First Contact - Chapter 557: 4th & 10

7th Army Bugler

All news, no rumors.

7TH ARMY REGROUPS!

Following the heavy fighting against the Atrekna across the Lanaktallan Contested Zone, 7th Army is undergoing Interstellar Moment to TLK-38732 in the largest reposting of 7th Army since the end of the Mar-gite War. With millions of troops under movement, elements of the 14th Force are moving in to take 7th Army's place in over a dozen systems.

With new equipment templates, new training, and new munitions to tailor the war against the Atrekna, the rebasing to TLK-38732 promises to lead to at least a year of training according to 7th Army leadership. From new tanks to new rifles to new personal armor systems, TRADOC estimates at least three months of equipment re-familiarization followed by at least three months of training in the new anti-Atrekna tactics developed by General P'Kank of 2nd Army during the successful defense of Belvak-8 and General NoDra'ak of 7th Army during the liberation of Laglun-3.

System TLK-38732 was dedicated to basing elements of V Corps two years ago and since then has been built up to handle 7th Army and its supporting elements, including Space Force units, TRADOC, FORSCOM, and civilian industries.

The Third Lanaktallan Army, known as the Atomic Hooves, will be undergoing training for force integration, lead by their general Great Grand Most High A'armo'o. After their stalwart defense of multiple systems side by side with CONMIL forces over the last year, and with the unconditional surrender of the Unified Coucil, TRADOC and FORSCOM is hoping that [WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE?]

GENERAL NODRA'AK SET TO TAKE CHARGE OF 7TH ARMY

With the loss of Terran Descent Humanity, General of the Iron NoDra'ak has been promoted by CONMILCOM from commander of V Corps to commander of 7th Army. The promotion is part of the Theater Reorganization taking place across the entire former Lanaktallan Disputed Zone.

General NoDra'ak is known for his attention to detail, highly aggressive command style, and his command of the 319th Orbital Drop Horde during the Clownface Nebula Conflict. His most recent command was of V Corps during the liberation of Laglun-3.

What this means, with the reorganization and retraining of all of 7th Army is unknown at this time. However, sources close to the General state that a major part of the retraining will be the training of Space Force staff officers in ground landings and ground attacks as well as the training of Army and Marine Generals in orbital and system defense/offensive procedures.

Additionally, joining 7th Army for the reconstitution will be elements of Space Force, commanded by Admiral NGwark and Admiral Shtuklar, who will be training elements of Space Force based on lessons learned. Additionally [WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

GENERAL TRUCKER PLACED UNDER ARREST

Upon orders from CONMILCOM MP's were dispatched to arrest Major General of the Iron Manuel Trucker. While no charges have been filed at this time, the use of the [Black Cauldron Protocol] mandates arrest, confinement, and a board of inquiry regarding the use of such things.

General Trucker was released under his own recognizance to continue his duties with the the Third Lanaktallan Army.

The Black Cauldron Protocol was used by General Trucker in order to assault the heaviest concentration of Atrekna forces during the initial landings on Laglun-3 after the Great Die-Off resulted in the loss of 99.997% of Terran Descent Humanity just prior to the receipt of the distress call from Laglun-3.

Random polling interviews on Corps Social Media suggests that the majority of service members feel that Trucker's use of the Black Cauldron Protocol was justified and within regulations due to the heavy Atrekna presence across the entire zone.

CONMILCOM has recommended that upon arrival of V Corps at TLK-38732 a board of inquiry consisting of General Trucker's peer be convened in order to determine [WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

FIRST TELKAN MARINE DIVISION RETURNS TO TELKAN SYSTEM

Upon order from Telkan Military Command and CONMILCOM, First Telkan Marine Division will be returning to the Telkan System in order to undergo reinforcement, standard PCS movements, and rearming. With the Telkan people having flagged six Marine Divisions in the last five years, First Marine Division has been the Telkan people's vanguard in the fight against the Unified Council and the Atrekna.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

REENLIST TODAY

With the unconditional surrender of the Unified Council ceding vast swaths of the base of the Cygnus Orion Galactic Spur, more than a hundred thousand systems are in need of garrison troops as well as troops to repel the inter-dimensional invaders known as the Atrekna.

Bonuses relying on time in service, grade, and MOS are available for critical MOS's and positions.

See your reenlistment officer now!

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO K - ]

12,089th CAPTAIN'S COMBAT AND MANEUVER COURSE GRADUATES

Among the graduates are the first Telkan Captain in history, a Pubvian Captain formerly with 17th Republican Guards who was part of the Pubvian Resurgence, and the 8th Infantry Divisional Bodybuilding Champion. The most recent class had to address temporal warfare protocols as well as dimensional warfare protocols.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

CORPORAL NAXTREK INDUCTED INTO 3RD TELKAN MARINE DIVISION

Following the reorganization of the Telkan Marine Corps, the 3rd Telkan Marine Division is now an honor assignment. As of this writing the Division only includes seventeen members, the majority of which are posthumous assignments.

Corporal Naxtrek, then Lance Corporal Naxtrek, successfully held off Atrekna forces on Laglun-3 for two weeks supported only by BOLO supply drops and three supplementary fire drones. During that time Corporal Naxtrek was facing massive Dwellerspawn forces despite having no communication with Fleet at the time of his defense.

Tuesday morning he was formally inducted into the 3rd Telkan Marine Division, where his name will permanently be placed.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

SENATE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE TO REVIEW CONFEDERATE MILITARY ACTIONS AT THE FRONT

With the Confederate Senate reconvening, the legislators of the 1,475th Senate are demanding a new, in-depth briefing of the actions of the Confederate Armed Services in the Lanaktallan Disputed Zone. Headed by Senior Senator Clearmon, the Senate Armed Services Committee is promising that every detail of the five years of warfare in the Lanaktallan Zone.

Among the questions put forth by the SASC is whether or not local commanders overstepped their authority in enlisting former 'neo-sapients' as well as Lanaktallan forces into the Confederacy's order of battle.

Most pressing, according to sources within the SASC, is the release of a group of interdimensional refugees from a group formerly known as "the Locusts", as well as whether or not Admiral Smith exceeded her authority in her assignment of the dimensional and temporal refugees.

Senator Clearmon has reaffirmed his desire to ensure that civilian control of the Confederate Armed Services is recognized and solidified.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

DEPENDENT SUPPORT COMMAND SEEKS VOLUNTEERS

With the influx of dependents to TLK-38732, DSC is asking for any volunteers willing to help people new to the dependent system. DSC needs sponsors, community support supervisors, and spousal/children's group leaders.

See your unit DSC representative if interested.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

SIXTEENTH AND NINETEENTH ARMY TO DEPLOY TO TALMONUS HARMONY SPACE

The Senate has determined that with the fall of the Talmonus Harmony government, the treaties preventing Confederate military troops from entering Harmony space are null and void.

With the massive humanitarian disaster of the Great Die-Off and the brutal genetic warfare attacks upon the Talmonus Harmony, the need to locate any survivors is primary. Signals from the Talmonus Harmony indicate there are surviving groups of Terran Descent Humanity still in the area.

It is the hope of the Confederate Senate that this humanitarian operation will heal the rift between the Talmonus Harmony and the Confederacy of Aligned Systems.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE]

SCIENTISTS STILL BAFFLED REGARDING THE TERRA-SOL 'DRAWSTING'

One week ago scientists returned from the Terra-Sol Gravitational Anomaly after gathering additional data using methods devised by 7th and 2nd Armies for tracking Atrekna leadership castes. Scientists believe that the Atrekna Biological Genetic Archeological Attack may have had some kind of effect upon the 'drawstring' and The Bag itself.

One scientist mentioned that she believes that the alterations to the drawstring may be 'self-sustaining' as well as 'self-perpetuating' and thus there may not be any half-life to the particle decay.

At the time of this writing, communications with Terra-Sol have been interrupted for almost two years.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOWN MORE]

Major Exquisite Melding of Chrome and Flesh put the donut in her mouth as she watched the technicians doublechecking the equipment. The cloning and SUDS decks planetside on Laglun-3 were being turned over to the locals, as well as the local garrison, but the decks aboard the flagship had to be gone over.

She sighed through her legs as she double-checked the system. It had largely been used to run off the odd limb here and there as well as skin for burn victims. Now, with the fleet about ready to move, the cloning systems and SUDS array systems had to be wiped and cleared before being put into low power sleep mode. Otherwise data could be damaged through exposure to jumpspace or hyperspace particles.

It was rare, but it still happened.

"Ma'am," one of her subordinates, Captain There and Back said.

Both Major Exquisite Melding of Chrome and Flesh and Captain Never Give You Up looked up from where they were both examining the computer systems connecting the cloning tanks to the SUDS array system. Colonel Resists the Eternal Darkness also looked up from where she was examining the log files on another system.

"Yes?" Doctor Resists asked.

There and Back motioned at the cloning bank she was kneeling down next to. "This one refuses to power cycle," Back said. "It also refuses to disconnect from SUDS Sub-Array Twenty-Two."

Resists got up and moved over to the cloning bank. She checked the telltales and tapped her antenna against her forehead. "That's odd."

"What is it?" Exquisite asked.

"There's about a dozen LARP profiles we had loaded up when attempting to bypass the SUDS lockout and the cloning lockout, but that's not what's causing the lockout," Resist said. She opened the panel and looked at the small monitor. "There's a profile loaded up in the queue for both the SUDS array and the cloning bank."

Exquisite looked over Resists shoulder, tapping in the profile serial number sequence.

"That's even odder," Exquisite said softly.

"Is it safe to flush the LARP profiles?" Never Give You Up asked.

"According to Colonel Tangeeran, LARP profiles are only copies not in the master system till they leave the LARP worlds," Exquisite said. "He was one of the best out there when he was in Space Force, and now he's been on a LARP world, one of the hard core ones, and is still one of the best."

"Wish there would have been a way to convince the system that the Elven Queen's court was a World Engine," Never sighed.

Exquisite looked at her datapad. "Weird. This guy was KIA over three years galactic, ten years local. Killed on Hesstla back during the Second Battle for Hesstlla."

"So, what do we do? Delete it?" Never asked.

"I'm not sure," Exquisite admitted. "OK, here's an idea. We'll go ahead and wipe the LARP profiles, let the system do error checking. It should reject the whole thing then we'll pull the memory module and put it in storage data."

The system chuckled to itself for a little while as the profiles were copies to static write-once read-many storage systems that had been jury-rigged to hold SUDS and cloning data.

"There he goes," Never said. She shook her head. "Give it about fifteen minutes to double-check the data and after the cloning bank and the SUDS array kicks it back, we'll move it to WORM and put them in stasis."

The russet mantid team went back to work, making sure the medical systems were cleared.

A beeping caught Exquisite's attention and she looked up to see one of the green mantid technicians triggering the alert button.

"What?" Exquisite asked.

--85% and climbing-- 84.D signaled. --something weird--

The machine beeped, throwing an error code and started to cycle the SUDS template out of the buffer and into the storage memory. The number suddenly dropped back to 79.76% and the error code kicked out.

59 4f 55 20 43 41 4e 27 54 20 4b 49 4c 4c 20 4d 45

--see weird weird-- 84.D sent, along with an emoji of a confused face with spiraling crazy eyes.

The other russet mantid doctors, all experts in cloning, cybernetics, and SUDS transfers, all grouped up to watch.

The machine beeped an error at 87.65% and tried to reset.

59 4f 55 20 43 41 4e 27 54 20 4b 49 4c 4c 20 4d 45 kicked on the error status.

It dropped back to 85%, the last error percentage, and began to slowly climb back up.

It took three tries before it passed the 87.65% mark. When it did it flashed the same error code a dozen times.

The ongoing situation in the lab had attracted attention as it went through the grapevine. Other doctors were there, nearly a hundred green mantids, and two dozen doctors. Six MP's showed up with shipboard weapons, all making sure everyone stayed back from the SUDS array stack and the one cloning bank.

--almost there-- 84.D said.

The cloning bay beeped an error, a warning, but something overrode it.

"Where's the signal coming from?" Exquisite asked one of the green mantids.

--ring ring in house-- 773 stated, holding up his detector. --have you checked children--

"It's coming from inside the rebirth system?" Exquisite asked.

--righty righty-- 773 flashed, along with nearly a score of the other greenies, all of whom were examining every one of the systems except for the connected cloning bank/SUDS array.

The SUDS check flashed 100%.

The system tried to kick it back.

DANGER! UNMODIFIED HOMO SAPIENS TERRA SAPIENS DETECTED! WARNING! DANGER!

the system beeped several times.

59 4f 55 20 43 41 4e 27 54 20 4b 49 4c 4c 20 4d 45

appeared, streaming down the screen.

The system suddenly beeped and the lights went green.

Everyone watched as the cloning system began a fast regen, flooding the tube with biogel. The biomatter printers went to work and Exquisite and the other mantids watched the SUDS template transfer to the cloning bank. The SUDS array beeped, began clearing the queue, and started to shut down.

It took nearly fifteen minutes for the clone to reach the point where the SUDS template was supposed to be loaded. The system beeped, trying to throw error codes.

59 4f 55 20 43 41 4e 27 54 20 4b 49 4c 4c 20 4d 45 appeared again and again.

"How... how is this happening?" Exquisite asked.

"Human," Resists said softly. She shook her head. "Somehow, some way, it's a human."

59 4f 55 20 43 41 4e 27 54 20 4b 49 4c 4c 20 4d 45 appeared.

Finally the tank beeped. Resists watched as the matter printer cut in.

"It's applying clothing," Resists said.

--battledress-- 185 said, checking the codes. --acu-- it transmitted, referring to the adaptive camouflage uniform.

"Everyone get back," the lead MP ordered as the timer wound down to under 10 seconds and the tube began to gurgle as the biomatter liquid was withdrawn. Resists could faintly hear the print heads moving back to the sides.

The doctors and technicians shuffled back, none of them really willing to give up watching whatever was going to happen.

The timer hit zero. There was a hiss and the cloning bank broke seal.

Resists noted that she could smell the slight tang of... sulphur? Rust? Something strange.

The human figure fell out of the tube, landing face down.

Resists noted it got its arms in the way.

The MP's leveled their weapons at the form.

It coughed several times and pushed itself on all fours, hacking up pinkish clear thick fluid.

"Can't..." the figure coughed.

"Don't move," one of the MP's said.

"Kill..." the figure hacked again.

"Get on your knees, hands behind your head," another said.

"Me..." the figure slowly struggled up.

Resists noticed the wild grin, the wide eyes, the deep burning amber glow in the eyes.

"Who are you?" the MP's asked.

The grin got wider.

"I'm the Ordnance Man."