Ballistic Coefficient

In the black of space, a miniature singularity collapsed in on itself before expanding, reaching across roughly half the distance between Earth and Mars. All the Caatex ships caught in the blast were instantly atomized, leaving not even dust behind. The singularity blinked once, and then dissipated, leaving behind no trace of the fact that this was once a massive battlefield.

A moment later, a single voice cut through the deathly silence.

“Weapons test successful, Admiral. All Caatex ships in the vicinity have been eliminated. Estimated enemy casualties are in the tens of thousands. The singularity has disappeared and there was no residual damage done to Earth.”

“Excellent work, Pale,” came the reply over the radio. “Return to base immediately.”

Pale sent an acknowledgment, then began to prep her faster-than-light drive. The drive began to emit a low-pitched whine as it charged up, though it was soon interrupted by her IFF transponder pinging. Pale’s attention turned towards it.

“Admiral, it appears the rest of the Caatex fleet has arrived.”

“How many?”

“Unknown. The entire left half of the radar is completely whited out with blips.”

“Pale, get out of there, now! Do a random jump!”

“Acknowledged. Engaging random faster-than-light jump in three seconds.”

“Pale-”

“Two.”

“Pale, hurry-”

“One. Engaging.”

The moment the drive was fully charged, Pale engaged it. However, a split-second before the ship was able to begin FTL travel, several Caatex plasma torpedoes ripped into the side of the ship. Alarms began to blare all throughout the ship, and Pale screamed.

A split-second later, the FTL drive engaged, and Pale was gone.

–

Pale drifted through space, the ship shedding small pieces of molten metal. The FTL jump had taken most of what was left of the ship’s energy, and now it was stuck listlessly moving through the blackness, with only the stars to guide it.

Which was a problem, because none of the star systems nearby were familiar.

The ship still had some reserve power, enough for basic systems to function. The trouble was that even with power running to them, they refused to respond – the radar was showing no friendly or enemy IFF codes throughout the entire solar system, meaning the ship was completely alone. The galactic map and star chart were placing it nowhere familiar. The radio had power, but wasn’t working, which told her that there were no buoys nearby to bounce a signal off of.

All that was to say that, for all intents and purposes, Pale was completely alone, drifting through space purely on inertia.

Years passed. The isolation and silence had eventually grown to be too much for her, and Pale had placed herself into hibernation. Eventually, though, something changed.

Pale suddenly sprang to life, an alarm going off throughout the ship. It was approaching a planet, and not just any planet, but a habitable one – preliminary scans showed a breathable atmosphere, as well as signs of life. Curiously, industrialization seemed to be very limited – there was very little carbon output, and absolutely no nuclear signatures.

Still, Pale decided it was worth investigating. What little power the ship still had left was diverted to the engines, which was enough to get it close to the planet to the point where its gravitational pull would catch it. Once the ship was stuck in the planet’s orbit, Pale powered down all but the absolute most essential systems, then grabbed some basic supplies and beamed herself down to the surface.

Wherever she’d ended up, it had to be better than drifting endlessly through space, after all.

–

It was an odd sensation, being outside the ship. She’d done it a few times, but never for very long, so she had never gotten a chance to truly appreciate nature.

Unfortunately, the acrid tinge of smoke that hit her nostrils told her that nature was going to have to wait.

Pale looked around, curious. There was a small puddle of water nearby, which she peered into to confirm her appearance. It was as she’d expected – long, white hair flowed down to her lower back. Her eyes shone with an almost unnatural electric blue, which accentuated her cream-colored skin. She was roughly five-and-a-half feet tall, and built like an endurance athlete – lithe, with very low body fat, but also not overly muscular. By her estimate, she was in her early twenties.

With her identity established, Pale focused on her surroundings. She was standing on a grassy hill of some kind, clad in a standard American Galactic Navy uniform – an urban-gray battle dress, with a basic black plate carrier worn over it. The carrier held a lightweight depleted uranium body armor plate in the front and back, and was also lined with spare ammunition for her chosen weapons, a ten-gauge pump-action shotgun and a .45 caliber handgun. The only strange thing about her outfit was that it completely lacked a rank insignia of any kind despite being a military uniform, but that was to be expected for someone like her.

Pale hefted her shotgun, tucking it into her shoulder as she investigated the area. It didn’t take long to discover why she smelled smoke – a town off in the distance was burning in the night, the flames reaching high up into the air. As she watched, Pale realized she could hear far-away screaming, along with the occasional explosion. Curiously, the town looked very rustic – it was almost downright medieval, if she had to draw a comparison to a point in time. The houses were constructed of wood and stone, and did not look sturdy in the slightest. That didn’t completely surprise her – this was a completely new system, after all, so odds were that any intelligent life she came across was going to be simplistic compared to what she was used to.

It suddenly dawned on her that this was a possible first contact scenario, but at this point, she didn’t have a choice – she’d used precious power to send herself to the surface, and now she was stuck here unless she wanted to waste any more. And even if she did, that didn’t change the fact that the ship was currently stuck in its orbit. Pale sucked in a breath, then exhaled.

Her superiors were going to be cross with her, but that didn’t matter. She’d done the best she possibly could with the information she had. Now it was a matter of seeing it through to the end.

Of course, now it was a question of what to do about the town. The protocols were clear – a first contact scenario, if it could not be avoided in the first place, was meant to be undertaken as carefully as possible. That meant neutral ground and minimal stakes; a burning town was neither. But then again, the protocols were also clear with regards to her defending the innocent. She was torn by indecision, up until the moment she heard a woman’s far-off scream suddenly be cut off. Her eyes narrowed, and in that moment, Pale made her decision.

She set off towards the town.

–

As Pale approached the town, the smell of blood and burning flesh pierced her nostrils, mixing in with the stench of acrid smoke. Pale’s brow furrowed, but she pushed away the disgust that welled up in her, instead continuing on.

This town, wherever it was, had clearly been the victim of some kind of raid. Dead bodies were piled up on the streets, and blood soaked the ground, squelching under her boots with every step. She paid it no mind, however – instead, she continued on her way, past the burning buildings and corpses, looking for any survivors. For several minutes, she found nothing but the dead, and all civilians, at that – they were dressed in old furs and leather clothes, and nearly all of them were completely unarmed.

Her gaze landed on one of the corpses, and she paused, her eyes widening with surprise. Slowly, she approached the dead body to take a look and confirm what she was seeing. Sure enough, it was as she’d initially thought – the people who lived here were humanoid, at least, though for whatever reason, they had animal traits, such as cat ears or tails. Strangely, the traits appeared to differ from person to person – some had cat ears, or fox tails, or even one who had claws on his hands. That was certainly odd compared to humanity, but it was far from unheard of – the Caatex, after all, were giant reptilians; these people, at least, were far more familiar to her than the Caatex were.

A large crash from a nearby street caught her attention. It was soon joined by a woman’s panicked screaming. Pale turned her attention away from the dead man and instead began cautiously moving towards the source of the noise, her shotgun held at the low ready the entire time. She sidled up to the corner of a nearby house, pressing her back against it as she peered around.

Off in the distance, roughly thirty yards away, she could make out a tall, burly man pulling a girl behind him by her tail. She was covered in scratches and bruises, and was desperately trying to claw her way free, her hands scrabbling against the stone beneath her, but to no avail. She was trembling with fear, tears trailing down her face as she sobbed.

Pale had seen enough. She spun out from around cover, bringing her shotgun to her shoulder and leveling it at the man. She aligned the sights, and then pulled the trigger. There was a massive burst of kinetic energy and noise as twelve copper-plated pellets went screaming downrange. Pale watched as the pellets struck the man in the chest, blood erupting out from the wounds. He dropped to his knees, choking and gasping for breath as blood bubbled up from his mouth. Pale didn’t waste any time, instead closing in to check on the girl, who had managed to scramble away.

As Pale drew closer, however, something strange happened. The man she’d shot suddenly became enveloped in a blood-red light of some kind, and against all odds, he rose to his feet and rounded on her, a snarl crossing his face. Pale paused, staring in surprise, but only for a second before he let out a shout and charged her, ripping twin axes from his belt. Without missing a beat, Pale pumped her shotgun to chamber a round, then stood her ground as she began to fire shell after shell into him. Somehow, though, the buckshot was having little effect – she could see the puffs of red blossoming across his torso as the pellets made impact, but he didn’t even flinch under her assault. Desperate, Pale aimed for his head on her final shot, then pulled the trigger. The man suddenly came to a dead stop, his head lurching back as the buckshot made impact. That should have been the end of it; nobody could survive a full shotgun blast to the head at that distance.

And yet, slowly, the man turned back to look at her. Half his head was blown apart, exposing his brain within. Liquefied gray matter trailed down the side of his face. Pale stopped and stared, her eyes wide with confusion, as the man took several more shaky steps towards her. She stepped backwards, letting her shotgun dangle from its sling as she drew her .45. She was just about to start putting more rounds into him when the man suddenly stopped, then fell flat on his face. He let out a final, raspy breath, and then died.

Pale stared at his body, unsure of what to make of the situation. He should have been dead long before that final headshot, and yet, he had just kept coming. Even that last shot to the head hadn’t immediately stopped him, which defied all rational belief. It made absolutely no sense to her, but she couldn’t deny what she had just seen with her own eyes.

A small whimper of fear caught her attention, and Pale turned to find the girl from earlier hiding in the ruins of a destroyed house. For the first time, Pale was able to get a good look at her. She was just over five feet tall, and was thin – not malnourished, but also not nearly as athletic-looking as Pale was. She had white hair tied back into a low ponytail, and brilliant green eyes. Most striking of all, however, were the black-tipped white wolf ears and tail, though given how everyone else in this town boasted similar features, she wasn’t surprised by that. The girl was dressed in a red cloak, underneath which she was wearing brown cotton pants and a white blouse. She appeared to be around seventeen or eighteen years old. Carefully, Pale approached her, raising both hands to show she was unarmed.

“It’s okay,” she said, doing her best to sound reassuring.

The girl stared at her, then said something in a language so unrecognizable that not even Pale’s translator could pick up what it was at first. Parts of it made sense – the translator picked up tinges of German, French, and Latin – but for whatever reason, it was coming out very muddy. That was no problem, though; Pale simply motioned for the girl to keep talking, which she did. After several minutes, there was a breakthrough.

“-entered town and began attacking everyone, and-”

“Stop,” Pale commanded, silencing the girl. “That’s enough.”

Again, the girl stared at her. “What happened? I can understand you now…”

“My translator was finally able to parse enough of your language that we could converse. What is the name of this planet?”

The girl blinked. “This planet…? Why does that-”

“Focus, citizen,” Pale said. “Calm yourself.”

The girl instantly leveled a glare at her, her wolf ears flattening against her head. “Calm myself? Calm myself?! Look around you! How am I supposed to calm down when everyone is dead?! And my father-”

She suddenly trailed off, her eyes widening. “...Gods, my father… they have my father!”

She began to hyperventilate, and Pale frowned. She needed information, but this girl was no use to her like this. She was going to have to try something different.

“What is your name?” Pale asked.

“K-Kayla,” the wolf-eared girl offered. “My name is Kayla.”

“Okay, Kayla. I will go save your father.”

Kayla rounded on her, her eyes wide with surprise. “You can’t! Those brigands-”

“If I do this, however, you must answer my questions afterwards, no matter what they are,” Pale insisted.

“But-”

“Do you accept?”

“I-I mean… yes, but-”

“Very well.”

With that, Pale turned and began to walk away, looking for more brigands to interrogate. She made it just a few steps before Kayla called out to her again.

“Wait! What’s your name?”

Pale paused, then turned back towards her.

“I am USS Behold a Pale Horse,” she explained. “I am the only Thanatos-class gunship in existence. I am the single most powerful weapon ever created by humans in recorded history. And I am the monolith of their inhumanity that will put a final end to their losing war of extinction.”

–