The Space Between Life and Death

“We know the H-bomb is on Gaastrosie. We know that you were sent to plant and detonate it. We know that you don’t care about killing civilians. We’ve successfully disabled the main detonator but it didn’t disable the bomb. Now, you have two choices. One is to tell us the location of the second detonator and rot in prison in one piece. The other choice is to not tell us and have us beat it out of you and you die a slow and painful death,” Aevar threatened in a frighteningly calm voice. The four members of Task Force Titanium were standing around the slimy, barf-green, foul-smelling thohnod who was tied to a chair in the center of the small, dimly lit room.

“No,” replied the thohnod in a rough, thick accent. A smile appeared on his slimy face, a smile of… pride, was it?

“What’re you looking so khigging proud for? Millions could die if it goes off!” Ashr cried, losing his cool and throwing a punch at the tied-up terrorist. “Where the khig is it?”

They were running out of time; it could be hours, minutes, or even seconds before the bomb went off. The walls of the black site interrogation room seemed to close in and Ashr felt beads of sweat forming on his forehead. Ashr’s eyes flashed blue. He punched the thohnod again, this time breaking the skin. The thohnod’s head jolted to the side from the impact; he adjusted his position as much as he could, which was not very since he was tied to a chair. He spat out blood and it sprayed across the wall. The green liquid sizzled as if it were boiling water. The wound healed itself and became nothing more than another line of scales on the thohnod’s face.

Unnoticed to anyone in the room, the punch had caused a small electric sizzling sound in the thohnod’s mouth.

“You are right. Millions of Gaatrosians will die and the radiation will kill many more!” the thohnod laughed. “The men, women, and children!”

“You sick karvak!” Captain Aevar yelled, unsheathing his Vibroknife and placing the rapidly vibrating blade dangerously close to the thohnods’ throat.

“No Captain, we need him alive,” reminded Private Vruul, placing a hand on Aevar’s shoulder. Vruul led his commanding officer toward the back of the room. 

“Yeah, you need me alive,” sneered the thohnod. “I am the second detonator.”

The thohnod then simply smiled, revealing a suicide explosive chip implanted where one of his fangs should have been. The damage it could cause was catastrophic. Captain Aevar Grald and Lieutenant Ashr Wilm noticed the chip, simultaneously. 

“Get down!” Aevar yelled as Ashr leaped on the terrorist.

The terrorist bit down on the chip and the bomb went off. The other members of Task Force Titanium dove for cover. There was an earsplitting boom and a blinding flash of light. Smoke filled the room and created a haze, too thick to look through. The smoke eventually cleared and they saw that the blast only took the lives of the thohnod terrorist and Ashr. Had the chip not been damaged from Ashr’s punch, the H-bomb would also have been detonated. The shard of a cosmic dragon egg that Ashr would always carry around, lay next to him; it had fallen out of his pocket and shined through the smoke and dust.

There was a silence.

“Does he have a next of kin?” Vruul asked after a while.

“He has a son,” Aevar replied, trying to keep a stoic, emotionless demeanor. “The kid’s two years old and lives on Xeria. He’s an orphan now.”

“Khig.”

“Yeah, and it’s my fault.”

“At least he’ll have the government stipend, right?”

  His stoic demeanor fell away and his face contorted.

Aevar kicked the wall and let out a scream. Ashr had been his responsibility. 

Either way, it was done. Lieutenant Ashr Wilm had died, shielding his team and a planet full of innocent civilians from the blast.

⋆⋆⋆

The thohnod’s name was Timiriv or Timi for short. A rather unique name for a thohnod, much unlike his brother’s name Revilo, which was a very common name for a thohnod to have. However, the thohnod culture was not one to shame one for their differences. Quirks were seen as gifts that either had or hadn’t revealed themselves yet. A very accepting culture, really. 

Timi’s funeral was one of many that occured at the local cemetery just that day. The war brought more death and destruction than the galaxy had ever witnessed; war takes lives on both sides. Timi’s family wasn’t poor, but they weren’t rich, either. They lived in a cozy home on the outskirts of a small town called Shrukus. Therefore, they were able to afford a traditional thohnod funeral for Timi. 

The cemetery was lined with rows upon rows of eternal flames lit in memorial of the fallen. There were puddles of grayish water sunken into the muddy pasty ground. Revilo trudged his previously-polished-now-mud-splattered military boots through the mud. He couldn’t feel the muddy water seeping into his socks or the light mosquitos swarming about his legs, landing on them periodically to suck blood. Revilo, along with his parents, navigated his way through the luminegryft fruit trees that lit the cemetery with their pods of light glowing through the gray mist. Chilly zephyrs swept through the cemetery one after another, making the memorial flames waver back and forth like the grishrays his grandfather farmed. 

“We’re here.” Revilo’s father stabbed the plasma torchstaff in the mud.

They stood in front of a nest, the nest that Timi was born in. It sat there, a round white sphere of twigs and branches, looping around and under each other like ribbons. Revilo’s mother knelt down, stretched out her trembling hand, and placed what was left of Timi’s egg into the nest. 

“Nez zua sitv gusiwis op qiedi,” Revilo’s father started to chant. Revilo and his mother joined in. 

They brought the torchstaff to the nest and burned it.

Odysseus Ashr Wilm lived alone in a small apartment located in the east part of the city. He had messy dark brown hair and was slightly taller than average. He was rather lean, and thanks to his docrorian biology, his high metabolism converted most of his fat into energy and muscle. His biology also made him genetically smart but he himself wasn’t brilliant or anything due to not having had a good learning environment for most of his childhood. He was smart enough to get by though, and that was all he needed. 

He didn’t have much but it was enough to survive off of. He lived in a rather small apartment that he had received via a government stipend after the death of his father. However, he wasn’t overly unhappy about his situation. At least he had a roof over his head. The streets of Xeria were littered with people living on the streets, begging for scraps of food and the occasional blanket. There were the native xerians of course but also other species including the vilaraans, llarthals, chuls…

He lay flat on his back on top of his bed with both hands on the back of his head. The NEBULA exam was today. He hoped Kir would get a good score. It didn’t matter much to him if he did well on the test or not. He wouldn’t get a great job anyway. He was an orphan, the last alive out of five siblings, stuck in an apartment in the dark pocket of a planet tucked away in an unnoticeably small corner of the galaxy. Even the kids who came from affluent families would immigrate to the core planets for employment propositions. Kir was all he cared about. She deserved a good life and he only hoped she would get it; although, she was an orphan as well so her future wasn’t exactly fortuitous either. After the war broke out, all the funding went to national defense and little was allocated to social services.

His mind then drifted to what he hoped would be his future. Traveling the galaxy, fighting the thohnods, protecting the people of the Galactic Treaty Organization had been his dream since he was little. He closed his eyes and thought of speeding through the stars in a Protonspeeder. The balls of burning gas would flash by his windshield and back behind him. He would blast a few asteroids into smithereens just for the hell of it. Free. He’d be free...

His train of thought was interrupted by the annoying beeping of his alarm clock. It screeched “0600! 0600! 0600!” over and over until Odysseus dropped his hand onto the snooze button, returning his room to its previous silent state. He swung his legs off of the bed and pulled himself up so that he was sitting on the edge of his bed. He quickly grabbed a container of “Minimal Food”, a smoothie of sorts with only the necessary amount of protein, fat, nutrients, and so on. He slurped it down while reciting the properties of Afthartasium in his head. He shoved his lucky dragon eggshell in his pocket while trying to remember the lightspeed routes that lead to the Sanguis Nebia Galaxy. He then gripped his backpack up and hoisted it up and leveled it on his shoulders. 

He rushed out the door trying to remember when the war against thohnods began. He ran out the door and slammed it behind him. He sprinted to the railings of the stairs and vaulted down to the next flight. He shoved his universal language translator into his right ear. He burst through the front doors of the building and jumped over a sleeping chul, almost stepping on her tentacles. He yelled a quick “Sorry!” but she was still fast asleep. He dodged a large metal pole and skidded to a halt at the hover bus station. 

“Almost late again, eh Odysseus?” the bus pilot greeted gruffly.

“Sorry Jagx,” Odysseus replied. “Almost trampled an old chul lady to death on the way over here.”

“Happens to the best of us,” Jagx replied, taking a bite out of his frozen Minimal Food rations.

Odysseus nodded and headed to the back of the bus. He spotted a leg trying to trip him on his way back. He stepped on the foot and heard a yelp as he continued back. Out of the dreary, tired, acquiesced faces that he saw, one stood out. The face had a big smile stretched across it. The characteristically pink-haired nihizien who the face belonged to waved at him. Her friendly bright green eyes looked at him and he smiled. Kir. He felt his face light up as he sat down next to her.

“Hey Kir,” Odysseus said. “NEBULA exam’s today.”

“I know, I’m so nervous,” Kir rambled. “I’m not sure if I’m going to do well and I really want to become a general in the Cosmos Corps and that’s been my dream ever since I was little but I don’t know if I’ll be good enough and—.”

Odysseus took her hands and looked her in the eyes. 

“Kirya. You’re going to do great. I believe in you. You’re the smartest person I know. I think—no, I know you’re gonna ace the exam,” he said.

“Thanks,” Kir said, her breathing slowing down to a normal pace. “You’re gonna do great, too. Just remember that you are smart. So use that big brain of yours. Ok, Ody?”

“Yeah alright. Thanks,” Odysseus replied sheepishly.

As they continued talking, the bus continued its way to Xeria High School District 72. The bus soon slowed down in front of a two-story gray building. There was a hiss as the bus lowered to the ground. Jagx pressed a button on his control panel and the doors slid open.

“A’ight everyone, good luck on your tests! All of you are gonna need it,” Jagx yelled before laughing at his own joke.

Odysseus and Kirya stood from their seats and got into the heavily unorganized line of jumbled students trying to get off the bus. Eventually, Odysseus was at the front of the line and leaped off the bus. Kirya followed and they walked toward one of the teachers to get their room assignments for the test.

“Odysseus, head over to room 3 of hall 22,” Mrs. Scis read off of a roster. “Kirya, you are to take it in room 2 of hall 22. You guys both have Mr. Gaerry as your proctor.”

“Mr. Gaerry? But he hates kids!” Kirya blurted out.

“Yes, sorry,” Mrs. Scis said, wincing a little. “Well, at least he’s not Ms. Rubrov.”

And with that, they had the second-worst proctor in the entire school proctoring them for a test that could determine the rest of their lives.

⋆⋆⋆

“Mom! Dad! Xjisi esi zua!?” Revilo yelled: Where are you?

The sporadic and spontaneous yet ubiquitous and simply utter destruction of everything across the landscape, the fire engulfing everything from small huts to people, helplessly crawling away from the devastation, could mean only one thing. Hypersensitive bombs. Banned by the UGTO Rights Division, used by the UGTO military anyway. Hydrogen bombs with electromagnetic pulses that exploded from anything— even the slight brush of a feather of a bird that wouldn’t see its feathers feather ever again. These bombs would sometimes be set off by the shockwaves of the explosions of other bombs, causing massive chain reactions, taking the lives of both the droppers and receivers of the bombs. 

He jogged through what was left of the village, doing his best to dodge the chaos falling around him, yelling for his parents. He noticed two little kids, a boy and a girl, twins probably, tugging at an arm sticking out from a pile of rubble. They were no older than he was when he saw his brother for the last time before his last deployment.

Revilo changed course and ran over to the twins. He squatted down, placed his shoulders under the rubble, and lifted a large chunk of debris off of the arm. He grunted as he threw the rubble to the side. As he rolled back his shoulders he saw six bombs in a beeline toward him and the kids. Acting more on instinct than thought, Revilo swung out his pistol, lined up the sights with the bombs, and fired at them. Nothing else existed; he saw nothing but a threat to the kids who had already lost so much. So much. He fired a single bullet at the lead bomb and watched as it tore through the bomb as an explosion simultaneously caused A layer of smoke engulfed his field of vision and as it all cleared up, he saw the girl with her head buried into a gruesome body, crying, weeping, for him to get up again. That he couldn’t die. That she needed him. Her weeping eventually quieted down to silent sobs, but the sound of her weeps seemed to still echo through the ruined village.

The boy didn’t cry, not at first; he stood there for a minute, his mouth agape, before falling down on his knees. Then tears started to fall from the corners of his eyes, one by one. He eventually regained movement and crawled over to his sister and hugged her. 

They cried together silently.

⋆⋆⋆

Revilo stood; there was nothing he could do. The rest of their lives would be much harder than before today. He dropped the rest of his military ration packages and some units on the ground before them. 

“Upma yti vji nupia op inihipdat,” Revilo advised before resuming running toward where he used to live: Only use the money in emergencies.

He saw an old man tugging along a sack of porridge only that on closer examination turned out to be his leg that had been beaten; the raindrops of explosions pattered all around him. While there weren’t as many adult thohnods still alive, the ones who were were helping the children save buried loved ones, trying to save buried loved ones of their own. Revilo saw an adult thohnod on his knees, holding his son’s lifeless body in his arms, sobbing into his chest. A thohnod shaking the body of her lover, begging for him to wake up. 

Revilo ran faster.

Their hut sat in the middle of a field of burned crops and under a sky of gray as thick as porridge. It looked as if someone with a really bad twitch tried to cut a cake diagonally. The wooden beams that held up parts of it were lying on the ground, snapped in half, thirds, and even fourths. There were tongues of fire everywhere, reaching up at him, trying to grab him and pull him down; chunks of cement were thrown about, pieces of rebar sticking out of them like spears. Revilo felt the shockwaves from the bombs shake the ground and travel up his legs and body. Revilo vaulted over the pieces of wall and roof in his way. He shoved a piece of debris out of the way and let it fall on the ground. As he continued to lift and throw debris off of the pile that was his home, yelling for his parents. Would he find them like he found the twins’ parents? Would he find them at all?

He kept at it. Digging and digging as the bombs whistled all around him. The gales seemed to whisper in his ears, taunting him. The skin on his fingers started to crack and bleed, sweat pouring from his forehead. The skin wouldn’t heal; the scars would soon be covered by scales. He stood and yelled in frustration. And again. He howled. He resumed his digging. The intense battering of the bombs hitting the ground seemed to fade away as he kept digging. 

Did Revilo ever find his parents under all the rubble? No. But I can assure you, they were dead. 

One could suppose that the universe thought this was as good of a time as any to make Revilo’s life considerably worse. This time, preoccupied by the will, the need, to search for his parents, Revilo never heard the shell coming. The volatile war crime that decimated what was left of his old life.

Odysseus and Kirya walked through the halls, talking to each other about what they would do after the end of that year. It is a strange thing, thinking about one’s future, especially when one is right in front of it. There is a sense of uncertainty, and depending on the type of person you are, a sense of anticipation or even excitement. 

Soon, they found themselves in hall 22 in front of rooms 2 and 3. Kirya touched her lips to Odyseus’ and waited a few seconds before pulling back.

“For good luck,” she said quickly before disappearing behind the door.

“For good luck,” Odysseus repeated to himself. “Alright then, let’s do this khigging thing.”

He opened the door and stepped inside. A hologram of Mr. Gaerry was pacing at the front of the room. Odysseus walked over to an empty chair next to the window and plopped down on his seat. He shifted the weight of his backpack off his shoulders and dropped it on the ground next to him. 

The hologram of Mr. Gaerry stopped pacing.

“Okay,” he started. “As you disappointments know, today is the day of the NEBULA exams. The Neo-galactic Employment Bureau Ubiquitous Labor Aptitude exam is the most important exam of your lives. IF you cheat, you will be immediately disqualified and have the fact that you were cheating recorded on your record instead of a score. Let’s be real, that’s gonna mean that you will spend the rest of your life shifting around space debris from an asteroid field to a trash planet so just don’t khigging cheat. 

“The test will be broken into a vat ton of parts including geology, physics, psychology, biology, anatomy, history, basic mathematics/algebra, statistics, language arts, engineering, coding/computer sciences, economics, government, a few essays, chemistry, trigonometry, calculus, geometry, few language tests, you get the point. Then there’s gonna be a physical test, where you bundles of shame get to embarrass yourselves at your physical capabilities right after you’ve almost pissed yourselves during the intellect portion. The physical portion will include swimming, running, parkour, a number of pushups and situps, combat situation simulations, hand-to-hand combat, a randomly picked surgery, pilot simulator, for those eligible, a flight test, and the final test will be to evade capture from your proctors for one day. Cheating in this portion will automatically nullify whatever score you earned in the intellect portion. If you suck at something, don’t lie about it. Alright is everyone ready? Who cares. Start now.”

And so it began. The intellectual portion of the test was projected as a hologram from his comp-desk. He ignored the sticky-note on his desk that said “Haha you’re gonna do terrible! - Mr. Gaerry.” after briefly wondering if Mr. Gaerry had put one on every desk or had just predicted his seat.

The mathematics portion was rather simple. He breezed past the algebra, calculus, and geometry portions. Answering those questions was simple enough; all one had to do was remember the rules and formulas and insert the variables. Do a bit of solving and that was that. Then he had to move on to the geology portion. These questions were doable as well, although he was thankful he had studied the months before because otherwise he wasn’t sure he would’ve gotten some of them. 

Partially due to an adrenaline rush in the rhenesian biology section, Odysseus was able to finish with barely enough time to feverishly look over all of his answers. The hologram of the test disappeared just as he was finishing reviewing his last question.

He was worn out from that. He had been sitting for 12 hours, finishing the most difficult test in the galaxy while his proctor walked into the room at random intervals and threw pencils at the students (to “jog the three brain cells you have.”) His brain felt like a scrambled egg and he yawned the largest yawn he had ever yawned. He took out a Minimal Food rations package and tore it open, eating the semi-melted flavorless cube at his desk. 

“Alright failures, listen up! If I had it my way, you would have the physical test right after this so that more of you would fail but unfortunately, you guys get a break. I’m obligated to tell you that you get to go home. Now go and try to guess how much you failed. Then remember that tomorrow will be the most grueling day of your lives. Try sleeping with that thought,” informed Mr. Gaerry’s hologram. “I’d go in there and congratulate you guys myself except I really don’t want to nor do I think that you guys deserve it. Bye.”

And with that, the hologram disappeared and the exhausted students trudged out of room 3, hall 22.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus stepped out of the building and breathed in the semi-fresh air of Xeria’s atmosphere. Xeria’s atmosphere was made up of mostly hydrogen sulfide so there was always a foul stench in the atmosphere, resembling that of an exposed sewage pipe. 

Odysseus stepped onto the bus and sat down toward the middle of the bus. He laid his head on the window of the bus and sighed. It had been a long day and he was incredibly tired. He felt his eyelids growing heavier and his brain hazier. He had almost fallen asleep when Kirya, also looking extremely worn-out, plopped down next to him. 

“Well, at least we don’t need to ever take that test again,” Kirya said, trying to find a silver lining.

“But we still have to do the physical exam tomorrow!” Odysseus whined.

“I don’t think I can do worse on that than I did on the intellectual portion,” Kirya said, half-jokingly. 

“Ugh, this sucks! This is complete vat and I hate it!” Odysseus cried, throwing his hands into the air and letting them fall back onto the bus seat.

“Well, there isn’t much we can do, right?” Kirya asked.

“I guess. Just promise to remember me when you’re famous,” Odysseus said.

“No, I won't. I've forgotten you already.”

They both laughed and as they continued to talk, the bus continued on its way, stopping occasionally to drop off students at their homes. The bus soon stopped again. It was hovering right outside Odysseus’s apartment. Odysseus stood, said goodbye to Kirya, and walked out of the bus. He hopped to the pavement down below and walked toward the front doors of the apartment building. He saw the old Chul woman who was sitting with her back leaning against the wall of the building and her hat down in front of her. She didn’t seem to recognize him from earlier but Odysseus still felt bad and dropped a few coins in her hat. 

Odysseus took the elevator this time and got off at this floor. He walked to his apartment and collapsed on the bed, not even bothering to change. Why did tests have to exist!? He felt worn out and tired. He felt his eyelids getting heavier, and as he drifted off to sleep, his mind drifted as well to how well he could have done, the part about how many parsecs were between the Difiji system and the Trartesian system he had most definitely missed and how low of a score he probably got. What would he do with his life if he got a good score? His eyes were fully closed now and he fell asleep; dreams of saving the galaxy, destroying the thohnods, and becoming a hero circled through his mind.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus started the physical test before he had even gotten to school. Odysseus had had to run to school because the school decided that, as part of the test, they would cancel all the buses, forcing the students to arrive on foot. If they were late, they would get points marked off. Just a great and encouraging incentive for the kids, right off the bat.

The entire field had been converted into an insane mess of equipment for the physical exam. There were multiple swimming pools, tracks for running, parkour courses, injured people lying on metal operating tables, combat situation simulations, hand-to-hand combat bots, and an aerial obstacle course for flight tests, made exclusively for species with wings. George looked around the field and started to panic. There was no way he would pass the test. He felt surges of adrenaline coursing through his body just from looking at it. Beads of sweat formed at his forehead and he felt his heart beating faster and faster. How the khig was he supposed to pass this thing? Odysseus took a few deep breaths and started looking for the table where they were handing out test waivers.

Odysseus saw a large group of students, lined up in front of a table and figured that was the one. One of the other students in line saw Odysseus and started waving furiously. Odysseus smiled to himself and jogged over to his place in line.

“Come on dude, I saved you a spot,” yelled Koltn. 

“Hey Koltn,” Odysseus said approaching Koltn’s spot in line. He slid right in front of a large crythoterian. The crythoterian’s wide nostrils flared and the veins on his horns glowed a dark magenta color. 

“You cud in frond ov me. I’mb gonna ead you,” huffed the crythoterian in a thick accent before opening his large maw and attempting to take a bite out of Odysseus. Odysseus dodged the bite and Kotln sent his fist flying into the crythoterian’s face.

The crythoterian stumbled back before giving two final flares of his nostrils and bulging his horn veins even more before turning around, his back toward them. Odysseus and Kotln figured that this was the end of the fight so they too, turned their backs to the crythoterian.

“Dude good luck on the swimming test man. It must be hard, only having lungs and regular legs,” teased Kotln, casually bringing one blue hand into Odysseus’s view and spreading his fingers apart, making the webbing in between Kotln’s fingers very visible. Kotln then turned his head to show off his gills, opening and closing them repeatedly.

“Ahhh that’s so unfair!” Odysseus exclaimed, half-jokingly.

“Dude compared to Dongoo, this is completely fair.”

“He has literal wings. It’s the most unfair thing ever.”

“Dude all Dongoo has to do for the running test is spread his wings a little and that’ll give him a huge boost!”

Odysseus kicked a pebble into a nearby rain puddle.

“Yeah and for the part where you have to hide from the proctors for 2 days, all he has to do is hover up high somewhere,” Odysseus complained. “While the rest of us have to bribe old people into hiding us in their homes.”

“Shamefully unfair dude.”

“Yeah but your thing still will give you a giant boost in the swim test.”

“I mean c'mon dude. You’ll totally beat my score in the running test and parkour test. Plus, it’s not like I’m the only one with a swim test advantage; Taer is a Chul so he’s got like tentacles and everything. That’s way more helpful.”

“Whatever man.”

The two kept talking and the line grew shorter and shorter. Odysseus and Kotln were soon face to face with their section proctor. 

“Bands!” demanded the android at the desk without looking up. 

Odysseus and Kotln put their paper wristbands under the android’s scanner and waited for the beep before pulling their wrists out. The barcode on the wrist band had been lasered off, leaving an empty, burned patch where the barcode used to be. The android then scanned both of them for any tools or weapons that would help them in their test.

“Next!” called the android as Odysseus and Koltn walked away.

“Well I’m going to start with the swim test so I’ll see you later,” Kotln said before waddling off to the pool.

Odysseus waved to his friend and then decided to start with the running test. He hopped onto one of the treadmills and placed his thumb on the start button. A small needle dug itself through his skin and collected a small sample of blood. A message popped on the screen that said “Hello Odysseus Ashr Wilm. Welcome to the running test. The intensity of the test will increase the more it calculates that you will be able to match it. Eventually, the test will sense that you have reached your threshold for running. The further and faster you run after the threshold, the more points you accumulate along with passing the test. This test will test your pacing, speed, and endurance. Good luck.” Under the message was a “Start Test” button. He touched his finger to it and the treadmill started to move. The message was right: the more Odysseus seemed to run, the faster the treadmill got. It never got slower, only faster. Odysseus started to sweat but kept running. The test was designed to push him past his limits. He kept running faster and faster and his heartbeat rose as well. He could feel it pounding in his chest and his lungs working furiously to grasp just a bit of oxygen from the atmosphere. Eventually, the test apparently thought that he had had enough and the treadmills started to slow down. Once it was at a walking pace, Odysseus jumped off of the treadmill. He felt a strange sensation in his legs as if the ground was still moving. He took a few steps to regain his balance and almost vomited. Thankfully, there was nothing to vomit as he had skipped out on breakfast earlier that day.

The rest of the tests went a similar way. For the emergency surgery exam, he had had to mend a shrapnel wound that pierced into a simulated crythoterian’s abdomen. The scrap of metal had sunk deep through the flesh, piercing blood vessels and vital organs. Odysseus first anesthetized him which was not very difficult. The hard part was slowing down his own heartbeat from the earlier tests and holding his hands steady as he dislodged the shrapnel. After that, to fix the bleeding, he had to use some Medi-Freeze to create makeshift tissue, mending all the blood vessels temporarily while the tissue could heal. He did the same with the vital organs and finally the flesh before giving the crythoterian an adrenaline shot to wake them up.

After fixing up the last few tests of the day, he found himself waiting amongst a group of other students, patiently waiting for the final test: to evade capture by the proctors for 24 hours. There had been a rumor that there was a new rule that would cause the entire planet to also be on the lookout for them. The rumor went that there was a rule that if anyone were to turn in a student that they had found, they would be granted a reward of 5,000 credits.

Odysseus had discussed this part of the test with Kyria. They decided that they would meet up in the abandoned building that they used to hang out in as kids. Odysseus smiled as a wave of nostalgia hit him. The good old days. Before the stress of preparing for the NEBULA exams. 

“Alright everyone!” an android yelled. “The hunt will begin right after I finish this speech. As done every year, the students will have one hour to transport themselves to their hiding places. These can be anywhere on the planet. If brought back to the school before the time limit, the test-taker has failed this test. The test will end in 24 hours. Good Luck!” 

And with that, there was a blare of a horn. The students all around him started yelling and screaming. They stampeded out of the school like a giant amoeba of students while making as much noise as possible. The entire grade had discussed this before; a massive amount of noise would disorient the proctors. They would go quiet once they were out of school boundaries. 

Odysseus saw a few chuls and brarothi force open a manhole cover. They then each jumped into the sewers, the last place anyone would want to go. As predicted before, Dongoo spread his wings and flapped them a couple of times, lifting his whole body into the air. He then hovered above for a bit before soaring above the clouds and out of view. The gorathors took advantage of their 5 centimeter long bodies and hid in the bushes, trees, and other places where they wouldn’t easily be found. Odysseus didn’t have time to envy their advantages. The crowd of students was now thinning with students realizing that they had a better chance if they split away from the main group. Odysseus decided that this was the time for him to also part ways from the rest of the group. He saw a crashed hoverbike that had been there for years and knew that it was one of the many landmarks that marked the path to the designated abandoned building.

Odysseus navigated through the streets of Xeria. He had run the route a thousand times before, ever since he was little. There seemed to be imaginary arrows leading him where he needed to go.

Odysseus was now far from the main crowd and was climbing up a wall at the end of an alleyway when the speakers around him started screeching a message. “One hour has passed! For every test-taker one brings in, that citizen will be awarded 5,000 credits! The test will end in 23 hours! Let the hunting commence!”

Just as the message finished blaring, a door at the bottom of the wall burst open and a middle-aged melijicap man aimed a ShockGun at Odysseus. Odysseus quickly pushed off the wall with his legs and landed on his feet in front of the melijicap. The melijicap threw a punch at Odysseus which he dodged. Odysseus then grabbed the arm of the melijicap, brought it around the melijicap’s neck, and started to choke the melijicap with his own arm. The gasps for breath became fewer and weaker until the melijicap had passed out. Odysseus picked himself up, checked to see that the melijicap was still breathing, and grabbed the ShockGun. He also found some Minimal Food bars and put his findings in his pocket before scaling the wall that he had tried to scale earlier. 

Odysseus saw many of his peers captured in the streets. The crythoterian that had been behind him in line earlier was plowing through a group of people trying to capture him. They were impaled by his horns and were stacked on top of each other like a kebab on the crythoterian’s head. The tips of his horns that stuck out through the hunter’s backs were coated with blood. The crythoterian then shook the bodies off of his head. A hunter shot their ShockGun at the crythoterian, causing the crythoterian to howl. The crythoterian got on all four hooves and stampeded toward the hunter. The hunter was trampled. The crythoterian then closed his mouth over the hunter’s head and ripped it off. Odysseus winced and looked away in disgust. He tried not to think about it and kept running.

Odysseus also saw a group of hunters launch a large net at Dongoo. The net wrapped itself around Dongoo’s wings, causing him to spiral out of control and crash a few meters away. The hunters looked giddy with excitement and were jumping up and down, high-fiving each other. While Dongoo had used an unfair advantage, this giddiness made Odysseus’ blood boil. He didn’t know why he felt angry but the faces of the hunters celebrating because they had caught Dongoo pissed him off. Odysseus aimed his ShockGun at the leader who had shot the net-cannon and pulled the trigger. A bright blue ball of electricity flew at the hunter and hit his back. The hunter’s whole body shook for a few seconds before dropping to the ground. The other hunters were aghast by their leader falling unconscious and quickly took notice of Odysseus.

“Hey!” shouted one of them.

Odysseus didn’t waste a second and shot the other three hunters. Soon, they were all on the ground, out cold. Odysseus kicked them a bit to make sure that they were unconscious before searching their bodies for supplies. He found a Vibroknife, a few Minimal Food rations, a can of Medi-Freeze, and a few spare credits. He pocketed his findings and jogged toward the direction that he had seen Dongoo fall. 

“Help! Somebody, anybody! Please!” yelled Dongoo. 

Odysseus saw that one of the harpoons on the net had pierced his wing. His wing was now a bloody mess of feathers and was mangled almost beyond recognition. His limbs were tangled in the net and he was stuck. Odysseus sprinted over to Dongoo and knelt down next to him.

“Hey hey shhh,” Odysseus hushed as he placed a hand on Dongoo’s back. “I’m here, I’m here. But you have to be quiet or someone will hear us and they might not be as nice as I am.”

“Thank you so much,” Dongoo whispered.

“Alright, that’s a really bad wound you’ve got there so I’m gonna have to pull the harpoon out. It’s gonna hurt really bad but please try to stay quiet.”

Dongoo nodded and looked away. Odysseus placed his hand on the mangled wing and wrapped the fingers of his other hand around the harpoon. Dongoo flinched a little and Odysseus reassured him. Odysseus took a deep breath and pulled on the harpoon while simultaneously pushing the wing. Dongoo yelped in pain and Odysseus fell back onto the ground, his hand still clutching the bloody harpoon. Odysseus then took the Vibroknife he had stolen earlier and cut the rest of the net off of Dongoo. Dongoo tried moving his wing but had little success. His leg then gave away, causing him to fall to the ground. 

“You probably have a few broken bones from the fall,” Odysseus observed. “Here, I stole a can of Medi-Freeze earlier. I’ll fix you up.”

Odysseus sprayed the can on Dongoo’s wing. With each layer, more tissue was repaired, and eventually, Dongoo’s wing was functional again. Odysseus sprayed some Medi-Freeze on Dongoo’s broken bones as well, mending them. 

“There we go,” Odysseus said after finishing. “Good as new.”

“Thank you, Odysseus,” Dongoo said, moving his wings.

“You’re welcome Dongoo. Well, I gotta meet my girlfriend at our place so good luck on the rest of the test,” Odysseus replied, putting the can of Medi-Freeze and the Vibroknife back in his pocket.

“You too.”

Dongoo then flapped his wings and took off into the sky. Odysseus continued on his way as well, weaving through buildings and scaling walls to get to the abandoned building. On the way, he saw some proctors bringing in the crythoterian from earlier. They had tied him up in chains and were dragging him back to the school. Odysseus took out his ShockGun and stunned all the proctors before using his Vibroknife to cut through the chains. He used Medi-Freeze to heal some of the crythoterian’s wounds and then resumed his path to the alleyway. 

Eventually, Odysseus found himself in front of the abandoned building. The building was not that wide and had only one floor. The doors had been blown off and the windows were mostly broken. They had made it rather comfortable over the years, though. They had gathered enough blankets, jackets, and other things made of cloth to create a makeshift floor so that they wouldn’t be as cold. They had also created a small fireplace at the back that could easily be lit for nights that they wanted to spend there.

Odysseus walked through the door frame and could hear a faint crackling from the back of the building. He walked through the rooms toward the back. He walked and pushed open the door. He saw a large metal bar swing at his face before falling to the ground.

“Khig!” he yelled as he fell to the ground.

“Oh vat!” exclaimed Kyria, dropping the metal bar and rushing to help him up. “Sorry, Ody! I thought you were a proctor or something! Oh my god, are you ok?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Odysseus replied, bringing his hand up to his face. He looked at his fingers and saw that they were smeared with blood from his face. “I have a can of Medi-Freeze in my pocket, that should help.”

Odysseus took out the metal can and sprayed some of it blindly into his face. He had little success, trying to aim at a wound that he couldn’t see, so Kyria took the can and applied it for him. He could feel the blood vessels in his nose mending themselves and his skin tissue recovering. Soon, he felt like nothing had happened.

“Sorry about that,” Kyria repeated sheepishly, helping Odysseus up to his feet.

“Oh it’s fine I’ll live.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

She smiled at him and they sat down in front of the fireplace that she had lit earlier. He told her the story about how he had stolen the ShockGun, saved Dongoo’s life, and freed the crythoterian. Once he had finished, Kyria told him what had happened to her after the test began.

“I started by running with the crowd and left the main crowd at around Street Four hundred thirty-something. That’s when a proctor saw me and tried to hit me with a ShockBaton. I knocked him out and stole his money, food, and ShockBaton. I kept running and running and I ran into a few other proctors so I stunned them with the ShockBaton but one of the proctors shot the baton with their ShockGun so I improvised and knocked their head against a wall really hard. Then I grabbed a random pipe part that was lying around and made it the rest of the way here. I then started the fire and waited for you. Oh my god, I was so worried about you. I didn’t know if you’d made it or not or if you’d got caught or if something had happened and you were hurt. And I was scared that the proctors and hunters might find me and—” Kyria said, her voice breaking toward the end of her story.

“Hey, hey, I’m here now and I’m completely fine,” Odysseus comforted, putting his arm around her.

She rested her head on his shoulder and sniffled quietly.

“It’s all right. We’re gonna be fine. I’ll protect you,” Odysseus continued.

They then lied down on their backs under a large gaping hole in the ceiling that provided a perfect view of the universe. They watched in silence as starships zoomed around above, resembling comets in the night sky. They saw thousands of blinking lights sprinkled throughout the dark blanket of space. 

“What are you going to do if you get a good score?” Kyria asked, breaking the silence.

Odysseus thought about it for a little. “I don’t know. I’ve never really thought I’d get a good score. I guess I just want to help people.”

Kyria nodded.

She laid her head on Odysseus’s arm. More silence.

“Do you remember your parents?” Kyria asked, once again interrupting the quiet. 

“I don’t know,” Odysseus answered. “I remember flashes. Mostly of my dad since my mom died when I was still little. Well, I guess my dad also died when I was little. But I do remember flashes of him. He had this weird habit where he would flash his eyes blue. It used to calm me down and I guess he did it to calm himself down. I remember brief moments of him holding me and of him helping me walk my first steps. Nothing more than that though. The only piece of him I have left is the dragon eggshell shard that he used to carry around.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright. In the end, I think your parents were the ones who took care of me. I grew up at your place. Your parents, they fed me, put warm clothes on my back, took care of me, and loved me. You guys treated me like I was family. I’ll never be able to pay you back for that.”

“Yeah I miss them.”

“Yeah.” 

Kyria drew herself closer to Odysseus. “Do you think there’s any chance that they’re watching us? Your parents and mine, I mean.”

“You mean like from the Afterlife?”

“Something like that.”

“Well your dad used to say that they’d always be with us, even when they’re gone. I like to think that he kept that promise and I don’t know if my dad said anything of the sort but I like to think that he’s watching over me as well. My mom, too.”

“Yeah.”

They continued to talk as the night drew longer until they both soon found themselves falling asleep.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus woke up with a strange feeling of dread and adrenaline. He closed his eyes and put his hand to the ground. He felt footsteps coming to the building. At least six or seven pairs! His eyes widened and he felt adrenaline course through his veins.

“Oh, khigging vat!” Odysseus half-whispered half-yelled to not attract the attention of whoever was coming. He shook Kyria gently to try to wake her. “Kyria! Wake up! We have to go now! Kyria!”

“What?” Kyria asked groggily.

“Someone’s here! They found us!” 

“Vat!”

They both jumped up and scrambled to gather their things. Odysseus could now hear the footsteps getting closer. Odysseus grabbed his ShockGun and aimed it at the door. 

The door burst open and Odysseus pulled the trigger but the proctors had already taken cover behind the wall.

“They’ve got a ShockGun!” one of the proctors yelled.

A small cylindrical object was thrown into the room.

“Flashbang!” Kyria yelled.

Kyria and Odysseus both closed their eyes shut and clasped their hands over their ears and turned away from the blast. The sound was still deafening but didn’t take long to recover from. Unfortunately, the time that it took to recover was enough for the proctors to burst into the room. Within seconds, they had Kyria and Odysseus pinned to the ground.

“Let her go!” Odysseus yelled. “If you khigging hurt her I will khigging murder the khig out of you, you khigging vatheads!”

“Oh I’m so scared!” laughed the proctors on top of him sarcastically. 

“What you gonna do kid, huh?” laughed another proctor, placing his foot on the side of Kyria’s head and pushing it into the ground as she screamed in pain and terror. Tears were streaming down her face and her eyes were even wider than usual with fear.

“Stop! I’ll khigging murder you! Khig you! Please! Don’t hurt her! Don’t khigging hurt her!” Odysseus pleaded. “Just take me please! Let her go!”

The proctors laughed and kept abusing both of them. They kicked, punched, and stepped on Kyria and Odysseus. The proctors used their ShockBatons to electrocute them over and over again.

“Alright, we’ve had enough fun,” said the leader proctor after a while. “Let’s bring these vatheads in. We’ve only got about five hours left to bring in as many kids as possible.”

While the proctors were distractedly talking about how many more kids they could capture in the next five hours, Odysseus grabbed his Vibroknife with his teeth and sliced the ankles of one of the proctors. He fell to the ground in pain and the other five looked confused for a second before realizing what had happened. Odysseus then scrambled onto his feet (which was difficult because the proctors had tied up Odysseus’s and Kyria’s hands and feet) and stuck the Vibroknife into the throat of another proctor. Odysseus then let the Vibroknife fall onto the rope between his hands. His hands were now free and he cut the rope tying his feet together as well. He then dropped the knife and kicked it over to Kyria for her to use. 

“Hey!” yelled the lead proctor as he walked over to Kyria. Kyria kicked him in the groin with both legs and he fell back. He fell backward and was screaming in agony. Kyria then finished cutting herself free and looked at Odysseus.

“Go!” Odysseus yelled. “Go! I’ll be right behind you! Go!”

The three other proctors took this as a chance to still grab Odysseus. They tackled him to the ground and punched him in the stomach over and over again. 

“Ody!” Kyria cried out, tears brimming her eyes.

“Go!” Odysseus repeated. “Go! Now!”

She took one last look at her boyfriend. “I love you, Ody!”

“I love you too, Kyria. Now go!” he yelled.

Kyria grabbed the Vibroknife and leaped out one of the windows. Odysseus’s vision started to blur even more with every punch. He could feel his consciousness fading away from him. The last thing he saw before he blacked out was the concrete floor of the abandoned building.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus found himself being dragged back to school by the remaining three proctors. He tried to move his arms and legs but was not able to. They had wrapped him in the same chains that they had wrapped the crythoterian in before. He sighed as he realized that there was no way he would pass the test now. He closed his eyes and wondered if Kyria was alright. He calculated that there were still about three hours left in the test. Well, at least he had gotten close to passing the test. He sighed and tried closing his eyes to get some sleep before they arrived at school. 

Odysseus could suddenly hear something but could not quite put his finger on what it was. It sounded like a faint whooshing sound that grew louder and louder. Suddenly, something dove down from the sky and tackled one of the proctors.

“What the khig was that?” yelled one of the other proctors.

A single feathered, white wing hit the other proctor in the chest, sending him flying toward the wall. He hit the wall and fell to the ground, unconscious. The pair of wings then opened wide before clapping closed, causing a strong zephyr of wind to blow the final proctor into the sky. Dongoo then turned around and gave Odysseus a thumbs up.

“Hey I was flying and I saw that you were in a bit of a situation. You helped me before so I wanted to return the favor,” Dongoo explained.

“Thanks, Dongoo I was really screwed there for a second,” Odysseus replied. 

Although it took some time, Dongoo was able to untie Odysseus’s chains. Odysseus brushed himself off and thanked Dongoo again before they both went off on their separate ways to continue the test. 

Odysseus’s bad luck had seemed to have run out for the rest of the test because he encountered no other proctors. He wandered around for a little, went back to the abandoned building, and simply waited for the test to be over. He tried to look for Kyria but failed. He was a bit relieved to know that she had hidden well. Those proctors were ruthless. 

Odysseus was sitting on the ground in an alleyway when the speakers started blaring again. “The test is now over and no captures beyond this point will be valid. Congratulations to those of you who evaded capture. You may now return to your homes in peace. With the conclusion of this test, you have all graduated from the Neo-galactic Education System: Xeria. Congratulations.” And with that, Odysseus was legally an adult. 

⋆⋆⋆

“The NEBULA exam results will be handed out today. You guys all know how important this test is to your relatively worthless futures so if anyone is stressed or depressed because of their score, I really don’t give a single flying khig. Deal with it, everyone else does,” Mr. Gaerry’s hologram announced to the class. “Alright, I’m going to be calling the names of the highest scorers first along with their corresponding score. This is because the last people who are called will be embarrassed and humiliated in front of the entire class, not to mention disappointed with themselves because of their low scores. This is always my favorite part of being a NEBULA proctor. The enthusiasm will just disappear from your little eyes. It’s always a joy watching that.”

Mr. Gaerry’s hologram picked up a stack of papers and looked at the first of the stack. Odysseus could feel his blood pressure rising. The nerves around his veins started to give a tingling sensation and he could sense beads of sweat forming on his forehead. The back of his neck suddenly felt very itchy and he felt like there were bugs under his skin. His stomach felt like milk getting churned into butter and his fingernails suddenly felt very foreign. He started rubbing his hands together and fidgeting. The test had been the most difficult he had ever had in his entire life. Perhaps he had got 85% overall. Or maybe a 90%. No definitely not. 

He wished Kyria was there. She had called in sick to school since the end of the NEBULA test yesterday. He had tried to visit her but she hadn’t let him up to her apartment. Apparently she was just really sick. Odysseus had left her to rest. She had been really stressed about the test and the proctors were extremely violent to her. His blood began to boil as he thought about what the proctors had done to her. However, it wasn’t long before his anxiety about the test took dominance over his feelings. He began spinning a pencil in his hand over and over again. He focused on the weaving the pencing in and out between his fingers.

“This is weird,” said Mr. Gaerry, interrupting Odysseus’s train of thought. Mr. Gaerry looked at the paper once again, then flipped it over and back again as if that would change anything. Mr. Gaerry flicked, flipped, and even shook the paper. What the khig is happening? Odysseus wondered.

“Well, congrats to Odysseus Wilm,” Mr. Gaerry finally said. “You are the first person to ever receive a perfect score on all parts of the NEBULA exam.”

⋆⋆⋆

Kirya hadn’t answered her phone or any of her texts at all since the test. Odysseus grew worried but realized that she probably simply moved toward the inner planetary systems of the galaxy to train and pursue her dream of becoming a general in the Cosmos Corps. She was probably just really busy or something. He understood that. He also had to deal with something himself: what to do with a perfect score on the NEBULA exam. This was such a big deal that after the last day of school had finished, Mr. Gaerry had come up to him and told him “not bad kiddo.” 

The planetary government had decided to use him as a poster boy and the entire galaxy now knew about the orphan from Xeria who got a perfect score on the NEBULA exam. He had been getting compliments everywhere he went. Random people would come up to him on the street and compliment him. It was a weird feeling, being a local famous figure. Job opportunities were filling up his phone like crazy. It was a frenetic situation and everyone from mining corporations to moisture farms to speeder dealerships wanted him to be an executive. He had told them all that he needed to wait a bit to make his decision. “Of course Mr. Wilm,” they all said. “Mr. Wilm.” Those words felt so foreign and strange to him. Everyone called him “Ody” or “Odysseus”. “Mr. Wilm” just felt weird as if they were talking about someone else.

He missed Kyria already but decided not to call her because he had already done so a lot. She must’ve heard the news right? She was probably just too busy to call him. She was training to be part of the Cosmos Corps after all. 

Odysseus had got one job interview that interested him, however. Yesterday he had received a highly encrypted message. The message itself needed to be hacked before he could read it. The message itself was much shorter than the other job offers. The message had said the following: 

Hey Ody,

If you’re reading this, good job hacking my encryption. I used to work with your dad before he died. He saved my life and died doing what he loved most: helping people. I’ve observed your actions during the hunt. Looks like you’ve also inherited his altruistic gene. I’m proud of you and I think he would be, too. You’ve also grown to be a humble, smart, and respectable young man. With your skills, I think you could make a difference in the galaxy. If you’d like to work for my organization, this will be your only chance to do so. You’ll be able to save lives and create real change. And I think that’s what you want. From life I mean. So, if you want to help people and make a difference, meet me tomorrow at the bar in District 420 at 1400. I’ll be wearing a trench coat and will be drinking a glass of firomos gold.

Best, Your guardian angel

Odysseus’s heart was racing. This mysterious stranger had known his father. Odysseus didn’t know much about his father except that he had died when Odysseus was two and that Odysseus’s middle name was named after him. This person knew his dad personally and was with him when he died! He couldn’t wait to meet him. But knowing his father was not the only exciting thing about this mysterious person. They also knew how to code well. Really well. While Odysseus was able to hack the message, the process took almost an hour of work. Odysseus wondered what the job was. His dad had done it and it was something that could allow him to help others and make a difference in the galaxy.

It was almost 1330 so Odysseus walked downstairs and out of his apartment building. Jagx had agreed to allow him to borrow Jagx’s hoverbike. Odysseus saw Jagx outside, leaning on the bike. 

“Just don’t scratch it,” Jagx said half-jokingly.

“Thanks, Jagx,” Odysseus said, taking the keys from him.

“You earned it kid,” he replied.

Odysseus felt the bike roar to life under him. He leaned forward and the bike zoomed ahead. Odysseus had memorized the way to District 420 a few years ago and was there within a few minutes. He saw the bar that the mysterious person was talking about and parked his bike in front of the bar. He walked into the bar and saw that no one was there except for him and a man in a trench coat sipping from a cup of firomos gold. Odysseus walked up to him and took a seat in front of him. He had whitish-gray hair that sat on top of his head. He had a rather untidy beard and had a large scar on his face, stretching from a few centimeters above his brow and down to his cheek. He had a tough yet controlled and quiet look.

“It’s good to finally meet you face to face, Ody,” greeted the man. 

“Hello,” Odysseus said. “Only my close friends call me Ody. How did you know—”

“Your father. He loved you more than you could imagine. He was so proud of his new son when you were born. He wouldn’t stop showing us baby pictures of you before missions,” the man replied. “He saved my life. The least I could do for him is look after his son after he died.”

“Oh ok. So you’ve been watching me my whole life?”

“Well not in an up close creepy way. I’m busy, too. I just made visits to the planet every now and then to make sure you were alright.”

“Okay. So what was the job offer that you were offering me?”

The man finished the last of his firosomo gold and put the cup down in front of him.

“You know about the Cosmos Corps, right?” the man asked.

“Yeah they’re like special forces people. My girlfriend is training to become one right now,” Odysseus answered.

“Yeah, yeah so the Cosmos Corps have to answer to the government and such. They’re also known by the public and the thohnods which makes it harder for them to carry out covert operations. I’m the leader of Task Force Titanium. It’s like the Cosmos Corps except we only accept the best of the best from the entire galaxy and, on paper, we don’t even exist. We carry out more important missions, though, and save billions of lives from working in the shadows.”

“I am definitely not the ‘best of the best.’ I just got a really good score on a test. That’s all. I’m not special in any way nor am I especially loyal or brave. I don’t want to die and leave Kyria! She’d be devastated! I can’t do that to her. I have a responsibility to her to not die and leave her alone.”

Odysseus realized that he was now standing up and pacing the bar. The man just sat there and waited patiently. He didn’t seem at all phased by Odysseus’s sudden outburst.

“Sorry,” Odysseus mumbled.

“No, I know. I understand. I know you love her a lot. A chip right off the old block, eh? Your father was also like that. Loved his wife more than anything in the galaxy. He was absolutely devastated when she died. While she was sick, he wouldn’t leave her side. You get that from him,” the man replied. “Don’t be sorry about that. Selflessness is one of your best traits.”

“What convinced him to enlist?“

“Well he realized that by enlisting, he could help serve and protect others’ loved ones as well as his. And if I’m not wrong, that’s what’s going to change your mind as well. Neither of you could ever hide your altruism.”

The man smiled. Odysseus sat back down in front of the man.

“Alright I’ll enlist. But if I die in the line of duty, Kyria will be provided with benefits, right?” Odysseus asked.

“Oh yeah you don’t have to worry about benefits. From this job, you get benefits for you benefits,” the man said. “Well I’m glad you’ve decided to accept the job offer. The sooner we leave, the better and I’ve got an X70 parked behind this bar. If we leave now, we should be able to reach HQ in a few hours.”

“A Protonspeeder X70?!”

The man smiled.

“Yes.”

⋆⋆⋆

The X70 was a sleek, majestic, spaceship. It had four auxiliary engines in the back, surrounding one main one. The ship was shaped like the blade of a dagger and the underside of the ship was lined with weapons ranging from long range lasers to mid range missiles to short range machine guns. The cockpit was placed at the top of the ship and had two seats. There was a small cargo space in the back but it wasn’t very large. The metal on this one had been scorched and darkened in certain places from combat but it still looked as if it were in almost perfect condition.

Odysseus stood in front of the X70, gaping at the amazing feat of engineering. He didn’t stop gaping even when he was inside the spacecraft. This also happened to be when he realized that he had not asked the man what his name was. Odysseus stops right before the platform.

“Sorry but what was your name? I don’t think you’ve told me,” asked Odysseus.

“I’m Captain Aevar Grald,” he replied, standing on the platform.

“Captain of what?”

“Taskforce Titanium. Welcome aboard, kid.” 

Odysseus, following his lead, took his first step onto the X70. Aevar and Odysseus then sat themselves in the cockpit. Odysseus asked if he could pilot to which Aevar replied with a quick “Khig no!” Aevar brought the spacecraft up higher and higher into the atmosphere and Odysseus could hear the roar of the engines behind them. Soon, they were amid the blackness of space, surrounded by distant stars and planetary systems. Aevar punched in the coordinates to HQ into the computer. There was a high-pitched whirring from the center of the ship and Odysseus was suddenly thrust into his chair. Stars streaked past them as they sped across the galaxy at close to the speed of light, Xeria quickly fading into the darkness of space

⋆⋆⋆

They were landing on a landing pad in a large city. Skyscrapers hovered everywhere and when he looked out the window and down toward the ground, he could not see the bottom. Purple clouds roamed across the sky and there were speeders everywhere. Hoverbikes and speeders honked at each other and their drivers exchanged curses. Odysseus and Aevar stepped out to the sounds of vehicles zooming around. He felt a little disoriented and he looked around a bit in confusion.

“Follow me,” Aevar said, walking into the building.

Odysseus followed him. Soon, they came to a mirror where Aevar completed a series of retinal scans, handprint scans, DNA checks using blood drops, biometric scans, and passcode inputs. This caused the mirror to glow and melt away, revealing a corridor. Odysseus followed Aevar through it and heard the mirror recreate itself behind them. After a while of walking in the corridor, they came to what appeared to be a window. The window melted away, revealing a bunker with broken computer screens and scorched walls. There were dead bodies laying all over the floor and there was smoke in the air from a few small fires. In the middle of the broken mess was a thohnod. He was about two meters tall and was standing in the middle of the room with a smug smile on his face.

“How was your recruiting mission, Aevar?” he asked.

“Who the khig are you?” Aevar yelled.

“Oh I just renovated the place a little. You’re gonna love the look here after I blow it up. Actually, you’ll have to take my word for it because you’ll both be dead.”

Aevar reached into his trench coat, pulled out a laser pistol and aimed it at the thohnod’s head.

“Answer the question before I start pulling this trigger: who the khig are you and how the khig did you get in here?” yelled Aevar.

“Let’s not use that, shall we? I am Revilo, I’m not a member of the thohnod army, but my brother was. There were three men responsible for his death: Ashr Wilm, Vruul Dapp, and you Aevar. He was to explode an H-bomb on Gaastrosie sixteen years ago. You stopped him from completing his mission, and made his death in vain!” Revilo yelled. “I’ve spent the last sixteen years, planning my revenge. I was the one who murdered Private Vruul! I will be the one who kills you and the last thing left of Ashr Wilm. And I will complete what my brother started sixteen years ago.”

Revilo pointed at Odysseus. His slit-like yellow eyes glared at Odysseus with an inexplicably large amount of raw hate. Odysseus gulped and hoped that Aevar knew what he was doing.

“What you don’t think that Kyria actually just mysteriously decided not to contact you, right?” Revilo sneered. “I kidnapped her and I will murder her slowly in front of you so that you will watch every ounce of pain she will go through and be nothing but a helpless spectator as the love of your life dies before your eyes. The pain will be unbearable and I am counting on it. Then I will keep you alive so that you have to live the rest of your life with the guilt of not being able to save her. And when I drugged her and tied her up in the back of my ship, she screamed. And she kept calling out your name. Crying it. Sobbing it.”

Odysseus let out a yell of pure rage and ran towards Revilo, catching him off guard and tackling him to the ground. Odysseus brought his fist up into the air and brought it crashing down on the thohnod’s face over and over again. 

“Feel better now?” Revilo laughed. 

Revilo then picked up Odysseus by the throat and threw him across the room. Aevar started opening fire on the thohnod, firing several rounds at him but Revilo pressed a button on his detonator, blowing a hole in the wall. He jumped out the hole, escaping into the city. 

Aevar acted quickly and picked up Odysseus’s unconscious body and jumped through the hole as well, knowing that Revilo would likely detonate a second bomb to blow up the entire building. As soon as Aevar and Odysseus were in freefall, Aevar pulled out his grappling hook and shot it at their landing pad. The hook hit home and they stopped falling and instead started slightly swinging back and forth. Aevar pulled the trigger again, retracting the grappling hook, pulling him and Odysseus up to the landing pad. He threw Odysseus’s body up to the landing pad before climbing on top of it himself. He then cut the grappling hook with his Vibroknife and put both back into his trench coat. He picked up Odysseus’s body and sat it in the cockpit with more difficulty than expected (putting an unconscious person in a sitting position is difficult no matter how strong you are.) Aevar then piloted the X70 off of the landing pad just as the entire midsection of the building was blown to smithereens. 

⋆⋆⋆

When Odysseus regained consciousness, he found that he and Aevar were now in space. They were floating in the middle of the empty vacuum and were once again surrounded by stars. 

“Khig!” Aevar was muttering to himself. “Should’ve been more careful. The khig was I thinking?!”

“Don’t worry we still have a chance,” Odysseus said, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“And how do we have any resemblance of a chance? Our headquarters just blew up, your girlfriend’s been kidnapped, and we’re both probably going to die! So tell me how do we have a chance?”

Odysseus pulled out his phone and opened up an app. “When I tackled him, I planted a tracking chip on him. I know exactly where he is.”

“Wait really?” asked Aevar in disbelief. 

“Yeah see?”

Odysseus showed Aevar his phone and Aevar punched in the coordinates.

“Odysseus this is in thohnod space, you know,” warned Aevar. 

“Well, that’s what we do here, right? Operating behind enemy lines,” Odysseus replied.

Aevar smiled. 

“What?” Odysseus asked.

“Nothing, you just remind me of your dad. He would have been proud,” Aevar answered.

“Thanks. Now let’s go kill that son of a gritsh.”

Aevar punched in the coordinates that the app displayed. They were pushed back into their seats once more as the X70 zoomed them across the galaxy and into the thohnods’ territory. Odysseus was determined as hell and he would save Kyria or die trying.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus felt the ship slow down. Eventually, the streaks that were stars materialized into balls of gas again. Out of the cockpit window, Odysseus could see Revilo’s ship. It was a massive carrier that had hundreds of thousands if not millions of weapon modifications. There were green linings of light that resembled veins on the ship and the black hull seemed to blend seamlessly into the background of space. 

Aevar landed the ship on the hull and magnetically attached it onto Revilo’s ship. 

“This must be it,” Aevar said. “I’m gonna be your getaway driver so go in there, kill Revilo, save your girlfriend, and we’ll get the khig out of here.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Odysseus agreed.

“Weapons are in the back,” Aevar informed. “And good luck kid.”

“Thanks.”

Odysseus slid through a hatch and entered the cargo hold. There were plasma assault rifles, laser pistols, Vibroknives, and grenades displayed on the walls. Under those were bins filled to brim with ammunition. Odysseus clasped his hands together and rubbed them together. A giddy smile appeared stretched itself across his face and he excitedly grabbed a plasma assault rifle. He also took a laser pistol and holstered it in his pocket. He then grabbed a Vibroknife, a grenade, and all the ammunition his pocket could hold.

Odysseus then grabbed a plasma drill and cut a hole in the hull of Revilo’s ship. He jumped in and found himself in the middle of a dimly lit corridor. He heard a few thohnod’s coming toward his direction. Odysseus unsheathed his Vibroknife and turned it on. He flipped the knife over in a reverse grip and stabbed one of the thohnod’s in the stomach, careful not to touch any of the acidic blood. He then punched another thohnod in the face and shoved him into the wall. The third thohnod tried to shoot Odysseus with his laser pistol but Odysseus dodged it. He removed his Vibroknife from the first thohnod’s abdomen and slashed the throats of the other two. 

Odysseus turned off his Vibroknife and continued on his way to the front of the ship. He didn’t encounter many thohnod’s after that which made sense because Revilo wasn’t technically part of the thohnod military. These were all simply paid mercenaries and guns for hire. The few thohnod’s that Odysseus did encounter were quickly dispatched with a few shots from his plasma assault rifle, with help form the element of surprise. He lined them up in his sights and pulled the trigger. They never knew what hit them until it was too late.

Odysseus used the butt of his rifle to strike one of the thohnod’s in the temple while kicking the other in the chest. He then pulled his laser pistol out and aimed his pistol and rifle at the two thohnods. He pulled the trigger of both guns simultaneously. 

Odysseus continued this pattern, reloading in between when needed. He eventually found himself in front of a large vault door, guarded by two tough looking thohnods. Odysseus threw his Vibroknife at one of the thohnods’ head. The knife sank itself into his cranium and thick blood oozed down the side of his head and out of his eyes. He leapt up and grabbed the knife out of the thohnod’s skull and slid in between the second thohnod’s legs, slicing his groin with the Vibroknife. Odysseus got up, held up the thohnod’s head and slit the thohnod’s throat with the Vibroknife.

Odysseus tied a grenade to the vault door and pulled the pin. He ran around the corner of the corridor for cover and waited for the blast. The sound was deafening and Odysseus could hear it even though he had his fingers plugged into his ears. He adjusted his grip on the plasma assault rifle and entered the room. 

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus’s vision was shrouded by smoke from the grenade. He squinted his eyes to try to fix this issue with little success. Suddenly, he was punched in the face and shoved against the wall. Odysseus squeezed a few shots out from his plasma rifle before it was ripped from his arms. Odysseus then tried to punch the direction that he thought Revilo was at. Revilo dodged the punch and kicked Odysseus in the face. Odysseus was then thrown across the room and hit the opposite wall. He fell to the ground and tried to bring himself back up. Revilo kicked him in the stomach and he was once again thrown against the wall. 

“Ody!” yelled a familiar voice, from the center of the room. The smoke began to clear and he saw Kyria sitting in a cage, her arms and legs tied together. Her face had numerous bruises and cuts and her eyes were filled with worry and terror.

“Kyria!” Odysseus shouted.

“Remember when I told you that I would kill your girlfriend in front of you? I changed my mind. I’m gonna kill you in front of your girlfriend. Then, I’m gonna kill your girlfriend,” Revilo snickered. “I am going to love doing this.”

Odysseus could no longer feel his face. The metallic taste of blood filled his mouth and his vision was blurred by a red filter. Revilo didn’t stop. He kicked harder and harder. Kyria’s pleas for Revilo to stop were soon drowned out by white noise. He could smell nothing but the rich smell of blood. He coughed up the red liquid over and over again. He could feel himself dying. He was coughing and wheezing everywhere and tried to crawl away from Revilo. Revilo brought his foot crashing down on Odysseus’s outstretched hand. He couldn’t feel anything. With the last bit of strength he had left, he gripped his laser pistol and shot the Revilo’s leg. He then emptied a few more shots into Revilo’s stomach. This knocked Revilo back, providing just enough time for Odysseus to bring himself up and aim the pistol at Revilo’s head.

“You didn’t think this would be that easy, did you?” a wounded Revilo laughed. “Oh how naive you are. I knew you planted that chip on me. I knew you would track me down here. I knew you would kill the guards with ease. And I also know that you’d die for your girlfriend. Just like your dead father. Which is why I did the smart thing and put a microchip in both Kyria and my brain. If you kill me, you’ll also kill Kyria, but several EMPs that I have planted on different key regions in the thohnod territory will also detonate, destroying their defenses and ending the war. If you don’t kill me, Kyria lives, you live, but the thohnods’ defenses remain intact and several quantum gravity bombs that I have planted in the Neo-galactic United Systems’ key regions will also detonate, killing trillions upon trillions of people. Basically if you kill me, I die along with your girlfriend but you end a war, but if you don’t kill me, I live, you live, the thohnods live and your people die.”

Odysseus’s finger was frozen on the trigger. With one pull, he could save the lives of trillions of people. He could end the war, saving countless more in the future. He would also be destroying the thohnods’ defenses and ending the galactic war. He could bring peace to the entire galaxy once more. But with the same pull, he would lose the love of his life forever. Kyria. She had stood by him for all these years and was the one person who was always there. He loved her more than anything in the world and just the thought of living in a world without her, brought tears to his eyes.

“You could save trillions at the price of one!” Revilo jeered. “Shoot me, and you kill the bad guys, save your people, and end the war all at the price of one life! One life! That’s it! Just one life and you’ll have saved everyone. Well, almost everyone. It’s a hell of a deal I’m offering you! Take it! Trillions for the price of one!”

Odysseus could feel himself shaking. He kept his gun aimed at Revilo’s head but could barely keep his hand from shaking uncontrollably. He looked at Kirya. Their eyes locked from across the room. He saw that hers were brimming with fear but she wasn’t crying. She was trembling as well but the look in her eyes indicated that she was ready to give her life for the lives of trillions others. She gave Odysseus an encouraging smile and nodded. 

“I’ll always be with you, Ody. Every step of the way, I’ll be with you. Every step you take, I’ll take with you. Every laugh you laugh I will laugh with you and every tear you shed I will shed with you. When you miss me, remember that I’m there. I always will be. And I’ll be waiting for you in the Afterlife. I’ll be with you,” Kirya reassured him.

“‘Oh I’ll always be with you,’” mocked Revilo. “You’ll never do it. Sacrificing yourself? Easy. Sacrificing someone you love? Impossible. Your love makes you weak. Weak! How could you live with yourself, knowing you could have saved all those people? How could you live with yourself, knowing you murdered her? Either way, the clock is ticking. Pick soon or trillions will die along with your precious Kirya. Tick tock, Odysseus. Tick tock.”

Odysseus’s eyes and Kirya’s locked again and the memories they had shared over the years started to flood Odysseus’s thoughts. He remembered when they first met. She had stood up for him against a bully. Although they were both beat up by the bully, the incident has started a lifelong friendship between them. Odysseus remembered when he first asked her out on a date when they were thirteen. He had barfed three times the night before from the anxiety and barfed right after asking. She had said yes before helping him clean up the vomit. He remembered their first kiss, under the night sky in the abandoned building that they had made their home. He remembered studying for the NEBULA exams together, staying up late at night and scrutinizing the textbooks. 

“I love you, Ody,” Kyria said, as if she were also reliving the memories.

“I love you, too,” Odysseus replied.

“I knew you’d choose her,” Revilo sneered. “Pathetic.”

She closed her eyes and Odysseus looked back at Revilo’s smug smile. Odysseus closed his eyes and made a decision he would regret for the rest of his life.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus threw the pistol on the ground and ran over to the cage where Kyria’s body lay. He used his Vibroknife to cut through the bars of the cage. He picked up her body and brought it out of the cage. Tears fell from his eyes and he brushed the hair out of her face. He touched his forehead to hers and quietly cried. 

“I’m sorry, Kyria! I’m so so sorry! Please, forgive me! Please! I’m so sorry! Come back! Please!” he sobbed. “I need you! Please! I love you!”

But it was in vain.

Odysseus felt the entire ship start shaking and pulling itself apart but he didn’t care. He also heard footsteps coming but he still didn’t care. He only looked up when he saw Aevar’s face yelling at him that they needed to leave. Odysseus picked up Kyria’s body in his arms as he let Aevar lead him back to the ship. He couldn’t stop crying and couldn’t hear anything. Everything was blurry and he felt nothing other than a sinking feeling in his stomach: an emptiness within. They entered the X70 and undocked from Revilo’s ship just in time before Revilo’s entire ship exploded in a fiery explosion. 

⋆⋆⋆

Over the next few months, the story about Odysseus spread across the galaxy like wildfire. He was interviewed in press conferences, photographed by paparazzi, and was asked for autographs countless times. The rest of the Neo-galactic United Systems’ military attacked the thohnods and they quickly surrendered. The war was over and people celebrated everywhere. There were fireworks, parties, and parades in the streets. 

The story about what he sacrificed to save everyone and bring the war to an end, also got out. There had been a funeral for Kyria and he had made sure that no paparazzi would be there. 

His sacrifice made people love him more and many came up to him and gave their condolences. The government provided him with a payment of five quintillion credits. News stations were sending him message after message, asking for an interview or exclusive. Random people on the street recognized him as the “Boy who saved.” The fame didn’t phase Odysseus at all, however. He still missed Kyria so much and he couldn’t sleep. Whenever he closed his eyes, he relived her death and would wake up in a cold sweat every night. 

Aevar had sent him a message a few days ago about a proposed meeting. He had said that it was important and Odysseus believed him. Aevar was scheduled to be arriving at Odysseus’s home in a few minutes so Odysseus got two glasses of firomos gold. He sat on the couch and sipped from one glass. Odysseus heard three rapid knocks on the door. He got up, walked over to the door, and opened it.

“Hey Ody,” Aevar greeted.

“Hi Aevar,” Odysseus replied.

“Can I come in?” Aevar asked.

“Yeah sure,” Odysseus replied. They went inside and Odysseus pulled up a chair in front of the table.

“I’ve got a mission in a bit so I’ll make this quick,” Aevar said hurriedly. “There’s a way for you to bring Kyria back.”

There was a silence. Odysseus wasn’t sure if he had heard Aevar correctly.

“I’m sorry, what?” Odysseus asked.

“You heard me. If anyone finds out I told you this, I’ll be arrested for treason so listen close,” Aevar said in a hushed voice, paranoidly looking over his shoulder. Odysseus leaned in to hear him better.

“How?”

“The Afterlife. It’s real. Sort of anyway. We discovered a wormhole a while back. No one we sent in ever came back. We built a whole research facility around the thing. The weird thing though is that whenever someone died in that research facility, the radiation signatures from inside the wormhole would fluctuate. We eventually started monitoring asteroid field deaths with the fluctuations. The times of the deaths matched the times of the fluctuations perfectly.”

“So the deaths took place at the same time as the fluctuations?”

“The dead people were the fluctuations.”

There was another silence. Aevar took a sip of his glass of firomos gold before continuing. “This might just be one large coincidence but it might be worth noting that there was another fluctuation at the estimated time that Kyria died.”

“I could see her again?” Odysseus asked, holding back tears.

“Not just her. Potentially, you could meet every dead person who ever lived. That includes your mom and your dad.”

Odysseus felt his tears brimming over his eyes. They rolled down his cheeks and he used the sleeve of his sweatshirt to wipe them away. He could finally meet his parents. He could see Kyria again. He could tell her that he was sorry. He could tell her that he missed her. He could tell her he loved her.

“Now remember,” Aevar continued. “It’s just a theory. If it’s wrong, you could die. And there are so many other variables to think about like what your plan to get back is and if just the ride itself will kill you. There might be nothing at all. You may just be transported trillions of light years away alone and—”

“What are the coordinates?” Odysseus interrupted.

Aevar smiled. The pure determination in Odysseus’s eyes reminded him of Ashr so much. He wished he could tell Ashr that he was sorry for letting him down. He wished he could tell Ashr about what an amazing young man his son had grown up to become. He wished he could tell Ashr a lot of things. Aevar felt tears brim in his eyes as well and turned away.

“What’s the matter?” asked Odysseus.

“Nothing kid. You just remind me a lot of your dad. He would’ve done the same thing,” Aevar replied. He took a napkin and pen out of his pocket and scribbled the coordinates on it.

“Thank you Aevar,” Odysseus said, taking the napkin from him.

“The security should be pretty low because everyone is celebrating the end of the war, so if you go now, you should be able to pass the blockade.”

“Thanks.” 

“Yeah just remember that I never told you any of this.”

“Of course.”

Aevar stood and stuck his hand out. “Good luck, kid.”

Odysseus stood and hugged him. Aevar was caught off guard by the sudden hug but embraced Odysseus as well. They parted after a few seconds.

“Well, I should get to my mission,” Aevar said, heading out of the house. “Goodbye, Ody.”

“Bye, Aevar,” Odysseus said and with that, Aevar was gone.

Odysseus wasted not a second. He sprinted out the backdoor of the house and climbed into his Protonspeeder X70. He initiated the starting sequence and fired up the engines. He brought the ship past the atmosphere and waited until it was floating in space before punching in the coordinates into the computer. He pulled the lightspeed engine lever and felt himself slowly being pushed into the back of his seat, once again.

⋆⋆⋆

Odysseus’s ship pulled out of lightspeed right under a giant metal ring that had been built around what appeared to be numerous layers of space crunched together and mashed like a sandwich. The center of the rift had a bright light emitting from it, so bright that Odysseus had to squint his eyes. Odysseus carefully brought his ship closer to the rift. He eased it slightly upward but accidentally bumped into the ring while being distracted by the awe of seeing a wormhole up close. This caused an alarm to blare through the entire facility and a group of about twenty ships undocked from the ring and opened fire on him. 

Odysseus cursed under his breath and diverted full power to the engines. He pulled up and aimed the nose of his ship at the wormhole. He heard lasers and bullets whiz by his ship but he knew that he was in the home stretch. He crashed full speed into the rift, causing an ear-splitting boom. 

He felt himself once again being pushed into his chair but the pressure was higher than before by at least ten times. He felt the ship shaking and trembling and saw a tunnel of light outside the window.

Despite the pressure pushing down on him increasing by the second, Odysseus felt oddly at peace. This was the first time he had felt this way in months and he could feel his consciousness leaving his body. He didn’t feel like he was walking into a hellscape of nightmares as he had felt for the last month when he tried to sleep. He instead felt like he was leaving and going somewhere else. Nowhere in particular yet everywhere that mattered. He closed his eyes and let the light tunnel take him back to Kyria.