Alex
“Well if I thought politics was boring before, I certainly don’t think that now!” I said with a chuckle.
Aeva finally tore their eyes away from the holoprojector long enough to look at me. “How can you be so calm about all of this? Your people are going to war!”
I grinned maliciously. “The Yaleya Conclave has no idea what they’re getting themselves into. Humans have been practicing warfare for as long as we’ve been recording our history. Sure, size may be an issue, but that doesn’t mean that we’re completely out of the fight!” I proudly explained.
Aeva didn’t look convinced. “Well, how do you know?”
“Well,” I started, “first, they don’t even know if we even have a home planet, let alone where it is. And even if they did, we have enough defenses in system that they probably won’t even get close to it. Second, if I know United Terra’s Space Command, then they’re probably planning a preemptive strike to cripple the enemy before the Yaleyans can even try anything.” Aeva was still not looking convinced. I smiled, “And besides, the galaxy at large doesn’t even know about half of the ships that Terran civilians are allowed to know about. Trust me, humanity will be fine.”
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Sergeant Grays
Well, the day that humanity had been dreading has finally arrived. We were about to partake in our first interstellar war. I was pouring over the mission briefing that I had been given, shock written all over my face. This plan that command has authorized is a bold one. If they think that everyone is coming home after this is over, they’re crazy. I looked up from my tablet to survey the scene in front of me.
The hangar that I was in was massive, large enough to store hundreds, if not thousands of the biggest mechs that humanity could produce. It was a beehive of activity, with deckhands moving from place to place. I looked up at the massive cargo mech that was carrying a rack of single-seater fighters and interceptors, the ground shaking as it stomped past before setting down its load of aircraft. I saw my platoon slowly filter into the staging area for our portion of the operation. I looked down at my watch. Three minutes late.
When all my marines finally made it, I stood up and made my way to the holoprojector at the center of the staging area. “Sloppy, marines, you were three minutes late!” I said in my sergeant voice. “That means when we are done with this mission, I expect each and every one of you to give me three hundred pushups!” There were some murmurs of dissent from the group. I quickly wheeled over to the offending group of marines. “STOW THAT SHIT MARINES WE ARE AT WAR NOW! AND THAT MEANS BEING ON TIME TO BRIEFINGS! DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?”
A loud “Sir, yes sir!” rang around me as soldiers straightened their postures.
“Damn right I do! For Operation Hidden Phantom, we will be the tip of the spear, so listen up, I will not be repeating myself!” I turned on the holoprojector. It showed the Yalayan capital ship, the Indomitable Crusade. “This is our target, the Indomitable Crusade. Our objectives are to infiltrate the ship and find and destroy the computer components that control the early warning system and the sensors suite for their entire fleet. Intelligence has pinpointed those systems to be here and here,” I said pointing to two different points that started to glow when I touched them. “In the event that they aren’t where intelligence has suggested, then our mission is to find them, and put them out of commission. We have also been encouraged to destroy as many secondary systems as possible, but the sensor array and early warning system are the priority. After we achieve our objectives, we are to signal to command to send in a mech boarding party from the Failure to Communicate’s carrier group. For this mission, we have been given access to the newest and shiniest toys.” As I said that the hologram changed to a depiction a sleek one-seater aircraft/spaceship combo. It was also conveniently sitting in the hangar next to us. “We are being given access to the single-seater F-200. I have been told that it has been outfitted with some of the best stealth technology that humanity has ever come up with.” I turned to my marines. “Any questions?” I asked.
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A marine casually raised his hand. “Sir, what kind of support will we have?”
“Until we take down the sensor arrays of the Indomitable Crusade, we won’t be getting any. We will, however, be given stealth based exo armor and enough explosives to level half of New New York. Command has assured me these measures will be enough for us to get in and do our jobs so everyone else can do theirs. Any other questions?”
Another marine held up their hand. “Sir, the briefing says that the Indomitable Crusade has the best shields the Conclave have to offer. How are we getting past that? And what’s our infil?”
“Excellent question marine!” I exclaimed, proud that someone had actually read the mission briefing. “Intel says that the shields don’t even activate unless something is coming at it quick enough. This prevents it from using energy deflecting harmless space debris. Today, we will be disguising ourselves as harmless space debris in the solar system that the Indomitable Crusade is currently.” I saw the marines looking around at each other. They were clearly excited for this mission. “As for how we’re getting in, we will stick to the hull and cut through it until we get into the maintenance shafts, where we will then move to the air vents. This should give us plenty of time and help us avoid the xenos on board.” I looked at my watch. “It looks like that’s all the time that we have for a briefing, so get yourselves suited up and ready to go! We leave in ten minutes!” I shouted as the marines gave a hearty oorah. I couldn’t help but feel proud of my marines. “And may God have mercy on those poor xenos.” And with that, we all made our way to where we would pick up our stealth exo suits.
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High Commander Tussus
It has been a long time since we have had a good war. Our people have gone soft and complacent in a way that not even compulsory military service could fix. We needed a war to ensure the strength of our people and the future generation, but we couldn’t declare war on a species in the Galactic Community without risking the ire of that irritating body of pencil pushers and bureaucrats.
Then the Terrans arrived, like sunshine on a stormy day. They were always on the edge of policy making and made themselves an easy target by their secrecy. As soon as their secret came out, high command saw this as a perfect opportunity to strengthen our people in the furnace of war. At this point, we were just waiting for the Terran targets to be given to us by command. This should be easy. They are so small that they can’t even defend themselves without their precious suits.
“High Commander,” said my chief engineer.
“Make your report,” I said irritated that he brought me out of my thoughts of conquest.
“We’re reading some very minor hull breaches in maintenance hallway seventy-three B.”
I paused. “Are we leaking air?” I asked.
“No High Commander. It seems like we are not. And anything that would be moving quickly enough to cause a hull breach would have been deflected by the shields, so it can’t be debris.”
“Is there anything on the cameras?” I asked.
“No, High Commander,” was the response.
I waved my hand. “Send a maintenance team to see what the issue is.”
“At your command, High Commander,” he said. “Maintenance team Delta 32, report to maintenance hallway seventy-three B and report on a possible hull breach.”
I leaned back in my chair. Despite the issue being resolved, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of dread come over me, almost like an omen of ill things to come.