Location: Kuiper Belt, 5,100,000 kilometers from Earth
Date: March 5, 2213
Time: 18:00

Captain Monroe looked across the viewscreen, taking in all of the information of the unknown spacecraft ahead. It loomed in the distance, a pale orange color with narrow tentacles reaching out of the engine area. According to the scans, there has been no record of this ship so far, and it had the ability to go to warp speed. He frowned. No one besides the U.S. military should be able to do that.
The first officer below him, Lieutenant James, called out a status report. “Captain Monroe, the fleet is in position. Ganymede Base is awaiting transmission for briefing.” Monroe sighed internally. Why is it that Admiral Taft always waits until they are actually at their destination to brief them? “Put it through,” he said. The communication screen zoomed in on a picture of All-Fleet Admiral George Taft at Ganymede Base, the primary outpost for U.S. space operations.
“This is Admiral Taft,” he announced, as always stating the obvious. “There have been reports of alien spacecraft in the area and one of our scouts was destroyed in the investigation.”
Alarm bells went off in Monroe’s head. That thing destroyed one of our ships? “We have found the alien craft and are preparing to engage, sir,” he replied, which was partially true.
“What does the scan report?” Taft asked.
Reading off of the computer boxes on the viewscreen, Monroe summarized the data, that the ship was about three times the size of theirs, and used technology that the scanners can’t comprehend.
“We have six battleships on standby,” the Captain said, cutting to the chase. “Permission to engage?”
“Negative. Not until you have more information. Try to contact it with Universal Dialogue,” Taft said.
Yeah, because if they already destroyed one of our scouts, they’d TOTALLY respond to a peace message, Monroe thought. But of course, he had to comply with the Admiral. “Yes sir.”
Admiral Taft’s video window faded. “Lieutenant, transmit a standard Alien Encounter Message to the alien craft.” Lt. James walked off to tell the bridge communications officer.
Soon after, the communications window turned back on to transmit a reply message from the aliens. As it popped up, Monroe recoiled. The aliens were a twisted mix of a human and an orange spider, with a humanoid form but having a spider face with two shiny, black eyes, and four spidery arms with one sharp pincer instead of a hand. There were two of them and the one on the left began to speak. Its language was translated in the passing.
“Presenting his High Greatness, King Zuarnof.” it said.
These aliens have quiet an ego, Monroe noted. The alien on the right began to speak. It was wearing a turquoise spiked disc on his head, perhaps as some sort of crown? “Who dares stand in the way of the Greatness?!”
“This is Captain Monroe of the United System of Allied Forces,” Monroe said, pretending that he wasn’t speaking to some mutant orange spider. “You have reached the border of our syst-“
“Our empire knows NO BOUNDS! Join us or be crushed like the insignificant Vaals of Lectis-5!” it cut in.
“I’m afraid we cannot submit to any empire unless an equal treaty was made,” Captain Monroe replied.
“Then it is WAR.”

Location: Unknown System, far from Homeworld
Date: 25 years from the Planetary War
Time: Evening



A vein pulsed in Zuarnof’s head. No one, not even the rebels from the Planetary War, had arrogance like these fools! These aliens were taking him for an equal, no, a lesser being than themselves! Well, they were going to regret angering the High Commander of an Obliterator warship. Time to show them what this baby can do. “High Commander to Weapons Control. Open fire on all opposition, strobe sequence.” King Zuarnof allowed a smile to cross his lips. Not that you could actually see it under his thick mouth-pincers, but a smile nonetheless. Let’s see these aliens beat this.




Captain Monroe flinched and stared in horror as a burst of red gas streamed out of the front of the enemy warship, demolishing the first in the line of their battleships. The entire battleship was gone as if it had never existed, including the entire crew of one thousand operators, and its captain. Not only does their ship have advanced weapons systems that can take out our ships in one shot, but our lasers are apparently having no effect on it. Great. A bead of sweat appeared on his brow as the alien ship prepared to strike again. Come on, there has to be a weak spot somewhere…




King Zuarnof continued to smile, a rare occurrence. The enemy ships’ light guns hadn’t put a scratch yet into his newest warship. Suddenly, everything flashed red and the bridge was a cacophony of noise. What? How?
“Sir! The enemies have ruptured our gas containment unit!” a Bridge Operator below called.
Zuarnof’s face paled. The red gas that is used as the primary weapon on the spider-aliens’ Obliteration warships is all compressed and stored in a large chamber protruding from the top of the ship like a turquoise eye. If the enemies had somehow released the destructive gas, it could be enough to consume the ship. Realizing that the ship could be destroyed any moment, he jumped off of his commanding platform, racing towards the hangar before his prized Obliterator was consumed by its own weapon.





Finally, a weak spot, Monroe thought as one of the blue lasers flashed across the bow of the enemy ship, hitting a large, projecting bulb on the outside. The bulb then exploded, causing the very same red gas that it had been using as a weapon to burst out of the sides. Bull’s-eye, thought Monroe. All of a sudden, the enemy ship erupted in a vibrant explosion, shattering it into a thousand pieces. One of the pieces, though, was bigger than the rest….



An escape pod!

Location: Kuiper Belt, 5,100,000 kilometers from Earth
Date: March 5, 2213
Time18:20

“Chase it down!” Monroe shouted as the escape pod sped past their fleet into the black abyss. The pod weaved in and out through the asteroids littering the empty space, the U.S. battleships hot on its tail. “Sir, we are within scanning range” called up the Lieutenant as the orange oval that was the enemy escape pod expanded on the screen. Then, out of nowhere, the pod disappeared into the distance.

“What happened?” asked Captain Monroe, staring in shock at the empty space before him.
Lieutenant James looked up at Monroe. He looked at the officers around him, and then spoke, “The escape pod went to warp. The computer is tracking it to the system in the CT-320 region.”

“But how could that tiny thing possibly fit in a warp engine?! It was less than 10 by 3 meters!” Monroe said angrily.

“I don’t know, sir. We should probably get back to Ganymede Base to report the events of today.” the lieutenant said.

The four battleships shot out of the cloudy ring of dust surrounding the Sun.