The sky was a vast, endless canvas of eternal twilight, its hues shifting between deep indigo and streaks of ember as the twin moons hung like watchful sentinels over a dying world. High above, the planetary ring stretched across the heavens, a fractured arc of shimmering light casting broken reflections upon the ocean’s surface. But the ocean—if it could even be called that anymore—was no longer the unbroken abyss of sapphire and black it had once been.

  It churned in violent protest, entire sections of water vanishing into spiraling vortexes, siphoned toward the massive harvester looming on the horizon. Its form was a grotesque silhouette against the moons’ glow, an obsidian leviathan suspended above the waves. Thick, jagged tendrils of alien machinery plunged into the depths, tearing through the planet’s lifeblood like parasitic fangs. From its core, veins of crimson light pulsed in rhythmic, mechanical hunger, feeding upon the planet’s very essence.

  And beneath the roiling waters, cutting through the waves like a blade honed for war, Deep Crown moved.

  She was no longer merely a submarine, no longer a construct of steel and human engineering. The vessel had been transformed, reborn—a fusion of two civilizations, of human ingenuity and Vey’Narii evolution. Her hull, once rigid and defined by angular lines, now pulsed with flowing organic plating, reinforced with a substance that shimmered like liquid metal. No longer confined to the depths, Deep Crown now glided, no longer just a weapon, but a living predator of the abyss.

  Nathan Henshaw stood at the heart of it all.

  His steel-blue gaze locked onto the tactical interface, reading the battlefield the way an artist might a canvas—seeing the strokes of destruction before they were painted. War was not fought with brute force alone. It was an equation. A puzzle. A game of precision.

  And he would not lose.

  "Enemy warships inbound!" Ortega called from the helm, his hands tightening over the controls. "Two of them, closing fast! They’re covering the harvester!"

  "Shields online?" Henshaw asked, voice steady, the calm before the storm.

  "At full power," Sinclair confirmed. "Shockwave Cannons primed, plasma disruptors locked. We’re armed and ready."

  Elizabeth’s fingers danced over the interface, analyzing the enemy formation. "They’re holding a perimeter around the harvester, forcing us to engage before we get close. Standard defensive strategy—keep the prize out of reach while the grunts do the work."

  Sinclair grunted. "Guess that means we crash the party."

  Henshaw’s mind worked in overdrive, dissecting the battlefield, searching for the pressure points, the fractures in the enemy’s design. He had spent a lifetime reading wars before they happened, analyzing weaknesses in real-time. Every warship had a flaw. Every commander made a mistake. He just needed to find it.

  Then ANDI spoke.

  "Strategic assessment complete," the AI announced, his voice smooth, precise, yet carrying an edge of something… more. "Enemy trajectory calculated. Initiating synchronized engagement protocols."

  A pulse of alien data flooded the interface, and for the first time, Henshaw saw the battle in a way that transcended human instinct. It was as if time had slowed, the battlefield unfolding in predictive waves, every movement, every attack visualized before it occurred. ANDI was reading the future.

  And now, so was Henshaw.

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  A grin touched his lips.

  "Ortega, drop us low," he ordered. "Sinclair, scramble their sensors. Rafael, target the leftmost ship’s propulsion core with a shockwave barrage. Hit them fast. Hard."

  Deep Crown responded as though it were alive, veering sharply into a dive, slipping beneath the waves with supernatural ease.

  The first Phyrax Dorne warship fired, streaks of molten plasma searing through the sky, lighting the ocean’s surface with eerie red reflections. The water boiled in their wake, vaporizing into clouds of steam.

  "Hold course," Henshaw said, voice steady. "Wait for it…"

  The warship adjusted its angle, tracking them, waiting for a breach—

  "NOW!"

  Deep Crown burst upward, breaching the surface like a leviathan from hell.

  The Shockwave Cannons roared, twin pulses of energy hammering into the enemy vessel’s shields, sending ripples of destabilization cascading across its hull.

  "Shields at seventy percent!" Elizabeth called out.

  "Hit ‘em again!" Henshaw ordered.

  A second volley fired. This time, Rafael launched a plasma disruptor torpedo in the wake of the shockwave bursts. It slipped through the weakened shield, striking the warship’s starboard flank with a thunderous detonation.

  The ship tilted violently, its stabilizers failing. Fires burst along its plating, crimson light flickering as power surges rippled through its systems.

  "Enemy vessel critical," ANDI confirmed.

  Henshaw didn’t hesitate. "Finish it."

  A final shot from the Shockwave Cannons tore through the fractured hull.

  The warship exploded.

  One down.

  The second warship responded with brutal efficiency. It unleashed a barrage of scatterburst projectiles, streaks of molten energy that detonated on impact.

  Deep Crown shuddered as a hit struck its reinforced plating.

  "Damage report!" Henshaw barked.

  "Minimal," Sinclair confirmed. "We can take more than that."

  "Let’s not," Ortega muttered.

  Henshaw’s eyes narrowed. The enemy was adapting. So was he.

  "Ortega. Forced dive."

  "What?" Ortega turned, confused. "That’s suicide!"

  Henshaw’s smirk was razor-sharp. "Not if we come up harder."

  Without hesitation, Deep Crown vanished beneath the waves.

  The Phyrax Dorne vessel hesitated, sensors struggling to track them.

  That hesitation was its death sentence.

  Deep Crown erupted from the water, rising like a demon in a storm, and unleashed a full broadside salvo.

  A full barrage of plasma torpedoes tore through the warship’s exposed underbelly.

  The sky ignited. The warship detonated midair.

  And then—silence.

  Two down.

  Henshaw turned his attention to the harvester.

  "Now for the big one."

  The massive construct pulsed with power, its siphoning appendages retracting as it prepared its final defense.

  Then the sky lit up.

  A gravitational pulse exploded outward, ripping a column of ocean into the heavens.

  And Deep Crown was caught in it.

  Alarms screamed. Systems surged. The ship was no longer moving—it was being dragged.

  "Engines failing!" Ortega shouted. "We’re losing control!"

  "ANDI!" Henshaw barked.

  "Redirecting power," ANDI responded instantly. "Calculating counter-trajectory—advising full weapons deployment."

  Henshaw’s fists clenched.

  "FIRE EVERYTHING."

  The entire arsenal of Deep Crown unleashed at once.

  The Shockwave Cannons.

  The Plasma Torpedoes.

  The Full Payload.

  The harvester convulsed, its core rupturing.

  The ocean collapsed back down.

  And Deep Crown emerged through the wreckage. The first harvester was dead.