Cruel Fate

[Heuschrecke]

Embodiment.

"We are ready..." Her call went out in both voice and thought, reverberating within and without. In answer, the hangar bay opened, giving her access to see Omega Fifty-eight for the first time. Dark matter swirled around, catching and absorbing the dim glow of the Pulsar. A sight that before would have induced terror inside, gave her only a familial sense of being home. Somewhere her new life could belong. Somewhere to return to when her tasks were complete and to receive new purpose. She willed the vessel to life, lifting up off the bay floor after the engines powered up. Not even they had remained unchanged, the HNP exhaust fumes non-existent, replaced with the blueish glow of more alien origins. Their output was far more efficient too, coping well under the ionised atmosphere within the system that would cause most vessels to falter without proper shielding.

She took some time to glance around and get a feel for her new home, the looming structure of Kaarst and some of the surrounding fragments providing some shelter from the glare of the system's star. "Home." Content rose up from the nomad, it only interfering to correct her flight as she adapted to the new responsiveness of the Roc. It took some time, but she got used to it. Soon, she would become a weapon to be directed as necessary, to wreak havoc on those who deserved nothing more than to suffer and perish by the Light.

On one particular loop, she saw a 'Heimdall'-class gunboat emerge from a particularly dense patch of dark matter, and the way the substance clung to its hull while dissipating into a cloak of shadows gave her pause to a story her Ma told her when she was young. A single word rose up from within. "Schattenjaegerin". This was to be her new legacy, a Huntress from the Shadows against bearers of darkness, against those who oppose the Light and its allies.

Humanity would learn to fear her and her vessel. She would become an instrument of their demise.