New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

“I am relieved you are all right, Apollonia,” Cathal Sair said.

Even though he had to sit on the other side of a clear titanium wall, Apollonia did not feel the distance between them.

She smiled, reaching up to put a hand on the titanium.  An alert tone reminded her that she was not supposed to touch the walls, and she reluctantly took her hand back down.

But Father Sair only looked happy at the gesture, the emotion seeming very genuine.

“It was really weird,” she said, feeling that the words were lame but for once not feeling annoyed at herself.  Really, how else could she describe it?  There weren’t really words for it.  ‘Weird’ would have to be enough.

Cathal seemed to take her words with great gravity, nodding thoughtfully, his eyes wandering down and out.

“What I said isn’t that insightful,” she noted, with a playful sarcasm.

“It’s not that,” he said, his smile turning easily into amusement.  “I just regret that you had to face something so . . . by all rumors, awful.”

“What are the rumors saying?” Apollonia asked.

“Rumors are just not worth focusing on,” Cathal said, waving away the thought.  “You should focus on recovering.”

“I don’t actually feel that bad, to be honest,” she said.  “I mean, it’s kind of odd, but I feel almost better than usual.  And get this – when they put the scanner disks on me after I came back, they worked!  Normally that stuff doesn’t get much of a signal once they put them on me.  So maybe this . . . helped me, in a way?”

Cathal did not seem to share her joy at that, only nodding and looking pensive again.

Apollonia felt it an odd response, and changed the subject.  “So, uh, does your religion talk about things like . . . well, weird things like you hear in the rumors-we-must-not-discuss?”

He snapped out of his thoughtful reverie.  “At times, yes.  There are strange things, strange events, strange eons.  Yet . . . much of it is allegory.  Or so I long believed.”

“Allegory sucks, then,” Apollonia joked.

The man’s smile did not seem as amused, and she wondered if what she’d said had been offensive.

“At the end of the day, I’m still here,” she said.  “I guess that’s a win.  And I guess this is just what a CR does, you know?”

Her words were bold, but they were as much to encourage herself as to put on an air.

Dark, she didn’t want to encounter anything like that again.

“Is it true that Ambassador Kell appeared?” Cathal asked quietly.

Apollonia’s eyes darted upwards.  The Craton was not so crude in technology as to have literal cameras like she’d often seen on New Vitriol.  But she knew that she was being monitored.

“I think I can’t really talk about details,” she said.  “Captain Brooks probably wouldn’t like that.”

“Of course, of course.  I apologize,” Sair said.  His face turned a little dark.  “I regret that he chose to send you.”

“Someone had to go,” she said.  “It might have been worse if I hadn’t been there.”

Which sounded like bragging, but she did feel it was true.  If she had not been there, she had a feeling that Response Team One would not be alive now.

She had taken its attention.  It had toyed with her – and that had bought time.

I guess I make good chum for weirdness, she thought.

Cathal leaned closer.  “Once you are out, Apollonia, I would . . . enjoy if we could pray together again.”

She blinked away her other thoughts, and found her cheeks feeling warm.  “Yeah.  Yeah, I think that would be nice.”

She said nothing else, but raised her hand – she did not touch the glass, but put it near.

On the other side, Cathal raised his hand and did the same thing from his side.

FINIS

---

< Ep 10 Part 39 | Ep 11 Part 1 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Pirra blinked slowly, staring at the ceiling again.

It was just as dull as ever, but right now she welcomed that.

Every part of her hurt; her head, her bones, her sky-damned winglets ached.  Even the points where her wing-drapes attached to them were sore.

And she kept having to throw up.

It was not that troublesome for a Dessei; humans had a far more difficult time regurgitating than her people, but after a certain point there wasn’t anything left to vomit and it just hurt.

The splitting headache only added to her misery; Y had told her that she’d narrowly avoided a serious brain injury, but getting the Pre-Traume Gel out of her brain would take several days.

“And unfortunately I cannot give you much to help with the discomfort,” he had said.  “There is only so much toxicity your body can take, even with nano-machines cleaning your blood around the clock.”

So she would have to suffer.

But it was not the physical discomfort that bothered her the most.

It hadn’t been that long ago she’d been on the altered Hev ship, been exposed and potentially afflicted herself.

Here she was; that exposure seemed pathetic in comparison to what she’d just experienced.

Her entire team had been utterly helpless in the face of . . .

She didn’t even know what the hell it was.

How could she be okay after that kind of exposure?

She kept trying to check herself, think through logic excercises.  Count to one hundred, go through the alphabet.  Sing old songs to herself.

She felt like she was complete, but she could not believe that she possibly was.

A force had controlled her like a puppet.  It was going to make her shoot herself, even though she’d tried to resist with every fiber of her being.

There was no technological way to do that under those circumstances.  Not without massive, intrusive technology like nano-machines or neural manipulators.  Things that had not been present.

Alexander was standing outside.  He could not come into the room right now; after her exposure, she had to be quarantined.

He’d tried to talk to her, and a part of her appreciated his concern and hated how much stress he was put under because of her.

But she did not know what to say to him.  How to even begin to broach the topic.

“Pirra?” he called through the intercom.

He called out to her every few minutes.  Pirra knew Y had told him to do so; to try and distract her from her physical ailments.  The AI would not understand her current feelings, however.

“I’m okay,” she said, through a scratchy singer.  She’d said that a few times, it was all she could really come up.

“Do you want me to go?” Alexander asked.

It was a sincere request; she knew he was hurting with concern for her, but he understood that she might just need space.

At least, she hoped he did.

“Yes,” she said.

There was a pause; in the corner of her vision she could see his form begin to retreat.

“Wait,” she said then, the thought popping into her head.

“Yes?” Alexander asked immediately.

“I need you to do something for me,” she said.  “I need you to get Iago and bring him here.  I need to talk to him.”

Alexander hesitated.  “All right,” he said.  Then he disappeared.

Iago would know, she thought.  He would understand what she had just experienced, in a way no one else would.

Maybe he could help her tame the fear that threatened to overturn her whole being.

---

< Ep 10 Part 38 | Ep 10 Part 40 >

Today is a double post because I feel like it. Enjoy.

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Captain’s Log:

Commander Urle is in stable condition.

Though he suffered a great amount of blood loss and torn tendons, Doctor Y has stated that he will be fully recovered within a few days.

I have spoken to him briefly and reviewed his footage of the incident.  I have nothing but the highest praise for him and for the actions of Response Team One.

Much of their data is incomplete or corrupted, but some portions of Apollonia’s in-helmet audio recorder is intact, even if her video data is not.  We do not know who she was speaking to, but all evidence seems to confirm that some sort of contact was made with a being we know precious little about.  What blurry images can be taken from Urle’s data suggest an alien being that we have never encountered before.

The pirates on the station and the surviving small vessels have capitulated completely, and we estimate that we have taken almost five thousand captive.  We are currently awaiting the arrival of a support squadron to take custody of them.

The lone survivor kidnapped from the colonies has been identified as Kade Karloff.  While he has yet to speak, we did find on him a written account about his events which sheds some light on the situation.

We still do not know how Ambassador Kell got onto the pirate vessel.

But he will tell me.  Soon we will speak, and I will not let him go without giving a very good explanation of what has just occurred.

---

Brooks closed his log thoughtfully.  Kell had said he would arrive on the hour, and it was still twenty minutes away.

He had reviewed all of the data they’d taken from the event, but to his immense annoyance, no trace of Kell appeared in any of them.  Urle’s video gave out before his apparent arrival, as had Apollonia’s audio.

He felt a strange pride at how she had attempted to free the others against whatever had been speaking to her, though he knew he had very little to do with the innate goodness in the young woman.

His eyes went back to the file that they had found on Mr. Karloff’s person.  He had, according to his logs, been made to write this by Captain Tarsota before his death.  But Karloff stressed that the pirate had wanted the truth to be known – ugly or not.

He brought up the text once more, perusing it.

Captain Tarsota was not always like this.

I won’t try to argue that he was a saint or even a good being.  He was not.  But he was not a monster.

He was sterile born, as many Greggans are.  He was a laborer from a young age, then ran away and joined a pirate crew.  He was big, but also smart, and became one of the leaders, until the old captain was killed and he took command.

They mostly stole food, ship parts.  Things needed for survival.  They were not usually cruel, but sometimes they could be.

It all changed when they found the strange temple in space.  It was a structure that he described as seeming like stone, though he carefully deleted all references that might help anyone else find it.  It had been the secret goal of the last captain – and possibly why he died – to find this place, which he said he had dreamed of.

Tarsota began to dream of it, too.  He followed the leads, found clues.  Ancient stories, which even in his personal logs he was very vague about.  Eventually, they led him to it.

Mostly, though, he said it was the dreams.  He could hear the singing of the place, calling him.  He described it like an ancient song by his ancestors, calling their people home.

When he found it, he thought there would be riches.  But there was only the sarcophagus and thousands upon thousands of dessicated corpses.  They were of a species he had never encountered before, but he hardly cared.  He had wanted gold, but settled for the sarcophagus.  It could be a tool.

His dreams turned to nightmares.  A horrible presence haunted him each night, torturing him and demanding things of him, robbing him of strength until he could not make himself resist.  It moved his hands, it gave orders through his voice.

He felt himself shrinking, becoming smaller.  He felt first like when he’d been a laborer, then like when he’d been a child.  Helpless.

Somehow blood was involved in the goal of the malignant force.  Human blood was better, or maybe he just didn’t want to kill his own people.  He wasn’t even sure by that point.  He just had to feed it something.  It demanded it, but even when he drenched it in the blood it was not enough.  Not right – there was something missing that he did not understand.

The Source made him opened the viewscreens while they were in zerospace, showing himself and the crew the world between worlds, or whatever it is.  He said that made it worse for them all, that the thing was strengthened through them seeing that cursed light.  He tried to kill himself, but it wasn’t enough, he could hurt and gouge his flesh, but not complete the job.

He was remembering little by the time the Craton appeared.  He knew it would mean his end, and he was glad.  He just hoped that it would not find someone new, though he had a feeling it would.

I deleted his personal logs, jammed the files with random data so they can’t be retrieved.  After seeing zerospace, after seeing him die I’m finally understanding just how terrifying this presence is.  I have to make sure no one else finds it.

That’s it.  That’s all that can be told about Captain Tarsota.  I wish there was a moral, a lesson here.  Some wisdom to impart.  Maybe someone else will figure it out from my few words here.  I hope so, but my head hurts.  I am too tired.

I don’t think I’m going to make it out.

Brooks put his tablet down, lost in thought.

His message indicator blinked.

“Yes?” he answered.

“My apologies for interrupting you, Captain,” Y said.  “You wished to hear of my results of the brain scans of our people and those of the pirates.”

“You’re not interrupting, doctor, please go ahead.”

Y sent visual data of brain scans.  “As you can see by the comparison between normal scans and those of our crew, portions of their brain activity temporarily lowered or even ceased during the event on the ship.  In Response Team One and Commander Urle it is most pronounced, though it is present on everyone on board the ship, including Apollonia Nor.  Thankfully, this seems a temporary phenomenon, and nearly all of their brain function has been restored.  What still lags will recover within a day or so, I believe.  They are most fortunate that the activity affected was not vital to life!”

“That’s good news.  Does this match the Greggans?” Brooks asked.

“For them, the effect was far more severe.  Here is a scan of average Greggan brain activity, and here is what we have from the pirate crew.”

The images appeared, and the differences were stark.  On the normal scan the brain was aglow with activity.  But on the pirates, there was almost total darkness.

“You’re saying that something shut down their brains?”

“Yes.  And yet, there were physiological markers that suggest they were functioning, albiet in a reduced way, not long before.”

Brooks frowned.  “What could explain this?”

“I am at a loss to explain, Captain.  There is only one comparison I can make, however strange it may be . . .”

“Go on,” Brooks urged.

“In some cases of brain trauma, it is necessary to use remote devices to stimulate the brain externally into normal functioning.  In cases of extreme brain shutdown, if the devices are disconnected or disabled, the result will be much like this.”

“You’re saying,” Brooks began, “That the pirates were being controlled by an external force?  And once it was gone their brains no longer could function on their own?”

“I cannot make such a conclusion,” Y said, rather evasively.  “It is just . . . I see similarities.”

Brooks sighed.  “And what about Mr. Karloff?”

“I am unsure,” Y said.  “His brain is showing large sections of darkness, but my attempts to externally stimulate the areas are having no effect.  It is possible that with some assistance his mind will heal, but the prognosis is not positive.  He is, at least, able to maintain his basic life functions.  All I can recommend is for his transfer to a place where he can be cared for better.”

“You mean MS-29,” Brooks replied.

“Yes, Captain.”

“I see.  Well . . . thank you, Doctor.  Continue to monitor the situation and inform me if anything changes.”

Another person to go to the Chain because of these things, Brooks thought.  He was too tired to even be bitter about it.

He ended the call and checked the time.  Kell should arrive at any moment.

The hour turned and a message came in at that moment.

I am here.

Brooks hesitated, feeling his hackles rise.

Taking a long and deep breath, he pushed his unease aside.  He usually felt this when Kell was present – even to an extent when Apollonia was around.

With her, he knew it was not her fault – and that she was, in reality, just a young woman.  One possessing a power they could not yet explain – but still just a young woman.  Like him in the ways that all humans were like each other.

But Kell was not.

He opened the door.

Kell came in, his eyes locking onto Brooks’s.  Unblinking, he approached.

“Take a seat,” Brooks said, gesturing.

Kell ignored it, pushing the chair aside to simply stand across from him.

“You have questions,” Kell said.

“Yes,” Brooks said, feeling his temper rise more than usual.  He could usually handle Kell’s utter disdain for acceptable behavior with more calm, but right now he was having a harder time managing it.

“A toll has been exacted upon you,” Kell noted, clearly seeing it.  “And upon your people.”

“Which is why I need to know more,” Brooks said.

Kell looked down upon him.  “Why do you think it will help?”

Brooks stood, meeting Kell’s gaze unflinchingly.  “You told me you would have answers for me.  I’ve waited long enough.”

Kell’s face remained nearly as impassive as always, but there was the barest hint of emotion.  For once there was no disdain or annoyance.  Only a calm acceptance.

“The thing that we destroyed was an ancient God-Priest.  They are a species beyond ancient; old when our world still glowed with the heat of its birth.

“They were born in strange ages before the dawn of stars and colonized the universe when to cross it meant far less than it does now.  Their lives were measured in eons and in those times they learned the secrets of the universe.”

Kell paused, turning slightly.  He seemed troubled by his own words.  “I am loathe to give credit to these beings, Captain.  They were not like humanity – or Dessei or Sepht or Bicet or the Hev.  Not in how they viewed the universe, nor in how they acted.  They were utterly without conscience, without love.  But they were powerful.

“As the stars began to glow and space itself stretched the distances between them, schism occurred in their people.  Once united and ruled by the sharp hand of their God-Priests, time caused factions to form.  Eventually it became impossible for their God-Priests to keep all in lockstep.

“Eventually even some of their own split from the fold, taking bands of their followers into the endless depths of space.”

Kell held up a finger.  “One band of these beings came upon a cooling rock orbiting the star you call Sol.  They settled this world just as the first life formed, and then using their cruel and twisted technology, they used that life as the basis to create something new.  They created my people, Captain.

“We were slaves to serve these colonists, who were few in number.  We were their laborers, their servants, their soldiers.  Because despite their age and power, they were beset by other beings, just as ancient, who hated them.  All of them equally abhorrent and soulless creatures that all saw the universe as theirs, something to take and hold, to mold and break and twist as they pleased.

“Thus my kind were also cannon fodder.  Against the weapons possessed by these beings, we died in our billions.  Never once did our creators spare the slightest thought to our fates or our suffering.  And we fought with every ounce of our beings, but we began to wonder; was to fight and die and serve all we would ever know?  Was there anything more?”

Kell’s hand formed into a fist, his knuckles turning white.  “When we rose, we killed them all.  They again killed us with dazzling methods of cruelty, but we had nothing to lose and they had no mercy to spare us if we surrendered.”

He looked at Brooks, and something incredibly violent, feral and hateful went across his face.  “I still remember what it was like, in perfect clarity, to kill them.  To rip them apart, to hear their flesh tear as I removed their heads.  It was the first time I felt joy in my life.”

He laughed, loudly, almost uproariously, and Brooks sat back into his chair, almost propelled so as his insides turned cold.

“You would think that to have death be the first thing that brought happiness to my kind would mean we are monsters – and I would not disagree.  But is that all we are?”

He shook his head.  “Nevertheless, we did not kill them all.  Some of our hated masters escaped back into the stars.  Among them their God-Priests.”

He met Brooks’s eyes.  “One of whom is the being we just encountered, that these foolish, unfortunate pirates discovered.  Make no mistake – this God-Priest was long dead.  But the God-Priests were capable of eluding death in some ways, and perhaps even returning from it.

“I do not know where the pirates found it; frankly, I do not care, because even I have long grown past dreams of petty revenge, at least until it is served directly to my face.”

He shook his head, looking down and away.  “But no – what I did was not even revenge.  You understand, I know you do, that the remnant of that ancient God-Priest wrought all of this.  When the pirates discovered his carcass, they thought they had found a weapon.  But they were puppets long before they even drew near it.  The Priest had called them in their dreams, brought them to it, and then guided them, slowly taking over the mind of their leader until only fragments of its mind remained.  Once I destroyed it, there was not enough left of the Captain’s original mind to even sustain its life.”

“How can you kill such a being?” Brooks asked, finding his voice hoarse.  His throat scratched painfully, and making the words was difficult.

“I consumed it.  In its deathly state it could not resist me enough; though you know it tried.”

Kell smiled, the feral viciousness back in a heartbeat.  “And it knew fear as I consigned it to a final death.”

His face returned to its normal placid, emotionless state and he met Brooks’s eyes again.  “I know that nothing I just told you will bring you any peace.  You also know that all I tell you is the truth,” he said.  “You know that it was the God-Priest calling that caused our vessel to hum.  It sought an even greater host than its current one, because no matter how many lives and how much blood that pirate fed to it, it was not quite enough to bring it back from death.  It sought you, Captain, and this ship.

“I had to destroy it; we all know that even had we sequestered those remains, hidden them so that they might not tempt us, it would only be a matter of time before Freeman found it.  And once it had him, it would return.  A God-Priest with knowledge of the universe, with a perfect puppet to use for its ends would have been a thing beyond terrible.”

Kell’s eyes sparkled, almost feverishly.  “I know, too, why you knew to believe that foolish young priest and Apollonia Nor when they told you of the ship’s hum,” Kell said.  “Because you heard its song yourself.”

Brooks was pale, a bead of sweat running down his brow.  He said nothing, meeting Kell’s eyes until he could not anymore.  They lost focus, staring off into the distance where he still saw the impression of an eye, fixed upon him.

Kell rose.  “It is sometimes a painful thing to learn a truth, Captain.”

He said nothing else as he left.

Brooks received a call from Jaya, requesting permission to enter and speak to him.  Brooks declined the call.

---

< Ep 10 Part 36 | Ep 10 Part 38 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

“Captain, we are recording that all our people are off the pirate vessel,” Commander Eboh said.  “Their shuttles are heading back.”

“Good,” Brooks said, the great pain in his chest easing somewhat at the news.

It had been twenty minutes since they’d lost contact with Team One and the wait had been terrible.  “Once they are safely out of range-“

“I’m sorry sir,” Eboh interrupted.  “Ambassador Kell is . . . he’s on the line, Captain, and saying he must speak with you.”

Brooks froze, staring at the communications officer.  “Ambassador Kell is on the shuttle?  Or is he somewhere on the Craton we haven’t looked?”

“He’s . . . on the shuttle, Captain.”

Brooks went quiet again for a long moment.  Then; “Put him on.”

Kell’s voice came into his ear.

“Captain, destroy this vessel as soon as we are clear,” Kell’s voice came through, deep and commanding.

“Kell how the fuck are you on that ship?” Brooks demanded.

“That is not important.  Just destroy this ship.  It is poison.”

Brooks took a long pause.  “When you return, we will have a long talk, Ambassador.”

“So long as you do what I say.”

“I have no intention of leaving that ship – or anything on it – intact,” Brooks said.

“Good.”  Kell clicked off the line.

Gasconey, the Response officer in charge, came on.  “I’m sorry, Captain, I have no idea how the Ambassador got here, but when we found Team One he was the only one awake.”

“Our medical readings from the team seem dire, Commander,” Brooks said.  “Give me some good news.”

“We’ve got Commander Urle stabilized.  He lost a lot of blood but seems otherwise all right.  Apollonia Nor is unconscious but seems in good health.  Response Team One are somewhat out of it, but we’re not reading anything seriously wrong with them.”

Gasconey sighed.  “We recovered one colonist, sir.  He was on the bridge, but he’s not communicative.  The rest . . .  God, sir, you should have seen them.  I’m sorry, I wouldn’t actually wish it on anyone.  We’ve got scans, but none of them were alive.  These fucking pirates strung them up like animals.”

Brooks had seen some of the images already; the bodies hanging, drained of blood.  It was beyond horrifying.

“What about the pirates?” he asked, knowing he could not linger on that horror.

“All of them were catatonic.  Just laying or sitting on the decks when we left – at most they had some basal brain activity, but even that was fading.  We can’t account for it, sir, but we scanned them.”

“And their Captain?”

“He was dead, sir, on the bridge.  Alone with the surviving colonist.  Not sure what killed him, but he had zero brain activity.”

Brooks took a long breath.  “You did good work.  Get back here safely.”

“Aye, Captain.”

The shuttles had reached a safe distance from the pirate ship, and he turned to Jaya.  “Prepare to fire on the pirate vessel.  Use megaton-scale warheads – I want that ship gone.”

Jaya did not move to act.  “Captain, we have orders to recover the relic technology.”

“There is no relic technology aboard that ship,” Brooks said.  “Follow my orders.”

“Captain,” Jaya said, her face set in dead, serious calm.  “There was something there.  We need to recover it.”

“Don’t argue with me, Commander,” Brooks said shortly.

“Captain, all of this is for nothing if we do not recover whatever was on there!” Jaya burst out.

A silence fell over the command center.

“You have your orders,” Brooks told her, meeting her gaze.  “I will not sacrifice my people for whatever it is those pirates found.  It did not do them any favors.”

Her lips were pressed into a tight line, but she gave him a brief nod.

Brooks looked back to the image of the pirate vessel on the screen.

The missile streaked out; the coilguns took aim and fired.  The three shots were aimed to break the ship’s back, to make it easy for the nuclear warheads to rip apart completely.

The missiles hit a few moments after the coilguns.  Their brilliant flashes were dimmed to tolerable levels, but were still so bright as to completely wash out all detail.  When the fireballs disappeared, so had the pirate vessel.  Only small pieces of debris remained, and their lasers went to work destroying those.

He felt a measure of calm return.

---

< Ep 10 Part 35 | Ep 10 Part 37 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

Oh Lord of the Dark, Soul of Emptiness, 

please have mercy on us tiny lights in the darkness.

Though we are doomed to dim, 

please grant us your mercy for a swift passing.

Cathal had always meant the words of the prayer, as long back as he could recall.  As a child he had often been afraid of the idea of the Dark and their inevitable deaths.

But he had gained inner peace when he learned that all things died, that it was inevitable and normal.  He had accepted his own mortality.

But while he had cared for many, he had never been so afraid to lose someone.

“Please, protect Apollonia,” he whispered fiercely, rocking back and forth with pent-up energy that kept him from being as still as he should while praying.

Something great was occurring on the disabled pirate ship.  He did not know what, but he knew that he was not meant to be a part of it.

The Source there, whatever it was, had not called him.  If it had, he would be there now, he knew.  Things had worked out as an Ascended had desired.  It had noticed him, that he knew – and found him wanting in some way.

But it had decided to take Apollonia.

“Please,” he said out loud, fiercely, through tears streaming down his cheeks.

Tears of shame at his own inadequacy.  Tears of fear for his friend.

“I need a miracle.”

---

Apollonia felt something cold on her hand.

For a moment she thought it was the feel of her own blood; but that would be hot, not cold, and she opened her eyes to stare at the hand of Kell, holding hers.

Even with all of her strength she could not budge the metal blade.  He shook her hand, almost gently, and her ersatz knife fell from her grip, clattering to the floor.

He let go of her, and she felt all strength leave her body; the grip of the Source releasing her.

Because now it was entirely focused on Kell.

He was staring back at it, his face tight with an anger so intense that Apollonia felt stunned by it, subsuming any question she might have of why he had come or how he had gotten here.

The revulsion of the ancient Priest was visceral, manifesting in the world; the edges of the sarcophagus around it began to decay, crumbling to dust, and its withered body shook with a hate even brighter than Kell’s.

Unworthy thrall.  You dare to stand before your god again?

The destructive fury of the being seemed to be expanding; the decking around it began to crack and corrode, pitting as if acid was eating away at it, and with what little strength she had, Apollonia tried to drag herself away.

Kell alone seemed unaffected.  He took a step closer.

“You are no god,” he said.  “Nor are you beloved of any of those beings who you proclaim our superiors.”

Blasphemy! the Priest screamed, punctuated with a boom like thunder that left its sarcophagus cracked and rent the metal deck plates.

“You escaped once,” Kell said.  “But not this time.”

I am eternal! the Source screamed.

But it was tinged with fear.

Kell lunged in; his swiftness that of a predator going for prey.

And when he hit the withered carcass, he was not a man, but his true form.

Apollonia saw it clearly for a moment.  It seemed to pour forth from his body; a viscous, tar-like liquid that covered the Star-Priest, dragging it down into its sarcophagus.

Its legs flailed, and it rent reality, creating bizarre distortions in the air that glowed in unearthly colors.

The tarry flesh of Kell contorted, but it did not stop.

She could not see what happened in the sarcophagus, but she felt the waning presence of the Source.

It reached out to her, screaming for help.  Begging for her, the one it had just wanted to kill.

Don’t you want to know what you truly are?

Don’t you want to know what it means for your life?

You can be greater.

Help me, young one and I will tell you all.

“No,” she said softly.  She couldn’t even feel hate for it at this point.  Only disgust.

Its screams turned into incoherent pain and fear.  Until it winked out.

And she could only think that even unto its end it had not understood or changed.

Kell’s mass, a hulking, shapeless fluid mound, sat atop the sarcophagus and then screamed from a hundred mouths.

A primal release of anger that had been contained for eons.

Its ancient enemy destroyed at long last.

---

< Ep 10 Part 34 | Ep 10 Part 36 >

New to Other-Terrestrial? Check here! Or if you need to, jump to the beginning of the episode here!

---

“What the hell is going on in there?” Brooks demanded.

“Team One is not responding,” Kai called again.  “We’ve got mic control and they’re on, but we’re receiving nothing!”

“Keep calling!” Brooks ordered, feeling fear roiling inside.  “Do we have biometrics?”

“Yes, Captain,” Y said, his voice running far faster than normal, almost frenetic.  “But their readings are impossible – their hearts are racing and yet brain activity has dropped to incredibly low levels.  I believe they are conscious, but . . . I do not understand why they are unable to say anything.”

“An exotic chemical paralysis?” Cenz suggested with as much urgency as Y.  “But no, there are no other signals that suggest it . . .”

“Teams Two, Three, and Four are all responding,” Eboh said.  “They are reporting that they are fine, and that the pirates are no longer fighting.”

“Surrendering?” Brooks asked.

“No, sir.  They are doing nothing – the way they are describing it it sounds like they have gone into vegetative states.”

Brooks stood, pointing sharply.  “Order all teams to converge on Team One’s position,” he said.  “I want them to extract Team One, Nor, and Urle, and get them the hell off that ship!”

He turned to Jaya.  “Prepare a full barrage – coilguns, missiles, everything.  As soon as we have all friendlies off that ship, I want it destroyed.”

He looked back to the pirate ship on the screen.  “I don’t care how valuable that relic technology is.  I am not going to let it take my people.”

He had seen the displeasure on Jaya’s face at his command.  But she did not argue with him.

Good, he thought.  Now was not the time for that.

“Find Ambassador Kell,” he said.  “Tell him I urgently need to speak with him.”

Cenz hesitated.  “He is not in his room, Captain.”

“Then where is he?” Brooks demanded.

---

Pirra’s heart thudded in her chest like a hummingbird, the helplessness she felt almost overpowering.

She’d never been this helpless in her life.  Her body would not obey her commands, she could almost feel the clutches of the unseen force upon her body, paralyzing her almost completely.

She knew that its attention was barely on her and she could do nothing.  It could stop her heart if it wanted, with barely a thought.

Her head was tilted downward, staring at the floor.  Whatever was going on above she could not see, she could only see the boots of Apollonia Nor, now covered in the blood that had splattered everywhere.

Even her suit cameras were non-functioning, just repeating error after error.

Skies, she should have called off this mission as soon as they saw the fucking floating blood.  What had she been thinking to press on?

She hadn’t, she knew on some level.  She’d been drawn in, like the others.  A moth to a flame.

It didn’t help to dwell on that.  What did she have control over?  Her suit was useless, but she could breathe, she could blink, albiet with some difficulty.  She looked around, trying to see if she could make eye contact with anyone else nearby, they had a blink-code that could impart a little information . . .

But no one was within her vision.

Her hands began to move, shocking her.  She still held her rifle, and she shifted it, pointing it upwards.

Bringing the barrel in line with her head.

“Oh shit,” she breathed.

---

“I don’t want to know anything you have to tell me,” Apollonia said.

Or attempted; her mouth and throat could barely move.  But she knew the Source could understand her.

Her head was swimming, her body screamed in pain, her muscles tensing, struggling to take breath through lungs that did not want to obey her.

I offer.  And I take, the voice hissed.

She heard guttural cries, the radios suddenly working by its will.

It was the Response team.  They were yelling, screaming.

She did not have to see them to know what was going on.  Their words were clear.

“I can’t stop it!” one man yelled.

“Do not fire!” Pirra roared.  “Do not pull those goddamn triggers!”

“I can’t control my hands,” Kiseleva’s voice came through, a strained grunt.  “Bliat, I’m not going to fucking shoot myself damn it . . .”

“Hold your fire, that is a fucking order!” Pirra screamed.

But Apollonia knew that they could not help it.  The Source demanded; and it was so.  They would turn their own weapons on themselves and they would die.  Their blood would feed it.

“No!” she heard the clipped yell.

And then the clicks of triggers.

But no shots rang out.

“Locked out!” Kiseleva cried.  “Who did it?”

A bright flash streaked by Apollonia, a dozen tracer rounds that ripped into the alien carcass, and she felt its hold slacken for an instant as its attention was diverted.  She fell back, her body still stiff, muscles roaring with pain.  Hitting the floor hard, she nonetheless turned her head, trying to see who had fired.

Urle was beyond the team, on all fours.  He was crawling forward slowly, doggedly.  He could not rise, but the mechanical weapons on his back were aimed on the Source, firing another burst of rounds into it.

Blood ran from the edges of his prosthetics, the machine battling the flesh that had fallen sway to the control.  Even the mechanical parts struggled, sparking and shaking, fighting off an alien hold that they could not comprehend.

“You . . . will not take . . . my people!” Urle yelled.

His weapons fired again, him bracing against the ground, and Apollonia could only stare at what it cost him.  His entire body was shaking, and despite his fire . . .

The Source stood unharmed.

The holes from the bullets seemed to have no effect on it, and it gazed at him only a moment longer.

Urle groaned, its full attention too much even for how much he was willing to fight.  He sagged, his weapons fell, and then he too crumpled to the floor.

The ancient Priest Lord looked back to her.

She felt herself pulled like a puppet back upright, her feet dragging against the decking as she came closer to the thing.  Its feeble arms reached out, opening widely to welcome her.

And she realized she had a jagged piece of metal in her hands.

For a moment she thought to stab it, but even as the thought came to her she found that she did not lift it against the cursed thing – but against her own neck.

Her helmet crashed to the floor, even though she did not remember taking it off, and the jagged metal pressed against her now-exposed jugular.

With your blood, I shall be whole, it said.  Mania filled its voice, and the terrifying thought came through her mind that for all its power, all its ancient knowledge . . .

It was mad.

She did not think her blood would restore it.  She did not know if anything could.

But it thought that it would.  And it would drain her of every drop of life in the effort.

And beyond her, the crew of the Craton.  And once it dominated even the mind of Captain Brooks, it would travel and seek other lives.

It would never stop.  Never be sated.  It would always be able to reach out into the dreams of men and women to find those who would be tempted, and where it could not persuade it would force.

Until it turned the stars red with blood.

The metal bit into her neck.  She felt it ready to cut.

It was closer now, without even moving it seemed to dominate all of her vision.

There was nothing she could do.

---

< Ep 10 Part 33 | Ep 10 Part 35 >