NationStates Jolt Archive

Kung simpered.
A grayish sphere practically immersed in its parent red giant, the cloudy, featureless atmosphere gave no hints as to what was inhabiting its surface. The surface itself was more exciting, though not by much. Dusky seas washed down the ground to a flat relief faster than the halfhearted tectonic action could throw mountains up. The indigenous civilization had been absorbed into the Empire extremely early on, and now nearly no trace of the early kung remained. Gleaming Imperial suntowers rose from the seas, containing billions of citizens, a very few of them kung by race, and, in one, the headquarters of the Imperial Investigative Service.
Away from the shining golden-white space stations that controlled the traffic to this somewhat minor Crown Protectorate, near the massive junkyards that still held some of the debris of the War of Temporary Succession, one ship, somewhat larger than a fighter but smaller than a battlecruiser, sat waiting for instructions. A swarm of robotic attendants covered the ship like bees on a hive.
Three shuttles converged on it, meeting at a sizable docking bay for such a small vessel. Xavier McFly was on one.
Xavier stared out of the porthole. He hoped there were interesting people on the other shuttles, because they were going to be in that special-order ship for a long time.

His shipmates all noticed the gesture, given by himself to himself. They all recorded it, in their slowly growing file labeled Xavier McFly. They all remained silent.

Thomas Rose rose his fingers to the crowd in the two-fingered gesture of peace affected by many thousands of presidents and prime ministers before him as he grinned his way up to the podium. As he reached the stand, he lifted his arm and the applause ceased.
He stared at the teleprompter. Green words crawled from the bottom of the screen, reminding him of his half-read speech. Behind him, the stars as seen from the Sol System twinkled over the last barren terrain on the planetoid, the pulverized metal where the gate to the Gate had once stood and the grotesque Blood Memorial now bore witness to.
"People of Roseway!"
This still got them going. For years under the old Viceroy all they got was, "Citizens of the Empire!" and "People of the Crown!" To be reminded that they were people, yes, and not just people, people of Roseway, their home, that always drew more cheers.
They quieted down. He might be speaking again.
"I come before you today, as President of a free Commonwealth, to celebrate a great anniversary with you!"
More cheers. This was Rose's favorite part. All you have to do is remind them of where they live and they applaud you.
"Twenty years ago, today, as we count them, not the Empire -"
Yes, more cheers, just as he had expected.
"Twenty years ago, the people of the great Commonwealth of Roseway rose up against their extradimensional oppressors! Twenty years ago, we came from being an insignificant frontier city to a power in our own right!"
Not really. Roseway was barely self-sufficient, with no trade and less military. Let them cheer. It's a celebration.
"Twenty years ago, when their god-emperor finally died on them, the Imperials got careless. They let down their guard. For one brief moment, the Empire lifted its boot from the neck of Roseway. And we fought! As one people, we snuck into their guardhouses and military bases in the night, to execute their servicecreatures and commandeer their equipment for the Rosewegian People."
Actually, they slaughtered a bunch of alien citizens in their beds. They stole a few fighters, which crashed as soon as they left Roseway's gravity well, and they smashed the minor gate.
"We destroyed those huge metal doors, symbolic of the gates to the Sheol of the Empire, and more than that, we destroyed the greater door beyond it! We disabled the dimensional Gate that allowed the Imperials to come here! And not just that, we scrambled it, so that they were banished, never to return!"
More cheers. Don't mention Vegliani, even though he was the only intelligent human being involved in the revolt. Mention how his genius created the scramblers which the Empire has as yet not found a way to get past, but don't mention that Vegliani mentioned a possible way the day before you executed him.
"And today, we celebrate the complete, final, and everlasting independence of Roseway!"
Complete? For the rulers. Final? It could have been, had you kept Vegliani alive, maybe listened to him once. Everlasting? Definately not.
The crowd cheered. They didn't know how to boo.

A white flash zapped through the Kung shipyards as one final shipment ported in from the gate at Shand. A clumsy array of what looked like three spheres in a triangle with a solid mess of wires between them and green fuel rods sticking out of them flashed with a speed not borne of any engines it itself bore towards the Great Kung Junkyard.
As it neared the ship, a sallow beam of pure energy leaped from a port near the pointed nose and grabbed the device. The entire ship glowed a shade brighter than usual for less than a second as the device's inertia dissapated and the device settled into a sullen float, suspended a mile in front of the ship.
Inside the ship itself, robotic eyes and a silent observer noticed the approaching shuttles. A sizable door in the ship's hull opened into space.
The shuttles' automatic pilots set them down in a room scattered with smaller shuttles, mechs, fighters, and smart nukes. To the uninformed observer, it would be quite scary, but those with business on board the as-yet-unnamed ship were prepared to see the finest in Imperial weaponry in a privately-registered vessel.
When the doors closed, the ship's engines powered up, seven white ovals glowing against the shipmetal. It lurched, then sped up, faster and faster before it started to fade.
The glow of the engines and the dark of the metal slowly combined. The massive red giant of Kung began to show through. Five minutes after the engines powered up, the unnamed starship was completely gone.

Xavier McFly stared at the door. Or what they said was a door; the only thing distinguishing one blank section of the hall from another was the sign, "MCFLY," painted on the upper half of the wall.
He reached out and felt the wall. It all felt the same, except for just under the nameplate; there was a small area that felt like cloth or some kind of plastic.
As his fingers lingered on the soft spot, the wall seamlessly slid into the ceiling, revealing a standard, windowless compartment, complete with a kitchen and a washroom.
He walked in and slung his pack onto the bed. He had a chance to sit down and zip his pack open before a voice from the hall cut in.
"Gunnery Officer Xavier McFly, report to the central turret and prepare for transit."
Central turret? There were only two gunnery officers on the manifest. And what kind of transit? If it required that you strap down in an acceleration couch like the early hyperdrives and wormcores, why wasn't there an accouch in his compartment?
He walked out glanced around. The hall was lit with color strips, and his color combo was flashing to aft. As he jogged down the corridor, the ship tremored, shoving him off of his feet.
The hall went right to the turrets. There were three: central, and, intuitively, port and starboard. McFly climbed up the middle ladder.
He found himself in a cramped hemispherical turret. The star of Kung glowed green through the perfectly clear turret-glass; as he stared, it changed color to maroon, then cobalt, following no order he could see.
"Sit down!"
McFly whirled. Sitting in the cogunner's seat was a humanoid like a glowing blue skeleton with a welding helmet. Its electronic voice sounded just like all the other Drej voices he had tracked, silenced, and fled throughout his career, but there was something familiar about it...
He sat, in the gunner's seat. A very large plasma cannon was mounted right in front of him, aimable over his entire field of vision. The preplasmic matter was practically nonexistant until it reached the turret-glass, which activated it, transforming a substance akin to caloric into a flaming ball of gas ten feet in diameter.
Kung flickered, and went out. The Universe was looking very different; brown swirls and stains covered everything to be seen of Space except for a somewhat triangular shape far ahead of the ship, and a thin black tunnel behind.
"What's this?" he yelled, for a deep humming noise had begun to come from the ship itself.
"Trans-dimensional coffee spill!" yelled his companion. "We really aren't anyplace, and it's trying to pull us apart!"
"Why didn't we use the Gate!" he shouted. "It would have been a lot easier!"
His companion looked at him. "They blocked it!"

"But, my people, freedom is not free. You, as citizens of Roseway, the greatest of nations, you have your duties and your obligations. Through the wisdom and benevolence of your leaders, taxes are not a hassle, but don't complain. Don't disturb the Pax Rosewegia! Don't entangle yourselves in the horrific crimes of Treason and Sedition! The Empire will not return, but that does not mean that the other nations passing themselves off as human will not come knocking at Roseway's door. When they come, and they will come, we must stand together as a people, and as a people with a leader, and with a leader that is THE MOST qualified leader since... forever, ME!"
Cheers? Yes, they cheered at that. Why? Because even though you're lying about the one thing they know isn't true, the Secret Police is watching, and taking notes.
"So, in the next election, put Rose in the ballot box!"
The next election? This is too rich. Have a big sheet of paper with a checkbox on it. Tell people to check it, and put it in a box. It's been tried before, an old Earth dictator named Saddam. It didn't work very well. And campaigning while you're absolute dictator and while the People are celebrating their independence, that's just stupid.
"Rose! Why else is this country's very name Roseway?"
Because you changed your name?
An aide walked in from the side, bearing a note. Rose paused the teleprompter and read it. He then looked up at the crowd.
"My people, I interrupt your celebrations to inform you that your pride, your nation, your very way of life is in jeopardy."

Around the center of the large hunk of rock making the land area and cubic of Roseway, the Rosewegian equivalent of Cheyenne Mountain was a beehive of workers, technicians, and really smart computers working in harmony.
Rosewegian Army Commandant Jorge Palaviras walked into the main command bunker and thumped a folder on a desk. "I've read the briefings, but they didn't say anything," he said. "What in Sheol is going on?"
An intimidated technician pointed at the screen. "A starship just penetrated the first level of the Vegliani Shield," he said. "It went through like the field wasn't there."

"So! How does this transit work!"
"I don't really know! I think it causes everything in contact with the engines to vibrate like everything inside the other universe, so it won't work with another verse with a Gate! At the end, we have to have a huge freakin' explosion to blast our way through! Once that's over, there's a big rip between the universes that won't close fast! I think there'll be a follow-up mission right after we come through!"
"Slow down! When will we have the explosion!"
The brown stains darkened, and white specks coalesced. The humming grew louder than ever.
"Soon!"

On the bridge of the unnamed starship, three sentients held on to their seats.
Captain Janet Polk was reduced to screaming. "Planrathtep! How are we!"
The fithp conn officer's trumpeting voice barely changed pitch as he responded. "Almost there, captain! Detonation in nine seconds!"
The kung first mate turned to Captain Polk. "Captain! There's some sort of malfunction with the hull airlock!"
Polk smiled. "Never mind that, Mister Halfheart!"
And then the world turned white.

"They're here."
A dull red blip near the back of the display briefly flared into life.
"Just one?"
The screen went blank. The room went dark. The constant reassuring hum of the circulation went silent.

"The Imperials have returned, with an armada to destroy us! You must not panic, but you must take up arms against them! They have penetrated our Shield and they lust for our blood!"
Behind Rose, on the flat plain reserved for the Blood Memorial, the three-dimensional cross-section of the explosion of a ten-gigaton Klepps warhead cut a perfectly spherical hole, just the size of the old Gate. The shock wave shoved the nukeproof glass toward the crowd an inch.
As the light died down, a starship of a curious design hovered perfectly motionless in the middle of the blast sphere. Seven white lights flared into life on one end of it, and it slowly began accelerating away from Roseway. The ancient defense turrets blasted away at it, but the shots were shrugged off easily.
On the bottom of the starship, a glass door melted out of the gray shipmetal. The door opened, revealing a dark humanoid and another door.
The humanoid shoved itself from the airlock towards the Rose Dome. Slowly, as if the scene had been framedoubled into slow motion, the figure fell at the stunned crowd.

Jamlai inhaled and opened the airlock. With a combined body shove, he propelled himself from the tiny room in the general direction of the glass dome on the edge of the barrenness.
He exhaled, and the air particles tried to freeze and fall. But Jamlai was too experienced for that. With less than a thought, he sent the particles to form a molecule-thick pressure shield around his body, keeping it from exploding from the pressure differential. Now came the hard part.
He shut his eyes and concentrated. He had only done this difficult maneuver once before, in a training room in one of Spike's subterranean oceans. Now, in real life, he was attempting to use the Force to guide his free fall to a specific destination.
He opened his eyes seconds later, and he was almost there, and going faster. With a flick of his thoughts, his lightsaber was in his hand.
He hit the dome, jarring his thoughts and releasing the air. His lightsaber extended, a shining white diamond affair made by his grandfather before the Recoronation. With a flick of his wrist, it sliced through the dome, and with a push by the Force, the dome itself puckered inward, sucking Jamlai inside.
The dome was basically empty, with a teleprompter on a raised stage above a stairway being the only decoration on this side of the floor. The floor was half-filled with people. Jamlai had learned that mobs were only good for two things: mass anarchy and hostage pools.
When Jamlai stopped pulling on the dome, it began to suck back out, the dome's air pulling everything into the vacuum. With two long strides, Jamlai was at the teleprompter. With a slash of the saber, he had the plastic screen in his hand. With another slash, the surface of the screen was melted.
He turned around and threw the screen at the dome wall. It hit the gash and stuck. The terrible wind stopped.
Now the entire assembly was staring at him. Oh well. It happens sometimes.
He shoved the fat man who had been speaking aside, and took his place at the microphone.
"I am Jamlai, a Jedi of the Order, representative of the Order and of the Empire, and from this moment on the Commonwealth of Roseway is under my command."

Rose was stunned. This was clearly not possible. Therefore, steps must be taken to stop it.
This "Jedi" that had shoved him from the stage had not shoved him from authority. Thomas Rose was still in charge.
He whispered into his lapel. "This is Rose," he said. "I need security in the Rose Dome immediately. And stop that ship..."

The shuddering stopped, and the stains faded. In less than an instant, the sky was again starry and black. The only change was the addition of the planetoid surrounding them and the turrets shooting at them.
McFly slipped into his warrior-psychform as he gulped a few pills down dry. "Target."
The Drej cogunner responded as quickly, though it was not drugged. "Locked."
He swung the plasma gun at the nearest turret and depressed the firing stud once. The plasma traveled faster than the human eye could track, and the turret exploded, leaving a crater in the urban terrain. There were three turrets left.
"Target."
"Locked."
One by one, the threats disappeared. McFly released his grip on the gun. "Damage."
"None."
The ship accelerated, leaving Roseway behind.
"Target."
"Approaching."
Two heavy fighters swung into view, using standard Imperial evasion techniques. A slight puff signaled the launch of two missiles from each.

Polk watched the screens with a bored look on her face. She swung to her first mate. "Halfheart. Has Jamlai succeeded in entering the dome?"
The kung nodded. "Yes."
Captain Polk smiled. "Good," she said. "I am sure he will be able to accomplish his mission." She spoke to the conn. "Planrathtep. Show me Roseway."
The screen changed to show the brand-new Blood Memorial crater, with the ragged Gate covering most of the pit. What seemed to be a huge yellow-metal block was attempting to force its way through. Imperial fighters swarmed over the city.
"Gunnery! Report!"
She enjoyed the feeling of power this gave her. As a child on Harbin, she had not been in the highest level of the social elite. Raised as a servant, she had grown up with everyone looking down to her. Now she was the captain of her own ship. An extremely understaffed and cramped vessel, but it was still classified as an Imperial ship of the line.
That insufferable young gunnery officer - Xavier McFly, out of every possible name - responded with a light-headed voice. "Zero damage sustained in escape from Roseway. Two heavy militia fighters in pursuit. Four bigbrain missiles after. Evasion?"
"Planrathtep! Evasive maneuvers."
The ship ducked and dived. The missiles went straight toward it.

"Evasion. Effective?"
The Drej studied the approaching missiles. "No."
"Target."
"Not possible."
They watched the missiles come on, completely not fooled by the ship's evasive maneuvers.
"Probability."
"One hundred percent."
The missiles swerved together and aimed at a point in between engines in the aft of the ship. Tiny electrical discharges sparked between the Drej and the terminal. McFly watched passively.
At the last possible instant, the missiles turned and passed over the ship, inches from scraping the paint. Two missiles went straight on past the central turret, almost close enough for them to touch.

Polk, Halfheart, and Planrathtep all let out a breath. With shock, they watched the missiles return to the fighters and settle back in their launching bays.
Halfheart spoke. "Did we teach them to do that?"
Planrathtep simply stared at the fighters, which about-faced back towards Roseway. "No..."