You were sitting back in your chair and nursing a serious headache as General Hall decided to cut things short and kill a man before your very eyes.
He flicked through some papers - unthinkably ancient technology, brought into vogue in a universe where quantum teleportation and sentient supercomputers made any digital data eminently accessible - and then flipped the manilla brown envelope shut with his finger and said: "Commander DuGalle, you have gone through every step of your proposed program, and have yet to actually demonstrate to me any particular advantage that your weapon system has over any of the weapons or tools we've been using for the past ten centuries."
Commander DuGalle, who was standing before a holographic display of his proposal, managed to keep his narrow, angular face relatively composed. Impressive, since you knew for a fact he had been pushing his proposal for almost his entire career, ever since the Battle of Cygnus II - where he'd really gotten hooked on the concept.
It had worked great at Cygnus II when he'd utilized the intrasolar automated freighters for a sudden advantage - taking advantage of the solar system's unique history and place in the galaxy. Not many systems even had that many orbital freighters to weaponize.
But you had to admit…
General Hall had a damn good point.
"An orbital platform has no cover to shelter behind. It cannot be hidden, it cannot maneuver without expending reaction mass, it requires sophisticated gravitic technologies to accomplish anything of note we can't replicate with a ground based weapon system. Humanity hasn't built a starship for military purposes in the twelve centuries since we put a brace of men on Luna - and I don't think we'll ever need to do it." Hall slapped his palm down for emphasis. "We can, for the price of one of your proposed
battlecruisers, put three ACUs on a planetary surface and, unlike your proposal, the ACU has been instrumental in every single notable victory in the entire Infinite War - including, I hasten to add, your own."
"That cost estimate is based on needing to first develop the manufacturing templates," DeGalle said, his voice tightening. "Once the system has the final components worked out, and it has been put into mass production, we will have a definitive edge over all other factions."
"Assuming, of course, the Cyrban don't just hack into the computer systems running this thing's fusion reactor. Or an Aeon planetary beam weapon doesn't cut it in half," Hall says. He looks left, then right. His eyes meet yours.
Your headache has been getting worse. You hate the endless grind of meetings like this. So, you throw a log onto the fire. Or maybe another knife in the back. "I'm sorry, Commander," you say. "But at the end of the day, the primary use of these weapon systems seems to be glassing planets. Earth doesn't want to administer cinders."
DuGalle gave a curt nod. "Sir," he said, woodenly.
After the meeting, you were escorted on your way to your office by your adjutant, who had a pile of papers and data-slates, full of information on new results in the endless, sprawling conflict that spread throughout the Milky Way. Your eyes took in none of the information, and her words just went into one ear and out the other. Then she said something that made you lift your chin.
"And you've been requested for a speech at V-Scorpii Day. Uh, they want you to be there, being that…um…" she trails off at your look. "Also, there's a, um, a message for you from a, uh, Mr. Riley?"
Your brows knit slightly and your headache rachets up a bit.
"Right," you say. "I'm going to need a bit of privacy, Juhani. Go and take the rest of the day off."
"Thank you, General Clarke!" She says, then bows, then hurries off. Adjutants are loyal, but…you know that when Riley sends a message, you want things to be very, very, very private. You have no idea what would get him to message you over a com, though. They worked hard to make his coms secure, but…memories of General Hall's paper flicks through your brain as you settle into your office. The window looks out on Geneva, and the faint silvery disk of the moon slices through blue air - the darkened side illuminated by Luna's vast, sprawling cities - built and occupied before people realized that there were better worlds out there, and clung to by people who no longer could live on Earth without serious genetic modification and acclimation.
You turned on the privacy devices you had, just to make sure, then…rubbed your temple as another spike of migraine shot through your head. "Fuck," you whisper. You open the drawer on your desk, where the painkillers are waiting.
Come on, Sam, you think.
You can take a fucking painkiller.
You still hate taking medicine. Bad memories of months in a regeneration tank and the hideous side effects of antiradiation medicine. To you, a pill meant cramping. And vomiting. And worse. You closed the drawer with a thump.
"They should have fixed headaches when they were doing the genomic fixes…" you muttered under your breath. Then you thumbed on your desk, and leaned forward as the screen flickered on and Riley's face appeared on it.
"Sam," he said.
"Riley," you said. "What's this about?"
He snorted. "This is why no one likes you, Sam. You never have any time for small talk."
"Riley, you're the president of the UEF. You don't have time for small talk."
Riley frowns. "You look like hell, Sam. Are you okay?"
You sigh. Reach into your drawer. You dry swallow your painkillers, forcing them down. Once you've done so, you sit up a bit more and look square into Riley's eyes. "What's this about, Mr. President?"
Riley sighs, then frowns out of the screen. "Have you ever heard of the Dark Sector?"
You nod. "Yeah. It's a logistic pain in the ass - it requires routing of any quantum jumps in that area of space through three or four solar systems to avoid hitting the damn place. And every hundred jumps run into a bit of quantum wobble and just vanish." You sigh, feeling the headache fade, bit by bit by bit. "It can't even be a steady phenomenon, it has to have
wobble."
"Still, several hundred star systems in it," Riley says. "Seems like it'd be more than a footnote."
"Galaxies are big places," you say. "And there are habitable planets everyone's busy fighting over, we've been over this before, Riley."
Early on in his first term, he had run the idea of racking up 'victories' by finding new habitable planets. But while space was big and transportation was instant - if you ignored the energy cost at least - finding habitable planets remained hellishly difficult. If it had been easy, or simple, there might never have
been an Infinite War. Then again…considering humanity, maybe there would have. That was just a grim enough thought to make you think you should chase the painkiller down with something more recreational.
"Right. Well." He sighed. "Sam, we've received a signal from it."
You freeze. Your blood runs cold. You sit up - but before you can say anything, Riley adds.
"A human signal."
You let out a
whuff of relief. "Thank god," you say.
The last time humanity had made contact with an alien species, it had spawned the Aeon Illumination - the only faction of humanity that had given the Cybran insurgency a run for their money on the galactic stage when it came to being deadly threats to Earth's supremacy. According to the propaganda, the Aeon were brainwashed maniacs, worshiping an alien species they called the Xel'Naga, proclaiming that they had foreseen some 'purity of form and purity of essence' that they would bring to the rest of the human race.
According to the…infosec you'd have access too…
You weren't sure.
Some of the Aeon had abilities that were hard to parse as just fancy pieces of technology derived from studying Xel'Naga ruins. And there had been enough Xel'Naga artifacts found throughout the galaxy to make it clear that they
were a big deal, before they had gone extinct. But really, you didn't give a shit about the metaphysics. What mattered was that the Aeon had a goddamn
monarchy. Founded by a fucking botanist. You were not going to cede any duly elected authority of the United Earth Federation to some fucking botanist's granddaughter. The very idea was insulting.
On the battlefield, you knew their commanders were skilled and their technology was cutting edge.
That was what really mattered, huh.
Riley chuckles at your reaction - and you ask the next obvious question. "Is it a sublight communication or-"
"Primitive quantum waveform," he says. "Right from the edge of the anomaly, which is why we think the signal bounced out. Though, the high forehead types say that they think that from inside the Dark Sector, quantum communications will still function - they think it's not a total suppression field, but a kind of…bowl." He shook his head. "What matters is…well…" He made a gesture.
The screen flicked on.
The human was shockingly familiar looking - not that you'd ever seen her before, but because she was just so…refreshingly mundane. No Cyrban implants, no Aeon tattoos, no UEF genosculpting. Just…basic human. She was dressed in a black jacket and blue jumpsuit, with a strange red and blue flag pin on her shoulder: Red square, blue X through it. She looked tired and…deeply fucking pissed off.
"Repeat, this is Colonial Magistrate-" static buzzed through the screen. When it came back, you could hear gunfire and screeching sounds. "-we're under attack by an alien species. I…listen, General Duke, you smug prick, I know you're out there. Mar Sara is overrun, and we need goddamn air support!" More gunfire. She ducked her head forward, then grabbed the microphone, her eyes flashing. "Repeat, this is Colonial Magistrate-"
The door to the room burst open and a man in articulated power armor - the kind you'd use if you were doing heavy cargo work and didn't have any bots on hand - came stumbling back into the room. His visor was down and he was carrying a heavy rifle, which hammered away as he fired at something. The door exploded inwards - and you jerked back slightly in your seat.
The creature was somewhere between a snake and a man, with arms that came to bladed points. Its face was skull-like, with extending mandibles that swept open as it hissed and screeched at the camera. It spread its arms wide, revealing that the muscular, tough brown flesh that covered its bony shoulders
slitted open. Projectiles shot out of its chest, thudding repeatedly into the console right below the camera. The woman flung herself flat as the man in power armor lifted his rifle up - but two projectiles slammed into the rifle. It sparked, hissed.
"Tarnation!"
You mouthed the word slowly as the man threw the rifle at the creature. It lifted one arm, blocking the shot, but then he had pulled out his sidearm: A powerful looking, primitive pistol with a revolving chamber. He stepped forward, shoved his bulky power armored glove directly into the drooling maw of the beast. The report of the pistol was muffled. It took three shots before the top of the creature's curved skull exploded in a spray of red.
The Colonial Magistrate got back at the screen, her face filling the camera.
"This is Mar Sara, we need fucking
help, General Duke, you…" she made a face. "Fine! Fine! Mengsk, if you're listening, pick us up! Now! Christ on a crutch!"
A heavy hand closed around her shoulder. The man in power armor pulled her away. "All right, Magistrate, we are
leaving."
They went out the door, as more screeching filled the air - more gunfire. And in the distance, the thunder of heavier guns.
The feed cut off.
You whistled, slowly.
"I spoke too soon."
***
In the war room, everything you knew about the Koprulu Sector was projected on a great big screen while you, General Hall and President Riley stood in a line and listened to the good historian. Dr. Keller had been pulled from Earth's billions of people in a tearing hurry, and he had been cast into this position without knowing thing one about why he was being pumped for information - but none of that seemed to matter, since he was just happy to talk about his…fixation.
You found it all rather fascinating.
"See, the first quantum tunneling experiment was accomplished in 2025, but the energy requirements for pushing past a moving few atoms required cracking fusion power. And there was a century-long period between then!" he said. "And the Ecotastrophy was going full swing. Oh, it was a turn of the millennium problem, involving carbon production, we fixed it with the nano…anyway, uh, as I was saying, the Ecotastrophy was going full swing, quantum tunneling looked like it was well outside of our bounds of possibility. So, a collection of extranational forces worked to create a series of colony ships. The
Regan, the
Nagglfar, the
Argo, the
Sarengo. They launched, and beamed information back all the while. Really remarkable stuff. Remarkable. Then, well, fusion tech was cracked, and quantum tunneling made starships something for bad holo shows…"
"Fascinating. How long would it have taken them to have reached this hypothetical end point?" Riley asked.
"Oh, based on the information you've given me, I'd say…eleven, twelve centuries. They probably only arrived a few decades ago, honestly…"
"Is it possible to survive that long in cryosleep?" you asked.
"Well, it's…
possible…" Dr. Keller said.
"Thank you for your input, doctor," Riley said. He made a gesture and the line was cut. General Hall shook his head slowly.
"Well, fuck me," he said. "They're from the dark ages."
"They're from the dark ages, yes, but they're also human and they're also facing an alien threat. We've managed to get a few more signals…" Riley said, frowning as he turned to face you and Hall. Hall stroked his mustache, slowly. "The colony that was attacked? It was destroyed from orbit by the aliens they were fighting - or possibly, a different species, entirely. We have some images…"
The screen flicks on. Vast, golden ships - huge and elegant and curved fill the screen, surrounded by throngs of strike fighters. You cross your arms over your chest, frowning intently. "Shit," you say. "Please don't tell me they're Xel'Naga."
"That's not what the local government is calling them," Riley said, quietly.
"Are we sure that these are the same aliens?" Hall asked, frowning as he pointed at the gently curved ships. "That creature down there looked barely sentient. And it had no tool using appendages."
"A bioweapon, maybe?" you hazarded.
"Maybe," Hall said.
"Whatever the situation is, it's dire," Riley said. "They glassed the planet."
You made a face, remembering DeGalle's suggested weapons platform. It seemed, in the Koprulu Sector, people had listened to him. And they'd made it work. You had no idea how, or why it had become practical, but clearly, there was a calculus you were missing here.
"Mr. President, there's only one problem with all this," Hall said, shaking his head. "We can't reach them. Our war-fighting apparatus is built entirely around the quantum gate. If we can't tunnel there, if we can't get an ACU there…"
"That's what the high forehead types are working on," Riley said, quietly. "I hope that these Terrans can hold on until then."
You nodded, then quietly. "Do the Aeon and the Cybrans know about this?"
"We don't know," Riley said.
You pursed your lips.
***
The headaches were getting worse. No one had managed to find a reason beyond 'stress'. No shit you were stressed. The reports coming from the Koprulu Sector were patchy and inconsistent - reports of civil war between Terrans, of two distinct alien species - confirming Hall's guess that there were different breeds, not one species with wildly divergent technology. Protoss. Zerg. Their names were heavy on your tongue, and the scattered images left more questions than answers.
And the headaches kept hitting you.
Two months after the message arrived, two months after you had this new piece of worry to work on, you woke up in the middle of the night, your head
pounding. Your hands went to your temples and you half closed your eyes. "Fuck," you whispered.
Then…
Samantha.
Your head jerked up, looking around the room. Your hand dove under the pillow - and you drew out your snub nosed pistol, aiming it around the room. The laser for the targeter flicked on and the holographic sights came on as you glared around yourself, remaining perfectly still. You'd been targeted for assassination before.
At least your head had stopped-
"Samantha."
Your pistol swung and you saw the woman crouched at the end of your bed. Glowing orange eyes. Spines instead of hair, short and sharp and stabbing. Black lips. And wings. Wings spread around her shoulders like a dark angel. She looked right into your eyes and you immediately pulled the trigger and sent several high caliber rounds into the wall with a roar.
You slapped the lights on and lowered your pistol, slowly.
The woman was gone.
Three holes smoked in the wall.
"Fuck," you whispered.
You had to get to the Koprulu Sector. The
fact of that bloomed in your brain, so…impossible to resist, even as you heard the thundering sound of footsteps. The door to your bedroom burst open and two security officers came in. "General!?" One asked, the other sweeping his rifle around to cover the room.
"False alarm," you said, rubbing your face. "False alarm."
You had to get to Koprulu Sector.
***
You stood on the Equadordiato tether station and watched as the final stages of construction wrapped up. The UEF
Expeditionary One had taken an unthinkably long time to build - almost six days of straight nanofabrication, running on five orbital printers, straight out. Those printers had also take a preposterous length of time to build in orbit -
a week each! - because they had all been designed for naval operations on planetary surfaces. But civilian printers for making civilian starships like asteroid haulers and science ships couldn't produce the hardened alloys and materials required for the E1, so…
You watched as the print-beams skimmed along the glowing superstructure of the E1, layering down the corridors and internal components atom by atom at dizzying speed - several hundred of the beams intersecting and interfacing with one another as they emerged from countless projectors, while the mass tanks grew more and more empty, and the energy plants ran into the dangerous yellow zones of their power emissions.
"Quite a ship, eh?," a cheerful, panslav accented voice drew your attention. You turned and gave a serious frown to the man approaching. He was in UEF blue and had the collar tabs of a Lt. Commander, with the interlocking gears of a support ACU pilot under his breast. He froze as your shifting posture let the dim lights of the observation bay play along your collar tabs. He came to attention. "A-Ah, General Clarke. My apologies."
"Stukov, right?" you asked. "At ease. I'm not going to jump down your throat."
He relaxed, fractionally. "Thank you, General."
"You're in the selection for the expeditionary force," you said, speculatively.
"Yes," he said, nodding. "I've always wanted to see new worlds. That's why I joined up with the UEF. And to protect Earth, of course." He smiled, wryly. "These Zerg don't seem like they will be a big problem. Maybe for some colonials with primitive technology…"
"That is why this expedition is so important," you said. "Advice, as a former SACU pilot." you smiled, wryly. "Keep up on the repair work. Unnoticed attrition is the number one killer of green Commanders, and as SACU, you'll be the one who can keep an eye on the primary logistic train."
"Thank you, General," he said, nodding.
You turned back, watching the E1.
The final layer appeared around her hull - and the pale glow faded as the entire ship came online. You watched as it, in silence, broke away from the makeshift dockyards and began to cruise towards the equally large, equally makeshift quantum tunnel that had been created. At least
that had been relatively simple to make. Space based quantum tunneling systems had been in use ever since the first solar system with valuable asteroids and no workable planets had been discovered - it was just a matter of fishing the schematics out of the ancient database and rebuilding it with some orbital printers.
This had used civilian models.
Unlike the E1, the gate wasn't going to get shot at.
***
You'd read, once, before you had ever traveled beyond Earth, that quantum tunneling was like being reborn.
You wished.
Instead, for you, a quantum jump was just a painful white flash, a sickening sense of nausea, and then a lurching feeling through your entire nervous system. You usually threw up.
This time was worse. Many times worse. The headaches were back, with a vengeance, stabbing into your temples as you rubbed your fingers fiercely against your head, trying to keep the pain from overwhelming you. Throughout the officers jump room, restraint harnesses were coming free, and you could hear the cheerful sound of Lt. Commander Stukov's voice ringing out from the underofficers section. You forced your eyes open and lifted your head, slowly.
You were the commander of the expedition. You had gotten to choose who was coming with you.
Sitting across from you, their own faces haggard and drawn from the quantum jump, were…
Pick your Science Advisor
[ ] Dr. Egon Stetmann - a highly skilled and broadly educated specialist in various kinds of advanced physics and biological fields, Stetmann has the slight disadvantage of being the youngest officer in the room and a deeply nervous attitude. You plan to just aim him at science and wait.
[ ] Dr. Ariel Hanson - a civilian logistics and medical specialist, Dr. Hanson is noted as being professional, cool under fire and has been in hands on scientific research across the Infinite War. Military Intelligence has her flagged for having Cybran loyalties - or at least a less than glowing attitude towards the UEF. But you're fairly sure that when it came to saving humans from not one but two alien menaces, that she could be relied upon.
[ ] Dr. Zachery Arnold - an outrim scientist from the edge of UEF space. He has the most expertise with non UEF social structures - not that he's been to the Aeon or Cybran spheres, but he has interacted with minor polities that have yet to be snapped up during the Infinite War. While his specialty knowledge isn't as great as others, his 'common sense' is hard to beat.
[ ] Dr. Michelle Aiko - a doggedly professional academic from Pacifica. She's not…brilliant, but also, she's one of the most stable, steady people you've ever seen. She won't panic, make erroneous assumptions, or run into flights of fancy. Good for a leap into the unknown.
Pick your Operations Advisor
[ ] Major Matt Horner - an ACU pilot who accomplished several impressive victories in defensive battles against Aeon invasions, Horner was sidelined after he refused to fire on Cybran targets that he claimed weren't military assets but, rather, civilian areas. The tribunal cleared him of any charges, but the general staff was leery of trusting him with anything. That light touch is exactly what you need.
[ ] Major Mira Han - a Support ACU pilot and naval specialist who was responsible for the amphibious landings on no less than three worlds. Called, in her various reports, "a pirate in blue" and "basically a criminal", Major Han also has something else going for her: She gets shit done. And she gets mixed up. Her SACU (and later, when promoted, full ACU) tends to support heavy combat weapons and just as much battle damage. Hence…the cybernetics.
[ ] Major Mikal Fletcher - a longterm veteran of Cybran and Aeon combat, Fletcher has driven an ACU in nearly every environment and fought in each of them with skill, tenacity and courage. Though psyche has cleared him for this mission, you know that he has recurring issues with combat fatigue. You plan to keep a close eye on him - use his eminent skills while keeping him out of any fighting that might leave him too rattled to be of use.
[ ] Brigadier General Zachary Arnold - the oldest officer in the roster, and the only one who is no longer listed as being fit for ACU combat (despite his grumbling to the contrary), Zachary was the man who said that, one day, you'd outrank him. He was right, but you still relied on his advice and good sense for years and want his confidence and his steadiness, even if that leaves you down an deployable ACU.
Pick your Political Officer
[ ] General-Coordinator Tychus Findley - of course PolitCom assigned Findley to your orgchart. Findley is a larcenous, lecherous, corrupt prig. The fact he's been one of your best drinking buddies over the years doesn't change the fact that him being highly ranked in PolitCom and the Coordinator officer corps is a sign that the UEF needs a major overhaul in their military/civilian oversight commissions. Still. At least you won't be drinking alone.
[ ] General-Coordinator Gabriel Tosh - you've heard rumors about GC Tosh. Rumors like he's a washout from some black ops attempt to crack the rumored Aeon psi projects. You don't know much more than that, but he seems professional…enough.
[ ] General-Coordinator Abigail Toth - her documentation is incredible, but you've never personally interacted with GC Abigail Toth. That's not too strange - PolitCom is huge and employs a lot of officers. She was assigned to you and while you don't like political officers, you hope that she lives up to her background.
[ ] General-Coordinator Jericho Dostya - an up and comer in the PolitCom, GC Dostya has exploded onto the scene by closing out several procurement scandals and cleaning up after a Cybran sleeper cell attack on Tartev II. You've never worked with him before, but having a political officer that actually seems to want to accomplish things would be…nice.
You rubbed your palm against your face as the PA crackles.
"Jump complete. Beginning preparations for sublight passage through the sector's boarders."
You smacked your lips as the entire ship rumbled. Vast antimatter engines were starting to propel her forward through space using the preposterously expensive method of throwing matter out the back - but it would clear the theoretical barrier between the Koprulu Sector and the rest of the galaxy…
The…theories were a bit sketchy here. Some of the egg heads had said that the barrier was only a few hundred thousand kilometers thick, and would be cleared in less than an hour. Others theorized it was a light year or two thick.
Which was why E1 had been loaded with cryocrypts.
But you hoped against hope that wasn't the case - or else everyone you were here to rescue would be dead. Dead. Dead.
---
Plan vote, please! 
