It wasn't quite like their home at home, the aging General thought, sitting down to dinner with his family, but it would suffice. Granted, it was beautiful, and they had the whole thousand kilometers of the small continent to themselves, but it was a poor substitute for the country home on the rim of UEF space where he had raised his two sons. His wife seemed happy, though, and he could sense it in the food she had prepared for them tonight.

"Smells good, Alexandra," he commented.

His wife, Alexandra Reddington, gave him a warm smile. "Has it ever not?" she asks, almost playfully.

"You know I've always loved your cooking," he responded, savoring the scent of well-prepared steak as Alexandra set plates down on the dinner table.

Alexandra looked at him curiously, sensing something in her husband's voice. "Something on your mind, Carl?" she asked.

"This new period of relative peace," he replied. "It seems almost unnatural. Military recruiting in the Core Worlds is at a standstill, and the UEF has stepped down most of the troops to reserve duty." He tooka bite of broccoli, then continued. "I'm just concerned about the Kyrozch, that's all."

"Don't worry so much, Dad," his son, Clay, responded, having just finished a bite of steak. "We're safer now that the Kallum are gone. And it's not like the military is disbanding overnight. My unit's still active."

Carl smiled. "True. How long are you on leave?"

"One more week," Clay replied.

Carl nodded. "So are we. And I, for one, intend to enjoy my time off to its fullest. It's rare I get to do anything except worry about troops and ships and enemies and whatnot."

Carl's younger son, Chance, spoke. "The Manheim Institute doesn't give us very much vacation time. I have to go to work in two days."

Carl nodded. "They keep you busy there," he noted.

"That they do," Chance agreed.

They looked, in all respects, like a normal family, and Carl could easily have been a normal man. But, instead, he was a legend. General Carl Reddington could easily be counted as one of the most influential figures in the history of the Blacken Colonial Command. Brave and ruthless, he was revered by friend and foe alike for his uncompromising, brutally efficient work ethic, as well as the uncanny ability to summon galaxy-crushing armies from nothing in mere moments.

None of that showed through right now, though. Tonight, he was taking a break from that life to spend time with his family, from whom he had been separated for years. It had taken a great effort to find them - he had had to conquer the hitherto impenetrable barriers between universes - but it had been worth it, he reflected, remembering that as a side effect he had brought the thousand-year Infinite War to an end, found valuable allies to help fight against the Kallum, and established a new peace for the Blacken Colonial Command.

The family talked of less important things now, enjoying their food, silently thankful for the quiet time they had worked so hard to establish.

Logan Grimnar rose from his chair aboard the Heleriya, and walked forward towards the control panels at the front of the deck.  Most of the systems were left idle, there hadn

Most ships choose hyperspace to traverse the distance between the stars, a strange realm that exists both inside and outside the universe, a realm where one enters through a jumpgate and uses the beacons just inside as a tentative guide in the place where two meters forwards could easily be a lightyear backwards.
Some ships, the more techologically advanced, choose faster than light travel, crossing the universe at speeds that would make Albert Einstein seethe with envy, encased in a bubble of warped space.
Very few ships are capable of doing what once scientists dreamed of, capable of actually bending space and time itself so as to simply be somewhere else in an instant.
The Wardancers chose a very different path.

Somewhere between a planet and its red moon the distant stars seem to stretch and twist, not in a simple circular way as one would expect with a black hole or some other naturally occuring anomaly, but in a complex, almost regular pattern.
Suddenly the fabric of space gives, tears,  the darkness is split by the Crbrs as it brutally shouders its way back into the universe, its harsh angles trailing fire and light, and its engines roaring at full burn.
One of the humans watching via the planetary defence grid finds himself reminded of a nature program he saw on the TV once, of a scene in which a the life of a peacefully swimming seal is ended by a shark as it powers its way up from the depths of the ocean to annihlate the seal with brute force, exploding out of the ocean.
"It's alot uglier than a shark."
"What was that lieutenant?"
"Nothing sir."

Garrus stepped down off of his speeder bike and gazed casually at the base and its surroundings. The defensive droids lay all over the ground, some in the trenches and others around barricades in the inner areas. Talus soldiers were combing the wreckage for survivors. He gazed at the deep, burning craters that had been made by artillery and orbital strikes of Graser cannons.

"Sir. We have cleared the base and are positioned outside the way into the chamber connecting the prison area and the Warden's personal chamber." A Special Forces Officer said to him.

"Very good, Captain. Your uncle would be proud." He patted the Officer's back as he stepped past. It had been two years since the slaying of the Kallum Emperor, but the pain from the loss of Thresher was still there. He walked into the dimly lit hallways and followed the path of destroyed droids towards a large door, surrounded by Special Forces Shock Troopers.

"Do you want us to go in hard or soft, Sir?" Another Officer asked while he placed a detonator on the door.

"That will not be necessary." He approached the door and punched in a five-letter password and the door opened with a soft hissing noise. Garrus walked through into the brightly lit center of the chamber and saw two doors. One was fancy and the other was dull, dark and cold looking. "I like what you've done with the place in my... absence." A figure entered the circle of light from the far end of the chamber.

"Garrus... please... show mercy..." The pleading figure moaned out, its back hunched over as it tried to make itself look more pitiful.

"Mercy? How dare you ask me for mercy?" Garrus roared and slammed the figure up against one of the four massive pillars of stone, pinning his neck to it with an armored hand, "Where was this mercy when I was in your position? Where was mercy when I was a prisoner here? I have no mercy for you... no you shall receive full justice for your crimes, Garus, full justice." Garrus threw him to the floor and a single, long energy blade extended from Garrus's right fore arm.

"No! Wait! I repent! Let them decide my fate, they are the prisoners, not you! Please... mercy... I beg of you!" Garus cried out in horror as the heavy clunk of metal boots approached him with the soft hissing and crackling of the energy blade. The cries became screams that echoed off the walls, screams that chilled the blood of even the most battle-hardened soldiers outside the chamber.

Garrus turned off the energy blade and walked away from the limp body and headed towards the fancier door. He cut his way through and retrieved the key from a safe, to which he knew the combination. Now he crossed the chamber once again with his chest rising and falling rapidly as he felt the burden he had borne for two and a half years falling from him.

The key turned.

The locks jolted open.

The door was swung outward, revealing its cell and the inhabitants.

At first the two bodies quickly shrank away in fear of this tall, alien, armored figure. But then light spilled onto them and Garrus saw their terrible condition, he knew they would surely not survive much longer in this place. They reminded him of what he looked like after his imprisonment here, but he shuddered off the past and opened the cell door. He extended his hand as friendly as he could and waited for the humans to respond. After several long seconds the older one took his hand and stood up, holding the child close to her.

"I am a friend of Logan, your husband. I am here to take you home."

There was nothing left to check aboard the ship so Logan decided to rest. After giving strict instructions to Helmond to warn him in any sign of enemies, he rose and walked to his quarters. They weren

"So what makes Amanda Grimnar so valuable to the enemy, then?" Carl asked. The family was gathered around the dinner table, their dining room turned into a makeshift briefing room. A holoprojector had deployed itself from the ceiling directly over the table, and as they talked, relevant data was projected.

"Her potential," Chance explained. "There are certain people who are born with abilities beyond those of normal humans. Some abilities are genetically inherited, some are activated or deactivated by certain epigenetic tags that can be developed or inherited, and some appear out of nowhere and disappear just as easily."

"So you're saying that Amanda has inherited some trait that gives her a strategically valuable ability?" Alexandra asked.

"Roughly," Chance replied, "but that's no guarantee that she can use that ability to any useful extent at present. However, such abilities can be honed with extensive practice, and in some cases, indoctrination."

Carl closed his eyes. "In short, if we recover Elliot and Amanda Grimnar, we have to keep watch over them at all times." He remembered when they had lost them so soon after they were found the first time. They had not been taken by force, but by a more insiduous method, being compelled by some ethereal voice to leave on their own.

"That is a fair conclusion," Clay agreed.

Carl opened his eyes. "That's not a conclusion I'm willing to live with. We need to figure out who kidnapped them the last time and make sure they can't do it again. Otherwise, we'll only have a repeat of what happened previously."

They were interrupted by a short message from Command. The family quickly scanned it over. Garrus had located the two and were bringing them home. They were severely malnourished and had suffered extensive damage. The Talus doctors were doing all they could, but Carl knew that the trauma therapy could take months, if not years.

He knew James Bridgetown could heal the damage almost instantaneously, but he also knew James, as the chief medical officer of the Unification, was busy. What with having to take care of two million people, and doing research as well, he knew that enlisting James's help would not be a trivial task.

"Good news," Carl said. "But complications will probably arise. I'll call James in the morning and see what he can do. Other than that, all we can really do is hope. The other thing I have to do is send a message to Logan. He'll want to hear the news."

Jeodan took a seat in his new command chair, as he sat down it leaned backwards and the entire sealing glowed with an exact map of the solar system and everything on it. The chair augmented his abilities which would allow him to command the entire fleet indirectly and everything on his ship directly. This technology has literarily fused him with the mighty Kedelbe V5.1. "We really should start naming our ships." Jeodan thought as he went trough the map and sensed if they needed anything.

He ordered some fleet maneuvers to be carried out and a simulative battle was to be fought between Cy'tan and a coalition of Kryzoch, Kallum and Wraith ships. GA(great alliance) and some Cy'tan ships to bolster their numbers posed as the threats.

This would prove a good simulation if the greatest threats combined would form an alliance. There would be a lack of communication between most of the Cy'tan ships and others to simulate differences between Wrait, Kallum and Kryzoch.

Altough this battle could have just as easily been fought within the Mathrioshka Jeodan wanted to see for himself what would be the outcome.

The fleets jumped somewhere else; a pretty straight forward map was chosen. The enemy wants to get their hands on an asteroid belt which would be filled with Ilum crystals.

With exact military precision the Cy'tan ships crossed, gaps opened and closed as fighters, bombers and smaller corvettes rushed to take out enemies. Small Cy'tan ships would fire from gaps as larger Kedelbe ships moved around each other. Every time a Kedelbe was in risk of losing its shield corvettes and frigates jumped in front of it and formed a shield on their own. The enemy however chose a more direct attack.

The enemy lost terribly. The odds were stacked 3 to 1 but the Cy'tan managed to take out 40% of the enemy before losing a single Kedelbe.
"Good odds." Jeodan thought as he reviewed the battle.

He ordered all ships not belonging to the Cy'tan to leave and then ordered Cy'tan fleets to intensively search every corner the radar system would not reach.

After the search all ships returned to their designated planets.

Darkas Mbenge, diplomatic attache to the UEF and specialist in first contact situations, slouched in the high backed chair accross the table from the armoured bulk of the Wardancer called Krg. The Wardancer seemed intent on maintaining the air of mystery that surrounded his people, the bubble that Darkas assumed protected Krg's head was dark to the point of being almost reflectionless, the overhead lights reduced to nothing more than bright stripes on the dome.
"Would you be more comfortable with the lights lowered?" Darkas offered. Maybe with the lights dimmed the Wardancer would open that bubble and he would finally be able to see what Krg's face looked like, assuming he had one. "No, thankyou." The voice that came from the armor was electronic, just like in all previous communications with the Wardancers. Darkas nodded, straight to business then, "I'll be open with you, Commander Krg. Some people feel that because we know so little about you Wardancers that allowing even one of your warships to operate within UEF boundaries, even under UEF control, is a risk not worth taking. Luckily for you most of the people that hold that view are not in any real position of power, however those that are in a position of power have some questions they would like me to ask you before they consider the situation any further." The armoured hulk seemed to bow slightly, "You have studied your sensor data from the battle two years ago and have concluded that the world you found us defending cannot be our homeworld, and so you wonder why we lied." Krg raised a six fingered gauntlet to the dark bubble, which cycled up and back behind his head.
Krg had pink skin, bright pink skin, and unblinking purple eyes set beneath a slightly bulbous forhead. He appeared to be smiling, however the rows of fangs were less than comforting. This time he spoke with his own voice, a voice which was much higher in pitch than what Darkas expected from a being of such size, "When we came here our mission was simple colonisation. We genuinely had no idea we were in someone else's territory, let alone walking into someone else's war. To be honest we had no way to be sure that the right side won, so we did the bare minimum to keep the victor happy while we did some research." Krg smiled again, "We liked what we discovered." Finally Krg sat down, and the chair creaked under his weight. "We like you. We want to be friends. We need to be friends."
"Need?"
"We plan on colonising a number of planets in what used to be Kallum territory, and we don't want to run into any... difficulties. We feel that such things could be avoided if we achieve a greater understanding of each other, if you learn that we are not a threat."

"Where and when?"

Carl looked at Logan's reply and sent an answer back immediately. "Garrus has reported that he is on his way back to Blacken. He has notified us that he will arrive in 30 hours. I'll meet you there."

"I still can't get over the fact that you built that ship yourself," Clay remarked; they had arrived at Blacken Starport and were heading for the landing pad where Garrus's shuttle would arrive.

Carl shrugged. "What? You didn't think I was an engineer?"

"I mean, all by yourself without the aid of, well, anyone."

Carl smiled as they arrived at the pad. "Using the tools I had on hand. And never giving up."

They watched the shuttle land, along with hundreds of other officers who knew Logan well enough to understand the gravity of this event. They watched the boarding ramp lower, then saw Elliot and Amanda Grimnar take their first steps on the planet after over four years of captivity, then watched Logan rush forward to embrace them.

The pad was filled with applause as the Grimnar family, separated for so long, finally found unity.

The ramp lowered, and Logan

Garrus spoke briefly with Carl and then returned to the Reaper after Logan and his family reunited. As he stepped into his personal quarters and noticed the clean bed had been moved back in, he sighed and sat down at his personal terminal and rubbed his eyes.

"Sir?" A voice came from outside his door. Garrus answered simply and the soldier entered, "We have a Top Priority message from Admiral Septimus at Nordok!"

"Patch it through." Garrus scanned the message and ordered the battle group to make emergency jump to Nordok. Garrus's mind raced as he had the ships arm their weapons and send crews to battle stations. He thought briefly about why the Kallum could be making a major counter attack against the military base at Nordok, but until the battle was over it wouldn't matter. His terminal beeped that a message had been received and as he turned it off he saw the name 'Carl' in the sender's box.

Several hours later they had jumped to Locus, and then made a series of leapfrog small jumps and went through a wormhole to finally enter Nordok.

"Sir! We have critical shield failure! Forward batteries are under heavy fire, I don't know how much more the ship can take!" Septimus ground his teeth as the ship, the Sergio, bucked under another heavy hit. Kallum ships had shown up in force to make a counter attack against Talus operations in the area and Septimus was doing his best to keep them away from the planet. Several hundred Talus and Kallum ships blasted away at each other as a series of small space forts tried desperately to stop the swarm of transports headed down to Nordok, the first of four habitable planets.

Garrus saw the battle raging and looked at the strength he had collected on the way there. He had gone from forty ships to nearly three hundred, but he was not yet satisfied. After this battle, he decided, it will be time to re-form a Main Battle Fleet and attack the Kallum once again. As the Reaper raced forward, headlong into battle, Garrus rubbed his eyes and wondered where and when all this would end.

"This is becoming slightly more complicated than we bargained for," Carl said. They were back in their house at Pennsylvania Nova III, seated around the dinner table again, with the notable absence of Chance, who had left for the Manheim Institute after everything was in order at Blacken. With them was Colonel Matthias Bloodmoon, who had assisted them during the assassination of the Kallum Emperor, and Colonel Taylor Williams, captain of the starship Nebula.

"Agreed," Clay said. "But we know nothing about this son of Logan's, nor why the Kallum would still have him. It's possible that he is being held for the same reason as Amanda was, but we have no way of knowing for sure."

"Maybe if General Bridgetown would help us?" Colonel Williams suggested.

"I will mention it the next time I meet with James," Carl said. "He is a remarkable fellow. He may have some insight that we cannot achieve on our own."

Colonel Bloodmoon nodded, then gestured to the screen. "Assuming proceeding with this operation is a good idea, we will need a plan."

"Of course," Carl agreed. A map of known space appeared on the holographic screen. The clusters of remaining Kallum territory were highlighted.

"These regions represent the remnant of the Kallum presence still loyal to the Emperor. Logan's son could be held anywhere in this territory. However, it is likely he is being held under tight security."

Dots within the highlighted territory flashed on the screen.

"These are the locations of high-security Kallum installations that have not yet been liberated. Logan's son might be being held in any of these compounds. I hope James will be able to give us insight into where he is being held, but failing that, we will need to conduct a systematic search."

"Let's hope he can help us," Colonel Bloodmoon said.

Carl nodded. "Let's hope."