Castaway

Chapter 1 : Contact 2-Over, I repeat, Contact 2-Bzzt!

StarIt is 13th of June in Human Calendar, in a far, far distant cluster of stars, light years away from Earth. On a sole mining colony of System 698-Beta, also known as Venture Star System, lies a sole taskforce of space ships of extraterrestrial in origin. Gliding into the system, unnoticed. The ships were not of any human designs ever made. The ships were distinctly sharp in shape, like that of a sword being beautifully ordained with fine craftsmanship when compared to ships of human designs.

If anything, it's like comparing a fancy ink pen to a utilitarian pen.

There at the edge of the solar system, is where the ships are located. A group of what is the Human designation of a medium sized fleet. It is being operated by a sole Battleship, and is accompanied by a pair of Heavy Cruisers, followed by 5 Light Cruisers, 9 Destroyers, 17 Frigates, and 25 Corvettes. The battleship is being followed by what seems to be the largest in the task force, of what is a ship called a Carrier, with 5 supply vessels circling it and 10 support ships circling the two most important ships in the fleet. A large ship that holds of dozens and dozens of small craft of varying roles, like that of a fighter, bomber, and a torpedo bomber. And as it implies, the ships around the battleship are getting busy as the Shipmaster and the Admiral of the task force have begun their conversation, regarding of the operation they will now prepare.

There on the top of the flagship, named "Justice High", is a dome like area. That is being encompassed by what seems to be heavily reinforced glass that peaked through the command centre and the cosmos. At the centre lies like a catwalk like area, in which a large sofa like furniture made out of soft materials and reinforced metals that oriented it around like a throne. The one sitting on it is what the humans called it, a mantis, a rather large one at that. Sitting down at 1.6 metres tall, the dark coloured preying mantis silently observed the gigantic hologram. Showing a total of 7 planets in total, and 7 other smaller planets that surrounds a similarly familiar star of colour yellowish orange, though in this case, it's more orange than yellow and slightly larger than Sol.

The humanoid mantis on the throne, adorned what seems to be ancient greek like robes of colour purple, then look at the mantis in front of him that seems to be busy on a circular console as it spoke. It's mandibles on its cheeks opening in and out, and it's lips like mouth opening unnaturally for a human like face to do, called out the captain in front of him.

"Fleet Shipmaster. Status report of the star system."

The Shipmaster flinched for a moment, and then stopped whatever it was doing and bowed beneath the tendrils of the larger mantis on the throne.

"A-Admiral. The star system is what the data was described by the Home Council. Barren, with only limited planets being habitable. With the rest being either gaseous planets, or too toxic of a atmosphere to be lived in. Especially of our species and the ones of the 2nd and 3rd Worlders."

The Admiral did a equivalent of a puff of air, startling the few officers on the bridge, as the Admiral finally stood up from his seat and tower over the rest of the crew of 2.1m tall.

"I see... So O'heet must have made a mistake then..."

The Admiral said out loud, simply because of how the star system they are looking at seems to be different than what they have been speculating to have look like.

The Admiral then sway his front legs, to show another holographic interface of a star system. This time however, it looks slightly different than the one being shown at the present of what the Council calls; The Luminous System. As it seems the current system have extra 5 planets than what has been speculated by the Committee.

"Navigator, are we on the speculated star system that our operation is tasked?"

"Yes Admiral! We are on the correct path, though our coordinates do not match on the speculated star system. We do have matching readings on the planets and the... Aliens... We are subjugating... Have a 98.6% accuracy of the data we have acquired."

The Admiral remained silent for a moment, before grunting, as the Navigator then manipulated the gigantic hologram to present the speculated star system and the Luminous System as all the minute details were presented on each planets. As though different, it has a very striking resemblance, except for the extra planets. 4 barren planets, 1 habitable planet, 2 gas giants, 2 water worlds. The extra 5 being closer to extraordinarily large asteroids than planets with their non spherical shape.

"Elaborate the details throughout the fleet for those ill informed. Those fools would be complaining that they can't do much if they are in a empty star system."

"Affirmative Admiral!" The bashful Navigator bowed beneath the height of his tendrils and proceeded to fiddle with the consoles next to him.

Observing this, the Admiral wondered if continuing this operation really is a strategic choice for the Confederation. Technically speaking, it is not like he was worried if the operation will not be successful, in fact it is the opposite, as the fleet he has now is more than enough to subjugate a species with technology as luck luster as the data being currently provided. No, it isn't that thought of failure is what he is worried about.

The Religiosa species have been around space for nearly 7940 years now, with experiences of previous space conflicts that could make a hatchling gurgle in delight of the light show they displayed. However close calls did happened, especially with 3rd Worlders. The 3rd Worlders are the third species that the Religiosa have abducted under their Council for equal prosperity among species. The Admiral knows it's all talk to make seems the Religiosa are innocent, but in fact it was the opposite. He was there after all when they decided to make example of one of the important core worlds of the 3rd Worlders when they decided to rebel from the Home Council to conduct a war of independence.

The war of independence failed of course, and under his command, he stopped the war as a praised war hero. Thus boasting the egos and pride of the Religiosa home worlds and his promotion to Grand Royal Admiral. However, he prefers to be called Admiral to not waste more words of the already long syllables needed in their language.

It may sounds like he is sympathising with the 3rd Worlders, but he isn't as much. In reality, he seems disappointed that they began to do their foolish war of independence, knowing the fact that they are outmatched in all ways and even decided to excrete the idea that their deity was a fraudulent mortal on a prey's skin. The 3rd Worlders have got that situation to themselves to blame, they are already gaining more benefits under their ruling with technology, culture, cuisine, and religion. It's almost an act of mercy when they were founded by his ancestors nearly 5 centuries ago, and yet, they received those benefits with the low price of being labour force. The divide among their species only got worse instead, with their treatment returning to days of those centuries ago with the rebellion.

It may be 50 cycles ago, but the rebellion definitely remained it's aftertaste, and it left a bad taste to the Religiosa pride that a inferior species made a large dent in their resources and finances than the minor damages predicted. Thus the sanctioning of their core worlds and recontracting of economic laws are being brought upon them to reciprocate their losses.