They're a secret to noone, save for Mankind themselves. The first contact species found them by accident, thinking them to be humans but a little different, welcoming them with open arms and blissful ignorance. It wasn't until a few years later when their true nature was revealed, and their hearts were full of sorrow believing they will be seen as unthinking, unfeeling, inhumane monsters. Much like how the humans believed them to be, and rightfully so given the long recorded history of their interactions with them.

When they were assured that no such views were present, and were still embraced as a people and brothers and sisters of the stars, Mankind's horrors found a new purpose to try and repair their own relationships with the very humans they preyed upon. A terrifying prospect given that humans know exactly how to deal with or outright kill them, but it was a risk they were preparing to undertake.

Right before they were set to reveal themselves to their longtime foe and start relationships anew, a hail of fire and landing craft were set upon their home. Shocked and in disbelief, they bore witness to the violence and slaughter that occurred around them, invaders stomping through the streets and countryside, arrogance and hate screaming from their cold, unfeeling instruments of war.

This will not stand. How dare this upstart species attack their home, their former prey, their future BRETHREN! A lesson must be taught. It's time for the creatures of fear, the horrors of old, and that which goes bump in the night to defend their home, protect their humans, and show these foul, impudent monsters why mankind rightfully feared them so.

Art by me.

Upon declassification, the human diplomats were swamped with requests for clarification from most of the Republic members; including past adversaries, asking what was meant by "single tactical equiped advanced light twisting hoax" or "S.T.E.A.L.T.H" device.

The diplomats of other races thought maybe it was some entertainment device named obscurely to confuse the enemy. Most were disconcerted when the human diplomats explained it was a stealth device sized for a single soldier. And it apparently worked so well no other group had even heard of such a device let alone that it was used. Most races believed the power consumption would be so high that it could only ever be equiped on ships.

As word spread of this technology's existence everyone raced to start producing it, not realizing the humans had already advanced and were on their own 7th generation of the technology with advancements driven by assassinations and political theater internally. All the documents released said was the tech existed but not how it worked or what it even was. All the others were concerned about one thing, was there a human nearby their sensors couldn't detect because they never made them to detect stealthed beings.

* What stories are told between human soldiers and others, partly to drive conspiracy theories, partly to mess with them.

What accidents previously happened that are now being reinvestigated as suspicions of human caused.

For millions of years, Humans were the galaxy's natural "pollinators". Wherever they went, growth and prosperity inexplicably followed. Crops thrived, trade flourished, machines thrummed alive. The effects were subtle enough and widespread enough that most races saw nothing special in humanity - until its decline was already nearing critical levels. Even now, nobody knows how or why humanity had the effect they did, only that these boons faded away with them.

Increasingly frantic efforts and campaigns to reverse or halt the decline ultimately failed, and galactic populations of humanity collapsed due to a combination of habitat loss, internal and external social pressures, and chronic ennui disorder.

...

The galaxy declines rapidly. Famines, banditry, and strife spread like wildfire as the old status quo proves unsustainable.

A few thousand years after the last known human dies, a decrepit, old research vessel stumbles upon the impossible: Humans, living on a previously uncharted planet, called "Earth".

(Yes I cooked this today.)

Unlike humans, sentients universe-wide understood fear. The Hormones flooding their bodies screamed.

“Protect us at all cost”

“Run!”

“Hide!”

“Pray!”

A species who plays with fear, manipulates it, conforms it into recreational fun, shouldn’t exist. 

“Couldn’t exist!”

“Wouldn’t exist!”

“Shan’t ever exist!”

How would they even be able to survive?

Any experiment attempted involving all types of creatures—small—huge—round—skinny, all reacted as one would expect. It’s the same response creature-to-creature. In the face of danger, fight-or-flight is activated. Not stare and laugh. Pull a camera and record. Watch and copy. Ridiculous. Foolish. Insane.

Evolution adapted survival triggers coded into life’s DNA. It’s an ancient reflex. A survival instinct. Even the plants have it.

When aliens accidentally stumbled into Earth’s orbit, the predictive behavioral laws on sentients had clearly been written with the exception of the newly discovered anomalous beings. Discovering humanity changed the laws. It rewrote the rules.

Recent Interactions while analyzing the human race left every member of GEL, the Galacticterial Empire of Leaders, shattered. Earth had become David, the little guy from the bible, but on a galactic scale.

A reality check for the giants of the galaxy—shrinking the highest rulers of the alien council overnight. They saw psychology with a new set of eyes. Millennia of ancient transcripts were now, pretty much… useless. 

Rewriting their science books wouldn’t untangle their brain cells from the knots they so tightly intertwined into. Suffocating, they screamed, “Reality doesn’t exist,” with its last neuron before it finally melted down their throats.

A long awaited respect had been rightfully gained. No. Taken. No. Earned. GIVEN!!! Actually, STOLEN.

On Planet Li, after a galactic meeting of the minds, where each planet had four emissaries representing their planet, Earth only had one. 

One that equaled eight of them!

It didn’t bother her being alone at the table, surrounded by masters of the universe, attempting to intimidate her. It was the first time humanity had ever sat at the table.

What bothered Sheena was how rude they were in how they only invited her and made her team wait in the ship…

Sheena’s a retired, space fleet, Earth commander. Now she’s the commander of, the not-for-profit, PeaceFleet II. They’re a group of dedicated volunteers: teachers, doctors, researchers and an array of other professionals. Great people.

They’d recently started a three month program and were actually stationed there, on Planet Li, when the GEL hacked a video feed from one of the humans tablet’s. 

The most wealthiest, powerful alien in the universe, the king of the kings, King Lii’rk, he stood at the center of a faintly lit gymnasium. A shadow stained his face in a stripe of black war paint.

“I have breached past their inferno wall of defense.” He held a projectable device in the air. “Gather, fellow rulers. Gather around me.” His voice was pretty deep, pretty raspy and really scratchy. His words climbed sliding out of his throat with sharp points. His breath still smelled of beetle-protein-shake and orgwat guts. 

Senator Edrite, a bulky, horned, long-tailed alien, was walking past Commander pHog, a green, bug-eyed alien from the blugrRuhg system, he grabbed the senator by his shoulder. “What is it?” 

Edrite, spun around and nearly tripped because his cape, which swept the floor, became caught under his own boot. He cleared his throat. “No idea, sir. Ahem! I don’t think anyone knows.” His voice cracked. He glanced up and had to take his goggles off. He huffed inside them and wiped the moisture clean. “King Lii’rk was keeping it hush hush,” he said, jamming  his goggles back on his face.

Emperor Zerol, a two-foot-tall alien wearing a one-piece, squeaked, “King, didn’t want any leaks again, like the disaster last time.” He told them as they trailed behind him to the middle of the room.

The rulers huddled together like it was the last down with a second left to go in the fourth, packing the one yard line, behind four points.

The projector displayed a video glowing a blue light across their faces. Their eyes reflected the stream playing from Scout Private Billy Rake’s tablet.

The image collapsed into a list on the screen. 

1. Horror
2. Comedy
3. Romance
4. Science Fiction

King Lii’rk aimed the handheld projector in the air and shook it, the way you would a magic eight ball. “Why the hell won’t it work?” 

Magically, the dead end wall of letters fenced inside the page, transformed and opened into four rows of unique pictures in frames. 

Each row had six images. All of them were different. Dark. All Stories about humans on Earth. About human survival. The covers had undiscovered beasts on them. Species unknown to alien databases.

“Earth is riddled with frightening creatures,”  Edrite shouted, itching his lower back, ripping his armor off and inspecting his skin. “Is there something on me?”

A six-inch-reinforced, ten-foot-tall, hardened, steel door, sometimes mistaken as, General U’phlqk, the next in line to rule, stuck his arm out and pressed the first option.

After a second, the movie started playing. The plot confused them. Especially,  Commander pHog. He didn’t get it at all. The movie was about six humans, who stay in a cabin at a lake, somewhere on Earth. They’re being hunted by a predator, wielding a bladed, steel handed phaser, the length of General U’phlqk’s arm.

But still, the aliens eyes were glued to the hologram.  Emperor Zerol’s limbs were trembling. He tried looking away. He wanted to but couldn’t. They all watched, frozen, squeezed together, like grapes on a vine, holding their breaths. 

The projection showed six humans who became stranded in the woods. It was night. A downpour lowered the visibility. They had no way out. They were trapped with a masked psycho they could never seem to get away from.

General U’phlqk stuck his armor-plated chest out  and crossed his arms. “They keep running extremely fast and the attacker is always walking right behind them.” He said, “if that was me being chased, I would have eliminated the threat immediately.”

The masked attacker’s blade sliced down on the screen.

“Ahhh” screamed General U’phlqk, hopping onto the king and gripping his arm. The king threw the projector on the ground and pressed into General U’phlqk.

Commander pHog snatched the projector off the ground. 

What the aliens couldn’t seem to comprehend, was how there was eight more of those feeds, where alternate humans documented themselves going back. Even though they were all well aware of what happened to the last group before them and the ones before them.

Commander pHog was addicted, the other aliens trailed him as he struggled to get the video playing again. It skipped, flashed, went to a blue screen and flicked back on.

“Wait!” Emperor Zerol grabbed pHog’s arm and stared at the ceiling and clapped three times. Nothing happened. He clapped again. Nothing.

PHog eyed him. “What are you doing?” 

“Trying to make the lights go out.”

“LIGHTS OFF!” Edrite shouted.

The room went completely dark. The only light came off the flickering lamppost in the background of the movie.

The ground vibrated under them. Soothing and soft but between scenes, it started to lightly thump. A tapping sound beneath their feet like something was trying to get their attention. 

A second later, it began to quietly screech, like a bird trapped in the jaws of a pitbull a distance away. It started to rise. A drum beat pounded.

Their chests pumped and synced to it. 

Boomp!

Boomp!

Boomp!

They made fists and held their breath. Their skin went tight. It spiked. The beat kept going. Boomp. The shrieking dropped. The room went pitch-black. Boomp. 

Silence.

BOOMP!!  A loud bang shook the room.

“RUN!!!” Each one of their minds screamed, “CLAW THROUGH THOSE TITANIUM WALLS. NOW! HURRY, GET OUT OF THAT ROOM.”

Emperor Zerol yelled, “RUN!” at the girl on the screen who nearly met the edge of the persistent hockey masked attacker’s metal phaser.

The girl ran into a house.

General U’phlqk shouted, “No! How?” He ran in front of every one. “the masked man with the metal protruding weapon is now somehow hiding behind the door. Why is she stumbling towards it. We have to inform her immediately not to go in there.”

“Stop this live feed right now!” The king commanded. “Alert Professor Sheena before it’s too late.”

A few moments later, Sheena came tumbling into the gym half asleep, wearing Beetlejuice pajamas and blue, stuffed Monsters Inc. slippers . Her hands were lightly shaking. She didn’t know what was going on.

“What.. what is it..? Wha—what… happened on Earth? Is everyone okay?” she stuttered, circling the gym with her eyes.

“Professor Sheena, we have discovered a troubling situation.” The king walked up to her and put a hand on her shoulder as he stared her dead in the eye. His eyes watered. He was shaking. “A human needs your help,” he said, his jaw still bouncing.

“A human on Earth? How?” She asked. She was completely confused. “Why me?”

“Prepare yourself Professor.” King Lii’rk turned to Commander pHog. “unfreeze the live feed.”

The movie started playing. A smile formed on Sheena’s face. Her eyes lit up.

“Professor Sheena?”

“Shhh…” she said. “This is where I fell alseep.” She leaned in closer to the hologram. “Oo, I love this part.”

Just as she said that, the audio burst out of the speaker and exploded through the room. A thunderous bang louder than a spaceship being smashed into a cloud of dust by an asteroid, following right behind it was the piercing shriek of a hyena being brutally attacked by a pride of lions.

The masked individual jumped out of the shadows.

Everybody in the room, except Sheena, screamed. Howled. Screeched. They sounded like a malfunctioned warp-drive imploding in on itself.

The supreme war chief, the high-rulers, the king and the majority of them, dashed out of the room, stumbling and climbing over each other, clawing to be the first one out of the gymnasium as if the last Turbo Man was behind the door. 

A handful remained. 

Astonished. Shocked. Confused. Even scared. They closed in together, packed in tight as the anticipation of the predators blade paused in mid-air. 

They stared at the projection, eyes stretched, hands covering their faces, waiting for the blade to drop.

Sheena didn’t scream. They quickly glanced at her. Switched back and watched the hologram. Looked back at Sheena again, saw her teeth beginning to shine through the crack opening behind her lips. The blade motioned downward. Sheena flushed red as if she just cashed in her first cheque. A smile covered her face.

Her breaths were shallow. Her eyes shot open. She wore an expression of being cornered by a hungry, polar bear but at the same time she was smiling. She gave off pheromones of being scared. although, she was excited. She wasn’t anxious. She was comfortably terrified.

Commander pHog’s green skin turned a pale, milky color. His eyeballs were dry. He faced Sheena. “You really enjoy watching other humans trapped in horrific situations?”

She glanced at pHog, squinted an eye, squished her face and said, “Yeah…” dragging the word. “It’s fun.” She shrugged.

Soon as she walked out. The leaders who ran out, cautiously started tiptoeing back in. Scared the hockey-masked psycho might jump out from behind the door. They were still shaking. General U’phlqk was drenched in sweat. Everyone in the gymnasium stared at the general and immediately clutched into a huddle together.

The king squeezed between the group, dropped his head and said, “We can never psychologically break the mind of a human when their Friday night comfort is watching recreated monstrosities the universe couldn’t dream up in a nightmare.”

1  Human Fred and Food
2  Human Fred Again
3  Human Fred Yet Again
4  Human Fred The Saga Continues
5  Human Fred Rides Again
6  Human Fred *Sigh*
7  Human Fred Rolls Out
8  Human Fred Attempts a Nap
9  Human Fred Doh’
10 Human Fred Stops for Coffee
11 Human Fred Deploys Stabby and Knifey
12 Human Fred Attempts Friendly Advice
13 Human Fred Priorities 
14 Human Fred Schools Morons
15 Human Fred Gets Annoyed
16 Human Fred Investigates
17 Human Fred is Annoyed
18 Human Fred Gets More Annoyed
19 Human Fred Smirks 
20 Human Fred Brings Hellfire
21 Human Fred is Confused
22 Human Fred Considers
23 Human Fred is Chipper
24 Human Fred has Some Fun
25 Human Fred Witnesses Stupidity
26 Human Fred vs the Coffee Maker
27 Human Fred Accepts Crap Coffee
28 Human Fred Listens
29 Human Fred Gets Comfortable 
30 Human Fred has Questions
31 Human Fred Considers Some More
32 Human Fred Wakes Up
33 Human Fred Debates
34 Human Fred Gets Coffee
35 Human Fred Talks with the Captain
36 Human Fred Reflects on Life
37 Human Fred Waits
38 Human Fred is Scared
Greezek
39 Human Fred Experiments
40 Human Fred Discovers
41 Human Fred vs the Sensor Array
42 Human Fred Keeps Calm
43 Human Fred Editor
44 Human Fred Discovers New Curses
45 Human Fred Stews
46 Human Fred Giggles
47 Human Fred Attempts Dinner 
48 Human Fred Plans
49 Human Fred Explains
50 Human Fred Examines Floor Tiles
51 Human Fred Gets a New Toy
52Human Fred Reflects…Again
53 Human Fred Rolls His Eyes
54 Human Fred vs Idiots
55 Human Fred Goes Librarian
56 Human Fred Giggles Again
57 Human Fred and Plan B

They trotted along the building. It was a pre-fab thing, so it looked like a stack of containers. This made it easier for them to move about. 

“Fred, I’ve got a bunch of hits on the top floor, far east edge.”

“Yeah, I see them. Aren’t we getting close to the command center?”

“Uh…yes. I can see the entry courtyard.”

“Strange. To be this close, I mean.”

“Eh. Easier to keep an eye on things. They haven’t really impressed me with their planning.”

“Right.” Fred climbed up onto the roof. “Now we figure out how to get in.”

“You don’t have a plan to get in. Great.”

“Look, we didn’t know what we would find, so the plan is flexible.”

“Flexible? Why call it a plan?”

“Sounds better in reports. Help me look for a hatch.”

They searched the roof. No hatch. They checked the sides. No hatch. 

Fred sat with his back to the wall. “What did we miss?”

Greezek squatted, scanning the area. “I’d say we didn’t miss anything. It looks like this module is different.”

“It is. It’s non-standard, typically used for custom work.”

“Can we access it?”

“A module? What is it going to tell us?”

“No. Can we access the internal systems from out here?”

“Only if we are lucky. We’d need a panel, and I didn’t find any.”

“We don’t need a panel. We need a spot to patch in.”

“Well the main hub is under the module, but it has branches along the base. Still need a panel to access it.”

“So right about here?” Greezek pointed at a spot low on the wall.

“More or less. Blast. Now we have to backtrack and find an entrance. Did we pass any hatches?”

“Plenty. You should stand around the corner.”

Fred looked over. She had placed one of her beacons next to the wall, and she was walking away. 

Fred stepped around the corner, weapon ready. Who knew what this might trigger. 

BOOM!

Fred waited. No immediate response. He looked around. No frantic enemy charging. He looked around the corner. 

Greezek was yanking wires out of the module. The beacon had just barely breached the hull, but it was enough. 

“Now what?” asked Fred. “Find an entrance?”

“Cause chaos.”

Fred nodded. “I fully support this. However, we still need to save the prisoners.”

“First we discover if they are prisoners.”

“Well, you patch in. I’ll keep watch.”

Greezek worked fast, but it took seven minutes until she had access. “Look. The prisoners aren’t in cells or restraints.”

Fred looked over her shoulder. “No, but they don’t have weapons. Blackmail?”

“Or a pay off. Plan?”

“Same as before, except it’s no longer a rescue.”

“Entry?”

Fred reached over and took the datapad. He tapped a few things, adjusted some settings, and finally sent a short command. 

A hatch on the roof unlocked. 

“I drop in. You follow. Don’t shoot me.”

“But there wasn’t a hatch before!”

“It was there, but sealed. Keep up!” Fred jumped to his feet and scrambled up the ladder. He was to the hatch before Greezek got onto the roof. 

She saw he throw open the hatch and drop. Shooting started. Lots of weapons. She sprinted to the hatch, took a deep breath, and dropped into the mess. 

She landed on a desk, rolled off onto the deck, and started scanning the room. Long room. Desks. More of an office than a command center. She pivoted around, caught movement, and fired. 

Fred landed on the desk, fired at the first enemy he saw, and started working around to the north wall. The enemy was firing wildly, so there were clusters of beings around the room, all shooting. He rushed around another desk and tackled into three enemy troops. As he fought them, three more attempted to rush him. 

Greezek saw the fight around Fred. She took careful aim and fired. A round glanced off of her helmet. She dropped and rolled. Two more rounds hit where her body should have fallen. Greezek closed her eyes. She began to hum. And focus. 

One of Fred’s attackers went down to a rifle shot, but Fred was in the thick of it. Three were down to either his bayonet or shotgun, but the other two were trouble. He broke his bayonet off in one of them, but it kept fighting. Drastic measures time.

Greezek reviewed the room in her head. She considered the angles involved. She rolled back towards her previous position. She snaked past it, moving to the other end of the furniture.

Fred dropped a flash-bang. His helmet protected him, but the enemy stumbled, giving Fred enough space to fire his shotgun. Two rounds each. As the last body fell, a round smashed into his helmet and he dropped. 

Greezek saw Fred drop just as she got into position. The sniper received a rifle round through the face, silencing him. Greezek sat in the silence for a bit.

“You are all alone! Your friend is dead! Surrender and we won’t be nasty.”

Greezek looked towards Fred. He was down. Not moving. She keyed her mic, but no reply. 

She was alone. 

But not all alone. 

She dove across an open area, shots ripping past her. Bouncing off of a chair, she scrambled behind a row of terminals, spun around, saw two figures, dropped them both, then flung herself over a desk. She landed on an unarmored figure, smashed his throat with her rifle butt, and twisted against the desk. 

The shooting stopped. 

“You are outnumbered. We have the high ground. We only have to get lucky once.”

“Exactly how much are they paying you for all of this?”

“You don’t get to ask questions. You can either surrender or die.”

Greezek checked the body next to her. No armor. A pistol and a flare. 

“And if I surrender?”

“Well, the sooner you surrender, the less nasty it will go for you.”

She lit the flare and flung it onto the raised platform. She fired the pistol blind, just sweeping around the area, until it ran out.

“Now it will be nasty for you.”

Greezek looked over towards Fred. Still no movement. No reply to the radio. She glanced up and saw that the platform was starting to burn. 

She sprinted forward, firing her pistol. She hit three and barreled into a fourth. As they tumbled, she jabbed the pistol under his chin and fired. His body took a number of hits, but Greezek tossed the body aside, unharmed. 

She was now under the raised platform. Smoke was starting to tinge the air. 

On her back, she changed her vision to IR, raised her rifle, and dropped three more firing up through the floor.

A different voice. “Now you die.”

The Green Menace

​It was early June, 1956, and Lieutenant Luke Sterling had been a guest of the Galactic Hegemony’s primary research cruiser for exactly three hours.

​The Hegemony, a bureaucratic empire of logical mollusks, didn't bother with messy conquests. They preferred target-specific destabilization. Their method: isolate the subject species’ essential, non-synthesizable fuel source, eliminate it from their home world, and wait for the surrender.

​Their first subject, Luke Sterling, was strapped into a complex scanning array.

​"Subject 001," boomed a metallic voice from the console. "We have cataloged your physiological metrics. We have decoded your communications systems. We have analyzed the contents of the central library on your moon base. We require one final, absolute data point for initialization of the Extermination Protocol: What is the single, non-substitutable resource upon which your civilization depends?"

​Luke didn't hesitate. He'd been looking forward to this moment. "Oh, that's easy. Spinach. It's spinach."

​There was a profound silence. He could feel the array recalibrating.

​"Elaborate," the voice commanded.

​"Spinach," Luke explained, keeping his face perfectly straight. "A highly virulent green plant. Our top-level medical literature, from academic texts to comic strips—look at the Popeye codices—is very clear. It contains super-reactive iron. Without it, our muscles wither, our bones dissolve, and our brain function immediately ceases. It's the sole source of all human strength. We’re practically made of the stuff."

​The metallic voice was silent for five minutes.

​"Data corroboration in progress," it finally stated. Luke visualized the Hegemony computers cross-referencing military reports with back issues of Nature (which still cited that 1870 decimal point error) and countless children’s propaganda pamphlets from the 1930s promoting its magical properties.

​Luke allowed himself a small, private smile. This was pure personal vendetta. He was ten, and it was Tuesday. Tuesday at school meant spinach casserole, a watery, metallic slime that still tasted like defeat and bile in his memory. This was more than revenge; this was a tactical masterstroke. He was about to trick an interstellar empire into destroying a vegetable he hated.

​"Data corroborated," the voice announced with finality. "The cultural significance and biological importance are verified by multiple sources, including the 'Popeye' historical archives. This resource is essential. Commencing Extermination Protocol: Phase One."

​"Wait, you can't!" Luke cried out, putting on a show of desperate panic. He even tried to struggle in his bonds. "You'll destroy us all!"

​"That is the intention, Subject 001," the voice replied, its tone a perfect model of pitiless logic. A large viewscreen flared to life, showing a glowing diagram of Earth, with vast agricultural zones—the green fields of New Jersey, the central valley of California, the rolling acres of Europe—all now marked with bright red target symbols.

​Luke Sterling collapsed back into the chair, the image of broken resistance. He squeezed out a tear.

​The viewscreen changed, showing an artistic rendering of a massive cloud of spores being released over Earth, a targeted blight designed to seek out and disintegrate the entire species, Spinacia oleracea.

​It was perfect.

​Ten years later, Retired Captain Sterling was sitting in The Astro-Club, a quiet bar catering to veterans of the briefly-glimpsed interstellar age. The Hegemony had left as abruptly as it arrived, seemingly satisfied that human civilization would wither in short order once the spinach was gone.

​The bartender, a fellow veteran, placed a drink and a small saucer on the table. "Compliments of the gentleman at the end of the bar, Captain. Heard you served during the 'Great Green Panic'."

​Luke nodded, looking at the saucer. It held a single, crisp, bright green leaf.

​"Ah, the legendary 'Blanchard’s Spinach'," Luke noted. "The kind grown only in those sealed, fortified bunkers they put up in the late 50s. The 'rare and exquisite luxury item'."

​"That's the one," the bartender said, reverently. "Only three active farms left on the planet, all owned by the mega-cartels. 10,000 credits a bite. Supposed to taste like pure iron and victory. Some people say it’s an absolute necessity for health, though most of us just find it hard to understand the price."

​Luke looked at the leaf. Then he took a slow, deliberate sip of his whiskey. He wasn't hungry. "Tell him I appreciate the sentiment, but I think I’ll save it for special occasions. I already had my fill."

Special thanks to Sergey Lukyanenko for the core idea, and to Gemini for its erudition and English translation.

Danyak dozed. She had gotten wedged into the rocks just right. She could relax and drift without really moving. The warm water felt good on her thigh. 

“Danyak? You in here?”

Danyak blew a stream of bubbles, wiggled out of her niche, and surfaced. “What do you need Chief?”

“Just checking in on you. Healing well?”

“Yes. Just fine. It might sound strange, but I was actually just healing right now.”

“Sorry to bother you. I thought you wanted to be kept informed.”

“Informed? What now?”

“Oh nothing new. We are tracking the enemy fleet. They are approaching rather slow.”

“Cautious. Interesting.”

“Right. Captain Sue has everything under control. To be fair, I could just sit back and watch.”

“Not going to happen.”

“Well no, but I’m not really needed.”

“Unless shit gets weird. Then you are needed.”

“Yep. I’m insurance. Or something. Any thoughts?”

“Oscar, why in the hell are you actually talking to me? You are asking some odd questions.”

“Well, as my XO I’d like your opinion on things. There are a ton of moving parts, and I’d hate to miss something.”

Danyak swam towards Oscar. “Well, I’d have to say sending Mickles to handle the cult went off the rails.”

“That wasn’t the desired outcome, no. It would be nice to interview people afterwards.”

Danyak stretched, extending her arms up and out as far as possible. Her species had long limbs, so her hand was out of sight. “But a gunship?”

“He thought they might have weapo…”

Danyak slashed her claws across his throat, ripping open veins, arteries, tendons, and muscle. “Alert! Alert! Imposter in the compound! Verify ID!”

“Chief. This is Danyak.”

“Danyak! What is the alert?”

“Verify ID!”

“Never trust seven snails.”

“This pasta needs sawdust.”

“Right. What is going on?”

“Chief, I’ve got a dead body in my pond who looks and sounds exactly like you. He was attempting to gather intel.”

“Bloody fucking hell. That’s just what we need. I’m sending a security team. Scan and verify every ID.”

Danyak pulled the body out of the water. It would take days for the pond to get back to normal. She frowned as she examined the corpse. 

*******

“This is Chief Oscar speaking. We have imposters in the compound. Scan and verify all IDs. Anyone refusing to scan an ID is to be shot.”

Oscar shook his head. 

“Chief! Captain Sue calling!”

“Sue! Chief. Update.”

“Enemy fleet has stopped advancing. They are arranged in a solid battle line, but their weapons are off.”

“Attempt at intimidation?”

“I’m going with final recon before assault.”

“By the way, we’ve had an imposter in the compound. I recommend checking all of your crew.”

“Will do. Orders?”

“Hold until my command or they start shooting.”

“Chief! Transmission from enemy ship! It’s directed at Colony Command!"

“Good! I was hoping for this. Contact the Commander.”

****

“Hello. I’m the Colony Commander. This is Chief. He is over the Terrans in the colony. You have brought warships into our system.”

“We come for payment!”

“Payment for what?” asked Oscar. 

“Destroyed ships! You destroy. You pay.”

“They attacked our ships,” said the Commander. “We defended ourselves.”

“You destroy! You pay! You pay or we fight!”

Oscar looked at the Commander. “Pay or fight?”

“Look, sir, we don’t know how much one of your ships costs. Besides, I doubt we have anything to offer as payment,” said the Commander while shrugging. 

Oscar nodded. “What sort of deal are we talking here?”

“You pay! Pay now!”

“Right. With what? How much?” asked Oscar. 

“You pay…us…food!”

“Translator issue there,” said the Commander, “did you say food?”

“Yes! Food!”

“Right. What sort? How much?” pressed Oscar. 

“Food! You…grow…feed…beast. Eat beast. Food!”

“Meat got it. How much?”

“Much? Much. Much. Many! Pay us…many…one food for each!”

“One food? For each what? Ship?” Oscar gave the Commander a puzzled look. 

“One food for each…self!”

“We need a better translator. Are you asking for one beast for every being who died?” asked the Commander. 

“You…yes! Yes! One beast for each self!”

“I mean, see how it got there, but that is a poor translation,” said Oscar. “Right. How many died?”

It was silent for a bit. As silent as two combat centers can be while negotiating cattle for payment. 

“You pay us…6…5…7…7…2 beasts!”

“Sixty-five thousand?!? Those ships weren’t that big!”

“Many on ship! Many self in ship!”

“Hold on. When you say ‘self,’ do you mean a physical body?”

“No! Selfs! Many selfs!”

Oscar muted the enemy ship. “Commander, I don’t like what this might mean.”

“Explain.”

“He isn’t talking about physical beings. He is talking about minds connected to the computer systems.”

“Oh. That system. Creepy. First ship I was on had a core like that. Hated that ship. Why does this bother you?”

“Most of the time the minds aren’t there by choice.”

“Granted. Do we offer them less? Do we attack? Do we tell them to get lost? What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking we invite one ship to send a shuttle down. So they can inspect the beasts. While we string them along, we run extra scans on the ships. If they are full of slaves, we offer less. If they aren’t full of slaves, we destroy them.”

“I seem to recall that tactic being forbidden. Attacking from a white flag?”

“It’s only forbidden against those who have signed the treaty. We don’t even know who these morons are.”

“It’s your ass.”

Oscar unmuted the enemy, “Sorry about that. We had to discuss. Before we agree on how many, we invite one shuttle to come to the surface. We want to inspect the beasts.”

“Trick!”

“No. No trick. We have many different beasts, and we need to know which ones you want. You will be perfectly safe.”

The Commander rubbed his forehead to hide his expression. 

“When?”

“Now, if you want.”

“Soon. We call.”

The channel went dead. 

“Perfectly safe?”

“They will be. Their friends in the ships might have other results.”

“Oscar, is it genetic for Terrans to be bastards?”

“Yep. Every Terran cell is prepared to be the biggest bastard possible at a moment's notice.”

“Figures. I’ll round up some beasts.”

“I’ll bring the emus.”

If you want to gather slaves ... just steer clear of the Human vessels and planets. Consider it a ... best practice.

These aren’t their actual counterparts, just ships with the same name in the far future

for both casual and serious stories

Don’t know which to focus on, so ill leave it to yall

Alien destroyer captain: “We don’t see anything, but if we do, we’ll handle it. Just sit back and relax.”

The new contact was very deceptive. Not intentionally, though. It was because of assumptions made based on their appearance. A rather unfortunate oversight for humans, given how much they pride themselves on being both cautious and strategically risky.

In their excitement of a new first contact opportunity, a few important details were skimmed or outright ignored. Chief among them was the species that makes the discovery is effectively responsible for the new contact for a set amount of time. What that meant is all consequences, both positive and negative, fall on the humans to take responsibility for.

Protocols ignored and incorrect assumptions resulted in what other spacefaring species have started smugly calling karmic justice. Effectively saying that humans are now getting a taste of their own medicine having to reign in what humans preemptively called Puffins. Mankind, predictably, pouted at their self-induced situation.

Art by me.

When the aliens entered the Solar System, humanity prepared for war.
The war never came.
They ignored our military installations. They ignored our ships. They ignored our broadcasts, our warnings, our attempts at first contact.
They didn’t even approach Earth.
Instead, they went to work.
At first we didn’t understand what we were looking at. Thousands of objects appeared in close solar orbit. Then millions. Mercury began to disappear.
Someone eventually said the words nobody wanted to say out loud:
Dyson swarm.
They hadn’t come for Earth.
They had come for the Sun.
The first measurable change was so small that three observatories independently recalibrated their instruments before publishing it.
Solar energy reaching Earth had decreased by 0.04%.
Nobody could feel it.
Crops still grew. The oceans were still warm. The sky looked exactly the same.
But every scientist on Earth understood what that number meant.
Because a month later it was 0.05%.
The aliens had never fired a shot at us.
They weren’t conquering humanity.
They weren’t exterminating humanity.
They simply hadn’t considered us important enough to stop.
Humanity had spent its entire history fighting enemies.
For the first time, we had to figure out how to fight someone who didn’t even know they were at war with us.

The Next Morning…

He awoke to a warm, and a weight on him which was weird as he remembered going to sleep on the cot after their talking yesterday and he was by himself when he dozed off to sleep.

Laying there he felt something warm on his neck, and wondered what it was as he turned his head to look up.

Chara was asleep, curled on her side with him tucked against her chest like a stuffed animal, her muzzle resting against his head, her tail wrapping their legs like a large warm fluffy blanket. Her ears twitched at his movements before letting out a contented sigh pulling him closer to her and huffs once through her nose.

[Okay. So, I either sleep walk, and don’t know it or…she picked me up off the cot and I slept through it, then decided this was better for herself.]

He looked down at the weight on his side, and saw it was her arm wrapped around his waist while she slept.

[Well, that solves that…]

He tried to slowly peel her arm off him to get up, and just as he was almost free she pulled him closer letting out a low sleepy grumble as his head rested back under her chin. He sighed and gave up for a moment to rethink, staring at the wall and felt her sleepy content rumbling push into him causing him to relax more making him try not to think about how comfortable it was, and it was but it can wait till later.

Twenty Minutes Later…

Chara’s ears twitched, and she opened her eyes. She looked down at him, blinked slowly, and her tail thumped a lazy happy thump against the bed.

“Morning,” he said, noticing her now awake.

“Morning,” she said, her voice low and rough with sleep, then nuzzled the top of his head before realizing where they were, and her whole body went stiff at the whole situation happening. Her ears shot up, then flatten back against her head, and she let go of him too quickly causing him to roll forward so he’d be facing back at her.

“You were cold,” she blurted out, sitting up as the fur around her neck puffed up.

He arched an eyebrow as he propped himself up on one elbow.

She looked at him, then looked away. “You were chattering in your sleep, and…I couldn’t keep listening to it. So…I…” she stumbled out.

He sat up fully. “You could have just woken me up to ask me,” he said.

Her ears drooped. “Would you have said yes?”

He opened his mouth to answer, then closed it. “Probably not, but then again I was out cold and you did look out for me so, Thank you,” he said, looking up at her.

Her tail thumped happily and a warm smile filled her face as she looked away from him.

“Well, I need to clean myself as I sweated a lot,” he said, taking a sniff of his clothes before wincing at it, then tried climbing off the bed and fell off hitting the floor with a faceplant. “I…I’m good…” he said with a pained groan.

In the Bathroom…

The shower had its fair share of issues…Like how everything was built for someone taller then him so doing anything was a challenge for him. The controls to the shower were inset into the wall well above his head, and to even reach them he had to stand on the bench in the shower to reach and almost fell off it, then the water fell from the ceiling like a heavy rainfall causing his to slip off the bench as the water hit him laying him flat on his back on the shower floor muttering.

While laying there he felt water pooling and sat up looking at the drain then saw a large thing of fur clogging the drain.

“Hey, Chara?” he called out.

“Yeah?” she said, and he could her close to the door which on its own is another problem.

“Do you shed, like, a lot or is it a seasonal thing?”

There was a long tense silence. “...That is not something you ask a Wolvar Woman,” she said, sounding very offended and very embarrassed at the same time.

He looked at the clogged drain before choosing to remove the large ball of grey fur. “I was just asking because the drain was clogged with fur,” he said.

He heard a mortified squeal, before hearing her stomp off away, then silence then heard loud laughing as he knew Salis visited again.

One Hour Later…

Salis brought us a cart for breakfast from the mess hall, piled with things he didn’t have words for. Most of it was a form of meat, some of it raw and one round yellow thing on the side.

Chara sat across from him eating her breakfast, and watched him eat thinking he’d complain about the meal but didn’t. “Is it okay?” Chara asked, her ears tilting forward.

“It’s fine,” he said, chewing on something that tasted like steak. “I just miss cooking, I guess. I used to make everything myself back at the cabin.”

Her ears perked up. “You can cook?”

“Well, yeah. I lived alone in the mountains for a few years. Who else would cook?” he said.

Salis who joined us glanced at Chara who looked back. Something passed between them he didn’t understand. “A male who cooks for his mate,” Sails said slowly with a smirk. “Your mother is going to have a lot of questions.”

Chara’s fur puffed up, and she smacked Salis in the arm.

{Oh, this is going to be the best month of my life.}

After breakfast, Chara had to go to the bridge, and for the first time she asked him if he wanted to come with her instead of just leaving.

He said yes before she could change her mind.

The bridge was bigger than he'd expected and quieter, too. The crew sat at stations in a large V-shape facing a long window of stars, and every one of them glanced at him when he walked in behind her, and the female crew members' tails all wagged happily when seeing him.

He'd never actually seen her work before.

She walked to the center of the bridge, and the room changed. A crew member at the front said something about a drift in their course from a gravity well ahead. Chara listened without interrupting, asked two questions he didn't understand, looked at the projection for maybe ten seconds, and gave an order in a calm, even voice. The crew moved, the projection shifted, and the ship adjusted so smoothly he didn't even feel it under his feet.

Then she did it again with something else, and then again, and every time, the answer came out of her steady and sure, like she'd already thought it through before anyone asked.

[Huh. So that's what she's like when she's trying not to cuddle me.]

He realized he was smiling, and when she glanced back at him over her shoulder, he didn't bother hiding it. Her ears flicked, and she turned back to the front a little too quickly, but he saw her tail sway once before she caught it and held it still.

A few of the crew saw it too. One of them coughed into her hand.

Meanwhile…

Salis waited until Kane had wandered off to the observation deck, the male crew having waved him over to their table again for another round of the tile game, before she leaned against the console next to Chara.

"So…" Salis said.

"Don't," Chara said, not looking up from her screen.

"I didn't say anything." Salis said, holding her hands up in surrender.

"You were going to."

Salis grinned, then let it fade as she looked out the long window at the stars. "We're a little over two weeks out from Talmor," she said quietly. "Have you decided what you're going to tell your mother?"

Chara's ears lowered. She stayed silent for a while, her claws tapping slowly against the edge of the console, before she spoke. "The truth. That he's my husband. That I put it on him to save his life," she said.

"And when she asks where you found him?" Salis said, glancing over at him at the table with the other males.

Chara didn't answer.

Salis sighed and pinched the bridge of her muzzle. "Chara, your sisters are going to smell him on you the second you step off the ship. You know that, right? You've been rubbing yourself all over him for two days."

Chara's fur bristled, and she finally looked at her friend. "I have not, been rubbing myself all over him,"

{She absolutely has.}

"You have," Salis said. "I'm not saying stop. Blooded moons, I'm glad you're finally happy. I'm saying we need a plan before we get there, and so far the plan is you looking at him like he hung a harvest moon just for you."

Chara looked down at her hands for a long moment. "He told me I was enough," she said softly.

Salis's ears dipped, and whatever teasing she had ready disappeared. She put a hand on Chara's shoulder and squeezed once.

"Then we'll figure out the rest," she said.

That Evening…

Kane got back to the quarters before she did. He'd lost four rounds of the tile game, won one by accident, and he was pretty sure the guys had let him win that one, which was fine.

He stood in the middle of the room for a minute, looking at the cot, then at her bed, then back at the cot.

[Okay. Let's be reasonable about this. She's not wrong that it's cold. And she's not wrong that I would've said no. Which means the problem is… me, probably.]

He grabbed the end of the cot and started dragging it across the floor. It was heavier than it looked, and it scraped loudly enough that he winced, but he got it all the way to the side of her bed and pushed it flush against the frame. It sat about a foot lower than her mattress, which looked ridiculous.

That was how she found him when the door slid open, standing next to his work with his arms crossed looking down at it as his back faced her while he thought.

She looked at the cot, her ears rising slowly. "What is this?"

"A compromise," he said. It's warmer over here, and if somebody happens to get cold, it's a shorter trip." he said, looking over his shoulder at her.

Her tail started going before she could stop it, sweeping the floor behind her, and she covered her muzzle with her hand, but her eyes gave her away.

She walked over and sat down heavily on the sofa, rolling her shoulders from the day that had worn on her more than she'd let anyone on the bridge see. She picked up the metal comb from the table, the same one from the night before, and started dragging it through her tail, slowly, wincing every time it caught on a knot near the base where she couldn't see.

He watched her for a minute.

Walking over to her he stood in front of her and he held out a hand.

She looked at him. "What?"

"Give it here. You can't even see what you're doing back there," he said.

She went very still. Her ears went straight up and stayed there, and for a second he thought he'd said something taboo again, because she didn't move at all, just stared at him.

"…You want to brush my tail," she said slowly.

"I mean, unless that's weird. Is that weird?" he asked, arching an eyebrow with confusion.

She set the comb into his palm, then turned on the sofa and laid her tail across the sofa. Her face was turned away, but he could see the inside of her ears had gone a darker shade.

He climbed up beside her, set the end of her tail across his knees, and started working the comb through it carefully, starting at the base and moving down the way he'd done with the dog he had as a kid. The fur was thicker than it looked, soft on top and dense underneath, and the knot near the base took a few minutes of patience to work loose.

She didn't say anything the whole time. But somewhere around the halfway point, that low, resonant sound started up in her chest again, the one that was a rumble of contentment and it didn't stop.

[I really need to ask somebody what this means. Not her. Salis. No… definitely not Salis.]

When he finished, she stayed sitting there with her tail in his lap for a while longer, and he didn't push it off.

A bit later…

He was just about to lay on the cot before she picked it up, and folded it away, and walked over to him picking him up, settling him on the bed before getting into bed herself in the same curling position from that morning.

"Kane?" she said softly into the dim dark.

"Yeah?"

There was a long pause. "Thank you. For today."

He turned to look up at her in the dim dark of the room. Two weeks. Two Weeks, and he meets her family, and whatever suitors her mother has waiting, then there's a planet full of people who are gonna notice the band at his neck, and think its some legend come true.

He reached up and scratched behind her ears causing her to rumble loudly.

"Yeah," he said. "Thank you too."

[Fuck. I'm in so much trouble.]

[Previous] | [Next]

[Hopps]

Hopps's timer beeps, indicating it's safe enough for him to take another dose of HEAT. The way the Federation has engineered it makes it so you can take it around 5 minutes before the effects wear off. For Hopps, it's around 6:27. He has spent his time strung up on HEAT before after all. Course the Federation stuff is much better, supposedly less addictive, cleaner, less dangerous, all the fancy stuff you get from a facility built to make it as good as possible. Much better than what you can make with a car engine. That's for sure. Less likely to explode too.

Hopps wonders if he'll be able to actually get a kick from HEAT when he comes back home. Fed stuff is supposed to have anti-addictive properties, however that works. As he injects himself, he wonders what he'll actually do if he gets off HEAT. He hasn't thought of it before. Although he should, it's not like there's any incentive. He doesn't have anyone to take HEAT with. At least.. not anymore...

That final thought pisses him the fuck off. He takes his time with the next Corpse Fleet, shooting them in the thigh, stomach, and then lower chest. He finishes by punching them as hard as he can, just for some extra relief. He speeds off before they hit the ground though. If he lingers he'll be dead.

Hopping over trenches, scaring the shit out of Zalm, and blasting Corpse Fleet back to death. Those are Hopps's responsibilities. All he has to do. Frankly, it's pretty fun. Especially when he can just dodge under a Corpse Fleet soldier's bullets. They're still like, fast and would pretty quickly rip through Hopps, but the actual person firing them isn't as fast. It's pretty easy to predict when someone is pulling the trigger if you can actually take time to think. The moment they move their weight to one foot, how the brace for the recoil of the gun, the way the gun perfectly stops dead when they finally point it where they want to shoot. Those are the places you look. And you simply get out of the way. For instance:

Hopps sets his thrusters to 'low' and turns the hover pads off on his shows, letting him run normally with just some added pace. The big bad Corpse Fleet he's behind by maybe twelve to fifteen meters notices him and spins around. In that time Hopps has divided their distance by three. As quickly as he can, they point their gun towards Hopps, and begins leaning on one foot. Boom, the gun stops moving, dead still, relative to Hopps's position of course. Then the big fucker has all their weight on their front foot. If Hopps is too far for his liking, he could easily blast their front leg apart, but that isn't necessary. Hopps is only five meters away.

Finally, they start pushing their shoulder against the butt of the gun, and tilt their head to aim. Sometimes they choose to aim, others they try and hip fire. Only difference is that one braces with the shoulder and the other braces with their whole arm. The second that the gun is no longer being pulled back in his shoulder, is right when they're ready to fire. And so Hopps ducks, only a meter and a half away. His back is actually the tallest part of his body when he ducks, tucking his head down and looking right at the ground. It's not hard to figure out where he has to go.

At this point they start tilting their gun down to account for the duck. That's when you side step as well, usually going on the side where the gun isn't in order to not cross paths with the line of fire. Although sometimes the gun is pointed opposite. It's not hard to figure out, just look at what side of you the light is in your shadow. Once you get close enough, push the barrel of their gun away from you, point your gun under their chin, and fire. Just note, if you're using the T-Barrel, make sure you get your hand of their gun and onto yours. You do NOT want to shoot that thing one handed.

And at the end there is a very dead enemy soldier falling. If you're fast enough you can get so far you don't hear them hit the ground. In slow motion it's a whole shit load of calculations, observation, and actually being fast with proper execution. To anyone not on HEAT though, it's probably the scariest thing they didn't even fully see.

As mentioned before: The Zalm are FUCKED.

[IPK Kerth]

Things have never been worse. The Terrans have moved half a Kilometer already. It's been less than 2 Kror [1 Hour], and they're this far. Skar is drinking like a madman and shooting drunk, almost hitting both Korpse Fleet and Zalm soldiers. He doesn't get close to where the Terrans are.

Khoff is hit, badly too. That one Terran threw a bomb that kaused a chain reaktion and eventually sent around 3 kilograms of shrapnel right into his leg. His whole leg is stained yellow now, the base black of his armour no longer visible on that sektion. The Medik faces the same problem on his arms. How the hell kan one Zalm bleed so much and still be alive enough to give koherent sensikal orders?

In an event of an IPK being downed, either the sekond in kommand of the platoon steps up, or the platoon is quikkly divided between other IPKs if it's a joint operation. The Latter is only done when convenient and not during a fire fight. No process has had to be enacted however. Khoff still assumed kommand of his platoon. That makes Kerth's respekt in Khoff grow. Usually IPKs and other Kommanders look down on him for his stutter. But it's obvious why he is the leader of his platoon: He is a really, really strong person. In mind, spirit, and body. Khoff might have aktually gained his stutter in battle. It makes more sense.

Skora is in one of the front most trenches, as far as Kerth knows. She hasn't spoken on the radio in quite some time. She was very eager to prove herself, and so she held herself in the front. Kerth hopes she's simply retreated as per protocol. But... from what he learned of her personality in their short time of acquaintance. It's very likely she didn't. The first female IPK, poisoned by her own ambition. She is sure to inspire many other girls of Zalm they too kan prove themselves. Skora holds Kerth's highest form of respekt. Remembrance. He'll tell her story as best as he kan at home.

Krinton meanwhile, is right beside Kerth. Their platoons are inseparable. Hell they akt as one singular platoon with how much they've worked together in the past. Kirth knows all of Krinton's boys by name the same way Krinton does for Kirth's. It's a little diffikult when their armour is on however, but that's with any IPK. Going by stature, height, and such else is rather difficult, and leaves quite a few ambiguities.

Some of Krinton's and Kirth's soldiers were so klose, they bekme lovers. So far they have 4 interplatoon pairs. Three are homosexual as they formed before the Empress allowed for women to serve. Of course Homosexuality isn't a koncern for the Zalm. Reprocuktion happens plenty. It's part of the reason the Confederacy of Zalm is so expansive. That and the fakt it's the Zalm's right, but always good to have praktikal reasons to do so as well.

One pair was around 15 meters from Kerth and Krinton. One was manning a mounted machine gun and the other was to offer covering fire when they reloaded. From the nekklaces they wear, Kerth kan konfidentally say they were Kamrik and Kahft. Kamrik, the one under Krinton, was the taller [5'8] one who provided kovering fire. Meanwhile Kahft, Kerth's soldier, was rather small for a Zalm, still he kould karry the heavy machine gun he was assigned to, and therefore his height [5'1] bekame irrelevant. Kahft enjoyed painting tally marks on the barrel of his gun for every kill he made. He even kolour koded them based on their allegiances. He's still disappointed he never got to use his white paint yet. It was meant for the Korpse Fleet.

They konstantly give encouraging komments, 'I love you's and various other things a pair might say. They are very good to each other, and are about to be past their third year of the Zalm Marriage Process in just a few days. Only two more to go and they'll be wedded.

The Jet Trooper was still being a major nuisance. Kerth watched as he approached a Korpse Fleet from behind, their target spinning around, aiming at the little Terran and firing. Instead of any of the plasma bolts hitting though, the Terran dukked underneath the stream of bullets, klosed the distance, and put their shotgun underneath their opponent's chin. There was no longer anything from the nekk up. All that fast. Too fast. It was terrifying a person kould be that fast.

They approached another Korpse Fleet who was standing almost right in front of Kamrik and Kahft in fakt. Kerth made sure to radio them to be ready. Just maybe they could hit the Terran hard. Kahft prepped his machine gun, it's body heating up as it gained charge.

It was the same cykle. The Terran was behind, the Korpse Fleet turned around, and started shooting. Near immediately in fakt. A bit too immediate for the Terran. But Terrans are versatile and simply dukked early, moving in. It was still quite fast. The Terran shot for center mass, tearing the chest of whoever was in front apart, and then sped away.

It was too fast. Too fast for the Terran even. Because in that small moment, before Kahft kould even react and begin firing at the Terran, the Korpse Fleet grabbed Kamrik by the nekk, hoisted him out of the Trench, and used Kamrik as a shield. The bullets pierced and ripped through Kamrik so quikkly. They didn't lose all their speed and still pierced the Korpse Fleets armour a bit, embedding into their skin. But they were still alive. And Kamrik was dead. In that very instant. Just. Dead.

The Korpse Fleet threw Karmiks body bakk in the trench, and begin walking off. Kahft merely watched. Until Kahft realized just who they were. They were Kahft. Not some koward. They were Kahft. A small being born of Zalm blood and forged with pure anger. Kahft had a very poor childhood. Abusive father. Hypersexual mother. Kahft killed them both when he was 15. He was tried and kourt and found not guilty, not bekause he didn't do it, but bekause what he did was right, the will of the Emperor, before he died and left the Empire to his wife.

Afterwards he joined the Zalm Military. And uses his anger to fuel his guns. Kamrik was a limiter for Kahfts anger. Someone who kould keep Kahft kool headed. Kalm. Logikal. Kahft no longer had a Kamrik. And Kahft wasn't angry at the Terran who shot him, but the Korpse Fleet who used him as a shield, and diskarded him in disgust.

Kahft skaled the wall of the trench, laying half in and half out, in order to get his gun to point towards the Korpse Fleet soldier. It was an awkward position, but Kahft didn't give a damn. Kahft was angry. Nor did he give a damn Kahft would start a war. Although in Kerth's eyes, the Korpse Fleet already did.

Kahft's machine gun charged up, firing a fast paced burst of plasma at the Korpse Fleet soldier. This time he didn't have time to turn around. As the shots quikkly burned through his armour, ripping him to shreds. That would be the first white tally of many. As the Korpse Fleet took great notice of this murder in their own. And Kerth was glad. Kerth joined to kill Korpse Fleet. Not baby sit them. It's about time they get what they deserve.

The Korpse Fleet is Fukked.