NationStates Jolt Archive

They came, a fleet numbering in the hundreds, to the unassuming world known only as 'Colony 3' by the new arrivals. A beautiful world of rolling hills and verdant forests and calm seas. A true paradise to all who watched it on the holoviewers.

There was only one little snag. It was already settled.

To the humanoids coming to 'colonize' the world, the current inhabitants were little more than pests to be exterminated. Their form only reinforced this assumption, as how could anyone ever truly respect a race of placid sentient rabbit-lemmings? True to form, the invaders felt no need to disguise their arrival or intent.

They were such cute little things, and all the information they had acquired suggested at best a post-industrial civilization, not at all capable of offering an effective resistance.

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"Look at them. So blissfully unaware of our approach. It will be a pleasure to annihilate them. Like shooting fish in a barrel."

The command bridge was a great hive of activity, with so many pre-conflict preparations underway, though there was no underlying air of tension typical to entering a warzone. To the crew, this was a standard snatch-and-grab operation akin to taking candy from a baby.

"No signs of military preparation against us. The few villages on the ground seem to be completely ignorant of us. It looks mostly like farmland from here."

"Launch fighters. I want to start up some skirmish raids and let them know we're here. Let us see if they will submit for termination nice and easy instead of wasting energy and resources to blow them all away the hard way."

"Aye sir."

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The fighters blew up a few huts and sent a few clusters of rodents skittering to nearby forests, but there really wasn't much to shoot at. It was unfortunate. By all estimates the fighter skirmish had terminated a full half of their buildings in approximately five minutes, mostly consisting of travel time to and from.

All reports stated that the huts were little more than haphazard constructs of mud and wood, and the creatures themselves wore loincloths. Suggesting that the analysis' belief that at best they would be post industrial was an extreme overstatement.

Which made the communication signal all the more surprising when it came.

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"Sir! They're... hailing us! Priority one! Somebody has gotten a hold of our secure channel information."

"What? Put them on!"

The image that came onto the main viewer made everyone gasp.

It was one of those placid sentient rabbit-gophers, wearing a highly specialized harness of tools and weapons, its brown fur striped with gray and painted in several spots with what looked like bloodspatter. It twitched constantly, not with fear or trepidation, but the spasmatic movements of a psychotic break. Its high pitched demonic cackle was particularly unnerving, all things considered.

The humanoid began. "How did you get this chann--"

"OH GOODY. PROTEIN. WE HAVE SO BEEN LOOKING FORWARD TO A FRESH SUPPLY OF LIVESTOCK."

Somewhat startled by this awkward turnabout, but still standing tall in the light of the unnerving display, the humanoid commander decided to issue the ultimatum.

"This world is now under control of the Terran Star Confederation. You will submit to summary termination in order for this world to be properly colonized."

"HMM... WE ARE NOT AS ADEPT AT THIS DIPLOMACY THING, BUT I SHALL TRY...

"WE ARE THE DEATH SPECTRES OF THE DESTRUCTORS, RULERS OF THE WORLD KNOWN TO YOU AS COLONY 3 BUT TO US AS 'SLAUGHTER'. ALL OF YOUR WORLDS. ALL OF YOUR PEOPLE. ALL OF YOUR SHIPS AND YOUR TECHNOLOGIES. GIVE THESE TO US WITHIN FIVE MINUTES AND WE WILL, IN RETURN, GIVE YOU THE PRIVILEDGE OF SHUTTING THE FUCK UP."

"I'll take that as a no. Prepare to die."

"YOU FIRST, MEATSACK. HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA..."

Communications was suddenly flooded on all channels and all possible encryptions with the insane laughter of millions upon millions of voices, all cackling madly in unison.

"Sir! Massive energy buildup on the surface! They've deployed shields! All kinds of weaponry have just popped out from the ground!"

"What? How did they keep all that hidden?"

"I don't know! Energy discharges all across the surface! They're firing at us! It looks like they have every kind of weapon we've ever seen, and some we haven't! By the gods... the output is incredible..."

"All hands, brace for impa--"

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Thirty seconds later, it was over. The weapons focused on eliminating engines and weapons emplacements, leaving those ships that did not get caught by stray fire with predictably flashy results as little more than drifting cans full of people. Unable to move, and unable to respond to what came next.

Thousands upon thousands upon thousands of small craft came billowing up from underground facilities to pick apart the remnants of the fleet. They latched on floating battleships and destroyers and cruisers and frigates, and began to ferry the larger vessels towards the planet. The crew could only watch as each ship was brought down to the ground, to be set upon almost instantly by swarms of cackling rabbit-gopher-demons.

Bulkheads were ripped open, gunfire was exchanged, but the creatures were far too fast and far too vicious to stand against. They tore into the defenders like chainsaws, inexorably making their way to the ship command centers and ordering non-combat crew to submit to their new overlords.

The dead were carted off to be reconstituted. The living were shuffled off to be interrogated, killed, and carted off to be reconstituted. The ships were picked apart for every piece of technology they could rip from the vessels, until nothing on the surface remained but the occasional bolt or piece of wiring, and even these little pieces of flotsam were removed from sight.

All that remained of the invasion was the sparse cloud of space debris, a race of subterranean creatures that had just started infusing their diet with freshly acquired proteins, and a single signal bouy amidst the wreckage of the fleet, transmitting the following signal on a repeating loop:

"Slaughter is our world. There are many like it, but this one is OURS. Be nice, and we'll be nice. Be un-nice, and we'll eat you."

A trifle under 30 hours later, a trifle over 30 light hours away, someone was watching the brief and efficient battle. The Angori scout fleet wasn’t supposed to be searching for unknown civilizations; they had an old enemy to look for. With half the Demonic Gopher war fleet missing for purposes unknown, the Angelic Gophers were more than a little worried. Still, when they came across signs of combat, this group of ships couldn’t resist pausing a moment to find out what happened. Besides, the scattered wreckage could have been caused by one of the three dreadnoughts they were trying to find.

So they traveled a couple light hours further from Slaughter, sent out scouts to establish a sensor array, and watched.

“Ah, there’s one side. Quite a fleet, maybe enough to give a Demgori dread some trouble.”

The scanner technician who had spoken brought the image up on the main screen of the command ship’s bridge, and the other ‘Gophers present gathered to watch. This situation had ended in wreckage; whatever had happened, it was sure to be worth seeing.

“Looks like it’s an invasion fleet. Pretty large, to take on a world with no sign of advanced technology.”

“The natives look some sort of little rabbit creatures – just the sort our cousins are always eager to protect. If they came upon this attack while it was in progress…”

“Fighters against mud huts!? What a waste! It’d be quicker and more efficient to just wipe ‘em off the map from orbit, and there’s any number of ways that would be more fun..”

“Oho!! Look at that! Seems these natives aren’t as defenseless as they appeared!”

“Marvelous! What a beautiful trap!”

“Ha, well armed, too!”

“And here come the harvesters…. Quick work.”

“Prey lured in, netted, and dispatched in under a minute. I like these natives.”

“Yes, so do I.”

The rest of the Angelic Gophers fell silent at the sound of this voice – the voice of their current leader, Lord Karvan Jathaldos.

“This may not be what we came for, but these people could prove very valuable allies if we can secure their friendship.” Karvan continued. “In the long run, this discovery may even be more important than whatever those curséd dreadnoughts are up to. Prepare a messenger probe.”

A few minutes later, the two meter long device dropped free of Lord Karvan’s battleship, and the scout fleet watched it skim off toward Slaughter. The probe was slow, by Angori standards; it took it more than twenty minutes to get within a few light minutes of the Destructors’ home. At this point it slowed rapidly (or, more accurately, decreased the distance it was jumping across), partly to make it as clear as possible that the device was not a weapon. At the first sign of any attempt to communicate with it, or upon reaching a distance of one light second from the planet, it stopped completely and transmitted its message.

-“Greetings. This Transmission is from Karvan Jathaldos, of the Angori. I am commanding a scout fleet that happened to be passing through this area. We saw how efficiently you dealt with your attackers a short time ago, and we are impressed. If all you seek is to be left alone, than we have no wish to disturb you, but if you have ambitions beyond this planet, perhaps we can come to some agreement for our mutual benefit?”-

Their messenger dispatched, the Angelic Gophers settled in to watch, and wait for a response.

OOC:
I’m not sure but what the Demonic Gophers would actually get along better with your people than their Evil Alternate. They only have six warships at this point, though, and all of them are either on semi-permanent guard duty or occupied elsewhere. The Angori, on the other hand, currently have scout fleets scattered about more or less at random, trying to locate three of those DG dreadnoughts. It seemed perfectly reasonable that one such fleet might stumble upon this situation.

For your information, Angelic Gophers sometimes use magic. If you prefer, I can keep this well hidden in the background, where it won’t get in the way of pure FT.

For a few minutes, there was little response to the probe's arrival and transmission. A slight increase in power was all that seemed to punctuate anything even remotely corresponding to a reaction.

Then the entire system lit up.

Well, at least in a roughly straight line between planet Slaughter and the new arrivals. Power signatures appeared on every single piece of space debris throughout the corridor, all of them suddenly manifesting roughly sufficient power and weapons signatures to match ships roughly twice the size as those of the newcomers.

It became apparent, when the communication signal came through, that the signatures were being used more as a relay than as defensive platforms. The image of a single creature digging into dirt showed itself to the Angori, apparently ignorant of the attention until a single ear poked out of the hole it was fervently excavating.

"Shh. We're busy. That fleet had the first faster-than-light drive and we're gonna adapt it while we still can."

OOC: How shall I put this... The possibilities are endless, despite the novelty effect.

IC:

The rabbit nibbled at its back. Not all that surprising, it was a rabbit after all. The wolf stepped forward. Again, unsurprising, it was a wolf, rabbits were edible. The wolf dropped stone dead with 18 inches of solid steel embedded in its throat. Wait...that's not right.

"Nerd Boy's gonna pay for this one... so freaking dead...Who the hell are you?"

The shadow that had fallen over the rabbit was impressive. Standing nearly 7 feet tall, the ACS Trooper was a fairly menacing sight. Also a fairly stupefied one. "You're the contractor they hired?"

"Yup. You still haven't answered me." In a flash the Rabbit had moved from the ground, and had a weapon pressed into the faceplate of the Trooper's armor. It didn't look very dangerous, but with this most hated of rabbits, just because it looked like a Glock didn't mean it wasn't something significantly more dangerous.

"Lieutenant Pederson, Armored Combat Suits, Solarin Confederacy. I'm your transport."

The rabbit dropped to the ground. "Alright then, lets roll. Where's the margaritas?"

It was only the beginning, but nothing could spell greater disaster for the rabbit-lemmings than the hiring of this, most evil bunny.

OOC2: If anyone gets the jokes, feel free to run like all unholy hell. If you don't just wait in stupefaction until the cute little talking rabbit kills you all. We'll all be laughing anyway.

OOC: Firstly sorry for this OOC intrustion but the following statement is required.

Killer-Rabbit of Caer Bannog! (and whatever that AC creature was called)

OOC: Firstly sorry for this OOC intrustion but the following statement is required.

Killer-Rabbit of Caer Bannog! (and whatever that AC creature was called)

OOC: No. Significantly more dangerous.

OOC: Firstly, let us try to keep ooc chatter to a minimum. Secondly, despite appearances, this is a serious RP, though there is going to be hilarity involved. Were I you, I would avoid attempting to throw major character types at these critters if you have any reservations against them being dead really fast if you make the Death Spectres madhungrynuts.

Just some advance warning.

As for Magic and Psionics, I don't mind it, but know that trying to read their minds is traumatic in the much the same way as stepping on a nail.

Oh, and Max has nothing on these guys.

OOC: Understood. This'll be the last pure OOC post, if I can help it.

Max, The Killer-Rabbit, or anything else you can think of has nothing on this guy. Unless you happen to be a webcomic fan, and are wise enough to fear the Bunny. Ka-click.

"Shh. We're busy. That fleet had the first faster-than-light drive and we're gonna adapt it while we still can."

"Well, at least they didn't just tell us to scram, or shoot down our probe."

"Should we offer them the Skimmer Drive, your Lordship?"

Lord Karvan paused for a moment to consider. Making such an offer would show a willingness to be helpful, and could save these natives some work. On the other hand, it would also go against their stated wishes.

"No. These seem to be smart people; I'm sure they realize we possess FTL, and we did offer help if they had ambitions beyond their homeworld. They seem to feel that timing is critical in examining their new catch, so it's probably best not to bother them until they express an interest in talking."

Activating his fleet communication system, he issued a few quick orders.

"Lord Donral, I'm leaving you here to keep an eye on the situation. You may select three scouts and two escort vessels. Alert me at once if they resume communications, or if another force shows up."

He waited while six ships separated themselves from the rest of his forces, then continued,

"The fleet shall move out! We have work to do."

The remaining vessels swung away from Slaughter and skimmed swiftly off to resume their interrupted search.

If anyone gets the jokes, feel free to run like all unholy hell. If you don't just wait in stupefaction until the cute little talking rabbit kills you all. We'll all be laughing anyway.

OOC: OOOH! I know! I know! (http://sluggy.com/daily.php?date=020610)
Though I have to wonder how you already know IC that you need the likes of you-know-who.

Fortunately, the only characters I have present are expendable, for a good cause. They also have access to rum, and alfalfa.

OOC: Firstly, let us try to keep ooc chatter to a minimum. Secondly, despite appearances, this is a serious RP, though there is going to be hilarity involved. Were I you, I would avoid attempting to throw major character types at these critters if you have any reservations against them being dead really fast if you make the Death Spectres madhungrynuts.

Just some advance warning.

As for Magic and Psionics, I don't mind it, but know that trying to read their minds is traumatic in the much the same way as stepping on a nail.

Oh, and Max has nothing on these guys.

OOC: Sorry about the OOC, but I had to respond to that.

Magic will be kept reasonable, and mind reading is very rare among Angelic Gophers.

All would be well advised to fear the Bunny... and worship the Comic.

Edit to avoid purely OOC post: I figured you might be going the AI route, but I wasn't certain. (I need to read that series some time.) And now that you've spilled the secret, I don't need to avoid giving it away....

Link added.

OOC: He's been hired as an infiltrator,. Something that big and the fleet was like "WHOAH!!! Get the bunny, he's easy to miss."

The fact that they're bunnyesque is coincidence.

IC:

The rabbit entered the system with no fanfare. Sliding quietly in as the other fleet took attention off of his tiny shuttle. Not that it really mattered, he was...old. And nothing had yet killed him. Nothing had yet come close.

"Where the @%$#& is my Mother @%$#& margaritas!?" The bunny was not at all happy. His employers were very nearly in breach of contract, though he had been assured that the big titted blond would be waiting on the surface. With that in mind, he brought his tiny vessel to ground, ignoring any pot shots that might be taken at him. They just didn't know enough yet. It would soon be time to fear the Bunny.

OOC2: While AG knows of the Rabbit, I don't think he quitwe has everything straight. This is in fact an AI construct(a la the Council Wars series), who aided the Confederates during their recent and extremely brutal AI Wars. If it exists, he's probably killed it at one point or another, up to and including a full blown battleship. He is evil incarnate. He is death, in a furry cute talking package. He is Bun-Bun. Fear the Bunny, Sluggy Freelance. Ka-Click.

Though there was no true resistance offered against the small craft, the ship had most assuredly not arrived undetected. In fact the system lit up with activity all along the path that the small incursion vessel took towards the planet. And though guns with barrels larger than the vessel itself tracked its movement, they remained silent.

Closest to the landing area, beyond a small forest, a farming village of man-sized rabbit-lemmings milled around tending their small crops. Escorting them were small crowds of tiny little poofballs chittering and chirping merrily in the sun. They went about their business, completely ignoring the relatively obvious landing.

Bun bun's arrival was also observed by the waiting Angori scouts; if it hadn't been, the attention it attracted would surely have changed that. A messenger probe is not designed for observation, but it is quite capable of functioning in this role, and several of the device's sensors were soon focused on the landing site.

Bump for attention. Must have more people...

"The hell is this shit? Nobody hired me to look at some freaking farmers!!! Davis! You've got a load of explaining to do!" The tiny FTL-comm relay, one iof the rabbits many tricks, activated, and carried his words all the way up the chain to the president.

On the presidents desk appeared a hologram of a rabbit, festooned with weapons, from knives of all sizes, to a multitude of pistols. The bunny was not happy. Before the president could say a single word, the Bunny seemed to turn and address something out of his view. "Hey! What the fuck are you looking at? Yeah, I'm talkin to you." The rabbit appeared to glare at something only he could see, but which was obviously one of the inhabitants he was supposed to be watching. He had obviously approached the village, faster than many might have believed possible, and was now venting his anger simultaneously at the president and the locals.

The ugly armed creature's hoots and squeaks went ignored by the lumbering rabbit lemmings, but the tiny cubs immediately focused their attentions on the alien intruder. Two of them tentatively hopped a couple feet forward, snuffling the air and chirping quizzically at the snarling and yelling invader, while the others stood still as stone, eyes wide in a mixture of curiosity and... something else.

The larger rabbit-lemmings warbled a tooth rattling call, and the cubs, one by one, hopped off after their parents. Though they moved much as before, there was always one cub paying attention to the heavily armed alien rabbit.

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Meanwhilst, a single ship, little more than a fighter craft, rocketed into space... and exploded as a result of its engine overloading.

Upon seeing the explosion, Lord Donral was faced with the original dilemma all over again - interrupt to offer help, or remain silent while the natives spent time, effort, and possibly lives on a project that might be avoidable? He paused for a moment, staring into his view screen and wondering which would be a more effective diplomatic move...

OOC: <BUMP> for viewing.

"What the fuck is your issue fluffball?" The Rabbit glared at the two approaching fluffballs, before they hopped away. "Davis, the fuck is this place? I'm not seeing any big titted blonds, or alfalfa margaritas. You lied to me!"

The president didn't even flinch. "I did not say that there were blonds or margaritas there. I said that if you went there we would give you a big titted blond, and a years supply of alfalfa margaritas. That is not the same as saying that they're on the planet. Now, go figure out what they're up to. Find something that talks."

"Whatever, nerd boy. You're mine when I get back."

The Rabbit hopped away from the village, muttering curses and occasionally blasting small portions of the landscape into oblivion. He was one angry bunny.

While realization might not have dawned immediately, as BunBun wandered through the forests and plains of the disturbingly calm world, something would have become more and more notable: No big animals.

Apart from insects and small birds that seemed to land in packs and only for as long as absolutely necessary, there were no other animals in the forests. Instead of a verdant paradise that one would come to expect from such undisturbed forests, this land gave off the distinct sensation of being in a tomb. The creatures in the villages were for all intents and purposes the larges creatures on the planet. With the skittishness of what little creatures there were, it soon became apparent that whatever animals had existed had suffered EXTREME attrition to the point of mass extinction on an unsurpassed scale.

Also curiously, the creatures seemed to take Bunbun's destructive tantrums in stride, if only because they seemed to be in a constant state of panic already.

Right up until one of Bunbun's attacks fell upon some previously unseen form of matter shielding raising up over a hillside. Whereupon everything just vanished. Bugs. Birds. They almost created a breeze as they all fled in unison.

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Meanwhilst, another ship rocketed into the sky... and vanished.

It reappeared next to the Angori ships. It wheeled about back towards the planet and vanished again.

OOC: Bumpness? Wouldn't mind if more folks would decide to make contact, for better or for worse...

"Lord Karvan, they appear to have assembled a working FTL prototype."

"Impressive research abilities.... Continue observation."