Jenrak
12-02-2006, 03:31
The Exus-Hykrica…
Amidst the shadows, amidst the darkness, in the dark corners of a galaxy where the light only barely pierces its dangerous sword into, a pantheon of dangerous worlds and even more dangerous systems. This was the home of malicious empires, horrendous murders and slaughterhouse genocide. Yet, it was life, it was to everyone, normal. But there were kingdoms, empires, that worked alone.
There were empires that posed a threat to reality itself – to order. Situated by burning stars, vortexes of never-ending death, one of these empires only crawled alongside the edge of known space with a dangerous fervour. Nobody knew what it was called, what is was named, except for the people who learned of it, who went to it. Yet no one would ever return from it, no one would live to see what they saw, and it only heightened the fear of everything around it. It was as if it was a massive black hole, a giant gravitational force of fear, sucking people into its terrible abode.
This empire, was called the Exus by its minions, its people and its warlords. They were a tall, powerful, but manipulative people, conquering and assimilating poor and unfortunate worlds before them, increasing the potency of their damage. Their red eyes only held centuries of pain and torture, their tongues licking their fervent cracked lips with the ancient millennia of war. They live for it, they fed off of it, and they depended on it.
They all had their price, their price for survival, but so far, they have never met it – so far, the only fools to fight them, were the fools of the arrogant, to only have their worlds crushed beneath a blanket of steel and iron. They called them Exuses, the children of the Totals, the previous empire name, ruled by the terrible Lord Totalius, his great vestige of hunger a rip within the social order. No one stood before his might, his hunger for chaos, and his armies swept forth many times to fuel the never-ending power, as he leered always from his crackling eyes.
Then there were the Joint, the seeds of annihilation, touching and drinking and eating all around them, consuming up even the most resourceful worlds into a bleak wasteland, so thoroughly that deserts looked like paradise compared to their handiwork. Powerful, mechanical, and heavily armoured, they worked with strict discipline and calculations, never letting a single chance slip by. For centuries they waned and waxed, their power growing and falling, with every world they burnt, every single star they fed from – until the two, the Totalians and the dreaded Joints, came as one.
Now lurking in this bleak, vast, steady empire, were two children born of the same womb in destruction, one of organic and symbolic meanings, the other a strong, violent society built on steel and alloys. This was the Exus-Hykrica, the Hybrids.
<Scout ship, Class name 1-Z>
Standing in his normal position, back bent, hands shaking, fingers bleeding, Kerenus watched as the droids prickled and picked their little tiny metal fingers, drenched in a thick glutinous liquid, stabbing into his ripped fingers, the pain searing up in a blinding motion. He could barely keep his voice shut, as his yell echoed through the whole of the small, tiny and weak ship. In fact, his yelp of pain was so annoying, the many squandering and loitering fellow soldiers on the ship had to tape his mouth shut, a grey band stuck over his mouth as he watched in horror his fingers being torn apart, flesh stripped from the bone, new flesh growing out in their place, like rotund strands of red liquid bound in a thin layer of transparent fluid. Barely breathing, he felt as if he would pass out, but that would be out of the question. If he ever did pass out, if he ever did fall down in fear or pain, or even loss of blood, he would be shocked back to unconsciousness, and that certainly would prove to be more painful that watching his finger, while null of any sharp activities, become cut open and dissected apart, muscle by muscle, bone by bone.
Whimpering like a little starving dog, he tapped his feet in wonder, as finally the last strip of muscle replaced his cut and gangrene hand, the purplish and black flesh from his original hand in flames aboard the trash compactor, sleek and silver. In this ship, its long nose-like cockpit, its wide spanned wings and its small compartments, life was harsh, life was difficult. They always had problems with the machines, and entire trips and scouting missions would take days upon days to reach, and they were always sent out in the middle of war to watch. Why did their superiors order them to go? Why not the machines? Would it simply be cheaper?
No, it apparently wouldn’t be. They had their reasons, they would say. They have calculations to think out, the machine Lords would agree. Bullshit was usually the first words that come out of Kerenus’s mind, and this was where he was put now – whimpering on a cramped scouting ship, his fingers being torn apart and ‘replaced’, only to be sucked into an endless void, with no known routes back. He had been tracing every part of his route, returning the information always back to the nearest headquarters, but it was a horrible trip. Twice his roommate had caught a strange fever, and for two days his mechanical leg began to rust violently. Now, in the process of fixing his friend’s leg, he was cut by the loose shards, and his hand infested with gangrene aboard the nasty conditions of the used ship.
Finally taking the tape off his face, and throwing it into the blazing trash compactor, he sighed heavily, before heading out of the dank and tiny medical room and across the grey hallway into the cockpit, where his friend sat in the control seat, as the ship lunged forwards from a small tug on their end, Kerenus falling to the floor, the hard ground cold on his bottom. “What the hell did you do?” He asked in rage, the first words coming out of his mouth.
“We’ve hit some sort of gravitational signature. There’s something big nearby.” His partner replied.
“Big? In this void of space?”
“We’re not in a damn void, K. We’re just stuck in a place that the empire’s never scouted out before, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah. Save me the lectures, I know where we are.”
“Then why did you ask if it was a void?”
“I just did, okay? Can you drop that?”
“Why should I? You’re the one being fussy.”
“Shut up.” Kerenus said with a tone of finality in his voice, sitting down at his sit, the soft leathery feeling pulsing warmly in his body, comforting sensations encompassing his form. He sighed with a glance, when his partner opened his mouth again.
“So how’s the crew?” He asked, of the others on board all of whom were asleep at the moment. Kerenus shrugged. “You’re as clueless as normal.” He said.
“Yeah? We – “ But before he said anything, he saw a small dot, standing out from the normal twinkling of the stars in the dark void that laid before him. Leaning over a little, he looked a bit more carefully, pressing the controls forward a slight bit, as the tiny dot appeared to grow larger to a spherical planet.
“The hell…” His partner murmured in amazement, pushing forwards as well, the scout ship swiftly blasting towards the object.
“We’ve found a planet.” The scout said. “And it’s not in our records, so we can begin the tracking.” Kerenus replied, punching in their co-ordinates into the beeping control panel, as the lights flared up in a brilliant display, a long line appearing on their window and their interface.
“This will be another addition to our empire.” The partner replied. “Shame. Looks like a nice planet. Oh well, it won’t be so pretty after the Joint gets through with it.”
“Fifty credits say Totalius will harness an academy of War here.”
“The fifth academy of War. Nope.” His partner said defiantly.
“We’ll see.” Kerenus said.
At that moment, a ship never seen before, emerged on their panel, as they watched in surprise, a ship, leaving the planet’s atmosphere, with what seemed to be an angel, and a strange flag a dotted feature of this oddity.
“Holy crap. This place is sentient. Let’s get out of here now!” Kerenus said, as his partner agreed, and the scout ship ran for it.
Amidst the shadows, amidst the darkness, in the dark corners of a galaxy where the light only barely pierces its dangerous sword into, a pantheon of dangerous worlds and even more dangerous systems. This was the home of malicious empires, horrendous murders and slaughterhouse genocide. Yet, it was life, it was to everyone, normal. But there were kingdoms, empires, that worked alone.
There were empires that posed a threat to reality itself – to order. Situated by burning stars, vortexes of never-ending death, one of these empires only crawled alongside the edge of known space with a dangerous fervour. Nobody knew what it was called, what is was named, except for the people who learned of it, who went to it. Yet no one would ever return from it, no one would live to see what they saw, and it only heightened the fear of everything around it. It was as if it was a massive black hole, a giant gravitational force of fear, sucking people into its terrible abode.
This empire, was called the Exus by its minions, its people and its warlords. They were a tall, powerful, but manipulative people, conquering and assimilating poor and unfortunate worlds before them, increasing the potency of their damage. Their red eyes only held centuries of pain and torture, their tongues licking their fervent cracked lips with the ancient millennia of war. They live for it, they fed off of it, and they depended on it.
They all had their price, their price for survival, but so far, they have never met it – so far, the only fools to fight them, were the fools of the arrogant, to only have their worlds crushed beneath a blanket of steel and iron. They called them Exuses, the children of the Totals, the previous empire name, ruled by the terrible Lord Totalius, his great vestige of hunger a rip within the social order. No one stood before his might, his hunger for chaos, and his armies swept forth many times to fuel the never-ending power, as he leered always from his crackling eyes.
Then there were the Joint, the seeds of annihilation, touching and drinking and eating all around them, consuming up even the most resourceful worlds into a bleak wasteland, so thoroughly that deserts looked like paradise compared to their handiwork. Powerful, mechanical, and heavily armoured, they worked with strict discipline and calculations, never letting a single chance slip by. For centuries they waned and waxed, their power growing and falling, with every world they burnt, every single star they fed from – until the two, the Totalians and the dreaded Joints, came as one.
Now lurking in this bleak, vast, steady empire, were two children born of the same womb in destruction, one of organic and symbolic meanings, the other a strong, violent society built on steel and alloys. This was the Exus-Hykrica, the Hybrids.
<Scout ship, Class name 1-Z>
Standing in his normal position, back bent, hands shaking, fingers bleeding, Kerenus watched as the droids prickled and picked their little tiny metal fingers, drenched in a thick glutinous liquid, stabbing into his ripped fingers, the pain searing up in a blinding motion. He could barely keep his voice shut, as his yell echoed through the whole of the small, tiny and weak ship. In fact, his yelp of pain was so annoying, the many squandering and loitering fellow soldiers on the ship had to tape his mouth shut, a grey band stuck over his mouth as he watched in horror his fingers being torn apart, flesh stripped from the bone, new flesh growing out in their place, like rotund strands of red liquid bound in a thin layer of transparent fluid. Barely breathing, he felt as if he would pass out, but that would be out of the question. If he ever did pass out, if he ever did fall down in fear or pain, or even loss of blood, he would be shocked back to unconsciousness, and that certainly would prove to be more painful that watching his finger, while null of any sharp activities, become cut open and dissected apart, muscle by muscle, bone by bone.
Whimpering like a little starving dog, he tapped his feet in wonder, as finally the last strip of muscle replaced his cut and gangrene hand, the purplish and black flesh from his original hand in flames aboard the trash compactor, sleek and silver. In this ship, its long nose-like cockpit, its wide spanned wings and its small compartments, life was harsh, life was difficult. They always had problems with the machines, and entire trips and scouting missions would take days upon days to reach, and they were always sent out in the middle of war to watch. Why did their superiors order them to go? Why not the machines? Would it simply be cheaper?
No, it apparently wouldn’t be. They had their reasons, they would say. They have calculations to think out, the machine Lords would agree. Bullshit was usually the first words that come out of Kerenus’s mind, and this was where he was put now – whimpering on a cramped scouting ship, his fingers being torn apart and ‘replaced’, only to be sucked into an endless void, with no known routes back. He had been tracing every part of his route, returning the information always back to the nearest headquarters, but it was a horrible trip. Twice his roommate had caught a strange fever, and for two days his mechanical leg began to rust violently. Now, in the process of fixing his friend’s leg, he was cut by the loose shards, and his hand infested with gangrene aboard the nasty conditions of the used ship.
Finally taking the tape off his face, and throwing it into the blazing trash compactor, he sighed heavily, before heading out of the dank and tiny medical room and across the grey hallway into the cockpit, where his friend sat in the control seat, as the ship lunged forwards from a small tug on their end, Kerenus falling to the floor, the hard ground cold on his bottom. “What the hell did you do?” He asked in rage, the first words coming out of his mouth.
“We’ve hit some sort of gravitational signature. There’s something big nearby.” His partner replied.
“Big? In this void of space?”
“We’re not in a damn void, K. We’re just stuck in a place that the empire’s never scouted out before, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah. Save me the lectures, I know where we are.”
“Then why did you ask if it was a void?”
“I just did, okay? Can you drop that?”
“Why should I? You’re the one being fussy.”
“Shut up.” Kerenus said with a tone of finality in his voice, sitting down at his sit, the soft leathery feeling pulsing warmly in his body, comforting sensations encompassing his form. He sighed with a glance, when his partner opened his mouth again.
“So how’s the crew?” He asked, of the others on board all of whom were asleep at the moment. Kerenus shrugged. “You’re as clueless as normal.” He said.
“Yeah? We – “ But before he said anything, he saw a small dot, standing out from the normal twinkling of the stars in the dark void that laid before him. Leaning over a little, he looked a bit more carefully, pressing the controls forward a slight bit, as the tiny dot appeared to grow larger to a spherical planet.
“The hell…” His partner murmured in amazement, pushing forwards as well, the scout ship swiftly blasting towards the object.
“We’ve found a planet.” The scout said. “And it’s not in our records, so we can begin the tracking.” Kerenus replied, punching in their co-ordinates into the beeping control panel, as the lights flared up in a brilliant display, a long line appearing on their window and their interface.
“This will be another addition to our empire.” The partner replied. “Shame. Looks like a nice planet. Oh well, it won’t be so pretty after the Joint gets through with it.”
“Fifty credits say Totalius will harness an academy of War here.”
“The fifth academy of War. Nope.” His partner said defiantly.
“We’ll see.” Kerenus said.
At that moment, a ship never seen before, emerged on their panel, as they watched in surprise, a ship, leaving the planet’s atmosphere, with what seemed to be an angel, and a strange flag a dotted feature of this oddity.
“Holy crap. This place is sentient. Let’s get out of here now!” Kerenus said, as his partner agreed, and the scout ship ran for it.