Preparing a vessel to travel between galaxies was no minor feat. The Andromeda galaxy was over two hundred thousand light-years across; and the Milky Way was over ten times that far away. Warp drives could go faster, more safely, the less mass there was around to risk colliding with; but that was still a risk. When traveling at over ten thousand times the speed of light, even the smallest particle strike could be devastating; and to reach the Milky Way within a year, they needed to be traveling over two million times lightspeed.

  Possible, with the Warp drive; but extremely dangerous.

  Eyeball was directly involved with the plan for the vessel, named the ‘Dragonslayer III’ while still being built, not for his engineering expertise; which was abysmal compared to Ascension or Svetlana; but because if something felt wrong to him, there might be a deadly flaw that would cause problems down the line.

  Minimal forward surface area was key; so the vessel would be a cylinder. That had already been decided.

  The safest way to make sure the path was safe was to follow someone else down it; so they’d copied the device the Founders made to clear a path of tiny particulates… and built three of them.

  One would be on the forward end of the Dragonslayer; while the other two would be on smaller, satellite vessels which would travel one minute and one hour before it, reporting back via FTL.

  If one were damaged, all three would stop; fix the damaged one; and resume course. The Dragonslayer would have what it needed to build dozens more, if need be…. And it shouldn’t even need one, unless something catastrophically failed.

  And of course, Eyeball felt terrible about the idea of skipping them. Was it his powers, or was it just paranoia? The joy of powers that worked on a subconscious level was ever-present, but by now, he had the confidence to just run with it.

  He studied the plans, and looked out the impractically large glass panel at the work in progress; currently just a skeleton six kilometers long, which would, eventually, be fed into an enormous extradimensional space.

  It would be extremely similar in core principle to the Dragonslayer II; much bigger, and with vastly more firepower, and shields using the best technology from both galaxies… but also without the insanely durable armor that had made her predecessor so unstoppable.

  He had no idea what to expect when he arrived. A peaceful galaxy-spanning Empire, ruled by a Romani lady? Those golden crabs having somehow recovered and expanded, and even conquered the earth? An entirely different universe, and an alternate version of the Emperor to find a way to kill?

  He needed to be ready for whatever he found. Ascension would seed the unsettled parts of the Milky Way exactly how it had done Andromeda… and if he ran into problems… he’d be loaded for bear.

  ***

  The navy was gone; alongside every scrap of transportation in the system. Horang was once a populous, thriving star system, with over two billion people in it, ranging from a healthy population of Tier 1 and 0 individuals running the show from Horang III, locally known as the Sapphire Blossom.

  It was beautiful; seeded by the Founders with a particularly elegant strain of descendants whose hairless teal skin was both elegant in the manner it blended with Republic uniforms, as well as with native plant-life.

  They grew crops, manufactured tools; and lived healthy, long, prosperous lives. The hard labor was done by a substantial population of Tier-2 members of lesser, imported species, and there was even a collection of the ‘Yogg’ slave race that was being forced to work from isolated settlements in the asteroid belt.

  Administrator Chaitha stared down at his hands, and then out at his office.

  His secretary was dead. His staff was dead. He’d been on vacation, when it all started… and come back to find that the only intact group among them all were the Yogg; not due to any natural resilience, but merely because they were completely isolated and never shared air with their betters.

  Part of him was tempted to infect them deliberately. But… he’d need them, to pull anything out of this hell.

  The number of Marrick survivors was in the hundreds. Society had broken down, especially due to the rage-inducing illness; but aside from the dozens who had been lucky enough to be isolated or on vacation, the only other survivors were those who had by vast fortune or incredible durability… survived every single illness.

  The net population of Horang was now less than fifty thousand. There was no help coming. Chaitha was faced with a variety of grim realities; the Republic was gone. If he touched the surface, he was dead… but the equipment to keep these space stations up and running needed technicians. Workers. People… who were now dead. The entire population off-planet was about three thousand; himself, his family and bodyguards, a handful of small isolated stations… and the Yogg.

  Built-in security would keep them from wreaking havoc on the system; and they’d inevitably starve, since the Yogg stations were deliberately prevented from being self-sufficient like his own. But….

  Self-sufficient was a misnomer. His own headquarters needed cleaning. Maintenance. Regular repairs. Replacement parts that must be manufactured.

  If they’d been taken from the right subsections of the population, civilization could be maintained properly with less than ten thousand people. But… there were dozens of absolutely vital jobs without a single surviving member of, at any level.

  Chaitha laid his hand against the desk. He had four children. A few weeks ago, he had seven; three by various mistresses who had elected not to join his vacation.

  He considered his options.

  He lacked the expertise to maintain everything they had. It was all based on Founder technology, and the data readers could help serve as educators in a pinch; allowing them to, maybe, squeak by, and preserve some orbital infrastructure.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  They couldn’t possibly save all of it. But…. the Yogg might be saved, if they learned to farm, and were delivered to the habitable planet. The Marrick… would not. They would dip below the sustainable population threshold.

  He’d heard rumors that there was some mass exodus planned, that millions of survivors were leaving the galaxy, to found a new Republic elsewhere. But he had no idea where it was. No….. he could either gather those uninfected survivors he could and flee, or do what he could to salvage what would eventually become a Yogg civilization here in Horang.

  He tapped his comms.

  “Citizens of Horang. The Republic has fallen. We are now isolated; only a single Warp-capable ship remains, my own personal craft; and it lacks the ability to carry everyone. Food is plentiful on the surface. We have a beautiful, habitable world… whose water has been poisoned against Marrick. We have bare handfuls of people left.”

  He inhaled. “For those few survivors of the plagues, please meet at the starport. I will be gifting you passage on my starship, you may go where you wish. They will already be everywhere you go, and anyone else who leaves will inevitably get infected and die.”

  “...For the Yogg, who we have so long oppressed. I will be disabling all security controls on your stations. The machines which once gathered and processed food to deliver to you no longer have operators. Avoid contact with anyone else, as most of the plagues will effect you; but the parasites poisoning the water do not. I would recommend settling down there and simply watching the last of us die off.”

  He looked at the door to the room containing his children. “For the rest of us…. Our time has come. Make your peace with the end. Survive as best you can, for as long as you can. For those willing, help keep the machines in order and ready; the Yogg may have use for them, someday.”

  He disconnected the Comm system. He contemplated, for a moment, taking his own life…. But no. He should instead work on gathering those isolated pockets of uninfected, bringing them to his station, and arranging as pleasant an end as possible, while all the shuttles still worked.

  His Comm beeped almost immediately… he glanced at it. Accepted the call from his Captain.

  “You are released from my service. I would recommend isolating yourselves, and after taking your new passengers wherever they wish to go, simply keeping the ship.”

  ~Administrator. I’ve picked up incoming on scanners. A Swarm ship. Not the same design as the one that dusted us with the plagues…. But a similar one.~

  Chaitha blinked. “Thats… why would they bother? We’re already dead.”

  ~They’ve hailed me, personally… and when your message ended, asked to speak to you.~

  “Well. Put them through, then. What are they going to do, kill us again?”

  An image appeared on his console; a figure in a dull red helmet, with an odd golden logo; two tools crossed over each other.

  ~Administrator Chaitha. This is Ascension, of the Union of Confederate Republics. We are here to help.~

  ***

  Thousands of light-years away, a fleet had gathered; thousands of vessels, both military and civilian; a task force that would’ve been impressive, under other circumstances. Warships, gate-ships, scouts; civilian vessels of every description.

  The four Council members who had survived to bring fleets here stood together on the command deck of one of the Republic’s mighty Dreadnaughts; a behemoth of armor and weaponry that, before the Outsider had arrived, was believed to be the strongest non-Founder vessel to exist in the Andromeda galaxy.

  As they surveyed what each of them had brought; millions of personnel of various races, billions of tons of food and resources; they made their plans.

  Halax rose up to stand over the table, and his fellow Councilmen.

  “I’ve spoken to our scientists. The… best of whats left. Our craft are durable, and fairly reliable. But for a journey of over two million light-years.. And to be certain we haven’t arrived in the Outsider’s home galaxy they believe we should avoid the closest targets… they estimate a net voyage of over one hundred years at a safe speed….. We’re going to, most likely, go through an estimated five rounds of downsizing. We will start with one hundred and seventeen thousand vessels.”

  “Over time, some will fail, be disassembled for parts, melted down… and we will be bringing seven improvised factory ships; shipyards that we have broken apart and brought with us. Over the course of an estimated century of travel, we will likely drop to roughly eighty-seven thousand ships, and while we can replace any single part, we will eventually be forced to lose one of the factory ships as well as we run through expendable resources..”

  He sighed. “If we remain here in-system for a year… we can dismantle many of these vessels and build a series of massive, more durable, arks, built for a longer, slower, voyage. This would allow us to take all surviving population, and have room to grow. If we do not…. We will need to undertake careful population control measures, and each time we suffer a round of downsizing, select a proportion of the population to remove.”

  He looked at his fellow Councilmen. “As such, I recommend as follows. We initially direct our fleet here… to this smaller dwarf galaxy. We’ve never explored it before, thanks to the great distance, but it will only take us seven years to arrive. Over ninety-nine percent of our fleet should survive that journey. When we reach it…. We do what we would here, if we had time. Gather resources. Build ark ships, rebuild everything for the long haul… and then depart. We should be safe there, for a while, but I’d recommend against spending more than five or six years there; they will eventually come looking for us.”

  He sighed… and looked at the starmap. “...To make that following more difficult, we are taking two steps. First… a Gate-ship has already been launched, already active, towards our destination. A second linked ship will be accompanying us in an entirely different direction. In the event they witness our departure, they will believe we are heading for the Outsider’s home galaxy… and all they will find, when they intercept us, will be a long-dormant ruin of a single Gate-ship, abandoned over a thousand light-years beyond the edge of the galaxy.”

  He looked at his companions. “Second. The star we launch from, and the best position to observe our trail and plans… we are following the example of the Outsiders, and reinforcing another Gateship pair… before launching one into the star. Shortly after we depart, it will go nova, making following our decoy trajectory difficult.”

  Cholick gave a slow nod. “Excellent thoughts, Halax. I took the liberty of assembling Decoy fleets as well; I took volunteers who had already been infected, putting their crew into stasis… each of them will only survive a few days before going mad, so they’ve been fitted with collars to kill them before they can destroy everything. They’ll be heading in a few random directions, pretending to be much larger fleets, departing from areas that will be more easily witnessed; hopefully throwing the enemies off of our trail.”

  The others nodded… before Halax sighed. “And now we come to our final issue. Chaif. This fleet should have been bigger. Stronger. More of our people escaping. But…. without our permission, he has gathered a fleet to strike at the Outsider home galaxy. A galaxy that, from what information we have, is filled with horrors more dangerous than the Outsider himself. He is doomed, of course. But…. if the Outsiders suddenly receive an invasion from another galaxy….”

  Cholick grimaced. “...They might start expanding. The vast gulf between galaxies is enormous, but not insurmountable for a determined species with their level of technology. If he shows up and does some damage, they might start heading out to nearby galaxies, conquering them…. And there may be no safe place for us to go. Ever. We lack the entropy-defying technology of the Founders; we must, eventually, found a home base somewhere.”

  The elder nodded. “And thus… we should ensure he never reaches them. However much I might wish we could wipe out the Outsider galaxy for all of the crimes they have perpetrated…. If we allow that attack to go on, we doom our future.”