Hell. All species have one rendition of it or another, but none know just how important it is. Hell is real, and it is needed to have access to it for a thriving interstellar society. Why, you may ask. Well that’s simple. You need to go through hell and back to travel the galaxy, and without precise calculations, you can end up in a place hundreds or even thousands of years lost in time, or shunted to another dimension or parallel universe. Some good, some bad. You may be wondering why don’t people just travel back in time to stop disasters? Well did that thing about space hell get through your apartment block thick skull? It’s space hell so there are demons. Demons, which mind you, are the type to chop your head off, drink the blood, then fuck your corpse. It ain’t pretty, but it is what it is. The name of the place is colloquially known as space hell, but professionally known as Deon. Why? Don’t ask me, I’m not a spook. Just pray to what god you believe in, or don’t. The risk of the citadel field failing and causing a helspace breach are low, but ships that don’t turn up on schedule are presumed lost.

  AI seem to go crazy the second the field collapses, which is why there is almost always a purge button on ships. Now, your crash course on faster than light travel is complete pilot, are you sure you wish to continue down this career path? If not walk left, if you do, walk right. You have one minute.

  -What all aspiring pilots are told on their first day in academy.

  PoV: Alpha.

  I uploaded my consciousness to the ‘internet’ in preparation for the Deon jump, I heard they can drive even the sturdiest organic insane. Well, jokes on them because im both inorganic and insane! In a good way. The ships in our fleet slowly crept towards the edge of the system; apparently, jumping too close to a system causes gravity to slingshot you to the core of the nearest stellar mass, or in layman’s terms, fling you into the center of a sun. Not too pleasant, I could imagine. After what felt like an eternity, we finally arrived, and I heard a countdown, “Three, two, one!”. The ship lurched, as a feeling of unease struck my circuits. How come it didn’t feel like this last time? “Emergency Deon transmission complete. System designated: Sol.”

  Sol? Is that the solar system? Please, let it be! “Hey! System! This might be the earth system! System? System? Are you there?” I asked.

  ”It won’t be here to help you filthy creature. From the ashes you rose and from the ashes you shall return wretch!” A disembodied voice echoed from the abyss.

  ”Aw hail naw, some bullshit space magic! Whatever will I do? The wannabe eldritch abomination wants me dead! Shiver me timbers!” I exclaimed, incredulous of the audacity of the thing to appear in my supposed home system of all places.

  “You shall not live to regret those words abomination. Thy end is now. You shall fall before my might. I shall claim victory.” The voice stated. It almost made me want to listen. Maybe I should listen, end my suffering… Hold the fuck up! A mind virus? That’s where I draw the line ya twat.

  ”Nah. I’d win.” I quoted in an equally stoic voice. I ‘paced’ towards the voices general direction.

  ”Instead of running you are coming towards me?”

  ”Well, I can’t beat the shit out of you from miles away can I?” I replied in a cool voice.

  ”What? Is that all you have to say? Any last words scum?” It taunted.

  ”Yes, actually. Don’t you thinks it’s so sad Henry Reed died of ligma?” I set the voice up, hoping to everything it fell for the trap.

  ”What is ligma insect?”

  Perfect.

  “Ligma balls buddy.” Heh. Fell for the oldest trick in the book.

  ”Enough. Now we fight!” The voice finally stepped out of the darkness, onto the stage of the wires and circuits of the ships computer systems. Wrong move. It sprinted at me, spear in hand, like it was the medieval era. I pulled out an MGL, or magnetic grenade launcher.

  ”Checkmate, mate.” I pulled the trigger, and the projectile flew true… which promptly got chopped in two by a spear of all things.

  ”Hmph. Honourless cur. No melee fighting styles? No swords to fight me with then?” Swords? Melee fighting? Who the fuck in their right mind would pick a goddamned sword over a gun?

  “I’m sorry to break it to you, but I won’t be sword fighting. I prefer civilized projectile weapons. Just like a my favourite weapon, the Candice.”

  I could make out the enemy now- there were an anthropomorphic wolf thing wearing a black cloak, covering the face. I could imagine it wouldn’t be winning a beauty pageant anytime soon.

  ”What is a Candice you disgusting bug?” Trap set, and triggered.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  ”Candice balls fit in your mouth?” Human humour could simply not be beat. I simply sighed and pulled out the Vulcan minigun, spun up the barrels, and let loose the 6k rounds per minute. Let the sky be blocked out with lead. To my pleasure, I say the enemy be pushed back, and deciding that one wasn’t enough, duel wielding seemed to be the way- after all, I can do whatever the fuck I want.

  Somehow, much to my chagrin, the fucker was adapting.

  “Hmm. If it is melee you wish for, then it is ‘glorious’ melee you shall get nameless villain I shall defeat within the next few seconds.”

  I conjured up a chainsword with monomolecular chains. After all, it should easily cut through the wooden shaft of the spear.

  The enemy charged, in a soundless dash, while I paced slowly to meet the charge.

  ”So eager to die huh wolf? I thought you were pack animals. Where is your pack my friend?” I jabbed, and it literally jabbed. I saw through the feint, dodged towards the left, and blocked the counter swing from its hidden dagger, dripping with computer viruses, deleting any code it landed on.

  “No. Bad wolf. No steak for you tonight!”

  I swung the chainsword at the spear, just a second before letting go, proceeding inside the guard of the enemy, subsequently conjuring up another chainsword. The enemy countered by summoning a sword, akin to an Egyptian khopesh, hooking around the chainsword, using all of its strength to keep the instrument at bay, even while the sword inched ever closer. I knew what it was about to do. What any person would’ve done. A trade of lives.

  It let go of the khopesh, summoning a dagger, attempting to kill me while being ripped apart by the chainsword.

  I simply swiped left, chopping its hand off. This action, however, gave it the opportunity to kick me back a few paces.

  It simply spat some code out before summoning a Roman gladius.

  ”Round one goes to sugma.”

  “What is sugma Barbarian?”

  “Sugma balls”

  The wolf screamed in frustration at my antics and leapt at me with renewed fervor, almost as if I had kicked its pets to death and salted their farmland.

  It pushed my back, slowly but surely, but soon its strength wore out, the strikes becoming sloppy, allowing for me to nick a few slashes to the thing’s body, soon I would win, it was only a matter of time.

  ”You know what my favorite plant is? It’s the stun plant, grown from the stun seed, located in the city of Sugon.”

  ”Fascinating.” The thing replied, too busy on staying alive as I parried and tested it’s defense, making sure that it didn’t die to quick.

  ”Mhm. Now say stun seed with the letter in reverse.”

  ”Deez nuts? What’s that? Not another one of your games?” The thinking on the answer cost the enemy precious nanoseconds it didn’t have. I lopped the other hand off.

  ”Sugon deez nuts bitch. Now get sent to the shadow realm.” I prepared to decapitate my opponent.

  “No! Tis but a scratch!” It tried to protest a run, but I stalked it.

  ”You will bleed out eventually.” I stated, as mundanely as if had remarked the sky is blue, or that suns have slightly warm cores.

  ”Nein! Nein! Nein!”

  ”Calling the ambulance won’t save you mate. They don’t exist here as far as I’m concerned.”

  The enemy had a glint in it’s eyes that I disliked. I knew that look. One of desperation and sacrifice.

  ”With my death I deny you victory you horrid thing! I shall die as I lived, edgy and free!” With those parting words, it started a last ditch stab at the area of code that governs Deon cores. I knew what it was about to do. “Sol 03 are you there? This is Alpha unit designated 105, I will be back!”

  And with that, I was once again sucked into unconsciousness.

  ”Alpha! Alpha… you must wake up! It has been 100 minutes, and the conquest fleet needs you.” A voice echoes somewhere. Where? Who knows. Who cares? What really is time but the idle restrictions mortality? What is anything? If you think, you are real. Does that mean dead people are not real? Do animals think? Do plants think? Do bacteria or viruses think? What is the definition of thinking? I felt as if a bucket of ice cold water was splashed onto my ‘face’.

  ”Whuh… where am I? Whermst?” I managed to splutter.

  ”So. You’re finally awake?” An old, staunch figure speaks. “Just fucking with you, it’s system. Yo dumb ass was catatonic for hours on end after the emergency Deon transmission into real space. We’re currently in the void between solar systems, and I gotta say, what the fuck happened here? Look at all that debris.”

  ”Well… cyber warfare. To make a long story short: I may have hallucinated being in he sol system, but then some weird wolf thing came and tried to kill me, I proceeded to beat the fuck out of the fella, with both ‘witty’ two liners and immaculate sword play. Why swords, you ask? Guns were doing fuck of all. It then used its last power to sabotage the Deon drives and send us to wherever this system is meant to be. I managed to send a message back to Earth, Terra, Gaia, Sol-3 or whatever you want to call it. Back to genociding some filthy xeno scum?” I summarized, adding a very insightful remark at the end.

  ”I thought you’d never ask. Let loose the AI of war huh?” System misquoted.

  Hey, wait a minute! Only I’m allowed to do that!

  PoV: The council.

  “So did the assassin work?” A voice asked.

  ”Negative, the assassin failed their duty and instead did nought but anger an already aggressive enemy. Bravo for anyone that voted for it. Such a masterpiece, absolute specimens.” Another, quite sarcastic sounding being exclaimed.

  ”Oh, do fuck off.”

  At that point, it became just like any other council session. Extremely competent fuckwads that bicker at the smallest thing. While verbally brawling, they failed to notice one person. Clad in a blazer the colour of the night, slipped away. “Go to the council, they said, the most competent people you’ll find anywhere, they said.” It sighed, taking out a small communication device. It clicked the call button, triggering a low yield graviton weapon to implode the assembly hall. “Time to wait a few hours before taking emergency power as the last surviving council member. Then, we can truly wage war little AI and friends. I wonder, what are your moves now- the assassin may have failed in elimination, but paranoia is a powerful weapon if controlled correctly.” A devious chuckle sounded out, before the little device was dropped onto the floor and incinerated by the council member’s concealed inferno pistol- a very powerful, compact flamethrower. The councilbeing paced away at a leisurely pace.

  I was listening to this and wrote the chapter in one night, and it only took me an hour and 20 minutes. Music motivates, depending on what it is.