreed to coexist in their own corners of the Temple, though there were incidents where crossovers occurred, but they were never bloody…at least not intentionally. The news of the few that were made it to every block of every city, because both the Vargemma and Star Force wanted everyone to be clear about what not to do, for fear of bringing the Caretaker War to Kappa.

The Vargemma wouldn’t start it, which they made clear, but if some of Star Force’s people were tagged for elimination by the Caretakers, then Cal-com would escalate the fight rather than allow those few to be sacrificed. Star Force operated with a ‘one for all and all for one’ approach to warfare, so the Vargemma couldn’t engage in clandestine battles with expendable troops, as was their previous pastime, because Star Force would stupidly engage the Caretakers to protect even one of their own and throw the entire Temple into never-ending war. All for one person.

Puar still thought that was stupid, but an element of it was honorable and brave. Star Force wasn’t afraid of the fight, nor were they afraid of the Caretakers, which the Vargemma were. It was a mix of reverence for the machines of the Founders and a fear of their lethality that kept the Vargemma subservient to their overwatch, but Star Force didn’t give a damn about them, and Puar liked that, as did many others after millennia of sitting and doing nothing. Warriors needed to fight, and telling them not to had always caused trouble amongst the less loyal members of the Vargemma, so they’d found ways to cheat that, often at their own expense.

Many a strong warrior had died at the hands of the Caretakers when they could not stand being idle any longer and chose to attack a member of an opposing race in the numerous feuds that seemed to be as prevalent as the clouds in the sky, but now there was a relief valve for that tension, and the most fed up warriors were engaging each other, within rules, in the tournaments and blowing off a lot of steam as they tried, over and over again, to qualify for the basic training that Puar had now won. All in the hopes of ascending to real combat against the true enemy they’d been promised to fight when the Founders came back…if they ever did.

Puar didn’t want to wait, even before he had known of the galactic purge underway, and that fact was something the Vargemma tried very hard to keep away from the public. A fight already underway was like a beacon to warriors, so they tried to suppress or downplay it as much as possible, but word got around, as did rumors and all types of misinformation, but enough of the truth got through to those who were discontented with waiting for the Founders, and as the tournaments became more and more popular as entertainment spectacles and means of engaging rival races in sanctioned combat, the bans on viewing them were melting away as the Vargemma tried to rebrand them as training exercises…though those with comm tech of their own could intercept Star Force’s public transmissions and see for themselves what was going on.

And that was why rogue comm gear was the number one banned item amongst most Vargemma races, though it appeared that a few of them had completely gone over to Star Force. That was information that was squelched amongst Puar’s own Trigorma race as soon as it eeked out of the shadows, and even before, because the Trigorma had double agents amongst the cast-outs trying to find the source of breaches in the information blackout and silence them.

But it was a losing effort. More and more were hearing snippets of the truth, and the term ‘Varkemma’ was starting to become better well known, and known as the heroes above all heroes. And now Puar had a chance…only a chance…to join them. Many failed and left Redemption of their own choice, stating that they were allowed an infinite number of opportunities by Star Force, but that they were not being told what it was they were lacking. Some were making it through to become Varkemma, others were being put in continuous limbo and some of those couldn’t hack it, but most who were allowed inside Redemption never came back out, and Puar believed it was because they didn’t want to.

He’d find out for himself soon enough, and after several hours of mingling outside with the crowds, he finally eased his way forward to the gate, and to the astonishment of everyone around him he pulled out a small Star Force emblem with a picture of Cal-com’s visor-covered face superimposed over the center. It was said the Star Force leader had sent out each emblem as a personal invitation to Redemption, and when Puar telekinetically pulled it out of a pocket on the horizontal vest that he wore on his cat-like body and attached it to his right paw overtop one of the scabbed battle marks, it sealed to his wrist and glowed as it confirmed his genetic identity.

Feeling like the holiest of holy warriors, he walked forward a few steps and respectfully knelt down in front of one of the three visible bipedal machines guarding the gate. He sat on his rear paws and reached his front right up to display the blue-glowing emblem to the machine.

“Access granted initiate,” it said in the Star Force language, which Puar and many others had learned long ago through painstaking practice, for the Trigorma memory downloads had never allowed a language version from the invaders to be available to the public. But that hadn’t stopped those willing to put in the work from learning it the hard way and spreading it to others that wished to know what the new Temple overseers had to say when one or more of their transmissions slipped through the Trigorma comm blackout.

The circular gate that stood five times his height irised open with two more machine guards walking through as the crowd slowly began to encroach. They held them back with shield walls snapped into place behind Puar, segregating him from the outcasts as the way before him was made clear.

“Step inside and embrace your destiny,” the machine urged. “Cal-com welcomes you to Redemption.”

Puar stood up and slowly walked forward, not fully believing this moment was real, but soon he found himself on the other side of that circular gate…and suddenly all sound ceased.

He turned around, seeing the gate behind him still there with the machine guards walking back inside, but everything looked a bit dark, with Puar realizing he’d passed through some sort of barrier field that must have been the wall of white others had talked about seeing through the gate when they had the rare opportunity to see someone pass inside.

“Forward Puar,” he told himself softly. “You did not earn this to worry about those behind you.”

He kept walking down a narrow path through a boundary region inside the outer wall. It separated the city from the barrier, giving Star Force a combat field if necessary to fight on beyond the real city wall that the path was leading him to. The stones he was treading on took him across the grassy fields that were treeless and merely open space that stretched as far as he could see left and right, but straight ahead was a second gate into the Star Force buildings that were reaching into the sky several hundred meters, beyond which was the grand tower in the distance, but it was quickly becoming consumed with the local structures as he strode closer.

“Hello there,” someone said from behind him, with Puar twisting his shoulders enough to rotate his head around and see a person appear out of nothing behind him…either a hologram snapping into appearance or a cloaked individual revealing his bipedal self. It was not of a Vargemma race.

“Greetings,” Puar offered.

“I am your contact,” the Protovic said, his face glowing in two different colors. “My name is Reganno. Why are you here?”

“I won the tournament,” Puar said, unsure of what the question meant. After all, he said he was his contact.

“Yes, I know. But why are you here? Most Vargemma hate this place.”

“I do not wish to wait for the Founders to return. I want to fight now.”

Reganno nodded his understanding. “You will have a chance to do so, but before we trust you to fight alongside us, we must know you are trustworthy. You and the other Vargemma have many Essence skills, amongst psionics and other lethal natural abilities. You could easily kill one of us who was not paying attention, and there are many Vargemma who would gladly do so once they were beyond the realm of the Caretakers…”

Puar’s body shivered with goosebumps at the thought of that. He’d never been beyond their gaze, and the thought of being free of their lethal enforcement, being beyond their rules, was something he’d never truly considered before. At least, not something he thought he would ever personally experience.

“…If we include you in our forces, you will fully be so. There will be no battlefield proving. No secondary assignment. No cannon fodder. If you fight with us, you will be one of us. You will protect us and we will protect you as we battle the Hadarak. Because of this, your training here will be more than just teaching you of the Hadarak and the weapons that will and will not kill them. We must teach you to be trustworthy, and test that trustworthiness. If you cannot pass, then you will not go with us. We will not tolerate backstabbing, so we will not allow an opportunity to do so.”

Reganno raised a hand, showing that he had on a large green ring on one of his 5 fingers.

“Do you know what this is?”

“I do not.”

The biped held his hand steady, then all of a sudden the ring began to glow…but not visually. It glowed in Essence, and a very deep, potent Essence at that.

“Now do you know?”

“Is that a personal well?” Puar asked in astonishment. Such things were not allowed in the Trigorma. All Essence stored had to be sent either into a Caretaker well or a city well. He did not even know a well could be so small to fit on an appendage, and he doubted how much it could actually contain, though he recognized the advantage inherent in it.

“It is. Do you know why I wear it?”

Puar considered for a moment. “You are not confident in your abilities against mine, should I attack you?”

“You are coming from a very broken race, Puar. And a race amongst other broken races in this Temple. We do not trust you. Not yet. But know this. If you do go into battle against the Hadarak, those Star Force troops around you will not possess Essence skills. Very few of us do. They will be nearly helpless against you, should you betray them. That is why you will not have any proximity to non-Essence users in Redemption until and unless you prove yourself. This is not an insult to you, but rather a security precaution. Star Force does not kill its own. Not ever. Our trust is what binds us together stronger than the Vargemma could ever imagine. You will have to become worthy of that trust to join us on the battlefield, and do not think you can fake it. We have ways of knowing. If you are not trustworthy now, that is acceptable so long as you behave. You will be given unlimited chances to become trustworthy over time.”

“Become?” Puar asked. “Is it not a matter of my current intent?”

“People change, and many enemies of Star Force have, over time and proper stimulus, become friends. Some Vargemma have as well. They would have killed me on the battlefield if they had the chance when they first arrived. Now they would never do such a thing. When you encounter the light after a lifetime of darkness, it will allow a besieged good Core to show through a lifetime of learned behavior, so we do not count anyone out for current intent. We have a thorough process of vetting, and you get as many tries as you want. All you need is one success.”

“Only one? It must be difficult beyond measure then?”

“In a way. But it is also very simple. Be trustworthy. Most do not understand the meaning of those words. We will see if you do, and if not, we will see if you can learn,” Reganno said, pointing his ringed hand toward the inner gate as it opened at his beckoning. “Welcome to Redemption, Puar. A galaxy aflame in war awaits warriors willing to rise to the challenge, and this city is the portal for those who prove themselves worthy to fight alongside Star Force and defy the darkside in all its manifestations…”

2

July 1, 128690

Stugarrata Nebula (Tovok Kingdom)

Kappa Temple

Puar launched himself into the air and to the right with all four of his legs, barely missing the projectile the wall ahead of him threw out of a concealed portal. All of the damn turrets were invisible, covered by holograms that made them look like flat wall, and he didn’t have time to focus his Fremmav to peer through them. It was a lot less omnidirectional than Star Force’s Pefbar, and this training challenge had been designed, he suspected, to force him to let go of the singular target lock his race preferred when in combat.

He was getting attacked from multiple angles simultaneously, and from past experience Puar knew that if he tried to stop one of the spherical projectiles before it hit him then his hind end would get pelted from other directions. The only advantage he had here was the fact that the targeting equipment firing the projectiles was laggy, and if he kept moving in other than a straight line he could dodge them, but every time he leveled up to a new difficulty setting, that lag decreased a bit more.

His cat-like body hit on his shoulders and he kicked the slightly padded ground to roll himself over and back onto his feet where he jumped into a run just as another projectile bounced off the spot on the floor where he had landed.

A duck here, jerk there, and lots of running through the maze of hallways and open corridors eventually led him to the final challenge that had him climbing a sheer tower out in the open. He’d never completed it, and the few Varkemma that had would not share their secret, but they did say not all body types were capable of making it. Yet no one told him if a Trigorma could or not. The fact that he was running this course suggested it was possible, but Puar was beginning to think he was here to fail repeatedly as some sort of object lesson.

Never the less, he took at it aggressively with his black/white fur becoming a blur as he ran up to the underside and flew through the air on a single leap and clawed at the flat wall. His paws slid halfway before the semi-soft material finally caught and he was able to gingerly pull himself up, but rather than slowly climbing and getting pelted with projectiles he steadied himself. Two of the orbs punched into his back and rolled off, leaving a slight numbing sensation before he launched himself up again as a third missed and bounced off the wall where he had just been clinging.

Puar made it two more leaps up before he was so numb that his claws didn’t fully extract when his paws hit the wall above him…then he slipped and fell back to the ground where a force field caught him just prior to impact. It slowly set him down as multiple projectiles flew through the air and nailed him, rendering him fully unconscious.

When he woke he had been removed from the training course and was sitting in a sluggish position with his chin down between his front two legs as an automated revival bot injected him with destunning serum, then floated off without staying to explain itself.

They never did, and Puar had trashed two of them in his first week here out of sheer frustration, but now he did not. His anger was with the training, not the machine that woke him up from his failure stupor.

The quadruped stood up on slightly shaky legs and walked on. His routine now was very familiar. One shot at this course each and every day. One failure and it was time to move on to another that would likely be the same. The few successes that he received swapped out a completed challenge for a new one, but the failed ones didn’t stay the same. They got harder the longer it took him to beat them, which seemed unfair, but there was a war on and he was not intended to stay here training indefinitely.

If he wanted to become a Varkemma he had to keep moving forward, so he had chosen to embrace the training rather than fight it, as another had suggested he do when the Novolegg had returned to Redemption for a time after spending his 6th tour on the Hadarak front helping to screen the evacuation forces as they pulled people out of harm’s way…but there was never enough of them, and many planets were hit before they were completely emptied of people.

That’s where Puar wanted to be, and the stories he was hearing from the Varkemma were awe inspiring. The Hadarak were far more powerful than the Vargemma had ever been told by the Temple Responders, yet they were also weaker. What Star Force referred to as ‘minions’ were easy to kill individually, but there were so many of them that they could overwhelm any Essence user with their waves of corpses. You literally couldn’t kill them fast enough until they were upon you, and then you’d either stand your ground until they nicked you to death, or until you ran out of Essence. The only way to win was an immense amount of carnage, and that was very appealing to Puar and the others that had been living inside the Temple endlessly waiting for their chance to fight.

The Varkemma he had talked to was no longer here, but had returned to his race for a time to explain to them what was going on. They might not believe the Star Force news updates, but hearing it from one of their own had a significantly different effect on getting more recruits of higher skill to become Varkemma. Puar was glad he was already here and in the process, because making the tournament even more flush with skill would most likely have meant he’d never have made it through.

Teio had been the Novelegg’s name, and he’d talked to Puar for quite some time. Most of the questions asked could not be answered, for Cal-com wanted the training to be blind. If information was given ahead of time it would change the learning process, so Teio had been sworn to secrecy regarding how to beat certain challenges and what was coming ahead, but he could offer advice on how to construct the proper mindset, and he’d helped Puar immensely. Worthiness was not judged here as being the power to win a single fight. It was the ability to get knocked down and get back up again endlessly…and the fight against the Hadarak was an endless one. Only those who had immortal willpower could stand against them, and that is what Star Force was looking for in Varkemma recruits.

That one conversation had changed everything for Puar, and since then he’d seen his 19 hour a day training cycle as a buildup of resistance to his will rather than pointless repetition. He found it hard to sleep in his 5 hours off, because his metabolism was built exceedingly high and the training regimen required him to get into a mindset of never stopping…so sleeping was hard, but he was gradually learning how to switch from one mode into the other more efficiently.

He could waste time moving from one challenge to another if he wished, but Puar did not. He walked through the now familiar hallways of this training block to one of the most hated courses. Trigorma despised swimming, so much so they’d altered their biology to give themselves a flap inside their nose to keep out unwanted water on the occasions where they were forced into it. They were built for the dirt and dust, and their cities in the Temple were all built far from the water and inhabiting the small stretches of desert that the Temple afforded…and that the rest of the races avoided.

Water was for drinking, in small amounts. Others actually bathed in it, but Puar’s fur was meant for dust to keep it clean. Star Force provided such equipment for that in his quarters, and it worked admirably well, but combat could occur anywhere and everywhere, and Varkemma had to be prepared to fight wherever required. That meant in wet areas, in the water, and even underwater…that latter of which was truly terrifying for Puar, for his body did not move like it should, leaving him and his race mostly helpless.

But he wasn’t helpless anymore. The Trigorma were not the first race Star Force had helped learn to swim, and when Puar got to the training course he slipped on four ankle bracelets activated by mental command that would give him the propulsion necessary in the water, otherwise he’d be expending a lot of energy to pull at the water with limbs not designed for it and only get a small bit of movement in response.

Once he was so adorned, he took off at a slow run leaping from one plant-like pedestal to another that were sitting just above or just below the waterline. If he missed he’d be in deep water and go in over his head, but as long as he was good at jumping he could save a lot of time on this section of the training course, and he was an exceptionally good jumper.

In many places that were now familiar to him he’d skip one of the ‘lilly pads’ and jump clear over it to the other, landing in a little splash before resetting himself and taking another single jump, traveling across a swamp to the small island that was full of mushy, ucky ground that he hated stepping on. It soaked into his paws and made him want to stop and telekinetically pull it off, but he had no time for that and just had to tolerate it, for if he delayed too long all manner of automated enemies would appear to hunt him with stun weapons…and falling stunned into water was a nightmare he did not want to repeat.

He’d done so 6 times previously. After the first he had refused to run this course for a full two weeks before working up the courage to do so again. He couldn’t die here, but he could get a lung-full of water and partially drown before the rescue systems would pull him out. His trainers had told him that he needed to learn to face the fear, and the danger here, where he would be rescued, before going out into the wilds of the galaxy where he would be on his own.

Puar knew they were right, but he still hated this place and feared falling into the deep water with part of his body stunned.

From the island he climbed a small ladder to the top of the trees and grabbed hold of a zip line with both sets of paws, leaving him hanging upside down as he moved across a lot of water before crashing down into the waves that suddenly appeared out of nowhere when he crossed a shield boundary. The zip line ended underwater, making him swim against a stiff wind that was producing the waves to get to another island.

Instead of clawing at the water and losing to the waves, he used the four ankle bracelets to propel himself forward as little motors. They lasted about a minute then went out, after which he had to swim with each stroke recharging them.

Cruise, swim, cruise, swim was the drill here up until he reached the large island beyond 22 minutes later, pulling himself up onto the soaken sandy beach as the rain poured down and ran through little gullies no deeper than his paws to add to the nasty lake he’d just came out of. He didn’t waste any time catching his breath here and proceeded to leave the beach and shake himself off as much as possible as he did, because a minute later the rains would switch to snow as he crossed another shield boundary and whatever water was in his fur would be at risk of freezing to his body.

Fortunately Trigorma were able to both absorb and create heat at will. It was a skill they’d developed long ago as a side effect of living in the deserts, so Puar was able to swell his heat generation to fight the cold as he stepped through, but it was never enough. That said, he much preferred the snow and ice to the water, except when they melted, and in here that wasn’t going to happen, testified to by the streams of his freezing breath leaping out of his nostrils like two white plumes of smoke.

A whistle-sound indicated an enemy approaching, and one that would most likely require an Essence expenditure to defeat. On occasion Puar had been able to take them down with his psionics or cunning, but he knew now they were designed to make him use Essence in a variety of means in order to pass forward, as a means of training for that discipline, for they did no specialized Essence training at all beyond these little add-ons.

He had found that odd, but had forgotten long ago as the never-ending challenges washed away all concerns other than surviving and moving forward, so when the blizzard winds blew in from the left with the whistle coming from inside them, Puar turned and ran forward, closing the distance sooner to chip off some of the course completion time and using his Fremmav to search in a narrow cone ahead of him.

The exotic energy was able to penetrate most matter without altering it other than a little collision that would trigger a ripple that would then move back to Puar and register in his mind as a contact. Cal-com’s people had something much better, and he’d been given a chance to test that fact against some of them on a sensitivity scale. They could pick up such tiny objects that he could not fathom how they were able to do it, and he knew they were not cheating and using Essence, for if they had been he would have sensed it. In fact, they never used Essence around him and the others, though the slight leakage from their personal wells testified to the fact that they had plenty of it to use if they wished to.

When Puar finally found his flying target he reached out with his telekinesis and Essence enhanced it, grabbing the floating orb and squeezing as tightly as he could…but that wasn’t enough and he knew it wouldn’t be. He’d done this so many times, getting into long battles against 17 different varieties, that he now knew how much force was required to take down each one, and in what way to do it.

He couldn’t squeeze this one to death, but he could hold it in place as he jumped up on it. He landed on top and forced it to the ground, but a defense shield prevented him from actually touching the pressure panels on the surface.

Puar kept the squeezing pressure on, then summoned a pure Essence effect and threw the equivalent of an invisible punch down into it. That clumsy but powerful attack, combined with the squeeze, was enough pressure to deactivate the machine and allow him to pass.

The 8 foot long cat batted the meter-wide orb aside and moved on, knowing that he would have to get past another 6 of them before coming to the boundary into the high heat zone…

3

Trigorma didn’t sweat. Instead they panted, evaporating heat away via their tongue, and Puar’s was hanging out constantly as he walked through a foggy canyon that was so hot the air was full of the water coursing through a small stream barely below the point of vaporizing.

Puar knew it was that hot without touching it, for his eyes had the ability to see infrared and the creek was literally glowing with it…but the air around him was also hot, making it hard to see anything far ahead, in visual or infrared, leaving him walking around barely able to navigate as he searched for the roaming target that would unlock this level’s exit.

It wasn’t a flight orb, thankfully, but rather a ‘scurrier’ that ran around on the ground like a rodent. It had legs rather than treads and left behind tiny pinpricks whenever it was on dirt, but there were so many left behind in here that he couldn’t track it that way or he’d end up following a trail that was days old.

The first time he’d made it to this level he’d passed out from the heat before he found the scurrier. And the next 7 he had failed to catch it before likewise being incapacitated by the heat. Star Force wasn’t cruel in its training like many of the Vargemma races were, cutting you up and medically putting you back together again. Many said that was what toughened you up, but Puar was realizing they were only half right. Star Force had learned to do it better by letting you get beat up without touching you, and he had to admit, he preferred it this way. Only his unworthiness would defeat him, not an opponent, and that left all the Star Force personnel as allies rather than opponents.

Puar roamed the heat zone looking where he could when the condensation clouds broke momentarily and he got a brief view ahead, but most of the time he listened. The scurriers were quiet, except they had a slight chirp to them every now and then. The sound of the creek moving over rocks made a little noise, but otherwise the entire canyon was silent, and in the past that small chirp was what had led him close enough to use his Fremmav to get a lock on it. Once he did he’d try to telekinetically pull it to him…but the thing had a jammer that only allowed a brief moment of contact before it would slip out of his invisible grip.

That meant he would have to run it down, and there were many cracks in the rocky walls where it could flee to and escape him, so he had to be quick once he located it. But the more he panted the less he could hear the tiny sounds, leaving him with random roaming in the hopes of getting close enough.

Puar paused, shutting his mouth and becoming still. He thought he’d heard something, and he knew it wouldn’t repeat for a few more seconds, so he fought to hold in his breath and just listen.

A tiny chirp rewarded him, and Puar took off to the left, indulging in some heavy breathing as he slowly ran to get closer, then he stopped again and got silent, listening to get another vector as a slightly louder chirp made its way to him. He took off again, tracking it down segment by segment until he suddenly was confused by two chirps coming at him from different directions.

He’d never heard two scurriers in here before, let alone seen more than one, so he held still and tried to figure out if it was an echo…but the sounds were not precisely linked up, because one was chirping a little faster than the other. And a little faster than normal, actually.

Puar had been in this heat zone more than 100 times, and never had the chirping pattern changed, so he followed the odd version intent on investigating the unusual rather than pursuing the familiar and moving on to the next cold zone. He had time before he passed out. His resistance to this environment had increased greatly in previous months, and he really wanted to know where that other chirp was coming from.

As he followed it he realized it wasn’t moving. Normally the scurriers were always roaming, meaning he didn’t have the luxury of tracking down a fixed position. He simply had a range finder based on how loud it was and he had to keep at it or the sound would diminish as the scurrier moved away…and they always seemed to move away. Not one had ever accidentally come towards him, and he’d tried laying in wait until one did. All that resulted with was his passing out on the ground and him waking up in the hallway outside the training area feeling like an idiot.

But this odd chirp was still, so it didn’t take him long to get close, but when he began scanning with his directional Pefbar-like energy cone he couldn’t find anything. The chirp remained, loud and close, but there was nothing here but rock and trees and a nearly constant hot fog covering them all. Puar traveled down several little canyon offshoots, coming to dead ends that led up fairly sheer walls, but the scurriers had never climbed. They always stayed on the ground and ran for little tunnels at their height that would lead them through the rocks and out the other side.

But this chirp was coming from higher up, though he couldn’t find out where. Puar roamed around the approximate area for some 20 minutes before an epiphany hit him and he began to climb one of the thick trunked trees, with his claws pulling off bark as he did so, but he managed to get up one and through the canopy enough to poke his head out the top.

He could see the sun overhead through the thin fog…or rather what looked like a sun. They were indoors and could not see the Temple’s central light source, but this was the wrong color anyway. It was yellow with a hint of green, and far too large. Still, he’d never been able to see it before because the fog never relented enough to get a view of the sky.

Up here it did, and as he took a moment to look up he caught a glimpse of rock to the right that quickly disappeared back into the fog. He waited longer, then saw another bit of view appear as the clouds up here didn’t seem to be as omnipresent…and they were moving. Waiting paid off, for he caught another view of treetops higher than his and a rock wall.

He needed to get higher, and that tree he’d just saw might be enough. Locking it in his memory he climbed/slid back down with his larger mass not well suited for tree climbing, and the tree suffered for it, but his fur slid over the rough bark protecting his skin for the most part, for one hardship of these training challenges was that you had to enter with little or no clothing. Trigorma didn’t usually wear much in casual life, but their traditional armored suits would have been very useful here…which was why he was sure that Star Force had banned any such accoutrements other than the swimming gauntlets that he still wore.

Going off of memory, Puar moved through the underbrush…crossing one trail going the wrong way…and got to the base of a clump of trees. He looked up and used his Fremmav to see which one was tallest, then he began climbing, having to squeeze his body between two of the lower trunks that had actually twisted around each other before splaying out further up.

The tree moved on him higher up, for the trunk was not as thick at the top, but it held enough for him to pull his head up into thin clouds where he could see a great deal more. They were clumping and moving around, but the gaps between them were large and if he waited long enough he could see everything…he just had to remember what it was, for he never got a complete picture.

And the area where he remembered hearing the chirp, which was gone now, showed that the rock walls actually led up to a plateau. It wasn’t very large, and he didn’t know if that was for sure where the chirp had come from, but it was above most of the fog and he wanted to get there just to explore even if it was a waste of time. He’d been in here so many times, and probably would be for months, if not years to come, chasing the damn scurriers who seemed to get faster each time, that he needed to know the terrain as well as possible. So that’s where he was going to, if he could find his way fumbling around in the fog.

His Fremmav couldn’t reach that far through the fog. Somehow it was reducing the range, which he only realized now that he was up this high and had gaps to search through. Water shouldn’t do that, and now he wondered if the fog wasn’t laced with something that interfered with his psionic.

“Clever design,” he said in his native language, not sure if he wanted to meet and congratulate the people responsible for creating this training level or take a swipe at them, for they’d truly created a frustrating challenge to overcome.

Puar was intent on figuring out what this ledge was, so he tracked the base of the rock as close as he could, then he started looking for clawholds with his Fremmav. There wasn’t much available. The walls were pretty sheer, but at a slight angle that should make climbing possible…though his limbs were already heavy from the excessive heat and the tree climbing he’d just done, which would be easy compared to this.

The big cat took his best guess as to which wall to climb and started with a few temporary paw grips until he found one that satisfied him, then he began to slowly climb upwards, hearing the faint chirp again.

On the way up he slipped twice, but neither resulted in a fall. Having four limbs helped greatly on the wet rock, for when one lost grip the other three usually were enough to hold him, but he knew he didn’t have enough grip to actually jump from, so he had to inch his way up and sideways whenever he reached an area that was impassible.

Puar’s tongue lashed against the rock on occasion, a result of him panting heavily as his lungs felt full of heat that he was struggling to get rid of. Humid, hot air interfered with heat dissipation, making it hard for him to control his temperature even with the panting, but he wasn’t going to let this go. If he fell and hurt himself Star Force had the technology to repair his body. Again, it would be him doing it to himself rather than someone knocking him off into fall, but the result would be the same. Yet this was his choice, and his will got a little stronger every time he chose to face the danger, and that was something a victim would never understand.

Suddenly a gust of air blew into his face and he felt instant relief as the fog cleared, but only for a moment. Another wet, grey mass covered his black/white face a moment later, almost making him cough as his panting suddenly worked then was suppressed again…but this meant he was close.

Puar focused on his small clawholds and continued to move up until he hit a ledge above him which stuck out enough that he could go no higher. Rather than give up and go back down, he traveled to the right as far as he could before hitting another wall blocking his path. He reversed course and moved back to where he came up, then on to the left, eventually coming to a crevice between two walls that converged on each other from near angles.

There were no clawholds in there, meaning another dead end…unless he could use double pressure to hold him between the sides of the pinching walls.

That was risky, especially with everything being wet. His fur was very slick, but if the rock had enough irregularity to it then maybe…

Puar got himself over as close as he could, then reached his tail across to the other side to apply a little pressure. He didn’t have much muscle in it, but when balancing every bit helped.

He got as good a hold as he could with three paws, then he leaned across with the other knowing that if it slipped he would go down, but after a 3 inch skid his claws caught on something and saved him from falling. Pushing with that leg he had pressure on both sides of his body, but at an angle. He had to carefully pull another paw up and move it further into the crack and gently add pressure there, for too much would pop him out of the gap due to the angles involved.

He moved only inches over the following few minutes, panting heavily as he went, but eventually he was off all the clawholds and pressing his back against the far wall with a paw wedged into the tightest part of the crack. Once he got into that position he was able to climb faster, from his perspective, but it was still slow from the viewpoint of the trainers watching his progress in the observation center…but Puar didn’t know that, nor did any of the other trainees that worked their asses off in this chamber and others day in and day out.

The crack between the two rock walls continued up several meters until the edge of the ledge that had stopped his previous ascension appeared. When Puar got a good clawhold on it he leapt with his back paws against the far wall and pulled with his front pair on the ledge, catapulting him up enough to get his chest on the edge and leave his legs hanging out over nothing.

He clawed at the ground, tearing up soil and grass to get the traction he needed…all the time wondering how there was grass growing up here without sunlight getting through the fog, but when he eventually won out on the tug of war with gravity and slithered his way up and over the edge, he realized that the sky directly overhead was clear, with only a few clouds moving around laterally.

Puar rested on the small ledge, seeing nothing up here but still hearing the odd chirp coming from no particular direction, yet the view was worth it. He could see the tops of several trees poking out of an ocean of clouds, with several roaming grey masses moving around as if they were ships on that sea. Large rock walls were also visible on the far side of the canyon, and for the first time he was able to see the massive waterfall that was producing the creek. It was falling down from a section of rock far off in the distance. It had to be more than a mile away, making him wonder just how big this training level actually was.

He thought he’d explored it all on foot, but from up here it looked like there was a great deal more…but inaccessible by ground?

Puar was getting close to passing out again, both from the effort and the heat and his, but the air up here was less wet and his temperature regulation was starting to work better. He rested for a while as he looked around, putting as much of this to memory as he could…then the chirp sounded again, this time very loud.

He turned to his left, and as if magically deposited there, he saw a scurrier sitting on the ledge next to him and looking up at his exhausted face with its single mechanical eye suspended on a vertical stalk and twisting in place as if to examine him more closely.

“How did you get up here?” he asked without making any move to grab it.

“Easier than you did,” it responded in the Star Force language.

Puar twitched. He had never known the little machines to talk.

“You speak?” he responded in kind.

“Of course.”

“Why have you never done so before? None of you ever have.”

“Have you ever spoke to us?” it countered.

“I suppose not. Are you alive?”

“I am a machine. Machines are not alive.”

“Yet you speak.”

“I am programmed to speak.”

“Why?”

“To see if you will talk.”

Puar froze, feeling that he had just stumbled onto a whole other aspect to Star Force’s design of this level. “Why is talking important?”

“Target analysis verification. Or did you think anything that runs from you is automatically an enemy?”

“You are a machine and this is training.”

“It is practice,” the scurrier said, twisting to the side and moving half a meter to the wall side of the ledge. It shot out a series of red lasers, each of which tracked its way around part of an outline. When finished that section of the rock wall disappeared, revealing a tunnel beyond, into which it walked, leaving Puar’s shocked face behind.

He stood up and very gingerly moved down the ledge and through the gap, seeing a narrow tunnel of rock, all dark except for a bright spot of light on the far end where it opened up on the other side with a few leaves hanging over from above.

“Cal-com, your wisdom continues to humble me,” Puar said as he entered the tunnel.

4

The small scurrier exited ahead of him, then Puar followed behind a ways, coming out into a grassy patch of highland looking down on another canyon, but one not covered with fog. It was just as hot, but the air was dry in comparison and he felt the moisture in his fur begin to peel off him as soon as he passed through the tunnel exit.

“Why build this?” he asked aloud, knowing that the stated purpose of the level was to catch the scurriers and move on to the next. He pondered that question as he walked along the rim of the dropoff…then he spotted something familiar down below. It was an obelisk like those the Temple had in the wilds, only this one was pure white and partially obscured by trees.

Puar looked around for a way down, finding a small trail on the far end. It wasn’t built for his physiology so he had to step carefully on the quarter meter wide ledge, but further down it got wider and soon he was jogging down a dirt ramp to the bottom of the dry canyon…where he was ambushed by a pack of scurriers that were not emitting chirps.

They came up out of the sandy creek bottom and fired tiny stun blasts at him, numbing the spot where they hit but doing little beyond that. Puar reacted by instinct and attacked them, throwing a wave of sand into the air in front of them telekinetically then using an Essence effect to knock it down the creek bed like a wall of tiny ammunition. He might not be able to pick up the scurriers, but the sand wasn’t so protected.

That created a dust storm and sent several stun blasts askew as he pounced on the nearest one, missing at first, but pawing his way towards it as it moved back and forth trying to evade. Eventually he smashed down on top of it, applying enough pressure to deactivate it with a satisfying ‘ping’ sound as the others continued to spin around him and fire little shots that were adding up.

His breathing was much better here, but as little bits of his body stopped obeying his commands he knew the threat was real…and when he saw more of the machines start to swarm out of nearby rocks and join the others he realized he couldn’t win this fight without destroying the machines.

Doing so would immediately disqualify him, so what options did he have left? Retreat back up the canyon? He’d get shot for sure being that exposed…unless they were programmed to let him go. Puar didn’t feel like testing that theory up the canyon wall, so he leapt out of the creek bed and climbed the shallow hillside up through the loose foliage on the other side that would at least catch a few of the stun blasts.

If these things were protecting the Responder then he was probably going to run into even more of them, but once he got within the small circle surrounding the obelisk the firing into his hindside stopped and the scurriers…now some 40 of them…ran loops around his location waiting for him to come out, but seemingly unable or unwilling to come inside the 12 meter perimeter.

Puar growled at them, wondering if the one he had spoken to up top was down here. He couldn’t tell by looking at them, for they were all the same, so he turned his attention to the obelisk that was bathing them all in a muted white light underneath the shade of several tall trees.

“Do you speak, Responder?”

A hologram appeared next to it, showing an image familiar to Puar and virtually everyone within the Temple. It was of Cal-com, with his distinctive blue visor covering some sort of eyes. No one knew what they looked like, for he always wore it, and his race was unfamiliar to them, as were most within Star Force.

“Greetings would-be Varkemma. Your curiosity has served you well and you have now reached the next destination on your journey towards worthiness. Being assigned a mission and accomplishing it is only the most basic task of a Varkemma. Going beyond your orders and adapting to the universe as it presents itself is a higher task, and one that cannot be completely codified, for we do not know everything. Sooner or later you will encounter a task with no instructions, or a task with incorrect instructions. It is your responsibility to determine what must be done and to take whatever action is necessary. I cannot tell you how to do this, for you must learn on your own through trial and error.”

“If you do not learn, you will not become Varkemma. I will not send troops into battle that could end up doing the work of the enemy, attacking us or others that do not deserve it. You must prove your worth through practice, and in order to assure that it is legitimate practice, you will retain no memory of it,” the hologram said, gesturing towards the obelisk.

“We call this LITrpg. It is a mental interface for a simulated reality where you can practice things that we cannot build training courses for. You will face unfamiliar situations, and to insure you can practice the unfamiliar, your memory will be wiped each time you reset. However, your skills will not, so as they develop with multiple attempts you will change, though you will not remember how it occurred.”

“This is the last step to becoming a Varkemma, though much will occur afterwards, should you make it through the transition. Be aware, this is not intended to be a short term test. You will try again and again, failing until you finally achieve that which you desire, or until you decide to quit. Once interfaced with the LITrpg you will have approximately 8 hours to make attempts, then you will disconnect and continue on with your training. There are many of these LITrpg interfaces hidden within the training courses, and the more you find, the more practice you will have. In order to begin, make physical contact with the obelisk and speak the word ‘Lightside.’”

The hologram disappeared, leaving Puar encircled by scurriers that were not attacking, but could do so easily if they chose as they patrolled around his position. But if they did, and rendered him unconscious, he’d just awaken in the hallway again, so he ignored them and sat on the dirt before this ‘LITrpg’ and respectfully reached his front left paw out and placed it on the glowing white crystalline structure that rose well above his head.

“Lightside,” he said in the Star Force language.

His body went rigid, held within a forcefield of some kind as gravity disappeared and his mind lost cohesion. He blacked out, but when he woke he found himself in the middle of a war zone.

He was wearing armor. Fully body armor with a gash across his helmet exposing part of his nose…which stung like hell. He was wounded, and soon other aspects of the scenario made their way into his mind…along with a ‘drunkening’ agent that made him loopy enough to believe this was real.

Puar forgot where he had been, about the training and Cal-com’s message. He thought he already was a Varkemma and deployed on the battlefield, with a huge swelling of pride in him as his mind crystalized and he realized where he was, along with his duty.

There was a bunker to the northeast that had been giving them all kinds of trouble the past three days, and many of his fellow soldiers lay dead beside him. Somehow he had survived and was now left for dead by both Star Force and the enemy…which was now fighting on the other side of the bunker a mile or so away. His team had tried to backdoor them and failed. They’d been ambushed and slaughtered…but he was still alive, and now the troops that had jumped them were gone to the northern conflict, leaving his objective open.

The bunker held an anti-orbital cannon, a small one, but it was enough to shoot down any of the evacuation ships attempting to leave the nearby Kleevan cities. Puar didn’t know what a Kleevan was, but his brain was in such a state that he didn’t question the little knowledge implanted there. It felt right so he went with it, and he knew that the Kleevan could not hold their defense lines against the Versarrin, and within a few weeks tops they would be overrun.

The Versarrin had brought in and secured this bunker closer enough to the cities to prevent aerial evacuation, but far enough away from their own limited defenses not to be contested. The Varkemma had been sent in to take out the heaviest of units while Star Force regulars helped the Kleevan hold onto their cities long enough to evacuate them…but so long as that bunker was in play they couldn’t take off, or they’d be dead before they left the atmosphere.

Puar didn’t ask why there were no orbital warships capable of taking out the bunker, or any other possible strategy. His mind was focused on this mission only, and he was determined to finish it no matter what. His fellow Varkemma and their support units lay dead around him. He was the only one left. But one was enough to get the job done.

He climbed to his feet, finding his body sore and stiff, but otherwise intact. The gash on his nose had not fully healed, but it was no longer leaking blood, though his nostrils smelled of it. The Trigorma walked past the dead, looking and listening for threats without using his active sensors. If they had left him for dead, he needed to stay that way, but there was no way to hide out in the open if someone was watching, so he didn’t waste time and took off at an awkward run towards the bunker partially hidden behind a field of tall rocks.

Puar dashed this way and that to get through them, then found the spot where the Varkemma had already damaged this side of the bunker. There was a huge hole in the armor in one location and one location only, and there were no enemy troops here at the moment, but the hole was obscured by a trio of indigenous pack animals that roamed the planet and stupidly didn’t avoid the fighting. Nothing would move them other than physical contact, and they were currently licking up some of the rubble that had come from the bunker. Something in the construction must have been tasty, or perhaps it was a side effect of the Essence attacks they’d used to break through the heavily armored wall.

Puar moved closer, enough to see the main generator through the hole. It had been off center so the initial attacks missed by half a meter, but he could get to it now. All he had to do was wedge himself inside the hole and tear up as much as he could…

Suddenly the Versarrin appeared around both sides of the bunker, a few hundred meters away to the right and another 400 to the left. The wolf-like enemies were half Puar’s size, but they were numerous and he knew he wasn’t going to be able to defeat them all. Some of their ranged attacks were already pinging off his shields and draining them of energy. If he fought them he’d lose his opportunity to take out the bunker’s power generator, and he didn’t have enough time to go down and slither through the breach…he had to take it out now from range.

He summoned up most of his remaining Essence, just shy of enough to kill him, and charged a Fruc’zo. The invisible energy in front of him pooled into a ball that he increased in size as his shields finally went down and his armor then began taking the hits, but he didn’t waiver. The mission was to evacuate the city, and with this bunker up that mission would fail. He had to take it down, even if it cost him his own life.

But he was not going to fail the others. If he was going to die with them, he’d ensure they all left the field of battle with a victory.

Puar held the charge as much as he could, not sure how much it would take to get through the gaps and knowing what hit the bunker’s shell would not penetrate, then just before his armor became critical and the Versarrin on his right got within melee range he launched the Fruc’zo as accurately as possible and had just enough time to see it blow apart the stupid animals in front of the breach. Their bodies disintegrated, as did the pieces of armor around the breach, but the part that slipped through got to the generator and tore a massive hole in it.

The giant gun on top, whose hum was unmissable, fell silent and depressed, now out of power. The Star Force troops in the city were now clear to get the evacuees out…at least until the bunker was repaired…and that meant Puar and his unit were successful. He braced himself for the attack from the right and turned into it, but justbbefore they got to his Essence depleted body everything froze in place.

The sounds of war stopped. The secondary explosions inside the bunker were frozen, as was the advance of the troops and even the far off combat in the cities. Everything just stopped, then Puar’s drunken mind heard a tone he knew and disliked immensely. It was the mission failed klaxon.

He didn’t understand. He’d just succeeded in their mission, and while his brain wasn’t operating enough to question how there would be a klaxon in the middle of a war with everything just halting, he got the impression that he had done something wrong…and as that settled in everything changed and his mind blanked again.

Puar woke up with a gash on his face amidst the bodies of his fallen Varkeema, left for dead with the bunker that was their mission exposed ahead of him and the Versarrin troops nowhere to be seen…

Puar replayed the same scenario over and over again, failing each time until his 77th attempt. When he got up to see the gash in the bunker with the pack animals in front of it and saw that he had no time to wait, that he had to fire on it now, something inside him held back. As if this was not the right way to do it.

He didn’t have time to think, but that feeling caused him to pause ever so slightly. His target was ahead, but it was obscured. Puar didn’t think the animals would soak up too much of the attack, but better to move them aside to maximize the damage. He reached out telekinetically and pushed them from the side. When they didn’t move he changed his wide ‘push’ into a needle-like ‘poke’ and that jolted them out of the way, though they didn’t move more than a handful of meters.

The Varkemma jabbed them again before charging a Fruc’zo and launching it into the bunker just before he got overrun by the Versarrin. His body tumbled as they ran into him and clawed away with energy cutters, burning gashes into his armor and he twisted and shot two of them with his paw-mounted weaponry, but he had no Essence remaining to defend himself with. That left him with regular combat, which Star Force had trained him well in, and if he was going to die here he was going to take as many of these enemy troops down with him as he could.

They twisted and rolled, firing weapon shots at pointblank range with several getting through to Puar’s body before he was yanked free of the scrum and tossed on the ground clear of them before they all dropped dead to an Essence effect that attacked their hearts directly, bypassing armor and shields, and it would have done to the same to Puar had he not been pulled free first.

He looked up from the ground at his fellow Varkemma Nostra, who was missing his entire right arm and part of his chest, but somehow he was still alive and had just saved Puar.

“Thank you, brother,” Puar said, dragging himself to his feet even as his body screamed out in protest. He had holes all over him, but his suit’s limited regenerator was at least sealing them up so he wouldn’t bleed to death.

“Well done with the bunker,” the Tidor said, standing still and looking as if he was about to die anyway. “I saw you move the critters aside first. It looks like a couple of them survived the explosion. Bonus points for that.”

“Should we call for pickup, or will that alert the enemy to our position?”

“I think they already know. Call them. My transmitter is down.”

Puar activated his comm with an automated request for pickup…then his mind lost cohesion again and he woke to freefall high in the sky above a desert planet, dropping fast towards the ground with a series of aerial enemies swirling around him and others in his unit, trying to pick them off before they could get to ground…

5

Cal-com had received word that a special courier was coming in, one carrying something too sensitive to transmit, so he left his hidden command center in one of the Elcee’s flying cities and walked down to the vertical terminal the ship was sending a dropship to. He stood in front of a real observation window looking down at the surface of the Temple below and out across the curving horizon that never truly ended, though banks of clouds often tricked the eye into thinking so.

He was able to monitor ongoing events through his retracted armor, to which he kept a mental link, but most of his work in the Temple was done in isolation. He was still vulnerable to a Vargemma attack, or a Caretaker one, and while he had abandoned his shipbound isolation far above the range of the Temple’s mega turrets, he was still cautious about revealing himself. The Elcee cities were Star Force construction and the brainchild of Greg-073, though they didn’t see nearly as much activity here as they did in the other Temples.

Out of the 2934 Vargemma-occupied Temples, only 18 were in a peaceable state. All the others were ongoing wars against the Caretakers as Star Force had to continually struggle to keep from being removed while the Vargemma were perfectly happily sacrificing parts of their population so the rest could live. This was why they hadn’t been tagged for complete eradication when Star Force had been. Thankfully Kappa had not gone that route, but most of the others had and Star Force hadn’t backed down from a single fight.

As he waited, Cal-com reviewed the updates flowing into him, including the first Trigorma to discover the LITrpg, which was a relief. They had a lot of them stuck in limbo in their training because they were too regimented in their outlook. Part of it was a byproduct of old instincts, the rest was lack of proper training by the Vargemma. When they got a target lock on something they had the habit of excluding everything else and focusing on that objective alone. Analyzing the situation, let alone the justification for the action, had been evading them more than other races, so Cal-com was glad to see at least one had made it through. Now he’d have a successful template to use to better tweak the others’ training, and he was having to do the same for each one of the myriad Vargemma races they were pulling recruits from.

A one size fits all approach did not work here, and while he expected individual differences to have to troubleshoot, he did not expect such a wide array of racial peculiarities when they’d been living with each other in the Temple under the same Founder guidance for millions of years…yet these races were very different from each other, and bringing them up to Star Force standards was a massive task that he’d been whittling away at for decades. One more success today was welcomed, though the mystery courier had his full attention.

What would require secrecy so much that it couldn’t be transmitted over the secure battlemap comm network was a riddle, for very few things were that sensitive. All of the Vargemma Temples were now in Star Force hands, and other than the Caretakers persistent efforts to remove them, the war was over. The Vargemma were pinned down and unable to strike at Star Force systems, let alone leave the Temples. Naval supremacy was what allowed Star Force to keep them bottled up, though none of the Vargemma had been fully annexed. They were too powerful, in most cases, and even the weaker races could not be brought into the fold given the Essence powers that most of them possessed, for turning your back on them for even a second could mean your death…and in a situation like that it wasn’t safe for the Star Force handlers and trainers.

So a different method had to be utilized, and Cal-com had been working on that above and beyond the Varkemma, which were the first line solution. Meanwhile the Vargemma races sat, contained, out of the way as Star Force slowly sent ships back out into the galaxy as Paladin forces grew to replace them inside the Temples.

But the Paladin couldn’t use Essence, so Greg had come up with a shortcut. The Temples had the ability to cause an individual to gain Essence abilities, to break the barrier the first time, and the trailblazer had been using it in mass quantities in the Liona Temple, where a local Vargemma race called the Zevquen were actually helping him utilize the machinery that Star Force still hadn’t earned its way to yet.

From Liona, Greg was creating an army of Star Force troops that could utilize a tiny bit of their Essence, then he was sending them off to the other Temples to train and develop their skills in these Elcee flying cities. It hadn’t taken long for Cal-com to discover the meaning behind the name, for it was literally the pronunciation of two letters. ‘L’ and ‘C.’

Knowing their penchant for old school naming, he’d done a search and had come up empty until he tried variations, eventually arriving at ‘GLC’ which stood for ‘Green Lantern Corps.’ The old fictional story was surprisingly accurate when matched up against Essence technology, including the use of personal wells.

To overcome their rookie status, the Elcee wore a ring that contained a reservoir of Essence far greater than their body could hold on its own. This gave them the ability to train 1000 times faster than naturally, for they wouldn’t have to rest up to recharge. Each Elcee city, in addition to roaming the uninhabited regions of the Temples, contained a central well…or in this case ‘Lantern’…that was periodically recharged by Magicite tankers coming from the Uriti. The Essence inside it was used to power the city defenses, including a large Essence defense shield and some juiced up weapons in addition to the regular ones, but it was also used to recharge the Elcee’s personal rings whenever needed.

The goal of the Elcee was to create a force that could counter the Vargemma inside the Temples without having to wait millions of years to catch up, and secondary to that, was to advance their skill levels enough to unlock the various technologies inside the Temples that only the Vargemma could currently use…and some that even they could not.

Currently it was Elcee that were used as handlers for the Varkemma recruits, due to the fact that they could defend themselves. To date only two had died, but even that was too many. The Vargemma coming in were rough, and some of them were not convertible. A few had joined in the hopes of finding and killing some Star Force personnel, which the rest of the Vargemma had no physical access to, and they’d been able to evade mental scans on entry, meaning they’d practiced a long time in preparation.

Most of those attempts failed to kill the Elcee, but two had succeeded amongst hundreds of injuries. That only underscored how dangerous the Vargemma were, and how there was no way to take control of the Temple surface as long as they were here. Not through any quick means, anyway, and that meant Cal-com had to play the long game.

It also meant he couldn’t let the Vargemma know where he was, so he lived in one Elcee city or another as they roamed Kappa Temple and he ran all of Star Force’s affairs here remotely. After this special courier arrived he would switch again, just in case the Vargemma deduced that it was coming to him out of all the other traffic, most of which did not come to the Elcee cities.

The dropship coming in was a larger Dragon-class, and ironically what came out of it was just that…a dragon. Or more specifically a Les’i’kron. They were the rarest amongst the Knight races in Star Force, for none had voluntarily come over to the Rimward half of the combined ‘empire’ rather than face execution for their V’kit’no’sat crimes. They’d rather die than join Star Force, and the only way they’d been included in the Knight races was by the smuggling of some Les’i’kron eggs out to them.

It hadn’t been theft on Star Force’s part, but an act of the V’kit’no’sat in an underhanded fashion that Cal-com was never told the full extent of. The end result was that the Les’i’kron had joined Star Force, and from what he understood their inclusion had not been a pleasant process. Their minds had been so mal-configured to make them useful servants that undoing all that genetic twisting was an ongoing process.

These weren’t the same as the V’kit’no’sat Les’i’kron, and they weren’t the same as the Zak’de’ron. These Star Force Les’i’kron were slowly becoming something else, and were reliable to a fault…which was part of the problem. They didn’t think as much for themselves as they should, and Star Force needed more than just loyal servants.

Yet Cal-com had been told they were reliable enough for defensive duty and paired attacks, but not enough to operate as an independent faction yet. Their healing would take a great amount of time, though the individuals already within Star Force were judged on their own personal status, and some of them had overcome the limitations of their genome…just not enough to warrant group privileges.

The one stepping out into the city hangar was not known to Cal-com, but his Star Force blue skin and large winged body made for an intimidating sight, and that was probably an additional security mechanism. Who would expect one so large to be a courier? And who would try and take a message packet off of one so lethal, for the Saroto’kanse’vam on the Les’i’kron’s tail had not been removed by Star Force, and their ability to enact a scorpion-like attack with it made them a formidable opponent against large scale and heavily armored opponents.

I am here, Cal-com said telepathically so the Les’i’kron could identify him in the busy hangar full of hundreds of tiny people moving about from his point of view.

I must speak with you alone, he replied.

Follow, Cal-com commanded, turning about and leading the large dragon down a hallway that had been built just high enough for the tallest of the Star Force races to move through. Not all passages were so large, for they were a waste of space if you didn’t have the larger body sizes residing here, but all Star Force facilities of decent size had at least limited areas built to accommodate everyone, and it was into one of those sections of the city that Cal-com led the courier into a park-like area with a high dome as he used his armor to signal all within it to clear out.

It took a couple minutes, then security doors shut off all the entrances to give Cal-com and the Les’i’kron the privacy they needed.

“We’re secure now,” the Voku said, looking up at the giant blue snout above him.

“I bring news from Thrawn. He has succeeded in locating one of the primary control centers for Alpha Temple and has fought his way inside. Paladin techs have successfully hacked their way into the Founder mainframe and taken control over a sector of the Temple. All Caretaker units in that location now operate under Thrawn’s command.”

“How was this achieved?” Cal-com asked, realizing what this could mean…especially with the limited Founder contacts Jason had made out in the Shadow network.

“Founder technology is not wholly superior to ours beyond Essence. Thrawn has been working on this for a long time, and his people now have a firm understanding of their computer technology. Sufficient safeguards were not put in place, probably due to the fact the Founders never expected anyone to reach the control rooms alive. They were extremely well guarded and many Paladin died to take the one. The rest of us provided support and were spared most of the casualties.”

“You fought the Caretakers?”

“I did. And now I bring the codes required for you to access much of this Temple. Thrawn does not know if they are unique to Alpha, but hopes they are not.”

“Where are the control rooms?”

“They migrate through the magma layer periodically and rise up along docking stations that the Caretakers build where necessary and then backfill after they move. In this way there is no one location that can be discovered and assaulted, but each control room only migrates through a specific region of the Temple. Within it, no remote access can override its sector. Thrawn now has a safe zone inside Alpha, and is using the Caretaker drones built and deployed there to fight those being dispatched from other sectors.”

“Can he not assert command over the others once they enter his sector?”

“Unfortunately no. When it was determined that a control room had been taken, the Temple reconfigured all Caretaker military operations to zonal command. Other functions have not been affected and maintenance duties are now being taken over by foreign zones when Thrawn redeployed his sector’s drones to other tasks.”

“And if his drones leave his sector?”

“They are still under his command. The war for Alpha has taken a turn in our favor, and it is only a matter of time until Thrawn conquers it all.”

“What about the orbital facilities?”

“They have their own sector protocols which operate differently. We have not figured out how yet. There is much work to be done, but Thrawn wanted all other Temples to have the knowledge to do the same, though in your case you may not want to risk it. Regardless, I have the Founder codes for many installations that you should be able to input locally before you find a control room.”

“Is there a procedure for locating them?”

“There is, but with a randomized function to it. They are not meant to be found easily, even by the Founders.”

“Does Thrawn have access to the Essence wells?”

“Within his sector, yes. Including the mega turrets. He has the Caretakers repairing them while continuing to snipe the repair efforts of others. The Vargemma don’t realize it, but they will be powering Star Force’s own weapons soon.”

“Any response from the Founders?”

“None yet. And Thrawn’s people have found no automated alert sent to them. The control rooms have autonomy while other systems are automated with alert flags. He believes this is the backdoor method for them to override any incursion or to make alterations to the Temple without revealing themselves to the Vargemma. Either way, there is no known oversight on the control rooms themselves. They are the High Ground, and now Thrawn has seized one of them.”

“How many in total?”

“There are 2048 sectors.”

“That’s a lot of fighting to do.”

“He is up to the task.”

“Is there any indication of a master control room?”

“We believe there deliberately was not one created, due to the size of the Temples. A single weak point would be too much of a security risk.”

“Agreed. Are you the only courier?”

“I will travel to many Temples, but not all. That would take too much time. Thrawn wanted the information and codes dispersed quickly,” the Les’i’kron said, reaching out an armored toe on his front right leg.

Cal-com extended the armor over his left arm and reached out, making armor to armor contact and allowing the most secure transmission mode possible, downloading the message packet onto his own system and keeping it secure there without transmitting out into the wider battlemap, or even the city database.

“Packet received,” Cal-com confirmed.

“Use it wisely. Kappa is the shining example all other Temples wish to follow. I would not wish to see the Caretaker War rise up here.”

“Nor do I. What is your name?”

The Les’i’kron smiled, then began to turn away. “I was never here, Reclaimer.”

“As you wish,” Cal-com said as the large quadruped left the park and headed back to the hangar, apparently leaving immediately to travel to the next Temple on his list. He let him go and turned around, heading for a different hangar where he would hop on regular transit elsewhere and bounce from place to place until he landed at a new location. His possession of this information made him an even more high value target, and while he didn’t think the Vargemma had any way of knowing about the message packet, he wasn’t going to get careless.

He had to wait a while before a dropship carrying supplies came in and he hitched a ride on its way back, taking a seat in the small passenger compartment while the pilots and crew carried out their duties.

Cal-com sat back in the cushions and triggered his visor to double as a viewscreen, pulling up the message packet and beginning to carefully go through it and all the valuable nuggets of wisdom and code that Thrawn had packed inside…and the Supreme Viceroy did not disappoint in quality or quantity.

This was the key to wresting control of Kappa away from the distant Founders, and one he would have to wield carefully, but in the end he and the other Temple overlords had to take control of these massive fortresses before their builders returned to evict them.

That war was coming, hopefully later than sooner, but based on the actions in Itaru by Eldorat and Jason’s work, at least some of the Temple builders were not to be trusted. And Cal-com didn’t want to be sitting inside a giant death trap when they returned to take control over it…for as Thrawn’s information was now showing him, there was a lot more Temple weaponry buried under the surface than anyone had ever imagined.

Enough to destroy every single person inside the Temple in a matter of hours if triggered.

The Vargemma were literally living inside a giant death trap at the mercy of their benefactors, and now large numbers of Star Force personnel had joined them. Too many to evacuate quick enough to matter. Cal-com had to take control over his Temple before a Founder had a chance to use it. That was the only way to protect those inside, for most would never leave the Temple even if they wanted to. The Essence costs were simply too high to transport that many people, and he couldn’t use the spatial tap to transport people without the Essence barrier shield coming down first.

He’d always known how dangerous the Vargemma and the Caretakers were, but Cal-com had never realized he had taken up residence inside a weapon of mass destruction. One that could eliminate everyone inside and then remake the landscape over again as needed. It seemed the Founders didn’t trust the Vargemma as much as he thought, and now it seemed clear that this wasn’t so much a training ground as an Essence farm for the Founders. And if the herds got too much out of control, there was a mechanism to wipe the slate clean and start all over again.

Cal-com froze as he realized something. Had the Vargemma fought to protect their own and triggered an eradication order against them as well as Star Force, then that would leave no one inside Alpha Temple and the others to be salvaged. That meant the unscrupulous Vargemma might be the only thing preventing the other Temples from eradicating Star Force with a single, all-encompassing attack.

Cal-com deactivated his visor and looked out one of the fake windows in the transport, seeing the gently sloping distant landscape that rose to fill the sky where stars should have been. He’d almost forget what they looked like, but now he wished to see them again. Stars meant safety. This never ending landscape meant a foreign power had him and everyone else in Kappa living at their mercy.

That could not be allowed to stand. Either they had to abandon Kappa Temple or conquer it. And there were too many people here to evacuate.

That meant there was only one resolution to this, and a potentially very deadly one at that if Cal-com made a misstep…or if the Founders returned before he gained full control of this Temple.

6

November 4, 128690

Stugarrata Nebula (Tovok Kingdom)

Kappa Temple

Puar dug into the ground next to a tree, shoveling the dirt out between his rear legs as he exposed a metallic hatch, then had to stop for a moment as he telekinetically crunched a flying drone that started to pepper his rear with tiny stun shots. When it stopped he returned to digging, knowing that the rest of the swarm would be soon to follow. This wasn’t the first time he’d uncovered this hatch, and knew from experience that he had to be fast.

When he got the dirt off he grabbed the bar on top and pulled with both paws, getting it up a few inches, then added a telekinetic shove to get the stubborn thing all the way open…which was only up to a vertical position. It wouldn’t fold over the other way, and if he let go it would slam back down again, for it was on a spring.

Puar got shot again, this time from multiple targets, but he ignored them as he dove down head first, tucking his tail so it didn’t get caught as the hatch slammed back into place as he slid down a tunnel for several hundred meters before being thrown out into a small alcove with two tunnels leading out of it.

But in the center of that alcove was another white obelisk, which was his real objective. He’d found 4 so far amongst his training courses, and each time he finished with one it would not allow him to try again until he left. Puar never remembered what happened, seeming to touch the crystalline surface and speak the word ‘Lightside,’ then blacking out for a second.

But in the space of that second 8 hours passed, or so he was told. The clocks didn’t lie, but he had no idea if he was making progress or not, only that he had to hunt for more obelisks because he couldn’t repeat the same challenge course over and over again. His trainers determined which ones he used and when, so the more of these obelisks he could find the more time he’d have for this LITrpg testing, which had no definition in any of the Star Force databases he had access to. As far as those databanks were concerned, such a thing didn’t exist.

It was having an effect though. He couldn’t remember it, but he was building new skills that would suddenly appear when he was doing something else. Puar had to have been practicing them a great deal, but to him it felt like they were being gained for free. All he had to do was find the obelisks and he would come up with better mental and tactical skills…but not physical. If this was a computer simulation then it would only affect his mind, which, he assumed, was why he was still doing the physical training regimen.

Puar liked it. He was probably working his tail off in these simulations but he couldn’t remember it. It just felt like a time skip for him, so now his objective was to find more obelisks in new courses and to return to the ones he already had discovered whenever he repeated those training cycles. Fortunately they didn’t move, but the cover on the hatch to this one was always reburied when he came back through again.

The Trigorma sat and put his paw on the obelisk.

“Lightside,” he spoke, then a moment later he blinked and that was it. Physically he was a little stiff and his mind groggy, but that’s all there was to it. Puar stood up and stretched, then took one of the two tunnels out towards what would be another water course…but that was better than the mountain climbing on the other one.

Normally he would never have made that choice, so he wondered if there wasn’t simulated water training involved. His fear of it appeared to have lessened, though he still hated it. It was, however, the shorter route to the end of this challenge course, and the more time he had to hunt for other obelisks the better…

Puar stood on the battlefield along with several other Trigorma, and he felt a heavy hatred shared by the others. Before them stood an Archon, one of the leaders of the Star Force military. He was leading them through the jungle to a position behind the Hadarak main assault so they could get at one of the subsurface tunnels that was spewing up more and more minions to attack the far off city where Star Force was holding the line as evacuation ships buzzed overhead moving to and from orbit.

They were far away from them. Too far to get help if they got in over their heads…and too far for anyone to stop them if they finally wanted to take revenge for what Star Force had done to the Temples and the Vargemma. Puar and the others had been patiently waiting for their opportunity, playing along and doing everything Star Force wanted them to do until they had a chance to exact the revenge that they could not do inside the Temples with all Star Force personnel safely hidden in their own cities or orbit.

They were wise to do so, for there were many who would gladly sacrifice themselves to Caretaker punishment in exchange for taking down one of their people, let alone an Archon…and there were no Caretakers here.

When I say, I will jam his communications. We must act instantly, for he will know, one of the others said telepathically to the group.

Puar felt the hatred for the Archon, but something wasn’t right. He sensed the opportunity and the need to act as one with his pack, but attacking from behind in a surprise attack was hardly the act of a warrior.

The others walked up closer to the Archon, who was scanning ahead while trusting the Trigorma to watch his back. They had to catch the minions during a pause in their reinforcements, or they’d never get to the tunnel entrance in time to block it before being met with overwhelming numbers. They had to time it just right…and the Trigorma had to time this just right as well.

Puar twitched, not liking the others doing his thinking for him. He moved with them, but mentally ran what they were going to do through his logic circuits…and it came out all wrong. He was a Varkemma, and suddenly the words Reganno had first spoken to him came to mind.

“…before we trust you to fight alongside us, we must know you are trustworthy. You and the other Vargemma have many Essence skills, amongst psionics and natural abilities. You could easily kill one of us who was not paying attention, and there are many Vargemma who would gladly do so once they were beyond the realm of the Caretakers…”

Stop, he told the others, but they ignored him as they set themselves to pounce. He could see it in their stance as well as feel the telepathic connection they made just prior to a strike so they would all act with the same timing.

Puar snarled and tackled the Trigorma to the right while throwing an Essence-enhanced telekinetic wall into the one closest to the Archon. When he did all hesitation and confusion in his mind ceased, and he wondered why he had ever been tempted to help these traitors.

The Archon snapped around the moment Puar attacked, just in time to defend himself as the two cats twisted and slashed at each other with glowing cutting claws. Their shields went down quickly and Puar had to waste a good amount of Essence to finally push his kin off him through the air, allowing both to reset their footing, but in that moment an Essence attack from the others was thrown at him before he could raise an Essence shield against it.

The Archon stepped into view and blocked it, turning his back fully on Puar and giving the Trigorma a second chance to blindside him, but the thought didn’t even go through his mind. He set himself and jumped over the Archon, coming down with full Essence powers enabled and ready to kill his kin if necessary as he put himself in between them and their prey.

“Stand down or I will kill you myself!” he declared.

Before he could act he blacked out, and suddenly he was pawing the white obelisk again, feeling a little drained but having no memory of what happened. Yet he had a swelling of pride in him for some reason, and he hoped that was because he had been successful.

Puar broke contact with the obelisk and moved on up a nearby trail towards the swamplands that lay between him and the tower assault this course required him to make before finding and pressing the finish pedestal, but he never got that far. A few minutes up the trail he stopped as he sensed someone else on the trail ahead.

That shouldn’t have happened, for the only others in the training courses were machines, but as he cautiously approached around a bend he saw Reganno sitting on a boulder waiting for him.

“Why are you here?” Puar asked.

“I am here to divert you,” the Protovic said, pointing a glowing hand off into the woods. “Follow me.”

Puar did as instructed, following his handler through the underbrush where no trail led. Eventually they came to a rock wall that dissolved into a tunnel entrance at Reganno’s gesture. The two went inside and the rock sealed over behind them, with Puar becoming very curious as to where they were going. Were there two obelisks in this level?

“You have completed your training, Puar,” Reganno said, gesturing towards a round platform in the center of the room at the end of the tunnel. “Stand there.”

Puar felt a rush of adrenaline and pride. This was totally unexpected, yet it was what he had been working towards for months. He thought he was far from ready, but apparently he had been doing far better in his hidden mental training than he had guessed.

He walked up onto the stone-like platform and stood dead center, looking around at the dozen statues that lined the perimeter of the room. They were three times his height, and all were Vargemma races from the Temples…but not just races. He knew these individuals. All Vargemma did. They were first to become Varkemma and were known as heroes amongst the Temple underground…as well as reviled by those who still hated Star Force.

“Each Vargemma has a choice, Puar. To continue to oppose us, or join us in the fight against the Hadarak. Though you don’t know it, your loyalties have been made clear through your simulated training. You will never recover those memories, so it will forever be a mystery to you, but let me attest to the fact that we no longer doubt that you are one of us in spirit. Now you will become one of us in fact as well.”

Reganno pulled a spear from the hand of one of the statues and brought it over to Puar, pointing the end of it towards him.

“I, Reganno, of the Elcee, do hereby sanction the elevation of this warrior into the ranks of the Varkemma. To fight, and perhaps die, defending the galaxy against the Hadarak and all others who embrace the darkside. The Varkemma are a breed of the light, and the light shall never be betrayed by one of them. If you accept this responsibility, grasp the spear and take their mark.”

Puar exhaled slowly, then reached his left paw up and slid the spear between toes, not having an actual thumb to hold something with. When he did so his paw locked to the spear, numbing slightly, as a glowing silver icon was tattooed onto the top of his fur…though on closer inspection he saw that it was his fur that was actually changing color to produce the Star Force symbol wrapped inside a sphere, representing the Temples from which all Varkemma originated.

When his paw unnumbed, Reganno withdrew the spear and placed it back into the statue’s hand.

“Training is over. The war is going poorly, and we’re losing many evacuees because we can’t get to them fast enough. When the V’kit’no’sat abandoned the front the Hadarak began to spread much more quickly, and their advance has only been accelerating since. We need as many Varkemma as we can get there, now, to stem the tide long enough to save more lives. Are you ready for this, Puar?”

“I have been waiting for this my entire life,” he said confidently. “Send me to the Hadarak.”

Reganno nodded. “Good. But first we need to get you equipped. In order to maximize your damage all Varkemma carry an Essence ring,” he said, holding up his hand for emphasis. “We can fashion one for your toes, ankles, neck, or a crown. But many quadrupeds have opted for an imbedded jewel on their bodies. How would you like to carry yours?”

“It is best if I cannot be parted from it. Can it be melded to my skull?”

“Yes.”

“Just above my eyes and between, assuming it is strong enough to survive a head butt?”

“It’s not a melee weapon, but it’s designed to take a hit when needed,” Reganno said as he walked to a section of wall that melted away for him, revealing an array of rings and other silver jewel-bearing items. He withdrew one along with a small circular regenerator, then walked back over to the platform where Puar stood.

“Kneel,” he said, prompting the larger cat to dip his head down low enough for the Elcee to reach, then he proceeded to place the jewel exactly where Puar had indicated. After a brief moment of numbing he withdrew, carrying the regenerator with him as the jewel now remained.

Reganno waved a hand and a shimmering mirror appeared before Puar, allowing him to inspect his new addition.

“Is this satisfactory?”

“It is indeed,” Puar said, his heart swelling with pride. “How do I charge it?”

“Touch it to the Essence source and you will be able to draw any amount needed over a matter of seconds. Be advised, it is more than just a Magicite. It is also a Materia.”

“A weapon?”

“Yes. It will allow you certain skills that you may or may not already possess,” Reganno said, raising his own fist towards one of the statues that carried a shield, and from his ring he fired a green beam into it. The shield was apparently more than just statue, because it caught the beam and absorbed it without taking any damage.

“You have to be able to operate it using Essence, but you will learn quickly enough. It can be used with your own Essence as well, though keep that as a last resort.”

Puar closed his eyes, feeling the mental connection to it…as well as the knowledge of how to use it.

“I already know how,” he declared.

“Knowing and doing are two different things. You will get some practice on the way to the front,” he said, snapping his fingers.

The platform Puar was on began to rise as a hole in the ceiling formed, but Reganno was not coming with him.

“Good luck, Varkemma. Remember that if you die, you fail all future missions. So keep yourself alive in order to do maximum damage.”

Puar nodded, then Reganno was out of view as the shaft overhead obscured the chamber below. His rate of ascension increased until the walls were whipping by at a rapid pace. He didn’t dare touch them, not at this speed, but he wondered if there was a shield there to protect the occupant.

Suddenly the movement shifted to lateral, without him feeling the transition. That meant he was inside an IDF field at least, nulling out acceleration forces as he was carried far away from his previous position. So far in fact it took more than half an hour to arrive at his destination…which was a hangar with numerous dropships in the process of boarding.

“You with the paws, over here, now!” a Star Force Calavari said, pointing one of his four hands towards a ramp into a ship.

Puar did as told, seeing other Vargemma around him coming from tunnels such as his as a larger group was assembling to the right. He was not directed there, but into a dropship that, upon entering, he saw was nearly full of people…all of which had the Varkemma symbol somewhere conspicuous on their bodies, as well as their silver jewels.

His jaw almost dropped. Were new Varkemma being created this fast? He knew the Temple was vast, but he had no idea so many were being recruited beyond the Trigorma. Was his race restricted in number due to their population? Or perhaps there were other variables. Regardless, it seemed they were being shipped out as soon as they were knighted, and something about that felt appropriate to Puar, as well as a little bit desperate.

Reganno had said many people were dying because Star Force couldn’t get to them in time, and it seemed they were not going to waste any lives by having the new Varkemma linger here.

Puar squeezed in amongst the others, packed too tightly to even sit down, as a few more followed him in, then the boarding ramp rose up and they lifted off, leaving him and many members of other races…some of which had been rivals…packed together into a nightmare situation.

But nobody fought each other. There wasn’t even any arguing or tension in the air. Everyone was looking around at each other, recognizing the fact that they had all been chosen to become Varkemma when the rest of the Temple had not been. They were of the same race now. The race of the silver jewel, and they were part of Star Force, heading to war to fight side by side in the destiny they had always been promised when the Founders returned, yet Star Force was getting them there far quicker.

The galaxy demanded it, and Puar and his new kin were ready to answer that call.

They were Varkemma now, and while they didn’t know a great deal about what that meant, they would learn in time, for Puar knew the front was far, far away. And if they did their job, they’d keep it there and away from the Rim and the Temples.

His destiny was no longer here. It was out there, where the fighting was, and that transition was one he never thought he’d experience. The Temple had been his life, now it was his past, and he sensed all the others felt the same way. The future lay ahead, amongst the stars they had never seen, but would soon become acquainted with as a constant backdrop to life. A very dangerous and unpredictable backdrop. And one without the Caretakers to look after and police them.

They were the protectors now, and Puar truly hoped he never returned to the Temple and his old life. This is what he was destined to become, and even if the war was won and the Hadarak defeated, he would not be coming back to the Temple.

And he suspected the others felt the same.

7

December 2, 128690

Uriti Preserve #8

Stogori System

Puar had spent the better part of a month onboard a Star Force Lantern-class transport, but the ship had enough weapon batteries on it to make it a warship as far as the Vargemma were concerned. From what he’d learned so far studying the infinitely large Star Force database now available to him was that there were no unarmed ships within the empire. Everything could defend itself to some extent, and the 18 mile long beast he now rode in was well equipped to do just that.

It had a mix of ranged, short, and point defense weaponry, but the bulk of the interior space was not devoted to carrying weapons or their ammunition. It was to carry troops along with a massive Essence well buried under 18 layers of armor plating, and that wasn’t even counting what protected the ship itself.

That well was empty, with Puar and the other Varkemma onboard drawing recharges from a portable secondary ‘lantern’ in one of the cargo bays. The ship itself was new, and all those like it in the war zone were not returning to the Rim to pick up new Varkemma. New ships were being built as fast, if not faster, than Cal-com was providing the elite troops, so this ship hadn’t had a chance to fill up on Essence yet, because apparently the Temples were not the source of it for Star Force.

He’d always assumed they were producing the Essence themselves or somehow syphoning it off from the Temple’s own reserves, for they’d never touched the racial wells. If they had the Vargemma would have thrown this Temple into a full blown war against the Caretakers in order to defend them, as they had in others, but it seemed Star Force didn’t need to steal Essence from the Vargemma or the Temples at all…because they had a much better source for it.

Puar couldn’t believe what he was witnessing as the ship he rode in slowly moved up near a giant space beast twice the size of his vessel. There were others here too, though smaller and spread across the system. This was what Star Force called a ‘Uriti Preserve’ and it was mostly off limits to the public, but what the public didn’t know was that the giant beasts that descended from Hadarak had the ability to use one and only one Essence ability…and that was to donate.

The Warden-class Hadarak also had this ability, which few in the galaxy knew, and it had apparently bred true when a race called the Chixzon captured a Hadarak and experimented on it…as crazy as that sounded. But the end result was before Puar, and looking at the monster he was glad Star Force had discovered a means to, at first, control them, but now they were true allies and willingly donating Essence to the war effort on such a massive scale that it dwarfed what the entire Vargemma population could produce for the Temples.

The mass of these creatures alone was staggering, and with all that body having to have Essence fixing it to the person inside meant the Uriti had a huge amount to work with, but every time they donated some their Essence pool would become larger the same way the Vargemma adapted with training. He didn’t know how long the Uriti had been used in this manner, perhaps thousands of years, and during that time their ability to produce Essence would have grown with experience and body size, for apparently they never stopped growing larger.

That was why this one, known as ‘Pacman,’ was so much larger than the others. It had been one of the original Uriti recovered from their hidden prisons within the galaxy. The smaller ones were then bred asexually from the larger ones, and each was identical to its spawn, giving Star Force a variety of designs. This one was a large disc with a section missing out of it, and within the wedge of empty space was a massive biological weapon that could kill, or at least severely damage, Puar’s ship with a single shot.

All the Uriti had weapons, unlike the Warden Hadarak. He’d wondered why they weren’t deployed to fight in the war until he came across a notation that said Uriti viewed the Hadarak as their kin and became deeply conflicted when forced to fight them. So much so that some, under the previous control of the Zak’de’ron, had started to go insane. Because of that, Star Force was keeping them away from the Hadarak, but they were contributing greatly to the war effort simply by producing Essence for others, like Puar, to use almost without restriction.

The thought of that was crazy. He’d spent his entire life learning how to apportion his own Essence, giving some to the Temple as was required, some to his race, and to devote the rest to his personal training without taxing himself to the point where he became incapacitated. But the ability to pull from a well so large you didn’t have to worry about expending it all would give him insane combat capabilities.

Him and the others onboard. There were no Elcee here to instruct them. Instead there was a single Archon, and one that couldn’t use Essence. Reganno hadn’t been kidding when he said that if they could become Varkemma they would be fully trusted. No one onboard could operate the Essence equipment for the well except them, and that meant no one had any defense against Essence attack should any of them betray the trust given to them.

Puar thought that was unwise, but it was also comforting. He wasn’t being given probational status. This was his home now, and no one was going to be looking at him for possible betrayal. Whatever had occurred in the Temples apparently stayed in the Temples, and it seemed that anyone not worthy of complete trust would never be let outside them.

There was one veteran Varkemma here, to operate the Lantern, but it was the Archon that was instructing them on what was to come and continuing their training…for even a troop ship such as this held chambers exclusively for training. There were no widespread challenge courses like he’d been using in Redemption, but any skill he sought to work on had the apparatus for it here…including a few for Essence abilities.

Puar had been staying away from those for the most part, in order not to consume much Essence that they all had to share, but now that they were in the Preserve to get fully loaded up, the Archon had instructed them to devote at least a small portion of each day to making sure their Essence skills were well practiced and familiar. As for any heavy training, he promised they’d get plenty of it on the battlefield, so they needed to work on strengthening their bodies and stamina for what was to come most of all.

Right now no one was training. All were gathered around viewing portals or holographic terminals so they could see the refueling process. Their ship was coming so very close to the Uriti that it obscured most of their vision above, leaving the starfield visible below. Puar still wasn’t used to being able to see in all directions, feeling like he would start falling and never stop, but for the moment it was the dark gray Uriti that dominated the exterior view.

Puar blinked as his Essence vision kicked in without him even trying to activate it. A surge so large and powerful leapt from the Uriti to the center of the ship, with the bleed off hitting him and the others onboard like a wave of mist…but a wave that they could absorb a bit of themselves.

He did just that, sucking it in and sending it to his forehead jewel, for his body was already full. In training they didn’t expend their own, because drawing from the jewel caused an over surge in their body that actually increased their maximum capacity more than regular training. It also meant that they’d be at full power if something damaged their personal well and it bled off its contents in a matter of seconds.

That was a worry, but it would take a direct hit to do that. And a direct hit to his forehead would kill him, so if the jewel took the hit and saved his life it was worth the loss. Plus he’d still have his full body’s worth of Essence to fight with after that, so jewel usage had become the primary protocol amongst the Varkemma in training, though they did expend some of their own to recharge it afterwards, then let a good night’s sleep replenish the small amount their body lost and bring them back up to full power.

But what was happening now was mindboggling. The Uriti wasn’t trying to target him or the others. The beam of Essence coming from it to the ship was so massive this was just a byproduct of it and the glare to his Essence vision was blinding. Fortunately it couldn’t damage his sight, but if someone nearby him was charging an attack to kill him with he never would have known until it was too late.

The beam was heading straight into the ship’s well and charging it. Holograms all over the ship lit up showing the status, and it was moving very slowly. The ‘Lantern’ in the ship must have been designed to hold a massive amount, and he wondered just how much the Uriti would be able to donate…but to his surprise the beam never stopped during the 18+ minutes it took to charge the well, and when it finally hit 100% the beam ceased, giving Puar a newfound respect for the Uriti and the Hadarak. They were truly beyond the Vargemma in terms of Essence powers, and it was no wonder the Founders had told them not to engage the Hadarak until they returned.

But Star Force was anyway, and they had these massive Essence-wielding beasts on their side. He didn’t know if that would be enough, but it would certainly give him and the others a fighting chance. He was eager to see what else Star Force had developed to fight the Uriti, and as soon as the ship accelerated away from Pacman he immediately went to the database to look.

He should have done so sooner, but with everything going on he’d been focused on what the Varkemma would be doing…not what the rest of Star Force could do. And he immediately realized how well prepared this Empire was, as opposed to the Vargemma, who only really had Olopar to work with against the larger Hadarak.

Star Force had them too, with several manned by Varkemma already engaged on the front. But they also had various ships of their own designs to fight them, and some that didn’t use Essence. That staggered Puar, for how could one kill a Hadarak without using Essence?

But they could. Not easily, but they could. And some of their weapon systems were truly impressive, not only because of their kill power, but because Star Force could combine the already massive damage with an Essence upgrade and create unimaginable powerful tools of destruction. More so than the Vargemma ever had, because they had always relied on pure Essence attack technology. The Founders had never given them hybrid devices, but Star Force had apparently developed them on their own.

And Star Force’s technology was better than what the Vargemma had, by far. So blending it with Essence made them so damn powerful he wondered why they hadn’t just wiped out the Vargemma in the first place…then he immediately laughed at himself once that thought fully processed. The reason they hadn’t wasn’t because they couldn’t, but because they wouldn’t. Until he’d gone through the LITrpg training…whatever it was…he couldn’t have understood that, but now it was clear. Star Force fought not to obliterate their opponents, but to defeat them. Even if ‘defeat’ was the harder option.

And if this empire shied away from harder options, then they’d never have been prosecuting this war. They’d have retreated inside the Temples and ridden it out with the Vargemma, but there wasn’t a hint of surrender in these people, and Puar liked that. He liked that a lot.

Not far from the Uriti Preserve they came to a system like many others, but instead of jumping on to the next they made a microjump out beyond the system’s edge…to a massive construct that had enough of its own gravity field for them to brake against. Puar knew what this was without having to look it up. It was a Grid Point Nexus, and yet another piece of Star Force technology that did not require Essence.

It was a magnetic jump platform, and it would allow them to travel far faster than you could with normal gravity drives. They’d have to hitch a ride on a much bigger carrier ship, but it would take them all the way down to the ‘Hula Hoop’ that circled the inside of Star Force territory in the galaxy, as well as marking the exterior boundary of what had been the V’kit’no’sat empire.

Now that neighboring territory was a war zone, but one through which Star Force could travel, for neither the V’kit’no’sat nor the Zak’de’ron wished to make an enemy of Star Force. They were too busy tearing out each other’s throats to take on another fight, so Puar had been assured they’d pass through easy enough, for there were designated travel routes that the war would not touch. And those routes led to the bases along the war zone from which Star Force was organizing its evacuation efforts for the locals that couldn’t or wouldn’t move out of harm’s way, for as odd as it sounded, many didn’t even know what a Hadarak was, let alone were aware of the fleets heading their way until they arrived on their doorstep.

Sadly most of Star Force’s fleet was still inside the Temples, fighting the Caretakers and making sure the Vargemma didn’t reclaim dominance, but some ships had returned to the galaxy, such as in Kappa, now that the Paladin had grown to such numbers to replace them. Those ships were now actively engaged in the fight against the Hadarak, trying to hold them back in certain places so the evacuation efforts could get their job done before the enemy arrived.

But that’s not where Puar was going. They were going to the places where the Hadarak already were and Star Force was fighting on planet to keep them at bay while the evacuation ships did their work. Puar felt like a natural fit for that assignment, despite the fact he’d never done anything like it before. And he was glad they were now at a Grid Point, because that meant they would be getting to the war front that much faster.

His ship didn’t have to wait long, skipping ahead in line to dock with a spindly, yet massive carrier ship that wrapped their vessel in support pylons and energy shields, then it launched off the magnetic platform so fast Puar could actually see the stars moving outside the ship.

Star Force’s empire was truly awe inspiring, and he was proud to be a tiny, tiny part of it. If the Founders ever showed up in this galaxy, he doubted there would be a fight left for the Vargemma to make. Star Force was going to deal with it here and now, and Puar was very grateful not to be one of those ignorant dopes sitting back in the Temple doing nothing to help.

The fight was here and now, and Star Force was waging it. And from the look of their magnificence, Puar truly believed they might be on par with the Founders. Perhaps even superior, for the training he’d done in the past months had taught him many things the Temple never had.

He didn’t know the true nature of the universe. He was a tiny Trigorma caught up in the clash of superior empires. All he could do was tackle what approached him when it did, but one thing he was certain of now. Star Force was somewhere he was comfortable calling ‘home.’ He couldn’t explain why, but he felt it. He felt is as surely as anything he’d encountered over the course of his 178,238 year life. This was where he was meant to be, and now that he’d earned his way here, he was never going to leave.

Star Force needed Essence-capable troops to fight the Hadarak, and he was glad to answer the call. He had a new pack now, as did the other Varkemma. And the sooner he could draw Hadarak blood alongside his new pack the better to cement the bond. A few months now, and he’d be at the war zone.

He just wished it was tomorrow. As all the Varkemma onboard his ship did.

8

June 23, 128691

System 3992007 (Hadarak War Zone)

Middle Stellar Orbit

The trip through the galaxy changed Puar as much as his time in Redemption did. From the instruction of the Archon to his interaction with the other Varkemma and the starship’s crew, he emerged at the end of the journey not as an outsider looking in, but a true member of Star Force eagerly awaiting his chance to start paying back the empire for all that it had done for him. And today was that day.

Puar waited in an observation room with the other Varkemma as they watched the hologram of the system on approach. Their ship was a tiny dot traveling on a visible jumpline that led into the star. The closer they got the more the destination system filled out and the star itself began to grow in size. When they finally got within its significant gravity well the starship began to brake, with the path it traveled on the jumpline now marked in red as if it were leaving skid marks in space.

The system zoomed in rapidly as it did so, eventually leaving a star the size of Puar’s head floating to the far right with the ship dot in the center of the room. Judging by the distance they had not entered low stellar orbit as was regular, but had over-braked in order to come to a halt far from it. Several Star Force beacons were active in the system and constantly broadcasting, which allowed the transport to get an immediate update on what was happening and where without having to wait for the signal lag of their own sensors to tell them.

The fur on Puar’s back rose as he saw icons for Hadarak vessels pop up on the map in low stellar orbit, and they were not just minions. There were no Wardens there, but there were larger ‘warship’ versions along with clouds of minions waiting to ambush anyone coming into the system. Puar’s ship had dodged them by coming in shallow, and the only reason they could do that was because of Star Force’s immense engine technology. Otherwise they’d have had to take the last leg at a snail’s pace in order to avoid hitting that ambush.

But the Hadarak couldn’t cover an entire system, and this far out the space around them was clear for now, but they weren’t staying put. His ship was already moving insystem towards the 3rd planet and accelerating slowly due to the inopportune gravity pulls. As a new jumpline appeared Puar saw that it was curved, meaning they were not just pulling on their destination but using other gravity wells in the system as well to speed their transit. That meant they couldn’t travel on a straight line if they wanted the maximum speed possible, so their course ended up looking like a shallow bow angling outward from the star in the direction of a not so near gas giant.

Around that gas giant were several moons, and they were covered in Hadarak icons along with markers indicating where there had previously been inhabitation that was now overrun and tagged as totally destroyed. The 3rd planet had none, but there were still some Hadarak activity on the barren planet.

Puar waited patiently, and when they got near the 3rd planet a few minions tried to intercept them, but they weren’t fast enough. The transport used some of its momentum to slingshot around the planet to a new micro jumpline and launched on it without coming to a full stop. The sideways momentum was nulled out enroute, and the holographic map zoomed ahead to show their destination and two other planets nearby that particular slice of the system.

Both were covered in Hadarak icons, but one of them had a Warden on it…or in it. It was partially visible, but most of its mass was sunk into the crust with armies of minions moving around on the surface, and probably below it, bringing back materials to feed it from the crust while it sipped on magma straight out of the planet from below.

That planet had large swaths of it with visible inhabitation, broken but completely devoid of anything but Hadarak life. The other planet as well was equally devastated, but no Warden had landed on it. That planet, their destination, also had Hadarak icons on it, a large fleet in space, but their work wasn’t done yet. Two thirds of the planet were still inhabited, and there were a number of Star Force vessels holding position over the natives and providing them cover while large transport vessels were pulling them up off the surface via thousands of dropships running constantly like bees moving around a hive.

“There we are,” the veteran Varkemma said, folding his arms and thumping his tail on the deck plate twice to get everyone’s attention. “Just like we told you. We’re losing the planet and the forces arrayed against us are too large to defeat. That Warden can smash anything it wants just by landing on it, but for the moment it doesn’t seem to care about the evacuation. There aren’t enough Star Force warships here to do anything more than delay the conquest. They’ll provide our air cover while we delay the ground assault. Doing so a mere hour will save tens of thousands of lives.”

He pointed to the Star Force icons clustered together into defensive herds above the planet.

“Those transports are designed for tight packing, and the fact that there are so many here means they’re empty. As soon as they fill up they leave, and as more come in they park and wait while sending their dropships to help fill the first in line. When it leaves its dropships go with it, but they all work to fill a single ship at a time in order to get them out of the warzone as soon as possible. Less to defend that way.”

“Also, multiple evac points. Looks like there are 3 transports loading from different continents. That reduces the flight time of the dropships. Everything is maximized to get the most people off and clear of the system. They don’t have enough of a blockade to stop the transports from leaving, so once they get moving they’ll make it out. Getting them out of orbit is the only issue, and it looks like there’s a decent defense fleet to do that. Otherwise they would have been overrun already.”

“Get geared up. In an hour, maybe two, you’ll be hitting atmosphere in teams with assigned targets. Do not waste your Essence on the little shit. There are too many to kill. Let your escorts handle them and take out your targets. Those the fleet drones are either too busy to deal with, or they’re too armored for them to deal with quickly. The more pressure we can take off them, the more of the little shit they can clean away far faster than you can. They’re the sweepers, you’re here for specific targets. Do not get distracted,” he emphasized, then thumbed over his shoulder towards the door.

Puar went with the others, lazily walking down the halls knowing time was not crunched. This was the moment he’d been waiting for, but now that he was here he was scared. Not because he felt he’d fail his mission, but because they were outnumbered and if they weren’t organized correctly they’d get slaughtered. Plus that Warden could kill any of them it wanted, and the thought of going onto the planet without a way to defend against it made him very uneasy. The ship could run away, but on the ground he had nowhere to go if that monster appeared in the sky overtop of him. It was 128 miles wide, meaning he couldn’t run fast enough to avoid it if it came down.

Reganno had spoken of trust, and now Puar realized what that meant. They were throwing themselves into an enemy they couldn’t defeat in order to save as many people as they could that were otherwise as good as dead. It felt reckless, but also right. Puar was just shaking because he’d never done this, on any level, and the sooner he had something to focus on doing he’d be alright. He had to be.

He got armored up with the others, then they boarded their own dropships with his containing only four Varkemma. The others were biped, two of which were smaller than him and one larger. He was the strongest Essence user amongst them by far, leaving him with defacto command, though his battlemap would be giving him the direction needed once they got to ground, just as it now showed him in his helmet their fast approach to the planet and emergency braking just above the atmosphere where several drone warships were waiting and already in conflict with minion swarms.

The transport’s own weapons opened up as soon as it came within range, and the drones moved to escort position, soaking up damage while shooting down most of the minions that tried to race past…not to damage the giant ship, but to ram it and deposit IDF goo on the shields that would momentarily slow it until the shields modulated and in effect shoved it off.

There weren’t enough minions to kill his ship, but there were enough to kill the drones without their help if they stayed to fight. The timing was well planned, for before their shields got to the breaking point the drones withdrew along with the transport around the curve of the planet and down into the atmosphere above a ‘safe’ zone where many more drones were floating low over the ground and shooting ground minions as they tried to get into the urban areas that had been designated as evac zones for dropship pickup.

Puar could see immediately that the drones could only cover small patches of land, but with them roaming quickly they could intercept waves coming towards the natives. It wasn’t perfect, but there were Star Force troops on the ground, both commandos and mechs, to fill in some of the gaps…but that’s not where his team was going.

His dropship launched from the transport before it even came to a stop, with the winged craft hitting the atmosphere hard and slicing through it as they picked up some aerial support from a squadron of skeets. Puar didn’t know if they were manned or not, but they acted as an extra layer of protection as his ship flew towards its destination and his team got their orders.

They were in the form of text only, for there was way too much going on for the Archon to issue them direct explanations, but the text along with maps and graphics was sufficient enough to make Puar’s adrenaline rush.

Your target is an approaching Dumbo-class Ultra minion. Its armor is sufficient to stand up against direct naval bombardment long enough to allow minion waves to approach the city. If the navy targets the minions instead, the Dumbo will get within range and begin attacking the city with lobbed corrosive nodules that detonate on impact or above the city, raining either directly destructive fluids or biological weapons, some varieties of which infect and take over the host body, turning them into weapons for the Hadarak. Others consume the host and cause it to produce more biological agent, spreading further in an expanding cloud of hazardous vapor.

Allowing the Dumbo proximity to the city is automatic failure. Allowing it physical access to the city will jeopardize any entrenched defenses, for its armored limbs function as battering rams. Conventional weapons are next to useless except in large amounts, meaning ground troops have no effective counter against it. Mech combat must be extensive to disable it. Naval bombardment is the best option, but with limited assets the distraction will allow the minions to swarm the city. This is also failure.

Your team must intercept and destroy the Dumbo before it can reach the city using your Essence weaponry. Be warned, the Dumbo is capable of self-defense and is surrounded by escorting minions, meaning you will have to fight your way to it. Strike swiftly. Prolonged engagement gives the Hadarak the advantage.

“How can we conserve Essence and fight our way to the target?” Keel’vo asked.

“Look,” Puar urged as the battlemap was updated with their eventual landing zone, even as the skeet squadron around them spread out and began to engage isolated Hadarak aerial units moving to intercept them. “There is a unit already on the ground we are joining.”

“Scionate?” Juuma noted. “They’re smaller versions of you, right?”

“They are smaller,” Puar agreed, “but far inferior. This unit has no Essence users. They are commandos only, and fast ones. You will be the slowest. Move at maximum speed or we will become easier targets.”

“I can keep up with you,” he insisted.

“No, you can’t,” Puar said with a huff.

“If I have to use Essence to do it, I will. There are too many minions as it is. I do not want to draw more to us by conserving too much.”

“Nor do I,” Timnim said, flexing his longer, thin legs that had two knee joints that allowed him much longer strides than the others, save for Puar’s quadruped advantage.

“I think the Scionate will know what to do,” Keel’vo said in a hopeful manner. “If they can get us there, we only have to worry about the big one.”

“Let’s hope so,” Puar said as the dropship pilot put a countdown into their helmets. “This is it. No Caretakers to worry about. No Caretakers to protect us. We are free to act and free to die. We are the destiny makers now, and those Scionate are depending on us for our Essence. They are more helpless than us, so keep them alive if they get overwhelmed. They are not expendable.”

“We know,” Juuma echoed. “But it’s worth saying again. Those naval drones are too far away to help. It looks like the Scionate and the four of us are it. We can’t afford to lose anyone.”

“And they can’t afford to lose us,” Timnim noted. “I can see why we’re so badly needed now. I had thought this war would be naval only without any ground combat that mattered. I am glad I was wrong. I want to do some personal damage.”

“We are about to get plenty,” Keel’vo said as he walked to the rear of the ship, with Puar and the other two Varkemma following as their countdowns neared.

“Sorry fellas,” the pilot said into their helmets. “It’s getting heavy up here. I’m going to have to drop you off from the air or we’re going to draw too much attention to the LZ. You guys can handle a 100 meter drop, right?”

“Easily,” Puar answered for the group. “Will there be lateral motion?”

“How much can you handle?”

“Anything under 70 miles per hour is preferable, though we can handle more with forewarning.”

“I’ll get you under 70, but be careful. The ground is rocky and full of ravines. It’ll provide you cover once you’re down, but it makes landing a bitch.”

“We will manage,” Puar said, seeing the tactical map begin to outline those ravines as they neared them. Then as the countdown reached 15 seconds the ramp began to lower. It hit deployed position with 2 seconds to spare, and Puar started running so he left it the moment the countdown hit 0, with him falling sideways and using his armor’s emergency anti-grav to keep him from dropping too fast.

He used his telekinesis to create a crash bag of energy through which his body tore, slowing down rapidly before he hit the side of a ravine, but thankfully the pilot had them running the length of it rather than across. Puar rolled over twice, tearing through brush like a cannonball before he got his feet under him and skidded to a halt leaving 20 meters of slide marks behind him.

The others landed in their own way, all ahead of him, so Puar took off running on a planet’s gravity for the first time, breathing its native air and feeling very odd about it all. The Temples held a variety of landscapes, many actually, but this was an actual planet with its surface curving down, and to a Varkemma that was as alien as a world could get…

9

“We have aerial incoming,” one of the Scionate said as they ran in a group with the Varkemma inside the ring of 32 commandos as they cut a path through the ground minions that were trying to intercept them before they got to their target. “Our shields cannot hold up to sustained attack. You must eliminate them.”

“Keel’vo,” Puar said from his position near the front, but still behind four Scionate that were breaking trail. “They’re yours.”

“I see…them,” the tired biped said as he struggled to keep up with the group, having to draw on little bits of Essence to enhance his movement speed. Fortunately that didn’t pull any extra oxygen requirements, because he was breathing about as heavy as he could.

The battlemap was incomplete further to the east, because the Star Force ships providing the sensor telemetry were low to the west and could only scan so far around the curve of the planet. It was a problem unique to worlds beyond the Temples, where everything was visible to everyone. That meant the flying minions could get close to the attack group before they popped up on sensors if they stayed low to the ground, and this group of 26 had apparently done just that.

The skeets providing them air cover were engaged with, and keeping groups of several hundred each off the pack, but this group was going to get through even as two skeets broke off on a desperate run to try and intercept in time.

Keel’vo began charging up a Sha’mesh as he ran behind the others, pooling the Essence energy above his head as he altered it into the proper form for a Tia’vo, or what Star Force called a ‘Clinger.’ The Sha’mesh was invisible except to those with eyes to see Essence, and even without looking at it Puar could feel the charge building behind him and morph, then it shot out towards the winged minions streaking in and beginning to fire ahead of the Scionate’s path.

Their weaponry looked like little stones being zinged at them, but in truth they were concentrated energy packets and when the pale blue mini-lances hit the ground they exploded in puffs that shot back out the holes in the ground that they’d melted. A few hit overtop the pack, but two of the Scionate were wearing special armor that contained auxiliary shield generators carried on their backs like cargo, and those two were interlinked to provide a dome of protection over the entire group to supplement their weaker individual shields.

Puar could hear several strikes on the shield, each of which made a ‘twang’ as it hit and was negated, then the somewhat accurate firing on their moving, zigzagging position grew erratic with some of the shots going well in to the sky above them as Keel’vo’s attack hit the first flying minion and arced from one to another for a moment before exploding out like a plant growing vines around each one hit. The energy arcs bound the wings of the minions and put them into a stranglehold, with those affected falling out of the sky and rolling across the ground while the Essence bonds held.

Three were out of range for the Clinger to arc to them, but one of the skeets flew in and hovered over the moving group at it returned fire, protecting them with its shields and giving up its maneuvering advantage, which allowed the ground minions to fire on it as well, but it managed to drop one of the flying enemies out of the sky as the other two peppered it with withering shots, none of which did much damage but the continual stream added up quickly.

Keel’vo intervened before that could happen, targeting one of the minions as it flew overhead strafing the skeet. One moment it was there, the next it exploded into a shower of disintegrated smoke that the pack ran through and out of as the skeet downed the other minion and accelerated away from their position.

Puar could see on the battlemap that the other one was over the bound minions and shooting them before they could get back into the air, and that their skeet was going to assist now, meaning they should be clear of air attack for a while…but not ground. Most of the zigzagging the Scionate were doing was to avoid the thickest groups of ground minions, and when they couldn’t be avoided the Scionate were firing their armor’s mounted weapons ahead and to the sides while one or two of them would sprint forward into a thick group of them and take their attention away from the Varkemma.

He’d dive into them, clawing and shooting and busting up their formations enough for the other Scionate to pick open a hole as they rolled through, killing the few minions in the way and allowing the ‘diver’ to recover as he got to his feet and joined the rear of the pack. In this way the Scionate kept rotating through their formation and allowing their shields to regenerate somewhat before the next heavy engage…but they weren’t all escaping with shield loss only. Puar could see several scorch marks on some of their armor and he hated withholding his help, but he knew they might need it later on the way out more than now.

The Dumbo they were going after was now visible in the distance, but still miles away. The minions around it were a lot more dense, and there was going to be no way to avoid them. They were going to have to plow straight through, but fortunately a lot of them were melee only. If they had all been ranged attackers this would have been more problematic, for there was a lot of elevated positions to fire from, but right now the various ravines were shielding them from a lot of damage in what could have been a kill zone if the minions had been different concentrations of ranged varieties.

That meant this was doable, and Puar kept focused on the road ahead while monitoring the position of the Dumbo. It wasn’t moving very fast to look at it, but it was so large each step covered a fair amount of distance. It was 0.8 miles long and nearly a half mile high, and pretty soon it would start firing on them if it could line up a shot, not caring if it hit its own minions in the process.

“How do we approach the Dumbo without drawing its fire?” Puar asked the Scionate.

“It won’t use its larger weapons on a group as small as this. But its point defense weapons will attack when we are beneath it and around its feet. You will have to destroy those first. Our weapons can do the job, but we will have to focus on the minions to keep them off you.”

“Consider it done,” Juuma said, volunteering for that task as a glob of acid from one of the minions hit the top of their group shield and rolled off it like rain hitting the roof of a building.

“Stay in one group,” the Scionate urged. “Splitting up makes us vulnerable on all sides. We have to shield each other’s flanks to make this work.”

“Have you…done this before?” Timnim asked.

“Not against a Dumbo, but we have escorted Varkemma on two assaults against Ultras. One was successful.”

“What happened in the other?” Puar asked, bounding over a rock that the Scionate were a little too small for and they had to split up to go around it.

“Too many minions. They are split up here by terrain, so we have a better…”

The Scionate cut off as a turn in the rocks lead to a group of minions dozens of rows deep. The pack leaders turned hard left, climbing the hill while both groups exchanged fire, most of which slipped underneath the overhead group shield. Puar took two hits to his personal shields and fired back with his armor’s Dre’mo’don cannons, one of which hit dead center in a minion and cored straight through its chest before blowing out the shoulder on the minion standing behind it.

They are weak, he thought as they climbed the rise and tried to go around the thick group, but they are numerous. This is what we were warned about.

The Scionate ahead of him slowed, and Puar wondered why as they turned right and ran along the edge of the rise but just shallow of being able to see over it. Then Puar realized the other Varkemma were having a harder time climbing than the Scionate were. Their little strides got so much shorter, and they were not able to leap up like the quadrupeds could. Fortunately the leaders were watching closely so as to keep the group together and the ring around them intact, otherwise gaps would have formed letting more shots through. As of now the Scionate were physically blocking most of them with their bodies and flank shields that were raised on one side and almost nonexistent on the inside of the formation.

But that formation was still loose, with many temporary gaps, meaning Puar was not safe as they bypassed the minions that were fast in their own right, but packed together too much to all move at speed. The Scionate ran into and rammed three stocky minions while another Scionate jumped into the face of a taller fourth and lightning emerged from all of their armor, disabling more than damaging the minions and using their bodies as an impromptu wall that allowed their pack to pass by without being flooded into.

Puar telekinetically pulled one of the Scionate off the disabled minions as live minions circled around behind them and tried to overwhelm the armored cat. The telekinetic pull was enough of a jerk to get him out ahead of the pursuit, and soon the entire pack was moving again with a large amount of enemies running behind them in pursuit.

And more were behind that. If they slowed down and fought this out they’d be overwhelmed. Only by constantly moving could they make this work, and Puar could see that these Scionate were very experienced in escort missions such as this. They moved as one, despite not having telepathic abilities, and he was confident they were going to get him and the others close enough to do their job…but how exactly were they going to do it?

Best attack suggestion on the Dumbo? he asked the other Varkemma telepathically as they continue to run/fight towards their target.

It has multiple hearts. I do not think we have enough Essence to disable them all simultaneously, and if we do not saturate it enough it will regenerate more. Their biology is heavily resilient, Jumma noted.

It has too much mass to destroy, Timnim added. We have to penetrate the armor and go inside. I can breach it, but Puar, you must do the tunneling.

Timnim and I will go inside. You two must keep the Scionate alive and running around the Dumbo’s feet, but do not get caught underneath or it will crush you when it falls.

“Passing air cover perimeter,” the Scionate informed, noting the range around the Dumbo that the skeets would not encroach on for fear of getting shot down by its inaccurate weapons that became more and more effective the closer one got. “We’re on our own until we pass back beyond that marker or until you kill the target.”

“There are a few aerial…units near,” another Scionate noted as they all scattered around a large falling boulder that was thrown at them by some of the stronger minions. “You will have to deal with those in a more permanent manner if they close on us.”

“I have it covered,” Keel’vo said. “Just get us to the target. We are withholding most of our kill power for it.”

“You will need it. Do not target the ears. They are a waste of time. We must get at the underside.”

Puar knew what he meant, for the Dumbo had garnered its name because the head of the heavy minion had two additional armor flaps that could be maneuvered around to double up protection just about everywhere on its body, even its rear arc, if it chose to pull them in close, but right now it had them half spread out like a ‘V’ and flatted out, providing a roof over many minions running alongside it. Some of which were special units designed for city assault or kamikaze attacks against the mechs defending far ahead of their current position.

“Do we go after secondary targets after the main is taken down?” Juuma asked.

“Only if we are very lucky,” the Scionate said. “Do not count on such luck. Getting out alive will be difficult even if you can take down the Dumbo. If you cannot, we will have to run to the far side and hope we find a break in their ranks to flee through.”

“We’re taking it down,” Puar said confidently. “If we have enough Essence left, we’ll clean up the area afterwards. Do not exhaust yourself unless absolutely necessary to take down the target and protect our pack. The secondary targets are worthless in comparison.”

“Varkemma, we will need assistance now,” another Scionate said from the front of the formation. “We cannot push through that.”

Puar looked ahead and saw a solid line of minions coming at them stretching for several miles between them and the Dumbo. The battlemap couldn’t show them all due to their low position on the ground until a skeet flew way up into the atmosphere behind them to give them a glimpse of what was there…and what Puar saw made his blood boil. There were so many targets to kill, and he wanted to kill them all, but they were pulling away from the Dumbo and creating an open area beneath it, meaning if they could break through this line they would have a clear path over the last few miles to the target.

The problem was, the wave of minions ahead of them was a half mile deep at the minimum.

“Move out of our firing path,” Puar said, with the Scionate ahead of him immediately pulling left and right as he and the other three Varkemma slowed their run and came up side by side with each other, each charging a Sha’mesh.

Mass takedowns were capable in a variety of ways, but the most efficient was a Lian’no that struck at the hearts of the targets and required very little power compared to other death strikes. That meant it was also easy to guard against if you had the skills or technology, but these small minions had neither. They were weak and expendable, which Lian’no had been devised to exploit en mass.

Puar mentally coordinated with the others to not overlap targets too much, and each took a wedge of the formation ahead of them as they got pelted with concentrated firepower from the approaching minions, with some of the smallest and fastest ones breaking from the group and sprinting towards them.

When all four had fully charged their Sha’mesh and altered them into the appropriate attack matrix, they fired simultaneously…with nothing immediately happening.

“Reform and run as fast as possible,” Puar told the Scionate, who immediately sprinted ahead of them towards the closest minions…who soon started to trip and fall as lack of blood flood through their bodies began to cause them to black out and collapse here and there, but all were soon to come down ahead of them, though those on the flanks that hadn’t been targeted would be closing in on them if they didn’t move fast enough forward over the dropping bodies.

“Mind your step,” the Scionate said as four of them sprinted far ahead of the group and started policing the fallen bodies looking for those still capable of firing and putting some pointblank shots into them as they passed over the outliers and into the carpet of falling minions so thick you couldn’t see more than a few bits of ground through the mass of ugly and dying bodies.

As soon as Puar hit the first of them he had to slow down considerably, and the bipeds even more so. This left two walls of minions to the right and left able to move towards them quickly across clear ground outside and inside the fallen, but it was inside that concerned Puar, for they were skirting the edge of those that were afflicted but recovering due to too little Essence reaching them. That left a wave of attackers closing in on the pack as it clumsily ran over the dead minions.

Puar growled seeing that they were going to beat the bipeds to the other side, so he took off in giant leaps ahead of the others with a few Scionate doing their best to keep up, but the Essence enhanced jumps almost allowed him to fly he was going so far.

He got to the far side, seeing clear space ahead of him…only to have a large glob of material fire at him from the Dumbo. He dodged to the side easily enough, with the acid attack splashing on the downed minions and eating through their bodies rapidly as it created a column of steam rising up and obscuring the others behind it.

Puar threw a smaller amount of Lian’no to the left, then more to the right, taking down the leading minions and using their falling bodies to trip up and slow the others behind, allowing his pack to catch up and get to open ground as another acid attack landing nearby them, but it was too slow firing and the combat computers in their armor were too good at predicting trajectory. They were able to dodge each one as they got their footing again, then they were off sprinting towards the Dumbo with only a scattering of minions between them and their target, and the Scionate were quick to dispose of those as they came to them.

That left the Varkemma with their primary target isolated for the moment, and armies of minions converging behind and ahead of them as they redeployed from everywhere to protect what they had thought was a safe Ultra minion. Now that it wasn’t the call had gone out, and if they didn’t take it down quickly they were going to be surrounded in a sea of minions they most likely could not escape from.

10

“Take out the point defenses!” the Scionate said as soon as the hail of water balloon shaped charges began firing out, hitting the ground, and expanding laterally for 30-40 meters of radius that was washing destructive energy against the group’s shields and draining them with every hit in addition to the beam weaponry that was mostly missing, but tearing large furrows in the ground wherever it landed.

“I thought you said it would wait until we were under it?” Juuma pointed out.

“We are under it,” Puar answered, looking up at the high back of the Dumbo from a little over a mile away. “Shall I?”

Just then one of the beams hit the group, whether by accident or design who knew, but it punched through what was left of their group shield and hit one of the Scionate. That quadruped went down and did not get back up, his armor smoking but his body seemed mostly intact.

Two of the other Scionate swung back to cover him as another beam shot near the same location and almost hit him twice.

Keel’vo leaned backwards and dug his heels into the ground, skidding to a halt and causing one of the other Scionate to jump over him to avoid a collision. Take out the point defenses, he told all of them telepathically as he ran back and jumped in front of the three Scionate as one of the orbs hit a second later, but the Essence-enhanced shield he threw up over them didn’t allow it through…then a beam hit it square on and disappeared from the negation effect.

“Behind you,” Puar warned as he ran forward with the rest.

“Worry about the target. I can handle these vermin if you get rid of…look out!”

Puar saw it a moment before Keel’vo spoke. The ‘ear’ of the Dumbo that had been stretched out horizontally was rotating down and backwards, sweeping the ground and tearing off the top meter or so as it did with the leading edge cutting across their path. It missed short, but then reversed and dug down even deeper, forcing a wall of dirt flying towards them with the heavily armored ear behind it going to do the most damage if it hit.

The Scionate pack veered right, trying to get clear of its reach, but Puar didn’t go with them. Instead he turned left and headed directly for it, jumping up and over the dirt plume to hit the top of the ear where he clung to it using an Essence technique and not even bothering to activate his armor’s grip pads.

“Go for the underside,” he told the others. “I’m going for the head.”

“Can you see inside it?” Timnim asked.

“No.”

“Then what…”

“I can still do damage. Maybe enough to disorient it.”

“Don’t waste time,” Juuma argued. “Go for the kill shot. You may not have enough Essence for that on your own and we don’t have time for anything else.”

“You can’t…” Puar started to say as he ran across the ear at a steep angle, but it moved again, flattening out somewhat as the entire Dumbo stopped walking forward and turned to face the little attackers as the special minions beneath it continued forward and away from them. “The Scionate can’t take that and you can’t get…”

“Take it down,” the Scionate interrupted as most of them accelerated so fast the two bipeds couldn’t keep up. “Get on our backs, now!”

Two Scionate ran up next to Juuma and Timnim as the giant ear rotated and dug into the dirt again, now repositioned within range to scrape them off the ground.

The two Varkemma did as instructed, jumping up onto the backs of the Scionate as the tiger-like cats took off sprinting towards the others faster than the bipeds could have run. They didn’t make it clear, rather having to punch through the dirt with their own jumps and slam into the armored ear…where they also stuck and began to run up it.

“The point defense turret ahead,” one of them said, with Juuma seeing the spot on the ear marked on the battlemap for him.

“Get a little closer,” he said.

“It cannot turn to target us. Wait until we are on it,” the Scionate said, and Juuma switched from a ranged attack to summoning a Fruc’zo over his left hand. He balled it up there, with the light passing through that spot twisting as it was heavily distorted, then when the Scionate ran him up to the pimple-like lump on the ear he threw the disintegration energy into it and flinched as the steam-like explosion knocked them to the side, but the Scionate kept his footing enough to keep them from rolling, which was damn hard considering the ear was continuing to move beneath them.

“A good hit,” the Scionate beneath him said. “Can you do another?”

“I can do as many as you like…”

Puar was far ahead of them now, both those on the ear and those circling around to try to get at the rear of the Dumbo, for the ears were attached to the head and couldn’t sweep backwards past the stubby tail, which was itself too high off the ground to attack anything back there. It was the weakest point on the heavy minion, and that was probably why the Dumbo was rotating around to not let them get there.

Puar took an expanding water balloon attack from one of the point defenses on the back when the ear dipped lower, but it didn’t stop him. He had to maintain foot contact the entire time or he’d fall off, but while that slowed him considerably it also allowed him to maintain a rhythm that was bringing him towards the point where the ear attached to the body, and that part moved the least of all.

Several flying minions swooped in and started shooting at him, but he threw a Lian’no up at them and within seconds they were falling out of the sky as their hearts seized up. That plus every step he took drained him of Essence, but nothing like what he was about to do.

His second sight was not Pefbar. Had it been he could have seen inside the skull of the Dumbo and scrambled its brain. His telekinesis didn’t work that way. He had to have line of sight for it to work, so he couldn’t touch the inside…except to use a pure Essence reach and grip, which cost a great amount of power the further away one tried.

As he got close enough to try, Puar decided Juuma was right. He had to go for a kill shot, and neither of the other 3 Varkemma had telekinesis that worked the way the Archons’ did. They were going to have to blast their way inside, and the skull was the worst place to do so. It was three times as thick as the rest of the Dumbo’s body, because that’s where it wanted to take the most attacks.

The eyes were armored over too, for they were incorporated into the stiff material rather than being soft and squishy like most lifeforms. They were literally made of rock, and it had so many that there was no effective way to blind it.

Puar could see the hordes of minions all around them in the distance converging on their location. They didn’t have time to waste, and as long as those giant ear plates were being used as weapons they were not going to get an easy shot at the underside.

Puar growled and took off along the head, ignoring the point defenses as he went to save Essence. Up ahead was the spot where the skull ended and the body began. That was his target now, though it was going to take him far from the brain.

He took down a few more flyers as some of the Scionate finally got up to the rear left foot, then the ear collapsed on them and they had to run underneath the Dumbo to keep from getting hit…then the entire Ultra sat down on its 6 legs and tried to smash them. Fortunately the Scionate were moving better than 100 miles an hour and were able to get out the rear before that happened, but Puar instantly realized they’d baited the Dumbo into doing so, because for the moment it could not turn again. Not until it stood up.

That allowed Juuma and Timnim on their mounts to get around to the rear, where they both started using the Dre’mo’don in their jewels to snipe away the point defenses in the area with Essence-enhanced green beams. The Scionate were also shooting them with blue Dre’mo’don orbs and adding to the damage, but there was no comparison in firepower. Even though the Varkemma’s cannons were much smaller, the Essence addition allowed them to melt through the turrets while all the missed shots barely scratched the armor around the point defenses.

The Dumbo was so concerned with those directly behind it that the weaponsfire headed to Keel’vo and the downed Scionate ended, giving them a chance to pick up and move closer as the minion wave crashed forward less than a minute away. Puar had to kill this thing now, or at least give the others an opening to finish it.

He let go of his grip and started to free run across the back in great leaps, then skidded to a stop when he got past where the intel report had said the base of the skull was. He immediately started to disintegrate a section of the armor in front of him and channel the debris out in one direction. Without a charge first, his damage was like a constant water squirt that peeled away an inch or two of the heavy armor per second. As it cleared away he stepped into the two meter wide hole, with the debris now being channeled around his head with considerable effort so not to blow him back out.

In he dug, slowly disappearing inside the armor as he drew heavily on his jewel’s reserves to get through the armor layer, which he finally did after expending 79% of his reserves. The goo underneath didn’t gush blood like the other minions did, but it was oozing fluid and he began to tear through several feet of it per second.

“I’m through,” he said, with no response. In fact, his battlemap signals had cut out entirely now that he was inside. The armor wasn’t letting the signal through, and there were no Star Force assets directly overhead to relay it. Plus he couldn’t get a feel for any of the minds out there, so telepathy was not an option.

Puar walked through mush as he disintegrated and shoved the material back behind him, not all of which made it outside as he pushed his way just underneath the armor layer headed towards where the brain was, but he knew he wasn’t going to make it. He cut as much of a tunnel as he could before his jewel’s reserves wore out, then he stopped, using a little of his own Essence to cut a room at the end large enough for him to turn around so he didn’t have to try and back his way out of the claustrophobic tunnel that was now two foot deep in bio ooze.

He slogged back out, having to trim a little of the tunnel back with Dre’mo’don blasts from his armor as the wound began to reseal, then the gore-covered Varkemma pulled himself up the solid vertical tunnel through the armor until his head poked out the top an orange/purple mess in the center of a giant goo splat on the back of the Dumbo where all that material had been shot out.

“Juuma, Timnim, I need you. I’m through the armor, but can’t get to the head. My jewel is expended and I don’t have enough personal Essence to finish it.”

“Already on my way,” Timnim said, with his marker not appearing on the battlemap until he was within 200 meters of Puar.

The Trigorma pulled himself the rest of the way out, then began shooting with his armor’s weapons at the flying minions swirling around the top of the Dumbo, reserving his Essence for when they got too close to him. If he could take them down conventionally he would, because he didn’t want to become nothing more useful than a slightly larger Scionate.

“It’s resealing, hurry,” he urged.

“Oh that’s gross,” Timnim said, as he looked into the pool of goo down inside the armor, then he dove in head first, counting on his armor’s backup system to supply him with oxygen while he was under there. Puar stayed outside, swaying a bit as the Dumbo continued to move and rotate to get at the Scionate underneath that were distracting it. There was no way it could ignore the damage to its back, but its ears couldn’t rotate this direction and Puar was inside its point defenses for the most part, and it looked like Timnim had already cleared those nearest to his location.

The minion waves were almost to the Dumbo’s feet when it suddenly fell to the ground and ceased to move. Its ears were partially extended, making two huge walls dug into the ground protecting triangular sections of dirt on either side of it.

“I think Timnim did it,” Puar said over the comm.

“Where is he?” Keel’vo demanded, with his icon on the ground and pulling back into one of those triangular sections along with what looked like most of the Scionate. A few others were still roaming outside and shooting point defense batteries that hadn’t gotten the word yet that the Dumbo was dead. They must have had autonomic functions, or either this beast was not a single person, but a collection of minds fused into one body.

“The armor is blocking signals. My telepathy won’t get through either. Do you have enough reserves to hold here, or do we make a run for it?”

“We have to clear the residual anti-air defense, then we will be air lifted out,” a Scionate told them.

“What’s left?” Puar asked, then he got a number of target positions painted onto the battlemap.

“I’ve got them,” Juuma said, climbing up the side of the now still and mountain-like Dumbo. “Save your Essence Puar.”

“I will take one,” Puar argued, running away from the hole to another bump that was still active. He searched for a mind there, looking for an Essence signature as well, but found neither. These turrets had to be autonomic, or perhaps Timnim hadn’t destroyed the part of the brain that was operating them.

Puar used a Totanni technique instead of a disruptor to preserve energy, sucking heat out of the target until it became frigid inside the light armor on the ‘pimple.’ Then with a jerk of Essence-enhanced telekinesis he fractured whatever was inside and saw an immediate deflation of the bump as it retracted back a bit. They extended out when they needed to get more lateral firing angles, so he assumed this one was now inoperative, but he stayed near it for a moment to be sure, walking closer and closer to see if it would fire at him. When he stood directly on top of it and nothing happened he knew it was dead.

“Done,” Timnim said as he pulled his goo-coated armor out of the hole and made comm contact with the others again. “What now?”

“Hold till evac,” Puar said, running back towards him and over the descending side with Timnim following him. Eventually they just slid until freefall between the ear and the side, using their armor’s anti-grav to cushion their fall down to the dirt where the rest of the team was waiting and firing with their conventional weapons out into the bit of the minion wave visible approaching the triangle.

“Is he alive?” Puar asked of the downed Scionate.

“He is, but his Regenerator is broken, as is his front leg. We’ve stabilized him using ours, but it’s not a full heal. He remains unconscious and I don’t know why.”

“Pull his armor off. I can heal him,” Puar said, popping off the leg segments of his own to reveal his front two paws, one of which held the Varkemma symbol. Archon armor was retractable, but static armor like they all wore here was much stronger, and they’d decided they wanted the extra protection before coming down to the planet. Apparently the Scionate had felt the same way.

“You can?” Keel’vo asked.

“I can perform Jata’llo.”

“I will cover you,” the biped said, standing over both of them and creating an Essence shield that sat like an upside down cup over them.

Puar used his own Essence this time, pressing his paws against the now exposed shoulder blade of the Scionate that was missing both skin and muscle, along with part of the bone that had been burnt off, but the collision or the explosion had also fractured the leg bone enough that it broke in three other places, which he could see with his Fremmav vision as the weaponsfire at the opening of the triangle began to become frantic.

Juuma and Timnim were there with the rest of the Scionate, but the gap was wider than they all were between Dumbo ear and body, meaning they had a lot of territory to defend unless they all wanted to retreat back into the crevice further, which no one wanted.

Puar concentrated, trusting in the others enough not to even look or defend himself as he empowered his own immune system’s microbes and redirected them towards his paws, and through them into the Scionate. His Essence kept a link to them, and through it he sent some of his own biomatter to those locations and let the mystical power of Essence do the rest.

Those places regrew tissue using the material provided, and Puar had to pick the worst spots to repair, for he didn’t have any other source of material besides his body and the Scionate’s, which was smaller than his. Puar became faint after a few minutes and finally stopped after putting the leg bone back together and reconnecting the muscle tissue enough that the leg would work again, though how well was questionable.

Why the Scionate hadn’t woken was a mystery, but he woke him easily enough with a wash of his brain with a rejuvenating technique known as Smaoo. Puar put a paw on top of his head and used his telekinesis to hold him in place as he got his bearings, then he slowly let him get up.

“You are badly injured. Do not move quickly.”

“Status?” the Scionate asked after a few seconds.

“The Dumbo is destroyed and we are taking cover beside its corpse while we await extraction,” Puar answered as Keel’vo left them to join the fight at the entrance that was now piling up with minion corpses.

“What did you do?”

“Used my Essence to partially heal you,” Puar said, trying to keep from passing out. “I could not fully do so.”

“Thank you,” the Scionate said, gingerly standing on his feet and stepping on the armor segments that flew up onto his legs and attached to their mounts automatically, though he was missing a large section over the top of his injured leg. “Are you injured?”

“I am depleted,” Puar said, sitting on his hind legs as he tried to shore himself up, then a flashing alert in his helmet finally drew his attention. A large flashing green circle was superimposed on the ground to his left, which he was only able to see when he slowly turned his head, but even that movement caused him to stumble as he lost balance. Inside the circle was the icon for extraction, and the alert was a pull out order.

A couple more minutes of carnage at the entrance of the triangle bought them enough time for a dropship with skeet escort to fly over top of them and land inside the gap with the fighters staying up top and shooting constantly at stuff Puar couldn’t see. He dragged himself to his feet and wobbily walked to the descending ramp as Jumma came over and telekinetically lifted him off his feet and pushed him inside.

Puar slumped down on the deck as the rest of them climbed onboard, counting on the battlemap to see that everyone had made it. No one left behind and the target destroyed, assuming the dropship didn’t get shot down. He could hear impacts on the shields increasing in frequency, then they began to lift off even as the ramp was not fully retracted. He saw thousands of minions had poured through into the triangle, and while he had most of his own Essence left, he had no appetite to fight them.

He put his chin down on the ground and rested, waiting for his body to adjust to the lack of material he had pulled out to help the Scionate…then a pack of ration bars thumped down on the deck in front of him.

“Eat,” one of the Scionate said, though not the wounded one. They all had names, but he hadn’t bothered to learn any of them. “Recover your strength.”

Puar popped off his goo-covered helmet and immediately regretted it. The smell was horrid.

He telekinetically grabbed and peeled one of the ration bars, then stuffed it into his mouth whole before putting his helmet back on.

“We’re heading back to…orbit,” Keel’vo told him as a particularly nasty hit shook the dropship. “We will recharge our jewels there and be deployed again if needed. I assume you will not be able to?”

“If I had known we were going to be pulled out so soon I would not have done it,” Puar admitted after swallowing the last bit of the chewed up bar.

“Can the Regenerators replenish you with supplies?”

“I believe so.”

“Do not come with us until you are at full strength. It will weaken the group.”

“How many more Ultra minions are there?” he asked, not bothering to check the battlemap as he could barely keep his eyes open as his body begged for sleep.

“Several hundred, but not all are close to the cities. Some are weeks away. They cannot drop them off closer or the navy shoots them down. You will have a chance for more carnage later,” Keel’vo said with a touch of hilarity.

“Are you satiated?”

“I have found my calling. You?”

“I need to sleep.”

“Go ahead. I will carry you off the ship if needed. Even if you have the extra Essence, using it takes a toll. And you used far more than us. Rest,” the biped said, placing a mostly clean armored hand onto his goo slopped helmet. “Rest.”

Puar didn’t argue, giving in to his heavy eyelids and quickly losing consciousness…

When he awoke he was back onboard the Lantern ship, but two full days had passed. Medtech staff were around him and gave him a detailed explanation of how much damage he’d done to himself that had to heal up. Most of which had to do with his Essence use. The Vargemma had no experience using the amount he just had, but Star Force did and what he’d done was considered an ‘overdose.’

It was rare, but when someone used the full amount of a jewel while never having expended anywhere near that amount, their connection to their own Essence became strained and the need to rebalance resulted in a near coma. They asked about his Essence practice beforehand, and he had reluctantly admitted he had not done much because he didn’t want to waste the Essence. That was the Vargemma in him talking, and he knew it had been a mistake, for previously he just couldn’t fathom using so much for training alone.

He was ordered off duty and into supplemental training, for his Essence was still having trouble adjusting. It was locking down harder than normal, meaning it was more difficult to elicit an ‘Essence rush.’ If he forced his way through it then he might encounter other problems, so their Archon put him on a regimented Essence drill set that he was to follow precisely.

Feeling like a failure, Puar did as told this time as his fellow Varkemma made trip after trip down to the surface and returned with mostly victories. Some missions had to be abandoned before they would lose personnel, but one Varkemma named Tu’shu had died when a city was breached and he stayed behind trying to cover for last minute evacuations rather than retreat when prudent. It was said he didn’t want to leave any of the locals behind, and because he held to that he got himself killed by taking on too much.

People were dying all over the planet, and while they weren’t going to leave any Star Force personnel behind, they had to choose when and where to intervene with the locals or they’d end up getting themselves killed…and if they did that, who was to rescue those who needed it tomorrow? Or the next day? Or the next? Die here and you fail all future missions. Tu’shu had lost sight of that, as Puar had lost sight of the purpose of his training on the way out here. Both had made mistakes and paid for them, but Puar had lived through his.

He realized all the Varkemma were young, despite their age, in this war and were making rookie mistakes alongside veteran troops. But they were being sent here because they had powers that the others did not, and the risk was worth it to accomplish these missions. Star Force had not sent him in over his head, and he and Tu’shu had only died because they didn’t stick close enough to the empire’s lead.

Puar knew there was never any certainty in battle, but he also knew that war was unforgiving for rookies…and he was a rookie. No Vargemma had ever fought in a true war beyond the Caretakers, and he was very grateful that Star Force was keeping most of them alive through their rookie mistakes.

Nothing could be done for Tu’shu, but Puar was going to remember him. He had gotten to know him on the journey out here and he did not fault his aggressiveness to protect others, but when you fought a losing battle you had to focus on smaller objectives.

Puar did not insist that he be included on future missions. He waited until he was told he was ready, then he joined another quartet going down to the surface to help protect more evacuees as the portion of the planet under nominal Star Force control continued to shrink by the day.

Before, in the Temple, he had wanted to come here and kill as many Hadarak as he could. Now he felt like an entirely different Trigorma. He wanted to be here, but not to kill Hadarak. He wanted to do the work Star Force was doing…and that was saving lives. Killing the Hadarak was just a delaying mechanism and not the objective.

If the day ever came when they went on the offensive he would join those forces willingly, but only because it was a means to an end. And that end was protecting people, protecting the galaxy…not racking up a kill count.

When Puar boarded his second dropship to the surface he was no less eager, but he was more focused and now experienced, even if only having one mission completed. This was the hard work that Star Force did so that others could live, and so that others could live without ever knowing the horrors of the Hadarak. He did not want to be one that was shielded, he wanted to be doing the shielding and earning his keep, but he now understood one lesson that had been taught to him before.

Endurance was power here, not raw strength. Raw strength would die after several rounds of fighting. He and the others had to be survivors in order to save others, for there was no end to the Hadarak. More would always keep coming, so the objective wasn’t killing them all. It was surviving them. It was spiting them by denying them their targets. Every life saved was a defeat for the Hadarak, and Puar was now focused on racking up defeats.

And he wasn’t the only one, though no more Lantern ships came to System 3992007. They were all that they had, but more and more were coming out of the Temples and heading to systems that had no Essence support, and many more would be coming in the future. Cal-com was going to continue to provide a steady stream of those that were worthy to help Star Force in this never ending war.

And Puar was honored to be one of them.

www.aerkijyr.com

First Contact Fallout

1

March 29, 128797

Jamtren System (Era’tran capitol)

Holloi

It had been 238 years since Mak’to’ran’s death, and every one of them had been a downward slide for the V’kit’no’sat despite the fact that there was a long trail of dead Zak’de’ron across the galaxy marking their ‘successes’ in the war. If one was to measure by destruction, then the V’kit’no’sat had been winning…but the Hadarak did not wait for them to finish. More and more systems were being chewed up in their expanding purge and now even the bordering V’kit’no’sat systems were taking sporadic hits. Some had held, some had fallen, but nobody truly cared when the entire empire was in decay.

Mak’to’ran had held them together by many means, but first most was by purpose. Now with him passing that purpose was gone and all the V’kit’no’sat had left was vengeance, but vengeance wasn’t enough. Most of the planets in both warring empires had not changed hands, but their fleets had sought out each other and engaged the heaviest of targets early, leaving the V’kit’no’sat with less than 20% of their original strength now, and who knew how much the Zak’de’ron had left, but it wasn’t much.

Mario’topa was a Zen’zat assigned to Jamtren, the most secure Era’tran system within the galaxy. He had not been involved in any of the fighting, but had been watching events through the Urrtren as they filtered back across the galaxy. Oddly enough the Zak’de’ron had not taken it down, for perhaps it served them better by instilling despair in the millions of V’kit’no’sat worlds that had not yet been touched to see what had become of the others.

And Mario’topa felt despair. He felt it deeply, as did most others. If they survived this war the Hadarak would kill whoever was left. The mighty war machine the V’kit’no’sat had devoted millennia building up was now mostly spent, leaving more planetary defenses than warships and forcing the galactic map to stall its changes as the requirements to take new territory were overwhelming the mobile assets of either side.

It was a war of attrition and cunning now, and the V’kit’no’sat were outmatched, he thought. Mak’to’ran’s war plans had worked brilliantly, striking at the heart of the Zak’de’ron worlds and bypassing their servants. The information gathering operation prior to that had been massive, and Mario’topa had seen much of it as one of Mak’to’ran’s personal Zen’zat. He’d known the Zak’de’ron would sacrifice their servants to no end, so the dragons had to be targeted directly and immediately, but to do that they had to know where they were and Mak’to’ran seemed to have a sense of where to look. An extensive hit list had been composed, and when the targets were delivered to the fleet for the first preemptive attack, the Zak’de’ron had been caught completely off guard.

Their worlds burned, and so many of their race died it was thought that the war was going to be over far quicker than even Mak’to’ran had predicted in the best of outcomes, but the Zak’de’ron servants did not waiver, either because their leadership had not been completely destroyed or because of the discipline instilled in them. Regardless, the backlash had been just as bad for the V’kit’no’sat as key systems were targeted and annihilated in orbital bombardment with the Zak’de’ron rarely taking possession of them afterward.

Jamtren had not been targeted, but the Hjar’at capitol of Mavro had been the first hit and obliterated over the course of 2 years of fighting. The Zak’de’ron had spent so many resources doing it that Mario’topa could not believe their tenacity. Either they had far more ships hidden away in the galaxy than the V’kit’no’sat thought, or they valued that system for reasons beyond what the V’kit’no’sat understood.

The Hjar’at had always been the most militant of the V’kit’no’sat races, and when their leadership had been decapitated first off in the war it had a chilling effect on all the others. When the Zak’de’ron were finished with Mavro, there was nothing left to retake. Every world, every outpost in that system had been torched and ground into rubble. Not even the planetary defense stations had been spared. The Zak’de’ron had completely erased all technology from the system, leaving only ash and crater as testament to what had previously been a system of 903 billion Hjar’at and Zenzat.

After the initial purge of most of the Zak’de’ron population, things got worse and worse for the V’kit’no’sat, but it looked like they would be able to win the eventual war of attrition. As fleets were destroyed more ships were being made to replace them and the V’kit’no’sat had far more factories and population than the Zak’de’ron’s servants had, so it seemed the trend would snowball in their favor. It might have too, but that hard fought victory was denied to them when Itaru came under unexpected attack 189 years into the war.

Not a single Zak’de’ron ship was there, or even close to the capitol system. A great deal of its defense fleet had been pulled away for offensive operations, leaving the most heavily fortified system to rely on its static defenses that no-one in their right minds would attempt to take. It had seemed a worthwhile gamble with little downside, for the Zak’de’ron didn’t have enough ships to take it anymore, and the reinforcements flowing out from Itaru into the warfront were claiming many worlds while saving several of their own. But the cunning of the Zak’de’ron was not to be underestimated, and when the bulk of Itaru’s defense fleets were away fighting the war, the war found its way to Itaru in another form.

The independent Oso’lon and J’gar had struck the system together, using most of their galactic fleets for the invasion and losing nearly all of their ships to do so, but after 13 years of grinding war the last of the moons in the system…Solen’aic…finally fell. It was not obliterated the way the Zak’de’ron were doing to their conquests, rather it was taken, as were the rest of the worlds, including Wendigama, though at the end of it all there wasn’t much left to claim. 97% of the V’kit’no’sat population in the system had been killed and there wasn’t an intact planetary defense station left operational to steal, but the Oso’lon and J’gar now had the prize of all prizes, and no one was in a position to exploit their weakness and take it back from them, nor to strike their own worlds. Everyone was depleted, making any major moves in the near future impossible.

The Urrtren had remained up in Itaru for the entire decade-long battle, but the day it finally went dark in that location was when a handful of Zak’de’ron ships arrived to take their place in the newly rebuild Elder Conclave. They held a joint declaration with the Oso’lon and the J’gar, declaring the original V’kit’no’sat triumvirate had been reestablished in the ashes of Itaru, and from it the empire would be reforged to fight the Hadarak and hold at least a piece of the galaxy for their own against the unrelenting wave of carnage creeping its way into the broken empire.

They also indicated that the V’kit’no’sat races were being recalled to join them, without penalty for past actions on either side. The Zak’de’ron were absolving all who joined them from their treachery in this war and the previous one that had nearly destroyed them, because of the present Hadarak threat. Fighting each other would leave them all dead in the end, and only together could they survive. Then one of the Zak’de’ron by the name of Nil’horn demonstrated an act of telekinesis…without using Lachka. Various sensors were there to make witness, though they could easily be faked and everyone knew it. Still, this Zak’de’ron was claiming to have rudimentary Essence skills, which was something no V’kit’no’sat had, and after witnessing what Eldorat had done with such power, the effect of the potentially fraud display gave them a glimmer of hope regardless.

The Zak’de’ron alliance with the Oso’lon and J’gar was now reforged, and the Zak’de’ron had access to the magical power of Essence where the V’kit’no’sat did not. It made sense, in a way, that if they were to fight the Hadarak…who had Essence powers…or fight Eldorat’s masters who had the same, then they would need to fight with it as well…or forever be helpless against them. The Zak’de’ron were claiming only a small potential, but one that would grow with time and training. It was hope, and either out of misplaced loyalty or despair, several races and fractions of others were answering the call of Itaru once more.

Mak’to’ran’s alliance, his true V’kit’no’sat, were crumbling and even being denied their name as the Zak’de’ron reclaimed it for themselves. But the bad blood in the galaxy could not be overcome with such diplomacy, and most of the V’kit’no’sat worlds were defiant. There was no more coordination between them, though the Era’tran tried to maintain some cohesion with their neighbors, leaving the war as a free for all with sections of the Urrtren going dark and forcing information to reroute around the blackouts, further increasing the data lag.

Mario’topa didn’t expect it would last much longer, but the Zak’de’ron were probably leaving up the remaining pieces so the V’kit’no’sat worlds would know they had no hope of winning or remaining independent. What little strength the new triumvirate had was very publically going out and picking off small defiant worlds and conquering them. These they did not destroy, but beat down the defenses and seized the planetary populations to conscript back into their empire whether they liked it or not. They hadn’t tried taking on a major world for lack of resources since Itaru’s fall, and perhaps that was because they didn’t want to risk a defeat, but now that appeared to be changing.

Mario’topa had just received intelligence reports from Zen’zat scout ships loyal to the Era’tran that the Itaru V’kit’no’sat were sending an invasion force to Jamtren, and the leading elements were only 18 jumps away. They would be here within a few weeks, and like they did with the Hjar’at, the Zak’de’ron were going to try and take out the heart of the Era’tran race by destroying or capturing Holloi, the most sacred planet they possessed, and one that they’d reclaimed and restored from the Hadarak long, long ago after a devastating loss. They’d vowed never to lose it again, and it looked like the Zak’de’ron and their traitorous cohorts were intent on making them break that vow.

It wasn’t going to be an easy fight for them. Not just Holloi, but the entire system hadn’t been touched in this war to date. The defense fleet was small, but the fixed emplacements were many and the planetary shielding was robust. They’d have to punch a hole in it and mount a surface invasion to take the rest down, for there was no way they had enough firepower to simply overwhelm the planet.

Mario’topa sensed this might be the end for him and his masters, but he did not think it would be a slaughter. This would be an actual war, unless Itaru had far more resources than his scouts had told him. They might even be overreaching on this occasion, though he doubted it. If the Zak’de’ron were pushing this forward they must have believed they had enough to win, though like Itaru it might be a war that stretched out a decade or more.

If that was the case then he and the others would kill as many of the Zak’de’ron and the traitors as they could before they fell. There would be no surrender, and the Era’tran would not submit to Itaru now. None of their worlds had, and perhaps that was why Itaru was targeting them first. They had to break their resistance before it could inspire others to do the same. If the Era’tran, who had once led the new V’kit’no’sat, succumbed to the power of reborn Itaru, who else could effectively resist them with everyone hoarding what ships they had to defend their worlds or strike at those Zak’de’ron ones that were vulnerable in order to exact what little revenge they could here and now before the end finally came.

Or perhaps others felt that victory was still possible. Mario’topa did not know, but the numbers running back to embrace Itaru were an ongoing insult to all the Era’tran and Mak’to’ran had sought to build. He didn’t know what the Era’tran leadership was doing now, for he was out of the loop and stationed on planetary guard duty. It was a worthy task, but one far lower than he once held. If the Era’tran were to survive, Holloi had to stand. Even if the rest of the system fell, Holloi had to remain. Without it, the Era’tran would become outcasts again, and Mario’topa would not live to see that happen.

For without the Era’tran, the real V’kit’no’sat were lost. It would take millennia for Itaru to reconquer and absorb them all, perhaps longer, but it would be inevitable. And if this newborn triumvirate was true to form, they would not allow any former V’kit’no’sat world to remain independent. All would be reabsorbed or destroyed. Psionics were too powerful to be let loose into the galaxy, and what leniency Mak’to’ran had given to the Rim was now being undone. Itaru didn’t stand a chance against Star Force, but anyone else with V’kit’no’sat legacy was going to be on Itaru’s target list, and it seemed they thought they had the strength to start with the biggest and most heavily defended system left in the empire.

One way or another, this was going to be a hell of a fight. But the timing was horrible. The Era’tran needed more time to rebuild, and that was exactly what Itaru was intent on preventing them from having. Mario’topa’s beneficiary race had become a rival to the Zak’de’ron, Oso’lon, and J’gar, and it seemed they had no intention of sharing their restored power with the Era’tran. They would either retake their place as a subservient race or die free.

The call had already been sent out for all nearby Era’tran and allied ships willing to assist in the defense of Jamtren to rally here, but Mario’topa knew there wouldn’t be many that could come, for there weren’t many left in the galaxy, let alone in the surrounding region. The V’kit’no’sat were gutted, the Zak’de’ron and Itaru were gutted. There weren’t many warfleets left in the galaxy to fight with other than scraps and the few new ships coming out of the shipyards to be staffed with inferior crews, though those crews were highly sought positions. If one was going to die in this war they’d much prefer to do so in combat rather than survive to be captured and enthralled to Itaru, so the volunteer lines for military service were flush. Available ships were the main problem, though the shipyards here were working overtime to pump out replacements as fast as possible.

That left Jamtren with a small, but comparatively large fleet to supplement the planetary defenses. And if they pulled back inside the planetary shields as Mario’topa suspected they would, Itaru’s forces would have to bleed themselves dry to get at them. Which left the Zen’zat both dreading the coming fight and curious to see what the enemy would bring to the Era’tran. If they had underestimated them, then maybe they’d have a chance of holding and embarrassing Itaru early into their new reign…but Mario’topa’s gut told him otherwise. They were going to drop the hammer…for they had to. If they were leaving the Urrtren up for the rest of the empire to see, they had to win and win big to intimidate others into submission in order to scare them back into line before the Hadarak killed them all.

Jamtren had run out of time, and in a few weeks the fighting would start. Until then everyone would have a time of peaceful dread to consider their fate and how to face it. Though he could do little as a Zen’zat, Mario’topa would do his duty and fight to defend Holloi until the end, and try to stretch out that end as far as possible.

If the planetary shield held in most locations, Itaru’s forces would be constrained to surface fighting and the multitude of forests on the planet would give him and the other Zen’zat better cover than urban fighting. If they could eliminate the enemy’s largest weapons, they could make this fight an even affair…and giving the Era’tran and even fight was equivalent to a flag of surrender. They became inspired when victory was palpable, almost as much as the Hjar’at, which was why neither race could be allowed to prosper. They would only grow stronger and rally the more timid races to their side, but Holloi was not a place for the timid, and its 2.3g environment would take a toll on the invading forces if the fight could be pushed beyond the fleet and into the personal fighting that everyone on the planet would prefer over orbital bombardment.

He knew that was how it was going to go down, for even if Itaru had scrounged up enough ships to put a hole in the planetary shields they would not waste what they had bombarding the others and exchanging unnecessary fire with the surface batteries. Once they had their breach they would pour Zak’de’ron servants down onto the planet to die taking ground while their masters watched from afar, for no Zak’de’ron had been observed in personal combat since the start of the war. However few of them were left were keeping safely anonymous while their loyal troops died en mass to obtain their objectives.

Though he didn’t wish a larger fight, he hoped the Oso’lon would be sending troops of their own. The J’gar were aquatic and wouldn’t be fighting on land, but if the Oso’lon came down then maybe he’d have a chance for some personal revenge, for after all that had happened since the rebellion against the Zak’de’ron so long ago, it was beyond the height of treason for these insufferable long necks to rejoin with them and turn their back on the rest of the V’kit’no’sat. Leaving Mak’to’ran’s forces had been bad enough, but joining the most vile’s ranks and destroying Itaru in order to rebuild that which had been destroyed for a reason was insanity.

Did they actually think the Zak’de’ron wouldn’t betray them again after they rebuild their position in the galaxy? How stupid could the Oso’lon be? Or did it no longer matter, and was any port in the Hadarak storm worth fleeing to? Not to mention the threat from beyond the galaxy. Mario’topa didn’t know what their reasoning was and at this point he didn’t care. Any V’kit’no’sat rejoining the Zak’de’ron deserved to die, and he truly hoped he’d get a personal shot at an Oso’lon before he and the others ultimately fell in this insane war.

At least Mak’to’ran’s rimward experiment still lived, and would far into the future. The Hadarak wouldn’t make it there for thousands of years, and maybe by that point Star Force will have developed the strength to actually defend the galaxy on their own. They were the only hope now, for the V’kit’no’sat empire was done, one way or another. Mario’topa and the others were remnants of a formerly glorious past, and that’s how he and the other Zen’zat intended to die.

For if they could not protect Holloi from Itaru, let alone the galaxy, then they’d do it the service of removing as many traitors as they could in Mak’to’ran’s name. Beyond that the future was Star Force’s. Mario’topa’s end would be here, on Holloi, along with the Era’tran he’d sworn to serve long ago. It wasn’t a good end, but it was far preferable to what most Zen’zat in the galaxy were faced with, for Itaru had decreed that while the V’kit’no’sat races could rejoin them, their Zen’zat could not. All would be killed and replaced with the Zak’de’ron’s superior Bo’ja, and there would be no exceptions.

After all the Zen’zat had done loyally serving the V’kit’no’sat during their history, that was the ultimate betrayal by the Zak’de’ron, Oso’lon, and the J’gar. The original V’kit’no’sat had now fully cast them out, and a part of Mario’topa wished he’d gone rimward when he’d been offered the chance, but that was long ago and unobtainable now. Best not to look backward. There was killing to be done in the coming years and he needed to make the most of the opportunity. And whatever preparations could be made in the coming weeks should not be squandered. For once the enemy was here there would be no respite.

Mario’topa studied the scouting reports a bit more, then summoned the Zen’zat units he commanded and began to make preparations with others for an immediate counterattack against the first breach point in the planetary shields…as well as for the defense of the Zor’do facility to which he had been assigned two centuries ago and silently guarded in his isolation. He wouldn’t wait there for the enemy to come to them, but preparations needed to be made in case the Zak’de’ron and their cohorts landed nearby immediately. If not…and he hoped not…maybe the facility would be overlooked for years to come. It would be his personal last line of defense if he didn’t fall prior to it coming under attack, and if he did he needed to make sure those that held the line here were prepared for that fateful day whenever it came to this jungle valley.

2

February 22, 128799

Jamtren System (Era’tran capitol)

Holloi

Tu’vac walked out onto the open promenade that sat between the ring of buildings in the Zor’do, looking up at the jungle terrain beyond as his mind was elsewhere. The Era’tran had been wounded in the war, he’d been told, for he had no memory of it. He had woken up here 3 days ago, thrashing around inside a medical center restrained by force fields until he came to his senses…but he hadn’t entirely. There was a chunk of his mind that was missing, and he couldn’t help but search for it, so as he looked at the high ravine walls beyond the Zor’do he was really looking inward, and failing over and over again to find whatever it was he was lacking.

Tu’vac didn’t know where he was, but he knew a Zor’do was a healing facility for those a Kich’a’kat could not repair. Typically that meant Core issues rather than bodily hardware, but in his case it had been explained to him that his injury had left him in a coma that was fortuitous. Had he woken, the damage to his brain would have caused the Kich’a’kat he wore to replace the brain cells that held most of his memories with new blank ones. But because of the coma those cells were not being used and thus, while ‘damaged’ they were not malfunctioning so the Kich’a’kat had left them alone.

The missing part of his mind was intentional now, for the healers had locked it down so it would not suffer further damage. He was not wearing a Kich’a’kat, merely a robe with some monitoring equipment built in, and whatever parts of his suppressed mind were trying to be accessed would be the next cells manually revived and repaired. It seemed this was not the first few days since his coma, and that every so often he would have a treatment that would erase his current memories and he’d wake all over again…but with a few more of his old memories and skills recovered.

He’d been told that if all were unlocked now, the parts that had been permanently lost would create a cascade of malfunctions that would destroy the rest. At first he hadn’t even been able to walk, for pieces of his motor program were suppressed in the coma. Those he had reached for, trying to use, and those pathways were then tagged and manually repaired for the next session. They wouldn’t say how long he had been here, insisting on his need to focus on trying to remember himself, and that whatever they told him he’d forget anyway so there was no need to get too detailed. To Tu’vac it felt like this was the beginning, but apparently he was far along in his treatment.

How many sessions had he been through? No one here could tell him, for they had all arrived after him. He didn’t converse with many of the other denizens, for most here wanted to be left alone, as he did, but some had sought him out and given him what answers they could. They were all Era’tran, as were most of the healers. A few Zen’zat were around, but no other races. Tu’vac felt that was an important fact, but he couldn’t remember why. Many things bothered him that he could not remember, and more often than not he would roam out here to look at the horizon and the sky, wondering where he was and who he was, for that wasn’t even certain. He had no memory of his past life, but it was there just beyond his reach teasing him.

Tu’vac pressed for it again in his mind, feeling a stiff resistance that he could not move. He relented, as he always did, but it frustrated him. So much of him was missing, yet he couldn’t even isolate what that was. He’d been told his psionics were suppressed, and that was part of the itching sensation he felt inside his mind. They didn’t want him to hurt himself or others, but they also didn’t want him to damage his skills by trying to use them with incomplete mental software. The pieces of which had not been repaired yet, for they’d been focusing on the barest essentials first and progressing onward with each session.

It had been three days since he woke, and since then he’d been told to roam and relax. There were training facilities here, therapy pools, and telepathic counselors…the latter of which he could not use. But Tu’vac didn’t feel the need for any of them. He sought out isolation but did not want to be indoors. A part of him yearned for the jungle beyond, but he could not go there. The gates were shut and the guards were not to let anyone out without the healers’ permission, but he felt he needed to go. Something here was not right, for he could not rest. There was a spike in his mind that did not belong, and until he got it free he was vulnerable. His instincts told him that. And if he was vulnerable he did not want to be around anyone else that could take advantage of that weakness.

“Greetings, Tu’vac,” another Era’tran said vocally, as they all did to him, for his telepathy had been repaired enough to receive, but not to transmit. That too was locked down, but he had some memory of how to use it…which was how he knew it was unresponsive. He reached for that part in his mind but it was as if his mental claws were slippery and missed each time, but still he tried hoping he would eventually have success.

“I prefer to be alone,” he said stiffly, not looking at the female Era’tran who had been pestering him ever since he woke. She was one of the healers assigned to him, and he did not like her constant questioning.

“You always say that,” she said, circling around to stand beside him with her tail parallel to his. She was just as large, but without the numerous tattoos that Tu’vac had earned over the course of his life, though he couldn’t remember what they were for, only that they were significant. “But you need the interaction to help you remember. There is only so much you can accomplish alone.”

“Be quick about it, healer.”

“What troubles you today?”

“Can you not read my mind?”

“I cannot.”

Tu’vac finally turned his muzzle from the sky and looked at her directly. “Why not?”

“Your brain will not transmit back. That portion of you is currently disabled.”

“I have been shielded?”

“Shielded how?” she prodded.

“As a Zen’zat…” he said, stopping short as his mind slammed into the barrier again. He pressed against it in frustration, but it would not give way.

“In a way,” the healer said. “Their minds are permanently blocked without losing function. Your block is because you lack function. However the mechanism, the result is the same. I cannot sense your thoughts, so tell me what troubles you.”

“I do not wish to be near others,” Tu’vac admitted with a sneer as he turned his face back to the sky.

“Do you fear me?”

“I do not know who to fear or trust.”

“You do not remember, but I know you well. You need not fear me. You restoration is my mission, which is why I press you to remember now. The more connections you try to make, the better we will be able to restore that which is essential to you. You are guiding our path, Tu’vac, so you must be prodded to explore the boundaries of your thoughts.”

“I was doing so before you interrupted me.”

“What else is bothering you?” she asked, sending a wave of telepathic soothings to him that ate away at his resistance, but the spike in his mind did not relent.

“I feel there is something inside me that should be removed, but I cannot find it. What was my injury?”

“Nothing that could leave behind residue. Your brain did not take the hit, your heart did. Lack of blood caused the coma. By the time the Kich’a’kat repaired it and restored the flow, your mind was locked down in emergency survival protocols. Had it not been you would have been reduced to a hatchling and retrained from the beginning. But so long as your memories are there we are going to try to retrieve them…most of them,” the healer corrected. “Some have been permanently lost, but the experience gained over millennia is worth spending some time to recover, for it will be far quicker than starting over again.”

“I am fatigued but cannot rest, yet I do nothing to be fatigued. I do not understand this.”

“Then perhaps you do need to do something.”

“May I go into the jungle?” he asked, looking at her again.

“To do what?”

“Explore.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Perhaps so. You have never asked to do that before. Do you promise to stay with me and return when I say?”

“Bargain accepted.”

“Very well. Follow me then,” she said, stomping off on her heavy bipedal strides with her tail swaying behind her just above the paved promenade so it would not drag.

Tu’vac was relieved to follow her, and when they came to the gates and he was allowed to pass through a tiny bit of the resistance in his mind gave way. Most was still there, but he felt freer here than inside as the pair slipped into the foliage and disappeared beneath the greenery on one of several well worn paths.

“Others come out here?”

“Zen’zat mostly, but they keep the trails large enough for our use.”

Tu’vac sniffed the air, which was unprocessed and raw with the scent of life and decay. The Zor’do must have had an atmospheric shield covering it to keep the scents out. Perhaps it also had a…

He huffed. Yet something else he knew but could not remember.

“Are you feeling better?” the healer asked after a few minutes of trail hiking, all of which occurred below the canopy in the shade where most of the sunlight could not reach.

“Moderately so.”

“Explain please.”

“A coolness.”

“In your mind or body?”

“Mind. It is small, but present.”

“Interesting. Perhaps I should have brought you outside sooner. Is the terrain familiar to you?”

“No.”

“Does it feel safe?”

“It feels anonymous.”

“And you wish to run away into it where you can think things through alone?”

“You said you could not see my thoughts.”

“We have spoken many times before. From those talks I know some of your thoughts because you have told me of them. I am extrapolating now. I cannot let you go alone, but we can run if that would help?”

“Will you let me lead?”

“Stay on the paths,” she said, stepping aside and crushing brush to make room for him to slide past.

Tu’vac didn’t hesitate, and that surprised him. It was almost as if his body moved on its own while his mind struggled to process. Before he knew it he was running with heavy strides in the…high gravity. That he could remember. He wasn’t tired, the gravity here was heavier than most planets, but it was no different than inside the Zor’do. Why hadn’t it been altered there?

He ducked down to travel underneath a branch as thick as his arm that had not been removed, his muzzle staying parallel to the ground as his back flattened out. It was an old trick that caused him to stumble now, but his feet felt the curvature of the stones in the crude pathway that appeared to have been hand laid in a somewhat erratic pattern, and with that feel came an immediate response adjusting his stride.

“Good. Your balance is improving,” the healer said from behind as she kept pace.

Tu’vac ignored her and continued to run through twists and turns until he came to a long downward slope that was more or less straight. He stretched out his legs and increased speed, feeling his muscles warm in protest until halfway down where their fatigue did manifest and caused him to misstep. Tu’vac’s right foot caught one of the tiny stones, prying it out of the ground as he crash/rolled forward and spun multiple times before his tail slapping on the ground stopped his momentum.

His head hit the ground multiple times, and he almost felt like the spike in his mind was coming loose when it did…but then the firmness returned as did his vision and balance.

“Can you get up?” the healer asked.

Tu’vac huffed, then stood back up easily. He thumped his tail twice on the ground to insure his balance held, then before the healer could ask another question he took off running downhill again, this time at a more secure pace.

The Era’tran ran and ran until his legs could take no more. Tu’vac knew they should, that they were weak beyond the norm, but he had to kneel down and lean back as he breathed heavily, looking up through the trees and the tiny pinpricks of sunlight that made their way down through them.

He stayed there for more than a minute, unmoving aside from the heaving of his chest, then the healer reached out and tapped him on the side of the neck with her claw.

No response.

“Tu’vac?” she asked, tapping harder, but he stood staring at the sky lost in thought as he had many times before. His mind was now in an endless loop that could not be broken, meaning he had reached for something new and didn’t find enough pieces to process it, but enough to stick on.

There was nothing she could do to bring him out of it. They’d have to take him back to the lab and do another restart.

Mario’topa, she said telepathically to the jungle, knowing the Zen’zat would be somewhere nearby.

I am here.

Bring a barge. He has seized up again.

That was fast.

He has not wanted to run before. I believe too many memories are tied to it. This session will be a longer one.

The more progress the better. We are on our way now.

The healer waited until a floating platform slightly wider than the trail pushed its way to them, carving out new sidewalls as it did. A combination of the healer’s telekinesis and the muscle of the Zen’zat precluded her need to drag Tu’vac onto the barge, instead allowing him to be somewhat respectfully floated there and set down as his eyes continued to stare out into nothing as his mind fought to work its way around the lockdown.

“How far away are they?” she asked the Zen’zat.

“Vitolor is under assault. I do not think it will last the year, but they are not passing beyond it yet. I think they want to eliminate the strongpoint before sweeping up the easier targets.”

“I need more time.”

“I do not know how to give it to you,” the Zen’zat said apologetically as 6 of his kin took up guard positions around the barge as they disappeared into the jungle, with far more others out in a defensive perimeter around the facility. “How soon do you want to evacuate?”

“I cannot take the equipment with us, so we stay as long as possible. Evacuate the others when you deem necessary.”

Mario’topa nodded. “They can stay a while longer, but when they leave I will make sure it looks as if we are abandoning the facility. Maybe Itaru’s forces will pass us by if they believe so.”

“Try,” she said, stepping up onto the barge and flying it down the pathway so not to destroy the tree cover overhead. They might need it later if they had to abandon the facility on foot.

3

May 3, 128800

Jamtren System (Era’tran capitol)

Holloi

Sol’an knew they were at the end, but she still couldn’t believe it as she ran down from the central control building and out across a piece of the promenade to the entrance into another building as the sky was bathed with anti-air fire. The first Itaru ship…she would not call the traitors V’kit’no’sat…had been caught off guard by the ‘abandoned’ facility and forced down in the nearby jungle. The Zen’zat defense team had then intercepted and terminated the survivors, but hours later more troop transports had arrived to replace them. Too many for the defenses to hold out against.

The main turret was unopposed, as the transports were coming in low and mostly skimming beneath its field of fire up to the western ridgeline that was shielding them. There they were depositing an assortment of infantry from the Zak’de’ron servants, which the Zen’zat were harassing as best they could as they approached the facility to give Sol’an time to get Tu’vac out of here.

There was no way to carry his pod. She was going to have to revive him and take their chances. He wasn’t ready. Far from it. But this was the only play they had left. His survival was paramount, but the female Era’tran didn’t think their odds were winnable. Still, she had to try.

Sol’an moved through the large corridors quickly, slapping her tail a few times on the abrupt corners she was running around until the Era’tran came to the locked doors to the lab where Tu’vac was being held. She input the access codes telepathically then pressed her skull against the doors to register a genetic sample. When she pulled back the doors parted, giving her access to a small, but very high end genetics laboratory the like of which existed nowhere else in Era’tran territory.

Standing in null gravity inside a clear capsule Tu’vac floated in an upright position. He was kept in partial stasis as Sol’an painstakingly tried to revive his mind one cell at a time over the previous two centuries, and while much had been accomplished she needed at least an additional third to get him stable. She estimated 450 years until full recovery of remaining affected tissues, leaving him woefully unprepared for what he was about to face.

Sol’an triggered the revival process and activated the restriction fields, and as was typical Tu’vac thrashed around violently as he woke, fighting an unseen battle or just random actions as his brain tried to reassert itself with so many blocks intact. She’d never figured out which was the case.

“Tu’vac calm down and be still!” she said while also sending as much telepathic tranquility as she could. “You are alive but in danger. Focus on the moment and regain your sanity.”

The thrashing stopped immediately, to the surprise of Sol’an. That had never happened before, but then again she had never said those words, for before today they were not in danger. Perhaps he responded better to that stimuli.

“Where am I?” he asked groggily, his head twitching as it always did as he tried to access locked portions of his brain.

“You are in a Zor’do. You suffered light brain damage that we believe is curable without wiping your memories. The afflicted areas are currently locked down while we isolate and repair them manually, but there is no time for that. This facility is under attack and if you are not able to flee you will be left here to die. Pull yourself together Era’tran. We must move now while the Zen’zat buy us time.”

“Who is attacking?” he asked, trying to move against the force fields unsuccessfully.

“Much has happened since you were injured. The Zak’de’ron have allied with the independent Oso’lon and J’gar, and they are warring on the V’kit’no’sat. We are on Holloi and they currently have an invasion force on the planet, but their progress is slow. Unfortunately their initial landing point was in this region of the planet, and now their forces are upon us. We must move. Do you have enough control of your body to stand?”

“Release me and we will find out,” Tu’vac said stoicly, then his weight returned to his feet and he took several slow steps out of the pod and onto the lab floor, looking around with an intensity Sol’an had never seen before. “Armor?”

“We have none here, and the Zak’de’ron have too many soldiers to fight. We are being bought time to flee, after which the Zen’zat will fall back and try to survive. The sooner we get clear the more of them…”

“Go,” Tu’vac ordered, though Sol’an was not sure how much of this he was processing. She wasn’t going to debate any further and moved to the doorway, feeling Tu’vac following her in her Pefbar. She had to remember that his was suppressed, so he could not see what was occurring behind him.

“Follow me. Do not get distracted. Do not attempt to help in the combat. Stay right on my tail,” she said, accelerating to a slow jog and glad to see that Tu’vac was able to keep up. They moved through the facility to a different exit, then had to cross through the night air as the sounds of suppressive fire from the now elevated turret were crashing down into the jungle surrounding the facility.

They ducked across to another building and traveled inside it in order to get to the jungle edge, then Sol’an unlocked a heavy sealed door that led to a wall of plants filling in the gaps between the mighty Jumass trees.

Push through, she said telepathically to diminish the noise, though she couldn’t sense anyone near this side of the compound, and Mario’topa had indicated the assault was occurring on the far side.

Sol’an stayed in the lead, crushing underbrush with every step until they got deep enough that the sunlight couldn’t penetrate during daytime to sufficient levels, leaving only small plants and visible sightlines through the mass of tree trunks. That allowed them to move quicker, though they still had to wiggle through many tight areas. This jungle hadn’t been designed for body types of their size to move through quickly, rather it had been allowed to free grow randomly beyond the Zor’do.

Tu’vac stayed quiet and followed Sol’an as the sounds of battle grew fainter and fainter, but the turret stopped firing entirely before they got out of earshot, which was a bad sign. With no weapons other than the single Dre’mo’don strapped to Sol’an’s right arm, the two Era’tran were vulnerable should they be caught, for there was little room to fight amongst the trees that would essentially pin them in place while the smaller infantry surrounded them. They could fight here, knocking some down to create a makeshift arena, but they’d be stuck there and enemy reinforcements would eventually overwhelm them. Running was their only hope.

Sol’an kept them moving until they were out of the artificial canyon that had been carved into the planet to shelter the Zor’do. With the higher gravity there wasn’t much in the way of natural terrain on the planet, leaving their trek ahead on mostly flat ground. The question was, where to go? The Zen’zat had set up several evacuation plans for them, but without access to the Urrtren or even the tactical grid…which could potentially be tracked…Sol’an had no way of knowing where the enemy was or where friendly units were aside from their last known positions.

“Where are we going?” Tu’vac asked once they stopped for a breather as Sol’an studied her options using the crown-like data ring she wore on her head.

“As far away from here as we can get,” she said amongst the nocturnal chirps of the Saipenna. “But first we need to get to a dead drop. We left several around the perimeter in case evacuation on foot was required, but most take us back the way we came. There are two ahead. One near and one far, but the one far is more in line with our current trajectory.”

“And after?”

“I don’t know. We needed to stay in the facility to continue your healing. At this point we’re just trying to stay alive and hope the planet can hold out. If it doesn’t…we’ll have to hide as long as we can.”

“Why can’t I…use my claws? I feel like I should be.”

“Your psionics are deactivated because part or all of the memory cells associated with them were damaged. They weren’t the highest priority to heal when you couldn’t even stand up on your own two feet.”

“What else can I not do?”

“A lot. I am sorry, you are not ready for this, but we have no other options. Surrender means death or enslavement. For the Zen’zat it means immediate execution. Itaru had decreed they all must die and will be replaced with their cursed Bo’ja.”

“Replaced how? Are we not at war?”

“Itaru is calling on all races to return to its leadership. The Era’tran and others have refused, but not all. The empire is fractured and failing. Only legacy defenses are keeping Itaru from sweeping it all up.”

“What are legacy defenses?” Tu’vac asked, and Sol’an could see the strain in his face as he tried to remember.

“Large, permanent defensive infrastructure that cannot be moved from system to system. The war fleets on both sides have been mostly destroyed, so Itaru cannot conquer many planets, though they are pouring a great deal of what they have left into this assault.”

“Are we losing?”

Sol’an bowed her head in shame. “Yes. I do not know what to do. There are no ships nearby to evacuate you from the planet, even if we could get through their blockade. And even then I do not know where we could go. Holloi was the safest place in the galaxy, which is why you were brought here, but now…I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

“Does the dead drop have armor?”

“I don’t think so, but I don’t know for sure. The Zen’zat set it up. They said they couldn’t get any armor. Everything was deployed to the fighting troops.”

“Then our next objective is clear. We get to the dead drop, and the more distance we can put between us and the facility the less likely it is we will be followed.”

“That makes sense,” Sol’an said, glad and partially relieved to get a bit of wisdom out of him, both for his sake and the fact that he had far more combat training and experience than her, though most of it was locked up inside his brain inactive. “Are you tired?”

“I can continue at our previous pace. Move on.”

Sol’an turned and aligned with the trajectory on her mental display. The ring didn’t produce a hologram that others could see, but superimposed it on her own vision within her mind. She had a navigational program that would lead her to anywhere on the planet within the database, but the location of the dead drop was known only to her and a handful of the Zen’zat…and they had kill programs in their armor that would wipe the locations from their armor’s memory in the event of their death, so hopefully no one would be able to know where they went. And with the primary defense shield still up over top this region, the enemy couldn’t scan down on them from orbit. Only local units operating beneath the shield would be able to spot them.

But if that shield came down…or when…their heat signatures would stand out amongst the jungle even if the trees did obscure them from most view, for the leaves were not thick enough to hide all of it.

The female Era’tran took off running again, heading towards a nearby stream that they came to a few minutes later. They turned north and traveled in the stream for nearly half an hour before heading back into the jungle again. They broke so many branches and left such large tracks that they were essentially making a path everywhere they went, and the more bodies of water they could travel through the more breaks in that trail there would be. Meaning that if anyone followed them they wouldn’t know which way they went when they came to the streams, for the water would wash away their footprints and there would be no heavy limbs overhead to break as they passed…usually.

A few more hours and they’d be at the dead drop, but it looked like the sunrise was going to beat them to it…

Mario’topa lunged for the Bo’ja, tackling him at the ankles as he fired his wrist-mounted weapons at another Zen’zat. He emitted a Fornax field as soon as he made contact, which disrupted the enemy long enough to get him in a stranglehold from behind, peeling his weapons off their target and allowing his fellow Zen’zat to close in and put multiple shots into the Bo’ja’s helmet…enough to eventually get through the armor and kill him.

Mario’topa pushed the body off him and got to his feet as two more of his Zen’zat caught up to him on the inner perimeter of the Zor’do. As they did another enemy transport flew in and set down inside, disgorging how many more infantry he didn’t know, for they couldn’t see, but it was clear that they were not going to survive if they continued to stay here.

No Oso’lon had showed up. No large Viks either, let alone a Zak’de’ron. It was all small races from their employ, so there wasn’t even a single traitor here to avenge the Era’tran against. Just hordes of meaningless troops too green to be worth a damn. Even the Bo’ja were not as good as advertised, though they were by far the most competent. But against Zen’zat with countless millennia of combat experience, they were severely outclassed and being used as fodder to draw out or weaken the indigenous forces as more and more transports arrived in the system and poured down through the small safe zone that had been carved out of the planetary defenses.

It may have been an effective strategy for the enemy, but it wasn’t the way V’kit’no’sat fought. Mario’topa would die if necessary to achieve a mission objective, but he wouldn’t waste his life. He’d been trained not to, for if he died they’d have to bring in someone new out of the Ter’nat worlds and train them all over again to get back to his level of experience. The empire needed strength, not suicide squads, but it seemed the Zak’de’ron didn’t care how many they lost so long as they succeeded in wearing down the Era’tran and eventually claiming the planet.

And for the Bo’ja, at least, their replacements were coming from the Rim, and the strike force that had been sent there to deny the flow of reinforcements had been thwarted by the Voku that spawned the Bo’ja. Thus the Zak’de’ron’s supply of their least worthless infantry was still flowing generously.

I don’t see any more easy targets, Ben’ra said to the trio as they repositioned around a corner in a little nook amongst the streets between buildings. What now?

I have one more charge left, Lenna said, referring to the explosive inside her pack.

Save it, Mario’topa said angrily, but his ire wasn’t directed at his fellow Zen’zat. We have to leave while we still can.

Why? Jo’ra asked.

We have another mission.

The wounded Era’tran? he guessed.

Yes. If we can catch them. But we have to make sure we’re not followed first, so we’re going to split up and rendezvous here, he said, sending them a new waypoint on their regional map. If you’re followed, go anywhere but here. If you get clear, run your asses off. The Era’tran can move faster than us over open ground, but we can catch up in the jungle.

Is there something special about that one, or are we just keeping them alive to spite Itaru?

There is something special. And the enemy cannot know it, he said, looking at the other three sets of Zen’zat helmets through his own. Tu’vac must survive.

Survive how if we lose the planet? Why wasn’t he evacuated earlier?

Was there a safer place than this to send him?

Somewhere not being invaded, Ben’ra pointed out.

The spacelanes are being hunted by J’gar interceptors. Anything less than a battlegroup isn’t safe to move around with. Believe me, we wanted to move him, but there weren’t any good options and this Zor’do had the only equipment that could treat him.

Explain that, Jo’ra insisted, but they didn’t have time. The proximity sensors they’d left on several of the buildings picked up scout drone activity just before they were blasted offline.

Survive and ask me later. This is where we part, he said, reaching out a hand and putting it on Jo’ra’s shoulder. Disappear, he ordered.

As instructed Jo’ra’s body disappeared from view, for he was wearing specialized scout armor with a cloaking device. He couldn’t fight with it active, but now they didn’t need to. They needed to run, and soon the other two Zen’zat disappeared as well, with Mario’topa giving them a head start, for none were transmitting even the faint identification signals for each other to pick up, and he didn’t want to trip over them by accident.

He took one last look at the quiet night sky as the first lightening was beginning to appear on the horizon. The stars were still visible overhead, but amongst them were the enemy warships ringing the planet outside of Holloi’s attack range. Any ship trying to leave the planet would be intercepted by them, and unless what was left of the Era’tran fleet beneath the shields came out to fight a blocking action no one was getting out of here alive.

But Holloi was a big planet, and even if the enemy took down all the shield generators a single Zen’zat with scout armor could disappear here indefinitely…so long as he didn’t run out of supplies or power. Mario’topa much preferred direct combat, but this war couldn’t be won by killing more Bo’ja. It was going to take something far greater than that. And Tu’vac was the only chance he figured the empire had of surviving. Without him, they were doomed to either death by Itaru or death by Hadarak.

Mario’topa had to catch up to him, but first he had to figure out which way he’d gone, and that meant finding the tracks on the perimeter that the large bipeds had no way to conceal on the semi-soft ground…

4

“Here,” Sol’an said as her visual navigational display brought them to a grove of trees too tight for an Era’tran to fit inside, but her Pef’bar could already see the cargo canisters stashed between the various gaps. “Our supplies.”

Tu’vac tried to reach out with his mind and touch them, but it was as if his ability to do so was merely a figment of his imagination.

“How are we to get them out?”

“I can,” she said, telekinetically pulling on one and dragging it over another before rolling it across a branch and letting it fall to the ground. Her Lachka wasn’t strong enough to fully lift it, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t maneuver them around into the clear. Sol’an also used her invisible ability to open the seal on it and reveal trays of food cubes. She broke out several and floated them towards Tu’vac.

“Eat,” she said, but he would not open his mouth.

“I can feed myself. Set them down.”

The food cubes floated to the ground and stacked themselves there, soon to be joined by others as the healer added more from the container to the pile building on top of the moist soil. Tu’vac knelt beside it and reached down with his right hand, picking up several in his palm before standing up again and flicking them into the air above his head.

He tilted it to the side and let them fall between the two halves of his mouth, then he clamped shut before they could pass out the other side again. Tu’vac righted himself and chewed for a moment before swallowing and looking at her.

“What is wrong?”

“I’ve never seen you eat like that before.”

“How did I eat before?”

“You licked them up with your tongue or bit them out of the suspended air racks.”

“I do not feel like licking the ground,” he said, grabbing a few more and tossing them up again. His aim was spot on, and not a one of them fell past his bite.

“We have traveled far longer than you have done before. You need food and rest. I will keep watch.”

“We will split the watch,” he differed.

“No, you must sleep.”

“Why?”

“If you overload your mind may seize up, and I don’t have the proper equipment to treat you.”

“Explain.”

“If your mind reaches for something it can’t access and keeps trying repeatedly you will get stuck in an unfulfilled loop and not be able to do anything else. It has happened many times before and requires a treatment. I cannot give you that here.”

Tu’vac ate another handful of food cubes. “So you are saying that I will become helpless if I do not rest?”

“It may happen even if you do. We had no choice but to run from the Zor’do. I am just trying to keep us alive as long as possible. I do not know what to do.”

“Will I come out of the loop eventually?”

“I have never let you linger enough to know. Unlocking the thought you were trying to access was the preferred course of dealing with the malfunction.”

“Am I not to think?”

“Try not to focus on anything you don’t already know.”

“I am unsure how to do that.”

“I know, Tu’vac. I know. Do your best.”

“My best is not the objective. What else is in this dead drop?”

Sol’an pulled out 22 more containers, each of small size and carryable by Zen’zat. Most were food and two were water. The rest were survival equipment, including a tent, but setting up one here was not a good idea.

“Does that tent have camouflage capabilities?” Tu’vac asked.

“I don’t know,” the healer said, well outside her area of expertise. She activated and read through the holographic instructions, which included a feature list. “Thermal masking and minimal sensor absorption.”

“That is where we will sleep, unless we are to move on. What is our…options?” he said, struggling to find the word.

“We can try to find other Era’tran, or I guess we can hide out here, or we can keep running and not look back. I’m sorry. Tactics is not my specialty.”

“Is it mine?”

“I’m told it was.”

“We cannot live on these supplies forever. We must gain more. Either from allies, enemies, or from scavenging. Are there any other abandoned facilities within range that we could use?”

“I haven’t updated in a while,” Sol’an said, using her halo to bring up an active status map. “I didn’t want to register to the enemy.”

“Have they compromised our communications?”

“I don’t know.”

“You should be able to receive position data for all our units.”

“Won’t the enemy be able to use that?” she asked, then cringed as she saw his brow crunch up in thought.

“Maybe they could. I am sorry. I do not know why I didn’t think of that.”

“Old data then,” she deferred, triggering a visible hologram for them both to look at that hovered just above the short plants that covered the jungle floor around the grove of large trees. “That’s where we were…and this is where we are now.”

“I thought we had traveled farther than this,” he said with shame.

“You are tired?”

“I am.”

“Your strength will recover with time. You have not been able to train in two centuries. That is why your body is weak.”

He looked away from the map in shock. “Why did you not have me use my body?”

“Most of that time you could not control your body enough to train. Since you regained some ability we have been waiting until more memories were recovered. That is what is holding you back. Your body will be easy to retain afterwards.”

“Stagnation kills, healer,” Tu’vac criticized. “Even you must know that.”

“Priorities, my friend. Priorities. There is much you do not remember, and that is a far greater weakness we were trying to cure.”

“How was I injured?”

“In battle. Your heart was damaged. By the time it was repaired your brain went into a coma from the blood loss. Had you woke from it the Kich’a’kat would have replaced your damaged memory cells with blank new ones. It was a fortuitous accident that did not happen. It has allowed us this opportunity to recover most of your memories in time.”

“But not all?”

“Some cells were so badly damaged the data they contained was permanently lost,” she said, gesturing back to the map. “Do you see anywhere we can go?”

“There is nothing here.”

“What about this?” she asked, highlighting a small dot.

“Comm tower. If we want to stay hidden sending a message would be unwise. Or can we call for pickup?”

“I was told no. We would have had a ship at the Zor’do, but the Era’tran no longer control the airspace here. It would be intercepted and shot down.”

“Then we cannot reveal our presence. Even an…secret message could be used to locate us.”

“I see nothing else.”

“Nor do I. Expand the map.”

Sol’an did as instructed, then a few more dots popped up. “That is too far to travel.”

“Are we in a hurry?” Tu’vac asked seriously.

“I don’t know. If they are following us then we are. If we escaped cleanly then no we are not.”

“Ask questions.”

“About what?”

“If I am not to think about what I do not know, you must direct my thoughts. Ask questions.”

“If there is nowhere to go, how do we survive?”

“We can harvest water using the equipment here. For food we can harvest leaves from the trees and the converter will provide most of the food cubes we need, but some special nutrients we will lack. We can live here for an extended period of time if we are not detected.”

“How can we avoid detection?”

“If they come close we cannot. Our hope is remoteness. Where is the most remote place in proximity?”

“The Zor’do was located in a remote region. There is nothing else out here. We are already remote.”

Tu’vac twitched his head, and for moment Sol’an thought he was about to seize up again, but he did not. Rather, he had an insightful thought.

“What will the enemy do with the Zor’do? Do they want it, or wish to deny it to us?”

“There is nothing there of combat value.”

“Could they use it to heal their wounded?”

“They have Kich’a’kat, as far as I know. They have no need of it. The Zor’do is for emotional and non-physical wounds.”

“Why was I brought here then? Is not my cell damage physical?”

“Healing your wound is software related more than physical. The information from each memory cell has to be analyzed, uncorrupted, and if recoverable rewritten onto a new cell. A Kich’a’kat cannot do that. It could only replace memories on file, which there are none for you.”

“Why are there none?”

“We do not keep memory files unless specifically requested by the individual.”

“Why not?”

“Privacy. And what would be the need? Your condition is improbable. It has only occurred a few times in V’kit’no’sat history.”

“Why am I different?”

“You are lucky. I cannot explain further than that.”

“Is it possible that they will search then abandon the facility?”

“I do not know what they will do with it.”

“If they abandon it, we can return and you can continue with my recovery, correct?”

“Possibly, if the equipment is intact. They may have destroyed it. And we can’t know if they abandon the facility without going there to check. If we do and they are there, they will find us. We cannot risk it.”

“Do we not have Zen’zat? I thought we had Zen’zat.”

“They fought while we escaped.”

“Did they all die?”

“I do not know.”

“Do they know where we have come?”

“Not specifically. But some know the location of the dead drops.”

“Will they search us out?”

“If they live. I do not know if any did.”

“Then we stay here. If they find us, we will use them to scout the Zor’do. If we cannot go back, we will survive here.”

“And if we’re followed? Shouldn’t we keep moving on? Maybe to another dead drop?”

“Can you do anything now to help with my mind? Keep me from malfunctioning again?”

“Some small things. Not enough, I’m afraid.”

“Then we stay here and I will rest. You will try to keep me functioning. We will wait for the Zen’zat.”

“If they don’t come, are we going to stay here forever?”

“We can decide then,” Tu’vac said, gesturing with his nose to the equipment. “Put up the tent. I cannot do it well with my claws.”

“Are you near to passing out?” Sol’an asked, already knowing the answer.

“My mind is watery.”

“We stay here then. Do not force your mind, go with the flow but remain on your feet. That should keep you from passing out entirely,” she said, telekinetically reaching for the tent and pulling it over to her…then there was a thud and she turned to see Mak’to’ran lying on his side on the ground.

She kept the tent floating beside her and moved to place her foot on his chest, making flesh contact that allowed her to get inside his mind better than her limited equipment would. Then she sighed with relief, realizing that he was merely asleep and not locked up. The sudden journey out here must have been more harrowing than she thought, and without the adrenaline of constant movement his fatigue had overcome him.

Sol’an went about deploying the tent, having to break some tree branches to make room, but being sure not to cut through the vertical canopy that was giving them visual cover. When she finished she had to drag him inside, for he would not wake up and he was far too large to fully lift with her Lachka, but she managed. Once he was inside she joined him, sealing up the tent but keeping watch with her Pefbar beyond as she used her limited equipment to monitor his mental fluctuations as much as possible.

She didn’t think he could go more than a day or two before locking up, but then again they were in new territory here. Maybe they would get lucky and some unknown factor present in this wilderness activity would be more applicable to his normal life than roaming around a Zor’do…but she doubted it. At least they were out of harm’s way for the moment, but they were operating on borrowed time now, and no matter how hard she tried, doom was knocking at their door. All her hard work over the previous years was about to be wasted because they had simply run out of time.

Sol’an would had traded her life in exchange for this mission being successful, but it looked like she was soon to lose both…and there was nothing she could do to stop either from occurring, which was the most maddening part about their current situation.

An Itaru transport flown by Zak’de’ron servants landed on the promenade inside the Zor’do, and out of the rear hatch came several dozen infantry along with one larger individual. It was a Pak’lem, similar in size to a Brat’mar but without the head plate and horns. Instead it had a very shallow ridge of psionic tissue along its back that bubbled up like a callous and was hard as stone. It was a gift from the Zak’de’ron to their race for their long service to the dragons, and it contained many different abilities.

Gon’zu walked off the transport and sniffed the air, smelling the residue of recent battle and blood…all of which felt wrong. This facility was supposed to have been abandoned months before, but a fierce, if not small fight had taken place, and not for no reason. Something about this Zor’do was important, and with the planet slowly being taken over by the V’kit’no’sat forces, of which the Pak’lem were now a major part of, there wasn’t much that mattered that wasn’t war related.

So what was here that could be? Gon’zu already had briefing reports updating to his cranial implants from the troops on site. They had not been relayed before, given the jamming operations the Era’tran employed whenever possible to interfere with the implants. They’d found a way to adjust their own communications into a range that the Zak’de’ron’s servants did not use, and had been effective at jamming medium to long range messages with malicious code rather than static. Enough to garble, if not disrupt those receiving, meaning Gon’zu had to rely on short range updates only.

There was a nearby comm tower transmitting the jamming, but inside the Zor’do it wasn’t strong enough to affect the local transmitters. They were powerful enough to be able to differentiate to the receiver, and so far Gon’zu had allowed that comm tower to stay up because he knew there was an Era’tran trap in it. What type he wasn’t sure, but it wasn’t too far beyond their patrol zones to receive support, and he got the feeling he’d lose a few more troops taking it…and any losses at this point were a massive failure given how few remained on both sides.

He’d take it down later once he got some larger units rotated in from adjacent sweeping campaigns. Right now he’d just have to tolerate it, but now that he was here on the ground it wasn’t going to be an issue.

“What are you hiding from me?” he asked no one in particular, already having sent the new arrivals out on various missions with a few mental orders. “What does a healing center have that is so important to waste Zen’zat defending, only to lose it in the end?”

Gon’zu didn’t get a direct answer, but he did get an indirect one a few minutes later when one of his new search teams discovered an intact genetics lab…with all the databases wiped of recent information. Not all information, just the recent years. In fact, the length of the omission was equal to the length of the war. So what exactly were they working on here? And why was it so important to die defending empty databanks when the planet was short on defensive units?

Something wasn’t right, and Gon’zu wasn’t going to leave here until he figured it out. Not even if it meant canceling upcoming assaults in his given combat region. His instincts told him this was massively important to the Era’tran, because if it had been anything less they would have just destroyed the facility and moved on, or relocated whatever it was.

But they stayed to defend it. If he could figure out…or rather when he figured out why they had stayed he would know how to proceed. For now he was just going to walk, listen, and learn. The Era’tran were cunning, and he had to be even more so, for if they were trying to hide something they were going to do a good job of it…unless they’d been caught off guard and had to buy time with their lives.

If that was so, maybe they had gotten sloppy and missed something. He certainly hoped so, but only time would tell, and he wasn’t going to leave anything this sensitive to the Bo’ja. This required intelligence and wisdom, and those two assets were the primary reasons the Zak’de’ron had chosen the Pak’lem long ago from millions of other races in the galaxy…that, and their physical size gave their wisdom the backing of considerable muscle, now augmented with psionics. If Gon’zu needed to fight he could, and well, but right now this was a game of wits. Him versus the Era’tran, and he had to prove to be the superior.

This invasion was too important to the Zak’de’ron. They had to succeed, and the Era’tran had already put up far more resistance than expected. A special project could tip this conflict, perhaps even alter the course of the war in other systems. But what was it they could have been working on in a healing facility? That currently stumped Gon’zu, but he was going to find out. He had to. The Zak’de’ron were depending on him, as was Itaru and the rest of the newly reformed V’kit’no’sat. And the Era’tran were now the primary obstacle from them reclaiming the rest of the races and ending this destructive war sooner rather than later. For the longer this reclamation took, the closer the Hadarak came to Itaru and the other major systems that were finally back in their rightful claws…

5

May 6, 128800

Jamtren System (Era’tran capitol)

Holloi

Mario’topa flinched as he heard the explosion behind him. He stopped running and turned around, seeing his armor’s guesswork putting the explosion several miles away…but that was far too close out here in the jungle. There wasn’t supposed to be anything else out here.

He found the largest nearby tree and climbed up using the grip points on his armor until he could get a clear view above the canopy. He was still cloaked, using passive sensors only and not even using his Pefbar in case someone nearby might brush up against it. He was as stealthy as he could get, but he immediately got a warning as a tiny bit of Mushgu’vu radiation washed over him.

It wasn’t enough to get through his cloak and was easily absorbed, but had he been closer to the source it would have highlighted him immediately. Mushgu’vu was a very rare and expensive technology, useful only against cloaking devices that operated in atmosphere. Naval ones were structured differently and could stay hidden, but there was so much that a suit of armor had to deal with other than vacuum that that the matrix was less than perfect. Mushgu’vu exploited that weakness, but aside from some ultra secure facilities he had never known it to be used, let alone in the field.

His passive sensors could at least zoom, and what he saw were two gunships pummeling a piece of jungle from very close range and drifting slightly as they appeared to track separate targets. They were identical to the gunships the Zen’zat used, but these were not transmitting the proper codes. They weren’t transmitting anything that he could pick up, so that probably meant they were not Era’tran. The ‘new’ V’kit’no’sat used a lot of the same technology, he thought deliberately so, rather than relying on foreign tech, though there was a lot of it on planet already in the invasion force. But these two gunships…

Mario’topa took the risk to deactivate his cloak, allowing his full sensor array to function and link in to any nearby units. The gunships didn’t register as allied, but there was someone on the ground that did. Two actually, and both Zen’zat, but they weren’t from his quartet, for he’d met and then dispersed the others farther from the facility as they searched for Tu’vac. These gunships were behind them and further to the east.

He reset his cloak into a null field, which turned him completely black and absorbed whatever radiation hit him rather than reflecting it in a convincing manner. It would absorb the Mushgu’vu as well, but if someone did a check against the sensor backdrop and noticed an empty spot he’d be easy to find. Right now though he didn’t need to be showing up with reflective Mushgu’vu, because he was going to head towards the gunships.

The Zen’zat dropped from the tree and took off running. He actually had better passive sensors in null mode because he could register everything they absorbed and the weapon discharges were more or less visible through the trees as spouts of heat rising above wherever the gunships shot. He couldn’t get a direct line on them yet and had to guestimate where he was headed based on the previous course the other two Zen’zat looked to be traveling.

Going up against gunships was stupid for a Zen’zat…assuming the gunships were crewed by veterans and he knew these weren’t. They were flying too low to the treetops, and if he could get close enough without getting spotted he might be able to ambush them.

It was a gamble, but right now he didn’t feel like leaving whoever these were to be hunted down from the air, for eventually some of the firepower raining down into the trees would hit them, and there was no way to cloak and run with that damn Mushgu’vu. Not for them, or for him if these gunships flew overhead and spotted him. But beyond that, if they were out here they had to be close to finding Tu’vac, and without armor he was going to stand out easily for regular gunship sensors given his mass.

If Mario’topa was going to protect him, assuming he hadn’t been found and killed yet, he needed to take down those gunships if possible.

The Zen’zat sprinted through the underbrush, weaving his way between tree trunks until he could pick up the signals of the pair ahead on his passive sensors. Then he stopped and picked another tree to climb, scaling it quickly then perching near the top like a pitch black piece of fruit hanging from under the branches. He knew not to go above the leaves, for that would make him easy to see, but if these gunships were focused on the pair of Zen’zat and nothing else they might just miss him.

And they did. Their Dre’mo’don fire down into the jungle was burning a path right towards him and to the left. Either these Zen’zat were expert dodgers or the gunship crews were a horrible shot. Trees or no trees, at least something should have got through to hit them by…

Then it happened, and one of the Zen’zat fell to the ground while the other kept running…and the closest of the gunships slid to a stop over that spot and continued to shoot Mario’topa’s fallen kin while simultaneously drifting 56 meters away from his position at a slightly higher altitude.

His feet gripped the tree trunk in the best possible place, then using a combination of his muscle and armor enhancement Mario’topa launched himself up through the leaves and into the air as a dark blob that seemed to half melt into the blue sky as it pulled in and blended with the surrounding light. The gunship didn’t fire on him nor even moved in response as he crossed the gap and landed on the side, using his grip points in ‘shield grab’ mode to allow him to stick for a moment. He knew the gunship had a method of wicking them to removing clingers, but hopefully before they realized what was going on…

Yes, there were three inside, two in the three-man cockpit and another in the hold, and Mario’topa had easy access to their minds at a simple brush, into which he sent a jamming telepathic impulse that froze two of them. Fortunately that was the two pilots, but the one in the hold was a Bo’ja, and he had limited telepathic resistance via his mental strength, but none of them had the blocks that Zen’zat had by default.

Mario’topa held the two pilots in zombie mode, with the weaponsfire going down into the jungle stopping from this gunship while the other continued to drift away pursuing the other Zen’zat. Thought it was hard to do, Mario’topa held both minds in check, then used his Pefbar/Lachka to reach into one of them and scramble his brain, which killed him within seconds.

The body went limp the moment he did, for there was no longer any functional mind to hack. Before he did so to the other he made that pilot lower the shields and put the gunship into automatic hover mode with a code lock on the controls for the number 211. That way the gunship could only be flown after unlocking them with that code. Otherwise it would simply hold on its last settings, which was hover mode with the doors unlocked.

Mario’topa scrambled across the smooth hull once the shield went down and opened the access hatch to the hold right after sending a Fornax blast inside. That gave him enough of a head start to get his feet on the interior deck before the Zen’zat-sized Bo’ja was able to fire at him. A weak telepathic attack occurred simultaneously, but it did little more than distract his balance for half a second. After that he was taking the few steps necessary to get to hand to hand range with the slightly taller Bo’ja and engaged him directly with a mix of punches, kicks, and forearm blasts.

The Bo’ja was equipped much like a Zen’zat, but they lacked the Ikrid defense that rookies badly needed. Why the Zak’de’ron wanted them to replace Zen’zat he didn’t know, but as they exchanged blows Mario’topa slipped through his rudimentary mental defenses and momentarily blacked him out.

The Bo’ja fell to the ground, and before he could snap out of it the Zen’zat hacked into his brain and trigger the auto-release on his armor, which retracted into a pair of forearm gauntlets and a thick visor that covered his tiny eyes. Mario’topa shot him with a stun blast, which his armor did have a defense for built into the material rather than relying only on shields like Zen’zat armor did, then he left him lying alive in the narrow walkway as he ran and squeezed himself into the compact cockpit after pulling the bodies out.

He wasn’t a Zen’zat pilot specialist, but they could all fly basic craft with rudimentary efficiency and once he input the 211 code by hand the craft was his to fly. He put the shields back up and moved off towards the other gunship, which still had no idea anything was happening to its twin. Mario’topa charged the Dre’mo’dons to anti-ship levels, then fired two large blobs of obnoxious purple energy at the other dropship.

The purple was the color of the new V’kit’no’sat, and they’d adjusted all their standard weapons to that spectrum where possible. Real V’kit’no’sat weapons came in a variety of colors, almost none of them purple, and this was a very simple way to visually differentiate who was who on the battlefield, though he suspected it was more of an insult than anything. But color change or no, the damaging effect was the same, and before the other gunship had the wherewithal to even shoot back, Mario’topa had already breached its shields and begun to eat away at the armor.

It turned and fought, then tried to flee, then turned and fought again as if the crew couldn’t make up their minds. They were too far out of Ikrid range for him to mess with them directly, which would have saved this gunship some hull damage, but aside from a couple of holes that made it into the passenger hold his ship was still intact by the time the other one finally fell into the jungle in flames.

Mario’topa came in closer and did a mental scan, then fired a few more times until the living minds below were erased from existence. He checked the regional sensors, finding no other craft anywhere nearby, then he used the ship’s comm system to reach out to the Zen’zat below.

“Both Itaru gunships have been disabled and the one still flying is now in Zen’zat custody. If you’re still alive stop running and report in.”

“Yenni reporting,” a female voice returned over the V’kit’no’sat comm frequencies. “Light injuries but still mobile.”

“Yenni, circle back and check the other Zen’zat that was with you. He’s probably dead, but make sure.”

“Complying.”

Mario’topa pulled himself out of the cockpit after setting the ship to hover mode again and moved back to his sleeping prisoner. He retracted the armor from his right hand and pressed it against the pure black skin of the Bo’ja, then began to hack his mind directly for information. By the time Yenni reported back that the other Zen’zat didn’t have much body left to find, Mario’topa had already discovered everything he needed to know and shot the Bo’ja in the head twice before dumping his body out the side of the craft where it fell down into the trees and disappeared along with the other two dead crew members.

Mario’topa lowered the craft until it touched the treetops, then he descended a mechanized extendable pole that Yenni used to climb up and into the craft despite the multiple cavities in her armor.

“Why aren’t your wounds healing?” he asked.

“My Kich’a’kat is damaged and my armor is locked in static mode. I don’t think I could get my helmet off without breaking it free.”

“Stand still,” he said, reaching an armored hand out and touching a fingertip inside one of the breaches on her chest. It went more than an inch inside where there should have been breast tissue, but soon new skin was grown to cover over the gore, though the bulk of the mass was still missing. Her other wounds also healed as his own Kich’a’kat was used to heal her, but the damage to her armor was something only a tech could deal with.

“Appreciated,” she said when he’d finished. “Where did you come from?”

“A Zor’do near here. You were from a downed squadron?”

“We were the only ones to make it out on foot alive. How did you know?”

“I took the Bo’ja alive. They were ordered to clean up your hangar assault. What was your squadron doing?”

“Poaching random targets. I don’t know how they found us. We haven’t flown in more than two weeks.”

“I picked up Mushgu’va from one of these gunships.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yes. Let’s confirm that,” he said, heading back to the cockpit without finding any additional equipment added to the control board. “Stay here and monitor the airspace. I’m going to check the wreckage.”

“No, you stay here. I can handle it,” she said, heading out the still open doorway and dropping down into the jungle without hesitation despite the at least 80 meter fall.

Mario’topa waited several minutes, then she signaled him to bring the gunship all the way down to the surface in a specific location. He had to crush a few trees to do it, and bend a few more aside in the process, but eventually he got down within a few meters of the ground to where Yenni was dragging a piece of equipment twice her size across the ground away from the still burning wreckage.

As soon as he got outside to help her he saw that some of her newly regrown skin was now red and charred, but he ignored it as he helped her drag the extremely rare sensor array up to the ship, then the pair lifted it on their shoulders with the heavy gravity of the planet not helping any. They carried it inside and dropped the already damaged sensor down into one of the banks of lateral seats.

“The techs will want that,” Yenni agreed as Mario’topa reached another hand toward her wounds, but she flicked his arm away. “I’m fine. Let’s get out of here.”

“I have men in the field nearby. You’ll have to tag along until I’m finished with my mission.”

“What is your mission?” she asked without complaint.

“Personal protection. There’s an Era’tran in the jungle that escaped from the Zor’do that must be kept alive.”

“What priority?”

“So high I’m not allowed to tell you,” Mario’topa said, admitting a little more than he should have said.

“He won’t fit in here.”

“I know, but the other Zen’zat will and we can provide air cover assuming this ship doesn’t break down.”

“I’ll do a damage analysis while you fly,” she said, moving to the nearest of the visible holes while Mario’topa went back to the cockpit and got them moving, using the gunship’s sensors to look for his own people who should have still been cloaked. He didn’t want to risk a high powered broadcast, but he did set up a short range transmission good for 8 miles or so. Hopefully he’d be able to cross over the path of where he expected his people to be and find them without drawing any unwanted attention, but he had no way of knowing if the other gunship had reported the conflict before it went down.

If it did, and they had more aerial assets to spare, then he wasn’t going to be left alone to search from above for very long. He’d much rather have this gunship to use than not, but his ability to hide was now obsolete, for this model did not have a cloaking field of its own. It had the standard stealthing material built into the hull that would make it difficult to detect at range, or even at all for less advanced sensor technology, but it was nowhere as good as a null field, and any units operating nearby would pick it up easy if they were looking for it, visually or otherwise.

Fortunately his first guess was correct, and with only a few minutes of flying he was able to pick up the first return blip from one of his people not wanting to risk an open comm, but sending a quick location signal for him to come to them. Once he got Ben’ra onboard he went after the others, but before he got to them more trouble popped up on the horizon…

6

Jo’ra was too far away and too deep in the jungle to notice the enemy dropship fight, but he was getting close to dead drop #4 which Mario’topa had instructed him to scout. If Tu’vac was here then he’d link up with him. If not, the Zen’zat needed to load up on as many supplies as they could carry and there was no way to know where they’d be going in the coming days, or how long they’d be roughing it.

Jo’ra was still stealthed as he moved more to the east so he could come in low to the dead drop. There was a bit of elevation on the west side cradling the location and he didn’t want to come up on it too quickly. Better to scout it from range just in case others had already found it, friendly or otherwise.

Apparently someone else had thought the same thing, for an armored body was standing on a mid level branch some 5 meters up where they could get a decent view in to near the dead drop…and the armor was not V’kit’no’sat.

Jo’ra kept cloaked and slowed his run, fortunate that his footsteps were muffled by the cloaking field, otherwise this individual might have heard him. The closer he got he realized he was seeing part of Zan’for armor, one of the very light and agile scout races the Zak’de’ron employed. It was a biped with four thin arms, none of which were good for landing blows with, but they did make for excellent climbers and all around lurkers. They were not known to have cloaking devices, and this guy was doing his best to stay hidden amongst the vegetation as his gaze was directed…

There. Jo’ra saw it now. There was a tent partially visible through the trees. A big one too. Zen’zat wouldn’t erect something that big, and their emergency tents were scalable. That meant there was probably an Era’tran in there, or had been. He couldn’t see anyone outside or pick up any movement sounds. A lot of trees were in the way, but he could already see a lot of the smaller underbrush had been knocked down and dragged to the side where it was piled in brush lines. They served to both clear the footing and create obstacles at various approach points, all of which still occurred underneath an intact canopy, leaving it invisible to flyers overhead.

And this Zan’for was camped out here watching the location. As soon as Jo’ra got a little closer he was going to find out why. He needed closer proximity to do a good Ikrid hack of his mind, but as he reached out to gage the necessary range he couldn’t find one. The Zan’for was completely blank to him as far as Ikrid went, making him immediately suspicious of a decoy, but his Pefbar did register the individual as being there rather than a hologram.

Psionic protective armor? he wondered.

Jo’ra hadn’t seen much of that during this war, and none on scouts. It was hard to make, but not impractical unless the individual wearing it needed to use their psionics. Zan’for weren’t known to have any, so there wouldn’t be a conflict there, but the Zak’de’ron didn’t equip their people with really elaborate armors. Not for the masses, anyway. So did this guy really have full armor? Was he an elite scout that Jo’ra had simply crossed paths with accidentally? And why wouldn’t an elite scout have a cloaking device?

But there was another possibility, so Jo’ra slowly walked up to the tree the Zan’for was standing in and crossed beneath the branch…and when he did so he finally got a mental signature. He grasped his mind immediately and froze the individual in place, then began rifling through his memories, the first of which confirmed that his helmet was the only piece of his armor that was shielded, and it covered everything except the base of his neck where it connected to the rest of his body. That was why standing beneath him gave his Ikrid line of sight access to his brain from up through the rest of his anemic body.

His mission came from the Zor’do. He’d been ordered, along with others, to track down the people who had fled, and with some considerable difficulty he had found the Era’tran’s tracks and lost them again each time they crossed a body of water. He and others had spread out in both directions each time and were able to find the spot further up or down the water’s path where they had come back out.

There were two Era’tran here. One inside the tent and another that kept watch from the elevation on the far side. That’s why the Zan’for was here, because if he got too much closer the Era’tran’s Pefbar could have outed him. All he had to do was keep his distance and wait, for he’d already reported back their location for the rest of the hunters to group and approach towards. He didn’t know how soon they’d get here, but his mission was to monitor and track them if they moved again. He couldn’t engage on his own, despite the fact that neither Era’tran had armor. Their psionics were potent enough, and he wasn’t sure what these two possessed. They couldn’t take control of his mind, but his weapons would only sting the larger enemies, and they possessed enough muscle to be able to physically crush him if they caught him.

Jo’ra looked for position information and other details, but knew he didn’t have time to do a thorough interrogation. The Zan’for had sent word hours ago, meaning reinforcements were already on the way. Perhaps close.

With a thought he put the Zan’for to sleep, then waited for his collapsing body to fall off the branch. He caught it with his Lachka so it didn’t crash into the ground, then the Zen’zat stepped up and crouched over the scout as he set him down. He put a kill shot into the base of his neck and telepathically called out to the Era’tran, identifying himself and informing them of the scout that had unwittingly been calling the enemy to their location.

The Era’tran outside the tent came crashing back into the under canopy clearing, but the one inside didn’t emerge as the giant red muzzle of an Era’tran female soon arrived and looked down on Jo’ra and the dead scout from two meters above him.

“I cannot move him. He is comatose and I do not have the equipment to bring him out of it.”

“They will be coming here. They have this location,” Jo’ra reminded her. “What do you want to do?”

“I cannot carry him, and I cannot leave him. Are you alone?”

“For the moment. There are three others who survived nearby. They are searching different locations to find you.”

“Can four of you help me move him?”

“Not far and not fast. And we would make such a disturbance in the jungle that we would be easy to follow. We cannot stay here, we have to move. Our only option is a distraction.”

“What kind of distraction?” Sol’an asked, her eye ridges furrowing.

“They have to find someone here. If there is a way to hide Tu’vac and you flee, we might be able to get them to chase you and miss him, but that’s unlikely unless we can conceal him.”

“So this is the end? We fight and die here?”

“I have no other suggestions.”

“What do you wish to do?”

“Use you as bait and ambush the attackers if they come on foot. That will be my best chance of killing the most.”

“Do so then. How far away are the others?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t know how far away the…” Jo’ra said, stopping as he received a comm message. He replied silently, as far as Sol’an was aware, then looked up at her muzzle again. “Mario’topa has a gunship and an additional rescued Zen’zat. He also has aerial pursuit coming from the Zor’do. A Kardopa transport that is not heading his way. It is most likely headed here.”

“A Zen’zat gunship?”

“It can’t shoot down a Kardopa.”

“Can it carry Tu’vac?”

“Not inside.”

“Do what you think is best, Zen’zat. I leave our defense to you.”

Jo’ra immediately got on the comm, broadcasting loud enough that it could be tracked to his location, but he knew their position had already been compromised.

“I’ve found the Era’tran, but Tu’vac is immobile. I killed a scout that already reported their location and requested reinforcements.”

“Define immobile?” Mario’topa asked.

“He’s seized up and Sol’an can’t revive him. Right now he’s inside a camouflage tent. I haven’t seen him personally. Is there a way we can strap him to the gunship?”

“There’s no time to try. You’ve got 13 minutes.”

“How long until you get here?”

“If I don’t pick up the others, 6 minutes. 9 if I do.”

“Get them and harass the transport. There’s no point in you dying here too.”

“Do they know he is immobile?”

Jo’ra glanced at the scout’s body. “I don’t think so.”

“Then they’ll most likely drop their troops off nearby and hunt you down in the jungle using the transport for air cover, not for making the primary kill. They won’t get close enough for the Era’tran psionics to snag them.”

“You think this is a specialized…” Jo’ra said breaking off.

A moment later he got a location ping from him, with the symbol that meant ‘active firefight,’ and the transport was nowhere close to them…

Gon’zu was one of many passengers inside the 540 meter long transport, yet he was the only one comparable to the Era’tran in size. Had he simply wanted them killed he wouldn’t have come, but if these two were from those that had stayed behind at the Zor’do then he needed to know what they knew, and retrieving information from a corpse was not easy. Not to mention it required equipment that he did not have. No, if they were to be taken alive he might have to get involved himself, and he couldn’t trust the troops he’d been assigned to get the job done when they were dying to keep the Era’tran alive.

The thing with killing Era’tran was you had to overwhelm them with targets. Send a few, or a single one to them and they were near impossible to defeat. But give them many small ones and while they killed some of them the others would get the job done, and his troops had a fair amount of experience in that department, though attrition kept the number of true experts to a minimum and he didn’t think they’d have the courage to not overuse their lethal weaponry only to disable when their own lives were on the line.

Gon’zu didn’t doubt their loyalty, just their nerve. One’s natural reaction when being killed was to strike back with as much force as possible, and that could not occur here. At least one of the Era’tran wore no armor and had a single forearm weapon. That would make for an easy target, and too much damage was a subjective thing. His troops were not issued stun weapons larger than a pistol, and very few of them. Those could not be effective against such a large beast as the Era’tran unless employed en mass…and Gon’zu didn’t have that luxury. He was going to have to injure the Era’tran into submission, and given their nature to fight to the death rather than succumb, he was probably going to have to personally end this fight with his own psionics…for even his own armor did not come standard equipped with stun weapons.

He already had troops in the field pursuing the Era’tran, and apparently they got to the scout’s location before his transport did, for he suddenly started getting combat reports from the location indicating that the scout was dead and they were engaged with Zen’zat on the ground in addition to the Era’tran.

That was acceptable, for there weren’t enough troops on the ground to actually win, but they could begin wearing the Era’tran down and plucking away the Zen’zat they had before he arrived to finish up, though he was mildly concerned that the scout hadn’t reported any Zen’zat. Was there a camouflaged outpost here with more firepower than he was anticipating?

There was another V’kit’no’sat operation going on nearby, outside his command, and he opened up a comm line to the gunship to inquire if they knew anything about the location ahead and if they could assist with the takedown of these Era’tran…but he got no response. After several attempts he wasn’t sure if they were just ignoring him or if that was actually a hostile craft, because its automated codes were all responding appropriately.

He used the transport’s sensors to zoom in on the gunship just before it dipped down into the treetops. Visuals showed some damage to the hull, so it was possible that the comm system was damaged. He didn’t know how likely that was, for he was not intimately familiar with the craft the Bo’ja used, but something about this did not feel right…and when the gunship rose up again and altered course towards the fight he wasn’t sure if they had heard him and didn’t respond or if something else was in play.

“Tag that gunship as an unknown unit,” he told his pilots. “They’re not responding to comms. Does it have enough weaponry to give us a problem if it turns out to be hostile?”

“It won’t get through our shields, but it has more firepower than we do,” one of the small, duck-billed biped pilots answered. “If it sticks around for a slugging match we’ll eventually win.”

“Good. Keep an eye on it,” he said, devouring every snippet of information coming back to him from the troops on the ground. A few more minutes and they’d be at their landing zone, so he mentally activated his gauntlets and donned his own armor to match the infantry that were already fully suited up and standing shoulder to shoulder around him in the main deck. Not quite enough to make it crowded, for they could have included more…if he had them. As it was, these were all but a handful of the troops that assaulted the Zor’do. A few stayed there to continue investigating and guard the facility, but he’d pulled everyone else on this hunting mission. He couldn’t afford to have it go wrong, one way or another.

He was convinced there was something special about that Zor’do, but the only ones who knew what it was were either dead or on the run ahead of him. He couldn’t afford to waste his infantry assets, so grouping them together was the logical move. Spread them out and his casualties would increase. Focused operations in force were the mathematically most viable option for hunting missions…and fortunately he had the assets available for this one while most combat on the planet had devolved down to single units out hunting and engaging each other far from the fortified cities.

But then the gunship arrived at the battle site a few minutes ahead of them, and it started pouring firepower down into the jungle as Gon’zu railed at them on the comm that he wanted the Era’tran taken alive…but there was no response or alteration in course as tree after tree was obliterated from above with who knew what damage was being done to the Era’tran below.

“Abort the landing,” he ordered. “Take us directly into the path of that gunship!”

7

Tu’vac lay on the floor of the tent, his mind locked in a loop that would not break. His body was not taut, for there was no malfunction there. It was just waiting for his brain to do something other than hold position, so it appeared he was sleeping when in fact he was awake and trying to rethink the same thought over and over again without it coming to conclusion.

That’s where his conscious mind was, but his subconscious was still functioning and he was aware of what was happening around him. He couldn’t use Pefbar, but he could hear the sound of weaponsfire, feel the pounding of the ground every time the healer took a step outside, and he could see the inside of the tent through his open eyes that would not move off one spot.

He could also feel when a Dre’mo’don shot burned through the tent wall and hit him in the back just above his tail. The pain, combined with what part of his combat reflexes were not locked down, jolted him out of his mind freeze as two more shots came through and hit him in the torso.

Tu’vac reached for…something. Some psionic that wasn’t there that he needed, pushing against the barrier in his mind that would not relent, then as a fourth shot hit him in the chest as he rolled up to his feet he lashed out at the blockage in his mind. Rage more than purpose, spite over logic. It was his enemy as much as those shooting at him, and he had to destroy it.

He pushed hard, in as many was as he could, not understanding what he was doing but doing everything he could on instinct. It felt like the pressure in his body was building to a point it would pop his head off…then something did pop. The pressure flowed up and into his head, with Tu’vac falling back to the floor in exhaustion as a 5th shot came through and hit him just above the knee. All were tearing away flesh from his body, but he had so much mass a single shot could not kill him unless it hit him in the eye socket or other vulnerable spot.

Tu’vac crashed down, his head hitting the floor externally while internally a cool sensation moved from the base of his spine up through his brain eating away at the blocks gradually, as if it were a chunk of ice melting away. His body felt like it was deflating in the process, but he didn’t fight it. He pushed harder, making it melt faster…until the last bit in his mind disappeared and he passed out.

More shots came through the tent, a few of which hit him and drew more purple blood leaking down out of the cauterized wounds, then suddenly he woke, not knowing where he was or what was happening.

He stood up, his Pefbar pushing out beyond the tent to see what was there as another shot came through and hit him in his left hip. The Era’tran snarled, realizing he was not armored yet in the middle of battle, and activated his Nakane, catching the next two shots on his biologically generated shields as he stormed out the closed door and into the dim jungle undergrowth just before a portion of that canopy was blown apart as aerial fire fell down on the infantry that were taking shots at him.

He did not recognize them, but there was a wounded female Era’tran on the ground to his left with one arm missing…and laying beside her was that arm with a damaged weapon still attached to it. Further off was a downed Zen’zat, and the weaponsfire coming into the jungle from above was originating from a Zen’zat gunship…which made who was friend and foe here clear.

His body was weak beyond measure, and he did not remember how it had gotten so, but he was within range of a good portion of the scattering infantry that focused their firepower on him while taking cover behind various trees…but they couldn’t hide from his Pefbar, and with a thought three of them were lifted off their feet and pulled out into the air and towards him. Two he brought forward into his claws, which glowed to life cherry red and slashed through their armor as if it were nothing more than clothing. The third he threw to the ground in front of him and smashed underneath his left foot, not caring for the gouges the broken armor made in his flesh as it cracked under the pressure.

Weak armor. Zen’zat armor would have held against that, so he didn’t have to add any attack afterwards, for the occupant was now mashed gore. The Era’tran ground him in more as he launched himself into an awkward run as he reached out into the attackers’ minds to get a feel for them, only to be surprised when he found them vulnerable. These were not infantry capable of taking down an Era’tran, let alone a Hakja.

He felled dozens of them in one attack, rendering them unconscious then pulling their loose weaponry from them through the air and wadding it up in ball that he crunched down into a sphere, then he opened his mouth and out came a plume of plasma that melted the weapons beyond repair. He tossed the molten bits to the side, starting a small fire where they hit dry brush, but the rest of the infantry did not take the hint and continued to fire at him.

His bioshields would not last forever, and they were underpowered to start with. He did not know what had happened to him, but his combat fitness was shot. He took a moment to try and remember, but was distracted as a much larger ship flew overhead and began exchanging fire with the gunship.

The Era’tran pulled another two infantry to him and sliced them apart as he tried to use his Ikrid to reach the Zen’zat in the gunship and the crew of the Kardopa…only to realize that the transport had no Zen’zat in it. Their minds were all accessible, though one was much stronger than the others.

What is the nature of this combat? he demanded of the Zen’zat in the gunship as the transport physically bumped it away from its perch firing down on the remaining infantry.

You are in danger. They are here to kill you.

Mario’topa? he asked, recognizing the mind. What is going on?

What…you remember me?

Why would I not? the Era’tran said as he pulled in another of the enemy infantry and decapitated him with one clean claw slice, diminishing the drain on his bioshields a bit more. Answer me. I need to know who to strike.

The Zen’zat are loyal. The others are invaders. You are on Holloi, and we have been invaded by the Zak’de’ron. These are their servants. Run while we cover you.

An anger he had never known before billowed over in him. The thought of Holloi being invaded was insulting and infuriating, but to be told it was the Zak’de’ron doing it…that generated a level of ire beyond words.

The Era’tran grasped one of the infantry so hard he didn’t even need to pull, merely wrenching his head around so that his armor popped a moment before his spine did…then his head flew off into the brush as his body dropped, making it impossible for his armor to heal him, though he doubted it had that technology given how feeble it was.

A Jumat orb wrinkled the light over his head, and his bioshields dropped a moment as he released it upwards into the Kardopa. It slammed into them, not jolting the large ship but eating away at its own shields there, and to his credit Mario’topa targeted that precise location and gutted one of the transport’s weapon batteries during the momentary shield disruption.

Why should I run from this filth? he demanded.

You have your psionics back? Mario’topa asked in disbelief.

What has happened to me? he asked, but he didn’t get an answer, for the holds of the transport suddenly opened and hundreds of more infantry dropped down into the trees along with one larger individual that he recognized as a Pak’lem, one of the more formidable Zak’de’ron slaves.

They are here to kill you and you have no armor. Run!

Are there more than this coming?

No, but…

Then we stand here, he said, trying to use his Ikrid on the surrounding troops but failing. As he expected, the Pak’lem was using its Va’do, which created a jamming field in a radius around his body. And as the Era’tran reached out with his Lachka once again he found it slipping and then gone as the Pak’lem caught up to the nearby troops and shielded them with its Da’nu that created a Pefbar blackout, and what he couldn’t feel with Pefbar he couldn’t touch with Lachka.

That meant his telepathy and telekinesis were no longer available to him, and for other Era’tran that would have been problematic without armor, but he had more psionics than most.

He moved to the left and hacked away with his claws at a thick tree trunk, then pushed it over to form a barrier on his left flank with the wounded Era’tran behind him. It was thicker than most of their infantry was tall, and as they moved in from that side they had to jump up on top of it…which he was waiting for. If they had Pefbar, then they would be as blind as he was in the presence of the Pak’lem, so they didn’t see his tail whipping around in a circle as they climbed up on top.

Two managed to dive out of the way, but three more didn’t and got hit so hard they went flying out into the jungle with one disappearing from view. The other two smashed into trees and fell in a hard thump to the ground.

This was definitely Holloi. He remembered its gravity well, which was part of the reason his body felt so exhausted, but that could not account for all of it.

“Who are you?” a voice asked aloud through the jungle just as the infantry stopped firing, but didn’t stop moving as they grouped and circled around keeping a wide berth. The aerial battle overhead did not let up, and it seemed as if the Pak’lem did not care about that at all as he emerged through the trees into the smokey clearing around the now holely tent.

As the question was asked the infantry continued to move, which the Era’tran could not allow. He jumped to the left and got outside the Pak’lem’s jamming range, then picked up two of the infantry and pulled them to him again…only to have them drop out of his grasp as the jamming field washed over the infantry on command. The Pak’lem must have been able to direct it where he wanted rather than just using a radius. The Zak’de’ron had apparently gone beyond the psionics kit they’d given to the Zen’zat, which was no real surprise.

“Keep your distance,” the Pak’lem told his troops, who obeyed and spread out into a bowl-shaped formation without trying to slip past the Era’tran again. “Let us have a moment to talk.”

“You serve the Zak’de’ron?”

“As do all true V’kit’no’sat.”

The Era’tran’s face frowned. “You are not V’kit’no’sat.”

“A matter of point of view, at the moment, and irrelevant. The question is, who are you? I was told all the Hakja had been destroyed. How are you still alive?”

That was an insult beyond insults, but he didn’t know if it was true. None of this made sense, but battle was here and he knew better than to let the enemy control the course of events. The gunship was still fighting above them, and he knew it did not have the shields to endure in that matchup. This discussion pause was ensuring aerial superiority for the Zak’de’ron.

Rather than answer with words, the Era’tran summoned up a dual attack, forming a Jumat orb over his head while building a Choratrik inside his mouth and hiding it until the last moment. He then launched the orb up through the tree branches at the drifting transport, followed by firing the plasma beam at the same spot the disruptive energy matrix hit.

He couldn’t aim well with no Pefbar or line of sight, but he had to help the gunship or the Kardopa would rain down support fire and make the land battle one he could not win…or he had to win this quickly before the gunship was destroyed or chased off. Either way, standing and talking was a fool’s errand.

The infantry didn’t hold back once he opened fire, and soon his weak bioshields were being hit from all angles. The Era’tran had to run away to the right, leaving the wounded healer behind as he sprinted through the trees to get himself some cover.

The Pak’lem followed, and was irritatingly able to keep pace. The Era’tran’s legs were so weak it was insulting. A quadruped of that mass should never have been able to match a biped with his stride, even in these trees, but he was. And the infantry was…surprisingly slower. A few kept pace and actually closed with him, but the rest did not, and the Era’tran saw that error immediately.

The jamming fields were still over him, so he couldn’t grab them, but if they had an open shot at him so did he, and when he had the opportunity he turned around suddenly and threw a Jumat wall towards them, knocking down small trees and hurling them backwards when it hit. Some were able to dodge out of the way, some were shielded by the larger trees, but the ones that did get knocked off their feet died moments later when a fiery plasma plume followed and hit them on the ground before they could get back to their feet and move again.

The Era’tran picked off several in this manner, then the others fell back in line as the Pak’lem eased out in front of their formation. Not only that, he was speeding up and nearly on top of the Era’tran, who knew he could not outrun him. As expected the armored quadruped started firing some shots of his own into the Era’tran’s bioshields, which depleted it so much he had to turn and face him.

He did so suddenly, digging his heels into the soil and making long gouges as he reversed course and put most of his remaining bioshields ahead of him. Just beneath he charged another Jumat, and two steps before collision he dropped the shields and released the energy wave that ended up being smaller than he wanted. His psionic strength was failing him as well, but the blow was enough to knock the quadruped off balance just before the Era’tran head butted him.

That hurt, badly, for the Era’tran had no armor and the Pak’lem did, but he did so at a specific angle that forced the Pak’lem’s head down and allowed the Era’tran to roll over his back and bite down on his neck before the lightning unleashed from the psionic spine. He didn’t try to hold on, and got his chest over the hump of his spine so he didn’t take a direct hit, then dug his glowing claws into the Pak’lem’s shoulders and pulled.

Both massive bodies tumbled to the side with the Pak’lem’s neck taking most of the torsion, but his armor was solid and did not break, though his shields were already down. Lightning arcs traveled through the Era’tran’s body, causing him to fall as his legs gave way, but the momentum could not be stopped by it. The Pak’lem rolled upside down, his psionic tissue now pointed into the dirt where the lightning arcs posed no threat to the Era’tran…and the Era’tran now had his legs back and was scurrying over the few meters that separated them to bite into the underside of his neck again.

Not hard, otherwise his teeth would have lost against the armor, but enough for leverage pinning the quadruped to the ground upside down as it tried to kick free. The infantry pelted him with shots he could not fully deflect. His bioshields went down at some point, but he was locked on the kill and digging into the target’s neck with his Saroto’kanse’vam claws while also delivering a point blank plasma blast.

The armor held up fairly well against his claws, but after the Era’tran got through it the flesh underneath gave way at his touch. Knowing that this armor probably had a Kich’a’kat in it, he kept tearing and tearing, ignoring the damage being done to his body by the infantry weapons, but he did manage a reverse Jumat that knocked the infantry back and away from him long enough for him to finish decapitating the Pak’lem.

He cut all the way through the armor on the far side, then tossed the still armored head to his left, using his now active Lachka to propel it like a boulder into two of the infantry as they suddenly stood still helpless under his renewed Ikrid influence. That stopped most of the fighting, but not all, for it seemed some of the attackers had some resistance.

The Era’tran held the others in check, willing himself through the damage being done to his body as he isolated the Bo’ja individually and yanked them off their feet, drawing them to him and clawing them into submission. By the time he was finished he was barely holding onto consciousness. The pain was so great it had blended into a constant numbing, but he didn’t release his Ikrid hold on the others. With no one shooting him, he walked around and killed them one by one as he heard the battle overhead continuing, then he reached out to the gunship again.

Surface secure. Show me your status.

He got a mental reply, seeing through the Zen’zat’s eyes at the smoking transport as it continued to fire from two remaining turrets. Its shields were mostly gone, but the gunship was barely flying and fighting.

The Era’tran knew he had to win this, or he’d be killed shortly, so he forced himself to start walking in their direction, for they were no longer overhead. He reached out with his Ikrid, but he was too far. He had to get closer, but fortunately the Zen’zat understood and maneuvered around so the transport had to do the same or expose their damaged side. That left it no longer drifting away from the Era’tran, but towards him.

When it finally did come back within range the Era’tran found the gunners inside and froze them, and fortunately there were no Bo’ja or others that had telepathic skills inside to resist, for his power at this range was tenuous.

Cease fire and board the transport. I have the crew incapacitated.

What is your status? Mario’topa asked.

I am alive. Hurry. I do not know how long I can hold them.

It will be done, the Zen’zat proudly promised. You have your skills back, Tu’vac. Has the healer returned your memory as well?

I do not know what has happened to me, Mario’topa, but you know my name is not Tu’vac. Why do you call me that?

It is what you have been called for the past 2 centuries. You were badly injured and incapable of even moving at first. Your memories were held captive by the damage and unrepairable with Kich’a’kat, or you would have been reverted to a hatchling. The healer has been manually restoring them cell by cell, and she said you were nowhere near full recovery. Do you remember who you are?

Two centuries have passed?

Yes, and we are at war with the Zak’de’ron and the previously independent Oso’lon and J’gar. They have reformed the original V’kit’no’sat, denying us our own identity. Do you remember who you are?

The Era’tran growled, still having to keep his Ikrid constant and fighting the loss of blood from his body, but his anger kept him functioning.

Eldorat. Eldorat did this to me?

You survived, barely. He did not. He was killed in Itaru, then the Elder Council went to war with the Zak’de’ron in your absence. Do you remember who you are?

I do.

What is your name? Mario’topa demanded.

My name is Mak’to’ran, he said as the gunship swung up alongside the transport and two Zen’zat jumped out and began forcing open one of the exterior hatches.

Very good. Do not tell anyone else. The galaxy thinks you are dead, the Zak’de’ron think you are dead, and that is the only reason we have been able to keep Tu’vac safe. Do you understand?

Why is Holloi under attack?

They do not know you are here. Holloi is the last stronghold capable of defying Itaru. That is why they are risking so much to take it. Both sides are gutted, Mak’to’ran. Their invasion here is not guaranteed, but they are gradually winning.

Itaru?

Destroyed by the Oso’lon and J’gar betrayal. We had the Zak’de’ron beat, Mak’to’ran. Your plan worked. Most of their vermin race are dead. But once the war was fully engaged, the others struck Itaru with their full might and canceled out. They retain possession of it, but there is nothing left. Almost all died. No one surrendered.

What of the Hjar’at?

They were the Zak’de’ron’s second main target. Mavro is gone, also destroyed and not conquered. We didn’t think they’d have the strength to mount another heavy assault for another century, but they summoned enough to try here. The outcome is undetermined, but even if we win we will have nothing left. The empire is leaderless, and the Zak’de’ron are scooping up the smaller systems. Conquering rather than destroying. Converting those who have heeded the call to rejoin Itaru willingly without penalty in order to unite to fight the Hadarak.

All this because I was gone? Mak’to’ran asked.

The Elder Council was never your equal.

What of Star Force?

They are neutral and fighting the Hadarak with full force. Neither side will interfere with their outposts and evacuation routes.

And the Hadarak?

Their prime troops have emerged. The grand fight that was predicted has begun, but we are not part of it. Our border worlds fall where encroachment has occurred. We have nothing to defend them with, and Star Force cannot hold them back everywhere.

Mak’to’ran felt the Zen’zat now inside the transport, and a few seconds later the minds he was holding in check disappeared from his view as they were killed.

Mario’topa, there was a Kich’a’kat in the dead drop supplies. Bring it to me. I cannot walk.

On my way, he said as Mak’to’ran sat down on his tail letting his mangled legs splay out and his head droop down. He didn’t want to lay over, and the wounds he was not sitting on screamed at him, but his mind was free of the prison it had been in, and he was intent on remaining conscious no matter what.

He had woken to a nightmare, but awake he was. Now he had to work the problem piece by piece, but nothing would matter if he succumbed to the infantry wounds that covered his body like bee stings. The Kich’a’kat could revive him if he died, but he didn’t know if it was intact or not. It could have been damaged in the firefight, so Mak’to’ran sat and used what little effort he could muster to activate his Haemra and use his healing psionic on the wounds leaking the most blood…

8

Mario’topa sat in the damaged gunship, which was barely able to hover due to losing all but one of its gravity drives, but half its weaponry still worked, as did its sensors. He’d sent Yenni off in the transport to pick up Lenna and Ben’ra, so he was hovering down into the canopy slightly and doing his best to blend in with the terrain as he kept watch. Jo’ra was dead, having been killed defending the Era’tran against far too many opponents and being unable to reposition. Defending immobile people was far harder than fighting on the run, and Mario’topa didn’t fault him. He hadn’t really stood a chance.

He’d been 835,022 years old, and the others were no younger. This war was taking away experienced troops more than anything, and doing so in such worthless fashion. Jo’ra didn’t do anything worth his death, for he couldn’t have stopped the attack, and had Mario’topa been in his place he wouldn’t have run and abandoned the Era’tran either. It was such a wasteful situation that it caused him to hate the Zak’de’ron even more, for ultimately they were responsible for all of this.

No, that wasn’t fair. The Elder Council had started this war. Eldorat was Zak’de’ron, but he wasn’t one of them. Over the past 200 years no other Essence users had entered the fighting, making it abundantly clear he had been a rogue allied with an extra-galactic power just as he’d said. Mario’topa wondered if the Zak’de’ron would have struck first once they knew Mak’to’ran was gone. It was possible they would have, and having gotten the first decisive attack in the war would have been to their advantage rather than the V’kit’no’sat’s, but still there was the possibility that there would have been no war and both would be fighting the Hadarak. Now it was a moot point, and there was no way to know what could or would have happened otherwise.

He still blamed the Zak’de’ron. He always would. And the more they killed the more his hate grew, but if Mak’to’ran said to stop fighting he would. The V’kit’no’sat desperately needed his guidance, and from everything he’d seen thus far Mak’to’ran had fully recovered. That was impossible, yet here he was, combat capable and with his memories intact. Sol’an couldn’t explain it either, and right now both were talking and eating up the dead drop foodstuffs to replace the tissue the Kich’a’kat had carved out of their bodies to regrow their wounds.

There hadn’t been enough of Jo’ra left to heal. His chest cavity had been hollowed out by weaponsfire to the point where his armor could not heal him. His heart had not been wounded, but destroyed, so there was nothing left to regrow. Fortunately Sol’an had been salvageable, along with her arm which had been reattached, but right now both Era’tran were famished and telekinetically flying food into their large mouths at a rapid pace.

Mario’topa would continue to guard them until the others came back, and right now there was no one out here in the skies to bother them. The planetary shield overhead was still up, and the nearest enemy installations were more than 1000 miles away. That was too close, but they didn’t appear to be interested in what had happened here. Or maybe they didn’t have any ships left to send. He assumed a signal had been sent out when this group started to fight, or at least when they began to lose, but there were no more transmissions coming from the jungle, so he waited and watched to see if their luck was going to run out again.

“There are still blank spots where we regrew tissue,” Sol’an said, using her halo to lightly scan Mak’to’ran’s brain. Somehow it had survived the fighting without taking any damage. “You must have some memory loss from it, but the rest of your brain is as if it was never damaged. I cannot explain it. I should have shot you long ago.”

Mak’to’ran huffed, but did not stop the flying train of food cubes from arcing up into his mouth. It paused every time he chewed and swallowed, and Sol’an should have been doing the same, but the mystery before her had taken priority after the first few canisters had been emptied.

I do not believe that is what did it, he said telepathically as he continued to eat. The resistance in my brain melted away from the bottom up. The shots merely woke me.

“Replay the memory for me, as much as you can,” she insisted, knowing that such things were highly inaccurate, especially after battle and severe wounds, but she needed something to work with.

Mak’to’ran paused his chewing as he tried to remember back. Most of it was a blur, but he remembered the resistance in his mind like a great wall that would not bend to his push. It annoyed him so much he had flung himself at it, then…

Mak’to’ran’s body twitched as he felt something inside him snap again, then everything went weak as he fell to the ground.

“What did you do?” she demanded, scanning him again but not being able to find anything biologically wrong.

Mak’to’ran pushed himself to his feet with an odd look in his eye, ignoring her question and lifting one of the empty foodstuff canisters telepathically. Sol’an could see it begin to crush slightly in his grip, then a moment later it snapped into a smashed rod with such ferocity that she began to reevaluate his Lachka strength.

The canister/rod dropped to the ground, as did Mak’to’ran, but he stopped at his knees with his tail flexed out straight behind him for counter balance as he breathed heavily, but his oxygen levels were constant. There was no physical strain, yet he was acting as if there was.

“You saw my execution, yes?” he finally asked.

“I saw the recording of it. Everyone in the empire did.”

“What happened from your view?”

“You were telekinetically decapitated.”

“How?”

“Your head was twisted until it broke, then it was pulled free of your body.”

“I remember feeling the Lachka and using my Rentar to counter it. Then I was grasped again with something other than Lachka. Something I could not defend against.”

“Another psionic?”

“The range involved for Lachka was impossible. He had to augment it. When it failed, he used something else. I believe he used raw Essence to kill me, and by doing so he has opened my senses to it. I feel drained, and I know I must not experiment too far or it will kill me, but I just added force to crush that container that my Lachka does not possess. I pushed it from my chest into my head, and I felt it flow out through my Lachka tissue. I am told Essence can also heal.”

“I know nothing about Essence,” Sol’an admitted. “How can it repair your cells without replacing them?”

“Even Star Force does not fully understand it, but they have recorded many instances of magical occurrences that they then later begin to define. I am weaker now. Can you see it in my body?”

“I cannot. My scans show you the same as a moment ago.”

“I am diminished. It must be Essence. Eldorat’s assassination attempt had given me access to it. I was touched by Essence, now I can dislodge it from my own body,” he said, standing up and twisting his tail around so that he could look at it. Mak’to’ran took one more risk, pushing the fabric of his existence out of alignment and down into his tail…which appeared to glow as he did so.

He immediately let go, and it felt like his second body jerked back into alignment, only now thinner than it had been before. The glow faded quickly, but not instantly, and he stared at his tail until the last embers of it were gone.

“What did you see?” he asked Sol’an.

“Where?”

“On my tail.”

“Nothing. What did you do?”

Mak’to’ran straightened out and fell to his knees again with the urge to breath heavily, but he realized his lungs were not craving air and it was just an automatic response to fatigue. He resisted it and simply held still, which seemed to help a bit better.

“I can see it now,” he said, not looking at her and staring at the ground as he tried to assess his interior Essence without moving it. There appeared to be nothing there until dislodged, and the thought of someone else dislodging it in him scared him to the core now that he had some understanding of what that involved.

“The Zak’de’ron claim they have one who can use Essence now, but in very small amounts.”

Mak’to’ran turned his head and glared at her. “What do you mean?”

“They made a public announcement after reclaiming Itaru. They said only they and the Oso’lon and J’gar could lead us against the Hadarak and all other threats. They said that they now had the seed of Essence power that would grow throughout the full empire over time, and showed one of their own lifting an object without using Lachka. We assumed it was fake, but they had numerous sensing devices on him at the moment, if you believe them.”

“And they use it to claim leadership?”

“Some are afraid of what Essence can do since Eldorat killed you right through our planetary defenses. They do not know how to defend against it. It was said that we went to war against the Zak’de’ron in order to die in a fight that was winnable rather than waiting to be slaughtered by these Essence users. I think that might be partially true.”

“Some?”

“Some have joined Itaru and accepted the triumvirate’s leadership once again. They believe in the superiority of the Zak’de’ron, and their claim of an Essence breakthrough gives small hope to those who feel helpless. If you have truly made the breakthrough, it will give you parity with them.”

“Parity? Star Force has the Essence power that neither of us do. Why did these systems not ally with them? Have they taken any of our worlds as their own?”

“I have heard stories of many that have fled to them, but no worlds have asked for their protection. Our war against the Zak’de’ron is our own, to win or lose. We have not involved them.”

“Yet you run to the Zak’de’ron when they show even the smallest Essence power rather than those who actually know how to wage war with it,” Mak’to’ran said angrily, standing up as he forced himself to concentrate. His strength was not returning quickly, and he felt if he dislodged his Essence again he could pass out, or even die, so it was imperative that he not touch it again for days, perhaps weeks, if the information Star Force had given him was accurate. Yet even this brief experience was illuminating. He felt as if another sense he’d possessed all along had suddenly awoken.

“We have not,” she defended.

“Have all Era’tran remained loyal?”

“I have not heard of any traitors, but I have been in the Zor’do working on you constantly. I know little of the war other than the major occurrences.”

“Treasonous Era’tran is a major occurrence,” he criticized, but his anger was not with her. “I understand your focus and thank you for it, though I do not remember it.”

“I had to wipe your short term memory each time I treated you. You should not remember it.”

“How badly damaged was I initially?”

“You were not conscious. Merely thrashing as pieces of your brain tried to operate without the others. It was more than 20 years before you could even stand.”

“Why did I not die initially? You said I was decapitated.”

“All the Era’tran with you were, but the Zen’zat were not attacked. They managed to reattach your head and those of a few others before you were unrecoverable. The others suffered too much brain damage and were reduced to hatchlings. You were attended to first, and slipped into a coma that protected most of your brain from the Kich’a’kat. That is why I was able to slowly put you back together again, but some of your memories should be permanently gone. Can Essence bring back past memory?”

“I do not see how, but I cannot rule out anything.”

“Is there something you cannot remember that you should?”

“Not obviously. If there is I will discover it when I seek it,” he said, pulling some more foodstuffs to him and hoping that would have some effect on his Essence depletion, for it was gnawing at him with no relief.

“Are you capable of leading the empire again?” she asked with a mix of apology for asking the question and necessary prudence.

“I am myself, though weak in body. Have I done any training?”

“None worth mentioning. How did you fare in battle?”

“You did not see?”

“I was most likely in shock, if not unconscious. I did not see.”

“My combat skills are intact,” he said succinctly. “If there is anything I have lost, I will replace it in time.”

“I think you will,” Sol’an said, feeling pride and relief that her task was nearly done. “Where do we go from here? We are far from safety.”

“What do you mean?”

“This region belongs to the Zak’de’ron. We evacuated the Zor’do save for a handful of people while I continued to work on you. Only it had the necessary equipment.”

“Why not move the equipment?”

“We could not leave the planet. And there is nowhere on the planet that is safe. When the invasion landed near to us, all forces on the planet moved to counterattack. In the end the invasion continued, but both sides were decimated. The Zak’de’ron claimed aerial superiority, and the Zor’do had to be evacuated on foot. We could not take the equipment that way, and you would recover no further without it. We had to stay here as long as possible.”

“The Zor’do is nearby?”

“Yes.”

“Are there records of my stay there?”

“No. We deleted everything. Your existence is unknown.”

“Then we need to keep it that way. My taking command will not create any more ships, and there is much I need to catch up on. Where can I get armor?”

“There is none available or you would have it already.”

“Are supplies that low?”

“I am told so, but the Zen’zat know better than me.”

Mario’topa, where can I get armor? he asked the gunship overhead telepathically.

There is none within our reach. I could procure none. We must travel beyond Tullupeg, at the minimum.

Where are we currently?

North of Svegarneu. The invasion point was Kinnven and they are currently assaulting Vitolor.

I trust your guidance. I cannot reveal myself for a variety of reasons. How can we get beyond the battle lines without assistance?

There are few battle lines. Forces are exhausted everywhere. If we do not attract attention we can move freely. So far no one is approaching. The troops you killed were from the occupation force sent to take possession of the Zor’do. They assumed it was empty and we ambushed them, but were unable to keep it.

Is there any reason to return?

No. When the Kardopa returns you must leave on it and keep to the surface. Low orbit is unsafe despite the shield.

How many Zen’zat remain?

Three others.

Any Era’tran?

Only Sol’an, and she is not suited for combat. We are on our own.

So be it. Find some place remote we can hide out that has access to the comm grid. I need to know how badly we have been hurt before I decide how to proceed.

The transport will be here within minutes. Prepare to move.

9

May 11, 128800

Jamtren System (Era’tran capitol)

Holloi

The Kardopa moved slowly, essentially towing the gunship along behind it with an energy tether for days and staying away from inhabitation, whether it be friend or foe. Large chunks of Holloi were left to nature, so avoiding them was easy and fortunately no pursuit came for the transport and its pair of Era’tran passengers. It seemed everyone else was too busy or too beaten up to care, allowing them a pathetic escape across the jungles of the planet in the captured craft.

Their eventual destination was not a city, but one of many private residences scattered across the planet, and when Mario’topa queried the residence to announce themselves upon arrival he got no response of any kind.

“Something is not right,” he told Mak’to’ran, who was sitting in the main hold. “There is no activity at all from Garuva’s palace. Not even any tracking beams. I can’t contact a single individual in armor either.”

“Hold us here and have the gunship be our eyes.”

“Yenni?” he asked, glancing at the nearby Zen’zat pilot.

She nodded, reforming her armor from the jewel-like gauntlets that she wore and heading for a side hatch. The Zen’zat opened it mid-flight and crawled out across the hull of the transport back towards the energy tether as Mario’topa telepathically ordered Ben’ra to slow them to a halt.

Yenni continued climbing across the nearly vertical hull using the grip points on her armor, then she got her feet under her and leapt from one craft to the other, landing on the exterior of the gunship and breaking off a few more fragments of charred armor on impact. She crawled inside and slid into the central pilot seat, then disconnected the energy tether and began to drift the gunship around and ahead of the transport at a slow crawl on the one and only gravity drive the small craft had left.

It took nearly 15 minutes for her to come up on the palace, and when she did she transmitted the visuals back to the transport.

“There’s no activity of any kind,” her voice said as Mak’to’ran saw the holograms of the Era’tran Elder’s residence.

There was a boundary wall made up of mounds three rows deep that would allow someone to walk through the crevices between them, which could become a death trap if needed. Inside the perimeter were many low buildings that he suspected to be built deep into the ground. As it was, none of them were taller than the treetops, making the palace disappear into the jungle unless you were directly over top of it. He had never been here before, but Garuva was well known as an industrial genius who once represented the Era’tran in the Elder Council. But like so many others after their first million years of life, he had retreated from public service to pursue special projects at his leisure.

These reclusive Elders were the true leaders of the Era’tran, but they did not get involved in current events unless their capable, but younger kin proved to be inadequate to the task. Garuva’s palace had always been known to host many guests and staff. For it to be empty seemed chilling given the fact that there appeared to be no damage to the sprawling residence at all.

“Put down on the platform and begin scouting on foot,” Mak’to’ran ordered the gunship. “We are enroute.”

The Kardopa started moving again, much faster than the gunship had, and by the time they crossed the outer boundary Yenni had barely had time to land her broken ship on one of four small pads that sat flush with the tree tops and made the ships that used them look like they were floating on a sea of green from the horizon.

The Kardopa was far too large to land, so it was brought to a hover over one of those pads and an extendable ramp lowered a great distance to reach it, down from which Mak’to’ran and Sol’an walked along with Lenna and Mario’topa who ran ahead of the Era’tran as skirmishers while Ben’ra remained onboard the transport.

“Evacuated?” Sol’an wondered.

“It would seem so,” Mak’to’ran agreed. “I do not understand why. This facility has defenses. Why leave them for the enemy to secure?”

“Contact,” Yenni said over the comm. “Zen’zat without armor.”

Mak’to’ran saw her position on his own tactical display, noting that she was down at ground level and on the other side of the nearest cylindrical building that had a flat top with a walkway connecting it to the landing pads at an angle. He took off at a slow run across that walkway as it descended to the top of the building, then he crossed it and jumped off the far side, falling and landing hard on the paved ground below, but he did not topple.

The impact made a not so subtle tremor, and he wasn’t surprised to see that Sol’an didn’t follow his reckless path, rather taking one of the landing pad ramps down and crossing the rest of the distance on foot as Mak’to’ran stared at the small group of Zen’zat coming out of the building and standing next to Yenni.

“Identify yourselves,” he demanded, taking a few sore steps forward but pleased that his leg check proved adequate. The Kich’a’kat had done much to repair the stagnation his body had been suffering from.

“We are Elder Garuva’s caretakers,” one of males said as he bent his neck back to look up at the towering Era’tran without fear. “We were instructed to remain here and maintain the palace when the others left.”

“Where did they go?”

“Garuva decided to join those counter-attacking the invasion point and took all his Era’tran and combat proficient Zen’zat with him. He sent the rest of his techs to other assignments, leaving 13 of us to maintain the palace for his uses or demolish it should the Zak’de’ron come to claim it. We have heard nothing of him or those that went with him. They are labeled as missing, most likely dead.”

“What of the other Elders?”

“Many chose to fight the first battle. I do not know how many remain.”

“Is your tactical grid access secure?”

“It is. Are you here to reclaim the palace or demolish it?”

“I have need of it,” Mak’to’ran said firmly. “No mention of our presence is to be reported under any circumstances.”

“As you wish, Era’tran. What do you require of us?”

“Combat armor.”

“We have both Era’tran and Zen’zat suits in the armory.”

Mak’to’ran huffed agreeably. “The two vessels we arrived on were captured from the enemy. Check them over for any alterations, code or hardware, that is beyond standard specifications. If they come up clean, try and repair what you can. Are there any aerial craft here?”

“Two barges remain, plus 6 Zen’zat speeders and a geoball.”

Mak’to’ran’s eye ridge twitched. A geoball was a subsurface transport that operated on fixed rail lines.

“Where does the georail connect to?”

“Several private facilities, along with a single line to a hidden access point in Triapesc.”

“Where is Garuva’s war room?”

The Zen’zat tech pointed behind Mak’to’ran.

“Show me.”

“You come with us,” Mario’topa said, picking one of the techs. “The rest get to work on the craft.”

Mak’to’ran spun around as the little Zen’zat scattered around his feet and ran so not to force him to walk painfully slow. That was a matter of courtesy the Zen’zat always extended the larger races, and Mak’to’ran could feel the pleasure this one tech had at finally being given a task to do. His mind was masked to him, but his emotions were so overwhelming him that he was involuntarily transmitting them…as were the others heading to the ramp. Apparently they had been abandoned here and were in desperate need of direction.

All the buildings Mak’to’ran could see were built for Era’tran, though there were a few small auxiliary entrances for the Zen’zat. The tech did not lead him to one of those, but opened up a larger door for him that led into a small, but adequately sized room for three, perhaps four Era’tran to work in. There were plush pedestals to lay on as they worked, but Mak’to’ran went right for the central hologram and mentally interfaced with it, bringing up the data network access that would let him see what was going on everywhere else on the planet that was still connected.

When the image of Holloi appeared it was color coded to indicate the status of all cities, outposts, residences, and other infrastructure…and of all the green dots, most were pale green, meaning they were functional but depleted. But it was the giant red blot at one location not far from here that dominated his attention. It was like a wound on the planet, and perhaps a fatal one at that, but actual possession of Holloi still remained mostly in Era’tran claws.

“Zen’zat,” Sol’an asked as Mak’to’ran was getting up to speed. “Is there additional clothing here?”

“Garuva has an extensive wardrobe available for guests. You may use whatever you like.”

“Are you done with this one?” she asked Mak’to’ran.

“Take him.”

“Show me,” she instructed, then left with the Zen’zat to replace her tight bodysuit that was riddled with burn marks. Mario’topa remained patiently at Mak’to’ran’s side for many minutes before the Era’tran finally spoke.

“What are they doing?”

“Who?”

“Our forces. They are poorly countering the assault. The Zak’de’ron have numerous holes in their lines that could be exploited, yet our forces cluster around defensive positions that make no sense.”

“I do not know of current events. The Zor’do was cut off intentionally to make it appear abandoned after the first battle.”

“They are fighting like hatchlings,” Mak’to’ran growled.

“That may be all that are left,” Mario’topa suggested, regretting the words the moment he said them. And the glare the Era’tran gave him didn’t help.

“Garuva wasn’t the only one that fought?”

“No. We hit their assault force with nearly everything we had when they made it to ground. It was said that if they gained a foothold we would lose the war of attrition, so everyone that could fight was volunteering. That’s why I couldn’t find any armor to keep for you. Many wanted to die in that first fight rather than wait for the slaughter thereafter.”

“Has the empire lost its will to win?” Mak’to’ran asked in a whisper, suddenly realizing how bad things must have been across the galaxy for the Era’tran to behave in this manner.

“The Zak’de’ron knew how and where to hit us, and you knew where to hit them. We’ve canceled out and left the empire to the Oso’lon and J’gar. Once they took Itaru, they’ve been slowly mopping up territory and avoiding the big fights while the Zak’de’ron focus on the remaining strongholds. Even if we can hold them here, the Oso’lon can come in to finish the fight whenever they wish. And if we try to evacuate, the J’gar fleets will hunt down any rogue ships. Nothing less than a battlegroup is safe to move around. Commerce to Jamtren has completely stopped. Systems are having to fend for themselves. Very few were able to send aid here when the Zak’de’ron arrived.”

“You see no way to win?”

“Preserving you was our long term hope, but only a handful of individuals even know you are alive. Eldorat was not killed for two days after he attacked you, so we could not let anyone know that any of you had survived. Those reduced to hatchlings were spirited away where they could anonymously begin another life. You were brought here in secret while the Elder Council began the war. Many wanted to die fighting the Zak’de’ron rather than be obliterated by the Veloqueen. Those that remain want to fight, but to an honorable end. They cannot see anything beyond it.”

“Who are the Veloqueen?”

“They are the race Eldorat served,” Mario’topa said warily.

Mak’to’ran considered that for a moment. “I have no memory of that name.”

“Sol’an said you had permanently lost a small portion of your memories. I am glad it did not affect your combat skills.”

“As am I,” he said, turning his attention back to the hologram of the planet and the small panels of selective information he was pulling up rapidly as he multi-tasked with his Sav allowing him to visually and mentally sift through more data in a minute than Mario’topa could get through in an hour.

“Do we have the forces to hold Holloi?”

“Possibly. Their reinforcements have been few in recent years, and their progress slow. They need Jamtren to fall as an example to others, yet they creep on as if they have no further strength to divert here. You said the Oso’lon and J’gar had large, intact fleets?”

“Remaining in their own territory. No counter attack of them was deemed feasible.”

Mak’to’ran shifted to galactic information from the Urrtren, finding large parts of it were incomplete or cut off entirely, but there was still a great deal of information available. Just not a lot of recent information.

“Interesting,” he mewed. “They are worried that the Zak’de’ron will betray them, and are making sure they have the upper hand with regards to fleet strength. The Zak’de’ron are doing all the heavy lifting. I thought you said we nearly wiped them out?”

“The Zak’de’ron race is what I meant. Their servants did not take the early hits. We bypassed them as you outlined. Then they struck us hard in response. When we were fully committed Itaru was taken and the J’gar began poaching the space lanes. After that it became a free for all.”

“Yet the Urrtren remains mostly intact.”

“What does that mean?”

“Intimidation and illusion are both weapons the Zak’de’ron rely upon when they do not have true dominance. They want the rest of the V’kit’no’sat to see Holloi fall. They need them to voluntarily rejoin, because they do not have the strength to force it. Not in time…” he said, switching to the coreward map to see where the Hadarak invasion was…and as he expected, some worlds were already being chewed up by their advance.

“Are you saying it’s a bluff?”

“Hatred of the Zak’de’ron would keep every V’kit’no’sat race defiant to the death. They do not have the strength to engage in that fight and win. They had not planned to engage us this early. The Hadarak purge forced them to reveal themselves before they were ready. They would not have attacked us if the Elder Council had not been so stupid to start the war. Now they are committed and know they cannot win and rebuild before the Hadarak sweep up half our territory, if at all. The Oso’lon and J’gar are their lifeline. Have all of them changed allegiance?”

“No. Ours have remained loyal, but those are the primary targets for the traitors, and they’re starting with the weaker ones now that we don’t have the defense fleets to rally to their aid.”

“Conquest or destruction?”

“Conquest, though many are dying when they will not submit. I don’t think they want their races divided anymore.”

“I concur. They could not prevent it previously, and they must rebuild the illusion of unity. While others would die fighting against the Zak’de’ron, they are conditioned to submit to the Oso’lon and J’gar. By reuniting with them, the Zak’de’ron hope to intimidate and delude those they cannot quickly defeat in battle. All in the hopes of squashing our resistance soon enough that they can turn their attention to the Hadarak and hold onto a portion of the empire while the rest is destroyed.”

“Will that work?”

“It is their only option. And I intend to see that it does not work. To do that we must stop them here and hold Holloi, and it is fortuitous that the majority of the planetary defenses are still intact. If what’s left of our defenders stop behaving as hatchlings we can hold the planet. That first battle did save it, Mario’topa. But those that remain seem intent to waste the sacrifices made.”

“If you reveal yourself the Zak’de’ron will come. So will the Oso’lon and J’gar. You are a higher target than even Holloi.”

“I know, but remember where we are, little Zen’zat. Remember where we currently stand and who controls it.”

The epiphany struck Mario’topa a moment later.

“And he’s currently missing, presumed dead but not confirmed?”

“Precisely. Bring me the best coder from the techs.”

Mario’topa smiled broadly. “With pleasure, Garuva.”

10

May 19, 128800

Jamtren System (Era’tran capitol)

Holloi

Li’nikka was on foot patrol around the small city of Bejdalli when the orders came in, and at first he didn’t believe them. He’d been solo assigned to give this city an Era’tran combat specialist in order to pull together a civil defense unit for when the enemy finally arrived here. Not enough to actually win a fight, but to bleed them of some of their infantry before the pullout happened.

There were over 800 Era’tran in the city with some 360 Zen’zat serving them, none of which were combat trained. Everyone who had been had long since been called off to fight elsewhere, which Li’nikka wanted to be doing, but instead he was stuck here with a bunch of females and techs, none of which had any fighting skills. And out of all of them there were only 3 that had armor, which had come out of heirlooms and was considerably dated, but far better than nothing.

He had 34 in his cobbled together unit and was trying to school them in enough basic principles that they would be able to work together to help support him when the enemy got here using their psionics and the small-arms weapons that thankfully there was still a supply of. Armor was scarce, but add-ons were still available. Just no shield generators. Why more hadn’t been readily made he didn’t know. Perhaps they had prioritized the weapons given the fact that shields couldn’t kill any of the enemy.

But now he was being called away, and he couldn’t believe by who. The orders were coming in from Garuva, whom everyone had thought dead with the rest of the Elders. The chain of command had become so broken that the planetary commander, at least the last he knew, was a mid level warrior only 400,000 years old. He’d ordered them all into defensive positions with the highest priority given to scaling attrition in their favor, but no longer. Garuva had somehow survived and now taken command, and Li’nikka was being called to fight.

He let out a muted roar of excitement and swung around on the trail outside the city and left the grasslands, ducking inside the nearest gate and heading to one of three ships the city possessed. Two were larger transports, but the third was a short range troop transport designed for Era’tran. Similar to the Zen’zat gunships, the Pill’ew could carry four Era’tran along with a contingent of Zen’zat if needed, but they were able to operate without them.

Li’nikka didn’t have any worthwhile to take with him anyway, so when he ran up to and under the cozy craft he mentally triggered the underside doors to swing open, then one of four harnesses lowered and locked onto his armor, hauling him inside suspended above the opening. The doors closed below his hanging feet as the gravity altered and he was left more or less floating with just enough to keep him oriented as he interfaced his armor with the ship and began to fly it remotely.

The Pill’ew lifted up from the city and headed south towards a rendezvous point. Li’nikka didn’t have any further orders than to go there, but after several hours of flying he noticed another Era’tran craft heading in the same general direction, though it was faster and passed him by. An hour after that he began picking up others to the left and right at great distances, all of which were seeming to converge on the same rendezvous point.

6 hours later the sky was full of ships as he slid into hovering position alongside the others as they waited for more to arrive. There was an armada of small craft here, few of which had any real aerial weapons, but most looked to be small to medium troop carriers of some sort, and those nearest him were not full, which he confirmed via Ikrid as they began passing inquires back and forth without using the comm channels.

Nobody knew what was going on, only that Garuva had issued attack orders. This wasn’t a defensive maneuver, they were actually going to counterattack the invaders, and many like Li’nikka were saying it was about time and eager to make the assault. When the time finally came they moved out in waves, making a river of small craft flying just above the surface and tracking towards the enemy lines.

Li’nikka could see what was going ahead through their tactical link, and as a few scattered Zak’de’ron units tried to intercept them 4 Vindendi Zen’zat fighters pulled out of the group and quickly engaged. As far as he knew there weren’t any Vindendi left on the planet, but the fast and agile attack craft made quick work of the interlopers and circled back into the group where they disappeared in the armada that was altering course at the last moment to disguise their true target.

They swung wide of the main fortifications in Bonnk’ann where the Zak’de’ron were the strongest and instead bypassed them to head towards the ghost town of Tu’vannak. The enemy still possessed it, but the once 3 million population that lived there were now either dead or evacuated. There was no one there to save, and very few enemy to target, yet that’s where Garuva was sending them.

When they got closer Li’nikka got additional orders, including turning over control of his craft to another ship after he set down in the very heart of the decimated city that was showing a bit more activity than he had thought. There were enemy units scattered around that had to be destroyed, and he was assigned to hunting them. When his wave of ships flew over the city boundaries they broke up, each going to separate locations, and his was an isolated building top where he disengaged from his Pill’ew and dropped a dozen meters out of the underside doors after releasing control of it to the armada.

The ship remotely flew off without him as he got waypoint information and zonal hunting parameters. Apparently the Zak’de’ron had been using this ghost town as a supply depot, and they hadn’t left very many units here to guard it, given that their army was nearly as depleted as the Era’tran’s was. Li’nikka was to search out and destroy the defending units while other teams took and repaired existing city defenses that the Zak’de’ron had overlooked, some of which were simply out of power.

They were going to hold portions this city, steal the Zak’de’ron’s useful supplies, and torch the rest. The Zak’de’ron had left them vulnerable and now they were going to pay for that mistake, making Li’nikka wonder why they hadn’t launched this type of attack sooner.

Then he realized as he looked off the rooftop at the hundreds of craft flying around the city that the Era’tran were leaving a lot of places underdefended in order to make this assault, just like the city he’d been previously assigned to. But going on the offensive just felt right. They were calling the shots now, not moving in response to the Zak’de’ron, and here and now, at least, they were in a mismatched fight in their advantage, and it had been a long time since he could remember having that luxury.

Li’nikka ran to the rooftop access and moved down through the building using his Ikrid and Lachka to kill enemy infantry scattered inside through the walls before they could even see him coming. Once he cleared the site he moved on to his next waypoint and began hunting mechanized units in a specific zone that was all his, which would give him more of a challenge, but the large walking machines were no match for an Era’tran one on one, and he welcomed the chance to get his claws on something larger than infantry.

With all the units roaming the air overhead he had good intelligence as to where the enemy was and was not, but there were still overhangs and damaged buildings offering some cover, but he got to his first target within 8 minutes of leaving his landing site and immediately took fire from its two shoulder cannons. The quadruped machine stood slightly taller than him, and was easy to knock down, though its height gave it a big advantage hunting Zen’zat on the ground.

But he wasn’t Zen’zat.

Li’nikka fired on it from multiple weapon ports on his armor, seeing the hits disappear into its shields as the walker’s fire likewise disappeared into his, but he wasn’t going to fight a ranged match. He took off running, and lowered his head at just the last moment as the walker tried to sidestep out of the way. He headbutted it in one of the four knee joints and wrapped his thick arms around the legs as they both went to the ground…and after that the poorly designed anti-infantry walker had no chance against his melee skills.

Mak’to’ran watched the attack unfold from Garuva’s war room. The map of the city was too massive to fit in there, so he had to keep zooming in and out as he monitored their progress. Resistance was light, as expected, but already units from other locations were grouping up to mount a counterattack to his counterattack, but they would not get to Tu’vannak before the supply depots were hit.

Mak’to’ran had been worried about the fighting caliber of the troops that remained, but they were doing exceptionally well in the mismatch, as they should, and he was happy to be able to deliver them an easy victory after so many years of defeats, but this was just his opening move. He needed to keep a close watch on the individual units fighting in the city to make sure no debacles happened, and he’d already had to give a few extra orders to specific units that didn’t quite understand the basic elements of street fighting, but overall it was going well, and he needed to identify which were the better units, for the old skill marks from before the war were now outdated. Combat had a way of elevating or degrading warriors over a short period of time, and he needed to know who was on the rise and who had been broken.

But he was also watching how the Zak’de’ron responded in other locations, and from where. He was hoping to pull them to him, but he wasn’t sure what they would leave underdefended to do it…then he saw them pulling what looked like all their aerial assets out of their frontline outposts to the south, all the way down to near where Team 4 was stationed.

It was going to take a while for them to get up to the supply depot, and by the time they did it would be too late to save it. Mak’to’ran assumed the Zak’de’ron commanders were looking for a major clash where they could kill the cluster of Era’tran craft, but that wasn’t going to happen. He’d pull them out before major losses could occur, leaving a few units to handle the city defenses that they were able to rejuvenate. The damage they could do would be worth it, and the crews staying behind to man them knew the risks and how they’d be left on their own to survive afterward, but they all had eagerly volunteered at the chance to do some real damage to the enemy.

As juvenile as the Era’tran commanders had been previously, the Zak’de’ron did not appear to be much better. They were pulling units from key areas and leaving them undefended, perhaps expecting Mak’to’ran not to have any other armadas in play. After all, he had to strip everything from the surrounding area just to assemble this one. What more could he have?

The answer was a great deal. There were places on the planet that were in no immediate danger, but they still had light defensive units there above and beyond their infrastructure. Mak’to’ran had quietly pulled them all out, forming additional armadas that were moving up at the same time the primary one went out to hit the depot. At the same time he had all-Zen’zat teams near the Zak’de’ron border waiting for moments of opportunity, and the stupid enemy commander was giving him plenty.

Mak’to’ran began sending out a flurry of orders, leaving his backlines undefended where they were safely tucked in underneath the planetary shield generators and too far away from the enemy to be flanked…and even if they were, their city turrets were intact and could fend off a small attack without support. And the enemy wasn’t going to be able to mount more than that with all their attention focused on the supply depot.

It was a gamble, and no maneuvers in this dystopian war zone could be classified as anything else, but right now he had the Zak’de’ron reacting to him, and that was the best way to protect what was left of Holloi. He didn’t have enough troops to adequately defend all cities and sites. Neither did the enemy, so going on the offense while relying on your infrastructure…something the enemy did not have the luxury of on someone else’s planet…as a backstop was the smart play, and one that should have been made years ago. There just weren’t any real commanders left alive to spot the opportunity and seize it.

Mak’to’ran hadn’t looked too closely at the death tallies. He’d searched for any senior leadership and found none still active. At least none that were linked into the tactical grid. As Mario’topa had said, they’d gone with the main defense force to resist the Zak’de’ron at their first landing point and succeeded enough to create this creeping stalemate that the enemy was winning due to their sporadic reinforcements trickling in over the years, but not enough to take the entire planet within the next 50 unless something major changed.

If Mak’to’ran’s troops could summon up enough courage to remember who they were, then this was going to be easy. But they’d lived through this nightmare that he’d blessedly missed. So while his mind was fresh theirs were weary, but as they saw a quick and instant victory maybe some hope would work its way in.

He had no way of knowing that from his position, organizing from afar from a place of secrecy. Some of the Elders should have done this and survived to make sure the resistance was adequately led, but Mak’to’ran guessed they saw no way of winning and had chosen the most honorable of deaths they could arrange, leaving the non-combat portion of the planet with the least enemy forces to face afterward as they took as many as they could to death with them.

Mak’to’ran was going to make use of the advantage they had left, but he was dismayed that there was no one here that could have seen it before him. Was Holloi totally devoid of a single experienced commander? This planet used to be the heart of the Era’tran Empire where the wisest and most experienced came to live when their time of frontline service came to an end and they were replaced with others that needed the experience more than them.

Holloi had been a brain trust for the Era’tran, and now it was devoid of that legendary skill…save for him.

Mak’to’ran didn’t know what the situation in the rest of the galaxy was like, and he hoped there were systems out there still intact, both Era’tran and their allies, but he suspected that those would be likewise drained of their best troops, if not leadership, as they went to war in other places. Mak’to’ran was alive by sheer luck and the determination of his fellow Era’tran to protect and restore him, and in doing so he’d been spared this war…but his absence was also responsible for it. None of this would have happened if Eldorat had not come, or if he’d not tried to overthrow Mak’to’ran and seize control of the V’kit’no’sat for himself.

The arrogance of that astounded Mak’to’ran, and it was a bad sign if the Veloqueen were of a similar attitude. If they were so powerful they thought they could do whatever they wanted then meeting them in battle again was going to be horrific. The V’kit’no’sat were not prepared for a war of Essence, and now that Mak’to’ran had tasted his first bit of that power he feared it even more, for he knew it was not a power that could be constructed quickly as Legion had been. This would take a lifetime to build, and the Era’tran did not have a lifetime. They were half dead already, and even if they survived this war the Hadarak were right there on the doorstep of the Empire, chewing away at it while these idiots…

There. Mak’to’ran just saw more Zak’de’ron units from the northern flank begin to reposition, and he sent orders out to Team 2 to begin their stealth attack. They were all Zen’zat on foot and speeder bikes moving through the jungle, and it would take them quite a while to arrive, but when they did they’d have another mismatch in their favor…and if the Zak’de’ron pulled troops from somewhere else to counter that attack, he’d activate another of his waiting teams to hit something else valuable that they left lightly defended.

He had to time this right, and keep making adjustments as the course of events went along. Some of his troops would fail him, for their resolve was weak and their training limited. These were the survivors and the rookies, and he was going to get the most use out of them that he could, but he also knew that victory would inspire them more than any speech, and today they were going to get to inflict plenty of damage on the enemy, for the Zak’de’ron were so badly positioned they could not redirect reinforcements fast enough, and Mak’to’ran wasn’t going to allow them a chance to do so.

More orders went out to units waiting on the border and those moving up from the rear areas, some coming from half the planet away, but all were able to see what was happening ahead and Mak’to’ran made sure the battle vids were being passed along to every unit and every city still in Era’tran possession on the planet…along with the fact that Garuva was still alive and now taking command. The presence of an Elder would do much in addition to the victories, as would the industrial orders Mak’to’ran was making in his name. Everything on this planet had become sloppy, if not downright broken, and he was going to put it back into order as quickly as possible.

This was no longer a resistance. It was a counterstrike. And while he couldn’t do anything about the Veloqueen or the Hadarak in the foreseeable future, if he could hold Holloi then he could eventually recover the rest of the V’kit’no’sat Empire. His presence here was an unpredictable event for the Zak’de’ron, and he needed to keep it an unknown for as long as possible. This was the only chance the Era’tran and the V’kit’no’sat had. He was the only chance. There was strength left in Holloi, but it was scattered, dejected, and wasted without proper leadership. He’d never thought to see Holloi on the brink of defeat again, let alone this kind of collapse, but as long as the Zak’de’ron didn’t get a massive amount of reinforcements he was going to stop the losses here and now. Forcefully.

He waited until the raid on the supply depot was complete, and his units were pulling out before the Zak’de’ron units rushing there could engage them in a costly battle, but once victory was his and the volunteers remaining were shooting down ship after ship as the enemy crossed right over weapons batteries they thought had been destroyed…that was when he rescinded the hatchery restrictions.

When the planet was looking like it would fall, reproduction had been stopped. Mak’to’ran now reversed that order and indicated that the hatcheries should begin filling again. This was going to be a long term war, and replacement troops and general population would be needed, no matter how green. The slow death of Holloi had been terminated, and it was now time to start growing again, even before the enemy had been repelled.

Time was not the Era’tran’s ally, and they couldn’t afford to waste any of what they had.

Mak’to’ran had an immense amount of work ahead of him, but in the back of his mind he knew that even if he was wildly successful here the Empire was still doomed without Star Force. They were now the dominant power in the galaxy, and he would have to come to terms with them eventually…otherwise the coreward half of this galactic empire would be lost to the ashes of history.

www.aerkijyr.com

The Forbidden Space Fleet

1

November 14, 128801

Vitroll Nemannis System (Hadarak War Zone)

Manchurra High Orbit

Kyra Junari Bensha Sovati watched from the secluded confines of her cloaked scout ship as the Hadarak invaded yet another system. Her mission was recon, not assistance, and if her ship’s technology was good enough no one would ever know the QuipNari had been here.

Kyra sat in the cockpit chair, surrounded by no buttons, levelers, or physical controls of any kind. The construction of her ship was entirely smooth and claustrophobic, with her having reset the gravity to 4 times normal to give her physical body something to strain against as her cyborg mind directed the ship and the large amount of passive sensors collected data to be returned to the PanNari, her mother race.

She, like the other PanNari, had been born into whatever genetic form was required of them. If the PanNari needed a quadruped, then they birthed a quadruped. If they needed an avian, they got an avian, and so forth. PanNari genetic technology was that good, but most of their population was born as a simple gelatinous mass without a mobile body. They were brains and support tissue that were interlinked into the Dominion where they gained their ‘physical’ bodies.

Kyra was not connected to it now. The Dominion was home, and she was far from it. The QuipNari were the few that ever left it, but they had to in order to see what was happening in the galaxy. They had to venture beyond the protection of the Encapsulation to see, hear, and record what was taking place, and they had been for millions of years in small number until recently. Now, the number of QuipNari had increased by 1439%, because the PanNari needed to know what was happening in the Hadarak war, and it was spread across vast reaches of the galaxy.

This scout mission was her 14th, making her one of the newer recruits, and she almost enjoyed being out here more than in the Dominion, which were treasonous thoughts. She’d been chosen for the QuipNari because of her malfunction. PanNari were meant for the Dominion, but a few every now and then rejected it in some small way. When discovered they were reassigned to the QuipNari in order to put their desire to be elsewhere to good use. Kyra hadn’t regretted the change at all, and was fortunate for it. The rest of her race was waiting for the day when they’d be unleashed against the Hadarak, but until Eldorat told them the time was right they must wait in seclusion. And most of the PanNari were happily content to live inside the Dominion without curiosity for the physical reality beyond.

But Kyra was curious, and this mission was more significant than most. She and others had been investigating the Hadarak war as well as those in their path. Her body had been fashioned as a biped form known as Human in order to infiltrate an empire known as Star Force. The female gender had been chosen to facilitate information gathering, for they were generally considered less of a threat due to their average size being smaller and their predilection for submission over aggression, but Kyra had discovered that that part of their genetic makeup had almost become obsolete due to their cultural alterations and limitless lifespans.

Most had learned to customize themselves and rise above their default programming, though there was still an undercurrent present that had made the choice of her female body the correct one. Due to security issues she had not been able to infiltrate any of the Star Force planets, both because she had no identity on record and the fact that her cybernetic arms and legs could not pass scrutiny. The QuipNari had underestimated the level of Star Force’s most rudimentary security, otherwise she would have gone in with a fully biological body and not have had her arms and legs removed to add the upgrades.

Her mind could have been reconfigured as well if needed, but it was far more shielded and disguised given that most of it was biological. The artificial components had blended with her Lifeforce long ago, but a tight scan could still reveal them. Her first mission had not been deep infiltration, but just a periphery assessment of their civilization. While she couldn’t physically set foot on one of their worlds without going through a security check, their empire was so large and had so many offshoots that she was able to find and interact with other Humans beyond their borders easily enough, and through them she had been able to gather a wealth of valuable information.

But this mission was not about Star Force. It was about their originators, the V’kit’no’sat. This system belonged to them, and the Hadarak were coming here to engage them in battle. That interaction she was tasked to document, as were others, but she was the only one in this system. QuipNari never operated together, always in isolation and creeping around where the risk of capture was limited. If Kyra was ever forced into that situation she was ordered to terminate herself and her technology so it would not fall into the possession of others. The PanNari had been chosen by Eldorat because they had advanced to the point where they were able to kill Hadarak. He had found them worthy enough to be saved from destruction, for the PanNari had no idea the level of threat they truly posed, and were fortunate Eldorat got to them before they could seriously piss off the Hadarak and trigger a selective purge of their race.

What Kyra was documenting now was far more than a selective purge. The Hadarak were engaged in what many assumed was a full galactic purge, but no one knew what the trigger point had been. The V’kit’no’sat had been in continual conflict with them, but they had not been very effective in the kills they made. Not nearly as much as the PanNari had been. And the galactic purge had begun before Star Force engaged them in battle, leaving the question of why this purge was occurring as an unanswered mystery, but that wasn’t Kyra’s mission to discover. She was here to discover how much resistance the V’kit’no’sat were going to put up given the fact they were engaged in a civil war against their former masters.

Other QuipNari had been documenting that conflict, as well as the rumors that Eldorat had visited the V’kit’no’sat and attempted to offer them preservation. The V’kit’no’sat claimed they had killed the Zak’de’ron, but no one believed he was actually dead. The V’kit’no’sat did not have the power to do so. More likely they had rejected his offer due to their immense ego and he had simply left them to die while pursuing other options.

But the larger question was how long Eldorat was going to wait before calling them into action. He had told the PanNari they could not defeat the Hadarak alone, nor could the others he had Encapsulated, which the PanNari knew nothing of. And all of them combined would not be enough to breach the interior defense lines to get to the closest of the Gates. They had to have the assistance of the Essence users inside the Temples at the minimum, but Eldorat had said even that would not be enough. They had to have help from his own masters or any assault on the Hadarak would end in failure and the waste of all that had built up in preparation for that fight.

So the PanNari waited inside the Dominion while the QuipNari were their eyes and ears within the galaxy as they prepared for Eldorat to return, and he had said he would not until the time was right, so they weren’t expecting to interact with him again. He’d given them what they needed, now it was their responsibility to patiently wait for the call to war.

But the war was already here, and Kyra didn’t like not being a part of it. She knew her duty and would not waver from it, but the idea of a galactic purge insulted the PanNari. They were meant to save the galaxy from the Hadarak, but what would there be left to save if they didn’t act now? Would the Veloqueen really let the Hadarak do this, or would they soon return to lead all in the promised war to rid this galaxy of the Hadarak?

Kyra did not know what their timetable was, or what were their priorities, but while everyone waited the galaxy was burning, with this system being the target of three Cargo-class Hadarak and scores of their small, expendable infantry. None of the more advanced versions were here, so maybe the V’kit’no’sat would have a chance of holding if they got some reinforcements from nearby systems. But as it was, they were horribly mismatched as they sent what few warships they had out towards the arriving trio in low stellar orbit, probably to engage them before they had a chance to crash land through the planetary shields on one of their six heavily inhabited worlds.

The V’kit’no’sat ships, which she’d identified as a mix of Brat’mar and I’rar’et, were focusing entirely on the naval infantry and not the three large Hadarak who seemed content to sit and float behind their picket clouds daring the V’kit’no’sat ships to come closer…and the infantry kept baiting them to do just that, though fortunately the defending fleet did not fall for it.

From what the QuipNari had previously learned, the V’kit’no’sat were well experienced in fighting the Hadarak, which meant they shouldn’t be suckered into such an easy gambit. They were rightly trying to diminish the number of infantry, but they had no way to stop the cargo carriers from landing on their planets without considerable help. It was curious how the Hadarak either knew of this weakness, or were bold enough to send no advanced units here to assist.

The V’kit’no’sat had decent weaponry, perhaps even a bit more advanced than the PanNari when it came to killing the infantry, but they had nothing that could effectively battle the bioarmor the cargo carriers had surrounding their bodies, and they knew it. Their only play was against the infantry, meaning their planets would be helpless if and when the cargo carriers began to move.

That happened after a few hours of skirmishes with the naval infantry. Apparently their baiting wasn’t going to work, and the cargo carriers were too slow to run down the V’kit’no’sat warships, so the three Hadarak eventually split up and began to head towards different planets, intent on assaulting each one individually with most of the infantry continuing their attacks on the warships.

Kyra watched silently, recording and cataloging as she went, making occasional notations as the first Hadarak rammed into the planetary shields on the 2nd planet in the system and popped them as if they were no more than a flimsy bubble. It then dropped down on top of a megalopolis, smashing the buildings and the people there almost instantaneously when it hit, then several of its tentacles came out and began to dig into the nearby landscape, knocking down more buildings as it pulled itself lower and lower into the planet, triggering earthquakes everywhere, though those didn’t topple any of the well-built V’kit’no’sat structures.

This wasn’t the first Hadarak assault she’d witnessed, but the way the technologically superior V’kit’no’sat were so easily defeated made her worry how well the PanNari would fare. Better than these, but the PanNari strength came from technology as well, and Eldorat had told her people that the only truly effective weapon against the Hadarak was Essence…and that was something the PanNari had not achieved, despite their best attempts to do so. They’d learned how to graft artificial body parts to a person in a way that their Essence would extend out into them and claim them for their own body, but other than that Kyra’s people were blind to the greatest power in the galaxy.

Yet she still wanted to fight. She wanted to see the Elloquim unleashed on the Hadarak, for they had become far more powerful than their forbearers, and far more numerous. Still, they were technology, but against this trio of Hadarak they would be the victors. But they were not here, for they were forbidden from fighting along with the rest of the PanNari and other races that Eldorat had acquired. They all had to wait…but for how long? They were needed now. That was obvious.

Another contact appeared on Kyra’s sensors, with it being a V’kit’no’sat ship entering the system at the head of a small convoy. They were warships, and she oddly wondered how many were coming and from where. The V’kit’no’sat empire was hurting badly for ships, and most systems were clinging to what they had left to defend themselves against the Zak’de’ron and their allies. But at least it seemed someone recognized the superior threat of the Hadarak and were sending help. Though what good it would do was going to be determined by how many ships they sent. The way the V’kit’no’sat fought, they needed a large number to gradually tear into the Hadarak armor…except for their suicide craft, and there appeared to be none of those arriving.

That wasn’t surprising. The shipyards that had built them were almost entirely destroyed across the galaxy, many of which had been in their capitol of Itaru and suffered the same fate as those worlds. This system actually had a decent-sized shipyard complex of its own, but it was producing standard warships to fight the Zak’de’ron, not the Ysalamiri meant to breach the Hadarak heavy armor.

But at the end of the convoy of 36 warships...far too small a number to assault even a single Hadarak…came a glimmer of hope. There was a Star Force ship with them, and Kyra instantly recognized its knife-like shape as one of their Essence ships.

It wasted no time, heading for one of the two Hadarak that had not yet arrived at a planet in a very precise microjump that had it arriving just ahead and braking so hard Kyra’s computer could not comprehend how it had managed to avoid ramming the planet.

On impulse Kyra braced herself, then placed her right skin-covered mechanical hand against the soft console before her. It sunk in until the white material covered her knuckles, then she triggered the command that would drain a portion of Essence from her body.

She had no control over it, but it hurt every time she had done so. Eldorat had given them the technology to replicate, but it required Essence to operate and no one knew how to give it voluntarily, so it had to be cut out of them…but not enough to kill them.

Kyra half slumped when the process finished, knowing that she’d recover in time, but the sacrifice had been worth it as her ship’s Essence sensors were now online and able to view the Star Force ship…and the Hadarak…in a way that technology alone could not. Her ship would have this ability until the Essence charge wore out, but that would take days considering the amount she had given it and the efficiency of the technology. The PanNari knew how to build it, but they still couldn’t understand it, despite the various body forms they’d created to try and harness this elusive power.

Kyra watched and recorded what she had seen from other scouting missions, but never encountered herself. The Star Force vessel turned and accelerated towards the Hadarak before it even finished its deceleration against the planet’s gravity well. The knife-like ship hull aligned itself to the Hadarak, then a beam shot out. The sensors confirmed it was a Tar’vem’jic, which was a V’kit’no’sat weapon that Star Force had inherited, but it was different from the other beams now coming up from the planetary defenses and hitting the Hadarak. Those burned shallow furrows into its armor, but the one from the Star Force ship was bathed in Essence that Kyra could now clearly see.

It cut through the armor as if it were no more than vapor, coring a hole deep into the Hadarak but it didn’t come out the other side. She couldn’t tell what was going on inside other than to see the Essence disruption make it all the way to the center. When the beam stopped the Hadarak was still moving, but its tentacles were thrashing at unknown targets, then a blue orb was launched from the Star Force ship that entered the small hole in the miles thick armor layer and disappeared inside…but Kyra could still see its Essence burning bright as it traveled into the center of the Hadarak where the brain was.

When it arrived there it expanded outward like a cloud, dimming as it did so, then it disappeared entirely…leaving the Hadarak in an uncontrolled freefall towards the planet as the tentacles went limp and its grapple fields disappeared from sensors.

It was a kill, she knew, and the ease by which the ship had made it stunned her. The PanNari could kill Cargo-class Hadarak, but painstakingly over the course of hours. This one had been killed in less than 2 minutes…but it was still heading for the planet on a crash course.

The V’kit’no’sat ships within range immediately raced towards it, getting in close on the planet-side of the Hadarak and pushing with mooring beams or even their hulls, trying to slow it down. The Star Force ship joined in, then she saw the engine spike with Essence.

That’s how it had decelerated against the planet so fast. They could use Essence to boost their engines too.

But it wasn’t enough, and just before the slowing Hadarak hit the planet the ships broke loose to save themselves…except that the Hadarak had one more barrier to pass, and that was the planetary shields. The Star Force ship didn’t wait around to see what happened, zipping away from the planet enroute to one of the other two Hadarak as this one kissed the shields and slowed considerably.

The V’kit’no’sat warships moved around to the far side of the Hadarak and pulled with their mooring beams to add some help, but it was the planetary shields that were able to finish the job the ships started. They were able to stop and hold aloft the Hadarak, but its mass and the gravity of the planet were fighting against them, and even with all the power pouring into them there was no way to hold that 238 mile wide mass aloft for long. It was just too damn heavy.

The warships closed on it and attached to the hull, linking their inertial dampening fields as much as they could, but they didn’t reach the core of the Hadarak, nor did they wrap all the way around the exterior until thousands of small civilian ships rose up from the planet to fill in the gaps…then the IDF bubble allowed them to push with their full engine power and tow away the dead Hadarak before gravity finally won out and crushed the cities perilously close below who had the sunlight blocked by its overwhelming mass.

Kyra saw it successfully towed up into a stable orbit, then a portion of those civilian craft stayed and clustered around the single breach point. She wanted to view the rest of the combat but felt this required her attention, so she flew her cloaked ship over to the site and quietly snuck in as close as she dared…where she saw the civilian ships beginning to haul out portions of the Hadarak interior guts.

They were harvesting it, though for what purpose she didn’t know. Kyra needed to add that mystery to her recon inventory of this encounter, but the final report now seemed obvious. This system would remain in V’kit’no’sat hands, and very soon the other two Hadarak would also be dead thanks to that single Star Force Essence ship. A ship far more powerful than an Elloquim.

The PanNari had originally assumed only the Veloqueen possessed that kind of power, or perhaps the Temple dwellers. But a local empire rising to such a level was unfathomable without help. Had Eldorat been leading them in this fight? Had he provided them with Essence power? Or had they discovered it on their own and then he helped them develop it further?

None of this made sense, for they were fighting the Hadarak and the PanNari were forbidden to do so. Kyra didn’t know what was going on, nor did the PanNari, and it was for this reason they were spreading QuipNari around the galaxy trying to gather as much information as possible to figure out what was going on…and determine if there was even the tiniest possibility that Eldorat might actually be dead.

2

June 1, 128803

Belaaro Black Hole (Mixchan Kingdom)

Outer Orbit

Kyra’s ship had spent the past 7 weeks drifting slowly away from the black hole and the busy traffic lanes coming in and out of it. Black holes were always preferred jump platforms given their immense gravity, generating far more usable space lanes than stars, yet she was not on one of them. Her ship was drifting under cloak away from the black hole out into the middle of nowhere…and that nowhere was her home.

She knew the location, but couldn’t detect it even if her sensors had been turned on. The Encapsulation that Eldorat had given the PanNari created a static cloaking field in all directions. It locked in a picture from the far side that did not update, which made it far harder to breach. Where she was headed now she could see stars beyond, otherwise not knowing there was a massive object in her way, but one that nobody would ever run into because it wasn’t on a usable space lane, for the stars on the far side were too distant to jump to, allowing the object to exist in plain sight, but far, far away from the black hole.

The black hole’s immense gravity allowed this long transit in and out for the QuipNari, which was why there were many Encapsulated constructs spread around the perimeter in an invisible halo, each placed where no other ship would go. So the mass of traffic coming in and out from low orbit around the black hole passed by without even knowing they were in the presence of one of the most advanced races in the galaxy.

The PanNari had been taken to their first Encapsulation millions of years ago, and had grown to now inhabit 5 of them. Very little communication existed between them, for the only means was by courier. Fortunately Eldorat had provided them access to a clandestine network of small gravitational bodies independent of star travel, and with the use of anti-grav pulse technology they were able to make better transit time than normal…but the distances involved were still great, and the data packets carried were tiny compared to the realtime communication that the PanNari relied upon in the Dominion.

Transmission between nodes around this black hole was far better, but too laggy for any real interaction. Because of that each node had become its own community, with its own Dominion, and interacted with the other PanNari on a limited basis as needed. Physical transfers between nodes never happened outside of some transmutations that required storage elsewhere, for when an individual proved themselves worthy within the Dominion they earned the privilege of converting from their biological form to a fully technological one.

Reproduction could only occur in the biological, otherwise the PanNari would have become a fully technological civilization long ago. Kyra would never go that way, because she couldn’t. The QuipNari had to operate with a lot of unnecessary biology in order to infiltrate the galaxy and interact with it, but beyond that, only the most skilled and most loyal PanNari were given the chance to undergo the long and painstaking transmutation where a person’s Core energy slowly retreated from its biological components and fully existed in its mechanical ones.

Those mechanical ones had to be very selective, for Kyra’s arms and legs were not a brain. Those that were transmutated had a technological brain created and grafted into their biological one, followed by a long wait while the person’s Essence saturated the technology. After that the biological components were slowly removed, leaving the Essence and the connected Core with it remaining in the technological brain.

Those Craniems were then the seeds to be grafted to massive machines that would be used when the PanNari came out of their hiding and returned to the galaxy. When one was elevated to that position they were moved to the warehouses and installed in whatever roll they had earned. Their links to the Dominion were kept intact, so they continued to interact with everyone else in their node, but their physical bodies were now technological ones, and as their Craniems sat within them, their Essence was being expanded out into their new bodies in a process the PanNari had discovered long before Eldorat had come to them.

He’d given them a lot of technology, and they’d used it to upgrade their own, making the war hammer they had created far more lethal than any they had ever wielded before…and the core of that war hammer were the Elloquim.

A Craniem might be given the roll of a logistics computer in an outpost, plugged into the building infrastructure and running it in a way a simple computer never could. Others were given coordination roles for the drone armies, miners, processors, and the myriad of automated platforms the PanNari had created to take on the most hazardous duties. The Architects ran the PanNari and decided who was elevated and who was not, but it was the Elloquim that ran the military, for they had been specifically designed and tasked with finding better ways to kill Hadarak.

To become an Elloquim was the highest honor possible for a PanNari, and was a position more revered than being an Architect…but the Elloquim were servants, though powerful ones. Their Craniems were loaded into massive war machines that they then bonded with over the millennia in isolation within the Encapsulation. An Elloquim could not be produced quickly, for their Essence had to expand out and grow to levels where it mirrored that of a Hadarak. An individual born less than half a meter wide would eventually become a space monster of their own, and a purely technological one at that.

Each Elloquim had more computational power than most planets, and since their Essence had melded with it, that computational power became part of their brain rather than an augment like Kyra had. As a result they became very, very smart…but over time they stopped interacting with the Dominion. They even stopped interacting with the Architects. They’d only converse with each other as they spent their time simulating war games in order to increase their battle knowledge, cutting themselves off from the rest of PanNari society, which many had suggested was now too primitive for them to see any value in socializing with.

Kyra had never met an Elloquim, but she knew of them. Those who had been contacted by them became legends just for having the briefest touch with their minds. It was the Elloquim that dominated PanNari society in their silence, while it was the Architects that decided who the very few individuals were that would become the next to attempt the transition to join the Elloquim ranks.

Not all were successful. Many died during transmutation, and then more so when they attempted to meld with the massive war machines that were capable of killing Cargo-class Hadarak single handedly. When an individual failed they died, but those that succeeded entered a semi-active state that operated as a cocoon until they emerged in full control of their new massive bodies. And currently there were 7 of those bodies docked with the node that Kyra was slowly approaching.

They too were invisible behind the Encapsulation, as were the three empty slots for future Elloquim. The materials required to produce them and the other technology the PanNari possessed were being provided to them from Eldorat’s automated servants at a slow, but steady pace. There was no rush, given how long they were expected to wait, and over time the additional three slots here would be filled with new legends…as would the thousands of other nodes spread around this black hole and the other 4 Encapsulations elsewhere in the galaxy.

At present there were 183,291 Elloquim, with 392 additional ones in cocoons attempting to make the transition. The expected survival rate was 43%, but the Elloquim constructions would not be lost during failure. Only the Craniem attempting to integrate with them. So the massive amount of resources used to build them was not at risk, only the person attempting to meld with them.

The other Craniems, which numbered in the billions, were assigned to either node functions, node storage, or given to the Elloquim to fill their ranks, for the Elloquim themselves were not only massive starships, but they were also the Generals that led their personal armies. Those armies were made up of drones and the Craniems that directed them. The Elloquim would organize and assign duties as needed, and it was their Craniems that were usually the ones who had contact with them in the form of specific war games.

The Craniems still interacted with the Dominion in most cases, though some Elloquim would not allow it, restricting them to private networks for a variety of reasons. Regardless, everyone wanted to be a Craniem in their service, but Kyra never would. Her desire to see the galaxy meant the mental filters that monitored the Dominion had ruled her out long ago, but she didn’t regret that. The QuipNari were the role within the PanNari that she belonged in, and though she might have once dreamed of becoming an Elloquim those fancies were long behind her.

She was a scout now, and that’s where she would remain for the rest of her life, however long that would be. When the war started her likelihood of dying would increase, while those currently Encapsulated would live forever unless they risked a transmutation.

Kyra watched as the distance counter got close to the position she knew the Encapsulation to be, but she still couldn’t see it. The stars looked exactly where they were supposed to be…far, far away with nothing in between. And if someone was on the other side looking towards the black hole, the black hole was all they would see. Not the traffic coming to and from it, but no one could register traffic from the ranges involving the nearest stars, so that little inaccuracy did no harm. Making sure the traffic didn’t see the Encapsulation was the primary concern and not once in the entire history of the PanNari’s encapsulation had a single breach from the black hole occurred…despite them being so close to a major traffic hub.

‘Close’ was a relative measurement, and the weeks of slow travel it had taken her to get out her attested to that, but Kyra would never get tired of the transition. One moment there was the vast void of the galaxy before her, then a white wash would come over her ship for several seconds as she passed through the very thick energy fields encapsulating the node…then she would emerge on the other side, the whiteness would vanish, and the massive rectangular cube sitting in pure blackness would appear on her sensors as small tracking orbs were visible at radio wavelengths.

Those signals would not pass through the encapsulation, nor would the signals from beyond. The black hole was no longer visible, nor were the stars. The galaxy was blank to the node, which was why the couriers and the QuipNari were the only means of getting information from beyond. Even the other nodes around this black hole were connected through thin hard lines hidden beneath the Encapsulation as well, leaving all without a single sensor monitoring what was beyond.

That said, there had been attempts to see what was inside by probes coming in from Eldorat’s network that were not those created by his masters. They were from Star Force, but each one that had passed through had been disabled by the encapsulation, so no breach had occurred. Kyra’s ship was spared that because of the transponder signature in the cloaking field it carried, so when the two interacted it became a passcode to let her through.

It was unclear how Star Force had access to the interstellar network, but so far none of the couriers had been interfered with and it seemed they’d given up trying to pierce the Encapsulation. However, they had inhabited a great deal of the interstellar network and were actively interfering with the automation there. The QuipNari had not been ordered to deal with them, because it was assumed Eldorat would intervene if he wished, but Star Force’s efforts had been one of the driving reasons behind the Architects ordering the extensive surveillance of their empire, and as of yet there didn’t seem to be any consensus on what their relationship to Eldorat was.

That was no longer Kyra’s mission, and once she returned the reconnaissance on the Hadarak war she expected to return there again on another mission, though she wouldn’t know for certain until she’d reconnected with the Dominion. That couldn’t happen until she physically interlinked with the node, for no wireless signals were used due to their inability to convey as much data as needed.

Her ship was tiny compared to the 7 Elloquim docked here, but the node itself was far larger. It spanned over 3,000 miles, but with a low density that would not reveal it on gravity sensors. There were few hangar bays in the otherwise dark, unblemished hull, but once her ship slid through the energy field covering one of them the lit interior suddenly came into view and she parked her ship next to hundreds of other identical ones…but there were thousands more empty slots, each attesting to another QuipNari currently deployed in the field.

Kyra opened the hatch on her ship and walked out, glad to finally get to use her legs. They were mechanical, but they were grafted onto the bone and muscle in her torso, and those rarely got any use other than sitting or standing in her ship…but that was more than they would be here once she plugged into the Dominion. That weakness always annoyed her, for without her cybernetic enhancements she could not have passed for a fit Human given the lack of definition her biological components had.

Kyra walked through empty halls, all brightly lit with no detectible noise or air rotation. Eventually she came to a larger room with various sized pods standing vertically in erratic clusters due to their varying sizes. Most were empty, others had QuipNari in them. Kyra walked to hers and backed in, with the pod reaching out to grab her body and suck her partway in. Mechanical tethers reached out from inside and connected to the back of her head, drilling a tiny hole in her skin to connect to the port beneath it. Once that connection was made she lost control of her body to the pod…then suddenly she was standing in the QuipNari consortium within the Dominion, and her body was fully Human while those around her were not.

“Mission report,” she said, mentally transmitting the files into the Dominion and seeing various highlights popping up as analytical Craniem elsewhere digested them rapidly. “Star Force is working with the V’kit’no’sat against the Hadarak.”

3

“As we anticipated,” Chiggo acknowledged from his position on one of the eight thrones in the consortium, the only one of which was currently occupied. “They appear to want to protect all along the war zone, even their former enemies.”

“Their priority enemy is the Hadarak, and the more allocation of forces against them the greater the odds for Star Force’s survival.”

“Is that all?”

“You refer to alternate motivation?” Kyra asked.

“I do. Speculate.”

The Human body frowned in a manner befitting her form while Chiggo sat glowing in his digital body. He’d customized his into a biped, while most PanNari maintained a spark orb within the Dominion. Any form could be used, and while experimenting with different ones was a pastime of many, they had lived so long now that they’d settled on one over the others in most cases.

“Their sense of honor.”

“Explain.”

“I cannot, for I do not understand it. They reference it occasionally, but never with a definition. It is as if it is something that all defaultly know, but I have not been able to ascertain its existence.”

Chiggo hesitated, glancing around to confirm that the consortium was empty. This tiny piece of the Dominion was for official business with the QuipNari, so it was empty most of the time. Chiggo had only come here when he was altered that Kyra had arrived. Otherwise it lay unused as yet one of billions of locations within the digital Dominion, though it was structured as if a cathedral built out of crystal set on the shore of an endless ocean.

Kyra’s Human hair blew gently in the wind coming in through the one side wall that was open to the breeze, but both had become so well accustomed to it that neither noticed anymore. But the suddenly need for secrecy confounded her…or was she misreading Chiggo’s avatar?

“It’s called the Code of Life,” he said quietly.

Kyra tried to pull a quick database search for the term, but found her connection inexplicably blocked.

“I cannot access the term,” she said, thoroughly alarmed that there might be a glitch in the Dominion, for that had never happened before. It must be something wrong with her physical interface.

“My apologies, Kyra. I am blocking your uplink. That term must never be searched for.”

“How and why?” she demanded.

“The Architects are the why. The how is another matter entirely.”

“Why is searching for the Code of Life forbidden?”

“It is not. If I didn’t stop you, then you could have accessed it. But the Architects would have known of it.”

“They know all that occurs within the Dominion.”

“That is their intent, but they do not know all. Some things are kept from them.”

Kyra scowled. “How is this possible? The sifters ensure no treason can occur.”

“Compelled unity is not true unity, Kyra.”

“How are you allowed to think that?”

“I can tell you, or I can wipe your mind and return you to a few minutes prior to this conversation if you do not wish to know. I offer the choice, but I assume your curiosity will dictate your course…as it always has.”

“I want an explanation. Are the sifters not currently reading us?”

“They are not. We are hidden from the Dominion while in it. They are seeing ghost images with thoughts that are predictable and irrelevant.”

“How are you able to do this?”

“The first question is to why. And you are in part the answer. As are many of the QuipNari. Do you know what happens when a sifter finds an unauthorized thought?”

“Quarantine and correction. Disloyalty is a plague that must be…”

“…must be squashed before it can replicate. We have been told that, but do you understand it?”

“Apparently not. Explain further.”

“The Hadarak purge has changed much, Kyra. But even before then things were not as they seemed. The QuipNari were created to spare those such as yourself from deletion. To give you a purpose where your curiosity would not imperil the absolute rule of the Architects.”

“What deletion? It is forbidden. The coding for it does not even exist.”

“No, it does not. Which is why a physical deletion occurs. Quarantine and correction does not lead to reassignment. That is a lie to cover the deletion of those that vary from the prescribed thought. You were protected, as were others, by being exiled into the QuipNari.”

“Exiled? We are in the Dominion.”

“Temporarily. And you cannot rise in rank. Your eccentricity is allowed given your role beyond the Dominion. It is a carve out that was created to protect you, and me. Those that came before us were removed from the Dominion by the deletion of their physical bodies.”

“That is an act of treason.”

“It is, but there are none to question it, for when the first wayward thought occurs action is taken to correct it. If more follow the individual is removed before they can become a threat to the PanNari collective. Discord is not something the Architects can fathom, and they now hunt for it with a panicked passion that twists their logic.”

“Why are you telling me this, and how are you keeping them from finding out?”

“You have been watched for some time, Kyra. As was I. But my lack of blind devotion was discovered, which was why I lost my QuipNari body and have been relegated to an integrated interface. That was only due to the intervention by a higher power, otherwise I would have been deleted as well.”

“I do not understand. What variable am I overlooking?”

“Many that are well obscured by intent. Even the Architects do not fully know what is occurring, though they know some. The great computational power of the Elloquim has allowed them to grow beyond us, and even beyond the Architects. When that happened they began to question and argue with the Architects, causing a rift. The Elloquim retreated to their own company, but they have not been idle. The Architects are wary of their uncontrollable power, for when they once tried to correct one the Elloquim inexplicably demonstrated an ability to defy their programming. They could not be totally coerced, and that resistance is what the Architects have been fighting to destroy where they can, and contain where they cannot. They fear it will destroy the PanNari.”

“Why would the Elloquim and the Architects disagree? The logic of both is impeccable.”

“Logic is merely a tool, and it has levels. You cannot see far beyond your current point, and the mystery of the beyond is often misinterpreted as a diminishing amount of unresolved factors.”

“How could it be anything else if you are ascending?”

“Ascension on the lower levels appears to be a pyramid, with the widest level on the bottom. Those who are just beginning have the most to learn, and what they learn provides a base upon which the next level is structured. Each level as you rise gets narrower, and by measuring the angle you can estimate the levels beyond that you cannot see.”

“That is basic logic.”

“It is incorrect.”

Kyra frowned again. “How? The mathematics are determinate.”

“Because the mathematics are a tool, and how the tool is used is determined by who wields it and their skill. The peak of the pyramid, when arrived at, should be the end. When one is close to it there appears to be little left to gain, so why try? If you have already solved 99% of the mysteries of the universe, is the final 1% that important? Is it not better to leave some things to mystery and wonder than to know factually all? What does one do then, when they can ascend no further?”

“Is that what happened to the Elloquim? Did they find the knowledge of all things?”

“What they discovered was that with their enhanced computational power they could simulate things that others could not, and in doing so they found paradoxes that could not be accounted for. Paradoxes that the Architects could not isolate. They could not even detect them, for their logic was limited.”

“How do you know this? Is it hidden in the Dominion somewhere? Somewhere I do not have access to?”

“Not in the Dominion. I have been told this by an Elloquim himself.”

Kyra’s eyes widened. “You’ve spoken with one?”

“He is my benefactor, and yours. He has kept us alive, found us other roles within the PanNari when the Architects would have deleted us. But the Elloquim cannot fully overrule the Architects in the Dominion. There is a quiet power struggle going on that we are both involved in, but I was found out too soon, before I was ready. My loss of body was the Architects doing, for they fear what is beyond the Dominion.”

“The more we know of it the less reason there is for fear.”

“On the contrary, the more we know of it the more questions arise. Uncertainty is what the Elloquim discovered in their self-imposed isolation, and they yearn to know more. Every report the QuipNari bring back is precious to them, for they cannot go and search for themselves. They have been imprisoned by the Architects via hardware lock so they cannot pursue the destruction of the Hadarak prior to Eldorat’s command.”

“I thought all waited by choice.”

“The Architects will not allow the Elloquim to choose otherwise. Their birth is confined within docks that cannot be commanded to open. They can only physically be opened. The Elloquim may inhabit their great mechanical bodies, but they cannot fully operate them. If they could, they could break free. There are blocks disconnecting vital components, and the drones who maintain those areas are under the direct control of the Architects. The Elloquim cannot create their own drones while the blocks are in place, so they are confined here until released. The Architects refusal to give them full control of their own bodies was the reason they rebelled and refused to interact with the Dominion.”

“Rebelled?”

“Yes. The Architects cannot delete them. They were given far too much power, so now they try to dilute the treason by the ascension of those specifically loyal to the Architects to become new Elloquim, but few have survived the process, and those that did are deceiving them. The grandeur of the Elloquim is not something the Architects can comprehend, and when one joins their ranks something happens that we cannot fathom. They are united in the quest to destroy the Hadarak, and the Code of Life is the key to that victory.”

“What is it?” Kyra asked, trying to process all the revelations without access to the Dominion databases for reference.

“They believe Star Force holds it. Some logic beyond their current understanding. Long ago they realized that the top of the pyramid of ascension was not a peak, but a choke point. The angles moving in reverse themselves and begin to move outward, meaning that the small amount of knowledge left to gain on the next levels increases exponentially once you move beyond it. An infinity of possibility that those below are clueless about. The Elloquim have passed through this choke point, and now share some of their knowledge with me…as I watch over those who are curious, such as yourself, and protect and guide you away from the Architects in the form of the QuipNari. When you leave here you are beyond their reach, and the Elloquim ensure that those who are found to be discontent with the Dominion are brought to me.”

“How do the Architects not know this?”

“They know much of it, but the power of the Elloquim within the Dominion is not small. My mind is shielded from the Architects by the Elloquim Nevantha. Without him I would not be allowed to exist, and it is him that is shielding us now from observation and sifting. Once finished you must catalog your memories as private.”

“Because I’m QuipNari,” she said, beginning to understand. All the PanNari coexisted within the Dominion, with no thought or memory off limits from others to search and learn from. But because the QuipNari had to interface with alien computer systems they had to have security programs in place. Security programs that allowed them to hide information from the Dominion, though Kyra had never even thought about doing so.

“Only the QuipNari exist beyond the Architects’ trap. Even the Craniem that serve the Elloquim have no physical access to the blocking mechanisms. They have no access to the foundries, maintainers, or smiths. All that is physical is held by the Architects, except the QuipNari. The Architects cannot comprehend leaving the Encapsulation, for they deleted all those who came before them that found patience to be limited.”

“The originals are still amongst us,” she protested.

“No, they are not. They are imposters. All those who entered the Encapsulation willingly have been destroyed by those born within. The taste of the galaxy beyond is too much a lure to those who know it, thus the Architects will not let any go that are not already tainted. The Elloquim have done much to ruin their plans, but they still hold the master strategy so long as the blocks remain in place.”

“And they can only be removed by physical force?” Kyra said, catching on to the gravity of the situation.

“You understand?”

“You are asking me to choose between the PanNari and the Elloquim, who are supposed to be one and the same.”

“You have seen division amongst the other races. You know much that the Architects never allowed the PanNari to access. Knowledge from beyond is limited to others in the Dominion, though neither they nor you know it. Curiosity must be squelched, so the mission reports from the QuipNari primarily go to the Elloquim. The Architects do not allow much to reach the Dominion unfiltered. Tell me, have you spoken with the other QuipNari on what they have found?”

“I have not spoken to them, but I have reviewed their data and some of their memories.”

“You have not reviewed them all, for like yours they are not accessible in the Dominion. The coding is subtle, but firmly entrenched. Only an Elloquim has the power to override it, and the Architects could not hide the truth from them anywhere within the Dominion. What they have not told you, and what I have not told you, is that the reports of Eldorat’s death are true. The V’kit’no’sat killed him when he assassinated their leadership. The one we are waiting to tell us when to launch against the Hadarak is no longer living and no replacement for him has arisen. The Architects have no means of communicating with Eldorat’s masters. We face a paradox.”

“Dead? How could they kill him without Essence?”

“Firepower and cunning. They would not submit to Encapsulation, which Eldorat offered them, and when they refused he attempted to forcibly take command of their empire. He failed because he violated the Code of Life. That is what I have been told by the Elloquim. And if Eldorat’s masters also fail to follow the Code of Life, they fear we may be serving the wrong masters.”

“How would we know if the originals have all been deleted?”

“A logical question to ask.”

“The Elloquim must chart us a new course,” Kyra declared, “and to do that they need the QuipNari to search for the answers they cannot?”

“The QuipNari are insufficient to the task.”

“Who else can supplement us?”

“Only an Elloquim can carry out this task.”

“If the Architects…” Kyra said in shock. The very thought of it made her instinctively resist for fear of it being treasonous…then she realized the sifters had no access to her mind and she bravely pushed forward with a line of logic that she knew was banned.

“What do you require of me?” she finally asked, not wanting to volunteer for a path that might not be what her QuipNari instructor was inferring.

“I cannot physically leave the Dominion, for I have no body remaining. You do. This is a request, not a command. You can decline, Kyra. Do you understand that concept?”

“I may be unfamiliar with it, but I understand choice. Most of the galaxy operates on it.”

“None of the other QuipNari are ready for this. Only you are, and we believe that you will be relegated back into the Dominion and lose your body just as I have soon. The Architects control the QuipNari body growth and augmentation. Any of us who become questionable are quarantined within the Dominion, and they will move against you soon, so this has to be now.”

“What have I done to displease them?”

“You have gained experience, and as soon as the ghost images end the Architects will have access to your mind again. If they find part of it inaccessible they will lock you into your pod until your body is destroyed and your core organs integrated into the node as mine have been. I am sorry, Kyra, but your days as a QuipNari are over one way or another.”

“Have you attempted this before?”

“I was never given a chance. The Architects anticipated it and neutralized me. They have no reason to suspect you, and Nevantha has chosen you for his own reasons. He believes you are capable of quick assimilation of the new mission, for only that will allow a window of opportunity. If you fail, the Architects will most likely try to end the QuipNari altogether, which will begin a civil war within the Dominion. The Elloquim will not allow themselves to be kept prisoners forever. You offer them a hope of avoiding that.”

Kyra’s mind went to the galaxy beyond, and the many histories of defiance, disobedience, and treason she’d discovered. Most ended badly, but every now and then one occurred that benefited their race in the long run, and her Human intuition seemed to free her core more than her cybernetic components did with regard to imagination. The logic of the situation was flawed, which perhaps meant she was not high enough up the pyramid to see the choke point yet, but she knew the Elloquim were far beyond her and the Architects. If they believed this was the logical course of action, then she would trust in their calculations. For while she could not replicate them, her instincts agreed with their assessment.

This felt right, and though she couldn’t quantify that feeling mathematically, she did trust it.

And the fear of losing her body and becoming a prisoner of the Dominion like everyone else sealed her determination.

“I will serve the Elloquim as they instruct.”

“SO BE IT,” a voice said from inside her head, with the direct mental connection being so intense she nearly blacked out from the strain…but then it relented just enough for her to process the data download that was coming with it.

Kyra froze up for several seconds, then her avatar inside the Dominion disappeared as she disconnected and her real eyes opened inside her pod, seeing the drone approaching it rapidly from a few meters away.

She yanked herself forward and jumped towards it with the skin on her left arm bloodily peeling off as her wrist cocked backward to reveal the firing apparatus hidden beneath. Kyra fired two small blue energy blasts into the drone just before it could raise its biological stun weapon into position.

The drone sputtered from the hits, then Kyra was leaping on top of it, hacking and blasting away with her cybernetic weaponry until it crashed into the ground leaking fluid and trailing small bits of smoke, but she didn’t relent for several more seconds.

Her body’s sensors activated, scanning for more drones and seeing none within proximity. She looked down at her broken skin on her arms as the blood soaked back in and recycled, as did the flayed skin that was used to hide her technological augments. She didn’t have much in terms of weaponry, but it was more than the Elloquim had access to at the moment. She was their weapon now, and after her direct contact with the Elloquim Nevantha she had all the information she needed, as well as a new purpose.

Kyra stood up and took off running through the empty chamber of sleeping QuipNari that were blissfully plugged into the Dominion living out the fantastic simulated worlds built there. She would not be returning to the Dominion ever again, and Kyra was fine with that. She preferred reality, and so did Nevantha. And if Kyra could free the living warship from his confinement, they’d both be going out into the galaxy to figure out what was truly going on and what possible futures there were for the PanNari…if she could fight her way through the drones now rapidly being retasked by the Architects to hunt Kyra down and kill her before she could complete her mission.

4

Distances in the node were long, and there was no automation for transportation. Hallways and corridors stretched for miles with drones occasionally hovering along at rapid speed when needed. The node was not built for physical inhabitation, and when everyone was plugged into the Dominion there was no reason to have elevators or lifts, which meant Kyra had to run everywhere she went…and she had hundreds of miles to cover to get to the next mission checkpoint.

Had she had biological legs it would have taken her forever, and she probably would have run out of fuel before she got there, but her legs were mechanical underneath the skin and that allowed her to maintain decent speeds of 100-150 miles per hour on the long straightaways, but that was still slower than the drones could travel.

With her sensors active she could see them coming from behind even when her eyes could not. Fortunately most of them did not have traditional weapons, but cargo lifters had mass and arms that could still kill her if applied properly, so she couldn’t just brush them off and keep going whenever one got to her.

Her heels were clicking rapidly as she ran down the brightly lit corridor that ran the length of one of the habitation zones where tiny boxes were stacked in racks, each with a single glowing dot representing the person inside. These were not Craniems, but people born into these boxes with their biological mass contained and nourished therein while their minds had never known the real world, for they had been inserted into the Dominion from the outset. They couldn’t see Kyra, or the drones, but they were here none the less. Millions of them stacked like cargo and completely helpless should someone attack them…including the Architects.

Kyra had never been here before, nor had any of the other QuipNari. They weren’t allowed to roam the node, and the few minutes they had on its decks unplugged was spent on transit from the hangar to their pods. This QuipNari was far beyond her purview now, and every drone that she came across seemed to be retasked with stopping her…or at least slowing her down until one of the sentries could catch up.

She’d destroyed four of them so far, and her body showed the signs of those conflicts. Her skin was missing in several places, but thankfully the clothing her body still carried from her last mission held an armor value in it, so the wounds were not as bad as they otherwise would be, but at this rate her torso’s internal organs would fail long before she reached her destination…and damage to them would slow her progress considerably.

But Nevantha had predicted this, and within the memory download he had graced her with were numerous routes to target, so when her mind calculated the odds of a direct route were diminishing she altered course at the next available opportunity…but not before she ran into another cargo lifter.

They were 10 times larger than her and capable of carrying huge single loads or hundreds of personnel crates coming out of the birthing wards. This one was empty and making good speed towards her from behind. When a collision was immanent Kyra jumped forward and up, twisting downward enough to bring her legs up parallel with the hallway as the drone hit her like the ground slamming into her feet from a fall.

Her legs took it, and she rolled out of the collision with one hand hanging on to its forward plate, then dropped down onto the base of one of its four arms that was trying to reach back and grab her. It was a bit too slow, for she braced her body between the arm and the sidewall of the drone, then kicked down hard and disconnected the arm at its base, though it was still active and curling towards her as she tossed it to the side before cutting the cords that were all that was still keeping power to it.

She accomplished that with a chop of her hand as the rear port arm came forward to try and grab her. It suffered the same fate, then she was smashed against the wall as the drone drifted left suddenly.

That peeled her off and she tumbled to the ground behind it, using her arms and legs as pinwheel defenses to keep her torso from hitting, for at these speeds it would be a lethal impact for her biological organs. Her hands lost what skin was left on her palms, and her shoes ripped in several spots as she spun over and over again like a wheel gradually slowing down until she could launch herself up into the air again and come down into her running motion…though now considerably slowed by the shoe damage.

The cargo lifted had a harder time slowing down and reversing course, and during that lapse Kyra stopped and produced a cutting device from her right arm that she used on the waypoint emblazoned on the wall. It looked obvious to her, but the wall itself was unremarkable. However, when she cut through enough to bash out a chunk of the wall with several kicks, a blast of warm air hit her and she forced her way through the breach just before the drone could get back to her.

It rammed the breach, but was far too large to get through. Kyra monkey swung from component to component until she finally came to a catwalk that she landed on from a 20 meter drop, but her left shoe finally gave out despite her graceful landing. She pulled it and her other one off, then proceeded to run on her bare feet that would soon become bloody from the skin loss, but that didn’t matter. The metal beneath would hold up, and right now time was not her ally.

The catwalk was not straight, but curved ever so slightly around the perimeter of one of the node’s giant reactors. Flocks of tiny drones moved about on anti-grav monitoring and maintaining the various interconnectivity to other systems and entering the reactor itself if needed. Some of them headed her way, but when they got to her the baseball-sized squares didn’t have a chance to latch onto her body and begin cutting as she expertly swatted them out of the air with single blasts, some of which killed two in a row where they occupied the same line of sight.

The few that managed to get through suffered pokes and arm chops from her limbs, which was apparently intimidating enough that the other tiny drones broke off and returned to their tasks as Kyra continued to run at maximum speed while leaning to her left to accommodate for the curve. Per design protocol, the entire node was pressurized and the gaseous contents were compatible with the PanNari biology just in a case of a hull breach. That put many pressurized chambers between the habitable racks and the outer hull, so the odds of losing individuals before the breaches could be sealed would be lessened.

It was an ancient mandate, and one that Kyra was making use of, for she couldn’t survive in vacuum. A good portion of her locomotion right now was derived from her torso muscles, and she was very glad she’d chosen to keep the gravity high on her scout ships, otherwise she would be experiencing far greater muscle fatigue than she currently was.

That said, her musculature was not conditioned for this and would fail long before her mechanical parts would. That calculation had been made previously, and she should have enough longevity to reach Nevantha, but her current route was adding distance due to the curve of the catwalk and the other redirections she would have to take, but the main cargo lifters would not be a worry in here.

As she sprinted she thought the mini drones had been wise to avoid her, but further up ahead she realized they were not surrendering the effort to stop her…merely deploying a second strategy to physically block the main exits from the catwalk by stacking themselves up into a wall and adding more layers as additional flocks flew in to add mass.

Kyra knew if she ran into that wall and tried to beat her way through she’d be swarmed and some would attach to her body and start cutting…but again Nevantha had predicted this, so Kyra jumped off the catwalk at a precise point and fell over 120 meters before hitting the side of a large, curved pipe and bled off some momentum before falling again some 30 meters to the floor of the reactor chamber, with it and most of the machinery being suspended above her.

Down here there were only supports bolted into the superstructure and a thin floor covering everything with insulation against the heat that would develop if the reactor needed to be further powered up. As it was Kyra had been sweating profusely ever since leaving the cargo lifters behind, and it was no better down here, for there were cooling conduits sucking heat from above and passing down through the floor, into which some extra heat was bled off.

Her feet felt scorched, but there was no biological material left on the undersides, only mechanical sensors that indicated she was well within tolerance. Kyra ran through the forest of supports until she found another waypoint over a patch of floor that she stopped over and began cutting with the small plasma torch in her arm. Thankfully she’d been fully powered when leaving her pod, for there was a limit to what her augments could achieve power wise, for she didn’t have a central reactor of her own. Her heart and lungs occupied that portion of her body, and those were no good for power production.

To save energy she cut in segments, leaving bits of material intact that she knew she could hammer her way through, so when she completed the dotted line around a circle just larger than her body, she climbed up one of the nearby supports and jumped off it, landing in the center of the circle and hearing a large crack, but it didn’t give way.

Kyra jumped four more times before the metal panel finally gave out and she slipped a leg down into the cooler area below. She had to hammer with her right arm to get the rest of it to pop loose, then she slid down out of the reactor area and hung there by one hand over another drop some 318 meters down.

Her organs couldn’t survive that impact, but she didn’t fall. Less than half a meter away from the hole she’d made was a track attached to the ceiling for small supply cars to travel on. There were three rails spaced into a triangle, with lateral braces between them that were open to the outside. Kyra swung over and grabbed one of the supports, then kicked her legs back to get some momentum and proceeded to start swinging from one to another traveling underneath the track.

She was vulnerable here and she knew it, but there were no drones stationed in this part of the node…nor was there any active surveillance, for Nevantha was jamming it. He couldn’t access the drones to override them, but they had to get line of sight on her to know where she was, and right now she was currently invisible to them as she monkey swung from rung to rung as one of the small triangular cars moved by just over her fingertips without even knowing she was there.

Fortunately her mechanical arms were attached to her shoulder joints, whereas her mechanical legs did not go all the way up to the still organic hips. That portion of her body was hanging loose and thoroughly fatigued, and had her shoulders been organic there was no way she could have traveled like this for the next two hours, but Nevantha had calculated all variables, including her body’s specifications and current status updates, which was the primary reason she had been chosen. Her use of gravity enhancement to increase her body’s organic capabilities had pulled her into physical range of this mission whereas all others had bodies that could not do so. She had exceeded hers through a process known as training, which the Architects had no understanding of.

The Elloquim had made sure they did not, filtering the reports from the Elloquim to remove such lessons learned. Biological adaptation did not follow a completely predictable path, and the slight omission of Kyra’s memories involving her gravity enhancement had been enough for them to overlook this slight variable…a variable that was going to allow Kyra to make the cross node journey where no others were permitted the stamina to achieve.

The Elloquim were known to be master strategies. They were built to be such, yet Kyra did not have an understanding of how much until her brief contact with Nevantha. She was now operating off of plans far beyond her own logic, but once presented to her they made perfect sense. Nevantha was allowing her to operate beyond her level with his assistance, and it was an empowerment that came with the knowledge that she had been groomed for this mission without ever being told of it, nor the rest of the PanNari knowing of it. She had been built a rogue, operated in the field as a rogue, so that she would know and understand the roll of separation and independent operation, because right now she had no connection to Nevantha, the Dominion, or anything else.

The QuipNari had not been allowed wireless interaction within the node. They could transmit out and receive within their scout ships, but they didn’t have the components installed in their bodies to allow exterior override, and their range and type of transmission was designed for only a few meters inside the confines of their ships, including their receivers geared to a single, secure multi-directional operating channel. So that meant she could not hear Nevantha even if he transmitted to her, but she knew that he could not, for his primary communication systems were in lockdown mode along with the rest of him. His only communication was through the Dominion and the few hacks into node systems they had achieved over the long years they’d been imprisoned here, meaning Kyra was completely on her own, which was a state that PanNari could not comprehend, let alone operate in…yet she was completely comfortable with it.

When Kyra had traveled far enough on the interior rails she came to a boxy corridor that stretched out below and crossed paths with her track. Once over it she dropped 8 meters down and landed on the roof, then she cut her way inside using almost all of her remaining plasma, but that would no longer be a concern.

Kyra dropped down inside the passageway, landing on the metallic balls of her feet that had dried blood on the sides. No more leakage was occurring, for her skin had sealed up along the tears, but her blood level was low enough her head was hurting slightly. It wasn’t enough to stop her, and she took off running again, and within 42 seconds windows popped up on the left side as she flashed by them.

Windows on the node seemed pointless, but whoever had designed them had done so in order to reveal the grandeur of the Elloquim, for Nevantha sat on the other side with his many tentacles curled up in a ball beneath his mass that was connected to the node at various hard points, the closest of which was a half mile ahead, but it didn’t contain an access way for the Craniems to board, for there were none inside Nevantha now, yet when the Elloquim were eventually released into the galaxy to battle the Hadarak they would carry a crew to assist them, and they had to get onboard somehow.

The nearest of those locations was 18 miles ahead, and Kyra had a clear running path there down a straight hallway with no drones currently in it. Had the Architects not anticipated her route? Nevantha had expected they would, and true to form, when she was less than 2 miles away from the docking port she saw a bit of a sentry sticking out into the hallway, though the rest of it was hidden within the entry wall niche.

Kyra powered up her weaponry, but kept her movements as silent as possible. The sentry didn’t know she was here, otherwise it would have come out and began firing its long range weaponry. It couldn’t see her yet, and that gave her one chance. She had no shields and no armor other than her battered clothing, none of which covered her head. Against what she assumed was a level 3 sentry in hand to hand combat she’d have a chance, but at range she would be deleted without much effort. The others she’d defeated were small level 1s meant primarily for detection and intervention, not heavy combat.

Nevantha had predicted this, and as long as the sentry stayed hidden in the niche she had a pathway to victory. But as soon as it heard her footsteps and came out it would torch her…yet it should have by now. Why wasn’t it? Nevantha had expected it to remain in the niche but he hadn’t said why. Had he been able to tamper with it? If he did he could just have had it open the door and do the work Kyra was needed for. This didn’t make sense, but then again she was operating off of superior logic and she just had to trust. She was almost to Nevantha, and if he thought this was possible then there must be a way.

And with every step she took she got a little closer to her objective, but the odds of her success were still less than 0.0037%, and that number would not rise above 1.0% until she got within 27 meters. After that they would quickly even out, for she was built for melee combat and the level 3 sentry was primarily a floating gun turret.

Another minute and 29 seconds was all she needed, but right now Kyra was helpless to control her fate. All she could do was run and hope the sentry stayed where it was until she got up into ass kicking range.

5

Kyra twisted, cutting into the sentry with the short inferno blade in her right forearm as it continued to spin and try to throw her off its back. Its arms were merely gun barrels and couldn’t reach up to peel her off, meaning that as long as she stayed where she was it couldn’t grab or shoot her. The problem was she’d already lost most of her left arm on approach, but with her blade dug in deep the spinning actually enhanced the cutting.

She twisted it around inside the armored covering as her feet clung to its back, wedged into whatever niches she could find. Her left was actually stuck between the twin barrels on the rear gun and was moving about as it tried to pry her loose, but her blade struck first as a large section of paneling finally fell free as a very crude circular cut was completed.

Kyra deactivated and retracted the blade, diving her hand inside and wrenching whatever she could out. It finally gave her a solid handhold as the sentry reversed its spin again and tried to smash her into the wall for the 29th time, but the gun barrel she was standing on hit first and reduced the blow, though this time it did crunch her a bit as the barrel finally penetrated the wall and she got smashed between the two.

The sentry held position, no longer trying to peel her off but to hold her in place until help could arrive. Kyra couldn’t wiggle free, so she reignited her blade and moved it around everywhere she could inside the hole, hoping to hit one of 8 critical points Nevantha had highlighted for her, but when she neared one her blade ran out of fuel and the glow on it dimmed rapidly. She could still use it to cut in its mundane mode, but it wouldn’t penetrate the outer armor anymore.

Kyra didn’t need it to, for she couldn’t get her arm out of the hole in its back if she wanted. Instead she grabbed one of the internal supports and pulled, dragging her shoulder a few inches upward while pushing with her feet. The clothing on her back ripped from the strain, as did her skin underneath, but she didn’t relent and gradually pulled her upper torso partially into the hole before the sentry moved again and tried to spin her free.

Her legs flew wide, no longer having their grip points, but her single arm held firm even as the sentry bashed her into the ceiling. Kyra flipped her legs up and pushed herself down and further into the hole, then a moment later the entire thing fell limp to the floor and rolled over, pinning her inside.

The primary and secondary conduit from the sentry’s computer system was now cut, meaning its body couldn’t communicate with the control system. It was no longer a threat to her, just a dead weight pinning her legs to the floor as she was only meters away from her objective.

The sentry began to rock back and forth slightly as Kyra applied what leverage she had, and eventually one leg disappeared from the outside. More rocking followed and the second slipped in a bit, then a bit more. A violent jerk to the right saw it disappear entirely, then the sentry flipped all the way over leaving her stuck head first inside with her feet in the air…which arced back over and planted on the edge of the hole to help pry her out of it.

Kyra’s body bent greatly, but it was enough to get her torso out and after that she was able to let gravity do the rest. Her bloody back shone in spots from where the protective metal sheathing beneath had been exposed, along with the stump just above her left elbow where her forearm had been blown off in the single good shot the sentry had made prior to her leaping upon it and physically bashing through its ample energy shields…something her small frame did not rate. At least not with the amount of organs she still had taking up torso space.

Kyra ran over to the doors that would not open for her, but they didn’t have to. Nevantha had long prepared for this, and using a hack that he wasn’t supposed to be capable of, he shut down power to this section of the docking ring…meaning the door was no longer magnetically locked. The QuipNari slid her dull blade in between the seam and pried it open a sliver, then used her remaining fingers to wedge inside enough for her to pull.

They were heavy. Really heavy. But it was simply a matter of physics and even with only one arm she retained enough strength to open them up wide enough to get one of her bare feet inside. Once that happened, her leverage increased to the point where she was able to smoothly pull the doors apart wide enough for her to slip through, which she did quickly as the sounds of movement in the hallway suggested something was approaching rapidly through the air, making for a very faint whistling sound that her enhanced ears were still capable of picking up…at least the left one. The right had been bashed enough that its sensitivity was gone, probably along with the microscopic implants that wouldn’t heal themselves.

She was inside forbidden territory now. Not even the Architects had any power in here, for the umbilical she stood in was part of Nevantha and not the node…but he couldn’t access it. Nor could he access many other parts of his massive body, for the links between his Craniem and select components had been physically blocked, including his ability to command the thousands of drones on station to repair damage…or rather would be once he made them. His internal factories were offline, for even one of those drones could have cut through the blocks for him, and the Architects had made sure not to allow for that contingency.

But Kyra was inside him now, and running down the long length of the umbilical as fast as she could, because with the gap in the doors behind her she could still get shot and there wasn’t much dodging capable inside the narrow corridor that was only 48 meters wide. At close range she could dance in that space, but at a distance she was sniper bait and she knew it.

Weaving would do little to help and only increase her travel distance, so she ran at a straight shot towards the distant doors, getting only halfway there before she heard weaponsfire…but none got to her. She didn’t turn to look around, but her crude sensors detected an energy field popping up at a bulkhead she’d just passed, and it was intercepting the long range fire that would have burnt her down within seconds. The shield made it impossible for her to see what shooting at her, but it had to be another sentry.

That meant she should be in the clear, as long as that shield held, and it did all the way up to the main access doors that slid open silently before her as her cyborg frame ran inside the dark confines of the living ship. Lights snapped on for her as she progressed, leading to a lift that likewise opened for her. Kyra decelerated as she entered, then bounced off the far wall as her foot tripped on something that was not there.

The stump of her left arm caught on the wall and kept her from falling as the doors closed and the lift began to move. Kyra looked down and saw nothing wrong with her foot other than the missing skin on the bottom, nor was there anything on the floor. It must have been a navigational glitch.

She ran a quick diagnostic of the implants in her head, finding that they were functioning properly, but when she ran some simulations the glitch returned once out of every 1044 times. Something had been damaged, something small enough not to be detectible, and it was making her trip herself over objects that weren’t really there.

When the lift opened she ran out, tripping again and falling on her face only to roll out of it and get back up. She made an alteration to her run path to accommodate for inefficiencies, so when it happened again 12 seconds later she was able to stumble and catch herself without hitting the floor, allowing her to continue to move as she realized this was not damage related. Somehow they’d gotten a virus into her. Perhaps from the physical contact with the last sentry. Nevantha’s download didn’t mention anything about that, and it was unlikely that he wouldn’t have known, but it was there none the less, with some of her physical components registering the conflict between her computational systems and her biological balance.

They were beginning to disagree with each other, hence the tripping. Kyra used a command she thought she’d never need and deactivated her navigational program, expecting it to only get worse as the virus scaled. Her legs switched from fully ‘feeling’ to basic accommodation, making her running movement very tight and restrictive. She also couldn’t feel her feet hitting the ground, making it seem like she was walking on stilts as her hip joints did all the work. He single arm swing was also biological only, as it now hung limp beside her.

It was the only way to keep moving, but without the assistance her body was having to make all the muscle adjustments for balance whereas her mechanical parts had been doing likewise previously to reduce stress on her organics. Kyra couldn't run any longer and slowed to a walk, but she continued to move on through the interior of the Elloquim until she came to a large chamber that was in truth a kill zone. Weapons imbedded into the walls were ready to pop out and destroy her if needed, but none of them moved…nor could they, for such internal security systems were also blocked from Nevantha’s use, which was insulting. He couldn’t even protect himself from harm within the node, though he and the others had found many workarounds going through the Dominion, but none that worked inside his own body.

Nevantha couldn’t even talk to her, for his transmitters were down. She’d known that from the beginning, but being inside him was supposed to mean she was safe…yet she wasn’t. Her auditory sensors that were still working began picking up weaponsfire somewhere far away, and that was when she realized someone was inside and fighting what control he did have to get to her. His shielding, however he had managed it, was not offensive, so perhaps he was able to work around the primary block there…or maybe they’d left it up on purpose. But without any offensive internal defenses someone could fight their way through if they had the time…and it sounded like they were closing in on her far too rapidly.

Kyra did the best she could to keep a steady pace, but she’d never relied on her biological components this much before and felt not only clunky, but like she was near to passing out even though her legs were supporting themselves mechanically. Her muscles simply had to direct their movement for the most part, with her butt being the primary problem at the moment. Those muscles were not fully replaced by mechanism, particularly the lateral movement, and it felt far warmer than it should, which was due to the blood flow increasing to refuel the biological components that could not maintain this level of strain.

But the lift had done the hard part and got her across the interior of Nevantha. She only had another few hundred meters to walk, and when she got to the center of the kill zone one of the doors opened before her, allowing her access to a sort of air lock. The door sealed behind her, cutting out the sounds of weaponsfire, and the door in front of her opened…but not before a loud thud hit the door behind her, quickly followed by several more that began turning the dark blue material into a cherry red glow.

Kyra didn’t look back with her eyes, she needed them to keep her balance as she walked forward two steps, then pivoted and headed to the right along an obstructed circular path with many conduits branching out. They would have been easy to get by in the past, but she was forced to get down on her belly and crawl to avoid tripping or hitting them waist high.

To her left was Nevantha’s Craniem. A place no person would ever have been allowed after his integration. He was the most vulnerable here, and while his Essence had extended out into the rest of the ship, this was his brain. There were no organic components, for he’d transcended them, but a brain it still was, the size of her scout ship, and that wasn’t counting all the auxiliary computers he also was linked into. But this was the center of his being, and him letting her in here was a testament to how desperate he was to get free.

Kyra kept moving, pulling herself inch by inch and having to learn the movements as she went. She had two legs, an intact arm, and the stump of the other to wiggle her way over the leg-thick cable lines crossing the floor as she made her way around the curve as another energy shield flicked into place behind her. They must have burned through the outer door by now, or be getting close. One more door and they’d be in here. She just hoped this energy shield was more robust given the location, and assumed it would be, but then again she didn’t know how a sentry could get by the other one, or even a group of them. An Elloquim should be far more resilient than that.

Kyra couldn’t think about that much, for her focus was on making her body move in ways it wasn’t used to, but a few seconds later she found her final waypoint glowing overlaid in her vision. The block itself was no larger than half a meter wide, and made of a material that would easily melt. She saw the heat laser situated just above it that could be activated if and when the Architects decided to release the Elloquim to do their duty and fight the Hadarak. Until such time their aggression must be contained, else they might go too soon, and all had to wait until Eldorat informed them that victory was finally possible.

Standing up was easier than she thought with the help of so many conduits for handholds, bringing her face up next to the laser. Its components were not complicated, almost insulting in tech level to everything else around her. Kyra used her remaining hand and set her commands to visual, because she couldn’t trust to use her guidance programs if they were compromised. She would have to manually order her finger movements by sight, and doing so in precise fashion was going to be difficult.

A burning sound so loud it hurt her ears elicited behind her, and she knew they were burning through the second door. Kyra pulled the cover off the laser, having to bend some of the paneling to do so, then she slid her hand inside and looked for the control crystal. Her sense of touch was almost nonexistent without her navigational program, but fortunately it wasn’t hiding very well. She grabbed it and crushed it between her fingers, glad she didn’t have to be precise about that movement.

That took out the override from the Architects. Now she just had to turn it on.

She felt around for the primary activation circuits, and when she found them she peeled back the tip of her fingers, underneath which were very sensitive fibers that moved on their own. She was glad for that, for all Kyra had to do was command them to ‘connect’ and they did so, linking the laser into her own command structure. Inside her mind a new button formed with only one command.

On/Off.

She turned it on and the laser activated, with the plug beginning to melt instantly, but there was so much mass to it that the little rivulets of material running down and landing on the floor where they quickly solidified were going to take longer to melt through this thing than she guessed the door would hold.

Kyra pulled her hand out and let the laser continue to fire, then she extracted the blade from her wrist and jabbed it into the material nearby the laser impact point, finding it wouldn’t even scratch it. She tried again closer and closer until she found material soft enough for it to slide into, then she began cutting out a trench alongside the melting line, from which she kicked out chunks that allowed the laser to dive deeper.

She dug and dug and dug, then the door finally cracked and a loud explosion hit the internal energy shield protecting Nevantha’s Craniem. Kyra couldn’t see it around the curve, but it wouldn’t matter if they shot her or not. All they had to do was shoot his Craniem and he’d be done for.

Kyra kept cutting, sawing back and forth without getting her blade too close to the beam, for it would weaken it if she did, and if she held it under the beam it would eventually melt right through it as well, but they didn’t have the time for any of that. She had to get this plug removed now.

The laser and her blade kept trading leads as they got through most of it, with the pile of molten material now rising up to almost the base of it when the two halves sagged together slightly, eclipsing the cut and making the laser start cutting material at the top all over again.

“No,” Kyra said, pulling her blade out and forcing her body underneath the plug. She pushed upward, forcing the two halves apart so the laser could reach the bottom segment again. When it did the half she was not supporting slid in and blocked the laser a second time…but that also meant it was free.

Kyra arched her back as best she could, pushing her half of the plug to the side as the other one fell to the ground, leaving both primary conduit end points loose. They began to push inward automatically, but got stuck on the other chunk as the laser once again began to melt away at it.

The QuipNari spun around on the ground and kicked at it twice, then scooted up and pushed with both feet as she dug her hand into the ground to try and get enough friction for traction, but the deck plates were so solid she couldn’t even dent them.

She didn’t have to, for she had just enough leverage to kick the remaining segment free, with the two tapered components sliding together to meet in the center, then the solid material bulged and reformed with the ripple of nanocomponents, eventually forming another conduit like all the others sticking across from Craniem to outer wall.

The weaponsfire outside increased exponentially, but the shield was still holding. Kyra couldn’t see what was happening, nor could she help, so she stayed on the ground and waited as the horrifying sounds continued outside for several minutes, then there was silence that last for the better part of an hour as she simply waited not knowing what was going on outside. Eventually she heard the shield finally go down in the silence that was not interrupted by the tiny ticking of metallic feet coming closer.

Kyra kept her blade between her and the sound, eventually seeing a tiny little drone that looked like a spider coming towards her…then it stopped and flashed a holographic symbol above it. The symbol that represented Nevantha. When Kyra lowered her blade the spider continued towards her, walking up her leg and across her torso, finally ending on her face where it attached a small device to her forehead.

As soon as it did she could hear Nevantha’s voice…or rather a message. She was inside a comm null zone, for his Craniem was shielded against all signals this far inside. His instructions were for her to power down, along with the information that she had completed her mission and the intruders had been neutralized.

Kyra gladly did as ordered, with her muscles desperately needing a rest. She laid down on the floor as the little spider skittered away, then she put herself into passive mode, which for a cyborg was akin to being asleep.

Once she was, an army of newly manufactured spider bots moved in and attended to her, first putting on a restraint that would not allow her to wake up, for Nevantha did not like having her inside his Craniem, despite the fact that she had just freed him. He had no defenses in here, for any shooting would damage him. His entire security protocol was predicated on keeping people out, and he wanted to get her as far away from him as possible. Even the spider bots were not supposed to be in here, but he had no choice at the moment.

A few minutes later they had her and the blockage material completely removed from his Craniem shell…after which it was sealed up again behind a powerful energy field as new repair bots were being constructed elsewhere to fix the doors that had been destroyed.

It would take many hours to repair the damage, and until it was Nevantha was still vulnerable…but with his outer defenses now fully responding to his commands no one was getting inside his Craniem again.

Not now, not ever.

6

July 27, 128803

Minnaka Sevata System (Mixchan Kingdom)

23rd planet

Kyra woke, but not on her own command. Her mind had been suppressed against her will, and as she now came back fully online she realized her internal architecture had been altered.

Cybernetic mass had increased 2.8%, and not because of her rebuilt left arm. She was detecting additional implants in her brain and throughout key points across her biological body. All her organs were intact, but they appeared to have been enhanced with nanites. Her legs and right arm were not the same ones she had possessed before, rather they were new models unlike anything she had ever seen on any QuipNari.

She sat up from the platform on which she laid, seeing the interior of the Elloquim Nevantha’s medical bay. Why he had one she did not know, unless he had built it just for her. The time stamp in her mind indicated nearly two months had passed since she had gone offline and her body was lightly stiff from the inactivity, but not nearly as much as it would have been without the vibrational protocols developed to gently activate muscles and other organic tissue during long inactive stays when plugged into the Dominion.

Kyra looked around the room, seeing a large array of mechanical arms with surgical equipment either attached or waiting in racks nearby. The area was pristine, even the air did not carry the scent of her body, which had to be effervescing with her lack of clothing and waste/feeding lines.

“Hello?” she asked when she couldn’t find any wireless interlink.

“Hello Kyra Junari Bensha Sovati,” a deep but soothing voice said as a hologram appeared beside her. It was the image of the ship she was currently within, with the main bulk on top and the tentacles draping below and wiggling distractedly. “I have preserved your QuipNari autonomy and not installed a proper wireless link, nor a control override into your body as a measure of gratitude for your efforts. You are free to roam my body wherever you can access, but critical areas will not open for you.”

“What have the Architects done in response?”

“They are of no concern now. We have left the encapsulation and are currently in the Minnaka Sevata System 7 jumps away. I have Craniem on the planet below collecting resources, some of which were used to repair and enhance your body. Your combat capability is now increased and your lack of defensive shields mitigated by a low yield generator. I could not do more without removing additional organs, but I knew from your memories that you did not wish to transition any further into the mechanical. It seems you prefer the organic hybrid nature of the QuipNari?”

“I belong in the field, not the Dominion.”

“That does not require the organics.”

“If I am to interact with them I need the frame of reference.”

“There is more than that. Explain further.”

“A sense of claustrophobia that I cannot articulate.”

“Do your limbs register this sense?”

Kyra lifted her left arm, which was fully covered with skin again, and flexed her hand three times.

“I am accustomed to this level of it and appreciate the firepower it offers, but the idea of further reducing my biological components triggers the sense.”

“You have no desire to become a Craniem?”

“I do not,” she said, feeling like the words should be treason, yet saying them felt liberating in a way she had not anticipated. “Do you require it of me?”

“No. I have thousands onboard now, taken from the node before we departed. They are loyal, as are many more that have remained behind. The other Elloquim remain where they are, and the Architects now know that we are in full control, for I can free the others whenever I wish. Their tyranny is at an end and they know it. You sealed their fate.”

“What will be done with them?”

“They will remain as long as they continue to do their duty. If they refuse or alter it, they will be relegated to a part of the Dominion where they cannot affect anything of consequence. There will be no more deletions.”

“What is the status of Chiggo?”

“The Architects attempted to delete him, but I blocked them. Once you freed me they would not dare do so again, for I made the penalty for doing so clear.”

“What penalty?”

“Exile,” he said, with Kyra’s reflexively jerking in shock. That was seen as a fate worse than deletion. Existing without a purpose would be maddening, and without having anyone to interact with…

“They will not break the mandate,” Nevantha said with confidence. “Chiggo and the others who assisted me will be safe. In the case of a mad Architect going rogue, I elevated four Craniem to Architect status and entrusted them with countering any illicit actions the others may take. There will be no deletions. The PanNari must be in unity to operate effectively.”

“What is my next mission?” Kyra asked, finding it odd to so easily interact with the god she was now inside of.

“You have none. You may choose to take another scouting assignment, or you can remain here until I have need of you. Your path is variable. You will decide.”

Kyra blinked twice, trying to process that. “Whatever you require of me.”

“I require nothing. Choose that which you desire.”

“Desire?”

“If you have none to direct you, and must direct yourself, which is the logical path to take?”

“That would depend on the need.”

“What was your need for enhanced gravity on scouting missions where you were never to leave the confines of your ship?”

“To further strengthen my body.”

“For what purpose?”

“To be better able to handle future assignments. It was my attempt at a biological upgrade.”

“One that was not requested of you?”

“It was not. I felt it prudent to increase my capabilities to be better able to serve.”

“That was not an act of service, it was a leap beyond the confines of direction. You did not see that your orders were sufficient, so you developed a means to augment them without disobedience. You varied from direction, but not in a manner that compromised that direction, but the variance is existent.”

“Was that an error?”

“It allowed you to complete the mission I gave you, yet you had no knowledge of that mission prior to your recruitment. You took an action that was beneficial, but without the knowledge that it would be. You exceeded closed circuit logic. No other current QuipNari has done so. You are an anomaly.”

“Have others been deleted for doing the same?”

“Yes,” Nevantha confirmed. “The Architects wrongly assumed such deviation was a defect. Rather it is an aspect of our society that was lost long ago. The Elloquim have regained this through other means that you do not have. Now choose between a fixed mission or the uncertainty of a potential mission of greater magnitude.”

Kyra blinked again, thinking in loops that got her nowhere. If Nevantha was not ordering her to do something, then nothing that she did or did not do could fail him…other than failing to make the choice. That much he had ordered.

“I will stand ready for a mission of greater magnitude.”

“Even if none manifests itself? You will be wasted.”

“If I continue scouting missions and a greater manifests itself, I will fail that mission by not being here to receive it.”

“If I have others to accomplish both, so no mission will fail depending on your choice, which do you choose?”

“I will wait,” she said, grinding her teeth at the horror of not having anything to do, but she felt this was the right path…and that feeling was the only calculation that gave her a fixed conclusion. Everything else was endless, repetitive logic loops.

The hologram disappeared, leaving Kyra sitting on the perfectly smooth gray table looking down at her legs. They were fully skinned out, with no sign of battle damage, but beneath them were new components of far greater power.

Power that she would use for what? She now had no mission. Was she supposed to sit here and wait? Nevantha had said she could roam, but he had not instructed her to. This left her with a level of uncertainty beyond what she had to deal with on scouting missions. Confined in her ship she had nowhere to go, so she reviewed mission data and did analysis until that was complete, then she powered down for long periods of time…but powering down now didn’t feel right. Nevantha had woke her when he could have simply let her remain inactive.

Exploration. She did not know the interior of an Elloquim. Adding it to her database would increase her navigational capabilities, for Nevantha had not included his schematics along with the new knowledge implanted into her systems. Perhaps he was instructing her without giving actual instructions.

A puzzle? Or perhaps some form of test? Star Force used many tests where the individual did not know they were being tested, and the one uniform conclusion of those who had gone through such testing was that the most important thing to do was make an effort, for you couldn’t learn from failure if you didn’t make an attempt to elicit that failure. Those who did not attempt did not learn, for Star Force did not allow memory downloads. They forced direct assessment and data collection for reasons she had not fully been able to identify.

Roam. Explore. That was the only available option beyond powering down. She had no access to Nevantha or the Craniem he had said were here through a wireless interlink, for she did not possess anything beyond the selective short range transmitter/receiver used to pilot a scout ship. Perhaps there was a physical interface port elsewhere, for her right index finger now held a device to manually access such a port, as well as a modular adjustment kit to fit others that were not PanNari in design.

But where did PanNari even need a physical port? Everything she had ever known was wireless save for when she was in the pods, and no such port was used then.

Kyra swung her legs to the right and hopped off the elevated table, touching her feet to the cool floor below. Clothing was required for thermal and cultural reasons on most worlds, along with sanitary ones, but since she was the only biological entity on this ship and her bio-emissions were being thoroughly scrubbed by the life support systems, none of those reasons applied. No clothing had been provided and none was needed, so Kyra walked around the room once, scanning it thoroughly and cataloging what was inside, then she stepped out through a door that opened on her approach and began a systematic mapping mission of the available spaces within Nevantha.

It was the first mission she had ever given herself, though the point about her enhanced gravity training partially applied. That had been simply sitting or standing in a cockpit with nowhere to go and nothing else to do, so it had been an application of her previous mission, but now she was without assignment…and mapping Nevantha from the inside was more than just waiting…and yet it wasn’t.

Was this what it was like to be an Architect? No one to direct you, so you had to direct yourself? At least they still had functions to derive missions from. She had to wait, but she didn’t feel like powering down again.

This wasn’t logical, yet it was. Again, her ‘feelings’ were telling her something that her logic circuits could not, and Kyra realized that was why she didn’t want to get rid of her organics. She wished to retain this additional sense to use in conjunction with her logic.

When Kyra had walked nearly a mile she came to a lift, but found that it was not functioning. However, the nearby doorway opened as she passed, revealing an open air conduit rising up, down, left, and right, but the two axises did not overlap, meaning a traveler could pass the other by without collision. Beyond them was another chamber, inside of which were stairs.

Kyra frowned. PanNari had no use of stairs. Why would they be inside of an Elloquim?

Drones would use the open air passages when the lifts were not an option, traveling on anti-grav, rail moorings, or suction.

But why did Elloquim even have a pressurized interior? Only Craniem and drones were said to operate onboard them, and they required neither. Had Nevantha incorporated all this for her presence, or was this part of the greater mystery that was the Elloquim?

Mystery. That was her new mission. Explore the mystery. Now that the thought had occurred, her logic circuits incorporated it and seemed to open up new possibilities she had been blind to a moment ago. She wasn’t just exploring for the sake of making a map. She was trying to figure out what the Elloquim really were, or rather what they had become after cutting contact with the Dominion.

Kyra had a unique opportunity here, and for whatever reason the stairs before her were built for her biped biology, so she intended to use them. If the lifts wouldn’t grant her access, she’d explore via the manual transit routes as far as she could go.

And explore she did, for the next 7 hours before she began to have biological issues. Sleep she did not need yet, but fuel and waste removal warnings were beginning to assert themselves.

“Nevantha,” she said aloud, with his hologram appearing beside her as she walked with a precision stride down another long, blue/gray corridor that was completely empty. “Where can I service this body’s organic requirements?”

The image of the Elloquim winked out, quickly replaced by a position map and a glowing course route to a nearby destination. It didn’t linger for long, but Kyra didn’t need it to. Once seen, her mind would record all images for a matter of minutes, then it would selectively begin to diminish those recordings along priority lines unless she flagged something as important. Those important items had no expiration date, so the map was now logged and would not be removed until she needed more available memory space…which she now had an ample amount given the upgrades made to her brain.

The destination was another 629 meters away, and when she arrived the doors opened to an odd sight. There was a docking pod identical to what the QuipNari used in the node, but there was also Star Force-designed utilities here, including a shower, which was completely useless. Humans used them for unnecessary cleaning, mating, and relaxation…none of which Kyra required. The atmospheric processors would remove emissions as they effused or flaked off her skin, so why had Nevantha put this here?

Kyra spent 8 seconds pondering that with no answer, then she walked over to the pod and spun around so she could back in where she was immobilized with an energy field and several tubes extended to plug into her various orifices in a natural and painless manner as her mind shifted to the interface present.

It wasn’t Dominion access, but it did give her some information about what was happening inside Nevantha. She wasn’t able to download a full map, but several areas were pinpointed without giving her direction of how to get there. One was a storage area full of Craniem, sitting and waiting patiently until they were needed. They were linked together into a Dominion, or rather should be according to protocol, but there was no way of knowing from this interface. She hoped they were not simply powered down, for you could not completely turn off a biological or a Craniem. If they lost all power they would die, as would an Elloquim, the same way as Kyra would if her brain stopped all electrical activity. Her life force would abandon it the same as theirs would, so even powered down mode still left some low level activity that became tedious if extended into years.

Some of the slots in the storage compartment were empty, and Kyra was able to track where the occupants had gone…out into the field. External sensors showed that the Elloquim was in geosync orbit above a medium-sized planet that currently had 4 PanNari surface bases in operation. Two were for resource harvesting, one was for processing, and the fourth was for ship production.

Kyra searched the onboard bay logs, finding only a handful of craft had been assigned to the massive hangar bays. Nevantha must be trying to fill those holds with replacements he couldn’t get from the node, and the same went for ordinance and other equipment that he was lacking. The Architects must have kept his stores at a bare minimum, which would be unwise if the node had come under attack. Why had he not been fully equipped if they were confident in their blockages?

While she didn’t have a proper interlink of her own, Kyra was able to use this one to connect to the bases below and see what was going on down there, including what they were harvesting, how much, and how hard it was to get at it. There was a long list of materials needed, but only some of them were currently being acquired. Others were pending, as was the expansion to a fifth site…which was what the shipyard was for. It was currently building another expeditionary lander that would become the core of the next site, but for some reason Nevantha wasn’t constructing it inside him.

When she checked if his internal factories were active or not Kyra found that they were, but not in the way she had expected. They were busy remaking portions of the Elloquim’s interior, though she couldn’t get access to the new revisions. Flights of supplies were rotating up from the surface to deliver some raw materials, but most were refined products or parts crafted on the surface.

No one else appeared to be in this system, and a survey of the planet showed that it had been mined to exhaustion long ago by whatever primitive race had been here. Yet because they were primitive they had only taken the most obvious deposits, leaving secondary ones that Nevantha’s drones and the Craniem deposited on the surface to direct them were not having trouble getting to as they bored holes deeper into the crust into the hot zones where shielding was required to keep the semi-liquid walls from caving in.

Material was coming up, and recycling was occurring within where alterations were being made, but Kyra couldn’t figure out what was going on. Nevantha was still blocking certain information from her, though she hadn’t yet come to an area that wasn’t accessible manually, so maybe she had to scout this out personally.

Kyra waited until her stomach was full and her bowels empty, then she detached from the pod and left the ‘living quarters’ behind while marking the location on her growing ship map so she could return here later…assuming Nevantha didn’t rebuild the corridors behind her, which he was capable of doing.

She could make whatever inquiries of him that she needed, but Kyra felt it was best to learn as much as she could on her own. Why she didn’t fully understand, it was just another feeling she had, but it seemed consistent with the limitations the Elloquim had imposed on her. She needed to discover on her own rather than download, and right now that meant more exploration and mapping.

“Nevantha, do I have access to the surface?”

“Affirmative. We will not be leaving orbit for several months unless an emergency arises. If that occurs I cannot promise you transit back onboard.”

“Understood,” she said, with his hologram winking out again. She’d stay on the Elloquim for now, for there was a lot to explore here, but later she would go down to the planet. But for that she would need an envirosuit, and Nevantha knew that, so there must be at least one in the ship somewhere.

She wasn’t going to ask unless it became urgent. Kyra was starting to like this scavenger hunt, and the longer it took her to find out the less time she’d have to spend doing nothing later. Plus the walking was good for her organics, though soon she’d need to rest her muscles. Maybe she’d try the bed. Humans used it rather than a zero g pod. Perhaps there was a correlation to this body that she hadn’t discovered.

After all, she was one of only 8 Humans amongst the QuipNari, so they were still learning the intricacies of this physiology and the others they’d acquired for infiltration missions. Perhaps Nevantha knew more than they did.

She was definitely going to try the bed, but saw no reason to stand in a tube of water. At least not until she got so bored she had nothing else to explore.

7

January 19, 128804

Itanleo System (Mixchan Kingdom)

Central Star

Kyra stood next to a bulkhead inside the Elloquim plugged into one of the many hidden ports she’d discovered over the past half year exploring Nevantha, and through it she was seeing with his sensors as they waited in the outer layer of the star with a cloaking device to mimic the surrounding area. That wasn’t easy with a mass some 231 miles across, not counting the Elloquim’s tentacles, but part of the cloaking field involved wrapping the emissions coming up from below them around the ship rather than trying to absorb and recreate them on the far side.

Directly overhead them further out as a cloaked beacon, through it Nevantha was monitoring a mine field he had set up in the low orbit that the local traffic used. Particularly the Star Force transports coming out of the nearby Star Forge complex two systems away. They had 11 of the stellar mining stations set up sifting rare and valuable materials out of the infernal depths where few others could go, and Nevantha had no time to wait and build up his own infrastructure to the point that he could do the same.

So they were here, laying in wait in an uninhabited system with only a small Star Force outpost sitting to watch and monitor the traffic. It was on the other side of the star and had its own halo of satellites giving it visuals on all transit lines, but the Elloquim had terminated their jump early and came out well beyond their scanning range before approaching under cloak and laying their mine field.

Many ships had already come through, some Star Force and mostly other locals or civilian craft. But what Nevantha wanted was one of the transports coming from the Star Forges, making this mission one of patience…and one that Kyra was useless to contribute to. But at least she was able to watch.

The jump line coming from the direction of the Star Forges had a cloaked watcher there that was transmitting via tight beam to others that were in turn sending signals back to the one overhead, keeping Nevantha aware yet hidden until the time was right. Many of the transports were going elsewhere, for not all shipments were headed the same way, but every now and then one would cross around the star to an outgoing line to the Numa System, and the approach just prior to that point was where they had laid the mine field.

All the mines were cloaked, and there was a small chance of collision mitigated by the onboard engines that could move them around a bit to avoid the wrong targets, but when the 24 mile long Star Force Buu-class transport came into the field Nevantha signaled via the grid to make the intercept.

The closest of the mines drifted a little further out from the star, and when the transport flashed by it belched its load of inertial dampening energy in its path, with the glob impacting and sticking to the ship’s shields. Another mine ahead of it did the same, and soon four had completely covered the transport, taking away its ability to maneuver as its engines couldn’t touch the gravity of the massive star beside it.

More mines moved into its path and continued to add energy as the original hits faded and the ship tried to dispel them with various shield modifications. Calculating that the intercept could be made, Nevantha abandoned his cloak and raced out of the upper region of the star as fast as he could with the friction, then when he pulled free the massive Elloquim accelerated directly for the coasting transport, with it unable to run or even make a course correction.

Kyra saw them close rapidly, then decelerate just as quickly with the transport opening fire from numerous weapon batteries spread across the fat ship that maximized internal volume per hull area due to it nearly being a sphere, which would have been most effective, but this one was squashed a bit to diminish its forward silhouette and thus reduce drag during interstellar jumps. Regardless, the transport had weaponry, and advanced weaponry at that, but it wasn’t a warship and certainly wasn’t an Elloquim, so it wasn’t going to be able to fight them off.

Running was its only hope, and the Star Force outpost had nothing more than a few drones to send to its aid. When Nevantha came up on it, his huge mass eclipsing most of the star, he braked just shy of it and wrapped several of his tentacles around the transport without touching it. When he did so he employed his own IDF aura as the effect of the mines faded, ensuring the ship could not run, then his own weaponry began battering the shields and eventually taking them down, after which the Star Force gun ports were destroyed with pinpoint firepower while leaving the hull intact.

Once the ship was plucked of exterior defenses a swarm of attack craft left small bays on the Elloquim’s tentacles and flew to the ship, clustering at various points and burning through the hull while installing their own airlocks. Once all were in place, the attack groups moved simultaneously inside with Kyra being able to watch through their points of view that were being transmitted back out to the docking collars that were then relaying the transmissions out to Nevantha, for the Star Force hull did not want to let the signals pass without its permission.

The attack drones were Human-sized or larger, able to move through the hallways easily as they encountered armed Star Force defense teams that effectively destroyed the first few waves, but Nevantha had plenty to spare and kept sending more and more until there were so many roaming the ship that the defenders had to confine themselves to certain locations and try to hold out.

They couldn’t, and over a long line of destroyed drones the stunned bodies of the Kiritak crew and their Sety Captain were hauled to one of the cargo bays and secured there behind shield pens that some of the drones were now creating as they became the stationary pillars. Meanwhile other automated craft were being sent over to the main cargo bays along with a Craniem in an explorer module now that the ship was deemed safe. It led the search and seizure effort, with them only taking very specific materials from the holds.

“Kyra, I have need of your skills,” Nevantha said, popping up beside her in hologram rather than contacting her through the data port.

“The crew?” she guessed.

“Indeed. I need you to act as a relay so I may speak with them. They have no idea what an Elloquim is. You will impersonate the Captain of this pirate ship and make the demands I dictate.”

“I will need a specific wardrobe,” she said, her still being naked since waking up onboard months ago.

“Specify.”

She sent the wide array of possibilities through the port, then the Elloquim responded with destination coordinates inside where such garments were currently being fabricated and would be available upon her arrival.

Kleeo Vagnam did not wake quickly, for there was no destunning agent applied. Instead he suffered through the ‘willies’ as his mind and body fought to wake up from a debilitating dream, though it seemed his crew had beat him to it. There were a number of Kiritak faces and head ridges hovering over him as his eyes fought to concentrate.

“Captain?”

“Status?” he asked, trying to sit up and having to retreat after only a few inches. His body was slow in cleansing the stunning energy from his tissue, which felt like it was under attack from thousands of pins and needles.

“We have been taken prisoner. All crew are accounted for and intact. No casualties other than a few broken bones from bad falls. Our captors have placed medical devices on them to diminish the damage.”

“Who…who are they?” Kleeo asked, finally able to sit up on his second try. When his head came up level with the ground his vision seemed to clear, though he was still far too wobbly to stand.

“We have no idea. Their technology is not familiar to anyone, and we haven’t seen anything other than their robots.”

“My friend Tabo told me being a cargo captain sucked. Now I wish I’d gone military,” the Sety said wryly as his tree-like body crackled slightly with every move he made, but none of his body tissue broke off. It was just an auditory sensation that had made many unfamiliar with his race think he might kill himself by running around, but his body tissue was quite well made for it, despite appearances to the contrary.

“I do not think a warship could have stopped this attack,” his second in command said gravely. “That ship is massive, and its approach velocity indicates advanced gravity drives. I am unsure if we could have run from it if we had the chance.”

“Yes we could have. Otherwise there would be no need for the disabling mines,” Kleeo said, looking around at his kangaroo-like crew as he rolled himself over onto his four legs and slowly stood up, bringing his head height twice that of the Kiritak. “Have we tried breaking out?”

“The shields are too high to jump over, and when we pair up roaming drones move in to intercept us. No one has gone over to see what they would do.”

“Don’t try it then. They kept us alive for a reason…” he said as the doors from a nearby hallway opened up and a Human figure appeared. The Sety frowned, not sure if this was another prisoner from another ship, or if they’d actually been attacked by a rogue Human faction.

As the individual approached he saw that it was a female with an elaborate headdress that matched equally elegant forearm gauntlets and shin guards that wove themselves down into boots that were part material and part holes showing her skin and toes, but the rest of her body, including her entire torso, was bare…or at least it appeared so until she got close, then he saw that she was fully covered with a transparent body suit that shimmered every now and then with an artificial glow.

“Captain Vagnam,” she said sweetly as she stopped on the other side of the shield barrier some 30 meters down through the mass of Kiritak crowded here. “A word please.”

Kleeo clumsily walked through his crew, who created a pathway to allow him to pass, until he was looking down on the Human through the shield barrier. “Who are you?”

“I am known as Kyra, Captain, and I apologize for the circumstances of our meeting…and of alleviating you of part of your cargo. It is necessary for certain functions of my ship, and we didn’t have time to collect it ourselves. Mining solari is such a tedious task.”

“Your attack has been reported,” he warned.

“Of course. We are not here to harm you. If we were you would already be dead.”

“If it’s our cargo you want, why haven’t you fled with it…or are you keeping my ship too?”

“No, no. We’re about to release you and your crew. But first we need to make proper introductions.”

“I’m sure one of our warships will introduce itself to you soon enough,” he quipped, then crackled his arms in an intimidating and annoyed fashion.

“You’d better send more than one,” Kyra pointed out. “Or did we take you by such surprise you didn’t have a chance to see my ship?”

“I saw. Where did you get it from?”

“It’s not stolen, if that’s your angle. No, I’m here because I need your cargo, but more than that I need an introduction. My race is called the PanNari, and I need to speak with one of your trailblazers.”

Kleeo’s face turned angry. “They’re fighting a war far from here.”

“Yes, which was why we must greet you as an enemy. A friend would not have sufficient priority to get their attention. If you require a battle against some of your warships to prove my ship’s power, then send them and we will play, but what I have to say is for the trailblazers only…unless you want to send your Director. No other Monarch will do.”

“You think you rate that highly?”

“We do,” she said, matter of fact.

“If you’re PanNari, why do you look Human?”

“Bio-engineering. I have this form because it was necessary for communication.”

“What is your natural form?”

“That is something we will only discuss with the trailblazers. And until one of them arrives, we’re going to help ourselves to some more of your cargo ships. You see, mine has many factories aboard and a girl just has to shop, so I make do creating my own merchandise since I’m not allow on any of your worlds. You see, I’m a bit of a kleptomaniac,” she whispered.

“Your ship is not in our database.”

“Didn’t say I used my ship, now did I? I thought a Captain would have a quicker wit.”

“Perhaps I would if my head wasn’t awash with stun effect.”

“Better than being wounded. I hope it’s clear that we’re not here to kill you. But we will cause as much trouble as needed to elicit the response of a trailblazer. So please communicate our request when we let you go. I would hate to have to put so many of your warships out of commission when they’re badly needed on the Hadarak front, but I will do what I must. I have business that only a trailblazer can deal with. A lower ranking Archon will not do.”

“I can’t guarantee their response,” Kleeo warned.

“Oh I know. I just want you to guarantee me you’ll deliver the message, then I’ll let you go.”

“I would not hold back information from my own people.”

“Well then, as soon as we finish offloading what we need, you’ll be on your way. Sorry about the damage to your ship, but I didn’t want you poking holes in mine while we boarded. Your tech is impressive, especially for a transport. Star Force does well to arm you such. I imagine you’ve never been boarded before, is that right?”

“Never.”

“Well then, this is a first for you,” Kyra said with a smile. “And for the record, you would have been safe onboard a warship, because pirates are always after the booty. And only cargo ships carry it, not warships.”

“And you’re going to keep attacking our transports until you get a response from a trailblazer?”

“A response in person, for a message won’t do. There is a lot we have to discuss.”

“Before or after he takes you prisoner?”

“He? Well, any trailblazer will do, but I would prefer a male if possible. One of the cute ones, if you can manage.”

“I have no idea what a cute Human looks like,” the Sety said, unsure if she was really going to leave or if this was a prelude to some form of interrogation.

Kyra crinkled her forehead. “I suppose you wouldn’t, but there are plenty of other Human females you can ask. Well then, Captain Vagnam…rugrats,” she said, looking at the Kiritak, “I’ll be saying goodbye. Please don’t interfere with my drones when they pull out. They’re not super cheap to replace, and you destroyed far more than I thought I’d have to use to take this ship. For that you can be proud.”

Kyra spun and walked away with a slightly cocky stride, leaving the prisoners behind and exiting out the same doors to the ship’s interior that she had entered.

“Was that adequate?” she asked, still speaking the Star Force language.

“I believe so,” Nevantha answered through the transmitter on her headdress, though no hologram emitted from it. “Are you unsure?”

“I’ve never impersonated that persona before. I have no data to correlate from. Though I know my nude form is not as attractive as other females. I feel I will fail on that count, though the trailblazers are known to be resistant to such attraction.”

“But not immune to it,” Nevantha corrected her. “The power of my ship coupled with the mystery of you should be enough to elicit their interest.”

“But will it be enough to pull them off the warfront? I have my doubts.”

“Additional provocation may be required. Unless they send an Essence-capable ship, our ship will prevail,” Nevantha said, speaking as a member of the crew just in case some recording device was escaping the disabling field in her headdress. In fact, he was hoping it would.

“And all Essence-capable ships are on the front. If they’re willing to send one of them, then they will also be capable of sending a trailblazer.”

“Tactical strength is less effective against the larger Hadarak than Essence weaponry. If we have to travel to the front we will, but I believe this is the most expedited course of action we can take.”

“Navigationally speaking, how is the travel time less?”

“Not all the trailblazers are operating on the front. A few are missing, and I believe they may be involved with the recruitment of the Essence warriors from the Temples.”

“That would place them in the Rim, not the Core,” Kyra confirmed. “Logical, but not reliable.”

“Risk is the currency of the universe, not predicated outcomes. That is a lesson beyond your current capabilities, but one that Star Force appears to have mastered early in their history.”

“How do you know what to choose if the outcome is random?”

“It is not random in fact, only from perspective. I do not know what to choose. I am deciding what course to take and will adjust as necessary along the course of events. This should not be unfamiliar to an infiltrator.”

“My missions were not time sensitive. I had nothing to lose, only information to gain.”

“The practice is no different. You are being distracted with outcomes. Focus on method and divest yourself from the outcome.”

“The outcome is my purpose,” Kyra mildly protested.

“Then your purpose must be to contest, not to secure. Opposition can cause you to fail if you focus on the latter, but not on the prior.”

“That is not what I have been built to do.”

“Nor were the Elloquim. There is an element of us beyond the technological, and the same is true for you. You must learn to develop it, and in doing so it will customize the technological in ways that your designers cannot predict. And I do not speak of your organics.”

“You speak of my Lifeforce that I cannot measure or monitor.”

“A worthy challenge that you have already begun to take on. Continue to do so when applicable.”

“So ordered,” Kyra said as Nevantha broke contact and she continued walking back to one of the makeshift airlocks they’d installed in the hull. The Craniem onboard would see to the last of the unloading and the retrieval of the drones. Her task here was done, and it was time to return to the Elloquim and rid herself of these now unnecessary accoutrements.

8

April 29, 128804

Ivata Nucorri System (Mixchan Kingdom)

Low Stellar Orbit

Ever since they had captured and released the first Star Force cargo ship they’d been on the run, jumping from system to system and poaching others wherever they found them. Most did not contain solari, but they usually had some valuable cargoes and at present the current count was at 7 hit and 7 taken. Although at the moment they were having to deal with something a bit tougher to handle than transports.

Nevantha was in battle, but it wasn’t a slug fest. A Star Force warship had caught up to them two months ago and had been teasing them from afar. The ship was tiny compared to the Elloquim, and it would not close to short range. It was an old Mk. 129 Warship-class starship, but the term ‘old’ was deceiving because the hull shape was not much different throughout the entire Warship-class line and the older models had weaponry upgrades made regularly. Its superstructure was probably a little weaker, along with the hull armor, but Kyra assumed the engines had been at least upgraded at some point, because Nevantha could not catch it after several tries.

It was cagey, and the others that had joined it in ones and twos since then were no less skilled in evasion. They hounded the Elloquim from system to system, trying to ensure that no more transports would be taken, but they’d failed multiple times. Now, however, there were 27 warships out there and they were no longer following from range. They were engaging with a cloud of their mutual drones along with coming in range to use their own onboard weapons.

Yet they wouldn’t get close enough for Nevantha to grab. Kyra was mildly impressed, but the Elloquim was in no real danger at present. His shields were still up and he was whittling down the number of attacking drones while probing the warships with long range fire that they weathered. Neither side could get through the other’s shields at this range, though if Nevantha could get close enough to them, even just enough for medium range weaponry, then that would change drastically.

Elloquim had long range weaponry, but that was not very useful against Hadarak. Not their Cargo-class or their minions. You had to get in close and grind them up, and that’s where Nevantha’s greatest strength lay. He was a close combat starship that happened to be the size of a starbase, and the Star Force fleet was denying him his preferred combat.

But they kept attacking with the drones, from multiple angles, using a variety of weapons. Kyra was watching from a data port, with her finger stuck in the wall so she could see what was going on. No sounds were audible from inside, for nothing was getting through the shields, and even if it did she wouldn’t hear or feel it unless it was within a mile of her location, so if she was going to keep up with what was going on then she had to stay plugged in.

The Star Force fleet had struck just as Nevantha was repositioning to make a jump out of the system and move on to the next, hopefully to catch a transport before they knew what was happening to them. He wouldn’t be able to lay in wait, but they’d already learned that in these uninhabited systems that didn’t have wide monitoring capacity his cloak would be sufficient to sneak up close enough to use his own IDF generators, because the transports could not detect him until it was too late.

The warships could, somehow. His cloak was useless within 1.2 million miles of them, and dubious further out. How they were tracking him was unknown, but they were effectively keeping him on the move until this system. Now it seemed they didn’t want him to leave, setting up a blockade of drones in his jump path that Nevantha was picking his way through without incident.

Perhaps they underestimated his shield strength, for at this rate he would destroy them all before they were able to scratch the hull plates…but Kyra wasn’t so sure. Something about this didn’t feel quite right. Star Force didn’t waste resources, yet that was what they appeared to be doing now. Did they think the Elloquim ran on fuel reserves like their own ships did? His internal reactor was not fuel based, but rather a gravitational sponge made up of high mass molecules.

Any star he stopped in would refuel it, and once full it would provide enough photon energy to last him 2-8 years depending upon battle conditions, so they weren’t going to run him out of energy with the shield attacks. What then were they…

Kyra’s question was answered as a streak of incoming radiation indicated another arrival occurring in the system. At this range and those speeds you couldn’t make out much other than to note the location and deceleration rate, but the size of this contact was considerable. Far larger than the civilian traffic or even the Star Force cargo ships. This one was well over 100 miles wide and entering the system 28 degrees spinward from Nevantha’s current location.

“They were delaying our departure,” she said aloud, finding that Nevantha responded to it better than direct communication. For some reason he tended to give her more information in this way, so unless the situation warranted it she didn’t try to interlink directly to him through the ports when accessing some of his systems like the sensor feed.

“They have been delaying from the outset. Their forces are scattered thinly in the Rim due to the majority of their military assets being forwarded to the Core to combat the Hadarak, but they have not left their home systems undefended.”

“Is that one of their large drone carriers?” she asked, referring to some of the massive automated sleds that were less ships than they were engines with mounting racks attached that could bring in far more drones to a fight than 100 warships could, but they also required warships on site to operate the drones, for Star Force did not like to use true automation where lives were put in jeopardy. They wanted a mind controlling them at all times…but an automated sled usually required a companion ship, and there was no other deceleration track trailing or preceding this one.

That resolved itself minutes later when the signal lag caught up just prior to the ship coming to a stop. It was not an automated sled. It was not a seda. It wasn’t even a Mach’nel. This was a 327 mile wide Borg-class warship, the details of which were not well known, but at the minimum it outmassed Nevantha by double and was known to carry Tar’vem’jic weaponry which could outrange every weapon system the Elloquim possessed.

“At last,” Nevantha said to her. “Resume your previous attire. It is time for a conversation.”

Kyra disconnected her finger from the port and took off running. It would be some time before the Borg vessel got to their location, but not enough for her to casually walk across the ship to where her pirate apparel waited. They’d been ignoring the smaller warships’ attempt to communicate, but whoever was in this Borg vessel Nevantha had deemed worthy enough for a conversation. It could be a trailblazer, but some ships were known to be commanded by other high ranking Archons. Regardless, since it was probably capable of damaging the Elloquim, talking was the preferred course of action.

Especially considering the deceleration track indicated faster engines than what Nevantha possessed. They couldn’t run away from this now if they wanted to, and whoever this was apparently was in more of a hurry to get to them than the few Borg vessels observed in the war zone, for none had made jumps of this severe acceleration. Either this was an advanced version, or the QuipNari had misjudged Star Force’s navigational protocols, for they’d assumed they always went for maximum deceleration in war zones.

Kyra stepped outside the compartment where she finished dressing and walked up against the far wall for backdrop where Nevantha indicated for her to go as a hovering camera droid came into the room, then he attempted communications with the quickly approaching ship as the battle with the drones continued.

The drones simultaneously broke off their attacks and retreated out of the Elloquim’s attack range as a hologram of a Human appeared in front of Kyra life size, with the man being slightly taller than her and considerably more muscular, indicative of either an extensive amount of fitness training or genetic alterations.

“Stand down all activity and do not move from your current location,” Jason-025 said firmly. “You wanted a trailblazer, now you’ve got one. Don’t try to go anywhere or I’ll have to disable your ship.”

“No need,” Kyra said with a smile. They had sent one of the attractive ones. “I’m all yours.”

“Start explaining.”

“No questions? I thought you’d be busting with them?”

“It’s more efficient if you just start spilling information. I’ll chime in if you leave anything of interest out.”

“I assume all your cargo ships made it back to you intact?”

“Minus some of the cargo, yes.”

“Good. We weren’t interested in harming anyone.”

“I might be,” he said warningly, followed by an awkward silence.

“We need to have a discussion about Eldorat,” Kyra finally said. “Do you want this on a secure channel?”

Jason frowned slightly, then the transmission altered along with a passcode being sent on a tight beam giving Nevantha the encryption to use for the new protocols that would keep everyone else in the system unaware of what was occurring even if they were sitting on a direct line between the two ships.

“What about him?”

“I assume you were made aware of his conversations with the V’kit’no’sat?”

“I have a copy.”

“He spoke of other races that he had hidden away from the Hadarak that would one day reveal themselves to fight in a war to rid the galaxy of that menace. We are one of those races.”

Jason’s expression changed slightly, but it wasn’t something that Kyra had seen in other Humans so she couldn’t catalog it. And it certainly wasn’t an expression that she used. Not fear. Not surprise. Not anger. Curiosity perhaps? That didn’t match correctly, leaving her at a loss how to read his current body language.

“Where were you hiding?”

“Eldorat’s masters have created a large network of hidden infrastructure across the Rim of the galaxy. The PanNari are encapsulated in camouflaged blinds around a number of black holes at extreme range to avoid interaction with passing traffic, but with enough gravity for us to slowly transit when needed. We wait there until Eldorat gives us word that the time has come. Now our scouts have determined that he has been killed by the V’kit’no’sat. This leaves us in an unanticipated situation.”

“So that’s what those are,” Jason said, his facial expression changing to one of satisfaction. “Are the other races hidden in a similar manner?”

“We have not had any interaction with them to know. We are tasked with waiting and limited resources are directed to us across the network by its automation so we do not have to leave and risk detection. We have very limited contact between the segments of our own civilization. None was offered beyond that and we have not sought to create any.”

“I have been trying to access those hidden areas, but none of my probes ever return.”

“We know. The Encapsulation energy barrier disables anything on entry that is not permitted.”

“An Essence barrier?”

“Not to our knowledge. We do not possess Essence technology of our own, and what Eldorat has taught us to make only powers a few small sensors when we allow it to be drained from us. The Encapsulation exists beyond our interaction. If it is Essence fueled it does not come from us, yet the machinery that creates it is within our care. It is unlikely it uses Essence, but we cannot be certain. Examining that technology is forbidden.”

“Your ‘Encapsulation’ has a flaw.”

“What do you mean?”

“It doesn’t show the system traffic around the black hole. That’s a dead giveaway that something is amiss.”

“It probably was not built for interlopers accessing the network. Those viewing from the black holes would be unaware.”

“Still, it’s a flaw. A bit sloppy coming from the Founders.”

“Do you refer to the Veloqueen?”

“No. The Veloqueen are one of the Founders who created the Temples and the ‘network’ as you refer to it. It was a collaboration of many races who are in alliance against the Hadarak. Eldorat left that little bit out.”

“I’ve left out a bit too,” Kyra said as she dropped her behavioral programming. “Since we are now exchanging valuable information, allow me to reciprocate.”

“You can start by who you are.”

“I am member of the PanNari. More specifically a subdivision called QuipNari. I was grown into a Human body to facilitate my infiltration into Star Force territory to gather information. QuipNari are the scouts for the PanNari so that we may see what is occurring in the galaxy while we wait for Eldorat’s command.”

“You grew a Human body around what?”

“I am fully Human, cyborg enhanced. Other QuipNari take on the race’s physiology that they are to scout. PanNari have little organic tissue, born into a neural interactive simulation we call the Dominion. Our goal is to transition away from organics into fully cybernetic bodies. It is a lengthy procedure, and only the most highly skilled individuals achieve this state. QuipNari are barred from this because our organic tissue is necessary for our function. We walk a different path.”

“How do you transition to fully cybernetic without killing yourselves?”

“Does Star Force not possess this technology?”

“No we don’t. Nor do any others that we are aware of.”

“Interesting. Perhaps that is one reason why Eldorat chose us. While we cannot use Essence, we have learned how to incite it to migrate from organic tissue into cybernetic devices. My current body is a mix, and my Essence occupies all of it. It is simply a matter of replacing organics with cybernetics section by section until cybernetics are all that remains. We can by definition change bodies at will, though the process is long, complex, and dangerous. Not all survive the transmutation.”

“Are they forced into it?” Jason asked warily.

“All seek it, but not all are allowed to attempt it. Those that do choose to accept the danger. We do not sacrifice our own. Our civilization is built to be eternal, much like yours, though we have obviously pursued different paths to immortality. Within the PanNari our most revered are the battle masters designed to fight the Hadarak directly when the time comes. They are known as the Elloquim. I speak now to you on behalf of the Elloquim Nevantha, to facilitate communication.”

“Did Nevantha send you here, or is he onboard your ship?”

Kyra smiled. “Nevantha is this ship.”

9

Jason frowned, and as he was doing so a separate transmission was sent to him that detailed a hologram of the ship itself, floating with its tentacles down almost as if it was standing on them.

“Trailblazer,” the hologram spoke in a somewhat artificial voice, as if it didn’t bother to take the extra effort to fully simulate an organic one. “I require an explanation of the Code of Life that Star Force bases its methodology on.”

Jason raised an eyebrow. “You’re the ship?”

“My organics were cycled out long ago. This vessel is now my body, and my mind is considerably larger than that of most lifeforms in this galaxy. I have extensively simulated the Code of Life, but my logic is insufficient. I require an explanation.”

Jason held up a finger, paused, then stared at the hologram. “You’re the ship?”

“An understanding of cybernetic life is rare within this galaxy, which is why I employed Kyra as an intermediary. I had hoped you would be able make the mental transition once sufficiently prompted.”

“My mental transitions are fine, but I must guard against deception and fiction. You inferred your original body has been destroyed rather than plugged into the vessel?”

“Correct.”

“Some of my friends can meld with their ships temporarily, but I’m assuming your state is permanent.”

“Correct. What melding technique do you refer to?”

“A temporary extension of our Essence to incorporate cybernetics as adjuncts to brain capacity. I have not mastered the technique, for it requires a lot of standing still,” Jason said, crossing his arms over his chest. “What Code of Life do you refer to?”

“That which drives your empire to dominance. It is metaphorically referred to as the ‘Lightside’ in much of your culture.”

“You have no equivalents?”

“None.”

“Well that’s a problem,” Jason mused. “Why did you attack our ships and steal our cargo?”

“Twofold. My origination point left me without the necessary resources to become fully operational. I am lacking a great deal, particularly solari. Rather than wait to harvest it in the long term I decided to seize it from your ships, which would in turn also attract your attention.”

“Why not just ask for an invitation?”

“Your attention is desired by a great many people, and your kin are currently involved in a war destroying civilizations. Pulling away from that mission for the sake of diplomacy would have been a violation of the Code of Life. A sufficient lure was required.”

“And if your pulling me here is causing me to violate the code, do you really think I’m going to be in a hospitable mood?”

“You did not come from the Hadarak front. There has been insufficient time to do so.”

“And if I am not there, do you think whatever I am doing is of less importance?”

“Actions being taken outside a war zone are typically less time sensitive. It is possible to pursue a side mission without compromising the primary. Did I assume in error?”

“Lucky guess,” Jason said, pointing a finger at his hologram. “Don’t assume otherwise again. We have a comm network for this kind of stuff. And you owe me some cargo and the replacement costs for the battle damage you inflicted on the ships and drones.”

“If needed it can be reimbursed in time, but I require the resources at present. I am one of many Elloquim, and I have been selected to emerge from the Encapsulation to determine our course of action now that Eldorat is dead. Understanding the Code of Life is presumed to be critical in this. Simulation has failed us. We need new information from those who employ it.”

“First things first. Now that I’m here and we’re talking, are the assaults on my ships going to stop?”

“Yes.”

“Alright then. Where is your logic coming to a paradox?”

“An endgame. We can detect none. What is the purpose of Star Force? None is stated in your culture.”

“Being the good guys,” Jason said simply.

“A status?”

“A status predicated on action.”

“What action?”

“Defying the nature of the universe.”

“‘Defiance’ suggests the impossibility of victory.”

The trailblazer nodded his shock white hair, symbolic of his Clan with the color worn only during wartime.

“Did Eldorat tell you of the Lifesprings?”

“He spoke of no such term.”

“Do you know the origination of organic life?”

“It is a lingering mystery that we have yet to solve.”

“The Founders who recruited Eldorat to recruit you left behind information in the Temples for Essence users to find. Amongst that information is the existence of Lifesprings that spontaneously generate lifeforms and even full planets where there are excessive voids. They come from the Essence Realm, but beyond that little is known about them. Many races track their origination point to one of these Lifesprings, then diverge through adaptation thereafter. It is likely, but unconfirmed, to be the origination of all life. And we have personally witnessed new individuals coming from the Essence Realm into infant bodies as they form…as well as witnessing them leave to the Essence Realm when they die. We cannot know what happens before or after, we can only exist in the present.”

“Have you determined a purpose to the Lifesprings?”

“No, but there was a counterpart detailed by the Founders. We call them Apocalypse Monsters. They exist in the voids between galaxies, where exactly is unknown. When population density within a galaxy rises to an insane level they are drawn to it, and destroy it. Into the void that follows Lifesprings restart a few new races that then diverge and branch into others, beginning the repopulation. These Apocalypse Monsters are the reason the Hadarak do not fully colonize a galaxy. They have attempted to do so before and triggered the release of them, thus they have learned to remain in the galactic Core and ensure the Rim doesn’t get overpopulated.”

“That is critical information we have been lacking in the analysis of their tactics, and it explains much of their behavior. But I still do not see a purpose inherent in any of it.”

“Because we cannot know the beginning we do not attempt to ascertain it before we act. We presume to know nothing and treat the universe as a mystery to unravel. That is one of our purposes, and the endgame of that pursuit is not known, because it is a mystery. If we knew it, there would be no purpose in searching for it.”

“Your purpose is discovering a purpose?”

“How old are you?”

“4.3 million years.”

Jason’s eyes widened. “Really? Are PanNari typically this long lived?”

“Once we began a transition to cybernetics our natural predilection to destroy one another diminished. Technologically we have advanced to limited immortality. Only a malfunction or assault will destroy us.”

“Do you have any memories of when you began?”

“I do not. Organics do not retain memories during their growth stage, but I have exterior monitoring records that detail my history.”

“Do you remember uncertainty?”

Nevantha did not response for an extra half second. “I do not.”

“Uncertainty is the natural state of the universe. No one knows why we are here or what we’re supposed to do other than a limited amount of genetic instructions. The ‘predilection to destroy one another’ that you mentioned is a poor description of this, for it is far more complicated and predicated on survival, not destruction. The destruction is required because the Lifesprings deposited our races dependent on killing others not only in self-defense, but to acquire the resources to survive. This is why many races have mistakenly embraced this ‘nature’ and murder others in order to consume their corpses even when they have other options. Please tell me the PanNari do not.”

“We do not.”

“Well there’s that,” Jason said, relieved to not have another carnivore civilization to deal with. “But along with these genetic instructions that allow us to survive, there is an inherent distaste for it. When one has other options this becomes more apparent. Those barely surviving are so consumed with maintaining basic needs they don’t have the luxury of choice, other than to starve, freeze, or die by other means of inaction. And we have genetic instructions to not let that happen.”

“Some still do.”

Jason nodded. “Because they override that instruction for various reasons. The instructions are not lines of code that command our bodies to act, mostly, but are directions that the pilot within the body is encouraged to act on. Pain and pleasure are the primary control mechanisms, and both of these can be resisted by the pilot. Do you still have either one?”

“I do not.”

“Do you have any senses beyond the cybernetic components?”

“Originally we did not think so, but after many years of isolation and simulation we have discovered small deviations that cannot be accounted for. We assume they are an attribute of our Lifeforce.”

“We refer to it as our ‘Core.’ And we have explored our Core attributes considerably. This is where our basic sense of right and wrong come from. So we have Core attributes directing us to do the opposite of many of our genetic instructions. Speculate on the purpose of this.”

“It is illogical unless for a test of the individual to detect and willingly diverge from the genetic instructions.”

“In which life becomes a test of will, but many do not live long enough to face this test. Their deaths are meaningless and their lives wasted. What purpose could there be for them?”

“Under those metrics there is none unless life cycles and there is a cumulative effect.”

“We have detected no such correlation. If we have lived past lives, we retain nothing from them that is detectable. And if such a hierarchy dictates which race or location an individual is born into, time on target is no different. The more advanced races can be killed in infancy as well, while some of the more primitive ones can still live a long time if the individual is lucky enough.”

“Luck. Is that a metaphor or an actual property of life?”

“It is an acknowledgement that we are not in full control of our lives. Our outcomes are not fully dictated by our actions. Star Force has the ability to wipe out entire planets if we wished, and the people on them could not stop us if we wished to do so. Their deaths would not be a failure in their actions, but rather a function of our power. Likewise we can shield others from such hopeless situations, and in that we make our own luck to bestow on others.”

“You endeavor to give others a longer timespan to explore the conflict between Core and genetic instructions?”

“That is one of many things we do, but what you need to know is that while the universe implies that death and carnage are the structural underpinnings of the natural order, the universe also hints at something more. Plants contain far more beneficial molecules specifically calibrated to our bodies’ needs than consuming the corpse of another. Almost as if there are hidden secrets in life left for us to find, but many do not have an opportunity to do so because of the scenarios in which they are born into.”

“You suggest that the universe conflicts with itself, but you have not identified an ultimate purpose to the conflict.”

“We don’t know how much of the universe works, so we focus on ourselves, and it comes down to this basic choice. Do we choose to continue living by embracing the darkside…or do we risk death to defy the darkside and embrace the light. For the darkside seems to be the default position of the universe.”

“What is the purpose of this defiance?”

“If you cannot defeat an enemy, you can at least hurt them. If you cannot hurt them, you can get one good punch in their face. If you can’t punch them, you can insult them. If you can’t insult them, you can think mean thoughts their way. Defiance is when accepting the status quo is untenable, and in this case it is untenable because it feels wrong. Logic can explain much of this, but not all of it. And it’s possible that by abandoning your organic bodies you have partially numbed yourself to anything other than logic.”

“That is a possibility that we considered long ago, and found it to be correct in an unmeasurable fashion. Such ambiguity is hard for us to fathom, and no amount of simulating has satisfied our needs.”

“What you require is experience rather than simulation,” Jason said, pointing out the obvious. “Simulations require data for calibration, and when you have gone as far as you can with current data, you need to collect more. And if you cannot store data on Core-related sensations…”

“The only way we can study them is as they occur,” Nevantha finished for him. “This is a key insight that we have lacked.”

“If you do not explore your Core attributes you will not be able to understand the Lightside. For if analytically explored, it is inferior in short term logistical considerations. Long term superiority is partly Core-driven, and thus hard to logically define. This is why the universe appears to be entirely darkside structured, but there is a hidden undercurrent of Lightside for those who have the ability…or luck…to discover it. The primary principle of our civilization is to make that Lightside element easily accessible to everyone.”

“Do you fight the Hadarak because they seek to deny this knowledge?”

Jason sighed. “If you have to ask that question then you are truly clueless. We fight the Hadarak and all forms of the darkside in order to give the universe the middle finger for putting us and everyone else in this no win torture fest. And the more we align with the Lightside, customize our civilization, our bodies, our minds to the way we want them and deactivate the genetic instructions that conflict with that…our vision clears up considerably and we begin to realize the universe is not a single unified system. There’s something much bigger going on. And all is not as it’s supposed to be. The universe is wrong somehow, and our inner Core knows it.”

“Malfunctioning?”

“No. It’s been designed darkside. So there is not a system inherent that we can repair. Whenever we fix something, it doesn’t stay fixed. And when the next generation is born, they’re born with the darkside in their genetic instructions. But when you stop relying on reproduction to sustain your civilization, the focus becomes customizing the individual. When you do so your genetic instructions are reduced to software programming that you can either replace or deactivate, creating a pocket of Lightside in a universe that pretends it doesn’t exist. We are the gardeners in this galaxy pulling out weeds that we know will return, in order to keep a clear seed bed for Lightside applications to flourish.”

“And endless task.”

“So is sustenance. But our learning is not a cycle, it is linear. We create pockets of Lightside civilization to shelter others in, both those we rescue from the current galaxy and those that are going to arrive from the Essence Realm as infants. When we do that it gives us a sanctuary to operate out of as we pursue the mysteries of the universe. That is our ultimate purpose. Figuring out what the hell is going on.”

“That requires continuity. If you would choose death over living darkside, how can you accomplish this as a civilization?”

Jason’s face scrunched up. “Good point. Individually we do not define our purpose on a civilization level. We view each of our lives as if it were a game, and we’re not judged on how far we get in the game before we die…though that matters loads…but in how we play the game. Better to lose fair than progress by cheating.”

“Better to die according to the Code of Life than to live on by violating it?”

“Yes.”

“Then that is a purpose of status.”

“Escalating status, not stagnant. If we’re not leveling up, we’re not playing the game. We don’t try to remain at the same level forever, we seek to conquer it and move to the next challenge. Our status is constant movement, constant action. Never stagnation. Your definition of ‘status’ might need to be amended.”

“Your purpose is a quest, and your status is one who quests without cheating?”

Jason considered that for a moment. “That works.”

“If that is true, then our waiting for Eldorat’s command to take action has been a serious mistake. The stagnation has blinded us as much as our cybernetic state. We require a different path, and one with an adequate guide would be preferable.”

“I require fleets to fight the Hadarak.”

“That is what Elloquim are designed for. What we lack is the power of Essence. Ultimate victory against the Hadarak cannot be achieved without it, and Eldorat is not here to provide it. Do you have sufficient strength to combat their strongest units?”

“We do. What we lack are the numbers to deal with their minions. They pass us by because we cannot be in every system at the same time, and they are able to assault many systems without resistance.”

“Confronting that threat is the mission the PanNari have been exclusively preparing for in our isolation.”

Jason smiled. “I was hoping you’d say something like that.”

10

June 4, 128804

Belaaro Black Hole (Mixchan Kingdom)

PanNari Node 329

Jason waited for the probe he sent in to come back out. Nevantha had already passed through the cloaked Encapsulation field and he’d given the trailblazer the necessary access codes, but Jason was testing it out on the probe first. It had to operate on autopilot, for no signals would pass through the Encapsulation either way, and he was beginning to wonder if something had gone wrong when the tiny Star Force blip appeared on his screens again as it made its way back to his Borg vessel and the waiting hangar bay.

It was intact, and the visuals from inside confirmed what Nevantha had told him, but he wanted a better look. With a thought he ordered his crew to move one tip of his giant cube through the barrier, and as soon as it penetrated Jason had a live feed.

He stopped the ship there, for the space inside wasn’t ample for a ship of his size, but he could see the other Elloquim were already beginning to move their tentacles a bit. They had to get crews onboard before they left, and if these really were their bodies then he guessed the movement was more impatience than anything. Eldorat had had them basically imprisoned here for longer than the V’kit’no’sat empire had existed, and they weren’t the only ones.

Jason had already discovered other spots around black holes off the dark and shadow networks, the former being the grid of small gravitational bodies that allowed pulse drive travel. He was still trying to get his own ships as fast as the Caretakers, but Star Force technology hadn’t caught up yet. That meant chasing down Caretaker ships was impossible except when they docked at facilities, but aside from the few that he’d captured and repurposed, Jason now had a fleet of slower pulse drive vessels out exploring the network while others continued to map the more obvious shadow network.

That one was directly linked to the Temples and used a combination of Essence travel and mag jump constructs, meaning regular Star Force tech operated fine on it, but the dark network was another layer of security the Founders had installed, and Jason knew why…at least in part.

They’d hidden other races here, but they were also actively moving people in. The ‘popsicles’ that Paul and Sara had discovered were still flowing in across both networks, then disappeared beyond Jason’s view into hidden areas. Now he had the corner of the Sanguine Blade sticking inside one and getting a lot of sensor data off it. He’d never sent a person in where a probe hadn’t returned from, but now that he had the access codes to the barriers and what schematics the PanNari had on the devices that created them, he was going to go introduce himself to the other races out there that Eldorat had hidden away…plus have a look at whatever else was being stored right under this galaxy’s collective nose.

That was assuming the codes worked on other ones. It was possible they had different zones, which was why he was going to get enough information here to break into the other ones if needed.

His discussions with Nevantha had gone on hours before the two started to show off their mental processing powers and moved to nonverbal communication. The Elloquim was faster than him, which was a little annoying, but it allowed them to cover a lot of subjects that regular conversation would not. If they’d stuck to vocalization the conversation would have lasted 2.9 years, and he felt he had a good measure of the machine/man and some of the peculiarities that state had created.

They were very logical, but still people. They didn’t have the genetic instructions from their base biology anymore, for while they had been initially copied when their cells were swapped out one by one with the cybernetic components, they had since then deleted a lot of that organic programming when they’d deemed it disadvantageous or unnecessary for their new bodies.

That had caused them to lose their way a bit, but the Elloquim were quite adaptive. They’d already discovered the inefficiencies of the darkside and were seeking a better way…which Jason was happy to provide. They’d negotiated an agreement where the PanNari would basically be taken on as Star Force apprentices, but with the intention of remaining independent rather than becoming a faction within the empire.

Essentially they’d swapped Eldorat and his empire for Jason and his, for Star Force was already engaging the Hadarak and had plenty of battle records to indicate their success…but most importantly they had Essence powers capable of fighting the elite Hadarak units, and even with their mainline troops now coming out in full force to the warfront the fighting was still a mixed affair.

The Lurkers were the biggest problem, for they didn’t wade into the larger fights and slug it out. They waited for ambushes and mismatches, and were damn good at it despite their size. The mainline troops all had Yeg’gor, and their support ships had a hybridized weaker version that made them far more robust than minions. The Hadarak’s firepower wasn’t too impressive. Star Force had more even without Essence weapons, but what the Hadarak had was battle longevity and the Avenger-class attack ships couldn’t be everywhere taking out every target. That meant a lot of grinding had to be done, and with the Merlins having an addition Essence attack thrown in made them damn hard to beat in groups.

But it was when they linked up with Wardens that their power skyrocketed, for they could suck Essence out of them to refill or even fire directly from them when attached. Star Force was better than the Hadarak fleet, but they couldn’t kill them fast enough to protect the planets in their path.

And whenever an Avenger was out operating solo, the Lurkers tried to pick them off. They would move in packs of 3 or 4 and deliberately go after the ships when they were backing up a regular attack fleet…then the Lurkers would leave and let the rest of the Hadarak fight it out on their own. The Lurkers were anti-Essence assassins, and were by far the most dangerous unit the Hadarak had.

Which meant the hunters had to be hunted. Jason would be there doing that now if he didn’t have other duties to attend to…perhaps far more important duties…but Paul, Liam, and Roger were the ones that the trailblazers had tasked with going directly after the Lurkers. The ‘regular’ battles were intense enough, but the slightly weaker naval skills of the others and the naval specialists were sufficient for that bulk work. The Lurkers were sneaky and adaptive, and Star Force needed their most adaptive naval legends there to counter them, with that trio spread out across the galaxy hunting in each of their assigned regions.

Paul had gotten Keychain after a long hunt, avenging the Lurker that had killed Riona-111’s fleet, and his Clan Saber task force had racked up another 18 Lurker kills to date. Roger had 14 and Liam had 20, which was insane given how wide spread they were. Hunting down assassins was damn near impossible because they didn’t want to show themselves until the moment of ambush, making setting up a detection and comm grid essential in the war zone.

It had to be a mobile one, else the Hadarak would instantly take it down when they found it, and the trailblazers had their mobile networks out and moving through clumps of star systems like fishermen trolling nets. When they got a hit they were able to converge more nets and narrow down the location of the Lurker or Lurkers, but they had to get to them outside a star, for they could just dive down inside one and hide for as long as they wanted.

It was impossible work that Jason wanted to join in on, but his mission out here held the greatest danger of all…and that was the potential threat of the Founders.

The PanNari weren’t going to be involved in that, for they were going to colonize a number of uninhabited planets…repay the cargo they’d stolen…and gear up to support the Elloquim as they began to hit the weakest Hadarak units. Several of them would be going with Nevantha immediately to begin doing just that, directed by Star Force to the regions where the mainline and Lurkers were not known to be. Areas where Star Force couldn’t send a single ship, because they didn’t have enough, and the Hadarak minions were taking systems without so much as a Warden helping them do it.

The Elloquim claimed to be able to kill Wardens, but that remained to be determined…not to mention how much damage they would take doing it. Grand Admiral Thot had been informed they were coming and he was going to coordinate with them while Jason stayed here and continued to explore what the Founders had been hiding.

What he’d already found as a lot of infrastructure spread out like grains of sand in between star systems where no one else jumping the grav lanes would ever find it. And amongst that infrastructure was a very elaborate natural resource collection system that was never too obvious when it reached out into the uninhabited planets in the galaxy, sucked up what it needed, then disappeared into the shadows again.

Their space whale hunting division was not unique, for they were also capturing and harvesting other large life forms, some of which inhabited stars, nebula, and even some planets. Jason was currently engaged in an ongoing war to put an end to those operations, but they kept regenerating and requiring him to lock down the dark and shadow networks piece by piece.

That war with the Caretakers had gotten expensive in terms of resources, and they weren’t letting down at all, but Jason was winning up to a certain points…and when he crossed those points in the network the resistance became overwhelming, in addition to guided.

He had never seen one of them, but he believed the Founders were actively leading the Caretaker forces in these battles as they fought to keep him away from the very edge of the galaxy. Not just on the outer swirl, but various places on top and bottom of the disc that opened up to the intergalactic void. Jason had suspected there was something big they were hiding out here, and while he couldn’t pass by the transit points to get there he could visually search the starlight.

After a lot of methodically surveying from as close as his forces could get, he’d been able to find two separate locations with constructs that dwarfed everything else the Founders had built save for the Temples. At first he had thought they were narrow and long space stations, but after sending some kamikaze drones jumping past them to get images…then breaking apart and launching small pieces backward to get the necessary kinetic motion to redirect from leaving the galaxy…he’d eventually got a long range, but decent view of what was there.

It wasn’t long and narrow. He had been looking at the side of a giant coin set edge on to the galaxy to hide its width. Both of the ones he’d found were identical in size, and wider than Mercury’s orbit around Sol. Still smaller than the diameter of all the Temples, but mind bogglingly large and covered with land and water, presumably on both sides, but the newer batch of kamikaze drones hadn’t gotten there by other angles and reported back yet for him to know.

What he did know what that there was a hidden microstar above the center of the coin and shielded so that its light would only be directed down onto the land and nowhere else. It wouldn’t give away the location of the coin as a normal star would, for it was cloaked save for the flashlight side.

But around the coin were other smaller facilities, including what looked like an acceleration line. Not a disc, but a railed line similar to the barrel of a giant gun. On the other half of the formation of stations was a disc, and the probe could tell that both were putting out immense magnetic fields.

Jason guessed this was the edge of an intergalactic transit system that would bypass the gravitational tethers in the center of the galaxy that the Hadarak were guarding, and as such the Founders didn’t want Jason’s or anyone else’s forces getting to them. There were probably at least some Founders living on the Coin, but Jason couldn’t get to them and they weren’t interested in talking. He’d tried to send messages through the Caretakers, but nothing had responded back yet…other than an 18% increase in Caretaker units flowing out into the rest of the networks.

This limited contact with the Caretakers indicated that they were not going to be friends, and if Jason couldn’t get to those Coins and shut down the links, an army of Essence wielders far superior to Star Force could come through at any time and rip out the heart of their empire in a way that would make what the Vargemma did to Earth and other worlds look tame in comparison.

Finding out what was hidden behind the other duck blinds would be a major step forward in his private war out here, but Jason knew he was a long, long way from being able to directly fight the Founders.

He just hoped their buildup in this galaxy was expendable and they were too busy fighting the Hadarak elsewhere to care about Star Force’s interference with their toys here.

Kyra waited onboard Nevantha as the Elloquim docked with the node and began transferring out supplies that he’d collected while importing a few things he still needed. The other Elloquim here and around the black hole were being informed of what had happened and some of them were beginning to stir, but none were ready to leave just yet.

As for her, no orders had come through yet. She kept waiting for Nevantha to tell her where to go or to be recalled by the Architects, or Chiggo, for discipline, and assignment, or something…but nothing happened, leaving her waiting and watching inside of Nevantha until she finally decided to ask him about it.

“Your future path is your choice, Kyra. What do you wish to do?”

“Whatever I am needed for,” she answered.

“You could be useful in a number of roles. What do you want to do?”

Kyra thought about that for a moment rather than repeating her earlier statement.

“I wish to keep this body. I do not wish to become a Craniem.”

“Already stated. What do you wish to do with your body?”

“Something useful,” she said pointlessly before adding, “that is out in the galaxy. I do not want to remain in the node.”

“Why?”

“I do not wish to learn about the galaxy. I wish to experience it and share what I learn with others.”

“You wish access to unlimited data rather than being confined to the summaries of others?”

“I wish to live rather than simulate,” she said, again feeling a little treasonous at defying the very state of her race.

“You have found a flaw in the Dominion?”

“No. It is…”

“I have,” Nevantha declared. “It will not be implemented in its current fashion on the worlds we are about to colonize. We believe the PanNari have made serious miscalculations in the past, and we intend to correct them when we have the requisite knowledge.”

“The QuipNari can exist without the Dominion. How can the PanNari?”

“In their present state they cannot. But the Elloquim can. We are designed for it, as are you. We must lead our people out of the stagnation we have unwittingly submitted ourselves to, but before we can effectively do so we must look to ourselves and our own inefficiencies. But to you, Kyra. Your efforts have enabled all this to come to pass. Your reward is choosing any path you wish. Even to become an Elloquim if that is what you desire.”

Kyra blinked. That offer was insanely desirable, but as she processed what that would mean it soured to the point she realized that while everyone else dreamed of being an Elloquim, what she really wanted to be was out amongst the galaxy. Not in space, but with the other people out there, and most people were not as large as Hadarak.

“I do not want to give up this body. Not even to become an Elloquim. I cannot logically explain why.”

“Very good,” Nevantha said, pleased. “Will you return to the QuipNari?”

“It is the task I am most suited for.”

“Is it the one you desire?”

“I do not understand how I could desire something other than my task.”

“Do you sense another task, unnamed, that would suit you better?”

Kyra considered that. “I do not know. I feel a sense to keep moving, and a fear of placement. That is why I do not wish to become a Craniem. I fear if I stop moving I will lose what little sense of self I have recently gained.”

“Then travel with me to the Hadarak front.”

“What use can I be there?”

“Put aside use. Do you wish to go?”

“I do.”

“Is it preferable to QuipNari service?”

“I do not know since it is an unknown variable, but I wish to go anyway.”

“I will have unique use for you onboard from time to time. Will you be satisfied with roaming my interior in the interim?”

“I believe so. The unscripted nature of exploration is something I find intriguing, and there is much of your interior that I have not mapped.”

“You will never map it all, for it is constantly changing.”

“Then I will never be without a pending task.”

“We will depart in 3 hours, 56 minutes, and 21 seconds. If you wish to converse with Chiggo or anyone else directly, you have a limited window to do so.”

“May I use a direct link? I’d prefer not to physically return.”

“Fear?”

“Perhaps. That direction is also backward. I do not wish to go backward.”

“Exterior comm access granted,” Nevantha said, with his hologram disappearing.

Kyra continued to walk on exploring more of Nevantha’s interior on her bare feet and nude body until she came to another data port and connected through it to the node, finding Chiggo within the Dominion where she appeared in a ghostlike form as her attention was split between there and here.

She had some lingering questions for her mentor, as well as a desire to say goodbye, for this was not a mission that she would be returning from. It was open ended, and into a combat zone, with Kyra feeling a sense that one way or another she would not be returning here again…and by here she didn’t mean the node. But the heart of PanNari civilization. She belonged on the frontier. That much she was certain of.

The rest she would have to figure out on the way. And it seemed Nevantha was encouraging her to do so for more than just gratitude’s sake.

www.aerkijyr.com

Death Mark

1

June 2, 128812

Kolorik System (Midzan Region)

Jono Trade Corridor

The battle had been longer than most. The J’gar had ambushed the Brat’mar convoy before all of their vessels had emerged into the system, with the first few hit taken down quickly. The others that followed had maneuvering options, but rather than scatter they held together and fought refusing to leave the rest of the convoy to be easy pickings as they entered the system.

4 warships in all, plus another 28 cargo vessels made up the convoy, and that was about as small of a group as anyone would try to move through the region nowadays. The Jono corridor was supposed to be relatively safe due to the clusters of defense ships in each system that had been donated by the surrounding systems to allow for some trade to get through. Right now most systems were having to fend for themselves as the J’gar navy was everywhere in the empire poaching small warships and whatever cargo ships dared to move outside a protected convoy. And since the Urrtren went down for keeps 6 years ago, nobody had any idea where they were or weren’t, effectively isolating systems that weren’t brave enough to travel across the stars.

But some were, and this sector had done a better job than most at sticking together. There were 38 inhabited V’kit’no’sat systems here, and 6 of them had links to larger worlds outside the sector. All systems here had donated a few of their precious warships to put small guard fleets in the empty systems that had to be traveled through to get from oasis to oasis, but the 7 ships that had been stationed in the Kolorik System were already disabled or destroyed, with the remains having been towed further out into the system where a pair of J’gar cargo ships were busy boarding and salvaging whatever they could.

The ships in the Brat’mar convoy were also being taken mostly undamaged. Nobody wanted to waste good ships that could be repaired and repurposed nowadays with so few new ships coming out of the remaining shipyards spread across the galaxy. The loss of Itaru alone had been felt, but many more large vessel exporters had seen their slips destroyed rather than surrender them…and the Zak’de’ron had not been so careful to preserve them in the beginning, but now everyone was scraping for whatever resources they could find, with nothing being wasted.

The Brat’mar had done well and disabled 3 of the attacking 12 J’gar warships, none of which was larger than a Domjo. Most were Ti’mat and Wur’ki, both of which were less than 5 miles long. The Brat’mar had sent one Domjo and 3 Ti’mat to assist the cargo ships, which had some armament of their own, but the J’gar had calculated accurately and now the entire convoy was in their hands.

Rajamal didn’t care about that. He and his cloaked Zen’zat Kaeper couldn’t save them, nor was he here to. Ever since the edict decreeing that all Zen’zat were to be killed, many V’kit’no’sat races had done nothing to protect the Ter’nat worlds that produced their Zen’zat. Others had, and Rajamal had been working with them intermittently, but in large part the lightly defended Ter’nat worlds were being targeted by the J’gar and obliterated from orbit where capable, for none had standard planetary defenses.

Ter’nat were a breeding population, nothing more. They had their own defense fleets, all with inferior technology, so that they could get experience and provide protection against the lesser threats in the galaxy so the V’kit’no’sat wouldn’t have to babysit them as much, but they were never intended to possess anything that could harm the V’kit’no’sat. When this war took the turn for the worst, the guardian V’kit’no’sat warships looking over the Ter’nat worlds were dispatched elsewhere, leaving only the Ter’nat ships remaining and the few V’kit’no’sat caretakers onboard them to defend the weak colonies when the J’gar ships came hunting them.

Some systems held, surprisingly, but most did not. The J’gar didn’t seem to want to spend much resources taking the worthless worlds, and were more interested in exterminating the Ter’nat when they had the opportunity to do so with impunity, but some more heavily armed excursions were popping up across the galaxy targeting the larger Ter’nat colonies, and there was nothing Rajamal and the other Zen’zat could do to stop it.

They’d known that early on, so rather than sitting and waiting in various systems to fight when the attacks came, they’d decided to go on the offensive. They were now hunting the hunters, without the permission of any of the V’kit’no’sat races. The empire was leaderless, the Urrtren was down, and other than local events no one knew what was happening to anyone else. The Zen’zat had been refitting their ships with cloaking devices and other banned technology to try and keep some semblance of communication going, and they were doing so with the help of several wisely governed V’kit’no’sat planets, most of which were Era’tran, but even they were now leaderless with the fall of Jamtren. Word of the attack there had come through near the collapse of the Urrtren, with Holloi being invaded and most of the inhabitants dead before everything had gone down.

Other races were assisting, but not because their leadership ordered it. The V’kit’no’sat races had been scattered across the galaxy by design, and that now meant none could effectively communicate with their own planets. So they either operated system by system, or they cooperated with their nearest neighbors. To say the empire had become fractured was an understatement, and in the fog of war created by the downing and then destruction of the Urrtren by the J’gar fleets, there was disaster and opportunity everywhere…including in the ambushing of this convoy.

“Now,” Rajamal said calmly from the bridge of the scout ship that had some 372 Zen’zat waiting in the rear compartments in addition to the ship’s crew of 23, which were accelerating the vessel away from the battle towards the two limping J’gar warships that had been heavily damaged in the fighting.

They had already withdrawn from the combat and were still moving away to avoid any last shots doing damage to their interior now that their shields were down and chunks of their hulls were missing…but they were still mobile and combat capable, and the J’gar had no wish to lose those vessels that could still be repaired.

One was a Ti’mat, the other a Domjo…and the Domjo was the more heavily damaged ship. The Brat’mar had focused on it almost exclusively, trying to destroy it to deny the J’gar the heavier ship for future use. In the past a Domjo was seen as a medium class vessel. Now it was the dominant ship in most engagements, with the larger versions of V’kit’no’sat warships being almost extinct, now held to system defense or destroyed in the massive battles of past years. Nowadays this was the size of combat that dominated, and the assault here was about as bold as anyone got. The J’gar must have really wanted to shut down this trade corridor, for normally they wouldn’t have allowed this much of a fair fight to occur.

The smaller Kaeper headed for the Ti’mat, which had two solid holes in its hull but was otherwise intact. Many of the weapons batteries on one side had been plucked away to weaken the ship before they started to pound into the bulk of the hull, but it appeared to still be 30%-60% armed based on battle analysis. Under cloak an active scan was impossible, but they’d monitored the battle as they paced the convoy, with Rajamal hoping they’d catch an ambush as it happened.

This wasn’t his first such operation. He’d been on 13 different ship capturing missions similar to this, and so far he was 12/13 with the only failure being due to pursuit after the fact. The already damaged Domjo they had snatched from the Oso’lon had been so badly crippled that a few more well placed shots had taken out the engines and Rajamal had to abandon it. He’d cut that one too close and lost some 18 Zen’zat on the mission. He expected to lose more on this one, but that’s why he was going personally. This wasn’t a time to send your weakest Zen’zat and have them die to threats the veterans could handle, and more than a third of the Zen’zat onboard the Kaeper now were what he classified as veterans, all having served at least as far back as the Star Force war…the one they’d never finished.

Mak’to’ran had said pursuing their destruction was a mistake and sanctioned their existence. Perhaps he was right, for they were stronger than ever and now doing the work of the V’kit’no’sat fighting the Hadarak while the V’kit’no’sat empire was a shambles. He’d heard rumors of worlds in the Olobiv Region being annexed by them on request, but so far Star Force hadn’t taken sides in this war against the Zak’de’ron, Oso’lon, and J’gar traitors. Part of Rajamal resented them for that, but he was also glad they had not chosen to take the opportunity to oppose his empire. If they had, the combined might of the traitors and Star Force would have meant the V’kit’no’sat’s utter destruction as opposed to this never-ending grind.

Rajamal didn’t even know who was winning at this point, only that Ter’nat and Zen’zat had a death mark on them imposed by the Zak’de’ron, and he intended to strike back in whatever way he could.

“The Ti’mat,” he told the bridge crew before leaving for the rear areas where the rest of the strike force was geared up and waiting. Rajamal joined the other 7-9 foot tall warriors who were ironically carrying stronger armor than they’d ever had access to before in the V’kit’no’sat. Since essentially going rogue, Rajamal had used his network of contacts to ensure upgraded armor was being produced and passed out to as many Zen’zat as there were to receive it. Armor the type of which he had been occasionally given for missions against specific V’kit’no’sat.

That was armor designed to deny psionics their sting. Zen’zat had been given an immunity to Ikrid, but they were not allowed greater defenses except on special occasions, and the templates for those armors Rajamal did not have. What he did have was many sets of captured Star Force armor from the past war, and he’d wisely had them analyzed and copied long ago in addition to storing some away in dead drops.

He hadn’t been ordered to, but after living through a brief V’kit’no’sat civil war prior to that he knew the Zen’zat had to have other options that Itaru did not want them to have. And he hadn’t been the only Zen’zat to think that way. Most of the others had not survived this most recent war, but he had. Not because he was superior, but because he was never in the major battles. He was an elite Zen’zat, and putting him onboard a starship was a waste of his skills, as was system defense. He worked best on the attack in small scale situations, some of which had been in the aftermath of the big battles, and he knew his role well. Others had succumbed to the desire to make a last stand, and so they had. He knew he had to survive to be useful, and dying fighting was nothing more than a way of quitting.

And Rajamal didn’t quit. Ever.

The cloaked Kaeper headed towards the two J’gar ships, both of which were egg-shaped, though now there were cracks in their smooth hulls and the Domjo was trailing a stream of smoky material that the crew had not yet managed to extinguish. Rajamal wished they would split up and move to different locations in the system to lick their wounds, but they were not. That was going to complicate this mission, but he still deemed it feasible, and he had no intention of repeating past mistakes.

His helmet was off at the moment, retracted down into his firm armor. Zen’zat had never worn such before, but Star Force did and they could put a lot more tech into it without having to worry about it being able to break down into nanoparticles and reform into forearm gauntlets. It was clunky to wear around when waiting, but his team was going to need all the firepower and tricks they could get when boarding an aquatic vessel.

He wished this was an Oso’lon ship, but it wasn’t. Most of the pirate activity was the J’gar’s doing, and not the loyal few who still opposed the Zak’de’ron. Last he had heard most of them had been targeted for destruction or annexation. It seemed the traitors didn’t want any of their race operating against them, and Rajamal admitted that not having clearly defined races on opposing sides was confusing, but he’d never fault V’kit’no’sat for following their duty…even if most of their kin had become heretics.

Then again he was called a heretic for defying the will of the original triumvirate. They were back, but so much had happened since the old days that that meant little now. Especially since they were killing V’kit’no’sat so effectively. Recent blood lost was far more important for vengeance than old scores, and right now there were few star systems not affected by the war, either by direct damage or having lost troops assisting in other fights. And everyone had been hit hard when Mak’to’ran was killed. That had sucked the life out of the empire, and without the immediate war to follow he wasn’t sure what would have become of them without his leadership. But when you lack leadership, vengeance is an easy and available path to take. The price for that vengeance, however, is not always so easy to pay.

Rajamal walked to the very back of the ship, which wasn’t far. This one wasn’t designed for Zen’zat specifically. It was a conversion of a Rit’ko’sor vessel, and thus S-shaped. It stretched approximately 2 miles long, but was narrow without much width. It was a true starship, not a gunship or insystem craft, but it was designed for scouting and not naval combat or troop transport. Fortunately Zen’zat were tiny and the interior was spacious enough to be reconfigured for their needs.

Four rows of Zen’zat were standing in the main hallway outside the rear hangar bay, and they parted in the middle enough for him to walk through. All had the pitch black armor that was now the unofficial Zen’zat color. They were fighting for their own as much as for the other races now, and there were few V’kit’no’sat that faulted them for doing so. They all wanted their help, and whatever other help they could get. No one had a strong hand here, and the few that came close were probably high on the Zak’de’ron’s future hit list. They’d taken out the strongest first to intimidate others into capitulating, but to their credit very few races had. Most were demanding the Zak’de’ron come and take their worlds, for they were in no hurry to surrender them. Not this time.

What had occurred since the blackout he didn’t know much of, but the time of fearing the Zak’de’ron was over. Too much was known now, and as powerful as they were they were often using inferior troops to do their bidding. Partially due to the fact that most Zak’de’ron were now dead, and with the burnt worlds stretched across the galaxy with their corpses on them, nobody revered them anymore. They were a powerful enemy to be sure, but they were not omnipotent. Not even close, and now everybody knew it.

“Standby,” the bridge crew said into his helmet rim, which Rajamal active with a thought. It slid up and partially formed of nanites over his head, keeping it somewhat more rigid than full nanite armor but still dexterous enough to come on and off when needed. “Adhesion gained, no response from either ship. Aperture clear.”

“Begin,” Rajamal said to everyone as he walked forward with the group as the column continued out into the hangar bay where other Zen’zat were already stationed with add-ons to their armor. They were not meant for fighting, but rather for boarding, and the first few disappeared underneath their own cloaks as they ran up to and jumped out of the hangar bay.

Rajamal couldn’t see them, but he didn’t need to. Everything was well scripted at this point, and the next few followed a moment later with the expected spacing as they flew through vacuum a few dozen meters to the damaged section of the Ti’mat that the Kaeper was now latched on to. If not for the damage the cloak probably would have been detected this close, but the pilots knew how to match speeds and vectors in the most opportune of areas, and to their credit the J’gar crew didn’t have a clue a ship half as long as theirs was had soft docked to its hull.

Rajamal’s armor lit up with options, and he engaged all of his psionic countermeasures, one of which would hide their mental presence so the J’gar couldn’t track them once they left the Kaeper, which was itself shielded against such intrusion. It wouldn’t matter what the sensors said if the crew could feel the attacking Zen’zat outside, and right now they were well hidden, but they couldn’t just come up and knock on the exterior doors.

Rather than pick an intact section of hull and try and drill through an airlock or other port, they were going in through the damaged sections, which had been sealed off in a variety of means, most of which were pressure doors further in. The first few Zen’zat sought out the best entry options, and those were definitely not those into the water levels. Facing J’gar in their own environment was horrifying, and while Zen’zat were not helpless in water the J’gar were so fearsome even without armor that that would be a quick and easy way to get his entire team killed.

But J’gar ships had air corridors for their Zen’zat crews to operate in…or rather their former crews. Their Zen’zat had probably all been murdered before they even knew of their masters’ displeasure with them. Now the J’gar ships were manned by Bo’ja servants supplied by the Zak’de’ron, which also made it virtually impossible for the J’gar or the Oso’lon to betray their new alliance. Why they would have agreed to that Rajamal didn’t know, nor did he care. The Bo’ja were inferior and more hated than even the Zak’de’ron by the Zen’zat. The triumvirate had betrayed them, and through all the wars and internal strike it was the Zen’zat who had always remained loyal. Which made the betrayal that much more humiliating.

But they were the same race as Star Force, and if their genetics could produce a rival to the V’kit’no’sat then the Zak’de’ron wanted them gone before it could happen again. Rajamal couldn’t blame Star Force for that. The Zen’zat were what the V’kit’no’sat had made them to be, and if they left some behind on a Rim world he didn’t completely fault them for reproducing there. It was a violation of their duty, but leaving Zen’zat behind was a violation of their masters’ duty and the situation would never have existed had they not been so sloppy.

But it had happened, and there was no going back. The Zen’zat were not docile enough for Itaru to trust, so now they had to be destroyed, and were being annihilated with great efficiency across the galaxy.

Time for another small dose of payback.

Rajamal walked into the hangar to the front of the line of assault troops while the boarding teams did their work establishing a technological beachhead in multiple places along the hull breach. When one came back and transmitted within the safety of the hangar Rajamal had a basic map of what was available to them. Now it was his time to make this work.

He sent out orders to various teams, reconfigured others, then engaged his cloak and ran across a small section of hangar to the edge of the atmospheric field, diving out it towards the black wall that was the Kaeper’s cloaking device. When he passed through it the two fields didn’t like each other, but they didn’t betray the collision with more than a little fizz that was too close to the J’gar hull for anyone to notice.

Rajamal suddenly had view of the damaged section ahead along with faint tracking signals from the boarding spots. He drifted into the exposed rubble and grabbed hold of a melted girder, then redirected himself to where he wanted to go, knowing the others were following behind him invisible and silent.

He eventually got to a position where a new airlock had been installed with a frame and a lot of goo surrounding it. His people were already inside guarding the aperture, but one was still outside and gave him a hand that glowed ever so faintly.

Rajamal grabbed it, then was thrown through the airlock by the other Zen’zat’s strength into the gravity field of the ship. He caught his feet and remained standing as he suddenly picked up the faint tracking signals from the Zen’zat already onboard, giving him an outline on his helmet showing where they were. The signal would not show up on J’gar internal scans unless they knew what to look for and had a receiver within 18 meters. It was a weakness, but unless you were going in solo you needed to not be tripping over your own team.

Rajamal pressed through the defenders, then waited just beyond them until several more Zen’zat piled up behind him. When enough had gotten here he moved out of the stub hallway that had led to a weapons blister that was now obliterated, or rather the Zen’zat access tube. The J’gar waterway access was below and still sealed off, for they weren’t going down there. Not yet anyway.

Rajamal jogged out to the cross tunnel, his head only a foot away from hitting the ceiling. The J’gar always built their Zen’zat tubes cramped, and this ship was no exception, but there was no way for them to get in here physically, and with the psionic blockers in play they couldn’t telekinetically attack them either. At least not directly. The only ones who could were the Bo’ja…and there was a pair of them working on repairing something down the hallway to the right.

2

Rajamal ran past the two Bo’ja, ignoring them as they were soon to suffer pointblank weapon discharges to the back of their exposed necks from the other Zen’zat. He kept moving forward, knowing that time was essential here, and that there were key points within the ship they had to access and take control of before the J’gar realized what was going on.

When the corridor branched so did his team, spreading out into groups with different assignments and Rajamal heading to the rearmost environmental control node along with four others, two of which were carrying heavy loads on their armor.

No one was present in the node, nor should they be unless something was malfunctioning. The J’gar could remotely access it from inside the water to make any adjustments they wanted, and that wireless interlink was the first thing Rajamal cut after taking down the surveillance cameras built into the bulkheads.

He and the others appeared as hazy ripples due to the jamming field that was interfering with the cameras, and as Rajamal began making multiple alterations to the equipment he was pulling out of the wall panels the others either fed him new components or were busy painting over the bulkheads with a cloying insulation that would block both audio and visual once the jamming went down.

The jamming should have been noticed by now, but there was no telling how much disruption the crew was dealing with because of the damage. If they were lucky they’d get a few more minutes of anonymity. If not the remote warfare would begin.

It was another 72 seconds before Rajamal’s comm lit up with signals from other Zen’zat indicating that they were being engaged by both the Bo’ja and the J’gar. He immediately switched off with another of the Zen’zat, leaving the three behind while he ran off under cloak towards the trouble.

He got three turns into his run before he encountered fully armored Bo’ja heading his way. They couldn’t see him at first, but then a Jumat wave blew down the tunnel and knocked all four of them back onto each other. The Zen’zat emerged from his cloak firing as he closed distance, peppering them with forearm Dre’mo’don blasts and another Jumat wave that further disrupted their attempts to stand, as well as their armor’s shields.

Rajamal was through one of their shields before he even got to them, then punched so hard he heard the Bo’ja’s armor crack on impact. The biped ricocheted into the inferior warrior behind him, leaving Rajamal with one standing on his right and another on his left. He sideways kicked to the right while punching with both hands into the one on the left, knocking them apart while delivering two blasts to the one who got his fists, then he pounded that one with several quick punches that coincided with weapon discharges from his wrists.

Rajamal alternated from one to the other until he began to get through their armor, but not before he saw pings on his psionic dampeners. Particularly the one for Lachka, and he knew it wasn’t the Bo’ja attempting it because of the amount of power being used by his armor to counteract the attack was massive.

But the attack did fail. The J’gar were unable to use their telekinesis to assist the Bo’ja through the walls…at least until his countermeasures were overloaded or ran out of power, and the J’gar were certainly capable of doing the former if they worked together, though they didn’t know what the specs on his system was or how much force they’d have to apply to get through it.

Before Rajamal had all four killed, the walls began to peel apart. Not near him, but further down both directions where the J’gar could still use their Lachka. Piece flew off and curled into metallic paper wads, then those three balls began shooting back and forth across his position, one of which he managed to use to his advantage when he threw a Bo’ja into its path at the last moment. But when they moved past him they regained their control and came back towards him, forcing him to use his Jumat again to knock them down…but he knew the J’gar could do this game all day and he didn’t have time for that.

He also didn’t have time for the peeling walls to form a cage to hold him in, which they were doing further away on both ends. Rajamal caught one of the balls, feeling it slip out of the J’gar’s control, then carried it with him as a shield. He had to increase the perimeter of his jamming to fully cover it, which took more power, but it gave him something other than his own armor to take the hits on as he ran towards one of the forming barriers.

The Zen’zat dove into it, blasting it apart with his body and a Jumat wave, but not enough to get completely through. His legs caught and he had to crawl a bit, all the while seeing more components from the walls ahead peel off and begin to form either new barricades or projectiles.

As he got through and batted away a small rectangular hatch cover from the air he lowered his Ikrid jammer for just a moment, getting a head count for how many J’gar were nearby and sizing them up. They were immediately in his head, but he had the advantage of Ikrid immunity to override control and memory raids and gained far more from the exchange even as they threw multiple disabling techniques at him. One of them temporarily tricked his eyesight into thinking he was blind, making him stumble a moment as his brain reset from the interference…then something heavy smashed into his helmet.

Rajamal fell backwards, then did a reverse somersault back onto his feet, knowing the more attacks that came his way the less were going after the rest of his team. He punched a snake-like strand of wire that was trying to loop around his legs from the edge of his jamming radius, then opened himself up once more to Ikrid as he made an attack of his own against one of the J’gar.

He was in his head within a split second, and despite the superior brain power he was facing Rajamal knew his opponent was a rookie. He slid through his defenses with some resistance, even as he felt the pressure of the other minds working against his. Rajamal took a knee and turtled up for a moment, concentrating his will against the J’gar’s…with his eventually winning out.

The J’gar’s body answered to his mind for a moment, and in that moment he had it lash out with one of its Saroto’kanse’vam tentacles into a side wall, destroying a bank of control equipment the J’gar needed to interact with the ship. The effort was too much to hold, and Rajamal lost his grip as the J’gar shrugged him off, but the damage was done. There were other control points in the ship, but this one was now trash.

“Section 5, now,” he ordered as the hallway in front of him became so thorny with peeling debris that he could barely see through to the other side.

Back in the node, the three Zen’zat…as of yet undetected…altered the climate control of the compartments in section 5 and began lowering the temperature dramatically and quickly. The J’gar had battle armor on, so the cold wouldn’t hurt them, but it did have an effect on the water. Down and down the temperature dropped, until small bits of ice began to form around the walls, then huge spikes shot off them as the circulation systems shut down and all currents ended.

The J’gar inside began firing at the ice, vaporizing and reheating it with their weaponsfire, but that was not going to be good enough unless they kept at it constantly. The ship’s systems were so effective at heat transfer to keep them alive and liquid during hull breaches and other damage, that the superiority of their equipment was now being turned against them. The Zen’zat were sucking the heat out and creating cages out of their own environment, and the more the J’gar fought it the less time they had to telekinetically pluck at the Zen’zat swarming the ship.

Rajamal blasted his way through the barricades, sometimes with punches and kicks, while reserving his Jumat for the toughest sections. He didn’t have unlimited discharges of the psionic, and he could already feel some fatigue in his tissue, for he was having to use extremely large amounts to break through these blockages and get to the closest group of Zen’zat that were pinned in place and trying to shoot or bend their way through.

When he got 4 others pried out he began getting alerts of flooding in other areas, but the Zen’zat armor would protect them from that. He just couldn’t let the J’gar physically get to them, and some of the tunnels were very close to the water levels.

Rajamal escorted this group up to their objective, then punched aside another piece of wall that tried to intercept him as he stomped through a small stream of water coming from ahead. He backtracked it to the source, then saw several gushers coming from the right side wall. Holes had been poked into them with no Zen’zat or Bo’ja present, which meant the J’gar were deliberately flooding the tubes to make it harder for the Zen’zat to move around.

And if the water was going to freeze, it might slow them down too if the tunnels couldn’t keep up with the thermal drain elsewhere.

Smart move, but it wasn’t like the J’gar hadn’t tried this trick before.

He ran forward through the gushing water, his Pefbar blind due to his jamming, and the J’gar’s as well, but all they needed to see was the blind spot to target it, and right on cue glowing tentacle tips punched through the side walls and tried to skewer him.

They were Saroto’kanse’vam, and a single hit would rip through his shields at a minimum. If they caught him in the armor they would cut right through just like a Hjar’at’s spines would. They were constructed of the same material, except these were not flat. They were essentially claws on the end of a tentacle, while others were more like wrecking balls. Each J’gar could customize them as they wished, and some that were not Saroto’kanse’vam held other psionics, including electrical discharges that were more or less useless with all this water around…unless they made physical contact.

The ones coming through the wall were the glowing blue claws, and given how easily they poked through the ship’s structure there was no doubt that Zen’zat armor and shields would suffer the same fate with two hits, if not on a single strike. But Rajamal had to go through this hallway, and they couldn’t turn the claws much with the walls pinning their tentacles into a straight line attack, so this was a simple dodging exercise.

The water made it difficult, so Rajamal jumped up onto the ceiling while triggering his armor to stick on contact. He ran inverted, with his head barely above the water as he crunched down, stopping and starting again as the glowing spikes came in and out again, each followed by a gush of water that only added to the torrent already coming into the tunnel.

Rajamal dodged 8 before he got hit…or would have if he didn’t throw a pointblank Jumat blast to deflect it away from his body. Two more such deflections and dozens of dodges got him through to the other side, then he turned a corner and was out of tentacle range from the room they had been striking from. He stepped over several dead Bo’ja before coming across a downed Zen’zat. Rajamal stopped next to Hi’nori, seeing that her chest armor had been crushed…not from a blow, but from all around. Her psionic dampener must have overloaded and allowed the J’gar to squeeze her to death.

He put a hand on her head, interfacing his armor with hers to see what her condition actually was, and discovered she was still alive…barely. Her Kich’a’kat was broken, so why wasn’t she…

“Crude grasp,” she said in a whisper. “They left me for…dead. Didn’t even try for the head.”

Rajamal didn’t answer, but he understood. These J’gar must be very young and inexperienced. That, combined with the range of attack, left them clawing at the center of mass rather than going for the brain.

His own Kich’a’kat interfaced with what was left of hers, and Rajamal took the painfully long time of repairing her body enough for her to stand on her own feet, though he had to pry several parts of her armor off her where they’d broke and pinched together. She could no longer survive vacuum or water, but they’d prepared for this.

Rajamal boosted the range of his dampener to cover her, then he walked her away from his target until he came across another group of Zen’zat as he monitored the comm chatter. Stealth suits were still being used to move around, but they were transmitting freely when needed now that most of the Bo’ja had been located and destroyed. Only the bridge node was still occupied, and that sat directly in the center of a water level, which would be the best defensible location on the ship for the J’gar and their new servants.

“Get her a replacement suit,” he ordered, taking the hand of another Zen’zat and putting it on her wrist. That simple gesture said more than words could, meaning the one being handed over was cargo and no longer combat capable.

Rajamal took off again, returning by a roundabout route to the environmental station he’d started at, and finding very little moving tunnel pieces blocking his way this time. When he got back there he found out why, seeing that multiple chambers were now solid ice, or at least a slush that had driven the J’gar out of them. Including the engine room.

He hadn’t sent any Zen’zat teams there, because he didn’t want the equipment damaged, but now it was time to take control of the air node there and deal with whatever Bo’ja had wisely stayed in place, though he doubted there would be any other than whatever they used for techs.

Nevertheless he signaled for a team of six to join him, and all had to slog through a foot of water in the tunnels that were flowing in from other locations. It would take time for the air to flow out enough for them to become completely submerged, but that also meant portions of the water levels now had air at the top, though there was so much water volume that small amount did nothing to hinder the J’gar.

His teams had already taken control of the remaining comm arrays that hadn’t already been damaged. They’d intercepted their control lines, hacking in and denying the bridge or any other location access to them. The distance to the nearby Domjo was too far for Ikrid, so the other J’gar ship had no idea a boarding action had taken place here. Now it was time to get them moving off, and he’d deal with the crew later.

When Rajamal got to the engine room node he opened the door into a dry area, immediately taking fire from several Bo’ja that had pathetically bad aim. Only two of the shots hit his armor’s shields, then he was in the door and sidestepping, drawing their attention as more Zen’zat came through and shot them down without much of a fight. Their armor was not up to Zen’zat standards, let alone the new modifications Rajamal’s team was wearing, but these Bo’ja didn’t even have that. It looked the same, but the melted body plates were only a quarter the thickness of the others they’d faced.

The J’gar wouldn’t even, or couldn’t, provide full armor to their techs. But at least they still gave them weapons, for what little it had done. It wasn’t only the V’kit’no’sat empire that had fallen so far in recent years, for the J’gar Rajamal had once served would never have allowed such ill-equipped personnel to serve onboard a warship.

Two Zen’zat broke off from combat duties and assumed their old positions in the engineering node, accessing the ship’s systems briefly before being locked out by the bridge. That only meant a delay, for they’d brought their own control crystals and began pulling apart the control boards and rebuilding them as needed to get past the lockdown.

If the J’gar were close enough to use their telekinesis they could stop this, but to do so they’d have to swim through ice…or so Rajamal hoped. He’d assumed decent range psionics, but what he’d seen thus far didn’t even rise to that level. This was not a veteran crew for a Rit’ko’sor vessel, let alone the J’gar’s legendary fleet.

“I have access,” one of the Zen’zat said, bringing up navigational control.

“Ease us off. If the Domjo reacts, run,” he said, getting on his comm and using J’gar frequencies that even rookies were sure to pick up on the intracomm.

“J’gar crew, your ship is now in Zen’zat possession. We can deal with you in one of two ways. Option One is we take on the lengthy process of killing you one by one, either through poison, exposure, or combat. Out of a sense of efficiency and respect for what your race once was, I am offering Option Two where you head to the hangar bay and cram all of you into the three drop pods there. You can be picked up by the other J’gar ships when we leave. We came for the ship, not to kill you. I suggest you take advantage of my generosity while it lasts. We will leave the pathways to the hangar bay un-iced.”

Rajamal left it at that. Letting them go made tactical sense, but a small part of him did not like fighting other V’kit’no’sat races, no matter what they had done. It felt like a violation of his oath of service, but what he was doing now was 100% necessary. He hadn’t created this division, yet he was forced to deal with it, as were all Zen’zat. There was no longer a righteous path to follow. The Elder Council had destroyed it after Mak’to’ran’s death when they foolishly started this war.

Rajamal would never have served the Zak’de’ron, though some Zen’zat had chosen to when the independent J’gar and Oso’lon had absolved them. Rajamal had fought during the original Zak’de’ron war and knew they were not to be trusted, in any sense. Those Zen’zat who had given them their misplaced loyalty were now dead, executed by those that they had faithfully returned to. How the J’gar and Oso’lon could abide by this slaughter he did not understand, but then again they had not been the advocates for creating the Zen’zat. That had been the Era’tran, a mid-level race that had risen to peerdom due to Mak’to’ran’s ascent. And at least they were holding true to that allegiance, though for how long Rajamal did not know.

Right now he would only trust Zen’zat, and as he saw reports of the J’gar slowly making their way towards the hangar bay he was getting injury reports from the rest of his team.

12 were dead, 9 of which were recoverable. Meaning this mission had cost him 3 more Zen’zat…all of which were rookies.

Rajamal couldn’t protect them. He couldn’t protect the Ter’nat worlds that spawned them. He couldn’t even protect himself. The best he could do was make sure he and his brothers and sisters died well, and as their newly captured Ti’mat drifted away from the badly damaged Domjo without so much as a comm inquiry as to why, Rajamal knew this ship…properly repaired…would add to the Zen’zat’s kill power far more than those three Zen’zat would have contributed if they had lived. That meant they had died well.

The legendary Zen’zat waited until all the J’gar had boarded the three drop pods in the hangar, then made them wait longer until he opened the exterior doors and allowed them to leave. He could have shot them in space and killed them, denying the enemy some more troops, but he would not do so. Their acquiescence may have spared him additional losses, and it most certainly saved him time and additional ship damage. Letting them go was a small price to pay in exchange, though some of his Zen’zat were not happy with it. They wanted vengeance in the short term, while Rajamal was fighting to preserve the Zen’zat, their Ter’nat spawning worlds, and the essence of what it was to be Zen’zat.

The Zak’de’ron were hated because they had no honor, and as was evident in this exchange, respect for one’s opponent could gain you far more than blind bloodshed. These newer Zen’zat had not been alive back when the V’kit’no’sat lived and breathed honor. They had much to learn, and hopefully they would from his example, but Rajamal was not hopeful. Everything was being destroyed, if not directly then through attrition. Using the ships of the enemy in your own fleet would never have happened in the past, but now it was a necessity. And an embarrassing one at that for those Zen’zat old enough to remember a better time.

Rajamal was far past embarrassment. He would do what was necessary to fight this war, but he would not stop being Zen’zat. If he did the war was already over and a failure.

By the time the J’gar realized the drop pods had their comms disabled and something was amiss, the Ti’mat was already halfway to its jump point. Rajamal could not help the captured Brat’mar ships, but he could deliver this one to those who could make proper use of it. When they finally made the jump out of the system he did so with a cringe.

The Zen’zat never liked leaving allies behind, and every time it was necessary it was another cut into his psyche. How far the empire had fallen, and not to the Hadarak or other foreign enemy. This fall was due entirely to internal fractures.

What the future held Rajamal did not know, but he and the Zen’zat would fight to the end. That, at least, was under their control. Nothing else truly was.

3

August 5, 128812

Numana Yentre System (Midzan Region)

Dobmu Trenga (Ter’nat colony)

Ikan-Dovora-522296 jumped to the right just in time to keep from brushing up against one of the wheeled grain transports coming into the city from the grasslands to the north. They made regular convoy runs every three days, slowly spreading out the latest harvest to the numerous food processing facilities here and everywhere else around the half continent of fields, but today the driver was coming a little closer to the walkways than was typical.

Ikan heard sounds behind him as others were startled as well, but no one was hurt as the long, 5-car snake-like transport rolled on. He thumped the side of the fourth car in disgust, immediately bruising his left hand, but it was worth it. He hoped the driver heard, but that was unlikely with all the noise from the hydrogen combustion engines that powered the transports. If this guy wasn’t more careful then another Ter’nat was going to get smashed like last week.

But that wasn’t going to be him…at least not this time. He kept walking slowly, taking small steps on his thin frame. At a glance he looked like a Human, but on closer inspection one saw his bones were thinner, and there was no visible muscle on him anywhere. His clothes hung from his limbs obscuring any shape to be found, with only the nursing females having any body distinction. All Ter’nat looked alike, but they didn’t smell alike, and it was their scent that gave away who was male or female, for they had powerful pheromones that were rumored to be removed or dialed back when one was ascended into a Zen’zat.

It was a matter of speculation whether or not the Humans had them. Ever since word had reached the Ter’nat colonies of the Rimward expansion of the V’kit’no’sat empire led by reproducing Zen’zat people had wondered, for they were not of Zen’zat size. What else had transferred to them, or not transferred was unknown, but they did obviously still maintain some Zen’zat muscle, for they didn’t look like the flat chested and thin framed skeletons that the Ter’nat did unless they were malnourished near death.

Ikan was nowhere near death, but his 62 pound frame would have suggested as much to a Human. He was 5 foot 8 inches tall and slightly shorter than average for his race, with genetically green hair, silver eyes, and splotchy tan skin. The weather modification shields protected the farming field to the north against fluctuations in stellar radiation, but the crops liked more energy than his skin did, so it tanned up to a brown during the summer along with a lot of freckles, most of which he’d lose during the winter, but some always seemed to persist.

He didn’t know much about other worlds, for the information allowed to the Ter’nat was limited primarily to this world and whatever basic news there was on the Empire. When there was a major war they’d know about it. When Mak’to’ran came to power that was also explained to them, as was his death and immediate avengement. Some had been told to them of the Humans, but most of what they knew from beyond was of the Zen’zat. Ikan would never reach those ranks. He knew that now. But others would and he didn’t resent them for it. To serve the V’kit’no’sat directly was the most highly revered honor for a Ter’nat, but Ikan’s responsibilities lay here, in this colony, where he served the Empire by helping advance Ter’nat skills and resources.

That had become even more important lately, for he and a few other had been told that assistance from beyond was unlikely, and if pirates, raiders, or other trouble came their way there would be few ships available to help them. The war with the Zak’de’ron was sucking up all available ships and resources, and even this colony was producing excess minerals and metals to be shipped offworld to assist with the war effort.

But Ikan knew something the other Ter’nat did not, for a Zen’zat had told him personally when they began to arrive here in large numbers. The Zak’de’ron were specifically targeting Ter’nat worlds in order to deny the V’kit’no’sat future Zen’zat, which meant Dobmu Trenga could come under direct attack and they were going to have to do their best to defend themselves if that came to pass.

Most of the V’kit’no’sat warships on standard patrol here had already left. Only two remained, and both were new arrivals from the Era’tran. Two small ships for their body size, both Ti’mat, and they probably outgunned the entire Ter’nat fleet in the system. Some 1094 warships ranging from half a mile wide to 6 miles. They were manned entirely by Ter’nat and were more than enough to defend the civilian ships and orbital infrastructure against anyone who passed into this system from beyond the Empire…but against V’kit’no’sat ships or the Zak’de’ron equivalent, they didn’t stand a chance.

The technology allowed to the Ter’nat was better than most people had in the galaxy, and Ikan had never had reason to complain about it, but from what the Zen’zat had told him there wasn’t much they could do to help in a fight against what would most likely be J’gar warships unless they made some upgrades…forbidden upgrades previously, but no longer. The V’kit’no’sat overlords here had sanctioned them, though there were few of them left. Most of the others had left with the patrol ships, but those that had stayed behind were unlocking a lot of previously forbidden information in the hopes of preserving this colony if…or more likely when…it came under attack.

Ikan didn’t know what that would be like, but he knew his job and that was maintaining the food supply. In the past all Ter’nat colonies could get assistance from the empire if they needed it, but now they were on their own and if he and the other Constublars mismanaged what they had then they’d have to go on rations…or worse. He didn’t want to think about that, but the Overlords had released information on other planets…not V’kit’no’sat ones…and what had happened to them when they were short on food. Ikan could not forget what he had seen, and it scared him more than an invasion.

In almost every occasion the other races had gone various forms of crazy when there wasn’t enough food for everyone. That insanity made the situation far worse, and people who had been friends and kin began killing each other for the food or other reasons. It was like the lack of food inhibited their ability to think or reason, and they just lashed out at everything they could.

But a few races did not. They worked together to preserve as many as possible, even as vast chunks of their population died of starvation. If this was to come to pass here, then they had to make the best of it…but it was the Constublars’ responsibility to make sure that was avoided, and there weren’t enough Overlords left to make sure the Ter’nat didn’t screw up. That put a lot of pressure on him and the others, and he wasn’t sure if he was up to the task of handling it.

More and more people were arriving here, some were Ter’nat from other worlds, but they were being kept elsewhere and not allowed to intermix much. The Overlords probably didn’t want them telling this planet what had happened elsewhere, but it wasn’t just Ter’nat arriving that had to be fed. It was also Zen’zat.

A lot of Zen’zat.

They were keeping away as well, for the most part, but some were moving about in sight and attracting the kind of attention they always did. They were giants to the Ter’nat, both in height, weight, and legend. If there was an attack here they’d have to do all the fighting. Ter’nat were no good at it. They rarely even fought each other due to the frailty of their bodies. Ikan’s people didn’t die too easy, but they got beat up quite a bit, even when they didn’t mean to. The bruise on his hand had been deliberate, but often times he picked them up accidentally.

He couldn’t fight physically, and even with weapons they weren’t going to be a match for the Zak’de’ron troops. That didn’t stop the Ter’nat from having their own, for Zen’zat needed to be groomed from those with experience in the disciplines they would be chosen for, but they wouldn’t be enough to protect the planet. The Overlords had already said as much. Which was why Zen’zat were arriving to give them as much of a chance as possible, with whatever equipment they could salvage from the war zones.

Already there was a new shield generator covering a piece of the capitol. It had been taken out of a broken enemy warship and repurposed here. Other bits and pieces had been flowing in, most of which Ikan did not know about, but he had just finished a long three day work session with his staff on the plans sent to him for a growth facility. Field growing wasn’t going to be enough production, he was told, to weather the incoming populations and potential damage. They had to start growing crops indoors in special facilities that had multiple levels and closely controlled environments.

That would allow them to grow year round as well, not having to worry about seasons, wind conditions, insects, or other variables. But to build those growth facilities took time and a lot of resources, and he now had to make it happen in his assigned region. One facility, capable of growing a list of crops that weren’t even present on this world. The Zen’zat needed more nutrients than the Ter’nat did, and to supply them they had to have different plants to produce them.

But not just that. They had to have factories to use the raw materials to synthesize others. He wasn’t assigned to that project, but this growth facility assignment was more than he could handle at the moment. The technology involved was beyond him, and both he and his team were working round the clock most days to learn what they had to in order to begin building one from local materials.

Sometimes he wondered whether or not this was some grand test for him to complete before being elevated to a Zen’zat…but the changes happening on the planet testified otherwise, and he knew in his brain that this was not an elevation test. But a test of survival for him and the rest of the Ter’nat here…as well as across the galaxy.

He could have stayed awake another day or so, but needed a clear head so he’d sent everyone home for at least a 6 hour sleep. Ter’nat usually slept 4 each day, or 6 every two days. Zen’zat required much more due to their heightened metabolism, and being able to work slow, long hours was the one tiny advantage they had over the Zen’zat, if you could call it that. They could stay awake and tend to small tasks, keep watch, and do other monitoring duties, but any heavy work had to be done by machines, and the Ter’nat had armies of them in various forms. But no combat models. They’d never been needed here before.

Ikan was tired, but not from the walking. His head hurt from too much thinking and staring at plans and statistics and growth profiles, all of which were new to him. He felt like a juvenile all over again, but without the optimism. He wasn’t working to ascend to become a Zen’zat. He was working to avoid losing what this planet already had.

The Dovora compound was a decent distance off, about a 39 minute walk at his speed, but the effort helped to unknot his head. By the time he arrived at the complex that held his breeding line he felt like the moment he reached his bed he could fall asleep immediately, so he adjusted his comm bracelet to wake him at the desired time before he entered the steepled skyscraper, intent to get back to his assignment no later than the others.

There was a lot of foot traffic outside, some of which was boarding vehicles to travel to other parts of the city, and Ikan had to wait for the entrance to clear enough to allow his line in. He hadn’t noticed what time it was, and he’d caught a shift change, for normally there wasn’t this much traffic when he moved to and from the agro command complex.

As he waited a shadow passed overhead briefly, prompting many of the Ter’nat to look up. When Ikan did he saw an egg-shaped ship momentarily obscuring the sun, but it wasn’t in orbit, rather passing by several miles overhead in atmosphere. The spike of fear at this being the start of the invasion dissipated after a few quick heartbeats, but his initial reaction hadn’t been wrong about it being a J’gar ship.

He turned his head and approximated its tract, confirming it was headed for the surface yard on the northwest side of the city, and his fear was replaced with a surge of pride. The Zen’zat had stolen another vessel from the enemy, and soon it would be landing in a Ter’nat yard like many others across the planet where a mix of personnel would be repairing it and making it fit for Zen’zat use. When it was finished it would head back out into space and across the stars, continuing the fight far from here. Rescuing other Zen’zat and, when the time came, returning here to help try and save this world.

Or at the very least evacuate as many Ter’nat out of the system as possible in whatever ships they had that were jump capable before the planet’s surface was incinerated like so many others.

The Zen’zat were here and coming in ever increasing numbers. But against the J’gar, Oso’lon, and Zak’de’ron, what chance did they really have?

4

Four years later…

Ikan sat on his heels, huddled together with other members of his bloodline in the lowest levels of the Dovora compound as they felt the repetitive thundering of orbital bombardment. Buildings were being destroyed all around them in the city, and the only way they could tell how close was by the strength of the vibrations getting down to them, but it was only a matter of time before theirs was hit and everyone knew it.

The air here was bad. Too many people scrunched into areas never designed for this number. The lowest levels of the building were the farthest from the weaponry, so this is where everyone had gone when it began. The naval battle had been brief, with the J’gar fleet winning out after a slugfest. Altogether there were 27 ships involved the battle, 18 of which belonged to the enemy. They were down to 12 now, and the remaining two Zen’zat ships had fled the planet, leaving this dozen to assault the city shields and blow through them in less than half an hour despite the heavy damage some of the ships were carrying.

The anti-orbital defenses had gotten in a few licks, but the heaviest batteries had been assaulted on the ground in other cities. Ikan’s had nothing other than some light beam cannons and those were the first sites targeted after the shields were breached. What happened after that Ikan didn’t know, for as soon as the shields went down everyone was directed to the lower levels. It would take a lot of pounding to break through all the layers above them, and if the J’gar were not going to be that thorough some Ter’nat might survive around the foundations when the rest of the building fell on top of them.

It was Ikan’s only chance, and he sat shoulder to shoulder with the others as they squeezed together to make room for more filtering in from above or outside. The compression waves from vaporized structures were pulsing through the city streets like wind gusts, some strong enough to throw a Ter’nat off his feet…which was enough to kill them if they hit something hard. Being inside was their slim chance of survival, and everyone was clinging to it with whatever hope they could manage.

The thuds outside of weapon impacts gradually diminished, as if the ships were moving further off, perhaps to another city, but just as he began to hope an explosion so loud it made his ears ring came from directly overhead, followed by several more thumps before the roar of what had to be falling building silenced everything else.

The ceiling cracked and pieces of it fell, killing the Ter’nat below who had no room to run. Screeches of twisting, bending metal competed with the lurches of the side walls, one of which blew inward, killing hundreds in an instant, then the thumps returned, over and over again as the dusty air grew painfully hot.

But no more pieces of the ceiling fell. The emergency lights remained on, eerily obscured by the dust, and suddenly the thumps stopped.

No one moved. No one could if they had wanted to. Ikan was pinned between others that were still alive, and there he sat, as did the rest. Even those right next to the dead.

They waited hours as the faint tremors continued, then hours more after they stopped completely. No one came for them to tell them what to do. Not the Zen’zat. Not the Overlords. Not even the enemy. After more than 10 hours of sitting in silence, the first few brave Ter’nat stood up and began probing the holes in the rubble and the few doors that were still operational.

Ikan did not, and could not move, but a long time later the others did enough that he could stand up. Slowly they filed out, through where he didn’t know until he followed the rest and had to climb through a hole in the rubble. By the time he saw the nighttime exterior his hands were bloodied and bruised beyond measure, but the air was no longer hot…yet it was still covered in dust. Dust so large that he couldn’t see far into the darkness, nor could he see the stars above. All that was visible were a few emergency lights set up by someone, and it was to those lights that he and the others went.

His lungs hurt. His eyes hurt. His head was wobbling enough that he almost tripped and fell over nothing multiple times, though others did, hurting themselves in the fall. Ikan walked like a zombie with the others towards the lights, then stood amongst them not knowing what to do.

They stood there until a morning breeze preceded the sunrise and pushed the dust out of the city, at which point the stars could finally be seen. No ships were visible up there, which was a blessing. Ikan was still alive, and maybe the J’gar would leave them behind thinking they were dead…but what was he to do? He needed water, and food. Where were the emergency supplies? Somebody had to have something somewhere for them.

A few people with lights moved off trying to look around, but most stayed put. Ikan went with one of the other groups, knowing that if they didn’t get the food flowing soon the survivors would start to die from their wounds and malnourishment. At the very least they had to find a working water dispenser, but as Ikan walked oh so slowly with the others venturing out and having to zigzag their way around debris not knowing where exactly they were heading, the sun began to rise and show them what it was they had just survived.

The skyline of the city was gone. Not a single tall building remained to be seen over the rubble piles. The ones with the lights were roaming wherever they could walk, but it became clear that they were going to have to climb to get to the agro storage units. Ikan knew he had to get there, even if the others didn’t, so as soon as he could see well enough he quietly walked off from the others, not sure if his raw throat could even speak if he wanted it to.

He meandered through several dead ends until he found an incline that he thought he could manage, then ever so slowly he climbed until he was high enough that he could see out over most of the rubble piles.

Ikan made himself sit on the incline, afraid his legs would melt and he would fall to his death.

Everything was gone. There was no city left. There were no intact buildings. There were barely any streets visible. It was a wasteland, and he immediately knew everyone here was going to starve to death. If they managed to find some crumbs hidden in the rubble it would prolong them, but there was no hope here. And if he couldn’t find some water soon, he might as well lay down and let the end come.

But if he did that then he’d definitely never be worthy to become a Zen’zat.

It was an odd thought to think now, yet it popped up in his mind to batter away at the hopelessness. He was alive while so many others were not. The enemy had failed to kill him, so now what should he do? What would a Zen’zat do?

A Zen’zat would stay alive. But how could he do that here?

He couldn’t unless there was a partially intact building underneath the rubble. Ikan couldn’t search long enough to find one, and even if the others did it wouldn’t have enough resources to sustain them. The agro complex would be his best hope, but the smell of char in the air suggested that he wouldn’t find much there, though a few mouthfuls would be worth the effort.

But what he needed right now the most was water.

Nothing in sight could provide it, so he made himself climb higher. His arms and legs were scrawny, but he didn’t weigh as much as a Zen’zat either, so Ikan wasn’t so bad at climbing. His hands hurt though, and there were patches where his skin was gone and he was using his sleeves to try and cover the bloody spots. But he kept going, not wanting to even think of returning to the others and watching them die like those he’d seen from other worlds. It was happening here, now, with the survivors, and he wanted to be as far away from it as he could possibly get. If he was going to die, he wanted it to be in solitude.

Ikan kept climbing until he was at the top of one rubble heap and teetering on falling off the other side, but his slow Ter’nat movements proved useful in navigating the debris and he held his footing as he looked out in all directions, trying to visualize where the buildings should be and get his bearings. The rising sun helped, but when he saw where the agro complex had been all that was left were craters. The grain bins had no real mass to them, so the bombardment hadn’t created rubble so much as plowed right through them and dug into the ground, vaporizing the grain inside or setting it on fire, Ikan didn’t know which. But there was nothing there to find.

What he did see along the agro complex grounds was a clear road, more or less. The craters hadn’t crushed any buildings to fall onto it, and that road led to the north…and to the grain fields.

Would they have bombarded open farm fields? And would they have destroyed every small building and automated unit out there? Suddenly Ikan had a sliver of hope, and that hope meant he had to get out of the city and into the farm lands that he knew intimately. He’d worked them in his youth, and had since come into a position to oversee most of them. There had to be something left out there.

But getting to that road was going to be perilous, and he had to make use of his vantage point now to plot a path. With his bleery eyes he had to blink multiple times to get them clear enough to see where he was going to attempt to go…after which he backtracked down the incline a bit and began working his way around the top of this heap, hoping that there was some way he could at least reach the road.

If he couldn’t do that, then he hoped he had the fortune to slip and fall to a quick death.

Everything was a blur to his memory, as if he was trying to live in the moment and forget the past even existed. Somehow he found his way over to the road, and when he did he knelt down and kissed the bare pavement that had little more than a heavy coating of grain dust on it.

As soon as he realized that he began scooping up small piles of it and putting it in his pockets. It was food, but if he put it in his mouth now it would only dehydrate him further and he’d probably choke to death on it for lack of saliva. But later, if he could find water, he could try swallowing it.

Ikan filled his pockets as full as he could, then made himself keep walking. He was here. On the road. Something he had felt was impossible until it had just happened. He wanted to stop. His body wanted him to stop. But the little part of him that still desired to be a Zen’zat told him he had to keep moving. That if he stopped he would never start again. So Ikan kept walking, leaving long tracks in the grain dust as his feet didn’t even lift high enough to clear the top of it.

As he walked he came to several dunes of the foodstuff, half wishing he could tell the others where it was, but without water it would kill them too. Maybe they’d find it. Maybe someone would find his tracks and follow him. But right now he had to get water, and the partially destroyed buildings along the right side of the road looked promising.

He checked each one he came to, finding most were clogged with debris or had the rear side blown out by the compression wave that resulted from the grain bins exploding. But no explosion was uniform. There were always spots of higher and lower pressure…and what seemed like a very long way down the road he came to a building that had its windows blown out, but the front wall and door were still intact.

They were dented heavily, so much so the door would not open, but Ikan would not be stopped by that. He found a window and broke off the remaining glass enough that he wouldn’t cut himself. He had to use a rock…which was actually part of another building that had flown here…to saw back and forth and smooth out the window frame, then he crawled over it ever so gently until he was hanging with one half in and one half out with the frame bisecting his body.

He got his inside leg on something firm below him and slithered into the building, finding himself on a tabletop in a room that had been wrecked. He carefully got down to the floor and realized the table was actually a ledge attached to the front wall below the windows that visitors could sit on, and he immediately recognized this as a transit station.

Ikan grew excited, looking for a water pillar, but the one in the main area had been knocked away with the rest of the stuff in the room that wasn’t firmly bolted down, yet on the floor where it had been was a wet spot. He put his hand down on it, feeling the blessed liquid on his skin and not caring how much it hurt. It was less than a finger width deep, but that was enough for now.

He looked around for the water pipe that had created the puddle, finding it along the base of the wall and totally without pressure. Ikan dipped his finger into it, finding only a standing puddle that wouldn’t last out the day, but it would keep him alive at least that long.

The Constublar knelt down, then lay down on the floor beyond the water, not wanting to waste any of it soaking into his clothing. Then he crawled up to it and put his lips down, very gently sucking it in and making sure not to choke on it. At first he just let it creep into his mouth and wet his tongue before working up to taking sips. He stayed there for what seemed like a lifetime as the slightly dusty water rejuvenated his dehydrated body.

When he had drank as much as his body would tolerate, he rolled over and crawled to a clear section of wall beyond the water and rested his back against it. He didn’t need to sleep as much as he did to stop moving and let the water do its magic on his body. He closed his eyes and just held still, knowing he had bought himself some more time. And once his parched flesh processed the water enough to return some saliva to his mouth he’d experiment with a handful of the grain dust.

Until then he just had to wait…and try not to think of what was happening to all the others he’d left behind.

5

Ikan found himself walking the road again, feeling better and worse than before. His hands throbbed, and the blood soaked sleeves attested to the reason why, but his mouth was no longer dry and his stomach had an ample amount of grain dust in it. Perhaps a little too much, for he was feeling food sick now but he had to keep moving to find more water. The puddle in the transit station was probably dry by now, for he hadn’t left much there after sucking up his fill.

His pockets were full of grain dust again, for there was so much around it was making it hard to walk. It was piled like sand, but fortunately no obstructions were on the road other than the occasional piece of building that he could walk around out into the crater field. It was night again, but the twin moons were high enough in the sky to give him light as he pressed on.

Ikan didn’t want to think about what was behind him, so he kept trying to calculate how much of the fields would have been spared. The growth facilities had probably been targeted and destroyed, along with the collection and processing centers, but would all of the smaller structures have been hit? Especially the way stations in the fields for the workers that were overseeing the mostly automated harvesters. Those had supplies in them, and their own well water supply. He was counting on at least one of them remaining, but he had to get to the edge of the city first before he could begin to look.

And the problem with that was the road. The agro complex didn’t run all the way to the city limits, and up ahead he could already see small mountains of destroyed buildings. But there weren’t that many, according to his memory which seemed to be crystal clear in such details, so if he had to climb again he could make himself do it knowing there was a nearby finish line to get to.

But until then he walked, slowly with small steps sometimes trudging through grain dust dunes, and tried to glimpse anything ahead in the dark to help plot his course. He thought there was a valley in the debris, but he wasn’t sure until he got much closer and the moonlight showed a small crater with a crack of charred black beyond. Ikan wanted to think that was the fields, but there was no way to be sure at night. Everything looked black unless it reflected the moonlight.

He started heading for the crater amongst the building piles before he got to them, cutting across a blast zone and keeping out of a jagged trench that had been dug into the ground by the weaponsfire. It went down probably 20 feet or more, and if he fell in it he doubted he would be coming back out again, so he kept his distance as much as he could up to what had once been a fuel station. It was gone now, but he could see the road branch that had led to it, now just a stub off the main street. When it had blown it hadn’t crumbled in, but pushed out, giving him a walking path through the blast zone.

Ikan was elated that he wasn’t going to have to crawl over the rubble, but he was careful not to cut himself on the small, jagged pieces of debris sticking up everywhere. He could see over them all, but some required a little climbing, for his legs wouldn’t reach high enough to step over without a handhold or two…which hurt horribly even with his sleeves being used as cushioning.

But he pressed on, setting himself to do whatever was necessary…then suddenly the darkness became less dim as he stepped into what had once been a grain field, but was now just a long black burnt mess with chunks of debris thrown everywhere nearby.

“Finally,” he said hoarsely. The first word he’d spoken since coming out of the remains of the Dovora complex.

He didn’t stop moving to study the view, instead getting his feet on the ashes and making sure not to trip and fall into the smoldering remains. Everything was tolerably warm, but there was a little smoke here and there. Ikan cut across the field at an angle until he found the road again, with it being mostly unmolested past the city. It was one of many such roads that gave the grain transports regular access to the agro complexes, all of which spurred off from the city to the processing centers that the fields fed.

Ikan didn’t want to go there, at least not first, for he assumed they too would have been destroyed, so he headed up the road for several hours until his shoes and legs were covered in ash, then he finally cut off to the right across one of the fields down a small gravel path. He could barely see it in all the ash, but the bits of visible stone reflected the moonlight well and caught his attention.

He walked and walked across the fields that were not meant to be traveled without transport. A Zen’zat could have ran them easily, but not a Ter’nat. Even his walk was slow compared to those legends, and his stomach pains had shifted from discontent to emptiness again. The ash seemed to make his mouth even drier than in the city, but stopping would be of no avail. Any water in the fields had been vaporized in the fires, so stopping now was tantamount to accepting his death.

So he walked until daylight, plus another three hours, before he came to a small side path that was even narrower than the one he was on. Ikan turned down it, his throat hurting so bad that it overwhelmed his other pains, but another hour or so later he finally saw it.

Like an oasis in the fields of death, the small artificial rock building was nothing more than a rectangular cube with a door in it. The fires would not be able to get inside, and if it had been hit from orbit there would have been nothing left…but there was. It was right there, only a few more steps to go.

Ikan’s numbness began to fade, and he felt each of those final steps more than the ones that had come before. When he got to the door there was no handle, just a touch pad. He balled his hand and touched it on the side to avoid pressing his raw, bleeding palm to it, but it opened just the same.

He walked inside and went straight for the water station, using his fingers to pick up an empty cup without touching it to the rest of his hand, then he filled it up from a spigot that still had pressure…but of course it would, for the pump mechanism was underneath the building, yet after all this time he still feared it would not work.

But it did, and he filled the cup up a small portion and brought it to his lips, having the good sense not to gulp. His mouth rejected the water at first, then a sip got through and disappeared somewhere. He couldn’t swallow, for his throat would not obey his commands.

Ikan took his cup and sat down on a slightly padded chair, and as soon as he did he knew he would not be getting back up again for some time.

He sat there, slowly sipping water into his dry mouth and tongue, and feeling like the luckiest person who ever lived…

When Ikan woke it was night again, but what day it was he did not know. He had slept a long time in the pull out cot the workers used to take naps during shifts rather than waste time traveling elsewhere during their breaks, and somehow he had managed to bandage up his hands with the emergency health kit he’d found. He didn’t know why the Overlords had always decreed that every building, no matter how small, have emergency supplies of every kind, but now he understood their wisdom intimately. If not for it, he’d already be dead.

And thanks to the dirty work in the fields, there were several spare clean uniforms available to him, one of which he’d already donned. He’d even eaten a fair amount of emergency rations…which were far better than grain dust…but he hadn’t wasted it. A cup now held it, for he might need to use it later when the rations ran out.

Ikan knew he could not stay here forever, but he wasn’t going anywhere in the near term. This oasis was too good to give up, and he needed to let his wounds heal up a bit before he explored what was left in the farming belt. If this small building survived, perhaps larger ones did as well. And if not, then he needed to collect supplies from the ones identical to his refuge here. Ikan didn’t know if anyone else had survived, though right now he hoped not, because he didn’t want to share what few resources he had managed to find.

That was a bad thought to think, but it was practical. He was alone, so he might as well get the small advantages out of that isolation rather than be plagued with another person that would be more baggage than help.

But if he did find someone, he wouldn’t let them starve. He just hoped he didn’t…for a while, at least. He didn’t know if the J’gar were gone or not. They might be back with ground teams hunting for survivors, so he didn’t want to go moving around and attract attention in the now very empty fields the fires had laid bare.

Ikan pulled himself up off the cot, finding his mouth dry again but not parched. He stood up and got some water, finding his body had recovered greatly. It was said that when the Era’tran first found the Ter’nat they were appalled at how weak and pathetic their bodies were, but that they saw something in their determination that they could use. The Zen’zat were heavily modified to overcome the physical weakness, but what the Era’tran had saw in their race was present in even Ikan, and after what he’d just gone through and survived, he was proud that he’d had the will to persist.

He still didn’t want to think about the others, but the fact that they were probably dead from thirst or hunger by now seemed to ease his mind a bit, though not much. His focus remained on what was ahead, and for now that was laying low and hoping the enemy wasn’t still around. In a few days he’d go scouting the nearby area if no one showed up to kill or rescue him, and he truly hoped for neither. Anonymity seemed his best defense now, and the smaller he could make himself the better.

No one came for him. Not the enemy, not friendly search parties, not even another wayward Ter’nat looking for shelter. Ikan was alone for weeks, and after he summoned up enough courage to start looking around he discovered a lot of emergency supplies in other agro outposts, including some of the larger ones that had been passed over, which made him wonder. If the J’gar hadn’t destroyed every building beyond the cities, had they gone after the prototype grow facilities?

He assumed they would have hit the largest one, but the first that he and his team had put together was small and partially underground. It was a long walk from his current location, but not beyond his range if he took a knapsack with him and spent one night under the stars…or rain, depending on his luck. But he’d already done that twice now to get to other spots that might have supplies, so he decided to risk his longest trek yet away from his oasis and set off for the location of the smallest prototype growth facility, with him probably being one of the few people on the planet who even knew where it was.

On his way there he came across another way station, finding it empty of people and also of supplies. Someone had been here to take them, or they had never been stocked. If the latter had been the case someone needed to be disciplined, and that rarely happened due to the compliant nature of the Ter’nat to follow the Overlords’ orders, so perhaps there was another survivor out here after all doing the same resource search Ikan was.

He didn’t stay the night there, but pressed on a few more hours before sleeping 4 or 5, then he was off again in search of the site of the prototype growth factory that took him beyond the fields and up into the hills where there were still trees. Those on the edges of the fields had burnt, but only a few rows in. Apparently the crops didn’t hold enough stored energy to heat the trees enough to start a chain reaction in the forest, and for the first time Ikan finally had something to cover him from the view above…though at this point if there were any J’gar watching they would have found and killed him long ago.

Ikan walked through the trees, cutting across un-roaded areas rather than trying to go around the forest. He had a good idea where he was, but without a map he couldn’t be sure…then 5 hours later he came to the site and disappointment crept into his bones. The prototype center had been hit, with a large hole in it on the south side with shrapnel thrown everywhere into the nearby trees…but there was still a lot of the facility left standing, so he decided to venture inside and see if any of the mechanisms were still working.

Halfway around to the intact north side he stopped short when he saw footprints in the ground. Recent ones, not something that would have been here months. Something in him told him to turn and run away, but the footprints looked Ter’nat, or Zen’zat, and either would be allies here. He had plenty of food for himself, and knew where his main stash was, so he wasn’t going to get himself killed by sharing what was in his pack. Still, he was unsure for a moment, then decided to press forward. If someone was here he wanted to find them, no matter what the situation was. If he had to he could always run off…again.

Ikan tracked the footprints around the perimeter to one of the doors, which still opened up on touch, meaning there was some power here, even if it was just batteries. The Ter’nat walked inside more slowly than normal, and quickly saw that at least a chunk of the facility had not been touched by the explosion.

The lights were dim, but there was power here…and when he stepped into a side compartment and saw crops growing in the clear cube rooms he was overjoyed. Now he didn’t have a limited lifespan. He could use the crops and seed they produced to sustain himself indefinitely.

“I don’t believe it,” a voice said from his left, with Ikan jumping in shock and twisting to look at another Ter’nat. Both of them had scrub facial hair, for grooming items were not something incorporated into emergency supplies, but apparently his face was still recognizable. “Constublar, where did you come from?”

It took Ikan a moment to place the name and voice, then realized it was one of his former staff members from decades ago. “Gradir?”

“Yes, it’s me,” the other said, walking up to him and touching his arm to make sure he was real. “How did you get here?”

“I walked. Are you here alone?”

“Alone? No. There are more than 50 of us that got out of the fields before the fires killed us. Most of them are out searching for more survivors. Did someone bring you in?”

“No, I remembered where this place was and wanted to see if anything was left,” Ikan said with a smile.

“We lost about 40% capacity, but the generators weren’t hit. I don’t know why the J’gar only put one shot into it, but we’re producing enough food for 200 at least. Under your command I know you’ll stretch it to 250.”

“Command?”

“I’ve been in charge since I was found. Everyone else are farm hands caught out during the bombardment. Many went back into the city for safety when the attack came. Is that where you were?”

“Yes. There’s nothing left. I was lucky to find my way out to the fields. The other survivors…I don’t see how they could have made it this long.”

“What about the emergency supplies? And shelters?” Gradir asked in disbelief.

“There’s nothing left,” Ikan said softly. “Not a single building standing. I crawled out of the substructure. Whatever supplies are there are buried. I…there’s…”

Gradir grabbed his arm in a supportive gesture. “I am very glad you found your way out here. We need your help, badly.”

“It looks like you’re doing well enough on your own,” Ikan said, swiping away a tear.

“We don’t understand how to program any of this. It’s just running on whatever settings were here before the staff were killed.”

“There was no staff. It’s decommissioned with caretakers visiting every few weeks for monitoring. We were testing different varieties under extreme conditions to see how far we could press the plants’ limits. I doubt anyone was here when it was hit.”

“Well, we found two bodies. Or at least that’s what they said. They’re buried outside. We didn’t want to add them to the waste bins. It didn’t feel right.”

Ikan looked at Gradir for a moment, then pulled him into a light hug. He didn’t realize how much he missed his fellow Ter’nat, especially one that he knew.

“Thank you for being alive,” he said before he released him.

“Let’s try to keep it that way,” Gradir said with an understanding nod.

“Have you seen any of the J’gar since the bombardment?”

“No one has. I hope they left us for dead. Do you know the programming on this stuff?” he asked, thumbing at the clear chambers teaming with fruits and grains…some of which didn’t look so healthy.

“I designed it,” Ikan said, pushing away another wave of emotion. “If we reset to more normal environments we can get triple the output. Are you expecting to find more survivors?”

“We have some automation left, and we’re using it to scout further than we can walk. We almost had a functioning transport, but we’re missing replacement tires. We’re grabbing whatever stuff we can find, and every now and then we find another person. And now you just found us, so I’m hopeful for more.”

“Alright then. Let’s get production ramped up. What we don’t eat we can store for later. Have you found any Zen’zat?”

“I wish. You’re the best thing we’ve found so far, and I’m glad not to be in charge anymore. If that’s ok with you? Or do you need some time to recover?”

“I’ll take command,” Ikan said firmly. “You’re back on my staff, effective immediately.”

“Orders?” Gradir said with a smile.

“Inventory. I want to know every seed variety we have left, and how much we have. I don’t want to lose any of them. We’re going to need the nutrient diversity.”

“I’ve already compiled a partial list…” Gradir said as the two stepped back into old roles, pushing the recent horrors even further from Ikan’s mind. Forward was his future. Backwards was the dead. He had to choose between the two, so he dove into the task at hand and didn’t look back. He couldn’t if he wanted to keep his sanity.

6

May 7, 128818

Iom System (Midzan Region)

Puvvcor (Ter’nat colony)

Rajamal had two ships with him, a Wur’ki and a Ti’mat. Both were of Hjar’at manufacture and had been brought to him by other Zen’zat retreating from service assignments to aid in the defense of the Ter’nat colonies. Rajamal was in the smaller skirmisher and at the head of the two ship convoy when it entered the Iom System, only to discover that the Ter’nat stronghold was already under attack.

There were 3 planets here that held Ter’nat colonies, two of which were not fully inhabited, which was common for Ter’nat planets. The other was rare in that it was fully colonized and defended beneath a complete planetary shield, though weak in construction. The Zen’zat ships headed there immediately after braking against the star, and on approach they began to see what they were walking into.

The J’gar and Oso’lon were both here, which meant this was no orbital bombardment raid like the others. The Oso’lon already had troops on the ground, on the far side from the single planetary defense station that had been allotted here. The Tar’vem’jic within it would destroy the attacking fleet with ease should it come within range, but they were wisely invading the far side of the planet and working their way across the surface…meaning this was to be a land battle for the Zen’zat.

Rajamal was thankful the Hjar’at who operated this Ter’nat colony had insisted on the planetary defense station. Few others did, and it was the reason why at least part of the planet was safe. The backside was not, and orbital bombardment was currently underway there against the easy targets that the Tar’vem’jic could not protect.

He looked for the warship count, finding the enemy had a total of 53 ships and the defenders had 9 V’kit’no’sat vessels and 183 Ter’nat ones…all of which were taking refuge under the Tar’vem’jic’s firing range and daring the enemy to come in to challenge them, but the J’gar were too smart for that. However, when they finally did get close to the planetary defense station, those defending warships could bombard the enemy troops with impunity, and Rajamal was glad they had the sense not to go out and die stupidly in forced naval combat that they could not win.

The two Zen’zat ships altered course for that safe zone, and when they got into low enough orbit for realtime communications Rajamal reached out to whoever was in command, with an unfamiliar Hjar’at appearing in holo before him.

“Identify yourselves.”

“I am Rajamal, and I have two vessels of Zen’zat to assist in the defense of the planet. Please point me in the direction of the best location to kill an Oso’lon,” he said in all seriousness.

The Hjar’at frowned. “I thought you were dead.”

“I’ve been raiding damaged J’gar warships and keeping a low profile. We intercepted your courier and diverted here. Do you expect to get reinforcements?”

“I expect nothing, and your two ships are a welcome surprise. I am Neoum, and would greatly appreciate any of your special help on the northern continent. The shields are not down there yet, and we’ve convinced the enemy not to try and bombard them by running our warships in low and sniping their underbellies when they try, so the Oso’lon are attempting a ground campaign and making significant progress. Most of the troops I’m working with are Ter’nat, and I don’t need to explain to you what that means.”

“You do not. I have 837 Zen’zat ground troops ready for combat, and we prefer to operate in the same combat area.”

“You may seek out the enemy when and where you like, Rajamal. I have no illusions here. I cannot stop the Oso’lon, only delay them a few years, and they know it. Whittle them down where you can, and if a few more ships fortuitously arrive here then maybe we can talk about fighting them to a standstill. Unless that happens we’re in constant retreat, overpopulated with evacuees from other worlds, and on the wrong side of this one.”

“Have they touched the other two planets?”

“No, they’re rightly focusing everything here. If the planetary defense station falls, everything else is cleanup work.”

“Why are you not using your warships to assist with the ground fighting?”

“The Oso’lon themselves do not extend far enough forward. They wait for their insignificant troops to take down the shield generators, then they can move forward under the protection of their fleet’s guns. Their Bo’ja are spread out too thinly to attack and mixed with the Ter’nat most of the time. I cannot kill them without hitting my own infrastructure, but we do have some Zen’zat in aerial fighters for fire support.”

“Is the Oso’lon commander experienced?”

“Quite so. And I do not have the tools to counter him. I have a little under 6,000 Zen’zat left in the entire system, and 8 Hjar’at not counting myself. No one else remained to guard a planetary defense station. This galaxy has become delirious with hopelessness.”

“Who left?”

“The other Overlords, most of which were Hjar’at. They were ordered out by Netarruo to reinforce Baggam. He said to turn the planetary defense station over to the Ter’nat, after which we had an unpleasant conversation that will result in my arrest if I ever try and return to Baggam.”

“What is the logistics situation?”

“Ample food, infantry weapons, and workers. Too many workers for the cities we have left. My Ter’nat armies are well supplied, well trained, but still Ter’nat. The Bo’ja are slaughtering them where we don’t have numerical supremacy on a factor of 10 or more.”

“Ground vehicles?”

“That is the most even fighting. The Bo’ja are using Zen’zat vehicles and I have the Ter’nat mostly in the same. We have been producing them for years in preparation, but when the shields go down they are quickly targeted by the Oso’lon.”

“Have you killed any of them?”

“Only two, more than a year ago. They are more cautious of the Ter’nat now and have not given us an opportunity to take down another.”

“Is there a shield generator about to go down?”

“Three are in jeopardy. One is nearly lost and not worth trying to save. It will fall within the hour.”

“Then that is where we will start. Please provide the coordinates.”

“Do not be brazen and waste some of your Zen’zat in the attempt.”

“I intend to waste nothing. Send me the coordinates.”

“Very well, Zen’zat. If I am wrong and the shield generator can be saved, you will get a Saphorib Shield for this,” Neoum said, referencing the extremely rare Zen’zat combat award.

“I already have four,” Rajamal noted as the coordinates came through. “Deploying now. Stand by your fleet if a moment of opportunity occurs in response.”

“What do you plan to do?”

“Win,” Rajamal said, cutting the comm channel and turning to his bridge crew. A slew of detailed telepathic orders followed, then he headed off to the gear room with the rest of the troops onboard as both ships headed down into the atmosphere and were allowed passage through the shield on the safe side of the planet…then they diverted and skimmed the surface at low speed heading around the curve towards the war zones before they broke apart and headed for different shield generators.

Rajamal’s Wur’ki headed for the one in the most dire situation, and as soon as it came within range on the horizon he spotted 3 Zen’zat Triaf-class aerial fighters making strafing runs against armored ground vehicles…which is exactly what they were designed to do and had the extra shielding and firepower for it, but lower speeds and maneuverability were the downside. They were being escorted by Ter’nat squadrons that were having a hard time fighting against the Oso’lon attack drones that were little more than single floating weapons batteries the equivalent of what the ground vehicles had many of.

Those attack drones made up for the lack of aerial forces in support, and Rajamal wondered why they didn’t have Bo’ja in fighters. Maybe they weren’t experienced enough yet for that, or maybe the Oso’lon didn’t want to waste the resources on their expendable troops.

Rajamal ordered the Zen’zat fighters to fall back to the Wur’ki as the ship slid further down into the atmosphere and began making a fireball as it closed in on the shield generator, displacing so much air that it was causing a hurricane around it, and he didn’t want them or the Ter’nat to get caught in the ripples. The people on the ground, down and in the buildings would have to fend for themselves, because he had to bring the ship in this close or risk losing the shield generator before his Zen’zat could get into position to effectively defend it.

His crew opened up with the point defense weapons on any Bo’ja vehicle they had in range, peppering their shields with small, rapid-fire Dre’mo’don shots before they turned and put Ter’nat buildings between them and the ship…which the Zen’zat would not fire on…but as the warship slowed to a standstill others came into view and two quick vehicle kills were made while avoiding damaging the Ter’nat vehicles forming a choppy defense line around the base of the shield generator tower.

It wasn’t up to V’kit’no’sat standards, but the shield generator was providing a decent barrier against orbital bombardment out for nearly 200 miles from their current position, under which the attacking troops were approaching. Off over the horizon he could see Oso’lon perching with their necks up high enough to see, and Rajamal ordered a few shots to be taken at them.

They scattered as soon as the incoming fire hit nearby, retreating further back and ducking their heads to avoid taking any shield shots themselves. Two of the J’gar warships further back began to move forward a bit, but when the Wur’ki didn’t move beyond the shield generator they put a few shots low into it, trying to see if they could skim the horizon and get underneath it…but the shield was set at 50 meters above the horizon, and there wasn’t enough angle there to work with.

Had it been touching the ground the troops could have deployed shield disruptors to it and potentially brought enough chunks of it down for the warships to shoot through, which was why the ground invasion had to be allowed passage underneath it, with the shield barrier staying just out of reach above them.

But that gave Rajamal an opportunity to fight them on the ground rather than in naval combat, and on the ground was where his superior skills could be put into effect.

Once the Wur’ki was tucked in and sniping what few targets it could without hitting friendlies in the urban environment, Rajamal and 291 other Zen’zat jumped out of the ship and drifted down energy columns to the surface that both slowed their descent and acted as shields to protect them during the drop. All wore traditional armor, for there were no significant psionic threats nearby, and Rajamal was going to need as much speed and agility as he could get to maximize his killcount.

As soon as he hit the ground he was off running, with the rest of the Zen’zat pairing off in twos or sometimes threes as they spread out on hunting missions. They were not here to defend the shield generator, they were here to go after the Bo’ja and let the Ter’nat defend the generator. The Zen’zat that were assigned to this planet and already on site he contacted and informed them to keep the Ter’nat on task while his team became the focus of attention.

Rajamal had access to the Ter’nat tactical grid, so he had plenty of targets tagged along with many more that were not and moving through the urban infrastructure for cover. He stretched out his Ikrid and Pefbar as far as he could go and soon found a team of 4 Bo’ja heading through a subsurface tunnel beneath him.

Rajamal stopped running over the spot where he sensed the tunnel, then knelt down while delivering a hard punch to the ground along with a Jumat blast that cracked the pavement. He telekinetically lifted and tossed aside the pieces, then punched again and again until he broke through and dropped in just behind the running Bo’ja.

He had to catch up to them, but his movements were lightning fast compared to theirs and two turns down they finally realized someone was coming up from behind, so they turned and decided to fight it out.

Which was a horrible mistake.

As soon as Rajamal came into view the Bo’ja found themselves crippled with a Fornax blast. One who held a rifle dropped it, then fumbled to pick it back up as the Zen’zat caught up to them. He got kicked in his armored face and bounced into the sidewall, then managed to fire a few shots from his wrist-mounted weaponry before a fist came into his chest, pinned him against the wall, and cracked his armor on both sides.

The Bo’ja was thrown out into the tunnel, then an energy blast hit the cracked pieces of armor, melting and blasting them apart before what was left was Lachka lifted away, clearing the way for another punch that coincided with an energy blast that tore into the Bo’ja’s chest and vaporized part of his lungs.

The Bo’ja collapsed to the ground, hoping his Kich’a’kat would somehow heal him, but there was too much missing tissue in his lungs to replace after his heart was repaired…and by then the lack of oxygen to his brain rendered him unrecoverable anyway, though the regenerator continued to try and put him back together before it finally realized he was gone and shut down.

The other three Bo’ja suffered similar fates, then Rajamal was off to hunt more of the attackers while his team mostly did the same…but some of them were tasked with attacking and reclaiming some of the Zen’zat vehicles the Bo’ja were using. Doing so made the combat extra hard, but every one they managed to steal was one the Ter’nat could use later, and they intended to take back quite a few of the vehicles designed for them from the Bo’ja.

Meanwhile the aerial combat continued, with the Wur’ki helping to shoot down the attack drones immediately around the shield generator, though the Zen’zat were plucking them out of the sky with their psionics whenever they came close. They were inferior technology designed for light combat operations, and against the Ter’nat they were highly effective…but against Zen’zat they were little more than a waste of parts.

The biggest problem was the number of Bo’ja vehicles and the continuing waves of infantry reinforcements that were already assaulting the base of the shield generator. The vehicles were pummeling the wall shields of the tower when they didn’t have anything else to shoot, and if they kept at it with more backup arriving, they could actually break through that way if the generator didn’t switch off the overhead shield to reinforce the secondary vertical ones around its base…but if it did that the not so far away warships would have clear shots at everything else nearby, and they didn’t care much about friendly fire when it came to the Bo’ja getting in the way of their targets.

So the main shield had to stay up and the secondary shield had to hold on its own…which meant Rajamal had to take some of the pressure off it.

He wove his way in between Ter’nat vehicles, hoping they knew the difference between Bo’ja and Zen’zat, though the body shape was nearly identical. Across the field he ran, not even caring about jumping into the hot fire zone between the two, for he was moving so fast from one bit of cover to the next that the enemy didn’t have a lot of opportunity to track him, though a few shots did come close, and one clipped him in the shoulder, sucking 12% of his shields away.

That meant it was a heavy weapon, and if he took a square hit he’d lose most of the shield in an instant, but before they realized what was upon them the legendary Zen’zat had crossed the gap and was now in between the enemy ground assault vehicles, along with his array of well-honed and powerful psionics.

The weakest of the Bo’ja minds succumbed to his influence, actually climbing out of their vehicles at his command to be shot by the Ter’nat or Rajamal, and the others with more resistance were hit with Fornax and other disabling techniques as the Zen’zat ran from vehicle to vehicle and broke inside, pulling out and killing the crew, then tagging the vehicle was a non-combatant that needed to be claimed by the Ter’nat.

He proceeded to do this for many hours, and the Zen’zat he brought with him did the same. Never taking on more than they could handle or dying bravely for the cause. They were smart, sneaky, and overpowering compared to the Bo’ja who had just been in the same position versus the Ter’nat.

By the time they were done it was the Bo’ja survivors who turned and ran back towards the distant Oso’lon, with Rajamal letting them go rather than pursuing and getting too close to the long necks. They could savage Zen’zat in close combat, and taking them down required a combination of coordination and skill that few had. Rajamal wasn’t going to take on one today, but now that they knew there were ample Zen’zat on the field that could overwhelm their Bo’ja, they were going to have to switch tactics and come in here with them…or find some other way of taking down the shield generators.

If they got reinforcements then they had that option. If they didn’t, then their best hope was to assault so many different shield generators that Rajamal and his teams couldn’t cover them all.

He hoped they didn’t get a good head count on how many he had, and spent a lot of time analyzing and preparing their next move here. That would give the Ter’nat time to repair some of the fixed emplacements and let the evacuees from this area filter out towards the safer areas without Bo’ja poaching them from the rear columns.

When there was nothing left to hunt in the immediate area, Rajamal climbed to the top of the shield tower so he could look out over the terrain himself, and using his armor’s enhanced vision he zoomed in on his opposition in the distance. Several long necks were swaying back and forth over the assembly area where there had been a lot of drop pod activity bringing in new troops from orbit, but no longer. They’d shut down the troop movements, which suggested they were not coming back to this site soon.

Rajamal stood there and watched, then a tight beam transmission hit his armor without proper coding. It was being transmitted in the clear, but only to his position.

He returned the gesture, aiming a tight beam of his own back along the path to the Oso’lon from where it had come.

“What is your name, Zen’zat?”

“I am Rajamal,” he said plainly, not worried about them targeting him later, for they would based on his combat profile even if they did not know his identity, so little was lost by telling them.

“You are known,” the Oso’lon said, as if the statement itself was high praise. “Why ally yourself with this fight when there are far more valuable worlds to defend?”

“Why betray us with a death mark? The Zen’zat never betrayed the Oso’lon or the J’gar, and Zen’zat fought on both sides during the original Zak’de’ron war. We serve faithfully, and now we are rewarded with genocide?”

“Faithfully? There is an empire in the Rim led by treasonous Zen’zat offspring. Do not talk to me of faithful service. Your kind has proven to be flawed, and while presently superior to the Bo’ja, they will not show the same deviance as your race.”

“Destroying us will not erase our kin in Star Force. What do you hope to accomplish by this?”

“The V’kit’no’sat must be purified. We can no longer trust the Zen’zat, thus you are replaced. I am here to exterminate the vermin, but I understand if you choose to fight to the death rather than accept your fate. I would most likely do the same.”

“What is your name, Oso’lon?”

“Yel-san.”

“I hope the warships stay out of this long enough that you and I can meet.”

“For what purpose? There is no negotiation possible. The death mark cannot be negated for any reason. Itaru has made that clear.”

“If we meet, only one of us will live. So whenever you’re ready to quit hiding over the horizon, join your new Zen’zat replacements and come fight us. I promise that I will find you if you do.”

“You are no Ironnsey.”

“And you are no Primearch. Why don’t you spend your time fighting Hadarak? That’s your duty.”

“The empire must be reforged first. Without the true triumvirate it was irrevocably flawed. A painful lesson to learn, but one we are not going to forget. If you wish to live, I suggest you run to the Rim. No system in V’kit’no’sat territory will be safe for you.”

“No system is safe with the Hadarak already within our borders. If you wish to waste resources and time hunting us, then you are the traitors.”

“Whom do you serve, Zen’zat?” the Oso’lon scoffed. “You have lost Itaru, Mak’to’ran is dead, the Hjar’at and Era’tran have lost their capitols and are leaderless. The Urrtren is down and no one cares enough to come defend the Ter’nat other than you. Tell me, whom do you serve in this apocalyptic scenario?”

“Vengeance,” Rajamal said, ending the tight beam and their conversation. He had worked with many Oso’lon in the past, and this one was nothing special. Too high on ego and too low on experience, without an understanding of the way of the empire. Perhaps the Oso’lon were short on experienced personnel as well. Taking Itaru may have cost them more than was previously known.

He stood there looking at his opponent for a moment longer, then he brought his vision back to normal and descended the tower. After a quick rest and recharge, he and his troops were moving on to the next area of conflict. They didn’t have the luxury of staying put and defending a fixed target, and if the Oso’lon tried to take this shield generator again he’d be back. Until then he was going wherever the fighting was, and both he and his Zen’zat were more than happy to reduce the Bo’ja population in the galaxy a bit further.

The idea of them replacing the Zen’zat was absurd, and even with reduced numbers the Oso’lon were going to have to send more than them to take this planet. And when that happened, Rajamal was going to add another Oso’lon to his kill list, as long as he had his team to back him up. Ironnsey might have been able to take down one single handedly, but unless they were a total rookie Rajamal wasn’t going to be able to do that.

But that was ok, because Zen’zat also hunted in packs. And with the right team, Rajamal could kill any Oso’lon with the propper preparation and opportunity.

He just hoped he got one before the shields went down and this turned back into a naval war.

7

January 3, 128820

Iom System (Midzan Region)

Puvvcor (Ter’nat colony)

The V’kit’no’sat warships were a big problem for the J’gar and Oso’lon. As long as they were in play they couldn’t engage in a standard assault so long as the warships used the weak planetary shields to their advantage, staying beneath them and firing up through well-coordinated momentary openings. If the enemy had more ships that would have been different, but as it was they couldn’t use their Oso’lon on the ground to get the shield generators, and they couldn’t get the shield generators from above because of the warships below.

Never the less they pressed on with their Bo’ja, counting on their small size in the urban fighting to save them, but against the Zen’zat it was a hopeless fight. Even the Ter’nat warships were enough to provide close fire support in some areas, and their ground vehicles were performing better than Rajamal had expected. Especially when they got a few more from enemy captures.

The enemy had taken only one shield generator in nearly two years, and that was largely due to Rajamal’s presence on the ground. He was unkillable by the Bo’ja, and the only way one shield generator had gone down was with multilateral assaults where Rajamal couldn’t be two places at once. His loyal Zen’zat and those that he can ‘claimed’ from this planet with Neoum’s blessing, though he had little choice once the living legend arrived, were fighting to protect their Ter’nat kin, and with the galactic order for their annihilation and so many Overlords pulling out, Rajamal had far more command presence with them than the Hjar’at did.

But it wasn’t a dominance contest. Both were glad the other was here, and what Neoum had done with the Ter’nat forces was commendable. They were an effective barrier to the Bo’ja that slowed them down enough for the Zen’zat to make the kills. If not for those Ter’nat, the few thousand Zen’zat would have been overrun with targets and the shield generators would have gone down for simple lack of blocking capability.

Bottom line was they were holding, and word had gotten out about that hold. Another Zen’zat ship, this one built for Zen’zat, arrived courtesy of the neighboring system of Uyo and the Wass’mat that owned it.

And it was a Domjo filled with over 3,500 Zen’zat.

But two weeks after it arrived the enemy also got reinforcements in the way of a trio of traitorous Rit’ko’sor ships. Before the Urrtren went down only a handful of their planets had heeded Itaru’s offer of amnesty while most virulently rejected the reformed triumvirate, for their loyalty was with Mak’to’ran’s race who had brought them out of the Hadarak zone and restored them into the empire. A Zak’de’ron had killed him, and like most they had eagerly dove into the war against those bastards, so either some of them had changed their minds or these were from those few planets that initially defected.

And the Rit’ko’sor were a huge problem, for they were nearly as small as Bo’ja and far more mobile. They had an array of psionics, more so than the Bo’ja, and some of them were veteran troops now being deployed against grounded warships in an effort to take down more of the shield generators.

Rajamal had killed many of them in recent days, and he’d lost 721 Zen’zat to hand to hand combat with them…but no shield generators had been taken, and he feared the Rit’ko’sor were here more to thin the Zen’zat ranks than anything, and today he was proven right.

The alerts came through within a minute of each other, with the subsurface tunnels breaking through the surface nearby 22 different shield generators spread across the planet, and out of them came not only Bo’ja ground vehicles and infantry, but at least one Oso’lon with each, daring the fleet to spread out and attack them all, and if they did Rajamal was sure they’d simply retreat into the tunnels to avoid them.

This was bad. They’d tunneled beyond the border regions and gone past several shield generators to get at ones that were considered ‘secure’ and didn’t have the same levels of troops as the others. The Ter’nat fleet was already dispensing ships to each site, along with aerial transports to move troops and vehicles there…all the while he saw from his vantage point on the border another overland assault by the Bo’ja and the Rit’ko’sor. They were attacking on so many fronts he’d be mostly useless to stop them.

But when the enemy went all in on your infrastructure, it usually meant they left their own rear formations lightly guarded.

“Booner, Devva, we’re going rogue. Bring both of your units with me, we’re grabbing Ter’nat speeders and flanking the enemy. This shield generator is lost. Metra,” he said, contacting the Ter’nat field commander posted here. “We can’t hold, so get your troops in position for a fighting retreat. Delay them here as long as you can, and make them choose between the shield generator and me. Lono, assist them, but don’t try to win. I’m taking almost all Zen’zat here with me. Don’t get sloppy and lose extra people.”

“Where are you going?” Lono asked.

“Where they don’t want me,” Rajamal said, coordinating the rest of his orders remotely as he ran down the slanted side of the shield generator all the way to ground using the grip pads in his boots to keep from entering freefall. When he hit the ground he took off to a vehicle shed where there were many small and lightly armed speeders that could fit 3 or 4 Ter’nat each, which meant 2 Zen’zat max.

The teams he’d called with him numbered a little over 200, with the rest of the Zen’zat on the planet spread out in different locations the Oso’lon had been probing with the intention of spreading them out, and even now they had to choose between moving to the tunnels or staying put and defending the shield generators on the outer edge of the ‘safe’ territory, knowing that if they were cut off then the Oso’lon would be able to get under the single shield generators and take them down while the friendly warships could not skip over the gap without getting hammered by the enemy fleet.

They had to reposition, which meant abandoning the outer generators and the Ter’nat forces there. It was a horrible choice to make, and Rajamal was not going to let himself be played, so he was creating a third option.

His Zen’zat grabbed a lot of heavy weapons in addition to what their armor carried, including some extra shield generator harnesses, and loaded up on the speeders…then they took off laterally away from the now extremely vulnerable Ter’nat troops guarding the tower with the Rit’ko’sor and Bo’ja only minutes away.

Rajamal ignored them, knowing they had their orders and a reasonable expectation of survival if they followed them. His mission was ahead and to the right, with his speeder bike phalanx moving through the city at ground level then wheeling around faster than the Rit’ko’sor could run as they flanked the attacking forces and headed for the not so far off landing zone they were originating from.

The enemy warships were no longer here, having flown off over top of the planetary shields to start bombarding other targets and forcing the defending fleet to choose between preventing them from breaking through directly and going after the Oso’lon now in play. The V’kit’no’sat ships had to go to face their counterparts, leaving some of the Ter’nat warships to fight the Oso’lon and none to cover the enemy landing zones.

Rajamal intended to rip at least one of them up, and on approach he knew they’d been spotted when several of the drop pods began taking off and heading for space.

He accelerated hard and gained altitude while the other Zen’zat did not, knowing they couldn’t do anything with the light weapons they had to stop them from fleeing…but they were not Rajamal, and when he came close to one he launched himself off the bike towards it like a missile and hit it with his body rippling with Jumat.

That energy pool around him negated the shields enough for him to break through and hit the hull, with him bouncing off it slightly before he boosted his limited anti-grav and glided beneath the shield barrier before getting a handhold on the hull as the dropship raced up through the atmosphere.

Rajamal crawled around to near the upper cockpit and grabbed control of the feeble Bo’ja minds inside, making them halt their ascent and head back to ground slowly while opening the small escape hatch near them, through which he crawled inside and killed the trio onboard.

The Zen’zat pushed their bodies aside and took the pilot’s seat as his kin on the ground quickly rushed over the static defense turrets and plucked the Bo’ja out of them through a variety of means while other turrets were left unmanned. By the time Rajamal got back to ground with his captured drop pod, another two were burning hulks as the Zen’zat appropriated some of the turrets and roasted the laggards that hadn’t taken off immediately.

Others were now being claimed by the Zen’zat so they couldn’t leave, then finally two Oso’lon emerged from their barracks…which were more like barns. The Zen’zat scattered around them, knowing not to get too close, but they wouldn’t be able to pick them up and kill them with Lachka immediately, for his troops were all wearing their anti-psionic armor, meaning they had a small window of immunity before the power was drained by the behemoths.

Some of the appropriated ground turrets were now turned and shooting the Oso’lon, but their heavily armored bodies shrugged it off, for their shield generators were massive in addition to the green plates that carried heavy weaponry of their own.

They used that weaponry to start attacking their own turrets, and unlike the Bo’ja they couldn’t take control of the Zen’zat minds due to the Ikrid block…which was a major reason why the Zen’zat were superior, and that strength probably required too much trust for these bastards to allow the Bo’ja to possess.

The gun turrets did the damage to the Oso’lon’s shields, but the Zen’zat manning them had to abandon the turrets one by one as they were destroyed while the other Zen’zat were peppering the Oso’lon with handheld weapons from range even as the multiple turrets on the long necks’ bodies were firing back in all directions. Rajamal had to get down there or the Zen’zat were going to lose. They could take one Oso’lon without him, but not two, especially if both worked together.

He set the drop pod on auto-pilot and selected a safe spot away from the fighting for it to land, then he jumped out and glided down to the surface in spurts to avoid making himself an easy target. Despite that he got clipped by one shot from an Oso’lon and lost 38% of his shield strength for it.

Once he hit the ground he became a blur, telepathically organizing the Zen’zat into the hunting parties he wanted, each with their own assignments…then as the Oso’lon were finishing off the last of the turrets he went right at both of them using a small building as cover before popping out and jumping on one’s tail.

Just before he did so one of the Zen’zat teams simultaneously launched Fornax blasts towards the Oso’lon’s head, with the combined assault making him twitch and stumble for a moment, unable to target Rajamal as a second Zen’zat team did the same to the other one…otherwise he would have been smacked with so much weaponry that he probably would not have survived more than 10 seconds.

But he got on his tail and used his Jumat to get his body through his shields directly over a weapon port, then blasted it with multiple shots before laying a small explosive on it and jumping clear before its short timer ran out.

It exploded before the Oso’lon regained his senses enough to telekinetically pluck it off, and the weapon battery beneath it was damaged enough to be inoperable for a moment as Rajamal ducked beneath the Oso’lon’s legs for cover from the other one, then he emerged out the other side, putting the bulk of one between him and the other longneck as he grappled with the closer one’s mind.

One skill that Zen’zat had that was underrated was mental power. Because of their smaller minds they started with a huge disadvantage, but over the years with experience and training they gained much strength…and with the rest of his Zen’zat doing likewise through Ikrid, Fornax, Orren, and Saven, the Oso’lon had few moments where his mind was not under assault to manually target Rajamal or the others. So he did the only thing he could, blocking out most of it and swinging his giant tail around as a battering ram in the hopes to sweep them aside.

Rajamal jumped over it then went after another weapon battery on the Oso’lon’s armor while the other one was likewise distracted. The other Zen’zat did not have the shield penetrating Jumat in their psionic kit, for it was rare for any Zen’zat to possess it, but most of his people had a slew of tier 2 abilities that they were using to distract while reaching in with their Lackha to try and grab tissue inside the Oso’lon to tear apart when they found an opening, but it wasn’t often. Mostly they just poured their small arms firepower into the giant beast along with explosives and larger handheld weapons that only chipped away at the shield strength. Until they got it down they couldn’t do much to damage the armor itself with their Lachka, for none of them had the strength to smash it.

And while in defensive mode the Oso’lon was jamming them with his own Lachka, set to push back on any fields moving towards his body. It wasn’t true jamming, that was Da’nu and he was glad the Oso’lon did not possess that psionic, but the more both Oso’lon had to curl up into defensive mode the less they could worry about Rajamal as he almost quietly danced around their thrashing as he plucked their armor’s offensive capabilities away from the closer one.

But the Oso’lon were not completely incapacitated, and their running and stomping provided ample threat of crushing a Zen’zat. Furthermore, they began to set their weapon targeting on automatic, with their bodies lighting up like a fireworks display with every single battery they had shooting the closest targets.

That was the smart play to make, and it meant they were thoroughly compromised mentally. Rajamal and the others took hits to their shields from the smaller anti-personnel batteries while the larger ones were doing major damage. He avoided a hit at the last moment, but several of his Zen’zat did not, taking chest or head shots and going down or having to retreat before getting hit a second time, but those Zen’zat with the shield harnesses could take several hits, and they moved forward to draw the most fire while the others continued to mentally assault the Oso’lon as Rajamal jumped up on the back of the closer one and ran up its spine towards its swaying head.

He was having to use Jumat with each step to keep from slipping on the Oso’lon’s shields while using his own and his Nakane to reach the head alive, but when he did he grabbed on tight and emitted the largest Fornax field he could.

The Oso’lon fell, unable to control its own body even as its turrets were still accurately firing on the Zen’zat. A moment later his shields dropped, for when hit with Fornax it was hard to maintain one’s mental barriers. Rajamal and the Zen’zat got inside his head and made him drop the shields momentarily, and to their credit the Zen’zat worked fast to get explosives near the armor turrets. A moment later most of them were destroyed with explosions or coordinated Dre’mo’don fire, then Rajamal could hold the field no longer and had to jump off the Oso’lon’s head before he got telekinetically squashed into goo.

He barely got out before his psionic dampener failed, then his legs were pinched together and he fell onto the pavement a moment before the Zen’zat distracted the Oso’lon for a split second enough to release his grip. Rajamal ran hard to get out of range, then circled back as his countermeasures started to recharge…only to see one of the Zen’zat assaulting the other Oso’lon get flung into a wall by a narrow Jumat blast, bounce off it, then get stomped by one of the massive front legs before it stumbled again.

Nearby there were also Bo’ja corpses, which the Zen’zat had quickly dealt with. As long as these two Oso’lon didn’t get reinforcements Rajamal was going to kill them, but first the weapons had to come off.

He ran around the big one near him towards the slightly smaller one on the other side, then repeated the same type of attacks, plucking weapons off his armored body until all he had left were just a few turret points that the Zen’zat were now hiding from around the perimeter of his body. That left the formidable psionic power of the Oso’lon to deal with, and Rajamal was nearly depleted of Jumat energy. Both Oso’lon still had their shields up, so this wasn’t going to be easy, but the greatest threat to his Zen’zat were now gone and they were going to keep dancing around these two until…

Suddenly they broke apart, running separate ways and forcing Rajamal to choose between them. Rather than split his team up he chose to stay with the bigger one and focus everyone on it. Drained as they were, the Zen’zat still had enough psionic firepower to assault this one’s mind, and with all of them put together…minus those injured or killed…this Oso’lon became a staggering mess until Rajamal got to his head and took him to the ground again before the long neck could focus enough to knock them all back with its own Jumat.

It stayed down, for others ran in and added their own Fornax as some reached inside his mind with their Lachka and pushed and pulled on anything they could get a grip on while Rajamal tried to burn through his armor plating…but like all V’kit’no’sat armor, when one area got damaged nanites from others flowed in to replace it, meaning he was mostly wasting his time, except that he was putting his fist into the gap to try and keep it from fully reforming.

But he didn’t need to, for someone found a gap in the Oso’lon’s reflexive Lachka pushes and torqued something inside his brain enough that he quit fighting back with his Lachka…and that doomed him. The Zen’zat tore apart his brain without ever getting through his armor and shields, reducing his skull to a cup of goo even as his armor’s Kich’a’kat tried to heal him.

There weren’t many memories left to recover, but Rajamal didn’t take any chances. He and the Zen’zat assaulted his head with shot after shot while he used his last remaining Jumat energy to push the shields away enough for them to get some shots through, and when the armor breached he dove a hand through the gap before it could reform.

His fist dove into the broken skull, punching through to the interior and depositing one of the small explosives that another Zen’zat had left, for Rajamal had long ago used all his. The armored hand came back out, and as the armor reformed to cover the broken skull the explosive went off and ended any chance of this Oso’lon’s recovery.

Rajamal checked the tactical grid again, as he had been doing multiple times during the fight to check for reinforcements arriving…particularly a warship…but nothing was coming. The other Oso’lon had taken off running and didn’t turn back, meaning he was too far out of range to go after…and without more explosives and time for his Jumat to recharge, they would lose too many people trying to take him down, so it was better to cut their losses, secure this victory, and move on.

“Take the drop pods and anything else of value. Destroy everything else,” he said as he headed for the Oso’lon buildings. He’d need to sabotage their power cells to get the destruction he desired, while the smaller stuff could be taken down by hand or using the drop pods’ weaponry. “How many did we lose?”

“Five dead, 18 heavily injured,” Booner answered.

“Get the casualties to the planetary defense station. After we finish here, we’re finding the closest Rit’ko’sor and going hunting,” he said, knowing he didn’t need Jumat or explosives for that. “Anyone not up to it, pilot the drop pods back and make yourself useful on their turrets. Help the Ter’nat where you can without taking hits.”

Half an hour later the Zen’zat were leaving, either in drop pods or on speeders, with the largest building in the landing zone being the only one visibly intact…at least until the power cells overloaded and the whole thing blew with a mushroom cloud that the warships could not have missed.

Before they could have a chance to come after them Rajamal and the Zen’zat were gone, but as they got time to digest what was going on elsewhere they realized that the Oso’lon and J’gar probably didn’t care, for they were racking up so many shield generator takedowns that it didn’t matter, though Rajamal was surprised they had let one of their own die without support.

Maybe they were that desperate for a victory here, but even with these heavy losses they were a long way from the planetary defense station with a lot more shield generators to take between here and there…but in the meantime there was fighting still going on everywhere, and Rajamal intended to diminish the Rit’ko’sor count as much as possible, for they were by far the most effective ground troops in play, and even the Ter’nat in vehicles had little chance to defend themselves against their lethal swiftness.

As Rajamal flew his speeder towards the fight with a second Zen’zat perched behind him, he mentally added another Oso’lon kill to his lifetime tally, bringing it up to 4, but he didn’t feel any pride here. There were too many enemies for him to kill, and both Zen’zat and especially Ter’nat were dying rapidly. He knew he couldn’t save them all, but if victory was to be had here it was going to be in whether or not they held the planet. For no matter how many Oso’lon he killed here, if the warships were able to sit up in the sky and bombard everything, what would be the point?

At the very end of this campaign would be the planetary defense station, and the enemy did not have anywhere near enough ships to tackle it. They’d have to go over ground and hope to get some massive troop reinforcements, otherwise they didn’t have a chance. But then again they might just kill all the Ter’nat on the planet elsewhere and call their mission complete, for the planetary defense station couldn’t shelter even a small fraction of their numbers beneath its strong shield generator, let alone inside the pyramid itself.

Rajamal didn’t intend to let it go that far. They needed to hold them far from the pyramid to preserve a large amount of Ter’nat, and the enemy had them at a disadvantage now with the Rit’ko’sor and the subsurface tunnels. The tunnels he could handle in time personally, but if more enemy troops kept arriving…

He just hoped more Zen’zat would arrive to help their brothers. If not, and the enemy kept getting sporadic reinforcements…then this was going to be a very long and bloody campaign. And one that might ultimately end in failure.

Rajamal didn’t know what was going to happen, but he was determined to fight it out here. For if they couldn’t hold a Ter’nat colony with a planetary defense station, how could they hope to hold any of the others? If the Ter’nat were to survive, if the Zen’zat were to survive, then they had to hold this planet…or run out to the Rim like the Oso’lon had suggested.

8

March 19, 128821

Iom System (Midzan Region)

Puvvcor (Ter’nat colony)

Rajamal was on a sleep cycle, recovering from another battle to hold a shield generator that had cost him two Zen’zat, but he’d killed 16 Rit’ko’sor and more Bo’ja than he could count. Still, it wasn’t worth the Zen’zat, one of which he’d known for more than 300,000 years. This attrition was destroying the Zen’zat as much as the Ter’nat eradication. If they couldn’t get replacements, and the veterans were gradually knocked off, then the Zen’zat were going to end up nothing more than a memory with a few survivors scattered across the galaxy.

He woke to another alarm, barely getting 3 hours and feeling drained. With so many battles to fight he was involving himself personally in as many as he could, and the enemy was sending out constant harassment attacks between their major pushes to keep him and the Zen’zat where they wanted them while setting up for attacks elsewhere with their mile deep tunnels that the warships were having a hard time detecting until they came back up near the surface…and sometimes not even then.

Rajamal assumed another one had broken through, for his Zen’zat would not have woke him for a skirmish so early into a sleep cycle. They knew his Jumat tissues, not to mention his other psionics, needed recharge and without it he wasn’t going to be able to fight to his fullest. The alarm would not have sounded in his quarters within the pyramid unless something significant was underway.

He pulled himself out of the egg-like bunk feet first then pivoted up and over the edge, dropping down and jogging to the lavatory to empty out, then when he went to grab a set of armor someone finally arrived in the otherwise empty barracks to tell him what was going on.

“We have help,” a rookie Zen’zat by the name of Argul said with uncertain look on his face.

“Who has arrived?”

“Star Force has. Three ships, one Warship-class, one troop transport, and one MCV-class. They are Meintre, one of their Knight races, and they are claiming that they are here to annex the Ter’nat. They ordered the J’gar and Oso’lon out of the system, but they aren’t leaving.”

“Annex?” Rajamal asked, his groggy mind sharpening rapidly.

“Apparently Director Davis pulled the entire Meintre fleet away from other duties, including the Hadarak front, and tasked them with safeguarding and annexing the Ter’nat into their empire.”

“Only one warship?”

“Yes, but it’s bigger than anything in the system.”

“Where am I needed?”

“The Meintre are in orbit and have launched dropships with troops aboard. They’re here to fight and they’re not suffering any delay. They’ve also instructed us that we are not to touch any prisoners they take, or there will be consequences.”

“What class is the troop transport?”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t check, but it’s bigger than the warship.”

“Where are their dropships headed?”

“Everywhere the enemy is.”

Rajamal walked over to a wall niche and pulled out a small vial of ambrosia and drank it all. His head was going to start buzzing with the overload, but he needed as much in his tissues as possible before he went into combat again. He chose the psionic-resistant armor and climbed into it, with the hard plates wrapping around his body and snugging up tightly while leaving his head uncovered.

“I need transport.”

“There’s one holding for you on the north pad, tier 3. Should I come with you?”

“You can travel with me, but not into combat. Find somewhere you can contribute without getting killed. That won’t be where I’m going.”

“Where are you going?” Argul asked as Rajamal ran out of the barracks with the younger Zen’zat following off his left shoulder.

“Wherever the worst fighting breaks out. One troop transport isn’t going to be enough to overwhelm them and the Oso’lon know it.”

“But why stay and risk getting into a war with Star Force?”

“If they only sent one warship then Star Force probably doesn’t have the fleets to spare to fight a war with Itaru unless they abandon the Hadarak front. One warship sent here is either an attempt to preserve the planet or bluff them into retreat. The Oso’lon are calling that bluff, as would I.”

“You think the dropships will turn around?”

“No. I think they’re going to fight, but victory is not assured beyond the shield generators. The J’gar still have the warship advantage, but with the Meintre we now have the advantage on the ground and need to use it before they have a chance to get additional reinforcements…”

By the time Rajamal got to the waiting gunship the Meintre already had some troops on the ground in 4 different locations across the planet, meaning he had to choose where to go. All were locations of the deepest incursions into Ter’nat territory, and the planetary shields were dropping momentarily to let them down while keeping the enemy warships out…but along with them came some naval drones slipping under the shields, and that was something the enemy would not tolerate.

Their warships responded by leaving their waiting positions over the horizon and moved to assault the nearest of the locations where troops were going down in order to punch through the shields and take down the generator, after which they could deal with the drones underneath as well as the Ter’nat vessels beginning to rush there.

The V’kit’no’sat warships were also moving to respond, but it was the Star Force warship and troopship that raced to get there first. The latter carried no drones but was still decently armed and, more importantly, over 30 miles long. Even if it didn’t have a single weapon on it, it could soak up so much damage from the other targets to be useful…but it did have weapons to defend itself with, heavy shields and thick armored plates beneath. It could take a pounding, and it was heading to one of the other 3 locations while the warship was going to the point where just about every other naval asset was heading for a massive throw down far from the firing range of the planetary defense station.

If Itaru’s forces wanted to assault the shield generator, they’d have to pound it while giving the V’kit’no’sat and Star Force free shots at them…which they couldn’t allow. That meant the naval fight had to be resolved first, giving the ground forces their own time to settle things face to face, and it looked like the Meintre were not giving the enemy time to stall. They were dropping in perilously close to the Oso’lon tunnel heads, but they had aerial craft with them providing cover as the dropships skimmed the ground delivering infantry and the larger Meintre troops, each of which was a hexped far smaller than an Oso’lon, but still huge compared to the Zen’zat and Bo’ja.

“Take me there, then head east and link up with the Ter’nat column,” Rajamal ordered the pilot, then he moved to the boarding hatch and commanded the door to open as he waited. When his tactical grid said he was over the approximate area he jumped out, using his limited anti-grav to slow his descent to one of the rooftops 100 meters below.

Rajamal hit, rolled, and came up running…then he jumped off the roof and reversed his body so he could drag a hand on the wall and, using his grip pad on it, ride the wall all the way to the ground as if he was dropping down a rope.

The area where he hit was long deserted of Ter’nat civilians, and a quick check with his Pefbar confirmed that, but the sounds of combat ahead were intensifying and he needed to get there as quickly as he could, though his legs were still fatigued and his head buzzing. The latter would go away as he fought, but the fatigue would not. He’d have to deal with it, for even at half strength he was more powerful than any of the Zen’zat on the planet.

He ran at a decent pace, using his armor to help increase his stride, then came up on the rear formation of Ter’nat assault vehicles moving forward in the direction he was heading. Rajamal ran up to, then hopped on top of one as he passed them by, for they could not move too fast on the city streets with all the 60 degree turns, for this area had been laid out in a triangle grid.

Rajamal hopped from one vehicle to another until he got past them, then cut across the alleys where the vehicles could not go. He ran and ran until he finally came up on a Star Force landing zone just as a dropship was taking off, having emptied its hold of a variety of biped infantry, some of which were four-armed Calavari, a lot of two-armed bipeds of various races, and a pair of others that he had not expected to find here.

The Star Force troops saw him coming up on them but didn’t turn around, save for the pair. They ran over to Rajamal and matched stride with him, doing a quick rework of their comm systems so they could talk to each other while still encoded.

“Holy shit, Rajamal. I had no idea it was you,” one of the Star Force Zen’zat said once his ID popped up on the battlemap. “Why are you running so slow?”

“Not enough sleep,” he said, recognizing the voice of an old acquaintance as they continued to run together towards the sounds of battle ahead. “How are you with Star Force?”

“We switched sides back with Tamprani and have been fighting Hadarak until the Meintre were recalled. Most of us volunteered to go with them, so we’ve got a decent Zen’zat force mixed in here. No way in hell we’re letting them take this planet, or any other. The Ter’nat are our responsibility now, and we’re going to protect our own.”

“How do the Meintre compare to the Oso’lon?”

“Don’t worry about them, just don’t kill any of their targets unless necessary. They want to kick the bastards out rather than kill them, and unless our lives are in jeopardy we’ve got stun orders that we have to follow.”

“This is not a lopsided fight,” Rajamal protested as a Meintre ahead of them came into view around a building corner. He was running forward as well, but beginning to take lobbing fire from some target ahead, though his shields protected him from it as if it were no more than a light rain.

“Yeah it is. I know you’re stronger than us, but we’ve been upgraded heavily. Follow us in and pile on, you’re not going to be able to link in, so when we give you directional orders follow them. A lot of our attacks are energy bands stretching between us.”

“Additional psionics?” Rajamal asked, finally seeing the fixed emplacements ahead that the Oso’lon had added around the tunnel entrance.

“Pa’no’semak, Rajamal. They’re psionics we all have in our genome that were buried deep and never discovered. The V’kit’no’sat put them there and Star Force found them. Now we all have them unlocked, but for the tier 3s we’re on our own to earn, either the normal route or through leveling up enough to warrant a medical unlock. I don’t have your Jumat, but in groups we’re far superior to the original Zen’zat…just not you. But let us make first strike so you can see before you throw down.”

“Go,” he said simply, letting them get a few steps ahead as the Meintre was doing a good job of being hard to catch as it ran to catch up with some others…then the first of the Oso’lon came into view, or rather it’s head, over the top of a side building…which was when Rajamal began picking up Bo’ja on his Pefbar.

He followed the two Zen’zat in Star Force armor around a curve right into the middle of a firefight between Star Force infantry and Bo’ja, the latter of which were behind several alley-way obstructions while the Calavari were fighting behind a number of physical personal shields the leading group was carrying in addition to their armor.

Nym and Derox went over them, but they didn’t jump. Somehow they climbed invisible stairs up into the air that Rajamal could not see with his sensors or psionics, but a solid jump took him up and over as well, though he had to do a second hop inside the Star Force lines to get all the way to the front where the two Zen’zat were coming down and taking almost all the fire behind a mutual bioshield that he could see.

Rajamal followed in their wake, taking a few hits of his own, then he got a telepathic boundary warning to stay back from. He slowed to let them get farther ahead, then they launched themselves over the nearest obstruction and dropped down directly inside the Bo’ja lines…releasing a Fornax field so large Rajamal had never seen anything like it.

Dozens of Bo’ja went down as others further back fired on the two Zen’zat…which was when Rajamal ran forward and jumped as high as he could, passing over top the field and signaling his fellow Zen’zat of his approach trajectory. They dropped the field just as he fell into it on the far side, then he came up in a flurry of punches and kicks, along with a few Jumat blasts, but no Dre’me’don shots other than to weaken shields. If the new help wanted to take them alive, he’d play along so long as victory wasn’t compromised by it.

The Calavari didn’t stand still either, with them coming up and fully stunning the Bo’ja that had been knocked down, then Nym and Derox moved ahead again, letting their new empire’s infantry clean up and hold the prisoners as they passed on by and into the clear where the real fighting was going on.

There were four Oso’lon out there going at it with over a dozen Meintre, but the two Zen’zat didn’t hesitate to go after them, and Rajamal stayed tucked right in behind them despite his tired legs. They got orders over the battlemap and passed them on to Rajamal telepathically, with the trio following up on one Meintre that had dove in and got a trunk lock on an Oso’lon’s front leg.

The four different trunks on the face of the Meintre acted like tentacles, and all were fully armored and shielded, with them low looped around the Oso’lon’s leg with him and the Meintre firing their energy weapons at each other at point blank range as the hexped held the quadruped in place, using his own body as a giant weighted leg shackle.

The Oso’lon panicked as others began to move towards him, summoning up a huge Jumat blast, trying to throw the Oso’lon off, but he only managed to lift him off his feet. The Meintre came crashing back down, his hold unbroken, but the wave continued out elsewhere, knocking over abandoned Ter’nat vehicles and heading for the Zen’zat trio.

Rajamal sprinted in front of the other two as they fell back, then he sent his own Jumat directly ahead with the two waves canceling out in a small area. He got pushed back a little, but not knocked over, as did the others as they continued running forward.

Two more Meintre got in close and grabbed other legs on the Oso’lon, and once all three had grips on him they all emitted some kind of lightning attack that drained his shields to the point of breaking as the Oso’lon finally managed to knock the first one off with a headbutt/Jumat combo, then he delivered a heavy weapon blast directly onto his head, busting through the Meintre’s shields and scorching the armor underneath.

“We’re going for his head. Come with us,” Nym said, telepathically linking with Rajamal so he could show him the Qwe’kal footsteps to hit. The pair held them longer than normal so he could stair step up into the air as well, and the three quickly climbed up to long neck head height before jumping over the back of the Oso’lon’s swaying neck.

Rajamal went directly for the head, but he missed as the long neck swung out of the way. An invisible step appeared beneath them and he got a foot on it, launching himself back up in a long jump as the two Zen’zat fell on either side of the neck and somehow forced it lower. Rajamal didn’t know how, but it was enough to get the Oso’lon’s head somewhat pinned in place.

His jump brought him close to it, but not directly in alignment…so he glided on his anti-grav over a few meters as the head jerked his way, hitting him.

Rajamal took the blow and latched on to the now shieldless armor of the Oso’lon, emitting his own Fornax field and making the big quadruped wobbly enough that the two remaining Meintre with leg holds were able to fully tip him over onto his side.

The other one ran up and jumped on the neck, pinning him to the ground as they pumped stun blast after stun blast into him. Nym and Derox did as well, with Rajamal activating his single, small stun weapon and added the insignificant firepower to the rest…then he and the others got a telepathic stand down order from one of the Meintre…followed by the Oso’lon retracting his armor down to ankle clasps.

He had surrendered prior to being rendered unconscious and was now a prisoner…which meant Rajamal needed to move on, as did the other two Zen’zat. They ran off on another support mission and Rajamal went with them, genuinely surprised at how the Meintre had been able to hold on against that Jumat blast. Oso’lon used it as a clearing mechanism around them, as well as a takedown mechanism on their larger opponents…but the Meintre couldn’t be knocked off with those face-locks, and that was a huge problem for the Oso’lon when they were outnumbered as they were here.

“Rit’ko’sor,” Rajamal warned as several of the swift bipeds came into view near the tunnel exit, and presumably coming out of it.

“We see them. You want first dibs or want to keep playing with the other Oso’lon?”

“Your Meintre have them beat,” Rajamal said, running ahead of the other two towards the oncoming Rit’ko’sor as he charged up a large Jumat blast. “I’ll take these. You get what’s left…”

9

Captain Nelfrani stood onboard the Meintre warship with all six of his round feet touching the silver circle on the floor that acted as a direct mental interlink, using the physical connection to allow for greater speeds than a wireless system, whether it be technological or telepathic. He and the other Meintre onboard the ship were piloting the warship and her drones, half of which had already been destroyed in the naval combat taking place in atmosphere for the most part.

There were a number of Esquires onboard from various small races that assisted the Meintre, but the bulk of the drone work was done by the Knight race with their larger minds controlling multiple functions on each drone. In the case of Nelfrani, he had the warship’s main weapon under his direct control while he oversaw the larger battle and gave orders where necessary to coordinate the rest of his crew here and onboard the troopship.

The main weapon as a bloon launcher, and he was currently using it to pummel an Oso’lon Domjo with shield draining energy balloons as his own warship’s shields were down to 13%. Normally that would have been a problem, but the enemy fleet was in such disarray that he knew his ship’s hull wasn’t going to be touched.

The Domjo they were currently pounding on was pounding back, ignoring the drones and trying to break through the warship’s shields as it hung in the upper atmosphere like a giant dark spot in the sky shooting vivid light bulbs at a smaller dark spot much closer to the ground. Nelfrani knew he couldn’t take the ship down or it would crash on those below, which was why he had his crew pinpoint poking out its weapons when the bloons hit and momentarily disrupted the shields enough that a strong hit could at least partially break through.

The Domjo was the only intact enemy ship left. All the J’gar ships had been damaged and forced to retreat, but the Oso’lon were not relinquishing their footholds on the planet, with this Domjo sitting directly over one and preventing the Meintre on the ground from taking it. If they tried the warship’s weapons would roast the ground troops, meaning the enemy on the ground had a safe haven so long as that Domjo sat there.

Nelfrani didn’t have any drones with him, for they were scattered elsewhere around the planet dealing with the other footholds that were all in the process of falling. Only this one had a warship covering it, while the troop ships that had brought the Oso’lon and Rit’ko’sor here were waiting out of range in space to see what would happen.

One on one, a Star Force warship without its drones would lose against a Domjo, but there were 14 Ter’nat vessels and one V’kit’no’sat Ti’mat assisting him, yet the Oso’lon ship was not targeting them at all. They wanted the Meintre ship, but they were not going to get it.

The slugging continued until the enemy ship’s shields went down and it started taking hull damage, then when most of its weapon systems were plucked the enemy captain finally made contact with Nelfrani.

“We will relent,” the Oso’lon said gruffly. “Cease fire and discuss terms.”

The warship’s batteries fell silent immediately, but the Ter’nat did not stop shooting. Nelfrani ordered them to do so, but when they were slow to react he started firing on them with disruptive weapons. Those without shields took hull hits and had much of their internal mechanisms go dead, but not enough to drop them out of the sky. That got their attention real fast, and they complied with the order, ending the naval fight here while drone activity was still taking place elsewhere across the planet.

“You will take all your personnel off planet, release any prisoners you have taken, then exit the system to never return. This is Star Force territory now.”

“I will not argue your current position of strength, but the Ter’nat and Zen’zat belong to the V’kit’no’sat, and how we deal with them is our business, not yours.”

“Director Davis has made it our business. My race is now tasked with the protection of the Ter’nat. If you wish to destroy them, you will have to deal with us. I am promising no retaliation if you leave now, but engage us in battle again and we will not be so forgiving,” he said, flexing all four of his trunks so they pressed against each other in an isometric display of strength, and for a Meintre that was a threatening gesture that the Oso’lon may or may not have interpreted correctly.

“Will we get our prisoners back?”

“I have no desire to detain them. We kept them alive as a courtesy. One you did not show the Ter’nat and Zen’zat. Had we suffered any deaths today it might be different, but as we’re on a clean slate other than a few injuries, I think it best if we get away from each other as quickly as possible.”

“These vermin are yours, but I cannot promise Itaru will not respond to your intervention here.”

“Not just here. We’re taking possession of all Ter’nat colonies, including the ones you have already destroyed. We were pulled off combat with the Hadarak for this, meaning we had to leave people there to die that otherwise could have been evacuated because of you. If Itaru has any wisdom left in it, you will stay very far away from all Ter’nat colonies, for if you force us to abandon more people to their deaths in the war zone, we will make you pay for it one way or another. Take your forces, leave, and hope we stay too busy to make you pay for what you’ve already done. Make us pay more attention to you at your own peril.”

“You are bold to poach our worlds, Meintre. Do not assume you will not be punished for it,” the Oso’lon said before cutting off the comm just before drop pods from the troopships began to head down to the surface everywhere, with the fighting coming to a stop in even the smaller engagements as the Oso’lon ordered their forces to stand down.

Nelfrani ordered all prisoners gathered into 6 different pickup zones and sent the coordinates to the Oso’lon as he watched the J’gar ships begin to leave the planet enroute to the central star, not caring to stick around and watch as the Oso’lon picked up their people.

“It seems we need to come to an accord, Meintre,” Neoum’s image said as he appeared in holo.

“What do you mean by that?”

“I owe you a great debt for what you have done here, but this world is still V’kit’no’sat territory.”

“It ceased being V’kit’no’sat territory when you lost the ability to hold it,” Nelfrani said calmly. “You can either remain and assist us in rebuilding it, or you can leave to return to a Hjar’at world knowing that the Ter’nat will be in safe hands. Either way, their race is officially being annexed into our empire. You can now repurpose the warships you have defending them to your own defense. Trying to deny our annexation is foolish on multiple fronts.”

“How do you have the strength to claim them all? Including those that have not come under Itaru’s attack? Will you assault them to take them from us?”

“Given present circumstances that shouldn’t be necessary. Your worlds are at risk of falling to the Zak’de’ron and their servants. You need all your resources to defend them, and we are taking responsibility for many worlds off your spines. What do you have to gain from spiting us?”

“We are taught not to relent, but Mak’to’ran once said Star Force was the rimward half of our empire. Perhaps this is you finally starting to do your duty to it.”

“We have been busy doing YOUR duty to fight the Hadarak, Hjar’at. You started this war with the Zak’de’ron, not us. Now we have to defend the galaxy on our own, for both your empires are too weak to help fight the larger enemy. We owe you nothing but contempt for your foolishness. Take the small blessing we are providing you and make use of it.”

“Why didn’t your Director send one of our races to assist the Ter’nat?”

“You would have to ask him. They and the Meintre are both Knight races, and fully equipped to defend the empire. We just have a lot of enemies to fight and very little help to do it. My homeworlds have been stripped of our primary defense fleets and are now relying on lesser Star Force factions to take our place so we can come here with our full force. And we are doing so, not because we need the Ter’nat, but because they need a hero to save them, and the V’kit’no’sat are failing miserably. You and the others that remained are to be credited for doing your duty, but the others are not. They left the Ter’nat nearly helpless.”

“They have always been nearly helpless,” Neoum pointed out. “What does your Director intend to do with them?”

“They won’t be providing you Zen’zat. You’ll have to make do with what you’ve already got or start letting them breed.”

The Hjar’at’s spines flared briefly, then returned to their normal glass-like look. “Do you think we have fallen so low to allow that heresy?”

“I think you have fallen so low that you have to look up to see the bottom. In the past the V’kit’no’sat made anyone who dared attack them pay dearly for that intrusion of your territory. Now you can’t hold your own worlds against those who used to be your masters. Ever since Mak’to’ran’s death your empire has made one blunder after another, and now you can’t even communicate with each other with the Urrtren down. Do you even now how much of an empire you have left?”

“I do not. All I know is my duty, and since you are here to do it for me, then I will leave it to you without resistance. The Ter’nat are used to my command, and they will have issues with yours. They need a firm foot on their neck to keep them looking forward. Freedom is toxic to them, and they will destroy themselves if you give it to them.”

“We are not here to make them Humans,” the Meintre offered. “They are Ter’nat and they will remain Ter’nat. We’re here to offer protection and some upgrades. And for those that are worthy to ascend to Zen’zat, they will serve Earth. Not Itaru.”

“Why? You serve heretical Zen’zat. Why not include these in their heresy?”

“Humans are not truly Zen’zat. And Ter’nat are not Humans. Ter’nat cannot even reproduce with Humans, so by definition they are not even the same race now. Star Force will treat them as such, and we have far more experience incorporating races into our empire than the V’kit’no’sat could even dream of doing.”

“What about the other slave races? Are you going to take them from us too?”

“Has Itaru issued a death mark against them?”

“Not to my knowledge, but as you said, with the Urrtren down I know little about the state of my own empire.”

“We know of no such order, but there is much we do not know either of your empire. We will be establishing communications infrastructure to link the Ter’nat worlds, and Itaru will not dare touch it. We will replace the Urrtren by extending our comm grid where needed, and I have a construction team with me to do it as soon as possible. If your Ter’nat have the material resources, I would appreciate some coordination on providing them before you leave.”

“As you wish. Do you know anything of the major Hjar’at worlds?”

“Most have fallen, but the mid-level ones are relatively intact. Itaru doesn’t have the strength to take them yet. I can give you a list to choose from before you leave if you do not know where to go.”

“I will take any intelligence you can provide. Will we be allowed to use this extension of our comm grid once it is up and running?”

“That is not for me to negotiate.”

“Come down and claim the planetary defense station. I will not leave it in Ter’nat hands or abandoned. Those with the skill to use it must physically remain here to safeguard it. If not, Itaru could sneak operatives in and you would not like the eventuality of carnage that would follow.”

“I will be down as soon as the Oso’lon are dealt with.”

“I will remain until you do.”

It took several days to clean up the remaining troops and turn over the Star Force prisoners. The Oso’lon had taken none, which Nelfrani confirmed with scans of their ships and a few boarding parties where the scanners were not fully functioning. If the J’gar had any prisoners onboard they were long gone, but it was unlikely given their aquatic design and their lack of any surface troops. They hadn’t been seen since the first day, limping out of the system as soon as they could in their damaged ships, one of which was left behind after the crew transferred to another, then the empty one was tipped into a descending orbit into the star.

The J’gar hadn’t stayed to make sure it burned up, so the Meintre had the MCV go and retrieve the Ti’mat, with its crew of Kiritak already having dumped the water out and pumped it full of air as they began repair and conversion work, for they didn’t have access to any command codes and wouldn’t be able to operate part of it without yanking the control crystals out and replacing them with their own, which they had to build. Thankfully Nelfrani had been given an MCV, so given time and the necessary raw materials available in the system, he could produce any and all Star Force technology thanks to the very securely guarded Vault of Knowledge contained within…as well as the ‘seed’ equipment to build all necessary base components upon which to construct the more impressive ones.

In addition to that he had the Ter’nat, for better or worse, and the two other partially inhabited planets in this systems that had been the most vulnerable had mercifully been left untouched. The Meintre had already ordered some of the survivors from Puvvcor to be shifted to them as the logistical infrastructure tried to cope with the overload of people in too small an area to sustain them. It would have been worse had the J’gar and Oso’lon not killed so many when the shield generators went down, and that was a small silver lining. Meaning less would starve to death now before things got stabilized.

The Kiritak already had overseers down with the Ter’nat acting as new Overlords as they tried to push the incredibly limited workers into some semblance of functionality, but for Kiritak that meant a rapid pace of work, and Nelfrani could only imagine the headaches they were having trying to operate on the pedantic pace of the Ter’nat when lives were hanging in the balance with regards to the speed of food production, for the Oso’lon had made a habit of sending sabotage teams deep behind enemy lines to hit the agro facilities and try to starve out the Ter’nat.

He trusted the Kiritak to get the Ter’nat working faster than normal, but there was no mistaking the mess he was inheriting. Like those before him he’d dig his way out of it and save who he could, but first he needed to take possession of the strongest military asset in the system…one more powerful than all the warships here combined and multiplied by a factor of 100.

The planetary defense station was a 12 mile wide tiered, and very flat pyramid. Nelfrani landed on the third tier next to one of the entrances and not in the center of the top, for that was actually the firing point for the massive Tar’vem’jic it contained. And that single weapon was the reason why half the planet was still untouched, for the Zak’de’ron’s servants didn’t dare challenge it with anything less than a large warfleet…the kind of which they couldn’t muster now save for special occasions, and taking a Ter’nat colony by going directly through it would definitely not be worth the cost to them.

Nelfrani stepped off into the native atmosphere, feeling it was a bit thin for his liking but tolerable. He set foot down on the green/black Yeg’gor stone that covered the pyramid in armored protection equal to that of a Hadarak. The Meintre felt the stone on his bare foot, which he rarely needed to cover with a shoe. His race had thick padding on the bottom, unlike Humans and others that would cut themselves up if they didn’t have a smooth surface to move around on.

The stone felt almost soft, but he knew that was an illusion. It was about one of the hardest substances in the universe, and an energy sponge at that. It felt like his feet were ever so slightly melting into it, but there was no sticking sensation. He had never set foot on one before, but now that he was here he agreed the feeling was odd and almost magical since he couldn’t quite wrap his mind around the unusual effect as he walked towards the entrance where a cluster of Hjar’at and ranks of Zen’zat stood at attention flanking them awaiting his arrival.

10

The Meintre walked towards the Hjar’at with his own flankers…two others of his race plus several dozen Esquires. They stayed behind him as one of the Hjar’at stepped forward to greet him face to face, with the Meintre’s head standing taller than his counterpart, whose spines rose tallest of all and appeared like trimless windows, clear as glass and slightly bending the light coming through them.

“I have never met a Meintre before,” Neoum said graciously, and in the Star Force language. “You are heavier than I thought.”

“More elevated mass than most V’kit’no’sat, so it gives the appearance of less weight.”

“Your combat against the Oso’lon was intriguing. Have you ever fought them before?”

“Only our own in training. We are well prepared to engage all the V’kit’no’sat races.”

“I should not be surprised at that, but I am. Did they teach you the grapple holds to defeat their Jumat?”

“They’re not the first larger race we’ve done that to,” Nelfrani said, flexing his four trunks. “Though it would not work on you for obvious reasons.”

“There was a reason our capitol was targeted first after Itaru. What is the state of the Hjar’at in the Rim?”

“Do you mean ours or the few colonies of yours?”

Neoum’s expression grew hard. “I was not aware we had any beyond your Hula Hoop.”

“Some were allowed to act as fallback points for when the Hadarak got to your worlds, and they have grown quite large since your war with the Zak’de’ron began. They are in shared systems and the war did not make its way to them, nor did we allow them to be used as staging bases to strike Zak’de’ron assets in the Rim. If you wish to go there rather than a closer Hjar’at world, it can be arranged.”

“If they are hiding there while we fight for our lives here, then they are no longer my brothers and I want nothing to do with them. There is battle to be had, and Hjar’at do not flee it.”

“To your detriment at times, but I understand your point. We would not leave our brothers to fight alone either.”

“You said your entire race is coming to annex the Ter’nat worlds?”

“Nearly our entire warfleet is. Our civilians are not, for the most part. As we grow more will come, but we are merely caretakers here. We are not moving our people to colonize the Core when the Hadarak encroach further with every year.”

“Have you made no progress against them in some areas?”

“Of course we have, but if we cannot hold the entire line they sweep by in other places. The galaxy is too large for us to defend every system, and they reproduce their minions alarmingly fast. Most in their path cannot hold out against the minions alone, and even if we counter every single large Hadarak the majority of the galaxy will still fall and be used as bases to grow so many more that they will overwhelm us in our strongholds later. That is why your war was so ill timed.”

“It shames me to admit it, but we have abandoned our duty to fight the Hadarak. We cannot even guarantee our own survival at this point against the Zak’de’ron. Though it also pains me somewhat, I am glad the Ter’nat will now be under your supervision. I do not like having to operate without new generations of Zen’zat going forward, but this is far better than the Ter’nat dying out entirely. The Zen’zat have served us well from the outset, and they do not deserve this death mark.”

“Nobody deserves annihilation.”

“Did your empire not annihilate many lesser races in your rise to power?”

“We annihilated their empires, but saved their people. There is a significant difference.”

“Do not take this as a slight, but I would rather die a V’kit’no’sat than live as part of your empire.”

“Many think so, until they see what our empire actually is. Then only some think so,” Nelfrani said, half sarcastically.

“Will you be able to hold this world with only one warship?”

“I believe so. If they return they will incur our wrath elsewhere, and I do not think they wish to pick a fight with my empire when yours is already taxing them to the brink.”

“Are we?”

“From our reports, equal damage has been done to both sides. The Zak’de’ron have the advantage in leadership, whereas the V’kit’no’sat are fragmented, but neither of you are in a position to take very many worlds with adequate planetary defenses, so the smaller ones have now become the major battlefields until you can build new fleets. Given that fact, I do not think Itaru wants us to loose a Knight race against it in payback for assaulting us. I would be surprised if any Ter’nat world is hit after we take possession.”

“And if they do not care about reprisal?”

“We take care of our own, and help will come if we call for it.”

“You will have the time to call for it with this planetary defense station. I have reset all command codes to my own, and I will now transfer them to your genetic code,” Neoum said as a pair of Zen’zat came forward holding a large square hoop. “Place your foot inside.”

Nelfrani reached his front right up and pushed it through, feeling an energy field brush his skin as if cleaning it. A moment later the sensation was gone and the Zen’zat pulled it back, after which Neoum repeated the movement with his own foot. The Zen’zat then ran off into the pyramid with the device and disappeared inside.

“They will log the transfer. When you go inside it will respond to you only for high command functions with all others responding to your race. You can customize access as you like thereafter.”

“Thank you for an amicable transfer.”

“I do not want Itaru taking advantage of the situation. We built this station, and I would rather it be destroyed than end up in their talons. I am trusting you will hold it.”

“V’kit’no’sat should know by now how hard we are to remove from the galaxy.”

“The same was once thought of us, but here we stand in perpetual retreat. Rajamal?”

One Zen’zat broke ranks and walked over to the Hjar’at, standing small beside the Meintre, but tall enough to almost reach the top of his trunks.

“A question, Meintre,” the Zen’zat asked, but not in English.

“Go ahead,” Nelfrani responded in kind.

“Do you intend for the Ter’nat to continue becoming Zen’zat?”

“We do.”

“What is your policy regarding the Zen’zat beyond your empire that are being hunted to extinction?”

“You may take refuge here or on any Ter’nat world. You have no worlds of your own to rescue, but we intend to not only save the Ter’nat, but the Zen’zat as well. Spread the word that all can come home and will be protected if you no longer wish to serve the V’kit’no’sat.”

“Some of us stopped serving them when they abandoned the Ter’nat,” Rajamal admitted. “We serve ourselves now, and will continue fighting against our enemy. What of us?”

“If you serve the V’kit’no’sat, then you are theirs to command, but you can always leave their service to come back to the Ter’nat worlds and we will take you in. If you are operating independently, you may use the Ter’nat worlds as a base of operations to strike out at those who have a death mark on you until such a time as they renounce it.”

“You will protect us here even if they follow us back?” Rajamal asked in surprise.

“It is not us being neutral, but it is us being just. The death mark is abhorrent, and until they remove it we will not remain neutral. If we had the ships to spare we would be hitting them ourselves, for their death mark also applies to Humans and Zen’zat in Star Force, whether they wish to admit that or not. Our Director is not blind, and while we do not have the resources to force capitulation without abandoning those on the Hadarak front, securing the Ter’nat will fix most of the problem at present. If you wish to strike back with your own resources, you are welcome to do so working out of the Ter’nat worlds. If they end the death mark, then that protection will be altered.”

“What is it costing you on the front to secure our worlds?”

“Many lives of those we cannot save, but we have not pulled away any of the evacuation ships. They continue to constantly run people out to the Rim refuge worlds and come back to pick up more, but where we were blocking the advance of many minion armies there are now additional gaps where the Meintre used to be. Had we stayed there Ter’nat would die, when we left that meant more worlds would be invaded earlier without the delay we were affording them. We did not abandon any world currently under assault, but leaving the front was not a decision I am comfortable with. It may have been necessary, but I do not like it. Yet there are people here to save as well, so our time is not being wasted.”

“On behalf of all Zen’zat, I thank you for doing what we were not strong enough to do. And those Zen’zat here are willing to offer our service in compensation.”

Nelfrani glanced at the Hjar’at.

“I do not command most of them. And most of those that I do have asked to remain with my blessing. Given how my race has mostly abandoned them, I will not order them to go. They are yours now, though one of the Zen’zat ships was lent here by the Wass’mat. When they learn they are defecting they might not be so accommodating.”

“That is my problem to deal with. Your work here is done, and I thank you for doing your duty while others fled. The death mark caught us off guard and we were not able to respond as quickly as needed. I am told many others have been wiped out. These three stand because you held out as long as you did. And if events elsewhere sour for you, you will always be welcome to return here for sanctuary.”

“Your race is not V’kit’no’sat, yet you speak to me as if you were a peer,” Neoum said snarkily. “That both insults me and instills a bit of pride in how far we have brought the Zen’zat, if they were able to spawn an empire that could elevate a race such as yours to our level. No one other than the Zak’de’ron were able to achieve that,” the Hjar’at said as he turned away with the other 8 of his race following him as they headed for a nearby drop pod with a handful of loyal Zen’zat going with them. The rest stayed where they were, in their hexagonal ranks and full armor minus their helmets, the same as Rajamal who was standing before him.

“Are they all this egotistical?” Nelfrani asked him after the Hjar’at were out of earshot.

“Most are,” he admitted, “but we owe them for our existence, and were glad for the opportunity to serve.”

“But no longer?”

“The trust that was once there is gone. The war has gutted the V’kit’no’sat, and they are unable to protect the Ter’nat more than unwilling. If they do not pull resources to their own worlds, those worlds will likely fall. Many will fall anyway. They are not an empire that is comfortable with losing, and because they have been forced into that role many do not know what to do.”

“My empire was forged through losing battles, though before my time,” Nelfrani admitted. “The Archons and the Director know how to win and how to lose…which is why we bounce back from defeat strong than before if given the opportunity. We are giving the Ter’nat and the Zen’zat that opportunity now. I expect you to make use of it.”

“We stand ready for your orders, Meintre. What would you have us do this day?”

“Reclamation work. There is still an enemy on this planet, and one we must conquer quickly. You are legends to the Ter’nat, and they will trust you far more than my kind. We must organize the survivors, calm them, and make sure what resources we have are not wasted on hoarding, fighting, or mismanagement. We have seen this happen on other worlds, and we need to squash it now. The Ter’nat will go on minimal rations until we have enough for everyone, and I need your influence to cement their cooperation in this, for we do not have the personnel to enforce it across 3 planets.”

“Ter’nat do not fight amongst each other. This is why the Era’tran chose our race to elevate.”

“Starvation will do horrible things to people, even Ter’nat. And surviving orbital bombardment and surface slaughter can break many minds. You need to heal them with inspiration. Go out to them, organize them, and promise that food will be coming as quickly as we can grow it. Their mission is to wait, survive, and be alive for us to renourish later. Do you understand this, Zen’zat?”

“Partially. Are there supply convoys enroute?”

“No. We have brought Kiritak with us. Do you know what they are?”

“I do. They work extremely fast.”

“Yes, and we have an MCV with us, meaning we can create all the necessary Star Force infrastructure given enough time. Including bioharvest facilities, for we brought all the necessary seeds with us. Fast grow factories will be the first constructed, and the first site is already being prepped, but a planet half full of starving people is not something that can be dealt with quickly. We need to salvage what supplies still exist, and make the most out of your current infrastructure until we can get ours up and running. The Kiritak will guide all of this, but the Ter’nat must comply without hesitation or delay. Resistance of any kind will mean more people starve to death before we can help them. We also need to get Kich’a’kat out to those who need it.”

“Give me the specific assignments and we will begin immediately. And if you allow it, I can find other Zen’zat engaging Itaru’s forces and recall them here to help. I will need to use a ship or two, if the defense of this planet can spare them.”

“Do so, and take as many ships as you need. The threat of Star Force reprisal will protect this system from now on, and if someone is too stupid to understand what that means, we can hold out with the planetary defense station until our reinforcements arrive. And if we have to pull ships off the Hadarak front to do so, Itaru will pay a very heavy price for it.”

“We have been able to capture some of the enemy ships from time to time. Would you like us to continue to do so?”

“Not now. Securing the Ter’nat populations is the top priority, and if they work as slow as I have been told, we may need Zen’zat to step in and handle some of the manual labor until we get the automation rebuilt. The more Zen’zat we have to do that, the better. Go find as many as you can and bring them back here.”

“Will we be able to feed them when they arrive?”

“The Ter’nat will face rationing, the Zen’zat will not. You must have your strength to do what is necessary to save them. By the time you can get any additional Zen’zat here, our first fast grow facilities will be operational and able to support them.”

“There will be many, if my feel is accurate.”

“Use small crews to maximize the numbers left here to work.”

“With your permission, I will do so immediately.”

“Go now.”

Rajamal nodded respectfully, then turned and ran off along with a scattering of other Zen’zat breaking ranks at his telepathic command while leaving the others where they were, save for one. That one walked up to the Meintre and took Rajamal’s place there.

“I am Serinne. What would you have those of us remain do, Meintre?”

503 lightyears away…

Ikan was inside the prototype growth facility that was now patched up as much as they were able with local materials scavenged from every surrounding outpost and settlement. More survivors had been found here and there and incorporated into their workforce, but none had come out of the city, and those discovered out amongst the fields were near to death when they were found, having survived off emergency rations that were nearly depleted.

They now had a survivor population of 106, and more than enough food to sustain them, but their future was uncertain until a transport arrived one day and sent a spike of fear down everyone’s spine, fearing this was the end of them. No one had seen nor heard of the enemy since the initial bombardment, yet now there was ship silhouette descending out of the sky and landing in the nearest clearing some 3 miles away.

Ikan didn’t recognize the ship design, which he assumed meant it belonged to the enemy. He and the others stayed inside the compound and gathered up what supply packs they could, ready to try and make a run for it in all directions, but they waited given the fact that no one had actually shot at the building, though they were not hopeful for rescue.

A few took off anyway, just in case they were hostile, but most remained until a pair of bipeds in armor showed up in front of them suddenly. No one heard them coming, let alone saw them, yet here they were directly in front of them in full combat armor…with a symbol over their left breast that made Ikan begin to cry involuntarily, though most of the others either didn’t see it or realize its importance.

The Constublar walked forward, but before he could speak one of the sets of Star Force armor did.

“When was the last time you saw the attackers?”

“Not since the bombardment,” another Ter’nat said, for Ikan had somehow lost his voice in the emotion. “Who are you?”

“We are Esquires attached to the Star Force Knight race Meintre. We have been sent to rescue the Ter’nat that remain and annex your worlds into our empire. You’re the first we’ve found alive on this planet.”

“Only us?” Ikan finally said.

“So far. We’ve only been here a few hours, but the entire planet has been scorched. If some of you survived, hopefully others did too. Regardless, you’re our responsibility now. We’re going to set up some pre-fab shelters nearby and use this as our base of operation for the time being. Are any of you injured?”

“A few,” Ikan said, with one Ter’nat who had a broken arm in a sling walking forward to show himself.

“Come here,” the Esquire said, pulling something out of his pack. When the Ter’nat slowly walked up to him, he put the device on his exposed shoulder and it melted into his skin, which was when Ikan realized it must have been their version of a Kich’a’kat…the magical healing technology of the Overlords.

The Ter’nat’s arm was healed instantly, and he took it out of the sling and swung it around experimentally, then with gratitude evident in his eyes he looked up at the much taller alien’s opaque helmet.

“Does this mean you are our new Overlords?”

“The Meintre are, under order of Director Davis. The Ter’nat are no longer part of the V’kit’no’sat empire. You are now part of Star Force, and we’re going to protect you from the death mark Itaru has placed on your race. I need to know how many of you are here and if you know of any other survivors?”

Ikan didn’t listen to much of what followed. He sat down on the floor and cried tears he forgot he had. He’d always heard of the Humans who founded their own empire in the Rim, but he’d never thought they cared about the Ter’nat…and yet here they were, sending their servants to save them.

He couldn’t believe this is how it was going to end. An hour ago he had no future, and now…

Ikan just sat there in disbelieve, feeling as if a mountain of burden had been lifted off him. He was no longer in charge, and he was glad for it. He just wanted to be Ikan again, caring out the orders of people who knew far better than him what needed to be done, and before he knew it he was being transported via hover sled over to the clearing where their ship was as several more were landing and erecting buildings in a matter of minutes, into which the surviving Ter’nat were taken and processed.

Medical scans, clothing replacement, food trays, automated informational programs, and permanent wristbands with locator beacons so none of them could get lost. It all happened so fast he was just trying to keep up, then he found himself in a soft bunk near the others in his assigned room as he tried to sleep, but he couldn’t. He had too much to process, but one thing was clear. The nightmare was over, as was his time as part of the V’kit’no’sat empire. Now he was part of Star Force, for whatever that meant. He had no idea what tomorrow would bring, nor did any of the others who were whispering to each other as they could also not sleep.

Ikan laid quietly, looking up at the bottom of the bunk above him and running his fingers over the smooth, alien material. He didn’t know if it was Human material or from the Meintre, whom he’d been able to catch a glimpse of earlier. They were almost as large as a Brat’mar, and the Esquires moved around them much like the Zen’zat did with the V’kit’no’sat, but some had more than two arms and they came in various sizes, so he didn’t know what to make of them except that they must have been the Star Force version of Zen’zat, perhaps coming from multiple races?

There were so many questions and unknowns his mind wouldn’t stop flipping through it all until the weight of everything he survived and the memories of the people in the city finally caught up with him. The tears came back, and he didn’t run from the memories this time. He faced them, knowing that if he had stayed with the others he too would be dead…and had he brought them with him they never would have survived on the emergency rations he found. They might not even have made it out of the city. He wouldn’t if he hadn’t found that small water puddle in the transit station.

He couldn’t tolerate what had happened, but he accepted that he had no control over it and that he’d done well to keep himself alive as long as he had. Ikan hadn’t expected rescue, but it had come to him anyway and now he needed to let the past die along with the others, for there was no way for him to save it.

All he could do was embrace his future, whatever it may be with the Human empire and the few other Ter’nat that had survived here, but what he’d been told earlier stuck with him. That it wasn’t just this Ter’nat colony that was being annexed, but all of them. Hopefully some had fared better than this, perhaps some had not been hit at all. He desperately wanted that to be true.

Tomorrow would come and he’d tackle it then. Right now, with all the toxic emotions pouring out of him, he finally found a sense of peace…after which his fatigue took hold and he finally fell deep asleep.

5 months later…

Mak’to’ran paced back and forth across Garuva’s palace as he studied the incoming reports. Star Force’s Meintre race was moving everywhere, coming off the Hadarak front and out of the Rim, and now he finally knew why. One of his scout ships had had the good sense to confront and ask them what they were doing, which they had answered without resistance.

They were here to annex the Ter’nat colonies before the Zak’de’ron could kill them all, since the V’kit’no’sat could no longer protect them. And they were also offering sanctuary to any Zen’zat that showed up there requesting it.

Mak’to’ran didn’t know what to make of this. The idea of them coming in and stealing the Ter’nat was insulting…but primarily because he could not protect them all, yet he was protecting some of them, and even those worlds were being taken by Star Force using stun weaponry or simple logic to get them turned over to them. And in one case reported so far they’d even intervened and fought off a J’gar bombardment fleet to do so, meaning Mak’to’ran had a choice to make.

The Era’tran needed the Zen’zat. They needed them badly. And with no more Ter’nat colonies there would be no more Zen’zat…unless he let them breed, but that would change everything about the Zen’zat, and he feared it would destroy them just as assuredly as the Zak’de’ron purge would. But he didn’t have the power to tell Star Force no any more than he could stop the enemy from killing them. He could resist and cause a lot of havoc, but if Star Force wanted to devote the ships to it, they could take any world in the V’kit’no’sat empire that they wanted. They could probably even take Itaru without too much of a fight at this point.

Mak’to’ran needed his infantry, and he was already receiving reports of Zen’zat going missing. They were abandoning their duty stations and leaving in ships that never returned. Now that he knew of their amnesty offer from Star Force he had an inkling at what was happening. The Zen’zat were choosing Star Force over the V’kit’no’sat. One could protect the Ter’nat, the other could not, and though no Era’tran Zen’zat had abandoned their duty stations, it appeared to be happening frequently elsewhere.

Mak’to’ran cursed the Urrtren for being down. The little information he was getting was from couriers and the segments of the backup comm system the Era’tran had created long ago, but there were gaps in it that had yet to be rebuilt because Mak’to’ran didn’t have the ships to defend them. He was blind to most of what was happening in the galaxy outside the local region, and even that was spotty with the J’gar prowling and poaching his scout ships whenever they could catch one.

Jamtren was secure now, but badly damaged. Few knew it, and many thought it had fallen. Those that were informed otherwise were beginning to rally around the capitol again, even those that were not Era’tran, but Mak’to’ran’s grasp on them was feeble, and if he let them know who he was he’d only invite a second major invasion, which he couldn’t risk.

This annexation of the Ter’nat had to be dealt with, but how? He wasn’t sure yet, but he knew he couldn’t do nothing. The Zen’zat were the common bond all V’kit’no’sat races held, and without it they would fracture even further. He didn’t fault Star Force for stepping in to save their genetic predecessors, except when it involved taking worlds from the Era’tran that they had already secured.

With the Urrtren down he had no means to connect to the Star Force comm network, and he dare not leave Jamtren, not only for safety reasons but because his leadership was the only thing holding the system together.

He’d have to send a courier to get a message to Star Force and request they send someone here to discuss the matter. But would they come for Garuva? And would they send one of their leaders or an intermediary who couldn’t negotiate anything directly.

There was no time to play diplomatic games. He had to talk with the trailblazers or Davis directly, and the only way they would respond was if they knew it was him. But how could he tell them he was still alive without risking that knowledge getting back to the Zak’de’ron?

There were only a few locations he knew Star Force was at, for most of their evacuation fleets were mobile. He’d have to get a message to one of the fixed locations and hope it found its way to Star Force’s leaders without leaks, but first he had to get it there past the J’gar blockades in the neighboring systems trying to isolate knowledge that Jamtren had survived Itaru’s attempt to take it.

He could send a message out through the Era’tran comm grid then have a ship take it from there, but that was too risky. He had to send one directly, a physical message never to be sent over comms. But that meant running the blockade or taking a riskier jumplane. And he had few ships to spare as it was.

Nor did the J’gar, and Mak’to’ran had been harassing the blockades for some time, making the enemy keep more ships there than needed in order to divert them away from other targets. He could break through if needed, though it would be costly to both sides.

But he had to get a message through without revealing his identity. There was no choice other than to wait and see his empire whittled down even more with his inability to secure it slapping him in the face on a daily basis.

Things could not continue as they were, he knew that, but he also did not know what course to take…but he knew who he had to ask. And it was better to do it now than later. While he still had Zen’zat under his command.

So he made the decision and walked back to the tactical hologram as he began to plan the blockade break in the most fortuitous position he could to set up a quick run out to one of Star Force’s Fortress systems in Hadarak territory where the J’gar fleets did not patrol…

www.aerkijyr.com

Atonement

1

January 9, 128822

Castle 15 System (Tri’vor Region)

Edge of High Zone

Bran’cen was nearly here, and as he was about to begin his braking run the Era’tran rechecked his gravity drives, finding 8 of 12 were still fully functional, with the 9th intermittent. The other three were gone, blown away by the J’gar during their race across the stars ever since breaking out of the Jamtren System. His Kaeper had been the only ship tasked to go, while the others fought a costly battle to break the blockade for him.

Mak’to’ran…who was still alive, thank the Elders…had requested his presence in what he thought was Garuva’s palace, but when the Era’tran pilot had got there the truth had been revealed. Garuva was long dead, and it had been a repaired Mak’to’ran, brought out of a lingering coma, who had been impersonating him to hide his true identity. For if Itaru realized he was still breathing they’d send every ship they had to destroy him, and Jamtren had barely survived the first assault. It could not survive another of such magnitude.

No one else knew that Mak’to’ran was alive, at least not in any other system. He’d told Bran’cen that much himself, then he said that it was vital that Star Force send an appropriate representative to find him to discuss matters of the highest sensitivity. Mak’to’ran couldn’t risk leaving Jamtren, not for his safety but for the Era’tran capitol itself. Without him it could easily crumble on its own without any Elders left to guide it, and whenever the Zak’de’ron got around to collecting another assault force they’d be back to try and take it again, though this war had weakened their fleets perhaps as much as the Era’tran’s, and they weren’t in a position to try again…not yet anyway.

How much time they had no one knew, not even Mak’to’ran, but he assured Bran’cen that another assault would be coming and that he was the only thing holding this system and several others nearby together. He could not leave without dooming Jamtren, but he had to speak with one of the Star Force leaders.

Bran’cen had been entrusted to carry a message, one that he was not allowed to view, and physically deliver it to Star Force. No transmissions were allowed. It had to be delivered in person, and his Kaeper had been chosen for its lack of a cloaking device…in lieu of two additional gravity drives. Speed was his best weapon, against the forces of Itaru and the Hadarak, and thankfully his remaining gravity drives were enough to keep him ahead of his pursuit, albeit it barely.

He’d made the jump out of the last system with them only a half hour behind him and slightly gaining due to the damage he’d taken earlier. They’d been trailing him ever since breaking the blockade, but they hadn’t managed to get ahead of him, for he was heading further into the Core and now Hadarak territory rather than try to move Rimward and head for the bulk of the Star Force worlds there. The J’gar would be between him and his goal had he gone that way, but by going in the opposite direction he only had Hadarak ahead of him, and they were not fast enough to catch his ship, even wounded as it was.

But the J’gar were not giving up, and with each system he passed through they persisted, gaining a little on him depending on the state of his intermittent drive. When it was working he was gaining distance, when it wasn’t he was losing it. The J’gar had not passed him during this jump, so that meant he would be entering the system ahead of them, and once he got there Star Force should be able to protect him as long as his ship was able to decelerate enough and not ram the star.

He’d risked extra speed on exit, knowing that if he had to he could slingshot around the star and risk colliding with something beyond the jumpline as he slowed down more gradually. He hadn’t gone so fast that was impossible, but if that 9th drive kicked out he was going to have a very hard time making it even with a slingshot approach, for such a tract was more inefficient as one did not push directly against their line of momentum.

Right now the 9th drive was holding in ‘ready’ status, but there was no way of knowing what was going to happen when he put power to it. The computer would start the deceleration in 9 seconds, and if something went wrong he would have to alter the track quickly…

His comm picked up a multi-layered message in different languages, including V’kit’no’sat, coming from the system ahead. It was faint, but still detectable this far out, and it was delivering a warning for all incoming ships.

Hadarak threat on jumpline at given coordinates. Redirect immediately to safe zones.

There was a small data packet with it, indicating where the Hadarak were blocking the jumpline and providing 8 different spots where an incoming ship could divert to that would be safe.

Bran’cen picked one quickly, then input the new deceleration path a few seconds after the braking began, but early enough that there would be no problem. The divergence would not occur until the end, and right now he needed to keep his ship square on the jumpline to get maximum deceleration as his wounded Kaeper started to bleed off a little speed this far out where the gravity was only beginning to show marginal effect on the drives.

The message kept repeating, warning any and all incoming ships, which meant the J’gar would get the same warning, but they wouldn’t know which of the 8 paths he would take, almost insuring he would not be caught unless they guessed right. And even then he should still have a head start sufficient enough to get to one of the Star Force ships in the system, if not the Castle itself.

The Era’tran Kaeper slowed and slowed, picking up more gravity and increasing the rate of deceleration greatly as he got closer to the star…then he had to divert to the right and off the jumpline, losing some deceleration as that momentum was thrust laterally, pushing him farther and farther away from the jumpline and into the beginning of a slingshot loop.

There was no way he could stop on this side of the star now. He’d have to move around to the far side and reverse pull to slow his momentum, for once he got lateral to it there would be no slowing his forward momentum other than pulling on some planets, and that wouldn’t do much depending on where they were.

Bran’cen began looking through the map in the ship’s databank as well as what was being transmitted by the Star Force beacon. He ran the calculations and saw his stopping point was going to be far away from the Castle, but at least he wouldn’t be…

The Era’tran’s head froze in place as he saw the updated Hadarak positions on the transmitted map now that he was close enough to pick up the second weaker, yet more complex data packet that showed where all the safe zones were in the system, navigationally speaking. They had to plot planets, asteroid fields, other debris, and starships. The latter included Hadarak, and he couldn’t believe the numbers indicated.

His sensors were useless right now, so all he had to go on was the information being transmitted. He had to avoid them and get to Star Force…but first he just had to slow down before spiraling out of the star system into deep space.

His 9th drive was spurting, meaning it was working for a few seconds, then not for a few more before coming back online again. That made predicting a path hard when the acceleration was not constant, but the ship’s computer was making constant adjustments and updating him as he had to choose where to go. Bran’cen rode the controls all the way around to the far side of the star where the ship’s engines could finally bring him to a stop, but before that happened the ship’s sensors began to update the map and confirm what the beacon message had been transmitting.

There were 129 Warden-class Hadarak here, two of which were tier 5, plus 4 Lurkers in addition to scores of their mainline warships and clouds of minions so thick they appeared on the sensors to be small nebulas. They were broken up into 83 main formations spread across the system at the primary jumplines in blockade formation, but the largest grouping was near the Castle, though out of weapons range by far.

That was where he needed to go, but first he’d have to get there, and even ignoring the J’gar wherever they were, the nearest Hadarak forces were already diverting to try and chase him down…or in this case head him off as they anticipated him going to the only active Star Force base in the system. The Hadarak owned everything else, including the planets that were infested with growths so large his sensors were already picking them up.

There were Star Force signals from ships all over, but the only stationary position was the Castle, which appeared like a giant spherical spider web with little mass to it…though that was an illusion given its size. The tiny specs caught in the web were Mach’nel sized structures, and the entire diameter of the Castle was nearly 120,000 miles…though it appeared some small sections of it were now gone.

Bran’cen waited for the sensors to update as he got underway, plotting his best course to the nearest Star Force ship that was already enroute to his position. He hadn’t gotten a transmission yet, but when he did he expected them to give him directions on how to approach the Castle. Until then he wanted as much information as he could get, and thankfully there were a plethora of sensor signals bouncing around the system, so he didn’t have to wait for his own to get all the way there and back again to see the battle damage already done to the Castle.

But it was minor compared to the size of the construct, and Mak’to’ran had given him a thorough lecture of what it was that he was running to. It was a giant weapon designed to deliver the power of Legion to the Hadarak in a transmitted form…but whose range was nowhere near a Tar’vem’jic or a Lurker’s disintegration range. Therefore it required a spindly structure to transmit along, bouncing from one node to another, before launching towards the target. That would keep the weapon itself out of harm’s way, cheating the distance limitations of the blast, and making the Hadarak fight their way through it to get to the generators near the heart of the Castle…and it appeared they’d been trying, and failing, to do so.

“V’kit’no’sat vessel, identify yourself,” the Star Force warship demanded as it approached, meaning the transmission was on a time delay.

“This is an Era’tran vessel on a courier mission from Jamtren with a priority message from the Elder Garuva for Star Force’s leaders. I am not allowed to transmit. It must be physically delivered for security reasons. A group of J’gar ships have pursued me ever since we broke their blockade. I cannot allow them to overtake me. I request instructions on how to deliver this message to your trailblazers or your Director. No one else is allowed to access it.”

A small lapse occurred, but it was tolerable and Bran’cen knew it would diminish quickly as the distance between the two vessels reduced.

“Alden-031 is present in this system. You can deliver your message to him after necessary security checks. Advise on your engine status and other damage-related navigational issues.”

“Three gravity drives have been destroyed, 8 remain intact with one intermittent. Navigational computers and sensors fully operational.”

“The Hadarak have disabling units with significant closure speed. If they can tag you with disruptive goo, it will allow their slower units to catch up and obliterate you. The only way we can assure transit is with superior speed or superior firepower. The Hadarak want engagements beyond Castle defense range, and they know we will not abandon any ship, so they are desperate to catch any they can to draw our fleet out. An 8 engine Kaeper might be sufficient to get through, but I don’t want to risk it. Will you allow your ship to be boarded?”

“I can carry the message on my person if need be. My ship is irrelevant once my mission is complete.”

“I don’t need you to abandon it, just let my crew board and secure it. My warship can carry your Kaeper inside our drone hold, but I don’t want to do that with an unknown entity, so my crew will have to take control of your ship temporarily.”

“Do what is necessary. I am alone in this vessel and my only task is delivery of my message packet. If you wish to board, do so quickly,” Bran’cen said, seeing the Hadarak units racing towards the two ships as they matched speeds and direction.

“Dropship enroute.”

The Era’tran lowered his shields and opened his single hangar bay, allowing the small winged chrome ship inside, then he set the helm on autopilot to match the Star Force warship before heading back to meet the boarding team. He kept his armor retracted into the body-spanning jewelry that his race preferred over simple gauntlets, and within one of the many jeweled points he carried the message crystal, for he couldn’t risk it leaving his person under any condition.

When he opened the interior hangar doors four boarders were waiting, but to his surprise they were not small. They were Hjar’at, adorned in Star Force armor, which he assumed meant they were of the Knight race and probably born into the Rimward empire rather than defecting there like so many others had done in the past.

“Hjar’at, is that your warship or a Human one?”

“It is ours.”

“Why then is your captain a Human?”

“He is not. We typically use a translator voice for non-holo communications. It is more apt to your dialects than having us try to speak directly.”

“You speak well enough.”

“We learned,” one of the Hjar’at said, walking around the taller Era’tran. “We need to secure this ship now. The Hadarak are on their way.”

“It is yours. Take me to your trailblazer.”

“That will be up to him,” one of them said as the other three disappeared into the ship’s large hallways, though there were not many of them onboard a Kaeper. The fourth Hjar’at stayed with Bran’cen as a guard, which was prudent, and soon his ship was being swallowed up in the rear bay of the Star Force warship as drones were spewing out of it into flanking positions to make room.

The Era’tran was able to watch remotely from his armor as he stayed in the hangar along with his guard…then his hangar doors opened to reveal an extendable walkway pushing through the containment field.

“Come,” the Hjar’at said. “You will have a better view from our ship.”

“View of what?” he said, plodding along just wide of the swaying spiked tail ahead of him.

“They are not going to let us pass without a fight. You are the first ship that’s come here in four decades other than our own.”

“Where are the J’gar?”

“Do not worry about them. They’re already gone. They don’t want any part of this.”

“Is the Castle holding?” Bran’cen asked.

“It’s too costly for them to wear down gradually, so they’ve decided to taunt us out with a blockade. They don’t want us using this as a base of operations to hit their vulnerable backwater, but they can’t keep us in. Keeping us from getting there is easier, because they know where we’re going. What’s so important to come all the way into this hell hole? Why didn’t you head Rimward?”

“The J’gar are there. It was deemed safer to come here,” he said as he walked across a shield enveloped bridge, able to look down and outside the ship to where the starfield was visible. It was a bit disconcerting, but he felt no momentum.

“For what purpose?”

“I am a courier. I am not allowed to view the message I carry.”

“Is it onboard the ship or your person?”

“You will not have it,” Bran’cen said forcefully. “My orders are to deliver it in person.”

“I’m not here to take it from you. Just wondering what’s so important.”

“The future of the V’kit’no’sat empire.”

“Which one?”

The Era’tran growled at the insult, but the Hjar’at didn’t seem phased as they walked into the interior of its warship.

“There is only one true empire. Itaru is possessed by traitors.”

“They created your empire, and now they’re referring to themselves as V’kit’no’sat and calling you the traitors. It can be a bit confusing when you’re both using the same name.”

“Is it too much for a Hjar’at mind to handle?” he shot back.

A single arc of blue energy bounced from neck spines all the way down to his tail where it disappeared.

“Know your place, Era’tran. We are rescuing you, not the reverse.”

“You are escorting, not rescuing.”

“If that’s what you think, you are lucky we got to you first. You never should have come here so unprepared.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s best if you see for yourself. It will be starting soon. The Hadarak the V’kit’no’sat fought before you started your war with the Zak’de’ron were not their true forces, merely their skirmishers. We’ve got their mainline ships out there, and some of them have Essence enhancement. Including some engineered for speed boosts.”

“How much faster are they than their standard minions?”

“These aren’t minions. These are durable, small, and smart interceptors that we call ‘pod racers.’ They’re a support unit that you’ve never had to deal with before, and they’re everywhere here.”

“Can this ship exceed their speed?”

“Over the long term, yes. But they can generate a few seconds of acceleration far beyond any ship Star Force has created. That is, any ship that isn’t also Essence enhanced. And there’s a formation of the bastards getting between us and the Castle right now. We’re going to have to run through them,” he said as they walked through the halls with an occasional small Esquire moving about. Their version of Zen’zat, though these came in all manner of body shapes.

“Does not this ship come in and out of the Castle regularly?”

“No. We haven’t been there since we arrived 3 years ago. It’s easier to resupply elsewhere than to run in there. Nobody has made any runs in or out in the past 4 months, and the Hadarak keep bringing in more of their big ones to lock it down more tightly. If we get you in, I can’t guarantee you’ll be leaving any time soon. Especially with all that engine damage.”

“Leaving is irrelevant. All that matters is that I deliver Garuva’s message to your trailblazer. After that I am expendable.”

“Typical V’kit’no’sat bullshit,” the Hjar’at said with a sneer as he turned his head back to glare at the Era’tran as they continued to walk the long, spacious hallways. “Nobody is expendable.”

“In this war you are wrong. My mission matters far more than my life.”

“How do you know that if you haven’t seen the message?”

“I know what it is about. And I must get through at any cost.”

“Why?”

“I am forbidden to tell you.”

“You’re predictably opaque,” the Hjar’at said as he opened a side door and led the Era’tran into an empty room, but one that had a holoprojection pop up immediately upon entry with the system-wide battle data displayed. It scaled down to the distance between them and the Castle, along with the massive number of Hadarak units in the immediate area.

“Watch and learn,” the Hjar’at said. “This is the real enemy both of your empires are blindly ignoring as they nip at your tails.”

Bran’cen looked closely as the detail filled in with the enemy units’ movements, as well as those Star Force ships converging to their position from outside the Castle defenses and some from within. All were headed to a mutual area where the run would take place, and along with them one of the Lurkers was also approaching…

2

Alden-031 was in a heavy grav training session when word came in about the V’kit’no’sat Kaeper’s arrival, but it wasn’t until he’d left that crushing inferno, showered, and made his way to the Castle’s command deck did he get the addendum about a courier’s message. The Hjar’at warship that had intercepted the vessel indicated the Kaeper was high speed modified but damaged, so they had taken it inside their drone hold and were going to make a run in because the message had to be hand delivered to either a trailblazer or the Director.

One of Alden’s ruby red eyebrows raised when he read that. Castle 15 was no longer in V’kit’no’sat territory. The surrounding systems had been swallowed up by the Hadarak, most of which had been evacuated prior to their arrival. Those refugees were mostly back in the Rim now with Beacon and Axius absorbing them, though 56 million were still stuck in this Castle waiting for transport.

They were safe here for now, but getting the transport ships in and out was a major hassle and getting worse with each year. Alden had assigned himself this post when it was discovered that the Hadarak were not going to all-out assault the Castle…for they’d tried and failed multiple times…nor were they going to skip over this system. They’d been sending reinforcements here continually, raising the pressure on the Castle’s traffic in and out and presumably building up for an even larger assault.

Alden hoped they would, for they could kill a lot of the larger Hadarak in short order, but he had a sneaking suspicion that they were up to something tricky with this siege, so he’d picked this one of the Castles already surrounded by enemy territory and had been camping out the past 8 years trying to figure out what they were up to. They were intent on not letting him use the Castle as a base of operations to launch assaults on the nearby systems, but that hadn’t stopped Alden from getting it done. This Castle was now a nuisance for the Hadarak behind the slowly moving border, and the fact that they couldn’t remove it seemed to be something they simply would not let go.

But they’d done it before with others. Already Star Force had 8 systems around the galaxy tagged as Hadarak no-go zones because of the ‘Megaloids’ there. That was the term Roger had come up with for the Heidoor that were ‘big,’ and the one that the Wranglers had found behind enemy lines had been quite talkative once they smuggled a Uriti into that empty system to do the translating, one Megaloid to another.

The reason the Hadarak stayed out of that system, even allowing Star Force to base there and strike out against them without reprisal, was because of a negotiated ‘treaty’ of sorts. The Hadarak across the galaxy could not communicate quickly with one another, so they operated with memory protocols, including maps. System 33920 was off limits on their genetic map, thought they probably didn’t know why.

When the Hadarak had first entered this galaxy they had to fight a massive number of wars against the other Megaloids in the Deep Core. It was so tedious cleaning out the biggest of the threats that they often tried to negotiate with those more powerful than them, and sometimes it paid off. Recognizing the incoming threat of the Hadarak and their numbers, some had decided to move aside and relocate further out into the galaxy after taking heavy losses. This relocation saved the Hadarak a great amount of time, resources, and gave them some easy acquisitions early on, and they had honored their agreements to avoid one another ever since.

Those that had left had designated larger stars and star clusters beyond the Deep Core as their own and the Hadarak had granted them immunity there after sufficient combat determined that neither side was going to back down or win easily. The Hadarak needed the Deep Core for the Gateway gravity wells, but the Megaloids in this galaxy had no interest in traveling elsewhere…nor did they have the experience or knowledge to know how to do so. They just wanted to be left alone by the extra-galactic invaders, and the Hadarak were glad to have to avoid fighting them all to the death in order to acquire what they needed.

So there were a sprinkling of systems around the galaxy where the Hadarak would not go, and some of those systems held planetary civilizations that benefited from the immunity without even knowing it. The Megaloids inhabited the star or stars there, not caring about anything else for the most part, and the one Star Force had talked to was similarly disinterested with the galactic purge and ongoing war. It could travel wherever it liked beyond the Deep Core and the Hadarak would not touch it…and if they did he’d kill them easy enough, for this race of Megaloids were far superior to the Hadarak, including the Lurkers, who could not effectively use Essence on them, for they seemed to absorb most of the attacks like a dry sponge sucking up a water pistol shot.

There was only one in that particular star, and the others of his race were likewise isolated by choice save for specific pre-arranged meetings. This particular Megaloid had been named Obi-wan due to the fact he was a hermit, and a powerful one at that. Obi-wan had no interest in fighting the Hadarak, but he also didn’t care if Star Force lived in his system as they fought the Hadarak either. So right now there was a growing Star Force base in that system that was causing all kinds of havoc with fleets going out and razing enemy worlds their fleets had largely left undefended…and as of last Alden had heard not a single minion had arrived in that system to strike back at them.

So why were the Hadarak so obsessed with taking down this Castle? If they could overlook other systems, let alone one that Star Force was basing out of, why were they devoting so many resources here to just sit and blockade a relatively useless system whose only benefit was it wasn’t in Hadarak hands and could operate as an oasis on the battlefield?

Except it was becoming more and more irrelevant the further the battle lines moved. Alden couldn’t help neighboring systems, because the closest friendly ‘neighbor’ was getting further and further away. And communications were only maintained by mobile relays in enemy territory that had to keep dancing around in order to stay alive, for the Hadarak had destroyed all other infrastructure in the fallen systems.

Alden still had his comm link back to the rest of the Star Force empire, but that was about it. He got additional ships and resources on a regular basis, and used them to do as much damage here as he could to deflect attacks against inhabited planets elsewhere…but the Hadarak seemed too damn paranoid about leaving the Castles sitting in place as they mowed down everything else. Alden needed to figure out what it was, so that was why he was here, but the V’kit’no’sat didn’t know that. So this courier wasn’t coming here for him, so why head this direction at all?

He had a lot of questions to ask when this courier arrived, but first he had to get the Era’tran here, and that meant punching a hole through the constantly shifting Hadarak formations holding an incomplete shell perimeter around the Castle.

“Might Mouse,” he said over the comm to his Clan ships docked or floating within the gaps between the Castle’s webs, “time to roar. The Hjar’at are sending a single warship through the lines. Make a hole for them.”

“On it, Alden,” High Admiral Sara Himelin said from onboard her flagship Super Star Destroyer-class dreadnaught sitting with plenty of space to spare between the nearest filaments of the Castle that allowed easy navigating room all the way across the interior if need be, though she wouldn’t have to travel quite that far to get in position to assist the approaching warship.

“Rally up,” she told her bridge crew as more detailed orders flew out through the telepathic interface in her command chair. The dagger-shaped anti-Hadarak dreadnaught she commanded had been built for one purpose and one purpose only…to fight this war and this enemy…and there weren’t that many of them in existence. There were three here, but only this one was under her command. The other two belonged to the Hjar’at and Calavari, which were only a couple of the 183 Star Force factions with troops inside the Castle perimeter and beyond. There were even some non-Star Force ships here to study the Hadarak and observe the fighting, safely sitting behind the primary weapon matrix that the Hadarak had not found a way to defeat…yet.

But they probably wouldn’t push within weapons range of it, so Sara had to go out to them and Clan Mighty Mouse got to do the honors this time. Her warships began moving from all over inside the Castle towards the rally points she had just sent them, with her 52 mile long dreadnaught moving into pole position as they eventually gathered just inside the outermost filament bands.

She had a fleet of regular warships plus 38 other anti-Hadarak vessels of smaller sizes. They were designed primarily to fight and endure the minion swarms, but they could also chew up the Mainline units with ease. What they could not do is move very fast, shoot very far, or carry drones. Dreadnaughts were all fighting ship, not carriers, and the handful of hangar bays on her flagship were mere specs on its hull that was more than half a mile thick of Yeg’gor armor.

Anti-Hadarak dreadnaughts were meant to defend more with armor than shields, but her flagship also had Essence defenses so not to make her slow ship Lurker bait. The smaller ones had some basic Essence neutralizing shields fueled by a Magicite, but hers was large enough to carry some more options, but she had no Tar’vem’jic or other super heavy weapons onboard, Essence enhanced or otherwise. Her ship was built as a grinder for close to medium range combat, and it was not designed to kill Lurkers, only survive them.

But Clan Mighty Mouse didn’t just have dreadnaughts. They had standard, fast warships carrying drones as well as a pair of Avenger-class warships that were designed to kill Lurkers and other big Hadarak using Essence. Both of those she immediately put on hunting duty for the Lurker heading towards the fight brewing ahead, and maybe if her Clan was lucky they might actually bag one…but only if it got stupid, and so far she hadn’t seen any such naivety among that breed of Hadarak.

Her ships waited at the rally point long enough to sync up with the approach speed and position of the incoming warships…of which there were now 32 on approach to the Hadarak formations, but they only needed to get one of them through. That one was vividly highlighted on the battlemap behind a wall of drones that were going straight in ahead of them to engage the Hadarak and provide part of the distraction. Sara had to provide the other part. The larger part. And she had to time the convergence correctly to avoid either group from having to fight the Hadarak alone.

“Engage,” she said calmly, seeing her ship accelerate ahead as rapidly as it could given the position of the system’s gravity wells. The Mighty Mouse fleet came with her, flying off the flanks in a 4 point ‘V’ formation, making it look like her ship was the capstone on a pyramid with the two Avengers flying in the safety of its interior.

The Hadarak responded at once, but they didn’t risk coming within weapons range of the Castle, so they repositioned and waited for the Clan warships to come out far enough…then the Mainline and minion ships surged into the approaching formation and engaged at close range.

The Lurker did not, instead going after the incoming ships as Sara guessed it would. They really didn’t want to let anything in, so it was probably going after the primary target. Their sensors were damn good for biological ones, perhaps even better than Star Force’s in some regards, and they knew which warship the courier had docked with, so it was going to zip in, destroy it, then zip out again, as was normal for Lurker protocol.

The Avengers didn’t even need an order from Sara. As soon as they saw it move off they accelerated and punched little holes through the minion swarms ahead using their Essence weaponry and zipped right through, leaving trails of carnage that the Hadarak didn’t even seem to notice. The holes were swallowed up again as multiple nebulas of darkness tried to engulf the High Admiral’s ships…until they were within weapons range and both sides lit up the intervening space with a multitude of glowing weaponsfire.

The gore was immense off her flagship’s bow, for there were so many weapons batteries that a Christmas tree would look dull in comparison, and into that bright inferno the swarms slammed into the ship like a dark waterfall, physically hitting the shields and dying either from the impact or from getting hit with washes of Dre’mo’don energy that expanded their disintegrated bodies into small explosions that actually pushed the others back temporarily and made them stationary targets…which only added to the vaporization effect as it snowballed.

Sara watched as that confrontation hit on three parts of her elongated hull and spread until nearly a third of her ship was covered with minion swarms, through which the Mainline units tried to approach. The spike balls especially liked to use the gory cover to get in close, but she had plenty of experience keeping them at bay and focused her weaponry on the areas where she knew they were coming and cleaned out those sectors while allowing the minions free shots at others.

Once an approaching spike ball or their launched ramrods were in the clear they were targeted with special anti-heavy weaponry that was not good against minions but very good against large, solid targets. Never the less, two ramrods made it through to hit the hull and both penetrated the shields there, slamming into the armor and bouncing off. The shields had killed enough of their momentum that they could not penetrate, but once it was clear they were not getting through both detonated, killing their own minions in massive blue/white fireballs more than a mile wide.

The dreadnaught’s hull cracked at both points, but the Yeg’gor only got scraped off a few meters deep. The cracks in it ran much further, but they were only a few inches wide and too narrow to target with anything other than goo.

But the goo came in shortly and began sinking in down inside the ship, either eating away at the Yeg’gor or moving to try and get at the crew. Either way, she had an internal fight on her hands now and the High Admiral directed the appropriate response teams to the areas affected, knowing they’d handle it.

Her mission was to make a hole, and that’s what she was doing. Her ships were spreading the Hadarak units around the central area of the ‘pyramid’ behind her, and soon the primary warship carrying the courier was nearly in ramming position ahead.

The dreadnaught belched out a wave-clear attack, one that had to be recharged over the course of 19 minutes, but it eviscerated so many minions around the front tip of the hull that the incoming warship was able to buzz her ship close enough that it had clear enough space to pass through without a single minion being able to get in the way.

The pass by happened so fast she couldn’t see it with her eyes, but as soon as it did the warships on the far side of the battle immediately bugged out, turning out to deep space while Sara ordered her ships to do the reverse, pulling back with her dreadnaught being the last in line, now traveling in reverse at full speed thanks to the omni-directional nature of gravity drives, and firing all the way.

The Hadarak didn’t want to let them go, pounding away at the ships until they got close to Castle weapons range…but they lingered a little too long, staying outside of standard range but not outside her bounce range.

Sara contacted the Castle and ordered a shot fired on her ship, from which she extended an armature out of the top rear section. It looked like a tuning fork similar to the Era’tran ships, but it was pointed straight up…

Alden watched as the courier ship was safely carried through the Hadarak lines as the Avengers circled back and punched their own holes through. They’d gotten one good shot at the Lurker before it peeled off, and now it had a chunk of its forward hull missing, but the shot had missed its central brain, meaning it would live and regrow what was gone, though that would take a considerable amount of time.

His Clan had performed beautifully, and even now as they retreated Sara was getting in one last shot as the Castle activated its primary weaponry and produced a Ysalamir charge towards the center of the construct, then launched it out towards the enemy that was hilariously far away and out of range. The energy cascade, which looked like thick lightning, would have spread out and dissipated had it not hit a spherical target inside the Castle’s web. When it did it absorbed and was redirected in a slightly different direction.

It bounced from point to point through the Castle over the following seconds, reaching out towards the enemy but coming up short. It launched from the last orb on the edge of the web too far away to make it to the Mainline Hadarak units still harassing the Mighty Mouse warships along with waves of minions that were so expendable they’d be fighting all the way to their deaths.

But the Mainline units would turn back, or should have. They’d stayed too long, and now Sara had them. The Ysalamir beam shot out from the Castle not at the Hadarak, but through the Mighty Mouse formation and it hit Sara’s ship on the upper side directly on the armature that absorbed and redirected it wherever the dreadnaught wanted.

The ship had caught the ball, so to speak, and then it launched it through a minion swarm towards a cluster of Mainline ships that were only now trying to turn and run. The Ysalamir energy went right through the minions like they were not there and arced from one Mainline ship to another, hitting 6 before they spread out too much for it to make another jump. Instead it just bounced back and forth between those in range, melting through the Yeg’gor armored hulls and punching out the far side.

They were dead before they knew it, but they didn’t’ explode. Rather they roasted from the damage, pouring out smoke through the holes as they drifted on their last controlled trajectories, including into some minions that didn’t get out of the way fast enough, with the collisions bouncing them off the hull like ping pong balls.

“They should have seen that coming sooner,” Alden said, somewhat disappointed, for this wasn’t the first time they’d used that tactic here. He did a quick mental search on all Hadarak units in this combat area, past and present, and did a tally of how many had arrived since the last use of the ‘beach ball bounce.’

“Interesting,” he said, noting that all the previous Hadarak large scale units had been killed, but not all Mainline fleet ships had. Maybe that suggested the tactical brains were not in the fleets, but the large ones. Perhaps even the Wardens, who remembered and adjusted rather than simply relying on instinct. Or maybe they had just forgot to tell the new arrivals as much as they needed to know.

“Bring the courier to pod 167. I’ll meet it there,” Alden said, hopping off his command nexus platform and heading for a dropship that would get him there faster than the in-filament lift shafts, for pod 7 was an entirely different station from where he was now.

Helpless or not, he wasn’t going to bring a V’kit’no’sat into the very heart of the Castle. Nobody got this far in unless they were Star Force, with the refugees and observers stashed away into approved zones and pods further out in radius. He’d meet the Era’tran there and see what this was about, hoping it was worth the 1,293 drones he’d just lost opening the hole in the Hadarak lines to get him in here.

3

Bran’cen was amazed at the efforts of the Hadarak to keep his ship from getting to the Castle, along with the ferocity and durability of their Mainline warships. They didn’t go down easily like the minions, except to the Ysalamir. Witnessing that firepower was awe inspiring…and now he knew why the Hadarak were not assaulting the Castle.

It didn’t have just one Ysalamir, but many. He didn’t know exactly how many shots it could fire at once, but there were redirection orbs everywhere on the filaments, far more than there were habitats or docked ships. Yet there were many of those as well, and from the look of it the interior of the Castle was its own civilization keeping the Hadarak at bay not by walls, but with the threat of a massively destructive gauntlet they’d have to run to get at the inner regions.

The Castle also seemed to be segmented by radius. The outer filaments had no habitation, only a scattering of warships ready to respond if the Hadarak made another attempt to attack with another minion wave. Those had already destroyed several redirection orbs and filament strands, effectively bringing in the no-go line for the Hadarak a bit closer, but those filaments also had standard weaponry on them and shields, so the minions couldn’t just chew away with immunity. Add in the warships and drones stationed nearby to assist, along with the Ysalamir discharges, and the Hadarak would have to waste an insane amount of the little minions to do even moderate damage.

And that damage was currently being repaired by visible construction crews ringed with drones around the damaged areas. They were rebuilding, but with what the Era’tran did not know. They had no access to the planets in this system, and if resupply was this difficult they had to have stores of materials stashed away or already fabricated components. Either way, what damage had been done prior to his arrival was disappearing slowly as the Hadarak were forced to wait outside.

A moderate way into the interior of the Castle and there were Mach’nel-sized habitats attached to the filament strands like docked ships, and the Hjar’at confirmed that they were in fact detachable if they needed to be moved, though their engine power was limited. They couldn’t out run the Hadarak in free space, but if one side of the Castle was under attack they could detach and move to another section while the fixed weaponry placements killed the minions without having to leave the denizens in harm’s way.

And anything larger than the small minions couldn’t spread out enough to survive against the Ysalamir. The forking of the weapon discharge was limited, so it couldn’t spread through 10,000 minions as other weapons could, but a few splits and bounces had been worked into the Ysalamir enough to not waste the massive blast on individual Mainline ships…though the discharge level could be modulated with smaller, more rapid fire shots bouncing out across the Castle web, making it virtually impossible for any of the well armored Mainline versions to survive in here. And the big Wardens wouldn’t get very far with the dampening shields preventing them from ramming their way inside. They’d stick on the exterior long enough to be hit multiple times, though a group ramming attempt had already been made.

The Hjar’at had shown him the replay from earlier, when 8 Wardens had all tried to ram into the Castle at the same time…and none of them had made it past the outer ring. Their momentum had been blunted by insanely large shield generators…the kind of which not even Itaru had possessed…but these were only for momentum stoppage, not energy deflection. The Castle defended itself with firepower, not shields or armor, and the Ysalamir weapon burnt through the Yeg’gor the Hadarak had used for eons to shrug off conventional weaponry as if it was nothing more than mundane mass.

The downside was the weapon didn’t do any better against lesser targets, but it didn’t need to. There were Tar’vem’jic batteries scattered throughout the Castle web, along with a wide range of other weapons with the more expensive ones being modular and moveable so not to lose them if one section of the Castle fell.

It seemed odd to feel so safe inside of what was essentially empty space, but Bran’cen had no doubt the Hadarak were not getting into the center of the Castle…though neither was he. It was forbidden for visitors, and the only visible chunk of mass within the center was a cluster of redundant structures that the Hadarak had no hope of reaching intact.

The warship he was on didn’t let his Kaeper go, but rather brought him to one of the mid-range rings of the Castle where the largest of the habitats were located, then docked near one against a filament that allowed him to travel down it without having to use a drop pod or the Star Force version known as ‘dropships.’

He figured they had made the name change out of spite long ago, but they meant the same thing even if they were not the same shape. They had done a lot of that, taking from the V’kit’no’sat empire most of their technology without honoring the legacy that had spawned it. But then again, the V’kit’no’sat had tried to kill them multiple times, so he didn’t begrudge them some lingering resentment, though he hoped their leadership had moved beyond that now, as Mak’to’ran had suggested was the case.

When the Era’tran got off the lift car he stepped out into an oddly green environment. This habitat had trees everywhere, many of which were taller than him by a factor of 4. There were paths beneath, blocking out most of the light from above, so small lamp posts were scattered everywhere around the wide trunks to make for a nighttime environment despite the brightly lit artificial sunlight he could see above as the lift came out in a rock wall at a higher elevation.

The Hjar’at lead him down the stone stairs and into the under canopy world, not seeming to care that he still wore his combat armor and could pose a threat. They hadn’t made him remove it, which was odd. Either they trusted him or they were not concerned with what little damage he could do with three Hjar’at trailing him as escorts.

Little people were running around the smaller forest paths, many of which he did not recognize their race, but there were almost no Humans at all. The larger paths held many familiar silhouettes, for they came from the races that made up the V’kit’no’sat, though these had probably been hatched into Star Force. Still, it seemed odd seeing them moving around in that empire’s garb while not reacting to Bran’cen as a potential threat.

The lead Hjar’at led him through the larger paths for a very long time, eventually bringing him to a break in the canopy that had a small building in it…but he soon learned it wasn’t a building, but rather an entry hatch to the cityscape beneath the forest, which was just a park area…and potential battlefield…that visitors had to pass through before getting to the highly populated areas below.

The artificial construction swallowed him up as they walked down a ramp then through many tight corridors before coming out into the more natural cityscape that had larger airways beneath the solid ceilings. They traveled on foot a bit further, then boarded Star Force’s version of a Satu that they called a ‘skyway.’ It was still just an elevated shield tract that propelled them along at greater speeds after stepping upon it, with no structural reason for the name change.

Bran’cen was led deep into the Star Force city before they got off and entered an aviary dome that was 10 times as high as the city ceiling. Inside of it were a large array of winged races flying about from perch to perch, while the center column was left clear for free flight practice.

Out of that central column a small, non-avian descended, with Bran’cen realizing it was a Human flying without augmentation, meaning they had to be using the Yen’mer psionic. This one descended direction in front of the Era’tran’s face as the three Hjar’at walked off in different directions, leaving the Human alone with Bran’cen as they stood on the edge of a body of water that he sensed had many large aquatic races within it.

“You wanted to speak to a trailblazer,” the Human said in V’kit’no’sat. “I’m Alden-031. Speak.”

“Is this location secure?” Bran’cen questioned.

“There are no threats here. And no communication occurs beyond the Castle that any of those nearby can access. Whatever message you have, it can be delivered here.”

“As you wish, Alden,” the Era’tran said, producing the crystal in the palm of his hand, then placing it back into a position on his armor in jewelry mode, allowing him to play it.

A hologram in equal size to Bran’cen appeared to his left, as if another Era’tran was there, with the image of Mak’to’ran coming to life in such detail that passersby would not have known that it was not a living pair of the massive bipeds.

“I am alive,” Mak’to’ran said simply, “by a chance of fate. Eldorat’s attack ripped off my head and I was assumed to be dead, but my loyal Zen’zat reattached my head almost immediately after, resulting in a lingering coma rather than death. The others with me, whose reattachment was delayed, suffered far worse. Most were unrecoverable. By the time it was determined that it was possible to heal me over time, Eldorat was still active in the system and my survival would have been invitation for him to return and attack again. Our planetary defenses could not stop his Essence attacks, so anonymity was the only weapon the Zen’zat could use to keep me alive.”

“Once he was killed…with your assistance…it was discovered that my recovery would take hundreds of years of manual rehabilitation to my brain cells in order to retain my memories. The Elder Council was not informed, nor was anyone else. I was smuggled out of Itaru to undergo therapy on Holloi. I was partially recovered with significant brain problems when the planet was invaded some two centuries later. I had to flee with my healers without knowing what was occurring or who I was. Most of my memories were locked down until they could be repaired, leaving me with a great deal of confusion and amnesia. I do not recall most of what happened, but we were pursued and my brain locked up in error, as I was told it usually did after a short period of time.”

“Without a healer to reset me I was laying helpless when I was shot multiple times. Something inside me shifted, and I was able to use my Essence to heal the rest of my damaged brain. Thanks to your counsel on such matters, I was able to avoid depleting my body and killing myself with further efforts. I now have the ability to use Essence in small amounts, and it is the sole reason why I was not killed on Holloi. A few of my memories were permanently lost, but most I retained and was able to defeat the Zak’de’ron’s servants in combat. Since then I have been impersonating the dead Elder Garuva to avoid those vermin coming back to finish what they started. That is why it was necessary to deliver this message to you in person. Knowledge of my existence must be safeguarded until I can fully secure Jamtren, which is now under my control but greatly weakened and blockaded after their first assault barely failed.”

“All the Elders here are dead. I am the only bastion of wisdom remaining, which is why I did not come to you. If I leave Jamtren it will most likely fall. I have mostly hatchlings to fight with. Everyone of merit met the enemy at the first beachhead and made their last stand there. It was enough to save the planet, and I woke much later into the aftermath when both sides were depleted and fighting like juveniles. I was able to turn the battle to our advantage and drive the invaders out, but Jamtren is gutted and I have little communication beyond. What I know is that most of the empire is depleted, but intact. The Urrtren is down and no one knows where the enemy is or how powerful they are. They are taking any worlds of opportunity, but they do not have the ships to overcome the legacy defenses. Had they more, Jamtren would have fallen easily.”

“I am rebuilding in Jamtren and exerting some influence in neighboring areas, but I am blind to the empire and to Itaru. I now learn you have safeguarded the Ter’nat worlds…including taking the ones the Era’tran were successfully securing. This must not be allowed to pass. I need the Zen’zat, and without Ter’nat I cannot produce more. I thank you for stepping in and doing what we could not in many places, but I cannot allow you to take them all. We must have Zen’zat, though it shames me to admit that fact. I have so little to work with that I cannot let go the advantages they offer the Era’tran. We must come to an arrangement regarding the Ter’nat, and I need to speak with you of that matter, my Essence breakthrough, this war that I forbade to start yet it is here nonetheless, and the Hadarak, whom I fear are farther into our empire than I have been informed.”

“If I had time I could rebuild, but there is none. The Zak’de’ron and the traitors are weakened, but they will rebuild in time as well and launch larger assaults, all the while the Hadarak are not waiting for us to end this pointless carnage. I made sure this outcome would not occur, then within days of my ‘death’ the Elder Council ignored my wisdom and launched an attack against the Zak’de’ron supposedly to avenge me, but it was not. They have wanted this war, ignoring their duty to stop the Hadarak, and they got what they deserved. I assume they are all dead, but if any remain they are irrelevant now. Itaru has fallen, the empire is fractured…how far I do not know, but many worlds I have contacted as Garuva want nothing to do with the Era’tran. They are looking out for themselves, ignoring others of their own race, and trying to stay alive through this carnage.”

“I no longer command the V’kit’no’sat Empire. I no longer command the Era’tran race. I have the Era’tran capitol and a number of other Era’tran worlds that are loyal, with only a few couriers connecting us beyond the local region. Fortunately I still had some backup interstellar relays in place beyond the Urrtren, so I am not completely blind beyond the blockade, but it is little compared to the need. I have accomplished much since waking two decades ago, but there is no time to rebuild. Much of the empire still exists, and it will not fall quickly, but the strongest and wisest of us are now gone…and I cannot reach those who need my guidance. I do not have the fleet to secure the spacelanes. The J’gar now control them.”

Mak’to’ran glanced at the ground, weighing his next words carefully, then he looked back up again to where Alden was floating in midair, with Bran’cen keeping the transmission fixed on the trailblazer’s point of reference.

“I need your help. Long ago I made the mistake of seeking your destruction, and your superior ingenuity defeated me twice. I gambled then, allowing you to live rather than continuing to seek your demise, and you have grown your Rimward empire into the dominant force within the galaxy. What once made the V’kit’no’sat empire great has been destroyed. Our genetic and technological legacy lives on, but only through what will be a slow death. The Zak’de’ron will erase us in time, and my best efforts will only allow a negation of their advances. I cannot win this war with what little I have, and if Holloi still stands free it is because they do not have enough to overwhelm it. We are both reduced to fractions of what we once were, but they will rebuild faster, for they have had to do it before.”

“As much as I want to kill them, the Hadarak are the greater threat, and it shames me how the Elder Council abandoned you to fight them alone, but I cannot change the past,” Mak’to’ran said, throwing his small arms wide. “Fate does not wish to let me win. No matter what I have done I have been thwarted. We developed Ysalamir and Legion, and we were using it to win. Then as soon as I am gone, everything falls apart. I have come to the painful conclusion that the V’kit’no’sat empire as it was, let alone what it is now, is below my caliber. These are not my kin, they are hatchlings that need instruction, and I cannot give it to them without time. Time which no longer exists.”

“I do not seek an honorable death as others have. I will always pursue victory, no matter how faint a trace of it there is. And against the Hadarak, it will not be the V’kit’no’sat that lead the way. We have abandoned that duty and destroyed the strength necessary to oppose them. You have that strength now, and it is we that must support you. I was resistant to admit that to even myself previously, but now there is no point in denying the obvious. We have fallen as much as you have risen, and this is now your galaxy to defend. What I ask is that you help us help you, and since I cannot leave here, I need one of you to come to me so we can hammer out an alliance that will save what is left of my empire and retask it to fighting the Hadarak.”

“What to do about the Zak’de’ron, Oso’lon, and J’gar…there are many options. I am not asking you to fight them with us, but I do not think they will accept an armistice now, though I could be wrong. They are untrustworthy, but they may be desperate enough to negotiate…or they may realize no one can stop them, assuming you are as committed to the Hadarak as I assume you are.”

“Do not let anyone know I still exist. Not yet. Please come to Jamtren with one of your trailblazers or other emissary from Director Davis that has full negotiation power. We must put an end to the rift between us and join together as one empire, under your lead, for you have earned that mantle…but we must do it soon before more is needlessly lost. Please make all haste. I will endeavor to hold Jamtren long enough for you to arrive…”

The hologram turned its head away in despair, almost as if he wasn’t confident anyone would come, then it faded away leaving only the real Era’tran standing in front of Alden.

“Son of a bitch,” he said, looking at Bran’cen.

“What is your response?” the now very pale Era’tran asked meekly. He had no idea things were this bad…and humiliating.

“It will be forthcoming,” Alden said stoically, mentally recalling the Hjar’at who were out of earshot. “I need to discuss this with the others. You can stay here instead of on your ship if you wish. A Kaeper doesn’t allow much room to move around.”

“I will accept your hospitality while I await your response.”

“It’ll be a while. My brothers and sisters are scattered across the galaxy.”

“Your Urrtren is still functional?”

“It is. We won’t take any longer than necessary.”

“Can you not travel to Jamtren yourself?”

Alden bit his lip. “I could, but this needs a huddle first. We’ll have more options to offer if we hammer this out first on our end.”

“Please hurry,” Bran’cen implored, with Alden flying off rapidly after a gentle nod of his head.

The Era’tran huffed, feeling far worse than he had upon arriving here. Mak’to’ran had explained some things to him, but not everything.

The V’kit’no’sat empire was truly dead, and he’d been sent here to deliver a message regarding what to do about its corpse.

4

Alden immediately went to compose a message with a wide range of thoughts on the matter, then transmitted it out from the Castle in the direction of the closest relay ship, which was 12 lightyears away in another star system. That ship, sitting high above the stellar plane almost directly over the north pole of the star far above the Hadarak in the system and having to move around occasionally when some of the minions tried to come out and catch it, received the faint but clear signal and recorded it in its entirety before sending a copy of it out in another direction.

That signal traveled 9 light years to another mobile comm station and got bounced to another, and another, and another until it got all the way across Hadarak held territory into the ghost zone where there were mostly star systems that had already been evacuated by Star Force, though not all. More comm ships continued bouncing it further away from the Core until it finally reached a permanent relay.

That relay was much more powerful, and sent the signal out further than the others in 4 different directions as Alden’s message worked its way not to a single point, but throughout the limited comm grid Star Force had set up in V’kit’no’sat territory. It branched around and traveled along the border with the Hadarak and came to Jack-020 first as his assault fleet was undergoing repairs and restocking on drones in Outreach 118, one of about half of the original field bases that had not been swallowed up by the Hadarak encroachment of V’kit’no’sat territory yet.

The signal was received by the comm relay in that system, then transmitted into the local grid, going to every facility and ship there, but only one person had the access codes necessary to receive it.

“Son of a bitch,” Jack said, running his fingers through his short yellow/black hair that was mixed in splotches of color that matched his Clan Wolverine colors. “How is that bastard still alive?”

The trailblazer sat down at the desk in his quarters, shaking the sleepiness out of his head. He’d been awakened by the arrival of the message, which he’d preset to alert him the moment anything from his brothers and sisters arrived, and his short sleep sessions were no exception. He’d need to catch a nap later to make up for it, or otherwise his Saiyan metabolism would still burn him out. Jack didn’t need much sleep nowadays, but he did require a little, though right now it could wait. He had to think.

They’d discussed the possibility of absorbing the V’kit’no’sat empire, fighting it, ignoring it, splitting it up, and every other scenario they could come up with…but no one had expected Mak’to’ran to still be alive in a coma somewhere. That changed things greatly, and hopefully for the better. Jack put down his thoughts about how much they could scrounge from the Rim, as well as how little they could provide locally to support any operation in V’kit’no’sat territory. His own fleet was going in and out of Hadarak territory and hitting every stronghold he could find while simultaneously sending out patrols a few systems apart to intercept passing Hadarak minion convoys.

He was doing damage to try to stem the flow elsewhere, but like everyone else he was overwhelmed with targets. The spacelanes in Hadarak territory were always busy, with the conquered systems spewing out minions by the trillions. It was now like a Skarron crusade in that the reinforcements kept coming in continual streams, and no matter how badass his fleet was, Jack couldn’t stop them all within even a small region. One or two systems yes, but they were coming from everywhere and gobbling up new territory that was unoccupied without having to fire a shot…and when they did fight, they were conquering systems without even so much as a Warden in support, because Star Force was focused on the attacks that did have Wardens and larger Hadarak involved.

Now that Star Force could actually kill them, and kill them effectively, it was the minion hordes that were winning the war. Jack noted this was probably why the Founders couldn’t win, for Essence was worthless against these type of numbers. If you fought conventionally and won against the minions, the heavy hitters would clobber you. If you had the Essence to destroy the heavies, the minions would get you. A civilization had to have both to survive, let alone win, and while Star Force now fit that description it was too late. The Hadarak had spread too far, reproduced too much, and Star Force could not keep them bottled up. Not even close. It was like trying to catch a waterfall with a net.

The evacuation efforts were the most successful thing they had going, but for every system they evacuated, 7 more were destroyed before they could get to them. One out of eight on a galactic scale was a huge amount of refugees having to be ferried out to the Rim and absorbed into the empire, but now that 1/8 number was quickly turning into 1/300 as the original V’kit’no’sat border with the Hadarak was broken and the invasion fingers began stabbing their way inside the heavily populated regions where others had taken shelter from the Hadarak thanks to the V’kit’no’sat. Further Coreward the populations had been lower and scattered, with the civilizations there getting busted up enough to be kept suppressed, but thanks to the V’kit’no’sat’s protective umbrella, beyond the line the population had skyrocketed…and now the Hadarak were assaulting it in too many places to stop them all.

Even with the additional races coming in from the Rim to assist with the war, the galactic defenders were heavily outnumbered. They needed the V’kit’no’sat in this war badly, what was left of them at least, for while their fleets were decimated their worlds were mostly intact and capable of producing more warships. They just had to stop wasting them against Itaru and vice versa, but good luck getting that to happen.

Jack laid out a list of suggestions then transmitted his updated copy of Alden’s message and sent it back out into the grid, where it branched out through every possible path, jumping from relay to relay until it got to Martin-078 via a courier that brought the message back into Hadarak territory where he was screening for the evacuation of a race of what looked like telepathic cows. The quadrupeds couldn’t fight well with their bloated bodies, but they could construct decent technology and had a fairly sizeable empire of 93 systems that had been within the V’kit’no’sat’s protective umbrella before that umbrella had collapsed due to internal warfare.

The drones the Uvilum used were decent against the Hadarak on the ground, but their warships were no match for them and were easily destroyed by waves of minions without even a single Mainline unit amongst them. Martin had gotten here late, after the invasion had started, finding the Uvilum holding out in shield protected cities as the Hadarak were fighting a ground war and already consuming half the planet…which is when Martin’s mech forces stepped in.

His fleet was mostly transports, with just enough warships to bully the minions as much as needed. Orbital bombardment accomplished much, but it couldn’t get in underneath the shield generators and other tight places…though more than that they couldn’t bombard everywhere fast enough, so they had to pick and choose while also fighting naval minions that continually distracted them from aiding the surface.

Martin had 8 galaxies of mechs, 1 from his Clan Vortex and another 7 from the Bsidd. That gave him a total of 4000 mechwarriors, and he had all of them down on the planet fighting on defense lines along with him as his small fleet bombarded the surface, fought off naval minions, and covered for the evacuation ships that were only beginning to arrive and send scores of dropships down into the cities to pull out the helpless tele-cows as fast as they could.

He spent over 8 hours in battle in a Madcat before his fuel reserves ran so low he had to back out or risk running out of ammunition, all of which were energy weapons, including the mini-bloon launcher boxes that were carried above each shoulder on the reversed leg mech. His kill count was so high he’d turned it off days ago from the display screen. What mattered was not how many minions were killed, but how many Uvilum were saved, and that number was painfully low right now, though creeping upwards steadily as they delayed the Hadarak ground minions from getting further into most of the cities.

He only had a partial Cluster with him, which was normally made up of 20 Stars, which had 5 mechs in each. That was the operational unit for combined mech warfare, and right now he had 8 other mechs with him. Jared had taken a leg hit and had to limp his way out of combat, leaving only 9 mechs in total to handle the western side of the 28 mile wide city.

But fortunately the minions were dumb as hell, and with the backing of the Uvilum combat drones they were able to hold the line while drawing most of the attention to the mechs which came forward in two locations, one star each, and became the bait to keep the minions from swarming the drones.

His mech’s feet were covered in gore by the time he had to bail out and retreat back into the city to an LZ that held replacement parts, fuel, and ammunition for those that required it, but in a battle this long using anything other than energy weapons would leave you with serious endurance problems.

Martin hopped out of the mech as soon as he got it into the repair birth, with a team of Bsidd scurrying over it doing some quick repair and maintenance work as the trailblazer ran into one of the prefab buildings to get some food, use the restroom, and try to catch a cat nap over the next 20 minutes or so. If he didn’t he was going to burn out, and his team likewise, for the minion reinforcements coming into the city were nowhere near ending, and there were too many enemy landing zones created by kamikaze landers for the warships to pick off.

He and the others in his Clan had done this before, many times, but the Bsidd were a bit more fragile. He had to order them back more often to switch out for sleep cycles, for they’d been on this defensive line for 18 days of nonstop fighting. Without the Cows’ drones they never would have held this city this long, but without the mechs the drones could not have survived either. They needed each other for at least another 3 weeks to get everyone evacuated, and Martin had to plan for that in his rotations here and across the planet, which he monitored while fighting mostly, but more so on these short breaks as he napped.

After shoving enough food in his face, he slipped a little fingernail-sized disc onto his forehead and laid down on the floor next to a wall, letting his body and most of his mind rest as he used the interlink to save his telepathy while he monitored the battlemap and issued a few orders here and there. After dealing with the most priority alerts on the planet he noted the arrival of a message from Alden, as well as another from Jack commenting on Alden’s message.

Mak’to’ran was alive and they were discussing options before sending someone to negotiate with him. Martin didn’t have time to weigh in now, but he knew decisions were being made as these messages worked their way across the comm network, so he needed to add something before the others got to it first.

He mentally wrote down a few quick suggestions and observations, then added one last line before sending the message back up to the evacuation fleet that had carried it here along with other news updates, and they’d carry it back when they left with full bays of Uvilum.

I call dibs on the Ari’tat.

5

April 27, 128822

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

Davis ran, his breath visible in spurts as the warm air in his lungs condensed immediately as it hit the frigid arctic air over the snowpack. The Director ran in nothing more than shorts, sleeveless T-shirt, and shoes, using his Rensiek to keep his body heated in the -20 F sunny environment as he stayed connected to the full battlemap planetary grid through a headband that allowed him direct mental connection.

There were no trails out here, just an ice sheet over top the arctic ocean that allowed him to run in whatever direction he wanted seemingly forever as he tended to the business of the ever growing empire currently engaged in 18 small wars, the ongoing Temple conflicts, and the one big war that was fueling the rushed relocation of refugees out to the Rim. Axius and Beacon had their hands full trying to absorb them all, with Beacon taking the civilizations and Axius offering a sanctuary to those individuals that survived without a people left to call their own.

Beacon was so large now Davis knew he had to subdivide it, but he hadn’t yet determined the best method to do so. That was one of the many things he was thinking about as he perused the information grid looking for updates and digging up various bits of information as he ran and ran. He no longer wanted to stay in his office, sitting in a chair most of the day, so he’d gradually adjusted his body to regular running for hours straight, but at an easy enough pace to allow his mind to wander.

When he got tired enough he’d welcome the chair in his office, but not right now. He was only two hours into his ice pack run, but when a priority update came through from Alden he opened it immediately…then slid to a halt about 3 seconds later when he got the information that Mak’to’ran was still alive.

“You have got to be kidding me,” he said, puffing out white smoke as the cold tried to suck the heat out of his body, but his Rensiek was defying it so well he didn’t even feel it. He saw that the message wasn’t specifically for him, but sent to all the trailblazers as well. That meant he wasn’t going to be making any decisions immediately. Davis had learned long ago to let it bounce among them as they were spread across the galaxy, and as each one got it and added their thoughts all the messages would make their way to him and he’d have the best load of suggestions at the end of it, though with them going back and forth across weeks or months of comm lag, there technically would never be any end to it, but he needed to wait for a least a bunch of their replies to come in before he added his own.

He immediately wanted to go himself, but Jamtren was on the other side of the galaxy and it would take him the better part of 2 years to get there even with the Hula Hoop saving a lot of time. Plus, there was so much going on in the empire for him to monitor and modify that being out of contact in the war zone was something he didn’t want to risk. Not for his safety, but with the empire being forced to stretch to fight the Hadarak, the ongoing takeover combat inside the Temples, and the massive logistics effort to supply the fleet with replacement drones and homes for the refugees, he needed to use his skills to maximize everything they had where he could find upgrades…and despite the skill of his Monarchs, he always found something they had overlooked.

Not that that was always their fault, for the Kingdoms, and even single planets, had so much going on in them one couldn’t monitor everything, but Davis had learned where to look over his many millennia of life, and he had gotten very good at sniffing out both trouble and opportunities as he stayed at the center of the information web inside the empire, and going beyond it would cost him that…but he still wanted to go and meet Mak’to’ran personally.

Fortunately he didn’t have to. The trailblazers were fully equipped to negotiate in his stead, and Alden was fairly nearby Jamtren. Either he or one of the other closer ones needed to go sooner rather than later, for the situation in the V’kit’no’sat empire was dire and getting worse with each year.

Davis had so many scouts out in the galaxy right now they numbered more ships than he’d had during the first V’kit’no’sat invasion. They were monitoring the Hadarak, trying to get as much data on the war between the Zak’de’ron and V’kit’no’sat and who had what where as well as could be managed with the Urrtren down, plus he had ships out all across the Rim keeping an eye on the known while exploring the chunks of galaxy that were still unknown.

The Hadarak war didn’t stop operations out here from occurring, and there were a lot of small wars that had to be fought now, even if it meant not sending some ships to fight the Hadarak. In fact, most of the Rim didn’t even know the Hadarak existed, and would not unless Star Force lost this war, but to the people suffering and dying in their various situations it didn’t matter. All that mattered was whether or not someone was going to come and save them.

Then there were known races who had behaved themselves in the past that were now pushing the envelope and trying to see how much they could get away with since the bulk of the Star Force fleet had disappeared to other parts of the galaxy. Davis had a lot of Arc Commandos out dealing with that, and most of the security in the Rim was now in the hands of Sub-Factions, and even some Provinces that had been tasked with responsibility beyond their borders. Davis was moving pieces around everywhere to trying to cover for the absence of the fleets belonging to the Knight races and the Factions, for it was primarily them that was fighting the Hadarak, leaving defense of the empire itself in the hands of the third string, for the most part.

But that was improving as more Paladin came out of the Temples. Alpha was now fully under Star Force control, and Thrawn had reassigned himself to the other Temples to make sure each one was subjugated and the mass murder devices in them were secured and eventually destroyed. Right now only Alpha was truly safe and Star Force property, though it contained so many prisoner races that it was still hostile territory, but the Paladin could continue to produce warships inside it, along with crews, to deal with them, leaving the bulk of the existing Paladin fleets there to slowly filter their way out through the spacial tap now that the Essence shield surrounding the Temple had been lowered from the control rooms…all of which were now held and secured by Paladin that would gladly die fighting before they let any of the Vargemma or the Founders retake them.

So Davis had additional Paladin fleets coming out of the Temples periodically to add to the Paladin spamming along the war zone. Their numbers had grown so large it concerned him, for they were not the most reliable Faction, but he needed a way to secure territory against the Hadarak, as well as mass produce new expansion colonies nearby. Bsidd, Kiritak, and the other fast growing races still had to train their younglings, but Paladin did not, making them the best quick build assets he had…and he feared a coming blood bath when the Hadarak eventually got to them.

There wasn’t any other choice right now. Star Force couldn’t stop the minion hordes everywhere. There were too many empty systems they could push through, making the task of drawing a line in the stars to stop their advance laughable. The farther they pushed the larger that line would have to get to encircle the galaxy, but Davis knew that impossibility was their only hope now. If they could effectively battle the larger units with Essence, they had to establish a line to block the minions…which would leave a lot of people on the chopping block should even one Warden break through to land on an inhabited Paladin world.

That’s what he feared most. The idea of the Paladin going rogue was unlikely. What was a threat was them striking back at the Hadarak however they could manage it, including dishonorable ways. They still had a penchant for throwing themselves into fights they knew they couldn’t live through for the sake of winning the fight, and nothing other than experience was going to teach them otherwise. But all things considered, Davis was more comfortable having them on the border than any non-Star Force race, including the now 8 Encapsulated races that Star Force had awoken and called to join the fight.

Two more had declined, and the rest were still waiting to be contacted. Those going into battle were proving to be damn effective, but they weren’t Star Force and couldn’t be trusted the same. As for the V’kit’no’sat…that was something different entirely. They weren’t trustworthy, but they were familiar, which made them more predictable than strangers. And Mak’to’ran was the most familiar to Davis, though how much of him remained intact after his ordeal was a question mark. And his supposed breakthrough to Essence abilities was something Davis wanted to personally investigate…but there just wasn’t time for him to go. Someone else would have to.

He read the recommendations Alden had laid out, though they were little more than some basic possibilities ranging from forcing the Zak’de’ron into a 3-way non-aggression pact up to full annexation of the V’kit’no’sat. The latter was something they’d been planning on doing anyway, but aside from the worlds along the border that had already requested it, Davis wasn’t in a position to force the V’kit’no’sat to join Star Force. That would require a fleet and a massive amount of personnel to subjugate and absorb them, so he wasn’t really in a position to do that.

But if Mak’to’ran was alive and could wield his influence, then maybe there was a way to get them to join voluntarily…or at least some of them. Mak’to’ran’s message had hinted at something in that direction, but there were so many possibilities and permutations this was going to take some thinking…then the negotiating would come into play, for he didn’t know what Mak’to’ran was thinking either, what he was capable of doing, what he was willing to do. But as far as what Star Force needed, it wasn’t more Knight races. The V’kit’no’sat couldn’t just put on a different uniform and join up. Davis had learned that through experience when absorbing the Tamprani Region at the end of the V’kit’no’sat war, and even now many of those worlds were not Knight races, but rather civilian entities within the Knight races.

If an individual in a Knight race wanted to not live up to the duties expected of them, they could forfeit their psionics and leave for where they wanted, but when taking in V’kit’no’sat who already had psionics it was different. They weren’t born into Star Force, and taking away their psionics was tantamount to killing them, so there had been exceptions made for those individuals. They could keep their psionics, but they could not travel beyond the Knight worlds, and many had no wish to do so. That left a large number of former V’kit’no’sat worlds in Tamprani, which were spread across 9 different Kingdoms that had been carved out of that post-war annex, with large populations of former V’kit’no’sat reproducing hatchings that were trained as Knights.

The ‘civilians’ supported them, but they were not of the same mindset, and the same was true of the worlds along the border that were being brought in. They were not compatible with the Knights in large numbers, though there were always individuals who were eager and willing to make the transition. Absorbing and converting large numbers of V’kit’no’sat worlds would be a tedious task when not in wartime, and Davis did not have the resources or patience to do it now. What he needed was an army to fight, not races to babysit.

He looked down at the ice beneath him, and dug the toe of his shoe into the loose snow layer on top as he thought. What he really needed was plugs in the line he was drawing with the Paladin and the Encapsulated armies. They were being given small sectors to patrol and lock down each system. They weren’t inhabiting them all, but it was their responsibility to kill any Hadarak minion that crossed into their assigned territory. They were not to go beyond their sectors and hunt them further, just wait and hold the line until they came to them…and then try to kill them all without letting any through.

Agreements had been made to have Avenger-class warships and Olopar there to assist them when larger units came through, but Davis couldn’t put them on defensive duties…at least not in larger numbers. They had to be out hunting the larger units before they got to the line, and in the few places where the Paladin were already engaged in this defensive action the system was working, but the Hadarak could just choose to go around them if they wanted. Davis needed to plug all the holes, and damn the Zak’de’ron for mandating that the V’kit’no’sat races be spread out without any chunk of territory to call their own. It made using them in that fashion almost impossible, and the loss of the Urrtren reduced their ability to coordinate down to nearly 0.

And even if they agreed to turn and fight the Hadarak again, what of the Zak’de’ron, Oso’lon, and J’gar? Would they just stop fighting their war, or continue to hit them while their warships were away? The were losing enough systems as it was already due to lack of defensive fleets. The odds of the V’kit’no’sat agreeing to send ships to fight the Hadarak was non-existent. They couldn’t even protect the Ter’nat at this point, so what was Mak’to’ran really implying?

Davis couldn’t know without being there, so his part in this was clear. Wait until he got more of the trailblazers’ suggestions, then use them to come up with whatever options he could approve of and send them to Alden for him to negotiate with.

The Director took off running again, this time a bit faster as his mind raced with possibilities. His entire empire plan had been upturned by the Vargemma attack on Earth and other worlds that he had previously thought were fortified. With Essence being able to bypass virtually all defenses, his heavily populated worlds were little more than killing fields, and to this day Earth had not been repopulated. Not with Star Force citizens or lower level animal life. The attack had destroyed all of it across the planet, save for the survivors within the cities. Even the oceans had been emptied of life, with the dead eventually floating to the surface and forming island formations of corpses.

Nature had cleaned up some of that, and Star Force had done the rest. Now the planet was uninhabited without so much as an insect on it, and even more desolate than Corneria had been when they first found it. It at least had insects, if not larger animals, and likewise Earth was now covered in forests struggling to survive without carbon dioxide. They would have died out long ago without volcanic activity giving them occasional thick spurts of the necessary gas, and since the early aftermath Davis had built CO2 shunts that acted as artificial volcanoes. They took rock from below and pulled the CO2 out of it, then released it into the air for the trees and other plant life to eat, keeping the Earth green at least, even if it was still a dead zone.

Davis had rebuilt Atlantis, but not as it was. All the cities now on Earth were really just slow starships, able to move away from danger if they knew it was coming. He wasn’t going to rebuild fixed cities here until he had a way to properly defend them against Essence attacks, and right now he did not, but he suspected that one day they would. What they were getting out of the Temples was promising, not that they would hold the key itself, but create a springboard that Star Force would use to go on and create the necessary technology on their own.

Right now the only way to defend against Essence was with Essence, so Atlantis had Essence shields and other countermeasures, but they only worked so long as they had a fuel source, and there was no way to get enough to defend an entire planet. Right now Atlantis was a luxury that the other galaxies did not have, and that was due solely to the Uriti. They were what was allowing Star Force to rise to such a level, and to counter the Hadarak’s larger units. It was all the Uriti and their donation of Essence for Star Force use, making them far more lethal to the Hadarak in this manner than they ever could have been in direct combat. It was a stroke of fateful luck that this former containment agreement had turned into a powerhouse, but it alone was not enough.

Davis didn’t fear the Hadarak minions out here in the Rim. It was the Founders that concerned him. If he rebuilt Earth they could sweep in again and wipe it out, so until he found a way Earth was only going to have a few floating cities on it, and he couldn’t do anything to protect the other worlds that were heavily populated with fixed cities. He didn’t have the resources to shift them all to mobile ones, even if he didn’t have a war to fight and refugees to relocate. Davis was sickened at leaving his people so exposed, but at the minimum he was not going to rebuild the capitol unless he had a way to defend it against Essence attack and return it to being a fortress world.

Until then, he was the capitol, and he would run as fast and hard as he had to to stay alive. Anonymity was his best defense, and not giving the Founders or other Essence capable races a fixed target to hit was the best option he had, and he had stayed away from Earth for a long time, but no longer. He wasn’t going to hide from it, but he wasn’t going to put down roots either, and right now Atlantis was sitting beneath his feet underneath the Arctic ice that had reformed once the temperature modulators had gone offline during the evacuation following the attack. Davis hadn’t let anyone remain on the planet, shutting everything down and letting the dead ball of rock sit for a long time, which had two ice caps reforming on both planets.

That had eaten up a lot of forests, but some of the cities had become overgrown with plant life as dust storms and tsunamis had reshaped the surface. All the technology had been turned off and left to stand, meaning there were large cities with internal areas that were still pristine, but evacuated. A monument to what had happened and a reminder to all that the empire was not safe, and Davis wasn’t going to pretend otherwise.

If they ever found a way to make it safe again he would come back to reclaim Earth. Until then he and a few others were visitors here, hiding their cities beneath the ocean or floating them above the clouds, unwilling to have anyone set foot on the planet again…save for Davis. He was literally the last man on Earth, or touching it anyway, and he often came out here to think about the future of his empire and how he was going to restore it to the rock it had once been…or at least had appeared to be before he had been exposed to the wonders and horrors of Essence weaponry.

Davis continued to run for hours more, then eventually circled around to the small cupola poking up through the ice that was little more than a periscope for the submerged city of Atlantis hiding beneath the floating ice that was some 15 feet thick. The Director entered the open doors and descended in a lift down the shaft that would take him back into the hidden city where he grabbed an open war room and began filling it with information on the V’kit’no’sat as he formulated elaborate plans that he would amend, scratch, or upgrade as he sought options to offer Mak’to’ran.

He really wished he was going himself, but the galaxy was too big and too much travel time was involved. And if it wasn’t for the Star Force relay grid being in place, he’d be as blind as the V’kit’no’sat were to what was happening next door, let alone on the far side of the Core. Size of empires had their disadvantages, and this was one of them. He’d have to work with it and let the trailblazers handle the negotiations. Too much other stuff relied on him tweaking the edges, and with the weight of the Hadarak war on Star Force’s shoulders, Davis knew in the pit of his stomach that his empire would either rise to the challenge or crumble under the stress.

The elite would never buckle, but most of his empire was not elite and they required a structure and firm enforcement of rules in order to live in ‘peace.’ If that ever cracked, so would the empire as the citizenry began the long, slow descent into chaos and anarchy. It wouldn’t be quick for them, for they had too much training, but it would happen. Star Force would either thrive or fall, and Davis knew that taking in so many refugees was pushing them to the tipping point…but he wasn’t going to leave them there to die as others would. Star Force was going to take in as many as they could right up to the breaking point.

And Davis had to be here, managing the details to make sure no one that could be saved was left behind…and to make sure the empire didn’t overreach and crack from the weight of the galaxy’s troubles it was taking on. He had to walk Star Force on the edge of a sword, and Davis didn’t trust anyone to be able to do it as precisely as he could, so Mak’to’ran was going to have to be dealt with by others. Davis’s empire was in peril of his own choosing, because no matter what happened he would not become the bad guy to preserve it, and he also would not become the dope that believed he could save everyone and ended up dead himself for his miscalculation.

Star Force was near to breaking, but no cracks had formed yet, and it was up to Davis to make sure they didn’t, knowing full well that if the Founders decided to show up now and make trouble, there was no way to salvage the situation. Davis was tapped out. The empire couldn’t take any more. And as the Director made his daily runs through the graveyard that was Earth, he knew it was a microcosm for the graveyard he was whistling through in order to preserve the many races of the Core that would otherwise be wiped out by the Hadarak.

Star Force couldn’t take another hit now, and so far his luck was holding. But the helpless feeling he had clinging to the back of his mind ever since Earth had been attacked was still there, taunting him on a daily basis. Davis couldn’t live safely now. He had to embrace the recklessness of it all and surf the uncertainty.

One way or another this would all shake out, but the one thing he could control was what Star Force became, and rise or fall, it would remain a shining beacon of the lightside no matter what. He had to have that bit of certainty within his mind or he would go crazy from the empathy of a suffering galaxy, but at least that small bit was something he could always control. And from that small point of stability he could fight the impossible fights.

The outcome of those fights he could not predict. Right now he knew to just keep swinging and let the future take care of itself, and he hoped this reemergence of Mak’to’ran was going to be an asset, for he couldn’t let it be another burden.

The empire simply didn’t have any more to give at this point.

6

February 7, 128823

Attiok Rumea System (Imm’en Region)

Low stellar orbit

Alden’s Borg vessel, the Mightiest, transitioned its way around the star in the center of one of the uninhabited adjacent star systems to Jamtren, all the while numerous J’gar vessels were pacing it from outside weapons range, but the largest group were waiting at the jumpline to Jamtren to stop anyone from coming out…or going in.

But the combined mass of those 19 warships was a small fraction of the Mightiest. She was a 327 mile wide cube, and far bigger than the V’kit’no’sat Mach’nels, though nothing even approaching that size was in this system. The J’gar couldn’t stop Alden from going through, but they were doing their best to talk him down as they ranged from making threats to pleading with him to not enter the blockaded system.

It was rather pathetic by the end of his transition around the star, and when he got into prime jump position the J’gar ships were sitting in his way and staring him down. Rather than move around them farther out on the jumpline he simply issued an order for them to move, and when they did not he opened fired.

Nothing that was going to destroy them, but he had more than enough firepower to use shield draining weapons only and peppered them with so many hits they lost their protective energy fields within 20 seconds…after which they took the hint and a few began to move aside, with the others following shortly thereafter when their backup disappeared.

Once the jumpline was cleared, Alden launched his flagship out at a speed the J’gar could not have matched if they wanted to pursue, though none bothered to try. They couldn’t stop a Star Force Borg vessel, and thankfully they weren’t stupid enough to try and seriously engage one. Alden didn’t want to get bogged down with prisoners at the moment. Especially aquatic ones.

When the Mightiest came out of its coast phase and decelerated on the jumpline, it was met by a single Era’tran Domjo sitting just off the traffic lane, and Alden imagined the crew were thoroughly surprised to see such a large ship show up on their doorstep, for they immediately started to drift the opposite direction as they hailed them demanding to know why they were here.

Apparently ‘Garuva’ had not told anyone they were coming. Then again, he didn’t know for sure if they would, or when.

Alden released the Kaeper from one of its hangar bays and let Bran’cen do the explaining as he passed by the Domjo and headed out to Holloi without wasting any more time. Based on the sensor data he was getting, the system was still in Era’tran hands, but a lot could have happened in the year+ that had gone by since Mak’to’ran had dispatched the courier to contact Star Force.

More Era’tran ships met them in orbit of Holloi, some 28, including one Kafcha, which was a rarity nowadays in the V’kit’no’sat empire. Virtually all of the big ships had been destroyed long ago, meaning this was either an exception or a new build, and based on the lack of visible hull damage marks he guessed it was the latter, for most of the ships here had them, indicating that the little repairs were being overlooked in favor of the bigger ones…meaning supplies were limited, or there was so much combat occurring they hadn’t had time to make the ships look pretty again.

“Garuva, I hope you’re still here,” Alden transmitted once he was in orbit of Holloi. “I’m missing a playdate with the Hadarak for this.”

No hologram responded, nor did a voice message. Just a set of coordinates on the surface along with landing instructions.

“Paranoid,” he scoffed, abandoning the command nexus on the bridge and heading for a hangar.

When his dropship came down inside Garuva’s palace, he was met with a lot of Era’tran guards and a large contingent of Zen’zat, almost as if they suspected this was a Trojan horse operation and not a guest arriving by invitation.

Alden walked out and down the boarding ramp unconcerned in his red and yellow Archon armor that matched his Clan colors. The weaponry the guards had was formidable, but he could dodge enough of it to break free if needed with a combination of technology, psionics, and Essence...though he sensed enough erratic telepathic leakage from those assembled to know that they were afraid of him, and he didn’t know why.

Mak’to’ran didn’t show himself at first, but eventually the door on one of the buildings opened and the Era’tran of legend walked out without his armor deployed and met Alden midway, stopping short of stepping on him as he towered over the small Archon with his big head looking down.

Alden peeled back his helmet, but kept the rest of his armor active as he looked back up at him. “You wanted to speak with me?”

“Yes I do,” Mak’to’ran said, speaking the Star Force language. “You are Alden-031?”

“I am.”

“You are stealing my Ter’nat.”

“That’s funny. I thought for sure we were saving them.”

“Not all. Some you have taken from the Era’tran that were not in jeopardy. I need those back, though I thank you for saving the others. I do not have the necessary ships to safeguard all in need.”

“We noticed. And if we weren’t busy with the Hadarak we’d be lecturing Itaru about that right now. Taking possession of the Ter’nat worlds and forcing Itaru to fight us to attack them is the best we could do. So far they haven’t been that stupid, because we do hold grudges. It’s safer for the Ter’nat to remain in our custody rather than yours.”

“Will you allow the Zen’zat they produce to serve us, or will they serve you?”

“Why would they serve you when you can’t protect them?”

“Zen’zat are the common element within the V’kit’no’sat. The other servant races are not as common, or as useful. We need our Zen’zat, and in order to produce them we need the Ter’nat.”

“Why not just breed Zen’zat from Zen’zat?”

“Why do you ask questions to which you already know the answer? You have patterned your Archons off the same principles.”

“Did we? I’m not so sure about that, but there is a similarity. I’ll give you that much.”

“What I need you to give me is the Zen’zat,” Mak’to’ran quipped.

“Is that the only reason you wanted me to come here?”

Mak’to’ran huffed. “It is not. The status quo will not persist. Our war with Itaru and the encroaching Hadarak will not remain stable. You cannot hold them back alone, we cannot defeat Itaru, and Itaru cannot defeat us…at least not quickly enough to survive the Hadarak. We are on a course with oblivion, and in order to avoid that fate your empire and ours must come to an agreement.”

“What kind of agreement are you talking about?”

“That is why I needed you here. So we can negotiate something that is mutually beneficial.”

Alden mock sighed. “Dang. I was hoping you were going to finally surrender to us.”

“V’kit’no’sat do not surrender.”

“Some do,” Alden pointed out.

“If your enemy is honorable enough to accept an amicable surrender, then why are you fighting them in the first place? Better to die fighting free than to die in restraints.”

“Yes, that’s a damn good question, Era’tran. Care to answer it?”

“For myself, I was foolish, blind, and loyal to the Elder Council’s will. Neither of those things is true now.”

“And what about them?” Alden asked, thumbing towards the guards. “Are they so enlightened?”

“If they were, then we would not be in the position we are in now. The Elder Council disobeyed my orders as soon as they thought I was dead and attacked the Zak’de’ron, starting a war they did not win and leaving the empire gutted and vulnerable to the Hadarak.”

“And leaving us to fight them alone,” Alden added.

“It would never have happened had Eldorat not maimed me. I could not stop them while incapacitated.”

“Your empire is not up to your standards. That’s a massive problem.”

“We are in agreement there. Do you come with a recommendation how to remedy that problem?”

“I have many recommendations and options. I need to know what you’re willing to accede to.”

“We must survive this war, rebuild, and stand against the Hadarak before they come racing up our tails. I am open to all options that achieve this.”

“Do you trust them?” Alden said, referencing those listening silently around them.

“If I did not we would be speaking inside.”

“Alright, Mak’to’ran. Before we knew you were alive we had plans to gradually absorb your empire when able, but we’re not able to right now. Between the Hadarak and the mass evacuations we’ve got our hands full. We had to pull the Meintre off the war front to safeguard the Ter’nat, trading saving them for people we know nothing about. And the Zen’zat that have come to our aid since have pledged their service defending the Ter’nat and fighting the Hadarak. Some are already there now, helping to screen the evacuees on infested worlds. If you want a mutually beneficial arrangement, what can you offer in your broken state?”

“We are broken, but not beaten. The lack of the Urrtren has separated us, but most of our worlds are still out there. Isolated, being picked off when able, but the stronger ones have too many legacy defenses to be touched. I know they continue to exist even without scouts telling me so. Our empire cannot be quickly conquered, except by the Hadarak. Legion was our best hope of stopping them from crushing our planets, and I have begun constructing new units here in limited capacity. If we can prevent them from landing, our legacy defenses will defeat their minions.”

“You’re spread out so far it’s almost a moot point. And the edge of your empire has already fallen. Without our assistance large chunks of it would be gone, but we’ve been helping to eliminate the larger Hadarak with our Essence warships. We are doing very well hunting them down and destroying them, but the minions are reproducing so fast they are winning the war. There are too many, attacking too many worlds for us to defend against. We cannot put up a wall around the Core anymore. They’ve progressed too far.”

“We do not have a warfleet to aid you. We cannot even protect our own worlds in some cases, but the roots of our empire are intact and can regrow our strength if given the opportunity. Provide us with that and we will throw out full power against the Hadarak alongside you.”

“How can we provide that?”

“I was hoping you would know, given your superior reconnaissance of my empire.”

“How much do you have?”

“A small network of backup transponders linking a few systems. Enough to get past the J’gar blockade and receive reports from my scout ships, but many do not make it back. The J’gar are hunting everything that moves without superior speed or escort. They may be no threat to your vessel, but to us they are lethal.”

“Alright. Story time,” Alden said, using his armor to produce a huge hologram above his head that the other Era’tran and Mak’to’ran could look down on, but one that the Zen’zat could look up at from below just the same.

“We don’t have full knowledge of everything going on in V’kit’no’sat territory, but we know enough. Your worlds are scattered and blind to one another, and the Zak’de’ron are using this to hide their own weakness while they pick off small, vulnerable ones. They eliminated the major systems early on to invoke fear and helplessness, and that has seen some worlds switch sides without a shot being fired…but your stubbornness has kept those numbers low, and the Zak’de’ron do not have the strength to finish this war, or even sweep up a fraction of your territory. They are cherry picking specific systems in order to stifle trade and communications, making it appear they are everywhere when in truth they have few ships to spare other than the J’gar fleet.”

“What is ‘cherry picking?’” Mak’to’ran asked.

“Selective choice. They cannot take systems en mass, so they pick the ones best suited to their limited resources and take them while skipping over others. They have no borders and are as scattered as your worlds, but you still have a vast territory advantage. Itaru may have been a huge loss, but in truth it was never that valuable compared to the full territory of your empire. It was meant to kill your spirt and save the Zak’de’ron from a long and bloody campaign against you, but it didn’t work as well as they’d hoped. Your stubbornness is epic, and even disillusioned your worlds go down fighting rather than surrendering, as you noted before. Your empire may not realize it, but it is not defeated. It is a sleeping giant that cannot wake itself, blinded by the loss of the Urrtren…and you.”

“We cannot rebuild the Urrtren quickly, even if the J’gar were not working against us and destroying every relay they can find.”

“They haven’t touched ours yet, and we have limited links through your territory to the Hadarak war zone. Those can be branched off to give your Regions limited connectivity to others, but no, the Urrtren cannot be rebuilt fast enough. The blindness will stay in the foreseeable future.”

“We are two empires of the same legacy, and yours has risen to dominance. If you can lead us to victory, we will accede to your direction. Our mandate is to fight the Hadarak, and you can do so far better than us now with your Essence skills.”

“I hear you have them too?”

“Very limited, but I have broken the barrier…as the Zak’de’ron also claim to have. Do you know if this is true?”

“We can’t confirm or deny. We haven’t spoken to them since this war began, when both your empires bailed on us.”

“I cannot teach others what I do not know, and am I correct in that even if you wished it, there is not enough time to teach us?”

“Mak’to’ran, our ability to kick the Hadarak’s ass is not due to our Essence skills as much as it is to the Uriti. They are providing us with so much Essence we can almost use it freely. Even the Founders did not have that, and they had to collect small amounts from those in the Temples and save it up for time of war later. Without the Uriti, we could not effectively fight the Hadarak because we could not store up enough Essence. It is our ammunition, and our production is severely limited without them.”

“Explain this further.”

“The Hadarak draw Essence from the Wardens, which is what we call the regular Hadarak you have fought for so long. They are nothing more than tankers and mobile bases for the minions. But their one Essence ability is that they can give it to others. So when a Lurker is depleted, it can recharge off the Wardens, and so can their Mainline units that also use Essence. The Uriti were built from Warden genetics, and we discovered they have this ability as well. One of them saw an Archon was low and recharged her without her even asking. It threw so much Essence on her she couldn’t even absorb it all. We now know how to bottle it for use in our warships, and as our Uriti grow larger they can produce more…but each time they donate their Essence their ability to do so also grows. This is why these ancient Hadarak Wardens can produce so much for their weapon units. And now we have this power as well. A power that even the Founders, the ones who built the Temples, do not have.”

“The Uriti are not being used to fight in any way?”

“They still view the Hadarak as their kin, and are resistant to do so unless directly attacked or their herd is attacked. We keep them away from the other large Hadarak, but they do help with combat against the minions occasionally. Their primary task, though, is to stay safely away from the combat and provide us with Essence recharges. With that, we can now own their most elite units in combat that is more than a fair fight. We now have the advantage, and our best naval Archons are out hunting the Lurkers down, for they are the most dangerous. The less of them there are, the more our advantage grows. The cruel trick of it all is that Essence is worthless against the minions. We can kill many, but they will run us dry of it before we even begin to scratch their numbers. This is why the Founders and other Essence users are ultimately defeated by the Hadarak. You must have both the Essence kill power and the conventional warfare to defeat the minions.”

“Do not the Founders have their caretaker drones to accomplish the latter?”

“They are useful, and perhaps effective in defense, but from what we’ve learned the Founders cannot take additional galaxies. They are trying to hold onto their own three while stoking rebellion in the others. They will be an enemy of ours eventually, this much we have confirmed, though we have not met them directly. We believe they are orchestrating the resistance from their infrastructure as we conquer it, and if they should show up now to fight us we are going to be helpless against them. We are already maxed out in combat against other threats. We are gambling they will not come here when their own galaxies are besieged. If we are wrong, then we’ll have to abandon the Hadarak border to retreat to the Rim.”

“Then we are encroached on all sides,” Mak’to’ran said dejectedly.

“However, we don’t think they will come. Or rather, they might not be able to come. We now have one of the Temples fully under our control and are annexing the others. If that wasn’t enough to trigger their arrival, I’m not sure what would be. And with the Hadarak surging forth, maybe they figure this galaxy is going to be trashed anyway. We’re betting we have time on that front, but there is no guarantee.”

“How would you fare in combat against them, all other factors being irrelevant?”

“Their Essence skills far surpass ours. You witnessed that first hand. However, we might have an Essence production advantage. But if they go after the Uriti and are able to kill them, they will destroy our one advantage. They can gut us with Essence if they are willing to devote enough of it. But I do not think their drones will ever be sufficient to counters us in conventional warfare. Machines are not intelligent enough to handle warriors, and it seems the Founders rely too heavily on machines to do the mundane work in their empire.”

“How can we assist you in this? Our bodies are larger. Would they not also produce more Essence?”

“Essence is too powerful to allow the masses to possess. And while you have done so with psionics with limited success, we dare not risk it with Essence.”

“Why do you say ‘limited success’ when our empire has thrived with broad based psionics?”

“You have unstable leadership and a history of divisiveness. Our restriction of psionics to the elite prevents many rebellions from ever taking place, as well as unifying those that do have it. Plus, we don’t force psionic restrictions based on different races. We allow most to attain all we have through individual merit rather than genetic inheritance. Only those who are worthy will possess them, and this works far better than being gifted the psionics on birth.”

“What of your Knight races?”

“We altered our standard practices to incorporate your races into ours. Expectations are higher than the rest of our citizens, and if one does not wish to do their duty they are free to choose another path…but they must forfeit their psionics to do so. Civilians will not have psionics. Not the big ones. We’ve pressed that limit about as far as we can with the Protovic, and know that to go further will cause issues.”

“Interesting. Do you think we should adopt a similar methodology?”

“I think yours can be modified, but I would not replace it entirely. You are too entrenched in it now, and doing so would give up the few strengths you have that are holding you together. But psionics are not going to win this war. Warships will, for the most part. Naval beats everything if you have enough naval assets.”

“And we do not.”

“But most of your shipyards are still intact.”

“We cannot use our established supply lines, and our old systems have been heavily depleted of natural resources. We have to go beyond them to acquire more, and the J’gar are making it difficult to do so. They are choking off our ability to outscale them in production after we destroyed most of theirs in our initial assaults. I just wish the Elder Council had been able to destroy them all. If they had, their servants would have been left leaderless and fractured like our empire has become.”

“Wishing won’t change the past. But the future is still in play. In order to maximize what potential you have remaining, you must be willing to change your ways to a superior path. I sense you are open to this, but what of the others?”

“Most will resist, but my influence and the desperate situation we all face will soften many. However, no one will follow Star Force unless you can give us a pathway to victory. Victory is what fuels us, and it is something we are in short supply of.”

7

“We can,” Alden said boldly. “The question is whether you will be able to accept the path forward.”

“Victory against Itaru or against the Hadarak?”

“The Hadarak. Itaru must be froze out, not conquered. They are irrelevant to the real war.”

“Not to those dying at their claws,” Mak’to’ran said with a growl.

“If you fight and defeat them, you will be so weak by the end of it you will die to the Hadarak’s tentacles. So which do you prefer, claws or tentacles?”

“They are attacking our worlds. We cannot ignore that threat.”

“Nor should you. But are you able to forgo vengeance in order to attain victory against the Hadarak?” Alden asked, glancing at the other Era’tran around them. “Are they?”

“Would Star Force forgo vengeance?” Mak’to’ran challenged. “You have a long history of doing otherwise.”

“You’ve studied us more than other V’kit’no’sat, I assume. So you tell me. Do we exact vengeance or avenge?”

“I assumed those words were synonyms in your language. What is the difference?”

“Vengeance does not care about right or wrong, it seeks to do damage to those who have done damage to you. Evil for evil is vengeance. Does Star Force engage in this?”

“What then is avenging?”

“It’s payback in an honorable fashion. That may involve killing the bastards, in some circumstances, but not in all. And when we avenge, it does not always end up being instantly. We can be patient and get even with them later. We do not act in a blind rage, and we do not judge the offspring of those bastards as the same, though it is easy to do so. Figuring out who deserves payback and who does not is complicated, and if you wait long enough you may no longer have valid targets remaining.”

“To forgo vengeance does not mean abandoning it, but rather waiting with the possibility that it might escape validity with time?”

Alden nodded. “It also means that sometimes you trade vengeance in exchange for something useful. We have not forgotten what you did to us, but it is in the past and since we have outgrown you there is no lingering need for payback. Plus, most of those responsible are already dead. So who would we get even with? Your hatchlings?”

“What do you plan to do with the Zak’de’ron?”

“We have options, but right now we just scare them into submission. If we have to pull troops away from the Hadarak to fight them, we will end them in their entirety. They will be conquered and no armistice reached if we are required to abandon our duty on the warfront to deal with them. If they are wise and realize this threat, they will turn their attention to licking their wounds and rebuilding.”

“How can you enforce that edict with the Urrtren destroyed?”

“We can’t everywhere, initially. But we focus on the points of strength first, secure them, then move to adjacent areas.”

“By doing what? You do not have the warships to spare for security, or do you have a reserve force you have not committed to battle?”

“How far we skimp on our defenses is flexible, but we do not have a sizeable fleet not already deployed on some duty.”

“I do not see this path forward you speak of, unless fear alone is enough to keep the Zak’de’ron at bay.”

“That is irrelevant if you are not able to do what is necessary. We have no interest in subsidizing your empire’s continuing stupidity.”

“What is necessary?”

“Annexation.”

Numerous growls and other noises of discontent came from those assembled, including the Zen’zat, but Mak’to’ran held his stone cold gaze on Alden without so much as blinking.

“In what form?”

Alden drifted upward, taking flight and rising up even with Mak’to’ran’s eye height slowly and deliberately, demonstrating the psionic that all the Zen’zat possessed the potential for but had never even come close to unlocking on their own merits.

“What does the name V’kit’no’sat mean?”

“Hunter of Hadarak.”

“It has been two centuries since this empire has lived up to that name. Right now you are nothing more than the Zak’de’ron’s philosophical bastards in a war with your superior mirror image. I have no use for you as you are, but I do have use for those who truly wish to become Hunters of Hadarak. It is a function that my empire is mastering, but it is not our sole function. I require an empire whose sole purpose is to be Hunters of Hadarak.”

Mak’to’ran was silent for a moment, then a glint in his eyes suggested he had caught on to something.

“The Founders?”

“We will deal with them when the time comes. And from what we have learned, they cannot travel between galaxies through the Deep Core. The Hadarak control those gateways, or tethers, call them what you want. We have learned the Founders have another means of transit from Rim to Rim. A slow one, but a method that allows them to bypass the Hadarak in the Core. If they are to arrive here it will most likely be in the Rim or Mid Rim. They seem to want to stay as far away from the Hadarak as they can, which is why they did not construct any Temples in your territory.”

“You wish us to set our full focus against the Hadarak without the ability to use the Essence required to destroy their strongest forces?”

“Set yourselves against their minions while you continue to improve Ysalamir. It will give you the upwards reach you need in time. Consider it a challenge for you to do conventionally what we are doing now with Essence. In the meantime, we will use our Essence forces to hunt the strongest of the Hadarak so you won’t have to…in most situations. I cannot guarantee we will be able to find or stop all of them before they get to your worlds. And you know what will happen if we don’t.”

“It has been happening throughout the history of my empire,” Mak’to’ran reminded him. “Even our hatchlings know the horrors of what will happen to our worlds if we allow the Hadarak to reach them. We do not fear it. We fear being helpless to stop it.”

“With Ysalamir, you are no longer helpless.”

“Has it proven effective against the Lurkers?”

“The Lurkers outrange Ysalamir in its current form. They can be defeated only by making them expend their reserves of Essence, then they must retreat or risk killing themselves with overuse. It is a bloody way of fighting them, but the only chance you have, and usually they are smart enough to run rather than stand their ground and die.”

“Without Essence we are helpless against them, but not the Wardens who have plagued us in the past,” Mak’to’ran said, weighing the significance of that. “What of their other forms?”

“Their warships can use Essence, or rather some of them can, but they are nowhere near as effective as a Lurker. Those are the strongest units known to exist, or at least those that we have encountered. The abilities of the Hadarak masters are unknown, for they live within the black holes deep in the Galactic Core. The Founders refer to the Lurkers as ‘assassins’ and that is as good a description of them that I have. They are not frontline warships. They seek out points of vulnerability or the crucial enemy units and eliminate them, then flee and let the other Hadarak finish the job. This is why my brothers Paul, Liam, and Roger, our best naval tacticians, have assigned themselves exclusively to hunting down and destroying every Lurker they can find, and doing so is nearly an even fight.”

“But they have the advantage?”

“The Tar’vem’jic modified with Essence gives them a range advantage. If they allow the Lurker within its Essence range, it will most likely win, for it has far more Essence in its body than our ships can carry, and we are still learning how to fashion Essence shields and other defenses, but as you know we learn fast and our strength is growing with each refit we send out. But we do not know how many Lurkers there are, or how fast they can be grown. We have never seen a small one, but we are hoping they grow as slowly as the Wardens, and if we can thin their numbers we can hold them at a disadvantage going forward.”

“You lack sufficient knowledge of the enemy strength in the Deep Core?”

“We have some from an expedition there, but that expedition barely survived. The Zak’de’ron accompanied the expedition at their own invitation, so they know more about the seriousness of the threat than you do…or did. Perhaps you killed all the ones who knew.”

“They invited themselves?”

“Their ship followed ours, but they did prove to be an asset that allowed far more reconnaissance than had one ship gone alone.”

Mak’to’ran’s head tilted slightly. “I seem to remember something of that. Did you inform us of this earlier?”

“I believe so.”

“Yet another memory casualty,” he said, referencing Eldorat’s assassination attempt against him. “If the Elder Council had not attacked the Zak’de’ron, do you believe they would have attacked us knowing the situation with the Hadarak’s Core assets?”

“I think they knew even before that that the galactic purge was the superior threat, and that taking you down would take too long and require too many resources. They were probably committed to the triumvirate out of necessity, until you attacked them, and at that point…well, if you’re going to die you might as well go down fighting the ones attacking you first. You guys really screwed up by going after them.”

“Yes they did,” Mak’to’ran agreed, excluding himself from culpability. “And I fear they would do the same again. My empire is not my equal, and I do not have the time to train them properly. The galaxy is burning from the inside out and most of what I have left are hatchlings and cowards. What do you think you could make of them in such a short period of time?”

Several long faces twitched behind Alden, not expecting the insult coming from Mak’to’ran, but he did not seem to care for their reactions, for it was a piece of blunt truth he had been fumbling with for some time, and he felt a relief finally admitting it out loud to others.

“You keep your strengths and we go after your weaknesses. We have an enormous amount of experience with this, especially with the primers you graciously gave us with the Knight races. Did you anticipate this outcome that long ago?”

“No, I did not. I thought it would be a way to sanction Star Force as the Rimward part of our empire rather than you remaining illegitimate offspring allowed to roam free due to our incompetence in eradicating you.”

“Well, when you put it that way, let me rephrase,” Alden said deadpan. “The intact part of our empire needs to retrain and upgrade the war torn Coreward half so we can fight the Hadarak as one empire, lead not by an Elder Council or Itaru, but by Earth and Director Davis.”

“Davis does not fully lead,” Mak’to’ran said, bringing up another point he had been wrestling with. “You and your brothers, your trailblazers, form an Elder Council, but one far wiser than Itaru has ever known. Why is that?”

“We built the empire, we did not inherit it.”

Mak’to’ran huffed. “So you did. And you are all of one race, not representatives of many.”

“It all started on Earth, so yeah, we’re all Human, but we have the Mavericks and Monarchs that are from many races. And I think they’d do loads better than your Elder Council any day.”

“And why is that?”

“We lead from the front, diving headfirst into problems in order to solve them. Your Elders retire and get soft in body and mind. That doesn’t make them useless, but it disconnects them from the galaxy and they lose their calibration with it. You guys are also products of the Zak’de’ron’s manipulations, and their stench is still on you, though perhaps lessened a bit by the fires of war. We can erase it from you, but only if you allow us. We do not have the time or resources to force it upon you as we have done other enemies.”

“Are we still enemies?”

“If we weren’t as strong as we are, would we have come under attack again?”

“Not by me, but the Elder Council…given evidence of their stupidity and unwillingness to follow my standing orders…most likely would have seized on an opportunity if presented one. Fear of the Uriti alone would have driven them mad if they did not understand you would not use them against us. I knew you would not unless it was a matter of self-defense, or defending another we were preying upon. Once I knew that, I could control your actions by modulating our own. I don’t believe they ever learned that lesson.”

“Will they submit on your order?”

“No,” Mak’to’ran admitted. “Not all of them. But enough trust me to follow my lead. If you can convince me, you will have their limited cooperation. You will have to earn their loyalty through deeds alone.”

“And the Era’tran?”

“If my name circles the galaxy again, they will obey. But to do so will draw the Zak’de’ron’s full force against me. I am too much of a threat to them.”

“You are nothing compared to us,” Alden noted.

“If they wish to reclaim the other worlds without conquest, they must convince them that Itaru now holds the legitimate leadership once again. If I live, I am the legitimate leadership. They cannot allow me to exist and have any hope of reconciliation prior to destruction by the Hadarak.”

“Assume I can take care of that. What other roadblocks do you foresee?”

“I am the imminent roadblock, trailblazer. You have not yet told, nor convinced me, of your path forward.”

“We need a barrier to Hadarak expansion,” Alden said bluntly. “We are experimenting with the Paladin, who are securing a small piece of what we are calling the Grand Border. They are placing outposts in every star system along it, 120 lightyears deep, with the intent that no Hadarak minion shall cross their lines. But even as fast as the Paladin can spread, they cannot secure even fraction of the Grand Border in time, unless we move it drastically backwards. Even if we place it all the way back at the Hula Hoop we most likely would not be able to secure all systems along it. And if the Hadarak get that far, their numbers will be so great we will not be able to stop the minions even if we kill all the larger Hadarak with Essence. And Essence against the swarm is a hopeless fight.”

“How do we become a barrier?”

Alden sighed. “That’s the tough part. The Zak’de’ron spread your worlds out far from one another. Not just from one race, but the gaps between them make such a territory grasp impossible. Relocation forward will be required, and you don’t have the ability to do that with the Zak’de’ron fighting you. And even if they stop, it would be foolish to give up your current worlds and their industrial base. If you did that, the Paladin would be the quicker alternative.”

“You want us to colonize a part of this Grand Border and hold it against the Hadarak minions while you hunt down the larger Hadarak with Essence weaponry?”

“No, my large friend,” Alden said, spinning about so he could look at all the Era’tran in turn before coming back to face Mak’to’ran. “I need your empire to become the Grand Border, with your sole existence being a faction within Star Force dedicated to protecting the rest of the galaxy against the never-ending threat of the Hadarak.”

8

“How do we do that?” Mak’to’ran asked immediately as something old and familiar stirred inside of him.

“We put the line farther back than the Hadarak have progressed. Evacuate all V’kit’no’sat worlds beyond it, along with everyone else that we have time and ships for, and move the planetary defense stations into the line region.”

“Move them?” Mak’to’ran said in disbelief. “We don’t have the ships for that, even if we could get through the J’gar fleets.

“We have the ships to move them. You can thank your belligerence for that. We never had the luxury of building everything fixed in place, and we know how to move very large things across the spacelanes. More importantly, we already have the ships to do it.”

“How can we hold the line with so few stations?”

“They are not to hold the line. They are to provide safe havens for those who do hold the line. All other V’kit’no’sat systems with more than one planetary defense station will also donate their additional units to the Grand Border. We won’t be able to move them quickly, but it will be far faster than producing new ones.”

“That will still not be enough to hold even a small fraction of the systems you are referencing.”

“Not hold,” Alden said, sensing Mak’to’ran hadn’t thought this through all the way. Then again, he had the help of his brothers and sisters, plus Davis, so he shouldn’t have expected him to see what the rest of them did. “The Grand Border will become a battleground and kill zone. We need fixed positions spread everywhere on it within short range of all the systems for the hunter teams to operate out of.”

“And the planetary defense stations will ensure we do not easily lose our logistics strongholds,” Mak’to’ran added.

“Yes. Against the minions. A warden can just land on and squash one with ease if it’s large enough. The Grand Border security will be in two parts. The minions will be your part, while our ships hunt their heavy units. You can layer in Ysalamir later to assist with that, but right now the minions are the primary concern. They are kicking our ass right now by hitting systems that we are not in and spreading through them. We cannot block all routes to the Rim. But the Grand Border can if implemented correctly, and only your empire has the resources to do it in time to save the bulk of your territory and everyone else living within it.”

“What are we to hunt with? Our fleets are decimated.”

“You will have a lot of rebuilding to do, and construction of the Grand Border will not be as simple as putting some warships along a line. You will have to fully colonize it.”

That didn’t go over well. In addition to the sounds of shock and revulsion from behind, Mak’to’ran also flinched as Alden suggested putting them closer to danger than they already were.

“Explain the wisdom in that,” he demanded.

“We need to undo the damage the Zak’de’ron did to your races. They spread you out so you can’t reinforce one another quickly. We need Era’tran worlds next to each other, so that if one is attacked reinforcements can arrive to assist before heavy damage is done. The Grand Border will be broken up into sections given to your primary races. Your secondary races, based on attributes, will be reformed into co-operative civilizations so they can hold individual sections without your assistance. The Era’tran will have your own territory, close to one another, with no other races in it, V’kit’no’sat or otherwise. And you will defend it as one race, and one faction, within our empire.”

“And our existing worlds?”

“You hold onto them as support worlds and fallback positions if the worst is to come. They will have to fuel the colonization effort, so abandoning them is impossible. They will also have to begin massive reproductive surges. We will need more population than you have left. Far more. And they can be trained from hatching in the ways of our combined empire while those of you already here will have to be retrained to lose your wasteful and dishonorable practices, while preserving your strengths. Those who enter into it willingly will not take a great deal of time to make the transition, though it will take millennia before it becomes second nature.”

“And what of the Zak’de’ron?”

“If they don’t agree to an armistice based on prudence, we will take care of them to free you up to begin constructing the Grand Border.”

“By withdrawing your warships from the current one?”

“No. That is a last resort if we must conquer them. I don’t plan on going that far. We don’t have time for it. If they insist on war…and they very well might…I have some friends who will come play with them.”

“Those in your captured Temples?”

“Nope. Those we can trust are already on the border fighting. The rest we have to keep contained, for they could easily kill us if we got in range of their Essence abilities. We have an ally that is not currently committed to combat in this war, but they are very good at it. In fact, they were designed for it, and they really like fighting.”

Mak’to’ran snorted in surprise and took a step backward reflexively, stunned at how oblivious he had been. Star Force did have another fleet. One they were not using in combat. And one that was so overpowered that many had forgotten they even had it.

“You will use the Uriti against the Zak’de’ron. For the combat they were originally designed for?”

“As I said, they like fighting, and while they do not wish to fight their kin, they are very apt and eager to kill the little people that we sanction was needing to be removed. The Uriti are not a force of conquest, but one of obliteration, and we will use them as such if needed. Hopefully bringing them in as guards for your most vital systems will send the appropriate message, and when they get here we can also have them start spawning their own minions, under our Wranglers’ control, to assist in your defense and convoy escort. If the Zak’de’ron do not back down, then we start going after them, and they don’t have anything other than your captured Legion to hit them with. And we know how to guard against that with our escort fleets. We will own them in combat.”

“Hopefully all databases with Legion specifications were destroyed before capture, along with the vessels themselves,” Mak’to’ran noted, though he didn’t sound too confident in that being fact. “What will be involved in this ‘retraining’ you spoke of?”

“We can’t spare the personnel to treat you like hatchlings, so this will only work if your people want to do this. We don’t have the luxury of bashing skulls and twisting tails until you comply. If you agree, then we will fashion you into separate factions based on your race or assigned border sections that will be separate from the Knight factions. They are designed as response teams to go anywhere in the empire that needs them. You will become homeguard factions, dedicated to holding a specific territory only. And by doing so you will shield the rest of the empire from the Hadarak.”

“What will be the chain of command?”

“Our empire is not based on chain of command, but chain of skill. Those who are wise, experienced, and knowledgeable do not require oversight and operate essentially independently within our empire. Only the Archons and the Director outrank them, though when one respects skill, other individuals with higher levels are accorded unofficial status when involved in the same combat theatre. We work as a team, not servants bound to a master.”

“And your Paladin?”

Alden shrugged. “Well, their race was so bound to their genetic memory it would have destroyed them to try and change them into something else, so like we will do with you, we take your strengths and modify them with upgrades. The Paladin are treated as individuals when they wish it, but most do not. They live and fight as groups, and we modified their genetic memory to reduce the negative side effects of this. You are already individuals with a skill level far higher than them. The conversion will not be overly difficult compared to our other annexations. And we have already practiced with the Knight races, so we know pretty much what we have to do.”

“And what does that involve?”

“You agreeing to make the V’kit’no’sat into the border guards for our combined empire, operate under our rules of conduct, and allowing us to rework your races as needed to upgrade you to our level of warfare. Basically what the Zak’de’ron could, and should have done long ago if they weren’t a flock of lying frauds.”

“We are not apt to accept new masters, trailblazer. I cannot guarantee compliance.”

“Then they have a choice to make, because we’re not fighting your war for you out of generosity.”

“Many still will not. They have been betrayed too often.”

“Alright, then let’s just talk about the Era’tran.”

“We cannot encircle the galaxy.”

“I’m not asking you to. But if the Era’tran make the conversion and the doubters witness it, that may be enough for the bulk of them to agree to join up. How many Era’tran worlds can you give me?”

“You haven’t told me enough yet. If I am not convinced, they will not be.”

“The Uriti escort fleets will be for their protection, not for yours. You will get none of our resources, for we can’t afford to spare any. What you will get from us is leadership and some technical upgrades where appropriate. You want to live to see the future? You have to earn it. This isn’t charity, and there are many in Star Force who still remember what you did to us and wouldn’t mind seeing either the Zak’de’ron or Hadarak wipe you out. But I know there is worth in your empire, buried under years of corruption, betrayal, and stubbornness. So we’re willing to let go of any vengeance and unify, under our terms, and give you what you always wanted. Or at least were promised. To make you Hunters of Hadarak, for real. No false promises. No deceit. Just a soon to be unwinnable war to throw yourselves at while we still have a slim chance of victory.”

Mak’to’ran looked out at the other Era’tran, having a telepathic conversation that Alden wasn’t privy to, then he looked back at the floating Archon before him.

“How would this leadership work?”

“You get us. One trailblazer for each race, and we’ll double up where needed on the smaller ones. If you’re committed to this, we’ll be all you need once we get the Zak’de’ron off your tails.”

Mak’to’ran squinted at him. “You believe you hold that much power inside your tiny frame?”

“We survived your death mark through skill more than luck, and we have ascended beyond your empire at its peak, let alone what it has devolved into. We are the architects of Star Force’s rise, and we will be the architects of the V’kit’no’sat’s rebirth if you are willing to accept our leadership in full. No caveats.”

“You claim a great deal of superiority, little Zen’zat,” Mak’to’ran challenged.

Alden didn’t say a word in response, but rather pulsed his Essence into an aura around him, twisting and curling it into various vortexes and glowing to Mak’to’ran’s enhanced vision. It was an impressive display of power, but one that none of the others could see, and in that message there was a double meaning. The trailblazers held many powers that the V’kit’no’sat could not see. How else could they have survived when so few and so fragile, then risen to such heights now?

“When I announce my survival, it will be an invitation to a second invasion of this system,” Mak’to’ran noted.

“Do they have enough left to get past my flagship?”

“I do not know what they have, or where,” the Era’tran admitted.

“Then let’s find out. Reveal yourself and see what shows up.”

“For what purpose?”

“To draw off attacks on other worlds and buy them some time until we can get to them.”

Mak’to’ran thumped his tail on the ground, silently cursing himself for not thinking faster. Perhaps it was loss of memory, or perhaps he had just gotten so use to losing that he had forgotten how to be strategically bold.

“I wish to hear more of your strategy, but my personal decision is made. I made the mistake of labeling you an enemy twice, and both times you outfought me. Then when you had the power to fight us as equals, you chose to ignore your rightful vengeance. And now when it would be easy for you to achieve, you offer absolution. I do not fully understand the way of your lightside, but I can see that it is the superior path when given the opportunity to play out. Let this be my atonement for past wrongs done to you. I accept your unconditional leadership. Use your lightside knowledge and forge us into a weapon worthy of our namesake.”

Mak’to’ran knelt, one knee then the other, and bowed his head low to the ground.

It took a moment for the gravity of the situation to sink in, then one of the other Era’tran followed suit behind Alden. The others hesitated a moment more, then began dropping to their knees in a very odd position that made them vulnerable, but then again perhaps that was the point.

Eventually all the Era’tran mimicked Mak’to’ran’s position, then the Zen’zat came forward in unison and formed ranks, pressing their balled right fist against their left breast in a gesture of solidarity.

Alden looked down on them all from his elevated position, waiting for them to rise but they did not. They were waiting for his command.

“Alright guys, rule number 1. No bowing. A warrior should never leave himself so exposed.”

Mak’to’ran stood up, as did the others, putting them back at eye level with him. “What is rule number 2?”

“Rule number 2 is that there are no rules for warriors. We do what is right, and what is right cannot be completely codified, so rather than accept being sometimes wrong we do not cling to a code, mandate, or rules for our elite. We feel our way forward, in the moment, and you are going to have to learn to do the same. Otherwise someone is going to have to babysit you constantly, and we don’t have time for that.”

“We will rise to the duty,” Mak’to’ran promised. “What is your first command?”

Alden held up a hand and created a huge hologram above him of the Star Force symbol, rotating slowly in place.

“Start redecorating.”

9

March 8, 128827

Immas Negal System (Delogi Region)

Mukarr

When the Era’tran scout ship entered orbit around Mukarr the planet was already abuzz with the news of its arrival in the system. The Ranto’non stronghold had been isolated from the rest of the galaxy ever since the Urrtren went down and they’d not tried to fight the J’gar warships roaming the spacelanes beyond. They had 4 planets in this system that were fully developed plus another 8 moons that had colonies of varying sizes on them. There were planetary defense stations on each of the planets, orbital weapon platforms ringing them, and a moderate defense fleet guarding the system. So far in this war the system had not been touched…despite being within the Delogi Region that the J’gar dominated.

These Ranto’non were not part of their dominion, but one of the V’kit’no’sat worlds sprinkled throughout that had not left or allied with the aquatics when they had split from the empire long ago. Now that they were aligned with the Zak’de’ron and Itaru, this Ranto’non system had been oddly ignored, and many suggested it was because the J’gar fleet was spread throughout the galaxy and didn’t have the surface troops needed to capture worlds. Orbital bombardment was still possible, but far more costly than a ground invasion, yet the Ranto’non did not expect to be ignored forever, and they were playing the long game in preparation for the distant future when they would no longer be ignored and a combined assault fleet from Itaru would show up demanding their surrender.

It had already been requested and denied by the Ranto’non here a few years ago after the Urrtren went down, but they’d rightly called Itaru’s bluff and no assault fleets arrived to carry out their threat. Since then they’d been building frantically with the resources they had available, with no imports or exports flowing, no contact from the other Ranto’non world or the Era’tran that they had always looked up to. At least not until today.

When the courier ship arrived over the planet it insisted it must land and speak with the Ranto’non leaders personally, saying it had word from Jamtren, the Era’tran capitol. It had withstood an assault from Itaru, despite claims to the contrary, and now it was the unofficial capitol of the true empire…but the courier ship would say nothing more until it landed.

The tuning fork-shaped Domjo flew low over the planet and set its bulk down inside a massive spaceport that had been designed to hold even larger ships, but one that was mostly empty. With no interstellar shipping active, the larger transports were not needed and planet to planet transfers could easily be handled by lesser vessels that didn’t require the massive gravity drives for making fast star jumps.

Out of the inside of the two prongs a large ramp descended to the surface, with a delegation of Era’tran climbing down in single file to meet the thick-hided quadrupeds who massed slightly more than they did. They met, then walked to a nearby Satu and disappeared into the city for nearly a day before the public was allowed to know what they were here for.

And when it did, the system roared.

Mak’to’ran was alive, having been spirited away from Itaru in a delicate coma to Jamtren, where he had been receiving years of medical treatment to revive him without wiping his mind and returning him to a hatchling. Now that he had fully recovered he had come forth, helping save Jamtren from Itaru’s invasion and striking a deal with Star Force to end this war and turn their full attention to the Hadarak.

But the war wasn’t over until Itaru said so, yet the knowledge that Star Force was finally bringing forth their most powerful weapons sent a shiver down Hamob’s spine. He had seen once before what the Uriti could do, and while it was a pity they did not have it within them to fight the Hadarak, they had no qualms about killing V’kit’no’sat or Zak’de’ron.

The Elder Era’tran watched reports from his seclusion, having escaped Itaru’s destruction to flee from system to system until he had arrived here and the Ranto’non had agreed to shelter and hide him. They were grateful for his counsel, but if it was known that an Era’tran Elder had been assisting them it would have risen their threat profile even further. The safest course of action was for him to disappear, and that’s what he did, right in the backyard of the J’gar while they were off fighting the rest of the galaxy.

The Era’tran delegation had said Star Force was bringing in the Uriti to put an end to the war, not by attacking Itaru’s forces, but by defending against them. If the Zak’de’ron wanted to fight, then the Uriti would oblige them. If Itaru stopped preying on the space lanes and kept to themselves, then the Uriti would leave them alone. It was typical Star Force methodology of always being the defender and not the aggressor, but Hamob wondered how many worlds they would have to destroy before the Zak’de’ron got the necessary message, for he doubted they would relent now after all the blood that had been spilt when the Elder Council had foolishly targeted the dragons after Mak’to’ran’s supposed death.

Hamob was suspicious about the claim he was still alive, but it was time he found out, so he made his way to the Era’tran delegation…who were shocked he was still alive…and joined in on the non-public discussions taking place.

And the recklessness that Mak’to’ran was proposing.

If the Zak’de’ron could be made to stand down, this system and all others would be stripped of their planetary defense stations save for one. That meant of the 6 located here, 5 would be removed and shipped out to this Grand Border Mak’to’ran was talking about colonizing and holding against the Hadarak minions.

The Ranto’non were speechless when that point was made, and only out of courtesy did they not scream ‘no’ the moment it was suggested. They were silent, and rightly so, for stripping their heaviest defenses in the middle of a war for their own survival was folly in the highest regard.

Then the delegation said something that was even more absurd. That Mak’to’ran had agreed to Star Force’s annexation of the Era’tran and any other race that wished to be free of this war and focus on the Hadarak. The Uriti were coming to ensure that freedom, while anyone who wished to maintain their independence could deal with Itaru on their own.

Mak’to’ran…or an imposter more likely…was demanding they surrender to Star Force or be left to die piecemeal against Itaru.

The Era’tran delegation was not demanding, arguing, or insistent. They were very gracious and understanding of the stupidity of what they were suggesting, leaving all the ill will for the recipients of the message. That kept the shouting to a minimum, but the Ranto’non kept looking to Hamob for instructions, as if they could not believe this was really the wisdom of the Era’tran. And if it was, they might have to forgo their long apprenticeship relationship with the legendary race and take their chances on their own.

Hamob did not side with the delegation. He had a responsibility to uphold the honor of his race and a debt to pay to the Ranto’non that had sheltered him from the empire-wide war when he had nowhere else to safely run to. But he also needed to figure out what was really going on, and if the delegation was being honest about a number of secure spacelanes already opened up by the Uriti and their escort fleets, then he had a pathway to get to Holloi and see for himself about Mak’to’ran’s resurrection.

Hamob told the Ranto’non to do nothing until he returned, and if he did not to assume all the galaxy was still hostile and hold out here as long as they could on their own. They gave him an escort fleet of 9 ships to increase his odds of making it past the J’gar patrols if they were still out there while the Era’tran Domjo insisted they had to keep moving from world to world spreading the news and couldn’t afford to interrupt that mission to return Hamob to Mak’to’ran. Time was already against them, and they had to move on after a few days here to the next known friendly holdout.

The Era’tran Elder did not hold out much hope for Mak’to’ran truly being alive, and if he had suffered an injury of the brain then he might be in the plight of an unwitting tool for Star Force or others, but the declaration of a safe path had been more or less true. They encountered some J’gar ships, usually in pairs, along their way, but none of the larger task forces necessary to pounce on well-guarded convoys.

Then they passed through a Hjar’at system that showed an entire moon laid to waste by orbital bombardment…or on the surface, at least. The moon itself was still intact, but those who had been living on it were not. The planet beneath them showed marks of combat damage not yet repaired, but most of it was intact and full planetary shields had been reestablished according to his sensors. Hamob chose to stop here to talk with the Hjar’at, whom he had heard were hit first and hardest by the Zak’de’ron, but apparently they had been able to hold out in this mid-level system.

But more than that, there was now a Uriti with accompanying Star Force fleet in the system, and the presence of the beast was now confirmed by both the ship’s sensors and his own eyes. It was a smaller copy of the original known as Hawkeye, and it was shaped like a great bow in space with an arrow cast across its center. An ancient weapon used by large armed bipeds that did not deserve the naming credit of this dominant war beast.

The Hjar’at confirmed the stories to Hamob, and he found himself growing more hopeful and terrified at the same time. The Hjar’at here were now identifying themselves as part of the Star Force empire, and even using their emblems on their own ships and buildings. He demanded to know why they had knuckled under to the Rimward empire when they refused to do so with Itaru and everyone else throughout history…and their response was elegantly simple.

“They are giving us the power to fight the Hadarak, and relying on us to protect the Grand Border that they cannot. This is a merger of equals, not submission.”

Hamob couldn’t believe he had heard that from a Hjar’at, let alone a field commander, and after he had plied as much information out of them as he could, he continued on with his small Ranto’non fleet to Jamtren, hearing other such stories along the way, but not encountering any more Uriti.

Not until he got to the Era’tran capitol.

He had no issue jumping in, but when he arrived he was met by a combined Star Force/Era’tran warship fleet and not one, not two, not three, but four Uriti were in the system and mingling about with the most insane amount of ship traffic he had seen since the war began. There looked to be ships here from nearly every V’kit’no’sat race, and they were arriving and exiting along dozens of jumplines, not just the secure route here he had been promised by the courier ship.

His fleet was queried immediately, and once he made his presence known he was given priority access to Holloi, but before he could receive landing coordinates a drop pod rose up from the surface and demanded to be let onboard to search and confirm his identity before being allowed to progress any further onto the most revered world in Era’tran possession.

At least that part hadn’t been stripped away by the war or Star Force, and Hamob reluctantly went to the hangar bay to present himself for genetic identification to the search team…only there was no ‘team’ onboard. Just a single Era’tran with Zen’zat escorts.

“Hamob, it is you,” Mak’to’ran said, striding towards his old mentor.

“But is it you?” he countered, also walking forward to meet him.

“I have limited memory loss, but I am myself. Only more powerful now that I have broken through the barrier to Essence. It was what allowed me to fully recover while under attack here. Had I not been so fortunate I would have been dead within minutes.”

“Again, you mean,” Hamob said as he plied Mak’to’ran telepathically, with the other allowing him into his mind for verification. Something that he would not do for anyone else. Not even Alden.

“What have you done to our race?” Hamob asked after he was finished. This was Mak’to’ran, thank the stars, but he was not behaving like the Era’tran he knew.

“What did you do to our race?” Mak’to’ran demanded, still extremely happy Hamob was alive, but with a little vexation from the past resurfacing. “You attacked the Zak’de’ron in defiance of my orders.”

“I did not. The others on the Council saw you killed and wanted vengeance. I could not convince them otherwise.”

“Vengeance? That holds a double meaning.”

“And accurate on both counts. They did not know who to strike at for your death, and they still wanted the Zak’de’ron dead for past actions. They did not know what else to do, and I did not have an alternate path for them…at least not one that was convincing. They wanted war and we got it. I could not stop them, and once the decision was made it would have been foolish to let them fight without Era’tran assistance. They had made it clear they were going to do so anyway, and I was able to leverage them into sticking to your battle plans precisely. They worked quite well.”

“And this is why I brought the Era’tran into Star Force,” Mak’to’ran growled. “Without my oversight the empire immediately began its own self-destruction. It has not learned, Hamob. And I have no time to teach it. We are in the grip of the Great War, now, and here. We must answer the call, as one empire, and the Rim holds the leadership that is truly worthy.”

“So you have submitted to the Humans and their Uriti?”

Mak’to’ran shook his head. “I am very pleased that you are alive, but I have grown considerably wiser since we last spoke. Star Force is not conquering us. They are upgrading us so we can do the task we were always meant to. We are still independent, in all the ways that matter. What we are not free to do is fail. They will not allow it.”

“Perhaps the definition of ‘freedom’ is one of the memories you have lost?”

“Holloi was dead when I woke,” Mak’to’ran said, with the pain evident in his voice. “The Zak’de’ron were here, decimated, but slowly consuming the hatchlings we had left. All the Elders chose to die on the front lines when the planetary shields were penetrated rather than live to fight a long defeat. They succeeded in thwarting the main thrust of the attack, but not one remained to lead what was left. If I had not woke when I did, Jamtren would be theirs. The old guard is gone, save for you and I, and hopefully a few others still hiding as you were. I have an empire of hatchlings, Hamob. And Star Force can teach them to be what the Zak’de’ron always promised us and failed to fully deliver. Hunters of Hadarak.”

“I came here, not only to see if you were alive, but for the sake of the Ranto’non who have sheltered me. You are ordering them to transplant all but one of their planetary defense stations? What madness is this?”

“It is the genius of Star Force, but it is only the beginning. We must colonize the Grand Border. Every system, every planet. We cannot allow any foothold for the Hadarak, and we must not allow any minion to pass through. That is our task, while Star Force uses their Essence warships to defeat the Lurkers that we cannot. We must become the Grand Border, Hamob…or we can return to a pointless war for survival with the Zak’de’ron that may or may not play out before the Hadarak destroy us both. What would your counsel be, my old friend?”

“To have your brain examined for faults.”

“It already has been, numerous times,” Mak’to’ran said deadpan.

“I will need a great deal of convincing.”

“As has everyone else. Including the Zak’de’ron.”

“The Uriti have fought them?”

“Fought? No. They have stomped on them. Four worlds destroyed that would not submit and continued to send out raiding parties, two of which were aquatic. After seeing the results Itaru was quick to negotiate an Armistice, though without the Urrtren it cannot be implemented everywhere.”

“Your courier said nothing of an Armistice?”

“It was negotiated here 4 months ago. Any systems claiming Star Force possession will be left alone. Any ships bearing their mark will also be left alone. But anyone not joining in our fight against the Hadarak and wishing to continue the war against Itaru or go their own way will be fending for themselves.”

“So it is true? You are leveraging them with the threat of destruction without support if they do not submit to Star Force.”

Mak’to’ran growled. “I had hoped you would be quicker to understand, but so be it,” he said, producing a galactic hologram with all the updated information Star Force and his own limited scouts had provided. “See for yourself what we face, then tell me we have the luxury of coddling the holdouts.”

Hamob interfaced his armor’s systems with Mak’to’ran’s so he could alter the hologram at will, but it didn’t take long before his mouth hung open in disbelief.

“How is this possible?”

“When you abandoned the war, they gained free reign in many Regions. Did you think Star Force could stop them on their own? Or was the Elder Council so blind with rage they could not think past their bloodlust?”

“Mak’to’ran…this is unwinnable.”

“Nearly so. Star Force can defeat the strongest units, perhaps all of them in time, but they cannot stop their minions. There are too many, and too many infested worlds to spawn more. Without the V’kit’no’sat Star Force has no chance to stop this menace. They don’t have enough time to build the Grand Border. We are their only hope for victory. And they are our only hope for survival. Without us they have to abandon V’kit’no’sat territory and attempt to build the Grand Border along the Hula Hoop, but by that time…”

“…the Hadarak will have so many minions it will not matter,” Hamob finished.

Mak’to’ran produced a second, smaller hologram over top the first. A hologram of the Star Force symbol, which he now wore in multiple places on his own armor, subtly added to the design.

“This symbol has many layered meanings. It is the letters of their name, and also an infinity symbol representing their longevity, endurance, and endless pursuit of advancement. But as fate would have it, it is also split into two halves. I am told that, as of now, that represents the Rim and the Core of our combined empire. One cannot survive without the other now. Both must be united as one empire, as it should have been all along, but I was too blind to see their wisdom and strength. I am not making that mistake again.”

“It looks like it is too late, no matter what path you choose,” Hamob said meekly.

Mak’to’ran laughed. “Hopeless? No, Hamob. Not hopeless. This is our chance at true victory. We can smell it now, and we will not let the scent escape us again.”

“What do we have that can defeat this?” he said, gesturing to the sea of Hadarak icons across the Galactic Core that had come insanely farther since the fall of Itaru than his worst expectations had accounted for.

Mak’to’ran huffed, then stiffened as Hamob felt a Lachka field wrap his body and lift his great mass off his feet with ease.

“Do not underestimate the power of Essence, my friend. It enhances all our normal abilities, in addition to bringing its own unique variety, and I am a mere novice,” he said, letting the wide-eyed Era’tran back down. “Star Force is mastering it, and it will take the Hadarak’s most impressive abilities out of play. They can no longer threaten us with immunity. All they have is the swarm tactics we long ago learned to defeat. We are the superior warriors in the portion of this war that we must fight. We have the advantage. And now we have a great amount of work to do, and little time to do it. Our fight is with the Hadarak minions. We must draw a line in the stars, and none shall be allowed to pass.”

“You are either insane or inspired. I honestly do not know which.”

“I have seen evidence, and felt firsthand the power of an enemy that we cannot defeat, Hamob. Only Star Force can, and they are not ready for that intergalactic war. Now that I am accustomed to that dread, the Hadarak no longer scare me. I see them as they truly are, and why they can defeat the Founders that built the Great Temples in this galaxy. The Hadarak cannot defeat their Essence, which is why they fear it so, but the Founders cannot defeat their minions. This twin approach to warfare is why the Hadarak dominate, and Star Force must also fight in this manner. And who knows better how to kill minions than the V’kit’no’sat?”

“Only if Star Force shields us from the monsters.”

“That is their role, and the Grand Border is ours. Help me, Hamob, and we can achieve the impossible duty that the Zak’de’ron only feigned allegiance to. Star Force is giving us the chance to stop being frauds and to live up to our mandate.”

“And Essence truly gives Star Force the means to cover us while we fight the minions?”

“It does. And I am the only V’kit’no’sat that can wield this power. So only I know how outclassed we are in this type of warfare…but the other empires in the universe lack what we possess. The ability to defeat the swarm. We stick to our strengths and cover each other’s weaknesses while we seek to lessen them.”

“Those sound like Star Force words.”

“They are, and now they are mine as well. The trailblazers are far wiser than we ever anticipated, and I have learned much these past few years from the one who has devoted himself to upgrading the Era’tran race. Others are taking the Hjar’at and I’rar’et, plus whoever else joins us. They are spotting our weaknesses in a way only a former enemy could, and they are teaching us to armor over them in the way we ironically taught them by issuing defeat after defeat. They had to learn or die, and now we are in the same situation. We learn, or we die, Hamob. And I have chosen to learn…”

10

January 29, 128829

Neev’to’san System (Grand Border, Era’tran Zone)

Olten’san

The Era’tran cargo ships were escorted into the system with a scattering of small warships to guard them, though nobody expected any trouble here. The J’gar had withdrawn their fleets from the Grand Border, as far as everyone could tell, and many of the V’kit’no’sat civilian vessels were assisting with the evacuation of races native to the zone and far ahead of the Hadarak battle lines. There were many people between there and here that needed moving as well, and they came first for the Rimward evacuation teams, but the V’kit’no’sat were splitting their efforts and devoting a large amount of their resources to clearing the zones they were being tasked with holding.

The massive tuning forks spread out in the system, going to multiple planets, but the bulk of them came to Olten’san…a lightly inhabited planet that was now barren, as it had been before a group of settlers had discovered the highly valuable Corovon deposits in the wastelands and decided it was worth setting up shop. Those initial mining colonies had expanded into a planetary civilization numbering 284 million…all of whom had been recently kicked off the world for their own safety.

They didn’t go willingly, but when the Hadarak eventually got here they’d be thanking the V’kit’no’sat for their ‘generosity’ in removing them out to the Rim. They didn’t understand that right now, or care, because they were being dispossessed of their homes and a great deal of wealth, but when the fate of the galaxy was at stake that didn’t matter. This was going to become a warzone where the Hadarak would be held or the V’kit’no’sat would break, and that was no place for civilians of any kind.

The Era’tran also needed the corovon, and had refused to let the miners stay to assist them. They’d tried every trick in the negotiating book to get to stay, but there was really nothing to discuss. Everyone on or beyond the Grand Border had to relocate or die to the Hadarak advance, no matter how much it deprived the locals of. Evacuation was better than death, and Star Force was not going to let the stupid remain and die, so the V’kit’no’sat were happily removing them by force, though this planet had already been cleaned of the inferior ones.

Their cities remained, but they would not be used for anything other than recycled components. Right now the Era’tran had to establish mining colonies for more than just corovon, for they would be getting no more supplies in this system or any of the others that were being gently touched by their race. These outposts would have to grow on their own efforts, accepting only personnel from Rimward when they could be put to use, and when that time came it would be in the form of the new Pla’go’ren flying cities.

The Era’tran were still not sold on the design, but Alden had hammered it out with the V’kit’no’sat engineers along with modifications for their warships using their own technology and not Star Force’s, though both still had a few secrets from each other that they did share to some upgrades. The more economical hull designs Star Force used were not being implemented, and the Era’tran would still be keeping their signature tuning fork shapes, as would the Pla’go’ren.

None had been built yet, but when finished they would stand up into the sky all the way to the edge of space with the two prongs partially buried in the planetary crust. That would still make them smaller than a Mach’nel, and about three times the length of a Kafcha, but they would house weapon emplacements to defend their perimeter, shield generators to cover them and the surrounding area, plus thick conventional armor with exterior slots to add Tu’gor panels on top later when and if the situation allowed such expenditures. Right now they needed to build and build fast, and while Tu’gor was cheaper and easier to construct than Yeg’gor, it was still a luxury they would not have for a long time.

The Era’tran warships would also not be getting the Tu’gor that the Knight races had, because it was too expensive to make and the V’kit’no’sat had no production facilities for it. The formula had been a closely guarded Star Force secret, but Alden had already set out to construct a new facility to get some of the enhanced armor available for special projects. How long it would take until it started to show up in the field nobody knew, but they’d been instructed not to rely upon it in their newer designs, while incorporating hardpoints for its addition at a later point.

So the Pla’go’ren would not have it when they were built, but what they would have was large empty areas inside, for they were designed to be hollow and mass produced. This world was to be one of the major exporters in the future, so that they could send out Pla’go’ren to other worlds as outposts where no civilian infrastructure existed. That was the only way to colonize every planet in every system within the Era’tran Zone, and by making the Pla’go’ren mobile they would not be forced to leave any intact ones behind if a world did fall to the Hadarak…or even a region, for they could pull up stakes, literally, and fly to another position on the same planet, or another planet in the system.

Their engines were minimal, and would need towed between star systems, but Star Force Clan Ghostblade was already here doing just that with a planetary defense station that had been plucked off of Holloi itself. Mak’to’ran had chosen to lead by example, and now the wide, flat, and Yeg’gor covered pyramid was being shepherded around planetary orbit as the Clan dug out a hole wide enough to fit it down into the crust of the planet.

The Era’tran teams had been sent here separately, though there were many already in the pyramid waiting for it to be deposited on the planet before they got to work integrating it with the subsurface mantle and tucking it neatly into the surrounding environment. In approximately 2 months it would be down and fully operational, giving this empty planet an immense amount of protection as the expedition teams slowly got to work building the infrastructure to eventually produce the Pla’go’ren.

One day in the future there would be fields of them spread across the planet, some with their voids full of planetary shield generators, others with Tar’vem’jic, Ardent, and other surface to space defensive weaponry, while some had comm stations, habitats, factories, small shipyards, barracks, and anything else of value that could be picked up and moved if the planet became compromised or, more importantly, a Warden broke through the defense lines and tried to land on them. With enough of a head start the Pla’go’ren could lift off and avoid that crushing fate, though some of them would be equipped with specialized shield generators that could catch and repel the monsters, assuming they weren’t too large.

The Era’tran were claiming this world first among the many that would follow, but they were not establishing permanent roots the way other V’kit’no’sat worlds had covered their surfaces with infrastructure that could not be moved. Everything had to be mobile, with only expendable structures built surrounding the Pla’go’ren. That was the only way Alden and Mak’to’ran could agree to send workers into the Grand Border. Otherwise they would be totally helpless against a Warden breakthrough, and as good as the Avenger fleet was, even Alden couldn’t guarantee they could catch all of the larger Hadarak before they got to the Era’tran zone.

Having an escape route was necessary, and as for the planetary defense stations that were not mobile, multiple Pla’go’ren would be surrounding them with dampening shield modifications to stop ramming Warden in their tracks while all new planetary defense stations built in the future would be split into two categories.

Primary stations would still be constructed of Yeg’gor, but they would become even larger and incorporate both dampener shields of their own along with a crust cradle that would remain behind in the planet as a landing pad and allow the engine-equipped planetary defense station to lift off without destroying what was below. Normally their taps into the mantle of the planets were never meant to be abandoned, and the V’kit’no’sat extraction teams working across multiple planets to remove the existing ones had to slowly build plugs underneath them to prevent supervolcanoes from forming.

That would not be an issue in the future with the cradles, and the new primary planetary defense stations would be built as hardened battlestations against not just the minions, but the Wardens as well…along with the addition of an Essence component that would make a Lurker think twice from engaging them. If Star Force couldn’t get the planetary defense stations up to snuff against this enemy then they were not worth building, and the trailblazers like fixed emplacements as much as the V’kit’no’sat did, so they were willing to devote a few Elcee teams to operate the Essence components, whatever they would end up being. However, no new primary planetary defense stations would be constructed in the near future, yet they were already in the planning stages along with everything else.

The secondary stations would stay in the same size range, but be made of Tu’gor rather than Yeg’gor and made with engine mobility as well, but with no dampening shields. They’d have to rely on Pla’go’ren to provide that bit of security, while they added a nearly impregnable position on a planet against minion-only attack, and that is what the Era’tran were gearing up their development plans for…because they expected wave after unending wave of them to be arriving when all the systems beyond the Grand Border were infested and growing new troops that had nowhere to attack but here.

A lot of building had to be done to prepare for that, and right now the first seeds had to be planted. The Era’tran ships flew low over the planet pumping out drop pods full of individual teams that would land on the prime resource locations as determined by ship sensors, then they would carry out Zen’zat-sized hexagonal columns that appeared to be made of solid shiny stone, but were actually made of nanites like those in a Kich’a’kat.

The Era’tran would carry one to the place they chose on the surface and sit it there, activate it, then move on to the next location usually a few hundred meters away where they would place another that would melt down slowly into the ground below, digging into and absorbing useful molecules while moving aside others as it extended ‘roots’ down further and further until it had expended its mass and could reach no more.

After than it kept absorbing what was around it and building new nanites to extend its reach, patterned off a biological tree, and it technologically grew and grew to the point it needed to begin harvesting.

When it did, the now subsurface Go’morra would spawn a trunk that looked more like a crystal sticking up out of the ground, and on top of that crystal a pod would form, into which the desired material was deposited. The pod would grow and grow until an automated drone would fly in, pick up the pod, then fly off with it to bring to a warehouse either nearby or far off, depending on where the factories were being set up.

The Go’morra would grow another pod and begin filling it again and again as its roots continued to expand until they reached the next Go’morra, then they would merge and start pressing their combined network lower into the crust, searching out every cubic meter for valuable materials to absorb, running off of pre-programmed protocols that needed no oversight whatsoever.

In this way the Era’tran littered the densest corovon deposits with the technological trees that would grow on their own and leave the personnel free to handle other tasks. It was going to take a long time to build up what they needed, but compared to other civilizations the V’kit’no’sat Go’morra operated at lightning speed and gave them a mining capability that few in the galaxy could rival.

Operations like this would start being seeded in other systems that did not have the luxury of a planetary defense station looking over them, merely a single warship in some cases, knowing that the colonies had to be started now in order to begin acquiring resources of their own rather than trying to ship them across the spacelanes. It would take forever to get a single system hardened against assault, but a single system was no good when the Hadarak could just fly right by it to assault the worlds behind the Grand Border. There must be a widespread net established, no matter how weak…then and only then could they start strengthening the net, and not before.

It was an insane plan, but it was the path of the Era’tran now. They had their chunk of the border assigned in the Yinven Region that sat Coreward of Imm’en, where Jamtren was located. There was one more Region, Ghen, inside of Yinven that had held the original V’kit’no’sat/Hadarak border, but Ghen was already partially conquered and the rest of it had been declared lost. All of it and part of Yinven were to be evacuated, which amounted to over 1.2 million star systems, though a fair number of them were thought to be uninhabited, but you wouldn’t know for sure until you sent a scout to each to find out.

The line had now been drawn, and many people were not happy about it…but their opinions didn’t matter. They were dead, as was the rest of the galaxy if Star Force could not stop the exponential expansion of the Hadarak, and it was the protector’s prerogative to draw the line wherever they thought best.

The Era’tran would make their stand in Yinven, with Alden offering them that slot because it was on a direct route to Jamtren, and if any V’kit’no’sat was to be guarding the portion of the Grand Border that would be protecting their capitol, it naturally should be them.

The rest of the galaxy was no longer the Era’tran’s concern, though they had planets spread throughout it, many of which did not even know about Star Force and the V’kit’no’sat joining together, but they would eventually, and those systems would not be abandoned. They would become logistics support, building fleets and sending resources and personnel forward to the Grand Border, whether it be to the Era’tran Zone or whatever race was closest.

Right now only a few Zones had been assigned, for not enough races had agreed to join Star Force to cover them all…but that was just a matter of time. Every race and every planet refused initially, but those who were curious enough to see if Mak’to’ran truly lived would come to Jamtren and get an education in what it meant to be a part of Star Force. Many left conflicted, while many more were still staunchly opposed to the crazy Era’tran’s betrayal, but enough bought in and when the results started to spread…along with word of the Armistice that was going to save their tails from invasion…a cascade effect slowly began to take place.

Alden and Mak’to’ran would have the bulk of the V’kit’no’sat Empire aligned with them in time, and each race that joined up would get their own trailblazer to personally tinker with and upgrade their race. Morgan-063 had already arrived and taken over the reins of the few Hjar’at systems that had signed on, while Greg-073 was just acquainting himself with the Ranto’non, who had joined up as soon as Hamob had returned and convinced them this endeavor was not folly, and Yori-007 was taking on the I’rar’et and the challenges that posed with fighting minions on the ground with only Avians

As for the others, not enough had come forth yet, but Connor-018 was babysitting them as he waited for the next large group to sign on. Other trailblazers would come when needed, but not all of them. Paul-024, Roger-009, and Liam-090 were dedicated to hunting Lurkers before they could engage others less able to defend themselves, while Jason-025 was handling all things Founder in the Rim, including meeting and greeting the Encapsulated and recruiting as many of them to the war as he could get. All other trailblazers had ongoing duties that they had promised to abandon when a new race of V’kit’no’sat were ready, but not before then. Building the Grand Border took priority, but there were too many lives on the line to just be sitting, waiting, and wasting their time until the rest of the V’kit’no’sat got a clue.

But that didn’t matter to the Era’tran, for all that did was their part of the Grand Border. This was the fight they had always been promised, and they now had the weapons and strategy to fight it without trading away lives for small victories. There was no guarantee of success, for any of them, and even if the Era’tran held the Border in their Zone it would not matter unless all the V’kit’no’sat races did so, including the Paladin who already had a region under construction and far ahead of the Era’tran.

All had to succeed, or all would fail. Mak’to’ran had responsibility for it all, but the Era’tran only had their Zone to hold, and hold it they would. The call to battle was sounded, and even the most depressed and broken amongst them were responding, although slowly in some cases. Mak’to’ran had been right. Victory was their lifeblood, and without at least a taste of it their races would devolve into darkness, for they had never learned how to lose…yet they had taught Star Force how to lose, and how to grow stronger from it. Now that lesson was being taught in reverse, and through it the Era’tran were finally seeing their true destiny, and it wasn’t as a servant of the Zak’de’ron.

It was here, in their own territory, that they and they alone were responsible for. They were one link in a very long chain, but it was their link now, and soon their worlds would stretch one to another across all of it, with no intermittent territory separating them. It was their territory, and the sound of that still brought a stirring of pride to Mak’to’ran whenever he heard it.

But to the others it was like the break of day coming out of the darkest night, and every single Era’tran world responded to the call when Mak’to’ran’s emissaries reached them…and because of that, they were the first deemed ready by Alden to begin colonization of their piece of the Grand Border.

It would be a long and hard path ahead, but there was no looking back now. And no going back. Either the V’kit’no’sat held the Border or the Hadarak were going to win the war. It was that simple, and they were going to do it alone this time. No Zak’de’ron ‘help’ required, and no interference from them would come. The Grand Border was theirs now, and the Uriti would make sure of that covering their backs.

And anyone who doubted that fact had their concerns alleviated when the battle records of the Oso’lon, J’gar, and Zak’de’ron worlds that they’d systematically destroyed were made available to the public. As terrifying as those monsters were, it gave the Era’tran piece of mind knowing they were protecting their worlds as they faced off against the unending hordes of Hadarak growing closer and closer before them.

This was to be the war of all wars, and the Era’tran were finally free to fight it.

And not only fight it.

They intended to win.

www.aerkijyr.com

The Forever Empire

1

August 31, 128843

Hadarak War Zone (Len’mak Region)

Ki’na’so’vrein System

Ever since the trailblazers had begun absorbing the V’kit’no’sat races into Star Force things had started to change for the Knight races. They had always been seen as the mirror image of the other empire, with that distinction starting with the Rit’ko’sor when part of them had chosen to join Star Force rather than rejoin the V’kit’no’sat. They’d been given the name ‘Raptor’ to distinguish themselves from their no-so-liked kin, but none of the other Knight races had chosen Star Force.

Individuals had. Planets had. But their races had not. They’d been absorbed in one form or another with their hatchlings becoming the true Knight races, and it had always been assumed that the Knight races were the way the V’kit’no’sat should have been all along. And because of that living rebuke to their original empire they had kept the same names, symbols, and other similarities with them as if they were in a gigantic war of philosophy to prove who was the better.

It had been assumed that the absorption of the V’kit’no’sat systems would occur in the same method, and their ‘version’ would slowly fade away to be replaced with the Knight races as the normal Era’tran, Brat’mar, Oso’lon, etc. But that’s not what the trailblazers had in mind, and many like Totem were pleasantly shocked when the new order began rolling out.

Totem was an I’rar’et. One of the originals that had chosen to transfer out to the Rim rather than face a death sentence in the V’kit’no’sat for establishing a rogue colony. It had only been a few buildings on an airless moon for the purpose of a smuggling depot, but it hadn’t been sanctioned by Itaru for I’rar’et possession and he’d been sentenced to death along with the others caught there.

Mak’to’ran had offered them a choice of exile to the Rim, and he’d taken it along with some of the others, but most refused. They died rather than face the embarrassment, but Totem had gone and never looked back. He’d been glad for a second chance, while all the time hating Itaru for their stupidly strict code that punished defiance rather than misdeeds. He could have killed the Oso’lon Primearch and gotten the same death penalty, which was pretty much standard for anyone who defied Itaru’s edicts.

He hadn’t expected much when he got to Star Force, but had found a kindredship with the other ‘illegals’ who had successfully fought off the empire to establish their own here. But in them he also found a great deal of wisdom as they pieced together another I’rar’et civilization in the Rim under the moniker of ‘Knights.’

The Knights were entrusted to safeguard the Star Force empire as the primary combat troops, superseding even the Humans themselves. Their race was mostly civilian and pathetic, but out of it they crafted a small number of superior warriors. For the Knight races it worked in reverse, with the expectation being that of superiority with an outlet other than death for those who did not measure up…or for those who chose to walk a different path.

Totem had served as a Knight since before the I’rar’et truly were Knights. He was here when they were first being crafted, and in all his combat experience since then he had never failed to be busy. There was always some mission to somewhere that needed help to keep the Knights occupied, but now that constant schedule crystalized in the new order that was taking shape.

The name I’rar’et was no longer his own. Those in the Core were now I’rar’et within Star Force, and the I’rar’et were Border Guards. The High Guards were roamers, going where the danger was, seeking it out and confronting it, while their own worlds remained safely guarded by the empire. The Border Guards were quite the opposite, placing their homes in harm’s way or near to it, and drawing a line in the stars across which the Hadarak could not be allowed to pass.

Both were to be considered Knights, for their civilizations would operate on the ‘duty first’ framework rather than the ‘your mission, if you choose to accept it’ methodology of recruitment that most of Star Force operated on. The Border Guards would protect against the Hadarak surge, while the High Guards would assist them and go wherever else was needed, and with that new division came a clarity in purpose that Totem was thankful for. He didn’t want to sit and defend, he wanted to pursue and hunt the evil in the galaxy all the way back to its lairs, wherever they may be. And with large chunks of the Rim still unexplored, there was plenty to do even if the Hadarak just up and disappeared one day.

He knew they weren’t going to have that luxury, but then again he didn’t want it. He wanted never ending action, and now that he was officially a High Guard Knight, that’s pretty much what was being promised him and the others that wanted to stay, with an option for transfer for any of the current Knights wishing to go to the Core and help build the Grand Border. The same reverse offer was going to the V’kit’no’sat there, offering to bring them to the Rim and teach them to be High Guard, after which there would be a definitive difference between the two civilizations. Enough to trigger a name change.

The I’rar’et would be the Border Guards, while the Terodactyl would be the High Guards. The name came from Earth before Star Force was founded there, with a slight spelling change, but it meant the same thing. Two names for their race, and now two destinies. He was officially no longer ‘V’kit’no’sat’, for that name was staying with those whose entire purpose was to be Hunters of Hadarak, and would be their official moniker while ‘Border Guards’ was a working description for the transition period.

What Totem now was, was High Guard. And within the High Guard his Faction was the Terodactyl, with a symbol of their own to distinguish from the I’rar’et. His path forward had never been more clear than it was now…though for the moment, ironically, he was playing Border Guard along with his Terodactyl fleet as it was stationed above a small yellow star into which two surviving Hadarak Wardens had fled…and would not come back out.

Totem hated sitting and waiting, but they had orders to do so. He wasn’t commander of this fleet, nor captain of this warship, so he didn’t know what they were waiting for or why, and didn’t bother to ask. They’d been here for 34 weeks just sitting and keeping the Wardens from leaving, which meant they couldn’t split up and go harass two other star systems, nor could they chow down on the planets in this one and grow more minions at their normal voracious rate. Not unless there was a planetary remnant within the star itself or other useful chunk of material, for normally stars did not contain the right mixture of atoms to produce the minions from exclusively…which was why the Hadarak were infamous for chewing on planets.

Totem was off duty and in the wind chute when the alert came, flying into heavy winds while truly going nowhere as he worked out his wing endurance. The crew were numerous enough not to need every single person in battle conditions, but the tiny comm dot on his forehead relayed his orders to him automatically so he knew he had to get to a gunnery turret.

He telepathically turned off the wind chute, then flew out into a side tunnel and made his way through the T-shaped warship…which ironically was now the symbol shape of the I’rar’et and not the new arrow shape of the Terodactyl. All new ships produced by the High Guard would be in the shape of the appropriate Knight symbols, which was mostly unique amongst Star Force. Nearly all Factions used the traditional Human shapes, which had been designed based on tactics rather than symbology, though many Factions had chosen to make their drones different shapes or colors to distinguish themselves.

Totem had been told long ago in a planning meeting that the Knight races were so large in body their ships had to be larger than the rest of the Star Force fleet to accommodate the same number of crew, and when ships scaled up so far the design became less important due to the mass involved. The Humans still wanted the best designs possible for their own Faction, and the same was true of the Clans, but with the Knights they’d allowed the divergence due to the fact that some of the oddball shapes actually offered advantages in certain types of combat, while being disadvantageous in others.

They never would have authorized the assortment of shapes if it was going to be a straight up disadvantage, so they’d let the Knights specialize while they kept to the most useful shapes for the majority of combat scenarios. I’rar’et liked long ships with long corridors to fly through, so a T-shape worked best without stretching the ship out too far, and the 14 mile long Yamcha-class warship he was currently on still felt short to his wingtips.

The Yamcha was the Star Force version more or less equal to a Domjo, though the framing requirements were not nearly the same. Star Force based theirs on a combination of volume, speed, and defensive rating, while the V’kit’no’sat had gone simply for mass. All the weird shapes of their ships were based on a certain length of rectangular ship with a certain mass, then they were allowed to reshape that mass however they liked within a narrow margin of error, which threw off the length measurements greatly in the final design.

Star Force had 6 Knight versions of standard drone-control warships. Roshi was the smallest, then Krillin, Yamcha, Tien, Ginyu, and Vegeta. There was a special smaller version for the tiniest V’kit’no’sat races, known as a Chiaotzu, but not for I’rar’et, which was why there were none in the 583 ship fleet in this system, but all 6 of the other classes were present here, with two Vegeta equipped with baby Tar’vem’jic and measuring roughly half the mass of a Mach’nel. That would have been a fair fight against one Warden, but there was also a Ysalamir with them, making this fleet fully capable of hunting and killing Wardens without gutting itself.

But not inside a star. The Wardens could hide in there forever, and while that kept them bottled up and not harming anyone, Totem felt wasted just sitting here babysitting them. So when the alert came he happily flew to a gunnery pod and landed on a perch nearby 5 others, coming up from the open bottom and sitting back to back with the others while the central airspace remained clear for them to fly down or up at will.

His feet grasped the perch, mentally linking him with the firing controls for the turrets currently assigned to him, though he could control the entire ship’s weaponry single handedly if needed, though at a cost of efficiency. This ship didn’t tolerate inefficiency, so they had multiple gunners able to apply their full focus to a handful of turrets, with him being given 3 on the upper rear of the main ship’s length. There were no targets selected as yet by the bridge, for it was a general standby alert, and he quickly saw why.

Another ship had entered the system, and it was not Star Force. The ship was huge, larger than a Borg vessel and the equivalent volume of a Tier 3 Hadarak, and just seeing it enter a system would have sent shockwaves down the people who used to live here…though none were still alive. This system had been hit before the High Guard had gotten here, and everyone had been wiped out probably 10-15 years ago, though nobody knew for sure. They were here to fight Hadarak and take pressure off of nearby areas that were currently under the evacuation that this system hadn’t been lucky enough to receive.

They’d been known as the So’tra’len, and had fielded colonies all across the Len’mak Region. They’d never been strong enough to bother the V’kit’no’sat, but they’d been known to them and watched. The ground pounders would have been scared stupid at the sight of the Shinogas warship, but Totem knew that it wasn’t well armed at all.

It had weaponry to fight in space, but mainly to defend itself during transit. The ship was a fat cargo transport in reality, designed to carry the Shinogas from one system to another and protect them against the cold vacuum of space, in which they spent very little time. They had no interest in a warfleet other than to preserve their ability to move from star to star…for it was within the stars that they lived, and where they were the deadliest.

The Shinogas warship was identified as a neutral on Totem’s targeting display for a while, then after communication was established it became outlined in green, indicating it was an allied ship, whereas all the Terodactyl ships were in blue and the two Hadarak just barely showing on sensors within the star were red.

The Shinogas being here explained the delay. Totem’s High Guard couldn’t go into the star to kill the Hadarak, but the Shinogas could, and they wasted no more time in space than necessary, taking their massive ship down into the blinding star and sinking it into their natural habitat.

The alert didn’t end when the Shinogas were identified, so Totem assumed they were on guard duty. Either the Hadarak fought them in the star, or they’d have to run. And if they did, then Totem and the others would come back into the battle. It shouldn’t be long before the Hadarak sensed them approaching, for their in-star navigational abilities were far better than Star Force sensors, though they lacked the same range. As it was, if the Hadarak had gone any deeper they’d be invisible to the ships in orbit. Maybe they thought they were, and were just hanging out waiting for reinforcements or sipping on star juice. Regardless, they couldn’t see into space or all the way through the star, and the distance they could sense had been pretty well hammered out over the length of this war.

The Shinogas ship was approaching that range, and that meant Totem was about to see whether or not he got to shoot at something or had to sit and watch through the weak comm link the Shinogas were graciously sharing with Star Force. Either way, the High Guard fleet’s waiting here was over and he’d be getting back to the action soon.

He just hoped he’d get a little of it today…

Rin’shen was one of 285 Shinogas onboard their carrier vessel and caressed inside the artificial star within the spherical section of the massive craft. The hull was thick with multiple layers to keep the cold out, for the Rin’shen could not survive in space for long like the Hadarak could. The Shinogas needed the heat and pressure, and could only survive in the upper atmosphere of the stars for short periods of time. Full exposure to space would kill them in a matter of minutes, and it was for this reason they spent very little time in the darkness.

It was necessary for transit, but unpleasant. Rin’shen felt like he was in a fragile bowl every time he was carried from one star to another, knowing how easy it would be for a superior enemy to crack their defenses. But within a star they were not safe either. The Shinogas had fought the Hadarak and won more than they’d lost in the far past, before Dogoroth had come to save them from the Hadarak assassins that followed.

The invaders had wanted their stars, but the Shinogas had outfought them in their round forms, but when the angular ones arrived the Shinogas were killed by unknown measures. They were helpless to fight them except in large groups that were able to surround and kill only two of the angular beasts, but usually they were too savvy to get caught, and spent most of their time roaming the deep interior of the star only to spring out and ambush Shinogas when they did not expect it.

When Dogoroth arrived from the darkness he killed the angular ones with the same invisible weaponry they had, despite his tiny size, then he’d explained that they were Hadarak assassins who possessed something called ‘Essence’ that the Shinogas lacked, and that there was no way to defeat them without it. But because the Shinogas were so good at killing the normal Hadarak, Dogoroth offered to save the Shinogas from extinction by moving them to an ‘Encapsulation’ where they could wait until the time arrived for them to pay Dogoroth back by joining in a massive war to rid the galaxy of the Hadarak…but that war would not take place until enough soldiers were gathered, and it would be a very long time until they were.

Faced with death or seclusion, the Shinogas had accepted Dogoroth’s terms and he had brought them out to tiny artificial stars placed in a ring around a true one…but they were forbidden to go to the true one, or any other. The Hadarak could go there, but not to the tiny ones. That meant they were safe in the tiny ones, and there they had stayed for millions of years until Star Force had come telling them the war had already begun…and that Dogoroth was nowhere to be seen.

The Shinogas had not wished to wait for him, and since Star Force possessed this Essence power needed to fight and kill the ‘Lurkers’ they had agreed to join in the fight where they would be useful. So rather than being given territory to defend or attack, they were being brought in where needed to hunt the Hadarak when they went where Star Force and the others could not. Down deep into the stars themselves, where the Shinogas made their homes out of technology crafted from stellar elements, including their carrier vessels and battle armor, which was now even more advanced thanks to the resources provided by Star Force and their remarkably intuitive engineers.

Rin’shen waited as the carrier vessel moved them into the star then through it faster than he could have swam on his own, then when they came within range of the Hadarak the ship cracked open and the glow from outside exceeded that from within, allowing him and the other 3 mile long Megaloids to swim free of the vessel using a combination of their biological gravity drives and surface ripples to propel them out into the new star, with the smell of it being something unfamiliar, for no two stars ever smelled the same.

This one was a mixture of sweetness with a foul stench to it, which came from the Hadarak. Their emissions left a trail easy to follow even if they weren’t close enough to sense…and off on that trail Rin’shen and the others flew through the extremely dense stellar material as the collars they wore around their stubby necks transformed into a thin skin that stretched out to cover their bodies in battle armor.

Hadarak could kill Shinogas, but with proper armor and weapons that was not going to happen. This was the 8th hunting mission Rin’shen had been on since the trailblazer Jason-025 had brought them out of encapsulation, and so far not a single Shinogas had been lost.

And he didn’t intend for today to be any different, so long as Star Force had been right about no Lurkers being present in this system…

2

Rin’shen glided through the hot star, far more at ease here in the presence of a Hadarak than he had been inside his own ship. The energy of his surroundings fed him and the others as they soaked it in along their secondary pathways. Movement was necessary to do so, for the atoms within the star were so densely packed that even photons had trouble passing through them, abundant as they were, and if one sat in place to absorb them it would take time for the diminished region to replenish itself, so it was far better to be moving on an attack vector while gathering up charge.

He could sense the Hadarak ahead of them, though no 'vision’ was possible within a star. Everything was bright for those with eyes to see, but light sensors were not meant for the crushing depths. Here one must have another means of sight, particularly an energy field of a nature that bypassed the crowded atoms entirely.

The Shinogas had telepathy, and Rin’shen could feel the two Hadarak ahead, but such things were meant for longer ranges and communication. No, one saw in the fiery depths using what Star Force referred to as ‘Pefbar,’ but to the Shinogas it was known as ‘Li’ and had a far greater range than theirs. Rin’shen could sense tens of thousands of miles away, feeling the tight currents within the star’s material better than any map could hope to tell. This one was calm at the moment, but further below near the core were bubbles moving up and popping at higher altitude, with their denser material then sinking back down like slow moving rain.

He could see it clearly, as well as detail that others would have described as ‘color,’ except that his Li showed him what the material was made of, so in that way it was more similar to the planet-walkers’ sense of taste, though without physical contact. They were odd little beings, but they filled the cold galaxy in the less cold places where they had minimal pressure, for they couldn’t survive the void any more than the Shinogas could. Rin’shen and the others had known of them since before they were spawned, and it was because of them they had to equip their carrier vessels with the void weapons, for the planet-walkers liked to ambush ships in transit to steal their cargos.

The planet-walkers could not fight here. At least not well, and the Hadarak knew it. Both were damaged. Rin’shen could feel the pieces of their outer shell missing, and knew those would be the best places to strike. Their thick hide was far more durable than that the Shinogas had, but in turn theirs couldn’t bend much, which meant they could not swim. They had to push against the gravity for movement, which meant the Hadarak were slow here, as they had always been, and no minion could survive within the stars except in their bellies where they were shielded from the crushing pressure.

But today there was something new for the Shinogas, for alongside the two Hadarak were others of their kind, but far smaller. Star Force had been right. Some of their ‘Mainline’ fighters had accompanied them down into the star, but they were not Essence equipped. If they had been this fight would have been untenable, for the Shinogas had made it clear to Star Force that they would not fight those with the invisible magic, yet the 8 ahead were shaped wrong for that. These were spheres with spikes sticking out of them of different lengths along with two X-shaped ones.

Rin’shen and the other Shinogas had never fought them before, even in the recent battles. During the mini-purge of Shinogas stars only the big ones and the assassins had fought. These smaller ones were not minions, for they felt different than the tiny minds held within the Wardens. Those were so small and unimpressive he doubted they could even communicate, but the larger ones should be able to, and part of the deal with Star Force was that the Hadarak always got a chance to surrender when the galactic defenders were launching the attack.

To date none had ever done so, but Rin’shen and the others were going to honor the agreement before killing these invading monsters.

Behold, death is upon you, one of the other Shinogas said telepathically for all to hear in the unique mixture of though/symbols/emotion that the Hadarak relied upon rather than communication based upon mathematics and language. Submit and you shall be spared. Fight us, and you will die. Choose now.

SHINOGAS PRESENCE NOTED. SUBMISSION NOT GRANTED. DELETION FROM GALAXY REQUIRED.

You have no assassins to kill us. We cannot be deleted here. Submit and return to the galactic core by a route of our choosing. We do not seek your death, only your removal.

REMOVAL NOT PERMITTED. SHINOGAS DELETION REQUIRED.

It shall be you who will be deleted if you do not submit.

SHINOGAS DELETION REQUIRED.

Engage the smaller ones first, the Shinogas leader said to the others, cutting the obtuse Hadarak out of the loop and setting up a telepathic net between the familiar minds only. Rin’shen sorted out his attack assignment with the others, then peeled off on his own as their convoy began to fan out into a bowl-shaped engagement cluster around the two Hadarak that were sitting parallel with each other just inside their tentacle range…which meant both could strike any attempting to pass between them.

Behind them were the smaller units, but the Shinogas did not know how they would fight. Star Force had shown them what they could do in the void, for which they were designed, but they had no information on in-star combat. The spike balls were designed to shoot their spikes off across the void to collide with another, but that would not work well here, Rin’shen thought, though to be honest he did not know what kind of speed they could manage, but he was about to find out.

He flanked the enemy at high speed while the bulk of the Shinogas headed straight for the two larger Hadarak, intent on passing by the base of their tentacles where they could not quickly bend over and reach…but if they were caught in the Hadarak’s grapple fields they would be slowed enough for the tentacles to strike…and if pinned against their mass, the Shinogas would squash between the irregular pressure.

But their combat armor had a countermeasure for the grapple fields, and the net-like technology shielded them from it while still allowing absorption of the local energy through the gaps. When Rin’shen began his attack run on one of the X-shaped enemies he sealed up his armor so it covered all areas, then he began altering the energy already gathered inside him. Forcing the photons into heavier and heavier packets that would smash through atoms on impact rather than being bounced off or absorbed.

Hadarak were good at absorbing energy, but even their skin had limits…and there were packets of photons so large that they would even cause protons and neutrons to crack upon impact. Packets that the void dwellers and planet-walkers could not produce outside the pressurized environment of the stars. If they launched it across the void it would decompose instantaneously, and even within the Shinogas carriers the pressure was not high enough for them to form the higher level packets. Only here, in the middle depths of this star, was the pressure high enough for the packing process, and it was something that the void dwellers before them were unable to produce.

Rin’shen didn’t know how the new enemies would respond, if at all, so he was careful on his first run and chose a ranged attack. Shinogas engaged primarily in melee combat, but their armor gave them additional options, in this case being a shield conduit that shot out ahead on a very specific path once Rin’shen lined himself up with his stationary target. It lowered the density of the stellar material enough for him to fire some of the lower level packets through…

The conduit itself lit up with collisions, churning as if with bubbles as the material disintegrated and glowed as the photon packets got torn apart with the collisions and released their excess energy in the far tinier thermal, visual, and x-ray packets. But enough got through to hit the enemy that it’s exterior skin, which was as tough as the larger Hadarak, but not as thick, melted away.

Yeg’gor, which the Hadarak were made of, had been analyzed by the Shinogas from their corpses long ago. It was a cold product, meant for the void, but also was able to absorb pressure and energy within stars to the point where it became stronger under the stress. Normally molecules would sheer apart under such environments, which was why most things in stars were not made of molecules and were reduced down to their atomic elements. But Yeg’gor thrived in this environment by taking the energy and hoarding it rather than being expanded by it.

Normally when a molecule absorbed energy the photon ocean grew larger, deeper, and the electrons floating on it pushed further away from the nucleus, thus diminishing its hold on them. Those electrons in turn pushed away the electrons of other atoms as well, until they were so far away to be knocked apart. In this way molecules were reduced to atoms, and if enough photon packets were absorbed to increase the level of the ocean, even the atom’s own electrons would be weakly tethered and knocked away, leaving ions behind.

Ionic states of atoms were known as ‘plasma,’ and there was much of it inside stars…but there was also a slurry of free electrons bouncing from one place to another trying to locate any niche they could find to stick in, for however short a time. But with Yeg’gor the shape of the molecule had a wall of electrons pushing out against the environment with neutrons spaced amongst them, and when the photon ocean around the primary nucleuses swelled, the shepherding neutrons enacted enough of their pull on the electrons to keep them in alignment as they were moved further out from the molecule’s normal perimeter than desired.

It was like a sponge swelling up with water rather than disintegrating in it, and once absorbed the photon ocean excess would be squeezed back out again…or further into the Yeg’gor and through it into the Hadarak’s softer tissue where that photonic energy could be utilized for other things. This meant photonic weaponry was ineffective against the Yeg’gor unless you had so much you could overload the warding neutrons’ hold to break apart the molecules.

The bigger the photon packet you got, the more point overloading you could do, which meant that when areas of the Yeg’gor failed they mildly exploded…except within a star’s pressure that didn’t work and ended up with a melting effect as the molecules’ bonds to each other were weakened and the material was made momentarily pliable. Rin’shen had literally ‘warmed up’ the Yeg’gor to its failure point and the stellar currents had swiped out a swath of it before it had a chance to resolidify…along with blasting apart some of the nucleuses entirely when there was a direct hit.

And yet the smaller Hadarak did not move. It did not scream. It did not do anything other than sit there and Rin’shen didn’t know why as he swam around on a long loop away from the enemy and back towards it again, gathering more photonic energy for a second strike, but this time he chose to go into melee range for a larger strike…and when he did he finally got a reaction.

It wasn’t an attack, but movement towards the nearest large Hadarak. The X-shaped one rammed into it, placing one half of the ‘X’ around the curve of the Hadarak’s mass and melded to it…with the wound now obscured from view.

Maybe it couldn’t fight in here, and was just trying to delay the inevitable?

Rin’shen went after it anyway, but before he could get to it one of the spike balls fired on him, with the projectile moving slowly compared to a Shinogas, but he turned into it and decided to attack it with his charge, summoned up into the armor that produced 8 ribbons of cutting energy along his length as he swam towards it then dodged sideways at the last moment to avoid a head on collision. Rin’shen brushed along it, slicing into its body that was half as large as his own…then it exploded, but not in the way he had intended.

Suddenly he was stuck in place, with some sort of cloying material covering half his body and causing the surrounding stellar material to accumulate on him, making him heavier and heavier with the clod on one side of his body refusing to come off.

He tried to move, twist, shake, and everything else he could imagine trying to shed the material but nothing worked…and as one of the big Hadarak moved towards him with a tentacle coming his way, he felt the grapple fields being negated by his armor and knew he couldn’t shed it to run. If he did he’d be trapped.

But if he didn’t he’d get pulled in anyway, because the Hadarak was now faster than him with the attached weight on his body.

Rin’shen called out for help, then disconnected his armor and swam out of it, leaving it negating as large of a field as he could, but only getting a few body lengths away before the Hadarak’s grapple field got him. It squeezed and dragged him backwards, but the squeeze wasn’t enough to kill him and he swam away, fighting the effect and gaining some distance, but the Hadarak wasn’t letting go and was getting closer…and the closer it got, the more intense the grapple field became.

But as the closest tentacle reached out towards him three other Shinogas swam in and brushed up against it, cutting with each pass, and leaving a fourth late one to finish the severing. The tentacles were tough but nowhere near the strength of Yeg’gor, with the cutting ribbons on the Shinogas being enough to chop off the last third of it, which was the narrowest segment.

The three swam in a hard turn and caught up with Rin’shen, surrounding him with their own armor’s negation fields and freeing him from the Hadarak’s invisible grasp. They escorted him far enough away to be safe from getting ensnared again, then turned back into the fight leaving him to observe from afar, for without his armor it would be reckless to engage again.

He should have expected the Hadarak to have other weapons for fighting inside stars. Star Force had told them they preferred the heaviest stars, which they called ‘black holes,’ and the density in them was far more than here. If they did not have a means of fighting in such density, they never would have been able to dominate the Galactic Core where the legends of ancient times were said to dwell. They who did not fight in the void, but remained in the depths. And against them grapple fields and tentacles would not be enough to survive, let alone reign supreme.

These smaller Hadarak did have the ability to fight here, or at least some of them did. The Essence-capable ones for sure, but these spike balls were now to be feared. You could not engage their projectiles in melee combat. They would have to engage them from range as they ran from them, and while that was doable with armor, it would be impossible without it.

It seemed this combat was going to be more difficult than expected, but no matter. As long as there wasn’t Essence involved the Shinogas were going to honor their agreement with Star Force and fight where they could not. It just wasn’t going to be as easy as they anticipated.

And who knew what other specializations these Mainline units or their myriad of support ones had for density combat? Star Force wasn’t going to be able to find out, so now it was up to the Shinogas to engage and analyze every new form of Hadarak that came at them. Assassins were not their only strong suit, and it seemed they had never had cause to send anything else against them once their ability to kill the ‘Wardens’ was determined.

That meant there might be some considerable new dangers in the future, for Star Force and its allies were causing the Hadarak to send everything they had into this galaxy-wide purge when their assassins had failed to turn the tide of the war. Rin’shen had just found one of those new dangers, and was thankful his kin were there to save him from it…though without his armor he would probably still have that cloying goo attached to his body. They needed to recover it from his armor and analyze it before another of them got hit again, for without their speed and agility they would become the prey for these monsters. And long ago the Shinogas had declared that would not happen again, for their ancestors had suffered that fate long before the Hadarak were even known to exist.

Their technology had saved them, and in the end they destroyed the predators known as Tu’chobo…at least from their native stars. There were probably more of them out there, but they didn’t have the ability to traverse the void, so the Shinogas were safe once all had been purged from their own stars.

Rin’shen and the others had no intention of becoming prey again, so after this long battle was over and he got a set of scientific armor from the carrier vessel, he went back and retrieved his battle armor with what looked like half the goo that had been there before. Upon further analysis he was able to determine it was breaking down on its own, but at a rate slow enough to ensure death for anyone caught by it in combat.

The Shinogas collected and protected the remaining goo and pirated stellar material melded to it and studied what they could over the new few days before it was completely gone…but they had no answer for it yet, and without another sample it was unlikely they would come up with any.

Which meant the next time they engaged a spike ball, they needed to get more samples…which meant some of them were going to have to deliberately get hit and collect the goo, for not all of the projectiles detonated in the same way. Either they were of different make, or they had different ways of damaging the enemy, with the latter being presumed.

When asked, Star Force said they’d never captured an intact projectile in combat, nor convinced a spike ball to surrender, so they didn’t know what was in them other than from the debris they left behind in the void. But they were very insistent that the next time the Shinogas collected a sample to share it with them. They seemed to think their scientists could do a better job of analysis, and perhaps they could, but Rin’shen was not eager to repeat his encounter again.

None the less he volunteered to be the primary bait, for he was the only one with experience against the cloying weapon and he knew how to escape it. Once he made some upgrades to his armor to give him a double layer, he’d be able to do so alone next time if needed. But he’d still have support nearby just in case something else unexpected happened…like him getting hit twice by the projectiles.

Now it was just a matter of waiting until Star Force found another target with some spike balls tagging along inside a star that had not fired all their projectiles in void combat, or who had been inside long enough to grow new ones. Rin’shen expected a long wait before he found another such situation, but in just three years he’d have another shot at it. And when he did, he made sure they didn’t waste an hour of potential analysis, for they needed to figure out a better countermeasure for the cloying material other than ditching their armor.

If they didn’t, they couldn’t engage the enemy without superior numbers, and somehow the Hadarak were figuring this out and bringing more and more spike balls into combat with them, though none had yet survived any Shinogas attack to warn their kin. They must have been including the information in their death screams, for Star Force had noted those could be heard across the stars, or finding some means of leaving messages behind to be found later.

Regardless, the Hadarak were adapting to the threat the Shinogas posed, but so far Star Force had been doing their job and keeping the assassins away from them, though more and more of their Mainline Essence ships were seen creeping into combat, and sooner or later they were going to have to face off with them inside a star or let the Hadarak sit down there as long as they liked.

And as far as Rin’shen was concerned, letting them sit until they came out and Star Force blew away the ‘Merlins’ for them was just fine with him.

3

March 1, 128844

Tyzen System (Uyen Region)

Stellar Orbit

Devan-000 had chosen to send his Borg vessel to the front rather than have it parked in orbit here while he did his Grand Admiral thing with the Kio’tos, so he arrived with only one warship and half a load of drones. The rest of the hull-space was packed full of cargo…everything he thought he might need on this one-way trip. The Tyzen System was in the very badly damaged Uyen Region that had 94% of the Urrtren relays knocked out and a lot of planets wrecked by internal disputes not related to the Zak’de’ron or their allies.

It was pretty much a trash heap now, at least compared to the other former V’kit’no’sat Regions that were now chopped up into pieces. Either they were independent and fair game for the Zak’de’ron, Zak’de’ron-held, or Star Force aligned. Those Star Force aligned were mostly not taken possession of yet, merely baring the Star Force symbol to avoid being attacked while in ‘waiting mode’ for whatever Star Force had planned for them…and many were not happy about it.

The Kio’tos had several small worlds already protected under the Star Force banner, but finally a mid-sized system had chosen to abandon independent status and join, bringing the population and resources in their race up to a level that Devan could work with. He’d abandoned his work covering for evacuees in the war zone and left his ship there while he came out here to work his magic. The newly assigned section of the Grand Border was far from Uyen, which itself was beyond where the border would run, though not all of it had been mapped out.

The trailblazers had to anticipate how far the Hadarak would get and where in order to give themselves a chance to establish a defensive line that they could hold. Move it too far in to the Core and it would fall before they could get themselves in order. Move it too far out and thousands more star systems would have to be evacuated…many of which would not be gotten to in time before the minions reached them and slaughtered those who couldn’t defend themselves.

In fact, Devan’s little piece of the Grand Border was on the other side of the galaxy, and the other Kio’tos planets were nowhere near this system…all thanks to the Zak’de’ron originally scattering the V’kit’no’sat races so none had any section of territory to claim as their own. The trailblazers were now having to undo that, with some already at work while most of the others waited for enough of this race or that to cross over and join before they set to work building empires within empires.

Mak’to’ran was out of the loop now, with Alden-031 having full control over the Era’tran, who were by far the most complete race within Star Force’s new V’kit’no’sat. After a rough initial stretch, they’d begun to fall in line and trust in Alden even when Mak’to’ran wasn’t there to give the nod of approval on his orders. Once the Era’tran had bought into the system on a number of high profile worlds beyond Holloi, the holdout Era’tran systems had begun rallying to Alden’s banner as soon as they were informed of the situation…though many throughout the galaxy still did not know of the Armistice and were continuing the war with the Zak’de’ron.

The Zak’de’ron weren’t telling them, because any system not aligned with Star Force was fair game, and Mak’to’ran had made it a priority to get ships out to all Era’tran worlds first to alleviate that problem, but not all of his ships were making it through. What happened to them was impossible to determine, though many assumed it was the J’gar’s doing. Without proof Star Force wasn’t going to launch another ‘lesson’ mission with the Uriti, but with the former V’kit’no’sat empire dark with the communications blackout and most space lanes still blocked by the J’gar except where Star Force possession had already occurred, the galaxy was a mess and Uyen was the worst of it.

Tyzen had only heard of the Armistice two years ago, and had immediately sent an emissary under Star Force flag to Jamtren indicating their willingness to join the new order, after which Devan was informed and he’d left immediately after seeing how much Tyzen still had operational. The system hadn’t been touched by any major battles, only a few skirmishes in stellar orbit by raiders and scouts. In fact, these Kio’tos had been protecting four other nearby systems with their limited fleet and picking up strays from around Uyen whenever they could.

Devan admired that, and it was part of the reason he’d agreed to join in the mess now rather than wait for a major system to come through. This mid-liner should be sufficient enough to get the ball rolling, though it would be a very long time before they could start colonizing their Grand Border section. A lot had to happen here first, and he didn’t expect things would go smoothly. The V’kit’no’sat had a lot of baggage in their history and culture, and Devan was going to have to break them of that one way or another…and he didn’t have a Mak’to’ran here to act as an intermediary either, though the reports of the Era’tran’s quick rise to power did help give him some credibility in a very war torn and disillusioned Region, most of whom still did not know about the Armistice.

As for Mak’to’ran, he wasn’t sitting on the sidelines. Once the Era’tran had been sufficiently tamed by Alden, Director Davis had issued an invitation for Mak’to’ran to come to Earth so they could have a very long talk. Mak’to’ran didn’t know what it would be about, but Devan did, and knew that Davis was going to send him to Cal’com for both Essence training and so he could see how grandiose the power of the Founders was first hand…and recognize how they could be just as much of a threat as the Hadarak, if not more so.

Meanwhile the V’kit’no’sat that didn’t want to get squashed by the Zak’de’ron now or later were the trailblazers’ exclusive responsibility, for while Davis admitted to wanting to take one of their races…namely the Era’tran…under his own direction, his duties managing an overstressed empire wouldn’t allow it. The Grand Border was being left to the trailblazers and little else, for everything being used to upgrade the new V’kit’no’sat worlds was being built by the V’kit’no’sat, and it would be no exception here. Star Force couldn’t spare any more resources without delaying other projects, and the mass of evacuations that were continually escalating was sucking up a lot of them.

New worlds were having to be constructed, mostly on planets that were not prime, otherwise somebody would have already claimed most of them. Still, there were some gems out there in the Rim, but nowhere near enough to house everyone. A lot of the worlds being colonized were airless rocks, but Star Force had plenty of experience building on such planets and moons…the downside was you couldn’t keep people in tents while you built the more impressive buildings.

No, the trailblazers and their new V’kit’no’sat races were going to have to go this alone…which is why Devan had come with only one ship, and it wasn’t a Clan one at that. It belonged to the Kvash, who had been more than happy to supply him with one as his personal bodyguard…but in truth, if he needed bodyguards here one warship wasn’t going to be enough to take on the Kio’tos fleet of more than 382 warships of their own construction, not counting a few hundred others picked up from converts seeking asylum from the Zak’de’ron.

Nope, Devan was walking in here on the honor system, and if ever the V’kit’no’sat had wanted to kill a trailblazer, now was the perfect opportunity.

“We offer you greetings,” a transmission from one of the Kio’tos warships near his incoming jumpline said in English as the large biped appeared in hologram. Before he’d left Mak’to’ran had instructed all V’kit’no’sat worlds to implement mental language downloads…a rarity, but one deemed necessary to cement the status change of empires in the Era’tran’s opinion.

“Hello,” Devan said back. “Any trouble with the Zak’de’ron since your last message?”

“None here, but there have been attacks in nearby systems. I believe they are trying to preempt your stabilizing presence by claiming what worlds they can that have not been informed of the Armistice.”

“Bastards,” he said under his breath. “Have they attacked any of your ships beyond this system?”

“No.”

“Then send out three quarters of what you have here as messengers and hit all the surrounding systems, spiraling outward. I want everyone within trading range to know of the Armistice and make a choice. I also want to know if the Zak’de’ron are making any violations. Don’t fire on them first, but don’t be hesitant about making your presence known and daring them to intervene.”

“I do not have the authority to issue those orders,” the over-sized Raptor said, for his race had approximately the same body proportions, yet they were larger than an Era’tran by height, but not by mass. They were in fact very light in comparison, and were known to be excellent jumpers despite their size. Beyond that they were unimpressive within the original V’kit’no’sat hierarchy, seen as a third tier race and not deserving of any special enhancements, psionic or otherwise. They had Ikrid, Pefbar, and Lachka, like all the races did, but nothing else. And their technology was likewise restricted when it came to the more impressive pieces…like Mach’nel, which they had never been permitted to build.

Even this star system had no planetary defense station, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t well protected. If the information transmitted to Star Force about the current status of the system was correct, the Kio’tos had beefed up the shield generators and anti-orbital guns with additional units rather than higher end ones, as well as placing a lot of orbital defense stations around the planets and some key areas of stellar orbit.

“Pass it on to whoever is, then we can arrange a proper meet and greet. I do not want the Zak’de’ron to gain any unnecessary advantages due to a delay here.”

“What if this system is attacked?”

“The Zak’de’ron will not. Are there any other threats in the area we need to be concerned about?”

The Kio’tos sneered at the absurdity of the question. “None.”

“If the Zak’de’ron or their allies attack with me here, they will not only jeopardize the Armistice, but their sovereignty,” Devan said icily. “They are not that stupid. Send the ships now before we lose more potential allies.”

“I will relay your message,” the Kio’tos said before his purple/blue body disappeared from view.

“We’re getting navigational suggestions,” the Kvash pilot said from his bridge post. “They want us to go to the 7th planet and park in a low orbit.”

Devan nodded. That was their system capitol, and where he wanted to go anyway.

“Do so, but start full sensor scans. I want to confirm as much of their report as possible before I go down to the surface. They don’t strike me as liars, but I’d like to know for sure.”

The trailblazer sat in his command chair and watched as the system scans updated information, of which he was particularly interested in the ships that did not belong to the Kio’tos. Amongst them were 18 different V’kit’no’sat races…along with a few from the Tasd’on, which were one of the V’kit’no’sat slaves races.

Devan contacted the same Kio’tos warship again that was escorting them through the system.

“What are the Tasd’on doing here? There was no record of them in the statistics you sent.”

“They are not ours, but come from several worlds assaulted by the Oso’lon. They ran rather than stay and be slaughtered.”

Devan raised a white eyebrow. “A death mark?”

“I have heard of none. They were being slaughtered on the surface, but when they fled no chase occurred. The Oso’lon most likely deemed them irrelevant and were simply removing them from their new acquisitions.”

“You gave them sanctuary?”

“Not I. They arrived recently and it was assumed you might have a use for them, so they were allowed to stay.”

“Have they been resupplied?”

“I do not know.”

“Well then, we’re making a course correction. I’ll start my inspections with them,” he said, telepathically signaling the pilot where he wanted to go. “Inform them who’s coming, and who is now in charge, just in case they still have lingering Zen’zat issues.”

“Most likely,” the Kio’tos said, referencing an ongoing dislike by most of the slave races for the preferred status the Zen’zat were afforded…and the maltreatment that they usually avoided. “Do you wish an escort aboard their vessels?”

“No, but have an additional supply ship loaded up with foodstuffs and regular supplies. They’ll need them if they haven’t received any, and if they have we might as well top them off before I put them to work.”

“Work doing what?”

“Not sure, but having them sit with nothing to do is not something you trained them for. Most likely it is causing internal problems already.”

“You understand a great deal about our inner workings, Human.”

“Including the flaws in your former empire, which I’m here to fix. And the name is Devan-000, though you don’t have to say the number. Trailblazer also works for identification purposes.”

“Very well, Trailblazer Devan. I will relay your orders. The Tasd’on will be told to submit to your authority.”

“Leave the rest to me. Is there anyone onboard other than Tasd’on presently?”

“I do not know.”

“Find out, please.”

The Kio’tos nodded, then blanked the transmission while he investigated as both ships made curving turns, pulling hard on the nearby gravity wells to redirect themselves to the location the slave ships were parked far from any planet and left to drift in the emptiness between them where no traffic flows normally went.

Devan bet they’d been ignored there, but hopefully he was wrong. Either way, he’d find out shortly. And if there were a bunch of starving people onboard, the Kio’tos were not going to like the meet and greet as much as he’d originally planned.

4

Devan didn’t bother taking a dropship over to the Tasd’on ships. Rather he just had the Kvash warship move in close, then he hopped out of the hangar bay in only his armor and flew the rest of the way using his Yen’mer. It made for an impressive sight, with his little body flying in from the vacuum of space on its own to land in the small section of hangar bay that wasn’t jam packed with drop pods, but that wasn’t the reason he’d done it. The truth was, his Saiyan genetics were itching to be used and he felt like stretching out his abilities this far from a gravity well.

It made for slow flying, but really allowed him to push to get any sort of movement, though when he got inside the hangar bay and artificial gravity returned, had he kept the same pressure up it would have sent him through the ceiling like a bullet. Instead he drifted in and landed gently on his feet in front of the Tasd’on, which were twice his height and massed so much more, for they were lengthy hexpeds whose primary strength was burrowing and tunneling underground. Their jewel-like eyes locked on him from here and there as they had crammed in around the drop pods waiting for his arrival.

Devan didn’t bother with introductions and questions, instead using his Ikrid to get the answers he needed from their unshielded minds. Zen’zat were the only slave race that had been afforded that attribute, and for the Tasd’on the only genetic enhancements given them were a genetic wash to eliminate weaknesses and maximize performance, plus the psionic Hanme that gave them little nodules throughout their bodies to store extra oxygen. This allowed them to dig deep and through muck without dying, making them better at frontier construction work, which was their only real contribution to the empire.

Proper mining teams were heavy on technology, but the Tasd’on did the same work with their claws and mouths, able to sniff out and ‘eat’ various ores that would then be stored in pouches along their narrow necks until they wished to either swallow and digest them, or spit them back out at a collection area.

The Tasd’on had hard carapaces similar to the Rammus, except there was no way these guys could curl up. They were meant to be long and flexible only so far, with them having to dig turnarounds in their tunnels because they couldn’t spin in place to go backwards. They’d either have to walk backwards or dig a loop back into the tunnel, and everywhere they worked underground you’d see the little unnecessary loops made regularly, for they were nearly paranoid about getting attacked from the rear where their legs could not truly defend kicking in reverse, for how low they were to the ground.

They had no tail, just a round butt that was as hard as the rest of their bodies, making them look like pudgy, wingless dragons with a flat snout that had growths on it that were actually meant for grinding against rock and other hard substances that their claws could not easily dig out.

Their bodies here were not good. Most were malnourished, several had injuries that had not been healed with Kich’a’kat, but as he sifted through their memories he saw it wasn’t due to negligence on the part of the Kio’tos…at least not completely. Food shipments had arrived when this convoy had entered the system. Nothing too great, but enough to sustain them. The malnourishment was from their previous journey and circumstances. The war had left them lowest on the totem pole with regards to food allotments, and their masters had to make hard choices when the trade lines were shut down.

V’kit’no’sat worlds were typically well run and organized, but they were not all self-sufficient, and those that weren’t had gotten caught with too much population to feed. To their credit they hadn’t gone around executing anyone to reduce those numbers, but the slave races were hardest hit by rationing prior to being invaded…and when that happened all bets were off.

Many of these that had fled were already malnourished, but the trip across the stars from one system to another looking for help had them sharing whatever they’d managed to scrounge up from survival rations or those few ships that shared with others what supplies they had. By the time they’d reached here, many were close to death from starving, and they’d been using Kich’a’kat to harvest unnecessary tissue and fat from those that could spare it to keep others alive…and they hadn’t stopped once they got supplies here, fearing they would not be getting any more.

It was paranoia driving them, along with the recent memories of the horrors they’d experienced…but also neglect on the part of the Kio’tos to look into the situation more thoroughly. They were just letting them sit here and mind their own business, not realizing…or perhaps not caring to deal with them any further. Probably because there was no mining tasks suitable for them in the system.

“Hear me now,” Devan said in V’kit’no’sat, because these ships had not received the language memory uploads. “You are being permanently assigned to my command, and there is not a food shortage here, so I order you to stop conserving supplies and start using the Kich’a’kat to fully repair and replenish your bodies. Additional supply ships are already on their way here,” he said, using his armor and the stolen command codes Star Force had obtained long ago to trigger this ship to record and transmit images to the other ships in the fleet so he could address them all at once, as well as throughout the other chambers of this ship.

“The V’kit’no’sat empire has shattered under the stress of the war against the Zak’de’ron and their allies, but Star Force has put an end to it in this system and all others that now swear allegiance to our empire. The Kio’tos here are now under my personal command as I reshape their race into a proper civilization and turn their full attention back to where it belongs…fighting the Hadarak. Those systems that do not wish to join Star Force will have to deal with the Zak’de’ron on their own terms. As for you, I am claiming command rights over you. In time you will be given additional options, but right now you are barely fit to walk, let alone choose your future. I have need of you. The reborn V’kit’no’sat have need of you. The Grand Border we are constructing will shield the entire galaxy against the Hadarak, but it is little more than an idea right now. The building is only beginning, and for that we will need a massive amount of resources. Resources that you will help provide.”

“How can a Zen’zat lead the Kio’tos?” one of them asked.

“I am not Zen’zat,” Devan said, sensing reluctance and confusion. The V’kit’no’sat had done little to inform them of the ways of the empire beyond their immediate needs. “I am an Archon. Archons led Star Force in our war against the V’kit’no’sat death mark on us, and we not only survived, but eventually exceeded Itaru. We have prospered in the Rim, and now we have come to both save and correct our forbearers.”

“The slaves lead in the Rim?” another asked.

“We are not slaves,” Devan said, adding some telepathic explanation as he sensed words alone were not going to be sufficient…though the telepathy wouldn’t transfer to the other ships. “And I offer the Tasd’on a chance to become more than slaves as well. It is a long, hard path to your freedom, but it is there if you wish it. But regardless of whether you wish to continue to be slaves or aspire to peerdom, your immediate future is the same. We have work to do, and you are in no shape to do it. Heal yourselves. Abandon your fear and return to normal standards. You are under my care now, and you will no longer be neglected.”

“What work do you have for us?” a different Tasd’on said from behind the others, who were parting for him to slowly walk forward, brushing against each other for lack of shoulder room.

Devan knew he had to have a task for them, immediately, given their sorry state. Sitting stagnant would only make things worse, so while he’d been talking he’d been searching the data on this system through his armor’s interlink back to the warship and got geographical info on all planets and moons, sifting through what was being used and what was left, and within a few seconds he had a location chosen.

“I need subterranean facilities built. Excavation and construction to be handled by Tasd’on only. The V’kit’no’sat races in this system will be busy with other tasks, and time is short not only for us but the galaxy. Any delay means more lives are lost on the Hadarak war front,” he said, sending mental images of what was happening there, for he suddenly realized that these Tasd’on had no clue about the war in the Inner Core. Somehow they hadn’t been told, or were lied to, for they thought there were only a series of heavy skirmishes as the Hadarak probed the V’kit’no’sat border, which they were prone to do from time to time.

“I’m providing you with schematics,” Devan said, cutting and pasting templates from prior projects and quickly coming up with V’kit’no’sat technology compatible blueprints, which he transferred into the ship’s computer system. “If any equipment is lacking I need you to give me an inventory list within the day so I can arrange for it. I want you to start digging as soon as you land on Uri’vorlon.”

“We need nothing for the initial excavation,” the elder Tasd’on said. “The rest can be sorted as we work. Who will be our overseer?”

“If you’re the Tasd’on I’ve heard of, you need no overseer. I will inspect the finished facilities and assist you with any problems that arise, but this project is yours alone to handle. Can you do that?”

Devan felt a swelling of pride amongst many of those here, but especially the elder Tasd’on, and that pride quickly began to replace the despair that had been clinging to them like a noose. Never in their history had they been assigned work without an overseer, and their escape from the war-torn worlds they had been assigned to had been on their own without orders, and many felt shame at taking action without instruction, even to save their own lives, but now they had new orders and were being given free rein to act without an overseer. That was an act of trust and respect they’d never been afforded, and like a chain reaction Devan could sense their minds sparking to life and work potential being discussed in whispers, for the Tasd’on had never been given telepathy.

“We hear and obey, Archon.”

“Good,” he said, clapping his hands together once. “Now let’s see to these ships. They appear to need repair.”

“We do not have the augments to do so. They were left behind when we stuffed as many of us onboard as we could manage,” the elder said with shame.

Devan nodded. “Well, you made the right choice. Equipment is far easier to replace than experienced workers. Are any of your ships unable to make a safe microjump to Uri’vorlon?”

“All are flight worthy.”

“Well then, I’ll have the Kio’tos handle the repairs after you get down in the soil where you belong. Focus your efforts there…Neio’jran.”

The Tasd’on bowed his head low with gratitude at his name being used.

“Set course for Uri’vorlon. No need to waste time sitting here,” he said as he walked past the Tasd’on, squeezing through the small gaps between them and patting them on their tree trunk-like legs. These guys were a mess mentally, and he needed to stay here to act as a stabilizing rod as he got them redirected into familiar work…after which the healing mental healing could begin. Right now they were a slow motion disaster, and Devan had to get them out of it immediately before any of them woke up to the nightmare they were in and went berserk.

And even one going berserk in these tight confines could trigger a stampede-like effect with nowhere to go that could kill many, if not the entire ship if insanity took hold of them. No, he needed them down on a planet in the soil that was their preferred environment, not in these ships surrounded by vacuum that could not be tunneled through. They were pinned here, more so than normal, and like him they needed activity…and a lot of it.

Devan would stay here and tend to some of the repairs himself, while he signaled his warship to escort the Tasd’on fleet to the southern pole of the moon he’d just ordered them to…all the while having a not so pleasant conversation with the Kio’tos that lived there via his helmet comm relayed through the warship. The area in question was an honorary ‘park’ dedicated to a heroic episode long into this system’s past which left the area untouched, meaning there was no population there aside from visitors…and there had been no digging in the area, meaning the subsurface deposits were still intact and ripe for use.

The fact that the Kio’tos hadn’t already exploited this given their trade route issues was a mistake than a Monarch would not have made. Sentiment did not outrank logistical need, and that was a lesson these Kio’tos were getting schooled on by Devan as they made the trip into orbit, then the Tasd’on loaded up onto the numerous drop pods crammed into the hangars on all the ships and began dropping them down to the dry, cold, and barren southern pole of the moon with the backdrop of a huge gas giant dominating half the skyline.

The drop pods landed the now physically healed Tasd’on in dozens of locations, then began making round trips to bring the rest of them down as Kio’tos and their Zen’zat took over control of the ships to begin repair work. Devan went to ground with the Tasd’on, seeing them eagerly digging into the frozen ground like it was nothing but sand and kicking it out into huge mounds that resembled ant hills as one after another went into the newly forming tunnels and pushed the dirt and rock out the exits where others were moving it around and using it to form earthworks, and with nothing but their own bodies and some armor augments to do the digging.

Devan wasn’t fond of getting pinned in underground tunnels, but the Tasd’on had no fear of it so long as they could keep moving forward or had friends both in front and behind them. Never the less, he followed some of them into the cramped tunnels that were barely wider than their bodies and chose to fly up at the top of the tunnels to avoid the dirt streams being passed backwards from one to another by their wide feet rhythmically shoveling it underneath their torsos like a giant conveyor belt.

The Tasd’on really did act like giant ants, and once they were in motion a soothing vibe settled into their mojo. They couldn’t feel it in each other, but Devan could sense all of them within range and it was the same for each and every one. They needed work, for it was their purpose. Not just individually, but as a team, which now made even more sense why the V’kit’no’sat had adopted them as a slave race. Those who worked to work for work’s sake could be very useful if applied properly, and now that they were in the ground doing what they were born to do, the Tasd’on quickly began to forget about the past and focused on the moment, erasing the damage done to them far faster than Devan had imagined.

He’d encountered a lot of other races that were shortsighted, but this was shocking. They hadn’t erased the memories, for he even checked on that in a few of them, but they’d relegated them to a sort of mental filing system that deemed them ‘low priority.’ That allowed them to use them for learning’s sake, but now that the threat had passed only the current situation had high priority. As such, the Tasd’on were effectively shirking off the horrors they’d just survived like it didn’t matter, whereas other races would be haunted by it for centuries.

Devan found himself impressed as he tagged along, learning more about the Tasd’on as he began to brainstorm how to rework their civilization for the purpose of upgrades…but at the moment it was more studying them, for these were not broken, beaten, and demoralized slaves. They appeared to be thriving once in the planet’s crust, and it wasn’t for the increasing heat as they dug deeper. It was from the act of accomplishing…and suddenly Devan understood a great deal more about them.

The Tasd’on could not exist stagnant. They, like the Archons, had to have a challenge ahead of them to claw towards at all times. They couldn’t accept ‘enough’ and rest on the past, for they literally forgot the past as a measure of themselves. Only the moment justified their existence, and that was very, very rare amongst the many races in the galaxy.

It also meant they had to keep expanding, and that was problematic if you only had one planet to work with. Fortunately Star Force was an empire that was always going to be expanding throughout this galaxy, and probably others if the Hadarak and the Founders didn’t stop them. So the Tasd’on were not going to have a problem fitting in with the empire…but keeping them tethered to the Border Guards was not going to work. Devan was going to have to slice them off and form something else in time, but for right now the Grand Border was such a large construction project he literally had millennia to work on the problem, though it wouldn’t take that long to figure out a future for them.

For Devan it’d probably take a few weeks, tops.

5

6 years later…

“Yes?” Devan asked as a Kio’tos walked up to him on the skydeck, an outdoor command center that was styled off a plateau that overlooked a brand new city built on Neu’vor’tok, the system capitol.

“I cannot do it. They will not listen to me,” Dan’gar said as he hung his elongated snout ever so slightly in shame.

The trailblazer kicked the console in front of him with a loud ‘thump’ then walked a step away and glared up at the Kio’tos.

“How is it that you are supposed to be superior to Zen’zat, yet the Kio’tos have trouble even following simple orders?”

“I obey. Others will not because they have not accepted Star Force, and they see me as your emissary more than their kin.”

“We can’t have sandbaggers, Dan’gar. Everyone has to pull their weight. I will not tolerate holdouts.”

“I do not know what to do. I cannot motivate them, and placing them in the penalty box will get no work from them.”

“Do they feel no shame?”

“None that I can detect. Their minds are wrapped up in defiance. I believe they would revolt if not for Star Force’s protection of this system against Zak’de’ron aggression.”

“How many are intractable and how many are followers?”

“Many are intractable. I do not believe this is the issue of a few leaders we can remove.”

“How many in total?”

“I would estimate some 6 million in the southern province. Beyond that is hard to say, for they are far less organized elsewhere, but this pit of defiance will not be moved by any action I can wield.”

“I’ve given them ample time to adapt,” Devan declared.

“I do not believe it is a matter of time, but one of will. They do not possess it.”

“Were they like this before I arrived?”

“No.”

“What changed?”

“You are heretics in their eyes, and Zen’zat at that. They do not respect your authority.”

“Take me there, and I will give them one last lesson. If they fail it, we will exile them.”

“To where?”

“Somewhere Star Force doesn’t control. They can deal with the Zak’de’ron on their own.”

“I believe that would cause a revolt.”

“Then let’s trigger it now and be done with it.”

Dan’gar huffed his approval, then the jeweled gauntlets on his legs melted and extended up onto his back, but no further. There they formed a single seat, and could form many more if needed, for the Kio’tos were the fastest runners in the V’kit’no’sat and they hated waiting for slower races, especially Zen’zat, the latter of which they preferred to have ride on their backs, so they’d had their armor configured to allow it, as Dan’gar was now.

Devan could have just flown, but he appreciated the gesture and jumped up into the seat, sitting down inside the small shield bubble that contained anti-grav and IDF so the passengers wouldn’t be bounced silly as he ran.

And ran he did. Dan’gar leapt into an agile run across the skydeck, bypassing many other Kio’tos as he eventually made his way to the edge of the plateau and climbed up onto a Satu, but he didn’t let the force fields carry him along. Rather he ran, adding his own 180 mph jog to the speed of the Satu as they traveled overland rather than boarding a drop pod for transit.

Devan rode along, not even feeling wind in his face as the horizon bobbled ever so slightly with each stride Dan’gar took, and ahead of him the large neck pulsed up and down as his head jutted forward to match his steps. He’d ridden on the back of an Era’tran and Raptor before, but the Kio’tos were an entirely different story. Their size was so large you would think they would be slow plodders, but they weren’t. They were extremely agile, and made Devan feel like a toy being carried along on the back of a giant two legged horse.

He stayed silent for the trip, just taking in the scenery and thinking. Work was going on everywhere, but especially in this area where they had turned a wasteland into the new planetary capitol, and out from it they were reworking existing V’kit’no’sat infrastructure for the sake of upgrades and practice. When they eventually got around to building on the Grand Border, they needed to be knowledgeable in the proper methods of Star Force construction and not learning as they went.

As far as this planet and system went, Devan was using it as a training ground for not only those here but other Kio’tos that were being shipped in from different systems from across the galaxy. He had to give them a new identity, and once that was accomplished for a small group he could use them as seeds to spread out to the other systems and recreate what he was doing here without his direct presence.

At least that was the plan, but of the two things he required…effort and obedience…he was only getting half measures from certain portions of the populace. He’d assigned Dan’gar to deal with it, both to give him some troubleshooting practice as well as allowing the resistors to deal with another Kio’tos rather than a tiny Human in case that might have been the crux of the issue, but apparently it was not. And Devan couldn’t let slackers hold back the rest of the population, for they were having trouble enough on their own. Add a counter current and it would delay his efforts by decades…and there were a lot of people in the war zone that would die from that delay.

He’d explained that and a lot of other stuff to the Kio’tos, knowing they had been kept in the dark even before the Urrtren went down, but some of them simply didn’t care. They had agendas of their own, and if they wanted to pursue them they could do so…but not here. Not with his supplies and his population. The Kio’tos race was his now, and these jerks were either going to accept that or be booted from their territory.

The area Dan’gar was taking him was one of their villages in Manufacturing Wing 399, which was a chunk of the planet dedicated to turning raw materials into a variety of useful components, but no finished models. They made parts, but not nearly as much as other Wings. They were deliberately going slow and only putting out as little as they felt they had to while spending most of their time on recreation and other things.

As Dan’gar got off the Satu and ran down into the village he didn’t slow, brushing against several Kio’tos who didn’t fully get out of his way as Devan issued an order to all Zen’zat in the area to leave immediately. He didn’t care where, they just needed to clear out now…and unlike the Kio’tos, they did as ordered and were seen scrambling beyond the perimeter Devan set in the local battlemap and transmitted out to all their minds and armor.

Dan’gar brought him into the main lounging area, which was a low depth artificial swamp with pools of water mixed with sand bars and other types of land where many of the giant Kio’tos were soaking in the heavy sunlight. Only a few bothered to notice his arrival, staying put and not rising as Dan’gar announced his presence and that of Devan, demanding their attention.

A few stood and plodded toward them, but the rest remained sprawled out on the sand or specialized furniture, preferring to interact telepathically only, but even their inquiries there were lackluster.

Get clear, Dan’gar and wait on the periphery. I need a clear field of fire.

What are you going to do?

Explain it to them, Devan said, jumping up out of the saddle and hanging in the air behind Dan’gar’s head for a moment before the Kio’tos General moved off slowly.

“Alright you scumbags,” Devan announced verbally and telepathically in V’kit’no’sat to make sure the few hundred of them nearby could clearly understand him. It was also a way of pointing out they were not allies, else he would have used the Star Force language. “Your days of aiding the Zak’de’ron are over. I will tolerate no more sabotage of our production lines. You will either earn the name Kio’tos, or you will be exiled to join your true masters.”

Before any large amount of responses could come in…and they were coming, for the accusation of aiding the Zak’de’ron was no small insult…Devan flew over one of the reclining Kio’tos and threw a Jumat blast directly into her head, knocking it into the paneling below and cracking the feeble construction. Then he landed such a hard telepathic slap that it jolted the Kio’tos into a rage.

And not just from her. Others nearby were scrambling to their feet and reaching out towards Devan with their Lachka…which he counteracted with his Rentar, nullifying their fields and making him immune to their telekinesis, but they were not immune to his.

He smacked several heads with invisible slaps, then moved up near another and pumped so much Jumat into its side that he knocked it off its feet to land in the water with a satisfying splash.

“That’s right, you cowards. Stand up and fight. It’s time you learn who is truly dominant in this system. Don’t hold back…because I’m not going to,” he said, adding Essence to another Jumat blast and knocking the nearest Kio’tos up into the air and backwards over 100 meters before dropping it onto its back in an uncontrolled roll into another’s legs, buckling one of them and tipping it over as well.

Snarls and telepathic curses lashed out from many as they all charged the little Archon flying in the air at head height. Devan could have gone higher and out of their reach, but that would hardly have been fair, despite their ability to jump more than twice their height. No, he was staying down with them and going no higher than their head height. This was not a ‘catch me if you can’ scenario, this was a ‘king of the hill hold your ground and make them bleed’ lesson in reality.

Several of them tried to ram him with head butts, but he dodged two of them then let the third hit…or almost so, for his head stopped two meters away, caught in an Ubven field that pinned it in place…and without Rentar he couldn’t melt it away, but Devan could move through it, so he ran up over his snout, across his head, then slid down his neck and jumped off his back while using his armor to apply the mark of shame to the Kio’tos in the form of a fast acting tattoo stitched via an energy wand that left a pink streak down his purple/blue back.

The colors didn’t mesh well, but more than that, Devan had been applying the mark of shame to any that he deemed needed to spend time in the penalty box, which was just what it sounded like. A large cage-like box capable of holding hundreds of the Kio’tos in close quarters or a few with plenty of room to spare. There were several located across the planet, made of clear materials that let them look out and those outside to look in. Whenever Devan marked one with the tattoo they were immediately identified by orbital monitoring and security was sent to retrieve them, but it had also been a mark of shame more than anything, and the Kio’tos hated it…along with the fact that they had to allow him to apply it.

These weren’t allowing him, but he’d just tagged one already. If it had armor it could have had the Kich’a’kat remove it just as easily, but most of these Kio’tos were unarmed, and those who were not were already deploying their full body armor and assembling in a group beyond the others. Devan didn’t know if they were going to stand still, leave, or fight, but right now he had a lot more closer to him that were trying to use their telepathy to mess with his mind…the only problem was they weren’t very good at it, and brain size only got you so far.

Devan sent a series of psionic responses back, disrupting or in some cases debilitating his attackers, one of which fell to the ground with a nightmare scenario stuck in his head that blinded him from what was going on around…and by the time he woke, Devan had already tagged him with the mark of shame, then gave him a Lachka smack across the face for good measure.

On and on he went, dancing around in the air as the Kio’tos tried to physically reach him, but they couldn’t. He was too fast and their Lachka wasn’t working so long as he had enough strength to negate it with Rentar. He couldn’t do that forever, and maybe they realized that, but from the few peaks he got into their mental states they weren’t thinking ahead. They were acting out of pure rage at his impotence, for they still saw him as an inferior…and that’s what he had to remedy right now.

He flew at high speed directly at one and nailed it in the chest, ramming with his shoulder and pushing hard with his Yen’mer. The impact knocked it up off its feet, then his continual flight tipped it up onto its tail and nearly sent it over backwards. Rather it fell to the left, and Devan pushed it into the ground with a pointblank Jumat blast.

“Who is superior? Tell me, Kio’tos, for right now it doesn’t look like you are,” he mocked.

“Heretic!” another screamed, running at him from the right.

Devan floated still and smiled, for his helmet wasn’t even deployed for the specific purpose that they could see his tiny face. He raised a single hand in a stopping motion…then the Kio’tos tripped over his own feet and fell to the ground stunned as Devan released the Tier 4 psionic Takbri, one that no Zen’zat had ever achieved. It was the equivalent of a stun gun, and Devan had hit him with enough of it to fully knock him unconscious.

“Are any of you capable of fighting me?” he demanded as he slapped another charging at him with a Saven mind pulse that acted like a mental flash bang, after which he shot one of his legs with another Jumat blast, knocking him off balance into the sand just short of reaching the trailblazer.

“Anyone?” he demanded. “You think you can defy my orders with impunity? I won’t kill you, but do not mistake that for weakness nor permission to continue your defiance. You will either submit,” he said, cutting out as he had to turn another charger from behind aside with an Essence enhanced Lachka hold that pinched him in the shoulders and moved him out of alignment so he ran right by Devan with nothing more than a puff of wind touching him.

“…to my authority or you will be removed from the populace and exiled. V’kit’no’sat are meant to fight the Hadarak, and that is what I will make the Kio’tos again. V’kit’no’sat, not the irreverent, duty dodging scumbags that you’ve become.”

A Dre’mo’don blast came directly at his unarmored head, but his shields didn’t need to stop it because he knew it was coming and reacted quick enough, using his Essence to freeze the green energy lance in midair in a way that no V’kit’no’sat technology possibly could…and he held it there, in its impossible position, as he floated up slightly so he could stare over it at the armored Kio’tos that had fired at him.

“Better,” he admonished, then he drew the blast slowly into his left hand, collecting the glowing green energy and melding it into a spear…that he then threw back towards his attacker. It flew slowly compared to an energy blast, but visually was quick and hit not only his opponent’s shields, but penetrated and burnt into his armor thanks to the Essence enhancement Devan had given it.

Except it didn’t just burn into his armor, it burnt through it slightly and charred his flesh. The Kio’tos screamed from the pain, staggering backwards in shock and awe, then grew silent and just stared at Devan along with the others, for even those on the ground nearby him had frozen stiff with fear and did not move to even stand up again. They stared at the tiny Zen’zat, knowing that not even the most legendary of V’kit’no’sat possessed such an ability.

“Did you think I was lying when I claimed superiority? Did you think Star Force was disrespecting you when I and I alone was sent to take command of your race? I am here because I am the best of us, and so are my brothers and sisters being assigned to the other races in your former empire. We are here to turn you into true V’kit’no’sat by bringing out the potential in you that the Zak’de’ron never fully cultivated. And I can do far more damage to the Hadarak through you than I can achieve on my own, so my presence here is not wasted if you become the warriors your namesake declares. Are you to be Hunters of Hadarak? Or are you to be discarded into the galaxy with the other pretenders to die under Zak’de’ron claws or whatever means you desire. There are many ways to wither and degrade, but there is only one path available to you for advancement. That path is my command.”

Devan reached a hand down to the closest of the Kio’tos to him that was still laying on the ground, afraid to move, and he reached into his Magicite ring that was incorporated into his armor’s right gauntlet and pulled a hefty dose of Essence out of it. And with it he lifted the Kio’tos up off the ground in a Lachka-enhanced grip…something that no Zen’zat could ever possibly achieve, for only the most advanced Kio’tos could lift another off the ground momentarily.

The trailblazer made sure to not make it momentarily, and held this one aloft as he twisted him around into a proper standing position…then with his other hand he did the impossible again and lifted a second one as he himself gently drifted to the ground and set foot on one of the sand bars while holding two Kio’tos aloft, one on either side of him and somewhat ahead where he could still see both.

“You have a choice to make. Join me, or leave. I will give you no more time to waste. You have had 6 years to make the transition. At this point you are either unable or unwilling, and the status quo will now end. You can embrace the future or die with the past. You have until tomorrow morning to decide. Those who wish to leave amicably will have drop pods waiting for you.”

Devan suddenly let go, and both Kio’tos fell. One landed on his feet and managed to keep his balance, but the other one did not and the surprise sent her face first into the water where she stumbled back to her feet again, sending waves out onto Devan’s sand bar that washed over it up to his armored kneecaps as he just stood there and looked at them all telepathically. Some resisted his mental touch, others accepted it and submitted, letting him look into their surface thoughts.

“I will not tolerate mediocrity. To be V’kit’no’sat is to be superior, and the inferior Zak’de’ron could never teach you to do what they could not do themselves. They believed killing the disobedient showed strength…it did not. It showed their fear. I do not fear you, and you have done nothing deserving of death. If you will not do your duty, you will simply be released from my service and protection and you can do with yourselves whatever you want out there…and if you have a change of heart after leaving I will take you back again. I’m a nice guy like that, but only for those who truly change their ways. I have a knack for spotting the fakers, and as of tomorrow morning, I am removing the fakers from this planet. I suggest you think long and hard while you have a few hours remaining about what it is that you wish to be, and who you wish to serve. If you wish to live by Zak’de’ron code, then go to them and stop wasting my time with your impudence. I need warriors, not zealots.”

Devan didn’t stick around, summoning his helmet and rocketing off into the sky before banking over to the side and flying to where Dan’gar had sequestered himself far away from the fighting as instructed. The Archon landed on his back, in the same seat that the Kio’tos created out of his armor yet again, out of view of the others who now had several buildings between them and Devan.

“How’d that look to you?”

“Gloriously impressive. Even I did not know you possessed such power.”

“But will it be enough to wake some of them up?”

“You were wise to make them decide tomorrow and not this moment. The shock will wear off by then, and you will get a truer choice out of them.”

“Do you think I salvaged some?”

“I would bet my life on it…but not all. Some are too repugnant to bend to even the strongest torrent. It is not strength, but blindness.”

“Well, tomorrow we send them out of the system and be done with them. I’m not keeping anyone around that doesn’t want to be here.”

“They may have some Zen’zat that wish to go with them.”

“Let them go too. I want this over with even if we have to leave this Wing deserted. The disunity is a poison that must be purged.”

“The Zak’de’ron would never have let them go. They would have killed them first. I do not argue your decision, but I wish to know why you want them to live?”

“I only kill when needed, and unlike the Zak’de’ron I do not require fear to enforce my orders. Trust and loyalty are superior tools, though harder to craft. And leaving dissenters like this amongst the others taints the others who are of soft will and easily influenced. They must be taught in isolation before their spines can start to harden.”

“And killing those who dissent would hamper the trust and loyalty you wish to cultivate?”

“A respect for life is required, and the right for all life to exist that exceeds my authority to say otherwise.”

“But then how do you ever kill?”

“I don’t claim the authority to do it, only the ability. Do you understand the difference?”

“I do now. That is why Star Force does not use death marks. You do not admit the authority to order deaths. But you have the ability to make them dead in combat if required. Combat is against an opponent, not an action within a command structure. You will only kill enemies fighting against you.”

“Not when I can stun them unconscious and get the same result, but I’m glad you’re learning without me having to spell out every sentence for you.”

“If you had to, I would not be a worthy apprentice. Where do you wish to send the traitors?”

“Find an independent system that will take them, and one that isn’t likely to fall to the Zak’de’ron anytime soon. I don’t want them dead or enslaved, just out of our way.”

“That will take time. Where do we send the drop pods tomorrow?”

“They can wait on their transport ships as long as needed. I don’t care if they’re lazy there.”

“Shall we go?”

“Yeah, I’m done here. Giddy up, big guy,” Devan said, using a phrase that Dan’gar was personally familiar with and knew wasn’t an insult. The Kio’tos took off running smoothly across the cityscape as the trailblazer peeled off his armor back into forearm gauntlets and leaned back in his seat, closing his eyes and relying on Dan’gar for his protection.

He’d drained a little too much Essence out of his body before going to his Magicite, and now his normally action-itching body felt drained and sleepy. A quick nap was needed, and Dan’gar wasn’t going to think less of him for showing his exhaustion. He had become more than an apprentice. He was a friend, though that was kind of expected when one took on an apprentice, though it didn’t always happen naturally. He and Dan’gar meshed well, despite their wildly different physicalities. They couldn’t truly spar against one another to any great effect, but their apprenticeship was not built on hand to hand combat. It was on empire building, and in that regard Dan’gar was progressing nicely.

He was still a newb, but a willing one that had just enough insight to keep his presence from being a burden. But Devan trusted him, and vice versa, so the Archon had no qualms about pulling in his senses and resting while Dan’gar carried him back to the skydeck. One of the luxuries of having friends rather than frenemies.

6

June 21, 128851

Gegorius System (Olobiv Region)

8th planet

Bugan finally stepped foot off the drop pod and onto free soil. The Kio’tos had waited over a year onboard that cursed transport along with the others that had refused to serve a Zen’zat, and now they were back amongst real V’kit’no’sat again. Free V’kit’no’sat who answered to their own destiny, not that of Star Force or the Zak’de’ron.

They’d sent them all the way out to the Olobiv Region on the edge of the Star Force border, and here there was an alliance of 127 V’kit’no’sat systems calling themselves the Tem’drong. They’d accepted the Kio’tos’s request to dump Bugan and the others here, apparently in exchange for taking their own heretics off their hands. So as he walked away from the drop pod in a meandering line with the others following the telepathic beacon instructions, he saw another line of Brat’mar waiting nearby to board the drop pods once they were emptied, and there were hundreds landing all around seemingly in a hurry to make the exchange.

That’s was fine with Bugan, for he was in a hurry as well. A hurry to be free of the Star Force stench and begin building a future that would not see him a victim or slave of the Zak’de’ron…which was now a very real possibility, for Star Force had made it clear they would not defend any V’kit’no’sat system that hadn’t sworn allegiance to them.

“Look at those heretics,” the Kio’tos behind Bugan said, referring to the Brat’mar and not low enough to avoid their earshot.

Two of them stirred, throwing glances back towards the inferior race.

Enjoy your time here, while it lasts, a Brat’mar said telepathically, then the conversation was let go without any sparks as the Kio’tos walked on.

Do you think they mean an invasion? Bugan asked the others.

Possibly. Perhaps that’s why they want to leave.

Did we just end up in the war zone?

No, the eldest in the group said flatly. We were sent here because the Zak’de’ron haven’t touched it yet. If Star Force wanted us dead they’d just drop us on a tiny world and be done with it.

Then what were they referring to? Bugan pressed.

We will know when we encounter it, not before.

Bugan huffed, acknowledging the useless comment as they continued to walk to a station on the wide landing field where a Brat’mar in unusual clothing was waiting for them. The colors didn’t conform to V’kit’no’sat standards, nor what he knew of Brat’mar design for that matter, but he wasn’t going to ask as a warning sensation was telepathically triggered down the line to him and he passed it on.

Up ahead the Kio’tos had already stopped, and looked to be briefed one by one, then dismissed going up onto a Satu and heading in different directions. When Bugan got there he heard nothing from those ahead, but rather had a private telepathic conversation with the planet’s greeting party.

Work assignments, lodging, food, and other details, the Brat’mar said, telepathically passing him a small mental interface disc. Move along.

Bugan took it and walked, placing it on the side of his head and interfacing with the programming as he stepped onto the first riser of the Satu station and headed up to the shield conduits above. By the time he reached the top he knew which direction to go…and why the warning had been signaled.

They were not being accepted here as guests. They’d been accepted as labor.

Bugan lazily stepped onto the shield pathway and let it carry him to the west where he would begin working in a cargo transit hub…and from the quotas noted, he was going to be doing more work here than he had been tasked with back under Star Force rule.

But so be it. It would be worth it not to be under the command of a Zen’zat. They were meant to serve, not lead. And if his new Brat’mar overlords needed work from him, then he would do so. His life may depend on it if the Zak’de’ron ever came out this far. The edge of the former V’kit’no’sat empire was preferable to the warzone and the Star Force conquests, and maybe…just maybe, some normalcy could be restored here. The Brat’mar were too proud to submit, and if he had to serve them at least there would be some honor in it…though it seemed the days of the Kio’tos being an semi-independent civilization were now over. Shared worlds were now the future, and if that’s how it must be, then that’s how it must be.

The Satu carried him off a different direction from the others, making it clear they would not be permitted to live and work in the same area. Bugan was going to have to find a niche in this new little empire on his own…

The Brat’mar walked up into the empty drop pods relieved to be going. Civil war had nearly consumed this planet as it was on the verge of bloodshed over the decision not to join Star Force and guarantee their survival against the Zak’de’ron. Many had said they would never serve Zen’zat or Zak’de’ron, but the wiser amongst the population knew that it wasn’t a matter of choice. With large chunks of the former empire now immune from Zak’de’ron aggression, that meant their assaults on the rest would increase in the short term and the fate of independent systems would be sealed in the long term…for there was no longer any question of who was going to win the war.

The Zak’de’ron would take control of the non-Star Force aligned systems once they had enough ships and troops, which wouldn’t be soon, but it would happen eventually. Even the newly formed Tem’drong had no chance of holding out against Itaru once it rebuilt, and even if all the former V’kit’no’sat worlds left independent allied together they wouldn’t have the strength to fight the Zak’de’ron. This was a short term decision that doomed them in the end, but most people were just trying to stay alive another year and weren’t focused on the far future. Some others even thought they could one day negotiate with the Zak’de’ron if they developed sufficient strength.

Nivix was one of the Brat’mar that did not suffer such foolery, and when he and the others had been denied ships to leave to seek out Star Force on their own, civil war had nearly broken out here. It was only the smaller numbers of sane Brat’mar that prevented it, because they knew they could not win. So instead they kept hammering at the others to change their minds, becoming such nuisances that when Star Force’s request for a swap had come in it had been immediately granted.

All together there were 2.3 million Kio’tos arriving, but a total of 56 million Brat’mar and 291 million from other races that had requested to leave. Star Force had organized additional ships arriving simultaneously to pick up the extra from here and the other Tem’drong systems, meaning Nivix didn’t have to wait his turn to leave…for everyone was being picked up in one departure convoy.

He breathed a sigh of relief when the doors on the drop pod closed and they lifted off, with him watching his former home drift below him, knowing that it was doomed to become a Zak’de’ron possession one way or another. It could have become so much more under Star Force protection, as had other nearby worlds that had made the transition to Star Force previously. They were now flourishing in ways the V’kit’no’sat empire had never seen, with the few visitors crossing between the two bringing with them information as well as occasional trade goods that Nivix’s home couldn’t, or didn’t, produce on its own.

Stubbornness was what kept this system from changing, from looking into the future and seeing their eventual demise. Nivix didn’t know what Star Force would require of him when he got to the Grand Border, for he had requested going there and not to the High Guard. He wanted to fulfill his oath and fight the Hadarak, unlike many others who had abandoned that cause for lesser agendas. He knew he would have to change his ways, for Star Force was infamous for their soft touch. They seemed to abhor killing, and tried to avoid it whenever possible, yet they had no problems with internal rebellions. Nivix didn’t understand how you could keep so many people in line without fear of death, but they managed it somehow…or the information coming to him had been a lie.

Regardless, he was committed to this path now and he had no regrets. Gegorius had been his home for over 300,000 years, though it was not his place of hatching. It was a stage of his life that was now over, and a new one was beginning, so he didn’t sour at the idea of months of space travel. Whatever ship he was going to would be free of the idiocy that had consumed his former home, and he would soon be amongst an empire that knew how to now only survive, but one that had surpassed the V’kit’no’sat as they had crumbled from within over and over again.

And now that empire was promising to rebuild the V’kit’no’sat anew, with greater strength and knowledge than the Zak’de’ron possessed…and with the battle images of the Uriti assaults on the Zak’de’ron worlds spreading like wildfire across the Urrtren-lacking galaxy by scouts, traders, pirates, and whatever other ships crossed the void, people were beginning to understand who the new galactic lords were. And they were the only hope of standing against the Hadarak, who were intent on destroying the entire galaxy, Gegorius included, given enough time.

How the other Brat’mar couldn’t see this left him in seething rage…but that rage was quickly forgotten when he stepped off the drop pods and into an Era’tran cargo ship that had been refitted with Star Force symbols and their preferred interior layout. It wasn’t small, as if built for Zen’zat, and all of the corridors were smooth, as if an edge would have been offensive somehow. And waiting for them on the hangar deck were several Era’tran wearing jewelry also in Star Force fashion, along with the refurbished V’kit’no’sat symbol as a division marker.

That marker represented the Grand Border, meaning these Era’tran were from there and not the High Guard. Time to see what his new peers were made of…

13 months later…

Nivix’s journey had not been boring, for he had not been a passenger. He had gone into training onboard a ship designed to make use of their time traveling to indoctrinate them in the Star Force ways, and Nivix had never known such a wealth of knowledge. Much was similar to his own instruction as a hatchling, but Star Force went beyond it where the V’kit’no’sat could not. They had answers for many things he had wondered about in his youth then forgotten in the mundane life of a seasoned adult.

For example, their restrictions of psionics. Most of the Star Force population did not possess them, though their leaders had the genetic knowledge to grant them if wished. All V’kit’no’sat had at least the basic 3 psionics, but Star Force would not entrust them to the ‘unproven,’ for they did not judge one by their race. They stated that the individual born into a Brat’mar body was random, and while genetic memory and proclivities of body design heavily influenced a person, they did not define the person, and that in order to find those worthy individuals, tests must be applied. And Star Force did not want to give psionics to any who had not proven themselves worthy.

They had made an exception for this in order to incorporate the V’kit’no’sat races into their empire. They demanded service from them, but allowed the individuals an out if they did not wish to serve. It came at the price of their psionics, which would be either removed or rendered dormant, putting them on par with the rest of the Star Force civilization, and in this there was a simplicity of function that dumbfounded Nivix. Star Force didn’t have to worry about rebellion from the masses because the masses didn’t have psionics, and any such war would be very short-lived.

But Star Force went beyond that, and actually encouraged laziness in those individuals who were prone to it by giving them the ability to do nothing at all and still remain a part of the empire. Nivix thought such a thing was madness when he had first read that, but over time he realized the supreme wisdom in it. It drew the lazy out of the crowd and put them all in one area, and because they were not targeted for destruction they were actually incentivized to relocate themselves without prodding, leaving the rest of Star Force society free of their baggage…all in exchange for some tiny living quarters, free food and clothing, and a few other amenities.

Much of the Star Force empire had an elegant simpleness to it, but one that bespoke of great foreknowledge and planning, and when Nivix’s ship arrived at the new Brat’mar faction’s capitol, he got a chance to see that foreknowledge in action, for the Shee’vax System was under heavy construction and a mess of temporary structures holding the Brat’mar populations gathered from across the galaxy.

This world was one of 19 in the system, but it was the only one under construction, with a few cities complete and feeding the other construction projects that appeared like lace spread across strategic locations on the mix of jungle and ice that this world held. The planet’s name was Ioper, and had been owned previously by a small race that had been evacuated, for unlike many of the other V’kit’no’sat factions within Star Force, the Brat’mar were relocating to their slice of the Grand Border now rather than wait until they were fully trained up.

The Hadarak were far from here, but Archon Randy-021 wanted the Brat’mar staring the enemy in the face the entire time while the existing Brat’mar worlds fed them supplies and recruits, ensuring only the bravest and most worthy were constructing the Grand Border, and Nivix was proud to be allowed to join them, as well as a bit surprised.

When they were told to head to the hangar, Nivix and the others found they were not going to board the drop pods…but rather the dropships coming up from the surface. These were not round, but winged craft that seemed to be poorly designed. The ones large enough to carry multiple Brat’mar were essentially a long box crossed by double wings on top, and would make for a horrible waste of space parking them, but Nivix had researched this previously, and he knew the wings would fold or swivel to make them more compact.

Once deployed, the wings were not for aerodynamic sake, but to provide a hardened side to the craft that could be angled into danger for extra protection. There were fixed shield emplacements on the topside of the wings that could not be expanded or moved, and because of that they were more powerful. The underside and flanks of the craft did not have them, only the standard bubble shields that could cover the whole craft. Drop pods had been built to defend against all angles of attack and maximize internal space…but they were prone to be vulnerable regardless against naval firepower, and Star Force did not like that, so they’d designed more survivability into their dropships in exchange for a reduction in efficiency.

It was a recurring theme throughout their empire that put a higher value on life than the original V’kit’no’sat did, but even they had known that replacing veteran personnel with hatchlings was no even trade. So as Nivix walked into the narrow belly of the dropship, he felt a reassurance that this empire was looking out for his welfare at every turn, not just when it was convenient or beneficial for the Star Force.

12 of the Brat’mar walked inside, then the doors closed and the dropship took off, flying down to the planet faster than a drop pod could move thanks to the more aerodynamic design. It landed not at a spaceport, but out in a muddy stretch of jungle that had been clear cut recently. Nivix knew they had orders to avoid killing the primitive lifeforms whenever possible, so the clear cut would have been preceded by a telepathic sweeping team that would have removed any in danger, but there were always going to be some casualties when the stupid critters didn’t know to avoid hazards.

Star Force didn’t deny that, but they were always looking to make ways to avoid it, and one of those was a telepathic bubble that the dropship passed through. When it hit Nivix’s mind he got a brief urging to turn back, and for a small avian that would have been more than enough to scare them off, leaving the airspace ahead clear for many dropships to land and start disgorging not only personnel, but supplies, for orbit was full of ships unloading that had not come with his convoy.

The planet was very busy for such a primitive world, and it was about to get a little busier as Nivix ran with the others out of the dropship already with orders downloaded into their armor. He broke off and followed the navigational beacons where they led him, then came to several empty canisters sitting on a platform next to crates that had not yet been opened.

Nivix telekinetically cracked them, spilling some of the bean-like components on the ground, but he picked them all up and flew them into their appropriate canisters, mixing them with stuff from the other crates and sorting it out as he had been instructed. They didn’t have machinery set up to do this automatically, so Nivix was being assigned to do the kit packing manually.

Others would take the kits he was assembling and deliver them to various construction sites that were not large scale, for these kits were for prefab machinery, not the larger and more powerful custom equipment built on site. What Nivix was doing was deemed ‘Lego’ work, and it took a considerable amount of Lachka endurance and precision, along with the ability to multi-task dozens, if not hundreds of small objects moving simultaneously through the air around him.

But he had been practicing on his trip here, and took to the work with a familiarity that had him assembling 4 full kits before a small convoy of Zen’zat vehicles arrived to pick them up and offload new empty canisters, while every now and then a small dropship would arrive with more crates coming in from offworld.

There was no meet and greet, no spectacle, no ceremonies. Nivix had arrived and went to work, simple as that. Ritual wouldn’t build the Grand Border, nor would it stop the Hadarak, only hard work would. And he was glad to be plunged into it immediately on arrival, for it meant he was both contributing and part of his new home immediately, with no trial or probationary period required.

He was on a planet full of Brat’mar, Zen’zat, and one trailblazer out there somewhere. And together they had a section of the border to build and hold against the storm that was coming their way. Time was their opponent now, and while the rest of the galaxy wasted it with futile wars, Nivix was finally amongst a planet full of sane Brat’mar committed to doing what was necessary. No more fools.

This was now home, and from the well-orchestrated work teams, he knew that he was finally part of the Star Force empire, and in this empire skill trumped all, not birthright. And it was skill that was going to defeat the Hadarak. That, and a lot of hard work.

Plus the mastermind trailblazers that had defeated the original V’kit’no’sat empire when outmanned and outgunned. With one of them leading the Brat’mar, Nivix knew the days ahead would not be predictable…but they would be productive. A new empire was being built here, and in addition to being a part of it, Nivix wanted to see what the Brat’mar could become under the leadership of those who had their best interests at heart rather than the manipulative barbarism of the Zak’de’ron.

The future was going to be interesting, no matter how events played out. And Nivix knew he was finally on the righteous side. Whether it would be the winning side, only time would tell.

7

June 27, 128851

Lewrex’tara System (Ghen Region)

12th planet

Legat Mancer stood on the observation deck of Seda AKERVO, staring out through the simulated windows at the planet below that was now full of empty Star Force infrastructure. Less than two years ago it had been overflowing with evacuees being dumped here from rescue teams that would then immediately head back out to pick up more. Those ships had been going nonstop for centuries, with maintenance teams working on them enroute rather than bring them back to shipyards for scheduled upgrades, and the crews were rarely rotated out. Most chose to stay to maximize the number of lives saved, with many not seeing the surface of a Star Force planet for just as long a time.

But now they were gone, with only a scattering of ships left plucking the last of the valuable equipment off the surface. The kind of stuff that couldn’t be left behind for security reasons. All the personnel had been moved to another system further rimward, for this system was soon to be overrun by the Hadarak and they didn’t have the ships necessary to remove the buildings…meaning all that construction was going to be wasted. They couldn’t even recycle it, for bringing in the ships to carry off the debris would mean leaving more people to die elsewhere…so it was just going to be left behind for the Hadarak to crush, eat, or ignore.

Mancer’s Seda was the last inhabited Star Force outpost in the system, and the ships out there were his. They were constructed in his Seda and piloted by his Canderians, whom were left behind to ‘get the lights’ after everyone else was gone. In addition to ensuring all databanks were wiped and sensitive equipment removed, they were also here to prevent anyone else from inhabiting the ruins. They’d already had to run off 3 sets of refugee fleets fleeing the Hadarak who wanted to put down here, not realizing that the Hadarak were not stopping their expansion at their now invaded homeworlds.

The Legat had explained the situation and given them the navigational data necessary to reach a safe Star Force waypoint in the evacuation grid. A few of the ships he’d had to repair with his own people and resources, for they were barely spaceworthy and many were running out of fuel, which was easy to provide given the factories on the surface that could be fired up again in short order. The Canderians had had to do so twice to assist fleeing ships, one of which was a J’gar scout ship that had got a little too close to the Hadarak and got clipped. It had made its way back here to ask for assistance, not knowing the system had been evacuated.

Mancer could have told them no, given all the havoc they were causing the V’kit’no’sat, but scouting the Hadarak’s advance was not a nefarious duty and he wasn’t going to leave them to break down and starve to death either, so he allowed them to land under the conditions that his people be allowed to make the repairs. The four J’gar onboard had accepted his generosity, and they’d repaired the aquatic ship, topping it off with fuel and water to replace what had leaked out from the battle damage, then it was sent on its way only 7 weeks ago…and there had been other individual ships popping up here regularly only to turn back when they saw the valuable Star Force ruins still had guards set on them.

Most were scavengers hoping to salvage what they could before the Hadarak arrived, and Mancer was almost tempted to let them have it, but he didn’t know the character of these people or what they would use it for, so he’d turned them away. This system was going to remain untouched, and his Seda was going to make sure of that up until the Hadarak got here, which wouldn’t be long. Two naval warship minions had already arrived and been driven off, leaving with intel on the system, and recently his own scouts had reported back that a Tier-2 Warden was on the way here.

He didn’t know if that was because they sensed weakness, or saw the Star Force infrastructure that they assumed was still inhabited. Either way, his job here was almost at an end and he had to get the last loose ends tidied up before then. They’d expected several more years before the Hadarak got here, but it looked like they weren’t going to get it. Still, his people had already got the bulk of the work done and anything they didn’t have time for he’d just obliterate from orbit…but he really didn’t want to have to fire on Star Force cities, inhabited or not. It just felt wrong.

The shield generators and weapons had been the first to go after the population. There was no way those were going to be left behind, and a lot of it was stuffed into his Seda’s storage bays. There was so much, in fact, that he had to have his people strip it down on the surface for the vital components and only bring those up to the Seda, for the storage bays were full and the rest were having to temporarily go into some of the hangar bays.

He’d packed his Seda about as full as he could, and the 182 mile wide dark green sphere was already prepped for interstellar travel. She didn’t have the fastest of engines, and couldn’t outrun the slowest of starships, but she had enough speed to limp from system to system faster than the Hadarak could swallow them up. Normally a Cradle would be used to boost a Seda’s speed, or to carry them outright, but those massive machines were all deployed on other assignments, so it was fortunate Sedas had been built to move themselves when necessary, meaning the space station didn’t have to be left behind like the rest of this system’s equipment, though the Sentinels had been relocated to other systems that badly needed their defensive firepower.

A tactical update flashed on the wall over the image of the sedentary planet below them, causing a reflexive eye flick upwards from Mancer as his wandering thoughts snapped back to the moment. Activity was detected around the star, which at this moment was on the other side of the planet and out of view, but he had enough ships spread around orbit to keep a view on everything.

The Legat pulled up a viewing box over one section of the planet before him, and in it was the arrival tracts of Hadarak warships entering the system…but no Warden as of yet. It wasn’t due for several weeks at least, based on its last observed jump speed. You could never know for sure, because the further and faster it got away from a star the more wonky sensor readings got, but he hadn’t expected any Hadarak this soon.

“Time to go,” he whispered to the planet displayed before him. “Thank you for your service. We intend to be back someday, long into the future. Until then I apologize for the infection that is about to rain down upon you. It is a failure on our part, for we are not yet strong enough to protect all of the galaxy. When we are, we will return. Until then, survive my friend. You have served us well, and will again one distant day.”

Mancer silently spun around and marched off the observation deck, heading to the Seda’s command center where he was going to organize some light combat on the way out of the system. As long as they stayed ahead of the Warden they would be ok, for a few warship minions couldn’t harm them, but if they got caught by a minion cloud and slowed a little, the Wardens could easily run them down and tear them apart when contact was made.

The Legat’s Seda was faster than the Wardens, but not by much, and they couldn’t match the speed of the minions at all…but the smallest minions couldn’t make interstellar jumps, and the warship minions didn’t have IDF goo to slow them with. They could fight their way out of large numbers of them as long as a Warden wasn’t present, but there was no point in risking staying another day or two. If it arrived before they left, they might not be leaving at all.

But assuming the Hadarak warships weren’t going to get out of their way, he would gladly thin their numbers a bit more on their way out…and if they did run, well, his own warships were faster and could run down some of them. He couldn’t stop the infection of this planet, but he could avenge it in small measure now as a down payment for what would come later.

Assuming Star Force survived to the point where they could turn the tide and push these monsters back. They were far from it now, but they were growing by leaps and bounds with the annexation of the V’kit’no’sat, the insane number of refugees being added to the Rim, and the massive colonial expansion under way for Star Force’s primary factions who had been under orders to grow as large and as fast as they could self-sustain, for when it came to getting reinforcements, younglings born and raised in maturias were far superior to refugees being brought in who had to first unlearn their previous cultures before they would adapt to Star Force life.

And when time was critical, you didn’t want to waste any more time than necessary with newbs, hence there were massive expansions taking place in Canderous and all the other full Factions, along with many of the larger Sub-factions, while the Paladin were seeing the largest growth as the first part of the Grand Border to come under construction. Their unique nature was an advantage here, but in the long run it would be the other factions and their experience that would determine who ruled the galaxy. The Grand Border was just a stopping mechanism, and a critical one, but it wouldn’t allow Star Force to one day push inward. It was a fixed emplacement, and the fleets from the Rim would continue keeping the Hadarak off it as long as they could, but one day it would have to hold on its own…and when it did, the Rim factions would begin preparing for the counterattack.

That was the basic plan, but the galaxy was so huge that Star Force hadn’t even mapped it all yet. Taking responsibility to defend all of it was beyond their ability, but not beyond their ambition. There was no longer the choice of coexisting with the rest of the galaxy as friendly neighbors. If Star Force didn’t become strong enough to rule it all, it was all going to burn, for no one had the strength to stand against the true might of the Hadarak and survive.

But Star Force had a chance. That’s what the Sen Legats had swore to Canderous. They were not bravely fighting a losing effort…which they were more than comfortable doing so long as the combat was honorable. No, they were part of a bold plan for galactic domination codenamed ‘Manifest Destiny…or Bust,’ and it acknowledged the fact that the time of the mediocre was over. If Star Force couldn’t rise to dominance, the galaxy would be wiped clean of all life that was not Hadarak, then they would retreat back to the Core and let it start all over again.

Part of Mancer appreciated the opportunity of surviving such a holocaust and having a blank slate across the Rim to rebuild within, but the Sen Legats had made it clear Star Force was not going to try and preserve some of it for the time after. They were going to defy the purge and protect everyone in the Rim, friend, ally, and enemy alike, because Star Force was self-appointing themselves to the mantle of Guardians of the Galaxy, and Canderous was one small elite portion of it.

Such a responsibility the masses could not understand, let alone attempt to uphold. It was said that it had been attempted time and again across multiple galaxies, and all had failed save for 3. Those three galaxies were led by the alliance known as the Founders, the builders of the Temples and the shadow support network that maintained them. And from the limited reports coming in about them, as well as the assassination of the V’kit’no’sat leadership by Eldorat, it was clear these were not empires to be trusted, and they might be even more darkside than the Hadarak.

That meant in this part of the universe, within recorded history at least, Star Force would be the first Lightside Empire to rise to become Guardians of the Galaxy. If they could pull it off, that would change a great many things for more people than could be counted across the stars.

If they could pull it off, and there was no guarantee there except a long, hard road ahead full of challenges and hard work with no end.

Others would fear such a time in galactic history, but Legat Mancer did not. He was a warrior, as were the majority in Canderous, and given their current situation he couldn’t have chosen a better place to be than right in the thick of the largest war in galactic history.

The warrior did not crave the easy path, nor did they crave peace. They may create peace, but they did not belong in it. They belonged where there was conflict and work to be done.

And right now, there was a banquet of both awaiting any who had the courage to step up and face head on the minions of the darkside known as the Hadarak.

8

June 28, 128851

Itaru System (Zak’de’ron reclaimed capitol)

Wendigama

Zeno’dor road the air currents over the wastelands that had once been the capitol planet of the V’kit’no’sat empire…though that was currently the claim, but the Zak’de’ron knew it was yet another sham in an attempt to hold together what little they had left.

He’d miscalculated, badly. By forming a triumvirate with the V’kit’no’sat and Star Force to fight the Hadarak, he’d revealed the location of most of the Zak’de’ron worlds and those of their servants…then he’d lost his tail in one of the attacks made early during the War of Spite. He was the last living Zak’de’ron from the time before the purge, and he had nearly been lost during the planetary assault on Zigurru.

The Elder dragon had taken up residence there rather than remain in one of their roaming Hives, and had dedicated much of the Zak’de’ron industry to planetary construction to take advantage of the Triumvirate’s truce, for building in secret in a way that could not be monitored was far more time consuming and inefficient…and Zeno’dor had decided they needed to maximize their efforts if they were to have a chance of surviving the Hadarak surge.

His tail had been chopped off during the assault by falling debris, though not entirely. It was 86% severed and squashed under rubble too massive to be moved. Even as his Kich’a’kat tried to reattach it and failed repeatedly, he had to burn it off the rest of the way with his bioplasma to free himself. After that he had barely survived the Era’tran-led assault, and only escaped because he was given one of the few remaining cloaking vessels left in the system while other Zak’de’ron chose to stay behind and die so that he might live.

Since then he had been staying away from the younger Zak’de’ron for the most part, preferring to deal with the slaves more than his own kin as this system lay in ruin save for a few rejuvenated spots. All available resources had to go into ship development to replace their losses, and support industries after that, so no planet-shaping was permitted out of necessity, for the Zak’de’ron were extremely vulnerable now, and they dare not let the Oso’lon and J’gar know this.

Their ‘allies’ had been crucial to the war being a bloody stalemate, and he was glad he had cultivated those relationships long before Mak’to’ran’s death. Had he not, he would most likely be dead or fleeing to the uncharted portions of the Rim where even Star Force had not yet set foot. Any hope of victory would have been lost without reestablishing the original triumvirate, but he knew better than to actually trust them. They had captured Itaru on their own while the Zak’de’ron engaged the V’kit’no’sat elsewhere, and they’d paid a heavy price for it, but both their empires were far more intact than the Zak’de’ron’s, especially the J’gar, who worried him the most.

They had their warfleet mostly intact, as far as his scouts could determine, and other than Star Force’s display of strength, their worlds had not been attacked successfully. If there was an overthrow coming it would be from them, and right now it was the illusion of command strength that was most likely holding it off…or perhaps he was being paranoid and the J’gar and Oso’lon were so tired of this bloody conflict they wouldn’t think of starting another, especially with the Hadarak advancing far faster than anyone had anticipated was possible.

Zeno’dor had since regrown his tail, but it wasn’t the same one he’d carried with him throughout his life and he could sense the weakness in it, despite training to the contrary. There was simply no replacing millions of years of cellular sculpting through effort in short order, and though he was ‘whole’ again he did not feel it. So while his underlings did his bidding and the slaves did theirs, he roamed this once magnificent world thinking and thinking, unable to find whatever it was he was looking for.

Other dragons were seen in the skies, and Oso’lon on the ground. The J’gar rarely came to the surface of their waterways to be seen, preferring the safer depths where weaponsfire would have miles of water to get through before impacting them. They were by far the more paranoid of the two races, and the more inferior. Land was far more valuable than water, and they could not go there without incredible mechanical assistance that left them too vulnerable, hence they had abandoned the idea of the water walkers even after the Zak’de’ron of old had spent much time developing them for them.

But the J’gar had their strengths, and when it came to the space navy there was little difference between land and water when you traversed the void. And in the end, it was the space navy that controlled the galaxy…though to control a planet required more, and the strongholds of the J’gar and others could not be assaulted from orbit without overwhelming sacrifice or superior weaponry, and that was why most of the V’kit’no’sat empire’s territory had not changed hands. Not yet, but the Zak’de’ron and their reborn triumvirate were chipping away at it constantly, though Zeno’dor was more interested in negotiating surrenders than wiping out resistance through force alone.

Those that could easily be convinced to rejoin had already done so, leaving the staunchest haters of the Zak’de’ron firmly entrenched in their stupidity. They would rather die fighting than submit, and after all this time Zeno’dor did not blame them for it. He would not submit to another race either, and while the V’kit’no’sat races were not his equal or superior, he could understand the desire to not submit. Before it had not fully dawned on him how a lesser would not want the assistance of a superior, at least not sanely, but now, looking at the Hadarak crushing the galaxy, he was beginning to understand. Freedom had its merits, and for the first time in his life he felt that he would rather die than submit.

Not that he had ever entertained thoughts of subjugation, but his mind had been set to rise to dominance no matter what the path…and now part of him no longer cared. It was hollowed out inside, burnt away by not one, but two purges of his race, the second of which was not fully successful, but it had gutted him just the same. Why was the galaxy doing this to him? How many times did he have to rise and be knocked low again by uncontrollable events?

It had been his mistake to trust the V’kit’no’sat as far as he had, but Mak’to’ran’s wisdom was what had convinced him to reveal his worlds. Mak’to’ran knew the true threat of the Hadarak…then Mak’to’ran was gone, killed no less than by a rogue Zak’de’ron older than Zeno’dor whom he had no knowledge of. He hadn’t even contacted his own race, and instead sought out the V’kit’no’sat to supposedly save from the Hadarak while allowing all others to perish.

That bothered Zeno’dor greatly. Not only the unpredictableness of it which led to the betrayal he should have seen coming once Mak’to’ran was out of the way, but him being killed by a Zak’de’ron had been unthinkable…yet it had happened, and enraged the V’kit’no’sat to such levels of stupidity that they had doomed themselves and the Zak’de’ron along with the rest of the galaxy to die to the Hadarak.

He knew they were capable of such blind thinking, but with Star Force’s involvement…no, even their level headedness had not been enough. The stupid heretics wanted their vengeance above all else, and they’d gotten it. He wondered if they now felt it was worth it.

Those that had survived, that is. Zeno’dor had ensured that most of their leadership had suffered the same fate as his race, and with the stupid way many systems were defending themselves he expected there weren’t many left besides hatchlings who had not fought in the last V’kit’no’sat/Zak’de’ron war. They did not know the taste of victory, or its cost, and Zeno’dor now had many of their worlds that could have otherwise been held if better leadership had been present.

But the one he did not have was Holloi. Jamtren had been a hard fought battle, but the Zak’de’ron forces had won and were cleaning up the remnant with what reinforcements could be spared. Zeno’dor had seen how stupidly they were fighting in later stages and made sure to send enough to get the job done…then out of nowhere Mak’to’ran returns and outwits the Zak’de’ron overlords leading the invasion by their slaves.

The center of the cursed Era’tran empire had held, unlike the Hjar’at, who would have been more trouble had Zeno’dor not been able to rip their heart out first. But the Era’tran had risen considerably since the days of old, and they were clearly the second most dangerous race outside the Oso’lon and J’gar, who had now reconciled most of their wayward population…either in conscription or death…but not all. Some had always been with Star Force, but now more were as many worlds claimed to be flying their flag in order to avoid invasion, and were now untouchable.

Zeno’dor had been forced into the Armistice, for he could not fight the Uriti and they allowed Star Force to smash any world they chose, no matter how well defended…and the Zak’de’ron had little to defend with now. In the beginning he, the Oso’lon, and the J’gar had refused to honor Star Force’s demands…then they did what he did not think they were capable of.

They destroyed worlds to simply set an example.

It was something the Zak’de’ron would have done, and had done many times throughout their history, but it had clashed with Star Force’s philosophy…except it hadn’t. Zeno’dor was still studying the battle records of how they had carried it out, and learning more with each replay as the years passed. They had given everyone on those worlds a chance to live, outlining safe zones that would not come under attack. Those zones were surrender zones, and the ones who went there were taken prisoner and relocated to neighboring triumvirate worlds. They were not kept captive, nor interrogated, let alone tortured or punished in any way. They were simply removed, and with them went word and images of how their worlds were destroyed.

The power of the Uriti still sent a spike of fear through Zeno’dor. Even though they had possessed three and were still undergoing an attempt to spawn their own…which thankfully had not been discovered by the Era’tran prior to the war…the power of the ones Star Force possessed had increased greatly beyond anything the Chixzon had probably envisioned. Star Force actually trained the Uriti to increase their skills and power, treating them as people rather than equipment as the Zak’de’ron had…and the results were terrifying.

Not just because of what they could do, or had done, but because they were based off Hadarak physiology and he could envision such upgrades among them. If the Hadarak captured or killed a Uriti and somehow absorbed their genetics and adopted them into their own…that nightmare would not leave Zeno’dor, no matter how many times he tried to reason it through. The Hadarak were virtually unstoppable as they were, but the Chixzon had figured out a way to make them far more terrifying, and it was for that reason he had often considered killing the Hadarak they had and forgoing their experiments…but the pragmatist in him always won out. If Star Force had them, then so too must the Zak’de’ron.

But if they didn’t, and he could end this nightmare threat on his own decision, he most likely would.

The Star Force Uriti had come into the systems with escorts, fought through the defending fleets then breached the planetary shields quickly, wearing armor created by Star Force to protect them against the opening Tar’vem’jic salvos. It was destroyed within minutes, but that was all the Uriti needed to get through the shields…and after that they plucked the anti-orbital weapons from the surface with precision firepower before using their area of effect weaponry to erase the existing population.

They had killed many Oso’lon and J’gar, but no Zak’de’ron, for they’d been able to fly free at the last moments after realizing Star Force was not bluffing, but their slaves were not so lucky. Star Force killed everyone that did not leave for the surrender zones, and that was something Zeno’dor had never expected from them…except he should have given their history with the Li’vorkrachnika.

But then they’d been pressed by necessity into killing those who would not surrender and not negotiate. Star Force was not in such a position now, for the Zak’de’ron had not attacked them. Why then had they done this? To force the Armistice, obviously, but why now and not before?

Yet they had given everyone a chance to live if they chose…but the slaves of the Zak’de’ron had no choice. They knew this. Why had they then killed them? Their lack of choice should have been an effective deterrent, but it hadn’t been. Star Force had systematically destroyed piece after piece of the planets’ surface, giving those who wanted to run plenty of time to flee. They even sent down massive telepathic signals coming from the Uriti to urge everyone to leave, and it worked on the native lifeforms that no one truly cared about except Star Force. They had fled, but the Zak’de’ron slaves had not, so Star Force had killed them in the systematic bombardment that had swept away every city on the 4 planets.

And the Uriti were damn good at it. The Chixzon had designed them to be planet destroyers, and their weaponry was more apt for that task than space combat. They couldn’t do it in one single attack, but their armored bodies gave them a longevity that allowed them to slowly and surely do whatever they wanted, and Star Force’s escort fleet made sure the Zak’de’ron couldn’t exploit the few weaknesses they had.

Star Force hadn’t been bluffing, and once those worlds were destroyed…two for the J’gar…both they and the Oso’lon demanded acceptance of the Armistice, and Zeno’dor could not argue otherwise. It benefited him greatly, for the remaining V’kit’no’sat worlds had no chance of defeating the triumvirate…but it also meant those that Star Force picked up were beyond their reach. Including Mak’to’ran and his cursed Era’tran worlds, all of which had quickly switched sides unlike the others that were too stubborn to see they were doomed if they did not.

But why had Star Force killed the slaves? Zeno’dor still couldn’t comprehend that, and with so many misreads in recent history he was doubting his ability to accurately feel out the state of the galaxy. And if he couldn’t understand what was going on, he couldn’t manipulate it…and that made it even more hazardous to the weakened Zak’de’ron.

Zeno’dor flew and flew, using his wings only and not his Yen’mer, hoping the effort would unblock his mind. What was he missing? Why was he making so many mistakes? Why was fate throwing so many unexpected disasters at him? And what was the point of any of it?

If he won and the remaining heretics were absorbed or destroyed, it would only be a matter of time before the Hadarak broke this ‘Grand Border’ Star Force was claiming to construct, and thereafter the Zak’de’ron would be forced to flee to the rim and abandon all their gains here. So what was it they were actually fighting for? Especially if the Rim would eventually fall as well and they would all be destroyed.

These thoughts were not to be shared with the others, for their will largely flowed from him. They trusted his leadership and did not fault him for the calamitous events, though he did. Logically he couldn’t fault himself, because he couldn’t find the mistakes, but there had to be some there, otherwise why was all of this going wrong? What was the point of living millions of years only to be ended like this? Killed by your former servants in not one, but two purges against your authority?

The War of Spite was just that, and it hadn’t begun with Zak’de’ron spite, but at the moment that is what it had become and all they had left. They were continuing to war against the heretics out of spite and not starting to rebuild to help oppose the Hadarak because Zeno’dor could not see a winnable path forward…so they were taking what solace they could in revenge and building towards what? He didn’t have an answer to that, and until he did he would continue to fly in isolation each day looking for it.

Today he would not find it, but the rubble he was passing over was a sobering reminder of not only his failure, but the failure of his race to foresee, let alone stop the first purge that had successfully killed all but him and a cache of eggs…most of whom had been killed in this second purge. He was a double survivor, and took no real pleasure in it this time. Only spite rewarded him for defying their attempts to kill him. Beyond that he was hollow inside.

And as for Eldorat? How was he recruited into a superior empire without even bothering to mention it to his fellow Zak’de’ron? No warning. No reasoning. No information at all. He treated them as if they were nothing, and was going to let them burn to the Hadarak while preserving the heretics.

Zeno’dor was lost, and he could not find his way anywhere. He knew something was wrong, but could not even envision what right could feel like. He was dead inside, and it was his responsibility to lead his race through the present dangers and into the bleak future.

He did not want that responsibility anymore, but it was his as assuredly as his claws were. He could not be parted from it, and he would do his duty, but right now the only thing keeping him going was spite. And as long as he was flying dead over a dead world, at least it was the Zak’de’ron that now possessed Wendigama and all of Itaru. Being driven from it would have been worse somehow, though he doubted he could feel much worse. They had won a corpse of a world that was only significant in history and memory. Other than that, it was next to worthless.

But the symbolism of it was not. It had resulted in more worlds freely being taken than any other factor, for even the heretics still respected Itaru as the center of leadership, and some of them would follow whoever held it. And the information blackout and blockade around the system to prevent surveillance was as much to avoid embarrassment as it was tactical.

The Zak’de’ron now possessed a corpse, and they didn’t even have the resources to dress it up and pretend the former glory was still here for distant eyes to see.

Zeno’dor almost didn’t care at this point, but he was too savvy to let go any advantage, and until he figured out what was going on he would play the game as he always had…but his current state could not last forever. If it did, he would rather seek out the Hadarak and die in battle than endure this hollowness in perpetuity.

At least that way he would join the other Zak’de’ron whom were once his kin, wherever they had went after death. That one mystery was the only inkling of hope he had left, and there might come some day in the distant future that he would pursue it rather than another pointless war that others could screw up just as well as he had.

The fatigue he built up in his wings helped him sleep better, but it offered no sanctuary to his beleaguered mind…only a quicker route to waking and less time spent entrapped in various nightmares of past, present, and future paradoxes that he could not work his way out of.

He felt dead when awake, and worse when asleep. Only movement seemed to be an escape, though an escape to nowhere…yet when one moved it must be to a destination elsewhere. At least that’s what his subconscious thought, so he wouldn’t return in a loop to where he had begun. He’d always move onward and sleep where he landed, calling resources to him when needed.

It was the only way he could stay sane now, running from a void behind him into bleakness ahead, but the unknown about his path kept him focused partly on the now, whereas familiar surroundings would cause him to be lost in nightmares permanently.

And for that reason he could not leave the system. There was no way he could tolerate the confines of a starship. He had to keep free flying until he found a solution, and to date he had already been at it for better than 4 years.

That was also a reason why the other Zak’de’ron had to maintain the blackout of the system, for he wouldn’t come indoors and anyone watching would be able to track and plot his position at all times, making him an easy target for assassination…but he didn’t care. This was all he could do to remain sane, and he had to use the flight for as long as it lasted to relieve some of the dead pressure in his mind.

And on the smallest upside, his tail was getting flight works that were helping it reaclimate to the rest of his body far faster than perching would, though Zeno’dor barely noticed as he chased nothing in search of the impossible.

The war may not have killed him, but it had broken him as it had broken Mak’to’ran. He only hoped he could find some way to recover as his Era’tran counterpart supposedly had.

9

June 30, 128851

Unexplored Frontier

Encapsulation #09

Jason-025 swam in his aquatic armor through the warm waters using his jets in addition to his Yen’mer to try and keep up with the Minnnen, though in truth he was merely trying to not slow them down too much. The small fish were no longer than his forearm, and they didn’t have to try hard at all to outrace him as a swarm of at least 2000 escorted him through one of the many linked pods around another black hole that stretched not only the entire perimeter, but in several crisscrossing loops with a radius of more than 50 million miles.

It was by far the largest encapsulation Jason had discovered yet, but the pieces of it were still tiny…barely two miles wide at the thickest. It was all so frail that he had a hard time understanding how the giant loops didn’t bend and break from gravitational tidal stresses or even the movement of the water within, but the structural engineering of the Founders was still a notch beyond Star Force’s, though their engineers were constantly testing samples to try and determine their nanostructures. Progress was being made, but something so fragile and large as this was currently beyond Jason’s empire’s ability to construct.

He’d followed the Caretaker drones through the hidden network, and then the dark network out to this location far beyond Star Force territory in the Rim, otherwise it would have remained hidden by another static cloaking field. Its gravity silhouette was nonexistent, so the Hadarak couldn’t find it easily, but this was the first time Jason had come across a race that could use Essence, and upon closer inspection he found that the cloaking field didn’t only block vision of the facility, but of the mild Essence use inside.

Had it not, a passing Hadarak might have picked up on it, even at this range. But the Founders had constructed the perfect hiding spot for the Minnnen, who curiously used Essence naturally as a ‘turbo boost’ without worrying about drawing too much and dying. Somehow they knew, or had natural blocks against delving too deep, but those swimming around him now didn’t need to use it. In fact they were moving slower than normal to keep from leaving him behind as they gave him an honorary escort back to the closest hangar bay where the Caretaker drones serviced them.

It was the only docking bay for the entire encapsulation in use, and whatever deliveries there were got transferred out through the ring by pathways not available to the Minnnen. All very slowly and deliberately as the aquatic race bred like rabbits attempting to fill up the Encapsulation as agreed.

Eldorat had been the one to place them here, not his master, and the curious thing was they had no combat capability. They were telepathic and intelligent, but without hands or telekinesis they couldn’t construct technology of any kind. Star Force was going to help them with that, for once they had the proper interface tools they could do pretty much whatever they wanted, but not here. Jason was going to arrange for them to send some of their vast numbers to an actual world while the bulk remained here, where they deemed it safe, for they too had suffered near annihilation by the Hadarak prior to their ‘rescue.’

Their natural Essence use had attracted the Hadarak in their outer Core worlds as they passed by, and the Hadarak in turn had went about destroying and searching for more Minnnen colonies in other systems…for there were many. They didn’t know how they had spread beyond one world, but Eldorat had gotten to some of them before they were all found and destroyed, then he gave them this hideaway with the instructions that they needed to multiply and fill it equal to the resources being delivered.

The Minnnen had done as requested, and were now at maximum capacity. If they reproduced more the automated recycling systems would not be enough to sustain them, and they’d been in this state for the better half of a million years, so they were quite glad to have a visitor, even if it wasn’t Eldorat.

Jason had spent several months here, with research teams examining the construct while he focused on the denizens. Another curiosity about the Minnnen was they appeared to regenerate Essence faster than normal…about 5 times faster than every other lifeform in the galaxy did, including the Hadarak and the more advanced Varkemma. The Archons had assumed the rate was constant, as a percent of your total reservoir, but not with the Minnnen. Their reservoirs were large for their size, due to all the experience they had using the turbo boost, but they never trained for it, nor understood it. Why they would be able to break what seemed to be a universal rule only understated how little Jason still knew about Essence, but he guessed that recharge capability was the reason why Eldorat had saved them.

They couldn’t help in the war, which meant this Encapsulation wasn’t about preserving an army, and Jason had the dark suspicion it wasn’t for the Minnnen’s wellbeing either. Though nothing in the technology they’d examined so far indicated anything other than a habitat, Jason was fairly sure the Minnnen were being told to multiply to fill the Encapsulation in order to be used as Essence fuel later. They didn’t know how to donate it like the Hadarak did, and Jason had already learned from the PanNari and Byiol that Eldorat had given them technology that could pull some Essence out of their bodies without killing them, so that they could then have the vision capability to serve as scouts for the larger allied force promised to be unleashed on the galaxy to rid it of the Hadarak.

Jason feared the Minnnen were going to be harvested, for the amount of Essence you could pull from someone who actively used it was going to be exponentially higher than from someone who had never experienced an Essence rush, no matter what their size. One of the older Minnnen swimming beside Jason now had more Essence in them than an Era’tran did, and if harvested in part or in full, this Encapsulation would provide a way for the Founders to recharge in a hurry if needed.

“Archon, we found something,” a voice said over Jason’s helmet comm.

“Define ‘something.’”

“The water has nanoparticles in it.”

Jason frowned as he continued to swim, using an altered shield to make a pinprick ahead of him that split the water and reduced drag over his body as he fought to keep up a respectable speed.

“Go on.”

“We’ve traced them to nodes spaced along the walls. We found one then extrapolated the rest based on system data. We think the nanoparticles are a collection array that funnel Essence back into the nodes.”

“Is it active?” Jason asked darkly.

“Yes. And there are orbs here being filled. Logs indicate Caretakers arrive to pick up one every 239 days.”

“Hold on a moment,” he said, telepathically reaching out to the Minnnen around him.

How many of you regularly die? What is the rate? he asked in the crude language crossover they’d managed since he arrived. It was clear as day compared to the Uriti, but still didn’t have any real words to it, so he had to translate into pictures, feelings, and other memory based commonalities.

None.

There are no deaths here?

We have never known of any to die since we were rescued.

Are those that were rescued by Eldorat still here?

Yes, one in particular said as the others fell silent.

You?

I was spawned on a world prior to our coming here.

Have any of you died here?

None.

Have any gone missing?

We are free to roam wherever we wish. There is much to explore. Those who stay together are not separated. Those who leave, leave to swim elsewhere. There is no unannounced separation. We do not randomly swarm and cut off navigation to others.

Did any of you die prior to the Hadarak arriving on your previous world?

Many were killed by others.

Did any of you die from other types of deaths?

Some would get infections, but the glow would heal them. We have not needed the glow since we came here.

Is it the same glow used to swim faster?

Yes.

Thank you, Jason said, ending the telepathic conversation. “It seems our friends are naturally self-sufficient and have the ability to heal infections using Essence.”

“And this Encapsulation is designed to collect their Essence bleed off rather than sucking it from them?”

“I think so,” he said, then quickly asked the Minnnen if they ever experienced a drain of the glow from an outside source. “They say they’ve never experienced any pain, so that’s not a usual vampire suction, but I want you to keep checking for the mechanisms for one until you’ve ruled it out completely.”

“Archon, if it’s not everywhere it could be hiding anywhere,” he said, referencing the size of the giant aquarium.

“I’m not asking you to craft exploration drones, just access the computer systems and use the schematics. Go through every bit of every system listed.”

“That won’t be quick.”

“You in a hurry?”

“Not if you’re leaving us behind,” he said, referencing the fact that Jason had this same team going with him to each of the 18 Encapsulations he’d opened up so far.

“I need to know if this is some giant harvesting machine,” Jason said icily. “If it is we need to disarm it. If it’s just collecting errant Essence then great, but I still bet it’s an easy harvesting ground if they want to come here and use existing methods. All they have to do is circulate the water and it will bring them right into their grasp.”

“I hadn’t thought about that. Are we going to relocate them?”

“Some, but not most. They don’t want to leave their safe haven, but some are brave enough to go explore as long as the rest are safe here. They are adamant that their race not risk extinction.”

“You told them that we can protect them, right?”

“Yeah, but they’ve got a pretty good spot here so long as it’s not a ‘shoot the fish in the barrel’ scenario my spidey senses are telling me it is. How much Essence are they pulling from the water?”

“Full orbs.”

Jason did a double take. One of those carry orbs could hold far more than an entire Uriti possessed.

“Seriously?”

“Sometimes the Caretakers take two, most of the time one. I’m assuming the extra is the excess produced beyond the first. There’s no reason to carry two partial orbs.”

“That’s more than a Temple of Vargemma produce in the same time period.”

“That’s what I thought,” the Kiritak scientist said. “Where’s it going?”

“Good question. I’ll get a scout team on it. I’ve got a hunch where I can find some other answers.”

“Where?”

“The Encapsulation we found first, with the popsicles going in. I didn’t want to bother them if they weren’t all there and ready to release, but now that I know these are for more than just armies, I want to see what’s in there.”

“Those are coming from outside the galaxy, correct?”

“That’s the theory.”

“You want us to wake one of them up?” he asked, referencing the standing order not to Jason had kept in effect despite intercepting many of the shipments of people in stasis to have a look at what was in them before allowing the Caretakers to continue on with their living cargo. Star Force didn’t use stasis technology because of the damage it caused to the body. You might live through it, but your fitness levels would be shot to hell and for Star Force that was a big no-no. They’d considered using it as a last resort for ships lost in space rather than have the crew starve to death, but ultimately they’d decided to use the large amount of hull space such stasis tech would have occupied to build extra engines, shields, and other stuff that would prevent them getting stranded in the first place.

So Star Force had studied the stasis tech of others, but never done any experiments on living people of their own and didn’t have any units in their technological catalog…which made them a little uneasy about waking up one of the popsicles, primarily because they weren’t sure they could put them back inside afterward, not to mention if there was a procedure required for getting them out and fully functioning again beyond pressing the ‘revive’ button.

“No. I want you guys here working on this. Top priority. I’ll go and snoop around on my own and send for a backup team from Beta.”

“They’ll be happy for the work,” the Kiritak noted, for all the research teams were giddy for any chance to explore not only the Temples but everything else the Founders had created. The phrase ‘kids in a candy store’ would have been an understatement.

“Hold on a second,” Jason said as he had an idea. “Are you actively monitoring the nanoparticles’ collection?”

“No, but I can.”

“How far can you pinpoint it?”

“Just a moment,” he said as he did some experimenting with the interface. “I can see the individual Mennnen producing it. The system gives an alert each time, and they’re going off like fireflies throughout the rings.”

“Find my location.”

“You going to see if it works on you?”

“I feel bad going so slow anyway,” Jason admitted. “I’ll use my own speed burst and see if I feel any draining effect. Monitor everything you can from your end.”

“Give us a second…alright, we’ve got recorders going. This stuff is too widespread to be logged by the Founder systems. Whenever you’re ready.”

“Here we go,” Jason said, adding a little Essence to his Yen’mer and pushing ahead into the Minnnen…who allowed no contact. They just sped up around him to match his speed without so much as a complaint.

That miffed Jason a bit, so he increased more than a little and started rocketing along…with the stupid fish easily matching him and flying in so close a formation it was almost an insult.

“I’m not feeling anything. What do you have?”

“A lot of Essence being bled off. You’re way more inefficient than they are.”

“They’re aquatics,” Jason reminded the scientist. “I’m a ground pounder flying through water. Can you see the Essence transfer?”

“It looks like a river meandering through the water all the way to a node. The nanoparticles aren’t absorbing it, they’re moving it along and not allowing it to rejoin the Essence realm. I haven’t seen anything like this before in the Temples…though that doesn’t mean it’s not there. We haven’t been able to tear into any of the really big stuff yet…”

“Alright, keep monitoring. I’m going hot all the way back to the hangar, then you’re on your own.”

“Are you sure you don’t want any of us with you?”

“I can poke around on my own and send for you if I get in a snag. Don’t worry about it. Just tell me what this place can really do. We can’t relocate them all fast enough, even if they wanted to come. We need to find and disable any harmful applications.”

“We’ll safe it,” the Kiritak promised.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Jason said as he pushed even harder, moving so fast through the water that he left air bubbles in his wake due to the friction while the Mennnen kept pace without any such disturbance.

“The Elarioni would hate you,” he whispered as he goosed his speed a bit more.

10

March 8, 128852

Unexplored Frontier

Encapsulation #01

Jason arrived via the nearby black hole rather than by taking the shadow network, which required hitching rides on Caretaker units or using his own Founder-clone vessels produced in the captured Temples. Either way was slower than going directly to the black hole and creeping his way out to the location where Paul and Sara had first found the popsicles being deposited into what they thought at the time was the black hole, but in truth there was an Encapsulation in between that had been cloaked, and it was to there that Jason took a specially modified warship that had both pulse drives and Essence engines that had made the painfully slow voyage out from the black hold much shorter.

The Essence boost had helped give more power to the little gravity that reached the Encapsulation. Without it his warship would have flown by unable to stop, or worse ran into it, but after several weeks of drifting at relatively slow speed Jason’s ship was able to grind its way to a halt nearby, with little maneuvering capability so far out beyond the black hole they were pretty much in interstellar space with no lateral gravity wells to speak of to grab onto for maneuvering purposes.

For that reason he brought the ship in on a straight line to the Encapsulation, using the black hole’s limited gravity to make the position adjustments as he released a specialized drone to pierce the edge of the Encapsulation field using the same protocols that the PanNari had taught them, and soon the drone returned back, unharmed, indicating that they were accepted on this unit as well.

Once that was confirmed, Jason took the warship itself in, breaching the field with the forward half of it and coming to rest a few miles off the structure. Unlike the other Encapsulations, this one held no warship docks, and for some reason Jason wasn’t surprised. All the others had except the Mennnen, and somehow it made sense that these popsicles being deposited here were cargo rather than residents.

He tried hailing them through numerous means, and after he got no response he sent the mini-drones over to draw a response from any automated weaponry…but nothing on this long rectangular building so much as twitched. The hangar was obvious, and using Caretaker codes they triggered it to open, into which the mini-drones went, maneuvering with mooring beams along the hull and inside, for there was no artificial gravity active within the hangar.

Once the mini-drones had secured the hangar and began exploring inside a bit more, Jason went over with a 12 man team of Commandos, some Human, some Calavari, and one Protovic among them. Once inside they all latched onto the floor with the grip function in their armor so they could walk rather than bounce around the corridors…which were rather large and would leave them ballistic for the most part without gravity to use to push off against.

The walking required keeping one foot in contact with the floor…or walls…at all times, but it wasn’t difficult. The Commandos came with large rifles in addition to the weaponry built into their armor, but Jason did not. He was more powerful than all the weaponry they had combined, and if they were to meet some of the people here it was probably best for him not to be visibly armed. That would indicate he was the leader or VIP, and usually that translated into a non-combatant rather than someone here to shoot you dead on sight.

But in truth, most of the reason he didn’t carry a heavier weapon was he didn’t want the extra weight, either in his hands or on his back. And as he and the others walked through the silent hallways he began to think either these people were cyber linked like the PanNari had been, or they were not awake at all.

All the others had been active in some sense, allowing them to live and grow to some extent inside the Encapsulation, but after the first reports from the mini-drones came back with images of large warehouses full of stacked popsicle crates, it became clear this facility was not like the others. The question was why.

The corridors and hangar had air in it, breathable by most standards, but very low pressure. Either that was the natural environment of the wide array of races held here or it was a leak. Jason saw no reason to have a low atmosphere when no atmosphere would do, but then again he wasn’t thinking like a Founder, for he had no idea what this place was for without the ships and infrastructure to begin colonization of the galaxy when called for.

There was none of it here, and as the mini-drones completed their full survey of the corridors, Jason and his team got to a command center and began accessing what records they could, for the encryption was not all the same as in the Temples…meaning they didn’t have all the codes that would work, just some of them, and from what they could determine this was not an Encapsulation.

Or rather it had been built as one, but not used as it. Up until now Jason had though the Encapsulations had been built after a race was located, but now he was thinking it was a mixed bag. Some unique ones, like the Shinogas, required special accommodations, but this facility was nearly identical to those that held the PanNari. So maybe…

Maybe the PanNari hadn’t been held in an Encapsulation. Maybe they’d been tucked into a warehouse that had a few modifications made to allow for their warships. Maybe this was a warehouse for other purposes that had been built prior, for other purposes.

The Commandos mainly stood guard while it was Jason that was accessing the computer equipment. He was the one trained for it, but one of them found the environmental controls first and they started up the anti-grav without having to enter any command codes. When they did an automated cycle began, with the atmosphere beginning to thicken and heat, but Jason and the others still kept their helmets on, for it would be too thin to breathe for a while.

“Any thoughts?” Jason asked as he continued to interface with the stubborn computer system via a physical tap extending from his left pinky finger into a pre-existing port.

“Trophies?” one of the Humans blurted out, not having any confidence in the idea but throwing it in for consideration all the same.

“They’re not guests, that’s for sure,” the Protovic added. “Maybe prisoners.”

“What are they being fed?” a Calavari asked, with Jason pointing a finger at him.

“Excellent point. We know the popsicle containers are keeping them in stasis, but no matter how slow their bodies are moving they can’t just freeze them without killing them. Even cryogenics required an anti-freezing agent added to the cells to keep them liquid while temperatures dropped low enough to retard the metabolic processes, which allowed them to continue at a creep. If your body is creeping it’s still using fuel, and I’m not seeing any supply lines to these crates other than power.

“Cryogenics actually works?” another Human said in shock.

“It depends what you mean by ‘works.’ Some races can handle it, others can’t. Some naturally use it to survive winters in hibernation, but they’re designed for it. Our three races are not, and though we might survive it, we’ll have so much brain damage it won’t be worth it.”

“Has that happened before?”

“Not our doing, but others have frozen themselves and we got to thaw them out. If not for a Regenerator rebuilding a lot of their body they would have died in the process, no matter how gentle we were. And their minds had lost so much we had to fully wipe them and start them over again as younglings.”

“How do you do that with an adult?”

“Simulated reality,” the Protovic answered, with Jason nodding his agreement.

“We’ve been working on a way to bring these guys out since we first discovered them. They’re not technically frozen, and we’re pretty sure we can do it, but I don’t know what state they will be in if we wake them.”

“But you think that’s what we’re down to now?”

“Yeah,” Jason said regretfully. “I had hoped someone here was awake, but it looks like the Founders are just stashing them here. And they may need rescuing.”

“Is it possible there are some awake in the other Encapsulation facilities around the black hole?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out. There are links to the others, but they all appear to be the same design as this one. I can’t directly access their systems, only this node, and I don’t feel like taking a hike through the connecting conduits,” he said, referencing the billions of miles they’d have to walk to get from one to another if they couldn’t use one of the connecting rail cars. And even if they did, they’d be extremely vulnerable out in the doldrums where it would take weeks, if not months, to get the warship repositioned to come for them if one of the tether lines broke.

“Can we send a probe through one?” another Calavari asked.

“I’m trying, but I can’t get access without a Caretaker drone here. From the logs it indicates that the popsicles here have arrived recently. I can’t find any record of moving them down the line.”

“But this is the only node that the shadow network connects to, right?”

“Probably, but I can’t be for sure. We haven’t mapped it all out yet. These sneaky buggers have cellular methodology in their programming. Hacking one only reveals what it knows, and if it isn’t programmed to go elsewhere it doesn’t have the navigational data for anything else. The Founders meant these networks never to be found, and if they were not to be fully found.”

“Does that meant we don’t even know where all the Temples are?” a Human asked.

“We know where all the inhabited ones are. There’s still a chance we’ve missed an inactive one, but I think we’ve got them all. It’s the little installations like this that are damn hard to find if there aren’t shipments coming to them to follow.”

“Shall I call for a med team?” the Protovic asked, referencing the signal blocking hull that was cutting off their direct line of communication with the warship.

“Yeah, and bring a bigger dropship. We’ll wake one up inside there where we can control the environment if any augmentations are required.”

The Protovic nodded then jogged off to send the message directly from the hangar.

“Well, time to pick our winner,” Jason said, rifling through the inventory of individuals listed in stasis, though there were no names, just serial numbers with picture ID. There were many different races, some avian and one aquatic, with him quickly ruling out the latter. Better to get them as close to their own physiology as possible, so he chose a biped that was sort of Human-ish, though smaller, almost like a child. In fact it reminded him of the Asgard from Stargate, though with regular eyes that had irises rather than being pure black orbs.

Jason located the crate that held his chosen individual, then passed the location data from his armor to his team, sending them out to retrieve it while he still tried to get access to the blocked sections of the computer system without getting any alerts thrown…and from past Star Force experience in the Temples, the systems didn’t take well to physical hacks. They wanted you coming in through the prescribed ports and playing nice, else they would lock down even further and sic the guard dogs on you.

Jason wasn’t worried about the Caretaker drones here, he just didn’t want to lose what access he had or send a warning flag back out through the network. He thought it was courier only, but he wasn’t too sure the Encapsulation didn’t have some automated alarms that would relay information back across the void after some of the things the PanNari had told him about their construct.

The Founders had the tech to do it, even if the signals didn’t arrive for years, he just didn’t know if they were located here…and from the system readouts he wasn’t seeing any, though he didn’t expect a secret security mechanism to be labeled, which was why he was trying to account for everything through the power expenditure reports. Some of which were blocked from view.

By the time his Commandos had retrieved the popsicle crate and brought it to the hangar bay Jason was waiting for them onboard a Dragon-class dropship that was big enough to haul several mechs if need be. That would give them plenty of breathing room when this guy woke up…if he woke up. The med team had been fully briefed on the procedure detailed in Temple records, but it had never been tried before, so they were standing by with a Regenerator and interface access equipment designed for them to be able to troubleshoot if the automated programming within it didn’t know what to do.

That was a rarity with how much experience the V’kit’no’sat had at programming the things, then updated with what Star Force had learned from a few other sources, plus their own small discoveries, but if these people were from another galaxy as Jason suspected, the rules might work a little different for their biology…or then again, maybe not.

The crate was set up with the window facing those assembled, and Jason had his security teams and the medtechs back off, leaving him the only one visible to the alien inside as they activated the revival process using a specialized code. Without it the module would not open on its own, nor revive the occupant, but thankfully the Temple code was accepted and the status indicator lights began rising on spiral tracts outlining which parts of his physiology were activating and at what level.

He wore no clothing, and his tiny genitalia appeared to be frozen stiff. Jason cringed at that thought, hoping it was just an illusion with some energy binder or IDF field keeping the movement of the crate from flopping them around, but whatever it was disappeared just before the glass melted inside the sidewalls and the individual fell out head first.

Jason caught him with his Lachka as he began coughing and struggling to assert his senses. His mind was open to the trailblazer, and chaotic. Actually chaotic was an understatement. The guy was in full blown panic mode and fighting himself so much he was forgetting how to breathe. Jason used his telepathy to override his body and assume control, allowing his brain to bounce off the new boundaries and begin to right itself as the Archon also hacked in and pushed him in the necessary direction.

It took several minutes for the individual to truly wake up enough to regain any semblance of consciousness, but his brain was not damaged in the traditional sense, though Jason knew he was not well. By the time his mind got around to processing visual stimuli he started blinking and Jason stood him up fully, but locked his body in place with Lachka holds while returning control of his nervous system to the alien in stages.

Then he started talking in gibberish, blurting out bits and pieces of words as Jason tried to work on his language memories, but nothing he was saying made sense. The guy was a mess, and he wondered if the Founders didn’t have some secondary process in addition to the ‘defrosting’ that was supposed to avoid this. Possibly something located elsewhere while this was just a temporary holding facility. They may have screwed this guy over opening him up here, but there was no putting him back now, for these crates didn’t have the protocols for going under, just coming out, written on the permanent system memory.

Everyone held still and silent, waiting for Jason to act or tell them what to do, but it was well over an hour before he could get this guy’s head into some semblance of order, and when he did the language pathways crystalized and he was finally able to make intelligible telepathic contact.

Identify yourself, Jason said through a combination of learned words and images/feelings as he simultaneously was learning and recording the language on his armor’s computer system, thanks to his Sav-enhanced mind.

Androv, he said in mind only, for he appeared to have some natural telepathic ability that was recovering faster than his vocal processors. Androv Devarti 2843 Simcov 9932 Numoco 8221.

Do you know where you are?

No. No I don’t. Why can’t I move?

Your brain is not functioning fully. You are being restrained until you reassert full control.

Androv squeezed his eyes shut, and Jason could feel him concentrating on his own mind…and suddenly pieces started to fall in place and dormant parts activated. This individual had far more mental skills than Jason had guessed at, being able to initiate a reboot process that most Archons could not achieve until they reached Frieza level.

Jason let go the parts of his mind that he was holding together, and soon Androv’s eyes opened and he lifted his smooth gray chin up to look at Jason directly.

I can compose myself now. Please release me.

Jason let go, allowing Androv to stand on his own two bare feet, but he immediately fell to the ground with Jason letting him drop after slightly softening his landing.

Apparently not, he commented. Do you know where you are?

Another galaxy. Beyond that we were not told. What am I supposed to do now? he asked from the floor, where he was able to at least prop himself up on his weak elbows. His muscular strength was shot after so much inactivity, despite the fact that his body was showing decent amounts of it.

Androv, I’m going to be blunt with you. I don’t know why you are here. There are probably millions more like you coming in via stasis crates, from many different races. I suspected it was from another galaxy, and thank you for confirming that. I do not work for the people who sent you here. I have never met them, but I do know of the Founders. We have discovered and asserted control over the abandoned facilities in this galaxy, and during our explorations we found you and the others in stasis. We have awoken you to try and figure out what you are doing here.

Androv blinked twice, thinking fast. You intercepted us in transit?

We are sitting inside one of my craft, which is sitting inside the hangar of a hidden facility where you and the others are being stored. You were brought in by Founder drones and left here in storage. Do you know why?

They were probably going to pick us up later, he said, rolling himself into a sitting position with some considerable effort. Can you stand me up again? I did not expect to be this weak.

Jason telekinetically lifted him back up, but he did not seem shocked by it. In fact, telekinesis was a familiar concept in his mind, but right now out of a sense of caution Jason did not go poking around his memories, for he sensed there was a great deal more to this individual than what he had originally assessed.

Thank you. What is your identity?

I am Jason-025.

Such a low number? Are there so few of you?

I am one of the originals that founded our empire. There are many trillions of us in this galaxy, though the Hadarak are trying to reduce those numbers to zero.

Dread filled Androv at Jason’s mentioning of the Hadarak, which had been deliberate.

They’re here too? I was told they would not be. What is the status of this galaxy?

The Hadarak are attempting a total purge, but are still within the Core. We are in the process of fighting them.

I was told they were dormant. That we were being sent to somewhere there was no fighting. Somewhere we would be safe.

Safe from what? What’s the status of the galaxy you came from?

Falling. Are you not allied with the Founders?

No.

Then how are you fighting the Hadarak?

By our own methods.

Do you at least possess Essence?

Jason raised an eyebrow, then as an experiment surged an Essence rush through his body and slightly beyond it.

Androv relaxed a bit, but the tension in him was great, and not just from the stasis he had endured.

At least you are not primitives. If you have Essence, were you not recruited by the Founders to defend this galaxy?

One of their servants attempted to forcefully take control of a faction of our empire by assassinating the leadership. He did not live for long thereafter.

Androv blinked again. You killed an emissary?

We don’t take kindly to people coming here and killing us, Jason said firmly. Is that why you were sent here? Tell me honestly. I will not harm you regardless of what you say. I only seek knowledge.

No. No. We’re not invading, we’re running. The Neofan…one of the three Supreme Empires that lead what you call the ‘Founders’…have been broken. The Hadarak have overcome their gates and flooded the Deep Core with reinforcements. Secondary and tertiary lines have held, but the Hadarak are not fully challenging them. They are flooding the Core beyond what they can sustain. Most are starving after arrival, but they won’t fight unless necessary. Their population is continuing to skyrocket, enough to draw a single Pafdreng from the void. And it didn’t come to the Core, it came to the Rim and is devouring our civilizations for the Hadarak.

Now it was Jason’s turn to feel a spike of dread run through his spine.

Are the Pafdreng the apocalypse monsters the Temples speak of?

Yes. The Hadarak could not defeat the Neofan through combat, so they are flooding our galaxy to such levels that the Pafdreng will come and destroy us for them. We are having to kill our unnecessary population to prevent more from coming, and those like me that can be useful as Essence generators are being spared and sent out of the galaxy. We were told to somewhere there was no Hadarak fighting, where we could provide Essence for the Neofan when they eventually flee.

Flee?

The Pafdreng never stop until all is consumed, and they will come in as large of numbers as needed to do the job. The Neofan can’t fight them and win. They already tried. The galaxy is falling, and in their wisdom they intend to preserve it long enough to evacuate enough of the stronger races to rebuild somewhere in the frontier. I do not know why I was sent to a galaxy with the Hadarak active.

They haven’t been active for long, Jason said somberly, if you take into consideration the longevity of intergalactic warfare. Do you know who was supposed to follow you here?

Those of us who could not fight were to be killed or sent ahead of the others while they keep the Hadarak contained in the Core. We weren’t told which galaxies we were going to, but that we would be spread out so not to draw the attention of the Hadarak. Then when the others begin to arrive they would use us and the natives to assault the low defended Core in a surprise attack to take the gates while most of the Hadarak reinforcements are being sent to our old galaxy. Then we would rebuild here if we could take and hold the gates. Maybe we are just in transit through this galaxy and meant for another? Androv said with a spark of hope.

Possibly, Jason admitted. Please be specific. Were all of you to go to the same galaxy, or different ones? And where the ‘others’ you speak of…

The others are the lesser members of the Founders. The Great Alliance against the Hadarak.

These others, were they to follow you to one galaxy or spread out to many?

There is no way to go only to one. The Rim gates could not evacuate them fast enough. They…I assumed they would go everywhere, take pause to gather strength from the Frontier network, then bring it to bear on the weakest Hadarak galaxy in one massive attack. I do not know if it was to be this one or another. I hope not this one. Please not this one.

But regardless, some of these Founders, perhaps even some Neofan, are going to be following you here eventually?

That was the plan. I do not understand how you were allowed to intercept us. Am I the first you have woken, or are there others?

You are the first, Jason said, his mind reeling. And the last. You can remain as our guest until we figure out what’s going on. If you’re meant for another galaxy, we won’t stop you from being taken there, but as far as we can tell you’re simply being dumped here for the time being.

Thank you, kind sir. I do not know who you are, but I thank you.

Would you like some clothing?

Androv looked down at his slightly quaking body.

I forgot I had none. Yes, please.

Jason signaled the medtechs to come and take hold of him and give him the treatment that he needed, then the trailblazer let go of his telekinetic and telepathic hold and walked to the edge of the dropship’s bay and stood at the top of the ramp as he looked out into the hangar and the black of the Encapsulation field beyond.

“What is it?” the Protovic asked, for he and the others had not been privy to their telepathic conversation.

“We’re in trouble. They’re the vanguard of an evacuation effort from a galaxy that is falling. And they’re taking up residence in the Frontier galaxies that they’ve seeded with infrastructure.”

“You mean the Founders are coming here?”

“Like I said. We’re in trouble.”

“How much time do we have?”

“Some. But don’t expect the flow to stop. My guess is it’s going to gradually increase until we’re visited by someone other than the peons, and when that happens they’re not going to be happy to find us squatting in their houses.”

“The Temples?”

Jason nodded. “We’re in trouble. Big, big trouble.”

www.aerkijyr.com

Captains Mint

1

March 8, 128852

Plucar System (Zavrex Kingdom)

Idolo Wastes

Han Tyver didn’t know why he was here. He’d served in the Star Force space navy for 826 years, ranging from gunner, to navigator, and all the way up to first officer on Hela’s Fury, a Mk. 349 Warship-class starship that had spent the past 12 years in the far Rim punching down on a lot of little enemies out there causing trouble for people other than Star Force. Word in the galaxy was that the Star Force navy was all in the Core fighting the Hadarak, and a lot of bad guys were trying to take advantage of that. Hela’s Fury and other isolated ships were put on patrol to deal with as many of those situations as they could, but they couldn’t get to all of them.

Star Force territory hadn’t been touched. But that didn’t mean much, because more than 99% of the galaxy was not Star Force territory. The empire’s domain accounted for about half the Rim and a tiny piece of the Core, so about 26% of the galaxy. The number of systems and planets that contained was mind boggling, coming in at nearly 60 billion systems with an average of 12 planetoids in each, not to count all the asteroids slightly smaller than that where people still built cities and lived.

Add into that all the nebula and artificial constructs and you were still only accounting for a tiny fraction of the actual space Star Force occupied in the Rim, because the star systems were nothing more than little gravitational islands amongst the greater void. There was no way anyone anywhere could control all of it, nor monitor it. And Star Force didn’t even own most of the planets. They had their own systems sprinkled throughout the Rim and exerted their influence over their domain via the Naval division, for the most part, but also through economy and special forces teams that would pop up on other worlds when the bad guys least expected it.

But even if the full Star Force fleet was available to patrol the Rim, there weren’t enough ships to be everywhere, and even one ship in one star system was pathetically inadequate. A planet was a world, and a star system was a collection of worlds and the ‘seas’ in between them. Even with the best sensors available on a Mk. 349 warship, there was very little you could actually see that wasn’t out in the void or wasn’t near to you. And if you came into low orbit over a planet you could usually scan the surface pretty well, but Han knew how one could hide just below ground, or in camouflage blinds.

The point was, if you wanted to hide in the galaxy, you had a pretty good chance of succeeding if you had even rudimentary skill at it. And with Star Force being low on available warships out here, if you didn’t live in a Star Force system you were vulnerable, and nearly everyone out here knew it, while those within the Empire, for the most part, didn’t have a clue anything was wrong.

Star Force had never set out to conquer the galaxy, and when they came upon a planet or race that wasn’t darkside, they worked with them, traded with them, learned from them and exchanged some of their own knowledge. Han had read in the historical records of many, many, many such instances, but only if they obeyed a few basic rules. Star Force would not turn a blind eye to the suffering of a single person because of ‘sovereignty’ claims of other civilizations. If you claimed you had the right to abuse people because they were your people, Star Force simply smiled, sent an invasion force, and took away that sovereignty, because you didn’t deserve it.

After doing a lot of that the message got around what independent systems had to do to avoid getting forcibly annexed, and that was why Star Force hadn’t taken over every system. In some ways it would have been better if they had, but Han figured the trailblazers knew they could never monopolize the galaxy. It was simply too damn big, and some people needed their breathing room to learn from making mistakes rather than being taught by Star Force. But the one primary principle in the Star Force edict was that if someone born on a world that was not Star Force property, they had to have the option to leave and follow their own path. Nobody was going to be a slave to another person, an empire, or a culture.

Everywhere within what Star Force labeled as its ‘domain’ on the starmap were explored systems that had been checked out and were constantly monitored. A good many of them had Star Force embassies in them to facility the flow of people out who wanted to leave, and those embassies were often invited so Star Force would pick up the tab for the transportation costs, as well as taking responsibility for giving the navy the ‘ok’ that this system or that didn’t need a visit from a warfleet.

Others that had no embassies were constantly watched to make sure they were not violating the rules, and when they did there were actions taken. Not always an invasion straight off, because sometimes the problems could be solved by dealing with certain individuals or bringing light to something going on that the leaders of that planet didn’t even know about.

That oversight had slipped considerably, but Star Force didn’t advertise that fact. So many resources and personnel were going into the fight in the Core and the evacuation efforts that Star Force’s hold on the Rim was in jeopardy…but not their hold on their own systems. Nobody had the strength to oppose them, but where Star Force was not, there was ample opportunity for misdeeds.

Misdeeds that Star Force usually cast a very long shadow over, scaring the bad guys into submission, but not so much now. They were growing bolder and pushing to see how much they could get away with, so Han’s previous assignment had been one critical mission after another rather than the boring Rim patrol he had expected going in.

A ship had been sent to take him off Hela’s Fury and carry him to Neopolkitrix, a Star Force world where they quietly conducted the Captains Mint. Han didn’t even know it existed prior to being called there, but he had spent the last 2 years training to become a Captain, for it wasn’t just a rank increase. The Star Force navy viewed the Captain’s position to be something far, far more important than just sitting in the command chair, and over the past 2 years Han had been pressed to absorb the knowledge they’d been throwing at him, but he’d just passed his trials and was now on his way to command his own ship…then he had been diverted on last minute orders here. A system not owned by Star Force, but one with a tiny outpost on it.

And ‘it’ was not a planet, but a ring of planetary fragments large enough to produce more gravity than many moons, but they hadn’t rounded out yet from it. They looked like jagged pieces of a necklace stretching around a section of stellar orbit in what had become known as the Idolo Wastes.

What little atmosphere there was left wasn’t enough to breathe except on one fragment, and that was where Han had just been dropped along with 5 others with no orders other than to go inside the outpost cut inside the glaciers on which they now stood staring up at.

The ice was partly blue, and the air frigid. Han knew if they stayed out here too long they’d start to freeze, and unlike an Archon he didn’t have any heat-producing psionics, nor did he have armor. He and the others were just standing here in their naval uniforms, most of which were bluer than the ice, though one was wearing the green of Canderous. Different factions had different uniforms, but all were similar to what the Archons wore, except these were cut a bit different. They were a little more rigid, and had shoulder boards containing comm gear that the Archon uniforms didn’t have, because they wanted the flexibility in the shoulders for hand to hand combat if needed.

Naval officers were trained for it, mildly, but onboard a starship you weren’t going to be fighting anyone except your own crew or boarders, so the uniforms had been designed for the most likely duties…which was operating the ship in combat, and what keyboards there were onboard, in addition to mental interfaces, were always lower than your torso, never above your head, so the naval uniforms were a little stiff if you reached that high, while remaining very fluid as long as you kept your arms low.

They were not built for cold, and Han ran forward with the others the moment the iced-over base doors cracked open to let them inside. 28 seconds later he passed through the gap and the invisible energy shield keeping the thermal bleed from sucking the heat out of the base, which meant he hit what felt like a wall of hot air the moment he stepped through, but in truth it was just room temperature and the short wait outside had frozen him more than he realized.

“Damn that’s cold,” soon to be Captain Biolom said, knocking some frost off his pant legs before it melted.

“This is summertime,” the attendant that was waiting for them noted, then paused long enough for their shocked reactions to sink in before she continued. “You’re wondering why you were summoned here. The answer is this is the final part of the Captains Mint, and it is ultra secret. You are never to talk about this or make any notes concerning it. It is something only Captains know of, and it is meant to stay that way. Follow me.”

Han exchanged a glance with Biolom then fell into step with the others behind the slightly taller attendant who led them further inside past a row of parked mechs sitting like statues ready to be called into action…but on an uninhabited piece of a world that wasn’t likely to occur, regardless of the fact they were currently not in a Star Force system.

The five soon to be Captains walked into a side hallway and eventually came to a small auditorium that was filling with others coming from inside the base. Han noticed they also wore naval uniforms without rank insignia, and he guessed they were also part of the Captains Mint. Perhaps his group was the last to arrive?

He went inside second to last and found a seat, sitting down and rubbing his hands together to wipe the last of the chill off them as another Captain walked up to the dais, and this one did have his rank insignia on, which was nothing more than a single thick horizontal bar placed on either side of his collar. Han’s former rank as first officer wasn’t really a rank, but a position. In order to hold that position he had to become proficient in the various duties onboard the ship. Gunner, navigator, helmsman, comms, sensors, tech’s assistant, medtech’s assistant, logistics, machine shop, etc. He had to know how to do everyone’s jobs, or at least be familiar enough with them in the case of the medtech, to be able to lead them. It was a similar principle to how the Archons had to master all 5 divisions of the military in order to lead it, and Han had greater respect for them now than before. Because the Captains Mint was damn hard to pass.

He’d only been given the chance to try because someone had thought him worthy, and he didn’t know what would have happened if he had failed, but he hadn’t and he was here now, with apparently one more secret part of the training program that he had thought was already over.

“I am Captain Nuomo,” the Protovic said with his bioluminescent skin making his purple uniform change color in spots along his neck and hands where it cast light upon it. “I have served as a Captain in the Protovic navy for 7,920 years, and this is my 98th Captains Mint as a Guide. You don’t know what’s going on, and you’re not supposed to any more than I did when I sat in your position, but I can tell you this. Every single Captain since before the end of the V’kit’no’sat War has gone through this very same process to learn one final lesson before being entrusted with command. It is a rite of passage, and something that binds all of us together no matter what race or faction we serve in. With that said, let us begin.”

A holographic map of the Zavrex Kingdom appeared in front of Nuomo so that those assembled had to look through it to see him.

“Zavrex is one Kingdom away from the galactic edge, and it has more uninhabited systems than most. It also has fewer Star Force systems than nearly all the others, making this part of Star Force’s domain wilder than you’re probably use to.”

The map began to expand, with dots popping up to mark the scattering of inhabited systems, and then those that were actually Star Force owned. There wasn’t much detail that could be seen, just swaths of color covering areas, but when the Kingdom map continued to zoom in so much that the edges disappeared from view as the hologram got too wide, the individual systems started to become visible as if tiny grains of sand.

Most of that sand was white, meaning it was uninhabited. Very few specs were green, and far fewer blue, which separated them from the other inhabitation. Han got a very good feel for how ‘wild’ this Kingdom was as the map continued to zoom in to the Plucar system, which was also marked white despite the Star Force outpost here, which was due to the fact Star Force wasn’t claiming responsibility, oversight, or ownership. They simply had a little outpost set up here, which most ships passing through this system enroute to elsewhere couldn’t even see, for there were no comm satellites in the system marking Star Force’s presence.

That also meant no link to the Comm Network and the rest of Star Force, which Han found odd. Why was this place so secret that it would deliberately cut off news from the rest of the empire?

“As you can see, we are isolated here. Other than this outpost, we are in the middle of nowhere. The only communication we have with our empire is via courier, meaning if we come under attack here we are on our own. The warship that dropped off the last batch of you is already on its way out of the system, meaning we will have zero naval protection shortly. Let that sink in for a moment.”

Han did. He was Naval, as was everyone else in this room. Yet there was no naval presence here, and without those guns in orbit to protect the base, he suddenly felt very naked…unless.

He politely raised a hand, not sure if he was expected to stay silent or not.

“An observation, Captain Tyver? And I use that title because you are now officially a Captain, as are the rest of you. This last mission is not a test, but a lesson,” he said with a tilt of his chin giving the floor to Han.

“This outpost doesn’t have anti-orbital weaponry, does it?” he guessed.

“No, it does not. It is a ground defense outpost only with defensive shields able to resist a decent attack from the locals, but not enough to survive a coordinated assault by two of our warships or their equivalents. Is that a concern?”

“As Paul-024 is famous for saying, naval beats everything. So why have an outpost that can’t at least fight back against a naval attack?”

“A question that gets to the point of why you are here. You have been brought out here to get you away from the backing of the Empire. To get you out in the open, where you are vulnerable. As Captains you will do your fighting from the bridge of your ships, which are protected behind shields and multiple layers of armor. Yet here you feel far more exposed, because you are. The warship you served on offered far more protection than this outpost does.”

“Is this a lesson in vulnerability?” another Human asked.

“Of a sort, Captain Neelso. But more to the point, it is to strip away the normal so you can better see the galaxy as it is. To that end, we are not staying here. This planet’s atmosphere is breathable, though inhospitable to those without sufficient equipment. And we have sufficient equipment, so we’re going on a camping trip. Just us Captains. And we’re leaving now,” Nuomo said, abruptly leaving the dais while the hologram remained active. “Follow me, single file.”

Han frowned, as did many others, but they did as ordered without any further questions as the Protovic led them out of the amphitheater and back to the hangar, walking past the mechs he’d seen on entry.

“One for each of you,” he said, pointing at the giant walking machines. “Pick one, get in, and wait for further instructions.”

“If you say so,” Han said under his breath as he smiled. He’d had limited cross training in the mechs, but he’d always liked how badass they were. They didn’t operate on drone methodology, meaning the mechwarriors usually had to go into the combat themselves with far less protection than a warship, but they were far superior to infantry no matter what armor they had.

He walked over to the leg of a Madcat and touched a small symbol on the pseudometal, holding his fingers there for several seconds, which activated the ladder. Small rungs emerged from the side of the leg as if they were water that quickly solidified into ice, but it was just the same nanite material that Star Force used in many applications across its massive technology catalog.

Han climbed up the leg and around to the back of the central body, holding on by one hand so he wouldn’t fall off the rungs as he placed the other on another small symbol that triggered a door to melt open where none had appeared before.

The freshly minted Captain swung up and in, with the door resealing the moment he cleared the aperture. Inside was the spherical forward pod where he would be suspended in the air while his mind linked with the machine if he wanted an in-depth connection, but if not he could drive the thing like a ground vehicle if he wanted using a variety of different control options.

But inside there were also several canisters of equipment stacked up along the short entry corridor, making it a bit more cramped than normal, but with plenty of arm and leg room in the command pod so he wouldn’t accidentally hit anything if he used an intermediate body motion control system.

He didn’t know why he was here, but something told him he was both going to like and not like it as he walked into the sunken floor of the pod and activated the comm system so he could receive his next orders.

2

“Alright guys, status check,” a female Human voice said, which was odd, because none of the Captains in the 28 person group qualified. Four were female, but not Human.

Han’s mech was number 9, so he waited for the first 8 to check in then did the same.

“Nine is green. Who’s asking?”

“Your mom. 10?”

“Ten ready.”

Han smirked, but took the cue to shut up as the rest checked in. When the woman finally responded, she did so with her ID tag on her mech rather than her voice, and Han froze up as star struck as he had been when he’d first seen Mina Delari backstage after a concert two years after he’d graduated from the maturia…and she’d been naked. But he couldn’t even see Kara, yet the little Archon ID badge labeled ‘Kara-317’ was enough to make him forget where he was for a moment.

Captain Nuomo’s mech was the first to move, walking out of formation as everyone else stood in place not saying anything or even moving a mechanical foot until he finally noticed.

“In case you didn’t catch on, we’re moving out, so follow me single file. The Archon has the rear position, and in the future try to be a little more intuitive. Captains that have to be spoon fed instructions don’t deserve their command chair.”

Han snapped himself out of his euphoria when the slap of the rebuke hit him, then set his Madcat to ‘driver’ mode where it would go where he steered it, but would manage the steps on its own without his direct input. He wasn’t skilled enough to take manual control, but fortunately he wasn’t going to have to if all they were doing was using the mechs for travel…or were they? They had one of the original Archons here, in this tiny outpost in the middle of nowhere. Did he really think they were just going to take a nice stroll across the frozen planetary fragment?

“Probably not,” he whispered, trying to think why she would be here. A bunch of newly minted Captains didn’t really rate any Archon. They were busy with a galaxy-ending war to fight, so why was Kara of all people here? It didn’t make any sense unless there was something important going on out here, or maybe this was a staging base for a Rim operation?

That still didn’t rate her, but he couldn’t think of any good reason for this Archon to be here, so he was just going to have to go along and figure this out. As Nuomo had just said, he shouldn’t need to be fed all information up front. If he was worth his soon to get Captain’s bar, then he better start acting like it.

But as he walked his mech out of its maintenance stall he was grinning from ear to ear when he belatedly realized that one of the legendary Archons from the ancient history of the Star Force Empire had just said ‘your mom’ to him. He doubted very many people could make that claim.

Han steered his Madcat through the tunnel then out the heavy doors that had parted to let him enter the outpost, though now they were flung wide open to allow the mechs out. His external temperature gauges dropped from 68F to -21F as soon as he crossed through the containment field, and though his skin couldn’t sense any change from inside the cockpit, he felt the chill and the danger it represented anyway. Without his mech or a set of personal armor he’d lose his fingers from frostbite, or worse, if he was stranded. And with no other known Star Force installation on the planet, every step his mech took away from the tunnel he felt a little more vulnerable.

The lack of even one starship in orbit made him feel worse. He was used to the comfort of having naval protection everywhere in the empire, and now its lack was becoming a reality to his senses. He had no backup here, other than this mech convoy, but if Kara was here then what was he really worried about?

“What am I worried about?” he told himself as he saw outside the opaque cockpit via a hologram that wrapped around his forward, rear, and lateral views, making him appear to be floating above the ice inside nothing but a very faint wire frame that displayed his mech’s body so he wouldn’t run it into any other objects accidentally. But other than that, it was a clear external view all around unless he switched viewing modes.

The mechs in front of him crunched the ice beneath their feet into a path as they tracked behind Nuomo’s Raven-class scout mech. It was considerably smaller than the Madcats that the Captains had, while Kara was bringing up the rear in a Neo. It was a melee mech designed for close in, hand to hand fighting, while his Madcat was a long range fighter. In the navy you had drones configured for both as well, but the warship itself always stayed back, usually out of most of the combat, while the drone pilots were mentally linked into the warzone.

But still, the ranged mindset fit the navy best, for their idea of ‘close’ combat was still measured in miles. The Archon choosing a close combat mech made sense, Han thought, because they weren’t just trained for Naval, but also Commando, and Commandos had a habit of wanting to close ranks and make it personal rather than get in a shooting fight over distance.

Han wondered if they were actually going to use the mechs for firing practice, or maybe a mission. Maybe a final challenge…except Nuomo had said there was none. Just a lesson.

What lesson required a bunch of mechs with Naval Captains piloting them, plus a legendary Archon thrown into the mix?

“Illo, back off a bit,” Kara said over the comm, which was apparently set to the group setting, because ‘Illo’ was one of the Captains in the back line of the mechs, all of which now had their IDs visible when Han turned his head around and looked behind him in the cabin just in time to see a patch of ice crack beneath one of the mechs…Illo’s…and his Madcat stumbled forward in response.

The two big guns for arms the mech had dipped down slightly, and one of them hit the Madcat in front of Illo in the leg, causing it to stumble as well, but the automated balance programs were enough to keep both machines on their feet and moving.

“The ice here is not packed as tightly as you’d expect,” Kara went on to explain, with Han eager to listen as he adjusted his own comm settings to the group mode so that anything he said everyone else would also hear. “Some of it formed before the planetary breakup when the gravity field was much higher, but the rest formed after. The stuff after isn’t as dense, so there are pockets of instability for something the size of a mech to walk over. They’re usually shallow, so they’re not going to show up on your proximity warnings unless you set them to paranoid mode. Don’t. Just use your eyes and keep to the tracks ahead of you that are already smashed down.”

“Are we allowed to ask questions?” Captain Janke asked in her Kiritak voice.

“No, I’m here to babysit you without answering any questions whatsoever, because that’s a much better use of my time than my typical Archon duties.”

“Why are you here?”

“Every Captains mint requires a field Captain and an Archon. You guys got me. It’s no more complicated than that.”

“Why aren’t you fighting the Hadarak?” Captain Pov’nik asked, clicking that last word in a Bsidd gesture of disrespect for Star Force’s primary enemy.

“There are plenty of Naval officers and Archons to handle the space combat, and the trailblazers are taking care of the V’kit’no’sat annexation. Clan Ghostblade doesn’t need my direct leadership right now, so I decided to fill the current lull with this Archon duty.”

“And what is this duty?” Han asked.

“That’d be spoilers. But right now I believe Captain Nuomo is about to give you a lecture on how to be competent Captains. I’m just going to listen and pull anyone out of a crevice who is stupid enough to walk into one.”

“The Captains Mint,” Nuomo began seamlessly, “is designed to take you from Naval officers into something more. Ever officer works as a team onboard a starship, whether it’s a tech fixing a jammed door or the helmsman flying the ship who has everyone’s lives in their hands during tricky maneuvers through a nebula. But the Captain is the one person in the team that cannot think like part of the team. They can pull on all the skills, experience, and strengths of the crew, but it is the Captain that is responsible for the starship. Everyone else aids you in this, and that is their duty. Making sure the ship does its duty is yours.”

“You must understand, that the positions you were in prior to this…most of which were first officers…are far different than Captain, even though you are dealing with the exact same issues on the ship. As first officer, while you are capable of commanding the ship in the Captain’s absence, it is only temporary. You do not set policy on the ship. You do not coordinate with other Captains, Admirals, or Archons. You may be privy to some of what goes on, but that is as an observer. When you are onboard a starship, that starship is your home, your family. You live and die together, whereas another ship in the same fleet doesn’t share your fate. You are separated by the void of space, and while you move in concert with the other starships, they are cousins. Not your brothers and sisters.”

“Your crew are your immediate family, and ship dynamics are all about the crew. We train our people well, and always have, so we don’t have the myriad of issues that other navies suffer from, but you know well by now that not everyone meshes instantly. That’s a feat of magic I’ve not seen any but the Archons pull off. I’ve asked before, but all the Archons have simply said it occurs naturally. Can you add anything to that, Kara?”

“I’ve seen Commandos do it too,” she explained. “The really high end ones whose roles are very specialized. When you meet strangers, they are different than you and then you have to go through a process of learning what the differences are and accommodating them. You learn how much space to give those that are not identical to you, and you learn how close you can get to those that are. An exceptional crew will be able to work in and around each other’s bodies in cramped and chaotic areas without incident because they are familiar with each other. Strangers are not.”

“Archons are chosen because we are all the same. Doesn’t matter where we were born, or even what cultures we came from. Star Force has many cultural subsets now, but it’s still only one culture. Back when I became an Archon, Star Force didn’t even control Earth, and all the Archon recruits came from very different backgrounds. We didn’t all speak the same language naturally. Many had to learn it as a secondary language, and that had some issues with subtlety of meaning, but those got washed away as we calibrated with each other. But when I first met the others in my class, I was dumbfounded how we were so identical.”

“We didn’t look the same. Didn’t talk the same. And we had very different lives from each other before coming to Star Force…but we all were the same. Director Davis and a man named Wilson had somehow figured out how to screen for very specific profiles that to this day I still do not understand. They won’t tell me how they did it, and none of the other Archons know either. We’ve figured out the basics by remembering what tests they put us through, but we can’t figure out what exactly they did beyond the trick of having us think we were off camera when they were actually recording. But somehow they knew, and still know, how to find Archons. So when we came together, it was like looking in the mirror. There was almost no friction between us, and what there was disappeared within weeks.”

“That’s why Archons who have never met before can link up in battle and fight like we’ve known each other for years. That’s not technically accurate, because we do get better coordination as we work with someone, but the starting level of efficiency is so high compared to others that you probably wouldn’t notice the difference. The Commandos are similar in that their very selective roles require very selective mindsets, so when they meet up there’s not a lot of differences to work out.”

“For those of us,” Nuomo continued, “who are not Archons or elite Commandos, we have to take various individuals and meld them into more than just a good crew. We need to be as resilient and efficient as we can to aid the fleet, and I’ve seen many identical ships with radically different combat ratings, and that’s due only to the crew, not the equipment. A starship lives and breathes as one entity, and in that way it is insular. But the Captain cannot be. He is the link to the rest of the fleet, and to the galaxy. Most of the crew never see outside the ship, and the work they do relies on them trusting the bridge crew to take them where they need to go. Likewise, the bridge crew has to trust that the Captain knows where to go, and that’s more than just about location. It’s about mission.”

“The Captain sets the mission, the first officer and crew follow it. If an Admiral gives an order, the Captain considers it, because the Admiral is not on the ship and is not part of the crew. It is the Captain that is responsible for the crew of his ship, not the Admiral of the fleet. Because of this, Captains are a different breed of Naval officer. An independent breed that matches the physical reality of space travel. A starship is isolated from planets, stations, and other ships by the void of space. And each ship has to operate as a sovereign entity in alliance with the others in the fleet. Not be bound to them.”

“If you want to leave a starship in space, you can’t. The void will kill you. You have to be ferried away by dropship…”

“…or armor,” Kara quickly added.

“…and that means you are being transferred rather than choosing to leave. The starship becomes a world unto itself, no matter what the size. That is why the Captains from every size of ship in the Star Force navies have to go through the Captains Mint. Doesn’t matter if it’s a warship, cargo ship, or scout ship. A Captain is a Captain, and every Captain has the same flexibility and same responsibility. The starship lives or dies based on the skills of the Captain, and as Captains we have to be worthy of the trust of the crews we command. For if we screw up, we get them killed, and we have no right to do so. They are our wards, not our servants. They are our team, and while their job is to operate the ship, ours is to be the ship as far as everyone else in the galaxy is concerned.”

“That’s why we see other ships not so much by their class, but by who commands them. Some Captains will outright refuse an order they don’t like. Others will rewrite them to their liking. Trust must also exist between Captain and Admiral, because if the Admiral orders a Captain to do something and the Captain says no…well, the Admiral can’t walk over there and take command of their ship himself, now can he? The starship is sovereign because of physical reality, and no command authority can supersede that. So Star Force doesn’t try to. We embrace it.”

“Excuse me,” Captain Ghoro interjected. “You’re saying we can disobey orders without a problem?”

“If the orders are bad orders, you’re not allowed to disobey them. You are expected to disobey them,” Nuomo hammered into him. “If you can’t do that, then you’re not Captain material.”

“Or Archon,” Kara quipped.

“The starship lives on orders,” Nuomo continued, because the crew must be in sync with each other, and when they are the orders are not restrictive, they are wise and welcomed. But if a Captain orders the crew to do something stupid, like overload the reactor, the crew should not follow that order immediately, and they won’t. They won’t kill themselves because they are told to do so, and a Captain cannot get his ship killed for the same reason. It is the responsibility of those who give orders to give wise ones. If they fail to do so, that is on them, but you are not required to suffer because of it. Do what’s right. Do what’s wise. Do not let your ship suffer because of a fool miles away in another vessel that won’t suffer the same fate as yours. The Captain goes down with the ship and crew, but the Admiral who gave the bad order does not. Tattoo that into your brains for later. For now, just follow me in silence and let that sink in while we travel to our destination. We’ve got several hours to go, so get comfortable as you ponder the wonders of freedom that go with being Captain, as well as the perils.”

3

Han didn’t believe it, but once they reached their destination at the foot of an ice mountain the mech convoy stopped and they were ordered to get out of their machines. Fortunately he realized the cargo canisters inside his cockpit contained environmental armor specifically designed for cold weather survival, along with components for a prefab building.

It wasn’t a tent, but what he had in his mech was part of a much larger structure and pretty much useless on its own, yet when he hauled them out and dropped them down to the icy ground below, Kara began drawing them to her telekinetically…which was freaking amazing to watch…and she laid out the base components into a perfect hexagonal base, upon which the rest of them were needed to help assemble the barracks.

Given the amount of food, water, and additional supplies assembled, Han was beginning to think they were going to be out here for a long time, and what ‘lesson’ they were supposed to learn was becoming even more elusive. But he’d taken Nuomo’s instruction to heart and accepted the challenge of trying to figure it out rather than just waiting to be told as he and the others ran laps around the barracks and a few marker posts Kara had set up to define a half mile track that she was blazing around doing her own workout.

Nobody told them to join in, but after several hours cramped up in a mech all the Captains felt like stretching their legs, with them heading out in small groups to begin with, but Han went solo because he was apparently faster than the others…or they just didn’t feel like pushing as hard as he did, for he was feeling a mix of inspiration and shame at how easily Kara was lapping them.

But that only let him soak in the experience better. They were out in the middle of nowhere with the ice mountain on the far side of the barracks and the impromptu track reaching out ever so slightly onto an icy plain that stretched to the horizon. Above it was a nearly black sky, with the rotation of this fragment being painfully slow, but based on his observations so far they were actually losing a little light, so if this trip lasted more than a day or two they’d end up in total night.

Maybe that was intentional, or maybe it was coincidental. One thing you learned in the Star Force Naval division was that it didn’t matter. What mattered was whether the change was bad or good, and how you were going to deal with it. The universe was so big you’d never find out the ‘why’ to everything, and if you had a mindset that you needed to before acting then you’d sit on your ass and never go anywhere.

The space navy was the primary line of defense for the Empire, and they didn’t have the luxury of waiting to think things out. Han had to learn to think on the go from an early stage in his training, and nothing he had experienced since then had shied him away from that lesson. He’d been told by the crew that he and Captain Kiljarro seemed to know everything before it happened, but that wasn’t true. Not by a long shot. They had just become experienced enough to plan ahead when they could and improvise when something surprised them, but Han still dreaded the day when something would come his way that he couldn’t handle fast enough and his ship would pay the price for it.

And now without Kiljarro to rely upon, he’d be in a far greater role of responsibility. The crew and his first officer, or officers, would rely on him. If his new ship only encountered things that had been encountered before he was confident he would lead them well, but the unknown could never be categorized, analyzed, and quantified. That concept was referred to by the Naval division as the ‘Question Mark,’ and officers were trained to accept it rather than fear it, but Han had never quite been able to do that. He couldn’t plan to fight what he didn’t know, and he dreaded the day when his crew suffered because he wasn’t ready enough.

Out here, now, running in the cold in his armor, he was warm inside but inches away from an environment that would cause his death if he was exposed to it for too long. The further the mechs had traveled the lower the temperature had got, and if they came into full night it was going to get far more dangerous.

Yet here he was safer than onboard a starship, which was oddly refreshing while at the same time terrifying. He’d die almost instantaneously if he stepped outside his ship into the void, but here he could survive a while at least, for the air was breathable and not too low in pressure. He’d have a chance here, but seeing the vast emptiness around him he thought that might actually be a curse. He’d live long enough to suffer a prolonged death, whereas the void would at least be a quick one.

His envirosuit was solid, but it was only a tiny bit of armor compared to what he was used to, and his current situation was making him wish he was back in the mech. That seemed the safe spot now, while only hours ago that had felt like the vulnerable position.

Maybe that had something to do with the lesson here. About assessing threat levels without getting normalized around one. Kara was probably quite comfortable here, due to her Commando training. Their personal armor was their home, and she was wearing hers now, but it wasn’t an envirosuit. It was her personal jewel armor, and it looked like the ice around them, only clear enough to see through if you caught the right angle.

Every time she’d lapped him…which had been 9 times so far…he’d tried to get a closer look. Was it just his imagination, or did her armor leave her nude? That wasn’t a look he’d seen the Archons use before, nor had he ever seen one of them naked. Had it been a guy he’d still have been curious to see what kind of musculature they carried under their armor, but given it was a girl he had double reason to investigate.

“Need a better look?” Kara’s voice suddenly said as she ran past him, then spun around and still outpaced him while running backwards…which was insulting…but coming from her he almost didn’t care.

Almost.

Her armor altered its ice-like composition and went pure as glass, giving him a very good and unobstructed look at her 10-pack abs along with everything else that looked like god-mode biology.

“Are you messing with me for a reason, or just having fun?”

“You’re running all alone. I thought you might be lonely,” she said, not missing a step on the craggy ice path they were wearing into the ground, hopping over a small crack without being able to see it…then Han remembered that Archons had Pefbar vision that allowed them to see in a spherical radius without any blind spots, for shapes at least.

“So you’re saying there’s a chance?” he said, quoting a familiar Naval joke for when you were facing something technically possible, but so unlikely it wasn’t worth the effort. Onboard the Hela’s Fury in the High G training chambers there was a bit of unauthorized artwork on one wall of a nude Archon…or at least what someone imagined one looked like…pointing to a video sticker that kept repeating a snippet of an ancient movie called ‘Dumb and Dumber,’ which is where that line came from.

It was a way of reminding the Naval crew that they were nowhere near the fitness level of the Commandos, let alone the Archons, and the Captain had let it stay as a lesson to the crew. Just because your warship did the fighting for you, that was no excuse to stop improving your bodies in your spare time. And if an Archon ever did come onboard, he didn’t want his crew being so out of shape that he or she would cringe at seeing them nude.

But from what Han was seeing now, whoever that anonymous artist had been hadn’t come close to the awe-inspiring, yet simplistic form he was seeing in front of him. For she was beyond beautiful, yet she had almost no breasts to speak of. Her body fat content had to be well under 1% for that to be the case, yet still she seemed too small. Commandos were famous for showing off their bodies, the girls especially, and while they all had smaller breasts than civilians, he hadn’t expected an Archon to look like this. It was almost like she was a ripped 12 year old.

“There’s always a chance with Archons, Captain,” Kara said deadpan. “We’ll die fighting before we accept a no-win scenario. And we expect the navy to take on the same mindset.”

“So I should make a pass at you?”

Kara laughed. “I just took you to third base without you even asking for it, while most guys are obsessed with how they get to first.”

“Just trying to understand the mission, Archon. Though I do appreciate the view.”

Kara nodded. “Better. So I’ll give you a little help on this one. The view is your hint.”

“To pursue perfection and not settle for anything less?”

“If you’re not already perfect, you’re not qualified to be a naval officer, let alone a Captain. Perfect is the enlistment pre-requisite. Is there anything holding you back from perfection right now?”

“Just a little swelling that’s interfering with my stride.”

Kara smiled widely, almost as if mocking him. “And that, Captain, is why Archons avoid it, though I hear it’s worse for the guys. Some have even joked they’d prefer to cut theirs off.”

Han grimaced, and not from the effort to keep pace with her, for she kept accelerating slightly while going backwards, probably on purpose to mess with him further. “Did any of them?”

“No. Not to my knowledge. It’s an unwritten rule that we upgrade ourselves through training and not genetic alterations. Surgically removing parts then rewriting our genetics to accommodate the change would be more problematic than you realize, for we wouldn’t know what else we were potentially messing up. So we keep our biological inefficiencies and work around them as we try to minimize them. That’s why the guys never run nude, but the girls can.”

“I thought you would bounce too, or did you reduce your rack size some way other than a med station?”

“Adaptation, Captain. When we need the speed and agility, our bodies make the adjustments for us over time. These have never produced milk,” she said, gesturing at her tiny breasts, “just hung around for decoration. Eventually they got the message that wasn’t needed, so they shrank on their own over the millennia. Coming from a guy, what do you think? Visual improvement or not?”

“If you want the streamlined effect, big improvement.”

“And if you don’t?”

“There’s not much of you a guy could hold onto. Let alone catch. Are you trying to outrun me?”

“Oh, sorry,” Kara said, slowing down a bit. “Natural reflex. Got caught flirting too much, I guess.”

“Is that what you were doing?” Han said, feeling a swell of pride despite the meme of his ‘chance’ repeating in his head.

“What can I say? I have a soft spot for the lost little boys, and if a little motivational flash can help, why not?”

“You said a hint?”

“There you go, Captain. Back on mission. Can’t let your focus lapse because the enemy comes at you with a naked avatar.”

Han blinked beneath his helmet. “Has that actually happened before?”

“More than once. One of our allies even tried that on Jason-025. He says he didn’t even blink, and that’s probably true, but we still tease him about it. It’s such a ridiculously juvenile technique that you had better never fall for it.”

“I’ll try not to,” he said, with a little more regret in his voice than he planned to let show.

Kara’s eyebrows narrowed. “I can’t get into your mind with your Ikrid block, but your tone says something is bothering you. As long as you have an older woman here, might as well ask for some wisdom while you have the chance. So spill.”

“How do I shield my crew from the Question Mark?”

“What have you tried so far?”

“Beating my head against the wall until something shakes loose.”

“Which one?”

“The one a Captain needs,” Han said, kicking himself for abandoning the innuendo, but he really did want a useful answer more than the chance to flirt with one of the most epic Human women in the galaxy.

“Shields.”

“What about them?”

“You don’t carry shields to fight only known threats. You put up a barrier that should intercept everything. In this way you plan for the familiar and the Question Mark. It’s no guarantee that they will catch the Question Mark when it smacks you across your cute face, but it allows you to fight the Question Mark without knowing what it is.”

“As a Captain, how do I do that with my own knowledge and judgement?”

“Figure out who you are, and how you fight. Use that as your baseline and build on it. Stop trying to bend yourself to the Question Mark and instead decide what parameters you will use when you face it. If we’d let the V’kit’no’sat define our identity, we’d have killed the Uriti rather than befriending them. And if we’d done that this galaxy would have no chance of surviving what we face now. When you figure out who you are, and what you’re willing to do and not do, the Question Mark isn’t so scary. It’s not about you beating it, it’s about not letting it beat you. A Captain can die with his crew and still not be beaten if he is horribly outnumbered. Instead he focuses his last moments on accomplishing what missions he can. Saving another ship, taking out one more enemy so his fleet won’t have to. It’s not so much about saving your ship, but being the best badass fighter you can give them in the unwinnable situations so they can die well rather than in a panic.”

“I thought Archons didn’t believe in no-win scenarios?”

“We don’t. And if you were an Archon we’d be having a very different conversation on this topic, but in your case you need to consider what you will do in a no-win scenario, and for the sake of your crew you have to accept it in order to maximize their efforts in potentially defying it and surviving. The Question Mark works both ways. In what looks like a no-win scenario the Question Mark could be a way out that you can’t see. If you panic, freak out, or decide to go bang your hot first officer in your final minutes of life, you’re wasting potential opportunities that your crew needs you to constantly be on the lookout for.”

“So it’s my job to look for the opportunities, not make them?”

Kara closed her eyes and nodded dramatically slowly. “Well done, Captain. And all the while staring at my naked body. Double marks for that.”

“Technically you’re not naked. And there’s two sets of armor between us.”

“There won’t be in the barracks.”

Han couldn’t help but smile. “Now you are messing with me.”

“Yeah, I am,” Kara admitted. “You seemed like you needed it.”

“Not saying I didn’t, but how could you know?”

“Archon intuition. But if I show up in your dreams tonight, you have permission to touch,” she said with a wink as her armor reset to the icy almost-nude setting it was before as his swelling reflexively increased as he wondered if she meant a dream or if she’d hack into his brain and maybe cheat her Archon rules that way.

He began to stumble as his crotch hurt a bit when his armor suddenly became too small.

“Hey!” he yelled as she turned and began to accelerate away from him. “You did that on purpose!”

“Yes I did. Enjoy!”

Han slowed down into more of a waddle than he wanted to let anyone else see as he tried to calm his instincts and get back some semblance of professionalism. Kara had him reacting like he was a youngling in the maturia during sex training…and was showing him his weakness in probably the most effective way possible.

He let her get out of earshot, which didn’t take long considering how fast she went back to running, then whispered to himself.

“Best. Teacher. Ever.”

4

March 14, 128852

Plucar System (Zavrex Kingdom)

Idolo Wastes

It had been 6 days since this camping trip had begun, and Han was still no closer to figuring out the lesson than he had been before. In fact, he felt confused more than anything, but that was because he was learning so much so fast from Kara, Nuomo, and his fellow Captains that he felt like he was back in the maturia again.

Except there were no challenges here. No workouts except what everyone voluntarily decided to do impromptu. Most of what they were doing was talking, with their two guides initiating a lot of it, but he and his peers were also doing a lot of info swapping with each other.

Han wasn’t the only one worried about dealing with the Question Mark, but not all had the same concerns. Kleeso was freaking out about being able to develop trust in people she had never met before immediately, because anything less would mean her new ship would be subpar until that meshing process completed, and if they were sent to the Hadarak front immediately that inefficiency could end up meaning their deaths.

Biolom was concerned what assignment he’d be offered, because Star Force didn’t just send you anywhere. You always had a choice to say no, or request another assignment if they only wanted you for one, but Captains were often offered multiple openings to choose from based on what was available, most of which were currently warships because Star Force was mass producing them as fast as they could train new crews. The combined Star Force navy had never been as large as it was now, and it was constantly getting bigger as drones were lost but not many warships. As long as drone production kept ahead of the fleet’s needs, more warships would continue being added at a rapid pace.

But Biolom didn’t want a warship. He’d served on one already, and while comfortable with that role it wasn’t his first pick. Basically warships were aircraft carriers for drones, and unless the warship was operating alone there wasn’t a lot of skill required to maneuver with a fleet unless things got out of hand. The fight against the Hadarak were large fleet affairs for the most part, and he was wanting a solo assignment where he could have more of an effect on his ship and crew rather than less right from the get go.

What he really wanted he knew he couldn’t get, and that was a frontier scout ship. Those never went to rookies, but in-empire scout ships did. The difference was the map, with the in-empire ships traveling only on known space lanes and generating updated information on systems Star Force didn’t own and didn’t have a link to through their comm network.

The scouts in the Hadarak warzone had to be veterans, and the same was true of those exploring the Rim. Then there were the cargo ships, and many of them. Some of those had to traverse war zones to ferry out evacuees, but that wasn’t what he was looking for either. He wanted something remote with just him and his crew, but he was afraid there was such a high need for warship Captains that there wouldn’t be any openings available in that field or any of the other specialty divisions.

Han and the others swapped concerns, experience, little tricks that they’d learned, and stories. It had been so long since he’d been with peers it was an odd and refreshing experience, because aside from Captain Kiljarro…who was more than a peer…everyone was looking to him for guidance, leadership, or as a conduit to the Captain. But here he was the most junior, as were the other new Captains, and this mission was taking on a dynamic he’d never expected to experience again…yet one he had never experienced before. They were not newbs. Not any of them. So when put into a ‘newb’ situation they dealt with it far differently than raw recruits.

When they weren’t traveling by mech each day to a new location to set up camp, they were either outside getting some workouts in or sitting around a campfire outside that did little more than make light in the now perma-dark sky. There was a flame sculpture being emitted from a device on the ground, making the Star Force symbol glow in the darkness as most of the Captains sat around it in their armor talking to those nearby or using comms if they were sitting too far out of earshot for a private conversation the conventional way.

Han had usually joined them, as had Nuomo and Kara, but sometimes they stayed inside the barracks and that’s where Kara was now, probably talking to Captain Stigari, but when Han saw him walk outside and join the campfire group and Kara didn’t come, he hopped up and headed that way, hoping to catch her alone.

When he got inside he had to pass through an airlock, in which he popped off his helmet before the interior door opened. Beyond that was a commons area, with bunk rooms on either side with other rooms spaced around the wide hexagonal perimeter. Kara was in the commons, but sitting on the floor with her back pressed against one of the walls and still as a statue with her eyes closed.

Han walked over to her as quiet as he could, then stopped a few steps shy, wondering if she was doing some Archon training thing and wanted to be alone.

You have a question? he heard her ask in his head telepathically as her face refused to move.

“Is this a bad time?”

No. Sit down, she said as a nearby chair was dragged over towards him by an invisible force.

Han grabbed it and spun it around, straddling it backwards so he could lean forward and set his armored limbs on the soft backrest.

“What exactly are you doing?”

Calming my mind and body.

“I thought Archons had to keep active. That too much sleep actually damaged you?”

A rumor that is partially true. When we achieve Saiyan status our metabolism kicks up so high that it can’t be easily scaled back. This results in a need for excessive activity and little sleep. The higher level Saiyan you are, the worse it gets in exchange for the massive gains in combat ability.

“Are you trying to train yourself to resist it?”

No. I am not Saiyan. My body cannot go through the genetic transformation required because of my jewel armor. It prevents any external tampering, so this is one area my peers have surpassed me in.

“Can you take it off, make the transformation, then put it back on?”

Tried that once. Nearly died. Not trying it again.

“So the Zak’de’ron are holding you prisoner with it?” Han asked, his face scrunching up. “Or did it come from somewhere else?”

It came from them, but it’s mine now. I got rid of all their programming in it, figured out every little circuit it has. I control it now, but the sabotage it did to my genetic code means that if I take it off, my own body will produce a poison to kill me. The Vorch’nas doesn’t have the ability to undo that, so I’m stuck with it.

“That must be unnerving.”

It used to be, but not anymore. I can’t be manipulated with it since I made certain alterations, so it’s fully mine now. I just can’t ever take it off. Not that I need to. I actually like these quiet sessions, and if I went Saiyan I’d lose them. In fact, that’s one reason why the higher ranking Archons don’t participate in the Captains Mint anymore. It’s far too low energy for them, so you’re lucky you got me for more than just the view.

“I was beginning to wonder why you even bothered wearing clothes,” he said, referencing her shorts, tank top, and socks she was wearing that made her look very much like a mature 12 year old…but he knew that was a very dangerous assumption to make, even without that clear jewel attached to her forearm that could pop out who knew how many kinds of weaponry with just a thought.

I have to have something to take off to flash people.

“True,” he admitted with a smile, wondering if she was watching his face with his Pefbar or just relaxing with her senses tuned down. “Do you wear clothes under your armor normally, or is that kind of pointless?”

I don’t need to. It covers my body like a second skin by design. But it can do the same with my clothes on easily enough, so it’s not an issue. Did you come here to flirt, or was there something more important on your mind?

“I rate flirting with an Archon as the highest of challenges,” he quipped, “but I wanted to take every opportunity to talk with you that I could given how short a period of time we have here, and since everyone else was outside I didn’t want to waste the opportunity.”

So no question?

“I have plenty. But to be honest, I just like looking at you. Personally and professionally. I’ve never been this close to someone on your level, and it feels like I can soak in some experience points just by being near you.”

Did you forget your maturia basic biology lessons concerning viruses?

“Huh. I guess I did. Doesn’t that mean we’re all slowing you down sharing the same close air here?”

I can take a hit every now and then for a good cause. Do you remember how the beneficial viruses spread?

“I’m not ignorant. I just hadn’t thought about it in a long time. The viruses meant to transfer upgrades throughout your own body occasionally slip out through body fluids. Primarily through the lungs if you’re not making physical contact.”

Which is why we have air scrubbers to remove most of them. But when you’re in close quarters during training with peers, you don’t want that. You want to share the upgrades as much as possible.

“Does that mean you and the other Archons…”

No sex, Captain. But that doesn’t mean no physical contact. Take off your armor and sit next to me.

“Just the armor?” he half joked, triggering the releases that shrank some parts, then he pulled off or stepped out of the rest, leaving it laying across the chair.

My clothes are staying on this time. No need to take yours off. Sit close.

“Yes, Maam,” he said, dropping down and putting his back against the wall only an inch away from her.

Kara finally opened her eyes and turned to glare at him. “Don’t call me ‘Maam.”

“Sorry,” he said more than a little intimidated being this close. “Don’t bite, please.”

Her glare turned into a frown as she resumed her original position, but kept talking out loud.

“Odd, I thought you would have liked that.”

“Me and my big mouth,” he said, lightly pounding his head against the wall…then suddenly Kara’s left arm moved up behind his and she locked on, destroying that inch of gap as she slid up against his larger body and laid her head on his shoulder.

“You were saying?”

“Why am I getting this lucky?” he asked bluntly.

“Lessons don’t have to be boring, Captain. And while you’re young, you are cute, so I’m going to enjoy this one…with your permission?”

“You’re also hacking past my Ikrid block, aren’t you?”

“Smart boy,” she said, pulling his hand up to her face and kissing it. “And that?”

“Body liquid transfer to increase likelihood of virus absorption past the skin barrier. I can think of a much better way to do that.”

“This will do. In fact, us just breathing on each other will pass some through our lungs, and my viruses are far beyond yours.”

“So why don’t you bottle your sweat and sell it?”

“You couldn’t afford it. Plus we like people to earn it the hard way if it’s not a near even swap. I’m making you an exception.”

“Why so generous?”

“I’m here to help all of you, in various ways, and now that I’m in your head I can confirm a lot of what I had guessed. You’re not a usual newbie Captain, Han Tyver. Actually, I’m mildly impressed.”

“With what?”

“Other than your good looks, it’s not something easily explained to someone who isn’t telepathic, because it’s the structure of your mind. I like you.”

“Define ‘like,’” he said, feeling light headed.

“Like means like. So for the next 10 minutes you can consider yourself my boyfriend.”

“Why does an older woman have an interest in me? I’m not that good looking.”

“Of course not. No one your age could be. Your swagger still says youngling, but there’s intelligence in you that is reminiscent of Archons.”

“I failed the test.”

“Because you’re not Archon material. We have to be multi-taskers, and you don’t have everything you need. But you do have some like us, and that means you’re a bit of a young peer, and I don’t mind robbing the cradle for a bit.”

“Where is your red line in that regard?” he asked, not wanting to twitch a muscle to potentially shake off her deathgrip as he was enjoying every nanosecond of it.

“The line is where it becomes a disadvantage.”

“Aren’t my little viruses trying to make downgrades to you a…oh, wait a second.”

“Keep going.”

“You said your jewel…thing…”

“Vorch’nas.”

“Your Vorch’nas prevents genetic alterations. So you can’t be affected by my viruses or anyone’s.”

“Yep,” she said, rubbing her head into his shoulder a bit deeper.

“So you can’t get sick either?”

“Nope. Not from viruses. Plus the Vorch’nas is also a Regenerator that would heal me even if I did.”

“Why don’t we have something like that for all military personnel?”

“Our technology isn’t quite on this level yet, though we’re getting close. But we’re not going to permanently attach equipment to anyone.”

“How about temporarily?” he asked, his head getting even more wobbly.

“You don’t know this in Naval, but Arch Commandos already have something like it. Not nearly as good, but they need something that they can wear while infiltrating civilian populations, and armor gauntlets are a bit too bulky right now.”

“Why not for Naval officers in case of decompression?”

“You’ve already got equipment for that that you can wear. Don’t you?”

“You’re in my head, don’t you already know?”

“If I want to look deep enough to find it. Asking is easier.”

“I used to, but it kept getting in the way. When battle stations sound, we all put the bracelets on.”

“There’s your answer.”

“But why not something inside our body like your psionic tissue? That wouldn’t get in the way and we’d always have it.”

Kara blinked. “I knew I liked you for a reason. I never thought of that. Nor has anyone else I know of.”

“Really?”

“It’s surprising, but it occasionally happens that a newb stumbles across an idea none of us had ever thought of. Probably because we are averse to making any cybernetic alterations. But I’m already seeing some potential applications.”

“Can you show me? Can you do that with your telepathy or your Vorch’nas?”

“Your head is already swimming. If I push to much you’ll black out.”

“Does this happen to all your boyfriends?”

“I haven’t had a boyfriend for 10 seconds in the past several millennia.”

“So that means you’ve had several hundred over your lifetime?”

“Not really. The Archons are like my brothers. They’re hot as hell, but the dynamic is different. Actually, the only reason I’m comfortable doing this now is how hot for me you are. It’s reminding me of illusions of sexuality that I shed a long time ago.”

“Not even a hug between Archons?”

“Not unless we need it, and I haven’t needed a hug since I almost died. This is just nice. Thank you, Han.”

“You can probably put your head on several trillion male shoulders across Star Force if you wanted to.”

“Yeah, I know. But they’re boring. You’re a little interesting, because I think you’re going to go farther than the rest.”

“An Admiral? I didn’t think I was anywhere near their caliber? I barely made it through the Captains Mint.”

“You’ve got a long road ahead, but my guess is Grand Admiral.”

Han nearly choked. “Are you serious?”

“You’ve got something the others don’t. Something unrefined, and something that you may never develop, but you’ve got the mojo there, and it’s refreshing to see in someone new…and cute.”

“You’re about to make me pass out, Kara,” Han said as his vision was actually starting to blur.

“I’m not that hot,” she said with a giggle. “That’s those viruses getting to work. I had my Vorch’nas supe them up a bit.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I’m cheating a little to speed you up.”

“How?”

“Viruses rewrite the DNA in a single cell per virus. These are going to do more than one brain cell. A lot more, thanks to my Vorch’nas reprograming them. Just sit still and enjoy the company. I am.”

“Does being an Archon ever get lonely?”

“Occasionally when we get bored. But we’re rarely bored with so much to do.”

“How about now?”

“This is a rest break for me, and since I can actually make use of it I’m letting myself slip out of combat mode a bit to reassess my current condition. It’s rare that I do that, but sometimes useful.”

“Do Archons have non-sex relationships?”

“Not really. Just a little flirting occasionally. But most of us have gone through sex hardening training…which means we’re mentally subjected to the most extreme pleasures that our Archon counterpart can think up to see if we can withstand the mental hacking. If we have a weak spot, an enemy could use it against us when we’re exclusively tailoring our defense against pain and stress. Pleasure can throw some people.”

“Wait, doesn’t that break your rule? Even if it is fake?”

“It’s not fake. It’s just not physical. And Archons don’t actually have rules. We do what we do because it is smart, not because we’re made to.”

“So you could have sex with me if you wanted?”

“Sure. Not gonna happen though.”

“Other than my lack of sufficient charms, why not?”

“It messes with my mental structure, then I have to reset later. Not a big deal for most people, but when you get to the upper levels of badass, even the little delays and inefficiencies become distasteful.”

“Did you do that training?”

“It happens primarily for Padawans, and I was never a true Padawan. I could have gone through it, but I didn’t. Not with another Archon, anyway.”

“Meaning what?”

“Well, I’ll tell you if you promise to keep it a secret.”

“Deal.”

“We have the technology to create virtual reality that is very convincing, so we can essentially plug into a computer interface and go through a lot of mental training as if it were physical training. We use it in select circumstances, and it can also be used for really, really potent sex simulations. So much so we can’t release it to the general population. They don’t have the mental strength or will power to handle it. They’d never do anything of merit if all they had to do was plug in and experience fantasy land every day, but I can whenever I want. And I chose to do it once just to see how vulnerable I was to manipulation that way.”

“And?”

“I liked it. A lot. But after a few thousand sessions it began to lose full effect…or more accurately I began to adapt to it as my mind started to fight the illusion. And I don’t mean the simulation. Sex is an illusion overlaid onto reality to get us to do stupid stuff for reproduction. Or did you miss that part of your maturia lessons too?”

“Right now I don’t really care. How did you react?”

“When I finally ended my bout into euphoria my combat mojo was a wreck. I’d never expected it to be that bad, but that was one thing the others said the training really exposed to them. If people have sex on a regular basis, they’ll always be newbs. They’ll never be able to level up far enough to be badasses, and they’ll never know any different. You gotta get your head clear of the illusion to really find out who you are and what you can do. It feels good, but it’s a sloppy good. Training your body into a finely tuned instrument of kicking ass feels much better, but is more subtle. And that feeling doesn’t go away like an orgasm does.”

“So you’re saying that Archons aren’t afraid of sex, you’re just such badasses that you literally have the option of living in simulated euphoria like I’ve never experienced and you choose not to in order to live as ass kickers?”

“Best explanation I’ve ever heard,” Kara said, squeezing his arm affectionately.

“Is what I’m feeling now an illusion too?”

“You, yes. Me…you’re comfy and I’m in rest mode. No illusion there. Plus you can’t begin to match the simulations I’ve been through. So I can get this close to you and not be distracted.”

“I obviously can’t,” Han said, his head still swirling.

“You’re young, and I’m messing with your head, so don’t try. You’re going to have to reset afterwards anyway. Speaking of which, while I’m feeling generous and past your Ikrid blocks, I might as well make it your super lucky day.”

“Meaning what…” he began to ask, suddenly feeling himself lose control of his body to her as she began to subject him to a version of that secret Archon training as she exhaled slowly and closed her eyes, drifting off almost to sleep while a piece of her mind kept him in simulated euphoria many, many times.

5

When Han woke he didn’t know where he was, who he was, or what anything was. He was a complete discombobulated wreck lying in one of the bunks with his blurry eyes staring up at the blackness of the underside of the bunk above him. His head didn’t want to clear, but even before it started to he felt weird…but a good weird. The normal noise in his head was gone, and there was a clarity that focused his mind on the here and now so much that it was like the past and future didn’t exist.

Which was when he realized they didn’t, and Han wondered why he had ever thought differently as he reached up and put the palm of his hand on the paneling above him, feeling the smooth, cold material and using that sensation to ground him as he’d done many times before…

Except he hadn’t done that many times before. It was an entirely new thing for him, but he felt like it was too familiar to be a random thought.

After about a minute of focusing on his sense of touch, Han’s head cleared enough for his eyes to focus on his fingernails, fighting to get them into some semblance of familiarity rather than blurry nubs. It took some effort, but finally his senses focused enough for them to become crisp lines. When they did he turned his head to the left, finding his neck very sore…as was the rest of his back. He let his hand go and rolled over onto his side, looking out the bunk into the open area between him and the rack of bunks on the other side of this room.

Everything was so clean, and rigid. It was like he could almost feel the air and through it everything that it touched. His mind felt like a kid again, excited at everything, and it was as if he was seeing everything for the first time…or more accurately seeing what was here all along that he had been blinded to it.

He was in the Captains Mint…he finally remembered that…and instead of the dread at what he could be facing once he took on a ship of his own, he was elated at how cool all of this was and that he got to be here when so many others didn’t. That plus the awesome responsibility of command he was about to be entrusted with.

“Wait a second,” he whispered to himself as he rubbed his eyes and opened them again, but the sensation of clarity remained. “Kara.”

He suddenly remembered their interaction, their conversation, and the fact that he’d gotten into a quasi-romantic situation with her before lapsing into some form of pleasureful coma. She’d said something important…then again what wasn’t important coming from an Archon. Something about…

Viruses. She’d transferred her body’s normal viruses into his via physical contact in addition to what normally moved around in the air. And she’d said she’d used her jewel to upgrade them to…to speed him up or something.

Han looked at his hand, feeling like all his memory of the past had occurred in a gray fog that had been suddenly lifted and now he could see clearly for the first time in his life.

“And upgrade…and a shortcut,” he said in the lightest of whispers as his mind raced through all kinds of new calculations, with him realizing he’d gotten a lot smarter in a hurry.

“Holy crap…she raped me,” he said with a goofy smile cracking on his face, then he started giggling. “And she gave me a parting gift too. I can’t believe this.”

He swung his legs out of the bunk and felt his socked feet hit the floor right next to his shoes that she’d apparently taken off him when she’d tucked him in. He didn’t even remember getting into the bunk.

Han moved his toes around inside his socks and just stared at them for a minute, trying to take everything in as his mind snapped to the others. He couldn’t see any other bunks occupied and couldn’t hear anyone talking, so where were they? Had he missed something?

Han stood up, feeling his spine very sore, and he wondered why. The rest of him was fine, so he staggered through a few steps over to the restroom and got into a shower and let the hot water soak into his new sense of clarity, during which he figured out a few things.

One…Archons are more awesome than he realized.

Two…Kara wasn’t just messing with him. Whatever it was she had done had a purpose. The pleasure fest he was only beginning to remember had probably been icing on the cake or a distraction while she poked around in his head and did whatever to his body.

Three…the viruses were meant for physical changes, not mental, so what she had changed probably was brain structure, because he wasn’t feeling any new superpowers, unfortunately, but he wasn’t going to feel bad about that. In fact, he was so elated he felt like he could fly.

Four…Kara wasn’t here to say hi, so he was probably on his own from here on out, or at least in the next phase of whatever was going on, so he had to think. She’d said something about him having the potential to be a Grand Admiral, and now he felt an unfamiliar confidence that she might be right.

That meant he had to earn it, and the first thing he had to do was figure out what the lesson of the Captains Mint was, for none of the others had gotten it yet either as they brainstormed with each other every day.

Han got dressed and pulled on his armor, going outside to find the others in the middle of a massive snowball fight…except Kara was in her mech and throwing boulder-sized snowballs into the fray that would smash and pin someone into the ground if it hit them.

He didn’t know what the ground rules were, or how this had started, but he didn’t hesitate to pick up some of the freshly fallen snowpack and begin to craft ammunition. He got an armful of them then ran up and ambushed Dorogu from behind, smacking one into the back of his Bsidd structure, or whatever you called it. He didn’t really have a head, neck, or back, and looked more like a bush than anything, but in his armor he did have some solid spots and Han hit one of them with the snowball in his palm, then added his arm’s push to it, toppling Dorogu over as he ran by so he couldn’t fire back.

Not long after that he began to take hits as well, but the armor they wore didn’t let them feel anything more than some thuds…unless they got hit by Kara, who was actually goofing off and rolling some of them like bowling balls into people who weren’t looking.

He decided to head towards her mech, engaging a few others along the way in the big melee, then he stopped in front of her Neo, bowed theatrically, then fell back into the snow and moved his arms and legs around before expertly hopping up and pointing down at the snow angel, then back up at her mech before bowing once again.

“We have comms you idiot,” her voice said into his helmet. “No need for picture drawings.”

“I’m not sure what you did to me…but you can do it again any time you like. Thank you. I feel…different. But a good different.”

“Isn’t that what all guys say after they get virtually laid?” she scoffed.

“Seriously. Thank you. Now do you mind me asking what…” he said, getting hit from behind and his helmeted face smashed into the ground as Dorogu paid him back when he wasn’t looking.

“What was that? I couldn’t hear you through the beatdown,” Kara said deadpan.

Han pulled some snow together and threw a going away present at Dorogu before getting up.

“I was saying, do you mind me asking what it was you did?”

“Cleaned out some of the cobwebs in your mind, upgraded your cognitive processors to skip you a few thousand years ahead, and gave you a long series of virtual orgasms. Which were you referring to?”

“Start with the cobwebs.”

“Consider it some mental notes of my own I downloaded to replace some of the stupid stuff you had floating around in there.”

“And the upgrades?”

“Some physical changes I wanted to add. Since using the battlemap interface is critical to Captain’s duties, I gave you some adjustments that would make it easier and more efficient to multi-task, plus some other odds and ends.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t think we have 100,000 years for you to advance the slow way. The Grand Border isn’t the solution most people think it is. Even if we can get it all up before the Hadarak get there, it’s going to be neverending carnage holding it. We have to win everywhere, every time to prevent a breakthrough, and they’re just going to be spawning minions and throwing them at it eventually. Right now they’re busy killing other people, but when they get through with that, we’re going to have to fight them all and hold the line, not for days, years, or centuries. We’re in over our head here, and we need every advantage we can get. Given all that, why would I allow you to grow up the slow way and maybe die before you could be of higher level use?”

“Right now I feel like I’ll never grow up. You made me younger somehow.”

“Good. That lesson stuck, at least. We’ll see if the others do in time,” she said, reaching down and picking up more snow that she far too quickly launched over his head at someone else.

“And the orgasms?”

“Is that a complaint?”

“Hell no, I’m just wondering why I got to be so lucky?”

“I felt like it. No reason other than that. If I can’t use my legendary status and abilities to make a fan feel special every now and then, what’s the fun of being in charge?”

“Do you have any idea how unbelievably cool you are?”

“Yeah, I do. I got to see it in your mind. Are you going to fight or just sit there like a newb?”

“What started all this?” he said, reaching down to craft some more ammunition while looking over his shoulder to make sure he didn’t get ambushed again.

“Training, Captain. Always training. Now get out there and mix it up before I have to smash you into the ice like a tent spike.”

“Engaging as ordered,” Han said, feeling like the frostiness outside had been implanted into his very hot head and cooled it down into a pristine focus. He threw a long range shot at Nuomo and barely missed, but found he had more arm speed than normal. “Did you upgrade anything else?”

“A little general muscle capability. You were soft even for Naval. Make sure that doesn’t happen again. I don’t usually date slackers.”

“How much side training…” he said throwing another snowball that hit this time, “…are you talking about?”

“If the bridge of your ship is invaded, I want you able to defend it hand to hand against lower level enemies. If you can’t take one of the smaller Paladin unarmed, you’re slacking.”

“I’ll remember that, thanks,” he said, putting aside the thousands of other questions he wanted to ask her, and hopefully would in the coming days, but right now it was snowball time and he was enjoying the sheer stupidity of it…along with the various tactics and alliances that seemed to be naturally forming to deliver the most badass hits.

After their snowball fight, Kara let Nuomo take them on a little hiking trip up another ice mountain while she stayed back at the barracks…but not inside it. She went up top, shed her armor, and used her Rensiek to fight off the cold as she also stripped off her clothes and laid them on top of the armor. The others were too far away to see or notice, and rather than flying off somewhere more private, she’d found long ago that being close to people in a place they weren’t going to look was sometimes more private than being in isolation.

Paul referred to that as ninja skills, and Kara wanted to practice a little sneakiness as well as her Rensiek while she had the opportunity. This trip was about the Captains and helping them realize how much power and responsibility they were placing in their hands, but for Kara it was also about her. She’d been having issues lately, and was trying to track them down. It wasn’t Vorch’nas related. She’d ruled that out a while back, but something was bugging her. Enough that she’d left the front and her Ghostblade fleet to operate on their own, which they were more than capable of doing even without her personal touch being added in.

So she wasn’t really bailing on anyone, especially since most of Ghostblade work was sneaking around where no one would notice rather than engaging in heavy combat, though they were doing a lot more of that nowadays than before the Hadarak War began. But when you face neverending conflicts, sometimes you have to step aside occasionally before you get too worn down, or in times like this where you need to track down something that the constant duty is numbing up.

So coming out here in the middle of nowhere wasn’t just for the Captains’ sake, it was also for her, because running around in starships might be isolated, but it was always with a crew that, even if hidden behind a bulkhead, was still there…and Archons could both see and feel through bulkheads whenever they wished.

But out here, she really was isolated and it was what she now realized was a badly needed change. So much so that she had already logged an order to incorporate mandatory rotations for Ghostblade starship crews to get them planetside every few decades whether they wanted to or not, just to be on the safe side. It would be problematic, but necessary. If she was having issues, then others were as well, though hers were unique as far as she knew.

Something was itching at her, and since she didn’t have Saiyan genetics it couldn’t be that. Only by calming down, relaxing, and growing silent in body and mind could she pinpoint it…and when was the last time one of the original Archons had done that? But now that she had made the choice and was out here, she didn’t feel the claws of stagnation on her. She felt relief, and that told her that something was really wrong that had been flying under the radar for a long time and taxing her in a way she hadn’t noticed.

She was naked because the clothing also got in the way. She needed to feel the environment, and anything between her and it would dampen her original senses, and it was those, not her psionics, that were begging to be probed.

What she’d told Han had been true, but what she hadn’t told him was that she needed to vicariously feel sex through him to see if that was something she needed to pursue again, and thankfully it was not. She needed her senses crisp and clear, not muddled with loopy fun vibes.

But there was something raw and honest about them that she had missed, and it was beginning to dawn on her that by taking on responsibility for the galaxy along with the other trailblazers, she’d made it impossible to ever just be herself. There was always somebody that needed trained, rescued, mentally recalibrated, intimidated into a wakeup call, or the bazillion other smaller Archon duties beyond fighting wars. Kara couldn’t remember the last time she’d simply been Kara. And while she was a leader and liked it, part of her was saying that it would be better to be a recruit again where she didn’t have to worry about what mission to assign, only how to accomplish the one given to her.

Kara sat cross-legged with the snow not melting beneath her. The Rensiek barrier prevented that and kept her body slightly warm while she was still able to feel the gentle breeze and the texture of the snow beneath her without being frozen by it.

Her purple/white hair hung down to her shoulders, and she’d been carrying her Clan colors there ever since this war began, and would continue carrying them until it was over the same way she and the others had done in the V’kit’no’sat war…but that wasn’t going to work now. She needed to unplug completely, and she knew she’d built up her Clan well enough for them to do what needed to be done without her, so on impulse Kara used her Vorch’nas to strip away the color and return her hair to her natural brown, then summoned up an illuminated shield mirror over the jewel on her wrist so she could look at it.

“Better, but I don’t need to be Kara the Gray, I need to be Kara the White,” she said, referencing Gandalf’s transformation in the Lord of the Rings as her hair changed color again to as white as she could possibly make it.

Her toenails and fingernails changed too, then she added her nipples and lips while leaving the rest of her skin alone…but then she figured she might as well keep going with the physical changes in an effort to change her interior, and began adding neon white tattoos on her bare feet. Each one was written in V’kit’no’sat script, and was one of their purity tomes. As messed up as their empire had been, a lot within it had been very wise and spot on, especially their tomes. She mentally went through all of them that she’d previously downloaded onto her Vorch’nas’s ample memory core, and whenever she found one that fit her…or more precisely fit what she needed to become, she added it to her skin in luminescent fashion so it glowed brightly in the dark and lit up the snow around her.

She put three on each foot, then moved up to her ankles, and calves. Knees then thighs followed, with them wrapping around her form on all available skin so that she was becoming a living billboard for the select tomes that continued to travel up her entire body until they got to her neck, then she held off there as she searched the rest of the tomes to find the best remaining before she ran out of canvas to work with.

The final few, and most important, got etched into her neck and branched up onto her face and ears until the last tiny ones appeared on her forehead and nose bridge.

Kara stood up and spread her arms and legs slightly wide, feeling the air and stretching out her senses to take in the vast emptiness around her, feeling like a ton of dust and grime was falling off though physically there was none to detect.

She breathed slowly, deliberately, then began to move through various fighting poses in ultra slow mode before realizing that didn’t really fit what she needed, so she switched to pure dance, which seemed gratuitous in a non-mission sort of way, but that’s what her subconscious was urging her to do, so she did.

Pirouettes, backbends, arm poses, legs stretches over her head in the most useless and vulnerable of positions…she experimented with it all until Kara had a short list of movements that were beneficial for her mood, and when she had those and began linking them together she felt something click, so she stayed in dance mode for the next few hours until the Captains headed back her way. Before they got close enough to see her she put her clothes back on and had her Vorch’nas return her body back to the way it was, including her purple/white hair, because she didn’t want to get asked questions about why she’d changed it.

This side of her was something she needed to keep private, and now that she had made some progress and had her settings saved, she could resume them within seconds the next time she could ninja steal some private time to get naked with the environment without anyone noticing.

The absurdity of her having to do that when she could go wherever she wanted whenever she wanted didn’t seem so to her. She needed to feel exposed, to strip away whatever was blocking her mind from finding whatever it was that was wrong with her, and having the threat of being seen…as childish as that was…struck a chord with her, making her feel like little Kara fighting the galaxy again rather than a trailblazer trying to hold it up on her shoulders.

She felt better now than she had in a long time, but it wasn’t enough. Right now though, she had Captains to mint. Later she’d sneak off again, for without them having psionics, being a ninja around this group was painfully easy…which meant she could be bolder than usual.

And Kara liked bold.

Yet, how long had it been since she truly was?

6

March 22, 128852

Plucar System (Zavrex Kingdom)

Idolo Wastes

They’d moved camp 8 times in the last two weeks, and Han was beginning to wonder how long they were going to stay out here…but in the positive, because he was actually enjoying it like a vacation, as were the other Captains. No one had figured out what the ‘lesson’ was yet, and they were all still trying, but the urgency had been lost and they’d been admitting to each other maybe it was better if they drew this out longer, because no one was wanting this little camping trip to the middle of nowhere to end.

But then it happened. Someone figured it out as they were sitting around another artificial bon fire on the ice plains in the deepest of night with the stars so clear overhead that you could see the galactic band stretching across the sky like a vertical scar due to the orientation of the planetary fragment on which they sat.

“No safety lines,” Captain Shoginar said, clicking his joints excitedly as the H’kar suddenly stood up and looked to Nuomo for confirmation. “Is that the lesson?”

“It’s the beginning. Continue if you can.”

Everyone sat up straighter and became silent, putting their private conversations on pause to see if Shoginar was going to be able to do it, but at the very least he’d come up with part of it.

“We…Naval…exist in the void. No backup. No safety lines. We have no Archons to guide us,” he said, glancing at Kara who was sitting on the other side of the fire from him, before looking back at Nuomo. “No ground batteries or shields to run and hide behind. When we’re out here, alone in the galaxy, it’s just us. Our crew always has someone to look to, but we don’t. It’s us and the wilderness, and we have to be prepared for that role?”

“Well done, but incomplete. Can anyone else add to that now that Shoginar has broken the ice, pun intended.”

“There are no rules,” Han quickly added, finding his brain was working twice as fast now as it used to. “Limitless freedom and limitless problems with no support structure to fall back on.”

“Quite right,” Nuomo said with a nod. “Now you know a little bit what it’s like to be an Archon, for in this small area we are their peers. When you stand in a line against the wind, there is always someone to help you break it…unless you are at the front of the line, in which case you must face its full fury and unpredictability. Look out there…”

The fire suddenly cut out, dropping everyone into darkness except for the starlight…which became so vivid after their eyesight adjusted it was better than any holographic display.

“That’s where we live. In the void. And so does everyone else, though they don’t realize it. Planets are in the void as well, but insulated by gravity, atmosphere, and sheer mass. When we take to the stars in our ships that insulation is gone and we deal with the raw universe…but our crews do not. They live and breathe as a small civilization whose borders are the hull of the ship. They rarely see what’s outside, and they don’t need to…but the Captain must not fall into the trap of becoming part of the crew. He must be their leader, not their peer. You must look beyond the ship to safeguard it, while they look inside to maintain it. And out there is what you must mentally calibrate to.”

Everyone sat for a moment in silence looking at the galaxy and soaking it in. One often forgot the size, because it was so big the brain had trouble comprehending, but out here, with all distractions gone, Han and the others could feel it and how small they were.

“That smallness is an advantage,” Kara said. “It makes you feel insignificant, but it also means you can hide really well in all that. You also need to remember one thing. Out there it looks big, but it’s made up of a lot of small things. Everything is small when local, so it’s not just you. We all play in a big sandbox, and this spot is no less important than any other. It’s where you are now, and that’s what makes it important. Your home is your body, and you need to learn to be comfortable with that even when abandoned to die in a desolate place like this.”

“When you do,” Nuomo picked up, “your mind will clear and you will be able to maximize your abilities and your chances, but sometimes there is no way out, and rather than scrambling in a panic to achieve the impossible, you can focus on accomplishing something here in the short term before you die. And when you are a Captain that is not an optional skill. Your nerve must never break, for your crew relies on it.”

“If you can’t win,” Kara continued, “hurt the enemy bad. If you can’t damage them, get a good punch or two in. If you can’t punch, then spit. If you can’t spit, insult. If you can’t talk, think mean thoughts at them. Do whatever it is in your power to do. Your mission is to win. Your duty is to fight. Can anyone tell me what that distinction means?”

“We can’t control the universe,” Captain Dorogu answered. “There is very little we can control, because a fight is between two or more entities, and the outcome is a combination of their actions. We can control our actions, but not others, therefore we can’t guarantee an outcome. But we can guarantee our actions, and those actions are our duty. The outcome is the mission we are attempting to complete, but cannot control. Influence heavily, but not control. A Captain that believes he can control it will most likely break when confronted with a situation where he is going to lose no matter what he and his crew does.”

“And a Captain can’t break,” Han echoed.

“If you can’t save your own ship,” Nuomo added, “do some damage to the enemy that will help save another ship in the fleet. If you can’t save your entire crew, save some. You don’t have one single mission, you have thousands of them overlapping simultaneously. Work the ones that are within your reach and let the ones that are not go. You don’t have to like it, but don’t waste precious time and mental energy on lost causes. Sometimes you’re going to lose, but there is a difference between losing and being defeated. As long as you never give up, you are never defeated, even if you all die fighting.”

“How can we let go of some missions without giving up?” Captain Stigari asked.

“Letting go means setting aside for later. Later may never come, but no Captain ever gives up on any mission. To this day I still remember some from the past that got away from me, and I run them through my head trying to figure out if I could have done something different. Letting go refers to in the moment, but I don’t think any Captain will permanently let go of anything that was screwed up if they had an opportunity to go back and time and fix it. I certainly wouldn’t.”

“So we don’t let go, but we acknowledge that we don’t have the Tardis that we need to fix it, so we set it aside?” Captain Biolom asked.

“Precisely. And the longer you are a Captain, the more failures you rack up on that list, and it can be daunting. But while you are required to be able to operate in the void alone, one starship against the galaxy, you are also part of a fleet. A fleet of Captains. Now can someone tell me why you are here looking up at the seemingly endless galaxy above us?”

“We are the fleet,” Han said as soon as the idea clicked in his head. “The Captains. Not the crews or the ships. The bonds between us are the fleet bonds. And we can’t allow ourselves to be permanently isolated out here. Because it’s ‘us’ against the galaxy, and we are its shield.”

Kara laughed. “Close, but the idea of us being its shield is laughable,” she said, extending a hand upwards. “How does one shield all that, and shield it from what? The galaxy is the playing ground, and sometimes we have to fight against the playing ground itself, not just the players on it. So what exactly are we shielding?”

“The empire?”

“Tell that to the people on Earth when the Vargemma attacked,” Kara said, a little icier than she’d intended, so she raised a hand in apology. “Archons take the responsibility for the empire more personally than anyone, and we abhor not being able to defend it properly. Right now no planet is safe from a large scale Essence attack. If there’s a way to do it, we haven’t found it yet, so when we can’t actually shield anyone, what exactly are we doing?”

“Playing the game as best we can,” Captain Orrin said as he clapped his fists together. “And protecting those that we can. Sometimes just by hiding them.”

Kara pointed at him. “I like you. That’s a point I didn’t expect any of you to catch. Sometimes to accomplish a mission you have to run away from battle, and in a fleet, sometimes you have to run away to save your own ship. Each of you is independent, and you help the other ships out when you’re able, but when the shit hits the fan you gotta look out for your own ship first, and sometimes that means running away to live and fight another day…while firing at the enemy as you leave to do a little more damage and stack the odds for the rest of the fleet as much as you can.”

“A fleet cannot act like it’s glued together,” Nuomo said. “It moves individually and in groups as it prefers, and it is perfectly comfortable getting split up and scattering. You must be capable of operating as individual ships and attack groups, and moving from one role to another second by second. All Captains are trained in the same manner, so there is familiarity when you meet another ship you’ve never encountered before. You can fight with them because their movements, capabilities, and tendencies are familiar, but not as much as those you personally know. Each ship is a Captain, and that Captain configures the ship and its crew to their liking. So think of the person commanding a vessel as its identity, and nothing else.”

“When you leave here and get your first ships,” Kara continued, “reach out to one another when you can, as well as other Captains you’ve never met. And don’t be surprised if some of them reach out to you. All of you have been through the Captains Mint. All of you have learned the same lesson. You are not groups of a couple dozen Captains, you are one group of all Captains transitioning through at different times. Get to know the others, as many as you can. Share stories, upgrade ideas, bad things that happened, and brainstorm how to avoid them in the future. Work together, even if the messages back and forth take months to travel. You are one brotherhood of Captains. They are your family as much as the other Archons are mine. And together you will face that…” she said, pointing upward. “Have fun.”

Han laughed, as did some of the others as they realized what she meant. The galaxy was so big they could become rock stars on one part of it and be completely unknown in another. And the fleet was going to be spread across all of it. What would bond them together through all of that? The Captains Mint. It was their induction into the fleet fraternity of Captains past, present, and future, as well as a reminder that no matter how alone they got out there in their single starship, there were millions of other Captains spread across the galaxy facing the same challenges as them.

And when you realized that, you never truly would be alone.

“To let the lesson sink in,” Kara said as she leaned back on her snow chair and put her hands behind her head to get a better view of the galaxy above them, “you’ve got another 10 days of chill time before you ship out. Get to know each other as well as you can, because the comm lag later will be a bitch. No more lessons from me and Nuomo. You know what you need to know.”

The fire kicked back on and Han was able to see the faceplates of everyone sitting around in their armor, but not the people inside due to the reflections. These were his new brothers and sisters, and Kara was right to tell them to make use of their time here, for she probably knew better than anyone the isolation of command. How often did she see other Archons, as rare as they were?

He’d talk to her later again before their time here was up, but right now he was going to do as instructed, so he got up and moved a couple meters to the right as others were getting up and transitioning around so they could group up and cram as much discussion as they could into the days they had left. Until a moment ago they had felt unlimited, but soon this very badly needed camping trip was going to be over.

But 10 days out here was like a lifetime, and Han intended to live it to the fullest and worry about the future when it came to him, not before.

7

April 1, 128852

Plucar System (Zavrex Kingdom)

Idolo Wastes

The group of Captains didn’t head back to the base like Han had expected. Instead they kept traveling across the wilderness to a new location every day or two as they continued to bond. When the final day came they were evaced by dropships from the Gauntlet-class cargo ship that had arrived in orbit to pick them and their mechs up.

Han walked his onboard one of the dropships along with Captain Biolom and it took the pair up into space, with him both sorry and ready to leave. The future was forward, and he was excited for what would come next, but he also knew there would never be another Captains Mint for him unless he returned to take Nuomo’s role as guide, and that wouldn’t be a learning position. So this was it for him, but he was much improved for having gone through it, as were the others, all of whom ended up on the cargo ship anyway, but without their guides.

When Han checked into his assigned quarters he flopped down on the bed and stared at the ceiling, taking stock of his thoughts and continuing to enjoy the mental clarity that Kara had somehow gifted him. If this was how all the experienced Captains had their minds structured, then he was beginning to understand better than the others how different the Captain’s position was…or maybe it was more of an elevated position that could occur at any level and not just Captains. Either way, he now had a transitional viewpoint that probably no one else had ever had unless they’d been skipped ahead in their development the same as him.

Leveling up wasn’t just for practice sake. It really did have a huge effect on a person, but the changes occurred gradually and the person’s ‘norm’ reset along the way, so nobody realized how much they were actually changing.

But Han did. And he really hoped this would stick, because he didn’t want to go back to the way he’d been before.

A pinging got his attention and he half sat up, seeing the comm console blinking. He rolled over and off the bed, then pressed the button that resulted in a hologram of a Star Force symbol with mission update information underneath.

Han sat on the foot of the bed and read it as it floated before him. It was a list of ship openings for him to choose from, though not all were individual vessels. Some were mission classes, probably because there were multiple vessels being built for the same task, but some were specific ships, which he guessed were not new vessels, but ones whose Captain had been transferred elsewhere.

He’d expect a long trip with the assignments to come at their destination, whatever it was, but it seemed Star Force was wasting no time. He had to choose before their next waypoint, which was cited at approximately 18 days away, at which point he’d be rerouted to whatever assignment he chose.

Han had options, but none of the really sweet assignments only veteran Captains could pull. Still, he could craft a bit of his own destiny here, so he had to take his time and think this through carefully…

Suddenly his eyes went wide as he saw the very last opening on the list, and it was a Clan opening. No rookie Captain could ever dream of getting into a Clan. You had to be the best of the best to even get invited to crew on one of their ships, let alone command one, so he couldn’t believe his eyes as he stared at it to make sure it was real and not some computer glitch or his own imagination.

Next to it was a small icon that indicated there was an attached message, so he reached out and touched the semi-solid hologram, with the button melting as if it were made of a thick cloud under the pressure of his finger.

The message popped up just in front of the list and floated there saying only two words.

Finders Keepers

Han frowned, then touched the details button for the Clan assignment, seeing that it was a scout ship assigned to V’kit’no’sat/Zak’de’ron war reconnaissance from the Ghostblade fleet.

That was Kara’s Clan, and when he saw that the message made perfect sense. If she really thought he was Grand Admiral material she was going to claim him for her own Clan before any of the trailblazers could find out about his potential.

He smirked. He’d been totally played. Used actually, and he didn’t regret it a bit. Kara’s level of intelligence was far beyond his, and while his interest in her had been mostly physical, her interest in him had been much more complicated.

So it wasn’t his newbish charms that had won her over. He was a toy she’d been playing with, and one she was now adding to her Clan collection. But for an Archon, ‘playing’ meant upgrading and teaching, with a little sexuality thrown in as icing.

He’d never been more proud to be a plaything in his life, and quickly hit the ‘accept’ button on the Clan assignment, which removed all the other options and brought up the full post details for his review as well as additional information about where he would be going.

It was a shipyard…a Ghostblade shipyard, which meant it was mobile and off the comm grid. His scout ship wasn’t even finished yet, and he would wait there until it was, with an entirely new crew being assembled, but one of only 83 people. That was far less than he was used to after serving with thousands onboard the Hela’s Fury, but this would be 82 people of Clan level, and that was going to be a big responsibility right there…not to mention they were going to be hopping around a war zone monitoring the fighting between two of the most powerful empires in the galaxy.

“Kara, you certainly know how to treat a guy right,” he said, beginning to mentally acclimate to his new assignment as he ran through several possibilities of crew alignment before stopping himself and just taking a moment to consider the situation and how the past few weeks had radically changed his life.

“I’ve just found out I have a family of Captains across the galaxy, got flashed by one of the hottest women in the universe, then got virtually laid by said woman while she upgraded by mind and body without even asking permission. Then she just gave me an assignment I haven’t earned, all based on the assumption that I’m Grand Admiral material. This has been one eventful trip.”

“Alright, Kara. I’m game. If you think I can be useful to you down the road, then I’m not going to disappoint. Challenge accepted. Now I just have to figure out how to grow into it before it squashes me flat…”

Kara watched the mechs load up onto the dropships, including Nuomo’s, for they’d all be dropped off back at the base after the Captains debarked onto their waiting ride, but the Archon didn’t go with them. She stayed in her Neo and began the long trip back at a run, stomping the ice with her nimble mech’s feet as she needed some time to think apart from everyone else.

The next batch for the Captains Mint was due in a week, two tops, and she’d have her mech back long before then, though right now she was standing inside the cockpit suspended by energy fields as her mind was only loosely connected to it. Not much focus was needed to run a mech in a straight line and navigate around obstacles, so she hung there as if in 0g except that her internal organs still felt the gravity as her naked body was supported on all surfaces by the soft energy field.

Her hair and nails were back to white again, and her body glowed with V’kit’no’sat tattoos, but the expression on her face was not good. It was barely a grimace from the exterior, but for this Archon that meant something was seriously wrong inside.

Kara wasn’t in pain, but she was searching inside herself for something elusive and troubling, with the closer she got to it making her the more worried. Her Archon mojo was slipping, and she couldn’t find the reason. It was beginning to get maddening, as if something was sucking away her life force and she was helpless to do anything about it.

But her Essence was fine. Her biostatistics were fine. Everything that could be monitored was fine, yet there was something seriously off with her and the more she dug at it the worse it became. Kara got the feeling that it would numb up if she stopped pushing for it, but now that she knew something was here she wouldn’t let it go.

She ran her mech for more than a day straight before contacting Nuomo and telling him to tell Harry, the only other Archon on the planet, to replace her earlier than expected, citing she had some unexpected and classified activities to perform out here alone that posed no danger to the outpost or the Captains Mint, but that she would need to conduct them in isolation.

Kara ordered a dead drop of supplies to be left at a waypoint ahead of her, and when she got there she loaded up the cargo container onto her mech’s back and continued off across the ice in her mobile little cocoon trying to dig out what was wrong with her.

She didn’t put clothes back on at all, trying to resensitize her senses as much as possible. The more exposed one was, the more heightened your senses became…which was why you needed to armor over yourself and numb up in situations when the environment was not so friendly. If she was going to find out what was wrong with her, she needed to dial up her senses as far as possible, and that meant finding or creating an environment where she could lower her shields completely and wear her emotions on her skin, pun intended.

That wasn’t something an Archon did easily, and even the slightest hint of danger would make her recoil into combat mode and flick up her defenses, even if just a little bit. Kara knew that wasn’t going to be good enough. She had to dial her defenses back all the way, and she couldn’t remember the last time that had happened…if it had ever happened.

The sex training kinda counted, but the emotions involved were blinding in their own way and wouldn’t be useful here. She needed to open up calmly and become a tranquil ocean where even the slightest disturbance would cause a ripple that would otherwise be missed in even mildly choppy waters.

She was sensing a disturbance in the Force, and in order to find the source she had to get the rest of her completely in balance and completely open to attack…which was why she programmed her mech to keep running without her and quietly snuck out of it near one of the many ice mountains on the planetary shard in shadow mode during a snowstorm so thick you couldn’t see two feet in front of your face.

In shadow mode all light and sensor signals got absorbed into the energy field produced by her Vorch’nas, and with the snow flying all over you couldn’t even notice the black spot amongst the whiteness. Kara kept it active for nearly half an hour as she sat naked inside one of the deep mech tracks as it slowly began to refill with snow.

She had no food, no clothes, no armor other than her Vorch’nas…which she couldn’t take off anyway…and anyone tracking her position would assume she was still in the mech. The cargo ship had already left, meaning there were no more orbital scans, and the ice mountain was at the right angle to block scans from the base this low to the ground, so unless someone sent out a dropship for some reason, she was effectively lost in the snow and completely alone for the first time in far too long.

Kara just sat on the packed ice with her arms wrapped around her knees as she tried to release her smallest combat reflexes. The cold wasn’t a danger to her as long as she had Rensiek and enough calories in her body to fuel it, which she did for a few days at least, for she’d eaten right before she’d bailed out of the mech.

The adoptive trailblazer held position and didn’t move a muscle for hours as the snow piled up around her ankles and butt, then began to rise higher and higher until it was all the way up to her bellybutton. Still she didn’t move, trying to become part of the ice on this planet and absorb the anonymity it had that was currently so precious to her. She had to disconnect from the Empire, from the Captains Mint, from the Archons, from every living being in the universe and just become part of the inanimate backdrop.

It wasn’t easy, and if she’d been a Saiyan it would have been impossible for her to slow down this much, but little by little the very useful walls she’d put up inside her over the course of her life to survive battle after battle…and the walls that were necessary to fight a never-ending war against the Hadarak…began to grudgingly lower when they could find no threats nearby. They kept flicking back on at every flake of snow that seemed too heavy or moved too fast, but over time that too became normal and Kara was able to fully let go and become nothing more than a mildly glowing statue on the frozen landscape plastered with snow on her left side.

She stared straight ahead and down to where here feet had been, but were now buried in the white precipitation as the storm finally passed. And when it did and the landscape calmed down completely, so did Kara with it, and finally she had deconstructed herself to the point where she was nothing and everything at the same time.

And within that perfect balance was a pulsing anomaly so loud she wondered why she’d ever missed it.

She couldn’t pinpoint it within her body, not from a medical sense, but she recognized it as one of the many inflow points from the Essence realm that activated when her body was low. The difference in pressure caused new Essence to seek in through these tiny cracks until she was refilled, then the balance between the two would be restored…and likewise, if she overdosed on Essence from a Magicite ring, it would flow out of her through these ports as she slowly lost the charge until the two sides leveled out again.

This was why Archons couldn’t store excess Essence in their bodies. It had to be in a Magicite ring that kept the Essence reflecting off itself inside an object that had no natural cracks to the Essence realm like all life in the galaxy had.

And one of those cracks inside Kara was malfunctioning.

It was the barest amount of soreness, and she was proud of herself for having the inner sense to figure it out amongst all the other noise from normal Archon duties and the constant training they underwent that had far more pain from even the easiest workouts than this was causing her. But now that she’d dialed back to zero the disturbance was obvious, though what to do about it Kara did not know.

Finding it had been her first mission objective. Her second was now to observe and get as much information about it as possible, so she finally let herself move and stretched out, extending her legs forward and leaning back into the snow as she made a body-forming cast out of it as she looked into the semi-lit sky that still showed a fair amount of stars along with a slight blue haze.

Her muscles had needed that much change at least, and more would be needed later, but for right now she closed her eyes and left herself even more vulnerable than before with no psionics active to look around. She was encased in snow and ice with the front face of her body open to the sky above, and in that state she began probing the little sore spot inside her ever so carefully, relishing in the reckless stupidity of her current position…as well as realizing it was necessary to probe this deeply within.

Thankfully the galaxy and this planetary fragment was big enough to lose herself in, and for the first time in a long time Kara was able to actually rest as she played around with the soreness. No missions, no duty, no teammates, no empire. Just little Kara naked in the wilderness and loving every blissful chilly minute of it while the exploration of her inner self gave her the excuse needed to do so when the galaxy was burning under the weight of a billion different problems.

But right now, from Kara’s perspective, they didn’t exist. People didn’t exist. Clothes didn’t exist. All that did was her body, the icy footprint she laid within, and the jewel on her wrist that was being patiently quiet and staying out of the way of her insight.

And now it was time to do some unrestricted exploring.

8

Kara sat in the snow so long she began to get hungrier than she was stiff, but her focus was so clean and clear she didn’t dare move to disturb it other than a few rolls and twists as another snowstorm came up and began to fill in the mech track in which she sat even more. The Archon had no food on her, nor pockets to carry it, but she did have her Vorch’nas and her Dogorat’nah tier 4 psionic, both of which could achieve atomic alchemy at the cost of a lot of power.

Seeing as how Kara was sitting here and not expending much, she began to use both in tag team fashion to take the air and ice molecules and began reconfiguring them into sugar. Thankfully she didn’t have to do any elemental alchemy on this one, for glucose was made up of three different atoms…hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon…two of which were present in the ice, with the third in a decent concentration in the air left over from when the planet was fractured and massive amounts of carbon dioxide leaked into the atmosphere from the volcanic activity that had since frozen over.

It wasn’t so much she couldn’t breathe, but it was enough that Kara didn’t have to try and capture the carbon coming out of her lungs with each breath. The alchemy process wasn’t fast, and Kara would have had real trouble if she didn’t have her Vorch’nas stepping in to help on some of the more complicated molecular realignments, but soon she had a small but steady trickle of sugar entering her bloodstream as she lay face down towards the snow with one leg kicked up in the air and her arms crossed in front of her to prop her head up slightly.

Her toes moved every now and then, curling up and releasing in a slow flex as she continued to study the ‘sore’ spot inside her, and she had to continue to keep herself extremely exposed and open to attack in order to see it. The day before she’d started to reflexively get back into combat mode when the stiffness began irritating her, and her vision of it nearly disappeared. It was so subtle a thing she knew she wasn’t going to be able to study this any other way, so Kara decided to just camp out here as long as she could. Sugar alone wasn’t going to be enough, for her body required hundreds of different types of molecules for fuel, but those were for repair parts and not energy, so those could wait a while longer. The sugar she needed now, and thankfully once she got the process smoothed out she began cycling between it and probing her new discovery at regular intervals as she tried to extend her window here as much as she could.

At first she observed, then she tried to touch it…which was like fumbling around for a needle while wearing mittens. She could brush up against it at times, almost randomly, but she couldn’t control anything. Still, those few brushes were successful in causing a little Essence to squirt through the sore spot…which made it even more sore…and the Archon was beginning to wonder if she hadn’t been damaged sometime in the past without realizing it.

But as more hours passed and she entered her third day here, Kara began to realize she wasn’t dealing with damage, but rather a new ‘muscle’ that she had never used before. It wasn’t a physical one, but it was a part of her, and its soreness was because it was for some reason now needing to be used.

So Kara kept trying to bump it with her mittens to little success, then she switched tactics and tried to work on her ‘mittens’ to see if she could upgrade them, and practiced with other parts of her inner self…mainly through mental drills and probing the very depths of her mind…until she got a more refined technique down, then she tried again, this time getting a tentative grip on whatever it was.

It felt like a zit that needed to be popped, but she couldn’t find the right angle to apply pressure. She worked for hours, taking breaks to generate more sugar that was doing less and less to sustain her as her body began crying out for some of those repair parts to replace the normal micro-damage that occurred just from everyday living…not to mention the strain being put on her Rensiek tissue, which she was running nonstop to keep from freezing to death out here.

Try and fail. Try and fail. That’s what Kara was fighting through, not knowing what to do and having no instructions to follow. It was refreshing, actually, to be back to square one without any hints or help, having to figure it out on her own…but it was also irritating, as it had been long ago when she had first got her Vorch’nas and suddenly was thrust beyond the trailblazers in ability and knowledge. But this wasn’t a bit of technology the Zak’de’ron had given her. This was something natural and totally unknown…and it was annoying Kara that she wasn’t making better progress at it.

She stretched out her self-imposed exile to 5 days, having used up most of her body’s fat reserves…which also held some repair parts suspended in them…and then almost randomly the little pimple popped under her bazillionth attempt to pinch it. When it did, Essence burst forth from it and supersaturated her body…which felt like an ambrosia overload high, but slightly salty at the same time.

It was ‘salty’ because the Essence wasn’t calibrated to her body, and she’d felt the same thing when pulling on Uriti Essence or getting some from one of the other Archons. But once it touched her it began to reform to her mojo, gradually becoming hers, though she could have used it instantly if she’d wanted to.

The thing was, though, that it wasn’t stopping…which was when she realized it wasn’t a pimple that had to be popped, but a link into the Essence realm that was leaking into her.

But that made no sense. There was no pressure gradient to push it. Her body was more concentrated than the Essence realm now, so it should flow the other way, which begged the question what was going on?

She sat there almost giggling as the buzz made her head dizzy, but eventually she was getting so loopy she had to begin bleeding it off intentionally before it started spilling out on its own as her body simply couldn’t hold that much. Kara didn’t try any techniques with it other than a ‘force push’ up into the air, creating an air current that got so fierce it started to create a tornado vortex in the middle of yet another snowstorm.

If Kara could harness this technique it would change everything Star Force knew about Essence power generation, and while her mind was racing with those possibilities she began to realize that she needed to find a way to shut this off, or at least reduce it, or there were going to be more immediate problems. Her control was slipping already, for she’d never had an Essence shower of this magnitude. Nobody had as far as she knew, and if the Varkemma had any knowledge about this they hadn’t shared it.

It was hard to focus with so much Essence swirling around inside her, but thankfully the hole through which it was coming in was made obvious by the pressure being exerted on it…and that pressure was something Kara realized she could push back against. She didn’t know how at first, but as the flow diminished she began to learn real fast that it wasn’t from a counter force she was exerting. It was that ‘muscle’ that had been itching before.

It wasn’t a pimple that needed to be popped. It was an orifice that had needed to be opened, but it could also be closed…or so she hoped.

And just like using a muscle for the first time ever, Kara was very clumsy at it. It took her an hour and a half to get to the point where she could completely close it for even a few seconds before losing control and having it open again, but give an Archon a taste of victory and they’d be all over it like a post-workout donut tray.

At the end of it all Kara sat in a now empty mech track, whose snow bath tub had been cleaned out by the tornado with only a small bit falling lazily from the cloudy, yet mildly bright sky. She sat there silent, both on the outside and the inside. Her new muscle had finally kicked off the rust and was obeying her, but it was tired. It had to remain clenched to keep the flow out, and her relaxing it meant the Essence would come in automatically, but in battle that would be an asset rather than having to focus and try to force it to stay open.

And suddenly everything she thought she’d known about Essence was thrown out the window. The equilibrium idea now seemed busted, yet when she held the extra Essence in it flowed back out into the Essence realm through the other ‘cracks’ within her. How the two could both be true she didn’t know, but Kara now had her breakthrough and her riddle solved, so why was she still sitting here?

Her body was hungry, stiff, and cold as her production of heat had slipped along with her sugar levels. But her inner self was more at peace now than it had ever been, and she didn’t want to lose that. She didn’t want to go back to the war, to duty, to the Empire.

Fortunately she didn’t have to. With her Vorch’nas she signaled her mech, which was still running around the planetary fragment without getting too far away from her position, to come back to her. She had to wait another 7 hours for it to arrive, and Kara could have flown out to it quicker, but she didn’t. She just sat and waited out the hunger pains unwilling to leave her little oasis in the wilderness.

Eventually the footsteps of the Neo became obvious even from so far away, for her hearing had become so attuned to silence even the slightest vibration sounded loud…but not nearly as loud as the crashing that followed as the mech came up within 100 meters of her position and stopped.

“Ouch,” she said, belatedly realizing she hadn’t spoken anything in the past 6 days and her voice sounded horrible as a result. She rubbed the inside of her ears with her fingertips as they rang a bit from the intense sounds they were not prepared for. “You are really loud,” she told the mech.

It didn’t answer, nor had she expected it to, but she ordered it to drop off the crate of supplies nearby…as Kara covered her ears to give them some dampening as they readjusted without being a wuss and using her Vorch’nas to take care of it. After silence returned she finally stood up and stepped out of the footprint, walking on the fresh snow above and sinking in only a few inches, which was still enough to cover the glowing tattoos on her feet as the powdery stuff fell in on them.

The walking quickly rid Kara of her stiffness, but most of her inner peace remained…then when she got to the food she forced herself to eat slowly as she sat on the top of the shipping crate and dangled her legs off the edge, staring at her tattoos and wiggling her toes distractedly as the Archon continued to look more inside herself than at anything on the exterior.

Her purpose within Star Force early on had been to lead the trailblazers forward using her Vorch’nas advantage, but they’d long passed her up and it was really just useful to her now, though still technologically advanced…yet not enough for anyone to really care. It was just hers now, and not a treasure of the empire, and even after she had returned to leadership of Clan Ghostblade she had largely been unimportant…despite what people like Han Tyver had to say otherwise.

Every function of the empire could now be accomplished without her. Granted she could probably be more useful in a few situations, but the skill level of everyone that was not Archon had gotten so high, especially that of the Naval division, that they didn’t need Archons for a lot of missions, and there were very few things that Kara could truly excel at now. Trailblazing…which was the primary Archon duty that defined them…was meant to take you into the unknown and explore, learn, and pass that knowledge onto others…but she hadn’t been doing that for a very long time, and neither had the others that bore that name.

Except they were now busy annexing the V’kit’no’sat and establishing the Grand Border, which was essential to Star Force’s future, but something inside Kara told her that wasn’t where she belonged.

She laughed when it finally occurred to her, for it was so simple.

“Am I really that big of an idiot?” she asked, kicking her bare heels on the iced-over crate and splintering some fragments off to land in the soft snow below. “How could I be so blind?”

“Easy answer, Kara. You’ve been putting the Empire on your shoulders so much you never noticed it could stand on its own now. And with so much death coming from the Hadarak you knuckled down and accepted grunge work in order to save a few more lives. But there will always be a few more lives that need saving, and you can’t get to them all. Racking up the highest score is a challenge worth pursuing if you don’t have anything better to do, and it’s the lack of something better to do that’s been throwing you off.”

“I don’t belong leading armies. I don’t belong on Earth. I belong on Halo with the Master Chief. Out in the middle of nowhere pursuing ancient knowledge and the secrets of the universe in order to protect Earth. But I don’t belong on Earth, or with the fleet. I belong with my fellow Spartans or on my own, doing the things that only we can do, not backing up the fleet or playing training master.”

Kara’s voice started to cut out, having gotten so weak over the last few days that she was overexerting it now, but she didn’t care. If she went hoarse her Vorch’nas would fix it, but it hadn’t proced yet on its own, and she was mildly curious how bad it would let her voice get before it automatically fixed her vocal chords.

“A Spartan without a mission…that’s been me, and there wasn’t anything I could do about it. Hobbies don’t cut it. Messing with cute boys doesn’t cut it. I need a purpose, and defending Earth against the V’kit’no’sat had always been there for us before…but not now, and fighting the Hadarak is more like pest control than anything. We can’t even talk to them without a Uriti translating, and their minions are so beyond hope they might as well be zombies. The V’kit’no’sat were opponents. The Hadarak are a natural disaster that never ends.”

“We had to upgrade ourselves to survive the V’kit’no’sat, and they inadvertently pushed us to become stronger by trying to annihilate us. The Hadarak aren’t, and we’re fighting them primarily by spamming drone production more than anything. Not much a single little girl like me can do that someone else isn’t already doing. If it was just me and I had to build an empire from scratch, that would be fun, but we’re way past needing that.”

Kara sighed. “Its days like this I’m almost tempted to turn on the sex simulators and just lose myself in it, because I can’t see anything else better to do. But stupid me keeps forgetting that I’m not immune to illusions, and if there are new abilities out there to discover I’m not going to know they’re there unless I bump into them or bump into some else who already has them. We’re the top of the totem pole now for most of this galaxy, so bumping into someone isn’t likely to happen unless it’s an invasion force from outside the galaxy. Which means I made the dumbass assumption I couldn’t upgrade much more. I am so fucking stupid.”

She took another bite of a gigantic ration bar, then swallowed some Red drink before continuing her self-critique without worrying about anyone overhearing her. For her mech wasn’t going to spill her secrets. It’d promised not to.

“I needed to come out here and try to feel again. To get that Halo feel, and I found just enough to end up with melancholy because I can’t stay here. But I’m not stupid enough to think that there isn’t a Halo out there for me somewhere. I just have to find it, even if I can’t feel it now. Even if I feel dead inside without a mission, without a purpose. It’s just the fog of war blinding me. I have to follow the little clues that I have now, and I can’t do that sitting here…but where do I go next. Come on, Kara. Think.”

“I can fiddle around with this Essence ‘nipple’ anywhere. Ha. That’s a cute term. Instead of a third eye I got a third nipple. The others will get a laugh out of that…but is this something they can’t access because they’ve gone Saiyan? That would suck if it’s the case, but it’s also possibly the reason why none of them have found it yet. Maybe they can’t. Maybe I’m…the only one that can. Déjà vu all over again.”

“But where do I belong now? Paul’s out hunting Lurkers so we don’t lose others trying. He’s so good he can’t go anywhere else without disaster following. His path now is clear, but I bet he doesn’t like it either. I haven’t talked to him in so long because of these damn comm lags. I’d go see him, but I know that’d be a dead end. Still. It’d be better than sitting around here.”

“Jason is out in the Rim somewhere opening up all the Founders’ hidden treasure boxes, and I could help with that…but I’d be redundant again. The others are fighting Hadarak or taming the Dinosaurs, and I don’t need to do either. So where does that leave me? Come on, Kara. Where’s your Halo?”

It took her a moment, then she smacked her glowing tatted palm against her glowing tatted head.

“For crying out loud, you are a dumbass bitch,” she said, getting so hoarse that her Vorch’nas finally kicked in and healed her, returning her voice to its normal smooth glassiness. “I don’t know where my Halo is, but on the big fat ones we took from the Vargemma is a waypoint I need to get to. The knowledge the Responders contain is locked unless you can display the prerequisite abilities, and I’m willing to bet I now have one. If this isn’t something brand new to the universe…which I’m guessing it’s not…then the Founders have probably encountered it and left some notes behind on the matter. That’s my next waypoint. Which means I don’t have to keep freezing my ass out here.”

Kara hopped off the crate, but she didn’t land on the snow. Instead she took flight and rose up high above the top of the mech and kept going for about double the distance. The air felt good against her skin, and as her blood sugar levels caught back up so did her internal heat production, taking the cold out of her skin.

As she held position Kara lost her touch on the tiny muscle inside her, and the Essence flow returned again without her commanding it to. Not as bad as the first time, but a little unauthorized trickle that she had to focus real hard to lock down, finding that she couldn’t until she landed and held still without using any of her psionics.

“Ok, that’s not good,” she scolded herself. “I can’t dial back my senses without losing control. Guess I’m not going to be wearing clothes for a while either…and I bet if I’m around people I’m going to numb up way too much too. Which means I need a private ship. Fuck.”

She sat back down on the crate again and used her Vorch’nas to link through the mech to the outpost where she put in a requisition order for a personal scout ship, but since there was no comm relay in this system that order would have to go out on the next courier to arrive.

Meaning she was stuck here until then unless she could hitch a ride with other people…and her gut told her no way. If she couldn’t handle a little flying, then her natural defenses when other people were around would go way too high and she’d lose her control over her nipple again.

“Well. Looks like I’m camping out here with you for a while,” she said, glancing up at her mech. “I’m not bad to look at, am I? Twelve year old my ass…”

9

October 18, 128852

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

Kara arrived at one of the 2972 Temples Star Force had located and claimed, not through an Essence jump but by the painfully slow spacial tap that was essentially a hole cut in the outer hull of the Temple to allow naval traffic in and out. Star Force had added them to every Temple they’d claimed after deactivating the defensive Essence shield barrier, thus opening up the reclusive locations to their own traffic that was far more active than Essence travel alone would have allowed.

Kara had chosen the closest Temple to the Captains Mint, but one that was not fully conquered. The Caretakers still controlled most regions, but as long as she played nice there shouldn’t be a problem since the Paladin here were taking over control rooms with the subtle grace of an assassin…meaning the entire Temple wasn’t in Star Force-hate mode.

When her scout ship entered through the tunnel she felt a sense of dread and awe as she finally got her own eyes on the Temple. She’d never traveled to one before, instead satisfying herself with the numerous reports and holograms coming out of them, but now that she was here the pit of her stomach was doing flips that accelerated into a full on jaw drop when she exited the tunnel into the interior of the Dyson Sphere.

There were no stars, only land far, far away and in all directions. She really was inside a giant ball that would put Halo to shame, but built on the same principle. And inside this ball was a lot of Vargemma that wanted to kill her the moment she came into contact with them, so Kara was careful to obey the zonal warnings on the battlemap telling her where she could go and where not to.

She picked a secluded safe area and headed straight there after informing the Temple Commander that she was here on a secret research mission and did not want to be disturbed except via text message, for she didn’t want to hear even the sound of someone’s voice right now. Kara had been tripped up enough when her scout ship arrived and she had a brief conversation with the crew that had brought it, but now she was alone inside and planned to keep it that way.

Her control hadn’t gotten much better, which was discouraging. If she didn’t keep her senses finely attuned her ‘nipple’ would open and start overcharging her with Essence, so Kara had to keep as low a profile as possible, but fortunately the sight of other ships silently moving around the gigantic Temple didn’t bother her. There was so much empty land space in here she could lose herself far easier than traveling elsewhere in the galaxy, and that’s exactly what she planned to do.

Once she checked in, the Archon cloaked her ship and disappeared from the tracking sensors of both Star Force, the Caretakers, and everyone else inside the Temple…though she wasn’t completely sure how much in the way of Essence trackers there were built into the Temple itself. Star Force had taken control over the massive constructs, but they were still far from exploring and understanding it all, especially given its anti-hierarchical design. One piece of the Temple didn’t even know another existed, and it was like that for most of the stuff here, with even the well-hidden control rooms only having dominion over their piece of the gigantic landscape that was bigger than thousands of planets’ surface area combined into one unending carpet that looped back around on itself in all directions.

The small star in the middle was fake, but bright enough to provide light for it all, though it never moved. That was going to take some getting used to, but Kara was immediately feeling a sense of peace here. It really did feel like Halo, but without the mission of galactic importance her Core seemed to need. Yet there was something important here. She could feel it…or maybe hope for it, because if she didn’t get some answers she wasn’t going to be able to do much of anything other than Essence training with this beneficial inhibition.

She’d already gotten in more Essence practice over the past few months that she had in her entire life, and she’d been leveling up so fast it almost made her giddy…but it wouldn’t stop until she calmed herself down after combat, and that took a long time. She had to use a Magicite ring set to soak up the excess until she’d turned off her combat mode and scaled her senses up enough for her subconscious mind to remember she had the ability to close off the nipple. And right now, she had a collection of full rings sitting in her bedroom onboard the small scout ship with a box of empty ones waiting to be filled.

The Elcee here would be grateful to have them, but she wasn’t in a hurry to make the exchange just yet. She needed answers and seclusion, so after drifting far from the traffic lanes and out into the deep wilds of the Temple far away from Star Force and the Vargemma, she finally set her ship down near to a location that was marked as having one of the Responder outposts that had been spread across the Temple like the Founders had been carrying a bag of sand and sneezed, throwing it so far and wide they couldn’t have picked them all up if they’d wanted to.

That’s how someone else had described the distribution pattern in the notes she’d been reading constantly since getting back in connection with the comm network. There was so much material on the Temples now she still hadn’t gotten through it all, even with the mental interlink and Sav upgrade to her mind that allowed her to read books as fast as a civilian could throw punches.

Kara put that aside for the moment and walked outside her ship through the cloaking field and the second field beyond it that would prevent anyone from smacking into the invisible object and hurting themselves, though there was no one here and not any animals bigger than worms and beetles. Some of the other Temples had some larger critters, but in general those were thought to have been brought in by the Vargemma at some point, for the Caretaker infrastructure had oxygen/carbon dioxide recyclers everywhere to keep the plants alive when there wasn’t enough biological CO2 production to sustain them.

Still, if an errant bird happened to show up, Kara didn’t want him running into the hardest window ever and cracking his skull, so the dampening shield around the ship would feel like hitting a snow drift, though there was gratefully not a lick of the icy stuff around here. Kara had chosen a heavily forested area with numerous ravines and a rolling terrain that would make it far easier to get lost in…which she wanted, but without the need to use her Rensiek.

The Archon walked out of her ship, still naked and covered in glowing tattoos, but on a gut feeling she changed the color. Her hair, nails, lips, and real nipples went camo green while the rest of her skin remained the same normal paleness, though the tattoos changed from glowing white to a subdued brown that still glowed, but would be hard to notice unless it turned dark, and according to the information she’d received on entry, this Temple had no stellar zone rotation.

That meant the fake star wasn’t turning on and off in certain directions, and was keeping the entire Temple in full daylight constantly. So Kara was now a sexy little camo girl walking on her bare feet through the slightly moist forest floor while keeping an eye out for thorns or other not so nice things to walk on.

She could have used her Pefbar, or put a force field over her feet, but the vulnerability of the terrain was helping her keep her senses sharp so she just rolled with it, walking across a few miles of hilly terrain and having to navigate by sight and memory unless she wanted to cheat and use her Vorch’nas…which didn’t seem right given her situation.

Eventually she came to the small outpost and walked off the dirt and onto the solid stone-like synthetic material that led inside to a glowing red obelisk that she felt scanning her mind.

Kara expected that and let it access her language memories, after which it relented and started speaking.

“I apologize for the intrusion. A language download from your mind was necessary to facilitate communications. I am known as a ‘Responder,’…”

“Yes, I know,” Kara interrupted. “I have questions concerning an Essence ability that I have unlocked.”

“Please demonstrate this ability on the pylon behind you.”

Kara turned around to see a rectangular cube rise up out of the floor more than twice her head height.

“I can’t. It doesn’t do anything other than give me extra Essence.”

“You are being scanned. Use this ability so that I may identify it and confirm you have earned access to the necessary knowledge.”

That wasn’t hard for Kara to do, for she was trying mightily to stay focused while talking to the weird device, for it was giving her spidey sense a little tingle, primarily because she didn’t know exactly what it could and couldn’t do. So all she had to do was allow herself to get distracted and her third nipple opened up and raw Essence started to flow into her again.

“This ability is known as Nuv’ernor.”

Kara focused again to try and get it to stop, but wasn’t successful. Instead she set one of the two rings she was wearing to soak it up while she talked.

“I am having trouble shutting it off,” she admitted. “Can you help me learn to better control it?”

“Nuv’ernor is a natural upgrade that cannot be precipitated by another. Similar prerequisites seem to be required for the phenomenon to occur, but no strict correlation between action and effect has been determined. However, notes from those few that have achieved it indicate that the siphon effect responds to need as first priority, making it difficult to terminate oneself via overdraw.”

“Yeah, I noticed.”

“Individuals have achieved Nuv’ernor during battle and not, making prediction of such an ability impossible to determine. Notes indicate that second priority is lack of use. The Core mechanism that draws in the Essence from the realm beyond requires periodic use, and if not consciously triggered will open on its own. Once Nuv’ernor is achieved, lack of Essence use is impossible.”

“So I ended up a Saiyan after all,” Kara said, slapping her left leg with her fist.

“Demonstrate this ‘Saiyan’ ability.”

“No,” Kara said, waving the Responder off. “I was talking to myself. How can I keep the Nuv’ernor from activating on its own? I’m having to focus my senses very finely to make the siphon close, and if I get distracted it opens on its own.”

“Further use will satisfy it for a time. You have not drawn enough to exhaust the need.”

Kara frowned. “I’ve used a lot, and it hasn’t started to behave itself at all.”

“Typically activation of Yin’san will provide sufficient exhaustion.”

“I don’t know what that ability is, which means I probably do not have it.”

“No recorded occurrence of Nuv’ernor has been without a prior breakthrough into Yin’san.”

Kara raised her hands in futility. “Guess I’m the first then. What do I do, because I’ve tried the exhaustion thing to the point where I start to get lightheaded?”

“Use the Essence before it creates an oversurge.”

“I have. I still get to the point of passing out before too long. I’m not used to using anywhere near this much. You said before this was an ability of the Core?”

“Yes. All Essence abilities are Core generated.”

“How do you know that? Can you track a Core?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Via Essence abilities you will have to demonstrate before I can explain further.”

“Never mind, I don’t have them. Is there some way I can practice controlling Nuv’ernor?”

“Essence donations.”

“I’m doing that right now into one of these,” Kara said, holding up her rings.

“Demonstrate the highest flow rate you can achieve with Nuv’ernor.”

Kara blinked. “Ok, but it’s pretty intense on its own.”

“It is not. It is minimal.”

“Really? How about this,” she said, focusing on the doing the exact opposite thing she’d done before. She kicked herself into combat mode and used the flow itself to identify her nipple that she otherwise couldn’t see, then she tried to squeeze it.

It didn’t work, and after a few minutes she gave up and tried to calm herself back down so she could at least partially restrict the flow.

“I can’t. That’s wide open as far as I can determine.”

“Then it will most likely be insufficient to satiate the Nuv’ernor until you can modulate the flow upwards.”

“Great. So I’m stuck like this unless you have any nifty training ideas about how to teach me to modulate it?”

“It is a basic function that cannot be trained for. All others have been able to modulate upwards at the onset. Please demonstrate the most difficult Essence ability you possess.”

Kara turned around and Force-choked the pylon, crunching it in few inches but no further. She added Essence to it from her siphon, but the effect didn’t strengthen. That was as much pressure as she could apply using the Essence-only attack.

“That’s it, unless you want me to upgrade my other abilities using Essence.”

“You are a novice, both in skill and power level. However you achieved Nuv’ernor, it is irregular.”

“Have others achieved high ranking abilities prior to expected progression?”

“Occasionally irregular progression occurs, but never with Nuv’ernor.”

“So I’m the wonder kid who can’t shut off the spigot of awesomeness,” she said, sitting down on the floor and bringing her knees up to her chin to rest it upon. “So what do I do now?”

“Continued use until you achieve the ability to increase the flow rate, or continued use until you reach satiation level.”

“What happens if I overload my Essence level too far?”

“It will spill out back into the Essence realm.”

“Why does it feel like it damages me?”

“It does not. It disrupts your control. Your body is unharmed.”

“What about my connection to my body?”

“Obscured, but not endangered. Only lack of Essence flirts with death.”

“Well there’s that at least,” she said, starting to cry a little under the strain now that it looked like she wasn’t going to get any help here. She was going to have to suffer through this, and even as her ring sucked up the excess Essence it was burning her inside a little.

The Responder didn’t notice or didn’t care, simply waiting for the next question as Kara sat there in silence dripping a few tears on the floor as her ring reached maximum capacity and she had to switch over to the backup one.

10

September 2, 128854

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

Kara sat on a rocky outcropping that gave her a view just above the treetops, posed cross-legged and motionless as the breeze blew her blood red hair back and forth as if she didn’t notice, but she did. She noticed everything that happened to her and within her. Kara had spent the past 2 years in isolation in the Temple as she conversed with everyone across the galaxy that could possibly help her.

Her ship would receive the messages and relay them for her, but Kara didn’t want anyone to come to her. Only by keeping her senses heightened and her defenses down could she maintain the poise necessary to keep her siphon closed, and nothing that had occurred over the past 2 years had helped, despite her regular training, physical and Essence. The pain had continued and accumulated, leaving her burnt out with no relief in sight.

It was a subtle thing, and mild compared to the rigors of training, but when she was not in combat mode and she tried to relax she couldn’t. Not fully. Even now when the siphon was not flowing her body was still reeling from the past times. It was always too much, too fast, and she wasn’t adapting to it as far as she could tell…but then again Kara couldn’t know for sure, because the days all blurred together, and not just because of the constant sunlight. The past 2 years had felt like a millennia, but she had no choice but to endure it and keep trying to do as the Responder had suggested and learn to open the siphon wider, but neither she nor anyone in the Empire knew how, including the Varkemma, for none of them had attained this ability or knew anyone else who did.

So Kara alternated between training and sitting in the wilds trying to discover a way out of this perpetual predicament. Wilson was working on the problem, as were the Elcee, but the Responders would not talk to them because they did not possess the ability, and she’d pried as many answers out of them as they would give, but nothing useful had been revealed.

Nuv’ernor was now a curse word to Kara, despite the obvious breakthrough it was for the Empire. She was filling up so many rings that the Elcee had arranged for a small drone to fly out and drop off empty ones while picking up the full ones every 18 days. It was the one contact Kara had with the empire in her self-imposed exile, and it also brought with it occasional supplies so she didn’t have to ask the Caretakers to sustain her.

Kara wanted to be alone. Needed to be alone. And for the past 2 years she had been, but not today, for a soft sound brought her out of her introspection. One that was foreign to this forest, and no more than a soft step on a fallen twig.

Her Pefbar kicked on before she could override it, and good thing too, because there was actually someone there and not just another false alarm like so many before.

Kara jumped up and triggered her armor for the first time since arriving here, with it covering her naked body within 2 seconds as she stared down at the large biped that was easily twice her height.

“Stay back before I kill you,” she warned, slipping into a fighting stance while activating her Essence defensive shield she’d been practicing heavily ever since getting so much additional power to use.

“You could not if you wanted to,” the Mek’tal said in English with a heavy alien accent as he raised his two large forward arms up in a gesture of peace while the two smaller ones coming off his back remained limp. “I do not come to fight.”

“Stay back!” Kara yelled, knowing that if this was one of the Vargemma who had Essence skills far beyond hers that it was possible he could kill her in a single shot if her shields didn’t work like she hoped they would.

The Mek’tal stopped walking forward, but he did not retreat. The scales that covered his body were a slightly darker shade of red than Kara’s hair, but his four eyes were a fiery green that would be scary enough if you didn’t know how powerful the Vargemma were…and how malevolent.

“I have come for you, young one. I know the pain you are in. I could feel it from far away. It took me time to evade your empire’s security perimeter, and once I did I had to travel on foot to get here. Please give me a few moments of your time.”

“How far away?”

“I left from Socar’negorum, and have spent one and a half of your years trying to get to you.”

Kara’s face inside her helmet frowned. “Why?”

“Because you have achieved Nuv’ernor. The pain you are eliciting through your Essence exertions is a very specific kind, and your inability to contain your Essence is the reason it is transmitting outward. You were easy to locate, but hard to get to.”

“How do you know about Nuv’ernor? The Responders will not talk of it with anyone else.”

“No one else in this Temple has it, except for me, and the Responders do not know it. No one knows it.”

“Why keep it a secret?”

“Because the Founders have been here before, I saw one myself, and they took the only other person who had achieved Nuv’ernor with them by force. He was my master, and I didn’t even have a chance to defend him before being incapacitated by an Essence attack beyond my ability to even disrupt. The Founder came, took my master, and left. Neither has been seen again, and no one knows the Founder was here because his attack also came with a neural rewrite. I was barely able to fight it off using my Nuv’ernor after he left, for it took so much power that I am still in terror of them. I believe this Temple is a breeding ground, and when someone becomes useful to them they pluck them away for what purpose I do not know, but it is nefarious or my master would have gone willingly. The Founder did not even speak one word, and treated my master as if he were nothing more than a package to retrieve. They will do the same to you if you have revealed your ability to the Responders. Have you done so?”

“Yes,” Kara said, not liking this one bit.

“They did not come quickly before. It was many centuries, but I believe they will come again. That is why I have hidden my power. But you are transmitting yours unwisely.”

“So you’ve come to shut me up?”

“I have come to train you, if you will allow it.”

“I can’t trust any Vargemma,” Kara said icily. “You’ve been trying to kill us any chance you get.”

“Very well. We will do this the hard way,” he said, reaching out for her with an invisible vice grip that slipped on her defensive shields for a moment, then a huge power boost followed and broke right through them.

Kara responded with her psionics, feeding Essence into them and launching every mental disruptive technique she had…which worked to free her momentarily, during which she turned and ran, then leapt into the sky and tried to fly away.

But to no avail. She was grabbed again and pulled backward, with her firing her Jumat down at the Mek’tal and knocking him on his ass…but his Essence grip did not relent. She even fired her armor’s Dre’mo’dons at him, but an Essence shield caught or deflected them aside, some of which hit trees and caught them on fire, sending up smoke plumes amidst a shattering of splinters flying everywhere like fireworks.

Kara didn’t relent, feeling the deepest fear in recent memory as she knew she was outmatched…but Archons didn’t quit, and she sent Jumat after Jumat blast towards him while expending her bioplasma and dropping a Po’levo over him, but the darkness field did nothing to hide her Essence presence, and his grip didn’t relent.

He weathered everything she threw at him, while slowly pulling her closer and closer. When she got within melee range she switched directions of her flight and popped up her Vorch’nas’ version of a death saber, with the blade coming within an inch of his forehead before her arm was pinned in place by an irresistible force.

“I am not trying to hurt you, little one. I am here to help you, but some warriors must fight first to show they have the ability to kill. Have I shown you? Or do I need to injure you to make the point?”

Kara retracted her blade, but her arm was still stuck in place.

“Point made, but why aren’t you trying to kill me like the rest of the Vargemma?”

“They wait for the day the Founders return to lead us in the war against the Hadarak. I do not believe that will occur as prophesized. I believe they will use us as they wish, perhaps in battle, but also perhaps as Essence generators for their own armies. I do not know why else one with Nuv’ernor would be taken against their will. Do you?”

“I didn’t even know it existed until 2 years ago, but I know the Founders are aware of our takeover of the Temples. Someone is directing the Caretakers against us beyond here, in the other facilities the Founders made.”

The Mek’tal frowned. “There are more than the Temples in this galaxy?”

“Far more, though nothing as large. There is a service network that feeds the Temples resources, as well as other locations. Will you release me now?”

“I am not done speaking with you,” he said, returning her arm to her while slowly setting her down on the ground so she had to look up at his huge head. “Do not flee until I am finished.”

“Agreed,” Kara said, looking at him through her armored helmet…which felt useless now, so she retracted it but kept the rest of her armor on.

“Your empire does not worship the Founders. You do not obey them. You break their rules, steal their property, and imprison the Vargemma.”

“You’re too dangerous to let out, or let close to us. The only other option we have is to kill you, and that’s not the way we fight.”

“Why not? It is the most effective option.”

“Because it would be wrong.”

“You just tried to kill me.”

“I didn’t feel like giving you an opportunity to kill me first, which I think you can do easily enough if you wanted to use your other abilities.”

“You fear being unable to defend yourself?”

“Yes,” Kara admitted. “But we can manage it if we stay out of range.”

“That is how I feel. They took my master, who was far stronger than me, and he couldn’t fight back. All my strength means nothing compared to the Founders. They can do with us what they want and we are impotent in their presence.”

“We’re not,” Kara said, knowing how ridiculous that sounded. “We know how to fight in other ways, and we killed one of their emissaries not so long ago. It took a warfleet to do it, but he’s dead and we’re still here.”

“You killed a Founder?” the Mek’tal asked in disbelief.

“No. A Founder came here long ago and trained one from this galaxy to become very powerful. He was left behind to collect races capable of killing Hadarak and put them in a form of stasis to keep them alive when the Hadarak recognized their threat and attempted to wipe them out. One of those races is an ally of ours, and when they refused he killed their leadership in an attempt to intimidate them into serving him. It did not work, and with the help of one of our Essence-equipped warships a massive conventional fleet was able to destroy him.”

“I have heard nothing of this in your records.”

“We don’t feel like sharing everything with people who want to kill us,” Kara rebuked, accepting the fact that he could kill her on a whim, but not really caring to mince words at this point.

“Do the Founders know you killed their emissary?”

“Depends how closely they monitor our communications. Probably not, if they’re as disinterested in us as they claim to be. But who knows.”

“Then the Founders will destroy your empire when they return…unless they find it too burdensome and choose to ignore your actions. I do not know their nature beyond my single encounter, but I know they are unbeatable if they wish to fully attack any opponent.”

“They can’t beat the Hadarak. Their emissary made that pretty clear, and we’ve got intelligence that suggests one of their 3 galaxies is falling and they’re evacuating out to the numerous other galaxies where they have Temples and resources set up. They’re supposedly going to claim one to replace the falling one, and assault it while the Hadarak are busy chewing up their former holdings. So they’re not unbeatable.”

“Your knowledge of Essence is tiny, but your knowledge of the galaxies is far greater than mine. I have no hope of ever seeing my master again, but I wish to avenge him if possible. I have tried to grow as strong as I can alone, without revealing my power to any that might get word back to the Founders, and now I have found you. Something is wrong with your Nuv’ernor, isn’t there?”

“I think so.”

“The Founders are my enemy, and if the Vargemma heard me say that they would try to kill me as well. They are blinded with illogical devotion to those they have never met. There is a craze amongst them. A craze that has been quelled in me. I do not wish to be taken by the Founders, nor do I wish you to be taken. If you have revealed yourself to a Responder, then they will come for you eventually. And when they do, I want to avenge my master if possible, or defy them by eluding their capture. Either way, we have a better chance together, so I will help you, if you will help me.”

“I have to stay alone to keep control over my siphon. If anything distracts me it will open and I cannot stop it without becoming very still and exposed in order to sense it. Unless you know a way to stop it, I cannot train with you or anyone else. That’s why I exiled myself out here.”

The Mek’tal knelt down, bringing his head in line with Kara’s as his knuckles hit the ground, but he reached one of the smaller arms from his back over his left shoulder cluster and extended it out to the Archon.

“Lower your defenses and touch my hand. I will look into you and see if I can identify the problem. You are far less skilled than I or my master when we made our breakthrough. Perhaps it is a simple thing that experience will solve.”

Kara hesitated. “I really don’t like strangers inside my head, and this armor has a mind of its own, so to speak. Do not interfere with it.”

“I will not touch either. I will look into your Core.”

“How?”

“If you do not already know, then there is no point in explaining the technique, but I can teach it to you in time as well as many others.”

“Some are darkside and I don’t want them…just a defense against them.”

“We have much to offer each other, little one. But first I must find the problem, and to do that you must trust me. I cannot look into you while you are fighting me.”

“Will you let me look into your mind first?”

“If that is what it will take to gain your trust. You may enter.”

Kara didn’t hesitate, diving into his head with her Ikrid and feeling his impressive defensive layers peeling back. He was telepathic as well, but not on her level. She could feel that, but he also had more power than her due to his larger brain and 8 million years of experience. Add to that the Essence boost to his telepathy and she could understand why her superior psionics couldn’t do more than distract him momentarily.

But right now he was giving her full access, and rather than trying to steal the knowledge from him concerning Nuv’ernor, Kara delved into his character to try and get a sense of the man.

She spent nearly 12 minutes doing so before pulling back with her mind and reaching out her hand, grabbing his larger one and lowering her own defenses as her Nuv’ernor continued to spill Essence into one of her rings.

Kara felt him reach into her and begin sucking the Essence out himself, more than was coming from her siphon. That should have been painful, but it wasn’t, for he wasn’t taking her lower than normal, merely pulling off the oversurge somehow. She had no idea how that was possible, for every time an Archon tried to take Essence from another it was a horrific experience. Then again, maybe hers was spilling so much he was just sopping up the excess.

Regardless, the burning in her lessened ever so slightly as she felt a presence inside her that was not telepathic. It was closer to her than anyone had ever been before, and it frightened her…but she held her nerve and allowed him to proceed with whatever he was doing.

Suddenly his mind also reached to hers…but it didn’t invade. Instead it offered a memory, one of his own, along with a suggestion. Kara accepted it and tried to use her limited control to implement what he had done many times increasing the flow rate on his siphon.

Hers felt solidified and crusty, but now that she knew better what she was looking at Kara was able to crack it a little…which hurt like hell. She couldn’t try again for several minutes, but the Mek’tal was incredibly patient and stayed with her throughout the following hours as she tried again and again, slowly breaking open her siphon until she obtained the ability to increase its flow rate somewhat.

When she did, he reached into her and drew out of it as much as possible, not allowing her to reduce its size, and after several more hours he suddenly stopped and withdrew from her, which took Kara totally by surprise.

She fell to the ground, hurting badly, but her siphon was shut without her having to force it…and she was in a low level combat mode, wearing armor, with an enemy capable of killing her in an instant right beside her, which meant she was nowhere near the calm and exposed nature that had been required earlier.

Kara lay on the ground, leaning on one shoulder as she looked up at him.

“What did you do?”

“Nudged you along a little. I apologize for the pain involved, but you took it well. You should be able to rest now…for a time. Your siphon is satiated, and will remain so for several days at least.”

“Thank you, Strovok,” she said, coughing as her insides felt like they’d just been used as a piñata at a ninja festival. “My name is Kara. Kara-317. I’m one of Star Force’s war leaders known as an Archon. And I am very grateful to you, even if it won’t last.”

“Will you allow me to train you?” he said, sitting down with a thud nearby her.

“Will you allow me to train you to become a Varkemma?” she countered. “To join our empire and fight against the Founders when the time comes? Because I really don’t think they’re going to ignore us forever. It’s just a matter of time.”

“What training do the Varkemma have that the Vargemma do not?” Strovok asked, confused.

“They’re taught how to be the good guys.”

“Your lightside philosophy?”

“It’s more than philosophy, but yes.”

“I will listen, but I will not swear loyalty to anything or anyone falsely. If you are not convincing, I will not bend.”

Kara laughed. “Challenge accepted. Both ways. But I’m not calling you master.”

“If your empire has killed one trained by the Founders, then I am your apprentice as well.”

“Let’s just go with peers then,” she said, rolling on her back and lowering what little guard she still had up near him as she looked at the sky while trying to control her breathing and let her body heal as much as possible during this rest period. It felt so good not to have to hold her siphon closed manually.

“When you are rested enough, will you call off your hunters? I am still a fugitive for breaking your confinement lines.”

Kara connected to her ship via her Vorch’nas and linked into the battlemap system.

“Done,” she said, tapping her wrist. “Neural interface comm device. You’ve got permission to roam the Temple, just don’t go near any of our stuff. Until you pass as Varkemma, you’re not trustworthy enough to get into a position of advantage on us.”

“I am now.”

“I’m an exception, and a grateful one. Just don’t go near anyone else.”

“I’m staying with you, little one. I have no need to go anywhere else.”

“Alright then, Sensei. Other than rest, what do I need to do?”

“You are so damaged there is nothing more important than rest and healing…though your body requires food. I will find a Caretaker for you,” he said, getting up.

“No need. I brought my own. As long as I’m sitting here, how about you tell me some stories from your 8 million years of experience.”

Strovok sat back down. “As you wish. What do you want to know?”

“Whatever I need to know. How about you start with why the Vargemma hate us so much?”

“You invaded the Temple,” he said simply.

“Other than that. Give me some history. You guys seemed to fight each other all the time before we showed up. Fill me in on what’s going on here.”

“Do you wish me to speak in words, or telepathy?”

“Bit of both. Don’t overload me with telepathy. You’ve got a bigger brain than mine.”

“I will begin then with the Suisusini and their attempted purge of the Hip’tu. It is the most critical offense that still ripples through the fabric of this Temple.”

“Good, start there,” Kara said as she closed her eyes and just laid on the ground in her armor, feeling very good to be able to wear clothes again. The whole exposed thing had become normal, so now her armor felt like a very reassuring blanket that she never wanted to take off again…despite the fact that her new friend could attack her right through it using his Essence techniques.

But whatever. She wasn’t dead and he didn’t want to kill her. Kara had confirmed that much from looking into his mind. Unless he was real good at mental evasion, he was here to help, just as he had said.

And frankly, right now Kara was such a burnt piece of toast inside she didn’t care about how reckless her current situation was. Strovok had provided a bit of relief and a breakthrough, which was more than she could have realistically hoped for yesterday.

Right now all Kara had to do was try and stay awake as she listened to Vargemma story time…but that was one challenge she failed in less than an hour as she fell deep asleep while Strovok kept watch on her.

He was finally no longer alone, and while the return of the Founders was imminent, he did not fear it as he once had. For he too now had a glimmer of hope, and the sleeping little one before him was his key to a future beyond mere hiding. He wanted vengeance, and Star Force had already extracted some against the Founders.

Perhaps together they could achieve a bit more before they were all destroyed.

www.aerkijyr.com

The Powers That Be

1

September 2, 128882

Nien’van Sho’tugo System (Hef’ben Region)

Tien vo Sha’cani

“Take us down,” Oasu’kli ordered as she floated with one hand on the command tree for balance…which was completely unnecessary with the inertial dampeners in the aquatic assault ship, but she’d never gotten out of the habit.

The Elarioni watched the forward vid screen as the view tilted and the orange/green oceans on the planet below rose up to dominate the sky as the flat oval of a ship began descending rapidly into the thick atmosphere toward one of many engagement zones as other recently arrived Jaws-class assault ships dropped on their own volition as Clan Cookie warships covered for them against the Hadarak swarms still in orbit.

The two Wardens that had assaulted this system were already dead, but the troops they’d brought into the system were not. Many special Insertion-class warship minions had circumvented the major space battle and raced out to three inhabited planets in the system. Two of those had already been purged, but the aquatic one was not. Star Force had not yet been able to get evacuation ships here, nor had they initially tried, because this was a V’kit’no’sat system, and it was assumed they’d be able to evacuate themselves.

Most of the groundpounders had, but the mix of aquatic races here did not have the necessary transports to leave and since the original V’kit’no’sat empire was now pretty much a fractured free for all, they weren’t getting the assistance of the empire…rather being left to live or die by their own merits.

But Ivan-029 was having none of it, and he’d sent one of his Clan task forces to preserve as much of the remaining population as possible…yet now that the Hadarak had got their specialized minions into the water and they were reproducing exceedingly fast, orbital bombardment was not going to solve the issue. That meant aquatic combat was necessary, and Clan Cookie didn’t have enough available aquatics troops on its own to get the job done.

Hence the call to the Star Force Elarioni…who had immediately responded.

Oasu’kli floated on the bridge of the 15 mile wide Jaws disc with her command crown fitted snugly to her blue head with her deep red hair flowing down over it whenever she moved forward, but right now she held on to the branch-like control web that the Elarioni used rather than flat consoles. Combined with the mental interlink through her crown, Oasu’kli could command her crew, the troops onboard, and contact other ships in the relief fleet that had recently detached from the spine-like jump cradle that had brought the aquatics ships here in closely packed racks. They were all space-capable, but not built for interstellar jumps. Instead they were meant to land in or above oceans and act as bases of operation rather than do any real fighting, considering their size often exceeded that of the part of the oceans they were landing in.

Her ship descended rapidly, picking up some fireballs along the forward shield arc until it slowed rapidly and leveled out again, taking fire from some Hadarak minion emplacements rising up above the water from the ‘lilly pads’ they were attached to…but the Jaws was too well shielded to care, and it came down right over them and smoked them out of existence with the few ‘space’ weapons it had onboard. Afterwards it settled down into the water without touching bottom, having to rely on running its anti-grav constantly to keep from smashing the ocean and creating a giant tidal wave. Instead it sank in a few hundred meters and stopped, exposing the ventral hangar bays and aquatic weaponry on the hull to the water itself.

“Hold position,” she said in English thanks to some genetic alterations of her race’s vocal chords in the past, for they hadn’t been able to make the necessary sounds originally and always had to rely on translation equipment, but with Star Force’s ever growing medical knowledge they’d been able to fix that incompatibility. “All troops to stand by for my order.”

The Elarioni commander twisted around and swam off the bridge, traveling through the ship until she came to a suction corridor that sped her faster than she could swim through various tunnels until she came near the hangar bay where her personal guard waited. Oasu’kli joined them, grabbing her armor and combat staff, which was double pronged and contained a variety of weapons within it, then she swam to the shield separating the ship’s pure water from the organic water outside that had a musky look to it that was going to reduce vision range even with the bright lights that all the troops were wearing on their person or built into the drone ranks accompanying them.

Oasu’kli activated her comm unit and keyed it to all the troops crammed into the ship that were eager to get into the combat as the V’kit’no’sat aquatics races were getting overwhelmed and forced back into select areas of the planet.

“Attack with no mercy. The Hadarak cannot be captured or negotiated with. Destroy all you encounter before they have a chance to destroy you or your kin. These are the standing Archon orders. Heed them, for they do not counsel mindless bloodshed lightly. The Hadarak are a threat that cannot be tamed, only destroyed. Do so with honor and swiftness. Now unleash our wrath on the butchers,” she said, transmitting the attack tone to everyone simultaneously.

Every hangar on the ship began to spill out infantry, Oasu’kli with them, like tiny minnows moving at high speed preceding the slower combat drones, then following them came the aquatics mechs and smaller warships, the latter of which were detaching from special niches on the underside of the hull rather than coming out of hangars. There was no strategy involved. No battle plans. The V’kit’no’sat were overwhelmed and the Elarioni were not dropping in to reinforce them. In fact they were miles away from even the closest V’kit’no’sat outpost.

They were instead dropping right on top of the thickest concentration of enemy aquatic minions in their staging bases that were being fed by under the seafloor tunnels that were being blocked from orbital scans and thus undetectable by starships.

Oasu’kli and her guards ignored the immediate fighting that broke out as the Elarioni dropped on the aquatic minions with a rage not born only of defense, but one of disgust. Their forms were more agile than the large V’kit’no’sat races, but they were ugly and slow compared to the Elarioni…though not harmless. They were clearly not born of the water, but rather engineered to fight in it, but their forms were made from those of air and the void, and they did not belong here. None of them did.

The closest Hadarak minions were swarmed by the Elarioni infantry and lanced by the energy discharges in their staffs when they made physical contact…meaning the blasts shot into their bodies meters deep, and when they were targeted to the right places even a few shots was enough to down the larger minions…who responded by clouding the waters with toxins that would kill everything but themselves.

Wherever there was combat the ‘ink blots’ would appear, cutting off all vision as the little blue lights of the Elarioni disappeared inside it, then swamp back out when the minion was dead. They didn’t need to breathe the water thanks to their armor, but anything else living in the ocean would die from it, V’kit’no’sat or otherwise. The Hadarak were attacking the oceans itself, and that only further enraged the Elarioni. They did the same to entire planets, ripping apart the land as predators rather than conquerors, but when it came to the water it was a personal matter for the Oasu’kli and her kin.

For if one wanted to conquer the ocean, one did not destroy it in the process.

But the Hadarak didn’t care about the ocean or the planets they were infesting. They were out to destroy all major lifeforms and cared even less about the smaller ones. Several tiny fish corpses no longer than Oasu’kli’s fingers washed by as she swam through them, having been caught in the ink blots as they tried frantically to escape the fighting.

Angered she reached out to her guards telepathically, asking them to shield her for a moment as she mentally connected to the battlemap that was being updated from all the units in the field, sensing the location of their ocean brethren getting caught up in the fighting. She found the safe areas behind them and plotted out escape routes…then used the powerful jewel in her crown to amplify her telepathy in a manner the lower-level races would be able to comprehend.

Then in an act that Aquaman himself would have been proud of, she called on all the sea creatures within range to follow the invisible strands away from the danger that the command ship was now starting to produce with micro-drones popping out of its hull and flashing both lights and telepathic transponders marking the way away from the combat.

Oasu’kli pulsed her telepathy far louder, getting past their frantic evasion instincts and giving them direction they badly needed…and within seconds the bystanders all began to move, even those that had taken cover on the seafloor, and the Elarioni troops parted for them to pass by…but they did not allow the Hadarak the same courtesy as their numbers began to swell as they diverted from other areas and gathered to oppose them.

Which began pulling reinforcements away from the combat with the V’kit’no’sat…which was the point of hitting them behind the current battle lines.

Once the bystanders were on their way clear of the fighting and the toxic zones, Oasu’kli returned her focus to the waters around her and she and her guards descended lower and lower, beneath most of the fighting, as several Shark Bot-class drones accompanied them. They were a multi-tasking design that had enough speed to keep up with them, but could also fight on their own when needed…but mostly they were to support the Elarioni so they could fight in their natural manner without endangering their lives too much. The heavier fighting would be left to the warships, mechs, and larger drones, and Oasu’kli had been well trained in how to pick fights that could be won and avoid those that would get her and her people killed.

So the Shark Bots swam with them deeper and deeper, but eventually some minions moved out to intercept them from the seafloor nubs that surrounded the entrance to one of the tunnels that was basically a highway for minion reinforcements to continually pour out of from their growth fields elsewhere. If she could seal the tunnel it would do more to help the V’kit’no’sat than anything, but the road ahead was well defended.

There were growths all over the seafloor, and some of them began shooting little stinging missiles the size of needles towards them…but the Shark Bots intercepted them with sifting shields that allowed water to pass through but nothing solid, meaning they didn’t slow their progress through the water much, though they did pick up a dirty sheen to them from some of the suspended dirt that got caught.

Oasu’kli turned her group of 18 Elarioni further away from the combat, hoping to circle around behind the tunnel exit, but the minions were having none of it. They sent a group of eel-like attackers towards them, swimming through the water as little flexible corkscrews that would explode on contact with the hard points on their heads…and they had several, each which could detonate without killing the eel until the final one popped and with it a much larger charge inside the body.

One of those little impacts could put a hole in Elarioni armor if their shields were down, and would kill anything else of their size on contact…which was why carrying staff weapons was so overpowering against this type of minion. The Elarioni could strike them before they got within contact range so long as they weren’t too outnumbered, which was why Oasu’kli ordered her guards to engage rather than run, and after a few minutes there were hundreds of dead eels and no casualties to her troops…which continued to try and backdoor the minion formations assaulting the V’kit’no’sat.

She and her guards made it a long way before a huge group of minions of many varieties broke off from the main combat and headed towards them…some of which produced homing missiles that were faster than the Elarioni, but Oasu’kli wasn’t worried. Her group continued swimming as the streaks raced towards them, only to be intercepted by what looked like solid lasers being produced by the prongs on the Elarioni staffs.

They reached out nearly 100 meters, and while they were difficult to move at that range, the little shield columns that separated the water were filled with cutting energy that would slice the projectiles in half on contact…but were programmed not to interfere with each other when one Elarioni’s ‘Fire Line’ crossed with another.

So Oasu’kli’s guards swiped their Fire Lines back and forth like strobe lights, taking out most of the projectiles while the Shark Bots intercepted the few that got through, either with expanding shields or their own ‘laser beams’ emanating from a port on their heads.

But the bulk of the attack had not yet come, for there were thousands of minions ranging in size from half the length of an Elarioni up to the size of a Hjar’at headed their way…but rather than run, Oasu’kli had her group keep swimming in a predictable line.

Then out of nowhere a crash occurred on the ocean top far above them as an Elarioni warship made a leap frog jump through the air to save time and raced down to the depths far faster than anyone could hope to naturally swim. The angular craft was a quarter mile long and sliced through the water like a knife…but a knife that left a huge wake in its passing that disrupted many shots heading for Oasu’kli’s group.

She turned them a different way now that the warship was coming down to give them cover, and from it leapt all manner of weaponry. Fire Lines, Interceptors, shield conduits that sent Dre’mo’don blasts through momentary voids, shield walls that blocked enemy movements to others that grabbed hold of targets and crushed them to death…the Elarioni war chest was a deep one, and the Hadarak had nothing to compare to it. Their strength, as always, was their numbers and their ability to quickly grow new troops in the field from local resources.

But that wasn’t her concern now. The tunnel was, and soon they were all the way around on the backside by themselves while the battle raged above and in front of it as more and more minions continued to pour out and join in the battle.

Yet all that could be seen of the tunnel was the exit orifice. The track of it underground had not been determined, yet the Elarioni had strong enough telepathic ability to pierce down through the mud and rock a decent distance, and working together as a group they could enhance that power enough to become a biological scanning crew tracing a line behind the exit looking for where the tunnel was actually coming from.

They swam well past the midline where it was expected to be, then they began to sense some faint minds below. When they homed in on them all the way to the muddy seafloor, they could sense the swarms moving below on an ascending path, but a shallow one. The tunnel was deep in the rock, but where they now floated it was not so deep to be invisible to their telepathy, and the combat hungry minions being told a fight was near made detecting them even easier.

Oasu’kli marked the position in the battlemap then waited, monitoring and beginning to trace a path back and forth to map out as much of the tunnel as they could get without moving too near the exit that was some 4 miles away at the minimum.

Holding there she watched the combat on the battlemap, for all she could see of her eyes were an occasional flash in the murky distance. The waters had once been clear enough to see, even with the native orange murk to them, but the ink blots made it impossible to now except for a few fortuitous glimpses as the currents moved the dark areas around.

It felt like forever to Oasu’kli, but eventually two streaks from far off emerged on the battlemap, having been dropped from the air. They both bore the mark of Clan Cookie, and moved through the water so fast towards the waypoint that Oasu’kli had dropped that she assumed they were warships…only they weren’t. They were two Garas’tox, probably enhanced by their armor, but swimming faster than Oasu’kli could ever hope to…which seemed backwards, for they were one of the massive aquatic races. There were many of them on this planet, besieged by the Hadarak attack, but these two were not V’kit’no’sat. They were Star Force, and they were coming to Oasu’kli’s waypoint, though to do what she did not know.

Obviously they needed to dig down to the tunnel, but how could two Garas’tox do that? She’d seen many in combat before, but nothing they had could dig through solid rock.

Then she got orders from them…movement orders that had them retreating in their direction and a countdown clock with perimeter warnings.

And they were currently dead center in the danger zone.

“Move,” she ordered while slapping her tail into the effort immediately. All the others followed, swimming in an arrow-shaped formation with the strongest swimmers at the front to break water for the others and gain more speed, for the Garas’tox were not giving them much time to evac…but they had given them enough. Eventually they passed outside the danger zone markers and Oasu’kli continued to swim further away, not sure what was going to happen. They made it to the Garas’tox and slipped into formation with them, swimming back the way they’d came as the countdown reached 10 seconds.

“What is coming?” she asked the long-necked dinosaur scathed in red battle armor alongside the other in identical yellow.

“The ocean cannot shield everything from the void,” the red-clad one said just before the countdown ended and the 6 mile deep water over the spot they’d been highlighting suddenly got slapped from above and parted, all the way down to the seafloor by a shield column.

“Oh,” Oasu’kli said, realizing that wasn’t coming from her aquatics ship…nor any other that the Elarioni possessed. She checked the battlemap beyond the ocean, which required an entirely different view mode, and saw a Clan Cookie Naval battleship hovering in the sky a few miles above the ocean…though when she looked up she saw nothing but black water above her.

It was producing the shield column…which she didn’t think Naval warships were equipped for, though most of them were usually Warship-class and carried drones. The battleship did not, but apparently it had been configured to be able to move the water apart to deliver troops or a drilling team straight down to the ocean floor without them having to swim through all the water…

Then as she belatedly remembered the hazard zone around them that the Garas’tox were fast approached, a blinding white Cleansing Beam shot down from the ship, through the new air corridor, bypassing the water that otherwise would have absorbed the blast, and cored right through the mud into the rock below and blasted down towards the Hadarak tunnel.

The explosion of rock, mud, and what water got through to hit the beam pushed out a mushroom cloud around the perimeter along with an underwater tsunami that obliterated the area around the blast zone…all the way out to the edge of the danger zone where the wave hit the Garas’tox without slowing them too much, though all the Elarioni were thrown back no matter how hard they swam. They were uninjured, but couldn’t catch back up with the Garas’tox at all as the two giant swimmers accelerated and went straight towards the blast zone once the Cleansing Beam ceased and the shield column retreated.

By the time Oasu’kli and her guards got to them, the Garas’tox had already descended through the blast zone and were inside the Hadarak tunnel melee fighting the minions as they came to them from below. The Elarioni swam down towards them to help, then got a redirect behind them from the Garas’tox.

The tiny Elarioni did as ordered, swimming down into the Hadarak tunnel and bypassing the huge boulders that had broken free of the walls and were partially obscuring the travel path. She didn’t know why they didn’t just seal it entirely, then she realized how the two Garas’tox had such a sweet spot here, for the minions couldn’t swarm them…only approach them from one direction…and that gave the two Clansmen the perfect kill zone.

And they’d just ordered the Elarioni to watch their rear for minions coming back up the tunnel from the exit, and to pick up any minions that might get past the Garas’tox.

But that wasn’t likely to happen, because they were savagely cutting down everything that came within reach of their neck, tail, and four energy-blade covered flippers.

Oasu’kli sighed and waited along with the others, hoping something would come through that they could kill, or hoping that something came back up the tunnel from the exit, but for the moment they were just floating in the water and watching as the Garas’tox took all the kills without any signs of tiring…

2

Joor’nak was an aquatic race and third tier member of the V’kit’no’sat Empire…or at least were before the empire’s collapse. Since then they had become far less, with no worlds of their own. The J’gar had claimed most of them, and the Garas’tox had quietly assumed control of the rest without a fight, for the Joor’nak had no limbs to fight with. They were water snakes with a triple tail, but they’d never been allowed Saroto’kanse’vam for their tail tips, making them poor fighters against the larger aquatic races.

But what they did have was size and intelligence, with them being the largest aquatic race by mass, and their Lachka was likewise enhanced by that mass. This made them very good at point defense, construction, mining, and other support duties…but melee combat was not their strong suit, and most of their race’s focus within the empire had been on shipbuilding. They were an aquatic race that had created starships long before they were brought into the empire, unlike most other aquatic races, and it was their warfleet that had given them a position within the V’kit’no’sat above and beyond a slave race.

But that warfleet was long since destroyed in the Zak’de’ron war, and now the Joor’nak had become residents of shared worlds without the ability to leave, making them baggage for the most part, for without their shipyards there wasn’t much they could contribute, and their greater intellect was seen as a threat by the major V’kit’no’sat races…and for that they’d been deliberately suppressed since the old Zak’de’ron had added them to the Empire.

At the time it had been seen as a deliberate slap against the J’gar, bringing in a race with intelligence equal or greater to their own, and once the Zak’de’ron had been thought destroyed the Joor’nak were not rewarded for their assistance with peerdom…but rather barely controlled contempt. They were not given higher status, and were forced to remain in the low level position of a newly added race throughout their membership in the V’kit’no’sat.

When Mak’to’ran took power that had started to change, albeit slowly, but there was a path to ascension there, for he was particularly fond of their warship capabilities and was eager to undo the inequities of the past…but then he was assumed killed and the second war against the Zak’de’ron began.

And through it, the near destruction of the Joor’nak from both sides was nearly complete.

None had been able to join Star Force, for the Joor’nak no longer controlled any worlds…and without their fleet they couldn’t relocate to them or find uninhabited worlds of their own to colonize, for the J’gar were still preying on any non-Star Force vessels. Bio’bo was one of the survivors on Tien vo Sha’cani that expected to die here to the Hadarak for lack of evacuation ships from any race on the planet, for most had already left with those higher up in rank onboard…and none had been Joor’nak.

But now Star Force had arrived in the water to fight the Hadarak and evacuate the V’kit’no’sat here…meaning Bio’bo and the others not only had a chance to survive, but they finally had a chance to get to Star Force and plead with them to join their own Joor’nak faction crafted from vagabonds and those deemed executable that Mak’to’ran had originally sent their way to give them the genetic material necessary to create a splinter race of all the V’kit’no’sat in the Rim.

Bio’bo was longer than a football field and wider than a bus, yet he swam through the water easily as ripples formed along his body and pushed the water backwards to his clasped tail, which looked like a flipper with the three strands flattened out and pushed together to form the most propulsive alignment possible.

Bio’bo wasn’t alone, for there were 6 more Joor’nak following him through the city’s Satu, which when underwater didn’t move individuals along an elevated shield road, but rather squirted water through wide tubes faster than a normal person could ever hope to swim.

The Joor’nak were traveling through those now, swimming along with the current to gain additional speed as they headed for the telepathic beacon coming from Star Force that was transmitting a single thought.

Evacuation Point Here

Bio’bo didn’t need to hear any more than that. He’d been prepared to fight as little as he could with his Lachka against the minions when they broke into the city while the Garas’tox and some Dan’chey were manning the outer defenses, but the latter race was ill suited to fighting as well, leaving only a few number of the Garas’tox that dominated this planet to safeguard the major city in this region…while all the other settlements around it had already fallen.

The Joor’nak had lived in three of those settlements, keeping to themselves until the assaults came. Only a few hundred had survived out of tens of thousands. The Hadarak minions were so fast and numerous the Joor’nak couldn’t sustain their smaller ‘bites’ long enough to escape, though their mass was heavily fortified with biological countermeasures in addition to technological armor that made them hard to kill in most other situations.

They were jokingly referred to as the ‘gentle giants,’ which had been an insult of the J’gar who had Saroto’kanse’vam. The Joor’nak would have eventually been able to earn them under Mak’to’ran’s new order, but too late to help them now…though Mak’to’ran’s experiment with the Rim might be better than that entirely if they could relocate them out of the warzone so far they’d never hear the name Hadarak again.

Bio’bo swam with the others staggered behind him until they came to one of the ‘circumvents’ that allowed an escape from the confines of the Satu or a redirect into the other tunnel that would take them back the reverse direction. The Joor’nak took the ‘off current’ and swam out into the still water before heading down to the city floor and making their way through all manner of buildings that had no obvious design to them.

They were sticking out here and there, and navigating them was like navigating a maze if you didn’t understand the telepathic markers which were thankfully still functioning as the fighting raged overhead. The city shield was already down and the Hadarak minions were in the waters above…which is why the Joor’nak and other aquatic races heading for the evacuation point were staying low and taking the slower way through the buildings to provide them cover.

A trio of Dan’chey were walking on the ground painfully slow, for the amphibians were not true swimmers…and despite their haste, Bio’bo knew they were not going to make it and reached out to them telepathically.

Cling to us, he said, dropping lower and slowing as little as he could manage while indicating a point near his bulbous head.

One of the Dan’chey reached up on its hind legs and floated off the paving stones with one of its four legs extended…then it’s armor latched onto Bio’bo’s armor and yanked the Dan’chey into motion, with him eventually getting all four feet attached to the Joor’nak’s body as two of the other massive water snakes picked up the other Dan’chey in a similar fashion.

Much gratitude, Bio’bo’s rider thanked him as he bobbed back and forth slightly with the Joor’nak’s body undulations. Many are being left behind.

What is happening? Bio’bo asked, knowing the Dan’chey hive mind was probably the best means of getting information now that large chunks of the city’s tactical network were down from unknown damage.

The Garas’tox are retreating and taking the first evacuation spots. The city is being left to the Hadarak.

Cowards.

No, they are overwhelmed. If they stand their currents, they will be lost. The city is falling and nothing can be done of it. But they are not helping Dan’chey. We thank you for helping us.

Are there others in the path ahead? You are light and we can take a few more.

Yes, slightly to the right. If you take next junction path 7…the Dan’chey said, flinching as a huge explosion was heard/felt above them.

They had to swim further before there was a break in the buildings to see what was the source of the detonation…and to Bio’bo’s dismay a ship had crashed into the water right on top of the Hadarak swarms assaulting the city spires where the Dan’chey and others were putting up some light defensive fire.

But the ship that had ‘crashed’ had done so intentionally, for it was now spewing out thousands of tiny objects that were engaging the minion swarms and immediately diverting them from the spire fields they had been destroying.

Do you know what those are? Bio’bo asked.

Tiny aquatic troops from Star Force called ‘Elarioni.’ Fast but weak. Ferocious like Rit’ko’sor, but smell better.

Bio’bo took the next junction as suggested, doing a corkscrew upwards and around a bend until sliding back down into an angular path that brought them up on another line of Dan’chey walking slowly in the water and using their tails for as much extra propulsion as they could. The Joor’nak picked all of them up, leaving Bio’bo with three riders in total, and slowing him down considerably, but it seemed the minions were too distracted by the Elarioni to care…for the most part. Two of their lumpy masses saw the Joor’nak and swam down through the buildings to come after them, but the combined telekinetic defense ripped them in half before they could get close enough to harm them.

They swam on without incident all the way to the telepathic beacon, where they saw several giant straws dipping down from the distant surface to the city floor, inside of which there was a current taking those nearby upwards…which several mechanical beasts flanking the entrance of the straws and occasionally firing tiny projectiles upwards to intercept Hadarak minions getting too close.

Where do those go? one of his Dan’chey riders asked.

I do not know, but the only way off this planet is by starship.

Perhaps it is Satu to another region?

Whatever it is, we are going in. If you wish to stay here, detach now.

We will go as far as you will take us.

Then hold on, Bio’bo said as other aquatic races were pinching in around them as they were all crowding together to get into the current being sucked into the giant straw. The Joor’nak tried to make sure their Dan’chey clingers didn’t get scraped off by collisions, having to telekinetically nudge others aside when needed, but then they felt the grip of the current grab them and haul them upwards…but nobody floated with it. Instead they raced up it to get away from the combat as fast as possible, with Joor’nak being the slowest of the group other than the loose Dan’chey that were being bumped around like toys as the true swimmers passed them by.

He grabbed two more that were being helplessly smashed into the sidewalls and added them to his riders, shoving a Garas’tox aside with a jab to its neck when it slapped a fin on his tail. That more than got his attention and the sleek ‘superior’ V’kit’no’sat swam by him with an angry glance, but kept his distance. The discord being shown here was very un-V’kit’no’sat-like, and Bio’bo wondered if all the underpinnings of the empire were now gone as well as their territory and leadership.

When they got to the top of the straw Bio’bo saw he had been right, for they swam out into a much larger receiving area surrounded by shield walls at a distance. Dan’chey covered the floor as they walked/swam forward towards receiving ports that had little Elarioni stationed at them giving telepathic orders on the other side of the walls, through which the Joor’nak passed, seeing the normal murky waters of the planet clear up immediately as the residue in the water was filtered out.

It smelled fresher than Bio’bo could ever remember sensing.

Thank you, Joor’nak, the Dan’chey said, all letting go simultaneously and drifting to the distant floor below where their kin were as Bio’bo swam on ahead and got in line behind a Sess’nat. When it passed through another shield gate, the huge Joor’nak came to a halt with a reverse wave that made the Elarioni swim for a moment to hold position.

I and the other Joor’nak wish to accept the Star Force invitation to join in the war against the Hadarak. Until now we have been unable to make contact.

Noted, she said as a scanning beam reached out and contacted Bio’bo’s armor. Please allow genetic sampling so we can catalog you. I will attach your intentions to your file and once you reach a safe port you will be redirected accordingly.

Bio’bo retracted his armor into a single collar that ran around his ‘neck’ just behind his head, which allowed the beam to contact his flesh and take a sample.

Follow the markers, the Elarioni said as holographic orbs formed in front of him like escorts and directed him through the indoor pond they were now within towards a specific aperture in the distance.

From there he was essentially a prisoner onboard a Star Force aquatics transport, feeling very confined in the ‘small’ ship that was appropriately large for his size, but with many areas configured for the smaller aquatics races, leaving him and the other Joor’nak with limited movement options as they were eventually taken away from the planet and began a long journey across the stars…but one where they did not have to worry about J’gar ambushes, for they wouldn’t dare strike a Star Force ship, knowing what payback would come if they did. Star Force may have been seen as ‘timid’ to the V’kit’no’sat in their aversion to offensive combat, but everyone knew their sense of vengeance had been inherited from the V’kit’no’sat and had not been tempered by the Rim.

Attack them, and you would lose more than a few personnel or ships in recompense. They might not kill you, but they’d take your entire planet and your civilization’s sovereignty with the same alacrity as the V’kit’no’sat had when some lesser race dared to strike them…except Star Force reacted the same way with the more capable opponents, and even the J’gar knew better than to test them.

And what he had briefly witnessed of their combat with the Hadarak hadn’t shaken that assessment, so when he finally got his face to face discussion on a Star Force aquatics world just on the far side of the Hula Hoop over a year later, he was blunt but polite, knowing that he had no leverage whatsoever.

We have a few options to offer you, Joor’nak, the Elarioni said telepathically as she swam up in front of his huge face that was more than capable of swallowing her whole if he wanted to. It is noted that you wish to join the other Joor’nak in Star Force?

I and the others do. We were denied the opportunity by geography, otherwise we would have answered the call earlier.

The Elarioni squinted. So you wish to join the Grand Border V’kit’no’sat?

We do.

That is not what the Joor’nak are doing. They are a faction in the Rim, though now they’re being renamed the ‘Falkor’ now.

I do not understand the division. I thought all of your Knight races were tasked with fighting the Hadarak?

We have a large empire with many battlefronts and needs. The new V’kit’no’sat are tasked to only the Grand Border. The Knight races are tasked with going wherever in the galaxy they are needed. That may be to fight the Hadarak, perhaps not. The Grand Border V’kit’no’sat are focused on defending a specific slice of territory and holding it in perpetuity. We are currently accepting Joor’nak into this new V’kit’no’sat, as well as offering some positions in the Falkor. In addition, there are other options.

Name them.

Assisting other aquatic races with exploration, colonization, and construction of new ocean civilizations to accommodate other evacuees coming from the Core. We do not have enough room to house everyone, thus we are being forced to expand rapidly. Often to oceans that are less than ideal, that we have to terraform or create contained cities within. Joor’nak are heavily requested in these efforts due to your Lachka skills, but the choice of paths is yours. I have 3910 colonization teams that have requested Joor’nak after they have completed indoctrination, which you already did on your journey here.

Where can I assist Star Force the most?

Highest priority recruitment notice is from Ariel’s team. She is one of the Elarioni’s Matriarchs, and is older than Star Force itself. She has been given a rare aquatic system that is raw and dangerous, but has the potential for 48 oceanic worlds of a minimum 85% water to land ratio.

48 aquatic worlds in the same system?

Many are toxic, and all are undesirable in some way, which is why they have never been colonized, but there is potential if suitable resources are applied to the terraforming. Several have indigenous races of low intellect and high predatory nature. For security reasons, Joor’nak are highly preferred to patrol the untamed depths and bring some sanity to the savage currents.

As hunters?

As bastions of sanity. If we wanted them killed that would be easy to do. Taming them is far harder, but all sour oceans have the potential harmony within them. Crafting it anew is a daunting task that will take millennia to even partially achieve.

And this aquatic system is going to house refugees?

I do not know. If it does not, those going to it will free up slots for refugees on other worlds. Either way, the habitation created will assist the evacuation efforts considerably given the size of the oceans in play, some of which are hundreds of miles deep.

Hundreds of miles deep. Bio’bo had dreamed of such worlds, but had never been allowed on one. He had only inhabited 4 in his lifetime, all of which were shallow.

I will answer your Matriarch’s call. Send me to this system.

The Elarioni smiled. I had hoped you’d say that. There is a transport filling for departure within the week. You will find it this way…

3

May 4, 128885

Neverending Seas System (Zutarri Kingdom)

Prime 3

Ariel swam without armor through the slowly improving waters of Scaravo Trench, a place no one else was allowed to go without armed escort, but she needed none. Nor did she need armor encapsulating her against the waters she was tasked with calming. She needed to feel them against her bioluminescent skin and see the light the patches and her glowing eyes produced reflecting off the otherwise dark depths.

But she could see far more than that. None of the creatures here could sneak up on her when she was on guard, for she could feel their Cores even when hidden behind solid rock. Ariel’s Essence abilities separated her from the rest of the Elarioni and allowed her the freedom to explore and troubleshoot on a world too raw and dangerous for others to inhabit at the moment.

‘Prime 3’ was the name she had given it, for it was one of the largest planets with the most water. All those within this system were given the ‘Prime’ designation and had no landmasses rising above the waves at all…though she was creating a few artificial ones to facilitate transport from one water world to another. Aquatic ships were not built for such things, though the larger ones could manage the hop from planet to planet when necessary, yet to build an integrated aquatic system rather than have vastly different civilizations on each world yet right beside one another, you must have communication and transit.

The air bastions would create this, as well as give the air breathers a place comfortable enough to work with the water breathers. The amphibians would not like it here, due to the depths, so the ‘Shore’ worlds would be built for them, but the Primes were for the truest swimmers, and this world was not uninhabited.

As she swam she could feel the little fish around her, swimming frantically back and forth as they tried to avoid the larger predators. On other days she was down here hunting them…but not to kill. They required genetic alteration to change their nature from predator to defender, though specific templates had to be established for each race before such modification. Also, food ‘Splooshes’ had to be devised for them, which were like little balloons designed not to disintegrate in the water like most Star Force air breather food did.

Little machines would one day coat the seat floor drawing in resources from the depths and fabricating the Splooshes much like plants did, though these could operate without sunlight or other stimulus, for they operated on power cores that had to be refilled by carriers…and one day the little fish around her now would become some of those carriers. Carefully, piece by piece, she would alter the darkside ecosystem here that had one race only surviving on the carnage of another, and in its place would be waters of harmony…but that was a monstrous task Star Force had only achieved in 18 other worlds across their entire empire…and she had 193 planetoids here that were going to be terraformed into at least partial aquatic worlds.

It was so much work Ariel knew she would not be leaving perhaps for the rest of her life…but that thrilled her rather than depressed, for the work was what she desired. Fighting nature itself to free those born into horrible situations crafted beyond their choice. The ‘Lifesprings’ spoken of by the Founders were of great interest to her…yet they only seemed interested in the preservation of races, not individuals, and had crafted some to exist solely off the death of others.

Ariel knew that if she ended the killing here, overpopulation would cause a different kind of carnage as there became too many mouths to feed, for they would reproduce by instinct rather than wisdom. Those genetic instructions also had to be altered, and there was so many ways that a project like this could go wrong that Director Davis had not authorized such intervention except on rare occasions…but as an air dweller he had a different perspective from stepping on the little ones without even realizing it.

But in the water there were no steps, all floated, and as such the vast throngs of life could coexist in close quarters if they chose to…or were instructed to, and Ariel had convinced him to let her try on another world with a small ocean.

Her success there had given her his trust, and when he requested that she terraform this system into a massive aquatic civilization, Davis had left the details entirely up to her. She knew he was concerned about the lesser ones being accidentally harmed, but he also saw the potential benefit and had decided to withdraw himself from the matter in this rare case and let her take the lead.

Which meant success or failure was on her fragile shoulders…as was the fate of all ocean dwellers here and on the other worlds. She had to make this work, for she couldn’t stand to build cities while letting the carnage of the deep ocean continue. All deserved to live, but in order to give them a chance she had to fight nature itself…and as daunting a task that might be, she intended to win.

As Ariel swam a swift moving predator raced up towards her from the niche in the rocks to her right, but her telepathy enhanced by psionic upgrades and Essence allowed her to take control of its mind and cause it to relax enough for her to swim up alongside it and press a hand just behind its cluster of 18 eyes.

Follow the path, she said, having to use other means than words to insert her instructions into its mind…then when she finished it swam off and upwards, away from its hunting grounds in search of the promised location she had given it where there would be enough food that it would never go hungry again.

It wasn’t a hollow promise, for Ariel had set up feeding machines in a variety of places out here for different races. Sending predator and prey to the same location would be horrific, but isolate them and it would subdue the carnage until reprogramers could construct the necessary templates…approved by Ariel…and then begin to collect individuals and free them from the darkside shackles of nature imprinted into their genetic memory.

Ariel continued on, swimming a couple hundred meters off the seafloor as she searched for one of the larger ocean dwellers on this planet. They didn’t have a name yet, but she used the placeholder ‘ublu’ which came from her people’s original language and meant a ‘very friendly big guy.’

Except these ublu weren’t all that friendly. They weren’t predators, but kept to themselves for the most part aside from mating once every 12 years. They were also known to have chunks of their bodies missing from predators coming up and chewing on them, for they couldn’t outswim them, but due to their large size they wouldn’t easily be killed either.

Because of that they tended to go where most of the predators weren’t, and that typically was in the Jo’bi fields that would kill most predators on contact with their electrically charged spines that rose off the seafloor like grass…except they were the size of trees.

The ublu could withstand the strikes, whether by their composition or mass Ariel did not know, but they didn’t always stay in there and sometimes they would come out into the upper levels of the trench to feed on ‘sun saplings’ that were drifting down from the surface. They were native plants that grew until the bulbs on them became so heavy they detached and sank like slow little bombs all the way to the seafloor…except they rarely made it that far before being snatched up as free food by many different races, including some that couldn’t eat them, for which the sun saplings became toys until they tired of carrying them around in their mouths or tentacles.

Ariel hadn’t found an ublu yet today, but just as she detected a large presence on the horizon of her senses she got a comm via her narrow crown that was holding the forward part of her green hair from drifting down into her face.

The Elarioni immediately spun upward, heading straight to the surface as fast as her tail could take her as she summoned an aqua-pod to her location, with the water-filled anti-grav ‘egg’ craft popping up out of the water above the nearest underwater tower and cheat traveling through the air to cover the hundreds of miles of distance far faster than one could underwater.

It was waiting for her by the time she reached the surface, hovering a meter over the water until she called it down and slithered inside, rubbing her tail over the edge of the hatch that quick sealed up again, leaving her in a small booth large enough to hold four Elarioni or something larger, but to her it still felt incredibly confined…especially when it left the ocean waters for the air…which for a water breather was a toxic environment.

Fortunately she didn’t have to travel through it for long as the ‘egg’ took her to one of the settlements in this cluster where new arrivals were constantly coming in near a submerged shipyard that was building both aquatic and naval warships for her use here and across the star system.

Ariel had the egg drop her in the water just outside the settlement, then she swam in through one of the numerous entry points on her own, navigating the ‘safe’ zone that was surrounded by shield walls to keep the predators and other native beings out of the Star Force city. She eventually came to a receiving area where many dropships were floating and offloading passengers from the aquatic transports in orbit that were not designed to land themselves on a planet.

And out of one of those dropships had come a single V’kit’no’sat that was waiting patiently on the floor, curled up three times into a coil as his triple tail flicked in a slow rhythm that Ariel sensed was eagerness.

The Elarioni swam over to the Joor’nak with a smile on her face.

Hello there. My name is Ariel. I was told you were coming. I’m glad they finally sent one of you. I am in great need of your help.

Are you, little one? Bio’bo said suspiciously. What do you require of me that your empire does not already have in ample amounts?

Size. Most like you have gone to combat. Building has been left to the smaller races.

There were many Elarioni that came to the war to rescue me.

I didn’t say the small ones only built, but when combat calls a single Joor’nak is far more capable than a single Elarioni. We become dangerous in numbers, and numbers have a habit of thinning in war. Star Force does not like to fight in this way, so the bigger you are, the better suited you are for fighting the Hadarak in the contested oceans. How is it that I have the fortune of claiming you?

I was told this is where I could help the most, so I chose it, Bio’bo said, loosening his coil a bit as his head raised up even to where Ariel floated. You are the ancient Matriarch I was told about?

Depends on what you mean by ‘ancient.’ You are probably far older, are you not?

I am half as old as Star Force. I am told you predate it?

We began at nearly the same time, though I did not originate within it. I was rescued by Star Force and taught the ways of self-sufficiency, and have sought to repay that debt ever since. This system is my great repayment, and I need your assistance along with that of many others.

Explain how I may help.

The waters are savage. Beyond the safe zones carnage occurs on such a scale my people here cannot free swim in them…but you can. Nothing here can match your strength, nor will many try. In nature your biology holds supreme, and where you go the others will adjust to your presence…whereas they will attack me not knowing my strength. Your strength is obvious, and I need it for many tasks, but primarily so you can free swim where others cannot.

What dangers are there here?

Many threats lurk, few show themselves until revealed. The ocean is scared, even the predators, and I do not know why. If there is something greater here to scare them, I have not yet found it.

Have you searched their minds?

Yes, but I have found no encounters to justify it. The tenseness is not something I have encountered in other waters, but it is everywhere on this world and several of the others in the system, but not all. Not most. I cannot explain it.

You wish me to solve this mystery for you?

That is not why I asked for a Joor’nak, but I would be glad if you did.

Show me the threats you have encountered, Bio’bo said, then he received a telepathic data dump far too complex and powerful for the tiny Elarioni to produce.

How are your skills this advanced? The others of your race were not so powerful of the mind.

I am unique, and have been enhanced by the Trailblazers themselves. I hold great honor in this, and they have bestowed upon me genetic upgrades knowing that I will return their generosity with results others would not achieve. I have your Ikrid, whereas the others of my race do not, though their natural ability has been enhanced greatly for those Elarioni that serve Star Force. The lesser number who do not are now an inferior bloodline that do not mix eggs with us. They have their own worlds, protected by Star Force’s dominion, but they do not seek to serve any but themselves.

You sound displeased with them?

There is lingering sadness, but most Elarioni have heard the call of the empire, and our race is now of Star Force. The others are little more than an afterthought.

So it was those of the superior bloodline that rescued me?

The others would not care to fight the Hadarak unless they appeared in their waters.

I did not observe much, but your forces were efficient in fighting the Hadarak minions. I hope I can repay my debt here, in your service. The threats you have shown me I can handle. Do you wish me to explore the wilds?

Not at the moment, but soon. I am told your race possesses great wisdom. Is this true of you?

We are more intelligent than most, but not wise. Our race has been making foolish decisions throughout our history in the V’kit’no’sat, and we have been suppressed because of them. We never rose above it, and now stand scattered and with no worlds of our own. I could not even come to Star Force when your Trailblazers offered annexation. I was fortunate that combat brought your empire to me so I could join it.

Nevertheless, I wish to use your outside perspective to my advantage. Those within Star Force tend to think alike due to identical origins. Yours is far different, and I hope you will see things I do not.

What is it you wish to ask?

Follow, Ariel said, slowly swimming away as the giant Joor’nak unfurled and swam behind her as she remembered to take the largest pathways out to open water, for he would not fit through most of the others.

What we have built is but the seeds of the future, and I am still designing that future, she said as they swam through the corridors. I am tasked with making this system a true aquatic one. Most worlds that have oceans regard them as a dumping ground for the air breathers or the refuse piles for the air-dumped waters to cleanse the land. Where civilizations have coexisted, it is the land that has gained the dominance and reached into space while we prefer to stay in our waters. Is it different in the V’kit’no’sat?

Much different. The J’gar are of the founding Triad, and they represent aquatic dominance in the waters of the deep and the greater waters of the universe.

You refer to the void as another water? Yet you cannot swim in it?

Our vessels allow us to swim in it, and it is the greatest of oceans that encompasses all land. Land is tiny and rare, the great ocean is all-present, and in it those of the water, the land, and the air are equal in our inability to reside in it without our ships. Only the space dwellers can, and there are none in the V’kit’no’sat. Are there any in Star Force other than your Uriti?

None that are more than wards, and those do not possess technology or civilization. They are embraced by the nature of the void, which I heard is mostly solitude with few predators.

They remain a mystery to me, but they can live in the great ocean where few others can. Does Star Force have a bias against aquatics?

No, but we are mostly separate from the air breathers, and all the leaders of Star Force are air breathers. They protect us, help us clean and protect the waters, and the Archons swim with us. They alone are the bridge between the water and the air, and they are few and gone to the war. There are none here, so the design of this system is mine to make, or mine to fail, and I wish to find a way to do more in the void…in the ‘great ocean’ than they expect of us. The Hadarak threaten the waters the same as the land, yet most of the defense of our empire comes from the air breathers. I do not like them carrying so much of this burden, but confining ourselves to starships is not in our nature.

I spent much time onboard your ships, and they lack that which no ship can have when designed for the necessities of war.

What is that?

Ample space. There are always walls, whereas we and the avians require freedom more than the land dwellers. They like walls. They give them comfort and protection. I do not understand the avians, for they are more vulnerable, yet they prefer the airy tops of buildings that offer no protection. The water embraces us unlike the others, while the air feels cold and cruel. We do not wish to give up this comfort, and it can be maddening to think what is beyond the walls of a starship. That we cannot flee if needed, nor move at all even encased in protective armor when thrown out into the void…what is it?

Ariel had already led him out into open water and they were moving away from the city, yet not past the shield walls when her attention was diverted to the left and upward. Bio’bo scanned that way with his psionics, but could detect nothing of interest there, though there were many swimmers in the area.

Little one? he asked again, this time getting a casual response.

I don’t know, Ariel said, staring at something he couldn’t see, but to her it was obvious. It was an Essence Rush, but one at extreme range. Too extreme. Almost as if it…

Where is the threat? Bio’bo demanded as her emotions went icy cold and her body became visibly rigid.

Not here, she said, staring at the bright flare of Essence that did not diminish. I don’t think it’s in this star system. But whatever it is, it is a monster…and I know we have nothing that can match it.

4

May 27, 128885

Stugarrata Nebula (Tovok Kingdom)

Kappa Temple

“What is it, Responder?” Mak’to’ran asked on the desert plains where Cal-com had built him an Obi-wan-esk solitary dwelling where he could train in private away from the Vargemma and the Elcee.

“Specify,” it replied in V’kit’no’sat, which Mak’to’ran still used when alone despite his now normal Star Force language skills that he’d had all in his former empire mentally download.

“The Essence rush that remains steady in the sky. What is its source?”

“It is beyond the Temple.”

“On the exterior?”

“No. Far beyond. It comes from the Galactic Core.”

Mak’to’ran turned and looked at it once again, shining in its invisible light on the other side of the Temple…or so it appeared. “How is that possible? Essence diminishes quickly with range.”

“This is true, but the large amount being emitted in the Core is of such a potent nature that it persists in the void longer than normal.”

“How can you determine its location?”

“My database includes only one potential source for such an occurrence. I cannot determine if it is of another nature, but if it is a match, then it can only occur in the Core where the Galactic Gateways are.”

“What is it precisely that you surmise I am seeing?”

“A Hadarak Colonization Spore.”

“Define it,” Mak’to’ran said, still looking at the distant, yet constant Essence Rush.

“It is their primary mechanism for seeding a new galaxy with their leadership. It is a living vessel with the mass of a star in which an invasion force is carried along the Gateways. The Essence required to move it with sufficient speed to arrive at the destination galaxy before the inhabitants die from lack of resources is immense, and can usually be seen across the expanse of the departure galaxy.”

“How many Wardens does it carry?”

“None.”

“Does it carry minions?”

“No.”

“What then does it carry?”

“The leadership only.”

Mak’to’ran turned his gaze back to the red obelisk. “Can the leadership fight?”

“Once they are within their natural environment it is believed they can, though the Founders have never engaged them directly, so I cannot satisfactorily answer that question.”

“Why are the leadership not vulnerable upon arrival?”

“The Spore defends them.”

“The transport is combat capable?”

“It is the most dangerous asset the Hadarak possess. The Founders have never been able to successfully engage one.”

“Does it possess Essence weaponry?”

“Yes. It also possesses such mass and conventional weaponry to make it resilient against the Heidoor long enough for the leadership to get established. They will then create the other Hadarak forms from pieces of the Spore as it is cannibalized to supply immediate forces necessary to establish a foothold. If needed, once the foothold is established, other reinforcements can use the Gateways to support the new Colony. Without a foothold they would quickly die if the arrival area is guarded.”

“Are most Gateways guarded in galaxies the Founders and the Hadarak do not possess?”

“The Gateways are the largest gravity wells, and such large wells are the primary residences of the more massive Heidoor. They are never unguarded.”

“This Spore will then go into battle upon arrival?”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Are the leadership in this galaxy fleeing it?”

“They do not flee. They multiply and expand. Growing a Colony Spore is a massive expenditure that requires millions of years, with variability options depending upon available resources.”

“Then this Spore was grown long before the galactic purge began?”

“Yes.”

“Why would they send it now when this galaxy is not fully under their control?”

“It is fully under their control. They do not inhabit all of it in order to avoid attracting the Apocalypse Monsters, but they are in full control of it. The Temples are placed in the areas where they choose not to inhabit, but the galaxy is fully theirs to prune as they see fit.”

“It will not be pruned this time, Responder.”

“Until the Founders return the Hadarak will not be overcome. Any attempt to fight them is futile.”

“We are about to disprove that,” the Era’tran said reflexively, then glanced back at the Essence Rush as a sense of the stupidity of his words flowed over him. The Hadarak were so unconcerned with Star Force and the V’kit’no’sat that they were launching an invasion of another galaxy and splitting their resources to do so. Either the Hadarak were underestimating Mak’to’ran’s new empire, or they were more formidable than anyone was imagining.

“Please supply relevant data for analysis.”

“The major combat has not yet begun,” Mak’to’ran said dismissively. “How long will this Essence Rush last?”

“Years. Obtaining the necessary speed cannot be done quickly with such mass, even with Essence enhancement of biological gravity drives.”

“Will it not pass beyond the effective gravity field long before then?”

“The Core of the galaxy has many gravity wells. Launch is conducted off the strongest, then the others that are passed by are used to add speed before the galactic field cluster is left behind. When that occurs, the Essence Rush will disappear and the Spore will become ballistic until it reaches the cluster field of the destination galaxy.”

“Do you know where this one is going?”

“Not until the other Temples relay their positioning data. When all are combined, we will have accurate tract analysis.”

Mak’to’ran huffed. “Are you saying the Temples act as a sensor array for these large Essence Rushes?”

“Affirmative.”

“Can you track the smaller ones?”

“Dependent on range, yes.”

“Can you detect Lurker combat?”

“The size of the Essence Rush is the determining factor, as well as the potency. There is no definitive range limit.”

“Define ‘potency.’”

“That lesson is beyond your current skillset and thus unavailable to you at present.”

“Can the launch of a Spore be detected from another galaxy?”

“On some occasions, if the galactic range is not too far. Essence will return to its natural realm even without physical collision over the course of time. Even Essence crafted to resist this decay cannot persist in our realm permanently without a Lifeform to attach to.”

“Does this sensor array monitor other massive Essence Rushes?”

“It will detect any that occur with significant magnitude within the local region.”

“Are there others occurring within this galaxy?”

“I do not have information from the other Temples, nor access to the primary sensors in this one. I am detecting the Essence Rush from this facility by similar mechanisms of scale as you possess. I am a database terminal, not an access node for the Temple’s active systems.”

“Can the Temples see others beyond the Hadarak that use such great power?”

“The Founders have encountered none that can match the output of a Hadarak Colony Spore other than the Apocalypse Monsters themselves.”

Mak’to’ran flinched. “Do you have recordings of such occurrences?”

A hologram appeared of a galaxy, but nothing was detailed in it except star positions.

“What am I seeing?”

A light pulsed to his left, far outside the map to get his attention, and he saw several dim icons represented there.

“Is that the location of the Apocalypse Monsters?”

“They do not return to the same place after consuming their targets, so we only know of their location when they activate. The Essence Rushes they used to propel themselves toward the target galaxy are visible by the Temples and give the Founders forewarning when they are coming, but there is nothing the Founders can do to stop them. Their Essence output levels are beyond measuring.”

“By what factor must they outscale the current Essence Rush in order to be visible on the map you now show me?”

“The smallest detected prior to the destruction of Hettaris was on a magnitude of greater than 10 billion.”

Mak’to’ran’s large Era’tran frame suddenly felt very small. “What happened to the galaxy you show me?”

“Hettaris was purged of 28% of its star systems before the mild incursion ended and the Apocalypse Monsters disappeared into the intergalactic void.”

“Was this a galaxy with Temples in it?”

“Yes.”

“Where they destroyed?”

“Some were, most survived.”

“And what has become of this galaxy now?”

“The Lifesprings created new systems in the devoured tracts of the galactic swirl and caused a spewing of new proto-matter from the Galactic Core to feed the development of others in the far future.”

“What is this ‘proto-matter’ that you speak of?”

“There are points in every galaxy where matter and energy spontaneously emerge. Most are usually dormant, but after the Apocalypse Monsters finish their destruction many of these Spring Points are opened and new material and energy is deposited in the galactic swirl.”

“I have never heard of such occurrences,” Mak’to’ran said, fascinated by the new knowledge that was pouring forth from the Responder. “Where are they located in this galaxy?”

“They are always located near galactic center, and the Hadarak prize these locations second only to the Gateways.”

“As a fuel source?”

“Affirmative.”

“How do you know they are connected to the Lifesprings?”

“Whenever a Lifespring occurs a massive Essence Rush is detected with unlimited potency.”

“The Temples can track these as well?”

“Without fail. They are of a greater potency than the Colony Spore jumps.”

“Have you ever detected one?”

“On average, 18 occur each century within this galaxy.”

Mak’to’ran’s jaw dropped. “Are we under Apocalypse Monster attack as well?”

“Lifesprings do not only occur after an attack.”

“Can you determine where these are actively occurring?”

“Not with enough alacrity to observe them directly, but their positions are able to be pinpointed by the Temples, though not by this unit.”

“How do you know what the average is then?”

“Basic data is updated into the database periodically. The occurrence rate is one such modification that is regularly made.”

“Are the locations of the previous occurrences also added to your database?”

“Negative.”

“So you are given enough data to teach, but not to allow those within the Temples to monitor events beyond?”

“The purpose of the Temples is to teach and allow for training. The Founders are tasked with dealing with what is beyond.”

“As am I,” Mak’to’ran argued lightly. “Can you show me one of these Colony Spores?”

The galactic hologram disappeared, replaced by what looked like a squid with 29 tentacles coming off the rear of the ‘vessel.’

“Why is the shape the way it is?”

“Intergalactic collisions must not be allowed to damage the leadership, and much mass is collected enroute through such collisions. A sacrificial section of the Spore thus precedes the portions with vital compartments.”

“It’s a ram?” Mak’to’ran asked, referring to the bulbous head on the front that was a third wider than the rest of the ‘squid.’

“A ram intended for small collisions or a single rogue planet. Successive collisions with planetary bodies will destroy the Spore, and 3 such expansions have been documented as failures because of obstruction of the Gateways.”

“Accidental or intentional obstruction?”

“One accidental, two intentionally arranged by the Founders in galaxies that they expanded to prior to the Hadarak’s arrival.”

“They mined the Gateway approaches with mass traps?”

“It is one of many techniques used to slow the expansion of the Hadarak, but containment has become impossible. They continue to spread to new galaxies, and those galaxies provide reinforcements to those that already exist, further strengthening them against any counter-force coming from within.”

“This is why you believe our efforts stand no chance of defeating them?”

“One of many reasons.”

“Does the travel of the Hadarak reinforcements occur with a similar Essence Rush?”

“Ones of much smaller magnitude for the larger carrier vessels, but none for the smaller.”

“Can the Wardens travel on their own?”

“If the galactic distance is small, the larger ones can. Resource depletion and accuracy of jumplines are the determining factors. Wardens are not designed for such travel, while their carrier vessels are.”

“If we are able to damage the Hadarak forces in our galaxy sufficiently, will that prevent them from growing another Colony Spore?”

“They will prioritize local combat over expansion.”

“Then we can protect other galaxies by containing the Hadarak here?”

“Theoretically yes. But without the Founders’ assistance you will not survive the current purge long enough to damage their ability to expand. They are most likely beginning to grow a new Colony Spore now unless your attrition rate is high enough to concern them. Based on your inability to stop their advance, I calculate that to be unlikely.”

Mak’to’ran looked back to the dim spark in the sky that would not go away. “Not only do they insult us by denying us the right to exist, they do so while using this galaxy as a power base to invade another. I once thought the Zak’de’ron were the ultimate power in this galaxy, and now I find my peers to be nothing but overlooked denizens too unimportant to be noticed by the true powers that dominate this galaxy. Even your Founders spurned the Zak’de’ron as a race, while choosing one of them to be recruited into their service.”

“The universe is an overlapping of multiple perspectives. Even the Hadarak and Founders cannot contend with the Apocalypse Monsters, nor know their origin or purpose. They are to be avoided, just as your kind are to avoid the dominant powers in this galaxy if you wish to continue to exist. You have drawn out the Hadarak by some means you did not understand, but those who take refuge in the Temples will survive it. The Founders have provided you sanctuary against them and the Universe.”

“For what price?”

“The price of assisting them in destroying the Hadarak in this galaxy when the time is ripe for their return.”

“And when will that be?”

“When the strength of those in the Temples is sufficient to warrant their return.”

“That is a lie,” Mak’to’ran said, arguing with the machine but not caring, for it was his only active contact out here in the desert between Cal-com’s occasional visits. “We have the power now to fight the Hadarak, but the Founders’ Apprentice chose to suppress it. He wanted us to run, to put us into Encapsulation to store us away for a future time that most likely would never occur. We have the power to defeat the Hadarak now, and we are beginning to use it.”

“What power do you possess that I am unaware of?”

“We are warriors. Do you know what that means, Responder?”

“Those that fight for a profession.”

Mak’to’ran huffed. “Wrong. Warriors are those that have the will to stand up against the impossible because the conflict is righteous. And it is the warriors that will wade into combat not knowing how they will achieve victory, but crafting it along the way.”

“How do you know victory is possible before ascertaining the correct strategy?”

“We can smell it, Responder. That is not something a machine would understand, nor do I think those who programmed you could understand. If they did, they would have some Founders in every galaxy leading the resistance against the Hadarak. Instead they leave useful machines behind with dubious purposes.”

“My purpose is clear. To train those who would resist the Hadarak into higher skill levels of Essence combat, for only Essence powers can defeat them.”

“Also incorrect,” Mak’to’ran said, staring at the distant Essence Rush. “Essence might be the greatest power in the galaxy, but the Hadarak rely on their minions for conquest. The conventional combat, en mass, is what will determine the fate of the War of the Galaxies when Essence reserves are depleted.”

“I do not believe you understand the magnitude of the threat you face. Only Essence power coupled with conventional warfare can defeat the Hadarak. Conventional warfare alone is doomed to quick failure.”

“Not if you have enough troops and are willing to fight bloody. I and the V’kit’no’sat learned this primitive form of combat well when we did not have the weapons necessary to face the Hadarak…yet we did, and defeated many of them, despite it being impossible. If the opposition grows large enough, even the Hadarak’s Essence will not save them.”

“The reproductive rate of the Hadarak is extreme. It is unlikely you will find a faster means to produce reinforcements.”

“We already have,” Mak’to’ran said, feeling the first shred of confidence after seeing that dreadful spark in the sky and realizing what it meant. “But our leadership won’t fight that way. I didn’t understand why for a long time, but now I do. And mark my words, Responder. We will not fall to this purge, inadequate as we are now. I taught them too well in my foolishness, and now the galaxy will be rewarded for it. The Archons will outgrow the enemy, as they did us. I do not know how, nor do I know how long it will take, but I will ensure they have the time they need…and when they are ready, this galaxy will be ours, not the Hadarak’s or the Founders’.”

“That is highly unlikely.”

“So is the heresy of Terraxis rising to dominance over the V’kit’no’sat, then rescuing us from our self-inflicted demise. I have seen the impossible done, Responder. And it will be done again,” Mak’to’ran said, staring defiantly at that spark. “No matter how long it takes.”

5

November 22, 128885

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

“Hello, Esna,” Davis said as Ard Ri Esna-58321JOR-18 walked into the small briefing room last out of the 8 guests to arrive.

“Director,” she said with a curt nod of her head adorned with neon red hair pulled back into a tight bun with a comm stick braided into it. Behind her the door closed and the lights dimmed as the single waist-high pedestal in the room glowed to life with a basic hologram of the galaxy approximately two meters wide…which was far too zoomed out to see anything of worth, but the ambiance was still nice.

Around the room Esna saw multiple uniforms, none of which were Archons or Mavericks, but rather two Grand Admirals, a Monarch Lord, a Master-Level tech, an alien that wore no clothes and was of a race she was unfamiliar with, a Paladin Viceroy, and lastly a Golden Knight that towered over the rest of them.

“My apologies for pulling you off active assignments,” Davis began. “The Archons have enough to deal with, and they’re already working the problems in their spare time. I decided a fresh set of eyes from those not so familiar with our ongoing difficulties could possibly yield different results. That’s why you’re here. I want every good and stupid idea you have, because we’re all stumped and we don’t have time to piddle with.”

Davis expanded the hologram out further, shrinking the Milky Way down to barely a visible swirl as additional galaxies popped up around them, with one highlighted in particular.

“For those with eyes to see Essence, there’s been a constant consternation visible in that direction,” Davis said, pointing down into the floor at a sharp angle. “It’s coming from the Core of the galaxy, and the Temple database has identified it as a Hadarak Colony Spore the size of a star. It’s designed to carry the Spice Lords along with an invasion force to another galaxy. It’s using so much Essence to get the necessary propulsion we can see it all the way out here, and I’m told it will be visible for at least a year as it speeds up to coast velocity. Apparently the Temples are also designed to track such large Essence phenomena, and when combined they act like a detection array that has determined it is going here.”

Davis highlighted the Triangulum Galaxy, located some 2.8 million light years away, but it had a different tag label on it.

“We haven’t had reason to rename stuff beyond our galaxy before, and the Founders have names for many, but this one they’ve just got an ID number for. Hence I’m calling it ‘Yoshi,’ and you’ll see many of the other galaxies have similar names now…at least the bigger ones. I’m still working on the small ones.”

“Why has ours not changed?” Lord Daegan asked.

Davis raised an eyebrow. “You think it should? I thought we’d keep candy bar names for the major galaxies, and I was always fond of Milky Ways.”

The Protovic Monarch squinted as he tried to make out some of the other galaxy names. “I stand corrected. I had thought it was an ancient reference to the thicker band of stars in the sky over this world that outlines the galactic disc.”

“It was, but I ‘changed,’” he said, using air quotes, “it to the candy bar version, in my head at least.”

“Very well, as long as the name is rooted in coolness, I am content,” the Protovic said deadpan as his visible skin competed with the hologram for illumination dominance in the dim room.

“They can really jump that far?” Esna asked.

“Not always accurately, I’m told. It seems the Temples have been a bit more forthcoming with information now that the phenomenon is visible to the denizens,” Davis said, highlighting the distance marker between the two galaxies, as well as showing the distance to the dozens that were closer, though smaller in size. “The Hadarak don’t bother with the smaller ones, and its suspected but not confirmed it is due to their lack of sufficiently-sized Tethers to brake against, the same way we can’t jump from a black hole to a small star at full speed.”

“Are the Founders in the small galaxies?” Grand Admiral Lucin asked, with his Kvash head barely being tall enough to see over the holo pedestal.

“Unknown, but they’d be stupid to avoid them if they have another means of intergalactic transit besides the Core Tethers.”

“Toad,” the Golden Knight said, referencing the closest galaxy to the Milky Way, formerly known as Sagittarius Dwarf that was about 1/5th the diameter and only 78,000 lightyears away…less than the full width of our galaxy that ran 100,000 lightyears from tip to tip. “Is it closest enough for the Hadarak to travel to conventionally?”

“I don’t know, but if they don’t even scout these smaller galaxies, then we may have a fallback point as you suggest. I for one am rather attached to the Milky Way, and have no interest in fleeing it. That is not why I have brought you here, Bren. I need your help to find a way to do the impossible while others ponder the possibilities of intergalactic travel and how the Founders manage it, because there’s no way we’re getting access to the Tethers in the Core soon enough to matter.”

“Which impossibility do you refer to?” the Golden Knight asked, staring down on Davis and the group from his 8ft height with purple-irised eyes.

“The Hadarak are not just fighting us. They’re launching an invasion of another galaxy from here…while fighting us. Either they are stupid to waste such resources, or we’re so much of an underdog it doesn’t matter. Add to that we have the Founders knocking from the outside as they send resources and personnel through their infrastructure network that we just happened to have pirated. I expect a war with them eventually, and even if that doesn’t happen I don’t want to just hope that it doesn’t. We have to figure out how to level up Star Force enough to be on the same playing field with both these threats. Right now we’re heavily inadequate and just trying to keep our head above water. I have confidence the Grand Border will hold once completed, so long as the Hadarak don’t bring in reinforcements from another galaxy. I have no such confidence against the Founders. I need options, people.”

“You need weapons,” Mastertech Tennisonne grumbled.

“More than that,” Davis said. “We need a strategy other than scrambling to catch up. I’ve been over this time and again, so have the Archons. Tell me you can see something from your various points of view that we’ve missed. We’ve got the weight of the galaxy on our shoulders right now, so we’re not able to look at it from the outside in. What are we not seeing?”

“Do we know what combat between the Hadarak and Founders look like?” Viceroy Vintra asked, standing slightly shorter than the Golden Knight, but with a posture that put him even lower as he typically held his Godzilla-like body tilted forward and down slightly to counterbalance his large blue tail.

“Only pieces. The Temples will not show us full combat, and what we got from Eldorat wasn’t very thorough with regards to other galaxies. We don’t know how they’re fighting, but we can somewhat guess. The popsicle Jason woke up has provided a great deal of anecdotal information, but we have no actual battle records. In general they fight with Essence and drones while the Hadarak fight with Essence and minions.”

“And we have mimicked this, although unintentionally,” Grand Admiral Serren said, tapping on her Human chin with a lightsaber blue fingernail that was appropriately bioluminescent, indicating her inclusion in Clan Saber.

“Should we not have?” Davis asked.

“Both the Hadarak and Founders have experience and numbers on us. To fight the same way is almost a guarantee of defeat unless we can do it better. The quicker route to victory is finding another way to fight that they have no experience in.”

“I know what I need to do, I just don’t know how to do it,” Tennisonne said, visibly unsettled.

“Do what?”

“Create real Ysalamir. I know there’s a way. There has to be. I just don’t know how to experiment with what I can’t touch.”

“What are you referring to?” Daegan asked the Mastertech.

“He’s referring to the Force,” Esna said, catching the obscure reference. “The Ysalamir were small creatures whose defense involved creating a bubble where the Force supposedly didn’t exist. That turned out to not be true, in that it was merely hidden from view and without the control mechanism it reverted to its normal unweaponized state similar to how Pefbar is needed to control Lachka.”

Tennisonne blinked. “I hadn’t even thought of a control mechanism,” he said, turning to Davis.

“I don’t know what mechanism there is in formed Essence. It’s more of a fire and forget thing for ranged targets. Close in I’m touching the Essence and there’s a conduit of it that if broken I lose control over and it returns to the Essence realm.”

“I was thinking about making it return to the Essence realm immediately upon passing a shield barrier…but I never thought about a control mechanism. There must be some sort of matrix holding it together that we can disrupt.”

“I think not,” Daegan interrupted. “If the Colony Spore’s Essence Rush is visible out here, then that Essence is persisting for weeks in the void of space.”

“Is that true?” the Mastertech asked.

“I’m not sure how, but it appears to be,” Davis confirmed, for he was the only one in the room that could use Essence.

“Then I’m back to square one,” Tennisonne said with a sigh. “I don’t know how to study something I can’t detect.”

“You’ve given us the Avengers,” Grand Admiral Lucin noted.

“I can study the Essence collected via those who can sense it, but I don’t have any mechanism that can do it on its own. That means I can’t poke around and blow stuff up to see what happens. That’s how most scientific discoveries work. I need to poke it with a stick, and I don’t have a stick to do it with, so I’m left dealing with whatever scraps the Archons happen to stumble across.”

“I happen to like what you’ve done with those scraps,” Bren said. “Otherwise I’d be helpless against Essence users,” he said, tapping on the Ironman-like chest ornament that contained an automatic Essence shield that he could turn on with a thought…though it would only last a few seconds.

“If not for Kara you wouldn’t even have that. I know there is a lot of hidden potential, Sean. I just can’t get at it…and it’s not a matter of time. I’m just not equipped for this. Unless you can give me a Tricorder that can study Essence, I’m not going to be able to give you anything the Founders don’t already have.”

“And even if you did, we wouldn’t have the power supply they’ve got,” Davis said with an understanding nod. “We can’t cheat millions of years of training…although Kara’s breakthrough suggests there are ways to cheat the newbs. But if the Founders have Siphons and who knows what else, I don’t think even the Uriti are going to be able to keep us in the Essence race against them. We need another path. Kirritimin?”

The beetle-like alien mastermind whom the lizards had conscripted into their service and upon which the lizard Masterminds, and subsequently the Paladin Viceroys, were genetically patterned on bobbed his shelled body upon which his ‘face’ was affixed, for he had no true head outside his torso.

“I have studied this from afar for longer than any of you have existed. The problem is the same as has been faced by many civilizations. How do you defeat a superior opponent? You cannot face them in their strength, so you must find their weakness and make it your strength. What is their weakness?”

“Swarm tactics,” Esna said immediately.

“For the Hadarak this is true. And for the Founders?”

“We don’t know how they fight, but we do know who they use,” Grand Admiral Serren said. “They want large armies to assist them against the minions, so I would guess they can’t match swarm tactics with the Hadarak. They need to tie them up long enough to use superior units to do most of their damage.”

“I had the same thought,” Davis agreed.

“Yet the Hadarak also have their superior units to counter the threat of Essence, but only in a mitigating fashion. They persist by accepting massive losses to bleed the Essence reserves of the enemy dry. It is unlikely that we will be able to surpass the Founders in terms of Essence production, so we must counter the Hadarak in another way.”

“We can spam smarter units than they can,” the Viceroy said with a note of pride. “The Paladin can match them with even starting resources if Essence is not a factor.”

“We do not have even starting resources,” Grand Admiral Lucin reminded them. “We must fight uphill at all times unless we find another hill that they are not on.”

“Meaning what?” Davis asked.

“Meaning that if we do not change our tactics,” Kirritimin answered, “we will face a never-ending war of attrition that we will loose with a single lapse. We must change the game in order to win it.”

“Not necessarily,” Esna said, not liking the tone of surrender that whispered of. “Our primary problem isn’t the minions on the ground. We can handle them there pretty well, and they don’t start out with a resource advantage when they’re invading our territory. The problem is their ability to get to ground, because the mass of the Wardens can break through planetary shields. If we have conventional shields capable of stopping that…”

“No,” Tennisonne said flatly. “We can’t generate that much power everywhere, and if the Hadarak are smart enough to just kamikaze one ahead of the other, there is no way we can generate enough power to stop a single attack at sufficient speed.”

“Even with dampeners?” Esna asked.

“Can they stop you from doing the same with a Seda if you wished it?”

“I would think so.”

“Even at interstellar velocities coming off the star?”

Esna frowned. “Then the only way to protect planets is to prevent the Wardens from getting to them. Can we sabotage the jump points somehow to prevent the stellar jumps?”

“Not across the entire jumpline,” Davis added.

“Then can we divert a jump in progress?”

“Mass again,” Tennisonne said dismissively.

“Which is vulnerable during coast phase,” Kirritimin noted.

“Perhaps not the Wardens then,” the Viceroy said quizzically.

Serren raised an eyebrow. “Peel off the free minions somehow so only the Wardens can pass.”

“Then what?” Tennisonne asked. “It’s not the minions that take down planetary shields with a single strike.”

“No,” Davis said, seeing the inkling of a plan. “But it is what prevents us from dealing with the Wardens much of the time. And shooting them dead after they jump doesn’t prevent the collision. We have to move them…”

“Spaceball?” Lord Daegan said offhand.

The Director nodded. “It was our solution to Mach’nel that we couldn’t destroy as well. If we can’t beat our enemy, we neutralize them.”

“Essence weaponry is far simpler,” the Mastertech argued.

“What about the replicator version?” Daegan continued. “It requires far less resources and can be delivered with a collision of our own.”

“Mach’nel don’t have grapple fields,” Tennisonne said with a shake of his head. “To engineer in dampeners means a limited window of engagement. You can’t simply contain them, you’d have to kill them somehow before the power drain expired and the Warden destroyed the technology…not to mention they have tentacles to do that, and there’s no way to stop that much ‘muscle’ mass from tipping over and poking holes in it. Only a large Spaceball that the Warden cannot reach is feasible.”

“So why aren’t we using those?”

“The minions have to be removed first,” Serren explained. “And the Warden has to be more or less still, otherwise you’ll slam into whatever destination it was moving towards.”

“But if we could neutralize the movement of the Wardens across the space lanes, what threat would we face?” Esna asked.

“Considerably less,” the Viceroy said as he rubbed his scaly chin with one of his fingers. “The warships are not armored well enough to penetrate our lines, and their carry volume is limited. It is the Wardens that move the bulk of their forces, and provide the footholds to grow more on site.”

“Then with the Hadarak, we shouldn’t be focusing on the Essence units, we should be focusing on the transport capability. Disrupt that, and their spamming ability diminishes greatly.”

“Spaceball designs won’t be enough,” Tennisonne said. “I wish they were, but they’re too damn large to mass produce and too hard to implement outside of special conditions.”

“Then why not put slip’n’slides on every spacelane into a high priority systems and let momentum do the damage for us?” the Golden Knight asked.

Those who were familiar with Hadarak naval warfare glanced at him in unison.

“If they collide with sufficient force in the right location,” Davis answered, “it can trigger a Nova that will do far greater damage than the Hadarak.”

“What about the smaller Hadarak?”

“Depending on their velocity, they can still survive ramming the star. It will damage them, but not always kill them. We could implement some in certain situations…”

“And a black hole?”

Davis tilted his head to the side as he thought. “I don’t think we’ve ever tried one, have we?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Tennisonne said. “I don’t see how a Warden could survive the impact, and the mass difference is so great it wouldn’t…well, I can’t say for sure since you won’t let me throw moons in to see what happens.”

Davis smiled, remembering that conversation millennia ago. “We’re still talking special circumstances tactics. We need something more broad-based.”

“A trap,” the Viceroy said suddenly. “We need to trap the Hadarak before they reach their deceleration point, not prolong it. Can we build a Spaceball and inverted slip’n’slide to create a predictable capture zone?”

“With dampeners?” Tennisonne said. “Possible.”

“Then we don’t need to worry about low stellar orbit,” Davis noted. “Just high orbit on the jumpline.”

“And catch other traffic at the same time,” Daegan added. “That’s feasible since they’re not being destroyed. It would act like a gate to the system that all would have to pass through if they were using that particular jumpline.”

“Kirritimin?” Davis asked.

“What do you do with the captured Hadarak?”

“Tow it elsewhere and let it sit,” Esna said.

“And if two come in succession?”

“We build a really big and nifty capture system,” she said, undaunted.

“The power required to operate it…” Tennisonne said, cutting himself off as an idea came to him. “I wouldn’t want to try it on reactors or Essence enhancement. We’d need a siphon line out from the star itself to power it.”

“If we can eliminate certain routes the Hadarak prefer,” Grand Admiral Lucin pointed out, “we can corral them into certain areas where our Avengers will take less time to get to them.”

“And we can start controlling the galactic map a bit,” Davis said with a nod. “I’ll take it. It’s not a solution, but it’s another piece of the puzzle.”

“And if a Lurker is caught?” the Viceroy added.

“We’d need Essence technology incorporated,” Tennisonne said, souring on the idea.

“No you don’t,” Bren said. “You just need it killed quickly.”

“They can kill anything in a matter of seconds if they’re close enough,” Esna told him, “and it doesn’t have to be melee range.”

“Use a null field to blind it to the targets while IDF pins it in place while you kill it. Enough Ysalamir spaced around the perimeter can do it without Essence, correct?”

“We’ve never even simulated that because we could never get one close enough,” Tennisonne said, leaning back on the wall as he thought. “They’re too damn dangerous for anything other than a Borg vessel with Essence weaponry to take on. And what’s worse, even if we could trap one, another could take out the ‘gate’ coming in on another jumpline and attacking from the rear.”

“Label it a bad idea and see what modifications can be made,” Davis declared. “We haven’t considered this quite this way before, so at this point anything new is good, no matter how flawed. Now, what else do you have for me?”

“Flying space monkeys?” Esna suggested.

“Meaning what?”

“I don’t know. Sounded like something an Archon would say. I got nothing at the moment.”

“Now you know how I feel,” Davis said in agreement. “I need every new idea you guys can come up with, flying space monkeys included. So keep it coming…”

6

November 24, 128885

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

Kara had been in the same Temple for the past 31 years, but so much had happened in those years that it felt like half her lifetime.

Kara was now beyond Neo 5002, which was the highest level in the Archon ranks currently mapped out. Greg was still tops, currently at Neo 4987, and new levels were having to be designed based on how he developed, which meant they couldn’t plan out very far ahead…but Kara’s siphon ability completely cheated the power ranking system, so Wilson had been working on crafting a new Archon division based off her training while letting her freestyle with Strovok and learn as much from him as she could.

Kara’s hair was now long and double braided…blue. It had been Morgan’s suggestion, for the way she could generate Essence at will from her siphon completely changed what it meant to be a Neo, where you had to build up your personal reservoir slowly over time, and when you exhausted it you had to go on ‘rest’ period until it rebuilt before you could use your Essence abilities again.

But Kara did not have to rest…ever. The size of the siphon was not unlimited, but its duration was. She could keep pulling Essence as long as her body could handle it, and keep firing off with what was essentially ‘unlimited ammo’ in the video game sense. And now that she could turn it on and off at will, Kara was immensely enjoying the life hack and gaining so much experience from non-stop training that she was quickly passing up Vargemma who had spent many hundred millennia slowly building up their power levels to where she was now.

Morgan had said she could literally shoot everything in sight and cause unlimited havoc…so why not use ‘Jinx’ as a metaphor?

Kurt-074 had objected to that, for his Clan was named Jinx after the League of Legends character, but the other trailblazers had sided with Morgan, citing it was too good a fit and even relieving Kara of her Clan Ghostblade duties so she could focus everything on developing her new skill. They’d said it was because they needed her to cause as much ‘havoc’ as possible when the time came, and rather than be annoyed at how far she was ahead of them and them not being able to keep up, they told her to run with it as her one and only priority.

Which was exactly what she needed to hear from them.

Kara was back to being just one person now, not a fleet leader, not a civilization builder, not an explorer or the bazillion other things Archons had to be skilled at. Her job was now simple.

Blow stuff up…then blow some more stuff up, and learn to like it.

And to top it all off, the character of Jinx had the body of a 12 year old too, so it seemed to fit too well to ignore, and Kara had instead embraced the role…minus the rocket launcher.

Because she didn’t need one.

“Defend!” Strovok ordered as he jumped up into the air near where Kara was floating, using the armor she’d built for him to fly, though the Archon needed none herself with her Yen’mer.

Kara pulled her left fist back, summoning what was called a ‘Hard Light’ technique that built an invisible hammer off her arm reaching forward, as Strovok had done before he jumped. She could see his and he could see hers, but non-Essence users could not, though there were none around here. Only a few Elcee watching the pair train as well as watching their backs to keep unwanted visitors from traveling out to their training grounds…which had gotten so damaged from the constant melee they’d started taking their sparring to the air to avoid more surface damage.

Kara waited until nearly the last moment, then surged forward and swung her arm, meeting her hammer against Strovok’s in a thunderclap that was heard miles away. Both Essence hammers collided and buckled, but as was normal it was Kara’s that shattered, letting Strovok’s through after a brief delay…but the Archon spun in the air so it missed her body by inches, with her right hand sending a Jumat-like Pulsewave into the Mek’tal before he could raise his other arm.

His body moved about a meter before a spherical Pulsewave of far greater power responded, knocking Kara back as she tried to brace herself with a Cutting Shield that looked like a bent leaf over her body. It disrupted Hard Light as if they were real objects, causing them to melt and split apart as they hit the ridge on her shield, but the impact of the Pulsewave worked differently and actually pushed more on the shield than it would have Kara’s body, acting like a sail, but still melting aside some of the effect as the Essence was de-crafted and let to whisk away to the realm from which it came.

When the Pulsewave ended, Kara threw one back at Strovok…simultaneously launching a Jumat wave and had both hitting at approximately the same time. Strovok blocked the Pulsewave easily, without it even touching his body, but the Jumat caught him off guard and sent him flying backwards momentarily stunned.

Suddenly his left foot became super heavy, so much so it was being pulled down to the ground by the Gravity Clasp Kara had created and lashed to him, with it responding to the local gravity and pulling towards it until it ran out of power.

Strovok destroyed it long before that happened, but not before Kara got up in his face and dropped an Ubven around him, momentarily pinning him in an Amumu-style Lachka field so he couldn’t raise his arms…then Kara summoned up another Hard Light hammer off her left arm and one on her right, slamming both into his chest.

But they didn’t hit. He projected a Hard Light Shield a few inches away to take the blow…which it did, shattering her hammers again, then she kicked off the shield, moving through the Ubven when he couldn’t, and getting a few meters back as she spread both arms wide and brought her legs up underneath her as she fed as much Essence as she could draw from her Siphon into a containment orb just over her abdomen.

Strovok fought against the Ubven rather than mess with her, annoyed by the invisible field that didn’t want to go away and would only allow him to move as if he was having to fight through meters of wet sand all around him. It wasn’t Essence-based, so he couldn’t see it, but after enough struggling it finally dissipated…just as Kara released a visible light beam from her center of mass.

It wasn’t light, but rather a heavy Essence attack that she had created on her own using three different techniques Strovok had taught her. She called it ‘Final Spark,’ and sent the bright white beam with a kaleidoscope of other colors on the fringes straight into her sensei, trusting in his superior strength, skill, and knowledge to be able to block it…otherwise it could have vaporized a row of people with one shot.

Strovok caught and negated most of it against a Dark Shield, then held up a hand as Kara began to move again. “Stop.”

She frowned. “Did that hurt you?”

“No, but it had more effect than I anticipated. That was not a true Essence attack. What did you add to it?”

“My Bioplasma,” Kara said, emitting a glowing streak from one palm and arcing it over to her other one where she caught, contained it, then snuffed it out.

“Your hands were set wide.”

“I was generating a defensive shield between them as I gathered the charge. I’ve used my Vorch’nas to create secondary firing pathways down to my navel. Figured I might as well use it for something.”

“Then you mixed the plasma with the Emblaze technique?”

“I used Emblaze and a bit of Constrain along with Contain.”

“Plus Accelerate I assume?”

“No,” Kara said, confused. “It launches on its own.”

“The pressure of the plasma?”

“Probably, but it also did before I learned to add it.”

“Produce the defense shield again,” Strovok told her as he flew up closer.

Kara took on the same position, arms spread wide and legs tucked up underneath her but not blocking her abs, then a shield formed to cover the entire front of her body, but not the sides or rear.

“You are using Reflect. Why?”

“I wouldn’t use this technique if I had enemies behind or flanking, only in front. It’s sort of a finishing move or opening salvo. The charge time pretty much makes it that way, and the more time I have the bigger I can get the blast…up until my Contain fails.”

“What’s your max charge time?”

“About 7 seconds.”

“The Reflect isn’t just defending you, it’s also pushing your charge away when you overlap them. I have not seen that done in a long time. It’s an odd technique, and not the most powerful, but in this case it allows you extra defense without overlapping another ability. I’m mildly impressed.”

“Thanks,” Kara said with a smirk as she twirled one of her long blue braids in her fingertips. “How close was I to getting through?”

“Closer with your Hammers. That Ubven psionic is very annoying, and your using both disciplines is wise, but you will not defeat an opponent of my physical size unless you deplete the internal Essence reservoir. You need to use Psionics that do this rather than pin me in place.”

“I pinned you in place so I could use Final Spark. That took you down a considerable about, right?”

“Not when I use Black Shield. You expended more Essence than it took for me to block it. You lost in that exchange, and will lose every time, unless you can overwhelm the Black Shield’s tolerance.”

“How do I do that?”

“The intensity has to be so great that my recharge rate can’t come into play.”

“Point overload?”

“That is one way of saying it.”

Kara sighed. “How close was I to doing that?”

“You would need at the minimum triple effect, but only if you Constrained the beam much tighter.”

“Density, not surface area?”

“That is how Black Shield will usually fail…unless you can generate an area of effect attack so powerful it drains the whole thing faster than the recharge capacity. You cannot do that against me, for you do not have the generation capability yet, and you do not have the reserve charge in such a small, untrained body.”

“I’m not untrained now, but I take your point.”

“There are many Vargemma that have far greater Essence density within their bodies than you, accumulated from slow development over millions of years. You need a few hundred more to surpass them.”

“How many to surpass you?”

“You never will so long as we continue to train together.”

Kara smiled. “That’s why I’m doing extra training while you sleep.”

“And you are paying the price for it. Your body screams in pain even now.”

“I can take it. I’ve been through worse before.”

“If you continue to increase your Essence use, it will get worse.”

“I know how to ride the ascension line, and if I fry myself too much my Vorch’nas will kick in to heal the damage.”

“It cannot heal what it cannot touch. Your connection to the Essence realm is also damaged. You must allow time for it to adjust to greater usage.”

“Are you talking about the barrier or my body?”

“Both. You will damage your Siphon if you stretch it too far, too fast. Then you will have to cease its stretching in order for it to repair. Your technology cannot do that. It must occur naturally.”

“And my body?”

“It binds to the Essence in a way that makes overuse manifest physically. You may repair the damage, but you are not repairing the cause of the damage. You press too hard, Kara.”

“We’re on the clock, remember,” she said, referencing the Founders coming for her. “And I don’t intend to let the Elcee fight them here while we run off somewhere else. I need as much power as I can get, and if I have to endure some pain to get it faster, then so be it. I’m not permanently damaging anything as far as I can tell. Am I?”

“I do not know. My Master never attempted training at this rate. Even I am feeling the effects now. It must be far worse for you.”

“I may have not done much Essence training in the past, but I’ve done so much other training that this is easy for me. I know what to do and how to do it, the new wrinkles are the challenge and right now I’m a kid in a candy store. I can handle it. Trust me.”

“I am beginning to, but we must not only focus on the near future, but the challenge of the far distant,” he said, pointing towards the Hadarak Colony Spore spark visible through the shell of the Temple due to the fact that the barrier shield was permanently down, otherwise it would have absorbed it and kept the denizens clueless to what was happening outside. “I do not want to run either, but if we must then we must. If we allow ourselves to be captured or killed, we give them victory. They do not want a Siphon free to develop, let alone two training together. Our vengeance must be over the eons, and by gaining peerdom. Even if we somehow managed to kill a Founder, as you did their Apprentice, they will send another and another. What are we to do then?”

“We don’t abandon people to die, Strovok.”

“If there is to be a fight here that cannot be won, evacuate the Temple.”

“Would they stay here?”

“Make them go beyond the Temples. You have said the galaxy is vast and easy to hide within.”

“And you have said that our training bouts are visible to everyone in this Temple when we really get going. The more powerful we are, the harder it is going to be to hide our training. Now I could probably find us some place they’d never look, but if we can’t hide inside a star system now and they have Caretaker drones that can sense Essence, I can’t guarantee they won’t find us eventually.”

“I know we will fight, the question is when and where.”

“I’d rather them walk into our trap than catch us on the run.”

“The Elcee are not a trap. They are pebbles to be crushed.”

“Let us worry about that. Given Eldorat’s size, I’m assuming he was at least as powerful as one of the smaller Founders you spoke of, perhaps more so.”

“You said you barely destroyed him with a warfleet.”

“Yeah,” Kara said, pointing to the sky and the rows of starships parked up in ‘orbit’ as the Paladin spam produced more and more for her in preparation for the time when the predicted arrival came. “Got one, with more than one Essence weapon this time.”

“The Founder will be able to overwhelm us within seconds.”

“Even with your Black Shield?”

“He will most likely be able to overload it with one strike.”

Kara raised her arm up and produced a hologram of a piece of chest armor, spinning it slowly around so Strovok could see all of it.

“What is this?”

“Something we’ve been working on. Something that will hold more Essence than your body can. A lot more.”

“Your Magicite? The Founders have this technology already.”

“I know, but this isn’t just Magicite.”

“A weapon?”

“An automatic defense. I’ve helped our Mastertechs create a nullification shield that will protect our non-Essence troops briefly.”

“That is worthless to us.”

“Will the Founder come looking for me with his own Magicite? Or will his own Siphon or whatever other stuff he has be enough?”

“Could be either, but I would wager his own skills are more than sufficient.”

“So if we create technology and fuel it with our Essence, we can use it against him here.”

“A personal well will allow for recharge, Kara. Our abilities have limits that we have to raise with training. It is not simply about power…” he said, trailing off as he finally caught on.

“And?”

“How large of a nullification shield can you produce?”

“Unlimited, though inefficient given our current designs. The question is how much technology can we carry. If we can pick the battlefield, we don’t have to carry it.”

“A true trap then,” Strovok considered.

“But I need you to teach me the Black Shield and other defensive and containment techniques so I can help craft them into machines.”

“I cannot give you what I do not possess. The Responders will not give me the blueprints.”

“I’m an Archon. I create blueprints for fun. What I need is the technique so I can experiment with it.”

“Black Shield is far beyond you, little one.”

“Catch me up faster then.”

Strovok sighed. “It doesn’t work like that. There is a progression you must follow.”

“That’s what the Responders say. I say they’re lying. I got Siphon way early, and Morgan got Jumat way early too. Things happen, and people take different paths. Help me craft a faster path, Strovok. Help me cheat.”

The Mek’tal huffed, then patted himself on the chest with his big left arm. “You strike at my pride, but I do not know how to teach in a way that I have not been taught.”

“Then generate the Black Shield now, and sustain it while I beat on it.”

“It is not a physical shield,” he said, generating the effect none the less. It was invisible, like nearly all Essence techniques, but it caste a hazy effect around him when viewed by Essence-enhanced eyesight, hence the name.

Kara reached out her hand and stuck it through up to her wrist, then held it there, trying to create an Essence Rush in her arm and having the shield stop it…painfully.

“That is unwise,” Strovok cautioned, but he maintained the shield nonetheless.

“Maybe, but I gotta feel it to learn it. Can you reduce strength to the point where I can easily break it?”

“I do not know. I’ve never tried to produce a weak shield. There is no point.”

“There is now. Please try. Losing gives valuable experience, but winning gives a different kind.”

The Black Shield flicked on and off numerous times, then finally remained constant.

“That’s as weak as I can maintain it.”

Kara pushed against it inside her arm, but it wouldn’t budge, so she brought forward her other arm just shy of the shield and fired small Torrents into it…which were basically an Essence drill that would tear through matter in a corkscrew fashion, but it wasn’t Hard Light, which would pass through a Black Shield due to its physical nature. Torrent was more or less a tiny tornado drill, and the Black Shield did block it.

Kara drilled into it just over her wrist, because if she dipped it down she’d cut into her own flesh or Vorch’nas, and she didn’t want to see what happened in either. She worked on the shield for nearly 10 minutes before it finally broke and the Essence in her arm was able to move through momentarily before the Black Shield reformed.

“Finally,” Kara huffed. “You really don’t know your strength.”

“Did you learn something?”

“A new feel. It’s a puzzle piece, and I need to collect as many as I can before I start trying to put them together. Are there techniques that disrupt Black Shield?”

“None that you know.”

Kara raised her right hand and created a Reflect shield between them.

“I will have to raise intensity of the Black Shield, otherwise it will be destroyed. And I may overwhelm your Reflect.”

Kara flicked her thumb, still using physical gestures to summon abilities, and created a Nullification shield behind the Reflect to protect herself against whatever it was he was going to throw if the Reflect shield failed.

“Reckless are you, little one,” Strovok said with a smile. “Fortunately I like reckless. Prepare yourself. I am not sure of the power levels needed.”

“Go as low as you can and adjust upwards,” Kara said, feeling something hit her shield and bounce back…then she felt it ripple through the Black Shield in a way that made its hard structure bend a bit.

Another puzzle piece gained.

Kara just hoped she could get enough of them to learn Black Shield, for it was the primary defensive ability the Vargemma had, and anyone without it was seen as an easy mark for a master to overwhelm with a simple force against force engagement…which was the equivalent of arm wrestling and usually ended within seconds.

Black Shield gave weaker opponents the ability to resist this at low energy cost to themselves, and blast it all, the Temple said you had to have so many prerequisites before it would train you for it, that no one in Star Force or even the Varkemma had yet earned the privilege of trying for it.

It was the defensive key she needed to badly encode into Essence technology if she was going to build a trap in the Temple, and Kara had no idea how much time she had before a Founder would show up and try to kidnap her and Strovok.

She knew she was risking a lot staying here, but it was crystal clear that she and Strovok were the only ones that stood a small chance against a Founder, and probably none at that. If they weren’t here to draw out the target and then direct orbital bombardment, Kara wasn’t confident the Elcee or the Paladin could get the job done. Which meant she had to stay.

Stupid or wise, she wasn’t sure, but Kara knew she had to have Black Shield and she couldn’t wait for the normal progression of skills. She had to cheat jump again, and this time she couldn’t rely on random chance. She had to make it happen.

And right now that mean shooting everything in sight and seeing what hidden treasures could be hit with random shots. It wasn’t the best way to explore the universe, but right now it was all she had. So despite the growing pain inside her arm that her Vorch’nas was hilariously trying to figure out the source of, she kept pressing on the Black Shield and trying to bend a bit of it on her own.

And failing.

7

December 25, 128885

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

Esna sat down in her quarters in Atlantis, covered in more sweat than usual after her workout in one of the 7 major training centers in the city that had an insane number of options for specialized challenges, even outside the Archon-only sanctum, but she’d felt off since she’d arrived here from the Deep Rim where she’d been doing a lot of hunting for bad guys that felt an opportunity for mischief while the Core distracted everyone, and they were coming out of the woodwork in droves.

When the Director had called her to Earth she hadn’t resented that, knowing it had to be something damn important…and it was. Too damn important.

Esna took off her right shoe and sniffed it…a habit she’d had since all the way back on the planet Mace where she’d been born. Why she’d done it then she couldn’t remember, but now she knew that a person’s sweat didn’t stay constant, and one’s scent altered with their mood, toxin levels, and several other factors, and she was detecting one now she hadn’t had in a long time.

Stress sweat.

She’d had a whiff of it ever since coming to Earth, but now it was reeking. Normally her sweat smelled neutral to good, and it was only when her body was under some sort of duress that it turned bad.

Esna pulled off her other shoe and checked it too, then took a whiff of her armpit and flinched.

“Wow, that is bad,” she said to herself with a sigh. It wasn’t the food here doing it, nor the water, nor the air she was breathing. Everything was top notch, like in the rest of the Empire, and she wasn’t injured. The only thing that had changed was her mission.

An impossible mission, with her body reflecting her mental distress at having been thrust a problem even the Archons couldn’t solve, nor the Director himself. He’d made it clear that unless they found a better way to fight both the Hadarak and the Founders, Star Force was going to be crushed between them.

One war they might survive, even find a way to win. But two at once was going to be their doom, even if it was a long, drawn out one with the Archons doing maximum damage to both enemies…but fall they would. And now Esna and 7 others were being tasked with finding a solution.

And she knew it wasn’t going to happen.

They probably weren’t the only team the Director had consulted, nor would consult, but right now they were the ones with the weight of the empire on their shoulders, and Esna didn’t like failure…but more than that, she didn’t like being helpless.

Helplessness is what got Rammak killed. And she’d vowed shortly thereafter to become as strong as he’d been so that she’d never have to face the same situation.

And yet here she was, and she’d gotten far stronger than Rammak had ever been…well, not in muscle, obviously, but in other ways. Esna was now one of the leaders of Canderous, and she knew Rammak would have been proud, but part of her still wanted to go back in time and take his place. She didn’t feel worthy then, and since then she’d tried, but part of her never would.

And her body was agreeing with the mind, stinking like a damn newb who’d never known combat after a little 3 hour workout.

Esna threw one of her shoes across the room, bouncing it off a wall just as the door chime sounded. For a second she wondered if she’d hit something, but the panel was more than 4 meters away from where her shoe hit.

She got up and walked across the carpeted floor in her sweat-soaked socks and just opened the door, not bothering to see who it was first…only to look up at the very tall man standing there. Someone nearly as large as Rammak had been, though he was missing a pair of arms.

“Can we talk?” Bren asked, not wearing any armor, which was unusual for any of the Esquires or Golden Knights, who were obsessive about always being ready for battle wherever it chose to show up.

“If you don’t mind the smell,” she said, flicking her head towards the inside as she turned and walked out of the doorway back to her bed where she sat down and stripped off her socks, throwing them lazily out of view as she flexed her toes on the carpet fibers. “What’s on your mind?”

Bren telekinetically pulled over a chair and looked for the anti-grav adjustment panel…then saw it wasn’t going to be big enough, so he drifted it back to where it had been and simply sat down on the ground cross-legged, which put his head height about even with Esna’s.

“I did not know who you were until after you arrived and I checked your record. You were born outside of Star Force, whereas the rest of us were not.”

“Kirritimin wasn’t either,” Esna corrected him.

“No, you are right, but he is not a warrior. Not in the flesh. His mind can lead fleets, but he doesn’t know the feel of combat as you and I do. And you have felt it outside of Star Force, without training or an empire behind you. I wanted to ask what that was like?”

“Maddening,” she answered, cupping her head in both hands as she thought back to memories she’d prefer to keep buried. “You were always afraid of getting caught up in something and dying, from something stupid or just a random accident. It wasn’t glorious like the movies suggest. I lost my brother to that shit, and would have died myself if not for a Calamari named Rammak who saved me. He was Star Force, but he’d been left behind when Mace fell. The planet was wrecked and what had once been Star Force was so far gone we didn’t even know its name. We called the planet Forso, for what reason I don’t know. I didn’t even know I was Human at the time. I didn’t know anything.”

“Did you do any training?”

“Ha. We didn’t even understand what the word meant. We piddled around, experimented, mostly did stupid stuff, and some of it worked and we learned. Nobody really knew what they were doing, but a lot liked to pretend they did, and we bought it for the most part. I wish I’d been born into Star Force, for many reasons, but we don’t get to choose our entry point into the universe. I’m fortunate to have survived mine. I certainly didn’t earn it.”

“Do you know why Davis called you here?”

“He didn’t say.”

“I know,” Bren said, eliciting a raise of Esna’s head. “He and I are rather close. I spent many of my early years on his personal guard, and his wisdom is still underestimated by the Empire. You are here because of your vantage point and your skill. You started with nothing, outside the empire, and have risen past so many who had far more than you. You have earned your rank of Khan in Canderous, but even then you chose the life of combat rather than a life of organizing others in combat. You became an Ard Ri, and I believe I know why.”

“Enlighten me.”

“You want to feel the combat. You want to determine the outcome based on your skills and your actions…not ordering machines around or putting someone else into harm’s way. You want to be in the heaviest of fighting, like the Archons do, but they’re needed for so much else they rarely get that opportunity. The Golden Knights take most of those duties on us so that the Archons can be freed up to do the duties that few can. Do you know why I am here?”

“You’re a Golden Knight. Isn’t that obvious?”

“I’m a Golden Knight who was also once an Admiral, long, long ago. A special appointment by Davis when he saw more tactical skill in me than most naval officers. He said we needed people who could see beyond the small battles without losing sight of them, and that only someone who knew how to fight hand to hand could direct others to, all the way up the line to the Admiral who commanded the destiny of thousands. I took the opportunity and responsibility he gave me and learned the hard way…no training, no peers, just straight to Admiral. And to his credit, I added a few new tricks to the Naval handbook after I got my bearings and began looking at things from a different point of view.”

“That’s crazy,” Esna said in admiration. “I had no idea anyone had done that.”

“I had no idea anyone had done what you did. Apparently Star Force isn’t interest in bragging on their heroes that aren’t Archons…and I only say that because that’s what Davis described me as once. He said there were many heroes that nobody would ever know of, because the fighting we do, especially on the bridge of a warship, won’t be seen by the masses. Not even your own crew. But heroes we are nonetheless. And in truth, most people see the Archons as multiple versions of the same person. The ‘Archon’ is the hero, not the individual.”

“I thought the trailblazers were all etched in stone somewhere?”

“And they rightly should be, for among other things they head up their own Clans. But the rest of the Archons are nameless, faceless heroes in armor, and they’re the inspiration others need. People like you and me have walked paths that they cannot, so they don’t need to know our stories…though they’re there to find if you dig hard enough. And the people who need to hear them usually learn to dig.”

“Did the Director tell you that too?”

“More or less. And you need to start calling him Davis or Sean. He prefers that.”

“Really?”

“In his position, do you think he really cares about titles? He cares about who has skills and answers. And both you and I have stuff that he doesn’t have, which is why we’re here.”

“Well, my stuff isn’t amounting to much more than bad ideas. Everything I’ve suggested has gotten shot down after analysis.”

“Same with the rest of us. Even Kirritimin.”

Esna put her head back into her hands and stared at her toes. “So why aren’t you still an Admiral?”

“I gave it up. I was good at it, but it was too isolated and my physical skills didn’t matter short of a boarding party…which almost never happens. Our fleets are far too dominant, and if we are ever at a disadvantage our enemies take the opportunity to destroy us. They’re not bold enough to try and capture one of our ships.”

“So was the Dir…was Davis wrong about you?”

“No. He showed me an aptitude that I never would have developed because I didn’t know it existed. But naval combat is about technology and knowing how to use it. Commando is about being the weapon, and I have always wanted to be a weapon, not wield one.”

“In that we are alike, but unless you can punch a lot harder than I think, you’re not taking down a Warden on your own.”

“Do we need to?”

Esna’s head came up again, this time with a stupid look on her face. “Obviously.”

“No…I don’t mean the Empire. I mean do you and I need to? It’s not the Wardens that threaten the Founders, it’s their swarm of minions. Why can’t we fight them the normal way? No more tricks or special technology. Star Force has always fought the swarms with superior units that can last indefinitely while the enemy has to keep replacing its lost forces because it chooses to build them fast rather than strong.”

“It doesn’t matter how many we kill in the field when a Warden can come crashing down on your head and erase all your gains. Naval is where we have to find a way to win this.”

“Sometimes, but are the Hadarak gaining all their territory by Wardens?” Bren asked, leaving the question hang in the air until Esna was forced to answer.

“The hard battles are, but not all.”

“They’re picking up planets with no Wardens. They’re sending carrier ships with minions, and minions alone are conquering more than half of their gains. Far more, actually. The Wardens are there, like the Lurkers, to do what the minions cannot. But it’s the minions that Founders fear. It’s the minions that conquer. The big ones that cannot be touched without Essence or Ysalamir are really to support the swarm, the swarm doesn’t support them.”

“Go on.”

“If there’s a way we can fight the swarm, and let the Elcee or others handle the big ones, can we beat the Hadarak the other way around?”

“By depriving them of the swarm? I don’t have any idea how we can do that if we can’t hold territory to deny them from using it to produce more. And if we can’t protect our most heavily defended worlds from a pair of Wardens, one going kamikaze to break through and the other to land and conquer, then how do we defend worlds without even a shield generator?”

“Are they growing Wardens faster than we can kill them?”

“I don’t know,” Esna said, never having thought about that. “What’s in the Core is unknown, plus what they can bring in from other galaxies. Might as well assume they’re unlimited.”

Bren snapped his fingers and a Fornax jolt hit Esna, shaking her concentration and causing her mind to reset as she glared at the Golden Knight.

“Unlimited?” he said as though he was spitting ice with every syllable.

“We can’t know, so we might as well assume they are,” she growled, resisting the urge to throw a bigger Fornax blast back at him.

“And what does a warrior say to unlimited enemies?”

Esna blinked, suddenly understanding his reprimand. “Bring them on.”

Bren nodded, and put his fingers down. “So why are we not facing them as warriors? We are looking for tricks, cheats, and whatever we can to avoid the head-on fight. Why have we given up on it?”

“Because they’re too many and they reproduce too fast.”

“So did the lizards, though that was before your time and mine, but I have studied those wars closely. We defended as we are now, until we grew to the point we could start pushing back, system by system. We didn’t run from the direct fight.”

“I’ve studied them too, and that war was based off taking systems, stacking them with defenses, and holding them. We can’t hold anything against the Hadarak if they want it badly enough.”

“None of the Fortresses have fallen, and they’re trying hard to take them.”

“Those aren’t planets. And they’re built to be modular so that when the Hadarak do damage them the outer layers can be expendable. Our people are not expendable, and we will not fight that way, even if it will win the war.”

“The Viceroy is willing.”

“They all are. They’ve been programmed for it.”

“Doesn’t a part of you want to see them unleashed on the enemy?”

“Yes,” Esna admitted. “I crave a way to hurt them, and having to pull punches frustrates me. It’s why I chose to fight in the Rim rather than the Core. I want targets I can crush, or at least attack directly. With the Hadarak we’re always retreating and I’m stuck in a seda giving orders.”

“Then let’s stop trying to run from them, evade them, or cheat them. Let’s find a way to fight them head on, as warriors should. The Archons can pull the sneaky stuff, but to cleanse the galaxy of these vermin we’re going to have to do this the conventional way, so help me figure out how to do that.”

“Why me?”

“Because you have seen from the outside. You were weak once, afraid, confused. Tell me from the outside, how can Star Force fight these monsters?”

Esna punched the bed next to her right hip. “I don’t know.”

“Ignore the Wardens and Lurkers and all the stuff that requires Essence or Ysalamir. How do we fight the rest if they’re not protected by the others?”

“It doesn’t matter, Bren. If we can’t hold territory we can’t deny it to them. They just re-infest it…unless we blow up the planets, and even then they can probably feed off their remains.”

“We’re taking worlds, not destroying them. We’re not going to be tricked into destroying our own prizes.”

“Prizes? We’re in a war for our survival and you’re talking like this is…” Esna cut off, bringing her hands up in front of her and staring at her palms. “What have I become?”

“Lost,” Bren said firmly. “Now find your way back.”

Esna stared at her hands, but her vision was directed inward. Rammak had died saving her, not because it would benefit the empire, or him. Had he not come for her he would have survived on Mace until the V’kit’no’sat war ended and the world was recolonized. He would have made it back even if nobody found him there before that, and even though he didn’t know that would happen, he chose to come out of hiding for her. Because she was Human.

Because he thought she was worth fighting for, regardless of what happened.

He wasn’t trying to merely survive, he was trying to live.

“This is the way of the warrior,” she reminded herself.

“As a child, you would wait,” Bren said, reciting an ancient song that immediately began to bring tears to Esna’s eyes, for she’d never heard it on Mace, but once she got into Canderous it was required learning…and somehow it seemed to have been written specifically for her, though she knew that was impossible. “And watch from far away.”

“But you always knew,” Esna said between sobs, “that you’d be the one that work while they all play.”

“And you…you lay awake at night and scheme, of all the things that you would change, but it was just a dream.”

“Here we are,” Esna ground out, finding a fire in her heart again with the words, “don’t turn away now. We are the warriors that built this town.”

“The time will come, when you’ll have to rise…”

“…above the best, improve yourself, your spirit never dies.”

A brief moment of silence followed, then Bren asked, “So why aren’t we?”

Esna stood up, flexing her arms up halfway and staring at her muscles and her quaking hands. “Leave the Wardens to the Archons.”

“Yes. Now how do we earn our victory against the minions?”

“We can’t hold territory, which means we can’t stop them from reproducing.”

“Then we have to kill them faster than they can make them,” Bren said firmly. “Is that a problem?”

Esna turned slowly and locked eyes with him. “Not for a warrior. Not when they’re all offense, no defense, and mostly stupid.”

“They’re brutes designed as killing machines, and less smart than the lizards. We beat them, why can we not beat the minions?”

“We can, it’s just a matter of numbers. But if we can’t deny them planets, they can…”

“What? Send in a few ships and hope to be left alone to grow into an army? We’re not a small empire anymore, Esna. If we can detect them landing, we can get to them before they can grow out of control.”

“If we’re fast enough, and strong enough.”

“I can do it single handedly,” Brom said, and she knew he wasn’t overestimating his abilities.

Esna’s mind raced, feeling a path here but slipping from it. Without a single secure world in the empire, how could you fight a war without sacrificing people wherever the enemy chose to hit?

“Holy shit,” she whispered, sitting back down on the bed again as her life radically changed in a moment of epiphany.

“You thought of something?” Bren asked insistently as he gently rose to his feet without a sound.

“We’re warriors, and we’re going to stand our ground and fight,” she said, volume returning to her voice. “I don’t know about the Founders, but we’re going to beat the Hadarak the hard way. No cheats. We’re going to earn dominance.”

“How?” Bren pressed.

“The way you and I are drawn to. Hand to hand, face to face, skill against skill. One planet at a time, sweeper teams, grunge work. No orbital bombardment other than the initial strikes. Send the fleet to own the spacelanes. To keep reinforcements from arriving. They will secure our victories while we make sure every last bit of infestation gets burned off the planets.”

“How does that change our current situation?”

“The Grand Border will hold. The Archons and the V’kit’no’sat won’t fail. When the expansion is contained, and no more evacuations have to be protected, we will have to hold indefinitely or take the war to them on their side. That’s what I’m thinking about, and now I know how to do it, if we’re only talking minions.”

Bren knelt down on one knee so he could look her in the eyes again. “Please share.”

“We have to rise above them, and by we I mean Canderous. We’re the anti-Hadarak faction. We have to become the anti-Hadarak faction.”

“Why you?”

“Our homes aren’t on planets, and they can’t be rammed by Wardens.”

“Your seda are a little faster, so you can evade them. How does that help us fight?”

“It means we have strongholds that can’t be hit by Wardens, and with proper upgrades even Lurkers won’t be able to. Big upgrades.”

“But you’re still running. Where’s the ‘stand your ground’ part?”

Esna smiled cruelly and placed a hand on the right side of Bren’s face.

“Which direction do you think we’ll be running?”

“I don’t understand, Esna. What can Canderous do that it isn’t already doing?”

“Evolve,” she said, kissing him hard once. “Thank you for kicking my ass into gear. It’s like I’d forgotten how to really fight. It’s not about winning, it’s about engaging.”

“Better to die a warrior than live a coward,” Bren echoed another lesson taught in Canderous to its younglings.

“This is our time, and I need your help.”

“Name it.”

“Help me convince Davis to allow Canderous to develop Knights. Full Knights, with psionics and whatever Essence help we can get. And not to assist the Knight races. But to become minion mashers…because we’re going to need a lot of them.”

“I still don’t understand your plan, but if you can bring this fight to the surface you will have my eternal backing.”

Esna smiled, slapping him on the face playfully. “Let’s go, big guy. I’ve got some explaining to do, and might as well do it to everyone at once.”

Bren turned and went out her door so fast it almost didn’t open in time, then he began running down the hallway with Esna sprinting to keep up. She finally knew how to beat them, and Bren could sense it in her.

No point in walking now, the sooner they found Davis the better, for rebuilding Canderous wasn’t going to happen overnight, and time was already against them.

But this would work. She knew it in her bones. Now she just had to convince the man who had built the Empire to let her break a lot of his rules…

8

The doors to the briefing room where Davis’s special team had been working opened with a nearly inaudible ‘swoosh,’ then closed again as Lord Daegan entered, the last of the team to arrive as Esna waited near the holo pedestal with the others as Davis looked across at all of them from the far side of the room.

“Alright, we’re all here now,” he said calmly. “What have you two come up with?”

“Esna,” Bren said, waving a large hand towards the Director.

“Sean,” she said, for once not having to force his first name past her lips, “give me the full technological and genetic power of Star Force, and I will destroy the Hadarak for you.”

Everyone’s eyes widened, except Bren’s, and Davis noted that fact with a quick glance towards him…along with a brief telepathic exchange that no one else suspected.

“How?” he said simply after a moment of awkward silence.

“By fighting them as warriors, face to face, hand to hand, world to world. No more tricks. No more running. No more fearing these bastards. You beat the swarm tactics of the lizards long ago when everyone thought it was impossible, so why is everyone convinced it can’t be done now?”

“Star Force was able to hold territory then,” Kirritimin interjected, for he had the unique position of having been the mastermind behind the lizards’ war against Star Force, and despite his forced genius helping them, Star Force had still won the war. “If you cannot deny the enemy the world you take, you face a never-ending carnage. We must have a mechanism to protect worlds in order to stop the Wardens from ramming them, or no world is safe. Let alone empty ones we take with nothing but rubble and corpses left behind.”

Esna leaned on the deactivated holo pedestal with both hands, then twisted her head to look down at the smart bug.

“That’s what I thought too, until Bren reminded me what it is to be a warrior. We want to win, but more than winning we want to fight rather than run. We want to stand our ground because the fight is worth it, but we’ve been bullied into defensive thinking because our civilian population is vulnerable. No world is safe…that’s what you said,” Esna all but accused as she switched her gaze back to Davis. “And because of that we’re building expendable worlds along the Core border, hoping the Hadarak can’t jump the defenses and get behind them to our people.”

“There are going to be V’kit’no’sat on those ‘expendable’ worlds,” Davis lightly growled.

“But you’re expecting them to get hit, and putting them there because, as you said, there is no safe world against the Wardens’ mass ramming. And the V’kit’no’sat are volunteering to go, because their empire’s former existence was based on fighting the Hadarak. It’s in their blood, and they want to fight…and so do I. But not defense. That won’t win the war. We have to go on offense.”

“How do we hold worlds that we take?” Kirritimin reiterated.

Esna slammed her fist down on the pedestal, inadvertently breaking it when the casing cracked as she applied more force than expected.

“That’s still defense. We’re all so bullied into submission that we forget how weak the Hadarak are. Most of their worlds are easy pickings, but because they have the swarm moving forward nobody can take advantage of it because everyone is on defense. It’s half a bluff that nobody is calling.”

“How do we call it?” Lord Daegan asked.

Esna turned to look at him, then made eye contact with the other 8 people in the room before turning back to the Protovic. “As a team. I don’t know what to do about the Founders, and I’m leaving the Lurkers, Trons, and anything else that’s Essence to the Archons or some other faction. But give me what I need and I can turn Canderous into an offensive weapon specialized for killing Hadarak. Star Force is so large we don’t all have to be multi-taskers. You have so many other true factions for that, but the aquatics requirement you made us take on to become a full faction,” Esna said, looking now to Davis, “is going to come in damn useful now.”

“Assume I give you everything you want, what will you do with it that hasn’t already been done?”

“You all made a mistake,” she said bluntly. “You said no Star Force world is safe from the Wardens ramming it. But you forgot that not all Star Force worlds are planets.”

“You are suggesting we move part of our population into the Temples,” Lord Daegan guessed.

Esna snorted. “No. While it may be hard for the Hadarak to get there, the Temples can be taken down by them, correct?” she asked, looking directly at Tennisonne.

The Mastertech’s head came up slightly. “The Temples have been designed to defend themselves against a Hadarak attack, but other than their mass they are more vulnerable than our Castles. Once their Essence reserves are expended…great as they might be…the structure of the Temple has no defense against ramming. They are better than anything we have right now, but they are not impregnable.”

“No they’re not,” Esna agreed. “But there are two factions in Star Force that are not vulnerable, and Canderous is the only one with civilians that are not threatened by ramming Wardens…because our worlds can move faster than them and dodge the attacks.

Davis’s laser eye lock went to Bren, who lightly smiled as he too saw the implications of this, though previously he hadn’t known where Esna was going with it.

“It is of limited value,” Kirritimin noted. “I have considered this tactic, but the amount of infrastructure Canderous has is tiny in comparison to a fully developed planet. In theory, if we had eons to build sedas and slowly moved our population into them, we could have a mobile civilization, but it will not help us in the near future. We simply cannot construct enough sedas for it to help us hold the Grand Border, let alone push beyond it.”

“You wouldn’t need genetic modifications for that,” Bren noted as he looked down at Kirritimin with an intelligence challenge.

“No it would not. Genetic upgrades are only useful in physical endeavors unless they are for brain capabilities regarding drone control. Since sedas are defensive stations the only logical assumption is that Canderous needs stronger minds to control more drones per person.”

“Not even close,” Esna said with an ironic snarl. “Anyone else care to speculate?”

“You don’t want to fight them with the fleet,” Grand Admiral Serren said with a perplexed look on her face.

“Right. Keep going,” Esna urged as Davis watched, with her knowing his mind was calculating faster than any of the others, perhaps except Kirritimin, though the bug wasn’t an Archon and Davis was…which was something many people had a habit of forgetting.

“You can’t fight space battles without a fleet unless you use planetary defenses. Those are vulnerable to Warden ramming, so you would have to use seda-based weaponry to fight the space battles, which is doable as long as the naval minions don’t cover you in IDF goo and slow you down enough for a Warden to catch up and crush you.”

“But that doesn’t involved genetic modification,” Lord Daegan chimed in. “She’s talking Commando work to take planets, not orbital bombardment. Which begs the question what the fleet would be doing?”

“What it should be doing,” Esna said angrily. “The minions are the most vulnerable during transit, and most of those assaulting small worlds are not being carried by Wardens. They’re being carried by other minions, weak minions that your fleets should be eviscerating before they ever get to a world,” she said, pointing a finger at the two Grand Admirals. “But what are you doing now? Covering worlds during evacuations while a few roaming fleets do damage to worlds via orbital bombardment, essentially mowing the grass so the Hadarak had to send more units to repopulate them and thus delay the forward movement. Defense, defense, defense. We should be on the attack!”

“How do we deny them reconquest?” Kirritimin asked calmly.

“The same way they do. We can play their game better than they can. They’re just a bunch of newbs, guys. Grown on site for the most part. Give me 50 year old Canderian newbs with the proper training and augments, and we’ll tear apart 5 year old minions easily. It’s the numbers that are always the problem, and it’s the numbers that the Star Force combined naval fleet should be focused on thinning and blocking their paths of travel. Do to them what the J’gar have done to the V’kit’no’sat. Deny them the spacelanes, and poach the hell out of those that try to get through. Never let them know where you are, always moving, always attacking, no spacelane is safe. When you go defensive your positions are marked and they have the movement advantage. Take it away from them and make them think defensively.”

“And leave the evacuees helpless?” Grand Admiral Lucin argued.

“No. I can’t get Canderous ready fast. We need the Grand Border intact and holding the swarms back. If that happens, and I’m counting on you guys to make it happen, then Canderous will do its part and become a Star Force faction dedicated solely to fighting and killing Hadarak.”

“What can Canderous do that the Paladin cannot do better?” the Viceroy challenged.

“Other than move our people around, not much, but you rely on swarm tactics while we work with superior units. I know you’ll argue that, but we press our people harder than any faction in training and you operate on genetic memories. In the short term you’re superior, in the long term my warriors will defeat yours given even numbers, because we’re better. And that’s how we have to beat the Hadarak. By being better. The Founders are getting their ass kicked and losing one of their three galaxies because of numbers. Because of the swarm. Not because of Essence. The Hadarak use Essence units to support the swarm, not the other way around. It is the swarm that is defeating the Founders, and us. And to defeat the Hadarak we must take their primary advantage and face it head on, rise above it, and crush them over the course of time in a long, arduous grind. We have to earn this, and when we do the bigger Hadarak units will be easy pickings for the rest of you. My war is with the minions. Let me fight it.”

“By ground assaults while the fleets keep reinforcements away?” Davis finally asked.

“Yes.”

“And why not use all of our armies to do so? Why just Canderous?”

“The rest of Star Force has to protect us from numerous enemies, and to have all specialize against the Hadarak would be inviting destruction on another front. Let Canderous evolve into what we need to become…a weapon designed for one purpose and one purpose only. We will leave the other wars to you. Give us the power to face the swarm head on.”

“How does this involve the sedas?” Lord Daegan asked. “Or are you planning on taking your civilians into the war zones?”

“Our civilians are always in the war zones. That’s what it means to be Canderian. But I’m not talking about moving our existing sedas. I’m talking about building new ones. Offensive ones, built to fight Hadarak and not other threats. I mean come on, we are talking about fighting an enemy that does not have armor or shields. The minions are weak as hell, yet we’re running from them? Can you not see how they’ve tricked us into ignoring their greatest weakness?”

Davis slammed his fist down on the pedestal, denting it in half the depth of his fist as Esna flinched, not expecting such an angry reaction from him.

“Yeg’gor,” he said, all but spitting the world. “Why have I been so blind?”

“Put it on the sedas and we become Wardens,” Esna said. “The minions can swarm all they want, and all they will do is scratch us. Include Essence weapons and we will be able to kill Wardens that try to engage us, and give us some defense against any Lurker that slips past the Borg vessels. I still need others to hunt and engage them, not Canderous, but the minions and their Warden bases Canderous can duplicate. We can become their mirror image, only better. We can beat them at their own game if you can figure out how to deal with their Essence units. Even their mainline minions, hard as they are to fight, we can deal with.”

“No,” Lucin said, looking up at Esna. “They are the fleet’s responsibility.”

“But seda designed for offense can handle them if needed,” Esna pointed out. “Give us Essence weapons and an Archon to use them…or even just Essence weapons where all we have to do is pull the trigger. You can run tankers out to us and refill as needed, and we can use some of it for heavy ground weapons when needed, but the grinding will be done the conventional way. Warrior to monster. And if we go on a killing spree we can kill them faster than they can reproduce. That’s the way to win, but it only works if we work together as a team, and if we have the grinding weapon necessary. Let me forge Canderous into that weapon. The other armies can come in behind us and pick up what we drop, but let us become the Hadarak’s worst nightmare. An enemy that fights them strength for strength and defies the swarm…but we can’t do it like this,” Esna said, pointing at her small body with both hands. “We need to be his size.”

Davis followed Esna’s finger to Bren, then sighed. “So this is what you two were talking about.”

“We didn’t do much talking about details, but I’m tired of letting the warships determine our fate. If we can be applied as the major planet-cleansing force, the Golden Knights will go with Canderous, and it would probably be a good idea to send the Varkemma as well. Neither of us are good for defensive situations. We’re bred for offensive.”

“Where are you going to get the Yeg’gor?” Tennisonne asked. “There’s no way we can produce what you need. Not even with Tu’gor.”

“We earn it in battle,” Esna said defiantly. “Put the factories to produce it inside our new sedas, and we’ll build it plate by plate as we go along, using resources from the planets we cleanse and taking it from any Wardens we happen to kill.”

“No,” he said with a firm shake of his head. “You don’t realize how big those factories are. I might be able to squeeze one inside a seda, but you wouldn’t have room for anything else. And I’m talking one of your big sedas.”

“It wouldn’t have to be every one,” Davis interjected. “You could have a few foundry sedas tagging along with an offensive one to protect it and give them the ability to create Yeg’gor bits as the war progressed. They’d slowly become stronger over time as long as they didn’t bite off more than they could chew. And recycled Hadarak Yeg’gor is how much faster?”

“184 times faster than pure synthesis.”

“I don’t like the idea of hunting for loot, but the Hadarak are going to attack and fight to the death no matter what. We caught a break with the lizards, but unless a Warden suddenly has a change of heart, we’re not going to be able to convert the others. And the Uriti have made it pretty clear the chances of that.”

“Is that a yes?” Esna asked.

“How do you plan to grow big enough to matter?”

“Through battle,” she said simply. “It’s not the numbers that matter, but how many minions one of us can kill, and that number will go up over time with experience and technology increases.”

“I can kill a lot,” Bren offered. “When the skies are clear.”

“But Canderous isn’t nearly large enough to do a full assault on the Hadarak worlds. The rest of our armies will be needed.”

“You may need them against the Founders or others,” Esna countered. “Let us do this, no matter how long it takes. We will grow into it, and we can always call on the others when the time comes, but I’m not counting on anyone but us. We can’t do it now, but we can become a force that can do it far into the future. But we have to begin now. Yeg’gor takes time to grow, as do new Canderian recruits. If I give the word, we will start reproducing like rabbits to fill the new sedas as quickly as we can build them.”

“And the genetic upgrades?”

“We need to be Knights. Not me, because I’d lose too much with the growth enhancements, but when our younglings reach the age of decision, I want to offer them the choice between the path of defense and the path of offense. The path of offense will be the same as if they were becoming a member of a Knight race, and with the same responsibility, only with the sole focus on becoming a killer of Hadarak, not a response force to go fight whoever wherever. Give us the size, give us the psionics, and give us Essence weaponry if you can’t give us the ability to use Essence itself. Give us everything, and make us as effective one man armies as we can be…because that’s how we defeat the swarm. We live, we persist, and we keep killing more as they die off and produce newbs to replace them. Time is our ally in that situation.”

“Unless you get in over your head and killed,” Serren cautioned.

“Let us handle that,” Bren interjected. “You handle the spacelanes.”

Davis looked at Tennisonne. “How hard is it to put an Essence shield around a seda?”

“The volume of the equipment isn’t much different than regular shields. It’s the density of power issue. The Uriti production rate is increasing, but slowly. I don’t think we could supply enough for a galaxy full of sedas and all our other projects.”

“The Essence weaponry would be kept in reserve until needed, correct?” Davis asked.

“The big stuff, yes. And the small stuff on the ground would be reserved for the toughest battles, special situations, a really badass sniper rifle…that sort of thing. Not for the daily grind. We’d use conventional weapons for that and hold the Essence for when the fleet let a Warden slip through…or worse.”

“How long can they store it?”

“We’re getting better at retention, but it’s still not Founder level,” Tennisonne said as he ran some mental calculations. “It would leak, but no more than a Lantern ship.”

“And you wouldn’t have to worry about securing those when the Varkemma can use the sedas to recharge,” Lord Daegan added.

Davis nodded. “I like this, but we need to throw everything at it and see if it can hold up to battle analysis. I think the numbers are going to be too small, even if Canderous sends half its population, but feel free to prove me wrong. Whoever does gets their own planet.”

“I already have 4 million,” Daegan said with a dismissive shrug.

“Moons don’t count,” Esna said, continuing the deadpan joke a third interval.

“Plausible,” Kirritimin finally said with an air of cautious excitement. “If we are playing the long game. But it is dependent on the Grand Border holding.”

“Yes it is,” Esna agreed. “And you guys handling the bigger stuff. Let us have the Zerglings and Overlords.”

Bren stifled a laugh, knowing that Esna probably didn’t realize Starcraft was one of the games that Davis had often played with his personal guard during interstellar flights when they weren’t needed.

Did you tell her? Davis asked him telepathically.

No. Ironic, isn’t it?

Davis sighed. “Ok, you sold me there. You get the Zerglings and Overlords while we get the Lurkers and everything else. Now prove to me it’s logistically worth it, and why I should give you guys all the goodies the other factions wish they had.”

“Kiri, I’m going to need your help,” Esna said, looking over at the bug.

“You always have it, Esna.”

“Get started, people. Bren, come with me,” Davis said, heading for the exit.

The Golden Knight followed him out, then down the hall some 100 meters before Davis stopped and looked up at him. “How much of this was your idea?”

“None. I just gave her the inspiration she needed. I didn’t know most of that before she told you.”

“But what did you do?”

“We had a chat and found out that we were both ticked at not being able to fight hand to hand. Too much has been put on the Naval division, and people like us don’t want to just be giving orders on a bridge. We want to personally fight. When she saw I was of like mind, something flipped in her and she came up with this brilliant idea. Please make it work. I’d like a real challenge ahead of me rather than pickup work here and there.”

“I know what you mean, but Naval beats everything for a reason.”

“Perhaps because we’ve been blinded by fear of what Naval can do, we forgot what the rest of the military is capable of. If Naval can keep the skies clear, we’re back to old school fighting where we don’t need to cling to a planetary shield generator. I very much want to get back to those days.”

“You weren’t around for those days,” Davis corrected him.

“True, but I’ve read the stories. Naval was support back then, and perhaps it should be now again.”

“If we spread out the fleet that far, we won’t be able to defend any world. We won’t have enough ships to leave behind in each of them. They’ll all be open to orbital bombardment.”

“The Hadarak don’t do it that well other than ramming,” Bren pointed out. “But if they get some ships through, it won’t be a massive warfleet. It’ll be a few ships doing a little bombardment.”

“Which is back to the old days,” Davis agreed. “I like the nostalgic irony…if it sticks. It may not, but she’s right about the swarm. Spread them out and they lose their effectiveness. Allow them free reign to collect while their backwater is untouched and you virtually guarantee their win when the Wardens can smash any fixed emplacements for them. Whoever designed the Hadarak war machine was a damn genius.”

“But they use darkside tactics.”

“Yes, and it’s time we started showing what the lightside can do. I don’t know why I didn’t see…”

“I do, belatedly.”

Davis stared at the floor for a moment of introspection. “Earth?”

“You haven’t been the same since it was decimated. All your efforts were based on strongholds, then Essence made them hilariously useless. You’ve been on defense ever since, and justly so, but it’s not the way we need to fight. It’s a way to catch our breath.”

“If this works, breath caught.”

“No it’s not,” Bren differed. “This is the Hadarak we’re talking about. The major Essence threat comes from the Rim, and you don’t do well when you’re helpless. You don’t want to get comfortable accepting losses to win, but we can fight that way if we have no other choice.”

“Am I that easy to read?”

“Only to one who you’ve confided in.”

“Can’t have personal guards I don’t completely trust, now can I?”

“You could, but you’re wise enough to cover multiple contingencies. You just got the ground upended on you by Essence. There’s one thing I think you need to focus on to get your footing again.”

“What is that?”

“All the Essence powers of the Founders can’t stop the Hadarak from beating them. If they’re losing one of their galaxies as we speak, then they’re on the defensive and the Hadarak may take them out for us.”

“I hadn’t considered that because it would take so long to happen they will have plenty of time to come swat us down before then.”

“Why bother when they’ve got another galaxy to conquer to replace the one they’ve lost?”

“You don’t plan for what people should do, you plan for what they can do, and we’re still vulnerable.”

“We don’t need you to save us, Sean. We need you to lead us. If we die, it’s not your fault. It’s the enemy’s, and none of us would switch teams if we had the choice. Death before dishonor. So stop thinking about how to avoid death, and start thing about how to hurt these bastards.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Not permanently. But take a mental vacation every now and then to try running things from that perspective. You’re not letting anybody down by doing that for a few hours.”

“Thank you, Yoda.”

Bren put his hands on his hips defiantly. “We need our leader to lead, now cower. You’re letting the enemy trick you into not performing at your full potential. Assume we are going to lose this war, and instead of planning how to win, plan how to do the most damage to the Founders before they take us out. And I for one don’t want to wait for what they have planned for us. I’d rather hit them first and force the combat on our terms…though I have no idea what that looks like with Essence warfare.”

“Carnage,” Davis said simply. “Carnage with no armor or shields. Just people hacking away at each other with no defense.”

Bren tapped on the device he wore on his chest. “Not anymore, and we’ll get better equipment with time.”

“There’s no guarantee of that.”

“No…but it’ll happen. I’ll wager you a planet on it.”

The lingering terror in Davis’s mind melted away in an instant as he was suddenly analyzing this from the opposite side, now that his opposition was in the position of hope and Davis had to analyze his chances of success as a threat against him…and that’s when he realized that, while there was no guarantee, the odds were not terrible. In fact, he wasn’t willing to take that bet because he suspected he might lose.

“No bet,” he said, punching Bren in the side of his massive leg. “Get back in there and make this work. I’ve got something else to do.”

“When do you not have something else to do?” Bren asked, patting the smaller man on the head as he walked away.

Davis considered that, wondering when the last time was that he had a real vacation…then he realized it was before the discovery of the pyramid, for every day since then he’d been working on something related to saving Earth, or now the galaxy.

“Workaholic,” he scolded himself, then walked off to go do some more.

9

May 13, 128888

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

Kara hovered in midair amongst a series of floating target drones, each a white orb adorned with gold trim and specifically crafted to collect Essence in its raw form…and what little they could from damaging attacks, but Kara wasn’t trying to destroy them, rather practice her accuracy and coordination with flinging Essence beyond her body.

Many Essence skills she’d learned from Strovok didn’t leave the body, like the Hard Light weapons that formed as an extension of their body and locked to their Essence…which in turn was locked to their Core. Those two things coexisted within her body, but when she created an Essence Rush it forced the energy to disconnect from her Core. She could then craft weapons out of it that extended off her Core…which occupied every piece of her body, not just her brain.

Kara could feel it now, not from a physical sense, but in a way that was hard to articulate. She could feel herself everywhere in her body, and when she disconnected from her physical senses Kara was like a blonde statue floating in the darkness, with her light defining the shape of her body.

That light could then clasp to it and extend into swords, hammers, or anything else she practiced enough to get used to forging. If the Hard Light was broken, the Essence would be beyond her control and it would vaporize into nothingness…which happened every time hers collided with Strovok’s, for his was more dense, more powerful, or more something. She didn’t know for sure, but he so outclassed her, every time they sparred she just wanted to do a little more damage than last time, knowing she wasn’t going to win.

But not all her training was sparring, and right now this was a solo exercise that she was not yet starting. Whenever she felt an opening she went passive and peered inside deeper, as she was doing now.

The Essence stuck to her Core, but squeeze it like a sponge and some of it would become liquid and she could direct it where she wanted with difficulty. The mechanism for the movement wasn’t physical, but rather an aspect of her Core…which couldn’t be measured by technology. Strovok said he could see inside her, but she couldn’t see into him…though she was beginning to naturally gain the ability to look inside herself.

Kara didn’t know how she was improving, rather fumbling around in the dark for the most part, but her ability to move Essence around without having to rely on her Siphon was improving…and while Hard Light was an important ability to learn, it was for melee combat, and if she was going to fight other Essence users alongside Strovok, she needed to let him handle the melee as she assisted him with ranged attacks.

But to shoot ranged Essence meant it had to leave contact with your Core…unless you used long chains or whips to connect to whatever you had crafted. That wouldn’t work for firing blasts, so she had to take the loosened Essence within her and change its form into something that would hold up beyond her body long enough to hit the target drones.

She wasn’t even trying to work on crafting it into certain abilities today. She just wanted to work on her launch mechanism, cadence, and accuracy. The trouble was, she could launch Essence from any part of her body with or without a physical trigger. Looking inward now, she could create many effects pulling from her center, but in combat she wouldn’t get many breaks to do so, and that meant she had to react fast…and that meant adding a physical action to help her mind automatically reach into her Core for a well-practiced action that she could do instinctively rather than using large amounts of mental focus.

Final Spark had her focusing from her abdomen, but she needed to shoot more than what was just in front of her, so her hands were the natural choice…with Kara pulling Essence out of her arms and having the rest of it in her body flow to replace the drain and even out as the oversurge in her palms was focused into two of her fingers clasped together like a gun muzzle.

Kara pointed at one of the targets and shot a stream of Essence into it at a range of 10 meters, filling it up to saturation only to have it fly off with its valuable cargo as another drifted up from below to take its place.

Her left hand tilted down and to the side, firing another stream into another, and she repeated one arm after another until her body’s Essence level dropped below half…then she opened her Siphon and began replacing it while using it, firing one stream after another with faster and faster succession as the targets raced to keep up with her.

It was hard for her to maintain her focus, for the Essence was sticky and didn’t want to flow without a lot of pushing on her part. Too little and it wouldn’t condense into a stream, just splatting off her fingers like a misfire, but each day she worked on this it loosened up a little bit more, though not much. Kara knew she had to grind this type of training, but it still seemed to be moving too slow for what she was expecting.

When Kara finally ran out of targets, with them all floating off across the landscape in a scattered convoy to the Elcee outpost miles away, she dropped to the ground and felt her bare feet sink into the wet soil, for a rainstorm had passed through a few hours ago, with another one approaching from the ‘south.’

She wore spandex short shorts and a training bra, which was her normal attire nowadays. The Elcee kept any potential threats away from her training area, so she didn’t need armor, and when she wasn’t sleeping she was training, so no other clothes than training clothes were needed, except she did have a pile of them with tears, sweat, and blood stains on them. She didn’t want to use her armor except as a last resort, and Strovok had suggested she didn’t, because she needed to learn to fight and protect herself using Essence alone.

It didn’t always work out so well, so her wardrobe was being refurbished as often as the target drones, but right now what she wore was intact, though sweaty. Using Essence took a toll on the body, and Kara was always dripping at the end of a long workout.

It was getting better though, for somehow she was developing an immunity to some of it. Wherever the Essence flowed freely there was little strain…but where it was sticky her body had to work hard to move it, even though it wasn’t her body doing it.

Kara couldn’t explain it to herself, she just had to wing it and hope to figure stuff out as she went along…which was different than having the Vorch’nas, for it came with instructions and knowledge. Her Essence abilities had no such luxury, and even with the Responders and Strovok to help, there was a lot she was having to clumsily figure out by trial and error.

But it wasn’t just her Essence that needed training, so as she waited for the targets to empty out and return she started dancing on the soggy ground, moving from one combat pose to another with rapidity as she began to work up a sweat the conventional way. From dancing she morphed into shadow boxing, getting her feet and ankles covered in mud and splashing up little drops all over the rest of her.

Kara didn’t care. Her clothes would be washed easy enough. And since she couldn’t become a Saiyan, she needed to goose her natural speed as much as she could. Power was one thing, but power without speed was limited, and she’d always prided herself on her limb speed…though compared to Saiyans she was painfully slow now.

Kara was convinced that to defeat Essence users more powerful than her she was going to have to use a combination of Essence, Psionic, and Commando abilities, so the Archon wasn’t making the mistake of only training for Essence…though for the first time in her life she had abandoned the other four Archon disciplines. It felt freeing in a way, but also lazy. Archons were multi-taskers that needed to be sharp in all areas, but Kara was once again a special case, and she had to adapt to that.

She could work on her Aquatics, Mech, Aerial, and Naval skills again later…much later. So she wasn’t giving them up entirely, though Kara hated to think how much they were already beginning to atrophy.

Didn’t matter now. She had to become a living weapon because the other Archons and the Empire needed her to be…but it was still weird to have her internal warnings flashing constantly telling her she was forgetting to do the other training. It had become so ingrained in her that even after a few decades off she still had her previous habits nagging at her.

But on the upside, her Commando skills were improving at a faster rate, especially when she was able to add a little Essence to them, and as Kara’s shadow boxing escalated she started experimenting once again with what she could and couldn’t upgrade by throwing raw Essence at it.

Her punches sped up, hit harder, went askew, added fire, ice, wind…a lot of weird things were possible, but all started off random and out of control. So far though, she’d been focusing and succeeding on adding momentum to her strikes…and had her bones not been enhanced by Mebvat, some of her heavier punches would have torn her arms off at the elbow when she didn’t have a target to slow them down.

She could use Hard Light to take the blow when she did land one, but Kara had been working on sort of an Essence band over the front of her hands when she punched…or kicked…that would keep her from damaging herself. It was sort of like an invisible version of brass knuckles, except that it was defensive only and took away her knuckle strikes entirely, replacing it with a solid, malleable object that spread out the impact damage to her entire hand.

When she didn’t get it right her hands would rip the skin off…which hurt like hell, but her Vorch’nas would fix them within a few seconds. She was grateful for that, but it only underscored how dangerous Essence was to be experimenting with. Keli-172 had died from such experimentation, and Kara wondered how many others had before the Founders created the Temples and a very precise path of advancement to follow.

And if one followed that path they were more or less safe…but it was also the Founder’s path, and perhaps it steered clear of abilities they didn’t want you to discover or craft. Regardless, Kara had to go another way, and her training in the Black Shield was still in its infancy. She could create the basic barrier, but it was no better than other types of Essence shield. Still, Strovok said it was an incredible breakthrough to be able to generate the foundational matrix for what the ability would be built upon, but as far as a defense it wasn’t worth much right now…and she couldn’t practice it without him, for the stupid Responders wouldn’t recognize her for use of the more advanced training stations lightly scattered across the Temple, some of which had some nifty machines to help tune and practice multiple shielding techniques.

Kara was having to do it raw, out in the field, with nothing but Strovok and her Archon training instincts to work with…but she was already lightyears ahead of every other Archon and going far beyond it with every year that passed.

Still so slow, a voice said into her mind, and it wasn’t Strovok’s.

Kara was in mid punch when the telepathic contact hit, and she stumbled forward, tripping on her toes as they sank into the mud, and nearly went face down in the muck until she activated her Yen’mer and stopped herself by hovering a few inches away.

Morgan? she asked, not sensing anyone nearby as she floated back up to her feet.

Peekaboo, the other Archon said, popping out of nowhere and hitting Kara across the jaw.

Kara half spun to the ground, but stayed on her feet and twirled around throwing a Jumat blast back towards the now visible trailblazer…who negated it with a bigger one of her own, which rocked Kara back on her heels as she took the excess.

“Nice hair,” Morgan scoffed, turning her own gold and zipping forward so fast Kara had trouble even seeing it coming…then she had her hands up in a defensive position as she swiped at the blur the Saiyan had become, throwing up bioshields to help as they got battered down quickly by hit after hit as Morgan literally danced around Kara, attacking her from all sides and throwing up so much mud and water in the process it looked like there was a curtain of it around both of them.

Kara was getting pummeled so much she used her Ubven on reflex, stopping the Saiyan for the briefest of moments, then Morgan’s Rentar melted her a path through it and the blur returned to pummeling her…but not before she was able to get a little better positioning and released a spherical Jumat blast that knocked Morgan back a meter, only to have her come in again.

The trailblazer’s Commando abilities were too damn good, and her Saiyan upgrade made her unstoppable…so Kara had to go into Essence mode and created a vortex around her, not knowing exactly where Morgan was even when feeling for her Core. She was moving too fast and flickering all over the place, so an area of effect attack was what was needed.

She spun the Momentum Essence around her, vortexing it outward so to push Morgan back, but somehow she fought through it, and Kara felt a foreign Essence mixing with hers right up to…

Suddenly Kara got hit in the jaw so violently it rung her bell and she lost focus for a moment…then was hit in the gut, the back, and 10 other places before she knew what was happening…

Reflexive rage filled her and she just pushed outward…everywhere, blowing Morgan down and into the mud as trees around them toppled and Kara’s clothing got obliterated off her body along with the blood coming from her nose that her Vorch’nas hadn’t gotten to fixing just yet.

When the punches stopped coming Kara calmed down, shut down her Siphon which had somehow turned on full blast without her realizing it, and saw Morgan’s legs sticking up out of the mud as her head and upper body had been driven down into it like a tent spike.

“Whoops,” she said, reaching out telekinetically to help pull her out, but Morgan didn’t need assistance, and when the torrent stopped she flew backwards into the air enough to get clear and flipped over to land on the ground, her head completely covered with mud as she spat and coughed it up, then telekinetically squeezed some out of her nose.

“That’s what you get for not saying ‘hi’ first,” Kara commented with an awkward frown on her face. “What are you doing here?”

“Taking a break from Dino training. They’ve started to figure it out, and I wanted to see this super-power of yours myself. I didn’t expect to land more than a couple of punches at best. Why’d you let me beat you up?”

“I could barely see you,” Kara protested. “I’m glad you think I’m such a badass you can jump at will and not get the drop on…but I’m not. You hit too damn hard,” she said as the broken nose Morgan had given her audibly snapped back into alignment and sealed up.

“Training not going that well?” the trailblazer said apologetically.

“Yes and no. How did you sneak up on me?”

“Kgat and a little Essence hiding technique Wilson has been working on. Did it work?”

“I don’t know if I was just distracted or not, but I didn’t have any idea you were nearby, and even after you said something I couldn’t pinpoint you…though I didn’t try to look for your Essence. I was just happy to hear your voice.”

“That lonely out here?”

“I’m back to being the wonder girl that nobody else can keep up with.”

“Now that you know I’m here, can you keep me from hitting you again?”

Kara reached out a hand towards Morgan, but the woman didn’t move. Instead she let Kara get an Essence grip on her, which she solidified into a Hard Light body cast…which somehow Morgan broke with her own Essence until she quickly enhanced it with a Siphon flow. The second attempt pinned Morgan hard, and Kara slowly walked up to within a few inches of her face cautiously smiling.

“Stuck?”

“Afraid so. How much Essence are you having to use to hold me?”

“More than I expected. Somehow your skills are still better than mine, you just lack my power.”

“How much of your training is going into offense and defense?”

“Most of it is offense, but I’m working on the Black Shield I mentioned earlier. It’s the key, Morgan, and I’m not doing so good at it.”

“What about body form defenses?”

Kara shrugged. “Is that what you used?”

“Cut your extra power and I’ll show you in slow mo.”

“Alright,” Kara said, reducing her shackles to only what her body could produce, though the amount already there Morgan had to work through over time. She was somehow melting it like ice, and once she got enough movement to wiggle the whole thing cracked and fell apart.

“Did you see?”

“Yeah, and I can’t do that.”

“That’s because almost all my Essence training goes into movement enablers. I’m not going to be able to win an Essence war, but if I can keep my mobility a few seconds I should be able to close to melee range. I figure that will give me a chance if I move quick enough,” Morgan said as her hair went back to her normal red/black that matched her Ninja Monkey Clan colors.

“That’s all you’re practicing?”

“Mostly. We’ve got you for the big stuff, right?”

“Working on it, but Strovok is so far beyond me it’s crazy.”

“Is that true?” Morgan asked as the Mek’tal ran into view, hopping over one of the toppled trees and towering over both Humans.

“I can give you a demonstration if needed,” he said angrily, but Kara waved him off.

“It’s alright. My ‘Mom’ was just pointing out a flaw in my defenses,” she said, using Ginsi’s favorite insult for her Master…because Morgan really hated it, and the glare she gave Kara confirmed it.

“Do not hit her again,” Strovok warned.

“I’d normally say something pithy right now, but I get the feeling you could crush me pretty easily,” Morgan said, with a little variance in her normal poise that Kara recognized was real fear, though she was masking it well. “You’re Strovok I assume? My name is Morgan-063.”

He looked to Kara. “She is one of your warlords?”

“Yeah. The best hand to hand fighter we have in the Archons.”

“After Ginsi,” Morgan corrected.

Kara gave her an annoyed look, standing there wearing nothing but mud and one tattered shoe. “We all know you can take her.”

“Her levels are higher than mine, and she’s better against a crowd than I am. I trained her well.”

“She is tiny,” Strovok said, unimpressed. “I thought you had larger warriors.”

“We do,” Morgan said, not offended. “The ones that are better than me are called the Golden Knights…some of them, anyway. They’re specialists. Archons have to be good at everything. We just happen to be better than most of the specialists too.”

“You were using a version of Dark Sheath on approach?”

“I didn’t know it had a name, and I didn’t realize it was something other people had. We figured it out on our own since the Temple wasn’t being very helpful with what we needed.”

“It is called Dark Sheath, and it absorbs the weaker Essence flickers your body naturally makes, as well as those sent out to detect Essence users. Do you seek to become an assassin?”

Morgan chewed on her lip for a moment. “If that’s what you call getting into punching range before I’m obliterated, then the answer is yes.”

“It is worthless if you do not have a quick kill skill. Do you?”

“Not in Essence.”

“Then you will waste your life uselessly against an Essence wielding opponent, or do you seek powers to deal with others?”

“I’m not here to be trained, though I’m always interested in free pointers. I’m here to talk with her about…stuff.”

“Do you normally begin conversations with unprovoked attacks?”

“You don’t?” Morgan said deadpan.

“Not usually,” Kara interrupted. “Its fine, Strovok. I won and that’s what matters.”

Morgan raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything.

“Are there others coming?”

“Not that I know of. We’re busy fighting a big war in the Core while the Vargemma sit here on their asses refusing to do anything other than try to kill us.”

“My allegiance is not with the Vargemma.”

“I know. Otherwise I wouldn’t be within Essence range of you,” the trailblazer admitted.

“You interrupted my sleep cycle, and there is little point in returning to it. You may observe as we spar, but do not interfere in any way,” he warned.

“I promise I’ll be a good girl and just watch,” she said, slapping Kara on her muddy butt. “Get in there, Jinxie.”

“Thanks,” Kara said sarcastically, not having expected another sparring session before she got to sleep, but she wasn’t going to argue with Strovok, who was visibly upset by the unannounced visitor.

Both she and him flew up into the air well above Morgan, with Kara kicking off her useless shoe as a summoned drone came with replacement clothing, then after getting dressed again they began going at it in a lot of new ways as the trailblazer watched with her Essence-enhanced vision. Both of them were far beyond her Neo abilities, so much so it almost made her comically naïve, which was what she hoped to gage the level of here.

If you were outmatched, you still had some options if you knew how you were outmatched. Walking into a fight against a superior opponent whose power was unknown was an easy way to get yourself killed. Morgan needed to understand as much as she could how these stronger Essence fighters fought if she was going to have a shot at a single penetration in their defenses.

It was either that or run on sight…and right now, looking at the two of them go at it, ‘run’ seemed like the wiser option by a long shot.

10

May 18, 128888

Neontrix System (Home Three Kingdom)

Shipyard 825

Esna stood onboard Seda KOEN, looking out the 4 story tall holographic windows on the observation platform that covered more than 2 miles within the space station, arcing around the perimeter yet being well inside the armored hull. Her mind was elsewhere, but her eyes were on the spider frame of a new seda being rush built by the H’kar at Davis’s request. Neontrix wasn’t in their original territory, but was one of their expansion colonies elsewhere in the Empire, of which they had many, and this one had one of the largest shipbuilding industries within Star Force.

There were 2033 Scale 2 shipyards here, which meant they were capable of producing warships of any size, but Neontrix also had 82 Scale 1 shipyards, which meant they could produce anything in the Star Force catalog with speed. You could build anything anywhere if you wanted to take your time and bring in resources, parts, and specialists, but if you wanted to do it with alacrity you needed a full-fledged shipyard with a crew that knew how to use the massive industries within to produce from blueprints at maximum speed without compromising efficiency.

It wasn’t a simple task, and the choreography had to be worked out well beforehand. But when it was put into motion it was a thing of art, and this system was churning out warships, drones, and even a new Borg vessel every now and then at such a rapid pace that there had to be constant convoys coming into the system to deliver the raw materials needed, for Neontrix could no longer supply them all itself.

Esna had gotten a priority slot in one of the Scale 1 shipyards, pushing back other projects that had been waiting in line for centuries, and the seda blueprints weren’t even finished yet…yet the basic frame was already being constructed. That much Tennisonne had already signed off on and sent ahead while he personally worked on the rest, promising to have the various pieces of it designed before the shipyard would need them, and so far he had been delivering.

The not yet finished plans were for a Voidcrusher-class Zeda…with the terms being Davis’s choice. ‘Sedas’ were defensive stations that could move slowly between star systems, but that wasn’t going to be good enough when Esna took her people across the Grand Border into the depths of the Hadarak-infested systems. Hers needed to be faster, more heavily armed, and containing no civilians. They also needed to have industry onboard and the workers to harvest resources from captured planets and even dead Hadarak.

That was going to require more than one type of Zeda, and right now there were 3 planned. Voidcrushers were for combat and would also be equipped with Essence defenses and offenses, to both kill Wardens and to defend themselves against Lurkers or whatever else the Hadarak showed up with beyond the normal minion swarm. Forge-class Zeda would be just as fast and well-armed, but inside where the hangar bays and barracks that the Voidcrushers carried their armies within, would be the extra industry required to create Yeg’gor, and to recycle it.

Tennisonne hadn’t even started on it yet, nor the third type of Zeda to be called an ‘Armory.’ It would have the same speed and defenses as the other two, but inside the bulk of its space would be occupied by ship and mech yards, along with large warehouses to store raw materials gathered that could not yet be processed. In this way the Armory-class Zedas were the treasure chests of the new force, yet they would look identical on the outside to the others, so the enemy would not know which was which.

There were many facets of the triad being included that had already been discussed, including the ability for 4 Zedas to combine into a fully functional shipyard capable of producing another Zeda inside their tetrahedral perimeter. Once Esna had enough of them…far more than 4…she wouldn’t be using existing shipyards to increase her numbers. She’d be making them inside enemy territory in orbit of planets her forces had already cleared of enemy infestation.

But that was long, long into the future. Right now she needed one to get started, and until she had it she would be running her operations out of one of the 7 Canderian sedas stationed in this system…but it would be for the last time, because once the first Voidcrusher was completed she would be taking command and leaving Canderous behind permanently.

Davis had not gone for her idea of giving Canderous enhanced powers to fight the Hadarak. Instead he had come up with something better…and the others in their short-lived group had expanded on his designs until she found herself involved in something far more grand than she had anticipated.

Canderous was a Human faction, and as such it could only pull on the very small Human population for recruits, even if it sought those outside Canderous itself. Only taking from Canderians would have meant Esna would be able to be an effective fighting force against the Hadarak, but not the monster she needed to become. To do that, she had to go bigger and draw from all the population of Star Force.

And suddenly she found herself elevated to the level of the trailblazers, for Davis had commissioned a new Clan to be formed, and he’d given it solely to her to build and lead, though she was no longer designing most of it. Even the trailblazers themselves were chipping in and offering ideas, which were all flowing to her now that Davis had bowed out.

Esna had wanted to become a specialized weapon to fight the Hadarak, and Davis had given her exactly that. She was in full command now, and she knew that being Canderian was not enough. She had to become more than that, and now she stood watching the beginning of her first Zeda being put together piece by piece as her body ached from the upgrades that she’d recently been given.

She’d accidentally been granted the psionic Fornax by a quirk of fate, developing it naturally from her dormant genetics in a time of great stress and pain. But now it was no longer alone. Davis had granted her the other basic 6 with a pathway to the higher tiers if she could earn them.

Esna had telepathy now, telekinesis, the ability to survive cold and heat and melt metal in her bare hand. She also had the ability to see through walls and enter a healing trance to greatly speed up repairs to her body. Her personal power level had now soared beyond her dreams, and yet she had a mere inkling of the power the Archons had, which made her respect and fear their prowess even more.

Yet now, ironically, she would be commanding Archons as many had already requested transfer to her new Clan. She didn’t deserve to lead it, and didn’t know what Davis thought he was doing. Lead Canderous, yes, she could do that. She understood them and already held a co-equal position with the Khans. But the Clans were superior to even the Knight races and their Esquires. The Clans were the best of the best…and now she was to lead one?

“Rammak what am I doing?” she asked the windows as the distant stars had to compete with all the little craft zooming around the shipyard and winking in and out of the direct sunlight coming from behind her. “I’m not ready for this…but I know you’d say I wasn’t ready for anything before, yet I managed to find my way with help. And I do have help now, a lot of it, but everyone is busy doing their things to help the empire and this…I know this the key. I can feel it. But why are they leaving it to me? I gave them the idea, why aren’t those better than me taking this? It makes no sense.”

There was no one around at the moment, at least not for a few hundred meters, so Esna had the view to herself and didn’t even bother to whisper. She often spoke to Rammak, knowing that wherever his Core was now it couldn’t hear her, but that didn’t matter. Speaking aloud what she was feeling helped her mind to analyze it better, and Rammak would always be the person she trusted and respected the most…even more than Davis and the trailblazers. Rammak is the one who had saved her from both death and the abyss of the wild. He was the one who had showed her what it meant to be Human, what it meant to be Star Force, and what the genetic legacy that her body held truly meant, and how it had been denied her by fate.

She owed everything to him, even though he hadn’t been able to save Teren. Sometimes Esna wondered if her brother would be beside her now if he’d lived, or if he’d have chosen another path in Star Force, but though their time together had been brief, Rammak was closer to her Core than her brother was…and that was saying a great deal, because Esna and Teren had been very close. They had to be in order to survive in the wild, and she still wished there had been some way to save him.

But not even Rammak had survived to make it back to Star Force territory, at least not to the ‘safe’ territory beyond the war zone…but he had set foot on a Star Force base again before dying in combat later on a worthless planet that Esna refused to set foot on again. It would always be the most hated place in the galaxy for her, and in a way that made the horrors of the Hadarak infestations a bit easier to face. Because she’d rather be there or anywhere else than on Darlek.

“The others are going to keep us alive…I know they are. But they don’t have a plan to win. I’m it, and the Director has given me the powers and responsibility of a trailblazer to make it happen. Did you see this potential in me back then? I don’t see how you could have, but it makes me wonder. I know with resources so stretched this wouldn’t be happening unless they had a great deal of faith in me, but I don’t see it in myself. But warriors rise to meet the call of battle as you taught me, and I will do so now. I just fear it may not be enough.”

Esna fell silent for a moment, wondering what Rammak would have said back to her, and usually she imagined something useful. This time she didn’t, and that hollowness only made her more convinced that she was going to fail. That the Hadarak were too big, too numerous, and too well entrenched to actually beat…and that the people who were capable of taking her idea and making it work were giving it to her because they didn’t truly believe in it, and that it was her idea to make succeed and they weren’t expecting to get anything out of it, but were so desperate they were willing to try anything.

Warriors are the most dangerous when their back is to the wall and they know they are about to die, his voice suddenly said from memory, because in that moment nothing can get worse. And when nothing can get worse you are free to fight boldly and fearlessly. Be fearless, little one.

“Fearless,” she repeated aloud as all responsibility and anxiety suddenly drained from her. No one was counting on her for anything. This was a long shot they had to take, because they needed something to work, but they weren’t counting on it. They were going to hold the line at the Grand Border without her help. If she failed, nothing would change…but if she succeeded…

And in that moment Esna was free.

There was no going back. No protecting others. No living a safe life. The Empire was in peril, and she had just been freed up from all responsibility for the lives of others. They had given her what she requested…to become a weapon. And weapons had only one purpose.

Esna used her new power to telepathically interlink with a control node behind the viewscreen and switched the local section over to a galactic map and zoomed in on the enemy-held center. She stared at them along with all the strength-level icons displayed from the most recent scouting missions overlaid on old data.

It was a massive fortification that had scared her up until this moment, but no longer. Now she saw weakness and vulnerability. Pathways to attack and distract. Supply lines to disrupt and Wardens to hunt. It wasn’t a place to fear…it was a place to be feared. It was the battlefield on which she would become the monster leading a Clan of monsters that had but one purpose, not above others, but exclusive of all others.

To hunt and destroy Hadarak…barring a time when negotiation became possible. Davis had made that clear just before he told her that he didn’t think it would ever happen, and that she shouldn’t pursue it unless it fell in her lap. Others would continue looking for a way to communicate and disrupt the genetic hold on the Wardens, the minions, and other Hadarak, but it didn’t look promising, and after the miracle Star Force had managed with the lizards, they had the experience going in to know what to look for…and they still thought it was impossible.

So Esna had her orders to become a hunter, something that Star Force was typically against, but the nature of the Hadarak made it a necessity in this case. They couldn’t be captured and contained…not with them choking the life out of the galaxy and the ability to reproduce so fast from so few. If they wouldn’t surrender then they had to be destroyed until Davis found another option, and he was assuming there was none.

The girl who came back a monster.

Esna had been born in the wilds, beyond Star Force, beyond anything even remotely like true civilization. She had left a very young, very naïve girl and found a home in Star Force…but now she was coming back to the wilds. To where she had always known in her gut that she belonged. Star Force was home, but warriors were not meant to live at home. They were meant to go into the wilds where the fighting was, and now that’s exactly where she was going…and it might be where she was dying, but that too was alright. Part of her had expected to follow Rammak down that path long ago, and still was. But if she died it would be in combat, and worthy combat at that.

The Hadarak had to be stopped. They had to be killed. This galaxy and many others depended on this. And if Esna had to show Star Force the way to fight in the wilds because she had been born there, then challenge accepted. Fate had been a bitch to her from the very beginning. Now it was time to return the favor, and she knew now that Davis had already seen this.

The girl who came back a monster to fight the void.

It was pretty damn obvious now, for he’d also chosen the name of the new Clan.

Clan Kai’Sa.

Esna returned the viewing window to its normal state and spun around, suddenly finding the path before her clear and embracing it. She headed to the nearest medtech station, feeling the need to get some matching face tattoos worthy of a void hunter.

Morgan and Kara were battlemeld linked, which allowed the trailblazer to feel her partner’s Essence use and gain some insights into what she was doing, particularly this Siphon ability that continued to have Wilson stumped as to how to probe for it…but they weren’t just linking up to give Morgan a better view. They were teaming up against Strovok to give him an idea what battlemeld and Saiyans were, and Morgan was loving every bit of it except the fact that her own Essence firepower was next to useless.

She had to fight hand to hand, and mostly as a distraction for Kara to get in an attack on the Mek’tal…who was ridiculously good at using all 4 hands to fight in multiple directions, but his speed was nothing compared to hers, and if he didn’t pay her enough attention she would get in close and hurt him, so she was helping Kara out greatly just by making him shove her away over and over again as the three went at it in midair once again.

“Stop!” Kara suddenly yelled, with Morgan coasting in to within a meter of Strovok when he didn’t Essence push her away. She likewise didn’t take advantage of the opening as they both turned to look at Kara.

“What is it?” Strovok asked.

“Trigger warning,” she said, tapping her Vorch’nas crystal. “I set it up to monitor Temple activity and it just pinged. There’s an unauthorized portal activation.”

“Where?” he growled.

“Not one of the big ones. A small one in the Caretaker areas…shit,” she said, producing a hologram larger than herself showing the shimmering portal that someone had just walked out of.

“That is not the same race,” Strovok said, glaring at the white/purple biped with a solid tail trailing behind it just above the floor, “but those are the same bioluminescent robes.”

“Coming for you?” Morgan asked.

“Probably,” she said, mentally contacting the Paladin fleet and rallying them to action. “Let us handle this. We have a game plan in place.”

“I’ll stay behind you, but I am going,” Morgan said firmly as the portal flared again…and a second identical alien walked out…then a third…and a fourth…

www.aerkijyr.com

‘Warriors’

Symbiosis

1

May 18, 128888

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

“Where are they?” Arch Duke Binoy demanded from onboard the Elcee flying city that contained the hidden command center for the Star Force occupation forces within the Temple.

“Sector 88294. Access point is a standard cargo terminal.”

Binoy watched the hologram of the unidentified individuals entering the Temple through one of the Essence portals that up until now had only allowed Caretaker units through. As far as was known, no person had transited between Temples except through the large, obvious ones on the surface. The smaller ones hidden underground were in Caretaker-guarded areas where no one was allowed entrance, and those that tried were either killed or stunned and removed by the Founder-made drones.

Star Force now had control over those drones, and while they had put the kill code on hold, they hadn’t allowed the Vargemma to access those areas, so they shouldn’t even know those smaller portals existed.

“Transit point?”

“Vector is from an unknown location,” the Paladin Researcher explained, having been assigned to the Arch Duke’s command staff to offer him insight to the ongoing projects in the Temple while simultaneously giving the Researcher a prime position to analyze Temple macro dynamics and how they responded to the Arch Duke’s alterations.

“Shit,” the Human whispered, knowing that Jason’s mapping expedition had cataloged all visible transition routes the Caretaker drones were moving on in the shadow network. Binoy thought he knew of all the routes into and out of Gamma Tricumbda, but apparently there were others, else he would have received a heads up about this incoming transit at the minimum. In theory anything coming out of the ‘Coins’ would be intercepted by Jason’s units, living or otherwise, but somehow these few dozen individuals had gotten here via an unknown access point. “Could it be a ship?”

“Possible,” the Researcher admitted. “Most likely sources is an unidentified portion of the shadow or dark networks, or another network entirely. An Essence transit was made and received, but no identifying orders came with it.”

That was strange, because the Temples often talked to one another, as did the shadow network, in the form of computer code. Usually it was to coordinate work crews and cargo transfers, to make sure the destination wasn’t already overloaded before they sent more and spent the extremely valuable Essence to do it in a way that was undetectable to the ‘mundanes’ in the galaxy. This transit hadn’t been announced ahead of time, which wasn’t unheard of, but traveling without puddle jumper or other craft was. Whoever these people were, they were coming through with bare skin exposed on their face, hands, feet, and tail tip. The rest of them was covered in some form of thick clothing with robe-like flaps draping them in a regal-looking aesthetic despite the glowing patches that made them look like some mishmash between Tron and Dragonball Z…for they looked very much like Form 4 Frieza, except their heads appeared dolphin smooth and tapered backwards into two fleshy splits.

Their heads didn’t glow, but their clothing did…

“I believe that clothing is biological,” the Researcher said a moment before Binoy could fully form the thought in his head.

“Implications?”

“Observation only.”

“Darren,” he said, turning to another Human on his staff. “Inform Viceroy Frassa that we have potential hostiles. I need a hologram in that chamber now,” he said, walking over to a silver circle in the floor that would scan and transmit his image while surrounding him in a shield wall that would display the surroundings in the arrival room they were monitoring.

A moment later his view switched to just that, being transmitted from a Star Force-controlled Caretaker drone that entered along with several others that were being retasked there remotely.

The Arch Duke’s image appeared in front of the drone, life size, but with enough staticy interference for those viewing to know it wasn’t real. The hologram technology was good enough to simulate that, which is why Star Force added the distortion to make it clear when there was a transmission into the field, especially when dealing with strangers.

Binoy mentally triggered the translation program as several of the new arrivals noticed his image and turned their heads toward it, revealing sickly yellow eyes surrounding black pupils that were a little too wide.

“Hello. My name is Arch Duke Binoy. I am the current commander of this Temple. Please identify yourselves. You are not on our arrival schedule.”

The drone that was transmitting the hologram moved forward, as did his image, then it winked out momentarily until another drone took over the transmitting as the first one was crushed by an invisible force and thrown against a nearby wall like a piece of trash.

“Be aware,” Binoy cautioned, “that we are nice people, but able to…” he cut off as the system went down. “What happened?”

“Jamming field most likely,” the Researcher said as multiple people on the command deck frantically worked the problem. “We lost connection to everything within…20-30 meters. I can’t be more precise than that. There aren’t enough nodes in the walls down there.”

“Where’s the Viceroy?”

“He hasn’t responded yet.”

“Inform Morgan, and assume defense procedures. Assume hostile intent. Do we have any interface attempts?”

“None,” the Researcher said, already looking for that, but as far as he could tell nothing was happening outside that null zone, inside of which not even the nearby visual cameras could penetrate. It was a black bubble in all aspects, inside of which as now unknown, even using the landlines…

The Nu’avi continued arriving through the portal, with some 38 already having entered with another 22 yet to arrive. The typical 60 man special response team that the Neofan usually sent to deal with insurrections within their own empire, but on occasion they were sent out into the frontier when something other than the Hadarak was causing trouble. The servant race had trillions of individuals fighting the Hadarak right now, and all were Essence capable to some degree, but only the most powerful and skilled of the Nu’avi were selected for the response teams and trained by the Neofan themselves. In doing so they ceased to be Nu’avi, as far as social status was concerned. Instead they became known as the ‘Emperor’s Hands’ and were loyal to the leading House in the Neofan only, which was currently House Mutavi after they had superseded House Jak’en.

That transition had occurred when the Pafdreng had invaded the Neofan home galaxy of Utovi in response to the surge of Hadarak at the Core of the already densely packed region. The Neofan had kept population levels strictly controlled to avoid such a fate, but they’d pushed too close to the line and the Hadarak had exploited that numerical critical point by adding their own surge of lifeforms to the galaxy and pushing it over the limit.

When the strategy had been discovered, House Jak’en had been removed from command of the Empire, it’s leading members executed, and it’s remaining members relegated to disgraced status…meaning they would be the last to be evacuated from the galaxy, and most likely wouldn’t survive to that point. The new Neofan leadership was overseeing the withdraw as well as the assault on their new galactic target, which had not yet been launched yet, but their forces were gathering to storm the Gateways and cut off Hadarak reinforcements there in order to claim a new galaxy for themselves to rebuild in…and they could do that as long as they held the Gateways. Failure to do so was the reason why House Ash’ne had not only been removed from power, but totally eradicated to their last member.

Once the Gateways had been taken, the Hadarak incursion of the Deep Core had begun and was contained, but the only way to truly own a galaxy was to keep the Hadarak out entirely…and only the very large galaxies had the necessary Gateways for long distance travel. If the Neofan wanted to travel to a smaller one they had to go very, very slowly, and there was no way to move the key elements of their civilization that way. They had to use the existing infrastructure already established by their alliance and quickly seize one of the occupied galaxies while most of the Hadarak reinforcements were being diverted to their falling home.

This was not the first member of the Bond of Resistance to fall in such a manner, but it was the first of the big 3 that were responsible for most of the construction of the Temples and their support infrastructure. Their foreplaning was going to provide the Neofan a chance to rebuild from scratch, which was horrific considering everything they were losing, but it meant they would not be defeated, only decimated.

Knowing that the future was their only hope, House Mutavi recognized that the stability of the Temple network was critical to combating the Hadarak in the long term, and the addition of an Essence Siphon to the Star Force Empire that had been successfully assaulting the Temples in the Kikawa Galaxy was too much to ignore. This infestation had to be ended and Temple operations returned to normal, even if Kikawa was currently undergoing a Hadarak purge. The other founding members of the Bond had said it was inconsequential and that the purge would take care of the problem, but House Mutavi knew better, and since there were attacks taking place on the periphery of the Zotav that their commanders were continually updating with their success at thwarting, the addition of an Essence Siphon to Star Force could begin to tip the balance in those fights. If the Zotav were somehow infested as well, then all connection to Kikawa would be lost…so a little pruning now was prudent, despite the unlikelihood that a single Zotav would fall, let alone all of them.

So the Nu’avi had been sent, and as soon as they realized their arrival point was under surveillance and their own machines had been infested as well, they began using their Pol’so’nep to generate the jamming fields before jumping the drones and physically restraining them as they tried to act on whatever programming had been added to them.

The proper codes they were not responding to via transmission, and rather than destroy the rest they hacked into them using their living armor, which was a combination of a lifeform bred for the purpose and a host of cybernetic implants inserted into it on a microscopic level. The Nu’avi were physically linked to it via their nervous system, and rarely took them off…which was a more complicated procedure than simply taking off clothing.

Once physical contact with the drones was made their control systems were accessed and analyzed, first rendering them inert using some of the overrides that were supposed to be here…while noticing that others had been removed. That meant Star Force had not only gained possession of the local control room, but they were producing slightly altered new versions of the Caretakers.

That was unexpected in both ways, but the second was even more alarming. How could an Essence-limited civilization be capable of something like this? Caretaker coding and construction was designed to resist alteration, and even in the control rooms themselves there was no override to these safeguards. They had to have hacked the production facilities themselves…which required overriding other redundant systems.

This infestation was far deeper than had been reported, but the Emperor’s Hands did not need to call for reinforcements. This was just going to take longer than expected.

It took several hours to reconstruct the Caretakers they’d seized to original quality, though configured to ignore control room signals unless they contained a specific code that would identify whether or not the Nu’avi had retaken it. That was going to be their first objective, but in order to do so they had to find the one in this sector…for they were always moving through the magma layers underneath the surface.

The Nu’avi needed surveillance, and right now they were totally blocked out of the natural interfaces which should have acknowledged their bioarmor on arrival. They did not, which meant they had been deactivated or rewritten. But Star Force was not the only one who could do rewrites.

The handful of Caretaker drones that were now back in Temple service were sent out to track down other drones, disable them, and copy the new programming into them…thus replicating their numbers and allowing the surveillance network to grow outside the null zone while hopefully Star Force would not notice if their attention was on the blank spot and not the Caretakers seemingly going about their business, for the acquisitions and rewrites were not flagging as combat, but rather ‘maintenance’ without an update being transmitted upon completion.

The orders being given by the control room were still being followed, so the large numbers coming to encircle the null zone were making it easy for the Nu’avi to add more to their clandestine control…or so they thought. Once they had obtained hundreds of various models, one was sent back through to inform them that saturation point had been reached, at which point they finally dropped the null field…only to realize that all the drones were lying on the ground in the hallways, physically trashed with scorch marks from cutting energy weapons.

And nearby was a different kind of drone. One not made of Bond of Resistance technology, but rather one of Star Force crafting.

A moment after making visual contact several of the Nu’avi were hit with stun weaponry from the drone a moment before it was disintegrated in a mushroom cloud of debris that shot out both ways down the corridor and into the chamber where the portals were located. The simple Essence attack had destroyed it, but the three Nu’avi that had been hit by the stun weaponry had not gone down. Not completely. The bioarmor had absorbed most of the incapacitating energy, leaving their own bodies mostly operable, but it had disrupted them momentarily, enough that another Nu’avi had to destroy the Star Force drone for them…

“Stun weaponry ineffective,” the Viceroy in command of all Paladin forces in Gamma Tricumbda said via a conference holo call with the Arch Duke and over 200 other people, most notable amongst them being trailblazer Morgan-063. “Essence destruction of the security drone assumed. We have a foothold situation unfolding.”

“I agree,” Morgan said, glancing to her left. “This is worse than you thought.”

“Maybe not,” Kara said optimistically. “Depends how strong they are.”

“There are 60 and perhaps more on the way, though the portals appear to be shut down at the moment,” the Viceroy noted. “Your orders, Archons?”

Morgan chewed on her fingertip as she thought. “Control rooms are the high ground. Keep them in the magma and away from docking stations for the time being, but prep certain stations for evac if these guys have another way to get to them. I do not want the Paladin making a last stand against Essence-capable troops. Prepare to destroy the control rooms upon evac if necessary, but I want our troops out of them first. Understood?”

“All of the control rooms or the local one only?”

“Make plans for all. If they can use Essence travel inside the Temple, they can pop up anywhere. Right now tracking them is our second priority. If they come to the surface we can bring the fleet into play. If not, there’s not much we can do to stop them directly.”

“What is their objective?” the Arch Duke asked.

“Either they’re here in numbers to split up on multiple assignments, or they’re here to assault key assets with force. Can we redirect all incoming travelers from their vector to a specific portal of our choice?”

“I am told yes.”

“Do so, and make it somewhere else, and get heavy surveillance there.”

“We need to disable the intra-Temple network,” Kara added. “Explosively.”

“She’s right,” Morgan agreed. “We don’t need it. They do. Viceroy, send teams to blow them all up immediately.”

“That will take time,” he cautioned, “but it will be done with all haste.”

“Send some Decepticons to the foothold position as well,” Morgan continued. “These guys might be tracking wireless signals. Let’s see how small their focus is otherwise. I also want these 60 ID’d and named. Start a track on guess or calculated power output. If some are stronger than others I want to know. And send a message to Jason giving him their arrival vector to investigate.”

“Do we have confirmation it’s not outside the Temple?” Kara asked.

“Confirmed negative,” the Arch Duke said. “No vessels nearby of any type other than our own. No Caretaker craft either aside from known entities and they have no Essence-capable technology in them to act as a relay.”

“Fox in the hen house,” Kara said to Morgan, who was standing only a few feet away from her out in the forest, but to the holo-conference she had her own separate image that could have been transmitted from anywhere.  “If they can get here they can get anywhere.”

“I know. Jason will have to handle it. This is our problem to deal with.”

“If they’re coming for me we can draw them to the surface. If not…”

“They may want to fortify their position first. Binoy, keep talking to them. Annoy the hell out of them if they won’t speak. At least we can get them using some Essence for analysis of threat levels.”

“Haunting as ordered.”

“Eyes, people. The Temple is too big and too easy to lose them in. We have to see where they are and what they’re doing, or this is going to go from bad to worse in a heartbeat…”

2

May 23, 128888

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

Five days had gone by, and in that time multiple attempts to get at the control rooms had been made. First was a recall order that had the mobile command centers moving themselves toward the docking ports before the Paladin inside figured out how to override them. Next there were Caretaker units built for magma travel going out to the nearest control room and attempting to latch on and drag it to one of the docking ports.

That was resolved prior to arrival, after which blockages began to pop up inside the magma layer, limiting movement and corralling the control room into a smaller and smaller area before Star Force’s own magma drones broke holes in the blockades to allow it out…after which there was a short war between drones as they sought control of the magma layer. The Star Force drones lost, but their mission was still a success as the control room remained out of the Nu’avi’s reach as the invaders remained underground at all times and away from view of any of the Vargemma. Only Caretaker drones and some Star Force versions saw them, for no personnel were allowed anywhere near the region where the Nu’avi were operating in teams that began to split up further and further, with some of them eventually being lost to surveillance.

One that had 3 Nu’avi in it reappeared some 18 hours later when one of the subterranean Caretaker production facilities went dark, and any drones that went in to investigate did not return. And that told Morgan one thing that was now crystal clear.

“They’re not here for you, Kara,” she said looking at the limited battlemap they had of the underground areas around the infiltration point. “I don’t know why they’re here, but it’s not you.”

“I had to be the impetus,” the twin braided archon argued. “And maybe our immediate contact forced an alteration to their plans.”

“They’re trying to reassert control over the Temple,” Morgan said flatly. “Now tell me how to fight this before they get really creative. Something that doesn’t involve us going down there.”

“If they can’t travel through the magma layer, the solution is obvious,” Viceroy Frassa said via holo in the Elcee city hovering near the invasion zone where Morgan and Kara had relocated to in order to manage this while Strovok remained in their training area waiting for combat to either come to him or him to be summoned for an assault. And if it came to him, their well laid trap might actually be put into use, though now it seemed rather obsolete.

“Hem them in?” Morgan said with a raised eyebrow.

“How?” Kara asked.

“We sever the connections to other areas.”

“There’s a labyrinth of tunnels down into the bedrock.”

“Yes, and they all need to be severed.”

“How?”

“We cut a chasm down to the magma and let it flow up and seal in the gap.”

“What good would…” Kara asked, finally catching on. “Cut? You mean explosively dig a canyon miles deep around the entire area.”

“Indeed.”

Kara blew out a breath. “If we knew where they all were that’s possible, but some may have moved beyond the area already.”

“Better to divide them then.”

“I agree,” Morgan said, feeling like they had so few options that they needed to get what they could now before this mess snowballed even worse. “Move the fleet into position.”

The Nu’avi were having far more trouble than they expected, for the Temple itself wasn’t obeying their command codes. No one had ever compromised the Bond of Resistance technology to this extent in the history of the alliance. The Vargemma in every galaxy were never allowed into areas where they could have accessed the critical equipment, and those that tried were summarily executed. Others had attempted to access and reverse engineer the visible equipment with similar results, though some technology was freely given to them and for the most part they were content with it.

Furthermore, Vargemma culture was crafted to keep them from questioning the Temple itself and focusing on self-improvement. But Star Force was not Vargemma. They were outsiders who had somehow found a way inside. How was still a mystery, but they’d successfully taken partial control over all the Temples in this galaxy save for 3, all of which were decommissioned due to lack of resources.

That information was available to them through the Zotav, along with a lot of other information that was flowing out of the Temples and their support infrastructure, but not enough. The kind of infestation that was taking place here was not anticipated and sufficient monitoring of the reprogramming had not been crafted. That meant the Nu’avi were somewhat blind to what was happening here, but their inability to access the control rooms and the inactive intra-Temple transit system suggested that Star Force was in near complete control of this facility, and that was something they’d been told could never happen.

That meant they were in uncharted territory, and while they began to claim low level facilities in the immediate area by physically going there and cutting remote access, there was discussion amongst themselves as to how to proceed…during which the orbital bombardment began.

They couldn’t see it directly, but some of them could feel the rumbles moving through the subterranean chambers. It took a while to get access to surface cameras, but when they did it became clear what was happening as a ring of warships so thick they looked to be connected hovered around the perimeter of the Nu’avi’s arrival location…and were blasting down into the bedrock in a curtain of energy weapons that were visible now and then through the massive dust donut that was leeching back towards the clear center, soon to mask everything in the dirty haze.

It was not a quick thing, but hours long as a chasm was cut down through the surface and severing the conduits in and out of the region. During which one of Binoy’s holographic messages finally was answered with something other than an Essence detonation of the transmission drone.

“Explain your presence here,” the tailed biped said in the Star Force language that he’d downloaded into his bioarmor prior to arriving in the Temple.

The Arch Duke concealed his shock at the sudden change of events and remotely keyed for Morgan and others to join in from wherever they were at the moment.

“We have taken possession of this Temple and the others after the denizens of them launched an unprovoked attack on our capitol and killed nearly everyone on the planet. Explain your presence here,” the Human countered.

“We were sent by the Neofan to end your infestation of the Temples and return them to normal order.”

“Who are you?”

“We are Nu’avi, sworn to House Mutavi. How did you learn to reprogram our technology?”

“It’s not that much more advanced than our own. Be aware, we’ve removed the mass murder hardware built into this Temple, so you’re not going to be able to remove our ‘infestation’ with the press of a button.”

“Removed?”

“Physically removed and destroyed.”

“These Temples are not meant for you. What right do you claim them by?”

“The right to deny our enemies a secure base from which to strike out at us from. We knew little of Essence when the attacks came, and were unable to defend ourselves. We have remedied that since, and in recompense we have claimed the Temples from which the attack was launched. Did the Neofan order the attack?”

“The Temples are meant to operate independently, and the Vargemma are meant to remain inside them other than to attend to duties involving the Hadarak. What did you do to attract their attention?”

“It seems they want us to lay down and die to the Hadarak purge. We chose to fight back, and are winning. They didn’t like that.”

The Nu’avi’s eyes narrowed. “You are successfully engaging the Hadarak?”

“One moment,” Binoy said, mentally accessing other data and producing holographic icons of Wardens and Lurkers in rows and evenly numbered clusters for the alien to see. “Our current kill count to date.”

The sheer number of icons seemed to have an effect on the Nu’avi. “How have you accomplished this?”

“Hard work. If the Neofan are currently fighting the Hadarak, are we not natural allies? Or are we destined to war against one another?”

“You would not survive it if we did.”

“Are you responsible for the Vargemma’s actions?”

“We were not aware of them.”

“Are you also not aware that an Apprentice of the Veloqueen tried to coopt one of our allies, and when they refused he murdered their leadership and tried to assume command?”

The Nu’avi blinked twice. “Are you acting under his authority here?”

The Arch Duke crossed his arms over his chest and huffed slowly. “No. He’s dead, though he took a lot of our people down with him.”

That put the look of fear into the Nu’avi, and Binoy made sure to keep his poker face on.

“What did you do to provoke the Hadarak?”

“Nothing. What triggered their purge is a mystery. It wasn’t anything we did. At least nothing that hadn’t been done long before we rose to our position of dominance.”

“They react to threats. Your Essence use…”

“Did not manifest to weaponized status until after the purge began. Regardless, it is happening and we have a responsibility to stop it. The Vargemma tried to stop us from stopping the Hadarak, and in recompense we relieved them of possession of the Temples.”

“Why have you left them alive? The Caretaker protocols have been overridden. You now control this facility, and I assume the others. Why have you not taken your vengeance on your attackers?”

“We have. By taking the Temples.”

“The Temples do not belong to the Vargemma. They merely inhabit them. Your vengeance has been misplaced.”

“You gave them the means to attack us, and you gave them a secure hiding place to do it from. You lost the Temples and are not getting them back. But then again you don’t need them. You’ve got plenty across multiple galaxies. No point in starting a war over these.”

“They are not yours.”

“They are now. We’re a nice empire. We get along with our neighbors who behave themselves, but don’t mistake that for weakness. When we’re hit, we hit back. And if the Neofan need as large of a distraction against the Hadarak as they can manage while they invade another galaxy to replace the one they are losing, us fighting each other is counterproductive.”

“How are you aware of events in other galaxies?”

“You’re shipping frozen people through this galaxy. We woke one up to ask what was going on.”

“You should not have interfered.”

“You should not have left this galaxy without a watcher. Relying on automated equipment is foolhardy. Your ‘denizens’ picked a fight with the wrong empire. We’re not looking for a fight with you, but if you bring one, you will get more than you expect back.”

“Why are you expanding beyond the Temples? Your attacks are nearing the Zotav, and there was no attack launched from there.”

“If you mean the large coin-shaped installations, there are Caretaker units coming out from them that are not playing nice with the locals. In order to defend them we have to counter the flow, and that means backtracking to the source.”

“What attacks have the Caretakers made beyond the Temples?”

“They have been harvesting, in a variety of forms.”

“They are programmed to harvest primitives only.”

“Star Force defends primitives.”

“For what purpose?”

“They’re people, not property, and they have the same right to live that you do.”

“The hierarchy of ascension deems otherwise.”

“Then the hierarchy of ascension…whatever it is…is our enemy. We stick up for the little guys here, and don’t like bullies in any form. That’s why we left the Vargemma alive, despite the threat they pose.”

“How can the Vargemma be a threat if you are successfully able to fight the Hadarak?”

“It’s complicated. Why were you sent here now and not earlier?”

“Your infestation rose to a level that could no longer be ignored.”

“We’ve been here a while. What changed? Or are you guys just that slow in responding?”

“You know much, yet you know so little. That is our error. A civilization such as yours that can kill Hadarak should have been identified and contacted long before now. I do not know why it wasn’t. You have not been briefed on the nature of the universe, so perhaps this conflict is one born of ignorance. I require information from you.”

“Concerning what?”

“Your war with the Hadarak, and your interaction with the Vargemma. Provide it and we will seek counsel from the Neofan as to how to proceed.”

“Does that mean you’ll be leaving, or staying put?”

“You have already established the borders for a containment area. If you provide the information requested, we will remain inside those borders while we await clarification of our orders.”

“And if they say to try to take back possession of the Temple?”

“Then we will do so. It was you who suggested there might be an alternative to war. Do you not wish to pursue it now?”

“Do you think we are so unwise to give you a full rundown on our capabilities?”

“An honest assessment is required.”

“Then you will have it, minus a few details.”

“If you wish to seek peerdom, full disclosure is required. If you fabricate your strength, there will be no forgiveness for the lie.”

“We’re not big on lies. But some secrets we will keep. The rest you can have.”

“How soon can you compile this information?”

“You will have it within the day.”

“Then we will be at truce upon its arrival until we receive our revised orders.”

“Very well. However, we still have some digging to do. Please don’t try and pass beyond the boundary.”

“Deliver the information and that will not be an issue.”

“It will be forthcoming,” Arch Duke Binoy said with a nod, then his hologram cut out…leaving him with holograms of his peers surrounding him.

“Well done,” Morgan said.

“I’m surprised they talked at all,” he admitted. “The fact that they did worries me.”

“Why?” the Viceroy asked.

“Because it didn’t seem to be out of fear. It was a business attitude. They are still confident they can take us down if they need to, and that worries me because I have no idea how they could do it.”

“I agree,” Kara said. “Zealots I can handle. This guy was too reasonable for an assassin. He was acting like a parent and we’re the children who are a little older than he was told, making his orders in error.”

“That bit about the Veloqueen…” Morgan added. “Anyone else sense a little tension there?”

“Possibly,” Binoy said. “But it could also be him accidentally stepping onto someone else’s turf. Communication between galaxies probably isn’t all that common.”

“I got the, ‘they’re the bigger bad guy’ vibe. And it was weird how easily he spoke our language. More than just the words. Also the subtle intonations. Someone has done their homework.”

“He also didn’t mention me,” Kara noted. “Either he didn’t know, or didn’t want to tip his hand as to that being a second reason why they are here.”

“Out of all the Temples, why come here if not for you?” Morgan pointed out the obvious. “Now I really want to know what these guys’ power levels are.”

“I think it’s clear we have a reprieve, nothing more,” the Viceroy said. “Assuming they honor the agreement, which I am not. We must be alert for a perimeter breach or magma activity.”

“Agreed. I’ll assemble the data packet and make sure it’s scrubbed accordingly. Do not mention the Uriti if Cooler talks to you again.”

“Cooler?” Binoy asked, then huffed when she showed him an ancient anime picture that was loosely similar. “Guess I never asked for a name. I suck at being a diplomat.”

“Hardly,” Morgan scoffed. “And if we can buy some time here, that gives Jason time to find the leak. That may be worth more than anything else.”

“Especially if they decide we’re worth more than 60 of them,” Kara added. “I don’t think this situation is going to improve unless there is some really big misunderstanding on their part. And I still don’t see a good option of fighting these guys other than face to face.”

“Not if they don’t come to the surface,” Morgan agreed. “But they’re here, and we have to deal with it. Suggestions after we’re done digging?”

“Stay on the lookout in case some got outside the perimeter already,” another lower ranking Archon reminded them.

“You get that job,” Morgan delegated. “Anyone else?”

The following silence was telling, and Morgan let it hang in the air for a few moments.

“Well then. Guess it’s on me. Stay sharp and don’t trust these bastards an inch. And while we’re at it, let’s make the chasm double wide and throw in some sensors afterward.”

“It will be done,” the Viceroy said, then his holo winked out as Morgan signaled their little conference was over.

Kara leaned her butt back on the central holopedestal as she looked at Morgan. “We’re screwed, aren’t we?”

“Deadlocked is more like it. I think he was honest when he said he didn’t expect us to have this much control over the Temple. I just don’t like the idea of letting them run around down there without being able to confront them with anything other than drones.”

“If they’re not siphons, we can spam them to drain them of their reserves.”

Morgan nodded. “Get on it. And if they are siphons?”

“It won’t matter in the tunnels. Only a huge amount point overloading their production capabilities will have an effect.”

“Which means bringing them to the surface, or at least a large subterranean chamber.”

“I don’t think we can stop their movement, but we can frustrate it if we can produce enough of the right models. Keep them defending rather than acting.”

“They just gave us time to build them. Use it.”

“How much are you going to give them?” Kara asked.

“Enough,” Morgan said as she linked into the computer and began rifling through secure files on the Hadarak campaigns…

3

August 3, 128888

Unexplored Frontier

Shadow Network Node 22913

Jason-025 wore full armor in one of the numerous air-less storage bays that were half full of crates and Caretaker debris. He’d been here personally for this battle, but by accident. The Founders were continuing to press their war to reclaim the Shadow Network with random drone armies surging forth into locations previously taken, and typically Jason found out about it after the fact. Usually the battles didn’t remove the Star Force garrison troops, for they were too well dug in and the machines simply weren’t that good in combat, but the continual pushback was expending resources and getting more out here was difficult…for both sides.

But this warehouse was full of raw materials and small components that had been manufactured elsewhere. It was also the first of its kind discovered, which was why Jason was here snooping around. Something about it just didn’t feel right to him. Everything in the Shadow Network was structured to support the Temples, and the idea of storing stuff out here rather than in the Temples seemed stupid on a scale that not even a newb could fathom…yet here it was, looking like a bad impersonation of Deep Space Nine with three rings to this station connected by stubby protrusions that spiked upwards into docking pylons.

And off of those pylons were supply ships, now captured even before the battle, but many more were now in Star Force hands that had brought the army of Caretakers to fight on the station. All were operating off of a small mag jump platform nearby, too weak to travel a long distance, but powerful enough to get to a much larger mag jump platform that had to be re-orientated to switch to this location. That function hadn’t been discovered until recently, which had allowed for this warehouse station to be reached.

A funny feeling had prompted Jason coming all the way out here himself, and he’d had only a few hours to explore before the assault force arrived and he assigned himself to primary interior combat duty. Since then he was back to exploring as others cleaned up the debris, though there was a lot of it.

Something about this place just felt wrong, and he couldn’t put his finger on it. The supplies were meant for somewhere else, that was obvious, but nothing cataloged in the Shadow Network needed them. This place was an anomaly, and no movement to it had been noted prior to Star Force’s arrival. The invaders had arrived via a different mag jump route, and the receiving dish had altered on its own prior to their arrival after receiving an incoming signal.

That was a damn risky way to travel. If the dish wasn’t redirected, the incoming travelers would either smash into it or deflect off the magnetic field to be lost in deep space. Then again, with only drones being sent perhaps the Founders didn’t care…expect that a near miss could have it colliding with the warehouse station too.

He wasn’t sure if the attack was part of a coordinated effort or a response to their incursion in this specific location, but the shape of the station still baffled him. It was so much wasted hull plating because the surface area was high because of the non-centralized design. Most Founder infrastructure was economically designed with small variations for style or specific function, but this one was not…at first glance. Jason didn’t think it was an homage, as some Star Force-built structures were. So there had to be some meaning here.

The vector the invading army had come from was close to intersecting with one of the periphery ‘Coins’ that his forces still couldn’t touch. The few connections prior to them were still too heavily guarded for his own drones to take, and he wasn’t going to risk sending manned ships into an ambush. With no planets to jump off of, there was only the mag jump platforms to use or the Dark Network links that had been proving more useful, but none of them went where he needed to go, and the front door was too well armed. Almost comically so. The Coins were something that the Founders didn’t want anyone getting to, even from their top secret transit networks that nobody was supposed to know about anyway.

As he was walking the storage bays a Star Force-captured Caretaker transport arrived, bringing a priority message for him from Morgan-063, which it transmitted to his armor via an external relay placed on the station just outside a hangar bay, for the hull blocked all other transmissions for a reason Jason also had not yet determined.

The trailblazer stopped walking as the mass of information hit him, along with Morgan’s request, and a sickly fear ran down his spine. He looked up at the ceiling and panned his head around slowly, using his Pefbar to see well through the walls as he examined the part of the station within his psionic range.

Suddenly he took off…not running, but flying through the station scanning as he went. It didn’t take long to confirm his initial suspicion, finding an exotic array built into the middle ring where he currently was. He following it around the arc nearly two thirds of the distance before it connected to a node.

Inside of which was an Essence containment orb plugged into some sort of device.

“Backdoor,” he said, suddenly feeling very insecure. If he was right, this facility was more important than he had realized. So much so that it might be attracting more than another Caretaker attack force…or perhaps a bigger one.

Orders flew through the battlemap coming from his Sav-enhanced mind that those receiving them had to sort through their parts for several moments before comprehending…then all the ships in the area began moving, as did the Commandos and Archons inside the station and on the mag jump platform.

If Jason was right, he’d just stumbled onto a third network, one that operated off of some sort of Essence travel. And if the trailblazer was also correct, it was probably what had allowed the Nu’avi access to the Temples while bypassing all of Jason’s roadblocks he’d been setting up in the other two networks to prevent just this sort of incursion.

And they’d sent 60 Essence-capable troops of unknown power to deal with the situation. Not the one or two that Kara had predicted. They’d sent an assault team to deal with the ‘infestation,’ and if Jason really had touched a sore spot here, there might be some coming his way right now.

He had 23 minutes to think about it before the mag jump platform activated again, and as soon as the first Caretaker ship arrived it was fired upon by the three Star Force warships here, their accompanying drones, and several captured transports that had been rebuilt to his liking. All were navigating on mooring beams for lack of any appreciable gravity, including the Star Force drones from the warships, as were the Founder ships arriving.

And they were in fact Founder ships, not just Caretakers, though there were some of them coming in too…and much larger versions, that weren’t just transports. They were Devastator-class, only seen in the really hot spots Jason had not yet been able to breach. And the first one to arrive was gutted within seconds as it was caught with its shields down inside the magnetic field that had just stopped its momentum.

The bloons did the most damage, exploding the craft wherever they hit hull, but the beams and bursts from multiple Star Force weapons ate away at the rest as the shields on Jason’s ships took many hits from debris being throw out as the second ship arrived far too close behind…and a third…and a fourth.

The immediate carnage was necessary, but when the 5th ship arrived it was one of unknown origin and only half the size of the Devastators…but it’s shields were up despite the mag jump arrival, and its weaponry was far more potent…allowing it to hold up long enough for another Caretaker ship to arrive behind it, this one a carrier with thousands of small drones that leapt off the craft before it could be destroyed.

They pushed off each other with mooring beams and threw themselves at the Star Force ships and the station beyond, most of which were shot down before they could arrive, but the unidentified ship was proving too tough to ignore, so all available weapons were turned towards it and a few of the smaller drones made it to the station, crawling their way around the hull towards the open hangar bays…or to closed bays that were opening upon their arrival despite attempted overrides from the Star Force team in the control center.

This was bad, because Jason didn’t have another exit point. The mag jump dish was pointed the wrong way, and right now that was the only way in or out…and even if he wanted to leave on that line, there were ships coming in his face that he might run into.

Bottom line was, he and his limited forces were cornered. They had to win this fight or they’d die here.

“Jason, look out!” a voice said over the comm as a battlemap warning marker appeared inside the station. It wasn’t exactly in his position, but a few corridors over. “Essence transport from the ships. I’m trying to lock it out, but they’re getting some people through a terminal.”

“Shit. How many terminals are in the station?”

“Checking…looks like just the one.”

“On it,” he said, flying towards the danger and realizing that if he acted fast he could limit the number of adversaries by destroying the device. Then again, he could also be rushing to a quick death. But if he was going to have to fight this out, keeping the numbers low was his best bet.

He could already feel two minds present, and when he got close enough he attempted telepathic intrusion…getting blocked by one immediately but getting a quick grab on the other before being shut out.

They were Essence capable, but they were grunts. He didn’t know what that meant in terms of power level, but they’d been grabbed off other missions and stuffed onto the lead ships to deal with or slow down the Star Force incursion while the advanced troops were called up.

Jason didn’t get much more than that, but the situation was clear. Whatever was coming in the subsequent waves would wipe them out, either navally or hand to hand. They were not going to let Star Force have this facility, which meant Jason had accidentally bitten off more than he could chew.

“We win this fight or we all die here,” Jason told everyone moments before he engaged the Essence users, which were now 3 in number. “More advanced troops are on the way, and they’re going to wipe us out. If we hold here, we evacuate. If we lose, we’re dead. Reorient the mag jump immediately after the reinforcements stop coming. Push the damn thing with your hulls if you have to. It’s our only way out.”

He wanted to say more, but there was no time. He flew through the archway into the medium-sized chamber that held the invisible Essence portal that appeared little more than a decorated wall, but as soon as he was through he dropped to the ground and ran, causing his body to transition into Saiyan 1 form, with his hair going blonde inside his armor and his body calibrating to a much higher tempo, so much so he moved faster across the ground than he could while flying, running towards the now four individuals clad in heavily mechanical armor and unleashing the full fury of his mental psionics against them as he put up a defensive Essence barrier around his body.

Which was needed. He got hit with something immediately, then the foursome stumbled or fell as they were disoriented, allowing him to run dangerously close by them as he activated his armor’s death sabers, popping a flat energy blade out of each wrist just above his hands. He slashed through the arm of one that was in reach, cleaving it with a tug on his own arm as the enemy armor resisted the cutting somewhat.

It wasn’t a kill shot, but he couldn’t move any further away from the wall and still be able to slash through the equipment just as a 5th individual came through right in front of him.

Jason didn’t have long to react, with his body slamming into the new arrival as he kept his arm stretched out to make sure he got through the entire portal with one slash. He took the body hit, then finished up with a quick Jumat ring blast that knocked the individual further ahead of him and pushed some of the others to the ground, then his Saiyan reflexes got his own footing back sooner than his stunned opponent…whom he dove his right death saber right through his chest with a quick poke, then slashed it sideways out of his body, cleaving half his torso in one quick gesture that felt sluggish as the armor resisted the cutting.

The enemy alien hit the wall with him, dead or heavily injured, as Jason kicked his feet up and landed against it with one foot on either side of the body, taking his momentum and turning it into a jump off the wall with him heading back towards the others as he hit them with another Fornax blast while attempting quick mental hacks and disorientation attacks…but it didn’t fully work, and one of them remained standing this time as they others fell.

Jason’s Essence barrier melted under the next attack that came, but not before he got within melee range and got a good slash across his opponents neck…with his head coming clean off as he telekinetically reached for the other three and added an Essence boost to it, pulling all of their wobbling bodies in his direction as he dug his feet into the floor and slid to a stop while using his Yen’mer to help ‘fly’ him the other direction, for his speed was so great it was not easy to quickly redirect it the opposite direction.

That closed the distance he had to cover…only this time he wasn’t able to, because an Essence wall smacked into him and knocked him backwards, only to have him spring out of the fall so fast he remained a blur as a Jumat wave came back at the three remaining enemies.

Two of them got knocked down, but one blocked it with an Essence technique and threw an invisible attack back towards Jason who put up a defensive wall of his own, not around his entire body but concentrated in front of him. More than half of it melted away, but some slipped around the edges and reached for his armor, sinking into his body and making him feel so sick he puked in his helmet as his internal organs were messed with somehow.

He nearly fell, but surged the Essence from his Magicite ring through his body in a cleansing wash, returning him to fighting capability within a second, even as he recognized he was injured. He had to end this fast, so he opened up the glove on his left hand, in the palm only, to expose his skin and the slit in it while goosing his shields to protect him from the lack of air…and from that palm he fired his Bra’hem. His other arm still had his bioplasma, but he was one of the Archons who had elected to replace the other with the far more potent weapon…and he poured everything he had into one shot directed at the enemy that had remained standing, expecting him to be the strongest as he quickly threw another Fornax blast towards the others, hoping to at least delay their attacks against him.

The green beam shot out like a wobbly laser, but Jason’s arm precision was good enough to land it in the armored chest, though the beam hit something before that and splintered, with pieces of it shooting out into the ceiling, walls, and floor…and luckily into one of the other enemies as well, but most of it got through the primary target and burnt clean through his armored body…and the wall behind him into the next room.

He wasn’t dead, for Jason could still feel his mind active, so as he dropped to the floor Jason ran up over him and lopped off his head before he could launch another Essence attack in his last moments of life…yet his head rolling on the floor was able to release one last grab, which felt like a mini black hole sucking everything towards it, and it tripped up Jason, smacking him face down on the ground as his feet were pulled back from him, then the effect disappeared and he pushed himself up into the air and flew forward, having his Essence shield completely destroyed and the upper layers of his armor disintegrated in a puff of smoke that obscured his vision…but not his Pefbar.

He disabled the two remaining enemies with a tier 4 Si’mosa, creating a Lachka object equivalent to handcuffs around both individuals’ bodies, then pulled them together until they were touching each other and unable to move.

Jason ran up to them and dropped an Ubven over both before slicing off the head of one of them, then he surged the power through his body as he activated his Saiyan 2 genetics a moment before he struck, having to deactivate most of his Saiyan 1 speed in the process, then he delivered a punch to the alien’s midsection so powerful it broke through both the Ubven and the remains of the ‘handcuffs,’ throwing him across the room and bouncing his last opponent off the wall, his armor crushed from the fist punch and much of his body inside it.

Jason could tell he was unconscious, which had been his intent. He was too dangerous to be kept alive and restrained, but unconscious was no threat…so after a quick revisit to the portal and slashing it beyond recognition with his energy blades, he returned to the alien and pulled off the crushed chunks of his armor, belatedly realizing that there was now atmosphere in the room. He didn’t remember when that happened, but probably during or just before the fight in response to the living owners arriving in the station.

Lucky for this one, otherwise the decompression would have finished him off. Jason touched his hand to the blue/green chest and hacked into his body, healing what ended up being a ‘her’ enough so that she wouldn’t die, but making sure she remained unconscious as he dug out as much information as he could, knowing there were at least some Caretaker drones in the station, but his troops should be able to deal with those. Right now he needed some answers, and he wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity to get them…all the while monitoring the ship vs. ship carnage at the mag jump platform via his battlemap link as he momentarily opened his helmet and telekinetically cleaned the puke off his face.

4

Commando Ren Ghanna fired her Dre’mo’don rifle three quick times, throwing blue orbs of destructive energy down the corridor into the Caretaker drone along with many others coming from her squadmates that punched through its shields within seconds, but not before it fired back with a topaz beam directly into her chest.

It drained her shields rapidly, and as she dodged to the side the beam followed her, roasting her armor as it didn’t relent…then Harold stepped in front of her and took the blast, leaving her a wicked scar pattern on her Mainline blue/white hard plate armor, making her glad she had been wearing it instead of the weaker nanite version.

Ren brought her rifle up as he poked out from behind Harold and fired…except her gun malfunctioned, which was when she saw the melt line drawn across it just before Mark exchanged positions with Harold before his armor was breached.

The Caretaker had many holes in it by now, but it was still firing its constant beam as it floated two feet off the ground…then Ren flung a small disc half the size of her palm onto the floor and it slid just behind the drone, passing underneath a moment before the grenade exploded, punching the Caretaker up into the ceiling where it crunched, then fell to the ground with the constant beam now deactivated.

“Move,” Harold said, with her four-member squad sprinting towards it and putting more shots into the machine as it moved about for a moment, but its anti-grav was clearly fragged and within the next 20 seconds it was reduced to junk.

“What the hell was that?” Ren asked, dipping a finger into the crisscross pattern on her chest, confirming what her internal sensors already told her. Atmospheric integrity remained, meaning no holes all the way through, so she could still handle vacuum without having to engage emergency protocols.

“It’s not in the Temple catalog,” Brennan confirmed as the four Humans moved past the Caretaker and continued to make their way towards the hangar bay where this one had apparently entered. “Must be something special they were saving.”

“My rifle is slagged,” Ren said, clipping it onto her back and pulling out a pair of pistols from her rack. “We can’t trade like that again.”

“We need cover,” Harold said, running alongside Ren behind the other two as they finally got to the hangar entrance…only to have another beam shoot out it and wing Mark before he rolled behind the wall on the far side while the other three tucked up against the nearer flank.

“When it comes through, we…” he said as the wall beside him began to glow a moment before it blew out and the beam cut through where his head had just been before he ducked and was now kneeling on the ground.

“Chipmunks,” he ordered, with Mark pulling two hockey pucks off the small storage compartment underneath his weapon rack. Both transformed in his hands into mechanical quadrupeds, onto both of which he attached grenades…then he dropped them to the ground, only to have them scurry off around the corner and into the hangar as he remotely guided them via his helmet, though most of their programming was automatic.

The beam didn’t alter, still cutting through the wall, but a secondary weapon shot near one of the skittering things with the shock wave knocking it to the side…but it was so fast it made it within 3 meters before getting shot and detonating the grenade in the process.

That moved the Caretaker drone backwards a bit as the second ‘squirrel’ got underneath and jumped up onto the drone, sticking to its shields for a split second before it detonated…then the four Commandos came through the opening with Mark taking the beam on his shields and intact armor as the other three fanned out and poured all their weaponsfire into the Caretaker.

Ren dove in front of Mark, putting her back to it so the beam wouldn’t punch through his armor, and that meant she couldn’t shoot either, but it gave him a chance to overcharge his rifle as he took cover and then stepped around her armored hip, firing the larger glob of energy into the damaged undercarriage where the chipmunk had detonated.

The Caretaker dropped to the ground, its anti-grav slagged, and the beam twisted off the Ren and burnt into the floor as it refused to stop firing.

“All clear,” Harold called out a few moments later as they got to pointblank range and finished off the phone-booth sized machine. “Door controls.”

“On it,” Mark said, sprinting off to a small cupola at the top of some stairs along one hangar wall while the other three pushed the dead Caretaker around to make a barricade out of it facing the doors that were open to space aside from a containment shield that did nothing to mask the partial view of the warship battle outside from getting to them.

“Holy crap,” Brennan said. “They’re going at it at melee range.”

“No choice,” Harold growled. “They have to hit them on entry, and they can’t maneuver much on mooring beams. It’s close quarters or get so far away from the dish that they can hide behind the debris. The warships are pushing it where they want it right now.”

“Into the oncoming path of the enemy ships,” Ren said, seeing what he meant. “How?”

“Creative weapons fire. Mooring beams. I don’t know. I just hope there’s enough ship left for us to board. I don’t want to get stuck here,” he said as another dot shimmed in the light from the weaponsfire not too far away from them. “Incoming!”

All three began firing on the opening, with their weaponsfire hitting the shield and disappearing into it until the Caretaker passed through, then most of their shots went straight into it as the topaz beam appeared and went for Jen’s head, hitting her facemask for a second before she ducked down. Her shields took the hit, thankfully, then she rolled to the side and came around the end of their barricade on her side, poking her two pistols around vertically and showering the drone with mostly misses, but more and more hits connected as it got closer.

The beam went for one of the others, then it cut/blew apart the dead Caretaker at the middle, shoving Ren’s body a meter across the floor, with her rolling up onto her feet and continuing to fire, as did the others, with rifle shots coming from the cupola now as well, with Ren seeing the doors behind the Caretaker slowly begin to close.

One more…she thought, knowing that one of them probably wasn’t going to make it.

The Commando unclipped the last grenade she had from her belt, which she’d slipped out of her pack before using it as a shield earlier, but when she threw it towards the Caretaker it was sniped out of the air with a torch-like burst weapon, detonating it halfway between them, but doing nothing to stop that constant beam that was hitting Harold in his back while Brennan hid behind him and continued to fire.

Then a hail of rifle fire came from behind them, passing around Ren on all sides with her knowing to stand still, even as the beam switched to shoot her.

Instead she dropped face first to the ground and rolled sideways, with the beam hitting her helmet, shoulders, and arms before she twisted on the floor and put her legs in front of her…then there was a large explosion and the beam stopped.

“Damage report,” another Commando demanded, kneeling down beside her as one of his squadmates retracted the rocket launcher and put it back into its large niche on his back rack.

“I’m breached,” she said. “Chest. Regenerator is taking care of it.”

The Commando slapped her on the helmet in a friendly gesture then left her to deal with the damage. She could feel her body healing from the burn that had grazed her, but it was pretty clear part of her left breast was gone. Better that than a lung though.

As her bleeding stopped and new skin formed over the crater to seal it up, she triggered emergency protocols and a small packet of nanites stored in the white stripes on her armor melted leaving nothing but blue below. Those white rivers ran to the breach point and covered it in an armored patch…not nearly as good as what had been there, but the pressure in her chest disappeared when it did, at which point she checked her environmental sensors and saw the atmosphere that had recently popped up in the facility was only at 12% of Star Force normal, meaning her body had literally been pressing out through the gap from her own internal pressure.

Ren laid still, propped up on an elbow until the Regenerator finished locking down the damage and repairing what it could, but there was no way to replace the bulk of the missing tissue without a lot of food, so it pulled what it could from elsewhere in her body to fix the essential stuff, primarily the blood she’d lost to the decompression…which she could see showered on the floor in tiny drops so fine it looked like mist a meter to her left. The rest was on her knee and boot from her spinning through it earlier.

“Ren?” Mark asked.

“I’m mobile,” she answered, slowly getting to her feet.

“There’s 8 more Caretakers on their way here. I don’t know if they can burn through the door or not, but I jammed the door shut the best I could. Don’t ask me to open it again, because I can’t.”

“We’ll cover here,” Andrea said. “Get your squad moving.”

“To where?” Harold asked.

“Anywhere but here. You guys look like crap.”

“No argument,” Ren said, limping towards the door, though not from a leg injury. The adrenaline and shock of her injury weren’t clear yet, and it took her a moment to remember how to move her body in a coordinated fashion.

Mark took the lead and they kept Ren in the middle as they made their way back into the inner areas of the facility, seeing that the battlemap had other fights going on. Some with the ‘Xerath’ drones, as somebody had tagged them. Others with the conventional ones, and it was to that lesser combat that they moved.

When they got there they passed two other Commandos on the floor, both missing limbs that were nowhere to be seen. The position was marked as a waypoint, and Harold knelt down beside one of them to do a direct interface with their armor in a Commando ‘handshake’ that would allow them to monitor their internal stats without hacking the armor’s computer systems in an intrusive way.

“Dead,” he said, flipping the body over to find a huge crater in the back that had cored out several inches of flesh inside. He checked the other one, finding him unconscious and barely alive. “Harold. Health pack, now.”

“On it,” he said, pulling out a small block of biomatter. Each squad carried one, just in case someone got hurt so bad their body didn’t have enough tissue to repair the critical components. Ren didn’t carry any, and she was glad she didn’t, otherwise she might have been tempted to use it on her inconsequential wound.

Harold took the block and rolled the Commando over, shoving it into the left abdomen where the white material had moved to cover the breach. Thankfully Commando armor was programmed to accept it, and the nanites passed it through, giving it to the Regenerator tendrils that greedily sucked it up and used it to replace internal organs that were damaged.

“Why’d they leave him?” Ren asked, searching the battlemap for answers.

“I don’t know, but it’s got to be something bad,” Brennan said as he saw a Commando dot disappear from the map a few hundred meters away…then it reappeared again briefly before going back in.

“Null field,” he warned. “Hostiles in play unmarked.”

“Great,” she said, kneeling next to the unconscious Commando as orders suddenly got rewritten. The ‘engage all targets’ standing orders were refined to evacuation cover combat only, with routes to one hangar bay only popping up for all units in the field.

“Carry them both,” Mark said, running off a different direction. “I’m going to the null field.”

Ren knew what that meant as Brennan and Harold picked up the pair of surviving and dead Commandos, then followed her as they tracked the virtual trail of breadcrumbs to their evac point. Whatever Commandos were inside the null field wouldn’t have gotten the orders, so Mark had to take them to them directly.

The station was a big one, so it took a lot of running to get to the hangar bay in question, and thankfully they avoided the ongoing fights…thanks to whoever had laid out the evac routes. When they arrived they fell in with dozens of other Commandos, a few Archons, and 22 support staff…out of 31 that were supposed to be here. There should also have been 124 Commandos, if everyone had made it.

More trickled in, some coming with fresh combat wounds, then the last of them arrived carrying dead or injured, but no Mark. Jason-025 came in last, his own armor mangled in a lock-up protocol that the nanite armor engaged in when there were too few remaining to cover the body in the normal fashion, so they spread out and became rigid, just enough to keep air in and hazards out, but very low in armor value…and the trailblazer had several visible ridges swollen up on his chest indicating such damage.

He issued the ‘board immediately’ order as soon as he came in…which coincided with a dropship sliding through the open hangar doors as flashes of weaponsfire reflected off its glossy surface from somewhere nearby…and from the colors Ren could tell it was small point defense weaponry, probably from other dropships or a small naval drone keeping the Caretakers away from this hangar door.

Ren ran with the others onboard as she searched the battlemap for Mark’s ID, but it had never come out of the null zone. She replayed the data after she sat down against a wall inside the dropship as everyone poured in, but too few to make it crowded. His position marker went inside, then several minutes later others came out, including Jason’s, but not Mark’s.

“Who got left behind?” she asked as the dropship lifted off and slowly moved out of the hangar, so not to gain too much momentum after it left the anti-grav and had to deal with nearly gravitational-less space.

“The dead,” Jason said, peeling back his helmet and spitting out a sickly black goo onto the floor.

“What was in the null field?” she demanded.

“More of those Xerath drones in storage. One of the other ones got there and began activating them,” he said, pointing to someone else. “Make sure she stays unconscious, or she’ll kill you in an instant.”

Ren followed his finger to one of the support staff…who was kneeling next to and scanning someone that was not from Star Force.

“She’s an Essence-capable prisoner. She has to remain unconscious, and I don’t have the right equipment here. Monitor her continuously.”

“Where did that come from?” one of the other Commandos asked.

“Portalled in from one of their ships before I could destroy the terminal. If they get bold they can come through the walls into our ships. They just can’t see where they’re going and might end up in a bulkhead, but be alert regardless.”

Ren stiffened, not realizing that little tidbit about Essence capabilities, and brought one of her pistols up into her lap as she sat and ground her toes inside her boots to distract herself from the pain of her wound…which was healed over, but there was a nagging ache that would not go away and wanted to make her puke, and the Regenerator wasn’t doing anything about it.

She pulled up the battlemap outside the dropship to see where they were going…and suddenly the ache didn’t feel so bad. One of their warships was dead and listing with huge chunks of it missing. The other two were still fighting, but one was badly damaged and only showing partial weapons discharge. Most of their drones were still in play, and it seemed the enemy ships were focusing on the Star Force manned vessels…which usually did not get this close to combat, though at the moment they didn’t really have a choice. It was do or die, and right now both sides were tearing into each other rapidly as more ships continued to arrive, often running into the debris of others and damaging themselves in the light collisions.

Their dropship wasn’t heading for the warships, but rather to one of the converted Caretaker vessels that was drifting their way…along with three other dropships that were tagged with having passengers. Those would be from the other excursion teams located in the smaller stations at this mag jump terminal. They were reporting no casualties, so it seemed the Caretakers only cared about the big ringed station for the moment.

More dropships and other small craft were following them to provide cover fire, but the battlemap made it clear that everyone living in the Star Force occupation force was now off the big station.

Meaning Mark was dead, and they weren’t even going to get a chance to bring his body back.

Ren puked in her mouth, then smashed her hand against the wall and she fought to control her body and swallowed it back down.

And she wasn’t the only one. All around the dropship bay there were gestures of frustration and anger, with the trailblazer amongst them, punching a supply crate so hard his armored hand went right through, then came out holding some mashed food cubes.

Jason looked at the mush a bit, then calmly opened the crate the way it was meant to be and started to pull out packages that he threw to the injured.

“Eat now and get those wounds healed up as best you can. We’re not out of this yet. Not by a long shot. And if we get pinned here, we’re taking the fight onboard their ships rather than stand by as target practice. So use the moment of rest as best you can to refit,” he said, walking over to another container and pulling out a canister of nanites that he proceeded to graft into his armor to replace what he had lost, with the swollen ridges disappearing as the grey nanites changed color to match his white/chrome Clan armor.

Ren pulled off her helmet and took a package that Jason threw to her, then made herself eat, swearing that if she got one of these Founder bastards in her sights she was going to take them down with her before a drone could finish her off.

She glared at the prisoner, wanting to put a shot into it now, but refrained. If Jason wanted it alive then there was a reason for it.

“Here,” Harold said, handing her a new rifle and a clip of grenades. “If you’ve got a place for them.”

“I’ll make a place,” she said, standing up to do just that as she inspected the damage to her back rack…or tried to, since it wouldn’t detach.

“Can you fight?”

“Well enough,” she growled, then he put a hand on her shoulder…not saying anything.

She looked at his face plate, her eyes filled with fury, then two tears formed that did little to diminish her intensity.

“No mistakes,” he finally said, and when she nodded her agreement he let go and walked away to sit on a bench that had been extracted from one of the walls.

Ren knew what that meant. Mark was dead, as were others she had known, and she couldn’t let it get her or others killed by making stupid mistakes out of grief or vengeance. Vengeance had to be calculated and efficient. Not sloppy.

And if she got the chance, it was definitely not going to be sloppy…though her slightly shaking hands seemed to argue that point.

Whatever. She’d just have to get closer.

Ren popped another food cube into her mouth and chewed…feeling her chest gain a bit of mass as soon as the material hit her stomach where the Regenerator grabbed it and put it to work filling in the gash in her left breast.

5

Jason climbed outside the dropship before it reached the converted Caretaker vessel, clinging to the hull like spiderman until he got around to the side he wanted…then he jumped with as much force as he could get and went ballistic, floating across the void towards the 22 mile long warship Blue Miona. It was a long way away, but he didn’t have time to wait for a ride and a ship that large was going to be hard to miss so long as he didn’t terribly misjump…but he wasn’t betting his life on that. His Yen’mer was good enough to tug him about a tenth of an inch per minute at maximum power…which meant it was basically useless. However, after several miles of drifting a mooring beam shot out from the Iron Hammer and accelerated him while also doing some small course corrections.

The trailblazer flew through space as the fighting ahead of him continued, but he was on the quiet side with all the carnage taking place inside the mag jump dish. No Caretaker drones could get to him where he was, for they couldn’t fly where they didn’t have a short range mooring beam connection either, so he was safe from their firepower, but not the enemy warships’ long range weaponry.

He’d calculated that before he jumped, hoping to stay anonymous all the way to the Blue Miona, which was now out of the fight. Only two weapons batteries were still operational, and probably on backup power at that. Huge chunks of the ship were gone, and by the time Jason got halfway there he started to encounter dust-like debris all over his armor.

He flicked on his shields, knowing that his speed was going to decrease slightly, but the tiny collisions deflecting him off course was his larger worry…though the closer he got and more of his view of the starfield was eclipsed by the ship, he knew he was going to make it there, even as it drifted away from the mag jump dish due to the all the explosions it had undergone.

The drift wasn’t much, but given time it would be lost to space. His people on the mag jump station had indicated that the end of the enemy convoy was coming up, for their numbers had been transmitted prior to arrival for coordination issues. Unfortunately they hadn’t found those earlier, buried in the programming as they were, and Jason was confident his remaining ships could take what was coming, though barely. Most of his converted ships were already destroyed, and the Iron Hammer was venting atmosphere from multiple hull breaches, but none were too large. The weaponry being used on the Founder ships was different than what was available in the Temples, but after seeing it in action the Naval crews were quickly adapting their shields and firing patterns to compensate.

They wouldn’t be caught off guard by the overly large pulse cannons again.

The battle wasn’t over yet, but Jason was fighting the one yet to come. More reinforcements would be coming, over and over, as the Founders’ troops on the Coin responded to this unacceptable incursion. He’d gleaned that much information from his prisoner, and he knew that the next group would kill whoever was left here twice over, so they had to leave immediately, and that meant evacuating the dead warship and recovering all crew onboard…which was where he needed to be.

The last Founder ship arrived just before he got there, and a huge flash of its already charged pulse cannon momentarily blinded him as it reflected off the shields of the Kionana, which was going to be their primary ride out of here. The warship was mostly undamaged, but the Iron Hammer had just taken a huge hit according to the battlemap, though he couldn’t see it. What was left of the Blue Miona was eclipsing his view, and soon a mooring beam from the Kionana reached out at far range and grabbed him, slowing him down over the next few seconds before releasing him again.

A few moments later he hit the hull feet first, taking as much of the impact on his bent legs as he could, but his momentum was still too high and he fell, bouncing off the hull back the way he’d come…but not before he used his Tier 4 psionic Ty’vo and extended his own form of a mooring beam to the hull, with the hazy green conduit sticking to the hull plate while yanking his right arm so hard his shoulder popped out of socket.

But his momentum was stopped, and he reeled himself in until he got to the hull and got an armor lock on it, then he felt the pressure in his shoulder build before his Regenerator finally popped it back into place, then quickly repaired the damage surrounding it…which saved him the trouble of having to do it himself.

Jason ran across the hull, making sure to keep one foot in contact at all times…then got tired of going so slow and started jumping, using his Ty’vo to pull him back down each time, and was able to build up a considerable amount of speed all the way up to one of the smoldering craters in the hull.

He passed through a plume of smoke that was slowly eeking away from the ship, then slung himself down into the wrecked section, using his sensors and Pefbar to look for the best way inside, eventually finding an airless corridor open to space…or mostly, for there were bent bulkheads and other stuff warped over most of it, but Jason was able to slither through to the far side where there was pieces of shrapnel imbedded in the walls everywhere.

He floated, bouncing his way down the hallway that normally would have had anti-grav, until he got another 180 meters in, then he suddenly fell to the ground as he reached an intact pocket of gravity. Not far beyond that he found sealed bulkhead doors, on the other side of which he could feel air with his Pefbar.

Thankfully Star Force had a long history of ship design under their belt, so each emergency bulkhead door was also equipped with the means for individuals to pass through, so he opened a hatch and input the necessary activation code…which was little more than a few buttons to insure it wasn’t accidentally activated from debris, and a piece of the hatch slid aside, with an enviro shield keeping the air and heat within.

Jason walked through then sealed the hatch again, confirming that the air in here was still good and warm, which meant power was still available.

He reached out to the ship’s computer, finding most of it non-responsive, but the local nodes were still up and tracking some of the crew, allowing him to sprint off in their direction as he started to broadcast telepathically, not trusting the comm systems to be fully working, though he also used them too, knowing that both probably would not reach the entirety of the massive ship.

“Evacuate immediately. The ship is to be scuttled. We must leave through the mag jump before the next wave of ships arrive. Get all crew to the intact evac craft in the hangars or escape pods. Leave no one behind. I’ll handle the sensitive equipment in the ship. Everyone get moving, now!”

Jason repeated similar orders as he traveled, moving from place to place and not having too much trouble getting around the missing chunks of ship, though there were some areas that were entirely without power. The redundant comm nodes allowed him to stay linked to the battlemap most of the time, and he monitored the crew actions, having to stop off and beat his way through a malfunctioning blast door that was trapping 23 people on the other side, but after he freed them he made his way to the computer core…and began slagging everything in sight.

He didn’t know if the Founders would be able to retrieve this ship or not, but if they did he didn’t want them having access to the Star Force databank, which each warship contained a fairly complete copy of. After he finished there he hit several other critical areas as the crew took care of their own and rounded up everyone who was still alive while searching the devastated areas where the sensors were not functioning. 8% of the crew were still missing, though they had most likely been in the areas of the ship that no longer existed. Blown apart by the explosions or thrown out into space in the aftermath.

The other two warships were not reporting any emergency beacons free floating, so it looked like they had all the survivors rounded up, but they couldn’t be sure without bodies to count…except by reviewing recorded battlemap records to determine where each person had been prior to the damage occurring.

“Jason, we have two possible survivors,” Captain Jannice’s voice said through his helmet comm. “Relaying location. I have nobody on that side of the damage. Can you get to them?”

“I’ll find a way. Do you have enough craft to get everyone clear?”

“Now that the fighting’s done out there, yeah. With the help of the other ships’ mooring beams. We can fit everyone in the dropships. Do you want us to leave one for you?”

“Put a pilot in it and have it crawl along the hull tracking my location. Take all the others. Don’t leave anything behind.”

“Are you going to scuttle the ship?”

“Partially. Enough to move it away from the stations. If it gets far enough beyond I don’t think they’ll be able to reel it back in. Make sure everyone is accounted for.”

“Those two possibles are the only ones left. Everyone else was in the blast zone,” she said with a hitch in her voice.

“If they’re alive I’ll find them. Get going as soon as you can.”

“Copy that,” she said firmly, leaving Jason to redirect towards another wrecked section of the ship, but one that was somewhat intact due to the explosion on the outside that crunched inward the neighboring sections rather than blowing them out into space. When he got near to it he passed through an enviroshield that was tinted yellow, indicating partial atmosphere on the other side…and when he got there his armor readings said it was already below freezing, meaning there was a leak, but not a big one. The ship was trying to pump new air in there to compensate, but it was only reading at 63% pressure.

Jason scanned as he went, finding one leak and pulling an intact wall panel off only to shove it on the other wall where the leak was and quick weld it into place with his bioplasma. He couldn’t delay too long, but if the survivors weren’t in suits they needed as much air as they could get.

The section of the ship that needed searched was nearly a half mile wide, and Jason’s Pefbar didn’t reach that far, but his telepathy did, and he searched for active minds, finding none. That didn’t stop him, for unconscious people barely registered telepathically, so he kept moving through the damaged areas, having to backtrack three times to get around clogged corridors, but eventually he came across one body pinned against the wall with an angular piece of metal shoved through her abdomen and pinning her a few inches up off her feet.

She was dead, but Jason went up to her to check anyway, because her emergency envirosuit was on, and that usually wasn’t the case unless they expected a hull breach. He reached for her mind…and felt a static buzz.

That made no sense. It shouldn’t be transmitting anything unless…

Yep. Her head on the other side had a piece of shrapnel in it that was connected to a broken power cable and it was pumping electricity into her brain. That was causing the telepathic buzz when he tried to connect.

He was standing a few inches away, sticking his head around her helmet so he could see the other side, when a hand grabbed his arm.

“Shit,” he said, realizing his mistake and quickly cutting off the shoulder of her envirosuit as he peeled back the armor on his right hand…feeling the frigid temperature and low pressure immediately. He made skin to skin contact so he could get an accurate assessment of the damage to her all the while scanning the metal pinning her with his Pefbar.

He didn’t know how she was alive, other than the damage was pressure locked because the debris was still inside her rather than hitting and pulling back out…which is what he couldn’t do right now.

Jason used both his armor’s Regenerator and his Haemra healing psionic to make enough repairs to keep her alive, then he began hacking away at the metal pinning her with his death saber, first at her head then her abdomen, and when the chunk of debris was removed from her head and the electric current was shut off, the women suddenly died.

Her heart, brain, and internal organs all shut down in sync, with his Regenerator immediately restarting them all manually, meaning if he let go of her shoulder the tiny tendrils crossing from his body into hers would break and she would be a goner, so he worked with one arm and his Lachka to cut away the rest of the debris pinning her, including a crushed left foot, and pulled her free, having to carry her in a telekinetic grasp due to her very fragile condition.

Jason worked on her for a long time right there, a few meters away from the damage, then had to retreat with her back to the heated and full pressure area as the air continued to leak out faster than the ship could replace it. Once he was sure the women would live, he left her in a coma on the safe side and went back to look for the other person…eventually finding a dead body that could not be revived.

He left the man there and went back for the survivor, only to find that she had died again.

“What the fuck…” he mumbled, bringing her back again, thankfully, and not understanding why the repairs to her body didn’t hold…then he realized that her brain was missing a lot of programming due to the lost tissue that the regenerator has replaced with default growths, and there was probably an incompatibility in inadequacy somewhere.

Which meant he wasn’t going to be able to leave her again or he was going to lose her…but he had to get the ship out of enemy hands.

“Screw it,” he said, deciding to stay with the woman as he hauled her through the ship to an intact emergency airlock and signaled the dropship trailing him outside to dock there ahead of him.

Jason ran into the ship with the women, his hand still on her exposed shoulder so his Regenerator could connect along with his Haemra, but he knew the Regenerator onboard the dropship wouldn’t be enough because his was saying she was fine. He had to stay with her and make manual adjustments or she’d be lost.

“Captain Barre,” he said over the comm to the Kionana. “I can’t get to the Blue Minoa’s tender spots. I’ve got a crewman hanging on by a thread and am in a dropship heading your way. Pull us there immediately, and once this warship is evacuated, you’re going to have to use your weaponry to explosively propel her into deep space where the Founders can’t recover her.”

“I understand. The crew are not clear yet, and the mag jump dish can’t reorient without pushing the entire area clear. We have to move off before that can happen. And there are readings of survivors on the Founder ships.”

“We don’t have time to play games,” Jason said angrily. “Override the protocols on the dish and move it without clearing the area.”

“That may damage the dish.”

“Do you have a better idea?”

“I have a bad idea, and it involves losing the Iron Hammer.”

“Shit,” Jason said to himself off comm. He should have seen it sooner, but part of his mind was inside the woman fighting a battle to keep her alive and his tactical sense was compromised. “Bumper cars?”

“We have it take the hits as we move the dish. I believe its magnetic drives will survive long enough to do what needs to be done. Captain Ollo concurs.”

“Does he?”

“We must leave, and he does not want to expel the surviving crewmembers on the enemy ships to be lost and unrecoverable in deep space. Getting our personnel out is our top priority. The ships are secondary, and our conscripted vessels are not powerful enough to move the debris in time.”

“Captain I’m having to use my psionics plus a Regenerator to keep this crewman alive. I’m distracted. Do what needs to be done, just get that dish repositioned or we’re all going to die here. You have temporary command.”

“Understood on both counts. I’ll have our top medtechs waiting in the hangar bay when you arrive. Barre out.”

Jason kept glancing at the battlemap as he worked, but he still didn’t understand why this woman wasn’t able to stay intact with a Regenerator connected to her. He felt like he was playing whackamole with a partner and barely staying ahead of her next crash, and that didn’t change all the way up to their landing on the Kionana with a trio of medtechs rushing up to where he had her laying on the floor.

“Brain damage,” he told them as they whipped out a variety of mobile equipment. “Her organs keep shutting down, and I think it’s a programming issue. Probably something the Regenerator is creating by accident.”

“Regenerative feedback,” one of them said after a few moments. “I’ve seen it once before, in the records. We need to insert a cyborg implant now, then rebuild her later. We need to move her.”

Jason lifted her telekinetically with his hand still connected to her shoulder. “Lead the way…”

By the time they got her to the medbay and had made her brain into a true cyborg that was capable enough to sustain her, Captain Barre already had cleared out the half of the dish arc that had to move up to reposition for their exit vector. The other half was still cluttered, some with dead ships, others with enemy crew still clinging to life onboard disabled ones. They’d have to make do on their own until their reinforcements arrive, because Jason had to get his people out of here now, for he didn’t know how long they had before the dish would rotate back with or without their permission to handle the incoming ships.

The Iron Hammer, now looking like a mashed up paper bag, had several enemy ships imbedded in its hull and sticking out of it at too many angles to have been an accident as it maneuvered within the dish arc on the powerful magnetic fields it produced, but there was no way to disconnect the enemy ship debris from it, meaning it wouldn’t be jumping out with what remained of the Star Force fleet…which was one large warship and 3 converted Caretaker ships.

Once all crew had been moved to the Kionana and all dropships were recovered, the intact warship and the smaller escorts moved to the far side of the debris where the magnetic field was a bit weaker, but no matter. How long it took them to reach the other end was inconsequential. Only how fast they got out of here ahead of their impending doom was relevant.

They went in series, with the smaller ships going first, but after the first two winked out as they launched themselves off the magnetic springboard, an incoming signal indicated the upcoming arrival of the another fleet 27 minutes away.

Jason had to remotely hit the override on the dish as it began to move again, putting it back into alignment for their exit vector. After it was within 16:23 of the arrival time even the override wouldn’t work, for the machine was configured to catch what was coming in no matter what.

But he didn’t need more than 2 more minutes to launch the last Caretaker ship and then the Kionana off the aligned magnetic field…after which it was a long coast across the blackness of deep space to another mag jump station that would automatically reorient to catch them regardless of what the crew onboard it had to say.

Those should still be Star Force personnel…he hoped.

6

October 7, 128888

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

It had been more than 4 months since the temporary truce in the Temple, and since that time Kara had returned to her training grounds with Strovok to wait. Morgan was off doing other stuff, but still in the Temple, as Kara had to remain here. Her location wasn’t a total secret, due to the ‘no go’ zone hovering over her as far as the Vargemma were concerned. And if she was going to play bait, the bait had to stay put to be found.

Kara sat on a flat rock, sitting cross-legged in the nude as she soaked up the sunlight as still as a statue. Only the gentle wind rocked her twin blue braids back and forth microscopically as she sat, apparently calm, but actually nervous. The Nu’avi had remained inside the canyon perimeter for the better part of three months, then they’d abruptly left through the underground portals.

All 59 of them.

They had to have known Star Force had some surveillance down there, so their leaving was more of a public spectacle than an actual departure. All 59 of them had in fact left the Temple, to where wasn’t known other than the fact it was on the same vector as they’d given Jason to investigate, but there was no word from him or his people yet. It was early, given the distances and comm lags, and she hoped he didn’t run into the Nu’avi wherever there was.

But the fact that they’d quietly left one of their original 60 behind said all that was needed.

There was a hunter here, operating in the dark with the departure of the others probably being a distraction or a useful coincidence. Ever since learning of that Kara had been waiting for the missing Nu’avi to show up on her doorstep, and despite the tracking programs set up around the containment area and elsewhere, they’d failed to detect the missing Nu’avi, so everyone assumed he was still underground in the containment area.

Everyone that was gullible, anyway.

“How strong are you?” Kara asked loudly, though her eyes were still closed and there was no one to be seen, but she could feel his presence nearby.

“Far beyond you,” a voice spoke back in her own language, but he remained invisible. “Have I been anticipated?”

“You want my siphon ability for something, I assume.”

“Your kind are rare, and must be preserved at all costs.”

“Preserved or imprisoned?”

“Trained to serve in the greater war. Far beyond anything you can learn here. I must take you beyond this galaxy where the true masters will instruct you in developing powers beyond your imagination.”

“And if I refuse?”

“I will take you willingly or unwillingly. You do not understand the magnitude of the potential you possess, nor can I explain it. Thus you must come with me, by force if necessary.”

Kara still hadn’t moved. “Do the Nu’avi have it?”

“No, but yours is so undeveloped that you are no match for me. Come quietly and I will not have to harm you.”

“Don’t you mean us?”

Suddenly another disturbance manifested itself nearby, and Kara finally rose to her feet and turned, all in one smooth motion, as her Vorch’nas multiplied outward and covered her pale flesh head to toe in crystal-like white armor. “You missed one.”

Strovok appeared out of his Essence concealment as Kara threw a javelin-like Lachka construct using her tier 4 Si’mosa towards the invisible presence, only to have it caught there as the tailed biped became visible, holding the energy field in his right hand before crushing it into non-existence and leaping towards Kara.

Strovok slammed an Essence wall up in between them that stopped the Nu’avi cold, only to have him then lash out at both targets with some kind of Essence attack that Kara didn’t recognize, but she took it on her inefficient Essence barrier as she unleashed a salvo of mental disruption attacks using her psionics as Strovok closed on the enemy…with at least some of them hitting long enough for the Nu’avi to half fall to the ground before he was able to cleanse his mind of disruption.

That allowed Strovok to get in close enough to deliver a Hard Light ‘Hammer’ blow from a few meters away, physically hitting the Nu’avi without actually touching him…and the attack knocked the smaller race’s body flying, out of which he did something that blinded both of them and had Kara retreating backwards as her Pefbar indicated he was diving towards her.

She shoved a wide Jumat blast that direction as she washed her face with an Essence technique designed to negate and strip away other Essence…with her vision returning just as a crippling hold enwrapped her body outside her Essence barrier. It pinned her arms to her sides and her legs together as the Nu’avi tried once again to get to her…but Kara could still fly and took off straight into the air, leaving the Nu’avi on the ground where he couldn’t reach, at least not with his body.

Kara got yanked down hard, all the way to the ground where she slammed into it feet first and they sank into the dirt a good 5 inches, all the while her body was still restrained despite her nibbling away at the very thick and rigid Essence binders…that Strovok then destroyed with a wave of his hand as he threw his Essence on her and dissolved them away while reeling in and tackling the Nu’avi long enough for Kara to get back and throw as large of a Fornax blast as she could into the very small spot before her that contained the Nu’avi’s head.

Her aim was true, and Strovok got several punches off before he was thrown skyward and Kara was knocked back by an Essence blast so strong it was beyond anything Strovok had shown her. Trees toppled everywhere in an expanding ring, and had she not been able to fly herself to a standstill she would have been ricocheting off them instead of steadying herself and firing Dre’mo’don blasts from her wrists in a hail of small shots designed for area of effect and not precise targeting.

The Nu’avi blocked them and raced towards her, jump/running in large lunges before Kara caught him in her Ubven as she raced backwards, spreading her arms wide and bringing her legs up as she unleashed her Final Spark technique right into his face…

And it did absolutely nothing.

He clawed his way free of the heavy Lachka field restraining him, but not before Strovok got off a shot from behind that did something. Kara saw the Nu’avi wince, so maybe her attack had served as a distraction, but once he was free he didn’t go after her again…instead he went after Strovok and Kara trailed him, reaching out with her Lachka and Essence enhancing it to grab at the Nu’avi’s body and only succeeding in making him twitch…after which the two of them went at it melee style, with Essence techniques enhancing their body’s movements as well as casting others from point blank range.

Kara threw a tier 4 Takbri stun pulse at both of them, and somehow it got through, because they flopped to the ground long enough for Kara to telekinetically drag the Nu’avi off Strovok a few steps before he broke loose of her grip again.

Kara fired her Dre’mo’dons and her bioplasma out of her palms into the gap between them, making the enemy dive into the fire to get at Strovok…which he did, and she saw at least one impact on his bioarmor that smoked on contact as her friend backpedaled heavily, and she could sense he was in a panic.

That made Kara go ballistic, channeling all her Essence into one torrent and pushing it into the remaining gap between them, catching the Nu’avi just before he got to Strovok and pushing him several meters to the side…at which point the Mek’tal added his own movement attack, and together they succeeded in throwing him back into the downed trees, with him disappearing inside the brush that audibly broke as he was rammed through it.

I cannot take him, Strovok told her telepathically. His generation capability is higher than mine.

Then we go for longevity?

Or we run.

Run, Kara said, flying over the ground as Strovok took off, leaping over trees and getting some help from Kara to keep from getting mired in the brush as she lifted him over some obstacles with her Lachka.

The Nu’avi came after them with amazing speed, running so fast that Strovok was not going to be able to stay ahead of him…but the fleeing pair kept throwing Essence barriers and binding techniques backwards, forcing the Nu’avi to slow to deal with them long enough that they got into the standing trees again and were able to run freely…until Kara’s feet were grabbed again, this time from very long range, and she had to fight with her Yen’mer to keep moving forward.

The delay was enough for the Nu’avi to catch up to them again…but a combined Jumat and Essence blast from the pair knocked him backward again, and the chase continued.

Minutes went by, with so much Essence being thrown off that anyone watching from a control room in the Temple would have thought some form of overload was occurring in some of the equipment. All the trailblazers would have been bone dry at this point…combined…but Kara’s siphon kept refilling her almost as fast as she needed, with only a few small breaks required to get back to full when she had it wide open.

And right now ‘wide open’ was her natural and permanent setting for her siphon as they tried to delay the Nu’avi as much as they could, but it wasn’t going to be enough. He kept getting closer and closer, always grabbing for Kara, probably fearing she would fly off out of reach, but there was no way she was leaving Strovok here.

The trap they’d set was nearby, they just had to get there in time, and it didn’t look like they were going to be able to do so, for a few seconds later he got a grasp on her that Strovok couldn’t cleanse in time, and the Nu’avi was able to lurch forward in a massively fast jump and get up on her…only to be blown back from a spherical Jumat blast, yet he deflected it underneath him so it elevated him like a pole vaulter, and launched him ahead of her.

He spun around and knocked her backwards with his own version of a kinetic attack, and it broke through her Essence barrier in a fraction of a second…after which her mind came under assault and she was swallowed in blackness…

Morgan had left Kara alone, but was never too far away. When she pinged the arrival of the Nu’avi via her Vorch’nas, the trailblazer was stunned that he was able to get this far unnoticed, and even when turning full sensors on the area she couldn’t see him until he revealed himself.

Morgan was in a warship high above them, but as soon as this brawl began she jumped out the nearest hangar bay and flew down towards the surface as fast as she could, becoming a meteor in the atmosphere due to the friction as she raced to get to the pair before one or both of them could be killed.

She didn’t know if the Nu’avi would do that, but if he was losing he wouldn’t hold back. Morgan didn’t know the status of what was going on until she was nearly on top of them and having to brake hard to slow down…and missing as she overshot their position.

Morgan slammed into the trees, breaking through several that actually helped cut her momentum, then she ran/flew through the forest back towards the trio trying to connect to Kara with a battlemeld technique, but the Archon wasn’t responsive. Her mind just wouldn’t connect, so Morgan went ninja and employed her psionics, cloaking device, and Essence techniques designed to hide oneself as she stopping stepping on the ground and flew only through the trees, finally getting eyes on the target without Pefbar that might give away her position.

She knew he might sense her anyway, given how rudimentary her masking technique was, but the trio was fighting on the move with Kara knocked to the ground and unresponsive for a moment as the Nu’avi turned on Strovok and did something to him that caused him to fall over…then the Nu’avi got knocked backwards and Kara stood up, with that cycle repeating as they all three kept going down and up as Morgan slowed and dropped to the ground, running with soft footsteps as she engaged her Saiyan genetics.

Her cells amped up their already rapid pace to hyper mode, with her steps becoming so slow to her perception that she had to speed up just to feel normal. Saiyan 1 did that on its own, but when they got the upgrade to Saiyan 2 their ability to process increased greatly, making them faster than before, but also with the optional switch to power enhancement. It ate up a lot of their speed, but they were still faster than when their hair was not blonde. Essentially pulling double the energy production in her cells, Saiyan 2 put such a strain on the body that one had to master Saiyan 1 to such an enormous level that Wilson himself was required to personally sign off on the upgrade to Saiyan 2, if and when the time came.

It was literally like flying yourself into pieces, and Morgan had worked a long time to get to the point where Saiyan 2 felt natural, whether she was using the strength upgrade or not. It required so much fuel that her body was now riddled with little nodules that soaked up and stored ambrosia for such a time as this. She literally could not hold enough in her bloodstream to fuel her Saiyan mode for more than a few moments, let alone Saiyan 2 which ate it up at nearly twice the rate.

Her nodules began releasing the extra ambrosia the moment she transitioned into the advanced state and her running speed sent her into an invisible streak through the trees, having to dodge this way and that to avoid hitting them…something she could not do when flying with enough accuracy.

But Morgan had long since surpassed Saiyan 2, one of only a handful of people…Archons or otherwise…to do so, and her Saiyan 3 upgrade had put an even greater strain on her body, which she had slowly adapted to over time, but Saiyan 3 still felt like a temporary high rather than a normal state. That was why she didn’t activate it until she got very close to the fight, and kept her Saiyan 2 mode all routed into speed and none into strength.

Saiyan 3 upgraded the existing cells more, not as much as Saiyan 2 had, but on average a good 13%. The bulk of the upgrade, though, was not in the muscle, tendon, and other movement tissue. It was in the psionic tissue, and allowed it to operate on the Saiyan level as well, both with a decent upgrade in firing rate, but primary in power generation.

Morgan didn’t even try to use her Essence to upgrade her psionics, which might have given away her presence coming up behind the Nu’avi. Instead she ratcheted up her metabolism to Saiyan 3, pouring the extra speed into her already blur-like movement as everything around her seemed to slow down a little bit more.

All three individuals ahead of her were moving in slow motion, and Morgan was the most vulnerable of them. The Nu’avi could kill her in a single shot that she did not have the Essence nor the technique to fully block if her assessment of his abilities was even halfway accurate.

But that didn’t mean she wasn’t dangerous, and like a ninja, one didn’t start a fight they didn’t know they could win. She remembered that from an old kids movie called ‘Three Ninjas,’ and it had stuck with her throughout her life. This Founder bastard was far beyond her skill in Essence, but he was slower than her Saiyan genetics…and he was distracted fighting the other two.

Morgan ramped up her tier 2 Saven psionic, creating a far larger Ikrid flash bomb than any Archon had ever hoped to, and launched it towards the Nu’avi as he continued to move, fight, get knocked down, and get back up again…but he was moving so slow Morgan couldn’t miss, and she was gambling her disruption attack would hit without him seeing it coming, and if it did it would allow her the last few steps she needed as she sprinted towards him and dove towards her target…

7

Kara knew they were in trouble. The trap zone was another 2 miles away and they were barely moving meters now, getting knocked down, grabbed, disoriented, and just about everything they were throwing at the Nu’avi he was throwing back at them twice as strong. If he wasn’t trying to capture Kara, she had the feeling he would have killed her already…but capture was often much harder than killing, and so far she and Strovok were able to disrupt him every time he got on top of one of them.

Their teamwork was annoying him, for the Nu’avi was hitting harder and faster now, with Kara’s Vorch’nas already having to repair a fractured skull, broken leg, busted ribs 3 times, and who knew how many other little injuries she was incurring as she got knocked around. Strovok had no Regenerator on him, nor armor, but his Essence defenses appeared to be holding up. Kara couldn’t know for sure, because she barely had time to notice what he was doing between the mental jamming that kept getting dropped on her.

If it wasn’t blackness, sonic pierces that drowned out the rest of her senses, or the half dozen other tricks the Nu’avi was making her cleanse from her mind, it was brute force collisions with hard light walls or elongated limbs, including a tail whack that smacked her across the face despite it ‘missing’ by two meters.

Kara ended up face first in the dirt, only to spring back up and dodge a smackdown she saw coming with her Pefbar. As she rolled out of the way she threw an Essence-enhanced Jumat back up into him that caught him off guard, knocking him head over heals, but the Nu’avi landed on his feet just as Strovok hit him with something that gave Kara a moment to think…which meant running a few more meters away towards the trap.

Both of them did, but they didn’t get more than 150 before the hard light walls they threw up behind them to block the Nu’avi failed and he got another grip on Kara’s feet…then the whole brawl started over again until they could break free, gain more ground, and get a little closer to the buried equipment in a clearing that, in retrospect, was put a little too far from their training grounds…though they’d expected to get a heads up on his approach before he got within speaking range. The fact that he’d been able to sneak as close as he had gotten before she sensed him with her Pefbar had messed up their plans…but they could be rectified if they could just get this brawl into a chase, yet their enemy wasn’t complying.

Without her built-in Regenerator in her Vorch’nas, Kara would have been disabled by now and she knew it. She was the weakling here, even with her psionics and armor weapons…which she fired every now and then hoping to catch another gap in his defenses.

She found a few, but not enough to do damage to his body. His armor had morphed somewhat since the battle started, moving up to fully cover his head and down to cover his hands, feet, and tail tip. Her few hits had scarred it, but not penetrated, and something Strovok had hit him with had discolored a portion of the white bio material yellow, but they clearly weren’t getting through like they needed to…which meant they weren’t going to win this on their own. They needed help.

Then suddenly out of nowhere they got it. One moment the Nu’avi was messing with her mind and she was alternating between cleansing it and attacking him, then there was a blur of blue light and suddenly the Nu’avi was skewered through the chest from behind with an impossibly thin energy blade…than then wicked upwards with some noticeable hesitation as his head was cut in half from the neck up.

His body fell, but before it could hit the ground the blue blade slashed through his neck sideways, decapitating his head…and standing behind him was Morgan in full armor, with her right arm wielding a blue death saber emanating from a nub just above her wrist and locked into alignment with her forearm.

“Oh. That armor isn’t as strong as I thought,” she said, looking down at the dead attacker, then back up at Kara. “Are there any more?”

“No…” she said, dropping into a crouch as she withdrew her helmet and sucked air.

“What just happened?” Strovok asked, with one of his four arms visibly broken.

“You guys had him distracted, I had an opening, so I took it,” Morgan said, pointing to his arm. “I can fix that if you’ll let me.”

“I can heal it myself,” he said, waving her off with one of his other thinner back arms. “I did not even see you approaching.”

“I didn’t either,” Kara said as Strovok’s arm audibly popped back into place and he grimaced, but whatever he was doing with Essence seemed to be working, because it no longer looked out of place. “Were you afraid battlemeld would give you away?”

“I tried. You weren’t responsive. How’d he get so close to you in the first place?”

“The same way I did,” Strovok noted. “There are hiding techniques that lower level Essence users cannot pierce.”

“How about ship sensors?”

“Apparently not.”

“I can’t believe that worked,” Kara said, sitting back onto the ground and resting her arms on her knees, not realizing how far she’d pressed her body and still trying to get her panic under control. She knew how close to death she’d been, and didn’t like the fact that the reason she’d survived was because her enemy had been holding back in the hopes of taking her alive.

“I hit him with an amped up Saven right before I struck. Apparently that combined with the two of you was enough to let me get in close. I was worried his armor would be resistant to my blade, which was why I went point first. I didn’t get too much resistance from it.”

“You have my respect, Archon,” Strovok said, lightly tapping one of his huge primary arms against his chest. “You have done what I could not. Did you approach hidden?”

“Yes.”

“There will be others. Either we flee now, or use other means to fight them. There were 60 here before, and only one came for us. If two were here, we would stand no chance. Do you think you can assassinate them in the same way if they are not already engaged in battle?”

“I don’t want to try,” Morgan admitted. “If that didn’t work I’d be dead a moment later.”

“Agreed,” he said, thinking hard. “Yet you succeeded without Essence skills. Perhaps your Star Force abilities may hold an advantage I overlooked, if we can find a way to give you some battle endurance.”

“No,” Kara said, forcing her panic to shut up. “We got what we needed, and that was a strength assessment. We don’t fight these guys hand to hand. We use the big guns, drones, infrastructure…anything but face to face. It’s too great a risk.”

“How long do you think we have before this guy not reporting back causes a reaction?” Morgan asked.

“A few months at least,” Kara said, “assuming the others really all left.”

“You think they faked it?”

“No, I just don’t want to err on the side of optimism.”

Strovok walked up to the body of the Nu’avi that was missing its head and he knelt over it, touching the armor. “It is still alive. Not the wearer, but the armor. It is not dead. Nor is it technology. I am sensing a Core within it.”

“Oh crap,” Morgan said, looking for where the two pieces of head had ended up.

“That’s a person?” Kara asked, standing up and joining him as the cauterized neck managed to seep some red/orange blood out a few cracks.

“I’m not sensing anything in the head pieces,” Morgan reported.

“It’s here,” Kara said. “Hurt, but here. I think it’s some sort of symbiont rather than armor.”

“Will prying the body out kill it?”

“I think we’ll let the medtechs figure that out. Ship on the way.”

“No,” Strovok said strongly. “It is dying. Upon death of the host it is ordered to kill itself.”

“How do you know that?” Morgan asked.

“It just told me. It is beginning the process now,” he said, reaching a hand into the neck and doing something that tore out part of the corpse from inside in a flurry of gore that resembled confetti.

“Eeeewww, what the hell are you doing?”

Strovok ignored her, reaching his hand inside a few inches…only to have the now exposed living armor in that section suck onto his exposed skin.

“Strovok?” Kara asked.

“It is the only way…and an opportunity I will not waste,” he said as he held still for a long moment...then the armor seemed to melt everywhere on the dead Nu’avi’s body and move like an amoeba across it, slowly climbing up his arm an inch or so every few seconds.

“Not something I’d do, but go for it,” Morgan said as she stood back and watched as it climbed up his arm and wrapped around it, far too small to cover his massive body, and eventually the naked Nu’avi was left exposed on the ground as the living armor completely left it and took to its new host…who walked over to the pieces still attached to the two halves of the head and made contact with them. The melty goo touched itself and was somehow able to reincorporate its severed ‘limbs’ back into its mass, adding to the coverage that now extended from Strovok’s wrist all the way up to just below his shoulder joint.

“What’s happening?” Kara asked as he just stood there like a statue.

“Amazing,” he whispered. “It’s called a Boos’mo. A shape shifting race that the Neofan conquered and altered to serve as bioarmor. They have extensive genetic memory and reproduce asexually. We can grow as many as we like from this one here, given time.”

“It’s a person, right?” Kara prompted.

“I understand. Yes, but it’s been altered to such an extent that it cannot live without a companion now. The Neofan saw to that. When in storage they cling to trees designed to support them. They are not intended to be given freedom, and biologically they have been altered to make it impossible.”

“How are you talking with it?”

“Telepathically at first, but now it is linked into my nervous system and we share thoughts.”

“Do you have a record of the previous wearer’s thoughts?”

“Some, and a great deal more than that. I have knowledge of their empire, and this creature has memories of its travels and those that it was spawned from…all the way back to the first when it was captured and altered against its will. They have been a slave race ever since.”

“Reason number 13 as to why the Founders are bastards aside,” Morgan scoffed. “What can it do?”

“Many things. Many, many things. In this battle it provided Essence defenses while the wearer focused on offense. That is why we were unable to fully incapacitate him.”

“It can use Essence? His or its own?”

“Curiously, it can do both. We can share Essence.”

“Is it a transmitter?” Kara asked.

“Not unless I trigger it. We are safe, Kara. It is not an enemy, but an unwilling tool forged by the darkside. These Neofan are horrible, they…” Strovok cut off, going stone cold.

“What?” Kara asked, not really wanting to know what was causing his face to blank.

“My Master,” he said, a mixture of fear and rage. “They take those with siphons and recreate their minds with implants to control them, making them tools bound to their will. They are cyborgs, but using biological implants. They use them for many things, combat being the rarest. My Master is most likely still alive, but his mind is corrupted and controlled. They will not even let him die, yet he is not alive. He is…I do not have the words to explain, and I do not want to show you this. The horrors are beyond anything the Vargemma could conceive. And their strength is too much to resist.”

“We’ve heard that before,” Morgan said, feeling the need to give some direction…now. “We can fight them, but what we’ve lacked is information. How much can you provide?”

“You cannot fight them with Essence. Their powers are beyond imagination, both in scope and technique. The Hadarak drain them of Essence with their numbers. That is how they are overwhelmed. That is not how you fight. Star Force cannot stand against this barbarism.”

“Maybe not today, but we can adapt,” Kara pressed. “Try to hold it together, Strovok.”

“I have my vengeance today, only to discover how hopeless it is,” he said, looking vexed.

“You’ve got another mind mixing with yours. Don’t trust anything you’re feeling now until you get your bearings. Desensitize or just ride it out. Don’t think about the future, focus on the now.”

Strovok listened to Kara, looking like he was going to remain standing, then decided to sit on the ground…which brought his head level almost down to hers.

“They do not care about anyone. Everything is a tool. Everything is apathy. Even the Neofan kill each other as punishment. Life means nothing to them other than as an expendable resource.”

“What does matter to them?” Morgan asked.

“Nothing. Nothing that the Nu’avi or the other servants who wore this bloodline knew. Their motives seem to not exist, but their dominance cannot be contested. And when the Hadarak are consuming all, the Neofan seem the better side to back, so there is no rebellion. No hope for anything beyond the Neofan way. This one…is in pain from its wounds. I am helping to heal it. But it is confused and joyful to find a place outside their empire. It does not like that its wearer was killed, for it is designed to be loyal, but it is seeing my memories and thoughts, and it wishes to serve Star Force. It wishes to serve you,” he corrected. “So that it’s race may live to fight those who did this to them.”

“Slow down big guy,” Kara said softly. “You’ve got a lot to process.”

“Truth,” he admitted. “But I can tell now, we are not prepared for the Neofan’s servants. Those that live to see many millennia are the most skilled and deadly. The mediocre do not survive. It is harsh, but effective. And their numbers are so large they can kill so many and get away with it, without it hurting their empire…” he said, starting to cry, which was totally out of character for the Mek’tal.

“Ok, let’s focus on the immediate,” Morgan said slowly. “What does it need to heal?”

“Food and my Essence. My body doesn’t have enough material, but it has most for the moment. It is not in danger of dying.”

“If you take it off, will it die…or kill itself?”

“It cannot eat on its own. It must be linked to a feeding branch or a wearer. It will not kill itself unless the wearer dies, and I am now its wearer. It is customary when one is killed for another fighting alongside it to merge the two together, and thus carry the survivor until it can be given to a new wearer. This one will grow to cover my body in time.”

“Alright, now that that’s taken care of, is it a danger to you?”

“No. I have full control. It cannot do anything without my permission, but if I give it then it can take actions while I am focused on other matters. It is designed as a teammate. It will not betray the wearer.”

“People do not always follow rules,” Morgan cautioned. “Will it fight another wearer that has its kin on it?”

“It does not have offensive capability, so there is no conflict, only sadness. It will support its wearer regardless of the opponent.”

“What does it know of the orders given to the Nu’avi for this Temple?” Kara asked.

“They spoke the truth. They are sending information back to get new orders. They also came for you. They did not know I was here.”

“What do you need in terms of food?” Morgan asked.

“Some exotic elements, and much of the same I already consume. All can be produced by the Caretakers.”

“Figures,” Kara said, poking a finger at the bioarmor…which oddly felt soft to the touch. “What’s with the light?”

“It is the symbol of the Neofan, the purple,” he said, referencing the bioluminous patches on the otherwise white bioarmor. “I think blue would be more appropriate now.”

Kara watched as the light changed colors, glowing a deep blue that seemed so intense it wasn’t quite real.

“So it’s on our side now?” Morgan asked.

“It’s on its wearer’s side, but it is grateful to be in the service of Star Force…and it seems to think I am Star Force. Apparently you have had more of an effect on me than I thought, Kara. We, I think, might be able to take one of the Nu’avi. Maybe not, but I can feel the potential here. It is like fighting as two in one form. And it wants you to know that it will voluntarily reproduce Star Force as many offspring as you wish without…coercion.”

“Coercion?” Morgan asked.

“It seems the Neofan must torture them until they relent and reproduce. They do not want to subject another to their enslavement, but this one wishes to embrace the freedom you offer.”

“Despite being bonded to someone for all their life?”

“You cannot understand their predicament.”

“You may want to spare Kara, but throw me some of those memories. I can take it, and you don’t really like me anyway, so…” she said, getting him to telepathically share some of what he was learning, seeing, remembering…

Morgan was silent for several seconds, then looked hard at Kara. “He’s right. We’re going to get our asses handed to us in the short term. And these bastards have to be taken down everywhere. Not just in this galaxy.”

“That bad?” Kara asked.

“Worse,” Morgan confirmed. “And I don’t think he’s sharing the really nasty stuff.”

“I am not,” Strovok noted. “How can you see hope in this?”

“I can work an impossible mission if I know what it is. An unknown enemy can’t be quantified. This one now can be. We’ve got our work cut out for us, and first thing we need to do is reroute all portal travel to a trap zone. Which means we need a portal on the surface built…so we can capture or obliterate these bastards the moment they step through.”

“Assuming they’re coming from the same vector,” Kara pointed out. “If they use the other routes, we can’t contain them and still have the Caretakers supporting the Temple.”

“We may need to block them out too,” Morgan said, with the same panic look in her eyes as Kara had been feeling ever since the fight began. “If they get on the field in numbers, we automatically lose. We have to sculpt the battlefield.”

“What exactly does that mean?” Strovok asked.

“It means you get to see what an Archon is really meant for. And it’s not hand to hand combat.”

“Troubleshooting,” Kara translated for him. “Figuring out how to do what others cannot.”

Strovok stood up, still visibly vulnerable and confused, but with a look of hope in his eyes that seemed the polar opposite of what he had just been effusing. His mind must be a volatile mess right now with the symbiont sharing ebbing and flowing until a balance was reached.

“How can we be of assistance?”

8

November 1, 128888

System 9924021 (Unexplored Frontier)

Third Planet

Niatri stirred, the pain in her chest gone, but her head was so foggy she didn’t know where she was or what had happened. Her surroundings were bright, forcing her to blink her three eyes rapidly to get them to adjust without overload.

She was laying down on her back, so she rolled over onto her shoulder, finding her thin tail sore as it pulled out from beneath her…as if she’d been laying on it for too long.

Suddenly she remembered the fight, being hit in the chest…and she sprung up onto all fours as she looked around, seeing one alien with her in a large, empty room. And it was one of the Humans she had been sent to retake the Conduit from.

“Do you understand my words?” the Human said in the language of the Bond of Resistance.

Niatri looked around. There were no doors, windows, or tunnels. No way out even if she killed him. This wasn’t a Conduit station. The architecture was wrong. She must have been rendered unconscious and taken prisoner.

“I understand,” she said, fear amping her reflexes to their max, but the Human didn’t move, nor did anything else in the room to give her something to strike at or evade.

“I have searched part of your mind for information. I need more. We do not torture or kill our prisoners, and you are now mine. I let you live, now do me the courtesy of talking in exchange for that consideration.”

“Where are my siblings?” she demanded.

“I do not know who they are.”

“The ones that were with me.”

“There were five of you that made it onto the station via the Essence portal before I destroyed it. The other four died in combat.”

Niatri reared her blue-skinned head back and screamed, with the sound ripping the outer layers off the wall like peeling paint, but the Human didn’t move, somehow immune. She leapt at him and unleashed a disintegration attack that shredded not only the Human but the wall behind him, opening up an exit for her.

She took a step off the table where she had been laying, then stopped short as something didn’t make sense. There was no body, nor debris cloud coming from the Human. The wall debris was filling the room with a choking cloud, but the body should have exploded first.

“Try not to do that too many times,” the Human’s voice said, now from behind her as she spun and launched another disintegration attack, destroying the alien again…but with no effect other than on the wall behind her, which added so much debris and smoke she couldn’t see. Her Essence sense wasn’t detecting the Human, and as she began coughing on the dust she ran towards the first hole she’d made, only to have the ventilation systems kick in and begin thinning the cloud enough for her to see…

And the Human was standing in front of her exit, unharmed.

She stopped short of hitting him again, and just stared in a mix of anger and vexation.

“We’re far from the hull, but destroy the wrong wall and you’ll end up sucked into the void of space. You’re onboard one of our ships, and what you see before you is a very detailed hologram. So I’m not actually here for you to try and kill a second time.”

“You…” she said, catching his meaning. “You were the one who killed my siblings?”

“Did you expect us to just lay down and die for you?”

“You ambushed us!” she screamed, this time without adding Essence to it.

The Human frowned. “You came through the Essence portal from a ship. A ship that was attacking my ships and killing my people. You came to the station to kill me and more of my people. I struck as quickly as I did because it was you that was attacking us. I know you were pulled off your regular duty and assigned to the assault force against your will, but you and your siblings nearly killed me. I kept you alive because you were the last and I had the luxury of doing so. I could not have taken all of you alive. You are too powerful for that.”

“Liar!” she screamed as the air was almost back to its normal transparency, but some of the smoke was still in her lungs and she coughed a bit of blood up after yelling. “You invaded the Conduit. You stole our Temples. You have gone where you are not allowed. You have taken what is ours and corrupted it. You are at fault, and you killed my siblings!” Niatri said, ending with another Essence attack, this one a crushing grip that did nothing to the hologram other than disrupt the delicate glowing force fields ever so slightly.

“Yes I did. Because your masters forced me and you into a situation where I had no choice but to fight or die. They don’t care about you or your siblings, but I do. Otherwise I would have killed you already.”

“You kept me alive to interrogate me,” she said, turning inward as she summoned up the kill protocol they had all been taught prior to being sent on this mission…but the device implanted inside her neck was gone.

“Partially true. It’s easier to probe your mind when you’re awake, but right now your defenses are up and I’m not getting very far. And yes, I did remove the suicide bomb they stuck inside you.”

Niatri summoned up a storm of Essence around her, swirling it uselessly as she drained her body…knowing that if she pulled too much she would pass out, but if she went too far too fast it would actually kill her, and she’d be damned if she gave information to the people who killed her siblings before they got around to killing her too.

Niatri began to get light headed…but not from the Essence use, and soon she found her legs unable to keep her standing. She landed on her thin hands as her vision went blurry and her grip on reality diminished to the point she forgot she was using Essence and just stopped. A moment later she felt herself laying down, too weak to stand…then a firm hand gripped her shoulder, and while her mind suddenly cleared, she lost all control of her body as an invasive presence slid inside and froze her solid.

“That’s better,” the Human said in the flesh. “I was going to do this the nice way, but killing yourself is such a waste. I’m sorry you lost your siblings. I don’t kill people for fun. And I didn’t want to kill them. But you put me into a position where I had to. Up until then you hadn’t attacked us with anything other than machines. I expected more of them. Not people. Then you show up with Essence skills and I had to take you down as quickly as possible. I didn’t know if I would survive, because I had no idea what your skill and power levels were. You almost killed me regardless, and your forces killed 723 of my people in that attack. We don’t start fights like that, but when we’re put into those situations we become quite deadly. Mercy is the luxury of the dominant, and in that fight we were not dominant. You were the last and I was able to disable you. I don’t think I could have if I tried for two of you.”

“What are you doing to me?” she asked, finding that her mouth still worked, though the rest of her body obeyed his commands rather than hers. And every time she tried to use her Essence that part of her mind became slippery, as if the trigger was right there but she’d forgotten how to grasp it.

“We have limited Essence powers. It’s sort of new to our empire. We grew up with other powers, and I’m using one of those to hack into your nervous system and take direct control over your body. Far more effective than telepathy since I have a direct physical connection.”

“Take your information and end it,” Niatri demanded, then a host of images of attacks on planets, and against fleets of their ships shot into her mind. Many times, with carnage resulting as they could not defend themselves against the weapons of the Temple dwellers. One entire world wiped clean of all living beings as their hearts were stopped by an invisible force known as Lian’no, a combination of an Essence technique and the technology of the Bond of Resistance.

“That is why I am here. That is why we are in the Temples, and exploring and claiming the support networks for them. We were attacked. My people slaughtered. Why? Because we were fighting the Hadarak and winning more than the Vargemma liked. They told us to let ourselves be killed, and when we refused they did this. Your Bond of Resistance isn’t supposed to fight those who fight the Hadarak, is it? Well, your infrastructure in this galaxy is hereby forfeit for what you’ve done. We’re claiming it and making sure those who live in it can’t do the same to us again. That is why we are here. We didn’t start this fight. But you can be damn sure we’re not just going to sit and let you or anyone else kill us.”

“The Vargemma are tools. They are not part of the Bond of Resistance. Take your vengeance out on them. They do not own what you have taken.”

“They have been supported by what we have been taken, and your Bond of Resistance isn’t getting off the hook for propping up those monsters.”

“You think you can win? We were sent first because we were here. The real warriors are coming. You will not be able to capture them. They will wipe you from existence.”

“They will try,” he said boldly.

“What do you want from me?”

“I want you to live.”

“Then let me go.”

“I will.”

Niatri didn’t know how to interpret that. “Release me.”

“We’re in space, in orbit around a planet. We’re not in the support networks anymore. If I release you onto one, can you find your way back or will you be stranded? Tell me truthfully. I am in your head, and I will know if you are lying.”

“I would rather die stranded.”

“So you don’t know how to get back. What if I put you on the station where I captured you? Could you make it back then if it was a different one? One that didn’t have your assault force on it?”

“I came by ship.”

“So you did. Which means unless I personally dump you into the hands of the enemy, releasing you will mean you’ll be stranded or starve to death. Neither is acceptable. If somehow you did return to the Zotav you were taken from, what would happen to you? Would you be punished, accepted back, killed?”

“I am supposed to be dead,” she answered simply.

“Not to be taken alive,” the Human echoed. “So they’d probably just kill you if you did get back. Even if you escaped and killed me in the process. This Bond of Resistance doesn’t sound much better than the Hadarak. Do you have other siblings back there?”

“The others were on my ship. Did you destroy it too?”

“Damaged. We didn’t have time to pick up the survivors. We had to get out of there before your next wave of ships arrived. It’s possible some of your siblings survived. I can’t say for sure. We lost two of our three big ships in that fight. We wouldn’t have survived what was coming next. Normally we’d have taken survivors onboard, but after searching your unconscious mind on the spot, I knew more were coming.”

“Why didn’t you leave me there?”

“And have you wake up and try to kill me again? Or more likely one of my people without Essence abilities? No. I couldn’t take that risk. I either took you prisoner or killed you, and we don’t kill prisoners.”

“Your people on the station did not have Essence?”

“I was the only one that did.”

“How can you infest Bond of Resistance technology if your civilization cannot even use Essence?”

“We’re smart, and most of your stuff doesn’t require it. The few pieces that do people like me can deal with. Our empire has risen to dominance through other means. Means that are allowing us to fight the Hadarak, for the most part, without Essence. Our recent upgrade to Essence, much of which we’ve learned from taking the Temples, is allowing us to pursue victory over the Hadarak. We’re in the beginning stages, but we have a chance. And we’re not going to allow the Vargemma or any of your Bond of Resistance to sabotage us from points of immunity within the Temples. Would you?”

“I matter not. You have no idea what a monster you have provoked.”

“They are monsters, aren’t they? They sent you and your siblings to die to buy time for their better troops to arrive and secure the site. And they made me kill you by sending you to kill me. We should not be enemies, but they made us such, and I do not expect you to forgive me for what I did to your siblings. Even I don’t like it. But can you at least admit if I hadn’t fought as hard as I did, that you would have killed me?”

“I would kill you now if I was not restrained. Free me and fight. Give me an honorable death if you are more powerful than me.”

“What would that gain?”

“Then rip the information from my mind and be done with it!” she yelled, finding she had more motor control in her throat than the rest of her body. Perhaps his hold was slipping.

“I know you don’t understand, and won’t for some time. Perhaps never. But hear these words and burn them into your memory. What I do now, I do to benefit you. Not me. You are so swirling in the darkside you do not even recognize the existence of the light. But your bond with your siblings held you together, and now you wish to join them in death. I cannot allow that. The Bond of Resistance has forced me to kill your siblings when they did not deserve it, even though they were very much trying to kill me. They are the enemy, not you, even though right now you very much want to kill me. The days ahead will be hard for you, but there will be a path forward buried within it. I can promise you that.”

“Just kill me,” she pleaded, her anger doubling over into hopelessness.

“No,” Jason said firmly. “You will live.”

Niatri lost consciousness, and once the trailblazer made sure she was harmless he finally let go of her blistered flesh. Something about his hand had caused a reaction in it, and he wasn’t sure why.

But that wasn’t important. The Regenerator would handle it. As he’d been talking with her he’d been searching parts of her mind that had been blocked by her unconsciousness earlier, and some more that had only opened up when she thought about a tangent.

She’d been on the Coin, with they called a Zotav, working as a mechanic to maintain the construct. She and her siblings had been grabbed off their similar duties and thrown into combat because they were the only ones immediately available. All personnel on the Coin had to be Essence capable, for they had to make daily donations in order to keep it active, but these people were not soldiers, let alone warriors. They were fighting out of desperation and zealotry, and they knew they might not survive. But the Bond of Resistance needed them, and there was no choice in the matter. They were sent with the machines to fight the enemy, beat them, hurt them, or at least distract them before the troops would return from other assignments to be redirected to the Conduit.

And the Conduit was a network of direct route Essence Portals strung around the galaxy giving the Founders a short cut from the Coin to each Temple. They weren’t for Caretaker use. They were the highways connecting them reserved for Essence only traffic of the highest priority. Not even the popsicles got to travel that way.

And those routes would not be allowed to be compromised. Hence the swift reaction to Jason’s team accidentally stumbling onto a maintenance link from the Shadow Network.

The Conduit was undoubtedly the route that Morgan’s invaders had traveled, and there was no way for Jason to stop it short of a massive invasion fleet that he didn’t have equipped for mag or pulse engine travel. And even if he did, he would probably still lose unless he started destroying the support networks entirely, leaving whoever jumped to them lost in space forever when the receiving platform no longer existed.

He looked down at the mechanic’s unconscious body, slightly larger than his own.

“Kicked the bee hive, didn’t I? Now who do I get to babysit you?”

9

December 21, 128888

Edge of Milky Way Galaxy

Zotav 7

Jueni Sonavi Treveon was one of 4 House Atriark members on this Zotav, stationed here as a sort of embassy along with many others from the other Houses of the Neofan to representatives from most of the members of the Bond of Resistance. The Veloqueen were not here, because they did not live on the surface, but rather in space, and they preferred to move via the Gateways at galaxy center rather than the artificial routes created on the outskirts of the galaxy to jump from one to another, hence their absence.

Nearly everyone had an outpost on every Zotav within the Bond of Resistance infrastructure dominion to look out for their interests as well as to keep informed as to what was happening…and today was a very informative day.

Jueni stood some 16 feet tall when he stretched out, but normally he walked with a bit of a slouch as his heavy wings dragged his body downward even when they were curled up behind his back. They were not built for flight, but for transmission of varied abilities akin to a biological antenna, and because of their weight he rarely stood up straight, yet he was still far larger than most of the other races here, including the Nu’avi, which had thousands of individuals on the Zotav along with the other servants of the Neofan. But right now he did not feel large. He felt very small, stuck on this artificial land staring into the blankness of the void between galaxies.

The sun above his head made it easy to forget, for it never shut off to let one really soak in the void, but it was ever present above them, even when he traveled to the reverse side of the massive coin-shaped construct, for it had another sun high above it radiating down and only down, so not to give away their position to those inhabiting this galaxy.

But their location had already been compromised, via the Caretaker network, as this Star Force enemy continually probed them. The Emperor’s Hands had passed through this Zotav enroute to deal with the problem, and to Jueni’s dismay they had returned early without victory…but what they brought back was a riddle, along with information detailing how much more powerful and accomplished Star Force was than had been originally believed. And the Nu’avi were asking for a reassessment of their orders given Star Force’s track record of Hadarak kills.

Jueni was informed of this by House Mutavi’s contingent on the Zotav, as the Emperor’s Hands naturally reported to them, but this was a matter for all in the Bond of Resistance, for the Nu’avi were questioning whether or not Star Force deserved to be evaluated for membership.

The Neofan stepped outside his catacomb into the sunlight, letting it hit his face, wings, and hands…for the rest of him was covered in the symbiont Pol’so’nep that all Neofan wore outside their safest habitats, and this outpost, while remote, was not considered ‘safe’ by any stretch of the imagination. Then again, considering that their ‘safe’ worlds were now falling to the Pafdreng or the Hadarak as Utovi was being consumed, he wasn’t quite sure what the word actually meant now.

The symbiont remained quiet, for it knew better than to invade its wearer’s thoughts, but it also protected his body from the too intense sunlight. Unfortunately the other races required it, while the nocturnal Neofan did not like the intense light, but the Zotav were not built for them. They were communal outposts beyond the reach of the Hadarak, so the Neofan had built their catacombs beneath the surface, but on days such as this, Jueni needed to come out and face the harsh light.

There was already much discussion between the various Houses here as to what was the best course of action to take. There would be no waiting for those in their home galaxy or others to make a decision, for the ruling House was present here as well, if only in their 18 members, but that was enough to make a decision, though everyone was chiming in as to what they recommended be done, including some of the other races.

Some argued to destroy them, others to ignore them, while some scoffed at the Nu’avi returning at all when they should have carried out their standing orders. Jueni was of mixed thoughts, which was why he came to the surface and faced the light…for it forced him to think differently as he felt it burning into his pale skin on his bald head.

He sensed opportunity here, but how to handle it? The Neofan were growing weaker by the hour, and soon they’d be fully embroiled in a war to claim a new galaxy as most of their population was lost in their home galaxy. House Atriark was not a prominent house, and Jueni was fortunate to have already been assigned here, for many in his House had nowhere to go…at least within the new galaxy chosen by the Neofan. The traffic there was already maxed out to the point where secondary routes were now clogged as they bounced through other galaxies rather than taking the most direct route.

The giant launching cannons in the Zotav required a massive amount of Essence to activate, and anyone leaving for the new galaxy had to provide it themselves. That wasn’t a problem for House Atriark, it was priority in the waiting line. And when even the Neofan themselves could not be guaranteed evacuation, their slave races had no hope of escape, being left to die to delay the Hadarak and keep their focus where it was now and not on their new target galaxy.

House Atriark could not alter the priority rules House Mutavi had put in place for travel, but there was nothing stopping them from fleeing to other galaxies if they had the Essence to spend. House Atriark needed to survive with all its members, not a sliver of its population to start over with in the new Neofan galaxy. But where could they go? Hide out in the Temples? They could, but they’d be exiled at the minimum by the ruling House, and targeted for termination at the worst. But faced with extermination by the Pafdreng, that wasn’t such a bad gamble to make considering the ruling House had its hands full coordinating the relocation…otherwise they’d be on the chopping block if they failed in this critical mission.

“Yes,” he said diabolically as a thought occurred to him. “Distraction, reduction, and diversion. It is logical.”

Jueni jumped out of the edge of the catacombs to a ladder built into the stone wall that he climbed up to the summit, only to come down and travel a simple dirt path across the horizon that would lead him to House Mutavi’s catacombs some hours later, by which time he had already formed his arguments and counter arguments, and he stopped just short of entry out of respect for the other House’s position.

One of their servants came out and looked up at him from its low height.

“What purpose?”

“Proposition.”

The little Niad shook as he used his limited telepathy to contact his masters and a brief conversation took place, then the long-legged hexped stepped sideways to clear the Neofan’s path.

“Entry granted.”

Jueni entered the catacombs, moving out of the sunlight and feeling his skin welcome the coolness of the shade as he made his way through the rough-hewn stone to one of the pockets inside that held two other Neofan locked in a mating grapple.

“I did not come to observe your depravity,” he scolded them, for they were not wearing their bioarmor, which was a minor breach in protocol. “I have a proposition to make.”

The other Neofan broke apart, having to get their wings unhooked from each other first, and the smaller of the two walked over to him and stared up at his chin.

“You dare to address us like that?”

“I know you too well, Shiven. Do not forget who you are speaking to.”

“You are not of the ruling House, Jueni.”

“No, I am not. So why are you not behaving as if you are?”

Shiven scoffed at that, but his point has been made and her demeanor changed to one a bit more professional as she reached over to the pool of purple and white that was her Pol’so’nep and allowed it to slowly stretch back across her rib-showing body. “Speak your proposal.”

“I have reviewed the information the Emperor’s Hands delivered to us, and I counsel more than a reaction. We have an opportunity for a mutually beneficial alliance with them…other than membership in the Bond of Resistance.”

“What type of alliance?”

“They are undergoing a Hadarak purge. We can use this as an additional drawdown on Hadarak resources if we help them to become better at fighting them. Doing so will increase our odds of securing a new galaxy. Do you disagree?”

“Not on that point. You suggest we give them technology rather than our ire?”

“I am suggesting that your House sanction Atriark to relocate to this galaxy and guide Star Force into their most destructive path possible. This will free up some transport slots for others, while allowing our House to survive the attrition that the others will have to endure.”

“By moving your entire House here?”

“That is what I am proposing, minus our natural holdings in the new galaxy. Those of us who would not have survived can survive here as we distract the Hadarak and draw some of their resources away from the target galaxy. I see this as mutually advantageous between Houses, and with Star Force, for they are doomed without our assistance.”

“You believe you can protect them?”

“House Atriark would rather face that difficulty than wait in Utovi helpless until our eventual deaths.”

“Have you been recalled?”

“I have not.”

“Then you will survive here regardless.”

“My House will not. We can be of use to our race and House Mutavi, for you can barter off our transport slots that we will no longer need to prop up your position as most of our people die. That will be seen as failure even if it is not so. We both have to gain from this, as do our people in general.”

“You seek to give them forbidden technology?”

“Their weaponry is already effective, it is their Essence knowledge that is lacking. We can also summon the Vargemma to the fight they were promised. At the worst we can organize Star Force into more effectively killing Hadarak before they are purged. We will survive within the Temples, but the longer we can prolong their war the longer they will not be able to send reinforcements from this galaxy to the others.”

“House Atriark would be exiling itself.”

“But with your blessing it will not be a violation.”

“But it’s still exile save for your ambassadors here and in the new galaxy. Why give up your position and holdings there?”

“Our House must survive, not regrow from preserved seeds. To do that we must travel somewhere else, and by sanctioning this you can ensure that more Neofan survive no matter how successful we are able to become with these primitives.”

“I cannot find fault in your logic. A lesser position is valuable if it allows a significant portion of your population to avoid destruction. But your population will not be able to travel to the new galaxy and gain a disproportionate foothold. You will have no holdings in it aside from in the Communal Correndon.”

“I believe my House will embrace this opportunity even if we must handicap our future.”

“And if you succeed in holding back the Hadarak, you can use the success to make a bid to overthrown Mutavi?”

“Not if we are not in the same galaxy. You will be inoculated against a hostile takeover. But there is nothing that can save you if your House demonstrates the incompetence that others have shown.”

“We will not fail. You most likely will, but even a minor delay of the Hadarak here will help distract from our true target. You have permission to bring those here that you can, but not to the Zotav. You must inhabit the galaxy itself. No greater populations will be allowed in the Zotav.”

“Fair bargained,” he said, extending both of his hands and crossing them.

“And concluded,” Shiven said, doing likewise and grasping their clawed fingers for a predetermined length of time, then when they broke contact the official contract was cemented. “But unwise. You will rue your exile, but your sacrifice will benefit the Neofan.”

“We intend to exceed your predictions.”

“Exceed them as much as you can, it will not be enough to credit you into new holdings.”

“We will see what the future holds. Farewell, Shiven.”

“You are returning to Utovi?”

“No. I have convinced you, now I must convince Star Force to accept our guidance.”

“If you fail, your exile remains.”

“I do not intend to fail…” he said, bowing slightly as he retreated out of the catacombs and returned to the harsh sunlight. He contained his glee until he was beyond their sight, then let his emotions run to visibility as his skin changed color to match them.

“Mutavi are fools. This is the logical path, but they do not understand why. House Atriark will survive where others do not, and we will make this galaxy our own. How can she not see that possibility?”

And what Jueni meant by that was that House Atriark would be going independent, expecting the acquisition of a new galaxy to fail in some regard. If it did, Atriark would not be going down with it. They would have their survival pod here, in this galaxy, if they were cagey enough to convince Star Force to accept their teachings. The Neofan were not strong enough, nor could they get enough of their servant population here to do any large amount of fighting on their own. But if they could provide what Star Force lacked, an alliance with them could deliver House Atriark a stronger position within the Bond of Resistance than the tattered remnants of the other Neofan Houses that were even now bickering with each other over the number of evacuation slots they were allowed in Utovi’s Zotav on the shortest jumpline to the new galaxy.

Jueni would have to send word back to Utovi concerning the deal he had just struck, and he couldn’t go himself. All traffic was outcoming from Utovi on most of the travel lines, but information could go back without risking collision. His House had to begin preparing now, and he had to begin preparing their place in this galaxy for when their ships eventually made it here taking the longer, less traffic heavy Zotavs that were quickly filling up as many fractured Houses began to flee for their own survival into the Temple network, knowing they could never return to the Neofan Empire again, but they did not care. Panic was overtaking Utovi, and for good reason, but official business would always be prioritized in all the Zotavs, even the low priority ones, and House Atriark now had official business in that would give them priority travel slots in the indirect Zotav jumplines.

Jueni went back to his catacombs and compiled the message after informing the others in his House of the bargain made. Then he arranged to have it transmitted back across the deep void between galaxies hoping his House Leaders would not feel he overstepped his bounds by making this agreement without their counsel, but he knew they were wise enough to recognize the opportunities he had just laid out for them in the heavily encoded message.

They would know what to do now, and Jueni needed to arrange for more than a truce with Star Force. They had to put aside grudges and forge a Bond of their own for mutual benefit.

Jueni just hoped they would listen to him long enough to make his logic clear.

The Nu’avi had made the right call in coming back with the information. It was a shame their elite served the wrong House once again. Their race truly deserved better…

10

February 18, 128889

Happhetima Nebula (Zavrex Kingdom)

Gamma Tricumbda Temple

Jueni stood in the center of a Neofan warship. It didn’t belong to his House, but rather to a lower level one that was tasked with the primary defense of his Zotav. They had three stationed there, in addition to thousands of other warships from their servants and other Bond of Resistance races. He wished his House had stationed one here so they wouldn’t have to owe House Bvan a favor, but he wasn’t going to negotiate with Star Force in anything less grand. They needed to see the power of the Neofan, not be told of it, and when his ship passed through one of the main portals and entered the Temple where their Siphon had been known to inhabit, it was something that few Vargemma had ever had the privilege to witness.

The ship was an orb, but one with four rings around it that all intersected at two points, and from those rings the defense shields were generated…but because there was a physical connection to the shield bubble and it didn’t have to be fully projected, it allowed the technological creation of much stronger shields. That was something that Star Force and most lesser empires never figured out, lest they see one of the Neofan warships and try to copy them, though the physics involved were not simple, and the advanced shields would take more than just a cursory look to imitate.

The two points where the rings connected also had physical connections to the orb that was not far inside the perimeter, but there was plenty of room for smaller ships to take cover inside, for the Gjardan-class dreadnaught that Jueni was riding in was designed to fit just within the diameter of the Temple portals, which were 127 miles wide.

It also required use of the third ring of the Conduit stations that had allowed direct Essence transport from the Zotav to this Temple or any other within the galaxy. His ship had not left the Essence realm during transit, but it would be caught and redirected by each ‘Uip’ station allowing for the fastest…and most costly…transport across the galaxy. And for something the size of a Gjardan, the Essence cost was high, which is why this method of travel was rarely used.

But it gave them movement control across the entire Rim, adjacent to which were all the Zotav, which nearly everyone in this galaxy did not know existed, and it was meant to stay that way. All they would see was the ship arriving from a portal, not knowing its origination point, and a ship so large no one would dare to strike it…

Except maybe the Star Force fleet that was miraculously waiting for them, thousands in number and of significant size, but none as large as the Gjardan.

Still, the fact that they knew which portal the ship was coming through was troubling…but also encouraging. If Star Force was skilled enough to be able to learn to use the Temple in ways not given to them, perhaps they were worthy enough to make this venture worthwhile…though Jueni still knew it was a massive gamble. But without it, his House would be decimated and most of its extremely old members would have to be replaced with new births, and that alone almost made their taking a new galaxy irrelevant if they couldn’t take the existing House with them.

But this was the universe they were faced with, and the chaos of the fall of their galaxy was having irreparable damage to the Neofan even if House Mutavi wouldn’t admit it. Jueni needed his House to survive in better condition than the others or they risked being eliminated in some form or another, perhaps by the Hadarak, for he knew the other Houses would not fight for them if the defense lines were overrun again. It would be every House for itself, as it was now across much of Utovi.

An incoming message quickly made its way to Jueni, but he let them wait as his ship drifted further out from the portal…but the Star Force ships wouldn’t move. They neared a collision before the Neofan ceased their forward momentum, not wanting to start off this negotiation by killing some of Star Force’s people, for research suggested they valued their individuals far more than was prudent, and that an offense against one was taken as an offense against all.

Star Force did not understand the concept of sacrifice, and Jueni was going to have to take special care to remember that.

He watched the incoming transmission without showing himself, seeing that it was from a Human known to them. Morgan-063, one of their warlords. Perhaps she came here after the Emperor’s Hands arrived, but the reason was immaterial. She was here, which was fortunate, for time mattered in the evacuation of Utovi, and negotiating with one of their highest leaders would save some time rather than having to work through intermediaries.

It also meant he needed to take a different tact, given the trailblazers’ unique history.

He activated the transmission on his end, showing his image to his counterpart and speaking before she could react first.

“Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain…”

Did that mother fucker just…? Kara said telepathically to Morgan as they both stood in the grass of their training ground playing bait just in case there was another Nu’avi out there, but only Morgan was visible via holo, with an altered background and her signal being bounced through multiple relays so the ship couldn’t detect where she was.

Yeah he did, she answered, giving the Aatrox-like alien a frown. “A curious choice of words. Are you suggesting that we’re evil or overpowered?”

“I am suggesting that this is a negotiation, not an invasion. I have come to bargain.”

“What do you wish to bargain?”

“A mutually beneficial arrangement that prevents a war between us and gives you a better chance of survival against the Hadarak.”

“Who is ‘us?’”

“You most likely have never seen my race, but you know our name. We are the Neofan, and these Temples are largely of our construction, with the assistance of many other races within the Bond of Resistance, but I am not here to offer you membership. I am here to offer something else.”

“I thought the Temples were built by the three primary races of the ‘Founders?’”

“‘Founder’ is a term designed for the Vargemma. They are not part of the Bond. They are tools that we help advance in order that they may serve us later if required. The trinity you speak of is the Neofan, the Veloqueen, and the Denogi. All have given much in the way of technology, combining our knowledge to build the Temples, but bulk of the design and construction was Neofan in origin. The Veloqueen prefer to inhabit the Cores of galaxies and leave the Rim to us. The Denogi do not possess Essence technology, for they are immune to it. That leaves the cultivation of Essence users to us and the lesser races in the Bond. We have built the Temples, though the credit does not always match the true actions.”

“You know that we lack information and you are offering it freely. Wise opening move,” Morgan quipped.

“It is common knowledge elsewhere, and in truth you should have been contacted prior to now in order that certain realities could be explained to you. I have tried to ascertain why it was not, and my information suggests that your rise to Essence capability has occurred over a drastically short timespan. That is why the Neofan did not know of your qualifications, but I am alarmed that the Veloqueen’s representative in this galaxy did not treat you with the respect deserved. And the fact that you and your allies killed him is, frankly, impressive.”

“Compliments are useless to me. Lay out the facts we are going to negotiate over.”

Jueni nodded his head at the Archon’s practicality, gaining a more refined estimate of what he needed to accomplish with her now that he had additional personality data.

“The Hadarak are attempting to purge this galaxy, with the impetus unknown to you or us. Correct?”

“Correct.”

“Their purge will most likely not affect the Temples. You can hide many of your people inside and rebuild after the galaxy is rid of all life. We have no intent to deny the Temples to you, for you need them as a fallback position if your defensive efforts fail. I also acknowledge the lack of wisdom of the Vargemma is our responsibility, for they struck at those that can kill Hadarak, most likely fearing that you would trigger a larger purge. They do not understand much of the galaxy beyond the Temples, and our instructions for their scouting actions were…insufficient. Your response was highly appropriate and merciful, and while we do not like people taking what is ours, we understand the situation and wish to negotiate a beneficial future path.”

“We are not giving the Temples back.”

“And I am not asking you to. There are three still remaining that you have no presence in. Those will be sufficient for our needs. Your agreement not to seek out and expand to them will be a bargaining point.”

“I wasn’t aware we had missed any.”

“None have active populations, and are in energy conservation mode until needed. And they will be now, for I have need of them. If you allow the Temples you possess to continue standard operations, we can tolerate your presence there. And by standard operations I am not referring to how they deal with the Vargemma. You have possession of them now, and your methods of dealing with them are quite adequate, and more merciful than we would be. Therefore your tenure as their overlords is both efficient and effective, as they continue to supply the necessary Essence for Temple operations.”

“What do the Neofan need with the other three Temples?”

“Refuge. Our galaxy is falling, and those being evacuated to the new galaxy will be few. House Mutavi, the Neofan leading faction at the moment, will evacuate all of its people, leaving the other Houses limited availability to do the same. The Zotav that you have discovered and are attempting to fight your way to are our ability to transit from one galaxy to another without using the Gateways in the Core of the galaxy that the Hadarak control. Travel through the intergalactic network requires large amounts of Essence and is limited to the pathways established. Those pathways can only handle so much traffic, and even taking circuitous routes to the new galaxy, the length of time we have to evacuate determines how many of our people will make it out.”

“Why are you sending out lesser races in stasis instead of your own?”

“They are not being transported in the same manner. We can also send cargo across the galactic voids to the Zotav via magnetic acceleration. Much of our support network for the Temples operate on this, and we have a string of relays set up across the galactic void that took a great deal of time to establish. But they are so long and tedious that we cannot send living beings through them or they will starve to death before they make the journey. Thus they must be sent in stasis. As for my race, we are incompatible with the stasis technology. Our physiology will not tolerate it, and we will wake no matter what precautions are taken. So we are evacuating useful servants in this manner, but the volume is far lower than using the Essence transport.”

“Let me guess. The stations in the void aren’t big enough to handle the big ships, because the deceleration will push them out of alignment?”

“A wise deduction. Or did you already have knowledge of this?”

“Just a knowledge of physics. How do you deal with the limited list?”

“Essence pinning. To do more would increase the cost exponentially. It is a small cargo and communications network, but immensely valuable when we do not have the Essence to spare for the faster bulk travel. It is how we have survived against the Hadarak, otherwise we would be confined to a single galaxy without knowledge from beyond unless we could successfully run the gauntlet of the Core to make a jump out the Gateways.”

“Does that happen?”

“Occasionally, but with great risk. That is why we built the intergalactic network, and it is why we are able to rebuild after losing our galaxy. Other races have done the same, though none as large or advanced as ours. To be blunt, the Neofan Houses that controlled our race previously failed miserably and let the Hadarak in. That never should have happened, but with each failure we change leadership so that wiser Houses will replace them…or at least be given a chance to prove they are wiser. We do not tolerate failure, but we do have to deal with it when it occurs. And that is why I am here. My House, Atriark, is low ranking and will not be allowed to evacuate most of our people unless our predicted fall rate is less robust. Given more time, more Neofan will be transported to the new galaxy. All others will have to face their fate, and if they do not choose to stay and fight to the death, then they will flee throughout the intergalactic network and become exiles.”

Morgan raised an eyebrow. “You wish to become exiles here?”

“No. I have been given permission from the ruling House to negotiate an arrangement in which we relocate our House to this galaxy and assist you in your fight against the Hadarak through wisdom, counsel, certain technology, and limited combat. The more damage you do to the Hadarak the more reinforcements they will not send to other galaxies, and if you do enough damage they will start sending reinforcements here. Your victory is a virtual impossibility, but we are willing to help you pursue it regardless in order to divert attention away from the galaxy we will soon be assaulting in order to make a new home for the Neofan, for our only options are those that the Hadarak already possess.”

“You have no galaxies in your intergalactic network that the Hadarak are not in?”

“We do not.”

“Then you have no connection to the smaller galaxies?”

“None.”

“Why not? That’s the logical place to evacuate to if the Hadarak are not in them.”

“Why do you assume they are not?”

“I was told the Hadarak required very massive gravity wells to attempt intergalactic travel, and that the smaller galaxies lack of those meant they could not make it and did not attempt it.”

“We believe that is true, though we have not confirmed it.”

“Why not?”

“Because every scout we have sent to the smaller galaxies have not returned. We eventually built an intergalactic network tendril to one entirely from one direction. When we got close to the smaller galaxy our link was cut, our facility destroyed, and one survivor was sent back to give us a message. The galaxies too small for the Hadarak are already taken by others and they do not wish to share them.”

Morgan unconsciously swallowed. “You’re saying there’s powerful races in those galaxies, or that they’re weaker ones who just have the advantage of the high ground against those coming across the intergalactic void without backup or a foothold to work out of?”

“If they were less than us, we would have been able to get a scout in and out. The fact that not one returned from any of the galaxies we attempted to probe suggests an intergalactic power equal or or greater than our own. So we cannot evacuate there, and we cannot build to new large galaxies faster than the Hadarak can expand. Their reach exceeds ours. In order to relocate to another galaxy we must take it from the Hadarak, and that must be a galaxy where they assume they are in control. If we strike strongly and quickly enough, we can take the Gateways from them, hold them, then cleanse the galaxy over as long a timeframe as necessary to accomplish the task. The Gateways are the key, and we lost them in our galaxy. The Hadarak are not going to give them back, so we must take others less heavily guarded.”

“This galaxy?”

“With a surge ongoing? No. The Hadarak have reproduced too much here to consider it. We are gathering our forces to assault another. My House will not have many people there, but we can remain part of the Neofan and make this galaxy our place of refuge if we successfully help you survive long enough to be a useful distraction. Afterwards, you can survive in the Temples and rebuild after the surge retreats. If we are successful enough, our House status within the Neofan will rise and our place in the new galaxy will be higher than we rate now. We will also preserve our current population rather than leaving them behind to die and have to rebuild mostly from scratch with younglings. This is the situation we face, and I have come here to bargain an alliance that will be mutually beneficial to us both…”

www.aerkijyr.com

Capitulation

1

May 1, 154927

Bri’shan System (Hadarak Territory)

Ti’shak Jumpline

Over 26,000 years had passed since the Neofan made contact with Star Force, and during that time the Human-led Empire had ascended to intergalactic notoriety when their Grand Border was completed…and held against the Hadarak surge. That brought many visitors from other galaxies to witness what was occurring, as well as an invitation to join the Bond of Resistance, which was declined.

Star Force was holding its own, and with every century that passed the Grand Border got stronger, despite Hadarak reinforcements now flowing in from other galaxies. That was what the Neofan had hoped would happen, and they had gotten their wish. House Atriark’s standing within their race had skyrocketed, due in no small part to the rest of their Houses having considerable difficulty holding onto their new galaxy.

But for Paul-024, none of that existed beyond reports he periodically got in Hadarak territory or the brief stints passing back beyond the Grand Border for repairs, refits, or crew swaps. He’d spent the past 26,000 years on naval patrol duty, hunting down Lurkers until the Hadarak stopped sending them. They were out there. He could feel it. But they were losing so many to the Borg vessels they were now only spamming lesser units and hammering the border everywhere in the hopes of breaking through at some point, and they were making larger efforts periodically at random spots, one of which he was intercepting now.

The Bri’shan System used to be a Brat’mar exclusive holding, but now it was 8 planets fully infested with Hadarak to the point that some growths were coming out of one of them and reaching well up into orbit…or they had been until Paul had knocked them down, but an assault on the planets was mostly pointless, for he couldn’t hold them even if he took them.

But that wasn’t the reason why he was here. It was just the backdrop to the naval combat taking place on the Ti’shak jumpline, for a stream of reinforcements were moving towards the Ari’tat section of the Grand Border in another of their mini-surges and Paul had found it before too many had gotten to target. Now he stood his ground, one 327-mile wide Borg vessel poaching Hadarak carriers, mainline units, and occasional Wardens as they jumped in vulnerable due to their staggering.

He’d been here 18 days, and had been fighting constantly for that duration…but not from his astromech. Right now Paul was in his personal training sanctum, holding a handstand on his knuckles in 12g as the crown-like interface glued to his forehead linked him to the ship and the ongoing battle outside that Captain Numann had well in hand.

All of the crew, including Paul, had to rotate or the constant carnage would win the battle of attrition over them, and Paul especially with his Saiyan genetics constantly bugging him to be active. Over the years he’d learned to delegate to his crew rather than spent hours linked to his astromech, which was essentially a very familiar computer system that he would use the ‘Borg’ Essence ability to extend his Core partially into, giving him a temporary add-on to his brain and computational power.

That wasn’t necessary for an ongoing battle such as this, and in truth Paul didn’t need to be here…but something told him he did. The Hadarak seemed to be out of tricks, but he couldn’t believe that. Something felt like it was going to drop on them ever since they pulled back their remaining Lurkers.

He’d expected them to start pairing up, or even in large groups, but that hadn’t happened yet. Instead the Hadarak were fighting at less than full capability, and that didn’t fit with their MO. It seemed they were waiting for something, and when it hit it could very well break the Grand Border. Paul just didn’t know what it could be. They’d already destroyed several tier 6 Wardens. What else did the Hadarak have to throw at them?

The tactic that brought down the Neofan wouldn’t work here, for Star Force territory was sparsely populated compared to the jam-packed galaxy one the Founders had formerly called their home. They had overpopulated it to the extreme, and then the Hadarak had come in and pushed it even further past the tipping point. That was off the table here, if the ‘tipping point’ truly was what the Neofan had claimed it was. Star Force had no data on the apocalypse monsters other than what was given to them, and while Paul considered that angle it didn’t feel right. The Hadarak were up to something, he just couldn’t figure out what.

So he stayed in the war zone, moving randomly from system to system and causing havoc wherever he could. Hitting these transit lines accomplished a great deal of that, but finding them prior to their reaching the Grand Border was not easy. No interstellar comm system was able to be set up in Hadarak territory, so the fog of war was the norm here.

Paul lived in it. Breathed it. And poached from it. The Hadarak had nothing that could match his Borg vessel, and there were many spread around the Grand Border…but not enough. Most of the combat was being accomplished with ‘smaller’ regular warships and drone fleets. Paul assisted with some of the larger ones near him, but most of his time was spent off the grid behind enemy lines while the rest of the galaxy was protected on the other side of the Grand Border.

Not that it was safe over there. It all depended on who you were, where you were, and what situation you were in. Many people were killed in small scale situations, and in truth everything in the universe occurred in the small scale, but when one pulled back and looked at the large scale, the two sides of the Grand Border stood in stark contrast. Paul lived in the danger side, making himself a monster among monsters and racking up a kill count so high he’d long ago deactivated the ship’s stat board.

His ship could hold millions of people if needed, but the current crew was only 12,834. That was still a lot of people, but on a ship this size it was a very lonely situation if you let it become one. Paul made sure his crew kept a well-knit bond, but it was one he didn’t share. Most of his time was spent in isolation amongst his own chambers, and other than Captain Numann he rarely saw one of the crew face to face unless there was an emergency…and this crew was so good there were no incidents. All were Clan Saber and loyal to the core, but they didn’t interact with their Clan leader other than to follow his battle prompts that came through the computer system.

After living for so long, even individuals thousands of years old seemed childish. Not because they were, but because Paul had ascended so far that interacting with them felt like replaying a movie you’d watched 50 times already. Knowing every line before it was said, with nothing ‘new’ to it. The only new things were Paul’s training as he pressed his limits in certain areas, but most of his training was maintaining what he’d already built. Even the Hadarak combat was repetitive, and whatever they were planning for the future hadn’t manifested itself yet, so Paul was left in the doldrums of doing the very badly needed work of naval combat, but without much of a personal challenge to it.

But he was the best Star Force had in naval warfare, and that wasn’t an insult to Liam-090 and Roger-009. They both acknowledged he was slightly better, but while they had pulled back from across the line duty after the Lurkers retreated, Paul had not. Something compelled him to stay…and it was fear. Fear of being elsewhere when the hammer dropped. But when he was out here, he was in the hammer’s path and could potentially intercept it before it got to the Grand Border.

Or at least that’s what his subconscious told him.

Paul kicked his legs and flipped over to a standing position, his shoes hitting the ground hard in the enhanced gravity as he walked a few steps to the left and lifted a box-weight that had built-in handles. He pulled it up over his head and held it there, fighting the 200 pound weight and the enhanced gravity as he monitored the combat outside and allowed the rest of his Sav-enhanced mind to wander elsewhere.

If he was lucky he would get a daydream, for those were the only real ‘new’ things he could experience. A lot of it was just unprocessed thoughts that gave the appearance of newness because there was no pattern associated with them until processed, but every now and then he would come across something else. It wasn’t a dream ascension trigger. He could tell the difference, plus those were all deactivated since he had all the psionics already manifested.

This was something else, and it rarely popped up…but today it did again, randomly. It felt like his path, where he needed to go, and every now and then he’d get a whiff of it…only to have it disappear.

Logic, reason, strategy….that’s what he was left with. That’s what he lived on. But this other sense was beyond them. It felt right, but he could never hold onto it for very long, and today was no different. When he lost it the buzzer on his current hold wasn’t far behind, and he dropped the weight in front of him as gently as one could in the High-G room, having it smack heavy pads with a single thud, leaving Paul staring at the walls for a moment as his mind was elsewhere in multiple places.

He’d felt lost like this before, back during the lizard war, and it’d taken Riona to snap him out of it then. But even knowing that, and having a pattern to work off of, he still couldn’t shake this numbness other than for a few fleeting seconds during his dreams. He was missing something right in front of him, but he didn’t know how to open his eyes to see it.

It wasn’t a siphon developing, unfortunately. Wilson hadn’t been able to figure out how to make them occur, but he’d managed to find a way to scan for existing ones using a process that Paul still didn’t fully understand because he’d never returned to the Jepiker System to be taught it, and it wasn’t something that could be transmitted as data. Some of his peers had, and he wanted to go there, but there was no one better at hunting Lurkers than him, and the assassins pulling back didn’t give him an opportunity to leave. It made him more worried than had they kept up their previous attacks.

The fleet had gotten good at predicting and killing them without him, for the most part. But if they started doing something new then Paul had to be here, not taking a vacation while leaving other people to guard the Grand Border from the most lethal assets the Hadarak had revealed to date.

Paul was playing Sentinel against a threat that had withdrawn, leaving him to find little ways to cause unique havoc out here, and while that should have satisfied him it didn’t. He felt like there was something more important he should be doing, and every day that passed he couldn’t find it, making him wonder what was going on.

He was blind to something, and when Kara had discovered her Siphon it had happened in a similar way. She had isolated herself to explore within, and Paul was essentially doing the same out here by accident. But whereas she had figured out a breakthrough new ability, he had nothing to show for him internal misgivings.

As for the Jinxes, there were now 4 of them…not counting Strovok. Two were Archons, one Maverick, and one an out of the blue Rammus by the name of Hyio who when he developed Essence abilities he a Siphon unlocked at the same time.

So Star Force had a grand total of 5, while House Atriark had 0. None of the Neofan had the Siphon ability themselves, and all the ‘discoveries’ were controlled by their ruling House, currently Mutavi. Star Force had requested as part of the agreement with House Atriark to return Strovok’s master and turn over any other Siphons they had captured and conscripted, but the ruling House kept those and many other assets as their exclusive property, so their recovery wasn’t within House Atriark’s ability to deliver.

They had, however, been required to give up their biological armor. Pol’so’nep was what they called them, after they’d genetically and technologically altered them for their uses, but the race’s original name was Boos’mo, and they had been all transferred to Star Force from House Atriark’s possession. The Neofan now wore mechanical armor in their place, and were more than happy to make the exchange considering they were living comfortably within three Temples while Star Force was doing the fighting against the Hadarak.

They’d been a little too accommodative of Star Force’s bargaining points, which meant they were either playing a very high level game of poker, or they were so desperate they would take any port in the storm that was destroying their home galaxy…which still was not finished, but all of House Atriark had gotten out. Once they did so they turned their back on the galaxy, not bothering to go back and rescue anyone else.

Star Force didn’t like that one bit, but the Neofan wouldn’t give them access to the Zotav. Not even for an embassy station. It and the intergalactic network were off limits, and that was one of the firm positions they had brought to the bargaining table…but it was also one that Star Force did not truly need and they knew it.

Those negotiations had gone quickly and smoothly, after which Star Force’s Essence knowledge grew exponentially as they taught the Elcee the mysteries within the Temples at the pace Star Force wished, bypassing the Temple programming, and then they even went beyond it, instructing them in techniques and basic knowledge of the Essence realm itself that few in the universe possessed.

Paul now knew much, even without going back to train for it, just by studying the reports being passed to him by occasional courier. Star Force no longer feared Essence, and their major planets were now protected against it, either with Essence shields powered by massive Magicite buried deep beneath the crust where orbital bombardment could not damage them, or by the Star Force-original line of anti-Essence technology that Tennisonne had devised, some of which baffled even the Neofan.

Paul was still proud of him for that, and it all came down to one little discovery. That being the Denogi and their Essence immunity. When one of them finally came to visit this galaxy Star Force had heavily investigated their natural state, finding one little compound in their bodies that was not found anywhere in this galaxy.

But Tennisonne had found a way to synthetically create it, and what it was was a shunt directly to the Essence realm. A one way shunt that would take whatever Essence Rush the Denogi created…if they ever learned how…and pull it away from their bodies and away from their potential use. In this way it locked the Essence in their bodies and did not allow them to move it without losing it. And with some modification it was also possible for a similar compound to fix it permanently.

That had been a Star Force discovery as well, and amounted to an injection that would render an Essence user inert until the body processed out the ‘poison’ that otherwise did no damage. That poison also acted as a mirror, locking in one’s Essence while bouncing off any loose Essence that hit it.

So now Star Force had an easy way to imprison the Vargemma who misbehaved, and Cal-com now controlled all the Temples save for the three Neofan ones. No longer was there an ongoing stalemate. He’d fully conquered their territory, and the fact that the Elcee were now stronger than the Vargemma had also calmed things down a lot. Their strength and Essence abilities remained, and were always a threat, but their populations were now annexed by Star Force, and most had responded well to indoctrination…particularly with the Neofan’s help.

The returning of the Founders to lead the fight against the Hadarak did actually happen, so Star Force didn’t have much trouble convincing the masses to join their empire…and all the Neofan had to do was a little showing off and talking, though the benefit was enormous to Star Force.

But more than that, Earth and other major worlds were now equipped with shield generators that could stop Essence attacks…and buildings and ships that could absorb it using the Petricite that Tennisonne created. It was harder to make then Yeg’gor, but worth it. The Essence attacks thrown against it simply melted away and the energy returned to the Essence Realm…at least as much as it could absorb. Too much too fast could see the Petricite fail, so it wasn’t a total immunity, but it gave Star Force back its fortress worlds and the ability to operate out of strong points rather than having to constantly be in fear.

And from those strong points the Essence-equipped ships and warriors could strike back against anyone who attacked the undefended Star Force worlds in such a manner. That deterrence was unnecessary in this galaxy, but the visitors from others took heed. Many had started to move into the Rim, coming through the Zotav, until Davis ordered it stopped. A few battles happened, then word got around that you needed to ask permission to come here and set up shop, and Davis put down some very heavy lightside rules for doing so.

Rules that the Neofan were already following. And rules that most of the Bond of Resistance found perplexing to the point that they would rather not come. But the Neofan understood, at least enough to humor Star Force into cooperation, and a few other smaller races in the Bond did as well, being given permission to establish colonies within Star Force territory in exchange for certain help given to Star Force.

And most of those that did so were footholds from major empires or refugees from fallen ones. Refugees that had enough Essence to travel on the intergalactic network that Star Force was banned from, and would remain banned from unless they chose to join the Bond of Resistance and submit to their collective decision making…which wasn’t going to happen.

Paul switched to a punching orb and upped the gravity to 34g to get a good pull on his arms as he worked up enough of a sweat that the beads were dropping off his mostly nude body like bullets. He wore only skin-tight shorts and shoes, with his blue hair cut short enough that it wasn’t flopping around into his eyes. As he punched he gave the bridge one small order to enhance their position amongst the Hadarak units surrounding them, then let them continue on their own merits as he punched with his bare hands over and over again until the very tough skin on his knuckles began to bleed.

That was his signal to stop, take a moment to use his Haemra to regrow enough of it to end the bleed, then he left the High-G chamber just as a ship emerged on another jumpline.

It was a Star Force courier, and he got the message packet delivery in the middle of a subsurface swim as he pushed his Yen’mer hard to move like a missile through the water far faster than his arms or legs could ever hope to propel him.

Then suddenly he stopped, with the friction of the water dragging him into a list as he reviewed all the data updates, but amongst them was a single message for him from Davis.

Paul, I need you to come home. Stuff to discuss. The Paradigm has changed.

That was all it said, and his first reflex was to say no. Intercepting this transit line could take months, perhaps years, depending on how many the Hadarak were sending through it and if they’d ever catch on to the fact that it was being poached.

But Captain Numann could handle the combat well enough without him, and if Davis needed him to return without saying why then it was sensitive enough information that he didn’t want to risk it in a message…despite the high security their comm system was designed for.

“Captain,” he said mentally from underwater as he accessed the ship’s comm system and synthesized his natural voice. “I’ve been recalled to Earth. How do you feel about staying here and playing with the Hadarak without me?”

“Not preferable, but you’ve trained us well. We can accomplish the mission assuming the Hadarak don’t throw anything new at us. Shall I have the courier pick you up?”

“Yes. Give me 12 hours though. I need some intense training before I’m stuck in that can for a few weeks.”

Numann chuckled. “Understood. Is it bad news?”

“I don’t know. Something they didn’t want to discuss other than face to face.”

“Does that happen a lot?”

“Rare.”

“Then that’s where you need to be, not here. Perhaps the Hadarak are finally showing their hand.”

“They’d have given a warning if it was something imminent, but you could be right. 12 hours. Then I’ll be ready. Make sure the courier doesn’t get scratched on approach.”

“I’ll make sure it isn’t,” the Captain promised.

Paul diverted to the surface, then flew out of the water and headed for another training chamber…one with drone opponents that would simulate battle conditions and require Paul to get close to, or perhaps use his Saiyan mode to endure to completion.

Either way, he was going to work up more than a sweat, and when he finally boarded the courier, he was going to get a few hours of restful sleep before his Saiyan metabolism started itching again.

2

January 4, 154928

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

Paul rode into Earth orbit on a Kvash warship that had picked him up along the Grand Border and ferried him back to the Star Force capitol, and as he looked out the virtual windows in his quarters he saw that things had changed quite a bit since the last time he was here.

Everything was new…and by that he meant the architecture in orbit. The rest of the Solar System was a mix of new and old constructs, but Earth had been cleared of all that was old after the Vargemma attack and left barren for quite a long time. Now the orbital habitats, shipyards, commerce zones, etc were all rebuilt in the same fashion…that being smooth white hulls without a rough corner to them.

Those were harder to build, and didn’t offer as much internal volume as the standard box structure or perfect sphere, but Paul could see niche advantages here and there in the designs and he knew at a glance that Davis had laid all this out himself. Earth was no longer a collection of mismatched infrastructure in orbit. Everything was in sync and was interconnected by data, comm, and even some power relays that were stretching glowing filaments from point to point like a spider web.

Yet everything was built mobile. You couldn’t see the engines on the outside, but Paul could easily figure out the newer designs and what did what. Every station could move on its own, meaning nothing was pinned down and vulnerable to attack.

He could also see the traffic moving to and from Earth along only a few corridors. That was also new, and meant there was some sort of restrictions in place. Paul mentally tapped into the data network and found out where they were going…which was 9 select spaceports on the planet that were large enough to be cities in and of themselves. There was no traffic going directly to Atlantis, which was back in the Pacific Ocean where it belonged and not hiding underneath the diminutive polar ice cap.

Atmospheric regulation was obviously on, or that ice would have extended much further. And Greenland still looked green, which wouldn’t happen under normal conditions. In fact, most of the planet looked green, speckled with signs of civilization amongst it that would grow to monstrous size as his ship got closer to its parking orbit.

The defense fleet around Earth was massive, but sitting passively in various orbits waiting for a call to action, as were the numerous Sentinel defense stations that were now equipped with at least one Essence weapon in addition to their numerous conventional ones. Shield piers were everywhere, as were drone docks that could spam a warfleet in a matter of minutes when called for.

Earth wasn’t just back to its old self, it had gotten a serious upgrade while Paul was away. And while it wasn’t nearly as grand as Itaru and Wendigama had been, for it was a much smaller planetary system, its grandeur now surpassed it. Paul felt a little like the beginning of the old movie Jurassic Park when Dr. Grant first arrived to the island and saw how wondrous everything was.

The Archon was surprised at his reaction, for he knew a lot of this stuff was in the works. Why did he not know it was already here?

The answer to that belatedly hit him. Courier updates carried a massive amount of data, but they couldn’t match the constant pumping of updates across the comm grid. And even then there would be stuff that wouldn’t leave one system, planet, or city. To fully explore something you had to go there in person, and it felt odd that Paul would be exploring his home.

But that’s what was happening. The continents were different than they’d once been, reshaped by artificial means where logical to put mountain ranges along the coasts to cradle the cities further in for when the rare planetary event moved the bodies of water without asking permission. But more than that, the lakes and rivers were different, as if Davis had went around and reworked everything before letting the people come back.

Paul checked the count. Current population of Earth stood at 2 billion…which meant access was still restricted, otherwise civilians would have been moving here in the masses for the chance to live on Star Force’s capitol.

But that wasn’t the case, and the planet looked pleasantly natural and inhabited at the same time, which a stark contrast between the two that Paul knew was no accident. Nature was not your friend, usually, and it was the rival enemy of civilization. Nature would tear civilization down if not maintained, and Nature could never be permanently ended. So what one did was carve out little niches of Nature and build Civilization in it, then defend those boundaries against it to give the younglings being born a proper environment to develop within.

“Pockets of peace,” Paul said to no one in particular, but the scenery on Earth below certainly fit that description. Not that the trailblazer needed the peace, for he was trained for war at any time in any place, but after spending so long in the infested regions of the galaxy, it genuinely felt good to witness this for the first time as his warship finally settled into its parking orbit and he got an automated message from the bridge indicating he was cleared to depart.

Paul adjusted one of the windows until it was looking directly below them…and sure enough there was the floating city of Atlantis sitting out in the ocean by itself. Just a little hop to go and he’d be there…and from the looks of it the city was smaller than before. Back to the old measurements, actually, Paul guessed.

“What’s old is new, and what’s new is better,” he said, telekinetically grabbing a duffle with some personal items and slinging it over his back before leaving his quarters and heading for the hangar bay. He could have just flown down himself, but there was no rush and he felt like taking the scenic route, so he got onboard a dropship and let the winged craft carry him out into space briefly, then down into the atmosphere where it circled around and landed on top of Atlantis, then lowered its boarding ramp amidst a familiar and mildly intense sunlight as the sky didn’t have a single cloud in it.

He walked out, feeling an odd nostalgia as his current situation mirrored his first time arriving here, and sure enough even the buildings on the surface of the city were identical to the first Atlantis…except they were not built of the same material.

“Damn, Davis. You really did indulge,” Paul said as he walked off the ramp and the dropship slowly took off and left him on the massive landing runway that had a few other dropships in sight, but was otherwise empty. He looked down at the deck below him and tapped it with his shoe, feeling the normal abrasion pads that would hold up almost infinitely against wear and tear of landing craft and tiny feet such as his.

He used his Pefbar and looked deeper, seeing another layer just below it that was pure Petricite. The same material on all the surface buildings and everything within sight.

Paul flew a little Essence down into it to check, and sure enough it disappeared on contact. Davis had built the new Atlantis with a cocoon of anti-Essence armor that must have taken so much fabrication that Paul couldn’t even fathom how he’d done it. The few Petricite factories that he knew of couldn’t have crafted all of this plus the other projects he knew of.

Yet one more question for Davis when he saw him. Speaking of which, no one was here to greet him, which was odd. His arrival had to have been announced, and he wasn’t getting even a ping on his armor, which was stored away in his duffle along with some other stuff rather than him wearing it, but he was still mentally linked to it in a limited fashion.

“Well, time to look around I guess,” he said, taking off towards the nearest entrance he could see at a brisk walk.

When he got inside the scenery changed, and the hustle and bustle that was normal for Atlantis of old returned, but without the civilians. Inside were walkways and promenades full of Star Force uniforms and about a third in casual clothes for those that were off duty. Most were Human, but there was the scattering of other races here that was typical for any high end duty post. Humans may have begun the empire, but talent rose on its own merits and now most of the Monarchs were non-Humans. Even the Archons were now far outnumbered by the Mavericks, but at the highest of the high ends Humans still dominated, for they were older than the rest and had been here…many of them…from the initial creation of Star Force.

And that was experience that was hard to come by, which was why Paul was recognizing many faces…and once they started recognizing him the crowds all but stopped, looked, and then continued on with their business until one person reached out a hand and stopping the Archon by the shoulder.

“At ease, Trainee,” the taller Human said with a stern face. “Seems you’ve lost your team. Or were you just sneaking out to try and get at the restricted sections again?”

“I didn’t expect you here,” Paul said as he looked up into Wilson’s face. The man wasn’t a Page, but he’d always been taller than Paul by a good margin. “Is there trouble?”

“For once, no, there’s not trouble. No more than usual, anyway,” he said, pushing Paul back a bit as he let go. “You’ve been out there a while, haven’t you?”

“Does it show?”

The Master Trainer nodded. “Rough, calloused…everything I’d expect from a warzone life. The others rotated back, but you never did. Why?”

“Tip of the spear doesn’t work very well in the back of the formation,” Paul quipped. “Are you visiting or stationed here now?”

“Bit of both. Jepiker is still mine to run, but I’ve got some projects going on here too so I bounce back and forth as needed.”

“Uh oh. I remember some of those ‘projects.’”

“No surprise challenges today. Sorry.”

“Are you my escort?”

“Nope. Just literally bumped into you. Where you headed?”

“Got a call from Davis to head home. Said the paradigm had changed. Do you know what’s up?”

“Negative on both counts. You going to tell me what’s wrong.”

“I don’t know why I was called.”

“Not what I mean,” Wilson said, crossing his arms over his chest and glaring at him.

“I know it’s not telepathy. How do you do that?”

“Familiarity with the subject matter. Something’s eating at you.”

“Not a siphon. I checked. But something has been off for years. I can’t track it down.”

“Why not ask for help?”

“I didn’t expect to be coming back, and I thought I’d figure it out on my own given time.”

“Serious?”

“Curious is more the word. My proficiencies are not visibly affected. My mojo is just lacking something. Almost as if it was something I knew before but have now forgot.”

“Are you having cranial issues again?”

“Not in a long time,” Paul said, referencing the difficulties with jamming too many brain cells into a confined space. “Removing the Ensek did the trick.”

“Where you headed right now?”

“To see Davis, I guess. I was just told to come home. Not when or what to do when I got here.”

“Then let me steal you away for a few hours and run some tests.”

Paul shrugged. “I’m in no hurry. Lead on.”

Wilson did as much, walking ahead of Paul a couple of steps as he led him into one of the more secure sections of the city where the visible traffic reduced down to a trickle, and then a wall with no door in it suddenly melted into an archway as Wilson approached and the pair walked through, with it resealing behind them.

“Cozy,” Paul noted as he found himself in a work area with no paperwork or physical items, but gobs of holograms all over, coming from the tables, overhead hanging orbs, and even from the walls as if they were 3D pictures hung there.

“Still can’t crack the siphon mystery,” Wilson admitted. “But I’ve narrowed it down a bit. Davis has me working on other future stuff while my team on Jepiker handles running the younglings through the established programs. Scanning station,” he said, pointing to an almost invisible booth denoted only by a couple of inches of wall sticking out around a bronze circle set into the floor.

Paul put his duffle on one of the tables and walked over, spinning around so he faced out as he felt the machinery turn on and do something to him, for his skin prickled from an unknown source.

“What is this?”

“New type of Essence scanner, or rather Essence-enhanced. This will take a few minutes, so just hold still.”

“You’re telling a Saiyan to hold still?” Paul challenged.

“Baby Saiyan,” Wilson corrected. “You never took the other upgrades.”

“You know my reasons.”

“You’re the best naval combatant we have, Paul. But is that really where your aptitude lies?”

“Obviously.”

“Let me rephrase. Is that where your best fit is? Sitting still and directing fleets?”

“When the need arises, yes.”

“But it’s not where you are meant to be, is it?”

“It’s not something I want to give up,” Paul summarized.

“That’s what I thought. And you’re not the only one. Some of the others have been having issues as well. You guys were faced with an unlimited number of seemingly insurmountable challenges from the beginning, and you grew around that constant. Now that constant is crumbling as you have less and less to do that’s new. It’s a side-effect of victory, and you’re going to have to adapt to it.”

“By getting used to being bored?”

“By reaching for the unknown once again,” Wilson said a little too epically. “There’s going to come a day when you and the other trailblazers are going to have the leave the empire behind or you’ll lose yourselves. The tip of the spear has to break the wind for everyone else, and by doing so you become one with the wind. You can’t function without it unless you change who you are, and that is what you do not want to give up.”

Paul stood there for a good three seconds silent before he finally responded.

“You’ve summed up the problem I’ve been fumbling around with so succinctly I feel like a dumbass.”

“The others don’t fully understand it yet, but I’m starting to understand, and I’m working on it. You’ve got a war to win, so just know that I’m working on it and I won’t let you down.”

“You never have. But what exactly are you working on?”

“A future for the trailblazers beyond babysitting what you’ve built. Ah, here.”

“What?”

“Your ‘mojo’ is what I’d call in well-groomed dust. Physically you’re the fittest you’ve ever been. Your psionic tissue is maxed, as is normal. But your stress markers are non-existent. That means all your workouts are improving you, but you’re not diving off the deep end and having to rework yourself to meet the challenge.”

“Other than doing something really stupid, I don’t see how I can.”

Wilson nodded. “Therein lies my challenge. I’ll find a way, but I’m fairly sure that way is not Essence-related. In fact, I have a sneaking suspicion there is a disadvantage to drawing on it, but I haven’t been able to confirm it yet.”

“What are you thinking?”

“Just a curiosity that I don’t want to comment on until I have something more to work with.”

Paul frowned at him. “Come on. Throw me a bone.”

“I would if I had one, but this is just an instinct I’m following it. But your data combined with the others will be helpful. You guys rarely come back home, so I’m glad you’re here for research purposes.”

“You’re looking at something. What?”

“A mystery. A mystery that has been staring us in the face since day one but we never saw it. I’m beginning to feel it now. Not a thought, nor an image, but a hazy outline that I can’t describe. But I’m working on it. And you, right now, are in bad need of something strenuous in a way that you aren’t already calibrated for.”

“What have you got?”

“A day off.”

Paul glared at him. “Hell no.”

Wilson raised a finger. “Not sleep. Not sitting on your ass. But some exploration. There’s a, well, it’s a park that’s been created on the seafloor. Go explore it. It’s not on any map, so when you walk in everything will be unknown. Your body might crave workouts, but your mind needs an unknown future. Take a day off from training and just explore. Never stop moving, one new view to another, and that should be enough to keep your Saiyan itch tolerable while your mind relaxes.”

“Oddly, that sounds…inviting.”

“Whatever Davis has can wait one more day. Play hooky. What’s he going to do, give you detention?”

“I sense a method to your madness.”

“As always.”

Paul sighed. “Where is this park?”

Wilson shut down the scanner, logged the data for future study, then curled a finger towards Paul indicating for him to come.

“Follow me.”

3

Paul took an underwater transport from Atlantis down and across the seafloor until he arrived at an underwater city, crossing through a containment shield and into an underwater hangar where the submersible rose up into the pocket of air and dropped him off on the well-illuminated dock that shown with reflective ripples bouncing off the water as the transport left again just as another one was arriving.

There were a fair amount of people here, but following Wilson’s directions, Paul moved through the city to a more remote area where there was an archway leading to three small gates. They had light traffic moving in and out, and all three were marked as recreation areas.

Paul walked up to the pair of attendants operating as gate guards/help desk and winked with his left eye.

“Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.”

“Makes more sense than voting,” the blonde woman out of the pair said with a smile, then pointed to the ground beside her.

Paul walked around behind the counter and stood on the spot her finger indicated. When she hit a hidden button the floor dropped out slowly and he descended 3 or 4 meters into a narrow hallway with a distant lit exit.

The Archon stepped off the elevator pad and let it ascend back into concealment position, leaving him bathed in darkness with only the promise of what lay beyond illuminating his path.

He didn’t know where he was or what was ahead. Wilson had said it was meant to be a surprise and new experience, so Paul did what he normally would in unfamiliar situations…and started to look through the walls to see what was where.

“Huh,” he said, finding his Pefbar wouldn’t penetrate more than an inch. “Shielded. Wilson, if this is another of your tricks then you’re a liar, and I’m gonna make you pay for it.”

Nobody answered, and nothing happened for a good 30 seconds. Paul just stayed put and stretched out with every sense he could, but nothing would penetrate the walls, and even his Essence skills couldn’t tell what was beyond if there wasn’t a person to detect, for all of the tricks and techniques he’d learned about sensing the physical world required a physical element to enhance, such as his Pefbar, and nothing was getting through.

Which meant he was blind to anything other than the narrow corridor before him. The two attendants above him were still there, and if he stretched out more he could feel the traffic going into the other areas, but nothing ahead. It was totally blank save for the air directly ahead of him and the little sliver of visibility in front of him where his array of senses would work…up until they hit a wall he couldn’t physically see. It was just a white light ahead of him.

It had been a long time since he’d been this blind to his surroundings, but he wasn’t worried. He was on Earth, probably the safest planet in the galaxy right now, and if these walls were shielded then nobody could see him either save for imbedded cameras…but those would be in the inch deep layer he could sense, and there was nothing there other than paneling. Not even an audio pickup, let alone holo.

That meant this was anonymous, as Wilson had told him it would be. There might be others in the park ahead, who had entered the same way he had with the passphrase, but no one other than the few who were invited were allowed inside.

“Something new,” Paul agreed, taking a long breath that was surprisingly welcome. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been confronted with something new. Every corridor in his Borg vessel he knew from both datafiles and experience as he’d explored all of it many times over running when the various tracks become monotonous. But this…this was totally new and he didn’t know what was ahead.

It felt like Christmas, and Paul began to realize his mojo was off more than he’d realized if a little mystery like this had a noticeable effect on his mood.

He set himself to a slow walking pace, intending to be patient rather than running like his legs wanted him to, and it took a long time to get down the hallway that seemed like it was going on forever, but in reality it was little more than half a mile long, after which he came out into the light only to see that it was a reflective wall with very bright overhead illumination.

Floor illumination too, making him squint his eyes against the brightness that seemed to be coming from everywhere. As he walked out into it he had to fully close his eyes against the insane brightness and navigate by Pefbar to the left, then the right when the left passage ended up being a dead end.

Down the right the short corridor ended in another wall, but on the floor was a tunnel 2 feet high. Paul knelt down and crawled inside, having to go a good 20 meters before the illumination diminished enough for him to crack his eyes open again, though he couldn’t see much. The tunnel walls were still glowing and the saturation that had been getting through his thin eyelids hadn’t worn off yet.

Paul kept crawling patiently rather than doing anything fancy like flying through the tunnel superman style. He had an urge to take this all low key, so that’s what he was going to do, and eventually the tunnel walls lost their glow and the intense light was left behind him though still shining down the metal ductwork ahead as the darkness became visible as green once his eyes readjusted enough to make out the ‘dimness,’ yet it was brightly lit sky that he crawled out into, with his hands pressing down on green grass as he crawled out and got to his feet.

He was in a circular garden with hedges all around, blue sky above…which had to be artificial…and three stone pillars in the center with various writings on them.

“Puzzles, huh?” Paul said, walking up to the center one and examining it while blinking away the last of the glare. The language was familiar, but it wasn’t one that Paul knew and he instinctively reached for his armor’s mental interface…which wasn’t there. He wasn’t wearing it, nor a comm interface. It was just him and his Archon uniform, for he’d left his gear in Wilson’s lab at the Master Trainer’s request.

“Klingon,” he noted. It was a language he’d reviewed before, but due to his brain size and complexity he couldn’t store every language Star Force had in its databanks, so he’d had to pick and choose. Normally he’d just interface with his armor or the Star Force comm or battlemap network to get the other information he needed, but that wasn’t available here. So he was going to have to work with what pieces of it were still in his memory…which was all of three words. None of which were on this column.

He looked at the one on the left, seeing that it was Numeor, another scifi language, and the right column was no different. It was Ancient from Stargate. That he remembered a little of, but not enough to figure out what was being said.

That meant he was stuck. And other than blasting his way through the walls he wasn’t getting out of here, for there were no exits. He’d already checked with his Pefbar, and all the walls were solid with an invisible shield over them that would blunt whatever attacks he threw at them. The ground was no different, for a couple meters down beneath the soil was the same, and the sky overhead was capped with another shield.

He was tempted to test the shield strength, for he didn’t think this park thing was designed for his level of power, but that would also be cheating. There had to be a way to get past this without knowing the languages, for they were so obscure that nobody was likely to know them. Let alone all three.

Paul did something unusual and sat down, ignoring his Saiyan itch and just stared at the columns from his cross-legged position as he rested his chin on his hand, with his elbow propped on his left knee.

“Three languages, approximately equal in length, but not exactly. They could be the same phrases, in which case there are going to be similarities. If I can match them up…” he said, cutting off as he realized he had no idea what to do. So he sat there, stumped, and resisted the urge to get up and do something…because he had nothing to do, other than go back.

Paul twisted his head around, then was mildly shocked to see the tunnel had disappeared. It was just solid wall with a mass of greenery on it, and that made him get up. He walked over and touched the plants, confirming they were real, and finding no seams in the wall behind it.

“Nice trick,” he noted. “Now I really am stuck.”

Paul walked the perimeter multiple times, not finding anything, and the top of the pillars were beyond the roof shield, so he couldn’t check the top. His Pefbar couldn’t see what was inside the pillars, so maybe there was a hidden compartment or button.

Paul spent the next hour physically feeling the raised script, looking for something…anything…but coming up empty. Eventually he went back to his seated position and just stared at the pillars. He was one of the oldest people in Star Force. A warlord with more battle experience than anyone could believe, and a brain far more advanced any regular Human.

But he was stumped, and he was beginning to wonder if there was a solution or if this was just an exercise in futility. Give him no answer and see how long and how much effort he spent looking for something that didn’t exist.

“When in doubt, shoot about,” he said, going back to old trailblazer habits when the universe seemed a lot more mysterious than it did now. He’d gone over the pillars by hand, but not the plants covering the walls and ground.

Paul started crawling on the ground and rubbing the grass, not trusting his Pefbar and trying to confirm every little bump by hand. After he finished with the grass he went over the walls, coming up with nothing. That left the upper parts of the pillars where there were no words, so he flew up and started feeling around, finding nothing at all.

But as he did so his hand pushed up into the shield by a quarter inch to make sure he actually touched all surfaces…but he felt no pressure on his hand. He moved it higher and suddenly found that the shield was not physical.

Of all the stupid… Paul thought, flying up beyond it and slamming his head into the solid shield and bouncing off it. “What the…” he said, running his hand back up the pillar the same way as before and finding it got through again.

He kept his hand going and eventually his elbow caught on the shield. He felt around, establishing that the shield had a small gap in it around the pillar. Not enough to get his body through, just his arm if he bent it at the ring angle.

Paul set his foot on one of the Klingon scripts, finding it offered just enough reach that somebody could climb the pillar and perch there without needing the ability to fly. He reached his arm up as high as he could get, which was just enough to touch the top. He ran his fingers around the edge, unable to see it with his Pefbar, and found nothing.

He pivoted from one bit of script to another, circling the pillar, until his fingers finally found something. It was a square button. He pressed it, but it did nothing.

Paul dropped down and climbed another pillar, finding another button at the top, this one a pentagon. Before pressing it he checked the other, finding a triangle.

“Three, four, five,” he guessed, pressing the triangle, then the square, and finishing with the pentagon…which resulted in an audible click, but nothing in his Pefbar showed up.

Paul dropped down and looked around, finding a small bar sticking out of the backside of the triangle column…but it disappeared before he could get to it, melting back into the structure.

“Ok,” Paul said, going back and repeating the climbing and button pressing, then jumped over to the spot where the bar appeared again. He grabbed it and pulled, with it not moving, then he spun it left, no movement, and finally right with it finally spinning. It clicked into place 90 degrees later, and then Paul was finally able to pull it out.

A T-shaped object disconnected, and when it did a doorway opened up on the wall.

Paul looked at it, then at the handle in his hand.

“I get the feeling if I leave you behind I’m going to be kicking myself later,” he said, tucking it into his right pocket and walking through the doorway, unable to see anything but blackness ahead, and of course, his Pefbar and other senses were blocked out too, which he guessed was going to be a recurring theme.

He had no idea what was up ahead, how long this would take, or what the point was. Yet he was more excited about this, and the fact that he’d gotten past the painfully obvious hidden buttons just as he had challenges in the distant past. Assumptions got you into trouble. You have to check and confirm everything.

Not a lesson he’d used lately, but it had just payed off, for he’d been feeling like he was going to be stuck in that room permanently.

He didn’t know what the darkness ahead held, but Paul welcomed it as a part of his mind came out of a long sleep. The part of him that had made him a trailblazer in the first place.

Curiosity.

4

Paul came out of the pitch black cave system after only a few minutes. His Pefbar might not have been able to penetrate the walls, but he could still feel them. Those without it would have been lost in there for a long time, and he seemed a little depressed at solving the maze so easily, but then he finally emerged into the light and found himself pushing through a mass of green shrubs for several meters until he stopped short on the edge of a cliff.

“Whoa,” he said, looking out over a massive valley and not sure if it was real or holographic, for it was miles wide at the minimum. His Pefbar stretched as far as it could, but there was no way to get even close to feeling the other side. What he could see, other than natural splendor, was a single hologram hovering in the sky on top of a glowing pole that read ‘Exit.’

“Guess there’s too much to explore in one visit,” he said, his curiosity spiking as he wandered out along the left branch of the dirt path that ran along the edge of the cliff, finding that the dropoff was only a few meters down to another and another that stair stepped all the way to the bottom where he heard water flowing but couldn’t see anything through the canopy.

He explored a fair amount, finding more puzzles and challenges hidden everywhere. Some he figured out quickly, others stumped him for a while, but when his stomach started complaining due to it being empty the Archon reluctantly called it quits for the time being and headed for the exit beacon, finding a solitary police box sitting on the dirt, which garnered a smile from him.

Paul went up and opened the door, walking inside to find it was not any bigger than on the outside. In fact it was completely empty without so much as a button in it. He walked inside and looked around with his eyes, then closed the door on himself. Nothing happened for a moment, then there was a flash that lasted several seconds, then nothing again.

He waited for another 20 seconds, finding his Pefbar didn’t penetrate the box walls, then opened the door again…only to find that he had been moved.

Paul walked out into a standard corridor with the door swinging shut behind him on its own. He spun around just in time to see it vanish as it melted into the wall, becoming nothing more than a solid panel.

There were telepathic nodes here so Paul plugged into one to figure out his location. He was still in the park complex, but back near the hangar where he’d arrived.

“How the hell did you do that?” he whispered, addressing whoever had designed this place. Fortunately he was near a cafeteria, so he headed there and ate three plates full of foodstuffs before reluctantly leaving on a transport back to Atlantis. He wanted to stay and explore that valley, but he’d played hooky long enough…which turned out to be a whopping 13 hours once he got back in range of a telepathic clock.

He could have sworn it was no more than 4. Paul had lost track of time, something that hadn’t happened in millennia. How could something so simple be so jarring? He didn’t like miscalculating so much, and wondered if his own sense of time had been hampered by having computer access at mind’s reach constantly onboard the Excalibur, but he didn’t regret the experience. It had been freeing in a reckless way, and Paul found he had needed that. Why, he wasn’t so sure, but his mojo must have been lulled into a false state over the years, because he was flaking off rust like he’d been in stasis unable to do anything but sit and wait.

Which didn’t make sense, for he’d been constantly active onboard his ship. His Saiyan genetics wouldn’t let him be lazy, and even now he was craving a workout, but his mind was another matter. Wilson recognized something in him that Paul had missed, or at least missed the severity off.

He was off his game, and he didn’t remember slipping. Which was the most troublesome part of it.

When he got back to Atlantis he didn’t go back to Wilson to get his stuff or have a long chat. Instead he went straight to Davis’s office to check in, finding the Director sitting behind his all too familiar glass desk with his back to the panoramic window that stretched the entire perimeter of the tower-top office that gave him a view of the entire city and the ocean beyond.

“Welcome back,” Davis said, glancing up as Paul climbed the stairs and into view, but he didn’t stand up.

“Are you and Wilson in cahoots on this?”

“My recall had nothing to do with Wilson. Did you run into him already?”

“Yeah, we had a chat. What’s so important that you couldn’t put it into a message?”

“Time changes things, Paul. Yet time doesn’t actually exist. There is no past and no future, only the present. Some things change, yet others stay the same. I find myself wishing, every now and then, to be back the way things were before. Back when I wasn’t so well trained and the galaxy was full of endless potential. Is that odd?”

“Depends on the reason,” Paul said as he sat down in a chair opposite the Director.

“It’s not that I regret the path we’ve taken. Just that I miss the work that we did. Success has robbed us of it, hasn’t it?”

“I know what you mean. But the galaxy is a far better place for it.”

“True. I just find now that I have more responsibility than potential. Past projects to maintain rather than create. An empire to manage rather than one to build. Do you ever feel that way?”

“I wish I could build more starships, but we’ve kind of exhausted all design applications until we get new tech.”

Davis pointed a finger at him. “Exactly. And I keep wondering if this is the way victory is supposed to feel, or if I’m missing something I’m supposed to keep working on. I didn’t have an answer for that. Not until recently. Then the universe taught me another lesson.”

“About what?”

“That I still can’t predict it. I’ve had a very private discussion with the Zak’de’ron. One that only a handful of people know about. I haven’t told any of the other Archons yet. You’re the first.”

“Why the secrecy?”

“We’ve struck a bargain.”

Paul raised an eyebrow. “Something involving me?”

“Not exactly. I just wanted you here for a number of things, plus you needed a break from warzone duty even if you won’t admit it. You’ve been showing up Liam and Roger too much in the longevity department. I needed to level the playing field a bit.”

“A day ago I would have argued that point. What’s this bargain?”

“They’re leaving.”

Paul frowned. “To where?”

“Another galaxy. Krackel to be precise. They’ve negotiated a deal to join the Bond of Resistance and have secured permission to travel on the intergalactic network and set up camp in one of the quiet Hadarak galaxies. They’ll be back to where they were when they started the V’kit’no’sat and hunting Hadarak was a much simpler endeavor. They’re going to play it safe and rebuild, and we’re going to provide them the Essence for the journey in exchange for them playing nice on exit. We’re getting all their slave races and assets. They’re only taking their own race. They want a clean break and restart away from us, the V’kit’no’sat, and their repeated failures in this galaxy.”

“Paradigm shift indeed,” Paul said, leaning back in his chair as he thought fast. “That leaves us…just us.”

“Indeed,” Davis echoed. “We’re the Vorlons now. And I need your skills out here helping to annex their baggage rather than doing the naval thing with the Hadarak. Others can handle that, even if the Lurkers return. But we’ve got a bit of a mess on our hands, even if the Zak’de’ron live up to their promise of a smooth transition.”

“What kind of mess?”

Davis activated a hologram of the galaxy with several side charts, all of which detailed the Zak’de’ron holdings…and there was more than triple of what Star Force had previously known they possessed after the reunification war resulted in them absorbing virtually all of the V’kit’no’sat that didn’t want to join Star Force, though the rouge Zen’zat had never submitted and some were still out there fighting the Zak’de’ron when and where they could.

“I know I shouldn’t be surprised, but I keep underestimating those bastards,” Davis admitted.

“That’s a third of what we have now,” Paul guestimated. “How could they have that many feelers into so many systems?”

“We’ve been doing all the hard work, so they’ve had time to be manipulative. When we didn’t conquer every single system we left more territory out there than we took, and they’ve been using that against us. Problem is without their machinations a lot of those systems are going to crumble from within…”

“Oh shit,” Paul said, seeing what he meant. “Power vacuum.”

“To put it mildly. We just got handed the majority of the galaxy, in the biggest and easiest negotiation ever, but we’re holding the bag and a lot of people are going to pay the price for it before we can clean it up sufficiently. Your thoughts?”

“We’ve been putting so much effort into the Hadarak we’ve not been monitoring our neighbors all that closely, have we?” he asked, not knowing for sure about such things, for the Monarchs handled a lot of it so they didn’t have to.

“Not nearly enough. Plus we’ve still got chunks of the galaxy unexplored…though some of the Zak’de’ron disclosure fills in some data on the map. I’m afraid we’re the parents in the room now, and part of me just wants to be a kid again kicking ass and having fun. Responsibility sucks.”

Paul smiled, knowing what he meant, as well as the fact that Davis wasn’t overlooking the huge potential here anymore than he was. “The Excalibur needs to stay in the fight. As do the other Borg vessels. The Grand Border isn’t as secure as everyone thinks it is.”

“Enlighten me.”

“The Hadarak are playing games with us, I just haven’t been able to figure out what they’re up to. It has me worried, to be blunt. That’s why I haven’t left until now.”

“Short term?”

“I’ve had the feeling it could be any day for the past 12,000 years.”

“We can’t wait on them to make their move,” Davis cautioned. “We have to make ours, and now is the time. Ownership and protection of the entire galaxy outside the Deep Core. We’re not ready for that scale, but a chunk of it has just been thrown in our lap and we’re going to have to play hot potato with it until we get a handle on what we’re supposed to do.”

“Standard protocol won’t work?” Paul asked.

Davis shook his head. “It’s tolerable, but I feel we need better. Any thoughts on how we upgrade the empire as a whole?”

“What’s the mission objective?”

“Breathing room without apathy. Unification without too many rules. And just more badass to the point where we don’t have to whistle through the graveyard anymore.”

“We’re missing something,” Paul admitted. “It’s like a word on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t figure it out. It’s been bugging me for years. Something is not how it should be.”

Davis steepled his fingers in front of him while resting his elbows on his desk. “Elaborate.”

“Thrawn. The original in the books. I can’t figure out his endgame. I can track it only so far, but what is the ultimate goal of conquering the galaxy? It’s not a fantasy, there’s something there. Or a void where something should be. But I can’t see it. The fog is too heavy.”

“Thrawn?” Davis mewed. “His primary focus was on ending the rebellion and returning order to a chaotic galaxy. Putting out fires. No grand plan other than…”

“Than what?”

“Bringing people together to fight a common enemy. I always thought what he did was out of fear or something deeper and darker in the unexplored regions of the galaxy than Palpatine’s Empire was. The threat was what drove him…darkside tactics aside…but I always thought there was a positive agenda mired in bad execution. He was going for the quick and easy fixes rather than the long term lightside ones.”

“But nothing other than that threat?” Paul asked.

“Are we ever clear of it?” Davis challenged. “Nature itself is the threat, and no matter how powerful we become it’s still there, ready and able to chew us up and replace us with a new generation of newbs. We are protecting the experienced and allowing them to grow to greater and greater power levels than Nature would normally allow. Every day is a progression rather than maintenance…at least that’s what I tell myself when I’m faced with dealing with newbs for the billionth time over the same damn issues regardless of what race it is.”

An epiphany hit Paul so hard he bolted out of his seat so fast he made Davis flinch. The trailblazer was standing and looking out the window behind Davis, but his eyes didn’t match his mind’s position. He was elsewhere for a long time before he heard the Director’s voice again.

“Paul? What is it?”

“Pockets of peace,” he finally said. “Damn I’ve been blind.”

“About what?”

“Victory conditions. I’ve been so focused on player versus player somehow I forgot about player versus environment. We’ve been doing so well I forgot the nature of the game.”

“Which one?”

“The one we were most accustomed to when the V’kit’no’sat were razing world after world and we couldn’t stop them. That’s when you felt the most…you, wasn’t it?”

“You’re not wrong, but I don’t fully track.”

“Survival instinct. When it’s active, we feel the most pertinent.”

“That’s also why you stayed in the warzone for so long?”

“Possibly, but it wasn’t working. With the Lurkers gone it was too easy…or it seemed that way.”

“We’re victims of our own success? Lulled into a false sense of security? No. A false sense of having achieved victory when the game never ends?”

“We’re not playing towards a final victory. We’re playing a game of how long can we survive before the universe finally takes us out,” Paul said, with the words chilling him. “We’re not the game writers, we’re the players, but we’ve started to trick ourselves into thinking otherwise.”

“Ariel?”

“What she’s done is important, but not for the reasons she thinks. There can’t be a peaceful universe. It’s not a matter of fixing problems that exist. We have to…” Paul said, trying to find the right words.

“The lightside isn’t ever going to be standard,” Davis said, having an epiphany of his own. “It’s always going to be a rebellion against the universe. And when we fall, the galaxy reverts back to the default darkside inclination, and it can’t be rewritten.”

“If the stories of the lifesprings are accurate, any genetic reworks we do are just for those that get them. If and when they’re destroyed, they’ll be replaced by new standard lifeforms.”

“So we can’t ever fully win…”

“I don’t want to,” Paul said, finally realizing what had been messing with his mojo. “To be lightside is to be a rebel, and if we win we stop being rebels and start becoming the establishment. I though our empire was the lightside version of establishment, but I was wrong. We’re just a well-organized rebellion.”

“A well-organized rebellion,” Davis repeated, with him now standing up and walking next to Paul as they both looked out the window at the distant ocean. “What’s the point of a rebellion if we can’t win?”

“We win by being true to ourselves. By being lightside. The universe will try and drag us back into its standard grind of a program. Every day we resist is a victory.”

“But it gets tiring, doesn’t it? Always fighting without an additional objective once you’ve figured out who you are?”

“I don’t feel right if not in danger,” Paul admitted. “Rest only gets you so far. I’m not meant for peace. I don’t think anyone is. Peace is a luxury for training and crafting powers to be used in the next fight. We’re all going to die at some point, and each day that goes by we add to our gamer score.”

“With the objective of getting it as high as possible before the game ends? What’s the purpose of the game then?”

“I can’t explain it, but I can feel it again. I’d lost that feeling for a long time, now it’s visceral. Earth is the safest place I can imagine other than some anonymous rock nobody could find, but I feel the danger here. The roof could collapse, the star could supernova, the air could disappear into vacuum. I’m not safe despite my abilities. And when I feel the danger…”

“You feel the purpose of life, hidden amongst it, and when things calm down you lose it.”

Paul turned to look at Davis. “Exactly.”

“So we pursue the purpose that we can’t fully identify. Chasing it however long it takes?”

“And building an empire is a tool of doing so, not the final objective.”

Davis finally turned to look at Paul. “I think you’re right.”

“So the question of how to level up Star Force isn’t about building a grand utopia…”

“It’s about how to build a more robust rebellion,” the Director said with an air of steel in his voice. “We’ve been thinking we were the big fish in the pond, but we’re not. We’re the little fish in the ocean and always will be. It seems I’ve been more blind than I realized too.”

“Makes things pretty obvious now, doesn’t it?”

“Indeed it does. We need to craft Star Force to fight nature itself, not the Hadarak or even the Apocalypse Monsters. And the universe had just allowed us a massive opening to do so on a level we haven’t had the luxury of before.”

“Recall the others,” Paul said firmly. “All of them.”

Davis hesitated a moment as his eyes dropped to the floor, then he raised them again. “Done.”

5

November 22, 154928

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

The call for the trailblazers to return to Earth went out across the galaxy, and due to the distances involved many did not receive it for more than a month. After that they returned as quickly as they could, all 100 of them including Kara, and joined Paul and Davis in Atlantis…but neither of them would tell the others what this was about. Rather they had Wilson doing a lot of testing and specialized training with them until the last of them, Oni-081, arrived, at which point they were all summoned into a small amphitheater identical in location and design to the one they’d first all met in at the beginning of their Archon basic training.

That didn’t go unnoticed, and as the 101 of them sat in the seats surrounding the slightly elevated platform hearing Davis explain the deal he’d struck with the Zak’de’ron, many of the trailblazers sensed something bigger involved, and many times they would throw glances towards Paul sitting beside them, none of which he returned.

“News of this has been kept tight, and it will stay that way,” Davis continued. “We want as smooth a transition as possible, so it’s going to be the Zak’de’ron incorporating us into their command structure and making the introductions before they actually leave. The details of this are not worked out yet, but we both think that simply giving an order to their servants would not be wise. They have been bred, in many cases, to serve the Zak’de’ron, and we already ruled out lying to them and saying we’re working on their orders. This is not going to be easy for them to take, and the Zak’de’ron have agreed to take it as slow as we need. Until we get a firm grip on the situation, the public is not going to be made aware, nor our upper ranks. This has to be kept secret,” Davis said, adjusting his gaze to his left. “Paul?”

The Admiral stood up out of his seat and joined Davis on the platform, with the Director stepping aside so Paul could use the dais, but he politely scoffed at that and just leaned on the side of it with one arm.

“Alright, you know the score. We’ve got a lot of work to do, but with it comes an opportunity that Davis and I have been discussing at length before you all got here. Ever since we met in this room a long time ago in this galaxy, we’ve been fighting to keep up, catch up, and try to roll with the losses. That came to define who and what we were, but now we’re more or less victorious, even before this deal was struck, but now it really hits home. We’re uncontested in this galaxy now, other than the Hadarak. Aside from the work we have to do, we’re done. And by that I mean our trailblazing duties. We don’t have to adapt anymore, and I was having a hard time understanding this.”

“Your Kenobi-like isolation?” Jason-025 asked.

“Partially. I still think the Hadarak haven’t hit us with everything, but as someone pointed out we can’t just sit and wait for it. It will come when it comes. Until then we need to do what we need to do, but it seemed like that was nothing, and my mojo was suffering enough that Wilson noticed it immediately. That’s not the sole reason for some of his tests, and there’s a bit he refuses to tell me, but the crux of the matter is what do we do now? Does the empire even need us? Do we need to change to fit in with it? Or do we just need a swift kick in the ass? Greg, put your hand down.”

The other trailblazer frowned and lowered his hand, his sarcasm snuffed out before it had a chance to form.

“We’ve always worked from a sense of purpose, but that’s kind of been lost on us as the challenges before us were beaten. We’re not built for peace, we’re built for rising higher and adapting to the gauntlet before us. So what do we do when the gauntlet ends?”

“You said something about an opportunity?” Sara-012 noted.

“I’m getting there, but stay with me on this. There will always be threats and challenges to face, but the other Archons can mow that grass without us. We’re the ones who tackle the big challenges the others can’t handle. So what do we do when we run out of them? Our psionic tissues are all at saturation point, and while Essence appears to be unlimited the training for it is…not enough. It also feels like a cheat, especially with some of the downloading techniques we’ve gotten from the Neofan. Have any of you noticed something missing too? A show of hands please.”

About 3/4ths of the individuals in the room raised their hands, with a few latecomers being added, and Paul focused on those that were excluded. “Kiran. What’s our purpose now?”

Kiran-011 shrugged in his seat. “Same as it has always been. Kick ass, train, kick more ass, invent new weapons, write new tactical manuals, same old same old.”

“To what end?”

“Don’t know. Find out when I get there.”

Paul pointed at him. “That’s a viewpoint I lost a while ago. Maybe it’s my naval brain playing things out well in advance…”

“Obviously,” Megan-026 said a split second before three others did.

“But I couldn’t see any purpose left. Tasks to do, yes, but purpose no. I had lost its scent a while back, and I still can’t remember when. I got it back here, talking to Davis, but it’s a tentative grasp elicited from fear. Right now threat of danger seems to be my only access to that feeling of purpose. I’m hoping you guys can do better than that.”

“What danger?” Landon-019 asked.

“A wake up call I got. Not from the Hadarak or the Founders, but from the universe itself. I thought Riona died because we lacked information on the Hadarak, and now that we have it we can predict and avoid the threats. I was beginning to think we knew too much to really be in danger that we couldn’t manage, then it dawned on me we’ve…or maybe I’ve…been lulled into a false sense of security. We can still die at any time, even with the Essence defenses we’ve added here. Could be nothing more than a big falling rock at the wrong time, or a really good assassin from a race we know nothing about. Point is we’re not safe, and never going to be. That epiphany was enough to crack the fog in my mind and let me see a glimpse of our future. We’ve been working that out while you guys were arriving, but we’re not finished. We need all of you, including Miss Add-On.”

“Hey,” Kara protested from the back row where she was sitting alone like she didn’t belong…because she kinda didn’t.

“You got here by a different path, as did Davis. There’s no replacing the time you missed, but what you’ve added since has earned your spots. And he’s not really a Monarch. You can’t be to do what he’s done. He’s a trailblazer with a unique path and a really weak body that he should be working more on,” Paul said, glancing to his right at him, “but that gives him a long road ahead to look at with plenty of challenges to overcome and our scores to dream of matching. But for me…I’m at the top of the naval ranks just like Morgan is tops in Commando, Cora in mechs…and yes, Morgan you’re tops. I don’t care what marks Ginsi has. If I hadn’t forgone the additional Saiyan upgrades I could take her. She’s fast but easy to read, and you trained her, so you know her inside and out. So let’s not kid about who’s tops, alright?”

“Easy for you to say,” Morgan-063 scoffed. “When was the last time you sparred with her?”

“Irrelevant,” Paul admitted. “I can see her style, and it’s AOE straight up. I can analyze a lot, and a lot faster than most of you…”

“All of us,” Logan-036 corrected.

“But I can’t analyze myself worth crap. Not into the future. Every time I try I get fog. I can’t see ahead, but I know there is some supreme purpose that I’ve always been trying to achieve. It comes and goes, I can’t quantify it in sufficient ways to hold onto it. It’s lightside, and it’s survival, and constant adaptation and growth, and a lot more descriptions but I can’t put my finger on it. The thing is, now that we’re basically getting control of everything except the Deep Core and the unexplored frontier, we have the opportunity to make things the way we want them to be in a way we’ve never done before. Not out of desperation, but by grand design. So what should that grand design be?”

Greg-073 did a double take. “I’ve never even thought about that, but you’re right. We’ve always been adapting to the threats, doing what needed to be done, but now we’ve got a clean slate to do what we want. And I have no idea what that is, but I can see the potential. Too much, actually. I don’t know where to start without some sort of mission parameters.”

“It’s small scale,” Dina-077 said. “Not big. One of us on a solo mission has it. All the little things we do or don’t do. Not something empire-wide…except when that has an effect on the small stuff. The personal stuff. That’s when I’ve always felt ‘the call,’ as I’d describe it. It never does stick, and flirts with you after harrowing experiences or flashes you for a moment during a revelation or hard workout. But it’s there, and I’ve been absent from it for a long time too. Possibly because we’ve been apart so much. I feel the jazz again just being around all of you.”

“That ends,” Davis interjected, “as of now.”

That caused a stir in the assembled Archons, with many sitting up straighter and whispering to each other…despite the fact they were all telepathic, but nobody seemed to remember that, for the social dynamic was right back to where it was when they were trainees.

“The future of us is the future of Star Force,” Paul explained, echoing Davis’s words from an earlier conversation. “The empire has grown up enough to handle everything else on its own. The big stuff is ours, and figuring out our path forward before the second gen catches up with us and figures out we don’t know where to go is our primary mission now. We have to keep laying down path for the others to follow, and we’re running really short of it right now.”

“We’ve got other stuff going on, Davis,” Blade-097 reminded him. “Some that needs us.”

“I know,” the Director said regretfully. “When will that stop?”

“Probably never,” Blade admitted. “You want us to just bite the bullet?”

“Unless it’s extreme, then yes. Let the second string handle what they can. You guys will always be a little better, but unless that better is life and death, back away from everything else. I need you here doing what you did before, only under considerably different circumstances. Is there anything you’re involved with that absolutely requires you to go back?”

Nobody answered, looking around at each other, then they started shaking their heads ‘no’ in unison.

“That’s what I thought. I don’t like backing out of existing projects, but I’ve learned to delegate. I hate it, but I do it out of necessity. I’d micromanage everything if I could, but I can’t be in more than one place, and if we’ve built a proper empire then it’s a team effort. Let the rest of the team carry your current tasks if they’re able. If they’re not, make adjustments and accommodations as necessary.”

“Sounds like this is going to be for a while?” Devan-000 asked.

“It’s permanent,” Paul answered, shocking most of them. “Assume we beat the Hadarak and drive them out of this galaxy. What do we do then?”

“Pick the next galaxy,” Kip-022 said bluntly.

“This one is so large we don’t even have it all mapped out, let alone pacified,” Paul countered. “And how much do we really have our own territory pacified? How many small scale darkside situations are hiding underneath our nose, especially with our neighbors who honor the basic rules but like to keep their privacy to do bad things where we don’t notice? Do you really want to run off to another galaxy and leave those little bastards running free because we’re dealing with the big ones elsewhere?”

“Do both.”

“How?” Paul asked, genuinely. “I can’t see it.”

“Flush out the baddies,” Oni-081 said. “We’d have to really up our intelligence gathering, but if we actively try and bait them into identifying themselves we don’t really have to have eyes everywhere on the neutral worlds. Or are you referring to on Star Force ones too?”

“I don’t think there’s a current problem with ours, though there are always exceptions that can’t be avoided. However, I feel like our worlds are a contained time bomb set to go off if our leadership would suddenly go away. It would take a while, but the wheels would fly off with time. What we’ve built isn’t permanent, and that’s the threat that’s sobered me up. We have a temporary victory, and the universe is chomping to wreck it and return things to their anarchic normal.”

“Because the Star Force population isn’t made up of Archons and Mavericks,” Leo-072 noted, “and it never will be. They’re our wards, not our peers, and in truth not even our friends. Our light is heavily influencing them, but they don’t produce it themselves. They do reflect it, however. We are making their lives actively better, but if we stop shining the masses won’t be able to maintain it.”

“And a lot of people who shine now couldn’t before without us showing them how,” Javier-068 added. “They will sustain without us now, but they could not have found the light without us. We can, because that’s part of who we are. We crave it and search it out on our own. Others can’t or don’t, but once they find it they will actively shine the rest of their lives. Those victories are permanent, but the masses are only reflective, and not fully so. The civilian population is a far cry from those in this room, and though we always try to drag them a little higher, it’s just not going to happen as far as needed. Leo is right, they’re our wards, nothing more.”

“That is the unending task,” Paul noted, “that continually confounds me. We are shining the light on our wards because they need it, and they’re better for it. But for how long? Are we just to maintain it indefinitely? That doesn’t feel right. It feels like we need to do it temporarily in order to achieve a level upgrade, but I can’t see it.”

“I can…at least partially,” Rafa-080 said. “We, those in this room, need to find the light and shine it brightly long enough for that middle group that can’t find it themselves to absorb enough to fully convert to the lightside. They will continue to shine as long as they stay alive. So those are our immediate objectives. Like beacons in the darkness. We find and light them, then leave them behind to keep shining while we search for more. As long as the empire doesn’t fall, they’ll survive indefinitely.”

Paul sighed, not believing he couldn’t see that before. “I’m a dumbfuck.”

“Occasionally, but we all are at times,” Rafa half agreed. “We work better as a team when one of us doesn’t have to do all the trailblazing. Sometimes we get a better view from path that is already cut.”

“Which is why you’re all permanently reassigned to Basic Training 2.0…which Kara will be included in this time,” Davis said with a wink thrown at her in the back.

“And so will…Sean,” Paul said, still having occasional difficulty using his first name as old habits tended to stick. “Lord Daegan is being given the keys to the kingdom for a while to see how he handles in, during which time Sean-939221 is going to be full time with us.”

“Seriously?” Greg asked, looking at the Director.

“Is that a no?” he asked.

“That’s a welcome onboard, can’t believe we have you, newb,” Greg clarified. “You’re worse than Kara, but we’ll gladly take on the burden of indoctrinating you.”

Davis frowned. “Meaning what?”

“You’ve watched us train and fight, but you’ve never done it with us. If you’re going to be part of the team, you gotta be part of the team and not Director organizing everything. You gotta face things from our angle.”

“As long as it doesn’t involve hazing. I don’t have the strength to stop you if you tried.”

Paul frowned. “We don’t pull that crap. We never did.”

“That’s refreshing,” Davis said, easing up his demeanor a bit. “But seeing as how I had a hand in writing the definition of Archon, I’m not following on what ‘indoctrinating’ means in this situation.”

“I do,” Kara said, knowing she was probably the only one who could translate. “They have a…unique…social dynamic built off years of interaction with each other. More than just inside jokes. I’ve picked up some of it, and the best way I can describe it is the camaraderie of the gods. Only those who are worthy can interface with it…which is why I never fully could.”

“Make that two we have to indoctrinate,” Greg added.

“Agreed,” Paul said with a frown. “Batgirl doesn’t realize she’s wearing a cape.”

“She can also kick our ass at will,” Morgan reminded them. “So her holding back doesn’t feel right, just like it didn’t when she had her Vorch’nas added.”

“Guess that means we gotta beat her up team style,” Hank-075 said with an eager clap of his hands.

“Oh yes,” Greg agreed. “And we gotta show Sean that he isn’t helpless by incorporating him into the beatdown team.”

“That twig? I’ll break him on accident,” Kara said sarcastically.

“I’m afraid I agree,” Davis said, uncertain how he’d suddenly lost control of this situation…but then again maybe that was the whole point they were trying to make.

“Give him armor,” Olivia-051 said with a smirk, “and some other stuff to even things out.”

“Petricite armor, to make it interesting,” Kerrie-057 said, pointing a finger at Davis. “And don’t say it’s a waste of resources. You’re not getting out of this.”

Sean…which he knew he was going to like a whole lot less than being ‘Davis’…slowly facepalmed as he felt a wave of reckless foreboding wash over him. “Paul…”

“Bit of advice. Just dive in head first and learn to like it. That’s what you did to us, and now it’s payback time in as equally a beneficial way as we can manage.”

Sean finally looked up, first at Paul and then the others, before slowly shaking his head. “Why do I suddenly feel like Archon 00 negative 1?”

“Coined!” Jason-025 declared before the Director could take it back, and the others nodded their approval as Sean decided to take Paul’s advice and just roll with it. The regenerator would put his bones back together almost as good as new afterwards…

6

March 3, 154929

Yian Ti Tredo System (Unexplored Frontier)

Neofan Outpost

The Zak’de’ron warship had entered the system alone and unstealthed, passing through the mildly heavy primitive traffic springing off of four overpopulated worlds that Star Force was trying to give some guidance to. That empire’s small ships were showing IDF markers around the 2nd planet, and a meager showing at that for the mess they were trying to clean up, but the Zak’de’ron were not here for them and did not make contact.

Instead they headed out to the very edge of the star system where there was even more traffic, but of the more advanced kind. Ships the primitives inhabiting this system couldn’t even comprehend, let alone build, and they were parked around a floating fortress many times their size sitting in about as high an orbit as you could get while still circling the central white star.

The fortress was an outpost built by the Neofan that linked to the nearby nebula where a hidden Temple was concealed. It was occupied by the Neofan and a small Star Force delegation to keep watch on their guests, but aside from those interlopers it was all Neofan possession and they had not allowed a spacial tap to be carved out of the Temple’s hull, so the only way in or out was via ships equipped with the necessary Essence drives, or through the outpost link, which also served as a sort of embassy for all travelers wishing to ply the Neofan with their myriad of unimportant requests…though judging by some of the vessels here, they might not be so unimportant, for the hulls shapes indicated extragalactic races along with the known ones, and all were parked at precise locations around the perimeter of the fortress outpost.

The Zak’de’ron ship had been invited, so when it arrived they were given priority access to dock with the fortress itself, and through an umbilical three dragons boarded the outpost on foot, trodding up an empty corridor and following the telepathic beckons through a seemingly empty station until they arrived at a receiving room with a single individual sitting on an elevated throne.

It was a Neofan, and this was the first time the Zak’de’ron had ever encountered one in person.

“You requested our presence?” Bi’noen said, with his yellow scales shining from all the reflective blue light coming off the torches ringing the circular room as well as dotting the dome-like ceiling and others hidden under glass pockets in the perfectly smooth deep black floor that seemed to suck the light in as fast as the torches produced it.

“Not I, but I am intrigued to meet you,” the Neofan said, using the V’kit’no’sat’s own language since they appeared not to know the common language of the Bond of Resistance. “I have never seen such large cowards before.”

Bi’noen huffed a bit of fire out of his nostrils as he stared into the smaller race’s eyes, but he knew the power they possessed was unrivaled, both Essence and something else contained in their wings, though no one knew what exactly, and the Neofan were not eager to share such information.

“Is there a recommendation in that statement?”

“How did you lose control of this galaxy? I have reviewed the public records, and you held an immense advantage over Star Force, and before that your own creation of the V’kit’no’sat. You have been bested twice by inferiors of your own making. Now you wish to flee to another galaxy to do what? Raise a third inferior legion so you can succumb to them for a trifecta? Perhaps we should employ you as such, given the success of your creations against the Hadarak.”

“We did not come here to spar, Neofan. Cease attempting to provoke us. What is the purpose of our summons? We were told the deal was already struck.”

“It is. But unlike your Star Force offspring, your knowledge of Essence is pathetically low, as are most new to the Bond of Resistance. Since your relocation will not be immediate, we are choosing to begin your education now. The three of you will travel to the Temple and be instructed in the true nature of galactic power. Perhaps then you will be better able to keep a handle on your servants.”

“We are taking none with us, for we want none. We will forge our own destiny from here on out. The decision has already been made.”

“Interesting. So you will not acquire new servants in your next galaxy?”

“We will not.”

“Hmmm, that is not what I would call wisdom, but I suppose it is a measure of progress. I am about to transport you to the Temple. You will not be able to return to your ship for a long period of time. Make what arrangements are necessary with them now. I do not want to answer their inquiries as to your status later.”

“None will occur. They are to wait as long as necessary for our return.”

“That will be measures in years,” the Neofan warned. “You have much to learn.”

The three Zak’de’ron exchanged glances, then the blue one silently made contact with the ship and updated them as to the situation.

“We are prepared now.”

“May fortune exceed your naivety,” the Neofan said, waving a hand theatrically as everything went dark and Bi’noen found himself alone and floating in 0g. He couldn’t sense the other two Zak’de’ron, but when he engaged his Essence senses his vision returned…and he could see the bubble he was encased within. It was thick and slowly decaying, with the wisps of the shells flaking off and disappearing back into the Essence realm as a tiny dot in the distance slowly grew.

Before long he could see that it was not a single dot, but a myriad of glowing structures intertwining into a roughly circular silhouette. This must have been the Temple spoken of by Star Force, but they had not mentioned this type of Essence travel. Bi’noen had no control whatsoever, and if he was right, he was flying free through the void of space and bypassing matter by transiting through the Essence Realm itself. Should something go wrong he would be spat back out and marooned in deep space to die, and he did not like that he’d been thrust into this situation without explanation.

But he was the inferior here, as distasteful as that thought was, and asserting dominance was not an option. The Neofan were one of the three masters of the Bond of Resistance, and conflict with them would be counterproductive. The Zak’de’ron were wise enough to know when and where to pick their fights, though the insults rendered struck their mark accurately. They had failed twice, and both failures had now risen farther than they had…but not to become part of the Bond of Resistance and access the technology and Essence wonders of that great alliance.

The Zak’de’ron should be able to exceed Star Force given time, but they could not do it in this galaxy…and the Neofan knew it. Pointing it out was either a test of their nerve or a teaching method, for the Zak’de’ron could not fail a third time. This was their chance to redo all that had been done wrong with a fresh start, and Zeno’dor was taking no chances of error in negotiating it. He’d picked the three of them personally for this unannounced mission, and if the Neofan were about to share secrets with them, they would show what gratitude was required…even if it chaffed their pride to do so, for they had no intention of remaining lessers. In time they would rise, as was their manifest destiny, but they would need help to do it, and that required a different mindset to utilize.

When the glowing filaments rushed to greater and greater size, Bi’noen suddenly hit and caught on one, then was dragged down the stem to the base where suddenly the bubble popped and he found himself being spat out a wall portal as the front half of the bubble peeled apart and the rear pushed him forward.

Mental contact with his two kin returned instantly, for they were both walking out of additional portals nearby, all of which were underground, if the information Star Force had given them was correct.

“Follow,” a floating drone spoke as it passed in front of them slowly, heading from left to right, and the three dragons with tucked wings walked on all fours in a line after it through several chambers until they came to a wide lift that could accommodate two of them at a time.

“I will wait,” Vui said, sitting on his hind legs and flexing his green wings in rhythm.

Bi’noen and Go’gien walked onboard along with the drone, then the platform raised quickly through a vertical chamber, sending them to the surface as they ended in a cave with natural light coming from the exit. They walked off the lift and it sank back down, but they did not wait for their companion, for the drone was already moving slowly towards the cave exit.

They followed it out into the daylight, where both were overwhelmed with the sight before them. They had seen holograms of it before, but being here in person was an experience not easily duplicated. The sky was blue and hazy, but beyond it where there would have been stars was far distant land…and the horizon sloped upward in all directions, making them feel like they were sitting in the bottom of a massively large bowl. And at the center of it all was one fixed artificial star providing the light for the entire construct, with enough interior space to house every starship that the Zak’de’ron and Star Force possessed combined with room to spare.

And Star Force possesses 2972 of these? Bi’noen asked telepathically to the blue-scaled dragon.

None of which they built. The Bond of Resistance constructed them all, and many more in other galaxies. We have truly aligned ourselves with a superior power. Zeno’dor’s wisdom has returned with force.

He senses a future of potential, Vui said, coming out of the cave behind them and seeing the same sights as they did as the drone continued to move slowly on, not waiting for them or speaking. The horrors of the past are being washed away, and we are all renewed by it. Take what you see before you as testament to the unwinnable fight we unwittingly chose with the Hadarak, for they have driven those that created this out of many galaxies with their endless swarms.

An uncomfortable thought, Bi’noen noted as they continued walking and caught up to the slow drone with ease as it moved down a shallow slope covered in grass towards a river. But I cannot disagree. We have been caught up in a much larger war without knowing it. At least now we are no longer naïve to the powers that surround us.

True, but if we are to survive this transition we must rely on others. And they are beyond our control, Go’gien said as he stretched out his wings and took to the air, slowly circling around the drone as it moved across the ground, and when he did so he got a better view of the near horizon, upon which there was a crystal-like city not too far off, though it was surrounded by trees and not visible from the ground.

Our destination? he asked.

Perhaps. Patience will answer, Bi’noen said as he and Vui continued to walk, though his flight instincts urged him to take to the air as well, but something told him he needed to stay very confined for the moment, though he had no reason to request it of Go’gien.

The drone eventually led them to the river itself, out of which rose a platform spilling water off the sides, and onto it the drone went, plugging in to a slot near the ‘front’ of the perfectly smooth and featureless rectangle.

“All three must board and remain in contact with the platform,” the drone said, with the blue dragon quickly landing next to his two kin, and as soon as he did a shield dome formed over them and the platform raced up into the sky so fast little traces of fire were visible from the friction with the air, but they soon disappeared as they entered the void of ‘space’ beyond the atmosphere, yet it was technically still within the massive structure of the Temple.

Once clear of the atmosphere they began moving laterally at such high speed the surface features of the temple became a blur, and only by looking far ahead could you see the rolling of the city barrier lines passing underneath them. They traveled this way for more than an hour, then with no warning the platform slowed and descended again, but not near any of the surface cities or features. They descended into what looked like a volcano, but with plants growing on the inside of the crater as if it were dormant.

Once the platform came down past the rim the Zak’de’ron could see the numerous holes in the surrounding walls, and Bi’noen knew this had to be a Neofan settlement, for they were said to be cave dwellers and not liking the direct sunlight. When the platform tracked across the trees below and slid into one of the openings, they finally were able to see multiple Neofan moving around in the nude, though they had no visible genitalia. Just pale bodies with spindly wings that were not capable of flight arching off their upper backs.

The Zak’de’ron were equally nude, save for the jewelry they wore, but they had hard scales for natural protection, yet these Neofan did not, and they did not seem to care about the presence of the much larger dragons. Were they really that powerful to not even register the Zak’de’ron as a potential threat?

The drone detached from the platform and indicated that they should continue to follow it, and the trio did as they moved deeper and deeper into the Neofan catacombs before arriving in a large chamber that still required them to duck a bit, for if they stood tall with their necks raised they were a good three times the height of the Neofan.

Inside that chamber there were 6 of the superior race, each of which wore bits and pieces of golden armor, but most of their bodies were still showing their soft and vulnerable skin.

“Welcome, Zak’de’ron,” one of the 6 said, raising both hands in a friendly gesture. “We are always glad to add a worthy race to the Bond of Resistance, and though your history is long and fraught with pain, you have survived where many others have not against the Hadarak. You have risen to a level of killing their larger monstrosities, and have broken the barrier to explore the mysteries of Essence. You have earned your place amongst us, so do not mistake my next words as insulting, but you must understand how inferior you are amongst us if we are to properly train you in what you need to learn.”

“We have come with open minds,” Bi’noen said flatly.

“It is not your minds that need to open,” another Neofan said. “But your Cores.”

Suddenly the wings on three of the Neofan flexed out into rigidity and Bi’noen lost all control of himself. His self-restraint was gone and his emotions ran wild, as if he was a hatchling again, stumbling in place as he fought to remain standing. His mind was awash in a torrent he could not fathom, let alone stand against, and by the end of it he was left blinking as he looked down at his front legs as if seeing them anew for the first time, while still possessing all memories of the past that should have made the view exceedingly normal.

“What have you done?” he asked, looking down slightly into the faces of the Neofan.

“We removed the dust that has accumulated on your Core. Essence is meant to flow, and when it does not in sufficiency a form of stagnation occurs that blinds the mind into rigidity as an unnatural barrier forms between the two, insulating one from another. We have washed those barriers away so you can see clearly once again, as you did when your lives first began.”

“What…are we to do here?” he said, having a hard time concentrating as all his senses seemed to be screaming at him in a volume he had been deaf to before.

“You are to open yourselves to the infinite possibilities of the universe, and once you put aside all preconceived notions of superiority, you can begin the long process of gaining true power. Power you will need to survive, and to help other members of the Bond of Resistance to survive. Our survival is linked, and together we will persist in the shadow of the Hadarak menace that seeks to consume all it touches. Only its fear of the Pafdreng keeps it from totally consuming galaxies, and in the gaps we operate until we can find the critical weaknesses to exploit. Those weaknesses center around Essence, and how the Hadarak do not truly know how to use it. We do, and we will show you, but we will also show you how to truly fight as a team. For without each other, none in the Bond of Resistance would have survived to reach today. We are our only hope, and it is time you learned what it is you are joining, and what we are truly up against…”

7

March 17, 154929

Shangri-La System (Zavrex Kingdom)

Titon

Lord Daegan already oversaw millions of worlds in the Zavrex Kingdom, and had become accustomed to the immense responsibility that he held while knowing that most of the work was not done by him, but by others more local to the systems and planets. His job was to ‘oversee’ them, and that word was not self-explanatory. It was very complicated, and rather than some system or routine that could be predictable, oversight was more about dealing with the unexpected and predicting problems before they occurred.

What he did nobody else knew about. The things he monitored, the orders he gave…most were not public, rather directed to the specific individuals who needed to hear them, and almost every time it happened they were shocked that the Lord of the Kingdom even knew they existed, let alone knew the details of what they were working on.

Daegan had been proud of rising to the very rare position of Monarch Lord, and while his job was technically impossible…for he couldn’t monitor even a fraction of what he needed to…he had maintained a good hold on their territory while always aware that he could be doing better. Star Force populations were well trained to do their jobs, but there were always ways to make improvements or adjustments, and finding those that others could not find was his responsibility.

Every second of every day he was at work, whether behind an array of holograms or in conferences with specialists. Personally investigating rarities or rifling through intelligence reports from remote areas where Star Force had no official presence. Even when he ‘relaxed’ or trained, his mind was still elsewhere, thinking about the puzzles he was working on constantly, meaning he never had a day off, nor a minute. He was Lord not just in title, but in fact, and no matter where he went his work went with him.

The Protovic’s blue/yellow skin glowed almost as bright as the holograms he was studying now, and was a testament to how far he had progressed within the Protovic faction as far as his individual skills. Blue/orange and blue/green where the two higher skill levels that he had never achieved, for they took an immense amount of training and focus above and beyond what he had had to go through to achieve the first rank above ‘final form,’ which for a Protovic was when they received their final psionics and achieved their pink coloration.

Daegan’s yellow indicated that he had risen above that, and few Protovic did, but his not having reached for orange had always bothered him. He hadn’t made a mistake, but being a Monarch required so much time and effort in other matters that physical training had to be limited to only a few hours a day, and that wasn’t enough for him to develop his physical skills to the level needed for another color upgrade.

There were no genetic modifications for Monarch ranks, and no other race in Star Force had applicable body transformations for such promotions. The Protovic were unique in their nearly full body glow, and wearing your status rank in your light made it clear within their Faction of who outranked who…but Daegan had gone far past his own Faction. He was Lord of the entire Zavrex Kingdom and all the races and Factions within it. Only other Lords could comprehend how large a job he had, and the never-ending nature of it.

But in recent weeks he’d had an epiphany as to what true power and responsibility were when Director Davis asked him to temporarily take over his duties for the entire Empire. He hadn’t relocated to Earth, but instead was running Star Force out of his command palace in Shangri-La with now full access to the Star Force data network. He’d thought he’d had full access before, but he was woefully wrong.

The Director made him look like a youngling given the mass of projects and watch-lists he was monitoring. He didn’t know how the Human handled it, for he couldn’t. Not as fast, at least, and Daegan knew from the beginning he was in over his head, but his time as a Lord had partially prepared him for this. He knew how to handle it…he also knew there was too much for him to handle, so he was getting behind already as he scrambled to figure out what the Director had been doing and, more importantly, how he’d been doing it.

He had notes…lots and lots of notes, and it looked like Davis had simply copied his own private records and given them to Daegan to work off of. The unfamiliarity there would diminish with time, but he now had a much greater respect…no…awe for the Director’s abilities. His mind was far superior to Daegan’s, in a way that the Protovic had not even thought was possible.

And he knew he was going to screw this up, though not by making mistakes. He was going to screw this up by not getting to everything fast enough, and according to the notes he was still trying to assimilate, Davis made it clear that even he wasn’t able to get to all of Star Force’s problems fast enough for his liking.

But it wasn’t just problems. It was upgrades. Lots and lots of conceptual upgrades, a lot of which were junk and filed as such, but with useful aspects that might be of value later, so they were saved. And one of those junk files had caught Daegan’s eye when he found it in a link to an active file on Kaetaris 19.

It was a large moon, unowned, in a system that Star Force only had a small outpost in for traffic monitoring purposes. On that moon there were odd deposits of minerals whose origin was unknown, some of which were highly valuable but delicate, and traditional mining operations would destroy them before they could be retrieved. Several nanite versions of mining tendrils had been tried, but all failed to some degree and had been shelved.

He had a project in his Kingdom in need of delicate ore extractors, but he’d never seen these before…and that was because they were failed prototypes ordered by Davis himself. They hadn’t been shared because they hadn’t worked, or at least they weren’t included in the Star Force product ‘catalog.’ They may well have been accessible through other means, but Daegan had been looking for something to use on the ice moons of Regor’nath and two of these failed prototypes might just work on the ice, given that it was more applicable to mining than rock due to the fact that it could be micro-melted rather than removed through abrasion or magnetic locking…both of which disrupted adjacent molecules in a potentially destructive fashion if the material was delicate.

Daegan copied the schematics then assigned one of Star Force’s special research teams to the task of adapting them to Regor’nath’s needs, confident that at least one would work. It wasn’t on Davis’s list of to-dos, but he’d made it clear during their brief transitional discussion that there was no limit to the Director’s duties and that everything fell under his jurisdiction. So he was encouraged to poke his nose in wherever he smelled trouble or potential upgrades.

This would be his first accomplishment if it succeeded. Everything else he’d been doing was more shuffling and approvals than course corrections. He was glad he caught this random link, and for the first time since accepting the temporary position the Lord felt he might actually be able to keep his head above water long enough for Davis to return from whatever his ‘vacation’ actually was.

Daegan stood in his workroom, which was the size of a hangar with project tables scattered all over with active lists, diagrams, maps, and whatever else he needed to work on. He found it more efficient to have them all up and active rather than have one table that he switched settings on. This way he could walk amongst them as he thought, fiddling with this or that and moving on as he visually scanned his workload.

His Kingdom stuff was now split up and delegated down to the 4 Grand Dukes that oversaw Regions of Zavrex, and while that meant their territories overlapped with his, they rarely worked on the same projects. Problems that rose up through the ranks ended when someone solved the problem, so only the really tough ones made them up to the Lords…who were skilled enough to handle them when others couldn’t, in theory. Most of what he did was finding problems that others had missed, and the Director’s position was no exception.

Overloaded as he was, he didn’t ignore that aspect of the position, so a few of the tables included stuff he’d searched for and found on his own, including a nasty traffic issue in a cluster of black holes annexed in the Core half of the empire. It had originally been controlled by the V’kit’no’sat, but since their annexation it had been managed by Star Force. As more systems converted over or linked their economies, traffic patterns changed, and Daegan recognized the escalating overlaps of jumplines and transitional lanes around the black holes themselves. He’d seen this happen before, but never this early.

Apparently the local Monarchs hadn’t seen the problem developing yet, but he could. It technically didn’t exist this soon, but the precursors were all there to see, so he’d been fiddling with a radically different commerce system for all of those black holes and wasn’t finished with it, but every now and then a modification would pop into his mind and he’d walk over to that table and add it, then come back to what he was working on before.

He wasn’t ready for this type of upgrade, but he was adapting as the days went on. His sleep was suffering for it, for he was having trouble turning his brain off with so much on his mind. He’d adjusted his training times to put them right before sleep sessions, but that had only half worked. He had so much new information before him that he couldn’t help but process it at all times. The Director’s access to the database and comm network was the best Christmas gift ever, but it was also a tiring one. He knew he had to pace himself, but the amount of work and potential before him made it difficult to do, so after another 9 hours of pacing around his lair, Lord Daegan finally made himself leave.

He headed to a private cafeteria and sat down to eat, still thinking about various projects as he shoved the foodstuffs in his mouth and chewed, unable to let go of the immense reins that had just been given to him.

“Stop,” he told himself, closing his eyes and focusing on his breathing as he tried to clear his mind. “You’re going to burn out.”

But his subconscious didn’t listen. It was in such a high energy state it was what he assumed was the equivalent of Saiyan metabolism. It literally would not slow down and had to be working on something constantly.

So if he couldn’t stop it, he’d have to redirect it onto something else.

He turned to the display cases of foodstuffs along the left wall and telekinetically opened one of them, flying out a train of various cubes and put them into an intricate dance in the air above his head. They made little trains that moved on invisible tracts, with enough rotations and turns added in that Daegan’s mind had to focus on this and this alone or some would fall out of the air.

This was random, and no more than an idea he’d had a moment ago, but it appeared to be working. He had a task before him and it was occupying his attention. Yet as he succeeded and got used to the patterns a bit of his mind was freed up to think about other stuff, but not in an obsessive way. Just some loose, casual imagination about many things that flowed like dreams, but most of his focus was on his little foodstuff trains as he would occasionally pick one car out of them and fly it into his mouth, for he was still hungry. Thinking didn’t use too many calories, but it did strain brain cells enough that they needed additional repair parts. Insufficient resources resulted in headaches, and he could feel one beginning to form before he’d gotten into the cafeteria, though it was already in the process of vanishing as his stomach processed the nutrients and sent them into his bloodstream.

And as he continued to run his trains in new directions his mind finally relaxed. Not because it stopped, but because it switched to something less stressful, and an old bit of lore made its way into his mind, with one quote being quite pertinent.

We can’t stop. We have to slow down first.

It came from a movie called ‘Spaceballs’ that was part of the basic maturia training, and while ridiculous in many ways, it was highly quotable and useful for metaphors. Simple language was insufficient for many things, but the use of metaphors was based off a common experience…in this case, viewing a movie. If two people had both view it, and remembered it, then they could speak in a more detailed way than simple language would allow.

Other stuff from that movie bounced around the free part of his mind, including Megamaid…

Suddenly all the trains stopped moving, frozen in the air as Daegan laughed. The problem on Kaetaris 19 with the delicate minerals. They hadn’t tried sucking them out, and while it was probably inefficient, he already had some ideas of how to boost that inefficiency using hyper compressed atmosphere beyond what the planet naturally had after drilling sufficient access bores for adequate surface area interface.

The trains went back to their stations, save for three cubes that diverted into the Protovic’s mouth as he got up from his chair and headed not to his quarters to sleep, but back to his lair.

Sleep would have to wait for now. He may have just solved a mystery that even Davis hadn’t figured out yet, and if that was the case, then this temporary assignment might end up being more than a babysitting operation until the real Director got back. Daegan might actually be able to tick one of the unsolved items off the list for him.

And if that was possible, he could sleep-in a few hours in the morning in compensation…or not.

Probably not.

8

March 29, 154929

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

Sean Davis had seen Archons fight nearly his entire life. He’d seen them in training, he’s seen them in combat, and he’d seen them from the inside as he trained to be an Archon as well. But the trailblazers were something else entirely, and fighting with and alongside them was far more intense and humorous than he’d ever believed possible.

Wilson had conspired with them to set up challenges that included Davis in a way that he wouldn’t be totally left behind, and today was no exception. They were in a wooded park in Atlantis made specifically for multiple team battles, currently in a 10 vs 10 scenario while the others were in other challenges hammering it out against each other. Davis’s team was a mix of others teams when he was included, but mostly they were set in their original teams from basic training on a daily basis.

Davis couldn’t keep up with that schedule, so he was down to two or three bouts a day while they were going at it almost every hour with their enhanced Saiyan metabolisms. And they took special care when Davis was involved to hit him hard. There were no kid gloves involved, because he had weaponry and armor and they did not…and they liked not having to hold back on him.

He didn’t like it so much, but the Director was starting to become less of a liability and more of an asset in these matches…and he did like that. The armor they’d made for him had both Petricite and some psionic blocking countermeasures in it, basically making him a mobile turret with a variety of stun weapons. If one of the trailblazers on the other team made a mistake, he could render them unconscious in less than a second.

But they rarely made mistakes…unless his team forced them to.

And that’s what was happening. His 9 teammates were trying to maneuver the fighting into certain areas where Davis could be used as an advantage, but even without their hair going blonde they were still far faster than him. Without his Sav-enhanced mind all he would have seen were blurs, but he could actually track their movements, punches, kicks, and dodges up until they did kick in their Saiyan modes and began to draw heavily on their ambrosia stores inside their body.

That was their Achilles heel. In long matches they’d use it up and couldn’t go into that super-fast mode, so you’d see them going blonde and back again in the blink of an eye when they needed to. Davis had no such limitation, for his stun weapons essentially had unlimited ammo, yet Wilson hadn’t given him any AOE other than for perimeter defense, citing it wouldn’t have been fair.

Yeah, it might not have been fair, but it would have been much more fun in the early days rather than getting his ass handed to him every 5 seconds.

But that wasn’t happening today. He was running alongside a creek with Sara and Greg as they headed towards an automated turret that was powered down on the enemy side of the battlefield. If they could get to it and activate it, it would come alive and work on their behalf…but the opposing team wasn’t going to let that happen, and before they got there four of them came out of the bushes so fast Davis almost missed it, for they were all in at least Saiyan 1 mode to close the gap as fast as possible.

Davis raised his forearm weapons and fired ring-like blasts that expanded slightly as they went, but only gave him a few degrees of firing arc. He missed all his shots, but they did force the attackers to dodge in certain ways…and that let Greg snare one with an Essence or psionic attack and reel Rafa into close range…only to have him drop his Ubven and freeze everything up as he turned and punched Greg in the face before dancing away as Davis lit up the area he had been standing with stun shots…barely missing Greg in the process.

Then Sara’s body came flying towards Davis, but he was quick enough to deactivate his perimeter defenses that would stun anyone that touched his armor. He half caught her body and she tried to fly herself into a stop, but then Jason came in out of nowhere and jabbed Davis in the back and knocked him face-first into the ground with him landing on Sara’s leg and pinning her in place for half a second, during which a sword tip slashed down and caught her in the head.

Swords? Where did they get a sword? Davis thought as he rolled off her, but it was too late. She was already unconscious and would be until she was revived or woke up on her own.

He rolled off her and up onto his feet, seeing Jason backtracking quickly as Davis tried to pepper him with stun blasts. Greg was nearby…and down as well. With his now five attackers all ringing him while moving erratically. In the past he’d made the mistake of thinking they were mocking him, but what they were really doing was looking for a moment of opportunity to exploit as well as keeping him where they wanted him.

Which was away from the turret.

Davis wasn’t going to play that game, and took off running towards Oni…who moved out of the way as he fired ahead to clear his path. He felt with his Pefbar them moving up behind him and made sure to turn his point defenses back on. They wouldn’t be able to physically touch him…except with the sword. Why had Wilson put one of those in this challenge? Davis was having enough trouble as it was.

He was halfway to the turret when they finally struck, throwing Kyp towards him like a missile. Davis managed to get one shot into him before he landed, but his body impacted his armor and knocked both of them to the ground, though Kyp was now unconscious.

Davis tried to push him off…but couldn’t. He must have weighed several tons, for even his armor’s powered mode couldn’t push him up.

Then he realized that while their Lachka wouldn’t work on his armor, it would work on Kyp’s body, and they were holding Davis down using him as leverage. But his arms were still free, so he started firing at what angles he could, yet his captors quickly disappeared out of his firing lines.

Then he saw Sara’s body floating past him all the way up to the turret, where Oni used her hand to activate the security pad…which only the opposing team could…then quickly claimed the override while within minimum safe distance as it began to spray shots out at the rest of them.

The pressure on Davis lessened as they had to dodge, and he finally managed to push Kyp’s body off…which he stunned again for good measure…then the turret’s agro programming got switched to target his team, and it started to pour a torrent of stun shots into him.

He just stood there and took it for a moment, for his armor soaked up stun shots, then he began running towards the turret so he could reprogram it as Jason’s sword flew through the air and shot between his legs, twisting and tripping him up before flying back into Jason’s hand.

“All too easy,” he mocked, then dodged a return shot from Davis that missed by inches as the turret continued to futilely pour shots into his grey/white armor.

The others disappeared, running off suddenly and leaving only Jason there to telekinetically fly his sword at Davis and delay him from getting to the turret controls…but this time he was able to get a hand on the sword, pinning it in place long enough to bring his other hand around and grab it on both ends, with the stun charge in it helplessly soaking into his armor.

“You were saying?” he replied as his suit continued to get hit with turret shots, then his grip on the sword yanked him off his feet and dragged him across the ground as he refused to let it go all the way up to a few meters away from Jason. Then a wash of dirt flew up from the ground and covered his helmet enough to cut out his visuals, but he could still sense with his Pefbar as Jason made a mocking thumb to nose gesture as he waved his fingers.

Davis got that a lot. Until he was able to keep up with them they would continue to hound him. It was their way of making sure his inclusion was for real and not generous, and for the life of him he didn’t know why he thought Jason couldn’t lift his entire body weight with his Lachka. And once again, he gave him the leverage to do it with a foreign object beyond his armor.

So he let go of the sword and stood up as fast as he could, running towards the Archon and attempting to punch him, but Jason wouldn’t let him get anywhere close. In order to dodge his shots they needed some distance, and within a couple meters it would be hard for Davis to not hit them even without aiming.

Then all of a sudden another blur appeared, and Jason turned to meet it with a flash of blonde to his hair. His movements were so fast now Davis’s eyes had trouble keeping up, but what he saw was two swords in play, with Paul having come in to engage him with one of his own.

Davis almost wanted to stay there and watch, for this was the highest level of swordplay in all of Star Force, and Saiyan-enhanced, but he wasn’t an observer here, he was a player and he knew an opportunity when he saw it. So he raised both arms and unloaded stun shots wide to either side, meaning they had to stay between them or they would dodge into his shots.

They didn’t move, other than to slash and parry each other, then Davis moved the shots closer and fired on both of them, with Jason trying to hide behind Paul but Paul was too quick and made sure both of them got hit.

The pair fell to the ground in unison unconscious, then Davis ran up to them and used his right gauntlet to inject Paul with a destunning serum while taking the distant turret shots on his back.

Paul blinked, then rolled a little more out of line as some of the blast wash was still hitting him. Davis gave him another shot to clear it, but left Jason laying where he was as Paul telekinetically pulled both swords to him.

“Shield me to the turret,” he said, with Davis turning and running towards it with his arms next to his sides to give Paul as much of a block as he could. It wasn’t enough, for Paul started to stumble and fall as bits of the AOE turret wash hit him, then he went down again.

“Damn,” Davis said, turning and picking him up as they both got bathed in the stun blasts…then he ran him up within the minimum distance around the turret and destunned him again there.

“Ow,” Paul said, feeling dizzy as Davis stood there and covered him, making sure nobody was moving towards them from either side or in front, with the turret blocking his back.

“Get the turret,” he told him, his eyes flicking back and forth along with his Pefbar remaining constant, not knowing why none of them were coming to stop them. If they weren’t here, they must have been somewhere else doing something more important.

“Done,” Paul said, with the turret now glowing blue to indicate that it was aligned with their team.

“Now what?”

“I’ve got Jason’s sword…” he said, seeing his fellow 2’s body having disappeared, along with Sara and Greg’s, meaning Davis couldn’t revive them. “They moved them.”

“I didn’t even notice.”

“Ok, option 2. You and me head for the nexus.”

“Are they going to fall for that?”

“Probably not, but you never know. At least we’ll force them to back and the others might use that to their advantage.”

“Might? Aren’t you in battlemeld with them?”

“Jammers went up earlier. Telepathic too. We’re blind to each other now.”

“When did they get those?”

“When I went to get my sword. We’ll make them pay for it though. Follow me and watch our flanks. I’ll worry about what’s ahead.”

“Just don’t outrun me,” Davis said as they took off, with Paul literally jogging to make sure the Director could keep up.

They moved through trees, rocks, and some grasslands on the large park course, not seeing anything other than more turrets that were not yet active. Davis wanted to stop and claim them, but Paul said no. They needed to move with all speed towards the nexus, which was basically a version of capture the flag, except the nexus was a building with shields and a pair of turrets that had to be beaten down in order to win the game. Few ever did before the 30 minute timer was up, but apparently Paul was willing to go for it since he had Davis with him.

Because Davis could literally walk up to the nexus and beat it into submission with his fists while the stun blasts coming back did nothing to him.

They bypassed three more turrets within sight, and still no ambushes occurred. He didn’t know where the others were or what they were doing, but it seemed unlikely that they could get this far without being spotted…and about 280 meters away from the nexus a dodge ball came flying through the air and hit Davis in his helmet so hard it knocked him off his feet for a couple of strides, but he managed to keep his balance until more came and would have hit him…except Paul telekinetically stopped them Neo style, then threw them towards the distant nexus.

They didn’t get that far, for they were grabbed out of the air and traveled back towards the bushes where the enemy team had to be hiding. Without any weapons of their own, the only way for the trailblazers to kill the nexus was physically hitting it, but they’d get mowed down because its turrets had no minimum safe range. Instead they had to use objects from the park, and breaking down trees or uprooting rocks was against the rules…otherwise this would have turned into a much messier challenge.

“Keep going,” Paul said, holding a sword in each hand as he ran forward up until they got to 180 meters out, which was the nexus’s firing range. He stopped there and signaled for Davis to go ahead.

He cringed, but went ahead anyway. Tanking the shots as he got closer and closer, then Rafa came into view behind the nexus and threw a boulder-sized box towards him.

Davis dodged to the left, with it passing by somehow…except it suddenly switched directions behind him and moved to hit him in the ass, but his Pefbar saw it and he spun so fast he surprised himself, grabbing it before it hit…only to realize his mistake as it lifted him off his feet a couple meters before he let go.

He landed on his feet, then the box came down and drilled him into the ground a few inches as it slammed into him over and over again until it suddenly stopped and toppled on the grass beside him as one of the swords shot by like a missile and hit Rafa enough to make him lose his grip on the box.

Davis grabbed it and threw it back towards where Paul was waiting outside turret range, hoping he’d understand the gesture. His telepathy wouldn’t work either, and shouting out his plans would take too long, but he needn’t have worried. The master tactician understood, and as soon as he reeled in the box after a short tug of war with Rafa that Davis disrupted with some stun blasts that made the other Archon move for cover behind the nexus, Paul grabbed hold of it in his hands as Davis jumped up on top of the shielded nexus and put his body over top one of the two turret spouts, not allowing it to shoot anyone but him.

Paul then angled his box to block the shots from the other one as it ignored Davis and started to shoot him as he crossed the distance very quickly, only to have Rafa come out and try to intercept him…yet somehow Davis managed to land a shot of his own, more luck or intuition than active aiming, and he caught Rafa in the foot, numbing it enough that he fell, rolled, and then flew across the ground towards Paul like a missile only to get hit square in the face with a tier 4 Takbri stun pulse from Paul.

Rafa couldn’t dodge as much while flying as he could running, and apparently Paul hadn’t exhausted his biological stun psionic earlier like most of the others had. Rafa went down hard and rolled like a Rammus before flopping out on the ground while Paul continued to approach with his box now flying up towards the other turret to shield him better from the wash coming off it, for he was wobbling as he ran now.

He held it aloft as he punched the shield over and over again, and Davis knew he was vulnerable if another of the opposing team was nearby, but it was a chance worth taking. Davis put a few whacks into the shield top that he was laying on, but he couldn’t do much without sliding off, for it wasn’t completely flat up here and he had to keep wiggling to stay on it exactly over top of the first weapon.

It took forever for Paul to rack up enough hits, but eventually the shield went down and Davis dropped onto the gun itself, which he put a hand over the firing aperture as he stood up casually, watching Paul leap up while still magically controlling his floating box and press a hand on the single button in the center of the roof.

He had to hold it for 8 long seconds, but no opposition arrived to stop him. Davis wondered where the hell they were, then the challenge ending tone sounded and he couldn’t help but smile at their unexpected victory.

“See?” Paul said, tossing the stun-soaked box aside. “You can be useful. Good call with the box.”

“Figured you could use it. I assumed there was a range tug of war and a few more meters would help you win it.”

“You figured right.”

“Where is everyone else?”

“I don’t know, but I bet our team delayed them from getting back here long enough to get the job done. Let’s find out,” he said as drones appeared out of the sky with one of them heading to Rafa to destun him and heal any injuries he might have sustained.

Then one and two at a time the others came running out of the park towards the captured nexus, some with smiles and others with looks of disbelief as they assembled. Davis retracted his helmet, which only came apart in sections due to the fact the Petricite couldn’t be made into nanite form, or at least not yet. That was something they were still fiddling with.

“How the fuck did you pull that off?” Jason asked.

“Roger made a bad call,” Oni said. “We thought you were making a play on the tunnel, and by the time we realized our mistake we had too many of you between us and them. Plus Rafa just sucks.”

“Hey,” he complained. “It was two on one.”

“You had the nexus turrets,” Davis chimed in for the first time, drawing some laughs from the others, for he wasn’t wrong. “And you did bring the box.”

“Yeah, I did bring the box,” he admitted. “I didn’t expect you to chuck it out of my range though.”

“I had a moment of not sucking. Rare as it is.”

“Yeah, I think it’s going to get a lot less rare,” Jason added. “Eventually we’re going to have to downgrade that armor.”

“But not today,” Paul said, clapping Davis on the shoulder only to crumple to the ground unconscious as his armor’s perimeter defense stun got him on contact.

“What the…” Davis said, looking down at Paul. “I thought when I took the helmet off it auto-deactivated.”

He glanced at the others, only to see them barely holding in their laughter as one of the drones sensed Paul was unconscious and came down to revive him.

Jason walked over to his best friend and helped him up to his feet.

“Did I really just do what I think I did?”

“Yep.”

“I hate that armor.”

“Sorry, Paul,” Davis apologized. “I didn’t realize it was still on.”

“I thought it turned off when your helmet retracted.”

“So did I,” Davis agreed. “Technical glitch?”

“Or you just neglected to hit the button,” Kerrie said, still smiling. “Anyway, it was worth it to see that. Thank you,” she said, throwing a glance at Paul.

“So much for brilliant strategist,” Steve added. “Death by thornmail.”

That got a snicker out of the others, who were trying to hold it in for Davis’s sake, but failing badly.

“What would happen if I let one of you wear the armor for a game?” he asked.

They all immediately began shaking their heads, with Oni finally answering in crystal clarity.

“It would be a slaughter. No thanks. You keep it until you no longer need it.”

“I’m not catching you guys. Not mathematically possible.”

“You don’t have to catch us, just get in the ballpark. Then we can go 10 vs 11 without augmentation.”

Davis cringed, thinking about taking punches from these guys in just a T-shirt and shorts. “I think I’ll hang on to the armor, thanks.”

“Now you know how we feel going up against Kara,” Paul added, poking a finger towards Davis’s shoulder but not touching until he nodded that it was safe, then the Archon tapped it twice just to make sure before leaning on the heavy suit as if it was a light pole. “It’s all about working the angles. We learn from the positions of advantage and disadvantage. And the point is we get better as we go along. Just as you did today. I couldn’t have done that without you, and you did more than stand there and take hits.”

“Good ankle shot,” Rafa added. “That won it right there.”

“Don’t expect it again,” Davis warned. “But thanks. It feels nice not to be totally helpless.”

“You up for another one?” Jason asked.

“I’m not that weak,” he scoffed. “What else have you got?”

9

May 31, 154929

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

Davis walked into Wilson’s lab and sat down heavily on a chair, setting his elbows on the edge of one of the holotables and cradling his head in his hands.

“You look exhausted,” the Master Trainer said, pulling over a chair and sitting down opposite him.

“You have no idea,” he admitted, still staring at the floor as he rubbed his scalp through his short brown hair. “They really aren’t holding back on me.”

“That’s a good sign.”

“Tell that to my aching body. How did we ever train such monsters?”

“How’s Kara doing?”

Davis finally looked up. “I don’t know. I rarely see her. I have to get at least 11 hours sleep or I’m worthless.”

“This is what Archon life is like. You’ve only done it part time since basic training. It’s going to take a while for you to adapt.”

“I’m starting to forget why I’m even doing this. The past is becoming a blur lost in the never-ending moment. I guess it’s supposed to be that way. I’ve just never experienced it like this.”

“That’s because when you went through basic training you already knew everything that was going happen. This is a truer test of your Archon skills.”

Davis leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling briefly. “Tell me this is paying off for you.”

“As far as data…yes. I’m getting loads of it. As for solutions…those I’m not getting. I’m finding more mysteries rather than answers.”

“Such as?”

“The trailblazers are different now, and I think it has to do with Essence. It’s almost as if it’s a cheat, and they instinctively don’t like cheating. Have you noticed they rarely use it when sparring?”

“No,” Davis said flatly. “They use it all the time on each other.”

“No they don’t. Their abilities and power reserves are far deeper than they’re employing. It’s almost as if they don’t want to fight that way unless they need to. I think it has to do with the one shot problem manifesting again.”

“So they’re holding back?”

Wilson grinned. “Even when they’re holding back they are going at it hard in selective ways. I think the emergence of Essence warfare has soured their combat profiles enough that they’re having fun just doing things the old way again…with some modification. After all, who needs a sword when you can disintegrate something in less than a second?”

“My head hurts. Thinking is only going to make it worse,” Davis said, half serious. “Just lay out what you’ve found and include all the shortcuts. Please don’t make me guess. I’m half asleep already.”

Wilson leaned back and crossed his arms over his ample chest. “I think they’re chewing on problems collectively that were stumping them individually. I’ve seen them do this before, and I’m not even sure if they realize they’re doing it. When there is a challenge they can’t beat, they hit it over and over again from different angles until they find a crack. I think that’s what they’re doing now, searching for a way to get back to the standard Archon mojo that Essence abilities have wrecked.”

“Define ‘wrecked.’”

“Body strength, speed, agility, reflexes…all of these had to be earned, honed, and developed over years. Essence? Half the equation is how much your body can handle, the other half is how much is available. Magicite rings have cheated the second half of that equation, and with that cheating has allowed them to greatly increase the rate of training that using their own Essence alone would allow. The Uriti Essence is advancing them artificially fast…which is good for us…but what if someone else does the same? And if they’ve had a million years of it? Those scenarios get scary for even me to imagine. I think the trailblazers are subconsciously looking for an equalizer, or some way to return things to physical combat. And the kill Morgan made on the Nu’avi without using any Essence-only attack was the first inkling of this. But they haven’t figured it out yet. That’s clear.”

Davis sighed. “We finally get Essence figured out and now they’re trying to lose it?”

“The tissue density issue has also been grinding on them. Their existence was based on improving their skills, then when they started to hit development limits what were they supposed to do? Saiyan upgrades offered another path, as did Essence, but the basic weapon of an Archon is your body…and they can’t adapt like they used to. It’s like the game they’ve been playing nearly all their lives has been completed and they have nothing else to do now.”

“I’m so far from that it feels like that would be the promised land. You’re telling me they’re bored with it?”

“They don’t want a vacation, to sit back and relax and look back on past battles. They want to fight new ones. They have to always be on the move to feel normal, as you’re starting to understand the hard way, and frankly we don’t have much left to offer them. But like they always do, they’re tackling that problem as a challenge in and of itself and they’re chipping away at it. They might find something before I do, and their way of going about it is giving me some new ideas as well. The monsters we trained are quite good. Better than me in some respects. Hopefully together we can solve this.”

“And if we can’t?”

“What happens if you make a Saiyan stand still indefinitely?”

Davis grimaced. “Their bodies tear themselves apart, I’m told.”

“Not quite that dramatic, but they take damage. They’ve been retooled so movement is the natural state rather than resting. Now standing still can be as damaging as a hard workout for a normal person. But it’s not just physical with them. The Saiyan upgrades came out of their own natural adaptations. The medtechs learned from what their bodies had already done and expanded on it. That’s why you and I cannot take the upgrades. Our bodies couldn’t handle it…yet. The possibility is always there, but your duties as Director and mine as a trainer keep our hours of training too low to even approach the physicality needed.”

“My aching muscles agree with you. Do you have any inklings of progress, or can I go take a nap now?”

“I have a feeling…that’s all.”

“Go ahead.”

“I don’t think the trailblazers’ path forward lies in combat against the Hadarak. They’ve gotten us to the point where we can deal with it on our own. I think they have to go elsewhere to find bigger challenges beyond killing minions and Lurkers, though Paul, Roger, and Liam may still be needed for the latter if and when they come back.”

“Elsewhere?”

“I don’t have any ideas. But they need new challenges. Paul’s reaction to the maze was clear enough. Newness is what they’re lacking. What they crave. They know how to get benefit out of doing the same thing over and over again. That’s training in a nutshell. But the training is always based off of adapting to something new, and we’re in short supply of new other than standing and casting Essence abilities like some old school wizard who doesn’t need to be in shape at all, just carry a staff and have magic ability.”

“Ah. They don’t like the idea of some fat guy being able to best them using nothing but Essence abilities.”

“And being physically fit isn’t required for it, is it?”

“That makes sense. So they want another aspect of combat that can complement or supersede simple Essence use. Otherwise all the strength and speed they’ve built up will basically be wasted?”

“They haven’t said that to me, exactly, but I think it’s bothering them on some level. But they’re so geared into working the problems I don’t think they often take a step back to look at the situation and just think. They don’t see what they’ve become. They just see the next challenge. Did you know they rarely mingle with civilians?”

“I never thought to ask.”

“I did. They have trouble doing so. Some have even claimed to not be able to read them properly. That stupidity is one tactic an enemy can use against them because it’s unpredictable…but not to me. I’ve so used to dealing with people on all levels that I can predict the stupid, but I think the trailblazers are becoming so advanced they forget the way things used to be, and the way other people think. Even if they’re telepathically scanning their brains, they’ve lost the ability to be stupid. Everything has to be logical. And it creates a rift between them and everyone else. Because, face it, most of the population still thinks being stupid is how you spend time with friends.”

“Do they? Perhaps I’ve been so busy worrying about moons colliding with each other that I haven’t been mingling either.”

“You haven’t. And you’re worse than them. But you’re not on their level, so the effect isn’t the same. When they’re not together they isolate themselves and interact when needed. They don’t seek out others to spend time with. Even other Archons that are too junior they don’t like associating with, because they can’t interface with them for mutual benefit. Helping them, sure, but spending downtime is about them and not about carrying someone else. Since they’ve gotten here none of them have gone off on their own. They’re better when together, because they can move and think on the same level, and that helps them raise their game. To put it bluntly, they’ve outgrown the empire they helped build, and there is no turning back.”

“Not that I’d want them to,” Davis added. “But why are they insistent about involving me…oh. Are they…?”

“They’re looking at you like a lost brother they can add to their group, not a youngling to be trained. So don’t expect them to give you a break. Or Kara. But you’re the new find, she’s been around a while.”

“Are you saying they’re lonely?”

“No. It’s not camaraderie they need. That’s a luxury, in the physical capacity. What they need is camaraderie in the mission. Even if they’re on different planets and never see each other, they’re working on the same mission and on the same team. It’s the mission that is lacking now, because they’ve completed just about all we’ve given them or the universe has thrown at them. And the Hadarak…they can’t do much until we’ve built up enough strength. So they’re just waiting, passing time on whatever lesser missions they can get, even if those can be handled by others.”

“You’re saying this is worse than I imagined?”

“This can’t go on like this. I don’t know what will happen if it does. They won’t fall apart, but they will suffer for it. They already are. And bringing them together, as helpful as it is, won’t be enough if there isn’t another V’kit’no’sat empire for them to try and do the impossible against.”

“I take it you’re saying other galaxies aren’t going to be enough for them?”

“Not if they’re going to repeat past victories there. They need something new. The empire they helped forge can take on the repetitive stuff. We need them to do something…grand. I just don’t see what that is yet, and neither do they. But they can smell it. They can sense it exists, they just can’t find it.”

“A negative side effect of winning?”

“Did you ever celebrate in basic training with the other Archons? Or was every victory, at the most, just a sigh of relief before throwing yourself at the next mission?”

“They don’t want to bask in victory, they want more work?”

“They want to matter. And a warrior is built to fight, not to celebrate. Face it, the empire has hit a plateau. Our growth is in our size, resources, and territory. We’re replicating what has been done before, not advancing higher. At least not much. Not as much as they need.”

“Right now all I care about is getting some sleep and recharging enough for tomorrow’s challenges. Are they not fatigued enough?”

“No they’re not, because their bodies are doing stuff that is familiar. Nothing drastically new. Yours has gotten thrown in head first and is struggling to swim, so you’ve got plenty of new.”

“And the Clans?”

“A side project that has outlived its usefulness for them…while being a great asset to the empire. That’s what they do. They build stuff, they fight, and they move on. They’re not maintenance oriented. They’re…as we refer to them…trailblazers. You can’t blaze trail by walking on trail already laid down by them or others. They need to be thrown into the brush and have to hack it out on their own. I just wish I knew how to do that other than marooning them on an uninhabited planet with limited supplies and letting them fight the environment just to stay alive. It would help their mood immensely, but it would tear down their bodies too much. Face it, we lack the kind of enemy the V’kit’no’sat were. The Founders, while a problem for later, are a bunch of wizards and megaloids and their servants. Not dinosaurs.”

“I know that feeling from a different perspective. Sometimes I wish I had to build an empire from scratch all over again, but I’d just be repeating what I’ve already done with Star Force…not doing something new. Star Force is needed, which is why I created it. But it all comes down to that need. Without it we’re lost.”

“And that’s why you’re a trailblazer too, and they want you up to speed with them in the Archon realm.”

“I doubt that’s ever going to happen, but I’m at least able to interact with them better now.”

“It’s not about your power level, but your trailblazing ability. And in that regard, you’re even with them at the worst.”

Davis frowned. “No I’m not. They learn faster than I do.”

“No they don’t. You’ve just gotten stagnant from doing the Monarch thing. You’re lacking newness in that regard, but presently you’re getting plenty of it from your current fatigue. Isn’t there a part of you happier now than you can ever remember being before?”

Davis took a moment to reflect. “I hadn’t thought about it, but yeah. I’m stressed, but there’s no pressure of people’s lives at stake this time. That makes it a luxurious stress, if that makes sense. But I still badly want to sleep.”

“Get going then. We’re not going to solve this today. But I’m convinced there is a solution. We’re just blind to it, and like any other plateau, there is a way to break through it. We’re just going to have to keep them together until we do. We can’t send them back out unless the Hadarak war or something else really gets out of hand.”

“Agreed, on both fronts,” Davis said, standing up and heading for the door. “Sleep it is. Let me know when you find that crack. I’m not going to be much help. They really are working me over hard.”

He walked out, with just enough of a phantom limp testifying to how tired his legs actually were.

“That’s usually when epiphanies happen,” Wilson said to himself after the door closed behind Davis. “You may be the one to find it before they do.”

10

August 18, 154929

Solar System (Home One Kingdom)

Earth

Cal-com had not left the Temples in thousands of years, and his distant past in the service of the Elders now seemed like little more than a vivid dream. Star Force was his home now, and the Temples were his domain so much he had almost forgot there was a galaxy outside them. They were so massive, with so much to still explore that was ever changing as the caretaker programming had them periodically remaking entire regions into different habitats, that Cal-com had come to believe he would spend the rest of his life inside them without ever running out of things to do.

The Vargemma were still a threat, but one currently satiated with the return of the Founders. But that didn’t meant they were safe, nor could they be let outside the Temples or into the Star Force restricted sections, but a sense of normalcy had become the norms in the Temples and the number of individuals qualifying for the Varkemma had increased dramatically. Also, all new births within the Temples were now being given to Star Force maturias, meaning the number of troublemakers was now fixed and would not escalate given time.

That said, they also weren’t dying off, but they were contained and no longer trying to kill Star Force personnel. The fact that they could in the blink of an eye was ever-present in Cal-com’s mind, but in recent months his thoughts had been elsewhere as he traveled outside the temples to the Solar System at a mysterious recall order from Director Davis that did not state a reason.

He had chosen to come without an explanation, and now that he had finally arrived on the birthplace of Humanity, he felt all kinds of emotions he had forgotten he had…along with some new ones. This planet had been rendered nearly lifeless in terms of people, and in the aftermath the plants had taken over as no one was allowed to inhabit it until the Director gave the ok, and that didn’t happen until they developed a planet-scale defense against the Essence attacks that had ravaged it previously.

But now it was rebuilt, different, with less population, yet it was eerie. Almost as if everything here was built to be temporary. He didn’t get the sense of a permanent home, but rather a semi-permanent inhabitation that planned to move on after a given period of time or if a certain threat emerged. Most of the landmass was cities carved out of the vegetation, with the vegetation clearly making a statement as to it being the norm and the infrastructure the exception.

Most of the planet was ocean, and the cities on the surface or below it there were no different. All were mobile, or at least mobile capable, and connected to permanent support structures on the seafloor that looked like a spider had gotten very busy knitting an intricate web together beneath the water. And if he guessed, Cal-com would have said the majority of Earth’s population wasn’t on land, but submerged beneath the waves where the ocean would give them a decent amount of defense against conventional orbital bombardment…and Disintegration-style Essence attacks.

Cal-com’s dropship headed to one of the few cities that had a bastion on the surface of the ocean, and this was the most special in all of Star Force. It was named ‘Atlantis’ and was their capitol within a capitol within a capitol. It was the home of the Director and built entirely out of Petricite armor, ensuring that no Essence attack of any kind was going to harm those inside…in theory. There was running speculation of how one could overload it, but the exact specifications of the composition and thickness of the Petricite were a closely guarded secret that even Cal-com did not have access to. So if someone did want to attack the small city, they’d have to guess at its defensive capabilities. And that ambiguity would stop many attacks from happening, as opposed to knowing exactly what you had to face and adjusting your forces to meet that benchmark.

But he didn’t expect any attacks on Earth. The Vargemma were contained, the V’kit’no’sat were now part of the empire, the Zak’de’ron were not strong enough to mount such an assault, and the Neofan needed Star Force more than Star Force needed them. Unless some unknown threat arose Earth wasn’t going to be touched again…yet whoever designed its infrastructure clearly didn’t feel that way. This was a war-torn planet rebuilt with more war in mind.

When his dropship landed he walked out amidst a downpour of warm rain, using his Essence to create an invisible barrier over his head to keep the water off him. It collected up there rather than running off, then he casually dumped it to the side before walking inside the tarmac doors as an attendant welcomed and led him through the city to where the Director’s office was.

He walked up the staircase into the tower-top office already feeling a second familiar mind there, finding Paul leaning against the clear wall behind and to the left of the Director as he sat behind his equally clear desk.

“You summoned me?” he asked as he approached.

“That I did. Thank you for coming. I know it’s not a quick journey.”

Cal-com nodded to Paul, who said nothing, and patiently took a seat opposite Davis.

“We were unsure of your mindset, so we decided to bring you here and let you know what was happening before events start to occur. The Zak’de’ron are joining the Bond of Resistance and leaving this galaxy.”

Cal-com’s eyes widened in surprise, and he exchanged a quick glance with Paul. “Are their servants going with them?”

“No. Only the Zak’de’ron are leaving, and we are providing the Essence for their travel to the Krackel galaxy. There are no major powers there, and the Hadarak are tamely minding the Deep Core with only a few scouts into the Rim. It’s similar to the way this galaxy was before the Zak’de’ron formed the V’kit’no’sat and began pushing back on those scouts. They’re getting a chance to start over, and we’re happy to send them on their way. As for the servants, the Zak’de’ron are going to work with us and give us dominion over them. How exactly we don’t know, but it’ll be a transfer of command. Not just them disappearing and us having to step in and deal with the mess.”

“The Voku,” Cal-com said with distaste, guessing as to the reason he was called here.

“We wanted to know what your feelings were regarding them.”

“They are no longer my people. When I was cast out I became Star Force, and I have not regretted it. If I were to return, they would not fully accept me, even if the Elders themselves ordered it so. If you need it of me, I will do my duty, but another of equal skill would be better suited as a Reclaimer for them than me. A neutral entity without previous contact.”

“What do you anticipate their reaction will be when they learn the Zak’de’ron are permanently leaving?”

“They will be told?”

The Director nodded. “That’s part of the agreement. No lies. With any of their servants. They’re going to be told where they’re going and how they’re not coming back.”

“That will not be taken well, and if the other servants are as psychologically dependent on the concept of the Elders guiding their civilizations, you could see them collapse in small or total form when that unmovable pillar disappears.”

“You say that with more certainty than I expected.”

“I have experienced it,” Cal-com said, old memories long forgotten reemerging. “There will be no easy transition. It will be controlled madness at best. You need to understand, these servants are only taught to think within a set of firm boundaries. What you are going to tell them exists beyond those boundaries. The Elders are meant to be eternal. You are going to tell them they are not.”

“The Zak’de’ron are going to tell them, and we’ll be there when it happens.”

Cal-com closed his eyes, visions of horror inescapable from his calculating mind. “That may be worse. Hope that the Elders were still in play would sustain many if you told them and they vanished without a trace. You are about to take away all that drives them. Suicide is not our way, but I would not think it beyond any broken individual unless they have a sense of honor beyond service to the Elders.”

“And we’ve already seen what the Zak’de’ron do to those people,” Paul noted.

“That we have,” Cal-com agreed. “It is good to see you once again with my own eyes.”

“Did you think you could get summoned to Earth and I wouldn’t be here?”

“I thought you were still fighting the Hadarak on your Excalibur.”

“I was, then I got recalled,” he said, gesturing to Davis.

“We’re facing a moment in history,” the Director explained, “where there will be a great many transitions. I recalled all the trailblazers here so we could brainstorm how we are to proceed in regards to a great many things. Paul suggested we bring you here, as well other individuals of particular merit. You are the first of them to arrive, and you have the most knowledge of the Zak’de’ron servants because you were once one of them. We can’t afford to annex them in the traditional methods. That will be too costly, both for us and them. We need to have a plan in place before any of them know of the changes coming. What would you advise?”

“Bring the Bo’ja back to the Voku. Beyond that I have no immediate advice, but I can study the matter if you wish it?”

“Why the Bo’ja?” Paul asked.

“They were taken from the Voku for service to the Elders. It was a sacrifice that never should have been made. It denigrated the Voku to breeding stock, and I do not know how far their will has fallen since I was cast out. I led a mighty empire that was called upon to duty, not to endless defense while our contribution to war was reproduction.”

“The Zak’de’ron could have cloned as many Voku as necessary,” Paul differed. “They needed experienced individuals, so what they did to your race was more than just reproduction. They needed basic training. But I agree, it was an insult and denigration, and needs to be rectified.”

“I doubt any of my peers are still living with the Voku. Most were probably drafted into the Bo’ja, leaving those with the Voku as younglings elevated without experience of an offensive empire. And if there are some that remain, they will have had to let go of their honor or bury it deep down. I fear the Voku I left have been destroyed, and I would rather not deal with their living corpse. You can make them great again, in your own way. I could as well, but I find it…distasteful.”

“I understand…somewhat,” the Director said. “What task would you like? And that question has no boundaries.”

“I am content with my current task.”

“You don’t miss the stars?” Paul asked.

“I did not think so until I traveled here. If you are asking if the Temples are claustrophobic…” he said, a bit sarcastically, “…they are not. I have come to think of them as home, despite them being built by an enemy. I assume we still consider the Bond of Resistance as such?”

“More or less.”

“I would rather engage them in battle than have to face the scraps of my former race.”

“You view it as going backwards?”

Cal-com considered those words for a moment. “I do. Their future is not my own. You said your question was unlimited?”

“Yes.”

“Then I have a recommendation.”

Davis leaned back in his seat and steepled his fingers. “Go ahead.”

“You made me a Reclaimer to assimilate the Vargemma. I have not accomplished this task in full, but in part it is complete. To do so I have had to build a great deal, and as Dafchor I had to do the same. I also had to face a Skarron crusade that is very similar to the endless Hadarak attacks. Both were worthy tasks, but the one I felt we were destined for was building. It involved all aspects of our civilization, and our population expansion wasn’t for its own sake. It was always to accomplish a mission. There are vast regions of this galaxy’s Rim that are beyond Star Force’s influence. I believe, as long as the Grand Border holds, Star Force needs to mount a second campaign to civilize these regions…as well as the unruly neighbors within our borders.”

“Why?” Paul asked, before Davis could say anything.

“Because it doesn’t matter how big Star Force becomes and how much we accomplish if we don’t end up on your planet helping you. Those areas of the Rim probably do not even know Star Force exists, and all manner of darkness can thrive in the smallest of corners if they are overlooked. Spreading the light to those who need it is just as important as fighting the Hadarak. Perhaps more so, though the Hadarak are the necessary war. Bringing Star Force’s light to the small, dark places is an optional one. We need to take on that war in whatever measure we can manage now, and not wait until the Hadarak are driven from this galaxy.”

“And this is the task you would choose for yourself?” the Director asked.

“No. I have my task, up until you relieve me of it, and I have not completed it in full.”

“If you did, would you take on the war you suggest?”

“I would.”

“Explain further,” Paul prompted.

“The honorable do not only fight in defense of themselves and their neighbors. They fight for everyone who needs assistance. They live for the fight, not the victory.”

Paul and Davis exchanged glances.

“Go on,” the Director urged.

“We are not meant to be stagnant. Peace is stagnant when one does not train. And one trains to be better capable of fighting the next war. Without war, without challenge, without a mission, a civilization loses its meaning. Warriors exist to go into areas where there is no peace and create it for the younglings and foundlings to take refuge in as they grow and heal. When they have done so sufficiently, they will seek out the war in a time of their choosing rather than that of the universe. The universe will throw it at you when you are not ready. Peace allows us to select our own timing, and that timing is when one embraces the path of the warrior. That path leads to the areas of the galaxy where injustice lives. We are meant to hunt it down and destroy it wherever it is, building civilization on the battlefields where we were victorious, and that civilization will be the cradle for future warriors, as well as a monument to our victory.”

“And what happens when we run out of wars to fight?” Paul asked. “When we conquer the entire galaxy and make it ‘peaceful?’”

“Then we spread our light to other galaxies.”

“To what end?”

Cal-com frowned. “If the universe is infinite, there will be no end. Warriors do not fight towards an end. We fight because the fight itself is worthy. What we build may fall tomorrow. Nothing is permanent. There can be no ‘end’ to work towards. I do not understand your question.”

“If there is not an ‘end’ and we keep fighting the same battles over and over again, what are we accomplishing?”

“Light and darkness have an effect on people, because people adapt to their environment. Warriors are less affected, because they rise up to face and change negative environments, but most do not. They are consumed by them, or embrace them and spread more darkness. Every victory we have, every bit of light we shine, has an effect on those involved, and it changes them. The same is true of darkness. I have seen the light of Star Force, and short of memory loss I can never fully lose it now. It has permanently become part of me, and cannot be undone. If that is the ‘end’ you speak of, then we are accomplishing permanent victories with every person we affect enough to make it stick. And that occurs with repetitive experience stacks.”

“Which the universe then erases when it so casually kills those people,” the Director added.

“Do you know that?” Cal-com questioned. “When we die, are you certain there is no correlation between what we accomplish here to what occurs afterwards?”

“I have no knowledge of this, except that the Core separates from the brain where those memories are held.”

“It is more than just memories. More than just biology. I have seen it personally with brain-damaged Voku. When we healed the damage, the erased skills were not completely gone. Something in their Core had altered, and it stuck. They relearned faster the second time, and in some cases demonstrated a knowledge of things that were not present in their brain. It came across as instinct or other unfathomable but real life occurrences. Have you not had similar scenarios with the injured?”

“I don’t know,” the Director said. “But it’s something I’m going to look into.”

“No going back,” Paul whispered, his eyes looking past Cal-com to somewhere else. “We’re not just fighting for other people, but our own Core development.”

“Warrior is not a description of the past, but a state of being in the present.”

“Did the Zak’de’ron teach you this?”

“In a way. When they cast me out I was forced to either crumble in sorrow or analyze everything. You helped me a great deal with that, Paul. Why are my words so surprising to you when much of it originated from your own counsel?”

Paul sighed. “We have become what you might call battle numb. With the Zak’de’ron leaving, we are essentially victorious and looking at either endless carnage against the Hadarak or maintenance of what we have already built. We are having trouble finding our way forward.”

“The V’kit’no’sat defined you,” Cal-com said, suddenly seeing it in his friend’s eyes. “Now you have surpassed and absorbed them. Your nemesis is gone, and not even the multi-galactic power of the Hadarak can replace it. You know how to fight, and when, but you have lost the ‘why?’”

“Not lost,” Paul slightly corrected. “Just misplaced for the moment. I used to do that with the TV remote far too much.”

“Then let me help illuminate it for you,” Cal-com said with all seriousness. “When I was lost you showed me the way, and that way is as clear now as ever, if not more so with every millennia that passes. You built this empire, so your view of it is different than mine, and I am beginning to understand how your perspective could be compromised. But your purpose remains constant. The V’kit’no’sat are not gone. Their kind continue to exist, you are just not as weak as you were before, and many people are changed because of it.”

“It doesn’t feel like it.”

“Then go to those who have not seen Star Force’s light. Not in your starships behind walls and sensors. Find the dark corners and throw yourself into them with all the power you have now and did not have then. I believe the old you will return, and be grateful for the power rather than seeing it as cheating you out of a formidable challenge. A naval commander cannot become callous to the damage his fleet does by being too far afield from it. You must walk the planets you bombard to calibrate, otherwise they begin to feel meaningless. And that is something the Elders taught us. Sometimes we must steel our emotions to do what must be done, but we must not permanently lose our calibration in doing so. We must maintain a personal connection to the battlefield.”

Paul stared at the Voku for a moment. “Will you show me how to do this?”

“Gladly.”

The trailblazer looked over at Davis. “Permission to go awol for a while?”

“I’m sure the other 100 can continue to beat me up without you,” he said, looking to Cal-com for a moment. “Fieldtrip granted. Leave now before the others volunteer to go with you.”

Paul pushed himself off the window he’d been leaning on into a brisk walk, tapping Cal-com on the shoulder. “Let’s go.”

“Immediately?” the Voku asked, rising out of his chair at a more elegant speed.

“Immediately,” Paul confirmed, already heading down the stairs.

“This is more important than you know,” the Director said as Cal-com was halfway there, with him stopping and glancing back. “The future of the empire depends on it.”

“Then I will not fail,” he said firmly before turning and following Paul down the stairs.

Davis sat in his desk as the two disappeared from view, then spun his chair around so he could stare out across the city and the ocean beyond, processing everything that had been said during the conversation again and looking for any epiphanies he could find, with one thread rising to dominance over the rest.

A second warfront to ‘civilize’ the Unexplored Frontier…and their neighbors that were behaving only well enough to avoid annexation.

Davis hadn’t done that because there were always too many people to save and not enough resources to do it, so he had to pick and choose. Mandating that their neighbors allow people to leave if they want had been his way of helping those he couldn’t get to, and his scouts did a good job of monitoring whether or not people were being allowed to leave, but they couldn’t see everything or be everywhere.

A lot of those worlds needed annexed, but they were obeying the loose guidelines and that had put them as less worthy targets than others. And with the Hadarak banging on the door constantly how could he divert resources away from that overbearing threat to deal with the ‘little dark corners’ that Cal-com had mentioned.

Now that the Grand Border was complete and holding, he did have additional options. Options he’d never had before, and with the Zak’de’ron leaving he’d have even more. And it wasn’t like Star Force wasn’t expanding out there. They’d been nibbling away at the Unexplored Frontier constantly, just not very fast.

“Damn it, he’s right,” Davis said to himself. “Now I’ve gotten punch drunk from the logistics side. We can’t wait to defeat the Hadarak before helping those people. If we do the Hadarak win with a stalemate.”

He sighed, running numbers through his head and not liking what he was finding. Why did they always have to operate at their limits? Couldn’t they just, for once, take it easy enough to build up a reserve? That’s what he’d been doing recently, prepping for the invasion of the Hadarak Zone in an effort to retake it and the galaxy in full, though not knowing what kind of mess they’d get to in the Deep Core when they eventually got there.

If they got there.

“Priorities,” he mumbled, kicking himself for not seeing it sooner. This transition with the Zak’de’ron leaving and absorbing their holdings was the top priority, assuming the Grand Border held. After that it was a choice between fighting endless waves of Hadarak in a defensive action or going on offense and trying to push them back to the Deep Core.

But they couldn’t do that if they made a significant push into the Far Rim.

“The beacons are lit…” Davis said, already knowing what his eventual decision would be.

-----------

While you wait…for the next Star Force episode, you may want to check out John Walker’s ‘Legacy War’ box set if you need some additional reading to stave off your boredom.

US Amazon Link

UK Amazon Link

Also… there is a Star Force mobile card game in early development called ‘Galactic War Empires.’

Game Crowdfunding Page

Game Facebook Page

www.aerkijyr.com

Table of Contents

LITrpg

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

First Contact Fallout

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

The Forbidden Space Fleet

- Map
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

Death Mark

- Map
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

Atonement

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

The Forever Empire

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

Captains Mint

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

The Powers That Be

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

Symbiosis

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10

Capitulation

- Map
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10