Quoted By:
“MERRYGATE sees it first. Blue green on grey. A tiny imperfection upon the ash-soaked surface of MIZAR-III that could be mistaken for reflective debris or optical distortion.
I know that it is none of these things. I watch the aberration as it grows, meter by meter, kilometer by kilometer, soaking up radiative waste heat from the ambient environment. The surface ripples like an oil-slick rendered in dot-matrices. Tapered tendrils reach upwards, waving like strands of pulled sugar. The orbital elevators linking the Mizarian home world to its former empire begin to disintegrate like burning candlewicks.
The RAIN increases her altitude. As the horizon drops below her bow, I watch the growing mass spread into low orbit, reaching for the remaining patrol forces orbiting around the opposite side of the planet.
And then we hear it. Tachyon spoor and graviton song. Spacetime yields to a dense mass the size of a small comet. Starlight squirms in its wake, stretched into faint smears and glittering swirls.
I attempt to confirm my suspicions with MERRYGATE. She does not respond.
Dread. It clutches my mind like a hard vacuum on bare skin. I pulse the RAIN’s maneuvering thrusters to reverse thrust, counting down the seconds before I could reignite the main drive…
Without warning, the probe’s voice slides into my mind like a cold razor.
+++YOU HAVE SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETED YOUR PRIMARY OBJECTIVE. ALL INHABITED WORLDS IN THIS SYSTEM HAVE BEEN RENDERED UNINHABITABLE+++
+++ARE YOU PREPARED TO PROCEEED+++"
- [UNSIGNED], EXECUTIVE AUDITOR, TRS NOVEMBER RAIN, AD. 2242, DECEMBER 14th, PERSONAL JOURNAL
>QUESTION – GOAL. I will ask the probe to clarify its goals. I suspect that it has lied to me, but I cannot know for sure…
>QUESTION – PROCESS. I will ask the probe how it will proceed. What precisely will happen now…
>QUESTION – HUNTER. I will ask the probe about the hunter-drone. Perhaps it will be more willing to divulge information about it, now that it is gone…
>WRITE-IN.
