This story and it's core ideas were passed to me with permission by its original creator, 0841 Unyielding Temperance, for re-writing and continuation of his storyline. (His original story is thus far still visible on his profile) Thanks to him for such a fantastic universe for me to play with, and I hope you guys enjoy this AU just as much as the both of us do. I can only hope I do justice to the fantastic scale and potential this story has.
Chapter 1
Frossiya
Cycle 5, Arc of Restoration
Citadel of Souls
Before her stood a monument of sorrow.
She came here often, to restore her divine connection, to strengthen it, to understand the heritage of herself, the Council, and the people around her. It was a practice she continued, half in part due to her innate connection with the Ice, half in part to keep herself sane.
Today however, was more ceremonial in nature. The icy chamber, built into the side of a solitary mountain, stood tall and alone in the snowy Tsarvich Plains, a symbol of endurance and perseverance, to have stood for so long in the harshest place on the planet. She'd come here with only the Leader and the Intelligence, the only two permitted to witness this act of divination, and had been that way for a very long time. Her hands outstretched and her eyes narrowed, the chamber doors gleamed with the Insignia of Command, then slid open in perfect halves, allowing the dim light of the star Frossiya orbited to slowly illuminate the pathway before them, a long and dark corridor leading to the darkness beyond.
"Shall we?" The Leader intoned, outstretching his hand to allow the Commander passage. Her response was a nod, and she entered, her companions close behind. They made an odd trio; the Leader was clad in clunky battle armor, the Intelligence in ceremonial robes, but the Commander adorned a dress that exposed the top of her shoulders, the icy fabric covering the rest of her body, save a slit on the lower regions to allow movement, another layer of transparent fabric trailing behind her.
With more scraping against the frozen rock beneath its foundations the doors slid shut, the light quickly fading away. Abruptly the Commander reached out with her right hand and struck the side of the corridor. A blue spark ignited, rushing across and in front of them, lighting up the passageway, and then the spherical cavity within the mountain lit up with a bluish hue. The individual chambers of each and every incarnation glowed magnificently, and ice rushed to meet them, creaking as they joined to form a pathway from the passageway into the very center of the cavity, suspended in thin air.
It ended where the divine Ice floated. Crystalline in structure, column in shape, yet an enigmatic aura radiated from the core of the gargantuan chamber.
Almost tentatively the Commander forced herself to continue her walk towards the Ice. Already she could feel the pulsing of its mind, the small cluster of voices whispering to her around the insides of her head. She felt the minds of the Leader and Intelligence stiffen similarly from the contact, but they kept walking. The suspended pathway elongated, allowing all three of them to step before the Ice, and the pulses grew in intensity.
You are here.
The Commander merely nodded in response; there was no need for further communication, and doing so was an unnecessary taxation on her energy. You know why you are here. She nodded again.
A single, solitary icicle shot forth towards her, angled directly towards her nosebridge between her eyes. She did not flinch. As required. She'd passed the test, and worthy of the mantleship of Commander.
The Arc has just begun. You are now its harbinger, Elsa. See that the Arc flourishes.
Elsa took the icicle between her two palms, her power coursing through her veins. With a swift movement, she broke the icicle, and the stump retracted back into the ball of ice before her. The rod of ice creaked and crackled, morphing from a single icicle into a grand, twin-edged blade, the hilt made of the finest Dellium, the blade made of the purest ice. A matching sheath covered the sharp blade, inscribed with the sole runes that mattered as a Commander: Conceal, don't feel.
Icewrath is yours to wield, and yours only. Go forth, and let all be peace and prosperity.
Elsa bowed her head, attaching the sword to her belt, the Ice briefly flashing with the Insignia of Command once more, then disappearing back into the blue. The light dimmed, and the trio left the chamber, having been allowed one more glimpse into the mysteries of Frossiya.
The deity retreated back into its column of ice, watching silently as the chamber descended once more into darkness. Elsa. This was going to be tough; this new Commander strangely possessed a connection to it much greater than any other being, even the Commander before her. It had been a risky move to allow the divination to take place, but the one thing that the deity possessed that nothing else did on that planet was faith. Faith in its people.
So for once, the deity let the matter rest. And once more it called out its eternal name, the name it shared with the planet it resided in, the name its people feared and revered.
Frossiya.
The shuttle was parked upon the open plains. The ice beneath yawned and creaked; it was said that most of Frossiya's power came directly beneath those plains. For them to tread upon such divine ground was a privilege given to few.
But the privilege of Commander was also a curse.
Elsa let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding as she mounted the ramp to the shuttle's hold, her companions following behind her in stoic silence. They hadn't spoken since they had entered, and for them, starting a conversation often turned out rather awkward.
Luckily for them, they were bestowed upon them a conversation starter.
"There's a transmission," the Intelligence noted.
Elsa frowned as she briskly walked over to the console. She placed a palm upon its cool surface, the holographic display emitting a gentle hum as the transmission engaged playback.
"Commander." The Warrior's figure appeared before her, her red hair trailing messily behind her. "At around 5 millicycles after your departure we detected an unknown signature entering range of the Ringfleet sensors. It appears there has been an incursion into Frossiyan space."
The display warped and changed, the images reforming before them. Elsa sensed her companions shifting uneasily behind her, equally unnerved by this turn of events as the Warrior continued. "Preliminary analysis indicates that this ship is for resource gathering; most of the space on the ship is meant for storage. The equipment is premised upon some form of forceful penetration method that will be harnessed upon the surface it wishes to break. As of this transmission, the Ringfleets are currently moving into defensive formation, and will continue to remain undetected. I am compelled by protocol to state that should your return and that of the Leader's and Intelligence's not occur within the next 10 millicycles, the Strategist will assume command temporarily, and coordinate an effective response until you arrive."
The transmission shut off abruptly, leaving the three figures standing in the hull of the shuttle. 10 millicycles. There's only 4 remaining… And I know how thick-headed Hans can be…
"Get this ship in the air," Elsa ordered. The Intelligence moved to comply, sitting down at the console and starting the engines with a familiar whine. The Leader strapped himself into a passenger seat, and Elsa sat back into the Watcher's chair, feeling the ship vibrate with power as it levitated off the ground. "Set course to Ringfleet Glaciar immediately, and double it up. I will not have the Strategist carry out an action that we will all regret."
The engine's whining turned into roaring as the propulsion kicked the ship into high velocity, the Intelligence pulling the ship into a steep climb to escape the planet's atmosphere. She felt her own heart rate quicken, but she forced herself to cool down. It was never good to be hasty and irrational; those were the two banes of her existence as Commander. Right now she needed to focus and execute.
And be damned anyone who stood in her way.
"Alien ship continuing on current trajectory, no sign of course correction," the officer reported.
Hans sat back the in the Watcher's chair, surveying the situation. Upon the various projections he planned his next course of action. It wasn't sufficient for him to just let them enter a gyro synchronous orbit around the planet and just to monitor them from there; he'd blast them to smithereens. If anything such a decision was beneficial to his goals anyways; it showed his strength and steely determination in command.
And technically, he needed to show that, if he was going to get anywhere closer to the Commander.
"Prep the Ringfleets for offensive maneuvers. Ready Arms 1 through 3, prepare to immobilize and cripple. Additionally, ready all available cannons, and target that ship."
"Lock on acquired," another officer called out. "Still tracking descent."
"Prepare to fire." His eyes narrowed as the ship closed in on the effective range of the ice cannons, calmly waiting for his chance to strike. For Frossiya, it was a strike against invaders, or at least, that would be how it appeared to them. For him, it was a leap up the ladder of hierarchy, and hopefully put him in favour with the Commander.
"Ship has entered effective firing range."
His chance had come. "Open fire!"
Elsa rushed upon the bridge, her eyes narrowing the moment she heard the words "Open fire!"
"Belay that!" she yelled in response, her eyes focusing on how close the weapons officer's finger had been to the trigger. She stormed upon the bridge, eyes glowering at the Strategist, who sat motionless in his chair, albeit a small quiver every now and then.
"What in the name of Frossiya do you think you are doing?" she spat out.
"I'm defending our people," came the retort.
"By firing upon an unknown ship with no prior investigation?"
"At this point, it is logical to assume that they have hostile intentions."
"Until I can carry out a proper investigation, you will not utter another order on this bridge," Elsa managed to say without letting her voice get out of control.
"But Elsa—"
That did it. Elsa drew Icewrath, the icy blade scraping against the scabbard, its gleaming edge pointed directly at Hans' neck. "Vacate the seat immediately, Strategist. Do not forget your place here; you are to advise and to plan, not to order without MY jurisdiction. Vacate the seat, AND the bridge, and do not return until you are called for, else I will not hesitate to be off with your head."
She watched her words take on the intended effect. Hans sulked, angrily pushing himself off the Watcher seat and briskly vacating the bridge.
"He does have a point, you know," the Leader intoned after the last of Hans' silhouette vanished from the bridge. "It is safer to assume they are hostile."
"That may be, but our way of meeting the threat is not to obliterate everything we see." She didn't even grace the Leader with a decently sounding reply, simply moving over to the console to disarm the weapons. "He forgets his place; this is the Arc of Restoration for a reason. We are here to heal, not tear open old wounds."
"As commanded."
"What's their ETA?"
"3 days."
"Origin?"
"Working on it, Commander," the Librarian responded.
"Intelligence, speed up our systems, but maintain cloaking protocols."
"As commanded." The bridge erupted into a flurry of activity that Elsa oversaw, her eyes turning into dangerously narrow slits.
"Got it. They hail from the second quadrant of our galaxy, from a relatively young system." The primary display aboard Ringfleet Flagship Glaciar warped into a blue display of the Milky Way, marking out the lightyears travelled on the vessel's previous trajectory, then zooming into the second quadrant of the galaxy, the arm of the stars that orbited the black hole at the center. The system's star was identified, the information slowly loading on the display. A flash of memory sliced through Elsa's brain, and she grimaced, the Ice's memories flowing through her neurons. "Commander?" she heard through ringing ears, the voices reverberating off the insides of her head. "Commander? Are you alright?"
"I've… been there… before," she managed the say, forcing herself into an upright position amidst the stinging whiplash. The display had loaded; Sol, the star that gave life to its system, with its only significant, and habitable planet in that sector.
The Explorer squinted his eyes. "As have I, Commander. That is Earth, the place that they herald from."
"Detailed analysis coming online, Commander," the Librarian said as she consulted her tablets, frowning as she did so. "How… curious. These creatures require oxygen…"
She crinkled her nose as she uttered the next phrase. "…and water."
Murmurs echoed from around the bridge. Elsa could feel the pulses of distaste tugging at each and every member of the bridge's minds. Blasphemy. Sacrilege. To consume water was to take apart the very essence as to which Frossiya comprised, to use it for one's own needs. To do so was the greatest of heresies, to do so was to degrade their deity for their personal consumption. To alter something as pure and clear as ice, was unthinkable. Then mentally, they apologized, directing their remorse towards the great Frossiya, banishing the thoughts from their minds. An acceptable show of regret.
"But why would they come here?" the Leader asked. "They cannot possibly require oxygen and water; our atmosphere contains no such gas, their apparatus does seem fit for such collection, and they would not attempt to traverse such a great distance simply for such materials."
"Do they have databanks that we can hack?" Elsa inquired.
"They do. Retrieving information now," the Intelligence replied. The display morphed again, line after line of alien coding scrolling past their vision. "They seek, materials from Frossiya."
"Materials?" Elsa drew upon the data download and brought it up to her own console, scrolling through the information herself. But what materials could they possibly need? Our civilization flourishes on a meagre supply of resources, very little of which we consider valuable… Her train of thoughts paused momentarily as she halted at a section that seemed to answer her question: a list of precious metals and rocks, along with some form of scientific analysis. She opened the datafiles, scanning through their contents, frowning at the images that came to her eyes. Wordlessly she brought up the images on the main display.
"Dellium," she uttered. "That's what they want."
More murmuring. "They also seek many other metals and rocks that lie within the layers of our planet." Elsa put up more files on the main display as the downloads continued pouring in. "These other metals we have no use for, yet they believe that they could find a use for them. Large deposits of these resources exist all across our planet, of which number so many I will not bother listing. Their preliminary reports indicate this place to be some sort of 'gold mine', in their terms. They wish to forcefully penetrate our planet and extract the materials they desire directly." The murmuring that was occurring before had now turned into an uproar; Elsa noted the lack of restraint this time.
"Is there a name for this repulsive species?" the Leader spat out, crossing his arms as he moved over towards Elsa. "Why not just destroy them once and for all, as Hans suggested?"
Elsa frowned with contempt as she turned towards the Leader. "I could do that, if you insist that to be. If you are indeed willing to become the catalyst for the Second War of the Fourth Quadrant and render the efforts of the Fifth Cycle's Arc of Restoration useless, then I could indeed do so." She paused, letting her words sink in. "Otherwise, you will wait." For a while she looked down at her feet, allowing herself to calm down, before she spoke once more.
"Humans," she said. "That is what they are."
She turned back to her console, and rose to take her leave. "Reposition all Ringfleets back to defensive formation, and then trigger immobilization protocols. Make sure it hits."
"As commanded," the bridge echoed, just before Elsa left the bridge.