Gotta appreciate when a co-worker really has your back. Pete sounds alright 👍

A minor nitpick, but in case it saves any writers some effort looking it up, Apollo 17 was the last time a human landed on the moon, which took place in December 1972.

Alarms blared as Avesi ran down the hallway. She looked out the viewport as five Warp Conduits opened into their solar system within near-light range. A cylindrical ship emerged from one, a glowing maw at the front ready to reclaim raw matter and energy for reprocessing, flanked by armored sides, and heavy weapon emplacements.

From another emerged a bright glowing streak of plasmic slag, a second ship reduced to raw materials by the raw energies present in The Warp, what a terrible fate those on board must have suffered.

Two more jets of slag emerged, and finally a second intact warship, with unmistakable Human engineering. They arrived mere weeks after their armada had been sent on its relatively short 20 year round trip to the nearest star.

Avesi scrambled into the Control Station as weapons fire lit up the orbital platform. She fired up the automated defenses, then took manual control of a High Energy Canon. It was too late. They could detect intruders coming from dozens of light-years away, and had configurable defenses to repel any manner of invasion, but Warp Armadas were... suicidal...

She looked at the jets of plasmic slag that had already moved significantly far away, 3/5ths of the Human Fleet was in ruin before they even arrived. That kind of sacrifice was unimaginable to Avesi, but she pushed her horror away as she saw pods raining onto the Orbital Platform.

Armored humans ran out, many of them dying as their suits suffered breached seals and died in the very vacuum brought in with their breaching pods. But the rest ran forward, weapons belching plasma, tearing through metal, tearing through flesh.

It wasn't long before Avesi and a small number of other survivors were rounded up in the control room, the a Human captain overseeing their security.

Aveesi spoke up in Veelan, "Why are you so horrible to your own kind? Throwing so many lives away in the pursuit of a fast victory?"

The man turned to her, glancing at a translator module. He gave her a Grim tight-lipped smile. "You can afford to travel between the stars in safety, decades at a time between neighbors."

He stepped forward towards her. "For us to cross into your system that way, it sacrifices all of us. Traveling through the Warp is the only way any of us will ever live to see our destination."

Outside the viewport, the two surviving warships positioned themselves to catch the streams of plasmic slag, processors converting the energetic stream of matter back into metal, back into plating, back into new ships for a new crew.

That logic might suggest a probe identical to Voyager would be discovered somewhere by someone, but not that our voyager probe would be discovered by someone. What if it falls into a star first? How are they supposed to discover it then?

That sounds like it would make it LESS discoverable

Anselm woke up early, polished his armor to a mirror shine, oiled the joints, cleaned his sword, and was ready to report to the Queen's side by sun up. The castle was both beautiful, and inspiring.

The coloring of the walls was a paint made from pigments from every province in the kingdom mixed together, a symbol of unity that produced the darkest black you could get from a paint here. Despite the dark walls, the place was well lit by all the bright and cheery fireplaces, and sconces on the walls.

He entered the Queen's throne room before she arrived, and went to stand beside the throne in anticipation. The throne itself was a Wondrous statement of commitment to the kingdom's legacy, she kept a memento of her father, specifically his skull, mounted atop the throne itself, with his crown still on his head. The Queen said she wanted to remind people how she had come to power, which Anselm knew to be from a strong family bond. The Queen was remarkably well adjusted for a girl who had witnessed her own father tragically fall out of her own bedroom window on the day she came of age.

Some commoners were lined up to petition the queen, and as a servant informed Anselm the Queen was arriving shortly, he cued the crowd to begin singing. This was his favorite part of the mornings, hearing the citizens sing cheery melodies about their unwavering Obedience to the crown, and the blood the Queen would shed to maintain loyalty.

Finally, she arrived. Humble as ever, instead of wearing a golden threaded robe of rich purples and reds, and a gaudy overjeweled crown, she wore a simple black robe, and her own tiara made out of gold pulled from the teeth of the traitors and criminals she locked up in her first days as Queen. Truly it was a physical reminder of the dedication she had for rooting out corruption in the court, why she had no hesitation in rooting out even some of her father's closest confidants, once she found evidence of corruption in her own personal investigations.

The first peasant begged for his only son to be released from military service. Their farm wasn't running as well without the youthful lad, and he hadn't been able to keep up with the crowd's food tax on his own.

His Queen of course, spoke in simple clear words and let herself be understood. His son was serving the greater good, and now his father was shaming his service with his bickering. The official punishment for trying to desert a military draft was of course death, and death for your immediate family. However the queen showed the man mercy, Anselm drew his shortsword, and held it out to the farmer as the queen gave him the chance to spare his son's life by carrying out his own penalty to himself.

The selfish old man spat at her feet and called her a wicked evil old hag. Honestly, it was preposterous, she had never done an illegal thing in her life.

How could you be evil if you followed the law? Truly, it was nonsense. He pondered this as he dragged the man's body out of the Queen's sight.

I actually thought this was about Face Off

Nice to see the classic storyline hasn't died off

Shash, Prime Curator of the Seventh Secret Library stared at the twine wrapped, and thick paper sealed package. He had been told to destroy this book, not to touch the book itself, and not to speak of it. It was deemed too harmful.

Still, Shash hesitated. Had he not read the one Hundred Poems of the Unmade Mind, without losing himself? Had he not withstood the Ten Testaments of Hatred? Had he not distinguished himself by drawing new insights from Talash's hundred volumes of the Drowning Void of Wisdom? How could a book be named 'too harmful' in such company?

He could not simply destroy it. Not without looking. But he still had his own responsibilities that he could not neglect. He stepped outside his office and called his First Assistant. A short old woman with leathery skin snapped as straight as she could manage to his call, though her body was weary, her eyes were keen and her will strong.

"Yasha, I must put upon you an obligation." Shash spoke formally. A stern bow was her response. "I must look upon an object I have been bound to destroy. You are to contain me to my office, and see to it the book is destroyed should I find my will undone by its pages. I will not compel you to destroy the book, as I do this to see if it can be preserved. But if you deem that I have been too undone by the book, but become unable to finish the task, I bind you to carry on when my strength fails."

She was troubled by the prospect. He could tell she wanted to object, weather it was to destroy the book outright, or to preserve it no matter the case he could not read from her face. But she agreed, and stood ready outside his office.

Carefully, with door sealed, and none to see, Shash untied the twine. Then carefully he unwrapped the thick brown paper that wrapped the tome inside.

The title startled him, it was not as he has feared, a salvaged copy of the fabled Book of Undoing that caused an entire civilization to fall. Rather, it was a crisp recent copy of a math textbook.

Brow furrowed, Shash picked up the book, and let it fall open in his hand. It looked ordinary. He slid his thumb down the edge of the page ready to turn it and...

"Gah! Sonova..." he muttered in pain, licking the paper cut on his thumb. "Harmful indeed..."

He opened his door. "Yasha, could you get me a bandaid from the first aid kit? Blasted thing cut me."

Then as she went to carry out his wishes, he wrapped the book back up in the thick paper, tied the twine around it once more to be extra safe. And dropped it in the incinerator chute.

Alastor huddled by the cubicle walls to recover, sword still gripped in his white knuckled hand. His other hand still shaking fumbled for a flask at his side, a fresh tonic of Mountain's Dew to replenish his energy. The Board of Directors lay in wait through the final dungeon door.

A pack of interns driven by a whip wielding middle manager pushed past Alastor's hiding spot, giving him a moment of fright before realizing they had not noticed him.

Spirits restored, Alastor strode to the dual chrome doors at the end of the hall. He ran his blade along the metal, but no scratch was left, these were Mithril and brute force would not avail. Instead he pulled out his Key of Passing, an Enchanted rectangle that had been imbued with the authority of Upper Management by Davis, the Hackromancer who had called for his help.

With a wave over the Detection Web, the polished chrome doors chimed and slid open, revealing a small room inside. It was no ordinary room however. He stepped inside, and with a stomach churning lurch it slipped onto a nearby plane of reality. He had entered the realm of Upper Management.

Another chime as the doors opened to a palatial estate, a bubbling brook to the side filled with Coffium. Alastor stopped to refill his flask, this was a more potent restorative than the Mountain's Dew had been. In fact he downed his flask of Coffium and filled it again. The liquid burned as it rushed into his system, and his hand began to shake once more. It did not shake from fatigue this time, but rather from poorly contained energy. He felt alive!

With a kick of his enchanted Oxfords, Alastor crashed into the Crossroads of Board, where seven directors each holding a Scepter of their office stood in a circle. They had heard him coming, and were attempting to summon The Chairman.

Sword in white knuckle grip sliced through the air as Alastor charged in a Fury, but the blade was turned aside by a Ward. The Director of HR turned towards him. "Your action of violence has triggered my trap card!" She said, turning a magical document face up, "By the power of Assault and Battery I bind you to jail!"

This was no contest of brute force, but of wills, of wits, and of preparation. "I invoke due process" he shouted back, the incantation of delay. "And I file for employee endangerment!"

He pulled a document out of his leather satchel, "By the authority of the seven circles of OSHA, I condemn your authority! May the blood of your fallen interns bind you instead!"

A Djinn of Judgement appeared as he filed his claim, and the Director of HR's authority was undone, dragged to the very jail she had intended to condemn him.

The Director of Maintenance now turned to face him, a towering 7 foot Ogre. "Pity" he said in a deep gravelly voice "That your authority is only recognized by WiFi"

The lights dimmed as power was directed elsewhere at his command. Alastor felt cut off, his magical protections no longer in place without connection to the Magical World Web. His protections began to fade with no power.

As the Ogre stepped forward, wielding his Scepter of office like a club, Alastor remembered a source of power he still had. By pouring some Coffium onto his equipment, energy was temporarily restored. The Ogre howled in rage, but was not fast enough as Alastor's sword pierced through his flesh.

The lights flickered back on as power returned. At his iron gaze, the Director of Accounting broke and fled, as did the Director of Sales. With only three remaining the circle was broken, and Alastor clove through the remaining Directors with a mighty sweep of his Blade of Server.

Directors scattered, he turned towards the Accounting door. On the other side he saw vast wealth. Billions of Gold Coins alongside property deeds, and a library of patents. He checked his log, and made sure to retrieve seven patents for the Kingdom's needs, as well as the deed to his Father's Homestead that had been reclaimed by a Default brigand.

Once he had those items secured, he filled up his satchel with as much gold as it could carry, and returned home a hero.