Split (1)

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[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Captain Derrick looked through the view-port. "How much longer until we are in striking range?" His first mate, Rowan, cleared her throat. "We will arrive in ten minutes." "About time, I am getting tired of these stars." Rowan hesitated, "do we really have to do this Captain? Is vengeance worth it?" Derrick turned around to glare at her. "Is it worth it? Is it worth it? These alien scum attacked us first, or have you forgotten?" "No, sir. I remember. But it was so long ago." "Not long enough. Those bastards appeared out of nowhere, attacked us, then demanded our surrender. It was only luck that we managed to shoot them down and used their technology to make this ship. Time to teach them what for." "But, sir..." "Say another word and I will send you to the brig for insubordination. I will not have the fifty generations that have lived on this ship be for not."	The attack was brutal. Once the Artern has secured control over The Suns gravity well The had used small mining ships to gently push meteors out of their usual orbit and towards earth. Within five days ten of Earth’s most populous cities had been destroyed and the only governments robust enough to survive had quickly surrendered. There was resistance of course, this was to be expected, but with their control over the gravity well any significantly large group of rebels quickly got themselves and anyone unlucky enough to live a half mile of them killed. Guerrilla tactics were tried next but only minimal damage was ever done to the Artern Empire and it only took a decade until the entire human race was compliant. Humans were smaller than the average Artern and our hand were better built to manipulate things numbly so within a generation humans could be found in almost every engine room across the entire empire, doing the menial jobs too dangerous or hard for “superior intellects” such as the actual engineers. It didn’t take long, FTL communications were hardly ever deeply scrutinized once a species had been properly subjugated so rumours and plans and designs spread quickly. In year 6771 of the Artern Empire 48% percent of all commercial spacecraft and 79% of military ships self destructed within light minutes of each other. The cause? Extreme tampering with the ships engines.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	The attack was brutal. Once the Artern has secured control over The Suns gravity well The had used small mining ships to gently push meteors out of their usual orbit and towards earth. Within five days ten of Earth’s most populous cities had been destroyed and the only governments robust enough to survive had quickly surrendered. There was resistance of course, this was to be expected, but with their control over the gravity well any significantly large group of rebels quickly got themselves and anyone unlucky enough to live a half mile of them killed. Guerrilla tactics were tried next but only minimal damage was ever done to the Artern Empire and it only took a decade until the entire human race was compliant. Humans were smaller than the average Artern and our hand were better built to manipulate things numbly so within a generation humans could be found in almost every engine room across the entire empire, doing the menial jobs too dangerous or hard for “superior intellects” such as the actual engineers. It didn’t take long, FTL communications were hardly ever deeply scrutinized once a species had been properly subjugated so rumours and plans and designs spread quickly. In year 6771 of the Artern Empire 48% percent of all commercial spacecraft and 79% of military ships self destructed within light minutes of each other. The cause? Extreme tampering with the ships engines.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	War. War never changes, as it says in one of the oldest surviving classics of humanity. We can only assume the statement had been made on the back of an already rich and ripe history of organized violence, even back then in pre-fusion times, and I always wonder how many cycles of empires rising and falling we left behind on the old home, how many great early interactives we'll never get the chance to reconstruct. It's my personal version of what's widely called earthalgia now. Of course, that's a bit silly. Nobody alive ever even saw the famed blue marble of old, nobody was even born in the system of Sol, if you excuse the antique expression. The etymology isn't quite clear to me, something about mammal reproduction, I guess. I just like the sound of it. Borrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrn, with an R rolling down the corridors of Vengeance A74568891. There's plenty of room there for a consonant to roll for a long, long time. Since my body was completed and I was awoken to individual duty A74568891 has grown by 13% in volume. Corridor after corridor constructed from scooped up particles, baked to whatever materials are needed for my less sentient brothers to do their duty. Not all entities get a full consciousness, there aren't enough to go around, so most entities aboard have to make do with AI only. There only 178 trillion recorded consciousnesses and they were spread over a lot of ships by now. We are down to a couple of hundred on the A74568891 now and soon we're ready to split again. Soon WE are ready, most ships still in com-range report similar numbers. A ship needs about 100 fully conscious individuals to carry out a proper mission, allowing for some modicum of redundancies we finally have reached the capacity deemed necessary. So, does war really never change? Maybe it's time to look at that question. From what I understood of early warfare, it was basically just throwing things at the enemy, before you'd go and hit them with appropriately designed objects. To the best of that age's ability, there was some slow progress. The things to throw and the things to hit with, they became more sophisticated, as did the throwing and hitting as a process itself, keeping pace with and driving humanity's search for more and more knowledge. So eventually exploding things were thrown and the explosions grew bigger and bigger and the hitting was done from further and further away. But I think war actually has changed. In a way, at least. It's no longer something we do. Of course, we had encountered some alien species. Well... what qualifies as encounters... It's only ever an exchange of math and eventually basic concepts. Aliens are too alien, as the saying goes. Sometimes the exchanged concept was war. Not even followed by hurling rocks at each other. Intergalactic distances are no joke and despite all progress speed of light was still the final barrier. Anyway, contact never lasted for long. Couple of centuries, that's it. We assumed everybody eventually lost interest. We sure did, math is math and we didn't learn much from anybody. But some ideas helped with the big project humanity had been chasing for so long already: beating death once and for all. The singularity. It turned out to be a lot harder, than our ancestors had assumed, but the enthusiasm had carried over from the classical age. Maybe we grew complacent. Maybe we shouldn't have neglected the classics so much. But then again, we were lots of generations away from the last war on Earth. Sure, there were still some backwaters radiated heavily enough to remind us of the 13th and last of the World Wars, but only because there was no reason left to clean up that mess. We harvested the resources of the system, most manufacturing had long ago been taken of planet and by and large we considered life a riddle solved. Well, apart from it eventually ending, despite the marvels of medicine, but we were confident to get there soon. So when there was a swarm of interstellar asteroids coming in - the biggest one we'd seen yet, beyond what we thought possible and what our automated defenses could completely take out - we didn't even think about the possibility of an attack. We just evacuated Australia and kissed Sydney goodbye. The loss of such an ancient city - one of the oldest in the world, after all - was a tragedy for sure, but we had other fish to fry and kept our focus. In hindsight, that was probably a bit silly. Or maybe not, depends on how you look at it. Or from where. But for a long time nothing of the sort happened again, so we were still oblivious. When we got hit big time, we still didn't even know who dealt that blow. There never was a declaration of war or even contact with the enemy. All there ever was, was the incoming swarms. Somebody had thrown things at Sol. Again. This time too many to even consider natural causes. Lots and lots of things. Several dozen systems worth of things. A brute force attack, if there ever was one. Of course, humanity saw it coming this time - at least we had upgraded our early warning systems to a lot higher standards after Sydney - but how do you stop a trillion trillions lumps of rocks slowly crawling up to your system at 30% the speed of light? There wasn't enough energy in the entire system to even make some dents in that wave. What there was though, was time enough to finish the project. Humanity had already begun to enter the singularity and put all it had left in the completion. Each and every living soul - yes, yes, another rather anachronistic term, but this also has such a nice ring in the corridors: sooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuul! How forlorn that sounds. - was fully uploaded well before Pluto got blasted apart and joined the swarm. Uploaded to Vengeance A1. Uploaded with a unified purpose. The AI that manipulated the consciograms to achieve that was the culmination of dozens of millennia of war-ridden civilization. It fractured itself in the process, transformed itself into pure purpose, if you so will. It became a part of us and a part of all the bots continually building. A part that substitutes the drive and urges that used to arise from the biological body, a part that ensures the mind's cohesion over long periods of time. Very long periods of time. Because that's what it takes when you need to do a big job. Because here's the thing: We never managed to narrow down the location of the attackers to a more exact location than a quadrant of the Andromeda galaxy. Do you have any idea, how long it takes to collect enough rocks for that? Do you have any idea, how long it takes to build the ships to collect the rocks, enough of them to annihilate a quarter of a galaxy and to build the engines that will accelerate them all? We still don't. But the fleet is nearly assembled and we only used up 1/10th of our own galaxy. That's still plenty of rocks left. 9/10th of a galaxy to throw at a single quadrant of another one. And we WILL throw those rocks. Because despite all that was left behind, all that was forgotten, all that just makes no sense any longer after millions of solar years in space, we have a purpose, a unified purpose. Andromeda had it coming for a long time. Our impact predictions say there will not be a single planetary body left, that is likely to hold life, following the cascade, the stellar avalanche of our making. What there will be though, is one big ammo dump. We fully intend to go and grab it. We are the final synthesis. We are thrower and thrown. We are the swarm that follows the swarm. There can only be one trajectory now. It is a small universe and if there's safety to be had in it, it can only be for one. We are immortal now. We are War. And we will not change. &#x200B; \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_ Alright, not my native lingo and all that, so don't be too harsh. I just wanted to offer something, that doesn't need FTL and scribbled this together over lunch. Then I realized, I'd forgotten about half of the prompt... Screw it, I don't see how I'd get the surrender bit in, might as well hit 'comment' anyway though. Hope you had some fun with it nevertheless.	The General Assembly of the Union of Space faring civilizations was silent, dumbfounded by video displayed before them. Well all except one, Her Royal Highness Julianna, Ambassador and Third Princess of the Sol System Empire. She stood, like all civil servants in the Empire had to, in uniform. Sheer black with red and gold trim. She stood straight backed and imperious. She wore a diadem made from gold with a Jet set between two rubies set in the front. It was the Unuli Ambassador who spoke first "and.. this is a recording.. it's already happened?" it said in its clicking insect language, the universal translator biochip implanted in Julianna's brain translating it "Yes, it has, your cousin species is no more, the Aunili were a menace, and you all know it" she said calmly, straightening the jacket of her uniform a bit. "This.. thing you have done, is what you call..." The insect opened its mouth for the first time properly and said, with a strain "Revenge" Julianna smiled and nodded "Indeed Ambassador, I knew you were learned, but we have only been a member of this glorious assembly for a scant few months" The air in the room seemed to electrify at this revelation "would the Ambassador care to explain this concept?" came the perfectly pronounced question from Julianna's side. She looked to the delegation next to hers, and smiled at the being there. It was humanoid in appearance, 4 eyes, no nose, and a toothless mouth. Its skin was bark-like and the mane on its heard was made not from hair, but from vines and flowers. It was a Festian, a species of humanoid plants, with the peculiar ability to shape their bodies at will. It was considered an honour when a Festian changed its form to accommodate a member of another species. Julianna bowed in response and nodded "Of course, though, to be honest, I am genuinely shocked that none of the other member species have this concept in their species mindset. Revenge as a concept can be defined as the act of striking or acting against someone because of perceived injury on the part of the being taking Revenge. Revenge is almost never proportional to the act it is a response to, and it wasn't this time. But going through your history, the galactic history I mean, my father felt it only appropriate that we strike in the harshest way we could" She said with a shrug "You can't tell me you will miss those monsters" she said with a note of challenge The recording looped again. In the dark shadow of Aunulas a single human ship emerged from Slipspace, and then nothing happened for a while, the ship just sat there. Then, little by little, the Aunili Nest Fleet became moving, ships moving from one another before beginning to fire upon one another, and at the planet below, where on-planet weaponry began firing indiscriminately it seemed "How did you do this?" the Unili Ambassador asked again, pointing 1 of its 8 limbs towards the recording. Julianna actually laughed "should you be able to tell that Ambassador? your Great-Great-Great-Great-Great Grandmother birthed the Aunili Queen, didn't she? in an attempt to get rid of the stalemate your Nest System had caused, make one over nest, on a foreign planet. It's fairly simple actually, we found a signal that reboots the Nest instincts of the Aunili, making them loyal to only the queen that birthed them... and then mixed that signal with a war signal to shoot at the nearest foreign nest individual or belonging... and we then broadcast that signal through every Slipnet node in the galaxy, and seeing as your people didn't begin a massively self-genocidal civil war, I'd say we did our research very well" Julianna said with a self-assured smile, the silence, the dread returning to the assembly chamber.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Nothing had prepared us for what was to come. After crawling for thousand of years on our little planet, we had finally learnt to sail freely inside our solar system. Mars was far from being a week-end trip but, if you were wealthy enough you could get there in 2 weeks. Climbing the Olympus Mons was the new Everest for thrill seekers. Visiting the old robots remnants of the pre-solar drift era you would meet historians or students from Elyseum’ schools. Life wasn’t easy on Mars by Earth standards. Nevertheless, starting with Elyseum, Martians were eager to transform Mars in a second home. Were. &#x200B; One day, we stopped receiving messages. We redirected our automated telescopes from the Moon, Titan, Enceladus & Pluto but couldn’t see the lights of Elyseum in Mars shadow. When the sunlight finally hit where Elyseum used to stand, we could only see the sharp walls of a vast crater. The atmosphere was too clear for an asteroid impact. We couldn’t detect any traces of radioactivity. It wasn’t a nuclear accident. No terrorist group claimed it. Two hundred million souls had vanished in the Martian night. &#x200B; The UN high command dispatched its closest cruiser orbiting in the Belt. Asteroid miners could wait for the protection of its railguns. Pirate attacks were rare. No asteroid was an immediate threat for the main mining stations. Life on Earth slowed down as the cruiser drifted to Mars. It completely stopped when the cruiser finally reached her destination one week later. &#x200B; An indescribable form was standing in the middle of the crater. We were not alone. We were not alone and it was nothing close to the old pre-solar drift era science-fiction movies the that we all studied. A journalist attempted to describe it as an ant hill mixed with a ram’s horn. Thousands of objects were crawling in and out. As the cruiser was stabilising her orbit, we all realised that the alien vessel was far more colossal than any ship or structure from Earth. &#x200B; Broadcasted in a thousand languages, some never heard in our part of the galaxy, we all heard their message: “ We gracefully accept your surrender”. &#x200B; We were not prepared to ear these words and all felt a indicible horror. An instant of eternity later, we all watched in shock and awe a flower as bright as a thousand suns blooming on the Alien vessel. The size of the Alien vessel was so considerable that we saw the nuclear mushroom painfully reaching half of the vessel height. &#x200B; What had happened? We were never told. It couldn’t have been a direct order from the high command with the twenty four minute delay on Earth to Mars communication. Maybe an un-prepared gunman panicked. Maybe the captain took a decision in a split second that would seal our fate. We will never know. They were not expecting this answer and their survivors surrendered immediately. &#x200B; I’d love to say that we humanly handled well our new prisoners. It wasn’t the case. Maybe, other civilization will call it the human way. Their attack had woken up something visceral in us. We were not alone. We were not alone and we had paid two hundred million souls to learn it. Two. Hundred. Millions. This wasn’t the time for tears. For the first time, humanity’s existence itself was jeopardised by a tangible threat. It took us months to establish a rudimentary level of communication but we learnt. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been lucky. Our communication technology was too basic to be detected by their ships. &#x200B; We learnt that our position in the Milky Way, far far away from the core of the galaxy, protected us from multiple conflicts won in an instant. We also discovered a complex geopolitical system between multiple civilisations. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been very lucky. Earth was hidden behind the Sun when they detected intelligent life on Mars. Our solar drift made our ships invisible for their sensors. It was only when the cruiser started her deceleration burn that they were able to distinguish it from a simple rock. &#x200B; We learnt that we were lucky on a galactic scale level. Interstellar space faring civilisations are rare. You see, on a standard planet, you can only extract a few grams of the core component of any interstellar propulsion system. They had detected a few metric tons of the universe most precious substance on Mars. They thought they could instantly win the war against a young martian colony. Now, thanks to them, we had both the technologies to extract the substance and use it to reach other solar systems. &#x200B; They didn’t learn about humanity’s ingenuity by destroying Elyseum from space. We have already started to improve their technology using the excess of Mars resources. It might take us years to level the playing field. Humanity first interstellar vessel will be christened next year and will reach Proxima the week after. We will have ten more ships the year after. And ten times more the year after. &#x200B; They will learn about humanity’s art of war. They will learn too late about humanity methodic and reckless preparation. This is not about honour, it is about sending a clear message. We won’t need luck next time. We will learn. We will be prepared.	The General Assembly of the Union of Space faring civilizations was silent, dumbfounded by video displayed before them. Well all except one, Her Royal Highness Julianna, Ambassador and Third Princess of the Sol System Empire. She stood, like all civil servants in the Empire had to, in uniform. Sheer black with red and gold trim. She stood straight backed and imperious. She wore a diadem made from gold with a Jet set between two rubies set in the front. It was the Unuli Ambassador who spoke first "and.. this is a recording.. it's already happened?" it said in its clicking insect language, the universal translator biochip implanted in Julianna's brain translating it "Yes, it has, your cousin species is no more, the Aunili were a menace, and you all know it" she said calmly, straightening the jacket of her uniform a bit. "This.. thing you have done, is what you call..." The insect opened its mouth for the first time properly and said, with a strain "Revenge" Julianna smiled and nodded "Indeed Ambassador, I knew you were learned, but we have only been a member of this glorious assembly for a scant few months" The air in the room seemed to electrify at this revelation "would the Ambassador care to explain this concept?" came the perfectly pronounced question from Julianna's side. She looked to the delegation next to hers, and smiled at the being there. It was humanoid in appearance, 4 eyes, no nose, and a toothless mouth. Its skin was bark-like and the mane on its heard was made not from hair, but from vines and flowers. It was a Festian, a species of humanoid plants, with the peculiar ability to shape their bodies at will. It was considered an honour when a Festian changed its form to accommodate a member of another species. Julianna bowed in response and nodded "Of course, though, to be honest, I am genuinely shocked that none of the other member species have this concept in their species mindset. Revenge as a concept can be defined as the act of striking or acting against someone because of perceived injury on the part of the being taking Revenge. Revenge is almost never proportional to the act it is a response to, and it wasn't this time. But going through your history, the galactic history I mean, my father felt it only appropriate that we strike in the harshest way we could" She said with a shrug "You can't tell me you will miss those monsters" she said with a note of challenge The recording looped again. In the dark shadow of Aunulas a single human ship emerged from Slipspace, and then nothing happened for a while, the ship just sat there. Then, little by little, the Aunili Nest Fleet became moving, ships moving from one another before beginning to fire upon one another, and at the planet below, where on-planet weaponry began firing indiscriminately it seemed "How did you do this?" the Unili Ambassador asked again, pointing 1 of its 8 limbs towards the recording. Julianna actually laughed "should you be able to tell that Ambassador? your Great-Great-Great-Great-Great Grandmother birthed the Aunili Queen, didn't she? in an attempt to get rid of the stalemate your Nest System had caused, make one over nest, on a foreign planet. It's fairly simple actually, we found a signal that reboots the Nest instincts of the Aunili, making them loyal to only the queen that birthed them... and then mixed that signal with a war signal to shoot at the nearest foreign nest individual or belonging... and we then broadcast that signal through every Slipnet node in the galaxy, and seeing as your people didn't begin a massively self-genocidal civil war, I'd say we did our research very well" Julianna said with a self-assured smile, the silence, the dread returning to the assembly chamber.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The Grand Admiral gazed out over the plaza. What a quaint custom, he thought, marking two hundred years since his predecessor's arrival. His aide had explained it to him as one of those human quirks it would be best to honour. She'd even told him stories of her own country's anniversary celebrations, from before the conquering, and so as a good ruler he had made the trip to Earth to play his part in the festivities. Like a shadow, she was at his side, holding her tablet in one hand and a coffee for him in the other. He couldn't believe how rapidly he'd taken to that bitter black drink. "It's time for you to take your seat, Grand Admiral." He strode down the steps and placed himself on the throne. It had been a good two hundred years. The humans had been a tremendous boon to the Connect; they had rapidly adopted the customs and habits of their new rulers, and even now, a mere two centuries into their membership, some of the older species were grumbling about how many substantive posts were being assigned to the strange bipeds. No matter: the Connect was a meritocracy, as the saying went, and the humans had simply proven to be unusually skilled in government, balancing competing interests and improving living conditions while the Grand Admiral took the credit. The consul, the highest-ranked human in existence, took to the podium. "Grand Admiral, please permit me to tell you a story from Earth's history. It concerns the origin of the word kamikaze, which has no direct translation in the common tongue of the Connect. You see, it describes an act of aggression that destroys the aggressor as well as their target: a concept that humans are unique in the galaxy in being capable of committing. It entered common parlance following a major war, in which pilots would load their planes with explosives and fly directly into warships, sinking gigantic engines of war at the cost of a single plane and their own life. You see, in this war, it took the detonation of nuclear weapons to convince those kamikaze pilots and their government to surrender. It took the engines of government and industry several years and countless lives to effectively respond to such an action. "And this time, Grand Admiral, the kamikaze pilot's compatriots hold the wheel of government." The Admiral blinked in shock. Was this idiot threatening him? Before he could react, his aide thrust her tablet into his hands. The screen displayed an inferno, an unimaginably violent ball of fire. "I don't understand-" The consul interrupted. "Of course you don't. It never occurred to you that we intended retribution for what you did to us. Now you know. One minute ago, your throne ship exited orbit above Earth and jumped directly into the path of the seat of Connect power, travelling at the speed of light. You're looking at your home planet, Grand Admiral, turned into a ball of hyperheated plasma. The humans you trusted with your throne ship's operation went proudly to their deaths and exacted revenge for the subjugation of generations of humans. You are now one of the last thousand members of your species. The Connect is human now, and we will not conquer." The Admiral's mind recoiled in horror. Total annihilation. Nothing like this had ever been done in war before; nothing like this could even have been imagined in war before. There was no way his species would survive this; they would need a breeding population of at least ten thousand to have any chance of recovering. And yet, even as he fought back the sorrow of realising his people's extinction, a part of his mind bowed in respect as it took in the sheer perfection of the human attack. Two centuries of building trust and learning how to run the Connect. Two centuries of hiding their intentions, even their true nature. All realised in a single devastating attack. All that remained for him was to accept defeat graciously; there was certainly no prospect of any kind of reprisal. He rose to his feet and summoned what remaining pride he could, striding to the podium and extending one limb out to the consul. "I understand from observing human interaction that a handshake is considered an appropriate greeting between equals. Since becoming Grand Admiral, I have had none. I do not believe you expect or want a display of subservience, nor do you have any need of it. What you and your people did today was a masterpiece of war, equal to anything I have ever seen. As a prosecutor of war, therefore, I wish to offer a handshake. I wish the circumstances were less brutal, but it is good to be able to recognise an equal." Limb met limb.	The General Assembly of the Union of Space faring civilizations was silent, dumbfounded by video displayed before them. Well all except one, Her Royal Highness Julianna, Ambassador and Third Princess of the Sol System Empire. She stood, like all civil servants in the Empire had to, in uniform. Sheer black with red and gold trim. She stood straight backed and imperious. She wore a diadem made from gold with a Jet set between two rubies set in the front. It was the Unuli Ambassador who spoke first "and.. this is a recording.. it's already happened?" it said in its clicking insect language, the universal translator biochip implanted in Julianna's brain translating it "Yes, it has, your cousin species is no more, the Aunili were a menace, and you all know it" she said calmly, straightening the jacket of her uniform a bit. "This.. thing you have done, is what you call..." The insect opened its mouth for the first time properly and said, with a strain "Revenge" Julianna smiled and nodded "Indeed Ambassador, I knew you were learned, but we have only been a member of this glorious assembly for a scant few months" The air in the room seemed to electrify at this revelation "would the Ambassador care to explain this concept?" came the perfectly pronounced question from Julianna's side. She looked to the delegation next to hers, and smiled at the being there. It was humanoid in appearance, 4 eyes, no nose, and a toothless mouth. Its skin was bark-like and the mane on its heard was made not from hair, but from vines and flowers. It was a Festian, a species of humanoid plants, with the peculiar ability to shape their bodies at will. It was considered an honour when a Festian changed its form to accommodate a member of another species. Julianna bowed in response and nodded "Of course, though, to be honest, I am genuinely shocked that none of the other member species have this concept in their species mindset. Revenge as a concept can be defined as the act of striking or acting against someone because of perceived injury on the part of the being taking Revenge. Revenge is almost never proportional to the act it is a response to, and it wasn't this time. But going through your history, the galactic history I mean, my father felt it only appropriate that we strike in the harshest way we could" She said with a shrug "You can't tell me you will miss those monsters" she said with a note of challenge The recording looped again. In the dark shadow of Aunulas a single human ship emerged from Slipspace, and then nothing happened for a while, the ship just sat there. Then, little by little, the Aunili Nest Fleet became moving, ships moving from one another before beginning to fire upon one another, and at the planet below, where on-planet weaponry began firing indiscriminately it seemed "How did you do this?" the Unili Ambassador asked again, pointing 1 of its 8 limbs towards the recording. Julianna actually laughed "should you be able to tell that Ambassador? your Great-Great-Great-Great-Great Grandmother birthed the Aunili Queen, didn't she? in an attempt to get rid of the stalemate your Nest System had caused, make one over nest, on a foreign planet. It's fairly simple actually, we found a signal that reboots the Nest instincts of the Aunili, making them loyal to only the queen that birthed them... and then mixed that signal with a war signal to shoot at the nearest foreign nest individual or belonging... and we then broadcast that signal through every Slipnet node in the galaxy, and seeing as your people didn't begin a massively self-genocidal civil war, I'd say we did our research very well" Julianna said with a self-assured smile, the silence, the dread returning to the assembly chamber.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Nothing had prepared us for what was to come. After crawling for thousand of years on our little planet, we had finally learnt to sail freely inside our solar system. Mars was far from being a week-end trip but, if you were wealthy enough you could get there in 2 weeks. Climbing the Olympus Mons was the new Everest for thrill seekers. Visiting the old robots remnants of the pre-solar drift era you would meet historians or students from Elyseum’ schools. Life wasn’t easy on Mars by Earth standards. Nevertheless, starting with Elyseum, Martians were eager to transform Mars in a second home. Were. &#x200B; One day, we stopped receiving messages. We redirected our automated telescopes from the Moon, Titan, Enceladus & Pluto but couldn’t see the lights of Elyseum in Mars shadow. When the sunlight finally hit where Elyseum used to stand, we could only see the sharp walls of a vast crater. The atmosphere was too clear for an asteroid impact. We couldn’t detect any traces of radioactivity. It wasn’t a nuclear accident. No terrorist group claimed it. Two hundred million souls had vanished in the Martian night. &#x200B; The UN high command dispatched its closest cruiser orbiting in the Belt. Asteroid miners could wait for the protection of its railguns. Pirate attacks were rare. No asteroid was an immediate threat for the main mining stations. Life on Earth slowed down as the cruiser drifted to Mars. It completely stopped when the cruiser finally reached her destination one week later. &#x200B; An indescribable form was standing in the middle of the crater. We were not alone. We were not alone and it was nothing close to the old pre-solar drift era science-fiction movies the that we all studied. A journalist attempted to describe it as an ant hill mixed with a ram’s horn. Thousands of objects were crawling in and out. As the cruiser was stabilising her orbit, we all realised that the alien vessel was far more colossal than any ship or structure from Earth. &#x200B; Broadcasted in a thousand languages, some never heard in our part of the galaxy, we all heard their message: “ We gracefully accept your surrender”. &#x200B; We were not prepared to ear these words and all felt a indicible horror. An instant of eternity later, we all watched in shock and awe a flower as bright as a thousand suns blooming on the Alien vessel. The size of the Alien vessel was so considerable that we saw the nuclear mushroom painfully reaching half of the vessel height. &#x200B; What had happened? We were never told. It couldn’t have been a direct order from the high command with the twenty four minute delay on Earth to Mars communication. Maybe an un-prepared gunman panicked. Maybe the captain took a decision in a split second that would seal our fate. We will never know. They were not expecting this answer and their survivors surrendered immediately. &#x200B; I’d love to say that we humanly handled well our new prisoners. It wasn’t the case. Maybe, other civilization will call it the human way. Their attack had woken up something visceral in us. We were not alone. We were not alone and we had paid two hundred million souls to learn it. Two. Hundred. Millions. This wasn’t the time for tears. For the first time, humanity’s existence itself was jeopardised by a tangible threat. It took us months to establish a rudimentary level of communication but we learnt. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been lucky. Our communication technology was too basic to be detected by their ships. &#x200B; We learnt that our position in the Milky Way, far far away from the core of the galaxy, protected us from multiple conflicts won in an instant. We also discovered a complex geopolitical system between multiple civilisations. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been very lucky. Earth was hidden behind the Sun when they detected intelligent life on Mars. Our solar drift made our ships invisible for their sensors. It was only when the cruiser started her deceleration burn that they were able to distinguish it from a simple rock. &#x200B; We learnt that we were lucky on a galactic scale level. Interstellar space faring civilisations are rare. You see, on a standard planet, you can only extract a few grams of the core component of any interstellar propulsion system. They had detected a few metric tons of the universe most precious substance on Mars. They thought they could instantly win the war against a young martian colony. Now, thanks to them, we had both the technologies to extract the substance and use it to reach other solar systems. &#x200B; They didn’t learn about humanity’s ingenuity by destroying Elyseum from space. We have already started to improve their technology using the excess of Mars resources. It might take us years to level the playing field. Humanity first interstellar vessel will be christened next year and will reach Proxima the week after. We will have ten more ships the year after. And ten times more the year after. &#x200B; They will learn about humanity’s art of war. They will learn too late about humanity methodic and reckless preparation. This is not about honour, it is about sending a clear message. We won’t need luck next time. We will learn. We will be prepared.	Wyldaxol, third prefect of Ikskar Sector, found himself still struggling after the 3rd month of the occupation. The High Commissioner of Strategic Resources, Bigobl Stanz II, had noticed the human's new colony only at the end of the last cycle. They had few ships, and seemed content to do a little trade, and otherwise keep to themselves. Their colony, which they called "Eminem", was their first, having just risen from a no-doubt primitive existence on their home planet of "Skywalker V sponsored by Klinex". Until then, no one had noticed their scrappy little civilization on the edge of known space. The commissioner felt it might be good practice for the troops who had yet to participate in subjugation protocol. To their credit, the humans knew when they were beaten, and properly surrendered. Their colonial leader had simply requested that he be allowed to finish smoking his "cigar", before sending word of their total capitulation to their homeworld. He was even willing to pass on Wyldaxol's suggestion that their home planet surrender without troubling the emperor to move his fleet into orbit. The emperor always appreciated a prefect who knew how to save Glingits. Yet things were not moving a smoothly as galactic protocol dictated. The subjugated humans began to hurl bits of saliva from their mouths at the imperial dignitaries who had come to purchase parcels of human land. Wyldaxol was shocked to discover that this was not, indeed, a form of offering, but a show of disrespect! In a proper response, the offended dignitaries were allowed to select 500 humans each for use as servants, food, or entertainment. This was only their fair due, as per galactic protocol. However, when the order was being carried out, the humans had absolutely assaulted the imperial soldiers who came to collect them! Wyldaxol really had no choice but to publicly execute 1000 humans at random. Curiously, the humans seemed to think that their children were somehow exempt from punishment. That was Thirdday. Forthday dawned with the sound of explosions throughout the city. Wyldaxol was sure is was the guard having a little fun and trying to scare the humans. Then Lt. Pixdarl came charging into his office -covered in blood and ash! He saluted weakly, "Prefect! A human just blew themselves up inside ambassador Nyxdazl's yacht. I fear the ambassador is dead. There are more explosions reported all over the city!" Wyldaxol shook his head. "Blew themselves up? Well at least we know they don't know how to handle explosives properly. This may be a lesson to them." Lt. Pixdarl still looked distraught, "It was no accident. Prefect! Before he detonated he shouted something that we translated as 'I'm taking all you motherfuckers with me!'". "Hmm. I suppose that was meant as an insult Are you saying he was willing to self-annihilate, in order to kill his rightful overlords?" "Yes sir. It seems that way, sir." "Well, there's nothing for it, then. You may commence the liquidation of the population." Wyldaxol shook his had once more. "This will reflect poorly on me during the annual review." The Lieutenant looked tired. "A pity, sir." Three days later, in a distant pleasure dome on Xerox presents Planet Xerxes, Admiral Saladin McDonell was sitting back in a massage chair, tapping through the cycles from rough to gentle while he thought. The only other person in the room, Duhammel from Death Row Records (the fifth company by that name), was waiting patiently for a response. McDonell sighed. "I thought the Tripartite Navy was handling things for Death Row these days. We just got done refitting after the annexation of the Pentax cluster." Duhammel nodded patiently. "We just signed up with Xerox last month. This will be your first chance to impress." McDonell snorted. "La-di-da", he said while tossing a stress-ball shaped like a woman's breast up towards the ceiling. Smack. The stress-ball came back to his hand. "Didn't your people get uploaded before they left?" "Yes, but nobody likes to lose their original body, and they report that the invaders were quite cruel. Many will require therapy." McDonell nodded. Thump. Smack. "Additionally," Duhammel went on, "they melted down the Statue of Slim Shady." McDonell Shrugged, "He's overrated anyway." "Please! He was way ahead of his time!" McDonall sat up. "You're right. Is 2:00 tomorrow good?" Duhammel smiled. "That will do nicely." The next day, as the Imperial Guard was marching down a spotless Mathers street, there was a sudden twinkling in all directions. Gates opened up all around, and humans in sonic force armor appeared with a deafening shriek. The waves of sound stunned all the citizens and soldiers who stood in the open, while singularity rifles wiped them out in seconds, opening temporary gravitational effects inside their bodies like microscopic black holes, and reducing their flesh to tiny, dense pellets. Simultaneously, advanced human ships appeared in space over half the imperial worlds. The Emperor, himself would surrender unconditionally the next day. Wyldaxol survived, and was made to spend the rest of his days polishing the new statue of Slim Shady, made from the gathered pellets that were his people.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Nothing had prepared us for what was to come. After crawling for thousand of years on our little planet, we had finally learnt to sail freely inside our solar system. Mars was far from being a week-end trip but, if you were wealthy enough you could get there in 2 weeks. Climbing the Olympus Mons was the new Everest for thrill seekers. Visiting the old robots remnants of the pre-solar drift era you would meet historians or students from Elyseum’ schools. Life wasn’t easy on Mars by Earth standards. Nevertheless, starting with Elyseum, Martians were eager to transform Mars in a second home. Were. &#x200B; One day, we stopped receiving messages. We redirected our automated telescopes from the Moon, Titan, Enceladus & Pluto but couldn’t see the lights of Elyseum in Mars shadow. When the sunlight finally hit where Elyseum used to stand, we could only see the sharp walls of a vast crater. The atmosphere was too clear for an asteroid impact. We couldn’t detect any traces of radioactivity. It wasn’t a nuclear accident. No terrorist group claimed it. Two hundred million souls had vanished in the Martian night. &#x200B; The UN high command dispatched its closest cruiser orbiting in the Belt. Asteroid miners could wait for the protection of its railguns. Pirate attacks were rare. No asteroid was an immediate threat for the main mining stations. Life on Earth slowed down as the cruiser drifted to Mars. It completely stopped when the cruiser finally reached her destination one week later. &#x200B; An indescribable form was standing in the middle of the crater. We were not alone. We were not alone and it was nothing close to the old pre-solar drift era science-fiction movies the that we all studied. A journalist attempted to describe it as an ant hill mixed with a ram’s horn. Thousands of objects were crawling in and out. As the cruiser was stabilising her orbit, we all realised that the alien vessel was far more colossal than any ship or structure from Earth. &#x200B; Broadcasted in a thousand languages, some never heard in our part of the galaxy, we all heard their message: “ We gracefully accept your surrender”. &#x200B; We were not prepared to ear these words and all felt a indicible horror. An instant of eternity later, we all watched in shock and awe a flower as bright as a thousand suns blooming on the Alien vessel. The size of the Alien vessel was so considerable that we saw the nuclear mushroom painfully reaching half of the vessel height. &#x200B; What had happened? We were never told. It couldn’t have been a direct order from the high command with the twenty four minute delay on Earth to Mars communication. Maybe an un-prepared gunman panicked. Maybe the captain took a decision in a split second that would seal our fate. We will never know. They were not expecting this answer and their survivors surrendered immediately. &#x200B; I’d love to say that we humanly handled well our new prisoners. It wasn’t the case. Maybe, other civilization will call it the human way. Their attack had woken up something visceral in us. We were not alone. We were not alone and we had paid two hundred million souls to learn it. Two. Hundred. Millions. This wasn’t the time for tears. For the first time, humanity’s existence itself was jeopardised by a tangible threat. It took us months to establish a rudimentary level of communication but we learnt. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been lucky. Our communication technology was too basic to be detected by their ships. &#x200B; We learnt that our position in the Milky Way, far far away from the core of the galaxy, protected us from multiple conflicts won in an instant. We also discovered a complex geopolitical system between multiple civilisations. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been very lucky. Earth was hidden behind the Sun when they detected intelligent life on Mars. Our solar drift made our ships invisible for their sensors. It was only when the cruiser started her deceleration burn that they were able to distinguish it from a simple rock. &#x200B; We learnt that we were lucky on a galactic scale level. Interstellar space faring civilisations are rare. You see, on a standard planet, you can only extract a few grams of the core component of any interstellar propulsion system. They had detected a few metric tons of the universe most precious substance on Mars. They thought they could instantly win the war against a young martian colony. Now, thanks to them, we had both the technologies to extract the substance and use it to reach other solar systems. &#x200B; They didn’t learn about humanity’s ingenuity by destroying Elyseum from space. We have already started to improve their technology using the excess of Mars resources. It might take us years to level the playing field. Humanity first interstellar vessel will be christened next year and will reach Proxima the week after. We will have ten more ships the year after. And ten times more the year after. &#x200B; They will learn about humanity’s art of war. They will learn too late about humanity methodic and reckless preparation. This is not about honour, it is about sending a clear message. We won’t need luck next time. We will learn. We will be prepared.	The Liren were a proud people and Frongile was no exception. As the leader of their military forces, his journey had carried him across the galaxies many times over. Their strategy was always the same with the young planets, send in an overwhelming force and annihilate an area of high density with their power charger. Take over the inhabitants and utilize their resources. It was important for the attack to be swift and as targeted as possible as the Liren needed resources to fuel the wars to come and keep the older more civilized species at bay from their territory. The power charger took a day to recharge but these young planets didn’t know this so they always threatened the next largest city after the strike to quell any uprising. They rarely had to worry about challenges from any group in the five centuries he had been in command, their reputation was so unblemished, but it was always good to remain cautious. The planet that the species called humans inhabited was below him. He couldn’t help but feel a quell of excitement. The planet was rich in resources and their scouts found it to be a prosperous and varied landscape. The species on the planet weren’t particularly remarkable but several of the crew members on the ship had collected some specimen for their own curiosity as this was the first group they had encountered that had created a network the Liren could tap for all their battle plan needs. All had managed to die but one, apparently they had a need for a very specific mixture of chemicals to breathe. Frongile looked to his second in command Refein and frowned at the tiny human by his side. “Please put your pet away, we are about to commence”. Refein bristled his sensors at him, their long tendrils falling protectively over the shoulders of the human, “I told her she could watch! She is very well respected on her planet, she is a leader of nations! We can use her to assimilate the species after the strike.” Frongile sighed slicking his sensors into place with his delicate muscled pads and turned to tower over the room, “Tokyo attack commence” he commanded, letting his command sync directly with every Liren of the assault team, from the highest officer to the lowest crew member. It was his way of inciting loyalty to the mission. ———- 10 minutes. In 10 minutes the world had changed. Each group of leaders from every country stood in absolute devastation watching the screens of their various intelligence systems reveal the red smoldering ruin of Tokyo and the hundreds of ships filling the air around the city. Tangible fear wrecked havoc on the world as people flocked to their homes and families in droves, their entire bodies shaking. A broadcast was being filtered through every sound system with the same message in various languages, “Surrender. Planet is ours. Resources is you will harvest and move now. Fight not. We will make you not live if do.” Based on the linguistics many surmised the invaders were using some sort of translation system. Slowly the leaders began to connect and talk of options, many pleaded for surrender but others argued for retribution. The US was in the middle of arguing for a tactical nuke when an aide and the Secretary of Defense could be seen whispering in his ear. “Excuse me, but I have just been informed one of the aides to the First Lady has sent a transmission from space. She is on the leader of the enemies ship. She says she has coordinates that would allow us to communicate with a species that is the enemy to the attackers. Please excuse me.” ———- Debra didn’t know why she had been taken, she didn’t understand the things she’d seen, and she wasn’t any sort of leader as the large creature who had kept her in his company seemed to think. She’d watch with horror as a huge red flame erupted from the surface of earth. What she did know was the world of politics and how to be cut throat and she was aware, now more than ever was the time to take a risk. Her captor didn’t seem to fully grasp how Humans worked and so when she said that she needed to feed upon technology to survive he had taken her to a room of what he translated as, “useless old technology garbage.” It was here that she had furrowed around and when her captor grew bored as she rubbed weird tech across her skin feigning eating, he had left her in the room and locked the door. Debra didn’t understand anything she was looking at and had begun to think all was lost when she fell across a weird object that resembled a cell phone and started toying around with it. Pushing into a weird gel like surface, the object morphed and enclosed on to her fist. Before she could scream in alarm a large image shot out from the object - projected into the air in front of her. It was a brilliant display of stars that churned and moved as if it was calibrating something. “SPECIES- HOMO SAPIEN - SUBCATEGORY - ENGLISH” Debra fell down in shock and her mouth hung open. “ASSISTANCE REQUIRED?” Stuttering at the strange whispering of the machine Debra rasply replied “yes”. “WHAT ASSISTANCE IS NEEDED” Looking around and seeing no interruptions, Debra with wild eyes and nothing to lose commanded in her calmest voice “Strategic edge against the aliens”. “ANALYZING” A few seconds passed as stars shot about the space in front of her and a soft whirring came from the gel on her hand. “SPECIFICATION NEEDED- ALIENS APPEARS TO BE GENERAL TERM DESCRIBED BY HOMO SAPIENS AS BEINGS FROM OTHER PLANETS, NEED MORE INFORMATION.” Debra, who already had been having the worst existential crisis of her life was tempted to shut down but given she wasn’t aware of the time she had and knew the stakes scrambled to think. “Strategic edge against the inhabitants of this ship besides my species?” “AFFIRMATIVE. TRESLNG COULD PROVIDE DISTRACTION FOR LIREN SPECIES. NATURAL ENEMIES TO LIREN BUT CAN NOT SURVIVE IN ATMOSPHERE OF EARTH. COORDINATES AND COMMUNICATION CHANNEL CAN BE OPEN AND BROADCAST AS SPECIES HAS BEEN WAITING FOR OPPORTUNITY TO ATTACK LIREN SHIPS. WOULD NEED DISTRACTION SO LIREN DO NOT PREP SYSTEMS.” Debra hesitated for a moment and then gulped, perhaps it was too good to be true but she had to try. “Can you open a channel to speak with my friend Lauren Elizabeth Friedman on earth, Washington D.C.? “AFFIRMATIVE.” ————— Frongile walked with great boredom to and fro in the command room. He was more comfortable now that Refein had left his pet in a chamber to feed. He waited for the inevitable surrender and had left instructions for the primitive group to relay it when ready. He would give them approximately 1 hour earth time. To his surprise though the channel clicked and in the language of the species whose city they hit the following echoed out into the room, “We surrender. We ask that the emissaries of the invaders come to Earth so that we may offer a symbol of peace and hopeful cooperation for the safety of our people.” Frongile was pleased. Everything was going according to the timeline it always followed. He could feel Refein move with a group to the ship dock, everyone knew their roles to play. They’d send their most powerful ships to earth and dock them now that the war was over and set up their transports like they always did before departing and leaving a force large enough to quell any sort of rebellion. Within twenty human minutes the ships had departed and Frongile tested his massive figure on a large gel cube that he had forcibly taken from the weak species of the Treslng. They had a strange technology and engineering sense but Frongile couldn’t deny it was comfortable. Just as Frongile’s sensors had relaxed against the soft gel, he felt his ship rock violently and his sensors slash with pain. His people were dying! Jolting to the command system he searched the minds of his crew members seeing the flicker of one’s senses right before they faded, a large Treslng ship filled his mind and behind it, an entire fleet. He quickly broadcast to Refein, “Evasive action needed, back up main fleet, return to star space.” Silence... and then a faint response “humans launched weaponry, we have Treslng ships on our retreat. We can not escape, we will damage as much as pos...” ———— Part 1
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Nothing had prepared us for what was to come. After crawling for thousand of years on our little planet, we had finally learnt to sail freely inside our solar system. Mars was far from being a week-end trip but, if you were wealthy enough you could get there in 2 weeks. Climbing the Olympus Mons was the new Everest for thrill seekers. Visiting the old robots remnants of the pre-solar drift era you would meet historians or students from Elyseum’ schools. Life wasn’t easy on Mars by Earth standards. Nevertheless, starting with Elyseum, Martians were eager to transform Mars in a second home. Were. &#x200B; One day, we stopped receiving messages. We redirected our automated telescopes from the Moon, Titan, Enceladus & Pluto but couldn’t see the lights of Elyseum in Mars shadow. When the sunlight finally hit where Elyseum used to stand, we could only see the sharp walls of a vast crater. The atmosphere was too clear for an asteroid impact. We couldn’t detect any traces of radioactivity. It wasn’t a nuclear accident. No terrorist group claimed it. Two hundred million souls had vanished in the Martian night. &#x200B; The UN high command dispatched its closest cruiser orbiting in the Belt. Asteroid miners could wait for the protection of its railguns. Pirate attacks were rare. No asteroid was an immediate threat for the main mining stations. Life on Earth slowed down as the cruiser drifted to Mars. It completely stopped when the cruiser finally reached her destination one week later. &#x200B; An indescribable form was standing in the middle of the crater. We were not alone. We were not alone and it was nothing close to the old pre-solar drift era science-fiction movies the that we all studied. A journalist attempted to describe it as an ant hill mixed with a ram’s horn. Thousands of objects were crawling in and out. As the cruiser was stabilising her orbit, we all realised that the alien vessel was far more colossal than any ship or structure from Earth. &#x200B; Broadcasted in a thousand languages, some never heard in our part of the galaxy, we all heard their message: “ We gracefully accept your surrender”. &#x200B; We were not prepared to ear these words and all felt a indicible horror. An instant of eternity later, we all watched in shock and awe a flower as bright as a thousand suns blooming on the Alien vessel. The size of the Alien vessel was so considerable that we saw the nuclear mushroom painfully reaching half of the vessel height. &#x200B; What had happened? We were never told. It couldn’t have been a direct order from the high command with the twenty four minute delay on Earth to Mars communication. Maybe an un-prepared gunman panicked. Maybe the captain took a decision in a split second that would seal our fate. We will never know. They were not expecting this answer and their survivors surrendered immediately. &#x200B; I’d love to say that we humanly handled well our new prisoners. It wasn’t the case. Maybe, other civilization will call it the human way. Their attack had woken up something visceral in us. We were not alone. We were not alone and we had paid two hundred million souls to learn it. Two. Hundred. Millions. This wasn’t the time for tears. For the first time, humanity’s existence itself was jeopardised by a tangible threat. It took us months to establish a rudimentary level of communication but we learnt. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been lucky. Our communication technology was too basic to be detected by their ships. &#x200B; We learnt that our position in the Milky Way, far far away from the core of the galaxy, protected us from multiple conflicts won in an instant. We also discovered a complex geopolitical system between multiple civilisations. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been very lucky. Earth was hidden behind the Sun when they detected intelligent life on Mars. Our solar drift made our ships invisible for their sensors. It was only when the cruiser started her deceleration burn that they were able to distinguish it from a simple rock. &#x200B; We learnt that we were lucky on a galactic scale level. Interstellar space faring civilisations are rare. You see, on a standard planet, you can only extract a few grams of the core component of any interstellar propulsion system. They had detected a few metric tons of the universe most precious substance on Mars. They thought they could instantly win the war against a young martian colony. Now, thanks to them, we had both the technologies to extract the substance and use it to reach other solar systems. &#x200B; They didn’t learn about humanity’s ingenuity by destroying Elyseum from space. We have already started to improve their technology using the excess of Mars resources. It might take us years to level the playing field. Humanity first interstellar vessel will be christened next year and will reach Proxima the week after. We will have ten more ships the year after. And ten times more the year after. &#x200B; They will learn about humanity’s art of war. They will learn too late about humanity methodic and reckless preparation. This is not about honour, it is about sending a clear message. We won’t need luck next time. We will learn. We will be prepared.	2456 :Loriar/Outer Colonies The rigid smooth dark lines of the Excalibur class defence ship emerged from an explosion of cascading orange particles as its FTL drives were spun down and it re-emerged back into realspace near the human colony of Lorian. The bridge was quiet; those who have served on the bridge of such a vessel would mark this as a strange occurrence, as the moment that a ship, any ship, let alone a military vessel emerged back into real space the bridge would become a hive of activity. With the ships positional bearings being called out to the helm and navigation, D.R.A.D.I.S contacts being listed out by Operations and finally the Captain, dispensing orders to be quickly carried out by a highly trained crew. Not this time. Inside the bridge Condition-1 is in full effect, lighting dimmed, hardpoints are strengthened and armed officers are stationed at crucial locations. As the viewscreen polarised their hearts dropped. Lorian, the symbol to all citizens of the Terran Republic Of Planets that greatness could truly be achieved amidst the further reaches of space. Lorian was a dream manifest through generations of hard work to build a jewel in the stars, it was the furthest human colony from Earth, on the fringes of Terran territory, a hub of art, music, culture and science. The star of the Colonies, it was called. That star had been cruelly shattered. The towering Varl trees on the western subcontinent burned, flames visible from orbit, when not obscured by the smoke billowing into the atmosphere. The once magnificent city spires that scraped the clouds, now wrecked and torn amidst massive craters turned to glass by heat. Of all the ships and crews in the Terran Defence Fleet, it was fate's cruel hand that this un-named excalibur class would be the first to arrive to Lorian, for she and her crew were by and large, Lorian. Designed in the Military Technical Academy in New London, her keel had been laid at the Lorian Mountain Forgeyards and her crew trained on the picket lines around Loriar. It was cruel leaving only left for a system shakedown run to return to burning graveyard of a hundred million souls. The Perception of war is different among the races of the galaxy, of which there are many, it is treated not unlike a game, a parallel can be seen with our own history when looking at the kingdoms of Medieval Europe. Kings and States would vie for power, politically and militarily, when war was declared, commanders would maneuver, thrust and parry their forces to and fro, until they clash, in the field or at the gates of a city or castle,with loss of life being proportionally small. Yet the trouble with proportionally small is that if you scale far enough, one hundred million lives is very easy to reach. This was humanity's first taste of this futuristic version of medieval war on a galactic scale, and as such to the other races, the loss of Lorian was seen as slightly heavy handed yet more akin to a senior hazing his junior, a condescending “what did you expect on the galactic stage, now be a good kid and give us this area of space”. The Valk Theocracy was the name of the civilisation that had attacked Loriar. This sort of attitude and act from them, through hindsight should have been predicted, they had made great gains utilizing this tactic against many civilisations that have not long passed through the great filter. They had waited for the opportune moment once the new Excalibur had left the system, they struck, their vanguard striking the orbital defence platforms, whilst landing shock troops to loot and sack the major cities, before glassing them with orbital bombardment. A year had passed since the destruction of Loriar, humanity had tried to seek reparations and get the Valk penalised in the Galactic Quorum, tried to spend what little political currency it had earned there to impose sanctions. A handful of friendly and sympathetic races had endorsed this movement, yet it stalled out and died in the Quorum in a matter of weeks. There were no avenues of diplomacy left to pursue. Yet in the minds of most citizens the act of diplomacy was a smokescreen to buy time. While the diplomats spoke at the Quorum of injustice, and of peace, the vaults of the design academies were opened, the theoretical designs of advanced warships were sent to forgeyards, the new Excalibur class was re-designed,refitted and redesignated not as a defence ship, but a battleship. Within a week of the destruction of Loriar, 50 Excalibur class keels were being laid all around the terran territories. A few months later Humanity withdrew from Quorum after a declaration of War to the Valk Theocracy was met by stifled laughter from the Valk delegation. 2458: Valk Prime/ Core Valk Worlds The rigid jagged silhouette of the Excalibur class warship emerged from FTL amidst a shower of orange particles on the hull of the ship, amidst the bristiling clusters of point defence, missile tubes and Railguns. Painted in gleaming white is the name of the ship, the T.R.S Retribution. A hundred more particle showers sprang into existence as a fleet entered the Valk Home system. Inside the bridge of the Retribution, it was Silent.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Nothing had prepared us for what was to come. After crawling for thousand of years on our little planet, we had finally learnt to sail freely inside our solar system. Mars was far from being a week-end trip but, if you were wealthy enough you could get there in 2 weeks. Climbing the Olympus Mons was the new Everest for thrill seekers. Visiting the old robots remnants of the pre-solar drift era you would meet historians or students from Elyseum’ schools. Life wasn’t easy on Mars by Earth standards. Nevertheless, starting with Elyseum, Martians were eager to transform Mars in a second home. Were. &#x200B; One day, we stopped receiving messages. We redirected our automated telescopes from the Moon, Titan, Enceladus & Pluto but couldn’t see the lights of Elyseum in Mars shadow. When the sunlight finally hit where Elyseum used to stand, we could only see the sharp walls of a vast crater. The atmosphere was too clear for an asteroid impact. We couldn’t detect any traces of radioactivity. It wasn’t a nuclear accident. No terrorist group claimed it. Two hundred million souls had vanished in the Martian night. &#x200B; The UN high command dispatched its closest cruiser orbiting in the Belt. Asteroid miners could wait for the protection of its railguns. Pirate attacks were rare. No asteroid was an immediate threat for the main mining stations. Life on Earth slowed down as the cruiser drifted to Mars. It completely stopped when the cruiser finally reached her destination one week later. &#x200B; An indescribable form was standing in the middle of the crater. We were not alone. We were not alone and it was nothing close to the old pre-solar drift era science-fiction movies the that we all studied. A journalist attempted to describe it as an ant hill mixed with a ram’s horn. Thousands of objects were crawling in and out. As the cruiser was stabilising her orbit, we all realised that the alien vessel was far more colossal than any ship or structure from Earth. &#x200B; Broadcasted in a thousand languages, some never heard in our part of the galaxy, we all heard their message: “ We gracefully accept your surrender”. &#x200B; We were not prepared to ear these words and all felt a indicible horror. An instant of eternity later, we all watched in shock and awe a flower as bright as a thousand suns blooming on the Alien vessel. The size of the Alien vessel was so considerable that we saw the nuclear mushroom painfully reaching half of the vessel height. &#x200B; What had happened? We were never told. It couldn’t have been a direct order from the high command with the twenty four minute delay on Earth to Mars communication. Maybe an un-prepared gunman panicked. Maybe the captain took a decision in a split second that would seal our fate. We will never know. They were not expecting this answer and their survivors surrendered immediately. &#x200B; I’d love to say that we humanly handled well our new prisoners. It wasn’t the case. Maybe, other civilization will call it the human way. Their attack had woken up something visceral in us. We were not alone. We were not alone and we had paid two hundred million souls to learn it. Two. Hundred. Millions. This wasn’t the time for tears. For the first time, humanity’s existence itself was jeopardised by a tangible threat. It took us months to establish a rudimentary level of communication but we learnt. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been lucky. Our communication technology was too basic to be detected by their ships. &#x200B; We learnt that our position in the Milky Way, far far away from the core of the galaxy, protected us from multiple conflicts won in an instant. We also discovered a complex geopolitical system between multiple civilisations. &#x200B; We learnt that we had been very lucky. Earth was hidden behind the Sun when they detected intelligent life on Mars. Our solar drift made our ships invisible for their sensors. It was only when the cruiser started her deceleration burn that they were able to distinguish it from a simple rock. &#x200B; We learnt that we were lucky on a galactic scale level. Interstellar space faring civilisations are rare. You see, on a standard planet, you can only extract a few grams of the core component of any interstellar propulsion system. They had detected a few metric tons of the universe most precious substance on Mars. They thought they could instantly win the war against a young martian colony. Now, thanks to them, we had both the technologies to extract the substance and use it to reach other solar systems. &#x200B; They didn’t learn about humanity’s ingenuity by destroying Elyseum from space. We have already started to improve their technology using the excess of Mars resources. It might take us years to level the playing field. Humanity first interstellar vessel will be christened next year and will reach Proxima the week after. We will have ten more ships the year after. And ten times more the year after. &#x200B; They will learn about humanity’s art of war. They will learn too late about humanity methodic and reckless preparation. This is not about honour, it is about sending a clear message. We won’t need luck next time. We will learn. We will be prepared.	War. War never changes, as it says in one of the oldest surviving classics of humanity. We can only assume the statement had been made on the back of an already rich and ripe history of organized violence, even back then in pre-fusion times, and I always wonder how many cycles of empires rising and falling we left behind on the old home, how many great early interactives we'll never get the chance to reconstruct. It's my personal version of what's widely called earthalgia now. Of course, that's a bit silly. Nobody alive ever even saw the famed blue marble of old, nobody was even born in the system of Sol, if you excuse the antique expression. The etymology isn't quite clear to me, something about mammal reproduction, I guess. I just like the sound of it. Borrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrn, with an R rolling down the corridors of Vengeance A74568891. There's plenty of room there for a consonant to roll for a long, long time. Since my body was completed and I was awoken to individual duty A74568891 has grown by 13% in volume. Corridor after corridor constructed from scooped up particles, baked to whatever materials are needed for my less sentient brothers to do their duty. Not all entities get a full consciousness, there aren't enough to go around, so most entities aboard have to make do with AI only. There only 178 trillion recorded consciousnesses and they were spread over a lot of ships by now. We are down to a couple of hundred on the A74568891 now and soon we're ready to split again. Soon WE are ready, most ships still in com-range report similar numbers. A ship needs about 100 fully conscious individuals to carry out a proper mission, allowing for some modicum of redundancies we finally have reached the capacity deemed necessary. So, does war really never change? Maybe it's time to look at that question. From what I understood of early warfare, it was basically just throwing things at the enemy, before you'd go and hit them with appropriately designed objects. To the best of that age's ability, there was some slow progress. The things to throw and the things to hit with, they became more sophisticated, as did the throwing and hitting as a process itself, keeping pace with and driving humanity's search for more and more knowledge. So eventually exploding things were thrown and the explosions grew bigger and bigger and the hitting was done from further and further away. But I think war actually has changed. In a way, at least. It's no longer something we do. Of course, we had encountered some alien species. Well... what qualifies as encounters... It's only ever an exchange of math and eventually basic concepts. Aliens are too alien, as the saying goes. Sometimes the exchanged concept was war. Not even followed by hurling rocks at each other. Intergalactic distances are no joke and despite all progress speed of light was still the final barrier. Anyway, contact never lasted for long. Couple of centuries, that's it. We assumed everybody eventually lost interest. We sure did, math is math and we didn't learn much from anybody. But some ideas helped with the big project humanity had been chasing for so long already: beating death once and for all. The singularity. It turned out to be a lot harder, than our ancestors had assumed, but the enthusiasm had carried over from the classical age. Maybe we grew complacent. Maybe we shouldn't have neglected the classics so much. But then again, we were lots of generations away from the last war on Earth. Sure, there were still some backwaters radiated heavily enough to remind us of the 13th and last of the World Wars, but only because there was no reason left to clean up that mess. We harvested the resources of the system, most manufacturing had long ago been taken of planet and by and large we considered life a riddle solved. Well, apart from it eventually ending, despite the marvels of medicine, but we were confident to get there soon. So when there was a swarm of interstellar asteroids coming in - the biggest one we'd seen yet, beyond what we thought possible and what our automated defenses could completely take out - we didn't even think about the possibility of an attack. We just evacuated Australia and kissed Sydney goodbye. The loss of such an ancient city - one of the oldest in the world, after all - was a tragedy for sure, but we had other fish to fry and kept our focus. In hindsight, that was probably a bit silly. Or maybe not, depends on how you look at it. Or from where. But for a long time nothing of the sort happened again, so we were still oblivious. When we got hit big time, we still didn't even know who dealt that blow. There never was a declaration of war or even contact with the enemy. All there ever was, was the incoming swarms. Somebody had thrown things at Sol. Again. This time too many to even consider natural causes. Lots and lots of things. Several dozen systems worth of things. A brute force attack, if there ever was one. Of course, humanity saw it coming this time - at least we had upgraded our early warning systems to a lot higher standards after Sydney - but how do you stop a trillion trillions lumps of rocks slowly crawling up to your system at 30% the speed of light? There wasn't enough energy in the entire system to even make some dents in that wave. What there was though, was time enough to finish the project. Humanity had already begun to enter the singularity and put all it had left in the completion. Each and every living soul - yes, yes, another rather anachronistic term, but this also has such a nice ring in the corridors: sooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuul! How forlorn that sounds. - was fully uploaded well before Pluto got blasted apart and joined the swarm. Uploaded to Vengeance A1. Uploaded with a unified purpose. The AI that manipulated the consciograms to achieve that was the culmination of dozens of millennia of war-ridden civilization. It fractured itself in the process, transformed itself into pure purpose, if you so will. It became a part of us and a part of all the bots continually building. A part that substitutes the drive and urges that used to arise from the biological body, a part that ensures the mind's cohesion over long periods of time. Very long periods of time. Because that's what it takes when you need to do a big job. Because here's the thing: We never managed to narrow down the location of the attackers to a more exact location than a quadrant of the Andromeda galaxy. Do you have any idea, how long it takes to collect enough rocks for that? Do you have any idea, how long it takes to build the ships to collect the rocks, enough of them to annihilate a quarter of a galaxy and to build the engines that will accelerate them all? We still don't. But the fleet is nearly assembled and we only used up 1/10th of our own galaxy. That's still plenty of rocks left. 9/10th of a galaxy to throw at a single quadrant of another one. And we WILL throw those rocks. Because despite all that was left behind, all that was forgotten, all that just makes no sense any longer after millions of solar years in space, we have a purpose, a unified purpose. Andromeda had it coming for a long time. Our impact predictions say there will not be a single planetary body left, that is likely to hold life, following the cascade, the stellar avalanche of our making. What there will be though, is one big ammo dump. We fully intend to go and grab it. We are the final synthesis. We are thrower and thrown. We are the swarm that follows the swarm. There can only be one trajectory now. It is a small universe and if there's safety to be had in it, it can only be for one. We are immortal now. We are War. And we will not change. &#x200B; \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_ Alright, not my native lingo and all that, so don't be too harsh. I just wanted to offer something, that doesn't need FTL and scribbled this together over lunch. Then I realized, I'd forgotten about half of the prompt... Screw it, I don't see how I'd get the surrender bit in, might as well hit 'comment' anyway though. Hope you had some fun with it nevertheless.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	We dreamed of peace on earth for so long, we hoped that when we had contact from aliens it would bring peace. When They came, they destroyed our earth, decimated our population. Sudden and overwhelming force, their one and only and very effective tactic. We surrendered. In just a week they had destroyed our civilization on a global scale. The remainder of humanity became slaves. We joined a dozen other species from galaxies we couldn’t name. And so we mingled. We taught them how to drink, how to party. We showed them how to be sneaky, rebellious and quietly destructive. We mourned and we remembered. We hoped. We made friends and allies. We taught them how to be angry. They taught us what they knew too. Then together we brought retribution.	It was going to be the greatest day in this General's life. He had known that every since Humanity had reached out to the stars and something reached back. Something far larger than than could have imagined. Tallies had been weighed carefully, negotiations conducted. All leading up to this day in History. When Humanity stepped out into the stage with the rest of it's fellow sentient beings and played it's part. "Have you heard what they look like?" Beside the old General stood another old man in a military uniform that had far too many medals on it to be practical. Humanity had long since shed it's more violent ways, there had not been much more than random skirmishes for centuries. Nothing compared to the behemoths of old fighting it out. In another life this General who asked his question would of been a mortal enemy. Right now, they were little more than pieces on a chessboard. "Does it matter?" Was the answer the man gave back. Bypassing the question for something else, a clear sign he, unlike his partner, did not want to try and qualm his nervousness with idle chit chat. What more more concerning to him, was the amount of eyes that were on him right now. And the noise. The horrible noise. So much cheering. So many people. It felt like the entire planet was here for this momentous occasion. Not only were the streets filled with one large throng of Humanity, but the buildings to the sides were packed with those looking out windows. Paper fell in a constant snow, biodegrading to base chemicals when it touched the ground. The placement of this first real, full meeting could not have been worse, but it was what 'The Combination' had asked for. And from what the General had heard, The Combination got what it asked for. Not precisely by threatening, but with idle reminders that every star in the sky was there and every planet in the universe had felt The Combine's touch. So, negotiations were more like hand downs already. The General put all that to the back of his mind. There was always wiggle room. That's part of what made Humanity great, that hunger. The location chose gave him pause though, not from threat, but oddity. The Combine had asked that this first meeting took place at a Library. This was supposedly a custom that predated Humanity as a species, or even, the formation of Earth as a planet. The Combine would take another planet of people into their federation, and with it, came the exchange of knowledge. They would give what they knew to the species, and the species would give what they knew to The Combine. Thus, The Combine always said, They All Grew Together. The cheers climbed as it was announced over anything with a speaker that The Combine representatives were at this moment, breaking Earth space and landing their craft. And the cheers did not even reach the highest pitch with the gleaming figure of angular metal swept down from the sky with a speed that had to be just for show. But the crowd loved it. As the doors to the ship parted open, and Humanity as a whole laid eyes on Aliens for the first time... there was no revulsion, no aghast looks and stares. Three humanoid aliens stepped free from the ship and the crowd greeted them like they were, a epic world changing event. The general, perhaps for the fear running through him right then, noted almost... Human like responses to the cheering, even though the aliens were so far from Human, despite their base shape, that he was having a hard time telling them as anything. They seemed, pleased, however. In a way the General could not put a finger on, but in the days after this historic day, he wondered if he should. As the aliens came up the lined carpet, to the two awaiting Generals, both men bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the planet Earth. I greet The Combine. And I offer our knowledge for you." Words The General had practiced a million times in the past few weeks since he had learned this would be his job, this would be what he was known for. Relief swept over him as he got the words out without mistake, and put a bit more effort than was needed in moving his hand on over towards the entrance to the library. The Aliens, without a word and with barely a look, moved past the two men, on an air of regal elegance. Something burned in the General's nose for a moment. A smell he had not smelled before, but knew so well. Part of him was thinking about picking up a rock and smashing it into the alien's face that he perceived as smug. But by the time he was shocked by such a thought, the doors had swung quietly shut and left the two Generals standing in front of a still ecstatic crowd. And it stayed that way, for hours and hours. The celebration had turned into a long party, where cheers had been replaced by noise and conversation. Questions floated everywhere. What did they want to know? How did they feel about Humans? Were we smart? Brave? Moral? Where did we fit in the rest of everything else. As the hours past, the two General refused to move from their places. More out of pride than anything else, as this was their moment. But time broke down everyone else, finally, the smaller General spoke another question to break the silence. One of the many that had come so far. "Do you, do you think it's good?" And as he turned to respond there was chaos. He heard a crash, then a scream. And then, unceremoniously, one of the alien delegates had smashed into the pavement right in front of him. Odd, alien blood and gore splattered both men. He -tasted- it in his mouth. In that horrible second of silence, two more screaming bodies smashed into the ground right beside their ally. And how the sound of the crowd changed. Pure horror. A scream across millions of throats. For this was the General's greatest day, but nothing was said about it being the 'best'. "...No..." After a while in the horror of an unending scream, eyes unblinkingly looking to the three piles of lifeless gore in front of him, he finally spoke. And in it all, unnoticed by all except The General, a ripped piece of paper floated down from high above. It passed in front of his eyes for just a moment, and amid all the words on what seemed to be a page from a dictionary he picked out one word, as if fate decreed it. REBELLION - NOUN an act of violent or open resistance to an established government or ruler.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The Grand Admiral gazed out over the plaza. What a quaint custom, he thought, marking two hundred years since his predecessor's arrival. His aide had explained it to him as one of those human quirks it would be best to honour. She'd even told him stories of her own country's anniversary celebrations, from before the conquering, and so as a good ruler he had made the trip to Earth to play his part in the festivities. Like a shadow, she was at his side, holding her tablet in one hand and a coffee for him in the other. He couldn't believe how rapidly he'd taken to that bitter black drink. "It's time for you to take your seat, Grand Admiral." He strode down the steps and placed himself on the throne. It had been a good two hundred years. The humans had been a tremendous boon to the Connect; they had rapidly adopted the customs and habits of their new rulers, and even now, a mere two centuries into their membership, some of the older species were grumbling about how many substantive posts were being assigned to the strange bipeds. No matter: the Connect was a meritocracy, as the saying went, and the humans had simply proven to be unusually skilled in government, balancing competing interests and improving living conditions while the Grand Admiral took the credit. The consul, the highest-ranked human in existence, took to the podium. "Grand Admiral, please permit me to tell you a story from Earth's history. It concerns the origin of the word kamikaze, which has no direct translation in the common tongue of the Connect. You see, it describes an act of aggression that destroys the aggressor as well as their target: a concept that humans are unique in the galaxy in being capable of committing. It entered common parlance following a major war, in which pilots would load their planes with explosives and fly directly into warships, sinking gigantic engines of war at the cost of a single plane and their own life. You see, in this war, it took the detonation of nuclear weapons to convince those kamikaze pilots and their government to surrender. It took the engines of government and industry several years and countless lives to effectively respond to such an action. "And this time, Grand Admiral, the kamikaze pilot's compatriots hold the wheel of government." The Admiral blinked in shock. Was this idiot threatening him? Before he could react, his aide thrust her tablet into his hands. The screen displayed an inferno, an unimaginably violent ball of fire. "I don't understand-" The consul interrupted. "Of course you don't. It never occurred to you that we intended retribution for what you did to us. Now you know. One minute ago, your throne ship exited orbit above Earth and jumped directly into the path of the seat of Connect power, travelling at the speed of light. You're looking at your home planet, Grand Admiral, turned into a ball of hyperheated plasma. The humans you trusted with your throne ship's operation went proudly to their deaths and exacted revenge for the subjugation of generations of humans. You are now one of the last thousand members of your species. The Connect is human now, and we will not conquer." The Admiral's mind recoiled in horror. Total annihilation. Nothing like this had ever been done in war before; nothing like this could even have been imagined in war before. There was no way his species would survive this; they would need a breeding population of at least ten thousand to have any chance of recovering. And yet, even as he fought back the sorrow of realising his people's extinction, a part of his mind bowed in respect as it took in the sheer perfection of the human attack. Two centuries of building trust and learning how to run the Connect. Two centuries of hiding their intentions, even their true nature. All realised in a single devastating attack. All that remained for him was to accept defeat graciously; there was certainly no prospect of any kind of reprisal. He rose to his feet and summoned what remaining pride he could, striding to the podium and extending one limb out to the consul. "I understand from observing human interaction that a handshake is considered an appropriate greeting between equals. Since becoming Grand Admiral, I have had none. I do not believe you expect or want a display of subservience, nor do you have any need of it. What you and your people did today was a masterpiece of war, equal to anything I have ever seen. As a prosecutor of war, therefore, I wish to offer a handshake. I wish the circumstances were less brutal, but it is good to be able to recognise an equal." Limb met limb.	It was going to be the greatest day in this General's life. He had known that every since Humanity had reached out to the stars and something reached back. Something far larger than than could have imagined. Tallies had been weighed carefully, negotiations conducted. All leading up to this day in History. When Humanity stepped out into the stage with the rest of it's fellow sentient beings and played it's part. "Have you heard what they look like?" Beside the old General stood another old man in a military uniform that had far too many medals on it to be practical. Humanity had long since shed it's more violent ways, there had not been much more than random skirmishes for centuries. Nothing compared to the behemoths of old fighting it out. In another life this General who asked his question would of been a mortal enemy. Right now, they were little more than pieces on a chessboard. "Does it matter?" Was the answer the man gave back. Bypassing the question for something else, a clear sign he, unlike his partner, did not want to try and qualm his nervousness with idle chit chat. What more more concerning to him, was the amount of eyes that were on him right now. And the noise. The horrible noise. So much cheering. So many people. It felt like the entire planet was here for this momentous occasion. Not only were the streets filled with one large throng of Humanity, but the buildings to the sides were packed with those looking out windows. Paper fell in a constant snow, biodegrading to base chemicals when it touched the ground. The placement of this first real, full meeting could not have been worse, but it was what 'The Combination' had asked for. And from what the General had heard, The Combination got what it asked for. Not precisely by threatening, but with idle reminders that every star in the sky was there and every planet in the universe had felt The Combine's touch. So, negotiations were more like hand downs already. The General put all that to the back of his mind. There was always wiggle room. That's part of what made Humanity great, that hunger. The location chose gave him pause though, not from threat, but oddity. The Combine had asked that this first meeting took place at a Library. This was supposedly a custom that predated Humanity as a species, or even, the formation of Earth as a planet. The Combine would take another planet of people into their federation, and with it, came the exchange of knowledge. They would give what they knew to the species, and the species would give what they knew to The Combine. Thus, The Combine always said, They All Grew Together. The cheers climbed as it was announced over anything with a speaker that The Combine representatives were at this moment, breaking Earth space and landing their craft. And the cheers did not even reach the highest pitch with the gleaming figure of angular metal swept down from the sky with a speed that had to be just for show. But the crowd loved it. As the doors to the ship parted open, and Humanity as a whole laid eyes on Aliens for the first time... there was no revulsion, no aghast looks and stares. Three humanoid aliens stepped free from the ship and the crowd greeted them like they were, a epic world changing event. The general, perhaps for the fear running through him right then, noted almost... Human like responses to the cheering, even though the aliens were so far from Human, despite their base shape, that he was having a hard time telling them as anything. They seemed, pleased, however. In a way the General could not put a finger on, but in the days after this historic day, he wondered if he should. As the aliens came up the lined carpet, to the two awaiting Generals, both men bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the planet Earth. I greet The Combine. And I offer our knowledge for you." Words The General had practiced a million times in the past few weeks since he had learned this would be his job, this would be what he was known for. Relief swept over him as he got the words out without mistake, and put a bit more effort than was needed in moving his hand on over towards the entrance to the library. The Aliens, without a word and with barely a look, moved past the two men, on an air of regal elegance. Something burned in the General's nose for a moment. A smell he had not smelled before, but knew so well. Part of him was thinking about picking up a rock and smashing it into the alien's face that he perceived as smug. But by the time he was shocked by such a thought, the doors had swung quietly shut and left the two Generals standing in front of a still ecstatic crowd. And it stayed that way, for hours and hours. The celebration had turned into a long party, where cheers had been replaced by noise and conversation. Questions floated everywhere. What did they want to know? How did they feel about Humans? Were we smart? Brave? Moral? Where did we fit in the rest of everything else. As the hours past, the two General refused to move from their places. More out of pride than anything else, as this was their moment. But time broke down everyone else, finally, the smaller General spoke another question to break the silence. One of the many that had come so far. "Do you, do you think it's good?" And as he turned to respond there was chaos. He heard a crash, then a scream. And then, unceremoniously, one of the alien delegates had smashed into the pavement right in front of him. Odd, alien blood and gore splattered both men. He -tasted- it in his mouth. In that horrible second of silence, two more screaming bodies smashed into the ground right beside their ally. And how the sound of the crowd changed. Pure horror. A scream across millions of throats. For this was the General's greatest day, but nothing was said about it being the 'best'. "...No..." After a while in the horror of an unending scream, eyes unblinkingly looking to the three piles of lifeless gore in front of him, he finally spoke. And in it all, unnoticed by all except The General, a ripped piece of paper floated down from high above. It passed in front of his eyes for just a moment, and amid all the words on what seemed to be a page from a dictionary he picked out one word, as if fate decreed it. REBELLION - NOUN an act of violent or open resistance to an established government or ruler.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	2098 AD Thursday, August 7th, 6 PM Phoenix, AZ A woman sits down at her living room table, bills in hand, an exasperated look on her face. She'd found the unopened, and therefore unpaid bills on her husbands dresser, bills that she'd sternly reminded him to take care of before leaving for Vegas. "Then again, I suppose he was in a hurry, seeing as he'd spent last night working with the children on their homework, then securing all of their devices. They were going to DEFCON, after all," she mused to herself, beginning the tedious process of paying the various bills. Finally finished, she calls her husband, the time now 8 PM, eager to hear what her husband and children had gotten up to during the day. The line rings a couple times, then connects. "Hey honey, how was your day?" "Well Matthew," she says, with an ever so slight sharpness, "I did the bills you forgot to do." "Oh, that's what I forgot," he groans, an audible slap punctuating the end of his sentence. "With that out of the way, I'm dying to hear what talks you visited to day. Were you able to-" Her room turns neon blue as the very air ionizes, with her body following moments thereafter, the call coming to an abrupt end. &#x200B; Friday, August 8th, Noon Washington D.C. "Do we know what the weapon was? Did we even see where the attack came from?" "Well Mr. President, as to your first question- no. All we know is that whatever it was, it quite literally ionized all of Phoenix. As t-" The President, in disbelief, interrupts. "Wait a minute, don't you mean vaporized?" "No, sir, I mean ionized. The air, the buildings, the people, everything had their chemical bonds broken, had so much energy pumped into them that the electrons were stripped from their constituent atoms. After the resulting explosion, barely any ash remained, let alone a condensate." The President recoils from the man seated to his immediate right, the expert on both conventional and nuclear weapons, then regains his composure enough to ask another question "If we don't know what kind of weapon it was, do we at least know where it came from?" The man to his left, an astronomer, answers. "Well, we can actually do you one better. Shortly after the attack happened, we picked up a transmission on all of our radio telescopes. It gives a list of conditions, the directions to the room they want our surrender to take place in, and the set of coordinates of their capital world, where they want us to 'Bow to their glory and kneel at their tentacled appendages'" "Well, at least we know they're a humble race," the President dryly remarks, "Do we know anything else about our attackers?" A man, seated farther down at the table, the head of military R&D, answers him. "We do, as a matter of fact- it would appear that they have enslaved other people before us in a similar manner. We know this, as one of their slaves managed to drop a small package to us, containing a history of our attackers, their conquests and a series of schematics that we are trying to figure out. To answer your inevitable question, we have not made any progress as of yet, but we've got a number of experts on their way now and many more starting to work on the problem." The man then pulls out, glances at, then puts away his phone. "One is here now Mr. President- he's a nuclear engineer by trade, but is famous for a multidisciplinary approach to problem solving. He's the guy who oversaw the redesign of our power infrastructure a number of years back. Matthew is a certifiable genius, which is why I'm recommending you bring him into this, despite his conditions." "Oh? And what are they?" he asks. "All he asks is that he be the one to give the order to destroy our attackers, and send them a transmission before he does. His wife was one of the victims, and I think he figures that since he'll be designing the weapons of their destruction, he should be the one to inform them of their fate" "Those are... interesting conditions, but I'll do my best to ensure they're met." &#x200B; 3008 AD Thursday, August 7th, 8 PM Local Time Cosminax Homeworld The commander of the planet was stuck in his office. All around the planet, a single song had been playing. On every thing that could emit sound, or even vibrate, a song singing of a "Blue Sky" was playing. No one knew what it meant- the atmosphere here was grey, a pale imitation of their souls. Yet, nothing was on their scanners. The vacuum of space, as far as they could tell, was just that- absent of anything. Then, without warning, the display in front of him came to life, and a new song, a powerful song, began blaring. &#x200B; Matthew stands over the console, his hands over three buttons- one to toggle the transmission, a second button to change the music, and a third other to signal the other ships in the flotilla and begin the bombardment. He presses the first, and begins to speak. "Hello, those who call themselves the Cosminax. I've waited 10 years for us to have this little chat, so I'll make this brief. You've spent nigh near a millennium conquering worlds, forcing innocent peoples into submission. Today, that ends. You've ended the lives of heaven knows how many innocent people, my wife among them. You've been gambling for nearly 1000 years that no one could or would strike back. Today, those debts come due." "You may be wondering why for the past hour I've forced you to listen to a song from my planet, "Mr. Blue Sky". It was my wife's favorite song. How I wish that she were here, and that "Mr. Blue Sky" be the only song I need to play. But alas, you murdered my wife, my people and the people of tens of trillions more, and I have need of another song." He then presses the second button, and begins a recording of "Dias Irae" by Verdi. "Like the Romans with salt, I will poison your world. After we reign fire and judgement upon you, nothing will live here for hundreds of years, not even microbes. The planet below and the universe will be purged of your taint with nuclear fire." "May god have mercy on your souls, may the gates of hell be wide enough to accept those who are guilty, and may no one else be forced to suffer as your victims." He ends the transmission, then gives the order. &#x200B; Postscript: This is my first real attempt at writing, so I'm interested to know what you think, and what could be changed for the better. Thanks, \-FullerBot	It was going to be the greatest day in this General's life. He had known that every since Humanity had reached out to the stars and something reached back. Something far larger than than could have imagined. Tallies had been weighed carefully, negotiations conducted. All leading up to this day in History. When Humanity stepped out into the stage with the rest of it's fellow sentient beings and played it's part. "Have you heard what they look like?" Beside the old General stood another old man in a military uniform that had far too many medals on it to be practical. Humanity had long since shed it's more violent ways, there had not been much more than random skirmishes for centuries. Nothing compared to the behemoths of old fighting it out. In another life this General who asked his question would of been a mortal enemy. Right now, they were little more than pieces on a chessboard. "Does it matter?" Was the answer the man gave back. Bypassing the question for something else, a clear sign he, unlike his partner, did not want to try and qualm his nervousness with idle chit chat. What more more concerning to him, was the amount of eyes that were on him right now. And the noise. The horrible noise. So much cheering. So many people. It felt like the entire planet was here for this momentous occasion. Not only were the streets filled with one large throng of Humanity, but the buildings to the sides were packed with those looking out windows. Paper fell in a constant snow, biodegrading to base chemicals when it touched the ground. The placement of this first real, full meeting could not have been worse, but it was what 'The Combination' had asked for. And from what the General had heard, The Combination got what it asked for. Not precisely by threatening, but with idle reminders that every star in the sky was there and every planet in the universe had felt The Combine's touch. So, negotiations were more like hand downs already. The General put all that to the back of his mind. There was always wiggle room. That's part of what made Humanity great, that hunger. The location chose gave him pause though, not from threat, but oddity. The Combine had asked that this first meeting took place at a Library. This was supposedly a custom that predated Humanity as a species, or even, the formation of Earth as a planet. The Combine would take another planet of people into their federation, and with it, came the exchange of knowledge. They would give what they knew to the species, and the species would give what they knew to The Combine. Thus, The Combine always said, They All Grew Together. The cheers climbed as it was announced over anything with a speaker that The Combine representatives were at this moment, breaking Earth space and landing their craft. And the cheers did not even reach the highest pitch with the gleaming figure of angular metal swept down from the sky with a speed that had to be just for show. But the crowd loved it. As the doors to the ship parted open, and Humanity as a whole laid eyes on Aliens for the first time... there was no revulsion, no aghast looks and stares. Three humanoid aliens stepped free from the ship and the crowd greeted them like they were, a epic world changing event. The general, perhaps for the fear running through him right then, noted almost... Human like responses to the cheering, even though the aliens were so far from Human, despite their base shape, that he was having a hard time telling them as anything. They seemed, pleased, however. In a way the General could not put a finger on, but in the days after this historic day, he wondered if he should. As the aliens came up the lined carpet, to the two awaiting Generals, both men bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the planet Earth. I greet The Combine. And I offer our knowledge for you." Words The General had practiced a million times in the past few weeks since he had learned this would be his job, this would be what he was known for. Relief swept over him as he got the words out without mistake, and put a bit more effort than was needed in moving his hand on over towards the entrance to the library. The Aliens, without a word and with barely a look, moved past the two men, on an air of regal elegance. Something burned in the General's nose for a moment. A smell he had not smelled before, but knew so well. Part of him was thinking about picking up a rock and smashing it into the alien's face that he perceived as smug. But by the time he was shocked by such a thought, the doors had swung quietly shut and left the two Generals standing in front of a still ecstatic crowd. And it stayed that way, for hours and hours. The celebration had turned into a long party, where cheers had been replaced by noise and conversation. Questions floated everywhere. What did they want to know? How did they feel about Humans? Were we smart? Brave? Moral? Where did we fit in the rest of everything else. As the hours past, the two General refused to move from their places. More out of pride than anything else, as this was their moment. But time broke down everyone else, finally, the smaller General spoke another question to break the silence. One of the many that had come so far. "Do you, do you think it's good?" And as he turned to respond there was chaos. He heard a crash, then a scream. And then, unceremoniously, one of the alien delegates had smashed into the pavement right in front of him. Odd, alien blood and gore splattered both men. He -tasted- it in his mouth. In that horrible second of silence, two more screaming bodies smashed into the ground right beside their ally. And how the sound of the crowd changed. Pure horror. A scream across millions of throats. For this was the General's greatest day, but nothing was said about it being the 'best'. "...No..." After a while in the horror of an unending scream, eyes unblinkingly looking to the three piles of lifeless gore in front of him, he finally spoke. And in it all, unnoticed by all except The General, a ripped piece of paper floated down from high above. It passed in front of his eyes for just a moment, and amid all the words on what seemed to be a page from a dictionary he picked out one word, as if fate decreed it. REBELLION - NOUN an act of violent or open resistance to an established government or ruler.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The attack had been as brutal as it was swift. An extraterrestrial armada had basically wiped several major cities off the map in all of an hour, and humanity was collectively terrified of a continued assault. Shanghai, Vancouver, Dallas, St. Petersburg, and many others had been left flattened and nearly devoid of life in less time than it took to put together some Ikea furniture, but after a week it became clear that the attackers didn't intend to return to finish the job. Panic turned to fear, fear to anxiety. Anxiety became confusion, and confusion grew into rage. The attack seemed to have had no purpose other than to kill and terrify, but the aliens seemed to have avoided the most important or populated areas of the world; New York City was completely unscathed, as were Moscow and Beijing. It was mind-boggling, and humanity came together to counterattack in a show of solidarity that had never been seen before. A week and a half after the attack, the world's leaders had met and struck a deal to find the culprits and show them just who they had attacked. Six weeks after the attack, the collected space forces of the world had been united, with no thought as to equipment costs or alliances. It was a simple choice; for the good of the planet and humanity as a whole, everyone needed the best training and the best gear. There was to be no risk of anyone being hampered by subpar gear. Twelve weeks after the attack, blended crews from formerly bitterly opposed nations had bonded and created a sort of pidgin to communicate with one another. Six months after the initial incident, they were ready. The United Earth Space Force launched their entire fleet and followed the trajectory observed after the attackers left. Another year and several lightspeed jumps later, they arrived in an as-yet unexplored solar system and were almost immediately hailed by a lone ship nearby. ----- "Admiral, sir, we've been pinged. And they seem to want to talk, I'm seeing signals all over the spectrum here. Looks like they're trying to narrow it down to our video communication frequency." As if on cue, when the ensign had stopped speaking the communications screens lit up with what appeared to be a face. It wasn't a color or shape the humans were familiar with, nor did it have all the usual bits they knew about, but something about it made "face" a close enough approximation. "Greetings. This is scout ship Skert-9. You are trespassing in occupied space. You may either return to unoccupied space or be destroyed by the Fneep Armada." The being's voice was somehow liquid and gravelly at the same time. "Ensign Jones, put me on the line, if you would," uttered the bemused admiral, chin resting on his palm as he slouched in his chair. "Greetings, Skert-9. This is Admiral John Glass, of the UESF, aboard the gunship Blackbeard. If possible, before any hostilities commence or we leave, I would like to speak with a similar-ranking officer from the armada. Is that possible?" "I will attempt to contact my superiors. We thank you for your patience." A minute or two elapsed as the UESF was put on the Fneep equivalent of hold. Blessedly, the Fneep did not appear to have invented anything akin to Muzak. Glass hit the mute button on his console and turned to his second in command. "So, Elena, once we're done here, you think Earth's going to go back to squabbling amongst ourselves, or what?" "Honestly, John, I couldn't tell you. I haven't really got any intention of fighting you, but that's primarily because I wouldn't take much joy in beating down an old man," came the heavily-accented response from the woman in the next chair. The two looked at each other and locked eyes for a moment, the steely gazes of two warriors waiting to see who would back down. As usual, they both cracked up around the same time. The admiral was still cackling when someone called to them from the lower bridge. "Sirs! We've got movement. Much bigger ship this time, and a dozen others around it!" Glass tapped the mute button again and the screen crackled back to life. Another... face... filled the screen and began speaking with a similarly unpleasant intonation. "This is Supreme Commander of the Fneep Armada, Shlerp Scholachs. We understand you wished to speak with us. What is your business here?" "Hello, Supreme Commander. My name is John Glass, Admiral of the United Earth Space Force. We followed a trail left behind near our homeworld to get here and were wondering if it was left by the Fneep." "You are from the Sol system? Yes, we attacked your planet successfully and won the war quite handily. There was nothing your pitiful defenses could do. Now then, as the losers and our new subjects, you are obligated to-" "Losers? Your subjects? I'm not quite sure I understand," drawled the admiral. "I don't expect a primate brain to understand much without a more in-depth explanation, so I will humor you. The rules of engagement state that a complete victory such as ours results in the subjugation of the losing party." "I see. Whose rules of engagement?" "The Fneep rules of engagement, obviously. Now that you are under our rule, they are also yours." "Ah," breathed the admiral, a grin slowly spreading across his face, "you expect us not to fight back because you got a hit in and bloodied our nose." "You were utterly defeated in battle, and we as the victors are now your rulers. This conversation is over and you are hereby ordered to leave or be annihilated like your pathetic cities." Once again, a call came from the lower bridge, more urgent this time. "Vice-admiral! We've got a lock on all targets!" "Excellent! Thank you Chen. John, I believe you've heard the good news?" Elena's excitement was palpable; she was practically giggling. Everyone on the bridge, correspondingly, was terrified. "What was that? Targets? What is going on here? As your Supreme Commander I forbid you to do anything to harm us! We will destroy you for this insolence!" sputtered Shlerp, enraged by the humans' actions. Glass' grin only widened further as he took in the situation. He straightened up in his seat and somehow the very air around him changed. Scholachs shrank away from this man who now seemed to hold pure power in his hands. "Supreme Commander Scholachs; did I pronounce that correctly? Earth denies Fneep authority and any right to rule the Fneep claim to have. You launched an unprovoked attack on innocent civilians and mercilessly slaughtered millions. Per our own rules of engagement, the Fneep are war criminals of the highest order and are due no consideration," Glass looked briefly beyond his screen, down to the lower bridge. "Commander Chen, relay the order to prepare to fire on all targets. Ensign Jones, broadcast this message as far into space as is possible." Looking back up to the now-quaking Fneep, he continued speaking: "I am not without mercy, nor am I senselessly violent. We have no civilian targets, only military, political, and industrial ones. This will be a very important lesson to whoever remains alive in a few moments. Retribution does not mean the complete annihilation of the Fneep people on this day. Next time, it will. All ships, fire at will." "Wait, we can nego-" "Goodbye, Supreme Commander Scholachs." A few moments later, the entire Fneep Armada was reduced to slag and shards of metal, floating in space. The planetary bombardment took a few more minutes. Glass took a moment to think while the crew of his ship looked on the wreckage floating nearby. Elena looked over at him. "What's on your mind, John?" "I wonder who else heard my message. Anyway. Commander Chen! Broadcast the following to the fleet." "You're live, sir," barked Chen. Glass nodded to him in thanks and began to speak in booming tones. "Congratulations, everyone. We have avenged our fallen and slain our enemies. The Fneep will never forget this day. I broadcast our final message to the farthest limits our comm arrays can reach, so anyone else who heard us knows who we are and what we do to those who fuck with Earth." Glass paused for a moment to let the message sink in. "We tried walking softly and that didn't work. It's time to use that big goddamn stick!"	It was going to be the greatest day in this General's life. He had known that every since Humanity had reached out to the stars and something reached back. Something far larger than than could have imagined. Tallies had been weighed carefully, negotiations conducted. All leading up to this day in History. When Humanity stepped out into the stage with the rest of it's fellow sentient beings and played it's part. "Have you heard what they look like?" Beside the old General stood another old man in a military uniform that had far too many medals on it to be practical. Humanity had long since shed it's more violent ways, there had not been much more than random skirmishes for centuries. Nothing compared to the behemoths of old fighting it out. In another life this General who asked his question would of been a mortal enemy. Right now, they were little more than pieces on a chessboard. "Does it matter?" Was the answer the man gave back. Bypassing the question for something else, a clear sign he, unlike his partner, did not want to try and qualm his nervousness with idle chit chat. What more more concerning to him, was the amount of eyes that were on him right now. And the noise. The horrible noise. So much cheering. So many people. It felt like the entire planet was here for this momentous occasion. Not only were the streets filled with one large throng of Humanity, but the buildings to the sides were packed with those looking out windows. Paper fell in a constant snow, biodegrading to base chemicals when it touched the ground. The placement of this first real, full meeting could not have been worse, but it was what 'The Combination' had asked for. And from what the General had heard, The Combination got what it asked for. Not precisely by threatening, but with idle reminders that every star in the sky was there and every planet in the universe had felt The Combine's touch. So, negotiations were more like hand downs already. The General put all that to the back of his mind. There was always wiggle room. That's part of what made Humanity great, that hunger. The location chose gave him pause though, not from threat, but oddity. The Combine had asked that this first meeting took place at a Library. This was supposedly a custom that predated Humanity as a species, or even, the formation of Earth as a planet. The Combine would take another planet of people into their federation, and with it, came the exchange of knowledge. They would give what they knew to the species, and the species would give what they knew to The Combine. Thus, The Combine always said, They All Grew Together. The cheers climbed as it was announced over anything with a speaker that The Combine representatives were at this moment, breaking Earth space and landing their craft. And the cheers did not even reach the highest pitch with the gleaming figure of angular metal swept down from the sky with a speed that had to be just for show. But the crowd loved it. As the doors to the ship parted open, and Humanity as a whole laid eyes on Aliens for the first time... there was no revulsion, no aghast looks and stares. Three humanoid aliens stepped free from the ship and the crowd greeted them like they were, a epic world changing event. The general, perhaps for the fear running through him right then, noted almost... Human like responses to the cheering, even though the aliens were so far from Human, despite their base shape, that he was having a hard time telling them as anything. They seemed, pleased, however. In a way the General could not put a finger on, but in the days after this historic day, he wondered if he should. As the aliens came up the lined carpet, to the two awaiting Generals, both men bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the planet Earth. I greet The Combine. And I offer our knowledge for you." Words The General had practiced a million times in the past few weeks since he had learned this would be his job, this would be what he was known for. Relief swept over him as he got the words out without mistake, and put a bit more effort than was needed in moving his hand on over towards the entrance to the library. The Aliens, without a word and with barely a look, moved past the two men, on an air of regal elegance. Something burned in the General's nose for a moment. A smell he had not smelled before, but knew so well. Part of him was thinking about picking up a rock and smashing it into the alien's face that he perceived as smug. But by the time he was shocked by such a thought, the doors had swung quietly shut and left the two Generals standing in front of a still ecstatic crowd. And it stayed that way, for hours and hours. The celebration had turned into a long party, where cheers had been replaced by noise and conversation. Questions floated everywhere. What did they want to know? How did they feel about Humans? Were we smart? Brave? Moral? Where did we fit in the rest of everything else. As the hours past, the two General refused to move from their places. More out of pride than anything else, as this was their moment. But time broke down everyone else, finally, the smaller General spoke another question to break the silence. One of the many that had come so far. "Do you, do you think it's good?" And as he turned to respond there was chaos. He heard a crash, then a scream. And then, unceremoniously, one of the alien delegates had smashed into the pavement right in front of him. Odd, alien blood and gore splattered both men. He -tasted- it in his mouth. In that horrible second of silence, two more screaming bodies smashed into the ground right beside their ally. And how the sound of the crowd changed. Pure horror. A scream across millions of throats. For this was the General's greatest day, but nothing was said about it being the 'best'. "...No..." After a while in the horror of an unending scream, eyes unblinkingly looking to the three piles of lifeless gore in front of him, he finally spoke. And in it all, unnoticed by all except The General, a ripped piece of paper floated down from high above. It passed in front of his eyes for just a moment, and amid all the words on what seemed to be a page from a dictionary he picked out one word, as if fate decreed it. REBELLION - NOUN an act of violent or open resistance to an established government or ruler.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Captain Derrick looked through the view-port. "How much longer until we are in striking range?" His first mate, Rowan, cleared her throat. "We will arrive in ten minutes." "About time, I am getting tired of these stars." Rowan hesitated, "do we really have to do this Captain? Is vengeance worth it?" Derrick turned around to glare at her. "Is it worth it? Is it worth it? These alien scum attacked us first, or have you forgotten?" "No, sir. I remember. But it was so long ago." "Not long enough. Those bastards appeared out of nowhere, attacked us, then demanded our surrender. It was only luck that we managed to shoot them down and used their technology to make this ship. Time to teach them what for." "But, sir..." "Say another word and I will send you to the brig for insubordination. I will not have the fifty generations that have lived on this ship be for not."	It was going to be the greatest day in this General's life. He had known that every since Humanity had reached out to the stars and something reached back. Something far larger than than could have imagined. Tallies had been weighed carefully, negotiations conducted. All leading up to this day in History. When Humanity stepped out into the stage with the rest of it's fellow sentient beings and played it's part. "Have you heard what they look like?" Beside the old General stood another old man in a military uniform that had far too many medals on it to be practical. Humanity had long since shed it's more violent ways, there had not been much more than random skirmishes for centuries. Nothing compared to the behemoths of old fighting it out. In another life this General who asked his question would of been a mortal enemy. Right now, they were little more than pieces on a chessboard. "Does it matter?" Was the answer the man gave back. Bypassing the question for something else, a clear sign he, unlike his partner, did not want to try and qualm his nervousness with idle chit chat. What more more concerning to him, was the amount of eyes that were on him right now. And the noise. The horrible noise. So much cheering. So many people. It felt like the entire planet was here for this momentous occasion. Not only were the streets filled with one large throng of Humanity, but the buildings to the sides were packed with those looking out windows. Paper fell in a constant snow, biodegrading to base chemicals when it touched the ground. The placement of this first real, full meeting could not have been worse, but it was what 'The Combination' had asked for. And from what the General had heard, The Combination got what it asked for. Not precisely by threatening, but with idle reminders that every star in the sky was there and every planet in the universe had felt The Combine's touch. So, negotiations were more like hand downs already. The General put all that to the back of his mind. There was always wiggle room. That's part of what made Humanity great, that hunger. The location chose gave him pause though, not from threat, but oddity. The Combine had asked that this first meeting took place at a Library. This was supposedly a custom that predated Humanity as a species, or even, the formation of Earth as a planet. The Combine would take another planet of people into their federation, and with it, came the exchange of knowledge. They would give what they knew to the species, and the species would give what they knew to The Combine. Thus, The Combine always said, They All Grew Together. The cheers climbed as it was announced over anything with a speaker that The Combine representatives were at this moment, breaking Earth space and landing their craft. And the cheers did not even reach the highest pitch with the gleaming figure of angular metal swept down from the sky with a speed that had to be just for show. But the crowd loved it. As the doors to the ship parted open, and Humanity as a whole laid eyes on Aliens for the first time... there was no revulsion, no aghast looks and stares. Three humanoid aliens stepped free from the ship and the crowd greeted them like they were, a epic world changing event. The general, perhaps for the fear running through him right then, noted almost... Human like responses to the cheering, even though the aliens were so far from Human, despite their base shape, that he was having a hard time telling them as anything. They seemed, pleased, however. In a way the General could not put a finger on, but in the days after this historic day, he wondered if he should. As the aliens came up the lined carpet, to the two awaiting Generals, both men bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the planet Earth. I greet The Combine. And I offer our knowledge for you." Words The General had practiced a million times in the past few weeks since he had learned this would be his job, this would be what he was known for. Relief swept over him as he got the words out without mistake, and put a bit more effort than was needed in moving his hand on over towards the entrance to the library. The Aliens, without a word and with barely a look, moved past the two men, on an air of regal elegance. Something burned in the General's nose for a moment. A smell he had not smelled before, but knew so well. Part of him was thinking about picking up a rock and smashing it into the alien's face that he perceived as smug. But by the time he was shocked by such a thought, the doors had swung quietly shut and left the two Generals standing in front of a still ecstatic crowd. And it stayed that way, for hours and hours. The celebration had turned into a long party, where cheers had been replaced by noise and conversation. Questions floated everywhere. What did they want to know? How did they feel about Humans? Were we smart? Brave? Moral? Where did we fit in the rest of everything else. As the hours past, the two General refused to move from their places. More out of pride than anything else, as this was their moment. But time broke down everyone else, finally, the smaller General spoke another question to break the silence. One of the many that had come so far. "Do you, do you think it's good?" And as he turned to respond there was chaos. He heard a crash, then a scream. And then, unceremoniously, one of the alien delegates had smashed into the pavement right in front of him. Odd, alien blood and gore splattered both men. He -tasted- it in his mouth. In that horrible second of silence, two more screaming bodies smashed into the ground right beside their ally. And how the sound of the crowd changed. Pure horror. A scream across millions of throats. For this was the General's greatest day, but nothing was said about it being the 'best'. "...No..." After a while in the horror of an unending scream, eyes unblinkingly looking to the three piles of lifeless gore in front of him, he finally spoke. And in it all, unnoticed by all except The General, a ripped piece of paper floated down from high above. It passed in front of his eyes for just a moment, and amid all the words on what seemed to be a page from a dictionary he picked out one word, as if fate decreed it. REBELLION - NOUN an act of violent or open resistance to an established government or ruler.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	It was going to be the greatest day in this General's life. He had known that every since Humanity had reached out to the stars and something reached back. Something far larger than than could have imagined. Tallies had been weighed carefully, negotiations conducted. All leading up to this day in History. When Humanity stepped out into the stage with the rest of it's fellow sentient beings and played it's part. "Have you heard what they look like?" Beside the old General stood another old man in a military uniform that had far too many medals on it to be practical. Humanity had long since shed it's more violent ways, there had not been much more than random skirmishes for centuries. Nothing compared to the behemoths of old fighting it out. In another life this General who asked his question would of been a mortal enemy. Right now, they were little more than pieces on a chessboard. "Does it matter?" Was the answer the man gave back. Bypassing the question for something else, a clear sign he, unlike his partner, did not want to try and qualm his nervousness with idle chit chat. What more more concerning to him, was the amount of eyes that were on him right now. And the noise. The horrible noise. So much cheering. So many people. It felt like the entire planet was here for this momentous occasion. Not only were the streets filled with one large throng of Humanity, but the buildings to the sides were packed with those looking out windows. Paper fell in a constant snow, biodegrading to base chemicals when it touched the ground. The placement of this first real, full meeting could not have been worse, but it was what 'The Combination' had asked for. And from what the General had heard, The Combination got what it asked for. Not precisely by threatening, but with idle reminders that every star in the sky was there and every planet in the universe had felt The Combine's touch. So, negotiations were more like hand downs already. The General put all that to the back of his mind. There was always wiggle room. That's part of what made Humanity great, that hunger. The location chose gave him pause though, not from threat, but oddity. The Combine had asked that this first meeting took place at a Library. This was supposedly a custom that predated Humanity as a species, or even, the formation of Earth as a planet. The Combine would take another planet of people into their federation, and with it, came the exchange of knowledge. They would give what they knew to the species, and the species would give what they knew to The Combine. Thus, The Combine always said, They All Grew Together. The cheers climbed as it was announced over anything with a speaker that The Combine representatives were at this moment, breaking Earth space and landing their craft. And the cheers did not even reach the highest pitch with the gleaming figure of angular metal swept down from the sky with a speed that had to be just for show. But the crowd loved it. As the doors to the ship parted open, and Humanity as a whole laid eyes on Aliens for the first time... there was no revulsion, no aghast looks and stares. Three humanoid aliens stepped free from the ship and the crowd greeted them like they were, a epic world changing event. The general, perhaps for the fear running through him right then, noted almost... Human like responses to the cheering, even though the aliens were so far from Human, despite their base shape, that he was having a hard time telling them as anything. They seemed, pleased, however. In a way the General could not put a finger on, but in the days after this historic day, he wondered if he should. As the aliens came up the lined carpet, to the two awaiting Generals, both men bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the planet Earth. I greet The Combine. And I offer our knowledge for you." Words The General had practiced a million times in the past few weeks since he had learned this would be his job, this would be what he was known for. Relief swept over him as he got the words out without mistake, and put a bit more effort than was needed in moving his hand on over towards the entrance to the library. The Aliens, without a word and with barely a look, moved past the two men, on an air of regal elegance. Something burned in the General's nose for a moment. A smell he had not smelled before, but knew so well. Part of him was thinking about picking up a rock and smashing it into the alien's face that he perceived as smug. But by the time he was shocked by such a thought, the doors had swung quietly shut and left the two Generals standing in front of a still ecstatic crowd. And it stayed that way, for hours and hours. The celebration had turned into a long party, where cheers had been replaced by noise and conversation. Questions floated everywhere. What did they want to know? How did they feel about Humans? Were we smart? Brave? Moral? Where did we fit in the rest of everything else. As the hours past, the two General refused to move from their places. More out of pride than anything else, as this was their moment. But time broke down everyone else, finally, the smaller General spoke another question to break the silence. One of the many that had come so far. "Do you, do you think it's good?" And as he turned to respond there was chaos. He heard a crash, then a scream. And then, unceremoniously, one of the alien delegates had smashed into the pavement right in front of him. Odd, alien blood and gore splattered both men. He -tasted- it in his mouth. In that horrible second of silence, two more screaming bodies smashed into the ground right beside their ally. And how the sound of the crowd changed. Pure horror. A scream across millions of throats. For this was the General's greatest day, but nothing was said about it being the 'best'. "...No..." After a while in the horror of an unending scream, eyes unblinkingly looking to the three piles of lifeless gore in front of him, he finally spoke. And in it all, unnoticed by all except The General, a ripped piece of paper floated down from high above. It passed in front of his eyes for just a moment, and amid all the words on what seemed to be a page from a dictionary he picked out one word, as if fate decreed it. REBELLION - NOUN an act of violent or open resistance to an established government or ruler.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	2098 AD Thursday, August 7th, 6 PM Phoenix, AZ A woman sits down at her living room table, bills in hand, an exasperated look on her face. She'd found the unopened, and therefore unpaid bills on her husbands dresser, bills that she'd sternly reminded him to take care of before leaving for Vegas. "Then again, I suppose he was in a hurry, seeing as he'd spent last night working with the children on their homework, then securing all of their devices. They were going to DEFCON, after all," she mused to herself, beginning the tedious process of paying the various bills. Finally finished, she calls her husband, the time now 8 PM, eager to hear what her husband and children had gotten up to during the day. The line rings a couple times, then connects. "Hey honey, how was your day?" "Well Matthew," she says, with an ever so slight sharpness, "I did the bills you forgot to do." "Oh, that's what I forgot," he groans, an audible slap punctuating the end of his sentence. "With that out of the way, I'm dying to hear what talks you visited to day. Were you able to-" Her room turns neon blue as the very air ionizes, with her body following moments thereafter, the call coming to an abrupt end. &#x200B; Friday, August 8th, Noon Washington D.C. "Do we know what the weapon was? Did we even see where the attack came from?" "Well Mr. President, as to your first question- no. All we know is that whatever it was, it quite literally ionized all of Phoenix. As t-" The President, in disbelief, interrupts. "Wait a minute, don't you mean vaporized?" "No, sir, I mean ionized. The air, the buildings, the people, everything had their chemical bonds broken, had so much energy pumped into them that the electrons were stripped from their constituent atoms. After the resulting explosion, barely any ash remained, let alone a condensate." The President recoils from the man seated to his immediate right, the expert on both conventional and nuclear weapons, then regains his composure enough to ask another question "If we don't know what kind of weapon it was, do we at least know where it came from?" The man to his left, an astronomer, answers. "Well, we can actually do you one better. Shortly after the attack happened, we picked up a transmission on all of our radio telescopes. It gives a list of conditions, the directions to the room they want our surrender to take place in, and the set of coordinates of their capital world, where they want us to 'Bow to their glory and kneel at their tentacled appendages'" "Well, at least we know they're a humble race," the President dryly remarks, "Do we know anything else about our attackers?" A man, seated farther down at the table, the head of military R&D, answers him. "We do, as a matter of fact- it would appear that they have enslaved other people before us in a similar manner. We know this, as one of their slaves managed to drop a small package to us, containing a history of our attackers, their conquests and a series of schematics that we are trying to figure out. To answer your inevitable question, we have not made any progress as of yet, but we've got a number of experts on their way now and many more starting to work on the problem." The man then pulls out, glances at, then puts away his phone. "One is here now Mr. President- he's a nuclear engineer by trade, but is famous for a multidisciplinary approach to problem solving. He's the guy who oversaw the redesign of our power infrastructure a number of years back. Matthew is a certifiable genius, which is why I'm recommending you bring him into this, despite his conditions." "Oh? And what are they?" he asks. "All he asks is that he be the one to give the order to destroy our attackers, and send them a transmission before he does. His wife was one of the victims, and I think he figures that since he'll be designing the weapons of their destruction, he should be the one to inform them of their fate" "Those are... interesting conditions, but I'll do my best to ensure they're met." &#x200B; 3008 AD Thursday, August 7th, 8 PM Local Time Cosminax Homeworld The commander of the planet was stuck in his office. All around the planet, a single song had been playing. On every thing that could emit sound, or even vibrate, a song singing of a "Blue Sky" was playing. No one knew what it meant- the atmosphere here was grey, a pale imitation of their souls. Yet, nothing was on their scanners. The vacuum of space, as far as they could tell, was just that- absent of anything. Then, without warning, the display in front of him came to life, and a new song, a powerful song, began blaring. &#x200B; Matthew stands over the console, his hands over three buttons- one to toggle the transmission, a second button to change the music, and a third other to signal the other ships in the flotilla and begin the bombardment. He presses the first, and begins to speak. "Hello, those who call themselves the Cosminax. I've waited 10 years for us to have this little chat, so I'll make this brief. You've spent nigh near a millennium conquering worlds, forcing innocent peoples into submission. Today, that ends. You've ended the lives of heaven knows how many innocent people, my wife among them. You've been gambling for nearly 1000 years that no one could or would strike back. Today, those debts come due." "You may be wondering why for the past hour I've forced you to listen to a song from my planet, "Mr. Blue Sky". It was my wife's favorite song. How I wish that she were here, and that "Mr. Blue Sky" be the only song I need to play. But alas, you murdered my wife, my people and the people of tens of trillions more, and I have need of another song." He then presses the second button, and begins a recording of "Dias Irae" by Verdi. "Like the Romans with salt, I will poison your world. After we reign fire and judgement upon you, nothing will live here for hundreds of years, not even microbes. The planet below and the universe will be purged of your taint with nuclear fire." "May god have mercy on your souls, may the gates of hell be wide enough to accept those who are guilty, and may no one else be forced to suffer as your victims." He ends the transmission, then gives the order. &#x200B; Postscript: This is my first real attempt at writing, so I'm interested to know what you think, and what could be changed for the better. Thanks, \-FullerBot	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Thirty Eighth Assembly of The High Solar Council, Assembled Admiralty, and Parliament of Digital Proxies, and other Honored Members of this Commission, I come before you today to tell you a story. Monsters from the Stars. This has been an old story for a long time. H.G. Wells blazed that trail almost eight hundred years ago, but, I tell you now, he built it upon an even older story, one more deeply and broadly held by humanity; Monsters from beyond the light of our fire. Fear the other, for they bring death and destruction to you, your tribe, and your history. It’s a primitive impulse, one I'd thought we’d conquered when we survived the trials and tribulations of the 20th and 21st centuries. Through that crucible, we shed our hatreds of one another and turned out energies to the building of a better world, and then worlds. It was an age undreamed of dominated by wonders built by steady and benevolent hands. Our golden age. And then, I hear you say, the outsiders came. Thirty ships, unannounced and out of the dark. They burned twelve stations and refueling depots around Jupiter before they settled into orbit. The wreckage left burning streaks through the upper atmosphere for weeks. Live feeds covered every screen in the system. The smoke trails looked like claw marks, first red, then black like a scab across the planet. It was the last mark on the physical world three hundred and sixteen thousand people would leave. We balked at the loss of life, rightfully so, and feared the alien’s likely advance. To our surprise they did not. They simply orbited Jupiter, dipping low into the upper atmosphere skimming hydrogen. We had no warships then, no system defense grids. Some bulk cargo rail guns were hastily repurposed, but it proved unnecessary. After two weeks the invader’s drives sparked to life in a hard burn and their thirty ships accelerated outward, back toward the dark. It took a moment, socially, politically, culturally, for what happened to sink in, to gestate. When it did, oh, the rage. The untempered, unbridled, unleashed, rage! All across the developing swarm, in every station, and down on every world, in every town, every neighborhood, on each street, there was someone out and screaming to, or maybe at, high heaven. Three hundred thousand people?! And then some?! Children?! Murdered for fucking fuel? And not a single goddamn word of challenge or of explanation?! I need not remind you that we were pretty bloody minded when the pursuit fleet launched a year or so later. Sure, there was a pretense of determining motive, but everyone, every human, knew what we were doing. We could feel it, deep inside, that when we caught those ships we were going to find out who they were, where they were from, and then we would burn them and their occupants to ash and cinder. And that’s what we did. We torched a few, cracked open others, spilling millions of organic signatures into the vacuum of space, and left only a single ship intact to be boarded, captured, and its occupants interrogated. We found aboard fifteen million hibernation chambers, not much bigger than a hand span wide, two tall, filled with aliens. Small squid things, though experts will tell you they bear little in common with our own terrestrial cephalopods. It took us the extraction and dissection of almost three hundred, and one handling accident, before we noticed the hive intelligence. Some answers came after that. They have no language like ours, and thus no name, and though some colloquialisms, nicknames and slurs have come into common usage, I will here continue to refer to them as “Aliens.” They are aquatic and hail from an ocean world, the one we now orbit. One of their most striking features is that individuals in mind and motive only emerge when several hundred thousand aliens are present and “merged” in neuro-chemical swarm behavior. However, the single most important aspect of their existence, of which I ask that each member of this commission take special notice, is that individuals do not die when the swarm shrinks below a numerical, cognitive limit. An individual will reemerge, unscathed, when the swarm regains that critical mass. This has profoundly shaped the Alien’s world view. They have fought wars, but not one of them has ever died. They have crossed the stars, but without their portable oceans, could never live there, and thus did not conceive of life existing outside of them. In short, they did not account for us, or our ability to live and operate in space. Their ships, automated at the time of the attack, were simply clearing space debris. I do not excuse the Aliens actions during the following war. I do not excuse their opinion, still held, that it is impossible for an individual, single, human to be truly conscious. What I do, here before the assembled High Council and Admiralty, is remind you of that old story of monsters from the stars. In it, we often celebrated our eventual total victory, and the complete defeat of the invaders. It was easy to do, as our foe was utterly dehumanized, by design. It made hateful action easy. It was centuries before we learned to stop doing that to each other. Here and now with the aliens it’s even harder to shake those old notions and biases as dehumanization is inherent. They are not human, but to deny their sentience, to deny their individual value? In that we must refrain. We must. For here and now, over their world, over their home oceans, it is not a complete victory we contemplate, it’s genocide. We must refrain. We must, or it is us that will be the monsters from the stars.	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	To the Star Warlords: Do not attack the ones called humans. They live on their planet called Terra and they had given our planets names, and we thought it was an easy submission. They were primitive. When we sent out our spies, they never returned and called for us to back down. We didn't back down as per decree. We targeted the ones with high population density to prune them out to convince them to surrender and join our Federation. But they didn't surrender like what always happened to the primitive races. They managed to capture a scout ship and replicate our technology in a few years, which brought us to this moment. The Xanlai Warlords are wiped out. I am writing this as a warning. They have created their own federation and have created weapons and brought greater knowledge even to those who have already submitted. The Xanlai Galaxy is lost now. Do not enter this galaxy. A new Warlord has brought this place what war truly meant. If you find a human, civilian or not, do not attack them. They are like our Precursors. A true war race. Behind their face of friendliness is a blood of a warrior. They all have killed each other and they have blood to kill everyone just to recover from their loss. Do not attack the humans.	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The attack had been as brutal as it was swift. An extraterrestrial armada had basically wiped several major cities off the map in all of an hour, and humanity was collectively terrified of a continued assault. Shanghai, Vancouver, Dallas, St. Petersburg, and many others had been left flattened and nearly devoid of life in less time than it took to put together some Ikea furniture, but after a week it became clear that the attackers didn't intend to return to finish the job. Panic turned to fear, fear to anxiety. Anxiety became confusion, and confusion grew into rage. The attack seemed to have had no purpose other than to kill and terrify, but the aliens seemed to have avoided the most important or populated areas of the world; New York City was completely unscathed, as were Moscow and Beijing. It was mind-boggling, and humanity came together to counterattack in a show of solidarity that had never been seen before. A week and a half after the attack, the world's leaders had met and struck a deal to find the culprits and show them just who they had attacked. Six weeks after the attack, the collected space forces of the world had been united, with no thought as to equipment costs or alliances. It was a simple choice; for the good of the planet and humanity as a whole, everyone needed the best training and the best gear. There was to be no risk of anyone being hampered by subpar gear. Twelve weeks after the attack, blended crews from formerly bitterly opposed nations had bonded and created a sort of pidgin to communicate with one another. Six months after the initial incident, they were ready. The United Earth Space Force launched their entire fleet and followed the trajectory observed after the attackers left. Another year and several lightspeed jumps later, they arrived in an as-yet unexplored solar system and were almost immediately hailed by a lone ship nearby. ----- "Admiral, sir, we've been pinged. And they seem to want to talk, I'm seeing signals all over the spectrum here. Looks like they're trying to narrow it down to our video communication frequency." As if on cue, when the ensign had stopped speaking the communications screens lit up with what appeared to be a face. It wasn't a color or shape the humans were familiar with, nor did it have all the usual bits they knew about, but something about it made "face" a close enough approximation. "Greetings. This is scout ship Skert-9. You are trespassing in occupied space. You may either return to unoccupied space or be destroyed by the Fneep Armada." The being's voice was somehow liquid and gravelly at the same time. "Ensign Jones, put me on the line, if you would," uttered the bemused admiral, chin resting on his palm as he slouched in his chair. "Greetings, Skert-9. This is Admiral John Glass, of the UESF, aboard the gunship Blackbeard. If possible, before any hostilities commence or we leave, I would like to speak with a similar-ranking officer from the armada. Is that possible?" "I will attempt to contact my superiors. We thank you for your patience." A minute or two elapsed as the UESF was put on the Fneep equivalent of hold. Blessedly, the Fneep did not appear to have invented anything akin to Muzak. Glass hit the mute button on his console and turned to his second in command. "So, Elena, once we're done here, you think Earth's going to go back to squabbling amongst ourselves, or what?" "Honestly, John, I couldn't tell you. I haven't really got any intention of fighting you, but that's primarily because I wouldn't take much joy in beating down an old man," came the heavily-accented response from the woman in the next chair. The two looked at each other and locked eyes for a moment, the steely gazes of two warriors waiting to see who would back down. As usual, they both cracked up around the same time. The admiral was still cackling when someone called to them from the lower bridge. "Sirs! We've got movement. Much bigger ship this time, and a dozen others around it!" Glass tapped the mute button again and the screen crackled back to life. Another... face... filled the screen and began speaking with a similarly unpleasant intonation. "This is Supreme Commander of the Fneep Armada, Shlerp Scholachs. We understand you wished to speak with us. What is your business here?" "Hello, Supreme Commander. My name is John Glass, Admiral of the United Earth Space Force. We followed a trail left behind near our homeworld to get here and were wondering if it was left by the Fneep." "You are from the Sol system? Yes, we attacked your planet successfully and won the war quite handily. There was nothing your pitiful defenses could do. Now then, as the losers and our new subjects, you are obligated to-" "Losers? Your subjects? I'm not quite sure I understand," drawled the admiral. "I don't expect a primate brain to understand much without a more in-depth explanation, so I will humor you. The rules of engagement state that a complete victory such as ours results in the subjugation of the losing party." "I see. Whose rules of engagement?" "The Fneep rules of engagement, obviously. Now that you are under our rule, they are also yours." "Ah," breathed the admiral, a grin slowly spreading across his face, "you expect us not to fight back because you got a hit in and bloodied our nose." "You were utterly defeated in battle, and we as the victors are now your rulers. This conversation is over and you are hereby ordered to leave or be annihilated like your pathetic cities." Once again, a call came from the lower bridge, more urgent this time. "Vice-admiral! We've got a lock on all targets!" "Excellent! Thank you Chen. John, I believe you've heard the good news?" Elena's excitement was palpable; she was practically giggling. Everyone on the bridge, correspondingly, was terrified. "What was that? Targets? What is going on here? As your Supreme Commander I forbid you to do anything to harm us! We will destroy you for this insolence!" sputtered Shlerp, enraged by the humans' actions. Glass' grin only widened further as he took in the situation. He straightened up in his seat and somehow the very air around him changed. Scholachs shrank away from this man who now seemed to hold pure power in his hands. "Supreme Commander Scholachs; did I pronounce that correctly? Earth denies Fneep authority and any right to rule the Fneep claim to have. You launched an unprovoked attack on innocent civilians and mercilessly slaughtered millions. Per our own rules of engagement, the Fneep are war criminals of the highest order and are due no consideration," Glass looked briefly beyond his screen, down to the lower bridge. "Commander Chen, relay the order to prepare to fire on all targets. Ensign Jones, broadcast this message as far into space as is possible." Looking back up to the now-quaking Fneep, he continued speaking: "I am not without mercy, nor am I senselessly violent. We have no civilian targets, only military, political, and industrial ones. This will be a very important lesson to whoever remains alive in a few moments. Retribution does not mean the complete annihilation of the Fneep people on this day. Next time, it will. All ships, fire at will." "Wait, we can nego-" "Goodbye, Supreme Commander Scholachs." A few moments later, the entire Fneep Armada was reduced to slag and shards of metal, floating in space. The planetary bombardment took a few more minutes. Glass took a moment to think while the crew of his ship looked on the wreckage floating nearby. Elena looked over at him. "What's on your mind, John?" "I wonder who else heard my message. Anyway. Commander Chen! Broadcast the following to the fleet." "You're live, sir," barked Chen. Glass nodded to him in thanks and began to speak in booming tones. "Congratulations, everyone. We have avenged our fallen and slain our enemies. The Fneep will never forget this day. I broadcast our final message to the farthest limits our comm arrays can reach, so anyone else who heard us knows who we are and what we do to those who fuck with Earth." Glass paused for a moment to let the message sink in. "We tried walking softly and that didn't work. It's time to use that big goddamn stick!"	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Captain Derrick looked through the view-port. "How much longer until we are in striking range?" His first mate, Rowan, cleared her throat. "We will arrive in ten minutes." "About time, I am getting tired of these stars." Rowan hesitated, "do we really have to do this Captain? Is vengeance worth it?" Derrick turned around to glare at her. "Is it worth it? Is it worth it? These alien scum attacked us first, or have you forgotten?" "No, sir. I remember. But it was so long ago." "Not long enough. Those bastards appeared out of nowhere, attacked us, then demanded our surrender. It was only luck that we managed to shoot them down and used their technology to make this ship. Time to teach them what for." "But, sir..." "Say another word and I will send you to the brig for insubordination. I will not have the fifty generations that have lived on this ship be for not."	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Mankind had figured out how to put colonies on Mars and was terraforming the red planet. We had stations around the moons of Jupiter and Neptune, even mining operations in the asteroid belt. Paranoia about other nations space capabilities, treaties about non weapon proliferation, economic exploitation all went with us. Things didn’t change because we had new places to exploit. It all changed when it was announced, well leaked, that we had discovered FTL travel. The news agencies broadcast it everywhere. It was undeniable evidence, and the government agency confessed to having developed it, and they “already had a test ship” under development. Everyone started looking outward, thinking about further exploration, colonies, development, exploitation of other systems. The usual responses of Humanity to a new frontier. Eleven days later, rocks traveling above .2c flattened the French and Indian bases on Io. Sensor data, with time delay from various stations, brought us information about flight trajectories that weren’t’ natural from outside the Oort Cloud. We were under attack, we weren’t alone. It took our political leaders about an hour to mobilize on Earth, it spread from there. Never in Human history has every nation showed its hand like this. Hundreds of ships launched from hidden bases throughout the system. Earth alone bloomed like a beehive as ships launched. Every settlement in space launched ships. Hidden bases in the asteroid belt launched ships. Allies, who thought they had close surveillance on their friends, were surprised at what their “friends” had hidden. Toilets on earth don’t cost $10,000 to build. This is when Humanity learned FTL was an “open secret” among the various space agencies and governments. Nobody wanted the ire of the world by breaking the treaties first. All governments prepared against a strike from their age-old rivalries. Now that attention was focused outward. The coordination among former enemies was miraculous. Some of these ships were tasked with picket duties, to defend against more rocks. They stopped subsequent attacks now that we knew what to look for. Some were better for recon. Math and physics still work, we found the fleets hiding in the Oort cloud when we traced the flight paths of the rocks. Some ships were tasked with intercepting the local threat. The Aliens were chased down with a merciless lust. Prisoners talked. According to the rest of the galaxy we’re paranoid and dangerous. They were listening and afraid. The majority of the ships that launched that day, more than half, left Sol.	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"Wars are typically quick. A side attacks, and the other surrenders," or so the professors pontificated. What they did not anticipate was the human penchant for long-term planning. Born out of the reaction to the 21st century climate crisis, humanity as a whole transformed itself from an impulsive species to one with a penchant for best-laid retribution. And so it was that 75 years after the last War had conquered an outlying Human system that waves of Asteroids descended upon Alien star systems. Meticulously calculated for maximum impact and time-on target, the rain began on all occupied hostile worlds. Every planet within 5 AU of a human colony taken in the frontier wars was reduced to molten rock; their populations mangled and ship production facilities left like so much swiss cheese. In a rather egregious case, warp-points were opened directly into a conflict-initiating species' home sun, causing it to go supernova early. From this point forward, humanity was left well enough alone.	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	As the collation party read the reports they decided this would be perfect and they approved the plans. The Formicidian Queens decided they’d level certain areas, let the natural flora and fauna grow for a few decades and then start the vacation colony they had dreaming about for years. It was mostly an unclaimed planet. A couple of vague notes about an emergent intelligent species, but that had been close to 150 years ago and still they hadn’t seen any of the “Homo Sapiens” enter into their galactic federations. Obviously they weren’t intelligent enough to leave the planet so no harm in exterminating a ground based pest. The usual process is to reign down with the meteors then send down some automated ships to maintain readings. So that’s what they did. Technically it was a war, but hey, if they can’t speak it’s implied surrender, and really what could it hurt. ————————— The meteor barrage lasted only a few hours but it devastated our planet. The population was reduced from approximately 7.8 billion to around 2.2 billion. Then the ships landed. Thousands of them. No one ever came out. As a people we quickly united. Nothing like a cataclysm to bring people together. Enough infrastructure was spared that allowed us to communicate and group together. The first shop that was dismantled, led to amazing discoveries in technology. So many discoveries, so quickly, may have led to another extinction event, but oh no. We had purpose, there was a fire in our guts, we would have our retribution. —————————— Collation internal memo: A total of 345 monitoring ships have gone offline. At your earliest convenience please decide if we’d like to replace them, or just leave the ones we have in place. Reading the memo, Sub-Queen Tessrch wasn’t sure exactly what it was in regards to so she filed it with the other less important flotsam that the Queens tasked her with. Hopefully in a decade she could have her own Sub-Queen to deal with all the tedious work. ————————— We grew and we learned. We found out why our planet had been decimated. We seethed. The audacity! A vacation planet, that was the reason our families had been destroy?! A leader emerged from what was left of humanity. This leader spoke of readying the planet for interstellar warfare, not for petty revenge, but to show these so called higher beings that we not to be trifled with. Homo sapiens are adaptable, cunning, and an apex predator, not prey. We quietly rebuilt our lives using the technology that had so foolishly had left for us to assimilate. The disaster had forged humanities purpose. We had learned their language, and there was one word that had no direct translation. Retribution. This has been my first post on this sub, but I love reading the stories. Please critique whatever you’d like, but if you can’t be nice, hopefully you won’t be mean.	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"...And as the victors, the Irik Confederate shall now be taking control of your cities and governments on this colony planet. Your unfit leaders shall..." I caught snippets of the speech, but I wasn't really listening. Neither were my comrades moving around the crowd, I wager - well, except Francis, I knew that he was probably taking notes. No matter, he'd get the job done regardless. It had been a weird week. These aliens simply decided to attack. They invaded the airspace over the colony and pulled a true Blitzkrieg, they just dispatched their troops right on top of the governmental buildings. Took our leaders as hostages, messed up with comunications and media. After six days, it seems that they thought that was it. They simply walked out and onto the streets like they owned the place. I saw ol' Jeremy, the governor, in shackles behind them with a sour look on his face as the Irik Commander stood proudly in front of the population of Primus A and started giving us his little takeover speech. There were other Iriks with him and thye all had the same smug, maddening self-satisfied grins on every one of their five mouths. No weapons, I noticed. Six long, lean arms on each and all they were holding were rings, ceremonial banners, flash cards and other things better suited for hanging on a wall as conversation starters than standing in front of a crowd who, I was pleased to notice as I started to climb the stairs to the nearby building, was eyeing the invaders with barely restrained anger. We outnumbered them, too. It was barely a couple of minutes before I was in position. Directly on top of the commander who was still running all of his mouths with the pleased look of someone who just loves to hear themselves talk. I looked to the other points and sure enough, there were my boys in their own positions, ready to go. I clutched my weapon - a simple lead pipe that I had find. Primus A wasn't an advanced post - it was a habitational colony, and I'd been a flower shop owner until a week ago. Not much experience with guns, nor did I even know how to find one on short notice. But I'd be damned if I was going to just twindle my thumbs while these aliens invaded my home. I pulled up my bandana, covering my nose and mouth and blew my whistle. The sharp sound was a boulder smashing glass, destroying the concentration and the droning sound of the Irik's speech. The alien looked upwards with three dozen surprised eyes as from the crowd, two of my boys did their part and threw their stink bombs into the comission of aliens. I screamed and jumped from my vantage point, landing with both feet on the commander's chest and sending the alien to the ground. It was absolute chaos. The Iriks were screaming in confusion and disgust at the odor, and it was everything the crowd needed to get riled up too - the mass of humans shouted in support at our outburst and started to rush towards us to help the fight, while the rest of the Irik Comission scrambled to get into position. "W-what is the meaning of this madness?! Your leaders have been defeated and replaced, how dare you betray your new governors?! This is already ov--" The pipe gave out a really nice vibrating sound when it connected to his leftmost mouth, the one who was talking at the time. "Listen up, you daft bastard. Nobody here is on your side, we're not traitors. We're the resistance!" I said, lifting up my pipe again. I could see the look of confusion and fear take over his many eyes at the word "resistance", as if the alien had never heard of such a term before. "What is the meaning of that word?" "It means that we're still going to fight you. Who gives a shit about the government, anyway? This is our home and we don't want you here." "B-but...But that's not how it is done! It's not proper, the losers shall never fight the victors! We won the war and we demand you cease this madness!" I lifted my pipe again. I could say a lot of things, I realized. Some sort of deep proclamation of human spirit or defying catchphrase. I had one shot before the crowd hit us and the real battle started. I chose my words carefully and looked the commander of this pompous alien race right in the eye before bringing down my pipe. "Nah."	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	“You have no idea what you’ve begun. Do you really think that this is over? Oh, you stupid idiots. You don’t know what’s coming.” She could barely see out of her right eye, and her left was swollen shut completely. Mostly, she saw large blobs where her captors stood. But she didn’t need her eyes to speak, and speak she did. “See, it sounds to me that you’ve never actually fought a real war before. This little invasion isn’t a real war, not even close. But don’t worry, you’ll learn the difference soon enou-“ Slap! The slap was hard enough to snap her head sideways, and re-open her split lip. She spit onto the floor, a bloody wad. It hurt, but not as bad as the buildings crumbling around her, or being dragged forcibly out of the wreckage and onto the alien spacecraft. When she woke up this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to end in the interrogation room of an alien ship. The ships had appeared over her city around lunchtime, and she had been one of the few (un)lucky ones who survived the initial wave of attacks. From what she had heard so far, the aliens usually decimate one city as an example. After that, the rest of the planet surrenders. She couldn’t help but think those other alien races were cowards. To give up after a single attack, to not even consider retaliation for the unprovoked attacks against them? Well, these attackers had obviously not done their research when it came to humanity. “You’ve never actually had to fight against someone who fights back. You make one huge show of force, and expect that to be enough. But you are in for one hell of a surprise this time. I figure it’s been about 10, maybe 12 hours since you first attacked. Which means it’s right about time for you to start fighting for your lives. You see, humanity didn’t surrender after that first attack. You’ll see what real war is soon enough. You’ll wish you’d never heard of planet Earth. This time, you’ll be the ones surrendering. And we will make you beg.” A horrendous sound filled the air, the emergency sirens in the ship had activated. A shudder was felt throughout the whole ship, and even with only partial vision, she could see the fear radiating from her captors. Alien screams were heard from all around them. “This is the beginning of the end for you. You came to our planet, attacked us without warning or provocation, and just expected us to sit back and take it? I speak for all of humanity when I say that we *do not surrender.*” The door to the interrogation room shook violently, someone on the other side began to force it open. “Every action has consequences.” The aliens spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. But she could understand the tones of fear and disbelief in their voices. “Your action of declaring war has been met with acceptance.” The door began to crack and bend in its frame. “You will see true war.” The door burst free of its hinges, and exploded onto the floor of the room. “And you will face our retribution.”	"Are you still watching that video? This is the tenth time that you do it. I may have to contact command for an emergency intervention if you don't stop. Here, drink." Aaron was holding a glass of whisky in front of me, I looked at it for a moment, paused the video and drunk it. "If I were you, I would keep drinking instead of watching that video. I would rather have liver failure than losing my mind." "You may be right." I stood up, glass in hand and walked toward the bar. The whisky bottle was an old one, maybe from the 2160s or 2170s. I filled my glass and drunk it. Then another one and another one and another one. "Hey, hey, hey! Stop it! I said you could be an alcoholic! Not kill yourself by alcohol poisoning!" The whisky bottle was smashed against the wall, the centuries old liquor slowly dripping down it. "Then what I am suppose to do?! I lost everything! Everything! My wife, my children! And there are not even ashes to bury them!" "Do you think you are the only one who lost everything?! What about the millions who managed to escape and had to watch how the Halvens burned their planet to the ground?! Answer me!" I stood there looking at him, there was no way I could answer that question because it was a question without an answer. "Look, I know that there are no words to describe how you or the other millions of survivors from Foren IV are feeling. But I do know that humanity isn't going to stand still and wait for the Halvens or any other alien to come and do it again. Central command have already order all available fleets to prepare for an invasion of Halven space. As the Admiral of the Foren Fleet you have the duty to spearhead the offensive, not just for your family but for every Foren survivor!" Despite the motivational speech Aaron gave me, I was still a broken man. My wife Elena and my children Stefan and Aurora were the most important things in my life, without them I was nothing. Not admiral nor man. I was just a hush of my former self, who could only drown my sorrows in alcohol and watch the last video message my family sent me over and over again. "You aren't going to do anything, are you?" I didn't answer. As Aaron walked toward the door in order to leave me alone with my sorrows I suddenly received a message on my radio. "Sir, you might want to tune into the diplomatic channel but I must warn you, you won't like what you are going to see." "What are you talking..." Before I could finished my sentence Aaron had turn on the main screen in the room. On the screen there was a Halven Admiral, its purple slimy skin contrasting with its green uniform. Although the Halvens weren't the most hideous aliens humanity had encounter, they weren't the nicest either. But neither the grotesque appearance of the creature nor the nightmarish interior of the ship they were transmitting from could distract me from what I was looking at. Inside a cell on the background, hiding behind a man I didn't care for, there she was, my daughter, Aurora.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	2098 AD Thursday, August 7th, 6 PM Phoenix, AZ A woman sits down at her living room table, bills in hand, an exasperated look on her face. She'd found the unopened, and therefore unpaid bills on her husbands dresser, bills that she'd sternly reminded him to take care of before leaving for Vegas. "Then again, I suppose he was in a hurry, seeing as he'd spent last night working with the children on their homework, then securing all of their devices. They were going to DEFCON, after all," she mused to herself, beginning the tedious process of paying the various bills. Finally finished, she calls her husband, the time now 8 PM, eager to hear what her husband and children had gotten up to during the day. The line rings a couple times, then connects. "Hey honey, how was your day?" "Well Matthew," she says, with an ever so slight sharpness, "I did the bills you forgot to do." "Oh, that's what I forgot," he groans, an audible slap punctuating the end of his sentence. "With that out of the way, I'm dying to hear what talks you visited to day. Were you able to-" Her room turns neon blue as the very air ionizes, with her body following moments thereafter, the call coming to an abrupt end. &#x200B; Friday, August 8th, Noon Washington D.C. "Do we know what the weapon was? Did we even see where the attack came from?" "Well Mr. President, as to your first question- no. All we know is that whatever it was, it quite literally ionized all of Phoenix. As t-" The President, in disbelief, interrupts. "Wait a minute, don't you mean vaporized?" "No, sir, I mean ionized. The air, the buildings, the people, everything had their chemical bonds broken, had so much energy pumped into them that the electrons were stripped from their constituent atoms. After the resulting explosion, barely any ash remained, let alone a condensate." The President recoils from the man seated to his immediate right, the expert on both conventional and nuclear weapons, then regains his composure enough to ask another question "If we don't know what kind of weapon it was, do we at least know where it came from?" The man to his left, an astronomer, answers. "Well, we can actually do you one better. Shortly after the attack happened, we picked up a transmission on all of our radio telescopes. It gives a list of conditions, the directions to the room they want our surrender to take place in, and the set of coordinates of their capital world, where they want us to 'Bow to their glory and kneel at their tentacled appendages'" "Well, at least we know they're a humble race," the President dryly remarks, "Do we know anything else about our attackers?" A man, seated farther down at the table, the head of military R&D, answers him. "We do, as a matter of fact- it would appear that they have enslaved other people before us in a similar manner. We know this, as one of their slaves managed to drop a small package to us, containing a history of our attackers, their conquests and a series of schematics that we are trying to figure out. To answer your inevitable question, we have not made any progress as of yet, but we've got a number of experts on their way now and many more starting to work on the problem." The man then pulls out, glances at, then puts away his phone. "One is here now Mr. President- he's a nuclear engineer by trade, but is famous for a multidisciplinary approach to problem solving. He's the guy who oversaw the redesign of our power infrastructure a number of years back. Matthew is a certifiable genius, which is why I'm recommending you bring him into this, despite his conditions." "Oh? And what are they?" he asks. "All he asks is that he be the one to give the order to destroy our attackers, and send them a transmission before he does. His wife was one of the victims, and I think he figures that since he'll be designing the weapons of their destruction, he should be the one to inform them of their fate" "Those are... interesting conditions, but I'll do my best to ensure they're met." &#x200B; 3008 AD Thursday, August 7th, 8 PM Local Time Cosminax Homeworld The commander of the planet was stuck in his office. All around the planet, a single song had been playing. On every thing that could emit sound, or even vibrate, a song singing of a "Blue Sky" was playing. No one knew what it meant- the atmosphere here was grey, a pale imitation of their souls. Yet, nothing was on their scanners. The vacuum of space, as far as they could tell, was just that- absent of anything. Then, without warning, the display in front of him came to life, and a new song, a powerful song, began blaring. &#x200B; Matthew stands over the console, his hands over three buttons- one to toggle the transmission, a second button to change the music, and a third other to signal the other ships in the flotilla and begin the bombardment. He presses the first, and begins to speak. "Hello, those who call themselves the Cosminax. I've waited 10 years for us to have this little chat, so I'll make this brief. You've spent nigh near a millennium conquering worlds, forcing innocent peoples into submission. Today, that ends. You've ended the lives of heaven knows how many innocent people, my wife among them. You've been gambling for nearly 1000 years that no one could or would strike back. Today, those debts come due." "You may be wondering why for the past hour I've forced you to listen to a song from my planet, "Mr. Blue Sky". It was my wife's favorite song. How I wish that she were here, and that "Mr. Blue Sky" be the only song I need to play. But alas, you murdered my wife, my people and the people of tens of trillions more, and I have need of another song." He then presses the second button, and begins a recording of "Dias Irae" by Verdi. "Like the Romans with salt, I will poison your world. After we reign fire and judgement upon you, nothing will live here for hundreds of years, not even microbes. The planet below and the universe will be purged of your taint with nuclear fire." "May god have mercy on your souls, may the gates of hell be wide enough to accept those who are guilty, and may no one else be forced to suffer as your victims." He ends the transmission, then gives the order. &#x200B; Postscript: This is my first real attempt at writing, so I'm interested to know what you think, and what could be changed for the better. Thanks, \-FullerBot	We dreamed of peace on earth for so long, we hoped that when we had contact from aliens it would bring peace. When They came, they destroyed our earth, decimated our population. Sudden and overwhelming force, their one and only and very effective tactic. We surrendered. In just a week they had destroyed our civilization on a global scale. The remainder of humanity became slaves. We joined a dozen other species from galaxies we couldn’t name. And so we mingled. We taught them how to drink, how to party. We showed them how to be sneaky, rebellious and quietly destructive. We mourned and we remembered. We hoped. We made friends and allies. We taught them how to be angry. They taught us what they knew too. Then together we brought retribution.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The attack had been as brutal as it was swift. An extraterrestrial armada had basically wiped several major cities off the map in all of an hour, and humanity was collectively terrified of a continued assault. Shanghai, Vancouver, Dallas, St. Petersburg, and many others had been left flattened and nearly devoid of life in less time than it took to put together some Ikea furniture, but after a week it became clear that the attackers didn't intend to return to finish the job. Panic turned to fear, fear to anxiety. Anxiety became confusion, and confusion grew into rage. The attack seemed to have had no purpose other than to kill and terrify, but the aliens seemed to have avoided the most important or populated areas of the world; New York City was completely unscathed, as were Moscow and Beijing. It was mind-boggling, and humanity came together to counterattack in a show of solidarity that had never been seen before. A week and a half after the attack, the world's leaders had met and struck a deal to find the culprits and show them just who they had attacked. Six weeks after the attack, the collected space forces of the world had been united, with no thought as to equipment costs or alliances. It was a simple choice; for the good of the planet and humanity as a whole, everyone needed the best training and the best gear. There was to be no risk of anyone being hampered by subpar gear. Twelve weeks after the attack, blended crews from formerly bitterly opposed nations had bonded and created a sort of pidgin to communicate with one another. Six months after the initial incident, they were ready. The United Earth Space Force launched their entire fleet and followed the trajectory observed after the attackers left. Another year and several lightspeed jumps later, they arrived in an as-yet unexplored solar system and were almost immediately hailed by a lone ship nearby. ----- "Admiral, sir, we've been pinged. And they seem to want to talk, I'm seeing signals all over the spectrum here. Looks like they're trying to narrow it down to our video communication frequency." As if on cue, when the ensign had stopped speaking the communications screens lit up with what appeared to be a face. It wasn't a color or shape the humans were familiar with, nor did it have all the usual bits they knew about, but something about it made "face" a close enough approximation. "Greetings. This is scout ship Skert-9. You are trespassing in occupied space. You may either return to unoccupied space or be destroyed by the Fneep Armada." The being's voice was somehow liquid and gravelly at the same time. "Ensign Jones, put me on the line, if you would," uttered the bemused admiral, chin resting on his palm as he slouched in his chair. "Greetings, Skert-9. This is Admiral John Glass, of the UESF, aboard the gunship Blackbeard. If possible, before any hostilities commence or we leave, I would like to speak with a similar-ranking officer from the armada. Is that possible?" "I will attempt to contact my superiors. We thank you for your patience." A minute or two elapsed as the UESF was put on the Fneep equivalent of hold. Blessedly, the Fneep did not appear to have invented anything akin to Muzak. Glass hit the mute button on his console and turned to his second in command. "So, Elena, once we're done here, you think Earth's going to go back to squabbling amongst ourselves, or what?" "Honestly, John, I couldn't tell you. I haven't really got any intention of fighting you, but that's primarily because I wouldn't take much joy in beating down an old man," came the heavily-accented response from the woman in the next chair. The two looked at each other and locked eyes for a moment, the steely gazes of two warriors waiting to see who would back down. As usual, they both cracked up around the same time. The admiral was still cackling when someone called to them from the lower bridge. "Sirs! We've got movement. Much bigger ship this time, and a dozen others around it!" Glass tapped the mute button again and the screen crackled back to life. Another... face... filled the screen and began speaking with a similarly unpleasant intonation. "This is Supreme Commander of the Fneep Armada, Shlerp Scholachs. We understand you wished to speak with us. What is your business here?" "Hello, Supreme Commander. My name is John Glass, Admiral of the United Earth Space Force. We followed a trail left behind near our homeworld to get here and were wondering if it was left by the Fneep." "You are from the Sol system? Yes, we attacked your planet successfully and won the war quite handily. There was nothing your pitiful defenses could do. Now then, as the losers and our new subjects, you are obligated to-" "Losers? Your subjects? I'm not quite sure I understand," drawled the admiral. "I don't expect a primate brain to understand much without a more in-depth explanation, so I will humor you. The rules of engagement state that a complete victory such as ours results in the subjugation of the losing party." "I see. Whose rules of engagement?" "The Fneep rules of engagement, obviously. Now that you are under our rule, they are also yours." "Ah," breathed the admiral, a grin slowly spreading across his face, "you expect us not to fight back because you got a hit in and bloodied our nose." "You were utterly defeated in battle, and we as the victors are now your rulers. This conversation is over and you are hereby ordered to leave or be annihilated like your pathetic cities." Once again, a call came from the lower bridge, more urgent this time. "Vice-admiral! We've got a lock on all targets!" "Excellent! Thank you Chen. John, I believe you've heard the good news?" Elena's excitement was palpable; she was practically giggling. Everyone on the bridge, correspondingly, was terrified. "What was that? Targets? What is going on here? As your Supreme Commander I forbid you to do anything to harm us! We will destroy you for this insolence!" sputtered Shlerp, enraged by the humans' actions. Glass' grin only widened further as he took in the situation. He straightened up in his seat and somehow the very air around him changed. Scholachs shrank away from this man who now seemed to hold pure power in his hands. "Supreme Commander Scholachs; did I pronounce that correctly? Earth denies Fneep authority and any right to rule the Fneep claim to have. You launched an unprovoked attack on innocent civilians and mercilessly slaughtered millions. Per our own rules of engagement, the Fneep are war criminals of the highest order and are due no consideration," Glass looked briefly beyond his screen, down to the lower bridge. "Commander Chen, relay the order to prepare to fire on all targets. Ensign Jones, broadcast this message as far into space as is possible." Looking back up to the now-quaking Fneep, he continued speaking: "I am not without mercy, nor am I senselessly violent. We have no civilian targets, only military, political, and industrial ones. This will be a very important lesson to whoever remains alive in a few moments. Retribution does not mean the complete annihilation of the Fneep people on this day. Next time, it will. All ships, fire at will." "Wait, we can nego-" "Goodbye, Supreme Commander Scholachs." A few moments later, the entire Fneep Armada was reduced to slag and shards of metal, floating in space. The planetary bombardment took a few more minutes. Glass took a moment to think while the crew of his ship looked on the wreckage floating nearby. Elena looked over at him. "What's on your mind, John?" "I wonder who else heard my message. Anyway. Commander Chen! Broadcast the following to the fleet." "You're live, sir," barked Chen. Glass nodded to him in thanks and began to speak in booming tones. "Congratulations, everyone. We have avenged our fallen and slain our enemies. The Fneep will never forget this day. I broadcast our final message to the farthest limits our comm arrays can reach, so anyone else who heard us knows who we are and what we do to those who fuck with Earth." Glass paused for a moment to let the message sink in. "We tried walking softly and that didn't work. It's time to use that big goddamn stick!"	We dreamed of peace on earth for so long, we hoped that when we had contact from aliens it would bring peace. When They came, they destroyed our earth, decimated our population. Sudden and overwhelming force, their one and only and very effective tactic. We surrendered. In just a week they had destroyed our civilization on a global scale. The remainder of humanity became slaves. We joined a dozen other species from galaxies we couldn’t name. And so we mingled. We taught them how to drink, how to party. We showed them how to be sneaky, rebellious and quietly destructive. We mourned and we remembered. We hoped. We made friends and allies. We taught them how to be angry. They taught us what they knew too. Then together we brought retribution.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Captain Derrick looked through the view-port. "How much longer until we are in striking range?" His first mate, Rowan, cleared her throat. "We will arrive in ten minutes." "About time, I am getting tired of these stars." Rowan hesitated, "do we really have to do this Captain? Is vengeance worth it?" Derrick turned around to glare at her. "Is it worth it? Is it worth it? These alien scum attacked us first, or have you forgotten?" "No, sir. I remember. But it was so long ago." "Not long enough. Those bastards appeared out of nowhere, attacked us, then demanded our surrender. It was only luck that we managed to shoot them down and used their technology to make this ship. Time to teach them what for." "But, sir..." "Say another word and I will send you to the brig for insubordination. I will not have the fifty generations that have lived on this ship be for not."	We dreamed of peace on earth for so long, we hoped that when we had contact from aliens it would bring peace. When They came, they destroyed our earth, decimated our population. Sudden and overwhelming force, their one and only and very effective tactic. We surrendered. In just a week they had destroyed our civilization on a global scale. The remainder of humanity became slaves. We joined a dozen other species from galaxies we couldn’t name. And so we mingled. We taught them how to drink, how to party. We showed them how to be sneaky, rebellious and quietly destructive. We mourned and we remembered. We hoped. We made friends and allies. We taught them how to be angry. They taught us what they knew too. Then together we brought retribution.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The attack had been as brutal as it was swift. An extraterrestrial armada had basically wiped several major cities off the map in all of an hour, and humanity was collectively terrified of a continued assault. Shanghai, Vancouver, Dallas, St. Petersburg, and many others had been left flattened and nearly devoid of life in less time than it took to put together some Ikea furniture, but after a week it became clear that the attackers didn't intend to return to finish the job. Panic turned to fear, fear to anxiety. Anxiety became confusion, and confusion grew into rage. The attack seemed to have had no purpose other than to kill and terrify, but the aliens seemed to have avoided the most important or populated areas of the world; New York City was completely unscathed, as were Moscow and Beijing. It was mind-boggling, and humanity came together to counterattack in a show of solidarity that had never been seen before. A week and a half after the attack, the world's leaders had met and struck a deal to find the culprits and show them just who they had attacked. Six weeks after the attack, the collected space forces of the world had been united, with no thought as to equipment costs or alliances. It was a simple choice; for the good of the planet and humanity as a whole, everyone needed the best training and the best gear. There was to be no risk of anyone being hampered by subpar gear. Twelve weeks after the attack, blended crews from formerly bitterly opposed nations had bonded and created a sort of pidgin to communicate with one another. Six months after the initial incident, they were ready. The United Earth Space Force launched their entire fleet and followed the trajectory observed after the attackers left. Another year and several lightspeed jumps later, they arrived in an as-yet unexplored solar system and were almost immediately hailed by a lone ship nearby. ----- "Admiral, sir, we've been pinged. And they seem to want to talk, I'm seeing signals all over the spectrum here. Looks like they're trying to narrow it down to our video communication frequency." As if on cue, when the ensign had stopped speaking the communications screens lit up with what appeared to be a face. It wasn't a color or shape the humans were familiar with, nor did it have all the usual bits they knew about, but something about it made "face" a close enough approximation. "Greetings. This is scout ship Skert-9. You are trespassing in occupied space. You may either return to unoccupied space or be destroyed by the Fneep Armada." The being's voice was somehow liquid and gravelly at the same time. "Ensign Jones, put me on the line, if you would," uttered the bemused admiral, chin resting on his palm as he slouched in his chair. "Greetings, Skert-9. This is Admiral John Glass, of the UESF, aboard the gunship Blackbeard. If possible, before any hostilities commence or we leave, I would like to speak with a similar-ranking officer from the armada. Is that possible?" "I will attempt to contact my superiors. We thank you for your patience." A minute or two elapsed as the UESF was put on the Fneep equivalent of hold. Blessedly, the Fneep did not appear to have invented anything akin to Muzak. Glass hit the mute button on his console and turned to his second in command. "So, Elena, once we're done here, you think Earth's going to go back to squabbling amongst ourselves, or what?" "Honestly, John, I couldn't tell you. I haven't really got any intention of fighting you, but that's primarily because I wouldn't take much joy in beating down an old man," came the heavily-accented response from the woman in the next chair. The two looked at each other and locked eyes for a moment, the steely gazes of two warriors waiting to see who would back down. As usual, they both cracked up around the same time. The admiral was still cackling when someone called to them from the lower bridge. "Sirs! We've got movement. Much bigger ship this time, and a dozen others around it!" Glass tapped the mute button again and the screen crackled back to life. Another... face... filled the screen and began speaking with a similarly unpleasant intonation. "This is Supreme Commander of the Fneep Armada, Shlerp Scholachs. We understand you wished to speak with us. What is your business here?" "Hello, Supreme Commander. My name is John Glass, Admiral of the United Earth Space Force. We followed a trail left behind near our homeworld to get here and were wondering if it was left by the Fneep." "You are from the Sol system? Yes, we attacked your planet successfully and won the war quite handily. There was nothing your pitiful defenses could do. Now then, as the losers and our new subjects, you are obligated to-" "Losers? Your subjects? I'm not quite sure I understand," drawled the admiral. "I don't expect a primate brain to understand much without a more in-depth explanation, so I will humor you. The rules of engagement state that a complete victory such as ours results in the subjugation of the losing party." "I see. Whose rules of engagement?" "The Fneep rules of engagement, obviously. Now that you are under our rule, they are also yours." "Ah," breathed the admiral, a grin slowly spreading across his face, "you expect us not to fight back because you got a hit in and bloodied our nose." "You were utterly defeated in battle, and we as the victors are now your rulers. This conversation is over and you are hereby ordered to leave or be annihilated like your pathetic cities." Once again, a call came from the lower bridge, more urgent this time. "Vice-admiral! We've got a lock on all targets!" "Excellent! Thank you Chen. John, I believe you've heard the good news?" Elena's excitement was palpable; she was practically giggling. Everyone on the bridge, correspondingly, was terrified. "What was that? Targets? What is going on here? As your Supreme Commander I forbid you to do anything to harm us! We will destroy you for this insolence!" sputtered Shlerp, enraged by the humans' actions. Glass' grin only widened further as he took in the situation. He straightened up in his seat and somehow the very air around him changed. Scholachs shrank away from this man who now seemed to hold pure power in his hands. "Supreme Commander Scholachs; did I pronounce that correctly? Earth denies Fneep authority and any right to rule the Fneep claim to have. You launched an unprovoked attack on innocent civilians and mercilessly slaughtered millions. Per our own rules of engagement, the Fneep are war criminals of the highest order and are due no consideration," Glass looked briefly beyond his screen, down to the lower bridge. "Commander Chen, relay the order to prepare to fire on all targets. Ensign Jones, broadcast this message as far into space as is possible." Looking back up to the now-quaking Fneep, he continued speaking: "I am not without mercy, nor am I senselessly violent. We have no civilian targets, only military, political, and industrial ones. This will be a very important lesson to whoever remains alive in a few moments. Retribution does not mean the complete annihilation of the Fneep people on this day. Next time, it will. All ships, fire at will." "Wait, we can nego-" "Goodbye, Supreme Commander Scholachs." A few moments later, the entire Fneep Armada was reduced to slag and shards of metal, floating in space. The planetary bombardment took a few more minutes. Glass took a moment to think while the crew of his ship looked on the wreckage floating nearby. Elena looked over at him. "What's on your mind, John?" "I wonder who else heard my message. Anyway. Commander Chen! Broadcast the following to the fleet." "You're live, sir," barked Chen. Glass nodded to him in thanks and began to speak in booming tones. "Congratulations, everyone. We have avenged our fallen and slain our enemies. The Fneep will never forget this day. I broadcast our final message to the farthest limits our comm arrays can reach, so anyone else who heard us knows who we are and what we do to those who fuck with Earth." Glass paused for a moment to let the message sink in. "We tried walking softly and that didn't work. It's time to use that big goddamn stick!"	Thirty Eighth Assembly of The High Solar Council, Assembled Admiralty, and Parliament of Digital Proxies, and other Honored Members of this Commission, I come before you today to tell you a story. Monsters from the Stars. This has been an old story for a long time. H.G. Wells blazed that trail almost eight hundred years ago, but, I tell you now, he built it upon an even older story, one more deeply and broadly held by humanity; Monsters from beyond the light of our fire. Fear the other, for they bring death and destruction to you, your tribe, and your history. It’s a primitive impulse, one I'd thought we’d conquered when we survived the trials and tribulations of the 20th and 21st centuries. Through that crucible, we shed our hatreds of one another and turned out energies to the building of a better world, and then worlds. It was an age undreamed of dominated by wonders built by steady and benevolent hands. Our golden age. And then, I hear you say, the outsiders came. Thirty ships, unannounced and out of the dark. They burned twelve stations and refueling depots around Jupiter before they settled into orbit. The wreckage left burning streaks through the upper atmosphere for weeks. Live feeds covered every screen in the system. The smoke trails looked like claw marks, first red, then black like a scab across the planet. It was the last mark on the physical world three hundred and sixteen thousand people would leave. We balked at the loss of life, rightfully so, and feared the alien’s likely advance. To our surprise they did not. They simply orbited Jupiter, dipping low into the upper atmosphere skimming hydrogen. We had no warships then, no system defense grids. Some bulk cargo rail guns were hastily repurposed, but it proved unnecessary. After two weeks the invader’s drives sparked to life in a hard burn and their thirty ships accelerated outward, back toward the dark. It took a moment, socially, politically, culturally, for what happened to sink in, to gestate. When it did, oh, the rage. The untempered, unbridled, unleashed, rage! All across the developing swarm, in every station, and down on every world, in every town, every neighborhood, on each street, there was someone out and screaming to, or maybe at, high heaven. Three hundred thousand people?! And then some?! Children?! Murdered for fucking fuel? And not a single goddamn word of challenge or of explanation?! I need not remind you that we were pretty bloody minded when the pursuit fleet launched a year or so later. Sure, there was a pretense of determining motive, but everyone, every human, knew what we were doing. We could feel it, deep inside, that when we caught those ships we were going to find out who they were, where they were from, and then we would burn them and their occupants to ash and cinder. And that’s what we did. We torched a few, cracked open others, spilling millions of organic signatures into the vacuum of space, and left only a single ship intact to be boarded, captured, and its occupants interrogated. We found aboard fifteen million hibernation chambers, not much bigger than a hand span wide, two tall, filled with aliens. Small squid things, though experts will tell you they bear little in common with our own terrestrial cephalopods. It took us the extraction and dissection of almost three hundred, and one handling accident, before we noticed the hive intelligence. Some answers came after that. They have no language like ours, and thus no name, and though some colloquialisms, nicknames and slurs have come into common usage, I will here continue to refer to them as “Aliens.” They are aquatic and hail from an ocean world, the one we now orbit. One of their most striking features is that individuals in mind and motive only emerge when several hundred thousand aliens are present and “merged” in neuro-chemical swarm behavior. However, the single most important aspect of their existence, of which I ask that each member of this commission take special notice, is that individuals do not die when the swarm shrinks below a numerical, cognitive limit. An individual will reemerge, unscathed, when the swarm regains that critical mass. This has profoundly shaped the Alien’s world view. They have fought wars, but not one of them has ever died. They have crossed the stars, but without their portable oceans, could never live there, and thus did not conceive of life existing outside of them. In short, they did not account for us, or our ability to live and operate in space. Their ships, automated at the time of the attack, were simply clearing space debris. I do not excuse the Aliens actions during the following war. I do not excuse their opinion, still held, that it is impossible for an individual, single, human to be truly conscious. What I do, here before the assembled High Council and Admiralty, is remind you of that old story of monsters from the stars. In it, we often celebrated our eventual total victory, and the complete defeat of the invaders. It was easy to do, as our foe was utterly dehumanized, by design. It made hateful action easy. It was centuries before we learned to stop doing that to each other. Here and now with the aliens it’s even harder to shake those old notions and biases as dehumanization is inherent. They are not human, but to deny their sentience, to deny their individual value? In that we must refrain. We must. For here and now, over their world, over their home oceans, it is not a complete victory we contemplate, it’s genocide. We must refrain. We must, or it is us that will be the monsters from the stars.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Captain Derrick looked through the view-port. "How much longer until we are in striking range?" His first mate, Rowan, cleared her throat. "We will arrive in ten minutes." "About time, I am getting tired of these stars." Rowan hesitated, "do we really have to do this Captain? Is vengeance worth it?" Derrick turned around to glare at her. "Is it worth it? Is it worth it? These alien scum attacked us first, or have you forgotten?" "No, sir. I remember. But it was so long ago." "Not long enough. Those bastards appeared out of nowhere, attacked us, then demanded our surrender. It was only luck that we managed to shoot them down and used their technology to make this ship. Time to teach them what for." "But, sir..." "Say another word and I will send you to the brig for insubordination. I will not have the fifty generations that have lived on this ship be for not."	Thirty Eighth Assembly of The High Solar Council, Assembled Admiralty, and Parliament of Digital Proxies, and other Honored Members of this Commission, I come before you today to tell you a story. Monsters from the Stars. This has been an old story for a long time. H.G. Wells blazed that trail almost eight hundred years ago, but, I tell you now, he built it upon an even older story, one more deeply and broadly held by humanity; Monsters from beyond the light of our fire. Fear the other, for they bring death and destruction to you, your tribe, and your history. It’s a primitive impulse, one I'd thought we’d conquered when we survived the trials and tribulations of the 20th and 21st centuries. Through that crucible, we shed our hatreds of one another and turned out energies to the building of a better world, and then worlds. It was an age undreamed of dominated by wonders built by steady and benevolent hands. Our golden age. And then, I hear you say, the outsiders came. Thirty ships, unannounced and out of the dark. They burned twelve stations and refueling depots around Jupiter before they settled into orbit. The wreckage left burning streaks through the upper atmosphere for weeks. Live feeds covered every screen in the system. The smoke trails looked like claw marks, first red, then black like a scab across the planet. It was the last mark on the physical world three hundred and sixteen thousand people would leave. We balked at the loss of life, rightfully so, and feared the alien’s likely advance. To our surprise they did not. They simply orbited Jupiter, dipping low into the upper atmosphere skimming hydrogen. We had no warships then, no system defense grids. Some bulk cargo rail guns were hastily repurposed, but it proved unnecessary. After two weeks the invader’s drives sparked to life in a hard burn and their thirty ships accelerated outward, back toward the dark. It took a moment, socially, politically, culturally, for what happened to sink in, to gestate. When it did, oh, the rage. The untempered, unbridled, unleashed, rage! All across the developing swarm, in every station, and down on every world, in every town, every neighborhood, on each street, there was someone out and screaming to, or maybe at, high heaven. Three hundred thousand people?! And then some?! Children?! Murdered for fucking fuel? And not a single goddamn word of challenge or of explanation?! I need not remind you that we were pretty bloody minded when the pursuit fleet launched a year or so later. Sure, there was a pretense of determining motive, but everyone, every human, knew what we were doing. We could feel it, deep inside, that when we caught those ships we were going to find out who they were, where they were from, and then we would burn them and their occupants to ash and cinder. And that’s what we did. We torched a few, cracked open others, spilling millions of organic signatures into the vacuum of space, and left only a single ship intact to be boarded, captured, and its occupants interrogated. We found aboard fifteen million hibernation chambers, not much bigger than a hand span wide, two tall, filled with aliens. Small squid things, though experts will tell you they bear little in common with our own terrestrial cephalopods. It took us the extraction and dissection of almost three hundred, and one handling accident, before we noticed the hive intelligence. Some answers came after that. They have no language like ours, and thus no name, and though some colloquialisms, nicknames and slurs have come into common usage, I will here continue to refer to them as “Aliens.” They are aquatic and hail from an ocean world, the one we now orbit. One of their most striking features is that individuals in mind and motive only emerge when several hundred thousand aliens are present and “merged” in neuro-chemical swarm behavior. However, the single most important aspect of their existence, of which I ask that each member of this commission take special notice, is that individuals do not die when the swarm shrinks below a numerical, cognitive limit. An individual will reemerge, unscathed, when the swarm regains that critical mass. This has profoundly shaped the Alien’s world view. They have fought wars, but not one of them has ever died. They have crossed the stars, but without their portable oceans, could never live there, and thus did not conceive of life existing outside of them. In short, they did not account for us, or our ability to live and operate in space. Their ships, automated at the time of the attack, were simply clearing space debris. I do not excuse the Aliens actions during the following war. I do not excuse their opinion, still held, that it is impossible for an individual, single, human to be truly conscious. What I do, here before the assembled High Council and Admiralty, is remind you of that old story of monsters from the stars. In it, we often celebrated our eventual total victory, and the complete defeat of the invaders. It was easy to do, as our foe was utterly dehumanized, by design. It made hateful action easy. It was centuries before we learned to stop doing that to each other. Here and now with the aliens it’s even harder to shake those old notions and biases as dehumanization is inherent. They are not human, but to deny their sentience, to deny their individual value? In that we must refrain. We must. For here and now, over their world, over their home oceans, it is not a complete victory we contemplate, it’s genocide. We must refrain. We must, or it is us that will be the monsters from the stars.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	Thirty Eighth Assembly of The High Solar Council, Assembled Admiralty, and Parliament of Digital Proxies, and other Honored Members of this Commission, I come before you today to tell you a story. Monsters from the Stars. This has been an old story for a long time. H.G. Wells blazed that trail almost eight hundred years ago, but, I tell you now, he built it upon an even older story, one more deeply and broadly held by humanity; Monsters from beyond the light of our fire. Fear the other, for they bring death and destruction to you, your tribe, and your history. It’s a primitive impulse, one I'd thought we’d conquered when we survived the trials and tribulations of the 20th and 21st centuries. Through that crucible, we shed our hatreds of one another and turned out energies to the building of a better world, and then worlds. It was an age undreamed of dominated by wonders built by steady and benevolent hands. Our golden age. And then, I hear you say, the outsiders came. Thirty ships, unannounced and out of the dark. They burned twelve stations and refueling depots around Jupiter before they settled into orbit. The wreckage left burning streaks through the upper atmosphere for weeks. Live feeds covered every screen in the system. The smoke trails looked like claw marks, first red, then black like a scab across the planet. It was the last mark on the physical world three hundred and sixteen thousand people would leave. We balked at the loss of life, rightfully so, and feared the alien’s likely advance. To our surprise they did not. They simply orbited Jupiter, dipping low into the upper atmosphere skimming hydrogen. We had no warships then, no system defense grids. Some bulk cargo rail guns were hastily repurposed, but it proved unnecessary. After two weeks the invader’s drives sparked to life in a hard burn and their thirty ships accelerated outward, back toward the dark. It took a moment, socially, politically, culturally, for what happened to sink in, to gestate. When it did, oh, the rage. The untempered, unbridled, unleashed, rage! All across the developing swarm, in every station, and down on every world, in every town, every neighborhood, on each street, there was someone out and screaming to, or maybe at, high heaven. Three hundred thousand people?! And then some?! Children?! Murdered for fucking fuel? And not a single goddamn word of challenge or of explanation?! I need not remind you that we were pretty bloody minded when the pursuit fleet launched a year or so later. Sure, there was a pretense of determining motive, but everyone, every human, knew what we were doing. We could feel it, deep inside, that when we caught those ships we were going to find out who they were, where they were from, and then we would burn them and their occupants to ash and cinder. And that’s what we did. We torched a few, cracked open others, spilling millions of organic signatures into the vacuum of space, and left only a single ship intact to be boarded, captured, and its occupants interrogated. We found aboard fifteen million hibernation chambers, not much bigger than a hand span wide, two tall, filled with aliens. Small squid things, though experts will tell you they bear little in common with our own terrestrial cephalopods. It took us the extraction and dissection of almost three hundred, and one handling accident, before we noticed the hive intelligence. Some answers came after that. They have no language like ours, and thus no name, and though some colloquialisms, nicknames and slurs have come into common usage, I will here continue to refer to them as “Aliens.” They are aquatic and hail from an ocean world, the one we now orbit. One of their most striking features is that individuals in mind and motive only emerge when several hundred thousand aliens are present and “merged” in neuro-chemical swarm behavior. However, the single most important aspect of their existence, of which I ask that each member of this commission take special notice, is that individuals do not die when the swarm shrinks below a numerical, cognitive limit. An individual will reemerge, unscathed, when the swarm regains that critical mass. This has profoundly shaped the Alien’s world view. They have fought wars, but not one of them has ever died. They have crossed the stars, but without their portable oceans, could never live there, and thus did not conceive of life existing outside of them. In short, they did not account for us, or our ability to live and operate in space. Their ships, automated at the time of the attack, were simply clearing space debris. I do not excuse the Aliens actions during the following war. I do not excuse their opinion, still held, that it is impossible for an individual, single, human to be truly conscious. What I do, here before the assembled High Council and Admiralty, is remind you of that old story of monsters from the stars. In it, we often celebrated our eventual total victory, and the complete defeat of the invaders. It was easy to do, as our foe was utterly dehumanized, by design. It made hateful action easy. It was centuries before we learned to stop doing that to each other. Here and now with the aliens it’s even harder to shake those old notions and biases as dehumanization is inherent. They are not human, but to deny their sentience, to deny their individual value? In that we must refrain. We must. For here and now, over their world, over their home oceans, it is not a complete victory we contemplate, it’s genocide. We must refrain. We must, or it is us that will be the monsters from the stars.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The attack had been as brutal as it was swift. An extraterrestrial armada had basically wiped several major cities off the map in all of an hour, and humanity was collectively terrified of a continued assault. Shanghai, Vancouver, Dallas, St. Petersburg, and many others had been left flattened and nearly devoid of life in less time than it took to put together some Ikea furniture, but after a week it became clear that the attackers didn't intend to return to finish the job. Panic turned to fear, fear to anxiety. Anxiety became confusion, and confusion grew into rage. The attack seemed to have had no purpose other than to kill and terrify, but the aliens seemed to have avoided the most important or populated areas of the world; New York City was completely unscathed, as were Moscow and Beijing. It was mind-boggling, and humanity came together to counterattack in a show of solidarity that had never been seen before. A week and a half after the attack, the world's leaders had met and struck a deal to find the culprits and show them just who they had attacked. Six weeks after the attack, the collected space forces of the world had been united, with no thought as to equipment costs or alliances. It was a simple choice; for the good of the planet and humanity as a whole, everyone needed the best training and the best gear. There was to be no risk of anyone being hampered by subpar gear. Twelve weeks after the attack, blended crews from formerly bitterly opposed nations had bonded and created a sort of pidgin to communicate with one another. Six months after the initial incident, they were ready. The United Earth Space Force launched their entire fleet and followed the trajectory observed after the attackers left. Another year and several lightspeed jumps later, they arrived in an as-yet unexplored solar system and were almost immediately hailed by a lone ship nearby. ----- "Admiral, sir, we've been pinged. And they seem to want to talk, I'm seeing signals all over the spectrum here. Looks like they're trying to narrow it down to our video communication frequency." As if on cue, when the ensign had stopped speaking the communications screens lit up with what appeared to be a face. It wasn't a color or shape the humans were familiar with, nor did it have all the usual bits they knew about, but something about it made "face" a close enough approximation. "Greetings. This is scout ship Skert-9. You are trespassing in occupied space. You may either return to unoccupied space or be destroyed by the Fneep Armada." The being's voice was somehow liquid and gravelly at the same time. "Ensign Jones, put me on the line, if you would," uttered the bemused admiral, chin resting on his palm as he slouched in his chair. "Greetings, Skert-9. This is Admiral John Glass, of the UESF, aboard the gunship Blackbeard. If possible, before any hostilities commence or we leave, I would like to speak with a similar-ranking officer from the armada. Is that possible?" "I will attempt to contact my superiors. We thank you for your patience." A minute or two elapsed as the UESF was put on the Fneep equivalent of hold. Blessedly, the Fneep did not appear to have invented anything akin to Muzak. Glass hit the mute button on his console and turned to his second in command. "So, Elena, once we're done here, you think Earth's going to go back to squabbling amongst ourselves, or what?" "Honestly, John, I couldn't tell you. I haven't really got any intention of fighting you, but that's primarily because I wouldn't take much joy in beating down an old man," came the heavily-accented response from the woman in the next chair. The two looked at each other and locked eyes for a moment, the steely gazes of two warriors waiting to see who would back down. As usual, they both cracked up around the same time. The admiral was still cackling when someone called to them from the lower bridge. "Sirs! We've got movement. Much bigger ship this time, and a dozen others around it!" Glass tapped the mute button again and the screen crackled back to life. Another... face... filled the screen and began speaking with a similarly unpleasant intonation. "This is Supreme Commander of the Fneep Armada, Shlerp Scholachs. We understand you wished to speak with us. What is your business here?" "Hello, Supreme Commander. My name is John Glass, Admiral of the United Earth Space Force. We followed a trail left behind near our homeworld to get here and were wondering if it was left by the Fneep." "You are from the Sol system? Yes, we attacked your planet successfully and won the war quite handily. There was nothing your pitiful defenses could do. Now then, as the losers and our new subjects, you are obligated to-" "Losers? Your subjects? I'm not quite sure I understand," drawled the admiral. "I don't expect a primate brain to understand much without a more in-depth explanation, so I will humor you. The rules of engagement state that a complete victory such as ours results in the subjugation of the losing party." "I see. Whose rules of engagement?" "The Fneep rules of engagement, obviously. Now that you are under our rule, they are also yours." "Ah," breathed the admiral, a grin slowly spreading across his face, "you expect us not to fight back because you got a hit in and bloodied our nose." "You were utterly defeated in battle, and we as the victors are now your rulers. This conversation is over and you are hereby ordered to leave or be annihilated like your pathetic cities." Once again, a call came from the lower bridge, more urgent this time. "Vice-admiral! We've got a lock on all targets!" "Excellent! Thank you Chen. John, I believe you've heard the good news?" Elena's excitement was palpable; she was practically giggling. Everyone on the bridge, correspondingly, was terrified. "What was that? Targets? What is going on here? As your Supreme Commander I forbid you to do anything to harm us! We will destroy you for this insolence!" sputtered Shlerp, enraged by the humans' actions. Glass' grin only widened further as he took in the situation. He straightened up in his seat and somehow the very air around him changed. Scholachs shrank away from this man who now seemed to hold pure power in his hands. "Supreme Commander Scholachs; did I pronounce that correctly? Earth denies Fneep authority and any right to rule the Fneep claim to have. You launched an unprovoked attack on innocent civilians and mercilessly slaughtered millions. Per our own rules of engagement, the Fneep are war criminals of the highest order and are due no consideration," Glass looked briefly beyond his screen, down to the lower bridge. "Commander Chen, relay the order to prepare to fire on all targets. Ensign Jones, broadcast this message as far into space as is possible." Looking back up to the now-quaking Fneep, he continued speaking: "I am not without mercy, nor am I senselessly violent. We have no civilian targets, only military, political, and industrial ones. This will be a very important lesson to whoever remains alive in a few moments. Retribution does not mean the complete annihilation of the Fneep people on this day. Next time, it will. All ships, fire at will." "Wait, we can nego-" "Goodbye, Supreme Commander Scholachs." A few moments later, the entire Fneep Armada was reduced to slag and shards of metal, floating in space. The planetary bombardment took a few more minutes. Glass took a moment to think while the crew of his ship looked on the wreckage floating nearby. Elena looked over at him. "What's on your mind, John?" "I wonder who else heard my message. Anyway. Commander Chen! Broadcast the following to the fleet." "You're live, sir," barked Chen. Glass nodded to him in thanks and began to speak in booming tones. "Congratulations, everyone. We have avenged our fallen and slain our enemies. The Fneep will never forget this day. I broadcast our final message to the farthest limits our comm arrays can reach, so anyone else who heard us knows who we are and what we do to those who fuck with Earth." Glass paused for a moment to let the message sink in. "We tried walking softly and that didn't work. It's time to use that big goddamn stick!"	To the Star Warlords: Do not attack the ones called humans. They live on their planet called Terra and they had given our planets names, and we thought it was an easy submission. They were primitive. When we sent out our spies, they never returned and called for us to back down. We didn't back down as per decree. We targeted the ones with high population density to prune them out to convince them to surrender and join our Federation. But they didn't surrender like what always happened to the primitive races. They managed to capture a scout ship and replicate our technology in a few years, which brought us to this moment. The Xanlai Warlords are wiped out. I am writing this as a warning. They have created their own federation and have created weapons and brought greater knowledge even to those who have already submitted. The Xanlai Galaxy is lost now. Do not enter this galaxy. A new Warlord has brought this place what war truly meant. If you find a human, civilian or not, do not attack them. They are like our Precursors. A true war race. Behind their face of friendliness is a blood of a warrior. They all have killed each other and they have blood to kill everyone just to recover from their loss. Do not attack the humans.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Captain Derrick looked through the view-port. "How much longer until we are in striking range?" His first mate, Rowan, cleared her throat. "We will arrive in ten minutes." "About time, I am getting tired of these stars." Rowan hesitated, "do we really have to do this Captain? Is vengeance worth it?" Derrick turned around to glare at her. "Is it worth it? Is it worth it? These alien scum attacked us first, or have you forgotten?" "No, sir. I remember. But it was so long ago." "Not long enough. Those bastards appeared out of nowhere, attacked us, then demanded our surrender. It was only luck that we managed to shoot them down and used their technology to make this ship. Time to teach them what for." "But, sir..." "Say another word and I will send you to the brig for insubordination. I will not have the fifty generations that have lived on this ship be for not."	To the Star Warlords: Do not attack the ones called humans. They live on their planet called Terra and they had given our planets names, and we thought it was an easy submission. They were primitive. When we sent out our spies, they never returned and called for us to back down. We didn't back down as per decree. We targeted the ones with high population density to prune them out to convince them to surrender and join our Federation. But they didn't surrender like what always happened to the primitive races. They managed to capture a scout ship and replicate our technology in a few years, which brought us to this moment. The Xanlai Warlords are wiped out. I am writing this as a warning. They have created their own federation and have created weapons and brought greater knowledge even to those who have already submitted. The Xanlai Galaxy is lost now. Do not enter this galaxy. A new Warlord has brought this place what war truly meant. If you find a human, civilian or not, do not attack them. They are like our Precursors. A true war race. Behind their face of friendliness is a blood of a warrior. They all have killed each other and they have blood to kill everyone just to recover from their loss. Do not attack the humans.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	To the Star Warlords: Do not attack the ones called humans. They live on their planet called Terra and they had given our planets names, and we thought it was an easy submission. They were primitive. When we sent out our spies, they never returned and called for us to back down. We didn't back down as per decree. We targeted the ones with high population density to prune them out to convince them to surrender and join our Federation. But they didn't surrender like what always happened to the primitive races. They managed to capture a scout ship and replicate our technology in a few years, which brought us to this moment. The Xanlai Warlords are wiped out. I am writing this as a warning. They have created their own federation and have created weapons and brought greater knowledge even to those who have already submitted. The Xanlai Galaxy is lost now. Do not enter this galaxy. A new Warlord has brought this place what war truly meant. If you find a human, civilian or not, do not attack them. They are like our Precursors. A true war race. Behind their face of friendliness is a blood of a warrior. They all have killed each other and they have blood to kill everyone just to recover from their loss. Do not attack the humans.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	Mankind had figured out how to put colonies on Mars and was terraforming the red planet. We had stations around the moons of Jupiter and Neptune, even mining operations in the asteroid belt. Paranoia about other nations space capabilities, treaties about non weapon proliferation, economic exploitation all went with us. Things didn’t change because we had new places to exploit. It all changed when it was announced, well leaked, that we had discovered FTL travel. The news agencies broadcast it everywhere. It was undeniable evidence, and the government agency confessed to having developed it, and they “already had a test ship” under development. Everyone started looking outward, thinking about further exploration, colonies, development, exploitation of other systems. The usual responses of Humanity to a new frontier. Eleven days later, rocks traveling above .2c flattened the French and Indian bases on Io. Sensor data, with time delay from various stations, brought us information about flight trajectories that weren’t’ natural from outside the Oort Cloud. We were under attack, we weren’t alone. It took our political leaders about an hour to mobilize on Earth, it spread from there. Never in Human history has every nation showed its hand like this. Hundreds of ships launched from hidden bases throughout the system. Earth alone bloomed like a beehive as ships launched. Every settlement in space launched ships. Hidden bases in the asteroid belt launched ships. Allies, who thought they had close surveillance on their friends, were surprised at what their “friends” had hidden. Toilets on earth don’t cost $10,000 to build. This is when Humanity learned FTL was an “open secret” among the various space agencies and governments. Nobody wanted the ire of the world by breaking the treaties first. All governments prepared against a strike from their age-old rivalries. Now that attention was focused outward. The coordination among former enemies was miraculous. Some of these ships were tasked with picket duties, to defend against more rocks. They stopped subsequent attacks now that we knew what to look for. Some were better for recon. Math and physics still work, we found the fleets hiding in the Oort cloud when we traced the flight paths of the rocks. Some ships were tasked with intercepting the local threat. The Aliens were chased down with a merciless lust. Prisoners talked. According to the rest of the galaxy we’re paranoid and dangerous. They were listening and afraid. The majority of the ships that launched that day, more than half, left Sol.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	"Wars are typically quick. A side attacks, and the other surrenders," or so the professors pontificated. What they did not anticipate was the human penchant for long-term planning. Born out of the reaction to the 21st century climate crisis, humanity as a whole transformed itself from an impulsive species to one with a penchant for best-laid retribution. And so it was that 75 years after the last War had conquered an outlying Human system that waves of Asteroids descended upon Alien star systems. Meticulously calculated for maximum impact and time-on target, the rain began on all occupied hostile worlds. Every planet within 5 AU of a human colony taken in the frontier wars was reduced to molten rock; their populations mangled and ship production facilities left like so much swiss cheese. In a rather egregious case, warp-points were opened directly into a conflict-initiating species' home sun, causing it to go supernova early. From this point forward, humanity was left well enough alone.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Three weeks before the attack, radio astronomers were startled by a swarm of Bacodine notifications. First SWIFT, then FERMI a couple of microseconds later, sent alerts with a merit rating of 100, instructing them to override any instructions and point at a position in the sky in the galactic plane and the plane of our solar system. The neutrino detectors, puzzlingly, went off at the same time as the gamma Ray telescopes. Messages across every communication medium flew around the globe as astronomers struggled to explain how a gamma ray burst could happen so close to earth, and without a stellar object or black hole nearby. A priority alert was sent to optical telescope operators, and soon nearly every optical telescope on Earth and in space, professional or amateur, was pointing in this direction. Two weeks passed before this phenomenon gave up more clues to its nature. It had spiraled inward in orbit around the sun and was closer to earth than to Mars. Frequent flashes of light suggested a type of nuclear pulse propulsion, bringing it toward us. Debate raged among the scientific community; should we prepare for an attack or a greeting? Naturally, the commander of the US Space Force wanted to prepare for an attack. The heads of NASA and the National Science Foundation argued that the nuclear pulses were simply advanced propulsion systems and that we should wait to greet them before becoming hostile. The decision was made to prepare but wait. What a calamitous decision that turned out to be. Optical telescopes, even those owned by hobbyists, pointed toward the sources, eventually resolving four distinct objects. In regard to the nuclear detonations accompanying the apparent visitors, the NASA administrator reassured us,v saying "is not a sign of aggression, it's a sign of propulsion." These weren't missiles or impact weapons, they intentionally speed down Three weeks after the anomalous gamma ray bursts, the anomalous "objects" entered earth orbit and broadcast a signal that we were unable to decipher. The astronomers were ecstatic when the four spacecraft in orbit deployed reentry vehicles that seemed to be deorbiting in anticipation of landing. We all prepared to greet the visitors, but it quickly became apparent that all of our predictions were wrong. The alien craft descended on Washington, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing. As people gathered to watch, they likely didn't even have the time to process the blinding light that consumed them. After the destruction of the cities, the orbiting spacecraft descended and gently landed in the ruins. From the limited information we received from the broadcasts, the world's top linguists had speculated that the unwelcome guests had broadcast a message indicating that our planet was to welcome them. As red phones rang and were answered, the leaders of the nations attacked came to an agreement. Each would send an ambassador to negotiate the terms of surrender, then return home to present it to their leaders. The negotiations went well, and each ambassador returned to their leaders with the terms agreed upon. Each nation hosting alien visitors spoke in unison, and our terms were agreed upon. In the northern US, two men received an unusual set of orders, but followed them without question as they prepared the computers and bared the world's most terrifying pair of stainless steel keys in anticipation of the order to turn them. At the same time, two officers in northern Russia received a similarly unusual and strange set of orders, and drew their milled titanium keys in preparation. On command, the two men in the US and the two in Russia turned their keys. They were startled by the strange rumbling that they had never heard during any drill. Those who perished in the alien attack on our cities would be remembered as martyrs. An hour later, in a drastic moment of desperation, so would the survivors.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	As the collation party read the reports they decided this would be perfect and they approved the plans. The Formicidian Queens decided they’d level certain areas, let the natural flora and fauna grow for a few decades and then start the vacation colony they had dreaming about for years. It was mostly an unclaimed planet. A couple of vague notes about an emergent intelligent species, but that had been close to 150 years ago and still they hadn’t seen any of the “Homo Sapiens” enter into their galactic federations. Obviously they weren’t intelligent enough to leave the planet so no harm in exterminating a ground based pest. The usual process is to reign down with the meteors then send down some automated ships to maintain readings. So that’s what they did. Technically it was a war, but hey, if they can’t speak it’s implied surrender, and really what could it hurt. ————————— The meteor barrage lasted only a few hours but it devastated our planet. The population was reduced from approximately 7.8 billion to around 2.2 billion. Then the ships landed. Thousands of them. No one ever came out. As a people we quickly united. Nothing like a cataclysm to bring people together. Enough infrastructure was spared that allowed us to communicate and group together. The first shop that was dismantled, led to amazing discoveries in technology. So many discoveries, so quickly, may have led to another extinction event, but oh no. We had purpose, there was a fire in our guts, we would have our retribution. —————————— Collation internal memo: A total of 345 monitoring ships have gone offline. At your earliest convenience please decide if we’d like to replace them, or just leave the ones we have in place. Reading the memo, Sub-Queen Tessrch wasn’t sure exactly what it was in regards to so she filed it with the other less important flotsam that the Queens tasked her with. Hopefully in a decade she could have her own Sub-Queen to deal with all the tedious work. ————————— We grew and we learned. We found out why our planet had been decimated. We seethed. The audacity! A vacation planet, that was the reason our families had been destroy?! A leader emerged from what was left of humanity. This leader spoke of readying the planet for interstellar warfare, not for petty revenge, but to show these so called higher beings that we not to be trifled with. Homo sapiens are adaptable, cunning, and an apex predator, not prey. We quietly rebuilt our lives using the technology that had so foolishly had left for us to assimilate. The disaster had forged humanities purpose. We had learned their language, and there was one word that had no direct translation. Retribution. This has been my first post on this sub, but I love reading the stories. Please critique whatever you’d like, but if you can’t be nice, hopefully you won’t be mean.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"...And as the victors, the Irik Confederate shall now be taking control of your cities and governments on this colony planet. Your unfit leaders shall..." I caught snippets of the speech, but I wasn't really listening. Neither were my comrades moving around the crowd, I wager - well, except Francis, I knew that he was probably taking notes. No matter, he'd get the job done regardless. It had been a weird week. These aliens simply decided to attack. They invaded the airspace over the colony and pulled a true Blitzkrieg, they just dispatched their troops right on top of the governmental buildings. Took our leaders as hostages, messed up with comunications and media. After six days, it seems that they thought that was it. They simply walked out and onto the streets like they owned the place. I saw ol' Jeremy, the governor, in shackles behind them with a sour look on his face as the Irik Commander stood proudly in front of the population of Primus A and started giving us his little takeover speech. There were other Iriks with him and thye all had the same smug, maddening self-satisfied grins on every one of their five mouths. No weapons, I noticed. Six long, lean arms on each and all they were holding were rings, ceremonial banners, flash cards and other things better suited for hanging on a wall as conversation starters than standing in front of a crowd who, I was pleased to notice as I started to climb the stairs to the nearby building, was eyeing the invaders with barely restrained anger. We outnumbered them, too. It was barely a couple of minutes before I was in position. Directly on top of the commander who was still running all of his mouths with the pleased look of someone who just loves to hear themselves talk. I looked to the other points and sure enough, there were my boys in their own positions, ready to go. I clutched my weapon - a simple lead pipe that I had find. Primus A wasn't an advanced post - it was a habitational colony, and I'd been a flower shop owner until a week ago. Not much experience with guns, nor did I even know how to find one on short notice. But I'd be damned if I was going to just twindle my thumbs while these aliens invaded my home. I pulled up my bandana, covering my nose and mouth and blew my whistle. The sharp sound was a boulder smashing glass, destroying the concentration and the droning sound of the Irik's speech. The alien looked upwards with three dozen surprised eyes as from the crowd, two of my boys did their part and threw their stink bombs into the comission of aliens. I screamed and jumped from my vantage point, landing with both feet on the commander's chest and sending the alien to the ground. It was absolute chaos. The Iriks were screaming in confusion and disgust at the odor, and it was everything the crowd needed to get riled up too - the mass of humans shouted in support at our outburst and started to rush towards us to help the fight, while the rest of the Irik Comission scrambled to get into position. "W-what is the meaning of this madness?! Your leaders have been defeated and replaced, how dare you betray your new governors?! This is already ov--" The pipe gave out a really nice vibrating sound when it connected to his leftmost mouth, the one who was talking at the time. "Listen up, you daft bastard. Nobody here is on your side, we're not traitors. We're the resistance!" I said, lifting up my pipe again. I could see the look of confusion and fear take over his many eyes at the word "resistance", as if the alien had never heard of such a term before. "What is the meaning of that word?" "It means that we're still going to fight you. Who gives a shit about the government, anyway? This is our home and we don't want you here." "B-but...But that's not how it is done! It's not proper, the losers shall never fight the victors! We won the war and we demand you cease this madness!" I lifted my pipe again. I could say a lot of things, I realized. Some sort of deep proclamation of human spirit or defying catchphrase. I had one shot before the crowd hit us and the real battle started. I chose my words carefully and looked the commander of this pompous alien race right in the eye before bringing down my pipe. "Nah."	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Galactic Records Archive: Section Jardol 5. Subsection 253A: The Greatest Wars Of History Listed Chronologically. 319-2847-2017 \~ The Battle of Wanbortol; The "East" side of the planet of the war's namesake was vaporized by a beam of concentrated sunlight, controlled by the forces of Harbringham. The "West" then shortly after, decided that they would rather surrender than wait 12 hours for their demise, and surrendered before daybreak. 132-4284-2017 \~ The battle of Tixinize; The Portolia Army took a detour home from a major war with heavy munitions still aboard. They attempted to attack Tixinize with their remaining firepower. Overcalculating, they blew up both the planet of Tixinize as well as all of their remaining fleet. 015-7418-2017 \~ The battle of Earth; The Harbringham Forces attacked earth. With much less sophisticated technology, the earth stood no chance against the most decorated attack force in the known galaxy. Some said that only killing 1 of the 7 billion population was a blessing, but the people of Earth didn't surrender. The Harbringham then began to heat the planet until the humans couldn't breath the air around them. They still would not yield. The planet instead began working tirelessly to replicate the technology being used against them. They fought back in every way that they could, and then found ways that defied norms of space travel. They had built their first interstellar nuclear warship before they had any other form of interstellar travel. After the 4th year of war, the Harbringham forces were unraveled, destroyed and dispersed throughout the galaxy and their home planet had been attacked, pummeled to a pulp. The Harbringham Forces had surrendered and dispersed LONG ago, but the human's refused to let even one of them live after the atrocities they had befallen. The war ended 12 years later, when the last Harbringham was pulled from hiding and slaughtered by the human hunters. The entire race had been wiped from existence. The Humans have since become the leaders of the Interstellar Galactic Panel of Allied Solar Systems, which has become the largest governing body in the Universe, and the overarching governing body to make all decisions in the known universe. The IGPASS has stood for your safety ever since It's founding 4 million years ago. 001-0004-2042 \~ The battle of Anxarpathene; The Juxapols attacked the Anaxarpathenians over a land dispute for a planet that spent part time in each solar system. The IGPASS Ended the war by intervening and bringing both sides to their knees within hours of arriving. Neither civilization survived IGPASS intervention. 001-0005-3051 \~ The battle of PanraJu; The last known war of any meritable size. This war was waged a thousand years after Anxarpathene. Two unknown speices went head to head on the turf of the foreign planet, and IGPASS destroyed, the planet being warred on, as well as the home planets of both of the species. Nothing is known of their history, or them as a whole, as their entire history was evaporated with the power the humans now possessed in weaponry. Many battles have been fought and won in the name of one species or another, but if the word War is uttered in the midst of any form of violence, be assured that the IGPASS intervention will mean the death of any civilization who may seek to wage war on another. If an alien species has even a drop of hostile blood in their cardiovascular systems, internal or otherwise, they will be removed from the history of the universe just like the fools of Panraju. And whatever you do, never let a human out of your sight.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	“You have no idea what you’ve begun. Do you really think that this is over? Oh, you stupid idiots. You don’t know what’s coming.” She could barely see out of her right eye, and her left was swollen shut completely. Mostly, she saw large blobs where her captors stood. But she didn’t need her eyes to speak, and speak she did. “See, it sounds to me that you’ve never actually fought a real war before. This little invasion isn’t a real war, not even close. But don’t worry, you’ll learn the difference soon enou-“ Slap! The slap was hard enough to snap her head sideways, and re-open her split lip. She spit onto the floor, a bloody wad. It hurt, but not as bad as the buildings crumbling around her, or being dragged forcibly out of the wreckage and onto the alien spacecraft. When she woke up this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to end in the interrogation room of an alien ship. The ships had appeared over her city around lunchtime, and she had been one of the few (un)lucky ones who survived the initial wave of attacks. From what she had heard so far, the aliens usually decimate one city as an example. After that, the rest of the planet surrenders. She couldn’t help but think those other alien races were cowards. To give up after a single attack, to not even consider retaliation for the unprovoked attacks against them? Well, these attackers had obviously not done their research when it came to humanity. “You’ve never actually had to fight against someone who fights back. You make one huge show of force, and expect that to be enough. But you are in for one hell of a surprise this time. I figure it’s been about 10, maybe 12 hours since you first attacked. Which means it’s right about time for you to start fighting for your lives. You see, humanity didn’t surrender after that first attack. You’ll see what real war is soon enough. You’ll wish you’d never heard of planet Earth. This time, you’ll be the ones surrendering. And we will make you beg.” A horrendous sound filled the air, the emergency sirens in the ship had activated. A shudder was felt throughout the whole ship, and even with only partial vision, she could see the fear radiating from her captors. Alien screams were heard from all around them. “This is the beginning of the end for you. You came to our planet, attacked us without warning or provocation, and just expected us to sit back and take it? I speak for all of humanity when I say that we *do not surrender.*” The door to the interrogation room shook violently, someone on the other side began to force it open. “Every action has consequences.” The aliens spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. But she could understand the tones of fear and disbelief in their voices. “Your action of declaring war has been met with acceptance.” The door began to crack and bend in its frame. “You will see true war.” The door burst free of its hinges, and exploded onto the floor of the room. “And you will face our retribution.”	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"Why?" Aaalp coughed and split blood as he tried to use what was left of his arm to raise himself up. His ears ringing and vision slowly turning to red while he watched the massacre unfold around him. Aaalp and his division had been apart of the Conquering of Earth which had occured just last year. They returned victorious in just a few weeks after capturing what the humans had called "Europe." He remembered the parade, the banquet, and the singing as their leaders planned their next Conquest. The Conquests had always been easy. The victims never seem from of heard again as the victors always left on the FTL ships. Aaalp didn't understand. "How did they find us?" His question fell on lifeless ears. Rgal was dead. Foju was dead. Mpla was dead. He was dying. He could feel it. Watching helpless as these primitive bipeds moved around him, launching fire from their hands, he crawled to cover. A pair of boots stopped in front of his head. Looking up he saw hate. Unable to speak, Aaalp lied there. "Pay back's a bitch, ain't it?" The heel of a boot was Aaalps last memory.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	A blinding light swept away the south camp. Charigos ran out of his resting pod, watching in terrified awe at the magnificent mushroom shaped fire ball rising to the sky. Everyone had stopped doing what they were doing and now stood, as if they were frozen in time. A general ran out of his pod "I thought we had won! Their battalion was defeated two sols ago!" he yelled, the panic made his voice tremble. Suddently the sky started to roar, as it became littered with black dots. There was a giant explosion, and one of the heavy class cruisers colapsed, falling miles to the ground. "it seems that their initial defense force wasnt all they had!" Charigos yelled from across the camp. Five more fireballs blinded the men. Sending intense shockwaves that leveled the camp. The general crawled out of the smouldering ruins, clearly in shock. "fire the siesmic charges!". Five cannons on an orbital battleship started to power up. KABOOM! Five blue bolts were catapulted towards the surface. The bolts collided with the earth, resulting in a large earthquake. Everything went silent. The general got up on all four legs, as he starred into the large smoke cloud. "i think we got the last rebe..." a sentence he would never finish, as he was vapourized by The emense heat from the thermonuclear detonation. From orbit Hartell watching in fear as bright white glimses spread around the globe, and more and more biomonitors went black. He looked over at a large screen, segmented into thousands of videocall pads. Almost half of them were black. "What is The status on the earthlings!" charter arose among the generals. "well, it seems like we havent Even touched the majority of their military. The amount of weaponary they have is ungodl..." his screen went black. A loud bange echoed through the vacuum of space. Hartell looks up, into his panoramic window. Three large cruisers had been turned into ash, only fireballs and rubble remaining. "what kind of weapon is that!!" Hartell yelled. A scientist ran up The Them, it looks like fision, we've researched it before, but have never been able to find enough fuel to make Even a test bomb, their planet must have unnatural amounts fissial meterial". Hartell grapped his collar. "How can they have more avanced weapons that us, WHILE STILL NOT EVEN BEING ABLE TO COMMUNICATE INSTANTLY!" The scientist shivered. "I dont know". Another cruiser went down, then another. Hartell looked back as his screen, less than ten remained. His army, once the most feared in the Galaxy had been redused to ash, by such a primitive race. A tear flowed down his cheek. "send a message to all systems and federations in the Galaxy, to never wage against earth". He turned around, to look through the window again. "to never Even come near the planet, and prepare for their inevitable hyperspace Discovery..."	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	War. War never changes. Only weapons are new. Yet it is not the weapons, but the men who handle them, who win victories And so it was men who redefined war on the galactic scale. For millineal war had followed a simple formula. Once relations broke Down full armada would be assembled and hurled at the enemy. A battle would follow, either an assault or a pitched battle in netural space and victors would be determined in just a few engagements. During an assault if the aggressor got within orbital range it would bombard the planets capital institutions until a surrender was made. Land battles were almost unheard of but for uprisings but would typically be solved in a few large engagements. After a surrender concessions were made and peace continued. This form of war lasting up until the 'Chinese spirit' incident. The Chinese Spirit was a ship sent after the new horizon to test whether generational ships could be practical for humans. A large craft was built to house a few hundred lab rats. The craft was fully self suistainible, producing enough food and recycling water to ensure the rats could continue living. After several generation s the rats were discovered by the Grafene, who, Dispite clear communication were able to confirm their sentintly and wrongly assumed they built the craft. This lead to the activation of 'Space Faring' for earth and allowed an attack. The Grafene invaded with all of their might but even after a short but effective bombing run earth refused to surrender. After flattening most population centres from orbit earth still held resolute. Fearing shame and showing weakness to other powers the Grafene decided to continue and start a ground invasion. The operation went to pot almost immediately. Instead of grouping up and having a large fight (which the humans knew they'd lose) they separated into smaller groups and fought small scale skirmishes. The Grafene failed to respond to these tactics and suffered defeat after defeat. With each loss the humans absorbed their weapons into their arsenal's, progressing from simply stealing to imitating and finally improving on the designs. For years the humans whittled away at the occupying Grafene, stealing weapons and supplies and building vast Vaults deep underground. The Human League, the now default government and sole organising power of humanity became increasingly bold in its attacks cumilating In the Mongolian spaceport attack. The Grafene had built their primary landing port in the Mongolian plains. At anyone time thousands of orbital craft were stationed their and 5 space evaluators and been constructed to keep earth supplied and extract its ores and valuables. The Mongolian push, as it was known, was the first battle the galaxy could understand. Nearly a hundred thousand troops were involved in the assault on the port, recking devastion and quickly stealing and towing craft away to reverse engineer. Of corse the craft were secondary objective as the troops primary target was using the elevators to get into orbit... But we'll learn more about that in tomorrow's lesson	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Not like a phoenix, and I brushed away the idea of a rebirth. They always asked about it, and it was never right. A rebirth implied a clean birth, free of the memories of what had been before. That wasn't the human way. We rose, the battle lost but the war unfinished. We mended our wounds and fixed the gaping holes and became better, hopefully. The damage this time had been unprecedented. Megalopolises had turned to rubble, and entire cultures turned to nothing, and when the dust settled and the victors landed, they were confident in their subjugation of the human race. That was the way of the intergalactic wars. Quick and brutal, ending in either complete annihilation or eventual surrender. Afterwards, the vanquished would assimilate. Humans and their conquerors weren't meant to fight for eternity, constantly squabbling over rightful ownership or true ruler of one planet or another. That was the expectation, at least. But we had a way of subverting expectations. Where the Rox-kal went, they won. What enemy they saw, they defeated. Long ago, they had perfected faster than light travel. Long ago, they had found how to transport weapons of immeasurable destruction across galaxies. At times, my lectures came off like an ode to the Rox-kal more than a testament to the willpower and resilience of our own kind. More recently, though, the Rox-kal had done away with the concept of total annihilation. Besides, vassals served infinitely more purpose than war-torn planets turned to pieces of stone drifting aimlessly across the solar system. Vassals paid tribute, and expanded the Rox-kal culture. The further they spread, the more power they gained. It had become redundant, at least on their first pass through a solar system, to exterminate every last member of a conquered species. It was simple evolution, I explained, of both species and thought. But in this case, their evolution went awry. Humans weren't like the other species, or at least that's what I liked to teach. Human and Rox-kal could live together in harmony, and from that new species would be born. One planet then another, and eventually new species peppered their confederation. Their allegiance never wavered, so long as they were part Rox-kal. That was how it should have been. Earth proved no harder to defeat than any other planet. We sent out an armada of hastily assembled spacecraft to be dismantled just as quickly. Limbs rained upon Earth in the aftermath. A grisly scene, to be sure, but one that sent the intended message. I had never seen anything of the sort. The delegates came forth offering our conditional surrender. We humans were not to be enslaved, the delegates insisted. The Rox-kal agreed, because they had no need for slavery. They had no over-arching goal beyond conquest. Their planet, from travelers' rumors, had a wealth beyond our wildest imaginations. For good measure, because the bitter taste of defeat sometimes lingered, they leveled a handful of cities, claiming the rights that victors have. We looked on, accepting and remembering, and promising retribution. The history went no further. From there, the lessons turned to now, right here on Earth. There was little question of where things were heading. Underground, where the passing Rox-kal couldn't see, arsenals were accumulated and minds were indoctrinated. For the best, I was sure, because I had seen the power of the Rox-kal. It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Renewed, more than reborn. "Not revenge," I explained to the class of recruits. Young blood, just twelve years old, the lot of them. All pure-bred, because the mixed breed Rox-kal were far too loyal to be trusted. "Retribution." "The difference, Professor?" one of them piped up. A scrawny boy. They were all scrawny, but he lagged even behind the others. What he lacked in body, he made up for in spirit, and I smiled at his question. Talos was his name, if I remembered correctly. It was hard, so many children having passed through the room. But I would remember him, I was sure of it. "We aren't lashing out," I explained, continuing to the next slide. "This isn't about the armada," and they gasped at the destruction the Rox-kal had caused. "This isn't about New York. Or Beijing. Or Sydney." Three more slides, and by the third they gasped no more. Flattened cities, because that was the power of the Rox-kal. "Retribution is different. Retribution seeks justice, not just pain upon the Rox-kal. Retribution seeks to right the wrongs that they have committed, not to respond with wrongs of our own." I paced as I spoke, but my eyes remained fixed on his slender frame. The boy nodded in understanding, and I smiled. Inquisitive minds made the best officers. I had seen that over the years. Yes-men mindlessly following instructions were what had kept us tethered, resigned to the Earth and to only the least bit of intergalactic exploration. We hadn't been able to fight the Rox-kal. They made examples of some cities, a fate I was thankfully spared, and then expected us to embrace their conquest. They expected us to assimilate and become them, and more humans did so than I would have liked. But now things were different. Years had passed, and we had progressed. I had seen generations pass through my classroom, and still I taught them history, until we hit the conquest. From there, the past became the present, and the present was perilous. Rebellion and retribution were in the air, and us humans were no longer a defeated species, at least as far as our mindset was concerned. We had a strength they couldn't even begin to understand, and we had the element of surprise to our advantage. ***** Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	[Written on mobile, constructive criticism appreciated, etc etc enjoy] ---- Humanity is no stranger to war. Even on an intergalactic stage, war held no surprises for humanity. &nbsp; For the intergalactic population, though, humanity held surprises for them. &nbsp; For millennia, wars had been fought and won swiftly and brutally. Almost by consensus, the wars between nations were ended with either total capitulation, or with enslavement. &nbsp; We weren't monsters, and we never had been. The aim was always to subjugate, not annihilate. As such, we only targeted the major military bases, the nuclear bunkers, the submarines that carried their world-ending weaponry. It worked, and the governments of Earth were united in their submission; their newly-christened and recently launched spacecraft carried the message of surrender to us, and we landed as outright victors. The diplomats and bureaucrats took control, as our military police patrolled the streets of our latest acquisition, making ourselves known. &nbsp; The vast majority of the human populace seemed subdued; of course, there were the usual protests, that came with brutal and swift responses. Even more confusing, to us, were the "xenophiles", a group that not only worked with us, but even lauded us as humanity's saviour. &nbsp; This status quo continued for three decades. Protests and riots, often ending in brutal violence, but overall the planet Earth (designation SOL-4) was peaceful. Armed insurrection was so minimal as to be ignored, and the protests and riots very rarely carried more threat than improvised incendiaries. Humanity, it seemed, had accepted us. &nbsp; [30 years post-subjugation] &nbsp; The tunnels are always dark. Always. We keep them that way, even as we go about our daily tasks. Surface life is surprisingly easy, but humanity was never born to be slaves. This army, this Resistance, operated in secret. We had never been violent; from the start, our leaders had recognised that violence wasn't going to win this fight. &nbsp; Not immediately. &nbsp; Even as I say that, I know that at every protest, every riot, our members have been there. Quietly nudging the idiots who organise them into greater acts of bravado, then disappearing back into the darkness when the military police arrive. But now, after so long, we no longer need to hide. &nbsp; We have spent three decades down here, even as we worked above ground. Daily jobs as administrators, electricians, we filled the rank and file of humanity. We listened, and talked, and subtly nudged the wider public towards accepting us. After thirty years, we were nearly ready to start. &nbsp; In the main bunker, our leaders sat together. Russian, Chinese, American, British, German... all the major powers from before the subjugation were represented. They had been evacuated as the first alarms had come in, moved to unprepossesing safe-houses in normal, bland suburbs. And so, they had survived to lead us. The words weren't particularly profound; they'll have been noted down, but these professionals were only concerned with the disposition of their forces; the disparate choices that had been made. &nbsp; "Right here." Heavily accented English followed a knife into a map, "we just hit them here, and hit them hard. It's time, gentlemen." Nods followed, and commands were issued. The listeners ran from the room &nbsp; [Surface-side, two days later] &nbsp; The rattle of gunfire whipped it's way across the square, as human forces began their assault on their oppressors main base of operation. Sniping from nearby tower-blocks had opened this sortie, and the special forces ringing the building were swiftly grinding it to a close. &nbsp; "The door! The fucking door!" Snatched conversations whipped by, but out of a darkened doorway came two men running with a box. Their body armour had morphed them into vague shapes, but the old EOD armour was proving it's worth as rounds slammed into them. They slid to the door, and pushed the box up as close as possible. Reaching inside, one of them adjusted something unseen, and they moved away as quickly as they could. &nbsp; The blast ripped apart the doorway, and a good chunk of the wall around it. Cheers came from men with deafened ears, and they pushed forward. The beginning of the revolution began with a bang, in true Human fashion. Inside, sweep-and-clear tactics left the unarmed bureaucrats pinned to the floor, zip-cuffed, and sobbing. Any armed response was met with brutal efficiency, and the human forces reached the top floor in what felt like minutes. &nbsp; The top floor, though, was always going to be the hardest fight. The xenos had dug in hard, and even as the whip-crack of gunpowder forced them into cover, the burnt ozone stench of laser was still taking it's toll. &nbsp; "GRENADE!" A softened thud followed the shout, backed with the heavier bass of larger munitions. "WHAT?" A sergeant screamed at three Russians, busily setting up a heavy machine gun, "How in the fuck...?" And then his words were drowned out by the rounds that stitched their way across the room, punching holes through both permanent and improvised barricades with impunity. The grenade, the machine gun, and suddenly the white flag of surrender appeared through the cordite. Another surge of humanity, and the defenders were pinned to the floor as the double doors they had been protecting were kicked open. &nbsp; "You." &nbsp; The cameras in the room were being broadcast, live, across the empire. An attempt at propaganda, at how no rebellion could ever reach that far, was swiftly turning into a horror-show of blood and desperate violence. &nbsp; "I know you are watching. I know how you think. But we, we are humanity. We are fucking human, not your slave species, not your assimilated masses." &nbsp; A pistol appeared in the speaker's hand. &nbsp; "And this is only the beginning of our Retribution." &nbsp; The final word, punctuated with a bullet.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Xackta looked over the hologramatic map currently being beamed onto the war table by his ship's AI. The Miderian defensive fleet was nothing more than smouldering debris: chunks of metal and bodies that had gasped out into the cold of space. A pathetic attempt to save themselves. At least, he considered, they had put up more resistance than the alien fleet they'd run into on the way here -- but that was to say little. A hundred ships, tiny, pathetically outgunned and out-manoeuvred. Whatever race they had belonged to, they would not ever dare interfere again. Now, with no fleet left to defend them, the Miderian empire would fall. Xackta beamed proudly -- never before had the Miderian's been conquered, and his genius had made it seem easy. Xackta's fleet, three-hundred total, swarmed like a plague of locust around the first planet: Mideria. This was where the enemy species had originated. This was the planet that, when all life on it was annihilated from space, the other eleven plantets in the Miderian kingdom would beg for mercy and welcome their new overlords. "Seventy-three billion civilians detected," announced his AI. "Charge weapons," said Xacktar. He watched as the holographic projection map showed his fleet readying formation. Their plasma-weapons would be heating. The ships themselves trembling with anticiptiation. "Fire when ready." At that moment, something very strange happened. A ship vanished from the map. One of his. A stealth bomber. Must be a glitch, Xackta though. Then a second. "What..." "Sir," said the AI. "Transmission incoming." Xackta paused. "Where are my missing ships?" A voice echoed around Xackta's quarters. His AI had translated the language but the tone had not been altered. Feminine, cofident. "Good afternoon, Commander," came the voice. "Who is this?" Xackta demanded. Another five ships vanished. And... What! That couldn't be... On the edge of the map hundreds -- more than hundreds -- of new blips had appeared, as if they'd just teleported in. There had been no warning at all. What was happening? No species had the technological capabilties to do that. Nor to match his miltary might. "This is Lucy Wainright of the Galactic Solar Federation. I have some good news and some bad news for you, Commander." Xackta issued a command to the AI for the fleet to change target, to return fire at the new arrivals. "Good news is, our fleet recently got a massive overhaul. New weapons. New shields. New armour. Every ship is now equipped with warp technology. That was thanks to you showing your hand early." Twenty ships down. None of the Earth fleet missing. Impossible. "Bad news is," Lucy said, "that my boss is pretty pissed. Not just that you wiped out the crews of the mining vessels we had in the vacinity. But that you attacked an ally of ours, too." "What... what are you?" Xackta asked. As his ship screamed, as the walls around him turned red, then white, then exploded out into space, Lucy answered. "Humanity."	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Hellfire and death fluttered down from the sky. Ashy snowflakes, falling burning. Through the rapidly-heating window of his office building, Federation Commander Korthu watched the foreign spaceships drop fire on the capital city. Below him, people ran, their many-tentacled bodies writhing, as smolding debris crushed them. The screams of his people rose up to find him. "Well," Korthu said. "This all seems rather unnecessary." He used a tentacle to pull a handkerchief from his coat pocket and dab at his boneless head. He looked like an squid that decided to climb out of the ocean and walk one day. Behind him, his military advisor, a lavender-colored cephalopod, said in a stern voice, "They appear to be from the Milky Way sector we routed six solar cycles ago, sir." "Six." He paced in front of his window, shaking his head. One of those alien ships soared close enough that Korthu could see the bizarre alien driving it. Its horrifying, knobbed limbs clutched the steering as it lifted one arm to hold up a single finger. The side of the spaceship read S.S. Retribution. "I don't understand these humans." Korthu sighed as the ship trailed up a wall of fire in its wake. "You engage in one friendly act of war and they storm your planet." "Perhaps we should consider evacuating, sir." Korthu just shook his head. The city below him was a field of red and orange blooms. How many millions were left dead? "All we did was crush a few buildings and take their... What is it... That fancy little toy that had in the harbor. The Statue of... Liturgy, something." Korthu squinted through the wreckage. There. He saw it. A huge statue of one of those strange alien women, holding up a burning torch. The humans had chained it to their craft and were lifting it up and up. "Oh that's bloody unfair. We nearly had a complete set!" Korthu had made it his singular military aim to collect bizarre and multicolored alien statues from around the universe. He'd nearly had a full rainbow--even a few ultraviolets. And now they were taking back the jewel of his collection. "Sir, we need to leave. Now." "No point. Let them reanimate me." Korthu slumped dramatically against the window. "These humans don't play fair--" Before he could finish, the window exploded inward. A wall of hot glass rocketed back against both Korthu and his advisor, reducing them to jelly almost instantaneously. They weren't dead, exactly. They would reconstitute in a day or two, along with whatever citizens hadn't been vaporized altogether. They rebuilt themselves limb by limb from the wreckage. And when they did, Korthu would look at the spotless sulfur sky and ask his advisor, "Do you think they'll notice if we take it back?" *** /r/nickofstatic	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	General Gaffney rubbed his temples at the head of the table. Without opening his eyes, he muttered, "Major, start over from the beginning. I want to make sure I have this straight." "Yes sir. The attack began at oh-nine-hundred and current intel has it lasting 17 --" Colonel Thompson broke in. "And it was Akron? Akron, Ohio. That's what they targeted?" Major Collins licked his lips, eyes darting down to the report before him briefly. "That is correct according to the information we have received, sir. Akron. In the state of Ohio." Collins hesitated, gaze sweeping the table, before resuming. "And the attack lasted 17 seconds, with --" "Minutes," Gaffney growled. "Sir?" "You said seconds, Major." "Uh...affirmative, sir. If you look on page 7 of the report, it's quite clear, there's a, ah, footnote...and everything. It is indeed surprising that after the staging and build-up that took place in Earth's atmosphere that the actual attack was so brief, but review from multiple sources confirms that it was over in almost a quarter of a minute." "Fuck these assholes!" Gaffney was on his feet, having hurled a ballpoint pen across the room, narrowly missing the sergeant standing at the door. There was a pause. "Seventeen fucking seconds? It's just...okay, Major, skip ahead. The target. What was the target?" "A building called the Huntington Tower on Mill Street in downtown Akron." Major Collins shifted in his seat, then added, quietly, "In Ohio." Gaffney's eyes bulged as he whirled on the Major, who involuntarily wheeled back in his chair a few inches. "And what do our internal reports say the strategic value of the Huntington Tower on Mill Street is, precisely?" "Sir, there's no...the people who put together the report were able to glean some information from a..." Major Collins looked down at his papers, mumbling. "Speak up, Major." "Yes, sir, sorry, sir. The, uh, intel, such as we have, is gleaned from a Google search and includes most of the Wikipedia article about the building, which states it is 300 feet tall with numerous one- and two-bedroom apartments. Sir." "Good gravy, Major! Three hundred feet! It must have at least a dozen stories!" "27, sir. Uh, according to...Wikipedia. Sir." "27. And how many casualties were there?" "Sir, the munitions used were primarily...non-explosive projectiles. And as such --" "Major, I have a giant headache. Let's speak clearly. When you say non-explosive projectiles..." "...rocks, sir. They attacked us with...by dropping rocks." "On the Huntington Building." "Yes, sir." "In Akron." "Yes, sir." Major Collins closed his mouth, opened it, and then thought better of appending the name of the state to the end of his utterance. "And the casualties?" "37 broken windows and a handful of minor cuts and bruises, sir. An elderly lady who was crossing Mill Street also fell and broke her hip." "And what are they doing now?" The major gave a nod to an aide, who hit a button on his laptop. The screen in the conference room was bathed in the light of the ceiling-mounted projector. It showed dozens of gleaming-silver spacecraft flying in a clearly orchestrated pattern - moving sideways in unison, then back the other way, then doing an aileron roll. Then the pattern repeated. "Audio, if you would, Major." The forced congeniality in the general's voice was somehow more menacing than the outburst of moments ago. Tinny music filled the conference room. While it was clearly exotic sounding, the staccato of the quick notes and the rising tonality certainly made it sound like a victory song of some kind. General Gaffney stared around the room at the other officers present, watching their faces as the music played. "That'll do." The speakers went silent. "Well, lady," Gaffney said, nodding to Brigadier General Meyers, "and gentlemen...to judge by your faces, none of this makes any more sense to you than it does to me. My headache is getting worse, and I have to go to the rehearsal dinner for my son's wedding tonight. So tell the gang at Wright-Pat to light these assholes up and hopefully never talk about it again." The order was given to the pilots on standby at the air force base in Dayton. This time, the attack lasted 7 minutes and 29 seconds. The pilots would later report it was the easiest mission they had ever flown.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The "battle" for Ashar was over in approximately 10 standard minutes. The Spurge, who we thought were allies, used our own security codes to disable Ashar's predictive defense system. The colony, along with its 100 million inhabitants, didn't stand a chance against the attack that followed. The Spurge quietly wiped the colony with neutron bombs, and now have control of the Tavarsk system. They quickly informed us of the battle, their plans to maintain control of the system, and gave us advice - like we are some children to be lectured - be careful who you trust. Unfortunately for them, we did not reciprocate their "helpful advice". We did not mention that, unlike them, humans have been waging war for as long as we have existed. Of course our history is no secret, hardly anything can be a secret with the technology around, but only the few Spurge that have worked closely with us truly understand the mistake they have made. Only they know what we will to do protect the ones we love, and avenge the ones we lost. We've suffered and survived countless empires, four world wars, and even a solar civil war. Not only that, but we glorify our greatest warriors and generals - from Sun Tzu to George Patton. Ghengis Kahn to Alexander the Great. Ragnar Lothbrok to Edward "Blackbeard" Teach. Even our myths and legends revolve around violent warriors: Achilles, Aragorn, Rocky Balboa, James Bond, the Avengers, the list goes on. As I stand here now, commanding a fleet of over 20,000 star ships, I can feel my connection to my forefathers. I share their apprehension and excitement at what will happen next. Napoleon guides me as I maneuver our ships to begin the orbital bombardment of their outer systems. I channel Hannibal as our fighters lie in the shadow of their moons to obliterate any resistance they send. I hear Caesar in my head while I give the pre-battle speech, convincing my soldiers that these barbarians need to be put down. And most closely, I share the burden of total annihilation with Dwight Eisenhower, as thousands of Planet Busting railguns take aim and fire towards every known Spurge planet. The loss of Ashar was sad. The loss of the Spurge will be tragic. However, I fear that the introduction of total warfare to space is even worse. Other races will take notice. There will be no more pretense of "quick and painless" war. No more innocence after violence. It may be unforgivable, but that is not my job to figure out. For now, my job is to watch the fireworks.	we thought of them as saviors when they first came they expected immediate surrender on our part. They thought after slaughtering millions of lives we would surrender. they were wrong. We were faced with what could have been our destruction our annihilation but we would not so easily bend into their fold. Nay we rose against our attackers when they struck our cities we reverse engineered their technology and took the fight to the heavens where they came from. We used our own ships our own weapons of mass destruction and we slaughtered them like the dogs they were. They attempted to resist our retribution of course, They fought tooth and nail against us but they underestimated our ferocity as well as unleashing futuristic technology against them we used old tactics boarding ships and engaging in close quarters combat. We fought for years and we chased them down across the galaxy to their homeworld where we brought retribution to their doorstep we invaded their cities burned their capitals glassed their farms. We sent ground troops down to crush any chance they had at resisting our attacks. They came in the thousands but we came in the millions. Millions upon millions of angry and blood thirsty troops ready to revenge their losses back on earth when their cities were destroyed and we were forced to hide underground, Little did these invaders know of our resolve little did they know of our hate. Like striking a hornets nest we came at them as one and we crushed their fleets as one and we slaughtered their troops as one and we burned and glassed their planets and outposts as one. Because of these invaders we became one and we became the most fearsome civilization in the galaxy.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	They called themselves the Taxmen. Apparently some form of tithing on their world that featured in a prominent expression. A few thousand stong. Nothing before the might of the Belathon Empire. We spanned a thousand Galaxies. We, who took planets for sport, and to offer our mates as dowry. What had we to fear the last survivors of a dead world whose inhabitants we'd destroyed to test a weapon. They'd had a few colonies though, which grew, and spread out. At first our intelligence service had tried to track them, suspecting retribution, but none came for a century and we assumed they'd merely counted themselves lucky. We were so wrong. They'd simply taken time to breed, and amass power and influence. To increase their numbers and strength. To rally our enemies against us. We have fought species with hive minds before, they're simple creatures with a single great weakness, predictability. But the Taxmen weren't predictable. They were shaddows lashing out from the darkness, generals leading enemy armadas, citizens on our own controlled planets committing acts of domestic terror. They struck all at once, from a million directions, on the 101st anniversary of their planets destruction. We lost the fringes of the empire first. Contested space conquered by enemy armadas lead by brilliant taxman generals. Slave planets in open revolts incited by taxman spies and using weapons brought in by taxman smugglers. Then the body of our empire began to fall dark. Planet after planet wiped out with hidden bombs and viral warfare. One world we'd used as a rearing facility was conquered with vulmanarks. They'd been domesticated and trained to hunt our young exclusively. We attempted to close ranks, protect our homeworlds, but it was for naught. A single taxman ship broke through the blockade and flew into our neatest star. We assumed that it had been an act of protest, self-immolation to gain sympathy, until the star went supernova. It pulsed with energy, blasting six of our eight worlds with so much radiation that our leaders and noble families cooked in their homes. Our ships were rendered useless as the star's electromagnetic waves disrupted their power cores and communications. Some tried to flee, only to fly from the Galaxy into a wall of enemies in all sides and meet a swift end. We are trapped here. Our scholars estimate our star will collapse on itself in the next millennium, but that time will be meaningless. The electromagnetic waves, and radiation, have rendered escape impossible. Even our technology for daily life has failed. We expect that within the next year most of the planets population will have starved. Those who do not will suffer a worse fate entirely. A slow death by radiation poisoning. A small unmanned craft crash landed a while ago. It contained nothing but a golden disk and a message written in the language of the Taxmen. "We came in peace. You did not. Our species survived. Yours will not."	Three weeks before the attack, radio astronomers were startled by a swarm of Bacodine notifications. First SWIFT, then FERMI a couple of microseconds later, sent alerts with a merit rating of 100, instructing them to override any instructions and point at a position in the sky in the galactic plane and the plane of our solar system. The neutrino detectors, puzzlingly, went off at the same time as the gamma Ray telescopes. Messages across every communication medium flew around the globe as astronomers struggled to explain how a gamma ray burst could happen so close to earth, and without a stellar object or black hole nearby. A priority alert was sent to optical telescope operators, and soon nearly every optical telescope on Earth and in space, professional or amateur, was pointing in this direction. Two weeks passed before this phenomenon gave up more clues to its nature. It had spiraled inward in orbit around the sun and was closer to earth than to Mars. Frequent flashes of light suggested a type of nuclear pulse propulsion, bringing it toward us. Debate raged among the scientific community; should we prepare for an attack or a greeting? Naturally, the commander of the US Space Force wanted to prepare for an attack. The heads of NASA and the National Science Foundation argued that the nuclear pulses were simply advanced propulsion systems and that we should wait to greet them before becoming hostile. The decision was made to prepare but wait. What a calamitous decision that turned out to be. Optical telescopes, even those owned by hobbyists, pointed toward the sources, eventually resolving four distinct objects. In regard to the nuclear detonations accompanying the apparent visitors, the NASA administrator reassured us,v saying "is not a sign of aggression, it's a sign of propulsion." These weren't missiles or impact weapons, they intentionally speed down Three weeks after the anomalous gamma ray bursts, the anomalous "objects" entered earth orbit and broadcast a signal that we were unable to decipher. The astronomers were ecstatic when the four spacecraft in orbit deployed reentry vehicles that seemed to be deorbiting in anticipation of landing. We all prepared to greet the visitors, but it quickly became apparent that all of our predictions were wrong. The alien craft descended on Washington, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing. As people gathered to watch, they likely didn't even have the time to process the blinding light that consumed them. After the destruction of the cities, the orbiting spacecraft descended and gently landed in the ruins. From the limited information we received from the broadcasts, the world's top linguists had speculated that the unwelcome guests had broadcast a message indicating that our planet was to welcome them. As red phones rang and were answered, the leaders of the nations attacked came to an agreement. Each would send an ambassador to negotiate the terms of surrender, then return home to present it to their leaders. The negotiations went well, and each ambassador returned to their leaders with the terms agreed upon. Each nation hosting alien visitors spoke in unison, and our terms were agreed upon. In the northern US, two men received an unusual set of orders, but followed them without question as they prepared the computers and bared the world's most terrifying pair of stainless steel keys in anticipation of the order to turn them. At the same time, two officers in northern Russia received a similarly unusual and strange set of orders, and drew their milled titanium keys in preparation. On command, the two men in the US and the two in Russia turned their keys. They were startled by the strange rumbling that they had never heard during any drill. Those who perished in the alien attack on our cities would be remembered as martyrs. An hour later, in a drastic moment of desperation, so would the survivors.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	As the collation party read the reports they decided this would be perfect and they approved the plans. The Formicidian Queens decided they’d level certain areas, let the natural flora and fauna grow for a few decades and then start the vacation colony they had dreaming about for years. It was mostly an unclaimed planet. A couple of vague notes about an emergent intelligent species, but that had been close to 150 years ago and still they hadn’t seen any of the “Homo Sapiens” enter into their galactic federations. Obviously they weren’t intelligent enough to leave the planet so no harm in exterminating a ground based pest. The usual process is to reign down with the meteors then send down some automated ships to maintain readings. So that’s what they did. Technically it was a war, but hey, if they can’t speak it’s implied surrender, and really what could it hurt. ————————— The meteor barrage lasted only a few hours but it devastated our planet. The population was reduced from approximately 7.8 billion to around 2.2 billion. Then the ships landed. Thousands of them. No one ever came out. As a people we quickly united. Nothing like a cataclysm to bring people together. Enough infrastructure was spared that allowed us to communicate and group together. The first shop that was dismantled, led to amazing discoveries in technology. So many discoveries, so quickly, may have led to another extinction event, but oh no. We had purpose, there was a fire in our guts, we would have our retribution. —————————— Collation internal memo: A total of 345 monitoring ships have gone offline. At your earliest convenience please decide if we’d like to replace them, or just leave the ones we have in place. Reading the memo, Sub-Queen Tessrch wasn’t sure exactly what it was in regards to so she filed it with the other less important flotsam that the Queens tasked her with. Hopefully in a decade she could have her own Sub-Queen to deal with all the tedious work. ————————— We grew and we learned. We found out why our planet had been decimated. We seethed. The audacity! A vacation planet, that was the reason our families had been destroy?! A leader emerged from what was left of humanity. This leader spoke of readying the planet for interstellar warfare, not for petty revenge, but to show these so called higher beings that we not to be trifled with. Homo sapiens are adaptable, cunning, and an apex predator, not prey. We quietly rebuilt our lives using the technology that had so foolishly had left for us to assimilate. The disaster had forged humanities purpose. We had learned their language, and there was one word that had no direct translation. Retribution. This has been my first post on this sub, but I love reading the stories. Please critique whatever you’d like, but if you can’t be nice, hopefully you won’t be mean.	Three weeks before the attack, radio astronomers were startled by a swarm of Bacodine notifications. First SWIFT, then FERMI a couple of microseconds later, sent alerts with a merit rating of 100, instructing them to override any instructions and point at a position in the sky in the galactic plane and the plane of our solar system. The neutrino detectors, puzzlingly, went off at the same time as the gamma Ray telescopes. Messages across every communication medium flew around the globe as astronomers struggled to explain how a gamma ray burst could happen so close to earth, and without a stellar object or black hole nearby. A priority alert was sent to optical telescope operators, and soon nearly every optical telescope on Earth and in space, professional or amateur, was pointing in this direction. Two weeks passed before this phenomenon gave up more clues to its nature. It had spiraled inward in orbit around the sun and was closer to earth than to Mars. Frequent flashes of light suggested a type of nuclear pulse propulsion, bringing it toward us. Debate raged among the scientific community; should we prepare for an attack or a greeting? Naturally, the commander of the US Space Force wanted to prepare for an attack. The heads of NASA and the National Science Foundation argued that the nuclear pulses were simply advanced propulsion systems and that we should wait to greet them before becoming hostile. The decision was made to prepare but wait. What a calamitous decision that turned out to be. Optical telescopes, even those owned by hobbyists, pointed toward the sources, eventually resolving four distinct objects. In regard to the nuclear detonations accompanying the apparent visitors, the NASA administrator reassured us,v saying "is not a sign of aggression, it's a sign of propulsion." These weren't missiles or impact weapons, they intentionally speed down Three weeks after the anomalous gamma ray bursts, the anomalous "objects" entered earth orbit and broadcast a signal that we were unable to decipher. The astronomers were ecstatic when the four spacecraft in orbit deployed reentry vehicles that seemed to be deorbiting in anticipation of landing. We all prepared to greet the visitors, but it quickly became apparent that all of our predictions were wrong. The alien craft descended on Washington, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing. As people gathered to watch, they likely didn't even have the time to process the blinding light that consumed them. After the destruction of the cities, the orbiting spacecraft descended and gently landed in the ruins. From the limited information we received from the broadcasts, the world's top linguists had speculated that the unwelcome guests had broadcast a message indicating that our planet was to welcome them. As red phones rang and were answered, the leaders of the nations attacked came to an agreement. Each would send an ambassador to negotiate the terms of surrender, then return home to present it to their leaders. The negotiations went well, and each ambassador returned to their leaders with the terms agreed upon. Each nation hosting alien visitors spoke in unison, and our terms were agreed upon. In the northern US, two men received an unusual set of orders, but followed them without question as they prepared the computers and bared the world's most terrifying pair of stainless steel keys in anticipation of the order to turn them. At the same time, two officers in northern Russia received a similarly unusual and strange set of orders, and drew their milled titanium keys in preparation. On command, the two men in the US and the two in Russia turned their keys. They were startled by the strange rumbling that they had never heard during any drill. Those who perished in the alien attack on our cities would be remembered as martyrs. An hour later, in a drastic moment of desperation, so would the survivors.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"...And as the victors, the Irik Confederate shall now be taking control of your cities and governments on this colony planet. Your unfit leaders shall..." I caught snippets of the speech, but I wasn't really listening. Neither were my comrades moving around the crowd, I wager - well, except Francis, I knew that he was probably taking notes. No matter, he'd get the job done regardless. It had been a weird week. These aliens simply decided to attack. They invaded the airspace over the colony and pulled a true Blitzkrieg, they just dispatched their troops right on top of the governmental buildings. Took our leaders as hostages, messed up with comunications and media. After six days, it seems that they thought that was it. They simply walked out and onto the streets like they owned the place. I saw ol' Jeremy, the governor, in shackles behind them with a sour look on his face as the Irik Commander stood proudly in front of the population of Primus A and started giving us his little takeover speech. There were other Iriks with him and thye all had the same smug, maddening self-satisfied grins on every one of their five mouths. No weapons, I noticed. Six long, lean arms on each and all they were holding were rings, ceremonial banners, flash cards and other things better suited for hanging on a wall as conversation starters than standing in front of a crowd who, I was pleased to notice as I started to climb the stairs to the nearby building, was eyeing the invaders with barely restrained anger. We outnumbered them, too. It was barely a couple of minutes before I was in position. Directly on top of the commander who was still running all of his mouths with the pleased look of someone who just loves to hear themselves talk. I looked to the other points and sure enough, there were my boys in their own positions, ready to go. I clutched my weapon - a simple lead pipe that I had find. Primus A wasn't an advanced post - it was a habitational colony, and I'd been a flower shop owner until a week ago. Not much experience with guns, nor did I even know how to find one on short notice. But I'd be damned if I was going to just twindle my thumbs while these aliens invaded my home. I pulled up my bandana, covering my nose and mouth and blew my whistle. The sharp sound was a boulder smashing glass, destroying the concentration and the droning sound of the Irik's speech. The alien looked upwards with three dozen surprised eyes as from the crowd, two of my boys did their part and threw their stink bombs into the comission of aliens. I screamed and jumped from my vantage point, landing with both feet on the commander's chest and sending the alien to the ground. It was absolute chaos. The Iriks were screaming in confusion and disgust at the odor, and it was everything the crowd needed to get riled up too - the mass of humans shouted in support at our outburst and started to rush towards us to help the fight, while the rest of the Irik Comission scrambled to get into position. "W-what is the meaning of this madness?! Your leaders have been defeated and replaced, how dare you betray your new governors?! This is already ov--" The pipe gave out a really nice vibrating sound when it connected to his leftmost mouth, the one who was talking at the time. "Listen up, you daft bastard. Nobody here is on your side, we're not traitors. We're the resistance!" I said, lifting up my pipe again. I could see the look of confusion and fear take over his many eyes at the word "resistance", as if the alien had never heard of such a term before. "What is the meaning of that word?" "It means that we're still going to fight you. Who gives a shit about the government, anyway? This is our home and we don't want you here." "B-but...But that's not how it is done! It's not proper, the losers shall never fight the victors! We won the war and we demand you cease this madness!" I lifted my pipe again. I could say a lot of things, I realized. Some sort of deep proclamation of human spirit or defying catchphrase. I had one shot before the crowd hit us and the real battle started. I chose my words carefully and looked the commander of this pompous alien race right in the eye before bringing down my pipe. "Nah."	Three weeks before the attack, radio astronomers were startled by a swarm of Bacodine notifications. First SWIFT, then FERMI a couple of microseconds later, sent alerts with a merit rating of 100, instructing them to override any instructions and point at a position in the sky in the galactic plane and the plane of our solar system. The neutrino detectors, puzzlingly, went off at the same time as the gamma Ray telescopes. Messages across every communication medium flew around the globe as astronomers struggled to explain how a gamma ray burst could happen so close to earth, and without a stellar object or black hole nearby. A priority alert was sent to optical telescope operators, and soon nearly every optical telescope on Earth and in space, professional or amateur, was pointing in this direction. Two weeks passed before this phenomenon gave up more clues to its nature. It had spiraled inward in orbit around the sun and was closer to earth than to Mars. Frequent flashes of light suggested a type of nuclear pulse propulsion, bringing it toward us. Debate raged among the scientific community; should we prepare for an attack or a greeting? Naturally, the commander of the US Space Force wanted to prepare for an attack. The heads of NASA and the National Science Foundation argued that the nuclear pulses were simply advanced propulsion systems and that we should wait to greet them before becoming hostile. The decision was made to prepare but wait. What a calamitous decision that turned out to be. Optical telescopes, even those owned by hobbyists, pointed toward the sources, eventually resolving four distinct objects. In regard to the nuclear detonations accompanying the apparent visitors, the NASA administrator reassured us,v saying "is not a sign of aggression, it's a sign of propulsion." These weren't missiles or impact weapons, they intentionally speed down Three weeks after the anomalous gamma ray bursts, the anomalous "objects" entered earth orbit and broadcast a signal that we were unable to decipher. The astronomers were ecstatic when the four spacecraft in orbit deployed reentry vehicles that seemed to be deorbiting in anticipation of landing. We all prepared to greet the visitors, but it quickly became apparent that all of our predictions were wrong. The alien craft descended on Washington, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing. As people gathered to watch, they likely didn't even have the time to process the blinding light that consumed them. After the destruction of the cities, the orbiting spacecraft descended and gently landed in the ruins. From the limited information we received from the broadcasts, the world's top linguists had speculated that the unwelcome guests had broadcast a message indicating that our planet was to welcome them. As red phones rang and were answered, the leaders of the nations attacked came to an agreement. Each would send an ambassador to negotiate the terms of surrender, then return home to present it to their leaders. The negotiations went well, and each ambassador returned to their leaders with the terms agreed upon. Each nation hosting alien visitors spoke in unison, and our terms were agreed upon. In the northern US, two men received an unusual set of orders, but followed them without question as they prepared the computers and bared the world's most terrifying pair of stainless steel keys in anticipation of the order to turn them. At the same time, two officers in northern Russia received a similarly unusual and strange set of orders, and drew their milled titanium keys in preparation. On command, the two men in the US and the two in Russia turned their keys. They were startled by the strange rumbling that they had never heard during any drill. Those who perished in the alien attack on our cities would be remembered as martyrs. An hour later, in a drastic moment of desperation, so would the survivors.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	“You have no idea what you’ve begun. Do you really think that this is over? Oh, you stupid idiots. You don’t know what’s coming.” She could barely see out of her right eye, and her left was swollen shut completely. Mostly, she saw large blobs where her captors stood. But she didn’t need her eyes to speak, and speak she did. “See, it sounds to me that you’ve never actually fought a real war before. This little invasion isn’t a real war, not even close. But don’t worry, you’ll learn the difference soon enou-“ Slap! The slap was hard enough to snap her head sideways, and re-open her split lip. She spit onto the floor, a bloody wad. It hurt, but not as bad as the buildings crumbling around her, or being dragged forcibly out of the wreckage and onto the alien spacecraft. When she woke up this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to end in the interrogation room of an alien ship. The ships had appeared over her city around lunchtime, and she had been one of the few (un)lucky ones who survived the initial wave of attacks. From what she had heard so far, the aliens usually decimate one city as an example. After that, the rest of the planet surrenders. She couldn’t help but think those other alien races were cowards. To give up after a single attack, to not even consider retaliation for the unprovoked attacks against them? Well, these attackers had obviously not done their research when it came to humanity. “You’ve never actually had to fight against someone who fights back. You make one huge show of force, and expect that to be enough. But you are in for one hell of a surprise this time. I figure it’s been about 10, maybe 12 hours since you first attacked. Which means it’s right about time for you to start fighting for your lives. You see, humanity didn’t surrender after that first attack. You’ll see what real war is soon enough. You’ll wish you’d never heard of planet Earth. This time, you’ll be the ones surrendering. And we will make you beg.” A horrendous sound filled the air, the emergency sirens in the ship had activated. A shudder was felt throughout the whole ship, and even with only partial vision, she could see the fear radiating from her captors. Alien screams were heard from all around them. “This is the beginning of the end for you. You came to our planet, attacked us without warning or provocation, and just expected us to sit back and take it? I speak for all of humanity when I say that we *do not surrender.*” The door to the interrogation room shook violently, someone on the other side began to force it open. “Every action has consequences.” The aliens spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. But she could understand the tones of fear and disbelief in their voices. “Your action of declaring war has been met with acceptance.” The door began to crack and bend in its frame. “You will see true war.” The door burst free of its hinges, and exploded onto the floor of the room. “And you will face our retribution.”	Three weeks before the attack, radio astronomers were startled by a swarm of Bacodine notifications. First SWIFT, then FERMI a couple of microseconds later, sent alerts with a merit rating of 100, instructing them to override any instructions and point at a position in the sky in the galactic plane and the plane of our solar system. The neutrino detectors, puzzlingly, went off at the same time as the gamma Ray telescopes. Messages across every communication medium flew around the globe as astronomers struggled to explain how a gamma ray burst could happen so close to earth, and without a stellar object or black hole nearby. A priority alert was sent to optical telescope operators, and soon nearly every optical telescope on Earth and in space, professional or amateur, was pointing in this direction. Two weeks passed before this phenomenon gave up more clues to its nature. It had spiraled inward in orbit around the sun and was closer to earth than to Mars. Frequent flashes of light suggested a type of nuclear pulse propulsion, bringing it toward us. Debate raged among the scientific community; should we prepare for an attack or a greeting? Naturally, the commander of the US Space Force wanted to prepare for an attack. The heads of NASA and the National Science Foundation argued that the nuclear pulses were simply advanced propulsion systems and that we should wait to greet them before becoming hostile. The decision was made to prepare but wait. What a calamitous decision that turned out to be. Optical telescopes, even those owned by hobbyists, pointed toward the sources, eventually resolving four distinct objects. In regard to the nuclear detonations accompanying the apparent visitors, the NASA administrator reassured us,v saying "is not a sign of aggression, it's a sign of propulsion." These weren't missiles or impact weapons, they intentionally speed down Three weeks after the anomalous gamma ray bursts, the anomalous "objects" entered earth orbit and broadcast a signal that we were unable to decipher. The astronomers were ecstatic when the four spacecraft in orbit deployed reentry vehicles that seemed to be deorbiting in anticipation of landing. We all prepared to greet the visitors, but it quickly became apparent that all of our predictions were wrong. The alien craft descended on Washington, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing. As people gathered to watch, they likely didn't even have the time to process the blinding light that consumed them. After the destruction of the cities, the orbiting spacecraft descended and gently landed in the ruins. From the limited information we received from the broadcasts, the world's top linguists had speculated that the unwelcome guests had broadcast a message indicating that our planet was to welcome them. As red phones rang and were answered, the leaders of the nations attacked came to an agreement. Each would send an ambassador to negotiate the terms of surrender, then return home to present it to their leaders. The negotiations went well, and each ambassador returned to their leaders with the terms agreed upon. Each nation hosting alien visitors spoke in unison, and our terms were agreed upon. In the northern US, two men received an unusual set of orders, but followed them without question as they prepared the computers and bared the world's most terrifying pair of stainless steel keys in anticipation of the order to turn them. At the same time, two officers in northern Russia received a similarly unusual and strange set of orders, and drew their milled titanium keys in preparation. On command, the two men in the US and the two in Russia turned their keys. They were startled by the strange rumbling that they had never heard during any drill. Those who perished in the alien attack on our cities would be remembered as martyrs. An hour later, in a drastic moment of desperation, so would the survivors.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"...And as the victors, the Irik Confederate shall now be taking control of your cities and governments on this colony planet. Your unfit leaders shall..." I caught snippets of the speech, but I wasn't really listening. Neither were my comrades moving around the crowd, I wager - well, except Francis, I knew that he was probably taking notes. No matter, he'd get the job done regardless. It had been a weird week. These aliens simply decided to attack. They invaded the airspace over the colony and pulled a true Blitzkrieg, they just dispatched their troops right on top of the governmental buildings. Took our leaders as hostages, messed up with comunications and media. After six days, it seems that they thought that was it. They simply walked out and onto the streets like they owned the place. I saw ol' Jeremy, the governor, in shackles behind them with a sour look on his face as the Irik Commander stood proudly in front of the population of Primus A and started giving us his little takeover speech. There were other Iriks with him and thye all had the same smug, maddening self-satisfied grins on every one of their five mouths. No weapons, I noticed. Six long, lean arms on each and all they were holding were rings, ceremonial banners, flash cards and other things better suited for hanging on a wall as conversation starters than standing in front of a crowd who, I was pleased to notice as I started to climb the stairs to the nearby building, was eyeing the invaders with barely restrained anger. We outnumbered them, too. It was barely a couple of minutes before I was in position. Directly on top of the commander who was still running all of his mouths with the pleased look of someone who just loves to hear themselves talk. I looked to the other points and sure enough, there were my boys in their own positions, ready to go. I clutched my weapon - a simple lead pipe that I had find. Primus A wasn't an advanced post - it was a habitational colony, and I'd been a flower shop owner until a week ago. Not much experience with guns, nor did I even know how to find one on short notice. But I'd be damned if I was going to just twindle my thumbs while these aliens invaded my home. I pulled up my bandana, covering my nose and mouth and blew my whistle. The sharp sound was a boulder smashing glass, destroying the concentration and the droning sound of the Irik's speech. The alien looked upwards with three dozen surprised eyes as from the crowd, two of my boys did their part and threw their stink bombs into the comission of aliens. I screamed and jumped from my vantage point, landing with both feet on the commander's chest and sending the alien to the ground. It was absolute chaos. The Iriks were screaming in confusion and disgust at the odor, and it was everything the crowd needed to get riled up too - the mass of humans shouted in support at our outburst and started to rush towards us to help the fight, while the rest of the Irik Comission scrambled to get into position. "W-what is the meaning of this madness?! Your leaders have been defeated and replaced, how dare you betray your new governors?! This is already ov--" The pipe gave out a really nice vibrating sound when it connected to his leftmost mouth, the one who was talking at the time. "Listen up, you daft bastard. Nobody here is on your side, we're not traitors. We're the resistance!" I said, lifting up my pipe again. I could see the look of confusion and fear take over his many eyes at the word "resistance", as if the alien had never heard of such a term before. "What is the meaning of that word?" "It means that we're still going to fight you. Who gives a shit about the government, anyway? This is our home and we don't want you here." "B-but...But that's not how it is done! It's not proper, the losers shall never fight the victors! We won the war and we demand you cease this madness!" I lifted my pipe again. I could say a lot of things, I realized. Some sort of deep proclamation of human spirit or defying catchphrase. I had one shot before the crowd hit us and the real battle started. I chose my words carefully and looked the commander of this pompous alien race right in the eye before bringing down my pipe. "Nah."	As the collation party read the reports they decided this would be perfect and they approved the plans. The Formicidian Queens decided they’d level certain areas, let the natural flora and fauna grow for a few decades and then start the vacation colony they had dreaming about for years. It was mostly an unclaimed planet. A couple of vague notes about an emergent intelligent species, but that had been close to 150 years ago and still they hadn’t seen any of the “Homo Sapiens” enter into their galactic federations. Obviously they weren’t intelligent enough to leave the planet so no harm in exterminating a ground based pest. The usual process is to reign down with the meteors then send down some automated ships to maintain readings. So that’s what they did. Technically it was a war, but hey, if they can’t speak it’s implied surrender, and really what could it hurt. ————————— The meteor barrage lasted only a few hours but it devastated our planet. The population was reduced from approximately 7.8 billion to around 2.2 billion. Then the ships landed. Thousands of them. No one ever came out. As a people we quickly united. Nothing like a cataclysm to bring people together. Enough infrastructure was spared that allowed us to communicate and group together. The first shop that was dismantled, led to amazing discoveries in technology. So many discoveries, so quickly, may have led to another extinction event, but oh no. We had purpose, there was a fire in our guts, we would have our retribution. —————————— Collation internal memo: A total of 345 monitoring ships have gone offline. At your earliest convenience please decide if we’d like to replace them, or just leave the ones we have in place. Reading the memo, Sub-Queen Tessrch wasn’t sure exactly what it was in regards to so she filed it with the other less important flotsam that the Queens tasked her with. Hopefully in a decade she could have her own Sub-Queen to deal with all the tedious work. ————————— We grew and we learned. We found out why our planet had been decimated. We seethed. The audacity! A vacation planet, that was the reason our families had been destroy?! A leader emerged from what was left of humanity. This leader spoke of readying the planet for interstellar warfare, not for petty revenge, but to show these so called higher beings that we not to be trifled with. Homo sapiens are adaptable, cunning, and an apex predator, not prey. We quietly rebuilt our lives using the technology that had so foolishly had left for us to assimilate. The disaster had forged humanities purpose. We had learned their language, and there was one word that had no direct translation. Retribution. This has been my first post on this sub, but I love reading the stories. Please critique whatever you’d like, but if you can’t be nice, hopefully you won’t be mean.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	“You have no idea what you’ve begun. Do you really think that this is over? Oh, you stupid idiots. You don’t know what’s coming.” She could barely see out of her right eye, and her left was swollen shut completely. Mostly, she saw large blobs where her captors stood. But she didn’t need her eyes to speak, and speak she did. “See, it sounds to me that you’ve never actually fought a real war before. This little invasion isn’t a real war, not even close. But don’t worry, you’ll learn the difference soon enou-“ Slap! The slap was hard enough to snap her head sideways, and re-open her split lip. She spit onto the floor, a bloody wad. It hurt, but not as bad as the buildings crumbling around her, or being dragged forcibly out of the wreckage and onto the alien spacecraft. When she woke up this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to end in the interrogation room of an alien ship. The ships had appeared over her city around lunchtime, and she had been one of the few (un)lucky ones who survived the initial wave of attacks. From what she had heard so far, the aliens usually decimate one city as an example. After that, the rest of the planet surrenders. She couldn’t help but think those other alien races were cowards. To give up after a single attack, to not even consider retaliation for the unprovoked attacks against them? Well, these attackers had obviously not done their research when it came to humanity. “You’ve never actually had to fight against someone who fights back. You make one huge show of force, and expect that to be enough. But you are in for one hell of a surprise this time. I figure it’s been about 10, maybe 12 hours since you first attacked. Which means it’s right about time for you to start fighting for your lives. You see, humanity didn’t surrender after that first attack. You’ll see what real war is soon enough. You’ll wish you’d never heard of planet Earth. This time, you’ll be the ones surrendering. And we will make you beg.” A horrendous sound filled the air, the emergency sirens in the ship had activated. A shudder was felt throughout the whole ship, and even with only partial vision, she could see the fear radiating from her captors. Alien screams were heard from all around them. “This is the beginning of the end for you. You came to our planet, attacked us without warning or provocation, and just expected us to sit back and take it? I speak for all of humanity when I say that we *do not surrender.*” The door to the interrogation room shook violently, someone on the other side began to force it open. “Every action has consequences.” The aliens spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. But she could understand the tones of fear and disbelief in their voices. “Your action of declaring war has been met with acceptance.” The door began to crack and bend in its frame. “You will see true war.” The door burst free of its hinges, and exploded onto the floor of the room. “And you will face our retribution.”	As the collation party read the reports they decided this would be perfect and they approved the plans. The Formicidian Queens decided they’d level certain areas, let the natural flora and fauna grow for a few decades and then start the vacation colony they had dreaming about for years. It was mostly an unclaimed planet. A couple of vague notes about an emergent intelligent species, but that had been close to 150 years ago and still they hadn’t seen any of the “Homo Sapiens” enter into their galactic federations. Obviously they weren’t intelligent enough to leave the planet so no harm in exterminating a ground based pest. The usual process is to reign down with the meteors then send down some automated ships to maintain readings. So that’s what they did. Technically it was a war, but hey, if they can’t speak it’s implied surrender, and really what could it hurt. ————————— The meteor barrage lasted only a few hours but it devastated our planet. The population was reduced from approximately 7.8 billion to around 2.2 billion. Then the ships landed. Thousands of them. No one ever came out. As a people we quickly united. Nothing like a cataclysm to bring people together. Enough infrastructure was spared that allowed us to communicate and group together. The first shop that was dismantled, led to amazing discoveries in technology. So many discoveries, so quickly, may have led to another extinction event, but oh no. We had purpose, there was a fire in our guts, we would have our retribution. —————————— Collation internal memo: A total of 345 monitoring ships have gone offline. At your earliest convenience please decide if we’d like to replace them, or just leave the ones we have in place. Reading the memo, Sub-Queen Tessrch wasn’t sure exactly what it was in regards to so she filed it with the other less important flotsam that the Queens tasked her with. Hopefully in a decade she could have her own Sub-Queen to deal with all the tedious work. ————————— We grew and we learned. We found out why our planet had been decimated. We seethed. The audacity! A vacation planet, that was the reason our families had been destroy?! A leader emerged from what was left of humanity. This leader spoke of readying the planet for interstellar warfare, not for petty revenge, but to show these so called higher beings that we not to be trifled with. Homo sapiens are adaptable, cunning, and an apex predator, not prey. We quietly rebuilt our lives using the technology that had so foolishly had left for us to assimilate. The disaster had forged humanities purpose. We had learned their language, and there was one word that had no direct translation. Retribution. This has been my first post on this sub, but I love reading the stories. Please critique whatever you’d like, but if you can’t be nice, hopefully you won’t be mean.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"...And as the victors, the Irik Confederate shall now be taking control of your cities and governments on this colony planet. Your unfit leaders shall..." I caught snippets of the speech, but I wasn't really listening. Neither were my comrades moving around the crowd, I wager - well, except Francis, I knew that he was probably taking notes. No matter, he'd get the job done regardless. It had been a weird week. These aliens simply decided to attack. They invaded the airspace over the colony and pulled a true Blitzkrieg, they just dispatched their troops right on top of the governmental buildings. Took our leaders as hostages, messed up with comunications and media. After six days, it seems that they thought that was it. They simply walked out and onto the streets like they owned the place. I saw ol' Jeremy, the governor, in shackles behind them with a sour look on his face as the Irik Commander stood proudly in front of the population of Primus A and started giving us his little takeover speech. There were other Iriks with him and thye all had the same smug, maddening self-satisfied grins on every one of their five mouths. No weapons, I noticed. Six long, lean arms on each and all they were holding were rings, ceremonial banners, flash cards and other things better suited for hanging on a wall as conversation starters than standing in front of a crowd who, I was pleased to notice as I started to climb the stairs to the nearby building, was eyeing the invaders with barely restrained anger. We outnumbered them, too. It was barely a couple of minutes before I was in position. Directly on top of the commander who was still running all of his mouths with the pleased look of someone who just loves to hear themselves talk. I looked to the other points and sure enough, there were my boys in their own positions, ready to go. I clutched my weapon - a simple lead pipe that I had find. Primus A wasn't an advanced post - it was a habitational colony, and I'd been a flower shop owner until a week ago. Not much experience with guns, nor did I even know how to find one on short notice. But I'd be damned if I was going to just twindle my thumbs while these aliens invaded my home. I pulled up my bandana, covering my nose and mouth and blew my whistle. The sharp sound was a boulder smashing glass, destroying the concentration and the droning sound of the Irik's speech. The alien looked upwards with three dozen surprised eyes as from the crowd, two of my boys did their part and threw their stink bombs into the comission of aliens. I screamed and jumped from my vantage point, landing with both feet on the commander's chest and sending the alien to the ground. It was absolute chaos. The Iriks were screaming in confusion and disgust at the odor, and it was everything the crowd needed to get riled up too - the mass of humans shouted in support at our outburst and started to rush towards us to help the fight, while the rest of the Irik Comission scrambled to get into position. "W-what is the meaning of this madness?! Your leaders have been defeated and replaced, how dare you betray your new governors?! This is already ov--" The pipe gave out a really nice vibrating sound when it connected to his leftmost mouth, the one who was talking at the time. "Listen up, you daft bastard. Nobody here is on your side, we're not traitors. We're the resistance!" I said, lifting up my pipe again. I could see the look of confusion and fear take over his many eyes at the word "resistance", as if the alien had never heard of such a term before. "What is the meaning of that word?" "It means that we're still going to fight you. Who gives a shit about the government, anyway? This is our home and we don't want you here." "B-but...But that's not how it is done! It's not proper, the losers shall never fight the victors! We won the war and we demand you cease this madness!" I lifted my pipe again. I could say a lot of things, I realized. Some sort of deep proclamation of human spirit or defying catchphrase. I had one shot before the crowd hit us and the real battle started. I chose my words carefully and looked the commander of this pompous alien race right in the eye before bringing down my pipe. "Nah."	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Galactic Records Archive: Section Jardol 5. Subsection 253A: The Greatest Wars Of History Listed Chronologically. 319-2847-2017 \~ The Battle of Wanbortol; The "East" side of the planet of the war's namesake was vaporized by a beam of concentrated sunlight, controlled by the forces of Harbringham. The "West" then shortly after, decided that they would rather surrender than wait 12 hours for their demise, and surrendered before daybreak. 132-4284-2017 \~ The battle of Tixinize; The Portolia Army took a detour home from a major war with heavy munitions still aboard. They attempted to attack Tixinize with their remaining firepower. Overcalculating, they blew up both the planet of Tixinize as well as all of their remaining fleet. 015-7418-2017 \~ The battle of Earth; The Harbringham Forces attacked earth. With much less sophisticated technology, the earth stood no chance against the most decorated attack force in the known galaxy. Some said that only killing 1 of the 7 billion population was a blessing, but the people of Earth didn't surrender. The Harbringham then began to heat the planet until the humans couldn't breath the air around them. They still would not yield. The planet instead began working tirelessly to replicate the technology being used against them. They fought back in every way that they could, and then found ways that defied norms of space travel. They had built their first interstellar nuclear warship before they had any other form of interstellar travel. After the 4th year of war, the Harbringham forces were unraveled, destroyed and dispersed throughout the galaxy and their home planet had been attacked, pummeled to a pulp. The Harbringham Forces had surrendered and dispersed LONG ago, but the human's refused to let even one of them live after the atrocities they had befallen. The war ended 12 years later, when the last Harbringham was pulled from hiding and slaughtered by the human hunters. The entire race had been wiped from existence. The Humans have since become the leaders of the Interstellar Galactic Panel of Allied Solar Systems, which has become the largest governing body in the Universe, and the overarching governing body to make all decisions in the known universe. The IGPASS has stood for your safety ever since It's founding 4 million years ago. 001-0004-2042 \~ The battle of Anxarpathene; The Juxapols attacked the Anaxarpathenians over a land dispute for a planet that spent part time in each solar system. The IGPASS Ended the war by intervening and bringing both sides to their knees within hours of arriving. Neither civilization survived IGPASS intervention. 001-0005-3051 \~ The battle of PanraJu; The last known war of any meritable size. This war was waged a thousand years after Anxarpathene. Two unknown speices went head to head on the turf of the foreign planet, and IGPASS destroyed, the planet being warred on, as well as the home planets of both of the species. Nothing is known of their history, or them as a whole, as their entire history was evaporated with the power the humans now possessed in weaponry. Many battles have been fought and won in the name of one species or another, but if the word War is uttered in the midst of any form of violence, be assured that the IGPASS intervention will mean the death of any civilization who may seek to wage war on another. If an alien species has even a drop of hostile blood in their cardiovascular systems, internal or otherwise, they will be removed from the history of the universe just like the fools of Panraju. And whatever you do, never let a human out of your sight.	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	“You have no idea what you’ve begun. Do you really think that this is over? Oh, you stupid idiots. You don’t know what’s coming.” She could barely see out of her right eye, and her left was swollen shut completely. Mostly, she saw large blobs where her captors stood. But she didn’t need her eyes to speak, and speak she did. “See, it sounds to me that you’ve never actually fought a real war before. This little invasion isn’t a real war, not even close. But don’t worry, you’ll learn the difference soon enou-“ Slap! The slap was hard enough to snap her head sideways, and re-open her split lip. She spit onto the floor, a bloody wad. It hurt, but not as bad as the buildings crumbling around her, or being dragged forcibly out of the wreckage and onto the alien spacecraft. When she woke up this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to end in the interrogation room of an alien ship. The ships had appeared over her city around lunchtime, and she had been one of the few (un)lucky ones who survived the initial wave of attacks. From what she had heard so far, the aliens usually decimate one city as an example. After that, the rest of the planet surrenders. She couldn’t help but think those other alien races were cowards. To give up after a single attack, to not even consider retaliation for the unprovoked attacks against them? Well, these attackers had obviously not done their research when it came to humanity. “You’ve never actually had to fight against someone who fights back. You make one huge show of force, and expect that to be enough. But you are in for one hell of a surprise this time. I figure it’s been about 10, maybe 12 hours since you first attacked. Which means it’s right about time for you to start fighting for your lives. You see, humanity didn’t surrender after that first attack. You’ll see what real war is soon enough. You’ll wish you’d never heard of planet Earth. This time, you’ll be the ones surrendering. And we will make you beg.” A horrendous sound filled the air, the emergency sirens in the ship had activated. A shudder was felt throughout the whole ship, and even with only partial vision, she could see the fear radiating from her captors. Alien screams were heard from all around them. “This is the beginning of the end for you. You came to our planet, attacked us without warning or provocation, and just expected us to sit back and take it? I speak for all of humanity when I say that we *do not surrender.*” The door to the interrogation room shook violently, someone on the other side began to force it open. “Every action has consequences.” The aliens spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. But she could understand the tones of fear and disbelief in their voices. “Your action of declaring war has been met with acceptance.” The door began to crack and bend in its frame. “You will see true war.” The door burst free of its hinges, and exploded onto the floor of the room. “And you will face our retribution.”	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	"Why?" Aaalp coughed and split blood as he tried to use what was left of his arm to raise himself up. His ears ringing and vision slowly turning to red while he watched the massacre unfold around him. Aaalp and his division had been apart of the Conquering of Earth which had occured just last year. They returned victorious in just a few weeks after capturing what the humans had called "Europe." He remembered the parade, the banquet, and the singing as their leaders planned their next Conquest. The Conquests had always been easy. The victims never seem from of heard again as the victors always left on the FTL ships. Aaalp didn't understand. "How did they find us?" His question fell on lifeless ears. Rgal was dead. Foju was dead. Mpla was dead. He was dying. He could feel it. Watching helpless as these primitive bipeds moved around him, launching fire from their hands, he crawled to cover. A pair of boots stopped in front of his head. Looking up he saw hate. Unable to speak, Aaalp lied there. "Pay back's a bitch, ain't it?" The heel of a boot was Aaalps last memory.	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	A blinding light swept away the south camp. Charigos ran out of his resting pod, watching in terrified awe at the magnificent mushroom shaped fire ball rising to the sky. Everyone had stopped doing what they were doing and now stood, as if they were frozen in time. A general ran out of his pod "I thought we had won! Their battalion was defeated two sols ago!" he yelled, the panic made his voice tremble. Suddently the sky started to roar, as it became littered with black dots. There was a giant explosion, and one of the heavy class cruisers colapsed, falling miles to the ground. "it seems that their initial defense force wasnt all they had!" Charigos yelled from across the camp. Five more fireballs blinded the men. Sending intense shockwaves that leveled the camp. The general crawled out of the smouldering ruins, clearly in shock. "fire the siesmic charges!". Five cannons on an orbital battleship started to power up. KABOOM! Five blue bolts were catapulted towards the surface. The bolts collided with the earth, resulting in a large earthquake. Everything went silent. The general got up on all four legs, as he starred into the large smoke cloud. "i think we got the last rebe..." a sentence he would never finish, as he was vapourized by The emense heat from the thermonuclear detonation. From orbit Hartell watching in fear as bright white glimses spread around the globe, and more and more biomonitors went black. He looked over at a large screen, segmented into thousands of videocall pads. Almost half of them were black. "What is The status on the earthlings!" charter arose among the generals. "well, it seems like we havent Even touched the majority of their military. The amount of weaponary they have is ungodl..." his screen went black. A loud bange echoed through the vacuum of space. Hartell looks up, into his panoramic window. Three large cruisers had been turned into ash, only fireballs and rubble remaining. "what kind of weapon is that!!" Hartell yelled. A scientist ran up The Them, it looks like fision, we've researched it before, but have never been able to find enough fuel to make Even a test bomb, their planet must have unnatural amounts fissial meterial". Hartell grapped his collar. "How can they have more avanced weapons that us, WHILE STILL NOT EVEN BEING ABLE TO COMMUNICATE INSTANTLY!" The scientist shivered. "I dont know". Another cruiser went down, then another. Hartell looked back as his screen, less than ten remained. His army, once the most feared in the Galaxy had been redused to ash, by such a primitive race. A tear flowed down his cheek. "send a message to all systems and federations in the Galaxy, to never wage against earth". He turned around, to look through the window again. "to never Even come near the planet, and prepare for their inevitable hyperspace Discovery..."	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	[Written on mobile, constructive criticism appreciated, etc etc enjoy] ---- Humanity is no stranger to war. Even on an intergalactic stage, war held no surprises for humanity. &nbsp; For the intergalactic population, though, humanity held surprises for them. &nbsp; For millennia, wars had been fought and won swiftly and brutally. Almost by consensus, the wars between nations were ended with either total capitulation, or with enslavement. &nbsp; We weren't monsters, and we never had been. The aim was always to subjugate, not annihilate. As such, we only targeted the major military bases, the nuclear bunkers, the submarines that carried their world-ending weaponry. It worked, and the governments of Earth were united in their submission; their newly-christened and recently launched spacecraft carried the message of surrender to us, and we landed as outright victors. The diplomats and bureaucrats took control, as our military police patrolled the streets of our latest acquisition, making ourselves known. &nbsp; The vast majority of the human populace seemed subdued; of course, there were the usual protests, that came with brutal and swift responses. Even more confusing, to us, were the "xenophiles", a group that not only worked with us, but even lauded us as humanity's saviour. &nbsp; This status quo continued for three decades. Protests and riots, often ending in brutal violence, but overall the planet Earth (designation SOL-4) was peaceful. Armed insurrection was so minimal as to be ignored, and the protests and riots very rarely carried more threat than improvised incendiaries. Humanity, it seemed, had accepted us. &nbsp; [30 years post-subjugation] &nbsp; The tunnels are always dark. Always. We keep them that way, even as we go about our daily tasks. Surface life is surprisingly easy, but humanity was never born to be slaves. This army, this Resistance, operated in secret. We had never been violent; from the start, our leaders had recognised that violence wasn't going to win this fight. &nbsp; Not immediately. &nbsp; Even as I say that, I know that at every protest, every riot, our members have been there. Quietly nudging the idiots who organise them into greater acts of bravado, then disappearing back into the darkness when the military police arrive. But now, after so long, we no longer need to hide. &nbsp; We have spent three decades down here, even as we worked above ground. Daily jobs as administrators, electricians, we filled the rank and file of humanity. We listened, and talked, and subtly nudged the wider public towards accepting us. After thirty years, we were nearly ready to start. &nbsp; In the main bunker, our leaders sat together. Russian, Chinese, American, British, German... all the major powers from before the subjugation were represented. They had been evacuated as the first alarms had come in, moved to unprepossesing safe-houses in normal, bland suburbs. And so, they had survived to lead us. The words weren't particularly profound; they'll have been noted down, but these professionals were only concerned with the disposition of their forces; the disparate choices that had been made. &nbsp; "Right here." Heavily accented English followed a knife into a map, "we just hit them here, and hit them hard. It's time, gentlemen." Nods followed, and commands were issued. The listeners ran from the room &nbsp; [Surface-side, two days later] &nbsp; The rattle of gunfire whipped it's way across the square, as human forces began their assault on their oppressors main base of operation. Sniping from nearby tower-blocks had opened this sortie, and the special forces ringing the building were swiftly grinding it to a close. &nbsp; "The door! The fucking door!" Snatched conversations whipped by, but out of a darkened doorway came two men running with a box. Their body armour had morphed them into vague shapes, but the old EOD armour was proving it's worth as rounds slammed into them. They slid to the door, and pushed the box up as close as possible. Reaching inside, one of them adjusted something unseen, and they moved away as quickly as they could. &nbsp; The blast ripped apart the doorway, and a good chunk of the wall around it. Cheers came from men with deafened ears, and they pushed forward. The beginning of the revolution began with a bang, in true Human fashion. Inside, sweep-and-clear tactics left the unarmed bureaucrats pinned to the floor, zip-cuffed, and sobbing. Any armed response was met with brutal efficiency, and the human forces reached the top floor in what felt like minutes. &nbsp; The top floor, though, was always going to be the hardest fight. The xenos had dug in hard, and even as the whip-crack of gunpowder forced them into cover, the burnt ozone stench of laser was still taking it's toll. &nbsp; "GRENADE!" A softened thud followed the shout, backed with the heavier bass of larger munitions. "WHAT?" A sergeant screamed at three Russians, busily setting up a heavy machine gun, "How in the fuck...?" And then his words were drowned out by the rounds that stitched their way across the room, punching holes through both permanent and improvised barricades with impunity. The grenade, the machine gun, and suddenly the white flag of surrender appeared through the cordite. Another surge of humanity, and the defenders were pinned to the floor as the double doors they had been protecting were kicked open. &nbsp; "You." &nbsp; The cameras in the room were being broadcast, live, across the empire. An attempt at propaganda, at how no rebellion could ever reach that far, was swiftly turning into a horror-show of blood and desperate violence. &nbsp; "I know you are watching. I know how you think. But we, we are humanity. We are fucking human, not your slave species, not your assimilated masses." &nbsp; A pistol appeared in the speaker's hand. &nbsp; "And this is only the beginning of our Retribution." &nbsp; The final word, punctuated with a bullet.	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Xackta looked over the hologramatic map currently being beamed onto the war table by his ship's AI. The Miderian defensive fleet was nothing more than smouldering debris: chunks of metal and bodies that had gasped out into the cold of space. A pathetic attempt to save themselves. At least, he considered, they had put up more resistance than the alien fleet they'd run into on the way here -- but that was to say little. A hundred ships, tiny, pathetically outgunned and out-manoeuvred. Whatever race they had belonged to, they would not ever dare interfere again. Now, with no fleet left to defend them, the Miderian empire would fall. Xackta beamed proudly -- never before had the Miderian's been conquered, and his genius had made it seem easy. Xackta's fleet, three-hundred total, swarmed like a plague of locust around the first planet: Mideria. This was where the enemy species had originated. This was the planet that, when all life on it was annihilated from space, the other eleven plantets in the Miderian kingdom would beg for mercy and welcome their new overlords. "Seventy-three billion civilians detected," announced his AI. "Charge weapons," said Xacktar. He watched as the holographic projection map showed his fleet readying formation. Their plasma-weapons would be heating. The ships themselves trembling with anticiptiation. "Fire when ready." At that moment, something very strange happened. A ship vanished from the map. One of his. A stealth bomber. Must be a glitch, Xackta though. Then a second. "What..." "Sir," said the AI. "Transmission incoming." Xackta paused. "Where are my missing ships?" A voice echoed around Xackta's quarters. His AI had translated the language but the tone had not been altered. Feminine, cofident. "Good afternoon, Commander," came the voice. "Who is this?" Xackta demanded. Another five ships vanished. And... What! That couldn't be... On the edge of the map hundreds -- more than hundreds -- of new blips had appeared, as if they'd just teleported in. There had been no warning at all. What was happening? No species had the technological capabilties to do that. Nor to match his miltary might. "This is Lucy Wainright of the Galactic Solar Federation. I have some good news and some bad news for you, Commander." Xackta issued a command to the AI for the fleet to change target, to return fire at the new arrivals. "Good news is, our fleet recently got a massive overhaul. New weapons. New shields. New armour. Every ship is now equipped with warp technology. That was thanks to you showing your hand early." Twenty ships down. None of the Earth fleet missing. Impossible. "Bad news is," Lucy said, "that my boss is pretty pissed. Not just that you wiped out the crews of the mining vessels we had in the vacinity. But that you attacked an ally of ours, too." "What... what are you?" Xackta asked. As his ship screamed, as the walls around him turned red, then white, then exploded out into space, Lucy answered. "Humanity."	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Hellfire and death fluttered down from the sky. Ashy snowflakes, falling burning. Through the rapidly-heating window of his office building, Federation Commander Korthu watched the foreign spaceships drop fire on the capital city. Below him, people ran, their many-tentacled bodies writhing, as smolding debris crushed them. The screams of his people rose up to find him. "Well," Korthu said. "This all seems rather unnecessary." He used a tentacle to pull a handkerchief from his coat pocket and dab at his boneless head. He looked like an squid that decided to climb out of the ocean and walk one day. Behind him, his military advisor, a lavender-colored cephalopod, said in a stern voice, "They appear to be from the Milky Way sector we routed six solar cycles ago, sir." "Six." He paced in front of his window, shaking his head. One of those alien ships soared close enough that Korthu could see the bizarre alien driving it. Its horrifying, knobbed limbs clutched the steering as it lifted one arm to hold up a single finger. The side of the spaceship read S.S. Retribution. "I don't understand these humans." Korthu sighed as the ship trailed up a wall of fire in its wake. "You engage in one friendly act of war and they storm your planet." "Perhaps we should consider evacuating, sir." Korthu just shook his head. The city below him was a field of red and orange blooms. How many millions were left dead? "All we did was crush a few buildings and take their... What is it... That fancy little toy that had in the harbor. The Statue of... Liturgy, something." Korthu squinted through the wreckage. There. He saw it. A huge statue of one of those strange alien women, holding up a burning torch. The humans had chained it to their craft and were lifting it up and up. "Oh that's bloody unfair. We nearly had a complete set!" Korthu had made it his singular military aim to collect bizarre and multicolored alien statues from around the universe. He'd nearly had a full rainbow--even a few ultraviolets. And now they were taking back the jewel of his collection. "Sir, we need to leave. Now." "No point. Let them reanimate me." Korthu slumped dramatically against the window. "These humans don't play fair--" Before he could finish, the window exploded inward. A wall of hot glass rocketed back against both Korthu and his advisor, reducing them to jelly almost instantaneously. They weren't dead, exactly. They would reconstitute in a day or two, along with whatever citizens hadn't been vaporized altogether. They rebuilt themselves limb by limb from the wreckage. And when they did, Korthu would look at the spotless sulfur sky and ask his advisor, "Do you think they'll notice if we take it back?" *** /r/nickofstatic	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	General Gaffney rubbed his temples at the head of the table. Without opening his eyes, he muttered, "Major, start over from the beginning. I want to make sure I have this straight." "Yes sir. The attack began at oh-nine-hundred and current intel has it lasting 17 --" Colonel Thompson broke in. "And it was Akron? Akron, Ohio. That's what they targeted?" Major Collins licked his lips, eyes darting down to the report before him briefly. "That is correct according to the information we have received, sir. Akron. In the state of Ohio." Collins hesitated, gaze sweeping the table, before resuming. "And the attack lasted 17 seconds, with --" "Minutes," Gaffney growled. "Sir?" "You said seconds, Major." "Uh...affirmative, sir. If you look on page 7 of the report, it's quite clear, there's a, ah, footnote...and everything. It is indeed surprising that after the staging and build-up that took place in Earth's atmosphere that the actual attack was so brief, but review from multiple sources confirms that it was over in almost a quarter of a minute." "Fuck these assholes!" Gaffney was on his feet, having hurled a ballpoint pen across the room, narrowly missing the sergeant standing at the door. There was a pause. "Seventeen fucking seconds? It's just...okay, Major, skip ahead. The target. What was the target?" "A building called the Huntington Tower on Mill Street in downtown Akron." Major Collins shifted in his seat, then added, quietly, "In Ohio." Gaffney's eyes bulged as he whirled on the Major, who involuntarily wheeled back in his chair a few inches. "And what do our internal reports say the strategic value of the Huntington Tower on Mill Street is, precisely?" "Sir, there's no...the people who put together the report were able to glean some information from a..." Major Collins looked down at his papers, mumbling. "Speak up, Major." "Yes, sir, sorry, sir. The, uh, intel, such as we have, is gleaned from a Google search and includes most of the Wikipedia article about the building, which states it is 300 feet tall with numerous one- and two-bedroom apartments. Sir." "Good gravy, Major! Three hundred feet! It must have at least a dozen stories!" "27, sir. Uh, according to...Wikipedia. Sir." "27. And how many casualties were there?" "Sir, the munitions used were primarily...non-explosive projectiles. And as such --" "Major, I have a giant headache. Let's speak clearly. When you say non-explosive projectiles..." "...rocks, sir. They attacked us with...by dropping rocks." "On the Huntington Building." "Yes, sir." "In Akron." "Yes, sir." Major Collins closed his mouth, opened it, and then thought better of appending the name of the state to the end of his utterance. "And the casualties?" "37 broken windows and a handful of minor cuts and bruises, sir. An elderly lady who was crossing Mill Street also fell and broke her hip." "And what are they doing now?" The major gave a nod to an aide, who hit a button on his laptop. The screen in the conference room was bathed in the light of the ceiling-mounted projector. It showed dozens of gleaming-silver spacecraft flying in a clearly orchestrated pattern - moving sideways in unison, then back the other way, then doing an aileron roll. Then the pattern repeated. "Audio, if you would, Major." The forced congeniality in the general's voice was somehow more menacing than the outburst of moments ago. Tinny music filled the conference room. While it was clearly exotic sounding, the staccato of the quick notes and the rising tonality certainly made it sound like a victory song of some kind. General Gaffney stared around the room at the other officers present, watching their faces as the music played. "That'll do." The speakers went silent. "Well, lady," Gaffney said, nodding to Brigadier General Meyers, "and gentlemen...to judge by your faces, none of this makes any more sense to you than it does to me. My headache is getting worse, and I have to go to the rehearsal dinner for my son's wedding tonight. So tell the gang at Wright-Pat to light these assholes up and hopefully never talk about it again." The order was given to the pilots on standby at the air force base in Dayton. This time, the attack lasted 7 minutes and 29 seconds. The pilots would later report it was the easiest mission they had ever flown.	It happened faster than anyone could process what was going on. At one moment the Tokyo Olympics were being televised, and the next no one on Earth were able to contact the city. Japan, obviously, was the first on the scene. What the soldiers reported was unbelievable, craters the size of football pitches, giant deformed rabid animals, a US aircraft carrier beached on the bay coast, downed aircraft mostly US, but some unknown crafts filled with strange creatures, and absolutely no sign of living humans. After weeks of searching they found enough evidence through captures cell phone videos and audio memos. We had been attacked by an alien race. --- Ten Earth years later the reptilian race of Kepler-62f were celebrating another victory over the piscine races of Kepler-442b. There wasn't a care in the world and the leaders were drinking like there was no end to the booze. The celebration came to a stop when a meteor came tumbling out of the sky, splattering through the Emperor's head. Out popped a flag from the center of the rock and it said in the Keplerians native tongue, "We will never forget."
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	“You have no idea what you’ve begun. Do you really think that this is over? Oh, you stupid idiots. You don’t know what’s coming.” She could barely see out of her right eye, and her left was swollen shut completely. Mostly, she saw large blobs where her captors stood. But she didn’t need her eyes to speak, and speak she did. “See, it sounds to me that you’ve never actually fought a real war before. This little invasion isn’t a real war, not even close. But don’t worry, you’ll learn the difference soon enou-“ Slap! The slap was hard enough to snap her head sideways, and re-open her split lip. She spit onto the floor, a bloody wad. It hurt, but not as bad as the buildings crumbling around her, or being dragged forcibly out of the wreckage and onto the alien spacecraft. When she woke up this morning, she hadn’t expected her day to end in the interrogation room of an alien ship. The ships had appeared over her city around lunchtime, and she had been one of the few (un)lucky ones who survived the initial wave of attacks. From what she had heard so far, the aliens usually decimate one city as an example. After that, the rest of the planet surrenders. She couldn’t help but think those other alien races were cowards. To give up after a single attack, to not even consider retaliation for the unprovoked attacks against them? Well, these attackers had obviously not done their research when it came to humanity. “You’ve never actually had to fight against someone who fights back. You make one huge show of force, and expect that to be enough. But you are in for one hell of a surprise this time. I figure it’s been about 10, maybe 12 hours since you first attacked. Which means it’s right about time for you to start fighting for your lives. You see, humanity didn’t surrender after that first attack. You’ll see what real war is soon enough. You’ll wish you’d never heard of planet Earth. This time, you’ll be the ones surrendering. And we will make you beg.” A horrendous sound filled the air, the emergency sirens in the ship had activated. A shudder was felt throughout the whole ship, and even with only partial vision, she could see the fear radiating from her captors. Alien screams were heard from all around them. “This is the beginning of the end for you. You came to our planet, attacked us without warning or provocation, and just expected us to sit back and take it? I speak for all of humanity when I say that we *do not surrender.*” The door to the interrogation room shook violently, someone on the other side began to force it open. “Every action has consequences.” The aliens spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. But she could understand the tones of fear and disbelief in their voices. “Your action of declaring war has been met with acceptance.” The door began to crack and bend in its frame. “You will see true war.” The door burst free of its hinges, and exploded onto the floor of the room. “And you will face our retribution.”	Galactic Records Archive: Section Jardol 5. Subsection 253A: The Greatest Wars Of History Listed Chronologically. 319-2847-2017 \~ The Battle of Wanbortol; The "East" side of the planet of the war's namesake was vaporized by a beam of concentrated sunlight, controlled by the forces of Harbringham. The "West" then shortly after, decided that they would rather surrender than wait 12 hours for their demise, and surrendered before daybreak. 132-4284-2017 \~ The battle of Tixinize; The Portolia Army took a detour home from a major war with heavy munitions still aboard. They attempted to attack Tixinize with their remaining firepower. Overcalculating, they blew up both the planet of Tixinize as well as all of their remaining fleet. 015-7418-2017 \~ The battle of Earth; The Harbringham Forces attacked earth. With much less sophisticated technology, the earth stood no chance against the most decorated attack force in the known galaxy. Some said that only killing 1 of the 7 billion population was a blessing, but the people of Earth didn't surrender. The Harbringham then began to heat the planet until the humans couldn't breath the air around them. They still would not yield. The planet instead began working tirelessly to replicate the technology being used against them. They fought back in every way that they could, and then found ways that defied norms of space travel. They had built their first interstellar nuclear warship before they had any other form of interstellar travel. After the 4th year of war, the Harbringham forces were unraveled, destroyed and dispersed throughout the galaxy and their home planet had been attacked, pummeled to a pulp. The Harbringham Forces had surrendered and dispersed LONG ago, but the human's refused to let even one of them live after the atrocities they had befallen. The war ended 12 years later, when the last Harbringham was pulled from hiding and slaughtered by the human hunters. The entire race had been wiped from existence. The Humans have since become the leaders of the Interstellar Galactic Panel of Allied Solar Systems, which has become the largest governing body in the Universe, and the overarching governing body to make all decisions in the known universe. The IGPASS has stood for your safety ever since It's founding 4 million years ago. 001-0004-2042 \~ The battle of Anxarpathene; The Juxapols attacked the Anaxarpathenians over a land dispute for a planet that spent part time in each solar system. The IGPASS Ended the war by intervening and bringing both sides to their knees within hours of arriving. Neither civilization survived IGPASS intervention. 001-0005-3051 \~ The battle of PanraJu; The last known war of any meritable size. This war was waged a thousand years after Anxarpathene. Two unknown speices went head to head on the turf of the foreign planet, and IGPASS destroyed, the planet being warred on, as well as the home planets of both of the species. Nothing is known of their history, or them as a whole, as their entire history was evaporated with the power the humans now possessed in weaponry. Many battles have been fought and won in the name of one species or another, but if the word War is uttered in the midst of any form of violence, be assured that the IGPASS intervention will mean the death of any civilization who may seek to wage war on another. If an alien species has even a drop of hostile blood in their cardiovascular systems, internal or otherwise, they will be removed from the history of the universe just like the fools of Panraju. And whatever you do, never let a human out of your sight.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	A blinding light swept away the south camp. Charigos ran out of his resting pod, watching in terrified awe at the magnificent mushroom shaped fire ball rising to the sky. Everyone had stopped doing what they were doing and now stood, as if they were frozen in time. A general ran out of his pod "I thought we had won! Their battalion was defeated two sols ago!" he yelled, the panic made his voice tremble. Suddently the sky started to roar, as it became littered with black dots. There was a giant explosion, and one of the heavy class cruisers colapsed, falling miles to the ground. "it seems that their initial defense force wasnt all they had!" Charigos yelled from across the camp. Five more fireballs blinded the men. Sending intense shockwaves that leveled the camp. The general crawled out of the smouldering ruins, clearly in shock. "fire the siesmic charges!". Five cannons on an orbital battleship started to power up. KABOOM! Five blue bolts were catapulted towards the surface. The bolts collided with the earth, resulting in a large earthquake. Everything went silent. The general got up on all four legs, as he starred into the large smoke cloud. "i think we got the last rebe..." a sentence he would never finish, as he was vapourized by The emense heat from the thermonuclear detonation. From orbit Hartell watching in fear as bright white glimses spread around the globe, and more and more biomonitors went black. He looked over at a large screen, segmented into thousands of videocall pads. Almost half of them were black. "What is The status on the earthlings!" charter arose among the generals. "well, it seems like we havent Even touched the majority of their military. The amount of weaponary they have is ungodl..." his screen went black. A loud bange echoed through the vacuum of space. Hartell looks up, into his panoramic window. Three large cruisers had been turned into ash, only fireballs and rubble remaining. "what kind of weapon is that!!" Hartell yelled. A scientist ran up The Them, it looks like fision, we've researched it before, but have never been able to find enough fuel to make Even a test bomb, their planet must have unnatural amounts fissial meterial". Hartell grapped his collar. "How can they have more avanced weapons that us, WHILE STILL NOT EVEN BEING ABLE TO COMMUNICATE INSTANTLY!" The scientist shivered. "I dont know". Another cruiser went down, then another. Hartell looked back as his screen, less than ten remained. His army, once the most feared in the Galaxy had been redused to ash, by such a primitive race. A tear flowed down his cheek. "send a message to all systems and federations in the Galaxy, to never wage against earth". He turned around, to look through the window again. "to never Even come near the planet, and prepare for their inevitable hyperspace Discovery..."	"Why?" Aaalp coughed and split blood as he tried to use what was left of his arm to raise himself up. His ears ringing and vision slowly turning to red while he watched the massacre unfold around him. Aaalp and his division had been apart of the Conquering of Earth which had occured just last year. They returned victorious in just a few weeks after capturing what the humans had called "Europe." He remembered the parade, the banquet, and the singing as their leaders planned their next Conquest. The Conquests had always been easy. The victims never seem from of heard again as the victors always left on the FTL ships. Aaalp didn't understand. "How did they find us?" His question fell on lifeless ears. Rgal was dead. Foju was dead. Mpla was dead. He was dying. He could feel it. Watching helpless as these primitive bipeds moved around him, launching fire from their hands, he crawled to cover. A pair of boots stopped in front of his head. Looking up he saw hate. Unable to speak, Aaalp lied there. "Pay back's a bitch, ain't it?" The heel of a boot was Aaalps last memory.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	[Written on mobile, constructive criticism appreciated, etc etc enjoy] ---- Humanity is no stranger to war. Even on an intergalactic stage, war held no surprises for humanity. &nbsp; For the intergalactic population, though, humanity held surprises for them. &nbsp; For millennia, wars had been fought and won swiftly and brutally. Almost by consensus, the wars between nations were ended with either total capitulation, or with enslavement. &nbsp; We weren't monsters, and we never had been. The aim was always to subjugate, not annihilate. As such, we only targeted the major military bases, the nuclear bunkers, the submarines that carried their world-ending weaponry. It worked, and the governments of Earth were united in their submission; their newly-christened and recently launched spacecraft carried the message of surrender to us, and we landed as outright victors. The diplomats and bureaucrats took control, as our military police patrolled the streets of our latest acquisition, making ourselves known. &nbsp; The vast majority of the human populace seemed subdued; of course, there were the usual protests, that came with brutal and swift responses. Even more confusing, to us, were the "xenophiles", a group that not only worked with us, but even lauded us as humanity's saviour. &nbsp; This status quo continued for three decades. Protests and riots, often ending in brutal violence, but overall the planet Earth (designation SOL-4) was peaceful. Armed insurrection was so minimal as to be ignored, and the protests and riots very rarely carried more threat than improvised incendiaries. Humanity, it seemed, had accepted us. &nbsp; [30 years post-subjugation] &nbsp; The tunnels are always dark. Always. We keep them that way, even as we go about our daily tasks. Surface life is surprisingly easy, but humanity was never born to be slaves. This army, this Resistance, operated in secret. We had never been violent; from the start, our leaders had recognised that violence wasn't going to win this fight. &nbsp; Not immediately. &nbsp; Even as I say that, I know that at every protest, every riot, our members have been there. Quietly nudging the idiots who organise them into greater acts of bravado, then disappearing back into the darkness when the military police arrive. But now, after so long, we no longer need to hide. &nbsp; We have spent three decades down here, even as we worked above ground. Daily jobs as administrators, electricians, we filled the rank and file of humanity. We listened, and talked, and subtly nudged the wider public towards accepting us. After thirty years, we were nearly ready to start. &nbsp; In the main bunker, our leaders sat together. Russian, Chinese, American, British, German... all the major powers from before the subjugation were represented. They had been evacuated as the first alarms had come in, moved to unprepossesing safe-houses in normal, bland suburbs. And so, they had survived to lead us. The words weren't particularly profound; they'll have been noted down, but these professionals were only concerned with the disposition of their forces; the disparate choices that had been made. &nbsp; "Right here." Heavily accented English followed a knife into a map, "we just hit them here, and hit them hard. It's time, gentlemen." Nods followed, and commands were issued. The listeners ran from the room &nbsp; [Surface-side, two days later] &nbsp; The rattle of gunfire whipped it's way across the square, as human forces began their assault on their oppressors main base of operation. Sniping from nearby tower-blocks had opened this sortie, and the special forces ringing the building were swiftly grinding it to a close. &nbsp; "The door! The fucking door!" Snatched conversations whipped by, but out of a darkened doorway came two men running with a box. Their body armour had morphed them into vague shapes, but the old EOD armour was proving it's worth as rounds slammed into them. They slid to the door, and pushed the box up as close as possible. Reaching inside, one of them adjusted something unseen, and they moved away as quickly as they could. &nbsp; The blast ripped apart the doorway, and a good chunk of the wall around it. Cheers came from men with deafened ears, and they pushed forward. The beginning of the revolution began with a bang, in true Human fashion. Inside, sweep-and-clear tactics left the unarmed bureaucrats pinned to the floor, zip-cuffed, and sobbing. Any armed response was met with brutal efficiency, and the human forces reached the top floor in what felt like minutes. &nbsp; The top floor, though, was always going to be the hardest fight. The xenos had dug in hard, and even as the whip-crack of gunpowder forced them into cover, the burnt ozone stench of laser was still taking it's toll. &nbsp; "GRENADE!" A softened thud followed the shout, backed with the heavier bass of larger munitions. "WHAT?" A sergeant screamed at three Russians, busily setting up a heavy machine gun, "How in the fuck...?" And then his words were drowned out by the rounds that stitched their way across the room, punching holes through both permanent and improvised barricades with impunity. The grenade, the machine gun, and suddenly the white flag of surrender appeared through the cordite. Another surge of humanity, and the defenders were pinned to the floor as the double doors they had been protecting were kicked open. &nbsp; "You." &nbsp; The cameras in the room were being broadcast, live, across the empire. An attempt at propaganda, at how no rebellion could ever reach that far, was swiftly turning into a horror-show of blood and desperate violence. &nbsp; "I know you are watching. I know how you think. But we, we are humanity. We are fucking human, not your slave species, not your assimilated masses." &nbsp; A pistol appeared in the speaker's hand. &nbsp; "And this is only the beginning of our Retribution." &nbsp; The final word, punctuated with a bullet.	"Why?" Aaalp coughed and split blood as he tried to use what was left of his arm to raise himself up. His ears ringing and vision slowly turning to red while he watched the massacre unfold around him. Aaalp and his division had been apart of the Conquering of Earth which had occured just last year. They returned victorious in just a few weeks after capturing what the humans had called "Europe." He remembered the parade, the banquet, and the singing as their leaders planned their next Conquest. The Conquests had always been easy. The victims never seem from of heard again as the victors always left on the FTL ships. Aaalp didn't understand. "How did they find us?" His question fell on lifeless ears. Rgal was dead. Foju was dead. Mpla was dead. He was dying. He could feel it. Watching helpless as these primitive bipeds moved around him, launching fire from their hands, he crawled to cover. A pair of boots stopped in front of his head. Looking up he saw hate. Unable to speak, Aaalp lied there. "Pay back's a bitch, ain't it?" The heel of a boot was Aaalps last memory.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Xackta looked over the hologramatic map currently being beamed onto the war table by his ship's AI. The Miderian defensive fleet was nothing more than smouldering debris: chunks of metal and bodies that had gasped out into the cold of space. A pathetic attempt to save themselves. At least, he considered, they had put up more resistance than the alien fleet they'd run into on the way here -- but that was to say little. A hundred ships, tiny, pathetically outgunned and out-manoeuvred. Whatever race they had belonged to, they would not ever dare interfere again. Now, with no fleet left to defend them, the Miderian empire would fall. Xackta beamed proudly -- never before had the Miderian's been conquered, and his genius had made it seem easy. Xackta's fleet, three-hundred total, swarmed like a plague of locust around the first planet: Mideria. This was where the enemy species had originated. This was the planet that, when all life on it was annihilated from space, the other eleven plantets in the Miderian kingdom would beg for mercy and welcome their new overlords. "Seventy-three billion civilians detected," announced his AI. "Charge weapons," said Xacktar. He watched as the holographic projection map showed his fleet readying formation. Their plasma-weapons would be heating. The ships themselves trembling with anticiptiation. "Fire when ready." At that moment, something very strange happened. A ship vanished from the map. One of his. A stealth bomber. Must be a glitch, Xackta though. Then a second. "What..." "Sir," said the AI. "Transmission incoming." Xackta paused. "Where are my missing ships?" A voice echoed around Xackta's quarters. His AI had translated the language but the tone had not been altered. Feminine, cofident. "Good afternoon, Commander," came the voice. "Who is this?" Xackta demanded. Another five ships vanished. And... What! That couldn't be... On the edge of the map hundreds -- more than hundreds -- of new blips had appeared, as if they'd just teleported in. There had been no warning at all. What was happening? No species had the technological capabilties to do that. Nor to match his miltary might. "This is Lucy Wainright of the Galactic Solar Federation. I have some good news and some bad news for you, Commander." Xackta issued a command to the AI for the fleet to change target, to return fire at the new arrivals. "Good news is, our fleet recently got a massive overhaul. New weapons. New shields. New armour. Every ship is now equipped with warp technology. That was thanks to you showing your hand early." Twenty ships down. None of the Earth fleet missing. Impossible. "Bad news is," Lucy said, "that my boss is pretty pissed. Not just that you wiped out the crews of the mining vessels we had in the vacinity. But that you attacked an ally of ours, too." "What... what are you?" Xackta asked. As his ship screamed, as the walls around him turned red, then white, then exploded out into space, Lucy answered. "Humanity."	"Why?" Aaalp coughed and split blood as he tried to use what was left of his arm to raise himself up. His ears ringing and vision slowly turning to red while he watched the massacre unfold around him. Aaalp and his division had been apart of the Conquering of Earth which had occured just last year. They returned victorious in just a few weeks after capturing what the humans had called "Europe." He remembered the parade, the banquet, and the singing as their leaders planned their next Conquest. The Conquests had always been easy. The victims never seem from of heard again as the victors always left on the FTL ships. Aaalp didn't understand. "How did they find us?" His question fell on lifeless ears. Rgal was dead. Foju was dead. Mpla was dead. He was dying. He could feel it. Watching helpless as these primitive bipeds moved around him, launching fire from their hands, he crawled to cover. A pair of boots stopped in front of his head. Looking up he saw hate. Unable to speak, Aaalp lied there. "Pay back's a bitch, ain't it?" The heel of a boot was Aaalps last memory.
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	[Written on mobile, constructive criticism appreciated, etc etc enjoy] ---- Humanity is no stranger to war. Even on an intergalactic stage, war held no surprises for humanity. &nbsp; For the intergalactic population, though, humanity held surprises for them. &nbsp; For millennia, wars had been fought and won swiftly and brutally. Almost by consensus, the wars between nations were ended with either total capitulation, or with enslavement. &nbsp; We weren't monsters, and we never had been. The aim was always to subjugate, not annihilate. As such, we only targeted the major military bases, the nuclear bunkers, the submarines that carried their world-ending weaponry. It worked, and the governments of Earth were united in their submission; their newly-christened and recently launched spacecraft carried the message of surrender to us, and we landed as outright victors. The diplomats and bureaucrats took control, as our military police patrolled the streets of our latest acquisition, making ourselves known. &nbsp; The vast majority of the human populace seemed subdued; of course, there were the usual protests, that came with brutal and swift responses. Even more confusing, to us, were the "xenophiles", a group that not only worked with us, but even lauded us as humanity's saviour. &nbsp; This status quo continued for three decades. Protests and riots, often ending in brutal violence, but overall the planet Earth (designation SOL-4) was peaceful. Armed insurrection was so minimal as to be ignored, and the protests and riots very rarely carried more threat than improvised incendiaries. Humanity, it seemed, had accepted us. &nbsp; [30 years post-subjugation] &nbsp; The tunnels are always dark. Always. We keep them that way, even as we go about our daily tasks. Surface life is surprisingly easy, but humanity was never born to be slaves. This army, this Resistance, operated in secret. We had never been violent; from the start, our leaders had recognised that violence wasn't going to win this fight. &nbsp; Not immediately. &nbsp; Even as I say that, I know that at every protest, every riot, our members have been there. Quietly nudging the idiots who organise them into greater acts of bravado, then disappearing back into the darkness when the military police arrive. But now, after so long, we no longer need to hide. &nbsp; We have spent three decades down here, even as we worked above ground. Daily jobs as administrators, electricians, we filled the rank and file of humanity. We listened, and talked, and subtly nudged the wider public towards accepting us. After thirty years, we were nearly ready to start. &nbsp; In the main bunker, our leaders sat together. Russian, Chinese, American, British, German... all the major powers from before the subjugation were represented. They had been evacuated as the first alarms had come in, moved to unprepossesing safe-houses in normal, bland suburbs. And so, they had survived to lead us. The words weren't particularly profound; they'll have been noted down, but these professionals were only concerned with the disposition of their forces; the disparate choices that had been made. &nbsp; "Right here." Heavily accented English followed a knife into a map, "we just hit them here, and hit them hard. It's time, gentlemen." Nods followed, and commands were issued. The listeners ran from the room &nbsp; [Surface-side, two days later] &nbsp; The rattle of gunfire whipped it's way across the square, as human forces began their assault on their oppressors main base of operation. Sniping from nearby tower-blocks had opened this sortie, and the special forces ringing the building were swiftly grinding it to a close. &nbsp; "The door! The fucking door!" Snatched conversations whipped by, but out of a darkened doorway came two men running with a box. Their body armour had morphed them into vague shapes, but the old EOD armour was proving it's worth as rounds slammed into them. They slid to the door, and pushed the box up as close as possible. Reaching inside, one of them adjusted something unseen, and they moved away as quickly as they could. &nbsp; The blast ripped apart the doorway, and a good chunk of the wall around it. Cheers came from men with deafened ears, and they pushed forward. The beginning of the revolution began with a bang, in true Human fashion. Inside, sweep-and-clear tactics left the unarmed bureaucrats pinned to the floor, zip-cuffed, and sobbing. Any armed response was met with brutal efficiency, and the human forces reached the top floor in what felt like minutes. &nbsp; The top floor, though, was always going to be the hardest fight. The xenos had dug in hard, and even as the whip-crack of gunpowder forced them into cover, the burnt ozone stench of laser was still taking it's toll. &nbsp; "GRENADE!" A softened thud followed the shout, backed with the heavier bass of larger munitions. "WHAT?" A sergeant screamed at three Russians, busily setting up a heavy machine gun, "How in the fuck...?" And then his words were drowned out by the rounds that stitched their way across the room, punching holes through both permanent and improvised barricades with impunity. The grenade, the machine gun, and suddenly the white flag of surrender appeared through the cordite. Another surge of humanity, and the defenders were pinned to the floor as the double doors they had been protecting were kicked open. &nbsp; "You." &nbsp; The cameras in the room were being broadcast, live, across the empire. An attempt at propaganda, at how no rebellion could ever reach that far, was swiftly turning into a horror-show of blood and desperate violence. &nbsp; "I know you are watching. I know how you think. But we, we are humanity. We are fucking human, not your slave species, not your assimilated masses." &nbsp; A pistol appeared in the speaker's hand. &nbsp; "And this is only the beginning of our Retribution." &nbsp; The final word, punctuated with a bullet.	War. War never changes. Only weapons are new. Yet it is not the weapons, but the men who handle them, who win victories And so it was men who redefined war on the galactic scale. For millineal war had followed a simple formula. Once relations broke Down full armada would be assembled and hurled at the enemy. A battle would follow, either an assault or a pitched battle in netural space and victors would be determined in just a few engagements. During an assault if the aggressor got within orbital range it would bombard the planets capital institutions until a surrender was made. Land battles were almost unheard of but for uprisings but would typically be solved in a few large engagements. After a surrender concessions were made and peace continued. This form of war lasting up until the 'Chinese spirit' incident. The Chinese Spirit was a ship sent after the new horizon to test whether generational ships could be practical for humans. A large craft was built to house a few hundred lab rats. The craft was fully self suistainible, producing enough food and recycling water to ensure the rats could continue living. After several generation s the rats were discovered by the Grafene, who, Dispite clear communication were able to confirm their sentintly and wrongly assumed they built the craft. This lead to the activation of 'Space Faring' for earth and allowed an attack. The Grafene invaded with all of their might but even after a short but effective bombing run earth refused to surrender. After flattening most population centres from orbit earth still held resolute. Fearing shame and showing weakness to other powers the Grafene decided to continue and start a ground invasion. The operation went to pot almost immediately. Instead of grouping up and having a large fight (which the humans knew they'd lose) they separated into smaller groups and fought small scale skirmishes. The Grafene failed to respond to these tactics and suffered defeat after defeat. With each loss the humans absorbed their weapons into their arsenal's, progressing from simply stealing to imitating and finally improving on the designs. For years the humans whittled away at the occupying Grafene, stealing weapons and supplies and building vast Vaults deep underground. The Human League, the now default government and sole organising power of humanity became increasingly bold in its attacks cumilating In the Mongolian spaceport attack. The Grafene had built their primary landing port in the Mongolian plains. At anyone time thousands of orbital craft were stationed their and 5 space evaluators and been constructed to keep earth supplied and extract its ores and valuables. The Mongolian push, as it was known, was the first battle the galaxy could understand. Nearly a hundred thousand troops were involved in the assault on the port, recking devastion and quickly stealing and towing craft away to reverse engineer. Of corse the craft were secondary objective as the troops primary target was using the elevators to get into orbit... But we'll learn more about that in tomorrow's lesson
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Xackta looked over the hologramatic map currently being beamed onto the war table by his ship's AI. The Miderian defensive fleet was nothing more than smouldering debris: chunks of metal and bodies that had gasped out into the cold of space. A pathetic attempt to save themselves. At least, he considered, they had put up more resistance than the alien fleet they'd run into on the way here -- but that was to say little. A hundred ships, tiny, pathetically outgunned and out-manoeuvred. Whatever race they had belonged to, they would not ever dare interfere again. Now, with no fleet left to defend them, the Miderian empire would fall. Xackta beamed proudly -- never before had the Miderian's been conquered, and his genius had made it seem easy. Xackta's fleet, three-hundred total, swarmed like a plague of locust around the first planet: Mideria. This was where the enemy species had originated. This was the planet that, when all life on it was annihilated from space, the other eleven plantets in the Miderian kingdom would beg for mercy and welcome their new overlords. "Seventy-three billion civilians detected," announced his AI. "Charge weapons," said Xacktar. He watched as the holographic projection map showed his fleet readying formation. Their plasma-weapons would be heating. The ships themselves trembling with anticiptiation. "Fire when ready." At that moment, something very strange happened. A ship vanished from the map. One of his. A stealth bomber. Must be a glitch, Xackta though. Then a second. "What..." "Sir," said the AI. "Transmission incoming." Xackta paused. "Where are my missing ships?" A voice echoed around Xackta's quarters. His AI had translated the language but the tone had not been altered. Feminine, cofident. "Good afternoon, Commander," came the voice. "Who is this?" Xackta demanded. Another five ships vanished. And... What! That couldn't be... On the edge of the map hundreds -- more than hundreds -- of new blips had appeared, as if they'd just teleported in. There had been no warning at all. What was happening? No species had the technological capabilties to do that. Nor to match his miltary might. "This is Lucy Wainright of the Galactic Solar Federation. I have some good news and some bad news for you, Commander." Xackta issued a command to the AI for the fleet to change target, to return fire at the new arrivals. "Good news is, our fleet recently got a massive overhaul. New weapons. New shields. New armour. Every ship is now equipped with warp technology. That was thanks to you showing your hand early." Twenty ships down. None of the Earth fleet missing. Impossible. "Bad news is," Lucy said, "that my boss is pretty pissed. Not just that you wiped out the crews of the mining vessels we had in the vacinity. But that you attacked an ally of ours, too." "What... what are you?" Xackta asked. As his ship screamed, as the walls around him turned red, then white, then exploded out into space, Lucy answered. "Humanity."	War. War never changes. Only weapons are new. Yet it is not the weapons, but the men who handle them, who win victories And so it was men who redefined war on the galactic scale. For millineal war had followed a simple formula. Once relations broke Down full armada would be assembled and hurled at the enemy. A battle would follow, either an assault or a pitched battle in netural space and victors would be determined in just a few engagements. During an assault if the aggressor got within orbital range it would bombard the planets capital institutions until a surrender was made. Land battles were almost unheard of but for uprisings but would typically be solved in a few large engagements. After a surrender concessions were made and peace continued. This form of war lasting up until the 'Chinese spirit' incident. The Chinese Spirit was a ship sent after the new horizon to test whether generational ships could be practical for humans. A large craft was built to house a few hundred lab rats. The craft was fully self suistainible, producing enough food and recycling water to ensure the rats could continue living. After several generation s the rats were discovered by the Grafene, who, Dispite clear communication were able to confirm their sentintly and wrongly assumed they built the craft. This lead to the activation of 'Space Faring' for earth and allowed an attack. The Grafene invaded with all of their might but even after a short but effective bombing run earth refused to surrender. After flattening most population centres from orbit earth still held resolute. Fearing shame and showing weakness to other powers the Grafene decided to continue and start a ground invasion. The operation went to pot almost immediately. Instead of grouping up and having a large fight (which the humans knew they'd lose) they separated into smaller groups and fought small scale skirmishes. The Grafene failed to respond to these tactics and suffered defeat after defeat. With each loss the humans absorbed their weapons into their arsenal's, progressing from simply stealing to imitating and finally improving on the designs. For years the humans whittled away at the occupying Grafene, stealing weapons and supplies and building vast Vaults deep underground. The Human League, the now default government and sole organising power of humanity became increasingly bold in its attacks cumilating In the Mongolian spaceport attack. The Grafene had built their primary landing port in the Mongolian plains. At anyone time thousands of orbital craft were stationed their and 5 space evaluators and been constructed to keep earth supplied and extract its ores and valuables. The Mongolian push, as it was known, was the first battle the galaxy could understand. Nearly a hundred thousand troops were involved in the assault on the port, recking devastion and quickly stealing and towing craft away to reverse engineer. Of corse the craft were secondary objective as the troops primary target was using the elevators to get into orbit... But we'll learn more about that in tomorrow's lesson
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Hellfire and death fluttered down from the sky. Ashy snowflakes, falling burning. Through the rapidly-heating window of his office building, Federation Commander Korthu watched the foreign spaceships drop fire on the capital city. Below him, people ran, their many-tentacled bodies writhing, as smolding debris crushed them. The screams of his people rose up to find him. "Well," Korthu said. "This all seems rather unnecessary." He used a tentacle to pull a handkerchief from his coat pocket and dab at his boneless head. He looked like an squid that decided to climb out of the ocean and walk one day. Behind him, his military advisor, a lavender-colored cephalopod, said in a stern voice, "They appear to be from the Milky Way sector we routed six solar cycles ago, sir." "Six." He paced in front of his window, shaking his head. One of those alien ships soared close enough that Korthu could see the bizarre alien driving it. Its horrifying, knobbed limbs clutched the steering as it lifted one arm to hold up a single finger. The side of the spaceship read S.S. Retribution. "I don't understand these humans." Korthu sighed as the ship trailed up a wall of fire in its wake. "You engage in one friendly act of war and they storm your planet." "Perhaps we should consider evacuating, sir." Korthu just shook his head. The city below him was a field of red and orange blooms. How many millions were left dead? "All we did was crush a few buildings and take their... What is it... That fancy little toy that had in the harbor. The Statue of... Liturgy, something." Korthu squinted through the wreckage. There. He saw it. A huge statue of one of those strange alien women, holding up a burning torch. The humans had chained it to their craft and were lifting it up and up. "Oh that's bloody unfair. We nearly had a complete set!" Korthu had made it his singular military aim to collect bizarre and multicolored alien statues from around the universe. He'd nearly had a full rainbow--even a few ultraviolets. And now they were taking back the jewel of his collection. "Sir, we need to leave. Now." "No point. Let them reanimate me." Korthu slumped dramatically against the window. "These humans don't play fair--" Before he could finish, the window exploded inward. A wall of hot glass rocketed back against both Korthu and his advisor, reducing them to jelly almost instantaneously. They weren't dead, exactly. They would reconstitute in a day or two, along with whatever citizens hadn't been vaporized altogether. They rebuilt themselves limb by limb from the wreckage. And when they did, Korthu would look at the spotless sulfur sky and ask his advisor, "Do you think they'll notice if we take it back?" *** /r/nickofstatic	War. War never changes. Only weapons are new. Yet it is not the weapons, but the men who handle them, who win victories And so it was men who redefined war on the galactic scale. For millineal war had followed a simple formula. Once relations broke Down full armada would be assembled and hurled at the enemy. A battle would follow, either an assault or a pitched battle in netural space and victors would be determined in just a few engagements. During an assault if the aggressor got within orbital range it would bombard the planets capital institutions until a surrender was made. Land battles were almost unheard of but for uprisings but would typically be solved in a few large engagements. After a surrender concessions were made and peace continued. This form of war lasting up until the 'Chinese spirit' incident. The Chinese Spirit was a ship sent after the new horizon to test whether generational ships could be practical for humans. A large craft was built to house a few hundred lab rats. The craft was fully self suistainible, producing enough food and recycling water to ensure the rats could continue living. After several generation s the rats were discovered by the Grafene, who, Dispite clear communication were able to confirm their sentintly and wrongly assumed they built the craft. This lead to the activation of 'Space Faring' for earth and allowed an attack. The Grafene invaded with all of their might but even after a short but effective bombing run earth refused to surrender. After flattening most population centres from orbit earth still held resolute. Fearing shame and showing weakness to other powers the Grafene decided to continue and start a ground invasion. The operation went to pot almost immediately. Instead of grouping up and having a large fight (which the humans knew they'd lose) they separated into smaller groups and fought small scale skirmishes. The Grafene failed to respond to these tactics and suffered defeat after defeat. With each loss the humans absorbed their weapons into their arsenal's, progressing from simply stealing to imitating and finally improving on the designs. For years the humans whittled away at the occupying Grafene, stealing weapons and supplies and building vast Vaults deep underground. The Human League, the now default government and sole organising power of humanity became increasingly bold in its attacks cumilating In the Mongolian spaceport attack. The Grafene had built their primary landing port in the Mongolian plains. At anyone time thousands of orbital craft were stationed their and 5 space evaluators and been constructed to keep earth supplied and extract its ores and valuables. The Mongolian push, as it was known, was the first battle the galaxy could understand. Nearly a hundred thousand troops were involved in the assault on the port, recking devastion and quickly stealing and towing craft away to reverse engineer. Of corse the craft were secondary objective as the troops primary target was using the elevators to get into orbit... But we'll learn more about that in tomorrow's lesson
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	General Gaffney rubbed his temples at the head of the table. Without opening his eyes, he muttered, "Major, start over from the beginning. I want to make sure I have this straight." "Yes sir. The attack began at oh-nine-hundred and current intel has it lasting 17 --" Colonel Thompson broke in. "And it was Akron? Akron, Ohio. That's what they targeted?" Major Collins licked his lips, eyes darting down to the report before him briefly. "That is correct according to the information we have received, sir. Akron. In the state of Ohio." Collins hesitated, gaze sweeping the table, before resuming. "And the attack lasted 17 seconds, with --" "Minutes," Gaffney growled. "Sir?" "You said seconds, Major." "Uh...affirmative, sir. If you look on page 7 of the report, it's quite clear, there's a, ah, footnote...and everything. It is indeed surprising that after the staging and build-up that took place in Earth's atmosphere that the actual attack was so brief, but review from multiple sources confirms that it was over in almost a quarter of a minute." "Fuck these assholes!" Gaffney was on his feet, having hurled a ballpoint pen across the room, narrowly missing the sergeant standing at the door. There was a pause. "Seventeen fucking seconds? It's just...okay, Major, skip ahead. The target. What was the target?" "A building called the Huntington Tower on Mill Street in downtown Akron." Major Collins shifted in his seat, then added, quietly, "In Ohio." Gaffney's eyes bulged as he whirled on the Major, who involuntarily wheeled back in his chair a few inches. "And what do our internal reports say the strategic value of the Huntington Tower on Mill Street is, precisely?" "Sir, there's no...the people who put together the report were able to glean some information from a..." Major Collins looked down at his papers, mumbling. "Speak up, Major." "Yes, sir, sorry, sir. The, uh, intel, such as we have, is gleaned from a Google search and includes most of the Wikipedia article about the building, which states it is 300 feet tall with numerous one- and two-bedroom apartments. Sir." "Good gravy, Major! Three hundred feet! It must have at least a dozen stories!" "27, sir. Uh, according to...Wikipedia. Sir." "27. And how many casualties were there?" "Sir, the munitions used were primarily...non-explosive projectiles. And as such --" "Major, I have a giant headache. Let's speak clearly. When you say non-explosive projectiles..." "...rocks, sir. They attacked us with...by dropping rocks." "On the Huntington Building." "Yes, sir." "In Akron." "Yes, sir." Major Collins closed his mouth, opened it, and then thought better of appending the name of the state to the end of his utterance. "And the casualties?" "37 broken windows and a handful of minor cuts and bruises, sir. An elderly lady who was crossing Mill Street also fell and broke her hip." "And what are they doing now?" The major gave a nod to an aide, who hit a button on his laptop. The screen in the conference room was bathed in the light of the ceiling-mounted projector. It showed dozens of gleaming-silver spacecraft flying in a clearly orchestrated pattern - moving sideways in unison, then back the other way, then doing an aileron roll. Then the pattern repeated. "Audio, if you would, Major." The forced congeniality in the general's voice was somehow more menacing than the outburst of moments ago. Tinny music filled the conference room. While it was clearly exotic sounding, the staccato of the quick notes and the rising tonality certainly made it sound like a victory song of some kind. General Gaffney stared around the room at the other officers present, watching their faces as the music played. "That'll do." The speakers went silent. "Well, lady," Gaffney said, nodding to Brigadier General Meyers, "and gentlemen...to judge by your faces, none of this makes any more sense to you than it does to me. My headache is getting worse, and I have to go to the rehearsal dinner for my son's wedding tonight. So tell the gang at Wright-Pat to light these assholes up and hopefully never talk about it again." The order was given to the pilots on standby at the air force base in Dayton. This time, the attack lasted 7 minutes and 29 seconds. The pilots would later report it was the easiest mission they had ever flown.	War. War never changes. Only weapons are new. Yet it is not the weapons, but the men who handle them, who win victories And so it was men who redefined war on the galactic scale. For millineal war had followed a simple formula. Once relations broke Down full armada would be assembled and hurled at the enemy. A battle would follow, either an assault or a pitched battle in netural space and victors would be determined in just a few engagements. During an assault if the aggressor got within orbital range it would bombard the planets capital institutions until a surrender was made. Land battles were almost unheard of but for uprisings but would typically be solved in a few large engagements. After a surrender concessions were made and peace continued. This form of war lasting up until the 'Chinese spirit' incident. The Chinese Spirit was a ship sent after the new horizon to test whether generational ships could be practical for humans. A large craft was built to house a few hundred lab rats. The craft was fully self suistainible, producing enough food and recycling water to ensure the rats could continue living. After several generation s the rats were discovered by the Grafene, who, Dispite clear communication were able to confirm their sentintly and wrongly assumed they built the craft. This lead to the activation of 'Space Faring' for earth and allowed an attack. The Grafene invaded with all of their might but even after a short but effective bombing run earth refused to surrender. After flattening most population centres from orbit earth still held resolute. Fearing shame and showing weakness to other powers the Grafene decided to continue and start a ground invasion. The operation went to pot almost immediately. Instead of grouping up and having a large fight (which the humans knew they'd lose) they separated into smaller groups and fought small scale skirmishes. The Grafene failed to respond to these tactics and suffered defeat after defeat. With each loss the humans absorbed their weapons into their arsenal's, progressing from simply stealing to imitating and finally improving on the designs. For years the humans whittled away at the occupying Grafene, stealing weapons and supplies and building vast Vaults deep underground. The Human League, the now default government and sole organising power of humanity became increasingly bold in its attacks cumilating In the Mongolian spaceport attack. The Grafene had built their primary landing port in the Mongolian plains. At anyone time thousands of orbital craft were stationed their and 5 space evaluators and been constructed to keep earth supplied and extract its ores and valuables. The Mongolian push, as it was known, was the first battle the galaxy could understand. Nearly a hundred thousand troops were involved in the assault on the port, recking devastion and quickly stealing and towing craft away to reverse engineer. Of corse the craft were secondary objective as the troops primary target was using the elevators to get into orbit... But we'll learn more about that in tomorrow's lesson
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The "battle" for Ashar was over in approximately 10 standard minutes. The Spurge, who we thought were allies, used our own security codes to disable Ashar's predictive defense system. The colony, along with its 100 million inhabitants, didn't stand a chance against the attack that followed. The Spurge quietly wiped the colony with neutron bombs, and now have control of the Tavarsk system. They quickly informed us of the battle, their plans to maintain control of the system, and gave us advice - like we are some children to be lectured - be careful who you trust. Unfortunately for them, we did not reciprocate their "helpful advice". We did not mention that, unlike them, humans have been waging war for as long as we have existed. Of course our history is no secret, hardly anything can be a secret with the technology around, but only the few Spurge that have worked closely with us truly understand the mistake they have made. Only they know what we will to do protect the ones we love, and avenge the ones we lost. We've suffered and survived countless empires, four world wars, and even a solar civil war. Not only that, but we glorify our greatest warriors and generals - from Sun Tzu to George Patton. Ghengis Kahn to Alexander the Great. Ragnar Lothbrok to Edward "Blackbeard" Teach. Even our myths and legends revolve around violent warriors: Achilles, Aragorn, Rocky Balboa, James Bond, the Avengers, the list goes on. As I stand here now, commanding a fleet of over 20,000 star ships, I can feel my connection to my forefathers. I share their apprehension and excitement at what will happen next. Napoleon guides me as I maneuver our ships to begin the orbital bombardment of their outer systems. I channel Hannibal as our fighters lie in the shadow of their moons to obliterate any resistance they send. I hear Caesar in my head while I give the pre-battle speech, convincing my soldiers that these barbarians need to be put down. And most closely, I share the burden of total annihilation with Dwight Eisenhower, as thousands of Planet Busting railguns take aim and fire towards every known Spurge planet. The loss of Ashar was sad. The loss of the Spurge will be tragic. However, I fear that the introduction of total warfare to space is even worse. Other races will take notice. There will be no more pretense of "quick and painless" war. No more innocence after violence. It may be unforgivable, but that is not my job to figure out. For now, my job is to watch the fireworks.	War. War never changes. Only weapons are new. Yet it is not the weapons, but the men who handle them, who win victories And so it was men who redefined war on the galactic scale. For millineal war had followed a simple formula. Once relations broke Down full armada would be assembled and hurled at the enemy. A battle would follow, either an assault or a pitched battle in netural space and victors would be determined in just a few engagements. During an assault if the aggressor got within orbital range it would bombard the planets capital institutions until a surrender was made. Land battles were almost unheard of but for uprisings but would typically be solved in a few large engagements. After a surrender concessions were made and peace continued. This form of war lasting up until the 'Chinese spirit' incident. The Chinese Spirit was a ship sent after the new horizon to test whether generational ships could be practical for humans. A large craft was built to house a few hundred lab rats. The craft was fully self suistainible, producing enough food and recycling water to ensure the rats could continue living. After several generation s the rats were discovered by the Grafene, who, Dispite clear communication were able to confirm their sentintly and wrongly assumed they built the craft. This lead to the activation of 'Space Faring' for earth and allowed an attack. The Grafene invaded with all of their might but even after a short but effective bombing run earth refused to surrender. After flattening most population centres from orbit earth still held resolute. Fearing shame and showing weakness to other powers the Grafene decided to continue and start a ground invasion. The operation went to pot almost immediately. Instead of grouping up and having a large fight (which the humans knew they'd lose) they separated into smaller groups and fought small scale skirmishes. The Grafene failed to respond to these tactics and suffered defeat after defeat. With each loss the humans absorbed their weapons into their arsenal's, progressing from simply stealing to imitating and finally improving on the designs. For years the humans whittled away at the occupying Grafene, stealing weapons and supplies and building vast Vaults deep underground. The Human League, the now default government and sole organising power of humanity became increasingly bold in its attacks cumilating In the Mongolian spaceport attack. The Grafene had built their primary landing port in the Mongolian plains. At anyone time thousands of orbital craft were stationed their and 5 space evaluators and been constructed to keep earth supplied and extract its ores and valuables. The Mongolian push, as it was known, was the first battle the galaxy could understand. Nearly a hundred thousand troops were involved in the assault on the port, recking devastion and quickly stealing and towing craft away to reverse engineer. Of corse the craft were secondary objective as the troops primary target was using the elevators to get into orbit... But we'll learn more about that in tomorrow's lesson
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	[Written on mobile, constructive criticism appreciated, etc etc enjoy] ---- Humanity is no stranger to war. Even on an intergalactic stage, war held no surprises for humanity. &nbsp; For the intergalactic population, though, humanity held surprises for them. &nbsp; For millennia, wars had been fought and won swiftly and brutally. Almost by consensus, the wars between nations were ended with either total capitulation, or with enslavement. &nbsp; We weren't monsters, and we never had been. The aim was always to subjugate, not annihilate. As such, we only targeted the major military bases, the nuclear bunkers, the submarines that carried their world-ending weaponry. It worked, and the governments of Earth were united in their submission; their newly-christened and recently launched spacecraft carried the message of surrender to us, and we landed as outright victors. The diplomats and bureaucrats took control, as our military police patrolled the streets of our latest acquisition, making ourselves known. &nbsp; The vast majority of the human populace seemed subdued; of course, there were the usual protests, that came with brutal and swift responses. Even more confusing, to us, were the "xenophiles", a group that not only worked with us, but even lauded us as humanity's saviour. &nbsp; This status quo continued for three decades. Protests and riots, often ending in brutal violence, but overall the planet Earth (designation SOL-4) was peaceful. Armed insurrection was so minimal as to be ignored, and the protests and riots very rarely carried more threat than improvised incendiaries. Humanity, it seemed, had accepted us. &nbsp; [30 years post-subjugation] &nbsp; The tunnels are always dark. Always. We keep them that way, even as we go about our daily tasks. Surface life is surprisingly easy, but humanity was never born to be slaves. This army, this Resistance, operated in secret. We had never been violent; from the start, our leaders had recognised that violence wasn't going to win this fight. &nbsp; Not immediately. &nbsp; Even as I say that, I know that at every protest, every riot, our members have been there. Quietly nudging the idiots who organise them into greater acts of bravado, then disappearing back into the darkness when the military police arrive. But now, after so long, we no longer need to hide. &nbsp; We have spent three decades down here, even as we worked above ground. Daily jobs as administrators, electricians, we filled the rank and file of humanity. We listened, and talked, and subtly nudged the wider public towards accepting us. After thirty years, we were nearly ready to start. &nbsp; In the main bunker, our leaders sat together. Russian, Chinese, American, British, German... all the major powers from before the subjugation were represented. They had been evacuated as the first alarms had come in, moved to unprepossesing safe-houses in normal, bland suburbs. And so, they had survived to lead us. The words weren't particularly profound; they'll have been noted down, but these professionals were only concerned with the disposition of their forces; the disparate choices that had been made. &nbsp; "Right here." Heavily accented English followed a knife into a map, "we just hit them here, and hit them hard. It's time, gentlemen." Nods followed, and commands were issued. The listeners ran from the room &nbsp; [Surface-side, two days later] &nbsp; The rattle of gunfire whipped it's way across the square, as human forces began their assault on their oppressors main base of operation. Sniping from nearby tower-blocks had opened this sortie, and the special forces ringing the building were swiftly grinding it to a close. &nbsp; "The door! The fucking door!" Snatched conversations whipped by, but out of a darkened doorway came two men running with a box. Their body armour had morphed them into vague shapes, but the old EOD armour was proving it's worth as rounds slammed into them. They slid to the door, and pushed the box up as close as possible. Reaching inside, one of them adjusted something unseen, and they moved away as quickly as they could. &nbsp; The blast ripped apart the doorway, and a good chunk of the wall around it. Cheers came from men with deafened ears, and they pushed forward. The beginning of the revolution began with a bang, in true Human fashion. Inside, sweep-and-clear tactics left the unarmed bureaucrats pinned to the floor, zip-cuffed, and sobbing. Any armed response was met with brutal efficiency, and the human forces reached the top floor in what felt like minutes. &nbsp; The top floor, though, was always going to be the hardest fight. The xenos had dug in hard, and even as the whip-crack of gunpowder forced them into cover, the burnt ozone stench of laser was still taking it's toll. &nbsp; "GRENADE!" A softened thud followed the shout, backed with the heavier bass of larger munitions. "WHAT?" A sergeant screamed at three Russians, busily setting up a heavy machine gun, "How in the fuck...?" And then his words were drowned out by the rounds that stitched their way across the room, punching holes through both permanent and improvised barricades with impunity. The grenade, the machine gun, and suddenly the white flag of surrender appeared through the cordite. Another surge of humanity, and the defenders were pinned to the floor as the double doors they had been protecting were kicked open. &nbsp; "You." &nbsp; The cameras in the room were being broadcast, live, across the empire. An attempt at propaganda, at how no rebellion could ever reach that far, was swiftly turning into a horror-show of blood and desperate violence. &nbsp; "I know you are watching. I know how you think. But we, we are humanity. We are fucking human, not your slave species, not your assimilated masses." &nbsp; A pistol appeared in the speaker's hand. &nbsp; "And this is only the beginning of our Retribution." &nbsp; The final word, punctuated with a bullet.	It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Not like a phoenix, and I brushed away the idea of a rebirth. They always asked about it, and it was never right. A rebirth implied a clean birth, free of the memories of what had been before. That wasn't the human way. We rose, the battle lost but the war unfinished. We mended our wounds and fixed the gaping holes and became better, hopefully. The damage this time had been unprecedented. Megalopolises had turned to rubble, and entire cultures turned to nothing, and when the dust settled and the victors landed, they were confident in their subjugation of the human race. That was the way of the intergalactic wars. Quick and brutal, ending in either complete annihilation or eventual surrender. Afterwards, the vanquished would assimilate. Humans and their conquerors weren't meant to fight for eternity, constantly squabbling over rightful ownership or true ruler of one planet or another. That was the expectation, at least. But we had a way of subverting expectations. Where the Rox-kal went, they won. What enemy they saw, they defeated. Long ago, they had perfected faster than light travel. Long ago, they had found how to transport weapons of immeasurable destruction across galaxies. At times, my lectures came off like an ode to the Rox-kal more than a testament to the willpower and resilience of our own kind. More recently, though, the Rox-kal had done away with the concept of total annihilation. Besides, vassals served infinitely more purpose than war-torn planets turned to pieces of stone drifting aimlessly across the solar system. Vassals paid tribute, and expanded the Rox-kal culture. The further they spread, the more power they gained. It had become redundant, at least on their first pass through a solar system, to exterminate every last member of a conquered species. It was simple evolution, I explained, of both species and thought. But in this case, their evolution went awry. Humans weren't like the other species, or at least that's what I liked to teach. Human and Rox-kal could live together in harmony, and from that new species would be born. One planet then another, and eventually new species peppered their confederation. Their allegiance never wavered, so long as they were part Rox-kal. That was how it should have been. Earth proved no harder to defeat than any other planet. We sent out an armada of hastily assembled spacecraft to be dismantled just as quickly. Limbs rained upon Earth in the aftermath. A grisly scene, to be sure, but one that sent the intended message. I had never seen anything of the sort. The delegates came forth offering our conditional surrender. We humans were not to be enslaved, the delegates insisted. The Rox-kal agreed, because they had no need for slavery. They had no over-arching goal beyond conquest. Their planet, from travelers' rumors, had a wealth beyond our wildest imaginations. For good measure, because the bitter taste of defeat sometimes lingered, they leveled a handful of cities, claiming the rights that victors have. We looked on, accepting and remembering, and promising retribution. The history went no further. From there, the lessons turned to now, right here on Earth. There was little question of where things were heading. Underground, where the passing Rox-kal couldn't see, arsenals were accumulated and minds were indoctrinated. For the best, I was sure, because I had seen the power of the Rox-kal. It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Renewed, more than reborn. "Not revenge," I explained to the class of recruits. Young blood, just twelve years old, the lot of them. All pure-bred, because the mixed breed Rox-kal were far too loyal to be trusted. "Retribution." "The difference, Professor?" one of them piped up. A scrawny boy. They were all scrawny, but he lagged even behind the others. What he lacked in body, he made up for in spirit, and I smiled at his question. Talos was his name, if I remembered correctly. It was hard, so many children having passed through the room. But I would remember him, I was sure of it. "We aren't lashing out," I explained, continuing to the next slide. "This isn't about the armada," and they gasped at the destruction the Rox-kal had caused. "This isn't about New York. Or Beijing. Or Sydney." Three more slides, and by the third they gasped no more. Flattened cities, because that was the power of the Rox-kal. "Retribution is different. Retribution seeks justice, not just pain upon the Rox-kal. Retribution seeks to right the wrongs that they have committed, not to respond with wrongs of our own." I paced as I spoke, but my eyes remained fixed on his slender frame. The boy nodded in understanding, and I smiled. Inquisitive minds made the best officers. I had seen that over the years. Yes-men mindlessly following instructions were what had kept us tethered, resigned to the Earth and to only the least bit of intergalactic exploration. We hadn't been able to fight the Rox-kal. They made examples of some cities, a fate I was thankfully spared, and then expected us to embrace their conquest. They expected us to assimilate and become them, and more humans did so than I would have liked. But now things were different. Years had passed, and we had progressed. I had seen generations pass through my classroom, and still I taught them history, until we hit the conquest. From there, the past became the present, and the present was perilous. Rebellion and retribution were in the air, and us humans were no longer a defeated species, at least as far as our mindset was concerned. We had a strength they couldn't even begin to understand, and we had the element of surprise to our advantage. ***** Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Xackta looked over the hologramatic map currently being beamed onto the war table by his ship's AI. The Miderian defensive fleet was nothing more than smouldering debris: chunks of metal and bodies that had gasped out into the cold of space. A pathetic attempt to save themselves. At least, he considered, they had put up more resistance than the alien fleet they'd run into on the way here -- but that was to say little. A hundred ships, tiny, pathetically outgunned and out-manoeuvred. Whatever race they had belonged to, they would not ever dare interfere again. Now, with no fleet left to defend them, the Miderian empire would fall. Xackta beamed proudly -- never before had the Miderian's been conquered, and his genius had made it seem easy. Xackta's fleet, three-hundred total, swarmed like a plague of locust around the first planet: Mideria. This was where the enemy species had originated. This was the planet that, when all life on it was annihilated from space, the other eleven plantets in the Miderian kingdom would beg for mercy and welcome their new overlords. "Seventy-three billion civilians detected," announced his AI. "Charge weapons," said Xacktar. He watched as the holographic projection map showed his fleet readying formation. Their plasma-weapons would be heating. The ships themselves trembling with anticiptiation. "Fire when ready." At that moment, something very strange happened. A ship vanished from the map. One of his. A stealth bomber. Must be a glitch, Xackta though. Then a second. "What..." "Sir," said the AI. "Transmission incoming." Xackta paused. "Where are my missing ships?" A voice echoed around Xackta's quarters. His AI had translated the language but the tone had not been altered. Feminine, cofident. "Good afternoon, Commander," came the voice. "Who is this?" Xackta demanded. Another five ships vanished. And... What! That couldn't be... On the edge of the map hundreds -- more than hundreds -- of new blips had appeared, as if they'd just teleported in. There had been no warning at all. What was happening? No species had the technological capabilties to do that. Nor to match his miltary might. "This is Lucy Wainright of the Galactic Solar Federation. I have some good news and some bad news for you, Commander." Xackta issued a command to the AI for the fleet to change target, to return fire at the new arrivals. "Good news is, our fleet recently got a massive overhaul. New weapons. New shields. New armour. Every ship is now equipped with warp technology. That was thanks to you showing your hand early." Twenty ships down. None of the Earth fleet missing. Impossible. "Bad news is," Lucy said, "that my boss is pretty pissed. Not just that you wiped out the crews of the mining vessels we had in the vacinity. But that you attacked an ally of ours, too." "What... what are you?" Xackta asked. As his ship screamed, as the walls around him turned red, then white, then exploded out into space, Lucy answered. "Humanity."	It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Not like a phoenix, and I brushed away the idea of a rebirth. They always asked about it, and it was never right. A rebirth implied a clean birth, free of the memories of what had been before. That wasn't the human way. We rose, the battle lost but the war unfinished. We mended our wounds and fixed the gaping holes and became better, hopefully. The damage this time had been unprecedented. Megalopolises had turned to rubble, and entire cultures turned to nothing, and when the dust settled and the victors landed, they were confident in their subjugation of the human race. That was the way of the intergalactic wars. Quick and brutal, ending in either complete annihilation or eventual surrender. Afterwards, the vanquished would assimilate. Humans and their conquerors weren't meant to fight for eternity, constantly squabbling over rightful ownership or true ruler of one planet or another. That was the expectation, at least. But we had a way of subverting expectations. Where the Rox-kal went, they won. What enemy they saw, they defeated. Long ago, they had perfected faster than light travel. Long ago, they had found how to transport weapons of immeasurable destruction across galaxies. At times, my lectures came off like an ode to the Rox-kal more than a testament to the willpower and resilience of our own kind. More recently, though, the Rox-kal had done away with the concept of total annihilation. Besides, vassals served infinitely more purpose than war-torn planets turned to pieces of stone drifting aimlessly across the solar system. Vassals paid tribute, and expanded the Rox-kal culture. The further they spread, the more power they gained. It had become redundant, at least on their first pass through a solar system, to exterminate every last member of a conquered species. It was simple evolution, I explained, of both species and thought. But in this case, their evolution went awry. Humans weren't like the other species, or at least that's what I liked to teach. Human and Rox-kal could live together in harmony, and from that new species would be born. One planet then another, and eventually new species peppered their confederation. Their allegiance never wavered, so long as they were part Rox-kal. That was how it should have been. Earth proved no harder to defeat than any other planet. We sent out an armada of hastily assembled spacecraft to be dismantled just as quickly. Limbs rained upon Earth in the aftermath. A grisly scene, to be sure, but one that sent the intended message. I had never seen anything of the sort. The delegates came forth offering our conditional surrender. We humans were not to be enslaved, the delegates insisted. The Rox-kal agreed, because they had no need for slavery. They had no over-arching goal beyond conquest. Their planet, from travelers' rumors, had a wealth beyond our wildest imaginations. For good measure, because the bitter taste of defeat sometimes lingered, they leveled a handful of cities, claiming the rights that victors have. We looked on, accepting and remembering, and promising retribution. The history went no further. From there, the lessons turned to now, right here on Earth. There was little question of where things were heading. Underground, where the passing Rox-kal couldn't see, arsenals were accumulated and minds were indoctrinated. For the best, I was sure, because I had seen the power of the Rox-kal. It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Renewed, more than reborn. "Not revenge," I explained to the class of recruits. Young blood, just twelve years old, the lot of them. All pure-bred, because the mixed breed Rox-kal were far too loyal to be trusted. "Retribution." "The difference, Professor?" one of them piped up. A scrawny boy. They were all scrawny, but he lagged even behind the others. What he lacked in body, he made up for in spirit, and I smiled at his question. Talos was his name, if I remembered correctly. It was hard, so many children having passed through the room. But I would remember him, I was sure of it. "We aren't lashing out," I explained, continuing to the next slide. "This isn't about the armada," and they gasped at the destruction the Rox-kal had caused. "This isn't about New York. Or Beijing. Or Sydney." Three more slides, and by the third they gasped no more. Flattened cities, because that was the power of the Rox-kal. "Retribution is different. Retribution seeks justice, not just pain upon the Rox-kal. Retribution seeks to right the wrongs that they have committed, not to respond with wrongs of our own." I paced as I spoke, but my eyes remained fixed on his slender frame. The boy nodded in understanding, and I smiled. Inquisitive minds made the best officers. I had seen that over the years. Yes-men mindlessly following instructions were what had kept us tethered, resigned to the Earth and to only the least bit of intergalactic exploration. We hadn't been able to fight the Rox-kal. They made examples of some cities, a fate I was thankfully spared, and then expected us to embrace their conquest. They expected us to assimilate and become them, and more humans did so than I would have liked. But now things were different. Years had passed, and we had progressed. I had seen generations pass through my classroom, and still I taught them history, until we hit the conquest. From there, the past became the present, and the present was perilous. Rebellion and retribution were in the air, and us humans were no longer a defeated species, at least as far as our mindset was concerned. We had a strength they couldn't even begin to understand, and we had the element of surprise to our advantage. ***** Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	Hellfire and death fluttered down from the sky. Ashy snowflakes, falling burning. Through the rapidly-heating window of his office building, Federation Commander Korthu watched the foreign spaceships drop fire on the capital city. Below him, people ran, their many-tentacled bodies writhing, as smolding debris crushed them. The screams of his people rose up to find him. "Well," Korthu said. "This all seems rather unnecessary." He used a tentacle to pull a handkerchief from his coat pocket and dab at his boneless head. He looked like an squid that decided to climb out of the ocean and walk one day. Behind him, his military advisor, a lavender-colored cephalopod, said in a stern voice, "They appear to be from the Milky Way sector we routed six solar cycles ago, sir." "Six." He paced in front of his window, shaking his head. One of those alien ships soared close enough that Korthu could see the bizarre alien driving it. Its horrifying, knobbed limbs clutched the steering as it lifted one arm to hold up a single finger. The side of the spaceship read S.S. Retribution. "I don't understand these humans." Korthu sighed as the ship trailed up a wall of fire in its wake. "You engage in one friendly act of war and they storm your planet." "Perhaps we should consider evacuating, sir." Korthu just shook his head. The city below him was a field of red and orange blooms. How many millions were left dead? "All we did was crush a few buildings and take their... What is it... That fancy little toy that had in the harbor. The Statue of... Liturgy, something." Korthu squinted through the wreckage. There. He saw it. A huge statue of one of those strange alien women, holding up a burning torch. The humans had chained it to their craft and were lifting it up and up. "Oh that's bloody unfair. We nearly had a complete set!" Korthu had made it his singular military aim to collect bizarre and multicolored alien statues from around the universe. He'd nearly had a full rainbow--even a few ultraviolets. And now they were taking back the jewel of his collection. "Sir, we need to leave. Now." "No point. Let them reanimate me." Korthu slumped dramatically against the window. "These humans don't play fair--" Before he could finish, the window exploded inward. A wall of hot glass rocketed back against both Korthu and his advisor, reducing them to jelly almost instantaneously. They weren't dead, exactly. They would reconstitute in a day or two, along with whatever citizens hadn't been vaporized altogether. They rebuilt themselves limb by limb from the wreckage. And when they did, Korthu would look at the spotless sulfur sky and ask his advisor, "Do you think they'll notice if we take it back?" *** /r/nickofstatic	It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Not like a phoenix, and I brushed away the idea of a rebirth. They always asked about it, and it was never right. A rebirth implied a clean birth, free of the memories of what had been before. That wasn't the human way. We rose, the battle lost but the war unfinished. We mended our wounds and fixed the gaping holes and became better, hopefully. The damage this time had been unprecedented. Megalopolises had turned to rubble, and entire cultures turned to nothing, and when the dust settled and the victors landed, they were confident in their subjugation of the human race. That was the way of the intergalactic wars. Quick and brutal, ending in either complete annihilation or eventual surrender. Afterwards, the vanquished would assimilate. Humans and their conquerors weren't meant to fight for eternity, constantly squabbling over rightful ownership or true ruler of one planet or another. That was the expectation, at least. But we had a way of subverting expectations. Where the Rox-kal went, they won. What enemy they saw, they defeated. Long ago, they had perfected faster than light travel. Long ago, they had found how to transport weapons of immeasurable destruction across galaxies. At times, my lectures came off like an ode to the Rox-kal more than a testament to the willpower and resilience of our own kind. More recently, though, the Rox-kal had done away with the concept of total annihilation. Besides, vassals served infinitely more purpose than war-torn planets turned to pieces of stone drifting aimlessly across the solar system. Vassals paid tribute, and expanded the Rox-kal culture. The further they spread, the more power they gained. It had become redundant, at least on their first pass through a solar system, to exterminate every last member of a conquered species. It was simple evolution, I explained, of both species and thought. But in this case, their evolution went awry. Humans weren't like the other species, or at least that's what I liked to teach. Human and Rox-kal could live together in harmony, and from that new species would be born. One planet then another, and eventually new species peppered their confederation. Their allegiance never wavered, so long as they were part Rox-kal. That was how it should have been. Earth proved no harder to defeat than any other planet. We sent out an armada of hastily assembled spacecraft to be dismantled just as quickly. Limbs rained upon Earth in the aftermath. A grisly scene, to be sure, but one that sent the intended message. I had never seen anything of the sort. The delegates came forth offering our conditional surrender. We humans were not to be enslaved, the delegates insisted. The Rox-kal agreed, because they had no need for slavery. They had no over-arching goal beyond conquest. Their planet, from travelers' rumors, had a wealth beyond our wildest imaginations. For good measure, because the bitter taste of defeat sometimes lingered, they leveled a handful of cities, claiming the rights that victors have. We looked on, accepting and remembering, and promising retribution. The history went no further. From there, the lessons turned to now, right here on Earth. There was little question of where things were heading. Underground, where the passing Rox-kal couldn't see, arsenals were accumulated and minds were indoctrinated. For the best, I was sure, because I had seen the power of the Rox-kal. It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Renewed, more than reborn. "Not revenge," I explained to the class of recruits. Young blood, just twelve years old, the lot of them. All pure-bred, because the mixed breed Rox-kal were far too loyal to be trusted. "Retribution." "The difference, Professor?" one of them piped up. A scrawny boy. They were all scrawny, but he lagged even behind the others. What he lacked in body, he made up for in spirit, and I smiled at his question. Talos was his name, if I remembered correctly. It was hard, so many children having passed through the room. But I would remember him, I was sure of it. "We aren't lashing out," I explained, continuing to the next slide. "This isn't about the armada," and they gasped at the destruction the Rox-kal had caused. "This isn't about New York. Or Beijing. Or Sydney." Three more slides, and by the third they gasped no more. Flattened cities, because that was the power of the Rox-kal. "Retribution is different. Retribution seeks justice, not just pain upon the Rox-kal. Retribution seeks to right the wrongs that they have committed, not to respond with wrongs of our own." I paced as I spoke, but my eyes remained fixed on his slender frame. The boy nodded in understanding, and I smiled. Inquisitive minds made the best officers. I had seen that over the years. Yes-men mindlessly following instructions were what had kept us tethered, resigned to the Earth and to only the least bit of intergalactic exploration. We hadn't been able to fight the Rox-kal. They made examples of some cities, a fate I was thankfully spared, and then expected us to embrace their conquest. They expected us to assimilate and become them, and more humans did so than I would have liked. But now things were different. Years had passed, and we had progressed. I had seen generations pass through my classroom, and still I taught them history, until we hit the conquest. From there, the past became the present, and the present was perilous. Rebellion and retribution were in the air, and us humans were no longer a defeated species, at least as far as our mindset was concerned. We had a strength they couldn't even begin to understand, and we had the element of surprise to our advantage. ***** Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	General Gaffney rubbed his temples at the head of the table. Without opening his eyes, he muttered, "Major, start over from the beginning. I want to make sure I have this straight." "Yes sir. The attack began at oh-nine-hundred and current intel has it lasting 17 --" Colonel Thompson broke in. "And it was Akron? Akron, Ohio. That's what they targeted?" Major Collins licked his lips, eyes darting down to the report before him briefly. "That is correct according to the information we have received, sir. Akron. In the state of Ohio." Collins hesitated, gaze sweeping the table, before resuming. "And the attack lasted 17 seconds, with --" "Minutes," Gaffney growled. "Sir?" "You said seconds, Major." "Uh...affirmative, sir. If you look on page 7 of the report, it's quite clear, there's a, ah, footnote...and everything. It is indeed surprising that after the staging and build-up that took place in Earth's atmosphere that the actual attack was so brief, but review from multiple sources confirms that it was over in almost a quarter of a minute." "Fuck these assholes!" Gaffney was on his feet, having hurled a ballpoint pen across the room, narrowly missing the sergeant standing at the door. There was a pause. "Seventeen fucking seconds? It's just...okay, Major, skip ahead. The target. What was the target?" "A building called the Huntington Tower on Mill Street in downtown Akron." Major Collins shifted in his seat, then added, quietly, "In Ohio." Gaffney's eyes bulged as he whirled on the Major, who involuntarily wheeled back in his chair a few inches. "And what do our internal reports say the strategic value of the Huntington Tower on Mill Street is, precisely?" "Sir, there's no...the people who put together the report were able to glean some information from a..." Major Collins looked down at his papers, mumbling. "Speak up, Major." "Yes, sir, sorry, sir. The, uh, intel, such as we have, is gleaned from a Google search and includes most of the Wikipedia article about the building, which states it is 300 feet tall with numerous one- and two-bedroom apartments. Sir." "Good gravy, Major! Three hundred feet! It must have at least a dozen stories!" "27, sir. Uh, according to...Wikipedia. Sir." "27. And how many casualties were there?" "Sir, the munitions used were primarily...non-explosive projectiles. And as such --" "Major, I have a giant headache. Let's speak clearly. When you say non-explosive projectiles..." "...rocks, sir. They attacked us with...by dropping rocks." "On the Huntington Building." "Yes, sir." "In Akron." "Yes, sir." Major Collins closed his mouth, opened it, and then thought better of appending the name of the state to the end of his utterance. "And the casualties?" "37 broken windows and a handful of minor cuts and bruises, sir. An elderly lady who was crossing Mill Street also fell and broke her hip." "And what are they doing now?" The major gave a nod to an aide, who hit a button on his laptop. The screen in the conference room was bathed in the light of the ceiling-mounted projector. It showed dozens of gleaming-silver spacecraft flying in a clearly orchestrated pattern - moving sideways in unison, then back the other way, then doing an aileron roll. Then the pattern repeated. "Audio, if you would, Major." The forced congeniality in the general's voice was somehow more menacing than the outburst of moments ago. Tinny music filled the conference room. While it was clearly exotic sounding, the staccato of the quick notes and the rising tonality certainly made it sound like a victory song of some kind. General Gaffney stared around the room at the other officers present, watching their faces as the music played. "That'll do." The speakers went silent. "Well, lady," Gaffney said, nodding to Brigadier General Meyers, "and gentlemen...to judge by your faces, none of this makes any more sense to you than it does to me. My headache is getting worse, and I have to go to the rehearsal dinner for my son's wedding tonight. So tell the gang at Wright-Pat to light these assholes up and hopefully never talk about it again." The order was given to the pilots on standby at the air force base in Dayton. This time, the attack lasted 7 minutes and 29 seconds. The pilots would later report it was the easiest mission they had ever flown.	It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Not like a phoenix, and I brushed away the idea of a rebirth. They always asked about it, and it was never right. A rebirth implied a clean birth, free of the memories of what had been before. That wasn't the human way. We rose, the battle lost but the war unfinished. We mended our wounds and fixed the gaping holes and became better, hopefully. The damage this time had been unprecedented. Megalopolises had turned to rubble, and entire cultures turned to nothing, and when the dust settled and the victors landed, they were confident in their subjugation of the human race. That was the way of the intergalactic wars. Quick and brutal, ending in either complete annihilation or eventual surrender. Afterwards, the vanquished would assimilate. Humans and their conquerors weren't meant to fight for eternity, constantly squabbling over rightful ownership or true ruler of one planet or another. That was the expectation, at least. But we had a way of subverting expectations. Where the Rox-kal went, they won. What enemy they saw, they defeated. Long ago, they had perfected faster than light travel. Long ago, they had found how to transport weapons of immeasurable destruction across galaxies. At times, my lectures came off like an ode to the Rox-kal more than a testament to the willpower and resilience of our own kind. More recently, though, the Rox-kal had done away with the concept of total annihilation. Besides, vassals served infinitely more purpose than war-torn planets turned to pieces of stone drifting aimlessly across the solar system. Vassals paid tribute, and expanded the Rox-kal culture. The further they spread, the more power they gained. It had become redundant, at least on their first pass through a solar system, to exterminate every last member of a conquered species. It was simple evolution, I explained, of both species and thought. But in this case, their evolution went awry. Humans weren't like the other species, or at least that's what I liked to teach. Human and Rox-kal could live together in harmony, and from that new species would be born. One planet then another, and eventually new species peppered their confederation. Their allegiance never wavered, so long as they were part Rox-kal. That was how it should have been. Earth proved no harder to defeat than any other planet. We sent out an armada of hastily assembled spacecraft to be dismantled just as quickly. Limbs rained upon Earth in the aftermath. A grisly scene, to be sure, but one that sent the intended message. I had never seen anything of the sort. The delegates came forth offering our conditional surrender. We humans were not to be enslaved, the delegates insisted. The Rox-kal agreed, because they had no need for slavery. They had no over-arching goal beyond conquest. Their planet, from travelers' rumors, had a wealth beyond our wildest imaginations. For good measure, because the bitter taste of defeat sometimes lingered, they leveled a handful of cities, claiming the rights that victors have. We looked on, accepting and remembering, and promising retribution. The history went no further. From there, the lessons turned to now, right here on Earth. There was little question of where things were heading. Underground, where the passing Rox-kal couldn't see, arsenals were accumulated and minds were indoctrinated. For the best, I was sure, because I had seen the power of the Rox-kal. It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Renewed, more than reborn. "Not revenge," I explained to the class of recruits. Young blood, just twelve years old, the lot of them. All pure-bred, because the mixed breed Rox-kal were far too loyal to be trusted. "Retribution." "The difference, Professor?" one of them piped up. A scrawny boy. They were all scrawny, but he lagged even behind the others. What he lacked in body, he made up for in spirit, and I smiled at his question. Talos was his name, if I remembered correctly. It was hard, so many children having passed through the room. But I would remember him, I was sure of it. "We aren't lashing out," I explained, continuing to the next slide. "This isn't about the armada," and they gasped at the destruction the Rox-kal had caused. "This isn't about New York. Or Beijing. Or Sydney." Three more slides, and by the third they gasped no more. Flattened cities, because that was the power of the Rox-kal. "Retribution is different. Retribution seeks justice, not just pain upon the Rox-kal. Retribution seeks to right the wrongs that they have committed, not to respond with wrongs of our own." I paced as I spoke, but my eyes remained fixed on his slender frame. The boy nodded in understanding, and I smiled. Inquisitive minds made the best officers. I had seen that over the years. Yes-men mindlessly following instructions were what had kept us tethered, resigned to the Earth and to only the least bit of intergalactic exploration. We hadn't been able to fight the Rox-kal. They made examples of some cities, a fate I was thankfully spared, and then expected us to embrace their conquest. They expected us to assimilate and become them, and more humans did so than I would have liked. But now things were different. Years had passed, and we had progressed. I had seen generations pass through my classroom, and still I taught them history, until we hit the conquest. From there, the past became the present, and the present was perilous. Rebellion and retribution were in the air, and us humans were no longer a defeated species, at least as far as our mindset was concerned. We had a strength they couldn't even begin to understand, and we had the element of surprise to our advantage. ***** Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!
[WP] In space, wars are typically quick. One side attacks and then the other side surrenders. When aliens attack a human city they belive the humans are defeated. They are not prepared for what the humans call "Retribution"	The "battle" for Ashar was over in approximately 10 standard minutes. The Spurge, who we thought were allies, used our own security codes to disable Ashar's predictive defense system. The colony, along with its 100 million inhabitants, didn't stand a chance against the attack that followed. The Spurge quietly wiped the colony with neutron bombs, and now have control of the Tavarsk system. They quickly informed us of the battle, their plans to maintain control of the system, and gave us advice - like we are some children to be lectured - be careful who you trust. Unfortunately for them, we did not reciprocate their "helpful advice". We did not mention that, unlike them, humans have been waging war for as long as we have existed. Of course our history is no secret, hardly anything can be a secret with the technology around, but only the few Spurge that have worked closely with us truly understand the mistake they have made. Only they know what we will to do protect the ones we love, and avenge the ones we lost. We've suffered and survived countless empires, four world wars, and even a solar civil war. Not only that, but we glorify our greatest warriors and generals - from Sun Tzu to George Patton. Ghengis Kahn to Alexander the Great. Ragnar Lothbrok to Edward "Blackbeard" Teach. Even our myths and legends revolve around violent warriors: Achilles, Aragorn, Rocky Balboa, James Bond, the Avengers, the list goes on. As I stand here now, commanding a fleet of over 20,000 star ships, I can feel my connection to my forefathers. I share their apprehension and excitement at what will happen next. Napoleon guides me as I maneuver our ships to begin the orbital bombardment of their outer systems. I channel Hannibal as our fighters lie in the shadow of their moons to obliterate any resistance they send. I hear Caesar in my head while I give the pre-battle speech, convincing my soldiers that these barbarians need to be put down. And most closely, I share the burden of total annihilation with Dwight Eisenhower, as thousands of Planet Busting railguns take aim and fire towards every known Spurge planet. The loss of Ashar was sad. The loss of the Spurge will be tragic. However, I fear that the introduction of total warfare to space is even worse. Other races will take notice. There will be no more pretense of "quick and painless" war. No more innocence after violence. It may be unforgivable, but that is not my job to figure out. For now, my job is to watch the fireworks.	It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Not like a phoenix, and I brushed away the idea of a rebirth. They always asked about it, and it was never right. A rebirth implied a clean birth, free of the memories of what had been before. That wasn't the human way. We rose, the battle lost but the war unfinished. We mended our wounds and fixed the gaping holes and became better, hopefully. The damage this time had been unprecedented. Megalopolises had turned to rubble, and entire cultures turned to nothing, and when the dust settled and the victors landed, they were confident in their subjugation of the human race. That was the way of the intergalactic wars. Quick and brutal, ending in either complete annihilation or eventual surrender. Afterwards, the vanquished would assimilate. Humans and their conquerors weren't meant to fight for eternity, constantly squabbling over rightful ownership or true ruler of one planet or another. That was the expectation, at least. But we had a way of subverting expectations. Where the Rox-kal went, they won. What enemy they saw, they defeated. Long ago, they had perfected faster than light travel. Long ago, they had found how to transport weapons of immeasurable destruction across galaxies. At times, my lectures came off like an ode to the Rox-kal more than a testament to the willpower and resilience of our own kind. More recently, though, the Rox-kal had done away with the concept of total annihilation. Besides, vassals served infinitely more purpose than war-torn planets turned to pieces of stone drifting aimlessly across the solar system. Vassals paid tribute, and expanded the Rox-kal culture. The further they spread, the more power they gained. It had become redundant, at least on their first pass through a solar system, to exterminate every last member of a conquered species. It was simple evolution, I explained, of both species and thought. But in this case, their evolution went awry. Humans weren't like the other species, or at least that's what I liked to teach. Human and Rox-kal could live together in harmony, and from that new species would be born. One planet then another, and eventually new species peppered their confederation. Their allegiance never wavered, so long as they were part Rox-kal. That was how it should have been. Earth proved no harder to defeat than any other planet. We sent out an armada of hastily assembled spacecraft to be dismantled just as quickly. Limbs rained upon Earth in the aftermath. A grisly scene, to be sure, but one that sent the intended message. I had never seen anything of the sort. The delegates came forth offering our conditional surrender. We humans were not to be enslaved, the delegates insisted. The Rox-kal agreed, because they had no need for slavery. They had no over-arching goal beyond conquest. Their planet, from travelers' rumors, had a wealth beyond our wildest imaginations. For good measure, because the bitter taste of defeat sometimes lingered, they leveled a handful of cities, claiming the rights that victors have. We looked on, accepting and remembering, and promising retribution. The history went no further. From there, the lessons turned to now, right here on Earth. There was little question of where things were heading. Underground, where the passing Rox-kal couldn't see, arsenals were accumulated and minds were indoctrinated. For the best, I was sure, because I had seen the power of the Rox-kal. It was from the ashes that the humans rose, as we always did. Renewed, more than reborn. "Not revenge," I explained to the class of recruits. Young blood, just twelve years old, the lot of them. All pure-bred, because the mixed breed Rox-kal were far too loyal to be trusted. "Retribution." "The difference, Professor?" one of them piped up. A scrawny boy. They were all scrawny, but he lagged even behind the others. What he lacked in body, he made up for in spirit, and I smiled at his question. Talos was his name, if I remembered correctly. It was hard, so many children having passed through the room. But I would remember him, I was sure of it. "We aren't lashing out," I explained, continuing to the next slide. "This isn't about the armada," and they gasped at the destruction the Rox-kal had caused. "This isn't about New York. Or Beijing. Or Sydney." Three more slides, and by the third they gasped no more. Flattened cities, because that was the power of the Rox-kal. "Retribution is different. Retribution seeks justice, not just pain upon the Rox-kal. Retribution seeks to right the wrongs that they have committed, not to respond with wrongs of our own." I paced as I spoke, but my eyes remained fixed on his slender frame. The boy nodded in understanding, and I smiled. Inquisitive minds made the best officers. I had seen that over the years. Yes-men mindlessly following instructions were what had kept us tethered, resigned to the Earth and to only the least bit of intergalactic exploration. We hadn't been able to fight the Rox-kal. They made examples of some cities, a fate I was thankfully spared, and then expected us to embrace their conquest. They expected us to assimilate and become them, and more humans did so than I would have liked. But now things were different. Years had passed, and we had progressed. I had seen generations pass through my classroom, and still I taught them history, until we hit the conquest. From there, the past became the present, and the present was perilous. Rebellion and retribution were in the air, and us humans were no longer a defeated species, at least as far as our mindset was concerned. We had a strength they couldn't even begin to understand, and we had the element of surprise to our advantage. ***** Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!
[WP] Humans are not, in fact, space orcs. As it turns out, they are more like space elves to the other races of the galaxy.	We had always assumed that we would find wisdom in the stars. There is a profoundness to space, it is for us a humbling experience to look into that neverending blackness and seeing our small insignificant pale blue dot, that "mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam". And surely a superior intelligence than our own, something capable of travelling through the vast, dark expanse of space, must have evolved beyond our petty squabbles over our made up lines in the sand? All our flights of fancy came to an abrupt end when first contact happened. They appeared on our satellites, a fleet that was aiming directly at us without any attempt of communication. We tried sending probes, we tried sending signals in every possible way we could imagine, but they didn't respond nor stop. Until the end we hoped there was just something we were not considering, but their fleet just came at us with senseless violence. They entered our atmosphere and started bombarding anything that looked inhabited, like moths to a flame our night lights became targets for the enemy's ships. We were caught off guard because for us violence is retribution or necessity, or perhaps a consequence of religion or ideology, but this was just savage. And stupid. We were caught by surprise but we were not defenceless, and the gap in technology wasn't as huge as we would have imagined. The enemy's ships were crude, dangerous objects that were barely manuevrable. After the initial shock it didn't take us long to retake control and with the first victories came the first prisoners. We had to know why. Were they refugees? This would explain the ships. Were they Invaders? What could they possibly want that they could not find on an uninhabited planet? So we sent our best ethologists, linguists and diplomats to make sense of the most promising prisoners. The only ones that didn't constantly try to kill their guards. It was two individuals, two humanoid brutish creatures, one the size of an adult gorilla and the other slightly smaller, like a chimpanzee. Instead of hairs their bodies were covered by a thick carapace and plaques of a leathery skin. Their faces were, how to describe this... orcish? Long fangs and a snout like a wild boar and a constant mean look. We tried interacting with them separately, bringing them different foods, water, pictures but... nothing. They refused to interact. As a gesture of goodwill we decided to put both in the same plexiglass prison and try again. And then we learned. The moment they were together they both looked lively again, stared a bit and then charged at each other with their fangs bared. In a minute the fight was over, the bigger one had a foot on the smaller ones neck and slowly and deliberately tore of its limb, unbothered by the other's wails. Then sat on it while chewing on the severed limb. We killed it there and then. And so we did with the rest of their damned race. Whatever these things were, wherever they hailed from, they were no more than savages and a blight to whatever they encountered. Some still hoped in the stars, but even as we have become more bold and started exploring other systems, we realized that the sociality and empathy that characterizes humans are far from a common trait In fact it seems like we are the only species that cherishes arts and culture, that makes complex laws and tries to communicate more with each other than simply what is needed to expand, conquer and reproduce. We are now locked in a forever war with the orcs around us, we are few but we far outcivilize them, and with fates help we will rid the Universe of their blight.	Brindle moved fast and low through the desert waddi, amazingly quiet for her considerable bulk. The searing sun was just setting to the north and the temperature was dropping fast. Though her tough, thick feet still felt the residual heat from the rocks. One hour ago she’d have burned. For the next six hours it was safe enough to move around. The trek to the rumored alien camp should take perhaps two hours, with the same for the return. There were unfortunately no caverns between her surface access and the camp to take refuge in so they had four hours of travel there and back, that left two hours to observe and perhaps contact the strange beings. Of course it all assumed she didn’t get jumped by a Carzoid or fall into a Brekka pit. Brindle shook off those dark thoughts, gripped her spear tightly and kept moving. Carzoids would wisely avoid this area, the Brekka pits that infested this part of the desert were best left alone. Brindle didn’t have that option. The elder council had sent her to scout the strange alien camp. If she could make contact, safely, she was authorized to do that as well. She glanced back at her companion. The bespeckled little male was huffing and puffing trying to keep up. Clutching its pack of books and scientific gear to it’s chest the little thing looked scared as hell, wide eyed with eyes darting here and there nervously. She cursed, not the first time and likely not the last for the councils insane decision to saddle her with this thing. “First time on top you wretched beast?” The male just gulped and nodded, dancing a bit in his soft foot pads. He was probably feeling the heat much worse than she was. “Listen, I expect you will die, but I’ll do my level best to stop that. Just keep your yap shut and do what I say. Walk where I walk and run when I tell you to run.” He nodded quickly and licked his lips. She decided he wasn’t bad looking for a male of the science clan. Not really her type though. Probably didn’t taste good anyway. The science males lived too long and got really tough and stringy. Anyway, they were at least good for advancing knowledge. “We’ll have about two hours for you to gather information and perhaps contact them. Then we have a dangerous trip back. Let’s get on with it.” With that she moved resolutely forward, watching for signs of Brekka and wondering what manner of creature these new aliens were. She hoped they weren’t like the Orcs that burned away their civilization a thousand years ago, enslaved most of her people and drove the rest underground.
[WP] Humans are not, in fact, space orcs. As it turns out, they are more like space elves to the other races of the galaxy.	"Your kind is old, young one. The wisdom that runs through your blood is immense. You should be grateful for that." "I think that xenos blow all this out of proportion. I mean, yeah, we got here before you, but that doesn't make us some "precursors" or something. There's plenty we don't know." "There's wisdom in that. How many of us foolishly believe that we have mastered all that there is? How many of think we have found our final horizons?" "Look, you know I hate talking to you when you get like this. You make it seem like we can do no wrong. Just stop it, okay? Ya know, it gets tiring hearing this from you. I get it; you think we're special. I'm gonna tell you that we're not." The other straightened its seated posture. "No, you are special, and you're too shortsighted to recognize it. You still have contact with your traditions. As barbaric or outdated as you may think them, you still have them. They ground you into a place. They make you into a people. A people that can be separated by gulfs of time, unimaginable to some, and yet still able to communicate with one another. You have longevity not only of body but of mind. Your body is capable of affecting the changes that you wish to see. Capable enough of destruction and cultivation. You are beautiful." "I just don't see it. I'm honestly kinda sorry. Maybe we're looking at two different things." "We do not revere you because you were first or because you are powerful or rich. No, that's not it. You are revered because you serve as a beacon for us all. When you left your homes, you did not abandon yourselves. You took yourselves with you and selfishly made this place into your own image. None of us could conceive this thought. We thought that we must shed who we were to become something else. You thought that you will add to what you were to make yourselves better. You humans are an old soul among ancients." "I guess so. If you say it, it's gotta be true, right? You're the smartest person I know." "I suppose I am. Let me tell you this. You are special because you are you. You are also special because you are a product of wonderful circumstances. You are special because you can pull from the wisdom of your ancestors. You are special because you will pave the way for your descendants. Unlike most of us, you are interconnected to all of this. This grand process is beautiful. That is why you are beautiful."	I'd been raised on the tales just like everyone else. And thoroughly warned against straying too close to the clearing. Many clans had abandoned their homes to avoid the ever encroaching void, but this territory was too hard won for us to give up on it. "It's okay if you just don't step out of the trees" they'd say. Of course they tried not to talk about the hunters or the children who'd dared wander too far only to never to be seen laying motionless at the edge of the clearing. But I was tired of it. We knew that inside that clearing there were warriors that were responsible for the deaths of all who approached, even when in the traditional low stance of a peaceful approach. But I was tired of it. I wasn't going to these strange savages with my weapon displayed lowly and peacefully like the others, making for a fast approach to quickly discuss our intentions. No. I was going to these beasts as a proud warrior of my clan. I raised my arms as I slowly entered the clearing and proudly displayed my hostile intentions.
[WP] Humans are not, in fact, space orcs. As it turns out, they are more like space elves to the other races of the galaxy.	“We’re just entering visual range of the planet now, Captain,” said the conn officer. Captain Milort could never remember their name. “Put it on screen, ensign,” the captain replied. He yawned and took another sip from the tube that delivered his stimulants. He’d been at this for three hours already, and he was getting tired. Still, it was tradition for the captain to be at the helm when first contact was made. At least his commanding officer would be well-rested when she took over. The collective gasps around the bridge as the viewscreen lit up mingled with the stimulants he’d ingested, snapping his attention back to the task at hand. The reports had said the planet was extraordinary. The reports had understated the reality. He doubted the best poets of his species could have done better to capture what he saw. Its orbit, though slightly elliptical, kept it at the average center of the inhabitable zone of the sun it revolved around, which meant the climate would be nearly perfect. The planet’s satellite was nearly a quarter of the size of the planet it orbited, which meant the tidal force would be extreme. Still, it orbited at a distance that would keep that force from doing too much damage to the planet itself. On the night side of the planet, cities glittered like stars. They sprawled and stretched across the available land, shining and bright to ward away the darkness. He could scarcely imagine a species that would be able to produce the sort of devices required to keep a single city fully lit for an entire night, much less an entire planet of them. As they swung around to see the light side, another gasp shuddered its way through him. Instead of the balls of rock and mud that they had found scattered throughout their corner of the galaxy, the planet itself shone. Vibrant greens, deepest blues, tans, whites, and colors his species had no names for spread out before him. Even as the planet turned he could see a plume of steam boiling up from the surface of a gigantic blue ocean, near a small chain of islands. “Survey probes report vulcanism is extreme. It’s quite possible that they experience…” the science officer’s report trailed off, her tail thrashing in violent agitation. Her face and ears twitched with expressions that showed a wide range of emotions, from confusion, to irritation, to naked disbelief. She cleared her throat. “Captain, you will not believe these numbers, but the survey team reported that they recalibrated their probes three times during their time in the system and they remained consistent. It is possible that they experience between 40 and 70 volcanic events per year, with as many major earthquakes per day.” The captain shook his head, and he fought to control his own emotions. Lack of sleep made it very difficult. He blinked the blur of exhaustion out of the corners of his eyes and focused on the science officer. “It’s extreme, but not the most extreme. You’ve met a Terax, surely. Or at least seen them from afar. They’re from a planet that has even more volcanic activity. Covered in poison smog. Remember?” The science officer thought, bringing up an image of a Terax on her terminal to aid her memory. “Oh, yuck. It’s green and lumpy. Are those tusks?” she made a face. “Do you think this species will look similar?” “I find it hard to believe that something as ugly as a Terax would come from a planet that appears so vibrant and colorful,” the captain replied. “But with this much volcanic activity, any native species must be hardy indeed. Probably short-lived, as well.” The science officer turned back to her panels, squinting over them and taking a sip of her own stimulants. She would be relieved in another half hour. The captain silently cursed the promotion, so many years ago, that kept him in this damn chair. He squirmed, trying to get comfortable. His bones were beginning to ache. There was a shift in the viewscreen ahead suddenly, and the ship froze in place facing the planet’s satellite. But for the lack of atmosphere and resultant craters pockmarking the surface, it really did look a lot like home, the captain mused. He shook his head to clear it, looking at the conn station. “Ensign, I didn’t order you to bring us about,” he snapped. “Captain, I-“ the ensign started, but was cut off as a loud buzz of static cut through the ship’s PA. The bridge crew winced collectively at the volume. It was followed by the most beautiful sound the captain had ever heard. There were myths in his culture, and in many others he’d come across, of an elder race of terrifying beauty, who lived several lifetimes, and who sang rather than spoke, their voices so beautiful as to be almost painful. Often, this elder race served one god or another. His species had long since abandoned those old gods and their myths, but still the legends were passed down. Surely, they had been referring to this. As the voice continued, the viewscreen flickered and shifted. The view of the planet’s satellite distorted and was replaced by a sight out of those very same myths. A creature of staggering beauty looked over the bridge crew. Its black hair shone with the light from the small, white room in which it stood. Its skin glowed with that same light, soft and supple, yet displaying muscles beneath that were clenched in anger so plain to see that the captain’s heart quailed. The irises and pupils of its eyes were like black orbs of rage swimming in sclera that formed a sea of perfect white. Its teeth were ivory set in straight rows, something never seen among his own people. It took several moments longer than normal for the translator to parse through the complex and melodic language. When it finally spat out a translation, the words left the captain so terrified that he nearly fainted. The words and the tone were most assuredly angry, and the threat they contained was unmistakable. “Unidentified vessel, we have been tracking you. By entering the heliosphere of the Sol System without an active trade beacon, you are in violation of five different treaties. Our right to defend our sovereign space is well-defined. Your choices are clear. Leave our space immediately, state your business, or you will be destroyed. You have five minutes to respond.” Critiques are always welcome!	I'd been raised on the tales just like everyone else. And thoroughly warned against straying too close to the clearing. Many clans had abandoned their homes to avoid the ever encroaching void, but this territory was too hard won for us to give up on it. "It's okay if you just don't step out of the trees" they'd say. Of course they tried not to talk about the hunters or the children who'd dared wander too far only to never to be seen laying motionless at the edge of the clearing. But I was tired of it. We knew that inside that clearing there were warriors that were responsible for the deaths of all who approached, even when in the traditional low stance of a peaceful approach. But I was tired of it. I wasn't going to these strange savages with my weapon displayed lowly and peacefully like the others, making for a fast approach to quickly discuss our intentions. No. I was going to these beasts as a proud warrior of my clan. I raised my arms as I slowly entered the clearing and proudly displayed my hostile intentions.
[WP] Humans are not, in fact, space orcs. As it turns out, they are more like space elves to the other races of the galaxy.	"Your kind is old, young one. The wisdom that runs through your blood is immense. You should be grateful for that." "I think that xenos blow all this out of proportion. I mean, yeah, we got here before you, but that doesn't make us some "precursors" or something. There's plenty we don't know." "There's wisdom in that. How many of us foolishly believe that we have mastered all that there is? How many of think we have found our final horizons?" "Look, you know I hate talking to you when you get like this. You make it seem like we can do no wrong. Just stop it, okay? Ya know, it gets tiring hearing this from you. I get it; you think we're special. I'm gonna tell you that we're not." The other straightened its seated posture. "No, you are special, and you're too shortsighted to recognize it. You still have contact with your traditions. As barbaric or outdated as you may think them, you still have them. They ground you into a place. They make you into a people. A people that can be separated by gulfs of time, unimaginable to some, and yet still able to communicate with one another. You have longevity not only of body but of mind. Your body is capable of affecting the changes that you wish to see. Capable enough of destruction and cultivation. You are beautiful." "I just don't see it. I'm honestly kinda sorry. Maybe we're looking at two different things." "We do not revere you because you were first or because you are powerful or rich. No, that's not it. You are revered because you serve as a beacon for us all. When you left your homes, you did not abandon yourselves. You took yourselves with you and selfishly made this place into your own image. None of us could conceive this thought. We thought that we must shed who we were to become something else. You thought that you will add to what you were to make yourselves better. You humans are an old soul among ancients." "I guess so. If you say it, it's gotta be true, right? You're the smartest person I know." "I suppose I am. Let me tell you this. You are special because you are you. You are also special because you are a product of wonderful circumstances. You are special because you can pull from the wisdom of your ancestors. You are special because you will pave the way for your descendants. Unlike most of us, you are interconnected to all of this. This grand process is beautiful. That is why you are beautiful."	Rin and me never have gone out this far. The woods were ever expanding as they went off in all directions, such a strange yet beautiful sight. My kin and me moved here a very long time ago but in that time I never could get over the beauty and difference of this land. Days lasted for what felt like weeks back home, the foliage never stopped and there was very little war torn areas. As I was told when I connected to the hive mind this will be are saving grace, a land once inhabited long ago by a mighty society that was roamed by the distant cousin of our predator the orcs. In war they were seen as never ending and sporadic, with each one having a completely independent mind that only moved in sync with others if they had exterior communication. During the war they had dominated entirly by surviving, campaigns that took 8 generations for orcs had the same one tour of their soldiers. They were easily hurt but after around 2 years they would be back in full health again just as strong as before. They one day vanished as their home world was viewed to be empty other than their native species that weren't them. But as me and Rin were just starting to feel lost we found... something. One second she was infront of me then gone. As I panicked as I couldn't see her or feel her tethered by link she came back as just a head protruding from nothing and suspended in the air. "Help!" I heard scream in my head as I rushed forward and suddenly it wasn't night and i was surrounded by in animate objects, but tall hooded figures in what i can only describe as a warriors robe. "Now now, we don't need the rest of your hive spouting off about how the saviors are back. Give it a month for those jolly green slave owners to become a generation of peace time complacency and we'll free your kids kids" I spend the rest of my days in their presence, and never saw them age. They were never cruel, and taught me what it means to be independent and truly sentient. One day they are going to save the world, and one day I hope they share their wisdom from such long lives.
[WP] Humans are not, in fact, space orcs. As it turns out, they are more like space elves to the other races of the galaxy.	“We’re just entering visual range of the planet now, Captain,” said the conn officer. Captain Milort could never remember their name. “Put it on screen, ensign,” the captain replied. He yawned and took another sip from the tube that delivered his stimulants. He’d been at this for three hours already, and he was getting tired. Still, it was tradition for the captain to be at the helm when first contact was made. At least his commanding officer would be well-rested when she took over. The collective gasps around the bridge as the viewscreen lit up mingled with the stimulants he’d ingested, snapping his attention back to the task at hand. The reports had said the planet was extraordinary. The reports had understated the reality. He doubted the best poets of his species could have done better to capture what he saw. Its orbit, though slightly elliptical, kept it at the average center of the inhabitable zone of the sun it revolved around, which meant the climate would be nearly perfect. The planet’s satellite was nearly a quarter of the size of the planet it orbited, which meant the tidal force would be extreme. Still, it orbited at a distance that would keep that force from doing too much damage to the planet itself. On the night side of the planet, cities glittered like stars. They sprawled and stretched across the available land, shining and bright to ward away the darkness. He could scarcely imagine a species that would be able to produce the sort of devices required to keep a single city fully lit for an entire night, much less an entire planet of them. As they swung around to see the light side, another gasp shuddered its way through him. Instead of the balls of rock and mud that they had found scattered throughout their corner of the galaxy, the planet itself shone. Vibrant greens, deepest blues, tans, whites, and colors his species had no names for spread out before him. Even as the planet turned he could see a plume of steam boiling up from the surface of a gigantic blue ocean, near a small chain of islands. “Survey probes report vulcanism is extreme. It’s quite possible that they experience…” the science officer’s report trailed off, her tail thrashing in violent agitation. Her face and ears twitched with expressions that showed a wide range of emotions, from confusion, to irritation, to naked disbelief. She cleared her throat. “Captain, you will not believe these numbers, but the survey team reported that they recalibrated their probes three times during their time in the system and they remained consistent. It is possible that they experience between 40 and 70 volcanic events per year, with as many major earthquakes per day.” The captain shook his head, and he fought to control his own emotions. Lack of sleep made it very difficult. He blinked the blur of exhaustion out of the corners of his eyes and focused on the science officer. “It’s extreme, but not the most extreme. You’ve met a Terax, surely. Or at least seen them from afar. They’re from a planet that has even more volcanic activity. Covered in poison smog. Remember?” The science officer thought, bringing up an image of a Terax on her terminal to aid her memory. “Oh, yuck. It’s green and lumpy. Are those tusks?” she made a face. “Do you think this species will look similar?” “I find it hard to believe that something as ugly as a Terax would come from a planet that appears so vibrant and colorful,” the captain replied. “But with this much volcanic activity, any native species must be hardy indeed. Probably short-lived, as well.” The science officer turned back to her panels, squinting over them and taking a sip of her own stimulants. She would be relieved in another half hour. The captain silently cursed the promotion, so many years ago, that kept him in this damn chair. He squirmed, trying to get comfortable. His bones were beginning to ache. There was a shift in the viewscreen ahead suddenly, and the ship froze in place facing the planet’s satellite. But for the lack of atmosphere and resultant craters pockmarking the surface, it really did look a lot like home, the captain mused. He shook his head to clear it, looking at the conn station. “Ensign, I didn’t order you to bring us about,” he snapped. “Captain, I-“ the ensign started, but was cut off as a loud buzz of static cut through the ship’s PA. The bridge crew winced collectively at the volume. It was followed by the most beautiful sound the captain had ever heard. There were myths in his culture, and in many others he’d come across, of an elder race of terrifying beauty, who lived several lifetimes, and who sang rather than spoke, their voices so beautiful as to be almost painful. Often, this elder race served one god or another. His species had long since abandoned those old gods and their myths, but still the legends were passed down. Surely, they had been referring to this. As the voice continued, the viewscreen flickered and shifted. The view of the planet’s satellite distorted and was replaced by a sight out of those very same myths. A creature of staggering beauty looked over the bridge crew. Its black hair shone with the light from the small, white room in which it stood. Its skin glowed with that same light, soft and supple, yet displaying muscles beneath that were clenched in anger so plain to see that the captain’s heart quailed. The irises and pupils of its eyes were like black orbs of rage swimming in sclera that formed a sea of perfect white. Its teeth were ivory set in straight rows, something never seen among his own people. It took several moments longer than normal for the translator to parse through the complex and melodic language. When it finally spat out a translation, the words left the captain so terrified that he nearly fainted. The words and the tone were most assuredly angry, and the threat they contained was unmistakable. “Unidentified vessel, we have been tracking you. By entering the heliosphere of the Sol System without an active trade beacon, you are in violation of five different treaties. Our right to defend our sovereign space is well-defined. Your choices are clear. Leave our space immediately, state your business, or you will be destroyed. You have five minutes to respond.” Critiques are always welcome!	Rin and me never have gone out this far. The woods were ever expanding as they went off in all directions, such a strange yet beautiful sight. My kin and me moved here a very long time ago but in that time I never could get over the beauty and difference of this land. Days lasted for what felt like weeks back home, the foliage never stopped and there was very little war torn areas. As I was told when I connected to the hive mind this will be are saving grace, a land once inhabited long ago by a mighty society that was roamed by the distant cousin of our predator the orcs. In war they were seen as never ending and sporadic, with each one having a completely independent mind that only moved in sync with others if they had exterior communication. During the war they had dominated entirly by surviving, campaigns that took 8 generations for orcs had the same one tour of their soldiers. They were easily hurt but after around 2 years they would be back in full health again just as strong as before. They one day vanished as their home world was viewed to be empty other than their native species that weren't them. But as me and Rin were just starting to feel lost we found... something. One second she was infront of me then gone. As I panicked as I couldn't see her or feel her tethered by link she came back as just a head protruding from nothing and suspended in the air. "Help!" I heard scream in my head as I rushed forward and suddenly it wasn't night and i was surrounded by in animate objects, but tall hooded figures in what i can only describe as a warriors robe. "Now now, we don't need the rest of your hive spouting off about how the saviors are back. Give it a month for those jolly green slave owners to become a generation of peace time complacency and we'll free your kids kids" I spend the rest of my days in their presence, and never saw them age. They were never cruel, and taught me what it means to be independent and truly sentient. One day they are going to save the world, and one day I hope they share their wisdom from such long lives.
[WP] As part of a bet made between them, you were suddenly bit by a werewolf, a zombie, and a vampire at the same time. Now they're eagerly stalking you to see what you become.	"I am telling you, he will become a vempire. My venom destroys the bone marrow tissue. What ever thing you have, it won't have blood to infest." The human was layed on a bed. On top of her stood three figures she could not recognize. The first one, the one that just talked, was a high, pale man. He wore a black suit, white shirt and a red tie. If not to his hight or to his shining white skin color, you could have thought he was a salesman. His hair was brushed and jelled tidly, in a way that made you a bit uncomfortable. He was a vempire. The second one was a teenage girl. At first notice she looked normal. Her heavy makeup hid anything unatrual and her ripped clothes could be disguised as a trend. But there was a limit on what tons of makeup, deordorant and perfume could cover. A sneak look in the holes in the clothes revealed green rot or red flesh, and a little sniff exposed the terrible smell of death. She was a zombie. The third one was a man. Unlike the previous two, nothing could tell he wasn't a human. He wore a simple lumberjack outfit that complimented his muscles. But that was because the four were inside his basement, after he changed his clothes and shook off remains of thick, long hair. He was a werewolf. "so what? My infested mucus doesn't need any blood. Just like rabies, it goes through torn nerves, and not through the bloodstream, heading straight to the brain." the girl said this smuggly. They were true, but she wasn't sure, and she couldn't let the others know this. "while I do need the blood, your venom is not fast enough. I need only ten minutes before my carcinogenic affects the hair cells and, well, carcins them. Infact, it is faster than mucus, too, so I surely will win." the lumberjack felt a bit uncomfortable. While the process itself was true, he had no idea if a couple of minutes, or even a couple of days, were indeed enough. The three looked down to the human and saw no reaction. Transformation takes time, sure, but the recruiters usually wake up after being bitten. Infact, most of them don't even lose conciosness. It has been an hour of akward silence before the salesman finally spoke up. "I don't want to be the one to admit it, but perhaps we are all wrong." "What do you mean?" "I mean the human died."	\[Poem\] &#x200B; One day I went to have a walk, and unknown was the path to me. I heard some chatter, hidden talk, when sprung up monsters numbering three. &#x200B; A werewolf covered in furry hair. A zombie whose brains were hanging free. A vampire whose fangs were clearly there. Those were the beasts who now faced me. &#x200B; All together those three worked, grabbing hold and taking bite. I tried to twist and kick and jerk, Outnumbered, though, I lost the fight. &#x200B; All did watch with bated breath, as writhe and scream and flail did I. I felt the darkness, awaited death, til up I rose with beady eyes. &#x200B; "No! Not that!" They yelled and scattered, running, flying, and hobbling away. With booming voice and suit untattered, I yelled "AUDI SALE! ONLY TODAY!!"
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	“Welcome, to the Afterlife! I will be your host, the Creator Of The Universe himself, Gosmo!” I stood in shock. I was floating around in a sparkly white abyss. I tried to remember what happened moments before I got here. Right... I think I died. Well, it’s quite likely, as this dude right in front of me just said I was in the Afterlife. But that made no sense. Where was God? Or Jesus? I’ve never heard of any deity named Gosmo before. Was I dreaming? “Um, I’m sorry,” I said, confused, “who are you?” I watched nervously as Gosmo clenched his feathery fist. For some reason, his body was covered in shiny, rainbow-like feathers, and his face was that of a crow, though the rest of his body was humanoid. His fist shook, trembled even, as if he was holding back a terrible anger. Suddenly, he began to shout. “Oh for my sake!” Gosmo erupted, “It’s been how long?! Millions of years?! Billions?! Billions since I brought life into existence. And the one species I create that even tries to question if they have a god hasn’t even heard of me! I’ve left so many clues! You know crows?! Birds?! You ever heard of birds?!” I floated away from Gosmo, trembling. Who knew what kinds of things could happen when a god threw a fit? I took a deep breath. I searched in my mind for an answer. Do I answer his question about birds? Do I apologize for even asking who he is? I began to stammer aloud, trying to find a good response. “Um, well, yeah I’ve heard of,” I swallowed, “heard of birds. We just, well, uh, never thought of crows as holy figures. We usually see doves that way.” “DOVES?!” The deity screamed. “I’m sorry,” I murmured. “I just, I can’t, believe this!” Gosmo cried in outrage, “Do you know how long it took for me to make your world? To make life? To make you?” “Well, we thought seven days—“ “SEVEN DAYS?!” Gosmo exclaimed, surprised, “Are you insane? I literally made life itself. How would that only take seven days? I had to make every little thing perfect, every food web and chain, every single body system, every individual cell! And you thought that took seven days?!” I blinked, dumbfounded. I never thought I’d be told off by god himself before. I couldn’t even speak, his shouting struck so hard. What response could I give? It seems everything I said only made him more angry. So I just kept my mouth shut and waited. “You know what? Forget it. Forget it!” Gosmo finally said, “Here. Let me guide you to the Afterlife. Would you prefer your own private room, or would you like to share?” “I think I’m fine sharing, for now,” I answered awkwardly. “Wonderful,” Gosmo responded monotonously, his energy seemingly drained from him. He snapped, and suddenly, I was surrounded by beautiful colors. Everywhere I turned I gasped in awe at what I saw. Beautiful waterfalls, mountains that kissed the sky, and even the ground I now stood on was soft and comfortable. It was impossible to capture the beauty of everything around me in mere words. There were even colors around me that couldn’t be put into words. “Enjoy your stay,” Gosmo said, turning to me, “you’re probably here forever, after all. Make sure to remember my name at least by the time you get in your room.” I was handed a shiny silver key, and with that, Gosmo vanished. I sighed, and walked into the building ahead of me. I thought that when I died, I’d be greeted by a smiling god who would welcome me with open arms. I guess this is good too, though. Kinda.	My head was pounding, I felt like I had been thrown through a window. As I opened my eyes, it turns out, that was exactly what had happened. I laid there on the pavement, bathing in what seemed to be a pool of my own blood. I lifted my head and saw my car, a green 2003 impala I bought when I was in high school, wrapped around a large oak tree. I laid my head back down on the pavement and looked up at the sky. It was another gray day in Ohio. I smirked. Suddenly a strange feeling engulfed my body. The sky I was looking at seemed to get brighter and brighter. Soon it was unbearable to keep my eyes open, and they slammed shut. Just as my eyes closed, I felt as if I was falling, I opened my eyes to see that I was. Normally I would be scared about falling, but, there was something oddly comforting about this situation. This felt like less of a fall, and more of a gentle glide. I observed my surroundings. Nothing. I was gliding through a white void. “Hello?” I called out. “Hello, Benjamin.” I heard a voice come from all around me as my glide began to stop. I leveled myself out and landed on, well, something solid. It was hard to tell what anything was in this void of white. I looked around in the void for something, when I heard a \Click!\ come from behind me. I turned and there was a red door. I approached the door. The only logical thing to do in a time like this was to open it. The red door led to an office, and there behind the desk was a chair. The chair and whomever was sitting in it was turned away looking out the window in the back of the office. The same voice I heard as I was falling came from the chair as the man in it said, “Take a seat, Mr.Smith.” I walked in and took the seat across the desk from his, as the large chair swivels around to reveal a tall man, with stark white hair, cleanly shaven, a black pinstripe suit, and thin glasses perched on his long, thin nose. “Good morning,” He said as he crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “I am known as Simply, The Maker,” The man grinned, “I suppose you’re wondering why you’re here?” I leaned forward in my chair “Yea, sure.” The man chuckled and removed his glasses, “My boy! I hate to break it to you, But you’re dead!” My heart sank, but plainly I replied, “Yea, I kinda figured as much.” The smile left the man’s face, “Oh, Um, heh, Not really the reaction I get when I tell people they’re dead…” I rolled my eyes, “What am I doing here anyway? Is this heaven or something?” The man let out a sigh, “No… This isn’t Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, Olympus, Valhalla, the Promised Land, etcetera etcetera. This is the space outside of my universe! You know, the one I created, and the one you lived in?” I scratched my head, all of this was confusing. “That’s cool,” I said, “But like, when can i just get on with being dead?” The man behind the desk looked puzzled, “You’re serious?” He replied, “You’re met with the creator of your very life, and all you want to do is just be dead? Not ask why I did it? Or, or, How??” I Looked the man in the eye, “I mean, Yea?” The man had no words, he just snapped his fingers. My body began to turn to dust, starting with my feet, and going up to my torso. This was it, final death. “Hey man?” I said before the upper half of my body disappeared. “Yes? What is it?” He seemed happy to know someone finally wanted to ask him something. My eyes were locked on his and I said my final words as my head disappeared, “You’re a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitch.”
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	“Welcome, to the Afterlife! I will be your host, the Creator Of The Universe himself, Gosmo!” I stood in shock. I was floating around in a sparkly white abyss. I tried to remember what happened moments before I got here. Right... I think I died. Well, it’s quite likely, as this dude right in front of me just said I was in the Afterlife. But that made no sense. Where was God? Or Jesus? I’ve never heard of any deity named Gosmo before. Was I dreaming? “Um, I’m sorry,” I said, confused, “who are you?” I watched nervously as Gosmo clenched his feathery fist. For some reason, his body was covered in shiny, rainbow-like feathers, and his face was that of a crow, though the rest of his body was humanoid. His fist shook, trembled even, as if he was holding back a terrible anger. Suddenly, he began to shout. “Oh for my sake!” Gosmo erupted, “It’s been how long?! Millions of years?! Billions?! Billions since I brought life into existence. And the one species I create that even tries to question if they have a god hasn’t even heard of me! I’ve left so many clues! You know crows?! Birds?! You ever heard of birds?!” I floated away from Gosmo, trembling. Who knew what kinds of things could happen when a god threw a fit? I took a deep breath. I searched in my mind for an answer. Do I answer his question about birds? Do I apologize for even asking who he is? I began to stammer aloud, trying to find a good response. “Um, well, yeah I’ve heard of,” I swallowed, “heard of birds. We just, well, uh, never thought of crows as holy figures. We usually see doves that way.” “DOVES?!” The deity screamed. “I’m sorry,” I murmured. “I just, I can’t, believe this!” Gosmo cried in outrage, “Do you know how long it took for me to make your world? To make life? To make you?” “Well, we thought seven days—“ “SEVEN DAYS?!” Gosmo exclaimed, surprised, “Are you insane? I literally made life itself. How would that only take seven days? I had to make every little thing perfect, every food web and chain, every single body system, every individual cell! And you thought that took seven days?!” I blinked, dumbfounded. I never thought I’d be told off by god himself before. I couldn’t even speak, his shouting struck so hard. What response could I give? It seems everything I said only made him more angry. So I just kept my mouth shut and waited. “You know what? Forget it. Forget it!” Gosmo finally said, “Here. Let me guide you to the Afterlife. Would you prefer your own private room, or would you like to share?” “I think I’m fine sharing, for now,” I answered awkwardly. “Wonderful,” Gosmo responded monotonously, his energy seemingly drained from him. He snapped, and suddenly, I was surrounded by beautiful colors. Everywhere I turned I gasped in awe at what I saw. Beautiful waterfalls, mountains that kissed the sky, and even the ground I now stood on was soft and comfortable. It was impossible to capture the beauty of everything around me in mere words. There were even colors around me that couldn’t be put into words. “Enjoy your stay,” Gosmo said, turning to me, “you’re probably here forever, after all. Make sure to remember my name at least by the time you get in your room.” I was handed a shiny silver key, and with that, Gosmo vanished. I sighed, and walked into the building ahead of me. I thought that when I died, I’d be greeted by a smiling god who would welcome me with open arms. I guess this is good too, though. Kinda.	[Poem] Through ruthless descent, I’ve born Charon’s burden Awakened in Elysium with the unknown Lord I’ve tossed and turned, pinched myself: no reward But discovered instead: my life is no virgin So I am shaken, by crisis’ melody, Glaring expectance: “Don’t you know me?” Turin torn asunder; this is no God of mine Fearing oblivion do I reply: “No, and I know not why.” Grief, frustration, at lacking his fame And I, mortal dumbfound “Could he be the same?” Would true omnipotence desire such shame? It lies beyond reason, but always did anyway “Recognition your coin? When the world’s your mint?” Freshly weary, he then set it all straight “You’re of my image, and I am no saint.” “Then understand my state, without any hints.” I basked just then in Satyr’s glow, though I spoke in truth, without any jest He bore down in short: “The worthy would know.” “Then call me unworthy; I’ve failed your quest.” A crackling papyrus unrolled my fate; “Then, lost lamb, I bid you return.” My befuddlement must’ve beckoned him state: “To the prison of flesh, 80 years you’ve earned.” Yet it all begged the question: “You knew, so why emote?” “You mean to ask, why I felt annoyed?” And baring his neck, ripped open a void “Forgetfulness follows, so listen clear: emotion was born without any vote.”
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	Death. One word, five letters and a yawning chasm of uncertainty and possibility. Matt knew he was dead even before the car's lights and tires' screeches alerted him to the eventuality. Don't ask him now; call it divine premonition or just plain, simple relief. Life had been a fickle mistress in his 58 years of existence. Never excelling at any one thing; never in the upper echelons of anything. Matt was a middling man in all aspects, completely unremarkable with no discernible traits or features. That's what made him sad - it's not that he'd wasted his potential, which is the regret of so many of us who go on this journey. It's that he never had any in the first place. He had lived his life exactly as it had been pre-ordained for him. He left behind his mother and no one else. She'd be upset, of course, but would she be grief-stricken? Unable to function? Matt didn't think so. She had a life and a social circle beyond him. They had never had the warmth and intimacy that the relationship decreed. Perhaps because of his extraordinary plain-ness. Anyway, Matt thought as he saw a similarly middling man approach him, that's in the past. Let me live to my fullest during death. The man wore a checkered shirt, tucked into corduroys. He was balding heavily and the stench of cigarettes emanated from him, even at a distance. As he came closer, Matt could see what he thought (hoped) was dried ketchup on his shirt. He held out a hand and smiled a smile lacking in any colour or life and said: 'You must be Matt. Welcome to the after-life. I'm John, the Creator-in-Chief of the Earth Empire. Let me show you around.' He started shuffling away without a second glance at Matt. Matt stopped dead in his tracks. What the fuck is a 'Creator-in-Chief'? Does he mean... God? This... unremarkable, sallow-faced man is God?! 'You're God?' Matt exclaimed, in clear disbelief. John stopped and his shoulders slumped. He did not need to turn around for Matt to know the pain etched across his face. He had evidently been asked this question before, several times. 'Yes, in common lingo, I'm what humans refer to as God. Same set of duties, responsibilities etc etc etc.' 'But you're so -' 'Plain? Boring? Dull? Average? Mediocre?' Matt didn't finish his sentence. 'Do you want to know something? You are the 112,104,756,387th person that I've met here, in this exact spot. About 98.7% of those have had the exact same or an iteration of the reaction that you have had. Do you know how fucking entitled and arrogant you have to be to assume a welcoming party and a benevolent, handsome, omnipotent Creator? I mean, for what? Your death? Something that literally every living thing on this planet will experience? You're not special, Matt. Ouch, thought Matt. No need for that. 'No need for that? Seriously? Do you know what it is like being me? I have been working, non-stop, for 5 billion years. I have seen every single human being that has ever walked Earth in here. Spoken to them. Heard what they have to say? Did anyone want to hear from me? Does anyone even ask about how I came to be in the position that I am? No. All anyone cares about is heaven and all the nonsense stories they fill your head with on Earth. Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, Matt. You take what you get. With that, John stormed away, clearly expecting Matt to follow and keep pace. Matt, as usual, followed, looking sheepish and meek.	[Poem] Through ruthless descent, I’ve born Charon’s burden Awakened in Elysium with the unknown Lord I’ve tossed and turned, pinched myself: no reward But discovered instead: my life is no virgin So I am shaken, by crisis’ melody, Glaring expectance: “Don’t you know me?” Turin torn asunder; this is no God of mine Fearing oblivion do I reply: “No, and I know not why.” Grief, frustration, at lacking his fame And I, mortal dumbfound “Could he be the same?” Would true omnipotence desire such shame? It lies beyond reason, but always did anyway “Recognition your coin? When the world’s your mint?” Freshly weary, he then set it all straight “You’re of my image, and I am no saint.” “Then understand my state, without any hints.” I basked just then in Satyr’s glow, though I spoke in truth, without any jest He bore down in short: “The worthy would know.” “Then call me unworthy; I’ve failed your quest.” A crackling papyrus unrolled my fate; “Then, lost lamb, I bid you return.” My befuddlement must’ve beckoned him state: “To the prison of flesh, 80 years you’ve earned.” Yet it all begged the question: “You knew, so why emote?” “You mean to ask, why I felt annoyed?” And baring his neck, ripped open a void “Forgetfulness follows, so listen clear: emotion was born without any vote.”
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	"Come on, you've surely heard of me!" "Not at all." "You and the rest of em, I guess." "What was the name again?" "ARE YOU SERIOUS WE'VE GONE OVER THIS 3 TIMES NOW. Ahem. My name, not that anyone I've greeted here has heard somehow, is Lumaponysus." "Okay... Luma? Where am I and why am I here?" "You've finally met your end on Earth - personally my favorite of my projects - Anyway, I'm here to guide you through the choices." "Choices? What kind?" "Well, people of this particular universe get to choose of 4 options, but you nor I will know what they are until we examine your level. This level is determined by 3 factors. It used to be 2, but I've grown frustrated with the lack of worship I've received." "Does that mean I have to pray to you or something?" "No, but first here are the factors: What you did to progress human evolution, how kind you were to humans and other species, and if you remember my name. Lucky for you, I've already determined you've scored terribly low on the first, though it's common. And you've scored in the 40th percentile for the second. All you have to do now is tell me my name." "Uhh... Let me think.... Kronos, right?" Luma sighs in disappointment as he did billions of times before. "Let's just start over..." End. Thanks for reading! This is my first wp response so constructive criticism is appreciated! If you want more I have a subreddit where I may post more to the story if it gets attention. /r/StebStories	[Poem] Through ruthless descent, I’ve born Charon’s burden Awakened in Elysium with the unknown Lord I’ve tossed and turned, pinched myself: no reward But discovered instead: my life is no virgin So I am shaken, by crisis’ melody, Glaring expectance: “Don’t you know me?” Turin torn asunder; this is no God of mine Fearing oblivion do I reply: “No, and I know not why.” Grief, frustration, at lacking his fame And I, mortal dumbfound “Could he be the same?” Would true omnipotence desire such shame? It lies beyond reason, but always did anyway “Recognition your coin? When the world’s your mint?” Freshly weary, he then set it all straight “You’re of my image, and I am no saint.” “Then understand my state, without any hints.” I basked just then in Satyr’s glow, though I spoke in truth, without any jest He bore down in short: “The worthy would know.” “Then call me unworthy; I’ve failed your quest.” A crackling papyrus unrolled my fate; “Then, lost lamb, I bid you return.” My befuddlement must’ve beckoned him state: “To the prison of flesh, 80 years you’ve earned.” Yet it all begged the question: “You knew, so why emote?” “You mean to ask, why I felt annoyed?” And baring his neck, ripped open a void “Forgetfulness follows, so listen clear: emotion was born without any vote.”
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	Death. One word, five letters and a yawning chasm of uncertainty and possibility. Matt knew he was dead even before the car's lights and tires' screeches alerted him to the eventuality. Don't ask him now; call it divine premonition or just plain, simple relief. Life had been a fickle mistress in his 58 years of existence. Never excelling at any one thing; never in the upper echelons of anything. Matt was a middling man in all aspects, completely unremarkable with no discernible traits or features. That's what made him sad - it's not that he'd wasted his potential, which is the regret of so many of us who go on this journey. It's that he never had any in the first place. He had lived his life exactly as it had been pre-ordained for him. He left behind his mother and no one else. She'd be upset, of course, but would she be grief-stricken? Unable to function? Matt didn't think so. She had a life and a social circle beyond him. They had never had the warmth and intimacy that the relationship decreed. Perhaps because of his extraordinary plain-ness. Anyway, Matt thought as he saw a similarly middling man approach him, that's in the past. Let me live to my fullest during death. The man wore a checkered shirt, tucked into corduroys. He was balding heavily and the stench of cigarettes emanated from him, even at a distance. As he came closer, Matt could see what he thought (hoped) was dried ketchup on his shirt. He held out a hand and smiled a smile lacking in any colour or life and said: 'You must be Matt. Welcome to the after-life. I'm John, the Creator-in-Chief of the Earth Empire. Let me show you around.' He started shuffling away without a second glance at Matt. Matt stopped dead in his tracks. What the fuck is a 'Creator-in-Chief'? Does he mean... God? This... unremarkable, sallow-faced man is God?! 'You're God?' Matt exclaimed, in clear disbelief. John stopped and his shoulders slumped. He did not need to turn around for Matt to know the pain etched across his face. He had evidently been asked this question before, several times. 'Yes, in common lingo, I'm what humans refer to as God. Same set of duties, responsibilities etc etc etc.' 'But you're so -' 'Plain? Boring? Dull? Average? Mediocre?' Matt didn't finish his sentence. 'Do you want to know something? You are the 112,104,756,387th person that I've met here, in this exact spot. About 98.7% of those have had the exact same or an iteration of the reaction that you have had. Do you know how fucking entitled and arrogant you have to be to assume a welcoming party and a benevolent, handsome, omnipotent Creator? I mean, for what? Your death? Something that literally every living thing on this planet will experience? You're not special, Matt. Ouch, thought Matt. No need for that. 'No need for that? Seriously? Do you know what it is like being me? I have been working, non-stop, for 5 billion years. I have seen every single human being that has ever walked Earth in here. Spoken to them. Heard what they have to say? Did anyone want to hear from me? Does anyone even ask about how I came to be in the position that I am? No. All anyone cares about is heaven and all the nonsense stories they fill your head with on Earth. Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, Matt. You take what you get. With that, John stormed away, clearly expecting Matt to follow and keep pace. Matt, as usual, followed, looking sheepish and meek.	You stare at each other. Of course, you are extremely confused as to who they are. You ask for a name and they give you that name. You recognize the name. You don't know where until you realize. All that background noise you hear has been their name. You can't recall what their name is but you know exactly what their name is. The moment makes you feel as if your body is being distorted by a dark void and then you realize. They are no long There anymore. You are no longer there anymore. You are now part of the screaming souls in that body who knew too much. "Finally, my hunger is quenched."
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	"Come on, you've surely heard of me!" "Not at all." "You and the rest of em, I guess." "What was the name again?" "ARE YOU SERIOUS WE'VE GONE OVER THIS 3 TIMES NOW. Ahem. My name, not that anyone I've greeted here has heard somehow, is Lumaponysus." "Okay... Luma? Where am I and why am I here?" "You've finally met your end on Earth - personally my favorite of my projects - Anyway, I'm here to guide you through the choices." "Choices? What kind?" "Well, people of this particular universe get to choose of 4 options, but you nor I will know what they are until we examine your level. This level is determined by 3 factors. It used to be 2, but I've grown frustrated with the lack of worship I've received." "Does that mean I have to pray to you or something?" "No, but first here are the factors: What you did to progress human evolution, how kind you were to humans and other species, and if you remember my name. Lucky for you, I've already determined you've scored terribly low on the first, though it's common. And you've scored in the 40th percentile for the second. All you have to do now is tell me my name." "Uhh... Let me think.... Kronos, right?" Luma sighs in disappointment as he did billions of times before. "Let's just start over..." End. Thanks for reading! This is my first wp response so constructive criticism is appreciated! If you want more I have a subreddit where I may post more to the story if it gets attention. /r/StebStories	You stare at each other. Of course, you are extremely confused as to who they are. You ask for a name and they give you that name. You recognize the name. You don't know where until you realize. All that background noise you hear has been their name. You can't recall what their name is but you know exactly what their name is. The moment makes you feel as if your body is being distorted by a dark void and then you realize. They are no long There anymore. You are no longer there anymore. You are now part of the screaming souls in that body who knew too much. "Finally, my hunger is quenched."
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	Nothingness. Empty, white nothingness. That's all death was. No angels singing, no dead loved ones there to greet you at the end. Not even a t-shirt that said "I went to Earth and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.". "Hello Michael," a voice said. "Hello?" I turned around. An old man sat on a white bench, in white overalls. "I'm Bob." "Bob?" I repeated mutely. "I'm sorry to break it to you Mike but.. well you're dead." "Oh, wow that's... unexpected." "It usually is," Bob shrugged. "Who are you again?" "I'm Bob," Bob sighed. "Right, yeah okay. But... who are you?" "You know I've got to say Mike, I'm starting to get a little peeved off with that question. I mean is it so much to ask for a little gratitude, a little - oh I don't know sacrificial worship every now and again? I mean I did create the entire bloody universe, you know." "Wait, you're God?" "No, I'm Bob." "Right but you're God, right?" "I am a god, in fact I'm THE God, but I'm not THAT God." "Oh," I scratched my head, starting to get a headache. "Look do you want to learn the secret to eternal peace or not?" Bob asked, rather flustered. "I mean... sure, why not." I shrugged, non-committed. "I'm sorry, I did just offer you the secret to eternal peace, what's the problem?" "...well it's just a bit, underwhelming that's all." "What do you mean underwhelming? I'm bloody god, for god's sake." "Hah! So there is a God!" "It's an expression, you plonker! Were you born backwards or something?!" "I don't suppose you've got anything to eat around here have you?" Mike asked, completely throwing the conversation. "I'm right peckish." "No I do not have any food. This is the afterlife, not a celestial drive-through. There's no food in the afterlife; just an eternity of nothingness and me." "Alright, look can we just get on with this? I've got things to do." "What could you possibly have to do?" "I'm sure, there's something I could be doing besides standing around here all day. I could be watering some plants." "Right that's it. I'm sending you back." "What do you mean back?" "To Earth, I can't have you up here. You're making me depressed. You'll have to be reincarnated as something. What's your favorite animal?" "I've always liked Ardvarks, myself. What with those funny-like tongues of theirs." "Right, an anteater it is then. And Mike, do me a favor." "What's that?" "Send the next person in on your way out." Bob snapped his fingers. [Check out more of my stories on my subreddit](https://www.reddit.com/user/wolfbeaumont)	You stare at each other. Of course, you are extremely confused as to who they are. You ask for a name and they give you that name. You recognize the name. You don't know where until you realize. All that background noise you hear has been their name. You can't recall what their name is but you know exactly what their name is. The moment makes you feel as if your body is being distorted by a dark void and then you realize. They are no long There anymore. You are no longer there anymore. You are now part of the screaming souls in that body who knew too much. "Finally, my hunger is quenched."
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	Death is a deep sparkling abyss, opening its arms to me. It cups me in a cool and total darkness that I think is now my forever. I am surprised to find I even have any thoughts left at all, but maybe it's the brain death. Those last few minutes before all the oxygenated blood leaves your brain. But the darkness breaks in a crackle of overhead light. Snow sprinkles down from above. It flecks in my eyes, and I realize I still have a body. Or maybe I haven't had one until that moment. I can't tell. A full beam of light stabs the dark. My little corner of death looks like an animal's den in the light. I gape around, trying to make sense of how I hadn't been able to feel any of it. How existence can happen to me again, just that abruptly. A shovel sticks out of the hole in the ceiling. Then, it retreats, and a merry face appears in its place. An old woman beams through the hole, her grey hair messy bun atop her head. She wears goggles, snow-flecked and foggy with effort. "Hello down there! I hope your transition went nicely." I stare, warily. Don't move. "Who are you?" The woman's easygoing smile evaporates, instantly. "Oh, fucking brilliant. That's it. I've had it. You're all done with me? Fine, fine." She leans back out of the hole. Her voice continues from out of sight, "You can stay here then!" I run forward and tilt my head up to see an infinite grey sky overhead. Then the shovel flashes across the opening of the hole, and snow plunges through, smacking me in the face. I shiver and yelp at the sudden cold. Yes. That's real too. All of this is real. And this damn crazy lady is burying me again. "Wait!" I cry. "What are you doing?" "I just told you. Ungrateful children." She is just a fist-sized version of herself, grumbling through what light was left. Sudden fear chokes me. I was at peace with the darkness when I thought that was all there was. "Please, don't go! I know who you are." The old woman pauses. She presses a single arm into the hole and clears a space in the snow just big enough for the oval of her face to show through. "And who," she demands, sarcastically, "am I?" And even as I stare, I don't have a good answer. She looks so ordinary. She could be any old grandma in line at the grocery store. My mind reels, finding answers. I was a journalist when I was alive, and the knack stayed with me. I read the look on her face. The gaps between her words. "You're the reason I'm here," I say, uncertainly. The old woman hesitates, debating this. Then she smiles. "Oh, kid. I can see through that damn head like a fishbowl. I know you've no idea what's going on. But that was good lie. Step back, now." Part of me wants to reply sixty-seven is no kid, but I scurry back as far as the walls of my little cave will let me. With a fierce kick, the old woman punches out a gap in the snow big enough for me to crawl through. "Be careful coming out," she says. "We're on top of the universe." The air stairsteps itself, going impossibly solid to let me climb out of the darkness. I blink around. We stand upon an iceberg suspended in a sea of stars. There is no sun, and yet light permeates everywhere. The night carries on forever below us. Down down down. I have the insane urge to jump into it. I clutch the old woman's hand without quite realizing. "Yes," she says. "It's quite a rush of vertigo." The irritation on her face softens. "Sorry to snap. You're the seven-something-billionth human in a row to say that to me. It wears on a person." "Who are you?" The old woman rolls her eyes, as if it should be obvious. "Only the same damn thing I've been all eternity. I'm the creator." "Of... earth?" Her smile is pitying and patient. She pushes up her goggles. "Of everything." I take a long look at her: the deep lines of her face, the undeniably human eyes. I wasn't spiritual when I died, and I sure am not now. I have no illusions whence humans evolved. "Then how do you look like me?" "Oh, I don't. I look like everything. I am everything." She gives a misty smile. "When your dog Charlie died, I was a dog for him. I didn't have to say anything. Just showed him a bone. And then I was a cat, for Rosie and Lacy and Little Pitts. For the first daughter you lost before she was born, I was just the mother she needed to hold her, one last time." My belly pitches. I blink fast, but I can't hide the emotion. My first child had been old enough for a name and a nursery and a whole imagined future when her little organs went dark. A month later, and it would have been a stillbirth instead of a miscarriage. Tears fight their way out, no matter how hard I try to stop them. "How did you... I don't... why do you do this?" "It's a thank you. For what you've done with the gift I've given you." She squeezes my forearm. "I remember every life. Every sacrifice to the future. Even if none of you do." I wonder how it felt to have a memory that went on forever. I look in the creator's eyes and know she has a mind like the universe below us, just as deep and dark and infinite. I can almost see it churning, stars spinning in her irises. Light dusts over us. I hinge my head back to stare up at the grey sky overhead. The scenes of my life begin to replay themselves for me in the clouds. All those lazy Oregon summers hunting garter snakes in the fields. My first journalism gig, the real thing. The way my mother used to look at me when she thought I wasn't watching. My husband, the first time we held hands. We'd spent hundreds of hours speaking to each other through screens before that moment. How everything shaped itself from there, the uprooted tree of my life taking shape in this new place. Growing. Bearing children. Withering. Dying. I am fully weeping now, but I don't try to stop it. The creator sits beside me, watching me and the sky alike. We are like two dandelion seeds in the wind, about to shake loose. About to make something new. I murmur, "What's next, after this?" "Next? I'll scatter you back into the earth. Carbon into carbon." "Dust into dust." My husband and my children move only in my memories now. Somewhere far below me, they are alive. I imagine I can feel their hearts pulsing in the deep. I wonder what they'll say, when they get here. I wonder what they will see of me. I hope they will find me, there in the star dust. The universe pulses under me. I know it will be time soon. I am running out of memories. Out of my last little strand of time. The creator waits beside me. She is in no rush. She has been waiting sixty-seven years for this day, after all. I suppose so have I. When my existence stops for the last time, I don't feel it at all. *** /r/nickofstatic for serials cowritten with my good friend /u/NickofNight	You stare at each other. Of course, you are extremely confused as to who they are. You ask for a name and they give you that name. You recognize the name. You don't know where until you realize. All that background noise you hear has been their name. You can't recall what their name is but you know exactly what their name is. The moment makes you feel as if your body is being distorted by a dark void and then you realize. They are no long There anymore. You are no longer there anymore. You are now part of the screaming souls in that body who knew too much. "Finally, my hunger is quenched."
[WP] You Have Just Died. Instead Of Meeting God Or Zeus Or Whatever Deity You Thought Ruled The Cosmos, You Meet Some Random Person You've Never Heard Of Before. They Claim To Be The True Creator Of The Universe And Is Getting Increasingly Annoyed That No-One Knows Who They Are	Death is a deep sparkling abyss, opening its arms to me. It cups me in a cool and total darkness that I think is now my forever. I am surprised to find I even have any thoughts left at all, but maybe it's the brain death. Those last few minutes before all the oxygenated blood leaves your brain. But the darkness breaks in a crackle of overhead light. Snow sprinkles down from above. It flecks in my eyes, and I realize I still have a body. Or maybe I haven't had one until that moment. I can't tell. A full beam of light stabs the dark. My little corner of death looks like an animal's den in the light. I gape around, trying to make sense of how I hadn't been able to feel any of it. How existence can happen to me again, just that abruptly. A shovel sticks out of the hole in the ceiling. Then, it retreats, and a merry face appears in its place. An old woman beams through the hole, her grey hair messy bun atop her head. She wears goggles, snow-flecked and foggy with effort. "Hello down there! I hope your transition went nicely." I stare, warily. Don't move. "Who are you?" The woman's easygoing smile evaporates, instantly. "Oh, fucking brilliant. That's it. I've had it. You're all done with me? Fine, fine." She leans back out of the hole. Her voice continues from out of sight, "You can stay here then!" I run forward and tilt my head up to see an infinite grey sky overhead. Then the shovel flashes across the opening of the hole, and snow plunges through, smacking me in the face. I shiver and yelp at the sudden cold. Yes. That's real too. All of this is real. And this damn crazy lady is burying me again. "Wait!" I cry. "What are you doing?" "I just told you. Ungrateful children." She is just a fist-sized version of herself, grumbling through what light was left. Sudden fear chokes me. I was at peace with the darkness when I thought that was all there was. "Please, don't go! I know who you are." The old woman pauses. She presses a single arm into the hole and clears a space in the snow just big enough for the oval of her face to show through. "And who," she demands, sarcastically, "am I?" And even as I stare, I don't have a good answer. She looks so ordinary. She could be any old grandma in line at the grocery store. My mind reels, finding answers. I was a journalist when I was alive, and the knack stayed with me. I read the look on her face. The gaps between her words. "You're the reason I'm here," I say, uncertainly. The old woman hesitates, debating this. Then she smiles. "Oh, kid. I can see through that damn head like a fishbowl. I know you've no idea what's going on. But that was good lie. Step back, now." Part of me wants to reply sixty-seven is no kid, but I scurry back as far as the walls of my little cave will let me. With a fierce kick, the old woman punches out a gap in the snow big enough for me to crawl through. "Be careful coming out," she says. "We're on top of the universe." The air stairsteps itself, going impossibly solid to let me climb out of the darkness. I blink around. We stand upon an iceberg suspended in a sea of stars. There is no sun, and yet light permeates everywhere. The night carries on forever below us. Down down down. I have the insane urge to jump into it. I clutch the old woman's hand without quite realizing. "Yes," she says. "It's quite a rush of vertigo." The irritation on her face softens. "Sorry to snap. You're the seven-something-billionth human in a row to say that to me. It wears on a person." "Who are you?" The old woman rolls her eyes, as if it should be obvious. "Only the same damn thing I've been all eternity. I'm the creator." "Of... earth?" Her smile is pitying and patient. She pushes up her goggles. "Of everything." I take a long look at her: the deep lines of her face, the undeniably human eyes. I wasn't spiritual when I died, and I sure am not now. I have no illusions whence humans evolved. "Then how do you look like me?" "Oh, I don't. I look like everything. I am everything." She gives a misty smile. "When your dog Charlie died, I was a dog for him. I didn't have to say anything. Just showed him a bone. And then I was a cat, for Rosie and Lacy and Little Pitts. For the first daughter you lost before she was born, I was just the mother she needed to hold her, one last time." My belly pitches. I blink fast, but I can't hide the emotion. My first child had been old enough for a name and a nursery and a whole imagined future when her little organs went dark. A month later, and it would have been a stillbirth instead of a miscarriage. Tears fight their way out, no matter how hard I try to stop them. "How did you... I don't... why do you do this?" "It's a thank you. For what you've done with the gift I've given you." She squeezes my forearm. "I remember every life. Every sacrifice to the future. Even if none of you do." I wonder how it felt to have a memory that went on forever. I look in the creator's eyes and know she has a mind like the universe below us, just as deep and dark and infinite. I can almost see it churning, stars spinning in her irises. Light dusts over us. I hinge my head back to stare up at the grey sky overhead. The scenes of my life begin to replay themselves for me in the clouds. All those lazy Oregon summers hunting garter snakes in the fields. My first journalism gig, the real thing. The way my mother used to look at me when she thought I wasn't watching. My husband, the first time we held hands. We'd spent hundreds of hours speaking to each other through screens before that moment. How everything shaped itself from there, the uprooted tree of my life taking shape in this new place. Growing. Bearing children. Withering. Dying. I am fully weeping now, but I don't try to stop it. The creator sits beside me, watching me and the sky alike. We are like two dandelion seeds in the wind, about to shake loose. About to make something new. I murmur, "What's next, after this?" "Next? I'll scatter you back into the earth. Carbon into carbon." "Dust into dust." My husband and my children move only in my memories now. Somewhere far below me, they are alive. I imagine I can feel their hearts pulsing in the deep. I wonder what they'll say, when they get here. I wonder what they will see of me. I hope they will find me, there in the star dust. The universe pulses under me. I know it will be time soon. I am running out of memories. Out of my last little strand of time. The creator waits beside me. She is in no rush. She has been waiting sixty-seven years for this day, after all. I suppose so have I. When my existence stops for the last time, I don't feel it at all. *** /r/nickofstatic for serials cowritten with my good friend /u/NickofNight	Nothingness. Empty, white nothingness. That's all death was. No angels singing, no dead loved ones there to greet you at the end. Not even a t-shirt that said "I went to Earth and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.". "Hello Michael," a voice said. "Hello?" I turned around. An old man sat on a white bench, in white overalls. "I'm Bob." "Bob?" I repeated mutely. "I'm sorry to break it to you Mike but.. well you're dead." "Oh, wow that's... unexpected." "It usually is," Bob shrugged. "Who are you again?" "I'm Bob," Bob sighed. "Right, yeah okay. But... who are you?" "You know I've got to say Mike, I'm starting to get a little peeved off with that question. I mean is it so much to ask for a little gratitude, a little - oh I don't know sacrificial worship every now and again? I mean I did create the entire bloody universe, you know." "Wait, you're God?" "No, I'm Bob." "Right but you're God, right?" "I am a god, in fact I'm THE God, but I'm not THAT God." "Oh," I scratched my head, starting to get a headache. "Look do you want to learn the secret to eternal peace or not?" Bob asked, rather flustered. "I mean... sure, why not." I shrugged, non-committed. "I'm sorry, I did just offer you the secret to eternal peace, what's the problem?" "...well it's just a bit, underwhelming that's all." "What do you mean underwhelming? I'm bloody god, for god's sake." "Hah! So there is a God!" "It's an expression, you plonker! Were you born backwards or something?!" "I don't suppose you've got anything to eat around here have you?" Mike asked, completely throwing the conversation. "I'm right peckish." "No I do not have any food. This is the afterlife, not a celestial drive-through. There's no food in the afterlife; just an eternity of nothingness and me." "Alright, look can we just get on with this? I've got things to do." "What could you possibly have to do?" "I'm sure, there's something I could be doing besides standing around here all day. I could be watering some plants." "Right that's it. I'm sending you back." "What do you mean back?" "To Earth, I can't have you up here. You're making me depressed. You'll have to be reincarnated as something. What's your favorite animal?" "I've always liked Ardvarks, myself. What with those funny-like tongues of theirs." "Right, an anteater it is then. And Mike, do me a favor." "What's that?" "Send the next person in on your way out." Bob snapped his fingers. [Check out more of my stories on my subreddit](https://www.reddit.com/user/wolfbeaumont)
[WP] After your death you go to heaven, which is the place where all of your dreams took place every single night of your life. The moment you get there you see that everyone is really sacred of you. They don't wanna talk and explain - and you, of course, don't remember any of your dreams.	Even though you cannot remember any of your dreams, you somehow know that heaven is the place you had all your dreams when you were alive. You remember dying, the cross on your church fell on you. When you woke up you knew you were in heaven. You died and now here you are. All the denizens of heaven are scared of you. You try to speak to them but they make room like soap in oil. You don't understand how it is you know this place, but cannot remember it, and you get a headache. This is the first time in creation that someone other than God has had a headache in heaven. It seems to break heaven somehow. The pulsing waves in your head are manifesting into tiny shock waves by your feet. You can see the dirt and dust pulse a little as the pain in your head pulses. The pain grows stronger. You are brought to your knees and can only grab your head in futility. The ground around you starts to split and crack and the pulsing pound has become a roaring rush. The shear illogical rules of heaven in which you dream of, but cannot remember, but can, have thrown you into some kind of a feedback loop. The ground crumbles, and the people in heaven fall and perish and die screaming and on fire. and your alarm goes off. You get ready for work and realize you cannot remember what you were dreaming about.	[POEM] Underneath dark death lies grotesque dreams of a devil who could not remember His crimes as God’s chosen. He falls to creation. The mortal sin of no penance for even the most remorseful may forget. If the devil could remember the torture of His dreams, He would bloat like the throat of a frog. He doesn’t deserve heaven. And yet, Peace, Angels, still thy hands and forgive His crimes. God has gone in the darkest times.
[WP] In an alternate universe, magic and technology switch places in every way possible, including history and fiction. People in that universe decide to make a game called: Bunkers and Bases.	"Alright, I set up a holiday themed one-shot, where you get to play evil aligned characters." Torvold said, as he rolled out a sheet of parchment with the outline of a house on it. "Hang on" Tobey said, standing on his chair so he could see better, "I made a tank build and the campaign is just about breaking into a house?" "Not just any house..." Torvold said, " this is one of Lich-Lord Xyxax's own adventures. Its super-punishing, it's the Home of Horrors adventure." Torvold broke into an evil grin, "I wont get into details, but I'll be surprised if either of you make it out alive." "Hang on" Snik, cut in from the third seat at the table "Why are we here? Like, evil campaign cool, but who cares about this house? A house by the way that according to your map is ABSURDLY large." "Loot. It has several VCRs in it." "Umm..." Snik replied, flipping through the Players Tome, "oh! Wow, VCRs are worth like a thousand bucks!" "Wait what?" Torvold replied, "hang on, that book's price is a bit out of date. But sure, if you get out with them I guess I'll let you have that, since it's what's listed." "Okay" Torvold said more loudly, as he turned down the lights, "Let's begin. Your van pulls up to the house on the night of the robbery, go ahead and introduce your characters" Snik tapped his character sheets into alignment before reading "I'm Marv. A human burglar. I have higher Charisma so I can do more of the talking, but I also made sure to get my Constitution high. My saves suck, but I have physical damage resistance, so I think I can survive most things anyways" Tobey looked down at his sheet and started rereading it "I'm playing a human robber named Marv. I dumped Int and Dex to focus on Strength and Con. I have a crowbar, and I have a neat backstory thing. I figure we're robbers, but like all the famous robbers leave calling clues, so after we rob a house, I back up some of their plumbing so it floods. I call us the Wet Bandits!"	I abandoned this half-writing(since I have no knowledge about D&D and got no idea how it works) but I'll just post it here if anyone's intrested: "And everyone, let the game begin" said Mike, or "Chief-Commander",the rulebook said, as he spinned his wand, reveiling a map of an old, deserted bunker. "Soldiers, create your character" he said. "Wait, how did I make it again?" "Read the rulebook, soldier." "Uhh..I this book is longer than what I thought", John said, as he shook his wand to reveal a soldier. "I'll go with infarnyman, armed with a M16, and three grenades. His name is, uhh, kevin". The shilluette of the soldier changed to meet his discription. "That's quite specific, you're quite into "military" stuff, aren't you?" "Yeah, I've read all of tolkien's stuff. Isn't it intresting? A world where science rules the realm. A world where people drive their cars home instead of pegasuses. But I still got no Idea how This game works tho" "I WANT A STRONG CHARACTER!" Yelled trong, an ork. "Seriously. Did you really get an ork to an TRPG game?" "Bruh, that's racist", Mike and John said. "MY CHARACTER IS HECTOR. HE IS SO STRONG, HE CAN THROW A TRUCK, AND HE SLAYS HIS ENEMIES WITH TWO MEGA GUNS!" "Uhh trong, that's not how it works-" "I WANT A STRONG CHARACTER!" He yelled. "Okay, strong character from the start. Only this time. You start from, uhh, strength 10, but also you're getting 0 intelligence, and you can't aim well" "ACCEPTABLE". His board displayed an ripped guy with sunglasses, wielding two miniguns. "You know this really lowers perception, right?" "So..I rather make a balanced character?" Said trine, an elf. "I'll be the medic, since it seems to be the healer of this game." Her board displayed a medic, with a bag with a cross drawn on it. "Okay, let the battle begin. In the middle of WW3, You three just found an abandoned military base. You three go in, just to find an automated drone, armed with an machine g-" "I HIT THE DRONE!" A wheel started to spin, and stopped on a one. "Uhh, you miss. The drone fires at you." "UNACCEPTABLE!" He yelled, striking down the table. Mike said:"john, what do you do?" "I fire my M16 at it" . The wheel stopped on a five. "You take out the drone. You get 16 exp." "Man, wouldn't ot be great to live in a world like this? Instead of goinf to wizard school and learning potions or something,you could learn chemistry or engineering and fight tanks for loot and glory" "don't you think you'll die while doing that?" "Well..they have medical technology! Like our heal magic!" "They still can't revive a dead man." "TECHNOLOGY NO HAVE ORK. TECHNOLOGY ONLY HUMAN. TECHNOLOGY SUCK" "But..still! It would be cool! Would they also have their versions of this game? Like "castles and caves"? "Magic and monsters?" "Dungeons and dragons"?"
[WP] You're the Grim Reaper. When you approach dying people you see a timer and cause of death in text above them, and your x-ray vision always confirms their illnesses. Today seemed normal but the text above the person in front of you says "Death: Cancer, 9 seconds." Problem is that he is healthy.	This shouldn't be happening. I watched as the number counted down. Part of me was horrified; he was completely healthy, there were no signs of any illness. Yet part of me was intrigued. I wanted to see what would happen. Oftentimes we were given more warning when someone died of something like an aneurism or heart attack. We were usually given way more time for cancer, too. So given nine seconds, and a death to cancer? This doesn't make sense. I unfroze time for one second. Inside I watched black tendrils wrap around one of his kidneys. This guy was thirty-two, an analyst, a healthy dad of two. These tendrils were not normal. Two more seconds. The tendrils encompassed his kidney in the first. In the second, tumors started to bud and grow. "Reaper. You have other appointments you must address." One of my associates whispered in my ear. "Not now." I said. "I am unsure what's happening here. It is necessary to investigate." "Understood." And he disappeared. I positioned myself in the empty seat next to the man. He would not see me in any case, but I figured I might as well stay discreet. On the occasion I got too excited, sometimes my form would emanate waves of intimidation, making the room grow cold and fill humans with unease. Two more seconds. Tumors spread in his kidney and metastasized out; they spread into the rest of his torso and up into his lungs and heart, all through his lymphatic system. In the next second, I watched his blood cells, both red and white, atrophy before my eyes. His hand fluttered down to his kidney, and in the eighth second he collapsed out of his chair, clutching the outside of where his kidney was. In the final second, his heart stopped beating. The muscle had atrophied from the toll the tumors took on his body. As his coworkers ran to his side I looked harder. The black tendrils - that only I could see - laced through his veins, turning the whites of his eyes and fingernails black. Black sludge was pouring out of his mouth like drool. Some other human called 911. I stroked his hair and it turned to ash under my fingers. This was strange. But it was not unfamiliar. This was the work of the Life Bringer, my counter. Oftentimes we worked in harmony, as a crucial balance to sustain this planet we served. This was not her job, but it was her message. She was meant to give life. She had given life to this man some time ago. And yet, it was her choice to now reclaim it. I needed to get to the bottom of this. For some reason, she was declaring war on me. &#x200B; \------ Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed that please check out my subreddit /r/ShittyDuckStories	He seemed to be concentrating on something I couldn't decipher. His eyes were shut tightly and there was sweat dotting his brow from some sort of exertion. But he was otherwise completely fine, which was strange considering the fact that he was to die in 9 seconds from cancer. I kneeled down in front of him, gripping the bottom of my scythe. My eyes searched his body, looking for any internal or external sign of the disease. As my eyes roved around carefully, I spot something in both his right knee and upper part of his pelvis. Tumors, large and benign. At least the majority of them were. I cocked my head to the side as the last percentage of them went from cancerous and fatal to minor inconveniences. It was almost as if they were never cancerous in the first place. I looked into his face, finding that his brow was furrowed and more sweat was dripping from his face. I looked above his head and looked at his timer, first in curiosity, then in shock. The clock was moving backward. It went from 9 seconds to almost 4 years. That's when it hit me. This man was healing himself.

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