IMPALA (Farside Saga: Book One)

NEXUS

The transport ship landed softly in the docking bay of the Nexus then shut down. The cargo ramp descended as Pelik Vira and Kurie emerged. Their armor started shifting, finally ending in a protective cover on their backs along the spinal column, and the translucent inner covering began evaporating into the air, revealing a green translucent-like fabric in the same honeycomb design as their armor covering their translucent dark-skinned four and a half foot frame.

"What exactly was that?" Kurie asked out the blue.

The whole trip no one said a word. All lost in their own thoughts. Pelik, the deepest at the loss of his kindred, held himself together as best he could but he felt himself slowly losing his composure the more he thought back about the whole event. He felt the loss of the others as well but his brother was all he had after losing both their parents to the Kregorians. Now this, whatever it was, has taken his brother from him. The rage began to slowly build, gently tugging at the back of his mind.

"Whatever it was, I'm glad it's dead." Vira said.

"Im not so sure about that,...." Kurie said. Pelik turned his head to look at kurie. "....just before I blacked out, it opened some kinda portal. I heard the bomb go off and I barely caught a glimpse but it looked like it was absorbing the gravitons. I think it just left through the portal once it was done." Kurie finished.

"What was it doing there? At first i thought it was something of theirs but then it was attacking them too. Them more so than us, to the point i think we were just in its way." Vira asked out of curiosity as she pointed out Kurie's hidden thought. Pelik hadn't looked at it like that before. Now his curiosity kicked in and he silently set his mind to learning his new found enemy. They continued their journey to the debriefing room and sat down, looking at the holomonitor projecting the display of their entire mission from their armor's cameras, each one in a separate display lined along the monitor. The whole thing played through, all three averting their silvery eyes and shedding a tear at the captain's death before looking back and watching the end. Kurie's camera, confirming his theory as it caught a visual through a small hole in the debris, of the orb entering the portal. The video paused as all three looked up at the approaching transport vehicle descending through the roof of the tower just as the captain of the Nexus walked in. All three stood at attention with their fist over their chests. The captain nonchalantly dismissed it and gestured for them to sit down. He walked around to the other side of the holomonitor and cued the footage to their different angle of views of the purple fleshy looking orb as it attacked the Kregor soldiers then paused it. The 3 soldiers studied the orb more closely as the captain began.

"Out of the 945 ground soldiers and personnel, 337 pilots and 28 commanding officers...you 3 and a single pilot are the only survivors of the attack on Outpost 3. The only thing left of the Kregor invading force is what remains of their ship. I commend you all on your part of the battle but as much as i hate to say it, the credit goes to whatever these things are. Unfortunately, it's also responsible for wiping out an entire Velcronian defense brigade. I wanna know what in the Ender's pit is that thing...." The captain said, looking at the three soldiers through the transparent display. The projection disappeared, giving the occupants of the room a clear view of each other. Pelik, still standing stiff with his hands behind his back, spoke for the first time since leaving the planet.

"Captain...we have obtained the codec as mission perameters...." He started as he brought his hand from behind his back, holding the cube like object in his hand. At this, the captain slowly reached across the table as Pelik sat it down and slid it towards him. Suddenly, the lights went out for a split second before the emergency lights came on and the alarms went off as the room shook violently, throwing everyone down to the ground. The codec slid off the table in between Pelik's outstretched arms as he painstakingly lifted his head and saw it slowly roll to a stop. He grabbed it as he awkwardly got up and instantly felt a sharp pain in his left leg. He looked down to see a small broken piece of shard from the overhead panel that was hanging sticking out just above his ankle. He pulled it out with a short yelp as the extra pain hit before disappearing all together. Once his leg quickly healed, he engaged his armor as well as two other familiar activated sounds he heard, just as the panel fell, causing the rest of the ceiling to fall down, exposing sparking wires and the rooms fiber optic network. The loud alarms of the ship seemed to magnify tenfold as the doors opened and a crew member ran in, but stopped short, almost slipping on a piece of debris, as he looked at the room in shock. The three soldiers quickly recovered and made their way to the other side of the table towards the captain at the same time the crewman spotted him and ran to him.

"Captain...captain!! The crewman called out as he placed the palm of his hand on the side of the captain's head. Pelik, Vira, and Kurie stood back, watching through their armored visors....waiting.

PHOENIX

The bridge crew of the Phoenix watched in horror as a thick purplish beam of light shot past, striking and tearing the top left thruster and a good portion of the tailfin completely off the rear of the Nexus. The Herion, being the first to get the warning, had already turned towards the source of the beam and opened fire with its twin ion cannons. The slow firing lasers caused heavy damage but not enuff to stop it as it shot another purplish beam at the Ramada completely destroying the cruiser class ship. The source of the beam finally emerged from the rip in space revealing its true form. What came through was a massive black n purplish looking ship dwarfing the 7 destroyer class vessels. The long thin cylindrical neck finally came to an end as the massive quad wings appeared next causing the rip to stretch along its departure. In between the wings, at the top and bottom, just in front of the double tail fins along the tail that emerged next, sat a large translucent dome that housed a black and purple spherical object. The near dragon shaped ship almost appeared to be alive as the wings angled the ship to a more direct approach on the advancing fleet. The front of the ship swooped down to form a somewhat rounded nose that seemed like the bottom portion was melting as it flew at high speeds giving it a polished look. A round purplish glow began to form on that portion just before it shot off another beam towards the Augustus. The large but agile destroyer dodged the beam with only centimeters to spare as it launched a volley of its own weapons. The green ion beams and torpedoes all exploded on contact but did little to no damage to the hulking ship. Just then the massive ship rippled. A dark purplish cloud began to form around the ship then quickly started moving towards the fleet.

NEXUS

The captain regained conscience, much to everyone's relief, and all 5 made it back to the bridge just in time to see the Augustus dodge a purplish beam then fire back on the flickering view screen. The bridge was in complete chaos as everyone ran from station to station trying to regain control of the ship. The Nexus drifted around just missing a collision with the debris of the Ramada as the massive ship came into view. The space around the ship appeared to shimmer before the captain realized what it was.

"No, it can't be....abandon ship!!" the captain yelled before sitting in his chair and punching a few keys on the holographic control panel. The lights switched from red to green as the ejection pod doors opened up. Pelik, Vira, Kurie, and the officer all looked at each other then at the view screen. The captain swiveled his chair around and ejected a small red crystyline chip from his consel, then handed it to the officer.

"Take this and them three to these coordinates...." He told the officer, then turned towards Pelik. "My sorrows for the loss of your kindred but if you dont want it to be meaningless then protect the codec with your life until you get it into safe hands. All the information you need is on the data disk...now go...GOOO!!" The captain said as he forced them off the bridge. The cloud quickly engulfed the gathering fleet, disintegrating the ships,making it's way towards the Nexus as the captain swiveled back around and starred at the view screen. Tugging on Vira's shoulder, the officer got their attention and started heading towards the doors.

"My ship's this way!! He yelled over the alarms as he stood in the open doorway. Pelik and the rest started after him. They rounded the corner and made their way to the hangerbay. Among the long wall of Velcronian starfighters was a weird but familiar looking ship that Kurie recognised but couldn't think from where. Peeling away from the group subconsciously making his way towards it, Kurie walked along the solid rectangular fuselage rubbing his armored hand over the groove where the delta wings slid out. It was then that he remembered. It's his training officer's personal prototype carrier. The ship itself has long been in production and decommissioned 15 merks ago when the new Faline x9 starjumpers came out. His trainer was allowed to keep the prototype as a reward for his services. He knew every inch of the original design but this particular one was retro fitted and equipped with custom tech that surpassed even Pelik's knowledge of technology. Just then his comlink chirped.

"Kurie...where are you. We're about to take off!!" Pelik's voice came in. Reluctantly, Kurie left the old ship to it's fate and made his way to the rest of the group.

PLANET SURFACE

The battlefields were littered in debris and bodies all around. What once was a forest of life, is now fields of chaos and destruction. A small group of blue furry six legged creatures, about the size of a small rabbit, came bouncing through the clearing rummaging in the carnage. The glowing black and yellow rocks is what caught one particular drexian's attention, but just as he reached for it, it shot up into the air along with the rest of the pieces amongst the carnage. The drexians followed the pieces with their keen vision as they flew to what remained of the tower. The tower itself began to form into a long pointed spire that began pulsating bright yellow faster until all the floating pieces flew into it. Just as the last piece struck the spire, it shot off a thick bright yellow beam of light straight up that lasted for about four seconds, then disappeared, spire and all.

NEXUS

Kurie caught up with the group as they stood at the opening to hangerbay 2. "There...!" The pilot said, pointing off to the left at a sleek emerald green star skipper. They made their way towards it as they marveled at it's beauty and design. Just as they made it up the ramp, the ship was rocked hard causing them to lose balance and fall halfway down the ramp. They quickly recovered and made their way on to the skipper. They took off through the launch tunnel and out the shielded exit. Just as the pilot was about to hit the jump drive, a yellow beam shot up directly in his path forcing him to pull up and to the right. The sudden manuver threw the soldiers to the back of the bridge as the pilot barely dodged the beam. He angled the ship around to watch as the beam shot through the debris and strike the tail of the massive ship just behind the bottom dome and keep​ going. The ship lurched at a weird angle then turned towards the beams source. Unfortunately, that put the pilot and his ship in it's line of sight. Realizing this, he took off towards open space just as the purple glow shot off another beam. He dodged that one easily as the massive ship gave chase. The pilot's ship is faster and way more manueverable as he swung around and doubled back towards the ship dodging the ship's beam before passing under it. What he didn't count on was, just like a dragon, the massive ship snake it's way below itself directly behind the pilot. That huge lead he thought he was about to gain, just became dangerously non-existent... very dangerously non-existent. That close in proximity caused the ships collision alarms to go off as the pilot slowly began to gain his lead. The nose of the massive ship began to glow as the pilot tried to manuever from in front of it. He quickly inverted the ship and pulled up hard causing the ship to shoot downward at a ninety degree angle. He punched the jump drive and had just entered into subspace but not before the massive ship swiveled around and fired it's beam, striking the back of the pilot's ship.