The Recovery of the Time Shredding Gland by the Unexpected

Sessoren looked around his small room. In one corner was a suit of power armor designed by the Grey. It has a white material looked like a heavy silk, with a plastic-like armor reinforcement at the neck, wrists and ankles. This super light weight armor allowed for the fearsome claws of a Da'uhnb to be available for use against demonic foes.
Sessoren was wearing only a simple white ceremonial lioncloth. He walked up to a tall thin mirror. Da'uhnb didn't like mirrors usually. Anytime they caught a glimpse of their gland it would pulse and they would see different eras in the background. Sometimes a psychically trained Da'uhnb could use these flashes for inspiration, for a bit of divination.

In each of his hands he held a device few expected to see with a Da'uhnb. They were Time Shredder devices. The Da'uhnb were natural time travellers, able to travel without any devices through the pulsing gland in the center of their forehead. But Sessoren knew that if he was killed some of his changes to history might change too. So he had used these two Time Shredders. The red one was a box, covered in symbols and nails in slots. The blue one looked like a jeweled compass.

The blue one had been created by the rebel Time Shredder, Maverick Multimancer, especially for Sessoren.
The red one had to be purchased from General Tharr in the past, at a grave price to Sessoren, but to the benefit of the universe.

The blue one held his actions against the Warmonger and the Ancient Evils. The red one held his actions to prevent the rise of a New K'ias Empire.
He placed both in a Zela safe in the wall of the small room and sealed it, stepping away and walking outside the room. The Da'uhnb called upon the Leyas and shaped the stone of the wall to close it in. It was now a Zela safe sealed inside five feet of solid stone.
Sessoren left the power armor in the room, with his collection of weapons. He sensed something was coming.

He left his room, ready to meet his fate, whatever it may be. He was G.A.S.T., a hero to some, a misguided fool to others.

Meanwhile former Sector General Stark, a K'ias shapeshifter serving the Iron Republic, was pacing his quarters like a caged animal.

The damned eyes of the tyrant king stared at him through his shadow. As it had yesterday. As it had the day before that. As it had every damned day since the day the K'ias Stark had nearly been sacrificed to give the Warmonger a new physical form. Truly damned days. He saw himself as the world would make him, and it displeased him greatly. He was too prideful to accept his faults, too wrathful to say he was sorry, and he would fly too close to the sun. And it had caused him to drown in his way.

Flailing for life preservers he had perhaps grasped onto the wrong ones.

The very same Grand Admiral Thei'Gann of the Da'uhnb tricked him into following ancient starcharts that nearly trapped Stark in a black hole. Undoing that one event might have changed everything, Stark brooded for days, for weeks, for months.

He ordered his original flagship rebuilt and retrofitted. The same old Century-class design, with a few small internal modifications to the security system.

Stark was a single K'ias and could not trust most of his army with this task. A task so devious, it might even catch a time traveler.

He set off secretly with a skeleton crew of Brethren Deltas maintaining the ship, and Stark's personal crew running the bridge. Getting into the Hub of Worlds had been beyond belief, getting back out incredible and in his grasp.

Onboard his ship, he held in his hand a perfectly preserved specimen of a Da'uhnb's Time Shredding gland recovered intact. Stark ordered his best Omega Brethren Sniper to put a few simple tranq rounds into the Da'uhnb's stout neck. At the same time a pair of more overt Brethren in Gilgamesh Armor marked in Rebel colors fired off a few salvos of concussion grenades. They had taken the Grand Admiral and his Praetorians without killing any of them. They had surgically removed his Time travel gland and then regrew his using a Nanite Syringe. The Gland had not be pierced. It was a success.

Now Stark was rushing back, hoping he could beat the news back to the I.R.

What a risk, but the rewards??

Too bad nobody onboard expected an all call to be sounded from one of the pieces of gear they had taken from Thei'Gann the second they shadow jumped into orbit near the planet Refuge. Now Stark finds the ship assaulted from all sides. But who is attacking? And do they know that if they destroy the Heavy Frigate they will destroy the Temporal Gland???

Events that Thei'Gann had set in motion dramatically altered the course of the Unity's desperate fight for survival. Without his manipulations and eventual death, much would have gone awry. Thus, even though the battle had concluded, the Unity would keep a close eye on Thei'Gann, lest someone attempt to alter the very passage of history and unmake the Unity's victories. The matter was decided quickly, and then relegated to a small task force.
If anything, an attempt to assault Thei’Gann would act as an early-indicator of the Warmonger’s inevitable resurgence. The Unity theorized it would take a particular brand of madness to reverse the plurality of Thei’Gann’s works.

Days before Stark’s assault, causality itself had begun to shift. Fate was reporting a paradox spike in relation to Thei'Gann. Luckily, Garmin Fe had somehow convinced the grand admiral to take on Praetorian Guards. The Unity taskforce assigned to Thei’Gann gave him a microscopic tracking device. The latest iteration of the “spider meck” design, this small device would allow the Unity to keep track of Thei’Gann, or anyone who might attack him.
The Praetorians guarding Thei’Gann were ill-prepared for Stark's elite Brethren. Though they were overwhelmed, the Praetorians followed standard protocol and shared all they saw with the greater consensus. Considering the importance of who they were guarding, the information circulated quickly.

In moments, the Brethren and their rebel colors were identified. The spider-meck on Thei’Gann subtly transferred to those who moved to assault the hero. It was assumed by the grand consensus that the disciples of Warmonger had at last taken root in the Bretheren. This was not unexpected. Their brutal programming made them excellent hosts for the Warmonger’s particular ideology, and this risk formed the basis for the Unity’s subtle campaign of destruction. After all, the “Wage slaves” had long ago proved themselves not worth saving.

The spider mek reported its findings, sending subtle signals picked up by sensitive Unity receiving stations. These were no rouge Bretheren agents. The target vessel was the flagship of a Sector General...

Alarm washed through the consensus. This was no rouge Bretheren squad. These were Bretheren Super-Elites led by none other than Stark.

Immediately, the information became classified.

The implications of this action were staggering. It could have been that Stark was simply getting his revenge. It could also be that the Unity’s projections were off, and one of the Ancient Evils had already infiltrated the Iron Republic. Any Ancient Evil in such a position would have little need for the Unity’s patronage, and would have access to power beyond reckoning. Entire planets of tacticians began to tackle this particular problem, but a smaller force focused on the smaller matter of preserving the timeline.

Once the flagship made it into the space close to refuge, the spider mek fully activated. As a distraction, the mek began transmitting on all frequencies, sending out an all-call informing those who would listen about the ship and its contents. This would be a vital distraction for the Unity infiltration squad.

The gland needed to be preserved or taken. Without it, the loss of Unity personality cores would be staggering. At worst, the Hive King would have victory and the Universe itself would be re-ordered to sate Stark’s mad pride. A small team was quickly assembled. The Archon Armor would have a second test run.

The infiltration team would have two components. The quiet infiltration team would consist of a Seneschal and a Vrangian guard in custom close fitting black armor. These suits would protect them from the rigors of space and would give them some combat protection as well. The other three members of the team were operators of the Archon armor, the same one who had rescued Orleos. They stood motionless in their stark glory, awaiting the moment when they would unleash destruction.

The plan was relatively simple. The infiltration team would approach the ship flying in vacuum suits. They will place a small probe on one point of the capital ship, and then they would infiltrate the ship at a second distant point using nanites to tunnel a small entry point to the duct system which would seal behind them. They would get as close as they could to the gland as possible via conventional stealth. There would be no killing, and the Vrangian Guard will lay dormant probes along their path set to interface with the ship’s electronics when given the proper signal.

During this infiltration, the first probe would subtly worm its way into the capital ship. Like the roots of a horrible tree, silver wires would infiltrate the ship’s electronics as the probe grew. When the time came, the probe would breach the inner hull with 6 small shoots. When the time comes where the two infiltrators need a distraction, the probe would generate a hole in space connected to where the three veterans in Archon armor waited. Their task would be simple. The hacker in archon armor would use the multiple entry points into the capital ship’s computer to break communication lines and cause chaos while the two enforcers would scythe through defenders, sowing chaos.

During this bedlam, the Seneschal, assisted by the Vrangian Guard, would use every trick he learned during his countless battles. The lessons he learned on the old battlefields of refuge, his abilities with the Leyas, and his surprising ability to go without technology, would hopefully allow him to secure the gland, activate his shadow satellite seed, and escape.

The plan progressed exactly according to plan, and despite a heavy resistance by Brethren Omega snipers in thermal and visual cloaking technology way beyond anything the I.R. had shown off in previous encounters. Unity observers could not help but wonder if the I.R had been hiding its real growth over the last 2,000 years since the Earth Authority fell.
Or was it just more psuedo-tech created by the Tarrisian military and filtered upward into Stark's personal guard.

When the Senechal and the Vrangian Guard finally reached the chamber where the Da'uhnb's gland had been triangulated to, they found it guarded by four Brethren in Gilgamesh Power Armor. The Vrangian Guard drew them forward and met them in combat while the Senechal surged past them into the chamber and slammed right into Stark knocking the gland container from his hand. It slid across the room, and bounced against the hull wall.

Right at that moment, a Vrangian Guard Axe cut deeply into one of the Gilgamesh Armor's shoulder mounted missile tubes and it exploded. It launched shard of shrapnel through the nearby hull wall gashing it open. While not a huge hole, it was big enough for the gland, cannister and all to be sucked out into space.

It twisted in space and floated for a moment until there was a flash of blue light and it disappeared into time, possibly on its own. Faster than either Stark or the Seneschal could react.

As prognosticators of Fate ran calculations the timeline had stabilized, and no changes had occurred. The Gland had been recovered by some one.

The Unity withdrew quickly and tactically, with success in deploying the Archon Armor in some capacities, and safely removing it from the battlefield.

Meanwhile Stark sat on the bridge of his ship in a deep disgruntled silence.
He turned towards the closest Omega Brethren and asked, "Did we get the calculations and metrics we needed?"

"Yes sir," replied the Omega, "We have full masking as far as the Unity is concerned. But sir...with all due respect are you sure we can trust these FoF Cloaking devices, sir?"

"The mission may have been a complete failure in claiming the power of time travel," Stark said glumly, then brightened up a bit, "But we have at least tested the cloaking devices against both the Unity and the Temporal Empire and they are successful. Have we seen any negative side effects among the soldiers upgraded?"

"None sir," said the Omega checking his holo-computer.

"None yet," replied Stark, not trusting the alternate timeline technology, "None yet..."