2072

[Seth Karlo]

"NASA made a split decision in the summer of 2020, and started construction of a spaceship of unbelievable size. Almost 5 km long, and a kilometre in diameter, the ship was built on the east coast of Florida, in a massive building, specially commissioned for the project. Secretly, NASA started to extract people from around the world, using the last of the Space Shuttles to ferry people, the best and the brightest, from countries and into the USA. They kept this up for 9 years, rescuing close to 10 thousand minds, all brought to Florida, where they stayed inside the giant ship, codenamed PHOENIX.

While the rest of the world started to collapse, the US declared war on China and Russia after they both launched rocket attacks at them. The US, knowing it had superior advantage over the countries, demanded their unconditional surrender.

The Chinese in return told the USA about NASA extracting it's citizens, and the US government moved upon Cape Canaveral, where NASA had it's headquarters, and where PHOENIX was. When they arrived, they found the building empty, and PHOENIX gone. The 5km long ship had just... disappeared.

They gave up after hours of searching, but could only think that NASA had known they were coming and had dumped PHOENIX into the ocean, and yet after hours of diving, they could not find the massive ship. PHOENIX had disappeared.

40 KM away, Pilot John Franklin sat at the controls of PHOENIX as it sped along underwater. Every NASA employee was in the ship, waiting for their arrival. PHOENIX was going to Canada.

The Canadians had been supporting NASA for some time. They saw the Earth as ruined, and proposed a plan of rebirth, a plan to move away from Earth and head to the only other planet known in existence of supporting human life, a planet in orbit of the star 55 Cancri, 41 light-years from Earth.

The plan was codenamed ALPHA, and upon the arrival of PHOENIX, the plan was set in motion. Over the next 3 years, a second ship, codenamed Horus, after the Egyptian god of protection, was built. This second ship was to be a military vessel, and to make it 90% of all of the ships in the Canadian military were secretly melted down and remade into this ship. All weapons and missiles were loaded onto it as weaponry, and 3 days over the deadline, the ship was finished.

PHOENIX was lifted by the two carriers, before they were melted down, to the top of a mountain in the rockies. Upon this mountain was a giant metal track, upon which the giant ship was placed. The track stretched downwards into the distance for 25 km before pointing up. This was the PHOENIX launching track.

The Horus was launched via a similar track, but was accelerated from horizontal using electromagnets. The first electromagnet fired, and as the ship was pulled towards it it switched off, and a second electromagnet turned on a metre further down the track. This was continued for over 5 km until it pointed upwards, where the Horus would use a system similar to the ones on the Carriers to hover, and used it's large booster rockets to leave the atmosphere.

On the 19th of January, 2033, the Canadian population moved en masse to the PHOENIX. Inside the PHOENIX were 17 million cryogenic freezing pods, where the Canadian population would be frozen, along with all those rescued from other countries, and then reawakened after the 500 year long journey.

The United States government of course found out about this, and sent it's army north. It was a race between freezing the population before the army arrived and destroyed the PHOENIX. The Canadian government were approached by a team of people, who called themselves the "Sei". These people claimed that they could slow the army, and the government agreed to attempt to rescue them once the PHOENIX had launched in return to slowing the oncoming army.

By the 21st, the American army was 400km away from PHOENIX, and about 80% of the 17 million people had been frozen, and when an alarm was sounded, signalling 2 hours from completion of freezing, the Sei left the complex and moved to face the oncoming army.

There were 30 of them, dressed in black. Each of them held a long sword, curved. Across their backs were multitudes of blades, ranging from giant axes to tiny knives. Pistols, Automatic Rifles and other powerful weaponry was also with them, and they faced the oncoming army with gleams in their eyes.

They practised a form of martial arts that they themselves had invented, which involved weapons and incredibly fast movement. They believed that by clearing their minds they could focus on nothing but a battle, becoming so in tuned to their movements that they could move faster, be stronger, be unstoppable.

On the bridge of the Horus, General Warren Curren stood sharply, looking out the window. Equipped with huge numbers of missiles, railguns, machine guns and long distance gauss guns, the Horus was possibly the most powerful ship in the Earth. Along with a huge offensive capability, the scientists had come up with a way to create a repulsive magnet system, which was placed along the hull. Incoming metal could be pushed away by the magnets, creating a shield like system around them.

As soon as the Sei engaged the Americans, General Curren raised his hand and spoke to his men.

"Wish us luck gentlemen, I sure do. Now, launch us."

With a roar the electromagnets fired, pulling the Horus along. After 10 seconds the Horus was moving at 100 miles per hour, by the end of the track it was moving at close to Mach 1, or 1000 miles per hour. The main boosters fired with a shudder, and the Horus curved round, heading towards the American army, 900 miles away. The Horus was the protector, and protect it would do.

The American army was doing badly. As the men attacked the 30 men in black, the bullets would seem to miss, and blood would splatter from the necks of the soldiers whose throats had been slit. The American general ordered tanks to move in, machine guns.

Then as one, the Americans gasped as Horus came into view. Hovering via it's downward jets of hydrogen, where the recoil of the fired particles keeps the ship in the air, the ship pointed large numbers of weapons at the Americans. Ropes fell from a hole that opened in the bottom of the ship, and the Sei jumped onto them, being lifted up into the air.

The Americans started firing, but every bullet or shell that raced towards the massive kilometre long warship seemed to slow, stop and then start moving back towards them. The Americans started to retreat.

Then, with a roar from the mountains, PHOENIX launched. Two massive hydraulic rams were turned off, and the giant ship was moved from horizontal to a downwards angle of about 25 degrees. Massive boosters on the back of PHOENIX fired, pushing the giant vessel to incredible speeds. John Franklin sat behind the controls, designer of the propulsion systems, he was one of two people qualified to fly the ship, the other person, Hannah Davies, was sat next to him, copiloting.

The mountains behind them started to collapse from the incredible forces at bay, and rock started to tumble down after PHOENIX as it approached the end of the giant track that curved gracefully towards the sky. With an almighty roar it left the track, moving at Mach 2 towards the sky.

The American army dropped it's weapons and watched silently as Horus lifted away, firing it's own boosters and following it's protectee into space. Finally, project ALPHA had been completed."

Silvia stopped, her throat raw from talking. She drank again, and smiled before opening her mouth to continue...

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Signature by Sleipnir.