CHAPTER THREE
The Roar of Departure
The Krausnaut's engines sang like a thousand suns igniting at once.From the plains of Akromos, all tribes lifted their eyes to the heavens. They saw a streak of gold tearing the sky, trailing behind it the dust of Kandor's blessing.Children pressed their palms to the soil to feel the vibration in their bones. Elders wept openly, for they knew history was splitting.
On the command deck, Belial's eyes fixed on the star-river unfolding before him. Warp corridors bent space into ribbons, stars stretched into silken threads of light, and the void itself seemed to breathe.
The Shamru-node pulsed, its tendrils flickering across the deck like veins of living lightning. Belial rested a hand upon it. A surge of familiarity entered him, the faint echo of Akromos carried into the infinite dark.
"Maintain course," Belial commanded. His generals responded with silent nods, their thoughts disciplined, their fear buried beneath iron obedience.
This was the age of daring. This was the voyage of the Krausnaut.
Sleep of Generations
To cross sixty thousand light years required more than courage. It required surrender.
The workers entered their cryotubes first, rows upon rows of bodies sliding into stasis as nutrient fluid engulfed them. Their chests rose once, then fell into stillness. Their dreams became property of the Shamru fragment humming through the ship.
The generals followed, twenty-nine climbing into their glass coffins without hesitation. They knew the duty, to awake only if Belial summoned them.
Belial walked among the silent chambers, each tube reflecting his face. He lingered over them, as though reading names he might never call again.
When all was still, he entered his own tube. The hatch sealed. Cool fluid embraced him, filling his lungs. His body slowed, heartbeats fading to a whisper. His last thought before darkness: I will return. For Akhan. For Akromos.
Collision in the Void
Time became meaningless in warp. Days, months, years folded into a single breath.But the Krausnaut was not destined for smooth passage.
Somewhere beyond the spiral arms of Andromeda, two planets had collided millennia earlier. Their ruins drifted still; a graveyard of worlds, fragments hurtling across space like knives. The Shamru fragment within the Krausnaut had no chart for this unmarked wasteland.
The ship struck debris with the force of a god's hammer.
Belial's cryotube disengaged violently. Fluid rushed from his lungs. He coughed, gasped, staggered upright. Sirens screamed, red light bathed the command deck.
He stumbled to the Shamru-node. "Report!"
Collision detected, the Shamru's voice pulsed. Hull integrity compromised. Engines straining. Shields failing.
The ship shuddered again as another mountain of stone grazed its flank. Sparks rained from the ceiling. Panels burst open, showering him in shards.
Belial slammed his fist into the console. "Wake the generals. Now!"
Across the cryo-chamber, tubes hissed open. His chosen commanders coughed awake, disoriented but alive. They staggered toward him, armor half-clasped, eyes wild.
"What is it?" one demanded.
"Graveyard," Belial spat. "Uncharted ruin. If we stay, we die."
The Shamru's Counsel
The Shamru fragment glowed brighter, veins crawling across the walls. Its telepathic voice thundered in Belial's mind.
Abandon ship.
Belial's jaw clenched. "This is the Krausnaut. The pride of Akromos. We do not abandon."
The ship cannot endure. Shields crack. Hull collapses. If you remain, all perish. If you depart, some survive.
The words struck him with the weight of prophecy. He felt rage claw at his chest. Yet the Shamru was right.
"Prepare the landers," Belial ordered. His generals scattered, obeying without question.
Exodus from the Ark
The Krausnaut carried hundreds of landers, sleek vessels designed for planetary descent. Now they became lifeboats.
Belial oversaw the transfer. Workers in cryosleep were loaded by the thousands. Crates of mining equipment, tools, seeds, and animals were rushed aboard. Troju lowed in confusion as handlers guided them into compartments. Even the fierce Toruk were bound and sedated for transport.
The task was endless. The time was scarce. Outside, debris rained against the ship, each impact threatening to tear the Krausnaut apart.
"Prioritize workers and equipment!" Belial barked. "No lander leaves empty!"
Sweat streaked his brow as he lifted crates with his own arms, strength multiplied by fury. Generals shouted orders. Soldiers dragged supplies. The Shamru fragment glowed steadily, guiding the sequence.
One by one, landers detached, bursting from the Krausnaut's belly like seeds scattered by storm.
The Last Look
At last, only a handful of landers remained. Belial stood on the command deck, gazing at the Shamru fragment.
You cannot take me, it said, calm despite the chaos. I am bound to this ship. When the Krausnaut dies, I die also.
Belial's chest constricted. "Without you, we are deaf. Blind. Separated."
Then you must learn another way.
He clenched his fists. "I will return. I swear it."
The Shamru's glow dimmed, almost tender. Whether you return or not, you will choose. And that choice will shape all.
Belial swallowed hard. He turned, boarded the final lander, and sealed the hatch.
Behind him, the Krausnaut began its death-song. The self-destruct sequence flared, consuming the hull in light. In the void, the ship burst into a star's imitation; bright, brief, devastating.
Belial's lander shook with the shockwave. Through the viewport, he saw the fragments scatter across space, glittering like a shattered crown.
Akromos' greatest creation was gone.
The Cosmic Shower
The landers pressed forward in disciplined formation, each carrying hundreds of lives. Generals guided their squadrons with precision, maintaining order amid despair.
For a time, there was hope. Belial at the vanguard, his lander leading the way, confidence flared anew. The habitable planet remained locked on the navigation screen, a promise in the distance.
Then came the second storm.
From the edges of an uncharted belt, a cosmic shower erupted. Asteroids streaked like arrows. Shards of ice and stone tore through the formation.
The first 3,000 landers were obliterated in moments. Explosions dotted the void like dying stars. Entire populations vanished in silence, their tubes crushed, their futures ended.
Belial's scream tore through the Shamru-link. "Hold formation! Protect the workers!"
But there was no protection. The storm was merciless. Landers spun out of control, colliding with each other, shattering against debris. Flames erupted even in the void, oxygen vents igniting into blossoms of fire.
By the time the storm relented, over seventy percent of the fleet was gone.
Belial's lander drifted amid wreckage. His generals regrouped what remained: fewer than 12,000 souls, from an original sixty thousand.
Belial closed his eyes. The weight of loss crushed him. His mission was bleeding before it even began.
Rally in the Dark
The surviving generals connected through the emergency link. Their voices were frayed, trembling.
"We have lost too many. The mission cannot proceed."
"Without equipment, mining is impossible."
"We should turn back if we can."
Belial's eyes blazed. "Turn back? To what? To nothing? Akromos chokes even now. We are the only hope. If we falter, if we surrender, then all our sacrifice means nothing."
He raised his voice, filling the link with iron. "We are not corpses drifting in the dark. We are survivors. Warriors. Builders. The planet ahead waits. If gold lies within it, then Akromos may yet live. I will not let this be our grave."
His conviction burned. The generals fell silent, their doubts smothered by his fire.
At last one spoke: "Lead us, then. And we will follow."
A New Course
Belial shifted the formation. His lander moved to the front, engines blazing. The survivors aligned behind him like a battered spear.
"Stay close. No more scattering. We reach the planet together, or we do not reach at all."
The navigation screen flickered. Distance: two light years. The habitable planet gleamed faintly, blue and green against the void.
Belial stared at it, chest heavy. This was not Halla. The Krausnaut had been thrown off course by the storms. The Shamru's guidance was gone.
And yet, the planet called to him. It shimmered like destiny, waiting.
Perhaps this is where choice begins, he thought. Perhaps the Spirit Head spoke of this place, not Halla.
He tightened his grip on the controls.
"Onward," he said softly, to himself, to his generals, to the ghosts of those already lost. "Onward, until the last breath."
The landers surged.
And ahead, the unnamed planet grew larger, its oceans glinting, its forests sprawling. A world untouched, unclaimed. A world waiting to be written into history.
Closing Image
Belial leaned back in his seat, exhaustion finally creeping into his bones.The planet filled the viewport, vast and vibrant.
He thought of Akhan. He thought of the promise he had sworn. He thought of the Spirit Head's words: Your heart will decide.
His heart thundered with both dread and longing.
Soon, they would land.
Soon, choice would come.