The Thalatte Stratocracy believed it was their manifest destiny to rule over all the people of all the worlds of the galaxy. Unfortunately for these grand designs of theirs, they met with resistance at every step of the way.
The Zymeth Geniocracy, first of the modern races to reach the stars, was technologically more advanced, and so was able to hold the Thalatte off with their superior navies.
The Necupole Plutocracy were at the heart of all interstellar trade, and the Thalatte quickly found that their weapons of mass destruction had nothing on Necupole red tape.
And the Bernetigan Collective? They thought themselves the superior race, the pinnacle of evolution, to the point where they developed techniques and technologies to transform a person from any other race into becoming biologically Bernetigan. The efficacy of their techniques was enough to keep every other species away from their corner of the galaxy, the Thalatte included.
Conflict between these races, powerful as they were, could only end in a stalemate, and so the Enlightened (as they would come to call themselves) left each other to their own devices.
But that just meant that any other species trying to make it in the galaxy was fair game. And against these lesser threats, the Thalatte were more than happy to go up against.
The Meleten Empire and Lacertus Commonwealth were the first the Thalatte fell upon. For centuries, they subjugated these people, harvesting their citizens to bolster their own armed forces, levying taxes from their homeworlds and colonies high enough to render them barely operable.
Rebellion was an inevitability, and so when the Meleten and Lacertus wrested themselves free, the only ones who were shocked were the Thalatte themselves.
Since then, the Thalatte had made periodic pushes to try and conquer these two species, but the constant conflicts only helped to bolster Meleten and Lacertus resolve in maintaining their freedom, with all the resources now fully under their control going towards advancing their tech enough to go toe-to-toe with Thalatte superiority.
With the playing field inadvertently levelled by their own actions, the Thalatte sought out easier prey.
They found it in the Deupazing Monarchy, Human Alliance, Deorvira Federation, and Apiarius Aristocracy. Newly arrived on the interstellar scene, they had neither the technology or the numbers to withstand Thalatte invasion fleets, and so like the Meleten and Lacertus before them, these people were subjugated.
But like the Meleten and Lacertus before them, they fought back, securing their independence.
Despite this, countless members of their species were forced into Thalatte servitude. Their worlds may have been able to hold off Thalatte advances, but they didn't have the power to free all of those who had been abducted by them.
So it was that the unwilling slaves of the Thalatte would have to find their own paths to freedom.
And, invariably, that path begins in blood.
In their eternal bid for conquest, the Thalatte's military was constantly on the hunt for Hyttan tech, especially their powerful Odazaen. Despite being eons older than anything the modern races had ever created, these bipedal mechs were still some of the most dangerous machines on any battlefield. And with a need to turn every tide they waded into, the Thalatte were always on the search for more Odazaen to add to their armed forces.
Sergeant vel-Ahllan had been assigned as a pilot for one such expedition.
An apiarian abducted and pressed into service, she quickly gained recognition for her exemplar piloting skills. And with this particular expedition to seek out Hyttan tech being deep in Meleten space, the Thalatte needed their best pilots in order to return home with the goods.
Especially when the Meleten navy, always on the search for Thalatte invaders into their territory, would engage with extreme prejudice. Despite knowing that the bulk of the Thalatte's navy was made up by enslaved conscripts, they couldn't afford to be merciful.
This Meleten force struck the expedition Sergeant vel-Ahllan was on with lightning efficiency, wiping out all but a few of the escort vessels in the first minutes of the engagement. It was only Sergeant vel-Ahllan's superior piloting abilities that allowed her to escape the remote system the Thalatte had been excavating, the cargo ship she was flying filled to the brim with Odazaen and other Hyttan technologies.
She managed to escape the system, making the subspace jump to the closest Thalatte controlled territory, but the Meleten attack force was right on her heels.
They knew what the Thalatte had stolen from their territory, and they were unwilling to give it up without a fight.
Trahho Station orbited a barren world between Thalatte and Meleten space. Resource rich but incapable of supporting life, the world made for an adequate staging ground for Thalatte incursions into Meleten space.
It also served as a barracks and hospital for troops under Thalatte control to gather and recuperate, and with the number of fronts the Thalatte were always throwing their forces at, Trahho Station was never short of casualties coming through.
It kept Doctor Marinos, stolen from human controlled space, busy enough that her plans for escape were always forced on the back burner, especially when she had repeat patients like Corporal Killzar, a mech pilot abducted from deupazing territory, constantly coming through her operating room.
The pair had known each other for years, frequently as doctor and patient. With the number of conflicts a mech pilot as skilled as Killzar found herself in, injury was an inevitability, and so once again the deupazing found herself under the human's care.
"Alright, looks like the field medics were able to get a patch on you quick enough to prevent worse injury." Dr. Marinos said as she glanced over the corporal with her Longan Unit. The device bolted to the skulls of Thalatte slave soldiers, it gave troops hands free access to a powerful suite of tools - for doctors, a scanning diagnostic array was the most useful. It also carried within it a small explosive charge, one that could be remotely detonated, or triggered automatically if the Longan Unit was tampered with by anyone but authorized mechanics.
Obedience was easy to maintain when your prisoners had guns to their heads, metaphorical or otherwise.
"Go, there are others with more pressing injuries." Cpl. Killzar insisted, nodding over at the other mech pilots, some of them still being brought in from the medical transport that had brought them here. The rainbow hues of the blood of a half dozen different races was bringing colour to the gunmetal grey of a Thalatte medical bay, the air filled with the cries and shouts of the injured, undercut by the droning and beeping of equipment being used to try and save their lives. Doctors and nurses from different races were rushing between gurneys and tables, focused on the task of keeping all these people from dying on their watch. Unsurprisingly for the Stratocracy's armed forces, there were no actual thalatte present among either the wounded or those tending to them.
"Just sit tight and rest," Dr. Marinos said, shooting a stern glance at Cpl. Killzar, "I don't want you doing anything that'll shake that patch loose! It's the only thing holding your guts in place."
"Alas, I was hoping to dance along to this lovely music!" Was Cpl. Killzar's sarcastic reply, accompanied by a wave of her hand out at the horrific sounds coming from the rest of the medbay.
Dr. Marinos smacked her lightly on the shoulder and a fond shake of her head before rushing off to tend to the worst injuries of those who had been brought into her medbay.
Killzar watched as the human moved about the medbay with all the precision that only years as a medical practitioner could grant a person. As she watched the woman direct her staff towards this patient and that, Killzar knew that there would be many lives saved here today.
And that their thalatte commanding officers wouldn't offer even so much as a "thank you" for Marinos' services. After all, what niceties did they owe a slave?
Killzar was content to lay back and let the more grievously injured members of her unit be treated first. The pain from her own injury, though unceasing, was ignorable enough that she had begun to drift off to sleep when a station-wide alert came blaring over Trahho's communication system, the distress call from an incoming vessel blasting out for all Thalatte forces to hear.
"Mayday, mayday, this is the TNF Egni. We are under attack by Meleten forces. Our cargo is Priority Una. I repeat, our cargo is Priority Una."
To the Thalatte, Priority Una meant only one thing - resources vital to their hopes of conquest. Whatever cargo the Egni carried was important enough to sound a call for any and all available forces to render aid.
But as Cpl. Killzar slipped out of the medbay, allowing herself to be swallowed in the crowd of those fit enough to fight making their way to Trahho Station's hangar bay, it wasn't whatever the Egni carried that had her breaking out into a jog slow enough as to not exacerbate her injury.
It was the voice of one of her oldest and dearest friends echoing through the utilitarian halls of this Thalatte military outpost that drove her onward. Killzar would be damned if she let vel-Ahllan die for something as pointless as Thalatte victory.