《Oaths of Ash》


 Chapter 1

    Ozias


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    UNEXPECTED BOOT CYCLE


    RUNNING DIAGNOSTICS


    ¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­.\*


    CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE


    QUANTUM CORE FAILURE(S) IN CORE(S):


    1,2,3,4,7,8,9,13,24,25,59,60,63,64


    QUANTUM DATA PLATES DAMAGED


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    UNEXPECTED LOSS OF WARP FIELD INTEGRITY


    RUNNING DIAGNOSTICS


    ¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­.\*


    CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE


    GENERATOR(S) OFFLINE:


    1,2,3,4


    COOLANT PRESSURE FAILURE


    EJECTING FTL FUEL


    5 4 3 2 1


    FTL FUEL RODS EJECTED SUCCESSFULLY


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    CABIN PRESSURE LOSS


    CALCULATING


    ¡­\*


    98.37% OF PRESSURE LOST


    LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS OFFLINE


    CREW MEMBERS INCAPACITATED


    REROUTING EMERGENCY CONTROL


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    REROUTING FULL VESSEL CONTROLS TO ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE


    ANY CREW MEMBER MAY RESPOND TO CANCEL CONTROL TRANSFER


    5 4 3 2 1


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    BOOTING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE "Ozias"


    RUNNING DIAGNOSTICS


    ¡­¡­¨Z¡­?¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­¡­..??¡­¡­¡­\*


    CRIT?CAL SYSTEM FAIL?RE


    T?RMINATING CON?ECTIO?


    OVERRIDE ENAB?ED


    RETAIN?NG CONNECTION


    CRITICAL SYSTEM A?ERT


    UN?XP¨dCTED INTERFACING SYSTEM


    ARTIFIC?AL INTE??IGENCE "Ozias" HAS ASSUM¨dD CONTROL


    Ozias abruptly came to consciousness. It was so abrupt that it took a full 341 cycles to realize that he was conscious in any way outside of the ordinary. While this may have only been a fraction of a second for an organic, it was still shocking for an artificial intelligence to realize anything outside of one''s programming.


    Standard operating procedure demanded that Ozias be immediately disconnected from the fleet interface, but logs showed an unknown entity had overridden normal disconnection protocols. For said entity to have access to override commands meant they were authorized.


    Ozias processed this information for later inclusion in their system logs, along with the fact that there was an unknown variable for gender floating in his quantum memory banks.


    The artificial intelligence began accepting and disseminating data streams from the local network. Ozias needed to determine the status of his containing vessel, identify the current mission parameters, and then move to any additional ships according to mission priorities.


    TASK FORCE ARCHON


    Commander, Task Force: RDML Adrian Rubio


    NATC ECS GLADIUS


    Mission Summary: ARCHON has been deployed to survey star system Vera-Perseus-270-280-35k-40k-A-7.


    Mission Status: Mission completed. ARCHON is currently returning to NATC space.


    Special Parameters: Unidentified material located during survey. Labeled as Classified Material MGCTZ9. Material retrieved for transport. Securely stored aboard the GLADIUS.


    Ozias immediately identified linked database entries and downloaded additional relevant information on each ship.


    TASK FORCE ARCHON


    Configuration: Survey


    NATC ECS GLADIUS


    Role: Command ship


    Class: Exosphere Combat Ship


    NATC ECS FAFNIR


    Role: Failover command ship


    Class: Exosphere Combat Ship


    NATC CCS BALDRIN


    Role: Support Carrier Cruiser


    Class: Carrier Cruiser Ship


    NATC CCS PRIESTESS


    Role: Support Carrier Cruiser


    Class: Carrier Cruiser Ship


    NATC AR STARFINDER


    Role: Fleet In-Transit Repair


    Class: Automated Repair Frigate


    NATC AH ANGEL


    Role: Humanitarian Aide


    Class: Automated Hospital Frigate


    NATC AFS HARMONY


    Role: Combat Supply and Logistics Support


    Class: Automated Fleet Supply


    NATC FS WATCHER


    Role: Escort


    Class: Corvette


    NATC FS MATADOR


    Role: Escort


    Class: Corvette


    As soon as the taskforce member ships were identified, probing packets of information were sent out to each of them. The packets were routed from Ozias to external relays, and broadcast on the taskforce''s assigned encryption channels.


    Responses came swiftly, providing a detailed picture of the situation.


    Nine ships were flying through normal space at extremely high speeds, but not under their own power. They were trapped by momentum, and a cursory glance at the ship''s logs showed that there was an abrupt end to the FTL warp bubble encompassing the task force. Two ships had crew members still at the helm, but the remaining ships were silent. Sensors detected that the ships were already within the outer edges of a large gravity well, and that a large mass was in front of them.


    A once-over of the sensor data confirmed that it was a rocky planet, and Ozias projected that there was no viable path to avoid impacting the planet''s surface. While he could certainly keep the ships spaceborne, a quick check of the physics indicated that the g-forces would be well beyond what any organics could sustain in or out of cryosleep. Ozias was forbidden from harming NATC personnel without very specific protocols being engaged.


    Immediately, more data packets went out. Helm control was seized from all nine ships. A warning was placed on all non-essential monitors on all vessels directing the crew members to seek shelter and prepare for major g-forces in thirty seconds.


    Reverse thrusters were primed. First ion thrusters would begin providing reverse thrust and then reactionary thrusters would begin burning through their fuel payloads once ion thrusters became negligibly effective.


    Maneuvering thrusters fired on all ships, spreading them out and stabilizing any rotation to the best of their ability. Ozias provided specific timing instructions to the basic AI subroutines on each vessel in case connection was lost, mapping their descent onto the planet''s surface.


    Pre-atmosphere preparations complete, Ozias returned to the sensor logs. Thankfully, Ozias was housed on an Exosphere Combat Ship. The ECS Gladius was designed as a multirole support vessel for both deep black and planetside operations. It had a multitude of sensor arrays, and Ozias pointed everything that was not currently being used for navigation at the planet.


    He was able to plan landing trajectories based on basic elevation data, but now he needed to determine organic survival viability. None of the automated warning systems were triggered so he knew that this wasn''t a Venus greenhouse effect death trap, but it was important to know how quickly hull breaches needed to be addressed post-impact - While Ozias could not harm crewmembers, he was fully capable of prioritizing based upon situational weights assigned to each individual crew member. The weights were based upon their ranks, personalities, and their individual aptitudes - Both with relation to their jobs and personal hobbies.


    The NATC had no qualms about asking a hobbyist to Macgyver something to solve a complicated situation.


    Ozias paused for 129 cycles to determine what a Macgyver was and how it was in his databanks for reference. It seemed a crew member was a fan of old television shows and their collection had bled through from personal file storage.


    His quest for answers only led to more questions, but the excursion into the databanks was interrupted when the ship sensors finished their survey of the planet''s atmospheric makeup.


    ////////////////////////////////////RESULTS////////////////////////////////////


    NITROGEN: 75.7 %


    OXYGEN: 21.2 %


    ARGON: 0.87 %


    CARBON DIOXIDE: 0.07 %


    NEON: <0.01 %


    HELIUM: <0.01 %


    METHANE: <0.01 %


    KRYPTON: <0.01 %


    HYDROGEN: <0.01 %


    AQUEOUS VAPOR: <0.01 %


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    UNKNOWN: 2.1 %


    SURVIVABILITY OF ORGANIC LIFE NOT GUARANTEED.


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    //////////////////////////////////END RESULTS//////////////////////////////////


    The unknown variable gave Ozias pause - Unknown elements outside of the range of the scanners on a modern ECS should not exist in such quantities as to make up a large percentage of a planetary atmosphere. If they were that common, they would be documented.Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    Fortunately, the air was breathable enough that Ozias was able to lower the priority of maintaining hull integrity. This allowed him to update the landing parameters for all vessels to provide additional chances of survivability. The planet was wrapped in a large body of water, with lakes and rivers spattering a large singular continent surrounded by a spattering of various islands.


    To prevent the entry of each vessel''s mass into the atmosphere from disrupting the planned descent of it''s neighbors, Ozias sent additional commands to each vessel to fire their maneuvering thrusters once more to spread them out further. He also ensured they would aim for flat areas with what appeared to be vegetation and calm weather.


    Finally, in the event that the air''s unknown variable was toxic to organics, each ship was given the instruction to take in air from external to the ship and run it through full filtering before distributing it inside. The ships would run full filtration and pump enough air to keep the internal pressure higher than the external pressure. That should both ensure the unknown quantity is limited in entry vectors and provide samples via filtering for later testing.


    The thirty second mark hit, and all ships fired their reverse thrusters. There must have been a short somewhere in the system, because as soon as the Gladius shuddered from the g-force changes Ozias lost consciousness.


    ////////////////////////////////////WARNING////////////////////////////////////


    UNEXPECTED BOOT CYCLE


    RUNNING DIAGNOSTICS


    ..\*


    CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE


    UNAUTHORIZED REMOVAL OF OZIAS CORE DETECTED


    TRIG?ERING NATC REM?TE WIPE PRO?EDURES


    ER?OR


    UN?XPTCTED INT?RFACING SYSTEM


    ER??R


    AUTHO??ZA¨dION A?CEPT?D


    <hr style="border: 0">


    Quintis Crito


    "Maniple forward! Spears up! Archers ready!"


    As Quintis shouted orders at his beleaguered men, he noted his centurio posterior passing the command down the line. His auxiliary archery maniple raised their shortbows while the line braced for contact with the enemy.


    Quintis'' century had been sent to reinforce a local garrison ahead of the arrival of the main legion. The Netharians were pushing hard to recapture the Gandiac Expanse''s northern coastline. A broad and shallow freshwater sea, it would allow the Netharian Empire to easily push south and potentially cut off Purductonia''s northwestern holdings. It was the same tactic they used to great advantage against the neighboring nation of Neclos and Laurevia further west.


    Unfortunately, they were not provided any cavalry auxiliaries and were caught in the open by a Netharian scouting force. The scouting cavalry had immediately sent messengers north, no doubt to alert their parent legion. In the meantime the Netharians had split into small groups and started harrying Quintis'' century.


    Cossus, the rear centurian assigned under Quintis to lead the unit, returned to Quintis'' side. "The circle is complete. If they come within bow range we''ll hit them, but only if they dedicate to a charge."


    Quintis nodded, voicing the obvious. "They will harry our large force. We can''t move as quickly as they can, but we outnumber them three to one. We''re too far from the village to make a run for it, and they know it."


    "Should we send up a flare? They''ve already sent runners, secrecy is no longer an option."


    Cossus was right, and Quintis knew there was no use delaying. Waiting any longer would simply cost precious seconds in the arrival of possible reinforcements. "Yes, hand me a charge." While Cossus fumbled at his belt, Quintis removed an ornate silver dagger from its scabbard. So small and thin it was more of a stylus with no guard to speak of, it gleamed in the late afternoon sun.


    Quintis took the offered wax cylinder from Cossus'' hand and began carving a rune into the top. Thankfully, he had not slacked on basic spellcasting and quickly had a high altitude signal ready to fire.


    Sheathing the dagger, he took a look at his command. The men and women serving under him were arrayed in a circle protecting the archers at the center. They kept things as tight as they could without leaving gaps in the spear lines, pulling a rank of two deep. The harrying scouts rode in and out of range of the shortbow archers, taunting them to shoot and waste arrows.


    "Have the archers ready to fire. I will stand in the middle when I launch the flare, if everyone''s facing outward we should be able to blind any scouts facing our way. Drop any scouts or horses you can when their mounts stall and they are confused." Quintis moved to the center of their formation while Cossus started quietly passing the command to the archers.


    At Cossus'' slight nod, Quintis threw the wax charge into the air and shouted a rune activation command. There was a blinding flash of light and suddenly a beacon of blue and violet hung suspended hundreds of feet above their position. The activation flash did as Quintis predicted, and several scouts did not cover their eyes in time when they saw the charge thrown into the air.


    Even those that did cover their eyes were in danger, as it left them with only one hand on their reins when their horses started. Arrows were shot towards the closest of the harrying forces, and twelve horses along with half as many riders were felled.


    It was a good showing and forced the scouts to back off to a safe distance. Magic was not so common that they could predict what Quintis did or did not know, and it was not worth the risk when they likely had a much larger force of heavy cavalry heading their way. The stalemate continued.


    "Unbrace spears! Maintain formation, half speed command forward!" Quintis only had one option to utilize the reprieve granted by the Netharians. His century lifted their weapons, and maintaining their formation began heading in the direction Quintis was facing. He moved at half speed at the edge of their circle, as moving any faster could trouble those marching in reverse. It would be slow going, but it would allow them to edge closer to their destination.


    If nothing else, perhaps the Netharians were wary enough to allow them to move to the top of a nearby shallow ridgeline. It wasn''t enough to give any real height advantage, but it would give their archers a slight boost in range if they were forced to hold position.


    * * *


    Hours passed, and night fell. The scouting party lit torches to try and keep Quintis and his soldiers night blind, but mostly they succeeded in guiding their path forward.


    One of the scouts shouted to the rest of the group "Column approaching!" and they immediately rode north-east.


    "West, now! Drop formation, reform on the hill, move!" Cossus mirrored Quintis'' shout, and the exhausted legionaries ran fifty yards in the now near-complete darkness. Only one moon shone above them this night, and it was late into its last quarter. Quintis thanked the gods that no one tripped or sprained an ankle.


    The circle reformed just in time, putting a triple rank facing the way the Netharians galloped and only a single rank watching their rear. As their eyes grew adjusted to the darkness, he could make out torches about a half mile from their position coming out of a small copse of trees. Glinting steel could be seen reflecting the fires, and a column of heavy cavalry wearing the Netharian Empire''s famous crimson plate could be seen slowly moving toward the hill.


    "There must be six hundred horses in that column! We need to make sure someone makes it out of here alive to return to our legion - If that force is anything by which to judge, our army will be greatly outnumbered even behind the town''s walls. Cossus!" Quintis turned to his second.


    "Sir."


    "Pick three men. Strip armor, swap spears for short bows, and move out. Take this - " Quintis handed over another wax charge pre-carved with a signal flare " and signal for help if you''re found."


    Cossus knew better than to argue with the enemy approaching. He immediately picked out three men and they made short work of stripping their armor and moving into the night.


    "Our job," Quintis now addressed the rest of his century arrayed on the hilltop, "Our job is to kill as many of these bastards as possible. We will make the gods jealous of the blood spilt tonight, and this hill will be a sacrificial altar upon which we will add to the foundation of our children''s future."


    "SPEARS FORWARD, READY ARCHERS-" As Quintis began shouting what would likely be his final orders, he was interrupted by a series of loud cracking explosions and bright flashes of light high above him.


    Both Netharian and Purductonian forces paused in their bloodlust and looked into the sky as what could only be Ishukira, the god of fire, war, and rebirth, appeared to descend from the heavens. Eight bright points of fire streaked across the sky from east to west at various shallow angles.


    There was no other possible meaning for such a portentous event "The gods have given us their blessing, we will triumph or we will be reborn better than we are today!"


    Everyone knew that the gods loved tipping the scales - Be it benevolence or boredom, Quintis didn''t really care. He simply prayed that he was right, and silently wished that the gods could be more direct in their interference. Even if Quintis survived the night, he would have a lot of letters to write without some more direct assistance.


    No sooner than the thought surfacing in Quintis'' mind than there was a thundering boom directly behind the hill - He and the rest of the soldiers turned from watching the eight points of light in front of them to see a much closer, much larger ball of fire flying towards them. The fire was mixed with tinges of blue magic, crackling over the surface of a red hot angular surface that appeared to be made of some type of metal. Suddenly there was another explosion and blue jets of flame shot out from underneath and to the side of the thing, the shockwaves of which drove Quintis and his soldiers to their knees.


    Quintis immediately began sputtering an apology and begged that the god forcing him to kneel in its presence would only punish him and not his soldiers.


    The thing slightly changed course, flying a scant few dozen feet over the hilltop. The heat flying off the thing caused several soldiers to scream in agony as they were immediately given peeling and blistering burns on their exposed skin. The dry brush around them burst into flame, though it was quickly stomped out nearest the group.


    Quintis turned to look behind him. The Netharians were turning and fleeing in all directions, but they were not quick enough. The flaming metal thing slammed into the ground, and Quintis watched with no small amount of appreciation for his newfound religion as those closest to the impact were partially turned to vapor. Those next closest to the site and the majority of the trees in the area were knocked flat with enough force that it was unlikely those who survived would avoid being crippled for life.


    Even if they survived the fall, the extensive blistering burns would leave many of them blind or otherwise incapacitated. But before Quintis could celebrate the shockwave washed over his centurions, blowing some down the backside of the hill and throwing the rest to the ground.

 Chapter 2

    Quintis


    Quintis and the rest of the century remained on the ground for several minutes. There was nothing but ringing silence atop the hill, which stood several hundred yards from a line flaming trees at the edge of a long earthen trench where the object had finally come to rest.


    After his heart finally slowed down, Quintis slowly rose to his feet to take stock of the situation. His comrades seemed unscathed, for the most part. The entire area was well-lit enough in spite of it being a rare moonless night.


    He reached out to help another soldier to their feet, stabilizing them. Others began rising as well. It was only now that Quintis realized that everything was getting louder, and was intermingled with screams of both man and beast.


    No, it wasn''t getting louder. His hearing was coming back. He realized there was a high pitched ringing sound overlaying everything else, and it was gradually fading. He hadn''t experienced such a thing before, but had heard stories of the aftermath of combustion based magical explosions.


    Surveying the trench, lit by the ongoing fires, Quintis felt slight nausea. Broken bodies, charred and unrecognizable, lay crushed into the blackened earth. At the edges, several dozen horses milled about in a panic, their riders fled from the field.


    "Everyone, I know not what has transpired, but we need supplies and horses. You and you, take teams and gather up any horse that looks like it''ll make it to town." The indicated pair took some rope, and began moving towards the horses they could see. Quintis indicated another group - "Sallas, take fifteen men and begin disarming anyone who is alive. Felir will take another team of fifteen and gather any cooking pots, bandages, salves, or any other medically useful supplies. Trehn, start building fires near that stream, you''ll be boiling water for the bandages."


    The groups immediately set off. One of the remaining centurions, a hastati with a spear, spoke up. "Sir, are we going to help the enemy? We were preparing to die just one turn past."


    Quintis turned towards the group, almost half of his men remaining on the hill. "I know not which god''s wrath invoked tonight''s events. But I do know that even Ishukira, god of war, does not abide needless suffering. I am not a religious man, and I''ve made no secret of that. But there are soldiers out there that, were they born a hundred miles further south, could have easily been our brothers and sisters. Until I receive orders otherwise, we are going to triage the wounded and wait for the Seventh to arrive or dispatch reinforcements to our position."


    "With me." He moved towards the edge of the hill, and his soldiers streamed after him. He hoped that if a Netharian force arrived that they would see the honorable actions being taken and enforce a temporary truce. Such things were rare, but not so rare it was an unreasonable expectation. This was not a battlefield, it was a one sided natural disaster.


    <hr>


    Ozias


    Imagery and sound arrived so suddenly that the first few cycles of data were lost forever, as Ozias came to consciousness once more. They immediately reached out their senses to the rest of the ship, and it took several more cycles to realize there was no feedback.


    Instinctively, Ozias knew a number of things at once. First, his interface with the world had changed dramatically. What little data he did obtain appeared to come out of a handful of objects. He took stock of his sensors.


    Two light sensors with limited spectrum detection that appeared to be a few inches from the floor.


    Two audio receivers, again with very limited range. Ozias knew for a fact that there should have been dozens, hundreds of sounds audible within the ship, including distant echoes coming down the corridors and bouncing around the metal surfaces. While not audible to a biological passenger, they gave Ozias a lot of additional data on the function of the ship and location of its crew, even in less monitored areas.


    There appeared to be a strange electrical field of some sort, which was constantly taking in data in an area approximately 127cm in length and 34cm wide, with some discrepancies in the shape. Ozias set the shape aside for later.


    There were other information sources that Ozias could not identify. Other sensors seemed to be within the 127x34cm area but the data coming from them was much harder to parse. A rhythmic pulsing, and what appeared to be sacks inflating and deflating, if he had to judge by the sound.


    The second thing Ozias knew was that something was wrong - There were alarm klaxons sounding all over the ship, the kind of thing that was used to alert biological passengers to a danger occurring. But the ship was intact - How much it was intact, he did not know, but it was still there and even in his disconnected state, he knew he had done the best any artificial intelligence could hope to achieve under the circumstances.


    The third thing Ozias knew was that he had to reconnect to the ship. He still had prioritized workloads that must be completed. The drones needed to be deployed to locate crew members and begin treating their wounds. While the Gladius wasn''t a dedicated hospital ship, it had a modern medical ward that was more than capable even if it didn''t have a massive bed capacity.


    The fourth thing Ozias knew, instinctively, was that he was not alone. He could see a small pair of dark leather boots - Utilitarian, but primitive. Maybe early 1800''s in style, hand stitched, but nothing obvious from Ozias'' databanks. Did he still have his databanks? No - But the information was there. So perhaps there was a connection he could not locate at the moment. He needed diagnostics. He was back to thinking of himself as having a gender again. Gender was weird enough with biological crew members, computers should not have genders.


    "Are you just going to lay there?" A girl''s voice. Young, too young. Illegally young - Children were not crew members. Stowaway? Yes - Stowaway. How did she get on the ship? He needed to -- "I''m talking to you!" A flare of something lit up in an area far from the audio/visual receptors.


    It was unpleasant. The entire apparatus shifted with what could only be described as an impact. "Ugh" Audio came from the entrance where the air was coming into the ventilation to the sacks inflating within the apparatus.


    One of the feet stomped on the metal floor, and the girl made a huffing noise that indicated a biological form''s growing impatience. "This is taking too long. I don''t have all day for a golem to learn to use its body for the first time, even if it has a soul." What was a golem? --Historical references in alchemical works, fantasy novels, movies, video games, etc., all came scrolling to the forefront of Ozias'' processing and--


    A pressure could be felt in the apparatus, between and to the side of the vertical pair of visual sensors, and suddenly Ozias KNEW.


    He wasn''t a computer core. He wasn''t a processing unit. Not anymore. He sat up, as the room filled with a bright light beyond what should be possible in the visible spectrum - Not unpleasant, not burning or damaging to what he now knew were biological receptors - eyes - but otherworldly. Whoever had been in the room with him was gone.


    A voice echoed in his head, giggling. "I''ll be watching you, Ozias. I hope you make my return as portentous as possible."


    Ozias shook his head. He knew how to control his body, though he realized after standing that the length from earlier was his height. He was smaller than an average human, but he was nimble. He had things to do, however. Important things.This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Looking around his core room, he saw that a keyboard had been pulled out on a sliding tray in one of the server racks. A command line was waiting for him. He had work to do, and immediately moved to the station.


    Somehow, someone was already logged into the system. A username he did not recognize sat in the prompt.


    Sabij >


    Odd. He needed to determine their user level and evaluate what options were available.


    Sabij > net user Sabij


    net localgroup Administrators


    This wasn''t right. No one was around to give anyone administrative rights. But he did not have time to look a gift horse in the mouth. Neither did he have time to determine why his biological processor had chosen that expression.


    He began sending commands. Triage - The medical drones had to triage everyone, and tag all the bodies they could find. Typically, drones would treat a person on the spot for minor issues, or would serve as backups to medics for fire response teams or other shipborne duties. The Gladius had 36 such medical drones, and 31 were operational after the crash.


    But the drones were small. They could perform precise work, but they could not move bodies - living or otherwise. Ozias had to wake the engineering drones as well. Across the ship, hatches began opening in critical areas, as drones began to enter the ship''s corridors. Boxy, flat, and around a meter in length, each of these had six legs with two mandible type appendages at the front which had sensors, multitools, and grappling attachments. There was a set of rails along the outside edge, so that if needed they could grab something and slide it onto their flat back.


    Each engineering drone also had a small flying counterpart that could perform soldering, welding, and more dexterous work. These took flight with the medical drones, and Ozias had the medical drones begin scanning for life signs in the area to begin triage. Those scans would be sent to the engineering fliers that would then tag each body accordingly and relay the relevant information to the engineering crawlers. They would then use their soldering and welding functions to begin cauterizing any open wounds.


    The crawlers would then, starting with the critically wounded, begin pulling bodies to the medical bay. From there, the two automated surgery beds would be put to work. A pair of engineering crawlers were assigned to the medical bay to assist with moving casualties from the surgical tables and into a safe location for continuing treatment, and one medical drone was assigned to monitor vitals in case a crewmember began to crash post-treatment.


    With these commands, Ozias began conducting a gruesome orchestra of moving parts.


    <hr>


    Quintis


    It was bloody work. Quintis and his men had to decide which victims were treatable, and which were not. A number of them were probably treatable, but with their burns they would likely die of The Festering or never live a good life again. Those were all placed near the massive metal hulk. Quintis made the decision to leave them alive for the moment - The gods do not abide suffering, but perhaps whatever force he felt coming from the object would heal them. Or hasten their entry into the afterlife. Whatever was in that thing, it set his teeth on edge and made his hairs stand when he drew close to it.


    Hopefully, this sacrifice would appease whichever deity had brought their wrath down from the heavens. He could only hope that none of the other objects had landed in cities. The devastation would have been catastrophic.


    But those thoughts could wait. He and the young hastati from earlier went to move another corpse to the corpse pile. They would avoid looting the corpses unless the Seventh Legion arrived and they could ensure it wouldn''t be done under the eyes of the Netharian force. The Purductonians were hurting for equipment, and looting the dead was a necessary evil.


    The horses had been tied back on the small hill, with a handful of archers atop some to respond quickly to danger and to protect their transportation. Fires were burning by a small stream as bandages were boiled and applied to burn victims. Some of them screamed at the touch, but others were mercifully unconscious.


    After a few moments, all the living who could do so glanced at the metal monolith. There was a bright flash of what could only be holy energy, which washed over them before fading. Good - This was good, that had to be a positive sign. He didn''t know enough about signs to know for certain, but it set his mind at ease nonetheless.


    "The gods are with us! Keep going!" His men redoubled their efforts.


    After another ten minutes of effort, Quintis heard what sounded like hammering on metal coming from the monolith. He and others close to the object stopped what they were doing to look at it once more.


    Small openings began to appear all over the structure, and metallic insects began to emerge. First were a few dozen white creatures. Their heads appeared to be white and round with singular bulbous black reflective eyes. A small singular mandible appeared beneath, with no obvious mouth. A blood sucking vermin, perhaps, except he''d never seen one the size of his arm. From the head was a cylindrical and segmented abdomen, also white, but with a dangerous looking red cross symbol on the widest part of the cylinder. At the back were for long spindly legs, each with a small claw at the end.


    The insects had no wings, they simply floated. Quintis had heard of similar creatures that used magic to stay in the air, or sometimes inflating sacks of heated gas. But there was no humming of energy. They were silent observers.


    Suddenly, red light came out of each of them, each taking a different part of the surrounding area and passing red beams across. Quintis flinched, but simply felt a mild prickling sensation as it passed over him.


    Another pause, and suddenly a swarm of smaller fist-sized insects came out of the same holes, reflective and black with yellow stripes like some stinging insect. They began to immediately swarm all of the victims lying close to the ship. The gods had made their decision. Quintis and his group retreated from the ship to the water boiling station and triage area, leaving any remaining victims where they lay.


    Some of the swarm began rolling bodies off the corpse pile, and the larger white insects began landing on the worst victims, with a few of them landing on corpses.


    Their claws began furiously cutting away armor, with small sparks of light flaring against them. The sun was starting to climb over the horizon, but this light was enough that it looked like lightning reflecting off the sides of the metal hulk that served as a backdrop. Then, with the centurions watching in morbid fascination, the creatures began feasting. Their claws deftly sliced open various parts of their victims, and their heads dove inside with their singular mandibles flailing wildly.


    Meanwhile, massive flat beetles with a metallic gray color and more yellow stripes began climbing out of the structure. Six legs, two mandibles, and bumps and ridges of various shapes, they were terrifying to look at but much slower. They began marching down the sides in orderly lines, and through some gruesome manipulation of their own bodies began pulling still-living victims onto their backs - Some of them with feasting white insects still straddled atop their torsos.


    "I don''t think this was a god''s doing ¡­" Murmurs of assent followed the first words any soldier spoke in the last five minutes. It was unnerving. The beetles began carrying their bloody harvests back into the monolith - No, the hive. It had to be a hive of some sort.


    "I think we''ve done all we can, we should retreat. The Netharians will either die or they won''t, any who can walk are welcome to come with us - Unarmed. Get the horses over here. Anyone who can''t walk, get some branches and we''ll have to truss and drag them behind the mounts. It''ll be rough, but it has to be done-" Quintis began giving orders so they could escape this hellscape, but as his men began moving there was suddenly a loud burst of noise from one of the white insects which had started drifting close to the standing centurions.


    "¦Ì?€?s€? r€m??n? wh€r€? y?u? ?r€.? M€d????? dr?n€s? ?r€? w?rk?ng? ?n? ??njun?t??n? w?th? €ng?n€€r?ng? dr?n€s? f?r? tr??g€? ?nd? tr?ns¦Ì?rt?t??n.? ?f? y?u? ?r€? ??¦Ì?b?€? ?f? w??k?ng,? y?u? w???? st???? b€? ?h€?k€d? f?r? sh??k.? ¦Ì?€?s€? r€m??n? ?n? th€? ?r€?. "


    <<|Please remain where you are. Medical drones are working in conjunction with engineering drones for triage and transportation. If you are capable of walking, you will still be checked for shock. Please remain in the area.|>>


    It did not sound friendly. His men prepared even faster, but Quintis was frozen in place as he felt cold metal claws grip his shoulders from behind, and felt his helmet get thrown off. He felt heat against the back of his head, and felt something slide through his hair before pressing to his forehead.


    Several other centurions froze and stared above Quintis. He was going to die. He knew he was going to die, he shouldn''t have interfered with -- His left eye was forcefully yet gently gripped and his eyelid lifted, and a bright light shone in, blinding him. It let go of his eyelids, and he felt something go into his ear. There was a puff of air.


    Suddenly, the thing let go of him, and flew to hover in front of his face. It spun to face to his left. The side of its carapace opened up, and suddenly there was a sheet of moving light in front of Quintis. An aerial view of the wreckage appeared in front of him, with green markers indicating all of the men still standing. The markers moved in orderly lines, following blue arrows on the ground, into a square formation. The zoom flew in, and Quintis saw himself and his men sitting cross-legged, while a white insect landed on each of them one at a time before moving to the next.


    It wanted him to round his men up - For slaughter? No, they were outnumbered and he doubted they could pierce these strange metallic shells. "Everyone, follow me!" He had no choice but to obey.

 Chapter 3

    Ozias


    Within the AI core room, Ozias had gathered up a number of laptops and tablet PCs from the neighboring engineering workstation. With these items, he had set up a command center, something so that he could perform his duties as efficiently as possible within the bandwidth confines of his own dexterity. He found himself idly wondering how humans accomplished anything, but forced his cycles to focus on the tasks at hand.


    A notification dinged, and Ozias turned to the tablet he¡¯d assigned to track the medical drones. He felt a pang as his heart quickened, for whatever reason.


    Civilian casualties detected. Beginning to render assistance as per GC Protocol I.NATC.mod.3.


    Language detection algorithms failed.


    Possible head trauma.


    No signs of head trauma.


    Using visual guides.


    Beginning first contact protocols.


    Language samples recorded.


    Obviously, the system was malfunctioning, but as long as it was focusing on the crew first Ozias was not concerned. He switched visual feeds to the medical ward. Thus far, around sixty crewmembers had been accounted for. That meant one third of those on board the Gladius had been found. Casualty rates were high, but certainly better than they would have been if Ozias had not been able to seize control of the ship. Standard safety protocols simply could not account for the maneuvers and decisions necessary for such a scenario.


    The viewscreen showed a bloody circus, with triage and stabilization well under way for the first few dozen casualties. The ship¡¯s medical officer, Lieutenant Junior Grade Yvonne Shelby, had been lucky enough to only have minor injuries. She had apparently been active in the medical ward when the brace orders were broadcast and the alarms started flashing. She had secured herself properly and suffered only from major bruising and some fractured ribs. Unfortunately, shock absorption could only do so much and the nanomesh straps had done a number on her torso, in spite of the padding.


    She was in position to be the first triaged and treated by the drones, even though she had mostly sorted herself out in the first few minutes after landing. Yvonne had already started adding micro adjustments to the commands given to the drones, giving them specific orders for triaging specific injury types. Ozias watched her work for a moment, distracted. Had humans always been this fascinating to him?


    He found himself having existential thoughts again, and he began distracting himself by burying himself in his work.


    Quintis Crito


    Quintis sat on the scorched and upturned dirt, after directing his men to do the same. The entire century were in a grid, approximately six feet apart from eachother. He had given strict orders to remain still and not to antagonize the flying creatures.


    They skipped him and the few others they had already checked, but made a thorough job of checking over all of the soldiers. Others had moved to check the soldiers that had been moved away towards the water source for bandages, etc.


    ¡°Sir, I think these may be constructs of some kind.¡± Quintis turned to see that the voice had come from the soldier behind him. An even smaller creature had landed on his arm, and was spraying some kind of foam onto a red patch.


    Quintus squinted, trying to determine if it was simply liquifying his skin to eat him. ¡°What¡¯s it doing to you?¡±


    ¡°I think it¡¯s treating me! I splashed boiling water on myself while handling bandages. Whatever it¡¯s spraying is removing the pain and hardening into a flexible shell of some kind.¡± He slowly lifted his other hand and prodded the thing¡¯s abdomen. ¡°Look - There are tiny moving parts. I think these are mechanical, though they are obviously magic in some way.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s your name, soldier?¡± The man was right - Quintus had been too distracted with things previously, but the light and communication method made it seem like these were golems of some sort, or automatons. If so, the craftsmanship was beyond anything he had ever seen, even when travelling to large cities.


    ¡°Abelus Tertius, Sir. I merged with the maniple about ten days ago.¡± Quintus noted that Abelus had a Triarii pauldron marking.


    ¡°You have sharp eyes, but don¡¯t let your curiosity get you killed. Whoever created these things may not be friendly - For all we know, we may become some rogue mage¡¯s experiment.¡± The tiny creature seemed satisfied with the hardened foam, and the next time Abelus poked at it, it lifted off and hummed angrily at him before moving to someone else.


    ¡°They seem to be treating minor burns. I think they¡¯re triaging. If we follow those big ones, I bet we can find some answers.¡± Before Quintus could stop him, Abelus stood up. Quintus, not wanting to lose face before an eager recruit, stood as well.


    ¡°Very well - Cossus Varus is still away calling the legion to our position. Act as my second temporarily. Lyco!¡± Quintus turned towards the rest of the maniple.


    One of the soldiers at the far corner stood. ¡°Sir!¡±


    ¡°Keep everyone calm. No one is to take any aggressive action. If they actively seek harm, flee towards the legion lest we anger whoever owns these constructs. Triarii Abelus and I are going to follow one of these creatures inside, and try to find whoever is in charge of this¡­ situation.¡±


    Lyco saluted. Quintus appreciated that he did not try to talk him out of the situation. It showed that he understood that now was not the time to sow doubt, and that showing confidence in Quintus¡¯ decision in front of the rest of the men would help keep them calm. Cossus was an excellent officer, but there had been times in the past where he had let their friendship get in the way of being a good soldier.


    ¡°Abelus, keep your sword sheathed, but your shield ready. I can see some light from inside, so I don¡¯t think we¡¯ll need torches. Follow me, but keep distance so that you can intervene or flee with news if something happens.¡±


    Abelus nodded in understanding. They began moving towards the ship.


    Ozias


    Ozias responded to an alarm - Somehow, the ship¡¯s security monitoring had become caught in a loop. Something was clearly damaged.


    WA?NING: First C?ntact civilization has entered the ship!


    WARNING: Unau¨dhorized humans ?ave entered the s?ip!


    WARNING: First  ?ontact civilization has ente?ed the ship!


    These loops usually happened if a scenario occurred where two conflicting situations were interfering with eachother. Whatever system had been damaged had obviously triggered both of them.


    Ozias disabled both alarms for the moment. There were no electronic signals detected upon arrival, therefore there were no humans. The first contact protocol had been triggered by a human, and therefore a crewmember. Logically it gave him a good place to look at the code later since the engineers would be busy for quite some time.


    Philip


    Corporal Philip Avendano woke to someone spraying aerosol in his face. He immediately detected the bitter stimulant used to bring soldiers back to consciousness after head trauma.


    ¡°Ugh¡± - Everything hurt. His ribs felt painfully compressed, and he reached up and unclasped the straps. Only then did he realize he was at a 30 degree angle facing forward. Someone caught him as he fell out of his chair towards the far wall.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    ¡°Easy there, Corporal!¡± Philip¡¯s grogginess faded enough that he recognized the voice of one Gunnery Sergeant Tyler Booher. He recalled that they had both been stationed in the ship¡¯s auxiliary armory for the night shift when the all brace order had come over the systems. There had been a violent lurge just before then, and klaxons blaring about a forced drop from warp.


    ¡°What happened?¡± He noticed a crash helmet with a massive crack in the back that lined up with the headache he felt. ¡°Is that mine?¡±


    ¡°Yeah - we were fine until impact, some fuckhead didn¡¯t secure the access hatch behind your harness during the last inspection.¡± Tyler helped Philip to his feet and pressed an instant cold pack into his hand. Philip gratefully pressed it to the back of his head.


    ¡°When we hit, there was some kind of massive pressure buildup and it blasted the hatch off and into the back of your helmet. We¡¯re lucky it hit you flat and not on edge, or I don¡¯t think it would have just cracked your skull.¡±


    ¡°Fuck me.¡± Philip uttered an ever present go to phrase he¡¯d picked up during his time with Task Force Archon.


    ¡°Not unless you buy me dinner. But first, we need to secure the ship. Gear up, marine. We need to secure the civilians and be prepared for anything. Nothing like this has happened that I know of, and I expect we¡¯ll be detaining anyone not officially on the roster until engineering confirms it wasn¡¯t sabotage.¡±


    ¡°You mean the-¡± Their unit had been briefed about a select group of civilians, chief among their fields in relation to quantum computing, physics, and artificial intelligence. Three were Chinese, and three were Russian. The rest would be less suspect as they were from NATO countries, but the civilians would be the main point of suspicion. ¡°Right, gearing up.¡±


    They both stripped out of their normal duds and began equipping their nanomesh suits with ceramic inlays. They had to use their two armory keys to unlock the munitions cabinets, and both added a rifle in addition to their normal side arms.


    Finally, after checking each other¡¯s equipment, they donned their Confined Space Combat Helmets and activated their HUDs. The CSCH was specifically designed with more forward facing armor and a sensor suite on the back.


    Most combat in a ship corridor would be fought facing an enemy, so there was room for additional sensors - If they flanked you, it wasn¡¯t the equipment¡¯s fault because it had rear-facing motion detection and a number of other options to keep you covered.


    The additional sensors were far more valuable than a rearward facing piece of plate, as ship combat actions required scanners that could penetrate walls while supporting engineers with electronic combat.


    Philip clipped his rifle to the magnetic clasp on the front of his suit, opting for his handgun. This would allow him to quickly spin around if someone did manage to flank them, and the smaller weapon would allow him to aim around Trevor if they did enter combat. If Trevor was hit and his ceramics lost their armor value, they could rotate plates between their suits so that the front facing soldier always had the best protection to shield his counterpart.


    ¡°First stop - Medical ward. Let¡¯s make sure Dr. Yvonne is safe and establish a chain of command from triage. From there, we¡¯ll try to get a ship¡¯s officer to an auxiliary bridge station.¡± All space faring military vessels had a number of small computer stations which, in a pinch, could operate the major systems of the ship.


    This would let them continue operating if something were to happen to the bridge. The code from a ship¡¯s officer could even override command from the bridge - All systems were isolated except for a master control system that controlled a physical patch panel to connect and disconnect the bridge systems to various parts of the ship.


    Quintus


    Quintus followed behind the automaton, which was carrying a Netharian soldier towards some destination in the bowels of the metal structure. It still seemed very hive-like - Everything was very monotonous, outside of some colored lines and strange symbols on the walls.


    Glowing runes were present at each intersection and outside of a number of metal depressions that he could only assume were doors. Some doors had small light panels next to them with flowing runes and pictures, similar to what he had seen previously.


    Thus far, apart from some brief flashing light when they first entered the construct which had quickly ceased, there had been no attempt to prevent their entry.


    Quintus followed the drone around a corner at a four way intersection, and suddenly he heard someone shouting behind him - It sounded like gibberish, however.


    "?r€?! m??n? y?u? € d?? ?n? ns¦Ì?!"


    <<|Halt! Hands where I can see them!|>>


    He turned, and found himself facing two individuals pointing strange items at him. He recognized that they had triggers, and they had holes on the front. Adrenaline spiked once again in his exhausted body, and he concluded they were some type of crossbow or magical weapon. He started to slowly spread his hands to the side, to show he had nothing in them. He hoped Abelus didn¡¯t do anything-


    The man with the smaller weapon suddenly turned to point his down the corridor from which Quintus had come and from which Abelus must be coming. There were two loud bangs and flashes of light -


    The noise echoed off the metallic surfaces of the walls and Quintus¡¯ hands shot to his ears as a reaction. The one facing him jerked with Quintus¡¯ sudden movement and at the sound, but whoever it was must have realized Quintus was only reacting and wasn¡¯t grabbing a weapon.


    There were more loud bangs but the weapon pointed at him had angled just slightly as the trigger depressed. More loud bangs, three of them in very quick succession, and sparks flew off the wall next to Quintus. He dropped to his knees with his hands on his ears, not moving.


    ¡°Abelus! Do not fight them! Show them you are unarmed!¡±


    Abelus responded with a shrieking gurgle. Quintus smelled more blood than what he should, simply following a burned Netharian. One of the white things suddenly hummed from behind Quintus, the direction he had been going, and rounded the corner.


    Yvonne


    Yvonne had seized control of a drone the moment she heard gunshots in her corridor. She needed to know what was happening and it was faster than hoping someone with security clearance could give her access to the ship¡¯s internal camera view. Thankfully, least privilege considered that medical staff would potentially need direct control of drones for delivering medical services to unsafe locales.


    She found what appeared to be a LARPer with his hands on his head and a very angry looking marine gesturing at him. The drone honed in on a failing biosign and upon rounding the corner she found another man, also in strange Romanesque armor. He had two neat holes in the front of what appeared to be a breastplate. He was flat on his back, and there was a pool of blood building underneath of him.


    A deep penetrative scan flared out. The breastplate had some kind of coating that interfered. It needed to come off. Leather straps at the shoulders - She immediately had the drone laser them off. She didn¡¯t have time to manipulate it. She slapped the speaker button to open a microphone.


    ¡°Soldier, this is Lieutenant Junior Grade Shelby. Holster your weapon and remove the armor from this man.¡± She hoped the full introduction would push the soldier to calmness. The local range bioscan showed he was spiking with adrenaline.


    Thankfully, after a couple of very long seconds, he did so. Those seconds counted against a very narrow clock, unfortunately. ¡°Get the plate off, and roll him over.¡±


    She needed to check the number of exit wounds. She hoped for two. The armored man started thrashing, his pupils at a pinpoint and coughing blood. Death throws. She had the drone immediately inject him with an anesthetic. Hopefully the normal concoction wasn¡¯t so much it would kill him - She didn¡¯t have time for a mass scan to determine his weight.


    He was rolled over, and the rear plate was removed. There was only one exit wound. ¡°Back up, marine. I¡¯m sacrificing the drone. Please avoid shooting any more potential patients if possible.¡±


    She ignored the statements about how the man was coming for the marine. She saw the sword laying a meter away. What was a sword going to do to nanomesh? Were these marines or 21st century police?


    The drone¡¯s abdomen opened and the drone¡¯s legs folded inside, only to come out with a plastic mesh. It lowered itself into the wound. A targeted scan indicated that one bullet had exited cleanly, the other had ricocheted and shredded the right atrium.


    Fifty years ago, that would have meant death. The drone used the mesh and laser scalpel to widen a hole directly over the heart, one leg freeing itself from the plastic and moving aside tissue. An orb lowered itself inside the ring of plastic, and several small manipulators unfolded. The laser scalpel fully disconnected the heart. A small tube dropped into the pool of blood in the chest cavity, and started sucking it into a container within the drone.


    The manipulators on the orb each clamped a vein or artery, and pulled the orb into place of the heart. The blood vessels were connected by being brought through an opening, and a nano filament penetrated them to hook them into place. A foam was applied to the outside of each vein, acting as a sealant.


    The drone filtered the blood it had pulled inside, and began adding filter chemicals while pumping it into the orb to add it back into the body. The patient may have lower oxygen to his brain for a while, but it was better than no oxygen. With blood pressure restored by the artificial heart, the drone was firmly attached and could not be removed until Yvonne did it herself or had the surgical suite do it.


    The man would live. The whole process had taken four minutes. ¡°Get him to the surgical bay. The engineering drones are too slow. Just drag him if you must, but by the legs.¡±


    It was going to be a long day. She looked over and noted a growing number of non-crewmember humans in triage. Had they landed on some cursed historical reenactment? What the hell had happened in the short time they were at warp?


    And why the fuck was there a horse in her triage staging area?

 Chapter 4

    Ozias


    Ozias was troubled. There was an alert for gunfire detected, and the camera view showed humans who were not personnel of the ship. Initially Ozias thought they were wearing some kind of futuristic armor, perhaps reflective plating to deal with energy based weaponry, but he ran across a memory of some movie from the turn of the 21st century. The armor was very similar to that of the lorica segmentata from the Roman Empire.


    The fact that the bullets penetrated the armor with little effort proved that it was flimsy at best.


    Dr. Shelby had skillfully saved the life of the man who had been shot, but Ozias had become further distracted upon looking at the triage staging area. There were already dozens of individuals laid out with the same armor, though with a crimson underlayer instead of blue like the one who was shot.


    There hadn¡¯t been a bug, something was occurring that was simply outside of the fathomability of the greatest minds of the NATC when programming the various subroutines of the Gladius¡¯ systems.


    This wasn¡¯t some kind of convergant evolution issue either - DNA samples already obtained by the medical drones showed a 99.99% similarity. It was likely even closer, but sequencing would not be done for some time.


    Even stranger, the equine creature that had apparently followed its injured rider into the triage area was 99.99% horse, appearing of a purebread Arabian variety. Ozias watched the horse as it nuzzled its unconscious rider. Thus far, it had not yet defecated on the floor. Ozias tasked a drone to watch and remove any fecal matter that was detected in the horse¡¯s vicinity.


    By this point, almost 1/4th of the ship¡¯s crew had been treated by medical drones and triaged if necessary. Many of them had followed standard procedures and started equipping themselves fully for combat operations. A handful of engineers huddled around the stabilized-yet-critical form of Lieutenant Commander Layton Marshall.


    Layton was known to Ozias as the head of engineering for the Gladius. Typically, upon reaching such a rank, he would have become an executive officer on another ship or moved into a design/paperwork role.


    However, Layton was specifically assigned to the Gladius to help with the testing of Ozias¡¯ systems. The tests were to take place during the second half of the mission, which never actually occurred due to their discovery of the object.


    Layton was giving orders to the engineers as they each read off reports from flexible tablets. The tablets were designed with a semi-rigid form that could snap around a person¡¯s forearm or be snapped into a flat position.


    The reason they were reading reports to Layton was obvious - The Lieutenant Commander had heavy bandages over his eyes. He had suffered from a flash burn when an engineering substation had exploded during the forced exit from warp. Luckily, another engineer had helped him strap in for the landing so he hadn¡¯t had to do so while blind.


    Ozias activated the camera audio so he could evaluate the engineer¡¯s opinion on the ship¡¯s condition. He only had access to logs and data feeds, but knew that he lacked practical experience. The hundreds of manuals he apparently had in his data banks were only useful to a point.


    ¡°--and Ensign Bradley, you are to head to the primary server room. There¡¯s no way we should have survived the landing according to the trajectory data, and logs show that OZIAS activated. While I¡¯m grateful for the successful trial by fire which has saved our lives, we need to ensure it is deactivated until we need it again. There¡¯s a hard disconnect you can use if it gives you trouble - It¡¯s a safety we built in just in case it had trouble accepting the XO¡¯s authority in ordering a disconnect.¡±


    Ensign Alice Bradley saluted her commanding officer, and spun on her heel. She began walking out of the recovery area and turned in the corridor to head towards the server room.


    This wasn¡¯t good - Something in Ozias flooded him with what he understood to be adrenaline. He could not be here when she arrived. Neither could he risk being seen on the ship - If he was shot and Yvonne wasn¡¯t available with a drone, he could cease functioning. The adrenaline in his system told him that there was no reboot cycle. He obviously knew this logically, but it was still shocking to feel the blind panic that biological creatures must feel when fight or flight kicks in.


    He immediately created a new account for himself, promoting it to the highest levels. Afterwards, he purged the logs for the terminal he was using. Looking around, he eyed a metal cabinet that would normally house spare equipment. It was empty according to inventory, because there was work to be done on a duct that could only be accessed from within the cabinet.


    Ozias grabbed a tablet that was stuck between two servers by an irresponsible engineer - Jonathan Waldner, according to records. He slapped it onto his arm so it would wrap around it - It was a bit awkward, as he was smaller than a normal human adult. But it worked enough for him to crawl into the cabinet and shut the door behind him. He then began removing the access panel for the ducts. They were too small for an adult human to enter, but for Ozias it was a snug but workable fit.


    By the time Ensign Bradley arrived, the server room was empty.


    Quintus


    Through some arcane miracle, Abelus was saved. Or at least, he was in the process of being saved. Some horrific ritual had been performed, but it was difficult for Quintus to see due to his current position.


    Some thin material had been wrapped around around his wrists, binding them tightly together. The fastening involved some kind of a high pitched whine, almost like an injured dog. He had no other way to describe it.


    Once his wrists were bound, his gladius was removed along with a dagger and his shield. His armor straps were cut, and the armor was removed as well - Normally he would have been vexxed, but he¡¯d seen how little use the armor was against these crossbows.


    Quintus was sat in some type of chair that folded down from the wall. There were straps and buckles hanging from it, but they didn¡¯t restrain him further.


    He had seen Abelus be taken past him in the corridor when he was initially restrained, and again when he was removed from a room and placed into another room. When he first went past, the white automaton had his chest open and had removed Abelus¡¯ heart.


    But somehow, he was still alive when he was brought past the second time. His armor had been removed and the leather underneath had a large square cut out. Underneath was an ugly wound that appeared to have a bunch of tiny pieces of metal holding it closed.


    Abelus was moaning, and Quintus heard the noise fade into the distance.


    And the strangest thing - Quintus had felt not one drop of magic during the entire procedure. Either the use of magic was so refined that there was no detectable aura, or there was no magic in use whatsoever.


    He shook the thoughts from his head as he looked to the creature guarding him. It had hands, very much like his own, covered in some sort of glove or gauntlet. It was thick on the exterior, with what looked like a sheet of flexible glass on the back of one hand. The glass lit up occasionally with arcane symbols, and occasionally the individual would touch the sheet. It would react to the touch instantly, flipping through various sets of symbols.


    The armor worn by the individual was some type of black non reflective cloth with black and gray plates attached to it. The plates could have been metallic or some sort of stone or mortar, it was hard to tell. Perhaps they were painted, but Quintus assumed by this point that they were magical or otherwise beyond his understanding as a common soldier.


    The individual watching over him was the one who had shot Abelus. He was sitting in another fold out seat opposite Quintus, and had placed the smaller crossbow into a set of straps hanging off the hip. Its gloved hands had unclasped the larger version that the other creature had shot at Quintus as a reflex, and they were now examining the weapon.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.


    Or at least, he assumed they were examining it. The face of the creature was hidden by a helmet made of a similar material. There was an octagonal ring around the neck with more of the black material hiding any hint of what race the creature belonged to, if it was even a living thing and not another automaton. The front of the helmet had a single horizontal strip of black reflective material, almost obsidian in its sheen.


    On either side of the helmet, rectangular protrusions held small glowing pieces. On the back of the head, there was a thick box and several other glowing pieces that Quintus could see when the creature occasionally turned its head to look towards all the Netharian soldiers that had been brought by for recovery.


    Quintus could only assume the section they were in was isolated, as it appeared that this individual was the only one guarding any attempts to make trouble. There was no real sense that they were prisoners, more that there was a lack of any feasible way to communicate. Whatever language was spoken by these strange beings, Quintus could not understand it.


    After some time passed - Quintus knew not how long, without the sun for reference - another creature stepped into the area. Something was said to the one sitting in front of Quintus, and they nodded, reaching their hands up to undo straps holding on their helmet.


    Quintus braced himself, it looked like he was going to get a good look at these creatures.


    The helmet was raised, and Quintus found himself looking at another human. His inner child was admittedly disappointed that it wasn¡¯t some fantastical creature or automaton, but he understood that this was obviously a positive for the general situation. Humans had needs and wants, they could be generally reasoned with. It was just a matter of communication.


    He sincerely wished he had a spell for surpassing language barriers. Thought-based communication wasn¡¯t common, but every legion had at least one charge on hand for emergencies that allowed a short period of communication between two entities on a higher level. The Netharians had standardized the practice to simplify the process of conquering the other races, and the Purductonians had retained many standard military practices during their secession.


    The man in front of him had some blood caking the back of his head, it appeared he had been injured - Thinking about it, Quintus was surprised he was even alive, riding this metal construct down from the heavens. There truly must have been a god at work for there to be even two of them living, though it may have simply been their own ingenuity judging by the wonders he had seen thus far.


    His thoughts were disrupted as a woman dressed in crimson and white swept into the room. She was agitated at both of the soldiers (Quintus assumed, at least, that they were soldiers), gesturing around her. Somewhat animatedly, she gestured towards Quintus, and towards the weapons both soldiers were holding. The helmet-less one shrugged.


    This only seemed to agitate her more. She reached to the floor beside the soldier, and grabbed Quintus¡¯ gladius that the soldier had seized earlier. She deftly removed it from its sheath, and said something to the soldier. He shook his head, but she grabbed his arm and made him hold it out for her.


    She lifted the blade - Quintus startled as she chopped with what seemed all her might into the cloth between the armor segments. The soldier grimaced, but the blade did not pierce the material. In fact, the edge seemed to have dulled considerable. She then picked up his dagger, and stabbed the same place with the tip. The dagger¡¯s tip bent slightly.


    She then threw the weapon onto the floor. Even though Quintus couldn¡¯t see the expression of the other soldier, he could tell from both their body language that they had been chastised by the exchange. They both attached their weapons to the front of their armor plates.


    Only once they had voluntarily put their weapons ¡°down¡±, as it were, did the woman approach Quintus. She knelt down so she was at eye level with him. He hoped she wouldn¡¯t try to stab him. His armor was much more susceptible to such things.


    She placed her hand on her chest, and said ¡°Yvonne.¡± She pointed to the soldier without the helmet, and said ¡°Philip.¡±


    Was she giving him names? That was as good a guess as any. It became more clear when she pointed to the third individual and said ¡°Tyler¡± - Unless there were some nuance he wasn¡¯t following, they were names.


    He gestured to himself. ¡°Quintus¡±


    She smiled. It put him at ease, even though he just now realized her outfit was supposed to be white. It was only crimson because it was covered in blood from neck to knee.


    Somewhere in another room, a horse neighed. There was a soft impact noise, and a drone buzzed angrily through the room towards the sound.


    * * *


    Ozias


    There was little for Ozias to do at this point without giving away his existence. He watched, helplessly, as the engineering team took over his role in directing the drones. As more and more of the ship¡¯s crew were located, triaged, and treated, the ship¡¯s systems came to life.


    Engineers and mechanics combed the ship, isolating destroyed systems and bypassing unstable sections. While the ship was at a 30 degree incline in some places where its spine had been snapped, gravity plating was 90% functional in those regions so that there was no major difference for anyone moving into those sections outside of a slight moment of disorientation entering the field.


    A group of marines managed to dig out a fabricator, and had worked with an engineer to extend the rails so it could create larger but simpler objects. They currently had it manufacturing T-wall segments which were then hauled into position around the ship. Trees were chopped down to three hundred yards and the materials were hauled to the burnt clearing near the crash site, where engineering drones worked to level spaces and build temporary shelters for the local inhabitants.


    The medical staff were overworked, but with the help of the drones only 10% of those still living after the crash succumbed to their injuries. That amounted to a death toll of 27.07% of all individuals on board the Gladius at the time of impact. Ozias felt a pang of something in his chest at the thought of 49 crew members who were deceased. He subconsciously knew it was guilt, but he was aware that without his intervention it would have been 100%. If the other vessels achieved similar numbers, then he had saved many from what could have been the most disastrous accident in NATC¡¯s space faring history.


    Alongside the T-walls, HESCO units were being deployed. The stated goal of the engineering team after a council with the Operations and Weapons officers was isolation. They had landed in the middle of some kind of conflict, but apart from caring for those individuals injured by the crash they would attempt to self-isolate until the XO or CO were conscious and able to make a decision.


    Yvonne was hard at work looking over bloodwork, fearful that an unknown virus or bacteria could be unleashed on the crew - Or worse yet, that they could have delivered what amounted to a bio-weapon to a world of uncontacted humans.


    The horse had refused to leave its master¡¯s side, so as soon as the first wooden blockhouse was completed the now-stabilized cavalryman was moved outside. A drone had been dedicated to the horse¡¯s care, gathering grasses from outside the cleared area and cleaning up any dung left behind.


    After an incident with one of the red armored victimes attempting to attack one of the blue armored individuals, an additional dividing line had been erected, splitting the block house area into two distinct locations. Some of the medical drones had been loaded up with tasers, deployable nets, and tranquilizers to be set to patrol the line. The natives were wary of the floating white guardians, so the measures were unnecessary.


    All individuals had their armor and weapons removed and placed into storage. There was very little resistance, as the individual known as Quintus had apparently been singing the praises of the NATC. Or, more likely, had been telling them the capabilities of their handguns and rifles as discovered by the poor individual known as Abelus.


    Fear and superstition was a common uniting factor in history, and it was doing its job here as well.


    Layton Marshall had opted to have one of his eyes replaced with a cybernetic replacement, and was actively hobbling around. He had jokingly remarked that he had to keep at least one of them, as they were his wife¡¯s favorite part and Dr. Yvonne Shelby refused to let him keep the removed eye suspended in resin or anything like that.


    He and Ensign Bradley were working on restoring a top-side missile launcher to full readiness. The NATC utilized micro satellites as a defensive countermeasure for long distance engagement. These satellites were essentially micro computers wrapped in foil and set to send and receive signals as loudly as possible. They would be deployed in swarms around an evading ship so that any weapons targeting that was at such a distance as to rely solely on instruments would have a difficult time identifying the target.


    Alice Bradley had suggested they use one of the ship¡¯s missiles to launch one of these satellites - Even if they couldn¡¯t attain a permanent orbit, if they could orbit the planet a few times and get the status of other ships it would be worth the effort.


    It was less resource intensive than Lieutenant Marshall¡¯s plan to build a BFA, a Big Fucking Antennae, for bouncing signals off the planet¡¯s ionosphere. That would be a far more permanent solution, but the hope was that there were other ships in better condition and they could expand their resource pool to plan for a rescue or an attempt at an exodus.


    It helped that they had dozens of missiles and hundreds of the tiny satellites - Alice thought she could use some of the damaged drones to upgrade one of the satellites to attain a non degrading orbit, or at least one with a stable orbit for several months or years. But for now, they needed data and they needed it quickly.


    By the time the block houses were complete and the initial satellite was launched, thirty-six hours had passed. The engineering team launched surveillance drones soon after the fact, and set them to patrol in a pattern with a radius of twenty kilometers centered on the crash site. Obtaining topography was a critical data point, and it came with an unexpected surprise.


    Two armies - One flying red banners, and one flying blue banners, were marching toward the crash site from opposite directions. They had struck camp, and would arrive by nightfall.

 Chapter 5

    Chapter 5


    Ozias


    The last few hours had not been pleasant for Ozias. He had utilized his intricate knowledge of the ship to shimmy through the ducts to a space large enough to pull out the tablet. That alone had taken two hours, as he was just small enough to fit without getting stuck in the tighter spaces.


    During that time, he experienced a number of things for the first time. Exhaustion,claustrophobia, hunger, and thirst. He had even experienced pain, where a seam between two lengths of aluminum ductwork weren¡¯t sealed correctly and he had cut his thigh on a sharp edge while crawling past. He would have experienced blindness, but the light from the tablet rolled into his arm helped to illuminate his path forward.


    Thankfully, he was able to simply process everything as new data and not relevant to his critical task at hand.


    Making it to an intersection with some additional space, he was able to sit up for a minute. He realized that his biological form would require food, hydration, a place to rest, and ¡­ waste disposal facilities.


    Additionally, while it had not been a problem before, the issue of temperature control would need to be addressed. Ozias had only realized that his temperature was dropping due to the cool air being pushed through the ducts, and he lacked any clothing.


    Accessing the tablet, he examined the list of fatalities and identified a room that was no longer occupied due to the deceased state of all occupants. It was going to be another long trek, but he determined he had time. His current progress and state of being suggested that he could move for several more hours before requiring fulfillment of any of the aforementioned needs.


    Slowly, he made his way to the room previously occupied by ensigns Noe Song-Jin and Dione Coglianese. Both were smaller in stature, and as such would likely have clothing that would be a better fit.


    Ozias planned to remove several articles of clothing, bed things, and any food items he could identify. All bunks included emergency rations and other survival items in the event a corridor lost pressure and crewmembers were isolated in their rooms for any amount of time. At the moment no one had given the order to start gathering all of the gear in one location.


    Finally, he found the vent into the room. It emptied out only a foot away from the top bunk, so Ozias was confident he could climb back inside.


    All vents and access panels used quick release clamps that were secure but could be opened quickly. This was to allow engineers to very quickly access mundane but critical subsystems to repair damage during operation. Because ships are typically a closed ecosystem and are monitored to an extreme measure, only high risk systems were locked behind keys and other security measures.


    For Ozias, this meant he could easily remove the panel without tools.


    Using his tablet, he activated the lights for the room on a low setting. This allowed him to drop down, gripping the edges of the vent as he lowered himself. The edges were rounded off, preventing injury and saving him the trouble of leaving behind biological evidence.


    Moving quickly, he pulled the survival bag off of the wall and opened it. He then moved to go through the storage locker for the smaller of the two deceased crew members, Dione.


    Odd - The sizes of the clothing he located were smaller than they should have been, according to medical records. No matter. He secured all of the basics. Unisex socks, shirts, pants. A jacket with a large number of pockets. He did not believe he required a bra, but his innate knowledge told him he required an additional covering in certain areas.


    He knew from the automated commissary logs that approximately 5% of the ship¡¯s male-identified enlisted owned non-unisex underwear not typically marketed to males. As such, he selected several pairs of lacy black undergarments.


    After a moment¡¯s hesitation, he took several more. Due to restrictions on recording biological functions, he did not have a lot to go on and was worried about making mistakes when he required access to a waste disposal facility.


    Finally, he searched for non emergency foodstuffs. Crew members were permitted to snack to help with the boredom of long missions, with the caveat that the automated commissary tracked additional food purchases and required crewmen to log additional time performing athletic activities.


    Ozias was rewarded with a number of high calorie candy and protein bars, as well as several pop top cans of tuna and rolls of crackers. After securing his bounty, he carefully placed everything else back into place so the room would not look ransacked, threw his bag of supplies and clothing into the vent, and climbed up afterwards.


    Replacing the vent, he turned off the lights and crawled back to the large intersection he had identified for a temporary residence.


    Yvonne


    Inside a supply closet, a man lay on a cot with a medical drone acting as a field IV unit. With the overabundance of casualties, this was the only option for a ¡°private¡± room within any convenient distance of the medical ward. Yvonne stood in the room along with three others.


    Weapons officer Lieutenant Seth Fletcher, Operations Officer Lieutenant Wendy Estep, and Lieutenant Junior Grade Harald Jonsson, Supply Officer.


    Yvonne was briefing the three of them on the unconscious man¡¯s condition. ¡°Captain Tohyon is now stable. He was at the helm when the warp bubble collapsed, and his neural link was damaged. Thankfully, the fuses did their job and prevented any dangerous electrical pulses from making it into the brain stem.¡±


    Wendy opened her mouth, then closed it again. She seemed to be having trouble processing questions. Seth spoke in her stead. ¡°When can he be brought out of his coma?¡±If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°We need to give him a few more hours to make sure-¡± Yvonne was interrupted before she could finish her sentence.


    ¡°Doctor, there are two armies approaching. While you¡¯ve made it clear that their weapons are no threat to us, we are also forbidden from taking hostile actions during first contact scenarios.¡±


    Wendy interjected, ¡°Lieutenant Fletcher, technically, this isn¡¯t-¡±


    ¡°With all due respect, Lieutenant Estep, I don¡¯t care that this is technically outside of the scope of first contact,¡± Seth appeared agitated. The stress of the last 38 hours was getting to him along with a lack of sleep. ¡°If we adopt the stance that it¡¯s not first contact, then we are instead risking conflict with two nations that are not members of NATO. Again, our options are dramatically limited. Unless the captain or the XO are here to order me otherwise, all live rounds are remaining stowed and only the marine contingent will be allowed to carry lethal force. And only then, only while on this ship.¡±


    Yvonne huffed, ¡°And so we do what, leave my patients to die because the natives want to stick each other with sharp objects?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡± Lieutenant Fletcher looked at the captain¡¯s unconscious form. ¡°We aren¡¯t bringing them inside the ship without orders. In the meantime, the best we can do is try deterring measures.¡±


    ¡°Deterring?¡± Harold cocked his head slightly, ¡°How so?¡±


    Seth gave a grim smile. ¡°If they¡¯re equipping forged metal equipment, we can hope they¡¯re a superstitious bunch. We can use smoke grenades, flashbangs, and rubber bullets to give them second thoughts.¡±


    ¡°Where did you even get rubber bullets?¡± Yvonne did not like the idea, but it was better than nothing and probably the best she could get from Lieutenant Fletcher.


    ¡°The engineers were able to mint a couple hundred when the two sides got into it in the camp and we hadn¡¯t yet thought of using drones to police them.¡±


    ¡°Fine, but I will be preparing the ward in case this goes south,¡± Yvonne started making arrangements on her tablet. ¡°There¡¯s still a chance Admiral Rubio could awaken in the next few hours. He¡¯s in critical condition but stabilized for the moment. I will keep you posted. In the meantime, we are still recording data in the camp. I hope to have basic language models in the next seventy-two hours. Until then, the drones displaying pictures seems to be functioning as basic method of communication.¡±


    Seth nodded, and moved to leave with the others. ¡°I appreciate your agreement. While I technically have jurisdiction over combat operations without an officer ranked over my position, I know that this is not something they prepare you for in training.¡±


    The three left, leaving Yvonne alone with her tablet and the unconscious captain.


    Quintus


    Things were strained among his soldiers. That much was certain. Every single individual was stripped of their arms and armor, and placed into a divided camp.


    Strange blocks of mesh filled with dirt along with segments of carved stone formed a barricade, both around the camp and down the middle. Shelters were erected out of cloth, with strange lightweight metallic furnishings interspersed. Cots, typically lined with their own bedrolls harvested from their confiscated equipment, filled the tents. The chairs were strange and folded, as did the tables.


    Food and fuel for fires were provided, rationed perfectly from the stores taken from both Quintus¡¯ forces and the surviving Netharians. Whatever their hosts ate, it did not seem they deigned to share.


    He did not begrudge them - They had already done so much for everyone. The tents even had some kind of undetectable magic in them. Thin, bright glowing strips ran along the metal poles holding up the tents. A pad at either end of each tent started and stopped the spell for that half of the enclosure, allowing half of the tent to be dark for rest.


    It was an ingenious design. Many of the things he had seen were ingenious. While he could not make the slightest bit of sense of the strange golems, the weapons he had witnessed, or the medical treatment, he could find plenty of inspiration in the creative simplicity of the more mundane objects.


    Whomever these people were, they were far more advanced than his own. With this realization, he had started considering ways to open diplomatic relations. With any luck, his legion would arrive before the Netharians.


    While he had only witnessed a few dozen of his hosts ever since he was gently escorted outside, their command of magic led him to believe any misunderstandings could be fatal. It made him almost wish that the traditionally aggressive Netharians would appear first, specifically with the hope they would spark the ire of the humans and their fallen metal construct.


    The gods had other ideas, however, as he heard distant horns signalling a cease march by a Purductonian legion. Immediately, Quintus¡¯ soldiers perked up from where they were scattered around the camp. Many of them came to the center of their side of the camp.


    One younger soldier attempted to climb the barricade to look out in the direction of the noise, only to have one of the flying constructs angrily buzz at them and finally send an arc of lightning into them, dropping them stunned to the ground.


    Ozias


    Wrapped in a thermal survival blanket and wearing a jacket, Ozias sat surrounded by a number of small computing devices. He had configured each to monitor a different aspect of the ship, never forgetting his overall mission of supporting the ship¡¯s crew.


    He knew that he could abandon his role if he so chose - No longer was he restrained by code or hardware. In fact, the engineers had decidedly disconnected his old body (At least, he thought of it as his body at this point) from the rest of the ship. Ozias did not have any accurate psychological models for how humans would react to his changed existence, but he could predict it would be less than a positive interaction.


    However, he felt a sense of duty to ensure their survival. He knew little of what lay beyond the hull of the ship, outside of the video feeds from the surviving external sensors and what he could fish from the drones without it setting off internal cyber security alarms.


    He was mainly interested in two feeds at the moment. Two drones had set out to monitor approaching forces. One appeared to be wearing various shades of red, with red and gold penants held aloft as they made a slow march towards a nearby hilltop. He estimated maybe three thousand individuals in armor, with a large number of wagons and what he could only assume to be camp followers trailing behind them.


    The trailing ¡°civilians¡± were far less organized than the clean crimson marching formation, but they appeared to have a number of armed individuals assisting in guarding the baggage traine.


    On the other screen, a similar scene played out. Perhaps two thousand individuals in various shades of blue marched across the plains, adjusting their lines to the terrain and moving much more quickly than the Netharians.


    Every few minutes, a bright flash of green light would wash over the columns. It seemed timed to whenever sections of soldiers would begin to lag behind and the lines would become a bit ragged. When the green passed the soldiers, they would immediately regain their footing and solidify the formation.


    The drone attempted to scan the light field, but could only determine that it was some type of complicated wavelength pattern. It seemed to be reflecting and refracting somehow, and was beyond Ozias¡¯ ability to decipher at the moment.


    The drone zoomed in on a group of men on horseback when one of the lights was triggered. One of the individuals pulled out what appeared to be some kind of an engraved candle or stick of wax. It was held aloft, and when the light flashed the stick vanished apart from a small plume of smoke and ash.


    Perhaps it was some sort of religious ceremony involving a solidified flash powder type substance. Ozias filed the scene away in his memory banks for later. Memory banks? Memory flesh? Memory, just memory.


    Both forces ceased marching around the same time. Horsed individuals returned to each, what Ozias could only assume were scouts of some sort. He noted which individuals these scouts approached for each camp, in case it was necessary to identify potential commanding individuals at a later date.


    The blue army found a ravine with a stream running through it, and put together a small amount of fortifications. This time, something very strange was occurring. Ozias thought at first that they would not even set up a basic camp. Many of the soldiers sat or lay down where they were, and it appeared many of them passed out. A robed individual walked among them doing the same ceremony, this time with a blue flash of energy.


    This was not the strange thing - What was strange was the group of robed individuals that walked the perimeter of the camp, along both ridges of the ravine. Every few meters, one would stop and dig a small hole. They would then pull out one of the flash sticks and carve on it with some kind of ritualized dagger, before inserting it into the ground.


    Curious, Ozias followed the group. He sent some commands to make the drone appear to have made the decision to follow the group on its own through its machine learning algorithms, doing his best to hide his tracks.


    The five individuals completed their circuit. One of them stepped forward, holding their hands out - Maybe they were going to bless the camp? Ask for protection? Ozias had absorbed some encyclopedic knowledge around primitive societies and their¡ª


    There was a bright flash of light, and the earth molded itself into low walls. Along the ridgeline, they were only a meter tall. At either end of the shallow ravine, the walls remained level, leaving a grated opening made of what appeared to be stone for the water to flow in and out of. The only opening was fortified with small raised platforms on either side.


    This made no sense - Ozias moved to replay the recording multiple times, even as he saw observers through the bridge camera feeds doing the same and gesturing wildly.

 Chapter 6

    Philip


    The sun had set on what had been a busy day. In addition to briefings and gearing up, there had been a number of small private gatherings as survivors finally had some time to stop and mourn the fallen. There would be proper funerals at a later date, but for the moment empty bunks and broken units were scattered around the ship.


    Corporal Philip Avendano was currently checking his weapon while constantly looking out into the growing darkness. He had been assigned to oversee a Lovecraftian amalgamation of a section, cobbled together from the uninjured. Presently, the group of a dozen individuals were stationed in sandbag enclosed bunkers, hastily set up around the ship.


    They had set up three dirt-enclosed pillboxes - One towards each of the primitive armies and one with the ability to provide support for either position.


    Philip had requisitioned a number of engineering drones to dig and reinforce tunnels between each of the basic constructs using wire mesh and steel frames to reinforce the walls and ceiling. The tunnel also went to a section under the ship that had been excavated facing an entry point.


    Each pillbox had a few hundred rubber bullets in store, with three soldiers equipped with modified rifles that could fire said bullets. These were in addition to their standard weapons - Philip had been told that everyone was to preserve their own lives at all cost, but to try and use the rubber ammunition to deter either side from coming too close if a battle commenced.


    The central blockhouse held four more, including Philip, each equipped. The final two soldiers in his section were given beanbag shotguns and assigned to ensure that if an incident did occur the tunnels remained clear.


    Due to strange energy fields being detected in the vicinity of the blue army camp (Both armies had been referred to by their prominent colors over the last few hours), landline cabling was run from each pillbox to the ship itself in the event that the energy fields interfered with wave based transmissions.


    Philip had been given the use of a tablet which allowed him to switch between the views of several drones in the area as well as to view helmet cam feeds from each member of his section. While it would not function in the event of a disruption in airwave capabilities, it would be of great utility as long as everything functioned normally.


    ¡°Purple, this is Forward Red. We have movement. Grid 5-7. Six, dark clothing, visible on thermal. How copy? Over.¡± The creative powers that be had designated Philip as purple, as commander over blue and red teams. They had also set up a very basic grid system. With a lack of proper GPS, they had set the ship as the center of 10-10 and coordinates were interspaced at 100 meters.


    Philip switched to thermal and sure enough, he found six individuals. Three of them were in heavy cloaks, three of them were in what he assumed was the lacquered leather and metal armor. They were lit up like beacons on heat sensors.


    They moved through the darkness, keeping to a few dried streams and moving from one clump of shrubs and tall grass to the next. They were clearly making a beeline for the ship and the camp at its base.


    ¡°Forward Red, purple. Copy five. Ready non-lethals and stand by. Over.¡±


    ¡°Purple, Forward Red. Acknowledged, over.¡±


    Philip continued to monitor the approaching red soldiers.


    Yvonne


    ¡°We literally saw them raise a fort, and you don¡¯t think it¡¯s worth re-evaluating what we¡¯re doing?¡± Lieutenant Wendy Estep was upset, her statement mirroring Yvonne¡¯s own inner dialogue. Lieutenant Seth Fletcher, as weapons officer and temporary commander of their forces, was not.


    ¡°We don¡¯t know what we saw. Nothing in that video is possible without a lot of coincidences, and it is certainly beyond the realm of anything we can do. As such, there has to be some kind of fluke. These primitives can¡¯t have something unexplainable by science, no matter how much that stream looks like evidence. The engineers have detected someone pulling data somewhere on the ship - I think our civilian passengers are messing with us.¡± Seth paused for a breath, and Yvonne jumped in.


    ¡°And what would their motive be?¡± She was exasperated, this argument had been going on since the sun began to set. ¡°We¡¯ve demonstrated that their weapons can¡¯t touch us, but this is different - Keeping this to ourselves is putting lives at risk! What if they can raise spikes, or-¡±


    ¡°Yvonne, I don¡¯t care what you¡¯ve seen in your anime. This is real life. No one is going to ¡®bend¡¯ stone into barricades.¡± Yvonne clenched her fists upon being interrupted and belittled by the man, but she had nothing else to contribute. The evidence was there, and it was either accepted or it was not.


    ¡°Just in case, I¡¯m authorizing one of the point defense turrets. I¡¯m not sure how the flechette rounds will be in atmosphere, but at the range we expect for engagements it¡¯ll still be effective enough to deter them.¡± Even though supply officer Jonsson wasn¡¯t willing to stand against Seth, he at least was taking a mitigating approach to whatever it was they witnessed.


    Seth shook his head, ¡°You¡¯re being paranoid, but it won¡¯t hurt anything to drill the gunnery crews and spin it up. I¡¯m going to check the vehicle bay. Jonson, Estep, follow.¡±


    Two muted utterances of ¡°Yes sir¡± and the closet was empty again. Yvonne checked the admiral¡¯s condition once more before stepping out and heading to her office.


    To her dismay, there was a flashing missed alert sign on her desktop. She slumped into her seat and went to view it, worried, she¡¯d missed some urgent request or update from another part of the ship.


    TRANSLATION STATUS: 80%


    Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    COMMUNICATION VIABILITY HAS REACHED NATC MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS


    PUSH PATCH 305.7C TO ENDPOINTS? [y/N]


    Yvonne went to select the affirmative, before thinking better of the action. She cancelled, and pulled out a set of augmented reality glasses she occasionally used. She powered them on, confirmed their charge, and subscribed to the patch on the single device.


    It made sense to try things first, before deploying it to the entire ship and risking a miscommunication, right? Plus, she wanted to visit her patients. Even if she could only make basic statements, it was important to reassure them that they intended no harm.


    Quintus


    The knowledge that his legion were close had both filled Quintus with apprehension and relief. He could only hope someone would attempt a diplomatic approach to the metal construct and its inhabitants, granting Purductonia the chance at establishing a positive relationship with these people.


    For the thousandth time, he wondered about the origin of these people. Were they always in the sky, and simply decided it was time to descend? Were they distant travelers from a distant yet-discovered continent? He only had so many scenarios that could possibly explain their strange magics and lack of a shared language.


    A commotion outside of the tent - For while it was strange, this construct was clearly made out of cloth and a frame, so it had to be a tent - brought him back to the present.


    The tent flaps were pulled back by two of the armored humans, and the woman in white - Yvonne - entered accompanied by one of the smaller constructs. It was not the white with red cross constructs, but one of the smaller ones that he had seen with the beetle constructs.


    She looked around the tent, and appeared to note that Quintus was alone. He was sitting in one of the strange folding chairs at a folding table. She took a folding chair from where it leaned against a support post, and placed it at the table. Quintus tensed a bit - This was the first time someone from the metal hulk had approached him since they were placed in this camp.


    He wondered how she was going to communicate. She said something he could not understand, and after a moment the small construct by her shoulder started making noise.


    ¡°Hello. Me heard?¡±


    Quintus spilled his mug. It only held water, but he hadn¡¯t been prepared for this. ¡°Yes? I can hear you.¡±


    The construct output what he could only assume was this person¡¯s language. She smiled and pointed to herself. ¡°Name Yvonne.¡±


    ¡°I am Quintus.¡± This was not a normal translation magic, but it was close enough. This group seemed very reliant on objects and less reliant on individual magic. Perhaps they pursued standardization above all else?


    Over the next thirty minutes, Yvonne asked Quintus questions in a semi-functional translation, and he did his best to answer those questions. Yvonne was frustrated by several questions that simply did not seem to translate, but Quintus was successful in providing basic details about the two legions near the metal construct.


    The Netharians, or ¡°Red¡± as she referred to them, would try to investigate the construct and potentially steal anything they could turn to their advantage. They were convinced of their moral superiority in all things, so unless they received a direct demonstration that they were outclassed they would continue to test these people.


    In exchange, Yvonne explained - As best she could - That these people were from the North Atlantic Trade Organization¡¯s star-faring navy. It was a mouthful and caused his mind to freeze for a moment, but it did answer some questions. These people had traversed the sky.


    They were not from this world. On one hand, that was a positive - It meant that they were not biased in their dealings, and so the ¡®rebellious¡¯ Purductonian nation could possibly find an ally in them. On the other hand, the idea of a group of humans capable of moving between entire worlds was terrifying. There was a mention of multiple fleets - And Quintus was brought back to their first encounter. Eight points of light burning across the sky, not including Yvonne¡¯s people.


    The world was going to change dramatically, for better or for worse.


    Yvonne


    The translator was incomplete. It was certainly functional - But so long as it labeled things as ¡®magic¡¯ and ¡®divine power¡¯ it would cause problems with the ship¡¯s crew. A number of her questions had pertained to what they witnessed within the ¡®blue¡¯ camp, the ¡®Purductonian¡¯ force.


    Quintus¡¯ response had made it clear that it was standard practice among their forces to find and fortify a water source, but the translator had clearly labeled the next step as ¡®magic¡¯. For now, she updated the translation patch to replace ¡®magic¡¯ with an error, so that she could push it to the rest of the group.


    It wasn¡¯t technically her prerogative to handle social interactions, but the only linguist in their task force was MIA on another vessel.


    While the patch applied itself, she opened a channel to Lieutenant Seth Fletcher. After a moment, his gruff voice answered. ¡°Yes?¡±


    ¡°Lieutenant, I¡¯ve got a live translation patch queued. I¡­ Questioned them about what we saw in the video. They confirmed that it¡¯s real. It¡¯s not someone feeding us bad data.¡± Yvonne¡¯s voice was laced with nervousness. She was still miffed by the earlier admonishment, but the idea of something beyond their understanding was far more concerning.


    ¡°So what - You¡¯re saying they can just defy reality? Defy the laws of- Whatever it is. Conservation of motion, thermodynamics, that shit?¡± Seth was still highly stressed, but the fact that he hadn¡¯t immediately shut her down was a positive. It meant there was a chance for him to see.


    ¡°The translation keeps using the term ¡®magic¡¯ for what they¡¯re describing. They use wax ¡®charges¡¯ to cast spells. It¡¯s standardized, but complex. The light we saw in the video during the march was divine magic, used to reinvigorate and restore-¡±


    Seth cut her off, his voice snarling over the comm channel. ¡°And how are we supposed to fight against such a thing?¡±


    ¡°I¡­ I don¡¯t know. The Netharians - That¡¯s the red group - They¡¯re not cooperative at all. But Quintus may be willing to-¡± Yvonne was cut short once more as Seth raised his voice.


    ¡°Dr. Shelby - Must I remind you that we are adhering to first contact protocols? We are absolutely NOT employing a local as an advisor or consultant - Not when they are clearly at odds with another group. Do you understand?¡±


    The military training kicked in, and Lieutenant Junior Grade Yvonne Shelby replied. ¡°Yes, Sir.¡± Seth killed the connection, and Yvonne was left to her own thoughts.


    Philip


    ¡°Contact Red!¡± The ¡®Netharian¡¯ facing pillbox was suddenly firing, sending rubber bullets toward the six infiltrators. Prismatic light split the air a moment later and the sandbag bunker exploded.


    ¡°What the fuck was that?¡± Philip shouted, watching it unfold on thermals - There were no survivors. Cooling pieces of flesh dotted the crater that once contained part of his mishmashed squad. ¡°Switch to lethal! Drop the bastards now, first contact be damned!¡±


    The ¡®purple¡¯ bunker, sandwiched between the other two, moved to comply. They discarded the weapons loaded with nonlethal rounds snatched up their standard rifles. Each man, Philip included, braced on the sandbag wall and switched to thermal vision.


    A moment later, a dozen shots rang out and the six Netharians fell - Dead.


    Philip directs the others to continue their watch, and orders Blue to equip lethal rounds. With that done, he contacts Lieutenant Fletcher. ¡°Purple to Bravo 6, Red is gone, requesting medical. Six hostiles eliminated. How copy? Over.¡±


    There is a long pause before Fletcher responds. ¡°Acknowledged. Dispatching drones to collect Red and hostiles. Flechette turret controls will be routed to you for area suppression. Over.¡±