Nova Wars

I'm not worried about the fact that the Terrans have rebranded themselves as the Solarian Iron Dominion and have gone back to calling themselves humans.

As I sit here, looking over that ancient data dump called "AVENGE ME" to glean out information on the Mar-gite, I slowly grew to fear.

If that was what they were willing to dump, what else did they keep hidden?

But more...

...just how far were they willing to go, unilaterally and on their own? - Re'su'urchmo'o, Lanaktallan scientist, Greater Great Herd Corpotacracy

Inna spun the force lance, letting the field flutter to clear the emitters, as she shifted her weight to bring her center of balance lower and increase her stability. Her armor's grav boots locked her to the floor and she brought the force lance into the ready position.

Her two opponents circled her and she started circling with them to keep them in sight. Her eyes were set wider than Terrans, so she was able to keep the two Telkan, both with long claws and flowers replacing their eyes (Marked: Bioinfected Type XXIV on the HUD ID) in her vision.

One lunged and she went through the strike kata. Stop them dead with a thrust to the face, then sweep the feet. She blinked rapidly as she spun in place.

The other was moving in, but she had enough to time to absorb the situation. She leveled the lance, fired a single forcebolt, then spun back.

The other was straightening and she fired a single shot into the chest.

She spun the force lance and fluttered the field to clear the charge.

Her score came up.

31.

Telkan passing was 19.

She smiled as she spun the force lance into a whirring disk, listening to the end whistle.

The books said it was an older weapon, from the Great Glassing of Terra, but she had found it to be a fascinating weapon.

It could put out force packets at a rapid fire with enough power to dent and even fracture Mark-One Warsteel. It could throw a charged bolt good enough to punch through ten centimeters of Mark-One Warsteel plate or fifteen centimeters of warsteel laminate armor. A strike with it could either knock an opponent out or hit with enough sledgehammer force to shatter warsteel.

It was considered an obsolete weapon, more a historical footnote to those who studied Terra at that particular point in time.

She loved it.

She could block incoming fire, use it to pry apart plating, use it as a fulcrum'd lever to jump or whatever else she needed.

It was a complex weapon, with much more flexibility than anything else she had found herself having any talent in.

Oh, that didn't mean she wasn't going to pack one of the old Terran Confederacy heavy magac pistols. Those were better even than the ones she found out were current issue. Higher rate of fire, higher caliber, higher magazine capacity, even variable munitions.

She had done some research on the last part and discovered that the variable munitions function of the Confederate Magac Pistol had vanished within a century of the Terrans vanishing. It had to do with the inline nanoforge, apparently when the Terrans vanished the smaller ones quit first with the larger nanoforges and creation engines going dark later.

As far as she was concerned, the nanoforge was one of the greatest things ever invented.

The mat-trans was the worst. She had found out about it and been slightly frightened. Fiction all agreed that, at the best, a mat-trans merely copied you, killed the original, and released a clone of you. While most people were fine with that, since belief in the soul was largely seen as primitive superstition, something about it resonated with Imna.

The idea that someone would just walk into an execution chamber so a clone of them could walk around made her hackles raise.

She went through a quick five move kata, as much as she could before she had to stop and reorient herself, panting as she slid her feet back to the start position.

When she had started she had only been able to link three katas before she had to stop and take a look around herself at what was going on.

The eVI trainer had been slowly pushing her. Yesterday she had managed to do six, and during eVR practice she had been able to do three katas against VR opponents before she had to stop and look around.

Of course, that's when the VR opponents had beaten her into the ground.

She stood up, bowed to the trainer, an odd little tradition that she had slowly become more comfortable with over the last few months aboard the Nell of Night as it traveled through Hellspace. The eVR trainer, a small Terran not much bigger than her, bowed back and the practice area dissolved.

She went to where Mister Fixit was inside the weapon cage. She ejected the forcepacket ambloc and the magac ambloc, cleared the action on the pistol and discharged the capacitors on the force lance, then handed the weapons back to Mister Fixit.

From there, she handed in her practice gear and then the eVR gear.

Her stomach rumbled as she showered, so after she got dressed in the old ACU, she hustled to the mess hall deeper in the ship. The mess hall was empty when she went in, grabbing a tray from the rack, utensils wrapped in a thick paper napkin, then an empty drink container made of actual glass.

She hustled over to the nutriforges against the far wall, waving at the two black robots who were leaning against the food line smoking cigarettes and drinking beer.

The robots waved back.

She didn't bother to wonder why a robot would want a cigarette or how they could drink beer.

They just did.

And she'd come to accept that some things just were.

She set her tray down and flicked her fingers in the little cone made of gently spinning hair thin lasers.

The menu popped up and Imna stared at the menu in the Nell's mess hall. Over the last few months she had gone from just selecting the recommendation or the '[Meal Name] Special!' offered on the front page. Both her and Wrexit had been scrolling through the options, looking for new things to try. Having a fully functional nutriforge, a TerraSol make nutriforge from times of legend, was something special. Imna hadn't been raised needing much but even this relatively modest part of the Nell was almost obscene luxury to her.

An honest to wishes TerraSol nutriforge fully loaded.

Imna and Wrexit found out they could turn down the 'optimize for personal taste buds' and had been having fun bouncing across menus and alternating between "Holy shit you have to try this, it's amazing!" and "Holy shit, you have to try this, it's horrible!" as they sampled different meals.

But this one item perplexed her.

"Ahem?"

Imna's fur poofed up as her reflexes tried to make her look more intimidating as she spun around and saluted.

"C-Captain!" she stammered.

Captain Decken waved her down as Imna tried to catch her breath. "At ease, Marine. I was just wondering, you were so wrapped up in that menu you didn't even hear me enter the mess. Is there something wrong with the nutriforge?" He raised one eyebrow curiously.

"N-no Captain!" she said, dropping her hand.

"Then what seems to be the issue? We're not offering something offensive?" Captain Decken asked.

"No. No, sir. Just, something weird in the menu," Imna said.

The Captain let out a long suffering sigh. "Weird, huh? Might be those old attack virii still floating around in the system from Clownface. Mister Enduring?" He asked. He touched his temple. "Mister Enduring?" he paused for a second then nodded. "Could you run a quick scan of Mess Hall Nutriforge Eight to make sure it's not serving 'screaming flesh of the eternally dying' or something like that?"

The lights flickered moments before Enduring Hateful Code's voice was heard. "No signs of lingering Clownface EM Warfare corruption, Captain," The DS stated. "I'll kill all of you... all of you. Kill you as a mercy before I let Clownface madness touch you. You are mine to kill."

The threat was another reminder to Imna about how little she and Wrixet knew about the galaxy beyond their home planet. The Little Nell of Night had done a border patrol of somewhere called "The Clownface Nebula" a few years before Captain Decken had ended up in command of the ship and he was constantly on the lookout for anything ever since one of the air reclaimers had suddenly grown eyes and tentacles and had to be 'killed' by Captain Decken and a Marine squad.

What "Clownface" was, even in his madness Enduring thought there was some things that went too far.

"Um, thank you, Enduring? And no, Captain, I was just confused by one of the items on the menu. I'm not entirely sure why we have it," Imna said, moving slightly so that Decken could see the menu.

Drecken hmm-ed as he leaned in to read the screen Imna has been staring at menu. "ECRs? PMCs? TCGs? For emergencies of course."

"But...it says we have a year's worth of them already made and in storage?" Imna frowned. "But it's still in the nutriforge menu."

"Of course. They're emergency rations." Drecken gave one of his gentle smiles. "There are times where we can't run the nutriforge. Maybe it was damaged in combat, maybe we're running at maximum stealth for an extended amount of time, maybe we were the victim of electronic warfare, maybe it just decided it wasn't going to work any more because the malevolent universe loves us," he smiled again. "For whatever reason it's good to have backups. Hmm, now that I think about it, considering how few actually organic beings are on this crew we're probably good for a good while longer than just a year." Another hmm and Drecken started to poke at the screen. "Actually those are all for Terran biology. His hull sustains Mr. Naxin, but you, Mr. Wrexit and Mr. Hetmwit all have different dietary needs than me. I'll have to have the system adjust them."

Imna watched him punch in his override code, scan his thumb, then do some quick menu adjustments.

"There you go, all done," the Captain said.

The nutriforge beeped happily then hissed and chuckled to itself.

A moment later the nutriforge's door slid up and there were several yellow packets with green markings in them. Captain Drecken took one and handed it to Imna. "Here you go Mister Imna. We might as well do a taste test real quick on the ECRs."

Nervously opening the packet Imna found several wrapped sticks in various colors. She pulled a maroon one out and blinked. "Repple-root? I love repple-root candies!" she smiled, feeling her ears twitch in happiness.

Her vestigial claws made short work of the paper-like wrapper to reveal a waxy stick of the same color. Imna stared at it for a few seconds before biting down. The waxy material crunched at first but quickly turned soft and slightly sticky. The flavor came through about the same time, the taste of sweet Telkan repple-root filling her mouth.

"Oh they're delicious!" Imna's ears were perked up and her tail swished in delight as she devoured the rest of the maroon stick. After the maroon ECR was done, Imna started to work on a green one as Captain Decken watched.

"ECRs. Standard Marine emergency rations. They're good for at least a century...and you can even write and draw with them." Drecken smiled as he handed the rest of the packs to Imna. "Go share these with Mr. Wrexit. Telkan biometrics were already in the system but I'll need to work a bit to get proper rations for Mr. Hetmwit."

Imna nodded and managed to remember to salute before she scurried off in excitement with the green ECR held between her teeth. She planned on showing them off to Wrexit as soon as she could.

Drecken just smiled to himself. Tomorrow the Enemy Existed to be Destroyed. Today was a lovely day to enjoy the small things in life.

Like seeing a marine eat her first crayon.

He hummed to himself as he started toward the gym. He pinged one of the robots to gather a crew to move the emergency rats from the heavy duty nutriforge in the storage area. Now that the Telkan were onboard, they'd need to stock the Purina Marine Chow and the Thumbtacks, Crayons, and Glue meals

0-0-0-0-0

Hetmwit looked up when the Captain came in, freshly shaved and his uniform immaculate.

"Any progress?" Decken asked.

Enduring Hateful Code flickered into existence in one of the holotanks.

"Yes, Captain. Quite a bit," the DS hissed.

The Captain sat down in the chair, waving his hand for Enduring to go on.

"We're eight hundred lightyears from the Galactic Core Boundary, into the center of the Scutum-Centaurus Arm. We're two thousand light years 'north' of the galactic plane and three thousand light years anti-spinward from the galactic arm curvature line," Enduring stated. "Far enough nobody will hear you scream," Enduring whispered.

Hetmwit ignored it. He was used to Enduring's almost palpable hatred for all things living.

"No system survey?" Decken asked, tapping his knee with his left hand.

"No, Captain," Enduring said. "I can hide your bodies without anyone knowing."

"Well, it isn't optimal, but I've faced worse," Decken said, still tapping his knee. "What data do we have on the system?"

Enduring vanished, the stellar system appearing in the holotank. Seventeen planets orbiting the star, fifty-two moons scattered across the planets. Four were standard gas giants, two were massive-gas giants, and one dwarf gas giant the second most furthest out. One hyper-massive gas giant two thirds of the way out of the sytem. Nine 'planetary bodies', two in the red zone right around the sun, one in the amber, then two in the green, then another in the amber. The others were out past the red zone.

"Microwave and RF signals from these three planets," Enduring hissed. The two green and the further out in the amber zone planet had rings appear around them. "We launched stealth probes before going to full stealth and moving into the shadow of this gas giant," the nearest to the stellar mass gas giant had a ring appear and a small icon of the task force.

Decken just nodded. "Any sign of enemy opposition?" he asked.

Enduring's eyes appeared, stained glass kaleidoscopes. "The gas giants are infested with Mar-gite," the DS said. "Several billion, but they appear to be dormant."

Decken sighed. "And?"

Enduring blinked several times. Slow, feeling malevolent to Hetmwit.

He was used to it now.

"Some kind of ship building facility around the furthest out micro-gas giant. There are unfinished hulls in the gantries but I detected no power readings and no movement," Enduring stated.

"Life forms present on the three broadcasting planets?" Decken asked.

Enduring blinked again. "Aye, Captain. Extensive ecologies. I have discovered the sources of the microwave and EM scatter."

On the screen appeared the three planets, which were quickly laid out like a peeled orange. Strobing red pips appeared.

"The three planets are in contact with each other as well as a structure just inside the Oort cloud at due stellar north," Enduring stated. "Passive sensor analysis shows that the structure can only be a superluminal transmitter and receiver. Its construction and power readings show that it is a high traffic device with repeater capabilities."

Decken nodded. "We'll knock that out first if we need to," he stated.

"The system has been entirely mined. No comets, no asteroids, not even any debris above particles in the Oort Cloud," Enduring stated. "Probes discovered a type of stellar stabilizer as well as evidence of star lifting in the stellar mass."

"Odd," Decken said.

"Orbital bodies around the planet are all in stable orbits that will last millions of years. The planets broadcasting have little axial tilt and what appears to be weather control systems in orbit," Enduring stated. "Atmosphere is standard for known carbon based life forms."

Captain Decken just nodded.

"However, examination of the planet has shown no higher life forms beyond basic small insect, mammals, and amphibians. The ecosystem is the same on all three planets," Enduring stated. "There are, however, automated systems."

On the viewscreen robots appeared. Sleek, shining chrome bodies that looked almost liquid. They swooped down on a herd of furless mammals with pinkish skin that all scattered, running away. The robots used tentacles that dropped free to gather up several animals and then swoop away.

Within a few minutes the mammals clustered back up and went back to eating the vegetation.

The robots moved to a long low hill covered with grasp. They moved into tunnels.

"Tunnel doors are standard battlesteel. Tunnels are battlesteel, however from the way they are constructed, I believe that the battlesteel is biologically extruded," Enduring stated.

"So the space station might have been built that way rather than be the standard Hellspace corruption," Decken said. He got up and moved to the screen.

"What leaves the facility, and I have determined that it is a facility based on power readings and EM scatter," Enduring said. The view shifted to chrome insects on fluttering glimmering wings that left behind trails of purplish graviton energy. "Is a carrier. It then moves to places like this."

The view shifted to a large open field of grasses. There were flowers and colorful grass in the large field.

"That's artificial," Decken said.

Hetmwit nodded. The grass was too even and the edges of the forest clearing were too perfect.

"The fliers then release a spray, that I have determined is emulsified tissue with slight decay," Enduring stated.

The gleaming insects swept low over the field, spraying a mist, then zoomed away.

Beetles erupted from the undergrowth of the forest. Hetmwit noted they were only a half-meter long, maybe half that wide, and roughly ten centimeters high. Their carapaces were gleaming, iridescent beauty that caught the light and created rainbow refractions.

The view suddenly pulled back.

"I detected a sudden surge in phasic energy, possibly emanating from the beetles, and withdrew," Enduring stated.

The Captain was silent, staring at the beetles and frowning.

The view switched. "Other than the robots gathering animals and plant matter, delivering it to those factories, then spraying the fields where the beetles rush in, I can detect no other manufacturing, automated systems, or any..."

"Go back to the beetles," Decken said.

Hetmwit sat up. He could feel the stress in Captain Decken's voice.

"Scans show they are non-sentient and barely sapient," Enduring began to say.

"Now, Enduring," Decken snapped.

Hetmwit saw Enduring blink rapidly several times. "Yes, Captain."

The image of the beetles reappeared as they rushed into the field and began munching on the grass.

"Scans show they have limited neural tissue and..." Enduring started.

Decken held out one hand, his middle and index finger extended as well as his thumb, forming an "L" in midair.

Enduring trailed off.

Hetmwit stared at the insects. They were just beetles. Pretty, but just beetles.

Decken put his hand on his datalink.

"Captain, if you need help scanning the old files from the First Mar-gite War, surely I can..." Enduring started.

Decken held out his hand again and Enduring went silent.

"It never made sense," Decken said softly.

"Captain, if I can assist."

Again, Decken held out his hand.

"The prisoner camps. The tales of how planets taken in the beginning were covered with vegetation and there were often prisoner camps," Decken said.

"It was assumed the Mar-gite were keeping them..." Enduring started.

"Hush," Decken snapped.

Hetmwit looked over to see Imna and Wrexit looking at him. He shrugged and looked back at Enduring, who had appeared in miniature in the edge of the holotank.

"There," Decken said.

A set of pictures of the beetle appeared. On one it was eating grass. On another it was huddled up with several dozens of its kind all eating wet grass. The third showed it dissected with annotations.

Hetmwit noticed the grass looked the same.

"On every planet xenoformed, we found that beetle. Stupid, bumbling. They'd walk off a cliff if they weren't careful," Decken said softly. He moved forward. "The Mantid checked. They were stupid as all get out. They put out a little phasic energy, but nothing big. It would take dozens, hundreds, to equal the phasic output of even a greenie, and a greenie is sapient where these beetles are barely sentient."

Decken turned from the viewscreen. "Are any of the creatures you found capable of sapience?"

Enduring signaled negative. "No, Captain. They're even low on the sentience scale."

"Alert the task force. We're jumping out, full stealth," Decken said, turning away. He clenched his hands and unclenched them. "They were right there, they were right there the whole time and we fucking missed them."

"Where are we jumping, Captain?" Enduring asked.

"Somewhere we can get a hyperspace message torpedo to Confederate and Solarian Dominion Command. I want each ship to prepare to launch message torpedoes once every eight minutes for four hours. I want at least a hundred torpedoes launched," Decken growled. He slammed a fist into the wall. "They were right there and we fucking missed it."

The lights flashed and Hetmwit felt the ships slip silently into hyperspace.

"What was there, Captain?" Enduring asked. "Those beetles?"

The Captain nodded. When he spoke Hetmwit, Iman, Wrexit, even Enduring stared at him as if he had gone mad.

"The real enemy all along."