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Failsafe Kilo, once again. Technically, because the three galaxies it was situated around danced their own ballet in the galactic supercluster, the actual position of Failsafe Kilo constantly moved as well in order to keep it close to its standard position relative to those galaxies. Still, when looked down upon at the intergalactic scale required to give any meaning, added to the fact that the distances were immense and the galactic velocities specified were far, far below any appreciable fraction of the speed of light...
A point, out in the emptiness. Not exactly the Middle of Nowhere--Point Mon wasn't useful for much of anything, really, except for an extreme long-range observatory drone--as far from the Zone as it was feasible to make it, far enough from the Reavers and the Thaurians to make it relatively safe and close enough to them to make it a definite threat, as the superluminal sensors of warships there were close enough that sensor lag was not too severe.
Then again, threats need to be recognized, and now that Kilo lacked a Reaver sensor drone...
I got quite the view of the fallback. 'Bane introduced me to a little closet in the simulated English manor, explaining simply that it represented a connection to the IVSAR sensor network. There would be no physical harm in connecting, as the same amount of bandwidth and information was being shared in the environment simulacra; besides, she offered with a quiet smile, she couldn't let me feel useless. Honestly, the vacation was nice, but it was beginning to wear just a little; I was appropriately thankful for her intervention on the matter.
The curious thing about the IVSAR closet is that the symbology was notably different. Instead of simple blue icons for our ships, the vessels of Task Force GLAIVE appeared as their avatars, all kinds of images and types that expressed emotion and feeling unlike the simple shades of dots and simple polygons. Ares led the way by a few milliseconds, and the system followed her, jumping with a cat-like pounce onto Failsafe Kilo and looking around quickly, yellow eyes alert, green skin coiled. The area clear, she stretched out a bit and signaled to the rest who jumped after.
This wasn't known to the crews, I learned later, and 'Bane slowed it down for me. It was this quiet form of mutiny which made sure that we did not jump into total ambushes--the timing made all the jumps seem simultaneous to the crews but there are of course advantages for ship-minds to being able to think millions of times faster than those symbiotic organics that live inside them.
We took advantage of our position essentially out in the intergalactic void to use 'Bane's sensors to do some amateur astronomy. It actually was beautiful this far out, like it's beautiful to be in the middle of a desert at night--no pollution of any sort to obscure the brilliantly dusted sky. The experience was relaxing, most enjoyable... until we got the news.
"We've yelled at each other before, so I may as well just get this out," Odegi said with a frown. "You're a madwoman."
Chreeti cackled. "You really think so, Imcedi? I have plans, and things are following them quite nicely. Just you sit back, puppet, and I will show you a Concordat strong and vibrant aain with my efforts."
"It would be easier to believe you if I knew what some of those plans were! You're sacrificing our nation to the Reavers, we've completely lost control of one quarter of our galaxy, you're doing the bare minimum to keep Garbog from winning..."
"You fail to see in the long term," the Grand Inquisitor replies quietly, "that perhaps all these things are necessary. We are an older power than the Reavers, and we are a far older power than the Zone. Their day will come, then it will fade like so many others. Our strength is in our past and our scope. We can wait."
"This is still madness. Betting that far into the future is a sure bet on failure!"
"So you say. You will see--this will all work out in the end as Deslumbrador wills."
It has been said that there are two forms of paranoia--absolute and insufficient. It would only figure that the one time the Zone decides to skimp on paranoia for other reasons that it fails to pay off. Four octahedrons appeared, slipping in towards a quiet colony world on the fringe with weapons hot and defenses full. It was a young colony world, WZCS-2997/43, known to the inhabitants as "Where We Live," an obvious name no one had yet apparently thought of.
"Major," gasped a sensors technician, "we've got four hostiles inbound. Look to be Thaurian make, battlecruisers."
Major Vestel frowned. To call this a bad sign would be to make an extreme understatement. "Deploy the defense corvettes and get the civilians into the shelters. Get the garrison platoons ready to repel any invasion; send a message to secor defense command and get us reinforcements."
Pilots scrambled to their fighters, quickly hopping in, checking systems, strapping down and taking off. Insystem defense corvettes, gravitic drives humming softly, congregate with tiny squadrons of fighters and move to engage the battlecruisers. Standoff missiles launched, they moved to break away--and the battlecruisers tore apart the space between the two formations with gravitic and fusion lances, rending the third-line vessels to pieces as the missiles scatter off their shields. They did not then land forces or try to raid Where We Live.
Instead, the four capital ships entered stationkeeping over the colony and began to bombard.
Fleet Admiral M'Sharra of SEC12DEFCOM hissed with fury, quickly ordering roving cruiser squadrons to intercept. By then, it is too late--the Thaurian ships are gone and Where We Live is no more than wreckage.
"Total loss, ma'am." M'Sharra frowned as only a Kzroth can, a sort of reminder as to how severe that indicator of emotion can be. "We have several cruisers currently sweeping the area for survivors, but the few we have picked up insystem so far just adds support to the current story--Thaurians popping in and laying waste to the place."
This doesn't make any sense. Supreme Emperor J'hsen frowned as only someone in an extremely unwelcome position of authority can. "Understood, Fleet Admiral. Organize the sector defense forces for future incursions and probable counterattack."
"Acting, ma'am."
"This puts us in a spot," Wantanabe muttered, looking up at the strategic indicator. The former location of Where We Live now blinked a steady red, far away from the large blue arrow thrusting into the Reaver homelands.
J'hsen grimaced, brooding over her desk as she replied in a cold voice. "Get down to Military Services and tell them we have a second front on our hands. Pull away as much as they can from Pioneer and create a new task force, perhaps an expansion of GLAIVE, and then we're going to kick some ass."
"Just thought you might like to know, ma'am," the civil servant said as he took up a datapad, "it looks like SNC has just discovered that the Where We Live node of the matrix has fallen out."
"Damned netspiders," she replied with another grimace, "do they have any idea yet?"
"No, not yet. But it's only a matter of time before they send out some of their own news cutters and discover that we've got way too many soldiers and not enough civilians there for anything less than a complete disaster."
"Right." Leaning back in her chair, the Supreme Emperor closed her eyes and sighed. "I'll prepare an address concerning this. Thank goodness we actually have buffer space in the Nebulous."
Fleet Admiral Nibnumber looked over the new onion-skin thin orders hardcopy, then tossed it lightly into his jury-rigged inbox. "Well, it looks like we're busier than a steakhouse before Lent. Now you see why I had us only step back."
Ka-Ri raised a single furred brow. "Retaliation?"
"Inevitable. Now, we just need to figure out where to strike back, and hard. I want StratOff working on wargames and warplans. Pull as much runtime from Ares and the other ships of GLAIVE as they're willing to give up. The moment the boss gives us the call to jump, I want us to jump over the moon. Got it?"
"Ummm... just one problem with that, sir." Val's eyes glowed a mild red. "We don't know yet which faction did it."
"Well then... we'll just have to hit where we know there are enemies, hmm?" The human admiral grinned humorlessly. "Tell StratOff to concentrate on the Gee-Thirty shipyards. We've a bit of unfinished business there, I think... even if it is just a sideways strike on the way to something else."
"At nineteen-fourty-one Zone Standard time, we received a priority distress signal from the colony world of Where We Live on the edge of the Zone-Concordat demilitarized zone. They reported, and we have confirmed with surviving sensor logs, that they were attacked by four Thaurian front-line battlecruisers without warning or provocation. By the time Sector Twelve defensive forces were mobilized to react to this threat, the colony had already been completely obliterated. Over five million of our citizens were ruthlessly murdered by Thaurian ortillery.
"We do not know at this time which faction of the currently split Concordat decided to run this fools' errand. We will remind both the Imcedi and the Garbog of what happened the last time the Thaurians deigned to attack us without provocation. If we must, we will utterly destroy their capacity to wage war against us or anyone else in the supercluster in response to this act of needless aggression. Rest assured that we will prosecute the guilty to the full extent of our powers.
"At this time, the Legislative Unit of the Weirdo Zone is voting on an emergency resolution to declare a state of war against the Thaurian Concordat and authorize the Military Services to adopt whatever means are necessary to prevent a recurrence of Thaurian aggression in the future."
-- Supreme Emperor J'hsen, address to SCN, 3004
The Ancient One gasped. This was wholly unexpected. Could it be? Has the balance finally turned?
Imcedi Odegi suffered a similar response, albeit for an entirely different emotion as he felt his intestines tighten into knots under the dead weight of his viscera. He immediately shot a look at Grand Inquisitor Chreeti, who seemed perhaps momentarily insecure before taking on her usual arrogant visage and demeanor. "They have got what they have deserved. They cannot take on both powers simultaneously--"
"Have you just heard what she said, woman?" Odegi screeched. "We can't even take on our own power simultaneously. We're already host to a Reaver invasion, and now you want the Zone in on it too? I swear, your madness is the death of us."