"Why are you going back to the home system? That place has been reduced to nothing but destroyed planets and rubble!" Ta'rak nodded.
"Yeah, but I'd like to see if some of that rubble has materials we can use. Those soils may be dead, and the planets swirling debris fields, but the minerals are still there." The old man sighed.
"True, but no one has gone back since the invasion. When we discovered FTL, and stopped using the portals, those giants went back to sleep, and we managed to grow back into the universe again. We even have enough firepower to blow their heads off, but it takes an armada to do so. What if you find one still active, and not sleeping?" Ta'rak smiled.
"Then no one will miss me, old man. Take care. Maybe we'll meet again some day." He was sure they wouldn't. That one reason good enough to return to the Terran system was so dangerous, he would have been executed just for coming up with the idea.
He found the location of a decapitated giant, one of the Elder race whose eyes were used as the portals through gas giants. Hideously monstrous giants that walked through space like humans walk across the street.
It was originally thought that a fiendishly clever, and monstrously evil member of their race figured out that the eyes of his brethren could be used as telescopes into other systems. He went on a slaughter spree, killed massive amounts of his kin in order to seed the galaxy with the machines human's called portals. That was the hypothesis. Later, after much running, and discovery of ancient ships, abandoned cities, and destroyed agricultural hub systems, they found out the truth.
Those giants were in fact guardians of the solar systems. They would stay at the exterior, eat meteors that would threaten the interior of the system, and keep watch. One of the first races to find them was an extremely violent species with advanced military capabilities. They killed one sentinel for fun, and figured out that their eyes could be used to look through gas giants. They then developed the portal system. The more they killed within the galaxy, the angrier the giants became.
Eventually, the giants gathered in groups of hundreds and began to slaughter that long extinct species. Every species that attempted to use the portals afterward woke up that hatred. Even humanity had woken their ire. Once humanity discovered FTL, they were able to outrun the giants, and hide long enough for them to go back to their duties. After many decades of hiding, they began to expand, being careful not to wake the giants up again.
For now, the monsters sleep, but will one day wake up again. The galaxy isn't ready to deal with their anger yet. Ta'rak, however, is of another opinion. What if they can learn enough from one of the corpses and finally defeat them, or force them to stop?
"Taking into account the slow stellar drift, the possible impact of having your head removed, or having your eyes ripped out and then decapitated, any possible corpses should be outside of Pluto's orbit, or that ice planet. And that's if they were killed where they stood watch. The debris field is quite thin out there, so it shouldn't be that hard to spot." He scratched his chin, and thought about the problem.
"However," He continued to log his report, just in case something else found out about what he was doing, or something went wrong. "The outer orbital planes are not going to be easy to manually scan. Active scans will alert possible trouble, so I'll just have to travel that area, and use short range sensors." He shivered. "I'm almost afraid to find one. An intact giant corpse the size of one of the tallest mountains on Earth, whose skin is tougher then our strongest steels. But this is why I'm out here. Better get started."
The FTL drive took him through the dark spaces between solar systems, and after several days, he found the area he wanted to start in. But fate is fickle, and annoyingly patient.
"Two years! I've searched the outer system for two years, and all I had to do was turn the ship around on the beginning of the search! It was right there!" Ta'rak lamented the lost time and capital, but then did some close range scans, and relaxed. "It absorbs radiation, and solar energy. No wonder I couldn't detect it. This far out, without access to the sun, the body would have no stores of energy remaining within it." He did a thorough search of the area around the body, and eventually found the hollowed out husk of the skull.
"Brain tissues removed. Eyes gone. Nasal passages are openings, with no protrusion. Mouth is a multiple hinged mechanism that opens in four directions, unlike the human mouth which only has one. Facial tissue shows...." He moved the small cargo ship closer. He needed the space for supplies, power and fuel requirements. "two jagged cone shaped teeth in each quarter of the jaw. "The brain tissues, including the spinal stem have been ripped away, so I might be able to enter the throat of the skull and get a better look later." He maneuvered the ship around the head, and went towards the neck region of the body.
"The head was cleanly sliced off with some sort of tool, probably a high powered laser, or powered blade to give physical form to the carnage. The giant is almost completely intact, so it must have been one of the first." He approached the neck and smiled a bit.
"The neck's diameter is larger then the footprint of my entire ship. I should be able to land on it, and do a few tests with its spinal tissues." He smiled wider. This was going better then he expected.
Ta'rak quickly closed the switch and looked at his nearly drained energy reserves. He mentally cursed.
"Personal Log - Like human nerves, it needs energy to move, but like electrical circuits, it will use as much energy as needed to do the work it was made to do. My ship does not have enough power." He sighed. "It will take nearly a week to fully recharge my systems. If I try this again, the body should be moved closer to the sun, so that it can absorb ambient radiation. And since I wouldn't want to do that again, I'll have to maneuver the head into position in front of the body, then tow the entire corpse into Jupiter's former orbit. There is enough debris there to effectively hide my ship and the corpse from anyone's prying eyes." He leaned back in his pilot's chair and closed his eyes.
"What could go wrong? Everything from waking the giants en mass, or bringing this giant back to life. While unlikely that it would come to life, the other possibility is still frightening on its own. I'll collate all data into a probe and program the ship to send the data automatically upon attack, or destruction of the ship."
"Personal Log - That took longer then expected. The sheer mass of the giant is almost a quarter of the now destroyed moon of earth. It took several hours of sustained thrust to break the inertia, and more to break its current orbit. Once broken free of its place, it was relatively easy to maintain course. Now, I just need to move it into the debris field, in full view of the sun for it to absorb ambient radiation, and solar radiation. I don't know why they didn't destroy the sun, but all planets, including Mercury and Venus, are nothing but debris. That question isn't mine to answer. My questions all concern this giant, its life, and its death. I want to know everything." He shivered.
"I also want to know why I'm having nightmares of its death. End log." He sat back in his chair, closed his eyes, but then he opened them with a start. Another image of the death of the giant.
"Personal Log - Its taken a few months, but the giant is now in place. I've set up a dome around my ship, and landed it on the neck. I can now make sustained exterior jaunts without an EVA suit. The nightmares have changed since I've started to embark on these suitless walks. Now, I feel the weight of responsibility in the dreams. Feelings of a job made incomplete, and betrayal. I've had to return to a human controlled system to get supplies a few times, and now I've set up massive battery and capacitor banks to store up energy so I can try to make the body move again. Tomorrow morning, I will try again."
"It moved! One of its six legs moved! It completely drained all the power I had stored, but it did move! When I measured the amount of power before it was consumed, and after, the amount it took to move the leg was enough to run a battleship for a day! No wonder the giants are so powerful! It requires a massive amount of power just to move, so they must have enormous energy storage capabilities!" His excitement was hard to contain, as was his admiration for the massive beings.
That was probably why the dreams began to take on a more personal feel. Not like he was reliving the giant's life, but reliving his own.
"Report!" He fired out at the assembled personnel. Everyone looked shaky, and uncertain.
"The Net is reporting activity, sir! For the first time in decades, we have reports of activity from the net!" The Commander thumped his fist onto the table, and got everyone's attention. There was far too much noise in the room, and he wanted it quiet.
"What kind of activity? I'm not going to ask again. Report!" The Intelligence staffer swallowed a lump. This Commander was a hard ass, and would get his pound of flesh if he didn't do as he was told.
"The Forces set up multiple listen and watch stations throughout the galaxy, mostly concentrated on hot spots of Sentinel activity. There hasn't been any movement from those beings in decades, not since the time they stopped pursuing us, and resettled into their former positions." The commander waved that away.
"That is history. I'm talking about today."
"Which is what I'm reporting on, sir. The Net of sensors is reporting movement from the Sentinels." The commander narrowed his eyes.
"What kind of movement?"
"All Sentinels under surveillance have opened their eyes." They watched as the Commander fell into his chair and closed his eyes.
"Shit." They day they have all prepared for was upon them, and they knew they had no chance in hell of success.
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