CHAPTER 47: DEAD BODIES, DUMB SOLDIERS AND JULIAN

A vehicle exploded in the distance. Julian watched it, not that he gave a fuck anyway.

It seemed the soldiers of both oppositions were getting tired.

Drayyor’s soldiers fought like they had to pee real bad and the opposition soldiers fought like they had swords shoved into their butt holes.

Julian stroked the helmet by the chin.

He bet he would be looking very cool now.

The opposition’s commander held a weird-looking gun, average in size and tube-looking.

By the way it looked, it didn’t look like something that could actually do a lot of damage.

It looked more like a toy, something that was likely to shoot a bubble out of it.

Ttysryttoooo!

Julian squinted his eyes.

The other soldiers seemed to do the same also.

What the fuck could do that!

The sound. It sounded like nothing Julian had heard before.

Deep, electronic, and muffled.

Not too loud though, instead more low but ’attention-drawing’.

He could hear a soldier say by his side.

"The fuck?"

Another sighed.

Julian stood beside them and they didn’t even notice a thing that he wasn’t actually among.

"I knew it," one was saying. "From the moment I heard there was an invasion from the Hellfotts, I knew we were cooked."

"Tell me about it," the first one said. "We normally wouldn’t be afraid as we have insane techs that has helped us in much harder battles but, with the invasion of the Archos Imperium, we lost a lot."

Julian blinked thrice at that. No one could see him though.

So his guess had been correct.

When Hurijaa had told him that they were facing invasion, he had immediately guessed it was the Archos Imperium because that was the only empire he knew of that was capable of invading planets on a large scale.

He was shocked to hear it from the mouth of one of the soldiers though. Not that he was surprised but simply because being very well sure was exhilarating.

Boom!

The commander of the opposition fired.

Tiny bullets which Julian, for some weird reason he didn’t know, could see very clearly, shot out of the gun.

A gust of wind followed it, pulling every fraction of motion to a standstill.

Julian tried to move, tried to dive forward.

Tried to do the norms which was, anything a loud explosion of a bomb was coming his way, would simply dive to his left or right and dodge it.

But now, it seemed like it wasn’t happening.

Not even ’seemed’, it wasn’t happening.

Julian suddenly panicked, why couldn’t he move. He looked at the other soldiers in mech armor beside him, they too couldn’t move.

He looked around, no one could move.

Damn!

Xea came on now, as if it had read his thoughts.

’[The reason you can’t move or anyone around you is because the shot from this gun not only released bullets but then, something like a gust of wind, which halted literally all motions it was facing.]’

’[It’s gravitation-like. You know, somewhat like your gravity powers, it’s-]’

Julian was shot back by the force of the explosion.

He was unhurt, mainly due to the mech armor.

The others in it seemed to be unhurt.

Rehul wasn’t here too close where the explosion occurred so Julian concluded that she would be safe wherever she was.

Was every of the other Drayyor’s soldiers safe also.

It was unlikely they were.

Julian stood up and when he looked around, he saw that literally everyone apart from him and the soldiers in mech armors were dead.

Their dead bodies were covered in blood. The hands of some were in an abnormal position and some faces were twisted in ugly positions.

It seemed like they wanted to shout but then couldn’t.

Julian sighed.

The opposition soldiers must have found a way to not be affected by the explosion as none were on the ground.

The commander was on a flying vehicle, heading forward.

Julian squinted his eyes as he stared forward. He could clearly see city, the buildings reduced to debris.

The other soldiers were murmuring.

"Damn!, without this mech armor I would surely be dead."

Another sighed and then, one laughed.

And then, one walked over to the dead soldiers and bent beside the corpse.

"Damn, Matt is dead," said the soldier.

"Matt?" another asked.

The soldier nodded in the affirmative.

"And I earlier told him to wear the mech armor but he insisted he would be fine, that he didn’t actually need it."

The soldier sighed.

"If only we had a good governor. I mean, everything had been going quite smoothly not until we started facing serious attacks. Mostly from that vicious Imperium of Archos."

Julian paused, acting like he wasn’t paying attention, while he heard what they were saying.

"And our governor is way too weak. Look at him!, damn! He’s facing a war and what does he do? He just stays inside, doing nothing. To be honest I’m sick of him, heard he’s found a replacement to replace himself."

One of the mech soldiers laughed.

"You know, he’s got some guts, having to want to step down. I applaud him big time for that."

"Shouldn’t we be fighting?" a soldier who had been quiet the whole time asked.

"Not really, I wouldn’t want to go risk my life, I think this is well the end for us."

"Where’s the replacement by the way?"

Julian had been quiet the whole time because well, he didn’t actually know what to say. And he wanted to listen, gain some information and know if these soldiers were the serious stern type.

He had expected them to be serious and stern but well, that was one thing he had learnt from the few minutes he had been here.

The Drayyor’s soldiers were an unserious bunch of people.

With a deep breath, his voice calm, Julian said to the soldiers,

"I am the governor’s replacement."

’Buhahahahahahaha!’

’Hahahahahahahahah!’

The soldiers laughed like they had been hit by a plague of laughter.

"Good joke, Sfraa!," one of the soldiers said.

Julian was bemused. Who was Sfraa.

"I’m not Sf... e... ra," Julian said. Honestly, the name was quite hard to pronounce.

The soldiers stopped laughing and exchanged puzzled glances.

"Replacement?" one of them asked.

They realized it was not Sfraa.

Sfraa had a light voice and Julian’s voice with the helmet on was laced with boldness.

"How are you the replacement?"

Julian chuckled. So visibly they could hear.

"The planet is facing a war, you see a solution and then, you still ask questions?"

The soldiers formed a circle for some brief second as they discussed.

Finally, they pulled out of the destruction and one of them said:

"We should have taken you to the governor for confirmation as he was the one who knows the replacement that’ll replace him but then..."

He paused, not that he needed to but simply because doing so showed how stupid he was.

"...who knows, you might be sent to assassinate the governor so we won’t let you to him without asking a question."

Julian didn’t want to do this, he felt like plunging his sword into their faces simultaneously but he realized that there were some things you had to play dumb to achieve.

"Go on," Julian said.

"We know you were sent by an empress," the soldier began. "What’s the name of the empress and what planet is she from."

Julian almost laughed at the question.

If he eventually had to become governor, he sure had a lot of work to do because this soldier sounded like a child.

With a deep breath, sure he was about to convince them, he said:

"Empress Hurijaa, from planet Seisymy."

The soldier gasped.

"He really is him," three said in unison.

"From which galaxy?" a fat-looking soldier asked (what Julian decided was an idiotic question).

"Miniga," he replied.

"Follow us," the first soldier said. "You truly are the replacement."

Julian grinned under his helmet.