Memory transcription subject: Estala, Ex-Prestige Exterminator, current predator.

Date [standardised human time]: ?????

Today was a good day.

School had been enjoyable. I’d aced the history quiz: I did well at remembering facts and figures, I could recite off the tip of my beak the dates and events that led to the formation of the federation, the events of a better time before the great mistake of the Arxur was made. Tarvas said I was a nerd, but he was just jealous.

Lunch had been Kychuee fruit, which was my favourite, and even the weather was perfect: That fantastic kind of sunny day that caused the air to be filled with updrafts, letting you easily glide and soar between the large spiraling wood and stone architecture that made up the cities of Nishtal.

I waved goodbye to Tarvas with a final flap of my wings, as I descended down to the lower levels where I lived with my dad. We lived quite close to the ground, generally reserved for those less useful to the overall war effort against the evil Arxur, which made sense as a single father and his daughter were less important than a breeding couple. Once upon a time your vertical position mattered, as the further up you were meant you were the further away from predators. Now though, predator attacks were rare on Nishtal, meaning it was more of a cultural relic than an actual danger.

As I landed at my front door and carefully placed my school bag where it belonged, my thoughts were drawn to why it was just me and my father. I never knew my mother, having been taken in an Aruxr raid before I was hatched, my egg the only one of the clutch that my father had managed to grab on that fateful day. My dad talked about my mother often and I wish I could have met her: she sounded nice.

“Dad! I’m home!”

I pushed those thoughts away from my head as I entered my home. There were far more pressing things to be thinking of, for instance the next episode of The Exterminators was on today. The last episode had seen the Harchen Exterminator Duliny trapped in a predator’s den, and I couldn’t wait to see how she was going to make it out.

Unlike a lot of Krakotl my age I had no desire or fantasy to become an exterminator. While they were heroic figures, I was under no delusion that I would make a good one. The idea of facing down predators, climbing into dens of evil and being the first line of defence against the Arxur filled me with terror. I much prefer the maths and science classes.

“Dad? I’m home, you there?”

That was strange, dad always greeted me at the door, understandably protective of his only daughter. He’d been stressed recently, something about work, so maybe he was still there. Even weirder the living room was also a mess, as if a stampede of Venlil had run through our home; tables and perches upended and strewn haphazardly around the room. Weird…

Then I smelled it, a scent that caused a surge of fear to run through my brain. Of danger, of pain.

Blood.

“Dad!?”

I rushed forwards filled with terror, following the smell and opening the door to my fathers bedroom, opening the door to the horror scene in front of me. Purple blood covered the walls and furniture, drying and dripping into an horrific mess. The window lay flung open, drapes fluttering in the simple summer breeze, doing very little to air out the smell of gore. Until this point I had thought the violence and blood on The Exterminators to be super realistic, but it didn’t hold a candle to the devastation in front of me.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

In the centre of it all, lay my father, his belly was sliced open, intestines splayed out across the ground. Scratches in the wooden floor told the tale of someone trying to drag their broken body to safety before something had sliced his throat open. He stared blankly up at the ceiling, eyes devoid of any life as the pool of coagulating blood surrounded him like a final dash of colour in this destructive canvas of death.

I rushed over to his side, grabbing hold of my fathers wing: Bone cold, he’d been dead for a while. Tears started to form in my eyes as I stared down at the dead Krakotl, softly whispering the next word as if he could still hear me.

“Dad?”

I don’t know how long I stayed there holding onto my fathers wing, silent tears falling to the ground as the beautiful day outside continued on as if nothing had happened. As if somehow just staying still and doing nothing would fix the problem, as if you could put the pieces back together from a cracked egg by just wishing hard enough.

But eventually I had to do something, shakily getting up from my position. The exterminators, I had to call the exterminators. That’s what they said at school, that if there was a predator attack they were the first ones you contacted for help. I started towards the communicator, shaking like a leaf in the wind, before a sound caused my focus to snap back to my fathers body. The sound of cracking bone and twisting sinew rang out as my dad turned to look at me, his eyes still blank and unseeing, his head twisting at an unnatural angle to stare directly in my direction, as if he was a predator. What? This wasn’t possible, this couldn’t be happening!

“You did this.”

My dad’s voice was filled with anger, filled with accusation as I stood there shivering, feathers on end as my father continued to watch me with hate filled dead eyes.

“No, I didn’t. I tried to stop this, I tried to stop this from ever happening again!”

My father dragged himself forwards in my direction as I stumbled back in fear, his guts and insides trailing and slithering along besides him, before he lifted a single wing to point at me.

“Predator. Meat Eater. Evil.”

I looked down at my talons, at the end of my beak, the implements originally designed to eat meat were covered in my fathers purple blood, dripping onto the floor as I tried to wipe the mess away.

“No, I’m trying to fix it, I’m trying to make it better!”

More sounds of cracking bone as the Krakotl’s head twisted to the side in another unnatural movement, as if looking at me inquisitively, questioningly.

“By becoming friends with a predator? By cavorting with the enemy?”

I took another step back, covering my face with my wings and shaking my head back and forth as the accusations rained down.

“No. I just need more time! I just need to work out the human’s trick! I can save the Venlil! I can save everyone!”

“Wow this officially blew my mind by the way. So crispy and tangy.”

The sound of the human caused me to stop hiding behind my wings, looking up at the horror abovce. Noises of tearing flesh and grinding teeth filled the room as Joseph sat like an animal over my father, devouring and eating like the predator he is.

“I really hope whatever these things are, that they aren’t bad for me.”

I watched as Joseph tore into the corpse, covered head to toe in purple blood, ripping and tearing flesh and bone alike, as if it was nothing more than paper. Grunting and growling as he ate, tearing the body apart wing by wing, limb by limb, greedily shoving each appendage into his gaping mouth.

With a final movement it drove both hands into my fathers ribcage, breaking the bone apart with ease and rummaging inside the body before retrieving its terrible prize: A still beating heart. Joseph looked up at me, piercing eyes crazed and drilling deep into my soul, teeth bared in a wild blood covered grin. It then raised up the heart towards me in offering.

“Hey Estala, wanna try some human food?”

—------------------

I woke up screaming, falling off my perch with a clatter, fear and terror clouding my judgement. It took a few moments to realise where I was through my ever beating heart. I was still on Venlil Prime, back home. I was safe, it was just a nightmare.

Still I couldn’t stop thinking about the sight of Joseph covered in blood, of the blame of my predatory ancestry. I lay there shivering on the floor, seconds turning to minutes turning to hours.

Hating the monster that I was.