First Contact

"Did I take part in the Darkness War?

"Which part? Because there were a lot of parts." - Anonymous

"Why do you want to hear old ugly stories about what grampa did in the Darkness War? Sit with me, squirmlings, and let grampa tell you the tale of the clever podlings and the candy store." - Anonymous

"What I saw with my own eyes, none would believe, even as I transcribe what I saw into crude words." - Pulngee Limberton

"Laying there, staring at a darkening sky, I wished I was dead. Now time has passed, the stars have returned, and I am glad to be laying here.

"Beside you." - Anonymous

One by one

The stars went out

One by one

The stars returned

The cold light of dawn

was replaced by your warmth

sit by the fire with me

and we shall hold one another

It is dark and cold

but we have each other." - Poetry carved on a wall in Progenitor Ruins, anti-spinward, distal galactic center. Meaning unknown.

Tut'el stared at what, who, stomped out of the darkness, partway into the room, then stopped.

"Come in much further, we're going to fall through the floor," the massive armor said, using an external speaker.

The Warfather shrugged. "Not my intention."

"You got phasic shades everywhere," the figure, who Tut'el knew could only be Enraged Phillip, said slowly. The armored human lifted a hand and pointed a thumb behind him. "They're all over the parking lot."

"I need to shut down the ansible links," Vuxten said.

The human skull faced helmet turned left and right. "We can do that," the Terran said. There was silence for a second. "Menhit wants to know if you've eaten today."

There was an awkward silence broken only by the far off shrieks of enraged phasic shades.

"Yes," the Warfather said.

"All right, let's get to work," Enraged Phillip said.

Tut'el tensed, waiting for some kind of eruption of hyperviolence.

Instead the armor gave a weird double-beep and opened.

The Terran inside was all bulky muscle and tattoos, with brown skin and close cut black hair. He stepped out, taking a second to stretch.

"Dhruv said to ping the ansible," Enraged Phillip said, moving forward. "He needs you to ping a specific port, that'll signal him."

A bunch of icons appeared between the mantid's armored antenna.

"Which port?" the Warfather asked after a second.

The Terran made a snorting noise. "I understand engineer, kid."

"Oh, that's right," the Warfather sounded kind of embarrassed.

Tut'el felt suddenly angry. It was as if the Warfather was being deliberately shamed by the Terran.

"Dhruv said to show you this, that you'd understand it," the Terran said, holding out his hand. The holoprojector built into the Terran's palm spun up to life and flickering symbols started to appear.

The Warfather moved away slightly, going over by the empty suit. There was a singular tone and the Warfather's armor cracked open.

The private, Beatnik or whatever his name was, stepped forward, holding out a beer to the Warfather. Vuxten took the beer, took a long drink, then wiped his mouth, giving a sigh of pleasure.

"Forgot how hot she runs," Vuxten said.

"So that's Enraged Phillip?" Beatnik asked.

Vuxten nodded.

"Thought he'd be bigger," Bit.nek said, shrugging.

"I'm in disguise," the Terran said without turning around.

"Makes sense. Wouldn't want a shade to recognize you and ask you about your armor's extended warranty," the Private shrugged. "Catch."

The Terran didn't even look, just reached out and caught the beer, striking off the cap on the edge of a table with one smooth motion.

Tut'el moved over to the Warfather. "Sir," he said. He looked around. "Sir, don't you think that, well, with everything going on, we should be... uh... there should be... um, maybe we should..."

Tut'el trailed off, unable to verbalize what was bothering him.

"Maybe we should be more urgent, running around, yelling, firing our weapons, and the like?" Vuxten asked, his whiskers twitching with amusement.

"Feels like we should be doing something, right, Captain?" Beatnik asked. He tossed another bottle of beer and Captain Tut'el caught it. "Not just standing around drinking beer?" The Private lit a Treana'ad smokestick, taking a few puffs and exhaling a cloud of smoke as he put the lighter away.

"Well... yes," Tut'el said.

"We are," Major Vuxten said. He took another drink. "We're cutting off the superluminal communication system. That eliminates the enemy's reinforcements and prevents additional waves of enemy forces from entering the system. We are going to push out the methods of fighting the enemy, allowing people to defend themselves and others, allowing us to take the fight to what, at first, appeared to be an unstoppable enemy. What we're doing, just the six of us, is more than any other commander right now could accomplish with an entire armored division."

"And we don't have much time," He pointed outside. "At least half of the population is dead. At least two thirds of the military is dead. That's over six billion souls, gone, and the number is increasing every second."

The Major rubbed his face then looked up. "It's the early days of the Precursor Autonomous War Machine attacks all over again. All it needs is 'There Is Only Enough For One' to be booming out across the world every ten minutes or so, over and over, and screaming mobs of those driven to insanity to make this into my worst nightmare."

"Good job on getting here, Inertia says the other emergency broadcast stations aren't responding. This is the only operational one on the whole world," the big Terran suddenly said. "He's going to activate the system and push the data packet to the survivors. Give them a chance to fight back."

"Hate this. Gimme something to actually fight," Beatnik said, exhaling smoke into the air.

"Steady, lad. Your time will come soon enough," the Major said. He turned and looked outside. "They're mad."

Tut'el looked out, past where the vehicle was wedged into the front of the building, past the ragged hole the Terran had walked through.

The shades were sweeping through the streets. It looked to Tut'el like they were pouring down the sides of the buildings with antenna on the top, flowing through the streets and alleys like water.

Tut'el could hear their enraged shrieking even over the hum of hidden machinery.

The street lights flickered and turned red.

Shades caught in the light shrieked and flinched back, flickering out of the circle of red light to reappear near the light, pawing and clawing at an invisible cone.

"You do that, buddy?" Major Vuxten asked 471. He frowned. "Huh, I wonder who did."

"That's good. That means someone else is fighting in the method they're able to. They're thinking, looking past just their own door," the Terran rumbled. He gave a chuckle. "My Father once told me that every one of the Malevolent Universe's children is capable of greatness, they have greatness inside of them, burning like the light of a sun. All they have to do is find it."

Tut'el swallowed thickly, then took a drink of his beer.

The Major unbuckled his torso armor, letting it hang to the side, then moved over and pushed his back against a standing piece of artwork. He moved up and down, scratching his back on the protrusions of the bizzarre piece of lobby art.

"Oh, that's the stuff," he said. He stepped away and rebuckled his armor. "I get this itch just below by shoulder blades every time," he took another drink off his beer and then gave a sigh. "First Telkan War, I had that itch all the time, used to drive me crazy. No matter how I wiggled, I couldn't seem to scratch it."

"I'm ticklish. During the Second Invasion of Anthill when I was armored up, I swore there was this little spider inside my armor's sleeve," the Terran suddenly said. "The techs didn't believe me, nobody would believe me, but the little sucker would come out and bite my armpit and the inside of the my elbow. Plus, he kept triggering malfunction alerts in that arm. It was before I broke free of the Immortal conditioning, and there's this tiny spider, no bigger than the head of a pin, living in my armor's right arm."

The Warfather snickered. "What happened?"

The Terran gave a low laugh. "I'm ticklish. That and the little itsy bitsy spider ruined the Imperium's day," the Terran stepped back. "Ping me if you need me, Inertia."

The mantid flashed some icons.

The big Terran moved over and looked out the gap in the wall. "I'm really ticklish. The little guy was crawling around in my armpit, Lord Knight Vertrumat was commanding me to lead another assault straight into the teeth of the Nine Canyons Hive, berating me for cowardice because I'd called off the assault and ordered a retreat when a half dozen Speakers had shown up.

"So the Lord Knight is berating me. He'd already slapped me few times, so my temper was up, and here's this itty bitty spider crawling in my armpit," the Terran said. He shaded his eyes. "Huh, someone's turning all the room lights red. Good for them. Anyway, he's screaming at me, and his breath just reeks of curry. I hate curry. Dhruv used to sneak up on my while I was sleeping and smear curry under my nose," the Terran nodded. "Guess it's a good thing these people have their lighting controls connected to the network.

"Anyway, he's screaming sour curry breath into my face, my armor is pinching my balls, and this spider is crawling in my armpit. The Immortals conditioning is leaving me standing there, but I'm getting madder and madder. Every time I wiggle, the Lord Knight screams at me. FIDO is standing there and he's whining but I can't scratch his petting nerve to calm him down," the Terran said.

"Suddenly, it just all crashes together. I start screaming at the top of my lungs, trying to rip my armor off, the Lord Knight is yelling at me, trying to reestablish control with codewords, the spider is biting my armpit, FIDO starts barking," The Terran suddenly laughed. "By the time things had calmed down, Lord Knight Vertrumat was dead, I'd ripped the guts out of a Dominion class battleship, and I'm pulling apart my armor trying to find that spider."

Beatnik snickered.

The Terran lifted up his hand. "I found it. The little spider. Only..." there was a slight flicker and a tiny spider, made all of minute code, appeared on the Terran's fingertip. "It wasn't what I thought it was."

"What is it?" Beatnik asked, leaning forward.

"My Father had told me that even the smallest creature, even things we would overlook and ignore, have a purpose in the malevolent universe. He used this little thing as an example and gave it to me. It's like a Tommy's Gotcha. Your supposed to feed it, pet it, play with it. When the Combine slash Imperium took me and subjected me to the Immortals program, I'd forgotten about it. It hid, stored in the smartlink in my forearm," the Terran said. He held up his finger, looking at the little spider. "When I found it, sitting in the wreckage of the bridge of the ship, I am not ashamed to admit I wept.

"The last of the conditioning broke. I was the first Immortal to break free, as much as we ever did before the Lady Lord of Hell released our chains," the Terran said. The spider vanished.

"Think the Digital Omnimessiah meant for it to go down like that?" Beatnik asked, handing the Terran another beer.

The case was half empty.

"I like to think so," Enraged Phillip said. He stood up. "You seem to have this well in hand. Any particular reason you called for me?"

Vuxten nodded. "I know this sounds petty," he motioned at Beatnik and Tut'el. "They'll probably die of shock, but I could really use a couple of favors."

The Biological Apostle Enraged Phillip, AKA Daxin "The Walking War Crime" Freeborn, gave a loud groan and slumped slightly. "Fine."

-----

"How's it looking out there?" Brentili'ik asked. She was staring at a screen that would have shown newscast talking heads only a few hours before. Now it was displaying text.

USE TEXT OR AUDIO ONLY [STOP] VISUAL MEDIA CAUSES SPREAD OF KILLER GHOSTS [STOP] RED IN 880808 CREATES BARRIER [STOP] MEDIUM GROUND SODIUM CHLORIDE CRYSTALS ACROSS DOORWAYS OR WINDOWS CREATES BARRIER [STOP] SODIUM CHLORIDE IN CIRCLE CREATES SAFE AREA [STOP] MYLAR WITH 0.5 MICRON ALUMINUM OXIDE LINER CREATES BARRIER [STOP] COLD IRON AND NON-ALLOYED IRON DISRUPTS GHOSTS [STOP] STAY TUNED TO THIS CHANNEL OR OUR AUDIO ALERTS ON 102.5 MHz KBOY [STOP]

Her intelligence officer glanced at his datapad, checking the text. "There hasn't been any reported attacks in the last four hours."

Brentili'ik opened her mouth to reply when the words thundered through her very bone marrow.

LET THIS WORLD SHAKE IN THE WRATH OF LOST TERRASOL

There was the booming a vast iron doors then the clattering of heavy iron chains. From outside there was a crashing explosion that made the pictures clatter on the walls.

Everyone else had dove to the ground, leaving Brentili'ik standing alone in her office. She slowly turned from the desk to look outside.

A large suit of Terran combat armor was walking across the lawn, brushing away smoking dirt from the forearms. The suit stopped at the window and tapped on it with one armored finger.

Brentili'ik reached out and opened the window.

The armor's skull faceplate retracted, revealing a brown skinned Terran male's face with chrome tears tattooed next to one eye.

"Missus Brentili'ik?" the Terran asked.

"I am she," Brentili'ik said, holding tight to her courage when every fiber of her being shrieked at her to run away.

"I'm a friend of your husband, Vuxten," the Terran said.

"I am aware of my husband's name, Terran," Brentili'ik said, holding on to her sanity with both hands.

The Terran flashed one of those toothy smiles. "He'll be happy to hear that."

Brentili'ik barked a laugh.

"He just wanted me to see if you were all right," the Terran said. He turned slightly at the waist and looked behind him. "Sorry about the entrance. You've got a Case Omaha going on and that entrance is kind of hard coded into the system to go off if there's a Case Omaha in effect."

Brentili'ik nodded. "I understand."

An armored goodboi chassis reared up, putting its front paws on the windowsill.

**I am FIDO** it said.

Brentili'ik, familiar with Flopsy, reached out and scratched between the robotic ears. "And you are a goodboi."

The Terran's smile got wider. "Looks like you have everything under control here, Missus Brentili'ik. Anything I should know?"

Brentili'ik wanted to take a deep breath but instead just nodded slowly. "The Telkan system appears to have a unique situation going on, if you would like to stand in the window and take part in the briefing? I would offer to let you come into the office but I am unsure if your armor would be able to fit through the hallways."

"This is good enough," the armored Terran said. He leaned against the window, his arms folded. "Daxin Freeborn, known to most people as Enraged Phillip."

"Brentili'ik," she said.

The Terran nodded, smiling slightly. The armored goodboi dropped down and raced across the lawn, barking at birds.

The rest of the staff just stared at Madam Director Brentili'ik dealt with the imposing Terran without so much as a whisker out of place.

"Well?" Brentili'ik snapped, clapping her hands together. "Stand up. You were all saying we needed to get the information out to the other systems. Now we have a chance."

-----

Fenn finished spraying the wall with a light coat of red paint and stepped back. The windows had been covered by mylar, with ground sodium chloride crystals across the windowsills. She had an iron bar, something the nutriforge had called an "iron rebar - one each" leaning on the wall next to the window.

She lifted up one of the mylar sheets over the window, glanced outside and shuddered.

"Is she still out there?" her husband, Inkree, asked, raising the face shield from his sweaty face. With one hand he was shaking a spray can of red paint. "Finished upstairs."

"She is," Fenn nodded, letting the mylar strip drop.

Her niece, Dambree, was outside on the lawn where shades were swirling around her. None had gotten close and Aunt Fenn wasn't sure why. She turned to her husband. "Do a check, make sure the outside walls are coated."

Inkree nodded, moving away, still shaking the can of paint. He gave a sharp nod and the clear face shield dropped back down.

In the frontroom Meglee looked out the window between the small gap between two mylar panels, the size of a sheet of paper, on one of the windows.

Outside, in the sunlit day, on the front lawn Dambree was dressed in a flowing dress, dark colored with dark crimson edging, kneeling in the middle of the lawn, her hands folded in front of her, head up, face raised to the sky, eyes closed, lips moving as she sang.

She was surrounded by a nimbus of light.

Beyond the light, which was visible even though it was daylight outside, the light gold in color, shades swirled around the kneeling Hesstlan woman.

Meglee could hear Dambree singing even inside. It was a strange language, lyrical and musical, flowing words that seemed slow and stately.

The lyrics, the words, almost felt threatening to Meglee despite the fact that Dambree had translated the lyrics for Meglee before. While it was almost a dirge, almost a litany of defeat, but Dambree had taught her that it was a litany of hope and faith.

"What's she doing?" Pulngee, Dambree's baby sister, asked.

"Singing," Meglee said. "It's somehow keeping those... those things away from her."

Punee nodded, moving up and pressing her nose against the mylar and shifting her face so that one eye was even with a gap so she could see better.

Her sister was kneeling in the middle of a circle of light, visible despite the sunlit day, with shades swirling around her.

Punee noticed that there were some shades that were kneeling down around her sister, almost as if they were joining her in their songs. Some had their heads bowed, others had their faces lifted, some had their hands pressed together, others were wringing their hands.

"Aren't you worried?" Meglee asked her cousin.

Punee shook her head. "She knows what she's doing," she said.

All of her life Punee had believed in her sister with all of her heart.

Outside, Dambree could feel the rage of the shades around her. It was a rush of water, like standing knee deep in the fast flowing shallow rapids of a river of heated water. She could feel them moving around her, feel them trying to assault her.

They were the faint summer breeze compared to the rage she had withstood before.

Dambree raised her face, feeling her love for her family fill her, her eyes closed. She reached out, her voice upraised in song. She got to her feet, spreading her arms out, raising her voice louder so that her song echoed off the surrounding houses.

She could feel the pain, the agony, the despair that filled the shades around her. The horror, the rage, the crushing despair of their deaths that filled them. She reached out with her voice, with her heart, to the shades around her, calling them to her, beseeching them to come to her and hear her voice, hear her words.

Faintly, Dambree could hear some of the shades were beginning to sing along with her.

"Ave Imperator! Before you, I am cleansed! Remove me from the pain of the flame and grant me mercy at my end!"

Meglee and Punee were watching out the window.

There was a flicker. A distortion in the air, like heat ripples over a hot highway on a hot summer's day in the desert.

The grass waved as if a breeze had emanated from the distortion, flowers erupting from the grass and blooming. The trees bloomed. A rainbow appeared in the clear blue sky. There was a burst of golden light and the sound of music.

A man made of swirling blue code with silver patches appeared next to Dambree.

Meglee and Punee could hear his voice clearly.

"It appears that your people are in need of my assistance and I hope that I am not too late, my beloved child."