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They are Smol Stories

They are Smol: The Invasion of Earth – Chapter 6

Time stood still.

The crew of The Three Stones were watching multiple camera angles, so it was only by the sudden shocked silence of a few operators that the rest of the bridge even knew something had gone terribly, terribly wrong.

Security Chief Ri’tiki was under the second dropship, happily and completely unaware of any issues as his team demonstrated a very primitive, very basic child’s toy to the assembling soldiers – making slow, deliberate movements to illustrate that they meant no harm.

Lt. K’uree and his assembled away team were bemused as they watched on, mentally preparing themselves to soothe the natives’ ego once it came to accept their gift.

Aq’rel’a’s face was brimming with a smile of barely-suppressed joy, as she triumphantly lifted up what should have been a healthy, if not a little disgruntled and embarrassed local. Her eyes glazed over as they tried to parse, for a split second, where the rest of the local alien went.

The assembled defense of the United States – from the simple beat cop to the National Guard veteran – lost their breath as they saw the speed, ease and savagery of the apparent attack-

And Hank?

Hank just screamed.

“OH JESUUSSHH GOOOOODDDDDHHH-”

“|Wh-what?|” Aq’rel’a sputtered, the warm blood of the local sapient coating her talons generously.

“|H-how-|” started xenobiologist-cum-ambassador Qur’rra’ra, as Rkk’tkt let the cloth slide limply from his arms.

“WASTE THAT MOTHERFUCKER-” yelled someone, and the sound of automatic fire drowned out any argument to the contrary.

Bullets began to ricochet off of Aq’rel’a’s armor, the kinetic impacts registering on her body but not in her mind. Somewhere, far away, her suit automatically dispersed it’s small contingent of disposable shield drones, and the wireless power draw from her suit’s internal battery kicked on a timer on her HUD. Each of her three drones blossomed into an umbrella of light, moving to put themselves directly into the line of fire. She blinked as the sudden rapport of body-hits stopped, and looked down at the screaming, primitive, delicate and innocent native, as its voice trailed off and the lights of its’ soul began to wail and flicker-

‘Fix it’ cried something deep inside her, and she bent down over the metal plate that held this innocent creature that needed to be healed, to be protected – she bent down and in one swift movement ripped the plate from it’s fasteners on the ground, and sprinted forward towards her confused compatriots.

“|SIR! DO WE RETURN FIRE-|”
“|BY THE BLACK VOID WHAT THE FUCK-|”
“|I JUST LOOKED AT THEM I DIDN’T MEAN TO INSULT THEM-|”
“|BY OUR ANCESTORS WHAT DID YOU DO-|” Roared security chief Ri’tiki, the sound of weapons fire forcing him to yell. “|I NEED A STATUS REPORT, NOW!|”
“|DISPERSE THE SEEDS!|” Commanded Lt. K’uree over general comms, tapping his own suit to deploy his few drones. “|DEPLOY SHIP SEEDS AS WELL-|”

It was around this time that Aq’rel’a finally managed to make it over to Qur’rra’ra, almost bowling her over with her grisly delivery.

“|FIX IT FIX IT FIX IT FIX IT-|” Aq’rel’a chanted, slamming the grate – and Hank – into the arms of the xenobiologist. “|FIXITFIXITFIXITFIXIT-|” she repeated, more urgently, as rifle fire finally overwhelmed one of her drones, causing it to burst into flame and electronic smoke.

“|AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH|” thought Qur’rra’ra aloud, as her assistant Rkk’tkt danced nervously in place/tried to dodge the few bodyshots that were successfully slamming against his significantly weaker hazard suit.

“|FIXITFIXITFIXIT-|” chanted Aq’rel’a, being joined by Tr’chr’’ as he shakily held his non-lethal weapon, pointing it at the ground, flinching as the natives’ guns trained themselves on him. “|FIXITFIXITFIXIT-|”

“|AAAAAHHHHHSTASIS! STASIS!|” Qur’rra’ra rounded on Rkk’tkt, taking the bloody and slower-moving delivery from Aq’rel’a’s hands, causing the male to squawk unceremoniously. “|WHEN NATIVE SPECIES ARE DAMAGED WE PUT THEM IN STASIS-|”

“|FIXITFIXITFIXIT-|” chanted the entire away-team over the increasingly-frustrated sounds of security chief Ri’tiki, as the native soldiers finally pulled up a vehicle that had a top mounted gun which did not look friendly at all-

“|AAAAAAAABUTWEHAVEN’DI’LINUTSINSTASIS-|” cried Rkk’tkt as he sprinted back up the ramp, diving headfirst into the boxes of trinkets and gifts that the First Squad had brought down, wholesale throwing out entire delicate packages down the open cargo bay, as Qur’rra’ra slowly but speedily rounded the ramp under him.

“|I DON’T GIVE A SOUL-CURSED DAMN ABOUT YOUR NUTS-|”

“|WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO, SQUAD ONE.|” Order-questioned security chief Ri’tiki, as he sprinted from under Squad Two’s dropship. Qur’rra’ra made the mistake of pausing – just for a moment – at the base of the ramp, and the sight of what she carried caused Ri’tiki to slowly come to a halt.

“|Wh.|” he said, staring incredulously at the dying native served up on a plate.

“|It’s… not what it looks like?|” ventured Qur’rra’ra, as an entire cart of trinkets launched itself out of Dropship One, landing a couple dozen meters behind the xenobiologist.

“|FIX IT GODDAMNIT-|” Ri’tiki roared, as every dropships’ shield drones were dispersed, dozens of lights blossoming to life as they drew from the much larger and deeper well of the ships’ reactors. The natives, being as primitive as they were, seemed to ignore the soldiers for the time being – and began to focus fire on the drones closest to them, deeming them more of a threat.

Their small arms were nothing more than annoyances, given the increased power the drones could draw from. The vehicle-mounted weapons, however…

“|I GOT IT~!|” Chirped Rkk’tkt as he held aloft in both claws a stasis generator, a waterfall of nuts and foodstuffs cascading down the ramp to land in the alien soil.

“|NOW NOW NOW-|” Yelled Qur’rra’ra, as she lifted the native up towards her fellow scientist to be bathed in a deep, blue light.

“JESUS CHRIST-”
“I’M OUT – I’M OUT”
“RELOAD, GODDAMN YOU-”
“FRAG OUT!”
“GoddamnitgoddamnitGODDAMNIT-” rambled Ofc. Adam “Feisty” McCormick as he sunk behind his vehicle’s wheel well, rapidly searching his pockets for another full magazine as he ejected the expended one from his AR. Finding one – his last one – he slammed it home, and rose again to pour fire upon the invaders.

‘It was going to be such a nice day, too.’ He thought, as he selected a flying drone at random and began to fire.

“|Did you see that-|”
“|Run through her suit matrix again, I want to get every bit of data on that interaction-|”
“|The compressive augments didn’t even activate-|”
“|What’s the burn time on those shields?|”

The bridge of The Three Stones was in an uproar. At first, things were going swimmingly; data was pouring in, the natives were cautious – as they should be – but curious, and it seemed like the general gist of ‘we come in peace’ was being relayed effectively.

Then a rookie bisected a native on what seemed like an accident, and a battle started.

“|Get me a direct line to the Security Chief.|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, talons rapidly moving over her own console. “|Send a direct order to the other dropships; they’re to abandon CRADLE and rendevous with The Three Stones as soon as they’re able.|”

A point of view became prominent on-screen, and the roaring, shrieking trill of the security chief briefly drowned out everything else.

“|CAN YOU FIX IT?|” He roared, as the native was lowered down onto the decking of the dropship. Automatic clamps magnetically sealed the metal plate to the floor, and with the stasis generator locked in place –

Well. He wouldn’t be moving, at least.

“|Chief Ri’tiki!|”

“|Matriarch, begging your pardon, but everything’s really really condemned to all kinds of hell right now-|” growled Ri’tiki, his helmet’s camera lowering to fixate on the natives’ face, twisted in pain. “|And I really don’t have time for a status update-|”

“|Chief Ri’tiki, I’m here to offer aid, not judgment.|” sighed the Matriarch, her data team working furiously on AI-assisted possibilities. “|We… we don’t believe the neophyte meant to hurt the native-|”

“|Oh, right, just ripping off limbs is their custom of greeting-|”

“|From what we can tell, Ri’tiki|” growled the matriarch, “|her suit didn’t even provide tactile feedback until she hit the bone – or a bone analog.|”

The steel in the matriarch’s tone was enough warning for Ri’tiki to remember himself, and his point of view rose to look out the landing craft again. “|Well…shit.|”

The rookie in question scrambled up the ramp, small arms fire peppering the shield drones behind her, eyes wild and red with tears. Wordlessly and effortlessly the security chief picked her up and slammed her into a harness, locking it down automatically over her body.

“|Well…shit.|” he repeated again, poking his head out to see the arrayed forces against him. The first armored vehicle with the gun mount was rapidly joined by another that was firing as it pulled up, its’ forces rapidly disgorging to fall behind the earlier, lighted vehicles. More weaponsfire, more drones slowly being overloaded. “|We’re not going to be able to stay here forever, and we really really shouldn’t be kidnapping a local.|”

“|We know, we know. We’ve identified this symbol-|” with a tap Matriarch Tr’Nkwi pushed the information to every planet-side soldier, burning it into their HUDs.”|-as a possible place of healing. There’s a large building with this symbol half a league away from you, to your galactic North-by-north-west.|” Over the din of multiple voices shouting out status reports, Tr’Nkwi pushed more information to her troops. “|Chief Ri’tiki, I leave the decision to you on the ground; Do you think you can take him to their house of healing? Hopefully by depositing it at their doctors’ theaters, they would realize we made a mistake-|”

“|Run half a league through a hostile, urban, alien environment-|”

“|Or kidnap a local and watch their whole world burn.|”

Security Chief Ri’tiki growled, wordlessly, as EM Lord Itick’’t patched into the conversation.

“|Not to pour more kindling into the burner, but, I’m noticing a lot more activity heading your way. A lot more. That’s a… By the Eternal Soul, that’s a lot of aircraft…|”

Time stood still once more, as Ri’tiki’s mind raced.

“|RIGHT! LISTEN UP!|” Roared the chief, overriding everyone’s comms. “|ALL SQUADS WILL DISEMBARK WITH NONLETHAL WEAPONRY. WE ARE GOING TO FORM A PERIMETER AROUND OUR SHIPS.|”

Wordlessly, the two sealed dropships opened up, disgorging their contents.

“|WE ARE NOT GOING TO ENGAGE THEM WITH OUR WEAPONS. YOU ARE TO DEPLOY SHIELD DRONES AND SHIELD BARRICADES, AND NONVIOLENTLY PACIFY THE LOCAL POPULATION.|”

“|Ri’tiki-|” warned Matriarch Tr’Nkwi, the concern in her voice apparent.

“|THEY ARE PHYSICALLY WEAK. THIS MEANS YOU DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE, INTERACT WITH THEIR PHYSICAL BODIES. CONFISCATE WEAPONS, DISABLE VEHICLES.|” Ordered Ri’tiki, marching back down the ramp into enemy fire.

He stood there, drones forming a shield wall before him, bright angry flashes of light speaking to the amount of ordinance being pointed at him in a desperate bid to save their homes, their families… themselves.

“|DO NOT FIRE YOUR WEAPONS.|” He ordered, as his HUD notified him Squad One’s fireteam had off-ramped behind him. “|WE WILL NOT HARM ANY MORE OF THEM. OUR GOAL IS TO ESCORT A WOUNDED ALIEN LOCAL TO THEIR MEDICAL CENTER AND THEN RETURN TO THE SHIPS – AND THEN WE WILL IMMEDIATELY RETREAT. AM I UNDERSTOOD?|”

“|SIR YES SIR|”

With a defiant roar, they charged.

“FOCUS FIRE ON THE RAMP-”
“YES SIR! YES – THEY KILLED A CIVILIAN WHEN HE FELL. YES-”
“MORE OF THE FUCKS ARE COMING OUT-”
“NO THE HOUSES ARE NOT CLEAR! I REPEAT, CIVILIANS ARE IN THE A.O.-”
“WHERE IS OUR GODDAMN AIR SUPPORT-”
“FRAG OUT-”

Sgt. Hernandez screamed into his radio over the sound of the two .50 cals, the constant rapport of gunfire forming a chaotic background white noise. There was an almost imperceptible pause – almost a collective inhalation of breath, and then the weaponsfire somehow increased in volume… and urgency.

“GODDAMNITGODDAMNITGODDAMNIT-”
“FOCUS FIRE ON THE RIGHT-”
“FRAG OUT – DANGER CLOSE-”

Sgt. Miguel Hernandez looked up from his Humvee’s radio console to see a squad of aliens, clad in all black, sprinting towards his position. He had just enough time to put down his radio and pick up his rifle when one of them leapt, landing on the hood of his vehicle – and crushing it utterly. Hernandez dove for the pavement as the xenos reared back and pulled the MG apart – his gunner switching to his M4 and emptying a clip into it’s head… to seemingly no effect. With it’s other arm it darted forward and grabbed his rifle, pulling it effortlessly out of his hands.

Then they just stared at each other for a few moments, waiting.

Everyone was waiting.

“…Fuck you.” Pvt. Kowalski spat, as the alien crushed his service rifle in one hand, hopping off of the vehicle to grip another soldier’s discharging weapon.

“GIVE-GIVE THAT BACK! NOOOOO-”

In a confused daze Sgt. Hernandez turned to look at the police line – an officer was clutching his weapon with both arms and a leg – which is obviously against the manual of arms – and his corresponding xeno just… started to shake him off, like a particularly feisty cat.

“I-IT’S MINE GOD DAMN Y-” the officer cried before his grip failed, falling on his back with an unceremonious thud. He pulled out his service pistol and was able to fire just a couple rounds before a gauntleted fist closed over the barrel and pulled it effortlessly from his grip. The officer then reached into another pocket and produced an even smaller pistol and fired a few more rounds-

Amazingly, delicately, the alien pinched the slide between two claws and began to pull-

“Stooooooooooop-”

Sgt. Hernandez looked around as a dozen aliens overran their position, destroyed their weapons, and then… just left them be.

“…what. What?”

“|It keeps punching me, sir.|” Complained Tr’chr’’, as the alien he had just disarmed – and he cringed internally at that tasteless pun – three times started to smack him with his appendages.

“|You’ll live, Private.|” Murmured Lt. K’uree, his suit dispensing painkillers to compensate for the kinetic force of multiple-rounds-to-the-helmet.

“|Well what’s the – Hey! no biting -|” chided Tr’chr’’, as his nearby security-force alien attempted to gnaw on his forearm. “|No, stop – what’s the plan now?|”

“|We corral them under the ship.|” Responded Chief Ri’tiki, causing the pair to jump. “|Hopefully showing that we haven’t murdered any other souls will calm them down.|”

“|…Hostages, sir?|”

Ri’tiki sighed. “|We have to buy time, Lieutenant.|”

“|Forgive me for saying, but I just don’t think this is the right coinage, sir.|” Lt. K’uree said.

The two officers shared a knowing look, before the rapport of more gunfire forced them to move once more among the aliens, who had begun to raise their arms in an unknown gesture.

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Stories They are Smol

They are Smol: Invasion of Earth: Chapter 5

Really, all things considered, the first 24 hours were the worst.

This is from both the perspective of the crew aboard The Three Stones but also all of Humanity; the dread weight of the problem just floating right above you hung around everyone’s neck, plunging them into the icy cold ocean of anxiety and despair.

Granted, The Three Stones spent most of this time orbiting over the planet, scanning it and parsing as much information as possible to try and figure out what to do. They were hailed by various militaries – or military factions – as well as what they assumed were multiple leaders, religious icons, cults, and scientists. Surprisingly there wasn’t much they could glean from them, other than physiology and what these species’ “concerned face” looked like; it’s not like their AI was magic and could parse what they were saying. The engineering team really really appreciated this species’ science division, as learning about their base 10 number system and how they expressed complicated mathematical ideals went a long way to plugging gaps in their translation matrices.

Unfortunately, it also reaffirmed that this was the homeworld of a brand-new, primitive species. Honestly, you’d think it would be all the rioting that would’ve tipped them off, but to be fair, we kinda just do that sometimes.

The first 24 hours for Humanity was… let’s say “interesting”. All supermarkets were empty, all churches were full – and their parishioners armed – and the roads, well. For the first time, people were quietly and urgently moving forward everywhere, and Sunday drivers didn’t exist. The greatest benefit to the first 24 hours, as was unanimously agreed upon once the dust settled, was that pretty much every boss that deserved to get got got got by a mass of employees who were wholly convinced that they weren’t going to live to see the next Monday Morning Meeting.

Then Tuesday rolled around, the Earth collectively unclenched it’s asshole just a little bit, and began to wait for their visitor’s next move.

“|YOU WILL FALL IN RIGHT NOW OR SO HELP ME I WILL SEND YOU TO SEE THE SPIRITS OF YOUR ANCESTORS IN SHAME.|” Bellowed Security Chief Ri’tiki, standing at perfect attention as his small army collected itself and formed into companies. When it came to security drills and training the next generation of warriors, at the best of times Ri’tiki was stern if not kindly, and at the worst of times…well. Feathers did grew back.

However, today of all days Security Chief Ri’tiki was not taking any shit from anyone. He stood upon a raised dais, unmoving, unblinking, as his soldiers collected themselves underneath him. His mood was markedly different; the weight of the debriefing he was about to deliver had fully settled upon him, and it was with that same gravitas that he was about to present to his charges.

Behind him, the planet appeared on-screen, and a few excited murmurs rippled through the crowd.

“|Pay attention to this mission briefing; I will not repeat myself, and deviance from these orders will be met with summary execution.|”

Silence.

“|Approximately 17 hours ago we began orbiting the planet you see behind me, which we are designating CRADLE. Multiple scans of our equipment have allowed us to determine CRADLE’s infrastructure – it’s primitive at best, and dangerous at worst. Here, Here and here-|” Parts of the planet lit up, highlighting various population centers. “|Are major centers of habitation, and from what we’ve been able to parse from the clusterfuck of raw data coming at us every second, are local centers of government.|”

On one landmass above a center of government a second habitation center was highlighted; a picture of a building, some flags, a picture of their own world with a blue background emblazoned various vehicles outside.

“|We believe this is their global seat of government, in which representatives of all their territories work much like our own Senate. We will not be going anywhere near this city, nor the capitol city of the host territory-|”

Another image, a Red, white and blue striped and starred flag popped up and landed on multiple locations on the planet.

“|We believe this is the symbol of their unifying territory, or of the territory that is directly managed by CRADLE’s unified government. We’ve determined this symbol is on multiple landmasses and islands all across this world, so it’s safe to say that they are the ones we will be negotiating with initially.|”

The selected cities dimmed out, and a new civilian center was highlighted.

“|In 2 hours we are going to load out and land at this civilian center, codenamed GATEBELL, in unarmed survey dropships. 4 ships will touch down; First and Second squads shall be disembarking and escorting our negotiators and ambassadors in these two ships, while Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth will wait in the other two. We are going to land here-|”

A mass of woodland and open space appeared, nestled close to the city – but not so close as to be in it’s heart.

“|Disengage, and wait. Once the ambassadors signal they are done – or tell your Lieutenants what to do next – then you will either move back into the ship and return to The Three Stones, or will do whatever is culturally appropriate for CRADLE’s population.|”

Security Chief Ri’tiki looked over his troops with a hard eye.

“|We are going to be following all the rules of war with some significant additions. For starters, you will not take any lethal weapons on you; If you are found to be carrying anything lethal, including pitknives, you will be summarily executed. You will not be aggressive towards CRADLE’s populace; do not blink, do not move, do not scream or yell or fucking speak, or I or your Lieutenants – the only ones landing on that planet with lethal weaponry – will summarily execute you. You will not fire upon CRADLE’s security forces if and when they appear, and no, forget what you learned in training – you will be summarily executed if you attempt to move out of their line of fire. If you are fired upon, you will not make any aggressive movements towards your nonlethal weapons until you are cleared by your Lieutenants to defend yourselves; if you do so without order you will be summarily executed. If you are forced to engage in self-defense, you will be retreating back to the ships – not advancing. If the thought of being a hero pops into your head, you will be summarily executed. Do you understand me.|”

“|YES SIR.|” a thousand voices chorused at once. Their cry echoed around the hangar, and Ri’tiki let the ringing die down before he continued.

“|You may be asking yourself if I’ve lost my mind, or if we’re marching to our deaths, to which I say you may be right. However, we are on an uncut path; Never before has first contact been made with a species so primitive, never before have we met a brother on such uneven ground. They are scared, they are confused, and they are hoping that we come in peace. We do. I will not slaughter these innocents, even if they end all our lives – and I would rather be excommunicated for venting everyone out into the void before I burn their world to the ground. Have I made myself clear on my position?|”

“|YES SIR.|” a thousand voices chorused at once, no meeker than the first time. Ri’tiki allowed himself a small, flicker of pride to warm his heart; The young recruits before him realized the gravity of the situation, and were willing to follow him – even to death – to make this right.

…It would be right in the end, Ri’tiki decided to himself, as he dismissed his soldiers for their final preparations.

“|Calm down, calm down, calm down-|”

The dropship rocked back and forth as it was cradled for the first time in a long time by true atmosphere; the high-altitude winds began to buffet the smaller craft as it lazily began drifting down to GATEBELL, performing obvious, lazy arcs to their target.

“|You alright there, Tr’chr’’?|”

“|NEV-never better. You?|”

Aq’rel’a smiled softly, playfully elbowing her squadmate as much as the dropship harness would allow. “|Ah, I’m fine. You know, the locals are gonna love us! Where else would they see such shining examples of peak Karnakian performance-|”

“|The insane asylums, atmo-venting drug dens, the morgue-|”

“|I hear you back there Ckr’rri’li, and I’m ignoring you.|” Aq’rel’a quipped, bringing a smile to Tr’chr’’’s face. “|Look, it’s – it’s going to be fine. I mean it.|”

“|You said that about the obstacle course-|”

“|Well you finished it-|”

“|And the live-fire exercises-|”

“|Everything grew back-|”

“|And sneaking food from mess hall.|”

“|That… was an oversight. But you have to admit, my track record is stellar excepting that-|”

The beep of a warning alarm interrupted all conversation, before the pilot quickly shut it off. “|We’ve been intercepted… They’re not firing.|”

“|S-see? F…fine.|” Aq’rel’a smiled shakily. “|If they were hostile they’d have done something by now.|”

“|Yeah, I uh. I guess…|”

“|Just remember. You and I stick together, we go left out the gate and stop under the wing, and then zone out until someone yells at us.|”

“|Just like in training.|”

“|Hah!|”

The ship rocked a bit back and forth as more atmosphere surrounded it, punching through clouds and wind and sky, slowly and quickly making its’ way to the designated landing spot. It did so in relative silence; the soldiers on board reflecting on the weight of being a willing meatshield, and the few volunteer – and voluntold – “ambassadors” going over their gifts, their attempts to communicate peaceful intent, and their desire to not piss anyone off and have to fight off dozens, if not hundreds of these strange, unknown aliens.

“|Landing Approach.|” The Pilot said, breaking everyone out of their silent reverie. “|Pray for us, Ili’Ntwrek. Unlatching Piths.|”

The cascading sound of dozens of magnetic locks released, and the interior of the dropship bathed the crew in a sickly green as the harnesses slid open. The soldiers began to sway a bit more, gabbing hold of various handles, latches and straps to secure themselves in place as they prepared to disembark; the ambassadors’ grip on their still-locked harnesses turned white.

“|Begin, O’ my soul, the rapture of innocence, the song of my heart-|”

“|Grandfather, I ask thee, the distilled blood of my flesh-|”

“|The Great Spirit speaks to all, and to all who listen, she protects-|”

“|By the fire that burns behind our eyes, an oath; To you who bear witness-|”

“|Final Burn.|”

A few grunts interrupted the cascade of prayers as the dropship bled speed, it’s gravitational dampeners long since turned off. The ship shook fiercely for a few moments before a still settled on it’s frame.

With a heavy, mechanical thunk the two largest magnetic locks released, and the hot Georgia sun bathed the crew for the first time.

“|OUT OUT OUT REMEMBER YOUR POSITIONS-|” Cried Lt. K’uree, as the dropship disgorged it’s contents.

Hank reflected on the absolute absurdity of it all.

You see, the world might be ending… sure. The aliens could be here to enslave us, or steal our water, or take our habitable planet – the news had every self-proclaimed “xeno-(insert title here)” making the rounds, trying to whip up a frenzy for one reason or another. There were an equal amount “xeno-” people who said they may be benevolent; a star trek federation, perhaps, or a survey vessel from another empire, or here to help us ‘ascend’ – whatever the hell that meant. The real reason would sort itself out soon enough; if they were kind at least he kept his cool, and if they weren’t, well

…it’s not like he or Sarah could do anything about it.

The real absurdity was, after that first day where half of the people of the planet camped out in the woods and went apeshit and the other half just called in sick to work, was that…life continued. Babies needed to be changed, food needed to be cooked, gas needed to be pumped-

“Rrrrrrraar! Yip yip yip yip yip yi-”

-and little asshole toy dogs needed to go out to take a shit.

Hank for his part was a simple man; he found a good woman, they married – no children yet, but a little girl was on the way – and he lived an average life. So as to why an alien dropship had decided to pick Piedmont Park to land, and had decided to do so near him while Mipsy was taking a shit was something that could not be parsed by any sane mind, and quite honestly, was just absolutely absurd.

“Yip yip yip yip yip yip yip-”

“Goddamnit, Mipsy.” Hank sighed as the alien ship’s bay door dropped. “I’m not dressed for this.”

“Yip yip yip yip yip-”

“…I’m taking you out with me, you little shitrat.”

The fans on the combat suit kicked in immediately, pumping purified, recirculated air through the helmet to stop it from fogging up and to provide Tr’chr’’ with enough breathable air to not hyperventilate. His booted feet hit the dirt of CRADLE, and he instinctually snapped hard to the left, moving forward with his battle-buddy behind him. As the Dropship’s wings rotated up along the body into a locked position he stopped – his combat suit’s HUD notifying him that Aq’rel’a had stopped a scant few meters to his right.

Everything was… wrong.

Yes, the grounds of this park were manicured, and the buildings nearby were obviously built by intelligent life. The streets, although small, were laid out to some design known only to the occupants, and the various cylinders and metal boxes that lined the streets were put there with care – everything had a purpose and was crafted to that purpose, but it was all wrong.

Tr’chr’’ looked up, slowly, and met eyes with a native.

It was… Tr’chr’’ blinked away a few status indicators, clearing his helmet’s visor to get a better view. It was bipedal, with no tail for balance – it tottered unsteadily on two spindly limbs. It had light cropping of downy feathers – no, hair, Tr’chr’’ decided – in patches over it’s body. No shell, no mat of thick fur or hide, no scales… nothing but bare, smooth skin.

Now, none of this was news to Tr’chr’’; he had been engrossed over the parsed footage from this world like everyone else. However, it was one thing to see it on-screen but a totally different thing entirely to see it up-close and live. The object of his gaze was staring intently back at him with two small, shocked eyes; whatever tiny, squirming creature he had in his hand he dropped into one of the cylindrical containers with an unceremonious thup.

They stared at each other; The Karnakian overlooking the pajama-clad human, and the Human staring at the jet-black featureless outline that is a Karnakian fully-sealed combat rig. They remained as such, unmoving, as mechanical sirens began to blare from all around them. Almost as an afterthought Tr’chr’’ engaged his rangefinder and started slightly at the response.

100 meters.

But that’s wrong. If that’s the case, then these aliens couldn’t be any taller than a chick after their first molting. That would mean they’re-

“|…so small.|”

Tr’chr’’ dared to turn his head to Aq’rel’a, silently trying to scream with his eyes through their helmets to shutupshutupohAncestorsshutup-

Soulsight all Karnakians were born with, but apparently true psychic powers were still out of their grasp, as Aq’rel’a turned bodily towards him and tilted her head in the alien’s direction. “|I mean… look at it. I thought they looked silly just moving about, but…|”

“|Aq’rel’apleasebequietIdon’twanttodie|” whined Tr’chr’’ in as light and quick a tone as possible, his suit beginning to dispense relaxants to stop his heart from exploding in his chest.

“|I mean… it’s kinda cute, yanno? Here I was thinking they were going to tower over us because they’re always reared back, but to find they’re not even shoulder-height-|”

Tr’chr’’ wordlessly screamed, his body standing perfectly still, unintentionally freezing his Human counterpart across the way. The creature seemed to collect itself, and inhaled deeply.

“?@B—* ^^$##w%, ppbt!?”

They inhaled sharply; Tr’chr’’ because he was being hailed, and Aq’rel’a in order to let out the longest, softest peep.

“Uh, hello! The little bastard deserved it! Um.”

Hank absentmindedly wiped his hands on his rumpled t-shirt, acutely aware that he was not dressed in any way, shape or form to welcome family, let alone probably alien diplomats from another planet. In his haste to be as presentable as possible to the creature staring a hole into him – and also to not offend anyone – he went on autopilot. Step one when guests are over was to put up the dog. He spared a glance at the yipping trashcan.

…so, step one completed.

Step two was “stop looking like a damn hobo”, and that’s where he was running into some real issues. Since he very well couldn’t change out of his early Saturday morning attire, he was doing his best to make it work… and to be honest, he wasn’t under any impressions it was working. This pushed him automatically into Step three: Apologize.

“I um. Y-You know you’re uh, parking on the lawn? I mean, you probably can, I don’t think… it’s illegal. Uh.”

One of the aliens, clad in the same black suit but somehow holding itself different, rounded around the craft to his side and stared at him – or at least, stopped moving and kept it’s “head” pointed in his direction.

“But ah, Welcome? I-ignore the steel plates on the road, we just kinda, uh, do that, um. Hi?” Hank tentatively raised his hand and gave a little wave, only to have it slowly mirrored by the three aliens on his side of the ship closest to him. He repeated the gesture again, only to have it mirrored again.

“Well, that’s som..eth…”

Hank trailed off as two more aliens got off their ship – these were wearing much less intimidating, much more “open” suits; they were still very much sealed off, but around their heads, neck, arms and tail the suit was clear. It allowed Hank – and the now assembling police who were forming a hasty and panicked perimeter around their guests – to see exactly what they were dealing with.

“SIR – GET BACK NOW SIR.”

Hank turned his head to look behind him – blocking the intersection nearest him were two police cars, and behind the engine block and wheel well of each, an officer holding either a pistol or rifle.

“SIR! PLEASE GET BACK, NOW!”

Hank – for some reason unknown even to him, repeated the gesture once more to the fucking dinosaurs before him. He watched with detached bemusement as the officer’s expressions changed – the aliens must have repeated the gesture once more.

“I think we’re talking, sir!”

“. . . STAY THERE.”

“|I thought they spoke like that because we couldn’t figure out their language.|”

“?N$@@ F-b -/ -* x*wA!?”

Aq’rel’a kept cooing while Lt. K’uree stepped in line with the two recruits, mimicking the greeting gesture the local who hailed them performed.

“|Permissiontoactuallyspeaksir?|”

“|Hm? What, yes – you can talk, I’m not going to actually kill you if you talk, recruit.|”

“|O-oh, I just thought-|”

“|That’s what a grunt isn’t supposed to do, recruit.|”

“|Y-yes sir. Should we be worried about those reinforcements?|” Tr’chr’’ said, nominally dipping his head towards a larger, splotch-painted vehicle pulling up and rapidly disgorging more aliens.

“|Not yet, I think. They’re still trying to establish a perimeter, so we have time before they bring out the heavy stuff.|”

“|Absolutely fascinating.|Qur’rra’ra murmured, stepping up behind her security team. “|Their species absolutely refutes multiple biological theories we had about Intelligent life!|”

“|Qur’rra’ra, pull it back. You’re an ambassador right now, not a xenobiologist; don’t spook them.|”

“|Sure thing, Lieutenant. Ah, we have on-board some… trinkets. Mostly woven cloth, but, do you feel… like we should present it now?|”

“|To our little friend?|”

“?Mmmm@mm#m//mmm%mm^**mmm.?”

Hank let out a low whistle, mostly to himself, as he looked over the fucking dinosaur that was standing before him. Well, “before” – it was still a ways away, but he could tell that it was a big sucker, and didn’t look friendly at all. He spared a look back to the closest police to him, who were (1) exasperatedly on the radio with someone, (2) rapidly exchanging their smaller arms for apparently some military-grade weapons if (3) the national guard troops taking up positions with them were any indicator.

“Um…Well.” Hank turned back to his new guests. “I uh. Welcome back! I guess? We kinda… evolved……while you were gone.”

The clear-helmeted dinosaur tilted it’s head and said something only to itself.

“I mean. Really, uh… it’s not our fault! Um. We’ve also kinda grown attached to Earth? So if it’s alright with you, you can’t have it back? Or you can take Australia if you want.”

Another semi-clear bodied alien made it’s way out of their ship, holding in it’s arms a shimmering, almost incandescent cloth of the most beautiful blue Hank had ever seen. It stood beside the other clear-hooded alien, and very slowly held the fabric forward.

Hank pointed at himself, and the alien shook the cloth just a little in seeming confirmation.

“CITIZEN.”

“Hojeezuswhatthefuck-”

The megaphone gave a little feedback before clearing, a soldier leaning into the open door of the police vehicle. “WHAT IS YOUR NAME.”

“Uh, HANK!” Hank hanked at the police car, “HANK HILLSBERG. YES, I KNOW.”

“…REALLY?”

“YES.” Hank sighed for the millionth time in his life.

“LISTEN. THEY SEEM EAGER TO WORK WITH SOMEONE, AND YOU GOT THEIR ATTENTION. YOU ARE GOING TO DO EXACTLY WHAT WE SAY, OK?”

“I FIGURED.”

“UNTIL OUR NEGOTIATORS COME HERE, YOU’RE THE STAND-IN. DO NOT MAKE ANY PROMISES, DO NOT TALK TO THEM, OK?”

“YEAH, SURE.”

“RIGHT.” The megaphone experienced a little feedback, and there was a pause, before the soldier continued. “WE WANT YOU TO ACCEPT THEIR GIFT AND THEN COME DIRECTLY TO THIS VEHICLE. DO NOT PUT THE GIFT ON, DO NOT GO WITH THEM INTO THEIR SHIP.”

“WASN’T PLANNING ON IT, CHIEF.” Hank yelled, rolling his shoulders. “ALSO, I SEEM TO REMEMBER SOMETHING IN HISTORY-”

“WHAT.”

“I SAID I SEEM TO REMEMBER SOMETHING IN HISTORY CLASS ABOUT TECHNOLOGICALLY ADVANCED EXPLORERS GIVING NATIVES BLANKETS. DIDN’T TURN OUT SO WELL FOR THE NATIVES.”

There was instant feedback from the megaphone, and then silence – well. Not true silence, as Hank could hear the indistinct whisper-yelling of someone on the phone with multiple important people far above their paygrade, but compared to what was happening earlier it was close enough.

“…what even is happening with my life today.”

“Yip yip yip yip-” The trashcan began to protest.

“Look, Mipsy, I’m certain the ATF is somewhere nearby-”

“|What seems to be the problem, do you think?|”

“|Hmm… They probably don’t want to offend us, for one. For two, I think our initial idea of showing we mean no harm by being kind to their civilian may be backfiring. It looks like their military is giving him orders now.|” Qur’rra’ra mused, as her counterpart Rkk’tkt shook the cloth once more.

“|Poor thing.|” Aq’rel’a cooed, watching the alien suddenly tap the cylinder next to him with his foot, causing him to wobble a bit.

“|Well. The best thing we can do is just wait it out; let’s not make assumptions.|”

“We’re gonna be here forever, aren’t we? This is hell. I died and went to hell.”

“ALRIGHT HANK?”

Hank sighed, rubbing his forehead with his hand. “YEAH. YEAH?”

“WE’RE NOT SURE IF YOU SHOULD TAKE THE BLANKET YET, SO JUST SIT TIGHT.”

Hank looked up at the alien, who shook the blanket once more – and decided then and there to take his life into his own hands.

“Nothing ventured nothing gained – FUCK IT, WE’RE DOING IT LIVE.”

“HANK? HANK- STOP!”

Hank squared his shoulders, prepared his best swagger, and began to jog forward.

“|Ohygoodnessbythesoulsofthesaints-|”

“|Okay calm down calm down calm down-|”

“|This is unreasonable-|

The assembled Karnakian explorers watched the alien make his way forward in what looked like a natural wobbling, bouncing, completely off-balance gait. His head was held high, maintaining eye contact with Rkk’tkt, who was now standing perfectly stock still, but his legs had to move so fast to cover… not much distance at all.

“|Lieutenant this is wrong-|”

“|Just… they are… a proud and noble spe…species worthy of our respect, recruit.|” Lt. K’uree said, doing his damnest to hide his obvious smile. “|That is how the Great Spirit made them, and we sh-, we should respect that.|”

And Lt. K’uree did respect that for the next few seconds; it was when the alien wandered into range of his second sight that he absolutely gave up any pretenses with a groaned “|Come on.|”

“|It’s… their soul is full of starlight – it looks exactly like a hatchling’s! That’s not fair at all-|” whined Aq’rel’a, and the entire squad immediately agreed. Positively vibrating with energy, the 5 of them waited, patiently, for the alien to make it’s way to them on it’s own, sweet hurried time.

And everything was going as smoothly as one could expect it to, which is where the Georgia DOT comes in. You see, unique amongst metro regions in the United States is the GDOT, because for some unknown reason the entire organization has a horrific fixation with metal plates. Have a pothole? Not with a plate covering it you don’t. Uneven root-bump in the road? A plate turns that sucker into a uniform speedbump. Part of the curb just ceased to exist? Plate that sumbitch up and go get some wings, fam, cause you deserve it. Who gives a shit if the steel juts up a good 2 inches from the rest of the ground, or that it’s got little off-putting handles on all corners that absolutely shred tires, it’s fine. It’s fiiiiine.

And it was fine, until Hank didn’t see one of those handles, tripped, and faceplanted about 50 meters away from his goal.

“|Oh no!|” chirped the entire away team, as one they all flinched at the sound of impact.

“Oh no.” Deadpanned the soldier, as he watched Humanity’s first impression literally fall flat.

“Why, God?” Groaned Hank, as face-down he blinked away the stars in his vision.

“|Aq’rel’a! J-Just pick him up quickly and we’ll continue as if nothing happened-|Lt. K’uree barked, the radiating embarrassment from the civilian taking it’s sweet time getting back up in-front of them hitting him full-force. “|Let’s help them save face at this moment-|”

“|Aye, sir!|” Aq’rel’a said as she ran forward, skidding to a stop above the prone, small, wobbly starlit-soul’d alien. “|Hey, hey, it’s ok – It’s ok. We’re all… out of our depth here.|” She cooed, as she gripped him firmly – but gently – underneath his arms. Her talons sunk into his soft clothing with relative ease, and in one swift motion

She ripped both of Hank’s arms clean off.

Categories
Stories They are Smol

They are Smol: Invasion of Earth – Chapter 4

First Contact Procedures, broadly, were meant to do three specific things:

   (1) To ensure the safety and security of your home species

   (2) To determine the intentions and capabilities of the discovered species

   (3) To begin peaceful communications in a slow, deliberate way

And since First Contact Procedures were the part of the book that you scribbled notes over, that was basically the sum total of every mariner’s knowledge of them. To The Three Stones’ credit, it only took them 6 hours to gather their wits about them, and another 2 hours to find a serviceable copy of that particular chapter in their handbook, but once it was put in the Matron’s talons the bridge moved like a well oiled machine.

Step One: Ensure the safety and security of your home species

“|Engineering is go. Routing connection to Shepherd.|”

Step One was to scatter a subset of drones and skip them outside of the system; of the ones that survived, ping one of them at random to connect to your home sectors.

“|Good. Ah, EM Lord-|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, the sound of soft metal pages being turned over and back again filling the pauses between conversation.

“|Nothing coming in. No additional gravity wells, but I’m certain there’s a passive detection sink-|”

“|Alright, keep your eyes open for re-enforcements. Navigation-|”

“|All telemetry set, ma’am. We’re clear for 4 vectors, plus a slow road to the target-|”

“|Good. Pilot-|”

“|Nothing, ma’am, but we’re shielded an-|”

Step one was very important – the most important, really, which is why it’s step one. You make sure to let your people know where the potential enemy is, without letting the enemy know where your people are.

With an innocent ping the Engineering lead interrupted the conversation. “|Connection through drone 12 established with Shepherd …Krri’ik’ti. Shepherd on screen.|”

Without any ceremony the visage of a grayed, aged Karnakian popped up on the monitor wall, a small bemused smile on his face.

“|Well, greetings and blessings to you, Matriarch Tr’Nkwi of The Three Stones. Let me guess – Run out of fuel? Or are your survey holds full already?|”

“|Shepherd Krri’ik’ti, blessings and greetings to you as well – no, nothing so simple. Are we – any movement?|”

“|Nothing|” EM Lord Itick’’t said, continuously scanning the skies.

Shepherd Krri’ik’ti frowned. “|-Ah. Pirates, I take it. Well, we’-|”

“|Shepherd Krri’ik’ti, forgive me for my bluntness – it’s first contact.|”

To his credit, Shepherd Krri’ik’ti paused for only a moment before looking somewhere offscreen, a flurry of undefined sound beginning to pick up behind him. “|And we’re…|”

“|Yes sir – as you-|”

“|Yes… I see. Incredible. You’ve been hailed?|”

“|No sir. Nothing.|”

Step Two: Determine the intentions and capabilities of the discovered species

“|I’ve passed this along straight to the Diarch’s offices; it’s an auspicious day, certainly, but they do border our space…|” Krri’ik’ti murmured, looking over the data. “|No hails, no warp signatures – we’re certain they’re not masking in corvettes with their other planets’ gravity wells?|”

“|We’re -|” Tr’Nkwi spared only a glance at EM Lord Itick’’t before looking back. “|- certain. Nothing. I have some of our crew studying previous first contacts, but-|”

“|Hm? Ah. My… colleague here suggests they could be farming culture, like the M’brujj. Did you verify that with- you did? Ok-|”

“|I’m sorry, the what?|”

“|The M’brujj – the sect and practice have fallen out of favor, but, a long time ago…sorry, the AI is still pulling the data into a heuristic thesis analysis, but they would apparently set up colonies on far-distant worlds, give them enough technology to be self-sustaining and have a certain standard of living, a way to communicate with the core worlds… and then just leave them there for a couple millenia.|”

“|What? Why?|”

“|Mmm. Pseudo-isolation would create unique cultures – actually this makes some sense – cut off from interstellar trade for so long, locals would be forced to innovate. After a few thousand years they’ve either made their own starships and come back into the fold, or they’re reclaimed by the Diarchy as a whole. Notes are exchanged and everybody benefits.|”

“|That would explain why we haven’t been hailed; They probably don’t have an active array.|” EM Lord Itick’’t interrupted, continuing to scan. “|Without an active array, the only direction you can beam is right back home.|”

“|So… they’re a stranded colony until they figure out what our intentions are.|” Mused Tr’Nkwi, studying the blue-green orb projected on-sreen. “|Stranded at least, until the core worlds check back in with their colony.|”

“|They probably thought they were alone.|” Mused Shepherd Krri’ik’ti, looking over the expanding data thesis. “|That would explain why they broadcast on all spectrums; nobody else is around to hear, so why worry? And what stupid band of pirates would attack an entire colony world?|”

“|So, what are we looking at here in terms of capabilities?|”

“|Mmm. Mostly-unified species, most likely. From what you’ve shown us… a middling colony. Plenty of population centers, farms – probably just another colony copy of their core worlds. AI’s giving it a 94% chance within acceptable deviations.|”

“|Alright. So what’s next?|”

“|Well. According to my never-before-opened copy-|” Shepherd Krri’ik’ti chuckled, holding up a pristine, ancient manual, “|-we’re to form an Armada through the Crusade. That’ll be… checking the deployment maps here – with the jump data you’ve given us, say, another 3 days?|”

Step Three: Begin peaceful communications in a slow, deliberate way

“|I see. Shepherd, I don’t like sitting still-|”

“|Oh, no no. This glory falls upon you – we can’t… no one would want a strange ship sitting still in their system for days. You’re to make first contact; exchange gifts, pleasantries, show them we mean no harm. Probably once you let them know you’re just a simple survey vessel they’ll welcome you with open arms.|”

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi laughed mirthlessly. “|And if they don’t?|”

The greying Shepherd looked flatly at the Matriarch. “|Well from what we’ve deduced they have no in-system fleet, so it’s not like they can stop you from leaving. And if they do…|”

The Shepherd’s stare grew noticeably colder. “|That’s what the Armada is for.|”

“|I…see.|”

“|So. Take the most obvious route to their primary colony world, maintain communication silence until we show up – does your EM Lord agree?|”

“|I don’t like it, but I agree. The last thing we need is this species to backtrack our signals…|” EM Lord Itick’’t grumped, tapping a few more things into his console.

“|I don’t understand – I thought we were communicating securely – Engineering?|”

“|Ah – Ma’am. If they figure out where we’re beaming to, they could jump a fleet to that endpoint without us ever knowing – the drones are skipped out randomly. From there, it’s as simple as waiting for us to pick the wrong drone to update central on…assuming they don’t just dismantle the thing and backtrack us from there.|”

“|We’re masked by this giant lord’s-|” Itick’’t gestured to the gas giant idly as he continued to work “|- majesty, so this far out our communications have a wider variance; we’re harder to track and we’ll obviously know if we’re being tracked, what with a ship warping in and hailing us.|”

“|I see. And we’re certain that reinforcements will be here in 3 days? I just-|”

“|I’ve already received a processed order from the Diarch’s altars, with their personal seals. You will be getting an Armada of ships in that system in the next 3 days, and neither the silence of the dead or the void will stop them.|”

“|A…alright. Then with your leave, Shepherd, we’ll…|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi looked down at her manual before hesitatingly looking at her Engineering lead. “|…remote detonate the drones and maintain communications silence until the fleet arrives.|”

“|Aye, Ma’am.|” Engineering lead Strri’rii said, tapping a few buttons on his console.

“|Good luck, Matriarch. You have full authority of the Holy Diarchy behind you; fear nothing and stride forth.|”

“|I-I, what?|”

“|Yes.|” The greyed administrator said, his smile becoming somehow bittersweet. “|Until we meet again, you have full authority. Enjoy that while it lasts.|”

“|. . . Yes, Shepherd.|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, and bowed her head. The crew slowly followed suit, and in that silence deep in the void of space the only means of communications that The Three Stones had with their home, detonated.

Silence fell on the bridge once more, and in silence Trra’ira Piloted their ship towards an intercept vector to parts unknown.

“|~~~~*!|” Tk’il’a continued to trill through the tape that clenched his jaw shut.

Throughout Mankind’s history, there have been a plethora of bad people, bad ideas, and bad speeches.

Sometimes the three of them form a venn diagram of crap and somehow take off, and then you get Disco.

Sometimes just one of the three finds a home in a person, and they change the world forever. Lookin’ at you, inventor of the Interrobang.

But sometimes good people with good ideas can articulate them in terrible, terrible ways. Anyone remember that one guy who screamed during a US Political campaign and that just ended his career? Those were innocent times. There’s JFK’s “I am a doughnut” speech too. Of course, on the other end of the spectrum you have Marie Antoinette, or Idi Amin; terrible people saying terrible things.

President Carter was neither terribly good, nor terribly bad. He was pragmatic; he made deals, he kept the government running – something his predecessor couldn’t say – and he stuck to his morals, but wasn’t so inflexible as to make progress impossible. All in all, he was a decent President who would go down in history as the man who led the country through The Great Upheaval, as it would be known in the more academic circles, or “That giant clusterfuck” as it would be known to everyone else.

He would also go down in history as the man who gave the worst speech of all time. He didn’t know it at the time, of course; Standing at the dais with papers in-hand, he was expecting to go through a simple speech of reassurance to the populous, to raise their eyes to the skies with wonder, to ignite the fire of passion that lies dormant in the hearts of his fellow man.

What he did not mean to do was react to the news that whispered into his earpiece mid-speech that the Anomaly has moved and is coming here with the outburst, “What do you mean it’s coming here?

This was followed up by about 15 seconds of silence.

President Carter licked his lips. “Alright… so firstly: Nobody panic.”

This was followed up by about 15 minutes of frantic questioning, phone calls, police sirens and the mobilization of the greatest Military machine mankind had ever known.

“|I don’t like it.|”

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi leaned over her station, sighing heavily. “|You haven’t liked anything about this. You don’t need to keep reminding us.|”

“|No, it’s… It doesn’t make any sense.|”

“|It’s an alien mind – our best bet is to move slowly and deliberately – Pilot?|”

“|We’ll be in orbit of the binary planet system within the next 4 hours.|” Trra’ira said, smoothly steering the ship forward.

“|It’s more – wait. We’re…|”

“|Itick’’t I will rip out your tongue if you keep drifting off in mid-conversation-|”

“|Apologies Matriarch. I think we’re getting hailed. It’s just so difficult to determine – they’re not really using any specific EM band-|”

“|Well, put it up on screen-|”

Itick’’t frowned and did as he was ordered – and on screen were multiple, multiple scenes of carnage. Cities alight, aliens in the streets and thoroughfares – dressed in strange garb, doing strange things – others in uniform, firing onto the crowd-

“|Well that’s a riot.|” Security Chief Ri’tiki said, staring intently at the blue-clad soldiers on-screen.

“|Then we should hurry – finding out you’re not alone in the universe, this is probably traumatic for them-|”

“|Aye. That’s also…|” Ri’tiki trailed off as one of the points of view panned up, a few obviously militarized flying machines hovering overhead, while a few other aliens in fatigues spoke behind flagg’d backdrops. “|…interesting. Multiple classes of soldiers, possibly?|”

“|What do you think is happening? Are they militant – or is it more they’re trying to keep order?|”

“|Well-|” Ri’tiki scratched his cheek, pulling loose a few errant feathers. “|-we’re well within range of GIM bombardment, but we’ve detected no lock-ons or Maser fire or anything else, if my EM Lord and Pilot’s lack of screaming is anything to go by.|”

“|So more to keep order, you think?|”

“|I’d venture so. Keep order, fortify your most precious assets, let the guest call from the gate first. For all we know, their core belief system could demand they be alone in the universe, so there’s no telling what we’ve done to them.|”

“|Unfortunate… We should stay in orbit once we-|”

“|Ma’am, I don’t mean to interrupt-|”

“|Yes you do, Itick’’t. What is it?|”

Wordlessly the EM Lord put the planet back on screen – and zoomed in dramatically, past debris and archaic abandoned satellites, to…

“|What is that?|”

“|It’s a… I’m almost certain, it’s a space station, Ma’am.|”

“|That. That’s a Space station? Are you certain it’s not a passive relay-|”

“|Aye… ma’am. I’ve scanned and pinged it on every frequency that would make sense – it’s got no internal power. I’m almost certain it’s 100% solar powered-|”

Dumbfounded silence settled on the bridge crew yet again.

“|…it’s not solar as backup-|”

“|No, Ma’am. There’s no indication of any sort of internal power structure.|”

The bridge crew – and the whole of the viewing gallery – sat there, puzzling over this new oddity.

“|I…if I may?|” a small, quiet voice piped up. It was so quiet and so soft that normally it wouldn’t have been noticed, but as  the muffled trill of Tk’il’a had long-since become omnipresent background noise it stood out like a sore thumb.

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi turned her head and looked up at Junior engineer Ch’tki’ea, motioning with her hand to continue.

“|A-ah, um. What if… what if this isn’t a colony world? What if it’s their home?|”

Engineering lead Strri’rii snorted, crossing his arms. “|Really? The odds of that are so far outside of the deviation standards that it would… that would………|” he trailed off in silence as his mind began to work overdrive, sharing a now-terrified glance with his crewmates.

That would explain the lack of technology.

That would explain the lack of hailing.

That would explain the fact that there’s no orbital defenses.

That would explain everything.

Pilot Trra’ira swallowed dryly as he moved into orbit above a panicking, burning, roiling, primitive world.

Categories
They are Smol Stories

They are Smol: Invasion of Earth – Chapter 3

“Ok, I want you to – yes, drop that here please, thank you – I want you to say that again to me, very slowly.” The Man In The Tower said, waving his hand at his assistant. He placed the latest intelligence binder on the corner of the director’s desk and promptly walked out of the room.

“Look, Mike, I am not fucking with you here.”

“I know you’re not; you boys spot the Chinese up there before we do, and we appreciate that. I’m just-” The Man In the Tower cradled the phone receiver in the crook of his neck, reaching out to flip through the binder that was left on his desk. “-not really sure what to make of what you’re telling me. Other than a talk show tour and possibly a book deal-”

“No, no. Look, Mike-”

“Brian, what is it? Dumb it down for me, because I’m not really interested in ‘trans-orbital’ retrograde orbits or whatever; I’ve got much bigger fish to fry, and you know this secure line is only for emergencies or updates on Blackeye.”

There was an exasperated, nervous sigh on the other end of the phone, and Mike continued to flip through his intelligence report as his NASA associate collected his thoughts. The Russians were trying to destabilize what’s left of Ukraine after the disastrous pull-out-and-surge-back we attempted in Syria, the Kurds declared themselves a free state – finally – and Iran was now a nuclear state, which prompted Israel to drop their uranium dick on the table, but apparently the Muslim world was up in arms over Iran accidentally hitting the Dome of the Rock so there was a fatwa on-

“Aliens.”

“Fuck off.”

“No. I’ve checked with 15 other observatories – including overseas – and we’re all coming to the same conclusion, which is why we’re not telling anyone but you types.”

Mike put the binder down.

“This thing is – it’s like the size of Manhattan. Missing an asteroid that big would be a problem in and of itself, but it suddenly appeared in front of Jupiter. Not that we traced it to Jupiter – one frame there was the big bastard and the next was this thing. Nothing in this solar system moves that fast.”

“And you’re certain-”

We’re certain. I’ve sent over everything to you – raw data, our notes, everything – but we first thought it was an anomaly, or another exo-solar object. But…”

There was a shaky pause, and a deep breath.

“The fucker moved, Mike. It moved against the orbit of Jupiter’s moons. This means it’s powered; it’s not gravitationally locked to the planet. It appeared, and then from an impact trajectory the thing moved away.”

The Man in The Tower leaned forward at his mahogany desk in Langley and closed the folder with his free hand, the phone receiver pressed hard against his ear. Before he could ask his next question his door opened; his assistant gave him a very very concerned look… and held another stack of papers.

“. . . Who else did you say saw this?”

It wasn’t just the boys out in Mauna Kea who noticed – not by a long shot. The Hubble picked it up, of course, but so did SWIFT, Astrosat and BRITE – though that was due to a transit detection and was mostly accidental. CERN was concerned over what they were getting readings of and started to ping various agencies asking some very pointed questions, and AGILE – well, AGILE went absolutely apeshit.

The problem also wasn’t just that a few major governments of the world picked up “The Anomaly” – as The Agency would initially call it; Hobbyist astronomers numbered in the millions worldwide, and at any given time there’s at least a couple hundred telescopes pointed at the King of the Planets to stare in awe at his majesty.

The fact that a city-sized ship blocked their view of the Great Red Spot for a brief moment wasn’t lost on any of them.

And sure, it started with the initial round of tabloid gossip rags picking up the story, “ALIENS VISIT JUPITER – BAT BOY STILL AT LARGE” and a few morning talk shows had some shaky home-camera footage of a bright white dot appearing and disappearing before the Great Red Spot – but for the first few days, it was mostly ignored. Various Internet outlets printed their own take on the amateur photos, a few suited astronomers made the rounds, and things were being relatively suppressed.

Then the leak came.

No, it wasn’t because of any sort of treasonous behavior on an astronomer’s part – by now, multiple high-level calls had been made between various domestic and foreign ABC agencies, and pretty much the entire earth intelligence community was on board for operation “lowkey panic while the nerds figure out something goddamnit”. Operation Lowkey also had the fun side effect in the astronomical community of “we’ll murder you and everyone you ever loved if you breathe a word of this now above-top-secret information to anyone” with a dash of “We’re giving you all new harddrives; put your old ones in the bag please.”

No, the leak came because the fucking ship whipped back around into view.

Itick’’t was frowning – this in and of itself was nothing new; he was a bit of a sourpuss, all things considered, but that’s what made him endearing… at least, that’s what some of the older crew who had grown used to his prickliness said. The younger crew just called him “Taskmaster” or “Sir” to his face, and some other things behind his back that aren’t fit to print. However, everyone put up with him because he was damn good at what he did. And what he did was… well, a bit of a nebulous concept.

He was the ships’ ears, but not really. He was their eyes, but not really. He was their lookout – except, well, not.

Itick’’t was the ships’ EM/ECM Lord; his job was to make sure to clean up sensor data, to make sure everything was reporting as it should be, and to catch any sort of glitches that would indicate someone was hiding something that they didn’t want discovered. He’d been serving in this capacity for well over 500 years, and had seen many many tricks in many books; anything from spoofed credentials and masked ship wakes to false-star EM transmissions and Well-dropping. Itick’’t was frowning because he finally, finally was running across a trick that made no damned sense.

“?w-$$#@ f-8*&!$.?”

Itick’’t added that new transmission to the bank that he was developing, having his AI churn through the data looking for reason. The fact that it was sapient-made was of no argument; he had immediately masked each of the transmissions from the rest of his colleagues’ sensor inputs because for one, he didn’t want to distract them, and two he didn’t want anyone who may be watching to know that he knew.

“?390u —*_* _— 1@$#A`~?”

Itick’’t flicked the next transmission into the bank and erased it from the ship’s combined sensor suite. What was making him frown is that, usually, people tried to spoof very specific things in very discrete ways; to just blast reams of useless data on almost every spectrum…

“?E**— sd@@1@ #$@ !*>> ,<@!1!e?”

It was stupid. You’re basically screaming to anyone with any sort of sensor suite “HERE I AM RIGHT HERE LOOK AT ME” – And that blatant signaling was coming from everywhere. It was bouncing off of the gas giant they orbited, it was ricocheting from satellite planetoid to satellite planetoid, it pinged off of every asteroid and comet, and echoed from the cold planets that were lazily tugged along by their home star’s gravity like errant children.

“|Navigation, what’s our status on mapping?|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi asked, idly flipping through screens of data on her command station.

“|This giant is fussy, if Itick’’t’s frown is anything to go by-|” teased Rr’it’sqk, tapping through a few screens of her own. “|But he cleaned up the data enough that we’ve got a 77% confidence of mapping everything out there. The holes will be filled by the AI, but the major navigational hazards are all laid out.|”

“|Good. Piloting? Any reason we can’t spin around and continue mapping?|”

“|Negative, Matron. All systems are Blue on our end – the lord has cleared out his nest, so we shouldn’t hit any errant debris.|”

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi spared a moment to look up at the assembled juniors who were excitedly looking over the new telemetry and astronomy data, and smiled. What was it – 300, maybe 400 years ago she was in that same seat, peeping happily over seeing her first binary comet…

“|Well then, with your leave-|”

Itick’’t grunted. It was a little thing, but Tr’Nkwi didn’t get promoted to Matriarch over ignoring the little things. A silent conversation was opened forcefully on a certain bridgeworkers’ implant.

‘|Yes?|’

‘|I don’t like it.|’

‘|What don’t you like?|’

‘|I don’t know.|’

‘|Itick’’t-|’

‘|Be aware, we’re not the first here. Outside of that, I don’t know.|’

‘|I see.|’

“|Strri’rii, what are our capacitors at?|” the Matriarch asked innocently – innocently to everyone who hadn’t served with her before. A slight, imperceptible ripple of tension went through the crew, and a few sub-routines began to be silently enacted.

“|Capacitors at 85% Ma’am; We’re clear to run on stored power if necessary.|” The Chief Engineer said, his talons clicking a bit too fast over approving various subroutines.

“|Trra’ira?|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, addressing her chief Pilot.

“|…Shields are up, in the off chance we hit an errant comet.|” Trra’ira called out, his hands gripping the control sticks firmly.

“|Rr’it’sqk?|”

“|We’re clear to navigate around the planet, and even backtrack, if we have to.|” Rr’it’sqk said, her co-navigator Tw’Rria silently and furiously calculating emergency jump routes.

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi spared a moment to look up at the assembled juniors who were excitedly looking over the new telemetry and astronomy data, and smiled bittersweetly.

“|Trra’ira, please bring us around.|”

The ship lurched forward, the idly-spooled engine driving the massive ship around the gas giant’s equator. Slowly, imperceptibly slowly, the giant went from dark, to twilight, to day as the ship rounded the equator. Dawn broke on the bridge, and the entire crew was bathed in the white light of the lone star.

Nothing happened. No blueshifted missile headed their way, no sudden shuddering of shields, no overload of the engine – no boarding craft or pirates or mines or anything.

Matron Tr’Nkwi was looking at the newbies – for they had quieted down at the majestic sight – but also at her EM/ECM Lord, whose frown was only deepening. She saw him move in his workstation; he pressed a few buttons, toggled some switches, dismissed some screens and moved a few more inputs to his private implant – And then for the first time in the 300 years they had been serving together she saw something that made her blood run cold.

Itick’’t froze. He didn’t move a muscle, he didn’t blink – and if he wasn’t implanted with a health suite, Tr’Nkwi would think he stopped breathing. Itick’’t’s mouth opened, then shut, then opened again hung open.

“|EM Lord, Report.|” The Matron commanded to the statue, carved in the visage of her crewmate.

“|…EM Lord, Report.|” The Matron commanded again to the dead, as Itick’’t’s jaw moved up and down just a fraction, his normally-reserved feathers beginning to signal…something.

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi leaned forward in her command chair, summoning up the most authoritarian voice she could muster.

“|Itick’’t, Report to your Matron.|” She commanded once more, and once more she was utterly and completely ignored by a man in a trance. The commotion – and the lack of decorum from one of the more notorious hardasses of the crew, had completely and utterly fixed everyone’s attention. With a growl of frustration the Matriarch overrode his console, flinging whatever damnation that had transfixed him to the main screen.

“?-And we still don’t know what it was, Tim!-?”

Matriarch Tr’Nkwi froze, as did the rest of the ship. Suns stopped humming, moons quit their orbit and hung still.

“?Niisiis, kuidas me end selliste sissetungijate vastu kaitseme? Lihtne! Kinnitades oma keldri-?”

On the main screen, overlaid multiple times, were these… things. Yipping, moving, acting, talking things that were all jumbled up and moving into each other; transmissions overlapping dozens, if not hundreds of times.

“?-So then ask yourself, punk: Do I feel lucky? Well, d-?”

The Matron’s mouth hung open slightly, trying to form words – orders of what to do next. The one part of her training manual that was now in effect was the one chapter that pretty much everyone disregarded; First Contact Protocol. She had so many things to do, and they all needed to be done at once – determine the source of the transmissions, determine their intentions, calculate emergency warp skips and then randomize them-

A high-pitched musical note pierced the stunned silence of the crew, snapping them all out of the one-in-a-quadrillion chance they had found themselves in. Matriarch Tr’Nkwi looked around confused, until she tilted her head up-

Tk’il’a had expanded his feathers to his maximum size, his head was tilted all the way back fully exposing his neck, and his frills were standing on end. The grin that split his face-

 Matriarch Tr’Nkwi immediately growled a dangerous growl. She couldn’t allow-

The long trilled note continued unabated.

“|Tk’il’a I will ha- I will have you excommunicated if you continue to-|”

As his seatmates began to jostle him from side to side to get him to be silent, Tr’Nkwi came to a realization: It was too late. It was far too late. Tk’il’a was going to be insufferably smug, and they were all going to have to live with it.

Categories
They are Smol Stories

They are Smol: Invasion of Earth – Chapter 2

What the Karnakians learned long ago is that there’s no better teacher than experience.

Oh, sure, there was absolutely a time and a place for universities and other institutions of higher learning – especially in the theoretical or theological divisions – but when it came down to brass tacks, it was always better to have someone who’s spent 5 years failing and learning under supervision take the lead than someone who’s only read about it do so.

“|…and if we account for the drij of the planet we’re orbiting?|”

This was true for the simple things, like managing and repairing drones, interior decorating or cooking to the more complex, such as navigating a ship the size of a large metropolitan area around the gravity wells of planets and asteroids without altering their trajectory and causing unknown cascade effects that end up with an errant nickel-iron meteorite slamming into your colony 700 years later.

N-not that the Karnakians were speaking from experience or anything…

“|Um…|” Junior navigator Ch’irci tapped her talons against her workstation, eying the telemetry data in front of her. Everything here was an exact copy of everything a couple dozen floors up; the apprentice bridge functioned both as a great testing-area and a backup to the main bridge. The workstation she sat at – which they wouldn’t even turn on until she spent a month memorizing what all the buttons and dials did – was an exact copy of what she’d sit at once she finally earned her flight crests.

“|I’ll give you a hint.|” Second Navigator Tw’Rria said, pointing at the telemetry data. “|For this system we’re about to jump into, we want our gravity wakes to dissipate without causing navigational hazards. You’re a Ni’tikian?|”

Ch’irci nodded, looking at her senior curiously. Discussing religion wasn’t a workplace faux-pas, but it was an odd non-sequitur.

“|Didn’t one of the Arches say ‘if you throw a pebble in with a bould-’|”

“|-a boulder their wake is all the same. UGH we need to skip in within middle or low orbit-|” Ch’irci groaned, her feathered head-crest splaying flat against her scalp with a soft whump.

“|Hey! I knew you’d get it, rookie!|” Tw’Rria said, his face breaking out into a soft smile. A few of the other master/apprentice pairs spared a few seconds to look up at the duo before going back to their own teaching. “|So if we’re coming in close and we don’t want to ripple, we need to pick a large gravity well. Why the second-largest?|”

“|Now you’re just humoring me.|” Ch’irci moped, entering in navigational routes to the ship’s AI. “|The largest gravity well will always be the star or a black hole – neither of which you want to get into close orbit to. Second largest – as long as there’s a massive deviation between it and the first – will most likely be a gas giant, and therefore inert.|”

“|Top marks. You even dodged that little sandtrap I left for you.|”

“|Still. That was a first year question and I forgot. Against the dead, I passed that question in last week’s test!|”

“|Mmm. We all make mistakes from time to time – that’s why there are two navigators working at any time, after all. Besides, did I tell you the time about my first real flight?|”

Ch’irci continued to enter in her theoretical navigation data – flawlessly, she might add – as she inclined her head to listen with a frown.

“|So there I was, fresh from my apprenticeship on the Black Sun – and no, not that Black Sun, that was two thousand years before I was born, thankyouverymuch-|”

Ch’irci smiled softly as her senior continued to talk, the AI beeping back confirmations as she worked.

“|-and I sit down at my desk in full dress, because I wanted to impress everyone – never you mind that everyone else was in casuals, and I get my first order: “Confirm with Gri’’ti your preliminaries.” And get this:|” Tw’Rria said, leaning in close to whisper. “|I had been introduced to the whole bridge crew not 20 minutes ago, and in that moment I forgot everyone’s name.|”

“|No. NO!|” Ch’irci said, mouth open in shock as she turned to fully look at her senior, the older navigator reclining back out of her personal space. “|Yes indeed! So the entire bridge was looking at me, in my shiny dress-up, and I just sat there panicking. The Matron repeated her order, and I just started to look around for someone to say something. And guess what?|”

Ch’irci turned to face him, her work now forgotten. “|What?|”

Tw’Rria tapped the console that he was resting on, which sat not 5 feet away. “|Gri’’ti was right here the whole time-|”

Ch’irci couldn’t help it and burst out into a trilling laughter, her earlier shame long since forgotten. It took a few seconds for her to die down, and by that time everyone on the deck had given her their full, undivided attention – but it didn’t matter.

“|Th-thank you! Oh by the Spirit, that’s…oh my goodness I would molt on the spot-|”

“|Honestly, I almost did. And by the way, that data looks great. You accounted for the drij of our planet and the theoretical drij and ngri of the gas giant in the other system. If you don’t mind, I’d like to actually kick that data upstairs.|”

“|R-really?!|”

“|Mmhmm. It’s not perfect, mind you, but it’s 80% of the way there. And hey, it might shine a light on you, ay?|”

“|I uh – th-thank you, Taskmaster!|” Ch’irci said, bobbing her head quickly. “|I-I di-|”

“|And before you get any ideas, apprentice, you still need to finish telemetry for the seed probes. I’ll leave you to it?|” Tw’Rria said as he stood up, letting out a little grunt for the effort.

“|Yes sir!|”

“|Alrighty. Finish up your work and send the packet for your Taskmasters to review, and then you’re free until launch. The Matron wants all the apprentices to see how a bridge should work – and please, please make sure your friend doesn’t interrupt her again?|”

“|Y-yes sir…|”

The Bridge for The Three Stones, a Sacred Exploration Vessel, was both a working area and a bit of a theater, and that was by design. Exploration Vessels rarely dealt with anything too dangerous; being piloted by seasoned crew out-of-map cut out a majority of navigation errors, any pirates or illegal settlements discovered were immediately flagged by the ship as soon as they were discovered – and the ship immediately withdrew from the system – and if someone were so dumb as to think the long-range vessel were easy prey, well. There was always the security team filled with seasoned veterans and absolutely-bored-out-of-their-minds rookies.

Although some of the Security team were D’re’iasin all their public prayer confessions were always for the ‘safety and security of all the souls onboard’, Matriarch Tr’Nkwi personally believed their secret prayers were more along the lines of ‘please, First Soul, send us a small band of idiot pirates to break the monotony of this assignment’.

Anyway. The bridge was arranged in a “pit” of sorts, with screens all along the walls and a large panel of screens taking up an entire wall to the far “north”. Arranged in a semi-circle around the pit were seats; On the way out the rookies would sit and take notes and learn, and on the way back their Taskmasters would do the same as the rookies piloted over the already-discovered routes back to civilization.

“|Can you be-oww~!|” Tk’il’a said and immediately regretted as his tail was jabbed by a talon’d foot.

“|If you get us in trouble I will never speak to you again.|” murmured Ch’irci, making a point to not turn her head away from the recessed pit in front of her.

The Matriarch turned her head slightly – whether it was because she heard their little tiff or for another reason, Ch’irci didn’t know –

“|Spool Engines.|” she said, as she had said a dozen times before.

– Ch’irci let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding.

“|Engines Spooling – First breakers clear.|” A Green-clad engineer said from behind the Matriarch, his counterpart working with him in sync.

“|Cargo and Personnel.|”

“|All Cargo in stasis; All living cargo in stasis. All fields blue, all batteries blue.|” Called out a Grey-clad quartermaster from somewhere directly under Ch’irci. She was joined by another unseen voice. “|Personnel assignments set; all personnel accounted for. Emergency systems blue, but deck 12 has that glitch again.|”

“|No criticality?|”

“|Negative ma’am – no personnel stationed near the error.|”

“|Navigation.|”

“|Telemetry data set, checked by AI and within acceptable deviations.|” a Red clad Navigator said, his counterpart Tw’Rria making a note to pause his work to give a soft nod in Ch’irci’s direction.

Ch’irci’s crest rose unbidden in secret joy. It was her data!

“|Piloting.|”

“|All thrusters go, all pumps go, all shields go.|”

“|Acceptable dip in engine spooling; shield-debt paid in 15 seconds.|”

“|Gravity wake go, tensors locking-|” the black-clad pilot said to nobody in particular, his and his two counterparts’ eyes focused solely on their consoles. Throughout the entire ship a series of heavy thunks reverberated throughout the hull as locking mechanisms secured, bulkheads shut and the entire ship seemed to tense. It was a condition unique to exploratory vessels; by making the ship far more rigid and un-yielding there was a greater chance of surviving a direct hit from whatever small untraceable debris you could possibly collide with while jumping into an un-mapped system.

Well. Surviving is such a strong term. It was more “the ship should remain mostly intact and hey, your emergency unit pods are down the hall and to the right so stop complaining”. 

“|Shield debt repaid; Capacitors charging. 2 minutes.|” Engineering called out again.

“|-spine locked, gimbals are go. Clearing is go-|”

“|Packing atmosphere; void warnings are on.|” The quartermaster interrupted, as the isolated stations within the bridge began to work as one.

“|Acceptable dip in engine spooling; clearing debt in 5 seconds.|”

“|-navigation telemetry is fed into system. Looks good, Rr’it’sqk. Gravity well dampener is go-|”

“|Acceptable dip in engine spooling; debt cleared. Capacitors at 40%, debt Jubilee is allowed.|” Engineering said, and was immediately interrupted by multiple voices. Almost every station began to spool up their own systems and subsystems – all of them necessary, but all of them drawing from the capacitor banks as opposed to the spooling engine. After a few moments all voices died down, and there was only the humming of monitors, the shallow anticipatory breathing of the crew, and the Matriarch on her throne.

“|Sound off.|”

“|Engineering is clear for skip.|”

“|Personnel is clear for skip.|”

“|Navigation is clear for skip.|”

“|Piloting is clear for skip.|”

“|Cargo is clear for skip.|”

There was a pause. It only lasted for a moment, but it was just long enough for silence to settle like newfallen snow. The Matriarch looked slowly to the right, then to the left, and shifted a bit in her seat.

“|Lead pilot, at your leave, let us draw a new map.|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, a rare broad smile gracing her features.

“|Aye Ma’am!|” The lead pilot said, and his arm moved over his console.

Then, everything moved.

The feeling of initiating a skip jump was one of extreme, mind-bending speed. All at once you felt – or felt that you felt – the force of a thousand gravities for just a microsecond, and then…nothing.

Nothing at all.

The only indicator of their current speed and trajectory was the blindingly-fast passage of stars on the monitor wall. Everyone sat there for a few moments before the Matriarch hummed her approval.

“|Well done, everyone. I hope our apprentices were taking notes?|” Matriarch Tr’Nkwi said, her face all smiles – and immediately cast her gaze in Ch’irci’s position.

For her part, Ch’irci never nodded so fast in her life.

The drop out of “hyperspace”, if you will, was a lot more anticlimatic.

Imagine, if you will, that you have laid out fabric on a table. You take your finger, press down at one end and drag it along the surface. As you build up the ripples on the front of your finger, eventually you have to stop – as you’re dragging too much fabric – and you pull it smooth with your free hand.

That’s the basic premise of dealing with built-up gravitational ripples. All you simply did was kill your thrusters, stop feeding the engine power and your bubble of realspace quickly melded back into the rest of the fabric of the universe. That fabric – depending on how long you had been dragging your “finger”, I.e. the ship, would then snap back and ‘smooth out’ in your wake. You would, of course, keep your ‘realspace’ momentum, so adjustments had to be made once you snapped back into reality.

What greeted the Karnakians after a few days of travel was a large, vast and angry giant, with tormented winds and planet-wide storms. A king – nay, a God, floated before them, indifferent to their cause.

“|Magnificent. To think, we’re the first living beings to see this; the first to appreciate this gem of the One’s artistry.|”

“|I didn’t know you were one to be poetic, Tk’il’a.|”

“|Mmm. I am when the fancy suits me.|” He said, watching the giant take up more and more of the screen wall. “|I don’t want to call this one a foolish name. It needs something grand, you know?|”

“|Settle down over there.|” Droned Taskmaster Ri’li’’, tapping the hard-light screen with his indicator. “|We still have work to do – we came in on the end of this gas giant’s orbit, so we’re piloting to it’s dark side to begin our first round of scans due to overshooting. Navigation and Piloting will need to be paying attention-|”

A few side-conversations quickly died down, and Taskmaster Ri’li’’ continued. “|- and our cargo and personnel will need to make sure our fabrication capabilities are at speed. We’ll begin active scans once we complete our orbit and park; you have 5 hours before we need to work, which should be more than enough time.|

“|Maybe…|” murmured Ch’irci, before tapping her friend on his arm and pointing to the screen. “|Oh! OH, what is that?|” Ch’irci asked as a large and angry red swirl became illuminated by this giant’s lone, faraway star.

“No, I mean, What the fuck is that?” Allen Trazinsky said, tapping his finger so hard into the LCD screen that the crystals distorted.

“Meteor? Hell, we didn’t see Shoemaker-Levy 9 until it was already on a collison course…”

“No. No no no no no. This thing is fuckhuge. Look at it, Brian-”

“I… yeah, yeah. We sure that’s not an error? What the absolute fuck-”

I know, right?! This has to be another exo-solar object-”

“Or else we’re missing a fuckton of world-ending meteors out there. Shit, it’s big enough to be a planetoid! No, no…” Brian Jheske said, swatting away his coworkers’ finger and looking at the data. At any given point of the day or night there were at least 10 institutional telescopes pointed at Jupiter, and that wasn’t counting the hundreds, if not thousands of professional-grade hobby telescopes hard at work staring at the skies.

“Do you think the boys over in SALT or GTC picked this up last night? It’s… what, 15 miles across? 20? Do we have any more data?”

“I don’t know, but we better make some fucking calls.”