Chapter 1: Memories
1
E.T. 9:00 am (earth time) E.D. 01/01/2020 (earth date)
Surprimus Neptunus (a planet on the rim of the Superbun republic)2
Far, far, away in the not too distant future, a team of four aliens lie dying on a distant battlefield surrounded by the dead bodies of identical beings in plate armour made of an unknown alien metal. The leader of the aliens is Gareth Bushell who is 38% Superbun and 62% human.3
As I lay dying in the scorching desert heat, surrounded by the dead bodies of my clone battalion and partners, memories of the day’s fighting flowed through my head.4
E.T. 6:30 am E.D. 01/01/2020
Surprimus Neptunus, Earlier that day.
6:30. I touched down on the desert planet Surprimus Neptunus. To the north I could see the glint of bio-domes where the towering metal structures of one of the republic’s great cities could be seen. I led the clone battalion towards the (supposed) sighting of extra-terrestrials. The march was hot and tiring, even though the micro-coolers in my suit worked over-time to try and keep me cool. I kept one eye on the radar feed on my HUD, and used my Superbun Abilities to ‘sense’ the area up ahead.5
The march lasted for about three hours, until I sensed some kind of strange life form on the edge of his sense, I clicked on the COM (communicator) to my team and said “continue with caution, weapons out.” He then reached out to touch the creatures’ minds, but he found them oddly shielded. “Hey G., what is it?” Asked my second in command, over the private COM.6
“Strange life forms with shielded minds,” I replied.7
“I sense them too,” she replied, and clicked off the COM.8
Then suddenly a group of short green slimy creatures squeezed out of a crack in the rock face to his left, and fell on the left flank of the clones killing one before he had a chance to bring his pulse rifle to bear. Immediately all the other clones turned, switched of the safeties on their weapons and opened fire. I pulled the laser rifle from its sling on my back and let off a volley of laser blasts while at the same reaching through that familiar barrier in my mind to connect to the flow of the Super-energy around me, using it to throw a group of ten of the creatures against the rock face. 9
Then I sent a distress call to Superbun HQ before using the Super-energy to pull the ion blade from my belt and leaping in to battle. I killed thousands with both blades of my light sabre but for every one I killed four more squeezed out of the crack in the rock face. It was clear that we were outnumbered, as I watched the last few clones being killed, one of the creatures fell on me from behind and everything went black.10
Chapter 2: Regeneration11
E.T. 9:05 am E.D. 01/01/2020
Surprimus Neptunus.12
As I lay dying on the battlefield a memory of one from the early days of my training came back to me ‘Superbuns are invincible through means of regeneration, the knowledge to do this only comes to a Superbun in times of great need and fades shortly after it.’ Suddenly just a few seconds after the thought faded from my mind a rush of icy energy surged through me. The last thing I remembered was a burning flash of white light flowing over my body. 13
E.T. 9:00 am E.D. 10/01/2020
Superbun Earth defence command (polar station)
Medical centre (sickbay)
“Ugggghhhhh, where am I” I said when my eyes flickered open. “Master, he is awake” said a medical droid standing over my bed. A medial officer came out of his office and walked over to my bed. “What happened?” I asked “Last thing I remember... “14
“Sir...ummm” said the medical officer.15
“What?” 16
“You’ve changed”17
“What!”18
“Ummm, I think you’ve just experienced the miracle of regeneration”19
“Ok......... now what happened? What do I look like?”20
“Here, look at this mirror”21
“Master, they are awake” said another medical droid.22
I looked over to my left and I saw 4 Superbuns laying beside me whose name cards read ‘Bunny’ ‘Squirt’ ‘Sid’ and ‘Marshal A.’. The nametags only gave the codenames, of my team, due to being the command team for the Superbun military all of our personal information was classified23
Bunny was the only known purebred Superbun. Squirt came from the planet Aquarius 5, the people of the Aquarius system were amphibians, and were protected by bony plates which gave them the nickname ‘space turtles’. Sid, was Ventian – humanoids covered with primitive feathers. Marshal came from the planet Leo Prime, The Inhabitants of Leo Prime are highly advanced feline carnivores, Marshal had long, thick white fur. 24
“What happened?” asked Bunny25
“I don’t know”26
“Well we need to find out, they seemed hostile enough” replied Squirt27
“I agree,” said Sid28
“We should set a science team on it” suggested Marshal29
“Make it so,” I said to our recon droid, (A.K.A. spike)30
E.T. 2:00pm E.D. 15/01/2020
Superbun Earth defence command (polar station)
Science offices
After a Brief health check we were allowed to leave the sick bay and made our way to the science offices. We went into the combat analysis labs. We were standing in front of a large computer screen with a diagram of the unknown alien’s physiology, 31
“I analysed the recordings from your suit recorders” and produced this design, but it isn’t clear on the weaponry/technology from the retrieved footage, pity the clones’ recorders didn’t survive” a technician informed us.32
“I’ll help,” said Bunny33
She walked over to the console beneath the screen and tapped in a few commands which produced a diagram of the small green acid-plasma pistols they used.34
Suddenly the station com blared into life and announced “Gama team” (That’s us) “to the bridge please. I think you’ll want to see this”35
“Sorry, but duty calls” I said to the technician36
“Don’t, worry you’ve already helped us a great deal”37
We got into the nearest Hyper-lift and rode it up to the bridge.38
Chapter 3: Retaliation39
E.T. 2:05pm E.D. 15/01/2020
Superbun Earth defence command (polar station)
Command Bridge40
The bridge was a large, roughly curricular room with windows all around looking out into space and over the earth. The earth defence network is made up of large space stations armed with heavy Ion cannons. All around the room, below the windows were large screens showing the status of the earth defence systems, below the screens were consoles manned by the station’s crew. On the main view screen, directly in front of the raised platform where the hyper-lift was located was an uplink to Superbun HQ’s galactic monitoring system. In the centre of the room was an arrangement of 5 seats with arm-mounted controls, sitting in the centre one was the station commander, it was to him I spoke “you asked for me, station commander?”41
“Yes, look at this, over the last few hours alien sightings similar to the ones you saw have occurred throughout the outer ring of the republic. Armies of these aliens seem to be advancing upon all outer ring settlements. A few minutes ago a recon probe from one of our carrier battle groups spotted a large fleet of alien ships and received this text-only signal before it was destroyed. He pressed some buttons on his seat’s arm-mounted controls and the main view changed to a paragraph of alien text. 42
“Have you set the U Tran (universal translator) computer on it?” I asked43
“Of Corse, I did it as soon as we received the signal”44
A bleep issued from the com module in the arm-mount controls and the station commander pressed a button. The main view switched to a com link to the U Tran computer Labs. A Technician said “we have completed translation of the message you sent to us, it reads, ‘We are the Simetronians; you have entered our territory and have taken it as your own. We can stand this no more, you will surrender to us now or we will destroy your settlements,’ ”45
“The UFO’s have reached range of the Pluto Sensor array,” interrupted a bridge technician.46
“Station commander, we will take over from here”, I said. Bunny, Squirt, Sid, Marshal and I slid into the command chairs, one of which had been hastily vacated by the commander.47
“UFO’s have entered the Martian asteroid belt”, reported a member of the bridge crew.48
“I’ve warned the mining stations”, said Bunny.49
“Energize the shield grid”, I said.50
Behind me, orbiting the earth each of the earth defence sations emitted 4 energy beams, each of which connected to its neighbours’ beam to form a grid, a pulse of energy travelled across the grid, forming an impenetrable energy field over the Earth, completely invisible to human sensors.51
“UFO’s in visual range in 5... 4...3...2....1... Switching view now,” announced a member of the bridge crew.52
The view changed to a huge fleet of ships made up of large green bubbles contained within a network of large metal strips, giving the ships an almost organic look.53
“Launch the defence fleet, we’ll transport over to the Mothership now.” I said.54
Our fleet consisted of ships that were roughly cylindrical in shape, which taper into a blunt point. They are made of gleaming metal with large, glowing yellow engines at the back. All our ships have Ion cannons as the main weapons, and a host of other defensive weapons. Frigates have 1 small Ion cannon facing forward, as the main weapon. Destroyers are similar but they are flattened on top in order to hold a large Tri-Barrelled Ion Cannon. Their front mounted Ion cannon is bigger the frigates’. Carriers are like 2 destroyers with a rounded rectangular connection between them forming a hangar bay. Medium-sized Ion cannons are mounted on the 2 destroyer like segments. Super-carriers are like the normal Carrier but have 3 destroyer like segments, the middle section is slightly larger, and further forward than the other 2. a large Ion cannon is mounted on each segment. Dreadnoughts are like destroyers but much bigger, and with a slightly pointed wing like structures on each side. They have 2 large Ion cannons in each wing and a massive one in the main body. 55
We ran to the hyper lift and took it to the nearest transporter room. 56
The transporter room was square, with a manned control console in the corner opposite the door, and a large raised platform in the middle, glowing with a bright, faintly blue light. Glowing with a brighter, white light were 9 circles, each large enough to contain a person (if extended into a cylinder), positioned in a circle around a bigger, central one, which was mirrored by similar extrusion from the ceiling. 57
We stepped onto the glowing circles on the platform; there was a flash of light and we were standing in a similar room aboard the Superbun Mothership. The Mothership, or the SFS (Superbun fleet ship) Invincible, is like a stretched Dreadnought, with the wings removed and a row of ion cannon turrets down the middle.58
I stepped off the platform, followed by the others, and we made our way up to the bridge. The mothership’s bridge was smaller than that of the Earth defence Station and different in design - it had a circular ramp covering the back of the room with secondary weapon-control consoles and other combat-related controls set in it. There was a large view screen set into the opposite wall. Three command chairs were directly in front of the ramp with fold-out control consoles. In front of those were two permanent control consoles, one for helm (steering)/navigation and one for main weapon controls.59
I sat in the central command chair, Bunny sat to my left, Squirt took the helm/navigation console, Sid took the main weapons console, Marshal strapped on an anti-grav harness (anti-grav harnesses have a dome-shaped anti-gravity generator on the back, which activates if the wearer falls, or is thrown across the room, neutralises their velocity and gently lowers them to the ground), and manned the controls on the ramp. 60
“Red alert! Battle stations!” I said. At that moment, the lights dimmed, a red light flashed in all the corridors and an alarm blared. I pressed the whole ship’s comm on my chair’s controls and said “Crew, this is a red alert, all hands to battle stations, this is not a drill, repeat, this is not a drill”.61
Chapter 4: Battle62
E.T. 2:30 pm E.D. 15/1/2020
Superbun Mothership
Bridge63
“Hail the leading ship”, I said.64
The main screen switched to a view of the interior of the leading ship; in the centre was a taller and darker version of the Simetronians we had encountered on Surprimus Neptunus; it was wearing some form of crown. The background was obscured by a dark green gas.65
I got out of my seat and walked towards the screen.66
I said “Slimetronian Leader, I am Admiral Gareth Bushell, Superbun Leader and Chief Defender of Earth. Please state why your armies have surrounded our settlements and why you have brought a fleet of warships to Earth. If you do not comply we will be forced to open fire.”67
“Did the translators get that?” I asked Bunny.68
“Yep, and hardly any lag on the translation, their language seems to perfectly match ours – it can be represented by 26 symbols, also 10 digits that are arranged to form numbers.”69
The Slimetronian Leader replied “I am the Slimetronian Emperor! You have entered our territory and claimed it as you own…”70
“Yes, and you can stand this no longer, if we don’t surrender you will destroy our settlements, we got that much from your message, now is there anything important you want to say or are you just going to threaten us?”71
“That’s It All Ships ATTACK!” Replied the Slimetronian emperor. 72
At that moment, the leading ships fired their main guns and, hit the leading ships in our formation.73
“3 Destroyers, down, accompanying carrier, critically damaged,” Announced bunny74
“What! What happened to the shields?” I said75
Bunny didn’t have time to reply, as more waves of attacks smashed into our fleets, bring down more destroyers, carriers, and frigates, but that attack didn’t last long as the super-carriers and dreadnoughts opened up with their Ion Cannons destroying 1 in a flash of Blue Energy bolts, The groups of ships that had attacked us were quickly destroyed or driven back when the frigates switched their Ion cannons into Beam mode (which is much more powerful but shorter range than bolt mode). 76
Suddenly a huge explosion rocked the Mothership!77
“Damage report!” I shouted78
“Hull Breach on most of the starboard decks, Containment fields holding… 79
Barely, Breach in the starboard plasma generator!”80
“I never thought I’d have to give this order…” I said to myself81
“All hands, this is your captain, abandon ship! Repeat, abandon ship!”82
Chapter 5: Aftermath83
E.T. 4:00 pm E.D. 15/1/2020
Mothership Escape Pod84
As the escape pod drifted away from the mothership’s wreckage, the Remaining Slimetronian ships came into range of the earth defence stations, at that moment a barrage of huge energy beams destroyed all the Slimetronian ships, but before we could do anything to stop it a small, ship flew out of the wreckage of the Emperors flagship and accelerated to FTL (faster than light) speed. 85
The interior of the escape pod was, cramped, containing 2 reclined pilot/co-pilot seats, and 8 other passenger seats, the interior was made even more crowded by the masses of survival equipment and advanced communion/navigation systems, even though there was only 5 of us in the escape pod.86
Eventually were picked up by a passing frigate and made it back to ‘Earth defence polar station’ for an extremely depressing debriefing.87
E.T 9:00am E.D. 16/1/2020
HQ science offices 88
We were in the HQ science labs, design department, working on the designs for: the new mothership, new battlesuits for Superbuns and new shield technology.89
I was working on the shields, bunny and Squrtle was working on the mother ship designs. And Sid and marshal were working on the battle suits.90
The shields were being upgraded with capacitors that absorbed the energy from attacks hitting the shield and fed that energy back into the shield generator.91
The battle suit designs were practically like battlemechs; they came with, shield generators, strength enhancing servos, and lots more.92
Finally the Mothership design was like a giant city, complete with ship production faculties, colonising equipment, and a new prototype superwepon, the TFB (Time Flux Beam) which creates a time flux in a small area in front of the ship.93
Suddenly, a voice said over the tannoy. “Attention! Gamma team urgent message, from outpost station 374, report to the sensors suit”94
E.T 10:00am E.D. 16/1/2020
HQ sensors suit95
We were in the sensors suit, which was a quite small room dominated by a large hologram emitter, surrounded by control panels. Displayed on the holographic screen was a external view of outpost station 374, we a technician was standing at the controls, he said,96
“thank you for coming so quickly, this was picked up by outpost station 374,”97
The technician pressed a button on the controls, and a recording played on the screen. The recording showed a wing of Slimetronian fighters escorting a dome-shaped ship, which then landed, and drilled multiple tendrils into the ground. The recording then dissolved into static.98
“the outpost station then lost all scanner signal in a 10 kilometer radius from the landing site.” Said the technician99
“Open communication to the station” I said100
“Outpost station 374 reporting in sir, how may we help you?”101
“Try running a low-level modulating photon scan, it might be able to get through the blocking field and help you avoid detections”102
“Ok, running scan... what the? It seems that they have a whole army down there, and full production facilities, wait a minute, what’s that? INCOMING MISSILES! Abandon ship! Abandon ship! ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!”103
Chapter 6: Launch 104
Superbun Mothership 2
E.T. 11:00 am E.D. 20/1/2020105
“This is shipyard control, standing by for Mothership launch”106
“Roger that, standby for docking clamp release” I replied107
“Activate fusion/fission reactor” I said (a fusion/fission reactor works, by splitting a atom and then fusing it back together, therefore creating large amounts of energy, and reducing consumption of the fuel cells”108
“Activate Computer Core”109
“Powering up computer core..”110
“Shipboard Artificial life Engine online. Computer core running at maximum efficiency” said sally – who is the mothership’s AI (her actual name is S.A.L. E. which stands for Shipboard Artificial life Engine) 111
“Reactor online, power systems at 100 percent, reactor output within operational levels. Decoupling shipyard power feed. We are running on own power.” Replied bunny.112
“Activate Ion Engines” I said113
“starting up engines, engaging particle flow, activating ionising grids, focusing matrix online. Engines at 100 percent.”114
“Shipyard control, Release Docking clamps” I said.115
A large clang echoed through the ship as the docking ports disconnected.116
“Squirt, Take us out.”117
“ok, engines to 10%” Said Squirt 118
A faint rumble could be heard as the engines engaged.119
“We are moving under own power, engine systems are operating at 100% capacity, Reactor emissions within normal levels, we are away.” Said Sally
Chapter 7: War
Wreckage of Outpost station 374
Orbiting tesrof
ET: 1:00 PM ED: 21/1/2020120
“oh lord...” muttered bunny as we saw the wreckage of oupost staion 374. the missiles had passed strait through the shields and ripped the hull plating to pieces, scraps of metal floated around, nothing was left intact, some of the sections still had residual power and lights could be seen flickering and sparks flew from the severed connections, but the worst thing was the frozen corpses that were floating amongst the wreckage. “Marshal, run a scan for slimetronian ships” I said121
“at once, sir” he replied122
there was a brief pause as he examined the results of the scan.123
“Strange...” he said “there is no sign of any spaceship support”124
“Try the modulating photon scan again, it defeated their cloaking devices before” I said125
“Scanning…”said sally126
“No response” Said marshal127
“Oh well, Launch the MCB” I said. An MCB is a Mobile Command Base, it is basically a freighter that contains a command base for ground control . the ship is wedge shaped at the front and the middle section is a cuboid, with two large engines at the back, the ship is extremely well shielded, the armour is extra think and specially treated to make it resistant to the heat that is generated in re-entry.128
“This is MCB 001” preparing for re-entry129
“Hitting atmosphere in 5…4…3…”130
“2…1….”131
“0…contact!”132
ET: 1:10 PM ED: 21/1/2020
Tesrof Surface
Alpha Team133
"Alpha Team, Radio Check" Gareth's voice spoke over the coms134
"Alpha Lead, Reporting in" I said135
"Alpha one, Reading you loud and clear" Said another voice136
"This is Alpha two, Reporting in" said a second voice137
"Alpha three, operating at 100%"138
"This is Alpha four, everything's looking good down here"139
Gareth's voice spoke again "Alpha team, you're the advanced party" he paused and a 3-d map of the planet was projected onto our HUDs "The landing zone is here" a marker appeared on the map "you are to make your way across this bridge and secure the secondary landing zone here" a second marker appeared on the map, the map shrank to a small display in the bottom right corner of the HUD.140
"Get ready back there, we're approaching the drop zone" The pilot's voice came from the cockpit. I reached over and pressed a button on the wall. The rear door of the dropship slowly decended, the wind rushed in. I walked forwards to the very edge of the door, the rest of my team followed. I quickly glanced at the map on my hud and jumped out. For a few seconds I allowed myself to freefall, before I spread my arms and legs to slow my decent. I plunged into the flow of the super-energy around me, I watched the altitude indicator on my HUD, at 100 meters from the ground, I released the energy. I jerked to a stop, suspended above the ground with bright red light swirling around me. I pulled the pulse rifle from my back, It was a sleek rifle made from gleaming silver metal, there was a verticle foregrip, and a small scope on top. I examined the ground beneath me for a second, before releasing my power and dropping to the ground.
I rolled with the impact, landed on one knee and readied my rifle. There was a series of thumps behind me as the rest of my team landed. I quickly scanned the horrision, A few small hills and trees, but mostly long green grass as far as I could see. I glanced back at my team, our jet black battlesuits stood out clearly, and the sun glinted of the mirrored visiors of our helmets. I activated the coms syestem "Landing zone clear." The dropship circled around overhead and dropped our hover-jeep. The Hover-Jeep could of almost been a normal car, apart from the fact that it had no wheels, and it was floating about 30cm off the ground, and of course, the large repeating laser turret on the roof. At the bottom of both windscreens the body dropped down vertically, allowing the jeeps to be packed closer during transport, there was seating inside for a full 5-man squad and ample storage space, the roof-mounted gun was operated from the safety of the passenger seat.. I opened the Gull-wing door on the driver's side and slid into the Driver's seat, It fitted me perfectly, even in my bulky combat suit. The rest of my team clambered into the Jeep.141
I put my foot to the floor and the jeep sped off, skimming across the undulating hills of the planet. The Gleaming silver body reflecting the twin suns.142
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