by Dave Welch
Suns of bliss sprung that next morning when affiliates of Grand Valla arrived. Burdened enough by the strangest perception, the sensible workers came to a stall, but oddly, every delegate of Space Void was still there. And no one had the authority to question the extent, at least, not until Neriya Hatcher arrived.
Neriya, of Xarnan and slug decent, was a former Symbassy officer and now a Symbassy spy.
She stood about five feet and some change.
Her skin was gray and green, with flattering black and blue spots running down her back, arms, and legs. She wore a pair of compression shorts and a half-sleeved coat that stopped just above her waist to compound her dynamic body.
She sat in the pilot seat of the cockpit on her old clunky space craft, slumped over the control desk, peering out of the windshield and onto Grand Valla’s landing pad.
“They’re still here…” She whispered, unbuckling herself from the pilot seat.
She glared down to her Moly Board resting on the floor, up against the control desk. She glanced away in thought, staring back out of the ship’s windshield.
Landing abruptly in her old spacecraft, Neriya, better known as Meth, exited from the cockpit.
Now, the agent for hire, came high in demand even though she failed to obtain the clearance forms. And after several attempts to communicate with Piayas, Meth finally decided to pay him a visit.
The managing committee stood by the main door when she rushed in barefooted. Flaunting her presence, she turned every head in Grand Valla, mesmerizing the officials.
Thorice Senitel, the head of Grand Valla’s management team, wore a dashing all-black suit, tailored and styled with a black shirt and necktie to match. He was a bit older and more than mindful of his commitment to Grand Valla.
“Greetings, how can we assist you?” Thorice questioned.
Meth stared with a set of captivating eyes while Thorice waited patiently for an answer.
A fellow employee walked by and slowed to a stop.
“Hey! You’re…” he mumbled, with a handful of papers.
Meth snatched over to the employee.
The man was of Inatech descent and still among the younger crowd.
“You’re one of Ruckus’ students. At the school of Kontiemar!” The employee exclaimed.
“I’m here for Piayas of Zenickdale,” Meth responded.
Thorice inserted sincerely, “I’m sorry, ma’am. He’s in a me-”
“-I can see that.” Meth interrupted. “Their vehicles are still outside.”
“I’m sure they will be more than happy that you have arrived. They’ve been in there since yesterday,” Thorice interjected.
“Yesterday?” Meth spazzed. “I’ve been attempting to communicate with Piayas for days.”
“That’s kind of how it works, ma’am,” Thorice explained, but Meth turned to the Teledeck, agitated by his responses.
“They normally shut off all communication devices once the meeting begins,” said Thorice. “Bail!”
“Yes, sir!” The young employee jumped to attention.
“Would you mind escorting her up?”
“Yes, sir!”
Just then, everything stopped as Thorice stood bedeviled by the main entry door.
Bail gazed in the same direction and stumbled, dropping all of his documents to the floor.
“I—I’m sorry…” stuttered Bail as he grabbed up his things. Then, stacking his document on a nearby counter, he gestured. “Right this way, ma’am.”
Meth finally looked over her shoulder as this image spawned with discomfort.
“As I live and breathe… Meth! My dear,” grumbled a dark and monstrous voice.
A look of fear nested in the faces of Thorice and the officials. However, Meth, with her galvanizing presence, was just as formidable as the dreaded Simma Fice… Brother to Velleayan Fice.
Simma stood tall with smooth pink skin. His red hair spiked with an array of dreads. Then, a black cloth tied about his face with a faded red logo in the center. He wore dirty brown gloves, a tattered blue jacket, a black t-shirt, black and white striped pants, and black boots. His eyes were bloodshot red, as he had no pupils.
His showing was so revolting because, to the simple-minded, Simma was extremely hazardous.
Fice had a dangerous but unique gift. He was born with the ability to summon any organ from the cavity of another being, living or deceased.
Cycles over, the Xaris mercenary, and his strange gift granted him the name, Chest Pain. The alias seemed to tie in with his dastard deeds.
Fice was also a highly skilled marksman and a vicious opponent in hand-to-hand combat. A pair of projectile weapons accompanied him everywhere he went, for his unique ability only worked on others who possessed a lesser to no measure of telepathy.
He gazed deep into Meth’s eyes, waiting for her to reply, but Meth only searched for a group of words that she couldn’t find.
“My brother…is he still here? I was told that the meeting would only last for a moment,” said Simma while turning to look at Thorice.
Senitel shook in nervous distraction; the sight of Simma stirred ‘his grits’ to a solid clump.
“Ya-yes, sir…he and the others are still meeting,” Thorice replied with a trembling voice.
“I—I was just about to show Mrs.…I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t get your name,” inserted Bail.
Meth snatched away from Simma, glaring dead into Bail’s eyes.
“Take me there. Now!” She ordered.
“Yes ma’am,” quickened Bail.
Thorice took a deep gulp.
“I am sure that the meeting will end soon. I shall wait here for my brother’s inevitable return. Patiently…” added Simma while looking over to Thorice.
Thorice nodded in agreement as Bail and Meth rushed over to the Teledeck. They stood on the teleportation device, and Bail nervously typed the destination into the control panel.
“Meth, my dear…” said Fice with a scraggly, degraded voice. “Tell my brother I await him.”
“Of course,” Meth replied as the platform glowed brightly.
The two vanished.
Simma folded his arms and stared into the ceiling. Then, he sensed a pair of eyes and peeked over to see Thorice, visually immersed in his presence. He looked back up to the ceiling as Thorice sprinted out of the building.
A thousand floors up Grand Valla, Bail and Meth materialized on the Teledeck.
They peered down the hall at the meeting room door. Then, stepping from the platform, they walked briskly through the hallway.
“Do you have an access code?” asked Meth.
“Yes ma’am, I do,” he replied.
They approached the door as Bail entered the code.
The door opened with simplicity, revealing the tragedy.
“Ugk!” Bail vomited, engulfing the ghastly smell.
“Great inferno!” He gagged as Meth stared ahead, beyond the corruption.
She held out her hand and a spark flashed quickly, emitting a sphere from her palm.
“Oh man…” Bail whined as he glanced at the sphere.
Meth dropped her hand, and the Poly Sphere floated up beside her.
She stood still in the doorway, fixed on the unforeseen bloodshed. Her antennae grew out of her head as the Poly Sphere followed beside her.
She entered the room with grave caution.
“Madam…” Bail urged, gesturing for her not to enter.
She stopped and turned to him, shouting, “Go! Alert the others.”
Bail rushed off to the Teledeck.
Meanwhile, Simma stood in the same position with his arms folded, patiently awaiting his brother’s arrival.
As the edges of the Teledeck illuminated, he opened his arms to embrace his brother. But, Bail materialized, tumbling off the Teledeck.
“Sir!” he screamed.
Fice looked down to Bail as he struggled awkwardly over the floor.
“What is it, lad? Doth my broth
er require my presence?” Simma quizzed as Bail looked up to him with watery eyes.
“No, sir…I—I don’t know how else to say this, sir…” mumbled Bail, warring with himself.
“Agghh…spit it out, lad. On with it now!” Fice ordered.
“Your brother is dead, sir. He’s dead!” shouted Bail.
“Ha!” Fice laughed.
“They’re all dead, sir. Piayas, Gominis, Straton Mage. Dead sir!” Bail hollered as he scrambled to his knees.
The feeling Simma once possessed shifted with profound disparity.
Thorice stuck his head in from the outside as several more officials entered the lobby.
Bail gagged again from the visually damaging experience.
“What the hell…?” Thorice asked as he walked into the lobby.
“Take me lad. Show me,” said Simma as he stood over Bail who struggled to his feet.
Simma whipped his hand over Bail’s head, and he lifted with ease. His tears wiped clean away, just as well as his uncontrollable emotions. Bail nodded and immediately clambered back onto the Teledeck.
Simma, Bail, Thorice and several officers loaded onto the platform.
Bail typed into the panel as it sounded in discord.
His nerves had been shot to hell.
Fice turned to Bail with disapproval.
“Is there a problem, lad?” Simma asked.
Bail shook his head nervously, typing into the panel. The platform finally lit up to a bright light, and they all vanished.
Meth had already begun to examine the horrific befalling of her allies. She was looking under the large organic table when Thorice and Bail entered the room.
“Witness such sanguinary violence…” Bail mumbled as he gestured into the room.
“Whaaahh the fuck?” Uttered Thorice.
Panic spawned into its true relevance as Meth walked slowly along the side of the table. While glancing into the ceiling, she held out her hand, and the Poly Sphere sunk back into her palm.
She wiggled her toes in the bloody fluids below.
“Something was here,” she whispered. “Close by…”
“We have to report this,” stated one official.
“Yes,” added Thorice. “We need them here.”
“No!” Meth shouted. “Not yet. We must find who is responsible. And I just found a lead.”
“You’ve got something already?” Asked Bail.
“Maybe…” Meth grumbled, wandering over to Paymers’ corps.
Simma had just approached the entry door when the officials stepped aside. Simma did not slow in stride, not even the slightest bit. Instead, as he entered the room, he immediately identified his brother.
“Velleayan…” Simma uttered as he approached his brother’s body.
Simma held up his hand. His brother lifted from the floor and floated over to his palm. The officials stood in pure respect of Chest Pain’s existence.
Simma spread his fingers apart, and the laceration in his brother’s chest opened. As he gazed into the cavity, Meth approached his side, holding Paymer’s Info Gram.
“I just finished decrypting this Info Gram,” said Meth.
“Info Gram?” Bail asked from a distance.
He and the other officials stayed outside of the room, bidding to re-enter. They had become too green around the gills.
“Yes. A small-scale TPD,” answered Meth.
Simma stared in query, tuning everyone out as he examined his brother.
“My brother…” Simma bawled with an outpouring of miserable tears, falling vividly from his bloody eyes.
“Simma?” Meth called as Fice stared into his brother’s chest.
“Simma?” she asked again.
He peeked away from Velleayan in reverence to her questioning.
“Do the plane quadrants XZNI0ZQLRMNS mean anything to you?"
“No…” Simma silently replied as he turned back to his brother’s corpse.
“That was the last transmission received from this Info Gram’s space proxy. And if I’m correct, the credits accrued from Lower Riaxon.” Meth devised.
Simma blinked as his tears came to an end.
“Lower Riaxon?” Thorice chattered.
“Now. You may notify your authorities,” Meth ordered.
The officials moved with haste, but Bail, for some curious reason, stayed behind.
“Madam? If you don’t mind me asking. Suppose the assailant received the transmission within moments of the meeting. Wouldn’t it be virtually impossible for someone to get here within the given time frame? It takes the average individual a day, even with the fastest Unitran system, right? I mean, I’m not implying anything. Still, I believe that the murderer would have had to be in closer proximity. The physical timetable just isn’t adding up,” said Bail.
“True. But if you own a Yueqatti or a TPD, one could get here within a matter of moments,” Meth retorted.
A face of confusion overtook Bail. He scratched his forehead and smirked.
“I’m in over my head, aren’t I?” He asked.
“Yes. You are,” Meth echoed as she peeped over her shoulder. “I dismiss you from further involvement. Please join the others.”
Bail said nothing more as his presence became irrelevant. He dropped his head and hurried off to the Teledeck.
“Simma, I have something to show you,” Meth addressed.
Fice dropped his hand, and his brother’s body lowered to the floor.
Meth reached into her compartment belt and took out a tiny flask. She walked over to the Feuler’s seat and wiped up a slimy substance. Then, she raked the substance into the flask and walked over to Simma, still rubbing her fingers together.
Simma had been looking down at his brother’s body the whole time silently, and even though his face was covered, anger streamed from his eyes. A vexation you could smell above the stifling odor.
“His wound is from a massive weapon, archaic in class,” uttered Simma.
“This secretion is of slug descent. Judging by the texture alone, whoever did this had to be extremely old,” Meth proposed as Simma sniffed and sobbed.
“My father’s untimely death powers my passion for revenge. Nothing will stop me from rendering Arola justice. But this… This wasn't Arola. This was something else. This modifies the timetable.” Meth proclaimed as she put the flask into her utility pocket.
“This was a proposal—a scheme. The physical action of irrational impulses.” Simma chimed. “The Symbassy will accelerate their plans. The Rapture will engulf countless realities. The scales have tilted. Balance will rest in vaporization.”
“Indeed,” added Meth.
“Mr. Fice, we will discover the miscreant, and I will help in this hunt. I can have a team dispatched to these coordinates within a days’ cycle,” Meth quoted.
Simma kneeled to his brother’s body in sorrow, bloody tears filling his eyes. “I failed you, my brother. But I will avenge you. I will find who did this, and I will bury them next to you.”
“Mr. Fice, I know you’re still capturing this.”
“Yes,” Simma answered with a voice of fury, glaring out of the large window and into the vast alien land.
“You do know what this means, don't you?” Meth asked with a grumble.
“I do.”
Simma wiped his tears away, peeping over his shoulder. He spoke with affirmation. “War…”
Narratively speaking,
The events of Space Void impacted every habitation as the assault was never a part of the Xarchanzian plan.
To remedy this dire occurrence, the Symbassy expedited their timetable for Project: Rapture, forcing billions into Layian diplomacy. Within fractions of a second, the Symbassy controlled everything.
The ‘Cosmic Hitlers’ was so consumed by this undertaking that their rate of abductions grew endless.
Amalgamating all realities, the Xaris swallowed the multiverse, surging this awful quarrel to another degree.
Because of th
e Feuler’s baseless actions, Earth’s humanity became a factor.
Still sublimed in this masquerade… awaits the durable…
The well-defined…
The unnaturally resilient-
Canieya Lawson.
CHAPTER 2:
Initiate Canieya Lawson
Remembering the Past
New York, New York
August 5, 2025
Crane?
Whew! Guy’s kinda hard to forget… Like a car driving forward, but in reverse.
He was robust and not your typical male statistic. I remember how I used to stand in the kitchen and watch him eat. It was strange because he would stare right into my eyes the whole time. I could only gaze at him for so long before I would blush from the chemistry between us.
He wasn't too wordy. I wanted so much more out of him. Not just the sex (which was outstanding), but I wanted to know why he did the things he did.
Crane was violent. But he never hit me. Not even once.
I remember the times when he would pop up in my house covered in blood. And I never figured out how he got in. I don't recall ever giving him a key. But me, having been the woman—no, the caring woman that I was (and I do emphasize was), I wouldn't ask any questions. I'd just scour him down with a pressure washer or whatever I could get my hands on.
Sometimes, it would take me a few minutes to put two and two together. Other times I'd get all my answers from the evening news, and occasionally right before he would pop up.
Then there were moments when I would get so engulfed in Crane's secrets I would fear for his safety. But my house was the safest place for him; no one expected me to harbor a known fugitive.
Now Crane wasn't the brightest person, but he knew what he was doing. I don't know how many people he’s killed because the information crossing my desk was never enough to fully convict me of his alleged crimes. I don't think I could have anyway, considering how in love I was—and sometimes, still think I am.
Crane and I met a long time ago when I started training with the NYPD Detective Squad. I was still completing my master’s in criminal justice at the time. I spent three years training with the detectives to complete my thesis and finish my degree. And after twenty-one weeks in Quantico, Virginia, I returned to New York City. And that's when I met him.