First Contact

Chapter 827: Book of the Dead

We all thought we knew what was going to happen.

We all believed that in order to save the universe, the galaxy, the Cygnus-Orion Galactic Arm Spur, the Council and the Confederacy regions, we'd have to defeat the Atrekna.

We all believed we had a time limit to do so.

We mistakenly believed that the time limit had to do with the amount of time it took for the Atrekna to temporally replicate enough forces to swarm everyone under.

We were wrong.

The time limit was for when the Atrekna would make a critical mistake.

A mistake that would leave the Atrekna Progenitors extinct.

And the Cygnus-Orion Galactic Army Spur as silent as a tomb.

Or rather...

...a Tomb World. - SOURCE: RECOVERED REFERENCES OF DAYS OF POSSIBLE FUTURES PAST - Wemtarran Temporal Investigation and Alteration Project.

The portal had been used for a strike team of Atrekna, backed by servitors and slavespawn, to invade the stellar system and possibly assault what had a high percentage chance of being the Cult of the Defiled One's home base.

Nearly a hundred Atrekna, five thousand servitors, and twenty thousand slavespawn, including over a hundred Ohm Class, had moved through the portal.

Contact had been lost almost instantly.

Like all the other expeditions, the Eighteenth Expeditionary Force lost contact with the rest of the Atrekna within seconds. It was as if going through the portal severed them from contact with the rest of the Atrekna.

The 18th EF had possessed enough Atrekna to form a strong communal mind.

One of the carefully tailored slavespawn Ohm Class had been a mobile Elder Brain life support. The Elder Brain had been in contact with the primary Overmind even as it had moved through the portal to the target planet.

Then it had all gone silent.

The Atrekna gathered together, trying to understand what had gone wrong.

Probes of the planet had shown that there was a high chance that Dalvanak's Cult of the Defiled One had at least a minor base of operations on the planet.

It had been a Mad Lemur of Terra colony planet.

That much was obvious.

The planet's ecosphere had been heavily damaged. The world's major metropolises showed signs of heavy combat, including what looked like orbital kinetic kill weapons and atomics. Sweeps of fast moving probes had shown that there was only small patches of surviving Mad Lemur scattered about on the planet. The Mad Lemurs seemed to have regressed into hunter gatherer tribes that avoided the cities and one another, although one probe caught sight of what looked like a tribe in one of the massive cities that had been heavily damaged.

Those probes, however, had found an Atrekna scout ship on one of the larger continents. It was a scout ship that had been reported missing after nearly a dozen Atrekna defected to the Cult of the Defiled One.

There could be no other reason for the ship to be there.

Its transponder was still broadcasting, so the Atrekna had been able to pinpoint a method to open a portal and ensure that the strike team would be able to find Dalvanak and his cultists.

The Atrekna had put together a strong team. Instructions were to make for the scout ship, absorb the ship's memory, then seek out the Cult and destroy it.

Except...

...the force had gone through the portal and immediately contact had been lost.

The world the 18th Expeditionary Force had left from was one of the strongest fortress worlds the Atrekna possessed. Strong enough that it was not only able to resist the furious assault of Operation Iron Piglet, but it was still able to continue research even as the Inheritor forces were destroyed or forced from the system.

The researchers on the world refused to give up.

Seers and temporal investigation had stated that the Cult of the Defiled One would be instrumental in the downfall of the Atrekna and their plans. True, exactly how had not been revealed, but still, the Cult had been noted again and again as part of the downfall.

The other was some kind of creature, something that apparently dwelt in the depths of Hellspace.

While the Atrekna attempted to figure out a way to combat the Hellspace creature on other worlds, this fortress/research world was dedicated to rooting out and destroying the Cult of the Defiled One.

Which is why the 18th Expeditionary Force was launched from the fortress world.

After months of no contact, the 42nd Expeditionary Force was assembled.

The Atrekna dedicated four times the amount of the previous force, including four Ohm Class slavespawn that were nothing more than mobile Elder Brain life support systems fully capable of both defense and assault.

Probes were sent out.

The probes showed that the world was still still.

The scout ship was still there. Just sitting in an open area outside one of the metropolises.

There was no sign of the 18th Expeditionary Force.

The portal was opened and held open.

The 42 Expeditionary Force entered the portal.

And contact was lost.

Unfortunately for the Atrekna and the Galactic Arm Spur, this time there had been enough Atrekna and servitors for there to be some survivors.

-----

The 42nd Expeditionary Force moved through the portal, the lead Atrekna (who were all veterans of the fight against the Mad Lemurs of Terra) quickly set up a perimeter and put the slavespawn to work as they came through.

Before, the Atrekna had planned on moving with surgical precision, moving in small discrete groups to surprise Dalvanak's cultists.

This time, the 42nd Expeditionary Force planned on a different method.

Huge slavespawn belched out pollen and spores as well as floating creatures that moved high into the jet streams, spewing out pollen and spores, bacteria and other planetary assault organisms.

The Atrekna planned on taking the planet in its entirety.

The portal slammed shut as the last of the 42nd came through.

Twisted and warped life spread from the portal's destination point, rapidly consuming the damaged ecological systems of the Mad Lemur world. Plants became combative, what few animals still remained became carriers or troops for the Atrekna's biological assault on the planet.

The Atrekna had deduced that there was a high probability that the previous forces had run afoul of Mad Lemur tribes and been wiped out by the highly aggressive primates.

So the Atrekna would strip away the lemur's ability to exist on the planet.

The Atrekna leadership caste that had come through the portal discovered that there was some kind of dimensional and temporal stabilization in effect in the system that prevented another portal from opening up.

What they couldn't figure out was how the portal had been able to form in order to allow the Atrekna to move from the fortress/research system to the lemur world.

Still, they sent out forces into the rapidly xenoformed planet. Most of the forces had standing orders to discover the source of the stabilization. The rest were ordered to root out the cult and eliminate it.

Four times the research/fortress world opened the portal, sending through a probe that the Atrekna on the lemur planet used to transmit the data they had gained so far. While the portal opened on the fortress/research world side, it appeared only as a slight distortion on the lemur side.

It was a one way portal. Only paired particle transmission could move through the portal. Phasic powers were useless.

Still, the Atrekna on the fortress/research world side rejoiced. They had been able to establish a beachhead on the lemur world.

Which meant they would be able to assault the Cult of the Defiled One, root it out, and eliminate it from the galaxy before it was able to be instrumental in the downfall and extinction of the Progenitor Atrekna.

One thing the Atrekna on the lemur world noted was that the tribes of hunter-gatherer lemurs were very elusive. They showed none of the heightened aggression that characterized the Mad Lemurs of Terra. They were, well, shy and timid. They would vanish at the first hint of Atrekna or servitors.

The Atrekna noted that very quickly the lemurs seemed to learn to coexist within the xenoformed jungles and forests.

The Atrekna managed to capture several of the lemurs, finding out that the lemur's immune system was, if anything, even more aggressive than the Atrekna vegetation.

After a few incidents where the captured lemurs got free and smashed everything up before escaping, the Atrekna on the lemur world forbid any more capturing of the lemurs.

The Atrekna of the fortress/research world disagreed, but they could not enforce their commands to the Atrekna on the lemur world.

Four times the Atrekna went to where the scout ship had been sighted.

Every time they found nothing. Just an empty field of grass, and later, a large jungle clearing.

Yet probes launched from the fortress/research world would sight the scout ship.

The patrols would find nothing.

The vegetation pushed into the metropolises. Normally, there was no problems as brain coral grew and established the phasic information system.

The Atrekna in the fortress/research system felt anticipation as the expeditionary force reported that the brain coral supported Overmind was coming online and synching up. The researchers in the fortress system believed they had discovered what was wrong with the portal, why it was one way only, and they planned on establishing a two way portal across space and time.

Then the lines of communication went dead.

The fortress/research system let the other Atrekna held worlds know that the fortress system had managed to create a new kind of portal. It no longer depended on chronotron mechanics but now relied solely on phasic power.

The Inheritors of Madness were still pressing on thousands of systems, but they had been rebuked from thousands more, and those thousands all watched through various means as the portal was tested, proven to work, and slated to go to the aid of the 42nd Expeditionary Force.

A few Atrekna counseled caution.

Unperturbed, the Atrekna opened the portal.

The research and fortress systems of the Atrekna watched as the portal generated a phasic wormhole between the fortress/research system and the location of the fortress of the 42nd Expeditionary Force. The wormhole stabilized and then widened, a space-time bridge of pure phasic power.

None of them could hear the howling laughter of a malevolent universe as the portal stabilized.

-----

N'Thrap was a warrior caste Treana'ad of superior color and size. Hatched two years prior, he had grown up on the vast fields of Peanut Brittle Surprise, a cool world with a dim red sun and sweet breezes of nitrogen. He had entered basic training for the Confederate military because, well, of course he had.

Three point five meters tall four meters long, one point five meters wide, thick bladearms that were exquisitely sharp, thick of limb and carapace, highly sensitive antenna and other organs, and of course, the will to use it all.

His weapon, the Undying Queen of the Infantry Ma Deuce, was engraved with sayings of the Treana'ad War Horde and the words of the Biological Apostles of the Digital Omnimessiah. She was a faithful companion to N'Thrap, the steady KA-CHOK KA-CHONK KA-CHONK of her song a balm to his Warrior Caste soul.

His armor was dinged and dented. Here a 120mm sabot had been deflected by his thorax armor. There a 66mm rocket had left behind a shiny divot of osmium that had failed to penetrate his body armor. A patch over where a 155mm sabot round had been stopped by his very own carapace had a crudely scrawled painting of a sad Atrekna on it with 'sad squid noises' written over the top. His front legs had the holy banding of the Neapolitan Ice Cream and he had painted his back legs and lower abdomen with the stripes of Black Cherry Swirl. His rear right leg was a heavy warsteel cybernetic with pistons that hissed and released steam that smelled of warm nitrogen.

He was shoulder to shoulder with cybernetic Lanaktallan infantry, laying down firepower as they raced across the landscape, pounding the servitor lines with heavy weapons that were small arms for the heavy mobile infantry of the Confederate Armed Services.

The servitors had been putting up heavy resistance, stopping the Confederate advance time after time.

Now N'Thrap raced through the dust and debris of an atomic detonation that had savaged the front of the Confederate lines. The Lanaktallan cybernetic heavy mobile infantry had joined N'Thrap and his troops as they swept into the cloud to engage the servitors that were sure to be following up the attack.

He passed a burning Hesstla tank, the hatches open and three of the Hesstlan crew behind the tank, checking their rifles.

The Lanaktallan cyborg on N'Thrap's left twirled the guidon as N'Thrap blew on his whistle.

The Hesstlan tankers gave a cheer and one pumped a fist in the air.

N'Thrap turned smoothly, leading the Treana'ad and Lanaktallan mobile infantry out of the cloud.

They burst out of the dust and debris at a sixty mile an hour run and straight into the enemy's fire. The energy weapons cracked as they tapped at the battlescreens, the heavy kinetic weapons that the Atrekna had started to field less than a year ago slammed against battlescreens, and plasma weapons vomited up the ravening fourth state of matter.

N'Thrap charged directly into it, heading straight for the servitor lines.

Behind the servitor lines was a large crystal structure that heavy energy sources had been spotted emanating from by short-life spy-sats that had made it to orbit.

The enemy fire began to falter. Quadrants suddenly cut off.

N'Thrap got a feeling.

One he had never had before.

The sun seemed to dim. The nitrogen suddenly tasted sour as it hissed into his helmet from his environmental systems. The day seemed to get cold, chilly, as if all warmth was being sucked from the world.

N'Thrap blew the whistle and fired a flare even as he slowed as fast as he could, dirt showering up from in front of his footpads.

The charge came to a sudden stop, the lead crouching down. Heavy weapons deployed with a clatter even as the battlescreens flickered and synched up to strengthen one another.

N'Thrap fired off a commo drone even as the Lanaktallan cyborg next to him fired off some recon drones.

Silence descended on the battlefield suddenly.

Everything got hushed.

The screams were first.

N'Thrap frowned.

He had heard servitors scream in fear before.

This was different.

This was soul crushing terror.

Servitors started flooding out of the trenchworks and bunkers. Most of them were throwing their weapons away, others were turned around and firing back into the lines.

N'Thrap could see the glittering, almost fairy-tale appearing, fortress beyond. His unit's ultimate objective.

It seemed to darken. The sparkles stopped. The pink and purple darkened, dimmed.

"HOLD FIRE!" N'Thrap called out, blowing his whistle.

The servitors ran by, some throwing gear away as they ran.

N'Thrap could see their eyes, the raw terror that filled them.

Something flickered. Something strange.

There were a handful that flickered at the far trenches. They seemed to vibrate, jerking side to side, then vanish.

N'Thrap's weird feeling got stronger.

Part of the fortress slid off, turning to powder. Dull appearing, no longer sparkling, no longer appearing to be crystalline.

More like black powder just sluffing off.

Another flicker and the strange blurred shapes were closer.

His laser and sonic range finders didn't see it.

"You see that?" N'Thrap asked the Lanaktallan to his right.

"Yes," the Lanaktallan replied. "I am filled with unease."

For N'Thrap, that made the decision. Lanaktallan rarely felt unease or nervousness.

"FALL BACK!" N'Thrap ordered.

The radio was suddenly full of questions on why he had stopped his assault, on why he had just ordered a full withdrawal, on why his men were suddenly retreating.

N'Thrap had his camera focused just right when it came into view.

A Terran female. Her face was contorted with rage, her hands were tensed into tearing claws, her eyes glowed bright red. She was dressed in civilian clothing.

She grabbed a servitor. She yanked something out of the servitor, who collapsed limply on the ground.

She pulled her hands to her face and began chewing, biting, gnawing at the bluish thing in her hands.

"ALL UNITS FALL BACK!" came over the radio. "RETREAT!"

The Terran female raised her face to the sky and screamed, her scream disrupting the radio, creating howling feedback through the speakers on N'Thrap's torso.

Her eyes burned red as she looked around.

Red eyes.

Set in a face made of white line-art.