Warm salty sludge flooded my mouth, inhaled by traitorous lungs. They say drowning is a peaceful way to die- a quirk of our biological development within an aquatic womb. 'Peaceful' could not have been further from my mind. I screamed, bubbles glug-glugging upwards. A direction I followed with my pistol. Finger on the trigger and squeezing on sympathetic reflex alone; firing a single round towards a metal disk, a cap adorned with foreign protrusions and nodes that must have regulated the pod. My pistol, mundane as it was, poked a hole in the unsuspecting hardware with a soft plop. Leaving a small bubble behind. A bubble of air.

  I kicked off, struggling to swim through the cryogel, only to inhale again, drawing the sludge deeper into my lungs. Muscles yearned for oxygen and received it.

  That wasn't right. Not even a little bit. More wrong than my earrings and complete lack of clothing. Another breath, and my mind continued to function normally, no obstruction of vision or weakness plagued me. Another breath, this time exhaling through the nose unleashed snot tinged bubbles floating upwards like dandelion fluffs in lazy spirals that rose only when movement disturbed the otherwise solid gel.

  Hands and feet spread out, trying to climb the tube like a rock climber wedges themselves up a crevasse. A clever strategy that failed due to a suspicious lack of friction.

  Gel cascaded down my throat and tongue filling my respiratory tract with a warm, heavy presence. So similar to a weighted blanket. My chest expands, accommodating this new medium as a comforting relief spreads through me, like an embrace from within. Breathing out, I hear the gentle burble of bubbles escaping the Eustachian tubes a soothing counterpoint to the steady rhythm of my pounding heart, who's beat now pounds against my entire body, unhindered by air. With each cycle, the initial strangeness fades, replaced by a sense of peace.

  This is not drowning.

  Damnit! I was safe but trapped, and in desperate need of some pants. One look down told me all arm hairs were gone, along with my blue fingernail polish. More importantly the bottom was a metal sphincter, with overlapping plates that could iris open and closed. If that were punctured, then gravity would drain this tube...

  My pistol rose, firing again. A hollow-point projectile blossomed open, expanding to triple its radius and decelerating in the thick medium, gently tapping against the bottom. I inhale once more as clear fluid moved in and out of my lungs, its clean scent reminiscent of rain on a summer day mixed with yellow Gatorade. Air bubbles escaped my nose, rising slowly through the goop accelerating with each movement of my limbs, cutting through and disturbing the entombing gel.

  I tuck knees to chin, collapsing inward and slowly flick my hands and feet til inversion. A sickeningly neutral sensation as my ears are solidly clogged and thus do not provide the normal vertigo response. I'm thankful as it permits me to swim -one inch for every stroke of an arm- downward, bringing my pistol's muzzle six inches from the floor. Green sights align near the edge, finding the center of one of the many 'leaves' of the iris. Where the material should be thinnest as there is no overlap with adjacent leaves.

  Hammer falls, silence. I swallow, twisting the pistol sideways concerned that my only weapon broke during the submerged firing. Brass protrudes from the ejection port, a short stroke malfunction, easily amended. My fingers cycle the slide, ejecting the spent brass casing chambering the new round. Then pray as I try again, this time receiving the expected detonation.

  Whatever the 'steel' material actually is breaks cleanly, leaving a large grain structure along the edge, representative of a highly brittle material. But analysis can wait, I have an exit hole! Gel leaks from the hole like bubblegum. Which is to say, not at all. I bit the slime in frustration, flapping goo towards the breach to receive the most satisfying burp of my life. One burp follows another, slow but a self sustaining siphon that will drain this tube over the next hour or so.

  Time begets thought. Thought ignites curiosity, and curiosity takes over, my mind racing through potential outcomes. My hallucinations were only ever auditory, never connected to touch or taste, firmly anchoring this as reality. Across from me stands an identical pod, similarly occupied by a man who -like me- is awake.

  His eyes skip over my lack of modesty, zeroing in on my eyes with an intense stare. Bald head and substantial muscles combine to make him a dead ringer for Mr. Clean. It helps that his pod has a panel wrapped around it's center, keeping him effortlessly covered, as if the world bends to his whims.

  He presses hands together in the universal sign of praying. Then jabs steepled fingers towards a panel outside his tube. A touchscreen displaying his information. -Richard Z.-

  Completely inaccessible, for a mere mortal and not a superior psionic being like myself!

  I laughed, the sound like drumming pillows, gently pushing air bubbles out of sight. Time to employ every gram of my telekinetic might and escape. Guess I can help the dude as well... After all, what girl can say no to a six pack like Richard's?

  ---

  -Aboard the Arkship's bridge-

  Felicia flickered into reality, her six foot figure reaching that vaunted height with stylish heels, providing a visual representation of the Arkship's commanding. A digital deity wired into every circuit of the Arkship. The hologram was mostly for the benefit of secondary systems, the two human officers. Backup pilots, captains, mechanics, and most crucially the infallible human oversight required by Singularity law. They were unnecessary, as every system was fully automated, yet it always pleased her to be acknowledged by them.

  A melodic tone momentarily quells their readouts, as Felicia makes her report to the human oversight.

  “Final gate has achieved geosynchronous orbit. Quite the puzzle with all this orbital debris. Aaaaannnnd done." Felicia says, dragging out the word as she beams up the last human. "There we go, harvest complete. Shutting down both protochronian engines. Ah, just in time too. Solarium reserves are dangerously low, far too little for another gate deployment."

  On her right, Jim watched the reports pile in, AI powered subroutines sorting through the preposterous surfeit of humans. Nearly quadruple the forecast. Minutes ticked by as four billion humans were scanned, analyzed and sorted into various categories, starting with the lowest tier of 'unfit for any service' and rising to the exalted tier of 'special grade merchandise'.

  Jim’s lips curled into a smirk, his voice dripping with triumph. “Captain, today is a Singular day! Three billion over our yearly quota. Three billion! Lots of special grades too, mostly weak psychers but a few are protochronian compatible! We could dump half a billion and retire as kings. Buy our own worlds and an army to protect them.”

  "Ah hell Jim, don't get ahead of yourself. Half of them are skitzo and the most advanced country is the fattest. Never seen such a decadent culling. We’ll have to reject millions these worthless sacks of shit.” He finishes, hurling his datapad across the fragile command desk.

  A move Felicia protects against with localized shielding deflecting the pad away from sensitive buttons and screens. Her holographic imitation paced between the chairs, arms clasped behind her back like an admiral surveying a battlefield. Never pausing despite her many tasks.

  A deluge of diodes and alerts surged like a tidal wave—beeps, honks, and hoots colliding in a chaotic symphony. Auditory warnings of faulty humans.

  Jim adjusts the sorting algorithms, adding higher minimums for each category. A process he does not pause during the captain's churlish outburst, knowing better than to push his luck. After all, they have a delicate understanding. He fucks off, and Haime turns a blind eye to extracurricular activities, falsifying reports to make them both look good. As proof, a rainbow of medals and commendations line the cockpit wall, a welded shrine to their underhanded successes.

  Haime presses a button to warp the humans home, only to recieve a warning error. 'Insufficient solarium'.

  "Great... Teleporter's kaput. You'll have to get dirty." Haime sneers, working through three separate ledgers. "Felicia, plot a course back to Syrak-9 for resupply, shop around and see if anyone will trade humans for solarium. Offer a minor discount and offload all the generics."

  "Engaging engines." Felicia says.

  Jim shrugs, jaded to the process of sorting humans into piles of keep and recycle. Except for a few psychics, they're already dead. Better to die now in the recyclers, a painless death under anesthetic.

  He rises from the encapsulating chair, his second, unmonitored datapad in hand, sorting through the special grade merchandise for any humans that show a particular level of compatability with the bulge in his jumpsuit. a Protochronian device he's kept hidden from Felicia and Haime both, one for creating the Singularity's most terrifying and -most prohibited- weapon of war. A bioweapon. Though this specific device has no equal for it has not altered a human in living memory.

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  Red warning lights suddenly blare, bathing the cockpit in warnings.

  “Orbital star gate is activating? Who cold dials an uncharted backwater-”

  Proximity alarms caterwaul as one wormhole signal becomes forty, their arrivals staggered only by order of power generation, sending the most advanced race through first. Haime’s face falls open, staring at the svelte corvette that emerges long before all others.

  “Jim, if we die–”

  Jim gulps, Haime's has a neural uplink directly to Felicia, if his meatsuit dies, his consciousness will instantly activate in a virtual world. Unless Felicia, and by extension our Arkship, is entirely gutted. Whatever the ship is, it's a doozy.

  “No time for gawking! Transmit our charter before they vaporize us!” Jim shouts.

  "Azhurai Conglomerate Corvette has cleared the gate, maneuvering. Her weapons are hot..." Felicia says.

  Seconds drip by as the sleek crystalline ship emerges from the disk of light. Like all corvettes she's fast, with more guns than crew, and like all Azhurai ships shielded better than most homeworlds. Oddly conical due to the main gun, a prismatic laser array capable of variable output, all the way from scrotum shaving precision to strength capable of peeling away a planet's mantle and scooping out the molten core.

  “Charter has been transmitted. They wouldn't dare shoot at an Arkship right? I mean- we lay the gateways for everyone in the galaxy!" Haime says, tapping the neural jack to inject a mix of unfiltered dopamine and bio-identical testosterone, chemicals meant to induce euphoria.

  If he dies, it'll be with a smile. Rude lights vanish, missile locks fading.

  "Why are you worried Haaaaiiime?" Felicia chimes, taunting the crackhead-in-command. "Azhurai Corvette recognizes me as a -nameless- chartered Arkship, and guaranteed our safety. Such a gentleman. Captain Aence even sent an apology for targeting us." She says, opening a holographic display of the local system in preparation for the coming battle.

  One ricegrain of red light representing the corvette, lurking like a trapdoor spider above the gate. Right in the blindspot for arriving ships.

  "Just wait til our colonization fleet shows up. We'll blast those Conglomerate circuit breakers right outta the sky. Just like the Xentarii." Jim says, wrinkling his nose at the concept of a Conglomerate empire.

  According to him, they shouldn't exist, the very idea is counter to human nature. Hundreds or thousands of unique species all serving a single technological over-race creates a hodge podge of cultural nonsense where shitting in the kitchen is a daily occurrence. Worse, they're always stealing worlds, nipping at the heels of neighbors and allies, nipping at his homeworld-

  -Blaring claxions erupt as the orbital gate opens once more, marking the start of Earth's conquest.

  And completely overriding Felicia's warnings concerning two malfunctioning cryopods...

  ---

  ---Athena---

  Sweat poured down my face, somehow repelling the gel in a soggy gelatinous mess across my face. Any makeup was sure to be ruined. But who cared, all my shaking had worked a screw loose. Why did aliens still use screws? No idea. Maybe it was the same reason they stole a Humvee instead of making a smarter car. Easier to take prebuilt materials than make your own, and let's be honest, screws just work.

  I cupped the gel, forming a clear wad free of bubbles or pistols and used it as binoculars, pressing them against the tube's crystal wall. Now that my tube was half drained, I opted to remain within the goopy section, not certain how transitioning from slime-breathing to air-breathing would affect me. An idle thought I pushed away, focusing on the last screw willing it to turn with every ounce of my being.

  Nothing.

  I took a breath of fresh slime, already growing accustomed to being a test tube baby. Right up until gravity decided to pull sideways. The entire ship lunged forward throwing me against the wall. Gel cushioned the crush like a pile of dry leaves, conforming to every curve as I curled into a ball and floated with the flow, hands and feet slipping off lubricated glass.

  "We're in a ship." I gaped aloud, connecting the sharp shifts in momentum to Savannah's driving.

  Each jerk and turn squirted a bit more gel from my tube, rapidly clearing it. Now Dry, I steadied mind and body, opening Richard's panel. Inside the panel lay a damn Iphone, one of the ancient models, running some kind of mcdonalds food ordering app. Most options were out of stock or greyed out, but at least this menu was in actual english! Something I could read!

  One quick press of the 'water' option drained Richard's tune, and a tap against the the 'complete order' button retracted the crystal covering, showing it to be a solid five inches thick. Even if it were regular glass, none of my bullets would have pierced it.

  Mr. Clean ducks out of the pod, stepping onto the catwalk and directly onto a screw. I wince as his eye get that unforgettable squint of 'I just stepped on a god damned Lego and don't want to cry'. Jaw clenches, eyes shut, and he smiles, slowly bending at the waist to retrieve the screw. A faint glimmer of saline on the edges of his eyelids.

  Rumbling echoes through the ship as something hits us, sending my partner in crime sprawling and for ten horrible seconds I believe I've been abandoned for a second time. Then Dick clamors to my touchscreen, pressing buttons until a hiss fills the pod. My bottom phincter opening instead of the tube. I'm about to be flushed.

  I kick off. Leaping up the side walls as gel peels from my body, somehow coming away without residual moisture or funkiness. Except where it matters most, my lungs and throat. Sludge leaks out of my faceholes and ears as I scramble against smooth crystal. Now unlubricated I scramble higher as Dick furiously slaps the screen outside, only managing to hasten the draining.

  Far below me turbines spin to life, chopping the goop like a million razors.

  ---

  ---Aboard the Azhurai Conglomerate Corvette Dilmun.---

  In the boundless dark, where the shadows of stars burned cold, the wormhole shimmered like a ragged scar of violet light torn across the fabric of space. A miracle of the -nameless-. To the Azhurai, it was more than a useful cosmic anomaly; it was a lifeline, a conduit threading their gleaming and barren homeworlds to the resource-laden fringes of the galaxy. Guarding this precious gateway stood the Dilmun, the newest class of Azhurai warship, filling a need created by Kaalra's mandate to expand their influence. To bring all of humanity into the Conglomeration.

  A holographic projection twinkled over the bridge the Corvette appearing as she was, sleek as a shard of mirrored obsidian, its hull pulsing faintly with the rhythm of a quantum heart. From the command seat Captain Aence surveyed the void, his hairless head catching the glow of holographic displays, while nanotech-enhanced eyes piercing the silent bridge. Watching the wormhole for any sign of invading craft. The Azhurai were masters of the impossible—wielders of phase technology and space-time manipulation—and the Dilmun was their sharpest edge.

  Silence shattered as the wormhole convulsed, spitting forth two titanic shadows: Novan Battlespheres, each a moon-sized monument to brute force. With hundred meter thick Nickle iron hulls meant to shrug off any assault.

  "Ah, such a human thought. So, one dimensional." Aence intoned, earning hisses from his surrounding bridge crew. "Armor thicker than a planetary crust will not save them."

  Still, it represented a worthy target for the experimental main battery. Forged in the crucible of Conglomerate courts and quenched in battles of litigation between the many races, each suing for control of this warcrime.

  "Battlestations! Realign the prismatic coils, narrow them for greater burn through." Aence's voice sliced through the bridge, sharp as a laser. The crew, a seamless blend of Azhurai and client species, moved as one, the air thick with the ozone tang of charging systems. The prismatic scalpel whined to life, a weapon that could burn holes in reality itself.

  Hundreds of point defense batteries fired, weak energy beams that hit everything , Arkship, corvette, both orbital gates, Earth, and even Luna. A volley that roared it's challenge across the system.

  "Amateurs." Aence grumbled, targeting the rearmost ship.

  The Novan spheres pivoted, engaging all maneuvering and emergency thrusters to bring their frontal bays into alignment against the Dilmun. Moons displaying their long hanger and twin gays for The Battlesphere unleashed graviton torpedoes -their most advanced armaments- dark orbs that warped space into crushing voids, growing in volume with the amount of mass they consumed. Planet crackers.

  The voids twisted, threatening to collapse the Dilmun's hull. But Aence's lips curled in defiance. "Engage the Quantum Shield." A shimmering veil enveloped the corvette, bending the gravitational onslaught aside, then hurling it back like a vengeful tide. The redirected torpedoes slammed into the lead Battlesphere, its own weaponry imploding its forward hull in a bloom of twisted metal and silent fire. A gravity well that grew larger as mass fed the reaction until the ship vanished from all screens.

  The second behemoth pivoted, all thrusters and engines roaring to max as she narrowly dodged the dying corpse of her sister. To ignite a dozen plasma lances -beams of molten fury designed to smelt entire planets- and little more than laser pointers against the Dilmun, first of her kind. She danced, quantum shielding phasing her in and out of existence, a ghost dodging fiery spears. Or passing through them unharmed.

  "Prismatic array aligned captain."

  "Fire!" Aence barked. Dilmun's primary armament spitting a beam of unreality, flicking through the Battlesphere’s armor as if it were vapor.

  Space held it's breath, pausing for a split second as the Battlesphere's reactor breached. Nickle iron armor popped like an apple split by Mjolnir, blown apart by a brilliant golden light of solarium going supercritical. The ship erupted, a supernova of light and debris, painting the void with its demise.

  "Captain! Debris is on a collision course with the habitable planet." Calls Adept Elara, the navigations officer.

  "We'll salvage them later. I doubt those tin brains can survive falling from orbit in unshielded halves. Besides, if anything important survives we can use it to train the natives on salvage operations." Aence answered, trusting the adept not to involve her litigator.

  They were both Azhuraian, the true blooded. Not some client race begging for technological scraps. Salvage was beneath them.

  She gave him a mischievous smile, no doubt reading his mind. "Additional contacts on scanners. Keep fighting Captain."

  No respite was requested, and none given. The wormhole pulsed anew, disgorging four Singularity frigates in a traditional diamond formation—sleek predators born of human AI harmony. Their hulls shifted like liquid metal, polarizing to threats with an almost precognitive precision, a testament to the Singularity’s ability to combine the best of human intuition and synthetic processing.

  "Variable polarizing armor detected, main cannon will need time to adjust frequencies." The weapons station reported.

  "Keep us mobile! Lock onto the lead Frigate and fire when ready. Navigation! Prepare to launch drones." Aence ordered, gripping the arms of his chair between three clawed fingers.

  A Nanite Cloud billowed forth, covering the holographic projection in a red haze as glittering devourers filled space, attempting to unmake the Dilmun atom by atom.

  "Nanites. Ew, so crude they don't register on any Conglomerate scale." Said the weapon's officer, some sort of client race that was only vaguely humanoid with enormous compound eyes. "Countermeasures deployed." He chittered.

  "Do not underestimate the humans, nanite swarms are the best weapon they can employ against a gate ambush. A pity we are so far beyond them." Aence said, trying not to shudder at the insectoid being's presence.

  That was one race he looked forward to excluding from the Conglomerate.

  The corvette’s defenses flared, a high-frequency pulse rippling outward, scrambling the nanites’ directives. As one they turned inward, consuming itself as neural networks fried. Then came the synaptic disruptor- a killswitch for the now rebelling nanites. A synthetically generated psychic scream amplified by the central frigate's shifting hull. So potent it crossed space to claw at the crew’s minds. Aence's eyes snapped shut, Elara winced, but the Dilmun's own AI, woven into their neural implants, sang a counter-harmony, steadying their thoughts.

  "They'll pay for using psychic weapons against us! Deploy the drones, leave no survivors." Aence ordered.

  A swarm of miniaturized strike fighters erupted from the corvette, a newly invented weapon, small enough that even the miniscule corvette could carry two full wings of eight, though the launch tubes and computer could only operate one wing at a time due to their quantumly entangled shielding, a defensive measure that boiled down to invulnerability so long as the corvette's shields were up.

  They darted through the frigates’ adaptive defenses, dodging point defense lasers and missiles alike, to incinerate power conduits and weapon arrays with surgical precision. Point defense beams -small energy cannons meant to destroy missile guidance systems- bounced off strike fighter hulls or passed through them entirely, unable to match the quantum shielding on display. One by one, the frigates faltered, shields crumbling under the constant strafing.

  In a last bid for victory the humans performed a hail Mary, each of the four frigates broke formation, rolling to bring every weapon and missile tube into alignment with the Azhurai corvette. Scores of particle beams illuminated Luna, while thousands of missiles filled space in a massive stream of ordnance.

  "Ah, good tactic commander, if you had a dozen more ships. Engage point defense, divert power from the main gun if necessary. We'll wait them out." Aence ordered.

  "Diverting power sir."

  Azhurai point defense lasers cut missiles in half, their beams burning hot enough to detonate the ordinance at distance. A ballet of precision that dragged on for hours, until every Singularity missile lay expended; and still the drones carved. Trimming away until hulls crumbled into scrap metal, once again falling into Earth's atmosphere.

  "Main cannon is charged sir."

  "Should I pray for more targets?" Aence asked innocently, earning chuckles from the crew. "Excellent work. Contact the humans of this planet, make it clear that we are have claimed this system in the name of the Conglomerate. Once that is complete send a report of this battle to the Novans and Singularity."

  Adept Elara slammed her palms against the table. "Do you mean to give them knowledge of our ship? I can't believe the treason I'm hearing!"

  Aence shrugged. "I gain no satisfaction from beheading mice. This is only a measuring tablet. The minimum bar for opposing fleets to overcome. Our easiest way of saying bring a lion, the greatest pride of your august fleet, or do not come at all."

  "Ah, you mean to belittle them, to mock their failures. I concur with this action." The weapons officer chitters.

  "In part. We did not reveal our output, nor our reserves. But we must also warn others that an Arkship is in system. We cannot allow it to be harmed." Aence added.

  Elara nodded, sensing the millions of psychics aboard that ship. All of them weak, but there were ways to augment psychics, so long as they were naturally born.

  "We should shoot it down ourselves. Before one of those psychics grows into a monster greater than our fleet." She thought, never guessing just how right she was.