Humanity Endures

Part 7 - Last Stand | Chapter 1

"Every battle can be won; every battle can be lost. Defeat is the result of cowardice or incompetence, but either way, neither I, nor the Empire, will tolerate it."

— Telzivax "The Monstrous" Tekran, imperator during the civil war of 21,032. The general he was addressing was shot dead on the spot.

***

The Present

Upon arriving at the imposing, battle-scarred entranceway to the garrison complex, Terxah, who had full control over the building's systems, opened the door with a snap of her armored fingers, revealing to all the grotesque interior that awaited within; the triangular atrium of the structure's interior, three storeys tall like its door and immensely spacious, was littered with signs of a desperate firefight. All over the walls of the building's main hall lay scores of scratch marks and bullet holes, amidst a grisly paint-job of dried human — and alien — blood; the only thing that had prevented the aliens from corrupting the entire complex seemed to be that they needed the elevator to be functional, and had left the building unscathed after they had butchered its occupants.

The soldiers stationed here had evidently gone down with a fight, and even if they were unsuccessful in the end, Velan felt inspired by their heroism regardless. He had no access to the place's records, but he knew it was likely that they had been slaughtered down to the last soldier — the aliens didn't take prisoners, and running from the amazingly quick beasts was often as futile as fighting them.

Proceeding through the complex with great haste, the human force — which was fully inside the structure by this point — came across a sizeable double door, over one story tall, and comparable to the initial gate Velan and his force had passed through earlier. When arriving before this entrance, the formation paused its meandering movement; those in the vanguard had heard some form of movement or action emanating from behind the door, and, judging by the irregularity of the overly-heavy steps, and their accompanying heavy breathing, whatever lurked beyond was not human. Korthekar, eager for revenge, lumbered towards the gate as if to force it open and kill whatever was on the other side — a motion a few of the Kalithiharian enforcers mimicked — yet Terxah cried out for them to stop.

Korthekar, in reply, grunted out the word, "Why?"

"Because," Terxah said, "there is no alien on the other side of that door — according to this place's camera network, the beast on the other side of that door is none other than a genetically engineered war-beast, a medium one, that appears to be acting as a sentry. To us, it's harmless."

Ralthina, who was standing nearby, protested, "I don't know much about military matters, but from what I've heard, war-beasts are remarkably susceptible to alien corruption. Is this not true?"

"It is," Terxah replied, turning to face Ralthina, "but those corrupted war-beasts are easily identified not only by their mannerisms, but by the fact that most of their armor becomes pitch-black with corruption after minutes. Why would the aliens leave a corrupted war-beast to guard the garrison, when they could just as easily use one of their own? I can say, without doubt, that the war-beast behind this door is under human control."

"But whose?" someone cried out.

"We'll only find out if we keep that thing alive!" someone shouted in response.

Ralthina stepped backwards, cocking her head and raising her hands part-way into the air as if to mock-surrender, "All right! I defer to your judgement, Terxah — that of your superiors, that is."

As Ralthina finished talking, she shot a quizzical glance towards Velan as if to ask his opinion on the matter, to which he replied, "Show me this camera feed, and you'll have my opinion."