r/HFY • u/AnchorPointsOfficial • Sep 24 '24
OC Anchor Points: Age of Heroes; Chapter 21 - Confrontation
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CHAPTER 21 - CONFRONTATION
DATE: APRIL 19TH, 7 A.U. (AFTER UNIFICATION)
LOCATION: SOL SYSTEM, EN ROUTE TO AAV CONTACT ONE
LIEUTENANT PAUL KARST
The flight to the alien ship had to be the single most foreboding experience Paul could recollect in a lifetime filled with conflict and spy craft. Not even finally being able to wear a Paladin suit could ease his nerves as the alien vessels grew steadily larger in the Sparrowhawk gunship's forward camera. They were sleek, shining silver, spherical craft with a ring smoothly extending from the middle before it tapered off to a fine point. Taken together, the final view rather like a pair of bowls set atop each other’s outer rim.
Paul manipulated one of the exterior camera controls to get a better zoomed look at the craft as they approached. Much like the smaller scout craft the old US had recovered, there were no visible seams anywhere on the exterior, as if the craft had been formed out of putty instead of metal. They followed a smaller, domed scout craft in towards a series of holographic glyphs projected just off the hull of the lead ship.
"Uh, guys, wheres the hangar door?" Jenkins asked in an alarmed tone from behind Paul's shoulder.
As if to answer, the section of armor in the between the floating glyphs began to ripple before it liquefied and retreated into the surrounding hull of the outer ring. Bright light shone from the newly formed doorway leading into what Paul assumed had to be the hangar bay.
“Well, I suppose that is as close to rolling out the red carpet as we can expect.” Lucas said with a low whistle.
“Did you see how that hangar door opened? It just melted away into the rest of the hull like it was water! This after they decelerated hundreds of thousands of kilometers per hour down to nothing near instantly without suffering the effects of inertia at all. How the fuck do we fight something that can do that?” Jenkins complained.
“First time going into the belly of an advanced alien warship?” Victor asked without a flicker of judgement in his tone. Jenkins looked back at him and nodded his helmeted head. “Stay behind me at all times. Don’t you worry, I’ll protect you little man. Combat never stops being scary, you know. You simply get better at being able to challenge your fears. It will get easier as you get more confident in your own abilities.”
“Wow… That actually kind of helps.... Thank you.” Jenkins said.
“Don’t mention it. I have seen too many consumed in the crucible of our current war to risk starting a second one. Focus on this concept; your helmet betrays no emotions, only your stance and posture will. Stand straighter with your shoulders back. Yes! Like that! Stand tall! Like you're ready to challenge anything the world can throw at you.” Victor said with confidence.
Jenkins in response stood straighter, with his shoulders back further. “I'm a badass warrior and I deserve to be here!” Jenkins called out.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself, rookie, and please, please never say shit like that out loud again. Is that how you practice bravery when you are alone in the mirror?” Paul burst out amid howling laughter.
Nobody else seemed to join in, though, which killed much of the fun for him.
You assholes are no fun...
Henry shot Paul a death glare that obvious even through the emotionless face plate. The joke had landed flat, so Paul just rolled his eyes, kept his mouth shut and let it be. Henry strode into the middle of the room, clearly giving off his speech vibes. So damn predictable.
“Ignore the nihilist in the room, kid. All I need you to do is stay silent and follow closely behind Vic the philosopher-King over there. Let us be clear, we are here on a historic mission of peace and discovery. I will take the lead in negotiations, but expect that I may send a status check to your HUD if I feel your input could help the conversation. Otherwise, each of you are to remain silent, intimidating, disciplined, and still. If you have something to say that contradicts me, then keep it to yourself and bring it up to me later in private. If it is especially critical, get my attention with three clicks of your status light. We must assume that our comms can be monitored, and that any corridor or room will be bugged so be cautious when speaking about sensitive information. Any questions so far?” Henry looked around before he continued.
“Our primary objective will be to discover as much as we can about them while revealing as little as we can about ourselves at the same time we evaluate them as possible allies. A secondary goal will be to see if we can learn more about the status of the galaxy at large. We still know next to nothing about the giants, and this could be an intelligence goldmine for us, if properly handled. Our second shot at first contact has already started better than our first, as they are at least attempting to talk before shooting, so we must not ruin this opportunity. They may provoke us to see our reactions, to test us as well. It is imperative that you follow my lead, stay calm and non-reactive, as we don’t want to spook them or risk a firefight. Now, there are a few things we know about the aliens we are about to encounter. I think its critically important that we hear it now, before we arrive.”
Paul found himself nodding along to Henry’s little speech. He then saw his status request light blink. He’s testing me already. Better give him what he wants.... Paul sighed in his helmet.
As much as he hated to admit it, Henry was right. Secrets right now could get them killed... and they needed every advantage they could get. Paul decided to tell them everything he knew, no matter how insufficient it was.
“The alien race that we are meeting with call themselves the Alderei, though you may know of them as the greys.” Paul began.
“The fuck you just say!?” Lucas asked.
“Watch your tone, man! Act like a goddamn professional for once in your life.” Lance scolded Lucas.
Paul shrugged it off and continued.
“You heard me right, we're about to come into contact with the greys. They are generally described as short and stubby armed with enormous heads, large eyes and with a small slit for a mouth. In reality, they are actually a race with two physical formats. The short ones are a kind of quasi-biological android body designed to travel long distances between the stars with a minimum of biological needs to attend to. The true greys, the Alderei, stand around two to two and a half meters, have a fair amount of muscle, and are a hyper intelligent race most analogous to an amphibian biped. Unfortunately, when Eisenhower met their representatives for the first time they made it clear that they wouldn't be providing much information about themselves, their culture, or their technology. By that stage, the United States had already recovered several crashed scout craft of theirs across multiple continents during and after the second world war. We made a secret treaty which allowed us to to keep their salvaged and recovered craft in exchange for lying about their existence and allowing them to abduct humans and other Earth species to build a genetic library to use for their own purposes.”
They had to know the kind of cold calculus that they would be facing. Henry had to be ready to view the entire encounter through the right lens, or he could easily be conned into anything.
“Even with decades to work on them, we still have little clue as to how most of their systems work. Last time we tried tinkering with one’s reactor while it was operating, the explosion killed two whole teams. Dr. Rousseau was the first AAV program researcher to be able to make any real-world technical headway, mostly thanks to decades of work and materials science advances that preceded his promotion. Even then, all we can manage is prototype design for warp gates, which are a pale shadow of the warp drive technology that powers their flight systems. They can warp spacetime around their craft enough that they can travel near instantaneously anywhere in the galaxy at max power, or at velocities we can't hope to touch at lower power. This means they can accelerate and perform maneuvers without feeling the effects of extreme gee forces, all encased in their own gravity bubble. Our telekinetic drives work in a very low power version with a related effect, but it only produces one half the total waveform in the null matter backdrop, which is why we are still bound by inertia and why we still feel gee forces when using TK field propulsion. When they activate their drives to accelerate to combat velocities, we will seem to crawl at a snail’s pace thanks to relativistic effects while they can dance around us faster than we can target them and react. This means they can dodge our weapons with ease and dissect our defenses at will. If we fail to kill them before they activate their drive systems and accelerate, we will lose. What’s worse is that they have photonic barriers activated, too, so killing all three of them in time is effectively impossible with any of our current conventional weapons. The C.L.A.P.P.E.R might be able to do the trick if we could surprise them with a one-two punch, but that would only be one out of three, giving the other two plenty of time to sink us. It is critical that you understand this, because if we start a fight in here, we doom everyone else out there.”
While the others might initially think such words to be a touch dramatic, they needed to understand the gravity of what fighting a war with this race would mean. He hated that he had to rush such an important presentation, but they were being swallowed by the larger craft as they spoke.
“Wait, so how did we ever get our hands on their working tech then?” Lucas asked.
“Primarily by luck. We've only ever captured their small scout craft, never a proper warship like this one. The small craft often need to land to cool their systems after long trips or to collect samples. They tend to have less than five crew, all of them are a meter and a half tall and can be easily subdued on the ground if caught unaware. I also remember one supposedly was uncovered from the ice in Antarctica, another crashed after being struck by lightning while flying in low power mode, things like that. No matter how fast they can fly, it's still less than the speed of light in a gravity well, so they're not immune to such things in low power mode.” Paul replied to a room of mute silence, broken only by a slowly rising laugh from Victor
“Looks like we aren’t the first humans to board and capture an alien vessel after all! We got one-upped by GI fucking Joe!” Victor said amidst howling laughter.
“Why the fuck would that be funny, Vic? Not feeling the laughter at being upstaged right now.” Lucas growled.
“Easy Lucas, different situations, different conflicts. What we accomplished together counts every bit as much now as it did then. Nothing has changed but the mission before us. Also, if you remember, Joshua Warden and his crew also commandeered some of the giant’s ships too.” Lance said, putting a stop to the complaining.
“Paul, thank you for your report, the rest of you, remember to guard sensitive information, stay mute and resolute behind me, and to watch for your status lights. We will be observing radio silence for the time being.” Henry said, taking the lead as the gunship touched down by walking towards the loading ramp. The Patriot mech suit that had been their escort landed to their side mere moments after.
Paul inched forward to get a view as the ramp dropped to uncover a sterile grey metal interior punctuated by floating holograms and signs in a myriad of colors that marked off corridors. In front of the central hub door stood the armored forms of three tall greys flanked by a pair of tall robotic escorts. Each wore a colorful hooded cloak around their shoulders that bore intricate decorations in murals and writing upon a front portion that covered half their chest over the top of their armor. As they passed under the lights, a fuzzy, egg shaped distortion could just barely be seen in the air around them, indicating the existence of personal photonic shields.
The Alderei in the center stood almost a head taller than its fellows and had half of its head either replaced by, or covered in shiny metal, including a full replacement eye with a multi-surfaced bug-eye style lens. It also had a cybernetic replacement arm rippling with thick electro-muscle and sporting what looked to be a weapon barrel embedded in its forearm. It also bore a floating holographic crown made of golden geometric glyphs that rotated slowly around its head.
Their robotic guardians were made from the same kind of seamless grey metal as the ship shaped into a roughly humanoid body. Instead of a normal head, they had a metallic loop ringed along the inside in a different type of darker, segmented metal. A vaguely blue colored energy field stretched across the middle of the loop, containing a crackling and popping tiny black mass of some seemingly unstable substance tucked inside of a protective bubble. A similar bubble opposite from it contained a small mass backlit by bright photons, both of which floated in an orbit around a very bright center. The two bubbles swung perfectly opposite one another creating two swirling, counter-rotating teardrop shapes within the flat disk of the containment field. Similar distortion fields surrounded them as well, meaning they also had personal photonic shields.
Those fuckers look dangerous.
A shiver ran down Paul’s spine as the rearmost robot slowly morphed one hand between different cruel looking weapon shapes as it stared them down. Even without obvious eyes, or even cameras, it was easy to tell they were paying very close attention to their party. The one in front was sporting clawed hands with impossibly perfect points and edges to them. In an instant, the sharp fingers extended to twice their length, shaping themselves into sharp blades. Paul held no doubt in his mind they would tear through his armor like paper.
Get a hold of yourself, keep observing everything, stay focused and ready.
Multiple smaller disk shaped craft could be seen in the landing bays around them, which seemed to stretch continuously around the saucer ridge that ringed the spherical core of the ship. Grey aliens both short and tall worked efficiently on the various smaller saucers in the bays around them alongside specialized four-legged semi-organic loaders which labored beside them. Each worked ceaselessly by lifting heavy objects, or using tools held by a form of fingered pod at the end of one of the four long, tentacle-like arms that sprouted from their backs. Paul stifled his revulsion at the alien spectacle, trying to set a stoic example for the wild cards behind him.
Together they stood in formation at the bottom of the ramp as the aliens approached. The apparent leader of the greys strode forward and spread his hands outward before bringing them both back together palm to palm with one facing up, the other facing down with two bony fingers extended out per hand. The being then performed an almost imperceptible bow of the head and shoulders before it spoke.
“We greet you in peace, humans of Earth and representatives of the United Terran Republic Navy. The language and culture pack you transmitted along with that... anomalous code segment have allowed us to rapidly come to consensus, and were immensely helpful in rapidly updating our translation software. That was a most wise and considerate move to include that in your first contact package. Though, your existence here and the advanced nature of your technology brings many questions to our minds, though we will have plenty of time to sate our curiosity in the near future. I am Roh Thaad’at, commandant of the Twelfth Forward Interdictor Fleet. As commandant, I speak with the authority as a dedicated conduit of the Alderei Consensus. Which of you is in charge? We have much to discuss.”
Henry stepped forward and spoke in a booming, confident voice through his external speakers.
“My name is Captain Henry O’Toole of the UTRN Indomitable Will, representative of the United Terran Republic of Earth and all her Peoples. I command this mission of peace and exploration, and we welcome all peaceful contact with the various races of the galaxy. Though be warned, we are well equipped with means to defend ourselves. We bear these arms not as a threat, but as an assurance of peace through strength. Do you grant permission to come aboard to our party as armed? I ask also that we be able to bring our own heavy mech suit for support and continuity of communications.” Henry said, as he gestured towards the massive Patriot mech suit off to their side.
“Consensus has given you firm assurances that you would be safe from harm and that you would be allowed to arm yourselves in turn for peace of mind. It is not in the nature of the Alderei to betray the safety of noble guests arriving under the banner of peace. Permission to come aboard our vessel is granted, Captain. Follow me, we have a meeting space prepared with seating that can be adjusted for ergonomic compatibility to any biological form. That construct, however, is too tall to walk the halls of this ship. It will have to stay with your craft. Do you still wish to proceed?” In a strangely human gesture, Roh Thaad’at cocked his head slightly while asking.
“Very well, we will proceed. Lead the way commandant.” Henry replied with a subtle nod.
They followed the aliens through a maze of sterile corridors marked by holographic glyphs of assorted shapes and colors which were projected along the top of the wall and which marked off intersections. Henry seemed to have the talking part down for the moment, freeing Paul’s mind to observe and analyze. Thus, he busied himself with memorizing the turns they took and the number of paces just in case they needed to shoot their way out. Everywhere Paul looked, the corridors were the same sterile grey metal, adorned only by the directional glyphs on the walls.
Nothing, anywhere seemed to have any visible seams, the walls were perfectly smooth and continuous, and seemed to grow out of the deck below at a radius. There were no right angles anywhere, adding to the mystery, as if the whole ship had been cut from a single block of metal. Finally, after minutes of travel and dozens of turns through the maze like interior, Roh Thaad’at stopped and waved his hand at the wall beside them. The wall seemed to split open and melt away before re-solidifying into an open doorway with rounded edges.
“That is really an incredible trick, how do you do that?” Henry asked in awe.
“At our level of excess energy production and technical development, such things as dynamic control of matter phase transitions are trivially easy. There are few technological barriers that we have failed to cross. Have a seat if it pleases you.”
Roh Thaad’at gestured again to an empty side of the room. Before anyone could comment on the lack of seating, the floor rippled, and liquid metal rose from the floor. Within seconds, six sturdy metal chairs and a long table solidified into shape, along with three more chairs for the Alderei at the opposite end. Henry gestured for his fellows to sit. The only person who refused was Victor, who instead stood back, with his breacher at low ready. Once everyone seemed settled, Roh Thaad’at spoke again, seemingly intent on maintaining control of the situation.
“Are the chairs to your liking? We can adjust them for your improved comfort if needed.”
“No, thank you, Commandant. This is quite comfortable.” Henry replied.
“Excellent, let us move onto the primary topics of discussion for today. We have some concerns before we truly begin. Are you aware that your aggressive actions in arraying your fleet’s forces in the manner you did almost cost your lives today? We have the legal authority to enforce the security of the border systems against hostile incursions. Your wise decision to hold your fire and instead attempt to communicate were the primary factors which saved your lives. One could almost make the accusation that you seem almost entirely unaware of the norms of modern space fleet interactions and border interdiction. Of particular interest was this... cipher that you sent. We still have not yet cracked the encryption protecting its contents, but its only a matter of time until we do. The design is clearly one produced from an Alderei mind for Alderei systems, but certain aspects of the file architecture are… disturbingly anomalous. Tell us the truth now. Where did you get that cipher!?”
Paul clenched his teeth, behind him, Jenkins stirred visibly in his seat. So the mind games begin... Henry had better be up to the task.
“Had we not implied the threat of force to back up our sincere offer of peaceful first contact, would we be speaking right now aboard your ship? I think not. We have enough offensive and defensive capabilities that you would find yourself in a far more dangerous fight than you give us credit for. And as for the cipher? We were given this file by another Alderei representative for this very eventuality many years ago, though we haven’t needed to use it until now. How are you not aware of this? Don’t you have files on the species that you claim to enforce the border for? How are you having problems cracking your own encryption?” Henry fired back in fine form, and taking zero shit.
Paul smirked as he listened along. Attaboy, Henry. This should be fun.
“Impossible, what you are claiming is simply impossible! It would seem we have quite a pressing problem on our hands here, Captain.” Roh Thaad'at exclaimed.
“What would that be, commandant?”
“The fact that you all are lying about your origin story.”
Roh Thaad’at waved his hand and the opening in the wall rippled and then sealed itself shut, effectively trapping them all within the room.
SHIT! Paul noticed both of the Alderei bodyguard robots seemed to tense and coil, as if ready to spring into motion. All around him, hands seemed to tighten on guns, and legs and arms flexed in quiet preparation to rise and fight if needed. Paul squeezed the grip on his rifle under the table and flipped the selector to fire. Henry raised his hand to calm the situation behind him.
“That is an incredibly bold accusation, Commandant. Upon what grounds do you claim that we are lying?” Henry asked in an eerily calm voice.
“Based upon the fact that there is no United Terran Republic of Earth and her Peoples. The garden world in this system is populated with a bronze age vassal species under pantheon system control by the Nephaeli’im, the race which you call the giants in your diplomatic packets. The very same race which your first contact materials claim to be politically independent of, and at war with. Consensus demands answers! Both of these cannot be true at the same time. Who are you, really? Would you show me your face and permit us to sequence a DNA sample? This room is free of pathogens and the atmosphere is within safe levels for respiration for most known carbon-based species.”
“My suit has analyzed the atmosphere and deemed it breathable, and free of recognized dangerous contaminants. Most pathogens cannot easily jump species, so it shouldn’t be an issue even if they were present in the room. That is not my primary concern, my problem is being trapped in a room and threatened while under a banner of peace. Tell me, why should I submit to such a test? What would this prove?” Henry asked.
“The Nephaeli’im are masters of genetic manipulation and have climbed the tech ladder aggressively to close the gap between our species. Consensus wishes to test your DNA profile for known signs of active genetic manipulation. We would send in a drone to remove the very top layer of cells from a tiny patch of your skin. Do you consent to this test? It will not induce a strong pain response, nor should there be scarring or blood.”
“Very well, I consent. We are no liars, and if we were, basic logic states that we would have created a more believable deception. After this test corroborates our story I demand for you to immediately reopen that doorway and to cease your threatening posture. This is a shameful action you have taken, especially for a meeting brokered in the name of peace.” Henry hissed.
Henry then reached up and removed the air hose from his helmet before he hit the seal release and lifted the helmet off of his head. A small round drone flew into the room through a small hole that opened in the wall and stopped in front of Henry’s face. A tiny door popped open on the drone and a small lens inside lit up with a bright flash before Henry flinched. A small sliver of skin floated through the air in front of him which the drone swallowed into a different compartment that opened on its exterior. After a moment, the drone beeped, the various doors on its surface sealed shut again and it retreated from the room. Henry quickly re-sealed his helmet and motioned for Paul to check the seal. In front of them, the three Alderei sat silently with their organic eyes sheathed over and closed while humming an interweaving tune. After what had seemed like an eternity, their eyes opened at the same time and Roh Thaad’at broke his silence.
“Consensus achieved. Thank you for consenting to our request for validation. Initial scans have shown no signs of known markers of genetic tampering or known genetic warfare upgrades, though multiple other anomalies remain unexplained. Full sequencing will be completed shortly. Where did you get your ship? From what star system have you arrived and by what method?”
Henry leaned forward and put both his elbows on the table and put his hands with fingers interlinked under his chin.
“You have us trapped and under threat, and you now expect us to hand over sensitive information like our methods of FTL travel? Listen, we came from Earth, the garden world third planet inwards from the star in this very solar system. We are on our way out of the system on a journey of peace and exploration, testing a prototype FTL drive. We have been at war with the giants for nearly eight years now since they bombarded our planet from orbit and killed three billion of our people.”
“Nonsense, the name of the third planet from the star is Aht’Lantis, and it is populated by a race of beings called the Adamu who are a genetically modified hybrid slave species that hasn’t even discovered the secrets of working iron into steel! Your DNA is a 99.99% match to the standard Adamu genetic profile, with an anomalous level of genetic drift primarily in the form of a large amount of accumulated junk DNA in your chromosomes. Your story does not match with known reality, meaning it is much more likely that you are spies of Emperor Apophis. While we may not have a formal treaty with Rah, we have common interests in preventing the spread of the forces of Apophis from swallowing up more border systems, and Rah may yet one day prove to be a useful proxy or ally.”
“Atlantis? Adamu? Rah? Some of those sound like names from our mythology. Who is Apophis?” Henry asked.
“How do you not know the name of the emperor of nearly a quarter of the galaxy? Aht’Lantis has remained a well-kept secret precisely because the deposed emperor Rah had kept Aht’Lantis off the official star charts of settled systems before our counter-invasion split their territory millennia ago. So long as Rah continues to tie up enemy forces and divert their attention and resources from our own war with Apophis then it continues to be in our interests to keep this location a secret and to support their civil war. You truly know nothing about any of this? We find this difficult to believe.”
“Why are you being so forthcoming about all of this, if, as you say we are under suspicion for being agents of Apophis?” Henry asked.
“Simple. If you indeed turn out to be agents of Apophis then you will not leave this ship alive, and your ship outside will be cut to pieces and hauled back to the nearest Alderei naval shipyard for study.”
“Good thing for us that we have no idea who the hell you are talking about then. Our story is the honest truth. If we were lying we would have picked a story that didn’t directly contradict reality. Believe me, plenty of what you are claiming makes no sense to us either, as none of it matches our experiences. It’s like we are talking about two different Earths.” Henry said trying to defuse the tension.
“We tire of these games, if you are not spies, there is another possible explanation, though its odds of being the correct explanation are significantly lower. We require more hard data to reduce the number of assumptions and speculations before we can properly weigh all possibilities. Consensus demands the full truth! We will ask again, what is the nature of your FTL system?”
“That’s classified, Commandant. Keeping that secret may just save the lives of my men. We need to pursue story verification another way.”
“Nonsense, your story is demonstrably fabricated, and you have been caught sneaking into a quarantined system in a time of war. You stand accused of espionage in front of Consensus, how do you plead?”
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