Static and Echoes
Ash-gray twilight filtered through the broken glass of the command deck where Luto stood, the commline sparking like it was gasping for breath.
"Ryu, come in. You're at ninety-one BPM and dropping. Respond."
No answer.
Onyx's hand clenched at his side, static distorting his voice. "I'm going after him."
Luto didn't look up from the holo-slate. "No. Wait."
The tone in his voice was sharp—almost desperate. "We don't even know what that explosion was."
Onyx's gaze flicked toward the horizon where the belt glowed faintly blue. "He's alone up there."
"Exactly," Luto replied, fingers dragging equations through light. "That's why we think, not react."
The slate pulsed—Ryu's vitals flickering faintly in the lower corner. Pulse stable. Oxygen fluctuating. Still alive.
Luto exhaled, more relief than breath. "His comms are fried, but his biofield's intact. Whatever that was—it wasn't a fire blast. It rang. That means a shockwave, probably sonic in nature. That's why the line collapsed."
Onyx's jaw tightened. "You're saying it was an attack."
"I'm saying," Luto muttered, "it was deliberate."
They stared into the fractured skies above, unaware that far beyond the orbit's reach, Ryu was about to wake up in the middle of someone else's nightmare.
⸻
Ryu and the Resonant Dread
A sharp breath.
Ryu gasped as his lungs remembered how to breathe.
He floated among debris—the shattered ribs of a broken freighter, glowing faintly with leftover plasma. The air here was thin, but his aura burned just enough to make up for it.
Then the voice came.
A sound that wasn't quite a voice—half-echo, half-scream.
"You dare trespass here, mortal."
Ryu turned. And froze.
The being towered over him—massive, skeletal wings folded against a body rippling with dark, luminous veins. Half his face was hidden behind a cracked breathing mask fused to bone; the other half radiated fury. Around him hovered dozens of smaller bat-like creatures, each trembling, awaiting his command.
Ryu, ever Ryu, blinked once and grinned.
"Okay… you must be the boss bat. Gotta say, the wings are impressive. You train the others yourself?"
The air vibrated.
The echo deepened.
"You mock the Scourged of the Belt. Mortals. Gods. All are forbidden here."
"Right, about that—" Ryu raised both hands in peace. "I wasn't invading anything. Just picking up some mineral samples. Astral Ferrite, yeah? I can pay rent if you want—"
"Liar."
The word tore through the air like thunder. Zha'Kor vanished and reappeared mid-lunge, his clawed hand grazing Ryu's shoulder with enough force to spin him backward into a hull fragment. Ryu blocked the next strike, sparks erupting from the clash.
"Whoa, whoa—okay, I get it! You're mad! But you're aiming at the wrong guy!"
Zha'Kor didn't stop. He was fast—too fast for something that big. Each blow came with a vibration that blurred Ryu's vision, every strike ringing through his bones. His echolocation pulses disoriented Ryu further, making the entire belt feel like it was shifting around him.
"Come on, man!" Ryu shouted, blocking another strike with his forearm. "Let's talk this ou—"
Zha'Kor's backhand sent him crashing through a derelict ship's plating.
Inside Ryu's head, his thoughts whirred like static.
He's not fighting like a monster. He's fighting like someone protecting something.
As Ryu's vision refocused, he caught sight of what lay scattered among the orbiting wrecks:
the remains of divine executioner armor, melted blades, and skeletal fragments twisted around old energy cores.
His chest tightened.
So this is what they did to his world…
Zha'Kor's fist connected square with Ryu's jaw before the thought finished. The world blurred. Ryu went spinning again—then slammed against a derelict ship.
Below, in the camp, Luto's slate flared red.
"Vitals spike! He's taking hits—multiple hits!"
"Then let me go!" Onyx roared.
"Not yet!" Luto snapped, even as he looked pale himself.
⸻
The Breaking Point
Zha'Kor landed on top of Ryu, roaring as he pummeled him again and again.
Ryu barely managed to guard his face with both arms as the onslaught continued, metallic screeches echoing through the vacuum.
"Why do you not fight back?!" Zha'Kor's voice cracked through overlapping frequencies, almost breaking itself apart.
Ryu coughed blood, looked up through one eye. "Because I told you… I'm not here to fight you."
Zha'Kor froze, trembling—anger and grief warring behind his glowing eyes.
"You lie!"
His hands shook. For a moment, the mask over his face cracked wider, and for the briefest instant—Ryu saw tears.
Then Zha'Kor screamed, wings flaring open, summoning hundreds of his kind. The lesser Scourged formed a circle around the broken debris field, channeling their energy into one massive, resonant pulse.
"You will share their fate!"
The orbit vibrated so hard the nearby wrecks began to disintegrate.
"Ryu's vitals are spiking again!" Luto shouted from below. "There's something building—massive energy signature, 5.8 Centi-Rythe Units and climbing!"
"Luto, that's the same output as a lesser god!"
"Exactly."
⸻
The Voice of the Innocent
Zha'Kor's attack reached its crescendo, the air screaming before it detonated—
And then a smaller voice, trembling, human, broke through the hum.
"Daddy, he isn't lying!"
Zha'Kor's pupils constricted.
The blast was already unleashed.
Ryu moved on instinct—spinning, wrapping his body around the small figure of a bat-like child who had darted between them. He clamped his elbows over her head, covering her ears, shielding her completely. His aura flared crimson as he braced for impact.
The explosion consumed the orbit.
⸻
The Echo After the Blast
Silence.
Drifting debris.
And then—Ryu stirred.
He groaned, peeling a half-melted metal plate off his back. The little girl lay in his arms, unconscious but breathing. He let out a shaky laugh.
"Hey… kid… you okay?"
Her eyes fluttered open—wide, scared, but alive. She blinked at him.
"Why… did you protect me?"
Ryu smiled faintly, setting her down gently. "Because… I said I wasn't here to hurt anyone. And because your dad punches way too hard."
She hesitated. "Why didn't you fight him?"
"Because I've seen that anger before." Ryu's gaze drifted up to the endless wreckage. "And I know what it costs to feed it."
A heavy thud.
The girl's eyes widened. "…Daddy."
Ryu turned.
Zha'Kor hovered in the fractured light, his wings ragged, his mask cracked open completely. His voice was no longer layered—it was just one, quiet, trembling tone.
"You…" he rasped, staring at the two of them. "You shielded… her."
Ryu, still kneeling, smiled up at him with blood on his lip. "Told you, big guy. I wasn't lying."
⸻
The Resonant Truce
The silence that followed felt impossibly heavy. The only sound was the faint crackle of plasma and the slow, uneven breaths of two beings who should have been enemies.
Zha'Kor hovered a few paces away, his massive chest rising and falling like a dying star. The resonance in his throat still trembled with leftover rage—but his eyes told another story now.
Fear.
Relief.
Recognition.
The small girl peeked out from behind Ryu's shoulder. She looked barely ten by human measure, though her skin shimmered faintly violet, her ears tapered, and her eyes glowed like miniature stars. Her small fangs peeked through when she spoke, soft and uncertain.
"Papa… he saved me."
Zha'Kor's voice fractured at the word papa. "Vaelyra… you—" He caught himself, wings twitching. "Come here."
She didn't move. Instead, she sat cross-legged beside Ryu and, without hesitation, reached out to tug gently at his dreadlocks.
Ryu froze, staring cross-eyed at the tiny fingers tangled in his hair.
"Hey, easy—these are cosmic-grade, you know."
Vaelyra giggled, the sound a gentle, glass-like trill that echoed through the ruined orbit. "It feels like fire… but soft and you can touch it."
Ryu blinked. Then smiled. "Guess you could say that."
Zha'Kor watched them—his guard slowly lowering, his shoulders no longer flared wide. The fury in his eyes dimmed into something older, heavier.
"…Why did you come here?" he finally asked, his voice quieter but still carrying that echo-layered timbre. "Tell me the truth, mortal."
Ryu sighed, lowering his head. "I'm sorry. I didn't come to invade or steal. My brothers and I—we're stranded on the planet below. I only came up here to collect Astral Ferrite to build a ship. That's all. I didn't know anyone was still alive here."
He hesitated, looking up at the giant. "When I saw the debris, I realized this place used to be… someone's home."
Zha'Kor's wings shifted slowly, their glow dimming from violent violet to a softer indigo. For the first time, he looked tired rather than enraged.
He glanced down at his daughter—alive, smiling, twirling one of Ryu's locks around her finger—and something broke inside the old war-scarred creature.
He sighed—a long, deep sound that rippled through the surrounding wrecks.
"…Follow me, Flamebearer."
Ryu blinked. "Wait—what?"
"There is still Astral Ferrite within the Hollow Cradle. You'll take what you need… and you will leave this place intact." His gaze softened. "You spared my child. That debt cannot be repaid with blood."
Ryu nodded. "Deal."
He scooped up Vaelyra, who clung happily to his neck as if he were an old friend, and followed the towering Scourged leader deeper into the orbit's silent graveyard—where the last survivors of a forgotten tragedy made their home.
The Ascent
Back on the planet's surface, static hissed through the comms like the planet itself was whispering bad news.
"Ryu's vitals are still bouncing," Luto muttered, eyes scanning the unstable readings across his holo-slate. "I can't get a clear signal. Every frequency spike looks like interference from a resonance pulse."
Onyx stood nearby, knuckles whitening as he clenched his fists. "That's it. I'm done waiting."
"Onyx—" Saelara started, stepping forward, the faint green aura around her hands flaring in worry.
Luto turned sharply. "We don't even know what's up there. If that explosion was resonance-based, it could still—"
"I don't care."
Onyx's voice struck through the air like a divine verdict. It wasn't loud—it was final. The kind of tone that made lesser beings go silent. "He's my brother."
The air behind him rippled with black light.
From the void tore through Velgrath, the Hollow Fang—a wolf-faced beast clad in bone armor, its maw steaming with abyssal mist. It wielded twin cleavers that screamed with the whispers of trapped souls, and each breath rattled the sky itself.
The creature crouched low beside Onyx, lowering its head like a loyal hound ready to be unleashed.
Beside it, Onyx called forth Varkal'Zir, the Gravemark of Oblivion, its form twisting from spear to scythe in his grip, humming with gravitational weight.
And in the far distance, the ground quaked as Gravemind Doruun stirred—a colossus of shadow and stone, his body outlined by the red glow of the supergiant sun. The titan rose to his full height.
"Doruun," Onyx commanded, voice low but unwavering. "Hand me the sky."
The titan's eyes pulsed, understanding without words. He extended one enormous palm forward, its surface forming into a platform big enough for a fortress.
Saelara stepped closer, disbelief and fear flickering in her gaze. "If you breach the orbital belt at that velocity without stabilizers, your body will tear itself apart—"
"Then patch me up when I get back," Onyx said, flashing a grin that didn't reach his eyes.
Luto pinched the bridge of his nose. "I hate that I'm about to say this…" He sighed and walked forward, climbing into Doruun's palm beside Onyx. "But fine. Let's go get our idiot."
Saelara blinked at them both, her composure faltering. "You're both insane."
"Probably," Luto said, adjusting his gauntlets. "But we're consistent."
Velgrath crouched low beside the titan, howling as a ring of void lightning coiled around the brothers. Doruun's massive arms swung further back, the sheer pressure bending the surrounding twilight grass.
"Ready?" Onyx asked.
"No," Luto said, tightening his grip on his weapon. "Do it anyway."
Doruun's chest expanded, his roar shaking the horizon like a collapsing mountain. Then—with a swing of impossible strength—he hurled them into the heavens.
The air split into thunder.
Twin streaks of light carved upward through the crimson haze.
Velgrath leapt from the ground in their wake, running along the shockwave itself before vanishing into the upper sky—a phantom shadow climbing after its master.
The world below shrank to dust and memory as Onyx and Luto breached the clouds, ascending toward the burning wreckage of the orbit where Ryu had vanished.
⸻
And far above them, beyond the thinning air, a giant named Zha'Kor turned toward the rising streaks of light, his voice a low rumble that shook the silence of the Belt.
"Prepare the Choir," he whispered to his daughter.
Vaelyra blinked, clutching Ryu's arm as she looked toward the approaching lights. "Papa, are they… enemies?"
Zha'Kor's expression darkened—not with rage, but with something like apprehension.
"…We will see."