Alarms blare inside a Varot military base. Located atop a small mountain plateau, it is merely one of several thousand located on Veter's surface.

Hundreds of tall, skinny, ferret-like Mallali run through the halls, squeaking and chirping at one another as they don combat armor and weapons. Despite Veter's role as an industrial world responsible for making basic metal-byproducts and simplistic armor for 10th-Era vessels, the planet still boasts a sizable, self-sustaining military to protect itself.

"Cheeurr! Cheeurr!" One of the Varot commanders cries, his voice oddly high-pitched. "I want five platoons to reinforce Lithix before hour's end! Five more to travel to Piizar, and seven to protect the capitol! Fight with all your might, cheeurr!"

"Meep!" A female Varot squeaks. "Sir! Five hundred Disperra have broken into the capital! Civilians are dying every minute! Lithix has also reported multiple armies of Wuspa and Cantors covering the air and ground!"

"Curses," The commander scowls. "Since when did so many species of Buzor work together?! They've always fought each other more than us Mallali! Deploy an additional two platoons to the targeted areas!"

"Yes, commander!"

...

Inside the city of Lithix, where tall skyscrapers made of slick, sleek glass stand next to factories churning out smoke, hordes of Buzor rampage unchecked, tearing through all the Varot in their path. Males, females, and their kits equally perish to the monsters attacking their peaceful world.

One mother shields her trio of kits, using her body to hide their eyes as a huge centipede charges at her and opens its menacing front jaws.

"Nooo!" The mother screams. Her cries go unanswered, as the monster severs her body in half, spraying her blood across the faces of her babies. They sit, frozen in terror as the Buzor instantly chomps onto them next, gulping down the one-year-olds with mindless delight.

[Chuku chuku chuku!] The Cantor telepathically cries, signaling its first kill to the others nearby. They, too, detail similar stories of delicious meals as they crash through walls and tear into buildings.

The Varot inside flee in all directions, their panicked flight an act lacking rhyme or reason. Many of them run right into the waiting maws of the Cantors, while others find themselves besieged by Wuspa from above. The humming wings of these giant insects provide a fresh sense of hell for those who escape the Cantors. They run as fast as their short little limbs will take them, only for the oversized wasps to tackle them with their stingers, injecting agonizing, paralyzing venom into their backs.

The few who escape find no relief in their flight. Even if they survive one attack, they eventually round the wrong corner and arrive before the six-legged army of the Mitteras, huge ants with equally oversized jowls. These insects move as a swarm, climbing walls, breaking down doors, and shattering windows in their quest to slaughter as many Varot as possible.

[Churuk! Remember the mission!] One of the Mitteras soldiers, a mid-ranked commander, telepathically yells. [We must make way for the Dark One's advance. Continue to sow chaos and keep the Varot scared! Churuk!]

[Yes, High One!] The other Mitteras nearby reply, all of them eerily switching their movements at the same time. Their swarm moves fluidly, like a wave of muddy water. Where the most frontal Mitteras in any group moves, the others behind them follow instinctively. Together, their hiveminds unify as a collective consciousness, frightening the wits out of any poor Varot who has the misfortune to see them coming.

"M-Mitteras!" A four-year old Varot says to her mother, while gazing at the street five stories below. "Bad Buzor! They're attacking, cheeurr!"

"Oh, oh nooo!" The mother shrieks, when she runs up to the window and looks down. By the time she spots the Mitteras, she's already run out of luck. They swarm around her housing complex and climb up the sides, breaking windows and flooding in to maul the civilians trapped inside. Blood-curdling screams erupt as countless Varot find themselves caught off-guard by the unexpected attack in the middle of broad daylight.

The Buzor do not care.

The Buzor do not stop, no matter how their victims beg them.

The Buzor show none of their prey an inkling of mercy. Their compound eyes gaze emptily at the Varot as they bite and cut into them, ripping the screaming Mallali to pieces.

Tragedy lingers in the air. By the time the first military platoons arrive, already, tens of thousands have perished. The soldiers responding to Lithix's crisis find their fur follicles turning numb as a sea of black, red, yellow, and green Buzor sweeps across one of their many industrial super-cities.

Outfitted with 8th-Era military weaponry and vehicles, the responding troops momentarily realize they will not be able to stop the Buzor. Their weapons, while adequately lethal, simply lack the longevity to fight such a massive number of enemies for an extended period of time.

They know, as their transports drop to the city's surface, that their planet will fall on this day.

"Cheeurr!" The lieutenant in charge of one platoon screeches. "Even if we fail to protect our homeworld, we will still fight with our lives on the line! Kill ten Buzor each! Remind them of why they should fear the Mallali!!"

"Yes, ma'am!" The other Varot chirp.

They rush out of their combat shuttles with smooth, organized movements. The Varot soldiers immediately begin unloading on the distant Buzor, felling them by the tens and hundreds. However, the moment the Buzor begin to perish, their swarms circle around the grounded soldiers and engulf them in pincer attacks!

The soldiers fell more than five thousand Buzor, but in the end, they still perish to the maws of their hated blood-enemies.

Countless tragedies unfold all across Veter's surface. Tens of cities fall within the first two hours. No matter how many soldiers reinforce each other, in the end, the swarms consume all in their paths.

...

Inside the Varot military headquarters, many military commanders bark orders over their radios and comm networks. They deploy assets as best as they can, while the head of their planet's military, the Supreme Fesynes himself, finally receives the reply he's waited on for two hours.

"No! NO! Cheeurr!! This can't be! Those damned Dakkit! They left us out to dry! We're doomed! Doomed!"

His secretary blinks in alarm. "Supreme One! What is the matter? Will the Dakkit not send any aid?! Our world will soon perish!"

"They won't!" The Supreme Fesynes moans. "Somehow, these Buzor have united to attack more than a dozen Core worlds at once. The Dakkit... they only chose to send a single vessel to our world! Just one!"

His secretary stares at him bleakly. "Only one... cheeurr... what use will one ship provide? Such a token gesture will prove little more than a slap to our fur!"

"I know. I know!" The Fesynes wails. "My people. My children! All dead, dying to the Buzor! Ten thousand curses be upon them!"

Suddenly, one of the headquarter's guards rushes over. "Supreme One! Terrible news! Multiple companies of Buzor are headed our way! They will reach this location within ten minutes! We must evacuate you to safety!"

"Cheeurr! I shall not flee!" The Fesynes squeaks. "If these Buzor intend to kill my people, then I shall go down with them! A true leader never abandons his post!"

The Fesynes' guard and secretary both soften their expressions.

"Supreme One..." His secretary whispers.

Right as all seems lost, one of the Headquarters' lieutenants raises his furry head. "Cheeurr? Supreme One! An unknown ship has appeared in our system! Its appearance does not appear in any of our databases. I am attempting to scan it, but its surface... it's made of an alloy I've never seen before. This vessel is surely... one of the Mallali's secret weapons! It is a Planet-Crusher!"

The Supreme Fesynes shudders. He scurries over to that lieutenant's station, where his screen displays a long, rectangular vessel stretching more than three kilometers in length.

"What? A Planet-Crusher? It... it is! This model... it appears to possess parameters beyond the 40th-Era! How is that possible? If the Mallali have dispatched such a powerful vessel to assist us... we may yet survive this crisis!"

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The Supreme's words ring throughout the command center, making many of the sharper-eared Varot glance in his direction. Seeing the strangely-shaped vessel floating holographically in front of The Supreme, his senior officers momentarily feel their hearts lift in elation.

"Hail the vessel," The Supreme orders, straightening his posture.

"Yes, Supreme One," The lieutenant replies.

Moments later, a comm-projection activates in front of the Varot's highest-ranking officer. On its surface, a strange, almost furless biped stands with his paws behind his back. The creature wears a navy blue uniform far shinier and more impressive than anything the Varot leader has ever seen among any of the Core Worlders.

"Greetings," The biped says. "My name is Admiral José Rodriguez. I am a Terran, and I have come to save your world. Please send me detailed telemetry and geographical maps of Veter's terrain. I will dispatch my best ships to save your people."

Despite never having heard of 'Terrans,' the Supreme One doesn't bother with questioning his savior's identity. Whoever this creature is, he must have been dispatched by the Mallali higher-ups. Perhaps he is a top-secret bio-engineered being, one created for the sole purpose of following the Alfras's orders.

No matter the Terran's identity, it falls well out of the Supreme One's jurisdiction. He obediently nods and kowtows, bowing at the waist in deference. "Thank you for coming to save us, Great Terran! I know not of your species, but I will forever etch your kindness into my heart! Cheeurr! My lieutenant will send you all of our telemetry, as requested!"

"Good. Time is of the essence," The Terran replies. "I have brought with me an elite army of Kraktol and Kessu. Likely, you may find its composition strange and bewildering, but do not panic. My soldiers are highly competent at their jobs and will act as a bulwark against the Buzor."

"I dare not question your people, nor their capabilities!" The Supreme One replies. He straightens his posture to look the Terran in the eye. "Please, hurry! Already, many of our most populous cities have fallen!"

The Terran smiles.

"Don't worry. I would never let such a bunch of cute little ferrets go extinct."

The projection disappears, leaving question marks over the Supreme One's head.

"Cheeurr? Ferrets? What a strange thing to call us. And how did he arrive here so fast? The Mallali only just told us help was on the way. Have Hyperdrives made such incredible advancements, unbeknownst to me?"

A moment passes before realization dawns on him.

"It must be due to... secret Core technology! Of course! The Dakkit truly keep their paws close to their fur! Cheeurr!"

.......................................

The Buzor devour cities. They knock down buildings, collapse skyscrapers, and turn the once-beautiful world of Varot, even shinier and more pristine than New Pongi, into a wasteland of destruction.

Many Wuspa hover in the skies, visually scouring the ground for sneaky, hiding Varot. They spot many, yet miss others. Those the Wuspa miss, the Mitteras often uncover.

One small holdout of Varot, wielding non-lethal police weaponry, arm themselves with stun batons, stun guns, and other such armaments designed purely for incapacitating intoxicated and unruly Varot. With the Buzor attacking, the few police left alive hole up in their offices, barricading the doors to try and keep the oversized insects out.

[You cannot stop us!] A Disperra arachnid telepathically howls, its words piercing the wall of debris keeping it from its prey. [Ksssrrt! We are unstoppable! Your deaths shall taste of pain and fear!]

It, along with other assorted Buzor, grab and throw aside the crap in their way. They dig through the dressers, tables, chairs, and other furniture blocking an entrance to a small weapons depot, where two dozen Varot police huddle inside, their fur trembling with terror.

"D-don't come in!" One officer chirps. "Cheeurr! W-we'll shoot!"

[Do your worst!] The Disperra leader taunts, as it hurls aside yet another table. The door becomes visible, causing the Buzor to dig with even more gusto.

Suddenly, from the distance, a dull explosion rumbles in the air. The Buzor present freeze in unison. They halt their digging to pause as orders travel through the swarms outside, relayed to them via the telepathy of their many different species.

[...A new military force has appeared! They have begun bombarding the swarm from the upper atmosphere! It is as the Dark One said. The Terran has arrived!]

The Disperra commander freezes, a sensation of alarm passing through its body.

[The Terran? He really came! Ksssrrt!]

No longer do the barricaded Varot mean anything to the Buzor. The six and eight-legged monsters pull back and head outside, leaving the police behind to wonder just what in the hell changed.

"Why have the Buzor left us here, alone?"

"Don't know! Doesn't matter! You'd better pray they don't return!"

"Yes! Cheeurr!"

...

One Wuspa flying higher than the rest turns its compound vision toward the sky. There, it spots half a dozen teeny tiny white dots hovering amidst Veter's blue-gray upper atmosphere. The Wuspa cocks its head, uncertain of what those dots could be, as they were not present merely five minutes before.

Before the creature can report its observations, a streak of light rushes down from above, aiming straight at the giant insect. The Wuspa doesn't get a second to react as an anti-tank gauss round blasts through its thorax, exploding the creature's mid-section like a grenade. Immediately, the Wuspa's mind goes blank as its body falls in half. It plummets to the city streets, where its corpse slaps against the pavement and bursts open, spraying gore in all directions.

Simultaneously, a hundred other gauss rounds rain from above, each of them moving at sub-light speeds. Faster than any Wuspa's simple, compounded eyes can follow, these bullets rip through their bodies and spray their insides downward, leaving them to plummet to the ground below.

Not long afterward, the specks in the skies descend, revealing the distant outlines of troop transports, a single Titan Suit equipped with an atmospheric flight system, and two interceptors suitable for air-to-air and air-to-ground combat.

Umi's voice rings out in the interiors of all the ships. "Initial report. One hundred and sixteen Wuspa drones successfully slain. You may now descend to the lower atmosphere. Commence sub-orbital bombardment. Target the following coordinates, where the Buzor swarms are thickest. Afterward, proceed to assist whatever ground forces remain among the Varot defenders."

With ruthless efficiency, the six 50th-Era corvettes above Lithix proceed to rain fire and fury from the skies above. Hellish explosions, like the coming of Armageddon, erupt among their ranks, wiping out five times as many Buzor as those the Varot killed throughout the whole day.

Once the Terran's space-borne forces exhaust their ammunition, they descend to the city's surface and open up to reveal heavily armored Kraktol and Kessu shock-troopers, all of them kitted out in highly-advanced metallic exosuits, along with Survival Suits to protect them from long-range weaponry as well.

The platoons spread out in groups of six. Three Kessu ride atop the shoulders of three Kraktol, with the significantly smaller kitty-cats acting like turrets, swiveling their guns independent of whatever directions their Kraktol mounts choose to move.

The Buzor, initially fearful of these newcomers, quickly unite when they see the 'foolish' enemies make landfall. Just like they did with the Varot military forces, they circle around to initiate multi-pronged pincer attacks on their 'helpless' enemies.

Sadly, for the Buzor, they arrive to find one of the Titan exosuits, piloted by a cute little Kessu, awaiting their arrival.

A horde of Mitteras, seemingly mindless drones, rush like idiots to try and swallow the Titan with their bodies. Horrified, what they instead discover is a flamethrower mounted on the Titan's left arm with more than enough heat to roast their soft, unprotected limbs to ash, while its right arm wields a machine gun with enough stopping power to pummel a tank to scrap.

As the Mitteras try to backpedal, the Titan stomps toward them, unleashing blue flames exceeding two thousand degrees. At the same time, a stream of gunfire blasts from its secondary weapon, tearing through the Cantor in the back. Not even their hardened shells manage to resist the single mecha's weaponry.

"Hahaha! What great fun!" Says the Titan's pilot, Ruuki. As the son of Nyoor and Baaru, he has received privileges from the Admiral himself, allowing him to pilot the highly-desired Titan exosuit. "Burn, you ugly Buzor! Mraww! You smell like fried Dakkit, now!"

At the same time, the other troopers, despite lacking flashy exosuits, possess plenty of stopping power themselves. While Ruuki single-handedly takes out any poor sods dumb enough to attack from the east, his friends easily stop the Buzor's advances from the north, west, and south.

Two hours later, the Buzor present in Lithix turn around and flee. They wise up much too late to prevent the deaths of more than two hundred thousand of their members. Even as they leave, Ruuki takes to the skies, using his suit's rear-mounted wings to hover and take aim.

"Mraww. Switch to long-range tactical weaponry."

His machine gun reconfigures itself. It transforms into a ten-foot-long photon-lancer cannon capable of spitting beams of devastation. While the Buzor flee across a barren field, one they stomped flat when charging into Lithix earlier in the day, Ruuki pulls the trigger and swings his weapon from left to right. A sweeping beam swishes silently through the air, cutting in half an additional forty-three thousand Buzor, ending their lives in an instant.

Ruuki goes on to methodically wipe out another twelve thousand with two more sweeping beams before the rest quickly burrow underground or split apart, making his weapon far less practical. He nods, then speaks to his intercom.

"Meow! Meow! Lithix City cleared of hostiles! Regrouping with Red-Gamma squad! We will re-arm ourselves, then move on to the next position!"

"Roger that," comes the Admiral's reply over the comm system. "I'll be heading down to the field, next. Join up with my company at these coordinates."

"You got it, Great Precursor! Meow!"

As the Terran's army picks up and flies off, silence descends upon Lithix. Fires burn ceaselessly. From a city which once boasted a population of thirty million, less than seventy thousand Varot remain. The police eventually emerge from their shelters, hesitantly poking their heads out to search for any nearby Buzor. What they find is a dead city, one lacking practically any life compared to just 24 hours before.

The police chief lowers his head. He weeps, as do his officers. Their lives will never be the same.

...

Elsewhere, the Supreme Fesynes receives his first good news in hours. Thanks to the reinforcement of just twenty-four Kraktol and Kessu, his headquarters somehow escapes annihilation, leaving him and his officers to feel grateful to their gods.

"Cheeurr! We thank the Wind Mother for her blessings! Our people may yet survive due to her intervention!" The Supreme One chirps.

"We all thank the Wind Mother!" His officers yell in unison.

The Fesynes' secretary coughs into his paws. "Ahem! And the Terran, too!"

"Yes, yes! Of course! We thank the Terran and shall immortalize his visage in our historical holograms forever!"

Admiral Rodriguez's face lingers on a nearby holo-screen, having called again a few minutes earlier. He frowns.

"Don't celebrate yet. These Buzor are a hundred times more numerous than I expected. I have also uncovered the mystery behind how they slipped past your defenses. They played all of you for fools."

The Varot leader blinks in surprise. "You have? What method did they use?"

The Terran scowls. He motions with his hand, causing a holographic image to appear in the center of the Varot's command center.

"Long-lost Precursor technology."