Omnigalactic

by Christopher Conner

  “Suspicions of what?” I asked.

  He stood, stoic and silent. Then, he walked to the stone slab. “My suspicions were wrong, but nonetheless, a step in the right direction.”

  “What are you talking about?” the doctor and I asked at the same time.

  He touched the golden star. “Your researchers are wrong — at least, partially. These ruins are indeed the creations of an ancient civilization, but this is no tomb.”

  “Okay, if you are such a master of xeno-archeology,” she said, “then, what is it?”

  “It is a temple of offering, of sacrifice, to the Azarr'shna. The Daemon Realm. Or as we know it now, Interspace.”

  I shook my head. “I don't get it.”

  “You sound like one of my psych patients with delusions of grandeur,” Doctor Rupert said. “I hate to use this term because it stigmatizes mental illness, but you sound batshit insane.”

  “I am the sanest person in this room, Doctor,” he said. “What I speak of is the truth. Now, if I may continue, what your ‘researchers’ fail to understand is that the civilization that built this was none other than the beginnings of what was to become the Wyn Empire.”

  “How do you know this?” I asked.

  He pointed to the walls and the floor. “The inscriptions you see before you are of Wyn creation. It is an older — much older — dialectal variance of their written language. Unintelligible to a modern Wyn speaker, but to those who study it, it is perfectly intelligible.”

  “You can read this?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “Then, what does it say?”

  “There is a common passage that occurs throughout the temple. It says, ‘Mighty, Most-Powerful, All-Knowing Shen'roth, we humbly offer this sacrifice to you so that you may strike down our foes. Grant us mercy so that we may continue to serve you.’ It continues, but that is the key inscription.”

  “So, what happened to these Wyn?” I asked. “I thought the last of them went into exile after the AI War. But, this is ten-thousand years old. Was Harland their homeworld?”

  “That, I cannot answer. One can only speculate. Clearly, at one point or another, they left this world.”

  “I don't believe a word of this,” Doctor Rupert said. “Not when it's coming from some crazy man in wizard robes.”

  Glennsworth scoffed. “If you wish to continue thinking this is a king's tomb, then you may. But when you are a decade into tearing this place apart and possess no answers still, you will think back to this moment.”

  “Wait, wait, wait,” I said. “You mentioned a name - Shenny'ra? Shun'ru?”

  “Shen'roth,” he corrected.

  “Shen'roth, yeah. Who is that?”

  Glennsworth took out his book, thumbed through it, and set it on the slab, pointed toward us. An illustration of a giant shell with dozens of black tentacles occupied an entire page next to red and black writing. “Shen'roth, Elder Daemon of Deception. It seems this was who our Wyn friends were trying to summon.”

  I pointed at the illustration. “That looks like the animal that Jord and I killed!”

  “That thing?” Doctor Rupert asked. “You sure?”

  “Yes! I saw it up-close. It had a whole bunch of those black tentacles, like the one we brought to the lab.”

  “Let me make sure I'm understanding all this correctly,” she said. “We've uncovered a sacrificial chamber, and the thing that's been attacking us all along was summoned by ancient, daemon-worshiping Wyn? Am I getting this right?”

  “Precisely,” Glennsworth said. “And it seems our little green friend ended his reign of terror. Quite a feat, I must say.”

  “I have to include this in my report. I have to tell the university that—”

  Glennsworth stopped her. “None of what I told you will leave this planet.”

  “And why not? This is a major discovery! Everything we know about the Wyn — everything we know about Interspace — has changed!”

  “It will cause galaxy-wide hysteria! I thought you said I was the insane one!”

  The temple began to rumble. I stumbled, and my elbow cracked against the sandstone as I hit the floor. The rumbling continued, but more violently. I struggled to get to my feet. “What was that?”

  “Nothing good,” she said. “We have to get to the surface. C'mon, let's go.”

  We staggered as we traversed the steps out of the temple. The rumbling intensified, and I could hear the cries of the researchers. It was not good at all.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Stringy Meat Scraps

  By the time we made it to the researchers, it was already too late. Human bodies lay scattered about and torn to pieces. Their once-white lab coats were stained deep red with their blood. There were more shouts, and a head-splitting shriek reverberated off the glasteel dome. My heart sank into my stomach and boiled in bile. A massive, armored shell with dozens of black tentacles had dug its way under the earth and into the dome. Shen'roth had returned from the dead to kill us all, to exact his revenge. We had to get out of there, or we were all going to die.

  I called out a warning as one of the many tentacles flew at us. I ducked and rolled behind a downed pillar. Doctor Rupert and Glennsworth dove into safety with me. We debated what to do as we watched researchers being slain one by one. The tunnel was open.

  “We should run past him while he’s busy with the others!” I said. “That way, we can get help!”

  Doctor Rupert protested. “No, we have to help the others! We can’t leave them here to die!”

  Another tentacle flew our way. I rolled backward as the bumpy, black appendage slammed into the pillar, smashing it in half. Sand flew into my eyes and blinded me. I screamed out in pain as the coarse grains scraped against my eyeballs. A pair of hands grabbed me and flung me to the ground. Lukewarm water was dumped onto my face. Glennsworth commanded me to open my eyes. Despite the pain, I forced them open. With his other hand, he dried my eyes, using the back of his cloak. I thanked him as he helped me up.

  But where was Doctor Rupert? I searched the area like a frantic, fear-crazed madman, but all I saw were more dead bodies.

  There she was; over by a cordoned-off area of sand. She struggled to get up as I ran to her. I threw her arm over my shoulders and tried to hoist her up, but her leg was broken, and she could put no weight on it.

  I groaned, trying to support her weight, and for once, I cursed the Pantheon for endowing me with such a small stature. I felt her slip from my shoulders. I turned around. A tentacle grabbed her by the legs and tugged her toward Shen'roth. With all my might, I stomped at it, kicked at it, and slammed it with my fists, but it maintained its vice-like grip on her. She reached for my hands, and I grabbed them, digging my feet into the sand. Her arms felt like they were going to rip from her torso. Tears fell from her eyes. Her face sent chills up my spine and forever cemented itself into my memory. It was the face of someone who knew they had met their end, who had taken their last breaths. She was going to die, and there was nothing I could do.

  A metal rod cracked down onto the tentacle like lightning. Shen'roth shrieked, and the tentacle went limp as a dead fish, releasing Doctor Rupert. I looked up to see Glennsworth, coming down on it with another attack. He looked to me and shouted, “Get to the tunnel! Now!”

  I tucked Doctor Rupert's arm over my shoulders and started dragging her toward the tunnel. Some of the researchers had fled, while the few who remained came over to help me carry her. Behind us, I could hear more shrieks as Glennsworth distracted the giant creature.

  We were almost ten feet away from the tunnel when someone yelled, “Watch out!” I turned to see a long, unbroken pillar tumbling in the air toward us. I threw my body weight against Doctor Rupert's. We fell to the side of the pillar as it crashed into the tunnel entrance. Now, there was about a ton of sandstone rubble blocking our only way out. If we weren't screwed before, we most certainly were now.

  I watched in terror as
Glennsworth was smacked away by one of Shen'roth's many arms. My body was paralyzed. The lumbering daemon turned his body away from Glennsworth and started to squirm and slither toward us. He reached for one of the researchers, snatching them up and crushing them in his grip. Their legs hung from their torso on little more than bloody ligaments and bone. The researcher screamed in agony as they were tossed aside, like stringy meat scraps. My stomach churned and nausea overtook me from looking at all that carnage. It looked like some kind of twisted butcher shop in there.

  Thank the Pantheon, Glennsworth sent his metal rod flying through the air, and it bashed at Shen'roth's flailing limbs, prompting him to go after the blue-robed maniac again.

  Behind me, in the blocked tunnel, I could hear shouting. I yelled for help from somebody, anybody. We were trapped. Then, the voice became clearer, and I couldn't have been any happier than I was at that moment - it was Jord.

  “Sai! Get your green ass away from the tunnel!”

  I told everyone to spread out and move away from it. An arctic, gassy mist covered the pillar and hardened over it like ice. There was a ear-splitting, humming sound, and the pillar cracked and chipped as it turned into a pile of icy rubble.

  Jord walked through, armed with his Mark V gauss gun, and the cryoflayer slung to his back. “Heads up,” he said and threw me my customized plasma pistol. He looked at the other survivors. “You three, get Ellen back up top to the infirmary and put that leg in a splint.” He looked back at me. “Does your dad's book say anything about monsters coming back from the dead?”

  I reset my sights and flicked the safety off. “Very funny, asshole. It did mention what to do with disobedient, drunken employees, though. If we get through this alive, you're fired.”

  “Fired? Oh, so, you're my boss now? When did that happen?”

  “Since Day One, buddy. The business address is in my name, and I bought the ship.”

  “You mean your dad bought the ship, rich boy.”

  Glennsworth tumbled through the sand and thumped at our feet. He groaned as he propped himself up with his metal rod. “You two can help me at any time.”

  I pointed at Jord. “We'll settle this after it's dead.”

  Jord nodded and opened fire on the mass of inky, black tentacles in front of him. His gauss gun hummed as it chopped into Shen'roth's wet, fleshy limbs. The great daemon swiped at us and sent sand and boulder-size hunks of rubble flying in all directions. I leapt out of the way, desperately trying not to get crushed. I joined Jord and fired away at the dozens of flailing monster limbs that were squirming, striking, reaching, and grabbing at us. It was like running through a massive gauntlet. You might have been able to dodge the axes, clubs, and buzz-saws for a bit, but at some point, you would get sliced or bludgeoned into tiny pieces.

  If we had any sort of advantage in the fight, it was that Shen'roth's movement was much more awkward and slow, compared to how quickly he moved underwater. Despite our engines needing repairs and a thorough flush, we were able to kill the thing pretty quickly with the Lady Luna's railgun. But as I severed and maimed another tentacle with my plasma pistol, I worried that Shen'roth still had the upper hand in the scenario.

  I noticed something strange, as well - it looked like all his limbs had grown back after our first encounter. Was there some kind of amorphous blob inside that shell, like a freaky, radioactive, mutant mollusk from an old movie I’d watched? How did a daemon have regenerative powers?

  Another boulder flew at me. I dodged. There was no time to stand and think. But, we had to do something. The cryoflayer! That was it. Maybe we had to completely freeze and crystallize that thing, then blow it into a million pieces, so it couldn't regrow its limbs.

  I looked at Jord, who was blasting away with his gauss gun. “Jord! Use the cryoflayer!”

  Jord leapt and tumbled away before a pillar could slam down and crush him. “I've only got a couple shots left. If I miss, we're dead!”

  “You won't miss!” I yelled. “Just do it, or we'll all—”

  I was swept from my feet. The back of my head thudded against the sand, and my vision went blurry. My head pounded from the blow. I struggled to sit up and see what had happened, but my vision failed to straighten out. Something black wrapped around both my legs and tightened, constricting like a hungry snake. My body was dragged through the sand, and I reached out for anything to grab a hold of. Nothing but fistfuls of coarse sand slipped through my fingers. I jerked as I was lifted into the air upside-down.

  My vision finally started to focus. I looked below and saw Shen'roth's shell open. Inside was a gaping maw with hundreds of rows of razor-sharp teeth. An eye appeared, blood-red and piercing with an abyssal, black pupil. The eye swelled as it glowed ever more sinister, until it was bright red.

  My dad's book slipped out from inside my jacket. I shouted, “No!” and reached out to catch it. I failed. It fell into Shen'roth's mouth. Shen'roth coughed and tossed me across the room. I slammed into the glasteel dome, the wind completely knocked out of me.

  I looked up and saw Jord blast a stream of misty gas from the cryoflayer. Shen'roth shrieked as a number of its limbs hardened to ice. Glennsworth sent his metal rod soaring through the air and smashed the frozen tentacles to shards of meat which thudded as they hit the sand.

  Shen'roth turned to Jord, his shell open and exposing that evil red eye. It glowed, casting a red tinge onto Jord's cybernetic parts. Jord stopped firing his weapons and dropped them to the ground.

  Glennsworth called to him, “You fool! Don't look at his eye!”

  It was no use. It was as if Jord hadn’t heard him. He couldn't have heard him. His attention, his entire focus, was obsessively transfixed on Shen'roth's eye.

  “Jord!” I yelled. “Look away!”

  Jord slumped to the ground like a burlap sack. I sprinted to him. I had to see if he was still alive. His organic eye was closed and he was limp, but he still had a pulse. Thank the Pantheon.

  Glennsworth yelled at me, but I couldn't understand him over Shen'roth's shrieks, reverberating through the dome. He pushed me back and stood in front of us, book in one hand, his other outstretched toward the daemon. The red eye shined upon him, but Glennsworth kept his focus on the book. The ground swelled, and thousands of grains of sand and shells rose into the air around him, swirling like miniature tornadoes.

  His voice boomed and sank lower in timbre and pitch as he spoke: “SHEN'ROTH RA NORT NAER'NATH! SHEN'ROTH YAR GEZH'MET FIL KAERN'A!”

  The sand fell to the ground, and a deafening bang struck Shen'roth. A dull, grayish shield engulfed the dome, its edge just stopping short of us. Shen'roth lashed out at us, but the semi-invisible wall buzzed and sizzled as his tentacles struck it. The daemon's shell slammed shut, and it retreated back toward the temple in the thick of the ruins, shrieking as it squirmed and knocked over pillars and rocks.

  It was gone, and the nightmare was over — if only for now.

  “What did you do?” I asked, cradling Jord's head in my arms.

  “I incanted a daemonic ward,” he answered. “It acts as a barrier that he cannot pass, as it causes him immense pain. But, it will not last for long. We must retreat to the surface.”

  “Help me carry Jord. He's too heavy for me.”

  Glennsworth and I sloughed through the long, dark tunnel leading up to Melville. My legs, back, and head ached. Sweat dripped from my face and drenched my clothes. I'd never carried someone so damn heavy in my entire life. Jord must have weighed over three-hundred pounds, including the cybernetic half of his body.

  I checked the pulse on his wrist. Still there. C'mon, buddy, I thought. Stay alive. Don't die on me now. Don't deny me the satisfaction of firing you. Not when I know you were the one in the wrong.

  After what felt like the length of eternity itself, we finally made it up to the beach. The survivors of the attack were laid out on gurneys. There was no more room in the infirmary. Some of them were covered in blood-stained dress
ings, while others had intravenous bags of drugs and saline coursing through them. We laid Jord on an empty gurney next to Doctor Rupert. I collapsed to my knees, completely spent. I couldn't move another inch. I breathed the ocean air in deeply and shut my eyes, hoping it had all been just a dream.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  World-Class Loser

  Opening my eyes confirmed it hadn’t been a nightmare. It had been real, as real as the sky above and the ocean around me. I wished I was back home with my ass planted on the couch and a beer in my hand, relaxing until the next Interspace haul. Instead, I lay on the beach of some shithole research colony on some shithole planet in a remote area of the Koris Sector. All I could hear were cries and moans of pain.