The rounds never stop. The artillery never stills. The hum of the shield never quiets. The impacts never dull. The stars never shine. The sun never warms. On the Border Worlds, the war may wane, but it never ends.

  And today was no different.

  0500 sharp, Captain 1st Rank Regina LaCrox and her XO, Lieutenant Commander Tania Parker, entered the bridge with the rest of the primary bridge crew.

  "Captain-" the Senior Lieutenant on shift began, but Regina shut him down.

  "We are about to drop into hell, Lieutenant, save the formalities and get some rest."

  The Lieutenant snapped to attention, then left with the rest of the secondary crew.

  "To your stations!" Tania barked in a voice too light for command but held no less bite.

  Master Mate Jinoto slid into the pilot's chair, his hands quickly finding purchase on the digital buttons.

  Senior Crewman Vanessa sat down at her console.

  "Targeting sensors primed and ready, Captain," she reported.

  "Shields will be down for no less than ten minutes," Senior Crewman Alisser reported. "Anti-Mass Field is releasing higher than expected radiation."

  Regina sat, winced in pain, then decided to stand instead.

  "Dropping in one minute, Captain LaCrox," the mechanoid Ten reported from behind the Operations Center.

  Regina held her finger to her ear.

  "Chief Mate Teekaan, status report."

  "Gun crews at the ready, Captain," Teekaan reported in his deep bass voice.

  Regina switched frequencies.

  "Status report, Master Vaaka," she said.

  A mechanical voice overlapping a string of fluid words sounded in her ear.

  "Heat sinks are secured, Captain. As soon as the Anti-Mass radiation fades shields can be safely deployed."

  He remembered his translator. Good.

  "Ten seconds," Ten reported.

  Regina braced.

  She hadn't been on the Border Worlds since she was eighteen. When she was a Senior Lieutenant on board a shitty Boxer-Class Frigate.

  What had its name been?

  "Three," Ten reported. Everyone braced harder.

  "Two...one..."

  The UXC Battle Group had known they were coming, and were currently giving their lives to buy them the precious minutes it would take to jump out.

  The Cylinzz'ik Hegemony did not care for it.

  Already, they smelled blood.

  Massive biological warships, essentially bugs themselves, tore into the battle group. Ships fired with everything they had, plasma burning deep gouges into the creatures, while ballistics tore off chunks, blood quickly freezing in the void.

  Fighters, dozens dying every few seconds, ripped into the enemy, harassing them, keeping their eyes focused elsewhere.

  Regina looked to her Operations Crewman, Senior Crewman Menian.

  He could hear the general chatter of the system.

  Gods only knew what he was bearing witness to.

  "Get us a path out of here, Ten!" Regina ordered.

  "Compiling all possible route-"

  "We don't need all possible routes!" she interrupted him. "Just get me-"

  "Captain!" Tania called out.

  Regina looked back out the viewport, her gaze locking onto a large troop transport that dropped out of Light Speed.

  Not hundreds.

  Not thousands.

  Millions of Cylinzz'ik Crusaders were spilling from it, heading directly toward the Northumbria.

  "Targeting data acquired," Vanessa called out. "Full ballistic scatter!"

  "Target the carrier as well," Regina ordered. "Full plasma volley!"

  "Yes, Captain!"

  "Pilot!" Tania ordered. "Hard to port! Bring us in for broadside!"

  "Yes, Commander!" Jinoto replied.

  ****************

  The Northumbria was not a warship by any stretch of the word.

  It was slow, clumsy, and underarmed for its size.

  The shields were about the only true advantage it had, able to withstand the continuous assault of a Super-Crusier for nearly two days.

  Those shields meant nothing to enemy boarders though.

  Shields only stopped physical material at high speed and above a certain size threshold.

  And so the gun deck was bracing for the worst.

  And if the gun deck was bracing, so too was Chief Mate Teekaan.

  As the giant Oomaraan barked orders into the deck comms, doing all he could to ensure his gun teams were ready.

  "Chief Mate!" a voice called out. He turned and snarled.

  "There you are," he growled.

  The red-skinned Major Uniton came to a stop, rifle in hand.

  "I've got my marines stationed primarily in the occupied City Tubes," he reported. "I kept two companies in reserve like you asked-"

  "Ordered," Teekaan corrected.

  Despite being enlisted, he was Chief Mate and they were in battle.

  Outside of the bridge, his word was law.

  "Where do you want them?" Uniton asked, ignoring the correction.

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  "Send five hundred to the agricultural sphere," Teekaan ordered. "I want the rest in kill teams of three squads posted at M.T.S. Stations along the Brick. Wherever they start digging, I want your boys there before they make it through."

  Uniton nodded and spun on his heel, jogging off.

  They were as ready as they could be.

  Regular Army was filling in the gaps.

  RECON was doing whatever it was that RECON did that made them so terrifying.

  "Teekaan," Regina's voice came over his earpiece.

  "Yes, Captain?" he answered.

  "Targeting data has been sent to your gun teams. You are weapons free. Fire when ready."

  "Aye, Captain," he responded.

  He triggered his deck-wide comm.

  "All weapon batteries, initiate final checks and verify targeting data."

  He allowed an evil grin.

  "Fire at will."

  *****************

  The space between the Northumbria and the Cylinzz'ik carrier lit up as super-heated plasma and ballistic hell tore into it.

  Crusaders were transformed into frozen mist by mass, or roasted by heat.

  The carrier writhed as the plasma cooked its body, its silent scream unheard but witnessed.

  As the Crusaders closed the distance, the hull's point defense weapons opened up.

  The main guns used a round that was over fourteen hundred pounds of carbon weave steel.

  So the point-defense cannons using a “smaller caliber” didn’t mean much.

  Especially when that smaller caliber fired at thirty thousand rounds a minute.

  After suffering hundreds of thousands of losses, however, the first of the Crusaders hit the hull.

  And they began to dig.

  Finally, the shields came up.

  *******************

  Good.

  Now they can absorb the non-existent fire from the cattier.

  "How long before the Sling Drive recharges?" Regina called out.

  "Fifteen minutes, Captain," the Operations Crewman responded, his translator converting his vibrating horn into speech.

  Regina cursed.

  That was more than enough time for the enemy to enter the ship.

  Flashbacks of her tour ripped through her mind.

  Soldiers ripped apart, faces melted by acid, bodies pinned to walls by needle rounds.

  She forced a breath.

  She had ten thousand marines on board.

  And not just that.

  An equal number of regular army.

  And a hundred Tier One RECON Operatives.

  This wasn't going to be a slaughter.

  At least not for her people.

  Regina watched as the minutes slowly ticked by.

  The hull was thick, very thick, and with luck they would jump before a breach.

  If they did, the Cylinzz'ik that hadn't made it inside would no longer be a problem.

  She only vaguely heard the reports as they streamed in, trusting Tania to fill in the gaps.

  Instead, she stared at the digital window on the viewport, at the carrier still dispensing bodies, refusing to die as plasma mauled it.

  "Course set, Captain 1st Rank-"

  "Thank you, Ten," Regina said absentmindedly. "Just Captain will do."

  Then the words she needed to hear came from her Operations Crewman.

  "Sling Drive charged, Captain," Menian reported.

  "Get us out of here!" Regina ordered.

  Jinoto was already aiming the Northumbria at the star.

  "Initiating Quantum Tether!" he called out.

  Regina felt the thrum of reality as space itself was pierced by something none of them could see.

  "Tether set and taut!" the Unda pilot reported.

  "Crewman Alisser!" Tania called. "Drop the shield and engage Anti-Mass field!"

  Regina watched as their shield became briefly visible as it fell away, followed by the yellow, physics defying technology that encased the ship.

  "Field is up, Commander!" Alisser said.

  "Jump!" Regina ordered.

  The Northumbria lurched toward the star, and began to fly in tight circles around it.

  Like a ball on a string, it rotated around and around, gaining universe defying speed with every pass. Once they were moving at forty-five hundred times the speed of light, they launched.

  The Ether Space Drill powered up, and they dove beneath reality.

  ***********************

  Impossible.

  Obviously not because she was staring at the report.

  But the report shouldn't be saying what it said.

  No casualties.

  Well, no deaths. A score of wounded marines, a squad of army, and a single RECON Operator.

  Wounded, but none dead.

  Three breach points.

  Major Uniton’s kill teams had held off the swarm until jump.

  Physics had done the rest.

  And better yet, her fears of having to jump to a Hegemony system were avoided.

  The reason it had taken Ten so long to plot a course was because he was validating an Ether current that was hidden by others.

  They were on their way to a system one hundred light years from the Hegemony.

  One hundred ten from...

  Home.

  She inhaled briefly, and let it out slowly.

  She didn't have time to relax. The Crusaders had still damaged the hull.

  She had to meet with Lieutenant Vaaka and see how he was planning to repair it.

  She jumped as her door chime screeched at her.

  "Enter," she called out.

  The door slid to reveal Vaaka, datapad in hand.

  He moved to her desk and stood at attention.

  "At ease," Regina said. "What do you have?"

  He handed her the datapad.

  "We have acquired over two hundred..." he paused. "Weakened plates...in the hull, and three full…breaches. I have parties of technicians ready to go onto the hull and begin fixing it as soon as we arrive."

  She inwardly smirked at "parties."

  "Thank you, Lieutenant, anything else I need to be aware of?"

  "No, Captain," he responded.

  She handed the datapad back to him after memorizing where the damage was.

  "Dismissed."

  He snapped to attention, spun on his heel, and left.

  Regina sighed and slumped into her chair.

  They had five hours before they dropped into Real Space.

  Five hours of peace before the unknown hit.

  And with the mess they just escaped?

  She had a feeling they had used up the combined luck of the Expedition's first generation.

  *****************

  "Orient us, Crewman," Tania ordered Menian.

  "Dropping Ether Space Ping now," he replied mechanically through his translator.

  Radar and sensors moved at the speed of light, which was entirely too slow.

  Dropping the ping into Ether Space allowed the return of data much, much faster.

  The deeper you went, the faster the return, but the more garbled the data.

  Objects, ships, everything left shadows in Ether Space. The deeper you went the more those shadows blurred together.

  The ping was so deep the data for the local system was back before he could even pull his finger away.

  It would take nearly seventeen hours for any systems five light years out, and thirty four for the systems ten light years out.

  Which gave Vaaka and his team the time they needed to make their repairs.

  Regina nodded to herself.

  She had this.

  Everyone had this.

  She had a capable, skilled crew.

  Whatever challenges Sagittarius was going to throw at them?

  They'd be ready.

  *******************

  Finally out of uniform, Vaaka stood in front of the “What Ales You.”

  He was wearing typical Daovi attire.

  Dark leather with soft fur interior, with subtle shoulder padding and gloves.

  He took a deep breath.

  He was Daovi.

  Beloved Son of the Void Mother.

  He had dived into settlements within the DMZ, her name on his lips.

  Charged firing lines with pistol and axe.

  Sang on the streets of his cold city ship off Tel'nagra.

  Sat with the All Watcher's worshipers, listening to their insane rants of events he had no context for, and they were unable to provide it.

  And walking into a Coalition bar was making him nervous.

  "Oh Void Mother," he muttered in his native tongue. "Why did you lead me to this tuneless nation?"

  He moved, the door sliding to the side.

  Daovi taverns were boisterous.

  Singing, thumping, the smell of roasted meat on an open fire.

  This place was smoke, soulless music, and tuneless conversation.

  But it was what he had.

  He moved to the bar, where Glenn was pouring a drink for a Xero.

  Daovi was a culture, not a species, so he had lived near, and even fought and drank with many Xero. He always enjoyed their company.

  As he moved, he patted his pockets, looking for his banking chip.

  Banking chip.

  He missed the tactile feel of glass Kla, the rhythm of them hitting a wooden counter.

  Now he swiped thin metal, an arbitrary number in a digital system, reduced by an arbitrary amount.

  An amount that would increase by another arbitrary amount for the simple fact that he showed up to his shift on time and stayed all twelve hours.

  Finding his card, he moved to the bar. The Xero turned and shoved him aside with his shoulder.

  "Watch it, Daovi," he spat, literally spitting on the floor.

  Vaaka was about to respond, viscerally, when the Xero flew back, slamming into the bar.

  The music continued, but the chatter stopped, all eyes turning to Teekaan as he towered over the Xero.

  "Able Crewman Xanden," Teekaan growled. "I do not expect you to like the Lieutenant. I do not even expect you to be nice to him. And as we are not in uniform, I do not expect you to salute or stand at attention."

  He leaned in, going to one knee, his eyes level with the pupiless green orbs of the black-skinned, currently yellow-spotted being.

  "But I do expect you to show the proper respect for his station, regardless of uniform or not."

  Xanden rubbed his chest where Teekaan had shoved him.

  "Sorry, Chief-" he began.

  "I don't give a damn about your apology," Teekaan interrupted. "It is the Lieutenant you need to apologize to."

  He stood, taking a step back.

  Xanden managed to crawl up as well, placing his now empty glass back on the bar.

  "I'm sorry, Lieutenant," he said, looking at Vaaka, his emotion spots somewhere between an embarrassed dark yellow and angry orange. "I was out of line. It won't happen again."

  Vaaka resisted the urge to shove Xanden's glass into his eye socket.

  Instead, he nodded.

  "Your…apologetic state is acceptable, Crewman," he said in stiff Coalition Standard.

  Xanden nodded, and moved down the bar, waiting for his refill.

  Teekaan looked to Vaaka and motioned to the bar.

  "Join me, Sir?" he asked.

  Vaaka nodded and took a seat.

  Glenn already had Teekaan's dark ale in hand.

  When he looked to Vaaka he stared.

  Then stared some more, becoming obviously confused and embarrassed.

  He held his hands out.

  "Sorry, Lieutenant," he said. "Can't get a read. What can I get you?"

  Vaaka looked over the shelves.

  "Something to tune out your music," he ordered.

  Glenn snapped, grabbed a square glass and a bottle of orange, glowing liquid.

  He poured it, literal smoke curling up.

  "First drink of the Expedition is free," he said with a smile.

  Then he was gone.

  Teekaan watched as Vaaka picked up and studied the glass.

  "Sir," he said, taking a pull from his mug.

  Then in perfect Daovi he said, "Tell me of your home."