by Greg Ramsay
The captain of the enemy vessel replied in erratically fast dialogue that was similar, but not the same as Ramashin dialect. To Lia it sounded like aggressive gibberish. “No, I don’t want a free trip to Bermuda, thank you!” she bellowed sarcastically, then hung up. Mere minutes later the ship requested to dock in the massive hangar bay. Lia, with her mutt-zombie generals, 100 soldiers and James in tow, marched to receive the enemy. When they reached the hangar Lia opened the doors. The ship pulled in, smoothly launching its exit tunnel without damaging anything. Lia stood flanked by her commanders like a seasoned general.
Chapter 13 – Calm Before The Storm
In front of her stood a massive Ravagok in purple-ish blackened armour. It was a lot like a Ramashin, but six feet tall rather than the Ramashin’s five feet height. Unlike the Ramashin’s mottled grey-blue skin tone, its body was as black as Lia’s armour and it had sunken yellow eyes. It opened its massive red cavernous mouth. “Not Bermuda, Berola. No trips, only parley,” it bellowed. Lia tried not to chortle at its ignorance.
“Shouldn’t we be in conflict before requiring parley?” Lia asked pointedly.
Berola bellowed light laughter in response. “You lead Ramashin slaves, we are already at war!” it replied.
“Very well, what is there to parley for when I can eliminate your force alone?” Lia replied with a calm, serious, yet intimidating air about her. The Ravagok negotiator waved its tendril arms gently as if to mock her.
“Yanmousharah requests truce to reclaim Tamashiri,” it bellowed calmly.
“I will see the All Father for confirmation,” Lia bellowed.
“No, you will accept or face Ravagok,” it replied.
Another ‘All-important’ race that’s essentially structured just like the other and they’re at war, Lia thought sarcastically.
How is that any different than human wars? James thought to her via their link.
Fair, Lia replied.
I suggest we accept without condition. Makes life easier on us if they’re fodder. And if they cross us... well, you know that won’t be an issue, James thought. Lia smiled still looking at the Ravagok.
“Tell your Yanmoushara we agree to his terms,” Lia bellowed to it finally. The negotiator seemed to nod then left without further communication.
Returning to the mothership’s command deck, Lia hit a button as requested by Ravagok message. The entire centre of the space filled with bluish chalk like gas. A port had opened up in the ceiling with two smaller openings. Just as she was getting concerned, the gas stopped flowing. In that instant, a large current of energy was fired from the second port that reprogrammed the substance. Yanmoushara sat before her on its pedestal leg-like tendrils spread proudly to expose one large tendril between them. Lia watched disgusted as something visibly stretched the middle tendril outward from the inside like a bubble expanding a hose. Suddenly a Ravagok emerged covered in Yanmoushara slime, fully grown. Save for apparent differences in anatomy and overall slight differences in physical makeup, the two dominant species of Tamashiri really were quite similar. Lia did her best to push her imagination aside in terms of what anatomy a baby just emerged from.
Just like a kidney stone... James thought grimacing. Lia gave him a dirty look.
“You accept. Good. Now GO FIGHT. We support,” it demanded with powerful intimidating bellows.
“No, you fight, we’ll support. What are we dealing with here?” Lia replied sternly, unfazed by its obvious attempts to unnerve her.
“Closest orbiting. Ship. Infected, planet,” it replied in jagged English.
“We’ll clear the ship, you start with planet-side clearing,” Lia replied.
“Agreed,” it said before the powder-like representation dissipated back into the ceiling.
“Well, that settles that, muster your troops, it’s time to do work,” Lia said to James while heading for the hangar.
“What’s the plan?” James called after her.
“I take some of your drones, clear the ship, and bring it down hard as a distraction. While you bring our ship in to keep the Ravagok in line.”
“Try not to destroy the whole planet this time!” James yelled after her.
“Earth was already unstable from all the core drills, pollution and shit anyway...” Lia muttered to herself annoyed, but still satisfied with her choice. Flanked by aliens, knights and old west cowboys, Lia launched in a smaller vessel. Quickly they found themselves at the shut hangar door. Anticipating no response, Lia blew the door open with her blade, tossing her minions in like javelins with her free hand. Thanks to James’ gifts they didn’t need to breathe, but she wasn’t keen on flying them in. Her invasion squad followed her commands to the letter, mowing down shifted Ravagok, one by one. Lia’s team had slight advantages in speed and strength, but were limited by the habits of their old lives in some senses. One cowboy fell with two Ravagok on top of him because he’d ran out of ammo.
“Can’t you idiots supplement rounds with James’ hybrid material?” she demanded. Of course, they couldn’t answer that because they didn’t know what she meant. “Think really hard about bullets, they may be able to fire with your willpower, if you focus hard enough,” she said while deftly slicing apart one enemy after another. Her suggestion paid off for her gun-toting allies. Eventually she made it to the ship’s bridge; all detectable enemies summoned by her periodic bellows had been vanquished. Wasting no time, she programmed the ship for a crash course with Tamashiri.
Tamashiri’s healthy thick atmosphere lit up her view with fire while they roared down to the ground like a missile. Lia had the last minute idea to engage broadcast systems on the way down, linking with all allied ships around the planet. She bellowed a command to draw all of the Ravagers to one point – where they were landing. Lia slowed the ships descent just slightly to let the insanely fast Ravagers gather like starved animals. When satisfied she’d caused maximum impact, she brought her ghost ship down like a meteor, at full hyper speed force. Shockwaves blasted from her impact with such force whole massive forests were felled instantly, everything below was killed.
From Lia’s viewpoint, the ship’s nose was badly damaged, most systems non-functional, save for auxiliary weapons. Energy weapons may backfire here depending how the Ravagers have evolved, Lia thought to herself. Her blade caught her eye. Have to try though or I could be seriously limited myself, she concluded. After setting the system to continuously broadcast her call, she waited. A signal hit her display; it contained authorization to use a planet-wide broadcast system intended for emergency. The message was signed Bermuda. Lia laughed then looped into the system. Soon the whole planet was filled with her bellows like a natural disaster of sound. Lia engaged the ship’s weapons then blew a hole from her position all the way to the outside.
“Leave, meet up with Commander James!” she bellowed. With that she was alone.
She waited for what felt like an eternity until she could sense hordes drawing closer as directed. Remaining calm so as to be less detectable herself, she let the Ravagers draw around her. Once they were close enough to charge she ramped up the ship’s self-destruct condition. Lia sped from the ship so fast the Ravagers didn’t notice or were pre-occupied with their instinctive need to hunt the signal. Unlike James’ self-made army they didn’t obey her, instead her Ramashin voice only drew them to kill her. No wonder so many Ramashin died; their own weapon backfired big time, Lia thought suddenly grateful for her new immunity to Ramashin calls. I wonder why they once affected me? Probably because the L-strain was different from the sludge they bombed Earth with, she thought.
Meanwhile an allied Ravagok ship had arrived in the chaos. Moments later, James arrived as well. Lia flew to the sky, letting the dense atmosphere shroud her wings. James and his commanders launched midair with all troops following behind like paratroopers without chutes. Lia wings flapped to the beat of mutant zombie feet slamming into soft black soil. She bellowed an intimidating war cry to her Ravagok allies who opened fire
from their orbiting ships on her collections of Ravagers. War raged on planet-wide from dusk to dawn. Storms of red lightning crashed through grey skies in bad weather, often striking both teams. Those not of James’ army often played support roles, letting the mutant zombie beings take the brunt of battle. Lia herself remained in the thick of it as always, happiest when heavily outnumbered. James fought hard having consumed enough Ravagers to keep up his stamina.
Weeks passed, troops were falling left and right on all sides. Many of James’ lesser soldiers expired simply from overexerting the power he’d provided them. James was finally beginning to weaken from the constant overflow of enemies.
“Starting to agree with the efficient planet destruction plan...” he muttered to no one, while sustaining damaging blows.
Lia too had to retreat into a natural cavern to restrict the flow of combatants. One clean wave of energy from her blade mowed down countless Ravagers while inadvertently damaging some of her troops. Luckily, the energy was sufficient to repair them. All around her was a chaos of countless languages blurring together with the sound of weapons and explosions – the symphony of war playing for all to suffer to. Countless unintelligible warped native species worked as one destructive unit on land sea and air. James found himself finally faltering. Lia blasted him clear, only to be overwhelmed herself. A massive black-eyed mutant alien commander plowed everything away from her single-handedly with its spiked club. Nodding thanks, Lia abandoned her cavern, switching to airborne combat to alleviate pressure from the warped flying creatures of Tamashiri. Mutated Spartans and gunmen took up her previous position to draw pressure off those mid-field.
Mid-air, Lia grabbed one of James’ armoured knights and tossed it down on the head of a shifted giant covered in ragged fur. Bravely the knight withstood its strikes to stab deep into the giant’s spine, bringing it down hard on Ravagers climbing up its legs to kill him. Mutated Genghis Khan led a team of miscellaneous warriors on a large alien barge, hacking down any grotesque sea creatures that jumped up at them. After long endless periods of horde on dwindling force battle, Lia’s team retreated to their mothership. Allowing it to continuously blast the summoning call, they set about shooting into the growing pools of mutated creatures like shooting fish in a barrel. Eventually after months of tedious repetitive fighting, Lia’s force was down to her, James, most of the augmented commanders, and about 200 of the 1000 troops. Many of those troops were beginning to fade, so both Lia and James further over-burdened themselves blasting them with restrained waves of energy.
Regularly her planet-wide Ravagok allies reported success at the cost of heavy casualties, then repeatedly demanded Lia do more. Their combined tactics of shoot from space, drop down to fight, retreat, and repeat was quite effective. Below, the primary broadcast positions of every allied ship looked like whole countries’ worth of beings had been gathered up to be burnt black. Unbeknownst to Lia many of the remaining Nazis mused with their Fuhrer at the familiarity of bodies turned to ash under fire. Many other groups, if they had the mental capacity to do so, spent their off nights musing about their time in Earth wars versus now. To Lia it was like one big space camping ground gathered around her flame of leadership to bask in their success. She still hated that some entities like Hitler managed to remain by primarily hiding behind troops to focus on inspiration.
Chapter 14 – War Torn
Countless more months passed in violent repetition until radar-style scans revealed much of the planet’s native population had fallen. Lia remained in talks with the ever demanding Yanmoushara who now commanded her to attempt to preserve members of each species for ‘treatment’. Their alliance had proven beneficial without any drama for a long enough time, that she tolerated its attitude. I’ll confer with the commanders, she replied, referring solely to James without exposing his higher importance as per usual. Wordlessly as always, the Yanmoushara abruptly hung up.
“Do you love the smell of charred mutant corpses now?” Lia asked jokingly.
James sat with his spiked razor wings splayed out of his armour like a tired bird. He looked like a man who’d seen ten lifetimes of war and also bore the weight of their repeated multi-species genocides.
“No, I still don’t,” he replied curtly for the hundredth time.
“Yanmoushara wants us to spare the locals for supposed treatment,” Lia said.
“I’m sure they’ll line up in an orderly fashion for us,” James replied sarcastically.
Next morning Lia set about commanding her troops to build pens. Over the next few weeks they survived constant fighting and corralling of species that were for the most part more physically imposing than they were. Finally, scans revealed the planet’s native creatures had been either subdued or wiped out. Roughly ten of apparently fifty unique species native to the planet remained in very small numbers, still trying to break free of their pens. Days later Lia watched more of her troops fall to dust; now only the strongest wills remained.
Outside, Yanmoushara finally graced them with its presence via the negotiator Berola.
“Hey Bermuda, what’s next?” Lia asked in bellows.
“Yanmoushara thanks you”, it said, indicating medals engraved in its new armour with pride. “Humans, inhuman drones, all have gratitude.”
Both of them turned to hear a beleaguered Genghis finally returning to shore, rambling all the while. Suddenly a giant whale-like creature with shifted fangs burst from the sea covered in sword wounds. In one violent motion, the great conqueror was consumed. Then the whale-beast finally succumbed to its wounds. Lia watched out of the corner of her eye ships coming in from all sides dropping off Ravagok troops. She eyed her ally closely.
“Yanmoushara requests you die now, monster, aberration,” Berola bellowed coldly.
Seconds later Lia’s team was under fire from all directions. One bellow from her was all it took to set everyone into battle mode. IDIOTS! Lia thought while her armour absorbed all their power. She instructed mutt-zombie Hitler to escort James back to their ship in the event his armour wasn’t sufficiently adapted. Only she had consumed the Yanmoushala after receiving its weapon upgrade gift. Whereas James had not and she wasn’t keen on the idea of warring while babysitting because his armour reacted like hers used to.
Lia made quick work of her new attack ships and all, leaving the 100 or so Ravagok remnants to scatter. Lia’s remaining Ramashin forces seized the opportunity to intervene, snaring the larger Ravagok like a giant squid snares a shark. Each team of near identical beings tried to tear each other apart with the serrated backs of their tendrils. Lia dealt with stragglers the slower Ramashin couldn’t catch, allowing them to otherwise win their own fights. Some crafty Ravagok commandeered Genghis Khan’s boat, quickly gaining distance via sea.
Suddenly the mutated whale-beast’s body quaked. Muffled roaring accompanied the blade of a blackened augmented Mongol Sabre. Genghis Khan tore his way out of the beast looking to be two steps from his grave, yet full of rage. He spun fast, throwing his sabre at the boat thief. It grazed it well. Finally Genghis grabbed his bow, ending the Ravagok in one shot. Satisfied at his vengeance, he stood calmly. Before he could react, a Ravagok’s weapon shot him clean in the chest, bringing him to his knees. One commander, the vaguely familiar man Lia saw in the pod before, witnessed this angrily. He stopped healing other troops with energy emanating from his palms abruptly. With astonishing speed he set off running toward the lake after the escaping Ravagok. Rather than swim he ran across the surface of the water effortlessly, dispatching his foes with deft swings of his augmented Roman Gladius. Quickly the commander ran back. He desperately spent what would be the rest of his energy trying to heal Genghis with his bestowed power. Instead they both withered to dust that faded away. Lia was shocked that such comradery was possible between a healer and a conqueror, especially considering they should’ve been mindless. Must’ve just been the guy’s gift giving him the instinct to act, Lia thought to herself, distracted by pistol fire in the distanc
e.
She sped to the source to find, to her dismay, mutt-zombie Hitler still alive. She was shocked to find him standing guard over James. Not only that, but he’d also killed a few Ravagok at the cost of multiple limbs. Lia gave him a dirty look.
“Are you being a damsel again?” Lia called out to James.
“Maybe,” James called back jokingly, weakness evident in his voice. She found him, sitting far away consuming a pile of Ravagok he’d killed to mend his wounds faster.
“Good, wouldn’t want things getting any weirder,” she said jokingly. Hitler dragged himself over cursing loudly in German to salute them both before fading away also.
“Like that...” Lia said with cold disgust, “I still wish you’d left him to rot,” she said disappointedly.
“Many were conquerors, widely considered evil like him. This soulless version merely died serving humanity. Its service is over,” James said indifferently, ever the cold calculating scientist.
“Good pet mutant super-zombie Hitler,” Lia said sarcastically, inwardly agreeing that it had served its purpose at least. I hope there’s an afterlife so people like him can hate how their very lives and worth were recycled for good, Lia thought to herself coldly as she walked away.
“Where are you going?” James asked.
“To finish this war,” Lia said with resonating resolve as she walked away.
Soon afterward Lia was airborne with a lethal purpose –– to end the Yanmoushara. She knew where it was thanks to her command console’s triangulations, so it didn’t take her long to find it. First she had to navigate a sort of bunker entrance buried under a false tangible holographic forest. The door buried far beneath was keyed to its voice and a few other parameters for negotiator usage. Lia simply cut her way through it with her power. Moments later she’d sped through countless dimly lit spaces designed like their ships and was soon face to face with the ‘divine’ in its chamber, a space completely identical to the Yanmoushala’s in architecture and function, the only real difference being it had a dark black colour scheme.