The void was full of silent screams.
The triangular Black Ships of the Aseptic League dove into the Reef like needles, hunting the baby Star-Entities. The calves tried to run, but they were slow, clumsy, and terrified.
Every time a green laser hit a baby, it didn't explode. It dissolved.
"We are losing them!" Elara cried, her hands pressed against the glass, watching a small blue star-whale turn into gray dust.
"Focus!" Zin yelled, steering Vitalis through a storm of enemy fire. "We can't save the babies one by one. We need the Mother."
Vitalis banked hard, dodging a volley of plasma torpedos. The massive, moss-covered form of the Matriarch loomed ahead. She was a mountain in space, ancient and unmoving.
"She's in deep hibernation," The Queen analyzed. "Her heart rate is 1 beat per year. Shouting won't wake her. Pain won't wake her."
"Then we drug her," Zin said, his eyes locking onto a massive vein pulsing faintly on the Matriarch's neck. "Queen, mobilize the Adrenal Districts. I want every factory in the Kidneys to produce pure Epinephrine. Now!"
"Synthesizing..." The Queen's eyes flashed. "We have enough to stop a human heart. But for a creature this size? It's barely a cup of coffee."
"It's not about the dose," Zin said, activating the docking clamps. "It's about the delivery. Direct injection into the carotid artery."
[The Connection]
Vitalis slammed onto the neck of the Matriarch.
Compared to her, Zin's host was a tick on a whale.
Gorge fired the harpoons. THUNK. THUNK. Massive bone-anchors dug into the ancient skin to hold them steady.
"Deploy the IV!" Zin ordered.
From the belly of Vitalis, a thick, fleshy tube extended. It was tipped with a diamond-hard proboscis.
It struck the Matriarch's skin.
It pushed. It strained. The ancient hide was thick as armor.
"Drill!" Zin shouted.
The proboscis spun, vibrating at a sonic frequency. Slowly, agonizingly, it pierced the dermis. Then the muscle.
SQUELCH.
A geyser of silver blood erupted into the vacuum as the tube hit the artery.
"Connection established!" Gorge roared.
"PUMP IT!"
Inside Vitalis, millions of humans worked the pumps. Tanks of glowing amber fluid—concentrated Adrenaline synthesized from the fear and rage of the human race—were flushed into the tube.
Zin watched the flow meter.
The amber fluid rushed out of Vitalis, into the Matriarch.
Nothing happened.
The Nullifier was charging its main cannon. A green sun was forming at its prow, aimed directly at the center of the Nursery.
"Target lock: 100%," the voice of Null boomed. "Sanitization in 10 seconds."
"Come on..." Zin whispered, gripping the console until his knuckles turned white. "Wake up, grandma."
Thump.
A vibration knocked Zin off his feet.
It wasn't a hit from the enemy.
It came from below.
THUMP.
The moss on the Matriarch's skin shook off. The dust of aeons drifted away.
Inside the Matriarch, a heart the size of a moon contracted. The adrenaline hit her nervous system like a lightning bolt.
[The Awakening]
The Matriarch opened her eyes.
They were not like the eyes of the other stars. They were nebulae. They held the wisdom of a billion years.
She saw the Black Ships killing her grandchildren.
She saw the Nullifier aiming a gun at her nursery.
She did not scream. She did not roar.
She Inhaled.
The vacuum around the Nursery shifted. The gravity well deepened instantly.
The Matriarch opened a mouth wide enough to swallow a planet.
And she unleashed the Solar Wind.
WHOOOOOOOSH.
A beam of pure, white plasma—hotter than a supernova—erupted from her throat.
It wasn't a weapon; it was a breath of life so intense that it incinerated anything artificial.
The swarm of Black Ships caught in the blast didn't just dissolve; they evaporated. Their atoms were stripped of electrons.
The beam hit the Nullifier.
The massive black sphere's shields flared purple, then shattered. The beam carved a gouge across its surface, melting the Vantablack armor like wax.
"Direct hit!" Gorge cheered, punching the air.
The Nullifier reeled back, its main cannon misfiring into empty space.
"ERROR," Null's voice glitched. "ORGANIC RESISTANCE EXCEEDS PARAMETERS. RECALCULATING."
The Matriarch began to move. She uncoiled from the dying star she had been guarding. Her fins blocked the suns. She placed her massive body between the fleet and the baby stars, a living shield of unstoppable biology.
Zin stood up, adjusting his coat.
"Patient is stable," he said, breathless. "And she is pissed."
The Matriarch let out a low, rumbling song—a command.
The baby stars rallied. Emboldened by their grandmother, they stopped fleeing. They turned around, their small bodies glowing red with heat.
Vitalis detached the IV line and joined the formation.
Zin looked at the tactical map.
The odds had shifted.
It was no longer an extermination. It was a war.
"Queen," Zin said, his voice cold and sharp. "The Matriarch is the Hammer. We are the Scalpel. While she keeps the big ship busy... we are going inside."
"Inside the Nullifier?" Elara asked, horrified.
"Null is the brain," Zin said, pointing at the wounded black sphere. "To kill the body, we have to cut off the head."
He walked to the hangar bay.
"Prep the boarding pods. We are making a house call."