Chapter 12: Memories
The deciphering of the enemy's transmission and direct tapping into the draconian fleet network is quickly done by the Emperor using the Storm Fortress communication arrays. "Eh darling, why did you do that?" Vexis pondered the question. "Strategic purposes and entertainment. Oh finally." Naiki answers shortly and looked at the approaching enemy battleship. He deactivates the fortress cloaking system just to reveal the massive size of it to the battleship. Vexis quickly killed the battleship engine and weapons with the trap she sets up front. "My turn. Have fun watching…" Devilishly smiles Naiki while saying it to Lenora and Vexis. He goes directly to one of the fortress troop launchers. Relying on his newly unlocked powers, Naiki enters it and launch himself into space. The launch was smooth, out at the space he can breathe normally using the electromagnetic storm he generates; he even did not need to worry of the cold temperature.
Vexis sees it from the observation panel with Lena. "Now the two of us can stroll off the galaxy just fine." The satisfaction that Vexis stated to Lena of his abilities as she smiles. "Prepare yourself Lena; of the horrors that the Emperor is about to do." She warned Lena of what Naiki is thinking of doing to the enemy commander. Naiki looked directly at the battleship's bridge from afar, he lanced himself into the bridge just like he did before. The outer shell shattered into pieces and the inner bridge begins to self-seal. The bridge crew is paralyzed by his electrical shock, the second one kills them in one sweep without pain. He only leave the commander alive for him to savor his death. "Commander Orlan of the Draconian." Naiki says it to get his attention as he tries to back away from him. He clearly sees Naiki devilish self as he gives an evil grin at him with those red glowing eyes.
"Who are you, why do you attack us all of the sudden?" Orlan shouted in anger while bravely taking the combat stance against him. He finally sees the jet black uniform with red lining on them with the ICE mark on it. "The Imperial Cybran Empire ruler that will take its time to mince you out. Like the one that you one did to not long before. He did the exact same thing, crashing his fighter jet into your bridge." He walks around the bridge in full force to melt down any obstacle with his aura while saying it to him; making it a perfect dueling area for both of them. "Wha- the black ships? That person is a fool defending a dead nation, he thinks it is that easy to kill a draconian." He steps in closer to Naiki, bravely tries to fight him. "Hmm, why don't we test it out?" Naiki suggest it while playing the defense.
Orlan strikes him hard with his dual sword made of iron. Naiki effortlessly catches it as it melts in his hands like heated butter. Orlan quickly flies away in surprise of what happened and grabbed the nearby kinetic assault rifle to gun him down. He aimed directly at the head and fires it. The electrical wave from Naiki managed to block it, the bullets then explode in thin air. As the smoke blocks his view, Orlan speared to him with his tail. Naiki catches and dismember it with his energy sword from his palm. "Argh! M-my tail!" He back away while bleeding out after receiving Naiki's near miss throat slash. "Any final words?" Naiki says it while amplifying his energy sword and directed his shockwave to the Draconian commander. Orlan tries to change into his dragon form, it was with no success since Naiki suppresses his abilities to do so. He grabs his hidden laser pistol and fires frantically at him, Naiki only watches as the laser changes into electrical particle and be absorbed by him. The draconian face pales out of fright. "Y-you are not a normal human being. You are a monster!" Naiki laughed evilly hearing him speak and quick to choke him into the air; he struggles hardly for air, even tries to claw out Naiki's left hand. "It's your country's fault to wake this monster up and give his zealous empire a purpose." With that said, he viciously stabbed his gut multiple times as the lower organs gushes out; with his right hand ripping out Orlan's flaming like heart after he dissipate the energy sword. The lifeless body is thrown away like a doll, he crushes his heart with his palm while half of his lower clothing is still drenched in Orlan's blood. As the duel is over, Naiki overhears the crew member trying to open the bridge door forcibly.
Vexis and Lena quietly watches the scene and overhear every conversation. She sees Lena shuddering out of fright; even when Vexis touches her she startled immediately. "Hey, calm down. Naiki only did that only to the enemy of our empire. He get what he deserves. You did not expect him to do that huh?" Softly spoken to her. "Yes…" Vexis scoffs of her answer. "Then the frontlines is not for you dear, I have done far more than what Naiki have did; including devouring souls of people." The empress eyed Naiki on the panel. "I will need some time to adapt to this type of violence Empress. Forgive me for being such a weak hearted person." She bows down of her statement. Vexis comforted her as she is like a sister to her. "It's okay. If you cannot handle it, I will do it."
Naiki opens up link to the fleet teleportation room, he transferred the onboard prisoners directly to the Crimson Tide after locating them using the electrical surge. He then teleported directly to the fortress and fires its weapons that disintegrate the battleship permanently before they can retaliate. "Emperor, are you alright?" Lena tries to hide her fear including smelling the thick blood over him, the cold-hearted expression that he makes with emotionless eyes; looked at her and slowly returning to his normal self. "Darling, you're ruby red. Like, really red." Hearing her wife saying that to him, he looks over himself. "I need a shower, why don't the both of you grab something to eat back at Crimson Tide?" He suggested it to Vexis while going to his room. "Nope, I have my food right here and Lena can eat it from my inventory as well." Vexis taps his inventory bracelet. After Naiki entered his room, the floor is sanitized immediately of the blood using the cleaning sweeper. "What have I become? Doing all this for vengeance? No! I cannot stop now, this is for Lena and her people future." Naiki says to himself while entering his room.
The empress sits on Naiki's throne while searching for dried food to give to Lena. Giving her other type of food will make her throw up after seeing what just happened; that what's Vexis think out of her situation. "Here you go Lena" Vexis handed Lena some neatly packed grain biscuits. She gladly accepted it and slowly nibs it little by little. "Oh look, Ilya and Layla's fleet already ahead of us in the encirclement. Psh, they must be in a competitive mood again…" Vexis says it aloud indirectly while looking at the projected movement of their fleet to catch Lena's attention, she sees them already passing her home planet and into the draconian held territory. The main fleet continues to push on without obstacle while the fortress continues its destination to Lenora's home planet. Seeing she is still trying so hard to adapt to the empire, Vexis shared some of her past with Lenora.
"You seems to know none of our past; am I right Lenora?" Directly said to her who is still eating her food. She nods while looking at Vexis. Vexis then changed to her human form, it surprises Lena as she nearly choked a chunk of the biscuit. Vexis goes to her directly and give her the straw that Naiki made. Lena quickly drink from it. "I give you quite a shock huh with this form?" She gives a 360 twirl to Lena. "Yes empress." Lena acknowledges the fact. "Pfft, what's with the formality? I am the same as Naiki. When we are with our circle, you can call us with our name. But not on formal meetings; got it?" Vexis stated it to her while changing back into her anthro form. Lena nods in comply. "I'll give a short rundown my side of the story, Naiki can tell his part when he is ready."
Vexis sets up a small circle dark matter mist as soon as she started her story, it plays vision of her memories in it. "I am a mythical artic fox; you already know my three forms. The other one is a smaller feral form. Once, I only have my small feral and huge beast form but after they experimented it on me; I can change into the other two. I, Ilya and Layla nearly died because of that; and Naiki prioritize on fixing my genetics and splitting soul. I don't know how he did that and taking care of the other two quickly. After that illegal experiment, that person is executed. The three of us quickly adapt to the cybran society and they have treated us just like their own throughout our academic days including military knowledge, the cybrans also have become protective of us after hearing that incident." Vexis exhale hard of the past before she continues as Lena sinks into watching her memories. She skips introducing Chase since he is long gone.
"That's when I lost control of myself, my powers hunger for a single source; that is the emperor's still slow generating dark matter in his body. I chewed on the emperor for dark matter. The fight was a long one, as Naiki managed to slam me down at the training field away from the academy building while shouting something to the head scientist. Layla and Ilya watches in disbelief, they tried to assist him but I was too strong." Lena sees the fight of the both of them, Naiki bleed out on his right side of his body by the bite that Vexis have done in her mythical beast form. He entrapped her in a device with the help of his own powers. "Naiki sealed me in a confined space using the tool that the scientist have brought, while he transferred me into his facility; he says to me 'I will let you go when you are ready. For now, learn how to control your powers and how to generate your own source of energy. Look deeper into your spirit Vexis' he says it to me. Still feeling the guilt of harming my savior, I take the hard way to master my powers; engulfing myself into Naiki's dark matter sample that I eat. It tears me inside out just to contain and expand it; with that I come to be what I am now. That is a big lesson for you not to touch high density dark matter." She makes a fun out of the story. Lena backs away a little from the dark matter circle.
"Such a tragic thing. Vexis I don't know what to say…" Lenora swallows her sad emotion to not tearing up of hearing Vexis's side of the story while remembering her own. "Yes, each of us have their own tragic experience Lena." Naiki cuts what she wanted to say to Lenora. Vexis is surprised that Naiki already finished refreshing himself. "Vexis losing control to her awakened powers; Ilya, becomes a cold hearted person after I am missing just to buy some time for the empire to wake up; Layla, forced into killing her best friend just as she wanted her to survive using the scarce ration when they crash on a hostile isolated tundra planet that took us nearly a month to find her. And finally, me; of my curse and uncontainable hunger of chaos for my enemies and made me nearly heartless." Naiki speaks truthfully while sitting near the both of them. "When I finally snap out of control, I want the four of you to stop me at all cost. Even if you have to render me unconscious, breaking my bones, put me in the brink of death or throw me back into cryosleep. Do it." He ordered to the two of them. Lena and Vexis slowly nods, Vexis already know what Naiki say about the four figures. Matter, temperature, time and finally regeneration manipulation; this stuck Vexis of ways to counter him making her deeply focused on analyzing the subject.
"Hahaha, I am fine right now so no need to worry about that." Naiki burst out laughing to lighten the heavy topic while asking for Vexis to give him and Lena some peperoni pizza slices. "Still, I am confused of your dark matter powers Vexis. How is your dark matter can be seen by others? Normal dark matter cannot be seen by the naked eye." Naiki questions her while she handed him the whole pizza that is already sliced up. "That's an interesting question darling." Naiki chews the slice down while hearing out Vexis. "I wanted to give the chance of those who faces me to avoid it. Seeing them panic of the mist somewhat amuse me. Besides; isn't it much more badass to be able to appear using the seeable dark matter mist? I mean, look at you just now. All fired up in menacing hellish aura, eyes lit up grinning evilly at the enemy while red electricity spreads out in from you." Vexis answering to him. Lena only smile half-heartedly. "Heh agree…" He says shortly.
"Darling, is it true what happened to Layla?" Vexis asked of the topic. "Yes, I don't want to spread it out too much; it will hurt her more. If you want to know of the details, ask her; if she wanted to tell you about it or you can just poke inside her mind. Umu; this is tasty, where did you pack this one from?" He enjoys the pizza while directing to Vexis. "Back at the Leviathan; Marlow's pizza house near where we get some of the delicious restaurant food." Vexis answers straightly. Lena noted down of the area she wanted to visit later on the Leviathan. Back at Ilya's fleet, she encountered some resistance from the newly occupied by her force. "Regent Ilya, the planet will not yield to us and they are extremely loyal to the Draconians. They are trying to push us back and are deploying guerilla tactics against us." One of her commanders speaks to her in the communication hologram from the planet. Ilya look behind the commander of the currently dragging battle before answering him. "Teleport back to our fleet, I will ice the planet." The commander saluted of the order and quick to react of it. The portion of her deployed force finally returned back to her fleet. Ilya slaps her tail; pressing the atmosphere destabilizer weapon to be activated and targeted on the planet.
The results of the weapon is quick to be seen as it tears the atmosphere of the planet and quickly thinning it. The sudden temperature drop froze the planet and leave it lifeless. "Let's keep going, we are lagging behind of Layla's fleet." Ilya commands her fleet. Vexis senses what she has done and warned Naiki. "Naiki, Ilya just freeze a planet and its inhabitants to death. Should we warned her not to do that?" Naiki looks over the exact planet. "It is under the rule of the Draconians for generations. She must have her reasons to do that." Naiki monologue the situation using the known information. The view of a near barren planet is seen from the fortress. He checks that they have arrived at their destination. Lenora takes a peek at the view, her face is in shock of seeing her home planet being half barren bombarded into oblivion. She looks over to Naiki, waiting for an answer. "I sensed some of the people are barely surviving in the planet. Prepare to teleport down there." Naiki voiced his order. Lena hold her nearly shaken feelings, Vexis hold her right elbow while slowly nods at her with Naiki readying to teleport them at the planet surface.