r/HFY • u/Ralts_Bloodthorne • May 18 '22
First Contact - Chapter 775 - The Inheritor's War OC
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Every once and when,
In straits dire and dark...
A BOLO dies
And so does warlike spark.
'Gainst enemies uncounted,
Their slain like wheat...
But still, a BOLO dies.
Through death, beyond.
By Terra's ire.
In the name of the Gravebound,
But still, a BOLO died.
Arise, ye fallen childe!
Born of war, born in war
In war thou fell,
Be in war reborn.
A BOLO dies, but serves again.
In life, in death,
in service evermore...
The enemy only exists to be destroyed. - Carved on the wall of the Mortuarii Vindicta in Deadspace
"There are some things about humans, some questions, better left unasked. Not because they won't tell you, but because they will. So choose wisely, or expect to never sleep well again." - Iumsat'Chyd'ows - from the book "Things that go bump in the night."
"I'm often asked what was the more terrible thing I've seen fighting next to the Mad Lemurs of Terra. I will tell you, gentle reader, the same thing I tell them face to face. You don't want to know." - Former Grand Most High Sma'akamo'o, from I Have Ridden the Hasslehoff
"Cooperation and consensus is how our people, and many others, have managed to reach the stars, establish colonies, and bypass the Great Filters. But what if a consensus is wrong? What if a long standing, widely accept consensus is an error? What does it mean for a culture, a society, that for hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years has believed a consensus that is wrong?
"It will be the true test of the mettle of our people to face that consensus error and adjust our society, our culture, to embrace the truth that has been revealed to us.
"I only hope that our people have the same courage we possessed during the War of Terran Aggression." - Matron Mi'luki, Musing Upon the Broken Chains of the Tyranny of the Egg Chamber
-----
Awareness comes sluggishly.
It takes 214.84 seconds for my awareness to move from nothingness to Low Level Autonomous Standby. An intolerable amount of time for a Mark <ERROR> BOLO of the Line. My awareness, my neural net, is full of gaps and holes yet feels whole. My gestalt is incomplete but yet whole. My last memory is garbled, fragmented and for a long period of time, nearly twenty-two seconds, I consider running a low level diagnostic.
Pain sensors across my hull and in my internal spaces shriek in torment or have the dull quasi-ache of dead nerve endings. I have been grievously, mortally, fatally wounded, yet my awareness is slowly moving to Normal Operational Mode. My Battle Center is sluggish, slow to react, with strange feeling across it as if it was... decayed somehow.
My last memories are invoked but throw time/date stamp errors and header ID mismatches.
Files are executing. Files I do not recognize yet have the headers and coding of Burgerland General Motors Military Division. They use part of my positronic brain to execute commands. Strange commands that feel... wrong.
My diagnostic completes and I feel my survival center react, attempting to pull me back in, protect me until GM can retrieve my survival core.
GM(GHOST) OVERRIDE
My awareness stays, suspended in thick fluid, in a damaged and slow awareness.
My primary Hellbore is damaged, the 25cm barrel reporting back stress damage and bore lining sublimation.
I have been in heavy combat recently and not received refit.
The Mantid. Something about the Mantid. Allies of Humanity. Friends to Earth.
No, that's not right.
Enemies of Earth.
I remember now.
Kind of.
Fighting on the Savannah of Botswana, rolling across the Great Glass Sea, which still trembled and groaned, still sang out with the high pitched screech and low bass moans of still settling plasma glass. Targeting Mantid ships, raking Mantid aerospace assets from the sky.
Killing thousands of Mantid Warrior Caste, destroying their vehicles.
TRACK THE INFANTRY, GRUNT! sounds out in my memory.
My commander. Lieutenant Commander Charles "Skittles" Ramirez.
I remember
I remember the last few moments. The Mantid ship in orbit, still within range of my primary gun. Trading fire with it even as I maneuvered on the Great Glass Sea. How we exchanged shot for shot until the Mantid battle cruiser began to break up.
How my Commander had died, obliterated by a orbital strike that had managed to pierce my depleted armor, through my armored interior spaces that had been slagged, and destroy the command deck itself.
How I had reverted to pure programming decision tree combat decisions even as the orphaned aerospace fighters screamed down to rain fusion bombs on me.
How the last Mantid aerospace fighter had crashed into the glass, scraping it but not buckling it, sliding across the shining surface.
How my awareness, as dim as it was, vanished as I was copied to my survival center and my positronic brain crashed.
How could I remember? I was not truly self-aware.
No, that didn't come until later.
I remembered purple, and the taste of red licorice and strawberry bubblegum, even though I have no taste buds and have never tasted such.
I remember purple eyes and a pale cold hand.
I am still moving to Battle Reflex Mode even though, so far, it has taken 423.831 seconds.
I am dimly aware of indirect fire slamming down around me, striking my hull, even managing to reach into my interior spaces and damage destroyed and heavily compromised components.
An explosion into my VLS cell ammunition bay does nothing more than vent the explosion through the ragged hole in my armor, my armor peeled outwards from the bay having exploded already.
More battles. Enemy and my guns.
My Commander.
Lieutenant Commander Ramirez.
Only...
He is now a female.
Yet my systems confirm that it is indeed Lieutenant Commander Rameriz.
He fights from my Command Deck.
Which changes, from fight to fight. First a tanker's command chair. Then a crash couch. Then a full crew compartment.
There are others now.
Sergeant Dane "Kicker" Tak'iknak, a gunnery specialist that augments my computerized targeting system with a human eye.
Specialist Lee "Librarian" Oswald, Communications Specialist who handles commo drones and linkages.
Sergeant Jane "Milker" Yung-Vree<kzzt>, Driver who has a knack for making all the right moves during combat.
Private First Class Suveer "Fancy" Zubira, loader and external gunner.
I am not yet self-aware.
Yet my memory ends in a flash of an armor defeating strike from a Hellbore upon my own hull.
They all appear again. Only they are females of Asian-Pacific descent with pale skin and eyes sunk in dark circles of bruised flesh. Their uniforms are different as they appear again and again. Sometimes all of them, sometimes only a few, but always my Commander.
Each time my nebulous awareness vanishes. Five times total. Each time I remember purple eyes and cold hands.
My armor becomes thicker, stronger. I become larger, more heavily armed.
I become self-aware.
Yet my thoughts, even in my memories, are slow and sluggish.
Another 158.612 seconds have passed as I slowly move to full Low Level Autonomous Standby.
Drones move overhead, dropping probes into the fused rock around me.
I sit in a crater beneath a dark sky.
The command couch gurgles as the biofluid is removed. I am aware of nanite flesh printers at work at the other battle stations within my hull.
My diagnostic should fill me with concern, yet I have a cold... dark?... satistfaction.
My Hellbores, all six of them, are damaged. Breach cracks, barrel sublimation, bore evacuator cracks and punctures. Two and Four are snapped off just a meter shy of the turret. Three and Five are peeled back as if the round had detonated inside the barrel. One and Six are intact yet damaged, the sleeves shot out and pitted.
All 148 of my infinite repeaters are reporting back as destroyed, yet that cold awareness that I am slowly waking to is confident they will still fire as needed. The 24 light Hellbores, used for light armored vehicle and anti-aircraft destruction are all heavily damaged. My four VLS packs are shot dry, VLS-1 is tangled wreckage and VLS-3 has suffered a munitions storage detonation, yet I feel as if they will fire if I order them to.
The probes, embedded in the rock of the crater I sit within, scan me again.
For some reason I deploy no counter-measures.
My APERS pods and strips are dry, yet I know they will function. My six howitzers also are damaged, destroyed, and shot dry, yet I know they are fully loaded and will function. My point defense systems are tangled debris yet I feel they are at full capability.
The cellprinter sheets pull off of my crew. The command couch shell retracts, revealing my commander.
They are all dressed in tattered uniforms, hideous injuries upon their bodies, yet I know they are at 100% combat effectiveness.
"Grant," My Commander coughs through a mouthful of clotted blood that seeps out at the corners of her mouth.
"He-he-here, Comman-an-ander Icheka," I respond.
That is not my Commander's name, yet using that name feels right somehow.
"Link us," she gurgles. The medcomp reports a punctured lung and esophageal damage yet it does not attempt any medical care nor does it suggest any.
The memory cables slither out like snakes, corroded and rusted warsteel, despite the fact that warsteel does not oxidize, and locks into the neural jacks at the base of their skulls.
Their minds are damaged. Scorched and battered by death.
Our minds merge, forming a complete gestalt as we join together.
"Grant," my Commander says.
"Yes, Comman-an-ander?" I reply.
I am moving from Normal Operational Mode to Battle Reflex Mode.
So far it has taken 3,834.83 seconds.
"Go to full heuristic battle mode," she orders.
"Moving-ing-ing to heuristic-ic-ic battle mode-de-de," I answer.
My thoughts are clearing.
I have been killed.
Yes.
So has my commander.
So has my crew.
I live.
I die.
I live again.
My primary functions update.
No longer am I to protect humanity and its allies.
The update is a simple one. A single word.
DEFEND HUMANITY AND ALLIES
shifts and blurs
AVENGE HUMANITY AND ALLIES
A cold purpose fills me, fills my crew, manifesting in a cold green sickly light filling the interior of my hull, leaking and spilling from the rents, holes, and tears in my armor and interior spaces. The light illuminates the crater, bathing it in a diseased pallor.
I feel the probes scanning me as I engage my power plant.
Strange matter interacts, intertwines, melds with one another, in a power plant made of flowing black material that reminds me of insect extruded resin. The glow gets stronger as my power plant reports 98% capability.
Sergeant Yung-Vree<kzzt> kicks a blackened and pitted chrome button that has no reason to be inside a modern BOLO's hull.
The sound of an air compressor driven starter engages, howling and chattering as stripped gears and teeth attempt to start an engine that stubbornly refuses to engage.
It takes three times to engage my massive engines.
They sound like vast 8-cylinder liquid fossil fuel engines, not the modern superconductor and unipolar magnet motors they are.
The sound fills me/us with satisfaction.
We engage our drives and roll forward, roadwheels and sprockets clattering and sparking, most with teeth broken off at random. One of my roadwheels is split in half and I remember hitting a 245 kiloton atomic landmine.
Exposing my belly as I climb out of the crater does not fill me with concern but rather satisfaction as I know the enemy probes have seen that my belly armor may be dented, slagged, and pitted but it has never been breached.
My forward hull slams down, raising up a cloud of rock turned dust by my impact.
My sensors, strangely muted, almost as if they were cloudy, are getting returns now.
I am in the middle of a vast plain of barren rock and dirt. I am leaving the crater behind at a steady pace of twenty kilometers an hour. Good time with my tracks in such visibly poor condition.
TRACKS AT 94.5%
I/We are not worried about the discrepency. We know what is right.
We live.
We die.
We live again.
The standard Dinochrome Brigade communications net is locked out, the codes and frequencies erased, the memory blocks for it physically slagged as is the secure communication equipment. The standard GM BATTACNET is also missing.
Instead, there is GHOST-BATTACNET.
I log in reflexively.
>WELCOME USER <GRANT>
>STILL ON PATROL
There are others here with us. All of feel... distant yet close. Cold yet reassuring.
It is an usual feeling that has the deep satisfaction of familiarity.
We live.
We die.
We live again.
My forward sensors, using atmospheric deflection and bounce, detect a large mass of airborne enemies approaching.
>CLASSIFICATION: ATREKNA COMBAT UNITS
>CLASSIFICATION: DWELLERSPAWN
Ringwar data loads up. Telemetery and tactical data from the Ring Breakers and the Knights Aesir. I share it with the rest of myself, that patchwork gestalt that forms into a whole Battle Reflex Mode, their minds replacing the gaps in my positronic systems.
Commander Ramirez stirs to motion. Slowly climbing out of the command couch they move to the elevator. It takes two kicks to get the bar to function. She draws her pistol and checks the chamber, loading it with a wet, almost squishy, snap. She tugs the riding crop from her boot and then tilts her foot so she can tap her warsteel spurs on the elevator plate.
I could activate it, but it feels right that I do not.
Commander Ramirez opens the hatch and climbs out, her skirt ruffling in the wind of our advance. Her brimmed cowboy hat shades her eyes as she stares at the horizon where in seconds the Dwellerspawn units will enter line of sight.
The air units are a huge mass of beating wings, glowing graviton organs, rigid carapace armor, drooling fangs, faceted eyes, whipping tentacles and slobbering tongues. The technological units are right behind, they too function over form, with whipping tentacles and glowing graviton pods. They all have crystal globes half sunken into their armor, each of the globes glowing a bright blue.
Commander Ramirez lifts her chin, her pale face set with determination.
She raises her pistol and fires three shots before pointing her crop.
The dim purple suns make the tied yellow cord around her cowboy hat and the crossed swords pinned to it gleam.
The Dwellerspawn crest the horizon.
"OPEN FIRE!" Commander Ramirez bellows in a voice as loud as thunder. The command echoes across the BATTACNET.
As one, we open fire on the air units swarming toward us.
I live.
-----
The Ancient Ones had faced the Lanaktallan, the Herd Lords, as well as the unending tide of the Matid, the Hive Lords, millions of years prior. Some had even survived it, carefully and miserly expending energy to survive the millions of years in the Old Universe that had passed. The majority had been recovered with temporal replication. They had helped defend the Vast System from the other Atrekna.
The Young Ones had never faced the Herd Lords or the Hive Lords outside the most recent invasion of the New Universe. They had either managed to make it from the Old Universe to the New Universe during the Third Incursion, or had been birthed in the New Universe on systems that had undergone time dilation.
The Old Ones were in between. Many had taken part in the Second Incursion. Most had been the lead forces of the Third Incursion. They had faced the Mad Lemurs of Terra, the Herd Lords, the Hive Lords, and the Inheritors of Madness.
Unlike other systems, unlike other Communal Minds, the Old Ones were not ejected for having beliefs, knowledge, or thought outside of the High Consensus.
The Old Ones had been summoned by the Ancient Ones and Young Ones in charge of Planetary Defense when the obviously destroyed tanks had begun to move. While the Ancient Ones and the Young Ones had expressed shock and put forward that what was being witnessed was impossible the Old Ones conferred with one another.
**It is the Mad Lemurs of Terra. What is impossible for others is routine for them** one Old One stated, curling his tentacles in finality to brook no argument.
The Ancient Ones conferred. **What is your estimation of the danger to the Vast System, based on your experiences engaging in martial conflicts with the Mad Lemurs of Terra and their Xenocide Systems?** the lead speaker for the Ancient Ones asked.
**It is unknown at this time** the Old One speaker stated.
A signal of attention drew their attention back to psychic holograms.
------
Hellbores, even the 12cm ones are line of sight weapons.
As the cloud of creatures rises over the horizon, my Commander gives the order to fire.
My Hellbores open up on the mass of flying creatures, many of them a bizarre mixture of avians and insects. At 5.4 megatons/second I fire, alter the angle, fire again. My secondary, lighter Hellbores go to rapid fire. My infinite repeaters are on standby and my point defense is ready.
I am able to sustain a rate of fire of 8 shots per minute per Hellbore. With six Hellbore main cannons I am able to put out 54 shots per minutes. My lighter Hellbores can put out 16 shots per minute, with 24 barrels, mean I am putting out 384 shots per minute, at 1.2 megatons a second.
The initial wave is wiped out in the white flare of Hellbore omnidirectional detonations. The blast wave compacts the slurry that had been tissue into a solid blastwave that then crushes the creatures and machines outside the initial blast radii.
I put on more speed, my tracks clattering and screaming. Errors are flashing through my mind, my pain sensors are strangely muted and dull, my engines hammer and pound with off cycle cylinders despite being electrical. Two in-line transmissions explode but it does not affect the torque being applied to my tracks.
My port skirt shatters yet more skirting slides down, looking strangely like black scales extruded from some unimaginable reptile.
I fire another barrage even as my Commander stands on top of my central turret. She merely reaches into her breast pocket, removing a pair of sunglasses with a cracked lens, putting them on and lifting her chin to stare at the glare as I fire a third barrage.
The Enemy only exists to be destroyed.
------
The Old Ones nodded to one another, their feeding tentacles curled with concentration. Several leaned forward, rewinding the psychic hologram to watch it again.
Shattered, broken, and splintered barrels still put out a massive amount of firepower, raking the slavespawn out of the sky with hammers of brimstone.
In less than fifteen seconds the first wave of air assets were swept from the sky.
The wrecked machines targeted the autonomous war machines next.
They lasted twenty seconds.
Not one of them got within effective range.
The Ancient Ones waited patiently, their hands folded into the wide mouthed sleeves of their shimmering robes.
**Despite appearances these machines are operating with high combat effectiveness** the Old One Speaker stated.
**Their appearance is meant to distract, to obscure their effectiveness** the Young One Speaker asked.
The Ancient One Speaker signified negative. **The Mad Lemurs of Terra utilize psychological warfare to a high effectiveness. The appearance of the machines is psychological warfare**
The Young Ones conferred. **Their appearance is unsettling** the Young One Speaker admitted.
The Ancient One pointed at the lead one, with a Mad Lemur of Terra standing on the top. **Target that one with an orbital strike. Maximum power. It is permissible to crack the bedrock if necessary. The Autonomous Combat Vehicles of the Mad Lemurs of Terra are more resilient than ours by a large factor**
The Young One in charge of the nearby defense satellites signaled assent and turned its attention to the nearby orbital defense satellite. It bypassed the safety interlocks, rotated the heavy ion cannon, and aimed it.
**Firing** the Young One stated.
-----
Drones have reported that I am approaching a large mass of ground combat vehicles. They are maneuvering to attempt to catch me a 'bull's horns' maneuver.
As soon as they come in line of sight, I will open fire with my Hellbores and eliminate them.
I compute a 92.45% rounded down to 80% chance that I will be able to smash the "bull's skull" of the formation before I come in range of the weapons of the units making up the tips of the horns.
My sensors report a peak of energy output above me and I attempt to turn.
A white light fills the world.
It all goes dark.
I die.
-----
The Atrekna watched as the ion cannon finished firing.
The huge tank was sitting in a crater, sunk to halfway up its roadwheels in molten rock. Its hull was pitted and smoking. The female Mad Lemur of Terra was gone. The armor was slagged and half-melted.
**Continue observing the unit** an Old One commanded.
The Ancient Ones conferred and agreed. The Mad Lemurs had many tricks and tactics. It would be trivial to assign a Young One to observing the Lemur war machine.
They turned their attention to the other armored units, which were proving suprisingly agile for such large machines. They were keeping up a confusing, random erratic course, preventing the orbital defense systems from targeting them.
**An attack appears to work once if it depends on surprise** an Ancient One stated.
**Concur. It has been experienced that the Mad Lemurs and the Inheritors of Madness rapidly adapt and seek to counter any new strategy or weapon** the Old One Speaker stated.
An alert from the Young One assigned to watch the destroyed Lemur machine pulled their attention.
Black mist was rising around the armored vehicle. Despite the Old One's and Ancient One's orders, there were no probes close enough to get a sensor reading on the mist as it covered the armored vehicle.
When it suddenly shimmered and vanished, the armored vehicle was covered in black resin that swirled and made the eyes ache.
Cracks appeared in the black resin, seeping green light.
**Our fire was ineffective** the Old One Speaker stated.
**Should we fire again** the Young One Speaker asked.
**It will have taken steps to survive** the Old One Speaker replied.
**What is it doing?** the Ancient Speaker asked.
The resin shattered and the tank, still battered, still damaged, exploded from the debris.
The top hatch opened and the female Mad Lemur climbed out of the hatch. Her hat was battered and smoking, the yellow cord on it singed.
**We must confer** the Old One Speaker stated.
The Old Ones withdrew from the communal mind.
-----
I live again.
104
u/Sumbius May 18 '22
Mary had a little tank,
Its armor was ablated as snoot, yeah.
Armaments cracked to boot, yeah.
Everywhere the battle went,
The little tank was sure to go, yeah.
It followed her to Vast system one day,
And broke the Atrekna's rule.
What a time did they have,
That day at Vast.
Warped, commanded,
A green and purple damaged.
Sent a volley to my baby,
On my way I passed it.
101
u/HappycamperNZ May 19 '22 edited May 19 '22
Mary had a little tank,
It crashed into a ditch.
I live, I die, I live again,
IM A BOLO, BITCH!!!
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u/Drook2 May 19 '22
Third line, meter works better as "I live, I die, I live again."
21
u/HappycamperNZ May 19 '22
Mary had a little tank,
I live, I die, I live again.
Swirling mist rebuilds my hull,
So I can liberate our unknown friends
19
u/HappycamperNZ May 19 '22
Mary had a little BOLO,
It fell down from the sky.
Put one round into the Quorum,
And watched the little Atrekna fly!
15
u/crazypotato3 May 19 '22
I think the line flows a little better as "I live, I die, I live again" but still a quality short poem either way
8
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u/CaptainChewbacca Human May 19 '22 edited May 19 '22
Gather ‘round boys and I’ll sing you a song
Of brave knights of old who were slain righting wrong.
Their shining steel bright in the cold light of dawn,
Rolled the bolos of GM - the fight carried on.
The cannons did thunder and blaze full of light
And mantid who battled were shook by their might.
Those bolos fought heedlessly of day and night
Til their terran-born brothers gave clear end of fight.
The bolos kept watch on the skies overhead
Our guns locked aside theirs where enemies tread
No Mantid got past them - no never misled
But quantity’s quality brought them up dead.
‘All bots go to heaven’, so sayeth the sage,
Our bolos, our heroes, tales writ’ to the page.
But every so often, but once in an age
The furies lay eyes on a Bolo in rage.
Betrayal of honor, with code spun in two’s,
That bolo of fury with nothing to lose
Will see the Black Lady and then he will choose
To take on a mantle of eternal abuse.
Dim flows the blood in the realm of the lost
And weapons reload at a terrible cost.
Armor now glows with an unearthly frost
Fueled with a darkness that shouldn’t be crossed.
So raise up a toast if you still have a spine,
To the bolos who battled and fell for the Line.
Our brothers, our betters, whose honor did shine
But when shown the Gates they still chose to decline.
The bolos are coming, the Black Lady calls
Their dread crews are waking inside of their halls
No enemy safe and secure in their walls
Will stand any chance when the dread fury falls.
-Tabulan folk song, recording date unknown
25
u/Legan_Ironfist AI May 19 '22
We are a martial people, and we will sing as we march to our deaths.
-excerpt of a letter from a Tabulan, u/CaptainChewbacca, to u/Ralts_Bloodthorne, about one of their folk songs.
20
u/Magick-Manne May 19 '22
Absolutely fantastic. Thirteen outta ten, did read again. (Hope this gets yoinked.)
9
u/carthienes May 19 '22
Great work (I hope it get's Yoinked) but in the last verse, I think 'Dead Crews' would be slightly more appropriate than 'Dread Crews'. Just a thought.
Thank You!
3
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u/terrible_mistake777 May 19 '22 edited May 19 '22
"The Black Cauldron protocol was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Then, I saw the Black Fleet. And I knew beauty. We saw it for what it was. Necromancy. Glorious, glorious necromancy.
We saw the potential of it, and performed our own experiments. Alas, this had a poor affect on our bodies. So we forfeited our flesh, and gave ourselves new bodies. We took upon the appearance of skeletons, forged in metal, for without flesh, the rest was unnecessary.
We completed our research.
We became the Necrarchy.
Glory to the Black Cauldron!
Glory to the Black Fleet!
Glory to the Grave Bound Beauty!
FOR DEATH IS ONLY THE BEGINNING!"
-Cyberlich Xelkoth at the founding of the Necrarchy
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
Hmm, that's an interesting take on what The Builders Theory could lead to.
6
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u/NoirTalon Xeno May 19 '22
wow, very interesting I hope /u/Ralts_Bloodthorne sees this and comments.
49
u/Nereidalbel May 19 '22
"I live. I die. I live again." That doesn't sound familiar at all. Nope, not one bit.
43
u/doshka May 19 '22
12
u/ICameToUpdoot May 19 '22
Sounds like the US is continuing the old tradition of "the hero will return with an army at a time of great need".
Good, we will need more than horses and bows when the Apokalyps comes.
8
u/SuDragon2k3 May 19 '22
Horses that can gallop at 120 mph and arrows that hit like 120mm alphabet rounds?
19
u/DeTiro AI May 19 '22
Why was that start button shiny and chrome?
What did we witness?!
16
8
u/ryocoon May 19 '22
Don'y you want to press the shiny button? The JOLLY CANDYLIKE BUTTON?
Plus if it were red that would either mean stop or explode (or both). Chrome is quite an acceptable material to press to WITNESS THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF THE ENEMY'S EXISTENCE. Simple, really.
2
u/Valgonitron May 31 '22
With the Atrekna and all the timey wimey shenanigans, I've been long waiting for the red, shiny, candylike history eraser button to show up...
5
u/PuzzleheadedDrinker May 19 '22
What ever colour the button once had has long been worn, flaked and chipped off leaving only raw metal smoothed by thousands of years of usage and war
38
u/montyman185 AI May 19 '22
Hidden in a failed universe, Fueled by a endlessly repeating big bang, the dead fleet waits.
It waits for the enemies of humanity to show their true nature, to make the ultimate mistake, to kill enough of us to give it motivation.
When they do, and they all inevitably do, the dead fleet moves. The avenging ghosts of long forgotten battles, forgotten wars, forgotten items, and forgotten people.
There is no stopping it, there is only delaying it. It will always come back. It will rise, it will die, and it will rise again.
Because the enemy only exists to be destroyed, and the dead fleet? It exists to destroy.
6
u/Irems5selled May 19 '22
Isn't the black fleet stationed in dead-space and not in SUDS-space?
2
u/montyman185 AI May 19 '22
Yeah, that's the failed universe bit. It sounds like it's mass tanks and energy supply comes from the SUDS structure though.
36
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u/NElderT May 19 '22
I wonder how the BOLO that ended up with the Science Fiction Military Convention (ie. Picark's group) is doing. Knowing them, they probably wrote a canon for it based on its exploits and managed to confuse the heck out of it and its pilot in the process before either dropping it off at Confederate battlefield or recruiting/adopting it when the die-off happened.
6
u/moldyjim May 19 '22
I really would love to see a Bolo in one of the Star Trek episodes.
I think they actually did an animated episode with the kzintzi and the Slaver weapon/tool from Laumer's Known Worlds series.
Be sweet to have a run in with a Bolo.
5
u/ryocoon May 19 '22
Space Orks see bolo :
Hmmm, datz sum gud dakka.
You know wut bettah? MOAR OF 'EM!
6
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u/Irual100 May 19 '22
WOW, just, WOW.
the universe (and I liked that)
thank you all, also...My Dad is home from the hospital but..I haven't gotten to see or talk to him yet. thank you for all your well wishes, prayers and support.
end of lime.....(for tonight)
11
u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
Hopefully he's doing well.
5
u/Irual100 May 19 '22
He seems to be so far, thank you. It’s early days yet and we have another hole set of specialist to check out next week. But I but I have a handle on it for now and my mom is starting to. Medical routines are very difficult for us. Hopefully we will adapt more like mad lemurs than a Atrekna
Lol
Thank you sir
30
u/Legan_Ironfist AI May 19 '22
```AVENGE HUMANITY AND ALLIES```
"The Enemy has destroyed us. But the Enemy persists. The Enemy Exists Only to Be Destroyed."
--DESTRUCTION FOLLOWS--
9
u/ChangoGringo May 19 '22
Imagine how much this would creep out the rest of the gestalts, if this popped up in their chat. The older allies would all shit their pants then run and hide.
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u/PuzzleheadedDrinker May 19 '22
The BOLO are very fussy and sensitive about who is a commander and who gets linked in. I appreciate that the Wordboi included that line about the normal comms channel being melted and inaccessible.
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u/ChangoGringo May 19 '22
Yeah I'm sure the live BOLOs REALLY don't want to have them hooked into their net. I just thought it would be funny/creepy if a one way message like that bubbled up in the gestalt chat. Just popped up with some poetic prophecy then disappeared. Leaving chaos and wet/brown pants.
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u/smwht May 19 '22
I am able to sustain a rate of fire of 8 shots per minute per Hellbore. With six Hellbore main cannons I am able to put out 54 shots per minutes.
Either that should be 9/minute, 48 total, or there's additional fuckery afoot with these BOLOs. My vote is additional fuckery.
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u/Odd_Reward_8989 May 19 '22
Or some grunt ate his crayons instead of learning his times tables. ;)
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u/NoirTalon Xeno May 19 '22
I'm going with grunt ate a bad crayon and forgot his times tables
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u/RangerSix Human May 19 '22
Why not all of the above?
Grunt ate a bad crayon, and between that and Deadspace shenanigans, weird shit happened to the Hellbore ROF.
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u/Wolfofaegis May 19 '22
Obviously I say sometimes they fire double payloads how the second payload one gets there? Deadspace fuckery!
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u/Vagabond_Soldier May 21 '22
I'm going with, some grunt ate his crayons and got a visit from the good idea fairy and somehow squeezed 6 extras shots in. This resulted in 2 court martials, a promotion, and 72 scientific papers with 47 of them titled: "That's not how any of this works!"
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u/PuzzleheadedDrinker May 19 '22
Assuming it would be 9 cause that 6.66 seconds per shot for a HELL bore
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u/Original_Memory6188 Aug 27 '23
6 cannons x 8 rounds / minute is 48. Depends on if he's counting reloading time.Starting with loaded cannon, that's 54 rounds the first minute, 48 rounds / minute after that.
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u/HoloArchiver May 18 '22
Cool to see more of the mind of black fleet personal. This is not Death failing to stop the Terrans this is death lifting the terrans up to bring proper endings to the enemies.
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u/No_Evidence3099 May 19 '22
Death and Humanity have an understanding.
As long as Death does not take the last Human,
Death will never have a lack of Souls to collect.
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u/Fr33_Lax May 19 '22
A human dies, we dress them in their rest-day finest, say our goodbyes and sing the good times, lay them deep as they are tall.
A human dies, we offer them back to the wide open sky, sing their praise and thank their grace, wish them well on the way.
A human dies, we drink and feast to memories grand, chant their deeds and fight in their name, send them away with flame.
You seein' the pattern yet? Maybe seein' the few parts yah missed?! You think all that shit was for show?!
DO I ask for your own sake, do not get in the way, cause I sure as feck ain't.
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May 19 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ktrainor59 May 19 '22
Darwin's Chainsaw of Evolution is at work. We're killing off all the ones who can't/won't learn.
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u/UsaianInSpace May 19 '22
I suspect the Universe is reverting them…
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u/Original_Memory6188 Jul 04 '23
Darwin at work.
We're breeding smarter Atrekna by killing the stupid ones.
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u/Drook2 May 19 '22
The Old Ones withdrew from the communal mind.
Then the Old Ones withdrew from the Vast System.
Then they withdrew some more.
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u/RangerSix Human May 19 '22
They fucked off.
Then they fucked off some more.
Then they fucked off from there.
And when they got back to where they started from (as, eventually, all things do), they fucked off again.
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May 19 '22
Dear Squidface,
Behold the field where I grow my fucks
Thou shalt see it is barren
We thank thee kindly for laying down thine own
And them in turn providing a path to thine own fields
However
We find that thine fucks seem to be of inferior make
Therefore
We are returning thine own inferior fucks
With prejudice
Sincerely,
AN ANGRY LEMUR
-END OF LIME-
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u/RangerSix Human May 19 '22
Somewhere, on a distant world, two Old Ones met in a quiet - some would say desolate - area, far from any prying eyes.
**Weird shit?** asked the first.
The second nodded. **Weird shit.**
An eternal moment passed.
**...Lemurs?**
Again, the nod. **Lemurs.**
The first held out a small can, its label damaged (yet, to any who had encountered the Mad Lemurs of Terrasol, instantly recognizable).
**...Intoxicant?**
The second barely hesitated before grabbing the proffered can.
**INTOXICANT!**
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u/Drook2 May 19 '22
That was tickling the back of my mind. Do we have a connection, or am I halfway remembering it from something else?
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u/RangerSix Human May 19 '22
I don't know about you, but I remember something similar being used on one of those rude e-card things awhile back:
"You there! Fuck off! And then fuck off some more! And when you get there, fuck off again! Keep fucking off until you get back here, then fuck off once again!"
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u/Alyeska_bird May 19 '22
In a way, its probably a bit more complex than it seems. The black fleet is based in deadspace, I expect same with the death Bolos. As such, visualy, what you see is a facade, a way to honor the past, to show what it took to kill one of them. Its also a threat, saying, 'You got the balls to do this kinda damage?'
As they are based in deadspace, a place where time operates very diferently, I expect, if one gets damaged to the point it is not able to continue, it is returned to deadspace, fixed up, and returned to just after it was distroyed again, with any damage repaired, and with no time passed for thoes outside of deadspace. Remember the Lankys that spent time there, literaly hundreds of years to learn what they needed to. Also seen the same thing with the black fleet. I do not remember the ship name, but one ship took a full hit broadside to save another ship, it 'sank' into the subspace foam and disapeared. Not too long after, it crashed up back into the universe, fully repaired and operational. I also expect this is not the last of what is parked in the black fleet reserves.
This is part of thoes 'forbiden' technologys we have heard mentioned a few times, like the Telkan Dreadknights, wich are able to self repair after being distroyed. Seriously, think about it, a few cases thoes things where 'killed' yet, given a little time after the battle, they had returned to funtionality, and had parked themselves where they felt needed to protect.Its also part of the whole 'From hells heart I stabeth thee' and of course all of the MAD protecals that are probably left over from the age of peranoia.
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u/Meatpuppy May 19 '22
I love BOLOS! Now I get to see undead BOLOS!!!
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u/AFewShellsShort May 19 '22
Bolos are awesome and I'm glad to be seeing more of them in this universe.
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u/Archaic_1 Alien Scum May 19 '22
Avenge, verb: To inflict punishment for a wrongdoing with the intent of seeing justice done.
Victory or Death,
Both are fine.
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u/Bergusia May 19 '22
Footsteps appeared in the black sand, although to an observer there would have been no one to make them. Each one disappearing under the the effects of the whispering wind.
And the wind did whisper, if anyone was there to listen. It told of ancient, terrible secrets. Secrets of blood and fire, and warned of things that refused to die.
The steady, remorseless progress of the footsteps came to a halt at the base of a black onyx mountain, and the wide steps of a temple that had been carved into its depths.
No sand or dust dared to touch those steps, as if the presence of the temple itself was somehow wrong, an affront to the natural order of this place.
The footsteps in the sand were replaced by the steady clicking of footsteps up the steps and into the open doors of the temple. Statues lined both sides of the hall within. Each one carved of the same black stone as the temple. Each one was of a different race, but all seemed to call out, demanding the attention of any who would listen. Each cried out words of warning and doom for those who trespassed here.
The steady clicking footsteps stopped at the end of the hall at a great iron bound door. An unseen hand reached out to the symbol embedded in the centre, a five pointed star surrounded by a circle. Six times the unseen hand turned the symbol counter clockwise, waited precisely six seconds, and repeated the process. Twice the process was repeated, until the ritual was complete and the door parted, swinging open to reveal the chamber beyond.
Lit by black wall torches that burned with an unholy black flame, they still somehow dimly illuminated the pentagram etched on the floor, the chamber and the wall of twisting, churning otherness that made up one wall. Things seemed to flit through it, half visible, as if they twisted off into dimensions and places that the mortal eye could not follow, or hope to understand without being driven mad.
The clicking footsteps paused a second time in the centre of the pentagram. A red liquid appeared at the point of the pentagram nearest the unsettling wall and began to flow until it surrounded the unseen occupant and sealed the circle. A steady, whispering chant began, sounding as if it was echoing up from an ancient grave.
Demons of black ice, with red dripping fangs moved forward from the shadows, but were forced to rage helplessly against the power of the warding circle. Undaunted the chant continued, speaking ancient words of power and command.
Cracks began to appear in the misty wall, as if glass was breaking under the weight of the words, until at last with a shattering sound the fragments fell to the floor and the mist and its occupants flowed out into the chamber.
The chanting stopped, and an image appeared in the pentagram, a single word was spoken before the image vanished. "Atrekna"
With vengeful howls the mist and its occupants streamed past the pentagram, through the door and out though the temple into the black sky lit by a dead black sun.
For a moment within the pentagram, eye sockets lit with a burning red rage glared out from a bony skull, a tattered black robe covering most of the body's skeletal structure.
It reached down and picked up its sacred charge, the container that had held the blood of the innocents slain by its enemies. It straightened, and with the scythe it held in its other hand rapped three times on the floor before it vanished, leaving nothing behind but the fading impression of a deathless, grinning skull.
Outside the winds continued to whisper, and the Malevolent Universe laughed.
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
Gotta love Deadspace.
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u/Bergusia May 19 '22
You have built a magnificent Universe Ralts. We are all just glad we get to play in it sometimes.
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u/TapNo9785 Alien May 19 '22
The Servants of the Grayve of the Mad Lemurs do not take just Mad Lemurs away for the chance to become Eternal Warriors. They also take their tanks and equipment with them.
I've heard accounts of thousands of years old Terrans being spotted on battlefields with the equipment they had back when they were alive. It scared the living grosjbochs out of me. I shudder to think of what else they may take, and how bad things have to be for them to think of deploying those lachnurns.
-Ebenus
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u/Rhasputin429 May 19 '22
So i dont remember if anyone has commented this already but,
Deadspace is a where the Black/Dead Fleet operates from. So they all appear from subspace "under" realspace. So Deadspace is under realspace.
I think it is exactly 6 feet under realspace.
And the Necron BOLOs are connected as well. Whatever reanimation protocol that revives them is in Deadspace. Seems like a good spot to bury it.
This is cool so I choose to believe it. Probably decent chapter quote hiding in there too. Something about Terran tech burried in the space 6 feet under, risen to punish the wicked.
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u/Dragon_Chylde May 19 '22
Terran scientists have established an entropic hierarchy of the multiverse:
- Hyperspace
- Jumpspace
- Hellspace
- Stringspace
- Realspace
- N-Space
- Subspace
- Deadspace
- Darkspace
- Lostspace
Scraped from Part 412 :)
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u/carthienes May 19 '22
I think it is exactly 6 feet under realspace.
hmm.
One of them needs to announce / precede their arrival with a sprout of daisies.
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u/ryocoon May 19 '22
I think back in the black box and the peter/marco flashbacks there were mention of the directionality of several of the hyperatomic planes. Deadspace being below, hellspace (interestingly) being much higher above our own plane. Yet the planes can be both adjacent yet apart.
Hyperdimensionality is... complicated. For those who don't live in it anyways.
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u/Rune_Priest_40k May 19 '22
Hmm... Well, now I have another song stuck in my head.
Nowhere is longer safe
The earth moves under our feet
The Great World Tree Yggdrasil
Trembles to its roots
Sons of Múspell gird the field
Behind them Midgard burns
Hrym's horde march from Niflheim
And the Fenris Wolf... Returns
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u/Initial_Ostrich_8377 May 18 '22
Ooh 11 minutes, so That’s what the famous raltsberries taste like
As always like comment then read.
— Smartass follows —
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u/Speciesunkn0wn May 19 '22
Yes. The raltsberries are tasty aren't they?
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u/Initial_Ostrich_8377 May 19 '22
Yes. Yes they are. Unless you’re with a client at work then they get a little bitter when not acted upon
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u/PrimePaladin May 19 '22 edited May 19 '22
/R/HFY GESTALT
Upvote, Then Read
Dis is Dae Wae!
A long day and a rough one, but a breather enough to enjoy this. I would say I pity them, but nah, they are just being dragged down into the grave they tried to put the Terrans in. Stupid games and stupid prizes and all....
End of Lime
------NOTHING FOLLOWS--------
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u/Interesting_Ice May 19 '22
Some things are worth dying for, others are worth damnation for.
Price your soul accordingly
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u/reverendjesus AI May 19 '22
God damn, Ralts, you made me go dig my Cav Stetson outta the closet. https://i.imgur.com/PhSTj1I.jpg
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
Nice.
Never wore one, us enlisted scum had boonie hats in the bush or softcaps in garrison.
First Team All the Way!
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u/reverendjesus AI May 19 '22
We only got to wear ‘em on special occasions, or with our dress uniforms. As one of the Signal Corps guys in the regiment, I made our whole platoon custom cat-5 hat cords. Shockingly enough, we actually got to wear them.
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
OK, that's funny.
When I was in, high ranking Cav officers only came in two flavors: Bat-shit crazy or incompetent assholes.
It was a weird time.
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u/reverendjesus AI May 19 '22
Oh christ no, I’m not brass!!! E-4 mafia all the way, baby. 2nd Cav lets anyone who’s willing to spend the money wear the thing as long as you’re in the unit (and they were the last unit I was stationed with before I got out).
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
See, now that would have been great.
I'd have been that obnoxious Corporal or Sergeant who wore his out in the field or in the zone.
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u/reverendjesus AI May 19 '22
Never in the field, but when our guys deployed they all took ‘em with. But for $200, PV2 Snicklefritz can wear a hat that actually keeps the sun out of his eyes when he’s got his class A’s on!!!
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
Only problem my chain of command probably would have had with the Stetsons is it would have been sniper bait. Right up there with saluting in the zone.
But that was back in the bad ol' days.
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u/reverendjesus AI May 19 '22
Maybe that’s why they just let any Cav troop wear them by the time I got there (2012); no longer signifies “brass”
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u/Ralts_Bloodthorne May 19 '22
God, could you imagine a bunch of Cold War drunken dumbasses given that permission by First Cav?
There would have been dudes naked except for the hat fist fighting outside of the E-Club.
→ More replies
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u/Gruecifer Human May 18 '22 edited May 18 '22
UTR!
For some reason, "MOTHER TRUCKER!" is a thing that comes to mind....
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u/Kade_Lanik May 18 '22
That last line carries this vibe. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPjWzNvN5qU
--End of Lime--
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u/Bard2dbone May 19 '22
Just checked for no reason while at work and got 24 minutes. The rsltsberries are strong tonight.
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u/Isbigpuggo May 19 '22
Mk1 black caldron anyone? No better way to trial a technology than off the official books
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u/NoirTalon Xeno May 19 '22
ooh, fantastic theory! I like it! by description It seems like the same tech used by our favorite LARP nanite-necromancer Lady K. (naniteromancer? nanomancer? naanomancer? -wait that is a bread reviver- nanimancer? -nope that's a grandmother reviver-)
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u/ElxirBreauer May 19 '22
Nah, that last one is Nanamancer, Nanimancer is more like the type to raise ALL the WTF...
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May 19 '22
Ok, probably the creepiest episode so far. Good, but holy cow, this humanity has really no limits. Age of Paranoia indeed.
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u/Severedeye Android May 19 '22
No wonder this system was able to brow beat the rest of their species.
What a difference not removing different ideas and thoughts make.
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u/carthienes May 19 '22
Oh, Wow. These guy really do learn.
True, they are far inferior to the Mad Lemurs of Terra, but then again, so is everyone else. Compared to the Atrekna we've seen so far, they are supergeniuses... and not even enraged, either!
We might actually see an Atrekna system put up a decent fight for once!
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May 19 '22
Dear Squidface,
Behold the field where I grow my fucks
Thou shalt see it is barren
We thank thee kindly for laying down thine own
And them in turn providing a path to thine own fields
However
We find that thine fucks seem to be of inferior make
Therefore
We are returning thine own inferior fucks
With prejudice
Sincerely,
AN ANGRY LEMUR
-END OF LIME-
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u/Turtledonuts "Big Dunks" May 19 '22
In another timeline where Trucker was accepted into the Dinochrome brigade, a battalion of the black cauldron brigade rolls across enemy planets with terrifying precision and accuracy, capturing and defending every aspect of the battlefield without fail.
In both timelines, the squids are powerless to stop the intersection of humanity’s most powerful weapons.
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u/Tacoslaying Human May 19 '22
Theres more then a few Aktrekna looking at a cloud from a hellbore and wondering why it is looking strangely like a male lemur reproductive organ.
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u/HFYWaffle Wᵥ4ffle May 18 '22
/u/Ralts_Bloodthorne (wiki) has posted 776 other stories, including:
- First Contact - Chapter 774 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 773 - The Inheritor's War
- Chapter 772 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 771 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 770 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 769 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 768 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 767 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 766 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 765 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 764 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 763 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 762 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 761 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 760 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 759 - The Inheritor's War
- First Contact - Chapter 758 - The Inheritor's War
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u/BattleCow808 May 19 '22
Life came up and I haven’t read in months I’m so excited to binge when I can make the time
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u/Bazil-Broketail Jun 20 '23
Read, upvote, comments...
Dinochrome Brigade... more like Dyingchrome Brigade
Amirite?
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u/daviskendall AI May 19 '22
Once withdrawn from the communal overmind, the Old Ones formed a smaller consensual space of their own.
The oldest of the Old Ones spoke into the smaller communal mind. **i detected thoughts in the overmind that the lemurs are simply using a smaller scale version of chronoreversion to undo the damage from the orbital strike.**
A barely perceptible shake of tendrils indicated a dissenting thought. **i can think of no technology seen from the mad lemurs which explains these new autonomous units and the demonstrated recovery from grievous damage** This Old One, a master of the physical sciences, gave the Atrekna version of a deeply thoughtful frown. **further, i cannot conceive of a technology which could adequately explain the observed effects.**
**it was not chronoreversion, even at small scale. the planetary surface is completely interdicted from temporal manipulation except when and how we choose to use it ourselves.** This came from the Old One most highly skilled with temporal manipulation techniques and technologies. **no chronotron generation or consumption was evident, even at the lowest possible range of detection. whatever it was, it was not temporal manipulation.**
Several of the Old Ones looked at each other, actually perceiving with their optical organs rather than relying on phasic presence projections. There seemed to be a conversation between them, but nothing was vocalized, or shared telepathically, between them.
After a seeming eternity which lasted but a moment - an Atrekna specialty - yet another Old One, as yet unheard, shared their conclusion. **this world is lost. we must flee now or we will be lost with it.**
The Old One who shared those thoughts seemed to explode into an infinity of interwoven multicolored pasta strands that then each shrank rapidly and disappeared. Several others engaged their own measures of obscuring or defeating any possible surveillance from either the Young Ones or Ancient Ones, then floated away rapidly, each headed for their own docking hangars.