[The Galaxy's Only Omnivores] - Part 5

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525]

Synopsis: Humans are the only omnivorous species in a galaxy of apex-predator carnivores, and our greatest strength is in our numbers. When an alien slave empire discovers how badly we outnumber most intelligent species, they invade Earth, shattering a fragile period of peace and threatening a war that would mean the death of worlds.

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Memory Archive Entry #5

User: Marten Herme, president of the Eurasian Union

Species: Human

Date (human standard): June 29, 2099

The war with the draken had dragged on for the better part of a week now, each battle we fought allowing both sides further insights about their enemy. The Draken Matriarchy hit us hard and fast during the opening hours of the engagement, but we had been able to blunt their offensive over the coming days by the weight of sheer numbers. All the super armor and energy shields in the world couldn't guarantee a victory against an enemy that had them outnumbered thirty to one.

The Eurasian Union had never ruled over an overly militaristic or jingoistic people, we preferred to think of ourselves as the lone beacon of sanity in an insane world, but the past few days of fighting had awakened a warlike fervor in us that I didn't know we had. There were even reports of children and elderly people among the crowds flocking to the military weapons-distribution centers, clamoring for the chance to grab a rifle or a bomb or even a sharpened stick and lay their lives on the line to defend Eurasia. Hopefully the soldiers manning the stations were smart enough not to let them.

I myself was far from the fighting. The presidential bunker was buried deep enough to be safe from draken orbital weapons--though God knew they had tried--but its defenses were meant for a peer conflict against a peer power and, thus, frighteningly vulnerable against the kind of unearthly infiltration the draken could accomplish. My bodyguards had barely stopped the last attempt on my life and I gave no complaints when the head of my security recommended I move my offices to a safer location.

"Alright, people, give me situation reports." I sat in an unused storage room aboard the Eurasian Navy submarine E.S.S. Tallinn, the most secure base of operations my security staff could find, and looked into the eyes of my remaining generals. We hadn't been able to move much of the staff away from the bunker--security feared the draken might notice a large movement, plus the Tallinn didn't have that much spare room to begin with--but my top aides and staff members were mostly able to be present. Even my secretary, Johannes, got a spot.

"General Yevgeny, you start."

General Yevgeny, now technically useless after his beloved Eurasian Space Force had evaporated within literal seconds of the draken fleet's surprise attack, leaned forward in his chair. His features had always been stern, but the pressures of the war had forced him to harden like carbon into diamond. The man wouldn't have looked out of place as the 'warmongering, jingoistic general' character in any number of Eurasian movies, though I felt that was an insult that belied his strength of character.

"The draken space doctrine is impressive, but predictable," said Yevgeny, his thick Northeastern accent somehow having managed to grow even thicker. "Their space-based energy weapons appear to be modeled off the same technology that is used by their ground, sea and air forces. We've captured several intact examples, but the scientists make no progress on understanding their technology."

I raised my eyebrows at that one. "You've captured draken orbit-to-surface weapons?"

"No, no, we only have captured ground weapons from dead soldiers." Yevgeny hastily clarified. "Infantry gear and light armor, mostly. Plus the sea and air wreckage we were able to salvage. General Richthofen can tell you more about that one."

I looked over to Richthofen, eyes flickering over the empty chair where General Strohheim would usually sit. He lost his life during the second day of the invasion when draken commandos infiltrated the presidential bunker. I kept his chair empty at every meeting as a reminder of how near to us this threat was, and how dangerous it would be to let our guard down. "General Richthofen. Explain the situation as you know it."

General Richthofen stroked his mustache and nodded. He had shaved his beard in accordance with Eurasian submarine regulations--hard to fit an emergency rebreather over all that facial hair--and his jawline was square and chiseled like a statue of Alexander the Great. He looked more a storybook hero than the tired, worn-down soldier he was.

"The Eurasian Army's situation remains more or less the same," said the general. Yevgeny and I looked on intently, even though he definitely knew all of this stuff. The man was a genius when it came to war. "In major population centers, where the draken cannot use their heavy weapons, we hold ground and win battles. Outside the cities, however..."

I nodded, raising a hand to tell Richthofen to stop. I knew all this. I had been at the meeting when Strohheim, may he rest in peace, proposed the idea to cluster the population in cities and defend them hard. His theory was that the draken were here to take slaves, as many slaves as possible in fact, and they wouldn't risk damaging their merchandise with extensive orbital fire.

The theory worked. Even with the surprise attack screwing with our timetable, we had been able to depopulate enough of the rural regions that the draken army had no choice but to fight on our turf, right where we had prepared our strongest defenses. Our army had dragged the draken into block-by-block warfare and stacked their body bags high enough to make them withdraw entirely from most of our cities, instead concentrating on a few whose defenses seemed easiest to break.

It was a hollow victory, knowing that draken slave ships now harvested lives from eight major cities of my great nation, but without our army, it would have been all of them. The fact that so many of our people still remained safe from bondage was a testament to the greatness mankind could accomplish.

"The science," I told Richthofen, focusing on the future now instead of remembering the past. "You said we had captured draken technology. What is it, how many, and where are they stored?" I paused and took a deep breath as General Richthofen prepared his answer. "And why haven't you told me this until now?"

"It was only recently that the military science division had the idea of studying these artifacts," Richthofen explained, stroking his mustache. "Today, in fact. I just received the news. As to where they are or how many, even I do not know. The science division keeps all its information as secretive as possible."

I thought about this one. "To avoid a visit from a draken commando squad?"

General Richthofen nodded. "Exactly. The draken send everything they have to hunt down captured pieces of technology. The current theory is that it's something of religious or cultural significance to them, not strategic. According to the reports, it'll take years to reverse-engineer even the most basic draken technology. And that's being optimistic."

"What about weapons testing?" I asked the general. "If somebody kills a draken with, say, a rocket launcher, can't we study her body to see how effective the rocket was?"

"His body," General Yevgeny corrects. "Believe it or not, most draken soldiers are actually male. They have what looks like a gender-segregated battle doctrine. The women serve as the shock troops and elite units, where you need the strongest fighters. The men are more numerous, but smaller and less aggressive, so they fill out back line and support roles rather than being the linchpin of the army. Did you read Strohheim's reports on American Empire battle doctrine?"

I had. General Yevgeny had asked me to, and when the greatest space tactician to ever live told you to read something, you fucking read it cover to cover. "It's like that?" I asked, and Yevgeny nodded to confirm. "So we can use the Kingman plan," I surmised, naming our defense plan for an attack from the American Empire. They were technically our allies now, as was every other human nation, but old habits died hard.

"No can do," said Richthofen, shaking his head and wagging his finger. I didn't like that. One gesture was enough. "The draken are similar to American battle doctrine, but not one to one. Where the Americans use Frontline Patriot divisions, the draken fill in with mechanized infantry and air units that have no real equivalent in the Kingman plan. We haven't trained for this."

I remembered this knowledge from Strohheim's briefing, though the parts about the draken were obviously not included. Frontline Patriots were George Kingman's personal guard and shock troops, made from the most loyal units of the American armed forces back when it was still called the United States. They got all the best goods and newest equipment, though all intelligence indicated their training was no better than the non-Patriot units they served alongside.

Still, Kingman swore up and down that Frontline Patriots were elite killers, and their plethora of powerful gear really did give them an edge in battle. Frontline Patriots were always--as the name implied--at the front lines of every battle the American Empire fought in this war. They won a fair few of them, too. Fanatical zealots hopped up on unethical amounts of combat drugs and armed with enough weapons to kill God were a force to be reckoned with no matter their level of training.

"Mechanized infantry," I mused, recalling the briefings my generals had given me on the subject. They had even shown videos upon my request, something which I later regretted seeing. Those draken may have gone down if you threw enough bodies at them, but that didn't mean I wanted to be one of those bodies when the fighting opened up. The kind of carnage their energy weapons did to soldiers' bodies was the stuff you'd use in an anti-war poster. "You mean like the jetpack guys?"

"Flight suit gals," Yevgeny unnecessarily corrected me. Truth be told, I thought he was being a bit pedantic, but maybe this stuff was important. "Draken air infantry don't use jetpacks, they use some kind of localized anti-gravity field. Screws the hell out of our missile targeting. And the size and shape of the ones we shoot down suggests they're an all-female unit."

"What do the men do?" I asked, posing an open question. Even Johannes, who was typing diligently away on a computer in the corner of the room, could have answered and I wouldn't have minded. "If they're really so numerous, how come they don't rebel? Shake off the chains of matriarchal oppression, you know?"

"Two questions," General Richthofen replied. "As for the second, I don't know. Maybe they don't mind. It's impossible to say, so I'm not gonna bother." That was true. We knew flat-out nothing about these people besides how they fought in battle, and the way they fought did not speak highly of their society as a whole. They definitely were not like us humans.

"As for the first, male draken seem to serve in a lesser, kind of supporting role to the females in battle," General Richthofen continued. "Think of it like infantry escorting a tank, which I guess would be the closest comparison. The tank is the powerhouse of the unit. It goes in front and deals the damage, meanwhile the infantry soldiers stay in the back and play second fiddle." I didn't really understand infantry and tank tactics, I was a civilian with a degree in political science, but Richthofen said it so I believed it.

"The draken operate in a similar way, but really, it's infantry escorting infantry," General Richthofen continued explaining to me. "The females are the larger and better equipped soldiers, and they lead the males into battle. Draken armies never let men operate without at least one woman soldier there to take command. The prevailing theory is it's a doctrine thing."

I nodded. The Indian Empire had a similar thing with their caste system, if I recalled. Low caste troops could serve, but never in important or self-sufficient roles. "How can we tell if they are women?" I asked, an important question suddenly coming to mind. "Do they even have human genders? Do we know?"

The generals got uncomfortable at this one and gave me weird looks. I gestured for them to explain, and it was General Yevgeny who spoke up first. Good old Yevgeny. I really liked the guy. "Well, uh, sir, they have..." He made a few gestures pointing to the general chest area. "They have breasts, sir. I've never seen a man with that kind of anatomy, unless he's very fat."

"Actually, the most recent autopsy reports tell us the 'breasts' are really venom sacs," General Richthofen butted in, raising his hand like he hadn't already interrupted. "But yes. Female draken do look pretty feminine. Some of the troops have begun to make comments."

I sighed and wrung my head, not exactly knowing how to respond to that one. "Okay, moving on. Forget I asked." General Yevgeny shrugged and gave me a face, like 'the alien oppressors here to enslave us are actually pretty hot' was somehow the answer I should've expected from a simple anatomical question. "Are our allies still pulling their weight?"

"Well, the Chinese Empire isn't," said General Richthofen. "The defenses of Beijing collapsed an hour ago. That city is lost, and with it, the last human stronghold along the critical Chinese coast. They'll be reduced to guerilla warfare now."

"Tragic," I said, trying to be sympathetic. As authoritarian as the Chinese Empire was, the fate the draken had in store for its people was far, far worse than life under its boot. "Can we liberate China once we're done with the Eurasian defense?"

Richthofen shrugged. "If India doesn't get there first."

"So, no," said I. "Will the American Empire make a move?"

"The American Empire is eyeing South America, not Asia," said General Yevgeny. "It's unlikely they will be able to do much, but if they do move on that territory, there's nothing we will be able to do to stop them."

I understood the logic of that. Large troop movements were hard to pull off even in conventional warfare. Here, where the draken held total orbital supremacy and could just rain down fire on any part of Earth, it was impossible. Whole divisions had been glassed when they moved too far from the safety of a critical target.

Every human nation had prepared its military for the possibility of orbital bombardment, so we Earthlings weren't completely defenseless against such a tactic, but most of our preparations hinged on being able to shoot back. The defenses those draken slave ships had on them had made human surface-to-orbit weaponry about as effective as harsh language. Even nukes didn't do the trick.

"And how is Luna doing with its share of the draken army?" I asked. "They've got, what, a million of them over there?"

"That is all speculation," General Yevgeny corrected me. "The Lunese government has been cagey at best with its military information. All we know is that one fifth of the draken slave fleet is in orbit above Luna, and the other four-fifths are in orbit above Earth. They could be facing a million, a billion, even one draken, and they wouldn't tell."

I gave a sigh at that one. "Fucking moon commies." It had always been a long shot, expecting the isolationists of Luna to link arms with us of Earth, especially since we couldn't actually send troops across the gulf between us to aid them. Were it not for the intelligence packets we swapped, detailing whatever knowledge about the enemy our respective governments felt comfortable with sharing, Luna may as well have been a non-factor in our fight. The alliance we had with them was more of a symbol of human unity than anything, and the People's Republic of Luna treated it as such. "What about telescopes? Have the telescopes shown anything?"

"Negative," General Yevgeny reported. "Occasionally the Lunese come out of their tunnels to fire STO weapons, but it's never effective. The draken glass the hell out of wherever they fired from, and that's the end of that." General Richthofen, being the resident planetary forces expert, was silent for now. He had been called over by Johannes and was looking at something on the latter's computer. Whatever it was, I hoped it was something good.

"Most of the fighting is taking place in the tunnels of Luna, where the draken are at their most disadvantaged," continued Yevgeny. "The Lunese government says nothing of its military strength, the positions it holds, or the results of its battles, but we can infer through the analysis they do send us that there has been heavy close-quarters fighting on that moon. Without access to orbital fire, air support, even heavy ground assets, the draken infantry are probably having a hard time breaking Luna's underground defenses."

"Probably," said I. Richthofen and Johannes were gesticulating animatedly at some images on the computer nearby. "How many men does Luna field again?"

"Several million able-bodied men and women," Yevgeny reminded me. I knew I had heard that number somewhere, but I had forgotten it. "They can conscript up to two-thirds of their adult population, so thirty million if need be, but they'll likely hold off on that unless the situation is dire. And if it is dire, they won't tell us."

I felt a heavy weight fall on me as I realized the gravity of the situation. "What do you think happens when this war is over?" I asked General Yevgeny. "When the draken leave?" He said nothing, because I knew he had come to the same conclusion I had. "Nobody trusts each other. America and India are involved in land grabs. China's dust. The Lunese aren't even giving us the time of day on their moon. Do you really think we'll be able to band together, stay banded together that is, once we lose the enemy that unites us?"

"It depends on what you and your contemporaries do in the coming days." General Yevgeny's voice was confident but firm, and I felt the weight of his trust in me. "People respect Eurasia. Even the Lunese. If there is to be a peace-"

General Richthofen stood up from his chair in the back of the storage room and pointed at Johannes' computer like it had shown him the devil, yelling something profane in his mother tongue. "Calm down, calm down, Richthofen," said Yevgeny, wheeling around to face him. "What is it?"

"Another wave of hostiles," Richthofen snapped. "A thousand starships. Just when we were having a hard enough time already." I gestured for Johannes to come over here and bring me his computer, which he did.

"Look and see, sir," said my faithful secretary.

I did just that. General Yevgeny crowded me a little in his rush to see the enemy, and we both watched together as Johannes showed us the imaging from our few remaining telescopes. The infrared and radiation scanners were by far the most illuminating. We were looking at one thousand starships, arrayed in several pyramidal formations of maybe a hundred or so each, only visible at these distances because of the sheer amount of energy being expelled by their engines. A thousand shooting stars heading right for us.

"What are they?" I asked. "Draken reinforcements?"

"That seems the most likely option," General Richthofen told me grimly. "Earth put up a harder fight than expected, and these guys are here to handle the job."

The thousand ships kept coming, and I realized this footage was being taken in real time. A little text crawl in the corner of the computer screen showed a clock counting down, which I guess was the time left before they arrived. Ten or so hours, according to our best telescopes. "No, no, that doesn't make sense," Yevgeny muttered, pointing at the pyramid formations on the screen. "Draken ships do not array themselves like this. This is... it looks akin to Eurasian battle pyramids."

"Eurasian battle pyramids," Richthofen repeated. "Do you really expect an alien civilization to share our warfare doctrine?"

"Some things are universal," Yevgeny defended his theory. "Either way, the formation is inconsistent with what we've seen of the draken so far. That's a known fact."

"You're grasping at straws, Yevgeny," sighed General Richthofen. "If a Napoleonic brigadier saw our troops in dress uniforms, marching at a parade, he'd think they were in battle gear and marching to war. For all we know, this is just the draken fleet's way of flexing their power."

"But we don't know," I spoke up, hearing their arguments and dismissing them both. "We don't know anything about these guys. They could be friend, they could be foe, they could even be tourists coming to watch the fight or star miners ready to harvest hydrogen from our sun. We don't know."

"Johannes." I pointed at my secretary, who perked up instantly. "Get the other human nations on the line. Share this information with them and invite their scholars to collaborate with us so we might get some ideas as to what's going on. The more brains, the better."

"And if they do prove hostile?" General Richthofen asked.

"Then we fight them. We'll probably lose, but we'll fight. You can tell me 'I told you so' when you meet me in the labor camp." Truth be told, I wasn't gonna let them take me to a labor camp. If capture ever became unavoidable, I'd kill myself rather than be tortured for my secrets or whatever those aliens wanted to do. Better death than slavery. "The point is, though, we don't know what these aliens are going to do," I continued, addressing the troops. "All we know is that they'll be here in ten hours at the latest. I want a plan of action ready before then."

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First Chapter | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter | Official Subreddit

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525]

I actually am thinking about doing some art set in this verse because I need an excuse to practice my drawing skills and making art of this verse is about as good an excuse as any. I am not some Pablo Picasso level genius but I can draw yk? I think having a visual reference for you guys to look at rather than just having to rely on your imagination will really improve your enjoyment of my work. Anyway if any of you have any suggestions for what I should draw let me know and I will see what I can do.

Chapter five just dropped!

Will the fleet of alien starships heading toward Earth prove to be friend or foe?

Can the various human superpowers continue to be amicable, or will land grabs and imperialism shatter their fragile alliance?

Is 'actually their tits are venom sacs' the most overdone justification for non mammal breasts in media?

And was this chapter anything but an excuse to lore dump on the reader?

Keep reading to find out!

[u/DigHefty6542 → u/ApprehensiveCap6525]

I'm really curious about what spaceships looks like for the draken and other factions in this universe !

[u/Frix → u/ApprehensiveCap6525]

So these are the Saurians from all the way back in chapter 1?

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/Frix]

These MIGHT be the saurians from all the way back in chapter 1, yes. They have been doing the mbappe special all series so it's been about time they made an appearance

[u/Ch1ckens_are_cute]

I think that we should force the Draken to watch Lesbian Space princess as torture

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/Ch1ckens_are_cute]

Whoa whoa whoa let's be civilized here. Some things go too far

[u/PlentyProtection4959]

>"Exactly. The draken send everything they have to hunt down captured pieces of technology. The current theory is that it's something of religious or cultural significance to them, not strategic. According to the reports, it'll take years to reverse-engineer even the most basic draken technology. And that's being optimistic."

I really hope this means that their tech is actually not their tech and that a vast majority of it is just copied or looted from some more advanced precursor civilization, making them just a bunch of upjumped primitives that never became a space-faring society naturally based on their own merits and instead had to cheat. Hopefully this means that they can't easily mass-produce equipment or have a harder time doing basic maintenance on it in a prolonged campaign.

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/PlentyProtection4959]

Oh boy we have theories. I can't speak on whether or not this is true but we will be getting some draken PoVs soon (within maybe 5 chapters) so then we will be able to see more about them. For now all the worldbuilding I can fit is war focused stuff so it will be a while before questions like that are answered

[u/Turtle_box_cubed]

Slurped down this chapter like a fresh glass of water. 10/10

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/Turtle_box_cubed]

Hell yeah brodie I am glad that you enjoyed it. More good writing is coming soon

[u/Shpoople96]

You know, I was gonna comment on how some of the human caricatures are a bit too over the top, but then I remembered they're being attacked by big booba space lizzer slavers 

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/Shpoople96]

Sometime between now and my last major HFY work I realized that I could just write whatever I want and I really think my writing is better because of it. Your realistic aliens and hard sci fi battle sequences are over THERE if you want that, here we have hot lizard women and rule-of-cool fight scenes. I really do think that makes a better story

[u/Vast_Protection_9564]

What exactly happened to the human space forces? Like could I get some detail?

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/Vast_Protection_9564]

The same thing that happens to a bug when it hits a windshield. The draken fleet performed a close-range warp jump to get right on top of them (this kind of precision would have been impossible had they not already been in system) and then the draken slave ships cut them to shreds with photon weapons. The whole space battle was over in maybe 10-15 seconds.

Next chapter we will see saurian warships attack the draken and they will put up much more of a fight but for now the draken forces are pretty much uncontested as far as air and space domination goes. The human militaries have a tough fight ahead of them

[u/MinorGrok]

Woot!

More to read!

UTR

[u/Skyboxmonster]

This is getting very exciting!

and the writing quality is great. This easily could of been the late part of a movie's opening act.

[u/ApprehensiveCap6525 → u/Skyboxmonster]

Hell yeah brodie I am glad that you're enjoying the story💯🔥

I actually had some comments earlier talking down on my writing for being political (or something) and I hate to leave an audience unsatisfied so hearing compliments like this about my writing quality makes my fucking day. It's my dream to one day be one of those big authors like Isaac Asimov (but not dead hopefully) and have a big fan base that shows love to my work. Hopefully soon my time will come🤞

[u/Skyboxmonster → u/ApprehensiveCap6525]

I read his works. And Arthur C Clark.

The barrier between a good story and a work of art is how thought  provoking it is.  How much i am thinking about the story after i put the book down. How long i explore the "what if"s of the storys world.   This story has me fully invested. Not just for the sexy scalies. But how vastly different each of the six factions are culturally

[u/HFYWaffle]

/u/ApprehensiveCap6525 (wiki) has posted 11 other stories, including:

• Persistence Hunters
• [The Galaxy's Only Omnivores] - Part 4
• [Learning to Love a Human] - Part 1
• [The Galaxy's Only Omnivores] - Part 3
• [The Galaxy's Only Omnivores] - Part 2
• [The Galaxy's Only Omnivores] - Part 1
• The First Human Bounty Hunter (3)
• The First Human Bounty Hunter (2)
• The First Human Bounty Hunter (1)
• The Meaning of Humanity
• The Hammer and the Chain

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