Falling Into Darkness

“Hello, sir.” “Hello, Agent Grey. I hope we are not intruding,” Director Kayre said, emerging from the shadows. “Well, I wasn’t expecting any company, Director. How can I be of service?” I asked as I took off my jacket and hung it on my coat rack. Four Helena Council guards accompanying a Helena Chairman also made themselves known. “Good evening, Agent. My name is Councilor Nathan Wright. I regret to inform you … We, the United Galactic Federation, have a problem. For the past four days we have been out of communication with the Helenac kingdom. Yesterday we sent a team to make contact with the planet. Of the ten ships we sent, none have returned. I fear a plague has come down on my home world. An evil has landed on my beautiful world, and I fear for the life of my king, for the princess, for the spirit of Helena.” He had a deep voice that took me by surprise. One guard straightened his shirt and rubbed his head. Another glanced at me nervously after seeing my holster and two knife scabbards, although he calmed down when he saw that they were empty. The other two were looking out the windows to make sure nothing was out of the ordinary. The director sat down on my kitchen table and took out his flask. I soon knocked him off the table by smacking his back. “So let me get this straight. Helena, the biggest exporter in rare elements and power cells, is not responding to our calls. We lost 250 guys to see what was going on, and we have not heard from them? And what do you want with me?” I put my feet up on the table as rudely as possible. “You are the best agent and the best soldier in the whole agency. You survived the attack on the Russian colony, the biohazard disaster in the Chinese colony, the Remen incident, the rebellion on Kepler, the discovery of the scorchers …” The director paused and looked toward the floor, avoiding my gaze. “The Battle of Clo, I mean basically any bloody conflict we have had, you were there.” “Yeah, spare me the ass kissing.” What a lovely way to put it. “Honestly, if I didn't know you were gonna say that, I’da asked someone else if they’d do the bloody job.” Ryan smirked. “So you want me to go and check on the planet?” I asked. Not even back from Edo five hours, and I was to be sent back to the field. “No,” the Councilor and the director said in unison. “No?” I repeated, surprised. What was the purpose of this mission, then, if … Oh, the royal family. “You want me to rescue the king and his family.” The chairman chuckled at my cleverness. The director looked quite pleased with my being able to solve it that quickly. “I’m a defense agent. I’m no longer military. Go ask them.” “Not if I have a say in that, Gerald,” he said in a mocking tone. “You still didn’t finish your second five-year agreement. You want me to ask for military personnel? I’ll reinstate your ass back into the machine, and you’ll become another piece. So there is no way of saying no.” The director always got what he wanted. “As you are aware, the constitutional monarchy of the Kingdom of Helena does not have a military—only a small police force. We believe the interference might be caused by a jammer. We believe that the reason no ships are leaving is that a layer of its atmosphere is covered with an EMP dust that might have already settled. However, we are afraid something else is down there,” the lead guard said. He stared at me, his blue eyes looking deep into my green ones. “Scorchers?” I asked, my voice quivering. Words failed me after hearing that as the thought of those red eyes burned in my mind. When one scorcher was in a city, it razed a peaceful town and butchered almost all of its inhabitances in a few hours . If there were multiple scorchers running around a whole planet, that would not end well. The councilor’s next word turned things from annoyingly bad, however, into terribly worse. “Worse.” His eyes darkened. “We believe that the reason no ships can leave the planet might be … Goliaths.” That last word hit me in the stomach like a baseball bat. The defiant attitude that protected me from kindness by not allowing me to share it, jumped out of me, abandoned me, and left me to rot. “When do I leave?” I asked, my mouth open and my knees trembling. This had become serious. A Goliath was no joke. These reptilian creatures could grow to towering heights. Some called them Godzilla, but the official name was Goliath. But what terrified me was that there weren’t supposed to be any Goliaths left. The last one was abandoned to die on its planet, with all of humanity watching. “We have a transport waiting for us downstairs,” one of the guards said. “Well, hurry up! We’re wasting time,” I replied, grabbing my jacket. This was bad. Very bad. A Goliath could raze an entire a planet if it was awake or infuriated. Hell, it would level the whole place just for fun. All seven of us started down the stairs to the waiting hovercar, inconspicuously parked in the street. The olive-green vehicle had armored plating and tinted windows that I was willing to bet Evelyn’s money were able to withstand a bullet bigger than a carrot. “Gerald, you seem to be in a hurry. You seem to care for once. Did something change?” The director chuckled as he got into the armored car. “I feel changed. I don’t know how, and I can’t explain it.” “Well, hopefully this ‘change’ will still bring you back alive.” I hope not, I thought to myself as I looked out the window. The rest of us got into the car, and the bald-headed Helena council guard started to drive to the UGF headquarters spaceport. The towering buildings of Earth seemed to block the horizon. Using the major highways and overpasses, we saw the old Lincoln memorial and the expanded White House, which served as the home of the Prime Minister of Earth. Since, during this four-year term, the prime minister was of American descent, the White House seemed an appropriate place for that politician to live. It didn’t matter to me, since I hadn’t voted for my fellow countryman. I had voted for the Russian one, and I still considered it a shame that she had lost. “Councilor, what if the royal family is dead?” I asked as we passed two cemeteries where the casualties of old wars were buried. “Take out the Goliaths. Avenge them. Kill those who are responsible for their deaths.” There was a fire in his eyes as he answered. Talk about devotion … “Councilor, I don’t believe you are authorized to give such orders to him. I also don’t think he can easily kill the Goliaths. Gerald, if they are dead, your new objective would be to take out the jamming device and get as many people as you can to the evacuation points we will - I’m also afraid this might be related to those damn coward terrorists. Remember that terrorist cell?” the director asked. “You mean those self-appointed saviors?” I chuckled, which made him smile. I knew who he was talking about—the “Libertas.” Such a foul taste those syllables left in my mouth! I hated myself for wasting my time by even saying their name. Terrorists are cowards. They claim to be heroes, but are like diseased garbage that seemed to breed with a mutated dog from Chernobyl. They have no honor; they have no courage. Only death awaits them. A war has been going on with their revolting kind for more than a few centuries. It brought me no pleasure to remember how the old governments destroyed an entire race just to quash terrorism. Two and a half billion killed. An entire desert landscape became even more uninhabitable. “Yeah, those guys. Driver, could you drive faster, but not like you are trying to kill us?” “What about them?” I asked the director. “Last week we raided one of their bases. We found it empty, but the place still had some equipment and intel. It mentioned a credit transfer for a transportation service. We also found a speech talking about liberating Helena, Kepler and a few other planets, plus maps, blueprints of key buildings, basically the works.” “Is that why you said to kill those respons