Chapter 7- Invasion

Portia holds her hand over her gaping mouth, I knew what she was thinking.

A star shouldn’t be that tall, that substantial?

Well, now everyone was thinking that. All eyes were on it, whatever the hell it was. It had horrible eyes, too pale for comfort.

“Why did you stop? Shouldn’t you have more matches? Oh my, did I come too late?”

Nobody responds.

“I guess I did, oh well,” It began to turn around, but its white eyes turned black, and within an instant debris was flying through what remained of the arena. It had hit the wall of the arena, destroying it. People in the seats highest in the arena went flying, and people in the lower seats were crushed under Debris. Some debris came toward me, but I formed a sword out of burnt off hair and sliced the block in half. Ricky and Lena are crouching behind me.

“You two okay?” They nod their heads yes. I run off to find Braun and any other smaller stars or brown dwarfs that may need help. Turning to the side, I see Sahl and Mekomia walk in; Mekomia opens a spell book and whispers something I can’t hear. Time seems to slow down. *From here until it says otherwise, we are operating on human/earth time scales.* Sahl takes a fan from behind her and throws it into the air. The invader is in the process of hitting the arena again, when Sahl’s fan acts as a boomerang and within minutes, it is near the invaders neck. BOOM! The fan grows, and explodes. Mekomia whispers again and time resumes. *Back to star time* The invader falls backwards.

“Y- y0u’r3 HuR7ing me again! S- 370p!”

Again? Had they met Sahl and Mekomia before?

The star then attempts to tear its own face off. It turns and thrashes at its eyes and face until it's completely deformed, its eyes and nose and mouth and ears were all in the wrong places; Some of the strands in its long hair were hanging off by a thread; Its hands kept thrashing and pulling. By the time it had stopped, its ears were detached, stringed to its body by a thin line of skin; It went back to normal within a few seconds, and its eyes went black again. “Stop arguing with me! You created me!” It pulls itself up from falling, attaching its hand to the broken arena and lifting itself up. Was it arguing with. . . Itself?

The invader screeched horribly and caused pain in our ears. Bigger stars around me started storming. I could barely even see with all the dust around me, clouding the air, and swallowing the screams. Suddenly, Sahl comes running towards me with Braun, Nahara, and Ramos in her hand and scoops me up into the other. She runs for the lift, and stomps on it so hard it starts to fall before jumping onto it. We crash hard into the ground after a few seconds of falling.

I cough and wheeze and try to get myself together.

“Sahl, do you know them? They said something about you hurting them again. . . did you maybe fight? During the war?”

Sahl looks at me terrified.

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“No, that thing was talking to itself. Me and Mekomia have both never even seen it before!” Rumbling ensues from the arena above us, and a chunk of what used to be the floor almost hits one of Ramos’s planets. Quickly, I drew my sword and jumped to cut it in half. “Oh stars, thanks for saving Gaia there. You know, she’s terrestrial so she’s sorta fragile,” Ramos inspects Gaia for any damage. “Oh I know! Vee’s that way too.” Sahl looks around frustratedly. “Look, we need to get out of here, Rayes! You're an announcer, do you know where the exit is?” I shake my head. “I do!” Nahara starts running for a dim sign, pushing all the dusty boxes out of the way as she did. Sahl followed suit, though for her it was more like 3 steps. She tried to push the door open desperately, but it wouldn’t budge, so she took out her fan and sliced the bar to push it open, sending us all out into open space.

“Mom, if you don’t know who that star is? Might you know someone who does?” I helped Braun up. Sahl’s face changed, it was obvious she was uncomfortable.

“I do, but I honestly don’t really wanna see them all that much. . .Okay, for the good of the star world we’ll see them. But you all must promise me that when we get there, you say nothing. Nothing at all. All of you. Got it?”

. . .

“Sahl? And friends, odd that you're paying me a visit. You never call, or write.” Sahl’s expression grows slightly annoyed. “Elder TON, we need your assistance, it's a very serious matter! Many are in danger right no-”

“Only come to me when you need my help, huh? That’s how it always is. No one wants to hang around such a sad old man like me, right?”

Sahl clenches her teeth so hard they might crumble into stardust. “Elder, please there’s a star. . .it's stronger and more massive than any of us, even me, Mekomia, and Stephen, and it's out for us all. I fear that only one with your power could-,”

“Oh, so Quasi’s back? I didn’t think that was possible. Fine, I'll deal with Quasi, you always were my favorite Sahl. But first, you must bring me an offering.”

“What kind, Elder?” Sahl’s teeth were seriously in danger.

“That blue girl, in your hand. I think she’d make a great addition to my accretion disk .”

“Please- I can give you a few planets instead? More dust? I’ll have some from the closest nursery right away!”

“I want a real meal, Sahl. Or you know what’s bound to happen.”

Meal? What was gonna happen?

Sahl started to panic. I had never in my life seen a supergiant have a solar storm this bad, but Sahl was flaring up horribly. What exactly were the black holes even capable of?

*Black holes, (as you probably know), are structures so dense and with such intense gravity that not even light can escape. In this story, they are the current supreme elders of the universe. Stars are expected to serve and respect them, no matter how big or small they are.

“He -he means me right? I thought- I didn't mean to. . .did I upset him?” Nahara is storming profusely.

“Shhhhh!” Braun covers his mouth with his pointer finger. His gaze is menacing.

“He’s not gonna actually kill me. . .right? This is just a joke! Ramos, tell me this is a dream, or it isn’t real! I’m imagining this right!”

“Stop talking!” Braun is pulling on his hair. He looks like he might explode.

“Is it gonna hurt?”

“A lot.”

White eyes I had never seen before appeared from behind Sahl’s hand. I didn’t know where they started, when they ended, but I could feel the stare I had before when I was in the basement. These eyes felt the same.

Sahl draws her fan from behind her back and raises it to them, her face is so cold, i’ve never seen it like that before.

“Elder, please excuse me for what I am about to do.”