I’m up a level, near the front end of the Dreadnaught, where a corridor with triple-reinforced glass allows for an unimpeded view of our approach to the SFC main hub. Point C3XSFCMH.
As usual, the corridor is packed with marines gazing over our destination. There is a quiet hum of conversation among the personnel. It's been a while for all of us inside the suffocating metallic walls of the Dreadnaught.
We approach slowly, decreasing speed even as the SFC hub's size increases to dominate the viewing window. It's an awe-inspiring colossal sight.
A million souls consider C3XSFCMH their home; most have been born there, in the dark quietness of open space, and have never known life outside of it. I don’t envy them no matter how pretty the sight I’m seeing might be.
The hub is shaped like a hollow ring with residential and industrial facilities placed on the inside. An AMAF runs along the ground floor providing a comfortable atmosphere for about 20 meters up all around the inner ring, and a clear-sighted blueish shielding membrane protects the open atmosphere from space debris.
For someone standing on the soft ground found on the inner side, the unending darkness of the universe with the lights of a trillion stars is only separated by the looping hub folding around itself. Looking straight up at the life of your neighbors may bring hours of entertainment and a stiff neck. I speak from experience.
When the Dreadnought passes through several smaller battleships on patrol we are close enough for me to zoom in through my optics.
I can see cattle grazing on green fields, organized lines of trees, and people laboring in one of the oldest professions throughout human history.
Farming will never disappear as long as hunger exists. The hub is a port facility as much as a production hub. It is self-sustaining but for mining ores where unfortunately there is nowhere to dig for.
For myself, apart from afar, I do not see much of the produce. After it has been processed and fitted in a mealbar little will be left to resemble its origin.
But with our return, a feast with real food will commemorate our success. It’s even more important for personnel morale than a boost in pay and an event I am much eager to go through.
After all, I can’t buy the real thing with credits. Not any of us Marines anyway.
I try to ignore the tall walls that separate each section of the inner ring but the contrast is so stark it's difficult not to see them. I see the villas and the gardens, and when they end at a wall, gray metallic buildings emerge on the other side that break up the pleasantly green landscape.
One of them is our barracks, Block F567, located in the center of several other facilities.
I feel a hint of anger, and I imagine flames consuming the whole thing but it’s a stray thought, not something I wish for. The hub is also home to the families of my comrades, those who have any either way.
On the outside of the ring, located upon long platforms, shipyards and docking stations busy themselves with the numerous ships that come and go. The heart of the SFC is filled with activity and we snake through it to reach our platform and disembark.
It's been a long trip, almost 4 months since the day we left. I can see the eagerness in the eyes surrounding me. A week-long vacation starts today.
—-
Somewhere in D9L
Unseen, skulking between star systems, a Light-Starcruiser hides from an Overlord swarm. It does not have the weapons to face even one from the hundreds, maybe thousands of the harrowing monsters that happened to be migrating simultaneously as the vessel tried to cross through the L system neighborhood of Derkal Galaxy.
The captain has a magnified image of one of the spacefaring beasts on the screens as the crew of 20 discusses countermeasures to their misfortune.
The Overlord, an amorphous blob of chitin-like flesh armor with several slenderly extending tentacles is ejecting a cloud of puss in consecutive puffs. The well-named gonorrheal glands produce a highly toxic antimaterial substance that will stick to and corrode anything it comes into contact with, and in especially unlucky cases, in the mix of the gaseous puss, Overlord eggs would be left behind to incubate inside the broken-down matter. Not one living soul wants to be anywhere near the hyper-aggressive offsprings, come hatching time.
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The captain looks horrified as the puss clouds gradually block the way forward, and knows that any rush movement from the Light-Starcruiser would end them up in a merry chase that the vessel is not so certain to outrun now that it has paused its momentum and throttle down its engines to avoid getting spotted.
“They are headed for Cerebrus Galaxy… should we inform house Arthas?” One of the crew members points out when the mainframe calculates the most probable swarm migration route.
“And let them know we are basically at their doorstep?” The captain growls back. “Not a fat chance of that.”
“We can beep a packet signal their way and skedaddle outa here...” The bridge officer offers.
“Silence!” The captain orders. “We won’t be sending anything the dominion’s way. Now plan me a route out of this mess and fast!”
—-
C3XSFCMH
The slight constant breeze that cycles along the hub’s artificial atmosphere is a welcoming change to the dry sting of the ventilation system of the Dreadnaught.
It's comfortable enough to wear a light uniform, grey and black, in the typical colors of the SFC, much different from the colorful red white, and black of House Arthas.
Tommy sits comfortably on a plastic chair outside the F567 barracks, lazily moving chess pieces to defend in reply to my overextending attack. His pieces outnumber mine almost two to one, but that is not a concern for my strategy.
The difference between a game and real life. In a quick combination of my knight and queen, I have his king trapped. No matter how much material he has on the board, his king falls to the ground and I keep my undefeated streak alive.
“Why am I playing you?” Tommy asks rubbing his eyes. “I thought, I had you this time, but it was all a trick, right?”
He isn’t a bad player, but to feel the challenge I give myself several handicaps. “Another one?” I say wearing the winner’s smile.
“Maybe later,” He grumbles and throws his head backward to gaze up at the ‘sky’ of open space. A shuttle hums overhead, its neon-white thrusters keeping it at the edge of the artificial atmosphere of the inner ring, just below the membrane shields, sending a light buzz of sound our way.
It’s been two blissful carefree days since we arrived, and I am guilty of saying I have spent them carelessly. The mood playing out around us is similar, with tables set up in the courtyard in front of the barracks. Marines leisurely enjoy the downtime releasing the accumulated stress.
When suddenly out of nowhere the alarm blasts, I am reminded of a familiar scene. I see with eyes closed a bulkcarrier punching a platform to bits, sending bodies flying. I shake my head to clear the memory from my thoughts and listen attentively to the speaker’s announcement.
*Prepare for battle. All SFC Marines are to proceed geared up to docking platform 44A and await further instructions.*
Inside the barracks, chaos reigns as marines rush to put on their biosuits and check their weapons. Gear and materials litter the sidewalks of each bunk, impeding the flow of traffic.
An emergency alarm in the SFC base of operations is not something that just happens. It’s a situation that brings forth a familiar dread that has been buried deep inside me.
No one knows what’s going on and the personnel shout between themselves for any kind of hint. With my biosuit on and my masked helmet tucked under my arm, I frantically search among the servers for a clue.
When I find it I pause and curse under my breath. A distress signal arrived with imagery attached. I see a massive yellow cloud with tentacles chasing after a hurrying ship. The moment I see the still image I know what we are facing.
It's difficult to count how many Overlords might be hidden behind the gasses, but I try to calculate it by combining the distance from the ship, the size of the toxic clouds, and the relative puss production of each Overlord. I also compensate for the fact that only the head of the swarm can be seen in the images.
I get a number that is definitely wrong, or I want it to be, otherwise, a lot of people will die.
Now that I know what I am up against I can prepare better even with the terror-infused tremble creeping along my limbs. I return to my storage crate by my bunk and dump several weapons I won't need for the upcoming battle.
Instead, I take my secondary armor-piercing rifle with the new metagrenade launcher.
With it, I stock enough ammo in the backstorage compartment of the biosuit to bankrupt myself, but that is a problem for tomorrow. Since my tech and ammo are mostly custom-made the SFC won’t be replacing any but for the standard issued. I have 16 inactive modified metapheres in their casings ready to be deployed.
It's the only thing I’m certain would do enough damage to pause an Overlord onslaught.
And I know exactly how to fight these monsters even if I’ve never been forced against one. The funny thing about memory-sharing no matter how much I detest it, is that it is a good damn training technique.
I’ve watched through an Overlord hunt, an Overlord swarm onslaught, an Overlord…whatever you may call the complete and utter annihilation of a fleet, and the first thing I acknowledge from each shared memory is that the monster’s name is well deserved.
These aliens pack a punch. The adults reach easily 50 meters in length without counting the numerous extending tentacles that could wrap and strangle everything around them. Worse for wear, they are encased in living armor resistant to extreme heat/freezing temperatures that's even durable against penetration.
In space, they move freely, changing directions with puffs of the toxic puss that you don’t want to be anywhere near. If they happen to reach a vessel, no matter its shielding, they will eat through it in less than an hour, which can happen more easily than people might think.
Spaceships usually have a forward-focused acceleration with secondary course correctors for slight adjustments. An enemy that can kite missiles and withstand heat lasers can close the distance surprisingly fast.
There is a single strategy for dealing with these monsters when faced against a swarm, to bait the whole lot of them to a kill zone and pray you have enough firepower.
With the size of the swarm in the images, I doubt we have enough weapons stored in the SFC hub to cull their numbers.
Given that, a number of our technologies are simply useless against them, I’m anxious about what we are about to face. Showering them in radiation has been proven to simply moisturize their outer armor. As is the case with almost all spacefaring alien monsters, radiation is what they feed on during the long travel distances between systems.
On platform 44A our Dreadnaught with its hatches open accepts a continuous flow of cargo and marines. As soon as our company of 100 in a tight line arrives from Block F567, we get the orders to embark.
The Ortheon II is ready to disengage.