ONE: Epilogue of Hermesh

13. Hope

Erra turned to face the individual who had uttered those words. But the sight that greeted him left the old Amarthian astonished. There stood in front of him, the strangest creature that he could ever have imagined, dressed in a curious saffron flowy outfit. This alien was almost the same height as Erra, but was unnaturally slender. Its skin seemed unusually thin and had a rubbery texture. It was brown in colour with a dull shine to it.

The other features of the alien were stranger still. Its pair of eyes were much smaller than Amarthian eyes and they were placed right in front of a very round head. Instead of the usual Amarthian red, these eyes were white in colour, with a single round brown object that seemed to be hovering inside each of them. In between the two eyes was a cylindrical extension with two holes at the bottom, which Erra assumed were respiratory ducts, like the small holes that he sported over his jaws. The Commodore observed them inflate and deflate slightly, in short intervals. But the strangest of all were his two hands. They were thin and elongated and had five thinly webbed bony digits, instead of three un-webbed ones. They were each capped with some kind of white filament.

For a moment Erra thought of calling security. But something akin to curiosity and fear prevented him from doing so.

“Who are you?” he asked instead, finally conjuring up enough courage to string together a few words.

“There will be time to answer that question,” replied the alien, "Right now, we must leave."

“How did you get in here?” Erra continued with his line of enquiry, ignoring the creature's suggestion.

“The same way we will leave," Replied the alien simply.

Still unsure about the right approach, Erra moved past his hesitation and further inquired, "Are you one of them? Is this your way of communicating?"

"No I'm not."

"If you're not one of them, then…was it you who spoke to me inside the wormhole?" Erra blurted out.

"Yes."

"How can you speak our language?"

“I am not speaking your language," the creature replied candidly, "You are hearing my voice inside your head, just as you did inside the wormhole.”

For a moment Erra paused to consider this and then continued, “You know of the species that is invading us?”

“Yes."

"What are they called?"

"They don't have a name. But you can call them Kaya,” the alien informed Erra.

“Are they here to conquer us?” Erra thought that he sounded naive even as he spoke those words.

But the alien answered just as impassively as before, "No. Nor are their intentions strictly hostile."

"I just lost 40,000 officers and three and a half thousand ships fighting them!" argued the Commodore, barely controlling his indignation.

"You attacked them. If you fight them, they will fight back. Self preservation," stated the alien, just as calmly.

"And if we don't?" Erra asked tentatively.

"They will do what they have been created for. To exterminate all life and its future possibility from this galaxy."

The answer was so blunt and direct that for a moment Erra just stood there in stunned silence before forcing himself to speak again, "But...but what are they?"

"Quasi sentient beings created for that one purpose. And you will not understand the reason, even if I told you. Not yet. But please know, to them, there is no difference between you and a single celled organism living somewhere in this galaxy. You are both living beings to be exterminated."