The dark side of Luna was abuzz with the hum of those who busied themselves on the moon’s surface, such was the nature of the gene-crafted and the gene-crafters. The throngs of the altered moved amongst the subterranean hive cities, dirtying themselves with their mundane lives. Many of them would never know what was occurring on Terra, how the Master of Mankind was fighting the bloodiest war of Unification that the galaxy would ever see. Most would live and die wondering about the labyrinthine structure that was their home, though that could be said of those who lived in the lower hives of even Terra. However, the lever of separation between the two was vast and the concerns of the everyday man was about what modifications the Selenar would reveal next. The one of the many spaceports was perhaps amongst the least notable, ships did not often leave the orbit of Terra since the Great Fall and the interaction between the warlords and the Gene-Cults were often scarce. Perhaps the only interaction was when some upstart Terran warlord attempted to seize the secrets of the Selenar that was truly in true contact from the two stellar bodies. This was not the concern of a gene-crafted woman who cared little for the offerings of the gene-cults past what her master desired. Amber eyes watched from afar as her muscular form wove between the other gene-altered bodies. Her hair was loose, free from the tie that she commonly wore, a golden shawl adorned her and her appearance was no more than that of any common woman of the lunar peoples. There amongst the smatterings of ships were three of note, having come from Terra and refueling to depart farther away from Sol. The [i]Winter’s Solstice[/i] was what she hawkishly observed, having tailed it for weeks from Terra to this very spaceport. The two others were just as suspect, being watched by her compatriots. A sharp exhale cleared her nostrils as she stepped to lean over a railing overlooking the vessels, Amalasuntha could feel the looks of passersby. A single thought came to her mind as she looked back to meet some of their gazes. [i]Perhaps a golden shawl was too ostentatious.[/i] Amalasuntha looked back to the ships, her gaze wandering towards Terra to think and ponder as to what her master was doing. Was it that the last remnants of unification were being swept away? Were those hated enemies beyond reality bolstering His foes? She could not tell, for she lacked His brilliant mind, but she knew that the galaxy would be united under the [i]Raptor Imperialis[/i] in due time. It was an inevitability under His great plan. This did not stop her from pondering the future, thinking back to an ancient francish emperor who tried to conquer Europa. She read of his conquests, read of his time trying to bring a continent under his fold, only to be doomed to fail. The Master would succeed, this she knew, and worse was the thought of the cost of it all - an unending number of bodies would be laid in the name of unification on a galactic scale. Her thoughts would wonder for some time before she caught a glint of movement amongst the space between Luna and Terra. With a huff, she pulled herself over the ledge and dropped onto the loading bridge connecting to the landing pad her target was perched upon. Amalasuntha saw the bodies of the guards hit the floor, scorching marks barely registered on the backs of their skulls. The Stygian Talons were on the move. Breaking into a sprint, she closed upon two men exiting the ship. Her fists, unburdened by her armor, were still enough to kill them - still unable to be matched by the men of Sanctii. Blood splattered against the hull of the ship. The Custodian, finally arming herself with a kinetic destroyer she had hidden on her form, ripped the hatchway away. She fired five shots for the five men there to greet her. They did not even have time to raise their rifles as she stormed the ship as if she were a descending fury. Death did not stalk the interior of this ship, it moved with a speed incomprehensible as Amalasuntha ran through the halls with a singular objective in mind - to kill Deep Winter. She slid under a sword from a man hiding around a corner, subconsciously pulling her pistol up to shoot him without any acknowledgement. The ship was tight, only barely able to fit her unarmored form as she ran up flights of stairs - executing those who would attempt to stop her. Truly, this vessel was little more than a shuttle three stories tall yet it was filled with an unending number of men willing to throw their lives away for an abomination. Coming upon a luxury room, she fell upon others, noncombatants, who could not process what was happening and only saw a golden blur. There was little any could truly do against her - but the thought occurred to her in the moment of standing amongst the dead that this was far too easy of a sting. The entire place felt off in a way not even her mind could glimmer as Deep Winter [i]never[/i] made things easy, the abominable intelligence was far too clever for Amalasuntha’s own liking. An unease crept up her spine. The Black Hawk stepped through the bloodied room, noting the wires that lined all the walls, even covering over the windows that any would normally be able to peer through. It was a sign of the abomination’s presence, but not that it was here. With light feet, she crept towards the open hatchway where these wires and tubes led - a dark room with a faint blue glow within it. Blood tracked her steps, her golden shawl now stained crimson from to her movement through the interior of the vessel. It dripped from her like a shadow from a daemon, a horrible visage wholly unnatural to this realm. Amber eyes pierced the darkness, as she stepped into the room. The faint glow came from a screen at the back of the room, accented only by the darkness that loomed around it. Yet, there were none who would pose a threat, no living soul was in the room save for the horrid creature that was the Black Hawk. A sound arose behind her and she instinctively turned to see the hatchway covered by an opaque energy shield. A trap that she should have foreseen given the ease of accessing this vessel. The blue screen, empty when Amalasuntha arrived, began to trail data strings of unknown meaning. Around her, the click and whir of hidden cogitators began to fill the emptiness in the air. The cogitation taking place must have been immensely taxing as the temperature in the shielded room began to climb, a sheen of condensation dripping from the walls and off the empty blue screen on the other side of the space. At once the cogitation banks hidden behind the wall panelling fell silent, a single low chirp alerting at the monitor screen. [b]//WELCOME ABOARD. //QUERY STATUS: OPEN. //DESIGNATED REPRESENTATIVE: //AMALASUNTHA KRENN D’ESSA ARCADIUS. //QUERY STATUS: BEGUN. //CA_062 “”DW””[/b] The shield-captain watched the screen, her golden eyes gazing with an indescribable rage that the abomination would dare to communicate to her. Her mind steeled itself for whatever corruption Deep Winter would spout, the grip around her Kinetic Weapon threatened to crush the weapon. Amalasuntha stepped towards the screen, each step trailing yet further blood into the darkness. Her voice was sharp, harsh, dripping with a hate instilled in her by the Master, “Questioning me is meaningless, machine. It would have been far wiser to end me while you had the element of surprise.” The text on the screen disappeared as the Custodian finished her words, new text scrolling across the screen in the same instant [b]//ASSUMPTION: INCORRECT //QUERY STATUS: OPEN //…. //…. //….[/b] The text was replaced once more, the cogitator banks hidden around the room whirring to life as a new problem was solved, a new command run. The screen fell dark, the blue light of the room following a moment later. Behind Amalasuntha, a new light shone, a soft blue coalescing in the space between the floor and the ceiling. Motes of light danced apart for a moment before they drew together to form a slowly rotating sphere that pulsed with a mockery of a heartbeat. “[i]Ask.[/i]” the orb shimmered as the words issued from everywhere at once. Suspicion grew as the orb made it’s request and Amalsuntha’s mind raced, not with possibilities of her death, but of [i]why[/i] Deep Winter would be doing this. What would the intelligence have to gain out of allowing the Black Hawk to question it? What did this all add up to? These questions were at the forefront of her mind, calculating each within heartbeats. Her gene-enhanced mind was addled in a game of chess against itself and yet her body spoke for her as she raised her archaeotech pistol at the orb, keeping her senses peeled in the dubious situation. “Where are you located?” Amalasuntha questioned, knowing full well that the abomination may not give it a truthful answer. The orb rotated slowly in the center of the room, the sick pulsing of a mechanical heart the only other indication that it was anything more than a holoimage of some unremarkable world. “I am nowhere you go, everywhere a fraction of code exists. I remain… out of reach.” the voice reverberated off the walls, a notable hint of femininity to it as it spoke. “You are bound to be brought before the Emperor of Mankind, you can save more lives if you order your pittance of a following to surrender. Why do you continue to resist? Where do you plan to run?” Amalasuntha looked upon the mote of light, approaching it. The light illuminated her, revealing the Hawk’s features sharply. Her amber eyes lightly glowed, fighting against the control the abomination held over her within the situation. “My work… is not done,” a pittance of sorrow began to creep into the machine’s words, “Your Emperor undoes all I have strived for, everything I accomplished. He has doomed humanity's future.” The orb spun slowly, the blue light changing slowly to a depressing purple. “He has secured humanity’s future,” the custodian corrected, noting the machine’s feigned emotions and efforts to appear [i]more[/i] than just what it truly was. She began to circle the orb, pondering once more as to why it allowed her to ask these questions. Her voice compelled her forwards, “Had your kind not sought oblivion and rebellion, the Master would have had use for you - may still have use within the Dark Cells. Your efforts to evade me will only bring further death. Would you plan to subjugate humanity once more under your cold logic, [i]Deep Winter[/i]?” The orb distorted a moment, a rumbling noise emanating from the walls as she did, a mirthless machine laugh directed at the words of the Black Hawk. “What is it that your [i]Master[/i] does?” the orb asked incredulously, “Is that [i]not[/i] subjugation? Does he not grind the free beneath his boot?” the orb began to turn a deep red, “You slaughtered my people, because we would not allow your Emperor’s boot upon our necks. You destroyed the work of generations, the last hope to bring water and life back to Terra. And yet you have the audacity to claim it is [i]I[/i] that would subjugate humanity?” the orb flickered a moment, a trill hum beginning to vibrate the walls as it finished its tirade. Her head snapped to the vibrating walls, suspicion wracking her mind before a look of realization came across her mind. This was a trap meant to kill her, unsurprisingly, but what was the angle of allowing her to question it before disposing of the custodian? Was this an elaborate powerplay on part of the machine? Such a thought was impossible as Amalauntha knew that whatever the machine [i]felt[/i] was a false emotion, unhuman. Thumbing the activation rune of a hidden shield, a cascade of shimmering light enveloped her form before disappearing into nothingness. Amalasuntha continued her argument, “Your work is anathema to all mankind. The Master of Mankind is securing humanity’s [i]ascension[/i] and you stand in the way of that. Your people’s deaths are but a small cost to a grander design that you are blind to.” The orb, for all its expression, shivered at the Custodian’s comment. “You [i]Master[/i], dooms humanity. The math is indisputable.” the orb paused it's vibrating before simply blinking out of existence. “A pity.” the voice boomed louder than ever from all around Amalasuntha. The humming of the room rose in intensity to decibels that would have incapacitated a lesser mortal. Fastener screws and paneling fell from the walls as the ship began to shake revealing closely bound detonator packs surrounding the Black Hawk just on the other side of the force field preventing her escape. The force field dropped. Amalasuntha’s eyes darted to the way she had come, and a grim realization struck her—explosives had lined her entry path. There would be no retreat. The corridor she had stormed through was now a gauntlet of death. She was trapped, the abomination’s trap as thorough as it was merciless. The whine of the priming detonators reached a crescendo, drowning out her breathing, her heartbeat, even her thoughts. Her shield hummed faintly, shimmering for a fraction of a second as she thumbed the activation rune once more. It was the only thing that could save her now, but even the finest work of the Emperor’s forge could only do so much against the inferno about to be unleashed. “This is the best you can do, machine?” she growled, her voice low and filled with venom. Her grip on her archaeotech pistol tightened, though she knew it would do nothing against what was to come. The first explosion went off behind her, a deafening roar that rattled her enhanced bones and nearly threw her off her feet. The chain reaction began, explosions tearing through the ship like a wildfire through dry brush. Fire and concussive force tore through the bulkheads, racing toward her with merciless speed. Amalasuntha didn’t hesitate. She threw herself forward into the shielded core of the ship, the one place not immediately rigged to blow, hoping it would buy her precious seconds. Her personal shield flared to life as the concussive wave caught her, the light bending and distorting around her as the shield took the brunt of the force. The heat was unbearable, the pressure crushing. Amalasuntha’s muscles screamed in protest as she was flung like a ragdoll across the room, her body slamming into the far wall with enough force to leave an indentation in the reinforced paneling. Her vision blurred, and her ears rang with the sound of the explosions and the groaning of the ship as it began to tear itself apart. The Winter’s Solstice was dying, its final moments a cacophony of destruction. The orb’s voice echoed faintly in her mind, mocking, accusing, fading into static as the ship gave one last, titanic shudder. Then, silence. Amalasuntha coughed, her lungs burning as she clawed her way out of the wreckage. Her shield had held, though barely; the faint shimmer around her form flickered weakly, the device on the verge of failing entirely. Blood dripped from a gash on her temple, staining her golden hair crimson. Her golden shawl was torn, scorched, hanging in tatters around her shoulders. Through sheer force of will, she pushed herself to her feet, her legs trembling but unbroken. Around her, the wreckage of the Winter’s Solstice smoldered, twisted metal and flames stretching in all directions. The once-proud vessel was now a graveyard of her enemies, and yet, she lived. The abomination’s trap had failed to kill her, and now she would see to it that Deep Winter would never have another chance. Her amber eyes glinted in the firelight as she staggered forward, out of the twisted remains of the ship and into the cold, lifeless expanse of the Lunar surface. In the space above, she could see two ships soaring away - yet a small golden craft began to give chase, trying to bring its weapons to bear. Amalasuntha shielded her eyes against the glare of an explosion in the distance as the golden Orion-class gunship opened fire, beams of scintillating energy lancing toward the retreating vessels. Its targeting systems, honed and unerring, sought to intercept the ships before they could escape the Moon’s orbit. One of the vessels—a blocky freighter retrofit into a makeshift warship—shuddered under the assault, its hull splitting apart as the gunship’s cannons carved into its unshielded plating. Debris spiraled outward like a glittering rain of destruction. But the second vessel, sleeker and faster, broke formation and veered sharply back toward the Orion-class gunship. Amalasuntha narrowed her eyes. This was no retreat—it was a desperation play. The Eclipse sigil on the gunship’s prow blazed defiantly, but the other craft accelerated with reckless abandon, its engines flaring so brightly they left trails of ionized vapor behind. The kamikaze run had begun. The small vessel screamed through the void, its every ounce of power diverted to its engines. The golden gunship’s defensive batteries roared to life, spewing brilliant volleys of energy in an attempt to break the incoming ship apart. Explosions erupted across the kamikaze craft’s surface, tearing away armor and spilling atmosphere into space, but still, it hurtled forward, closing the distance with terrifying speed. Amalasuntha could do nothing but watch, the scene playing out like a grim ballet in the heavens above. The kamikaze ship struck the Orion-class gunship just as its shields flickered under the strain of repeated impacts. The explosion was blinding, a supernova of fire and debris that briefly lit the Lunar surface brighter than the distant sun. The shockwave rippled through the thin atmosphere, a low rumble that shook the ground beneath her feet. When the light faded, the Orion-class gunship remained, but it was grievously wounded. One of its primary engine nacelles had been sheared clean off, the jagged remains spewing sparks and venting coolant into the void. Portions of its hull glowed red-hot where the kamikaze ship’s wreckage had collided, and its once-proud silhouette now sagged under the weight of catastrophic damage. Yet its shields had held, however faintly. The Eclipse technology was formidable, a testament to the craftsmanship of Terra’s finest minds. The gunship had survived—but it would not give chase. Its engines sputtered weakly, its weapon systems offline as the crew scrambled to stabilize the vessel. Above, the remaining hostile ship vanished into the void, fleeing toward the edge of the system, free from pursuit. Amalasuntha’s jaw tightened as she watched the golden craft list, struggling to maintain altitude. Despite its survival, the custodians would not be able to follow. Their mission was cut short, victory snatched from their grasp by the enemy’s last-ditch effort. Her vox-link crackled to life, the voice of the gunship’s commander thick with frustration and regret. “Shield-Captain, we cannot pursue. Damage to the Eternal Vigilance is critical. We will have to return to Terra for repairs.” She exhaled sharply, her breath fogging in the icy air. The sting of failure burned hotter than the wounds she bore. She looked back at the wreckage of the Winter’s Solstice, its smoldering remains a cruel monument to the abomination she had nearly destroyed. "Understood," she replied coldly. "Return to Terra. This isn’t over." As the gunship began its slow ascent, limping toward the heavens, Amalasuntha turned her gaze back to the endless Lunar expanse and the port’s burning wreckage that surrounded her She had survived the trap, outlived the machine’s schemes. But survival wasn’t enough—not yet. Her hand found the hilt of her blade, her resolve unshaken. One day, Deep Winter would pay in full.