We are called back home. The conclave awaits on Manda’yaim. The Faithful has fallen, and the clans convene. Death is life. He will be remembered.
Baatir fights on. He remains to lead those who would follow the clan. May the Destroyer see worth in his Chosen’s deeds.
I am bid to speak for Kar’taylir in conclave. I am uneasy. There is no more honorable place for the aliit-leader than war. But there are those whom will wish to speak of other ways. Of other paths. I sense the manipulations of the Trickster. And Baatir’s song is more written than mine own, and is sung louder.
The Akaan’chor’borar slows from it’s transit, the data-hunters guiding the ship-master have seen something. It is old and pitted, a creation of some unknown race. Their worth untested.
This is a path of risk. Already we have subsumed the conclave for battle once. This is not what I was bid. But to guide the ship is not my path, and this is no time to challenge.
The corridors and passages are strange. Geometry unlike any I know. What manner of species designed such a craft? The parties stalk forwards with care. The unknown is the greatest danger in such places.
Within a great void, so unlike the tortured architecture of the outer passages. And clusters of what seem to be eggs. And they number in the thousands.
If battle is close than we are outnumbered. So be it. The youngest is bid to return to signal range and bear word. We advance, and the data-hunters ready their tools.
On my side is Chayaikir, the warrior of Morut. She of the path of unarmed honor. She is unburdened by the plates I wear, and lithely steps from platform to platform.
Hand-signals ahead. There is movement. Then chaos. The air fills with creatures. Leaping so fast they might be in flight.
Chayaikir spins, her movement cleaving two in mid-flight. I catch one in motion, impaling it’s small torso on my munit’kad. Sounds made by no voice known to me scream from all sides.
Chayaikir falls backwards. They could not touch her, but their gore, their blood, eats through her thin chitin and suit as if it were not there. Death is life.
We fall back in steps, carrying clanmates with creatures wrapped about, and inside, their helmets.
Another wave, a thick cluster. My warriors tire, and I must lead by doing. A wide swing to buy space, then a targeted lunge and a shift to one side. My flank is open to save others. Movement and impacts on my side. Then memory fades.