Nova War

'Stay very still,' said a voice from behind his shoulder.

He'd started struggling with his two guards, desperate to flee to some small, safe dark corner where he could hide from big, angry-looking monsters. Somewhere in his panic he'd realized there was a tiny figure perched on top of the monster, but that observation didn't make him any less terrified.

He managed to twist around to see who had spoken, despite the firm grip the two guards still had on him. Honeydew was standing directly behind him, staring past Corso towards the monster. He turned back and watched as it came stamping to within a few metres of them before finally, mercifully, coming to a halt.

Corso found himself confronted by a vast, dripping maw, flanked by twin in-curving tusks. A spiked carapace encompassed the upper body of the monster, which looked capable of skewering a Tyra

He nearly dislocated one of his shoulders trying to pull himself free. If Honeydew was trying to scare the total crap out of him, he was doing a fantastic job.

After several seconds of this unwanted attention, the monster did the same to each of the two guards, the long, wet feelers playing across their upper torsos. Then the monster took a step backward, the deck vibrating under the broad stumps that were its four legs.

Corso now had a better view of the diminutive figure perched high on the monster's back, and seated just behind the broad expanse of its skull. It looked tiny and helpless, but clearly possessed some close relationship with the creature it sat atop. It was covered in a fine fuzz of hair the same colour as its mount, and it similarly sported a rope of facial tentacles. Its eyes appeared like small pink dots, and it slumped across the monster's back as if resting after a hard day's toil. When those eyes briefly settled on Corso, he had the feeling there was little or no intelligence behind them.

'This is Emissary KaTiKiAn-Sha,' Honeydew muttered into Corso's ear.

'What?' Corso gasped. 'Which one?'

'The unpleasantly large one,' Honeydew replied quietly. 'The smaller one is its mate, the male of the species. Please, be polite when you answer her questions. Our lives are in danger.'

'Your lives?' Corso hissed, his voice cracking. 'What the hell do you want from me?'

'Answer the Emissary's questions,' Honeydew replied, his electronic voice still pitched low. 'And, please, be very, very, very polite.'

The hell you say, Corso almost replied, then realized to his horror that Honeydew was just as scared as he was.

The Emissary mount reached up, with its multi-fingered trunk, to what Corso had at first taken to be a saddle of sorts strapped to its back, just behind its pink-eyed mate. It retrieved a large and bulky microphone that looked distinctly primitive in comparison with the spacecraft the Emissary had recently emerged from. The microphone disappeared quickly beneath the tentacles.

A moment later a crackling roar filled the vast empty space of the bay, before suddenly dropping in volume; but the monstrous baying continued as a savage, guttural howl emerging from the Emissary's mouth, hidden behind its tentacles.

'You!' an electronic voice bellowed over the monster's roar, this simultaneous translation reverberating, too, from the bay's distant walls. 'I am Emissary! Of great anger and volume! We bring salvation! And light! I ride with my lover to find God! Tell me! Where. Is God!'

The Emissary paused, and then Corso realized it was asking him a direct question. Its massive, boulder-sized head had swivelled to stare straight at him with huge, angry eyes.

'I… what?' Corso replied weakly.

'Answer,' Honeydew urged quietly from behind.

In the grasp of his guards, Corso twisted to stare at the Bandati agent incredulously.

'Please,' Honeydew whispered.

'I… I don't know what it wants me to say'

What happened next was something that would fuel Corso's nightmares for the rest of his life.

The Emissary took a step forward and, reaching out with its knotted tentacles, grabbed one of the two Bandati guards, effortlessly lifting him into the air. The guard struggled desperately, and Corso tensed, ready to make a break for it.

'Lucas.' It was Honeydew, still behind him. 'Believe me when I say she can run much faster than you. Just answer her question.'

The Emissary then took a half-step back, and ripped the struggling warrior's head from his shoulders in one swift movement. Corso gaped, appalled, as the head hit the deck and rolled to a halt some distance away. The torso was dropped at Corso's feet a second later.

Dark, wine-coloured blood spilled around his feet.

Honeydew's voice was clear in Corso's ear. 'Please answer, Lucas, or we are all dead. She might not kill anyone else if she finds your answer satisfactory'

The little bastard's hiding behind me, Corso realized, as he stared up at the Emissary.

He opened his mouth, but at first he couldn't get anything out. All he could do was stare at the headless corpse slumped at his feet.

'I… I…' He cleared his throat and started again. 'I… God is… here?' he finally stammered, improvising.

The Emissary stared down at him. 'God? Is here?'

'I… I suppose he might,' Corso mumbled, completely terrified.

The Emissary reared back to peer over Corso's head. 'You have God's ship?' she demanded.

This time, Honeydew stepped forward and himself addressed the Emissary.

'We have docked within your own vessel and request that you deliver us to God's ship. Our computers are now supplying you with the necessary coordinates, indicating that the ship is located in a neighbouring system. Once we get there, we will be able to make a full demonstration of our discoveries. This one,' he turned to look pointedly at Corso, 'has discovered a way of accessing its data stacks which, as you now know, is something that eluded us for a long time.'

Corso once again found himself the object of the visitor's unwelcome attention. Its tentacles once again began slithering across Corso's face and shoulders, and he found himself once more staring directly into its terrible black maw, whose fetid stench was almost more than he could bear.

'If you fail to reveal God's message to us, you will die!' it screeched. 'Should I kill more to make my point clear?'

Something wrenched at Corso from behind and he stumbled backwards. Honeydew and the surviving guard had pulled him away from the Emissary. 'Tell her that will not be necessary,' Honeydew said.

'It won't be necessary,' Corso stammered.

'We will go to God's ship immediately!' the Emissary cried, stomping backwards about a metre and turning as it did so.

In the distance, a panel slid open in the surface of the crystalline spaceship from which the Emissary had emerged. They watched as the enormous creature finally retreated back inside her ship.

If not for the firm grip the two Bandati still had on him, Corso would have crumpled to the deck. But after several moments their grip relaxed, and neither made any move to stop him as he turned and walked stiffly away from the still-expanding pool of blood.

Corso didn't get more than a couple of metres before he dropped to his knees and vomited noisily onto the deck. Once he'd finished, he reached up with one shaking hand and used his sleeve to wipe his mouth before standing once more.

'The Emissaries are very impatient,' Honeydew informed him, 'and, therefore, difficult to deal with.'

Corso nearly started to laugh, but choked instead. Understatement of the century. 'What the hell was that thing?' he demanded angrily. 'And why, in the name of hell, did you feel the need to put me through that performance?'