The Warlord Domination, Sovereign Race

Chapter 2: The World of the Weapon.

A BIG THANKS TO FROST ALEXIS AGAIN FOR THE COVER!

Planet: Otonoliss (pronounced: Aw-taan-oe-liss)

Space, white stars, vast emptiness. It all makes for quite the view to the good looking 29-year-old human man staring at it right now.
    Its deadly elements such as airlessness, weightlessness, or extreme cold- which is at a temperature of almost -270 degrees Celsius!- aren't a concern to him right now, being shielded by a near impervious grey and orange space suit, manufactured by the best craftsmen of this world to meet its high standards.
    This brown-haired spaceman is floating just above a kilometre-long plate of metal doing last-minute repairs to its exterior circuit panels. He himself is not actually a technician, but, because of the rushed state of the project, is lending a helping hand to assist in whatever is needed.
    His name is Riss Len-Quéd- an honorable name on this world: Otonoliss; one with a rich family history. Normally his role is quite different, being captain of the famous warship Chariot, protecting the world’s borders from alien fleets, and ensuring that the planet's own citizens stay in line.
    Peace has not been exactly an easy achievement over the course of Otonoliss’s three thousand year history- a relatively short time when compared to many of the universe's other worlds- especially lately, in the last seven or so years...
    First there was an interplanetary problem near the Horizon Fall nature [Nature means Planet to humans of these days.], involving a stranded civilian frigate trapped inside enemy borders. The tension very nearly erupted into a full-scale war between the dreaded forces of the mighty Censure Rite [The collective armies of a fearsome, alien-warrior band known as the Incite.], and the regretfully sparse human fleets.
    Then there was the more recent chaos involving a hero of humanity's ancient days. Raig Metrolan was his name, and the Incite's hatred of him, dating back perhaps 4 hundred thousand years (Yeah! That long!), caused chaos to erupt all across the known universe; pitting even those who should have been closest allies against each other in a fight to the death!
    The alien Incite band ended up with their wish- Raig Metrolan was killed, and “peace” returned between the races of the Incite and Humanity. But the “peace” after these hostilities between the two races is, in all but the minds of the deluded, a laughingly false one. All-out-war, resulting in quite probably the deaths of Millions, is perhaps only a matter of mere months away.
    The only question now is: who will prepare themselves better? Who has prepared themselves better?
    Riss tries to put these thoughts aside as he continues focusing on his work- primarily, pushing a troublesome circuit conduit back into place. 'Dang, it's a bugger!' he thinks, momentarily frustrated.
    Click! 'Finally!' It snaps back in. He grins behind his blue-tinted helmet visor. "Okay, Ja-ça”, he calls to one of the other spacemen across the upper hull. "Looks like I'm done on this end! First to finish as always!"
    Ja-ça slides his panel back into place as well. He then pulls out a bolt gun and drives two rivets into place on the panel's top and bottom. His young face, with a well-cropped brown beard, looks over at Riss. "Looks like I'm the only one to remember all the details!" he smirks, then adds, "As always!"
    Riss drives his two bolts into place with a disgruntled expression on his face. "Yeah, well…too bad rivet guns couldn't win you first place at the Academy, huh!?" He smirks, biting his upper lip to stop himself from exploding into a laugh.
    Ja-ça floats over and punches him in the stomach with the rivet gun, pretending to shoot him.
    "Uaaaah!" Riss plays dead, allowing himself to float to the far side of the hull. Finally, coming back to 'life', he grabs a guardrail near the plate's end.
   He looks over… "Wow…"
    "What now?" an annoyed looking Ja-ça asks, floating up beside him, holstering the rivet gun.
    Green and silver light reflects off of Riss's visor as he stares down below. "Funny, I gotta say…" he says deeply. "This is one view that never gets old…"
    There it sits, at least thirty kilometres below them, The Beauty of the Outermost: Otonoliss! A heavily forested greenhouse world composed entirely of great steel plates, which are covered primarily with the finest green trees, dotting the surrounding grasslands with their vibrant beauty. So do the hills- covered in grass, bush and flowers- reaching out to the clouds above. A grandeur unparalleled by any other nature [Remember, Nature means Planet.] known to man.
    The nature's clear silver waters, powered by great pumping machines, gush forth across its surface, throughout valleys and farmlands- even flowing in great waterfalls over the edges of the thousands of metal plates holding up the green surface of Otonoliss.
    Concerning those plates, one must needs be understand that each and every one of them [There are tens of thousands.] stand on different elevations. The afore-mentioned waters run on and off them, pooling ever downwards to the plates beneath. Traveling across their vast surface, the streams eventually fall once again to another land-plate below. This continues in an endless cycle to reach the bottom, and in order to prevent that from ever happening, the land-plates are in constant motion from top to bottom, every single one taking its turn at the appropriate time, creating a spectacle of an effect; which, from a great distance, looks like the inside of an organ when its keys are played from lowest notes to highest.
    All the waters end up flowing through the central equator, where lies the capital city of Inquina (a place Riss frequents during his off time), a virtual hive of gambling, partying and every other enjoyment the nature has to offer.
    But all these land workings of Otonoliss are little in comparison to its magnificent sky! (REALLY!!) For the entire plated giant is surrounded from pole to pole by an Enormous network of metal framed glass hexagons! Thousands upon thousands of glass hexagons; their inner borders reflecting every color of the rainbow back into space, and delivering the most beautiful color patterns down to the nearly 14 billion citizens below! Almost 50,000 pillars hold this giant ceiling in the air; and it, in turn, provides oxygen, atmosphere, seasons, and even night and day, all across the globe.
    Life here has become very normal under these seemingly unthinkable conditions. Business and trade flourishes just like in many healthy societies; jobs are all centered around the building and upkeeping of this populous world; travel is frequent, just like in our own world, as Otonoliss is famous for the beauty and craftsmanship of its renowned fleet of both military and civilian vessels.
    And last of all it must be said that on this world, more than any other of humanity’s 11 natures, a sort of sense of security has become prevalent amongst almost all of the nature's citizens, even in spite of their precarious situation (meaning the very likely threat of an Incite attack).
    Almost all.
    Riss Len-Quéd watches the nature with peering eyes, as if actually intrigued by something on its surface.
    Ja-ça decides to just give him his time. He knows Riss too well to interrupt him when he's having a quiet moment.
    All this bugs Riss. The entire world bugs him! He may only be one small captain out of a fleet of captains as numerous as apples in an orchard, but he's no fool. He knows only too well Otonoliss's real reason for being- why it was crafted around the bulk of a sunless asteroid at its inception; and why all of humanity has dumped wealths upon wealths of resources into its 3-millennia-long creation…
    Otonoliss is a weapon. By far the most enormous, expensive, time-consuming weapon ever created by either humanity, or any one of the dozen other known species in the universe. Designed and built for the destruction of all humanity's enemies- but mainly the Censure Rite and their Incite rulers.
    And it is lethal. Very, very lethal! People- experts in fact- say that it will be able to reach to the farthest reaches of even the ends of the universe in less than the blink of an eye!…and touch them with its terrifying, deadly light!
    But too few speak of how destructive that touch will be…and how many may have to die to find out.
    Now reality is about to set in (well…with any luck). The nature is at last finally finished construction. Riss himself is helping to complete the last few operations. Admittedly, despite his skepticism, he's quite excited- just like about every single other resident across Otonoliss. And who can really blame him anyway?
    3000 years of building! (When was the last time You spent 3000 years building anything!?) There is no man from the beginning of this journey who has survived to see its now imminent completion- save for perhaps some abominable Ancient from Faoe! (More on that later.) The old residents have passed its construction down from generation to generation, through good times and bad, through good men and bad, all to one day reach this point- this epic moment in time where Humanity may finally gain the opportunity to choose its Own course; with all other powers of the universe only able to watch, helpless to interfere.
    *Click!* Riss flips open his hand comm-node. "Len-Quéd here! Commander Lu-Den and I are done working up on the roof. Waiting on you guys now; over…"
    A moment passes. *Click!* A cocky voice comes back, *"Uh I'm afraid that is a negative, captain… Yeah you see, intel has my team's finishing time listed at 0'700 hours and yours at 0'702… So…I'm always sorry to correct you- as you of course know… Um, I don't know how you could have gotten your information so wrong…"*
    "Oh, Plug it up, Roice!" Riss shoots back, smiling to himself. "You'd better start sprinting back to base pal, ‘cause if I get back to that docking hatch first, I'm locking you out!"
    Laughter comes back over the radio *"Ahahaha! Well, there again, you see, we're kind of in outer space here… That makes it just a little bit hard to sprint…if you know what I mean?"*
    "Then you had better get an early start, don't you think?" Riss can almost see the chuckling expression on his friend's face.
    *"Roger that, Cappy! Commander Son-kye out!"* The link shuts off.
    Ja-ça floats back over to Riss. "Are we heading back already?" he says in his usual teasing voice. "I was just starting to have fun!"
    Riss straps on his equipment belt and picks up the remainder of his tools. "Right… Let's get inside. We wouldn't want to miss the grand opening ceremo-"
    *"RED ALERT, RED ALERT!!"* a nervous voice suddenly booms over the intercom! *"UNKNOWN SHIPS ON COURSE FOR THE ASZEN LENS!!"*
    Riss glances at his startled comrade. Ja-ça glances back. The two then bolt as fast as they can for the docking hatch, pulling hard on the zip-lines to gain more speed- not an easy thing to do in zero gravity, wearing a cumbersome space suit! It's almost a half-kilometre away though!
    Ja-ça punches his comlink. "What's going on, control?” he yells, “Who's on course!?"
    The voice blurts back, *"I D- I DON'T KNOW! GET INSIDE NOW!! THEY'RE ALMOST RIGHT ON TOP OF YOU!!"*
    "Where- WHERE!? How close!?" Ja-ça screams back.
    "Danger close!" Riss answers, pointing directly behind them, along their cord.
    Then, all across the star-filled blackness of space above Otonoliss, tiny burgundy lights begin popping into view- thousands and thousands of them! From each one emerges a small space vessel, dagger shaped, with their wingspan covered in light but Lethal weaponry!
    The portals from which they emerge dim out as they exit, splashing red energies across the vessels as they streak towards the nature below! (Not something Riss thought he'd see when he woke up this morning!)
    He tucks his head down and pulls himself in with renewed energy! He and Ja-ça are still at least two hundred yards away, scrambling towards the entry point to the outer station along with dozens of other workers and construction machines. He barely even hears the voice in his ear...
    *"GET INSIDE! GET INSIDE!! YOU'RE SITTING DUCKS OUT THERE!!!"*
    Too late!
    Something silver and orange whizzes past his head, darts forward, and then slams into a hull-plate just meters ahead!!
    BOOOOOM!!! The explosion seems to blast a hole in space itself! The ensuing shockwave slams into the group of men, scattering them in every direction, and knocking giant pieces of metal free from their moorings right into their faces!
    The sound of muffled screaming is loud in Riss’s ears as he fumbles to keep his grip on the cable! He grabs it tightly in his closer hand. "What the Blazes was-!?"
    Ja-ça interrupts, "RISS LOOK OUT!!"
    Riss turns around just in time to yank himself out of the way of another streaking fighter! This one follows the ruin of the first!-
    Ka-Boom!! The explosion's blast wave hits them all hard again! Cables are torn apart, sending more men flying! The station itself ripples like water, viewports shatter, and explosions erupt from every surrounding air vent! Even some poor technicians inside the station are ejected to their deaths!
    "EVERYONE HOLD ON!!" Riss shouts to the company as they are all tossed about like branches in the wind. More and more streaks zip past them, some hitting metal, others streaking deeper into the station, dodging the explosions of their comrade's vessels.
    "Riss, they're hitting the hull with their own ships!" Ja-ça cries out. "Riss, they're hitting the wall with their own ships!!"
    "Yeah! I can see that!"
    "What, are they suicidals!?"
    Riss keeps pulling himself in. "That, or just desperate!"
    "Nobody's that desperate!" Ja-ça shouts back, digging deep to keep up.
    "These guys are!" Another shockwave slams into them; this time throwing Ja-ça right off the cable and smashing him back-first into the outer hull!
    "AAAAAAHAAAOW!!!" he screams. "Blast it all!!"
    "Hang on buddy, I'm coming”, Riss mutters to himself. He then plants both feet on the cable and vaults forward, reaching out his hand toward his friend as he nears him.
    Ja-ça swats it away. "I'm alright!" he says though a pain-racked face.
    Riss quickly examines his suit and spots blood coming from the back. He grimaces and grabs his friend around the shoulders. "No, you're not. Now just hang on to me! We've got to keep going!" He grabs on to another cable.
    Ja-ça can only respond with a face of searing pain.
    Another explosion rocks the station behind them, then another, then two more! The entire view is lit up with seemingly Thousands of falling bolts of light- the majority of them speeding to a deadly landing, punching enormous holes in everything they smash into!
    But not all of them surge from their wormholes to their deaths. Some- no, many- slow their descent just enough to veer away from a collision. And as they do, their true forms can now be seen…
    Riss and Ja-ça both instantly recognize their design origin.
    Ja-ça blinks, puzzled. "Vex?" Then his face darkens. "Blasted, Vex Quick-strike Fighters! If that isn't an open declaration of war by the Censure Rite I don't know what is!"
    Riss looks closely at them as they spread out in apparently random directions- guns blazing at everything in sight. "Ok, so…if their fighters are digging in, where are all their big ships?"
    Ja-ça blinks again. "Yeah... It’s not like the Censure Rite to waste their one chance for a surprise attack with a bunch of fighter jets! ...It doesn't make any sense…"
    The PA system then booms out, *"ALL DEFENCE SHIPS SCRAMBLE!! KEEP THEM AWAY FROM THE ASZEN LENZ!!"* Riss thinks he can almost hear a hint of panic in the man's voice.
    "Hey, I hope you noticed we're still in the thick of it, Dopey!" Ja-ça screams, as another fighter whizzes past!
    Riss snaps himself back to alert immediately and starts dragging he and Ja-ça back down the cable again, while what looks like the end of the universe encircles the two survivors.
    *"Riss, latch on!"* Roice Son-kye calls from over the comm. He's about a hundred meters ahead, wielding a grapple gun. He points it at them…
    Foom! The grapple claw darn-nearly hits Riss in the middle of his visor! Still, he manages to grab onto its attached line and quickly ties Ja-ça to it.
    "Don't be stupid, Riss! Nobody's going to care if I die! Reel yourself in first, then-"
    "Pull!!" Riss shouts to Roice.
    "Whaa-!?" that's about all Ja-ça gets out before he shoots ahead wildly fast! flailing pointlessly against the force of the winch. After nearly colliding with a launching defense cruiser, he finally plows into Roice, who grabs him without further ado and throws him into an open airlock.
    *"Riss, you son of a-!"* Ja-ça  shouts before the airlock seals.
    *"Ok, your turn, Cap!"* Roice calls, as he aims again and fires.
    But as he does, something bright and burning hot flashes right in front of Riss's eyes! The orange light blinds him into a state of semi-consciousness…