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A red-and-white skintight uniform hugged a slender frame. The crew member hesitated for half a second, but still projected the observation footage onto the main screen.
Beneath his tall top hat, the captain's lips curved.
In this vast sea of stars, what creation could possibly catch my eye?
Before the thought faded, his pupils abruptly contracted.
His top hat tilted slightly as he leaned forward, one foot already planted on the edge of the command console.
A hull of wood riveted to metal was gliding through the vacuum.
Its sails billowed with an invisible current, its ropes gleaming cold and hard beneath the starlight.
The sight reminded the captain of a legend he had heard as a child: a savage tribe's dugout canoe ascending a waterfall into the clouds.
His mouth opened and his Adam's apple bobbed, yet no sound emerged.
Indeed... he had never seen anything like it.
"Stop."
He raised his flintlock cane and tapped the virtual screen with its tip. "Magnify this area."
The image zoomed in rapidly.
A black haori churned through the vacuum like a nocturnal tide. An upright figure was charging toward them, stepping on something invisible.
With every step, ripples like ice crystals blossomed beneath his feet.
Was it a genetic chimera? Or a mechanical biomimetic creation? Every weasel-shaped creature in the command cabin stiffened.
Within their classification system, they themselves were the standard template for "humanity"
.
That approaching shadow was merely another alien specimen awaiting dissection.
Whatever it was-
"Fire."
They were predators of the starry seas. When they encountered the remnants of civilizations, they dug up their foundations; when they encountered intelligent species, they seized their supplies.
Resistance? Erasing every trace of life from a planet meant no more to them than another small line in the voyage log.