I have grown so tired of the war, I just want it all to end, I want some peace and quiet.

I can pinpoint the exact moment that I wanted out of it all, it was when I was standing over Crystal's body in the morgue, my body beaten and battered, only found when Lenny's alarm activated and he came to find me. As I stood there, no more tears left I decided that I was done with the three way cluster fuck of a war that I had been forced to fight in.

So I had run away, taken the easy way out of it all.

They dragged me back in... I got Crystal back. But now... a month after our wedding, a week after she gave me the greatest news I have ever heard... that feeling of wanting out returns.

The Empire won't just let me go, I am far to valuable to them. I can't quit and the war is being far from over, fighting against either the rebels or the Ricward would be difficult but to take them both and win... I will be dead before the war is over.

If I could bring the Rebels back into the Empire though... well then maybe I could leave, maybe the war could end... our combined forces would be able to beat the Ricward. Sometimes I catch myself wondering if the seeds of the rebellion were planted by the Ricward centuries ago just to make their invasion possible.



A few years ago the Empire tested out a weapon I designed, a rail gun that could crack the crust of a planet or smash a moon apart.

They thought that was impressive... but it was among the least of the things I had thought up in my warped little mind, and it is the only one the Empire knows of.

There are a dozen of them, a dozen weapons that can cause devastation on a scale you could hardle comprehend. Some conventional and others chemical or biological. One of the nastier ones was a grey sludge composed of trillions of tiny machines that would break down anything they were programed to attack and once there was none of that programed target left they would dissolve themselves leaving no trace of target or weapon.

One though is more horrifying then all the others... it hadn't even started as a weapon.

Time travel, what young geek hadn't been curious about it. Originally I started the project on time travel in an attempt to go back and stop the Empire from ever visiting earth. That had been the intention... but it hadn't worked out.

I did invent time travel though, problem was I couldn't fine tune it. As far as I can tell every single time I used the method of time travel I had discovered it would open a hole back as far as possible. In other words I was able to create a short lived rip in space time directly back to the big bang. It had seemed worthless for a moment or two before I realized that using it I could destroy anything... and once I realized that I built a single war head the size of a tennis ball and deleted all my data. Could keep it all in my head anyway. That one tennis ball sized warhead, though tiny, could open a massive rift and be loaded into a conventional delivery system.

For years the warhead sat on my desk as a paper weight, no one having any idea what it really was, except for Crystal who figured it out when we shared head space.

I had never planned on using it... but people say a baby changes things and soon Crystal and I would have one... I wasn't about to let our child be a part of this war... I would end it.



We had been tracking a small Ricward raider group, just keeping tabs on them so we could hopefully find their base of operations and call in the big guns.

Instead we followed them into a battle, a Ricward armada locked in combat with a Rebel battle group of similar size.

I knew at that moment that I had my chance to end it, best case scenario what I was about to do would scare the Ricward out of the galaxy, more then likely it would just convince the Rebels to rejoin the Empire.

The Rebels were taking a pounding and had pulled away to regroup, this gave the Ricward a chance to do the same. At my instructions Lenny loaded the warhead into a small missile and then I over rode the weapons controls and launched it into the heart of the Ricward position.

It was to small and fast for them to stop it... and with baited breath I watched its progress on a screen.

The effects were immediate, right in the center of their formation a hole opened in space, at first it was just a ball of black that eclipsed the stars behind it but then... a flash of eye searing purple that swallowed each and every Ricward vessel. They were grouped tight together and the rip was roughly the size of Jupiter... they didn't have a chance.

Then as fast as it had appeared it was gone, leaving no trace of the Ricward behind.

I sat there, eyes closed.  There were no words, at least not at first.

Then it all exploded, the on ship communication network was filled with all sorts of chatter, everyone wondering what the fuck then had just seen. The rebels chimed in quickly, broadcasting calls for clarification to anyone that might be out there. Everyone was on the verge of panic... and that was when I acted.

With the push of a button I cut through all the chatter. “Attention all Rebels in the area, this is Science Officer level twelve Joseph on board the Scorpion, we have just annihilated an entire Ricward armada with our very first strike. We can do the same to you at out leisure...  go and tell others what you just saw. The Empire is ready to discuss the unconditional end of the Rebellion at your earliest convenience, please do not keep us waiting.”

And with that I changed the entire course of the war. The chatter resumed, the Rebels were now in a full fledged panic, Mathew was demanding a meeting with me right away... but none of it mattered because nothing would ever be the same again.