Sunset: Then, Now, Tomorrow (Maintenance & Role-Play)

[Sunset]

SDF-Dauntless, Underway to the Parson's Shoal System, Ares Super-Cluster...

Grand Admiral Glafka stood in front of the command chair - the same chair she had occupied since the Dauntless had been launched - with her back to the display and one hand touching the bare metal prosthesis that was her shoulder. It was also much of that side of her body as well as a reminder of the long-ago battle that had given it to her. Sometimes, just as now, she imagined there was some pain there where flesh met metal and layered ceramic but it was never real, medical technology having long ago moved past such problems. Even the enemy who had given it to her was now largely imaginary with even the name having long-faded from the collective memory.

"We're going to come in hot and fast. The target's capabilities are largely unknown and we'll want to limit our exposure. Keep moving, keep your eyes open, and listen close for any calls. As soon as it comes out of the sun," she paused and checked her chronometer, noting the rapid pass of seconds, "We'll try to contact it, see if we can't wave it off or at least establish some conception of communication, but hopes are not high. Based on the information we have, it will take nearly thirty minutes for ELO-04 to reach Hanson's Kneecap. That's the presumptive target but plans may change so keep that in mind. Assuming that, we'll give it five minutes to respond or wave off. At that point a warning shot will be fired, we'll give it one minute to respond, then I will call general engagement. Our objective will be to force a retreat by targeting the first limb near the base."

"But - and I cannot emphasize this enough - we know precious little about this entity or its capabilities. It will probably defend itself with gravity distortions of various kinds and these are capable of tearing apart a planet so stay on your toes. But thats only probably so keep your eyes open. Fast and hot."

Just in case they had to cut and run.

Just like Jupiter.

She rubbed the joint between flesh and metal again and checked the time. Her schedule had put all of the ships set to arrive thirty seconds or so before the intruder. This would give them that time to accelerate, to get up to speed while the tiny satillite orbiting the star tried every means at its disposal to contact the behemoth. Then she would fire that first shot, that single bright warning shot, and then by all estimates the battle would be joined...

[Sunset]

SDF-Dauntless, The Parson's Shoal System, Ares Super-Cluster...

"Lieutenant De Bruyne, prepare to fire a warning shot..." It would be the last order that Grand Admiral Jennifer Glafka would give to this ship and this crew before sinking into the time-relative BattleSpace and she took the opportunity to take in the whole of the bridge from the other officers seated at their stations to the enormous image of the invader sprawled across the main display to the scattered dots representing her ad-hoc fleet peppered through the holosphere. By the numbers the ships gathered from across the Super-Cluster would prove a formidable opponent for any adversary but against the titanic bulk of ELO-04 they looked tiny and distinctly out-numbered. Fleets and entire armadas waited in reserve, concealed in deep space for when that moment of existential threat might arrive, but here and now these were what she had.

There was a moment and then the Orc answered, ey's voice mild, "Yes Ma'am. Single shot, maximum power, longest pass, wide dispersal, low speed. On your order..."

Ey's settings were precise; A low-speed shot from one of the Dauntless' heavy naval particle projector cannon that would interact with the largest amount of interstellar hydrogen between the ship and whatever distant target the Lieutenant had aimed for. It would be quite the light show and hopefully enough to show the intruder that any further progress would be met with force. Whether it would turn back was another question; Every attempt to communicate that warning had been ignored entirely as the entity rushed head-long towards the distant inhabited world. Another minute would put it across the orbit of Dawson's Cellar, the closest of the three planets, but it was on the far side of the system along with its third sister. Only the second planet sat in its direct path; Fortunate and unfortunate at once.

"Fire!"

Energy sparkled across the void, a long streak of fiery-orange that lingered far longer than the brief sparkle of normal use. For seconds it linked the saucer of the Dauntless to some distant point and passing past the three gathered tendrils of the monster. A warning that could not be ignored but entirely it was, the beast continuing past and through to scattered the last remnant of dying crimson on its armored hide.

"All ships..." She picked up the thin cable that would connect her to the virtual space where the battle would be fought, "A warning shot has been fired. If there is no change or communication, we will engage on my mark in sixty seconds. Mark..."

The plug met the socket on the base of her skull and in a moment the reality she had known was replaced with the familiar but strange notion of the enhanced BattleSpace. Her senses were now the ship's, her actions and thoughts translated to orders for the crew that even now joined her. Sixty seconds was now six thousand; Time pressed into service against the enemies of the Republic of Sunset. This she filled with preparations from the last minute to the mundane, a message sent in response to a query, a checklist marked as to her next few actions. Another survey - she had thought the final but there was now again time aplenty - to see if there was anything she'd missed, some clue as to what the enemy intended or whether it could be swayed. Where were the evacuees? Ships fleeing the blue-brown world by any means towards the gateway in orbit.

Ten seconds.

Nothing. No change in course, no alteration of the great tentacles, no slight permutation of color that could signal an attempt at communication. Somewhere down on that world was a woman with thoughts in her head and those experiences, those memories, they would become the property of the one willing to take them once again. What were they? Why risk so much to recover what simply could be lived again?

Five seconds.

"Call the count-down," she ordered, a timer already floating to the side of her enhanced vision. "All weapons hot, synchronize fire on the designated target, reconfirm status of all ships, attack formation..." Orders that had already been issued, counter-confirmed, and readied but the rote was familiar. Her hand went to an invisible shoulder and she clasped it to rub a thumb at the hard ceramic. Alone against the stars the Dauntless was in the lead, the first of a hundred arrows that rose and fell towards their target; "All ships engage - Fire!"

All across the gathered fleet guns sprang to life as torpedoes leapt from their tubes as ships speed towards their chosen target. Weaving back and forth as they came, they multiplied from scores to hundreds and beyond as the space ahead of them was filled with swarming munitions; A host of avengers gathered to defend their home. Even as they closed there was no sign of irritation nor concern of threat from the great menace as it advanced unperturbed towards the distant sphere despite the innumerable slings and arrows directed towards it. Moments to spare before the two would come together and the ships turned as one to throw aside the armor that decorated their hulls and reveal yet more darts, thick missiles that boiled from their decks while the plates hurled forward at breakneck speeds. Yet there was a hole, a chink in the assault, a place where no ship ventured and it was determined safe for the beast to turn aside at the last instant, to push into the clear and throw all their attacks to waste.

The trap was laid and sprung; Far away from the impending maelstrom three great ships turned their prongs towards that distant system and called forth nemesis. Accelerated around their vast circumference projectiles accelerated beyond the keen of even the blink of an eye to emerge as one from each long fang, vanishing into the ether with only a trace of scattered light. Again and again they fired, their far-reaching bolts hurled from the throne of Zeus and destined to strike where there seemed but weakness a moment previous. Great barriers and vortex were thrown up to defend and scattered the attacks of the host but where torpedo turned aside or shattered more pierced through to burst with glowing light upon that sturdy hide. From nowhere and in an instant they were joined by those same thrown javelins and these struck as one to touch the scales of the enemy and become lightning unleashed. A white-hot sear spread across skin laid bare to space for untold millennia and the endless tendril shuddered as pain never felt coursed through it.

Now it was wounded and now it would fight. Where the bolts had fallen a great plate had split, torn loose by the intensity of the impact and through the rupture the very essence of the being flowed out, great purple shards akin to flesh and gore pouring out of the wound to scatter across space. Perhaps against the larger body it was nought but a scratch but they knew now that it could be wounded - it could be killed - and it now too knew that it faced a peril imagined. All around it the cloak of time and space gathered as waves of both surged forth, seeking to throw man and ship aside on the endless black tide of the stars. Here a vortex opened, there a spiral came together in a vicious crux and now truly was the battle joined.

As if to prove that fortune did not always favor the bold, a ship chose that moment to roll itself beneath the moving tentacle, more torpedoes launched from dorsal and stern while crackling energy chased after and through them to tear at the wound already opened. Here it should be safe for they were fast and for all their size the three limbs had proved dreadfully slow but this was not to be. In the moment when the light from the nearby star became shadowed darkness the ship began to disappear, to dissolve under some unseen force until it was naught but a glitter of dust when the light next fell on it. Others fell too, ripped asunder as they found themselves within the surge of gravity or suddenly taken by a swarm of their own making as a mysterious hand pushed them about as easily as a child might move a stone. For some extinction was sudden and thorough - graceful curves smashed down to a gleaming dart as by a great invisible hand - while others found themselves wounded and limping long enough for the skin to tear aside as the crew abandoned her.

Again the great guns spoke and this time not from one hole but six, piercing through their own to fly unhindered into the flesh where lightning spread through the translucent ichor to highlight shapes unseen and menacing. Fluid vital poured forth, loosed from its place by violence and strain, and the behemoth pulled close its shield to protect the wound. Beam and missile were absorbed and deflected but in the slow reality their masters inhabited the order was quickly passed; "Circle the beast, for it is dying. Where it lashes fall back and where it turns pierce its side." Attacks in symphony became a ragged chorus, each ship taking their own moment to pour forth. What had been a scratch was now a long tear and as each moment passed it ran deeper into the flesh of the monster until, with a shudder, it turned. Now every muscle was strained to the escape as it abandoned defense for speed, the star it had so recently abandoned now seeming distant as it gathered what strength remained. A cheer went up from the host and they pressed their advantage, tearing at the gathered cloak while the bearer began to flee.

Despite the loss, or perhaps to spite it, the great leviathan was not to be routed without gaining its revenge. Tossing aside its defense for a moment, the dark energies were gathered for one last blow and it seized on the one that had first challenged it. One upon another the vortex opened and she was tossed this way and that before, in a single moment, her hull was torn to flinders and Dauntless disappeared into the maelstrom. Upon her death the chase turned angry and where ships had nipped at the heels they now pressed close to tear with volley and blaze. The great wound spread but there was strength left and as they pursued it back to where it had come the great lines of force again reached across the depths to open the way to escape. Closer and closer to the star's flames they came and it was only as the first licked upward that they turned away, turned to watch their dread foe plunge into the corona intent on making good its escape.

But one ship did not. A late arrival, it had stood apart from the pack until that very moment, tense with anticipation. Nocturnal was its name and with it brought a final night. Fists shook in rage and frustration were suddenly stilled as the great tentacles began to spread, began to compress the very fabric of the universe within the safety of the star until escape could be made, but at the instant of defeat delayed some unseen influence tore whatever passed for hope from that great monster. The point rippled, instantly unstable, and where it would have disappeared into the endless universe the great leviathan now plunged flailing into the abyss, a titanic mote among the stars now reduced to ash and iron...

[Sunset]

A'iruka, Great Northern Wastes, Hanson's Kneecap, Parson's Shoal System...

"Time to come clean," the lone figure at the end of the hallway began as she leaned up against the elevator casement, one booted foot flat on the wall. She looked almost casual as she stood there with arms crossed and looking back inside the car as it stood waiting, the doors locked open by the still-pulsing alert. "See, there's a hole in this story and I just lost an old friend so I want to know which side of the plot you come down on. And if you don't tell me..."

Katryna - Admiral Silaco, Director of Special Projects and nominal commanding officer of the late-arriving Nocturnal - was not strictly alone on the handsomely appointed causeway that linked the twin bank of elevators to the head office of the conglomerate that claimed the city for its own. A half-dozen armored suits augmented the guardian robots that had remained on duty despite their owner's absence, tirelessly watching over the woman who stood silently between them until they had been relieved by the sudden arrival of the Marine units. All stood facing the woman with their cyclopian helmets un-moving and their rifles out, careful to keep at least the muzzle of the drone rifles pointed at her at every moment. From the moment they had arrived she had not moved and only the slow, steady rise and fall of her chest betrayed that there was any life at all in her.

"...we're going to have a problem, you and I."

"You see, we know more about what's going on that you might think we do - maybe not as much as we should, but maybe you can change that and maybe you can make me not like you just a little bit less. The problem with this story, as I see it, is a question of opportunity. All of this started with a rock out in the desert - a rock that Ms. Maric tells me that she found under a foot of sand in some cave. And we just happen to know that this cave wasn't being guarded, wasn't being watched, nothing at all was keeping it there until a prospector stumbled across another pretty rock out there and thought to alert her boss. Nothing at all stopped you from putting down your hats and thumbing a ride out into the desert to find this rock and recover whatever it was... Until now. So, either you are the laziest local avatar of a post-Singularity civilization ever or there is something else going on. Now, let's make matters worse. Somehow - and I'm not quite sure how - when Alwyra played delivery service and brought this rock to your doorstep someone else big, purple, and now very, very dead knew about it and decided to act on it."

Still without an answer in response, Katryna waited nearly a minute and then detached herself from the wall to step forward, coming to nearly arms length before a flicker in the woman's eyes told her that there was someone - something - there and that it was paying attention.

"How did it know? The only transmission we picked up was... To you. Or at least what we think might be you. But maybe its not? Or we just don't have the means to detect that transmission. I sincerely hope that's the answer, because if its not then that means..."

"We are not united. There are...factions."

Katryna rocked back onto one heel and crossed her arms again, glaring at the woman, "That's a good answer. Factions. Though you've still got a big hole to plug. Why didn't you just go out and pick this rock up earlier? You've been on the planet for nearly two years now - there was nothing stopping you. Literally nothing prevented you from going out with your sand pail and spade and digging up that gemstone and then getting the hell off our planet with it. Literally nothing. And now you've got an even bigger question to answer - you know about these things. What are they? Are they you?"

There was no answer. She had gone still again, whether she was considering her answer or simply unwilling to put one forward, but clearly the Director had had enough and she pushed herself forward again to put her nose right under the other woman's and fix those odd yellow eyes with her own purple, "I'm going to remind you that we just killed one. Maybe not the biggest, maybe not the baddest, but now definitely the deadist. Just think on that for a second. A lot of your secrets are now coming into the open and while I'm not going to threaten you, I am going to say that - based on what happened today - we can defend ourselves against you. And is that what you want?"

"There are factions," she repeated, but Katryna was of the notion that this was only a preamble and so she did not interrupt. "But understand that each faction is not pure and the arguments are complex. Much time is devoted to creating a course of action and not all support that course in the end."

"Politics. With the potential to kill millions - billions - over nothing more than a rock. I've heard worse. So what you're saying is that one of these factions wanted to retrieve whatever was in this crystal, another didn't, and that somehow being a couple hundred miles closer made the first faction more powerful? Space is a lot bigger than that," she finished, her tone skeptical.

"Consider this a lesson. Do not attribute rational action to us simply because our technology appears as magic to you."

Katryna's voice was nearly a scream, "Wrong answer! Hundreds of people just died. Hundreds of our people - and you are not our people. You are not telling me something - or you're flat-out lying. But that's what we do. We look for the truth, we hunt down hidden knowledge. Whichever it is, we're going to find out. Are you ready to be asked a different question when we find out whatever you're hiding from us? Are you ready to be asked why you were hiding whatever this is? Maybe you think you can hide it away because you think your technology is magic. But it isn't. Ten years ago we didn't even know about you but today we killed your pet space monster. Where will we be in another ten years?"

[Sunset]

Setting Five, The Circlet, Gen Celet System, Delta Quadrant...

"I'm in, Commander," and Annya stopped in the middle of the small space beyond the hatch to shake off the last few vestiges of the dirt and dust her coat had acquired during her slow crawl through the tunnels. A few passages had proven especially tight and both clods and roots flew away as she twisted back and forth. "That was fun."

"And what do you have now?"

The transmission had the odd stutter of error correction, understandable given the circumstances. Like the Ensign, the rest of the team had made their way into the structure of the Circlet but - where she had crawled and walked through the burrow dug out by the mysterious inhabitants - they had retreated via shuttle to the high platform where they had originally entered the Setting. Information gathered from the Zeer'Gen soldiers stationed to guard the entrance to the transit system had led them into a descending network of maintenance shafts and finally into the super-structure that supported the continent laid out over the top. With the unobtainium material blocking and reflecting their transmissions, they had laid a network of sensor strips behind them to act as repeater stations.

Pushing herself out of the half-crouch she had adopted in the real and imagined confines of the tunnels, she raised her nose to have a look around. The immediate answer was clear; A workbench ran down each side and curved towards the exit on one and cabinets hung above and below these. Most were closed and apparently locked tight from the scrape of tool-marks around access panels but others had been pried or somehow opened of their own accord, "Maintenance area. They've been through here, but doesn't look like they know how to use any of the heavy stuff. Power tools laying around," she grabbed the handle of one, recognizable as some kind of portable drill, and tugged on an activation ring. Not even the faintest click of a dead battery answered and she put it aside, "Useless though. All the hand tools that they could get to are gone. Little bit of an observation..."

She studied the floor carefully, using her nose as well as her eyes as she tracked from the blurry rectangle below the hatch where her own detritus had joined an uneven mound of more to the open doorway and the beginning of the corridor beyond, "There's a good amount of organic debris here, even dust;" Dust, being partially shed skin cells, was an important indicator of biological life, "But it fades out pretty quickly in the hallway. There's definitely traffic through here that I can smell, but either the cleaning systems beyond this point are really, really good or they don't come down here a lot. I'd put my bet on the latter - all of the power tools were discharged and you'd figure that the merry maids would have cleaned up the maintenance room too. This whole place seems pretty dead."

"Got it." Commander Timmons swung his light around and from the looks of the situation he'd have to agree with the Ensign's assessment. Somewhere there was activity - the massive atmospheric recyclers were still working, the altitude correction thrusters were still firing on occasion - but on an individual level there seemed no trace of whoever had created or inhabited the enormous structure previously, "Which could make sense if this place was built as an ark and then abandoned. Leave the native species to make their own way - no need to engage in mass extinction - but turn the lights off and lock up."

"I'm going to start laying down a web of sensor strips, Commander. I'll let you know if I find anything!" But largely the Ensign was going to be on her own for the next day or more. Figuring in flight time and the time required to pick up some personal ground transport - he'd wisely ordered some bikes ferried down from one of the ships in orbit - there was still at least a day's worth of unknown twists and turns between her and the access shafts; "Should have sprung for the deluxe hover-dog model..."

There was no going back on her choice of body and even as she laughed in her head at the idea of her legs tucking up to let her soar free around the corridor she put paw to deck and began exploring. At the entrance to the maintenance room she paused to pluck a pair of sensor strips from the dispenser on her flank and tack the near-invisible plastic to the wall. With less focus on the immediate, she began to study the infrastructure itself. Instead of the squared-off joints between floor and wall that she was used to, both rooms and halls here were rounded off at something of a third of a meter with even the corners and intersections sharing this characteristic. A subtle joint at the edge of the rounded bevel turned from the smooth metal of the walls to a textured floor. This too seemed made of the requisite unobtainium though the texture provided more than enough grip. Pill-shaped ovals either raised or sunk into the wall panels with the same curved aesthetic and some of these were now studded with mounted spheres that seemed like they might fulfill some particular purpose, though what that might be was never apparent.

"Lights, maybe, or access terminals or..."

They were also interesting in that they seemed to be the only indication of construction. A claw at the joint between metal-hard 'carpet' and the soft silver-white structure of the wall seemed to indicate that they were one solid piece while there were visible joints and plates on every one of the mounted spheres, though they varied in pattern. Any worry that these might be weapon turrets was long-vanquished - the Zeer'Gen guards had warned them of no such dangers and there had been no dangers reported by any of the other expedition teams or repair crews. At the end of the connecting hallway she stopped to place another pair of strips - facing each other, so a clever intruder couldn't slip past one - and then turned to survey the long corridor that stretched to either side. Here and there more small hallways on the same scale as the one behind her branched off but running horizontally to the rotation of the Circlet it was mostly a straight-shot to the edge.

"Might not be here alone for as long as I thought," but her nose had caught something familiar and she raced forward - and away from the rest of the team...

[Sunset]

Saryan Brilla's Apartment, Landor City, Terra Incognito...

"So let's write the story to fit the facts," Saryan decided aloud, talking up at the ceiling while one foot dangled overhead and the brush in her fingers vainly attempted a clean paint job on her toes. "Or at least the facts as we know them. Which are..."

What, exactly? It had been an interesting few hours and now she was alone with her thoughts while others went about the more real efforts of recovering from the battle that had taken place not that horribly far away. More than a dozen ships lost and more than double that damaged; She wasn't as knowledgeable in military matters as she was in the science of physics and so it was only a guess that just the material losses would set the Republic back for years. That was without even mentioning all of the trained crews that would either need to be replaced or - for a lucky few - provided with new bodies.

"Note to self, get on the Eien waiting list. Spooky pants said there were more of these things out there - imagine if they all attacked at once! Nope, better to get some life insurance. As in a way to insure I'm still alive afterwards!" She laughed - the first time she'd actually opened her mouth and done so since earlier that day - and it felt good so she indulged for a little bit even though the joke wasn't that funny. When her burst of humor had run its course, she turned back to toes and the questions at hand; What were the facts? It wasn't exactly her area of specialty but this was for her diary and, as she'd told herself earlier, someday someone might actually read this shit.

"Fact One; The gemstones known as Tyrant stones appear to originate with the Druth'Haari. Elemental comparisons between the stones found on ePyrk and elsewhere align neatly though the flash of light when the Tyrants are handled is still not explained. My theory is that this is some kind of stored Druth'Haari energy that we can't measure yet. Which..." Realization dawned and she rolled over to grab at her clothes, "Which is probably because it is similar to our Eien nodes! A holographic containment system? Maybe the gems act as a specialized container of some kind..."

Diary forgotten, she began to bounce around on one leg while hauling her pants up the other. Switching limbs she pulled a sweatshirt over her melons and headed for the door, "Which, if they do, then what Alwyra Maric recovered out in the desert was a storage system of some kind. But why leave it out in the desert? Why not just go pick it up? Unless... She," and by 'she' Saryan meant the previously mentioned Neko, who had spilled every last detail when Katryna had confronted her, "Said she found it under a couple feet of sand in a cave. Maybe it was supposed to be lost? No... That doesn't make any sense. She also said the armor showed signs of combat damage and it was her theory that the Tyrant stones scattered around the planet were the cast-offs from some long ago battle. But she only found one suit of armor - and there have been a lot of stones dug up."

She even had a few herself.

"So who was fighting the Druth'Haari? The big purple space squid? Pretty sure Hanson's Kneecap would be bone dust by now if that were the case. So it had to be someone capable of fighting the Druth'Haari on a person-to-person level... Why are the Druth'Haari fighting on a person-to-person level? That doesn't make much sense for an entity or entities capable of creating a system-level artificial singularity."

"Do you want a hint?"

"No, fuck off," but as soon as the elevator closed she resumed the conversation with nothing but thin air to the consternation of her fellow passenger, an annoyed-looking woman with a halo of permed fuzzy white hair. "No hints. Especially not from you, Mr. Might-have-been-able-to-stop it. Fuck off. So the Druth'Haari are fighting, blasting off bits of themselves all over the planet. They lose, their armor is left on the field, and the gemstone with a big chunk of data on it is eventually buried and then found. So... They are fighting..." Something Katryna had said earlier that the Saryan'Haari had said suddenly stuck in her head, "Factions. She said they were not united, that there were factions. And that maybe one of these factions had called in the ELO? Maybe these factions were fighting?"

"That was a quick trip, it's your stop," the voice reminded her as the doors opened with a chime.

"It was," though with her mouth busy she wouldn't have noticed a hundred floors let alone twenty. "Or are you talking about my supposition?" There was no answer as she walked out onto the street and so she continued, "I'll call that a yes to both. So they are fighting each other on the planet. Bits blasted off everywhere, leaving the stones behind for others later. But this big one - why just leave it there? Why not recover it and whatever was stored on it? Because..." Feet found steps and before she realized her answer she was nearly across the pedestrian bridge, "Because whatever was stored on it was supposed to remain lost. Because it was bad - it represented the losing faction in some way. Like... Their memories? Then why recover it when Alwyra dug it up? To us it is just sparkling light. But that wasn't so much information as it was thinking so what if it was bad thinking? Or..."

Suddenly she wished she'd put on a blouse instead; This would have been the perfect opportunity to flip up her collar and glance around suspiciously, "Dangerous thinking."

"Which would make sense. The Druth'Haari have a duel on the planet. The champions of the various factions! They duke it out, blasting the crap out of each other and then the loser and their dangerous thinking - at least to the other factions - is left like blood on the sand. Safe, hidden, forgotten. At least until one of A'iruka's prospectors stumbles across a piece of the armor. They alert Alwyra, she digs up the rest, and then brings it back to the city. Meanwhile, Saryan'Haari is in the city... Because she is keeping an eye on it! She knows its there but until Alwyra digs its up she figures it safe. But once its not safe, she comes to reclaim it. Why? Why doesn't she steal it? Or put on her hyper-armor and take it? Or destroy it?"

A hand on the door and then a casual wave to the receptionist and she was inside and straight onto the elevator at the back of the lobby. The hollow core of the research tower and the various walkways and cross-walks raced past as she headed for the top, "Because the information on the crystal was too valuable to lose forever, but too dangerous - or too repugnant - to keep on the inside. Like the warehouse at the end of Indiana Jones. Top. Men. Hey Doc," she waved to the Mecce as he passed, his furry head nodding in salute. "But once it had been dug up, it was potentially in our hands as well. What could possibly be that dangerous? So she takes the crystal, unlocks the containment, and the personality fragment returns to the Druth'Haari along with the information kept with it. And... They send a space squid to get it back? That doesn't make any fuckin' sense."

"No," Katryna shook her head, "It doesn't. Because the information wasn't with DH2, it had been sent back to the gestalt. Or whatever the Druth'Haari intelligence is. We didn't pick up any return transmission."

"We didn't pick up a transmission calling in the space squid either," Saryan pointed out twice just before her sent-ahead hologram flickered out, "At least, not that we can detect. But the carrier matrix for the information was kinda like opening the barn door really wide - you can see it all the way across the pasture. On a power level it was like an FTL jump. Just the kind of thing TRIPWIRE was designed to pick up. But lower-power transmissions, such as FTL comms, don't make enough of an impression on the metric tensor to be tracked. Unless we want to set up an array with a much higher density - like the one I have in my bedroom."

"Do I want to know why you have a TRIPWIRE array in your bedroom?"

Saryan pushed her hands up under the sides of her breasts and mashed them together, though the effect was ruined by the sweatshirt, "BOOBYTRAP, actually. Get it? Right? Bedroom, booby..."

"Hilarious. I'm guessing it has to do with our invisible friends and your desire to not have them spying on you when you're getting your fuck on?"

"Yeah. No. Sorta - more cause they - he - them? - keep showing up at my place. I think they like me. Couldn't care if they see me naked though, and to be honest? I think they're gay. Cause these girls?" She looked down at the concealed cleavage, "I'd do me!"

It was worthy of an eye-roll and Katryna complied, "Gender-less post-Biological. Unless uppercase and italics are a gender. So there was more than enough time for that data to be transferred back to DH2. Which could mean that ELO-04 was sent by one of the other factions to destroy her and it. But that doesn't make sense - she could just send the data back."

"What if... What if she didn't send the data back? Or hadn't? Or couldn't?" With one hand Saryan summoned the stored hologram that showed the breakdown of the transmission with the carrier matrix intact and removed, "Or maybe didn't? So you have this battle royale between the factions over this dangerous information. Which, in the case of the Druth'Haari, is probably something like how to restart the universe or initiate the Big Crunch. Fuck me - that's probably it. We think they survived the previous Singularity Event - what if they caused it? Anyway, the losing faction doesn't just lose the information but also themselves. They are shoved into this crystal just like in Superman 2000."

"The Phantom Zone. Okay, so they have the dangerous information with them and they are being punished by hanging out in the Prime. Alwyra comes along, digs up the crystal, brings it back to the city, and DH2 is then concerned that we will find it, figure out what it is, and somehow extract the information needed. And then initiate the Big Crunch. Or someone else would. So she frees the faction but keeps the information in herself. Which makes sense - otherwise she would have have left the planet along with the rest of the evacuees. Or at least ran. I would have. Instead she stays there to sacrifice herself when ELO-04 devours the planet. There goes the dangerous information."

"And she is doing what right now?"

"...shit."

[Sunset]

Ker'Strel, Sessool Space, The Eastern Edge of the Galaxy...

"...one oh' tha problems with tha best virtua' worlds is tha' sense o' cognitive dissonance."

They were the only two words Meli seemed to be able to pronounce correctly as she made her way down the street arm-in-arm with her latest conquest. First impressions aside, he was actually pretty sweet though with an arrogant streak that rose to absurdity. The robot body guard as well as his preference for short, large women had been explained by his remarkably poor eyesight; For Doctor ScLappi the first was essential to keep him from bumping into anyone and everyone while the second merely meant there was more to love. Her questions and his answers regarding the technology of the Sessool had also been expected and straightforward. Like most star-faring cultures they had their own technological base and then an amalgamation of add-ons gleaned by various methods from the civilizations they had encountered, absorbed, or conquered. There the Merchant Princes were nothing if not pragmatically cut-throat; New technology that gave them a temporary advantage was good but as soon as it was no longer new it was simply another selling point.

With that settled she'd gotten to know the man and now, with a modicum of understanding between the two, there was an opportunity for casual discussion, "Ya know whatcha know, ya know? If yer a fahter pilot ahn yer tryin' tah roleplay a tank commander, yer always gonna be wonderin' where yer ahr cover is. But the lahtest generation o' environments work with tha ExoCortex to selectively block yer skills. Tha're still thar, but you don't even rahmember you have em."

"Wouldn't that be strange to know you have this knowledge but you cannot access it? Such that it might be just at your fingertips but you cannot feel it?"

That was one of the things she'd learned about his porcine species; Their sense of touch was essentially primary as well as their sense of location. Spin him around a thousand times and he could always point in the direction he'd started from.

"Ya, but clever designers have worked ahround that one. You'll log in ahn they'll show you ah list o' your skills then give you a reward fer having them. Which is probably a complicated bit o' code but I know nothing bout it cept that there ahr zero's 'n ones involved. Or was it Zero-One? Ahways find them MonoCorporation types sculkin' round computers. But ya' get a fahncy hat or somethin' cosmetic ahn then yer off on yer adventures. Wha' they canna do is make yer personality differ'n, so the best players are pretty much yer dedicated, curious, creative, intellectual types in real-life."

"I would imagine you excel at the more physical forms of virtual entertainment then, Miss Telianna?" His hand - one again - drifted down to her butt and this time she ignored it. "You are a prime specimen, after all. But tell me - these virtual technologies and this ExoCortex - you say they are widespread in your culture?"

"Yep, everyone has the first, good bit oh' people have the second."

"How does that work within the larger context of your civilization? You say that people can spend weeks, months, and even years inside these worlds being someone else entirely. How do they work? Where do they get their income?"

"Ah dunno," it was an honest answer and one she hadn't thought about. The front of the shop where they intended to have lunch beckoned and they passed through the beaded curtain to present themselves at the counter. "Ah cahn never spend that much time inside. Work keeps ma' busy."

A gabble in the local language and he placed his order before she too answered with something generous and savory, though she had no real idea what was in it.

"In that, we are similar. I've had a lovely morning, and I'm sure lunch will be delightful, but after I must depart and return to my work. The Maiorca are an intimidating and impressive species and my Prince desires they be prepared for service in his name. He wishes to war with another and expand his territory and they would make able soldiers. Some cyborg augmentation and we shall have a suitable army."

"Okay, so first o' all... Thaht seems like yer plucking the golden goose then fryin' it up fer dinner. Don't they have some kindo drug in thahr feathers?"

Accepting his plate, he led her to one of the semi-circular tables that edged the wall. Each looked out its own window with the prized spots being those on the street or a pair upstairs that opened onto the jungle. These were his chosen destination and he hauled himself into a tall stool while the robot stood at the corner of the stairs to stare down at anyone who would disturb their privacy, "Yes, but he would take only those plucked."

"Mahks sense. So thahn mah next question - where do you lot get your cyborg bits? From what ah've seen you've got ahl the industry of ahn ant mound. Lots o' people scurrying ahround doin' what it takes one of our factories ah few minutes to do."

"Do not let the rural surroundings deceive you. There is an industrialized core to the Empire, though it is both ruled by the most powerful of the Desert Lords and very much off-limits to outsiders - including the lesser Princes. It is a form of control and an obvious one. The lesser must treat with the greater and avoid their ire while still supplicating their need for the rare luxuries typical to the fringes of the Empire. Perhaps this says much about the Sessool but more likely it is simply the nature of galactic civilization with only rare exception. If I were to posit, I would suggest that those rare civilizations likely either quickly move past our technological perspective or remove themselves from the vicinity of the more typical galactic fare as soon as they are able. It has been a long suspicion of mine that there are entire civilizations hidden out in the vast gulf between galaxies, safely removed from the seemingly petty concerns of those still tied to the resources of the stars..."

[Sunset]

Setting Five, The Circlet, Gen Celet System, Delta Quadrant...

"Anyone else notice something odd?"

The question was Trinya's and the others looked at her and then to their surroundings. By now they were deep in the bowels of the Circlet, surrounded by the sprawling structure that made up much of the majority of the construction. Corridors and hallways spread in every direction and here and there were rooms and chambers of indeterminate purpose. Another was coming up quickly on their right - the bikes ferried down from Southern Cross were carrying them along at a good clip, fast enough to be useful but not too fast as to either miss something or endanger their safety - and attention focused on the long doorway and the darkened area beyond. Another second and they pulled up in front, still looking back to Trinya as they expected an answer.

"Lots of new things - odd, if you want - around here. What exactly do you mean," Commander Timmons asked, pulling the bike around to point the powerful headlights into the chamber. Where they had lit the corridor they now spilled over machinery alien yet subtly familiar.

"There are no doors. Sure, the hatch had a door on it, and there are doors on the cabinets and on the transit system, but unless the door seems to have a very good reason for being there, there just aren't any doors."

Lae walked over to the doorway - archway, if one wanted to be particular about it - and looked it over. Like the rest of the walls and floors it followed the same rounded-over and single-construction aesthetic. There was a band set into the floor to divide one area from the other but it seemed just that - a visual divider rather than any physical barrier, "Huh. No control panel, no sensors... No door."

"You'd need a door in the transit car - it's a vacuum tube, wouldn't want people getting sucked out of the car. Same with the hatch. Don't want water flowing into the sub-structure. But yeah, no doors. There wasn't even one between the interior of the Setting and the transit station," Deania offered. "Which... Does that imply something about the culture of the people who built this," she rapped her knuckles on the closest wall, "Or are we just missing something? Maybe they use force-fields everywhere they don't need a solid door and they are just disabled right now. Or they are just a very open culture."

"And very weird. Why are they making lots of giant Christmas ornaments?"

Everyone turned to look and, by the sight that spread out in front of them, Timmons was correct. The machinery that filled the room was apparently dedicated to just that with multiple racks holding dozens of large spheres in various colors and what appeared to be an entire assembly line waiting for them. Each was about a third of a meter in diameter and there were five distinct lines that fed into a central finishing unit.

"It doesn't look interrupted, either. It almost looks like it has been prepared and set to be ready to run." Walking over to the closest of the serpentine racks, he tried to pick up one of the spheres but it was both slippery as well as oddly heavy for its apparent size. "More unobtainium. Solid?" He produced his hand scanner and checked the results, "Maybe. Something's blocking the scan, not that it would penetrate this much anyway. But it looks to be just a thin shell. I suppose if you've got enough of the stuff to make an enormous station, you've got enough to make ornaments."

The Seeker studied one for a moment then straightened up, "I don't think they are making ornaments. These line are familiar - the same thing you see mounted on the walls, except they've been pieced together with a visible joint. Or not - it looks like they cut them out of one solid sphere. That seems like an odd way to go about it, but I wonder what they are for."

"We'll have to keep wondering," Timmons shrugged. "We've got a date to keep..."

[Sunset]

SDF-Ojeni, Ares System, Ares Super-Cluster...

"...a few hours to Sslaa VI then two days while they replace our space-warp nacelles. Then we can head out to our first target. It could have been worse."

It could have been worse; The phrase was nearly the ship's motto now. Like nearly every ship in the Cluster, Ojeni had been scrambled to deal with the threat posed by ELO-04 and had been there not only for the battle but also for the destruction of Dauntless and the loss of the Grand Admiral and her crew. In the enormous atomic sphere of combat, she - along with the other rallied Explorers and Survey Ships - had played the part of distant electrons around the nucleus of the behemoth intruder and the heavy-hitting battleships and dreadnoughts. From there they had served as coordinators and information-gathering platforms and some few of their number still remained in the Parson's Shoal star system sifting through the carnage. Even before the action had ended the valiant crews of the Recovery Cruisers had arrived to rescue disabled ships and scattered crews and they had played their part in this but now the focus had turned to the substance of the little-understood leviathan.

"We were lucky," Sloan answered, more than a hint of glum in her voice; That too was quickly becoming an unofficial motto across the disbanded fleet. "A little bit to the front and we'd have been toast too."

A near-miss was still a miss but the powerful confluence of gravity shears generated by what was looking very much like an enormous biological organism had been enough to completely destroy the gravitec drive that occupied the forward third of the port nacelle and severely warp the stablizer rings in the starboard. Replacing the pair entirely was the best solution and, like all Republic starships, that was already inside the intended design. The fleet maintenance yard in orbit above Sslaa VI had the replacements on hand though it, like all the yards, was currently dealing with the sudden influx of damaged and salvage ships. Fleet Command had considered the possibility of sending all the damaged ships to one of the CORE super-stations - their vast facilities were designed to handle an enormous surge from all over the Triumvirate in case of full-scale war - but instead these were being relocated to limit the exposure of their Nemesis strategic platforms to a retaliatory attack from an unknown vector.

Kami stopped to pick up a drink from a convenient alcove, taking a sip through the sculpted cup before twisting her face into a momentary scowl, "Which is why it's important that we get out there and figure out what the deal is with this abandoned gate network. It might not be the big purple tentacle monster threat but it is a potential threat. The faster we get out there and nail down what this thing is, the faster we can check off one more potential danger or at least get a good handle on countering it."

"Yeah, I wouldn't want that job. Not to speak too quickly of the dead, but I wonder who's going to replace Glafka? I'd guess that the Secretary-General wants to get someone in as quickly as possible. Keep things running smoothly."

"It's going to be one of the Fleet Admirals," and Captain Blaine sounded especially certain of this, as though it had been delivered to her ears by the mouth of God. "The gossip is that Erika's looking at Alyndra Erriki. Very solid choice, worked her way up through the ranks - no dramatic promotions - and more of a managerial personality. Not exactly a protege of Jennifer's either - the opposite entirely. She'd be perfect for managing a Fleet expansion which is also what scuttlebutt says is coming."

"Oh boy, a tax increase!"

Kami shrugged, "Oh well. We have the means and ability to do more now, and with all the people going ExoCortex or Eien Node, we've got both a lot of people who don't need to buy furniture and a lot of unused housing. It would play well with her notion of a 'shining city on the hill' with open gates and open arms. To do that we'll need ships and crews and bases and... Lots of stuff. And a way to symbolically pay for that stuff."

"Guardians of the Galaxy, huh? All we need is a talking raccoon..."

[Sunset]

Officer Briefing, Circlet Intelligence Dossier, TYCSInfoNet...

Circlet Drone Systems, Presence & Speculation
Lieutenant J. Collins,
Sunset Defense Force,
SDF-Dogana

This briefing document covers the various drone systems found in the Circlet (Gen Celet Star System, Delta Quadrant) as well as layman's details as to their construction, deployment, and some speculation as to their role in the larger ecosystem. It is intended as a non-technical overview; Precise technical information can be found in the linked documents. Found throughout the orbital structure known commonly as the Circlet, the many drone systems left by the yet-unknown builders are inactive and apparently inert but due to both their numbers and capabilities caution is urged.

Construction: All of the documented varieties of drone found thus far share the same single source of construction - a perfect sphere with a shell composed primarily of a PTU-557 alloy. This engineered element - or 'unobtainium' - is the same that is found in abundance through the structure of the Circlet in every capacity from structural members to floors and bulkheads. It is classified as a structural engineered element but, due to its atomic structure, is also exceptionally durable and capable and compares favorably with PTU-8 (Primary Ring construction element). Owing to its particular characteristics, it is also highly opaque to most sensor methods; See linked technical documents for more information. This thin shell is then backed by a second layer that consists of a mixed super-conductive information storage/manipulation medium ('computronium') and a third non-reactive energy storage medium and then capped by an inner shell of the same PTU-557 alloy.

These orbs form the basic construction element of all drones found aboard the Circlet and they are themselves found in bulk in manufacturing centers spread out across the super-structure of the Circlet. These factories are in turn located close to the access points between the structure itself and the interior 'Continental' area as well as close to the atmospheric recycling units located at each end of the seven Settings. The placement is reasonable but this does mean that if the system was somehow hostilely activated they would have near-immediate access to the entire Circlet as well as key areas.

While the exact process has not been observed or activated, drone remnants recovered from the damaged area known as the 'Kion Breach' indicate that final construction is accomplished by cutting one of these spheres into multiple segments and then attaching articulating elements and specialized systems to these segments. This allows the segments to collapse into their original ball shape when not in use or for transportation and locomotion. Storage and maintenance receptacles for these drones - both empty and occupied - have been observed spread throughout the structure though notably none have been found in the open 'Continental' areas. Six distinct varieties of drone have been observed and all are marked via coloration as to their specific purpose; These varieties are detailed in the next section.

Drone Varieties:

Maintenance: This sphere is marked with a plain silver dome (the oxidized coloring of PTU-557-based alloys) and four blue panels inset with yellow. Once deployed, the panels expand into four two-segmented legs and four manipulator arms are deployed between them with two fine and two heavy manipulators between the four. Specialized 'foot' elements allow them to cling to any PTU-557-based alloy. A central high-energy emitter sits at the base of the core; Once stabilized, this unit can be used for high-precision cutting and bonding applications. Maintenance drones are speculated to operate in conjunction with the Overseer Drone. Due to their unobtainium shell they are rugged and durable though their size limits their individual effectiveness in repairs and large system maintenance.

Overseer: This sphere is marked with four circles laid out in a three-sided pyramid formation and marked in gold. Deployed, these panels retract to allow a number of sensors and communications modules to extend into the opening. The unit appears to be capable of hovering; Whether or not this is slower than rolling is unknown. Due to the preponderance of communications systems it is understood that these act as command and control units for other drones; How many and with what level of coordination is unknown.

Observer: This sphere is marked with three petals that extend from a central dome that is itself inset with an additional circle. These petals are also marked with a secondary inset; These deploy outward to form something of a three-pronged shape with the insets extending further out and back. The center dome houses a single powerful sensor unit and additional sensor antenna extend back from the unit when deployed. It is colored in blue and gold, and judging by the size of the central core is capable of high-speed flight. Due to the similar coloration, this unit is expected to act as something of an inspector, finding and determining problems for the Maintenance and Observer drones to correct.

Patroller: This sphere is marked with gold and red and has two disk-shaped side units that deploy into something like wheels while the segments between extend up into a vaguely torso-like body with extended arms. These each house the same high-energy emitter as found in the Maintenance drone and thus the speculation is that these are combat or at least deterrence drones. Due to the variable nature of the emitter unit, they could be capable of anything from lethal long-range blasts to low-powered 'sunburn' or 'nausea' effects. The same sensor unit found on the Observer is mounted in a vaguely head-like manner; If one of these units needs to be engaged it is suggested that this be targeted as it is relatively fragile.

Courser: Also marked in red and gold, this unit is expected to be the aerial counterpart to the Patroller. It deploys into a vaguely winged form with an extended tail housing the primary sensor platform while the head uses the same - seemingly standard - variable emitter. Large hover units built into the 'wings' virtually guaruntee that this unit is capable of high-speed and high-maneuver flight.

Assassin: The last observed drone type, this unit is both the rarest but also the most potentially potent. It does not appear to have a deployed form but instead has a secondary outer layer that allows it to assume the storage and movement appearance of the other drones. Inside is a large version of the high-energy emitter in common use as well as three more arranged around it. See the Speculation section to follow.

Speculation:

The drones present on the Circlet present an interesting mystery. At first they were assumed to be simply idle; The speculated age of the Circlet is in excess of one hundred thousand years and presumably any of these systems would lose power or simply be subject to entropy over that time. Instead it has been discovered that, with the exception of the drones activated in response to the Kion attack and subsequent Breach, the other drones and their manufacturing units have been idle and may have never been activated. While the drones destroyed in the attack were too damaged to allow a fully reconstruction and diagnosis of their software, the remaining drones are blank; Their computronium is awaiting software and programming. Furthermore their computational and information matrix is fixed - they are not capable of learning aside from presumably programmed methods. There is no chance that, like our own computronium-based Instinctive Intelligence (II) Cores that they will evolve true sapience though it is possible that - given the volume of matrix per drone - they could emulate sentience. It is possible that all of the drones not destroyed during the Kion attack on the Circlet were then wiped but that seems unnecessary.

This has ruled out one potential area of speculation; That the drones themselves were meant to house the intelligence's of the original builders. While it is possible, given the difficulties in making a complete survey and in the shear volume of the Circlet, that there are more drone varieties the discovered types would seem contrary to the idea of a machine-transfer civilization.

The presence of the so-called 'Assassin Drone' is also interesting and concerning. This unit has no other seeming purpose than ambush and assault and the camouflaging system would allow it to operate in the Continental areas where the other drones would be far more notable. This has led to some speculation that it was intended as a 'social control' unit where the civilizations in the Continental areas would be subject to selective 'culling' of unwanted individuals. This is on the wild end of the spectrum, however, since there is no evidence that the builders of the Circlet anticipated it housing any civilizations other than their own or even their own. So much is unknown about the purpose of the structure that most any speculation is conjecture. It is possible that these drones were meant as a third tier in the Patroller/Courser/Assassin hierarchy and as part of routine law enforcement and indeed this is the accepted role of these units.

[Sunset]

The Secretary-General's Quarters, SDF-Unconquered Sun, Gen Celet System, Delta Quadrant...

"Was this your first?"

The two women lay together on the bed, the first pushed under the arm of the second with her head on her chest. A thin cover was pulled up around them but it was clear by the state of array that they had not been engaged in romance but rather the half-asleep state of those pushed past the point of exhaustion. Perhaps one was still working - Erika's head was back and her eyes closed - but Demi knew that even if she was still in conference with some far-off Admiral or Senator the electronic intelligence still had the attention to spare her wife.

"Mmm, my first?"

"The first friend you've lost," the dark-haired woman clarified. "Jennifer..."

"I... I suppose it is. When Jon retired - was forced out - we kept in contact as I learned the ropes. There was a lot of new in the early days. They'd amended the Constitution to eliminate the President and establish the Secretary-General and we weren't completely sure just how everything would work. We'd talk almost every day about some point or procedure but after a couple years and as he got older the messages trailed off until we just stopped talking. It wasn't that we weren't friends but that was our sole point of common interest. When he died, I didn't really feel anything. There was a state funeral, I gave an obituary, but I didn't really think of him as my friend at that point. We had been, and we could have picked it up again, but neither of us had a reason. But Jennifer..."

There was a long pause and Demi remained silent, listening to the false breath as Erika's chest rose and fell and something inside her simulated a heartbeat. She knew it was all an illusion created for her benefit and the benefit of others but there was genuine emotion in the words that followed.

"I miss her. I've found myself half-way through a message to her, some piece of official correspondence, and then I realize that it won't reach her. Then, for a few seconds, I hope that all that stuff about Yahweh and Heaven is true and that she's somehow there holding eternal vigil over the armies of God. I know its not true, but it makes me feel just a little better for a little bit. Everyone says it will be better - that's what everyone always says, right? Give it some time... But forever is a long time."

Demi smiled, though there was a trace of sadness in the soft curves; The Grand Admiral had been her friend as well, "This is where you go crazy and try to figure out a way to bring everyone back from the dead so everyone can live forever, right?"

"No... I could make her again, clone her, but it wouldn't be her. Walk, talk, move, think... But not her. Maybe if I wanted to build a time machine, but if I could make a time machine I'd have already used it and she wouldn't be dead. That paradox has been solved for a long time..."

[Sunset]

A'iruka, Great Northern Wastes, Hanson's Kneecap, Parson's Shoal System...

"Has she done anything? Said anything?"

"No, ma'am," the Lieutenant on duty answered, looking up once again to check the display for any hint of activity that might have been missed by the far more vigilant network of sensors scattered around the woman. "Not a peep."

The title was misleading; Director Silaco was not on-site but rather standing behind the chairs at one of the monitoring stations housed in the basement levels of the Special Projects research tower on the outskirts of Landor City. These were normally used to keep an eye on whatever dangerous experiments might be in progress in the automated laboratories and testing facilities further underground but, as the officer had noted, the individual classified as DH2 had neither moved or spoken and still remained standing on the causeway that linked the city of A'iruka to that same company CEO's office suite. Being here as opposed to there gave Katryna access to a wider array of tools as well as the collective know-how of Special Projects but she was not without access or influence as the silent individual was about to discover.

"Some change in vitals," he glanced at the monitor that showed everything from heart rate to skin temprature to a real-time electro-cardiograph, "But she hasn't eaten in at least twelve hours."

"And she hasn't asked or moved, either. What does BOOBYTRAP show?"

They weren't preventing her from leaving but they weren't exactly encouraging it either, but whatever indications the Marine power armor stationed around her might have given she had effectively chosen her own path - which was to stand there and do nothing. She hadn't moved when more Marines had joined the first, she hadn't said a word when technicians had put up a trio of sensor poles around her, and she hadn't even batted an eyelash when they had returned with six double-hung pedestals containing a quickly-rigged version of Dr. Brilla's BOOBYTRAP system. Acting on the physicist's suggestion, these made use of an enhanced version of the Akashan tensor sensor that was placed in series with a Hawking sensor to allow it to detect changes in the holographic matrix. It wasn't enough to see what she was saying but it was enough to know that, "They are talking. Not much - just a trickle - and nothing like the burst TRIPWIRE recorded."

Which didn't really tell the Director all of anything except that the sensors were working. Stepping back from the station, she retreated to the far wall and froze as if catatonic while simultaneously appearing in the same hallway as the lone figure, "It's time to ask the hard questions again. Are you listening?" The change was barely perceptible but the flicker in the woman's eyes was enough to tell the Director her answer. "So, here's our theory; Whatever you recovered from that stone held something dangerous - some kind of dangerous information - and you are now holding it in yourself until a way can be found to dispose of it or the Druth'Haari collective decides to allow it back into themselves. Does that sound right?"

There was no answer, but she wasn't really expecting one. If it was the answer then the potential consequences were reasonably staggering for the hidden civilization and she continued, "One of these factions that you mentioned doesn't like the information you have and won't let you bring it back. In fact, they don't like it so much they sent one of their planet-killing assassins to destroy this planet and, presumably, you as well. You've already off-loaded whatever personality fragment or engram or whatever that was 'you' and now you're just a shell, waiting here until the Druth'Haari decide what to do. We've already shown we can kill one of their big pets, so maybe they are thinking about sending more or something else, or maybe they'll just let you stand here until that bodies dies. But if the information in your head is what we think it might be, do we really want the possibility that someone might just figure out that you're standing here with the ability to destroy the universe locked up in your head?"

No hard stare elicited a response and so the holographic Director turned away to the double-bank of elevators at the end of the causeway, "So I have a solution."

The doors chimed and both opened near-simultaneously to disgorge four more armor suits, each of which was carrying one-quarter of an empty disc between them. Surrounding the woman they began to set it up, first deploying legs to stabilize it and then fitting the four together until her back was to the opening of a person-height ring.

"Perfect fit. Just a little shove... What is it?" Katryna walked around the pair while the UHCVs stepped back to produce their own slung rifles and join the others, "It's a holographic bubble generator. I'm sure you know exactly what that is - your civilization helped us figure it out, after all. It will generate a bubble universe with a unique key, I'll give you a push, and whatever information you don't want us or anyone else to know will be gone. Isn't that nice of me? In fact," she paused and there was a hum as well as a brief intensity of light from behind the woman as the ring initialized, "I have to wonder why you didn't do something like that yourself? My guess is that that's what that crystal really was - a holographic storage device that would keep whatever information was inside safely locked away. Now I can't confirm that, of course. Any trace of the Hawking radiation would have already dissipated. But there's the question..."

She stepped close and studied the woman's eyes, "Why didn't you do something like that yourself? Is your civilization really so alien that the thought of killing millions of people didn't have an impact? Or is there something else going on here? Some other reason why this mysterious faction would send two hundred thousand kilometers of purple space squid after you?"

Outside of her vision but surrounding her, the hum from the machine intensified and lights blinked on as each node in the generator came to full power. Katryna put her hand on the woman's chest; The holographic her couldn't shove but she didn't need to. A single step back was all it took and the Druth'Haari disappeared, gone in an instant.

"Interesting. Were we right? Or did they just want us to think we were right? If it was only a shell..." Katryna shook her head then stepped back, "Questions for later. For now, we're going with the possibility that we have the end of the universe in here. Pack it up," she ordered, looking to the four that had brought it in, "And get it up to the ship. We're going to have to find someplace safe to put it..."

[Sunset]

Steven's Crater, The Moon Minamoto, Hachiman, Ares System...

"Mmm, yes, you are very much correct, Miss Nineteen. It could hardly be considered our fault if they lost their ship. And - while I am not the legal scholar - would not our participation in the search or any offer of non-contracted assistance be putting us in the position of potential liability?" It was all musing anyway; Doctor Stephen Ambrose had no intention of helping the Blud Dawgs with their little problem. Not only were the whiff of legal - and thus financial - repercussions as odious as a long-winded fart under the covers but his distaste for improper spelling had only been countered by the vast stacks of cash being offered. "No, best we steer away from this one. If its in the contract, then by all means. If not, then our answer will be 'How unfortunate - would you like to buy another?' I believe they call that up-selling. Savage, really, when one has lost their primary source of income. But we do live in a modern age!"

Miss Nineteen, perched as always just over his shoulder with clipboard in hand, scribbled on said device and finished with, "Of course, Doctor. I will reiterate that to the head of customer service."

He, however, was already off on another tangent of the same conversation, "...that brings to question how they were even contacting us in the first place. I seem to recall from my limited discussions with this 'Colonel Blud' fellow - quite off-putting, the man was in need of a shower, a shave, and a personality - that they would be buying such a large vessel with an eye towards expansion of their business. That would seem to imply that their entire operation would fit handily inside a one-point-one-nine kilometer space ship. Entirely too big, in my estimation. I prefer something a bit more cozy, but perhaps I am just showing my age."

It was a chance for a subtle shot but the red-haired assistant didn't take it. Instead a few clicks on the surface and she had what she was looking for, "That is correct, Doctor. Their entire operational element was to be housed aboard that vessel. Five hundred people, including their ground element and support staff. This would have left them with berths for nearly four thousand more."

"Given their nature, I'm sure they managed to fill it with looted valuables and ill-gotten gains. One step away from pirates, you know!"

"Yes, Doctor. To answer your question, that was only their operational element - including Colonel Blud. But the Blud Dawgs have a very small financial and media element based in the da Vinci arcology on Mars. This would seem to be the source of the query."

"Ha! So we find that great stain on civilization - marketing and advertising - in a sudden panic because their cash cow has disappeared? Or, as I would posit, more likely turned to that very option of piracy. Although," he stopped in place and turned from his pacing with a finger in the air and his mouth only slightly ajar, "A sudden though, Miss Nineteen. Amuse me for a moment. If, perchance, the Blud Huntr has indeed turned to piracy by means fair or foul - ghastly name, that - then that would turn the clock back to my previous point as to legal repercussions, correct? Piracy being illegal nearly everywhere and thus, under Republic law, subject to..."

Her stylus worked furiously while he rocked back and forth on his heels and in a few moments she interrupted his metronome stance with an answer; "Very illegal. Piracy is equivalent to murder as the convicted are presumed to have either abandoned the crew of stolen vessels to die or to have directly participated in the murder of said. As per usual Republic law, pirates are subject to either debt-labor for presumed murder - that is, life imprisonment under labor - or execution if direct evidence of murder is obtained."

"And if we invoke the times-three rule whereby the guilty are responsible for repaying three times the damaged amount? That is, I believe, the law in all cases? One to the State and then two to either the victim or, if the crime is victim-less, to the individuals who have uncovered said crime?" It was close enough and she nodded for him to continue, "Then let us do what we can - secretly - to uncover the location of this missing ship! If it has turned to piracy, we may be able to turn quite an extraordinary profit on this single sale. Since the ship was, of course, purchased from us for a very large amount. Even if a third goes to the victim, we may be able to get paid twice!"

"Always good," she agreed. "I'll put resources on it."

"No... You won't."

"Doctor?" She looked up from her work with a question on her face and he smiled before uttering those fateful words; "You're fired."

"...fired?"

There was time to savor it and so he did, studying her face as she stood there silently perhaps on the verge of crying, screaming, or any number of irrational emotional outbursts. But instead she closed the cover on the clipboard, set the stylus carefully in its place, and extended it to him, "Very well. I will clean out my work space immediately."

"...and hired. More of a transfer, if one were to use the proper language. I was very impressed by your work on the Mark 61 - Oxyuranus, isn't it? - and given your long service and apparent ability I have decided to create a new position within Ambrose Industries for you. That and I truly dislike anything to do with the creation of robotics and other mechanical monstrosities. But that is where we find ourselves and so that is where I shall put the onus on you instead. Miss Nineteen, I am now appointing you the Executive Vice President of Unit Nineteen, which will be in charge of all future Ambrose Military Industries design and engineering work! You will, of course, report to me but I will be decanting another clone to take your place." He paused, finger on the side of his chin, and he considered her, "No, you've been through enough. Instead I will be designing a new assistant. That will allow me to indulge in my passions and for us to make a clean break. Perfect!"

He rubbed his hands together and turned to walk away, "I'll begin immediately! Perhaps brown hair? Or purple? And..." He turned only once, "Congratulations. Don't disappoint me..."

[Sunset]

Clarisa's Handmaiden, GEC-79291, The Spinward Expanse, Alpha Quadrant...

"Blud Huntr, this is Clarisa's Handmaiden... Respond, s'il vous plaît. Again, Blud Huntr, this is Handmaiden, Répondez s'il vous plaît..."

The communications officer sat back from his station, tossed a shrug over his shoulder to the Captain, and waited. The good Doctor's own words had been essentially correct; In the world of private military entities there was often little difference between mercenary and pirate with the subtleties often laying in just who was paying the bills and who was on the receiving end of the contract. Smuggler should also be included with that pairing and for the past half-century the family clans of Os Sanglants had mostly fallen into that category though they preferred the more genteel Marchande. Wares from one place were moved to another and if the laws in between were inconvenient the price would only justifiably be that much higher. As one category moved into the other, however, there was still always both some concern for one's fellow rogue as well as an understanding that one had to make a living even if it was off the misfortune of one's fellows.

Tracking the wayward ship back to its previous location had been easily done and a reasonable step; One always finds what one lost in the last place looked. People talked and while some measure of professional respect might have kept the merchant clan from directly interfering with the plunder of the frozen world there was now little reason to avoid either it or the pretense of an investigation into the missing ship. That the Blud Huntr had been discovered in orbit had been a half-welcome surprise; That she was not answering the Handmaiden's hails was another.

"Blud Huntr, this is Clarisa's Handmaiden... Respond, s'il vous plaît," he finally repeated but with all of several minutes between attempts there was time for even the most vigorous fornication to be interrupted, "The fuck is happening over there?"

"Should we approach, Captain?" It was a suggestion from the helmsman but the Captain, an elder in the clan who had gotten there by being less bold than cautious, waved him off; "No. She's fine where she is and so are we. Méfiant, it is. Very suspicious. What business is it of ours that they chose to return to the place they just left after coming away with such treasure?"

The consideration was also practical. Clarisa's Handmaiden was one of the lean Incubus-Class of light freighters and was thus as much suited to the occasional skirmish as she was to the rapid transit of trifling freight from one port to another but against a warship on the scale of the Blud Huntr she would be merely a mouthful. Better he thought to stay at considerable range than risk a sudden attack from the méfiant vessel, "No," he continued, "We will wait and watch. There is no reason for them to object to that, is there? And if there is..."

"Captain, incoming message from the Blud Huntr..."

A press at the controls and the communications officer watched as the Captain again looked over his shoulder. Playing in a flat two dimensions, the message was a recording of the seemingly familiar face of Colonel Blud but there was something odd, off even, that the Captain could detect even from that angle and distance.

"Meaningless, Captain. It is double-speak - they have come to the planet because they have come to the planet to come to the planet. Something is wrong; He looks like a fantoche."

A puppet, and only when the sudden thought crossed his mind did the Captain's abrupt order save their lives, "Hard to port!"

The blast that peeled past them was enough to sear the jet gray paint from the hell, "Retreat! Helm, get us out of here..."

[Sunset]

Above the Labyrinth, Next to the Ol' Ambrose Place, Southern Anuke, Ares System...

"Ordinarily we'd have two choices, at least when you boil it down to the most basic points. The first choice would be to destroy it. Simple, reasonably cheap. A single conversion warhead right about here," the Intelligence man stomped his foot just a step ahead from where he stood, "Would do the trick. Core out the entire complex like an apple no matter what weird physics shenanigans that thing is up to."

"Pull back, nuke the site from orbit," Constable Lybecky repeated the familiar phrase. "Just to be sure."

"Very Roanian. The second would be to leave it in place, study it as much as we reasonably can, try to assure ourselves that no matter what these Sh'Dos or this machine possibly have planned. That's a lot of unknown-unknowns though and the higher-ups don't particularly like that idea either - not on the breadbasket of the whole system. We wouldn't starve - there's a dozen more Triumvirate worlds waiting to take its place - but it would be a pretty big crisis for a few months there. If we were an ordinary people I'm sure the higher-ups would be looking at the first option more than the second. But we are not an ordinary people."

Which explained the crates scattered around the pair. Of all the things one might expect to find at an Intelligence Service-headed scientific investigation, the last on the list would be storage containers embossed with the name of a little-known plumbing supply company. What few supplies remained were odder still; Instead of the usual assortment of pipes and fittings, there were a number of arm-length tubes no larger than Lybecky's thumb and tipped with a gruesome-looking trio of cutting teeth.

"Back about twenty years ago, my parents were contractors on the Atlantis Project. Which was," he explained in response to a visual lack of understanding on the Constable's part, "A project to turn one of the many moons in the New Mars system into a hollowed out luxury resort and home away from home for the rich and fabulous. It worked out pretty well - so many of the preposterously wealthy dynasties relocated to Atlantis that when the Boardroom Revolution swept through... Four years ago? That sounds right. When it swept through, they declared themselves an independent state. Set up their own military, their own government, and now they are a right proper oligarchy. Moderately successful too."

In fact, he'd done a stint there as a local field agent keeping an eye on the various dirty deeds done by those in power to try and keep themselves in power, "But they forgot - again - that just because you declare your corporate headquarters is Atlantis doesn't mean that your whole corporation suddenly moves there. With most of their employees and infrastructure located around the Republic and the Triumvirate, the lower-level staff simply locked them out and went back to business as usual, minus the huge slice for the leeches at the top. They still have more than enough money and influence for their children's-children's-children to live lives of utter luxury so... fuck em. Anyway, these little toys are some of the results of that project. Because the idea was to carve out the various living spaces and even the furnishings from solid moon rock, they needed a way to plumb it. Lots of whirlpool tubs in those lunar mansions. These are them - miniature tunnel boring machines just like you might find on a large scale digging the tunnel for an inter-city maglev."

"Since the walls of our little Pan's Labyrinth have decidedly odd sensor qualities - even ground-penetrating sonar does weird things - the idea is to get physical. I've set out a whole bunch of these with instructions to dig through the rock til they hit the walls then turn to follow them. That will give us the extent of the facility. Then we move to Phase Two."

"What's Phase Two?"

"Phase Two is where we add a third choice. With the layout of the facility solidly established, we'll dig boreholes at somewhere between three and five spots that will let us position a number of these," he conjured a floating hologram of a pill-shaped device with a rounded cube half-protruding from one side as well as the requisite hooks and eyelets to secure it in the boreholes, "In the holes. These are second-hand Republic and Combined Services jump drives."

They were actually neither. The jump drive on a warship was too big and cumbersome for the holes described and were not so easily modifiable into such a small form-factor. Instead they were the core of any one of the thousands of satellites that sat in orbit over the various major cities across all of the Republic's Core Worlds. On a regular basis these handled untold millions of terabytes of data being tossed to and fro across the planet, supplied orbital sensor data for weather, traffic, and crop reports, or just allowed the curious to see what their city looked like from above or project an image of deep space on their virtual window so they could watch the ships go by.

They were also the answer to the Triumvirate's own Nemesis Strategic Strike Platform.

At their core these many thousands held a single-use version of the standard TYCS Tesseract Jump Drive. If something like a high-distort missile was detected then one or more would maneuver into place (or hopefully already be there) and then activate the jump drive when the missile was inside the operational envelope. While this might ruin the day of any civilian shuttle that might happen to be in the area as well, it would also save the city below and the countless lives at stake. Since no system was perfect that particular capability was a closely guarded secret that had, thus far, never been used. With the addition of the TRIPWIRE Array the system had gained additional capability but largely the system was the same - get in the way of an incoming projectile and make it disappear. Since the Constable (and you) were not authorized to know about the system the Intelligence man did not share those particular details - presuming he knew them himself.

"We'll put them down the holes, synchronize the jumps, and we'll gain a new particularly lumpy asteroid wherever we decide to part this thing."

"Any idea where that is?"

"Nope."

Yes. He knew exactly where it would be going which was in fact another closely held Republic secret. Somewhere in the galaxy there was a place where three Black Holes had managed to form within touching distance and at the center of this gravitec maelstrom sat the Tidal Facility. It wasn't so much a secret as to keep people from nosing around but a secret because it was so dangerous and purposefully so. If an experiment held a fundamental level of unknown risk on an extraordinary scale, the Tidal Facility was the best place for it. Even if a ravaging horde of bio-engineered monsters managed to breach the facility's automated defenses then the whole thing could be simply tipped over the edge, so to speak, and into one of three immensely powerful gravity wells that would turn the bio-monsters into colorful spaghetti as they were sucked into oblivion. Fitted with station-keeping thrusters the new asteroid would join a number of other projects kept safe from themselves and outsiders by virtue of the punishingly rare circumstance they found themselves in.

All of which might lead one to question just what position the Intelligence man held within the confines of that Service, but since that wasn't central or important to the story it was glossed over.

Speculate if you wish.

"But once its there we can do both, sorta. It will be safely away from Anuke and we can study it all we want. And if a swarm of rat-monsters boil out of the depths, they will find nothing more vulnerable awaiting them than a bunch of garbage can turrets loaded with all the assorted nastiness. Which leaves us to sit back and wait."

"What are we going to do with the hole? We can't just leave it there - it's right next to a summer camp. Some kid might fall in..."

[Sunset]

Special Projects Covert Research Facility 74-A (Sigma), Denali, The Yukon System...

"So what is it?" That was the first question Francine - Site Director Kryger - asked and thus the first that Doctor Kraus answered with a hairpin turn at Albuquerque.

"It," and he held up his fingers to add the obligatory air quotes, "Is not "real"." How he managed to add the italics was another question but by some turn of the mouth they were clearly present and he continued, "This thing is bleeding Hawking-spectrum radiation like a stuck pig. If I didn't particularly care about getting some weird, freakish form of cancer that might or might not manifest itself as super-powers, I'd be wearing a nanny-black apron right now. Note to self," he tapped a clipboard on the workbench next to him, "Figure out a way to have cancer give you super-powers. Maybe integrate it with the Eien Node so you can..."

"Doctor."

"Ah, yes, the monster. Right." Putting a pause to his idea, he walked around to the other side of the bench where a large chunk of something purple sat on a surgical tray as if it had just been cut off a man made of grape jello rather than blasted free of a space-going leviathan by a high-distort munition. "So yeah, it's not real. Or at least not fully part of the Prime. The further we get into this shit the more meta it gets; Somehow - and I'm working on the how - this species actively exists in both the Prime and in its own particular corner of the multiverse. It shares some similarity with biological organisms but somehow manages effects that are normally confined to electronic systems, such as the creation of gravity wells at stellar distances. This piece right here might be considered part of the cytoplasm - there are whole teams working on the more discrete structures - and each of these cells is the size of a starship. Fortunately biological efficiency really breaks down at those kinds of scales or else this thing would have been a lot more dangerous than it was."

Which was nearly the diameter of Jupiter from tip to tail - still plenty dangerous as far as all involved were concerned.

"It would have been nice to get a sample from the other areas, like whatever nodes or cells or organs were responsible for the disintegration of the Scaramouch but the boss lady really, really wanted it dead. But I am really good at taking wild-ass guesses, so here goes; The disintegration was a manipulation of the local holographic boundary matrix that changed some particular manner of how atoms or particles interacted, rendering their molecular connections far less stable inside the affected area. Very similar to how the HOBD generators work except instead of the specific target of the hydrogen-oxygen bonding point it just targets everything. This is probably how it feeds as well. It uses the field to break down the planet then absorbs whatever these things consider 'nutrients' into its body. An atomic soup, yummy."

"Yummy. So the answer to 'what is it' is that it is a gigantic inter-dimension lavender space squid."

"Yes? Lavender though? I really see it as more of a lilac..." There was a minute of furious motion as he flung drawers open before grabbing up a set of cards hung on a ring. One by one he began to compare the chits until he found one that matched and then looked to the Director, who nodded confirmation, "Pantone #272. So noted."

"Which isn't lilac or lavender."

"But not the question you really want to ask," he swung the ring and the cards around his index finger and into his palm with a clatter before dropping them in the drawer and sliding it shut, "Which is 'why do I have a Pantone chipset in my lab'? The answer is that I'm married and thus have a lot of strange things in my lab. Color swatches, throw pillows, sex, end tables... Opening the wrong cupboard around here just got reaaally interesting, right? And cozy. Don't forget cozy."

The Site Director sighed, crossing her arms and leaning back against a workbench before suddenly realizing what he had just said and standing straight again with a jerk, "You know, sometimes I find myself hoping that you never reproduce. Then I remember that you already have..."

"Twice!"

"...and a little of me dies inside."

"Pfft," he waved her off with a turn of the wrist, "At least I'm not cloning myself. Or," he looked over at the bank of tubes spanning the rear wall of the laboratory where vaguely Kraus-shaped forms floated menacingly in shadow, "At least not to continue the use of my gene-line as a method for ensuring the transmission of an alien message directing us to an unknown but vast number of ships hidden across the galaxy for some unknown purpose. These are just for funsies. We should get back to that sometime."

"The local cluster, actually. There's more researchers than you, Doctor. They managed to back-trace the ships that had already arrived at their gather point and figured out that they originated from all over the galaxy and the various dwarf galaxies. We're not exactly sure who or why, but a break-down of the materials involved in the construction shows a surprising connection to a more recent discovery..."

"Can I play twenty questions?"

"Twenty questions..." The reference to the age-old children's and travel game suddenly caught her and she shook her head, "No."

"Then I'll do it in one!" His declaration was emphasized with a raised finger and he continued directly to his answer, "The Circlet. In the Gen Celet System. They both use a huge amount of PTU-557 in their construction, ergo they are likely from the same source."

Her mouth snapped shut and just for an instant her backside touched the workbench, "How... How did you know that?"

"Read your email. Interesting connection. That would seem to fit well with the theory that the Circlet was built as an evacuation or migration platform. They both fit that mold, if in different ways. I guess we'll find out when SDF-Ojeni investigates the contact in Canis Major."

"I don't believe Ojeni has any such destination on file." She couldn't be certain, of course - it was not inside her job to keep track of all of the movements of all the various Exploration Command starships - but along with the briefing dossier on the Circlet had come a note that that ship had been damaged in the battle that had resulted in the destruction of ELO-04 and the arrival of the various tissue samples at her facility. "And it's Ursa Major II."

"...I was only skimming it."

[Sunset]

SDF-Ojeni, Sslaa VI System, Alpha Quadrant...

"So, how do we get there?" It was the natural starting point and one that Captain Kamilia Blaine had been pondering since waking up that morning - relative to ship-time - to the good news that her brand new space-warp nacelles had been installed and were fully calibrated and ready to go. After a shower and a short test series the matched pair were pronounced space-worthy and she had gathered the command crew onto the bridge for the question of 'what's next?' "We've got a few choices..."

"Are we certain we are going there?" An unexpected question from an unexpected angle and she turned to Lieutenant Commander Ingersol, who stood next to Lieutenant Cadindra at the Tactical Station instead of at his own console. He'd been spending a lot of time with the new posting and suspicions all around were that he and the Coatlicue were making hay. No harm, no foul - he wasn't the young woman's direct superior and had shown nothing but professionalism in his duties. "We don't exactly have authorization from Fleet for an extra-galactic expedition. Not that I'm objecting, but do you know something we don't?"

"I know we don't not have authorization! And as I was telling Sloan, something like this is big. ELO-04 big. If there was at one point an operational plan by an unknown civilization to either invade or evacuate the galaxy for an unknown reason that may or may not have resulted in the disappearance of said civilization, we should be following up on it."

That and there hadn't been any kind of threat - veiled or otherwise - during her earlier situation briefing with the gray-faced (literally) minion of the Intelligence Service. The Bajoni had been just almost the opposite, though with the usual lack of commitment to anything concrete. As he'd told her again and again it was his job to present the data and the Captain's job to follow up on it. Though when he - possibly - disagreed with her he had an annoying habit of finding more data to support what she could only presume was his own position. Or the position of Fleet Intelligence. Or the Secretary-General, or any number of other individual figures who might be sticking their fingers in what she considered to be her pie.

"Mighty muddy, but I can get behind it," and there was a general murmur of agreement from the rest of the bridge crew, as well as Doctor Vikoso and the Eye. "So, here's what I - we - suggest..." Instead of moving to his own station, he leaned over to the Lieutenant's console. The motion coincidentally put her just under the taller man's shoulder and there was no shuffle aside but instead she remained comfortably close while collective 'gotchas!' went off among the other crew, "...which is that we look at the possibility of using the same trick we pulled with the gate complex in the Gen Celet System to force a connection through to the complex in the Kion System. Presumably there is either an active gate there, or an active communications node, but either way the return pulse from our 'hello world' gave us enough data to triangulate the destination."

But Commander Eye'tumno interjected, "The problem with that idea is that they won't let us. Fleet won't, that is. They have been using the Gen Celet-slash-Kion gate complexes to ferry back the salvaged ships from the Kion System pretty much non-stop. I've got a big report on my desk that I've been eyeing through. They are using what they can from the hulls to repair the Breach and moving on what they can't for either sale or recycling. A lot of those ships were still good by some standards and apparently there's a big push to build some kind of gate-based Trans-Beta Expressway. Big demand for slower-than-light ships right there. Now we could just Tesseract out there, but that would leave us making our way back by Space-Warp. Not exactly the best if we have to haul-ass outta there..."

And it would take a wartime override from the Captain and Commander - along with the requisite paper-trail - to use. Conceivably the ship's secondary faster-than-light drive could put them anywhere in the universe but with a recharge time that scaled dramatically based on the distances involved. A jump to Ursa Major II would leave the system out of service for quite a long time.

"...but it would take quite a while for us to get there by space-warp and through uncharted space at that. Months. So my - our - suggestion is that we pull the same trick again, but we're going to have to do a little work first."

"By finding an undamaged or only slightly dinged and dented Precursor gate complex," Kami finished. "And we just happen to have a convenient list of possible locations. So, presuming there is some grand conspiracy to work this all out behind my back, where are we heading?"

With a touch at the console, Ingersol popped up a new display on the main screen, "Ah! She's smart," and presented three choices along with relevant data-points such as distance and some technical information that looked essentially meaningless but was then explained as not, "And so we have three doors - three choices - that were made based on a breakdown of the return signal we received from the 'hello world' pulse. Which were the most coherent, which were the strongest, some included secondary data, some didn't. These are the best three - and your pick is..."

[Sunset]

Ker'Strel, Sessool Space, The Eastern Edge of the Galaxy...

First to emerge from the long blue waves of the tropical sea was a slicked-back helmet of jet black hair followed by a drifting halo that plastered itself to Meli's neck and back as she slid out of the water. The surf flowed away from hard muscles and glistening skin to remain wet only across a staggeringly tight coral white swimsuit that might have been familiar to any avid filmgoer of a previous age. Slim pockets were tucked here and there and a thin-looking knife was strapped to her thigh while a pale flash of rubber showed across her mouth and a mesh bag was slung across one shoulder. Odd-shaped sandals with ridges running down the sides might have moments before been flippers but now they protected feet from the hot sand as she ran from wet sand to dry to pause under a tree that might have otherwise been called a coconut. Something similar lay scattered around the base and the shorter woman's hands looked strong enough to crack one open without mechanical assistance.

"Aight, we're hear. Now that village is jus' up the shore?"

"Yes, that's right. To the north, by your compass." The second voice was muffled and indistinct, with a faint hint of something electronic or artificial about it. A plastic-looking bag marked in hexagonal pattern seemed to be the source and this rested in the open mesh of the bag that now hung at the small of the Dwarf's back. "I must add that this is a most interesting experience. I have not felt the slightest change as the implant has absorbed my individuality. By the monitoring system I am now sixty-seven percent electronic but I remain me with no interruption. Simply fantastic!"

When she had offered to ride him like a pony, Doctor ScLappi had not expected her to end the encounter by slipping a bridle on his neck. The decap-a-donut was of a very new type not yet available on the regular market that combined the usual functions of the life-saving device - a quick decapitation, a gathering of the blood vessels to seal them against dramatic blood loss, and a connection of the head to a biological support system - with a self-injecting ExoCortex that would rapidly move the individual's consciousness into that particular cybernetic implant. Deprived of his body and any reasonable means to make objections the scientist had settled into his new role of back-seat adviser with surprising ease. Access to her sensory stream gave him an outlet to the world that was only marginally taller than the one he had enjoyed previously.

Though he couldn't see octarine anymore.

"Raht..." With directions in hand she set off at a half-crouch, noiselessly passing under and around both hanging leaves and low-lying shrubs towards the nearby Maiorca settlement. As she started out the color of her suit changed to a creamy brown mottled with crisp green and light sand - colors that began to appear in quick sprawls across her own bare skin and before the thin fabric had dried in the warmth of the early afternoon she was well-camouflaged amidst the surrounding foliage. "Ah think Ah ken see it from here; Right there on thaht spit oh land?"

It was hard for a severed head to nod and after a single attempt he gave up to respond, "Yes, that's right. Just on that bluff. The village runs mostly down the other side to the sea; You were fortunate to come ashore here or else you surely would have been spotted."

"Better lucky thahn good, they say. Ahn I'm the best..."

"Which prompts me to ask, what is your particular intention? Other than directions to the Maiorcan village you haven't told me of your reasons for coming here. Given your sudden transformation from sophisticated off-world traveler to sexual misanthrope, I must assume that you are not who you said you are. My easiest guess would be some kind of spy and thus I would ask why you would be interested in the Maiorca? Soldiers are quite the commonplace wherever I've found myself employed."

Meli paused, most-hidden from view by a cluster of surrounding shrubs that came up well past her breast and almost to her nose. Crouching further she spread the thin passage between two to peer into the surroundings. Something had caught her attention but after only a cursory sweep it was revealed to be nothing more than a large arthropod sorting through a collection of fallen seed nodules, "Honestly? Shits'n'giggles. Mah assignment was over ah while ago ahn Ah've just been enjoyin' yer company. But they're bahnd to recall me right quickly so Ah thought Ah'd take a peek at yer project before we leave."

"So you will be taking me with you? That is some relief - I had envisioned a scenario whereby you were revealed as an amoral murderer who simply used me for my body and then abandoned me to a cruel eternal existence."

"Honesty, Ah lahk that in ah man. Yep, yah'll be goin' with me. Might be takin' one or two of these fellers with me as well, depending on..." One could practically hear her foot stop in mid-air as it descended towards a particularly noxious looking insect that had concealed itself among the ground clutter. At the exact same moment her attention had been drawn to a noise that had proven to be two humanoids stepping out onto the path she was mirroring not two hundred meters away. Through the open tangle of trees and shrubs she could just pick them out but still she remained perfectly still with one heel just a beat away from crushing the little crawler. "Well shit, they are ah lot bigger'n Ah pictured them!"

If she was the size of herself then she was also just about a solid two-fifths of their own which put each at something north of three meters. A careful squish and she disposed of one distraction to move into a better vantage point where she could take in the details. There was something familiar about them, something that struck the back of her head, but whatever the source it escaped her at the moment. Both had a beaked jaw and a crest that gave them a somewhat reptilian appearance but their skin didn't have the look of glossy scales but instead the softer matte of fur. Varied browns blended into the jungle well but there was a trim of vibrant colors along the edge of the crew as well as here and there - the jaw, above the eyes - that could only be the source of the psychedelic feathers the Doctor had mentioned.

Feathers. That was the answer; It wasn't fur but feathers.

One carried a spear and shield of a long, narrow sort while the other held nothing more threatening than a basket woven from native leaves. After a moment of interplay the two adjusted themselves and began to walk back towards the village, the Dwarf trailing along behind...

[Sunset]

Special Projects Research Facility, Tyco Crater Arcology, Mars, Sol System...

"...that's silly."

"To hunt a bigger buffalo you need a bigger gun," the man answered, pulling his hands up into the posture of one aiming a traditional rifle. "If we were big game hunters, this would be the biggest bag of them all." An imaginary trigger pull - and even a bit of a stagger - and he lowered his arms, "Pretty sure I'd have to expand my trophy room though."

"A million kilometers, a hundred stations, and where do you propose we get the ammunition for just such a cannon?"

Again he had an answer at hand, generating an illustrative hologram out of thin air with a snap of his fingers, "I'd considered exotic matter first, but this is a gun and it wouldn't exactly be mobile. Well, sort of. Let's answer that first question first; We'd find it. There are plenty of rogues we already know about and that would form the bulk of our initial ammunition supply as well as helping to keep the existence of this weapon a secret. Can't very well have all the competing powers realizing we've got a galaxy gun and running around scrambling to build there own, you know? So rogues it is, and since they are already out in the middle of nowhere and exactly where we'd want to operate this thing from the two coincide perfectly."

"Makes reloading a bitch."

"Well, yes, but I already mentioned that obliquely. Instead of moving the ammunition to the gun, we move the gun to the ammunition. Pick a rogue body of the appropriate size, move the stations to intercept positions, then as the rogue passes through the first set of stations... Bang!" He again mimicked the motion of raising and firing a rifle. "The existing velocity is magnified a hundred-fold, the bullet is slung through a wormhole at the end, and trillions of tons of matter turns to energy when it hits one of these great purple beasties at incredible speeds. It will take years, of course, but that's why we need to start now rather than later. If all what - six of these things? - that we know about decide to make a run at one of our systems we're not going to be able to stop them before they grab a meal to go. Which is presuming we know just how many of these monsters are out there..."

[Sunset]

Setting Five, The Circlet, Gen Celet System, Delta Quadrant...

"Hey, hey you! Stop! I just want talk!"

If she'd had a moment to reflect, Annya wouldn't have felt it the least bit surpring that, when faced with the nose-to-nose appearance of an obviously predatory species, the little alien had taken off at a dead run. Instead she chased it at her best speed with four legs barely keeping up with two as it darted around corners and through the door-less archways. Whether it had a destination in mind, it navigated seemingly unerringly in the darkness while she had switched to a combination of thermal and sonar since entering the under-underground complex. That left most of the details lost in thermal bloom though for the moment she was focused on keeping up and trying to elicit some kind of verbal response so that the translator could start its magic.

"Come on! I just want to talk about..." Another corner loomed and she barely kept her feet as the diminutive humanoid made a hard right at a pace that would leave an ArAreBeen saucer impressed. "Wait up! I have candy! Candy! Wow, that sounds really bad..."

Another pair of hallways and a trio of turns and a realization crossed her path; "A lot of animals run to lead predators away from their young."

Turning thought into action she waited til the next long stretch of corridor and issued the mental commands that would overlay her vision with the map that had been automatically generated based on the sonar returns. It was blurry - the primary alloy had strange effects even on that most fundamental of effects - but clear enough to show a clean arrow of revealed terrain between here and there despite all the twists and turns along the way.

"But do I turn back or keep chasing?"

Her presumption was that her fitness and training would allow her to eventually run her target down but that left the potential for either an escape or for her thought to be nothing more than that, "Better the devil know... And can barely keep up with! Hey, hey you!"

There was no stopping to chat; Another corner and she found herself chasing the lonely figure through an altogether familiar and unfamiliar space. Instead of the seemingly endless corridors and hallways they were now sprinting across the middle of a vast hangar. Aircraft of a sort sat in an orderly arc around the perimeter and a circular well led down and presumably out. Another routed up through the ceiling and Annya nearly screeched to a halt as she stared up at it. But the fleeing form beckoned and she put on a burst of speed to catch up. Racing under one of the stationary craft - a looming triangle with two bulbous pods on either side of a half-bent central module - she followed towards the dark portal of another archway.

Luck or planning had just now run out; The doorway led into a side bay where another of the craft sat with the pair of ailerons spread from each pod giving it an avian and predatory appearance. First the alien ran underneath to shelter with the bulk of the machine above it but as it caught sight of the four-legged Ensign standing in the door it retreated further and into a curved corner. Turning to face her there was a flash of something cold in the hand and Annya realized they had pulled a knife or similar from a scabbard on the opposite arm. Against the warm blob of the alien's body the weapon was impossible to clearly discern and she stopped, sinking back on her haunches and cocking her head. From here to there she had a comfortable two-score meters as well as body armor but in this unknown strange space anything was possible, "Woah," Her body interrupted with a bark, "Hey now, no reason for that. I wasn't going to eat you. Sure looked like I was, but I'm not..."

It was time to shed some light on the situation and she switched on the light mounted on her helmet, flooding the space with reflected luminescence. The little one shrank back and held up a free hand to shield its eyes while putting the weapon out in front. Dialing back the intensity until the hand lowered, Annya switched her vision to an enhanced low-light mode and studied the cornered individual. Orange-brown fur covered an athletic frame that was clearly meant for running. Thick legs propelled a lean body but the arms were still solid with wide hands useful for digging. Two black eyes were set apart and far back on a conical face that ended in a nose bumpy with some kind of nodules. More importantly to the Shepard - still considering the threat posed by the weapon - were the clothes. Crude but serviceable they looked to have been made from the leather of various woodland critters, stitched together into a patchwork that covered a surprisingly busty torso.

"Hur hur, boobs..." But the answer to why struck her, "Which probably means she's nursing."

Then and there she made a decision and with a bounce she turned from the doorway to retreat at a trot. The light scattered here and there off the parked aircraft but after a minute she was on the far side of the chamber and rapidly fading from view. Another dozen meters and she turned off the light to turn on the sonar again and crouch low, muzzle to the smooth floor. If her guess was right - and only a short while later it was - she would hear the tick-tick of claws on metal as the mother headed back towards her waiting babies. She couldn't be sure of the direction taken but the map showed otherwise and she waited again a few minutes with the goal of retracing her steps. That gave her time to ponder on another mystery she had uncovered and at the new entrance to the hangar bay she paused and look up, turning the lights back on to shine them around the overhead doors.

"Which have to lead somewhere. The one on the floor? The outside of the Circlet. That makes sense - these look like defensive fighters or gunships - but why inside? Actually, why not? But how?"

That was the question to be asking as she walked around the perimeter of the rising exit. There was seemingly no way to access it from the hangar floor though a number of additional doorways hinted at maintenance or control areas but more important was what was above the hangar doors just visible from where she stood. By the map, she was only twelve kilometers or so from where she'd entered the sub-structure but she couldn't recall seeing anything that would have suggested an entrance on the surface, "Which means it is either disguised or buried. Like..." She flipped through invisible layers until the overhead imagery gathered by Ojeni and Southern Cross after her lined up, "At the bottom of a lake."

So there was a likely point of access but not an immediate way to access it. That left her with the decision of whether to follow the alien or poke through the hangar bay and see if she couldn't figure out how to open it up. With the Commander out of range, she couldn't rely on his orders so it was her place to play it by ear.

"Back we go," was her answer as she laid down some sensor strips around the bay. "We're here for the aliens, and they are that-a-way."

There was also the possibility that the mother - presumably - would try to move the children as soon as she returned. This wasn't their home, after all - their real home lay in the underground warrens above. Trailing her back would both put her back on the track to make contact and hopefully to cross paths with the Commander and the others of her team...

[Sunset]

A'iruka, Great Northern Wastes, Hanson's Kneecap, Parson's Shoal System...

Alwyra stood at the window to the office - her office - with her hands braced on the sill and her nose practically pressed against the glass. Below and all over the central atrium people moved through in generally one direction as they carried bags or containers that held the few items that they had considered dear enough to evacuate with. Most were headed back to their quarters large and small and most fortunately none had more than a scratch on them. Despite the hurry and the rush to find space for all of them - she'd taken out more than thirty on her own ship - there had been no significant injuries among the civilian population, "All of this over... What?"

"Information," Lieutenant Kyong answered.

The Intelligence agent was standing to one side of the window, just enough to glance out but not enough to be easily seen unless one moved far to the left side of the space below. They were alone in the room - Kedo was helping empty their ship and her executive manager was busy getting the business back up and running - and it was time for whatever answers the agent could safely give. Outside the office on the causeway the Marines were gone along with the mysterious apparatus they had moved in to leave only her own security robots on duty. She had caught a glimpse of whatever it was being carefully moved back out through the main entrance and into the back of a heavy shuttle while Rear Admiral McCopper's Horizon loomed above it. The two had departed shortly after with the larger escorting the smaller up through the atmosphere and away to some unknown destination.

"Information." Ten years ago she would have laughed - or cried - at the idea of nothing more than information being considered so valuable that hundreds had died and untold billions worth of ships had been destroyed in pursuit of it. Information was only zeros and ones after all; A complete intangible that could be reproduced at will. Now she was both older and more experienced in the ways of business and the world and she merely sighed, "What information? And what happened to her?"

It was an honest answer, though whether the Amirah would believe it was another question, "We don't know. There's supposition, and we're looking, but the guess is that the stone you found in the desert - part of a helmet, if you want to know - held information that was of particular value to the Druth'Haari. Since they are a post-Singularity civilization of immense power and longevity, we are assuming that information would be even more valuable to a civilization not yet at that point in their timeline. Which is most of the galaxy."

"So..."

"As I said - we don't know. I could speculate but it would be my own. The higher-ups aren't telling me what it might have been which - honestly? - that scares me a little. At least after watching the fleet fend off an attack by a planet-sized purple space squid. She," Kyong turned back to the question of what had happened to the woman, "Is gone. I guess you could say she's imprisoned. Director Silaco was here, they talked - I don't know about what - and at the end of it she decided to leave."

Alwyra nodded. The idea of prison wasn't strictly familiar to the former convict - that wasn't how things worked in the Republic - but the concept was there. Locked away from everyone and everything and over nothing more tangible than information, "That's good."

Justice? Perhaps. It hadn't been adequately explained but events put responsibility for what had happened directly on the head of the strange woman. At least in her eyes, though she couldn't quite shake off the chain of events that had included her own fated expedition into the Eastern Mountains.

"They put her in that thing?"

Kyong didn't answer. She suspected the same but the instructions from central were to leave the woman's fate a mystery. The device - she didn't know what it was or how it worked - was being transported off-world and onward to a presumably safe location. The where and the how was again not important and as it was she had already gotten her marching orders. Finish her business here at A'iruka then it was on to an undercover assignment in the Mirayn System.

"Which is as good as a 'yes'. I hope they throw it into a black hole."

Now the Lieutenant finally cracked a smile and laughed, though she cut short when she saw the Amirah's questioning look, "The Druth'Haari... Their civilization lives inside black holes. Sort of - it's complicated and I'm not sure on the physics of it all. And I wouldn't go poking around any looking for her - this is pretty high-end stuff."

"Oh," though there was a trace of a smile at her unintended mistake.

For a good long while they both stood there, Alwyra watching the traffic pass to and fro, the vendors at their stands put out their wares again - possibly the same hot dogs that had been rolling around since they had left - and the few children make use of the terraced planters and steps as a distraction from harried parents. Soon enough everything would be back to normal...

"Wait - are there more out there? Should I be worried about my miners stumbling across more of these things?" But Lieutenant Kyong shook her head; "No, I don't think so. She left. She wouldn't leave if there were more."

A bonk as Alwyra dropped her head to the pane, "Good. Okay, so, we're safe. The giant space squid is dead - we don't have a name for it, do we? - and the woman who set off the attack is gone along with whatever information she happened to have." Something had crossed her mind and she turned from the window to cross the few steps to the desk and tap at the surface, "All those soldiers - sailors? - dead though. Kept us safe. I need a sculptor or a designer..." She thumbed through the list of debt-laborers, looking for someone who's previous resume matched that description, "We should build a monument. I'm thinking a big statue at the top of a mountain!"

[Sunset]

SDF-Ojeni, En Route under Super-Cruise to Objective One, Beta Quadrant...

"...which implies they have some kind of FTL access, is what I'm saying. Even if they moved around the perimeter of the galaxy setting up gates at STL-speeds it would take damn-near a million years based on the number of hits we got from the pulse and presuming a high-end slower-than-light speed. More like four million if you've got the average piece of crap."

With their chosen destination far across the Beta Quadrant and beyond even the distant Sessool Empire and the blank space on the map known as the Eastern Rim, the crew of the Ojeni had plenty of time to sit back and chew the fat. Even with only minutes remaining until their arrival Captain Blaine was still sprawled out in her command chair, feet up on an extension she had figured out how to extrude from the surprisingly flexible seating. Beside her Commander Sloan was similarly at ease with one foot up on the armrest of the Captain's chair where it could occasionally tap her shoulder to emphasize a point. It was fair to say that Kami expected no better of the rest of the crew; Drinks and plates sat at stations or, in the case of the Sensor Console, it was entirely unmanned as two managed to squeeze into one seat as he canoodled with the Coatlicue at Tactical.

"But yet they haven't found any evidence of a FTL drive either on the Circlet or as part of the gate network."

"I bet you that there's a super-gate somewhere," the Eye opined, practically prancing back and forth as he worked on some project or other at the rear-most station. "Either it blended into the other returns or was destroyed as part of whatever left us without the builders of all this. You can initiate a wormhole from only one end - plenty of FTL drives do that - but the trick is that it takes a lot more power and a lot less if you have an initiator at both ends. Our space-warp drive is nice that way because, in the grand scheme of things, it only takes a reasonable percentage of our total output to go super-luminal. We can lose something like eighty, near eighty-five percent power and still make a run for it. Not really the point though - if the gates were my preferred and-slash-or only method of faster-than-light travel I'd build a super-gate or better yet a few super-gates so I could open a suitable wormhole and toss a whole gate complex through to the other side. Then you have your energy efficiency..."

"And your control." It was Lieutenant Commander Ingersol's moment to toss in his two cents and as Tom began he rose from his place of particular comfort to return to his own station; Minutes had changed to the point where seconds could be counted without being overly annoying and it was time to assume some semblance of professional behavior. "Supposing they do have a super-gate - a theory I agree with - then that in combination with other details is starting to look like a civilization bent on control either of itself or of whatever species they chose to evacuate or conquer. Sure, to us all the silvery-white metal looks all nice and lovey-dovey, but they could just have an allergy to black paint. All those drones look suspiciously like a pacification force - back at the Academy they did a segment on the conquest of Ju-Docri and the early UHCVs were a big part of that - and the high-precision laser weaponry would be perfect for killing agitators or protesters without destroying the entire city. Though the hidden hangers don't really fit with that. I'd want those gunships out in public where people could see them and be frightened. If I ever retire and colonize my own planet I'm having my OmniFormer make me some of those..."

"OmniFormer?"

"New bit of tech," he answered his girlfriend. "Instead of terraforming a planet to suit the desired species it changes the species, the housing, the infrastructure, and the like to fit the planet. Kinda fits in with the whole ExoCortex-slash-EienCortex theme - instead of the same hi-tech world we've seen time after time you can have a local civilization integrated into something like a molten world or a radioactive hellhole." A glance down at his console to check the time and then he looked up at the display and there was a longer pause, "Forty seconds..."

Normally that announcement would have fallen to the Ju-Docri at the helm but something on the long-range sensors had given him reason to steal Camisole's thunder.

"But we might want to skip this one!"

Kami sat up in her seat, leaning forward to look both at the helm console and then to the main screen where she expected some depiction of the sensor officer's worry to appear at any moment, "Why? Sessool?"

There had been rumblings - but there were always rumblings - as well as a particularly intensive briefing by her Intelligence liaison that had made the point that the Sessool were potentially up to something and that said something potentially involved the Republic. Of course in the paranoid mindset of the Intelligence Service someone was always up to someone and it was always pointed like a dagger at the heart of the Republic. Despite this the Secretary-General still went on her morning jog without so much as a hint of official security and thus Captain Blaine took the briefing with a huge chunk of salt. Still it was the obvious conclusion to jump to and she waited anxiously for the results.

Instead the image that appeared was familiar but not - an object similar in scope and design to the Circlet but covered with some manner of growth that was gradually becoming clear as the long-range sensors gathered further samples from local space. For all the world it looked as though the titanic orbital was being slowly devoured by an amorphous blob and after a moment the expected gate complex - sitting out at a far orbit - also appeared before both were sent to the holosphere to draw in miniature.

"What is it?"

"I'm going out on a limb here, but not the Sessool. Orders, Captain?"

"Hmm, yeah, that looks nasty. Helm, change course. Or at least stop short;" Their current target was the traditional arrival at something near directly above the system's star at an equal distant to the system's outermost orbit, "And we'll take a longer look. Prepare a VDA for deployment in case we have to scoot - I just got these nacelles, I don't want to scratch the paint yet..."

[Sunset]

AMI Executive Annex, Steven's Crater, The Moon Minamoto, Hachiman, Ares System...

High heels - narrow, black, elegant - clicked on marble as Ms. Nineteen strutted the length of the table, stylus tapping the back of each seat for emphasis as she went through the details. She was in her element now, her own division and her own responsibility. Her first design would be crucial in proving her ability to manage and execute whatever projects lay ahead and of course keeping her in charge. Gone were the white lab coat and pastel shirts to be replaced with a charcoal gray skirt and a tailored jacket with just the edge of a silk blouse visible underneath. Her long hair was now medium and cut to a razor edge, the red unsuited to the more severe Palmer twist.

"...lean and predatory, curled over as if ready to pounce. An animal on the hunt, the essential alpha."

Back to basics - or as basic as the modern battlefield was. When the common anti-infantry weapon was able to ignite the unprotected soldier from mere exposure and leave them a flaming candle, the protection required to operate in such an environment went up as well. Gone were the days where one could simply flood the battlefield with millions of men and throw them in surging waves against each other armed only with crude rifles barely above the muskets they had replaced. To do so would simply ensure the death of millions as one side or the other employed whatever passed for the machine gun of the first World War on the battlefield of the future. Soldiers and their masters - civilian or otherwise - demanded protection that would leave them with some notion of survivability and that had a commiserate cost-per-unit that Executive Vice President Nineteen's balance sheets found intriguing. Thus her first design would be a suit of power armor suitable to the modern private military corporations that were AMI's bread-and-butter buyer.

As she issued her suggestions the traces of designs appeared above the conference table, sketched out by a trio of young designers on transparent clipboards that were her signature and the required office standard. At this point they were all similar - a hunched-over humanoid soldier - but some had touched of artistic licence curled out in the margins to dance in mid-air as she continued with an unexpected turn; "A tail. The definition of a predator. A forearm weapon - the wearer's arms will be inside the chest cavity..."

Permutations of the idea appeared with one crossing them across the chest, as was the manner with the current line of Republic battle suits, while another had them curled up under the ribs and the last held up at the shoulders until the pilot would resemble a boxer ready to take or give a punch. A tap of the stylus and the first two disappeared and she nodded approval while the other two sought to improve on the design of the third.

"A sword or blade - mercenaries are given to such frivolities and the idea of close combat. It never happens, but we can charge extra for it;" She was not concerned with the rarely-cited edge cases. If a regiment were to be wiped out in brutal hand-to-hand combat with some sort of biomorphic horror that would only give AMI the wedge it needed to produce and then sell a dedicated melee combatant at additional cost. Or the kind of expansive intelligence and analysis capabilities possessed by a government-level military that would allow it to avoid such easy folly. "On the opposite shoulder I'd like to see some kind of additional protection. A shield..."

Quick sketches and she turned to glance over her shoulder, taking in all three, "The second."

It was a medium-sized cauldron mounted to the shoulder itself with a second segment on the upper arm. With the arm extended to stabilize the mounted rifle it would provide significant additional protection to the head and upper torso from the forward arc. That in turn had inspired its own notion in the artist and she took the rounded helmet and expanded it to a matching crest, drawing in four tetragram eyes under the forward edge.

"Very nice - evocative of our Minions. Expand on it," she pointed at the other two. "An idea strikes me as well. The tail isn't strictly needed, so we can make it a useful element. Incorporate it into a drone that mounts on the suit's back. When attached, it allows the suit to fly or it can detach to multiply the attack angles. A parasitic look would be best; Show me your best..."

[Sunset]

Setting One, The Circlet, Gen Celet System, Delta Quadrant...

"...it wasn't as difficult as one might think, given the regular connotations of the word 'slave'." There was something of a sly smile to Xammit's words and the Otterkin - Sitsizi'i - continued to explain, "I have done some research. There was plenty of time while I was recovering from my injuries and the currents flowed in the direction of some new position of responsibility."

Like his fellows, Xammit had been injured in the blast when the Ojeni had opened a hole for them and the imprisoned ground team to escape through. To say injured was to do them a disservice; Without the protection of high-end duty uniforms all three had been partially or completely blinded and suffered burns over large portions of their bodies. All three were now released but only Xammit had returned to government service instead of families long-absent. Now he served as the Sitsizi'i Elder's Liaison to the Republic and the new government that had formed after the accidental conquest of the Zeer'Gen. This put him in the position of walking the same halls where he had previously labored alongside Ambassador Love.

"The closest approximation I could find - and I cannot claim my search was conducted with anything more than an amateur's enthusiasm - was that of the people of Egypt. Ancient Egypt. They toiled under the Pharoah - I think I've got that right - for the portions of the year where the rivers were flooded and they could not farm anyway. That was the state of our slavery under the Zeer'Gen. When we were not busy doing what needed to be done for ourselves we performed labor for them."

"But you built this," Demi pointed out, looking up and around the vast military citadel that surrounded them. To put the Great Pyramids beside it would be to put an ant beside their mound and in terms of complexity, "This took a lot of industry. It isn't exactly piling up stone blocks that you can cut by hand."

Metal would have had to be extracted from somewhere - oddly, there were whole deposits of iron and other ores laid down in the mountains that crossed the artificial continents - then refined, alloyed, and worked into the complex forms present. She was no expert either but she did have an awareness that there was a deep complexity to industry and the chain from raw resource to finished product.

"Very, very slowly. To continue the comparison, our progress on this fortress might be called glacial and by literal comparison. I will let you in on a little secret, Madam Ambassador;" Again there was that sly smile, "The Zeer'Gen are not a particularly smart people. Their fear of a Kion attack many thousands of years later was and is a reflection of their own culture. They are conquerors but not particularly skilled rulers and their own..." He pondered for a moment, moving through the words until something felt right, "Biology? Their own biology lends to the idea of a project lasting over many generations. Hundreds, in this case. The line of the Empress stretches back to when they first realized their existence and to them her line is all that matters."

"Which was why the investiture of the Regent was so important."

"Precisely. The words may have changed, but to the Zeer'Gen the Regent is the Empress. She will have offspring, the line will continue, and their strength will live on."

"Will they revolt?"

"Revolt? I have done a bit more reading than that! Your Republic would simply allow them to leave and possibly laugh at them. The Zeer'Gen are not equipped as a culture or as a people to survive in the galaxy. Perhaps in a few generations as your educational system pushes them forward but they largely inherited what they have from the Kion all those many, many thousands of years ago and it has remained the same since. Though I cannot say we were much better. I do not know what came before, but in conversation with Doctor Vikoso she told me that there was an example of my species entombed on this Dragon's Eye along with their other examples of conquest. Yet, where are the ruins of that civilization? It would seem the Kion attacked and simply took one of us as prize, mistaking us for the Creators."

Noting the emphasis, Demi asked the question, "And do you know who the Creators were?"

"No. If there is such a thing as religion among us, they are as close as we have. We know someone or something other than the Sitsizi'i created this place but we have never seen evidence of them other than their works. Unseen benefactors, perhaps forebears? Who knows? I will be interested to know, of course, but you will find that the majority of our people are content to live the same lives they have."

[Sunset]

Where The Labyrinth Was, Next to the Ol' Ambrose Place, Southern Anuke, Ares System...

"...mushrooms."

That was the answer from the man from Hao AgriCorp, who's fields had sat adjacent to both the former residence of Dr. Stephen Ambrose as well as nearly a third of the non-agricultural land on the planet. As fitting an industry that had long ago advanced to the point where robots and drones filled every conceivable role he was not strictly there himself, either. While Lieutenant Lybecky walked the edge of the excavation in the blue service armor of the planetary constabulary, Mr. Chang was a hologram projected by a nearby tower and comfortably ensconced at home in the planetary capital city; "Mushrooms?"

"Yes. Mushrooms like to grow underground but there are not a lot of caves on Anuke." That made sense, for those who knew their geography. The planet hadn't had surface water since well before the Republic had colonized the system and so every cavern or cave had to be dug out of the soil and bedrock. There were large aquifers, but it was as though at some point the planet had been re-ordered into a fixed series of layers of surprising regularity. Which was completely possible, if seemingly implausible. "We'll fill the space with a lattice of artificial logs for them to grow on, cap the hole so it is nice and dark, then we'll have mushrooms. More mushrooms, but some people will pay extra for mushrooms grown underground instead of in buildings."

Which was also - sorta, not really - case-closed for the Lieutenant. Malevolent aliens from a time in the distant past had sought to reintroduce their species to the galaxy by first attacking the (improbably large) security force of a well-known television huckster and then, that failing, had sought to spread themselves across the face of the planet by means of a genetically-engineered retrovirus. The third wave had been actual-factual aliens - he didn't recall the name at the moment, but it would be in his report - that were now being monitored in a government nursery somewhere under the watchful supervision of top men. What exactly would happen were they to show some sighs of absolute evil wasn't explained to him but he had been assured that top men would be on it. Past that the Labyrinth was gone, presumably in orbit of some dead world somewhere under the watchful eyes of top women, and that left the nefarious intentions or simple programming of the infernal machine outside of his immediate concern.

Who to punish for the loss of the entire crew of a Constabulary Cutter? There were a handful of the rat-men still alive, but they were proving to be bestial and somewhere just on the dividing line between sentient and programmed. Hard to pin the blame on instinct for murder...

"They better be damned good mushrooms."

[Sunset]

The ExoCortex:

---

What is it & How does it work

---

The ExoCortex is a modern miracle of medical and cybernetic technology that has been enabled by significant advances in both neural and materials science. It allows the migration of the parts of the brain that define our individual personality into a stable yet malleable electronic form; The ExoCortex Cybernetic Implant. With this implant the individual moves beyond the notions of biological life and death with their biological self becoming yet another tool to be manipulated by the intellect rather than the limiter of their mortality. It is not true immortality as the implant is still just an electronic device and thus subject to wear, tear, and intentional damage but there are both ways around this as well as extended options as will be discussed later. This implant has gone through various stages in its development and implementation and through an explanation of these we'll explain some of the advancements in technology and science required to make this seemingly impossible device come to pass.

The first great advancement that led to the creation of the ExoCortex was a complete mapping of the Human brain and how it functions. Every cell, every neuron, every pathway. One of the greatest scientific feats of the 21st Century and the collective goal of much of the civilized world. This alone would lead to innumerable advances in medical science and open up new treatments or complete remedies for many of the neurological illnesses and diseases that affected humanity until this point. Importantly to the ExoCortex, it also isolated the exact portions of the brain that held and define our personality; The parts that make us 'me'. That led to the possibility that these parts could be replaced by an electronic (silicon-based) version and early attempts were made - some with considerable success. In fact, there are examples of individuals with cortical augmentation still alive some one hundred and seventy years later, putting some of these rare examples at over two hundred and twenty years of age!

The next advancement would be the various breakthroughs in meta-material technology. These are materials that can do more than just lay there on the table; Some respond to heat or electricity to bend and shape or re-shape themselves while others are even more complex with the most pertinent example being the substance known as 'computronium'. To simplify, this material is a non-biological version of a brain cell. They can store information, form and re-form their own connections to others, and process both their own and outside information. It was this advance that led to the creation of the first miniaturized deep-learning neural network computers and by extension the first self-aware electronic intelligence. With these two technologies in hand the leap from biological mortality to electronic (near-)immortality was at hand.

---

Interlude
Move: To go or pass to another place or in a certain direction with a continuous motion.
Copy: An imitation, transcript, or reproduction of an original work.
Upload: To transfer (copy) from a computer to the memory of another device.

Uploading an individual into a computer does not move that individual into the remote system; It creates a copy of that individual. The original still (possibly) dies...

---

First, it is important to know that we are not the same 'me' that we were seven years ago. In a continuous process the body replaces every single cell, including those in our brain and the parts that make us 'me', with new as it replaces and eliminates old and damaged cells. As an aspect of consciousness we do not notice this process at work but the dust in the air and on our furniture and floors is evidence of this continual process as dust is largely composed of dead skin cells that have fallen off our bodies yet we remain intact and, to us, the same as we were yesterday. This makes the process both 'move' and 'copy' since the information stored in our brain cells is first copied to the new cell and then the new cell is moved into the position of the old within the larger framework of our consciousness. It is this continuation of consciousness that fundamentally marks 'me' as alive and when it is completely disrupted then marks the individual as deceased - ended.

As one might then guess, the first ExoCortex implants took advantage of this natural process to slowly intercept the replacement cycle of select areas of the brain and instead connect artificial brain cells built of 'computronium' of various types instead. Over the years this would migrate the interconnected matrix of thoughts, sensory input, memories, and experiences into the implant itself, which then communicated with the rest of the brain and its various functions through a high-speed electronic data bus that was - and is - very similar to the common 'data jack' type of cybernetic direct neural interface (DNI) implant. Just as this implant allows the individual to directly interact with a remote or local computer system - popular for virtual worlds and other simulations - the ExoCortex uses this technology to allow the migrated consciousness to control the body and receive sensory input from it. This does mean that the ExoCortex can be divorced from the biological body and transferred to another or to any number of robotic or electronic extensions.

By this system, there is no death of the individual. The rapid interchange of sensory information, memory, thought, and instinct continues and forms the individual's subconscious and thus the conscious and aware individual. The electrical power required by the implant is harvested from the body - as is with most cybernetic implants - and there is a back-up supply charged again by the body in case of biological injury. To protect the unit it is encased in a hardened shell approximately the size of the human palm and shaped to fit across the front of the brain cavity. To accommodate additional experiences and developments in personality it contains both additional 'cells' that can be activated and these also serve as potential replacements in case of damage while more can be introduced into this reserve if necessary. Most ExoCortex also include both their own DNI 'data jack' for cybernetic interface as well as sophisticated barriers and firewalls to prevent damage to the ExoCortex with the simplest being the very reliable metallic fuse.

While this system represents the first generation of ExoCortex implants, significant improvement has been made since that point. Notably the process is now faster with the implant taking advantage of that first piece of core knowledge to selectively trigger the replacement cycle early and force the migration of cells at an accelerated rate. Instead of years, the next generation took months. Instead of months, the next took weeks, and then days, and now the process can take hours. One interesting development that has come to light with this accelerated pace is as apparent as the wrinkles on the brain itself. It has long been noted that the more wrinkles present on the brain, the smarter and more intelligent the individual is; Essentially these folds increase the number of possible connections within the fabric of the brain just as a wormhole is the point where two far-distant points of space-time are folded together and meet through tremendous manipulation of gravity. So this is true with the personality of the individual as well with those having more wrinkles possessing a more developed and less instinctual personality. An odd side effect of this is that individuals with a more distinguished personality can experience 'fuzziness' or headaches as they transition at an accelerated rate.

The latest generation of implants aims to solve both this problem and again accelerate the pace of transition by making the ExoCortex implant itself more malleable and thus able to increase the through-put for the replacement process. This is made possible by additional advancements in that second core area; The introduction of another meta-material in the form of polymorphic computronium which can change its position within the mass while still retaining the connections and thus the nature of the individual. This is expected to bring the process down to under an hour and potentially into the range of minutes.

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The Future
The original still (possibly) dies... Or do they?

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As noted, the ExoCortex and thus the individual consciousness housed inside is still vulnerable. Though they live inside a hardened shell capable of withstanding falls from many hundreds of meters, low-velocity gunshots, accidental energy weapon exposure, and are essentially immune to poison, disease, and radiation, the ExoCortex can still be intentionally or accidentally damaged and thus the life of the individual either impacted or ended. Some of this damage is avoidable thanks to the many advances in modern life; An individual with an ExoCortex can choose to inhabit a robotic replacement for their biological self complete with faster reflexes, armor plating, or advanced weaponry or to simply commute via internet or projected hologram from the comfort of their own home. Even this does not avoid the possibility that their home might be destroyed in an orbital strike or simply plowed under when an undetected meteor hits their home planet. There are, however, options...