Ravens of Eternity

454 No Quarter, Pt Back on the Yggdrasil, a few dozen officers and analysts were abuzz at their terminals. They all pored through various data on their screens and discussed their findings with each other eagerly. The tacticians by their sides formed their own notes and added their findings to the pool of information.

In the very center of the small room was a low platform with a floor-to-ceiling tacmap on it. Displayed on the tacmap was Dendrus IV. Or rather, the void that was Dendrus IV which was covered in mirror satellites.

Various reports scrolled along the tacmap’s holographic edges, which High Admirals Anali and Halbrect read with great interest.

“Can we verify that Godeater’s antigrav field is still active?” asked Halbrecht. “It’d be great if we didn’t have to contend with it at all.”

“Unfortunately, it is,” Anali replied. “Raijin sent me her findings on those mirror facilities – they don’t just maneuver the mirrors around. Each one also emits an antigrav field. All of ‘em combined covers the planet.”

“How the hell does the damned thing even keep up power-wise? Aren’t those things energy-intensive?”

“Massively. I don’t know how it works exactly, but Raijin also said the station ran off of Godeater’s energies somehow? She was still looking into it when we talked. But she made it clear that it was through the mirrors themselves.”

Halbrecht whistled low as Anali shared Raijin’s report with him. It wasn’t just the data itself that impressed him – just the fact that they had any data at all.

It was clear that Yggdrasil base had some serious intelligence-gathering systems and mechanisms in place, somewhere deep in its belly. Or, perhaps, scattered all throughout the galaxy. From what Raijin had told them, it had existed for tens of thousands of years.

.....

And its former inhabitants had woven their influence through every society and manipulated their decisions. In fact, they practically helped shape the galaxy itself.

Halbrecht shivered at the thought of the vastness of that intelligence network. More than that, they now had access to it.

It was too much power.

Then again, the galaxy was dying, so it hardly mattered in the end.

“So it’s basically down to those mirrors like we thought, huh?” he said. “Wonder what they cost the Hegemony.”

Both sighed in exasperation at the thought. The Grand Parliamentarian’s frenzied protestations in his final hour certainly cemented the idea that the entire facility was worth ridiculous amounts of money.

And they both believed that however much it was could have been used towards much more effective things. Such as larger fleets, or simply more defensive fleets. Hardier interplanetary infrastructure that was more difficult to exploit.

Or simply as raw currency to help the diplomats buy victory their way.

Instead, they made a giant gun that they fired once before all hell broke loose. Both wondered exactly what the Grand Parliament was thinking in creating this monstrosity. And the Matriarch de Jardin, particularly why she sponsored the project in the first place.

But there was no asking them that now. 𝐟𝓇𝘦𝒆w𝚎𝐛n𝐨ν𝙚𝚕. c𝚘ｍ

“If either of us saw the actual ducat amount, we’d both probably get sick to our stomachs,” Anali replied. “You’ve got a tech fleet, right? Saw what kinda battlefield engineering they could do, right? I watched mine build a dyson sphere once. You know, fortified supply lines and all that. Basics. And I also saw the cost report right after.”

Halbrecht nodded in understanding.

“Also, we oughta get an engineer over here to help us figure out how it all works,” he said after a moment. “The more we know about those mirrors, the better.”

“As far as I’m concerned, all we need to know is how to break ‘em down best,” Anali replied. “But I agree, let’s send a comms to the Republic. Maybe someone there can help us out.”

Halbrecht nodded after a moment. From what he had heard and experienced, the engineers of the Republic were among the brightest minds he had ever come across. They had access to the technologies of every galactic nation.

If anyone could reverse-engineer the mirrors, they could.

“Or even join us,” he said. “Maybe we could even reach out to any Houses that’re still out there and operating, call on anyone for their expertise. There’s gotta be someone who knows about this project, right?”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Anali replied. “I’d ask House de Jardin, but… comms are chaos. The House is crumbling. There’s dukes and duchesses murdering each other, even as the others just run away.

“Most of anyone with a title packed up whatever they could and simply left. Just up and left ‘em to their fates.”

Anali sighed deeply. There seemed to be hints of regret and anger mixed in as she spoke further.

“Sickens me,” she said after a moment. “I hope they run into pirates or cannibals or something.”

“That’s a bit harsh,” Halbrech chided her.

“What would you do if your House abandoned your people? How would you feel? Hundreds of trillions of people, abandoned, just like that. And for what?”

Halbrecht was taken aback by Anali’s disdain for the de Jardins. All throughout her time as an Einherjar, she always held the family up. It was as though they were the only ones capable of pushing back against the Imperial threat.

But now, she made her revulsion clear.

Godeater’s incursion into their lives revealed the truth of who everyone was. Who they were deep down, and what they stood for.

It was clear that she now saw what the de Jardins were actually like. Or perhaps, she had become extremely jaded due to what Godeater was doing to the galaxy.

Likely, both.

“I’d join the Einherjar,” he replied.

Anali’s expression cooled, somewhat.

“Yeah, well, some of us are alright,” Anali said. “Some of us might be decent people. But most are the same as the others. Cowardly, opportunistic bastards who’d throw their own to the wolves to save themselves.”

“Like Lady Felrahn,” Halbrecht said.

“Exactly. But I was always under the impression that the de Jardins were better than that. In the end, they only turned out to have better masks to hide behind. They turned out to all be Lady Felrahn underneath. Well, most of ‘em, anyway.”

A dark cloud hung over Anali as she thought about her family more and more. She wanted nothing more than to fling her surname to the wind and discard it.

But it was honestly one of the only things that was left of the de Jardins. Or, at least, of what it should be.

Her thoughts were interrupted when a gruff female drogar’s voice pierced through the war room’s chatter.

“What in the ten heavens is going on here, exactly?!” Orsethii exclaimed.

Her footsteps fell heavily as she tromped into the room. She seemed angry, but that was also her default appearance even when she was happy. Maybe it was the same for her.

Halbrecht did his best to read her tail like Colviss tried to teach him, but he had difficulty translating her mood.

“I heard through countless whispers that you two were trying to assault Godeater,” Orsethii continued. “Well guess what, that won’t be happening…”

“You’re not exactly in a position to stop us,” said Anali quickly. “This is a volunteer fleet, and not an official Einherjar objective.”

Nothing Anali said seemed to stop the large drogar. She walked all the way to where they were, and stepped right up to the tacmap itself.

“I know,” she said. “I meant, you won’t be going anywhere without my fleet either. I’m volunteering for this, too.”

Her revelation left the two humans dumbstruck. Never in a million years would they have guessed that Orsethii would volunteer fighting against Godeater. Not because they thought she feared it, but because there was no point in fighting it at all.

“Why?” asked Anali.

“What a feeble human question,” Orsethii replied. “Ask yourself why you’re doing it, and realize that’s the same answer I’d give you. Let me ask you something in exchange – if not us, then who? We all have a need to beat our enemies. No reason to shy from that.”

“Well, welcome to the team, I suppose,” Halbrecht said with a chortle. “Though it doesn’t matter much, does it? We’ve got no idea how to fight Godeater itself. All we’ve figured out is that if we take out the mirrors around it, then it’ll get crippled.”

“Right, exactly,” Anali followed up. “We break the mirrors, and it won’t be able to move any longer. Spare whatever’s left of the galaxy…”

Orsethii rubbed the tip of her chin as she stared at the tacmap. Godeater had countless mirrors floating above its surface. Tens of thousands of them.

Destroying all of them was going to be a serious feat in and of itself.

“And we can’t even get close to hit, am I right?” Orsethii asked.

“Yep,” Halbrecht replied. “In fact, it probably doesn’t matter how far our fleets are, if we can hit those mirrors, then those mirrors could hit back. I mean, if Godeater can literally reach across the galaxy to hit distant planets, then our own distance hardly matters. Our ships would get turned in seconds.”

“If it still has its antigrav field protecting it, then we can’t even use our most devastating weapons at it,” Anali added.

“Hmm, yes. We can’t even throw a moon at it if we wanted, yes? That field would simply capture it,” Orsethii said. “And sure, distance might not matter, but it sounds like cover does…”

The drogar walked around the tacmap as she looked at Godeater from every angle possible. Then she zoomed it out slightly, so it showed numerous systems that surrounded it. Those stars and planets had all been swallowed up, but they were technically still there.

Their gravitational fields were still present, after all.

And as she walked around and around them, numerous ideas for assaulting Godeater filled her mind.

“We’ve got so many things working in our favor,” she mused. “Our target’s completely stationary for one thing. That means we’ve got lots of angles to hit it from. And with whatever we want.

“And I take that back – maybe we do throw a moon at it. Lots of moons. Let them smash and break apart on the antigrav field, literally cover it in dead planets. Maybe then it won’t be able to get out and spread itself.”

Idea after idea poured through her mind. A life of war and conflict and blood sharpened it to a truly sharpened point.

It quickly infected the other two.

“We could use planets as cover,” Anali added.. “Maybe something simple, we come in on the far side, fire, duck back. Maybe even port out and reposition. Basic guerrilla tactics almost always works against a technologically superior enemy…”

“Maybe we allow it to capture multiple heavy warheads, sprinkle its antigrav with bombs,” Halbrecht contributed. “Then detonate ‘em all remotely. Field would stop the shrapnel, but couldn’t stop the blast wave. Big enough bombs could maybe damage those mirrors.”

She looked up from the tacmap and gave both Anali and Halbrect a facial expression neither could understand.

Her tail pointed upwards and wove slowly in circles however, which Halbrecht recognized as amusement. Or maybe it was more like excitement? Both?

“What weapons do you two got?” she asked. “I mean, not the ones we’ve got equipped. More like, stuff that you didn’t want to show the rest so you uninstalled them and hid them somewhere.”

Both shook their heads. They brought everything they had to every fight and never held back even a single bit.

“Us neither,” Orsethii continued with a sigh. “I brought the best weapons the Empire had with me. And it’s just better versions of our old tech. Nothin’ actually new. Nothin’ we could use to hit Godeater with.”

“Well, Raijin gave us access to a whole mess of her designs, some of which are military-centric,” Halbrecht replied. “Let’s dig into that and see what we can find.”