"The sound struck fear into the Mar-gite. We thought the Mar-gite didn't feel fear, that they didn't have the neural wiring for it.
"The sound of 'ep ep ep' carried through the vacuum as they charged into Mar-gite boarded vessels.
"The Felt Marines were on our side.
"It's thirty years later and that sound still makes my hands shake." Commander A'argu'uyle - Kra'at Systems Ship Executor Officer. Mar-Gite Siege of Cygnus Orion
"Another wave, Admiral! Two-hundred fifty six point sources! All in Giga or higher range!" tactical called out. "We've got another dark matter pool forming!"
HEAVY TAL INCOMING rang out. Admiral Kra'akenwulf knew it was full of data for the navigation, communication, and other stations as well as a warning.
The Solarians were coming.
The Iron Fist shuddered as it suddenly corkscrewed through space, its damaged engines roaring, vibrating the whole ship as it managed to avoid a brace of spears as well as the cloud of 'boarders' sailing through space. A quick glance showed that the boarders would sail out and hit the stellar mass in a few months without intercepting anything.
Lighter ships or ships that had been heavily damaged had been tasked with taking out any groups of 'boarders' or any spears that might intersect with an orbital body before falling into the stellar mass.
The ship shuddered again and the artificial gravity heeled over to the starboard.
Admiral Kra'akenwulf held onto the bar that circled the holotank with his left side0 hands, pointing at holotank 3 with his upper right hand.
"Go to evasion!" he shouted. He had a steady whining noise in one ear and was blind in two eyes. "Tell the Pride of the Emperor Task Force to pull back!"
He knew that everyone had to keep at least a five light second distance between themselves and the Dra.Falten task force, since the weapons were dangerous to everyone, allies and the Dra.Falten alike.
"Dark matter pool is showing bulging!" scanners called out.
ARISTAEUS IS HERE roared out enough that several of the Mar-gite constructs near the dark matter pool suddenly exploded into slurry that froze almost instantly. The dark matter pool bulged, then tore, splashing dark matter for light seconds. Mar-gite clusters hit by it detonated, pieces flaming, burning in th vacuum of space with purple fire that completely consud them.
What ca erged was a massive colossus closer in size to a subcontinent than a standard spacecraft. Its warsteel hull looked like a female Terran sitting down, legs open, arms held out wide. She was naked, lush to the point of obese, with her hair spilling down her back. Broken chains hung from her arms and legs and crisscrossed her chest and vanished under her hair.
The holotank flickered and what appeared made Kra'akenwulf blink.
It was a puppet made of plush, blue fur, wide eyes, a big mouth, a dieval helt on his head. Above its head read dumbwire approximation in floating letters.
"Captain Super-Grover here, Admiral," the puppet exclaid, flailing its arms.
Kra'akenwulf realized the strange creature was wearing a cape.
"Stack your ships up for repair! Dumbwires for all!" the puppet yelled. It thrust a fist in the air. "NONE SHALL FALL! WE'RE BUILT FOR THE STREETS!"
The signal suddenly cut out.
Kra'akenwulf didn't bother asking questions.
"Queue them up by most need and most tonnage," Kra'akenwulf said.
Another set of spears slid by so close lightning arced off of the Fist's battlescreens to play up and down the compressed calcite spear.
The Kra'at heavy cruiser You Serve at the Voter's Sufferance Not Consent moved up to one of the outspread legs, cuddling up to the outside of the massive thigh. Gantries and tractor/pressor beams reached out, gently cradling the mangled hull and bringing the massive 2 kiloter long warship close.
Fuzzy creatures that resembled long bodied long mouthed felt puppets clad in armored spaceesuits charged in to work. Welder's sparked, hamrs slamd against bent hull plates to the rhythm if 'yup yup yup'.
Inside a massive fluffy yellow bird wore a cap with the left side curled. It cracked a whip at the shaggy elephantine creatures.
"PUT YOUR BACKS INTO IT, YA SCURVY DOGS! THE BATTLE'S STILL ON!" the avian creature shouted over the din of the repair bays. "GET OUT THE WIRES AND MAKE THOSE SHIPS DUMB!"
At the windowed repair oversight bridge a creature much like the Captain, only red and without helm or cape, watched with cold calculating eyes as the puppet ship crews flew into a frenzy of activity. He pointed out any starting mistakes, any misstep, any confusion and corrected it with a voice of frozen helium that was obeyed instantly.
The cape and helt clad Captain turned to a green hairy version wearing in jungle camouflage fatigues already stained with motor oil and coffee grounds, his battered and dented helt had a banana peel tucked into the strap with "SEWN TO KILL" written above it.
"Commit the widows, Commander, start recovering the derelicts. Get Marines out there," the Captain ordered, flailing his arms.
"Aye, Captain. Tasking the widows," snarled the puppet that everyone knew joined the Black Fleet just to spite the recruiters.
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Tugs detached from the woman's hair, spreading out, heading for mission killed or partially destroyed craft or ships that could not move under their own power. They looked like Terran woman in tattered wedding dresses, veils tattered and torn. Their faces were half cold beauty, half skull visage, their arms reached out toward their target, the razor sharp talons curled in a gentle yearned.
Emanating from the tugs were psychic screams of absolute rage and insanity.
One tug reached out their cupped hands, taking hold of the target. It nestled up to a heavily damaged super-cruiser. It connected as the arms wrapped around, tubes shooting out to connect to the holes created by the Mar-gite to board the ship. Another joined it, on the opposite side of the hull, the arms of the ship wrapping around the massive warship.
The desperate crew mbers, so down to fighting with prybars, knives, or worse, felt their ship jostle as the tug, shaped like a woman gowned and veiled with outstretched arms, reached out and drew their ship close.
There was a tremble to the deckplates.
The crew heard it, insanely, through the vacuum.
ep ep ep ep.
Then an all consuming crazed scream of insane joy and pleasure.
Dozens of screams, all overlapping.
From the tugs flooded the Marines. Crazed eyes, red curly fur, a roaring chainsword in their hands, a spiked collar around the neck. Behind them ca a shorter, purplish creature with a question mark for a nose, stitches down one side of his face, an archaic designed Kevlar helt with Gunnery Sergeant rank on the front, an unopened pack of Pall Mall reds on one side and "
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