《To Face the Day [Semi Hard Sci-Fi Space Opera]》 Marooned Janea awoke to the sensation of someone licking her face. Fortunately, that someone was her dog and not one of her crewmates. Her brown eyes blinked open, and she gazed up at the little white ball of fuzz floating above her, flipped upside down. The little dog, Snowy, panted and wagged her tail excitedly at the sight of Janea waking up. She was fruitlessly dog paddling in the air in an attempt to get closer to Janea. We''re in zero gee. That couldn''t be right, Albatross was supposed to be under thrust for another thirty hours. So, either Janea had managed to oversleep by almost two days, or the main drive had cut out. Again. Janea smushed her face into her pillow and gave a muffled shriek of frustration. Its a wonder we dont go bankrupt with how often this damned heap of a starship shits the bed. The thought had barely been formed in her mind before Snowy crashed back down into Janea, knocking the wind out of her. After a brief, startled yelp, Snowy seemed happy to be on her own four feet again, and excitedly crawled over to Janea and sniffed her relentlessly. Shoving the fuzzy face away, Janea sat up in her bed. Maybe Sandra was just doing some quick maintenance? Her confusion turned to concern when the engine cut out again and she was left floating cross-legged in the air. She held Snowy in her lap and absent-mindedly pet the stubby pooch while she pondered. Maybe theyre just testing it? Her thoughts were interrupted once again as she was suddenly flung against the wall. Shed managed to cushion Snowy with her body, so no harm was done. Shed expected a sore back, but the force that had flung her to the side had been surprisinglylight. That was a maneuvering burn! Why the hell are we doing emergency maneuvers? The ships elderly, diluted alarm sang a morose, drawn out tune, and Lances voice came over the intercom. Action stations! Action stations! Were under attack! SHIT! Janea yelled, clutching Snowy and propelling herself away from the wall. She snatched up the emergency kennel and stuffed the shrieking canine into it. It was a cramped little thing, designed to provide a safe, stable, airtight place to put a small animal in the event of a spaceborne emergency. Snowy was not exactly a devoted fan of the device, hence the shrieking. Trust me girl, youll like it a lot better in here than out there. Janea said, as she activated the kennels magnets and it attached itself to the floor. Ignoring the tiny dogs howls she propelled herself out of her room, slapping the door control on the way out. She was shooting down the hallway when the thrust suddenly returned, and Janea had the wind brutally knocked out of her again as she face-planted onto the hallway floor. I am going to strangle Lance if I survive the next five minutes. The hatch to the control room opened, and-with the thrust still simulating gravity-Janea came in at a brisk walk. What the hell is going on? Janea said, struggling not to let her fear make her shout. Strap yourself in. Now. he said with a terrifying calm. Janea obeyed immediately, and she felt her blood turn to ice water. If theres one thing shed learned about the ships easy-going pilot in the time shed known him, it was that he only started giving orders when things were really, really bad. Akito and Sandra came into the control room, and Akito spoke first, his gravelly baritone sounding equal parts afraid and annoyed. What the hell is- Both of you. Strapped in. Now. Just like Janea, they immediately obeyed, all blood draining from their faces as they did so. Lance didnt make a habit of giving orders to the people who signed his paychecks, a fact that was not lost on the couple. When he saw everyone was strapped in, Lance spoke. Diln Raider, pounced on our ass out of a particle cloud. Nearly barrelled right into its mass driver barrage. He laughed bitterly Dodging that shit woke me up real good. Im lucky I didnt splatter you three against the wall. He looked at one of his monitors in disgust, then transferred it over to Janeas console. It was the sensor read out. The fear subsided, and the old tried and true Space Force training kicked in as she suddenly became a sensors officer again. She gazed at the sensor contact, and then at the image the Albatrosss telescopes had produced of it. It was a brutally efficient design, little more than a set of modular containers bolted to a drive, with nothing protecting it but a few strategically placed Whipple shields meant to guard against micro meteors and little else. Its most stand out features were its trio of light magnetic cannons, which it had fired its initial volley with, and the light laser cannon mounted on its nose, which looked for all the world like a gigantic camera. Looking at his own console, Akito spoke up. Why are we going away from civilized space? Arent we going for help? Lance grimaced at that. That rail gun volley was never meant to hit us, it was meant to force us into an evasive burn in the direction of their choosing. It put us on a vector heading in the opposite direction of help. The longer we run, the further away we get. If we try decelerating, we jump straight into their waiting arms. Crafty bastards. A-...are you sure its Diln? That doesnt look like a Diln Fleet ship to- Sandra started. Lance tapped a key on his keyboard. A decidedly unpleasant barrage of alien noises poured out of his speakers, but it was soon overlaid with the classically dull synthetic voice of a translator software. Attention unidentified freighter, this is the Diln ship Krashtfivlnier , operating under the authority of the Supreme Commander of the Diln Hegemony. Decelerate immediately and prepare to be boarded for a contraband inspection. Attention unident- Lance tapped the key again and the speakers fell silent. Its a Diln ship. Privateer, most likely. Akito swore. Is there anywhere left in this galactic arm that isnt overrun by those bastards? Contraband Inspection? Does anyone fall for that? Janea asked incredulously Any particular reason we arent dumping the cargo and running like hell? Sandra asked. Akito looked like his soul had left his body as the amount of money he was about to lose was calculated by his brain. Wont do any good. Lance said. Theyre faster than us? Janea asked. Lance snorted Everyone is faster than Allie. She accelerates like a pregnant hippo, and thats when shes not loaded up with a fat stack of cargo containers. We might buy a few more minutes if we dump the cargo, but itll be more useful as extra mass to put between ourselves and that laser. Thats our plan? Just sit there and take the laser pulse? Akito said, having recomposed himself. Youre the captain, pal. I just fly the ship. If youve got an actual plan, Id love to hear it. Lance said. Akito sighed. None that arent just as likely to get us killed as they are to work. Detecting a big heat buildup on that bogey! Janea said, slipping into that accursed military lingo she could never seem to completely rid herself of. The thrust abruptly cut again, and Lance swore. I thought wed have more time. Theyre way outta range for a flashlight like that. Must be a custom build, some kind of long range disabler, for cooking through engine modules with one long range pulse. There was a slight weight on the crew as the maneuvering thrusters fired. What are you doing? Akito asked. Flipping us over. Dont want some trigger happy idiot frying us in one shot when they get into close range. Beyond that, I have no ideas. Lance turned to the other three crew members. Janea looked at the various images of the ship produced by the Albatrosss telescopes. Damn, those radiators are white hot. I dont think its going to be shooting anything for a while yet. ...in that case, I think we still have a play to make. Akito said. He keyed the comm, Attention Diln ship, our propulsion is out and we are at your mercy, we are standing by to be boarded. A synthetic rendering of the Diln tongue was fabricated by the ships computer, and a translation was made of the message and beamed to the Diln ship. The vessel burned on an intercept vector. So, you planning on dying as a slave in some Diln factory, or do you actually have a plan? Lance asked. Sandra looked thoughtful, then she seemed to have a sudden realization, and she reached over and slapped Akitos shoulder. I told you to get rid of those things. If we ever run into a customs officer who gives a shit, well be thrown in prison! Akito looked back with a shit-eating grin. Arent you glad I never listen to you? She smacked him again. Albatross drifted, and the Diln raider came alongside, attempting to drift parallel and align its docking clamps. As it drew close, trap doors in Albatrosss side opened, and a flight of six rockets, little bigger than those that would come out of a man-portable launcher, shot out. They were cheap, unguided, useless beyond absurdly close range. Yet, they sheared through the measly converted-freighter hull like a hot knife, and detonated their dirt cheap chemical explosives. The entire raider went up in an explosive decompression. It was an ambush weapons system. It had been designed for exactly this scenario, to serve as a hidden shiv against pirates and raiders. Unfortunately, criminals could get their hands on them just as easily, and after the loss of many law enforcement ships and crews, the various governments of the galaxy decided it wasnt worth the trouble and banned them. While its illegality was its final downfall, in truth it had never been a particularly popular weapons system before hand. Not because it wasnt effective, but rather because it was a bit too effective. Albatross received a demonstration of this as the explosion of the Diln ship scorched her hull and battered her with debris, sending her into a spinning, ragged vector. The reactor is cooked, it would take a miracle to get it working again outside of a drydock, but that doesnt even matter, because our drive cone got melted to slag as well. Even if we could fire the engine, wed just blow ourselves up. Sandra turned and gave a baleful look to Akito. Well, were not going to die in a Diln factory, but we are going to starve to death. Or maybe well freeze first. Brilliant plan, my love. Your genius knows no limits.Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. Whine all you want, the fact is that wed be naked and shivering in their cargo bay by now if we hadnt used that thing. Akito replied defensively Iknow, love. But you can maybe understand why that doesnt exactly leave me feeling very optimistic, yes? came his wifes tired reply. Janea fiddled with her console, trying to scrape together a distress signal with the ship''s battered comm laser. Lance looked over at her. Youd be as well to shut it down and save us the power. The signal wouldve had a hard enough time making it that far through Dark Space when the comm laser wasnt recently-exploded. A carrier pigeon would probably be more reliable at this rate. She gave him an annoyed look. Youve got a better idea, then? Cause from where Im standing it looks like were going to die without help. Lance took a while to respond. ...I might, actually. Been looking at the star charts and survey logs we downloaded on our last stop in port. Systems in this area are all a whole lotta nothing, for the most part, but there was one that got flagged for investigation by a survey probe a while back. Supposedly, it detected possible signs of a life-bearing world in this system here. It also detected what might have been artificial light emanating from it. Janea looked at him for a long moment. ...youre joking, right? Akito was looking at the probe data of the system himself. Lance, this is a white dwarf. Im no astrophysicist, but the simple fact that it exists means that it has died in spectacular, apocalyptic fashion, destroying every planet in its orbit. How would there be a life-bearing planet there? Maybe it''s an extrasolar capture? Lance replied defensively. If its in the habitable zone of a white dwarf, then that means its tidally locked. Not exactly ideal conditions for complex life. Janea chimed in. Even if there is an alien civilization-and there almost certainly is not, I will add-whats your plan for when we magically get there? This isnt exactly the same as asking the neighbors for sugar. Hes too young to get the joke, love. Sandra said. Yeah, but hes old enough to get my point. What exactly makes you think they could, or would help us? We can trade our tech. Teach them how fusion works, or something, in exchange they manufacture a new drive cone for us. Lance said, increasingly agitated. How would we even get there, our drive doesnt work, remember? Sandra said. Lance was quick on the reply. Were already headed in the general direction of the system, just a few burns from the maneuvering thrusters and we can get a straight shot to them. From there we just time our exit from Dark Space to be roughly in the stars habitable zone. Then we perform whatever burns we need to in order to orbit the planet, and then we make first contact. Janea snorted. Im no pilot, but I think itll be a little more complicated than that. Akito interjected. Let me get this straight, Lance. You want us to burn our precious, irreplaceable propellant to set us on a vector towards a star that-by its very nature-is unlikely to have any planets, in order to find a planet that-by its very nature-is unlikely to have intelligent life, to make contact with a pre-space civilization that-by its very nature-is unlikely to have even considered the possibility of aliens existing yet. And then, you want us to make first contact with them, a task that none of us are remotely qualified for. To top it off, all of this is based on a few quick flyby pictures taken by a cheap survey probe. Am I on the money? Yeah, that about sums it up. Perfect. Lance looked at each of his three crew mates for a long moment. Do any of you have a better idea? Weve got enough energy in the capacitors for one antimatter transfer to the transition drive. Once we transfer into realspace, we wont have any way to return, well be fully committed. Sandra said Akito snorted. I think we became fully committed around the time we used up most of our maneuvering propellant to alter our vector. You know what I mean. Yeah, I do. It means that wed better hope the weathers nice on that rock. Our fearless leader, everyone. Janea rolled her eyes. Yes, yes, youre both hilarious. Sandra turned serious again. Once the capacitors run dry, the antimatter containment unit will switch to its emergency backup RTGs to maintain containment. Well need to eject it before we attempt our orbit burn. Janea was confused. Why? We kind of need that antimatter to, yknow, leave. Because if we screw up and crash into that planet, itll just be like a meteor impact. If we screw up and crash with the antimatter core still on board, it will be like a big nuke going off. A really dirty nuke, thanks to those RTGs. Assuming theres actually people down there, wed be screwing over an entire civilization just to save our own skins. We cant do that. Its not right. Lance chimed in. We can strap it to some of our probes, use their engines to make an orbit of the star. It would be a really shitty orbit, but it would at least be somewhere that we could potentially pick it up if we follow the transponder. Works for me. Awfully optimistic, but it works. Akito said. Albatross would drift for a few more hours, and the crew took the chance to catch a few hours of sleep. Janea let a decidedly unhappy Snowy out of her kennel (and cleaned the panic-piss out of it) and then strapped herself and the dog to her bed. By the time her alarm woke her up, it was ten minutes to transition. Lance was already at his pilots console when she came to the control room, and Janea and the other two crew strapped themselves in. Lance spoke. Alright folks, transition in threetwoone A transition event was simultaneously magnificent and incredibly dull. From the perspective of Dark Space, the Albatross was there, and then it simply wasnt. No flash of light or radiation. Just somethingto nothing. From the perspective of real space, there was absolutely nothing at a certain point in space, just as there had been for billions of years, then the Albatross was there. No flash, no effect. The ship simply appeared out of nothing. Organic eyes often struggle to process the sight. A biological mind simply wasnt equipped to process such things. In the biospheres of life-bearing worlds, something did not just abruptly appear where there had previously been nothing one nanosecond before. Janea sagged into her chair. Sensors are detecting a rocky terrestrial worldand artificial light emanating from it. The weight of the discovery hit the four humans at that moment. They, four tramp spacers, were about to completely change the course of an entire civilizations history. And they were going to do it so that they could ask them if they had any fusion reactor parts to spare. The absurdity of it made it strangely easier to process. Sonow what? Janea asked. We decelerate. Lance said. Akito snorted. With what? Lance gave a wane smile. Anything we can. The mass of cargo containers floated away ahead of Albatross. The crew watched them go on the ships cameras. With the stack of containers gone, Albatrosss true, much less impressive size was apparent. It looked essentially like a squat cylinder with an engine bolted onto its rear. It had a large plate on its top that the stacks of cargo containers it was tasked with carrying rested upon. It was a hull configuration so common it was practically universal: engine, power plant, and crew module at the bottom. Propellant tanks and other important bits at the top. All of which was encased in a layered hull that protected against spaceborne debris. Its decks were oriented perpendicular to the thrust, enabling the powerful fusion torch to simulate gravity for the crew when under thrust. With the Albatrosss drive dead, her crew currently drifted in freefall. At the top of the ship, the electromagnets that aided with loading and unloading cargo had been repurposed into a makeshift magnetic cannon, which had propelled the stack of cargo containers ahead of the ship. It served the dual purpose of removing unnecessary mass from the ship, and aiding in the deceleration Akito tapped at his console. He had been an enlisted tech in a weapons department on a Space Force ship during his mandatory service, and was thus the closest thing the Albatross had to a tactical officer (in addition to being captain). Thus, when the Albatross had to fire its very meager weapons systems, he was the one who took charge of it. These weapons amounted to a pair of point defense guns on either side of the hull which served as a relatively effective defense against the low-quality guided munitions the average pirate ship might have. Her guns had never been fired before outside of tests, but now-at Akitos command-they unloaded their entire ammunition supply in front of the Albatross. The streams of bullets flew past the cargo containers. The recoil added even more to the deceleration, but Albatross was still moving faster than the Voyager probe had moved back when it had been the fastest man-made object. It would take more than the recoil to slow the ship. A small door opened in the side of Albatrosss hull, and out of it came a small vehicle. It was the ships lander, used to allow the crew to visit ports in the far-flung systems that lacked proper space infrastructure. It had a powerful chemical thruster able to safely land the entire crew in a variety of gravity wells. It now served as the primary means by which the Albatross might hope to achieve orbit. Lance carefully piloted the lander remotely, docking with the Albatrosss clamp. Then, he ponderously turned the Albatross itself, carefully rationing his movement to avoid using more of the precious maneuvering thruster propellant than he had to. Eventually, the ship was flipped on its side. Lance fired the landers drive, and the crew was thrown against their restraints as the inertia of the burn struck. After an unpleasant amount of time spent like this, the thrust was cut. Lance breathed an exhausted sigh of relief as he examined . This is the most ragged, half-assed orbit Ive ever madebut its an orbit. The crew all let out the breaths theyd been holding. Lance swiveled to face them. Well, now we dump all of our water into the landers fuel synthesizer and hope it''s enough to land. In the hours waiting for the fuel synthesizer, the crew passed the time by examining the world below them that was their only hope. It was, indeed, tidally locked. Its day side was a boiling desert, and its night side was a freezing desert. In the middle, along the prime meridian, a strip of life grew. It had a range of biomes, with climates determined by proximity to the day or night side. Curiously, the signs of civilization could be seen mostly in an arid patch of land in the northern half of the western hemisphere, smaller than Australia. Akito looked grim at that. If theyve only managed to spread that far, then they might be a lot less advanced than we might have hoped. Sandra scoffed. Akito, theyve got electricity. If theyve figured that out, everything else is justdetails. Akito raised his hands in defeat. Alright, youre the engineer. I suppose I should be happy that theyre here at all. Sorry I gave you shit for it, Lance. The pilot shrugged. Cant really blame you. I thought it was a longshot too. Hell, it still might not work. No guarantees that they wont just club us over the head and vivisect us. Well, on that lovely thought, I want to let everyone know Ive finished sending the first contact package. Janea said. Whats in it? Lance asked. Its a Mak Re first contact program, it comes standard with most ships. Its basically an algorithm that reduces language to its most fundamental concepts. You transmit it to an alien computer, and then they fill in the blanks with their own language. This creates a kernel that the translation software can build off of. Akito looked surprised. How exactly does that work? Janea snorted. Hell if I know. We had, like, one lecture on it in the academy. Im lucky I remembered it existed at all. Still, its from the Mak Re, its gotta be good. Nobody does xenolinguistics like the squids. What if they dont have computers? Lance asked, tapping the image of the alien planet on the computer screen with his finger. Then I hope you''re good at charades. Hilarious. Sandra interjected. How do we tell them where were landing? Janea grimaced. I hadnt thought of that. Akito put his face in his hands. Thats kind of important for the whole peaceful intentions thing. ...how about a pictogram? Lance asked. Well, theres a whole lot of reasons why that might not work. First of all, it involves making the assumption that they not only see light, but see it on a roughly similar spectrum to ourselves. I dont know about the spectrum, but judging by their use of electric lights, I dont think its unreasonable to assume that they have eyes. Besides, theres records of pictograms working with past historical first contacts. Sapient minds are by definition capable of reasoning, and carefully designed pictograms can appeal to that. Sandra said. I can make it! Lance said excitedly. His three crewmates looked at him with surprise. He looked uncharacteristically sheepish. One of my electives in the academy was graphic design. This time it was Janea putting her face in her hands. God help us. The crew had taken the time to empty their bladders before donning their environment suits. In addition to wanting to avoid the unfortunate situation of having to pee while attempting to land on an alien planet, the handful of milliliters of propellant that might be synthesized from their urine could very well be the difference between life and death. Clad in their vacsuits, and with Janea carrying a sedated Snowy in her kennel, the crew of the Albatross piled into the lander to face their fate. The lander detached from its mothership, and Lance took it in on a carefully plotted descent brun. The stubby little ship was engulfed in fire as it streaked through the atmosphere. The heart rate of every human aboard spiked as the lander rattled and groaned at the strain. Lances face was like granite as he piloted. He hoarded his fuel like a miser for the majority of the descent. Then, he fired the thrusters, and the crew was thrown against their restraints by a very unpleasant amount of gees. Slowly, surely, the inertia petered out, and there was a clank and a thud as the lander came to a rest on the dusty surface. The crew gave a few desperate sobs of relief. Lance unstrapped himself and wobbled to his feet, still a little disoriented from the flight. He stretched, laughing. And with a whole 3% of our propellant to spare! Hold your applause, please. He turned to his crewmates and chuckled. Well, the easy parts over. He turned towards the landers hatch. Now we start the hard part. Visitors Moments like this were the reason Ti-Ro loved her job. A half hour before, things had been completely normal. Now, she was a part of what would likely be the most important event in Zani history. A massive heat signature had abruptly appeared in the skies above Hent, some distance beyond the planets orbit. Natural objects did not emit heat signatures this substantial, and they certainly didnt appear out of nothing. While few had the courage to say it, it was at the forefront of everyones mind: Aliens. The last of the doubters had recently been silenced when the object had drawn closer and begun to emit radio signals. She stared at the monitor in front of her, taking in the image displayed there. Her incredibly complex and powerful eyes poured over the screen, and she absentmindedly scratched at her ghostly-pale skin with her tails while she waited for the file to load. On it were the image and sound files that the best computers on the planet had been able to parse from the alien signal. For what felt like the hundredth time, she played the file, and the computer struggled to make a graphical representation for a program that had been designed for technology so advanced it made it look like a stone tablet and stylus by comparison. It was a collection of images and sounds that the entire scientific community was pouring over with an almost fanatical attention to detail. It was several dozen incredibly basic images, accompanied by sounds that were at once alien and familiar. The most baffling part was the brief, yet noticeable pauses between each one of them. Their purpose was the primary question plaguing the scientific community, and the various chat channels on the academic network were awash with hypotheses and speculation. The sounds and images in the package played on a loop. It began with a series of sequential beeps. First one beep, then two beeps in a row, then three, and so on. It didnt take a genius to figure out that the beeps were meant to signify numbers, but why the aliens felt the need to include it was a mystery. The beeps were followed by some seemingly unrelated images and sounds. It began with an image that was completely alien in appearance, and yet also very obviously meant to be a depiction of water. This was accompanied by the sound of water. Rain falling, a river flowing, and so on. The depictions went on, there was what seemed to be a crude depiction of ice after this, followed by the sound of steam, and rushing wind. Ti-Ro laid back, closed her eyes, and listened. She moved her head as the sounds changed, instinctually angling her auditory organ in response to the changing stimuli. The sounds grew evermore complex and undecipherable, until it looped back around to the numbers. She lay still a while longer, mesmerized by the numerical tones. Then, the sounds of the rushing river and pouring rain came again, and snapped her out of it. It reminded her that she was parched. Shed been chatting with a colleague for some time over the academic net, and the dryness in her throat had increased. I could go for a drink. she said, lazily rising to her feet as she went to get one. I could go for a drink. a crude, electronic voice said back to her from her computers speakers. She whipped back around, and rushed back to her chair. A loud buzz played. I could go for a drink. came the electronic voice again. Then, the ice came. Thoughts whirled around in Ti-Ros head as she hypothesized and speculated. Finally, she settled on a course of action. Ice. she said into her microphone. Ice. the voice repeated back. After a time, the loud buzz came again. Ice. it said again. It cant be that simple, can it? Could it actually be the case that no one in the entire scientific community had thought to try talking back to the program with a microphone? What is it they say? Hiding in plain sight? The sounds of whistling steam and blowing winds came again, along with accompanying images. Steam? Or maybe vapor? she said aloud. Steam? Or maybe vapor? the scratchy electric voice said back She pondered more. What purpose did this serve? Was it some kind of test, or quiz? Why water? And why the numbers before that? What were the aliens trying to communicate to her people with this? A loud buzz. Steam? Or maybe vapor? the voice said again. It then went on to the next file No, vapor isnt the right word. It wasnt just water, there was also that sound of blowing wind. Maybe hydrogen and oxygen? Or maybe just gasses in gener- She sat up in her chair, heart pounding. Not vapor, but gas. Not ice but solid. Not water but liquid. The three states of matter. Basic, fundamental concepts. Preceded by numbers. Followed by more basic concepts. They arent trying to communicate something to us, they want us to communicate something to them. She restarted the file, from the very beginning. A single beep chimed. One. she said. One the machine said back. - It seemed so obvious to her, now that she was knee-deep in her work. It wasnt a message. It wasnt a test or a quiz either. It was a tool. A translation tool. If her hunch was correct, the aliens were trying to establish a basic understanding of her peoples language. Shed been up all night, puzzling over the meaning of the various images and sounds, and what word was most appropriate for expressing that meaning. The images and sounds had grown increasingly complex and alien as the concepts they tried to express became more abstract. Ti-Ro saw things that she had not thought Zani computer graphics technology capable of producing. Logically, she knew that her enigmatic guests were vastly more advanced than her own people. However, to see it expressed before her own eyes was astonishing, almost terrifying. This computer program had been designed on a completely alien computer architecture and logical framework, and yet it had not only been able to adapt itself to her peoples technology on the fly, it had managed to get more usage out of the machines resources than programs explicitly designed to run on it could. Ti-Ro was no computer scientist, but even to a layman it was obvious that technology like that was centuries, if not millenia ahead of her people. So, her dedication to her task had become about more than just her scientific curiosity. These beings could wipe out her entire civilization at the press of a button. Some kind of agreement, or understanding had to be reached with them. For the survival of her species. An image of an alien city was displayed on the screen. Crude approximations of alien voices and vehicles and machinery brought the image to life with sound. It was almost familiar, despite its alien sense of architecture. Then, there was a bright flash, and a horrifically loud noise. The flash faded, and in its wake was the ruins of the city. No sound played but that of howling winds. The program waited with an expectant silence for the word Ti-Ro would assign the things she had just seen. She stared in horror. Her people knew of such things. While destruction of such a scale was new to her, such senseless death and waste was not. It was a terrible thing, something that her people experienced a few times in their history, during the terrible crises that had struck their civilization at pivotal times. She tried to speak, but found herself hoarse. She cleared her throat and spoke. War. War. the machine said back. A loud buzz. War. The next image showed that same ruined city. Yet, the howling winds had faded. Slowly but surely, the city was nursed back to health. Buildings were rebuilt, voices and machinery could be heard, and life filled its streets again. Ti-Ro knew of this as well. It was something that all of Ti-Zan knew well. They had enjoyed it for centuries, as that was how long ago the last terrible civil war had been fought. Peace. she said. Peace. the machine said back. A loud buzz. Peace. it said again. This time, however, there was nothing following it. It was the last thing in the file. However, instead of looping back around to the beginning, the program closed itself out. Gratitude. came from the speakers. Ti-Ro looked on in surprise. Is it finished? She heard an electronic hum from outside. She went to look out the window, and saw one of the large radio dishes that were the pride of the lab she worked at begin to turn. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. Oh no the young scientist said in dismay. Itstransmitting? Nonononononononononono- like all zani, Ti-Ro instinctually lowered to all fours when running at top speed. She galloped down the hall, and nearly knocked over her supervisor in her rush, managing to skid to a stop just short of him. He looked on in surprise. Any particular reason youre sprinting down the hall? A-... An athlete, she was not. She took a moment to catch her breath, before stuttering out the most important word of the sentence. Aliens! Master Nen-Lig-Phin (his friends call him Nen), Chief Astrophysicist of the Zani State, tertiary member of the Governing Council, and accomplished scientist, felt a terrible itch between his plates. It was an itch hed first developed as a father, which inflicted itself upon him whenever one of his litter would manage to do something so stupid it outdid all of their previous antics. His children were all long ago grown now, and his sons had no doubt developed itchy plates of their own, but the itch had reintroduced itself to Nen since his rise to his current position. He oversaw every single astrophysicist in all of Ti-Zan. And his subordinates had a tendency to give him an itch worse than any produced by his offspring. Young researchers were a lot like children: simultaneously incredibly bright and agonizingly stupid. And also prone to falling asleep at the drop of a hat. One of Nens proverbial children sat in front of his desk, staring up at him fearfully. So, lets get all of the details together: You made a major breakthrough in deciphering alien communication. Without telling anyone. Then you spent hours feeding it information about our language under your own authority based on your own whims and biases. Without telling anyone. Then, you sent this transmission on one of our radio dishes to the alien ship currently orbiting our planet- You might be familiar with it, its the one we know absolutely nothing about -and, once again, you did it- ...without telling anyone? she interjected meekly. He gave a plastic smile. Ah, well I suppose its only natural for your sense of pattern recognition to be so astute, all things considered. He leaned forward onto his desk, his smile wiped away. My dear, dear girl. You really dont comprehend what youve done, do you? I-...I know I messed up, but I didnt know it would automatically- He leaned forward even further, until he was practically on top of his desk. Messed up? This is leagues beyond messing up, Ti-Ro. This is the single most important event in our entire history. The future of our civilization, our race, our species, hinges on the events of the next few days. That is an alien starship orbiting our planet. Every action it has taken since we first saw it has either defied our understanding of physics or demonstrated its vastly, vastly superior technology. It is clear beyond a shadow of a doubt that they could wipe us out with so little effort as to be almost comical. And yet, these beings instead reached out to us. They want to talk to us. Learn our language. Who do they have as their teacher? A highly-qualified team of our finest minds? The greatest linguists, scholars, and philosophers our species is capable of producing? Nope... He reached out and flicked her forehead. Ow! Ti-Ro said ...just you. Nen finished. He collapsed back into his chair. Youve gotten to explain yourself to me, now I get to explain myself to the Head of Physics, and Im dragging you with me. And believe me, Im going to throw you under the bus so hard theyll be digging bits of burnt rubber out of your tailbones for months. Grand Master Tet-Yur, Head of the Ministry of Science of the Zani State, primary member of the Governing Council, and talented shell-flute player, gazed upon the three people standing in front of her. There was a furious-looking Head of Physics, a resigned-looking Chief Astrophysicist, and a terrified-looking Junior Researcher. They all looked like theyd just come out on the wrong side of a leviathan hunt. Reaching out with one of her tails, she took a depressingly-expensive bottle off the top of her bookshelf, and set it on her desk. She reached out with both tails and snatched up four glasses. Uncorking the bottle with her hands, she began to pour. First you drink some tugi, then you tell me why youve ruined my evening. I dont drink. said the Head of Physics, continuing to stare past the Minister. I certainly do. said the Chief Astrophysicist, snatching up his glass and downing it all in one go. The Junior Researcher took hers and stared at it. Wonderful. Now, the evening-ruining. said the Minister of Science. The Head of Physics began. Well, the Astrophysics Department has taken it upon itself to doom our entire civilization. Oh, Ive had just about enough of your melodramatic quotes you paper-plated- began the Chief Astrophysicist. Gentlemen. Less testosterone, more explanations. the Minister interrupted. The Head of Physics was cowed, and Nen decided to speak. Junior Researcher Ti-Ro made a major breakthrough in the deciphering of the aliens transmission. Essentially, Unfortunately, in the process of her interacting with the message, it transmitted itself. Back to the ship in orbit, judging by its direction. The message transmitteditself. the Minister said flatly. Yes. Nen said back, equally flat. And you just, what, watched while your subordinate did this? Nen spared Ti-Ro a sideways glance of pity. ...Unfortunately, the Junior Researcher neglected to mention any of this to her supervisor and, by extension, I didnt know it was happening until the transmission was already away. Tet-Yur turned to Ti-Ro. You made the single most important scientific breakthrough in our modern historyand you didnt tell anyone? Struggling to keep her eyes from looking longingly at the window, Ti-Ro answered. ...yes. So, what was the answer to the transmission, in the end? The minister asked. Is this really what we need to be focusing on right now, Minister? the Head of Physics interjected. Shut up, Qet. the Minister replied, not looking away from Ti-Ro. Im waiting, Junior Researcher. Swallowing her bone-chilling terror, Ti-Ro began. Well, I was listening to the file loop. I got kind ofwell, thirsty. So, while it was still playing, I got up and muttered something to myself, I cant remember what. Andthe program said it back to me! Id left my mic plugged in you see. I had been chatting with my coworker over the net you see and-... she looked at the Minister, listening patiently. ...-not important. The next set in the loop played, and I said something again, and it repeated it again. Then, it hit me. Water, Ice, Vapor. Liquid, Solid, Gas. The three states of matter! This was following those series of beeps that were obviously denoting numbers. Why include these things? Because theyre the fundamentals. It clicked then. They were trying to learn our language, starting with the absolute basics. I went on down the list, and- Hold on. How did you know this? the Minister interrupted Iwhat? Ti-Ro said. So, youre telling me you acted on yourassumptions? A hunch? Not cold, hard, evidence. You know, the thing that our entire field is based upon? Now, hold on, Minister. Nen jumped in. Theres plenty of room for this sort of thing in our entire field. She had a hypothesis, and she chose to test it in order to study the results, all in pursuit of the truth. That is what our field is, Minister. Tet-Yur held out her tails to her sides, the Zani body language equivalent of fair enough, I suppose. Alright, she was testing her hypothesis. Perfectly good science. However, her test involved the single most important piece of information in the history of Ti-Zan. A piece of information we know absolutely nothing about. And, indeed, still dont. She turned to Ti-Ro. Im sure you really didnt know that it was going to transmit itself. Thats precisely the problem. Nen jumped. Im not arguing that shes not an idiot, because she is, but- A knock came from the door. Its open. said the Minister. The door swung open, and the Ministers secretary stood there. Uhmaam. Weve gotten another transmission from the aliens. Tet-Yur grabbed the Head of Physics untouched glass of mushroom liquor from her desk and downed it. The transmission played on screen and a lot of distressingly-important people stood next to Ti-Ro and watched it once again. It was a simple (ish) pictogram video. It showed a high fidelity image (so high fidelity that it stretched Zani graphics technology beyond its limits) of the western hemisphere of Hent. Then, two horizontal parallel lines slid towards each other from opposite ends of the screen, stopping short of actually touching. This was immediately followed by two vertical lines doing the exact same thing. The part of the planet that was inside the small square the two sets of lines created was then blown up to fill the entire screen. The image displayed the lands that were the home of all Ti-Zan (minus some of their more ambitious colony-burrows). Effectively, it served as a map. Then, the same line trick was done again, and the patch of land that was in the square was blown up once again. It depicted the dust plains of Igar. Dry, uninhabited, and flat as newly cut stone. Keb-Soot-Ferri, Mediator of the Governing Council, and the closest thing to a singular leader Ti-Zan had, spoke. Im no rocket scientist, but that looks like a pretty good place to land a rocket. Yenet, the Minister of Discovery, hummed his agreement. Spacious, flat, and far from civilization. Its perfect. Wed actually considered it for a testing site. Well, it looks like were meeting our guests in the front lawn. The Discovery and Diplomacy Act means Ive got full authority to negotiate on behalf of the Governing Council. the Mediator said He turned to the people in front of him. Ill want Yenet, naturally. Tet-Yur, too. My staff he turned to Ti-Ro. And you too, I think. Me? Ti-Ro squeaked out. The Mediator smiled with pity. You wrote their dictionary. Youre responsible for making sure it works. Good luck. Ti-Ro wanted to bury her head in the sand. How am I supposed to do that? First Contact The door sealed behind them, and the four humans stood in the airlock. Slowly but surely, it was completely drained of air, until it was effectively a vacuum. Once this was complete, the four vacsuit-clad spacers were showered in decontamination chemicals. As they dripped dry, Sandra spoke. Is this really necessary? Entire civilizations have been wiped clean by pathogens. In the pre-space age disease killed more people than every war ever fought. Janea turned to glare at her. So, yes, its really necessary. Sandra pressed on. I cant get dog diseases from Snowy, and she cant catch human diseases from me. And were from the same planet! We have more in common genetically with a banana or a carrot than we would with the aliens. How exactly are they supposed to all die of the flu or something when the virus isnt even remotely adapted to live in their bodies? Lance cut in. To be fair, Snowy can carry human diseases, and you can carry dog diseases. Were from a completely separate strain of life to the aliens, yes, but its all the same basic building blocks. Were just big stacks of biological resources, and theres billions-no, trillions of species of organisms that would be inhabiting this planets environment. Thats trillions of chances for one of them to be perfectly adapted to exploit us. And thats just us. Theres no telling what we could introduce from our own internal environments. Hell, theres damn near a thousand species of bacteria living in your gut. Thats a thousand chances that one of them is the alien black plague. Akito laughed. Youve been watching those old nature documentaries again. Lance shrugged. They pass the time. Janea was getting annoyed. How does all of this disprove my point? Lance turned to her. I know I talked it up, butits not really that big of a deal. Janea, there''ve been dozens of first contact events before, and none of them brought some sort of apocalyptic plague with them. Just because something technically possible doesnt mean it will happen. I mean, its possible that Allies antimatter containment unit could fail at any moment and vaporize us all, but she flew for decades and it never happened. Hell, she broke down and it still didnt happen. Look, the harsh truth is, its a lot more likely that these guys will just murder us and disect our corpses than it is that some alien pestilence will kill us. Janea sighed. ...just wear the damn helmets. He held up his hands. Hey, I wasnt the one who started this. Blame Sandra. Quiet, you! the offending voice said. Akito butt in. Alright, science lesson is over, and so is decontamination. Lets get out of this tin can and meet our hosts. He flipped the outer door release lever, and it popped out. The four humans were staggered slightly as a wave of alien air rushed in to fill the vacuum. They made their way out onto the alien sands as a group. Janea surveyed the landscape with her eyes, and she wasunderwhelmed. It looked pretty much like every other desert shed ever heard of, albeit bathed in the light of a perpetual sunset. It didnt help that it was flat as a pancake. She was decidedly less underwhelmed by the small caravan of alien vehicles she saw approaching in the distance. They were alien in their shape and aesthetic sensibilities, but they were still very obviously some kind of off road wheeled vehicle. Shit, I just realized we have absolutely no idea what we are doing. Janea said, trying not to hyperventilate. It took you until now to figure that out? Akito said. You are not helping. she dug around in her satchel. Shit. Who has the speaker? Please tell me I didnt leave it in the lander Sandra held it out to her, and she snatched it up. You gave it to me in the airlock. Janea fumbled with the buttons, her gloved hands making her feel about as dextrous as a rhinoceros, and managed to turn it on. On. Battery fifty-seven percent. the synthetic voice chimed Lance looked at her incredulously. You didnt charge it? Shut up! She connected the device to her phone, and then she loaded up the translation program. Ok, who wants to do the talking? she asked. The other three looked at her for a depressingly long moment. I thought you were going to. Sandra said. Yes, you were a communications officer, right? Communicate! Akito said. Somehow I doubt youd want me to do it. Lance said. Janea groaned. The alien convoy was audible now, and growing louder. Janea felt her heart leap into her throat, and begin beating a mile a minute. The convoy eventually came to a stop, and Janea feared what might come out of it. The doors of the middle vehicle opened, and its occupants exited. The beings that came out of the car didnt really pass muster as eldritch abominations. They werent particularly scary at all, really. They were moreweird, then anything. There were three of them. Their skin was a ghostly white. They all had what, at first glance, looked to be six limbs. Two arms, two legs, and twotentacle things? She couldnt get a look at their toes, but she saw what looked like four fingers on their hands, and two (pincers? Thumbs? She didnt know) on theirlets go with tails. They had what looked to be earholes and nostrils, but the most striking feature was their eyes. Shed never really seen anything quite like them. They were a rainbow of colors, and it was difficult to tell what (if anything) they were looking at. The closest equivalent she could think of was something shed seen in her darker moments of boredom, watching antiquated nature documentaries with Lance: The Mantis Shrimp. If they were anything like that shrimp, they could very well be seeing her in colors she couldnt even conceive of. The alien trio approached, stopping and seeming to be taking the humans in in exactly the same way Janea was taking the aliens in. One was distinctly different from the other two, with bony plates covering its head, neck, back, arms, legs, and chest. The other two seemed to be lacking plates all together. The grippers on the ends of the tails of the plated one were bony, looking almost like a crustaceans pincers. The other two had grippers that were covered in a soft, downy-looking fur or hair. Other than that patch of fuzz, both varieties of alien seemed to be completely hairless. Different sexes? Or maybe just different phenotypes. Sure, the plated one is bigger than the other two, but that doesnt mean anything. Just because human males are bigger than human females doesnt mean it works that way for everyone. They were clad in loose fitting robes that looked somewhere between a toga and a kimono. They didnt seem particularly bothered by the heat (as far as Janea could tell from her complete lack of knowledge about their body language), which made sense, she supposed. It was their planet, after all. The plated alien in the middle muttered something in an incomprehensible tongue to the unplated one on its left. Well, we know they communicate by vocalizations now, at least. Janea thought. The unplated alien that had been muttered to shuffled forward. Janea held the speaker out in front of her and gestured to it. She had no idea if her gestures actually meant anything to the alien, but it started talking either way, launching into a speech. It was a relatively brief speech, and the alien seemed to be looking at her with what Janea guessed was an expectant expression. After a moment, sound came from the speaker. Greeting. Welcome. [Untranslatable Proper Noun; playing recording] Hent Is that the name of their planet? Lance wondered aloud over the internal space suit comms. Or the name of their species. Or the name of this desert. Or maybe it means none of those things. Its impossible to know with a translation this basic. Janea said back. She looked at the being before her. It came from an entirely separate tree of life than her. Sandra wasnt exaggerating. She really did have more in common genetically with a banana than she would with the creature standing before her. Yet, despite all of this, that creature was willing to reach out to her and communicate. Cross the vast gulf between their two species. Oh God, what the hell do I say? Uhwe come in peace? It was fortunate the aliens could not hear the groans that sounded over the space suit comms from Janeas companions. Arrive. Friends. Peace. the sound came out of the wonderful little alien speaker. Well, I suppose that settles the argument over whether theyve come here to kill us. the Mediator mused. The day is young. the Minister of Science said. And peace could very well mean something entirely different to their minds than it does to us.Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. No. It means the same thing to them that it does to us. I can tell you that much... Ti-Ro mused aloud. She turned to the Mediator. I have no idea what it is they want, but Im certain that they havent come here with violent intentions. The Mediator took the information in, then spoke. Well, weve said hello. The proper thing to do next is introduce ourselves. Ti-Ro thought for a moment, then turned her attention back to the aliens. She gestured to herself with her hands and tails. Zani. she said. She pointed to the Mediator, and then to Tet-Yur. Zani, Zani. [Untranslatable Proper Noun]....[Untranslatable Proper Noun], [Untranslatable Proper Noun]. Very helpful Akito muttered. Oh, come on. Its obvious, isnt it? Sandra said, looking at Janea. Well find out. Janea said through her helmet speakers. She gestured to herself in a broadly similar manner to the alien. Human. Then she gestured to her three companions. Human, human, human. The alien tilted its head, and then seemed to understand. Probably. It tapped its chest with its hands. Ti-Ro [Untranslatable Proper Noun] the speaker said. Why do we even have this thing? Lance asked. Janea ignored him, and tapped her chest with her hands in the same manner that the alien had. Janea. Shazaazya-nee-hazyaneeha? the alien managed to get out Lance butted in. Whyd you give her the hardest name first? He turned to the alien, and tapped his own chest. Lance. ...Lahns. the alien repeated. Sandra. Sandra said, waving hello. ...Zaahn-...tra. the alien said, attempting a wave of her own. Akito gave a thumbs up. Akito. Ah-geeto. the alien said, she looked at her right hand for a moment as she created an approximation of the gesture. She then curled her lower tail-(thumb? Pincer?) inward and attempted to make the gesture with her tail as well. The plated alien stepped forward. Keb-Soot-Ferri. it said. The third alien stepped forward and imitated the firsts attempt at a thumbs up.. Tet-Yur. - The alien turned to each Zani one by one. Tie-RowGeb-Soot-FairyDet-Yer. it managed to get out. Eh, close enough. Tet-Yur said. Ti-Ro turned to the Mediator. What should we do, now? He gave a breathy Zani laugh. Who knows? There isn''t exactly a manual for this. Saints, if anything they seem as clueless about what to do next as we are. He pondered it a bit more. Well, lets start with the Leviathan in the room. He turned to speak to the aliens. Why have you come here? The speaker sounded out something in their incomprehensible language. They seemed to have some kind of silent argument amongst themselves for a moment, then they returned their attention back to the Zan. The one that had been doing the talking said something in its language. An instant later, the speaker sounded again. Need. Help. Ti-Ro donned her protective gear, and entered the sealed environment. She heard the clacking of claws on polished floors, and was amused. Her favorite alien was coming to greet her. Hi Snowy! she greeted in her best attempt at the aliens tongue The fuzzy little mammal yipped excitedly and tried to jump on her legs. Easy! Dont want to tear it. she scolded in her own language. The sub-Ministry of biology was extensively monitoring the sterile sealed environment they had created for the aliens. So far, they had yet to find anything that had a negative effect on Hent-based life among the microorganisms that the aliens brought with them. The general consensus was that they would be allowed to leave the confines of their sealed environment within one or two work cycles. The prospect of not having to don the biohazard suit everyday was an appealing one. Ti-Ro! Nice to see you. Lance said, walking into the foyer. Lance! It is good to see you as well. she replied, feeling a secret rush of triumph when he didnt correct her. Hello, Ti-Ro. Akito said, giving her a wave as he went to stand next to Lance. Janea spent most of her time fine tuning the wondrous translation software she had brought with her, and Sandra spent most of her time trying to translate technical documents with the data Janea gave her. This had left the two males with little to do, so they had been attempting to teach Ti-Ro their language. According to Lance, she had made astonishing progress considering the short time they had been at it. Ti-Ro took him at his word, as she had no frame of reference to form her own opinion about her progress. Ti-Zan had only one language, and so the idea of learning a new language was a concept that did not exist outside of the abstract for the species. While there were a few scholars and linguistic experts who specialized in the study of the more archaic forms of the Zani language written in ancient texts, learning an entirely separate language was not something that had been studied extensively. The hypothesis of lost tribes of Zan that had gone out and settled other parts of Hent had been a popular myth in the earlier parts of the industrial revolution, but it had soon been debunked. Once air travel had been mastered and exploration of Hent opened up fully, it had quickly become clear that the valleys and fields and crags of their homeland were the only places on Hent where their species lived. This meant that Ti-Ro had accidentally become the closest thing to a subject matter expert for Ti-Zan when it came to the learning of new languages. While there were teams of scholars, linguists, and scientists she consulted with, she was the one who was in the field. It was a lot of pressure, to say the least. Where Janea? she asked Lance. Where is Janea? he corrected. And shes in the same place she always is. The office. He said, pointing down the hall. Thank you. she said. She nodded to Akito (a bit of human body language she had grown fond of) and started down the hall, Snowy clattering after her. She knocked on the door to the office. Come in. Janea said. Ti-Ro stepped in. Ah, Ti-Ro, just who I needed to speak with. Janea said. While she had a good idea of what Janea had said, she had to wait for the translation when speaking with her, in order to better refine the program. For that same reason, she spoke in her native tongue to Janea. [Ah, Ti-Ro], just who I needed to talk to. the synthetic voice said over the speaker. Ti-Ro was shocked. Wow, so fluid! Yeah, weve finally gotten it to the second level of its translation matrix. It happened the other night while I was fiddling with it. Its gotten enough of a mechanical understanding of your language to speak fluidly, the only thing left is filling in the blanks of its vocabulary. For now, it will just fill in the words it does not know with the audio recording of the word itself, but its grammar should be impeccable. Go ahead, say something. Wow, fascinating. Do you use programs like this to communicate amongst yourself? I was shocked when Lance told me your people had thousands of languages. Its a wonder youre able to do anything with that many. Well, we technically have thousands of languages, but the [vast majority] of them are not spoken on a large scale. Almost everyone speaks Standard these days, its just so easy. That is what Lance and Akito teach me, yes? An artificial language. So fascinating! Yeah, its gotten a lot more popularrecently. It was designed [idiom: from scratch] to be incredibly easy to learn and pronounce. Well, for humans anyway. For you Zani it might not be the same. There it is again. Ti-Ro thought. When talking about themselves and their people, there was definitely something off about it. As she grew to rely on the translator less, shed noticed it more. She didnt think it was anything malicious, but there was a wrongness to it. She knew precious little about human body language, and she wasnt quite able to put her finger on it, but it was noticeable nonetheless. It was if they felt some conscious need to speak more carefully when talking about themselves, as a species. Trying to avoid an awkward pause, Ti-Ro breathed a laugh, and continued the conversation. I think it is still working out the kinks for proper nouns. Zani refers to one individual. Ti-Zan would be the proper word here, as you were referring to my species as a whole. Zan would also have worked, as it''s the plural. Yes, and I could have sworn Id set that correctlywait, were getting even more off topic. I didnt finish my original point: with the translator working at this level, we will be able to communicate properly with your government. In theory, we could pre-write a presentation, and then just translate all of the words the program doesnt know. Snowy, who had been staring at Janea for the whole conversation in the hopes of drawing her attention, finally just walked over and put her paws on Janeas lap. Janea idly scratched behind her ears, and bared her teeth (which was evidently used to convey happiness or amusement and not to convey a desire to tear out a throat, as a Zani grin did). Lets get to work, Ti-Ro. Why the hell are you so insistent on this? Lets just get what we need, fix Allie, and go. Akito asked. We cannot have the first official interaction between our two species be based on a lie. Janea insisted. Im something of a fence sitter for this argument, but I will add that it will involve a lot more than just getting what we need, Akito. Allies damn near totalled. Its gonna take a lot more than a patch job to fix her. Shell need a full rebuild, and even that might not work. Sandra said. And they dont exactly have dockyards for us to work in. I think were gonna have to cooperate with them pretty damn extensively to get anything done. Lance chimed in. All the more reason not to poison our entire relationship with a lie. Janea added. So, what? We just waltz up and say: Hey, were not actually important at all! Were just four space tramps who had our engine break down on us. Also, were actually from one of, if not the least influential and important species in the galaxy. Whats stopping them from just killing us and stealing our tech if we tell them that? Not much. Janea said. But, Im guessing you still havent changed your mind. Akito said with a sigh. Yes. This is bigger than the four of us. Like it or not, were humanitys ambassadors here. We dont have the right to poison our species relationship with them for our own personal gain. Janea stood in what she was told was the assembly room of the Primary Council. While the intricacies of the Zani government were a complete mystery to her, she had been made to understand that the Zan who sat in front of her were effectively at the top of the food chain. She cleared her throat. Greetings. The presentation today will serve to communicate the basics: who we are, why we are here, and what we can offer you. Please refer to your cultural references when you encounter a word that could not be translated, and understand that the translation program will automatically make conversions for things like measurement units. We ask that you hold any questions until the end, and also wish to inform you that the quality of translation will decline outside of scripted communication. she took a breath. I am Janea Balil. I served as a crew member on a rocket ship called the Albatross, owned by the Tanakas, Sandra and Akito, who are sitting behind me, along with our pilot Lance Kristiansen. While transporting cargo on the edge of settled space, we encountered a raiding ship owned by a species known as the Diln. The Diln [enslave] the crews of ships their raiders capture, so we did not deem surrender an acceptable outcome. We made a gamble, and it paid off. We destroyed the raider, but it came at the cost of our ship. We were drifting, far away from rescue, when we found your planet in our star charts. An automated probe had done a flyby of your star system, and your presence was detected. We gambled again. That is who we are, now why we are here: our ship is severely damaged. We have no way of accelerating, or returning to Dark Space, the plane of existence through which we move to travel faster than light. All we desire is to return home. Our hope is that, with your assistance, we can repair our ship and do just that. We have little of material value to offer you in exchange for your help, but we do have knowledge. An image of the albatross, taken from her launch day. This is our ship, the Albatross. She is a Stork class light cargo freighter of Human design. She was built [65 Harvests] ago, and is considered fairly elderly by modern standards. Even in her time, she was not designed for power or speed, but rather to provide the most cost effective means possible to perform bulk transport to colonies without significant space infrastructure. In short, she is old, cheap, and not particularly powerful. She also generates more power from her main reactor than your civilization has generated since your discovery of electricity. Or, at least it did when it was still functioning. She can provide [1.03 Hent gravities] of constant acceleration for multiple days at a time, with a maximum acceleration of [5.58 Hent gravities]. Again, this is technology that is older than most of you, and from Humanity -my own species- who is still fairly new to space travel by the standards of Interstellar Civilization. This is just one of the technologies we can offer to you. Give us a few [harvest fractions], and youll have your orbit. A full [harvest] and youll be able to fly to any location in your star system in a matter of [work cycles]. The Mediator raised a tail. Janea was annoyed at having her no questions stipulation ignored, but she nodded to him. Mediator. You speak of your own species in less than flattering terms. Why? We are very small, compared to most of our peers. As I said, we have little in the way of material wealth. We are somewhatstrapped for resources. How so? Does your homeworld he read his cultural reference. ...Earth lack resources? Janea closed her eyes and breathed deep. The old familiar pain came, from the open wound on the spirit of the human species. I...was hoping to reach the end of the presentation for this, but that seems to no longer be feasible. Inside her was a vault, a secure place in her psyche where she could store the horrible swirling vortex of despair and agonizing loss and utter, absolute hopelessness that every human carried with them. It had been banging at the door in anticipation, and now it came crashing out. The tears were unbidden, undesired, resented, but they came all the same, and a tidal wave of memories she longed to forget flowed with them. You see, Mediator, there is no Earth anymore. The War that Consumes the Stars Fifteen years. That is how long the Diln had been waging war against the entire Orion Arm. For Master of Fleet Kalhinfizett, it sometimes seemed as though hed spent his entire life fighting them. He scarcely remembered a time before the war. A time when the fate of all civilization wasnt hanging in the balance. Hed been a young whelp of a junior officer when the war had broken out. The fact that he was now a senior flag officer spoke both to the length of the war and to its heinous casualties. He stretched, thudding his giant tail against the solid metal bulkheads of his flagship. He was a Tlassiopei. Like all his people, he looked like a velociraptor that had been morphed into a particularly large bear with a long, shaggy coat. Ten minutes, Master. said one of his subordinates. He gave a growl-hiss of acknowledgement, not taking his eyes from the tactical display. He had been given command of the single largest fleet ever assembled by the Coalition, and then tasked by the Coalition High Command to defeat the enormous Diln invasion fleet currently rampaging through their periphery. Nearly a thousand ships from dozens of species would face the Diln menace in open combat. The fleet had every species and government in the Coalition shivering with terror. It was the largest the Diln had assembled in the war thus far. Previously, they had seemed to shun large concentrations of assets in favor of smaller, incremental operations. Their primary method of making war throughout the lengthy conflict had been to weaken the Coalition with irregular forces (the various ne''er do wells on their payroll) on a macro scale, and concentrate their regular forces on carefully selected strategic targets. They fought wide, and this forced the Coalition to do the same. Kalhinfizett stared at the tactical display. It was not a pleasant sight. The Diln fleet was roughly equal in size to his own, but outgunned it by an appreciable margin. A major factor tipping the scales in the Dilns favor was the two massive superdreadnoughts that were the centerpiece of their formation. The gargantuan ships were each armed with two spinal mounted hypervelocity cannons. When one fired, the other primed. With this relatively simple design, one ship could lay down continuous spinal mount fire. The vast armada of heavy cruisers and destroyers that followed the two superships certainly didnt make things any better, either. If he got into a prolonged gunnery duel with the Diln fleet, he would lose. The Diln focused heavily on their gun batteries, to the point that any single Diln ship outgunned any single equivalent Coalition ship in terms of kinetic weaponry. It was a difference in doctrine: the Coalition favored guided munitions, and sacrificed gun mountings for more silos, while the Diln favored kinetics, and sacrificed silos for more gun mountings. It was this disadvantage that Kalhinfizett was counting on The two fleets were going into battle ass-first, with their main engines facing each other as both sides decelerated. Kalhinfizett watched the timer tick down. When it reached zero, the entire fleet flipped over. A few brief moments passed as the computers seized control of the ships maneuvering suites and aimed their spinal mounts. Fine adjustments were made within the weapons own limited traversability. As one, the computers of the thousand coalition ships let loose a slug. They were answered a few microseconds later by the Diln launching their own volley. The computer of Kalhinfizetts flagship struggle to track and show the two volleys on the tactical display. Kalhinfizett strapped himself in. At this range, dodging was still practical, and he didnt want to get plastered all over the bulkheads. Throughout both fleets, ship computers seized the helm and burned their maneuvering thrusters or steered with gimballed engines. The machines struggled to avoid the incoming fire without sacrificing their ability to return fire. The volleys struck within instants of each other. Small ships like the Coalition frigates were simply vaporized when struck, destroyed with all hands in a matter of milliseconds. The larger ships like the Diln heavy cruisers and Coalition battleships had something resembling survivability. But not that much. A Diln heavy cruiser took a round head on. The slug pierced clean through the nose, shredding the reactor on the way out. Somehow, its antimatter containment held, but it made little difference, as its entire crew had been liquefied when the shot shredded its way through the main body of the ship. Another ship, a Coalition battleship, took a round on its nose at a sharp angle when it attempted to dodge. The entire massive war machine spun end over end at a sickeningly rapid rate. Military ships had their crew modules as close to the center of mass as possible, to minimize the injuries that could be sustained from inertia. Because of this, the crew of the battleship suffered only broken bones and ruptured organs as they were slammed against the bulkheads, rather than being pasted against the walls. It was all over in a matter of seconds as the two fleets rapidly reorganized and fired another volley at each other. Seconds later, the rounds struck and there was chaos again for a brief time. The cycle continued like this for some time. Volley, maneuver, reorganize, volley, maneuver, reorganize. Soon, it became clear that Kalhinfizetts prediction was accurate, as the Coalition fleet slowly but steadily bled to death against the superior firepower of the Diln. So, the Master of Fleet did the only sensible thing. All ships, make an orderly retreat. the Masters voice carried over the fleet communication network. It was the obvious next move for a commander in his position. He knew it, his subordinates knew it. Most importantly, his opponent knew it. Accelerating away from the oncoming rounds, the coalition fleet had an increase in the amount of time the slugs took to reach them, which gave them a generous amount of time to dodge. This proved a boon for the retreating fleet, as their casualty rates fell dramatically in a matter of minutes. However, the extensive dodging left the fleet disorganized and scattered. The Diln commander, unwilling to let such a spectacular victory slip through his claws, pursued at an even higher acceleration. Got you, you slaving bandit bastard. Kalhinfizett thought. He keyed a command into his console, and every ship in the entire coalition fleet opened its silos and emptied them of torpedoes. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. The torpedoes fell as their mother ships accelerated away from them at a blistering rate. Then, as one cohesive swarm, they turned and fired their chemical thrusters. Torpedoes were situational weapons, their limited delta-v compared to the powerful fusion torch drives of their targets meant that they could simply be run out of fuel by their quarry if fired from long range. Yet, their power was too great for this crippling weakness to entirely prevent their usage. A single torpedo hit could mean the end of even the largest of ships. The Diln fleet was coming on at the greatest acceleration the Diln body could consistently handle. They were very close, by the standards of space. They had little time to attempt a dodging maneuver against the full volley of torpedoes burning towards them. It was every guided weapons officers dream. The Diln opened their own, much less substantial, silos, and launched. Then, two large subfleets of destroyers suddenly vanished into Dark Space. Trying to save part of the fleet? Kalhinfizett pondered. He thought for a moment, then it hit him. Of course! Im reasonably sure those ships were auxiliaries from client races. Unwilling to take a full torpedo salvo for the overlords, no doubt. The Diln counter salvo came rushing onward. It was smaller, but the torpedoes were of much higher quality. It was another difference in doctrine, with the Diln preferring high-quality, versatile warheads. The exceptionally advanced weapons could strike with a weaker precision lance of nuclear fire, or explode with maximum energy output in a sphere of pure energy. The torpedoes of this salvo had been set for the latter. Kalhinfizett watched the Diln torpedoes on their unusual vector. They were burning far too hard to be able to reach the fleet- Spirits curse me! Stop decelerating immediately! Kalhinfizett ordered. The order was carried out with decidedly less precision than the premade orders he had activated earlier. Hundreds of captains from dozens of species acted independently to decelerate their ships. It was sluggish. Too sluggish. It happened so quickly it was difficult to follow. The Diln torpedoes activated their final stage, each one launching multiple independent warheads. The warheads flew to optimal locations in the oncoming enemy salvo and detonated. Kalhinfizett watched in dread as more than sixty percent of his salvo was instantly vaporized. Moments later, the remaining Coalition torpedoes activated their own final stage, and a still-large swarm of warheads came in. They drew within fractions of a kilometer of their target, and then detonated. Even severely depleted, the salvo extracted a grievous toll. Yet, the Diln fleet maintained its discipline and came hard for the Coalition fleet. The Master of Fleet knew despair as he watched the oncoming enemy. His own fleet had started to decelerate, in anticipation of delivering a followup volley on the Diln fleet. Which was supposed to be disorganized and scattered from maneuvering to escape the torpedoes. Kalhinfizett got a grip of himself, and let his fear and anger at his own failure go. The only thing to do now was salvage the situation. Hed have to engage, and try and break out and begin a rapid retreat- The two Diln superdreadnoughts opened their remaining silos, and fired the torpedoes they had evidently been holding in reserve. The guided weapons moved as one flock, before splitting off and going towards several carefully selected targets. It was the heaviest ships in each individual squadron- which were, naturally, usually the flagships of their respective units. The units in question burned in chaotic vectors, with the heavier ships struggling to evade while the smaller moved to intercept. It was in this moment that Kalhinfizett knew. His opponent wasnt improvising on the fly. This was a carefully crafted battle plan being executed before his eyes. He predicted every single action I would take, from the moment he laid eyes on my fleet. To have been outplayed in such spectacular fashion almost made the Master of Fleet lose control. Then, he remembered his duty. All ships are to activate their transition drives immediately and burn for friendly space! the ragged, disorganized fleet struggled to comply with their new orders. He was then immediately squashed into his acceleration couch as his flagship made a hard evasive burn. His ship was one of the targets. Under the strain of the acceleration, Kalhinfizett couldnt move. All he could do was think. With this defeat, the Coalition was wide open. To say that the war had been lost in this battle would be an exaggeration. Yet, because of this defeat, the meaning of victory would take on a new identity for the Coalition. Waving the banner of the free peoples of the Orion Arm over the many worlds of the Dilns vast, previously unseen civilization had hardly ever been in the cards, but now even just reclaiming what had been lost would be next to impossible. For some, the prospect of becoming a client race might even start to seem more acceptable. With this battle, the hope for freedom in the Orion Arm teetered on the edge of the abyss. The flight of torpedoes targeting the flagship had unleashed their warheads. Many fell to the laser point defenses of the flagship and its escorts. But all it took was one. It detonated, sending a thin lance of nuclear fire through the heart of the flagship. The antimatter containment was breached, and the entire ship was vaporized. The remnants of the Coalition fleet appeared into Dark Space piecemeal, rather than as one cohesive unit. This lack of cohesion made them fodder for the squadrons of client race destroyers that had vanished into Dark Space a short time ago after firing their torpedoes. While outnumbered, the destroyers were a disciplined firing line, while the Coalition was a ragged mob with no consistent formation. They were turned to mincemeat. The rest of the Diln fleet appeared into Dark Space. The rain of gun fire became a hail. The two superdreadnoughts carved a bloody swath through the besieged enemy, with each shot from their dual cannons having the potential to completely destroy even the largest of ships. The scattered few ships that had survived to this point fled in a full-blown route. The many Diln ships made to pursue their enemy as they fled like wild animals in every possible direction. No. a voice rang out in the command deck of one of the superdreadnoughts, the flagship. There is a point where pursuit brings diminishing returns. We have reached it. The voice came from a man that most would know as the Supreme Commander of the Diln Hegemony. Some would even name him Emperor. As his officers looked upon him, awed once again as he delivered his people another spectacular victory, many could certainly understand the sentiment. The Emperors were sacred figures, their dynasty long extinct. To claim their title was sacrilege. Yet, for those that followed him, it was hard to find a more fitting title. What else do you call a man who brings every one of the dozens of squabbling warlords to their knees, bringing peace to the Realm for the first time in a thousand years? What else do you call a man who led the Diln to greatness, dragging them from the ignorant muck of stagnation they had been stuck in for so long it felt as though it had always been this way? What else can you call the Ruler of All the Diln, other than His Majesty, the Emperor? The Supreme Commander sucked down a breath, closing his predatory eyes and running a claw through his coat. A great victory, they would call this. Yet, for all that, the losses had still been significant. Hed need every single hull for the work that was to come. And it still might not be enough. Them The Mediator was more than a little taken aback. He gathered himself and spoke again. I cant claim to know much about your species physiology, but judging by thesensitive subject matter, I can only assume this is an emotional reaction of some sort. Take all the time you need, but please. Elaborate Janea breathed in deep. She was young, had been born on one of the colonies. Shed never even been to Earth. Its loss still ached, in a distant sort of way. For people her age, the Earth was like a parent that had died before they could form a memory of them. The pain came not from the memories of what they lost, but rather from the knowledge of the memories they would never have. Those who had been youths or adults at the time would be reduced to tears when watching the footage of Earth. Like almost every human, shed watched that footage. It was a recording of a slow, agonizing murder. Cities crumbled, oceans were fried into a muck of desiccated animal corpses, continents were cracked. Yet, it was not memories of Earth that brought Janea pain in this moment. It was the memories of its murderers that gripped her heart like a vice. I Janea took another breath. This will be easy. I know it by heart. Every kid who grew up in the fleet could recite the whole war from memory. I will give you theshort version. In the last days of our civilization, we received a demand for one of our star systems by an ancient race known as the Ivos. No explanation was given. Within a few weeks, they invaded our territory. They were vastly more advanced than we were, but we fought back. We even won, for a time. Yet, they kept coming. The harder we fought, the greater their brutality became. One by one, our colonies were burned. Soon, all we had left was the Earth. Our Homeworld. They destroyed it, wiped it clean of all life. She took a moment, closing her eyes and swallowing. A few of us survived, fleeing in whatever ships we could find. Most of us died in the Ivos [genocide], however. The Zan in the room looked on in horror at the brief, monotone description of crimes worse than anything they could have ever conceived of. The Mediator was the first to find his voice. These- he cleared his throat. ...-These Ivos, what happened to them? We dont really know. They returned to their space, for the most part. They leave us alone, strangely enough. Had he possessed eyebrows, the Mediator might have raised one. Youll have to forgive me, as I find that rather hard to believe. Nevertheless, it is the truth. Why would they commit such astonishing evil, only to juststop? We dont know. Maybe they decided wed suffer more this way. The Zani mind struggled to grasp such cruelty. It was just tooirrational. Cruelty for crueltys sake was an alien concept to them. A mixture of terror, revulsion, and confusion filled the hearts of every Zani in the room. What of your neighbors? the Mediator asked There was little they could hope to do. The Ivo fleet was far too large. So they justlooked the other way? Yes. The Mediator took a moment to process that. I see. So, youve let us know that there as an ancient, highly-advanced race of beings that seems to committ genocide on a whim and has a fleet so large that none can hope to challenge them. Why, exactly, do you think going into space will sound appealing to us now? Youve already been discovered by that automated probe. If we know, then it wont be long before everyone knows. The Coalition will probably leave you alone, but the Diln arent above sending a fleet to subjugate you. The Mediator did the Zani equivalent of a sigh. ...Diln? An ancient species of slavers who are currently trying to conquer the entire Orion Arm. The Coalition is an alliance of races trying to stop them. Janea said in that same bland monotone. Ah, of course. What else could they have been? He rubbed his face with his hands. Are there any other terrifying existential threats we should be aware of? Well, a particularly bold pirate warlord might have a go at conquering you, but otherwise everyone else has already picked a side in the war, although there are a few irrelevant species that have managed to squeak by unnoticed. Humanity being one of them. The Mediator breathed a laugh. So, what? Were supposed to just form an alliance with humanity because you happened to be the first people to find us? Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators! I dont have the authority to do that. I told you, were just four travelers who want to go home. Were not offering an alliance, were offering a trade. Our knowledge, for your resources. Once our ship is repaired, well leave. If you never want to see another human after that, then thats your decision. The Mediator stood up. Under the provisions of the Discovery and Diplomacy Act, I have the authority to declare that we accept your offer, and I do, indeed, accept. However, arranging the details of the exchange is beyond my authority. The Governing Council shall take a few days to organize a plan of action. In the meantime, the four of you will be given housing and any supplies you may require to sustain yourselves. You are also free to explore within the limits of the capital city. We shall summon you when we are ready to proceed. I declare this Council session dismissed. He turned and left the room. That was surprisingly easy. Lance said, as the four humans and their Zani chaperone gathered together. Janea nodded. I know. I was expecting more pushback. Why? Its not like they have a choice. The cats out of the bag, has been since that probe first discovered them. A cats a pet. Kind of like Snowy, but, uhdifferent. Janea said, reflexively providing context for their alien friend. What? Ohyes. Ti-Ro said, before withdrawing back into herself. The four humans exchanged a glance. Sandra nudged Akito, and gave him her best wifely do something, you idiot look that she could muster. He coughed, scratched his head, and said something. So, Ti-Ro. Are there any good places to grab a bite to eat around here? Im told weve got the run of the place for the next good while. what? Ti-Ro said distractedly. Lance stepped in close. Food. Wed like some. I havent eaten anything that didnt come out of an airtight bag in weeks. Yes, food. Toeat. She started walking, heading out of the room. The four humans exchanged another glance. Janea gave a shrug and started after the alien, her three human companions soon following. Zani restaurants seemed to all be buffets. For the alien visitors, this quirk proved quite useful, as it allowed them to test the food to make sure they could eat it without melting their insides with alien chemicals. The humans stacked their plates high with everything that passed their phones chemical testing, and then made the trip back to their table. Lance then went off again, and returned with five glasses of suspicious liquid on a tray. He set it on the table. Well, I have five glasses of what my translator tells me is fungus beer, which smells about as appetizing as it sounds. he said as he set the tray down. Janea took a whiff. I mean, its not bad. Its not good either, but its not bad. Akito took an experimental sip. He made a face that was neither good nor bad. Its like someone made beer out of vodka. Sandra looked at him like he was an idiot. That makes no sense. She took a sip. ...oh my God youre right. The two younger humans took their own experimental sips, and had equally mixed reactions to the beverage. Lance picked up something on his plate, and watched it squirm in his fingers. Now, these things caught my eye most of all. They seem to be shellfish in the most literal sense of the word. I didnt have the courage to ask if they were still alive. Im also not sure how Im supposed to eat it. Janea looked at it in fascination. Wow. It looks like a rock that magically turned into a fish. Or a fish that is slowly turning into a rock. Lance countered. Either way, I dont know how to eat it. Any advice from our local girl? he said, turning to Ti-Ro. She was startled. Oh! Umm...we usually just put them in our mouths. Lance smacked his head into the table. Yes, I could gather that much. I mean, which part do I put in my mouth? ...all of it? Ti-Ro asked, momentarily broken out of her thoughts by the perplexing question. Lance looked at the rockfish and then looked back at the Zani. Hilarious, can I get a serious answer. I was being serious. she snatched it from his fingers and tossed it into her mouth. Unnaturally loud crunching followed as she ate the animal. For the first time, the humans actually took the time to get a good look at their alien friends teeth. Lance was mesmerized. Good God, theyre like soccer cleats. Its a wonder the dentists on this planet dont hang themselves. What is a dentist? Akito laughed. Well, thats a terrifying question. Sandra answered. It is a person whose job is to take care of other peoples teeth. Who would pay for that? Dont your teeth grow back? Ti-Ro asked, not a trace of deception on her face. Its surprising how well you pull off the puppy dog eyes, considering you dont have pupils. Lance said. That does not answer my question. In fact, it only gives me more questions. Ti-Ro said in annoyance. Sandra extended the alien a lifeline. No, Ti-Ro, we grow one set of teeth as children, and then a second, permanent set as adults. Isee. her brief burst of energy seemed to have gone as whatever was troubling her seemed to return to her memory. Alright, this is ridiculous. Ti-Ro, what is wrong? Janea asked in exasperation. Nothing. she said, about as unconvincingly as possible. Ti-Ro, Im insulted youd think Id buy that. Lance said. She pulled at the hair on one of her tails in anxiety. Its justhow are you ok? Janea sighed. Youre talking about Earth, I take it? She nodded emphatically, her love of the human gesture was displayed even now. Yes! How do you go from emotional pain so terrible you have a physiological reaction, to joking aboutrockfish, and mushroom beer? Sandra placed her hand on Ti-Ros. Ti-Ro, it does hurt. Even now, it hurts. For every one of us. Akito stared into his cup. Sixteen billion nine hundred ninety-nine million seven hundred eighty thousand. It was an agonizingly familiar number for the few humans left alive. What? Ti-Ro asked, confused by the non-sequitur. Thats the rough estimate of how many people were murdered by the Ivos. Lance said, his voice taking on a monotone all too similar to the one Janea had used. Ti-Ro felt ill, and it only grew worse as she processed the number. It was an inconceivable amount of deaths. It was a figure composed not of numbers, but of people. Each one was an individual, each one had been its own story. Every triumph, every tragedy, it had all amounted to nothing for seventeen billion stories that ended in ash and death. An atrocity of a scale physically impossible to comprehend Zan did not shed tears, but they certainly did cry. Ti-Ro struggled to fight down the urge to sob. That such a nightmare could be real was a tragedy that demanded her sorrow. How? she asked, unable to articulate her swirling thoughts. You get used to it, after a while. Janea said. Brains are good at compartmentalizing. When youre in the moment, living your life, it gets tucked away in a little box where you dont have to think about it. But, in the quiet moments, it comes again. It will always be there. Akito leaned against the table, thoroughly interested in his cup. We keep going, because otherwise it all meant nothing. While we live, they live on in memory. All of them, from even before the Nightmare. If we give up, lay down and die, then there will be no one left to prove that human civilization ever existed at all. Thats why we keep going, why we laugh and joke and live. Thats who we do it for. He raised his glass, the other humans doing the same. They uttered the words of the toast that had become tradition in the twenty years since the fall of Man. For Them. R&D To Face the Day - Interlude 2 Tet-Yur, Minister of Science for the Zani state, was disappointed. These seem a littleunderwhelming, compared to some of the other technologies I have read of in your archives. Nro-Phesh-Gezmei, Chief Rocket Scientist, was incredulous. Underwhelming? These vessels would outperform anything we have ever built! It could go to almost any Near-Hent Asteroid, and return, and then be reused. Most of our rocket projects budgets just get spent on the boosters to get the damned things into orbit. These ships will open up everything in our solar system. Sandra added her own points. They may not seem like much, but every single spacefaring race has used ships like this in their past. Cheap, reusable chemical rockets like this are the lifeblood of space travel. With these things, you can build and transport just about everything you need. Until you get proper space infrastructure in place, theyll also be the cheapest way of getting anyone and anything off-planet. Tet-Yur looked at the schematics again. It was essentially a big metal tube full of combustible chemicals, and yet somehow it was more advanced than anything ever produced by her people. She turned to the human engineer. Would our resources not be better spent developing fusion rockets? Nro grunted his agreement. While I am a fan of these rockets, I must admit to a desire to get fusion drives of our own. Sandra shook her head. Fusion isnt just a technology, its an entire industry. Itll be decades before your industry will be developed enough to produce reactors efficiently. Youve already got fission figured out, and that has more than enough power for our immediate purposes. She tapped her finger on the schematic. You use these things to set up the basics: infrastructure, orbital dockyards, spaceports, resource refineries. It took humanity nearly a century of using rockets like this before we could properly be called spacefaring. Youll have it different. With our help youll be in Dark Space within your lifetime. Tet-Yur snorted. Yes, Dark Space. Another fantastical technology you dont want us to build yet. Antimatter manufacturing is as expensive as it is dangerous. You dont have a nice conveniently placed uninhabited rock to refine it on like our Mercury, so the only safe way for you to manufacture it is in orbital facilities. Which are outlandishly expensive and completely beyond your capacity to build. Weve got some antimatter we left behind in your suns orbit, and Albatrosss transition drive still works fine. Well be able to leave. We can take some of your officials with us, and you can set up trading relationships with nearby suppliers. Tet-Yur cocked her head to the side. Are your people not able to provide us with antimatter? Weve told you, we dont have that kind of authority. I think our government will want to establish a relationship with you, but I cant actually guarantee that. So, Im giving you options. Tet-Yur slowly nodded, having taken a liking to the human gesture herself. Then she stopped for a moment, and looked confused. Wait. I thought the transition drive didnt provide any thrust, and your ships fusion rocket is still destroyed. If were not going to be making any fusion reactors anytime soon, how are you expecting to move once youre in Dark Space? Sandra gave a mischievous smile. Ive got a few ideas. I thought warships used kinetic weapons in our galactic Arm. Why are we making theseexplosives? Qet, the Head of Physics asked. These are a lot bigger than any explosions youve ever seen, I can tell you that much. Bek-Deel, the Chief Nuclear Physicist said. What the Chief says is true. One of these weapons could destroy a city. Aktio said. That seems likeoverkill. Qet said. They arent quite as potent in space. Theyre far more destructive in an atmosphere, as the blast wave created in the air does dramatic damage to everything in a very large radius. In a vacuum, there is no shockwave. The only thing they can do damage with is their raw energy output. Fortunately, their energy output is substantial. the human said. If theyre so powerful, why do your people use kinetic weapons, then? Qet asked. Because they cost money to build and maintain -substantially more than a railgun or hypervelocity cannon- for minimal added destructive potential. However, nothing you can build in the near future will have enough power to make a magnetic cannon that can compete with your neighbors. So, youll have to settle for the more low-tech option.If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Bek-Deel chimed in. So, what? If these Diln of yours come along, we just send one of your new rocket ships up there loaded up with these? No. The most efficient way is to load up a few hundred nuclear missiles into orbital silos. Itll take more time and money, but its guaranteed to deter the small-time threats that exist out there. A dedicated war flotilla will still roll over you, but theres little you could hope to do about that for now. Qet gave a queasy attempt at a chuckle. Comforting Bek-Deel scratched his head with one of his tails as he thought. It seems inevitable that well need warship of our own if we hope to remain independent. Yet, I dont know how we could hope to build something with an engine powerful enough to be worth the trouble anytime soon Akito held his hand to his chin. Well, now that you mention it, I think my wife had an idea about that Ti-Ro dodged an item that had been carelessly thrown by Janea as she dug around in the storage bin of the Albatrosss lander. Not that I dont appreciate a chance to get a closer look at this ship, but how exactly does what youre looking for help us? Ti-Ro asked. Janea rummaged some more. Ha! Got it. she pulled out the object in question. It was a big, ugly brick of a phone. I like my phone. Its really damn useful, and since youre the only Zani who speaks Standard, its the only way for me to communicate with Zan that arent you. So, Im not excited by the prospect of giving it up to be dissected by a bunch of Zani computer nerds. And neither are the others. She held up the bigger phone in triumph. But this thing? I dont give a shit about it. Its an emergency phone. Designed to be as cheap and durable as possible, and its not remotely as powerful as my personal phone. Despite this, its still got more processing power than your best supercomputer. Taking this thing apart and learning from it will advance your computer technology by centuries. She held out the phone for Ti-Ro to look at. Ti-Ro took the offered phone and examined it. Computing is not a field I am well versed in, but I can perhaps see its value. Janea smiled and held up her own phone. With this, I can process complex equations that would have taken days to calculate in the age before computers in a matter of microseconds. Yet, it can also do something as mundane as reminding me of my doctor''s appointment, or taking pictures, or playing videos. All of it on a device small enough to fit in my pocket. This is the future of computing, Ti-Ro. It wont be long before damn near every Zani on the planet has something like this in their pocket. Well, it certainly sounds interesting, at least. I cant claim to dislike the prospect of having a pocket computer of my own. But She made a show of looking around. Youll forgive me if standing inside of an alien spaceship is a bit more exciting at the moment. Janea laughed. Not really a proper spaceship. More just a really advanced taxi cab. It flies through space, and carries people on it. It is a spaceship. Ti-Ro said with finality. Janea held up her hands. Alright, alright. You win. She got up and dusted herself off. Ti-Ro tilted her head. You want to get some tagi? Janea scoffed. One of these days youll have to visit the fleet. Then maybe we can get you a real drink. That didnt sound like a no. Shut up and drive us there already. Nuclear Salt Water Rocket? the Mediator asked, looking at the document placed in front of him. He looked back up. Why do I get the feeling Im not going to like this? The four humans and several Zani scientists sat in a spacious meeting room, in order to present their proposal to the Mediator. Sandra decided to start. Its a very powerful rocket engine. Its about as close as you can get to a fusion torch with your current technology. With it, you might be able to make ships that can compete with light raiding ships and Diln privateers. Over short ranges, at least. Our own species used it for a time in the earliest days of Interstellar travel, before our fusion technology had fully matured. Fascinating. Why are you telling me this? the Mediator said. Well, as I understand it, youre not actually an executive in the sense we humans think. Rather, youre only the head of the Ministry of the Interior. However, you still have the authority we need to- Sandra began. Yes. I am not a ruler. My ministry oversees the various aptitude tests and exams that determine who gets what position in our bureaucracy. In addition, we enforce the various rules and regulations that control the mechanical functions of the government. My job, specifically, is to ensure that the Governing Council is taking an active approach to the government of the state. I call meetings, bring resolutions before the Council, and try my best to see to it that the Council reaches a consensus on a given issue within the time allotted. If we fail to do so, we all are forced to resign. Wellyes? Sandra said, a little taken aback by the oversharing. But, Im told your ministry is also responsible for fundamental things that affect Ti-Zan as a whole. Things like, access to clean water, food security, criminal justicepublic safety. Because of this, your permission is necessary for us to proceed. The Mediator laid his head on his desk. Oh Saints, thats an ominous thought. Bek-Deel cleared his throat awkwardly. Do you perhaps recall the bombs I discussed with you? The Mediator seemed to deflate at the question. Ah, yes. The city busters I believe was how you phrased it. The bombs that can wipe out hundreds of thousands of people in an instant. Why, dare I ask, do you mention those? Sandra cut in. This rocket engine we showed you operates under a similar principle. It is, essentially, one continuous controlled -and I do emphasize controlled- nuclear explosion. I see. So, youd have our astronauts fly a ship powered by one continuous city buster going off behind them. Yes, essentially. Its very safe. As I said, we refined the design over time when we used it ourselves. The version you would be using is a mature design, much cleaner and safer than our earlier models. The Mediator sighed. I cant help but notice that you said cleaner and safer, rather than clean and safe . Bek-Deel spoke again. Well, sir, do you know of the waste produced by the reactors that power our colony burrows? Slowly, painfully, the Mediator turned to face Bek-Deel. Oh, you mean the extremely toxic waste that can kill people just by being in proximity to them? Is that the waste youre referring to? Y-yes. The engine does produce a significant byproduct of radiation. So long as we do not use it near Hent or any other populated area, this is not really a problem. But But, you still need my permission, yes? You want my permission to build a gigantic continuous bomb that constantly spews radioactive death behind itself? Sandra blinked. ...Yes. The Mediator leaned back and closed his eyes. Then he sat up straight. Sure, why not? You have my permission. He stood up, and went to leave the room, only to turn back and face the room again. Please dont make me regret this. Fixer Upper A well-used lander of alien origin burns its way out of Hents gravity well. It isnt long before its on an intercept course with the orbiting derelict of the Albatross. Beside the derelict, the recently-gutted engine and reactor of the ship (removed during a previous trip) drift along. Albatross is a working ship, designed to be easily maintained. To this end, the entire engine and reactor assembly can be pulled out of its rear to be serviced. This feature has recently been used to swap out the destroyed fusion reactor and drive and replace them with the comparatively primitive atomic rocket to be used in its place. The finishing touches will still need to be applied inside the ship itself, however. The lander closes in, finds its tiny docking bay within its beleaguered mothership, and docks. Two humans and one Zani have come on the lander, and they exit the airlock with a purpose. As they enter the ship, power from the lander makes its lights flicker on. You can either come with me or find a spot to float that wont get awkward when the spin starts up. Lance said, heading for the control room. His two companions, Sandra and Zani nuclear physicist Bek-Deel, elected to follow after him. Making it to the control room, Lance sat down at his familiar pilots console and began inputting commands. WIth the extra maneuvering propellant transferred over from the lander on our last trip back up here, getting a tumbling pigeon going should be trivial. Lance said. While space travel was by default a weightless experience, gravity could be simulated through the inertia created by acceleration. When a ship was under thrust, it created the illusion of gravity for its crew through its inertia. The decks of a ship were perpendicular to the thrust, so from the perspective of the crew it was as if the ship was accelerating upwards towards its destination. However, ships were not always under thrust. Even with the incredible efficiency of modern engines, starships still spend much of their travel time simply drifting, in order to conserve fuel. During these periods of downtime, gravity is simulated by spinning. For military ships, this is accomplished by an internal centrifuge that spins like a top beneath its armored skirt. For yachts and luxury liners large, complex external rings or variable-geometry hulls will contort to create the spin gravity necessary without compromising passenger comfort. However, for the majority of the ships flying through the Dark Space of the Orion Arm, such measures are needlessly costly. For economical ships like the Albatross, the easiest thing to do is to just flip the entire ship vertically end over end, repeatedly. The less-than-eloquent name for this method being, of course, the tumbling pigeon. With her crew module located towards the bottom end of the ship, and fuel and critical systems located towards the top, the ship can spin in this manner without inverting the internal gravity and turning the ceiling into the floor and the floor into the ceiling. Albatrosss maneuvering thrusters fired on a carefully planned burn. Slowly, steadily, the three people aboard found themselves pulled to the floor by the inertia at a comfortable one half earth gravity of acceleration. The ship was more than capable of a faster spin and thus higher gravity, but it would be overkill. Besides, Lance loved half gravity. All the comforts of gravity, and you get to feel like a superhero with twice your normal strength. Once the spin was properly started, the trio went to the engine room. I dont know if Ill be able to get used to a giant slab of lead between me and the reactor. Sandra said, crouching down and banging on the hatch that had once led to the reactor room, and now opened only to a lead wall a few centimeters from it. The old fusion reactor room could be climbed into by engineers for servicing when powered down. Try to do that with the current arrangement, and youd be cooked alive by radiation. Its a lot easier than getting used to terminal radiation poisoning. Lance replied dryly. Fair enough. Bek-Deel looked around the engineering room with a mixture of excitement and reverence. This is definitely the highlight of my career so far. Sandra smiled. Ha, this is nothing. When I was in the Force, I got to serve aboard Zenith. Her engineering room was almost as big as the Albatross itself. Good God, the power output. One of her point defense lasers could probably melt clean through our girl. Albatross is my baby, but shes a bucket compared to most of the stuff out there. Zenith? Bek-Deel asked. Lance gave him the answer. Our flagship. Shes a super dreadnought, bigger than almost any warship in the Arm. We started building her to fight the Diln, finished her to fight the Ivos, and she never got used for either purpose He chuckled. Pirates never give us any trouble thanks to her, though. Sandra went over to her console. Im going to begin the startup sequence, can you give me a hand, Bek-Deel? The alien gave his best attempt at a nod and walked over to her. Hours had passed, and the reactor startup sequence had gone off without a hitch. Sandra and Lance were running through a systems check. Life Support. Sandra said. All air scrubbers were showing as green, and the temperature regulators were on and functional. Check. she said. Comm Laser. The communications device showed its status as green on the console display. Check. Lance raised an eyebrow. Ill be damned. I didnt think those Zani parts would be able to fix it. Sandra ignored him and went on. Telescopes and cameras. The video feed from the various visual recording devices throughout the Albatross came through on the screens of consoles around her. Check. Running lights. The external cameras showed the beams of light coming from the activated spotlights. Check. Point defense guns. Trap doors on either side of the ship opened and auto cannons emerged from them. The ship was sent back slightly by the recoil as the guns fired a single burst before falling silent. Check. Looks like it takes those new bullets without a problem. Sandra commented. The Zan had never even conceived of caseless ammunition before the humans had introduced the concept to them, but, once they had been given the proper chemical formulas, manufacturing the relatively small amount of rounds the Albatrosss guns used was fairly trivial. Main drive. The console displayed No Fuel. on its engineering interface. Sandra nodded in approval. Check. Well, we know that the new operating system we made for the new engine works. Now we just have to install the new fuel tanks and feed system. Two of the new Zani chemical rockets had attached themselves to the side of Albatross. It was the second mission the brand new rockets had undertaken. The first had been transporting the custom-built fuel system that the Zani engineers had designed for the Albatross. After a very lengthy install, the ship was ready for its first unmanned shakedown cruise. The distances would be small enough to make light delay a non-issue, so remote controlling the Albatross was relatively simple. It also meant that no one would die if the highly experimental fueling system went up in a nuclear meltdown. Hopefully. The Zani rockets towed the Albatross, accelerating for a carefully calculated amount of time. At the end, they detached themselves and left the human ship to drift. After several hours, the ship was at a safe enough distance for the test to begin. The task of the test was relatively simple: retrieve the antimatter containment unit from its orbit around the systems star. For a chemical rocket, or other, lesser engines, it would be quite the task. It was in an awkward position in its orbit at the moment, and they would have had to wait weeks or even months for it to be in the optimal position. Then, at the exactly correct time, the ship would have to burn hard and expand its orbit, sending itself on a trajectory that would, eventually, intercept the object''s orbit. Such a maneuver was called a Hohmann transfer by the humans. It was an efficient and relatively inexpensive way of reaching a desired object in orbit of a star. However, it was also painfully slow. The Albatross would perform the much faster (and dramatically less efficient) Brachistochrone transfer. Essentially, it would burn hard towards the location of the object (or, more accurately, towards the location the object was going to be) and, when at the halfway point to its destination, it would burn for the same amount of time in the other direction. All going well, this would bring it to a stop at the desired destination. It was the way almost every starship in the Arm traveled, as their highly advanced fusion engines could accelerate for days at a time without concern. With her comparatively primitive and inefficient fission rocket engine, Albatross would have to be a little more miserly than she would have needed to be in her prime. With the minimum safe distance reached, Albatross ignited her main drive. Within the mission control room of the Ministry of Discovery the four humans and their newfound Zani friends crossed their fingers. A lance of white hot radioactive death shot out from the Albatrosss brand new drive cone, and the ship shot forward likewell, like a rocket. Cheers erupted in the control room as the rapidly growing number denoting the Albatrosss velocity was displayed on the large screen. The old bird had new wings While the thrust at the Albatrosss disposal was significant, she had still spent most of her day-long trip to the antimatter containment unit drifting without acceleration in order to conserve fuel. She had spent the first quarter of the trip accelerating. Then, she had stopped and drifted. Now, in the last quarter of her trip, she was facing away from her destination as she decelerated. It was fairly common by the standards of modern space travel: half the trip spent under thrust, the other half spent drifting. Of course, more modern ships wouldnt have bothered with fuel saving measures for such a short trip. The propellant used by a fusion drive was incredibly cheap compared to the expensive nuclear salt water Albatross used. The ship cut its thrust completely as it approached the containment unit. The ship was still drifting, albeit relatively slowly. It turned so that its cargo plate faced the direction the oncoming object would be. Albatross flew past the containment unit, activating her magnetic cargo loader at a perfectly timed moment as it passed. The containment unit was pulled in and magnetically stuck to its cargo plate. The ship turned again, and began its acceleration burn for the trip home. This containment unit has seen better days, but the transition drive is showing all green. Sandra said over the internal communications to the rest of the crew up in the ships control room.This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. On the bright side, if the containment is breached well die so quickly we wont even have time to feel the pain. Lance said with a crooked grin. Akito and Janea glared at Lance, which only made his smile bigger. There wasnt any way to get a signal into Dark Space from within Real Space, so remote controlling the ship wasnt an option. Because of this, at least one live person needed to be on board for the test, but the entire crew was present for this test, mainly because if the transition drive succeeded in getting the ship into Dark Space, but failed in getting it back out, the ship could still go for help and repairs. His attempt at humor at an end, Lance went back to business. Well, I hope no one forgot anything, because we are transitioning in 321 The Albatross instantly vanished from the Hent system and appeared in Dark Space. Lances console immediately lit up as a contact appeared on his scopes. The pilot peered at it, and his heart rate began to increase. Nono no no-SHIT! He keyed the intercom to Sandra. Prepare to transition again, now! Sandra drew in a breath to protest, but it died as she processed the pilots serious tone. Alright. It will take a minute to spool it back up after transitioning so recently, but- Do it as soon as possible, forget the safety check! But first, brace for maneuvering. Lance said into the intercom. The crew was thrown into their restraints as he flipped the ship over. He ignited the thruster and Allie went burning away from the contact. What the hell is-'''' Akito began, but Lance held up a hand and transferred the telescope image to his and Janeas consoles. Janeas heart leapt into her throat as she looked at the image. It was a Diln ship, and it was no rickety privateer converted freighter. It was a proper warship, a recon interceptor. Interceptors were the smallest class of warship, their main reason for existing being economic rather than tactical. Their personnel requirements rarely exceeded a dozen crew, and (fortunately for Albatross) they were too small to mount a proper hypervelocity cannon on. Some models even lacked a transition drive. These things made them cheap to operate, but next to worthless in a fleet battle. Because of this, they were usually relegated to second line patrol duties and reconnaissance. The Diln liked to use them as aggressive patrol and scout ships. This far into the Frontier, they were the heaviest ships that they would have available on relatively short notice. They werent much compared to a proper warship, but compared to most of the junk being used as Q-Ships in the fringe backwater parts of the Arm, they were extremely lethal. They were probably dispatched by whatever Diln officer was overseeing the commerce raiding operations in this region. Theyre probably here to investigate what happened to the ship that attacked us. Janea thought. Its sheer dumb luck that we happened to transition when they were in sight of us. They were very near the limit of visual range in the light-dampening murk of Dark Space, but both ships could still just barely make eachother out. The front facing silhouette of the Diln interceptor was backlit by its drive igniting. The interceptor was burning for them, and hard. Sandra, I could really use that transition! Lance said over the intercom. He was unwilling to increase his acceleration beyond one gee when one of his crew was not strapped into an acceleration couch. Im trying, hold on...Alright! Youre clear to transition! Sandra hadnt even finished her sentence before Lance sent the ship back to Real Space. Ti-Zan had no military to speak of. The civil wars of the past were fought with large hordes of volunteer militia supported by the professional hunters of the various factions (the closest thing Ti-Zan had to professional fighters). Hunters still existed, and were still well armed and well trained, but their expertise began and ended wth killing the countless gigantic and dangerous animals of Hent. The National Police that functioned under the bureaucratic framework of the Courts were a large group of trained and armed bodies, but, like most law enforcement, their expertise lay more in solving crimes and babysitting drunk people than it did in defending the nation from attack. Because of this lack of a military, the Zani government was at something of a loss. They recognized the need for the various new weapons being manufactured, but they didnt really know who should be responsible for them. So, like most responsibilities the government didnt know what to do with, the orbital missile silos had been unloaded onto the Ministry of Interior. Having the government organization responsible for public safety, sanitation, and health be responsible for the nuclear arsenal might make no sense to an alien, but it made perfect sense to Zani sensibilities. After all, these weapons had been created for the purpose of maintaining public safety, and one of the Ministry of the Interiors responsibilities was public safety. Perfectly rational. Despite this, it was still decidedly outside of the organizations usual operations. Because of this, the Ministry had been sucking up talent from other Ministries to fill out the ranks of the new Department of National Safety, the unintentionally euphemistic organization responsible for the new fleets and weapons being assembled for the purpose of defending Ti-Zan from alien aggression. Gree-Fen, newly-minted officer of the Department of National Safety, was one example of talent being pilfered from other ministries. Hed been a scientist in the Department of Astronomy, overseeing one of the many telescope arrays the Ti-Zan had used to observe the universe. Now, he oversaw the entire defense satellite array, and its orbiting weaponry. It was a promotion, to be sure, but Gree-Fen wasnt sure how he felt about it. The stakes were a lot higher in this job than he was used to. Like every other Zani, hed watched the footage of the humans disappearing into Dark Space, mesmerized by the impossible sight. However, he was more surprised than mesmerized when it appeared from nothing once again. Ahead of schedule. It was lit up like a neon sign, more so than usual. It was sending out transmissions. Just as he was about to order that the transmission be played for him, another contact appeared on his scopes. It was a ship, and it had appeared from nothing just like the Albatross. Which meant it was an alien ship. With considerably more urgency, Gree-Fen gave his order. Play their transmission. -the Albatross, there is a Diln raider on our tail, prep all defenses. This is the Albatross, there is a Diln raider on our tail, prep all def- Gree-Fen cut the transmission, and then did his best to fight down his panic. Warm up the pods. he ordered, in what he hoped was a reassuringly calm tone. Small pods of three missiles each had been ferried up into orbit by reusable chemical rockets. They were little more than a small computer and communications antenna attached to a missile rack. They didnt even have targeting systems of their own, relying on the sensor grid to feed their missiles targeting data. The scrawny pods were a stop gap, intended to be replaced by proper missile silos when the designs for those were finalized. Unfortunately, the stop gaps were being put to the test now. Gree-Fen had been given a communications line straight to the Mediator, who had been given ultimate authority over the weapons by the Governing Council. Gree-Fen used that communications line now. I take it this call is about our latest visitors, Officer Gree-Fen? The Mediators dry tone came over the communicator. Yes, Mediator. So far, they are just drifting. They have yet to take any hostile action. Ive powered up the orbital pods as a precaution. How should we proceed? Broadcast the standard hail. The Mediator ordered. Gree-Fen obeyed his orders and brought his mic to his face. Attention unidentified starship, you are currently within the sovereign territory of the Zani State. Please state your identity and purpose. The translation program had created rough translation protocols for many of the more common languages of the Arm after the successful creation of the protocols for Human Standard. It would be a lower quality translation, as it relied on machines rather than being custom designed by organics, but it would do in a pinch. The supposedly Diln starship drifted for a little longer, then it transmitted a reply. This is the patrol vessel [Tyifanivelsti] of the [Diln Hegemony]. We are on an intercept course with a vessel that is suspected to be aligned with our enemies. Do not interfere, or we will have no choice but to use force to make you comply. A sigh of exasperation could be heard on the Mediators end. Well, it seems they are about as diplomatic as our human friends have told us. They make first contact with us, and it only takes them three sentences to threaten violence. Steel could be heard in the Mediators voice when he spoke again. Were not handing over those people to thesebeasts. Inform him that they have been granted asylum. If they want them so badly, their government should send an official request. Gree-Fen spoke into his microphone again. Attention Tyifanivelsti, the ship in question has been granted asylum by the Zani State. If you wish to obtain custody of the ship, please have your government establish official diplomatic communications with us to facilitate negotiations. There was absolute silence from the Diln ship for almost a full minute. Then, it ignited its main drive and streaked forward at a high acceleration. Saints curse them! the Mediator profaned. He sighed again. Warn them. If they fail to leave, then you are clear to engage them at your discretion, Officer. Understood. Gree-Fen said. He turned to his subordinates. You heard the man. Paint that target. The satellite array lit up the oncoming Diln warship with a target lock. The ship did not react. Gree-Fen began transmitting again. Attention Tyifanivelsti, you are required to leave our space immediately. Failure to comply will be interpreted as a hostile act, and responded to accordingly. No response was given, and the ship continued to burn on an intercept with Albatross. Cant say Im surprised. They must be hoping were bluffing. Fire all from pods twenty-three and seven. Gree-Fen said. The missile pods in question released all three of their missiles. The guided weapons oriented themselves, and then ignited their engines. The missiles burned hard towards the oncoming target. The instant the missiles had been released, the Diln ship swerved hard, burning on a vector perpendicular to the oncoming missiles. When the missiles drew close enough, the interceptor began shooting them down with its point defense laser. The invisible beam of UV light focused on its first target. A handful of seconds passed, and then the missile was disabled, and the laser immediately sought out another target. It continued like this for some time, destroying the missiles one by one. Eventually, the last of the six missiles fell, and the Diln ship reoriented itself and decelerated. The ship burned hard, this time heading straight for Hent instead of targeting the Albatross. Gree-Fen cursed. Fire all from pods fourteen through twenty. he ordered. Eighteen missiles were released from their pods and burned towards the Diln ship. Instead of going into another evasive burn, the Diln ship only accelerated harder. It kept coming, getting to an incredible velocity. Just as the missiles were about to intercept, it shot out all of its torpedoes and vanished into Dark Space. The torpedoes numbered eight in total. Two of them turned and burned towards the missile flight. The other six ignited their thrusters and went towards four of the orbiting satellites with blistering speed. The first two torpedoes found a place in the Zani missiles and then detonated, their large nuclear warheads taking out five of the missiles. The other six Diln torpedoes found missile pods, tracking satellites, and other targets in Hents orbit, and then detonated. Fortunately, the targets were in a high enough orbit that the EMP did not cause any problems for the civilization below. Mustve decided to do as much damage to our defense grid as they could before bugging out. Gree-Fen mused. He chuckled. Well, lets see if the Albatross can help us retrieve the warheads from all the missiles we just wasted. Aboard the Albatross, the crew argued. Theyll be back. Theyre Diln, they wont take this lying down. Sandra said. No ones questioning that. What I am questioning is you staying behind. Akito countered Janea butt in. Shes staying behind to help the Zani with their defenses. Someone has to do it while we go off to the Fleet for help, and shes the logical choice. Akito grew annoyed. Fine, then Im staying too. Now it was Sandras turn to be annoyed. Theyll need you on the ship- Why? To make sure they dont steal it? The two of them can crew the ship easily. You and I did it that way for years. Im not leaving you behind for the Diln. End of discussion. Akito said resolutely. Sandra groaned in annoyance, but she begrudgingly nodded. Fine. She turned to Lance and Janea. I have no idea how you can hope to convince Admiral Khatri, but we have to get the fleets help. We owe them that much. So, you are convinced that the Diln will return? the Mediator asked. He, his advisors, and the humans were gathered in a meeting room. Janea nodded. Yes. They know that youre here now, and they know you have fired on their ships. Theyll be back. And you believe that your fleet will help us? I honestly dont know. As Ive said, we have no particular authority or influence among our people. The most I could do is speak with our leader and present your case, from there it is not my decision. No, I think one of our own people had best present our case. He turned to Ti-Ro. You are the obvious choice. Ti-Ro wasnt sure if she was excited or terrified. ...me? she squeaked out. You speak their language, you have spent the most time among humans of any of us, and you were the first to speak with them. If youre not qualified, then no one is. Go now, the three of you. The sooner you leave, the sooner you might return with help. Saints know well need it Ti-Ro looked at her two human companions, feeling a mixture of delight at the prospect of traveling to another star, and dread at her reasons for doing so. She gave a quiet prayer to her ancestors and the Saints for their guidance, and then steeled herself for the task ahead. Albatross appeared into Dark Space once again. Fortunately, there was no Diln warship to greet them this time. Well, last I recall the Fleet was negotiating a contract for soil at some agricultural colony a good distance from here. I suppose we should start there. Lance cracked his knuckles and began to input the course commands into the ship. Ti-Ro looked at Janea, and gave her decidedly unpleasant Zani attempt at a smile. You have done so much for us, in such a short time. To ask more of you seemswrong. Janea shook her head. You all stuck your neck out for us. It wouldve been easy for you to just leave us for the Diln, but you defended us. Its our fault youre in this mess, well get you out of it. I hope. Do you think your Fleet will help us? Janea shrugged. Maybe. Other species stood by and watched while humanity was exterminated. Wed be hypocrites if we stood by and watched while your people were enslaved and subjugated by the Diln. Her face took on a more grim expression. But were justso few. The death of one human means so much more to the species as a whole than it did twenty years ago. If we commit to helping Ti-Zan, there will be casualties. We have already had so very many, many casualties. Itll be a hard sell. Ti-Ro was a little disheartened at that. Who else might help us? The Coalition might. Theyre mortal enemies with the Diln, but youd almost certainly have to join them to get their help. They dont have enough resources to expend any protecting non-member worlds. Of course, if they lose then theyll just cut their losses and leave you in the dust. Another target added to the list for reclamation in their inevitable counter offensive. Does the war go so badly for them? It depends on who you ask. They certainly arent winning, but theyre nowhere close to beaten yet. They just need one lucky break. Trouble is, theyve been short on luck since their founding. She gave a hollow chuckle. Still, theyve got better odds than we did with the Ivos. Lance cut into the conversation. Alright you two, brace for acceleration. They did as they were told. The powerful main drive ignited, and the Albatross burned on a course back towards her home and people for the first time in years. An Eye For an Eye... To Face the Day - Chapter 6 The battered, elderly form of a Stork Class freighter drifts through the murky, swirling emptiness of Dark Space. Within the ship two humans, a dog, and a zani are alleviating their boredom, sitting comfortably in their acceleration couches in the control room and watching Lances favorite form of time-killing: old nature documentaries. A human voice speaking a strange tongue in oddly soothing tones went on at length about the strange and fascinating animals being observed, while helpful Standard subtitles let the modern audience understand. It was a somewhat surreal experience for Ti-Ro. The humans who had made these documentaries were long dead and buried, yet they had unknowingly done their descendants a great service. Nearly every fantastic organism on display was now extinct. Films like this were all that remained of Earths wondrous ecosystem. It was a thought that filled Ti-Ro with a feeling that was difficult to describe. It was a crime that was difficult to process. The thought of all life on an entire planet being completely eradicated was absurd. Yet, that very thing had happened. As far as anyone knew, the only thing that remained of life on Earth was what the humans brought with them. The thought of Hent suffering the same fate wassobering, to say the least. The documentary eventually ended, and as the credits rolled Lance cracked his knuckles and checked the ships time. Well, thats the last one for tonight. Janea stretched, and gave a snort. I dont know why you like these so much. All it does is make me wish I could go see it myself, and then I remember that I never, ever will. Its depressing. The pilot shrugged. I dont know. Its just kind ofrelaxing? It makes me feelconnected. To my heritage, I guess you could say. Janea gave a bitter laugh. Yeah, and then Im reminded of how my heritage was completely destroyed, and it just makes me angry all over again. Lance shrugged. I guess I can understand, but I cant claim to feel the same anger about it. Justsad, I suppose. Janea looked at her hands. You werent old enough to remember the End when it happened, thats why. I was just a little girl, but I remember it clear as day. I remember what they did to us. To me. One day, well give them what they deserve. Lance held his tongue. Hed been hearing that his entire life, and it got old after a while. He stood up and gave a stretch of his own. Im off to grab a bite to eat. Try not to blow up the ship while Im gone. Janea nodded to him as he left. Ti-Ro wanted to ask Janea about what she had said, but it did not seem like the sort of topic the human would want to talk about. Ultimately, she decided to follow after Lance instead. What does she mean, when she says shell give the Ivos what they deserve? Ti-Ro asked. Lance snorted as he put his dinner in the microwave. I figured that part was obvious. She wants their worlds to be glassed, their people to be exterminated. Ti-Ro tilted her head in confusion. Butwhat purpose does that serve? It only results in more atrocities being committed. It creates more evil, not less. Lance shrugged. Its a pretty common sentiment back at the fleet. Am I to assume that it is not a sentiment you share? He looked uncomfortable at that. Its a sore subject, for most people. Theres a bit of a generational gap, I suppose. I was too young to remember the war. Janeas not much older than me, but shes old enough to have memories of it. Its morepersonal for people like her, I think. But, not for you? Dont get me wrong, it still hurts. I still think the Ivos are evil bastards, and what they did demands justice, buthow? Even if we could magically materialize a fleet and beat them into submission with it, what do we do? Round up their leadership and give them the noose, sure. But what then? When will it be enough? The microwave dinged, and Lance stared at it. Im just some guy Ti-Ro, I dont have all of the answers. My perspective is just one of many. He took the dinner out, and ripped off the top of the bag. He stabbed a morsel of food with his fork and took a bite. But, well When I was a kid, my old man always told me The best revenge is living well. The Albatross made a hard evasive burn as a pair of missiles streaked towards it from the ambushing pirate ship. Her two point defense cannons opened up on the incoming weapons, and shredded them into a mass of debris. Unfortunately for the ship, the missiles had been so close that the hull was peppered with the debris. Damn it! Lance cursed. The ship accosting Albatross was a classic pirate boat. Some dinky little interplanetary shuttle that had been fitted with racks full of missiles and sent out to wait in ambush on likely transport routes. Had he been flying Albatross in her prime, Lance wouldnt have sweated getting battered by some debris. But this was the jury-rigged fission rocket version of Albatross. A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. The foam shouldve sealed the tanks, but we need to check the holes. Get up there and confirm! Lance ordered Janea. The nuclear salt water that fueled the rocket was perfectly safe under normal circumstances, but damage to the tanks could potentially allow a critical mass of fissile materials to form somewhere. If that happened, then theyd all be cooked alive by radiation as the ship turned into the equivalent of a reactor in meltdown. Janea sprang into action and went for the service ladder that led to the fuel tanks, Ti-Ro following after her. The pair squeezed through the emergency door and clipped themselves to the ladders safety rails as they climbed up it. Janea scanned the walls of the fuel tanks around her, finding clumps of foam that denoted a sealed breach. She applied tape to all of the breaches she could find, with Ti-Ro doing the same. Suddenly, the pair of them were thrown against their restraints as the entire ship lurched. Just as abruptly as it began, it stopped. The main drive had gone out. With no acceleration to provide the illusion of gravity, the pair floated back down the ladder. They had to use the hand crank to get the service door open. As they entered the main deck of the ship, it was tinted red from emergency lights. It seemed the power had gone out as well. Janea grimaced. Damn, theyre almost certainly going to try to board us. Ti-Ro was trying not to panic. What should we do? I dont know. Ive never been boarded by pirates before. As if to punctuate her statement, a loud clanking noise could be heard through the Albatrosss bulkheads. Janea swore. Ok, theyre definitely boarding us. Shouldnt we fight? Ti-Ro asked, her tone making it clear she was not exactly thrilled about the idea. I dont think it will do us any good. What happens if we win? Theyll just crack Allies hull open and call it a day. Janea thought for a moment. Well, whatever we end up doing, we should get to Lance first. The pair attempted to make their way back to the control room, using the hand cranks to open each door along the way due to the power failure. The human and zani were turning one particularly stubborn crank together, when the door suddenly swung open and revealed a massive alien on the other side. The alien immediately smacked the two of them to the ground with one giant pincer, and trained a laser weapon on them with the other. It looked like an interpretation of a crab by an artist who had never actually seen one. It had four large, armored legs as thick as tree trunks, and three eye stocks sprouting out from the top of itshead? The unpleasant sight of its mouth grew even more unpleasant as it scratched out some sort of vocalizations from it. Obviously, it was saying something to the pair, judging from how it seemed to wait almost expectantly. When it became clear that it wasnt being understood, it motioned to something behind it. A pair of small tripedal aliens scurried past it, clutching handguns in their claws and peering at the human and zani with a single, highly complex eye. Their vocalizations were like rocks being ground together as they spoke to the larger alien. Whatever was exchanged between the two parties apparently came to a conclusion, as the two smaller creatures clattered over to Janea and Ti-Ro. They gestured impatiently with their weapons, beckoning the two new captives to move ahead of them. Janea complied, and sized the three creatures up as she did so. Ti-Ro looked at them with a mixture of astonishment and fascination. Oh, right. She wouldnt know these species. Janea quietly filled Ti-Ro in. The little guys are Krrg. Theyre a Diln client race. Theyre tough little shits. They can eat damn near anything and they have low oxygen consumption compared to most species, so they make pretty good spacers. Diln like to use them as labor on civilian ships, but they apparently breed and mature at an unusually high rate for sapients, so they also use them as massed light infantry. She nodded towards the crab alien. Big boy over there is a Strit. Theyre one of those irrelevant species I told you about that havent taken a side in the war. They mostly keep to themselves, but apparently they have some really cut-throat politics in their ruling class. People who end up on the wrong side of a power struggle flee into exile. Theyre big and tough, so its easy for them to find work in the underworld or in a PMC. My guess is that our friend here has a story that more or less lines up with that. Ti-Ro was even paler than usual. This would be fascinating if I wasnt terrified right now. Janea gave a half smile. Yeah, me too. Running my mouth helps me keep my mind off of it. The strit swiveled one of its eyestalks to look at them, and then warbled something in its language. Janea assumed it was an equivalent of Shut up!, so she held her tongue. The three pirates and their captive pushed their way down the hall, and came to a stop at the control room. Janea felt a cold knife of pure terror stab into her heart when she saw the unfortunately familiar form of a Diln in front of the control room door. Like all Diln, he stood on a pair of digitigrade legs with elongated, hoof-like feet. He was covered in a shaggy mane of hair, though he did wear clothing (specifically, he wore the uniform of a Diln privateer, to Janeas dread). Instead of fingers or other digits, he had six long, almost sloth-like claws attached to single, complex joints that allowed them to serve essentially the same purpose as fingers (with four as normal fingers, and two serving as thumbs). He was about the size of a human man, and his torso had a vaguely similar appearance, with broad shoulders and arms of a roughly similar length, though the musculature of his chest and abdomen were quite different. One of the more unusual features of the Diln anatomy, however, was the neck. The Diln demonstrated this when he turned his head one hundred and eighty degrees to look at the oncoming entourage, as he was facing the door. It was perhaps fitting that his eyes would have a vague resemblance to that of an owl, all things considered. He had a stubby snout with a large maw full of razor sharp teeth. He had no nose, instead he just had four nostrils lodged at the point where his snout met with the rest of his face. One similarity between Diln and humans was their tendency to bare their teeth as an expression of pleasure or approval, rather than the more threatening meaning it took with most other species that had teeth. Needless to say, a Diln smile was not a pleasant sight. The Diln turned his body around to match the direction of his head, and sauntered over to them. He stood for a moment, taking them in. He crackled out something in the Strits tongue. To Janeas surprise, it wasnt a translation speaker that was saying it, the alien sounds were coming from the Dilns own maw. Shed heard of the incredible capacity for vocalizations Diln had, but shed never actually seen it demonstrated like this. It might have been interesting if she wasnt too busy trying not to wet herself. The Diln gestured at his own head, miming the removal of a helmet. With little other choice, the human and zani obeyed. With their helmets removed, the Diln took them in once again for a moment. Then, it let out a sound that sounded like a pile of gravel attempting to laugh. Then, to her surprise and horror, it began speaking Standard. Just when I thought that there would be nothing of value on this relic, one of the Arms endangered species comes to greet me. He sounded distressingly human when he talked, like a fluent speaker with a very, very strange accent. He turned to reveal the doorway behind him, and Janea felt a light go out inside her as she saw inside. And the best part: Youre actually alive! the Diln crooned. Lance drifted lifelessly, spinning around slowly. Eventually, his helmet visor came into view. It was drenched in blood. Janea was completely numb, so numb she couldnt even feel the steady stream of tears that had come pouring out of her eyes. It just wasnt right. Why, of all people, did it have to be Lance? She choked down sobs, and Ti-Ro seemed to be crying in the drier zani manner beside her. The alien unconsciously wrapped a tale around the shuddering woman beside her. The Diln gave an exaggerated frown. Yes, its such a terrible loss, isnt it? There are so few of you left. And think of how much more money I couldve made with two of you! He eyed Ti-Ro. I suppose Ill have to settle for one of your mutant cousins He paced slowly. Im told that our beloved Supreme Commander has some sort of vague respect for you lot. Supposedly, its why we leave you alone. Mostly. He turned to the pair again and grinned. As you can probably tell, it is not a sentiment I share. If you stubborn, pebble-brained monkeys had a shred of common sense, and bowed before your betters, then maybe youd still have a planet. He paced again. You only won your little contest with us because of the idotic so-called Warlord who was ruling our periphery at the time. His head is now mounted on a spike, with all of the other fools who dared to stand in the way of our Supreme Commander as he leads us to our destiny. He stood in front of Janea and leaned down. Of course, there are still some rich idiot periphery nobles who have a grudge against your kind. Believe me, they will pay handsomely to take their revenge on you. He suddenly seized her head and slammed it against the bulkhead. Ti-Ro ran to help, but was seized by the guards. Janea saw stars and struggled to think through the pain. Unfortunately for you, I want some revenge too. Fear not, Im a professional. I know how to avoid permanently damaging the merchandise. I can give you a bruise for every shipmate I lost in the war, without doing any actual damage. As Janea was struggling to her feet, he seized her hair and forced her to look up at him. What is it you primates say? He belted her in the face, and Janea could feel her eye begin to swell up. Ah, yes. An eye for an eye. Very poetic. He looked thoughtful for a moment. Wait, no. I have a much more appropriate idiom He slammed his bony club of a fist into her gut. Janea doubled over in pain. The Diln leaned down and whispered into her ear. Welcome to Hell. Leaves the Whole World Blind Beth finished her lunch in the canteen, willing her stomach to keep down the Diln slop. She dropped her tray in the cleaners and made for the main airlock. Yifritel was bringing in a pair of new arrivals, and shed have to run them through processing. She felt bile wanting to climb out of her guts at the thought of the bastard. He had it in for humans, and had made that plain to Beth on many occasions, usually through violence. Still, they didnt pay her to run scared from asshole privateer captains, so she bit down her distaste and went for the airlock. She made her way through the halls, passing aliens from half a dozen species on her way. Less than reputable ships like this tended to be diverse. She did her best to avoid eye contact, and walked as confidently as she could manage. Shed been on the ship for nearly a year, but she still felt out of place. The self-loathing and shame had faded with time, but the distaste for her alien compatriots had not. She primed her electro-prod as she approached the main airlock. She keyed a command in, and the doors opened. The sight that lay behind them made her blood run cold. Yifritel stepped out of the airlock, his captures in tow. He spoke in that same uncanny Standard he always did with her. Ah, Miss Griffiths, prompt as always. He turned to look at the woman behind him. I trust that youraffinity for our latest guest will not impede your work, yes? Beth managed to tear her eyes from the woman and give Yifritel a bored look. They dont pay me to be political. She looked towards the human and the alien of a species she didnt recognize and jerked her head, indicating that they were to walk ahead of her. The human captive seemed to hesitate, likely distracted by the unfettered hate she was currently looking at her fellow human with, but after a nudge from the unknown alien she started forward. Yifritel grinned and called after the three. Of course, I was wrong to doubt you. The Hegemony is lucky to have such a loyal servant. Take care! Beth fought down her anger at Yifritel and shock at the new captive, and continued on. They walked for a time, with Beth gesturing occasionally to tell the pair in front of her where to turn. Eventually, the human captive spoke. Youre a fucking disgrace. She said those words to Beth not in a hiss of anger or a growl of hate. She spoke the words in a bland, banal sort of way. The way someone might talk about the weather. A simple statement of fact. Beth ground her teeth. Quiet. The woman gave a plastic smile. Ive read plenty of history. Weve always been ruthless, backstabbing bastards, but its a product of our environment. We had to fight to survive on Mother Earth. But in the fleet, things are different. Barely any crime, everyones needs are provided for. We have no homeworld, but we have each other. Id hoped, rather naively, that wed gotten one good thing out of the Nightmare: a chance to turn over a new leaf, as a species. She looked back at Beth. Clearly, I was wrong. She turned her eyes forward again. Maybe theres just something rotten inside us. Maybe our environment was just an excuse all this time. Beth bit down her anger. Do not speak about things you know nothing about. Janea looked back at her in false amusement. Touch a nerve? She eyed Beth up and down. Youre no spring chicken, are you, granny? You were an adult when the Nightmare happened. Mustve been hard. I was only a little girl, my memories are hazy and I still see them in my sleep every night. She turned back again and leaned in closer, peering at the woman. What do you see at night that brought you here, I wonder? Beth did not answer. The small group reached the processing center. Beth gestured with her prod. Clothes, jewelry, everything else. All of it goes in the hamper. Now. The pair looked surprised for a moment. Beth primed her electro-prod, and electricity arced over it menacingly. That was all the instructions the alien captive needed, and she started hastily undoing the clasps on her strange robe, slowed somewhat by the trembling in her hands. The human captive raised an eyebrow. Ah, yes. Strip the victims first, very efficient. Did you teach them that one? Its an old human technique, after all. Their evil bastards could learn a lot from our evil bastards. Beth rolled her eyes. Yes, yes. Youre very righteous and all that. Now take your bloody clothes off before I give you more marks than youve already got. The woman began undoing her jacket. Im Janea, by the way. I figured Id tell you. It throws a wrench in the whole dehumanizing part of the process. Beth threateningly primed her electro-prod again, and this time it was Janea who rolled her eyes. Beth watched as the pair took what few worldly possessions they had and tossed them into the hamper. The alien had bracelets and other trinkets on her person, which she dropped into the hamper with her robes and undergarments. The human captive had nothing but her clothes and a set of dog tags. She looked at the tags for a long moment, before dropping them in. The pair stood there, looking at Beth expectantly. Beth was ever so slightly shaken by the pure, unrestrained hatred in the human womans eyes. She also felt something likepride? She looked the younger womans body up and down. Jesus, girl. He beat the bloody stuffing out of you. Its a wonder you can stand, nevermind give me a lecture. Beth jerked her head in gesture again, and the pair of captives made their way out of the room and down a hallway, their captor on their heels. Had this been a ship full of fellow humans, thered probably have been jeers and wolf whistles. This being an alien ship, there wasnt much other than the occasional bored glance from passersby. From Janeas view, she was naked. Exposed. Vulnerable. From an alien view, she was just a weird bald ape. A weird bald ape without its clothes wasnt much more interesting than a weird bald ape with its clothes. The group reached its next destination: a small, suspiciously sterile room. Janea turned to Beth. Whats happening to us here? Beth was annoyed at herself for answering. She usually just ignored captives, except to give them orders. Youre getting chipped. It gets jammed in your auditory organ and translates for you. Cant work if you dont know what everyone else is yammering on about, after all. Janea turned pale, but her face showed no reaction. Soundsuncomfortable. Beth shrugged. Not really. Ive got one in myself. Its no different than a translation earbud, its justinvasive. You dont feel anything when it makes noise, believe it or not. The Diln are older than dirt. Theyve had a long time to figure tech like this out. No tracking devices in this, I hope? Janea said with another plastic smile. Beth just stared blankly. Janea shrugged. Well, it was worth hoping. Beth gave an actual, genuine snort at that. Even with the absurd circumstances it still felt good to justshoot the shit, with another human. Even one that loathed her with every fiber of her being. They couldnt be bothered with numbing it first? Janea ground out through the pain as she clutched her ear. Her alien companion was clutching her own head, although she had no visible ear to cup. Beth snorted again. They dont even budget for clothes, why would they budget for pain killers? They walked in silence for a short time longer, until they had finally reached their last destination. The cell door to one the female holding pens. While modesty and propriety for their slaves was hardly a concern, many species hadunpredictable reactions when confronted with the opposite sex of their own species. It was best to err on the side of caution. Beth felt herself wanting to speak, and couldnt stop herself. Girl-...Janea. I..didnt know-...didnt thinkthat thered be human captives. Im sorry. She was shocked at the genuineness of the words. Somehow, Janea looked more filled with hate then she had been before. Right, of course. Im not one of them, right? So now its wrong, right? Now its happening to real people. You fucking scum- She went to punch Beth in the face. Beth sidestepped the punch, grabbing Janea and kneeing her in the gut. She shocked her with the prod, long and hard. Then she grabbed her by the hair and dragged her into the room, eventually dumping her in a heap on the floor, in front of the many frightened aliens inside. The alien that had come with Janea scurried past Beth and went to check on Janea. Beth walked out of the room, trying not to hyperventilate as she locked the door behind her and dashed for the guards quarters. She was lucky enough to make it to the head before she vomited. Janea could handle an ass-beating. No one would ever describe her as tough, but shed had some hard knocks in her time. It would pass. She could handle being stripped and tossed into a cargo hold like a bag of garbage. She was on the shy side, but at least everyone else in this slave pen was a woman. Well, a female, at any rate. She could handle meeting that evil, disgusting traitor bitch on this ship. She could even handle her likely fate of being tortured to death by some vengeful Diln aristocrat. It was preferable to wasting away in some factory. What she couldnt handle was the mental image of a helmet visor, covered with human blood. The thought of the lifeless corpse of someone she cared for, drifting for eternity in his rusty tomb. Yet, the intrusive thoughts came all the same. The visor was the first thing she thought of when she came to from the beating the Diln had given her. Shed tried to distract herself by running her mouth, harassing the traitor. It didnt work. The visor was seared into her vision. Inescapable. She tried to ignore it. Ti-Ro gave Janea a wane smile as she came to. Welcome back. I know its not really any of my business, but maybe you should try not pissing off the angry criminal with the electro-prod next time? Janea gave an exhausted smile, and was then surprised by the voice in her ear. The translator. The voice was translating the growls and hisses of a Tlassiopei. Yes. It is generally better not to antagonize our captors. They largely ignore us if we keep to ourselves. Female Tlassiopei looked more or less the same as their male counterparts, only smaller. Janea put a hand to her ear and grimaced. Ughthats going to take some getting used to. A strange, primate alien whose species Janea didnt recognize came over to her. She walked on her knuckles, like one of Earths extinct great apes, albeit with plumes of feathers on certain parts of her body. It is unpleasant at first, but it is worth it. I think I would have gone insane had I not been able to talk to the others. The others approached and peered at the newcomers. They consisted of a Mak Re in a landsuit, another Tlassiopei, and a scrawny rodent-like person of a species she recognized called a Tygvib. Ti-Ro stood up. Well, Janea, allow me to introduce you to our new sisters in captivity. She gestured to the Mak Re. This is Mem So, our aquatic friend. She gestured to the two Tlassiopei. Zrikki and Byatiztet, theyre sisters. She pointed at the feathered ape woman. This is Galiwa, shes a Ponfet. Apparently, shes from a pre-space civilization too, so I suppose I have that in common with her. And lastly is our small friend here, Zyp. Ti-Ro turned back to Janea and bared her teeth in a grisly attempt at a human smile. I hope you get along with them, there isnt a lot of room in here. Beth sat up on her cot. Her attempts at sleep had proven even more futile than usual. The familiar faces that plagued her dreams were now plaguing her waking hours too. They looked at her, accusations written on their expressions. She gave the same answer she always did. The Ivos have to pay. They have to. The Diln are the only ones strong enough to make it happen. The Coalition has its head up its arse, and even if they didnt, theyre run by the very same species that bowed and scraped to the Ivos. Us humans are too busy wallowing in pathetic self pity and woe to do it ourselves. So, it has to be the Diln. Theyre already going to win this war, its inevitable, and when they do, the Ivos will be next on the menu. Theyll kill them all, and Ill be there to see that they give the bastards whats coming to them. Then no one will ever have to fear them again. The faces stared back, and gave the same retort they always did. Then what? As always, she had no answer for them. Not that it had mattered before. The faces that gazed in judgment of her all belonged to people long since dead. Ship mates sucked into the void, friends and family reduced to ash and glass. They were not here to give their protests in person. Because the Ivos had murdered them. Thus, the Ivos must pay. That other species might have to suffer to make that happen was of little consequence. Beth did for the victims of the Diln what they had done for humanity as it was incinerated by the Ivos. Which is to say, she did nothing whatsoever. Shed condemned what was likely hundreds of aliens to Diln enslavement, and she would condemn thousands more, if it was what was needed to advance her position within the Hegemony further. When the time came for the Hegemony to make war on the Ivos, Beth intended to be part of it. By any means necessary. Hate and vengeance were here fuel, but belief was the engine that consumed it. Specifically, her belief in the Coalitions ability to defeat the Ivos, or -more accurately- the lack thereof. The Diln seemed to be the only ones in the Arm who werent willing to just pretend the Ivos didnt exist. Shed visited their space, once. The things she had seen during her time there had convinced her that the Coalition didnt have a prayer for victory. Theyd also convinced her that the Diln were scared shitless, and it wasnt hard to guess what was scaring them. They were preparing for total war. There was something between the two species. Every Diln she had spoken to got uncomfortable and tried to change the subject whenever she mentioned the Ivos. She didnt know what the reasons for the animosity between the two were, and she didnt particularly care. The Diln were going to war with the Ivos, and Beth intended to do everything in her meager power to see that they won. Humanity, even other species. None of them would ever be safe while the Ivos were still out there, lurking. To end a threat like the Ivos, there was nothing that went too far. Nothing. Beth dug around in her trunk, looking for a familiar weapon. She pulled it out, its weight in her hand wasreassuring. Her granddad had given it to her, when shed graduated from the Space Force Academy, a lifetime ago. It was an ancient Webley Mk VI Revolver. If family legend was to be believed, it had been carried proudly by her ancestors in the great wars of humanitys pre-space past. If granddads stories were true, many utterly dreadful people had met their end from its barrel. There was one last villain that Beth planned to dispatch with it, once her work was done. A horrific monster who had sent hundreds of people to enslavement or worse. The Ivos had to pay for what they had done. But so did Beth, eventually. Its weight grew heavier. There was no other reason for her to be alive, while everyone she had known and loved was dead. She would avenge them, and then she would join them. That had been the plan. It had always been the plan. But then that stupid girl had shown up. Beth was a monster now, to be sure. But she had been a Space Force officer before that. She had taken an oath, to never let any human being be given up willingly to the dark while she drew breath. Not one. The faces that plagued her were all long dead, or at least they had been. Now, there was a new face, and it was alive and well, for the moment. It was a face that stared back at her with hate and revulsion, but it was still a human face. Beth placed the revolver back in her trunk, and went off to the head again. Janea sat on the floor, her arms around her knees, trying and failing to not think of a helmet with a bloody visor. She shivered in the cold. It wasnt a life-threatening kind of cold, just an unpleasant chill. What was it Akito had said wed be if the Diln captured us? Naked and shivering in their cargo hold? I didnt realize he was being literal. Ti-Ro didnt seem to be especially bothered by being deprived of her clothing. Janea didnt know if that was a Zani thing, or just a Ti-Ro thing. The fact that the alien didnt seem to have any immediately visible reproductive organs made Janea suspect the former. I suppose if youve got nothing to cover up, then being naked doesnt really mean anything. The other denizens of the slave pen didnt seem particularly bothered either, but that could just be because theyd had time to get used to it. The Mak Re, Mem So, made her way over to Janea and (Sat? Squated? Collapsed in a pile of tentacles?) down. One of Mem Sos eyes swiveled to face Janea. A synthetic-sounding voice came from speakers on her landsuit, and Janea heard the translation in her auditory implant. Uncomfortable, human? I can relate. She gestured to herself with her two arm tentacles. This infernal suit keeps me alive, but it doesnt keep me comfortable. Im lucky my kind has no vertebrae, otherwise this exhausting gravity would have snapped it in two. Janea couldnt help but smile at the friendly alien. Yeah, Im uncomfortable. I dont know about the rest of you, but us humans areattached to our clothes, I guess you could say. Im just feeling a little bit, uh, exposed. It was difficult to get a read of the giant octopuss body language, but she seemed to think on it for a moment. I see. I think I can understand. We Mak Re do not wear clothing, but we do adorn ourselves with other things. Females such as myself wear piercings in our lower mantles, gifts from our bondmates. For a bonded female to appear in public without her bond mates piercings was considered quite scandalous in my ancestors time. I thought such things old-fashioned, butI suppose it has left me feeling a little exposed myself. She brought the tips of her arm tentacles up to her sides, and looked at the floor. He made them for me himself. He was the traditional sort, you see. It took him [.87 Earth years], he grew the coral culture himself, shaped them. Slowly and carefully. They were beautiful, more lovely than any Id ever seen at a jewelers. Hed told me hed started making it the moment we started courting, hed known I was the one the first time hed laid his eyes on me. Her alien eyes seemed to fill with mischief. Flatterer. She slowly moved her arms away from her sides. They were all that I had left of him. Now theyll be pawned off as spoils by some halfwit pirate. Im sorry. Janea said. The alien swiveled both eyes to look at the human. Why would you apologize? You did not steal my piercings. Janea was a little surprised. Oh, uh, sor-er, I meanits just an expression. Im not apologizing per se, justI dont really know why we say it. The aliens eyes seemed almost amused. Ill take your word for it. She looked at the floor again. Supposedly, when I am sold Ill likely be bound for an ocean world. The Diln have an aquatic race as a client species, and they have a need for laborers that can live in the underwater part of their cities. She looked back at Janea. I wonder where theyll take you? Janea gave an empty smile. Some Diln aristocrats palace. Apparently, there are still those in the Hegemony who hold a grudge for us humans. I guess they dont think weve suffered enough already, so theyll make up the difference by torturing me. Mem So looked startled by that. IthatsI dont She looked into the humans eyes. ...Im sorry. The smell of blood was what woke him. Specifically, the smell of his blood. The first thought that struck him was, I have an awful headache. The second thought that struck him was, I must be alive if I have a headache. It was a somewhat surprising discovery. When the missile had struck Allie dead-on, hed thought thatd be the end. Mustve been a disabler missile. He couldnt see a thing out of his helmet. His suites battery was mostly dead. He went to undo the seals on his helmet, hesitating for just a moment as he worried that he might be in vacuum. Then he shrugged mentally. Hed already have died if the ship had no atmosphere. He unsealed his helmet and tossed it lightly away, his eyes coming into focus as he watched it float. He sized up the control room. For a ship that had been hit by a missile, it wasnt in the worst of shape. Janea? Ti-Ro? he called out. Dont know why I bothered. If they were alive and conscious they would have tried to wake me up by now. He drifted for a few moments more, before his eyes settled on a small container magnetically locked to the floor. He wiggled his way over to it. Snowy! He tapped on the glass, and the exhausted dog opened its eyes with great effort, and its tail wagged tiredly. Poor girl mustve screeched her throat raw. She was covered in her own excretions, but she was alive. He popped the sealed door open, and recoiled at the stench. Good Lord! he put his nose in the crook of his elbow. Snowy wiggled her way out of the kennel and then floated, not bothering to try staying awake. You, my friend, need a bath. But well need gravity for that first. He floated over to his pilots console, and was surprised when it turned on without issue. The reactor was intact and they justleft it? True, Allie herself was barely worth her mass in scrap, but her internal components still had value. It was a bit surprising that pirates wouldnt try to make a profit off of the ship. Well, I suppose it is a flying radiological disaster waiting to happen. I guess some other species arent as cavalier as us about that sort of thing. Still, they burned munitions on us, they wouldve wanted to salvage something of value out of-...SHIT! He opened the internal camera system, and flipped through. Not a trace of Janea or Ti-Ro. They must have taken them, butwhy leave me behind? He caught sight of his helmet floating past him, its visor soaked in blood. His mind raced. Of course, if they were slave hunting, then they wouldnt bother with a dead or dying man, although its strange that they didnt take the time to finish me off, or Allie for that matter. Maybe they figured out what kind ship they were standing on and decided to leave in a hurry? He rejected that idea. While it might have been true, surely they would have put a few rounds through Allie to hide the evidence, at the very least? They hadnt, which means that they must intend some sort of purpose for the ship. Lance checked his instruments, and what he saw had answered his questions. Allie was completely stationary. This was more or less an impossible task in Real Space, where objects were always moving relative to something else, but things were different in Dark Space. There were no celestial bodies or other significant sources of mass to be found, so objects that came to a complete stop would remain stationary. Forever. This was a boon for the various criminal sorts of the galaxy, as various illicit goods could be stashed away for safekeeping at specific coordinates. The Allie had probably been flagged for salvage by a dedicated salvage ship, and the actual pirate boat had gone on its way with all of the best loot. Which meant that there would be another pirate ship coming here, soon. Lance mulled it over. If they have a support ship they can rely on, then theyre definitely not independent actors. Theres almost certainly some kind of home base or mothership. Thats where they took Janea and Ti-Ro. So, thats where Im going.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. He turned to Snowy. Sorry girl, the bath will have to wait. Were going trapping instead. Lrgfrr studied his terminal screen with his eye, the highly developed organ swiveling as it read the data. Where did they dig up this fossil? He thought in amusement. He was a Krrg officer, a concept that would have been laughable before the Supreme Commander had ended a millennia of societal decay. The species had been regarded as little better than animals by the Diln for most of post-Calamity history. However, the Supreme Commanders insatiable appetite for sapient talent had led him to pass an edict that loosened all restrictions on recruitment for the Empire, in both military and civilian positions. Hed pitched it as a return to form. After all, the ancient Empire had not been so foolish to allow talented individuals to go to waste because they were not of the Diln species. Or so he claimed. So little record existed of the pre- and early post-Calamity times that history could be whatever powerful men wrote it to be. For all anyone knew, the client races might have had it worse under the ancient Empire. However, that didnt matter to the client races. What mattered to them was that they now had a higher quality of life then most of them would have ever hoped to have known only twenty years ago. Even the Diln were happy with it, they saw it as more of the Supreme Commanders ruthless pragmatism, the same pragmatism that he had dragged the Empire back into greatness with. The only Diln who minded were Diln supremacists and the aristocracy, but the Commander had mounted enough of their heads on pikes to keep them quiet. Once again, he proves his genius. Im just a dumb little Krrg and even I can see it. He wins the loyalty of the client races, massively expands his talent pool, and crosses another item off of his list of reforms. And after all of that he manages to be in a better political position than he was before. Lrgfrr gave the Krrg equivalent of an amused half-smile at his own thoughts Lrgfrr had struggled and fought and suffered from the moment he had hatched, as was the lot of Krrg. He would have lived a meaningless life and died a meaningless death, just like trillions of Krrg before him. But then the Commander had changed everything. He could not undo a millenia of oppression and discrimination with a click of his claws, but he could give the Krrg a fighting chance. It was a chance Lrgfrr had made full use of. Lrgfrr turned to his helmsman, and spoke in words that sounded like gravel being crushed. Take us in to dock with the salvage. He gazed at the readouts on his screen again. Not worth trying to salvage the whole ship, not for something that primitive. Well just strip all of the valuable components. Lrgfrrs ship docked with the salvage. Spin us up. he ordered. His own ship fired its maneuvering thrusters, and simulated gravity returned to both ships as they began to spin end over end. He and the other three Krrg that made up his crew went to don their vacsuits and board the salvaged ship. They went through the airlock and made their way to the control room. Lrgfrr became suspicious when he arrived. There was supposed to be a human corpse here. he said aloud. Maybe they already spaced the body? His second in command, Crrgiida suggested. Lrgfrr thought on that for a moment. Perhaps. We must search the rest of the ship. The words of an alien tongue came over the intercom, and Lrgfrr heard his translator speak inside his auditory organ. Im afraid that wont be possible, since all of the doors are locked. Lrgfrr cursed himself for his carelessness. Let me guess, youre our missing human? Got it in one little guy. Now, Im going to open the inner door of the main entrance, and you and your people are going to toss your weapons in there. As you can probably imagine, if you try anything funny I will cut off the life support for that room, and then you will all die once your suits oxygen runs out. Considering your profession, I cant say Id feel too badly about it. So, I would advise against it. Lrgfrr growled in disgust. We are soldiers of the Diln Hegemony. We will not disarm ourselves on the order of enemy combatants. I dont know what lies you humans have been fed about the proud and noble Krrg, but we are no longer the sniveling cowards lesser races claim us to be. We will die before we suffer the dishonor of- His sentence was cut off by a laser beam searing through his chest from behind. Crrgiida stood over him, and she looked down at his corpse grimly. Sorry sir, but Im fine staying a sniveling coward. They tend to live longer. She picked up his weapon, and tossed it into the open airlock, the other two crewman doing the same. Wonderful. Its good to be dealing with such sensible people. The voice said. What do you want? Crrgiida asked the voice. A terminal suddenly powered on. Enter the access and security codes for your ship here. Crrgiida blinked in annoyance. What guarantee do I have that you wont just kill us anyway? I dont know. My word of honor? Look, the only guarantee I can offer is that you will die if you dont give me the codes. If you do give them to me, theres a chance you live through this. Certain death, or possible death. Run that equation through your wonderful little Krrg survival sense, and let me know what it has to say. Crrgiida mulled it over. What happens to us after we give you the codes? You all pile into the lander, and I leave you here. Crrgiida hissed. So you just leave us for dead anyway? No deal. The sound of the life support turning off was deafening. Are you sure about that? Crrgiida felt a flush of terror, but fought it down. Either we suffocate now, or suffocate a few days from now. Either way our fate is the same. No. Deal. The lander has four days worth of oxygen for three humans. For three Krrg, thats probably a weeks worth, at bare minimum. Itll probably be more if youre careful. If I actually manage to survive my plan, Ill come back and pick you up. This is my only lander, after all. If I die, which I probably will, then youve still got plenty of time for a ship to detect your rescue beacon and pick you up. Probably. Crrgiida was almost amused. You are not doing a very good job of selling this. Im not very good at lying. All of this is just the truth. If I have to kill you, I will, but otherwise I dont really have any desire to. I can probably access the ship without your codes, but it will be a pain in the ass, so Crrgiida went over to the terminal and began entering her information. If I die because of this, human, I will kill you in my next reincarnation. she said. Beth entered the main security room, and began chatting with the Krrg watching the security camera footage. Hey Trrn. Any trouble in the pens? No, its as quiet as usual-hey, wait. Why are you here? He said, turning to face the human. Beth answered by putting a knife through his eye. The unfortunate Krrg died in a series of spasms. Beth shoved him out of the way and took his seat. She cracked her knuckles and went to work. Alright little girl, show them what us monkeys can do In the days she had been a captive here, Janea had come to loathe the monotony of the slave pen. Absolutely nothing happened here, and it drove her to distraction. Which was why, when the door to the pen suddenly swung open, it was almost deafening. The other captives sat up to look at the open door expectantly, but no one came through. Her curiosity getting the better of her, Janea walked over and peered out the door. No one could be seen, except for captives in the other pens doing the same thing she was. She turned back to the others. Cmon, this is our chance. Zyp looked frightened, and wrung her paws. What if it is a trick? Who cares? We wont get another opportunity like this! She scampered out the door, and her more hesitant companions followed her eventually. A small crowd of recently-freed captives now gathered in the main hallway. Then the main doors swung open. As if someone had announced the start of a race, the captives began running, scurrying, slithering, and crawling their way to the exit as fast as they could. Wait! Janea shouted. We have to stay together! She was nearly knocked over by a big Strit that slapped her aside as it clattered for the exit as fast as its legs could take it. Ti-Ro and Zrikki helped Janea to her feet. She rubbed her head. So much for solidarity We need a plan. Ti-Ro said. Janea nodded. Were on a spaceship. Theres only one plan with a chance of working: capture the ship. Byatiztet and Zrikki looked at each other, and then at Janea. Byatiztet spoke. That will not be easy. There are many slavers, and we are few and She glanced at the last of the freed captives running out the door. ...disorganized. Galiwa stepped forward. If it is warriors you need, my [Leader/Protector/Husband] will be of great assistance. Janea turned to the alien. Look, Im sure your man is a great guy, but I dont think one person will make up the difference here. Galiwa looked unphased. If you had met my [Leader/Protector/Husband], you would disagree. Zyp stepped up. The more the merrier, I say. Get me to a terminal and I can find your bondmate, young one. Galiwa looked like she wanted to kiss the little rodent woman. There is a machine at the main entrance. Ti-Ro said, pointing. The group wandered over. To her annoyance, Zyp found that she could not reach the terminal. She looked up at Zrikki. Could I get a lift here? The Tlassiopei picked up the tiny alien and held her in front of the terminal, where she began typing. Ah, Diln security, as embarrassing as ever. Within minutes, the Tygvib had the information they were looking for. There is no reference to a Ponfet species to be found here, but there is someone labeled under Proto-Species 4 who is locked in one of the high-security cells in the male pens. Theyre not networked, so the benefactor who opened the cells for us would not have been able to free him remotely. He is likely still in the cell. That is him, Im sure of it! Galiwa said. They would not place my [Leader/Protector/Husband] under standard security. It would not hold him. Ok, translator, can we just settle on husband? Janea said aloud in annoyance. To her surprise, she actually got a reply. Command Processed. Ohthanks? Janea said in bewilderment. The rest of the group looked at Janea like she was insane. Uh...carry on. she said. Galiwa shook herself. As I was saying, my husband is almost certainly the one in that cell. If we break him out, he can help us fight our way to the control room of this ship, I promise. The group looked at Janea. The human shrugged. Sure, what the hell. Its not like I have a better idea. The lifeless corpse of a Diln guard collapsed to the ground as Zrikki and Byatiztet finished strangling him. Ti-Ro snatched up his stun baton. Zyp consulted the pocket computer shed stolen along the way, and squeaked self assuredly. Its just up ahead. The group got to the door and Zyp began fiddling with the door control. Galiwa leaned in and peered at the controls. Can you get it open? Zyp squeaked in laughter. Can you get it open? Oh, youre hysterical, child. Just watch my back. Less than a minute later, Zyp proved her own point and the door slid open. Kaleet! Galiwa shouted excitedly. She slammed into a massive wall of muscle and hugged it. Huge hands stroked her head plumage tenderly. A deep baritone could be heard. It is good to see you alive, love. The huge male ducked under the door frame, and stepped out. Janea felt herself involuntarily gulp in fear. Ok, I stand corrected. One guy can definitely make a difference. She said meekly. Ti-Ro was studying the man in excitement. Fascinating! I have not seen such extreme sexual dimorphism among any of the sapient species I have read of, this is truly amazing. Janea looked over the huge alien, and decided that she couldnt help but agree. Ponfets had opposable thumbs on both their hands and feet, just like a chimpanzee or gorilla. Galiwa seemed to prefer walking on her knuckles, but she seemed to be fully capable of walking on her hind legs as well. However, her male counterpart seemed to be much better adapted to walking on two legs, with an extra toe on the back of his foot giving him greater stability, and much more powerful leg muscles. Standing at his full height, he easily exceeded two meters. He seemed to be pure muscle, and looked like he could snap his comparatively scrawny female counterpart in half. Ti-Ro was right, this was quite extreme sexual dimorphism. They almost looked like different species. The male, Kaleet was apparently his name, shoved Galiwa behind him protectively, and then the plumage on his shoulders extended out into a very wide display. It was almost like a peacock''s feathers, but morethreatening. What are these creatures, Galiwa? He demanded. Galiwas stepped back out from behind him, and gently placed a hand on his forearm. These are my friends, love. They helped me to free you. Not all Sky People are bad, some of them are good too! The feathers retracted, and Kaleet bowed deeply. Please forgive this insult, I was unaware of these truths. He turned to Galiwa. What of the children, and what of Taziya and Laree? That infernal stun weapon put me down, and I woke up here. Please, what is their fate? Galiwa bowed her head. It seemed shedding tears was a physiological trait the Ponfet shared with Humanity. My Co-Wives took terrible wounds in the fighting. They were deemed too injured to work, and the children were deemed too young. They werespaced. The Diln sent them out to suffocate in the empty realm beyond the sky. Kaleet shed tears of his own, and then he roared a terrible roar of anguish and despair. He slammed his fists into a wall, over and over again. Galiwa grabbed onto one of his massive bicep analogues and tried to stop him, but it was like a ragdoll trying to stop a gorilla. My love, stop at once, you will injure your hands! Kaleet obeyed, and clenched his reddened fists at his sides. Janea snuck a look at the wall, and was a little terrified to discover the massive dent that had been put in the solid steel. Blood. The huge male growled. Blood will be shed this day. I will be coated in the innards of these butchers of babes and helpless women before this day is done, this I swear on my fathers. Mem So turned to look at the other aliens. I think we have found our battering ram. A battered, elderly human freighter with a jury-rigged fission engine limped its way into the slavers base, although base might have been too generous a term. It consisted of an old Diln bulk freighter converted into a slave transport, and around nine raider and support ships. It was the location, not the hardware, that made it a good base. It was located in a small bit of empty space inside a huge formation of particle clouds. It had been discovered through sheer dumb luck by a pirate ship decades ago, and the valuable location had changed hands many times over the years. Nowadays, it belonged to privateers on the Dilns payroll. Three of the smaller raider ships went out to intercept the freighter, although they shied away when they saw the plume of lethal radiation being shot out of its drive cone as it decelerated. When it finished spitting out its radioactive hose and came to a stop, the raiders began their approach again, hailing the ship on an open channel and demanding that it identify itself. Unbeknownst to the raiders, they were being watched. A tiny camera drone recorded them and, with great difficulty, beamed the footage back through the particle cloud towards its mothership. It was an old fleet tender. It was a proper military model, so it still retained some surprisingly potent armament for a logistical ship. Three light automatic railguns could unleash a hail of metal, ripping lightly armored targets to shreds. It was these weapons that Lance was counting on. The three raiders took up positions around the freighter, locking their weapons on it and continuing to hail it. Lance waited patiently as the camera drone fed data to his targeting computer. Hed have gotten his ass kicked if he attacked head on, he had no armor and limited weapons. But an ambush? That was more doable. The targeting computer chimed its completion, and Lance opened fire. Out of the particle cloud, a hail of rounds came flying out at incredible velocity. Rail gun rounds werent invisible, but they were hard to notice if you werent looking for them. The three raiders might very well be surprised. The other six ships (not including the mothership) might have time to react. In anticipation of this, Lance had preprogrammed firing solutions for all nine targets. It all happened in less than a minute. One instant, the privateer raiders were still threatening the Albatross. The next, they were silent, shredded by a hail of rail gun rounds. The savvier among the captains of the other six ships immediately fired their thrusters, seeking to avoid the incoming fire they suspected. Four of the six captains were not that savvy, and their ships were destroyed and disable by the hail. The remaining two ships burned at maximum tolerable acceleration, firing wildly into the particle cloud. Lance took his time, trusting in his concealment as he waited for new firing solutions. The computer chimed again, and the hail went out again. One ship managed to avoid it, but the other was completely annihilated in an antimatter explosion when a lucky hit breached its containment. The ship that avoided it fired a burst into the particle cloud, and the ships automatic systems managed to dodge the rounds. Shit! Hes figured out my position. Lance thought. He seized the helm and burned hard. He shot out of the particle cloud. He swiveled the ship and fired another volley, then turned back and burned again. The volley accomplished its purpose: throwing off the enemys aim. The return fire from the enemy ship went wide as it hastily burned to dodge. However, the success was short-lived. The enemy ship released all of its missiles, and they came streaking towards Lances captured ship. Fortunately for the beleaguered human pilot, he had anticipated this. Albatrosss engines roared to life as her computer responded to Lances remote commands. Her point defense cannons joined his weapons as the two ships sent a barrage at the incoming weapons. All of the missiles were destroyed, save one. It was a disabler missile, little more than a chemical explosive warhead, more useful for knocking out the crew than doing actual damage. Fortunately, Lance was not knocked unconscious this time, though he almost blacked out as the ship spun like a top from the explosion. As the ship struggled to stop its spin with its maneuvering thrusters, Lance was giving remote orders to Albatross. The stubborn tramp freighter fired short, controlled bursts, fighting to provide covering fire for its companion ship as it righted itself. The low muzzle velocity of the PD guns meant they were of little threat to the privateer, which dodged them easily. However, it was enough to keep the enemy from getting a clear shot for a few more moments, and that was all Lance needed. His own ship righted itself, and his three railguns joined their firepower with Albatrosss. Against two separate sources of fire, the privateer found it near impossible to dodge, and even more difficult to aim. Eventually, it was ripped to shreds by a barrage of railgun fire. [All targets accounted for]. The ships computer stated blandly. Lance let out an exhausted breath. Holy shit. I am one lucky son of a bitch. Kaleet seized the Strits pincer as it went for his throat. With a terrible roar, he grabbed both ends of the pincer and ripped it in half. He took the two prongs and stabbed them through the Strits carapace, and the big insectoid let out a horrible noise that was like nails on a chalkboard as it died in agony. Once again, Janea found herself splashed with alien viscera. You know, I didnt think he was being literal when he said he was going to be coated in their innards. Ti-Ro looked at her in amusement. What are you complaining about? Hes winning! Janea shrugged and laughed. I dont know. Im butt ass naked, shivering in fear, and cowering behind the big, strong man. It just feels a littleregressive. Who else are we supposed to cower behind? He can dent steel with his fists! Fair enough. The small group passed over the Strit, and Zrikki gleefully snatched up the fallen aliens pulse pistol. Finally, some real weapons! She gripped it experimentally and grimaced. Terrible grip, though Byatiztet snorted in amusement. What do you expect? It had pincers. Perhaps I would have an easier time with it Mem So mused. Silence yourselves! Someone approaches. Zyp said. Janea did indeed hear footsteps when she listened for them. Kaleet flexed his hands, and then his arm shot around the corner like lightning as he seized the approaching person. Wait! Beth croaked out, clutching at the massive hand that had seized her throat. Kaleet peered at his victim, then he turned to Galiwa. This creature has the look of one of our companions. He turned around and looked at Janea. Is this female affiliated with you? Janea looked at the other woman with hate. No, not in the least. Please Beth wheezed out. Janea grinned wickedly. Im sure your victims said something similar to you, didnt they? ...talk The older woman managed to get out. Janea rolled her eyes. Fine, lets hear what the evil bitch has to say. Kaleet let go of her throat and the woman collapsed to the floor. After a coughing fit, Beth struggled to her feet and looked at Janea with a tired smile. Im sure youll be sorry to hear it, little girl, but you are affiliated with me now. Who do you think opened the doors? Janea ground her teeth. Right, because now the awful things you do are happening to a human, so that makes it wrong. I dont know why I bothered talking to- I wasnt finished, you idiot. Ive disabled comms and internal cameras for this ship. The rest of the flotilla wont know whats going on for the moment. You need to seize the control room and get the ship moving. Ill get back on the computer system and try to keep the changes I made from being undone. Ill be in comms with you. Why would I ever trust you? Janea asked Because you dont have a choice. Now get moving, little girl. She turned to leave, then wheeled back around. Oh, and take this. She handed her an antique firearm. Janea looked at her incredulously. Youre joking, right? What am I supposed to do with this, club them to death? Its a gun. Cock the hammer, pull the trigger. It killed people just fine three hundred years ago, it can do it just fine now. She handed off the revolver and all of her extra ammunition, and then left without a word. Were just letting her go? Ti-Ro said. Janea ground her teeth again. She was right. We dont have a choice. The group made their way through the decks of the ship, fighting through any slavers that tried to stop them. Janea, some kind of battle just happened outside the ship. All of the other nearby ships just went dark. It must be some kind of Coalition patrol Janea mused to herself. Your guess is as good as mine. The main point is that its damn good luck for us. If you manage to take the control room, youre home free. Janea had stepped over the corpses of slaves and slavers alike. The other escapees were running around like chickens with their heads cut off. It would have been better for them to stay together as one cohesive group, but at least this method was keeping most of the ships crew occupied. She rounded the corner and stopped in her tracks. Alright, the operative word is most. It was Yifritel, and a dozen Krrg and Diln fighters. If it isnt my favorite slave. How unfortunate that I have to kill you now. Janea dove for cover, and her companions did the same as a barrage of laser pulses and mag rifle slugs came down on them. The small group was outnumbered and outgunned, but they fought back as best they could. The Diln provided covering fire as the Krrg advanced. The little aliens rushed the escapees, diving over their cover. Half of them died just trying to get there, but when they vaulted over the cover they wreaked havoc. They gunned down Zrikki, and her sister wailed in anguish and melted the Krrg that had shot her sibling with her laser carbine. She wailed and sobbed as she was covered in the Krrgs blood. Another Krrg almost had her, but was seized by Kaleet. The huge alien gripped the smaller one with one hand, and bashed its skull in with the other. Once his current victim was down, Kaleet went in search of another. He dragged one that was grappling with his mate, dragging it off of her and caving its chest in. Janea surveyed the scene. Zyp sat nursing a laser wound to her thigh. Byatiztet cradled her sisters head in her lap and sobbed. Ti-Ro fired back blindly with her stolen weapon. Kaleet fretted over Galiwa. All of this was done while cowering behind cover, the superior Diln firepower forcing them to stay down. Were in trouble. Then the Diln fire abruptly stopped, and shifted as they fired down a corridor to their left. Janea didnt know or care what they were shooting at. Nows our chance, hit them! The group let out ragged return fire. Caught in a crossfire, the Diln were quickly gunned down. As silence fell over the skirmish, Janea cautiously rose from cover, shuddering as her bare feet stepped through puddles of blood and other unfortunate fluids. She saw Yifritel lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood. Ah, the lovely Janea. I was just about to- Janea put a round through his head with her revolver. She wasnt interested in what the scum had to say. She moved over to the corridor that the cross fire had come from. She leveled her revolver, her hand shaking as she took cover behind the corner. Whoevers out there, show yourself, or I start shooting! she called. Janea? a heartbreakingly familiar voice said. Janea felt her heart stop. She rounded the corner and saw him, then nearly tackled him to the ground. Lance! she could barely hold back the sobs. She buried her face in his shoulder. ...youre alive. she whispered. The pilot was thrown for a loop. Janea was covered in alien viscera, had just threatened to kill him, and was displaying more emotion than he had ever seen her display before. Oh, and she was also buck-ass nude. Needless to say, it made for an awkward hug. Nevertheless, there was so much genuine, desperate warmth in the embrace that he couldnt help but return it. Im alive. He confirmed. He wrenched away from her, and looked her up and down. Im not so sure I can say the same about you, though. You look like you just rose from the dead. She gave the warmest smile hed ever seen her give, so warm it nearly dried up the tears that were still falling. Youre one to talk... she said, smiling even wider. Lance coughed. Not to ruin the moment He looked away pointedly. ...but could I interest you in a jacket thats too big for you? It was hard to tell under the alien viscera, but he was pretty sure she was turning red. Uhyeah, Id like that. He undid the zipper and handed the garment to her. She looked like she wasnt sure if she wanted to smile or cry even harder as she wrapped it around herself. Its good to have you back, Lance. He grinned. Yeah, well see how long you say that. Youre the one who has to clean the alien guts off of my favorite jacket. She took the ammo she had been clutching in her hand, and put it in the jackets pocket. Then, she reloaded. Lance watched her load the antique weapon in amusement. You have the weirdest adventures when Im gone. Where did you even get that? Youre one to talk. What was your plan here, single-handedly capture the entire ship and rescue Ti-Ro and I? ...Maybe. Im not going to pretend like it didnt make me happy to hear you say that, but youre still an idiot. Ill take what I can get. Yeah, well, weve got a fight to finish here, so- Janea! she heard in her ear. What? She said. It was Beth. They figured out where I rerouted control to. Theyve sent a team to put me down. Alright, were coming to bail you out. Negative. No point. Get to the control room and finish taking the ship. Ill hold them down here as long as I can. And before you say it, I know its not enough to make up foreverything. Just get out of here alive. Get back home to the fleet and live your life. Do that for me. Please. Janea didnt know what to say. ...I will. Good. Ive locked the ships controls. The passcode is the Diln alphabet phonetic equivalent of Sierra Tango Echo Victor Echo November, did you get that? ...Steven? Janea said. She heard a laugh over the comm. Yeah, thats it. Dont ask, no time. Good luck, little girl. The comm cut out. Who was that? Lance asked. Janea smiled sadly. Some tough old bitch. Lets get to the control room and finish this. The Diln captain of the slave ship was absolutely inconsolable with rage. What do you mean its locked? Its our ship! UNLOCK IT! The Krrg tech struggled not to wet itself and scurried back to its terminal, where it tried and failed to unlock the control systems. One of the Diln officers called out. Sir! Motion detectors picking up something outside the main doors. The captain fumed, but was still coherent enough to give orders. Arm yourselves, everyone. Well show them who the masters of this Arm are. Everyone in the room trained their weapons on the doorand then nothing happened. The captain looked over to his officer. What was it, a false alarm? The officer was as confused as everyone else. I dont know what to say sir, its saying there are at least seven individuals outside of the doors. Perhaps it has a malfunction or- The quiet, but painfully noticeable sound of the air circulation turning off could be heard. The captain raged. Have they no honor? Open the doors! Sir, we cant! Then blow them open! We have no explosives- Then cut it open with lasers, damn you! Then, a very unfamiliar sound could be heard. The air circulation hadnt just been turned off. It had been reversed. The captain knew some small measure of the terror he had inflicted on his victims. Split Janea stared at the corpse on a slab in the morgue, as if she expected it to get up and offer an explanation. Instead, it just laid there in the typical silence of the dead. Beth didnt look the part of a ruthless slaver and traitor lying there. She just looked like a tired old woman, finally getting some rest. Janea had gone through Beths things in the aftermath of the ship being captured. The old woman didnt have much in the way of personal possessions. Aside from a few sets of clothes and other necessities, and the revolver shed gifted to Janea, her only possession of any interest was an old worn wallet. Janea turned it over in her hands, looking through it again. It was definitely of pre-war manufacture, mainly because there was no such thing as a post-war wallet. Most would find it silly to use the fleets limited manufacturing capabilities to make wallets for a cashless society. Janea wondered if it was real leather. She wouldnt know. Shed never even seen a cow, nevermind leather. It felt smooth and soft, and had a faint smell shed never encountered before, so Janea liked to imagine that it was real. She looked through the wallets meager contents once again. A United Kingdom Citizen ID Card, with a picture of Beth that would have to be from at least twenty years ago. There were two twenty pound notes, and Janea felt surreal looking at them. She knew of paper currency intellectually, of course, but actually holding it in her hand feltstrange. There was a small gallery of real, actual photographs in a little booklet compartment in the wallet. Janea found herself flipping through them again, each one offering more questions than answers. Three young women in old-fashioned Space Force Cadet uniforms posed in front of an old European building of some kind. The middle one looked a bit like Beth, but matching the old, weather-beaten face on the slab in front of her to the youthful smile in the picture proved difficult. She flipped the page. An old man with snowy white hair beamed with pride next to a young woman in a Space Force Cadets uniform. With the perspective of the photo being closer, it was much easier to make out the womans face. It was definitely Beth. She flipped the page. A grinning man with African features wraps his arm around a slightly older-looking Beth, who smiles gleefully for the camera. The pair sits at a picnic table with a bright green field in the background. Janea quickly turned the page. Letting her eyes linger on old photos of Earth never ended well. Beth stands in Space Force fatigues at some kind of space port, holding a little boy in her arms who giggles as she kisses him. Its the last picture in the booklet. Think she lost him? Lance, looking over Janeas shoulder, asked. Do you think shed be here if she hadnt? Janea asked back. She stared down at the body. I doubt she has any people in the fleet, but if she does Ill hand this off to them when I get there. She said, holding up the wallet. She shook her head ruefully. Shes traitorous slaver scum, but shes still one of ours. Lance nodded slowly, his eyes drifting to the body and lingering. Yeah. One of ours. Janea left the morgue. Lance remained, looking down at the corpse. Were you really a traitor? Or were you just one last casualty? He asked the dead woman. She didnt answer. The disorganized gathering of recently-liberated slaves crowded into the cafeteria of the slave ship they had captured. The ragged group squabbled over what to do next, their translation implants struggling to keep up with the mess of words from a hundred languages flying through the air. One voice, the deep baritone of a particularly burly male Tlassiopei, was attempting to lead the discussion. The obvious choice is to make for Coalition space at best speed and allow the authorities to repatriate us from there- the big Tlassiopei was interrupted by a young Nodexial, who cackled an echoing, musical laugh. It stared back at the Tlassiopei with eyes as black and empty as the void. It looked like someone had crossbred a giant eel with a giant centipede and then covered it with a full body suite of bony armor. The creature rumbled and screeched, and the translators spoke. How long have you been in here, Tlassiopei? The Coalition is being crushed under the Supreme Commanders boot. His fleets roam freely through space around all but the most powerful strongholds. Itd take hundreds of light years to reach friendly space, and wed be lucky to make it a dozen in tubs like these. It smacked on the steel floor with one of its segmented tentacles for emphasis. A sound like howling wind echoed through the room as the horse-sized Eeyuuanoo at the rear of the room vocalized. The massive triped did not see or smell the others in the room, it instead listened to the sounds of its inaudible sub vocalizations bounce off of them with an auditory organ that took up most of its head. Its bone-chilling voice presented a good point. I want to return to my home and herd, as Im certain all of us do. What would you have us do? Hide in this storm until the Great Decay? More music filled the room as the Nodexial chuckled bitterly once again. It swiveled its massive head over those of the others in the room to look at the Eeyuuanoo. If your home and herd isnt on the fringe or in the core worlds of the Coalition, itll fall within the [1.86 Earth Rotations] anyway. Its head swiviled again as it surveyed the room, eyeing each of its inhabitants. Its vocalizations grew louder, like it was giving a speech instead of speaking to a room full of translator implants. The only option thats reasonable is to find the nearest neutral spaceport that isnt overrun by the Diln and then each of us goes our own way from there. I have no interest in being dragged along on any suicidal adventures into former Coalition space, but I have no desire to bar others from trying. The Tlassiopei growl-hissed its disapproval. No! Our only safety is in numbers. If we split up then we become fodder for the Diln. The shrill cry of a Noqqou perched on a handrail butted in. It flapped its four brightly feathered wings and let loose a torrent of shrieks from its scaled maw of razor sharp teeth. It didnt look all that intimidating compared to the Tlassiopeis massive bulk: it was only the size of a particularly large bird. And who declared you our ruler? You Tlassiopei may think you run the Coalition, but here we are all equals! There was an uproar as old wounds tore open and the Coalition in miniature collapsed into infighting. Ti-Ro cleared her throat and tried to speak. Perhaps- The uproar drowned it out. She cleared her throat again and raised her voice. I have a- Again, it was barely heard. A series of deafening thunderclaps reverberated through the room. SILENCE! A terrifyingly powerful baritone echoed. All in the room obeyed and looked at the source of the noise. Kaleets massive form sat atop a stack of crates, a dent in the floor where his foot had recently been used as a drumstick. With there being no clothes anywhere on the ship that would fit him, he had taken to wearing a massive cloth wrapped around himself that, combined with his mane of beautiful feathers, made him look like some ancient, regal Emperor. His wife and the three stray Ponfet females who had gravitated into his orbit over the last few days lay reclined at his feet, which only added to the effect. The ponfet male glared daggers at the room, before finally deigning to speak again. Mistress Ti-Ro wishes to speak. He turned his head and looked back at Ti-Ro expectantly. The zani woman felt like her heart was about to leap out of her chest as all eyes were suddenly on her. She cleared her throat for what felt like an eternity, and then somehow managed to speak. M-...my homeworld, Hent, is quite close, relatively speaking. Closer than the nearest non-Diln civilization, if this ships star charts are to be believed. If we all head there, my people can protect us, and we can all recuperate from this ordeal. In time, my people can arrange passage for those individuals who wish to leave. The small crowd took a moment to digest that. Predictably, the Nodexial was the first to speak. If youre here, then the Diln know of your planets location, surely. You expect us to rely on the protection of primitives? Ti-Ro started to answer., but the Nodexial interrupted. No, wait, let me guess. Is it bombs? You think your nuclear missiles will protect you from a Diln battlegroup? the alien mocked.The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. I grow tired of your snickering, serpent. Kaleet rose to his feet, ignoring the placating hand Galiwa tried to place on his massive thigh. Ah, yes, how could I forget about you. I feel safer already. More primitives to throw spears at their battlecarriers for us. He shook his head violently, ignoring Kaleet as the ponfet struggled against the grip of his female counterparts holding him back. This is absurd, is there anyone who honestly believes wed be safe there? He said, surveying the room. Our fleet will protect you. The voice that spoke was not an alien shriek or howl, but human speech. Janea stood up at the back of the room, Lance looking up at her in horror. The room went even more quiet then it had at Kaleets outburst. Humans tended to make peopleuncomfortable. The sight of a human brought up an unpleasant truth to the minds of every other species: the Ivos were still out there, as unstoppable as ever. Every human was a walking reminder that, as bad as things were, they could get much, much worse. The aliens in the room looked at the bald ape standing at the back of the room with some apprehension because of this, but they still gave it their attention. One alien, however, was unperturbed by the implications brought about by the presence of a human. The Nodexial bellowed in the most bitter laughter it had produced yet. What, so the species that couldnt even protect its own planet is going to protect this one? This is foolish. Janea did not react to the callous disregard for the murder of her civilization. She just stared at the Nodexial. Others began staring as well. It was Zyp who broke the silence. Oh, child. Youre showing your age. I was around when the humans fought the Diln, nevermind the Ivos. If their fleet has one tenth of the courage shown in their war with the Diln, or one millionth of the courage in their war against the Ivos, then we could not find better protectors in all the galaxy. She looked at the Nodexial with some measure of sympathy. The Nodexial took a moment to look around the room, and then it bowed its head to Janea. That was ignorant and low of me to say. I apologizebut, He looked up, pitch black eyes boring into Janeas. It is not your courage that I doubt, it is the size of your fleet. Your superdreadnought might tilt the scales in your favor against a single battlegroup, but what happens if the Diln come in with two? Or an entire fleet? Despite his ignorant comments earlier, many in the crowd could not help but admit he had a point. Lance was the one to cut in this time. If the Diln have the resources to spare an entire fleet to conquer the most backwater sector in the Arm, then that means the Coalition has fallen and were all doomed anyway. That quashed most misgivings on the spot. It was difficult to argue with the morbid reality of the times. Lance glanced at Janea and went on. Janea, Ti-Ro, and myself were on a mission to bring a message to the Fleet and bring them to Hent. WIth thisdetour, things have changed. Should you elect to go along with this plan, I will bring all of you to Hent. From there we can secure passage to independent ports as needed while Janea and Ti-Ro go on without me and come back with the fleet. Janea glanced sharply at Lance, but then looked away quickly. There were mixed reactions in the room to Lances words. The Nodexial gazed at Lance. Youll allow us to go to a neutral port, truly? Lance nodded (not that the body language would mean much to the giant alien). As soon as transport can be secured, yes. The Nodexial rumbled for a bit, then seemed to make up its mind. If you speak the truth, then this plan has my vote. It was hard to read such an alien creatures body language, but Lance strongly suspected that this was a very bugrudging agreement. With the greatest voice of decent silenced, it wasnt long before the denizens of the slave ship voted on the matter, and elected to go to Hent. Lance, Janea, and Ti-Ro were heading back to the airlock to make their way to their quarters on Albatross. Janea shook her head. I cant believe we convinced them. Lance glared at her. I can, seeing as how you told them a blatant lie. Humanity isnt allied with Ti-Zahn. Hell, aside from you, me, Sandra, and Akito we dont even know they exist. Janea looked away. Iknow, Lance. But you know as well as I that this is the best hope any of them had. Theres nowhere else for them to go, not anymore. Ill convince the fleetsomehow. Lance grabbed her and whipped her around, pointing a finger at her face. He looked at her with an uncharacteristic glare. You damned well better. You just dragged almost a hundred innocent people into our mess, without talking with me first I might add. I dont care if you have to abduct Admiral Khatri and hold him at gunpoint, you will get that fleet out there. Janea pushed him away. You seemed all about this plan in the cafeteria. Lance shook his head. No. You made a play, and I backed it up, even though it was a bad play. Janea glared back. It was the best play we had. Lance sighed. I hope youre right, Janea. I really do. With the humans no longer at each others throats, Ti-Ro jumped in. Perhaps our odds of convincing your fleet are better than we thought. If the Diln are on the verge of victory, then perhaps your leaders will be more open to it. Lance shook his head. That big bony fuck was exaggerating. The Coalition has been losing for the past ten years. The war is far from over, even with that big battle they lost while we were on Hent. Like everyone else, Lance had been doing some catching up on the news from the slave ships computer. The last data package was from two weeks ago, but it was still more up to date than Albatrosss news package. Still, it might push the government off of the fence. Janea said. They go on and on about the future of the species, but we have no future if the Diln rule everything. We have to get involved, like it or not. Lance shrugged. Dont tell me, tell it to the Admiral. Two humans and a zani walked through the cramped corridors of a captured Diln slave ship. A little white dog happily trotted after them. This isnt right Lance, this is your ship. You stole it fair and square. Janea said, half serious. Yeah, which is why youre going to bring it back to me. I swear, if you get attacked by pirates again, Im going to start thinking youre cursed. Lance teased. He looked at Janea. She seemed unconvinced. Look Allie is home, I get it, but shes not her best self right now. I burned off most of that radioactive muck we generously called fuel in my little escapade. Weve also been here for over a week. If the fleet hadnt moved off before, it definitely has by now. Which means youll need a hell of a lot more fuel than Allie can hope to carry to get back on its trail. He stopped at the airlock of Grrg-Dentfa, the Krrg vessel he had captured. This is the most intact ship we have in this little flotilla. We need the Fleets help, we cant risk you not reaching them because we sent you out in some pile of pirate junk we salvaged. Janea smiled. Thanks, Lance. I promise to bring it back in one piece. Lance put a hand on her shoulder. Bring yourself back in one piece. Both of you. He said, eyeing Ti-Ro. You too, Snowy. He said, looking down at the little dog. The dog turned its head quizzically at Lances words. Janea put her hand on Lances. I know Ive said it before, but you have no idea how glad I am that you didnt die on that ship. I thought I was used to loss. I mean, what human isnt, right? But, seeing yourcorpse. It was as bad as when I was a little girl. Worse,even. Janea wasnt used to emoting like this, but it just kept pouring out. Its justwhen does the wheel turn for us? We claw our way to the stars, finally start to move past our differences, and it all gets turned to ash by some alien civilization wed done nothing to provoke. Then we drift around for twenty years, and finally find some friends, only for the entire Arm to be on the verge of falling to the Diln. Good God, am I crying? She looked up at Lance, fighting back tears. Why us? Why humanity? When do we finally catch a break? Lance squeezed her shoulder. He was more than a little taken aback by Janeas change in personality since her captivity. The Janea of old wouldve sooner jumped out an airlock than cry in front of someone. He couldnt help but comfort her, though. It wouldve been inhuman not to. He squeezed her shoulder. We play the hand were dealt, Janea. If it hurts this bad to lose it, then that means its worth fighting for. We cant give in, never. For Them, remember? Janea dried her damp eyes. She nodded. For Them. There was an awkward alien cough. The two humans looked at Ti-Ro. She gave an unsightly zani grin. Im glad youre alive too, by the way. she said. Lance grinned back. Thanks, Ti-Ro. Come home in one piece. And make sure she does too, will you? The alien shrugged, scratching her neck with one of her tails. Eh, no promises. She has a talent for getting people to want to kill her, and Im only one zani. Good enough for me. Lance said. He knelt down and scratched Snowy behind the ears. Take care of these two lunatics, okay girl? Snowy licked his hands in response. Lance nodded sagely. Its always good to know that theres at least one person whos judgment I trust with them, thank you. He stood up swiftly. Alright, get out of here. Every minute spent here is another minute for the fleet to get further away. The pair nodded and made for the exit, Janea scooping Snowy up on the way. The airlock slammed shut. Lance cracked his neck and stretched. They have to convince humans to pick a fight. I have to convince a ship full of aliens not to rip each other apart. I think one of those jobs will be a hell of a lot easier to pull off than the other. Lance wandered off down the hall, bracing himself for several days of arguing with the logic of alien minds. Shitsuyōna High above the skies of a barren desert planet, a lone destroyer sat in a tight orbit. On the worn and battle-scarred hull in faded paint the name Shitsuyna was printed in Roman and Japanese characters. It had rolled out of the Mitsubishi starship yards in Earths orbit under the flag of Japan sixty-five years ago. Now Mitsubishi, Japan, Earth, and all of human civilization were naught but ash and embers, but the tough little ship soldiered on. Shitsuyna. Relentless. An appropriate name for such a ship. However, the crew of the ship, who lived aboard her, loved and hated her, had a different name for the temperamental old bitch: Shitty. Shitty was a terror in battle, her Mitsubishi-Kawasaki fusion drive-state of the art when she was launched-outperformed even modern (by post-war standards) designs in terms of both power and reliability. It also outperformed them in being a gargantuan pain in the ass to perform maintenance on. Nevertheless, they were unfailingly reliable in combat. All of the ships critical systems were. The not-so-critical systems, however, were decidedly less reliable. The air-scrubbers, for example, were unflinchingly dutiful in recycling exhaled carbon dioxide into breathable air. The air fresheners, however, were another story. Suffice to say, there was more than one reason for the name Shitty. Her crew regarded her the way a juvenile might regard their older sibling. She was a spiteful, annoying bully, but when the chips were down, she took care of her little brothers and sisters. Shed taken a beating that wouldve crippled ships twice her size and then come out swinging. Her scars were numerous, each having their own story. However, they all came together to tell another, larger story: When humanity calls, Shitsuyna answers. Unfortunately, humanity had a tendency to call on Shitsuyna quite a lot more than her crew would hope. There was, in fact, yet another reason for her nickname: She got all of the shitty jobs. Which was why, when the rest of the fleet had wandered off to forage, the battered little destroyer had been left behind to ferry rangers around to finish up some mercenary work humanity had contracted out. The Shitsuynas captain, Commander Marku, was considerably more enthusiastic about his current assignment. He had something of a reputation among the Space Force as a man who lived for a fight. He was tall, gray-haired and olive-skinned, his face just as tough and weather-beaten as his ships. He was on the wrong side of middle-aged, a decorated officer whod risen through the ranks over the decades since enlisting as a young man years before the Ivo war. Hed been in the Force so long he was saltier than the brine of Earths devastated seas. He was also completely mad. Or, at least, thats what his crew said. They were convinced hed had more than a few screws knocked loose during the war. To Major Albert Newman, commander of the ranger detachment on Shitsuyna, the pair of brown eyes that scrutinized the recon maps of the bandit compound didnt look much like the eyes of a mad man. Just an experienced and battle-tested officer. Those eyes turned to him, and their owner spoke. Your rangers are gonna be really damned exposed going in like this. Commander Marku remarked. Al nodded. Yeah, tell me about it. Nothing but wide open desert far as the eye can see, flatter than a pancake. Which is exactly why we need to air-drop right on top of them. Approaching on foot is suicide. Marku grimaced and shook his head. I dont like it. You have even less cover from the air. Those skies are too damn clear. Which is why were dropping at night. Marku snorted. Even amateurs like this lot are bound to have at least a few thermal scopes. And night or day, if theyve got any laser defenses once they reveal themselves theyll chew through half a dozen of our people before my counter batteries can melt them. You need some kind of concealment. Smoke bombs? Marku shook his head. No, those wont obstruct the lasers enough. Al wracked his brain, and then when it hit him he smiled at the salty old officer. Ive got a few ideas. Perhaps there was some merit to Markus reputation for madness, because when Al told him his plan he didnt balk at it or list off the dozen or so reasons why they shouldnt do it. He just grinned right back. Al walked among his rangers, slapping them on the back or muttering words of encouragement. There was an even mix of people among the rangers. The majority were young bucks (and a few does) looking to prove themselves, eager for a fight, and also quick to get themselves killed. They paced, or chattered among themselves, or fidgeting in their seats. Others were more experienced, sitting quietly and waiting for the drop. A few were like Al, salty old bastards whod been wearing a rangers armor for longer than most of the drop bays occupants had been alive. They were all wearing an NCOs rank insignia, walking among the rangers the way Al was. Al envied them, in a way. Hed liked being an NCO a hell of a lot more than he liked being an officer. He hadnt the faintest idea how hed ever been convinced to wear an officers rank, but here he was. The ship began to vibrate, and Al walked to the front of the drop bay. He banged on the bulkhead to get everyones attention. Alright kiddos, buckets on. he said, placing his helmet on his head. His rangers donned their helmets and looked back at him, their faces replaced by the familiar visage of a UN ranger helm, the only indication that there was a human beneath it were the two opaque eye holes that his rangers stared at him through. Even with scraped and battered hand-me-down armor that necessity had given them, they still cut a striking figure. Al went on. Weve got a compound stuffed to the gills with bad guys sitting on a pile of Nodexi civilians. We drop in, kill the bad guys, free the civvies. Clear? Aye sir! the group shouted. Al nodded and moved over to his spot. The ships vibrations reached a loud peak and then started to peter off. There was quiet anticipation amongst the rangers, and Al decided to break the silence. Rangers, how many? He asked, putting on his graveliest NCO voice. Not one! his rangers chorused back. How many? Not one! HOW MANY? NOT ONE! Al smiled to himself as the rangers chanted, their spirits raised. He hadnt lost his touch yet. A red light shined through the drop bay. Seal check! an NCO shouted. Each ranger checked his neighbors armor seals and shouted clear! going down the two lines. Al heard his training come to his mind for the thousandth time. Arms crossed, legs straight, chin tucked. Arms crossed, legs straight, chin tucked. A voice chimed in Als ear. Icarus, this is Overwatch, are you green, over? Overwatch, Icarus, we are green, over. Al said back. Understood Icarus. Drop in ten, over. The light changed, and the drop bay was bathed in green light. Drop drop drop! Al shouted to his rangers. The two groups of rangers stood in a line facing each other. Trap doors began opening in rapid succession on Als line, the rangers standing on them dropping like lead. Al braced himself, hearing nothing but the loud clang of the doors opening, growing louder as it approached him. It still took him by surprise just like it always did, and the gravity of the dusty planet below him seized him in an iron grip and he plummeted through its skies. Al watched Shitsuyna shrink above him as he plummeted to the ground. He looked down at the vast empty desert below him and smiled. This fall was going to take a good while. He looked around him as his rangers spread their arms and legs and maneuvered into a formation. The atmosphere was on the thin side on this planet (even without the altitude), albeit breathable, surprisingly enough. The nearby Nodexi colony, Yuvintbirfset, had used this so far unnamed rock to host a few research bases looking to survey the planet in detail, until theyd been seized during the recent invasion by a bandit warlord. Some particularly influential pirate leader had gathered together a small army composed of all lowlifes from the region (who werent on the Dilns payroll) and had invaded the system with a sizeable armada of makeshift warships.This far out into the frontier, the Coalition and the Imperial presence was limited, to say the least. The beleaguered Coalition garrison commander for the district had a destroyer, a handful of elderly frigates, and dozen second-line interceptors to cover the entire region. Even if they had managed to gather them all together, it was far from a sure thing that theyd be able to drive off the warlord. So, the colonial government in exile had hired the best mercenaries in the Arm: Humans. Which was the reason that Al was currently hurtling towards the ground at alarming speeds. Humanity in exile really only had one resource: its relatively large and professional military. While the Fleet was largely self-sufficient, there were some supplies that they simply did not have the capacity to produce themselves. So, from time to time, humanitys disproportionately powerful military was contracted out to fight alien conflicts. While they had never once taken a contract that would bring them into conflict with one of the two warring superstates, and Admiral Khatri took special care to shy away from the more morally dubious contracts, humanity had still developed something of a reputation for the work among the sorts of people in the Arm who hired mercenaries. The Yuvintbirfset government had made an offer that Humanity couldnt refuse: a huge mountain of dirt. Soil, to be specific. Yuvintbirfset was a colony whose primary export was arable soil, and what a treasure it was. The government had offered humanity enough soil to outfit three new agriculture ships, with every gram of it engineered to human botanists exacting specifications. Engineered soil was obscenely expensive, so the payment offered was enough to buy the services of a heavy cruiser and its escorts. The small fleet had made short work of the warlords orbiting fleet, and the colony was liberated in a lightning fast ground assault. The rest of the task force had gone off for a rendezvous with the main fleet for repairs and rearmament, and poor old Shitty had been left behind to mop up the last few pockets of resistance. The only significant remaining pocket of that resistance was currently many thousands of meters below Al, and approaching rapidly. The bandits had razed most of the science outposts on the desert planet to the ground, and then holed up in the largest of them, turning it into a base. When the shattered warlords fleet had been routed, this little base had been left behind. Rather than surrendering like sensible people, the bandits were using the captured Nodexi researchers as human-er, alien-shields. By now the small base was close enough to be visible to Al without using his helmets zoom function. He looked around himself to the rangers surrounding him. Break. he said into his helmet comlink. The rangers immediately began to break off into units, preparing. A voice came into Als radio. Icarus, Overwatch, stand by for fire support in thirty, over. Overwatch, Icarus, understood, over. He grinned beneath his helmet in a mixture of excitement and terror. Hold onto your hats people! he called through the company comm. He gritted his teeth. Several horrifically loud sonic booms assaulted the ears of the rangers as cannon rounds soared past them at hypervelocity. And those are the light cannon rounds. Al thought to himself with morbid amusement. A handful of seconds after passing the rangers the rounds impacted their target. Which, incidentally, was not the raider base. Instead, it was the ground in front of it. A gigantic cloud of dust and debris was kicked up into the air, engulfing most of the compound. Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators! Now! Al ordered his rangers, and they all deployed their wingsuits. Al struggled not to lose his lunch as he was lurched around by the sudden change in control as he glided for the front of the compound. Within a few moments, Als suit computer calculated that it was time. His parachute deployed, and soon he crashed into the sand, skidding on his ass a few dozen meters from the front of the base. He didnt stop, instead turning his momentum into a sprint as he ran for the front wall, his chute rapidly winding itself back up behind him. Two platoons of rangers performed the same action, and the entire unit sprinted for the wall. The debris in the air had guarded against anti-personnel lasers, and now the precious concealment it provided was rapidly dissipating. Without prompting, two teams of rangers began setting breaching charges while their fellows took up positions around them. A handful of deadly accurate shots rang out as bandit gunmen placed on the roofs exposed themselves to the rangers thermal vision through the dust cloud and suffered the consequences. Within seconds, the charges were placed and the breaching teams got into position. The carefully placed explosives blew a hole in the wall, and shots rang out as rangers flooded into the building and took up positions within its hallways. In the aftermath of the brief firefight Al saw corpses from many species on the floor, but fortunately none of them were human. No orders were given, the rangers had the buildings layout memorized and had been rehearsing a breaching strategy for days. Getting here intact was the hard part. Now, it was business as usual. The rangers poured through the building, one platoon circling left while the other circled right. Resistance was suspiciously sporadic. Or, at least, thats what Al believed. The rangers moved in breaching teams, blowing down doors and rapidly clearing the rooms. A decent number of bandits were killed, but not a single hostage had been found. Figures. Al thought with a grimace as he heard the reports. He had a terrible feeling that he knew exactly where the hostages were. His enemies were not blind, and theyd had time to prepare. If they couldnt defend the compound, they really only had one card to play, and they were well aware of it. Odds were good that theyd retreated to some kind of bastion when their air defenses failed. It wasnt long before the entire ground floor was cleared of hostiles. The enemys numbers had been substantially lower than estimated. Unfortunately, there was still one last place to check. Al stood in front of the heavy steel doors of the compounds basement, his rangers fanning out to find the other entrances to it. An intercom on the door buzzed. Guessing thats for me. Al gave a resigned sigh and made his way to the door, tapping the intercom screen. A heavily scarred Tlassiopei appeared on the other end in a video call. His growls and hisses were translated by Als helmet. Human! Youve fought honorably, but Im afraid that the time for honor is over. Al was almost amused. Oh, is that so? What did you have in mind? I have some things I intend to purchase from you, and the lives of these hostages will serve as my funds. I see. Lets hear it. As much as it pained Al to negotiate with scum like this, at the end of the day he was not the one in charge here. The Nodexi would want to hear the criminals demands. They were not the sort of species that got hung up on matters of honor. It was simultaneously their most noble and ignoble quality: for good or ill, the giant centipede-eels were always willing to go to the table, no matter how foul their company would be. And at the end of the day, they were the ones signing Als hypothetical paycheck. The Tlassiopei spoke succinctly, his demands had likely been rehearsed. We want a Dark Space capable ship, either a tramp freighter or light passenger liner will suffice, and a pair of shuttles capable of ferrying us to this ship. In exchange, all hostages will be released, save for five which will be retained as insurance. These five will be dropped off in a lifepod, and after a timed delay its distress signal will be activated. All of the hostages come out in one piece and my compatriots and I get to keep our heads. Everybody wins. Al actually laughed at that. A professional hostage negotiator, he was not. Everyone wins, but some win more than others, right? The Tlassiopei chuffed in amusement. Just take the demands to your employers, primate. No, wait. I have a counter offer: surrender now and youll all walk out of that room alive, I swear it. The Tlassiopei chuffed again. Death now at your hands, or death later at the hands of the executioner. Not much of an offer. The Nodexi dont practice the death penalty. So I get to spend the rest of my life in prison instead? Tempting, but Ill have to pass. The ranger shrugged. Dont say I didnt warn you. He killed the intercom and went out to make a phone call. Nodexi didnt have much in the way of facial expressions, but Al guessed that Yuvintbirfsets governor was looking annoyed. They cannot seriously expect us to justwilt like this, surely? the governor asked. Commander Marku started to shrug, before catching himself. The aliens wouldnt understand a shrug. It is difficult to say, governor. This is likely their Hail Mary-er, their last gamble. What happens if we refuse is anyones guess. They may very well be prepared to die if their demands are not met, and theyre almost certainly prepared to murder, at the very least. These demands are completely unreasonable. Id expected bargaining for reduced sentences, perhaps negotiating for internment in a penal colony rather than a prison, but thisthe answer is no. I have no interest in negotiating with such unreasonable individuals. The big alien swiveled its head and looked at the screen where Al watched the discussion over a video call. It stared at him with the black empty pits it had for eyes. Tell these criminals that I am prepared to offer a reduction from life without parole to life with parole, and a deferment from prison to penal colony. This is my only offer. Should they refuse, or harm one of the hostages, you have my permission to storm the basement with lethal force. It seemed even Nodexi diplomacy had its limits. Al nodded. Understood, Governor. The Governor nodded and closed the call. Al shook his head. The idea that a criminal could use hostages to bargain down his punishment was completely absurd to his human sense of justice. Yet, his employers were not human. What was a mockery of justice to him was perfectly sensible negotiation in the interest of preserving life to the Nodexi mind. At the end of the day, if all of the hostages walk out of there alive then I suppose it doesnt really matter, does it? He made his way back to the basement door and buzzed the intercom. After a moment, the scarred Tlassiopeis face appeared in front of the camera. Well, human, what is your answer? The Yuvintbirfset government will not be submitting to your demands. They offer each of you a reduction of your maximum possible sentences from life without parole to life with parole, and the option to have your sentence deferred to a penal colony if you so choose. In exchange, you will release the hostages and submit to their justice system. Al suspected he already knew what the answer would be, and he subconsciously unslung his rifle. ...Is this a joke? Al grimaced beneath his helmet. No, its their only offer. The Tlassiopei bared its teeth and growled. So, they choose battle? A shame that such honorable warriors need kill each other for such gutless cowards, isnt it? Ill see you in combat, human. The big alien made to cut the connection, and Al prepared to order his men in. As he was drawing in his breath to do just that, the Tlassiopei was knocked out of frame by a massive Strit. There was a scuffle, and it ended when the Strit got its pinchers around the Tlassiopeis throat. It grabbed his torso with the other and twisted until the hairy aliens neck snapped. The Strit discarded the corpse the way one might dump a lunch tray, and swiveled its body to face the camera. Human, ignore previous spokesman. Terms are acceptable; will submit to your custody- The big arthropod was cut short by a gaping hole appearing in its chest. It collapsed to the ground. Behind it stood a Krrg holding a mag rifle. It shrieked in rage. Traitor! Then all hell broke loose as the bandits turned on each other. Al didnt waste time watching. He shouldered his rifle and joined the rangers stacking up on the entrance. Looks like Im leading from the front today. Breach breach breach! He roared over the company comms. Rinsvretqaglo sat on the ground, her armored body coiled protectively around her daughters. Shed worked as a contractor for one of the research outposts on this planet, what felt like a lifetime ago. When the raiders had come, shed been rounded up with all the other denizens of the planet who hadnt been murdered and stuffed into pens in this compound. She had lived in terror for months at the criminals hands, along with hundreds of others. It was sheer dumb luck that she and her daughters hadnt yet been carted off to be sold into slavery with most of the others. The raiders were disorganized in terms of logistics, and a low-priority task like transporting a few hundred slaves was not high up on the to-do list. So, she had lived in this same compound while the raiders carted away the population piecemeal, waking every day to the terrible fear that she and her daughters would be on the next tramp freighter heading for Diln space. Then, something had changed. The shipments had stopped going out. Their already meager rations had been cut, and the guards seemed to be on edge. Then, out of nowhere, Rinsvretqaglo and the other captives had been herded down into the basement along with most of the guards. It was not exactly spacious, and Rinsvretqaglos bones ached from being crammed into one side of the room with the other captives. While she still had no idea what was going on, she was watching her captors intently. The de facto leader of the band, a burly, battle-scarred Tlassiopei by the name of Hrigfitettlal, was seemingly having a heated discussion with someone in the intercom. Then, it seemed to abruptly end, and the gargantuan Strit whose name she had never learned seized Hrigfitettlal by his throat and killed him on the spot. A wave of terror washed through Rinsvretqaglos body, and she coiled tighter around her young. She watched as the nasty little Krrg standing behind the Strit blew a hole clean through its armored body, and then all the Seventy Hells seemed to break loose. The raiders turned on one another, and the Nodexi captives shrieked in terror. Rinsvretqaglo uttered a prayer to the Thousand Gods that her young die without any suffering, and then steeled herself for the end. All three doors to the basement were suddenly blown off their hinges, the noise deafening all but the most hardy of auditory organs. Disoriented, Rinsvretqaglo watched as bipedal forms clad in dark armor streamed into the room, their movements deliberate, every action perfectly calculated. A Krrg who had been lingering on the edge of the brawl noticed them first, and opened fire on one of them with a laser carbine. The beam struck the biped (gah, what was the species called again?) and it staggered, its flesh unharmed but its armor charred. One of its fellows fired a single shot from a mag rifle, and the Krrgs eye burst into a spray of gore as its body spasmed in death. The other raiders attempted to reorganize as their brawl was interrupted by the attackers, but most were gunned down in short order as they sprawl across the ground in various states of violent disorientation. A handful, mostly Krrg, had the sense to throw down their weapons and lie on the ground, gripping appendages on their heads. Others fought back. A Tlassiopei rallied a trio of Krrg, and they opened fire on the bipeds. One of the creatures fell, writhing on the ground with a wound. Its companions returned fire, their disciplined shots rapidly felling the shooters. One of the raiders, this one a Nodexi himself, scurried over to the hostages. It had a mag cannon wrapped up in its tentacles, and Rinsvretqaglo felt her blood run cold as she realized he was aiming at the hostages, not the attackers. Rinsvretqaglo joined others in screaming in terror, and then the Nodexi was shot, its mag cannon going off wildly and peppering the walls and ceiling with fire. The big male bellowed in pain, writhing on the ground in an effort to get back up. He managed to level his cannon at an approaching biped, and had his brain splattered on the floor for his trouble. Just as suddenly as it started, it ended. A pile of corpses littered the room, and what few raiders had surrendered were being put into restraints. The one who had killed the Nodexi criminal, and saved Rinsvretqaglos life, turned to face the group. It spoke to them through the synthetic voice of a translator. Uhhi? It waved its left gripping appendage back and forth in the air, standing still. Are you folks alright? Rinsvretqaglo didnt know if shed ever be alright again, but she (and more importantly her daughters) would live. She uncoiled herself painfully, and stumbled her way over to the biped on her blood-deprived limbs. As she approached, she wracked her brain. Bah, what are they called? Yunmuh? Tuhnan? No, I remember. A memory from her youth entered her mind. A newscast playing in her family home, her parents watching it in horror. It was the image of a murdered world, sent out for all in the arm to see by the genocidal lunatics who had committed the crime. Even so far out into the frontier, most have at least heard of- Human. Rinsvretqaglo croaked out. She hadnt spoken louder than a whisper in weeks. Woah, easy. The human held its hands out. We still need to search you guys, there could be- Rinsvretqaglo stopped short. Thank you, human. Al sat in Commander Markus office, enjoying a bulb of celebratory whiskey with the captain. While he did this, his men were finishing the cleanup on the planet below. Bandit corpses were disposed of, prisoners processed, and hostages given food and medical attention. The rangers also policed up what weapons and equipment the bandits had with them, as part of the contract with the Yuvintbirfset government included salvage rights to any equipment and ships belonging to the enemy (indeed, the fleet had gained several new hulls from salvaging the warlords fleet). Al sipped his whiskey, looking at the bulb with amusement. Being an officer does have its moments. That was damn fine work, Newman. Not a single hostage dead, the bad guys are all either corpses or prisoners, and you brought all of your rangers back alive. Commander Marku raised his bulb and grinned, downing the rest of it. Al smiled as well. Not just this operation, the whole campaign has gone damn near perfectly. That better be some premium dirt were getting, because humanity has more than earned its pay this time around. He shook his head, his smile growing rueful. I worry about us getting complacent, fighting scum like this instead of real soldiers. Our troops are going to get overconfident if we keep fighting things we can mop the floor with so easily. Marku shrugged. I dont know, I like these little operations Khatri sends us on. Before we started doing these, the only way a new recruit would ever see combat is if they happened to have a run in with pirates when escorting one of our trade convoys, or maybe on a scouting mission. Id rather our troops see combat in easy fights like these rather than never see combat at all. He grimaced. Hell, my first time in combat was against the Ivos. I wouldnt wish that on anyone. Al didnt respond, finishing his own whiskey. As usual, any semblance of a good mood he might have had vanished at the mention of the Ivos. I already see them every night in my dreams, so why does everyone feel the need to bring them up in my waking hours too? He was relieved to hear the captains handheld ring, as it absolved him of having to talk about the Ivos. Commander Marku answered his handheld. Yeah? Ok, whats strange about that? On my way. He got up to leave, turning to Al he said. Theres a ship that just dropped out of Dark Space. Its hailing us. Als eyes widened in mild surprise, and he followed the captain to the CIC. The pair entered the CIC, Put them on the big screen. Commander Marku ordered. Al saw the face that appeared on the screen, and just like that he was back on New Kolkata, looking into the empty eyes of the little girl hed found amidst a pile of human corpses. When had that dead, broken look turned into the strong, determined gaze he looked into now? And when had that little girl gotten so damned big? ...Janea? He asked in shock. She seemed as startled as him, but then her surprise broke into a smile, and Al felt his heart light up just like it always did when he saw it. That little girls smiles had always been few and far between, and every one of them was precious. Hi dad. Janea said. Her smile faded, and her determined gaze grew tired. I need your help. Lunch Sandra Tanaka watched with amusement as her husband pounded away at the rockfish. Akito was single minded in his determination to get the precious morsel imprisoned by the animals two centimeter thick bony plates. Even steamed to the point where human food animals would have their meat falling off the bone, the stubborn things barely budged under Akitos force. In the time she had spent living alongside Ti-Zan, Sandra had discovered much about her hosts. For the more abstract, cultural elements that make up an intelligent species, they were very similar to humans, albeit vastly more collectivist in outlook than even the most communal of human cultures. Like humans, they generally heavily favored permanent, monogamous relationships between mating pairs. Also like humans they had traditional roles the two sexes typically filled (though their monoculturalism makes it difficult to say how much of it is nature and how much of it is nurture). Much like humans, things like hunting, building, working a trade, and the hard sciences were traditionally regarded as things men do, whereas home life, organizing social functions, child care, and the soft sciences tended to be regarded as things women do. And, again, like humans they have begun to reexamine these roles in the wake of their industrial revolution. These things have their roots in generalized physical and behavioral differences between the sexes. On paper, the differences between the sexes are quite similar between humans and zani, with males generally having natural physical advantages and females natural advantages in social and emotional intelligence. However, theyre only similar on the surface level. Whereas human males are on average just generally physically stronger and more athletically capable than their opposites, zani males arent actually much more strong or athletic than zani females. They are, however, covered in armored plating. The plates werent just for show. Zani men were durable. Sandra had seen a man get hit by a car one day while walking through the capital city streets with Akito. The man had put a zani-shaped dent in the front of the car, and had then immediately gotten up and proceeded to argue with the driver over who was at fault, his only injury a nasty bruise. In comparison, a zani woman was about as durable as a human woman. In many ways, this made the physical gap between the sexes even more pronounced than in humans, despite the difference in actual physical ability being less pronounced. A Zani woman who got into a fistfight with a man would achieve nothing except broken finger bones and an annoyed look from her opponent, and the only reason shed be unscathed was because zani men took the adage that you dont hit a girl very seriously. When a single punch from your armored fist can crack a womans skull open, you kind of have to. This durability was an adaptation to the harsh and dangerous land they inhabited. Animals on Hent tended to be either gigantic and ravenous or tiny and hyper-efficient. Ti-Zan was a rare example of a medium sized animal inhabiting the planet. The countless tiny animals lived within the intricate network of small streams, brooks, and ponds that were shielded from the eternal sunlight by the vast array of above ground caves and crags that characterized the Zani homeland. They lived incredibly short lives, only surviving long enough to mate and lay eggs, before dying and flowing out of the caves and into the streams and rivers, where they were feasted upon by fungus. The megafauna in turn came to the valley to feast on this fungus (or to feast on other megafauna, depending on the species). However, eventually the corpses would run out, and so the megafauna would return to the night side of Hent to hibernate and birth the young theyd breed during their feast. Then the small organisms would hatch, breed, and die, and the cycle would repeat. This cycle of life was the closest thing the tidally locked Hent had to a season. Ti-Zan had found its niche in hunting the megafauna during the fertile season. The males would go out during those times and hunt creatures the size of buildings that could fling them around like they were a toy. When they managed to get a few good kills, they would carve up the carcasses and bring them back to their burrows, where the best meat would be eaten and everything else would be ground up into mushroom food. While they were gone, the females would do their best to grow food anywhere and everywhere they could in the worthless soil of Hent while the natural fertilizer was still around. The males who survived the hunts had been those tough enough to survive being beaten to smithereens by a kick from a leviathan, or quick and agile enough to avoid being hit in the first place. These males then returned home with their kills and bred with the females who had had metabolisms efficient enough to survive the lean times in between leviathan hunts and mushroom harvests. Countless generations with these selection pressures had bred men that could get run over by a car and have the worst injury they suffer be to their pride, and women that could go months without significant food. It had also produced a culture that was highly organized and strictly coordinated. When you lived on a world that gave you so little room for error, you either worked together or you starved. Sandra took her eyes off of Akito and looked at her own meal. It was a soup made from mushroom stock, which then had mushrooms added, and was then served with a side of mushrooms. She sighed. Sandra had learned and experienced much of Ti-Zan during her stay on their world. There was much to be admired about the hardy, sociable, and dutiful people that lived here. However, there was one thing that Sandra completely, unequivocally despised about them, and that was their cuisine. To put it more bluntly: Zani food sucked. The appalling quality of Hents soil meant that even in the zani homeland, the most fertile region on the planet, plant analogues struggled to grow. The food chain was sustained by hyper-efficient algae which permeated everything in the rivers and streams, and by chemosynthetic organisms that feasted on Hents countless spewing geothermal vents deep in within the water-filled caves. Terrestrial plants which lived in the soil on Hent were small, nutritionally bankrupt, and so difficult to digest that the only reason they didnt completely blanket the surface was because Hents worthless soil starved them before they could. What few decent-sized plants existed were relentlessly cultivated by Ti-Zan. Not to eat, but to burn for fuel, or make tools. Wood was a foreign concept to the species. The best they had was particularly sturdy stems or reeds. There was exactly one plant species that Ti-Zan had managed to cultivate into something resembling edibility, and diced up bits of one of its many breeds were currently floating in Sandras soup. It was a plant that grew short and straight in every Zani garden in the land. It was kind of like broccoli, except it was all stem, no flower, and had even less flavor. But it was also the only nutritious plant consistently available to the species, so it was in everything. There were no cereal grains, beans, fruits, or other edible plants of any consequence available to the species. The closest equivalents to those within Zani cuisine was their staple crop and the foundation of their civilization: mushrooms. Through millennia of selective breeding, Ti-Zan had forged several species of mushroom with fruits the size of small bread loaves that would sprout dozens of times, given that they were provided with enough nutrients. The meat of leviathans was a secondary objective of the hunts. The real goal was to grind the beast up into feed for Ti-Zans precious, precious mushrooms. The huge beasts were lean, tough, stringy, and almost inedibly gamey. More like eating a predator than a proper human meat animal. The best cuts were carved up into steaks and feasted on at the end of the hunting season, and absolutely everything else was fed to the mushrooms. This huge influx of nutrients would cause the organisms to explode with fruit, which would be eaten on the spot, roasted, fried, cooked into a soup or stew, dried, or (more recently) frozen. It was a super food, nutritious, hearty. The foundation of Zani civilization. Which is why it was a shame that it was so god-forsakenly bland. Sandra poked at the bits of it floating in her soup, growing increasingly disheartened with every prod. It was like a spongy, stringy potato, with none of the flavor. But, combined with the strange broccoli stem plants, it was one of the only consistent sources of food in the harsh environment of Hent. And, in one of the many merciless and cruel ironies of the stars, the two foods were some of the only organisms on Hent that humans could actually digest. Zan spiced up their cuisine (not to imply that they have many substantial seasonings other than salt) with, wellanything and everything. The uncountable species of tiny fish, amphibians, reptiles, and other crawlies that existed in their brief life cycles before the fertile times would be caught and eaten by Zan at any and every opportunity. If it wasnt poisonous, it went in the pot, more for their vitamin and mineral content than any real calorie gain. Unfortunately, these little beasts were almost universally inedible to a human. What little flesh existed on them was intermingled with forests of bones, spines, armored plates (an apparently very popular adaptation on Hent), chitin, guts, and other things that would rip a humans insides up. If you carved up every ounce of flesh from one of the critters and ground it up, you could get about a third of a chicken nuggets worth of meat that a human could eat. Even hosts as gracious as the Zan were not willing to go to all that trouble for their guests when there was perfectly edible mushrooms and broccoli stems they could feed them instead. With their gizzards to grind the bones and spines and chitin into powder, and their ruthlessly efficient stomachs, the Zan could scarf down the creepy crawlies with little in the way of digestive trouble. Unfortunately for humans, the small animals were the only non-mushroom or broccoli part of zani cuisine that was readily available. So, the two humans with their soft teeth and weak tummies had simply had to deal with it once their rations had run out. Once, after one of their many long consultation meetings with a board of zani scientists, the department director had treated the human couple to a leviathan steak dinner. Sandra had been practically frothing at the mouth at the prospect of tasting another flavor for the first time in weeks. Then the steaks had arrived, and Sandra was painfully reminded that the forces of irony were the true power in the universe. There are two kinds of leviathans: the ones that eat fungus, and the ones that eat other leviathans. They are also almost all muscle, some of the leanest meat imaginable. They are also loaded to the brim with pathogens, so the only safe way to eat a leviathan steak is well-done. Because, of course it was. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Yet, despite it having the flavor of panther meat and the texture and chewability of shoe leather, Sandra had still devoured it like a ravenous predator (which, all things considered, is exactly what she was). However, her stomach had voiced its displeasure at having to digest the disagreeable meat not long after the dinner, and so Leviathan was off the menu. Sandra and Akito were back to square one, it had seemed. However, irony had finally thrown them a bone. A very thick, armor-like bone. It seems that, ironically, the most suitable animal on Hent for human consumption was the one encased in a suit of armor. The rockfish had a very strange body plan. It was essentially a long, delicious hunk of muscle puppeteering a gigantic bony shell. This meaty center would stew in its own juices if you boiled the whole animal. After that, if you were willing to spend twenty minutes cracking the damned thing open, youd be treated to about one and a half bites worth of the most delicious fried fish you could ever hope to eat. It was the only thing in this accursed world that had a meaningful amount of fat in it, and boy oh boy did it show. Akito gave a muted little whoop of joy as the stupid fish finally cracked wide open, revealing the precious morsel hidden within. He pulled it out tenderly with his finger, smiling wide. Akito, my love, are you planning to share with your darling wife? Sandra said, fluttering her eyelashes exaggeratedly and speaking in a jokingly seductive voice. The man eyed the piece of fish, then eyed his wife. Youve got your own. Sandra smiled. Yes, but youre going to do the gentlemanly thing and not make me have to crack it open myself, right? She said, joking. Mostly. Akito looked at the fish, seemingly in deep thought. Then he popped it into his mouth, stone faced and looking his wife in the eye as he chewed. Sandra gasped in horror and sighed dramatically. It really is true. Chivalry is dead and buried. Akito swallowed and rolled his eyes. Give me the damn fish. Sandra put her hand over her chest. Be still my heart. Keep it up, dear. I can feel a swoon coming on. Akito shook his head as he worked at the stubborn creature, unable to keep himself from smiling in amusement. Sandra smiled, sneaking a glance at her fellow restaurant patrons, almost all of whom immediately looked away, embarrassed by their own gawking. Sandra couldnt help but quietly chuckle at that. They really neednt have been embarrassed. Were the situation reversed, and it was a zani couple inside of what passes for a human restaurant these days, theres no way that theyd have been left to eat in peace like Sandra and Akito had been. The hypothetical zani couple would likely have been distracted by the crowd plying them with a million questions, or just standing around openly gawking. Zan took their manners seriously. The humans being fascinating alien visitors from the most distant stars didnt make it any less rude to interrupt their meal. Sandra watched Akito as he worked away at the rockfish. So, do you think the new ships will make a difference? she asked. Akito shrugged, not stopping his work. Against another lone interceptor, sure. Between the missile pods and these new ships, they should be able to pull off a win. But its a moot point, because if the Diln come back, it will be with a raiding party. Maybe even a proper invasion fleet, if were unlucky. Sandra grimaced at the thought. Ti-Zan had been at peace for centuries, they had no army to speak of. The closest thing to a martial tradition that they possessed were their professional hunters, but - much to her and Akitos astonishment - they still used black powder in their rifles. It was almost anachronistic compared to the otherwise quite advanced zani civilization. With no wars to fight, weapons development had been stagnant, even in the middle of an industrial revolution. Most zani firearms were just the comically large elephant guns that they used to hunt leviathans. They suited the job just fine, so why try to reinvent the wheel? Even just a single battalion of Diln heavy infantry would probably be enough to topple the zani government if they managed to land troops. Which was why it was so important that they didnt. Though it was largely unspoken between the couple, they were both starting to lose hope of ever seeing Janea and Lance again, nevermind seeing any help they might bring. It was becoming increasingly likely that theyd be stuck on this planet, possibly for life. So, when the zani government had enquired with their alien advisors on the feasibility of constructing warships of their own, Sandra hadnt dismissed them out of hand like she would have normally. The zani had rapidly thrown together some zani-versions of several old fashioned human designs for reusable chemical rockets. They were building them with astonishing speed. Ti-Zans government may seem like a bureaucratic nightmare to an outside observer, but when the government was of one mind like it currently was, the raw productivity put other civilizations to shame. Although it could be argued that this productivity was mainly because their homeworld, for once, gave them an upper hand. Hent, being tidally locked, did not spin on its axis. So, there was no day or night within the ring of habitable land wrapping around the prime meridian. This meant that civilization could run around the clock, without any reduction in efficiency that would normally come on a night shift. So, zani construction crews had effectively been working non-stop since the humans had revealed themselves. They had been expanding Ti-Zans fledgling space industry to meet the enormous spike in demand. Dozens of workshops and laboratories and fuel refineries and countless other crucial pieces of infrastructure had already been built, and were busy spewing out the materials and products necessary to catapult the young species into the space age, and countless more were still under construction. If there was any civilization that could go from experimenting with primitive satellites to throwing together an honest-to-god space warship within barely a years notice, it was this one. Of that, Sandra was confident. Still, going from simple chemical rockets to the atomic warships they were planning was like going from canoes to guided missile destroyers. For starters, all a rocket really needed in theory was some combustible gasses and solar panels, and it was set. Warships needed, at minimum, a nuclear fission reactor (which didnt exactly grow on trees) and a primary thruster that had both a high thrust and a high specific impulse. In other words, a torch drive. Doing that without fusion power was like trying to make an airplane that ran on a coal-fire steam engine. They hadnt gotten beyond the workshopping phase. Akito gave a little whoop of triumph, and presented his wife with the exposed morsel of meat. She popped it into her mouth and chewed as slowly as she could manage. When she was done, she smiled at him. To her surprise, her phone rang. A small pang of worry went through her. Shed rigged up a point-to-point radio system that work with her and Akitos mobiles, but the zani never called her for the fun of it. Had something gone wrong with the prototype? She answered. This is Sandra. A small fleet of starships has appeared in the system, presumably from Dark Space. Get to mission control as soon as possible. On our way. Ships detected in the system, were going to mission control. Akitos question died on his lips as his wifes second sentence answered it for him. He waved over the waiter. Sandra and Akito rushed into the mission control center, greeting a very nervous Mediator and several agents from the Ministry of the Interior and Ministry of Rocket Science. The Mediator greeted the human pair. Thank you for coming on such short notice. We were hesitant to attempt contact without your presence. Sandra nodded. Mediator. May I see the sensor data? He nodded, and directed her to the console. She scrutinized the data for a long moment. With these emissions, Im reasonably confident there arent any military ships among them. Dont get too relieved yet, it could still be privateers. We should hail them, but get ready to activate the defense satellites if you have to. The zani communications array sent out a hail on the standard frequency taught to them by the humans. Somewhat to Sandras surprise, there was an immediate response and a channel was opened. I say again, this is Lance Kristiansen, please respond. Sandras heart swelled as she heard the voice of a friend shed thought dead. Lance, we read you, what in the stars happened to you two? There was a pause. Allie got ambushed by slavers. Janea and Ti-Ro were captured, I was left for dead. Long story short, we turned things around and started a revolt. Weve got a transport ship full of freed slaves and a bunch of salvaged escort ships. Janea and Ti-Ro went on in one of those ships to continue the mission while I brought everyone back here. That was way too much shocking information for Sandra to process now, so she shoved it aside in her mind and focused on the much more pressing question. Not that Im unhappy to see you, but why would you bring them back here? The Mediator chimed in. Yes, Im wondering that too. Would it not be preferable to just return the rescued captives to their own worlds? There was an audible sigh over the speaker that made Sandra very nervous. Thats the thing. The Coalition suffered the worst defeat of the entire war while we were stranded on Hent. They havent totally lost the war, not yet. But things are looking bad. Everythings falling apart out there. We have no way of knowing what is and isnt safe. Everything beyond their core territory is effectively on its own. They cant project power anymore, especially out here. The room stood in stunned silence at the news. Sandra was more shocked than shed expected to be at the news. Everyone knew the Coalition was losing, but they kept it tucked away in the back of their minds. People had faith that things would turn around, eventually. Thats what was supposed to happen, right? The Coalition were the good guys, they had to win. Youd figure a human of all people wouldve figured out that thats not how it works, but evidently not. Sandra managed to find words first. So, these are refugees, then? Of a sort. The main point here is that Ive brought several armed, modern starships back with me, and Im turning them over to the zani government. The Coalition forces out here are going to be bunkering down now that the news has reached us. The Diln will be free to run wild. We need to start upgrading these ships with anything and everything we have, and you zani need to start building ships, yesterday. Because theres nothing to stop them from scraping together a raiding fleet now. Sandra closed her eyes. Do you think Janea can get the fleet back here? I sure hope so. Id like to think our odds are better than before. With the Coalition falling apart, theres nothing to stop the Diln from tying up all of the loose ends they were too busy to deal with before, and humanity is one of those loose ends. They wont ignore us forever. If Admiral Khatri has any sense, maybe hell see that. There was a pause. But we cant rely on it. Ti-Zahn needs to be prepared to defend itself. The Mediator looked at the floor. Weve only just begun to touch the stars, and they are already falling into tyranny. He looked at Sandra. It seems the universe is a crueler place than my people had ever imagined. His expression hardened. But we will adapt, as we always have. We will take the hand the universe has dealt us. Sandra smiled sadly. Us humans know that feeling all too well. You can count on me to help anyway I can Were intimately familiar with fighting impossible wars, after all.