November 7, 2111

  James Stone

  With the crisp wind tickling our backs and chirping of nearby beetles, Kalvin and I stood in shock at the melted hatch door of Station 9. Those doors weren’t just your typical reinforced, shielded doors either. No, these doors were made from veridium, one the most durable metals in the galaxy - a metal durable enough to withstand tens of thousands of degrees Celsius, with enough tensile strength to stop armor-piercing, explosive rounds. So what in the deepest, darkest pit of hell could have done this?

  Kalvin and I walked inside to see the horror left behind. Dismembered, rotting bodies of the dead guards were spread across the metal ramp and concrete floor, which was partly descended further below. It was a massacre; limbs were spread around like wine-colored confetti, dried pools of blood, and mangled and battered corpses held frozen, a look of terror in their eyes. My hair stood on end as my mind imagined what kinds of beings could have caused this much damage. The biggest nut-pincher was a guard in power armor, encased in the wall. The only creature I knew of that could manage that would be a boultha, but there weren’t any leftover tracks outside.

  “What savage could have produced this chaos?” Kalvin wondered as he examined a body.

  “Damn, you might as well ask that wall over there, because I have no light bulbs shining in my head.”

  “Ah, this station contains surveillance so, ah--” the words slipped away from Kalvin as he probably got lost in his head. He crouched near some of the dead and studied them for minutes, looking for any sort of nuances or clues as to what had happened.

  “Hurry up, Kalvin. A dead snail superglued to a block of wood could move faster than you.”

  “My apologies.” Kalvin stood up and inched his way into the lead. He stepped onward, as if he didn’t want to know what or who did this, dragging his feet to a slug’s tempo.

  In the control room, monitors enclosed the room. Another dead scientist lay decomposing under one of the keyboards, his arm punctured with holes. Kalvin logged into the servers as an admin. “The last command typed into this computer was to disclose the location of our Room of Unknown Relics.” He pulled up a camera for each of the individual rooms. “Damn. They already took the key, and… and they took something else, too.” He scratched at his scalp in a nervous manner.

  “What else did they take?” I asked.

  “They took the bomb!”

  “How bad?”

  “To be candid, I have no clue. The writing said something like planetary mist. Though, there were more engravings we could not interpret. My analysis: It may be some variation of poison, or even worse.”

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Can it be disarmed?”

  “To be straightforward, the Order of Aegis has no indication of what the bomb does or how to activate or deactivate it. We do understand it to be crafted by the Devisors - the same species that crafted that key. That said, I would assume the Wersillian Legion understand how to control the bomb.” Kalvin looked up at me. I could see the worry reflecting from his eyes. “James, every study my scientists have completed has suggested the Devisors had technology far more innovative than any other identified species in this galaxy. If this bomb is activated, there is no foretelling what kind of devastation could be done!”

  “Then we need to know these enemies like the length of our Johnsons. Pull up the tapes.”

  Kalvin loaded a camera from the front hatch. It played back. The alarm flashed repeatedly in the corner of the screen. At the bottom, guards lined up, with more out of view. Moments later, the hatch burned a bright red and dripped away. Two individuals entered.

  The first was an unknown species to me, but I could tell he was a male. The being was humanoid but built like a bull; prominent muscles, physically intimidating, and near as tall as a maelkii. His white fur was thick, and he had manes that would make a lion jealous; growing along the chin and neck, the lengths of the arms, and the shins. Furthermore, the scary son of a bitch had horns like a demon growing from the sides of his head. And his armor was nothing like I’d ever seen; thick-red, with tons of tiny hexagons glowing and moving like waves and decorated with high-tech chainmail at the joints. Sharp claws, bone knives protruding a few centimeters from his elbows; an individual made for battle.

  The second was a female dytirc so ugly, she could model for death threats. Her skin was completely encased and stitched together with tree bark and leaves. What followed almost made my heart jump in rhythm: Five clones of the same dytirc entered behind the original.

  I looked at Kalvin, who studied the tape in fascination. His eyebrows twitched, and his eyes wondered. “Best guess: Warlords,” I told him. He remained silent, and I returned my eyes to the screen.

  The Order of Aegis guards unloaded a hell of a lot of firepower at them both. For the following minute, I watched as these guards were obliterated; they stood not a scrap of a chance. To leave us on a cliffhanger, the unknown male bull-man-thing punched a guard wearing power armor into the wall.

  “Good lord, what in the savory squawk are we dealing with here? These two… power whores... are unbelievable!” I exclaimed.

  I looked back at Kalvin; his eyes were fixed on the individual of an unknown species. “Kalvin?” I tapped his shoulder.

  “We must vacate, now!” He vamoosed back to the ship, me lurching behind him.

  “What? Why? Why were you staring at the abominable bull-man?”

  He stopped and turned to me. “James, that was a korkyra! If that species has allied themselves with the Wersillian Legion, we… our probabilities of losing this war are virtually definite.”

  “What the hell is a korkyra?” I inquired.

  “A species with strength near the level of a maelkii, agility and endurance on par with dor’o, and intelligence as extraordinary as the qwayks. That species, in layman’s terms, is a commanding army of you. Man for man, they are the deadliest force I have ever seen.” A typically charismatic, calm Kalvin was clearly disgruntled; taking rushed, jagged steps, he began an uncomfortable fiddling with his suit pocket.

  “Jeez, don’t slap me around without lifting my spirits back up. They must have a weakness.”

  “Rumors suggest they are few in numbers, but that is it.”

  The entire way back to the ship, Kalvin had on his I’m-in-deep-thought face, and he ignored everything I said. We entered his ship and took off almost immediately.

  Finally, Kalvin mumbled one last thought out loud, “The question is how did the Wersillian Legion recruit the korkyras?”