“Do… I… know you?” Hoshea asked, wincing under the weight of the Stelloid on top of him
“You killed him!” The Stelloid hissed. “Now I’m going to kill you.”
• • • • •
Hoshea opened his eyes blurrily. His whole body was sore; was he dead? The ground was dirty and smelled like smoke; the wall he lay against was somewhat squishy. This wasn’t exactly what he’d expected, per se. His vest and weapons were all gone, as were his boots and socks, which was odd.
He opened his eyes, peering around the squishy pink-walled room. The ground wasn’t just dirty, it was dirt, dirt, and ash. Philip lay against the far wall past a metal pillar covered in strings of pink squishy material. Hoshea stood up and walked over. Absent mindedly, he pulled on the flesh-like material; it came away from the silvery-white pillar easily, but flopped back when he let go. He couldn’t seem to rip the stuff, though he could bend it easily like gooey rubber. Yuck.
Philip’s eyes opened. He blinked rapidly. “Are we alive?”
Hoshea nodded. “Unless we go to some squishy pink room in what appears to be a Stelloid nest when we die.”
“I thought you said the Stelloids don’t take prisoners.”
“They don’t! When Commander Melniz and I destroyed that one Stelloid, he said that all humans must die because… wait, that’s it!”
“What is what?”
“The Stelloid that captured us! It said that I had killed someone! I bet it was friends with the Stelloid I killed.”
Philip shrugged. “Makes sense, but according to my memory, it said that it would kill you, just before they gassed us.”
Hoshea continued pacing despite his soreness and fatigue. “Yeah… ugh! I’m no good with plans, I can’t figure out what to do! Why did I have to get myself in charge of a ship!?”
Philip adjusted his position. “You keep saying that, but how would you know unless you’ve tried?”
“This isn’t some kind of practice field, Philip! This is real people, real danger, real lives at stake!”
“Try me.”
Hoshea explained what he was thinking, finishing with: “But I didn’t even have time to communicate it to Arman, and he would have thought it was ridiculous anyway.”
Philip didn’t say anything more, but Hoshea continued to pace until he was too tired to do anything but collapse on the floor. Ironically, that is when the Stelloids entered the small domed room with a central strange pillar. The wall split in a growing circle until it was big enough that one side touched the wall. A Stelloid, in a full armor suit, stepped in. “Ileek! You will come with me to see the general.”
Hoshea lay on the floor. “Five more minutes.”
The Stelloid stepped forward. “You will come now, Ileek.”
Hoshea looked up, his chin in the dirt. “Who is Ileek?”
The Stelloid gave him a kick. “Up, Ileek!”
Hoshe pulled himself to a sitting position. “There isn’t anything you can do to force me. If you kill me, then I won’t have to go through whatever torture the general wants me to. Now, I have a nap to finish.”
“You will come, Ileek.”
Hoshea glanced up. “Make me.”
A few minutes later, Hoshea again woke up groggy and unsure of what was happening. The Stelloid who’d captured him stood a pace away, glaring. Hoshea sat slowly, his body hurting worse than before.
“They told me you made quite a fuss when coming here.” The Stelloid said. It wore no armor, though a suit of the six-legged mech stood in the room ready to be occupied. The room was large and circular with five metallic tables (covered in a thin film of nest material) radiating from the center. The floor wasn’t of dirt but metal, while the ceiling and walls were still pink and squishy.
Hoshea nodded slowly, finally understanding the creature’s comment; his mental faculties weren’t at their best. He’d thrown a full-fledged tantrum, not really caring. He’d been dragged through the nest kicking and screaming until one Stelloid decided the developing Stelloid larva needed ‘pure and quiet noises’, not Hoshea’s cries and wacked him over the head. It appeared that this general had revived him finally. “Who… are you?” Hoshea asked hesitantly.
The Stelloid frowned; they were usually the ideal picture of innocence. Flawless and perfect, yet terrible. Now, as its face darkened, this Stelloid looked anything but. It stepped forward. “I am General Clear Note! Leader of the Death Commander’s forces on this world! You, Ileek, are a slayer of all things good and right! You murdered Perfect Tone! Though how an insignificant speck like you could take down one.” Here, its voice broke, trembling slightly. “One as strong as he.”
Ironic that it calls Perfect Tone ‘good and right’ when he mass murdered a diplomatic cruiser for the joy of it, Hoshea thought testily. “Why didn’t you just kill me? You Stelloids don’t take prisoners in my experience!”
At this, Clear Note smiled again. “Do you remember our promise to your people that you refused?”
Hoshea pondered this for a moment. Despite having helped recover the records of what Perfect Tone had said to the diplomats, no one had ever told him what the Stelloids had wanted of humankind that the diplomats refused to give. “I never learned what Perfect Tone had to say; I was too busy killing him.”
Clear Note struck Hoshea with a force he hadn’t expected; his head snapped backwards, hitting the wall. He winced in pain, pulling himself back to his sitting position. Clear Note towered over him despite its bare three feet of height. “You are a sick, vile being!” Clear Note hissed. “But I will restrain myself from your destruction yet!”
“No!” Hoshea growled. “You are the sick and vile ones, you pretend to be pure and perfect, but you kill and torture mercilessly! At least I accept that I am tainted and imperfect!”
Clear Note struck him again. “Perfect Tone offered your people Removal! He offered them a painless and easy death all at once, no need for war or pain! But your people refused, they laughed in his face, pulled weapons on him, told him they would rather fight a war they’d lose than surrender and let us kill them. What did Perfect Tone do? He destroyed them all, gave them a painful, drawn-out death that they deserved for threatening one of the people of the stars.”
Hoshea blinked up at the creature. He couldn’t tell, but it seemed to be female. “You wanted humankind to let themselves get killed?”
“We wanted you to accept your death as inevitable as it is! Removal would be quick, efficient, and painless if you’d let us use it. However, even though you laugh in scorn at us, we will be as humane (that is the English word for it, interestingly enough, seeing as humans are some of the least humane creatures in the galaxy) as possible. Right now, Removal is nearly ready. It is an old device we discovered and repurposed. The last thing we need is a bit more data to key the Eonian tech to human life signatures.”
“Eonian?”
“The High Ones, you humans are far too dense. How have you survived this long? Never mind, you won’t survive much longer. We Stelloids destroyed the Silen and now we will destroy their progeny.”
Hoshea knew something about the High Ones. The aliens discovered on the planet of Yi’up had mentioned them. The High Ones were said to be the first species to discover space travel in the Milky Way galaxy. The Silen he’d heard of before, they were the species that Perfect Tone had spoken of. They fought with the Stelloids, but ultimately lost because they wouldn’t kill every single Stelloid, while the Stelloids had no scruples about genocide. As for humans being the Silen’s progeny… that didn’t make sense, sort of like how Perfect Tone had mentioned the Silen using English as their trade language, but speaking a form of Latin as their home language. It appeared there were still many mysteries left to discover about the universe.
“So this data?” Hoshea asked warily. Clear Note’s smile was unsettling.
“Oh… Yes! I have many experiments to accomplish with you.”
Hoshea didn’t much like the sound of that. Clear Note stepped back and climbed onto the six-legged machine, which folded around her, making her just a humanoid blob in the center of a spider creature. “We should begin quickly, Ileek. Or in English, I believe it is: Star Killer.”
• • • • •
Lt. Arman glanced across the rooftops towards the giant bulbous nest waiting in the middle of the town. It was ugly and awful.
“What’s the plan?” One of the soldiers with him asked.
Arman bit his lip. “Not sure… I just don’t know what to do.”
The radio squeaked to life, buzzing with static. “Come in? Is anyone listening?”
Arman grabbed the radio. “Who is this?”
“Dr. Philip Range here. I was imprisoned with Hoshea, but they dragged him away. I just got away from the Stelloids; they took me to a kind of lab. Then all of them left to go and deal with what I can only assume was Hoshea making a scene. They stuck me to this table, but didn’t secure me well enough; long story short, I’m free. Look, we’re in the Stelloid nest, and from what I can gather about their plans for Hoshea, we need to hurry. Hoshea had a plan; it had to do with Phytom base pilots.”
“Pilots? Did the whole base get flattened in the initial assault?” Arman asked incredulously.
“Not all of them. Some of the pilots were on patrol over the desert looking for anomalies. Hoshea theorized that they landed somewhere in the trees near the desert. You need to find them.”
“Okay, then what?”
“This is what you do…”
• • • • •
Clear Note was back. Hoshea usually couldn’t tell the difference between different Stelloids while they were in armor, but Clear Note’s posture was distinctive as she entered. After she’d first fastened him to the table, Clear Note had left him alone. Other Stelloids had arrived to take blood, skin, and hair samples.
Now, Clear Note had returned. “Apparently, Removal is ready with only some blood samples; no further testing of killing frequencies is necessary. It will power up and destroy all human life on this world outside this nest in twenty minutes.”
“So, where do I check out?” Hoshea asked, his face sweat-soaked.
Clear Note’s mask slid back, revealing her innocent face twisted by cruelness. “No, I’m not finished yet. In fact, now I have no deadline; I can take as long as I want.”
• • • • •
The ground began to thrum, humming with a dangerous energy, a low note that shook the earth. It all emanates from the nest. For the past hour, Arman had been working furiously, confirming with Dr. Philip, who was still inside the nest looking for Hoshea. They were almost ready, but whatever weapon the Stelloids had been readying was now about to fire. They didn’t have time, but a little time was all Arman needed.
The Stelloids had all retreated from the town, which was disconcerting. Arman had planned for the six patrolling the suburbs to be caught in the initial assault; then again, maybe it was better for them to concentrate in the nest.
“We aren’t ready!” Arman complained, but shook his head and gave the order anyway. “Begin the assault!” Then, to himself, he added quietly. “And let the first battle of the Stelloid war begin.”
• • • • •
Hoshea smashed into the wall, which didn’t make a very satisfactory noise while still hurting like mad. He groaned, trying to get to his feet before Clear Note crashed into him again, tossing him to the side.
She’d removed him from the table and told him to defend himself, but he wasn’t doing a great job. Hoshea tried to side step her, but failed as Clear Note flipped him over with a foot and plowed him into the ground, stabbing her weapon into his shoulder.
It barely pierced the skin but sent a flare of bright pain through his whole body. It was long and skinny and looked like a fireplace poker. The Stelloid held it confidently, spinning it in her hand.
Hoshea rolled aside again; it seemed he could barely climb to his feet without her knocking him down again. Clear Note held him up with one of the machine’s legs. “So, you pathetic beast! What say you now? We Stelloids are the people of the stars, we are the great species! Do you deserve to live when nothing you can do will even injure us! We are mightier than you!”
“I didn’t seem to have much trouble stopping Perfect Tone!” Hoshea growled in the back of his throat before she hurled him backwards into the wall. He lay there, pain and exhaustion taking over him. Without the will to stand up.
Clear Note stood over him, clearly dissatisfied with her attempt at revenge. Perhaps she’d come to realize that hurting him wouldn’t fix her pain. At least that is what Hoshea hoped; he couldn’t take much more.
Clear Note pointed one of the Stelloid bracelets at him, the jagged point from which the energy pulsed aimed at his head. “How? And Why? Perfect Tone was powerful and wonderful. Why would any creature attempt to hurt him? And how could you, a weakling, kill him?”
Hoshea looked up at the Stelloid, for the first time being affected by the pain in her voice. “If you can’t answer that, you’re not as smart as you think. I can’t say I’m sorry for what I did to Perfect Tone, but I can say I don’t want us to be enemies.”
That must have been the wrong thing to say. Clear Note shook her head and fired. The floor shook drastically, throwing off her aim. She glanced around in surprise as the nest wobbled and explosions sounded. “What is this?”
• • • • •
The ASA pilots not at the Phytom base returned only to find smoking ruins and a giant nest under construction. They hid their one-man fighter ships in the trees and hiked into town under the cover of darkness, hiding in the buildings like the other townsfolk. The Void Crosser 2 was a cargo ship, full of weapons and ammo—enough guns to outfit every able citizen still alive in the town.
Hoshea’s plan was simple: get the townspeople to exit the buildings in a rush and overwhelm the Stelloids. He’d seen that enough hits would kill a Stelloid and enough Stelloids would be caught in the initial rush to allow the ASA soldiers and citizens to gain an advantage and press to the nest.
The remaining pilots would provide cover from the air and begin an assault on the nest. They could collapse it and destroy the Stelloids inside if all went well. Things weren’t going well, though; that was the problem.
The soldiers took the lead ahead, taking up positions in front of the nest as the fighters began their attack run on the nest, drawing the Stelloids out. They came in a rush, swarming out, roughly fifteen of them, more than half. Excellent. Arman looked up. “Open fire!”
The soldiers hiding behind crates and destroyed cars stood holding down the triggers of their pew-1.5s. The barrels on thirty identical guns went off, spinning rapidly and punching off rounds of faintly green light. Under Arman’s command, they mowed down the ranks of Stelloids. Each one fell back to the ground, screaming their strange cry. Then, in moments, silence reigned. Arman looked around. “Is that it?”
The Stelloids on the field stood up and raised their own weapons.
• • • • •
Clear Note confired with another Stelloid through a coms unit in her mechanical suit. A tune of wordless notes made up their conversation. It appeared that this was their natural language. Hoshea still lay on the floor, gauging his distance to a scientific instrument that looked dangerous. From the sounds of explosions and ships in the air, it seemed Philip had found a way to escape and communicate the plan to Arman, and the plan was working.
A sense of accomplishment filled Hoshea; maybe it was true that all his problems had been coming from his own self-doubt. Maybe it only seemed like Arman was doubting his competence because Hoshea himself doubted it. It was something to think about at least, if he survived this, that is.
Clear Note turned to Hoshea. “What are your fellow humans doing?”
“They have the citizens fighting back,” Hoshea wheezed. “And the pilots you forgot to destroy are blasting this nest to shreds. Removal won’t work; it will be destroyed before it can work! You lost yet again to the humans. Maybe we’re smarter than you give us credit for.”
Clear Note hissed in disdain. “You die here and now, Ileek! No more of your petty words and games.” She fired. Hoshea was waiting; he surged up and away from Clear Note, clearing the blast radius. Clear Note spun her weapon to follow him, but Hoshea ducked and grabbed the tool he’d spotted earlier. It didn’t do anything despite its menacing look.
Clear Note’s laser cut into the wall, leaving a gash; no wonder the other Stelloids avoided using their weapons in the nest. Hoshea dropped over the edge of one table as she fired again, running through his options in his head. None of them was good. “You wouldn’t fight when I wanted you to, but now you run? Face me, petty being.”
Hoshea didn’t respond; his main question is why she thought he would. He grabbed another instrument, this one buzzed and glowed with green light. Jumping up, Hoshea hurled it at Clear Note. Clear Note side-stepped it as it bounced harmlessly against the wall and fired at Hoshea again. He barely dropped quickly enough as it passed straight over his shoulder and nearly touched his ear. The blast cut into the wall again; apparently, Clear Note didn’t care about ruining her decor.
Hoshea ran at the wall, an idea forming in his head. He bounced off the wall, whose springy surface launched him over Clear Note. She fired upwards, tailing him, but only cutting the ceiling. When he landed heavily, Clear Note spun to face him, weapon out. For once, she didn’t bother with plesintries before killing him. Hoshea was plain lucky then that the ceiling she’d shot gave out just then.
Bits of sharp metal and glass, and a whole lot of pink gooey ceiling, sprayed across the room as the room above dropped its contents directly on Clear Note’s head. Something went wrong with her armor as it exploded with sparks. Hoshea got up, dusting himself off, and sprinted out of the room to find Philip.
• • • • •
Another man fell next to Arman; his breathing came short as he lifted his weapon and fired through the broken window of the abandoned car he hid behind. The soldiers were steadily falling back, relying on help from the citizens who’d begun shooting from windows and hurling out energy grenades. It wasn’t enough. The Stelloids were too strong.
“Keep falling back!” Arman shouted to those who could hear him. The ground thrummed with more energy. It wasn’t long before the Stelloids would release whatever they had planned. ‘Removal,’ Philip had called it.
Arman’s shots caught a Stelloid in the middle, which seemed to be the only area they were vulnerable. The legs weren’t actually legs; Arman had only realized that after blowing one of the Stelloid’s legs off and seeing wires inside. The Stelloid Arman hit finally dropped as joint fire from a window above Arman landed true. The Stelloid crumbled to the ground, the armor disengaging and dropping out a weak, pale form.
A green line lanced out from the nearest Stelloid, burning through Arman’s hiding place. Ten Stelloids still remained at least, and killing as many as they had was like fighting an entire army. The Stelloids were unstoppable. There was no hope for a victory.
• • • • •
Hoshea suited up quickly. He needed to find Removal and destroy it. That went without saying; he was lucky that he’d found the room where they’d stashed his gear. Philip’s bag was still there, with the jars of acid inside. Hoshea steered clear of that fastening on his helmet and vest, and loading up his pew 1.5.
Green light struck the back of his head, bouncing off the helmet and cracking it. Hoshea turned to see Clear Note behind him, already shooting again. With a curse under his breath, Hoshea dove to the side and lifted his gun. Clear Note looked fine despite the ceiling collapsing on her; her armor must have busted, though, because she stood in the doorway with only her bracelets for a weapon.
Hoshea fired off a volley at his enemy, she anticipated him moving with the deadly grace of a Stelloid to dodge his shots. Hoshea aimed and shot one of her bracelets, singing her hand. Clear Note cried out in pain and anger and leapt at him, knocking the gun aside and holding him down with a strength that seemed impossible for her size.
Hoshea’s back pressed into the hard dirt. This room was on the ground level, near the sounds of fighting and the noises of Stelloids trying to put out fires. It looked almost identical to the prison room, only this room had a metal door frame holding back the squishy walls. Clear Note growled, gripping him and forcing him down with one hand while trying to raise her wrist with the remaining bracelet on it to aim at him.
Hoshea reached for his gun, but it was too far away; the only thing close was Philip’s bag. Hoshea gripped Clear Note’s hand, pointing it away from him, but she was slowly twisting it back. Beads of sweat formed on Hoshea’s brow as the silent battle dragged on. Clear Note slowly gained the advantage, the weapon approaching an angle to hit Hoshea. Desperation built inside him, and he struggled, and his bare foot came in contact with his knife on the ground.
Turning his head to the side, Hoshea spotted Philip’s bag. He looked back into Clear Note’s hate-filled eyes. “You want to know why I killed Perfect Tone? Because he was evil!” Clear Note barred her teeth, fairly frothing at the mouth, as Hoshea’s toes closed around the blunt edge of the knife and lifted it up. “And you want to know how I killed Perfect Tone? Because he underestimated me, he thought a simple human could never hurt him!” Hoshea stabbed the knife into Clear Note’s leg. She pulled back, screaming in the Stelloid way that seemed to blur reality.
Hoshea leapt to the side, ripped open Philip’s bag, and hurled a jar of the acid at her. Clear Note recovered enough to focus on him and raised her weapon as the jar cracked on her head. Stumbling backwards, her skin draining of color, she fell into the wall. Hoshea stood up, moving from the room and looking for Removal. Before Hoshea decided where to go, he noticed the drooping, graying walls.
“Hoshea!” Philip was running up the hall towards him. “We need to find Removal!”
Hoshea spun on one foot. “How… what? Where are all the Stelloids?”
“They’re all outside the nest!”
The walls and ceiling drooped more. Philip glanced around, eyes widening. “You used the acid!”
Hoshea tried to see what Philip was glancing at. “What are you talking about?”
Philip grabbed Hoshea’s hand. “This entire nest is made of living material! You hit it with an anti-bio acid that spreads through living material!”
“So?” Hoshea reached for the odd, graying wall.
Philip slapped his hand away and tugged on him. “That means this entire nest is melting down! And if you touch it, you’re dead!”
Hoshea’s head snapped up. “What?”
Philip was already sprinting out, Hoshea hurried after him, bare feet pressing into dirt. The walls and ceiling fell in on themselves, and the exit began to shrink as dripping, dead matter fell from the ceiling around them. Hoshea increased his sprint, bursting out as the whole nest collapsed inward. An explosion of fire shot into the air. The thrumming of Removal ceased, and the slight tremors of the ground stilled.
Hoshea fell to the dirt with Philip likewise ahead of him. His exaltation stilled when he saw the last ten Stelloids standing like sentries a hundred paces off. Philip glanced up, seeing what Hoshea had spotted. “Oh great.”
Two Stelloids turned from the group heading towards the escapees. Hoshea scrambled up, firing his pew 1.5 into the alien’s chest. He needed cover and quickly, or this fight would be over in a snap of the fingers.
Fighters screamed down from the sky, dropping missiles at the ranks of Stelloids, as Arman led a last charge towards the nest. Hoshea pulled Philip back as the explosions hit and lasers began to fly. When he raised his weapon again, the fight was over. Ten more broken bits of armor collapsed on the ground.
Hoshea jogged over to Lt. Arman, standing in the center of it all, weapon held up triumphantly. He spotted Hoshea and actually grinned. “Major!”
“Lieutenant, excellent work here.” Hoshea grabbed Arman’s hand, and the younger man hit him on the back, still smiling.
“That was an amazing plan!” Arman laughed. “Yet crazy enough, I didn’t think it could work.”
Hoshea raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t say anything, deciding to take it as a compliment.
The whole team of survivors began to exult; citizens hiding in their houses for the last week came out cheering, and any animosity felt before evaporated in the celebration, the cheers, and hollers. Phytom was safe, safe at last. The exaltations and celebrations lasted for days. Hoshea and his crew stayed with the people of Phytom Base, trying to repair and rebuild. Ships full of supplies and relief arrived soon after Arman managed to get communications up and running. It would take years for Phytom to fully heal, and there would never be any way to replace the men and women who’d died to save their home from the aliens.
One sleek ship left the atmosphere as the battle ended, glistening with a silver light. Its engines fired as it took off at superluminal speed, while Stelloid doctors attempted to revive the patient (hit with a bio acid) within. A Stelloid sub commander glanced out a viewing port towards Phytom, right as it disappeared in a streak of light. “This is not over, it hasn’t begun.”