Chapter Four

  Toxic sludge festered within the gangly mane of tendrils crowning Nuqxug's bulbous dome. Saucer-round eyes squinted into narrow slits of frustration, the hunter breathing in uneven labored grunts. Never had the Ngangrul come across a material his excretions could not devour, but even under the corrosive tortures of Nuqxug's foulest emulsion, the ivy-drowned portal of the left-most cell refused to yield. After secreting gallons of the ravenous plasma, he collapsed on the sandy ground in an exhausted heap. Saith was up next. Ejecting its true form through the pressure seals of its suit, it attempted to phase into the material of the portal itself. When that failed, merging with the root systems of the blackened vines posed a reasonable alternative. Swimming through the unlikely flora's charred veins, Saith managed only seconds of resonance before being rejected, cast back into the sulfurous air.

  "Never needed a plan C before." Muttered Sheng to himself, perturbed by the stubborn denial of the barrier. The impassable door held beyond its thresh-hold his reason for entering this godforsaken tower. For decades, he had explored the galaxy, plundering every treasure, indulging in every deviant delight, and bearing witness to cosmic wonders others would confine to myth. And though his youthful appearance was yet to abandon him, and time had seen fit to leave his health intact, he could sense the pangs of mortality closing in with every subsequent dawn. The promise of what the Golgotha was constructed to contain was the final frontier left to conquer — that of death itself.

  Tugg strode up beside the three vexed hunters. With a lunge of his boulder-like fists, he grabbed the gigantic bolts that fixed the gate to the obsidian architecture. A gargled howl bellowed from his throat as he tore the bolts free from their holdings, uprooting a century of ancient vines with them. Without so much as a breath, he struck the next set of bolts, repeating the process until all twelve were free.

  Sheng-Vei and his hunters stared in disbelief at the lumbering titan. A steady stream of blood poured from his organic fist, and the liquid in his breathing apparatus bubbled with each taxing inhale.

  "And that is why we agreed to this little escapade. Tugg was it?" said Sheng-Vei, turning to his comrades with a smile of righteousness. He had always prided himself on his ability to decipher one's usefulness at first glance, and in Tugg, he had anticipated a treasure worth coveting. With the slightest application of force, the two panes of the door swung inward onto a vast ocean of life.

  The obsidian tomb relented to nature’s demands. Every surface blossomed with the verdant bounty of creation. A meadow of tall grasses, bouquets of variegated flowers, and a plethora of wondrous floral mysteries carpeted a bulging plane of rich soil. Prodigious trees formed a canopy of swaying leaves at the summit of the tall chamber, obscuring the ring of fluorescent lights that cast shafts down on the chamber's sole occupant. In the center, chained upside down and bound in a sheathing of thick dread-locked hair, was the prisoner.

  Saith released a series of vibrating coos, turning to Sheng for acknowledgment.

  "Everything about this place is impossible; your senses do not deceive. You there, are you alive?" Sheng asked the hanging figure as they oscillated like a human pendulum.

  "More than you will ever be," replied a female voice, soft as spring breeze but with the a razor edge primed to lacerate the overzealous.

  "Over a century has elapsed since the fall of the first pirate armada — one hundred years of imprisonment in this hell. Your foiled attempt to dismantle the government is legendary throughout the galaxy, and your face is as familiar to me as my own. So answer me this, Zaiede. How is it possible that not a moment of time mars your features?

  She smiled, and Sheng was unsure if his question had been mistaken for a compliment. Twisting her body, she unfurled the century of knotted hair, revealing woven ebony robes beneath. With the clink of her chains, she descended onto the grassy plane and curled her toes into the soil, its energies rushing into her and bestowing her almond skin with an otherworldly glow.

  "Nature is a kind mother. She will return in excess the gifts we choose to give." Zaiede wandered around her enclosure as she spoke, running her delicate fingers over the vibrant petals of her garden.

  "Early man planted seeds in her bosom, and she returned to him the bounty of food. That arrangement endured for centuries, until eventually, man was overwhelmed by his desire for more and chose to dishonor his word, opting to take and never to return. For this theft, his mother cast upon him a judgment, a judgment to demonstrate the magnitude of his crime: damnation." She hissed the word with all the fury of Mother Earth herself. Though long committed to history upon Sheng-Vei's birth, the desecration of humanity's cradle was a tale that all of earth's children heeded with shame. A paradise despoiled until all that remained was a barren geography of smog and sludge, a blasphemy for which they could not repent. Forgotten and deemed a mere mistake from which to learn, those responsible retreated to the stars, looking for the homes of others from which they could profit and expand their empire of lies.

  "Someone had to get revenge for what they did to her. Someone had to even the score. And for this task, nature bestowed upon me the gift I required to enact such righteous justice. Life, eternal."

  Never had there arisen an occasion on which Sheng-Vei was lost for words. Not once had he struggled for a witty retort or admonishment of foolishness. But in the presence of the immortal Naiiobe Zaiede, the right hand of Talas, he was rendered speechless.

  "I will take a guess. The Admirals have not seen fit to reassess the thousand years to which I was sentenced. You and your crew of strange creatures don't appear to be assassins, and I doubt this is a passing visit." She stared directly at Sheng as she spoke, her words probing his expression to uncover the truth of her release.

  "Well, that leaves only one, terrifying possibility… he's back."

  The chamber fell quiet. Only the rustle of nature and growl of the churning mantle below saved them from the deafening silence of the truth.

  Upon Talas' revival, the galaxy fell under his rule within a single cycle. Resistance was widespread in the beginning. What remained of the Navy coalesced into a minor armada in an attempt to retake the Fallonark, but against the might of the pirate Dreadnoughts, spearheaded by Galneus herself, they fell in a matter of days. What little of the Naval force was not incinerated fled into the Seethe, only to reemerge as Snapdragon, the singular remaining thorn in the pirate's side. Though disruptive, the guerrilla tactics and pockets of resistance had no long-lasting impact on pirate activities. Talas and his Lords continued to plunder the galaxy, amassing a wealth of material and manpower for some unknown, highly secretive purpose.

  Devoid of habitable worlds and a place which the rule of law had long ago abandoned, the Seethe was a refuge for those unwilling to kneel. Residence to untold numbers of colonial flotillas, fortress worlds, and artificial habitats, the Seethe was a region of, although hidden, diverse and thriving life. Sheng knew Talas coveted the treasures hidden in the Seethe, his countless expeditions in that flayed realm betraying his search for something of great import. A temptation of the magnitude offered in the Seethe would tempt a lesser man to his doom, but Talas knew better. Stretching from the arms of the galactic edge to the black hole in its center, the Seethe encompassed thousands of dead systems, eaten by time and remaining only as ruinous wastes to be swallowed and regurgitated as whatever the new occupant desired. Within these fresh bastions of civilization lurked the tyrant-tsars, doom-dynasts, and autarchs of apocalypse that were better left in the shadow. They cared little for the galaxy's affairs beyond the fortified circumference of their domains. The Seethefolk would give the Pirate-King a wide berth as long he didn't stray too far into their territory. He may have been a ghost, but those who dared venture into the Seethe knew far worse than ghosts lurked in that dead expanse.

  "Correct, Zaiede. Freed him from his tomb seven cycles past by his Lords. He dispatched three Admirals like they were nothing but children and went on to destroy the Naval armada. He currently occupies every strategic target in the galaxy, including the Fallonark, and all who refused to join have long fled into the Seethe." Sheng-Vei's tone was somber as he relayed the information. The truth in his words tasted like lies, for the reality of what Talas had achieved had been thought an impossibility. Every renegade in the galaxy dreamed of the Navy's demise. To see the Fallonark in flames and the Admirals on their knees was a vision shared by all, a future they attempted to bring about at every opportunity. Witnessing this dream play out had transmuted it into a nightmare. A malignant dread spread through the galaxy as the new King took his throne, a diseased feeling that the change would be devoid of the freedom they craved and, instead, filled with suffering more rigorous than anything the Navy proliferated.

  "Does the word Faehalion mean anything to you?" Naiiobe asked.

  Sheng took a moment. He had gazed upon the wonder himself on approach to Golgotha. The fleet of pirate-affiliated ships — secreted amongst which they had infiltrated the quadrant — had slowed to a crawl as they passed before it. Nine Levantikar, each planetary in mass, conjoined to form a ring that rivaled the majesty of the system's star.

  "Yes. Though the structure remains incomplete, the time of its resolution draws near. As we speak, the tenth Levantikar approaches. Talas and his Lords have gathered to greet it. This fortunate distraction gave us the opportunity for our visit."

  Naiiobe wandered over to the tallest tree, her chains rattling behind her as they stretched to the limit of her freedom. She caressed the grooves in its skin as if trying to discern some message embedded within the channels of its time-worn bark.

  "It's already over." She turned to Sheng, and he could see the sincerity in her eyes.

  "Once summoned, the Faehalion cannot be stopped. The Levantikar will assemble, and the gate will open, welcoming the end."

  "The end of what?" asked Sheng-Vei. "Talas and his Lords will take their leave, and we will be left in peace."

  For the first time in their brief meeting, Naiiobe laughed, hearty and full but hiding a pity for his naive assumption.

  "Left in peace. Is this what you think?" She asked, her laugh petering out into a frown.

  "No child. The Faehalion is no gate to the afterlife. There is no Elyssia. No great ocean waiting in some ethereal dimension." She sat down, placing her fingers into the soil and breathing deeply before continuing.

  "Did you never wonder why they are here? Why the Levantikar roam the cosmos?" Her question returned only blank gazes. Until recently, the Levantikar dwelt in legend, the galaxy unable to believe what it could not see. And, in the time since their arrival, little inquiry was made into their purpose, concern for survival occupying the minds of those fleeing pirate rule.

  "Renewal. A grand reset of the cosmos. The portal will open and claim our history. Every mark ever made, erased, pulled into the Faehalion, and ejected into the new universe that awaits on the other side. A fresh start for new life to bloom and the end of all we have ever known."