Encounter at Apollo

EOE Apollo Archive Station, high orbit over planet Ares-560.

July 19th, 2205

A large, red-colored gas giant hovered silently in the endless vacuum of space, easily dwarfing a twenty mile-wide, silver, multi-sectioned space station floating high above its atmosphere. Standing in a dark hallway within the station and looking down at the planet through a window was a young man with black hair. A name tag on a gray jacket he was holding in his hand said, “Lt. Benjamin Hall”, and he looked at the planet below with a fierce stare on his face, as through the gaseous world was his to control. He didn’t want to control it, however, despite being told that he did want to his entire life.

Benjamin was a third-generation soldier in the forces of the EOE, also known as the Empire of Earth. He had become a lieutenant at such a young age not because of his valor and strength on the battlefield, but because his father was a five-star general as was his father before him. This all came to Benjamin as nothing worthwhile. He didn’t care for the nepotism that came with his family name, he just wanted to prove himself the right way around and become a “true” soldier in his own eyes. However, Benjamin needed to figure out why he was fighting in the first place, so he had sent his subordinates on shore leave to a popular EOE-controlled paradise planet and came alone to an old imperial archive station to sort things out. He had now chosen to stand at the window, looking down over the planet below rather than reading any archives.

A month before arriving at the Apollo Archive Station, a backwater facility floating over a lifeless planet, Benjamin had watched from above what he felt was a pointless battle on an exceedingly small, relatively unusable planet locally called Liros. It was this humid, dark world where hundreds of soldiers from an opposing army were instantly wiped away by a devastating EOE weapon. Seeing that much devastation for such a small planet made Benjamin start to second-guess the Empire. No matter how hard he shut his eyes, he could see the alien bones that had hoisted the Empire of Earth to its impossibly high level. Even when he put on his helmet and turned off the ambient noise emulators, he still could hear the screams of these aliens, followed by EOE weapons fire, and followed again by silence emptier than the vacuum of space itself.

Benjamin grew up with a soldier’s life, his friends and family all being members of the Empire. He lived his entire life with these people trying to indoctrinate him into believing the Empire’s motto of “Strength Equals Control”, into thinking that because he was in the EOE, he was stronger than any alien out in the world. As such, this gnawing feeling of doubt that was eating away at the stone surrounding his imperial heart scared him more than seeing a mushroom cloud vaporize an entire legion of enemy troops ever could. More importantly, that fear worried him because his buried conscience told him that he should care for life whether it was human or alien. His morals contradicted the years of being told what to do, to shoot something if it wasn’t human-looking, and he only knew a few other people in the entirety of the Empire that shared the same moral core.

Benjamin stayed where he was as time ticked by, the numbers on his watch indicating that it was locally 3:00 PM. He was thankful for the watch because in space, on the station, there were no other indicators to tell him what time it was. Completed in 2063, nearly forty years after the EOE was formed, the Apollo Archive Station was launched into space as sort of a time capsule to keep the legacy of the EOE intact as well as test an experimental device called the “Outerlight Star Drive”, a space propulsion system designed to allow the Empire to move across vast reaches of space without suffering the time-altering effects of travelling faster than light. The launch and tests were successful, and the station was found a hundred years later with no power and in decaying orbit near the red gas giant that the EOE had designated Ares-560.

The lack of attention and upkeep led the Apollo Archive Station to be practically abandoned, a relic of the glory days signifying a time of world peace on Earth before the Empire became hell-bent on colonizing any planet they could get their hands on, whether it was already populated or not. However, it was a perfect place for Benjamin to hide from his officers, as not many people in the modern Empire would even know about the station due to its history, much less went there on a daily basis.

As Benjamin stood there, contemplating his future and loyalty to the Empire of Earth, a low-frequency sound slowly emanated out from a nearby command console. He walked over to the console and pressed a small red button in the center, stepping back in case the old device was about to explode or shoot electric sparks at him. He heard a distinctly raspy voice, similar to ones that he’d heard many times in the past four years. It sounded like one of his enemies. Content with the fact that the console was working properly, Benjamin pressed the button again and spoke into a microphone.

“Unidentified signal, report. Who is this? Answer me!”

The voice on the other end came through clearly, and the alien confirmed Benjamin’s suspicions on who the raspy voice belonged to. “This is the Tergoza Military transport vessel Wyvern. I was on my way to bring some medical supplies to a struggling civilian outpost near here when my ship was hit by an errant ion flare. I’m losing power and I need to siphon some energy off your station to make it to my destination. My ship does not have any weapons, and I do not wish you harm.”

Benjamin stepped back, taking his hand off the console. A few seconds passed, and he pressed it again. “You said, ‘Tergoza’?! You realize this station belongs to the Empire of Earth, right? How do you know that I don’t mean you harm?”

“Your station has automated pulse turrets. I can see them from here. If you really wish to kill me, then activate them. If not, then let me come on board. Your call, human.”

Benjamin turned and looked out the window, seeing a small green ship approaching from behind the Archive Station’s rear booster network. The ship was a slender-looking craft, shaped generally like a medieval dragon’s head. The sides of the craft were solid metal doors, and the back of the ship emitted a green propulsion energy as it flew towards a docking area located a few hundred feet from Benjamin’s location. Against his better judgment and knowing that he was aiding the enemy at the point, Benjamin pressed a button on the console to allow the ship inside.

While he was helping the alien, Benjamin was also worried about his own well-being, having decided to come to the station alone. While he walked through the station, he grabbed a rifle from where he was standing and crept towards the Tergoza’s airlock, ready to pull the trigger at any time. The airlock opened, releasing steam into the hallway as the Tergoza stepped through, brandishing his own energy-based rifle. The two pointed the weapons at each other upon first sight.

“I thought you said you had no weapons,” Benjamin said, “you lied to me.”

The Tergoza narrowed his eyes behind his helmet, glaring at the human in front of him. “I specifically said my ship had no weapons. You really think I’m stupid enough to come aboard an EOE vessel, alone and unarmed? I might as well have marched right into a prison cell. Where’s the rest of your army?”

“They’re around, hidden,” Benjamin lied, “they can get here in minutes if need be. Why don’t you put your weapon down so we can maybe have a civil discussion, and I won’t need to call them? I’ll lower mine too.”

The Tergoza glared at him again, then put his rifle on his back. Afterwards, he pressed a button on an armor piece wrapped around his wrist and held it up, scanning the nearby area for other people. When the scanner emitted a small pulse and shut off quickly, he lowered his wrist and stood up. “Taking precautions to make sure you’re not lying to me. I trust you’d do the same. Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Relki Volthes, I am a pilot for the Tergoza Military.”

“Benjamin Hall, Lieutenant for the EOE.”

“Very well… Sir Hall… What I told you about my plight was true: I was delivering some medical supplies when an ion flare struck my ship. I lost control of the vessel and found myself in orbit over this planet, where I just so happened to notice your station here. I know the Tergoza and EOE don’t see eye-to-eye, in fact our two species are kind of… at war… but I am insisting you help me. If you want, you can even take me as your prisoner after I deliver the supplies, but it is a struggling civilian outpost I need to deliver them to, and I need to deliver them as soon as my vessel is operational.”

Benjamin kept the rifle trained on the alien. “How do I know you’re not supplying war assets for a hidden base? How do I know this isn’t a trap?”

Relki lifted his hands, then took off his helmet. “You don’t, but you didn’t fire on me outside, so you have to have some sort of trust. Please.”

In all the time that he had been fighting them, this was the first opportunity Benjamin had to see a Tergoza solider fully unmasked. Relki was distinctly alien, like the rest of his people, being about a foot taller than Benjamin. His face was long with cold eyes and a reptilian, almost dragon-like snout. A row of razor-sharp teeth lined his mouth and he had spines sticking out from the top of his head, which resembled hair. Relki like the rest of the Tergoza was a lean humanoid with four-fingered hands, and he also had a long tail that swayed as he walked. He also had thick, leathery, scale-covered skin, but the rest of the Tergoza had that.

Relki here was close in size to the other Tergoza that Benjamin had met. He had black hair-spines, emerald-green eyes, light-blue skin, and black claws. He wore what appeared to be standard-issue armor for his military such as advanced sectional armor with a metallic chainmail-type bodysuit underneath. To Benjamin, the standard Tergoza solider evoked an image of the Dragon of St. George taking the form of an Arthurian knight, and Relki was no different than the lot.

Benjamin had been working against his better judgment from the moment the Tergoza arrived, and he figured ‘why stop here’ and lowered his weapon. Relki bowed and smiled.

“Thank you, Sir Hall.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” Benjamin replied, “if you try anything funny, I’ll activate the ship’s defense network and you’ll be fried lizard in less than five seconds. So, if you don’t want to spend the rest of eternity as a belt or a pair of boots, I suggest you keep your weapons here.”

Relki placed his rifle and sidearm on the floor next to the docking bay and slid them to the side. “I don’t want to fight. I’m just going to do what I need.”

Benjamin nodded and walked away, holstering his rifle. When he got to a command pad, he activated a small camera that tracked Relki’s movements, just to make sure. With that done, he took his weapon harness off and tossed it to the side, cupping his face into his hands.

“What am I going to do?” he asked himself, “this is technically high treason! How can I do this?”

He then remembered the planet Liros, and the devastation that was caused by a human nuclear bomb that he didn’t want to take part in. He remembered his coldhearted fleet commander telling his ship to launch the nuke at a relatively unarmed area full of enemy soldiers. He remembered what the commander said.

“If you don’t launch the weapon, I’ll take your ship down and fire it myself!”

Benjamin’s crew didn’t want to fire, they didn’t think that taking the lives of over three hundred thousand Tergoza would end the war, and it didn’t; it just made the enemy angrier and more brutal.

Benjamin wanted to disobey orders back then, and now wanted to make up for that mistake. Saying to himself that he was making the right choice, he powered up the energy coils so Relki could recharge his vessel and didn’t care whether the EOE would find out.

…

An hour had passed, and in that time, Benjamin had put on his own EOE-issued armor in case the Tergoza tried anything. He looked at himself in the mirror and noted that the two sides of the war had similar styles in armor, as both wore what looked to be advanced, futuristic medieval knight armor. While Relki’s armor had a faint green metallic tint to it and was practical in use of combat, the EOE’s look was slate gray with eerie, faceless masks and more places to put weapons than need be. The EOE invoked the image of a classic imperial force: no identity for any soldiers when they put the armor on. The Tergoza Military, it seemed, allowed its soldiers to personalize their armor with different modifications, something Benjamin held a sense of envy as he gazed into the mirror.

A door nearby opened, and Relki walked through covered in metallic shavings and grease. “Strangely enough,” he said, “This EOE base is suitable for our ships, I was able to attach the power coupling on my own vessel with no problems.” He then pressed another button on his wrist, different from the scanning device earlier, and a small drone popped out of his shoulder armor and covered the reptilian with a blue laser from head to toe. Within seconds, the grease and shavings were gone, and the drone flew back into place on his armor.

“That come standard for you?” Benjamin asked, astonished at the device.

Relkil nodded. “All current generation Tergoza armor comes with a sanitation drone. I suppose it’s easier than taking the armor to a cleaning facility, and more practical. You don’t have one? They’re especially useful.”

“Nah, the EOE doesn’t care about its soldiers enough to worry about sanitation.”

“That’s too bad. I’d give this to you myself; I can always get another. However, I don’t know what level I should set it on for the human body. It could vaporize you.”

“Really? Why not repurpose it into a weapon? A small drone going around vaporizing people, I… I’m giving combat tips to a soldier from an enemy force.”

Relki laughed, “No, the Tergoza try to avoid using unmanned combat drones to fight. We fight with honor," His reptilian face fell slightly, and his mood changed considerably. "To tell you the truth I don’t like to fight humans, that’s why I chose to be a transport pilot. I was involved in the war for a short while, and it didn’t work out. As a transport pilot, there aren’t many chances for conflict unless I get hit with an ion flare and am forced to dock at an enemy space station. But that never happens.”

“Yeah, it just—oh wait, sarcasm. That’s gotta tell you something about my Empire. I read that people were, well, nicer a long time ago, but everything changed when the Tergoza army attacked Earth nearly two hundred years ago.”

“What?”

“Yeah, we were on our way to world peace when your people came down from the sky and hit us with everything you had! Why do you think the EOE is so intent on wiping the Tergoza out? Everything in my training is telling me that I should shoot you in the head but I’m still fighting that training!”

Relki looked up at the ceiling, a visibly confused look on his face. “No, I meant ‘what’ as in ‘what are you talking about?’. The Tergoza never invaded Earth two hundred years ago, we were still trying to figure out interstellar space travel at that time!”

“What? Can you prove that?”

“Actually, being a pilot, yeah.” Relki lifted his wrist again and pulled up a holographic image of a Tergoza news article written in what appeared to be English, surprisingly. Benjamin always wondered why the Tergoza spoke English and why they had similar mannerisms and clothing styles to humans.

The article was dated from what Benjamin could translate between the timeframe of the Tergoza and EOE, around Earth year 2018 and spoke of the first unmanned vessel capable of travelling through unstable space-time portals. In the bottom left-hand corner of the holographic display, another small article discussed the mysterious disappearance of a large Tergoza transport vessel from its dock, resulting in the loss of thousands of aircraft, weapons, and armors on board. Benjamin put that in the back of his mind as he tried to contemplate the sudden revelation from this Tergoza soldier.

“So, if you didn’t invade us, who did?” he finally asked.

Relki shook his head. “I do not know. If I had some visual evidence, I could probably figure it out.”

Benjamin stood in place, thinking. “Wait a second, this is an archive station!” he then pressed a button on another command console and brought down a large screen, and seconds later an image popped up showing a picture of the Arch in St. Louis, Missouri dated November 4, 2021. Nestled in the arch was a bright, glowing green cloud.

“This image is from the first day of the invasion. The aliens used the arch as a portal to invade Earth. We spent over a week trying to push them back, but our victory came at a cost. Hundreds of pods had been launched at the city during the initial invasion, and those pods exploded when the main ship left. A lot of people died."

Relki looked at another image of a shot-down vessel, and sure enough he could see a green “T” encased in a triangle, the same insignia that could be seen on his own ship. “This doesn’t make sense. The Tergoza put aside experimenting with the use of portals until this very war started. Unless… did they ever get an image of the soldiers who invaded?”

Benjamin shook his head. “No, photographic evidence of the soldiers themselves was either non-existent or erased by the invaders before we pushed them off-world. This archive says that your people left behind enough of their tech for us to reverse-engineer, and by 2025, we were able to explore our solar system with ease.

“The Empire of Earth started out as a movement of world peace, a coalition of countries banded together by the president at the time, Ellis Kane, to fight back against aliens.” Benjamin continued, “It was formed as a United Earth Army for world peace, but unfortunately peace was never an option for some people. After we pushed back the aliens, a group of anti-coalition forces became more and more prominent. The more they pushed into disbanding the coalition, the more control the UEA wanted for itself. Within five years, the Empire of Earth was formed with Emperor Ellis Kane at the command.”

“Isn’t that a bit odd?” Relki asked.

“What?”

“That one person was given power over a planet so quickly. The Sorokanos Imperial Family governing over our star cluster gained its power over centuries.”

Benjamin shrugged, “people will do anything in times of desperation. So, after the EOE was formed they came up with the idea to colonize other planets. They built this station in the 2060s and launched it, and that was the beginning of our new space age. Over the years, the EOE colonized planet after planet, eventually building up enough of a force to attack already-populated worlds and colonize them. Two years ago, we found your Tergoza home world and launched an invasion force against it, as a way of revenge against your invading us.”

Relki shook his head, “I already told you, the Tergoza did not invade Earth. We must have been set up. Whoever attacked you must have gotten a hold of our ships and technology.”

Suddenly, a light went off in Benjamin’s head when he remembered glancing at something earlier. “Wait, while you had the article about the unmanned ship up, I read about the disappearance of a transport vessel, maybe that’s connected?”

Relki lifted his wrist up and activated the holographic device again. “Yeah, the J’hotan, it was the largest planet-borne ship in our fleet. No one ever figured out why it vanished or where it went. However, since the Earth was attacked by our own ships and weapons, I have a fairly good idea what it was used for. I have to get this information back to my High Command; they should know about this.”

Relki activated the device on his wrist again and downloaded the images and information from the archives. Benjamin knew how he could do it, with both now knowing why the technologies were so similar. Relki then ran back to his ship, but not before turning around to acknowledge Benjamin. “You are a worthy human, Sir Hall, a good person. Perhaps you can convince the rest of your people that having decent traits is a good thing.” With those parting words, Relki left, leaving Benjamin to wonder about his own people, and the future of the EOE.

After he watched the Tergoza ship fly away, Benjamin turned around and looked at an object left on the command console. It was the sanitation drone that popped out of Relki’s shoulder armor. Benjamin realized that the Tergoza left it behind for him, and he felt it was symbolic of the grime that had divided the two being pushed away by their interactions on board this ship. He picked up the device and looked at it, trying to see how it worked, and suddenly the drone fired a small blue laser at his chest. Benjamin wasn’t injured, but his armor was slightly damaged, mostly around the area where the EOE insignia on his left bicep was located. The laser destroyed said insignia, leaving no traces but ash. With his armor damaged, Benjamin turned around and looked at the planet, unsure of his own future with the Empire of Earth.