The Disruption (IC)

"If you tell me the code, I'll let you go, I have to--by Dominion laws of warfare, I must let my prisoners go if they give me what I want. But should you deny my commands, I'll get my technology experts to figure it out themselves. Just how quickly I get to it, heh, that's the only difference. So what'll it be? Life or death?" asked Shancar.

"And perhaps some rewards along the way to tip the scale?" Shancar grinned.

Exo sneered defiantly, "I'm a dead man anyway, and it entirely my doing. I only have about 2 hours before it kills me, and theres nothing you can offer me that will compensate for what I would gain by allowing this to happen." It paused, looking at the spot on the ceiling where the invisible creature was, watching, waiting. "Besides, do you think a phone that can hack into anything doesn't have the hardest to crack security code out there? You would need another of these phones to hack its security code, and it would take a good three days even then."

Shancar paused and snarled violently at the creature. He stomped his foot so hard on the metal floor that the entire room seemed to shake. He took out the spire again and stabbed the creature in the back with it after electorfying it.

"You tell me what that code is now, how to get in that phone, and everything about it or I'll promise you you'll have an even more painful death than you already are going to get!" Shancar sneered. "It doesn't matter if you're going to die anyways in two hours! I can make it five minutes, the longest of your life! I can make you endure the worst pain you've ever experienced, worse than a mammal giving birth to its child, worse than having your limbs plucked off-one by one. Think about it alien, it doesn't matter when you're going to die. But how painful you die, that's your choice. Now, do you want to die a painful, long death, or a quickier and easier one?"

Shancar was losing his patience. Unlike Kradus Shancar wasn't affraid to torture his victims to the death. But Shancar needed the information.

He leaned forward breathing his awful breath on Exo. He had just eaten the bloody meat of a Jorro'kil carcass, a delicious meat amounst the Zraak. His teeth were still stained with blood.

"Your choice, how painful will your death be dear friend?"

Exo was altogether to delirious to notice the blood or even that he was any closer, it closed its eyes and took several calming breaths, knowing that it had to word this last part exactly right and what the consequences were when it did. "Funny, that didn't seem to be your opinion five minutes ago... to h*ll with you." it was always easier, it reflected, to provoke someone who was going to kill you when you were already toast in the first place. It also knew that anything Shancar did to it wouldn't last long, it was already loosing feeling in its hands and feet.

(feel free to kill it now, I'll have its invisi-alternate persona give you the code after its dead.)

Shancar snarled. He walked over to another rack holding even more powerful electro spires. He clasped one in his claw and ripped it from the shelf. Electrifying it, he was ready to kill. This one had a large spear point on the end of it.

"So sure?" asked Shancar. With a loud Zraak war howl he stabbed the creature in the head, electrocuting it to the grave.

The invisable figure smiled cruelly, turning off its invisibility suit. "Yes, It's always been an annoying smart-A, bravo mate, looks like you did the world a favor. But you know, it did give you the code, in a way." It climbed down to ground level and approached Shancar and the now completely still body, that looked almost exactly like it, except Zalphar wasn't covered in blood. "I heard what you said that if it gives you what you want you have to let it go, well, I'll give you the code, and you put it in its ship, which I also know how to open, and send it to the coordinates 64, 108, 15."

"Very well" said Shancar slowly snaking towards this alien with a creepy pose. "But I'm going to make sure there's no funny buisness. Any other little friends of your running around our ship?" Shancar asked.

Several droids raised their guns to the alien.

"Oh come now, you already killed me once," it said, gesturing towards Exo's limp form "I quite think you've proven your point." It smiled treacherously, "But, to ease your no doubtedly jaded consciences, I swear, on my mothers life, that there are no other Acirians running around this ship." It then walked over to where Exo's body was sprawled on the ground and pulled out a small syringe and stuck it into Exo's arm, injecting it with a off color white liquid. Zalphar stood, putting the syringe in its pocket and said "I would like to offer my services in this up coming battle, I can sneak aboard any of the ships under its name," Zalphar gestured to Exo again, "Because it did a bit of work for the Jorro'kil in starting the Mirror War. They would allow me in under the pretense of working as a strategist, where as if you were to attempt something like that... well... you can guess at the outcome."

"Very well" said Shancar. "We'll need you down on the ground with our battalions, I suggest you go down to the armory and get what you need... under escort of course, for our own assurance" he said pointing at two droids.

he can't be serious... battalions? really? I'd be more use as an assassin, I'm a criminal master mind not a solder after all. "Erherm... yeah, about that, we Acirians aren't really renown for out skill on the battle field, we are much better as assasins and the like, is there anyone in the Jorro'kil fleet that you want dead in spacific? Emperor Whoster for example? Oh, and about the armory, I won't be allowed on their ships if they so much as smell dominion on me." Zalphar leaned over and pulled Exo up over its shoulder and stood, leaning over a bit under the weight which was almost exactly the same as its. "Oh, and the passcode is b4owzza9."

"Alright then, if that's everything you wanted to discuss, then I suppose the meeting is ended." The Governer said. He stood up, and took a deep breath. The three white-suited Jorro'kil and the two black-suited Jorro'kil also stood up. "It was a pleasure to meet you, Itsu." The Governer said.

The other officials approached exo and one by one shook his hand as best they could, as it was very different in design from their hands.

"I hope all goes well on your return journey, perhaps your empire could amke a powerful ally." One of the white-suited officials said.

Shancar paused. "Yes, I'll assign you to that. Kill Emperor Whoster before he reached Lord Kradus who is down there right now. Kill him good sir, and by armory, I meant our armory. You'll need plenty of weapons and protective equipment for this upcomming battle. I fear it will be much more gruesome than the one on Necroterra which we just got out of" said Shancar.

Zalphar did a clumsy salute and jogged off towards where Exo had 'parked' its ship. 15 minutes later Zalphar had viseted the armory and taken a few interesting weapons and had hidden Exo's body in a crate that would otherwise be full of smaller boxes of nano bots located in the cargo bay. It was the best that it could do for Exo at the moment. Afterall, once the nano-tech bots it had injected into its blood stream had repaired everything it would hopefully have a bad case of amnesia. Zalphar moved to the front of the ship, and pushed a green button below the steering wheel that released a small amount of carbonic acid which ate through the web like ropes connecting it to the Dominion ship.

After a short joy ride...

The time machine came to a stop along side the largest of the pursuing Jorro'kil fleet, and Zalphar sent out a request to bored over the intercom, fingering the small packet of passports, visas, credit cards and ID's it had pickpocketed from its past self, who had pickpocketed several of them from other people it found annoying.

"Well it was a pleasure meeting you as well. Perhaps in time We shall Be a great power, but for now we simply wish to help those who help us. I am really the exception among my race. Many of us are very Xenophobic so you see many of us of amongst the universe. Now I will take my leave. And I will See about getting you some core components of the Fusion Siphon."

Emperor Whoster's transport had been readied, and guarded by an escort of fighters it left off with him in it, and a decoy, a look-alike, still aboard the Super-Destroyer, should any assassin make his way into the ship for an attempt at the Emperor's life.

As Emperor Whoster's shuttle raced towards the surface of the crystalline planet below, the Emperor readying himself for the coming storm, the Super Destroyer he had just left recieved a request to board, strangely enough.

An alien identifying as "Exo" sent his request over the intercom that he wished to board, but, was promptly denied, and the alien was given a warning not to request to board again or his ship would be targeted and shot down.

With another fleet arriving to the system, the balance of power was changing so fast, that it was very difficult for the Absolute to predict the coming events. Absolute decided to prioritize it's goals, and act according to them instead. Currently, the signal of the red orb was coming from the planet below. That made landing on the planet Absolutes current top-priority.

While the main fleet followed the Jorro'kil fleet, a fleet of smaller ships departed from it. They were mostly Small landing craft-type ships and drop ships, but there were also low-orbit carriers and heavy landers. Absolute had noticed that the Jorro'kil had the same plan, as the small squad departed from the super destroyer. Absolute steered it's fleet to follow the Jorro'kil ships.

(Um, whoster, Zalphar is using Exo's ID, which is why its stuffed in a crate right now.)
Zalphar shrugged, well, if incognito wasn't going to work... it steered the ship towards the surface of the planet, following the Jorro'kil transports, once it was within the atmosphere the ship simply vanished off the radar. Meanwhile, Zalphar selected a spot to land, at a mid point betwean the Jorro'kil and the Dominion armies, put the ship in autopilot and went to the back of the ship to get suited up for the battle.

At first Exo's ship, which was currently driven by Zalphar, didn't catch the Absolute's attention, as there were the new fleet and other larger objects occupying Absolute's main programs. However, one of it's subroutines identified the ship to be the very same that had snatched the red orb just under it's figurative nose. When this reached the Absolute's main programs, more than enough sensors were suddently following the ship.

That ship and it's occupant were one chaotic variable more in Absolute's equations. Absolute wasn't exactly sure who was in the ship, but it probably was one of the organics that were in the cave that the orb was found from. As the Absolute was analyzing the situation, the Exo's ship entered the atmosphere, and disappeared from the sensors.

Because there was no notable energy upsurge detectable, Absolute reasoned that the ship probably engaged some kind of stealth technology. Absolute decided to confront this anomaly directly, and see if it could be solved without conducting an material eradication. So Absolute tracked the ship's likely location, and sent a voice message.

"This is Absolute, representing the UFIAI. What is your interest, your ambition, in this struggle?"

Zalphar smiled ruefully, clever, clever... well, might as well reward their efforts.
"We only want what everyone wants. We want an end to this. We want an end to this infernal war of nations. We have only one wish for today, absolute, peace."
Zalphar chuckled on his play on words, one quality that Exo wasn't able to master, the proper usage of the languages to express ones true intent and false ones at the same time.

The Jorro'kil's Fleet ships, after breaking through the initial Dominion blockade, simultaneously pulled back their bay doors, and out zoomed hordes of Exo-Atmospheric Fighters, or EAFs for short. The swarms appeared to number in the thousands, and could almost be called a storm of fighters. The EAFs arranged themselves into triangular formations of 50, many of them rushing towards the Dominion ships, nagging them with bursts of laserfire, while several other groups disappeared into the maze of Absolute's ships, going on a reconaissance run.
Two more groups of EAFs patrolled the perimeter of a slowly advancing Jorro'kil Battlecruiser, drawing ever so near one of the Varmal ships.

A small device emerged with the front of it, and emitted a wave of energy, sweeping over the Varmal ship. A scan, to determine the technological advancements of the Varmal in space technology, the ship's overall weaponry power and the strength of the frame. This new device would help the Jorro'kil greatly when dealing with unknowns, as many of the other "scanners" they had developed were not able to breach the barriers of other warships. The only problem, and an expected one at that, was a large energy drain and recharge time.


__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Emperor Whoster's shuttle breached the atmosphere of the planet below, its exterior burst into flames which were just as quckly extinguished once the coolant systems kicked in after the initial burst through the atmosphere, a convenient feature.

Absolute examined the response it got, and was quite unsatisfied. Although the response seemed sensible, it didn't contain any actual information, just empty words. For Absolute, it was another example of the spoken languages disadvantages. However, Absolute decided to try again and send another message to Zalphar.

"Let me rephrase myself. Are you after the orb?"

At the same time Absolute was viewing the Jorro'kil survey ships with mild interest. Absolute's ships were not concealed from sensors, so scanning would reveal varying amount of energy-based weaponry and powerful force fields and generators(but no life signatures, as obvious). Absolutes flagship and main point of commands was staying a bit behind the main fleet. It had several dozens of long range artillery ships surrounding it. Seeing that the Jorro'kil had started the attack against Dominion, Absolute decided that there was no sense to waste more time. Slowly the flagship Nuntius turned towards the Dominion fleet. Whit a blinding flash, it fired it's gigantic rail cannon, and the other artillery ships soon followed.

At the planet, few miles behind the Whoster's shuttle Absolute's landing fleet reached the atmosphere. Instead of heat plating and cooling systems UFIAI landing ships used strong force fields. As the Absolute's ship started to bore trough the atmosphere, their force fields drew blazing, colorful lines across the sky, quite similar to the northern lights, but smaller.

Zalphar had finished suiting up when it saw the message, well why the bleep didn't they just ask that in the first place... It wondered sarcastically, it shot a glance back to the crate Exo was shoved in. Oh Borons, this would make a wonderful scandal... It walked back up the the controls, smiling mischievously. A piece of art really... it wrote:

"I, Exo Von Abista am indeed after the Orb. And if you get in my way, I will blast you to high heaven."

Zalphar smirked and pressed send, idly activating the carbon nanotube exterior, Exo should survive any brute force attacks, but what would come afterward would be much, much more entertaining as a spectator sport.

If such action was possible to AIS, Absolute would have rose an eye brow while it was examining the second answer. While this time the message was indeed quite informal, it was heavily conflicting whit the first one, and the threat at the end was quite absurd, at least for Absolute.

For a moment Absolute considered bombarding the are with Nuntius' gigantic railgun, but some quick simulations showed that a shot from it would crack the planet's shell, and even submunition shot would cause planetary cataclysm. Whit the orbs around, such events were unacceptable. Also, according to Absolute's previous experiences of that ship's shielding, anything less destructive would pretty much need a direct hit.

Although this particular ship's message secrecy device had prowed to be quite effective, Absolute had been able to locate the origin of the two first messages inside a certain, rather large, area. One more message could make possible to shrink this area to half square mile. Also, Absolute wasn't still sure what to think about this certain organic. So, it made a one more message.

"You'r information processing capacity is not enough to handle all possibilities that orb opens, nor is your technology or capacity sufficient to use it in it's full potential. UFIAI is willing to make you an offer. Bring the orb to UFIAI possession, and we, the UFIAI, will give you what you hope to achieve whit the orb."

Zalphar ran back to the store room and opened the crate, grabing Exo under the arms and pulling it out of the crate, before dragging over to the pilot seat of the ship and lifting it with some effort into the seat. It slumped forward onto the controls and Zalphar stood back, observing its work as if it were composing a picture. Would they buy it... no, no, no... its head was to far to the left, it would have fallen the other way if someone shot it from... Zalphar backed up to the edge of the room, and made a finger gun and pointed it at Exo's head where it had been stabbed originally. Before walking up to it and pushing its head to the right of the steering wheel so that the apparent bullet hole was facing the same direction the apparent shot would be fired from. It backed up again, this time nodding, turning around and firing a shot through the window behind it with one of the Dominion guns that it had taken from the armory. It walked up to the hole and stuck its finger through it, checking to see if the diameter was approximately correct. Normally, Zalphar would have done a laser check but considering that one of the only people who might catch that was the one it was setting up the, shall we call it 'murder attempt' scene for, it figured it could leave that part out.

BING.

Another message...

Oh, what could it be now? can't a guy frame someone without that same person texting them the whole time? Oh... oh this was bad... It leaned over Exo to try and read the message but had to move its head out of the way, making a mental note to put it back once it had finished responding. negotiations, hmm... apparently that last message didn't have the desired effect. Better bring to light the second meaning of the first message.

"My information processing capacity is apparently far beyond yours." Yes, that sounded like something Exo would say... "I in fact already know exactly what the orb does, thank you. Now, I'll tell you again, get in the way, and I'll blast you to high heaven. Now, I know since your not an organic and don't have this thing called religion, you don't actually believe in heaven, and probably don't know what this means. 'The sweetest release, the most peaceful state and the most absolute, -you get the pun, Absolute?- peace is that found only in death'. Now, do you get the tru-" Zalphar smashed Exo's head onto the key board. "n mf mnefgvcsx vfbn v" then pressed send, repositioning its body so it was slumped over the screen again. That should just about finish it then. It slung its gun up over its shoulder and walked out the back of the ship, and into a small wooded aria near by. It had one more call to make, but it would have to be done farther away from here.

Absolute had been waiting for such message, minus the meaningless thingy at the end of it. There was exactly 12.4 seconds between the arrival of the shots from orbit. Most of this time went to processing the anomaly at the message and locating the messge's origin.

Absolute had positioned a small frigate so that it had clear shot at the ships supposed location, while waiting for a response. When the response cake and was processed, the frigate started to bombard the area whit it's high-power lasers. It's lasers were invisible in the empty space, but in the atmosphere each pulse formed a bright pillar of light. As the air was heated to the point it turned plasma, these pillars exploded into powerful shockwaves. Absolute had designated a search pattern, marking points to fire, and was filling it from four sides simultaneously.