Chapter 22: The Devourer
Ilya wakes up after a long sleep, the day has come for her armada to switch back with her governor. She yawned sharply as her predatory fangs can be seen in her reflection near the glass screen of her projector. She likes most of the old stuff that Naiki's invented including the glass screen projector before they changed it to projection type. The snow leopard sees the night light projector that Naiki gave it to her before. She remembers that very well since she has been afraid of the complete darkness before. But now, she embraces the darkness as her senses and cold heart. It is easy for Ilya to refresh herself using her ice powers and go to the bridge to take command of the armada shift.
On the other hand, Layla skipped her resting time to train her eye-tracking senses at her armored gear unit. It is an assault mech equipped with long-range loadout; agile enough even for its size of two normal autonomous assault bots. A priceless present from General Grukev since she was able to beat him before in a virtual battle. "I will be back old friend," Layla says to the mech after exiting it and gives it another quick look before returning to duty. Using the linked teleporters, she is quick to arrive at the bridge and resume command. "Status report," Layla says loudly to her bridge crew. "My lady, the two-week mark has reached. All of our armadas are ready including the ground forces." The ship captain reported to her. General Rokosovsky instinctively established communication with her and remains on standby. Layla looks over to the command table to see the enemy's movement; there is none. She quickly uses the sector projectors to see it; the abyss creatures only can be seen approaching Ilya and Lenora's position. "Visual contact!" the operations team noted the bridge crew.
They immediately focus on the approaching abyss host. What was seen staggers Layla; it was a dark shadow mist like how Vexis uses her powers only at close range they can detect the creature hosts approaching them. "Initiate counterattack! General! Get ready!" Layla shouted the order. The cybran general salutes and cuts the channel. The typhoon missile system on her ship begins locking into the targets and automatically fires at them. This is followed by the pulsar cannon beams barrage from multiple cybran warship formations.
The wounded abyss host rain what it carries to the planet, receiving the cold welcome that Rokosovsky and Layla's governor has planned. Multiple high-altitude thermobaric shells from the deployed railgun artilleries exploded in their set altitude fuse; hitting the landing dark creatures. Some of it managed to land and is met with fierce firepower from the cybrans autonomous units that patrols some of the areas. They are quick to adapt and slip away from the patrols; clustered abyss creatures form up and attacked the cities throughout the planet. Most of them did not have any inhabitants, only the combined soldiers of Cybrans and Altorans remain; guarding them. At the moment all is going well until the hosts exploded and spread out into the planet. This was not predicted by Layla; she quickly tries to use her powers to see some of the future but is only able to get a blurred vision out of it.
The cybrans ground forces retaliated quickly killing and shouting in the chorus as it was their style to scare off the enemies. The abyss creatures are misunderstood by the cybrans, they did not have feelings; only a strong hunger to feed off every living being. For the first time, there are injuries on the cybran ground forces. General Rokosovsky sees the injured soldier's status in each division, he quickly grabbed the connected comms to his soldiers throughout the planet. "My soldiers, do not risk yourself too much! If you are injured, use the teleportation bracelet and return to your forces warships!" As the General gives the order, they only riled up and fight much harder. He shakes his head in disbelief; grinning at the fact that his soldiers are fighting a determined battle. The Altoran King is also present near him; King Zela did not know how to respond to seeing the zealous cybran soldiers. "It takes them much more to ask them to retreat than advance huh…" He says to the general. Rokosovsky only nods, he sees two of the injured princesses and pointed them to the king. Zela reacted and see his daughter being treated. "It's just a scratch father. I still can continue the fight." Fenrusia says to his father even after receiving the injuries on her forehead from the near-miss black crystal projectile. "If it wasn't for the cybran soldier deflecting the projectile, I would lose my head now…" She says to her father. "Same for me, the big machine blocked the needle iron thing from hitting my chest. It only hit my legs." Fenya rubs the wound with some of their medicine. "What are they? They keep changing; sometimes crystal, metal, liquid, mist. It's like we are fighting a faceless enemy." Princess Fenrir enters the outpost and loudly says it, this catches the ear of Svidana who wanted to take a drink before returning to combat.
King Zela remembers what the nameless always bring to their side, it was the same thing as they see before but was smaller and tame. He paces around to crunch out the details of the exact creature, this surprises his daughters seeing the odd behavior of their father. Zela stops near the side of Rokosovsky and tells him while leaning back at the wall. "I finally remember; they are dark mythical creatures that the nameless always take as predatory pets. The creatures are quick to adapt to any environment and learn from their masters." With the note from the king, Rokosovsky moves to the command room and informed Layla. "Wait, so they are not normal beasts?" Layla asked him. The cybran general barely nods when the alarm suddenly blared. "First and second defense line breached! They warped past our defense!" Rokosovsky is quick to react to the announcement and analyze the situation. "All troops fall back to the third line and hold there, send the Cauterizers to the frontline and the assault bots." The order was heeded by the commanders and directed the actions. Layla overhears the announcement. She cannot even do a fully precise bombardment throughout the planet; for fear that the core of the planet destabilizes. "I am going down there with my mech battalion." She says it out of worry that the battle is overturned. "Regent Layla; Permission to deploy the Taskmaster-VII hover command assault carriers?" General Rokosovsky asked her. She simply nods and cuts the communication. He exhaled and takes it personally as he sees the disturbed regent.
He walks past the room where the Altoran high-ranking nobles are recovering, King Zela catches a glimpse of the riled-up general as he changes into his high-tech command suit and goes to one of the teleportation portals that they have set up in advance. He disappears in the neon glow of the teleportation. One of the cybran commanders enters their room and deploys the projection devices for them to see what the situation is. The projection splits into multiple screens overseeing the battle. Altoran casualties count rises as the advancing creatures keep assaulting them while the cybrans support their allies to fall back before they did the same. The six-legged autonomous Cauterizers stamp out the enemies that have passed them; deafening lightning bolts are fired from its main turret rapidly while the active hard-kill micro turrets on its legs sweep the area using lasers. It walks passes the friendly soldiers carefully; towering above their heads while covering them.
Layla's mech battalion arrives through the portal gate, they quickly handle the flanking abyss creatures while Layla's mech alone goes to the center frontline. "Where is it? Where?" She senses the hive lead but cannot find its location. She continues combating the creatures with the proximity of the towering Megalith IVs the horde is quick to learn the agility of Layla's mech and hurls crystalline projectiles at it. She managed to dodge it; some of the abyss creatures warp in front of the mech and damage its joints. Layla notices that some of the much larger creatures are nearly the size of her mech. With desperation trying to push them back, Layla hooked the untested weapon module on her mech. 'Unknown unit detected, recommending the immediate termination of use.' The static voice of the mech interface warns her as she charges the disintegration beam and fires it on a full charge. She directed it 180-degree angle at the enemy. Abyss creature that comes in contact with the beam immediately disintegrates; the mech Layla's piloting overheats and enters a safe mode, she purges the weapon system from it. The main hive lead that sees her takes the opportunity to kill her and warped in front of her mech. A quick miss reaction of her vision powers becomes real as her mech was stabbed by the spiked crystal. It hits her left kidney and left leg; leaving the wound open. "Raaarghh!" With an angry cry, she kicks the creature much larger than her mech, separating the both of them. She takes commands of nearby units with a quick finger touch and directed them to focus fire at the hive lead. Cauterizers, assault bots, Megalith IVs fire at it in sequence; breaking every crystal part of the hive lead. As the hive fleet dies, all of the creatures on the planet disappear into a mist.
Late into the action inside the 750 meters length Taskmaster-VIIs, General Rokosovsky sees his mentor's mech missing a part of its torso due to damage. Bewildered, he immediately contacts her mech units. "Where is regent Layla?" he questions with a shaking voice. "She is receiving medical assistance in her flagship; Regent Layla is badly wounded. The commander is taking her mech for repairs." The captain of the unit answers for the commander. For a moment, the general stays in silence out of disbelief. "Have…you reported it to the emperor yet…?" He asked the captain; he shakes his head. "I…I will report it to the emperor…" The general feels a cold shiver behind his spine as he cuts the communicator and directly opens a comm channel to the emperor.
Naiki and Vexis are busy managing one of Zarck Cybran Corp facilities to hasten the development of the nanoparticle variant when he receives the comm. He recognized it immediately; it was one of Grukev's sons as Vexis peeks in. "Your highnesses, I have bad news. Regent Layla is badly injured and is receiving medical assistance in her flagship." The news hit hard on both of them. "What!?" Vexis was in shock at hearing that. "I am going there right now," Naiki says to him before turning off the comm on his gauntlet. He is quick to grab one small cylinder of nanoparticle before Vexis warped both of them at her flagship; she notedly restricted him from using his powers. All of the nearby crew is surprised by their sudden appearance. Naiki located her precisely and tell Vexis where she is; again, they warped at the medical chamber. Seeing the grit that Layla is holding on to as the doctor is applying the pain killer gels; she tries to hold back the pain while receiving the blood transfer from the infuser in her hand. Naiki looks at Vexis full of vengeance. "Kill them, all of them near this sector. Replace their darkness with yours…" Naiki eyes lit up in anger as he wanted to destroy the nearby sectors himself. Vexis gives a serious expression to him and nods slowly as he backs up in her dark matter mist, the last thing he sees is her raging red irises. The whole ship shakes as she charges to the nearby sector expanding the highly dangerous dark matter mist that she develops, her growling scream can be heard across the armada and the planet.
On and off-planet, all of the cybrans strike a pose of respect with their weapons seeing what they know is coming to the abyss creatures. "May the Emperor's wrath be sated by the Empress's vengeance." Few of the cybran soldiers pray for the inevitable including General Rokosovsky who saluted with his royal rifle. Naiki assisted the doctor in mending her wounds. Layla closes her eyes and falls asleep from the effects of the medicines. Naiki mixed the nanoparticles into her blood infuser, the doctor did not refuse what he is doing. They managed to mend the critical wounds. After a long hour, her fatal wounds begin to heal using the nanoparticles. The doctor sprays a layer of regenerative liquids; enhancing the recovery. "It's finished Emperor, I will remain on standby at the main medical facilities." The doctor bowed and leave; he did not want to make eye contact with the emperor. Naiki gets one of the hover seat cushions, activates it, and sits at her side; watching her vitals.
After another hour of worry, he did not want to take any more risks with the regents and decided to contact Shultz. He activates the sound barrier; it prevents Layla from hearing; letting her have a silent rest. "Naiki, I heard about Layla. My armada is near her position in the first place. I'm sorry…" Shultz expresses his regret. "Why didn't you assist her?" Naiki speaks in a low tone. "I think of it was some sort of test that you and Vexis have given them. They are still young Naiki, they don't have the experience to quickly adapt to multiple situations. Unlike us from our homeworld…" Shultz pauses; watching Naiki stay in silence. "Why don't I handle the rest from this point? 12 of my armadas are on active standby near the border of the core worlds." He slowly nods to the theatre admiral. "Be careful Shultz." This surprises Shultz since it was a long time since he cared for him. "You don't have to worry about this old man, he can take care of himself." Shultz smiles and nods before putting his game face on after turning off the signal. Naiki deactivates the sound barrier only to see Layla is disturbed by the visions that she has been through. Layla immediately awakes from the nightmare to see the emperor is at her side.
"Master I am sorry." She slowly musters to say it to him. Naiki comes closer to her with the hover cushion. "No, it's alright Layla. It was my fault for not being alert to your situation." He gently stroked the Vulpes face as she sees him trying to hold back his emotions. Naiki level down the hover cushion; he puts his face at her side as Layla softly nudges him with her dried nose. Vexis returns with a force slamming at Layla's flagship, she materializes in her normal form and reported back to his beloved. The white fox sees what her husband is doing and did not stop him from comforting her. Instead, she joined in and nuzzles at the other side of her face. "Layla, it's my fault for pushing you to defend the planet's capital." Vexis apologizes, Layla only shakes her head. "I must serve the Emperor and Empress." She says that out of sync. "Don't say that Layla, I am a part of your family," Vexis speak in return to her. Naiki cannot hold his tears anymore and covered his face with the pillow side that she was laying down on her head.
"Layla, do you know how important you are for Naiki, me, Ilya? Let us spoil you a little more; stop being so independent and try to solve hard things on yourself…" As those words come out of Vexis, Layla turned to Naiki and hugged his face; She simply holds the pain in her left waist and leg just to embrace him. Naiki hugs her gently while she wipes away his remaining tears. "Those abyss creatures are disgusting! I feel like I am eating a bitter medicine of something." Vexis exaggerated to get some of the attention from Naiki. He looks at her. "It is done darling; you don't have to worry for at least about a month from now. They immediately halted after seeing me devouring their…hmm…look like forward scouts and host leads on the planets and sectors." Vexis hard to describe what she just sees firsthand. "Shultz is taking care of all the western frontline. He has brought 12 of the imperial guard armadas including Grukev's imperial army groups from his planet." Vexis was taken aback by hearing the main core world planet mobilize their veteran armadas and forces to hold the enemy down. Slightly relieved; Layla sighed. "Get some sleep Layla or do you want dearest darling to sleep with you here?" Vexis teases Layla who boldly nods. Naiki granted what she just wishes for and sleep on the side of her bed as long as she recovers. The empress joins in after locking the door with the nearby interface. She takes the hover cushions from the rack and sleeps on the opposite side of Naiki and Layla.