The glory of a sunrise on fog laden rolling
hills was in stark contrast to the
miserable 'sunrise wake up call' that
greeted the boys the following morning.
Togo, a six and a half feet tall brute of a
Terran man with a shiny bald head, stands
partially hunched over on the grey wooden
slats of the front porch of Building Ten
fiddling with a thin black metallic bracelet
around his muscle bound right arm. The
black metallic bracer ignites with a brilliant blue flash and a metallic liquid
encases Togo's massive fist. He then pulls
back his arm and unloads his heaviest
punch into the sunbleached double doors
of the wooden building. Shred, a deaf man
of equal stature to Togo wearing a tan
denim jacket and matching pants, rips his
baton from its holster on his right hip and
follows Togo's lead through the hole
where the front doors had stood just moments ago. Wooden shrapnel lines the entryway of the building as Togo and
Shred scream and prod the slave children
from their sleep.
"Zro found the carcass of the new skulker smoldering in the Hideki Forest this
morning!" Togo shouted while the boards
creaked and whined below his platemail
covered boots as he paced the floor. "He
wants to know who did it or else everyone
gets punishment quarters and restricted
diet for two seasons!" he continued
angrily but the frightened boys didn't
whisper a word.
"Hmmummtiponkmmm." Shred exclaimed
to Togo while imitating a person
whispering.
"Yes, I know." Togo responded while giving him a sweeping hand gesture as if to brush off his comment. "Zro and the
Dvenin mine overlord will be here in just a
few minutes and someone will confess,
understood?" Togo continued yelling.
"Not a chance." Darrius squeaks from his
top bunk in the back corner of the
building.
"What?! Who said that?!" Togo inquired furiously. "You little worms will do as I say
or you'll get beat!" he screamed. The
dozen or so sleeping slave boys instantly
snapped out of their bunks and were
dressing before Togo could begin another
sentence.
"I think I hear them... coming... right now."
Togo eagerly teased the frightened boys
while the thumping and rusty squealing of
a heavy armored truck approached. The
boys' nerves were at a fever pitch by the
time Zro and the Dvenin arrived outside. Zro, an obtuse, balding, filthy Terran man,
sat perched delicately on a teetering
benchseat mounted within the truck's bed.
Next to him, a near featureless, grey
skinned creature of immense height and
slender build covered by purple and black
silken robes sat with its gargantuan
obsidian eyes wide open staring into the
hole of building ten, as if to pick victims out before moving from the old truck. The
Dvenin are a widely feared and despised
race throughout the galaxy even without
their strange physical appearance being a
factor.
"Bring them outside Togo! Quykig has a surprise for them!" A nasal yet horsed
male voice thunders through the building
as Togo shoves the enslaved teenagers
out the door one by one.
"What happened last night?" Edul mouths
to Darrius. But Darrius just smirks and
winks his dark hewd left eye at Edul.
"Is this all the slaves we have left in this
building, Togo?!" a different, deeper voice thunders from Zro's throat and into the microphone that the fat man is holding.
Zro's blue eyes crossed over his bulbous
nose as the words carried from his
chapped lips. Any new slaves would have lost
their mind when Zro stood, his large gut
stretched out above his spindly legs and
tiny dress shoe covered feet, his limbs
contorted wildly while he slowly floated to
the slightly frosted ground outside the
topless truck. Edul and Darrius, however,
knew that this was a Dvenin control
technique by which the mouthless and voiceless creature is able to communicate verbally with other verbal
beings by taking absolute control of the
symbiote. Quykig had used Zro as his
personal symbiote for years before Zro
became unable to travel due to failing
health.
"Eighteen left since last season's
executions, sir." Togo answered rapidly.
"I must order more." The Dvenin's 'voice'
exploded out of Zro again. Assist Zro and
I in this expedition would you, Togo?"
The Dvenin continued as he moved Zro to
the line of forcibly kneeling slave boys.
Quykig, the Dvenin meant for Togo to do
the tedious paperwork of actually placing
the order for more slaves. To which Togo
reluctantly agreed with a simple nod and
smile.
"My gratitude, Terran." Zro nodded as he
gazed at Togo. "Thirty should be enough.
No more Chelesyans or Sorishans.
Worthless children." The Dvenin sneered
through Zro, his chest vibrating from the
thunderous voice escaping his body. Togo
grinned maliciously a seething hatred
concealed behind his pearl white teeth
and scarred lips. Zro's slightly contorted
body turns an about face away from the
kneeling slaves to face the Dvenin still seated in the rusty truck.
"Now for the fun part", the rumbling
Dvenin voice cackled from Zro. "Since no
one is willing to admit their involvement in
the death of my favorite skulker you shall
all be punished"
, the Dvenin warned
menacingly as it turned Zro's body back
around to face the children. Zro's
gelatinous stubby arms clutched a large
laser rifle. He waved it around laughing
gleefully as he pranced back and forth in
front of the slaves.
"Stop!" Darrius yelled from the far end of
the second row of kids. "I did it. I killed
your stupid cat. No one else was
involved." Darrius continued. Zro stopped
his awful dancing and stared at the thin
dark haired child.
"You?" the Dvenin squawked through Zro. "You couldn't have dreamed of harming an
adult skulker, pathetic Terran child", he
continued disgruntled. Zro turned back to
the rusted truck reaching in a small
leather pouch and removing glowing
marbles to load into the gun. Darrius tilts
his head slightly confused. Any time he
had admitted wrongdoing in the past the
Dvenin would punish him and drop the
punishment for any of the other slaves but Zro continued loading powercells into
the laser rifle undeterred.
"You're not going to punish me?" Darrius inquired. Zro turns his head slowly toward Darrius his gaze never swaying from the
rifle's loading port.
"No, I'm going to punish you all." Zro
smirked as the words rolled out of his
mouth.
"I said I'm the guilty one, damn it!" Darrius shouted back at the Dvenin's puppet. Zro's attention focused on Darrius for a brief moment then he finished loading the
shiny marbles into the gun.
"Okay", the guttural voice crept out again.
Zro moved the gun to a firing position and
took aim at Darrius. "Then you die first!", the Dvenin's symbiote hissed before
squeezing the trigger several times. Edul
sees Darrius, with several holes through
his chest, fall to the gritty ground with a
plume of dust replacing where his body
had stood. Edul's thoughts and emotions
run wild seeing his only friend die before
his very eyes. A blinding burst of green light from Edul's pocket incapacitated the Dvenin and its instruments for a moment.
A breeze around Edul awoke into a titanic
tornado. Edul vanished behind a curtain of twisting tree limbs and other debris, his emerald crystal floating just ahead of him wherever he went.
"Shit, that kid's an Eiden!" Togo shrieked
and pointed at Edul's floating sphere
fortress of tangled limbs and prickly vines
then ducked behind the front of the
ancient armored truck. Shred busted
through the back door of the building and
got no more than two giant steps before
his head was flattened seemingly without
reason. A trivial trickle of bright blood ran
from where his ears used to be before his
body collapsed in a heap. The Dvenin's fat
human device didn't fear the floating boy
or his wind and trees as Shred did. Zro
retrieved a blue and yellow painted metal
disc from the floorboard of the truck
before pressing a button on it and
throwing it toward Edul. It only managed
ten feet before it began to fall and
miniature engines fired off and thrust the
bomb toward Edul again. BANG! The
explosive created a gaping hole in Edul's
tree shield and vanquished the torrent of
wind surrounding it.
"Ha ha!" a deep cackling reverberated out
of Zro.
"Got you, now!" Togo yells and
dives out of the dusty ground firing his rifle directly at the momentarily still
floating kid. The wind whips back around
the golden eyed and golden haired boy
just before a second homing explosive
flies from Zro's hand. Edul dodges the explosive this time with ease. BANG! In
the chaos some of the slave boys have
decided to run for freedom. The scattering
children made Togo's attention shift
toward containment of the Dvenin's
property or the destruction of it, whichever was easier. Togo bounced back to his feet
and ran after the children firing his
weapon indiscriminately on them. A
bipedal rhinoceros-like child is shot and squeals in agony while stumbling behind a lightly snow dusted broken dying tree.
Togo laughs manically,
"Got you" as he
reloads his gun. Just then his feet lift
from the dead grass covered earth
beneath him. "What the..." the shiny
headed muscle bound man whimpers as
his body creeps further and further into the air. Another explosive flies from Zro's direction toward the thin, blonde Eiden. BANG! A direct hit blows apart the
remainder of Edul bark covered shield.
"Ha ha ha", the Dvenin's voice cackles out again. Edul notices another explosive zip over Darrius's bleeding body toward him.
He lets out a fearsome roar as the torrent
of twisting wind knocks away the
explosive device. It comes to rest on the
dusty ground next to Zro's feet.
"Damn", Zro says simply before the
explosive cries its final warning beep and eviscerates the obtuse man. BANG! Blood coated chunks of Zro rained down around Togo showering him in a thin layer of
sticky red blood and greyish brown mud. Before Togo can wipe the spatter from his
face Edul drops from the sky and lands
mere inches from the demented red
bathed man.
"Hi", Edul sneers and smiles while his feet
gently come to rest on the ground.
"I'll kill you, you little bastard", Togo
exclaims wiping Zro's blood from his face
with the sleeve of his t-shirt. He readies
his gun but a bright white searing pain
then numbness shoots through Togo's
chest and back making him unable to
move.
"That should do it", Edul breathes softly
and floats away cheerfully reengaging his tornadic torrent. The muscular man's
arms drop to his side and his gun falls
twenty feet to the forest floor below. As every tense area of the man's body relaxes
and his head falls forward Togo notices
the giant hollow steel pipe protruding
from his sternum. The Kethrene tree that became Togo's tomb resembles a red
painted fence post as the man breathes
his last. Edul speedily flies back to where Darrius's body lay to see a slender
cloaked figure no taller than a child bent
over the boy's maimed mess.
"Get away for him!", Edul demanded
ferociously the pain in his voice apparent.
"No.", a soft, caring female voice echoed
from under the cloak's burgundy hood. "I
felt the commotion and chaos so I made
my way over here." she continued, raising
her head and pulling back her hood to
make eye contact with the floating Edul.
"You FELT the chaos?" Edul asked aloud.
"Yes, I'm also an Eiden. I can FEEL everything." she responded. "I'm trying to
heal him but he's very weak", she said
finally looking back at Darrius's tattered remains then closing her eyes. Edul hadn't really talked to a female Terran since his mother, who he had seen die before he
and Darrius were captured by the slavers
a few years ago. He was mesmerized by
the girl's glowing ebony skin and huge penetrating crimson eyes. She was definitely a Raxii. A shape shifting alien
species that were uncannily human like in
their features. Her bold brunette hair shimmered with hints of gold and auburn
as a few strands twisted and twirled in the
breeze. Edul had never seen any elegance
that compared to this ethereal angel and
as far as he was concerned he wouldn't
ever find another either. Edul's floating
crystal instantly dropped to the debris
strewn ground and his windy shield
dissipated thereafter. His attention immediately jumped back to his mortally wounded friend. A single teardrop rolled
down Edul's cheek while he lamented
silently for his dying friend.
"Did you forget about me, slave?" Edul's
own voice beckons in his head. The
Dvenin mine overlord, as they are called, briskly reveals himself from a crouched position behind the rusted truck. The
blonde boy grabs his jagged green crystal
from the amongst the debris and screams
once more as his transformation occurs
again. His golden eyes lock onto the lanky,
dull colored alien as Edul begins to lift off from the ground. The almost completely
flat faced and mouthless alien pulls a curvy compact black sword hilt from
behind its back with one hand and
smacks it against its other hand igniting a ragged blue energy sword that protrudes
from two sides of the hilt.
"You want revenge for your friend's death, don't you? You'll never have it.", the Dvenin
transmitted its thoughts directly into
Edul's mind, this time without any voice.
The rage brought on by the alien's taunt engulfed Edul instaneously. The cloudy
screen of wind, dirt and snow that
revolved around Edul stood still and the
debris caught in the torrent fell to the
ground. Edul, unknowingly, also stopped. Stopped moving, stopped thinking and stopped breathing. His green crystal
floated four feet in front of his face
shining a brilliant emerald. Edul noticed
the light from the morning sunshine
dazzle and dance through the stone in a
display of absolute wonder. Twinges of
blues and golds sparkled entrancing the
boy momentarily. In his serene
suffocation Edul watched a minuscule
fracture in the stone grow to a zigzagging
crack and then flake away. The stone's
brilliant colors grew more vibrant as they
raced faster and faster around the crystal. Edul felt more powerful than ever but still
not powerful enough to even move air into
his lungs. All the while the Dvenin lunged
at him with the blade over and over. Either
by sheer instinct or sheer luck Edul managed to dodge each and every strike without a single atom of oxygen available
to his lungs. An uppercut counter attack knocked the grotesque alien's energy
weapon to the ground and nearly broke
the creature's spindly neck. Edul had never seen a Dvenin's massive ego collapse so
quickly. Before he could blink twice the Dvenin rolled from its back to its knees
and beg for its life.
"Please, do not harm me any further. I
yield. You are free.", the Dvenin used Edul's
voice again in a strange internal
monologue. As his lungs began to
function once again Edul screamed,
"I will have revenge", while staring menacingly at
the begging alien.
"No, please.", the frightened alien begged
Edul. The worn and rusted military truck lifted slightly from the dusty road in front
of quarterhouse ten at about two feet off
of the ground with an incredibly pained
groan it tore to pieces. Each individual
piece slowly began to revolve around thepleading Dvenin as Edul smiled gleefully.
"Stop now, kid. Or I'll be forced to stop
you", the cloaked female boomed. But her
warning went unheeded. Edul's attention remained focused on his pathetic prey. A miniscule mechanized chuck of engine
hurled itself radically toward and then
through the slender frail body of the
terrified Dvenin. One through the chest
and two more through each lanky limb.
Edul guided them with his seething rage
and a pointed index finger on either hand.
"He begged you to stop and you didn't!
You are a monster", the girl screamed and threw her burgundy colored robes aside
and revealed a thin shapely white
gemstone on a necklace from between
her budding young breasts. She flipped
into the air and never came back down.
Her crimson eyes turned stone grey and
her hair flowed as if it were liquid. Her
elegant ebony skin seemed to crust over
into grey and brown reptilian scales. She
takes control of the still orbiting rear
bumper of the truck and uses it to bind
Edul's hands tightly enough to cause him
to stop his attack. The biting metal sheers through layers of the boy's skin and
muscle while blood escapes from his arms. The pale boy can remember nothing
else from that point on aside from the
terrible agony in his arms and an inhuman hissing male voice incessantly repeating,
"I don't know if I'll be able to save him,
Elder."
© Macabre Entendre