Xuxuhr was a patchwork of nightmares grafted onto a giant and then further cursed by daylight. His apex was a locust’s face with short horns for antennae between unblinking, cuttlefish eyes. The snout of a caiman erupted from his exoskeletal head in place of insect jaws. But the typical stretch of bone and scales was cut away near its base. The remnant of the lower jaw appeared to have stretched out to catch the cascade of teeth liberated by the cutting blow. Other teeth seemed to have fallen down across his giant’s body and taken root. Spikes erupted through seems between plates of his dark grey armor. He stood on two cloven feet at the ends of his long legs. Both sprouted two lizard-like toes, but with two talons each. The General’s posture showed a monster at complete ease with his twisted form, and who enjoyed his physical power. Another set of eyes stared out from his shoulders on each pauldron of his armor. They were purely intimidating decoration. Yet, they blinked.
Like all Generals, Xuxuhr had received a personal weapon from the Dark Urge. Unlike all Generals, Xuxuhr put aside his malevolent black whip in favor of lengths of a tremendous chain taken in conquest. The chain was a remarkable feat of engineering by the species called Ignitaurs. However, the chains were not as indestructible as his whip. Thus Xuxuhr needed replacements and repairs to his chosen symbol of terror. Foreseeing this, he captured and imprisoned the Ignitaur chain makers and gave them a life beyond their planet’s death. This likely was not in league with the will of the Dark Urge. And so Xuxuhr never mentioned acting outside the normal laws of annihilation. Because he was not destroyed for it, he assumed he was allowed a boon of unspoken consent.
Xuxuhr kept the Ignitaur smiths in a hidden prison deep within his ship. That first captive generation once lived on a world made of enchanted steel. They attempted to capture Xuxuhr in special chains made for that goal. The arcane strength of the links would astonish even the Forge mistress, the Dark Urge. The chains were nearly strong enough to bind a General of Hell. But the steel planet watched in horror as Xuxuhr broke free, even without the aid of his demons. The most hideous of Hell’s commanders then used his failed bonds as massive whips. With the links in constant motion, he slashed apart their grey and gleaming cities, and finally sundered the hull of the planet.
The chain makers were doomed to serve Xuxuhr trapped inside the equivalent of another artificial world. Xuxuhr’s ship was built for perpetual war, and burned like an eternal foundry. All the Ignitaurs needed was ore, anvils, hammers, and the will to survive. If they failed, Xuxuhr’s original whip still hung in his armory. They wished to live, even as prisoners of the monster that destroyed their home. Life attained time. Vengeance required time. So they made their jailer incredible chain. Their patience helped them survive intense heat and captivity. And, like Xuxuhr, they also kept well-hidden secrets.
Xuxuhr’s next target dominated the landscape. The towering building had stood for so long that windblown sediments encased one side in compacted layers of rock. Storms further covered that slope in nutrient rich soil. Over the ages, a habitat of lush vines, flying reptiles, and herbivorous serpents took hold. The blows of massive chains sundered it all.
Again, Xuxuhr reveled in using something built to constrain for destruction, instead. Rockets exploded across this frame. Orbital vehicles built to launch communication satellites were armed with warheads and fired at Hell’s forces. They blew apart demon formations, but gave Xuxuhr little reason to pause. Still, he nodded a salute to his attackers in the distance, and then the chains flew again. Xuxuhr’s onslaught eclipsed all the storms suffered on the planet Maeron. Little could stop him once he gained a rhythm. One image caused him to slow, and then sigh. The chains clattered to a halt with the rumble of thunderstorms. A giant spider hung in the sky beside him. He turned to face the Great Widow’s projection. A mocking tone gripped to his words as his grating voice clawed out from his throat.
“There is legend of a great spider
that lives in the depths of a fiery well.
She stays at the feet of the dark god
and never ventures from Hell.
Lest the great boots of conquest
slam down and crush her well.”
Laughter like acid frothed from between the General’s phalanx of teeth.
“There once was appreciation for poetry, General Xuxuhr.” The Great Widow said. “But I’m afraid your effort needs work to be appreciated in any form, let alone a threat.”
“I threaten worlds, Widow.” Xuxuhr said. “That is my role. “Yours is always a curious state.”
“I serve my mistress, the Dark Urge, whom I speak to in person. In Hell.” The Great Widow changed the orientation of her projection so that her face and fangs hovered above Xuxuhr. “So do not trifle with me, hideous beast. I have eight legs. It is not I who would be trampled.”
“Eight legs.” Xuxuhr mused. “Sutuhr has ten eyes, but eight like yours. I always wondered if you crept into his gestation chamber and meddled with his form.”
“If I ever did such a thing, it would be with the grace of Dark Urge. And so what might I have done to you?” The Great Widow taunted. “Certainly I did not choose your face.”
“Aesthetic judgment from a giant spider,” Xuxuhr observed. “I bid you come with me. I enjoy a panicked stampede. What might both our faces do to the minds of the gnats I now slaughter?”
“From threats to request of an alliance.” The Great Widow said. “Your mind has more loops than your chains.”
“We both serve. Destruction. Fear. Horror. And, then at last, conquest.”
“All for the Dark Urge.” The Great Widow added.
“Of course,” Xuxuhr nodded. “All praise be to my mother, but who is only your friend.”
“My friend. My mistress. Your ruler.”
“A fact I accept, Great Widow.” Xuxuhr bowed his head. He noticed a glare of light flash across his chest. The eyes on his pauldrons blinked. “Now, why have you invaded my brain? Not to duel with me, nor distract me from the service to our almighty, black sovereign.”
“She has need of you, General. Of you and your horde.”
“I serve her, now.” Xuxuhr raised his chains in his fists as he walked toward the source of the glare.
“The Dark Urge has need of you here. In Hell’s own system.” The Great Widow’s image kept floating at Xuxuhr’s left side.
Xuxuhr paused and lowered his chains. He looked up the spider. “If this is her command, then why does she not burn me with the blessing of her presence?”
“The Dark Urge has never done so. But if you love your mother, you will do as I ask.”
“I will obey her will. As always.” Xuxuhr paused to hide thoughts of his chains and their makers. “If I come home to Hell, perhaps I can do something that will give me great pleasure.”
Xuxuhr raised a taloned foot over a field of solar collectors used too late to focus heat as a weapon. He slammed his foot down to crush the panels. They shattered in a glittering wave of ceramics and steel. Xuxuhr twisted his foot as if to crush something beneath it and looked up at the Great Widow. His teeth bent into something approximating a horrific smile.
Sutuhr sat alone, and glowered. He hated glowering. He had reason to do so, and to be angry. His ship was still under repairs. It had taken the most damage of any Hell ship. Thus, his ego was also damaged. He could not bring greater glory to the Dark Urge on a floating wreck. He knew his demon crews worked tirelessly to restore all ships functions and weapons. But in a sense, the Xa’rol battle was still ongoing. His frustration amplified his hellish quirks. His left hand now ached from wiping away his own venom. His tongue was numb from rubbing against his teeth and fangs. A small river of venom flowed from the front of his throne. When system repairs reduced gravity, it rose as a liquid and highly toxic rope off the deck plating, only to splat into a wider, steaming sheen when gravity returned. Hell’s warships’ carried an overwhelming array of advanced weapons, but not one primitive mop. Sutuhr hated that.
The General was a chimera. His
ship was also a mix of systems that drew power from forces operant in spacetime and the arcane. It functioned as a unified war machine, until someone found a way to exploit one aspect to threaten the others. The Xa’rol weapons were the most powerful Sutuhr had ever faced. They struck down his ship’s defensive inferno, but still did not penetrate its hull of chaotic steel. Other weapons did. Now, even though they Xa’rol were vapor, a second battle raged inside the ship. The Xa’rol proved excellent engineers of data weapons. Sutuhr recalled Marn mocking system infiltration as the lowest form of combat. It was a very effective form of aggravation. Sutuhr was very aggravated. He became more so when a giant spider descended before him.
“I bid you greetings from your dark and infinite mother, Lord Sutuhr,” The Great Widow said.
“To my demons I am Lord and their bond to the Dark Urge. To you I am General.” Sutuhr answered with a sneer and drip of venom. “Unlike my demons, what will become of you should you ever die, I do not know. I am certain you are not Hell born. I am. So what would Hell have me do?”
“I am Hell’s voice in the cosmos, General.” The Great Widow replied. “The Dark Urge, my mistress and Hell’s almighty sovereign, my friend, orders you to return to Hell. Now.”
“Return?” Sutuhr thrust forward to the giant, dangling spider, even though he realized she was only spinning her image in his mind.
“When I leave you, make your main sail and transit to Hell’s orbit.”
Sutuhr slumped back in his throne. “I am pained greatly by my reply. I can only set my ship towards Hell in real space. I cannot attend the Dark Urge immediately. My ship was damaged in the commission of her will. As yet, I cannot make the main sail, lest I doom the horde.”
“When will it be repaired?”
“I cannot say.” Sutuhr wilted on his throne. “My demons work unceasingly to restore full operations.”
“And their General?” The spider’s eyes drew closer to Sutuhr’s own semi-arachnid face.
“I am their leader, spider!” Sutuhr sat up and stiffened. “My demons work well because they both love and fear me. I am their Lord!”
“And you are failing as a son. What should I tell your blazing mother? You fail in war and so you fail to obey her now?”
“Old Widow, I am as devoted a servant to my mother as could be possible!” Flecks of Sutuhr’s venom shot though where the spider would hang if she were physically present. “But if you continue your barbs, should I return to Hell soon, my first act of defiance will be to kill you.”
The Great Widow paused. She had made a tactical error in her interaction with Sutuhr. So long as his piety was a line kept straight an understood, he was complaint. When that line was plucked or challenged, his aggression replaced devotion.
“Your faith and threat are noted, General Sutuhr.”
“Do not question me. Do not question my faith.” Sutuhr’s lips curled back.
“We all serve the Dark Urge as we can. As we must.” The Great Widow’s tone became soft. “All praise be to the Dark Urge.”
“All praise is for her.” Sutuhr growled. “Now, help me with my ship. If you can.”
“Then it is more than mere physical damage.” The Great Widow remarked.
“My ship is intact. Its internal power system is infiltrated.”
“Not possible.”
“Fact, distant bug!” Sutuhr snapped
“Then, how?” The spider asked in a more gentle tone.
“My last enemy launched more than powerful beams at me.” Sutuhr grumbled. “The infection makes my reactors surge and overwhelm the capacitor grid. The first incident led to an explosion. We have shut down systems to isolate the cursed gremlin. My demons are barracked in vacuum to prevent greater losses.”
“But your ship can generate replacements.” The Great Widow twitched.
Sutuhr took in a long breath before exhaling his exasperated reply. “To phase energy into matter, especially living matter, I need energy. I need power.”
“Redirect your main drive through your ship.” The spider offered.
“Your wisdom is as great as your service to Hell, old spider. I thank you for telling me a strategy that has already been enacted.” Sutuhr paused for his ridicule to fully penetrate. “However, we still cannot make the main sail without the main drive and our internal power grid fully devoted to that task.”
The Great Widow was silent as she thought.
“So you begin to see my hindrance.” Sutuhr grasped his mace from beside his throne and slowly waved it in the air. “If not for my horde and the crimson grace of the Dark Urge burning through our decks, my ship would effectively have no defense. Fortunately I have already killed all enemies in the nearest systems. Yet I grow bored, and wish to kill something. Anything.”
Behind Sutuhr’s throne, Crucis entered the bridge. Upon hearing his General’s words, he exited.
“This is an unprecedented problem, General.” The Great Widow broke her silence. “Never before has alien data been able to corrupt Hell’s code. Even so, the infernal power of your ship’s central core should cleanse the infection when it’s found.”
Sutuhr breathed deeply, again. “If it can be confined. Yes. That is our strategy. Isolated and overwhelm. Or at least excise and hurl the infection into space. Where I can shoot it. Yet this is a very large ship. It has an extensive grid. And then another after that. The schematic is likely more complex than your web.”
The three-dimensional, intricate and vast power grid schematic replaced the hovering Great Widow and scrolled before Sutuhr. One of the end of the spider’s legs moved the schematic.
“No. It is not.” The Great Widow’s said.
Sutuhr snorted.
“That some alien has broken our coding is, quite improbable.” The image of the spider returned.
“And yet, here I fight just that.” Sutuhr said.
“Gain as much knowledge on this gremlin as you can, General. I will tell your great and powerful mother you still serve her with all devotion possible. And that you will, one day, return to her side. Do so as quickly as you can.”
“Is my mother under threat?” Sutuhr stood and narrowed his sideward cat’s eyes at the spider.
“Do so as quickly as you can,” The Great Widow repeated. Her image vanished.
Sutuhr was uncertain if the spider had just repeated herself or he saw a reflected message. He felt needed by his greatest love, but was marooned in deep space. Frustration overwhelmed him. He made war on the sheen of his own venom on the deck plate by beating it with his mace. Crucis heard the roars and smashing metal in the corridor outside the bridge. He made a mental note to summon a sacrificial repair crew.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Most of the planets orbiting the Kellis stars were solid worlds. That made Anguhr glad, if not merciful. These worlds might be his last campaign. He was unlikely to die. However, there were only so many worlds left to conquer, and there was more than one General at work. If Anguhr could jump his ship on a solo mission to another galaxy with powerful opponents, he would consider that a promised land. The future without the war was an inconceivable and unwanted existence. For the Kellis system, the future ended with Anguhr’s invasion. His arrival on the first contested world was near to an asteroid’s collision. He stood as the shockwave spread out from the impact crater. Battle cries of his demons cut through the falling rock and dust as they streamed down from space to follow him.
Above them, the last desperate ships of an allied armada exploded and fell toward the planet. The evening sky was brightened by flashes and streaks of a last stand in orbit and fall of hope. The secondary batteries and missile bays of his ship were already hot from constant fire and perpetual launches. Anguhr let Proxis deal with the valiant, doomed survivors. He looked for better sport on the surface. Ahead of him, energy lances slashed from beyond the horizon to intercept incoming demons. The lances were few. The demons were many. Those demons hit by the defensive fire corrected their flight and returned fire wit
h their heavy, metallic rifles.
Enemy aircraft roared through the darkening orange sky. Their shape marked the squadron as allies of Kellis. The fighters were spear-point shaped with contrasting falcon wings of steel. Anguhr had seen living, feathered predators soar. Those hunted the skies of a planet with terraced cities and fields of agriculture floating in tropical air. He cleaved the structures and their defenders apart with his axe. Aside from the destruction, the native falcons had stirred a rudiment of aesthetic appreciation in Anguhr’s mind. He annihilated the native civilization, but left the planet intact. Anguhr had no thoughts of preservation as he watched the attack craft bank and drop into a lower arc. Their new trajectory aimed straight at him. He smiled.
Before the aircraft could launch their payloads, streaks of fire struck their formation. There were no demon squadrons close by when the fighters altered course. But the allied pilots didn’t realize the demons’ ability to accelerate. Each demon could act as an arcane fighter craft that bypassed aerodynamics. The winged spearheads exploded in succession. Their burning wreckage fell behind Anguhr as he continued toward the city. A new, massive wave of demons followed him in the sky. The chorus of their war cries became a sonic wave creating tremors. The energy lances from the city continued to fire skyward. Hulks of ships fell from space as burning streaks in the night. The city Anguhr approached shimmered with lights among its buildings. By the time Anguhr passed through it, there would be only flames.
Anguhr’s massive form crushed rock beneath his boots. He glared across the city as his demons made it a battlefield. He stood as a beacon of doom. Yet doom was an end, and Anguhr never enjoyed victory as much as the fight. The act and idea of war brought joy. He held other feelings almost all sentient creatures would consider even stranger than that. In Anguhr’s mind, war brought a sense of safety and calm. It merged with other impressions in his mind that had lingered since he could make rudimentary thoughts. The result felt as a transcendent presence. This sense of War was his own, secret belief. It was also dangerous. It undermined the ability of Dark Urge to control him.
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