[Fan Fiction] Looking forward to the Mirror (Completed)

[Krulle]

SpoilerShow

Chapter 16, part 1

[...]

The Soroin opened fire in unison, their particle blasters set at maximum in order to guarantee a crippling wound if not a kill. The Shells knew that the concentrated fire would instantly take out even hard troops and the they implemented a simple enough tactic for some additional cover to the Hard-troop vanguard. They simply took the Loroi dead that were left behind and nailed them onto makeshift shields that the hard-troops carried to cover themselves as they just walked into the blaster fire.

Is it my annoying behaviour you want to avoid. You got much better in your first versions, by now I only see stuff spell checkers would not see.

The infantry is coming!

(Wow, that chapter is intense. And it leaves me, once again, wanting more.)

[dragoongfa]

Chapter 16, part 2

“Clear, all hostiles down!” Sergeant Antares reported a few moments after the last bug was torn apart.

“Sounds like the rest of them are on the way!” Master Sergeant Anderson added.

Marine Lieutenant Josef Allerberger didn’t have any choice on the matter, he hoped that the Loroi would be able to last long enough for them to find them and extract them but the fact that they couldn’t hear any explosions or energy weapon’s fire must have meant that the Umiak had finally got them.

He glanced around as he made the decision to quickly retrace their steps to the Loroi airlock; the relatively open intersection they were currently in must have been where the bugs hit them after they unleashed the ‘Shout’. There was plenty of blood, some dead bugs and even some Loroi limbs but no Loroi dead who must have been dragged away in a hurry if he was to judge by the blood trails that lead deeper into the dark corridor from which the unmistakable ruckus of battle was being heard just a few moments ago.

They were going to run straight towards the noise when a small group of bugs literally run into them from another of the intersection’s corridors; their MD-45s tore them apart in seconds but two more small groups followed suit and they found themselves locked down in a firefight. Thankfully there weren’t any of the heavily armored variants who by the looks of things were akin to cyborgs which would explain the toughness and dogged determination in the face of death that they showed back at Matveyev. Still, even the normal bugs wasted enough of their time by the time they finished them off.

“We were too late…” He said angrily

“Sir, the Loroi medic doesn’t look well!” Private Hood said and he turned to see what the matter with her was. Doranzer Needle was on her knees, visibly shaking and unable to stand up.

“I am sorry Doranzer Needle but we have to go.” He said and offered his hand in order to help her to stand up.

“…No…Shout…Strong…Close…” She replied as she shooked her head violently.

“Are you certain?”

“Yes…Shout…Feel…Close…”

“Can you tell me which way?”

“I...Hard…Shout…Focus…” It was plainly obvious to see that she was worse off now than she was when they first entered the ship. If close proximity to the ‘Shout’ affected them more then it should make sense that they were close to it. He wonder how any Loroi managed to survive if this ‘Shout’ affected them in such a way but then he realized something and he had only a few moments to decide on a course of action.

“Alpha and Charlie, defend this point. Beta you are with me!” He ordered as he grabbed Doranzer Needle and forced her to stand up. “Anderson, hold this point at all costs!”

“Sir? What’s the plan?” Master Sergeant Anderson asked.

“It’s all or nothing now, we must be close to what the Loroi were after and the Umiak don’t want us to have it.” He explained as he half carried the Loroi medic who could barely stand even as she used him as a support. “Doranzer Needle, I need you to tell me when we will be getting closer to the ‘Shout’, do you understand?” He said in Trade as he walked towards to corridor from which the first group of bugs came from.

“…Yes…”

“Beta, we try this corridor first.” He said as he pointed forward with his weapon and the squad immediately formed around him with Sergeant Antares and two of his men on point while the remaining two brought up the rear. They had barely managed to take a few steps into the corridor when the first few bugs rushed into the intersection and the marines they left behind opened fire.

“Another small group!” Master Sergeant Anderson reported. “Nothing we can’t handle!”

“Hold the fort marine.” He replied.

“Don’t take too long or you will miss all the bugs.” Anderson joked.

“I have a feeling that bug hunting will become an honored tradition in the future sergeant.” He replied with a chuckle as he half carried the Loroi medic.

“…Close…” She managed to say as she obviously became less and less lucid with each passing step.

“Just keep yourself focused.” He replied but she didn’t say anything.

The screeching in his head had gotten stronger as well but even with it numbing his mind he didn’t have any trouble connecting the dots which led to the mess they were now stuck in.

The Loroi really wanted something from this ship, they wanted it so bad that dropped everything and launched an attack on their own despite the situation they were in. What they wanted was surely telepathic as well, there was no other explanation to everything that had happened up to that point; telepathy was the greatest advantage they had in this war and they were in the precipice of losing this advantage.

The problem was the human immunity which had to be real from the way the Loroi acted towards them when they went to investigate their ship. The Loroi actions made even more sense now that they knew about the Umiak telepathic abilities; it was easy to deduce that the Loroi attack and inherent hostility towards them wasn’t just because of the human immunity to telepathy but because of the new telepathic abilities of the Umiak. The Loroi who attack Gomez didn’t do so because of fearing the unknown but because she must have believed that they were enemies.

The Loroi had known in advance that the Umiak had found a way to hide themselves from their telepathic sensing and this Umiak ability explained why they were surprised to learn about the Umiak ship. The Loroi couldn’t sense it and they had assembled and activated the emergency generator by that point; which meant that they had the necessary power to activate any equipment they needed.

The Umiak hiding themselves gave them an advantage since the Loroi own history clearly stated that they had a greater industrial capacity than the Loroi; them having telepathy however would affect humanity sooner or later because of the human immunity. The Umiak had learned the hard way how advantageous telepathy was and now that they had some short of telepathy of their own they wouldn’t look kindly to anyone who had immunity to it.

With both sides actively employing telepathy the human predicament was greater than ever; Humans were now a threat to both sides, a threat that sooner or later would force either of the two to act against them. With one swell swoop the human vested interests were shifted from picking the winner who would protect them, to making sure that the lesser evil would come on top in the end.

For better or for worse the lesser evil was the genocidal Loroi Union; the Umiak Hierarchy wasn’t just an expansionist entity, they were an entity that was driven by the monomaniacal goal to eliminate all potential threats. Many of Matveyev’s crew, himself included, had managed to skim through the Loroi history of the war that they were given. It was not what they expected; the expected propaganda and skewered narrative were evidently there but their war history had far more in it than that. There were plenty of somber self-reflections, critiques and outright admittances of fault; something that anyone who read history would never find in any official history of a still running war.

The telepathic Loroi who couldn’t lie to each other had actually maintained their truthfulness even in their wartime histories; they wrote down the truth as they knew it and the realization was sobering to everyone who read it, despite the fact that it was hard to read at times. The Loroi admitted that they were partially responsible for that incident that started the war, some short of a minor skirmish in a contested border system. The Umiak response that the Loroi presented was initially unbelievable in its scale, some even said that it was an obvious fabrication when they first went through that part, but as they raced through the accounts they all realized that it was the truth; there was no other way to explain the extreme losses and conquered territories.

Both the Orgus and the Loroi accounts depicted the Umiak in the same way; as a force that would stop at nothing to attain an advantage and their own run in with the Umiak didn’t do anything but reinforce what they were told. A monomaniacal state that forcefully expanded onto others couldn’t be trusted not to take radical measures against those who nullified their newfound telepathic advantage; they already enslaved anyone in their path, it wasn’t hard to imagine what they would do to someone whose very existence threatened them.

This didn’t mean that the Loroi could be trusted, they proved themselves genocidal but their history was rife with internal politicking with alien members of the Loroi Union and their other alien allies; over exaggerated accounts or not, the Loroi looked like they were willing to cooperate and negotiate with aliens, they had to be wary of them but so far they were arguably the lesser of the two evils.

He had to make a choice with what he knew in mind and what he chose was that the Loroi had to get their hands on the telepathic apparatus of the Umiak; Humanity as a whole didn’t know where to start in order to make heads or tails about it but the Loroi who so desperately wanted it would certainly gleam something from it.
He didn’t know if Shadowcloud or anyone else from her team were still alive, he didn’t even know if Anderson would be able to hold back the Umiak crew long enough from them to secure whatever the Loroi were after. What he did know is that even if a single marine was left alive with the Umiak telepathic equipment still intact then humanity with have something valuable to offer.

“I hear movement up ahead… it’s another intersection.” Sergeant Antares reported from a dozen or so meters ahead of them.

“Hold on.” He said as he gently pulled the Loroi off him and sat her on the floor with her back on the wall before telling her to stay there in Trade. She didn’t reply, she just looked at him and blinked.

The firefight back the way they came from reverberated throughout the ship, they couldn’t see that far back due to the turns they had taken but it was obvious that the others were still holding on, despite the fact that they couldn’t contact them anymore probably due to some short of Umiak ECM.

He stacked with the others and did a last moment check of his weapons before giving the signal.

“It’s all or nothing now Marines.” He said and Sergeant Antares through a flash bang grenade which went off a moment after several bugs cried out in their clicky language and fire several particle slots at the mouth of the corridor which lead into the intersection.

“Go!” The momentarily blindness of the bugs allowed them to rush through the fire as they fired wildly throughout the intersection. “To the right!”

The Umiak had barricaded a corridor to their right, a couple of them were behind the makeshift barricade, carrying some short of particle blaster pistols which the fired blindly into the intersection as if they were maddened. The problem were the two armored bugs that were rushing towards them with unimaginable speed.

Antares who was first barely managed to get off a shot, the SHEAP exploding harmlessly right before hitting the wall behind the bug, he was sent flying and crashing onto the wall by the combined kicks of the bug’s two frontal legs. Hood who was right behind him tried to bring his weapon to bear but the bug was too far; it dexterously pivoted itself on one of its hind legs, knocking his weapon aside with a kick before grabbing him and stabbing him repeatedly with gleaming metallic spike that protruded from the bug’s right metallic hand.

Him paying attention to what happened in front of him nearly cost him his life as the second armored bug kicked the marine behind him and tried to stab him in turn; he parried the spike with his rifle at the last moment before ducking beneath a swipe by the bug’s left arm. He tried to bring his weapon to bear as well but the bug once again tried to stab him with lighting speed; he parried it away with his left arm but the bug instantly grabbed it with a razor sharp metallic claw that protruded from the back of its left hand as it brought it back for another strike. Despite his armor the claw closed and cut his left arm off before he could feel any pain.

He felt his severed limb burn as if it was on fire while the bug brought back its right hand to try and stab him again before stumbling forward and falling onto him, sending him sprawling on the floor with his legs pinned down by its armored corpse. The unmistakable flashes and telltale bangs of firing MD-45s lit the room as the two standing marines finally fired and killed the two armored bugs before taking out the other two who were still blindly firing their blaster pistols from behind the barrier.

“Clear!” Somebody cried out. The whole fight lasted less than five seconds and all of the bugs guarding the intersection were dead but they paid a price for that.

“Hold on sir!” Sergeant Antares said as he took the armored bug off him before grabbing his bleeding stump in order to apply coagulant foam and close it off with an emergency tap. His own armor had already applied the local anesthetic dose and his entire left arm had gone completely numb by that point.

“I see two dead.” He managed to say once he paid some attention to the flashing status of Beta squad, the rest of his force being just marked as out of range as the sounds of the ongoing firefight still reached them.

“Just one, Hood. The other was stabbed on the shoulder and got grazed by a blaster which plaid havoc with his HUD.” Sergeant Antares said as he inspected the closed off stump.

“The others are still at it…” He said as he looked around. “Find whatever the bugs were protecting but keep it alive and in one piece.”

Chapter 16, part 3: http://www.well-of-souls.com/forums/vie ... 176#p22176

[dragoongfa]

Two reasons for the considerable delay:

I got pissed off with this one and had to rewrite it twice and I actually broke one of my ground rules and started working on an other Outsider fan fic while this is still unfinished.

In any way, the next part should be ready sometime tomorrow or the day after tomorrow.

[Krulle]

I still like it very much!

The price paid is rising, will the attained price be worth it?
But then, Humanities survival is at stake! What are a few soldier's lifes compared to that?

[Username]

NO!!!!!! Not the space elves

Or is that just what the marines think happened.

(did they really die? )

[Krulle]

I would guess the Humans accidentally cut off the Umiak soldiers from attacking the Loroi.

[Zakharra]

I would guess the Humans accidentally cut off the Umiak soldiers from attacking the Loroi.

another possibility is that the humans were closer to he device and moving towards it, and were clearly not affected by it, hence they would be seen as the more dangerous foe since the Loroi are definitely negatively affected. As long as the device is screaming, the Loroi are neutralized. Human's aren't. Thus we are the greater immediate threat.

[peragrin]

I would guess the Humans accidentally cut off the Umiak soldiers from attacking the Loroi.

another possibility is that the humans were closer to he device and moving towards it, and were clearly not affected by it, hence they would be seen as the more dangerous foe since the Loroi are definitely negatively affected. As long as the device is screaming, the Loroi are neutralized. Human's aren't. Thus we are the greater immediate threat.

From every sc if I have ever read/watched. Humans are always the greater threat .

If we aren't then we will become so.

[dragoongfa]

I would guess the Humans accidentally cut off the Umiak soldiers from attacking the Loroi.

another possibility is that the humans were closer to he device and moving towards it, and were clearly not affected by it, hence they would be seen as the more dangerous foe since the Loroi are definitely negatively affected. As long as the device is screaming, the Loroi are neutralized. Human's aren't. Thus we are the greater immediate threat.

From every sc if I have ever read/watched. Humans are always the greater threat .

If we aren't then we will become so.

That's the essence of the Humanity Fuck Yeah! trope which tends to seep into Sci-Fi and Fantasy storytelling because the author and the audience almost always want to relate with human protagonists/main characters, or at least mostly human.

The sole exception that I have run across is the 'Shakara!' comic from 2000AD which had an intentional subversion of the trope in which Earth is destroyed in the very first page and the last human ever is killed shortly thereafter. Of course the main POV character is an alien woman who looks very much human with 'human' clothing because nobody thought that anyone would relate to the comic if some characters weren't relate able.

[dragoongfa]

Chapter 16, part 3

After everything that had transpired Kitiiikht-14-Tahkit-Tuk saw himself as a fool. His focus on offering one last contribution to the war effort by killing the torturing witches was a folly. Was he a coward? Acting like that in order to prolong his life just a bit more?

No, he had fully embraced the certainty of death the moment he realized that their true opponents were a group of torturing killers. His sin was pride, he wanted his death and the deaths of his subordinates to be one last contribution to the Hierarchy’s goal but in the end his actions were to the Hierarchy’s detriment.

He should have instantly disassembled the device before he and everyone who knew about it committed suicide. Only this would guarantee that it and knowledge about it wouldn’t fall on the clutches of the enemy. He realized his grave mistake when he called for most of the device’s guard to aid in the push against the torturing witches. They had taken grave loses but they had victory in their grasp, the only thing needed to do was to keep pushing while their defense was crumbling.

But the humans suddenly appeared close to the device, catching him by surprise; not only for them being there but for the fact that they were seemingly unaffected by the device. Everyone but Umiak should have been affected by it but they weren’t and losing the device to them wasn’t an option even if they killed all of the witches in turn. They had to secure the device before its handful of defenders fell; he had to stop the attack in order to do just that.

Through luck or careful planning the humans had cut them off from the device and due to their attack on the witches they couldn’t concentrate their numbers to attack them as the three different groups that attacked the Enemies had to take different routes to the device.

The meager guards he had foolishly left were now dead and Kt’rkrktkr 48 trkrk could not hope to offer any resistance to the humans. He felt the device’s fear in his head once the humans got to its compartment and he still felt the shriek it let out once they disconnected Kt’rkrktkr 48 trkrk from it.

The device’s shriek seemed to come from everywhere and it confused every Umiak left alive but they still attacked the humans who were completely unfazed by it. They still would have managed to get through them if not for the fact that they had brought heavy projectile weapons with them instead of the lasers that most species on their tech level used.

He had hoped beyond all reason that the device’s shriek would keep the torturing killers at bay long enough for them to defeat the humans and blow up the device but his hope faded the moment the shriek subsided and disappeared.

Drawing the last vestiges of his willpower he prepared his own spike and tried to trust it into his head through his frontal eye but his motion was stopped midway as an unseen force forcefully lifted him in the air and slammed him hard on the ceiling before crushing him hard on the floor and pinning him there as if he was suddenly under the effects of heavy gravity. Unable to use his limbs he called out for someone to kill him before it was too late but the few subordinates he had with him abruptly fell dead one after the other before they could do anything.

He called out again in desperation but there was no one around, he could still hear the desperate voices of his subordinates through his comm. unit as they died one after the other until he could hear nothing anymore.

Moments felt like eternity as he was constantly pressed against the floor, he needed to die before the witches got to him but he was completely helpless. After a while he hear several running footsteps but they weren’t the quadruped pattern of his kind but the bipedal one of the Enemy.

He knew that they had come for him; he could see their armored feet with his side eyes as they surrounded him and waited for something in total silence. Some moments later a few of them made way for another one of their kind who walked up to him and stayed still right next to his head examining him.

Suddenly his right arm was crushed and torn off with unimaginable force; he wanted to cry out in pain but no words left him as the unseen force stopped even his mandibles from moving. Then he felt as if his severed stump was on fire, no it was fire; he smelled the burned flesh and exoskeleton as they were fused by the heat, effectively cauterizing the wound and stopping the bleeding.

None of the enemies said anything as the process repeated itself for all of his remaining limbs; in the he was left only with the agonizing pain and the smell of his own cauterized stumps. Suddenly the force that had pinned him down reversed itself and he found himself airborne again. He was quickly pivoted around and was brought face to face with the enemy that came in last; the enemy just looked straight at him through the helmet’s visor.

“I always find your kind’s ships annoying…” The enemy said in his own language. “Your big black eyes not only offer you a greater field of vision through their positioning but they also allow you to see better at a slightly larger visual spectrum. A fact that has always pissed me off when I board your ships, because your emergency lighting barely registers to us and as such I am always forced to use the helmet’s night vision.”

He made to reply but the invisible force that kept his mandibles from moving was still there.

“Wearing the helmet deprives me of many enjoyable sensations, like the subtle noises your exoskeleton makes when it is about to crack or the amazing smell your kind lets out when you are burned from the inside out.” The enemy laughed at that, one of the handful of mannerisms that were similar to both of their kinds. “Don’t worry though; I am sure that you will make it up to me one way or the other. So many things that you can do for me, like answering what did your kind do to the one you used against us?” The enemy then slightly shook her head while chuckling. “But I am getting inpatient; there are things that have to be done before then but have no fear though. We will spend a lot of time together in the future.”

Chapter 17, part 1: http://www.well-of-souls.com/forums/vie ... 337#p22337

[dragoongfa]

Chapter 16 is now done.

Two, maybe three, chapters left and the prologue. I will see if I can expedite things and have the story wrapped up soon.

[Tamri]

Cool. Umiak took humans for Loroi bioweapons against psionics?)

[Argron]

I think I peed myself a little in the end lol, yeah you don't want to be caught alive in that war, no matter the side. Goes for the humans too, the umiak are going to be awfully interested on human immunity to telepathy, let alone our similarity with their main enemy.
Great end to the chapter

amazing smell your kind lets out when you are burned from the inside out.

Leaving aside that those are sentient beings, you can't really blame her there, they are probably shrimp-like and who doesn't like those lol

That's the essence of the Humanity Fuck Yeah! trope which tends to seep into Sci-Fi and Fantasy storytelling because the author and the audience almost always want to relate with human protagonists/main characters, or at least mostly human.

The sole exception that I have run across is the 'Shakara!' comic from 2000AD which had an intentional subversion of the trope in which Earth is destroyed in the very first page and the last human ever is killed shortly thereafter. Of course the main POV character is an alien woman who looks very much human with 'human' clothing because nobody thought that anyone would relate to the comic if some characters weren't relate able.

I just hope that if aliens come into contact with us they don't read that part of the internet or they might decide to nuke us lol. Nor any other part of the internet for that matter XD

[Krulle]

SpoilerShow

Chapter 16, part 3

[...]

Moments felt like eternity as he was constantly pressed against the floor, he needed to die before the witches got to him but he was completely helpless. After a while he heard several running footsteps but they weren’t the quadruped pattern of his kind but the bipedal one of the Enemy.

[...]

None of the enemies said anything as the process repeated itself for all of his remaining limbs; in the end he was left only with the agonizing pain and the smell of his own cauterized stumps. Suddenly the force that had pinned him down reversed itself and he found himself airborne again. He was quickly pivoted around and was brought face to face with the enemy that came in last; the enemy just looked straight at him through the helmet’s visor.

[...]

I just hope that if aliens come into contact with us they don't read that part of the internet or they might decide to nuke us lol. Nor any other part of the internet for that matter XD

I think the aliens already did, and simply quarantined our system.

Cool. Umiak took humans for Loroi bioweapons against psionics?)

That would mean the Loroi knew about the device(s) and came to this system to trap the Umiak specifically.

“So many things that you can do for me, like answering what did your kind do to the one you used against us?” The enemy then slightly shook her head while chuckling.

Quite some sadistic ladies... She looks forward to torturing him (?) more. Anyway, they seem to have found out what the device is, and she is still able to chuckle? Not good.

[dragoongfa]

From the Loroi POV relieving the Umiak of their VERY DEADLY arms is the sane thing to do in order to stop any captive from committing suicide or killing any guards, I was ambivalent about the legs getting the same treatment but the problem lies with how Arioch described the Umiak exoskeleton. In short any size able hole or big enough crack to the exoskeleton is potentially deadly as the lack of internal skeleton will mean that the vital organs don't have an anchor to keep them in place (the same way our lungs and heart are kept in place by our thorax) thus any large enough wound to an Umiak exoskeleton carries the same risk to them that a size able abdominal wound does to us.

Now let's take a look at the Umiak legs:

http://well-of-souls.com/outsider/forum_umiak.html

They look very much like hooves and its my guess that although they shouldn't be flexible enough to kick a hole into the main body, they are very capable of cracking open the exoskeleton at the other legs which will cause excessive bleeding and a very quick death if left untreated for more than a minute or two.

Which reminds me that I have taken a liberty in regards to the Hard-Troop hand to hand arm weapons; the normal Umiak have only their very sharp fingers and their very sharp claw on one of their hands, the cybernetic hard-troops also have an upgrade in the form of a long hidden knife like spike that protrudes from their 'normal' hand; which I consider to be a necessary adaptation to pierce heavy armor. Their cybernetics give them the necessary strength to stab through armor with the spike and even cut through armored limbs with their fully cybernetic claw.

So in short, Umiak limbs are dangerous for the captor and the Umiak captives who will prefer to commit suicide rather than betray the Hierarchy in any way or form.

Mizols have found out the hard way that they have to keep themselves alive around the sources and to keep the sources alive long enough to extract the necessary information. How the various Mizols are going about doing that its down to each agent as no one is going to ask any questions about the fate of Shells. I imagine that there are many who prefer their sources as undamaged as possible, rellying more on drugs, restraints and just the removal of the most dangerous elements of the Umiak captives (A quick removal of the claw and trimming of the sharp edges of Umiak fingers and hooves.

Shadowcloud on the other hand...

She really HATES Umiak with every sense of the word and for good reason.

Character Outline: Shadowcloud

Caste: Mizol
Rank: Torimor
Age: 262 years.
Height: 1.76 meters or 5.77 feet
Weight: 65 Kilograms or 143 libr
Hair color: Black
Skin color: Light cyan
Eye color: Hazel
Planet of Birth: Taben
Planet that she was raised up: Perrein
Mother's Caste: Listel.
Father's Caste: A male caste with eidetic memory.
Telepathic Potency: High to Very high
Telekinetic Potency: Very High to Extreme; described as monstrous when using an amplifier
Telepathic and Telekinetic proficiency: Best described as Master, some Loroi would call her a Sage.
Number of Children: 12. 11 females, one male. Three of the females and the male pre-war, the rest during the war. All of her daughters successfully became warriors for the Mizol, Teidar or Listel depending on their telepathic, telekinetic or eidetic skills. 5 of them died during the war.

Shadowcloud is best described as a high ranking Intelligence Agent with a penchant for on hands investigations and black ops wetwork.

Her telepathic and telekinetic potential was discovered early in her childhood and her Telekinetic potency caused quite a bit of friction between the Mizol and the Teidar at the time. If she was only a Telekinetic the Teidar would have gotten her but the Mizol pushed for her due to her Eidetic memory. Listel mothers always preferred to have the memory skills of their daughters used for combat related purposes and her mother prefered to have her enter the Mizol caste where she knew that Shadowcloud would use her eidetic memory in ways that she as Listel never would be able. The Teidar generally using their members with Eidetic memories as caste archives and historians instead of intelligence officers like the Mizol do.

At Perrein Shadowcloud became the leader of her diral band, which for the Loroi is more of a curse than a recognition of capability. This was due to her background and the fact that she wasn't a native of Perrein. Regardless of this fact she proved to be an effective diral leader, although she could be described as bullyish in the way she led her band.

After becoming a full fledged warrior she was quickly thrown into the deep end of the Intelligence world. With her eidetic memories she was an excellent spy/analyst while her telekinetic abilities made her a potent martial asset. She quickly made a name for herself for discovering, analyzing and eliminating threats to the safety and stability of the Loroi Empire. It was during this early stage of her life that she became what is best described as a Mizol supremacist.

She quickly drew the attention of high ranking Mizol and former Mizol Torrais, including future Emperor Greywind. She was an early proponent for a deep Mizol investigation into the Umiak hierarchy and was even part of the Mizol delegation that petitioned the Third Loroi Emperor Eighth Dawn for financing and supporting such an operation. The downright insulting way that this proposition was shot down became a bitter memory for her and the other members of that delegation and sparked the beggining of an underground Mizol movement to subvert Eighth Dawn's reign.

Shadowcloud became a key figure of that movement but the beginning of the war marked the postponing and later disbanding of that movement. Eighth Dawn's death and Greywind's ascension became a key political victory for the Mizol but fragmentary evidence of that movement's existence were used as an excuse for the failed coup against Greywind (who may or may not have been part of that movement herself).

After the coup's violent subjugation ShadowCloud joked morbidly that she killed more Loroi then and there than Umiak agents throughout the entirety of the war up to that point. Many expected that she would ascend to the Torrai caste but she herself vehemently opposed this, thinking (rightfully so) that her known Mizol supremacist views and her part in the coup's subjugation could be used against Emperor Greywind. Despite this she continued her exemplar intelligence work, uncovering numerous subversive plots instigated by Umiak agents/sympathizers.

She was a very loud opponent of the Tithric campaign, fearing that the downright genocide of the Tithric would prove problematic later on; she did wish for an exemplary punishment for what she saw as war profiteering by the Tithric but she was a proponent of an occupation and using the Tithric as living shields rather than killing the majority of their population and practically annihilating them as a political entity. During the Semoset campaign even she was shocked to discover how damaging to the Loroi war effort the Tithric issue had become.

After the collapse of the Semoset offensive she was among the many Mizol tasked with maintaining order in the Union and attempting to spy on the Hierarchy. Just before the story begins she was at Tinja sector overseeing the preparation of a deep intelligence operation to the former Umiak-Tithric frontier. An operation that was put on hold due to the disappearance of a Loroi picket squadron deep into former Tithric space.

Fun Facts:

Mizol Supremacist: She sees other castes as sentimental/temperamental fools, with the Listel and Teidar being somewhat better than the others. (she keeps this to herself, most of the time)
She has barely managed to kill more Umiak than Loroi subversive elements.
Prefers a more hands on approach for missions.
Could be described as a mild bully, her motto being: Whatever makes one stronger is acceptable.
She tends to understand the abstract way of thinking of aliens.
Hates Umiak.
Likes Perrein cooking.
Has sparingly visited Taben for recreation.
Really hates Umiak.
She once posed as a Doranzer medic to impress a male.
Did I mention that she really hates Umiak?

PS: Looks like I fucked up somewhere with my notes in regards to the Umiak hand to hand fights, those will need a rewrite since I jumbled the left and right hands and accidentally gave the long protruding spike to the normal Umiaks as well.

[Krulle]

i am less concerned in her direct approach to securing the carrier of the information she needs.
But she is looking forward to the interrogation in a manner that makes my hairs stand up.
(which is not a bad thing, as this is just a story. And she really hates Umiak. More than the rest of all Loroi together ever could.)

I definitely dislike her chuckle after she asked Kitiiikht-14-Tahkit-Tuk “[...] what did your kind do to the one you used against us?”, apparently knowing what the device is.
This connections make my skin feel really uncomfortable.
Other interpretations of this chuckle are less serious:
- She already sees how this device (and its kins) can and will be used against the Umiak.
- The device is a heavily altered Umiak (after the Historians told the Umiak bits and pieces about telepathy). Which seen from outside seems to have been tortured more than Shadowcloud could imagine torturing Kitiikht-14-Tahkit-Tuk...


I'm looking forward to the wrap-up chapters.

BTW, I assume the Humans, in their need to switch off the device ASAP, simply killed Kt’rkrktkr 48 trkrk when they encountered him, as they did not have the means to recognise this Umiak as a technician who might know a lot more, and since the Humans do not have the knowledge yet of how dangerous captured Umiak are. Nor the ability to actually capture Kt'rkrktkr 48 trkrk alive.

[dragoongfa]

The next part will have extensive cover of the 'device's' inner sanctum; suffice to say that you are partially right on both of your hypotheses.

[raistlin34]

Question: If I have read it right, in your fic humans are, from a loroi´s psychics point of view, a blind spot which cannot be directly targeted. Yet in the original comic, Fireblade had no problems pushing Alexander in the elevator.

[dragoongfa]

Question: If I have read it right, in your fic humans are, from a loroi´s psychics point of view, a blind spot which cannot be directly targeted. Yet in the original comic, Fireblade had no problems pushing Alexander in the elevator.

Humans are undetectable and impervious to telepathy but they can be visually identified and thus targeted when they are within line of sight. Fireblade in canon used telekinesis on Alex when she could actually see him. If Fireblade could sense Alex through telepathy she shouldn't have any trouble using telekinesis on him without a line of sight. The deadly appliance of telekinesis without a line of sight is demonstrated in the fan fic.

I have a suspicion that only Beryl would have escorted Alex if he could be sensed; I high ranking and capable Teidar like Fireblade wouldn't have her time wasted as a lowly escort for an ordinary alien. But an identical alien with Lotai could end up being extremely dangerous and I have an inkling that Fireblade acted the way she acted to remind the potential telepathic and telekinetic alien not to mess with her for any reason.

[Zakharra]

Yes. I believe it has been confirmed by Arioch, that humans are invisible to telepathy and being sensed via any form of telepathy. So when a human it out of sight, the Loroi cannot sense him/her. However telekinesis isn't telepathy, it affects a physical object, such as flesh. So in that case, the human Lotai is not a shield. All that prevents is mental contact/control/manipulation, not use of powers that affect physical stuff. So a Loroi that can start fires, throw/move things, or whatever, can affect a human, IF she can see the human. Hence Fireblade being able to give Alex a shove in the elevator.