I woke up for another day of pain. They gave me the weird stuff they always gave me before the meager scraps they called breakfast. I was checked for contraband and as usual, they found nothing, the same as every day. They transported me to the torture chamber once again and strapped me into the chair. A male fleshling walked into the room, a different one than the last few times. He sat down in the chair across from me and folded his arms.

“So, where have you and your people come from?” The fleshling asked me.

“We came from Atroxis 3,” I answered.

“Why is it called Atroxis 3?” The fleshling continued questioning me.

“It’s the third moon of Atroxis,” I told him. “Is that not how you typically name moons here?”

“No, we name them after other things,” the fleshling said, “hey! I’m supposed to be the one asking questions!”

“Ok,” I said, “ask away.”

“So, why did you and your people come to Earth?”

“We were chased off our world by the fire demons.”

“What do you mean ‘fire demons’?”

“Big flaming beasts that come from below the surface. They haven’t arrived here yet. They’ve probably destroyed Atroxis 3. And 2. And 1. And likely even Atroxis itself.”

“Why didn’t you fight them? Your military is strong after all.”

“The fire demons are stronger,” I said simply.

“Ok, next questions. What are you?”

“I’m a variant of the original Atroxians. So I would be one of the Third Atroxians. We developed scales and physical superiority over the original Atroxians after moving to Atroxis 3. However, we managed to lose all of our technology long ago and didn’t have the right knowledge to recreate it. We had focused on military discipline and tactics. So we developed a new society on Atroxis 3. One of bloodshed and endless carnage.”

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“Ok, that’s all the time we have for today,” the male fleshling said as he got up from his chair.

As the interrogator fleshling left the room, a pair of guards in heavy armor walked in. They lifted me by the armpits and unchained me from the wall. Then they put my chest piece of immobility back on. They helped me walk back to my cell and removed my chest piece before throwing me into my cell. That was their first mistake. As soon as I was in my cell I turned around and slammed guard number one into guard number two. They thought they could take me. That was mistake number two. Guards number three and four tried to fire their weapons at me, and that was mistake number three. With my hold on guard number one, I pulled him in front of me to take the hits from the metal pellets. I threw him down near guard number two and rushed guards three and four. I slammed into them and knocked them onto the ground. Guard number four got back up so I grabbed guard number three’s weapon and bludgeoned guard number four to unconsciousness. The blast doors were still open. I began walking out when guard number two got back up.

“Hey,” guard number two was slurring his words, “lizardman.”

I ripped the helmet off guard number four’s head and threw it at guard number two’s. Guard number two was unconscious once more. His waking up was the fourth mistake. The blast doors had closed.

“Well shit,” I said to no one in particular as I pried the blast doors open, with just enough space for me to fit through. I pushed myself through and they instantly slammed shut behind me. I stepped one foot forward and a dart came shooting out of the wall. I sprinted through the corridor with the occasional acrobatic maneuver, dodging all the darts. I ran across the barren ground and found my spider was exactly where I had left it.

“What the fuck are you still doing here?” I said to it, not expecting a reply. It chittered in reply, meaning nothing to me.

I hopped on and began making my way back to the old camp. My people had rebuilt it. I was welcomed by all as the leader again. They knew what my return meant. It was time for war.

“Atroxians!” I yelled, “It is time! It is time for us to make a place for ourselves permanently! We will take the fleshling’s base from them! We will charge them with all our military might! We will destroy the fleshings! All of them will die by our hands! NO MERCY FOR THE FLESHLINGS!”

A war cry erupted from my army, and the fleshlings heard despite their distance.

“Now we march on their base,” I said as I led the charge atop my bunker spider.

We marched to the fleshlings’ base for a whole cycle. We attempted to break in, but they countered us. We weren’t outnumbered, but we were in over our heads. We had the physical strength, but they had the technology. We lost miserably to the fleshlings that day, but I will still tell you of the battle that came.