Owl and Hoplon

[Thunderer]

"अपो अस्मान मातरः शुन्धयन्तु घर्तेन नो घर्तप्वः पुनन्तु
विश्वं हि रिप्रं परवहन्ति देविरुदिदाभ्यः शुचिरापूत एमि"

The words of unexplained power slid gently from the depth of a soul to envelop the edges of a statue. It was a small, portable figurine of Saraswati, the Hindu devi of wisdom. The patina over her bronze eyes suggested they had seen many generations. Their view was perfectly indifferent to all of them, same as the day the metal cooled down.

A pair of devoted eyes with the blackness of a cave slowly, and cautiously, lifted their view from the floor to the ceiling. The figurine lay in the middle, and they purposely avoided it.

He was kneeling before, and now he was John Khatri, a captain in the Bretonian Armed Forces, with a duty on his shoulders.

The chamber was small, dark and empty. A pedestal and the figurine was all it contained. Khatri left. He closed the door very gently, as if taking care not to wake the deity. Then he bolted through the brightly lit corridor of sterile whiteness. He was the captain of the ship, and the ship needed him. It was about to send a mooring request.

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[Thunderer]

"##############ation, I am requesting to #oor. I re#eat, I am requesting to moor."
The static was beginning to clear as the layer of atmosphere between the ship and the station was thinning. It unveiled its gargantuan elegance to the bridge.
"This Captain John Khatri, HMS Avalon. Sunderland Station, please respond, over".
"Roger that. Your request is granted. Please proceed Three."

Sunderland and the Avalon each opened their mooring bridge doors and the different atmospheres collided. Two squads of Bretonian marines stood opposite of each other. At their middles were their respective commanders: Admiral Norma Peter Clark, commander in chief of the Grimsby Flotilla and Sunderland Station, and Captain John Khatri, of the HMS Avalon. He approached the admiral and his men followed in a broad line. As he saluted, his men proceeded to those of the admiral's, and integrated with her forces. Khatri was now on her ground, and under her command. While doing so, he invested great effort not to incidentally look at her widely spoken about backside, which he did successfully. He then spoke with as much formality as he could, because he knew that was the only way Clark approved. Not even "ma'am", let alone a name -- the rank was all that mattered.
"Admiral! The cargo I spoke about is aboard the Avalon. It is ready for your team of experts. I have also brought you some oxygen straight from New London,.. with fresh rain scent. I am aware they rarely supply this place. Orders?"
"Is the... thing here?", suspicion raised her stern eyebrow.
"Ah, the box! It is inside, but I suggest dressing the men into both armour and hazard suits while opening it. And bring a number of them."
Clark raised her chin. "I believe I am perfectly capable of arranging everything myself." Her frowning lips suddenly bent into a smile, albeit a fake one. "Now... come to my quarters. You are a guest here." She turned towards the marines: "Men!" They saluted. "You are dismissed!"
Khatri obeyed. He could not do anything else. But he did so gladly, and his imagination ran wild -- as the marines' laughter when the two got far enough.

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Bretonian Charter of Interstellar Law Bretonian Secrets Act

[Thunderer]

"Alright, what do we have here...", one of the workers in a hazard suit casually spoke through his gas mask as he turned on the light. It revealed a large, metallic box. It was no longer looming in the dark -- now it was only one of the objects under the light. The sound of a heavy forklift echoed through the dusty cargo space. The machine slightly struggled to lift the object, but it managed, and then casually took it with itself, aboard Sunderland. The workers followed.


"Two Earl Greys!", Clark ordered the waiter. She was sitting at a table, a most common of tables in the common messroom. However, no one else but the waiter was present and most of it was dark. The lights in the kitchen and the lights above the table were the only ones lit.
"I told you we needed to speak in private. What happened in New London? Tell me." She said that with an almost commanding tone.
"With all due respect, Admiral, haven't you read m-" She interrupted him.
"You said that the cargo somehow materialized in your ship. What really happened?"
"It did truly materialize out of nothing. Or the sensors were dysfunctional. Everything I wrote in the report really happened."
"Objects don't just materialize. I find there is less reason to believe you than suspect you."
"By the arms of Shiva, I swear! I-" The tea had just arrived.
"You will take this one", Clark gave him a cup. He looked at it with hidden suspicion and smelled it. It smelled good and he could not resist taking a sip. "Be sure that our investigation will determine the truth. But let us change the subject to something more pleasant..." She brought her cup to her lips, which grinned. "What's the weather like on New London?"


"Now the last one...", said a worker while putting a screw from the box down onto the floor. It used to hold the lid closed. He grasped the last screw with a wrench and pulled it out.
"Eh up there, Joe!", he shouted in the direction of the forklift. "Our part's done. Gather up the soldiers to get out whatever bleeding hell's inside and let's get ourselves a cold one!"


The lid had been opened. A wall of plasma rifles stood motionless in front of the hole. A nanofibre net covered it. A soldier cautiously approached and lighted a flashlight inside. It seemed empty. Then, suddenly, a black, elongated eye looked back at him. He flinched and the squad aimed, but no one fired. An emaciated arm slowly made its way from the darkness. The muzzles tracked its movement. It had five fingers, but they were unusually long. A relatively small, pale and very thin humanoid creature, with a large head, followed. It wiggled out like a worm, but then it fell into the net and it did not move any more. The soldier approached to check its life signs. It suddenly spoke, with a quiet, deep voice, that sounded as if it came from the hollow core of a large and rotten tree, inconsistent with the creature's size: "I will only converse with the Khatri-named one."

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Bretonian Charter of Interstellar Law Bretonian Secrets Act

[Thunderer]

"Good day", said Khatri, with a reassuring smile on his face, while he was closing the door of the interrogation room. Then he turned towards the creature. His lips opened and he backed away by reflex.
"I am glad I made you stop thinking about that", the creature muttered.
"About what?"
"You know about what. Your chances with the large-gluteus-one are non-existent and I used to be a female. Please do not think about that any more."
"You used to be...?" Khatri completely disregarded the intriguing fact that it was reading his thoughts. He sat on the opposite part of the table.
"A female. Like the large-gluteus-one."
"A woman?"
"Yes."
"What happened to you?"
"I was upgraded when I joined what you call the "Cult of Technology".
"How does one join?"
"I will not speak about that."
"But, would it not interest you to attract more members?"
"I will not speak about that."
"Alright..."
Complete silence lasted for a few more seconds.
"Do you need some clothes... milady? You seem..."
"I am dressed."
"It doesn't appear so..."
"This is my suit. But it is also part of my body now."
"Mhm..." Khatri was trying to remember what he had wanted to ask right before he entered.
"You wonder why I will only speak with you? Because you are good."
"Why do you think I am better than others?", Khatri's modesty had to ask.
"No. You are weaker than others. What you call "good", we call "weak". There is no good and evil. There is only reasonable and unreasonable. What you call "good" relies on the existence of what you call "God". What you call "evil" behaves by using only reason. There is no "God". There is only reason.
You are more likely to trust what I say than hate me because I am different and allow your emotions to influence your objectivity."
"So... you are evil?"
"There is no evil."
"What does the Cult of Technology want?"
"Everything."
"I see..." He gulped. "And why did you... materialize aboard the Avalon?
"I disagree with my superiors. They think that your entity called "Bretonia" is stronger than the entity called "Gallia". They want to do action against Bretonia to weaken you for our conquest. But I used simple mathematics and calculated that Gallia is stronger than you and the entities called "Liberty", "Council", "Crayter" and "Malta" together. I want to help you weaken Gallia."
"So you can conquer us?"
"Yes. After Gallia.", it added unemotionally.
"Fine for me... I suppose. But why can't you do it right now?"
"My superiors act unreasonably. We are weak."
"Good." Khatri's patriotic pride rose his confidence. "And how do you intend to help us?"
"Bring me what you call "computer"."

In a couple of minutes, Khatri returned carrying what looked like a glass panel. It is 825 AS, and all computers are very thin and light panels that one can see through if they are shut down.
At the moment Khatri placed it on the table, Megahard Doors started. Apparently the creature was controlling it. However, even with the enormous telepathic power the creature had, Doors still took a very long time to start, although it was 825 AS. The creature spoke no more, but a data download bar appeared. It was slowly filling. Very slowly.
"Can you make this faster?", Khatri asked after a few minutes. He received no reply.

Half an hour later, a beeping sound could be heard. Someone was using their access card to open the door. A soldier entered. His eyes were perfectly blank and did not look at any particular spot. He raised his rifle and pointed it at the creature. Khatri ran towards him to disarm him, but he was slower than a laser. The next moment the creature lay on the table in a red pond, with a hole through its head. The soldier lay on the floor, knocked down by Khatri, who was over him.
"What happened!? Where am I!?", the soldier asked as if suddenly woken up from a nightmare. His eyes looked like if there was a soul behind again. A group of soldiers quickly dashed into the room and took him away, him still clueless. They were followed by medics. Khatri turned around, trying to comprehend what had just happened.

The progress bar was at 99%.

---

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[Thunderer]

"Come here! Come!" One of the scientists in one of the many laboratories aboard Sunderland was calling Khatri with excitement. "You must see this!" They approached a terminal.
"Poor man... I don't think he was even conscious when he did it...", Khatri said as he was shaking his head, still struck by the events in the interrogation room.
"Yes..." The scientist was not even listening to Khatri. He was currently opening a programme. "Aaah! Here it is! Look!" He excitedly pointed towards a list of statistics. Khatri looked closer. "It's called an ion cannon, but those have only been theorized. Until today... According to this data, it can, upon hitting the bare hull of an enemy ship, drain twice more power than it uses from yours! This should be impossible! But we've done it!"
"So, we can produce them now?"
"Well... No. Not really... We can produce precisely four, so far. We don't have the technology to produce the containment chamber, but among that pile of mostly useless scrap you've brought us, there were two intact ones."
"An energy draining cannon? Is this all?" Khatri somehow managed to be disappointed.
"No, of course not! This is just the beginning! Using what we have learned, we have come up with the idea of EMP flaks. But, the containment chamber is the problem again... We can only use the four you've brought us. Oh, and..." For a second he forgot what he wanted to say. "Yes! There's more! We also have all the theoretical data on the so called "Terminator" cannons. It's the newest development from Kusari. Believe it or not, a joint project between Kishiro and Samura. What we know of it is that it's a fast firing weapon, short ranged and not very efficient, but extremely devastating. The containment chamber is not a problem here, it's quite similar to that of Solarises, but the muzzle is. We can't make the materials durable enough to withstand the overheating. You have, again, provided us with that, but only two muzzles... Oh, and another thing. This one might be a bit more serious."
"Yes?"
"We don't have the faintest idea how to assemble it!" The scientist laughed on his own account. "The data you have given us was incomplete. The whole theory of how it works is there... but not the practice! I expect the top Kusarian weapons scientists to be better informed, but I very much doubt they'd give us a hand."
"Anything else?"
"No, I'm afraid this is all we have... for now."
"Very well. Good luck with your job, and now I shall tend to mine. I will try to get you help from Kusari. Oh, and thank you!"
"Just a duty, Sir." They shook hands and parted ways. The scientist thought about what a superficial man this Khatri was. Such as any soldier. Khatri could not stop thinking about the events from the interrogation room.

Sunderland silently floated through Darlington's atmosphere as if it was any other day.

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