Why hello! Thanks to all those who read and liked, and special thanks to HallovveenGirl. Welcome back! Glad to make you...well, glad :)

Not much to say, accept that I didn't put a disclaimer in the first chapter, so here:

Disclaimer - I don't own anything accept for my OCs and other original content. All the credit for the other characters in this story belongs to their rightful creators.

There, now enjoy and leave some feedback for me. Reviews are the figurative Advil to my headache XD

Chapter 3 - Night Raid

Silent sleep was interrupted all too suddenly, the disturbing noises of chaos and confusion reaching the Kaleesh ears. His eyes opened, and he rose in one smooth motion. Insectile screeching, gunfire, and loud yells of indecipherable words lay beyond the door of his meager home, and the picture to accompany those sounds was more discomfiting still.

The settlement burned, smoke and fire surrounded by a sea of living things fleeing for their very lives, or striving to take just that.

Qymaen took his cloak in hand, three it over his back and subsequently reached for a dagger - his predecessors'- he had mounted on the wall. With these two objects on his person, he set out into the smoke-filled night at a run. The military base, at the center of the village, was his destination, where he knew he could find Rahkah, a general among four others: Voaga Dau-Maz, Csilvitor T'lit'co, Fiatahh Aavok, and Arad Karivasi. They were the legends that the young ones heard about in tales of valiance when they were growing up. The older two, Dau-Maz and T'lit'co, had also been friends of his father a very long time ago.

It soon became more obvious than it had already been that the violence had been brought about by the Huk. The Yam'rii. The race that inhabited three of the four worlds in the system, excluding Kalee. They were barbaric and greedy, killing and enslaving without a second thought, for they wanted the planet that was not theirs, and would never stop unless divine intervention was to happen. In addition to being entirely unsympathetic, they were hard to kill, covered in a thick, outer shell tougher than Rancor hide and resistant to most long range shots. Their heads were their only vulnerable part, as well as their undersides.

How did he know?

He had killed many of them before with only a dull hunting knife and god-given strength. They had swarmed the very same village that he had given food to just days earlier with the intention of taking all the males captive. The men would not stop fighting, and were slain after a long while of attempting to fight them off. It was a massacre on both sides that could not be stopped. Qymaen had only been seventeen standard years old at the time, early for even most enlisters in the army. That had been close to eight years ago, whenever he stopped to think. He felt quite weathered at twenty-four, though it was all most likely an ill product of his imagination.

Every which way he looked, there was something happening, no peace to be sought out anywhere. He kept to the shadows the night and fire created, ready to defend himself, but keeping himself in an unassuming position. He caught his first real look in many moons at the enemy when the military base was in sight. The creature, larger than its puny followers, walked upon two legs like any other sort of bipedal being, but looked so very out of place, disturbing even. Its long arms were held out in front of it, balancing its large, unproportioned body, while the little ones behind it stayed lower to the ground, crawling along on four legs, like the insects they were.

He wanted to kill them, badly even. He wanted to feel the blade of the dagger imbed itself within their scrawny necks, and experience the satisfaction of seeing the body drop to the ground, twitching.

It was not the time for games, however.

He had to find the commanders.

Qymaen watched the enemy pass, and stealthily started for the large gates before there was an attack on his destination. The watchmen saw him, and was quick to demand, "What is your business here? Why are you not aiding the injured and saving the imprisoned?"

"That is none of your concern. I must speak to the Generals, now. It is imperative."

A small door was opened for him without any further questioning on the matter. His social status was to thank for that.

He found the four of them within the innermost structure, seated around a large table. Rahkah's gaze was drawn to him as soon as he stepped foot within the room.

"What is it, young Sheelal?" Dau-Maz, at the head of the table, inquired.

"Permission to speak freely, sir?" Qymaen asked with haste.

"Yes..."

He took a breath. "This place is lost. You should be out there staging an evacuation, not sitting in there pretending that this is not happening, because it most certainly is."

Aavok, discourteous as always, cut in. "Who placed you in a position to be telling us what we can and cannot do? The forces protecting this town have been given the authorization to fight off the invaders, so I believe that you should go...do something constructive to help."

"The "forces" are too small; our peoples' homes are burning. You expect me to sit by, you who called yourselves allies of my father, and watch everything sink into hell around us? Why have you not done anything to help?"

Dau-Maz raised his arms in submission. "I know you are not one of us, I shall not state that again, for you know as well as I, but I believe there comes a time when one must become aware of the goings on."

"I am more than aware of - "

"No. No you are not."

Karivasi, swift with words but kind at heart, pointed out quietly, "Voaga...you should tell him. He should know."

"No! Why? Why should he, one who has blatantly stated that he wishes to stay out of military affairs, be told things that we have only just discovered?" Aavok snapped, slamming his fist down on the table.

A silence followed, and Qymaen lowered his eyes to the floor.

"I'm with Karivasi, gentlemen." Rahkah said suddenly. "He should know."

Dau-Maz nodded, and looked back to the young man. "Sheelal, there is a greater problem here than meets the eye. We cannot interfere. They have taken prisoners...Csilvitor's family, and have assured us that they will meet a painful end if we hinder them."

Yayyyy, chapter 3 is done! Thanks for reading!