Memory transcription subject: Captain Sovlin, United Nations Fleet Command
Date [standardized human time]: February 21, 2137
Tyler attempted to slam the door in my face, but I drove my shoulder into it with force that could only stem from passion. The memories of stabbing my claws into an Arxur’s neck on Sillis, while trying to save Marcel, were fresh; everything that had gone wrong in my life started and ended with the grays. The reason I tortured the kind-hearted human was because I equated Earth’s sapient predators with these child-eating, reptilian abominations. My daughter’s screams, as she was eaten alive, echoed in my ears, and uncontrollable hatred blacked out any judgment.
“What the fuck are you doing here? You’re only authorized to accompany Hunter!” Tyler exclaimed.
The blond human made a move to intercept me, but I ducked under his grasp. The Arxur at the table hadn’t reacted to defend itself, and it looked more alarmed than ferocious. I could see Terran playing cards on the table in front of it; how could Tyler, my friend, have been indulging in a game with these savages? The two primates who were duped into bringing me here drew their weapons, though Officer Cardona urged them to stand down. Just as I came within striking distance of the gray, shadows flashed in my periphery.
A massive, scarred Arxur tackled me away from the one at the table, a growl rumbling in its throat. It had the clear opportunity for the death blow, but it had purposefully not driven its claws into my flesh. Rather than pinning me with its superior weight, it released its grip and gestured for me to stand. The beast’s body tilted forward, arms raised in a fighting stance; it baffled me why it hadn’t used its fangs to draw my blood. Was it toying with the prey that wandered into its den?
“Stand down, humans,” the Arxur barked. “I can handle myself. Captain Sovlin, we have not met before, yes? I am the one you want, not Vysith. She was born long before any of the war atrocities happened.”
An ajar door informed me that this newcomer predator had burst in from an observation room, where a recognizable human face was watching the scene unfold. It was the Secretary-General of the United Nations himself, giving a filthy monster a tour fresh off the Summit! Zhao looked silently livid, striding into the room in a hurried attempt to defuse the situation. The name the Terran referred to the gray demon as was Isif, which rang a bell. The primates were consorting with the Chief Hunter that terrorized Gojids, forgetting all of its sins because it saved Earth?
This ugly bastard is directly responsible for Hania’s fate. I’m going to rend it from limb-to-limb; it underestimates just how much I want it dead.
Vysith stood from the table, lashing its tail. “Why don’t we talk about whatever the issue is? It’s dishonorable to trade claws without provocation. Besides, I would love a chance to speak with an alien other than—”
“The leaf-lickers do not see you as worth talking to. We’re monsters that deserve death to them,” Isif hissed.
“With what the Arxur have become now, I can understand where they’re coming from. I never would’ve imagined we’d…eat and torture people.”
“That’s something that’s burdened me my entire life. Why do you think I’m letting Sovlin have a swing at me? I do not need outside assistance, which would make me look weak. Go on, Gojid, do your worst.”
My bones ached from the force of its tackle, but I stood with renewed determination. This Arxur was mocking me, assuming I couldn’t scratch it; the Terrans were foolish if they bought this mechanical, staged profession of guilt from the monster that led the raids. I shrieked, swiping straight at Isif’s eyes. Its tail hooked around my legs, while I was mid-swing, and sent me crashing to my rump. It waited with patience, heartless eyes facing me as cold slits. My spines bristled, sickened by the predatory visage.
Isif seemed to be treating this skirmish as recreation; the glint in its eyes reminding me of how Tyler looked, playing his murderous video games. In my youth, my movements might’ve been a bit more spry, but my ankles were throbbing from the tail swipe. I could acknowledge that the monster had a grasp on its hunger, enough to calculate and wait rather than act in a frenzy. That necessitated a more measured response on my part, despite the fog of fury spurring me onward.
“Lost your nerve already?” the Chief Hunter prompted.
I raised my claws in defiance. “Bloodthirsty, rotten, unfeeling fiend! I want you dead, dead as the fucking children you ate alive. You…STOLE MY FAMILY!”
Creeping forward with purposeful steps, I kept all of the Arxur’s offensive weapons in my peripheral vision. It had to keep its repulsive pupils focused on me, which made it obvious where it was looking. When its gaze flicked downward, I hopped over the blistering tail sweep that followed. The gray balanced itself, swinging an arm at my head; I landed just in time to duck, and pop back up to swipe its snout. Crimson red blood, the same iron-rich color as the humans, spurted from its nostrils. The UN soldiers looked ready to intervene, treacherously worried when I drew the gray’s blood.
“Stop attacking Isif at once! That’s an order, Sovlin,” Zhao growled, his own brown eyes narrowed in predatory fashion.
I darted out of Isif’s range, daring him to come to me. “Fuck you. The grays are animals…existential threats.”
“This is why you weren’t supposed to know any of this!” Tyler shouted. “You can’t control yourself or be trusted with any info involving the Arxur. The Federation started all of this; we can prove they weren’t always like this.”
“I don’t care! You have never understood how they deserve to writhe! Their words, their past, their supposed change of heart—it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t fucking matter.”
Isif bared its savage fangs, instruments of death which evolved for the sole purpose of dissecting sinew and crunching bone. The monster pounced toward me, jaws wide open. The terror of being eaten made me slow to react, disgusted by the carnivore’s gaping maw revealing the accrual of filthy drool. Its teeth were impossibly sharp, digging into my throat with painful force. The gray was applying the maximum pressure it could without puncturing my vulnerable flesh. It relaxed its grip for a moment, long enough to throw me into a pin on the ground. Its fangs were then back at my throat, bringing my prey instincts to full-fledged panic.
The last of my control poured into not flailing, which would risk Isif piercing my neck. The chemical surge was a blinding hysteria; sensory input was nauseating, with the reeking predator grasping me within its fangs like a meal. I didn’t want to die the way my daughter had, dissected in slow fashion to savor the cruelty! The Arxur were evil creatures incapable of containing their hunger, and this moment proved it. Despite all of this, the idle humans were watching, as if they thought the scene was within acceptable limits of behavior! Perhaps they were scared to interfere with a gray’s catch…or perhaps I was wrong to trust their benevolence.
Wasn’t I always worried about Terrans siding with the Arxur over us? Was all the secrecy because they’re throwing us to the grays, colluding with Isif above creatures with any redeeming features?
Isif placed an uncanny eye inches away from one of mine. “I do not want to hurt you. If I did, we would not be having this conversation. Are you understanding my words yet? An Arxur knows when they’ve been bested…when to admit defeat.”
“Kill me, you fucking m-monster.” A stutter lapsed into my voice from the dizzying pull of adrenaline, but I clung to my hatred in the face of certain death. “Savor the act, like the predator you are.”
“It can feel good to engage in acts of aggression, but I derive no pleasure from needless suffering. Survival is not a choice; it’s an imperative commanded by biology outside our control. The societal confines under the Dominion mandated horrible actions. Evil is not natural…it is gradual, hardened by time and birthed of ideas. It is a phenomenon of sapience, not predation.”
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“Only predators eat people. You l-lost the right to call yourself sapient with the first child’s carcass you munched on.”
“I…am sorry for every meal I’ve ever had. I had no choice, so while objective fault cannot be assigned in such circumstances, my conscience assigns guilt all the same. It is unforgivable.”
“That’s why you must die, scum.”
“Were I not vital to the efforts for a peaceful future, I would agree with your assessment. By your own words about the right to be deemed sapient, Vysith has not lost her status—she never ate any creature with sophonce in her life. She was rescued from the Archives, and her people might as well have been a different species. They welcomed you…as the humans would have, and like humanity, their civilians were killed for it. Direct your anger at me.”
The Arxur, for an unfathomable reason, opened its jaws, and allowed me to crawl away on the floor. Why would it spare defenseless prey, when it could literally taste my flesh on its tongue? Perhaps it was deceiving the humans, who clearly trusted it enough to let it place its gross, chipped fangs on my throat. It had more control than I’d anticipated from a vile gray, but I didn’t buy for one second that their species was different in the past. The Federation brought out a viciousness that was their existing inclination; no worthwhile race could’ve hunted other civilizations like they had.
The UN soldiers bound my wrists, as though I were the criminal; Tyler and Zhao both stared at me with disapproval. While I had disobeyed direct orders and trespassed, it’d proven that their secret actions were reprehensible. It was tough to believe they’d pulled Vysith from a cryopod, and deemed it ethical to keep the ancient Arxur out of my purview. I risked my life on that mission to help the Earthlings; I had the same right to know as anyone else! The humans crafted too many excuses for the grays’ behavior, and their continued cooperation with these tormentors was unacceptable.
Tyler breathed a flustered sigh. “I was s’posed to keep Vysith company, Sovlin. She’s a guest, and she’s not dangerous. You can’t be questioning our judgment, and poking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”
“I’m tired of you treating the Arxur like genuine people!” I spat. “They’re not.”
“You know what? Either you sit and talk to Vysith like an adult, or I’ll have you charged for insubordination! Your pick.”
“As if I’d ever care what a gray has to say. My decision is self-evident.”
Zhao tapped his chin. “Do you think the Arxur are evil?”
“Of course I do! You humans can’t even say that word.”
“What the Dominion have done is evil, but that’s why they’re sapient. It takes intention and knowledge to be malicious…animals just exist, unbeholden to our morality. The capacity for good and evil are adjacent to one another.”
“Oh, I get it: you think you see yourselves in them. They are way different. Humans might’ve had savage outliers in your past, but it wasn’t your whole fucking society!”
“That’s the problem with outliers. Left unchecked, you realize one day that they’ve become your whole society, in plain sight.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but my treacherous thoughts turned to how easily the Federation ensnared countless societies in its web of lies; our entire society was disingenuous, and the loudest voices all had called to slaughter the peace-seeking humans. Secretary-General Zhao’s words boasted the conviction of truthfulness, and Carlos’ old lesson from the Battle of Sillis rang in my ears. “That’s the belief that makes monsters of us all. Nobody has empathy for someone that is too unalike.” When the dots connected before my eyes, that the Arxur had en masse been convinced that aliens weren’t people, I couldn’t deny that it fit with true evil.
The humans viewed the grays’ trajectory as a knowing, purposeful decline into depravity. Where I wanted to find a monster beyond comparison, I saw the Federation mirrored. Both parties were to blame for what happened to my family, and for that, they were irredeemable. I hated that I’d served for years beneath the Federation’s banner, fighting for their causes, as much as I loathed the carnivorous creatures in this cell. Perhaps the Arxur were once capable of a slight semblance of civilization, since their decline had to start from something that wasn’t this abominable. The Kolshians contacted those demons as sapients, and by Nikonus’ own admission, starved them soon after.
Maybe Vysith is capable of restraining her bloodthirsty instincts—because unlike the humans, Arxur certainly possess those. Isif was drooling, and the brutality in the grays’ mess hall on that cattle ship…
Zhao pointed a hand to the table. “We want peace. Make your choice: be a part of that vision, or refuse and help the Federation and the Dominion keep us in this cycle of death.”
Tyler seemed surprised, as I gave the ultimatum genuine consideration. The ancient Arxur had returned to its spot at the table, watching me with an unblinking stare that seemed to x-ray my skeleton. Isif’s pupils darted between me and Vysith, perhaps regretting relinquishing a Gojid prey to fatten itself up. No doubt both grays had cued in on my vulnerable areas and fleshiest organs the second I stepped into the room. There was no depth of emotion when I peered deeper into those terrible eyes, unlike when I’d gazed into Marcel’s from my jail cell.
The Arxur were soulless predators incapable of kindness; their exteriors had zero cues that didn’t scream cold-blooded killing machine. Still, as suicidal as it seemed on an instinctual level, the debt I owed to the UN compelled me to comply with Zhao’s urgings. My feet shuffled toward the table with hesitancy, feeling instinctive disgust and apprehension swell within my chest. Every neuron summoned the impulse to run away from the ravenous beast, who I couldn’t hope to best with my arms still chained.
Vysith drummed its claws on the table. “Your visit was most insightful, Isif. I’d like to speak to Sovlin alone, and not while being watched like some zoo exhibit.”
“I do not know this ‘zoo’ word; is that a term of the human lexicon?” Isif asked.
“No? It’s Morvim, like all my other words.”
“Since your language has been dead for many centuries, my knowledge is negligible. I must research this ‘zoo’ concept; perhaps my human friends can aid me. I’ll leave you two be, Vysith.”
The Chief Hunter departed from the observation door it came from with Zhao, while the ancient Arxur looked mistrustful of the modern predator that had schooled me. Then again, I suppose I was being foolish to assign any emotion to a gray’s countenance. However, it was an undeniable fact that Vysith waited for Isif to be out of earshot to address me directly. The carnivore gestured for Tyler to retake his seat, and it tended to the playing cards it had abandoned. The blond human watched me with disbelieving eyes, relaxing his posture for the first time since I barged in.
“I can’t begin to express my shock, waking up to find the genocidal Northwest Bloc won…and that the galaxy sees my entire race as people-eating monsters,” Vysith hissed. “We were fascinated by the idea of aliens. I guess Betterment has bred out all curiosity too. Your behavior is unhinged, Sovlin, but I agree that these Arxur are beyond saving…they are no longer recognizable. No longer people.”
I recoiled at how smooth and reproachful the gray’s speech was. “How could your society ever have had meaningful differences from today?”
“For starters, we cared about each other. Social and non-social Arxur managed different roles in society, being on opposite ends of the spectrum, but we respected the contributions of both types. At least in my nation. The Northwest Bloc wanted to destroy the Morvim Charter though, and we feared the war would kill us all. That might’ve been better than losing to those megalomaniacs. I am so unspeakably horrified by everything the humans say we’ve done since then.”
“Why would you care?”
“Because…they made thinking people cattle, and wiped out entire societies. So many needless deaths, whole generations born into war, and no freedom of expression? Betterment has become so comically villainous, with the titles and hunting obsessions, that it’s not even funny!”
“They didn’t use those titles back in your day? No Your Savageness?” Tyler commented.
“They would’ve been a mockery if they did. What’s admirable about not landing a clean kill, choosing cruelty over honor? Anyhow, I got abducted by the Farsul on a mission to Kyssium, a neutral state the Bloc invaded in their quest for power. I was enlisted as a soldier against those bastards, and I wanted to stop them from hurting innocent civilians…not watch them carry out atrocities in the stars!”
I struggled to meet the beast’s eyes. “Arxur hunters ate my daughter alive.”
“I offer my sincere condolences; that must have been wretched to go through. I’ll have you know I would never do anything like that. The Arxur I knew would never commit such vile murders, because it’s unthinkable! It must baffle you that we could’ve ever been anything else, after witnessing such a graphic and personal atrocity. This is a nightmare of epic proportions to me too. Imagine…how you would feel, finding your own species in such diabolical straits centuries later.”
Even with the gravelly register, the content of this beast’s words seemed more like a human’s speech pattern than that of a terrorizing predator. It was worlds apart from Coth or even Isif; I would’ve never imagined that an Arxur could put such eloquent, civilized sentences together. Deciding to humor the carnivore, I engaged in the thought exercise. If the Gojids went on to hunt the races of the Federation in gruesome fashion, I would feel like ten times greater of a monster than when we were revealed to be omnivores. What could be more appalling than seeing your species reduced to mindless, hated savages, with its worst members from your time in charge?
“I couldn’t bear to see the Gojids committing such heinous acts.” I shared a glance with Tyler, and picked up on the flash of agreement in his eyes. The human had wanted me to empathize with an Arxur’s plight. “I’d mourn what my species used to be, Vysith. I imagine that’s what you’re doing.”
The predator lowered her reptilian eyes. “Yes, I suppose I am.”
Against all odds, I’d survived one Arxur’s jaws, and was engaged in decent conversation with another. A part of me wondered if things could’ve been different, had savagery not overtaken their entire society. Could carnivores have conducted themselves like any other species? The humans had seen something more than malicious monsters from the outset, and with Vysith slashing down my preconceptions, it was tough to claim the primates didn’t have a case. For the first time in my life, I spotted a tinge of sapience in the galaxy’s original predators.