Ripe for the Harvest
Prologue - Whatever it takes
Reap and sow.
Reeeap ‘nd Sssow.
Those three alien words flowed quite smoothly off the mandibles, without the usual jarring contrasts of human speech. Maybe that was why the overseers of the Enclave had chosen that name, meditated Ashk in their slumber-chrysalis - all vital processes kept to a minimum to save precious energy, except for that lone strand of conscious thought. They told themselves it was to be ready in case of an emergency, but in reality it was a way to ease the regret of wasted time that gripped them every time they woke up from a prolonged period of deep sleep.
Ever since leaving the Baekdu Enclave, many body-cycles ago, Ashk had felt like time was a precious commodity: together with their memories, a sort of urgency accompanied their passing from one genetic descendant to the next, and they had no doubt that even their future bodies, the three spawn-embryos traveling beside them, would inherit the same restlessness.
They remembered home, thousand of years earlier in their relativistic proper time, and they remembered Paradiso, a mere reincarnation ago, where the Enclave had established the front company Reap and Sow in the human datasphere to carry forward the Multipliers Denavishii - the survival plan for those not willing to entrust the Evolved Intelligence with the continuance of the Shasvastii race.
They were so close to completing the construction of their Shaviish in the far, lightless reaches of the Human Edge system, unbeknownst to the EI - and, of course, to the wasteful humans - when the Sphere Powers and their new “ally” had turned their attention towards the HuEOS planetoids - dangerously close to their concealed Hatchery, their insurance against extinction secluded in the recesses of a barren asteroid trapped in the gravitational well of the Twins.
When the Combined Army had moved its “peacekeeping force” to the system, the overseers had managed the inclusion of their vessel - the ghost ship Manifestation of Absence - in the large contingent; it was up to the small crew of Multiplier faithfuls to divert the unblinking gaze of the EI from the clear, living proof of their mistrust.
They had done well so far, twisting orders, leaving evidence of Combined Army activity for the humans to find - fueling their hate, feeding their suspicions - to keep the Evolved Intelligence preoccupied with hundreds of small conflicts and misunderstandings with O-12 officials. However, the internal divisions among humans weren’t always helpful: the code they had to inject in Dakinis and Yudbots had been found out by Nomads of all people, and the news, lost among their usual wild claims, didn’t seem to be making Aleph any more cautious in professing alliance with its Ur counterpart. Fortunately, their direct collaboration remained limited, and the wide spectrum sensors of the Eye of Hipparchus still looked away from their cherished Shaviish.
The rest of the Baekdu Enclave had instead been working from Maya, the human network, using the Reap and Sow company to hire mercenaries through smart contracts, helping to keep the region as unstable and dangerous as it could be.
The Manifestation of Absence was, however, still an Expeditionary Force ship, and as such it was expected to carry out orders - especially given that even their Shasvastii brethren of Conservative faith in the upper echelons of the army could not be trusted with the secret of their real mission, the risk of betrayal to win the favor of the EI was too high.
Their next operation was in fact going to be an assignment as much as an assessment of their worth - or worse, an investigation: their commanding officer, Valesh of the Tactical Monitoring Company, had received orders from the Cadmus-Naish Sheskiin to assist her in the delivery of a bioengineered Demarok - a fearsome creature from Ugarat, the Morat homeworld - to the FZX Arena on Du-ε, and her spacecraft, a clumsy Exrah heavy-duty transport, was completing right in that moment the coupling maneuvers to their ghost ship.
Then, the feeling of a slight mechanical tremble as the docking procedure finished, and the hiss of air flowing through a pressure differential. Seconds later, voices, bouncing in the long corridors of the ship, barely muffled by the thin walls of the chrysalis:
“Welcome, dearest blood kin, to our vessel.” Valesh’s greeting words were warm, but their tone was formal and cautious
“You took your time to reach us.” Curtly answered a sharp, markedly feminine voice, almost human-sounding in the way a Speculo Agent’s morphed throat would. “We need to land with the cargo and deliver it within the hour. Send your soldiers to my ship, I will take command.”
“Of course, Agent.”
“On my return, I expect a detailed report on your activity since arriving in the system - and I will need to speak with each of your hatched subordinates.”
There was no answer, just the sound of firm, quick steps moving away, followed by the signal to awaken tingling Ashk’s nerves.
Quick, silent preparation followed - only the occasional hiss of a question and the growl of awakening Taighas breaking the tense atmosphere of the hold. Ashk checked their sniper rifle, diagnostic systems returning “all clear” signals as soon as they connected to their personal datasphere, and donned the bioquantronic Pioneer Corps armor - a wave of pins and needles crawling through their skin as the nervous interface initialized and the fabric-like material started following their movements and blending in with their surroundings.
Valesh was pacing the hold, silently urging them to hurry. They stopped for a moment beside Ashk, a sharp pain blossoming in their left arm as a strand of macro-chromatin mnemonic information got injected in their hemolymph - a briefing, orders and priorities springing to their awareness, leaving a faint dizziness and a metallic taste in their mouth.
That manner of communication, the ripening - or “Parināmanā viscus”, as the human vivisectionists called it - was the Multipliers’ most powerful instrument to maintain secrecy despite the all-pervasive presence of the EI, allowing ideas and thoughts to quickly spread from one Shasvastii to another without needing to resort to a datasphere.
They would have to complete the delivery to the humans - the EI had interests in keeping a business channel open with FZX’s leader, Samantha Moneylady-Harboil - but they also had to make sure that the Cadmus-Naish wouldn’t be able to hinder the Multipliers’ plans, and possibly install a listening device near the Arena to try and keep track of the deals struck between their enemies on Du-ε.
Ashk ground their mandibles - neutralizing Sheskiin wouldn’t be easy: they couldn’t take any direct action, as their betrayal would become apparent upon her resurrection, and, even if they managed to involve her in a fight with the humans, the Cadmus was still a living legend, a true paragon of physical prowess. Her only known weakness was her bloodlust - they would have to make do with that. If they were to succeed, command would pass to Leshti of the Sabotage and Destruction unit. Markedly Ileshta, she favored being addressed with female connotations - they knew each other well, as they both originally came from Baekdu and had, over time, shared more than a few memories.
The impatient scratching and growling of the small pack of readied Taighas brought Ashk back to the present - it was time to go. The rabid creatures moved ahead of the four Shasvastii - the two of them, Shunya of the Tactical Dominance Wing and Khali, the Galashta Speculo with his unsettlingly human features - and entered the narrow, acrid-smelling corridors of the Exrah ship.
Controlled chaos
A handful of minutes later, the craft was descending in the almost-nonexistent atmosphere of the small planetoid.
As soon as they landed, the Ikadron remotes started unloading the massive container housing the Demarok under the supervision of Sheskiin and another Shasvastii - an engineer named Novish, from the same regiment as Leshti, she had hissed under her breath during the flight.
He was a Conservative, and couldn't be trusted.
While their temporary officer discussed the details of the delivery with one of the humans, the Manifestation soldiers established a defensive perimeter - Shunya and Khali had quickly disappeared, the former keeping an eye on the landing area from a rooftop, and the latter having already disguised himself as one of the human technicians, while the Taighas fanned out, excitedly sniffing and drooling around the buildings of the freight yard. Ashk and Leshti exchanged one last worried look before engaging their active camouflage and heading to opposite sides of the container - they didn’t have much time to come up with a plan to destabilize the situation.
Meanwhile, judging from the furious rattling and roaring sounds that had started echoing from the sealed enclosure, the hulking biomechanical monstrosity had awoken from its tranquilizer-induced sleep.
Looking for a vantage point that wasn’t too close to the caged beast, Ashk climbed on a low structure that probably housed some kind of money exchange during the normal operation of the terminal - from there they could spot Khali, already putting his newly acquired form to use: the dirty-looking worker was animatedly speaking to a tall Yu Jingese soldier, sporting the long braid of an Imperial Agent. Soon after, the man was furiously dialing on his Comlog, and other ochre-armor clad figures started emerging from the adjoining terminal.
Sheskiin’s voice suddenly sounded in their communication channel, her wicked longing for violence dripping from every word:
“Look alive, brothers and sisters! We’re getting an inspection request from Imperial troops - as soon as they trespass, we begin the slaughter.”
Ashk grinned, adjusting their grip on the rifle and taking cover behind a railing - truly an excellent performance, dear Khali.
The seconds slowly passed, a tense silence enveloping the loading dock as all the workers abandoned their vehicles and posts, quickly walking away from the brewing confrontation - peremptory messages bounced back and forth in the datasphere, neither force apparently willing to make the first step.
Then, without any warning, the four doors of the Demarok cage burst open.
The deafening bellow of the creature echoed in the still air - despite still being restrained, it could now launch hails of its deadly bio-engineered spines outside of its prison: a Taigha screeched, rolling and ducking aside to avoid the lethal volley.
An hostile hacker attack, anyone would have thought, but Ashk immediately recognized Leshti’s handiwork: she had little love for meticulous, patient plans, and much preferred unleashing chaos and disarray. That was indeed more than enough aggression to spur Sheskiin into action:
“Eviscerate them!” was her gleeful scream in comms, as the lithe form of the Cadmus-Naish, enveloped in a cloud of smoke-like protective nanites, darted towards the Imperial soldiers with unnatural speed, machine gun roaring in her hands.
Ask positioned themselves to keep an eye on her advance, while on their left the sharp cracks of a shotgun announced that Khali had dropped his act and gone on the offensive. The mercenary snipers accompanying the Yujingese officer tried to slow down Sheskiin’s aggression, but to no avail: laughing off a seemingly deadly bullet wound as if it was merely a scratch, she swept the buildings in front of her with a hail of bullets, leaving those who hadn't put their heads down in time as bloodied heaps on the oil-stained floor. With no more enemies in sight, she seemed to come back to her senses, and started moving back to the cover of a large vehicle, parked diagonally between them and the dangerous open cage of the Demarok.
Thinking the assault had ceased, the last surviving merc got back up to try and catch Khali off guard, but a well timed missile from Shunya turned the rooftop he was standing on into a blazing inferno before he could draw a bead on the Speculo Killer.
“Wasn’t that a tad excessive, my dearest?” came his amused voice on their squad channel “You worry way too much about me.”
Shunya’s answer was a low growl and a whispered “I was just getting bored.” before she reactivated her thermo-optical camouflage and dropped from medium-range communications.
Khali gave a brief chuckle “I guess I’ll go find another face to wear and take care of that listening device issue.”
The Imperial Service forces, however, were quickly mounting a counterattack: an imposing Hsien started advancing towards Sheskiin, keeping out of sight from both the still invisible Ashk and the Noctifer; soon she found herself under heavy fire from their blind angle, and rolled backwards, grievously harmed - then, from behind a stairwell, another figure appeared, executing a textbook pincer maneuver on the wounded Shasvastii. The female, pink haired form of the human flickered and dissolved, revealing an older, stern-faced man aiming down the sights of a custom-looking rifle.
Ashk breathed in, the target already in the center of their crosshair - and waited, holding their shot for the fraction of a second necessary for the human to open fire. Lethal viral bullets bit into Sheskiin’s incapacitated body just as the high caliber round of the sniper rifle impacted on the side of the man’s head, killing him on the spot in a spatter of blood and bone fragments.
The Cadmus briefly spasmed on the ground - even her superior physiology, with many redundant organs and advanced implants, was proving incapable to oppose the terrible damage her body had suffered. Her dying gurgles resonated in their ears for a long moment as she desperately tried to articulate something, before finally going silent and still.
“Commanding Officer Sheskiin is out of action. I hereby take charge of the operation.” Stated Leshti matter-of-factly. Their mission was a success - now they just had to clean up this skirmish and deliver the EI’s parcel to FZX.
With all the enemy attention concentrated on the first assault, most of their Taighas had managed to sneak dangerously close to the ISS lines: with shrill screeches of delight, the creatures jumped on their prey, firing the rudimental weapons connected to their nervous system and sinking teeth and claws into soft flesh.
Now that the action had moved away from their position, Ashk didn’t have a good view of the battlefield, so they started looking for a better spot - the enemies were close to Leshti’s location, and it was only a matter of time before she got involved.
They shouldered their weapon and clambered onto the upper floor of the structure they were perched on, jumping over a security railing to land on the metal roof with a soft thud - from there they could clearly see the silhouette of their camouflaged teammate highlighted on the combat visor: she had started moving, passing less than an arm’s length away from the Crane’s unsheathed sword with silent and confident strides. The human was still looking left and right, probably sensing that something was wrong, when she unleashed a point-blank submachine gun burst in his back. Leshti, however, had not accounted for the quality of Yujingese heavy armor: with barely an half-step falter, the warrior turned around to face her, quickly unholstering his gun to shoot the surprised alien between the eyes - were not for the two sniper rounds that caught him square in the chest during his motion, the impact of the double action shots shattering the damaged armor plates and sending his broken form tumbling to the ground.
After crouching beside the Imperial Agent and making sure he was dead, the Caliban turned her gaze towards Ashk, who responded with a wave of the hand from their rooftop.
“Oh, come on, now this biomass is totally ruined - what did I even get my Protheion Augmentation for?” she sibilated, trying to fake disappointment
“Well, sorry for trying to spare you another reincarnation.”
Ashk lowered their rifle, as the humans had started to retreat after the Hsien exhamined one of the quantronic panels of the container.
“I had everything under control, I was just softening up his shell before consuming him.” she replied unconvincingly “...and besides, I know you always have my back” she murmured.
This narrative follows a game of Xenoform Containment, my Shasvastii versus Drop Bear’s Imperial Service. If you want a more accurate look on what happened (and more photos!), check out his battle report:
https://dropbearslog.blogspot.com/2024/10/xenoform-containment-operation-edgelord.html
Here are the table setup, and the list I used for the game:
The alien vending machine you can spot in some of the photographs above is my Impersonation marker, just pretend it makes sense.
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