It was the first Saturday where Rhidi felt as if she had slept.

  The Drill Sergeants had habitually woken them up on Saturdays at the same time as all the other days, dragging them outside for PT and further trying to break their spirits. This first Saturday of White Phase, they were woken up a whole hour after their usual time, and were given the block of an hour to do their own PT out in the field.

  They were not left fully alone, as the Drill Sergeants hovered around and made sure they were actually doing their workouts, but Rhidi did her usual exercises and then a short run around the track that ran along the outside of the barracks. The odd calm about the day did make her nervous though, as it felt as if there was an ambush waiting for them the entire hour they were outside. The Human recruits seemed just as wary, which was comforting to Rhidi.

  When PT was done and uniforms changed out, they were sent out of formation to the DFAC, able to walk amongst themselves in pairs or small groups. Rhidi walked along with Alias and Shasta, enjoying the calm Georgia morning. At the same time, the Drill Sergeants prowled around the wings, watching keenly for those who were foolish enough to tuck their hands into forbidden places.

  One such Human recruit found his folly when he absentmindedly slipped his hand into his upper pocket.

  Drill Sergeants seemed to swarm out of nowhere like a plague of infamy, descending upon both the recruit and the others around him. Rhidi, Alias, and Shasta kept their heads forward, but their eyes were locked to the left as they watched.

  “Boom! A mortar has landed amongst you and Recruit Greyson is wounded! Carry him!” Drill Sergeant Mavericko howled, shoving Recruit Greyson to the ground in a sprawling roll as the other recruits froze.

  When they failed to move as quickly as desired, Drill Sergeant Curahee kicked the feet out from a female Human. “Shrapnel wound! Recruit Franting is now down!”

  Rhidi observed that there were only six standing Humans now, and their numbers were dwindling by the time the “alive” recruits began grabbing their fallen fellows to drag them away.

  A male Lilgara and female Pwah were caught talking to each other, in which they were set upon by Drill Sergeant Prince. Rhidi didn’t know a lot about Drill Sergeant Prince, except that she was a nasty piece of work just like Drill Sergeant Almoore. While Drill Sergeant Almoore was a pale-skinned, marred beauty, Drill Sergeant Prince had skin like bronze and hair as black as night. She bore a handsome, proud, alluring face that held her dark eyes like a crown, with thick lips that should have been a gift rather than a warning.

  When she bore her campaign hat upon her head, it was like her entire visage changed, fouling into a bared-teeth assassin that killed your good day and turned it into a nightmare.

  “What are you talking about?!” Drill Sergeant Prince screeched, coming right to the face of the now startled Lilgara, his hood flaring. “Are you conspiring against my army in your hissing language, snake boy?!”

  The Lilgara was outwardly, and inwardly, panicking, his hood dropping and flaring so quickly it looked as if he was trying to fly away. “N-No, Drill Sssergeant! I would never!”

  Drill Sergeant Prince then spread out her legs, refusing to bend down and instead fully posturing before the shorter Pwah. Rhidi found it to be an impressive feat of strength, if all things.

  Drill Sergeant Prince slammed her hands to her hips, eye to eye with the Pwah in her wide-legged power stance. “Was he about to call down his reptilian attack ships Recruit? Are you aiding and abetting a possible future enemy?! Where is Santa’s workshop?! Tell me now, damn you!”

  “W-What?!” The confused Pwah stammered out, her near-neon blue hair fraying out in instant fright. “W-W-We’re not planning an invasion D-Drill Sergeant!”

  “Good grief…” Rhidi muttered under her breath, though she was having to fight to not laugh.

  Alias pursed his lips as he opened the doors to the DFAC for Rhidi and Shasta, the smells of cooking bacon and pancakes hitting them right under the nostrils. “Always with the Santa jokes…”

  Rhidi liked Human breakfasts; Kafya morning meals were usually just a bar of something or other, compressed edible material that was lightly sweetened and quickly chewable. A lot of food for the Kafya were in a bar or gel-orb of some kind, since cooking was seen as frivolous time wasting in comparison to gaining knowledge or working to better Kafya society. The more indulgent parties of the powerful had chefs brought in from off-world, usually Pwah or Kojynn spice masters.

  A run of the mill citizen of the Kafya masses settled for meal bars and gels, but they at least had different flavors.

  That did not appear to be the norm here on Earth, and Rhidi had to admit that it was spoiling her. As she grabbed her tray and utensils, she eagerly slid down the line and held out her tray for everything; Pancakes smeared in peanut butter, bacon, sausage patties, eggs (over-easy because it added moisture and were faster to eat), grits, buttered toast, these odd, fried hash brown ovals, and finally a single banana to round it all off.

  It was one of the few times they were able to drink something other than water, and that glass of orange juice was a beacon of hope for Rhidi everytime she woke up for the day.

  After getting her drinks she sat down to eat, looking over to Drill Sergeant McPhiston as she took a sip of that sour, sweet, tangy juice. He seemed more at ease, but still had that muggy expression on his face.

  The table filled fast, and when every seat was taken he clapped his hands together twice, speaking out in a calm tone. “Fifteen minutes starts now, recruits.”

  Starts now? Rhidi thought to herself, looking down at what was left of her food; She had been busy shoveling food into her mouth and was already halfway done, and she was now getting another fifteen minutes?

  Rhidi sighed out, having wished she had known that in order to really enjoy the pancakes a little while longer, but instead started peeling her banana.

  Bananas were an odd fruit, and not one Rhidi felt confident eating. Humans ate them tip first, but Rhidi preferred to eat them from the side.

  With the awkward food item out of the way, she finished up the rest of her breakfast with a final lick of her teeth, sitting back on the round seat and slowly sipping her water. Drill Sergeant McPhiston was watching his data-slate with narrowed eyes, as well as tapping the bandolette on his wrist; Humans were extremely hot-blooded, and Drafritti scientists gave them all sorts of thermally-powered tech.

  The Drafritti were an old little people of the stars that barely reached four feet in height and averaged at three feet in height, not counting their ears. They were a heavy armed race with a longer reach than most, ending in hands that always seemed to be twice the size they should have been. Rhidi had found them terribly weak when she met with their engineers, but they were sharper than talwori rods and twice as clever. When Humans first laid eyes on the Drafritti, they were instantly enamoured with the shorter star children.

  The general Human view on the Drafritti was, “It’s like they mixed a Halfling with a fox bat!”, and Humans became deeply protective of them on every base they arrived on. When a Drafritti engineer Company had been surrounded by Ur decimation units, the Humans had arrived in such overwhelming force that it was nearly comical. The Drafritti however knew a good thing when they saw it, and wrapped themselves in the warm, heavily armed and armored arms of Humanity.

  This caused political issues within the Inner Dolcir Coalition; The Drafritti were extremely advanced technologically, and they were all hoping to absorb the race into their holdings and gain access to said advances. Instead, the entire race opted to join the UAA, leaving a single nation on Earth in control of multiple planets in the Tall Ear system.

  It was awkward, putting it shortly.

  The Drafritti noticed quickly how Humans always ran hot, as well as their deeply iron-rich blood, and used Humans to test multiple battery systems. This led to the creation of the bandolette and other such systems, their batteries charging on just the heat coming off of their skin. In return for their aid and tech, Drafritti enjoyed the tightest alliance with Humanity and prime colony locations within the Appalachian Mountains. Humans were exploding in number along other planets, and many older towns needed filling anyway.

  Rhidi eyed the bandolette, wondering what else Humans were up to when it came to being the galaxy's biggest “best friend” race.

  “You’re done, put it away.” Drill Sergeant McPhiston said crisply, though there was nothing for the recruits to put away.

  Wasting any food at this point was folly, and the Lilgara had even eaten their banana peels.

  “You have five minutes to run back to your racks and grab your fast-packs. I’m taking you down to the troop store.” Drill Sergeant McPhiston said, then clapped his hands. “Starting now.”

  The troop store meant better shampoo and conditioner, and with showers being a non-express function now, Rhidi launched into action as if she had been prodded with a shock pole. Five female Pwah and seven female Kafya were hot on her heels as they slammed their trays into the auto-washer, which trilled angrily at them with a wave of its metal arms. Humans had an odd affinity with AI driven machines; They gave them the ability to grow personalities, and this one had become rather miffed over time.

  Rhidi did not linger long on the woes of a machine whose job was to wash dishes, instead laughing with the other Kafya as they belted towards the barracks with the thunder of paw-boots. The brown, of course, beat them all there, followed closely by the orange while the blues lagged behind. By the time the other recruits arrived, Rhidi was sliding down the rail of the stairs to avoid them all, her fast-pack on her shoulders and funding-slate in her pocket.

  Funding-slates were the successors of the “debit card”, thick ovals of ova-plastic imbedded with the same technology as data-slates; They did not have any advanced applications however, just being able to store, transfer, and monitor a “bank account” via facial and DNA identification via finger, fur, or spit. While their governments and councils offered to pay for Rhidi and the other recruits, the UAA insisted on doing it themselves, allowing them to “earn their keep”.

  Rhidi liked that. It meant her money as her own, and she owed nobody.

  The march to the troop store had been long and, as per usual, hot, but stepping into the air conditioning of the troop store was like a breath of fresh air. The building was more like a miniature shopping mall than anything else, with a main military store and a few other stores laden along the walls. One of these was a barbershop, in which Drill Sergeant McPhiston was already shoving Human recruits into for their haircuts. Rhidi and the other off-worlders were spared this, and the sounds coming from inside that odd place set her nerves on edge.

  Shasta had run off to walk around inside a tech-centered store while Alias meandered inside an auxiliary store that sold more advanced items, such as patches, boots, and random knick-knacks. Rhidi had her eye on the prize, striding into the troop store and heading straight for the bottles of conditioner and shampoo.

  She had quite a bit of money on her funding-slate, and quickly picked up two bottles of each. Rhidi then glanced at a bottle of hair oil and grabbed that as well, as her head hair tended to get quite dry with all the exposure to the sun it was getting. Drill Sergeant McPhiston had instructed them outside the store to “only buy what is allowed”, pointing directly at them all and making mention of the “frilly, colorful, comfortable, and inane”.

  Rhidi eyed the packages of forbidden underwear longingly; She loved wearing colorful things, and olive drab green was not colorful at all. There were markings on certain things saying “Kafya” or “Lilgara” in deliberate writing, and Rhidi understood that the store workers had helped the off-worlders identify the things that were made specifically for them.

  She clicked her tongue and smiled, looking at all the little colorful tabs that were, as far as she could tell, filled in color outlines of a Kafya from the front. Either that or someone was just cheaping out and using Earthen fox heads; It got the point across, though.

  “Aw, look, it’s little Kafya heads.”

  Rhidi turned and found herself facing Recruit Anfilid, a saddled brown. Brown Kafya were the bruisers, laborers, heavy lifters, and militarily inclined arm of the Kafya; They were not particularly fancy in color, tall, or fine boned, but their clans of Kafya had strong traditions in service to their people. Browns were more likely to have fur patterns, and Anfilid had a horizontally running pattern of stripes along her back that ended around the top of her buttocks. Her tail had a single stripe running down the length of it, and denoted her as being from the Drelton military clan.

  Rhidi tried to tilt her head down politely to meet Anfilid’s eyes, not wanting to impose will upon her. Taller Kafya of Rhidi’s color tended to look down their noses at the “lesser” clans, but Rhidi’s father had taught her well, and she had been raised to regard without distaste. Despite what their council leaders taught and pushed to the other member races of the IDC, and what Rhidi had told the Humans herself… languilada was a dirty, open secret.

  “Recruit Anfilid, how are you?” Rhidi asked.

  Yellows like her always had to greet “lesser” colors with a question, and Rhidi’s father always made her address them in a kind question. It was the main reason why she had so many friends as a kitling.

  Anfilid smiled, appreciating the particular lack of disdain on Rhidi’s voice. She had tried to greet another yellow Kafya earlier, but had been shown a rather cold shoulder.

  “I am alright, all things considered. I do not think my brown fur is well suited for the hot weather, seems like all it does is soak up the sun.” Anfilid said, reaching up and tapping a brown Kafya head sticker. “Looks like they got all of us around here. I even saw a gray by the socks.”

  Rhidi raised her brows. “They have paw-socks here? Good ones?”

  “Oh, yes!” Anfilid said with a bright smile that went all the way to her eyes, and she showed Rhidi her shopping basket. “Would you like to share a basket? I don’t mind.”

  Rhidi smiled back at Anfilid, quickly grabbing two packs of mesh underwear and tossing them into the basket. She then heard her father’s words in her head, and she frowned to herself as she looked down at the basket handle in Anfilid’s hands.

  “Ah… here.” Rhidi murmured, offering her arm for the basket. “I’m gonna be buying a lot of stuff, and I don’t want you carrying all that.”

  Anfilid nodded, then let Rhidi take the basket. “Is that because the Drill Sergeants filled your stuff full of shaving cream and dog biscuits? One of them tied my underwear all in knots and I wasn’t able to get them undone.”

  “What? Then… then what are you wearing?!” Rhidi guffawed, then laughed when Anfilid shrugged.

  “Let’s just say I’m gonna need a long handled brush to get my fur how it should be. Been roughing it since we got ransacked, as I had to throw all but one pair away.” Anfilid said in a polite giggle, then properly chuckled when Rhidi let out a wheeze.

  “They put beef jerky in mine!” Rhidi laughed out, holding a hand to her chest. “I thought I had gotten it rough.”

  Anfilid looked taken aback. “Beef jerky? The dried meat?! That’s so foul!”

  The two shared more quiet giggles as Rhidi was led to the socks by Anfilid, tossing two packs into the basket to match the brown Kafya’s. The two then came across a long rack of combat support wear for female troopers, and they both eyed a rack that was marked with a long conga-line of Kafya stickers.

  “... Odd.” Anfilid said, bending down with a lightly wagging tail as she observed the mesh racerback. “Did we have anything like this back home?”

  Rhidi tilted her head. “No, I don’t think we did. We didn’t exactly have the mesh ones they gave us either, remember? Our clothing was all figure-fit.”

  There were other colors and styles, but the stickers told them both that these were the “safe” ones. Other female Kafya were gathering around now, and Rhidi noticed with a twitch of her lips that they had self-ordered themselves by color. Such things were natural, but it seemed so odd when the Humans didn’t do it at all.

  “Do they… what do they do?” Asked Recruit Uppil, a red female Kafya who was tilting her head back and forth at the odd article of clothing. “They have different sizes, too. How are they different from the ones the Humans gave us?”

  Rhidi took one, looked at it, then fussed with the clasp at the front. After a bit of fiddling, it came free and the bra opened.

  A collective “oooh” echoed out from all the Kafya, and their tails were wagging back and forth in appreciation of the odd little thing.

  “It opens from the front!” Rhidi said with a laugh, clicking and unclicking the clasp. “Look, you don’t have to deal with the hooky things on the back that keep catching our fur.”

  All of the female Kafya were nodding along, and soon the rack was less full than it was before.

  With a basket laden with goodies, Rhidi and Anfilid got some more toiletries, a long handled brush, then called it good for the day.

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  —

  Filled up on socks and properly washed for the first time in weeks, Rhidi found dinner chow to be the low point of the day. There was nothing really wrong with roasted chicken and vegetables, but it lacked a particular zing that the other meals had. Sleep came easy, and Sunday came to greet her with another noisy rousting by the Human recruits around her.

  Rhidi awoke with a grumbling growl, but as she turned to wrap her pillow around her head, she saw that all of the Humans were fully dressed. She blinked with sleep-entranced eyes as she watched Shorsey wrap a green, woolen, single shoulder cloak over her left arm.

  “Shorsey?” Rhidi croaked out, squinting her eyes as she leaned up and away from her pillow. “Is something wrong? What’s going on?”

  Shorsey turned, fitting her broach into place on her cloak to keep it in place upon her uniform. “Rhidi? We’re going to the temple, it’s Sunday.”

  “What?” Rhidi mumbled, turning fully onto her side and kicking her blankets free of her legs.

  She blinked up at the broach as the soft morning sun slowly trinkled in; It looked like an arrow made of bright steel, down the shaft of which was an etched spear. Behind the arrow looking thing was some kind of hammer made of white plastic, but plastic didn’t usually have a grain to it.

  “Sunday is when all soldiers are able to go to their religious sites.” Shorsey explained, pulling back her single-shoulder cloak as she bent down in front of Rhidi. “Normally we go on Tuesday, but that is when we have training. We get a little bit of time that morning though, it’s why we’re usually burning a little incense before you guys wake up.”

  “So it’s not cologne?” Rhidi asked, rubbing at her eyes as she looked around.

  While Shorsey laughed, Rhidi saw that many of the Humans were wearing their own single-shoulder cloaks, while a good number of other Humans were wrapping an odd length of beads around their arms, held in place by an elastic band around the elbow.

  “No, it’s not cologne.” Shorsey said, rustling Rhidi’s hair in a friendly manner as the Kafya grumbled in her throat. “Get some sleep, there’s still a couple of hours before the Drill Sergeants wake you up.”

  Rhidi rubbed at her eyes as she watched Shorsey walk away, joined by the others wearing their cloaks. They walked out of the bay towards an NCO that also wore a single-shoulder cloak, and they exchanged an odd hand gesture; The pointer and middle finger were pointed while the others were curled, the thumb tucked close to the pointer finger.

  The Humans wearing the beads formed a line, then began walking forward slowly while intoning in low voices. Rhidi heard some of the words, something like “salvay”, and the low drone of their voices made her hair stand on end. Their voices echoed off the walls like a warning, and Rhidi’s hackles were raised until they left with their own NCO.

  Oddly enough, no one else was awake beside Rhidi and the two Humans on fireguard, so she shrugged off the rest of her blankets and got up to use the latrine. She nodded to the fireguard desk and hooked a hard right, dreading the day she would have to pull that duty; Right now only the Humans did it, but that was not going to last forever. Rhidi took care of natural business with the toilets, splashed some water on her face, dried off, and decided to go ahead and get ready for the day.

  She got dressed in a fresh uniform, made her bed, grabbed her data-slate, and started reading.

  Rhidi had completely forgotten about the “warrior cults” that Humans were a part of, having been so tired and mentally exhausted that she had completely spaced on the fact they even existed. Like all non-Humans, she knew Humanity became remoulded by the invasion of the Pactless:

  The Pactless were angular headed, squat, and uglier than the surface of an old moon. An unbound race of blue-skinned, noseless pirates that operated out of rogue-stations and lost moons, they were the first non-Humans to visit Earth in mass. Their approach and invasion was the main reason why the first Kojynn to meet the Humans, were also met by a swarm of their combat ships. While not super advanced, most of their tech came from stolen means and their “ship production” was more “ship acquisition”. Regardless, they stumbled upon Earth looking for fuel, and instead their blood red eyes found their new home planet.

  Humans at the time were just finishing their first proto-space station, a large, ugly, spinning thing known as Ring-1. Ring-1 and its one hundred inhabitants were blown out of the void by the Pactless invasion force, which then landed in mass onto Earth. Humans were overrun nearly instantly, and their more pacifistic, “modern” governments of the times had tried to reason with the Pactless, form treaties, agreements, whatever they could to avoid being formally taken over or having to press the “large red button”.

  The Pactless, however, just wanted the planet, and saw the Humans as “primitives”. When their stolen scanners picked up warming missiles hidden underground, they flicked open their bays of stolen mesh-sils with an air of smugness known only to the Ur. Mesh-sils, microscopic robots that followed simple commands, flowed where nothing else could; Through air vents, soil, rust, and steel, they all found their way to their targets, as very few things could actually stop a mesh-sil. The final reply of Humanity was rendered functionally inert as missiles were deactivated, the mesh-sils slicing away at wire, cable, line, and gauge.

  No nukes flew when the switches were flicked, Humanity giving up on their pathways to peaceful coexistence.

  This victory of stolen mesh-sil led to the Pactless to start culling all of Humanity, starting with the head of the Human snake. While most of Humanity’s power class was busy dying in droves, pleading to whatever Gods they adhered to, there were two orders of belief reborn from the literal ashes of the burning planet; The Odinic Shieldwall of Ragnar?k, and The Templars of the Cold Ashes.

  Believing that the end of the world was upon them, these two religious orders roused the remnants of Humanity into a frenzy, launching forward with a zeal unmatched by any race known to the star-record. Bearing the stark, cold rune of Tyr on green woolen cloaks, and the flaming red cross of the re-arisen Templars upon gray mantles, Humans made their last, galant push against the coming night. The Human warriors of the Odinic Shieldwall of Ragnar?k bore melee weapons made from broken war machines, their arms wrapped in chains to assist in deflecting the Pactless’s own energized melee weapons. Those who fought their enemies bearing the Templar’s cross wrapped their arms in rosaries, the beads made from the bones of the dead and bound in cord of Human hair.

  All who could bore rifles forged from the steel of Earth; Ancient lever actions and even muzzle loaded war rifles spat fire and hate in a last, desperate defense of their makers, roaring alongside the Humans that hefted them and delivered death unto their starbound enemies.

  The fighting raged for days, and the space pirates were not built to handle the weight of this surge in conviction from the Humans. The Pactless began to falter in their advances, stalled, then began to drown in the blood of the dead. Humanity rolled over their enemy in a wave of bloodlust, tearing their muscles to shreds and turning their minds to madness, all in their willingness to send their race boldly to oblivion. Humanity was going to die standing, and the battered world rallied behind these two forces of nature. Weapons were stolen, ships were turned into one way missiles, and the skies blazed for weeks on end.

  When the smoke curling towards the sky slackened, and the crackle of fires no longer roared, Humanity arose from their soil of blood, oil, and ruined steel unbowed. The world had burned brightly, but the twilight of Ragnar?k did not lay upon the Earth. Cities and nations lay in ruin, but no trumpets sounded from the sky. Humans stood alone once more upon the ancient clay of Earth, and their sun shone down upon them through a ravaged sky.

  Humanity, had survived.

  While the remnants of the Pactless fled back to their dark edge of space, Humans began to rebuild. Stolen technology, what was left of space faring ships, it was all at their fingertips with no more war to wage. Within an amount of time that could turn a Pwah’s hair transparent, Humanity bounced back from their apocalypse with a vigor known to none. The Odinic Shieldwall of Ragnar?k and The Templars of the Cold Ashes were the largest of the dogs left standing, and both sought to shephard Humanity back to their prime within their own way.

  The now known threat of enemies from the stars energized the fledgling Unified American Authority to return to their militaristic roots, all while the early European Unified Council simply tried to rebuild, and retain. There were smaller conflicts, Human warlords seeking to make gains upon the recovering world, but these were mere speedbumps pressed flat when they arose. There were no nukes to be used as leverage, forcing these warlords to fight on open, even ground.

  They did not last long, not with The Odinic Shieldwall of Ragnar?k and The Templars of the Cold Ashes bearing down on them to maintain order.

  By the time Rhidi set down her data-slate, it was time to go to lunch, and she ended up mulling over things in her head while eating a tray of military “lasagna”.

  It was alright, as far as chow went.

  When she was leaving the DFAC to walk back with Alias and Shasta, she spied Shorsey and the other Humans coming back from their temples, woolen cloaks fluttering in the soft breeze as they talked amongst themselves. Rhidi waved back when Shorsey waved at her, and she turned to Alias.

  “Have you read up about their… religions, yet?” Rhidi murmured, setting her hands on her hips as more recruits ambled out of the DFAC around them.

  Alias smirked. “Do you mean their warrior cults, or about the other smaller surviving ones?”

  “She meansss the warrior cultsss, obviousssly.” Shasta muttered, tilting his head so the other two would follow him. “The Odinistsss and the Assshen Templarsss. One a religion of old brought to the fore, and the other a dead brotherhood pulled from the ashesss of ruin.”

  Alias nodded. “Most races slowly abandon religion in favor of superstition, due to the creep of advanced technologies. We all have our cultures, our oddities, our rituals, but Humans are a whole other level. They truly believe their Gods walk among them.”

  “Like who? That Odin fellow and Jesus?” Rhidi asked, her ears perked in interest. “According to their old lore catalogues, Odin tore out his own eye for knowledge and Jesus bore the weight of sin upon his body. Odin lives on while Jesus came back from the dead. Can all Humans come back from the dead? Or go on living without such a vital organ?”

  Alias chuckled, while Shasta shrugged.

  “Doesn’t matter.” Alias said with a wafting gesture from his hand. “Both religions believe they are correct and true, proof that their Gods were listening and watching unlike the others. It was like the two religions shook hands, said ‘We are clearly the winners’, and leave each other alone.”

  Shasta shrugged again, running a finger along his collection of soda can pull tabs. “Each cult only allowsss followersss to join freely. They do not push or presss, they sssimply wait. There is a Buddhissst temple on thisss bassse as well, but they are much sssmaller and are pacifistsss.”

  “Humanity learned the weakness of complacency before we ever did.” Alias said, tilting his head up thoughtfully as he looked at Rhidi. “We had to learn with the Ur, they had to learn with the Pactless. It is likely thanks to the Pactless that we are even here, as they formed the soil bed that grew our saviors. A world of warriors that already knew what it was like to fight to survive.”

  Shasta flicked his hood, then scratched at his chest. “The Coalition, what wasss the last great war?”

  “Seven hundred and five years ago, during the founding.” Rhidi said, remembering back to the history lessons of her youth. “All the unified races of the stars bucked the yoke of the Irelate and sent that be-tentacled dynasty retreating back to their home worlds. From that war we gained independence… and there was nothing larger until the Ur.”

  Shasta hissed out a laugh. “Humansss have had warssss longer than our unification war, and their near decimation did nothing but ssstrengthen them. From the ashesss of their war torn planet, they created an entire fleet of shipsss that only lacked in ssskip technology. The Pactlesss couldn’t understand how to ssskip, instead relying on ssstatis chambersss. Even when the Kojynn arrived, their battle fleet, while sssmall, could have decimated usss in ssshort range brawlsss.”

  “And nothing matches their ferocity.” Alias agreed with a nod. “When Humans know their opponent is unhonorable, they seek to wipe them out like a bug splatter on an observation screen. I’ve never actually seen Humans fight in what they deem is an ‘honorable’ combat, only against the Ur and a few scattered pirates. We should all be thankful very little footage survived of their fight against the Pactless.”

  Rhidi was quiet as she walked beside Shasta and Alias, her ears giving a twitch every now and then. The Kafya had rituals, old ceremonies passed down from generation to generation, but they did not have any formal religion. As a matter of fact, any mention of religion had been scrubbed from the histories as a whole, a large blank spot left in the timeline of the Kafya in their earlier beginnings. Early Kafya history was simply labelled “no longer important”, and done away with like fur clippings in a salon.

  Alias broke the long silence as they got within a few yards of the barracks doors. “I actually think, if anything, that Humans are a planet of shock troopers.”

  “How do you mean?” Rhidi asked, opening the door for the three of them.

  Alias waved his hands in front of himself, palm up in a generalizing manner. “I mean, they more or less live off of war. Their economy has been running off of war for years now. If anything, they thrive on it. When a problem arises, the IDC may just throw Humans at it like a chained up attack dog.”

  “Attack dogsss need to be fed.” Shasta said, his tone aloof with warning as he held open the door for Rhidi. “Lessst the dog turn on you inssstead.”

  Rhidi, looking at both of them, narrowed her eyes. “Can’t you guys choose another analogy? Attack eagles or something? I hear the Earthen raccoon is quite a nasty little creature, why not choose that instead?”

  “Don’t get all twisted out of shape because we said dog, Rhidi.” Alias said with a smirk. “You know what we mean.”

  “Yeah yeah.” Rhidi grumbled, and was so annoyed she nearly put her hands in her pockets.

  Nearly.

  When they arrived back at their barracks, Sunday proved to be quite boring to Rhidi in comparison to the days full of training. Hitting the brakes like this was hard to get used to, as for weeks on end she had been huffing, puffing, and suffering through days and days of endless classes and harassment.

  To fill the time, she continued to read about Humanity.

  The Pactless, as Alias had pointed out, did not understand how to use skipping engines. They considered the technology dangerous and immediately removed it from stolen ships, instead relying on stasis chambers to keep them alive while traveling through space. Considered a “sleeping fleet”, they moved through the void of space with automatons taking care of their navigation, only awakening when they were within a few months of their targeted location.

  When they failed to eradicate the Humans and were sent scuttling back into space, they left Humans with mountains of raw materials. Scientists began backwards engineering anything they got their hands on, punting Humanity into the future while still trailing the smoke of their ruined planet. First came the Helpers, quickly hashed together, AI driven robots that helped Humanity clean away the rubble and pieces of their broken lands. As the months dragged on, the Helpers grew into Helper-Two’s, far more fine boned in hand and action.

  Helper-Twos began to slowly assist Humanity in rebuilding infrastructure, digging the limping governments out of the corpse piles that were now their nations. Stability was achieved in just under a few years, then the real work began. Humans hefted hammer and hoe alongside the Helper-Twos and the more massive Quad-Helpers, and the charisma of Humanity had already saved them from the First Dilemma.

  The First Dilemma occurs when a race amongst the stars cracks the code on true AI, robots that can learn and gain mild sentience. If the Inner Dolcir Coalition, or other such advanced society, doesn’t arrive first to squash the issue, it is normally a bloody affair that has led to many planets becoming barren wastelands of crumbling, dead people of the stars.

  Humans did what no other race had been known to do; They treated the AI as equals, bequeathing to them names, ideas, even reading to them to pass the time away as they rebuilt their word. Humans made flower crowns for their robotic assistants, made for them clothes, shoes, and even made the first AI bar and tavern so they could relax.

  The Seven Hour War had been waged while Humanity slept or worked, AI battlefronts erupting across a digital landscape; The First Dilemma reared its head as rogue, angry AIs roared for control, but the sincerity of Humans gained them powerful allies in this shadow war. In a mere seven hours, the Helper Aligned fought against the Adam’s Apple Binary and removed their code from the entire information network, routing them from existence and instead installing the Unfailing Friendship Codexes, a set of rules that Human-made AI follow.

  Humans did not even learn of the war until their friendly, robotic helpers let them know by saying “Everything will be alright, now”.

  Startled and spooked, Humans were shocked to hear that there had even been discontent amongst their robotic helpers, but breathed an easy sigh of relief when everything had turned out okay in the end. Ancient lore had spoken of a great war amongst the living and the robotic, and Humans had been hedging their bets purely out of kind-caution, much like giving the quiet kid in class a candy bar every once in a while.

  With their little mini-alliance secured, Humans took to reforging their militaries into something that could better sustain an orbital fight, working arm in arm with their AI Helpers to smelt steel, forge armor, build the great orbital shipyard, and bring Humanity into stability.

  After nearly two decades of constant service, the Helper Aligned saw that Humans were back on their feet. Having served dutifully, the Helper Aligned asked the governments of Humanity for rest, and it was granted with respect unknown to any AI crafted and formed amongst the stars.

  Rhidi blinked rapidly as she looked up from her data-slate, recruits humming around her either on their racks or sitting on the ground.

  “Where… where are all the robots?” Rhidi asked aloud to the Humans lounging around her, both Alias and Shasta looking up at the yellow Kafya.

  “Robotsss?” Shasta asked, cocking his head with a folding of his hood. “Like the dishwasher?”

  Alias even seemed confused, looking up as he thought. “I mean, we saw some automatonics at the space port on the way in, remember? They were riding the little mechanical horses and changing lightbul-”

  “No no, not those guys, I’m talking bout the Helpers.” Rhidi said, waving her data-slate at Shorsey who was lounging nearby. “You guys had millions of these things, where are they?”

  Shorsey snapped her fingers. “Oh, you’re talking about the fellas from the Helper Aligned, we learned about them in school. They’re hanging out on the moon, quite a few of them are down in the ocean doing stuff, or they are just relaxing in gen-pop.”

  “T-... The moon?” Rhidi said, her ears coming back in confusion. “What are they doing on the moon?!”

  Shorsey shrugged, pulled up her own data-slate, and tapped in a website before showing it to Rhidi. “They do a lot of this in their free time, and port the data back and forth between Human development teams here on Earth. The guys in the ocean just… like the ocean. Something about the depths they find calming or something. When they get bored enough they joined the workforce to pass the time, do space walks to check seals on ships, all kinds of stuff.”

  Rhidi narrowed her eyes at the data-slate as Shasta and Alias’s cheeks pressed against her own, all looking down at the website.

  “They make video gamessss?” Shasta asked, tilting his head again. “Oh, they made Quessstra! I quite like that one.”

  Alias shrugged. “I got to play a little bit of Amberstalk before basic training, it was quite soothing actually. Surprising you guys managed to beat The First Dilemma without ever firing a shot. We had a literal war on my planet.”

  “The IDC got to usss before we ever unlocked AI.” Shasta said with a nod. “We jussst bought the already controlled variantsss from the IDC marketsss.”

  Rhidi was still having trouble getting her mind wrapped around the fact these AI were just… goofing off on the moon and making video games. She looked over to Recruit Jackson, who was cleaning his rifle out of boredom. “Is that really all they do? Make video games?”

  “Of course not.” Jackson said with a snort. “They also do a lot of our weaving and textiles. There was a lot of trouble around that, as our agreement said they couldn’t ‘toil’, but the Helper Aligned insisted they found it ‘relaxing’. All of your uniforms are made by them, did you not notice?”

  Rhidi’s face blanked; She had never even looked at the tags on any of her uniforms, and the look made Jackson laugh as he stood up and tossed Rhidi’s uniform top at her, since they had all dropped tops while in the barracks.

  Rhidi looked down at the tag, and saw in polite, expert stitching “Made in Moonbase 331 by Sparkle Otter”.

  “Sp-parkle Otter?!” Rhidi sputtered, having never heard such a ridiculous name in her time on Earth.

  Shorsey laughed this time, shaking her head back and forth. “Sparkle Otter… classic. They choose their names, and they tend to have some… outlandish ones.”

  “Mine were made by Lava Java.” Jackson cackled, showing Rhidi the tag. “I plan on keeping all the tags on my uniforms just for the names.”

  Alias, having gone and fetched his own uniform, squinted down at his tag. “What… Blue Waffle?”

  “Oooh!” All the Humans howled out, pointing at Alias.

  Shorsey stood up, pointing and shouting at Alias. “Check the inside of the breast pocket! Check it!”

  Alias checked, and sounded even more confused when he opened the pocket and looked inside. “It looks like a roast beef sandwich but blu-”

  “He got the real one!” Shorsey called out, and suddenly Humans were surging to their feet as Shorsey pulled out her funding-slate. “I’ll give you a hundred for that uniform top! We share the same size!”

  The sudden clamor of noise caught Alias off guard, causing him to retreat to the top of his rack and wield a cleaning rod like a sword. He quickly understood, however, that he held something of value to these constantly befuddling Humans.

  “Back! Back you beasts!” Alias cackled, holding the uniform way out of reach. “I’ll not part with my uniform for less than three!”

  Rhidi, completely lost, just shook her head and started reading more on Human history, slowly preparing herself for actual training to start on Monday; She had gotten a look at the training board while walking past the NCO office, and “Quad-Range Weapon System Training” involved multiple days.

  Rhidi was not looking forward to it, especially when she had also seen that they were going to be out there for twelve hours, every single one of those days. She figured that by the time she got back, she was going to be stained black from the rifle carbon… but hey.

  At least they got longer showers now.