Captain Clovia left her trading ship by taking over. She was already mentally ready for a brief weightless pair takeover, typical of the Phale space station. Orion Arms Trading owns all of the Faelle space stations and still operates from Lifte

Company S purchased new countermeasure engines. It is too expensive to add gravity in the pair of pipes.

But this station belongs to the Andrea regime. Instead of being weightless, Clovia received a slight increase in gravity to match Andrea's home planet. The transitions are seamless and flawless, showcasing a casual mastery of gravity that extends far beyond Faelle.

As soon as she entered the station, she was greeted by an automatic transporter, which quickly passed through the station in absolute silence. It placed her in a conference room where three Andreas were waiting for her at the table. There wasn't a seat on Clovia's side at the table, and she didn't expect it to be. The Andrea regime abhors casual gossip and flowery language. Meetings should be as short and concise as possible. Excessive language is considered a way to hide lies.

"Captain Clovia, you asked us to meet. What does the Orion Arms Trading Company want?"

"We are calling on all parties to support us in calling in the invasion force," he said. I'm here to request the use of saboteurs. ”

The Andrea looked at each other, their indistinct serpentine features and thick bodies revealing body language of surprise. Clovia recognizes this from her massive trades at the Andlem space. Andrea, on the far left, taps her paw on the metal tabletop, thoughtfully.

"We don't owe Faele or your company any favors." Andrea said. "Why are we allowing this to happen?"

"I'm here with carte blanche of the Root Band. You make a price, and we'll give it to you. ”

On the far left, the Anders tapped their paws again, followed by a few minutes of deliberation. He cited a number that could bankrupt some of the global economy. Captain Clovia's face turned pale, and her brown skin darkened with a pale green.

"We're going to pay the price." Clovia said.

"Interesting." Andrea, on the far left, said again. "Once the saboteurs return safely, we will return half. This system must be crucial for the company. ”

"That's everything." Clovia said eagerly.

I met the enemy's fleet a week from my outpost. They had more than 1,500 warships advancing in a stationary formation. Each of these battleships is at least as big as my own Viper battleship and many times larger than my small attack drones. In fact, this is equivalent to sending a small fighter against a warship.

The fleet is designed in a variety of designs, from heavy armored ships that break through my Mobius Gate blockade to light, delicate-looking ships huddled behind rows of larger ships. There are more than a dozen crescent-shaped ships occupying the left wing, while the top and right wings are mostly ships similar to those that have visited Earth. However, instead of having many branches like trees, these craft have some large, bulky branches with huge pods covered with weapons.

In fact, this is a miscellaneous combination, since more than half of the ships are specific to the fleet. This is all the hallmarks of a mercenary army, come together against us and completely wipe out any opposition to the Orion Arms Trading Company. Some have obvious clusters of lasers, some have barrels indicating some kind of speeding weapon, and some even have missile-sized ports, which I find very inefficient.

However, on my side, I let my attack drones move in endless loops and changing patterns. My drone is a complex design, with a variety of weapon loads and armor arrays, as well as a sizable point defense. In the first engagement, I did not deploy a single full-size battleship, but in addition to their absence, I had 83212 assault drones flying towards the fleet. I'm ready.

"Well, well, I'm General Brooks, and I'd like to contact Nikolai from the Origin. Is this thing on?" The last part was barely audible, as if the general was talking to the rest of the room.

"Yes, General?" I asked, focusing only a small part of my attention on his conversation. I'm in total war mode, with hundreds of threads on every front. I'm monitoring enemy fleets and Möbius' Gate with the help of the "Select" network of cube satellites, I'm tracking enemy ships that have detached from the main fleet and sailing to Earth, I'm watching Gerry accelerate into the slingshot maneuver around Venus. The focus is on the three ships I sent as long-range reinforcements in case they arrive in time to help fight the mysterious enemy. All other factors considered, the needs and desires of a small group of survivors are not very high on my priority list.

"Ah, Nikolai, yes. The parts you provided worked, and our heating system was back to normal," he said, almost reluctantly. It sounded like saying thank you, but he didn't say it and didn't want to say it.

I couldn't understand the trajectory of Gerry's life. Based on the speed at which he entered the Venusian slingshot, his flight trajectory was completely deviant from Earth. As I pondered, he disappeared behind the planet. I think I understand the trajectory of his actions, I just don't understand his purpose.

"I'm glad to hear you say that, General. What can I do for you?" I asked.

The enemy's fleet began to fire at my unmanned attack aircraft, and I reciprocated with them. I frowned at myself because the enemy artillery fire was fierce. The first salvo destroyed or seriously damaged 4.319% of our fleet. The enemy's fleet lost only 3.995%. In a war of attrition, I will lose.

I looked more closely at the formation of the enemy. They sailed in a rough cube, with the heaviest ships outside. I could see many of the fins dragged behind the boat, and on damaged boats, these heatsinks turned red as they dissipated as quickly as they could. I used to think that this formation was static and attributed it to the fact that it seemed to be a mixed force without a lot of combat training.

However, a closer analysis revealed that individual ships randomly changed course and stayed within about 100 meters of the point of movement in the formation. Taking into account the flight time, this would reduce my long-range firepower by 87.23%. My laser could not stay on the target long enough to inflict significant damage, and many hypervelocity bullets were missing or grazed off the armor instead of the estimated weakness. In fact, the standard firepower used by the lighter, faster Wasps disappeared completely for most of the time, and the gravity shield used deflected the fire of the hit to the point of bouncing off the edge of the ship's armor on impact. Moreover, they have much more effective point defensive fire than my drone. This is not to say that my drones cannot hit incoming fire, it's just that some drones are overloaded, while others are not targeted at all.

"Yes, well, in light of that, we have discussed your proposal," General Brooks said. "We've agreed that you can be there for us."

If I instructed my team leader, the NI-15, to create point defense groups in their squad and coordinate defensive fire, I could significantly reduce my loss rate. The other 5.114% of the losses were accumulated while I analyzed and devised a counterattack algorithm for the NI-15 squad leaders. I rushed it out as fast as I could. It's sloppy and there may be a lot of mistakes, but it helps. I'm focusing on improving the algorithm. Then the words of General Brooks hit me. Did he persuade them?

"At your service?" I asked, with suspicion in my voice.

"Uh, yes. If you can coordinate with my assistants, we can take stock of the Origin's assets and hand over operational control in an orderly manner, so we can start to get everything back to what it should be on Earth. "We can start rebuilding the United States of America and show those Chinese that we don't need them."

Somewhere behind my hundreds of attention lines, a security scan is over. The folder that Gerry had alerted me to was clean and safe. No programs, no worms or viruses. It contains only text and pictures.

I opened the file.

"General, please wait." I said, and ended the connection.

I walked into the house, but it was too quiet inside. The kids should be running around and my wife should be talking to them. The TV was supposed to be playing a daytime soap opera, and she swore it was only on to create background noise while she was telecommuting.

"Honey?" My name is. I heard a sound from behind the house and walked that way. I walked in and found my mom with a gun. My wife was crouching in the corner, keeping the two girls behind her back, and the scratches on her head were bleeding.

"You! Mom shouted. For the first time in my life, I saw my mother's hair unkempt and her face without makeup. Her clothes looked crumpled. "The church has found out that you and you are abnormal...... Abnormal life and threatened to fire him because he was hiding it!" It's your fault that he left me!"

"Mom, put the gun down," I said, slowly approaching. "I know you're sad, but that's not the way to handle anything. We have nothing to do with your marriage or your church. ”

"Let me get the kids out," my wife said. "They are innocent."

The gun shook a little. "They are innocent. I guess I'll have to raise them so they don't become aliens too. ”

I heard the front door open and my ex-husband's voice rang out of nowhere. "Are the girls ready?" I double-parked my car and didn't want to be ticketed. ”

My mother's gun slammed into the doorway, and I took the opportunity to pounce on her. The last thing I remember was the gunshots and my wife screaming.

Experiment. The folder is filled with details of thousands of genetic experiments. Genetic modification, experimental surgery, drug trials. All experiments were conducted on living people, and almost none of them were voluntary. In a matter of nanoseconds, I read and watched the entire folder of contents, reading and watching the systematic, cold-blooded, and ruthless experiments that humans have conducted on humans for nearly three hundred years.

There are videos showing homeless people tied to their beds and turned into lizard-like monsters a few weeks later. Most of them died and were vivisected in the same room, the other victims were still hanging from a rope, and none of them received even basic painkillers. Those who survived experienced a short and painful life before being executed and dissected in the name of progress.

Other videos show rooms filled with children with animal features, with white-clad and masked researchers walking from room to room, observing but not interacting. Many children are so sick that their DNA kills newborns even when they are sent directly to the nursery from an artificial in the genetic lab.

I watched a video of a dictator yelling at a group of scientists while children trying to clone and raise super soldiers sat in an observation room. These children have the size of adults, but have toddler minds, confusion and fear. One of them was psychologically closed, and she just held her knees and rocked back and forth.

The folder holds videos and documents collected over hundreds of years from dozens of countries, documenting systematic abuses that began and ended in different places under different regimes. Not alone. This is not a government. It's something that humanity repeats over and over again, decade after decade, century after century. The only unifying factor is a relentless pursuit of one thing – to be a better soldier.

The third iteration of my point defense algorithm stabilized my losses, and the enemy fleet knew this. They started to speed up to my formation, but it was just good news for me. I already know what I need to know about how the fleet fought, as well as NI-5 and NI-15. The enemy was cautious and calculating, which was the hallmark of a good general commanding the operation. They didn't leave anything to take advantage of, they didn't have any surprise tactics that would allow me to counterattack. They must have thought that it would be beneficial for them to engage in a battle similar to a knife fight in outer space. I want to prove them wrong.

The enemy's point defense has also been improved, understanding our fire patterns. But my pilots are all Nikolai Intelligence (Nikola I

tellige

CES), an adaptable, sentient computer that doesn't fall into bad habits and doesn't accidentally repeat mistakes after discovering them. They learn and change in battle, so the drones that are attacked now are very different from the ones that were attacked 30 seconds ago. The range of knife combat is ideal, the firepower comes quickly, and the quick decisions of the NI can shine in the enemy's fleet. I gave the order, and our formations, while accelerating towards the enemy formations, formed an almost impenetrable wall of point defenses. If we can break through the protective outer ring of a heavily armored ship, we will be able to target the cooling radiator and the weaker ship. We can crush the fleet from within.

These videos aren't the worst part of the folder. In fact, that's far from the worst part. The folder contains a detailed record of each experiment. It is a cross-reference indicator, a detailed report of experimental failure, which can be used as a reference. Here's a detailed roadmap not only about how, but when these experiments can be conducted again, and how best to create blindly loyal super-soldiers in the future. This folder is not placed here for archival purposes. It was placed here as part of future plans.

There's a subfolder that's prominent. Inside are the documents of the Nikolai Foundation, as well as their own embryonic laboratory experiments. They succeeded in modifying the baseline of human genes to eliminate abnormalities and genetic diseases. On the surface, this is the highlight of a bunch of bad guys. But digging deeper led to shady deals with the USNA government, where they experimented with using the data collected in this folder to create a viable, super-soldier subrace. The Foundation happily accomplished this work, and in return, the USNA turned a blind eye when it standardized its own embryos for Caucasian use only.

I consulted the genetics file I had. 50% of the stored frozen genetic material is a direct result of these experiments. The other 50% are labeled as "emergency genetic reserves, for subspecies modification only". This is where the DNA of the donors of the foundation is placed. It houses the DNA of the soldiers who made it possible for me to reach Gannymede, and their families.

The Nikolai Foundation was built on lies, deception and bigotry. Everything I have worked for, the future I have planned, is for humanity that has no place in the world I want to build.

Why should I do this? If the most evil side of humanity has succeeded because of me, then what am I fighting for? I spent 12 years building and planning, working tirelessly. What have I achieved? A city-sized war machine production facility representing a species that has fought aliens and will slaughter its own species in the most horrific way.

The alien fleet is right on my doorstep. I could simply pack it up and send myself and all my NI friends to Sakura's seed ship. I have a dozen warships that can act as frigates, and dozens of large transport ships that can easily carry hundreds of tons of supplies. My assault drone can cover me when I retreat. We can have my ship assemble outside of the Oort Cloud, set up a makeshift facility to build a larger aircraft carrier, and sail into the unknown. I certainly don't need this galaxy, and neither does NI. There are billions of stars in this galaxy alone, and I have infinite time.

"Nikolai, what's wrong?" "We hope to complete this transfer as soon as possible," General Brooks said. General Brooks is a former colonel and author of the USNA Integrated Super Soldier Information Report, author of the budget and implementation timeline, designer of the education and training program, and advocated for black money funding for the program within the Pentagon. His hard work was rewarded by promotions and commanders of the Panamanian refuge, and the results of his life's work were included in the archives of the Nicolas Foundation.

"Mr. Brooks, you have a serious misunderstanding. I offered to help humanity, not serve them. In fact, I just found your filthy crime file, and I don't want to help you at all. ”

"What? !How dare you! He said angrily. "I have dedicated my life to serving and protecting the American people!" You're not even human! You shouldn't operate without strict constraints! I command you to hand over your business to us at once!"

My formation of unmanned attack aircraft is approaching the incoming fleet, and the distance between them is only a few thousand kilometers. In deep space combat, this is close range. My drone swung up and down and spun wildly, jerking and pulling in a high-altitude maneuver that could kill a human pilot in a matter of minutes. NI-5 and NI-15 burned their afterburners without scruples, consuming fuel at a ridiculous rate.

"General, I am fighting an alien fleet of more than a thousand enemy ships. I'm too busy right now to pay attention to your nonsense. I replied coldly, suppressing my anger. I don't have time to get angry with him.

"But, you need to-"

I interrupted him. "Let me be clear. Go away, I'm busy. ”

I turned off the channel and asked Sakura to keep an eye on the link, but she ignored it while I focused my full attention on the fight.

In the end, the formation of the enemy changed. The heavy ships in front moved to the side, and their fire was doubled on the point defense, so much so that I think they did not fire in the direction of my fleet. Those exquisite-looking ships in the center of the formation were given a clear view. Just as they entered the line of fire, the heavy ships began to retreat, closing their open windows. Within seconds of their exposure, 216 enemy ships in the center of the formation opened fire with a weapon that I had never seen before. It had a strange energy signature, formed a wide cone when launched, and barely flew over their own fleet.

Every hypervelocity bullet fired by my fleet into that gap exploded into a nuclear fireball, producing far more energy than they should. The cone swelled until it hit my fleet. One after another, my drone evaporated, and the way it exploded was impossible in space. No one can escape, no one can avoid a deadly explosion. Only a few hundred UAVs avoided these cones within range. The enemy's fleet attacked them fiercely. When they completed their mission, the remaining ships turned to the original point again. I destroyed a little more than a third of the enemy ships, leaving more than a thousand battleships coming towards me.

In a few minutes, my fleet was completely gone. I lost the battle.