The short, elderly woman stepped out of her cottage and stumbled through the chickens that were eagerly pecking at the soil. In her hand was a woven basket draped over by a handkerchief. She stuck a hand under the clothe and pulled out seed which she began to sprinkle as she walked. The woman seemed quite content as she hummed along some old tune she had fancied, perhaps something of her childhood that she had learned and that remained with her through all these long years. The chickens had surrounded her now as they gobbled up the seed and filled the air with their calls. The elderly woman smiled.
She continued this for a few more minutes before finally setting the basket down. The birds flocked to it and attempted to peck through the handkerchief allowing the woman to fetch a pale of water from the well in her front yard. She used a ladle to drink from it and then filled a nearby trough. She pulled some weeds thereafter and finally began to tend to her flowers which had grown around the fence and hummed all the same.
The chickens had stopped their frail attempts of getting more seed from the basket and instead quickly scattered with one trying to take flight before hitting the fence. The woman had taken notice and laid down a pair of scissors she had in her hand as she tried to calm them. She felt the rumble through the ground, and her attention was torn away from her livestock and instead up the dirt road toward the hills. Three Conglomerate aircraft came over the crest in the distance and screamed overhead flying low and kicking up dust. The windows of the woman's cottage shattered and she was knocked over and held her ears at the sound. In a flash they had disappeared over the opposite horizon.
A man was working at his desk typing away the morning on his terminal. The high-rise was absorbing most of the sunlight and so he reached over to dim the windows via a switch. His eyes followed three dots in the far distance, way off near the outskirts of town. ''They're flying low,'' he remarked prompting a 'Huh?' from his co-worker who was sitting next to him. The chunky man had slid back in his chair and pulled one of his earmuffs aside.
''Nothing, Gregory,'' the man smiled with a wave. Gregory returned to his desk leaving the man to stare out the window. He had become oblivious to the message flashing on his terminal about an incoming call. When he had noticed, he panicked and quickly answered. ''Yes! Welcome to Martian Dynamics, this is Yuri speaking. How can I help you today? Uh-huh. Mhm. One sec, and you said your number was... oh, one sec ma'am to get some pen and paper. Yes, 8111-34...'' He stopped repeating the number as he looked out at blazing streaks stretching towards the sky.
Goats had been grazing along the hillside for an hour, locked away in their fenced in enclosure happily oblivious to the world or its troubles. One pulled some grass by the root with its teeth and begin to slowly grind it in its mouth. It's dull, brown eyes stared off towards some workers who had surrounded a large camouflage lattice-covered structure. It swallowed and bent down to get more grass and continue to chew paying no more mind to them.
The men on the hill pulled the covering off, and then quickly ran from the structure as a glint of sunlight drew the goat's attention once more. Three jets screamed overhead, and the goat merely flicked an ear in annoyance at a fly as they passed. Other goats in the pasture baa'd and ran off in different directions. This original goat bent down again and drew more grass in its teeth as another bright flash caught its attention. The structure was fitted with long, large objects and each was now rumbling like thunder behind them. At last, they took off, and a number of sudden adjustments later, rocketed towards the sky. Their reflection could be seen in the goat's eye as it continued to chew on a mouthful of grass.
''Activating Apophis, standby,'' a woman's voice stated. The crew aboard the MCN Hallow were fumbling about with a panel on a communication satellite. They had been working on the think, a 'piece of junk' as the one engineer had remarked, for just about four hours. It gave them front row seats though to the show as they listened to the radio chatter. ''Maya, think they'll actually come this far?'' the man said in his spacesuit as he held on to a tether.
''Dunno, got admit though, you can't beat that view,'' Maya responded in kind with a smile. They watched as the nearby spire began to adjust and light up across its exterior structure. A wormhole could be seen forming along one axis, and another along the opposite. ''It's oddly beautiful,'' Maya reflected as she took a wrench from the man she had been working with.
''Will they fall for it, Admiral?'' an officer, a colonel, stated as she stared at the hologram. A group of them had been working in the dimlight of their bridge with Grand Admiral MacNamara standing out among the rest. His white uniform contrasted heavily to their greys, and his quiet, cold eyes watched over the telemetry with a stoic and serious gaze. The colonel turned to look back at another screen. ETA 15 minutes. Mk V Launch could be seen in bold green text above the data.
''They should. Times put out that we had already pushed our forces back into Kathira. We deployed our Mk V ISCMs on the ground and in numbers consistent with a missile cruiser. We've got asteroids being moved into place by tugs, holograms, and gravwell generators running to mimic the mass of our fleets as if they were actually there. By all accounts, Kadrian LIDAR should tell them we are in Kathira, which means they'll likely seize the opportunity since it appears to them we're still in a preparation phase and unorganised. If they take the bait, they'll move into Kathira expecting to find MCN forces, allowing us to jump in behind them, Colonel,'' MacNamara stated.
''Aye, Admiral. We've got 15 minutes until the salvos reach the Raetian Front,'' she piped up.
''Very well. For the moment, we'll continue in our holding patterns. You're certain that Hawking's Recall can be configured in this way? To let us jump in behind them?''
''They've assured me of it. The nodes we've planted around that we've disguised as space-debris should allow us to use the recall protocol and jump in after them,'' the Colonel responded.
''Carry on, then,'' MacNamara stated.
