Chapter 1
The expanse of space is harsh and unforgiving. It’s just the kind of place for Admiral Lorna Holden to find comfort. There was something about the Stygian void that led her to a state of contentment she had not felt since childhood. Contentment, she had found, was difficult to come by in the Far Reaches. For the century that mankind had maintained a presence around the coyly titled gas giant and her two inhabitable moons, it seemed she was more likely to find a tale of conflict and despair in the place of stories of triumph and peace. It was for this reason she had joined the naval branch of the Union of Sovereign Nations ten years prior. Though she was young when she signed, Holden was anything but naive. When the proposed Union of Sovereign Nations was finally established only to be immediately countered by the movement known as The Confederate Territories of the Reaches she knew what had to be done. How could progress occur and stability be reached while the CTR chose to wallow in their century old filth instead of push forward for the betterment of the people? She knew it was time for change. She knew it was time for a cleansing and one decade after the start of this turmoil, the USN was ready to deliver the coup de gras.
The Admiral had just successfully established a blockade around the gas giant known as Bor and the bigger of the two moons FR-1. A crushing defeat of the CTR Naval forces in open combat had lead to this opportunity. By cutting the supply line from the mining facility above FR-2, it would only be a matter of time before the USN ground forces could end this conflict. For the time being, however, she could think of nothing better to do than admire her work through the central viewport of her command deck. Lorna’s profile stood out to those with her on the bridge of the USNN Jade Serpent. Her light, straight hair that sat naturally on the shoulder of her tall, athletic build gleamed with the radiance of the sun, yet her face remained as stone. She had always been an inspiring, yet intimidating presence to her crew and she intended to keep it that way. She hoped the image of her silently surveying the mangled corpses of battlecruisers, corvettes, and frigates of both ally and enemy make would remind them of who she was. Admiral Lorna Holden knew her crew. She knew that even though they would follow her to the ends of the unknown regions they were terrified. She liked it that way.
Resounding footsteps approached Holden from behind and the booming voice of her trusted captain soon followed. “Ma’am, we have an approaching shuttle. They claim to be civilians heading to FR-2, what’s your suggested course of action?” The Admiral glanced over her shoulder at the creature known as Captain Raymus. The strangest discovery that mankind had made when they came upon the Far Reaches was that of the indigenous life. Captain Raymus was no exception. Just like the rest of the original inhabitants of this sector, Raymus was what humanity would consider an anthropomorphic animal. He was something closely resembling a rhino, to be exact, though he stood on two legs, was capable of speech, and could use his hands to finely operate machinery.
“We’re a blockade. What course of action do we always take, Raymus?” Holden said, turning her head back toward the viewport calmly. She had grown accustomed to the creatures of this world, though most people still feared them and allowed their fear to become hatred in return. She fought hard for Raymus to become an officer, and he respected her for it. She respected him for their similar methods of ensuring victory and their drive for the betterment of all people, human and anthro alike. It also never hurt to be on the good side of a seven foot living tank. Of all the anthros she had ever come across, he was the most imposing. Whether it resembled a bear, a feline, or some other earth creature, nothing held a presence quite as commanding as Captain Raymus.
“Yes ma’am. I will prepare a boarding party at once.” Raymus knew the answer he was going to get, but he always asked her guidance anyway. He had never felt fear in his life, but he imagined the aura she exuded was something like it and he couldn’t help but acknowledge that.
“Very well. Return with news or not at all.”
Raymus turned with a grunt of confirmation and made his way through the room. As soon as Admiral Holden heard the metallic doors slide closed on the other side of the bridge she let out an audible sigh. Despite the appearance of distaste she aspired to maintain among her men, her grief actually stemmed from the incompetence of her superiors. Though there were few above her, they were there, and their presence pierced like a thorn. She grew tired of sitting idly in orbit while battles raged on the surface of the moon below. There was no reason in her mind that they couldn’t bring the whole might of the fleet down upon the remnants of the CTR. The unconvincing reason she had been told repeatedly by high command was that they wished to avoid instilling fear in the civilians. What the generals and commanders failed to acknowledge was that the people of the Reaches had been instilled with fear for the last decade.
“What’s one more day of terror when peace is sure to follow?” she said under her breath as she turned to leave the bridge. As she continued across the spanning command deck she could feel the anguish of her men. They were creatures of space to be sure, but they despised catching the enemy one ship at a time in this vacuum while their brothers in arms died en masse below. The falsehood of peace that the Union hoped to achieve by forcing a surrender through blockade seemed idiotic to the men who were putting their lives on the line every day. By blocking access to the privately owned mine they were stopping the production of weapons and fuel for the Confederacy, but to what end? The Admiral never forgot to remind her superiors that slowly disarming a threat when complete annihilation was an option was a waste of resources and foolish. And it seemed high command never forgot to answer it with deaf ears.
Admiral Holden stood waiting for the automated door to open with her arms tucked neatly behind her back. She turned her head to the left, addressing the nearest deck officer. She instantly recognized the strange, yet soft, face of Lieutenant Bugsby. This doglike creature reminded her of a puppy she had as a child back on Earth before her family made the voyage to the Far Reaches. “Lieutenant, I will be in my quarters. Hail me when Raymus reports back with the outcome of his boarding action.”
“As you wish, Admiral.” affirmed Bugsby with his small but hoarse voice.
“Thank you, Lieutenant. You have the command deck until the Captain or I returns.” Lorna turned back toward the open hallway and continued on to her quarters before she saw the excited nod on the anthros face, but she knew it was there. It always was.
The four men in Captain Raymus’ boarding party remained silent, just like the vacuum that waited beyond the unsettlingly thin hull plating of the shuttle they sat in. The small freighter they now approached claimed to be heading to FR-2 for relief effort and halted without hesitation when hailed by the Jade Serpent. This alone was reason for suspicion. Most ships that made it this far into the blockade either retreated back toward the surface of FR-1 after being contacted and if they weren’t that smart, attempted to break through before being scattered amongst the stars by various weapon emplacements that lay dormant for just such an occasion. The act of peacefully complying was unusual and thus merited the worry the crew garnered from it. Beyond that fact, Raymus couldn’t recall the last time he heard of anyone sending aid to FR-2. The scarred moon had become nothing more than a graveyard for soldier and battleship alike. Many battles had been fought on and above the ghostly sister of FR-1. The Confederacy initially drove the Union of Sovereign Nations away from the moon, but not without much loss. After the conflicts had ceased on the surface, all of the resources and tactical locations across second satellite of Bor were either stripped bare or all but destroyed.
Raymus had experienced the decimation of the moon first hand and seeing the drive to go there in anyone put him on edge. Looking over at the youngest member of his boarding party, Private Miller, Raymus saw that Miller was returning the favor, only with visible fear in his eyes. The mighty anthro knew his men could feel the tension just as clearly as he could. “You find something of note before me and drinks are on me for a month,” the rhino said out of the corner of his mouth in an attempt to raise the soldiers spirits before the same spirits were put to the test.
Private Miller let out a nervous chuckle, “Sir, unless there’s a liquor store on the next asteroid over I think I’m shit outta luck.”
Raymus rose from his seat, giving Miller a resounding pat on the back as he passed by him, “Unfortunately for you, Miller, that’s not my problem.” The captain stood in front of the airlock before his men, waiting for their shuttle to berth with the similarly sized freighter. “Alright men, I want a quick scan and sweep. Anything suspicious comes through me. When I set foot back on this shuttle in fifteen minutes, it leaves. It’s up to you to make sure you leave with it.”
The four soldiers replied in unison to their captain, much like a quartet offering up their next song to passers by, “Sir, yes sir!”
The USNN shuttle shuttered as the docking clamps seized the waiting freighter. A low moan filled the ship as the airlocks of the two vessels aligned, readying themselves to open. At this point, all of the USN soldier were out of their seats and readying their weapons. Raymus took this brief moment of rest to gaze from the nearest viewport at the blockade. He couldn’t help but marvel at the impressive display of the fleet with her crown jewel, the Jade Serpent, sitting in lead of the formation. She was an experimental ship made with a new alloy that supposedly gave it a stealth advantage over modern sensors. The upgraded hull also gave it a unique and beautiful sheen of green from which her name was derived. The unique nature of the ship was both a blessing and a curse from the day she was christened. While the sight of the Man-O-War class USNN Jade Serpent alone was enough to make any CTRN junker smaller than a battleship turn and run, her size and appearance made her the priority target in any conflict. Raymus didn’t doubt the skills of Admiral Lorna Holden, but he still thought it a miracle that ship remained amongst the stars.
The captain snapped back to reality as the large metal airlocks slid open with a hiss. His troops scuttled past him while he surveyed the interior of the captured freighter from within their own shuttle. The unsettling situation they found themselves in just couldn’t escape the trend of getting weirder. As Raymus shifted his gaze from one side of the room to the other, he saw what appeared to be the three crew members already sitting on their knees with their hands above their heads. “Check this scrap heap for more passengers,” commanded Raymus while three of the men scurried to various parts of the ship leaving Raymus and Private Miller to stay with the overly compliant crew. “What’s your business beyond the blockade?”
“We thought our intentions were clear. We’re on our way to FR-2 to bring supplies to the villages ravaged by your war,” said the man in the middle without even a hint of hesitation. That phrase, “your war,” was a sound that never sat well in Raymus’ tiny triangular ears. He had joined the USN Navy in hopes to bring peace to every creature of the Far Reaches, not to go to war with them. It only took a year for him to fully realize that peace could only be attained by blood. It took him five years to come to terms with it.
Just within reach of his peripheral vision, Raymus noticed the man on the right didn’t look quite as content as his two compatriots. When he looked over at him he noticed that he was quite fidgety and wouldn’t remove his gaze from him. “Miller, check them,” commanded the rhino. He liked to keep his commands vague in situations such as this to try to avoid arousing any hostility in his captives. It didn’t bother Private Miller, though, he knew what Captain Raymus expected of him. Without further instruction, Miller moved toward the man on the right and unfortunately for him, the man moved back. When the Private was within reach, the man produced a blade from within his sleeve and brought his anger into physical form by repeatedly stabbing Miller about the neck and shoulders.
“You Union boys killed my brother!” yelled the man on the right, making every strike count, knowing he wouldn’t be gifted with many more.
“Peter, no!” yelled the man in the middle as he too rose to his feet. Raymus wasted no time spraying searing plasma from his weapon toward the two men. Peter and the man in the middle collapsed to the deck in seconds as the rest of Raymus’ crew arrived upon hearing the noise. They looked down at the two men, Peter had died instantly while the man in the middle looked up at them with blood trickling from a satisfied smirk, releasing his last breath into the world. “Peter died with the pleasure of avenging his brother. I die knowing your judgment will come because of mine.”
“Look!” exclaimed one of the soldiers pointing to the left of Raymus. The captain glanced upward to see the last captive who had been sitting on the left running through the corridors of the cramped freighter and toward the nearest escape pod. He quickly shifted his aim of his rifle toward the fleeing target, pressing his luck to get an accurate shot off in time. He squeezed the trigger just as the man hit the door controls. Raymus’ shot went wide and hit the frame of the door, sending sparks and shrapnel in toward the man just seconds before his safe haven rocketed toward FR-1 below. Raymus felt his age and knew the war was wearing on him. The third prisoner wouldn’t have escaped his shot, let alone have made it to the pod even just two years ago. With no time to worry about the natural degradation of his state, Raymus heard one of his men behind him speaking into his radio.
“Jade Serpent, this is Spectre Group. We have an unauthorized pod departure, do you have eyes on the target?”
“Negative, Spectre. We don’t have a shot, “ Lieutenant Bugsby replied from aboard the cruiser.
“Damn it! Orders, Captain?” The soldier waited for a response from Raymus while staring down the hallway at the now empty pod bay. The only response he received was silence. “Captain?” This time he turned to see the anthro down on one knee next to the bloodied corpse of Private Miller. Private Miller had joined the USN Navy in hopes to bring peace to every creature in the Far Reaches, not to go to war with them. He didn’t even make it a year. He never fully realized that peace could only be attained through blood. It would now take Captain Raymus the remainder of his life to come to terms with that.
