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Chapter One Hundred and Two

His Glorious Aspirations. Fallout Universe.

Not long after we arrived back in this version of the Sol System and my cruiser began makings it way to Earth, the Ad-Mech commanded frigate peeled off from the fleet and set a course for Mars, no doubt many of the machine loving cyborgs would be sent down the red planet along with a lot of resources in order to begin turning it into something close to a forge-world.

This suited my plans very well because if I ever wanted to operate without the support of the Imperium I would need not just a major Ad-Mech presence in a universe out of the Warhammer 40k but also a shipyard capable of serving a cruiser as well as escort ships. A tall order and it could take a couple of decades for the Ad-Mech in this universe to progress that far while they were also supporting my House's efforts on Fallout Earth.

Which was fine with me since the IOM wasn't going to collapse in that time frame and hopefully I would be able to bring plenty of resources and technology to Mars, actions that would keep the Ad-Mech in this universe both dependent on me and grateful.

Sure they had their own frigate in this dimension, but it couldn't go far since it didn't have my cruiser's advanced warp drive nor was the Emperor's lighthouse visible in these parts. Besides, the cyborgs were unlikely to send their ship anywhere until Mars had a lot more defences.

Due to the vast amount of resources that were going to be required to turn Mars into something close to a forge-world it was a good thing that the Squats had come with us as they'd promised me a fraction of the minerals they dug up in exchange for bringing them here and supporting their new colony during its early stages. Those minerals would be needed to set up vast amounts of infrastructure on the red planet.

From my command throne here on the bridge I received data which informed me that the Squats ships, all of which had managed to make the trip more or less intact were now heading towards the outer planets of this system with the intent of scouting out sites for their colony. They were leaving only some of their population on my cruiser to be picked up later once they had somewhere to house the space dwarves.

Squats were hardy frontier folk with a strong desire for independence so it made sense for them to move that far away from Earth and Mars. I had no intention of withholding support since any investment in the new Squat colony would be paid back in mineral wealth later. The honour of the space dwarves would allow for nothing less.

Another fact that had to be taken into account was that the deal between the Squat Clan, the Ad-Mech and House Thrax gave the cyborgs exclusive rights not only to Mars and its two moons but also the asteroid belt that lay between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The cyborgs had wanted Jupiter's moons as well because of the raw resources there.

Upon hearing that I'd put my foot down as the belt contained more than enough untouched resources and the Squats would need plenty of room to expand as I'd promised to transport more of their people to this system if any of them were at the Forge-World during my stopovers. This was more likely than it sounded since the Squats would have begun spreading word of my ability to get them out of their native galaxy and my stopovers lasted months.

As for Earth the Ad-Mech would maintain a major presence on the planet so as to support my efforts, and so they could get their machine limbs on as much tech as possible, but the planet would be considered under the protection of House Thrax.

Only the Emperor could be Master of Terra or even its sibling world, but since I was The Emperor's representative when outside of the Imperium's borders, having me, or someone empowered by me, to administrate the planet was considered acceptable. Natives would be doing the actual ruling when possible.

Not that I had much in the way of control over what was going on. Assuming all had gone well the Free Economic Zone of New Vegas and the lands controlled by the East Coast Brotherhood, a nation that would need a proper name, should be secure and their infrastructure greatly improved upon. I wouldn't know for sure until my ship got closer to the planet.

"Our allied vessels are clear and it's going to take us over 32 hours to reach Earth,'' my second in command let me know "We're detecting no sign of any xeno presence".

If there was an Eldar Seed ship somewhere around here I knew nothing about it and perhaps that was for the best. They weren't the aliens who concerned me anyway. I was more worried about the aliens with the motherships than what the space elves were up to.

"Very well, Commander" I replied "I have some matters to handle in my office. Let me know if anything needs my attention".

Bringing us here via the warp had been taxing. It was just that it wouldn't do for me to admit such weakness in front of the crew even if they knew I would be tired from my efforts. These people had never even seen Britain, it hadn't existed as a nation for tens of thousands of years, yet even in the grim darkness of the future it was important to keep a stiff upper lip.

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