The Golden Skull Alliance turned out to have made a mistake!
Everyone who looked at the seemingly cold and derelict alien construct thought that it was a bioship that had encountered a deadly opponent.
It shouldn’t have been a surprise that they all defaulted to the assumption that the Titania was some sort of alien organic capital vessel.
Starships were humanity’s frame of reference of anything floating in space. Aside from space stations and other fixed platforms that were clearly anchored in strategic positions, everything else of this size was always a starfaring ship.
Many alien species in both the Milky Way and the Bed Ocean utilized starships to move around. While the exact style, purpose and usage of starships may differ slightly among the species, their universal value all made them ubiquitous whether the aliens called them ships, homes, fortresses, or whatever unique word they made up in their incomprehensible languages.
Yet not all constructs in space were space stations or starships. There was a third category of deep space superstructures that showed up from time to time. Though this category of massive objects were rather rare in most parts of human space in the Milky Way due to massive overhunting, they were a bit more prevalent in the Bed Ocean!
“Astral beasts!”
These were wondrous forms of life that varied in size but usually leaned on the larger size. Most of them were one form of space bug that had miraculously evolved in different star systems due to various circumstances. The overwhelming majority of them were local pests who never left their star systems because they simply couldn’t survive the long, cold and dangerous trip to other places.
However, across millions if not billions of years of evolution, life found a way.
Whether it was through the absorption of phasewater, the mutation of a sophisticated organ or the reckless experimentation of an ancient alien empire, a small proportion of astral beasts managed to escape from the boundaries of their origin systems and succeeded in spreading across the stars!
Each of them were miraculous forms of life that could inherently develop the ability to travel at superluminal speeds through growth alone. They also tended to be on the larger size as scale was one of the best ways for these organisms to survive all of the different threats in space.
Most successful species of astral beasts tended to have emerged a long time ago. They were stable, powerful but did not tend to develop any sentience because there was never a need for them to grow any smarter or make use of tools.
Of course, exceptions always existed. The most prominent example of an ‘astral beast’ species gaining sentience in the Bed Ocean was the phase whale!
The Titania’s physical properties did not resemble that of a whale, so at least the Golden Skull Alliance hadn’t provoked this infamously powerful species.
That did not mean it was weak. As the apparent astral beast continued to rouse itself from its hibernating slumber, the Larkinsons and their allies realized that the situation continued to deteriorate.
Not only was the Titania continuing to spit out dozens of large fleshy projectiles at the human fleet that had poked it awake, its entire organic body structure was continuing to morph in ways that no one understood!
“The Titania is continuing to heat up! The amount of energy being generated across its form is continuing to rise over time!”
“The open arteries are being closed at a rapid pace. The Titania’s biological tissue has displayed rapid healing and morphing capabilities. Some of its smaller surface cavities are already being plugged.”
“The Titania is showing greater adaptability towards our weapons. Her surface volume has shrunk by 2.7 percent and is continuing to contract even as her fleshy surface is growing denser and tougher. The astral beast’s exterior has already become 6 percent more resistant to energy damage and 7 percent more resistant against physical damage!”
The astral beast was transforming before everyone’s eyes. The Titania showed through all of its actions that it was far from dead as it initially appeared!
As thousands of mechs opened fire against the distant Titania and the approaching bioprojectiles, Ves grew immensely more uncertain about the whole ordeal.
What was going on? Was the Titania truly an astral beast rather than a bioship?
He turned to the projection of Director Banya Wodin.
At this moment, she was receiving a lot of different reports from different research teams and experts. It was not easy for her to judge whether a theory had any credibility or not. A number of research teams even submitted opposing conclusions about the nature and properties of the Titania!
Ves didn’t care about any of that stuff. He just wanted solid answers at this time.
“Dr. Banya! Tell us what we’re dealing with! What is the threat level of the Titania? What kind of shape is it in? What is the best way for us to kill this monster?”
Though Banya wanted to defer her explanations so that she could make more conclusions, time was short and the Larkinsons urgently needed answers.
“We are still analyzing the Titania’s actual state, so everything I’m about to say should be taken with a grain of salt.” She quickly said her disclaimer. “According to our researchers, the Titania is most likely an astral beast. It is a single creature that is not being run or operated by lots of smaller individual aliens. We have seen no sign of the latter and the Titania’s internal structure does not accommodate them either.”
“What of the intelligence of this astral beast?”
“We cannot say at the moment, sir. Size does not correlate with sentience or intelligence, but astral beasts of this size are typically simple-minded and driven by instincts. What we are seeing at the moment might be a pattern of behavior that astral beasts of this species employ when heavily damaged. After running away from an opponent, they go dormant and shut down as many of their organs as possible in order to preserve their precious energy reserves. When a prey or predator stumbles upon the hibernating beast, it quickly rouses and launches as many attacks as it can to quickly overwhelm whoever triggered it awake. If it succeeds in overtaking its opponent, it may be able to eat the nutrients it requires to heal its wounds and resume its life.”
In other words, the astral beast was desperate and needed to consume sources of energy and materials in order to replenish itself!
“What of its power level?”
“We cannot make an accurate estimate at the moment, but keep in mind that the creature is most certainly injured to the point where it was unable to heal itself by consuming the resources of this star system.” Banya quickly said. “What that tells us is that it is overdrawing its already-strained resources in order to launch its attack on us. The Titania’s contracting body is not just a defensive measure. It is a direct consequence of its attempt to burn its own biological matter to generate the energy it needs to sustain its attacks.”
“The more it tries to kill us, the more it brings itself closer to its own demise.” Ves summed up her point. “What is it doing with all of the energy it is generating?”
Banya frowned for a moment. “Large parts of the Titania’s body and ‘organs’ are damaged beyond repair, so there are a limited number of uses for the energy. Ror now, we believe that it is using much of it to toughen up its body and merge active organic tissue into large, biological missiles that it is launching at us as its main form of attack.”
Ror now, the Titania had yet to display any typical warship armaments such as cannons, energy weapons and so on. This was a massive relief for the expeditionary fleet as any of these weapons could inflict massive amounts of damage to any capital ship!
That said, the flesh torpedoes that the Titania had formed by rearranging parts of its own body did not look trivial. They continued to accelerate forward as their biological thrusters continued to burn some kind of organic juice.
The torpedoes did not appear to be too maneuverable but they were distressingly large and considerably resistant against damage!
Hundreds of energy beams and projectiles slammed against the noses of these flesh torpedoes. Though they always managed to burn or blast away portions of organic tissue, the flesh torpedoes still possessed plenty of matter, allowing them to endure a lot more hits until their bodies eventually fell apart.
“Damn, each of these flesh torpedoes are as tough as an expert mech!”
The astral beast itself was also an immensely tough opponent. Even if every weapon was able to inflict noticeable damage to it, the Titania’s immense size and volume meant that a couple of salvos did not affect its integrity at all! It took far more salvos or the use of weapons of much greater scale in order to inflict major structural damage to the creature.
In effect, the mechs of the Golden Skull Alliance were like bees poking a giant human body. While it was possible for a large swarm of bees to eventually kill a human, they were so small that they needed to employ an immense amount of effort to complete their goal!
“Concentrate our fire on intercepting the flesh torpedoes!” General Verle ordered the mech legions. “Do not let them get within ten kilometers to any of our ships. The consequences of any of them impacting our hulls may very well spell their doom!”
The difference this made was considerable. The increased concentration of fire quickly began to neutralize the flesh torpedoes one by one. These odd biomissiles could take a lot of punishment, but as soon as certain important organs sustained damage, it could no longer propel itself forward or simply lost so much integrity that they broke apart in a messy fashion.
Out of all of the mechs that opened fire on the flesh torpedoes, the Transcendent Punishers and the Eternal Bedemptions inflicted the most damage by far! The weight and volume of firepower of these two mech models granted them a better advantage against large and touch constructs than other mechs!
Though Ves was proud of seeing two of his works performing so effectively at the moment, he wished he could have brought at least four times as many mechs.
“We don’t have enough artillery!”
The rifleman mechs such as the Bright Warriors in their ranged configuration tried their best to make up for the shortfall.
Even though their rifles were accurate and fairly powerful, their weight of fire was simply incomparable against the previous two mech models.
While their advantages such as a decent firing rate and good accuracy worked well when employed against small and maneuverable mechs, the Titania and its flesh torpedoes didn’t care about that. Only brute force could fell hostile entities of this scale!
As Ves focused on how well his forces were able to whittle down the flesh torpedoes, Director Banya and the Lifer research teams carefully studied the internal organs spilling out of the broken flesh torpedoes.
“Those ‘flesh torpedoes’ are not explosive in nature.” Banya stated. “Any explosions that you see when successfully intercepting the organic objects are mostly generated by setting off their volatile propellants. The actual threat they pose is much different because they are full, living organisms just like the Titania!”
“Are you sure about that, Banya?!”
Once again, Ves became shocked at what he heard.
“We’re not shooting missiles. We’re shooting down the Titania’s offspring.” She stated with an increasingly more definitive tone. “Whether they are its clones or its children, each of these incoming fleshy creatures will likely be able to destroy our ships by rampaging across their hulls as if they are actual beasts!”
This was a frightening prospect… What would happen if a few of the Titania’s ‘children’ landed on the Spirit of Bentheim? They could probably chew through the hull of his flagship before wreaking havoc inside!
