CIS Outpost Omicron-Corsas
The "Tri-System"
The Irrulan System, Amaron Quadrant, Vidur Sector
NOV 7 2819/2819.311; 0115 Hours (GFST)

“Commander Hassan...?"

Commander-in-Chief of the Tri-System Central Intelligence Services and the Galactic Federation’s Thirty-Third Fleet, Space Marshal Ser David Hassan put the coffee mug that he had brought over from his shuttle down on the console. He sauntered over to the young lieutenant’s post with no real urgency, little in the way of emotion visible on his face, although he did take notice of the fact that all officers on the deck appeared nervous, almost shaken or scared. Hassan had a bad feeling. "Yes, Lieutenant, what’ve you got that’s so important you needed to wake me up and drag me halfway across the system?"

"You’d better see for yourself, sir..." The timid Lieutenant JG tapped a few more buttons, initiating the small holographic display near the head of his station. Particles of blue, red, and yellow light were seemingly ripped out of the air, twisting around one another and gathering into a hazy translucence. Projected in full Tri-D glory the spinning image of a humongous capital ship hung before the two men. Beneath the projected image a line of text blinked on and off, "Unknown classification."

"It was picked up by one of the deep space probes a couple hours ago, then it jumped out... telemetry looks like somewhere in the outskirts of the Leo Minor Sector." The Space Marshal figured that put it near the Landreich Territories, not far from the Hralgkrak Province of what had once been solely Kilrathi space.

Hassan sighed. "You did the right thing to call me here personally. What’ve we got for the dimensions on that thing?" He chastised himself for asking a question he already knew the answer to. He could already presume the capital ship was large, for it had probably been built by a race that was not known particularly for doing anything small.

The youth swallowed back his fear. "Ninety-two point three kilometers in length, forty-one in width, with a mass of eighteen billion metric tonnes..."

Hassan, as did the crew, already knew the juggernaut’s likely origin just by its design. It essentially looked like a sleeker, more menacing, obviously significantly larger Steltek Marauder-class dreadnought. The dark gray interwoven struts and conduits were there in its multiple mile-spanning hull, all of it coming together with perfect, demonic symmetry. The glowing orbs were there, too, strewn about its surface randomly, casting their neon green light over pock-marked spots on the craft’s hull. Curiously, instead of the single glowing pyramid structure in the center of its dorsal side from which ship-killing plasma bursts were belched there were three—one on each of the two curved sides and one directly in the center. It didn’t have quite the dimensions comparable to a planetoid like the V-shaped Planetship-class ship killer that destroyed Earth in 2795, but it seemed every bit as deadly, if not more so.

The Space Marshal asked another question he knew the answer to, "I trust you’re seeing the same similarities in design that I am, Lieutenant?"

"Yessir. Unfortunately."

David Hassan took a seat, a hand on his cheek as he looked out the main observatory viewport into the abyssal darkness of space, debating his next step after receiving such news. He thought of his wife, decades dead. She had been his pillar of support, his source of strength when the pressure was on him. He was committed to his duty, but Cheryl had been his committed voice of reason and purpose. With her by his side, he had always done what he believed to be the right thing for the right reasons. Now, he was concerned he might undertake a rightful action for the wrong reasons. But she was gone, her voice echoing only from his past, and his next move would be all on him now.

The Commander, masking his insecurity with his natural voice of authority, began dictating his thoughts to the young officer and the two Federation liaison officers that were among the senior staff. "As you’re aware, the Tri-System and Vidur’s Amaron Quadrant are well within the confines of Neutral Space, under the compartmentalized jurisdiction of our own CIS Militia, with me as the CINC. As such, it is not my duty or any of this crew’s duty to inform the Federation of what we have seen."

His statement was immediately contested by the young, fearful lieutenant. "But sir, this is a valid threat and if we do nothing—"

Hassan knew his duty: to maintain the peace within the Tri-System by serving as stationary reconnaissance. He was to gather information to ensure the welfare of the Tri-System. As for the Federation, any information he wanted to give them was officially under his discretion.  "It’s our call. The Federation is on the verge of a civil war, Lieutenant—"

The Lieutenant continued, "Sure, the Senate has had its share of squabbling, but—"

One of the liaison officers, a Varni named Rilnath, interrupted, crossing his arms, "But the ideals that looked so promising to its peoples are losing their edge and motivations. People are seeing them for what they are—dreams." Hassan had cut a deal with one of his contacts in the Federation to assign Rilnath, who had grown up in Neutral Space, as one of his liaison officers. A former intelligence operative, besides Hassan he trusted on one, especially anyone from outside the CIS. While they had both grown up on two different worlds and led two different lives, he and Hassan agreed on most measures that ensured the security of the Tri-System.

Rilnath carried on in a vindictive tone, "The Steltek War united the galaxy... and then we had our peace for a while. That peace—that unity—was paid for by the loss of Hades, your people’s homeworld along with several hundred thousand lives on your side alone... nonetheless, it united the galaxy. Perhaps...” He posed his wonderment to the rest of the command crew, "... another such engagement would have a similar effect?"

Hassan looked about the morning staff. “We need to ensure the security of our people in neutral space. That bastard is out of our fields and barreling toward the Landreich. Let them handle it,” he paused, “Our job, yes, is to at least support the Galactic Federation. By leaving them uninformed of this incident, an ‘engagement’ may occur later on that will have the end result of strengthening the bonds of peace that hold the Federation together. By not acting, we are doing the right thing for the right reasons. We will keep this to ourselves. Is that understood, people?"

"Are we going to let another trillion lives be wasted by the Steltek just to ensure a few more decades of peace?" a communications officer asked in the distant background.

He turned around to stare grimly at the source of the far-off voice, "And, young woman, are we going to let the Tri-System Peoples die because the Terrans, Kilrathi or even the fucking Mantu decide that this territory belongs to them? I would rather have the Federation worry about the Teks, rather than any invasion by a rebel faction."

Murmurs of agreement were his response.

"Good. Keep this quiet and we won’t see our families get hurt." Hassan let his shoulders sag, whispering inaudibly, “Not any more than they already have.”

RIS Lancelot; Cockpit
The Spinward Galactic Rim
The Chakram System, Kruger Quadrant, Leo Minor Sector
0235 Hours (GFST)

"Okay, so the sensor array isn’t really the top-of-the-line," Jarek admitted. "I mean, this is just a pleasure yacht."

"You know, I really haven’t had much pleasure so far," Shannon Blair growled.

"Calm down, kiddo. I had a lot planned until that shockwave. That sucker was shook us like a bucking bronco, and the Lancelot wasn’t even a stone’s throw near the epicenter."

"‘A bucking bronco?’ ‘A stone’s throw?’ I don’t get half the metaphors and expressions you use... just like my dad."

"Christ, I sound like that old goat, do I?" Jarek smiled at her only to receive a blank stare. "Well, you take whatever object that’s stuck up your ass, kiddo, and clean it, sand it, polish it, and then put it back where it was and maybe you will be a bit happier. Right now we have a bit of a crisis on our hands,” he noted, looking over the cockpit controls, "Oh, uh, anyway... these sensors aren’t that great, and all I have been able to deduce from the shockwave are some anomalous readings."

"Anomalous? Some great and holy hand just all of a sudden decided to give the entire system a good shake?" she said sarcastically.

"Well, I have found something else," he said, pulling up a cube-shaped chart of the system on the Tri-D display, "Do you see those blotches?" He pointed to a red mark contrasting with the emerald-lined grid of the system. "Some titanium, silicon, and coolants can easily be read from that blotch, indicating an explosion that came most likely from a CIS probe."

"And the other blotch?"

"My guess would be an auto-jump buoy. Whoever took that out wanted leaving this system to become a shade more difficult."

"Ah, Sherlock, and who or whom do you think decided to take a potshot at the probe? Could it possibly be one of the InSys punk riff-raffs that has it against The CIS Man? That could be any civilian vessel that came through here in the last couple hours."

The vaulted Son of Ricaud smiled a bit. "Look here,” he pointed to another display on the console readout at his armchair, “I am reading high levels of plasma around the explosion. That could be from the weapon or from the inner-workings of the probe itself. Also, the probe’s trajectory from the local outpost and onward goes to the debris of the auto-jump buoy. See, right there is an engine exhaust trail leading nowhere... it just goes on and on and stops. So our suspect vaporized the probe then shot out of here."

Shannon sighed, and for a long moment all that could be heard was the hum of the yacht’s engines. "So do you think that probe’s destruction and the shockwave are connected?"

"Stranger things have been tied together. But I’m the pilot of this little ship, and I’m gonna find out just what the hell is going on by following the trail left by whatever hate machine passed through here."

The Lancelot’s engines and thrusters flared brightly as she approached maximum speed.

Near Outpost Kruger Four
The Spinward Galactic Rim
The Mithra System, Kruger Quadrant, Leo Minor Sector
0250 Hours (GFST)

The Federate forces that were situated in the Mithra System knew something possibly bad was about to take place when the angry red vortex blossomed forth right on top of the large CIC exploratory station.

Any one of the three thousand war veterans assigned to Kruger Four knew what the vortex was. It was a bell toll of death, regardless of how many ships and fighter squadrons were present here and now in the system. They all had little hope. No one among the Federates would even dare say so though, because in the back of their minds they all held a small belief that they would be home with their families at the end of their shifts.

Slowly, ever-changing tendrils of murky tachyon-rich plasma clouds parted as the Throneship crawled out of the energy maw, which gave Kruger Four and its orbiting Phlegethon-class omnicarrier, the Tristam, enough time to scramble a portion of their active fighter wings. Quickly, from the Tristam’s main launch bay, a full interception squadron of F-709G Jackal fighters shot from one of the Federation’s most powerful vessels. The gargantuan vessel, which was shaped like the end of a Phillip’s head screwdriver, swung itself away with engines blazing from the station and toward the new threat. From the Tristam’s bow spat forth over ten antimatter warheads, followed by four streams of continuous salvos from its forward phase-transit cannons. Two full wings of F/A-1005 Thunderhawk medium fighters and A-305 Mandrake bombers sped out from the secondary launch bay.

Meanwhile, the Kruger’s defense grid was initiated. Panels on the outer hull slid open with triple-turreted Macrofusion cannons releasing atomically disrupting energies toward the imposing vessel. Near the lower ring of the ring-patched station a singular rotating capital ship plasma cannon fired shots meant to destroy entire ships.

Instead, those shots were merely absorbed into the Throneship’s shields. The Steltek vessel had already cleared the vortex and began a slow course off the port bow of the Tristam, whose assaults were having no noticeable affect upon the enemy. Most of the panicking crew nearly lost their composure upon discovering that a communications blanket had been cast upon the system, a morbid gift from the Steltek.

F-709G Jackal GFV-109 (Cavalier Lead)
0255 Hours (GFST)

Colonel Holson "Headhunter" Mannix led the Jackal fighters toward the Steltek Throneship, spreading into line abreast formation with accompanying wings of Thunderhawks and Mandrakes. They were spread out in a large and loose diamond formation. Above the wings’ position shot forth angry energy salvos of many colors, like a defensive blanket of fire to make sure the Throneship’s Drones did not pick them out of the sky from far off. Headhunter had to lead the pilots as close to the monstrosity as possible in order to make an attempt at slowing it down.

We aren’t supposed to win, he knew, we just need to buy enough time for the soon-to-be-refugees to get the hell out of here. Briefly, he thought of his father back home on Mithra Secondary. His old man had probably stopped his moisture farming in the dune fields near his house and was now looking up at the sky, wondering what was up with the fantastic light show. Maybe he had an idea that his son was out there somewhere, mixed up in the whole thing.  If he were to know the truth at that moment—

He forced the speculation out of his mind and concentrated on his fighter’s controls. Through a twitch of his eye he interacted with his optical control interface lens, or OCIL. With a small amount of routine, almost instinctual concentration he routed a good amount of extra power from his engines to his main gun: the Multiphasic Disruptor. He had only used the weapon in a test fire while sim-training and he never thought he would need to use it any day of his career.

But today was a very different day—his last, the Colonel determined.  

A green dot blinked in the corner of the OCIL’s vision-screen, along with a beeping tone. A message menu appeared: "GFS Tristam to Cavalier One: make sure your squadron repels any Drone ships you may encounter, but your priority is to—" the CAG’s gruff voice and craggy face cut to a blank image as the communications blanket was imposed upon the Tristam.  Headhunter hoped his people knew what to do—follow his lead. Before they had been rushed out of their barracks, a small blurb from the CAG had notified them of the situation ahead of them.

Holson remembered the words... "A ship of an immensely powerful alien race is here with weapons charged, ready and eager to destroy anything that even breathes near it." It had sounded like a joke, but it did not take him long to realize old Commander Drohmir wasn’t jesting. Regardless, that was all he needed to know, and not much else would help him or his people at the moment.

When the first of the Jackals and the other wings’ squadrons cleared twenty thousand kilometers the Throneship towered over them, three pyramid-shaped plasma emitters casting their foreboding neon-green glow over his squadron’s fighters. They soon, however, became the least of Mannix’s concerns.

Two compartments near the front of the vessel’s underbelly, which overshadowed all of them, slid open unleashing an innumerous horde of Steltek Drones. The ovoid vessels screamed out, moving almost jauntily toward the Federation fighters like bees from a hive. Already each of the enemy craft began spewing hot destructive plasma at them.

Even if Holson could communicate to his squadron mates, he never would have had the time to. Immediately the squadron had been outnumbered ten to one, thus several of the closer fighters faced immediate destruction. His fighter soared through a wall of gaseous flame that had only seconds before been half of his squadron. Immediately, another element of Jackals broke off and reformed on Headhunter’s wing. Beams of plasma-saturated light crossed over, under and to each side of Mannix’s position, followed by countless Drones.

Without a targeting solution he fired the Disruptor and watched the concentrated pulse slam into a Drone that had been pursuing another pilot. It hit the Drone hard enough to shake it off its course, giving his squadronmates enough time to release a volley of over thirty Advanced Dart Dumbfire missiles upon the enemy and its surrounding area. One missile, then another, followed by three more tore apart the autonomous Steltek fighter and turned it into a spinning pyre of death. Just as the flames cleared though, over five more Drones darted toward the colonel and his team.

"Aw, shit! Motherfuckin’ Teks!" Holson cursed, pulling his ship up into an ascending role from the underbelly of the ship, hoping to outmaneuver or outrun the next wave of Steltek Drones. To the starboard and port sides of him, both of his wingmen burst apart under the enemy fire. One plasma beam upon another collided with his fighter’s shields and then its armor... and with another well placed shot the Jackal squadron leader was sent careening into the dark abyss of space. Seconds later, his ship’s systems overloaded and he met his ultimate end. After taking out the rest of the Jackals, three-fourths of the hordes retreated into the alcoves of their Throneship.

Slicing through the fresh, twisting debris of their wing commander’s fighter were two squadrons of Mandrake bombers. The horse shoe-shaped vessels yawed as their rear tachyon guns railed out salvo after salvo toward a horde of over twenty in chase. As the distance between the two groups decreased, one Mandrake pulled away from the fleeing group. Drifting back toward the following horde, the pilot pulled her “Nuke’Em” device. One large expanse of white radiating light took out over a hundred Drones in one fell swoop. All of the rest continued to bear down upon the few and fleeing Mandrakes that had already released their ordnances.

Even throughout the quick sortie, the Throneship had never slowed or fired a shot itself. Stranger still was the fact that both the Tristam and Kruger Four were firing everything available at the juggernaut. With a quick burst from one of the dreaded ship’s emanating gemstones, a large plasma pulse was flung toward the Tristam.

Another horde of Drones had been distracting the omnicarrier’s fire, so it was already too late for the defense grid of the ship to lock on and fire upon the pulse. Jarring the powerful vessel off her position the plasma bolt dissipated over the upper port section of the starship, dispersing over the layers and layers of ablative armor covering her. With a shimmer her shield’s died.

Meanwhile, the remaining spaceborne fighter complements of the Tristam and Kruger Four could do little to prevent their bases from being hammered as several more hordes were released upon them, their streams and streams of plasma decimating a few fighters every second.

Exploding ships, soldiers dying, and futility all became the norm. Hope was now the rare case.

The hull of a stray F-3500B Excalibur bore a crippling plasma wound, accounting for its quick, lazy, unstoppable spin toward the omnicarrier. At her velocity, the damage to the Tristam would be worse than a capital ship missile. Even if she ejected, the remnant hulk of the Excalibur would still hit her home ship. The Steltek Intelligence knew this, and would not send one fighter to put the Excalibur pilot out of her misery. The Federate pilot, knowing this, set her fighter’s matter/anti-matter engine matrix off balance, effectively imploding the vessel into nothingness.

The Drones had taken the battle to the fighter wings.  Any fighter that left one of many launch bays had less than five minutes to live. The Mithra Engagement was now fated to be technically known as the Mithra Massacre.

Another plasma burst spewed from another one of the three pyramid structures placed on the Throneship. Without hindrance, the emerald teardrop-shaped pulse slammed upon the Tristam, causing all of her eight Hydrogen-Deuterium-Tritium fusion reactors, along with her synthetic Cynium power plant core, to massively explode in succession. The lengthy starship was soon swept over with a current of flame and destruction, making itself a brilliant star in the abyssal darkness of space. The tides of flame were followed by tides of burning, jagged metal.

The Kruger Four station had even less of a chance of survival. Already hundreds of civilian liners and shuttles were abandoning the station in hopes of evading the battle, but their escorting Excaliburs were become fewer and farther between as they too were bitten by the Drone Hordes. It was only a third or so of all the civilian vessels that left the station that actually made it anywhere near the jump point out-system, though their escape was in vain as their Steltek assailants saw to it they got no further.

No more handfuls of fighters escorting any escaping vessels to be worried about, the Steltek fighters concentrated on the all-but-abandoned Kruger Installation. As the fighters swarmed over the station, the three green pyramid structures of the Throneship began growing furiously bright, emanating not only light, but a determined and focused hatred. Vindication was at hand.

Three plasma pulses blasted in succession upon the starbase. The entire structure shook as a gaping hole was created clear through the station’s central axis. First, little flickers of flames rushed out of the hole as fractures cracked and webbed up and down the outer hull. The flames licked out of the breaches and finally a burst of fire and a waving inferno reached toward the top of the superstructure.

Within three minutes the Throneship was heading directly over the desert moon Mithra Secondary. One last transport trying to escape certain death was cleared out of the sky with a single pulse from the emerald executioner.

"HEATHENS..."

The Throneship spoke with the traditional monotonous voice, a voice so devoid of emotion, or hate, or peace. It was a voice indifferent of the fear and pain that the species itself had wrought in the past.

"KNOW THAT OVER TWENTY STANDARD TERRAN YEARS AGO, YOUR FILTH BATHED OUR WORLDS IN FIRE AND DEATH."

Another compartment opened from the underbelly of the dreadnought, spilling out small ovoid capsules over the tan sphere below it, resembling a thick, choking dust. Quickly small flares lit up the upper atmosphere as the capsules entered the realm.

"NOW, THE TIME OF RETALIATION IS AT HAND. LET THE VINDICATION BEGIN ANEW."

The tan world was corrupted. Its air turned to poison, burning within the lungs of the Mithran citizens who had been unfortunate in their inability to escape their home. Dark clouds swept over the sandy dunes and wastelands, turning the bright world into a dark, dead moon. One by one each of the two million inhabitants of Mithra grabbed at their chests, gasping for air and life, and then puking up blood, toppling over each other as their lives ended dismally.

Welling up inside their gemstone housings the deathship unleashed three plasmatic energy beams that converged on the capital city of the moon. An intense incinerating heat poured forth from the blast turning the sandy planes of the body into rock-solid white-hot glass. Small microscopic shards of the cooling glass were lifted into the hot winds of Mithra, enveloping the once-beige planet in a turbid darkness of despair.

One-hundred kilometers above the dead colony the Steltek Throneship, never diverting course or slowing in speed, proceeded on indifferently to the pain and suffering it had just inflicted.

RIS Lancelot; Cockpit
The Spinward Galactic Rim
The Mithra System, Kruger Quadrant, Leo Minor Sector
0406 Hours (GFST)

"Jump transit complete. Scanning the system," Jarek announced, swallowing some air as he fought off the disconcerting feeling of jumpshock.

Shannon was securely positioned in the co-pilot seat, speeding the yacht up while initiating maneuvering thrusters. "I’m allocating power to the sensor array, weapons and engines." As she pushed and pulled a few gauge handles up and down, respectively, the internal lighting dimmed. Both their faces were lit only by the status screens of the cockpit controls. Immediately, massive amounts of statistics, figures, maps and other data popped up on the holo-displays and the monitors.

Jarek gasped heavily. "I could sure use some of your Pilgrim know-how about now because I’ll be damned if I have any idea just what the hell happened here. I’m picking up megatons of destruction-debris is all over the place. Definitely Federation standard material..." He paused. "Mithra, Mithra," he repeated over and over. "Wasn’t there some sort of mining colony here... y’know, with a support station in orbit?"

Shannon looked over at him, her eyes as wide as saucers. "I ain’t got that much Pilgrim blood in me, but a colony and station were here." She pointed at the sensor display. "But this debris is more than what the station could put out. A heavy capital ship must have been here monitoring."

Up ahead of the Lancelot, twenty thousand kilometers off, was a gray moon. Jarek frantically tapped at the sensor display, cross-referencing with the RicauDataNet. "The RDN has identified that stellar body as Mithra Secondary, a sandy haven for the Mining Ops’ families. Fuck..." The color left his face as he re-accessed the sensor readings. "Mithra Secondary is... dead. I am getting no life signs, and the normality of the atmosphere has been compromised—no oxygen, nothing."

Jarek slapped the console, making the display screens shimmer a bit. "These goddamn pirates! They’ve probably got their hands on some heavy-duty—"

Shannon swung in her seat to face him. "You think this is the work of pirates? A station, a heavy capship, and both their fighter compliments, all of them destroyed on top of a planet wiped clean!" Pushing back her hair over her shoulders, she sighed, and swallowed. "A force larger than anything local has been at work here. First it was that shockwave, which we still don’t know the origin of, then that debris we scanned before... and now this. None of the Galactic Powers in the galaxy could pull off something like this without it being noticed, except for the Steltek."

Jarek swiveled toward her. For a moment they both looked at each other, realizing the conclusion of their investigation.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Shannon’s wristwatch sounded, and she glanced at it. "I need to get back to Vukar Tag ASAP."

"But what about the Steltek? We’ve gotta tell—" Jarek began to protest.

"Shoot all the sensor recordings to your dad, guy, because it’ll be hell to get a hold of my old man." The Lieutenant sighed. "A transport off the Maelstrom is coming by Vukar Tag to pick me up personally, so I don’t want to be late."

Ricaud sighed. "Shannon, my father’s fleet alone doesn’t have nearly enough firepower to even resemble a threat against the Steltek. Most of his fleet’s meant to deal with pirates and terrorists, nothing bigger. If the information we’ve gathered so far was put into the hands of your father, the senator, he would be able to have a decent-sized armada thrown together in less than a week. We have to at least try and get a hold of him!"

Blair’s daughter concentrated for a moment, but shook her head. “No, no, I’ve sent message after message to him and he hasn’t even responded. Hell, don’t you remember he wasn’t even there at my graduation? He’s no longer part of the Fleet, anyway. The political arena is his battlefield now. It’s not that I don’t want to send this information to him; it’s that it wouldn’t matter in the long run. I’m sorry. But at least with your father’s attention something can be done.”

The Son of Ricaud stared hard into space... "Then I guess I will have to look you up on the Maelstrom sometime. Other than that, I guess I’ll see you when I see you."

Shannon stared down at her lap. "It’s been fun, Jerri. Although what we found here will scare the Federation Brass out from behind their desks... it’s been fun."

United Galactic Federation Capital

New Constantinople Starbase; Senator Blair’s Office
The New Constantinople System, Potter Quadrant, Gemini Sector
0912 Hours (GFST)

In the two hundred-degree wrap-around viewport behind his desk, the rising red sun of the system bathed the room in red light as the primary planet moved out of the eclipse viewpoint. The natural oaks and mahoganies that were the interior of the office glowed wholesomely. The senator took the office’s woodsy smell in through his nostrils, pushing his mind toward memories of Earth long before it had fallen. As he pushed toward those memories, he pushed away from the sorrow related to them. It was morning in Blair’s office.

Senator Christopher Blair, dedicating the morning to more frivolous pursuits, had decided to put off sorting through the quarter-meter high pile of paperwork and bureaucratic E-mail in order to sip pink lemonade and listen to an MP9 from The Best of tHE lOVE aNIMALS. He scratched at his dark, shiny beard, moving his mottled hand up to reassess the finely combed part in his silky white hair which was just as well-trimmed as his beard. His hand went partially numb for a moment as nanotechnological microbes fought off the sharp pains of arthritic spasms before they started. He had lived two lifetimes—in two incarnations, a fact he had fought so long and hard to forget—and in this one he had finally reached old age.

No longer did his thoughts drift to his ancient past. It was so long ago that it seemed his actions, within and without war, had not affected the outcome of anything, really. He once fought to save Earth... and yet Earth was no more. He once fought against the Kilrathi... now a considerable faction of them were still more powerful and threatening. He created his concept of the mightiest starship, the Midway... yet monumentally larger and more powerful vessels had become the standard of the GalFed Fleet. It was as if his first incarnation was somewhat of another person with thoughts and desires that in so many ways merely mimicked his own.

Time had changed Blair, taking his life not once, but twice. Though finally in this life, Blair realized, was he truly living. He had a wife and family. Ricaud; a good and dear friend such as Paladin had been. Wars and fears of entire races bent toward extinction or destruction played briefly in his mind as worries taught only by memory, but these fears did not consume him. 

Instead, now he bargained with the representatives of countless races to build a better future for all of them. Yet, that future was becoming unraveled thread by thread as the naturals of discontent resurfaced. Like the ouroboros, the snake growing and yet eating its own tail, the same diversity that wove the Galactic Federation together was now threatening to rip itself apart. Like that symbol, he hoped the Federation would be everlasting.

Was the apotheosis of a galactic government hard to come by even in this age?

Knock! Knock! Knock!

"Come in," he moaned, hearing the creak of the ancient-style hinge door. The senator remained facing the viewport. He didn’t need his honed senses (he didn’t like to think of them as his Pilgrim senses, but to the average Terran they were) to realize who stood behind him. The red light still poured through into his office, giving his face a pinkish hue that was much livelier than his naturally pale complexion. "Janson, do you have those Intelligence reports on Ceti activity for me now?"

Janson, one of his aides, a young Border Worlder perhaps in his twenties as far as Blair knew, was panting—he’d run to the office. "No, Mr. Senator sir, you may have—we may all have more apparent problems at the moment!"

With a verbal command tHE lOVE aNIMALS shut off. Blair swung around in his floating chair, "Talk."

Instead, Janson stepped up to the Senator’s desk, initializing the holographic viewer. The FCN’s leading news anchor, Karen Miles, was right on the ball...

"... And at this time we shall recap of the events of the past two hours—rioting by the thousands is in progress on key worlds of the Federation, including New Earth, the Mantu Hiveworlds, and innumerable planets in Hari Sector, all in protest of the what they believe are the restricting lines of Federation Law. Let’s see if we can get a shot of some rioting in progress—"

The emitter shimmered off the newsroom and to a bird’s eye view of thousands of Terrans, Kilrathi, Firekkans, and many other races flooding the streets around a central dome. In the corner of the holo-display flashed the caption, "Capital Dome, New Earth."

A twelve-meter tall marble embodiment of Commander Hintre Marsden, Confederate heroine of the Scatterbelt Wars, exploded into dust as a damaged air-taxi collided with it. Other monuments of past wars were climbed on top of and toppled over by some rioters, crushing others. Dormant air-cars were being rocked and vandalized, as city buildings had their windows smashed and their insides ablaze. Some of the rioters even held signs up for the camera to see, reading "Federation = Empire," "We Don’t Need to be One," "Unity is Slavery," and "Give Us Liberty!" among various others conveying the same message.

"My god," Blair whispered to himself, "this needs to stop."

Janson tapped in a series of numbers on the viewer’s keypad, "And these following incidents have been picked up in the Hari Sector. They’ve been kept secret for the past few days. Intell wasn’t sure about releasing this footage until they were finished with their investigations. They wanted you to see it first."

Chris was not surprised. Of the entire Great Assembly, he was the one who had served the most years in armed conflict. He knew they believed his ear was the most sympathetic toward the needs of the Federation Armed Forces.

The footage started with a view from a fighter’s gun camera drifting across the immensities of two Terran-built Concordia-class heavy carriers with an Andorran supercruiser in escort. Suddenly, the supercruiser fired a full volley of CSM projectiles at the heavy carriers, and in close quarters both heavy carriers were crippled irrevocably within a second.

The view shimmered again, reforming into an image of a full squadron of Kilrathi light destroyers, each less than ten percent the oppressing size of the nearby Acheron-class omnicarrier Odin. Weaving and skimming dangerous across the omnicarrier’s bow, their heavy beam weapons lanced across the hull of the mighty ship. The squadron targeted one specific area, concentrating all of their weapons on it. The Odin was unable to handle the barrage—suddenly lines of fire spread out from the critical area. The lines became infernal chasms as the ship named after the Norse god of war fell to her own Ragnarok. The emitter shut off.

"Oh, hell... it’s started." Blair gave off a heavy sigh. "Contact the Federation President immediately." With a quick nod Janson left in a rush.

Everything is spiraling, Blair thought, spiraling into oblivion...

The Senator heard a disturbance outside...

"I want to see Blair—you know, mate, ‘Heart of the Tiger’ ‘Pilgrim’ ‘Maverick’ ‘War Hero’... whatever the bloody hell he’s calling himself these days! I don’t need to schedule any damned appointment!"

"Th-the Senator will see you at his own convenience," Blair heard Janson’s voice. The young man had seemed thoroughly shaken enough when he’d come into his office. Whoever was confronting him outside was only making it worse. "Please, sir, I must ask you t—"

"He’s had over a fucking century of convenience to see me!"

The Australian-accented voice was all too familiar to Chris, yet he still could not entirely place it. Undoubtedly the voice belonged to a soldier, one of his friends, but throughout his life the old war hero-turned-diplomat had gained so many comrades-in-arms. Just as I’ve had lost so many, he reminded himself, Spirit, Shadow, Flint...

... Angel.

His memories finally caught up with him, in more ways then one, when he finally saw the "disturbance"—a young, ragged-haired, upstart pilot—dressed in a Confederation civilian uniform.

Christopher stood up slowly from his chair. For a brief moment he felt dizzy but the nano-microbes quickly caught up and the disorientation passed. He shook it all away, turning his gaze again to the man who stood before him. "Hun... Hunter?"

The pilot looked up at him with a squinty gaze, accounting for the red sunlight coming in through the port. "Jesus Christ, Maverick." Blair had not heard himself addressed by his old callsign in decades. “You got old! They kept telling me you’ve cheated death a couple of times but... but I never knew what it cost you. Damn."

The Senator, in shock, found he was unable to move his legs. He sat back down in his chair, retrieving another glass from his desk. Fixing his old friend a glass of lemonade with a shaky hand, he nervously shoved it across the desk. The drink glided to a stop at the edge.

Maverick looked at Hunter, analyzing him. Was he a clone like himself? If so, what was his purpose? Question after unanswered question ran through his mind as Ian picked up the glass, downing all of it.

"Ah, lemonade," Hunter commented with satisfaction. "Even before I died I hadn’t had one of these in the longest time. Just like I haven’t seen you in the longest time, ’Mav... oh, pardon me—Senator ’Mav," he said with a smirk.

"Time, Ian... time is the only enemy you can’t put a targeting solution on. Now I suspect you know that as much as I do. Aren’t you supposed to be sucking vacuum somewhere in Hari?" he mused.

Hunter smirked, pacing a bit, looking out the window behind Blair. "I was. They didn’t have it in my flavor, though." He paused. "I set my bloody foot back on the Land of the Living yesterday morning. These space miners found me floating out in Hari and took my body somewhere in Cat Land—for ‘reanimation’ the doctors called it. So a while later I woke up and everything I knew was gone. They replaced every fuckin’ frozen organ, vein, and artery in my body and along with those they replaced my life with... a clean slate. Blair, it’s like I died in my own age, my own time, and now I have a second chance somewhere completely new. Hell, I’m not English, and I’m not bloody Austin Powers.”

Blair did not know of this Austin Powers character, but he got Ian’s point well enough. "I realized that, too, when I sat down and thought about it after so long ago," Blair added. "Then I realized that what was in the past shaped the future. What we both did over a hundred years ago has helped make the time we are in now what it is. And what we did then is the same thing as what we can do now: shape a future from today. And for both of us, Hunter, today is the future."

He thought about it a bit. "And this future is in danger, Ian. I’ve spent almost thirty years piecing together this Federation you’ve been thrown into," he grabbed his walking cane that was more for form than function and pushed himself out of his chair.  He moved toward the captain. “After the Steltek War, I, along with many others, figured that if the races of the known galaxy can ally ourselves for battle and survival we could do the same for peace and prosperity. By absolving governments into one united front the walls created by nationalism, expansionism and racism would crumble. It was a dream," he grumbled to himself. "It still is."

"So how ’bout the dream now, mate? This thing, this goal you’ve dedicated yourself to?"

The old man shook his head, replying, "I should’ve learned more than anybody that no one can escape their past. The Kilrathi worlds are demanding the ships that they have built and have their people manning to be allocated to support their own worlds, for God-knows-what. The Andorran worlds are funding their own research agency that wants to explore other galaxies without being regulated by the Federation. Hell, the Firekkan colonies are just bitching that this whole Federation isn’t working at all!" he exclaimed, jamming the butt of his cane down upon the Peronian carpet.

Christopher looked up Hunter, considering that just minutes before in the back of his mind he had thought would never see his face ever again. "But it’s a good dream nonetheless, and one I will gladly spend the rest of my days trying to ensure. And I’m glad you’re going to be here for those days, old friend," Blair said, extending his hand.

Taking the handshake, Hunter smiled. "Well, Chris, since you believe so strongly in this Federation, then the Federation is where I think I should be, too. Fuck, it will probably turn out to be a lot of bloomin’ fun. So where do I start?"

Christopher, with a large grin, nodded his head. "I knew once you walked in that it would lead to this.  I’ve got to make a few calls to the right brass first, but I think I have an assignment ready for you: the Maelstrom, she’s a brand new Acheron-class omnicarrier. My daughter, Shannon, has just graduated the Academy at the top of her class... that means she’s good but she’s still a plebe nugget."

Ian nodded in agreement. "Who would have thought... Blair the Father. You must be proud."

"She’s a good girl," was all Blair would say to that end. "She’s been assigned to a squadron on the Maelstrom as far as I know."

Ian smiled. "I know what you’re getting at, old timer. You want me to keep an eye out for her?"

"Exactly. I can’t think of anyone else I could trust more."

The uproarious Aussie gave Senator Blair his best smirk. "You got it, ’Mav. It’d be my pleasure."