Allison stepped back in the direction she came from. She had her pistol leveled towards what her motion detector was showing the height to be, approximately two and a half feet tall. The creature was furry. Its eyes glinted blue in the light projected by her hover flashlight. It rushed past her followed by a swarm of multilegged, almost like cat sized centipedes. They had no eyes and had sensor tentacles and mouths with a ring of vicious looking teeth. Allison seemed to be of more interest to the insects. They had massive stingers and one jabbed at her. Her armor formed a plate on her chest. The insect was sent flying and was smashed with a splatter of glowing green blood against one of the empty antimatter canisters.

Another lept at Allison’s face. She caught it with one hand. It struggled against the combined strength of her armor and herself. She stomped on another. With her free hand she shot another with the pistol it vanished in a puff of turquoise particles. She stomped another. The bugs started fleeing, she dropped her pistol and wrestled the one she was holding to the ground and punched what appeared to be its head several times until it stopped squirming. She was panting when she picked up her pistol.

“I hate centipedes! So creepy!”

“Are you hurt?”

“No, but my armor took a beating, its saying reserves are down to seventy percent. Still sealed though… whew. Okay, I take everything bad I said back about it, except that it’s too revealing.”

She switched her pistol down to maximum stun and shot the bug she’d beat into submission. It twitched. She kneeled down to scan it.

“Hmm, nothing in common with Sal’nash. Has Sal’nash goo on its teeth. Wonder if they eat the egg goo… or baby Sal’nash’s? One can hope…”

She felt something pressing against her thigh through her armor. It was the furry creature that had used her as a distraction.

“Oh, hello little shit that used me as bait. What are you?”

She rubbed her hands on the ground to remove the guk and couldn’t resist running her hands through the creature’s fur. It looked like a house cat that had been crossbred with a wolf somehow. It had a long-pointed muzzle and whiskers. Large, pointed ears. It was about the size of a medium sized dog. It had long teeth which Allison saw when it licked her helmet’s clear faceplate. On each of its paws were five toes. Between them were razer sharp claws. Its fur was white but shimmered and changed as it rubbed against her armor taking on a black tone.

“What are you?”

Bit responded.

“I have no record of either of these organisms in my records, Ensign. I see no activity from the hive since you discharged your weapon. It is likely dormant. I can move closer to take the sample on board.”

“Alright, I’ll wait here.”

Allison stood up. The furry creature, whatever it was, didn’t like that because she’d stopped petting it. So, it kept jumping up trying to get more attention. She sighed. Whatever it was it had the kind of eyes humans couldn’t resist. She kneeled down and started petting it again.

“So, were you someone’s pet? Hmm? You seem friendly. How did you last so long here?”

It purred like a cat might as she talked to it and scratched its head gently. Allison was a bit surprised to see her scanners were indicating it was a mammal. Must have been hardy because the air here had about half the oxygen of a H class planet, which is the designation for minimum for human colonization. Strangely it had no microorganic biome. All very strange. She saw the dust kicked up by Bit’s landing and stood up.

The furry creature followed her as she walked back to the bug she’d stunned. It growled at the bug’s unconscious form. Allison tossed the bug into the second cargo compartment and activated the stasis field. The furry creature followed her around as she opened another cargo compartment for it.

“In you go, come on.”

She motioned to the metal compartment. The creature just stared up at her expectantly. Allison patted the compartment floor.

“Go in, come on, if you want to get off this rock.”

The creature made no move to go inside. She pulled out some synthetic meat from her ration pack and tossed it inside. The creature licked its lips but made no move to go inside. Allison sighed. She flicked the meat onto the ground. She closed the cargo bay. The creature gobbled up the meat hungrily. Then it wrapped its teeth around her left hand and started tugging on it gently.

“Oh, now you’re in charge huh? Fine, let’s go. Bit this thing… is trying to lead me somewhere. Hold position here.”

Once Allison seemed to be following the creature’s fluffy tail wagged and it made a purring sound. She started trying to figure out what to call it.

“What should we call this thing Bit? Cag? Cog? Dat? Dag? Dot?”

Bit interjected

“How about Canis-felinis-RP-1?”

Allison rolled her eyes.

“A bit of a mouthful, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but technically accurate. Which is the best kind of accurate.”

Allison snort-laughed.

“You have the worst sense of humor.”

Allison looked down at the creature. It was starting to run she was having trouble keeping up. Eventually it turned into a game of chase. She saw a large silhouette looming in the darkness.

“Oh, there’s a ship, very low power readings, no life signs.”

It didn’t look any larger than the Qual’sa ship she’d rescued. It was hard to tell the scale in the dark. She found a portion of the ship that had been torn open in the crash. The wreckage was still smoldering in spots. The crash was recent. Perhaps only a few days before. She pulled out her pistol and started making her way through the ship. It was primitive compared to System’s Alliance standards. A lot of manual valves and the like. It reminded her of scenes from twenty-first century movies set in old sailing ships. Iron boats. She had her hand scanner in her other palm.

“Primitive tech. No antimatter containment vessel I can detect. If there were it would likely have burst in the crash. That means no FTL drive. Are you picking any life sign’s up Bit? Yours have better range?”

“No, Ensign. I am picking up multiple organic remains forty meters aft of your position. Most of them seem to be in a portion of the ship unnavigable due to damage sustained in the crash. Some remains seem to be intact four decks up from that position. Also, it seems to have been using a primitive version of nuclear fission to power it. I’m detecting high levels of radioactive isotopes in the area. Your armor and your standard dose of N-Rad will be sufficient to protect you. The alien mammal will be at risk if you venture into the far aft of the craft.”

“Noted.”

Allison glanced down at the creature who seemed intent on getting her to follow it. She shook her head and let it take the lead. It took her into a compartment holding dozens of cryotubes. Some sized for pets, others for children, and others for what appeared to be adults. None of them survived the crash or subsequent emergency thaw.

The cryo tubes were all open and thawed now. It looked recent, unfortunately the cryo-bay was a tomb at this point. The tubes had humanoids in them of various sizes and shapes. It appeared their evolution had mirrored humans; Save for the fact they were blue-skinned and on average a foot taller than humans. They had tentacles coming off of their backs.

“I have no record of this species, Ensign.”

Allison shrugged.

“They could have evolved and died out while you were stashed in that temporal shield. This appears to be a colony ship. There were several full decks of these cryo tubes beneath this one at least as far as my scanners are telling me. This is the only one that survived intact. I’d say four thousand… It looks like the crash killed all of them except for the… thingy.”

She saw names on each of the tubes on the one that it appeared her new furry friend had come from was overlaid with Oozenoshae, or that’s what Bit had been able to translate of their alphabet based on the iconography and other text Allison had seen with her contacts. The creature was scratching at a particular little girl’s legs and whining.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Allison kneeled down and tried to calm the creature down. A few tears started to grace her eyes. The animal was trying to get the little girl to wake up and she would never wake up. If the cryotubes hadn’t released… maybe some could have been saved but they’d been out for hours, and those the crash hadn’t killed instantly had died due to the air. Allison sniffled as she spoke.

“I’m so sorry Oozenoshae, she’s not going to wake up.”

Bit spoke and sounded like her news was urgent.

“Ensign, I am seeing movement coming towards the ship. It would appear the Sal’nash have become aware of the presence of new organic material.”

Allison stood up quickly and rushed towards what appeared to be a computer interface. She pulled out her data tap and yanked out a string of liquid metal and pressed it against what looked like a round network port.

“Interface with the computer. Pull whatever you can.”

She slapped the data tap against the ship’s hull.

“You said there was a fission reactor here. Is it possible to cause a thermonuclear detonation with what we have available?”

Bit paused before answering.

“Theoretically, I am detecting explosives on their airlocks.”

“On air locks? What on Earth?”

“Likely to disengage the doors quickly in event of an emergency landing. They apparently can be shaped. Provided you can match this configuration.”

Bit showed an image of a primitive nuclear weapon on Allison’s HUD.

“We could link a detonator to my control systems. I do not understand your reasoning, Ensign. Nor do I think you have time. Data download is forty percent complete. The ships computer is primitive.”

Allison grumbled.

“Look, I still need to see inside the hive. Maybe we can lure more to this location by killing a bunch?”

“Your logic is faulty. They would likely avoid sending more to investigate.”

Allison shook her head.

“Yeah, but, like they could do the opposite, send an overwhelming force to ensure they could beat whatever it was that attacked them. I don’t think they have radio comms or scanners like we do, they would have already come to investigate. It was probably myself or Oozenoshae disturbing the remains that kicked something into the air, or maybe it just took this long for the scent to reach them. Maybe the only way they will know what happened is if they send some more?”

Bit’s tone of voice seemed dismissive.

“Either way, it is a moot point. You do not have time to build such a device.”

Allison snapped her fingers.

“Ah but are there any antimatter containment vessels that are still intact and contain antimatter.”

“Yes, there are six in your vicinity, one contains enough for a one-kiloton blast. The remainder scale from ten and up the highest being a 1000 teraton yield."

“Mark the one kiloton and that 1000 one on my HUD please.”

Allison smiled when she saw that the one kiloton was the nearest and the rest would be outside of the blast radius.

“Whew, okay.”

She routed through the cargo bay and found a primitive wheeled dolly. It was no hoversled but it would do. Oozenoshae hadn’t followed her, but she didn’t have time to worry about that. She struggled to pull the heavy metal container of antimatter onto the dolly and started pulling it across the smooth, parched dirt. She followed Bit’s instructions on how to pull the explosive out of the ring around one of the air locks and slapped it on the micro-fusion power source that held the antimatter in magnetic containment. Yanked the detonator from one of her flash bangs and stuck it in the putty-like explosive. She wheeled it down to the fission reactor. She kicked the antimatter containment vessel off of the dolly and hauled ass back up to the one intact cryo bay.

“Data transfer finished, Bit?”

“Affirmative, Ensign.”

Allison pulled the data tap off and yanked the liquid metal cord causing it to suck back into its housing. She slipped it into her utility belt. She sighed. Oozenoshae was laying down beside It’s previous owner whining. She had twenty-five minutes before the first Sal’nash reached the colony ship. It would take her twenty minutes walking, ten minutes in a dead run assisted by her armor to reach a minimum safe distance. That was unencumbered. She looked down at the poor cat-dog-thing.

“Screw it.”

She picked up the girl whose name was roughly translated to Ion. She looked down at Oozenoshae.

“You’re going to get me killed, you know that?”

Oozenoshae yipped and purred as it rubbed against Allison’s legs. Allison made her way out of the wreckage and started in a dead run with Ion’s remains over one shoulder. Her other hand dragged the dolly behind her. Her armor’s power assist propelled her more quickly than she expected, its enhanced strength helped with her endurance. Her body still had to make a good portion of the effort though and do all the movements. She was thankful for all of it because by the time she and Oozenoshae reached Bit they had several minutes to catch their breath. Allison put Ion in a stasis cargo pod. She was pacing back and forth. She motioned for Oozenoshae to join its former master. The creature ignored her once again. Allison struggled to catch her breath and finally speak.

“You… know… it… would be great if I was a full vampire, they never get tired.”

“Then you would not be able to live on Eden Prime.”

Allison threw her hands up while still catching her breath.

“Bit please detonate the antimatter when the Sal’nash are in the colony ship. I’m going to get the big bomb… err antimatter containment vessel. Let me know if my plan worked.”

Bit paused briefly after starting to answer.

“Wait, Ensign, are you referring to the thousand teraton containment vessel?”

Allison nodded.

“Yea, that would be the big one.”

She was already walking away from Bit with the dolly in tow. Oozenoshae was running after her.

“Ensign, you are aware that kind of yield could crack this planet in half? Possibly change its trajectory, and the resultant electromagnetic pulse is likely to disrupt containment of all hyper-matter exhaust containment on this hemisphere, leading to catastrophic planetary collapse? The could the pulse travel at lightspeed and disrupt a good portion of the Andromeda galaxy? No one has ever detonated that much antimatter. Your own president has detected transdimensional waves during her tests. You could disrupt FTL travel, wormholes, knockout comms for all of the surrounding colonies and military facilities. It would be the equivalent of a small supernova.”

Allison nodded.

“Yes, there are like, there are billions of Sal’nash on this planet based on the amount of eggs you scanned and they’re awake, a bit of disruption and one rogue planet no one cares about in exchange for a galaxy worth of living things? Sounds like a good plan to me.”

“Have you, perhaps considered, that may start another swarm? If they have any sort of… FTL communications?”

Allison sighed.

“Duh, yes, but that colony ship crashing here likely already woke them up. They were sleeping. Probably because there was no food. Probably because they ate everything in the last swarm. They’re already awake, from what I could get from Aryna’s memories they consume everything in their path. Maybe that’s why they’re dormant?”

Allison reached the containment vessel that showed that it was still full. No eggs had attached to it.

“Perhaps… we could find a way to transfer some antimatter and confirm with System’s Alliance command.”

Allison groaned as she rolled the antimatter containment vessel onto the dolly.

“You said we couldn’t without causing catastrophic failure.”

“Yes, that was before I found out you were considering causing a hyper-matter exhaust explosion that could wipe out a planet, no if we were in a star system you could cause a supernova. This is a bad idea. Chaos is one thing, but you humans are completely insane.”

Allison took a few minutes to catch her breath and stretch.

“Look Bit, if I get to the hive and see no signs they can leave the planet, I’ll let it go, but if I do see any hint, they’ll be a threat to my home, I will gladly follow standing orders which are to use any and all means necessary to protect System’s Alliance citizens and personnel.”

“Do you understand you are contemplating the deaths of countless organic beings?”

Allison sighed and started pushing the dolly forward up the rise towards the Sal’nash hive.

“They’re bugs. It’s like using a poison bomb on a Falstinger nest. Just on a bigger scale.”

Bit made a sound like a sigh.

“Well, as my organic pilot I need to support your mission and you are correct about standing orders. We could wait until a fleet gets here to deal with this, they can coordinate with System’s Alliance command and their board of directors first.”

Allison was struggling to move the canister up the hill. Oozenoshae seemed to understand what she was trying to do and was putting its shoulder behind the dolly helping.

“Look Bit, say we do it that way, I get to Andromeda-1, we give a report, then it goes up to the joint chiefs, the President gets involved, then they have to order a fleet here, the nearest battle-ready fleet would be my babu’s which is at least three hours away. So, we’re talking minimum of three and a half hours, possibly a day. If the Sal’nash can travel between planets on their own, they could launch how many in that time? How many unsuspecting worlds could they attack if they don’t go after System’s Alliance worlds? Do you want to be responsible for ignoring a threat like this? How many died in the last swarm? Entire species were wiped out. What if the Synthlin worlds were close? What would your last pilot do in this situation?”

Bit didn’t answer for several minutes. Allison saw Bit was about to detonate her baby antimatter bomb, so she pulled the canister behind a pile of broken Sal’nash eggs and empty containment vessels. The ground shook and a woosh of dust blew past Allison who was shielding Oozenoshae. It started to whine. Allison held it and kept gently petting with her other hand. She tapped the command to activate her armor’s holoweb and extended it to cover the dolly, the full antimatter container, herself and Oozenoshae. The ground started to shake again as a stampede of Sal’nash of various shapes and sizes stomped by. Some were flying out on wings. Other larger ones were leaving the hive through massive organic panels akin to sphincters. Oozenoshae buried its face in Allison’s chest. She covered its eyes with her arm.

“Ensign, your gamble paid off. I am seeing increased Sal’nash activity planet wide. It would seem the swarm is reacting as if it is under attack.”

Allison closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Her armor’s energy reserves did not seem to be having any issues due to her cloak.

“Hmm, Bit, are you sure this holoweb is connected to the armor’s batteries?”

“I assumed it was.”

“Well, it’s not going down. I bet it’s powered by a micro fusion reactor. Switching off comms, I’m not sure how the Sal’nash sense things. Let’s hope the cloak works.”

She stopped suddenly and stuck her hand into one of the hard eggshells and started wiping the green ooze all over herself, the canister, the dolly and then looked at Oozenoshae. She reached out her goo covered hands and the creature whined.

“Its either this or you go back to the ship alone, Oozie.”

It sniffed her then the cannister and seemed to make a decision. It jumped into an empty egg and rolled around in the green slime. It hopped out and licked itself afterwards. It tried to spit and kept licking the roof of its mouth. Then it sneezed a few times.

“Well, you didn’t have to come with me Oozie, this was your choice. Silly thing. Now shh, trust me when I say we do not want to run into any of these things. They’re scary like you can’t imagine.”

Allison walked towards one of the entry points to the hive.