“You might want to take a seat." Bern said, his tone quiet but firm. He moved back to his desk, brushing his fingers gently along the edge of the long crystalcomm. As he did, the mechanism above once again dimmed the room. The ambiance illuminated by the serene light of the crystalcomm’s projection.
“Are we watching another movie?” Gira asked as he plopped onto the fluffy carpet beneath, laying down as he stared up at the projection.
“It’ll be more like a presentation.” Bern replied, rifling through files until he found one with an image of an undamaged Trant Station. “Here we go. Do you recognize this place?”
Gira, lounging casually with his hands behind his head, studied the image. “Uhhhh—nope.”
“Hmm,” Bern muttered as he changed the slide; a more dilapidated and broken-down version of Trant Station appeared on screen. “How about this?”
“Ohhhh, it’s that place!” Gira said, recognition sparking as he took in the station’s dilapidated state.
“Good.” Bern nodded, his voice quieting. “This was the site of the twin station incident over a year ago. That night, we lost many rangers, including some of my closest friends.” He flipped to another image, this one of a much larger building nestled against a rock face, its front lot filled with rows of bodies. “Do you recognize this place?”
Gira’s gaze lingered on the image, his expression growing somber as he noticed the lined-up bodies. “I… I do.”
“This is Circh Station, sister station to Trant and another site of abyssal chaos from that night…” Bern’s voice softened as he lingered on the image, his deep blue eyes seeming to lose focus as he stared into the bleak scene, shadows etched across the screen.
He changed slides, this time revealing a structure that Gira didn’t recognize—a towering black monolith that loomed ominously, its dark silhouette stark against the alien pink glow of a strange, twisted forest that seemed almost otherworldly. The monolith devoured the landscape, imposing and surreal. In the image, rangers stood scattered around, weapons drawn, scanning their surroundings with cautious, searching eyes, as if something unseen lurked just beyond the frame.
“What… is that?” Gira asked, lifting himself up, propping on his elbows as he stared intently at the image.
“It’s a Triclyrocerid Abductor—”
“A what?”
Bern continued, “It’s a ship belonging to a group of aliens called the Tryclyrocerids, a species once known for traveling star systems, targeting and consuming any intelligent life they encountered. They were extremely rare—most even thought they were extinct. But after the Shattering, we hypothesize that non-Translate species became more active once more. With so many systems now unguarded and isolated from the ORPA, species like these saw an opportunity.”
He paused, his gaze sharpening on the projection. Switching to an image showing the dark entrails of the ship. “We’re not sure how this ship managed to slip past our atmospheric Vivant defenses. But it’s likely they traversed the same leylines used by Rak’Da vessels. What we do know is that this ship was infected... with a new kind of abyssal spawn.”
He changed the slide, revealing barren, esoteric hallways that stretched into the ship’s endless darkness. The walls were coated in a dark, oily substance that pooled ominously around the feet of the rangers in the frame, clinging to them like tar. A strange, repetitive pattern rippled along the walls—a texture unsettlingly reminiscent of the inside of a throat, as if the ship itself were a dead organism.
Gira noticed how small the rangers looked against the immense hallways; their silhouettes seemed childlike, dwarfed as they ventured through forbidden grounds that loomed ominously around them. "What... what do the Tricly—the aliens look like?”
“Right…” Bern muttered. “Give me a second.” He opened another tab on the display, scrolling through until he landed on a particularly strange set of images.
The screen lit up with a dark blurry image: a lone beam of light, cast from the camera itself, cut through a field of tall golden grain. Wisps of white, feather-like substance drifted across the lens, caught mid-motion in the light. And beyond that, right at the boundary where light met shadow, three vertical, crimson-slit eyes stared directly into the camera—unblinking, intense, and unsettling.
Bern switched to another image, this one taken from a high angle, looking down over a sparse field of tall golden grain, faintly illuminated by the crimson glow of the shattered sky. Wisps of white floated through the frame, caught in beams from several searchlights, each operated by unseen figures combing through the field.
In the far corner, just beyond the reach of the light, a silhouette caught Gira’s eye. It had a cat-like shape, its arched back barely visible against the shadows. But there, piercing the darkness, were the same three vertical slit eyes, reflecting the crimson light in a blurry, ominous glow that seemed to linger at the edge of perception.
He switched to another image. This one showed a suburban-looking area, lined with hollow, empty buildings that loomed over an ominous, deserted road. The structures stood silent and lifeless, their windows dark and vacant, as if watching from the shadows. The ever-present red glow cast its dim, oppressive light across the scene.
“This image was taken in spring of this year,” Bern muttered.
Gira leaned closer, studying the image intently. Unlike the others, there were no lights to break the darkness—only the distorted outlines of the street, barely visible beneath the faint crimson glow. But even in the shadows, Gira could see it. Faint, but unmistakable.
There, standing upright in the middle of the darkened street, was the creature. It was facing the camera, its slender, serpentine form almost blending into the gloom, save for the reflective glint of its eyes staring back through the shadows.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
It stood in sharp contrast to the edges of the buildings around it, its gaunt serpentine figure an uneasy but lonely mark upon the silent scene.
“Wait—this year? You mean… this was taken here?” Gira asked, his voice laced with surprise.
“Yes,” Bern replied, his gaze fixed on the image, lingering on the distant, shadowy figure. “There was a survivor from that crash. It hid in the darkness like a wraith, emerging at night to take so many…” His voice dropped as he continued. “The unfortunate victims were the townsfolk of a coastal village called Reval.”
He paused, his expression clouding. “For months the villagers vanished... taken by the night. We’d find their remains washed up along the shoreline—half-digested…” Bern’s face was stern, yet sorrow clung. “I…we failed Reval…”
A flicker of dread curled in Gira’s chest, urging him to press his questions down. His fingers twitched slightly, his usual eagerness to ask questions battling with a newfound hesitation. But when he glanced at Bern’s face, illuminated by the dim, red glow of the projection, he fell silent. Bern’s expression was tight, his eyes shadowed with something heavy and unspoken. Gira swallowed, his mouth opening as if to speak, then closing again. Instead, he watched quietly, his gaze lingering on the screen as Bern continued cycling through the haunting images.
“The surviving Triclyrocerid vanished about four months ago… no more sightings of the damn thing—but the disappearances never stopped,” Bern muttered, his voice tense as he flipped back to the previous set of images.
Gira watched in silence, his usual curiosity dampened as the screen filled once more with eerie, dark images of the tar-black vessel. The insides of the ship twisted and layered in ways that made no sense, an incomprehensible mess that seemed to defy logic. Gira’s eyes traced the jagged lines and impossible shapes, but the more he looked, the more he felt a creeping unease settle over him. It was undeniably alien, something his mind instinctively hated.
“A group of rangers actually discovered the Abductor earlier,” Bern began, his voice taut with lingering bitterness. “But… we were betrayed.” He switched to an image of an infected Rak’da, its contorted form splayed across a dissection table, dark veins snaking across its body in grotesque, unnatural patterns. “We don’t know why or how, but somehow… Revenant Stalker Vizor knew.”
Gira tilted his head in confusion, his curiosity finally overwhelming him. “Who? Or what is a Rev—Stalker… the thing you mentioned?”
“Right…” Bern switched to another set of images. This one showcased a group photo. The image was warm. A group of maybe 30 Rangers stood smiling, all posing for a photo. But in the background, half-lost in the glow of the flash, loomed a ghostly figure. Its alabaster frame was barely visible, veiled in pale white shroud.
Bern pointed to the faint, looming shape. “That is Vizor,” he said, his tone shifting. “A mechanoid from the age of the ENN.KORR—a being who once served the Revenant Super Intelitat.”
Oh man, it looks awesome—but I really shouldn’t say anything… Gira thought, biting back his excitement as he studied the strange figure. “Why is it wearing a blanket?” he asked, pointing at the ghostly white veil draped over Vizor’s form.
Bern glanced at him, raising an eyebrow. “I have no idea... no one’s ever really questioned it. He’s worn that veil for as long as I can remember.” His gaze shifted back to Vizor’s form, lingering on the contours hidden beneath the ghostly shroud, which clung to an unsettlingly frame. “Regardless, Vizor is partially responsible for the abyssal outbreak. How he knew of the infected vessel, or what his connection to the abyss is... that’s a mystery to us.”
He scoffed softly, looking down, frustration tightening his features. “I mean, why? Why would he...?" His voice trailed off, as if the question itself were lost in the years of unanswered mysteries surrounding Vizor.
“After the incident at the twin stations, the abyssal condensation never decreased,” Bern began, a grim edge in his tone. “And from the uneaten remains of you left behind, we later discovered that the Anomaly you… devoured was once human. A young ranger who disappeared that very night—a boy named Mateo.”
Gira’s breath hitched, a gnawing dread gripping him.
Bern’s face grew grim, his gaze hardening as he continued. “I watched him get taken by one of those things… only to learn later that he’d been twisted into that monstrosity.” He paused, seeming to choke back his emotions before switching to an image: a series of blurry photos showing several pale, distorted figures, each one eerily familiar.
“We’ve identified well over fourteen unique Anomalies—they’ve been designated numbers until their identity is uncovered.” He paused, his gaze lingering on the images, searching for some trace of familiarity. “We call them Unknown.” Bern’s eyes were soft as he panned through blurry images of the inhumane, pale things.
“We’ve managed to subdue two specimens, but we still have no idea how they were transformed.” He paused, his expression tightening as he continued. “Sometimes they speak to us… confused babbling, sobbing, screaming—” His voice faltered, words trailing off under the weight of despair.
Gira’s eyes widened as fragments of his frenzied memory surged back to him. The hunger—the feel of bone grating against his tongue, the sinew and muscle fighting to escape his throat, the give of supple skin beneath his claws. The stench of death flooded his mind—a sickly-sweet aroma that blurred the line between disgust and twisted pleasure. His hand flew to his mouth, as if trying to contain the memory, or perhaps the lingering taste.
Bern noticed the haunted look in Gira’s eyes, the way his hand trembled as he pressed it to his mouth. Gira’s gaze was distant, lost somewhere in the dark reaches of his memory, a place Bern knew that Gira had to face.
“Gira,” Bern said, his voice firm, anchoring Gira back to the present as he stepped closer. He placed a steady hand on Gira’s shoulder—a reassuring weight that held him firmly in the here and now. “I’m not showing this to confuse or disgust you. I want you to understand the reality of what happened and to be able to move forward.”
He looked directly into Gira’s eyes, his expression unwavering but kind. “Whatever happened, whatever you felt—you’re here now. You’re in control. Don’t let that hunger define you.”
Gira looked up at Bern, his eyes filled with a surprisingly earnest look that caught Bern off guard. “Are you… afraid of me?”
Bern hesitated, his gaze shifting as if searching for the right words. His eyes flickered around the room before he finally sighed, the answer coming quietly. “A little…”
Gira managed a weak smile, his gaze dropping slightly as if unsure how to respond.
“You saved my life... but—I can’t lie,” Bern admitted, his voice softening. “As someone who’s spent years studying the age of the ENN.KORR, Zayto Onryō terrifies me.” He glanced down, a touch of vulnerability breaking through. “Honestly, being saved by the spitting image of my childhood nightmare... it really shook me up.”
“I promise… I won’t eat you,” Gira said with a solemn smile, his heterochromic eyes slowly fading to a dull, familiar gray. Small tears clung to the corners of his eyes, threatening to spill over. “I’m not a monster.”