The Futility Wars

by Magnus Thollander

  Juliet stood up and did the customary military salute which he hated, he returned the salute with a smile and sat down. She kept making origami while they chatted out the details and a soldier entered the chamber notifying them it's time to leave, they walked out to the lift that took them to a freshly designed ark ship designed for peaceful talks and comfortable living for a million people, it was mostly a pleasure cruise ship at this moment, The real arks which he had seen a few prototypes would carry at least a billion people comfortably, and then room for a billion more to grow and live there before being forced to transfer passengers to another ship, They stepped into the ark and the soldiers behind the young lady really creeped him out, it was almost like they were above anyone in this room and this little lady was above them. He just shook his head and remember the arrogance he had tackled with in negotiations with earth and other corporations and just chalked it up to nerves.

  They immediately portal ed to the Ortha homesystem, and they saw trillions of ships crossing around in neat patterns showing some as semblance of space highways, Garden system had a similar system near the planets but outside a million miles and it was anything goes, If humans had a trillion ship in the system they might have to adopt the highways too, But he also knew the navigational tech of the humans were better than the Ortha and most factions on earth did not even use portal tech, that was a S-4XN-001 exclusive, but there were portals across the entire galaxy now. And there were uncountable amount of humans and warriors across the milky way, it was almost crowded now with human population finally reached three trillion, and a new garden systems had been opened across the galaxy.

  There were at least fifteen of them bigger than rest and different ruling human councils on each system, humanity was in a gold age and there had been a system with a rule of only housing and land owning was allowed, no apartments or stores which had been a hit no matter how wasteful it was, there were even 50 earth class planets empty undecided who would rule them, humanity was matching the rate of planets with giving birth to more humans, there was almost a unwritten rule that if you had twenty kids you could get a house and land on a planet, which had been confirmed true on several planets. People with massive amount of children were priority housing and the number swelled constantly, work had been steady and childcare had been the premier job in the new garden systems, People had more children than fingers on their hand and it was a mess. Craig had eight children also, but he had lived for a extremely long time and married at least more times than he remembered, Marriage was easy in the galaxy and divorce was easier.

  It was a five-minute procedure to get divorced, and there was no dividing of money or houses.The divorced would get a temporary housing on another planet and could request certain things to be traded, like a house or money, if you had children they pretty much automatically won something from the mother or the father to support the child. Children grew up either without parents or just a single mother or father. They had it fine with special school and counseling and also the ability of meeting their parents virtual across the universe with the simulation cabins, which were in every home now. Craig had visited his children in the simulation cabin often and almost everyday when he was trapped in the other side of the galaxy, it was almost like he was there and the children did not mind.

  They rather stay by themselves and play the massive amount of games in the universe instead, or virtually connect to girls apartment for a party or something else. He had barely time to sit when the summons were called, and they had to dock with the Ortha space station, he adjusted his suit and was followed by a posse of lawyers, soldiers and a few civilians. He sat down on the human side with the new little young miss Juliet sat down next to him, Jimmy just shrugged and sat on his left instead. He would have told her to sit on the edge if he weren't so deathly afraid of the two armored soldiers behind her. He waited on the Ortha to arrive while taking out his computer to help negotiate or save notes from the Ortha delegation.

  The massive Ortha shells shuffled into the room and sat down on the opposite side with him recognizing the Ortha known as Qasqaer, He gave a smile "We meet again brave warrior Qasaer, greetings from the humans of milky way galaxy. We come in hopes of reaching a peace agreement between our two empires." Craig said with a calm voice.

  He waited for the Ortha to reply which would take a moment before Qasqaer spoke bluntly "HUMAN CRAIG, WE WOULD LIKE ALL ACCESS TO THE DEVICE KNOWN AS THE SOLAR AWAKENING DEVICE, AND WE WOULD ALSO LIKE HUMANS TO EVACUATE THIS GALAXY COMPLETELY AFTER SUPPLYING IT IN RETURN FOR PEACE AND RESOURCES, PLEASE COMPLY." The Ortha were brutes to negotiation and that showed, they had to start chipping down their words to make it useful for both of them, What Ortha wanted was unacceptable, and he knew that already, the SAD device would not leave his hands or any technology of any sort.

  He had been sanctioned to help in the defense of a few systems in return for some massive mineral gains which would please everybody. There were constant chatter between the human side while the Ortha was silent transmitting their thoughts directly to each other. Craig put on his best thinking face to please the Ortha that he was taking this seriously and showing some "weakness", The VIP next to him did not such thing and even scoffed at the Ortha with their demands like it was the most absurd thing she ever heard, The meeting continued uneventfully before it was adjourned, it went as most meetings did with Ortha no progress and felt like a huge waste of time, Craig was poked by the girl Juliet walking down the hallway to their ship "Seems, We both wasted our time here, The Ortha are nothing special and no wonder they are going to die out, They are not even worth saving."

  Craig was stunned at the callousness and coldhearted reply from that young woman, He was about to argue back before she diverted to another dock and took another ship, he did not even know another human ship had docked with the station before he was back at the massive gateway sitting in his diplomatic office trying to make sense of it all, Craig would spend many future years negotiating with Ortha before being recalled to milky way galaxy, for a new destiny.

  Qasqaer did the unthinkable after the meeting and contacted the warrior known as S-4XN-001 and lowered his head, and his superiors that lived for longer than anyone could imagine lowered their as well for his support, the civilian sector was about to be hit, and he knew he could no longer be stubborn, an agreement was struck that would ensure that the Ortha were pretty much indentured slaves considering the amount of resources is about to be sent across the galaxy to feed the human war machine, Everyone had agreed that the mineral losses and the submitting to the fate they could never raise their hands against the humanity they shook their mass of flesh in disappointment, they would lie to their people that the resources needed to supply enough power for the solar awakening devices to constantly keep the futility at bay, but they knew the truth and would never admit it, they had lost two wars, but they have gained a hope on life, Humans would forever leave this galaxy and only keep their little corner which would shrink down to 5 systems at the edge of their galaxy, they would supply a horde of resources every 10 years until the quota was complete which was not going to happen anytime soon, and when the quota was fulfilled then the humans would forever leave.

  Qasqaer knew this was the death of his race the warrior spoke off, and he could see it as well, there was no way to keep this information hidden forever especially now that they knew the east front did not exist, they could not ban everyone from exploring the galaxy which were now being slowly reclaimed, they gained about 10 system every hour with more and more ships pushing the line, their entire fleet was pushing the dead enemy ships into the stars since their material was useless as refining it took more energy than they gained, They were happy with his victory bu they were also unhappy, and he needed to placate his entire empire to tell them the truth. He let out a telepathic sigh, and he knew he would be the worst villain in the history of his race, he would take all the blame the council had to be unblemished forever.

  Qasqaer stood in his shel
l on a broadcast that was mandatory watch for everyone "Ortha! I have lied to you, and i will not explain why and how! It' all began when the futility arrived-"

  Qasqaer told the story that was a lie from even the beginning, he was not even a commander much less an officer when the Ortha had hit the system, but he knew he had to tell them a wide and big tale of how he pilfered resources from the "east" to feed his massive armada and the eastern front was lost 50 years ago, he had kept this a secret from everyone so his family would not be shame which were all dead considering they were army and space officers and soldiers, most Ortha had someone in the military which was unavoidable since they were fighting an army of infinite numbers. Qasqaer left with a disappointed look and was officially exiled from his own galaxy and his race as a whole, a blemish on his massive record that would never be repair no matter how much good he did in the future, nobody would believe a liar.

  He walked on to his ship and set course for the human area, he would stay in the gateway system as a guardian and go between forever, and when the humans left he had to leave as well since the Ortha consider it the biggest insult to growl and beg for assistance which he technically had to did if he were not being secretly supplied by the council, he would live in some comfort but alone with his only company being humans, this was his last and final mission.

  Year 2759

  The Ortha galaxy was officially cleansed of any futility presence which had gone into overdrive with their massive supply of minerals, and they had supplied, the human ships were now on the edge of their galaxy and futility kept jumping in and dying constantly, probably unaware they were losing and the council knew that the human had left on a mission to sterilize all the galaxies, the surrounding areas around the human home galaxy was clear and clean, Qasqaer stood in his shell watching the horrifying pillaging of his empire everyday with the loads of minerals being offloaded into the massive stations transfer to the human warrior that was now outmatched them in ships, they had not built any battleships in decades to speed up the process of kicking out the humans, Their numbers were swelling and their empire had been fully reclaimed they had 2 million systems under their thumb like they always had, but it was a hollow victory compared to the hundreds or even thousands of years of payments being made. But this was their war now, a war of resources which united their people with a cause.

  The first of the refuge fleet or alien caravan as it was called since it sounded like an insult to call them refugees, They had arrived at the edge of the galaxy pouring in by the trillions and were greeted by small guardian force that told them the happy news, Futility were being pushed back, and they could soon return home to their galaxies, There had been a flurry of activity across the alien ships, and they would have to speak in a diplomatic meeting of course which had been arranged, the aliens parked their ships a few hundred jumps into the galaxy just in case the SAD device would affect their health, a meeting was struck at 9 days later at the seat of most powerful warrior, the paradise system where a representative of all the milky way warriors and alien warriors would meet, a token of human and alien diplomats would also attend considering it was good to build some diplomatic relationship with the race that solved the Futility problem.

  S-4XN-001 was not amused at the meeting or the diplomatic headache that was about to happen, he was sending out his ships in a pattern that left no system unchecked, the Futility so far only came from system to system leaving behind scraps and havoc that would need eons to repair and restore to the perfection, they had mined and pillaged everything in the countless galaxies but in a set pattern, they all came to a galaxy which were their downfall, their giant conga line of ships and person ell were being destroyed every second, and they were pretty much surrounded in a five galaxy radius, they were trapped and the noose were tightening but it would take tens of thousands of years to clean out every system, if he had not found out how big their army really was it would not been possible to narrow them down to these 5 galaxies, which had billions of systems and uncountable amount of ships, he had not noticed any change in focus or target when the Ortha system had been cleaned out, which in retrospect was a smaller galaxy and the start and focus of his massive mineral income that could never be matched, he could probably match the alien caravan ship to ship right now, and he was the overlord of this universe for now at least, the aliens would probably want to return him with the futility gone, but he knew they were gonna stay here for quite some time being a nuisance.

  A massive amount of different shaped titans constantly exited the portal to the system that were about to house the meeting, it was a unremarkable place in middle of nowhere which was to S-4XN-001 tastes, the meeting could technically be made in a few connections sending data in nanoseconds but there was a process to this meeting that it had to be spoken face-to-face slowly and uncomfortably while camera were running and sending feeds across the galaxy to make the humans and alien cheer like seeing their favorite idols performing, He would rather the aliens tipped their hats paid a few dues and set course for home, when they would arrive it might just be live able again, of course most of the aliens home systems were occupied by uncountable number of Futility but the edges were at least clear, and after a few thousands of years they had a perfectly live able galaxy again. Several people requested to be able to attend that he thought was a bad idea but agreed anyway, might as well get everyone "important" to attend to show he at least cared about this snooze fest, the sooner they left the better for humanity and him as a whole, they were surpassed and beneath his attention now, and would probably forever be so, he would yawn if he was in his human body which he was never only a few occasions to visit his daughters to teach them a trick or two or engage in a verbal argument about their overstepping and stomping through the galaxy like empresses.

  He had done a few exceptions to allow them bit more freedom considering they were blood, but they had always requested more and more until it was outrageous, He had done a lot of concessions and this was probably the last of them. The alien fleet had arrived earlier than it should have, with every warrior in the galaxy attending which was the custom Milky way had the fewest with 500 million which was a lot considering it's short and murky history of internal warfare that plagued every race and nation, The big players were not arriving yet waiting to be fashionably late or simply did not care enough to devote even one second to this pointless en devour, everyone knew where it would lead and when the aliens left the better to most humans, Milky way was a paradise of resources and living they did not need the aliens cramping up the place although that sounded silly but when an alien civilization of trillions arrived in a galaxy that had enough ships and people to fill eight garden systems you know it was too many, The meeting was about to start in a hour that's when he arrived carrying a few extra personnel Ricardo, Seyla, His daughters and a few managers and diplomatic staff.

  Craig was obviously involved which he was happy about, but diplomacy was a waste of time, the aliens had been on the run for thousands of years and had no time to stop and go beyond their means of technology or resources, most of their ships where similar to his ark ships that only were designed to house the massive population that fled their home worlds, and give and take a few thousand years you had to build more every time you had the chance to stop, the alien fleet was surprisingly bonded in misery and no wars or bickering had been reported of their massive journey which was an oddity in itself. Seyla walked down the massive docking ramp from the titan which were state-of-the-art weaponry that could annihilate everything in the system and that had been broadcast with snippets of leaked footage of the black hole bomb on the alpha site, this probably put the aliens in a nervous fit, but they did not show it.

  Perhaps arrogance, or simply knowing it was not profitable to engage in the first strike, humanity would lose a lot of skilled diplomats and leader if the bomb was used and the counter-attack would be far reach and random which were bound to happen due to the aliens superior portal drives compared to the Ortha, t
hey could not be jammed in same fashion since they also used sub light drives for battle, S-4XN-001 walked first into the massive auditorium that were designed to house camera units and translation units to broadcast across the galaxy, there was proper procedure to these things and it would calm everyone down, the main area was all warriors which was custom considering most warriors were leaders of the massive battle fleets and empires that had been spawned across the years, He sat down on the seat of honor since this was his galaxy, and he was currently putting their entire collective to shame by whooping the Futility fleet to shred constantly, he did not even need to micromanage the Futility had been successfully surrounded, but he had wasted countless ships and resources building the stupid SAD-Ships, or Solar Awakening Devices.

  They were powerful ships in their own right, but against a proper fleet they were garbage. They only had one weapon which was a powerful radiation burst that fried the organic Futility ships which were shielded, A few days of staying in the same system no matter how much shield you had would give you a good radiation burn and the treatment that followed would not be so kind to your body, no matter how much elixir you chugged down, so the ships stayed far away from humanity when they were active, and the aliens were obviously curious and needed the weapon of their own, he had supplied the blueprint to the alien convoy which were extremely happy and baffled at the simplicity of the design, although it needed a bigger ships than his since they did not have access to the black matter material that now fueled his advanced ships, that could take anything one-to-one. He had reached the limits of technology in a sense since there were nothing stronger than the anti-matter drives and power generators, he could always go bigger which was nice, but it felt like cheating if you built bigger ships just for the sake of it, he had several hundreds of unrealized blueprints he could fine tune and construct, he was raking in enough minerals from simply trade in the milky way to build them constantly, not considering his own mineral operations across the galaxy which was increasing by the minute, he had stopped expanding in milky way when he officially had over 300 million systems, perfectly surrounding the edges of the milky way, which were he housed most of his random ships and fleets to guard against the futility if they had a few ships sneaking about, he was not a omnipotent god, so they had to stay there at least as first response to anything that entered his home galaxy. A tiny bell sounded out which was the bell signaling the first meeting between humans and the aliens, Craig was shaking, and he looked incredibly silly from his seating above the warriors which housed the many chairs and seats in middle of the room, Humanity had only one warrior representative which was obviously S-4XN-001.