Chapter 603: No Time for Tears

"A Terran. What, you've never seen one before?" - Unknown Trooper, 75th Rangers, Direct Action Team Lima Niner Eight Actual, Confederacy/Council Conflict

Roca's mind was running on several different tracks. Unlike the unmodified and unlike before she had gotten some mods back when she was a bounty hunter, she could keep track of more than one train of thought without any degradation of intellectual abilities.

She was tracking the city, her senses creating a map based on light and shadow, reflections, sound dopplering, street signs, and sight, slowly building a map and sharing it with the other members of 235 with her.

There were six others with her, she was highest ranking and so was tracking their vitals, armor levels, energy levels, backup mass, nanite containment level, and much more. She paid particular attention to Corporal Jack Regina Mbutu, who was running two degrees hotter than normal due to sweat glands not producing enough biocoolant.

Part of her mind was sorting through the "Black Fleet Codex", noting that it had armor and weaponry reconfiguration for her chassis class. She saw the "priority update" for the dorsolateral prefrontal right cortex (time perception control) and the neural wiring for how the body and mind interacted with time, including the section of the brain that handled precognition prediction as well as other temporal issues. Roca's thought train passed it to a newly opened thought chain, handing it off to the ones following her as well as pushing it through the screaming and dying echoing in her mind to the rest of the members of 12th Army still functioning.

Another part she was admiring the architecture of the little lizard people.

Her eyes were highlighting infrastructure, vehicles, building entrances and access points, showing the distance between two important points. Vehicles were being scanned and broken down according to the systems that were fully online and unlocked. Her statuses streamed by on the right and left of her vision, past her peripheral vision, added via optic nerve link to an area past her eye's abilities. She knew how much ground pressure she was exerting, how much ground pressure the pavement could take, and several times she made sure she leaped over critical buried infrastructure points.

She kept moving forward. She could taste/smell a temporal transfer point being laid down, feel the energy thrumming through her body. Behind her the six that had initially came online followed and, being the highest ranking, she knew their statuses.

Roca unlocked their combat capabilities, including scanning and biological battle screen generation.

Behind her, miles behind her, more of the former patients jumped from the hospital, falling and landing, before taking off with a distance eating bounding lope.

She wondered if it was going to be AWM's or Dwellerspawn. Between the two, she preferred the AWM's because of the sheer joy of ripping them to shreds but the last two engagements the Atrekna had largely depended on Dwellerspawn.

VITAL COMPONENTS DETECTED appeared in her vision. A vehicle was highlighted, a large cargo hauler.

She stopped and motioned. The other six gathered around as Roca grabbed the bottom and flipped the vehicle open. Corporal Aziz ripped off the cover of the transmission, exposing the inner mechanisms and the transmission fluid reservoirs.

From across the street a Phrewicken custodial engineer, who was supervising robots trimming the lawn, watched as the seven hulking creatures, all muscle and green skin and spikes, ripped apart several cars and ate parts of them.

It was interesting the first car, but he turned his attention back to the robots. Yes, he should be in a shelter, but he had decided that if the world was going to end, he would prefer that he carried out his employed duties and ensured that the lawns looked good.

Besides, his wife had grown thin tempered at the mammals' slow to come attack and hearing the same stories from one another for five days straight.

He did watch as the huge mammals flipped over a bus, ate large chunks of it, then screamed a scream that even made his skin prickle up in concern. As the scream went on they were covered by dusty looking dull matte black covers. It had spread out like sweat, gleaming in the sunlight before spreading until they were fully covered.

The mammals ran off and he went back to watching the robots work.

There.

Now he had a new story to tell his wife.

That would make her happy and he liked it when she was happy.

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Five Atrekna made up a small Quorum, and they had slowly set up the temporal resonance zone where they could bring forward Dwellerspawn and autonomous war machines if they needed them. The zone was ready, locked in carefully on several different groups to allow them to pull the best forces for the situation.

While the local defenses could not resist them, the Convention leaders were moving slowly, carefully, watching everything.

The system reeked of the Mad Lemurs, and the Convention in charge of holding the system were being careful.

Now, the Lemurs had forces on the attack in the system. Two of the Quorum had nodded thoughtfully as the sun had dimmed slightly and within hours the Lemurs had arrived.

One, a secret devotee to the Cult of the Defiled One, rubbed the carving of a devouring insect in the pocket of his robe, knowing that it was the act of dimming the sun and 'sinking' it into the universe to change the time perception that drew the Lemurs.

Its companions had no idea, but at the first sign of everything falling apart, it would leave them, leave the Conclave, leave the Convention, to fight the remnants of the Lemurs on their own.

It does not good to gather the resources of this vast universe if a Lemur rips off your feeding tentacles and defecates into your exposed mouth/throat it thought to itself.

It had come to that realization while covering in biting insects and meditating.

It looked up at the sky as the roar of COME AND TAKE IT! replied to the announcement that all belonged to the Atrekna.

Yes, it was a Lemur relic, which made it much more dangerous than his compatriots in the Quorum would even understand.

The Atrekna kept rubbing the ant carved from warsteel carved from shattered Terran infantry body armor.

It could feel the echo of endless, simmering rage inside the insect, biting at its flesh with psychic echoes just as the insects bit its skin during its meditations.

This universe is pain incarnate and I shall embrace it to understand this strange place it thought.

------------

The High Conclave in charge of the ground forces on the continent felt the sudden appearance of deep unbridled uncontained rage. They slowly shifted their carefully shielded divination powers, looking for the source.

It was, without a doubt, some type of Lemur relic, some Lemur remnant left behind on this planet.

While just under half of the High Conclave doubted any small remnants could affect the plans of the High Convention in charge of the multi-system attack, more than half had been present during Lemur assaults or the assaults of their allied species.

Which meant that the doubters were silenced and the High Conclave was careful to ensure all the shielding was in place as they focused their attention on the largest city in the middle of the vast Pangaea continent.

Just in time for the signals to vanish, as if the rage suddenly cooled.

A third of the High Conclave demanded that the divination lenses and devices be turned back to the great black ship that was busy using vast terrible guns to pound apart the autonomous war machines in the system.

The majority silenced them, this time with a painful slap, keeping them locked into the High Conclave's communal mind, and kept looking with the divination lenses.

The Arch-Quorum in charge of the High Conclave, that reported only to the Quorum of Shadows that pulled the strings of the High Convention, kept their minds clear of the eagerness that attempted to lift its unruly head.

The Lemurs were not the only ones that could change their tactics.

The Atrekna's vast pattern recognition and ability to adapt, which far outstripped the Herd Lords and the Hive Lords, had seen, over the course of hundreds of battles, that the current age old tactics were not working.

So they had plotted and come up with a new strategy that relied on new tactics.

All of the Arch-Quorum was secretly and coldly gratified that they had successfully concealed their membership in the Cult of the Defiled One from the others, who surely would not understand the wisdom of the maimed Defiled One.

The universe giggled at the damage the Terran infantryman was dealing on the Atrekna years after his death. The tearing away of part of Dalvanak's head, his feeding tendrils, and biting off half his hand had been the butterfly exploding in flame that had caused the forest fire that had caused the wind current changes that had caused the hurricane lashing through Atrekna society.

A nebula spun out of empty darkness at the giggling.

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The Great Citadel was a fairy-esque picture of sweeping lines, gossamer crystal, and gleaming spires. It resonated phasic energy and power for light years around it and orbited a brown dwarf star.

It was home to the End Of All Things Library.

It contained information and data that the Atrekna had gone through great trouble to conserve or replicate. Hundreds of Atrekna had been sacrificed by ripping through space-time to pull something they had touched or seen through from the Dead Old Universe into the New Universe.

It contained vast data, ancient wisdom, and terrible secrets of the Old Universe.

Information that many of the Atrekna leadership caste believed would allow them to overcome the lemurs and take possession of the New Universe to collect all of its resources and shepherd them for the good of the Atrekna and to ensure Atrekna dominance and survival for the next ten billion years.

Crystals and objects of strange matter in twisted non-euclidean shapes and forms made up ancient records of Atrekna a billion years before, when they took the universe in hand to conserve it all for themselves.

The Librarians were considered the wisest, most intelligent, and most learned of all the Atrekna. Many were Ancient Ones who were brought back through temporal manipulation. Others had been lucky enough to escape the Old Universe by being part of the effort to 'colonize' the New Universe.

All of them burned with hatred at the thought of those great ships of the Mad Lemurs that snuffed out their universe like an insect beneath a rock.

Well, they had.

Now, over half were dead and the rest in hiding.

In the great chapel-like vault at the center of the Great Citadel, the windows were destroyed, letting bright starlight stab down into the chamber, filling it with dim light that was nearly as bright as day to on of the Atrekna within.

One was on its knees, its robe torn, its flesh bruised from overwhelming psychic power being directed at it, its eyes wide as two hands forced it to stare at the heavens. One held onto the flesh of it head, the other, missing fingers, grasped all of the kneeling one's feeding tentacles to wrench the head up to stare at the sky.

**The universe is finite, we must protect our species** the kneeling one whined.

**LOOK AT IT** the other roared with a psychic voice more akin to a volcanic detonation. It wore a fabulous attire, covered in sparkling gems and crystals, as if the wearer had rolled around in stripper-glitter before being attacked by meth'd up teenage girls wielding Bedazzlers. The train was long and dyed to show the visage of a female Mad Lemur. The veil was covered in seed pearls and precious gems.

The one richly attired wrenched the kneeling one's head around, shaking it slightly, forcing the kneeling one to look at the stars.

**LOOK AT THEM** he, and he had decided that he was a he, roared.

**it's stars. stellar masses. what am i to see** it whined.

**HOW MANY STARS IN OUR UNIVERSE'S GALAXIES** the decked out one roared.

**sixteen to twenty thousand in the beginning, toward the last billion years of mass coalescing, five to eight thousand** the kneeling one replied.

**LOOK AT THEM** the standing one roared again, letting go of the kneeling one's head, but seizing them in psychic power so strong the flesh bruised. It pointed up with one unmaimed hand. **HOW MANY ARE THERE**

**thousands tens of thousands of what does it matter** the kneeling one cried out in pain.

**HOW LONG DID OUR UNIVERSE LIVE** the standing one bellowed.

**nine point two billion years** the kneeling one squealed as the standing one squeezed their feeding tentacles painfully. **it began to retract at four billion years we managed to shepherd another billions years beyond its total collapse**

**THERE ARE OBJECTS IN THE SKY OLDER THAN THAT YOU IGNORANT FOOL** the standing one roared out. The hiding Atrekna flinched as the enraged bellow tore through their psychic defenses, their towers of intellect.

**that is impossible** the kneeling one protested.

The standing one used the hand it was pointing with to sweep aside the veil it wore.

Its eye burned bright crimson, the fire deep inside strong enough it illuminated the other's face with bloody light.

**YOU DARE CONTRADICT ME WHO HAS LOOKED INTO THE EMPTINESS BETWEEN THE GALAXIES TO FIND LAUGHING PARTICLES BORN WHO HAS SEEN WHAT TERRIBLE CREATURE DWELLS BETWEEN THE BURNING PLANE AND THE STILLBORN PLANE** it roared.

The kneeling one wailed in pain and tried to turn its head so it did not have to stare into those burning crimson eyes.

**HOW MANY GALAXIES DID OUR UNIVERSE CONTAIN**

**one hundred twenty before the universe began to contract**

**THIS UNIVERSE IS STILL SPAWNING GALAXIES IS STILL GROWING AND YOU CLAIM THAT IT IS OUR DESTINY TO RULE AND POSSESS A UNIVERSE YOU CANNOT COMPREHEND OR UNDERSTAND**

The standing one bent down. **you will surrender to me the knowledge I wish** it paused and leaned even further down till all the kneeling one could see was those orbs of burning hatred and madness. **or. else.**

The kneeling one whimpered its surrender.

---------

The Steamboat Willy slid past the barrage of nCv shells, bringing its own massive guns to bear. Space rippled around the massive warship as the guns fired, flame bursting out of the ends despite the fact the ship was deep in vacuum.

The autonomous war machine that had initially moved to face off against the smaller ship had broken up, the pieces spinning through space and spreading out.

The barrages hit three separate Harvesters, the deadspace core rounds penetrating deep into the hulls before exploding. All three Harvesters shuddered as hundreds of miles of interior mechanisms were reduced to scrap, molten elements, or subatomic particles.

One broke in half, the front end tumbling.

From all over the system living and mechanical war machines swarmed toward the Steamboat Willy, all intent on punishing, destroying the interloper.

Even Atrekna controlled and inhabited vessels moved to intercept the massive black warship.

Admiral Thennis stood on the deck, her baton in her hand, the guns and weapon systems slaved to her eyes.

"Biomechanial warships are in range of deadspace cannons, Admiral," the Operating Mind said, its voice perfectly audible in vacuum.

"Load dead matter with enraged tachyon core rounds," Thennis ordered in a shout, pointing her baton in the direction of the thickest formation of Atrekna controlled and crewed ships. "We are the fury of the Confederacy! We are the unstoppable, the impossible, and we will not be defeated!"

Below decks the sweating crew heard their captain's voice and responded with a roar of approval even as they loaded the guns and shoveled fuel into the furnaces.

Admiral Thennis could see them cross the line that was visible to her sight.

"BATTERY NINE, ELEVEN, FIFTEEN, AND TWENTY-TWO! FIRE FOR EFFECT! SHAKE AND BAKE!" she roared, pointing with her baton.

The Steamboat Willy shuddered as gun batteries measured in kilometers fired every third gun, then fired another one of the three, and two seconds later, fired the last unfired in the string.

Thennis watched as the light speared across the light seconds in less than a second, bright purple light spiraling around a crimson core.

She nodded.

"Hmph."