trying.”
When Alnot didn’t answer, he went up in my estimation a bit.
Dral continued, “To the other side of the core were the
Reilan. The Reilan were peaceful as well, and hard to describe.
They weren’t humanoid either.”
The fact he was describing them in the past tense made me
pay even more attention to his words, and it gave me a sense of foreboding.
Dral nodded, “So in short, we were alone. We had two
peaceful neighbors, but they weren’t humanoid, and were hard to speak to and
understand. Up the arm we had the Knomen empire, an empire without
honor. Many millennia passed, and then the Reilan were invaded from the
other side. Many millions of small ships, the size of what we would
consider a shuttle or troop transport, invaded their space.
“We watched, and waited, thinking we were next. But
when the Reilan were destroyed, the swarm of ships headed up the arm.
We’d escaped a nasty war, but only for a time, and we never forgot, we built up
our ship numbers knowing that they would be back someday. Five hundred
years later, they swarmed back down the arm, and attacked us.”
He paused for a moment, and I wondered if they were so
different after all. He clearly had a good handle on the theatric.
“We have been fighting them off ever since. We tried
once again to get the Knomen to see true honor, and join us in defending our
arm of the galaxy, but that wasn’t to be. More than once, the Knomen saw
us as a threat and considered attacking us. We have the ability to find
out such things. Whenever that happened, we invaded Leira with a small
force, made up of older ships, and old warriors that wished to die in battle.
“We regret the loss of life, but true to form, the Knomen
are cowards, every time we invaded they would change their mind, until the next
time they remembered us.”
Alnot replied, “So you want to join the treaty, and have us
fight with you against these invaders, is that it? Why should we?”
Dral frowned, “Do you not understand? I thought from
my words, this would be clear. This… galaxy is some kind of experiment.
Whoever seeded our galaxy with life, only gave one arm to humanoids. On
one side we have amorphous forms that are peaceful but so alien we can’t have
meaningful contact, the other aliens that were destroyed are beyond my ability
to describe properly. The enemy that attacks us came from the fourth arm,
the one opposite us. We use words such as swarm to describe them because
they swarm like insects.
“The creatures themselves have exoskeletons like many
insects on our worlds, they even have an amalgam to mandibles, and the way they
feed. Beyond that though they have no relation to us at all, they are
entirely alien in nature. Even the insects on our worlds contain up to
sixty percent of the same DNA, not so for this race bent on destroying all life
in the galaxy that is unlike them. They do not live in atmosphere like
us, they thrive on gases that would poison and kill us. They do not
communicate at all, we are unable to even learn the
name of their race.
“To answer your question, why help, if we are destroyed,
they will swarm up the Orion arm with millions of ships, you will not have a
chance. It is the way of honor, something we hope is possible between us
now that the grip of the Knomen has been broken. If we join your treaty,
we will be allies, and you can help defend our lives along with your own.
Or, you can say no, I’ll leave, and when my race dies, yours will surely
follow. The truth that you have until now been unaware of, is we have
guarded you for millennia, against a brutal and merciless enemy.
“We are running out of resources, colonies, and
warriors. The truth is, without allies we will not last much
longer. When I say that, realize we have in excess of a million warships,
we could have invaded the arm long ago, and easily won, but we would see that
as dishonorable, and frankly we need
When Alnot didn’t answer, he went up in my estimation a bit.
Dral continued, “To the other side of the core were the
Reilan. The Reilan were peaceful as well, and hard to describe.
They weren’t humanoid either.”
The fact he was describing them in the past tense made me
pay even more attention to his words, and it gave me a sense of foreboding.
Dral nodded, “So in short, we were alone. We had two
peaceful neighbors, but they weren’t humanoid, and were hard to speak to and
understand. Up the arm we had the Knomen empire, an empire without
honor. Many millennia passed, and then the Reilan were invaded from the
other side. Many millions of small ships, the size of what we would
consider a shuttle or troop transport, invaded their space.
“We watched, and waited, thinking we were next. But
when the Reilan were destroyed, the swarm of ships headed up the arm.
We’d escaped a nasty war, but only for a time, and we never forgot, we built up
our ship numbers knowing that they would be back someday. Five hundred
years later, they swarmed back down the arm, and attacked us.”
He paused for a moment, and I wondered if they were so
different after all. He clearly had a good handle on the theatric.
“We have been fighting them off ever since. We tried
once again to get the Knomen to see true honor, and join us in defending our
arm of the galaxy, but that wasn’t to be. More than once, the Knomen saw
us as a threat and considered attacking us. We have the ability to find
out such things. Whenever that happened, we invaded Leira with a small
force, made up of older ships, and old warriors that wished to die in battle.
“We regret the loss of life, but true to form, the Knomen
are cowards, every time we invaded they would change their mind, until the next
time they remembered us.”
Alnot replied, “So you want to join the treaty, and have us
fight with you against these invaders, is that it? Why should we?”
Dral frowned, “Do you not understand? I thought from
my words, this would be clear. This… galaxy is some kind of experiment.
Whoever seeded our galaxy with life, only gave one arm to humanoids. On
one side we have amorphous forms that are peaceful but so alien we can’t have
meaningful contact, the other aliens that were destroyed are beyond my ability
to describe properly. The enemy that attacks us came from the fourth arm,
the one opposite us. We use words such as swarm to describe them because
they swarm like insects.
“The creatures themselves have exoskeletons like many
insects on our worlds, they even have an amalgam to mandibles, and the way they
feed. Beyond that though they have no relation to us at all, they are
entirely alien in nature. Even the insects on our worlds contain up to
sixty percent of the same DNA, not so for this race bent on destroying all life
in the galaxy that is unlike them. They do not live in atmosphere like
us, they thrive on gases that would poison and kill us. They do not
communicate at all, we are unable to even learn the
name of their race.
“To answer your question, why help, if we are destroyed,
they will swarm up the Orion arm with millions of ships, you will not have a
chance. It is the way of honor, something we hope is possible between us
now that the grip of the Knomen has been broken. If we join your treaty,
we will be allies, and you can help defend our lives along with your own.
Or, you can say no, I’ll leave, and when my race dies, yours will surely
follow. The truth that you have until now been unaware of, is we have
guarded you for millennia, against a brutal and merciless enemy.
“We are running out of resources, colonies, and
warriors. The truth is, without allies we will not last much
longer. When I say that, realize we have in excess of a million warships,
we could have invaded the arm long ago, and easily won, but we would see that
as dishonorable, and frankly we need
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