Untold Stories of a Galaxy - Kysaek: The Beginning

What Kysaek wouldn’t have given for real protective gear, or more precisely: a helmet with a filter. All the layers of her hooded equipment were powerless against the unpleasant smells of the angles. Most of the waste consisted of construction, machinery and metal scrap, but that didn’t change the stench and when it was once the smell of oil or rust that rose to her nose, Kysaek was really happy. She was less happy about what she had learned from Nimble Leg’s henchman when she had found the gang’s weakly guarded camp and killed the few Scyth guards with Thais, except for one. From him, Kysaek knew the approximate whereabouts of Nimble Leg and had gotten a taste of what the gang had already done from the possessions collected at the camp and testimony from the Scyth. Out of anger at what she had heard, she had killed her prisoner afterwards, despite the promise she had made earlier that she would let him go if he would talk. Her anger had gotten the better of her and the Scyth deserved no mercy in her eyes.

Because the zone, despite information, was still large and the paths between the mountains of rubbish so convoluted, Thais and Kysaek had split up and kept in touch through the connections of their vortex cuffs. The hover wheel was no longer an option for either of them, however, as the reduced radius was too risky for a scouting flight even in the moderate light conditions.“Can you hear me?” rang out Thai’s voice.

The Talin penetrated a virtual line directly into Kysaek’s ear. “Yes, have you found a lead?”

“Unfortunately,” Thais sighed. “A dozen bodies. Some of the bullet holes in their bodies are still steaming, so it can’t have been long and I’m following a lot of footprints. I’m guessing there are twelve to fifteen.”

“The sooner we find them, the sooner we can stop this,” Kysaek replied. She was about to climb one of the rubbish piles, but the unsteady ground did not make it easy for her. “I’m trying to get a better view. Maybe I’ll see something conspicuous.”

“Just watch out, I saw Genra earlier. This rubbish is ideal for their nests,” Thais said.

Genra were slender enough to be trampled by a foot, but the bipedal, spherical pests normally appeared in their hundreds and when they did, they attacked anything and everything with remarkable speed.

Kysaek joked. “I was wondering why I haven’t seen any of these critters in Sector Seven yet. I guess that speaks for the exterminators.”

“More like people are hungry.”

“People can eat genra? Is that healthy?”

“If you do it right, a lot of things are healthy. Even genra.”

The idea sent a shudder through Kysaek’s body. “Hopefully I’ll never have to find out,” she opined, and had reached thetopof the mountain.

The pile of rubbish was one of the larger ones, revealing new paths in the tangle. Not far from the top, part of the angled paths even ended, bringing the flat terrain of Sector Seven into play, but there was nothing of interest there. From one of the new paths, on the other hand, a fresh, grey-black cloud rose.

“I’ve spotted SOMETHING,” Kysaek reported to Thais. “Apparently there has also been fighting here recently.”

“We’re getting closer to the gang.”

“Looks like it. I’ll see if I can find anything at the site,” said Kysaek, who descended on the opposite side of the rubbish heap, soon wishing she had arrived earlier.

Death reigned at a ravaged rest camp and the cloud of smoke sighted earlier came from a fire burning corpses piled on top of each other. Moreover, the robbers had half gutted a slain negdrog, a rather voluptuous specimen of the massive animals.

Externally, they certainly looked like lizards, covered with colourless, almost scaly skin, and the three long tails at the rear and the angular giant mouth completed the picture. Despite this appearance, however, the peaceful Negdrog were mammals that produced good meat yields as slaughter cattle or made excellent beasts of burden when modern machines were not available or the terrain was difficult to negotiate. However, their special and most utilised characteristic was their omnivorousness: soil, plants, wood, stones, metal or meat, even toxic or radioactive waste - they could devour everything safely and thus became organic, environmentally friendly waste destroyers.

Suddenly Thais spoke up. “I found them!” she whispered. “Nimble Leg and five of his men have set up a roadblock and are talking about a large train of walkers approaching!”

Kysaek’s brewing disgust was replaced by drive. “Give me your location! I’m on my way!” she replied, setting off eagerly. She wanted to prevent the robbers from murdering any more people at all costs.

“You’ll come out right on the other side, but watch out! Apart from the group at the roadblock and two Scyth at higher positions along the road, I don’t see anyone. Nimble Leg said the rest will cut off the remaining paths and you’ll come along one of them.”

“So I’ll fall in behind them if I’m smart about it.”

“Yes, but we have to wait until their trap snaps shut.”

“Why?! Haven’t they killed enough already?!”

“They have. But if we attack too soon now, the hidden Scyth might be warned and then our rescue plan will be a disaster. Besides, you’ll probably make it just in time for the attack to begin, so let’s save as many as we can and put an end to this.”

Kysaek sighed, but she knew that was the best option. “I’ll stumble to you!”

Time was short and the way usually a good bit too far to make it early, but Kysaek’s legs carried her more hastily than usual and even the obstructive landscape did not stop her. She didn’t stay on the route that led directly to the blocked junction to the end, however, but climbed the back of an obsolete container ship a good one hundred metres long and it was as high as a four-storey house.

Thais murmured softly. “I’ve got you on the map, but watch out: one of the Scyth is on the front of the old ship, just ahead of you! A good firing position!”

“I’ll take that one!” decided Kysaek quietly as she stalked up.

Cunningly, one of the Scyth sat in a recessed hollow of the ship, just waiting to attack the approaching convoy with his scope-equipped magnetic rifle. There were about forty of them, storing their belongings on homemade wagons pulled by Negdrog or themselves. Only a single repulsorlift, a hovering long stretcher, was the technological exception to the otherwise primitive means of transport.

To help the travellers, a start had to be made, and Kysaek made it as she drew a sharp, long knife of Eldar steel. With the blade she crept up to the unsuspecting Scyth, but she had to be careful, for the ground beneath her feet tended to creak and was not exactly tread-proof in places. Kysaek’s target remained unaware of her presence, however, and her caution paid off when she drove the knife into the Scyth’s neck of the collar, the weak point of the biomechanical suit. She remembered this from her military training and Thais had told her as well. Important strands of the parasite’s nerves trailed under the skin of the neck and when Kysaek violated them, the Avatar jerked around convulsively. From inside the shrouding dome of its head came a dull, gooey burst that was too quiet for anyone but her to hear and instantly the Scyth’s body slumped - it was dead. “I’m in position,” Kysaek reported calmly, pulling the knife from her neck, its steel coated in a black liquid, before seizing the dead man’s rifle.

“My position is higher,” Thais replied. “I have a good view and will endeavour to take out the Scyth not far from you and take the roads under fire.”

“And I’ll take the roadblock,” Kysaek agreed. From where she stood, Nimble Leg’s roadblock was around a bend and the long road at the edge of the lake was the only thing she could see clearly. Step by step the convoy made progress along the main road and for Kysaek the air was thin to the breaking point. She did not feel well because she could not warn the people and saw only a few criminals. Where were the rest? Were they really all in the street next to the container ship and behind the travellers? It was the latter that should have caught the convoy’s attention when it became apparent where most of the criminals were hiding.

Waves made the still lake tremble and the pointed collars of Scyth slowly rose out of the murky water. None of the travellers noticed, but not three, four or five: No less than eight of the parasitic predators rose from the lake with their shock lances and fixed the pointed steel side on the convoy. Without warning and mercilessly, the parasites fired the spikes, whose perfidy lay not only in their force. Tiny barbs adorned the steel and sank painfully into the flesh of their victims, a bestial affair.

Blood spurted from the hits on the unharmed and cries of fear echoed through the crowd, who were only aware of the looming water attackers and fled in panic to the three ways or sought shelter behind their transport, with what they thought was a safe mountain of rubbish at their backs.

However, the trap now snapped fully shut and from all angles came the criminals. Especially at the end of the convoy, although there were not many of them, robbers burst out from under rubbish and with their light magnet machine guns, they opened fire. By contrast, the travellers could hardly stop, as only a handful had more than their fists or a blunt impact weapon. Few wielded magnet pistols, and not masterfully at that. They did hit the Scyth a few times, but only their bodies and not their heads, so the powerful shots fizzled out.

However, the loud run-up and the crashing noise of battle were more than perfect. As Thais had announced, she shot down the Scyth with a rifle, which stood not far from their leader and fell into the scrap in front.

Kysaek also went on the attack and targeted the Scyth around Nimble Leg, who were far away.

It took too long for Nimble Leg to realise how the henchmen around him were dying one by one, from precise shots against which the resistant domes were powerless. In no time, only Nimble Leg and not quite half of the gang were left standing, and most of those still alive had come out of the water earlier and were engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the travellers, making it difficult to take a safe shot at the criminals. Nevertheless, the situation reversed and the robbers became the victims.

A Davoc among the travellers single-handedly engaged one of the Scyth and matched him in strength, while several people surrounded and held one of the attackers before he had a pistol pressed to his head and was shot.

The situation soon became hopeless for Nimble Leg and he and his remaining hoodlums made their escape to the roadblock.

Thais interrupted the retreat, however, when she used her powerful prismatics and unleashed an avalanche of rubbish, making the road completely impassable and burying almost all the fleeing criminals under it.

Only Nimble Leg narrowly escaped the avalanche and ran straight back towards the stopped convoy, but it was not that convoy or the other roads that were his goal - the Calanian wanted to get to the lake! If he made it in, Nimble Leg, as a member of a marine species and thanks to his powerful tentacles, would have disappeared in the blink of an eye, and that was not to be allowed to happen! But as the Calanian ran along the stricken convoy, smoking clouds and the survivors there gave him protection.

Thais therefore did not dare fire her rifle, but again she was too far away for direct intervention.

Kysaek, however, was close enough and reacted immediately, leaping daringly from heel to heel until she finally landed ungently on the ground. Nevertheless, she hastily picked herself up and hurriedly followed her target. Nimble Leg’s mechanical runners were her point of attack, only Kysaek either didn’t hit the Calanese or didn’t hit it well enough and eventually the big octopus leapt into the water like a professional athlete.No! You won’t!Kysaek was so sick of it and not going to lose, not again! She threw her weapon carelessly away and driven by adrenaline and anger, she channelled a lot of prismatic energy, an enormous expenditure of power and concentration. This power unleashed Kysaek in the water, far from the edge of the lake, and beneath the surface a voluminous prismatic bubble inflated, sweeping everything up with it - including Nimble Leg, and as the energy exploded, it hurled everything off her.

The Calanian flew on edge, in a flood of water, back to the mainland, losing one of its mechanical runners on hard impact, while the remaining leg was damaged. Nimble Leg’s land mobility was gone and he was left beaten and motionless in the mud, which suited his surroundings as the fight came to an end.

The water continued to ripple for a while and Kysaek looked up at Thais, who came to her and clenched a victorious fist. She returned the gesture weakly because she was exhausted and made sure that all the robbers had been dealt with. Her attention, however, was more on the travellers who had out-thought the fight, and there were more of them than Kysaek had noticed in the heat of battle.

Those who had survived were cowering, which especially affected the children, or tending to the injured and a few were trying to extinguish the burning carts. Even one of the negdrog was still alive, but it shrieked because of the hot flames on its back and first of all the travellers removed any luggage to be saved before helping the animal.

That Kysaek and Thais were standing there somehow did not interest the people, while the two approached Nimble Leg. The Calanian was still alive and wanted to steal away and tried to crawl back to the water, but he was too far away, too slow and dark blue blood was coming out of a severe wound in his arm.

But that wasn’t enough for her and Kysaek picked up one of the shock lances, which was missing its tip but the steel would be more than enough for her purpose and it could still shock. The first thing she did was to stamp a foot on Nimble Leg’s tentacles, eliciting a sensitive gasp from him. Even as he turned to face her, Kysaek lashed out and jabbed the blunt shocklance end through the criminal’s stomach. “You’re not going anywhere!” she promised him, releasing the lance.

The wounded Nimble Leg was so weak he couldn’t even make the lance wobble. “Wh-who are you?” he asked, blood gurgling with every breath he took.

“Just shut your mouth and die!” retorted Kysaek, picking up her pistol. She knelt down and pressed the gun against Flinkbein’s chin. “And there’s an end to the raids now!”

“No! Wait! I ca-” the Nimble Leg begged, to no avail, and was shot.

Kysaek was done for and felt Thais’ hand on her shoulder. “Let us go.” the Talin said, stricken and unconcerned. “It is done.”

Leaving, however, was not yet on her agenda. “In a moment,” Kysaek replied. Just as she turned to the travellers, some of them gathered around her.

“You saved us!” said a young Talin full of happiness. But the mummery of Kysaek and Thais made it impossible for her to memorise her rescuers. “Who are you?”

Calmly and matter-of-factly, Kysaek gave her answer and advice. “It doesn’t matter - more importantly, you should turn back. Capon and its surroundings are not safe. You will see this sort of thing happen more often there.” She did want to defeat Luan and end the crimes to ensure a peaceful life, but if Kysaek failed, she would lead the travellers to their doom. She did not want to take on that responsibility, not without having warned the people. “You should go elsewhere.”

The Davoc, who had vanquished a Scyth in battle all by himself, spoke with quivering nostrils. “And go where?! The good areas in the sector are overcrowded and everywhere else is unsafe and we’ve just escaped from an even worse region!”

Thais repeated the advice. “But it’s no better in and around Capon. Take our word for it.”

“It’s hard to believe anyone down here,” the Davoc grumbled. Still, he knew what the two had done for him and the convoy. “But the people who rescued us surely mean us no harm. Only, what are we to do? If there is no place for us, everything we do is pointless.”

The only thing Kysaek could think of was what she herself had done in Capona. “Build something of your own,” she advised the travellers. “There is space enough in the sector and you could build something better if you wanted to.”

“Something better? How are we going to do that? With what? And how are we going to defend it?”

“Look around you. Everything you need is there. Even after the battle, a lot of your belongings are intact and you can take the weapons of the fallen to better protect yourselves. You should also have some foreign currency with you or you can loot their camps. We have already helped ourselves there and taken out the guards. But I would still be on my guard. You never know what’s lurking in the angles.”

“So you want us to start our own settlement?”

“If that is what you want your new beginning to look like, then yes,” Kysaek nodded affirmatively. To her, the best solution was for the travellers to take their fate into their own hands, and they had to do it alone. “Make haste, however, whatever you decide. The robbers had friends and they will probably come and search the area.”

Their helpers, unknown to them, left, but the people wanted to know who to thank. “Wait! Who are you?!” everyone asked. Kysaek and Thais gave the travellers one last look, but they shrouded themselves in silence and sought their salvation in flight, which did not go uncommented by the crowd. “Where are you going! Why have you done this! We thank you!”

It was not for thanks that Kysaek had done this, but it made her feel good that people were honouring it and showing how glad they were for her help. But she would not talk about it, neither to Prax and his brothers, nor to the people of Capona. Instead, Kysaek’s return to her village was unadorned, colourless and without fuss. Exactly what was in her mind. She even avoided paying Prax a visit and went about her work with Thais, Dios and Kuren for the next fortnight as if nothing at all had happened and so that her next plan could plausibly go ahead.

“Prax sent me a text message today,” Thais mentioned as she and Kysaek restocked the well emptied shelves in the warehouse. “Jason will be there in a few hours and I hear he’s very, very angry and has fewer men than the last time I saw him.”

“So Luan reacted as Prax suspected he would?”

“He did. Luan is said to have sent two dozen of his men into the Angles.”

It had been some time, but Kysaek had not forgotten the rescued. “Hopefully the travelling party has moved far away.”

Thais’ demeanour had changed after the fight against Nimble Leg. She was a little more composed “You warned them about Capona,” she reassured them, “And you told them what they could do. That’s certainly more than many others have ever done for these people.”

Kysaek wasn’t proud of it, but she had been spying on Thais wherever she could since returning to the village. She had not, however, found a clue as to what was going on with her Talin friend. “And that’s sad, isn’t it?” she asked rhetorically. “If we have to do things like that for people and tell them what they’d best do, then the galaxy really is fucked.” The good feeling of helping had lingered long after the fight, but it soon disappeared and Kysaek had stayed grounded. She remembered even now that it was primarily for her own interest. Whether that was wrong? She wondered.

“The galaxy has never been a friendly place, but since the war it’s as bad as it’s ever been - even my mother said that, and she’s lived in it for nearly A THOUSAND years,” Thais told her, smirking. “But she also said that no suffering is eternal.”

“I hope she’s right about that,” Kysaek said, but somehow she finally wanted to get away from that particular topic. “At least here it will soon be less suffering, and all without the scrutinising, male society ”

“With the disciples we got along without men too, but why do you say that? Do you miss them?“, Thais inquired and not without a certain dirty undertone. She liked the change from the same talking point all the time. “Would you like to have one around?”

“If he suits me, I wouldn’t say no,” Kysaek winked. She could play that game too. “And clearly you’ve been doing without for ages. You Talin are used to it, aren’t you?”

“What makes you think that?”

“Because there are no men among your people?”

“What nonsense. Of course there are men among us,” Thais asserted cheerfully . She had far less trouble talking about it than Dilén had back in the café. “How else would we reproduce? Do you think our children grow like flowers from the earth or fall as drops from the three moons lit sky of our homeworld?”

“That would explain why I’ve only ever seen beautiful, female Talin, but honestly I have no idea about your species. It could be the same with you as with the Nyrnka. They can be male or female as they need to be.”

“Ugh, no,” Thais replied with a shudder and briskly corrected this view. “It’s the same with us as it is with humans, and to put it less philosophically: We women are the bed and the men are the fertiliser.”

After this unequivocal explanation, which burned a certain image into Kysaek’s head, she finally wanted to know. “If they exist - where are your men? On Cipi I’ve seen women upon women and everywhere else I’ve been in the galaxy. Are the guys of your species so feminine that you can’t tell them from the women?”

Thais took it for granted. “They tend to get lost between us,” she said, revealing thesecret. “A little reading would have sufficed and you would know that there are simply not many men in our country. Only about one in ten thousand births produces a male Talin.”

Imagining dimensions wasn’t exactly Kysaek’s forte, but at the number she exhaled in amazement. “Phew. So you’re telling me there are ten thousand females for every male?”

“Something like that.”

Kysaek inevitably deduced from men to the Talin. “That must be an absolute dream for your men, but how’s that? Do Talin women fight each other for the bit that’s there? And what about children? If a Talin has a husband, does she lend him out?”

“We don’t like to talk about that with outsiders,” Thais agreed. At this point her candour was at an end, but she made no secret of it. “Please don’t ask any more questions.”

“Don’t worry,” Kysaek replied deftly, trying to block out her inquisitiveness. “I now know the great mystery of the missing Talin men and am fully satisfied with that. The rest, I’ll figure out in the Virtual System.”

Thais left the last words uncommented and waved them off. “If you are satisfied, so am I, and if Re’Lis is free afterwards, I will be more than that.”

“There will be many,” Kysaek mentioned when it inevitably came to that point again. If she got Jason out of the way, it would probably fundamentally change conditions in the area. Even before that, word of Nimble Leg’s death had spread quickly throughout Capona and Luan’s territory, and even in her village Kysaek heard some talk of fighting back. But she also knew of isolated voices who saw their own selfish advantages in Luan’s demise and thought they could take over his domain - not with me!

To even get this far, however, Jason’s end was required and he announced himself very punctually and ill-temperedly as the call signal of the harvest sounded outside Kysaek’s house and an impatient hammering pounded on her steel door.

A shotgun, right at the opening of the entrance, would have been the appropriate response. But as long as Re’Lis was not free, Kysaek could not do that and stepped to the front door alone, submissive and without a firearm. “You’re here early. We’ve been waiting for you.”

Jason was outside the house with three of his Skyth and the rest were in the square, close to the house “I’m not interested in chit-chat,” he said threateningly. “Either you have my foreign currency now or I’ll finish you and your girlfriends off by first beating the shit out of them, then raping them and finally slashing them!”

Kysaek had expected him to be less than enthusiastic, but the threat was not lost on her and it was not an act. “It’s all right, it’s all right. We have what you want,” she said, handing him a foreign currency badge.

“The whole four thousand?!” asked Jason, amazed when he saw the amount stored in the badge. “Even five thousand? What’s that? Are you trying to suck up?”

Unnoticed, Kysaek squinted at the plaza out of the corner of her eye. She did not notice any villagers, who were certainly hiding for fear of the collectors, and saw only a truck on which Re’Lis was, following the handover. “No, that’s an excuse for the stress of our first encounter.”

" ... And?”

Kysaek wanted to make the crook feel that he had properly intimidated her in the last action and so she asked hesitantly. “We ... were hoping to say goodbye to our friend Alra’Ta, properly, before she goes with you.”

“The game never changes,” Jason commented, his mood not improving. However, the apology had surprised him and he granted the wish “No one in the galaxy does anything without wanting something in return and because you have grasped that principle, I am in a giving mood. You have five minutes and not a second longer or I’ll break a few bones.”

“Thank you...,” Kysaek sighed in relief as she watched Jason give instructions and Re’Lis was allowed to step off the truck. The Galig joined her, which again was Thais’ cue. Everything was going as planned. Kysaek lulled her opponents into a deceptive sense of security who, despite what had happened in the dodges, were careless and thought it was all a maudlin goodbye.

“Come here,” Thais sighed, immediately wrapping her Galig friend tightly in her arms. “We’ll work this out somehow.”

Re’Lis, after all, didn’t know what was coming and accordingly her grief was absolutely genuine and convincing. “You better take care of yourselves. I’ll manage.”

“You say that so easily. We were hardly apart for many years.”

" ... I know,” Re’Lis sighed before Thais whispered to her.

Kysaek remained aloof, making a pout, while the Scyth turned away from the proceedings, disinterested, with only Jason half paying attention. However, everything takes a little time and the parting tugged at his patience while Kysaek gave her improvised play as a desperate friend. “Is there .... nothing we can do to make Alra’Ta stay with us after all, perhaps?”

No, there was nothing that could be done and Jason literally spat that out. “If you miss your friend so much, buy a new one. There’s plenty of them in Sector Seven and I don’t care about your whining! Honestly, I’d smack you right now if I didn’t know you were bringing in decent foreign currency!”

Shocked, Kysaek turned her face and front away from the criminal. “I was just hoping ...”

“I don’t care about that! This is over now!” said Jason. He extended his arm towards Re’Lis, leaving his defence completely open.

Stealthily, Kysaek drew her knife, which she had hidden under her jacket, and in a hasty twist, jabbed it into the distracted criminal’s eye. Streams of his blood erupted from between the edges of the knife as Jason silently sucked in his breath and fell into disbelieving rigor mortis. With a kick, Kysaek moved him away from her and her knife slid out of his eye socket.

Everything happened so fast, much faster than in the angles, and everyone carried out their part in the plan. Thais pushed Re’Lis into the house and had two pistols handy on her back. Both weapons were her tools as she shot bullet after bullet into the heads of the perplexed criminals around Jason’s body, shattering the glass domes of many Scyth.

Out of nowhere, Prax’s brothers leapt at the truck’s bed and pounced on their victims like predators. They tore the burly Scyth apart like paper thanks to their claws and teeth, but their massive tails and carried shotguns were also of great use as Kysaek and Thais joined the brothers’ brief fight. Together they grated the last remnant of Luan’s gang between them and no matter how desperately some Scyth tried to escape - each side became a death trap and as suddenly as it had begun, it was over.

There was no turning back. Luan was certainly weakened, but the criminal would take revenge on Kysaek and she had to face that. The only question was whether she stood alone with Thais, Re’Lis, the twins and the three Hishek brothers or whether she could shake the villagers awake. The voices of opposition had been quiet and few before, but Kysaek saw the opportunity and appealed freely. “Did you see that?!“,she asked, amplifying her voice through her vortex cuff. She was not stern or angry, just straightforward. “We don’t have to live in fear and under the yoke of pigs like that! They bleed and die just like we who have let them take advantage of us and worse!”

The fear of the residents had not yet disappeared and yet some ventured out into the streets. However, they mostly surveyed the downed criminals than looked to the speaker.

“That’s right!” said Kysaek as Thais, Re’Lis and the twins stood by her side, radiating unity together. “You have seen what few could do and this was not the first strike! We have already done the same in the angle moves! We have shown Luan what we think of his methods! Now imagine what it could be like if we formed a community, side by side! All it takes is a little courage from you and the will to stand up for each other!” The longer Kysaek spoke, the more she was heard and the more crowded the square and narrow streets became. The burgeoning flame of hope in the eyes of the villagers was impossible to miss and the more who ventured out, the bigger the flame grew. It was a real victory, the very first for Kysaek.