FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Alrighty, the next chapter in the odds against is finally ready for submission. I would have had this done earlier, but I have been very distracted lately.

Anyway, comments are appreciated as always. I hope you enjoy it.

---

11-03-3015

Time Index; 0215 hours GST

Terran Federation Research Station Pasteur

Asgard system, Terran space

Admiral Tack walked into the research lab, a little uncomfortable in the disposable jumpsuit and lab coat that everyone in the research station wore. Doctor Taggart stood at one of the lab benches, next to another white suited scientist and the aging Admiral threaded his way through the lab benches towards them. A micro-centrifuge and a half dozen pieces of other lab equipment that he did not recognize hummed away quietly beside them and he briefly wondered what it was they were doing, and why it was that Doctor Taggart asked him to come to the station in the first place. He didn't know enough medical science to make heads or tails of half of what she had told him over the years, and this would probably be doubly true with this other scientist. When he walked up, both of the white coated scientists looked up at him, the doctor giving him a salute.

"Admiral, may I present Doctor Lochland." She said, and the man held out his hand to the officer. As tack shook his hand, he looked the doctor over, considering him carefully. The dark-haired man had a somewhat intense look, but it wasn't a natural affectation. His face bore light blue tattoos in a line under his eyes, going over the bridge of his nose, the Gealic braid work highlighting his bright blue eyes. Without being told, Tack knew he hailed from Celdania, the Terran planet settled entirely by people originally from Ireland and Scotland. It had become tradition to tattoo such marks on every person from the planet. And, as he shook his hand, he noticed the Celtic trinity intertwined with a thistle that was tattooed on the back of his hands. That was a mark unique to the northern continent of the planet, a rugged, mountainous part of the world that produced some of the fiercest soldiers in existence. "Doctor Lochland is one of the foremost geneticists in the Federation. I asked him to take a look at Colonel Cramer's genetic code. General Cramer's I should say."

"Doctor." Tack said, nodding to the man. "Taggart, why did you ask me to come here so late in the evening?"

"I checked the access logs on this data yesterday." She whispered, leaning in close. "Even though I secured the file, someone accessed it a few nights ago, after I got off duty."

"Meaning what exactly?" He asked, already suspecting the answer.

"Admiral, I used a top secret encryption protocol to secure it, and I was the only one who knew the access key." She replied. "Someone hacked the encryption password, and judging from the fact that the computer didn't record anything except that the file was accessed, they were very good with computers."

"Don't worry sir." Lochland said, seeing the Admiral's eyebrows shoot up. As he spoke, he returned his gaze to the holographic monitor in front of him. "The machines here put out enough EM interference to block out surveillance. We are free to talk."

"What are you thinking Taggart?" Tack asked, nodding in appreciation to the scientist.

"Intelligence?" Taggart asked, looking contemplative. "Rogue elements, who knows? Whoever they are, they shouldn't have had access to the data. All the same, I think the information will be safest here. The data servers are hard isolated from the networks and heavily encrypted. Since the Endeavor will be in the shipyard for at least a month, Doctor Lochland can keep me informed." When Tack hesitated, she continued. "Admiral, I have gone as far as I can in analyzing the anomalies. If we want to figure this out, we need to have him look at this."

"Very well. Keep me posted Captain, Doctor." He said, starting to walk away.

"Admiral." Lochland called, making the aging officer turn back. "I know that the General is a friend of yours, but I have to tell you. You may not like where this leads."

"I understand." Tack said, pausing a moment before he continued. "Do what you have to..."

***

11-03-3015

Time Index; 1115 hours GST

MAS Carrier Yunius

Turlion system, Merxian space

Katy sat behind the desk in her office, quickly writing a report for her boss, the commander of the Merxian fighter corps. Unlike the Terrans, who had separate chains of command for the Marine and Naval components of their fighter forces, the Merxian Alliance had linked theirs into one unified command structure. Her commander was an Admiral second rank, the equivalent of a Terran three star admiral, and she had never actually met him. The report that she was writing was the last one she needed to do in order to properly take command of her post. The workload to switch over had been enormous, most of it busywork that she had put off until the last possible moment. When she finished the report, she could at last look over the data files that had been collecting dust on her computer since she got them. Sighing to herself, she typed out the last sentence and hit the send key. Leaning back in her chair and stretching, she yawned mightily. Getting all that work done had been very, very boring, but at least now most of the work was relegated to her staff. Looking back at the screen of her computer, she shook her head. She was tired of sitting in this office, tired of staring into the computer screen. What she really needed was to get away for a little while, a hard task when aboard a starship. Sighing once more, she logged off the computer and walked from her office, heading through the corridors of the ship towards the gym. It had been a while since she worked up a good sweat.

On her way through the corridors, she marveled at the incredible luck she had had. Admiral Antius' entire fleet was being rotated from combat duty for rest and refit, a process which would have them on reserve status for at least six more months. Which meant that the paperwork she had to work through now was limited, leaving her at last enough time to track down the info she needed. She had already made major strides in that regard, collecting enough communications data to fill eight memory crystals. She was actually pleased with how much she had been able to do in such a short time. But still, searching through all that data was going to be hard. Not to mention the fact that she still needed to organize it all, a task she dreaded. Frankly, she wished that she could trust her staff to help her with it, but she didn't know any of them well enough yet to trust them with this. She hoped that her mate was having more luck on his end, but they had as of yet been unable to manage more communication than the faint mental link that they maintained. It had been far too much of a risk to chance using the hyperlink chip in the ship's comm. system so far. But, that was about to change, at least for her.

The Yunius had left the shipyard before everything on board was operational, an event that was far too common during war time. As a result, many nonessential systems had been coming on line slowly as the crew got them in working order. And soon, the one system that she had been waiting for most of all would be ready for use. It was a private hypercom suite meant for her personal use, and since it was meant for that purpose only, it would be a safe place to install the chip. And, that was also the reason why it had taken so long to get operational. Much more important was the maintenance and adaptation of the ship's hangers to the new class of fighter that had been deployed to it, an extreme range fighter-interceptor called a 'Giryan' in the Merxian tongue.

The Giryan was named for a mythological bird that was said to never land, living its entire life in the air. The fighter fit its name perfectly, possessing a miniaturized jump drive and enough cargo space to store a good two weeks worth of supplies. They had been designed to operate free from a carrier for extended periods. They were also a joy to fly, possessing even more maneuverability than the interceptors she was used to flying, the ships that, for a reason she couldn't fathom, the Terrans had named Vipers. They didn't look remotely like a snake. Returning the salute of a fellow vixen wearing the ranks of a marine staff sergeant, she turned a corner and walked into the ship's gym.

The gym itself was a marvel of engineering. In all space faring vessels, space was at a premium, and yet, this room, while not large by the standards of any ground base, had the feel of vast amounts of empty space that she very much enjoyed. The room was almost three hundred meters long, stretching through the center of the ship and it was packed with workout equipment, and usually heavily occupied. Today was no exception, most of the machines in use already. Returning the salutes of several marines who were on their way out, she walked to the female locker room, and quickly changed out of her flight suit and into workout clothing bearing the insignia of the Merxian Marines. Some soldiers pinned their ranks onto their workout clothes, but Katy had always felt that the gym was supposed to be an informal setting, where rank and decorum didn't matter. When she had stashed her flight suit in an empty locker and sealed it to her ID tag, she slipped a specially designed com link into the pocket of her work out shorts. It was the one possession of hers she never let out of her sight. To prevent anyone from finding the hyperlink chip, she had rearranged the circuitry of the comlink and nestled the chip deep inside, where it would be hard to see, much less get to unless you were willing to take the whole thing apart. To anyone looking into it, it appeared to be just another part of the device, and not a piece of technology belonging to the Terrans. She had even had a maintenance tech run a scan on it to test her craftsmanship and the scan had turned up nothing out of the ordinary, which she thought was mostly her doing, but it might have had something to do with the fact that it was meant to interface into any hypercom system, regardless of who manufactured it. Still, even with her precautions, she thought it best not to leave it lying around where someone might find it.

Walking from the locker room, Katy headed first for the section of the gym devoted to cardio workouts, taking a position on an empty resistance bike. She set the machine to a hard enough level of resistance and started to pedal. Almost at once, the familiar heat rose within her muscles and she smiled, continuing her workout, ignoring the workout pains. She hadn't had the opportunity to do much of this recently, and she had missed it. As she pedaled, she listened into the conversations of those around her. The conversations ran from talk of home to duty assignments and stories of combat missions that these people had participated in. The conversation that she found most intriguing though was the one that a few young marine privates were having as they worked out with free weights. They were obviously part of the ship's security detachment and they kept saying how eager they were to get into combat, how badly they wanted to kill some humans and so on. Katy felt a brief spasm of anger flare within her when she overheard it, and she was surprised at her own reaction. She stopped her workout for a moment, sitting upright on the bike and wondering at herself. She had never had that reaction before to such talk, and it was common enough on warships these days. And yet, she had been tempted to tell them off for their comments. 'Why did I get so angry all of a sudden?' She asked herself silently.

Shaking her head, she continued her workout, pushing herself harder than before to cover up her discomfort. Maybe more had changed than she had thought when she had mated with her love. Shaking her head once more, she finished up her program on the bike and climbed off, heading over to the weight machines. She intended to work every muscle group and then go take a shower before getting back to work. But, things did not turn out the way she intended. Far from it in fact.

She was just finishing up a set on an abdominal machine when she realized she was being watched. At first, she ignored the wolf who stood nearby, his eyes fixed on her; after all, this had happened before. No matter what she thought about herself, many other Merxian males thought she was very attractive, and watched her while she worked out. After all, in such an informal environment, she was just another marine, not a senior officer. But after a few moments, while she pushed against the bar with her stomach, she glanced over at the wolf once more and suddenly, the thrill of a psychic warning ran through her.

Finishing with her set, she at last sat up, turning to face him and looked him over. He was taller than her by a good four inches much too tall to be a pilot, his fur jet black and sleek. He had a scar that trailed across his muzzle and down his neck, marring the black fur with a white streak. He looked like he had been a bodybuilder before he joined the military, and, judging from the tone of his muscles, he hadn't stopped. His eyes were golden, classically canine in their look, but something about them jogged her memory. His workout shirt bore the silver three pointed star of a Captain and the crest of the marines, but she knew, somehow, that she had seen him before, though she couldn't quite place him. He smiled a crooked, half smile at her gaze and at once the image of a black furred wolf popped back into her head, a wolf wearing the uniform of a cadet of the Regulos Marine Academy. She felt her jaw drop open in shock as a name came into her mind, the last name she had expected to hear herself saying.

"Kos?" She asked, and the wolf's smile widened a little, but remained crooked.

"Hello Kate." He said and she bristled a little. Unfortunately, it was indeed who she thought it was. Kos had been her last steady boyfriend at the Academy, the one who had almost insisted that she drop out of the Academy so he could play 'returning hero' when he came home. He had always been something of a control freak, and calling her Kate rather than Katy was just another way he had tried to control her. They had broken up in her second to last year at the academy, when she had finally gotten tired enough of him to kick him out of her life. He had then stalked her until she had notified security. He had been forced to leave the academy early because of it, going into the Marines as a private. That had been the last she had seen of him. And now, here he was again.

"How many times have I told you not to call me that?" Katy replied, irritated at being reminded of the time they had spent together. "My name is Katy."

"Alright, sorry." He said, holding up his hands in surrender, his smile not wavering at all. "I didn't know you were posted to the Yunius."

"Well, I am, obviously." Katy said, turning her back to him and plucking her water bottle from the deck next to the machine. The fox woman got up and walked towards another part of the gym, intending to finish up her last muscle group then leave. But, as she walked away, she heard him follow her, jogging to come up beside her.

"Hey, wait up a second." He said, putting a hand on her arm. Katy swatted his hand away, but he reached for her again, saying. "What is wrong with you? I just want to catch up."

"Kos, in case you don't remember, I filed charges against you that got you kicked out of Regulos. I don't think we have much to catch up on." She said, and when she sensed that his hand was almost upon her once again, she continued, her voice menacing. "If you lay a hand on me again, I swear I will break it."

"Alright." He replied, his smile at last wavering a little, returning his hand to his side. "Still, I want to know what you have been up to. If we are going to be on the same ship, we might as well get to know one another again. Besides, I forgive you for filing those charges. We can pick up where we left off."

"I don't want anything to do with you." Katy stated, sitting down at a bench press and setting the weight on the bar to the level she desired. She couldn't believe his audacity. He was acting as if she had been the one at fault by bringing charges against him. But, before she could lift the bar Kos leaned against it, adding more weight than she could move by her muscles alone.

"Oh come on, is that any way to treat someone who knows you as well as I do?" He asked, and finally, Katy's temper was kindled into life. With a thought, she pushed him away with her mind, forcing him back. Then, she pushed up on the bar a lot harder than she needed to, nearly making it jump from her hands, venting her anger on the bar rather than on him, barely containing the impulse to hurt him with her psychic powers. Unlike her Terran mate, whose talents lay in psychic sensing and mind control, hers lay within telekinesis and manipulating matter around her. She had learned long ago to keep a tight reign on her anger, or she might harm someone with her abilities. But Kos was being more than insufferably annoying. Grinning at her, he put his thick arms on the bar once again and pushed it down, making her strain to keep it from coming down on her neck. "You always were such a tease."

"Alright, that does it!!" She growled, a snarl coming to her face. With a flick of her mind, she threw him off the machine with enough force to give him a serious case of whiplash. He stumbled back in surprise, for she had never gotten this angry at him before. Before he could react, she stood from the machine and stalked towards him, forcing him back against the bulkhead, her eyes blazing with hot anger. Then, using her mind alone, she pressed him against it so hard his eyes started to bug out. Then, she leaned in close to him. Every soldier and crewman in the area was now watching them, but Katy ignored them all, snarling her words at him. "Listen you arrogant ass. I said I wanted nothing to do with you. I don't want to know where you have been, I don't want to talk to you and I certainly don't want to be anywhere near you. So this is your last warning. Stay the hell away from me, or you will regret it. Got it?"

"You don't have the authority to punish me for anything." He snarled in return, managing to push his head off the wall a bit towards her.

"Oh, I don't?" Katy growled, a predatory grin coming to her face once more. "I am a General, Captain, and the commander of this fleet's fighter command."

At that pronouncement, Kos' face instantly faded into a look of utter shock. With a last growl, Katy released him, allowing him to fall to the ground. He gasped, drawing in a deep breath, the strain of resisting her mental powers taking its toll. She looked down at him with utter disgust, but then, suddenly, she realized she had made a mistake. His nostrils flared suddenly as he sucked in a deep breath, trying to catch his breath after the pressure of her psychic push. But, as he breathed in, he also drew in her scent, which, since she had just worked out, was strong once more. And they had been together long enough for him to identify the change in her scent. His eyes grew even wider and he hauled himself to his feet slowly, a new look coming into his eyes. The look was a dangerous one, full of jealousy and betrayal. When he finally got to his feet, he spoke, his voice and manner suddenly withdrawn.

"I am sorry ma'am." He said, loudly enough for everyone in the vicinity to hear him, but looking at her with that same strange glint in his eyes. "You are quite clear." What he said next surprised her, and he said it so quietly that she thought she had misheard him at first, but there could be no doubt at what he was saying. "I understand now. Whoever he is, he is a lucky man. With your permission, General, I will be going now."

Katy nodded once, and the wolf walked away, seeming to be cowed by her rage, but there was something in the way he was walking, an almost imperceptible quality about his stride that told her that he was anything but ashamed. As he walked away, Katy looked at all the stunned soldiers around her, suddenly aware of how much of a scene they had just made. When they continued to stare, she called out into the sudden silence, her tone of voice more irritated than she had intended.

"Well? As you were!!" She shouted and the other gym users hurried to look as though they hadn't seen her at all, much less seen her violent confrontation with the wolf. Feeling frustrated and embarrassed, Katy grabbed her water bottle and headed for the locker room again, not bothering to finish her set. As she walked, she wondered what Kos would do now that he knew she had chosen a mate. He had always been a very jealous individual, and it was obvious to her that he had expected her to choose him and no one else, even after they had separated. She doubted that he had the authority to dig up the details of her last mission, but even so, this was a kind of trouble she really didn't need right now...

***

11-04-3015

Time Index; 1255 hours GST

Asgard Industries prototype development facility

Asgard system, Terran space

I looked up from the pad that sat in front of me at the trio of scientists who were readying a presentation in the front of the briefing room, no trace of humor on my face. The room had been designed to brief as many as a hundred people at once, with a many tiered amphitheater behind a crescent shaped table on the lowest floor, and about half the seats were filled. Normally, I wouldn't have put on such a serious face, but the long series of briefings and meetings and endless reams of technical data that I had had to endure since my arrival in the Asgard system was rapidly getting old. Not to mention the fact that my adjutant and I had not been getting much sleep since I had brought him in on Katy and I's plan. We had been going through hypercom data almost constantly, and it looked like the Conclave was larger than we had thought. A lot larger. So far, though we hadn't been working very long, we had identified more than five hundred people in Tack's fleet alone who were almost certainly members of the Conclave.

This was going to be the fourth such meeting I had had to sit through today, and it was actually the only one I had been looking forward to attending, and yet I wasn't feeling very friendly, or even amicable. I might have been able to deal with all the rest of everything that was going on without showing my emotions, had I not felt something very odd about a day ago. I had been signing off on a report in my temporary office when I had felt a sudden intense surge of anger rise within my heart. It had been so strong that I had nearly crushed the stylus I had been using when my fists clenched. It had faded just as quickly as it had come, but ever since, there had been this sense of wary foreboding that weighed down on me. I had never experienced such a thing before, and I could sense somehow that the feelings were not coming from me. It was like the sensation of sitting near to a fire. The heat made you warm, but it didn't come from you. It had taken me all of about a minute to figure that they must have been coming from Katy. Though we were separated by many light years, I was feeling what she was feeling. And she was worried, which made me want to do something to help her. But, since I had been unable to talk to her since we had parted, I did not even know what there was to be worried about, much less do anything about it.

As I was brooding on everything that made me feel unsociable today, Major Dillinger was seated behind me in the front row of seats in the amphitheater, typing rapidly on a mobile computer pad's keyboard. He and I were the only marine officers in the room, all of the rest being members of the navy. Sitting beside me at the front table were seven navy admirals, each one commanding the fighter forces of a specific fleet, and they would decide whether the flight groups under their command would be receiving the technology that would be presented in this briefing. The marines allowed the commander of the fighter corps to decide for all of our units. All in all, I thought that their way was a very inefficient way to organize a fighter command, but then, they said the same thing about the way we marines did things. Still, despite feeling rather out of place among so many naval officers, I knew that none of the officers present had nearly as much combat experience as I had, so their opinion didn't mean much to me. A few minutes later, the lead scientist of the project came forward to speak, quieting the murmur of discussion that had filled the room.

"Good afternoon gentleman." He said, looking a little bit nervous facing so many officers. When he started speaking, I returned my attention to the scientists, trying to ignore the constant foreboding I felt. "I hope you have all had a chance to review the technical schematics that were sent to your offices so that you will see the benefits of this new design." Most of the Admirals gave affirmative nods, but I sensed that only one of them had actually read the technical specs, which I found surprising, considering what a revolutionary design it presented. "As you know, the Tartarus Multirole fighter system presents many advantages over the current designs in use by our military. Its weapon and equipment systems are modular, allowing it to be rapidly inter-converted from an interceptor, to a light bomber, to a recon ship, to a long range raider, to a ground support craft, all within a matter of hours." As he spoke, the holo-projector behind him brought up a wireframe design of the new fighter, and as he mentioned each design, the fighter's configuration shifted, showing off the new equipment and weapons each design boasted. "The Tartarus can be crewed by as few as a single pilot, or as many as three crew members depending on the mission profile..." As he continued to outline the points that made the Tartarus such a fascinating design, Dillinger leaned forward and whispered into my ear, distracting my attention from the briefing for a moment.

"General, there is a message for you from the Prometheus Facility. Its ID code is flagged as urgent. Do you want to take it now?" He explained. I shook my head.

"No, I will take it after this briefing is over." I replied and returned my attention to what the scientist was saying.

"...And lastly, the Tartarus is the first fighter system of its size to possess hyperspace capability." He said, clicking a remote in his hand. The wireframe of the fighter disappeared, immediately replaced by a recorded sensor playback of a space engagement. Twenty four blips rendered in blue engaged a larger group of red blips surrounding a capital ship. The twenty four blue dots ripped through the red ones very quickly, finally ending by destroying the capital ship itself. "As you can see, the prototype squadron performed superbly in its first engagement against Merxian ships. Since then, we have seen several more engagements with similar results, demonstrating the effectiveness of the Tartarus' design." With that, the scientist concluded his demonstration, clicking the remote one more time, returning the wireframe model to the projector's display. "We are now prepared to answer any questions you might have."

I certainly didn't have any questions, since I had already been sold on the design before coming into the briefing. One of the major flaws I had seen with the fighter designs already in service was that they were too narrowly defined in their roles. Fighters had very little use against capital ships, and interceptors even more so, while bombers, with few exceptions, were like livestock being set upon by a pack of wolves when they came up against fighter attacks. There had been many attempts over the years to correct this, but they had all ended up being wastes of time, since all of them had been built on the principles of the existing designs. The designers had started wholly from scratch with the Tartarus. The modular design was a concept I couldn't believe they hadn't gone with before.

"Doctor, how much storage space would be required for the different components of the modules?" One of the admirals asked and one of the other scientists stepped forward to field the question.

"Actually very little. A full wing of Tartarus fighters, along with the standard mixture of module components, would actually only take up as much space as five squadrons of normal fighters." He replied and the admirals murmured disapprovingly. I couldn't believe what I was sensing from them. After a few moments, the admirals seem to come to an agreement, which I gathered had been prepared in advance.

"I am sorry doctor," The highest ranked Admiral on the board said, rising to his feet, "But I think I speak for everyone here when I say that the risk of carrying fewer fighters is not worth the benefit of having moldable designs. Thank you for your presentation."

"Excuse me, Admiral." I said, rising to my feet. He seemed surprised that I would dare to contradict him. "But you do not speak for me. The Marine's fighter corps would be more than willing to look into this design further."

"General Cramer, since you are new to your position, I must assume that you do not understand how things work within the Terran military's fighter services." The admiral began, his tone as condescending as it could have been without being totally out of line. "Your predecessor always agreed with the Navy's view, it being the senior service..."

"Admiral, with all due respect," I said, cutting him off. His disrespect was the breaking point for me. Irritated beyond being remotely respectful, I said the thing that came to my mind first, which might not have been the best thing to do at that moment. "But are you suggesting that I should be more like a man who was recently convicted of treason?" That comment had the exact effect that I wanted. Every admiral on the board suddenly looked uncomfortable. The navy always treated the marines like we were unworthy of respect, simple soldiers who didn't know anything beyond how best to kill our enemies. But now, I had just obliquely compared them and their opinions to a known traitor, insulting both in the same breath. And now, if they were to appear to be loyal soldiers, they had only one course of action. 'And now for the killing blow.' I thought, drawing a breath to continue. "Something you obviously don't understand is that the marines are an autonomous fighting service. I do not answer to you, and I resent your tone, Admiral." With that, I turned my attention to the scientists once more. "I will, of course, want to test the fighter myself before I make a permanent decision."

"Of course General." The lead scientist said, looking delighted. "The prototype squadron is stored in hanger three of this facility. I will see to it that one of them is made ready."

Turning my back on the assembled naval officers, all of whom looked like I had betrayed them or something, I walked out of the briefing room, ignoring the incredulous stares that were pointed in my direction. When Dillinger and I had left the conference room, I turned back to him and found him grinning broadly, the look on his face telling me that he was a hair's breadth away from laughing and it was only his discipline that had kept him quiet in the briefing room.

"Hoo-ah sir." He said and I smiled in return.

"Now, about that message." I replied and he handed me a pad, the message scrawled across it in computerized type. The first thing that I noticed was that it was addressed to Knight, my callsign, not my name. It requested that I travel out to the Prometheus facility at my earliest opportunity. But the message was not signed by a name or even a nickname. In place of the signature was a code of three letters, followed by a series of numbers. To anyone else, the signature would have been incomprehensible gibberish, but I recognized it immediately. Those numbers and letters were an authentication code used by the members of the Leviathan black ops teams. What was more was that, that particular code was only used by team two, my team. Only two people in the universe besides me would have known that code and its significance. Grinning to myself, I headed for my quarters, knowing that one of the people that I had needed to see had made contact at last...

***

11-04-3015

Time Index; 1400 hours GST

Terran Federation Research Station Pasteur

Asgard system, Terran space

Dr. Taggart walked into the research lab once more, wondering just what was going on with the young General. She and Dr. Lochland had been going over his genetic code and physical data for a long time, and they seemed to be making little progress. As she entered, Lochland was seated at his computer terminal, a contemplative look on his face and Taggart walked over to him, surprised.

"What is it?" She asked, walking up beside him to see that the computer was displaying hundreds of copies of the same four letters, the nucleotides that made up genetic code. But displayed alongside it was another set of data, one that she didn't recognize at first. Lochland looked up at her after a moment and nodded to her.

"I think I have figured out what is going on, or at least part of it." He replied, looking tired.

"Did you even sleep last night?" Taggart asked and he shook his head.

"I couldn't." He replied, suppressing a yawn. "Late last night I isolated the portions of the DNA that were showing unusual activity. Something about the sequences bothered me enough that I couldn't sleep. On a hunch, I fed the code into an analyzation program we use here and I found something else that is odd. The General has more DNA in his cells than is normal."

"Well, the actual size of a human's genetic material can vary in size." Taggart began, but Lochland shook his head.

"That is true, but not by nearly this much." He said. "He has at least ten percent more genetic material than is normal, and that is much more than genetic variability. And every bit of the extra DNA is showing unusual activity. But that wasn't what bothered me. It took me a few hours to figure out what about them bothered me so much. I have seen the sequences before."

"What are you talking about?" Taggart asked, looking back up at the screen.

"Before the war," Lochland began, "I was part of the project that was analyzing the genetic similarities of Merxians and Terrans." Taggart nodded for him to continue. The project had been very important in the scientific community before hostilities had begun. "Well, as you know, we received samples from each species in the Alliance for analysis." He paused for a moment, his eyes flicking back and forth as the DNA on the screen scrolled on by, "At first I thought I was going nuts, because this just shouldn't be possible. But there can be no doubt about it."

"Doctor, will you get on with it?" Taggart asked, a little irritated at his slow way of saying things.

"The genes looked so familiar," Lochland said, "because they are not human. They're Merxian..."