Arix emerged from the hyberpod, ready for a brand new day. The room the commander had let him use for the night was quite nice, he had to admit. And he had it all to himself, too. It was strangely generous of them – usually, they didn’t give things out. Or even talk to others much.

Arix shook his head. Now wasn’t the time to get caught up in thinking about the commander’s shift in demeanour. It was time, though, to check the time. He didn’t want to be late!

He walked over to the other side of the room, where a digital clock and calendar were embedded into the wall. The numbers and letters were displayed in a bright green, and they said…

“THE AFTERMATH 4?!” Arix began to pace around the room. “I was supposed to leave on the first! How did I sleep in for three days?!”

He stood upright and said to himself, “Well, I can’t linger any longer! I need to get out of here and to Saturn, pronto!”

Arix dashed out of the room, skidding on his heels and making a loud screech as he did so. He looked around the large, almost maze-like room of paths in the high-roofed room. There were many Starmen milling about, going about their day-to-day jobs. But that wasn’t what Arix was doing. He ran down to the south-left – that’s where the airlock was. The commander had reserved a one-seat ship for him when the time came for him to head to Saturn.

He wasn’t paying much attention to his surroundings, though, and ran directly into another Starman. He stumbled back a little, his metallic body ringing. His gaze didn’t meet the other Starman’s immediately; he had to look up a little to see who it was. And oh stars, it was the last person he wanted to see.

Captain Deepsea.

Captain Deepsea was perhaps the biggest jerk within the ranks of the Starmen. He acted as though he was the highest ranking Starman there was, even though there were Starmen that far outranked him, just because he commanded three smaller ships. Arix knew a Final Starman who commanded 10; three small ships wasn’t anything to be so boastful about. Arix knew that if Deepsea had the chance, he would probably wear a dumb cape as well.

With Captain Deepsea were two other Blue Starmen. They shared the same smug look on their faces as their captain did.

“Well well, look what *beep* we have here,” Captain Deepsea said. “You really thought you make a break for it when there’s so many people around?”

“I’m following orders, Deepsea,” Arix growled.

Captain Deepsea cackled. “Sure! Because the commander would want you to go to some planet by yourself!”

“They gave me the orders face-to-face,” Arix told him, crossing his arms. “And they reserved a private room for me to stay in and a one-seat ship.”

Deepsea and the two Blue Starmen with him howled with laughter.

“They gave him a private room AND a ship!? *whirr* What a laugh!” one Blue Starman said.

“I don’t even know why the commander keeps a defect like you around,” Captain Deepsea told Arix. “Those cracks near your eye and on your arm are only going to get worse, *click* you know.”

Arix instinctively pressed his right arm to his body, and hid as much as he could with his left. The right arm was where two of said cracks were. The one at the bottom-left of his eye couldn’t be hidden, though. Arix hated that Deepsea was right.

“Now, get back to work.” Captain Deepsea clapped his hands twice.

Arix glared at him for a few long moments. He then took a step back and teleported right past him. It was a good thing that Arix got that Flashporter engine installed during Bureaucracy.

Captain Deepsea and the two Blue Starmen spun around.

“Wha- HEY!” Captain Deepsea yelled. Arix ran into the airlock as Captain Deepsea ran after him, yelling, “GET BACK HERE!”

Arix ran down the halls of the airlock, sometimes teleporting to get ahead of Deepsea. The two Blue Starmen with the captain followed him.

He had gained some distance on Deepsea when Arix stopped momentarily to taunt, “You won’t be able to catch me! *whirr* I’m going to carry out my orders! Just you watch!”

“WELL, I won’t stand by and let you do that, you little pest!” Deepsea raised his hands into the air and began charging a PK Beam. The two Blue Starmen with him looked up at the charging beam, then at each other, fear filling their visors.

Deepsea wrenched his eye shut as he concentrated. The light blob hovering above his hands flared with light, and then shot beams out all over. Arix narrowly dodged a couple of them as they destroyed the halls of the airlock.

“You know, the commander isn’t going to be very happy with you once they see this! *beep*” Arix told Deepsea.

“I don’t care! If you’re going to rebel, then so am I! If that’s what it takes to put you in *click* your place!” Captain Deepsea turned to the two Blue Starmen with him. “Ferox, Telescope.”

Captain Deepsea walked out of the airlock. Ferox and Telescope exchanged worried glances before following their captain.

Arix whirred with relief. “Well at least that’s over. I probably won’t see him again.”

Arix now had to teleport from one part of the now destroyed airlock to the other. Deepsea’s PK Beam flare had done a number on it. But soon, Arix had reached the end of the airlock, and climbed into the one-seat ship the commander had reserved.

Piloting the ship was easy – the commander had left a note with the basic controls, that ended with, “In case you needed a reminder. Or have never piloted a ship before. The latter, most likely.” Arix turned the ship on, readied the engines, then took off.

The ride was peaceful. There weren’t many ships out and about. Saturn was a rather large planet, so it was easy to find and navigate towards. The flight took about an hour and a half, but finding a place to land on the rings wasn’t so easy. Especially nearby Sataene.

Another 15 minutes was tacked onto the total flight time from just looking for a place to park the ship alone. Arix eventually settled on a cliff – he would have to walk through the swamp, but that didn’t bother him. He wasn’t organic, after all.

Arix would have preferred to carefully descend the cliff, but the bouncy flowers conveniently growing nearby had other plans. They threw Arix up into the air with little effort, and he almost butchered his fall. He would have hated to find out how much his cracks would have grown if he failed to land on his feet.

There were only two houses in the area he had landed in. One simply had a Mr. Saturn dancing inside, and the other… was a cave. Well, it looked like one, anyway. It was a house that looked like a cave; a random mound of dirt sticking up from the ground with a door and a sign in front of it.

“No one know what go on in there,” another Mr. Saturn, who was ambling around outside, told him. “Just know that weird old Mook live there. Brrr!”

The sign outside the cave read, “Mad Malik’s house. Do not enter. That is, unless you’re on a superimportant intergalactic quest.” The “Mad” and the message after “Do not enter” had been handwritten on. The “Mad” looked more recent, but it was hard to tell. Both additions to the sign had been dry for many years. Arix figured his orders were at least intergalactic. He knocked thrice, waited for a second, then went inside.

There were no lights on inside. There was a screen high up on the wall, flashing with green symbols erratically scrolling up it. Standing before it was a white Mook, his eyes wide and fixated on the screen. Arix looked up at the screen himself for a few moments. He couldn’t make heads or tails of whatever was on it. They weren’t characters Arix recognised, and the speed at which all the they were moving didn’t help.

“Um, hello? *click* Are you… Malik?” Arix asked the old Mook.

The Mook whipped his head around to face Arix. He stared for a few moments before slithering up to him and looking him over. The only response he gave was a deep hum.

“Y’see, I’m just here on my commander’s orders – not to colonize the planet or anything! I’m… not really sure what I’m doing, to be honest. *beep* But the sign outside your house said that I could come in if I was on a superimportant intergalactic quest, and I do think it’s intergalactic at least, so-“

“I FORGOT TO TAKE IT DOWN!” the old Mook screeched. There was an eerily long pause before the Mook murmured to Arix, “Take it down for me. Burn it.”

“But I don’t know PK Fire-“

“Burn it!” the Mook snapped.

“Okay okay, I’ll- I’ll do that.” Arix wandered back outside. The moonlight from the several moons visible caused him to squint upon coming out, but he soon readjusted his eye to the light. He turned to face the sign outside the cave, and fired a PK Beam Alpha at it. The sign disintegrated immediately. Arix played with the ashes a little with his foot.

“That should do it,” he mumbled to himself before heading back inside the cave.

“You did it?” the old Mook asked, looking at him. He had returned to his spot in front of the screen.

“Yup,” Arix replied. “So I’m guessing you don’t do the whole superimportant intergalactic quest thing anymore? *beep*”

The old Mook simply looked back at the screen and let out a deep, long hum.

“I was going to head to Sataene, through the swamp. You got any-“

“NO!” the old Mook shrieked, his eyes wide. “You mustn’t go to- p-past the swamp! The end times lie beyond there!”

Arix laughed nervously. “Riiiight…”

“If they come together… If they try to… try to stop it… and with them… They’ll only make things worse!” The old Mook slithered back up to him, and put a tentacle on the side of his arm. “Please. Stay here. With me.”

The despair that filled the old Mook’s eyes unnerved Arix. He was really desperate, huh?

“Aha, sorry, but I can’t really not follow the commander’s orders,” Arix told him. “I’m already late as it is. You should *whirr* try to get some sleep. I hear that’s good for organics.”

Arix removed the old Mook’s tentacle from his arm, then waved goodbye as he left the cave. The old Mook simply watched, body limp, and eyes still full of despair.

The trip through the swamp was simple. There were some sapient growths that attacked him now and then, but they weren’t too much trouble to deal with. He arrived in Sataene quicker than he anticipated. He quickened his pace as he walked into Sataene, looking for anyone to talk to that could at least hint at where he could go next.

Just as he turned a corner, he saw a group of aliens do the same. There were five of them – two Mooks, two UFOs, and something else he couldn’t identify; it was clearly an offworlder.

“Hey, wait up!” Arix called out to them, and began to run. He teleported occasionally, just to catch up.

---

“So what is it that you want from me?! I already let you use my base- What, do you want to-“

“No, Elmadan. I have no such desires.”

“Good. I don’t have ‘em either, and I’m not about to start.”

“You have a use beyond lending us a home. If my calculations are correct… you should be the one.”

“’The one’? What the hell’s that supposed to mean, you weirdo?!”

“Elmadan, please. I’m trying to talk here. You should be able to give us insights on the path of action we take… but awakening those powers is no easy task. I will have to use my PSI on you.”

“Wait, what?! No- Hold on- You can’t just-“

“Elmadan, I need you to cooperate. The knowledge you may be able to give us will be a great asset to have.”

“…Do I need to get naked or anything for this?”

“No. But there is a chance your clothing will get ripped in some way.”

“…Well, I’ll just go thrift shopping after this if I have to. The only thing I have to lose now is my dignity, and I’ve already been well detached from it thanks to you.”

“…Shall we begin?”

“I guess so. Quick question: will this hurt?”

“A lot.”