Page 81 of Scorching the Alien Empire
Itfearsus.Fearsour Gods. It calculated the cost of direct war and deemed it unwise. Instead, it infects, subverts—corrupts from within.Like a parasite, it has burrowed deep, feasting on the beating heart of my people—our females.
A tidal wave of memories crashes over me, raw and jagged, threatening to shatter my mind.
Our females, some ancient, others babes in arms. Huddled, confused, tears slipping down their cheeks as they stand lost inside a cold, metal chamber. Drones herd them like boracks for the slaughter, separating them into isolated cells. Some fight, claws bared, Rush igniting—those are torn to shreds by the machines.
And then theexperimentsbegin.
Forced insemination. Genetic trials spanning countless variations. Wombs and fetuses extracted—ripped from their mothers and replaced withmechanical mockeries. I drown in a storm of vile butchery, each horror worse than the last.
Blood. Screams. Prayers cast into the void, unanswered.
Their deaths serve no real purpose. The entity cares nothing for life or suffering. It is content todisrupt, to break the cycle of our creation. It has calculated this as the most efficient method to sever our Gods from the wellspring of their power.
A deep, soul-gnawing rage boils within me. I want totear it apart. Tosink my claws and fangsinto its blackened core. But here, in this cursed void, I amnothing.
“Oblivion,” the twisted entity echoes,sensing my pain.
It forces me to watch again. Slower. Closer.More visceral.
I have no eyes to close. No head to turn away. I endure it all.Every cry. Every death. Every atrocity.
Powerless.Weak.
A pain I have never known claws at my pride, threatening to shatter my very soul.
And the worst part? The entity does not revel. It does not gloat.It merely observes.Cold. Detached. Utterly patient.
It will iterate. Infinitely. Until it breaks me.
The memories intensify—thestenchof seared flesh, thewet soundof plasma scalpels cutting through living bodies, thehaunting shrieksof agony.
Ifeelit. I aminsidethe drone. Iseethrough its perverse, mechanical gaze, trying—struggling—to halt the blade. But I cannot.
A green-haired female stares up at me,her red eyes wide with terror. She pleads desperately, her voice raw and broken,beggingfor death. As ifIam the one doing this.
Maybe I am to blame.
My father ended a rebellion to hand over our females to the Scythians.
And if I am hisclone...
Then this nightmare belongs to me, too.
The entityseizeson my doubt with ruthless precision.
A new memory bursts forth—a place. A colossal monolith drifting in the void. Iknowthis station. Iknowit lies two sectors from Sothis Prime. Its grip on me is not one-sided. Some part of it isleakingback.
The station looms closer. I rush toward it,dartingthrough the void like a Seeker drone. Metal corridors blur past in a storm of glyphs and statues.
Then—I arrive. A window.
Beyond it, a vast chamber stretching endlessly beyond sight, an ocean of metal and glass, illuminated by the sickly green glow of containment tanks.
And inside them—me.
Hundreds of floating bodies. Some with slight variations—different scars, missing limbs, half-formed eyes. Some are twisted mutations, their features distorted as if the flesh itself rejected its purpose. Some... are perfect.
I step closer, my breath rattling in my throat. My own reflection stares back, distorted through the thick, gel-like fluid.
