THE INFINITE BROOD (Starcraft/Supreme Commander Crossover Quest!)

"We need information. We need a foot in the door. We need some locals who recognize the UEF is here to help," you said, nodding. "Dr. Hanson, find us an isolated planet in distress. We'll send an ACU there, pre-loaded with civilian infrastructure programs."

"Yes sir," Dr. Hanson said, brightening.

Major Horner nodded. "Which ACU pilot are we going to send on this?"

Your bones ached to go. And...damn it. You had reason to go. You had to see things on the ground, didn't you? You drummed your fingers against the console and turned to face Major Horner. "Me," you said.

"General Carter, are you sure?" he asked. "We've got three ACU and combat ready pilot."

"I'm damn sure. We're going to be bringing this sector into the UEF. This is either going to be the easiest fight of our lives or the hardest, depending on how well their technology can hold up to ours. Either way, I need to know and I have the most combat experience. I want to assess the situation on the ground, from the front. And I've spent too long behind a desk as it is."

The more you spoke, the more right it felt, and you felt the faint pressure of your migraine fade slightly. The thought of getting to ride an ACU again was a damn sight better than being stuck in this metal can for another few days. Major Horner nodded - and you could practically see him doing the mental math. It is the safest mission, I suppose, he thought.

ACU pilots also had a relatively low casualty rate. And you'd been through the mill often enough to know when to hit the eject and cede a fight. Quantum teleporting home in a one shot tunnel that was snapped into existence a fraction of a second before a fusion core detonation blew you to vapor wasn't fun but it was a lot funner than learning which afterlife was right after all this time...

Gabriel Tosh followed you from the command center to your bedrooms - and only spoke after you were a good distance away from the nerve center of the expedition. "General Clarke," he said, his grin disarming. "I like the way you're thinking about this. Securing a toehold with hearts and minds? It's good. It's good." He nodded, slowly. "There are some worlds that might be better, though, than just any old random outback."

You turned to face him, arching an eyebrow.

"This sector's been long range charged by astrography," he says, shrugging. "Some things, some big things, change over the thousands and thousands of years light lag gets you, yeah? But some things don't."

"Yes, General-Coordinator?" you asked.

Tosh rubbed his large palms together, his eyes glinting. "There's some long range geophysics research, pointing to exotic materials that are rare in the rest of the galaxy, and too inefficient to synthesize without planetary fusion driving them. And, well...we have a war on..." He spread his hands. "So, if you focus on these planets, the UEF's Resource Board? They'll be happy with the first results."

"Right," you said, slowly. "What kind of exotic materials are we looking at here."
The political officer's smile remains the benign 'we're all in this together' bullshit you're used to seeing from his breed. Tosh is better at it than most. The light almost reaches his eyes. Almost. "I've sent the data to Dr. Hanson. She'll be keeping an eye out. I just wanted you to know how much I'd appreciate it if you kept the RB's thoughts in mind here."

"Right," you said, again. "Well, GC Tosh, I'll keep what you said under advisement."

He inclined his head.

"That's all I'm here for."

And with that, you were free. Extricated to get to your room. You rested your head against the door, frowning. You went to your desk, then called up the information he'd sent to Dr. Hanson. Being the CO, you had access. You scrolled through the data and got to the first name - Terafloxinehydroclorderite - and decided that the science precise was a bit above your pay grade. But you started to run cross references. Computer memory meant you had come to the Koprulu Sector with pretty much every non-classified piece of information you could, as you'd have limited chances to get a quantum download off the galactic networks. You snorted quietly. "Well, isn't that interesting."

Tera...fl...fucking whatever was a psychoreactive compound. Vitally useful in some medical industries, chronically short on supply, and almost never actually up for synthesis in the RB's calculation. You knew the precise numbers of matter/energy equations for the fabricators. It was simplified down to 40E to 1M for ACU pilots, who needed a quick napkin math for this kind of thing, but the real math was a lot more fucky and complicated. It should have just been E=MC squared, but...well, you didn't live in a perfect universe.

Course, it was also possible to turn it into quite a few drugs.

Was this just you hating political officers, or was this actually shady?

You rubbed your temples slowly.

There was the headache. It had been nice while it had been gone.

Three days later, and Dr. Hanson had her report together. The command staff met with her in the C&C, and she had a pair of worlds on display. Both were, as seemed fucking common in the Koprulu Sector, habitable: Green forests, blue oceans, dappling spreads of white clouds. There were differences in continent shape and faint hues of oceans and forests - but on the whole, it was like someone had come through and given this Sector enough free real estate to make you feel damn stinking jealous. Dr. Hanson nodded as she stepped out before the projections, nervously. "S-So, uh, I have been observing Dominion communication and some other communication from other Terran factions - the Umojan Protectorate, the Kel-Morian Combine, and others...and, well, we've narrowed the specifications down to two, uh, worlds." She gestured. "The first candidate is Agria."

The first world drew larger in the hologram.

"Population is low - sub hundred thousand - and primarily rural. They seem to mostly survive by shipping food growing on this world to other planets. They're near the edge of the Dominon and are supplying less habitable worlds with what they have...this kind of economic structure may seem odd to us, but, remember, they don't have the same technological foundation we do. Starships are common enough for freight shipping between planets to be economical..." She shook her head. "What matters is that during the recent war, it seems that pockets of their land got infested by the local Zerg and the Confederates on the planet have turned bandit rather than surrender to the Dominion."

"Sounds like those people could use some help," Horner said, nodding.

"The other world has been designated Bel'Shiar. It has a great deal of non-human construction on it, but human refugees have been heading there since the war with the Confederacy started. It has a smaller population and, um, no current distress, but it also contains an...immense amount of naturally occurring Terafloxinehydroclorderite. And the refugees are in a signifcantly more dire situation. Agria has towns, farms, homes. They have tents and transmitters." She looked between the two worlds. "There's also some spotty reports of what may be Protoss or...possibly a third alien faction. They're called the Tal'darim. It's unclear."

"That's just what we need," Tosh rumbled. "More damn aliens."

You rubbed your chin. "Good thing we have multiple ACUs..." you said, smirking slightly.

---
CURRENT HEAT: 0/6

Where too first?
[ ] You'll take the ACU to Agria - begin "Backwater Colony."
[ ] You'll take the ACU to Bel'Shiar - begin "First Strike."

And who do you send to the other place you're not going?
[ ] Major Horner (-1 use of Matt Horner)
[ ] Commander Stukov (Diff 5 Leadership check - gain 3 Heat)
[ ] No one. You don't want to send up too big of a signal flare.