A New Front: Chapter 2: I, Clio

As episode one hundred and twenty-three of The Next Generation ended, I was left questioning a great number of assumptions humanity had towards the antithesis, as well as consulting the basic antithesis catalog Uncle bought a while ago. Unlike the Borg, who were a true collective hive mind with the goal of assimilating the universe to learn about it in full, the antithesis models that were seen on Earth and Mars were not sapient in any measurable way, and current research on Earth supported that they were individuals who followed preprogrammed instincts via pheromones and then eventually, through different adaptations, sounds. They also held no observable goal beyond consuming and growing, not much dissimilar to normal plants.

The Borg appeared to be similar to the antithesis in that they invade planets and "wipe out" the inhabitants of them, yet their methodology and ideology, I suppose, were different. The Borg truly assimilated individuals with their technology, absorbing their minds and knowledge into the collective to learn and grow, while the antithesis only assimilated the biomass of the world itself. While Synaptic gave examples of the worlds they conquered, with them ending up becoming greenhouses for further expansion, they left nothing recognizable from before. The only learning that took place there was from the genetic level, testing and discarding the adaptations of the native inhabitants while ignoring any cultural history, philosophical debates, or the scientific understandings of Earth. They adapted to the threats and to inefficiencies in their forms and productions, yet they kept nothing recognizable of humanity in their forms.

The Borg and the antithesis are reviled just as equally, technically, in each world, yet the Borg were not simply a two-dimensional evil faction but a full civilization that built things and even had philosophy in its collective, even if it was alien to Picard and the rest. With that said, Uncle and the others had encountered speaking infiltration units of the antithesis, and while they had obviously had outside influences implanted into them, the fact that they spoke, that Uncle Roger had a conversation with one, was enough to plant a hefty seed of doubt in me.

Synaptic referred to those types as Apostles, beings that spoke to those who saw themselves as elite and above the masses of the worlds they invaded. They were extremely adept at rapidly learning about social structures and the history of the dominant civilizations, yet they were relatively rare in most early stages of their invasions. On record, there have been thousands of planets that have had records of Apostles active on them, and of those, barely eighty have fallen due to their direct efforts. That did not mean they did nothing, of course. Their effect was to bleed resources and people away from the fronts that needed them, while generally weakening the defenses of said world.

And yet, interestingly enough, once the invasions entered their full intensity, or if the civilization grew to a point that they could repel, or at least contain the antithesis threats fully, the Apostles vanished. Those who worshiped them or followed their plans either vanished as well, fled the world, or were lynched. What made me curious were those who vanished on worlds that contained the threat. The antithesis had no reason to take them, nor kill them, to my knowledge, and the records that were in the catalog didn’t say what happened to them, either. It made me wonder if they were removing destabilizing factors for some reason or if it was a failsafe to protect some core secret of the plants.

As I closed the video player and placed those thoughts into storage to stew upon later, I sped up my processors as the shell had alerted me that I would be landing on Four Vesta soon. Well, "landing" was a bit misleading, as I was in a bullet, not a landing craft like what humanity used to land on the Moon and Mars. Mom had installed a great deal of safety equipment to make sure I didn’t simply obliterate Four Vesta upon landing or knock it out of its orbit from the sun, yet I would still end up making a crater and alerting any antithesis that might definitely possibly be there.

I turned towards the sensory array and scanned Four Vesta, calculating that I would enter the range for the initial dampeners in five real-life minutes, or about a month or so at my relative accelerated processing speed. I checked the telemetry data and noticed the unfortunate signs of antithesis camouflage. It was something various Samurai astronomers cataloged and examined in depth, especially after the siege on Mars started. While the readings appeared normal, they all gave out the exact same reactions as other asteroids in the sector. Not simply reacting as if Four Vesta had its iron-nickel core or its near nonexistent gravity or that it reflected light in a certain way, but that it has the exact same make up and gravity and reflectiveness as the nearest six asteroids.

Goodie for me, as it meant my neighbors would most certainly want me dead. Oh! It was only a few around me, as there were far more that gave off the more normal, different signals. Excellent, I had options for expansion and mining. Although there were fewer asteroids in this sector than I was expecting, which was strange but not entirely unusual.

Now, I just needed to make sure I could deal with the hordes that would most certainly be after me the moment I landed. The only good news I could hope for is that the hive would not be on too high alert, maybe mistaking me for an actual, different asteroid. It might allow me a few more minutes to get some defenses set up, though they would not be fooled for long.

I was planning on hitting Four Vesta head on, as center mass as I could, which was made easy considering the ovoid shape of it and the fact that the widest portion was facing me. Considering the radius was two hundred and sixty-five kilometers at its longest and about half that at its shortest, the best-case scenario would be if the main hive would be at one of its ends, while the worst-case scenario…

I decided not to think about that as I adjusted my approach vectors, the hundreds of tiny maneuvering thrusters working in tandem to make certain I would hit exactly where I wanted. They burned super slowly, but again, relative time was fun. Considering the size of Four Vesta, the camouflage field would probably extend about a kilometer or two out from the surface. I would breach it seconds before I landed, so I would have a couple of hours to plan out my general base of operations. I could figure out the specifics once I had a geological survey of the surface and how structurally stable it was.

The basic plan was to set up a small bunker first while using the basic fusion generator in the shell as a temporary power source. It would be large enough to hold the portal frame and a war table, while the walls would be as thick as I could make them and filled with sensors. From there, I would build a few weapon encampments and rush the production of the portal frame before sending out a beacon to update the exact coordinates and frequencies back to Mom and Mother, as well as a situation update to them. It would take a few minutes for them to get it, but once they did, I would receive a flood of reinforcements to help me stabilize my situation.

From there, I would be able to push out the antithesis and take over Four Vesta, transforming it into the interstellar base of my dreams! I was still trying to figure out what I wanted to model it after, or even if I wanted to do something of my own design. It was a tough decision, really. Did I conform to the general theme that Uncle Victor had going of using different gaming properties, or did I embrace my own creativity and make something I wanted? Considering this was going to be both a war vessel, as well as a a mining rig, so the effective designs in media were weirdly common, yet also limited…

As I was in the middle of finalizing the production queue for my Fabricator Swarms, I breached the barrier surrounding Four Vesta quite a bit earlier than I expected. And when I turned my attention to the outside sensors, I gasped. Four Vesta had gained approximately twenty-eight percent surface area in pure plant matter, with the ovoid shape having been smoothed out to a near-perfect orb. I saw hundreds of plant balls orbiting the central hive at various heights and what looked like spires set to send and receive things, given their spiral, springy structures.

Worst of all, my worst-case scenario had happened. My landing zone, the spot I had decided was my best bet to avoid destroying Four Vesta or knocking it off its orbit before I could fix it, and the one spot with what I had hoped was the greatest distance from the hive? It was smack in the middle of what I could only assume was an anti-orbital weapon. There was a large spiraling structure, akin to a cuttlefish shell, with the central spire poking out and ending in a huge, riffled hole.

As I saw that, I could not help but chuckle, and before I knew it, that chuckle had turned into a full-on manic laugh. The situation was at its worst, yet due to some fluke of cosmic luck, I was given possibly the best solution. If I had chosen a different landing zone, or if I had been launched any later from the moon, I would most certainly have landed on the hard outer shell of the hive or the weapon. Maybe I could have angled to land in one of the spires, but there would be no guarantee that I could have entered the hive safely.

Yet with my approach angle, I had a perfect chance to do some real damage to the hive. I readjusted my build queue to add in explosives while the bunker was being built while also loading in every piece of telemetry data I obtained from the the Void Watcher scanners. The shell finished its final adjustment burn after it had plowed through a stray orbiting plant ball, not shifting a centimeter in the process.

I saw a few other balls begin to shift and unwind themselves, turning into a mass of coral-like tentacles. The speed at which they unwound was terrifying, yet they would be far too late to intercept me. With the final checks finished and my Fabricators beginning to make the several hundred pounds of grenades, I activated my personal frame from its hibernation and began the process to shift it to its combat state.

As I settled into the frame, I once more felt the love and care of my mothers. They poured so much into this body to keep me safe and make me dangerous, and while I was looking forward to testing what this thing could do, I also felt some trepidation towards the inevitable combat I would face. I knew that I would not die if this frame, this body of mine, were to be destroyed, but it was a gift filled with love and care and precision, and getting it damaged was not something I wanted to see happen.

As the final combat startup sequence finished, a message hidden at the end of the BIOS startup opened itself. It was a compressed audio file, nothing complicated, and it was something I could listen to at my full relative speed.

As I hit play, a voice that I was all too familiar with. Hey there, Starlight. It was Mother, and at the sound of her nickname for me, I felt my core stiffen with feelings of joy, homesickness, and love. If you are hearing this, then that means you are about to face real combat for the first time. Morrigan and I spent days on this frame, testing and simulating dozens of safety features, alloys, and armors, as well as a few more fun toys for you to experiment with on your own. I am confident that this is the greatest work that Morrigan and I are currently capable of making and that it will keep you safe. That said, knowing you, Starlight, you will be worried about damaging it or having it destroyed. Please, don’t worry yourself about that, as this is designed to take a beating, designed to take down as many xenos scum as possible before your core should ever be in danger. Use it as the tool it was designed to be, as it can always be repaired. Run wild, starlight, and burn as bright as your heart desires.

As the message ended, I felt the warmth from Mother’s voice linger on my core, and before I could process things further, my HUD flickered to life with massive words in Mom's "handwriting." “Fuck 'em up, love.”

I laughed hard as the instructions for the frame flew by, giggling further at the insane names that some of these functions were called. And as the shell finally slammed down the barrel of the antithesis gun, breaching the shell and slamming into the hive beneath, causing the sealed atmosphere to begin explosively escaping from the new hole and destabilizing the barrel, I launched my frame out of the shell and got ready to cause some chaos.