Secrets crafted in the dark

Weapons made to hit their mark

We didn't know or consent

To the Hell the Black Box sent - Lyrics from Secrets in the Dark, from Tastes Like Ash and Lies, Stellar Orphans, 6285 PG

How many times was a war lost because some leader sat and stared at a new weapon, wondering if it will be effective, until the enemy walked up and killed them with an 'obsolete' weapon? While the will to fight is the most important factor, having proven and fielded technological advantages wins wars. - East Point Graduating Class Lecture, 2491 PG

To understand how black projects began, and how they continue to function today, one must start with the creation of the atomic bomb. The men who ran the Manhattan Project wrote the rules about black operations. The atomic bomb was the mother of all black projects, and it is the parent from which all black operations have sprung. - Andelie Jay'kobsun

What crawled out of Terra's grave, with grasping hands and gnashing jaws, red eyes full of hatred and malevolence, was worse than anything we could have ever imagined. As it grabbed and chewed, pulling the victim down into the cold earth, it always whispered the same thing as those burning red eyes stared into the eyes of their screaming victims:

There is room in this grave for you. - Hi'sstoriemo'o, Lanaktallan Terran Historian, 12 PC3

Victory or death.

Either is fine. - Graffiti found on most, if not all, Terran ruins.

The gate to the empty building and grounds were guarded by four warrior caste Treana'ad in special assignment dress uniform. Red uniforms with black edging, a tall furry hat, a white bandoleer holding ammunition, and an archaic chemical propellant rifle with a bayonet upsized for a warrior caste. One stood guard on either side of the wrought-warsteel gate, the other two marched back and forth, crisp exaggerated movements, passing one another at the middle of the gate.

Many tourists to Smokey Cone came to see the Bongistan Cyberqueen's Own Treana'ad Guard. The Changing of the Guard was especially popular.

The guards did not react to passerby, being recorded, or to speech or any other stimulus barring violence, which was always reacted to with sudden and shocking physically violent retribution.

The wall was heavy granite, dark in color and sullen in appearance. It was nearly thirty feet tall, with crenelations and a street side overhang. On the corners and along the length of wall were twenty foot wide towers. The towers were marked with autonomous gun drones as well as firing ports for any defenders the wall or the building beyond needed.

The wall basically said "Keep the fuck out."

Another contingent of Cyberqueen's Own marched around the wall, a squad of twelve, marching in perfect synchronization, the leader, an officer that rounded it out to thirteen, marking time with a Bongistan accent.

Despite the formality, ever visitor knew that the warrior caste troops were picked for their combat efficiency and dedication.

Parade ground troops with extensive combat experience, specially selected to an elite guard force.

They guarded the Smokey Cone Terran Embassy.

Unlike many of the species of the Confederacy, the Terrans had always believed in what some species sneeringly and derisively referred to as "The Magic Dirt Theory", which stated that the grounds of the embassy was sovereign territory of the nation or species the embassy represented. The biggest surprise to species who encountered the Terrans was that the Terrans believed that the other species should have the same rights, as long as some basic rules were enforced.

It was a political theory that other races gleefully adopted, since more than a few believed that where their leaders went, it was the territory of that species.

"Where the Queen is, is the People."

The embassy was Terran soil.

Which explained why the building looked like an archaic fortress that had been updated for modern times. Anti-aircraft launchers, point defense systems, battlescreen projectors, all dotted the walls and the visible sections of the roofs.

Not that anyone expected any different of the violent and paranoid Lemurs of Terra.

The embassy had been empty since the Terran Xenocide Event. A few tourists had claimed to see a few Terran females lurking about, all dressed in spartan suits, all looking roughly the same, but no pictures ever captured anything but a prismatic blur.

Many of SolNet and GalNet believed that the so-called "Grey Girls" were ghosts and the conspiracy and paranormal boards had huge threads (many of which were outright flamewars) involving the Grey Girl Phenomenon.

But despite the Bongistan was lost in The Bag, the Cyberqueen's Own still guarded the Terran Embassy.

It was a matter of honor.

It was a nice day, with sweet nitrogen breezes and the red sun warm on the carapace when the guards saw something new. Something they had not seen in several years.

A Terran.

A male Terran.

He was dressed like any Range Rider, right down to the ankle length trenchcoat, the crossed gunbelts, the moomoo tender hat that concealed everything about his face but his gunmetal gray eyes, spurs on his tooled boots that jangled as he slowly walked forward, a cigarette in his mouth that trailed smoke.

A few of the Treana'ad were silently jealous of the projected image put off so effortlessly by the Terran.

Stolen novel; please report.

The Terran stepped up to the gate and held out one hand, wrist cocked, palm held outward at the gate.

The watching tourists waited with baited breath, all of them recording, some of them snapping pictures.

Those pictures hit the paranormal boards like a bombshell.

The Terran had a ghostly second image that was slightly out of synch with him.

The crowd gasped as the gates slowly swung open to admit the Terran.

The Terran touched the brim of his hat in salute of the guards, then walked onto the ground of the embassy, the gate silently closing behind him until the two halves met with a crash.

The Cyberqueen's Own guard gave out the standard gate closing call of "TREANA'AD ULGA-HIA!"

The tourists kept taking pictures, knowing that they had a story to tell friends.

The Terran walked across the ground as if he owned the place, skirting the fountain in the middle of the grounds. He walked past hidden gun emplacements, past beam projectors hidden in bushes, past land mines hidden in flowerbeds, even over mines emplaced beneath the path.

When he reached the entrance to the embassy itself, the door opened and he vanished inside, the door closing right afterwards.

The crowd murmured to itself about its luck in seeing such a rare phenomenon.

Herod looked around as he moved down the hallway, looking at the various signs on the doors. It didn't surprise him that the first two doors, one on either side, were warsteel under a thin wooden veneer. He knew those would be the quick reaction force ready rooms.

Still, nothing until he pushed through the double-doors and into the main lobby.

The short poles with the ropes cut the middle of the front half of the room into a maze of waiting lines. There were chairs against the entryway wall, and holograms showed offline notices.

There was a single counter open, with a single figure behind it.

Herod walked around the ropes and to the counter.

The armaglass stayed polarized.

"Please follow the correct queue," a heavily synthesized voice said.

Herod sighed, went back to the other side of the empty queueing line, and looked until he saw the signs that stated the queue path was open.

He walked around through the twists and turns then up to the counter.

"Please wait to be called up," the voice said. "Please return to the end of the line."

Herod sighed, walked around to the end, then moved to the front and waited.

Nearly ten minutes passed.

"Next."

Herod moved up to the counter.

"Ticket number?" the voice asked.

"I don't have a ticket."

"Ticket dispensers are at the far wall. Please take a number and wait to be called into the queue," the voice stated.

Herod sighed, went in, and looked carefully at the ticket dispensers.

What he wanted was buried in a sub-menu of a sub-menu of a context menu.

"YOU ARE NUMBER [ERROR]" appeared. After a second the error vanished and was replaced by C42.

It took nearly fifteen minutes for the hologram across the single open line to flash "C42" several times and the ticket in his hand to ping.

He walked through, then waited.

"Next!" the voice called out.

Herod walked up.

"Ticket?" the voice asked.

Herod put the ticket on the counter and it slid underneath the polarized armaglass.

"Reason for visit?" the voice asked.

"I need to speak with a Confederate Office of Scientific Research and Intelligence liaison," Herod said.

"This is the line for ID cards. You want Line C. This is Line B," the voice said. "Have a nice day."

Herod sighed and went back and got a new ticket.

When the newly opened queue path for J24 flashed his number and the ticket pinged, Herod followed the path, then waited to be called.

Once up there, the hidden worker asked for his paperwork. When Herod admitted he didn't have any, he was handed the paperwork via the steel drawer, then retreated to fill it out. It took him nearly two hours, but he finished.

This time, the paperwork was accepted and he was asked to show his ID.

Patting himself down, Herod realized his physical ID was somewhere in the SUDS. Acting as a shimmy for a table, if he remembered right.

Now he needed a replacement ID.

That took him back to Line B.

Once there, he ran into trouble again.

He was registered as a Digital Sentience, but he had a flesh and blood body.

He was required to fill out more paperwork and start over.

When he had his paperwork in order, he waited impatiently for a new ID number and card.

"This is the line for non-Citizens. You are a Citizen. Please take a ticket and wait for Line F to open," the voice said.

Herod sighed and started over.

Then he had to take a picture, go back through the line for Digital Sentiences, and show his digital avatar form that he could separate from his body. Then through the Digital Sentience Citizen Line H.

Finally he came back to the processing line, turned in his paperwork, and waited.

The polarized armaglass suddenly cleared and he found himself staring at one of the Grey Girls.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Herod blurted out.

"One of our few amusements," the Grey Girl said, a slight smile teasing the corners of her mouth and amusement sparkling in her eyes.

"All of this, and you were right here?" Herod asked.

"Moving back and forth between the lines. It amuses me," she admitted. "The art of IRL trolling is almost a lost one."

"There's a reason for that," Herod grumped. "So you already know what I need?"

The Grey Girl nodded. "I processed your paperwork while you were standing at the back of the room, mumbling to yourself, and eating a quikiheat burrito."

Herod made a disgusted noise.

"Why do you think you deserve a Black Box project? There are already Black Box teams working on the The Bag and The Noose," she said, still looking amused.

"Are any of them led by someone with as much experience as I have with abnormal or asymmetrical particle physics?" Herod asked.

"No," she said.

"Do any of them have any staff that worked on the SUDS?" he asked.

"No."

"Do any of them have a scientist with more than a thousand years of experience with real world particle systems?"

"No."

"Were any of them taught and trained by Legion or Vat Grown Luke or Dhruv?"

"No."

"Then they are all underqualified," Herod stated.

"True."

"By simple metric of experience and knowledge, I should be heading up a Black Box Project," Herod said. "If not, then I'll fund it myself and do it the old fashioned way of garagetek science."

The Grey Girl nodded.

"You've already been approved," she said. She slid the paperwork into the tray and pushed it out to Herod. "You should begin going through a list of people you want to work with or if you want this to be a solitary investigation."

Herod thought about it for a long moment. "I'll consider the pros and cons of both."

"A ship will be waiting at the starport for you. You can begin your arrangements onboard," she said.

"So it begins," Herod said, then felt foolish at how egotistical it sounded.

The Grey Girl nodded. "Anything else, Citizen?"

"No, I'm good. Thank you for your service," Herod said.

"You are welcome, Citizen," the Grey Girl said, polarizing the armaglass.

"NEXT!" she called out.

Herod turned and made his way out of the embassy, ignoring all the photographs and streamers and video recorders. He walked for several blocks, thinking, before getting in a taxi.

The taxi took him to an ice cream parlor near the starport.

Dana'ahsh was sitting at a booth, eating a banana split with a smile on his face. When Herod sat down the Hashenesh looked up.

"These are great," he said.

Wally beeped happily from under the table.

"Yup," Herod said. He looked around. "I got Black Box approval."

Dana'ahsh nodded, taking another bite, closing his eyes as he relished the taste.

"You can come with me if you want," Herod offered.

Dana'ahsh nodded slowly. "I appreciate the offer, but I think I'm going to stick with Captain Lag and the Uwu for right now."

"Life as a Range Rider beats Black Box researcher," Herod agreed.

"It was exciting, not always a pleasure, but an adventure to meet you," Dana'ahsh said.

"You too," Herod said, standing up. "Be well, Dana'ahsh."

"You too," Dana'ahsh said, shaking Herod's hand.

Herod left the diner, Wally clattering along next to him.

Anyone else would think it insurmountable, Herod thought to himself. But anyone else hasn't been where I have been, seen what I have seen, and done what I have done.

"One path ends, another begins," Herod said as he walked across the parking lot of the starport.

Wally just whistled in agreement.