by S. W. Ahmed
Or, at least, that was what Marc and his companions thought. And that was why what happened next took them completely by surprise.
Wazilban suddenly stopped talking to the Starguzzlers, and turned to look in the direction where Marc and his companions were hiding. A hush fell over the entire square, as all the other aliens also turned their heads to follow his gaze.
“Welcome, friends, or should I say, enemies!” Wazilban said in Mareefi. His loud, booming voice reached easily across the square and into the settlement’s alleys.
Before Marc or any of his companions could make a move, aliens suddenly appeared out of thin air all around them. Within seconds, the aliens had completely surrounded the intruders in a tight circle, leaving no room for escape. Their eyes were full of anger and hate, void of any signs of mercy. Several of them revealed their reptilian instincts by lunging forward to bite their new prisoners with their sharp teeth. Luckily they were pulled back by their comrades in the nick of time. With their front limbs, all the aliens were holding weapons shaped like hollow poles, pointed straight at the intruders.
Marc felt like he was surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves, ready to pounce on their prey. And whatever kind of weapons those hollow poles were, he felt fairly certain they could inflict far heavier damage than just blow air. While he and his companions briefly pointed their ganvexes and boryals at the aliens, it was painfully clear they were heavily outnumbered and that any fight would be futile. Without further ado, he and the others followed Dumyan’s lead and dropped their weapons to the ground. Almost immediately, a couple of the aliens came forward and took the weapons away, after which the rest of the aliens in the circle lowered their poles.
Then Wazilban appeared with a flash inside the circle. His face bore a scowl, with his snout open and his sharp teeth glistening in the dim light. Facing the intruders, he spoke. “You have interrupted a most critical discussion. We are not at all pleased. Did you really think we weren’t aware of your arrival in this star system and on our planet? What kind of idiots do you take us for?”
Nobody responded. Marc knew he and his companions had taken a lot for granted, but he also knew they had had no other choice but to keep pushing forward until they got to the bottom of this alien mystery.
Wazilban went on. “This is our world, our space. You have no business here.”
“And what business did you have in ours?” Dumyan demanded. “What business did you have creating so devious a scheme to take over our Dominion and instigate wars between the civilizations of our galaxy? We most certainly have plenty of business here. We have the right to know the reasons why, and the right to seek retribution for all the harm you have caused us.”
Wazilban broke out in laughter. Marc shuddered as he heard it – it was a laugh he knew far too well.
“Retribution!” Wazilban thundered. “How do you propose to so much as lift a finger now without getting your head blown off, Dumyan? I can see your reputation of foolhardiness is clearly justified.” He paused. “I must admit I don’t know how the lot of you managed to follow us here to this galaxy, nor am I certain how you crossed the barrier at the entrance to our settlement. I can only assume it has something to do with this individual.” He pointed a menacing limb at Marc. “I never did quite figure out who you really are and what species you’re from, Zemin. You have been a most annoying thorn in our master plan. But it matters no more. As intelligent and resourceful as your species might be, you were dumb enough to lead your little band of adventurers here right into our hands!” He laughed again. “You can rest assured that none of you will ever make it out of here again alive.”
Marc tried hard to keep his wits together. He reminded himself that regardless of all the evil things Wazilban had done, a higher power had consistently protected him and helped him come this far. That power had helped him see through Wazilban’s conspiracy, and had helped him bring the civilizations of the Glaessan together to unveil it. Whatever this higher power was, it was far greater and more insightful than Wazilban, that much faith he already had.
So he felt strong enough to speak out. “Kill us if you will, Lord Wazilban, but we are only the first ones to arrive here. Others will soon follow. Your conspiracy has already been unveiled, your grand scheme already thwarted. Whatever additional plans you have, they’re all futile now.”
“Empty threats!” Wazilban gloated. “Nothing can stop us anymore. Nothing can stop them anymore.” He pointed at the image of the Starguzzlers looming above the square.
“Who… what are those things?” Marc asked.
“Those ‘things’, as you call them, are the Masters. Those very same ‘things’ are about to invade your galaxy in droves and destroy everything in their paths. They shall all be arriving shortly in the vicinity of this star system to prepare for consar entry. It’s only a matter of time before your civilizations will be reduced to stardust.” He laughed again. “And now I must excuse myself. The final preparations require my attention. As you might imagine, setting up a consar large enough to fit a Starguzzler is a difficult task, as is the sheer number of consars we’ll need. Wishing you all a pleasant death!”
“Wait!” Sharjam insisted. “At least give us the satisfaction of knowing why before we die. Why invade our galaxy, why destroy it all? To what end? How does this all help you and your people?”
“I would love to indulge you, Sharjam, but thanks to you lot and your, heh, valiant activities at Bara Dilshai, you’ve left us with no choice but to accelerate our invasion plans.” Wazilban turned to the aliens surrounding him and said something in his harsh sounding native language.
The aliens pointed their weapons again at the intruders, as Wazilban’s body swiftly faded away from sight.
Marc felt his hopes fading away just as swiftly. He closed his eyes, waiting for imminent death. He couldn’t believe that this was how it would all end. He couldn’t believe that all his efforts and those of his friends had been in vain, that the higher power he had begun placing his faith in was going to let him down like this.
Then, just as he thought he heard the triggers being pulled, he heard the wailing sirens of the Starguzzlers blast through the settlement. Opening his eyes, he saw the aliens lowering their weapons once again. Something, it seemed, had just happened.
Chapter 37
Wazilban, or Jaegor as his real name was, was becoming increasingly agitated. The Masters were once again unnecessarily wasting time, thanks to their annoying curiosity and stubbornness. He had already explained to them the risks of delaying like this, but as usual they had failed to grasp all the implications. No, the Masters were not the quickest in making decisions or taking action – that much he knew.
“Might I request the Masters to consider that these intruders from the Glaessan are highly dangerous,” he said, staring up at the moving image of the Starguzzlers as he appeared again in the center of the square. “They should be executed right away before they attempt to escape. Some of them have powerful magical capabilities, and they may all vanish in an instant. It’s not like the transference mechanism my people use – if they vanish, we may no longer be able to locate them.”
The lead Starguzzler wailed away in response, its sirens perfectly understandable to Jaegor. “We want to know how they arrived here from the Glaessan. You assured us none of them would ever make it here, yet here they are. Were it not for one of us spotting their presence and leading them to this star system so they could be interrogated, we would not even have known they were here. We need to make sure no more of them are coming. This is a bigger risk to our survival than anything else, especially if our invasion of their galaxy fails. Bring them before us. We will interrogate them ourselves.”
“But we don’t have time!” Jaegor insisted. “We need to complete preparations for the invasion right away.”
“Time that we have lost thanks to your bungling things in the Glaessan. We shall no longer rely on your scheming and strategizing. Bring them forward, Jaegor! We shall not
ask again.”
Jaegor sighed, and signaled to his guards to call off the execution and bring the prisoners forward instead. He knew this was a mistake. It was no easy matter to get Aftarans to talk against their will, and to get the robotic Mendoken to talk was downright impossible. Volonans he didn’t have enough experience with. That other alien Zemin with the supernatural powers – well, the chances of getting that one to talk would probably be even slimmer. So perhaps the only way to do this would be to torture an Aftaran or two. In other words, it would all take time, time he didn’t have. Every second counted right now, every second that passed was another second given to the civilizations of the Glaessan to spread word of the conspiracy, to stop fighting each other and to unite against the common enemy.
The prisoners were brought into the center of the square in front of Jaegor, carefully watched on all sides by guards holding their weapons at the ready.
“Translate for us, Jaegor,” the lead Starguzzler said. “How did you enter this galaxy? Did you follow Jaegor?”
Jaegor couldn’t help chuckling to himself. The Masters really had no idea how to deal with beings of other species. They were just too used to always getting everything their way with his people. Nevertheless, he went ahead and repeated the questions aloud in Mareefi.
There was a short period of silence, during which the intruders exchanged glances with each other.
Then Dumyan spoke. “Considering what you’re about to do to our people, the least you can do is tell us who or what you are and why you intend to invade our galaxy. Then we’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”
Jaegor was a little surprised at Dumyan’s willingness to reveal any information whatsoever, but realized it was probably a delaying tactic. He translated Dumyan’s words for the Masters, and then protested to them again to not waste time with the prisoners.
“Tell them whatever they want to know, Jaegor,” the lead Starguzzler said. “And have one of your subordinates translate everything for us as you speak.”
Grinding his jaws in frustration, Jaegor began telling the intruders the story of his people and the Starguzzlers. He tried his best to keep things brief, but was repeatedly interrupted by Dumyan and a couple of the other intruders to provide more details. Overall, he stuck to the following outline:
My real name isn’t Wazilban, it’s Jaegor. Wazilban is the Aftaran name I adopted. My people are known as the Ungha. We are a very old civilization, our origins dating back to the very beginnings of the universe’s current oscillation. This galaxy, or what’s left of it, is our home. It was once a galaxy as big and populous as yours, and it was filled with stars, planets and moons. Ours was one of the first civilizations, sprung forth from the jungles of a planet called Konasum in the heart of the galaxy. We learned early on that the only way to survive in the jungle was to adopt its basic law of life – survival of the fittest, at all costs and regardless of the costs of others.
In the beginning, our people were not physically the biggest or strongest species on our planet. Often our ancestors were attacked by other species and many were killed. But we were the only ones with the ambition to rise and be greater than who we already were. Bit by bit we fought the others and slowly took over the whole planet. In order to defeat our enemies, we developed a strategy known as implosion. Some of us would disguise ourselves as the enemy and infiltrate them from within. We would rise to key positions of power over time, and instigate infighting among various factions of the enemy that invariably led to their own destruction.
Soon we grew advanced enough to travel through space, and we began colonizing other habitable worlds. Over time, we perfected the techniques of disguise and implosion. We also assimilated many great technologies from the civilizations we conquered. Examples include shape-shifting for disguises, consar travel and transference (the ability to instantly transfer our bodies from one location to another over short distances).
We eventually came across other civilizations more advanced and militaristic than our own, against whom the implosion strategy had no effect. They massacred us and pushed us out to the very edges of the galaxy, forcing us to alter our military strategy and invest in weapons development instead. This led to an arms race. In the end, we prevailed, for we came up with the ultimate weapon, a weapon so large and powerful that it could eliminate an entire star system by itself. A weapon so intelligent that it could collaborate with others of its own kind to conduct a whole war. With the Starguzzlers, we not only defeated and eradicated our enemies, but soon established ourselves as rulers of the entire galaxy.
“How did you come up with the name ‘Starguzzler’?” the Volonan Zorina asked, interrupting Jaegor once again.
“Isn’t it ironic that the most advanced weapon ever created is made up of the most basic elements?” Jaegor said proudly. “They’re composed of the same simple gases you see in stars, combined with large amounts of pure energy. They obtain the nourishment they need to sustain themselves by consuming gas from the stars. Their intelligence they get from a red nucleus that is composed of a sophisticated neural network.”
“So in your race to develop the ultimate weapon, you became blinded and you didn’t stop to think of the consequences of your actions,” Dumyan said. “You succeeded in building your weapon, but failed to foresee the environmental and sociological disaster that would unfold if you lost control over it. And lose control you did, for it became more powerful than you.”
Jaegor had to agree. “Not only more powerful than us, they learned how to sustain themselves without our help. Initially, we fed them with the natural gases found inside the bedrock of our own planets, but they later adapted to consume the gases of stars by themselves. That was when we decided to give them the name ‘Starguzzlers’. They multiplied manifold, and their bodies and neural networks grew in size. They grew more intelligent and independent, far more than we had ever intended them to be. They began communicating with us and placed demands. They threatened to destroy us if we didn’t comply, and made an example out of many of our planets and moons to prove they were serious. We had no choice but to give in to their demands. Slowly but surely, they became our masters, and have been so ever since.”
“Is it correct to assume that the Starguzzlers eventually multiplied in such great numbers that they consumed most of the stars in this galaxy?” the Mendoken Sibular asked.
“Yes. And with the stars gone, so were all our worlds that completely depended on them. Our entire civilization was destroyed and the majority of us, many quadrillions, were dead. All that’s left of us now is what you see here. Once we had huge cities with tall skyscrapers and beautiful gardens spread across many planets, but now all we can claim as ours are a few disheveled houses in this one underground settlement on this one planet.”
“Why are you all huddled up in this one place?” Dumyan asked. “Even your disguised ships under construction out there are all empty.” He pointed up in the direction of the sky.
Jaegor hesitated at first, but knew what he was about to say was no secret to the Masters. “I recalled everyone to the settlement upon our arrival, in order to make preparations for the invasion. But in general most of us stay together like this below the surface of the planet, with no easy access by outsiders. That way, the Masters can’t punish us anymore for any of our infractions without destroying all of us. Their firepower is so big that they can’t target anything smaller than an entire planet. If they destroy this last planet of ours, our civilization will be completely extinguished, and they’ll no longer have anyone to help them accomplish their goals.”
“They are running out of stars here, so now their goal is to emigrate to another galaxy in order to survive?” the same Mendoken asked. “And they are using you to make all the preparations for them? That is why you infiltrated our galaxy, to cause our civilizations to implode, so that the Starguzzlers face no resistance when they invade?”
“And that’s why you’ve been raising infant Starguzzlers inside our galaxy in h
iding, to increase their number and create an element of surprise during the invasion,” Dumyan added. “Although those Starguzzlers probably aren’t ready or big enough for battle yet, since you didn’t anticipate executing the invasion so soon.”
“It appears you’ve figured it all out,” Jaegor said with satisfaction. “Now it’s time for you to answer the Masters’ questions.”
“Not so fast, Wazilban, or Jaegor or whatever your name is!” Dumyan said. “One more question. Why our galaxy? Aren’t there many others closer to your own?”
Jaegor knew Dumyan was trying to buy as much time as possible, but a glance up at the Masters made it clear that they wanted him to keep answering until the intruders were satisfied.
Reluctantly, he went on. “We did our research. Your galaxy is large and has an abundance of stars. And, believe it or not, your galaxy is the only one we know of where consar travel is forbidden, thanks to the religious beliefs of you Aftarans. We purposely chose your galaxy because our traveling into and out of the Glaessan through consars wouldn’t be noticed and our routes wouldn’t be traceable.”
The intruders looked dumbstruck, as if lightning had hit them.
“We also made sure that nobody succeeded in developing consar travel capability in the Glaessan,” Jaegor added. “Although somehow we overlooked this species.” He pointed at Marc. “The Mendoken did a good job of hiding it from us.”
The intruders remained silent.
Jaegor felt an overwhelming sense of triumph. Seeing just how shocked these representatives from the Glaessan were was an excellent indication of how well his plan had been working, all the way until the final snag. Perhaps reminding the Masters of that would earn him a good standing with them again.
