After consuming a bit more alcohol than they could easily metabolize, most of the Juon were starting to look a little wobbly.

“I wanna another,” Lieutenant Guzzala said as she clumsily slithered towards the bar.

“Um, I really don’t think that’s a good idea,” the captain said, rippling with genuine concern. “Hey, why don’t you make her a virgin-”

“Yooou can’t make me a virgin,” the lieutenant slurred, interrupting the captain. “I’m already a virgin!”

“Oh no,” the captain laughed. “And that’s why Terran spirits are so hard to find in Imperial space. When most species encounter them for the first time, they swear off of them for life. I warned you kids that the stuff was dangerous.”

“Here you go, sweetie,” Sheila said, laughing from the lieutenant’s surprise revelation. “It’s a virgin, just like you.”

“Anyway,” the captain said, returning to the story, “After the Luna-5 disaster, the Terrans lost it. There were riots just about everywhere in the system immediately. After that, the whole system shut down.”

“The whole system?” one of the Z’uush asked. “How did they coordinate such a mass demonstration so quickly.”

“Terrans don’t have to,” the captain replied. “There is this inexplicable phenomenon involving them. They are normally incredibly individualistic, much more so than a lot of species. But sometimes, their minds, no, their very souls link up, and they mimic a hive-mind. This phenomenon has been studied for hundreds of years, and no clear answers have ever been found. It ‘just happens’.”

“That makes no sense.” The Z’uush said, blinking in confusion.

“Nope. It doesn’t,” Sheila said as she took a bite from a skewer. “You Z’uush are excellent cooks, by the way. These things are delicious.”

“The bizarre thing is that it will infect other species if you get too close to it,” Captain Zzuural said with a laugh. “If it happens, you will get swept up in it just like them. It is like a psychic black hole. Once you cross the event horizon, even reason can’t escape.”

“That’s a really good explanation,” Sheila said, nodding approvingly. “This linking can form over the most random things too. Sometimes it’s a good thing like project lifeline where thousands of Terran civilians took their ships directly into harm’s way to evacuate Imperial civilians when the Collective attacked. Sometimes it’s just weird or silly, like the great nakedness. And sometimes, more than we would like, it’s negative, and we get mass protests and, in the worst cases, riots or lynchings. The Juon, sorry, I mean tyrants, got to experience that first hand. Almost the entire population of the Sol system just went bugshit. Government vehicles and buildings burned, tyrant businesses and a few of our own for good measure got looted, ships and even space stations were scuttled. It was one of the best riots in history.”

“Wait. Back up there. The great nakedness?” the captain asked. The humans broke out in laughter.

“You didn’t know about the great nakedness?” Sheila laughed. “Ok, the planet Mars is cold, but with all of the reactors and other machinery, it can get quite warm, even uncomfortably hot under the domes and especially in the tunnels. The powers that be running Mars Twelve decided to cut back on the colony-wide cooling in order to save money. You can imagine that there were complaints. Someone, and we to this day don’t know who, lost their temper, completely stripped, and started running around yelling that it was ‘too fucking hot’. Then a few more joined him, then a few more, then a lot more. Soon, thousands took to the streets completely naked. They were running around, posing for the news cameras, painting themselves, squirting each other with water bottles, just having a great time. Hell, some people rushed to the station just so they could join in,” Sheila giggled. “Needless to say, the cooling was restored to its former levels pretty damn quick. You can still buy shirts and souvenirs there emblazoned with ‘It’s too fucking hot!’ to this day.”

The Juon lost it and started laughing hysterically, including the captain.

“Ok… Ok,” he said as he finally caught his breath. “As Sheila said, the Terrans were running around, and it definitely wasn’t the great nakedness. As the Terrans like to say, ‘Shit got real’. Anything resembling law, order, and most importantly to the tyrants, production came to a complete stop. Those people they had forced into working for them? They only had a few guards and automated doors to keep them in line. The guards were overpowered or run off, and the doors were torn apart. Billions, possibly trillions of credits worth of equipment was vandalized to the point that it was unrecoverable. Entire factories and mineral processing centers were completely destroyed. The Terrans that we all know and love had awakened, and all hell was breaking loose.”

“What took the Terrans so long?” one of the troopers asked, “The Terrans that I know would have been ripping some beaks off long before this.”

“A huge part of it was the first Lord Chancellor, Lord Zuk, and Tak Nakamura,” Sheila replied. “They both wielded a great deal of influence in the Sol system, and they were urging restraint while they tried to work out some sort of diplomatic resolution. Even though he was fired and disgraced, Lord Zuk was still going to all of the noble houses strong enough to resist the Emperor and trying to get one of them to get involved. None of them did. They had their own problems and weren’t too eager to add a new one,” Sheila said. “Good ol’ Lord Zuk kept at it until he was imprisoned for the crime of being a pain in the ass. Once that happened, people realized that the situation was permanent, and things started to go downhill fast. Even so, Tak still desperately urged restraint while he tried to reason with the new Lord Chancellor. He was also urging restraint for another reason that he wasn’t telling anyone about. You will find out why in a bit. Ol’ Tak’s word carried a lot of weight. It still does. He ended the Sol Wars, or he would have if you guys hadn’t shown up. Something like that gets you respect, a fuckton of it.”

A Z’uush walked past with a fresh tray of skewers, and Jacob, one of Sheila’s crew, started to reach for one.

“I’m afraid to ask, but what is this?” he asked, pointing at the meat.”

“Human-friend Jacob, it’s Terran chicken. Did you not recognize it? We asked if they had any Terran delicacies available, and luckily they did! We wanted to thank you for everything you have done for us.”

“It doesn’t quite look like chicken. Did they say it was chicken, or do you know it was chicken?”

“Oh, it was definitely chicken. It still had had the scales on and everything,” the Z’uush replied proudly.

“Cool, hand me some more of this ‘chicken’ would you,” Jacob laughed.

“Anyhow,” Sheila continued, “The Lord Chancellor wasted no time sending most of his forces to ‘crush the uprising’ as he put it and gave them orders to open fire. And to their surprise and horror, we started shooting back. Part of the annexation agreement was that we were to disarm. Now Lord Zuk figured that going in and trying to actively confiscate people’s weapons would be a bad, bad, really bad idea. So, he instead set up a buy-back program where once someone felt comfortable, they could turn in their arms, figuring that we would see how nice being an Imperial subject was and that within a few years, we would happily exchange our arms for credits. Besides, all we were talking about were ‘primitive’ slug throwers and crude explosive devices. We might as well be throwing spears,” Sheila laughed. “Even the wise Lord Zuk had no idea what our weapons could do, so he didn’t get concerned when nobody turned in their shit. He just figured it would take a little longer than expected, and we would come around eventually. The slug throwers were ‘harmless’ anyhow. He called them our ‘little security blankets’. Lord Zuk was smart, but apparently he didn’t watch the combat footage.”

“The result was that the Sol system was just loaded with weapons,” Captain Zzuural said, “Far more than we even thought possible. Most Terran families were in possession of at least one firearm, predominately the AK-47, and many people had heavier ordinance as well. It turned into a bloodbath. As we all know, 7.62 mm slugs couldn’t be deflected by a soldier’s screens, and the armor-piercing rounds went through their soft armor like it wasn’t even there,” the captain said while taking another bite. “Their armor could prevent penetration of a few of the early standard rounds, but even then, they hit so hard that they would rupture organs. What was even worse for those poor household troopers was that Terran combatants, all of them, were veterans of years, and I mean years, of horrible bloody conflict as opposed to poorly trained and equipped household troops. It was a massacre. In less than twenty-four hours, there were no household forces left on Terra, Mars, Luna, or in Jovian space. They couldn’t even evacuate most of them them. Every time they tried to do an airstrike or put a lander down, somebody would pop up with one of those fucking guided missiles. It was near one hundred percent casualties.”

“Is this when the porkies decided to run?” a Z’uush asked.

“Nope. They were celebrating,” Sheila laughed. “They had absolutely no doubt that the Terrans were going to be wiped out for this, and they would be the ones in charge in just a few weeks. Although to be fair, we were sort of thinking the same thing. One funeral home actually ran an ad saying that they were taking reservations as a joke. It was the meme of the week.”

“The Lord Chancellor actually collapsed,” the captain said with a chuckle, “They say he threw up and hid in his room for the rest of the day. If he actually had a brain in his bag, he would have immediately screamed for help, but he couldn’t stand the humiliation of getting his ass kicked by rock-throwing savages, so he said nothing. He hadn’t deployed absolutely all of his troops, and he had a small fleet of ships. He still thought, or at least desperately wished, that he could get things back under control. This gave the Terrans a few days. Do you have any idea what a Terran can do in a few days, especially when they know an ass-lashing is coming?” the captain said with a laugh. “Then, when they were ready, it happened. The famous broadcast. The Terrans somehow managed to hack into the hyperspace communications feeds and transmitted a message on all bands. Takashi Nakamura’s image was suddenly transmitted across all of the civilized galaxy, and he made a short statement. Terrans, I know all of you know it by heart, so if you would do the honors...”

The Terrans all rose and in a reverent tone recited in unison:

“I’m not going to lie to you. I’m not going to fill your head with ridiculous promises of victory. We are going to lose. That’s a hard cold fact. We face an interstellar empire with countless worlds and a military that dwarfs anything we can ever hope to muster. We are going to lose, but we have a choice. Do we bow, throw ourselves at the feet of this new so-called Emperor and his corrupt lackeys? Do we grovel and whine, or do we fight?

This is not a war where victory can be expected. This is a war with which we will define ourselves. Are we slaves, weak and willing, or are we Terrans? We’ve been here before. When Yellowstone erupted, did we just lie down and quit, or did we fight for our survival doing whatever it took to live just one more day? We didn’t just lie down and quit then, and I say don’t just lie down and quit now. Yes, we are going down for what we have done. An Empire cannot allow us to win, and they will not allow us to win. We will face the fires of hell, but hey, we’ve done that before.

We are Terrans, and Terrans know hell. We are going back to hell, my friends, all of us. We are going to eat bugs, snails, rats, and pond scum, again. We are going to watch our friends and family die, all over again. We are, once again, going back to being outgunned and outnumbered in a hopeless fight against the raiders, but this time the raiders are going to win. Count on it. They are going to win but let’s make them pay for it. Let’s make them fight. Let’s make them know hellfire and ash. Let’s make them pound this system, which they covet so dearly, into the rubble from which it rose not three decades ago. Let’s make them pay for every single cubic inch of it.

We are Terrans, but what does that truly mean? The rest of the fucking galaxy is about to find out. We may very well find out ourselves.

I have a confession, my friends. I am a hypocrite. While I have been urging restraint and peace, I restarted the production of our entire range of arms, using the same fully operational production lines that I pretended to destroy thirty years ago, the day I heard that our only ally in the Empire, Lord Zuk-kal-brekal, had been imprisoned and his mission had failed. I don’t know what good it will do in the end, but we do have vast stockpiles of food and munitions here in Jovian orbit, and transports will be on the way.

As for myself, I will remain here, in orbit around Jupiter, and will run my production lines for as long as I can. During the Sol Wars, I was fortunate. I had supplies, weapons, tools, and a private army. This time my good fortune has run out. Zeus will likely be the first to fall, and when they breach the walls and come for me, I will take up the same weapons I have given to you, and I am going to fight and die alongside my people. It will be my honor and privilege to do so. I hope that I face my fate with a fraction of the bravery and grace that so many of those who have fallen before me have shown. I also hope that I manage to take a few of them along with me.

Logistics and a chain of command are already in place, and we will be moving as much material as we can as fast as we can for as long as we can. You will be contacted by your old leadership, your chieftains, your warlords, your patriarchs, your matriarchs, or your military commanders. They know the score. You trusted them then. Trust them now. We have much to do, and we don’t have much time.

To the Empire, I say only this. We know what pain is. We know what loss is. We know true hopelessness and despair. We know what it feels like to watch the people we love more than life itself die in our arms. We have choked on fire and ash, and we know what hell truly is. Do you? Come, cut us down. Burn us, starve us, kill our friends and family. Go ahead. Do it. We are Terrans. We can die, and we will, by the millions, but we won’t break, ever.

My friends, we have a new Yellowstone. We might as well get to it. Take care and good luck. This is Takashi Nakamura, founder, and CEO of Zeus Industries, signing off.”

The captain and the older Juon started laughing and shaking their heads. The Z’uush and especially younger Juon looked at them in shock. This was an act of unforgivable disrespect. Then, to their complete and utter surprise, the Terrans started laughing even harder.

“Well, it’s nice you guys can laugh about it now,” Sheila said, wiping her eyes.

“Yeah, you got us,” the captain said, his chromatophores flashing in a rueful grin. He looked at the confused faces and turned to Sheila. “Ok, we need to let them in on the joke.”

“Takashi Nakamura is a great man,” she said with genuine admiration in her voice. “In his life, he has been an entrepreneur, an executive, a leader during some of the darkest days in human history, a diplomat, and a statesman. All of those have one trait in common, one thing that is absolutely essential to succeed in all of these fields,” Sheila said with a wicked grin, “You have to be a bullshit artist, and Tak, when he has to be, is one of the best.”

“Do mean that was all a lie?” one of the Juon asked in horror. He was embarrassed and shocked when that triggered another even louder bout of laughter.

“No!” the captain laughed, “Every single fucking word is one hundred percent true. Every fucking word! Every feeling it conveys is genuine and truly captured what it was to be Terran at that moment in time and let us and anybody else in the galaxy know exactly what we were in for. Only one phrase, while technically true, is intended to deceive. That asshole isn’t a bullshit artist. He is a bullshit Cerralz-Delxn. He doesn’t spread the shit around with a shovel. He paints fucking masterpieces with it, and this message is high mind fuckery in its truest form. I think I am going to need another drink to wash the rest of this story down.” The captain rose and headed to the bar.

“Heh, I remember that broadcast,” a grizzled old Juon said, “My first response was ‘What is a Terran?’ So I did a search and said one word, ‘fuck’. Then, I realized they hacked our communications network, and I said, ‘double fuck’. Those three words pretty much described my whole Terran adventure. I’m getting another drink, too.”

“Ok, that message had more than one objective,” Sheila said with a grin. “For us Terrans, it reached out to us. It confirmed our fears, but it also gave us hope.”

“How can any of that give anyone hope?” a Juon asked.

“I get it.” a Z’uush replied. “I really wish I didn’t, but I completely understand.”

“Yeah, that sucks, dude,” Sheila said, raising her glass to the Z’uush. “Anyway, it put a fire in our bellies, and it was exactly what we needed at the time. It also told us that there was a plan and that we had a part to play in it. That was good. It gave us something tangible.” Sheila paused to take another drink. “It also made it completely impossible for the current Lord Chancellor to hide what was going on. As long as it was hidden, he could do whatever he wanted to us, but the Juon have rules. They have customs, traditions, and honor. That bullshit where he just sent people down and told them to start shooting civilians before they even landed? That’s not what the Empire does. That asshole suddenly had a whole lot of questions to answer. His noble house had just been humiliated not only before the Empire, but that message went across the Federation as well. Not only did they lose face big time, but they were also responsible for embarrassing the Empire in front of the Federation. The Emperor himself was demanding answers.”

The young Juon let out a collective “Oooohhh”.

“Which house was it?” one of them asked.

“House Xkloran,” Captain Zzuural shouted from the bar.

“House Xkloran? I’ve never heard of them.”

“And you won’t. All will become clear, my little hatchling.” the captain said, returning to the group, fresh drinking dish in tentacle.

“One thing I don’t get,” a Juona crew member said, “is why would anybody think it was a good idea to transmit that. They called out the house and the entire Empire with the Emperor of that time behaving like it was millennia ago. The Empire and that house, in particular, would have no option but to act, and back then, it would be brutal. That house was humiliated. In those times, the only way to restore their honor would be to respond with force sufficient to restore absolute order immediately regardless of the cost. The loss of Terran lives-”

“Exactly,” The captain interjected. “That was the only move House Xkloran could make. They would have to use overwhelming force, and that is exactly what that glorious bastard Tak wanted.”

“He wanted his people to die?” the Juona asked in complete bewilderment.

“I shall yield the floor to a Terran. They should have the honor of detailing the complete tentacle knotting that happened next.”

Sheila stood with a fiendish grin.

“Ok, to fully understand what happened over the next few days, you have to know a little about Zeus Industries. They are a huge, and I mean huge, chemical refinery and chemical processing outfit operating around Jupiter, our biggest gas giant. They produce deuterium, tritium, helium-3, and a wide range of organic chemicals in unbelievably huge volumes, even by Terran standards. Some of their larger stations are more massive than our carriers. They are fucking huge. If you buy Terran fuel, you probably bought it from them. There are other smaller outfits that produce them, too, but they usually just sell it to Zeus for a very fair price, and then Zeus handles the storage and distribution. They are cool like that. Only the big lunar regolith processors are any real competition.”

“Why so far out? Wouldn’t having your facilities closer to your source materials be more reasonable?” a Z’uush asked.

“They are right on top of them,” Sheila replied. “They mine Jupiter.”

The Z’uush started to murmur among themselves.

“That explains the hydrogen and helium, but what about all the rest?”

“Dude, I didn’t say they skimmed Jupiter. They mine Jupiter. They can go deep, real deep, and chase down concentrations of what they want. Some say they can get all the way down into the metallic hydrogen, but nobody except them knows for sure. They keep that beyond a secret both for industrial and strategic reasons,” Sheila said. “One thing we know for sure is when one of their ships goes down, it can fall off the scanners and not come back up for weeks or even longer. Most of their vessels have isotope separators and other refining equipment on board, and they just stay down till they are full of whatever it is that they want before they come back up. If it’s in Jupiter, they have it. If it can be synthesized from Jupiter, they synthesize it. They also do an insane amount of manufacturing out there as well. They are a titan.”

The Z’uush start chittering excitedly back and forth. This was exciting.

“True gas mining! Do you think we could get involved in something like that?” one of them asked.

“Oh, you like the extreme stuff?” Sheila asked with a smile, “Then forget Jupiter and head over to the Uranus diamond mines.”

The chittering turned to squealing and hiccups.

“Oh, yeah, you will fit in just fine,” Sheila said with a chuckle.

“How much do jobs like that pay?” another Z’uush asked between hiccups. “I understand that compensation isn’t caste-based but depends on something called ‘the free market’?”

“Not sure on the exact amount, but it’s pretty decent. Hey, Jessie, do you have any data?”

“If I don’t, you hired the wrong gal,” Jessie said as she pulled out her tablet, her fingers turning into blurs. A few moments later she said, “I pulled up payroll information from all the mines and refineries in Sol (well the ones we have it’s a lot of them trust me), sorted the various jobs into categories, scrubbed the personal info ’cause you know there are people out there who will steal your shit (heh), and Bunny did her thing-”

“Bunny is her AI,” Sheila explained, shaking her head.

“Bunny did her thing, and this is a conservative estimate for each field. The data is a bit old (It’s been a while since I did a deep dive.), but Bunny and I did account for-”

“Jessie, shut the fuck up and hand it over!” Sheila shouted. “Sorry, she is always like this.”

“Ok,” Jessie said, grinning from ear to ear, “now don’t freak out...” She handed the Z’uush the tablet.

The Z’uush freaked out.

They all freaked out. Much freaking out occurred. While everyone waited for the squealing, hiccuping, and frenzied flailing and jumping to subside, the captain turned to Sheila.

“Hey, you said that you didn’t do stuff in the Republic, but your friend there seems to have some stuff that’s...” he said quietly.

Sheila just shrugged.

“You never know what you will need to know. We aren’t going to ‘do’ anything with it… probably,” Sheila explained. “Besides, it’s impossible to control Jessie. What she has even scares me sometimes.”

They both paused to watch Jessie chasing around dancing Z’uush, who were tossing her tablet back and forth, completely oblivious to the increasingly agitated human female who seemed to be dancing with them for some reason.

Once everything calmed down and Jessie finally got her tablet back, Sheila continued, or she tried to.

“Um… one question,” a Z’uush said in a slightly sad voice. “That is what Terrans make. What can we, honestly, expect to earn.”

“My little Z’uushlet,” Sheila said, “species discrimination is against Terran law, and we take that shit seriously. Also, while everyone assumes that Terran means homo sapiens sapiens,” Sheila pats her chest, “The Republic considers any Republic citizen a ‘Terran’. Chief over there is a Terran, and if you try to tell him otherwise, you will get a wrench shoved up your ass. You will be a Terran the second you raise whatever you guys raise and take the oath. I’ve seen you guys fight, and I know what you do when your backs are against the wall, and there is nowhere to run. You are Terran enough for me. Those numbers you see are for you as well. Terrans get Terran pay.”

A little more happy freaking out occurred, but they soon turned silent as the full weight of what was said sank in. Sheila continued.

“Those gas miners are huge, and they are built to withstand the truly stupid conditions in which they operate. They have massive armor, crazy shields, insane thrusters, stupid inertial dampeners, and gigantic power plants to run all of that, plus the fucking refinery inside. They are a cross between a refinery and a fucking battleship. They are so tough they don’t need hardpoints. Just stick whatever you want, wherever you want. And Zeus… Zeus has a fleet of them,” Sheila said with an impish grin.

“I am starting to see where this is going,” one of the Juon said.

“Yup. Zeus had dozens of gigantic, easily fortifiable stations, a fleet of ships with better stats than a lot of battleships that can hide inside a fucking gas giant, and last but not by any means least, the entire solar system’s stock of the new short, medium and long-range guided anti-ship missiles, weapons that the Empire had never seen before, fucking thousands of them. They had been running the lines 24/7 for a while,” Sheila laughed. “They really should have noticed that Zeus’ labor problems evaporated the fucking day that the news that Lord Zuk was arrested reached Ol’ Tak,” Sheila said with a laugh. “They also probably should have remembered that Zeus Industries was the only organization of any kind that remained in operation throughout the entire Sol Wars. The fucking Sol Wars couldn’t take them out.”

The audience let out a collective “ooo...”

“Ol’ Tak didn’t lie. Zeus was likely to be the first to fall… compared to fucking planets!” She laughed. “Anyway, the Lord Chancellor and House Xkloran had been thoroughly shamed, and the Emperor wanted results. They promised that they would deliver and decided to make fucking sure of it. They sent their entire fleet of ships and all the soldiers they could cram into them to Sol. Their primary target was Zeus, just as was anticipated. They were informed, and you can guess by who, that Zeus also had the largest number of transport vessels in the system, and they were just sitting there, like sitting ducks.” Sheila said with a predatory smile. “That was all well and good, but the household also wanted Tak alive, just as we planned. They figured if they could catch him, they could break him and parade him around like a trophy, just as we expected. While he was completely serious about fighting to the death, he put that line in there for a reason. Taking Zeus in a fashion that would allow them to subdue him would require a lot of men. They would have to storm the place so hard and fast that no resistance was possible.”

“Oh shit,” a Juona said. “Right into the missiles.”

“They should have had you in charge,” Sheila said. “The porkies did their part too, exactly like they were supposed to do. They happily provided all the stale intel and carefully engineered misinformation their spies were given. Both the porkies and household were beyond overconfident, which was a very nice plus. They had no doubt in their mind that absolute victory was at hand. Once they crushed Zeus Industries, they would then subdue the entire system. Their only concern was taking Tak alive and not damaging the priceless industrial center too much. Somehow, inexplicably, one of their spies just happened to find out exactly where Tak was’ hiding’, right in the middle of a formation of carefully positioned mega-stations. They thought they were good to go,” Sheila said with a grin.

“Weren’t they afraid that the spies would give away the whole thing?” A Z’uush asked.

“No, we wanted those spies. Perfect way to feed misinformation to the enemy,” Sheila replied. “The weapons production area and the other military stuff was completely self-contained and sealed away from everything. Almost every employee had absolutely no idea what was going on. The details of what they did and how they did it would fill a book, but they pulled it off. When it came time to deploy the missiles and arm the gas miners, the whole place went on lockdown, and they wiped out the spies. Type four Juon gravitational transmitters powerful enough to be readable several planets away are kind of easy to detect if you know what you are looking for, especially the old cheap ones the porkies were given. We weren’t going to detect them? Seriously? It was kind of insulting.”

“Empress, why didn’t they just have them send office e-mails,” one of the Juon laughed.

“Well, the household fleet showed up right on schedule,” Sheila said with a classic Terran toothy grin. “They easily shrugged off the weak improvised energy weapons that were put in place. The fleet passed easily through the ‘defenses’ with no losses. Once they were within spitting distance and every ship had been targeted, the biggest missile salvo of the entire war was launched. The household ships didn’t even try to dodge. The last message sent was ‘Oh look, they are throwing spears at us.’”

“Oh fuck, how bad was it?” a Juon crew member asked.

“Well, I gave you a hint,” Sheila said, “I said the last message sent was ‘Oh look, they are throwing spears at us.’ They lost everything. Every. Single. Ship. Everything they sent into Zeus Industries space, the vast majority of not only the expeditionary force but the household’s actual entire fleet was completely wiped out. All of the rockets were set to impact their targets simultaneously. No ship had any time to react before they were hit themselves. Even we didn’t know exactly what the result of a missile impact would be, so we decided on overkill. The number of missiles used was comical. Hundreds were launched, with each normal ship targeted with anywhere from five to fifty rockets. Their flagship had two hundred aimed at it.”

“That fucking many?!” Captain Zzuural exclaimed. “You guys should have more confidence in yourselves.”

“I know, right?” Sheila laughed. “Now that stage one was complete, we shifted directly to stage two. Just as the complete shock of their fleet getting fucking atomized was setting in, the hidden gas miners ripped up out of the atmosphere and charged towards the remaining vessels and the household’s main station. While they didn’t have jump drives, those monsters had truly unbelievable acceleration and were soon moving faster than the missiles they were carrying, and the household’s space station and the rest of the ships were only about as far out as Saturn. The miners were coming in disturbingly fast, and they looked terrifying. As you can expect, full panic set in. The support ships and any remaining combat vessels jumped out of the system. Some of them ran so fast they had to jump back to assist with the evacuation of their station. As soon as the household fled and the station was blown up, the gas miners turned towards the inner solar system and floored it. They had all been loaded with tons and tons of cargo, weapons, ammo, big industrial robo-facs, tiny desktop robo-facs, raw materials for the robo-facs, hundreds and hundreds of tons of food (Oh, we didn’t forget the food. Not after last time.), computers with every single schematic for every single product military or otherwise that Zeus produced, including all of the data concerning their secret reverse engineering project of FTL drives and navcomps. With that one haul, they made themselves redundant. They could fall, not that they were planning to, but they could.”

“And with that one strike, all Imperial forces were completely repelled from Sol,” the captain said, shaking his head. “Complete shock ripped through the Imperial military, well the parts of it that were allowed to know that a serious ass lashing just happened. The destruction was so sudden and complete we didn’t even have good data on exactly what happened. The few household troops and staff left could only say ‘everything exploded’ and the infamous ‘Oh look, they are throwing spears at us.’ line. Not a whole lot to work with. So, while we were scrambling around shitting ourselves-”

“You guys do that too?” a Z’uush interjected. Sheila’s crew exploded with laughter.

“No, not like you guys,” Sheila said, crying from laughter. “Now, be quiet and listen.”

“While we were scrambling around being very confused and upset,” the captain said, taking care to be a bit more specific, “The Terrans wasted absolutely no time at all. They did have logistics in place and used the time distributing arms, tools, rations, and equipment across the whole fucking system. They gathered, organized, and deployed their forces. They built fortifications and dug warrens. They evacuated civilian personnel as best as they could and worst of all,” the captain said, rippling with emphasis, “They delivered the supplies necessary to build their first shipyards to concealed locations across the whole system.” He took a sip and looked at his crew gravely. “Allowing them to set up those hidden shipyards is what lost us the war and changed the fate of the entire Empire.”

“How?” a Z’uush asked excitedly, bouncing up and down. Unlike everyone else, the Z’uush couldn’t touch the alcohol. It would actually kill them instead of just making them pray for death.

“That is going to have to wait until morning,” Captain Zzuural said with a laugh as he poked the now motionless misshapened lump that was once Lieutenant Guzzala.

“Mmf… Ish ok… just… resthing my eyes…”

“Well, some of the others have drunk too much, and I don’t want to have to tell the rest of this story twice, so we will leave it off here for now,” the captain said with a laugh.

“At least tell me about the porkies,” the Z’uush said. “Did they start running now?”

“Yes, they most certainly did,” Sheila said with a laugh.