《Echoes of The Abyss》


 Chapter 1: How the humans stopped being... human [Story 1]

    The kits grouped together before the elder, a rare phenomenon in between the Caloxi where a single individual in a billion can live for thousands of human years, for reasons still unknown to their science.


    "Do you want to hear the story of the humans?" The elder asked.


    The group of nearly forty kits responded, each one differently, but every one of them positively.


    "Alright, alright," the elder tried to calm down the younglings, "Who do you think the humans are?"


    One of the children got to be the first to respond, "The Engineers! The gods! The omniscient! The all-powerful!"


    "Some do think that yes..." he affirmed, "Do all of you take them as gods?"


    The elder got the same response as before...


    "Ah... I suppose that was what I should''ve expected..." he said, "Have you ever seen a human?"


    "No, The Engineers do not come to our plane!" another kit yelped to answer.


    "Nonsense!" the elder responded with a wave of his paw, "I guess, after all this time... the stories turned into a religion, I should''ve expected that. But now that you''re not so small anymore, do you want to hear the real story? For, I will tell you something, I have seen a human, I even have spoken to a couple, very many times at that."


    The group started to point their ears at the elder as much as they could, to get all of the stories that he would tell next.


    "Oh, eons ago... we started to explore space, and we encountered three races at that time, the Arseur, the Tyraxi, and the humans."


    At the mention of the Tyraxi, some of the children were... puzzled, they had never before heard that name, but the elder continued, "When we stepped into the scene, bad blood was boiling between the humans and the Tyraxi, but we didn''t think much of it. We were soon invited to start to trade with the three, the Tyraxi and the Arseur have never delivered, lying and trying to milk us for resources, the humans, however, were truthful, and fair. That''s when I met my buddy, Mark, who later left for war."


    By now the younglings were deep into the story.


    "Sixteen years after we entered the outer space scene, the Tyraxi started to wage that war, the war against humans, breaking the rules of war of the humans, bringing so much destruction and death... we did whatever we could to help, but that wasn''t much, and the Arseur didn''t even think of helping... Soon, the Tyraxi got to the homeworld of the humans, but they didn''t just decide to destroy it, or enslave the humans, or do anything that would at least let some live, no..."


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    The elder paused for a second, exhaling loudly, "They pushed the human homeworld into a black hole and killed off all of the humans that remained, scattered across space."


    "By then," the elder continued, "they thought that they won, but oh how wrong they were... the humans... some say that the black hole told them something, a secret no living being should know, but the humans, they didn''t surrender, they used it to escape the reaches of that cursed thing and live."


    "Sixteen hundred, that''s how many of them returned... sixteen hundred out of the billions that died, the worst of all... most of them were not older than nineteen, their parents sacrificing themselves so that their spawn could live..." he said, "but once they did return, they unleashed horror onto the Tyraxi, horror never seen before, even in the darkest reaches of space, horror that destroyed what the Tyraxi had... then they trapped them on their homeworld with enforcement platforms that will stay there until they are still alive. The Tyraxi, that now is known under the name The Cursed, and they named themselves The Engineers."


    Loud gasps could be heard from the group.


    "The thing is... the humans came back corrupted, poisoned even by the black hole, wielding its power in their hands, they achieved immortality, towed their world, split into two back from the void and moulded it back together. The star, Sol, which was lost shortly after they lost the battle, they recreated it, from nothing, made a star exist and placed the planets that once swirled around Sol in its orbit. They created cities, and the clouds covering them for all eternity."


    "Then they went for the Arseur, reminded them of how they stayed neutral when they were slaughtered. The humans said that they could be neutral forever, placing them in an orbit around the galactic centre, so close to it that they could only dream of using any FTL technology other than the humans'' and they would never achieve such a thing, they would never be able to engage in anything, ever again."


    "After that... they approached us again," the children gasped at that, "they held out a hand for us and helped us regain what we''ve lost during the war and gave us the territory of the Arseur."


    "What happened to your buddy, Mark?" one of the younglings asked.


    "Mark didn''t make it... he perished in the black hole, but Mark did have a child, a beautiful child named Max, and they lived..." he said and the children gasped again, "This Max then swore to protect us for all eternity, and they visited me a couple of times not long after... in the memory of their father, my best friend and mother who I have met once or twice... And since then, every new species was uplifted by an Engineer and they swore to protect their subjects... that is until around two hundred years ago..."


    "Max? The god of Caloxi? You met them?" one of the kits asked.


    "Yes, indeed, that''s what some named her."


    "Then where are they?" another one of the younglings asked.


    "Not far I hope... not far... I hope that they are just around the corner, an asteroid belt or two away..." the elder said quietly as another bomb fell near the capital''s bunker in which they sat, "They are nearly here, just give them some time... just a minute..." a tear slowly escaped the elder''s eye.

 Chapter 2: A minute away [Story 1]

    The bunker under the capital city of the Caloxi shook under the explosions, its old walls slowly chipped away by the intense vibrations that came with the shockwaves. This great structure, although old, was built so that it could accommodate everyone living in the capital at the time and for the years to come, which unfortunately put nearly everyone in one place, concentrated. The leaders, the Elders were trying to contact their protector at all cost while the lower-ranking ones were on the top floors trying to calm down everyone, one of them even telling tales to the orphaned children, who didn''t yet know of it.


    Telling tales of their protector, because they will save them, because they are nearly here. Others were praying, singing, chanting, nearly drowning out the rhythmic bombing in the background.


    "But why are the Arus attacking, what did we do?" one of the kits asked the elder.


    "See, the Arus, they are inherently bad, evil is coursing through their veins, just like The Cursed." he said, "After they joined the galaxy, they looked and saw peaceful people, and after The Engineers didn''t come to them, to greet them, to swear to protect them, they thought that they understood what was going on, they think that there''s no Engineers that it''s all a cult. Then they looked again and saw us living in riches, we had nearly everything, living peacefully for millennia, they, war-ridden, were living in poverty, using their resources mostly for their military, so they wanted what we had. They threatened us, and while others bent under their will, we stood up to them, speaking of our protector and they decided that they will make an example of us, but it will not be done, just wait. They''re nearly here, Max will come, give them just a moment more."


    A bomb fell nearly directly on top of them, dust falling off the ceiling and the walls and onto the floor, the floor shaking with the force of the explosion. Then it faded into silence. A silence that enveloped the whole bunker, the chants, singing and prayers stopped as did the bombing. The people inside were stricken with shock, they thought that they were going to be saved. They were ready to start up again, to celebrate, but just as they were ready to yell out in victory, a great hum of engines scorching the surface came through the ground.


    The hum of the engines of the drop-ships full of soldiers, ready to kill on sight. And as they landed the bunker started shaking, as if an earthquake had come. And as it faded out, the happiness turned back into sad prayers, chanting and singing, in an effort to call their protector once again, hoping that they would come back. Because they promised, didn''t they?


    "You promised, Max..." the Elder said through tears.


    The Arus soldiers slowly disloaded and came to the great doors of the bunker before they started to try to destroy, get through the metres of concrete and metal and ceramic. To make the Caloxi people perish in flames not seen for millennia. The sound of drills and explosive charges and torches scorching the doors came to the Caloxi ears. That door was the only thing protecting them from the Arus who only wanted one thing, to kill, and kill, and kill, and... kill... and... kill...


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    Finally, the remains of the fallen door banged onto the floor, the thousands of tons worth of materials in ashes, some still where they originally were and some on the floor in piece cut out, the last layer, the last layer that was the only protection between them and the monsters.


    The Caloxi now felt that they lost, some were still praying, some now crying, some even unconscious, and some, in shock and disbelief, but everyone had one simple feeling on their mind, unanimously... abandonment.


    But the monsters... they didn''t come, there was this one singular moment, as if a still frame, where everything and everyone just stood in one place, in this one singular moment, nothing moved, the whole system just froze in place.


    That was before the fire started. The purple and black fire appeared and went as if it was wind through the entrance to the bunker, eating everything in its way. But the invasion on the bunker didn''t come, the next minutes were full of... confusion.


    Soon, the doors of the elevator to the entrance floor split, revealing two Caloxi, the bunker guards. What they saw was, astonishing.


    In the great doorway and beyond, laid hundreds of corpses, charred corpses of the winged reptilians, some with the soul-drilling stare of the hunt still in their eyes, some with shock painted on their faces and in the back those with the sneer of cold command. Soon, many others joined the guards, and once they finally left the bunker, they looked up at the sky and saw... destruction and death not seen since the last days of the Tyraxi.


    Many ships, as if falling stars, burned in the atmosphere, many in pieces, debris flying left and right, some ships even split in half as if by a knife. The commanding ship of the invasion fleet shined in the night sky, without a scratch, but definitely dead.


    The people that once hid in the bunker were now on the surface, watching the light show, as if painted to say, "I''M BACK." When the Arus wanted to set an example, an example was set with them. But the image painted on the Caloxi night sky said one more thing, a thing that was said long ago, eons, that a handful of people now lived to tell the tale of, to remember what was said, the quote engraved in their minds, lodged deep in their minds as if it was yesterday, "We''re the Engineers, look at our works, ye Mighty, and despair, for we take the rule of the mortal realm!" the tall, skinny, slender figures standing, their arms outstretched after their enemies fell under the power that was given to them so long ago.


    The people started to celebrate, as one, then two, then four, then seven and slowly every other city woke up, their communications restored, and damages were reported, yet it wasn''t all that important, because they, the people of the Caloxi, lived as they said they would. And the Arus soldiers burned in the eternal fire of The Engineers.


    Everyone started to celebrate, that is, everyone but one singular individual, and even though the same thing was stuck in the minds of other Elders, this one especially was taken up by it.


    "Where are you, Max?" he asked Max, but he didn''t know where they were, so he just asked the night sky.


    He didn''t get an answer per se, but he saw a flash from the broken ships that reflected off a dark ship, slowly approaching, in between the falling stars, slowly falling out of the sky and he smiled, another tear escaping his eye, and he hoped that he would survive just a minute longer to finally meet them again.

 Chapter 3: The inhuman humanity [Story 1]

    "You know why attacking the Caloxi was the worst choice you could''ve made?" the deranged human chuckled, "Do you know why the Caloxi are so stubborn?"


    "W-Why?" The Arus warlord asked, a big slash going across her face, swallowing loudly.


    "Do you know the story?" the human asked.


    "I-I am f-familiar with t-the t-tale, y-yes," the warlord stuttered out.


    "Well, let me still refresh you on it, if you happened to forget," the human smiled.


    A very accurate hard-light hologram enveloped them, showing the old human homeworld.


    "We''ve fought a war, a war so bloody that you cannot fathom the sheer extent of pain and suffering that it brought. We once were the most peaceful in the galaxy, but there were people like you, but worse, the Tyraxi, but you may know them as The Cursed. See, they, wanted power, to burn, enslave and plunder, because that''s what they were all about. However, the Tyraxi encountered a problem, a big problem, looming over them, us. In response, the Tyraxi started forming great armies, readying themselves while also provocating us. When they finally were ready, they unleashed their unholy armies upon us, being in the dark about it, with no help, but the Caloxi, we lost, horribly, and when we did, we refused to surrender to the last moment."


    Tyraxi ships appeared on the hologram, surrounding the planet.


    "When they finally came to Earth, they frankly had enough of us, and as you did, they wanted to annihilate those that they oh so hated, but unlike you, they actually had power, weapons unimaginable to the likes of you pathetic creatures. They dragged our planet with everyone on it. They dragged it into a black hole."


    The scene of all the ships catching onto the planet and slowly pulling it into the darkness of the gigantic cosmic entity was shown before them.


    "And so they did, banishing us into the darkness. But it didn''t end there, we didn''t end there! We pushed on, we didn''t dare to surrender! We shouldn''t have survived, but we did. Do you want to know how?"


    The warlord didn''t dare to respond, breathing heavily and unsteadily.


    "When the Tyraxi didn''t even think of letting us live, plunging us into darkness, they thought we wouldn''t be able to be heard nor seen, that help wouldn''t come, and how could they not? You couldn''t drag us back with any technology we or they knew of. But, see, in that darkness, deep in slumber, existed an entity of great power. And when you looked into its eyes, you were swallowed by hate, hate towards what you did, most would jump to suicide, unable to handle what it showed them. We wouldn''t survive if not for this being waking up, it heard something, the only thing that propagated through the darkness, not radio waves, not gravity, nor has it seen the light coming off of the planet. It heard... the screams, it felt... the pain. The crying people, innocent, but banished by the worst the galaxy had to offer, crying children, and their parents with them. That being then looked at us, and it chose to help us, lending its hand to help us escape. Do you know how many of us escaped?"


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    "S-Six-Sixteen H-Hun-Hundred." the warlord, once powerful, now quivered in the presence of the human.


    Thousands of ships were escaping the giant of darkness as if with magic gliding them through space and something looming behind them.


    "No, no. One. Hundred. Twenty. Thousand. That''s how many, but here''s the keyword, escaped. Because as we left, most of the escapees children at that. The being looked at us, and we, looked at it. Over the next days, more than eighty-five percent of us perished, the ships self-destructed by their occupants unable to handle what they felt. But, we? We lived, but that didn''t mean we didn''t see, we saw, but unlike them, we weren''t blinded by what could only be attributed to guilt or evil in their minds, and as a consequence, died. What it showed us was how to handle and bend to our will a power unimaginable to the likes of you. All this power, no strings attached, do you know why? Because of the suffering brought to the purest of the pure, the most innocent of innocent, the once-brightest in the galaxy, shining with curiosity rather than anger, by the likes of you."


    "B- But-" the warlord tried.


    "NO!" the Engineer yelled, "You wanted to do the exact same, no matter to whom! Neither does the method matter, the outcome does! Do you know what the difference would be? They would''ve DIED! Nothing would''ve stopped you!"


    "And thanks to what we saw, we created horrors never seen before. Do you know why I was the first Engineer to actually leave Earth after the war?" they didn''t wait for an answer, "Because, you see, the others, were drowning in unfulfilled vengeance, the reason for this is the same reason because of which I am feared among the Engineers. I didn''t block myself in the depths of Earth, I went to the vermin and had fun."


    The human started laughing maniacally, "And I loved it, I hurt so many of them, to the point of no return. Some still live, to this day, the worst ones of them, held in suspended animation, on the verge of life and death from what I unleashed upon them, but they cannot distinguish between those anymore. Or if they can, they would rather choose the latter. Let''s maybe... listen in, shall we? At least to the best-looking ones, we wouldn''t want to scar you mentally, now would we?"


    The hologram changed to endless scenes of death and suffering, blood and gore-filled visions and in the middle of all of them, a young human, Max. The screams filled the room, ear-piercing screeches, begging and pleadings for life or if too far gone, the end of it, all of it, like a hell-sent symphony.


    The human just inhaled, flaring their nostrils, eyes closed, their arms outstretched as if grasping on unseen force, palms to the sky. The pristine armour changed into what they wore in the visions, a dark-brown trench coat, with darker clothes underneath, big boots, still in mud and gloves, still scarred with blood as was the rest of the clothes.


    "See, it wasn''t always like this," the human exhaled, "We weren''t always benevolent, loving, just beings and most of us still aren''t, me included, maybe with the exception of the Caloxi in my case. Because we, the last of humanity, escaped the abyss, we didn''t give in and then we claimed the world that was meant for us all along. You''re here just for the ride, and you will not be anything more, not now, not ever. We are your gods! You wanted to be the monsters of the galaxy, but you didn''t see anything, yet. Yet, you''re quivering, distraught, even, dare I say it, terrified of a mere human?"


    "Now," they looked the warlord up and down, piercing through her soul, sending constant shivers through her whole body, making her shake before slashing them again with a swift move of their hand. Another bloody slash appeared on her face, "I don''t think this experience is enough to satisfy me. You know, I haven''t been on the Tyraxi homeworld for so long. Shall we visit it? Get a little tour? See what will happen if you do not stop?"


    The human got near, in the face of the warlord, a predatory grin on their face, "Because, oh, I will show you. I will show you horrors you cannot imagine. I will show you something about what you will have night terrors for the rest of your days. I will show you a monster."

 Chapter 4: The thrill of the hunt [Story 1]

    The leaves of the dark forest rustled with the wind. The leaves covered the sky as a whole, not allowing any, but the smallest amount of light in, even at night as it was. As such, the forest was one of nightmares, and night terrors rather than dreams. The large trees blocking the view distance and covering whatever hid in the darkness. The grass was one of a colour of rotten green, defunct of life. Under it, dark dirt showed, black goo oozing out of crevices made by animals and over it floated clouds of heavy smoke. In the darkness, that itself seemed alive, those animals lived, animals of rot and death, their eyes piercing through the souls of their opponents. Yet, they never got close to the ones that they taunted upon. They just loomed over them, not feeding upon their meet, filled with nutrients, but upon their fear, savouring the taste and unlike in nature, worked together. An ability that their prey lacked, raised in wealth and power, their regal roots showing in their eyes, which darted around in search of the predator. That is, only the one''s that knew were, the others were not stricken with information and knowledge of what was happening to them nor what or rather who caused it. The forest itself taunted upon them by splitting them, as if seasoning the meat before roasting it to perfection. That didn''t mean however that they would be split for long, it only being a side before the actual meal.


    "Arso, is that you?" the old warlord bellowed, through the foliage, reaching the ears of another prey of the forest.


    "V- V- Vesul," she responded, still shaken up by what she endured mere minutes, or hours, or days ago, at this point she wasn''t even sure, "you- what are y-you d-doing here?"


    "Arso, what happened? Those are no ordinary battle scars? What did this Caloxi scum do to you?" he asked, dragging a claw of his over the other warlord''s face, now featuring slashes that wouldn''t heal whatever she did.


    At the mention of the Caloxi, thunder split the air, lighting up the treacherous forest by just a little bit, revealing a tall silhouette in the distance, and a giggle reached the ears of the Arus warlords. "Run!" the scarred warlord scream-whispered, before charging into the darkness, anywhere but where it was, the old warlord in tow, their tails barely holding them upright at that velocity. Their paws smashing onto the ground with such force that the leaves rustled with the vibration.


    But they couldn''t go on forever, especially Arso, tired thanks to what she lived through, but she couldn''t sleep, not just because of what was hunting her, but because of the nightmares that would hunt her if she dared to fall asleep.


    "Vesul, why are you here?" she asked, meekly.


    "What do you mean?"


    "What did you do, Vesul?"


    "I- we, me and Aseer, went to avenge you!" he answered.


    "You don''t know..." she said.


    "Don''t know what?" he asked.


    Upon the branches of one of the trees that they ran by, a barely visible body was hung, that is, if they even noticed it before it''s bio-fluorescent eyes were forced open, lighting up a small area of the forest. It''s arms were twisted around the branches in ways that defied nature, as if a rope, twisted around each other. It''s legs, floating in the air, their digitigrade bone structure visible through the scarred flesh. It''s head was rotated in such a way that it was upside down when the body was upright. In it''s chest, deep cuts slashes, or even places where flesh was simple ripped off, revealed it''s rotten guts underneath. The rest of it''s body, burned, cut, most of it''s bones broken. The view was gruelling, and the scarred warlord knew all to well who did this and what the creature was before such a thing happened to it. The creature should have been dead, yet, that theory was disproven by a maniacal laugh escaping it''s maw.


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    "You don''t know," it continued, staring into the eyes of the seasoned warlord, who now, was as terrified as a child of the darkness, "you didn''t believe, you didn''t think, and now, now the lords are back!'''' it went into a fit of laughter, "and, you, wicked creatures will be purged as were we."


    A sickle flew into view, decapitating the creature of The Cursed, swiftly cutting its neck, making the head, it''s eyes still glowing, fall onto the ground, and it giggled as it''s master rose up behind them. Their coat sweeping in the wind of the darkness, it''s hands drenched in blood that oozed out from within the sleeves, dripping onto the ground, causing disturbance in the smoke before it was absorbed by the ground.


    "Scared yet?" the predator whispered into their ears, their voice causing chills to go through their spines. Arso''s head snapped to the Engineer before she started screaming, slowly launching into a run, "Max! Max! I''m sorry, I- Please!"


    She grabbed Vesul''s paw, and started running for her life, quite literally.


    "You coward!" Vesul called to her as they were at a sufficient distance for Arso.


    "You don''t understand!" she screamed, "we''re in an Engineer''s territory!"


    "Then I will face them, with honour, and die the same!" he said.


    "You don''t understand!" she started to hyperventilate, "we are not talking about death, they are The Engineers."


    "You believe in those foolish stories? We''re probably on some weird planet with a couple android and a Caloxi trying to scare us!" he pointed out.


    "I saw it, they showed me," she said, but it was too late.


    The old warlord marched back to his predator as the leaves rustled, revealing the red sky, a silhouette deep in the distance, falling. Another Arus fell on the rotten ground, just before Arso before the leaves closed again.


    "Aseer?" she asked, recognising the bruised warlord.


    "Arso?" he returned.


    "Show yourself, you trickster!" the stupid warlord yelled.


    "Oh, no..." was the only thing she could say before a large, metallic spike rose from the ground with an unreal speed, piercing through the warlord''s guts, electing a scream of pain from him. He should''ve been dead, but he wasn''t, and they couldn''t get their eyes off of him. Max soon approached, glowing red to the horror of Vesul. From the forest appeared multiple of the wicked, encircling the old warlord before the ground opened, the black goo oozing out of the hole and The Cursed dragged him into it. And as the ground closed, the creatures and the warlord gone, Max''s head snapped to them and she started slowly approaching, each step making the remaining Arus warlords shiver. Aseer didn''t even move, he lacked the context and that created a whole different fear boiling within him.


    "Don''t bother," Max said, locking the two warlords to their positions on the ground and placing themself in between to tries before them.


    "Is this not enough?" The Engineer asked, venom in their voice and arms outstretched in the familiar way, "maybe this form is not what I should look like... stuck in nostalgia..."


    The Engineer smile engulfed her face, and a second pair of arms grew under the first, the trench coat adapting to the new form they adorned, "what do you think?" the lights that adorned their whole body rearranged themselves, in a way that they looked way more sharp, less organic, more scary.


    As Max felt the fear boiling in the warlords as they adjusted their form, they breathed in, heavily, savouring it, "welcome by the way... welcome to the matrix of souls, or rather, what I like to call it, hell. Don''t fret yet, this is only the surface, the entrance..."


    A thunderous sound reverberated through the forest, crows making sound in the background, and the ground split, a crack in the ground going into the distance.

 Chapter 5: Earths refugees 1 [Story 2]

    I''m pretty sure it was a Sunday... or maybe a Saturday.


    Whatever, what did in matter in the scheme of things?


    A couple days after New Year''s Eve it was, anyway.


    I was only sixteen when it happened... my parents woke me up. That is, my dad barged into my room, nearly breaking the door down with his entrance, alarms blaring in the distance. It was a night after all so I was sleeping, well, I wasn''t sleeping anymore after that. The outside didn''t seem out of the ordinary with the capital''s light pollution so high that the sky was not a bit different than any other night''s sky. Light-grey, not even a star on it, because it was yet before the blackout. Our neighbourhood, as always, was pretty silent and calm by itself, at that moment that is, before all hell broke loose...


    I barely remember rushing by the TV, still in pyjamas, because there was no time to even change. On the TV, three people stood at attention, their fists on their chests in a salute, singing the Union''s anthem and tears welling in their eyes. A moment later the signal cut off to static before a warning by the Union itself was displayed with a loud ping. I asked my parents over and over what was happening, but they said that everything would be fine and that it''s nothing serious. Suffice it to say, I didn''t believe them, but when I tried to see what was happening on my holopad which I snatched on our way out, my mum ripped it straight from my hands.


    In horrified silence, my parents pushed me into our car, which we had, even though it didn''t get much use with how hard it was to traverse the city in a car. Because of the rain outside my clothes were all wet, but with how terrified I was, it didn''t matter. I again asked my parents repeatedly what was happening, but they just said that everything was fine, which made me feel even worse. My dad tried to turn the radio on, but there was just static, he checked his holopad, but there was no signal. He drove out of the drive way and onto the road which slowly filled up with cars, heading out of the city and south.


    My parents handed me my holopad back, seeing that there was no internet. We drove for a minute or two as the gridlock slowly accumulated itself before all lights in the city gave out, and didn''t come back on, that is for the time that we were in the city, but the capital was lost not a long time later either way. We drove for hours, the chargers in the highway barely holding up under the massive load with everyone escaping. Because it had power from multiple places along the whole continent it was mostly untouched by the blackout.


    We stopped two times, at the end, because at the start, there was too many people to stop for more than a bathroom break, so we didn''t eat for hours and hours at a time. The first stop felt like it was the best thing that happened ever. I wolfed down a stale bread sandwich, the employees of the highway-side shop left long before we got there. After five days of constant travel, the power grid throughout the continent gave out at last, we only had another day or so of charge.


    Fortunately, with the power grid going down, an emergency radio station came on, phasing from static, middle of a sentence, and we finally got any kind of actual information on what was happening. My heart stopped as information about evacuation routes, destroyed roads, lost cities were broadcast. A good part of the northern hemisphere was lost, with only half of the massive capital surviving just long enough for people to evacuate and even that information was iffy, as we had no satellite service of any kind. Then the broadcast repeat and I actually got to know what happened.


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    The Tyraxi, a race essentially governed by a warlord empress, we''ve been at war with them for as long as I could remember. Pure evil, that race was. When you stood before one, you couldn''t be sure if it wouldn''t bite your head off, I would know, when we still lived on Proxima, one bit me- no he didn''t...


    Anyways... they launched Earth, the last oasis of human life, our last planet, into a black hole seemingly over night, almost twenty million Tyraxi died only to condemn us, that''s how evil they were.


    In a last ditch effort, the Union found some way to get us out, but only way to do even that was to escape from the other side, the far south, Antarctica. The barren continent, made of glacier, the coldest ever, but soon everywhere would be like that, apparently. We couldn''t use planes, because of the effects of a being shoved into a black hole, we needed to use boats, we just needed to get to the evacuation point and then everything would be fine.


    After our car''s battery run out, not only ours, because many cars were stopping along the highway until it was empty. We left our car, and into the whirling winds which were picking up by the hour. I ate a couple snacks that we managed to snatch from various stores, I was hungry, very much so. For a moment I thought that this was the end, that there was nothing else we could do, if only we had taken a spare battery or two... maybe we could''ve gotten to the evacuation point in time, or at least closed the last kilometres on foot.


    I looked at the sky, it was the first time in my entire life I actually saw stars... not in a ship that is. I would''ve never thought that the sky should''ve been dark. But those stars weren''t ours, they were foreign, unfamiliar, alien and a whole half of the sky was eaten up by darkness chilling to the bone. Around the dark half, a glowing ring floated, the remains, ruins of the Earth-Ring, burning, the only real source of light. Around in the centre between the two, Luna, the moon floated, but not how I remembered it... It was cracked in many many pieces, slowly heading in the direction of the black hole. For a moment I thought that there was a shadow between it and the black hole, but something else had taken my attention.


    As the thought of damnation finally started to set in, on the horizon, far far far away from us, from the direction we drove in, from the direction of salvation, dozens of little lights tracked in our direction. Flickering, getting bigger and bigger, closer and closer. I stopped crying, then started again, but they weren''t tears of sadness, but of joy.


    They were buses! A whole lot of them! Powered by good old gasoline, because we didn''t have power after all. They powered through the length of the highway, breaking the speed limit two times over before parking in place before us. With a screech of the tires and a swoosh of the brakes, a bus stopped nearly right in front of the right side of our car, the suspension jumped a bit with the force of the stop. The doors opened swiftly and deep voices shouting out orders broke the silence. Union soldiers helped us into the old buses.


    With how quick the whole thing went, everyone wanting get out of there as soon as possible our bus started on its way after only minutes. Even if there were some altercations with the soldiers. Some people were so stupid to want to take their luggage in an end-of-the-world scenario, it was nuts. But our bus, along with many other started on its way and relief washed over anyone as hope resurfaced that maybe we will get through this and everything would be fine. It certainly wouldn''t be normal, hell, we weren''t even sure what we will do with ourselves after we leave Earth, every colony was gone, Proxima maybe survived, but they already have been dead-silent for days when we left.


    I decided against thinking about it then, I took my holopad and turned one of the shows I downloaded on and got my headphones on. I was just trying to get my mind off of this, we were safe after all, we were with the Union military, nothing could harm us with them, right?


    Thankfully my holopad still had a lot of charge, it had a couple more days worth of charge, and at some point it should be possible for me to charge it so I didn''t think about it. Especially as I slowly faded into sleep in that bus, it was the first time in a lot of time that I actually had a good night''s sleep.

 Chapter 6: Earths refugees 2 [Story 2]

    With the buses as our new mode of transportation, the gridlock subsided and the highway cleared, we were moving at a much higher pace now, straight south. Some streets were already damaged as tornadoes were created from the wind currents so the buses needed to go off-road for some time, thankfully they were built to be able to do that.


    With the lack of triple-seat rows, I was sat next to a girl of similar age to mine with whom I didn''t talk for a big part of the trip... almost half of it. But after going to my parents and back multiple times, I noticed that she didn''t, that is, she just sat there, having the window seat, with a blank stare out that window.


    After fighting off my shyness, especially then, I approached her, that is, I started talking to her, because we sat next to each other for a couple of hours already. After begrudgingly answering my questions, zoning out a couple times, I learned that her name was Lucy. She came from the north side of the capital and she had her 18th birthday a couple weeks ago. Fortunately or otherwise, she was out in the city, in a club, on the south side.


    Due to luck or lack of it again, she was forced into leaving the city by the authorities, not allowing her to go home, she was told that they would come anytime, but they didn''t. Soon, the news about the north being totally annihilated from the face of the Earth reached her. She hitched a ride with the police and that''s about how that was.


    She didn''t want to talk to me at first, but at the end of that conversation I would say that it was getting easier for her. At least I hoped so.


    Either way, with the highway cleared, we drove way faster, and I didn''t to get to talk to her for that long in that bus, because well... we reached our destination, or rather the destination of the bus. Because we still had a long way to go... but at the very least it was the last part of the distance we needed to make. The problem was there was no more land to ride on...


    We left the bus in a single file, with the soldiers managing us, panic would be the worst thing in our case. I forced Lucy to come with us, it was the least I could do. And after all, we were ''friends'' by now... apparently. I couldn''t just abandon her.


    When we passed the vast fence around the humongous, newly minted parking lot for the busses I saw what we would make the rest of the distance with... holy shit were they big and a lot of them...


    Converted cruise ships, from left to right, there were dozens of them. Our family never had a chance to actually ride one, especially after we moved, I would have enjoyed it more if not for the reason for it.


    We were packed into rooms like sardines, even with that many of them, there wasn''t enough for all of us to be comfortable, after all there were people from multiple cities, including over half of the capital''s population. Unfortunately I needed to argue with a soldier or two for Lucy to come with us, thank god that my mum joined on the argument or I don''t know what would''ve happened.


    Instead of the comfortable, big beds the rooms were full of bunks, but who was I to complain, after all we were being evacuated, not going on a holiday. I expected it to be something like it was when we rode the buses, but I was a bit wrong. The waves made the ship tip from left and right, especially with all that was happening, the waves were gigantic.


    We weren''t allowed out, soldiers with a cart of rations went around every day and delivered a couple trays at the door without a word and then went out. The doors were normally closed with a key and you needed to specially ask to even go the bathroom. The whole thing was gruelling, but at the very least there was electricity so we wouldn''t bore to death. The waves also meant that the ships would travel slower, so a two day trip nearly took three times that.


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    On the second day, in the evening when I was finally adapting to our predicament, multiple very loud bangs went from the outside, like bombs were exploding. But from the window we could only see an endless stretch of water. It went on for the whole thing.


    One time, at night, as it always was then, I heard one of those from the outside and when I looked out of the window, maybe it was the night or something, but it looked like a whole mountain was erected in the water. A minute or so later, the biggest wave ever, from a whole other direction than it should''ve gone from, struck the ship. When I asked about it the day after that, no one said anything.


    On the fourth day, we started seeing a lot of ice outside the window, we were close, very close. I slept that day with anticipation and dread, after all, at this point, this whole thing could''ve been for nought. Though, I hoped it wasn''t, very much so.


    On the fifth day, the intensity of the bangs decreased, but the frequency increased and of course, we finally saw land, glacier anyway, and a great facility built on the land, or at least parts of it. The soldiers told us to be ready to leave at any moment, but we wouldn''t for another two hours or so.


    When we finally did, I finally could so a bit more than a straight line ahead, I could see the sky. The sight was gruelling before, yes, but now, now it was something else, the glowing disk around the black hole was one thing, but the other was parts of our natural satellite falling from the sky. The reason for the bangs.


    But that was a whole lot better of a sight than when I looked beyond the ship, multiple dozens, hundreds even if I wasn''t mistaken turned into barely more than a dozen or so. This was too much... one thing was just hearing ''we lost the north,'' the other was seeing what the count was then and what it was now. I saw how many ships there were. And I knew for a fact that everyone of them was filled up, because nearly the whole of the lot was filled up. This wasn''t about having too many ships in the first place, this was about not having all of them arrive.


    I don''t remember much of the way from there, it was just a flash, one moment I was there, staring and the other I was packed like a sardine, again, with other people, awaiting before the facility. The worst, or the best thing was that I was in the front, together with Lucy and my parents of course.


    The later part, I remember very vividly, every detail, engraved in my memory ''till my demise, I guess.


    "Please begin boarding the vessels, children from the age of sixteen to adults of age twenty one first," the order was said from a speaker.


    Everyone rushed in a flash, I barely saw anything, my dad caught my left hand and my mum the right. A moment after I felt the grate of the ramp leading into the ship cave in under my boot and then we were stopped by a soldier. Only then did I notice Lucy at my mother''s side.


    "I cannot let you in," the soldier said.


    "What?" my dad challenged, "but you said from age sixteen to nineteen! They both are!"


    "That''s not the problem sir," the soldier argued, claiming a more defensive stance, "I cannot let you two in."


    "But we are the parents!" my dad spewed.


    The soldier didn''t cave in, dad brought up his sacrifice during the war, he lost an arm and both of his legs on a ship called the Tartarus, one of the flagships in the war. The soldier just thanked him for the service before whispering something to him.


    My father''s face loosened before he took my hand, hugged me and threw me into the ship after saying, "I''ll be just behind you, in a different ship, we''ll see each other on the other side."


    My mum still argued with the soldier before father whispered something to her too and she just hugged me and did the same. I didn''t understand yet, Lucy took my hand and pulled me inside, away from them before the ramp began to close. I struggled against her grip to no avail... I knew they were lying... I knew it the moment I saw my father''s face just before the ramp shut, it was the first time I saw him cry.


    Lucy repeated that everything would be fine, but it never would! IT NEVER WILL!


    IT WAS ALL A LIE!


    THIS WHOLE FUCKING THING IS A LIE!


    THIS WHOLE SHIP IS A LIE!


    THIS WHOLE EVACUATION IS A LIE!


    EVERYTHING IS A LIE!


    HOW DID THEY JUST LEARN HOW TO ESCAPE A BLACK HOLE?!


    WHAT DO THEY EXPECT US TO DO AFTER WE EVEN ARRIVED WHEREVER THE HELL WE WERE ESCAPING TO?


    WHY DIDN''T THEY LET ME STAY?


    WHY DOES EVERYTHING NEED TO HURT ME LIKE THAT?


    I DIDN''T EVEN GET TO SAY GOODBYE TO THEM!

 Chapter 7: Earths refugees 3 [Story 2]

    --- 23 days after The Fall of Luna, 18 days after launch of Project Phoenix, Max Becker, Phoenix Ship 23 ---


    "Max, you said it yourself, it IS all a lie!" Lucy said, taking my hand.


    "I did, but what if there''s a reason for this!" I argued.


    The wall of our room still had the sentence written all over it in black ink, together with a bloody mark beside it-


    "Why would the OBSERVATORY be dangerous?" she challenged, pulling me forward, "this whole world is more dangerous than a glass dome!"


    "But Kyle said that it is! You know, the only person here knowing what they are doing!" I spat back, but tried not to attract attention, we both knew it was a bad idea there.


    "Oh, because of course, Kyle, the Norse mythology nerd knows what he''s doing and I don''t, you trust him more than me, don''t you?" she returned, "because of course, Loki is telling you the truth, it''s not like it would be the first time someone lied to you to save you, right?"


    The memory was still engraved in my brain, I wasn''t sure if I''d ever be able to forget or forgive what happened. They had no right to lie to me like that, especially then, I wasn''t a child no more, they could have just told it straight to me. But Kyle never lied to me, at least I thought so, for all I knew he didn''t know much more than we did. The only thing that he knew that we didn''t was how to control the ship, but I could''ve learnt that if I wanted to, he surely would teach me.


    "You have no right to mention that," I growled, "but let''s say we find something, what then?"


    "We''ll see," she said. Her hand collided with the door''s panel like a lightning bolt, loosening it from the wall.


    "Wait, what are you doing?" I asked, checking if anyone saw us.


    "Getting in, I mean, how bad can it be? If it was depressurised it would say so," she said, stripping a few wires of their isolation and mashing them together. This ship was never meant to be secure in that sense, it was an ark, not a prisoner transport so the door caved in, sliding open with a whoosh and thunk.


    "See," she started, "nothing, told you!"


    And indeed, there was nothing there, past the observatory itself and a small pedestal with a holopad, probably used for tracking what you wanted to see.


    Were the ships repurposed? I mean, why would there be an actual observatory in the first place.


    She entered and I trailed after her, "there must be something, they need to be hiding something!"


    She took the holopad, and I just stood there, she swiped left and right, with the screen not changing at all, stuck on the image of the black hole, "it''s broken-" the observatory''s viewport flashed and zoomed in on the black hole, at a click of a button.


    "Woah," I mused.


    For a thing like that, it was beautiful. If I tried not looking at the remnants of my home that is. Light bent around it, it was an otherworldly experience, something no living being was meant to see. It was beautiful.


    "Woah," Lucy repeated after me, "consider this as my birthday present for you."


    I just remembered that that was tomorrow. Time went on too quickly, oh how I would love to just stop it, I just my had sixteenth birthday, and now, in but a day, I would be seventeen-


    But then something came back to me, days ago, when we were still on Earth, on that highway when I thought it all was over, I saw something. I knew I did, my attention was taken from it then, but now I noticed it lurking in the black hole''s shadow again.


    Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    "What''s that?" I pointed out.


    Lucy froze looking at it and dropped the holopad to the floor. To be honest I did the same, past the holopad-dropping part. It was beautiful. Not the kind of beautiful that the black hole itself was, this was different.


    In the shadow of the black hole, it was like a shadow in itself, a purple phantom. Its tentacles wound around the Event Horizon, and floated around the Earth and the Moon. It was beautiful. It was like everything just faded, and it only existed in all of time and space.


    And then its eye opened, streaks of pink, purple, and blue light beaming from it around a white as a star iris. I looked at it and it looked at me, into me. I felt its gaze on me, searching. The whole world came back, but not like it was before, it was just an echo, like I was in a place completely detached from reality itself. It stood, or rather floated before me, not in space, just there. Its gaze dug deep into my soul, as I was thrown into that abyss around us.


    And I saw... I saw all of it... all of everything, ever, but not really. I saw, but I didn''t get to examine all of it, there was too much. But I saw some things.


    Our home on Proxima, I remember the vast grasses running in all directions from left to right, no, that wasn''t how that was. No. There was a city around it, yes. My friends, my school, the- and it was gone.


    Nothing made sense. But then it did. I heard a cry, something- someone crying, like a child. It was the hospital on Titan, I was the one crying. Mum, I tried to catch her hand as she held me, but I was a newborn, yes, I was just born, I don''t remember that, but I do, somehow. My hand phased right through hers and I was thrown through the wall, back into the abyss.


    The ship. My ship. Yes. But I was in the wrong place. Dad, he was there and mum, on the ramp. Yes, and I was there too and Lucy, I held their hands. I sprinted back towards the ship and the soldier leaned in to whisper to my dad, "sir, we can''t take you, we don''t-" and then the world fell apart. I fell into a hole, deep into the earth.


    Then I saw dad''s friend... a Caloxi, Te''ret, yes. I was on Caloxi Prime, I think. Some room, made from concrete. Yes, yes, and there were children around him and he said, "-child named Max, and they lived. This Max swore to protect us-" then everything went muffled... that didn''t happen yet, no... he said something more and a child said something, "Max? The God of Calo-" and then I was launched as if a rocket into the purple skies of Caloxi Prime, and there were ships in the orbit.


    A forest... dark forest, I didn''t know that dark forest... or I did... it was the forest of Proxima, but it was different... weirder... scarier... a winged reptilian ran past me... what species was that? And then I fell upwards, in between the leaves of the canopy.


    And then I was there, before it, a form of entropy in itself, surrounded by the echoes of a world long gone by in the abyss of eternity. And then it whispered something to me in a language forgotten before time had begun its existence in the universe, I didn''t understand the words, but I understood the meaning.


    Time and space was nothing more than an imaginary concept born from entropy, the universe was nothing more. Everything was just chaos, but chaos can be tamed and there was nothing that could stop me once I did that. Everything was just... a wave in the vast ocean of reality and it showed me how to turn the tide.


    And then everything stopped before the echo of a world became itself in full and I was thrust back into the reality I knew so well, but now I understood it.


    "-were right!" Lucy screamed frantically, backing away.


    "It''s beautiful!" I said, not yet understanding what was happening around me.


    "No it''s not!" she screamed, slamming herself against the wall opposite to the viewport, "it''s ugly! It''s bad! It''s wrong! I am not- I don''t- I-"


    "What are you talking about?" I tried to approach, but she bolted away from the observatory.


    "I will save everyone!" she screamed.


    She ran, and ran, and I was after her for all of it. There was nothing i could do to stop her, but I could follow. We ran past the cafeteria, the residential area and started heading towards the Stern to the Bow. The ship wasn''t that large and because it was the ''evening'' the hallways were empty so she was making some distance. In what seemed like a flash we were before the bridge.


    She banged her hand on the door as I tried to argue with her, "what the hell are you doing, Lucy?"


    "Saving everyone," she whispered.


    The door opened swiftly, the captain of the ship, Kyle Armstrong stood in the doorway.


    "Commander," Lucy called, "I need you to come with me."


    She pulled him out of the doorway before punching him straight in the face, potentially knocking him unconscious, but I wasn''t sure. She bolted to the control panel.


    "Lucy stop!" I tried to get her away from it.


    She mashed her elbow into my abdomen, launching me into the wall on the small bridge.


    From then on everything went like a flash.


    I felt something appear in my hand and I gripped it tightly, something heavy, made mainly from plastic, but with metallic parts also. My arms snapped it into position on their own as if they knew exactly what to do.


    And then- BOOM.