Prologue

The year is 2708. Far into the endless depths of space there is a massive Space Colony called Heaven's Gate, where humanity has used its advanced technology to build a colossal device called a Space Relay Station, used to serve as a waypoint from one side of the galaxy to the other. It consisted of a massive black hole generator as its energy source, a Relay Jumpdrive to aid in Lightspeed travel and thousands of humanity's best and brightest piloting it and keeping all the other sectors fully operational. Along with enough space to house a full Nature park, an entire city, and enough housing for nearly a million people, Heaven's Gate was truly a paradise. With this, galactic travel has been made a reality. Humanity has now stretched its reach to nearly every inch of the known galaxy, and beyond.

And on Heaven's Gate, in the main terminal room, the room of 37 people is sent into a buzz of activity, as one of their long awaited Explorer Vessels came back with a message.

"Attention Heaven's Gate! This is the Explorer Class Vessel, USG Camilla, callout number 42307, reporting in! We have located a strange relic in the Glorithol System and the Research Team requests further aid to help analyze it. It appears to be of unknown origin with unknown markings. Sending Co-Ordinance with the message! Repeat, we have found a strange relic and need immediate assistance analyzing it. Over and Out."

The USG was sent out nearly 15 years ago to help find recourses and potential planets to inhabit, but has been silent since it was sent out all those years ago. For it to suddenly ask for help out of the blue had H.G. a little concerned, especially since they had no clue When the call was sent out, being so far out in the depths. But following protocol, the head member of the terminal room sent the message out to all available teams, and for the one closest to that sector to head to the co-ordinance to aid in any way. One vessel pinged in an almost immediate response, a military vessel, the SMT Rosé, was making its rounds only a few hours of light speed from the USG Camilla and agreed to make a stop to check in on things.

SMT Rosé is a Space Military Traversal vessel, used to train the Military to be prepared for potential alien attacks. Onboard Rosé is 487 trained personnel, from Medics to soldiers, technicians and engineers to researchers. The General of the vessel, General Drak, was the one who answered the call to aid the USG Camilla.

Drak is a gruff and grizzly man, 58 years old, 5'8" tall, 219lbs. While serving his 35th year in the Space Military, he has seen all manner of battles form all manners of life forms, and has dozens of scars to prove it. Most notably, his deep gash of a scar on the right side of his face going from his forehead to his chin that made him blind in his right eye. However, in all his years, he's only lost a small handful of soldiers, and never once left a man behind. His soldiers are his children, and he will risk his life to save his soldiers.

The squad Drak was training this round was a platoon of 35 soldiers called Delta Squad. They were all Sergeant and Specialist rank, and have had their own experiences with aliens. The squad was down in the barracks of Rosé, most were just goofing around and joking with the others, a few were just relaxing on their bunks when Drak walked in. "Delta! Attention!" His voice was loud and gruff, demanding respect as everyone quickly shot up and stood in line, hands on their sides, heels pressed together, standing straight up and looking forward. Drak walked in, eyeing each solder with an icy glare. "We have a mission! At 0900, we are heading to the Glorithol System in response to a distress call from Camilla for help with Research! Apparently they found some sort of artifact there brainiacs know next to nothing about!" His remark on the Research team on Camilla got a few soldiers to chuckle quietly, as the USG Camilla prides itself on its top of the charts Research Team. One of the soldiers, Nick, nudges the solder next to him, whispering 'Guess the egg heads aren't all that, huh?' Drak shoots Nick a glare, pointing to the ground, signaling Nick to drop and give him Push-ups. Nick quickly complies, not wanting to test his luck. "That being said, we need to be ready for anything! We are going into unknown territory, so make sure to get your gear ready! Remember! Expect the worst!" The rest of the squad all shouted at the same time, even Nick; "Assume nothing! Always anticipate an attack!" "Remember those words, and you just might survive, maggots! Dismissed!" With that, Drak salutes the squad and they salute back as he walks out of the room, looking back at Nick. "Get your ass up boy! Yer sweat is stinking up the room!"

After talking to his men, Drak made his way to the Control room. The room was bustling with activity, dozens of crewmen getting intel from various sources and sending intel to other sources. As he's walking back into the Control room of the ship, Drak noticed the time; 7:45. He looked at a big glowing hologram of the galaxy map in the middle of the room, surrounded by crewmen sitting in front of screens, then to the pilot working the map, leaning onto an arm rail that surrounds the Holo map. "Pull up the map for the Glorithol System. Let's see what we're up against." "Sir. Pulling it up now." The map changed from a hologram of the galaxy to a zoomed in image of the system. It revealed only a few planets orbiting a red sun, a few clusters of debris, the Space Relay and idling next to one of the planets was the USG Camilla. "Sir. The Glorithol System is up. Only 3 planets, non of which are inhabitable, a few debris fields full of material that could be useful." "And the planet Camilla is next to? The one they found this thing on?" Drak shifts in place, his gut instincts telling him that things aren't as they seem. "Sir." The crewman zoomed in closer to the planet next to Camilla, showing a few holes dug into the planet from the vessel. "The Planet seems to be an Ice Ball. Most of the surface is frozen over, save for about 2% of the planet. Maybe they thought they could find some rare minerals down there?" Drak slowly stands up, his hands resting on the arm tail. "Hmmm…have we heard anything else from the crew? Have we tried making contact?" "Sir. We have tried reaching out, but we're too far out. Once we make the jump to the system, we should be able to make contact." Drak let's out a quiet growl, his scar starting to itch. That only happens when his instincts are letting him know something is wrong. He looked at the time again; 8:10. "Let the researchers know to be ready. I'll make sure my boys get them in there safe. Once the jump is made, let me know when you get ahold of the crew on that ship. I want to know what the hell they dug up that's so damn important." "Sir, yes Sir."

After that, Drak left the Control room, heading towards the armory. The armory is a massive room guarded by 3 soldiers with assault rifles. They saluted Drak and let him pass, letting him inside the room to reveal all the walls filled with the latest firearms, from pistols to assault rifles to shotguns to rocket launchers to mini guns. And in the back are the Armor pods, where the soldiers don their suits of high tech armor. The suits have breathing regulators, health moderators, grav. boots, stasis modulators, self repairing nanomesh, even magnetic grips for the weapons when not using them. Drak stepped into the pod, getting his suit on, preparing for what might be waiting for them.

As 0900 came, the SMT Rosé activated its Relay Jumper, and made the several hour jump to the Glorithol System. But once they get there, they would soon realize nothing could prepare them for what was waiting for them.

(To be Continued)

(I plan to write more as I come up with more. Stay tuned for the next Chapter~)