intergalactic peacekeepers chapter 1

Chapter 1 (see intro before reading)

The crowd breaks out yet again in uproar this time it is killed off by lieutenant admiral Gideon's voice “SOLDIERS”, his voice echoes throughout the whole hangar causing a collective yet silent gasp to ripple through the regiment.

“BOARD YOUR SHIPS” he orders, the regiment quickly breaks up into smaller battalions who then further divide themselves into batteries who again divide into different platoons.

Yours lose no time moving to your designated ship, you have been assigned to a new model of protector class spaceship yours is named SS Amadeus, it is 100 meters long and 15 meters in diameter due to its cylindrical shape, it weighs about 53 thousand tons, it can holojump at the the speed of light 299,792.458 kilometers per second exactly.

Such travel is possible thanks to the aforementioned arrays who work by encoding the exact quantum data of the ship as well as its crew in one array and then sending it to another via a hyper focused ray of energy that passes through designated hyperspace lanes, the receiving array then catches the ray and decodes its quantum data and rematerializes it.

As you stand before the massive hunk of metal that is the SS Amadeus, you're stricken by its design. It's caricatural of the U.P.F.’s monotone and systemic en masse production; you feel a strange sense of déjà vu looking at it.

Your heart is pounding in your chest. You would nearly faint if it weren't for the adrenaline surging through your veins.

The loading bay’s ramp seamlessly splits away from the rest of the heavy hull, its pistons slowly extending as the servo motors of the ramp hiss open.

You see a figure of a man behind the bay’s door, the man slowly appears as the ramp lowers itself. You can't make out his features yet, but your squad snaps to attention, which you instinctively follow.

As the ramp continues lowering, the moment seems to stretch. You take the opportunity to observe the interior of the loading bay more closely.

You think of all the missions you'll accomplish in this ship, all the lives you'll save, all the ways you will serve the empire, about all the years of training that have led to this moment, about how much you will enjoy it all; you can't help but wonder at what awaits you—such glory, such magnificence, such honor.

You quickly look around to your comrades that have been selected to be deployed with you.

Most of them were in the same dormitory wing as you, so you know them already.

You've known your shipmates your whole life; in fact, you could pick them amongst hundreds by their voice alone.

You think about how lucky you are to be able to serve alongside your brothers and sisters.

You also think about how you're never going to see your home again—at least, if you can call the training facility home.

Your eyes wander right, and you find that your comrades have boarded the ship already and seem to be waiting for you with a concerned look on their faces.

As you're still saluting, your movement is interrupted by a grim, worn-down face invading your personal space. You're taken aback by the sudden apparition but quickly get your bearings back. It's the same figure as earlier, and you can now see the rank on the man's collar—it dawns on you that it's the ship's captain.

Before you can even think any further, the captain screams with enough force to almost hurt your ears about insubordination and consequences. He screams so loud you can't piece two words together, as they quickly melt into a flurry of threats and insults, but his eyes alone scare you.

You manage to piece two and two together and figure he ordered you to board the ship while you were lost in your thoughts, and you've totally ignored his order.

You're at a complete loss for words. You can't believe what you've just done—and in front of the entire training facility. You've disobeyed a direct order; you feel as though the entire U.P.F. force is staring daggers at you, and you wish you could erase yourself from existence.

You're overcome with fear as you await punishment; you're already bracing yourself for it unconsciously. You consider begging, but you think that you, “a supposed peacekeeper,” have made yourself enough of a disgrace.

Then you see the captain's face contort into a mask of disgust. He simply orders you to board the ship—the disdain in his baritone voice making you want to sink into the ground.

Your body reacts before your mind even does, and you’ve already joined the rest of your shipmates before you're aware of it. The captain simply turns around and walks back to his original position, as if ready to resume a practiced routine.

It's at this point you notice a model X-60 droid standing next to him. Its design is sleek and mostly featureless; you can't make out if it's modeled after a male or female. Its only defining traits are its shiny silver skin and its surprisingly emotive eyes.

Looking at it gives you a sense of uneasiness. It is too realistic yet too vague at once.

Your focus shifts back to the captain, who is now holding his hand up in the orator's gesture, his eyes cutting through the deepest parts of your being.

He marks a noticeable pause before speaking; the atmosphere dies down to a quiet call-before-the-storm type, as if subjugated by him.

“Listen, and listen well. My name is Colonel Andrew Grant. Never let it escape your mouths without permission, and above all, never even think of it without adding ‘Colonel’ in front of it. I am the captain of this ship; it is why you shall call me Captain.

And aboard this ship, my word is law. I command your every breath and waking thought. You do not, under any circumstances, disobey an order. No matter if I told you to blow a planet’s core up, exterminate an endangered xeno species, or kill one another—if I demand it, you shall execute it.

Consider them; for even a second you will die, doubt them you will die, refuse to obey... You will suffer, beg for mercy, then for death, then die.

If I sense a lick of doubt or, even worse, rebellion in your tiny little brains, I'll make sure to make an example of you.”

“Now follow me,” he orders; instinctively, again you and your fellow soldiers form a neat column behind him as he turns toward a hallway leading to the main corridor of the ship, connecting every room in a complicated set of hallways, stairs, and ladders.

You start marching through the hallway, and you see out of the corner of your eye the droid walking alongside the file of soldiers. You turn your head slightly to get a better look at it, and your blood runs cold at the sight of the droid's eyes staring straight into yours.

It walks confidently and with diligence, its head turned to you, and its eyes seemingly scanning your every atom. You quickly turn your head away from the robot, yet it doesn't stop a chill from running down your spine as you feel the cold, calculating gaze of the machine onto you.

Colonel Grant remains undisturbed by the robot's presence, as if he is used to it or perhaps he knows something you don't. He simply keeps on walking down the hallway, though.

The sound of boots echoes down the ship, but more importantly, you notice the droid’s steps don't make any sound despite supposedly being metal on metal.

You look at it again, doing your best to put aside your fear, and see it's mimicking your march down to the smallest detail. All the while keeping its eyes on you—is it mocking you, can it feel your fear, does it know?
Worse even it's now mimicking your scared expression perfectly and you think you can make out a glint of amusement in its dreadful eyes.

You're dumbfounded. You don't know how to react—is it really mocking you, or is it toying with you, or is it just how it's programmed to walk ? But what about it imitating your face ?You don't know, and before you can question it any further, the marching stops.

Colonel Grant looks at the malicious machine and simply gestures to it. “This here is the cargo bay,” it says, its voice carrying something you can't quite identify—like a false, overfriendly tone and a chilling cadence to it. “It has a capacity of 2500 cubic meters and has accommodations for any cargo you may want to carry. On top of that, the ship is equipped with a tractor beam capable of hauling 3000 tons of mass and bringing it into the loading bay area.”

You carefully listen to the droid, doing your best to ignore your sense of unease regarding it.

“Follow, please.” It turns around and begins walking towards a steel double door that is at the end of the bay. When it arrives before the door, it simply waves its hand, and the door splits in the middle and slides open. As it continues walking, it says:

“This ship is equipped with a security system for every door, armament, or otherwise any other function the ship has.

It is specifically encrypted for you, with your very DNA sequence, which has already been collected from you when you boarded the ship through your sweat.”

Its tone dramatically changes mid-sentence, as if trying to intimidate you to comply—not that you have a choice anyway.

The droid casually resumes walking. In any other circumstances, you would assume its indifferent attitude to the bombshell it's just dropped on you to be a lack of humanity, but here your gut tells you it is meant.

Brushing off all of the earlier interactions with the machine, you soon get to a (relatively) large opening. The droid presents it as the main eating area where you will receive your daily ration of nutrients; it shows you where the trays are located and where the cleaning stations are.

“Here you will follow the same daily routine as you did back in the training facility,” Colonel Grant interjects.

“This means you will move when the bell tells you, eat when the bell tells you, sleep, piss, shower, and so on when the bell tells you.”

“However, remember what I told you earlier: if I tell the bell to fuck off, you will tell the bell to fuck off.”

A collective “Yes, Captain” is heard resonating throughout the ship. You're somewhat reassured by knowing you will still have the bell to help you through your days. It's almost a comforting piece of home that followed you on board the ship; you'd really be lost without it.

Captain Grant, with a simple grunt, turns back around as if bothered to have to talk you through the tour.

The droid instinctively takes over, pointing out metal sliding doors located on all of the height sides of the octagonal canteen.

It approaches one and waves the door open. It gestures towards the inside and tells you this will be your sleeping quarters.

“The sleeping pods are at the very tip of technology. They are designed to double as escape pods in case of emergency; they can resist the void of space, collision with asteroids, crash landing on hostile planets, all the while keeping you safe, of course.”

“They have an autonomy of 2 months when disconnected from the ship; they are designed to keep you alive and dormant for practically forever, as they can recycle your bodily fluids almost indefinitely, thus keeping you alive.”
“The pods have been programmed to redirect themselves to the nearest planet if ejected from the ship and send a rescue signal to every U.P.F. ship within the zone.”

The droid now points to four ladders located in between each one of the sleeping quarters stating that they lead to more dormitories just like this one.

“Let's continue,” says the droid as it now heads toward the door opposite the one you came in.

The door opens to a small corridor with two stairs going down on its sides; the droid leads down the corridor instead of down the stairs.

“And here we are in the most important room of the craft: the control room. You will see that you have the captain's seat here, where Captain Grant will serve as the governing authority aboard this ship.”

“They already know this, damned tin man,” sneers Captain Grant, his ego clearly touched.

“Of course, Captain,” reverently responds the droid before moving on with the rest of the tour.

“Over here we have my personal favorite part of the ship, the defensive and offensive armaments—or D.O.A. It's here that you will control the ship's many guns and defenses, which include a 200mm ionic cannon capable of punching a hole five meters deep into a similar ships armor at a rate of fire of five shots per minute, alongside two H-85 “Locust” laser beams capable of firing continuously for one minute with a recharging time of t'en minutes—thus being able to melt a two-meter wide hole through most metals found in this galactic subsector.”

“Next to it is the control panel of the ship's drone bay. The ship can send out as many as twenty drones, which measure barely one meter in diameter, and can be sent to perform various tasks such as scouting a landing zone, recovering small floating debris, or auto-destroying themselves on command against targets of your choice—and much more. Your imagination is the only limit.”

“Moving on to the defensive abilities of the craft: it is equipped with self-repairing units consisting of nanobots designed to instantly deploy themselves whenever the ship's hull gets damaged and repair it to the best of their abilities autonomously.”

“Then lastly, the most important part of the ship’s defense is a holo-shield of the best quality. It can withstand up to a whopping ten terajoules of energy blasts and is designed to run entirely autonomously—as long as the ship has power, of course.”

You're absolutely baffled by the astronomical power of the ship. You're in complete awe and feel an overwhelming sense of empowerment at the thought of serving on a ship of this caliber.

However you can't help but feel a pang of worry. What sort of trouble could you run into that would need such strong defensive and offensive abilities.

You interrupt yourself however remembering just exactly who you are or at least meant to be you're an intergalactic united planetary front peacekeeper damnit.

You would run head first into a charge of abhorrent xenos if it meant dying a glorious peacekeeper’s death.

No creature the cosmos holds regardless of how dark and twisted they may be in their intentions or appearance should be able to intimidate you instead it should be you that strikes terror into their hearts.

And yet you find your mind assaulted by hordes of horrendous monsters fighting over your mangled body.

You find yourself marching again down a set of stairs and along a straight corridor you seem to have let your mind wander again adding even more to the guilt you felt earlier.

You're tangled onto a web of fear and shame as your mind can't escape the thoughts of what you may encounter.

Every step you take hammers the word coward into your head. You can't escape it.

Thankfully your torment is cut short by the group's arrival to the armory.

“Alright let's make you peacekeepers once and for all” ceremoniously announces Colonel Grant.

You're curious at the colonel's words aren't you already an official peacekeeper what more do you need is there something you're missing is there something you have been told about in your training ?

All of those questions rising up a storm of worry in you are soon cut off as the doors of the armory slides open at a wave of the captain's hand he then steps into a large room with a tall ceiling. The walls of the room are adorned with every kind of weapon an intergalactic soldier like you could ever wish for as well as enough crates of ammunition to overrun a whole planet.

Plasma rifles, laser bolters, handheld ionic blasters, but also good old ballistic weapons like the L-50 Bulpup variant, the heavy N70, the FNW-89 sniper rifle and many more weapons,

As well as many kinds of grenades both lethal and non lethal like the infamous psionic wave grenades that can scramble cognition in targeted areas of the mind such as fear, aggression, mental state, and also things like sight, hearing, or even smell or taste or the terrible and almost ancient sarin gas grenades that can melt lungs with a single inhalation or even the UWB-AR grenades that uses Ultra wide band low-frequency, wide-band radar pulses that can detect motion and roughly map human-sized reflectors behind walls and then sends an AR silhouette of scanned enemies to the all the ally soldiers in a 150 meters radius.

You're beaming with joy; you're like a child in a toy store. All your earlier worries fade away as you now imagine the would-be monster eating your carcass now reduced to bits in a thousand different ways.

Your attention is then drawn to a strange looking station in the middle of the room it resembles a sleeping pod, it's is wonderfully decorated with a number of starts and engraved images of peacekeepers in battle all around the cylindrical outer shell it has been given a set of mechanical arms each one armed with 4 dainty and sharp fingers, you also see the outline of a figure cutout in the center of the pod you're intrigued by the figures resemblance with your own, above the pod you see U.P.F’s insignia adorning it along with its motto “The universe and all its stars” etched in shining golden letters.

You've never seen anything like this in all your years as a cadet. Normally such treatment is reserved for caskets of fallen heroes and official buildings. Never once in your life have you seen such a level of sacralization for such a seemingly inconspicuous machine.

You see Colonel Grant approach it. He carries a strange smirk on his face and his demeanor changes to a more somber one.

You're cautious to enter the room further every fiber of your being tells you to run like you know something bad awaits you in here

but why after all it's all you've ever wanted to be peacekeeper for the empire it is your biggest dream the moment you've been waiting for your whole life to finally be a full fledge peacekeeper whatever awaits you in here you'll face it.

every day of training you've given to the U.P.F
7 305 exactly every single drop of blood you've lost during training every single time you've dreamt of this moment all of it leading to here.

The thought of all the hardship you've overcome just to be here and to think you're finally being rewarded does little to calm you down besides you have no choice as the other soldiers continue to march into the room and you simply refuse to break the march.

At least whatever awaits you in here you're with you comrades and you know that together you can achieve anything.

The marching has stopped now as all of the soldiers have piled themselves into the room the atmosphere is tense and feels lethal no one moves or dares make a sound when suddenly.

Colonel Grant points a finger in your direction, the simple gesture making you jolt. “Come” he orders you, you jog up to him and plant yourself before him in an absolutely flawless salute you're far too scared of him to dare show him anything less than this.

His face is solemn like he is about to perform a ritual, his eyes are as cold and terrifying as ever but you catch a small almost unperceptive shift in his eyes something you are quite unfamiliar with is that…empathy !?

“Get in” he gestures for you to place yourself in the machine; his tone seems to carry the far off echoes of what one could mistake for compassion.

You nervously look at the machine but you refuse to disobey, no, not again, not this time you won't. You carefully step inside the machine and place yourself in the cutout silhouette.

The air around you feels charged with electricity and the machine now seems to suffocate you.

Its cold, almost hostile interior provides little comfort and you feel like you're encircled and trapped.

As you do your best to remain calm, Colonel Grant moves slowly and purposefully to stand next to you, his eyes closed as if in prayer he begins speaking again his voice strong and and full of fervency

“Children….you will now witness a child become a man, a meaningless nobody become a hero of his race, what this cadet has been through you all have, what tears he's shed you've shed them with him, what bad day he's had you've had them together, what dreams, what hopes, what ideals, he has we all share.”

He moves again still as slowly and purposefully as before.

“What he has done few others have dared and even less will succeed and you are all amongst those who dared and furthermore amongst the chosen ones who succeeded.”

He slowly moves his hand, his index finger coming to rest on top of an ominous button adorned with gold stars.

His words riling up a storm of emotions within your already troubled mind you feel in short succession pride then anxiety then fear then exalted then pride again then fear again.

The turmoil inside reaches an even bigger peak at Colonel Grant’s next words.

“His life as a cadet, tiring and full of adversity, now comes to an end and this moment shall mark the beginning of his new life as an intergalactic peacekeeper of the united planetary front of the human empire and will be given the proper respect reverence and recognition his stature now demands, by all and all will be able to see how righteous how strong how elevated he as become the light of justice shall shine through him and his actions for now he will lead a life of honor glory and justice, a life worth a million others.”

By the end of Colonel Grants’ speech you're shaking, you are torn apart by pride and the dread that has taken over you the grandeur of the moment causes a single tear to gently run down your cheeks as you do your best to hold back the others.

You cannot remember the last time you did if you ever did at all in your life that is and one small detail seems to be drilling away in your mind.

Are they tears of joy or of sadness?

Colonel Grant then closes his eyes again his brows furrowing as if he musters up all his energy to proclaim

“THE UNIVERSE AND ALL ITS STARTS…...are his!”


And with this he presses the button, your emotions whirling in a mix of fear, anticipation, joy and pride.

As soon as he presses the button the crowd who so far was watching in silence now erupts into cheers as the machine comes to life, its sarcophagi like doors slowly closing around you only heightening the feeling of claustrophobia that's taken hold of you.

The roar of the crowd has now become muffled and the machine offers little light for you to see.

You are scared you don't know what to expect. You just wish for this moment to be over already but you can't escape it. You've chosen to be there and you're getting what you asked for.

You're soon completely encased in the station as the mechanical arms of the machine slowly and methodically begin to work performing their task with surgical precision retrieving an armor plate with in its center the U.P.F’s insignia sat enthroned like an indelible mark claiming you as property.

You're gripping the handle bars on the sides of the machine with enough strength to incite a loud crack from your knuckles and your teeth keep on tightening painfully as you can't for the life of you relax your jaw.

The arms continue placing more armor parts on you, each one more intimidating, more cold and more sharp than the other. Your legs, arms and whole entire torso get carefully covered in plating by the mechanical arms with perfect unison and a certain rhythm as if they follow some kind of specific cadence they've been programmed to obey.

You want to scream to fight the arms off but you don't know why you're filled with shame. As a peacekeeper this should be the best moment of your life but instead it is the single most terrifying nightmare you've ever had.

You can still hear your comrades outside the station, chanting and celebrating. You want to call for help, to tell them to get you out of here, to get you back home, but you can't. You're part of the greatest, most powerful army in the entire known universe, and yet you're alone.

The arms continue fixing components and armor plates to your uniform, inexorably continuing their transformation of your trembling form, impervious to your current predicament.

Suddenly, you feel a cage closing around your head. You're completely unable to move it, making you feel even more trapped, to the point where you start feeling sick and dizzy. Your vision starts dimming as you feel the arms attaching parts of a helmet to your head.

As the arms relentlessly continue their work, you can't hold it any longer — you pass out from the stress and mix of emotions.

You seem to be carried away from the horror aboard the ship by an unknown force and you find yourself back in the training facility, surrounded by the very same people who currently witness your terrible transformation — during a camaraderie-building exercise where you had to talk to one another about your expectations and hopes for your future career as a peacekeeper.

It was the only time you were allowed to freely talk amongst yourselves. The experience was surreal, and it felt incredible to unsupervisedly discuss with your comrades about your shared interest and passion for the U.P.F. You regard it as one of your happiest moments during your training.

Suddenly, you're ripped from your dream — the very first one you've ever had — by a sharp pain coming from your skull. As you open your eyes, your brain is on fire, the pain in your skull keeps you awake this time. you find the doors of the armor station opened, and you see your whole entire squad cheering for you.

You try to get up, but the pain in your head is too much, and you fall back into the cutout silhouette as you feel a single drop of blood run down the back of your skull. You're unsure if you hit your head in your fall, but the drop of blood, reminding you that you are, after all, still a human made of flesh and born of a mother and a father, falls down onto the ground with a mind-shattering silence, the crimson tear disappearing as it is swiftly wiped away by one of the mechanical arms as again your consciousness has sliped aways.