That was the first part of the legend that was once spoke by Zaphod, one considered the mental pinnacle of his race. Grend knew many of his generation considered such a thing ridiculous, drummed up superstition. But lately, Grend was not so certain.

Anubis. The name of some ancient human death god, or was it embalming, Grend did not know. Humans lived such short lives their beliefs changed too often, what seemed only days to Grend would pass to them as centuries.

He stood in front of the war relics control system, contacting it with his unit. Many have paid for his decisions. Of his race, now only this fleet and two planets remain occupied. After the destruction of the creators home planet, the race scattered across the galaxy. What Grend did not expect, was that was exactly what Anubis wanted.

Grend knew his race was many things, but tacticians was not one of them. Anubis broke the only sure defense they had, complete unity. By exposing himself and attacking the capital, wreaking havoc across the race, and making sure his presence stayed secret until Grend himself was put on trial. The act of attacking at that moment, it destroyed something more precious than their homeworld, it destroyed their trust. Civil war while warring on two other fronts. Grend thought it ridiculous, if only they had listened to him they could have won. It was he who eliminated Deus. It was he who broke the lines of the order at Vijidan-14.

And soon, it would be he who defeated the dreaded ‘Red Dragon’.

Grend let go of his connection and looked around his ship. The new W’Kar reproduction was operational. It took longer than expected to merge, almost four years for completion. In order to allow the unit time to compensate, and further testing, Amira and Venez convinced him to wait out bonding with it by another 3 years. Soon it would be ready though. Soon the vision Dibblis, he and the others had imagined so long ago would be realized.

The bonding process took some unexpected twists once completed. The unit itself had modified itself it seemed. Certain new modern technologies such as the Mark II technology had been rejected by the element. The Bio-Doubler system had failed to activate upon testing. Even the dual-mind structure he developed with the Reproduction 6 had been completely erased from the unit. Not a trace of that even existed anymore. This unit was no longer classified as W’Kar Reproduction 7, but had been reclassified as Unit-W Model-2, the second developed True W’Kar unit.

Taking a corner across from his bridge he lifted from the ground and floating to a towards an alcove that led into a hallway with a large door. It was securely locked with 8 three foot sections of powerful metal, 7 layers of different shielding, complete with tracing lasers and various other defenses. Here it is that he stored the Unit-W. Grend placed his hand on the door and traced a sign with his index finger while his unit began to contact the ship, allowing him entrance. The shielding began to come down and the massive walls began to slowly recede.

Grend stepped forward past the defense system and waved his hand through the air. The shimmer of shields lowering gleaned off of his control medal, as he could finally see the pedestal that held the Unit-W.

It was a deep blue hue with a large central orb that swirled a glowing red and blue color. That was the W’Kar Element Grend knew its natural undiluted, undamaged state. Not mixed with perverted energies, not weakening itself to out of date configurations, not corrupting the mind. No, pure and powerful, as it was meant to be.

A florescent blue light shone above Albass as she stood in front of the holo-phone. It glistened off of her battle suit with a wave of cerulean, it’s tiny flickering intensity making swirls and patterns on the wall as it reflected off.

Albass stood straight up, her back arched completely in a semi-circle while the image of Zass Tallas, the leader of the Yovkisher people, and Koll of the Q’Gongi looked upon her as well. Zass stood with his blue colored guyver armor on. Despite the expressionless face of the guyver his depression could be felt by those who knew him. Koll was as defiant as ever in his deep red armor. The face spikes of the Q’Gongi were armored in the unit, giving the heads of Q’Gongi guyvers a very frightening look.

“I will not accept our defeat so lightly, Albass. If you feel like being weak perhaps you should throw yourselves before Anubis on your knees!” He cried out slamming his hands on an invisible desk, or rail, or something before him. The sound of the crunch of metal could be heard by all three of them.

Albass’ eyes went wide in anger. ‘How dare he!’ she thought to herself.

Zass Tallas interrupted first. “You will keep your comments to yourself Koll, ever have the humans been our allies in this battle, especially Albass.”

Koll seemed annoyed at the comment as his head arched a bit towards Zass. The two of them rarely saw eye to eye. It was divine irony, Albass believed, that led her to be the last of the three leaders left with these two.

“Very well, Zass. Regardless, we need to come up with a plan. Either we attack, or we flee,” Koll said looking towards Zass Tallas.

Zass nodded and turned back to Albass. “Yes. So far our assaults on the order have done nothing but cause our own casualties. We had some good battles Albass, but I believe it is time we retreated for good.”

Albass nods, giving a stern look towards Koll. “Yes. But my question remains, where to?”

“Scouts have reported no activity in the Futwoin star system,” Koll adds in.

Zass nods. “Yes, but we must consider Futwoin’s location. It is far away from any of the Orders outposts, but not when Grend and what remains of the creators have been finished off by the Order. Futwoin is merely a delay, we need to go further.”

“We could travel to another galaxy, as numerous as they are it will be difficult for the Order to follow us. Cover our tracks with a few dummy ships and we should be able to evade them,” Albass suggests resting her hand on a rail.

“The amount of energy required for a TRANS hop across galaxy would be a problem. It will be difficult to get enough ships operational in sufficient time to get the proper distraction,” Zass adds, looking upward in thought.

Koll cracks his neck. “How much time do we have exactly?”

“The Order has taken Gossa, Tiul’apin, and Nerios-4. We have Nerios-1, Verid, and Mariposa left under our control. Nerios-1 has been seeing many hit and run attacks,” Albass says, pressing her finger upon a series of buttons that display an augmented reality display screen in front of her and the two images of the other council members. The display glows for a moment and displays the information concerning the planets. Zass looks upon Nerios-1 with a disappointing nod.

“We should order the immediate retreat of Nerios-1. The Order is already there, Baphomet is merely toying with us,” he says looking towards the other two.

Albass and Koll nod in unison.

“Agreed,” Koll says sternly. “What of Verid and Mariposa?”

“Mariposa is in greater danger of attack, it borders only half a parsec from the a reported Order attack on a creator fleet. We should check in and order it’s evacuation as well. Verid can wait until we have finished with Mariposa, it should not be in immediate danger. We have 16 hours to evacuate Mariposa, so let’s get started,” Zass orders.

Albass nods. “The Accolade is close enough, we should be able to get there and get most of the evacuees within ten.”

“My ships are already on their way, we will be there in 12 hours. Will it be enough?”

“It should.”

Zass nods. “Very well, I will see to the fake ships and also finish the contruction of six additional vessels we may use for final evacuation. The Yovkisher will secure the escape, you two must secure our people.”

Sweat poured down her brow as Sarah glanced over at Edward. The missing socket of his left eye seemed to be struggling to see her while he took his bearings of the beast that lay on the outside. An empty socket glaring out at her, like the sunken feeling in her chest that somehow knew oblivion was coming to sweep her away.

Sarah clenched her teeth as their eyes met. Weapons were slim, the beast was much, much faster than they were. High ground meant nothing to a beast capable of leaping a hundred feet straight up from a standing position. It’s skin was thick, and Sarah knew the beast had shields. Weaker than normal, but she also knew it would survive and be able to fight under a lot more than just a missing limb or two.

Her eyes instinctively went to the river ahead. It was full of bodies. It would retard it’s sense of smell.

Her nose twitched, she knew better. False hope to try and see if she could make it across 300 feet of open territory in front of a hunting beast and expect not to get noticed. No, this was not going to work. She had to fight, this was going to be a fight. It was live or die, predator and prey, and this time the prey could fight back. She would not lay down and be eaten like some wounded sheep as the wolf came, no. She felt that if she were to die, this beast would carry her name burned in it’s ass for the remainder of its days.

Edward held the particle bomb in his hand and pushed up, getting to his feet quietly. Sarah mimicked the maneuver. The two looked out. It was obvious that the creature was going to notice their departure. If they split up though, he could only go one way. This was basic training for the two of them. They both knew it. One had to be the bait. And only one of them had a ranged weapon.

Sarah silently prayed and kept her back to the side of the craft as she shimmied out the door. The beast, in the distance, began sniffing the air.

His face turned towards her and he cried out a growl that made her chest tighten, bellowing fire and blood all over the ground as it began to run, smashing it’s large two arms into the ground and towards her. Sarah ran, lifted the Rail Gun to her shoulder and fired her first shot.

The rail gun shot careened towards the Lycanlord and grazed across his shoulder breaking only a slight piece off of him. His shoulder jerked back at the force, spraying a quick stain of blood but not slowing down the behemoth a bit. He was far faster than any normal person and was closing on her so fast her blink seemed to send it careening even closer.

Before her she saw a giant piece of wreckage with a hole just her size, and dived in just as she felt the hot breath of the Lycanlord searing the back of her legs and the heat of it’s claws slicing only inches away from her calf as she dived through the hole head first.

She didn’t even have time to recover before flames of burning plasma were flashing overhead. Her hair caught light just as she rolled across the bottom of the floor. A claw lashed out towards her as her back slammed against the wall. She saw the beast attempting to break it’s way through the hole that was too small to fit it. She could see it’s head with that wolf like maw violently growling at her. Saliva and blood shot onto her face as she kept her head cocked just enough to avoid the slashing claw.

She knew that wall would not hold up to the strength of that monster for too much longer. She pulled the vibro-knife out of her belt and swung!

The blade swung right across the Lycanlords hand slicing two of his fingers off. The beast yanked his arm out of the hole and stared down at Sarah, making her blood run cold for a moment before letting out an enormous growl at her!

Sarah swung the rail gun into place and fired a shot directly at it’s face, blasting it right in the eyes and sending his head careening upwards breaking the ceiling. Though it did little to the beast but tear a large scratch, it’s blood shot all over the wall and slapped into her face.

She heard a callout then, “HEY, ASSHOLE! That’s right, over here!”

The beast let one large growl back at Sarah and fled from her sight. In a bit of shock, Sarah got up and looked out to the west where just as she did so the familiar blast of a particle bomb set off, and the welcome sight of a Lycanlord careening at high speed into the side of the craft hitting into it so hard that it tore through the hull section and rolled through the ship. She lost sight of it, but heard as it bashed in between the hull sections and up the hallway.

Sarah heard the creek of metal, and leaped out of her hole just as the craft began to fall down missing her leg by only a foot before slamming down on the ground and collapsing into the river sending a deluge of red water flowing over the ground.

As she stood up from the ground Edward held out his hand, she smiled and took it helping her to her feet. She saw the other particle bomb in his hand.

“It isn’t dead Lance Corporal,” he said immediately as Sarah turned to see the arm of the Lycanlord tear through the roof of the collapsed craft. A piece of it went soaring skywards and landed a few feet away from Sarah.

Both of their eyes went wide in fear as the Lycanlord pulled itself out and roared. It was as loud as any monster out of Sarah’s nightmare, and seemed to shake the ground itself. Sarah knew it was only her knees quivering, and the shortness of breath that followed. The beast was healing quickly and set it’s eyes to them.

Sarah and Edward bolted into action and spread out. The Lycanlord growled again angrily at the sight, and lept downward to chase Edward.

He let loose with a howl and dived into the river of blood. The Lycanlord leaped into the air and slammed down into the river with its feet first.

Sarah watched and turned to point her rail gun, but through the sight saw the Lycanlord lift Edward up by his leg and slam him into the shore line. The force of toss tore off his foot and sent the wounded man sailing across the dirt. Sarah quickly took her shots, blasting two rail rounds quickly at the beast. She hit it twice where it’s heart would be, breaking open a small hole that the beast seemingly ignored as it stomped towards Edward.

Sarah began running as fast as she could towards them and drew her particle bomb. The only one she had, and heaved it towards them. Edward watched as it occurred and pushed past the torment and rolled away with his broken arm.

Unfortunately the beast noticed it too. It looked down upon the bomb heading towards it and somewhere amongst it’s intellect made the decision to raise its energy and shield itself from the blast that knocked it two feet back just from force but otherwise left it unharmed. It slammed its massive fist into the ground and bellowed in anger. The orb on its head glowed for only a moment.

Edward saw it and reacted quickly, tossing his vibrational knife at the Lycanlord. It stabbed into its neck. Not enough to stop it, but enough to set the creatures aim off enough to only send the laser careening towards Sarah at her leg. It ripped through her calf, sending her stumbling to the ground. Her scream of pain set a smile on the Lycanlord as it turned it’s attention back to Edward, who promptly greeted it with two tossed particle bombs. His aim was right on, and both entered into the gaping wound left by Sarah’s rail gun.

Sarah swung her rail gun into place and took a shot at the surprised Lycanlord, striking it right in the temple. It sent the Lycanlord rolling to the ground and out of the way just as the two bombs exploded simultaneously, sending shards of the beast in all directions!

Sarah’s eyes went wide as she tried to stand up. Her calf was cut, and she was bleeding pretty bad. She reached down with the barrel of her gun and pressed it against the laser wound. The searing sound of cooked flesh hit her bad. Her teeth gritted, and she limped over to Edward. His foot was completely gone and blood loss was quickly getting to him. She rolled up his pants leg and quickly set the gun barrel against his severed nub. Edward cried out in horrible pain but slammed his hand against his mouth to keep quiet.

Sarah looked down at her broken comrade. He could not walk without something, and she knew a rib or two was broken. It was going to be a battle in and of itself to get going and make it there. But the smile on his face was enough to get her up to help him up and keep going.

It was exhausting. That long march across open terrain through fields of the dead and broken weaponry. It was not only her legs that felt it, but her heart. What could people like her do against such raw evil? It made her stomach churn.

Edward had helped her so far, and Sarah couldn’t help but be thankful. He was a cool glass of water in this desert of disease. An angel sent by some god that favored her. And for that she was grateful.

“What if the engines don’t start?” Edward said, breaking that momentary serenity.

Sarah clenched her teeth and shut her eyes. “They will,” she forced herself to say. She believed it, it had to.

The them the hours seemed to pass as days. Sarah’s leg was getting swollen, Edward was already vastly weakened from blood loss. She didn’t even know if he would make it the rest of the way there.

She looked up to the horizon to see the glimmer of a craft! Finally!

“Come on Edward, we’re almost there.” She said, as the two held each other and limped forward on.

She couldn’t describe the ecstasy this vision put her in. Only a little bit more. Even if she couldn’t get it started she could get a signal out to the Accolade. A hyperspace channel would give her a direct connection and she could tell them of what happened and what will come.

Edward laughed as they made there way to the nearly undamaged ship. A single section had a couple of large gashes, likely from laser fire. But these hulls were tough.

“What,” Sarah inquired?

Edward shakes his head. “Sorry. I just didn’t think we would make it.”

Sarah shook her head and smiled. Color had faded from his cheeks. She sealed the wounds but hopefully there was a first aid kit inside. Something to at least keep him alive for the journey. If she could get in contact with them they could TRANS them back.

Sarah pulled the latch on the large door and swung the craft open. Luck was on her side it seemed, the craft was intact!

Sarah reached down and helped pull Edward into the ship. Fire seemed to pour from her leg it was so painful, but she clenched her teeth and pulled. A moment later they were sitting in the transport section catching their breath.

“Hold still while I see if there is a medical kit,” she says wheezing. She braces up against the wall and begins pulling herself up to round the corner.

Just as she does so she hears a roar.

“Lance Corporal, we may have to belay that!” Edward says pointing out of the hatch.

Fear in her eyes Sarah looks and sees at least four Lycanlords slowly crawling up the hill. All of them were sniffing the ground. One snorted and bit at the other who snapped back at him with fierceness only present amongst such animals.

Sarah grabbed the door latch quickly and slammed it shut. “Come on!”

The two of them helped each other to the bridge quickly and Sarah quickly leapt into the Pilots seat.

“Main computer!?”

“Check,” Edward replied clicking on a screen.

“Main Thrusters!?”

“Check.”

“Navigation!?”

“Check.”

“Long Range Communcation!?”

“Down, ma’am.”

“Damnit!” she called out. Like the day could get any worse. “Fire up the computer and put it under my control!”

“Check… double check!” He called out as he flipped two switches.

Sarah silently prayed to herself once again. She grasped her hands over the helm and flipped a switch on the dash in front of her. The engines immediately fired to life as the main H.U.D lit up on the front window, outlining it in all the technical information she would need to pilot the craft. Quickly she took a quick glance at all of it. The energy cells were only at half, which was fine. With enough thrust she knew she could get the craft to coast with enough speed to coast most of the time and make it where she needed to get to. Long range communication was down, but not short range. Could she get in the same system as the Accolade or any ally ships she would be fine.

But right now she had bigger concerns. The H.U.D display displayed the four of them incoming at high speed. She immediately kicked her foot on the pedal to start up the take off engines, and almost immediately the ship began kicking up pounds of dust into the air and took off, blasting high into the atmosphere. On her H.U.D, Sarah saw the Lycanlords leap at her.

Three of them missed, and tumbled to the ground growling and howling. But one, at the peak of his liftoff, suddenly he grew a blue orb on his abdomen and shot up into flight!

“DAMN!” she called out again just as she felt the shaking of the ship. It sent her tumbling heavily to the left and throwing off her course. The banging continued for three more shots before the H.U.D began flashing red.

[EXTERNAL HULL TEMPATURE RISING TO DANGEROUS LEVELS]

The H.U.D then flashed up as she saw the image of the Lycanlord heavily breathing it’s plasma breath on the side of the ship.

Edward pressed a few buttons. “We’ve got about forty five seconds to lose him before we are breached! Can we shake him!”

Sarah shakes her head. “No, it’s claws are dug in too well. Grab the controls, send us at a straight ascent. Let’s see if he can handle the pressure while I try something!”

Edward nods. “Yes Ma’am!” He grabs ahold of the co-pilots helm and Sarah gets up and quickly limps her leg over to a small screen. It reads: [Dispose of Plasma waste {y/n}]

She hit’s a button.

[Warning: Currently within a planetary atmosphere. Disposal of waste can cause severe ecological damage. Are you sure you wish to continue. {y/n}]

Sarah almost chuckles. She hit’s a button.

Edward has gone into a fast ascent, so fast he can feel some pressure on his chest. The gravitational and environmental controls were flashing warnings, and the ships hull was heating even faster with that Lycanlord on it. He watched as Sarah came back to the Pilot seat just as the H.U.D screen displayed the image of four plasma dischargers getting rid of engine waste. One of them came up right into the Lycanlords face, who stopped breathing plasma onto the hull to take a growling look at it. Just as he did, it discharged over fifty pounds of burning waste right into his face causing the Lycanlord to immediately let go of the ship and fall down to the planet’s surface growling and screaming.

“YES!” Sarah called out gleefully as the sky broke way to the comforting coldness of the stars.

Shendal stared down at the unit in front of her in this vast laboratory. It was what was left of the Necro W’Kar unit, after Zagam ripped it off of Kenji and handed it over to Anubis. Acquiring it was no small task. Thankfully that matrix she discovered long ago after finding the remains of a section of the clan ship those two universes fought after was there. It gave her an edge in this universe where nothing of that technology existed.

But it was dying. She did not know exactly why or how, but the Matrix was dying. She first started realizing it when she pulled Yaksha and Alexandria here for testing. Immediately afterward it disappeared for over twelve hours to repair itself. From a simple teleportation none the less?

The tests with Yaksha gave her great insight into finding out how the Lycanlords worked. The process was horrific. Chronos at least had the decency to keep their subjects unconscious mostly. She found a strain of some kind of virus like organism inside of her, the same kind that was inside of the unadvanced ones. Yaksha though had a far higher concentration. When her blood was subjected to other living organisms the virus began to invade it, transforming it according to a highly logical set of programmed instructions. When introduced to a cloned house cat it transformed it into the heart of a Lycanlord. Shendal realized that the people themselves are not the needed component for Lycanlord creation. Zoaforms required living full beings, the Lycanlords only needed living tissue. That was why Anubis could make them out of nearly anything. He was a genius, from his madness. Even Shendal could admit that. Once the necessary mass was collected the introduction of Lycanlord blood, tainted with this virus, began collecting it and forming it into the Lycanlord we have all seen.

Yaksha’s blood was filled to the brim with these viruses. It would explain why she is capable of creating Lycanlords from a person. It also makes sense why they must consume so much if they are to remain alive. Without adding in the needed extra mass the Lycanlord simply falls apart and the virus cannot complete its cycles. Yaksha’s brain was vastly different. Likely the advanced Lycanlords are hand made by Anubis, crafting the form in which he desires.

But it did give one great benefit to Shendal. All viruses can potentially have cures. While that may mean very little to saving the people tortured and made into these beasts, it means with time she could find a way to kill them easily and quickly. Time she has spent, but not finished. These viruses are unlike anything she has ever seen, and anything her databanks and even those of the creator ships she has taken over the years have.

Could Anubis truly have created an unstoppable monster? She could not believe such rubbish. All things have a weakness, but you have to find it.

She let Yaksha go. Not because she did not want to kill W’Kars wife, nor because she felt it better to destroy that which could kill thousands. She let her go because she knew that if dead the order would eventually track her down here.

Alexandria, though, that was pity. Shendal found out so little about her that it boggled even her mind. Shendal scanned her brain waves only to find none, which was impossible. Then she attempted to get a DNA sample, which came to different test results every time. She was complex.

It came to a point where Shendal had to make a decision. She let Alexandria go too. The memories were wiped away from them, and the two of them were sent back. A false memory of a creator kidnapping was instead implanted, and Shendal had the Lilis destroy a two small ships and plant evidence so that the story would prove positive.

The Matrix was still being used by her. She had utilized in removing Temporal W’Kars unit and brining it back to her. Philip, good man that he was, was no longer. Sentiment would only stand in her way. But that was the last thing she had utilized it for. And as of yet, the Matrix had yet to be able to activate. She could only guess that the same event that caused the multidimensional breech had caused more damage to it than she could knew.

“Shendal, what’s wrong?” a voice called out behind her.

Shendal blinked, lost in thought as she was, and turned around. She saw the large form of Jarrod looking down at her. His short brown hair and brown eyes were a welcome sight after so much bio-material and mathematics.

“Nothing, sorry. Just lost in thought,” she replied.

Jarrod nodded. “It’s alright. So, how is it going with the third?”

Shendal sighed. “Repairs are almost complete. I had to reroute the second crossover to help initiate the…” she stopped when she heard him sigh. Shendal smiled. “Sorry, I’m rambling again. I had to do some modifications to allow the new power system to work in it. But I managed to use the damaged pieces to add to the ship.”

He laughs. “Oh, see that I understand.” They both share a laugh and Jarrod reaches down to massage her shoulders.

“What about the second and the sixth?”

Shendal sighs. “The second cannot be repaired. The removal destroyed most of the control medal’s system. I’d have to remake the control medal and since I don’t have the original data I cannot. I’ve decided to utilize it for the ship.”

Jarrod nods. “And the sixth?”

Shendal leans back to look him up in the face. She smiles. “The Bio Control System is almost finished downloading Sho’s DNA into the ships databanks.”

Jarrod smiles. “So, it won’t be long now.”

“No.”

Jarrod nods. “I’ve been thinking though, about a name change?”

Shendal looks at him with a curious look. “Why?”

Jarrod’s face contorts a bit. “They all know my brothers name. If I am to go back after we are done, will it not be better if I didn’t have it?”

Shendal thought for a moment, then nodded. “Yes, it would.”

“Any changes in that?”

Shendal shook her head. “No, we still have not found him.”

“And your sure he survived?”

Shendal laughed. “You did, didn’t you? So did everything from that event.”

“I suppose your right,” he says squeezing a little harder into her shoulders. The two of them looked into each others eyes and smiled before Jarrod managed to pry her away to bed.

Sarah had just finished patching up and giving a strong vitamin injection to Edward when the engine had hit full throttle and cut, giving her a slow coasting back to where the Accolade was. It was a long and perilous journey, but the two of them had made it. Together they did what may have been the most unlikely battle possible, and escaped what could be considered the inescapable.

She knew she could count on Edward, a true friend.

He sat in the back resting his nerves. “So, how long will the trip be?”

She smiled. “Thirty six hours according to the computer.”

“That’s good. Gives us time to rest,” he says leaning back.

Sarah laughs a little, first time in awhile. It felt good. She gets up and turns around to the pilots seat.

“I’m glad we made it out of there. But we have a lot to worry about. I overheard the order saying they were heading to the Tidus Quadrant. Last reports place the Accolade there so we need to hurry.”

“You know, I’m very glad I chose you,” she heard behind her. It sounded so cold, and distant. Not like Edward at all. Her heart skipped a beat as she looked into the reflection of the on screen viewer and saw the Dark Knight Zagam standing there in his human form, right where Edward would have been.

The image of his sharpened smile and obsidian eyes were the last things Sarah remembered before her world turned to darkness.