Stardate 76136.7; February 19, 2399
EPISODE
100
Edited by Peter Bossley
Written by Chris Adamek
ADDITIONAL CHARACTERS
Ambassador
Corrin
Prime Minister
Vallis
Sor Dalem
Justin Reinbold
Lieutenant Flora
Sanders
Ansor Tanar
Lieutenant Jayla
Trinn
Ii’zyyr’aa • (ih-ZEER-ah)
Prologue
Beep.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The distressing resonance of the computer alarms brought Ansor
Tanar from his slumber. His pale green
eyes quickly flitted open, frantically searching the nearby controls for the
source of the computer’s consternation—but the fog within the bleary-eyed
ansor’s mind kept him from making a coherent analysis. In his stupor, Tanar could see little more
than the blinking violet light in the middle of the console…
His hands stumbled over the myriad controls, hastily working to
silence the clamoring computer, but his actions came too little, too late. By the time the computer was muted, the
Command and Control center was abuzz with activity. The lights were at full illumination, the rest of the lowly
ansors were diligently working to pick up for Tanar’s slack, and Sor Dalem had
emerged from her private anteroom to address the situation herself.
“What is going on?” demanded Dalem as she strode onto the command
deck. Her pale violet skin seemed to
glisten in harsh light, making the woman a very intimidating presence in the
room—a notion that was only exacerbated by her legendary impatience. “Tanar?”
By this point, the flood of thoughts racing through Tanar’s
chaotic mind had cleared his post-nap haze—and while his vision was still a bit
blurry, he could see enough of his workstation to realize what was going
on. “We are getting telemetry from the
Azel Cluster,” he reported, though his voice sounded a bit more uncertain than
he would have liked—but then again, the expedition to the Azel Cluster was a
fairly routine operation. It shouldn’t
have been generating level-nine sensor alerts.
As such, uncertainty was definitely warranted.
But if Dalem was uncertain about the situation, there was no sign
of it in her actions. She hastily
crossed the command deck and assumed a position at Tanar’s side. “A sensor anomaly, perhaps?”
No technology was perfect—not even Velora technology—so Tanar
could not immediately dismiss Dalem’s suggestion. But since the last notable computer malfunction occurred more
than fifty years ago, he was extremely skeptical. Still, he humored his superior, and performed a quick system
analysis.
It immediately confirmed Tanar’s suspicions.
“All systems are functioning within normal parameters,” he
reported, grimly shaking his head.
Dalem’s bright green eyes peered into the sensor data, and with
each second that passed, the look upon her face grew increasingly
distressed. “Get the Prime Minister,”
she said a moment later.
Tanar immediately froze.
“With all due respect, Dalem, the hour on the Moschet Peninsula is
late. The Prime Minister is most likely
asleep…”
Dalem’s angry eyes narrowed to slits. “Then wake him!”
And it was then that Tanar decided the situation was far worse
than he had originally thought. The
Prime Minister did not frequently involve himself directly with daily military
affairs—and when he did, it almost always meant bad news. And so, Tanar sent for the Prime Minister,
knowing that when he arrived, hell would be following close behind…
A colossal brown cloud rose from the barren world of Azel, a
densely thick mass of undulating bio-matter that spread relentlessly from the
planet’s dark, craggy surface. The
bustling entity penetrated the roiling atmosphere and spilled into the endless
void of space like floodwaters bursting through a dam…
Prime Minister Vallis was awakened by the sound of footsteps. He could hear the heavy footfalls
approaching even before they reached his cavernous bedroom, and he
instinctively knew they would not bring with them good tidings.
His heart began to pound, and a moment later, the heavy wooden
doors in the front of his room swung open.
Vallis glanced up to see a very morose Ambassador Corrin standing at the
threshold, flanked on either side by a pair of equally concerned guards.
THUMP-THUMP…
“Forgive the disruption, Prime Minister,” said Corrin as he
tentatively stepped inside cavernous room, “but there has been an incident…”
THUMP-THUMP…
Concern mounting, Vallis threw aside his bedding. He quickly grabbed a coat from the nearby
chair and an instant later he was on his feet, charging the exit.
THUMP-THUMP…
As the dark cloud stretched into the glittering cosmos, its
fluidic cohesion began to fracture.
Parts of the massive entity broke away, veering at random to port or
starboard, while the bulk of the roiling mass stormed away from the
cloud-shrouded world with incredible haste… And with good reason—a storm was
brewing on the distant horizon…
“We’re getting additional telemetry,” said Tanar, his nervous
hands hovering over the controls. He watched intently as the new data scrolled
across his screen; he didn’t like what he saw.
“It’s a class-fifteen neutronic wave front—headed directly for the
planet.”
Eyes wide with fear, Dalem shook her head in disbelief. “How many people are on that colony?”
Though he was loath to do so, Tanar temporarily removed the
accumulating telemetry from his screen.
Even though twelve other people in the room were monitoring the exact
same data, Tanar was afraid some important piece of information might be
missed. Besides, he was not eager to
see how many lives teetered on the brink of death; he already knew it would be
unbearably high.
Dalem sighed her frustration.
“Tanar?”
He quickly accessed the data.
“Eight thousand…”
The approaching storm was aglow in haunting crimson light,
devouring everything in its path as it roiled through the heavens. Great tendrils of electric energy arced
across the galactic plane ahead of the frenzied tempest. Most of the sizzling energy bolts dissipated
after only a moment, but some of the more energetic tendrils curled around the
planet’s atmosphere and began to interact with the rising cloud…
And an instant later, a huge chunk of the cloud shriveled up and
died… Thousands of dying organic vessels
immediately began to fall away from the cloudy formation, many of them
descending into the planet’s atmosphere to a fiery end.
Vallis stormed through the myriad halls within the Circle of
Defense, Ambassador Corrin and his entourage following close behind. However, despite of his haste, Vallis found
himself going nowhere fast. His legs
were simply not built for such a frenetic pace, and as such, the Prime Minister
ultimately realized he wound up going much slower than anticipated. Still, he would not stop…
He could not stop.
At least not until he reached the command center.
The roiling crimson storm fell upon the planet like a tidal wave,
crashing into the sphere with unprecedented force. Wicked tendrils of blazing white energy crackled through the
glowing atmosphere, coiling around the besieged world like a noose—and as the
flickering rope began to tighten, Azel’s crust started to crack…
Meanwhile, the immense swarm fleeing the dying world began to
waver. The approaching storm killed the
little ships by the thousand, its great tendrils of energy arcing around the
planet and into the undulating swarm.
In a futile effort to save themselves, some of the little insectoid
crafts broke formation and darted back toward the storm, ceaselessly firing
pale emerald energy bursts into the infernal storm’s blood-red maw…
So immense and powerful was the roiling crimson entity, it was
virtually unfazed by the insectoid assault—and a moment later, it devoured the
planet, the fleeing swarm, and every last speck of dust in its path…
Ambassador Corrin at his side, Vallis stormed into the command
center—his eyes flitted to the viewscreen just in time to see a massive bolt of
vivid white energy crackle through the scarlet gloom. And even before the blazing tendril began its assault upon Azel’s
glowing atmosphere, Vallis clenched a nervous jaw. No matter the outcome, this was going to be a terrible day…
Moments later, in the blink of an eye, the vivid white tendril
surged through the planet’s atmosphere, the forked bolt burned into the eyes of
all those watching. Almost immediately, the planet began to crumple. Massive plumes of fire and ash surged
through the fractured crust, billowing high into the atmosphere—and then the
transmission ended.
Vallis’ gaze immediately fell upon Sor Dalem—who in turn turned her
vivid green eyes upon the ansor manning the master control station in the
center of the room.
“Radiation from the wave front has temporarily rendered the probe
inoperable,” reported the ansor. Vallis
was reasonably certain the young man’s name was Tanar, but he could not be
certain—and in this dire moment, he didn’t particularly care.
“When will the visual feed be restored?” asked Dalem, hands
impatiently hanging upon her hips.
Tanar shook his head. “I’m
not certain,” he said. “Assuming it
survives the next couple of minutes, perhaps—”
But the neutronic wave front must have been moving at incredible
speeds—because even before Tanar could complete his analysis, a faint, grainy
image became visible on the massive circular screen at the front of the
room. But amidst the distorted
artifacts dancing across the screen, Vallis could just barely make out a sphere
in the middle of the screen…
Or at least part of a sphere.
“Can we get a better image?”
Dalem inquired.
“Perhaps switch to one of the other visual probes in the
vicinity?” suggested Ambassador Corrin.
His fingers dancing over the controls, Tanar shook his head. “The other three probes were destroyed,” he
gleaned from his sensors. “But the
fourth one is salvageable…”
Vallis sighed. There were
so many questions racing through his chaotic mind. He was eager to hear all of them answered—and he would, in
time—but as he peered at the grainy sphere on the viewscreen, Vallis could not
bring himself to speak. He could only
stand, and ponder the single most prominent question in his mind: How bad is
it?
A moment later, the question was answered.
There was a grainy haze surrounding the planet. Some of it was the result of the
transmission, but most of the haze was the dust and debris spewed into the
heavens during the storm. And once his
eyes looked past the dust, Vallis knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the
damage was unbelievably horrific.
Half of the planet was utterly obliterated—not burned or singed—it
was just gone. In its place,
where once there might have been forests or cities, now there was nothing more
than an enormous, smoldering crater.
His heart sinking, Vallis shook his head in disbelief. “May the gods forgive us…”