Fatal Frontier

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say.

There had been a lot of screaming since the Invasion began, and a lot of it from the invading forces. On reflection, Kre'ssh'ka wondered what the Galactic Federation had expected. Solaris-3, the most advanced of the system's 9 planets and the only one with a population capable of space travel, was a Deathworld, after all.

It had all started fifty standard cycles ago, when observation Scouts reported back in a panic that Solaris-3, which had only just achieved atmospheric flight less than one hundred cycles previous, broke out of the atmosphere and into space.

Galactic Policy regarding Deathworld Civilizations was simple: keep them contained on their own planets. It had been almost a thousand cycles since the last time a Deathworld had ventured off their planet in search of somewhere less hostile to their lifeforms, and been dealt with decisively. Solaris-3 had been under observation for several thousand cycles, with the general consensus that they were too busy fighting each other to concern themselves with the rest of the galaxy, but roughly a century ago, that changed abruptly.

Going from Stone and Stick to Metal technology had taken several thousand Solaris cycles, and from Metal to Steam several more. The leap from Steam to Fusion had taken barely two hundred cycles, and once Fusion had been adapted to work with Solar technology for self-sustaining Space Travel... well, the widespread panic in the normally calm and controlled Federation was considered very, very justified.

Thus, the invasion, relying on superior numbers and technology to even the odds and send the Deathworlders back to the Stone Age.

They had miscalculated, and miscalculated badly. It had been so long since they faced Deathworlders, and the reports from that time had focused on the battle against the dominant species.

They hadn't considered the horrifying array of apex predators that would give rise to a dominant species such as Humans, as they called themselves, hardy and durable and resilient to damage. Even the comparatively-benign animals had a ridiculous amount of lethal defenses. The 215th Battalion had been almost annihilated by a particularly nasty strain of plant, causing an allergic reaction that shocked the average system enough to be debilitating or even lethal!

HazMat gear had become standard issue, and the engineers were frantically working to adapt those to cope with the extreme temperatures common to nearly the entire planet.

The Galactic Federation had come to Solaris-3 to wipe out the Human Deathworlders. Kre'ssh'ka wondered if they wouldn't inadvertently wipe themselves out.

The Invasion had been a disaster from start to finish.

The Initial Landing of the Advance Forces had interrupted some kind of sport, where a large segment of the population had gathered, prime for a surprise attack. The initial strike had taken out the players, but sent the spectating crowd into a killing frenzy. The Advance Forces had been forced into a fighting retreat, but not in time to warn the HQ Vessel to call off the invasion.

Scouts had reported that the Humans of Solaris-3 hadn't even achieved planetary unity, split into more than 100 different factions, and most of those factions had opposing factions within themselves! Apparently, nothing inspired Humans to put aside their differences like a common enemy.

Well, the Humans wouldn't have lasted this long if they couldn't adapt to things that wanted to kill them, another thing that Kre'ssh'ka thought the Analysts should have anticipated. There was nothing for it but to bomb their Space Research and Testing facilities, use that as a distraction to grab some animal and wildlife samples, and perhaps a Human or Two, and study them.

Safely back on their ships and headed out of the Solaris System, Kre'ssh'ka joined those of xir battalion not currently occupying a bed in the infirmary or a shallow grave on Solaris-3 on one of the viewing platforms.

If the failed invasion had taught xir anything, it was that anything originating from a Deathworld was best observed at a distance, and that a 'safe' distance should probably be increased by several factors before it was actually safe.

The retreat had managed to obtain a species of clinging vine, a large green-brown sphere with spikes that the scientists assured them was a fruit, and two small furry mammalian-type animals. One was striped black and white, with a large and fluffy tail currently in an erect position. The other looked like an irresponsible scientist had bred several species together out of spare parts, having webbed feet and a large bill, but a streamlined body that had the analysts arguing whether it was aquatic, landbound, or a combination of both.

Kre'ssh'ka nudged one of xir comrades. "Did we get names for any of the vile creatures?"

They shrugged, ensuring that there were several ranks between them and the viewing window. "The fruit is called 'Durian', I believe. The black and white animal is - "

They were interrupted by screams of dismay and horror as a cloud of noxious gas erupted from the animal's rear end. Three of the scientists who had been standing closest collapsed within seconds, while the rest stampeded for the quarantine cubicles.

Kre'ssh'ka sighed, hoping that they managed to get the gas contained before it got into the air filtration systems. That would make for a very unpleasant several hundred lightyears between Solaris and Home.

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