A/N: HEY EVERYONE SORRY BOUT NOT POSTING AS MUCH, RL HAS STARTED TO KICK MY BUTT. WILL SHOOT FOR RELEASES ABOUT ONCE A WEEK NOW UNTIL THINGS CLEAR UP. THANKS FOR YOUR PATIENCE.

AS ALWAYS PLEASE ENJOY, COMMENT, RATE, AND HAVE A NICE DAY

Chapter 5 - Book II

As the Grey Imperium was building its forces, they ran into a major problem. They lacked the people to fill in the duties of the new ships. So then Sadia with her extensive knowledge of the Starcraft universe knew that there was a solution, two in fact. First was to hire mercenaries and people of different skills to spread word of a new place for them. Problem was that these people were usually criminals, psychopaths, or murderers sometimes all three. Second was to search for other refugees from the fall of the Confederacy or people running from the Dominion. This was what she preferred to do as it would be cheaper and allow for more diverse skills to join them.

With the prisoners they had from their first encounter they got information on a den. A place where there was only one rule, bring trouble at your own risk. This place was called Deadman’s Port, there anything could happen. There were connections to the black market, arms dealers, spies, assassins, and even mercenaries. It was all available, for a price.

On the Prometheus, Ira stood in charge of moving large crates of minerals. The crates were going to be sold in order to gain some credits for bargaining. With the buccaneers in their hold they were able to get information on a certain person who could help them. The man was called Murphy, as in Murphy’s Law. As Bucky explained, anything that could be gotten, can be gotten.

On the bridge Nathaniel was prepping for departure. He was going to negotiate for several things, the first were to spread word to fleeing refugees, second were the mercenaries or pirates, which ever worked best for their purposes. Lastly was a hidden objective, to search for Ghosts. It was going to be an interesting task.

On Olympus, under the palace Leo was talking to Dr. Oliver Strauss. Dr. Strauss was a Bio-engineer of sorts, he spent most of his life studying the miracle of life and was ready for the next big step. Studying the Asgard technology he was about to be more creative and let the computer to the modifications. His latest project was the topic of discussion now.

“Oliver, I understand what you’re saying but this is insane.” Leo stated.

“Why Leo? With the time dilation field we would be able to push our little settlement to a full society. We could go from a few thousand to several million.” He argued.

“True but if we used the time dilation field on Olympus and multiplied our numbers how would the people here feel about that? To have a hundred years go by? A thousand? Can people really stand living through that?” Leo asked.

“Well that’s where Section E comes into play. Those who are tires and want to wait for the next stage can be put into stasis and let the society just run its course.”

“No, Oliver. With the time dilation field active at that rate would not only drain our energy supplies but would also interfere with lots of other things.” Leo said, ending the argument.

“But I am interested in Project Seed.” Leo said. Looking up Strauss was now showing childlike look of joy.

“Ah yes I have multiple scenarios for that as well.” Strauss said as he began explaining.

Project Seed was a new approach to solving their population problem. Due to them having a population shortage, they needed to make up for it in every possible way. The idea was to seed a small population onto a suitable planet, install a time dome and then turn on the time dilation field. One week in real time would be one year on the planet and depending on the results they would increase the rate. The end goal was to have a large enough population that could expand every month.

There were two basic scenarios to test out. The first was to seed a planet, then to optimize it for food, production, or population. The second scenario was the same but make military training a standard thing, to create an action ready planet. The only thing that was concerning Leo was the people who would live on those planets. Once the planet was seeded what would happen once they needed space to expand again.

In the end Project Seed was approved for two trial planets. One for production and one for food, if those were successful then the project would continue.

Dr. Strauss looked excited as he left the room with Leo. As he was leaving Leo received a call from the Atlas.

“Guy!”

“High Lord!”

“Ugh, I wish people wouldn’t call me that.”

“No such luck, to be fair I voted for Lord Buttkiss.”

“Yeah, thanks I guess, whats up?”

“Sorry, back to business. I just received word on our dimensional jump drive and our preparations for our first recruitment jump.”

“Good, what’s the first jump been decided to?”

“We’re going to a high conflict universe, the terminator universe. If we’re lucky the newly acquired adjutant, upgraded by the replicators and Asgard tech should be able to hack into skynet and take over. Hopefully.”

“And if it doesn’t work?”

“Then we start bombing the installations from orbit, removing the network one by one. Meanwhile we beam the key players on board and help them fight the machines. Either way, we’ll get to rebuild an earth.” Guy said.

“Ok, I am green lighting your jump. How many people are you taking?”

“About 1500 crew and about two companies of infantry.”

“Did you give them the new beam rifles?”

“No, were not going to bring anything too advanced in case of losing it.”

“OK. When do you jump?”

“As soon as the Prometheus returns from their little recruitment trip.”

“Understood.”

“Atlas out.”

Six hours later, on board the Prometheus. The ship was on full alert as it prepared for departure. The cargo hold was loaded up with a good amount of cargo mixed in with fighter drones. On the bridge Nathaniel was getting ready to leave, next to him was Ira and Paul Carter.

“Thanks for coming along you two.” Nathaniel said as he checked over the manifesto.

“Well it wouldn’t be good manners for you to do all the work. My men and I have all joined up with the imperium so I would like to not how to be a refugee again.” Ira stated proudly.

“What he mean is he doesn’t want SHELLY to be a refugee again.” Paul commented.

Ira’s face turned beet red, “What!? I-I-I d-don’t know what you’re talking about!” He stammered.

“Uh huh, sure you don’t.” Paul laughed.

“OK Ira, if you don’t wanna talk about it we get it. Now time to go spread the gospel.” Nathaniel said as they took off.