Tales From a Parallel Universe: Part I (Lexx Fan Fiction)
My name is Lilly Starstrider, I come from the world of B6F. You probably know it as a member of the League of 20,000 planets. It's a beautiful world with warm beaches, palm trees, blue sky, and fresh air. Quite the contrast from this cold, dark, and smelly prison barge. Here I was sticking up for my little brother against those drunk clerics and then I felt a jolt to the back. Next thing I know, I wake up here strapped vertically to this rusted metal slab. I couldn't even feel my arms above my head as they have gone numb from the lack of blood flow. I was in a narrow metal corridor with other slabs in line in front of me, behind me, and a whole separate row to my left. They also fitted me with this clever little body harness to prevent me from using my core strength to escape.
My life was pretty uninteresting before this. My parents were two high ranking officials in the Divine Order, Universe only knows that happened to them after the events that unfold here. They were off world most of the time leaving me to take care of my younger brother Dylan. B6F is a vacation planet where the elite of the Divine Order resided when they weren't on the Cluster. Most of the time it was was quite, no crime, nothing eventful ever took place until one day I caught two old clerics trying to molest my brother. So here we are, strapped to a piece of metal on a prisoner transport.
The rumors really were true, They will arrest you and ship you off to the Cluster for the most minor infraction. People say that the system is fair, that His Divine Shadow's judgement is merciful and forgiving. But one thing is certain, nobody I know who has been apprehended has ever come back. But why would they have the trial on the Cluster, I get that it's the capital of the League of 20,000 but it seems like a total waste to ship the accused all the way there. All I can do is hope for the best, hope that His Shadow will see that I was only doing what was right. "I hope my brother is alri....."
Before I could complete my worrisome thought, an officer dressed in black approached me. A smirk flew across his face as he reached out to touch my face with his palm, I turned my head away to resist him. Only thing I could do as I was bound. As his hand left my face I painfully felt an electrical shock. As my body convulsed I noticed the officer was holding down a button on a small remote control device with a smug smile on his face. As my eyes acknowledged him the electrocution stopped as he took his hand off of the button and gleefully said "You're going into cold storage sweetheart, enjoy the trip!"
Cold Storage? Wait, what!? Before I could speak to ask what he meant, freezing cold steam shot down from the ceiling and before you knew it, I faded out of consciousness. I heard that in cryo-sleep that you never dream, but even my dreams proved to be resilient. As if my mind was trying to offer me a relief from the stress and the fear of things to come. It wasn't vivid, it was mostly flashes of memories, The feeling of the ocean breeze while standing on the beaches of B6F. I looked down into a puddle in the sand to see my reflection staring back at me, My skinny build, my blue eyes, and my thick brown haired pixie cut. My face then morphed into the face of my brother, then my parents, then my friends, and everyone that I have ever loved. They all faded in and out of the blackness. I then saw the face of my mother who began speaking, but her voice sounded different, computerized, and it was speaking in a manner which was incoherent and seemed to echo. The word's became more clear, and eventually they became coherent enough to make them out.
"PRISONER TRANSPORT 84B04 Proceed to gate 417 Punishment Level #2"
This repeated over and over as I slowly regained my consciousness, my body shivering as a blast of warm steam came down from the ceiling in a similar fashion as before to thaw me out. Here already huh? That was quick but I guess one of the benefits of cold sleep is there is no passage of time. Fifteen minutes later, two officers including the one from before came down to "inspect us"
"Number five, number six, and number seven freeze dried!" One of the officers exclaimed loudly. "Don't worry! We'll meet our delivery quota." The other responded.
The officer from earlier patted me on my cheek. "Good Morning" he said as he chuckled. I don't know if it was thirty minutes, two hours, or the remainder of the entire cycle of time, but it felt like forever until the transport docked. There were no windows so you couldn't see what was going on outside the craft. Also mind you so my still groggy eyes couldn't see anything other than the back of the slab in front of me. All I could hear was a woman crying and all I could think about was what is going to happen to me?
A huge vibration shook the transport and our slabs swung slightly. I guess were here I thought as a large door to the front of the corridor opened and our slabs began moving like a conveyor belt. We were literally being treated like cattle on a farm. What kind of Justice system is this? My first glimpse of the cluster was a large gritty and poorly lit room which was the size of a warehouse. Every piece of technology in this large space was clunky, old, and worn. This was the Cluster? I expected something grand and beautiful considering that it's the seat of His Shadow. No beauty to be found. Just a dark industrial sized room filled the moans and cries of all of "criminals" who were awaiting justice. Not to mention the stench of decomposing flesh and rusting metal assaulting my nose. This place literally smelled like death.
"I worship his shadow.... I worship his shadow.... I worship his shadow....."
I whispered to myself in a prayer. I did nothing wrong, he should protect me. He should know.... I thought. Our slabs slowly moved forward towards the end of the room until they suddenly came to a screeching halt. I struggled to see what was going on but I couldn't make much of it as there were many slabs ahead of me. What I did see to the corner left was a flickering hologram of a lawyer pop up with his left arm raised to greet her but it was as if he was frozen in time. Several seconds after some loud mechanical noises. The hologram of the lawyer suddenly became animated.
"My Client......." The lawyer Hologram said all to pause for a mechanical voice to continue the sentence. "Stelios Peachtree of Dill 4" The Lawyer continued "Is Innocent of the charge of...." The Lawyer glitched for a second creating a pause but then resumed "Failing to perform her wifely duties and throws herself upon the mercy of his court. Secure in the knowledge that his Shadow's wisdom will prevail upon these proceedings." More mechanical noises ensued as I heard muffled cries from the woman.
I then heard different voice, this one more stern. "You...." (Computerized voice) Stelios Peachtree of Dill 4" "Have been found guilty of failing to perform your wifely duties. You are therefore sentenced to be transformed into a love slave and to be given too......" (Computerized voice) C345665 "To be used for their pleasure, may his merciful shadow fall upon you." The sound of a loud metal clang followed as the woman's slab broke off to the right being escorted by two decapitated human bodies with robot heads as a substitute. The woman began to cry louder until she all but vanished down the hallway.
"What fresh hell is this???" I said to myself. I continued to hope for the best but it just proceeded to get so much more worse from there. Another prisoner was prepared and it went as follows..
"My Client...... (Computerized Voice) Tweeze of Orbital 6.. "is innocent of the charge of... littering in the temple and throws himself upon the mercy of his court. Secure in the knowledge that his Shadow's wisdom will prevail upon these proceedings." After six seconds it continued again, this time with the Judge's voice which I could only assume at this point was yet another hologram.
"You" (Computerized Voice) Tweeze of Orbital 6 "Have been found guilty of littering in the temple. You are therefore sentenced to.... have your individual life terminated. Although his merciful shadow will allow many of your vital organs to live on as components used in the making of robotic drones. Your usable flesh will be contributed to the protein bank where it will be recycled for purposes that serve his shadow... *computer glitch* serve his shadow."
"ARE YOU KIDDING ME!??? DEATH FOR LITTERING IN THE TEMPLE!??" I thought to myself with utter revulsion of how ridiculous this was.
A loud clang followed as the slab changed rails which began moving to my left. Tweeze began begging and screaming for his life as the lawyer hologram dissolved and was replaced by a different hologram popping up of what could be assumed to be an executioner. "In the execution of this sentence you are hereby cleansed of your crimes against the people of the 20,000 planets. May his merciful shadow fall upon you." The hologram said as Tweeze's slab moved closer a glowing red area which was outlined by the shape of a slab. As if the slab was supposed to fit in it like a puzzle piece. The sound of saws began to pierce my ears while coexisting with the man's frightful screams. The screaming grew very loud and intense as his slab merged into the hot red groove. As his cries finally subsided, I listened in horror as I heard the sound of bone and flesh being sliced by the screech of the saws.
I'm finished. I'm going to die, if I am lucky I will be made into a love slave. But I will never see my family again. My faith shattered. This is not a fair system, there is no justice. This is a slaughter house for people. I proceeded to close my eyes for the next four people whom were executed all for frivolous things that should never warrant ending a person's life. One was person was even executed for, get this... sneezing on a cleric. No matter how stupid the crime if even a crime at all, they were all sentenced to termination.
I kept my eyes closed the entire time as it was all I could do. I couldn't even cover my ears to drown out the screams of the painful deaths occurring in front of me. I wanted it all to be over as quick as possible. I couldn't take this anymore, I had a splitting migraine from the agonizing cries in addition to the discomfort of being suspended on a slab. It felt like an eternity waiting for my inevitable demise.
A fifth person was then moved up to face trial. My eyes were still closed until I heard the system computer speak a very familiar name.
"My Client...." (Computerized voice) Dylan Starstrider of B6F "Is innocent of the charges of assaulting a cleric in the service of his Shadow"
My eyes shot open with disbelief. My Brother! He did nothing wrong! He was only defending himself. Those old clerics should have been arrested instead for trying to molest him. "DYLAN!!!!" I yelled at the top of my lungs. I was powerless. I heard his panicking voice yell back to me. "Sis! Is that you?! Please help!...."
"Yes! It's me! Close your eyes Dylan! Close your eyes!" I responded completely helpless to do anything. I heard him letting out a primal scream as they attached the clunky memory probe device to his head. He was trie to resist the machine but it turned out to be futile as I then heard those dreaded words from the judge.
"You" (Computerized Voice) Dylan Starstrider of B6F "Have been found guilty of assaulting a cleric in the service of His Shadow. You are therefore sentenced to.... have your individual life terminated. Although his merciful shadow will allow many of your vital organs to live on as components used in the making of robotic drones. Your usable flesh will be contributed to the protein bank where it will be recycled for purposes that serve his shadow."
His slab then changed rails and began moving towards the grinder. "NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!!!!!" I roared with tears pouring out of my eyes. "Help me Sis! Help!" he frantically shouted. "I am sorry, I can't.... I can't do anything....." I yelled as the words struggled to leave my mouth. The Executioner's voice became muffled out by my own wailing.
"Goodbye sis...... I love you." He peacefully said in a calm manner, seemingly accepting his fate.
"Good... Goodbye Dylan. I'll see you.. I'll be with you soon." I stuttered as his slab entered the machine. As his final screams pierced my eardrums my eyes rained tears to the point my vision became blurry. I cried so hard my vocal chords tightened. My brother did not deserve this. Two slabs were now ahead of me. Nothing mattered to me now as I didn't want to live anymore. They just took everything away from me.
As the next the lawyer began to lay out the charges of the next prisoner the machine glitched frozen following a loud BOOM! A massive fiery explosion rocked the left side of the room. The room shook as I caught a glimpse of the blast at the corner of my eye. I heard the sound of metal bending as the room next to us was collapsing in on itself in a blazing inferno. Two robotic guards proceeded to move towards it to investigate only to be immediately vaporized by two well placed shots.
"LET'S FREE THESE PRISONERS! MOVE! MOVE! MOVE!" a loud voice exclaimed in a heroic tone. A group of men dressed in revealing black leather outfits rushed into sight. Two of the men flanked the slab of the prisoner who was about to be executed. They both grabbed his arms "On three! One... Two... Three... Pull!" The leader barked as the two men freed the prisoner from his slab. They proceeded to do the same for the next in line and then finally they reached me.
"Hang in there miss, we're going to get you out of here!" Said the leader. The two burly men grabbed my arms. "ON THREE! ONE, TWO, THREE, PULL!!!!" He commanded as they pulled me ripping the bindings and the harness that held me to the slab. I immediately collapsed to the ground unable to move or feel my arms. The other men moved onto free the others while the leader lifted me off of the ground and carried me off to a safe corner of the room.
"Who are you?" I muttered to him still weak and traumatized.
"Jack "Thruster" Killian, Austral-B Heretics, At your service" He responded in an over the top manner as he lifted my hand in the air and kissed it. "You can just call me Jack..." Jack was a husky man with short dark hair and a large scar on the left side of his face which ran down from his forehead, over his eyebrow, past his deep green eyes and down his cheek. He was clearly a veteran warrior who had fought in many battles against the Divine Order.
Jack's 'heroic' and charming introduction was interrupted by the sound of alarms going off and weapons fire being exchanged as three more sentry robots entered the room. "Stay down, and don't move" He said as he got up and ran off to go join in on the ensuing battle. Free from the slab I finally got to see the whole room. There was a huge out of control fire about fifty yards in front of me. The husk of a burning prisoner transport was visible through the raging flames. I then felt my fingers being able to move again as blood circulation was slowly returning to my arms. Almost as if my limbs were waking up from being asleep.
I scanned the room with my eyes more were I finally got a glimpse of the glowing red slot in which the slabs were being forced into. There were lines drawn in the wall depicting all of the major organs like the brain, heart, kidneys, lungs. Each line had a small razor saw protruding from it. So this is how they executed my brother! He was rhythmically cut open and systematically dissected like a frog. I'm alive... but he's is dead... I failed to protect him so what do I possibly have to live for? In that moment one of the heretics was disintegrated by a single shot from a sentry guard but not before his weapon flung out of his hands, hitting the ground and sliding towards my direction.
There was only one thing I could possibly think of at this point. Revenge! I am going to make them pay for what they did to Dylan! As movement began to return to my arms, I crawled towards the "black pack" as they call them. Pincer shaped guns which can turn pretty much anything into a smoldering pile of dust. I grabbed the battery pack in which the weapon was attached to via a cable and dragged it towards me. My weak arms struggled for a moment with this heavy piece of equipment, It wasn't as lightweight as it looked in the hands of the burly heretics or the robotic sentry guards who could hold it with one hand.
Holding the weapon with both hands I put a slight pressure on the handle and the pincer snapped open with the weapon slightly vibrating. I felt it's energy charging up just waiting for another squeeze of my hand to unleash it. I pointed the black pack at two of the sentry guards who were shooting at the heretics who seemed unaware of my existence. I squeezed grip and out came a loud burst of energy. I quickly aimed for the other one and squeezed again. Green webbed shaped bolts fired from the edges of the pincers and traveled about as fast as arrows fired from a bow. Both sentries exploded violently as the bolts made contact with them.
I quickly stood up on my two feet and rushed to Jack and the heretics. "That was a good shot, I never got your name beautiful" I spoke, my voice still strained sounded deeper than usual and intense "Lilly.. Lilly Starstrider of B6F" Jack responded by simply nodding at me with respect "So you're the infamous Austral-B Heretics that I have heard so much about, what are you doing here? Jack and I resumed our conversation as the other men scampered off to free the rest of the prisoners from their slabs.
"Umm.. Were improvising on a plan that has gone too well. Originally we were supposed to die in that fire over there." I raised my eyebrow in disbelief to this. He then continued.. "Our mission was to hijack a prisoner transport, rig it with explosives, and ram it into this building. But..... They didn't even bother to ask us for a security code and let us dock to our surprise. So, we got to live to have some more fun."
"So you mean to tell me you have no plan?"
"Pretty Much... Let's get a move on before the fire spreads shall we?"
While I was grateful for their rescue, these guys had to be the biggest idiots in the two universes. I have always heard stories about the Austral-B Heretics back on B6F. Tall tails from the clerics that they were pirates, criminals, and law-less scoundrels. So far they actually seem to live up to those rumors but I never expected reckless and unhinged. I thought they would be more calculating and methodical considering that they destroyed over two hundred of His Shadow's military vessels. Instead they turned out to be suicidal jackasses with a death wish.
After we freed the prisoners in the loading bay, we exited the loading bay and went down the corridor where they sent the love slave off to earlier. We got out of there just in time as a fuel line had ruptured from the fire causing yet another massive explosion. It was a nice relief to be away from the constant stench of death and decay which was all but replaced by the smell of smoke and burning metal. The hallways of the cluster failed to impress me either. They were poorly lit and dingy just like the arrival bay. The only source of light were small flickering screens displaying the faces of all of the escaped fugitives, one of them being my face. We came to find Stelios Peachtree who was the first person in line to be sentenced still strapped down to her slab with a blindfold covering her eyes.
I could not describe to you what she looked like before her transformation but she was incredibly beautiful. From her plastic smooth skin to her long flowy blonde hair. She seemed to be in an almost submissive and calm state on the slab, a stark difference from her crying as she was hauled off here. I lifted off of her blindfold "I'm going to get you out of here" I said as I worked to release her bindings from the slab. "I love you....." She spoke in a sensual tone. Right when I managed to free her left arm Jack yelled for me to leave her. I looked into her eyes and noticed that she was in a near vegetative state.
"Why?" I asked. "And why is she like this?"
"She has undergone the full love slave transformation. They lobotomized her. She will just slow us down, leave her!" Jack responded seemingly like he was in a hurry.
"No, she comes with us, we leave nobody behind especially since you macho men don't have a plan!"
"Fine! then lets hurry up!" Jack and and another heretic helped me finish freeing her. Stelios then acknowledged me with her zombie-like stare "My heroine......" she uttered with a loud sexual moan. What the hell did they do to this person? What kind of sicko would pay for a half sentient, live human sex doll to violate? I would have taken the protein bank any day over this fate worse then death. We continued down yet another dark corridor with Stelios mindlessly clinging to my arm as if I was her mighty protector, I managed to shake her off my arm eventually out of pure annoyance still in a state of pure shock after watching my brother die.
The alarm klaxons were still blaring from the fire and our escape were not helping my headache. "These fugitives wanted for immediate termination!" The screens kept repeating while flashing our faces over and over. The few humanoid robots we encountered in this hallway were unarmed and were completely oblivious to us as they were rushing to extinguish the fire in the loading bay. We pressed on until we reached another loading bay, this one twice the size of the previous one, But this one was different. There was no holographic court or execution machine. It was as if these people had already been sentenced and were awaiting some special form of punishment. None the less we went to work on freeing them.
The first batch was a rather colorful group. A trope of women who were adorned in exquisite pink, red, and purple dresses, they revealed themselves to be circus performers and acrobats who had failed to entertain his Shadow's followers in Cobalt Stadium. Their leader was Sippos, a flamboyant and well educated middle aged woman with snow white colored spiked hair. Perfectly white hair seemed to be a common thing attributed to beauty in the League of 20,000. It was also considered to be a trait of purity and leadership so it made sense. Stereotypes exist for a reason because with her it showed. As soon as she got free she managed to arm herself with a black pack of her own and she began giving orders not only her circus group but the to our makeshift militia. I couldn't even tell who was in charge anymore between her and Jack.
We continued to grow our numbers by freeing prisoners. One by one we built a whole army commanded by both Jack and Sippos. Eventually there were over four hundred of us, most of which including myself were untrained in combat however we had formidable strength in numbers. A majority of us were unarmed with myself, Jack, the heretics, Sippos, and a few others being the only ones carrying black pack weapons. His Shadow didn't exactly leave these things lying around for anybody to take. According to Jack only high ranking officers and elite soldiers of the Divine Order as well as the tall hulking robotic guards carried black packs. It made sense as black packs are unforgiving weapons. One shot and your done, nothing left of you except for a puddle on the floor. The escapees including the performance artists armed themselves with metal pipes or virtually anything else that could be used as a blunt melee weapon.
Some did not seem so eager to join in on our uprising though. Some people we're still so brainwashed by this religion that they either attacked us or attempted (and later succeeded) in ending their own lives to prove their loyalty to his Shadow thinking that they would be rewarded in the afterlife if one even existed. Most of those we rescued were pretty eager to fight. As a few sentry guards entered the room only to be ambushed by members of new found resistance. From the other side of the room two more sentries appeared for a batch of our group to recklessly charge them. The robots being slow and cumbersome could maybe shoot and disintegrate one or three people before they were tackled and disarmed of their black packs in a short struggle. Before we ventured further into the depths of the Cluster, the Heretics continued their trend of destruction by using the cluster's own fuel supply lines as improvised explosives. Since the fuel lines were connected, it created a chain reaction which caused other sections of this massive complex to explode.
Not staying in one place at a time we reached a large room which had a large window giving me my first glimpse of the Cluster itself. The capital of the League of 20,000 was a dark and bleak cityscape blanketed in eternal night with industrial smokestacks bellowing a mix of nitrogen, oxygen, and some carbon dioxide into the air creating a foggy haze. Jack explained to me that the Cluster itself is small, uninteresting, rocky, silicon based dwarf planet. He summarized that the Cluster had no atmosphere of its own so his Shadow had constructed a massive canopy over the city which is why there was never any sunlight. The factories were responsible for generating a breathable atmosphere. Some of which would vent out into space through the small hole in the canopy where ships would enter and exit.
Most of the low rise buildings were poorly lit making them appear as shadowy silhouettes in the yellowish green fog. Two large structures dominated the skyline. The large spaceport which glowed bright from the raging fires and explosions created by yours truly and Cobalt Stadium. Cobalt Stadium was a pantheon to behold. A large inverted dome with spikes and spotlights protruding from it and illuminating parts of the dark yellow sky.
The city below us including factories and housing projects were now beginning to catch fire as the fuel lines below the space port were now detonating from the chain reaction. Not only did we set the place ablaze but our rebellion had now inspired some of the Cluster's own citizens to begin rioting. We knew this because the screens which were previously announcing us as fugitives were now reporting on the riots. Some of the most desperate citizens including the poor saw a glimmer of hope, a figurative and literal flame of inspiration which came in the form of the spaceport tower burning. The downtrodden took the opportunity to rise up as they were never able to do before.
Although a majority of the population presumably bunkered down in their homes fearing the wrath of his Shadow, The hundreds of escapees combined with the minority of citizens who rose up was enough to attract the attention of His Shadow himself. We heard over our stolen comm devices that His Shadow was mobilizing his full military force to put down our uprising. Swarms of fighter ships began darting across the sky in formations. They're system of fear and tyranny was slowly beginning to unravel and they knew it.
"His Shadow must be pretty pissed off..." Sippos commented "Not as pissed off as I am." said my strained voice. I felt a rush of excitement, nobody had ever stood up to his Shadow like this before on the Cluster. "Are you sure you're not from a reform planet?" Jack joked. The humor however ended when we overheard on the comms that His Divine Shadow had just issued a "cleanse order" for the entire planet. All non military personal and civilians were to be eradicated at once. The fighters descended from the sky and began firing upon residential buildings. The fighters were armed with a more powerful version of a black pack. Sentry Guards opened fire on anyone roaming the streets below. His Shadow was not screwing around and was poised to set an example. We most definitely were not going to make it off of this planetoid alive I thought as we began contemplating our next move as a group. I noticed that Jack and the few remaining heretics had all but vanished into the thin air.
As the revelation hit me that the heretics had ditched us a large battalion of sentry drones entered the room and opened fire killing a quarter of our group. Sippos ordered us to begin retreating further into the city while we were returning shots and attempting to dodge the deadly bolts coming from their black packs. Stelios clung to my side vowing over and over again that she would protect me even though she was next to useless. At this point most of our army had become scattered but Sippos did a good job of keeping a majority of us together. Apparently this wasn't just some random suicide mission that the Austral-B pair had launched. They had a plan and we were their fodder to be used as a distraction while they went off to do who knows what. Within less than thirty minutes the skies of the cluster went from being it's usual bleak yellow to a red fiery apocalypse as military vessels were bombarding the city and families and their children were being gunned down mercilessly in the streets by sentries. At least these people were getting a quick and painless death by black pack unlike the protein bank as if this place wasn't already a giant orgy of death.
What was a desire for vengeance now became one of survival. Perhaps we could escape this world if we remained optimistic and tried, but how? We reached the city streets and as most of our group proceeded to engage the sentries Me, Stelios, Sippos, and a few performers from her trope hid in a corner alley and negotiated how we were going to get off the Cluster with the sound of weapons fire and explosions going off all around us. Perhaps we can steal a prison barge but that would mean backtracking all the way back to the spaceport tower. There was always the risk of being shot down by the fighters patrolling the sky but its a risk we will have to take. So there is our plan if there ever was one. Our hope is to sneak back into what's left of the space port and hijack a transport out of here. We would be emulating the heretic's original plan, only in reverse.
We moved out and continued to proceed through the city towards Cobalt Stadium. It was hard to maintain complete stealth as we were randomly engaging with sentry drones amidst the chaos. At one point Sippos pulled me out of the way of a black pack shot which narrowly missed me. The streets were complete anarchy, even though most of the rioters had now all been but subdued, people were fighting back against the sentries for their lives. Some were submissively willing to die believing that his Shadow had some grand afterlife in store for them while others were attempting to gain redemption by attacking the resisters only to be shot by the drones immediately after. His Shadow had no intention of letting anybody live.
To my surprise, even serial murderers were using this as an opportunity to rampage. We all crouched down behind burning rubble as we observed a deranged man with a black pack laughing and gunning down fleeing people while screaming "I WORSHIP HIS SHADOW!!!! I WORSHIP HIS SHADOW!!!! I WORSHIP HIS SHADOW!!!!" His loud and maniacal shouting was quickly put to an end by as he was liquidated into nothing by sentry.
We noticed that this sentry guard in particular was behind a shield tank. They were nothing impressive looking, Just exposed control chairs on top of wheels to move around. They generated an energy shield which was capable of absorbing black pack bolts but at the same time anyone behind the shield was able to return fire. It was a no win situation for anyone outside of the shield. They used these to create a bottle neck in certain streets where they freely could disintegrate rioters without being vaporized themselves by return fire from stolen black packs.
Things got quieter once we made it off of the streets and into the underbelly of Cobalt Stadium. At this point it was just me, Sippos, and Stelios. We entered the basement level of the stadium by using our black packs to blast open the doors. Not only could these bad boys disintegrate organic matter but they could also create a some pretty impressive holes in walls. Unlike most of the places on the cluster so far these corridors were narrow, and very hot and humid. We passed over a dozen piles of skeletal human remains. Something was down here, something horrible. "What could have done this?" I asked. "QUITE!" Sippos silently whispered and then continued. "I think we might be in the den where they keep some of the cluster lizards."
"Cluster Lizards!? You have got to be kidding me...." I said as if this day couldn't get any worse."Yes cluster lizards... They wanted to feed my circus group to them for the entertainment of his Shadow's followers."
Many people were sent to their deaths in Cobalt Stadium, Some of the most notorious heretics and rebels had their executions broadcasted all over the league of 20,000. I remember when I was six I sat in my living and room watched with my parents and my brother a live stream as Rex Donovan, the leader of the famous Dartmouth uprising was slowly devoured by nerve ball worms. Cluster Lizards were however the most popular as they had a craving for human brains which resulted in a more gory demise for their prey which people found to be the most entertaining. We had to get out of here quick, before we either overheated to death or we ran into one of the lizards. As you could probably guess, the latter of those things happened. Soon enough we stumbled upon a nest of Lizards.
Before Sippos could react, from an opening in the wall a large beak snapped out taking off her arm clean off. The lizard let out an ear piercing cry which alerted the other lizards. Sippos laid on the ground with her back against the wall. She was beginning to bleed out from where her arm was taken off but that did not stop her from raising her Black Pack and killing the lizards. As Lizards began rolling down the corridor like tires Sippos commanded me and Stelios to run. Sippos laughed as she began vaporizing the incoming lizards with her Black Pack. Not wanting to leave her to die, I engaged the lizards also but there were just too many of them, One of them passed her coming towards me, as I shot it another Lizard was beginning to devour Sippos whole. Stelios pulled me towards an exit ladder where we climbed out of the den barely escaping the lizards below.
After escaping the lizard pit we were extremely dehydrated from the heat on top of being starving as we were held prisoner for so long without anything to eat. We were taking a much breather resting in the now abandoned underbelly of the space port tower. We listened in on the comms in the meantime. Most of the city had been purged of its citizens and the military was still occupied in a stand off with a few hold outs who were making a valiant last stand. We also learned that a few high ranking officers had been executed by his Shadow for their "incompetence." for allowing this all to happen. I was beginning to feel guilty. We were just trying to escape death but we had instead caused his Shadow to purge the whole planet in response to our uprising. Everyone who had followed us perished. In the end our uprising was hardly a challenge for his Shadow's military might.
We kept moving but very slowly. The adrenaline rush which fueled me in the beginning had faded. I was feeling very fatigued from lack of nourishment as well as everything which had transpired today. The corridors were eerily quite, no sentry drones, no security, no resistance. We eventually reached a massive room at the core of the structure. There were strings of conveyor belts descending from the top of the tower on down in a spiral. As we began to ascend up the tower I noticed what was on the conveyor belts. Bags.... bags and bags and bags. Human organs such as hearts, livers, kidneys, spleens were all condensed together in clear plastic bags. I watched as countless... millions of bags were emptied into a large seemingly bottomless pit at the center of the room.
This must be were all of the organs go from the executed went. The remains of my brother were possibly among these. Just when I thought that this nightmare couldn't get any worse It did when I was hit with this reality. It wasn't just a handful of people who were being stripped of their organs, it was millions, perhaps billions of people from the 20,000 who were being mass murdered. During the bombardment I questioned to myself why His Shadow would kill his own citizens including the law abiding ones. How it would affect the economy not to mention the untold amount of collateral damage. The answer became clear. His Shadow did not care about life.
Even Stelios who could only comprehend her own infatuation for me was horrified by the amount of death displayed in front of us. We thankfully managed to find an elevator. I took a breather once inside the lift. I would have not had the strength to climb all of those stairs and ladders. As the lift ascended a computerized face appeared on a small circular screen. It was a woman's face which appeared to have it's skin stretched out as if it had been flattened by a hammer. It was like it was making a mockery of us considering the genocide we had just witnessed.
"You are now leaving the Protein Bank. We Worship His Divine Shadow.... Divine Shadow.... Divine Shadow..... Shadow...."
The screen glitched in a repetitive manner over and over until we reached the top. I drew my black pack expecting to be met by guards at the top. When the doors quickly slid open my heart skipped a beat but instead we were met by nobody. The space port appeared to be empty with a few prisoner barges just sitting there idly waiting for departure. As we made our way to the nearest transport a lone officer stepped out of the loading ramp.
"Do you have everything we ne......." He said only to abruptly pause as he saw my blood covered face. I immediately recognized him as he was the same officer who tortured me on my journey to the Cluster. His previously smug face turned to disappointment and shock when I aimed my black pack at him. Staggering forward as I continued towards the transport. "May his 'merciful' Shadow FALL upon you asshole!" He didn't have time to say a word back as the shot from my black pack took his head off leaving only his body to fall to the floor with steam and puss spilling from his neck. There was no blood as the Black Pack instantly cauterized the portion where his head exploded off of his body. I felt a sense of pride rush over me. Sure he was not his Shadow himself. but he was one of the men responsible for killing my brother.
"HALT!" Another officer shouted from the left of me. As I turned to face him he was disintegrated by a black pack of an unknown source. That source soon revealed itself as Jack and two surviving heretics who emerged from the vapor like steam which enshrouded most of the loading bay. Jack looked happy to see me until I aimed my weapon at him much to his surprise.
"Why should I let you live after what you did?"
"Please, I have to get off of this world!" Jack protested
"Why? Do you know how many people died over your stunt? His Shadow killed them all.... and then some! You used us! YOU LEFT US TO DIE!"
"I am so sorry we abandoned you but we couldn't risk his Shadow discovering us or our intentions! Please....! We had to keep our plans secret, you know how fanatical his Shadow's followers are!"
Jack continued to beg by holding up a capsule which was about the size of a human tooth.
"These are special amino acids which the Divine Order wants to use to for some special project, we don't know what, but it cannot be good! Please! Getting these back to the reform planets could save hundreds of billions of lives!"
I continued to stare Jack down angrily with my gun shaking with my hand. Out of the fog a loud metallic sound was heard, almost like the cry of a large bird and the two heretics who were escorting Jack dropped to the floor dead. They were not hit by a black pack as they were not disintegrated. They were simply cut down by something which moved really quick. I turned to the left to see a tall shadowy figure lurking in the fog.
"GOOOO!!!" I yelled as Jack rushed to board the transport. I then drew my black pack and opened fire upon this shadowy being. My black pack was pretty much useless against it. I continued to shoot at it only for it to continue to advance out of the fog unphased. As he emerged from the smoke his features became visible. He was a tall slender man dressed in a patterned black cloth material which also seemed resistant to my black pack. He had long hair which was wrapped up in a beehive like bun on top of his head with a single strand dangling down in front of his surprisingly gorgeously smooth pale face.
"I kill you now in the name of his Divine Shadow."
He spoke in a deep baritone voice as he raised his right arm. Fist clenched as if he was pointing it like a gun at me. I closed my eyes hearing the sound of his weapon. I felt nothing but instead heard the shriek of Stelio's voice. I opened my eyes to notice her in front of me with blood now dripping out of her back in the position where her heart is. She fell into my arms were I caught her and gracefully lowered her to the floor. "I.... I will love you forever...." She uttered as she laid dying having sacrificed herself for me. "I love you too Stelios, rest well." I responded like a mother to her baby while respectfully shutting her eyelids with my fingers as I cradled her in my arms. Despite the fact that I had no real feelings for her, this gave me a sense of closure as I never got to do this with my brother or even Sippos who I grew attached to. I looked up to notice this dark man now towering over me. He was almost robotic in nature as he stared at me with these cold but innocent looking eyes. This must of been one of those divine assassins that I have heard about. I have always heard wild tales on B6F about Divine Assassins, stories about these decarbonized reanimated corpses which hunted down the worst of criminals and heretics. I felt a slight tinge of pride that it had come down to His Shadow sending in his best to stop me.
Having a sudden surge of adrenaline I rolled over and shot and destroyed the docking beam control console hopefully giving Jack a chance at an effective escape. Jack's transport launched and flew away. In a last ditch effort I turned and pointed my weapon at the man in black. As I heard the screech of his brace weapon I felt an immediate sharp pain in right wrist. I looked to notice that his brace had cut off my right hand. I cried out while cursing, placing my right arm in my shirt to try and stop the rapid bleeding. I looked to my side to see my severed hand lying on the ground still clutching the black pack.
"You should have not of done that." He spoke again in an emotionless tone as he menaced closer towards me. Despite bleeding out profusely, I mustered the strength to pull myself off of the ground and stand on my own two feet. If today was going to be my day to die then I was not going to do it laying down. I proceeded to look up into his face as he still dwarfed me in height. "You're going to kill me anyway.... What difference does it make?"
"Correct." He softly spoke as he stood there and continued silently stare at me. Despite all of the horrors I witnessed today, despite all of the death, and despite his purpose and intentions, his presence seemed like a relief. He was the most beautiful thing I have seen all day weirdly enough aside from the courage displayed by Sippos and all of the other people who died fighting. As I got a closer look at his angelic, yet pale white face, it was expressing a child like curiosity towards me. He had a small tattoo running down the side of his left face in the shape of a line which I gracefully began to trace with my finger. His face was was cold and as hard as a rock. He was not giving off any body heat whatsoever. I became fascinated with him as he seemed to have no interest in expressing cruelty unlike everyone else on the Cluster. He continued to stare at me with those beautiful but deadpan eyes. A few words coughed out of my mouth as I struggled to remain standing up. "What is you're name?"
"I... I do not know." He responded after a slight pause.
"Why do you want to do this?" I calmly asked.
"I have no desire to kill you, but I must do as his Divine Shadow instructs."
He responded in a reassuring manner, affirming that this was not personal.
"I understand...." My last words as I nodded to him signaling that I was ready to accept my fate. I again closed my eyes as he raised his arm towards me. His brace fired puncturing one of my lungs which caused my eyes to jolt right back open. I smiled letting out a huge sigh of relief. "It's over, It's finally over!" I thought. I slowly collapsed onto the cold floor with blood now oozing out of my mouth and nose. As I looked upon my pale white face, eyes bloodshot lying sideways on the floor I realized I was officially out of my body viewing my corpse. It was the most peaceful feeling I have ever felt, almost like ecstasy. I could finally rest and see my brother again. All of my physical and mental anguish was washed away like sand on the ocean shore. Speaking of the ocean shore. I began to actually hear the sounds of waves crashing onto a beach as everything faded out to a bright white.
I opened my eyes to find myself lying in a very comfortable bed with my body whole again as if I had been dreaming. Wait, where am I? Better yet, who am I? I was in a brightly lit bedroom which was decorated in lavish white drapes. It's like I just had a dream which I forgot within the second of waking up. The sound of the ocean still roared off in the distance as it was now the only thing I could remember from my "dream." I got out of bed and walked over to the window. I looked out of the vista to see beautiful world with a deep blue sky being met with an endless blue ocean that stretched as far as the eye could see. The only thing that stood out of place was a large red and orange desert moon which took up a quarter of the sky. The question that remained most though was still on my mind as I couldn't even remember my own name.
"Who am I?"
The End.
Part II
My life was pretty uninteresting before this. My parents were two high ranking officials in the Divine Order, Universe only knows that happened to them after the events that unfold here. They were off world most of the time leaving me to take care of my younger brother Dylan. B6F is a vacation planet where the elite of the Divine Order resided when they weren't on the Cluster. Most of the time it was was quite, no crime, nothing eventful ever took place until one day I caught two old clerics trying to molest my brother. So here we are, strapped to a piece of metal on a prisoner transport.
The rumors really were true, They will arrest you and ship you off to the Cluster for the most minor infraction. People say that the system is fair, that His Divine Shadow's judgement is merciful and forgiving. But one thing is certain, nobody I know who has been apprehended has ever come back. But why would they have the trial on the Cluster, I get that it's the capital of the League of 20,000 but it seems like a total waste to ship the accused all the way there. All I can do is hope for the best, hope that His Shadow will see that I was only doing what was right. "I hope my brother is alri....."
Before I could complete my worrisome thought, an officer dressed in black approached me. A smirk flew across his face as he reached out to touch my face with his palm, I turned my head away to resist him. Only thing I could do as I was bound. As his hand left my face I painfully felt an electrical shock. As my body convulsed I noticed the officer was holding down a button on a small remote control device with a smug smile on his face. As my eyes acknowledged him the electrocution stopped as he took his hand off of the button and gleefully said "You're going into cold storage sweetheart, enjoy the trip!"
Cold Storage? Wait, what!? Before I could speak to ask what he meant, freezing cold steam shot down from the ceiling and before you knew it, I faded out of consciousness. I heard that in cryo-sleep that you never dream, but even my dreams proved to be resilient. As if my mind was trying to offer me a relief from the stress and the fear of things to come. It wasn't vivid, it was mostly flashes of memories, The feeling of the ocean breeze while standing on the beaches of B6F. I looked down into a puddle in the sand to see my reflection staring back at me, My skinny build, my blue eyes, and my thick brown haired pixie cut. My face then morphed into the face of my brother, then my parents, then my friends, and everyone that I have ever loved. They all faded in and out of the blackness. I then saw the face of my mother who began speaking, but her voice sounded different, computerized, and it was speaking in a manner which was incoherent and seemed to echo. The word's became more clear, and eventually they became coherent enough to make them out.
"PRISONER TRANSPORT 84B04 Proceed to gate 417 Punishment Level #2"
This repeated over and over as I slowly regained my consciousness, my body shivering as a blast of warm steam came down from the ceiling in a similar fashion as before to thaw me out. Here already huh? That was quick but I guess one of the benefits of cold sleep is there is no passage of time. Fifteen minutes later, two officers including the one from before came down to "inspect us"
"Number five, number six, and number seven freeze dried!" One of the officers exclaimed loudly. "Don't worry! We'll meet our delivery quota." The other responded.
The officer from earlier patted me on my cheek. "Good Morning" he said as he chuckled. I don't know if it was thirty minutes, two hours, or the remainder of the entire cycle of time, but it felt like forever until the transport docked. There were no windows so you couldn't see what was going on outside the craft. Also mind you so my still groggy eyes couldn't see anything other than the back of the slab in front of me. All I could hear was a woman crying and all I could think about was what is going to happen to me?
A huge vibration shook the transport and our slabs swung slightly. I guess were here I thought as a large door to the front of the corridor opened and our slabs began moving like a conveyor belt. We were literally being treated like cattle on a farm. What kind of Justice system is this? My first glimpse of the cluster was a large gritty and poorly lit room which was the size of a warehouse. Every piece of technology in this large space was clunky, old, and worn. This was the Cluster? I expected something grand and beautiful considering that it's the seat of His Shadow. No beauty to be found. Just a dark industrial sized room filled the moans and cries of all of "criminals" who were awaiting justice. Not to mention the stench of decomposing flesh and rusting metal assaulting my nose. This place literally smelled like death.
"I worship his shadow.... I worship his shadow.... I worship his shadow....."
I whispered to myself in a prayer. I did nothing wrong, he should protect me. He should know.... I thought. Our slabs slowly moved forward towards the end of the room until they suddenly came to a screeching halt. I struggled to see what was going on but I couldn't make much of it as there were many slabs ahead of me. What I did see to the corner left was a flickering hologram of a lawyer pop up with his left arm raised to greet her but it was as if he was frozen in time. Several seconds after some loud mechanical noises. The hologram of the lawyer suddenly became animated.
"My Client......." The lawyer Hologram said all to pause for a mechanical voice to continue the sentence. "Stelios Peachtree of Dill 4" The Lawyer continued "Is Innocent of the charge of...." The Lawyer glitched for a second creating a pause but then resumed "Failing to perform her wifely duties and throws herself upon the mercy of his court. Secure in the knowledge that his Shadow's wisdom will prevail upon these proceedings." More mechanical noises ensued as I heard muffled cries from the woman.
I then heard different voice, this one more stern. "You...." (Computerized voice) Stelios Peachtree of Dill 4" "Have been found guilty of failing to perform your wifely duties. You are therefore sentenced to be transformed into a love slave and to be given too......" (Computerized voice) C345665 "To be used for their pleasure, may his merciful shadow fall upon you." The sound of a loud metal clang followed as the woman's slab broke off to the right being escorted by two decapitated human bodies with robot heads as a substitute. The woman began to cry louder until she all but vanished down the hallway.
"What fresh hell is this???" I said to myself. I continued to hope for the best but it just proceeded to get so much more worse from there. Another prisoner was prepared and it went as follows..
"My Client...... (Computerized Voice) Tweeze of Orbital 6.. "is innocent of the charge of... littering in the temple and throws himself upon the mercy of his court. Secure in the knowledge that his Shadow's wisdom will prevail upon these proceedings." After six seconds it continued again, this time with the Judge's voice which I could only assume at this point was yet another hologram.
"You" (Computerized Voice) Tweeze of Orbital 6 "Have been found guilty of littering in the temple. You are therefore sentenced to.... have your individual life terminated. Although his merciful shadow will allow many of your vital organs to live on as components used in the making of robotic drones. Your usable flesh will be contributed to the protein bank where it will be recycled for purposes that serve his shadow... *computer glitch* serve his shadow."
"ARE YOU KIDDING ME!??? DEATH FOR LITTERING IN THE TEMPLE!??" I thought to myself with utter revulsion of how ridiculous this was.
A loud clang followed as the slab changed rails which began moving to my left. Tweeze began begging and screaming for his life as the lawyer hologram dissolved and was replaced by a different hologram popping up of what could be assumed to be an executioner. "In the execution of this sentence you are hereby cleansed of your crimes against the people of the 20,000 planets. May his merciful shadow fall upon you." The hologram said as Tweeze's slab moved closer a glowing red area which was outlined by the shape of a slab. As if the slab was supposed to fit in it like a puzzle piece. The sound of saws began to pierce my ears while coexisting with the man's frightful screams. The screaming grew very loud and intense as his slab merged into the hot red groove. As his cries finally subsided, I listened in horror as I heard the sound of bone and flesh being sliced by the screech of the saws.
I'm finished. I'm going to die, if I am lucky I will be made into a love slave. But I will never see my family again. My faith shattered. This is not a fair system, there is no justice. This is a slaughter house for people. I proceeded to close my eyes for the next four people whom were executed all for frivolous things that should never warrant ending a person's life. One was person was even executed for, get this... sneezing on a cleric. No matter how stupid the crime if even a crime at all, they were all sentenced to termination.
I kept my eyes closed the entire time as it was all I could do. I couldn't even cover my ears to drown out the screams of the painful deaths occurring in front of me. I wanted it all to be over as quick as possible. I couldn't take this anymore, I had a splitting migraine from the agonizing cries in addition to the discomfort of being suspended on a slab. It felt like an eternity waiting for my inevitable demise.
A fifth person was then moved up to face trial. My eyes were still closed until I heard the system computer speak a very familiar name.
"My Client...." (Computerized voice) Dylan Starstrider of B6F "Is innocent of the charges of assaulting a cleric in the service of his Shadow"
My eyes shot open with disbelief. My Brother! He did nothing wrong! He was only defending himself. Those old clerics should have been arrested instead for trying to molest him. "DYLAN!!!!" I yelled at the top of my lungs. I was powerless. I heard his panicking voice yell back to me. "Sis! Is that you?! Please help!...."
"Yes! It's me! Close your eyes Dylan! Close your eyes!" I responded completely helpless to do anything. I heard him letting out a primal scream as they attached the clunky memory probe device to his head. He was trie to resist the machine but it turned out to be futile as I then heard those dreaded words from the judge.
"You" (Computerized Voice) Dylan Starstrider of B6F "Have been found guilty of assaulting a cleric in the service of His Shadow. You are therefore sentenced to.... have your individual life terminated. Although his merciful shadow will allow many of your vital organs to live on as components used in the making of robotic drones. Your usable flesh will be contributed to the protein bank where it will be recycled for purposes that serve his shadow."
His slab then changed rails and began moving towards the grinder. "NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!!!!!" I roared with tears pouring out of my eyes. "Help me Sis! Help!" he frantically shouted. "I am sorry, I can't.... I can't do anything....." I yelled as the words struggled to leave my mouth. The Executioner's voice became muffled out by my own wailing.
"Goodbye sis...... I love you." He peacefully said in a calm manner, seemingly accepting his fate.
"Good... Goodbye Dylan. I'll see you.. I'll be with you soon." I stuttered as his slab entered the machine. As his final screams pierced my eardrums my eyes rained tears to the point my vision became blurry. I cried so hard my vocal chords tightened. My brother did not deserve this. Two slabs were now ahead of me. Nothing mattered to me now as I didn't want to live anymore. They just took everything away from me.
As the next the lawyer began to lay out the charges of the next prisoner the machine glitched frozen following a loud BOOM! A massive fiery explosion rocked the left side of the room. The room shook as I caught a glimpse of the blast at the corner of my eye. I heard the sound of metal bending as the room next to us was collapsing in on itself in a blazing inferno. Two robotic guards proceeded to move towards it to investigate only to be immediately vaporized by two well placed shots.
"LET'S FREE THESE PRISONERS! MOVE! MOVE! MOVE!" a loud voice exclaimed in a heroic tone. A group of men dressed in revealing black leather outfits rushed into sight. Two of the men flanked the slab of the prisoner who was about to be executed. They both grabbed his arms "On three! One... Two... Three... Pull!" The leader barked as the two men freed the prisoner from his slab. They proceeded to do the same for the next in line and then finally they reached me.
"Hang in there miss, we're going to get you out of here!" Said the leader. The two burly men grabbed my arms. "ON THREE! ONE, TWO, THREE, PULL!!!!" He commanded as they pulled me ripping the bindings and the harness that held me to the slab. I immediately collapsed to the ground unable to move or feel my arms. The other men moved onto free the others while the leader lifted me off of the ground and carried me off to a safe corner of the room.
"Who are you?" I muttered to him still weak and traumatized.
"Jack "Thruster" Killian, Austral-B Heretics, At your service" He responded in an over the top manner as he lifted my hand in the air and kissed it. "You can just call me Jack..." Jack was a husky man with short dark hair and a large scar on the left side of his face which ran down from his forehead, over his eyebrow, past his deep green eyes and down his cheek. He was clearly a veteran warrior who had fought in many battles against the Divine Order.
Jack's 'heroic' and charming introduction was interrupted by the sound of alarms going off and weapons fire being exchanged as three more sentry robots entered the room. "Stay down, and don't move" He said as he got up and ran off to go join in on the ensuing battle. Free from the slab I finally got to see the whole room. There was a huge out of control fire about fifty yards in front of me. The husk of a burning prisoner transport was visible through the raging flames. I then felt my fingers being able to move again as blood circulation was slowly returning to my arms. Almost as if my limbs were waking up from being asleep.
I scanned the room with my eyes more were I finally got a glimpse of the glowing red slot in which the slabs were being forced into. There were lines drawn in the wall depicting all of the major organs like the brain, heart, kidneys, lungs. Each line had a small razor saw protruding from it. So this is how they executed my brother! He was rhythmically cut open and systematically dissected like a frog. I'm alive... but he's is dead... I failed to protect him so what do I possibly have to live for? In that moment one of the heretics was disintegrated by a single shot from a sentry guard but not before his weapon flung out of his hands, hitting the ground and sliding towards my direction.
There was only one thing I could possibly think of at this point. Revenge! I am going to make them pay for what they did to Dylan! As movement began to return to my arms, I crawled towards the "black pack" as they call them. Pincer shaped guns which can turn pretty much anything into a smoldering pile of dust. I grabbed the battery pack in which the weapon was attached to via a cable and dragged it towards me. My weak arms struggled for a moment with this heavy piece of equipment, It wasn't as lightweight as it looked in the hands of the burly heretics or the robotic sentry guards who could hold it with one hand.
Holding the weapon with both hands I put a slight pressure on the handle and the pincer snapped open with the weapon slightly vibrating. I felt it's energy charging up just waiting for another squeeze of my hand to unleash it. I pointed the black pack at two of the sentry guards who were shooting at the heretics who seemed unaware of my existence. I squeezed grip and out came a loud burst of energy. I quickly aimed for the other one and squeezed again. Green webbed shaped bolts fired from the edges of the pincers and traveled about as fast as arrows fired from a bow. Both sentries exploded violently as the bolts made contact with them.
I quickly stood up on my two feet and rushed to Jack and the heretics. "That was a good shot, I never got your name beautiful" I spoke, my voice still strained sounded deeper than usual and intense "Lilly.. Lilly Starstrider of B6F" Jack responded by simply nodding at me with respect "So you're the infamous Austral-B Heretics that I have heard so much about, what are you doing here? Jack and I resumed our conversation as the other men scampered off to free the rest of the prisoners from their slabs.
"Umm.. Were improvising on a plan that has gone too well. Originally we were supposed to die in that fire over there." I raised my eyebrow in disbelief to this. He then continued.. "Our mission was to hijack a prisoner transport, rig it with explosives, and ram it into this building. But..... They didn't even bother to ask us for a security code and let us dock to our surprise. So, we got to live to have some more fun."
"So you mean to tell me you have no plan?"
"Pretty Much... Let's get a move on before the fire spreads shall we?"
While I was grateful for their rescue, these guys had to be the biggest idiots in the two universes. I have always heard stories about the Austral-B Heretics back on B6F. Tall tails from the clerics that they were pirates, criminals, and law-less scoundrels. So far they actually seem to live up to those rumors but I never expected reckless and unhinged. I thought they would be more calculating and methodical considering that they destroyed over two hundred of His Shadow's military vessels. Instead they turned out to be suicidal jackasses with a death wish.
After we freed the prisoners in the loading bay, we exited the loading bay and went down the corridor where they sent the love slave off to earlier. We got out of there just in time as a fuel line had ruptured from the fire causing yet another massive explosion. It was a nice relief to be away from the constant stench of death and decay which was all but replaced by the smell of smoke and burning metal. The hallways of the cluster failed to impress me either. They were poorly lit and dingy just like the arrival bay. The only source of light were small flickering screens displaying the faces of all of the escaped fugitives, one of them being my face. We came to find Stelios Peachtree who was the first person in line to be sentenced still strapped down to her slab with a blindfold covering her eyes.
I could not describe to you what she looked like before her transformation but she was incredibly beautiful. From her plastic smooth skin to her long flowy blonde hair. She seemed to be in an almost submissive and calm state on the slab, a stark difference from her crying as she was hauled off here. I lifted off of her blindfold "I'm going to get you out of here" I said as I worked to release her bindings from the slab. "I love you....." She spoke in a sensual tone. Right when I managed to free her left arm Jack yelled for me to leave her. I looked into her eyes and noticed that she was in a near vegetative state.
"Why?" I asked. "And why is she like this?"
"She has undergone the full love slave transformation. They lobotomized her. She will just slow us down, leave her!" Jack responded seemingly like he was in a hurry.
"No, she comes with us, we leave nobody behind especially since you macho men don't have a plan!"
"Fine! then lets hurry up!" Jack and and another heretic helped me finish freeing her. Stelios then acknowledged me with her zombie-like stare "My heroine......" she uttered with a loud sexual moan. What the hell did they do to this person? What kind of sicko would pay for a half sentient, live human sex doll to violate? I would have taken the protein bank any day over this fate worse then death. We continued down yet another dark corridor with Stelios mindlessly clinging to my arm as if I was her mighty protector, I managed to shake her off my arm eventually out of pure annoyance still in a state of pure shock after watching my brother die.
The alarm klaxons were still blaring from the fire and our escape were not helping my headache. "These fugitives wanted for immediate termination!" The screens kept repeating while flashing our faces over and over. The few humanoid robots we encountered in this hallway were unarmed and were completely oblivious to us as they were rushing to extinguish the fire in the loading bay. We pressed on until we reached another loading bay, this one twice the size of the previous one, But this one was different. There was no holographic court or execution machine. It was as if these people had already been sentenced and were awaiting some special form of punishment. None the less we went to work on freeing them.
The first batch was a rather colorful group. A trope of women who were adorned in exquisite pink, red, and purple dresses, they revealed themselves to be circus performers and acrobats who had failed to entertain his Shadow's followers in Cobalt Stadium. Their leader was Sippos, a flamboyant and well educated middle aged woman with snow white colored spiked hair. Perfectly white hair seemed to be a common thing attributed to beauty in the League of 20,000. It was also considered to be a trait of purity and leadership so it made sense. Stereotypes exist for a reason because with her it showed. As soon as she got free she managed to arm herself with a black pack of her own and she began giving orders not only her circus group but the to our makeshift militia. I couldn't even tell who was in charge anymore between her and Jack.
We continued to grow our numbers by freeing prisoners. One by one we built a whole army commanded by both Jack and Sippos. Eventually there were over four hundred of us, most of which including myself were untrained in combat however we had formidable strength in numbers. A majority of us were unarmed with myself, Jack, the heretics, Sippos, and a few others being the only ones carrying black pack weapons. His Shadow didn't exactly leave these things lying around for anybody to take. According to Jack only high ranking officers and elite soldiers of the Divine Order as well as the tall hulking robotic guards carried black packs. It made sense as black packs are unforgiving weapons. One shot and your done, nothing left of you except for a puddle on the floor. The escapees including the performance artists armed themselves with metal pipes or virtually anything else that could be used as a blunt melee weapon.
Some did not seem so eager to join in on our uprising though. Some people we're still so brainwashed by this religion that they either attacked us or attempted (and later succeeded) in ending their own lives to prove their loyalty to his Shadow thinking that they would be rewarded in the afterlife if one even existed. Most of those we rescued were pretty eager to fight. As a few sentry guards entered the room only to be ambushed by members of new found resistance. From the other side of the room two more sentries appeared for a batch of our group to recklessly charge them. The robots being slow and cumbersome could maybe shoot and disintegrate one or three people before they were tackled and disarmed of their black packs in a short struggle. Before we ventured further into the depths of the Cluster, the Heretics continued their trend of destruction by using the cluster's own fuel supply lines as improvised explosives. Since the fuel lines were connected, it created a chain reaction which caused other sections of this massive complex to explode.
Not staying in one place at a time we reached a large room which had a large window giving me my first glimpse of the Cluster itself. The capital of the League of 20,000 was a dark and bleak cityscape blanketed in eternal night with industrial smokestacks bellowing a mix of nitrogen, oxygen, and some carbon dioxide into the air creating a foggy haze. Jack explained to me that the Cluster itself is small, uninteresting, rocky, silicon based dwarf planet. He summarized that the Cluster had no atmosphere of its own so his Shadow had constructed a massive canopy over the city which is why there was never any sunlight. The factories were responsible for generating a breathable atmosphere. Some of which would vent out into space through the small hole in the canopy where ships would enter and exit.
Most of the low rise buildings were poorly lit making them appear as shadowy silhouettes in the yellowish green fog. Two large structures dominated the skyline. The large spaceport which glowed bright from the raging fires and explosions created by yours truly and Cobalt Stadium. Cobalt Stadium was a pantheon to behold. A large inverted dome with spikes and spotlights protruding from it and illuminating parts of the dark yellow sky.
The city below us including factories and housing projects were now beginning to catch fire as the fuel lines below the space port were now detonating from the chain reaction. Not only did we set the place ablaze but our rebellion had now inspired some of the Cluster's own citizens to begin rioting. We knew this because the screens which were previously announcing us as fugitives were now reporting on the riots. Some of the most desperate citizens including the poor saw a glimmer of hope, a figurative and literal flame of inspiration which came in the form of the spaceport tower burning. The downtrodden took the opportunity to rise up as they were never able to do before.
Although a majority of the population presumably bunkered down in their homes fearing the wrath of his Shadow, The hundreds of escapees combined with the minority of citizens who rose up was enough to attract the attention of His Shadow himself. We heard over our stolen comm devices that His Shadow was mobilizing his full military force to put down our uprising. Swarms of fighter ships began darting across the sky in formations. They're system of fear and tyranny was slowly beginning to unravel and they knew it.
"His Shadow must be pretty pissed off..." Sippos commented "Not as pissed off as I am." said my strained voice. I felt a rush of excitement, nobody had ever stood up to his Shadow like this before on the Cluster. "Are you sure you're not from a reform planet?" Jack joked. The humor however ended when we overheard on the comms that His Divine Shadow had just issued a "cleanse order" for the entire planet. All non military personal and civilians were to be eradicated at once. The fighters descended from the sky and began firing upon residential buildings. The fighters were armed with a more powerful version of a black pack. Sentry Guards opened fire on anyone roaming the streets below. His Shadow was not screwing around and was poised to set an example. We most definitely were not going to make it off of this planetoid alive I thought as we began contemplating our next move as a group. I noticed that Jack and the few remaining heretics had all but vanished into the thin air.
As the revelation hit me that the heretics had ditched us a large battalion of sentry drones entered the room and opened fire killing a quarter of our group. Sippos ordered us to begin retreating further into the city while we were returning shots and attempting to dodge the deadly bolts coming from their black packs. Stelios clung to my side vowing over and over again that she would protect me even though she was next to useless. At this point most of our army had become scattered but Sippos did a good job of keeping a majority of us together. Apparently this wasn't just some random suicide mission that the Austral-B pair had launched. They had a plan and we were their fodder to be used as a distraction while they went off to do who knows what. Within less than thirty minutes the skies of the cluster went from being it's usual bleak yellow to a red fiery apocalypse as military vessels were bombarding the city and families and their children were being gunned down mercilessly in the streets by sentries. At least these people were getting a quick and painless death by black pack unlike the protein bank as if this place wasn't already a giant orgy of death.
What was a desire for vengeance now became one of survival. Perhaps we could escape this world if we remained optimistic and tried, but how? We reached the city streets and as most of our group proceeded to engage the sentries Me, Stelios, Sippos, and a few performers from her trope hid in a corner alley and negotiated how we were going to get off the Cluster with the sound of weapons fire and explosions going off all around us. Perhaps we can steal a prison barge but that would mean backtracking all the way back to the spaceport tower. There was always the risk of being shot down by the fighters patrolling the sky but its a risk we will have to take. So there is our plan if there ever was one. Our hope is to sneak back into what's left of the space port and hijack a transport out of here. We would be emulating the heretic's original plan, only in reverse.
We moved out and continued to proceed through the city towards Cobalt Stadium. It was hard to maintain complete stealth as we were randomly engaging with sentry drones amidst the chaos. At one point Sippos pulled me out of the way of a black pack shot which narrowly missed me. The streets were complete anarchy, even though most of the rioters had now all been but subdued, people were fighting back against the sentries for their lives. Some were submissively willing to die believing that his Shadow had some grand afterlife in store for them while others were attempting to gain redemption by attacking the resisters only to be shot by the drones immediately after. His Shadow had no intention of letting anybody live.
To my surprise, even serial murderers were using this as an opportunity to rampage. We all crouched down behind burning rubble as we observed a deranged man with a black pack laughing and gunning down fleeing people while screaming "I WORSHIP HIS SHADOW!!!! I WORSHIP HIS SHADOW!!!! I WORSHIP HIS SHADOW!!!!" His loud and maniacal shouting was quickly put to an end by as he was liquidated into nothing by sentry.
We noticed that this sentry guard in particular was behind a shield tank. They were nothing impressive looking, Just exposed control chairs on top of wheels to move around. They generated an energy shield which was capable of absorbing black pack bolts but at the same time anyone behind the shield was able to return fire. It was a no win situation for anyone outside of the shield. They used these to create a bottle neck in certain streets where they freely could disintegrate rioters without being vaporized themselves by return fire from stolen black packs.
Things got quieter once we made it off of the streets and into the underbelly of Cobalt Stadium. At this point it was just me, Sippos, and Stelios. We entered the basement level of the stadium by using our black packs to blast open the doors. Not only could these bad boys disintegrate organic matter but they could also create a some pretty impressive holes in walls. Unlike most of the places on the cluster so far these corridors were narrow, and very hot and humid. We passed over a dozen piles of skeletal human remains. Something was down here, something horrible. "What could have done this?" I asked. "QUITE!" Sippos silently whispered and then continued. "I think we might be in the den where they keep some of the cluster lizards."
"Cluster Lizards!? You have got to be kidding me...." I said as if this day couldn't get any worse."Yes cluster lizards... They wanted to feed my circus group to them for the entertainment of his Shadow's followers."
Many people were sent to their deaths in Cobalt Stadium, Some of the most notorious heretics and rebels had their executions broadcasted all over the league of 20,000. I remember when I was six I sat in my living and room watched with my parents and my brother a live stream as Rex Donovan, the leader of the famous Dartmouth uprising was slowly devoured by nerve ball worms. Cluster Lizards were however the most popular as they had a craving for human brains which resulted in a more gory demise for their prey which people found to be the most entertaining. We had to get out of here quick, before we either overheated to death or we ran into one of the lizards. As you could probably guess, the latter of those things happened. Soon enough we stumbled upon a nest of Lizards.
Before Sippos could react, from an opening in the wall a large beak snapped out taking off her arm clean off. The lizard let out an ear piercing cry which alerted the other lizards. Sippos laid on the ground with her back against the wall. She was beginning to bleed out from where her arm was taken off but that did not stop her from raising her Black Pack and killing the lizards. As Lizards began rolling down the corridor like tires Sippos commanded me and Stelios to run. Sippos laughed as she began vaporizing the incoming lizards with her Black Pack. Not wanting to leave her to die, I engaged the lizards also but there were just too many of them, One of them passed her coming towards me, as I shot it another Lizard was beginning to devour Sippos whole. Stelios pulled me towards an exit ladder where we climbed out of the den barely escaping the lizards below.
After escaping the lizard pit we were extremely dehydrated from the heat on top of being starving as we were held prisoner for so long without anything to eat. We were taking a much breather resting in the now abandoned underbelly of the space port tower. We listened in on the comms in the meantime. Most of the city had been purged of its citizens and the military was still occupied in a stand off with a few hold outs who were making a valiant last stand. We also learned that a few high ranking officers had been executed by his Shadow for their "incompetence." for allowing this all to happen. I was beginning to feel guilty. We were just trying to escape death but we had instead caused his Shadow to purge the whole planet in response to our uprising. Everyone who had followed us perished. In the end our uprising was hardly a challenge for his Shadow's military might.
We kept moving but very slowly. The adrenaline rush which fueled me in the beginning had faded. I was feeling very fatigued from lack of nourishment as well as everything which had transpired today. The corridors were eerily quite, no sentry drones, no security, no resistance. We eventually reached a massive room at the core of the structure. There were strings of conveyor belts descending from the top of the tower on down in a spiral. As we began to ascend up the tower I noticed what was on the conveyor belts. Bags.... bags and bags and bags. Human organs such as hearts, livers, kidneys, spleens were all condensed together in clear plastic bags. I watched as countless... millions of bags were emptied into a large seemingly bottomless pit at the center of the room.
This must be were all of the organs go from the executed went. The remains of my brother were possibly among these. Just when I thought that this nightmare couldn't get any worse It did when I was hit with this reality. It wasn't just a handful of people who were being stripped of their organs, it was millions, perhaps billions of people from the 20,000 who were being mass murdered. During the bombardment I questioned to myself why His Shadow would kill his own citizens including the law abiding ones. How it would affect the economy not to mention the untold amount of collateral damage. The answer became clear. His Shadow did not care about life.
Even Stelios who could only comprehend her own infatuation for me was horrified by the amount of death displayed in front of us. We thankfully managed to find an elevator. I took a breather once inside the lift. I would have not had the strength to climb all of those stairs and ladders. As the lift ascended a computerized face appeared on a small circular screen. It was a woman's face which appeared to have it's skin stretched out as if it had been flattened by a hammer. It was like it was making a mockery of us considering the genocide we had just witnessed.
"You are now leaving the Protein Bank. We Worship His Divine Shadow.... Divine Shadow.... Divine Shadow..... Shadow...."
The screen glitched in a repetitive manner over and over until we reached the top. I drew my black pack expecting to be met by guards at the top. When the doors quickly slid open my heart skipped a beat but instead we were met by nobody. The space port appeared to be empty with a few prisoner barges just sitting there idly waiting for departure. As we made our way to the nearest transport a lone officer stepped out of the loading ramp.
"Do you have everything we ne......." He said only to abruptly pause as he saw my blood covered face. I immediately recognized him as he was the same officer who tortured me on my journey to the Cluster. His previously smug face turned to disappointment and shock when I aimed my black pack at him. Staggering forward as I continued towards the transport. "May his 'merciful' Shadow FALL upon you asshole!" He didn't have time to say a word back as the shot from my black pack took his head off leaving only his body to fall to the floor with steam and puss spilling from his neck. There was no blood as the Black Pack instantly cauterized the portion where his head exploded off of his body. I felt a sense of pride rush over me. Sure he was not his Shadow himself. but he was one of the men responsible for killing my brother.
"HALT!" Another officer shouted from the left of me. As I turned to face him he was disintegrated by a black pack of an unknown source. That source soon revealed itself as Jack and two surviving heretics who emerged from the vapor like steam which enshrouded most of the loading bay. Jack looked happy to see me until I aimed my weapon at him much to his surprise.
"Why should I let you live after what you did?"
"Please, I have to get off of this world!" Jack protested
"Why? Do you know how many people died over your stunt? His Shadow killed them all.... and then some! You used us! YOU LEFT US TO DIE!"
"I am so sorry we abandoned you but we couldn't risk his Shadow discovering us or our intentions! Please....! We had to keep our plans secret, you know how fanatical his Shadow's followers are!"
Jack continued to beg by holding up a capsule which was about the size of a human tooth.
"These are special amino acids which the Divine Order wants to use to for some special project, we don't know what, but it cannot be good! Please! Getting these back to the reform planets could save hundreds of billions of lives!"
I continued to stare Jack down angrily with my gun shaking with my hand. Out of the fog a loud metallic sound was heard, almost like the cry of a large bird and the two heretics who were escorting Jack dropped to the floor dead. They were not hit by a black pack as they were not disintegrated. They were simply cut down by something which moved really quick. I turned to the left to see a tall shadowy figure lurking in the fog.
"GOOOO!!!" I yelled as Jack rushed to board the transport. I then drew my black pack and opened fire upon this shadowy being. My black pack was pretty much useless against it. I continued to shoot at it only for it to continue to advance out of the fog unphased. As he emerged from the smoke his features became visible. He was a tall slender man dressed in a patterned black cloth material which also seemed resistant to my black pack. He had long hair which was wrapped up in a beehive like bun on top of his head with a single strand dangling down in front of his surprisingly gorgeously smooth pale face.
"I kill you now in the name of his Divine Shadow."
He spoke in a deep baritone voice as he raised his right arm. Fist clenched as if he was pointing it like a gun at me. I closed my eyes hearing the sound of his weapon. I felt nothing but instead heard the shriek of Stelio's voice. I opened my eyes to notice her in front of me with blood now dripping out of her back in the position where her heart is. She fell into my arms were I caught her and gracefully lowered her to the floor. "I.... I will love you forever...." She uttered as she laid dying having sacrificed herself for me. "I love you too Stelios, rest well." I responded like a mother to her baby while respectfully shutting her eyelids with my fingers as I cradled her in my arms. Despite the fact that I had no real feelings for her, this gave me a sense of closure as I never got to do this with my brother or even Sippos who I grew attached to. I looked up to notice this dark man now towering over me. He was almost robotic in nature as he stared at me with these cold but innocent looking eyes. This must of been one of those divine assassins that I have heard about. I have always heard wild tales on B6F about Divine Assassins, stories about these decarbonized reanimated corpses which hunted down the worst of criminals and heretics. I felt a slight tinge of pride that it had come down to His Shadow sending in his best to stop me.
Having a sudden surge of adrenaline I rolled over and shot and destroyed the docking beam control console hopefully giving Jack a chance at an effective escape. Jack's transport launched and flew away. In a last ditch effort I turned and pointed my weapon at the man in black. As I heard the screech of his brace weapon I felt an immediate sharp pain in right wrist. I looked to notice that his brace had cut off my right hand. I cried out while cursing, placing my right arm in my shirt to try and stop the rapid bleeding. I looked to my side to see my severed hand lying on the ground still clutching the black pack.
"You should have not of done that." He spoke again in an emotionless tone as he menaced closer towards me. Despite bleeding out profusely, I mustered the strength to pull myself off of the ground and stand on my own two feet. If today was going to be my day to die then I was not going to do it laying down. I proceeded to look up into his face as he still dwarfed me in height. "You're going to kill me anyway.... What difference does it make?"
"Correct." He softly spoke as he stood there and continued silently stare at me. Despite all of the horrors I witnessed today, despite all of the death, and despite his purpose and intentions, his presence seemed like a relief. He was the most beautiful thing I have seen all day weirdly enough aside from the courage displayed by Sippos and all of the other people who died fighting. As I got a closer look at his angelic, yet pale white face, it was expressing a child like curiosity towards me. He had a small tattoo running down the side of his left face in the shape of a line which I gracefully began to trace with my finger. His face was was cold and as hard as a rock. He was not giving off any body heat whatsoever. I became fascinated with him as he seemed to have no interest in expressing cruelty unlike everyone else on the Cluster. He continued to stare at me with those beautiful but deadpan eyes. A few words coughed out of my mouth as I struggled to remain standing up. "What is you're name?"
"I... I do not know." He responded after a slight pause.
"Why do you want to do this?" I calmly asked.
"I have no desire to kill you, but I must do as his Divine Shadow instructs."
He responded in a reassuring manner, affirming that this was not personal.
"I understand...." My last words as I nodded to him signaling that I was ready to accept my fate. I again closed my eyes as he raised his arm towards me. His brace fired puncturing one of my lungs which caused my eyes to jolt right back open. I smiled letting out a huge sigh of relief. "It's over, It's finally over!" I thought. I slowly collapsed onto the cold floor with blood now oozing out of my mouth and nose. As I looked upon my pale white face, eyes bloodshot lying sideways on the floor I realized I was officially out of my body viewing my corpse. It was the most peaceful feeling I have ever felt, almost like ecstasy. I could finally rest and see my brother again. All of my physical and mental anguish was washed away like sand on the ocean shore. Speaking of the ocean shore. I began to actually hear the sounds of waves crashing onto a beach as everything faded out to a bright white.
I opened my eyes to find myself lying in a very comfortable bed with my body whole again as if I had been dreaming. Wait, where am I? Better yet, who am I? I was in a brightly lit bedroom which was decorated in lavish white drapes. It's like I just had a dream which I forgot within the second of waking up. The sound of the ocean still roared off in the distance as it was now the only thing I could remember from my "dream." I got out of bed and walked over to the window. I looked out of the vista to see beautiful world with a deep blue sky being met with an endless blue ocean that stretched as far as the eye could see. The only thing that stood out of place was a large red and orange desert moon which took up a quarter of the sky. The question that remained most though was still on my mind as I couldn't even remember my own name.
"Who am I?"
The End.
Part II
O_O wo. Nice spinoff backstory. *LOVE. THIS.*
ReplyDeleteGreat story!
ReplyDelete9/10. Few minor spelling quibbles but that doesn't change the fact that THIS. IS. BRILLIANT!!!!
ReplyDeleteThank you for the feed back. The adventure will continue on Fire and Water in part II :)
ReplyDeleteGreat story very imaginative, wonderful use of stock characters.
ReplyDelete