Why Humans Make Bad Pets!

I’ve found a new family

“Why is Muulk always late?” whined Yil, “Just because he doesn’t have legs and can only move using pedal locomotory waves doesn’t mean he has to make all of us wait for him.”

“I think the fact that he’s the Field General of the Dominion military is the reason he can afford to make us wait,” replied Vttmcik'ntyr’kvp’tyyqrrc’mkzcvox, “And I think you should keep your . . . tongue? . . . between your teeth if you know what’s best for you. Just because you’re not technically under the army's jurisdiction doesn’t mean he can’t make life difficult for you.” Yil huffed, an impressive feat for a creature who didn’t stand upright, settling into a sullen silence. Vttmcik'ntyr agreed with Yil, although he would rather suffer a hernia before he admitted it. Why did Muulk have to be late for this meeting? For the first time since the Celzi had revealed their demon of a weapon, Vttmcik'ntyr felt hope. Hope that the Dominion wasn’t fighting a losing battle. Hope that would be proven genuine or false once the meeting was started.

The first glimmer of said hope had come from a minor skirmish on Helictor-4; an unimportant battle on a small planet. Apparently a single soldier, armed only with a Fusion Scythe, had managed to kill a Vulza. Never mind that the Celzi had bothered to commit one of their monsters to such a minor skirmish. How had a single soldier even survived such an attack, let alone retaliate to the point of vanquishing the thing? When the communications officer in charge first received the call from the commander of the 109th, he had assumed it was a joke, and a bad one at that. Once evidence had been provided there was no denying that it had happened, although Vttmcik'ntyr still did not truly understand how. The important thing was that he had managed it, and he had shown a Vulza could be killed without shooting it in the face multiple times with a coilgun.

Muulk’s shadow lumbered through the door before the General, appearing as though it were attempting to pull its creator through the door at a pace somewhat faster than a crawl. Vttmcik'ntyr knew that was a pointless battle. Field General Muulk was a Gordikl, a species nearly everyone agreed was gut wrenchingly horrid to look upon; It was even worse to view one in motion. Somewhere down the evolutionary chain a Gordikl had apparently decided he was too good for legs; cursing all future Gordikl to have the bodies of enormous slugs. But as Muulk oozed through the door, Vttmcik'ntyr didn’t think he had ever seen anything so majestic. They could finally start the meeting.

“I apologize for my tardiness, but I refuse to relinquish lunch for anything short of my death.” Looking at him Vttmcik'ntyr could easily believe it; although he worried the former would ultimately lead the latter in Muulk’s case. Once he had situated his bulk in the space cleared for him at the head of the table – how would he have used a chair anyway – Muulk motioned with an arm that seemed too small for his body. “Tyyvcl'lkklkzx, if you wouldn’t mind, could you bring us up to date as to your team’s most recent project?”

Tyyvcl'lkklkzx’cttvpxr’kl’nqqtcy’yz rose from his chair, straightening his clothes self-importantly, a smug grin spreading across his face. Vttmcik'ntyr didn’t really like Tyyvcl'lkklkzx. A Rrrrtktktktkp'ch just like himself, he annoyed Vttmcik'ntyr with his greater-than-thou attitude, and the belief that anyone who was not an engineer was not only beneath him in intelligence, but in worth as well. Vttmcik'ntyr had to admit one thing though. Tyyvcl'lkklkzx was good at what he did. He was the lead engineer for any specialized weapons developments commissioned by the military. As such, nearly all of his projects were classified.

“Thank you General,” Tyyvcl'lkklkzx purred, somehow managing to appear even more pleased with himself. “As most of you know, one standard cycle (6 months) ago, during a pointless skirmish on Helictor-4, a lone soldier managed to s*******r a Vulza with a mere Fusion Scythe. Obviously there was something different about him. Upon conducting a biomedical scan of the subject, we discovered that this soldier possesses a physiology quite unlike anything we’ve seen before. At least, anything we’ve actually been able to strap onto a scanner without it killing everyone in the room.”

A holographic display in the center of the table came to life, displaying a scanner readout of a bipedal creature. Vttmcik'ntyr couldn’t be sure of the size, since it wasn’t to scale, but he was unable to notice anything particularly odd about the creature. Truly, compared to Hunters, this thing looked hilariously docile. Admittedly, Vttmcik'ntyr didn’t know how to read bioscanner outputs. Something had to be special about it though, because every scientist at the table made sounds of extreme surprise, bordering on outright shock.

“As anyone who can actually understand bioscanner readouts can see, this creature’s incredible combat abilities come from an array of biological and even mental systems that have never before been seen. He is only one though, and we do not know where he came from, making it impossible to enlist more of his kind into the military. He alone will not be able to staunch the tide of Vulza and turn this war into a victory for the Dominion. Therefore, we decided to use the information gained from him to attempt to replicate his fighting abilities into something our soldiers could use. There were many excellent ideas as to how to accomplish this, as well as several . . . not so excellent ideas, one including the creation of giant robots to punch the Vulza into submission.” Tyyvcl'lkklkzx chuckled – more to himself than anything – at such a ridiculous thought.

“We decided to focus on his skeletal system and its constituent musculature. His bones are a ceramic matrix composite with a hydroxyapatite, calcium phosphate, and an unknown protein base. We had once considered a similar material for the use in a new generation of combat-harnesses, but ultimately discarded the idea due to the cost required to find the necessary raw materials to create enough for every single troop. This material, however, is significantly stronger than our previous attempt, more than justifying the increased cost which production will require. Using this incredible substance, we fabricated an exoskeletal-harness upon which we affixed a weapon previously assumed to be impossible for personal use.”

The emitter on the table flashed, changing to an image Vttmcik'ntyr instantly recognized, although he’d only ever seen them as a concept, rather than an actuality. A personal plasma rifle. Before the invention of kinetic-pulse weaponry, if one was able to think back that far, a plethora of weapons were used across the galaxy, although most relied upon a soft projectile mechanism. The allure of unlimited ammunition was too great for weapons engineers to resist. It wasn’t long before the potential of plasma weaponry was reexamined.

It made sense. Plasma rifles would be ridiculously overpowered for use as a personal weapon, but who would complain that their gun was too powerful? Even with compression technology as primitive as it was during that time, it was still efficient enough to the point that a single plasma clip would contain upwards of 10,000 shots, which, for all but the most protracted battles, was an essentially unlimited number of rounds. Researchers had assumed creating such firearms would be easy since plasma weapons were already widely used on any medium classed ship worth their salt.

Upon its adaption for personal use however, they quickly encountered several insurmountable obstacles. First and foremost was the recoil. Plasma weaponry required a magnetic coil to propel the shot from the compressor, which created the recoil effect on par with a coilgun. Such powerful weapons were only ever seen on vehicles, turrets, and smaller ships for a reason.

Backlash of such magnitude would turn any unfortunate enough to be holding the weapon upon its discharge into a conglomeration of bloody scraps. Unless the militaries of the future would be handing their soldiers overcomplicated forms of execution, the recoil would need to be solved. The other major problem was the heat. Discharged plasma was hot. Although the combat harnesses could protect from such temperatures for a short time, they would only do so for about twenty shots.

Ways in which to fix plasma weaponry so as to avoid killing its users were never found, for soon after the first prototype had been created, kinetic-pulse technology was invented. Using no moving parts, sufficient, albeit weaker damage output than that of a plasma weapon, and firing a pulse composed completely on energy, resulting in a truly unlimited number of shots, kinetic-pulse weapons were obviously the better choice, and plasma weapons for personal use were completely abandoned. Until now.

“Plasma weapons were never adapted for personal use because of the hazards they presented towards their users. They, unfortunately, conveyed the greatest amount of damage for their size, which is essential if they are to be used as an anti-Vulza countermeasure. With the advancements in today’s technology, however, we have managed to reduce the amount of heat discharge to an acceptable level. At least it won’t melt anyone standing within two borts (1 meter). As for the recoil, the strength supplied by the exoskeletal-harness is so immense that it easily holds up to the destructive backlash. We could probably mount a Mark III coilgun turret on the thing and it wouldn’t break. Such strength did, however, come at a cost. The harness is extremely heavy, though still light considering its strength. Any normal soldier who attempted to move in one unassisted wouldn’t be able to lift a finger.”

“To fix that we installed a muscular system comprised of the most advanced electroactive polymers, biomimetically engineered against the creature’s own skeletal muscle system. Such advanced systems are, of course, quite expensive. I advice that only one soldier in each squad be supplied with one. Even so, the advantage such harnesses convey is undeniably necessary. Not only will a soldier equipped with one be able to kill a Vulza from a short range, they will be impervious to kinetic-pulse fire. Coilguns will still be a problem, but that still makes the harness nearly equivalent to a tank. Questions?”

Tyyvcl'lkklkzx finished in a rush, breathing hard in his excitement. Vttmcik'ntyr knew he should be just as excited, but instead felt a sense of anticlimax. It just seemed to . . . simple. He had actually liked the giant robot idea, although he could see why this was obviously the better choice. Yil, tactless as ever, voiced Vttmcik'ntyr’s thoughts for him. “That’s it? That’s all we had to do? Just slap a big gun on a big harness and we’ve beaten the Vulza? Why the hell haven’t we done this before now?!”

Tyyvcl'lkklkzx, looking as though he’d smelled something unpleasant, graced Yil with a glance, voice dripping with scorn, “Because. We only just discovered how to make the “big harness” in the past cycle. Remember the whole “Unknown Protein” part about this creatures bones? That means it was previously unknown, as in, we didn’t know it, as in, we couldn’t have created it until just now. That material is the only reason the harness is able to avoid being completely annihilated by the recoil of the plasma rifle. Any of our previous materials would have either been to weak or too heavy,” he finished in a huff. “Now, are there any more questions that do not insult my intelligence?”

“No, Tyyvcl'lkklkzx,” Muulk replied hurriedly, before Yil could ask another. “On behalf of the Dominion, I would like to thank you and your team for your incredible efforts. You are dismissed.” Once Tyyvcl'lkklkzx and his ilk had left the room, only the military personnel and Yil remained. As loath as Vttmcik'ntyr was to admit it, the Dominion needed Yil, perhaps evern more so than Tyyvcl'lkklkzx.

It had only been through Yil’s prodigious efforts that the military had been successful in the cover-up which was the war with the Celzi Alliance. Of course citizens of the Dominion knew there was a war, but as to its true nature, they were oblivious. No reports of devastating defeats reached the public ear. Even the Vulza were a secret, amazingly. No videos of their terrible battle prowess could be seen within the Dominion, except in meetings of the highest secrecy. Vttmcik'ntyr supposed these new exoskeletal-harnesses, and the soldier they had been derived from for that matter, would remain a secret as well.

Vttmcik'ntyr thoughts were interrupted by Muulks rumbling voice. “I haven’t dismissed everyone because we have yet to decide what to do with this soldier. He’s wasted upon such minor battles as are fought by the 109th.”